I can sell Things Of Woe, but not alchemy?

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Mental Mouse
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I can sell Things Of Woe, but not alchemy?

Post by Mental Mouse »

It looks like several of my alchemy products and smithy productions are marked "unsalable". In particular, my alchemical "potion of cure poison" lacks the capitals of the "official" version, and is unsalable. So are any smithy products that come out flawed, or don't match official types. Oddly, the "boots of granite" were salable, but the "clawed boots" weren't both decursed. Outright negative items become salable of decursed, I don't see why flawed smithy items or alchemical products wouldn't be!

And why do I have a sneaking suspicion that "balm of minor healing" can't stand in for "balm of first aid" in a recipe, even though they have the same effects? Likewise, the level under Mile Miller's place has several props named "eyes" and "human eyes" (the latter with a two-eyed icon). Can [i]any[/i] of these stand in for the "man's eye" in the "cure blindness" potion recipe?
Raphael
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Re: I can sell Things Of Woe, but not alchemy?

Post by Raphael »

Mental Mouse wrote:It looks like several of my alchemy products and smithy productions are marked "unsalable". In particular, my alchemical "potion of cure poison" lacks the capitals of the "official" version, and is unsalable. So are any smithy products that come out flawed, or don't match official types. Oddly, the "boots of granite" were salable, but the "clawed boots" weren't both decursed. Outright negative items become salable of decursed, I don't see why flawed smithy items or alchemical products wouldn't be!
This is supposed to be a feature, not a bug. When you fail to create the expected result with alchemy, you can get slag, various failure effects or cursed items. The cursed items created by alchemy will always have no value, even if you remove the curse. This ensures that you cannot make profit from failed recipes.
Mental Mouse wrote: And why do I have a sneaking suspicion that "balm of minor healing" can't stand in for "balm of first aid" in a recipe, even though they have the same effects? Likewise, the level under Mile Miller's place has several props named "eyes" and "human eyes" (the latter with a two-eyed icon). Can any of these stand in for the "man's eye" in the "cure blindness" potion recipe?
The "balm of minor healing" and "balm of first aid" have the same effect but they are not exactly the same - they have different names. So you cannot substitute one for the other in your recipes.

Also, the "man's eye" required by the recipe for the potion of cure blindness must come from a man, not from some unspecified human. Some other recipe requires a "woman's head" and you cannot replace it with any random head.

If you want to be successful with alchemy, you have to ensure that the ingredients have exactly the same names as the ones required by the recipe.
Mental Mouse
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And selling flawed items would be bad, why?

Post by Mental Mouse »

[i]This ensures that you cannot make profit from failed recipes. [/i]

And how would this be so bad? Alchemy is already pretty darn expensive, why is it so important to make sure the alchemist can't sell flawed items? [i]Especially[/i] since the standard cursed items are mostly salable once you remove the curses....

And I'm guessing wyvern wings are useless too.... The alchemy rules really need some major rebalancing at low levels -- it's not clear how any full-time alchemist would get their start -- even my dwarven jack-of-all-trades is basically adventuring to support his hobbies of smithying, alchemy, and soon, bowyering (what [i]is[/i] the word for that? :) ).

Oh yeah, and don't get me started on the recipes being split among [i]five[/i] different skills! But then, there are five fighting skills and five spell skills, so that kinda matches.
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Re: And selling flawed items would be bad, why?

Post by Leaf »

Mental Mouse wrote:This ensures that you cannot make profit from failed recipes.

And how would this be so bad? Alchemy is already pretty darn expensive, why is it so important to make sure the alchemist can't sell flawed items? Especially since the standard cursed items are mostly salable once you remove the curses....
Alchemy already is a slot machine when it comes to making money; You can't (or shouldn't :wink: ) win the jackpot all the time.
"Put another, more succinct way: don't complain, contribute. It's more satisfying in the long run, and it's more constructive."
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Mental Mouse
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Funny kind of slot machine....

Post by Mental Mouse »

Selling with 19 charisma, my dusts of reveal enchantment barely cover the cost of their pyrite... [i]not[/i] counting failures.

(Warning: digression follows....)
But then, that's part of a general pattern where a player selling even standard, identified items in the "right" store, is lucky to get a tenth of what he'd pay to buy it back, and often it's more like a hundredth. The Merchant's Guild anthem must be "Oh My, How the Money Rolls In"....

And then there's the "you dropped it, you sold it" rule.... :x The game could at least wait until you actually left the shop, and do payments both ways at the doorstep!
Raphael
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Re: Funny kind of slot machine....

Post by Raphael »

[quote="Mental Mouse"]Selling with 19 charisma, my dusts of reveal enchantment barely cover the cost of their pyrite... not counting failures.

Trust me... once you are a bit more experienced, you will discover that alchemy can be a source of huge profits. You have to experiment a bit with various recipes and various ingredients for these recipes. Some recipes will always result in a net loss. But others will allow you to gain money easily.
Mental Mouse
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Um, those unsalable "ex-cursed" results...

Post by Mental Mouse »

Are they, by any chance, also unusable for further alchemy? :shock:
Raphael
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Re: Um, those unsalable "ex-cursed" results...

Post by Raphael »

Mental Mouse wrote:Are they, by any chance, also unusable for further alchemy? :shock:
I assume that you refer to the cursed results. Well, they can be used for further alchemy, preferably after removing the curse.

The fact that they have no value (they cannot be sold) does not mean that they cannot be used anymore. Feel free to recycle them.
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