Fuse ILZ fuels into one sort of fuel for OW

[cursive solstice]

The recent discussion in #🎮〕illuvium-overworld brought this topic up again. I think it is rather easy to implement and would help new users to enter the eco-system.
To simplify the payment model, it would be a good idea to fuse all fuels sold by ILZ to get fused into one currency for OW.
The team would save resources for balancing the fuels in OW and the system would be much more understandable for new users, because they don't need to buy three currencies to play OW.

[hazy stone]

I like this! the fuels can still be different in Zero though so we dont mess anything up there

Im sure the team has a reason for 3 fuels so would be curious to know why. @dry finch

[cursive solstice]

I thought that the three fuels just got transfered into OW, because for ILZ they make perfectly sense. A game like ILZ needs several currencies, maybe, it just grew that way, but that is just me guessing too much.

[buoyant rapids]

Yes

Simple is better

[dry finch]

It was meant to be three so there could be lands that produce more of some than others and profit when demands went up.

It’s not the end of the world to change that, if people find it simpler. I personally don’t think this is where the problems lie, but if I’m wrong on that then it should be changed.

[hazy stone]

Where do you think the problem lies?

[meager pebble]

This changes nothing and only dumbs down the game.

many land plots have already been traded on the market based on their topology/landmark. It doesn't seem fair at all to change that now.

[cursive solstice]

Sometimes I feel you just want to be against ideas. This change doesn't affect zero at all

[meager pebble]

Is it me who wants to be against the ideas. Or is it you who wants to be against what the game designers implemented?

[meager pebble]

why are the cheapest T4's on the market all with solon landmark then?

[cursive solstice]

It is me voicing the stuff many people in discord complain about.
Nobody gets hurt by a simpler system. Do you really want to tell me that this complicated monetization system for OW feels good?

[meager pebble]

we're talking about fuel here not OW monetization. I do like how it is, that's why I stated this only dumbs down the game.

[cursive solstice]

we are talking only about OW monetization here. 3 fuels in zero (that stays). 1 fuel in OW

[meager pebble]

each fuel type has unique use case. Why make it all the same. Why not let there be arbitrage between fuels?

[cursive solstice]

because it is super complicated for a new player. You buy crypton, you start your run, you notice you have to cure shards, you buy hyperion, you notice fusing costs solon.

[meager pebble]

everything is complicated for new players, that's why there is a learning curve with games.

let's just agree to disagree m8, all good.

[cursive solstice]

what a strange argument. As a player I don't care or feel better if I pay for stuff with different currencies it is just additional work

[sullen magnet]

yeah I agreed on this. Gatcha games or mobile games has evolved to one "premiun" currency. It's Easier to undertand.

[cursive solstice]

exactly, simple structures that feel rewarding on a psychology level. Illuvium doesn't achieves either of those points.

[meager pebble]

I'll just say this as my last point. You guys do realize you completely destroy the IZ game by having only 1 fuel type? Converters become irrelevant and all the building costs would need to be readjusted. Not to mention that I would also like a repayment for having bought crypton landmark T4's, which are usually more expensive.

[cursive solstice]

ILZ FUEL DOESN'T CHANGE. ILZ KEEPS 3 I REPEAT THREE FUEL SORTS (don't know how to phrase this anymore)

[meager pebble]

ok sure but what would then be the conversion rate of all fuels to the ONE fuel type? Cause all three have different price values.

[cursive solstice]

factor 1 for all of them

[meager pebble]

so solon is selling for half of crypton but still comes in with a factor of 1? Does that even make sense to you?

[cursive solstice]

yes, because the differences exist because of OW demand and not because of different production values

you can produce: 100 solon or 100 crypton or 100 hyperion per day
The only reason they are valued differently is because of OW demand balancing.
If they are all worth the same there is no further balancing required which also opens human resources on the team

[meager pebble]

yeah sure. You'll be trivializing all of ILZ land plots with this. But if you think this is a good idea, by all means don't let it be me the one to dissuade you.

