Fulmens

It is, it is indeed.

Welcome back.

As you can tell, there are a lot of really complicated new systems. Which are, as peripherally mentioned above, optional.

You can play "at standard levels" by doing the following. This is not optimal advice but it's good enough, and it's simple to do while you're getting the hang of everything ELSE that's new.

Every once in a while, go to Wentworth's and sell everything in your Recipes and Salvage for 1 inf each. If it doesn't sell in five seconds, take it down and sell it to a vendor or store. You will get the highest current bid, which might be a lot lower than what you COULD get. Here's why it doesn't matter:

Buying a full set of level 25 single-origin enhancements costs about a million inf.

Selling a single "midlevel" rare salvage gets you about a million inf. (they start dropping around level 20.)

So chances are good that you'll always have as much inf as you need.

If not, you can always ask seebs for money.

If you decide you do want to IO up, there is [as you may have noticed] a lot of help available. If you decide you want to make a lot of inf, the market forum is glad to help you learn how. [It's easy.]

If I remember, the hunt-back to Alex-hunt killed me. I did it with a friend once and it was a bit faster, but boring for the person who sits on Alex.

"It's I." "I'm it." Both are correct, for the same reason.

At least that's my understanding.

I do my merit stuff blueside. Having said that:

There's always the stereotypical "Do what you like". I don't Ouro a lot but I enjoy the Freaklympics once in a while. I had a character who ate Tsoo for breakfast and there's an Tsoo-beating arc in the 15-20 range that worked out very well for me [although that may have been novelty]; I tried it with another character and tore my hair out. If I'm just 2-10 merits short I tend to save the soothsayer a couple times, grab some insps and maybe beat the clocks and skulls once or twice. I wouldn't recommend that for getting, like, a full Hero Merit though. 25 times through? I'd go crazy. [for the Clock/skull one, Wentporters are your friend.]

Redside the "just a couple short" mission is the Loa bone- I can go to Ouro, start it and finish it before the Ouro portal recharges.

Four more happy customers- Protector, Freedom, Union and Exalted. Rar!

I'm making around 100M profit per purple crafted- compared to 8-15M per slot for most of the other things I'm selling. So 6-12 times less work in purples.

Admittedly right now I've got a lot of stray influence to invest because I'm behind on my burning.

The respec jacker... the pump-and-dumper... there aren't any good names for this person, are there?

My Respected Colleage who crashed respec supply.

MRC first moved in, I think, either during or just after 2XP. It happened on a smaller scale [going from 50 to 15-ish] almost every weekend after that. I wasn't tracking too closely. I was at one point battling with someone: I'd list for 208,100,908 and there would be some 208,100,909 bids after I got a couple. I happily cranked up the base price - the more people spend on BOTH sides of the flip the more inf I burn- to about 215M. The top end stayed at 280-300 million.

I suppose it's possible that lots of people "naturally" log on and get a respec on Thursdays, but I doubt it.

I think MRC got out before, or when, the mass of quasi-vet respecs hit. I've still got a few beached high sales, but... I handed off half a billion inf to someone to burn without even watching earlier today. I don't care much.

OK, another quarter billion to "The Einherjar" and a quarter billion to "The United Agency of Justice", started by a guy so new he didn't know what SO's were. I forgave him the 50 million.

This is fun!

People definitely have an increased supply of "quasivet" respecs, which has kicked prices down hard. I don't know if those vet respecs are going to provide a long-term reduction in demand or whether they're going to give a short-term "antispike". For that matter I don't know if people will spend real money on an extra enhancement row to need half as many respecs to strip a character.

I guess I don't know how respecs are really used; are most of them used on a small number of characters? Or are most of them used by a relatively large number of characters who just need one or two more respecs than they have?

(As far as the artificial jacking up of prices: I think someone started it and a bunch of people jumped on the bandwagon. I didn't start the shortage but I made money off it.)

Probably fine. Only difficulty is, I don't have a great overlap with the max-pop playtimes.

Nox: I meet people at the registrar and give them the inf (in advance) and watch the total for the SG go up. At one point I was just gleemailing the money, but it turns out I really like to watch the money burn.

Red: Great!

Draeth: Sure!

Everyone: Send PM here, or message in game to @Boltcutter, and we'll set up a time to meet.

EDIT: ... And let me know your global in game.

I'm looking to donate prestige to new SG's. Requirements are:
1) not on Freedom or Virtue
2) Under half a million prestige [or so; I'm not going to block you for having 500,001 prestige.]

If you can get together 50 million inf, I'll give you the other 250 million inf for you to turn into 600 thousand prestige. (If you can't get together 50 million - hide or I will explain in painful detail...)

