Yes, there's another thread on this, but it's pretty bloated and I wanted to specifically try and get a response from an En Masse rep. This is a major issue: the removal of eggs and mischief boxes has made "fine x" crystals so rare that they are essentially priceless. You can't even buy them at higher levels because they're so rare and yet so important, that no amount of gold can replace the benefit to your character. I don't care about the lack of boxes/eggs specifically, but I do care about the broken crystal system on NA due to a poorly thought out change.

Either you need to reimplement the boxes that can change crystals and have them only on specialty vendors (that way, they're not clogging drop tables or confusing newbies) or drastically increase the drop rate on mobs. Alternatively, you could put eggs back in and simply take out the alchemy rewards. If you took them out in order to not obsolete alchemy, that's all you have to do. They would still drop teleport scrolls and charms which are useful, and then players that want to combine them with destiny eggs can get fortune eggs for a chance to get good crystals. This would also make some of the dailies and repeatables that are currently useless (due to the removal of eggs from the reward, leaving only XP which is useless to level 60s) useful again.

I love the game, and this certainly isn't something I'm going to quit over, but it's very disheartening that there hasn't been an official response to this. It seems clear to people that actively play the game that the removal of these items had unintended consequences: obsoleting content and making "fine x" crystals more akin to priceless (but easily shattered) artifacts than the gold/time sink they should be. I would feel so much better just to have the issue acknowledged, even if it's something you can't fix soon.

The new crystal system is part of the westernization of TERA, which has taken almost as long as the total development time for the game.

Quote: Cirno999 on 05/11/2012, 05:36 PM - view

I'm assuming you're trolling, but if you're not, can you elaborate on what you mean by this? Have they said anything about future changes to the crystal system?

people that aren't doing endgame dungeons need to stop commenting on crystal threads, coz it's clear those people have no idea

I also doubt they'll add them back, because that would be EME admitting a mistake that they clearly know they've made by doing this, hence their dodging of every single thread on this topic, if anything we'll probably get some change that they'll claim they planned to add this whole time etc (that's IF we're lucky)

Hello, Jihoko.

Thank you for the thoughtful and constructive feedback!

We are constantly reading the forums but we discourage folks from calling out or specifically requesting En Masse staff to reply in a thread. The reason is we want everyone to understand that we don't give more attention to threads with the response requests in them (Calling out En Masse staff or other players is actually against the Official TERA forum rules.).

That said, we really appreciate the time and effort you've put in to explain your feedback and please be assured that we spend the time & effort to read and evaluate them too. :)

Quote: Minea on 05/11/2012, 05:53 PM - view

EME reps constantly reply to hot topic threads, there's several threads all over about the problem that is crystals due to a change made by EME, with not a SINGLE answer that could clear up things for everyone in 1 simple post, how hard is that to do really?

instead the topic gets dodged yet again with no answer regarding crystals and a warning saying it's against the rules for wanting a simple answer, amazing

I'm not trying to sound like an arse here, but threads about this problem surfaced as soon as these changed were implemented, and they've been going on daily for the last few weeks since then, without a single reply to clear up what might be being done to counter this problem that was made for no reason, and I'm sorry you can't claim the economic card when as the OP stated, they're so scarce for the most part at endgame that people aren't even buying/selling the crystals

(@Frisk, "please be assured that we spend the time & effort to read and evaluate them too." from my previous post. :)

As the game is not created or published by just one person, please understand that sometimes all we can confirm is "We are listening to you" or "We're looking into this", not "This is the solution we have" for the questions/concerns.

Please continue to request/ask/discuss all TERA-related concerns and questions (that's what forums are for and it's part of my job to make sure our community feedback is delivered to other teams) but calling out to En Masse staff is discouraged for the reason given above.

But let's not derail the topic (I apologize, Jihoko) more, please feel free to PM me if you have more questions or comments. :) )

100% agreed that this is an issue that needs to be addressed, and hopefully soon. It seems like whoever decided to remove eggs/boxes didn't think of the longterm side effects that it would cause at the higher levels.

Please just remove the Alchemy rewards from eggs if you feel that it makes Alchemy an obsolete tradeskill. You guys pretty much gutted the three main ways players on KTera obtain crystals in one fell swoop (eggs, mischief boxes, and LFD reward boxes); it's no wonder people are having a hard time obtaining useful green crystals.

Quote: Minea on 05/11/2012, 06:27 PM - view

I appreciate your reply, and that it IS infact being looked into is all I needed to hear, thanks

I also wholeheartedly support the OP. While the removal of the mob dropped engines was a great idea, the fact that we no longer have access to green, vendor-bought boxes is having some serious consequences. I'd suggest either upping the drop rates of fine crystals dramatically, or (ideally) adding back the crystal transmogrifying engine from the vendors. Adding back those engines would not only give a use/market for trash crystals (squelching, I'm looking at you), but it would also drastically increase the availability of the currently unattainable crystals.

Please EME, look into this; the way things currently are cannot be intended. If it is, then that is seriously a poor choice and differs greatly from the crystal availability over on KTERA. :[