[cursive solstice]

so, this is the real argument here. You would have paid too much for your t4 and therefore a simplification, which benefits the user experience would be troublesome, but long term your land will be worth more if we enhance the user experience by simplifying the onboarding (that includes payment models). Sure, a solon land would have brought you a bigger edge, but in the end you would profit as well, because with higher exposure to web2 we will definitely see videos that stomp on Illuvium, because of the complicated monetization.

[meager pebble]

Web2 won't come in the near future don't fool yourself, we're still very far from that. So instead of focusing on that why not make the current web3 games we have interesting to the web3 community?
our problem is we're trying to target two different demographics and end up targeting none.

[cursive solstice]

On the 2nd part I can agree.
I dont see at all why fusing the sold ILZ fuel into one OW fuel would make it less interesting for web3.

Lets say we do nothing. Devs will put a lot of work into balancing the fuel demand for OW, someday they will achieve a state of near equilibrium in which all three fuels are worth the same. Your plot will experience the same drop in value as you feared, it won't matter if you sell crypton, hyperion or solon. The system still would be unnecessarily complicated and we would have lost a lot of "dev-time"

[sullen magnet]

💯 this. This will not only make it easier for OW, it will make it easier for future illuvium games. Only one premiun currency is needed

[meager pebble]

you lose the arbitrage of fuel prices. Deciding on which fuel you give preference to convert to based on the market prices. There's a lot that goes into it. But I'm done with this thread. If you guys think this is the way to dumb down the game so be it .

[cursive solstice]

yeah, good point. You even have to balance fuel over future games as well. What a mess and way to much work. Especially, because if the devs succeed in balancing all fuel it is basically the same as having one currency to begin with (even from the side of ILZ)

[wraith spruce]

I think this is actually more fair to landholders. Fuel demand is completely arbitrary atm. They could just as well release a patch tomorrow with a new feature that requires Solon and suddenly massively increase demand for it. It is basically luck of the draw and an equalized approach for all fuel types is the most fair.

Some may have made investments or purchases with current market in mind, but it’s still extremely early and there’s no guarantee that the balance won’t/can’t shift. At least this actually protects land owners in the long run from drastic arbitrary shifts.

One premium currency used for all things would create fairness for ILZ while retaining uniqueness and differences between lands because good landmark combos would still increase production. It would greatly simplify gameplay in OW. I think we often underestimate how easily confused average players are so this is especially important if we want to onboard web 2 gamers at some point.

It’s not a great user experience when you buy a bundle of fuel (which is what a newbie would probably do), and you end up with a massive excess of 2/3 of them and a shortage of one. This also creates a strain on the team to try and balance this continuously

[buoyant rapids]

in your opinion, what is the biggest reason that solon price is the lowest?
we have seen attempts to give solon more utility, like curing master shard (it's always been advertised that hyperion is used for curing) and auto scan.
what is the next plan to increase demand for solon?

[normal galleon]

That's easy, cause the current crafting system is lacking and gates 99% of possible players from participating. It needs more replayability and RNG into it.

The other possible reason could be, as usual, the arena modes are not ready yet, and there's not as much demand for good gear.

It's likely a combination of both.

[frigid mantle]

He does

[meager pebble]

maybe present good ideas and I won't be against them. Simple as that.

I upvote much more than I downvote so that argument doesn't even make sense.

[cursive solstice]

hmm, I haven't seen a single valid argument that suggests that this isn't a good idea.
I am the first to say that I am in the wrong if presented with a good argument that invalidates my thought. Being wrong is part of a process.

In this case we had the following pro argument:

• easier to understand / less complicated / better on-boarding
• Less dev work to balance fuels against each other in OW
• More recognizable because other games use one single premium currency as well
• Current system is very likely to be frowned upon by web 2 to say the least
• work just gets more with future games

contra:

• web3 "gameplay" based on arbitrage of fuel prices -> weak argument because the target is to balance fuels anyway. Current system would take a lot of work to in the end still delete this "gameplay"
• people who bought crypton focused land with a premium could take a hit. -> again that would happen anyway, because the target is to balance fuels. Also speculation/trading always can go wrong. We can't watch everybody.

