Mystic forge glitch? Unintentionally suffering from DR.

#1 - Oct. 9, 2012, 3:53 a.m.

Despite claims from an arenanet game designer posting on the forum, the mystic forge is indeed suffering from (unintended?) diminishing returns.

Since the game designer in question claimed that the mystic forge is not intended to suffer from diminishing returns, this has to be a bug of some kind in the game programming.

Large scale testing has shown this bug is easily reproducible.

All you need to do is stock up on a few stacks of T5 fine crafting materials and T5 dust, and have some spare skillpoints.

Put the T5 fine material, the same material of T6, dust, and philosophers stones in the mystic forge, and confirm you want to forge them.

Now repeat this process 20 times.
You will notice a clear downward pattern in the return of T6 fine materials, until you eventually no longer get more than the bare minimum possible crafting materials from the conversion.

Now get 50 of your friends or guild mates to test this as well. They will all get exactly the same results.

This doesn’t only apply to fine crafting materials, it applies to EVERYTHING that involves a random element in the mystic forge. Including making exotics using rare equipment, or using exotic weapons to make a legendary base weapon. everything is affected by these diminishing returns

LinseyMurdock

#33 - Oct. 9, 2012, 3:04 p.m.

I just walked over to the programmer who implemented the DR system to ask if there is ANY way that there is some hidden bug that could be causing DR in Salvaging or the Mystic Forge. We discussed the way the system works and I am here to assure you all, that this is not possible. There is no hidden bug. The DR system does not come anywhere close to the Mystic Forge or Salvaging systems AND there certain triggers that are required for the DR system to kick in which simply can’t possibly be set by the Mystic Forge or Salvaging.

If we had DR in Salvaging or the Mystic Forge, we would tell you, just like we told you about the DR in other areas of the game. But for the sake of argument, let’s assume that you just don’t remotely trust what we say, and let’s look at this from another angle.

I want you guys to think about this a bit. Seriously. Why would we ever want to systematically discourage you from chucking things into the Forge or salvaging them as often or as fast as you want to? It is SO SO SO (I can’t stress this enough) important for items to be leaving the economy at a healthy ratio to the items being created and entering the economy, otherwise, there would be no economy. Everything would pile up and pile up until everything was worth nothing because the supply would be endlessly higher than the demand.

Bottom line, DR systems exist to prevent players from generating too much currency and destroying the economy. Why would we have DR on the things that balance and fix the economy?

LinseyMurdock

#37 - Oct. 9, 2012, 3:23 p.m.

It’s not really a reason not to have it in the Mystic Forge. It’s more the reason why we never needed to ask the question “should we have DR in the Mystic Forge or not”.

LinseyMurdock

#40 - Oct. 9, 2012, 3:30 p.m.

zbrkesbr.4173:
I want you guys to think about this a bit. Seriously. Why would we ever want to systematically discourage you from chucking things into the Forge or salvaging them as often or as fast as you want to? It is SO SO SO (I can’t stress this enough) important for items to be leaving the economy at a healthy ratio to the items being created and entering the economy, otherwise, there would be no economy. Everything would pile up and pile up until everything was worth nothing because the supply would be endlessly higher than the demand.

Bottom line, DR systems exist to prevent players from generating too much currency and destroying the economy. Why would we have DR on the things that balance and fix the economy?

There a simple answer to that last question: to limit income of new items/resources to players via Mystic forge. By your own logic: less items – healthier the economnomy is.

I suppose that is a fair enough point. Though then I would ask if that works when it also has the side effect of causing people to stop using it altogether.

Anyway, my personal logic for why DR in Salvaging and the Mystic Forge isn’t the point. The point is that it just plain is not there. Intentional or not. It does not exist.

LinseyMurdock

#41 - Oct. 9, 2012, 3:33 p.m.

Cerise.9045:
LinseyMurdock.4165:
It’s not really a reason not to have it in the Mystic Forge. It’s more the reason why we never needed to ask the question “should we have DR in the Mystic Forge or not”.

Good point. But that still means there could be a glitch that shouldn’t be there. Unfortunately this is really bad time to buy large scales so I’ll have to wait before I can record my findings on… a large scale.

But like I said, we looked into it and there is no bug. The systems are so far removed from the DR code, it’s not remotely possible that they are touching in any way that could allow for DR in Salvaging or the Mystic Forge.

LinseyMurdock

#42 - Oct. 9, 2012, 3:35 p.m.

And also, let me note, it’s not like DR is a default setting that we have to work around. It’s a system that is specifically and carefully coded for each unique place that it is being used. Real effort has to go into putting in DR on something.