Game Design The State Of Selling To Blacksmiths

I believe sometime during or shortly after The Economy Update it was changed so that Blacksmiths give you less emeralds when selling ID'd items, to the point you make an overall net loss by ID'ing then selling items rather than just selling them unidentified. I can understand why this change was made, but on the whole it leaves selling to Blacksmiths and the entire mechanic of unidentified items in an odd state.

First and perhaps most importantly is how the change affects new players. Hypothetically, it creates a glaring noob trap, as Blacksmiths are some of the first NPCs new players encounter and interact with and thus are taught to be one of the major ways to get emeralds. Players aware of the price changes will know not to identify items before selling them to Blacksmiths except in certain circumstances. However, new players will most likely identify everything they come across because why not? It's cheap and you get to unbox a shiny new reward! But since really the only option to get emeralds back is to sell it to Blacksmiths, they'll most likely be constantly harbouring an emerald deficient--possibly without even knowing. (Because let's be honest who's out here paying attention to the rates of both ID'ing and selling all the time? It took a while for me even to notice I was getting ripped off.)
The Trade Market is supposed to mediate this problem, but it's hardly a consistent replacement to selling to Blacksmiths--especially to new players. There's no real tutorial or in-game guide to using it despite its comparative complexity, and you only get 5 slots to sell at once. Furthermore, nothing is a guaranteed sell. I have trouble selling off even mid to late-game legendary items at lowball prices. For new players trying to sell early-game rare or even unique items, I can imagine it being only a futile process. After all, people still have to want and actually buy your items to give you emeralds--unlike the Blacksmith who takes any garbage. Experienced players will know only to use their 5 slots on good items, but new players might end up just clogging their slots with unique weapons and armour that nobody wants, waiting out the entire 2-week duration for a trade that will never happen.

This gets me to my next point, which is that unique items--at least in all but the late-game--have pretty much no point in existing anymore because of the Blacksmith change. They've always been the short of end the rarity stick--not being as good as rares and above but not (taking in price identification) selling as much as normals. But now it's just laughable. There is no reason any even moderately experienced player should ever ID a unique item when they could save their emeralds on identifying rares, sets, and legendaries with almost guaranteed better stats. Unlike before--where you would identify everything before selling and maybe on occasion find a unique that actually is good or has a niche purpose--it's better to just sell them unidentified before even giving them the chance. And using The Trade Market isn't a good idea either, because hardly anyone would want to buy even a high-end unique item without something niche going for it like Walk Speed or Loot Bonus. There's a reason that the front page of the Trade Market rarely ever has unique items on it, after all.

So, yeah. I'm not saying that the old Item Buyers were the best mechanic in the world, or that even the prices of Blacksmiths now should be changed, or that these are the biggest problem in the world either. However, I do wish for it to be addressed, because it does kind've demonstrate an underlying problem in the game regarding the economy as a whole. Limiting inflation is noble goal, but the changes throughout the years--such as decreasing quest rewards, and now this--seem to be made with only keeping high-level and experienced players in mind without considering new or average players who don't constantly inflate the economy by grinding for emeralds and mythics yet are still hit as collateral damage.

TLDR
Crappy Blacksmith selling prices creates a noob trap that rips off new players and makes ID'ing and thus using unique items obsolete. Furthermore, the Trade Market, despite being a sort of anti-inflationary replacement to selling to Blacksmiths, doesn't do anything to fix these problems because people have standards for what they buy.

 

Attempting to reduce inflation in an economic where all monetary generation is necessarily ex nihilo is futile and not actually that desirable. The money changes of 1.18 are easily the worst changes made to the game in my time here.

I concur that there's no reason to ID uniques, or even to pick them up at all. Honestly, the same goes for a lot of other categories of items (most rare weapons are a good example). Since you're not even making a stack per item at endgame, it's more profitable to ignore items that aren't easily marketable in favor or just taking emeralds.

 

Has inflation actually been significantly reduced in the economy?

 

People just take emeralds on lootruns, so not from that source by much. Quest rewards went down, and I guess so did Seavale. Professions likely added a moderate amount to emerald intake also.

 

I miss when legendaries were much less common and something to celebrate. Now, they're so common that I usually just IB them.

 

IB?

 

Sell it to blacksmith (Item Buyer)

 

Tbh Fableds are common enough that I sometimes consider IBing them (depends on the specific one ofc). But honestly, that's less about the rarity and more about the use or lack thereof. For example, I always take unique rings because a number of them sell well.

 

In my testing, I found that the only items worth getting were fableds, legendaries that sell on the market, and a handful of rares and unique accessories. In short, the very existence of uniques is more of a detriment to players after level 80ish, which is a whole other discussion, but it also means that players don't even pick up uniques anymore. Now, there's less of a reason to pick up rares and even legendaries, which is a pity given the amount of work that goes into making them. At least when people picked them up and identified them, they would see them and possibly use them, and they would potentially enter the market. Maybe not the usual case, but better than the current situation.

 

Imo don't pick up Nighthawk or Blind Thrust. They don't sell for enough to be worth it - often you can't even make up the identification cost.