I know most of the people here are -to put it mildly- not new, and have plenty of inf, but if you know anyone, or hear anyone broadcasting about their new SG, or whatever: let them know they can send a tell to @Boltcutter and I'll set it up with them.

Or if you, yourself, have a new SG you can post here or send a tell.

[Why am I doing this? Bunch of reasons. I like burning inf and convincing other people to burn inf. There's a "valley of death" between 400K and a million prestige where you can't add meaningful benefits to your SG. To welcome new players. That's not important.

OK, first quarter-billion delivered. To Exalted server. The problem here is that everyone on the global channels, or in the forums, is already pretty knowledgeable. Any ideas on how to reach the new kids?

2) How to IO out:
The simplest version is generics, which "work" like SO's only they never go red, and the higher level ones give you more bonus than the lower ones.
More complex is Frankenslotting: pick what's cheap and of a reasonable level [I like 30-35; 31,34 and 36 tend to be extra-cheap] and leave your bids for a day or two. My former sig was "If you didn't leave a bid overnight, you didn't really try to buy it." You can think of Frankenslotting sort of like miniature hami-Os that you can start slotting at, like, level 27. Notice that if you're level 28 you can put in bids for your next two IOs and, when you hit level 29, you might already have everything ready to slot. You have to do a teeny bit of planning, true, but you slot it at level 29 and you don't have to touch it until you decide you want to do a big fancy respec. Maybe at 50, maybe NEVER. You don't even have to spend a lot of money- it's five or ten times more expensive than SO's, but almost every time an orange salvage drops on you that's close to the price of a full set of SO's right there.
Yet more complex is the "Set IO" game, where you figure out what you want to max in set IO bonus terms and you do that. The more you spend the more you can max. I've done this on eight or ten characters, realistically. I recommend two or three things to ALL characters that you're IOing: a knockback IO if you don't have KB protection is the closest to "necessary" this game has. I wouldn't play without it. I suggest one or two sets that give global Accuracy bonuses- a lot of those are cheap and common. If you want to get a little fancy you can get some global Recharge, which is cheap as long as you don't want more than 10 or 20%.

But the max-IO game is something to do if you have one or two characters that you love A LOT and you want to make them as mighty as you can, and you're going to spend a lot of time on them anyway. Very roughly, your first 30% improvement in strength costs 10 million, your next 30% costs 200 million and your next 30% costs 4 billion. If you're going to make 4 billion inf anyway [because you play a lot or love marketing], why NOT make your favorite character more powerful?

3. Architect Entertainment. Many people have always loved doorsitting and getting PL'd and getting the most stuff for the least work in this game. It's been around since issue 2 at least- I remember Peregrine Island demon farms, I remember hydra teams, and I bet you do too. AE allowed those people to build custom farms and run them. In fact, it's really easy to build a farm. It's really hard and it's a lot of work to build an AE arc that is:
interesting
challenging
not annoying
not suicidal
and well-written.

I'd estimate 1% of the arcs in AE are really good, 24% are really trying, and 40% are abandoned or stupid or crapfests in one way or another. The other 25% are farms.

The number being RUN are probably 1% good arcs and 99% farms. That's not the fault of AE: it's the fault of human nature. Some of those good arcs are as good or better than the Devs' best work. There's a forum for that, if you run out of Dev-provided content.

Coming to this threat late [I swear I wasn't egosurfing!]

TXwXoX Three things:

1) You have sticker shock. I understand. I had sticker shock when you could get a character full of the most expensive stuff in the game for 300 million inf. [It's now in the multiple billions. Note "most expensive" is not "best".] The thing is that you can be a hundred-millionaire easily through normal play plus, like, five minutes of following directions.
2) IO'ing out doesn't have to be the painful process it looks like, but if you decide to live that lifestyle you DO have to put a few hours into learning it.
3) I'm sorry that you discovered Architect Entertainment the way it is actually used, not the way we hoped it would be used.

Discussing these points in detail:
1) Sticker shock: It doesn't matter much what the units are as long as you're buying and selling in the same units. [I recently realized that "starting salary" is about twice what it was when I last got starting salary. Sticker shock is very real.] 2 thousand frobnitzes and 2 million frobnitzes aren't really very different.

I'm going to discuss how to make 600K, 6 million inf, and 60 million inf in an afternoon.
600K is boring but foolproof: you find some level 50 recipe [confuse or sleep or snipe] with like 60 for sale and 0 bids. You buy as many as you can hold (at around 100 each) and run to a nearby vendor or shop. You sell them for 5000 or 10,000 each. When you can't buy any more cheap ones, find another recipe. Repeat for 100 recipes, around 10 runs. Might take an hour depending on how close the vendor is- KR has a very near one.

