From Involvement to Elyps

For some time now, you can earn Involvementpoints during dynamic events (DE). Other rewards will soon be added to those you already earn from official merchants (Imperial of Pyr, Royal of Yrkanis, Federal of Fairhaven, Dynastic of Zora and Marauder of the Camp).

Currency reform

The numbers of Involvement points distributed so far are very high ones, to the extent that we noticed players have now some difficulty to read them. That is the reason why the introduction of these new rewards will be coupled with a semblance of “currency reform”. Namely:

•  the number of Involvement points accumulated by each player character since the dynamic events were brought in game will be reduced to the hundredth of the current number;

• the number of Involvement points distributed during a dynamic event will now be lower and will also depend on the nature of the said event;

• the unit price in points of Involvement of rewards acquired from an official merchant will now also be divided by 100, thus exactly offsetting the loss mentioned above.

• In order to make this reduction in the price of rewards arithmetically possible, official merchants will no longer sell their items by the piece, but in batches. Thus:

• generic raw materials and experience catalysers will now be offered for sale in 999 unit batches (i.e. a complete pack in Bag);

• the sap crystals will now be offered for sale in 100 unit batches.

Nature of the new rewards

To start (other rewards will be added later), the Involvement points will allow their owners to get, in addition to the rewards already available:

• from their official merchant, the reduction of the remainder of their death penalty by 25, 50, 75 or 100%;

• from a groom in a capital city (or Marauder Camp), the (re)naming of their animals (mount, packer or Zig) with their own name, a random name or a name of their choice*.

• (*) The cost in points of Involvement of this (re)naming (said “inscription in the register” in game) of an animal under a name chosen by its owner will first (at the moment this new reward will be introduced in game) be particularly high for all interested owners, but will decrease regularly thereafter, down to a stable, definitive cost.

About Involvement

These changes are for us an opportunity to clarify (or recall) the meaning of the Involvement points, or, more accurately, their inclusion in roleplaying and their interpretation by the Lore.In the same way that the dappers paid to New Horizons allow everyone to travel from one city to another in a few seconds thanks to a “time ellipsis”, the Involvement points allow actions that are usually time-consuming to perform in a few seconds.Therefore, they can be seen as units of suspended time allowing their owner to perform in a flash various and varied tasks, such as:

• carry out missions on behalf of a nation or organization represented by its official merchant, missions whose success is, as usual, rewarded; 

• perform the actions usually required to reduce (until extinction) one's death penalty.

It is therefore this interpretation that allows us to imagine, as “rewards” provided by the Involvement points, a wide range of new activities and capabilities...And leads us to rename the said "point": it becomes the Elyps!

Super cool! ty for this latest inovation 8)

What about finding what to give to players (actual rewards), before introducing a new (and useless) currencies once again?

I don't get this, but okay I guess!

Looking into this:

[Old currency] 1 Sup Q500 sap crystal costs 11 Faction Points, whereas:
[New Currency] 100 Sup Q500 sap crystals costs 12 Elips, providing you complete "a lengthy task".

This means that there's no direct comparison between old and new but, on the face of things, Elips look to be more lucrative than the old Faction Points system.

When taking into consideration, Elips are harder to earn than the old faction points (you earn 17 Elips for each daily mission you complete which can be anything from Crafting/Foraging/Hunting or Package Delivery) means that 1 mission will earn you 100 Sup Q500 sap crystals / per mission completed vs 1100 [Old] faction points, it still seems more lucrative.

The downside to this is, what does "a lengthy task mean"? There is no mission description, or text anywhere to tell a player what the mission entails. Even right clicking on the mission opens a blank window which offers no explanation.

Again, taking aside Sap crystals, you can also use Elips to buy experience catalysers and generic materials (same as the old faction points system) but, in my mind, the question begs: What decision was made to remove the faction picks because they can't be bought with Elips? To those master diggers, who are looking for every bit of focus, the boost gained from using a faction pick is helpful, or at least it used to be. What happens once players have adopted the new Elips system and have run out of faction points? No more Faction Picks, or do they have to complete old missions alongside new missions to earn both rewards?? etc etc

In summary, whilst it seems that the new Elips system is more rewarding it, in truth, further devalues the Atys economy by making the old system redundant (there are still plenty of people with lots of Faction points stored up from completing daily occupations).

Overall, would be nice to see the new system finished, instead of left in it's seemingly half-finished state.

Agree, also I would like to see something else than generic materials, sap crystals and xp catalyzer.. i mean.. common, people like me have no use for these things :/
Why would i grind that elyps thingy is a mystery

Give how few dynamic events I've seen since they were added, I'm still wondering why I would even care about this.

Personally, I would much rather participate in dynamic events than have to do the boring occupations to buy sap crystals.

1.  Don't really see an issue here ... like getting rid of pennies.  Possibly addresses a potential integer value issue as well as reading the numbers ... like 2^16 limit of 65,536.  So instead of getting paid on pennies, we get paid in dollars.  Rewards and costs have same factor involved so no real change.  So "reform wise", nothing has really changed. We basically went from paying in pesos or yen to dollars / Euro.

