🌼👋 Dev Discussion: Economy and Stat Rebalance

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I'm super glad to see this, not because I care a lot about the specific numbers, I know those are flexible, but because it so clearly demonstrates to the unfamiliar that things like this can be really easily changed.

I think this ratio is also a really good start point because players are supposed to move in groups of 8, so 'getting into a party and grinding for 1 hour' sounds like it will be rewarding now in a way that fits my personal understanding better.

Obviously this is a really difficult thing to explain in short-form, so my group continues to appreciate all the effort being made despite that harsh difficulty curve, Intrepid.

Let the further speculation begin!

And now, rather than keep a bunch of 'internal group discussion' to myself or adding another 6 disparate "I was worried about X but talked it through with people"...

My group will speculatively/tentatively interpret that 1:7 ratio roughly as follows:

1. Most/all forms of Artisanship, if undertaken for an hour, will generate enough Progression relevant to the player's Tier in Currency (Gross Income) to match the equivalent of 7h pure grind in an average group.
2. A solo player grinding/questing for an hour will probably get some amount smaller than the share they would have gotten in a party , but not have to share, leaving their gains in flux (but they can always pivot into a bit of Artisanship in their Niche to make up for it)
3. A group that does not include any Artisans to 'increase their payoff for things they target for collection during their grind' will be less efficient (creating a light interdependence)
4. An Artisan that spends all their time trying to progress by Artisanship will eventually run out of materials or hit a cost limit (so we'd stop talking about Gross Income and have to talk about Net Income, which is a whole different ballgame) - this one is more of an automatic assumption for this game type
5. Artisans whose specializations do not produce direct progression through gear power gains will be needed for targeted progression activities (stuff that isn't just grinding, we do not tend to assume 'grinding' includes things like deep dungeon bossfights).

Those are the 'baseline assumptions' being used by my group in having the 'thank you Intrepid, this is a positive change' response.

A few speculations/hopes based on those assumptions:

1. Specialized Artisanship will require some amount of Adventuring or Org activity, which might in turn be tied to exploration/grinding/delving.
2. Crafted Gear and dropped Gear are more likely to be meaningfully 'different' than previous 4:4 number
3. The dilution of the ability to 'target progression through pure grind' hopefully implies that gear drops will be rarer.
4. The concept of 'obtaining items that can be put through the Artisanship loops for a 5x or greater increase in their value relative to progression, from grinding' will be increased relative to 'drops of things that are direct progression', even if they don't entirely replace them.

As a 'sales pitch' it would probably be summed up as:
"Dive into dungeons or climb mountains with your allies to bring back rare items and materials that can be crafted into gear and supplies for taking on powerful enemies, or relax and help build up the various Organizations in and around your Node Home to support the Adventurers wandering into the Wilderness... and the Catacombs...'

(and yes, to us, changing from 4:4 to 1:7 really does change the 'vibe' from 'what are we even doing?' to that 'sales pitch' above, even if it's inaccurate to the intended reality of the game).

Just updating, Intrepid, that Throne and Liberty's Housing update did turn out to be such a colossal push for simplicity and away from anything with proper economic integration that until/unless I mention something else, it is no longer valid as a reference and anything (in this thread) that I've said about it can be stricken/ignored.

1. Materials were removed from adventurer item crafting, making it worse than even BDO.
2. The gatherables did not actually add any depth, again making it worse than BDO, because they 'removed' others.
3. The Distributions were changed in a way intended to make it considerably easier to see (which then makes them easier to bot, but 'fortunately' since it's not even remotely worth interacting with it, botting is irrelevant.
4. A system of gathering exp and something similar to your time-gated crafting that isn't done by the player was added, which limits play compared to before.
5. The economy now only benefits grinders because of all the above, or rather, the two types are on such separate tracks that there's no way to think about it.

In short, whatever benefit there was has been 'put out to pasture' and the Econ/crafting aspects of the game are, as of this post, even below BDO and New World.

If not for you all at Intrepid, who I can watch make these same sorts of terrible implementations in real time and know that you are not making any money from it, I might be pushed to believe the same sort of jaded nonsense that most players say:
"The Devs don't care" and "This must somehow be another way to make money."

But thanks to you all, I am able to be patiently aware that these things take time and apparently are incredibly hard(?) so I can at least give them a few more months to find out if they really did just decide to give up.

Please let people know clearly if you decide to give up, Intrepid. Paying attention to your efforts takes time, and we're with you for as long as you still want to try , so don't leave us in the situation TL is putting us in now.