I repeat in the end I haven't seen a valid argument, which shows that this idea is bad. Aaron hasn't made his point, which means there is hope for you, because a good argument can change my mind.

[meager pebble]

I don't need hope m8 if the community wants to change this so be it. I wasn't actually talking about this idea when I said that. This one has some merit it's just my personal preference to keep it as it is.

[cursive solstice]

Still thinking about your arbitrage argument. I think it could have merit in someway with future features in ILZ. I am talking about a ILZ-ingame marketplace, which could make a lot of sense with future features and allow some sort of price fluctuation within ILZ. I just think it isn't a good mechanic to carry over to OW.

[severe moat]

This should be implemented immediately. Make payments easy as possible. Buying all these different fuels is waaaaay too much of a hassle

[hazy stone]

we do have bundles

[fading tapir]

Other than perhaps those users who targeted specific fuel types and perhaps paid a premium. Fusing them all I think could be a good solution to reduce friction for new players.
Imagine buying a bundle and realizing you didn't actually need 30000 Solon...
Instead it's just 30000 "fuel"

[hazy stone]

True

[ancient talon]

i think need to stop sell bundle let the price correct not add more fuel

[uneven palm]

I disagree with the change, It is a game after all and having 3 fuels provides more novelty and engagement, and makes you really think about the actions you are taking in the game (e.g. do I focus on OW runs, do I focus on levelling or crafting). This also links in with drone upgrades etc., some people will buy more of certain fuels and specialise in certain upgrades like mining vs encounters etc. I think having different options makes it more interesting and a better economy.

Also why even have another currency for OW if its not the 3 fuel as it is now? Then it should just be ILV that is spent and burnt to make OW runs. Land becomes pretty uninteresting then though.

[cursive solstice]

the three fuels in ILZ remain untouched

[hybrid fiber]

This sounds like a good change overall. Although some may like this extra layer of playing with 3 fuels depending on the market with their plots or having to choose which fuel to buy i think this change would bring a positive simplification

As you said ligyron the goal is to balance the fuels so they would end up the same anyway at some point. Even as an advanced player it feels like a burden to have to buy x of each fuel all the time, id much prefer to just buy a fuel that i can use for everything. For new players its something more to learn and get confused about while it doesnt bring much at the end of the day

[meager pebble]

I've been thinking on this and I'm more inclined to like this idea. I don't want the game to be dumbed down but I do want it to be simple to grasp. The pros seem to outweigh the cons on this one. You have my 👍

[buoyant rapids]

im glad we are finally here

[sage dirge]

You know how to balance fuel ?
150 travel = 50 crypton, 50 hyperion, 50 solon. Do this 33% Split for every cost and we are balanced. Then the supply May vary if Land produce more crypton than others and some will build converter to take the opportunity. To hard to balance the demand individually

Or at least. Wait to have consume data before unsplit thoses.

[carmine mason]

For me it was always more of a material than a currency.

To activate the obelisk you need to charge it up with crypton.
To melt all the ores down to forge a suit you need solon.
To make the shards usable you infuse some hyperion in it.

Always loved the aspect of the interaction of the landowners reacting to the fuel market, you have to anticipate or data mine to build the right converters to make more $ and outplay the rest.

To your 2 pro arguments (complexity and balancing):

• if 3 different materials are too complicated and is not beginner friendly we might better change it indeed. Wonder how they wana start collecting creatures for a game with x different affinities turning into y different composites interacting with z different classes + ranger equipement. Would be 2 completely different audiences.
• for sure balancing problems would be gone

To your contra arguments:

• since we are all gamers, i guess we all agree that you can't balance a system perfectly. There will always be differences and thats were the fun in zero is if it comes to economic gameplay

I can see dumbed down games are being played by a wide audience, and if majority wana go this route i won't fight against it.
Keep in mind tho that this will be a big hit again against Zero to hopefully attract more paying OW players, since the only interesting gameplay in zero atm is playing the markets game.