6 million inf is a little more tricky. It involves [audience hisses] crafting or flipping. The important thing to realize is that a lot of people have so much inf they can't even see the difference between a million and ten million inf any more. It's a rounding error. So you can take the time to craft, say, a level 50 Doctored Wounds IO, and put it up and they will pay you handsomely for the convenience of just buying it, slotting it and going. You can often find a recipe and ingredients for under half a million, spend up to half a million crafting it, and sell it for five million. Wents takes 10%, so your 4 million profit becomes 3.5 million. Yes. You need a bit over a million inf to try this and there are some tricks to learn. But it'll work.
6 million inf, version 2: Go to Ouroboros, select a 25-29 arc. This will "auto-exemplar" you down to 25. You don't have to DO the arc, though. You can go burn down a few hundred green or blue zombies in Dark Astoria, classical "Street sweeping" style. This can actually be fun if you only do it every six months or something. Eventually some of them will drop orange salvage, which sells for 1 to 1.5 million inf per item.
6 million inf, version 3: Do an AE arc or two. There's an entire forum full of people talking about the good, fun ones. Cash in your tickets for orange salvage and sell it for 1 to 1.5 million inf per item. I think Deific Weapons and Enchanted Impervium are still good sellers, but check for yourself.

60 million inf: This is going to be REALLY annoying, but it's a lot of inf. First, get 20 million inf and 50 Reward Merits. (Sister Psyche, for example, is a TF that gives EXACTLY 50 reward merits. You can also do a bunch of Ouroboros arcs and get merits.) Go to Fort Trident or the Crucible and buy a Hero or Villain Merit. Then, also at Fort Trident or the Crucible, buy a specific recipe. Details available on request. Craft it and sell it for 60 to 100 million inf. Gain 35 to 70 million inf in profit. [remember, you spent 20 on the Hero Merit and Wents took 10% in fees.] Boom, you're rich.

... Wow, that was longer than I thought it would be. 2 and 3 in next post.

Sold to Aneurysmo!

sold.

Still got mine for 2.5 bn.

Damn, I've got one I could let go for 2.5 Bn.

TL;DR version: If you have 50 million inf and a new SG, I will give you 250 million inf if you will burn the whole 300m to get prestige for your first major upgrade. First four SG's only.

Long Version:
1) New SG's run into problems with prestige- there's not really a lot you can do to upgrade between 400K prestige and a million.
2) I like it when people burn inf to make prestige. I burn my own inf and sometimes I convince friends to burn inf with me.
3) Lots of people have issues with using the market and can't (or don't want to, or don't know how to) make hundreds of millions of inf and use it on a base instead of IO'ing out their characters.
4) 600,000 prestige is 300 million inf. We're willing to provide 250 of that 300.

Therefore I have collected a few billion inf and I'm going around to various lower-pop servers and offering donations. If you put in a little inf, we'll put in a lot. I'm going in reverse alphabetical order.

Anyone on Union want a quarter-billion inf to help a new SG through the awkward startup phase?

(Thanks to RagmanX, Eric Nelson and anonymous donors for helping out with this.)

TL;DR version: If you have 50 million inf and a new SG, I will give you 250 million inf if you will burn the whole 300m to get prestige for your first major upgrade. First four SG's only.

Long Version:
1) New SG's run into problems with prestige- there's not really a lot you can do to upgrade between 400K prestige and a million.
2) I like it when people burn inf to make prestige. I burn my own inf and sometimes I convince friends to burn inf with me.
3) Lots of people have issues with using the market and can't (or don't want to, or don't know how to) make hundreds of millions of inf and use it on a base instead of IO'ing out their characters.
4) 600K prestige is 300M inf. We're willing to provide 250 of that 300M.

Therefore I have collected a few billion inf and I'm going around to various lower-pop servers and offering donations. If you put in a little inf, we'll put in a lot. I'm going in reverse alphabetical order.

So I've got a billion for Victory. Anyone want a quarter-billion inf to help a new SG through the awkward startup phase?

(Thanks to RagmanX, Eric Nelson and anonymous donors for helping out with this.)

Recent prices I've seen here [and a few in channel] have been 2-2.5 billion. But there's a huge difference between "I haven't seen it" and "It didn't happen."

OK, back and ready to start up the fires.

TopDoc: I would argue that prices are "too high" when they cause the market to fail to work. If you want an over-2-bn item you have the possibility of getting ripped off, you have to set up an exchange instead of just letting the market do its magic; it's inconvenient and it risks runaway inflation [more items over 2 bn = less inf sunk = greater prices for everything = more items over 2 bn...]

So to me this is a case where prices are too high because it's interfering with the game's ease of use, and with its inf sources and sinks .

"People can't afford stuff" is not, if i understand it right, the argument the original post is making.