Crystals & Shards No more

[Angellos]

I know this is a crazy idea - to get rid of crystals, shards and clusters completely but hear me out here:

1. Most of the gil bots spam ephemeral nodes to gather crystals in order to sell them on the marketboard. Since they're bots, they can do this all day every day. This is their chosen method of making gil. If you get rid of crystals and shards - they have one less venue for making gil to sell in RMT transactions.

2. Honestly it just makes no sense. I realize that it's a time sink - but, IRL we can make the same items and we don't need crystals to...craft...furniture?

3. The amount of crystals we get per swing just isn't worth it for people that aren't botters and don't have all day to go AFK auto farming shards and crystals.

In order to just get enough Sublimes for a gathering and crafting set, I have to gather over 1200 lignum vitae logs, 400 dimythrite ore and 100 mythrite sand. (OH BUT THAT'S NOT ALL) Even after I do that (Which even with auto gathering has taken over a full hour to gather.) Now i have to gather 3500 wind crystals and 700 ice crystals. That's going to take me another 2-3 hours of mindless farming to get since no one will be on to do Diadem with. And that's just for the sublimes you need to craft the set. That's not including the THOUSANDS of crystals to make the sets themselves.

I think crafting is plenty a time sink as it is, without having the crystals and shards involved IMHO. It wouldn't be so bad if each item only took 1 or 2 crystals but when making one piece of lumber takes 7 crystals it gets a bit insane.

Seriously though: It'd stick it to the gathering bots.

[Brightamethyst]

Agreed. Shards/crystals/clusters are outdated as a concept and need to go.

[AbelArchaniEA]

Disagree because it fits with the plot of the game. You craft magical items with crystals made from Aether. GG

[Enkidoh]

Disagree because it fits with the plot of the game. You craft magical items with crystals made from Aether. GG

That's also because the crafting system was taken directly from FFXI (right down to being literally called 'Synthesis') which also required crystals to be used as a catalyst when crafting - only difference being you didn't use tools to craft, you basically just selected the required materials and crystals from your inventory and selected 'Synthesis' from the menu.

But you are totally correct about the lore specifically stating the reason why crystals are needed in crafting. Because you are not actually making the item the normal way despite using tools to do so. You're actually initiating a magical reaction by drawing on the aether in the crystals to change the raw materials into the desired object based on your thoughts (the tools you use are just a conduit to focus the aetheric energy, just like how mages in the game use their weapons fo focus the aether into the desired spell).

This is incidentally also the reason why the game can get away with the old meme about using a frypan to make orange juice for instance.

[Elizar_Naki]

Disagree because it fits with the plot of the game. You craft magical items with crystals made from Aether. GG

While I generally enjoy lore-based explanations for in-game mechanics (and Enkidoh's elaboration on your post was fascinating for me to read, as I'd never considered FF14's crafting from that angle), do note that the lore of the game HAS changed in regards to similar systems. The lv.20 MIN and BTN quests have you gather 99 units of grade 1 carbonized matter; the MIN version, which I did early on in my time here, explained that carbonized matter was used as a catalyst for affixing materia to gear. In a later patch, however, this requirement was removed; I did the BTN quest AFTER this patch, and the dialogue explained that carbonized matter HAD ONCE been used to meld materia but that other methods had been found that no longer required it.

Similarly, the quests revolving around converting gear to materia mention (if memory serves) that materia conversion destroys the gear being converted, and that you need to have the appropriate crafter at the right level to affix it yourself. However, the devs have already stated that this will simply reset the spiritbond rating on gear being "converted" in 5.2, and that having ANY crafter at the right level will let you affix materia to any gear at that level. No doubt the quest dialogue will be adjusted to accomodate this change as well.

If the devs decided to at least REDUCE the crystal catalyst requirements for crafting across the board--say, 1 of any given shard/crystal/cluster per craft instead of multiple--it could easily be explained in-game, if necessary, as having "refined the relevant crafting techniques to require less aether," or something to that effect.

Tl;dr: don't hide behind the game's lore if you don't like someone's idea. The lore can be adjusted as needed if the devs decide to simplify any given process that has a lore-based explanation.

[Rufalus]

I don't think many people would be upset if they were removed. Maybe purging it would free up some character data headroom for something else like adding more things to the currency window or armory chest.

[RyuSaarva]

I don't think many people would be upset if they were removed. Maybe purging it would free up some character data headroom for something else like adding more things to the currency window or armory chest.

yes, let's replace crystals with random materials for every class which use 15 more inventory slots, need to encourage people to buy more retainers after all.

[Brightamethyst]

Just because it can be explained by the lore doesn't make it a good idea.

[Tiraelina]

Just because it can be explained by the lore doesn't make it a good idea.

It only became a bad idea because they neutered the ways to obtain them with 2.0. They used to be secondary items you got every gather instead of a dedicated target and you got 1-3+. Alch could also convert them between shards, crystals and clusters.

[Niwashi]

It wouldn't be so bad if each item only took 1 or 2 crystals but when making one piece of lumber takes 7 crystals it gets a bit insane.

I think this is the real issue. Only the very low levels have shard usage in reasonable numbers. But then it starts ramping up the number you need without a corresponding ramping up of the number you can collect in a reasonable timeframe. (I suppose the idea is that people who are buying their shards can afford more at high levels, but it kind of screws over people trying to be at least mostly self sufficient.)