[buoyant rapids]

imo, fuel, as the ingame currency, is the foundation of the economy.
in theory, asset prices are derived and influenced heavily by fuel price.
for me personally, having 3 types of fuel is inconvenience.
for example, i have to check crypton and hyperion price to determine the fair value of a cured shard. having only 1 type of fuel, simply simplified things

atm, solon is so expensive, i was planning to forge T3S3 suits but i dnt want to pay the current price. i do have some more in crypton, i wish i could convert it to solon.
i understand that this 3-fuel system adds complexity to the game or some might say "fun" to the game, i just dont see it as a "fun" feature.

[sullen magnet]

Consider, for a moment, a scenario in which Fortnite introduces three distinct types of V-Bucks: one exclusively for character skins, another specifically for weapon skins, and yet another for vehicles or musical instruments. Such a fragmented system would inevitably lead to unnecessary complexity and confusion among players. Instead of enhancing the gaming experience, it would create an overcomplicated economy. What is truly needed is the simplicity and clarity of a single, unified currency that allows players to make purchases across all categories seamlessly. We need only ONE currency, thats it.

[buoyant rapids]

thank you.
i think our focus this epoch should be to untangle the convulated system we have. the process of getting from A to B is just too much even for web3 native.

[wise venture]

Solon is expensive? I guess I better snatch up those T4 lands ...

Just wanted to weigh in a bit: In OW, the three fuels are externalities. There's nothing you see or do in the game that requires there to be three different fuels. I think this is what OP meant by simplifying it. Yes, we have some ways to shift around demand arbitrarily like solon for scans, but there's no reason that couldn't be 3x crypton for scans. From the perspective of OW, there's no attachment to the fuel types. You cannot find a "Solon Flower" that has a few in it or get an extra Hyperion when mining Seismic Quartz, for instance. This disconnection means there are 3 MacGuffins that could just as easily be 1 MacGuffin you need more of. It is truly unnecessary complexity from the perspective of OW.

From the perspective of IZ, converters can now be 100% efficient. I've had zero issues converting fuels on my plots from T1, T2, or T3. I don't own a T4, but the new Solon price has me doing some math. What I spent to get my plots is SO FAR REMOVED from the game play at this point, if you spent an extra few grand for Plot X over Plot Y, then good for you. Let me know when you are close to ROI - I'm about 75 years away because I took random mints.

I don't think 3 fuels is TOO complicated for people to understand. However, I don't feel there's some basic requirement to have 3 in OW. They are just MacGuffins. That they come in 3 colors barely registers after the fuel nerf as everything is pretty much the same price as I write this.

If there isn't going to be a gameplay reason for the three fuels in OW, then we should simplify it. If there is going to be a reason, then it should manifest sooner than later while the fuel nerf is still fresh in people's minds.

[buoyant rapids]

yea it went from cheapest to most expensive lol

[wise venture]

I've combined this idea with Aaron's Option #3. https://discord.com/channels/760344898200666112/1276653970538106920

[high obsidian]

Agreed. It's needlessly overcomplicated to have several fuels in OW, why make life hard just for the sake of it? Complexity is only worth having if it warrants a reason that justifies it. In this case, it does not, because it does not add fun and it turns off new players. Paying frequently for so many different processes alone feels crappy, but having to figure out the 3 fuel system and buy 3 different fuels doesn't feel fun. You do trivialize the land plots that are designed to generate more of one fuel than another plot, but is there not a solution we can come up with that keeps land holders happy with diversified land value without keeping OW in the stone age of bad decisions made that are not being taken well by the players? Like sell crypton to OW, and process blueprint dies with solon? I'm sure someone has an idea to keep each fuel valuable in ILZ without holding back other games.

[cloud marsh]

I back this. Sure then that simple fuel can be broken into the other 3 fuels as needed from this singular pool. Onboarding would be clearer too

[wise venture]

Or even if they want to go back to three in a year or two ... once some of the other stability and balance things are done and three games are getting played reguarly ...