2.  New rewards ....

a) You can buy faction death penalty reduction and now those that don't subscribe to the higher powers can too.  Cool.

b)  You can buy names for your animals.... Ok cool, not forced on anyone.

c)   Ok I like the naming thing ... but if we gonna have names .... we gotta have colors .... How much for hair dye ?

3.  Lore ... not really interested.

As to concerns expressed ... let's look at this.

To earn 36 products, for NH fair to say a time investment of 1-2 hours.  That would earn you ...

100 Fame = 7200 faction points / 360,000 dappers
 50 Fame = 1800 faction points / 180,000 dappers

I never liked this arrangement ... wasn't really fair to neutrals, rangers and marauders.  Seemed that a fairer way would be to allow  each person to spend half their total fame:

100-75-25 could spend the 100 ... 100% x 36 mats in nationn that they were 100 in ... 1 visit / all done .... or 75 in one spot / 25 in another

50-50-50-50 guy could spend 50 in 2 lands or 25 in 4 lands.

Using Bubba's numbers, if I did math right, old way was 100 QL500 crystals would cost you 1100 points.  A days NH would net you @ 650 crystals.

The new way you can get on average 12 Elypsies (depending on settings) per mission for 7 missions... so you'd get 700 crystals.   ... pretty much same thing.  Tho if you set no fame restrictions, you get 18 per mission or just about 1050 crystals.  So yes potentially more lucrative ... but you not getting fame, you not getting dapper (other than what mission gives you anyway).

I haven't experienced any "lengthy tasks". I hit the scroll icon, I see 7 missions and I choose which ones I wanna do. It's easier, well better said "less time intensive", than the normal a) find NPC b) take mission c) Go do stuff d) bring back to that BPC again .... is reduced to just c) and d), so far, I usually knock of all 7 in 30 minutes or so. Today I only did 6 as I decided I didn't want to do one of them cuz it was kill a tribe.

A brief description does appears on the Daily Mission window, you click it and you get a full description. Don't wanna do it, abandon the mission. Change ya mind, retake it. Not only that, the map shows you who you have to deliver to. No searching all over the region to find those wandering NPCs.

As to the faction picks, I stopped using them .... are they actually gone or are they just not purchasable any more ? Can you still buy with FP ? Can you do the original delivery missions ? If they have in effect been removed from purchase ... I imagine they could be restored or made available thru the original tour procedure.

When I visit the NPC, he's basically offering the same items through faction points (left click) or elipsies (right click). I haven't actually spent any cause I have so few of each left that.

Isn't the NH / Occupations thing still working as it was. I haven't found a reason to do occupations for about 2.5 years. When I did, I mostly did scroll maker as the Q70 scrolls sold for far more on the market than NH paid .... especially w/ 50-50-50-50 fame. But I talk to folks most days who are running Occs / NH but not as part of Daily Missions.

The problem for me is, and I have said this often. There's a mindset in every industry were having experts write manuals is believed to be a good idea .... and that's why no one in the world every had the correct time on their VCR and everyone struggles assembling their furniture bought at IKEA.

Every software manual begins with "Open the [ xxxx ] Window and ...." wait how do I open the [ xxxx ] Window ... WTH is a [ xxxx ] Window ?

I find it nice that we now have more options. I like that this, so far, appears to treat players with different approaches to game more equally. A significant number will be dismayed by that ... the ole "I deserve more because ..." thing.

My issue, in reference to the economy again, is not that any path has been devalued .... it's that I have nothing to spend the rewards on.

-Cats ? = More ways to get cats ? Each week after the NPC Hunt, we can't give them away.

-Wundahmat = It's OK, I like the no bulk thing for completing craft missions. The T & E required to get the wundahmat is far far greater then just digging ... and far more lucrative.

-Names for animals ... this I like, and if hair dyes were added it would be a kick. I have this image in my head of the movie "Earth Girls are Easy" and the brightly colored aliens ... tho on Atys Id prefer more of a subdued tint.

- Iron Ons ! ... Remember iron on images for T-Shirts ? I'd spend a few elipsies on s one time sigil that I could apply to a shield or breastplate. Once used, it's gone.

Most of all the Dailies give you something else to do ... options ... other ways to do things. I didn't really look at them with regard to the economy ... my problem has never been earning, but having something to spend it on.

Question ... as renaming your animas is expensive .... it would be good for us to know the limitations before we fork over several weeks / month worth of Elyps:

a)  Number of characters permitted ?
b)  Number of words / spaces ?  2 words i.e. "Zig Newton"  3 words "Packer Number One"
c) Numerals and Special Characters ?   "Packer No. 1" or "Packer # 1".

Other ideas:

a)  Hair / Fur Dye
b)  Brands ... Improng Guild / Faction / Alliance Symbol.  This is a 'no harm" idea... no branding irons ... just dye stencils :)

a) 24 characters maximum
b) No limit you can use how many spaces you want
c) All alphanumeric characters and ' # - .
d) Only renames who respect CoC