Serious Flaw (Bug?) in the Attunement System

[Boza]

Ok, first of all, before the flames begin, let me state up front this is not intended to be critical of the attunement system in the latest patch. I'm not going to get into my personal feelings about that. That being said, there seems to be a major flaw in the whole "attune, use, sell to merchant" system. Player-crafted items, even those that have been attuned, sell back to merchants at the same rate that they sell back BEFORE they were attuned. Let me explain: crafted items had their sellback value nerfed awhile back to keep people from making money by mass producing items and selling them to the merch for a profit. That's fine. HOWEVER, once that item has been sold to someone else and then attuned, it should sell back to a merchant for a price comparable to a DROPPED item of the same level. For instance, if I get a drop for a nice magic ring with decent stats at level 30-ish, it typically sells on a broker for 2-4g and it sells back to a merchant for around 80s (obviously an estimation). If, on the other hand, I *buy* a comparable item from a player crafter, it still sells to me on the broker for 2-4g, but after I attune it and use it for a few levels, it STILL sells back to the merchant at its original pre-attuned price, which is about 5s. That seems to be a glaring problem with the system. It seems to me that crafted items THAT HAVE BEEN ATTUNED (read: used) need to sell back to merchants at comparable prices to dropped items of the same quality. Otherwise, you can bet that I'll go out of my way to find DROPPED gear over crafted gear, because I know the resale value will be about 1000% higher. From a simple economic standpoint with regard to consumables, it's like this: given the choice between two similar items (say, a car), one of which will become utterly valueless after usage and one of which will still retain a percentage of its purchase value (albeit a significantly smaller one), any consumer will purchase the latter over the former--particularly in an economy that's already primarily dictated by the sellers.Anyone else have any thoughts? This seems to be a no-brainer to me, because I can't think of any compelling reason for the resale value of attuned crafted items to be so much lower than attuned dropped items--I can't believe it made it live like this, to be honest.*edited for clarification and to fix typos*<p>Message Edited by Bozack on <span class=date_text>02-18-2005</span> <span class=time_text>06:18 AM</span>

[Cyrdemac]

<DIV>Interesting thought, although I cant follow it yet, as european servers are still unpatched. If its really as pitiful as you describe it, then hunting for drop-items will be my upcoming hobby too.</DIV>

[Rondari]

<DIV>I tend to agree with this.  Once a crafted piece is attuned.  The vendor buy back price should jump to the same as an equivelant mob dropped piece.</DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>Rondari</DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV> </DIV>

[Knok]

<DIV>I can confirm this.  Went to sell my forged carbonite morning star to the vendor to see just how much it was worth.</DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>2.3 silver.</DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>not 23, </DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>not 20</DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>not 15.....</DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>2 silver, 32copper.</DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>that seems a little low, when its a drop thats on par with armor quest armor.</DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>AQ armor sells for around 20s.  that seems reasonable....would like to see a little more considering the time it takes to acquire some of the pieces, but its TEN TIMES what i can sell a player crafted weapon that i payed 30-40silver for.</DIV>

[Ki-a]

<BR> <BLOCKQUOTE> <HR> Bozack wrote:<BR>...crafted items had their sellback value nerfed awhile back to keep people from making money by mass producing items and selling them to the merch for a profit. That's fine. HOWEVER, once that item has been sold to someone else and then attuned, it should sell back to a merchant for a price comparable to a DROPPED item of the same level. <HR> </BLOCKQUOTE>Ok, let's assume they do as you say. Now along comes a crafty player (no pun intended :smileytongue: ) and their 2nd account or maybe just a close friend. Their firend buys all their armour, attunes it and then sells it for a nice little profit. That's why.<BR> <DIV> </DIV>

[Joos]

<DIV>I agree totally, the only problem with this is the developers will say something like, "if we do that then crafters can, again, make a very small profit by attuning items before selling them back to the vendor".</DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>Remember part of the patch is to prevent crafters from making any money, other than selling to players.</DIV>

[Knok]

<DIV>aye.  i understand the reasoning behind it, but it does stink for the casual adventurer.</DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>makes crafted armor more, and yet at the same time less desireable.</DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>"lets see, i can buy this BP that has good stats, or a player crafted one that has better stats, but when im done with it, it sells for crap, and the dropped one will sell for 10 times as much when im done with it.  lets go with the drop, i dont need those extra 5 points of power and health."</DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV> </DIV>

[Boza]

Ki-ana, that's a good point, and I hadn't considered that. With that in mind, though, my original scenario stands: if crafted items have such an abysmally low resale value, players will seek dropped items over crafted items with similar stats. Hell, now that I consider it, I guess there's nothing to keep the original crafter from simply attuning his creations to himself and then selling them back to the merch for a hefty profit. I still contest that it's a serious flaw in the whole system--that's a huge breakdown in how things are supposed to work, and it guarantees that any purchased item that's player crafted is going to be ultimately worthless after it's used. It really just seems like this whole system needed a lot more testing before it was just pushed live, because there are so many economic and gameplay ramifications.

[Joos]

<BR> <BLOCKQUOTE> <HR> Knokya wrote:<BR> <DIV>aye.  i understand the reasoning behind it, but it does stink for the casual adventurer.</DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>makes crafted armor more, and yet at the same time less desireable.</DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>"lets see, i can buy this BP that has good stats, or a player crafted one that has better stats, but when im done with it, it sells for crap, and the dropped one will sell for 10 times as much when im done with it.  lets go with the drop, i dont need those extra 5 points of power and health."</DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV> </DIV><BR> <HR> </BLOCKQUOTE>I like the part about player made with better stats, that funny :smileyvery-happy:<BR>

[Edowen]

<DIV>Point well made.  However, what is to stop crafters from attuning their items and then selling them to npcs?</DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>However unpopular the notion may be, perhaps it would be better to reduce what npcs pay for dropped items.  SoE is concerned about how much money is in the economy.  That may well be a better place to take it from than from the crafters via higher fuel costs.  If we are talking realism, IRL it takes the same amount of power to cook a fancy beef burgandy as a pot of chili; the same power to run a piece of teak through a power saw as a piece of pine. :smileyhappy:</DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>Edowen</DIV>

[LlewCadey]

why do that to a friend?just attune on urself, and sel to the merch at inflated priceits an interesting flaw really, no way arround escept the old unattune system, which then defeats the purpose

[Joos]

<DIV>We all know the solution to this problem: "Nerf the price of drop item sell back", you need to think the way SoE thinks, always take and never give.</DIV>

[Boza]

Yeah, this really was not a very well-thought out change, IMO. Way too many long-term ramifications that weren't considered or tested. But hey, at least we can order pizza in-game now! Because people were really demanding THAT feature, apparently =/.

[Jinsou]

<blockquote><hr>Bozack wrote:Yeah, this really was not a very well-thought out change, IMO. Way too many long-term ramifications that weren't considered or tested. But hey, at least we can order pizza in-game now! Because people were really demanding THAT feature, apparently =/.<hr></blockquote>Quoted for truth, justice and all-around awesomeness.