[cloud marsh]

ILZ farm fuel as is. No changes. Fuel goes into a singularity fuel. Singularity fuel can be broken at will into individual fuels again for its distinct uses in game. No change. What changes is the manifold in the middle where onboarding and buying of this singular fuel at a normalized price according to IZ sellers to this singular. If only we had something called singularity something or transducer something or rather??

[somber locust]

Fusion? Refinement?

[wise venture]

I would rather it not get broken back to individual fuels. That was the point of my similar post. There's no tie in OW to the lore of the three fuels, or any way to produce them. From a user standpoint, it is just three times you have to go back to the cashier to get different currency to progress the game. This is a BAD user experience for OW as it is CONSTANTLY reminding people that they have to pay for every last little thing of value in OW. Oh, you bought 150 Cyrpton and want to try a Tier 1? Okay. Did you buy Solon for the scan? No? Do you even know what a scan DOES? No? These little quirks of OW really detract from that experience just as much as the complexity of pushing them from IZ to OW for our own use complicates things. There's SO LITTLE to be gained from the complexity and SO MANY reasons to cut it back to one ... it is disheartening to hear the stubbornness of people against this idea.

[fading tapir]

I don't know though, what this would do to the fuel economy (not saying it's perfect as is) but as we saw with supply it's constantly in Flux - I think with this setup we would almost need to fix a price ? Or at least have a smaller possible range

[wise venture]

To me, there are a half-dozen tangible and intangible benefits of simplifying fuel in this way. I can't think of a single benefit to keeping them separated. I'm open to suggestions, but to me, this is a no-brainer. If someone has any kind of convincing argument to keep them separate, I'm all ears. Otherwise, we've had plenty of folks voting for Aaron's 3️⃣ and proposing some variation of "a single fuel downstream from Illuvium Zero."

[fading tapir]

I'm with it for sure, just widening the scope of the impact in terms of supply (as we've already had a "fix" to this) could be wider implications

[cursive solstice]

agree, I just think the team is a little overloaded for the moment. I will wait a little and hope that we get feedback from the team regarding aaron's vote and this thread. Afterwards I will eventually try my luck with an IIP, but I think this is something that the team should solve, because an IIP could be difficult in the future. In the end we need like 3-4 changes.

• Aaron's vote
• revisiting price range again
• fuel simplification
• order book
  would be better if the team combines all these threads

[wise venture]

Fusing fuels into one eliminates the need for an order book - at least for fuels. Would still love to see the rest of the market simplified this way for ores, shards, et al.

[high obsidian]

Can we leave 3 fuels in ILZ to not break the game, and to maintain plot rarity (some people picked expensive plots with hyperion vs others that don't?), make a ratio in ILZ where 1 hyperion trades for 2 or 3 crypton, but have only crypton in the OW. I would be fine keeping the 3 fuels in ILZ if it adds to that game, especially since it is so econically focused and you can use different fuels for blueprints etc. It just needs to be simplified to 1 fuel in OW and other games made in the future.

[wise venture]

All of this conversation is downstream from Illuvium Zero. So, when you sell from your plot to the market, there's some abstraction layer before Overworld players buy it. No one wants to change it to one fuel within the boundaries of Illuvium Zero.

(At least, not that I've heard anyone express.)

[obtuse quartz]

@cursive solstice There is a lot in common with this thread and maybe 5 others that have all honed in on this concept that share the core concept of simplifying the overall fuel system. It's complexity was an interesting novel concept but for many of us the juice has not been worth the squeeze. As we watch the project drive towards an improved gameplay experience, simplifying the fuel economy seems like a must. I think most of us, even including Filow who was hesitant at first, are saying the pros outweigh the cons here.

There are a few ideas for how we could implement something like this that all derive from "option 3️⃣" from Aaron's poll on the "Modifying the 1:20 Fuel.." initial thread which was maybe the most heavily debated thread on this topic. nASTY had a good one, as did yanghologram and probably others.

https://discordapp.com/channels/760344898200666112/1276653970538106920

https://discordapp.com/channels/760344898200666112/1275072638037004308

Aaron has said he personally would prefer to keep it as is if possible, but is open to simplifying it. However there are a now a handful of critical community members and council members such as scoriox, jaganite, filow, and others that seem to have arrived at the conclusion that something towards this one fuel for OW where 5% of sales go back to landowner is the simplest, highest success % scenario. The crux now seems to be how to best enact that system. So a consolidated thread or IIP seems like the move at this point. Would love to see what you come up with there

[meager pebble]

Let's keep it real please @obtuse quartz. The voting made on the other thread was very divided and no clear option took it away.
#1274080051029086319 message

Also please don't lump me in with false statements. I did make that thread to change the 1:20 ratio but after all the discussions had I don't think neither that nor decoupling fuel sales from IZ is the right choice.

#1274080051029086319 message

[obtuse quartz]

I was not at all trying to make false statements about your opinions, sorry if I misunderstood what you were saying here in this thread

[obtuse quartz]

When you said “I've been thinking on this and I'm more inclined to like this idea. I don't want the game to be dumbed down but I do want it to be simple to grasp. The pros seem to outweigh the cons on this one. You have my 👍” that’s what I was referring to as being onboard to simplify the system in one way or another

[meager pebble]

all good, let's just keep it real.

[cursive solstice]

I get your sentiment and I already wanted to write something in that direction, but beforehand I wanted to give labs the option to combine these threads into one solution. To me it seems that the community is more united in terms of combining the three OW fuels into one than on the price finding system for fuel prices itself.
Therefore, I guess, we can try a to fuse the three fuels outside of ILZ in the context of an IIP, but regarding fixed prices, open markets, 1:20 and optionalities of 95%, I would say, we haven't reached common ground for the time being.

Can write an IIP starting tomorrow. Was a little more silent these days, because I had to prepare for an important meeting today

[meager pebble]

yes and that is regarding this idea of having only 1 fuel. I can support this if the community thinks it's better.

[obtuse quartz]

100% in agreement with those things. Aaron’s initial poll is was divided and by no means the end all be all, and in all of these threads it’s clear there are a lot of people that do not want to give up on the 3 fuel system, I just think that my sense is that a growing % of us that have spent time in all these related threads agree the pros might outweigh the cons. However I think we need a more formal survey or effort from the team to flesh all of it out. Id love to see a consolidated thread from illuvium labs, and while I know OW features are the #1 priority right now, I think deciding the fate of the fuel economy needs to be done sooner rather than later.

[wise venture]

I think there are dozens of tangible and intangible pros. However, in the past couple of days, I have heard some cons that need to be weighed in the balance of any final solution. Wherever fuel goes from here, we have to realize it will be changed. It will be a compromise of these possibilities, or some may be ignored entirely. I appreciate folks like Scoriox helping us to vet some of the "bigger changes" as big changes always have bigger consequences.

Cons:

1. Some version of: I bought a land based on what it produced/could produce. I cannot produce the other fuels, and just convert to get through Illuvium Zero progression. I don't want my sale to the market to be radically altered because that would impact my original choice in buying this land.

2. Some version of: The complexity could be made more meaningful. Better tie-ins to lore, to Eth, to Overworld, and even Arena could require three different fuels for some future mode. The ecosystem is in it's infancy, the games are in open beta, and it feels premature to give up on the three fuels concept before trying to work out the current issues. (I even would lump Aaron into this bucket.)

Most of the other cons I have dismissed because they come off as simple "change aversion." Given that we know this is going to change, somehow, they risk getting upset no matter which way the wind blows. But given how hard the wind is blowing on this topic, change is coming as surely as winter to Westeros.

[scarlet comet]

**I think this is a terrible slightly bad idea. **

Most action/rpg style games have thousands of resource types and many types of currencies. No gamer playing a game as complex as Illuvium Overworld (with all its creatures and stats and items and tiers and stages, ores, gems, classes, affinities, infusion, capturing, shards, etc) is going to be confused by having three types of Fuel.

I've posted the 'currency like resources' that are available in Runescape as an example.

**The real issue is the complexity of onboarding currency. **

So

1) Fix onboarding of currency.

Make it easier to get money in to the system via Dex/Passport/etc. It should be easy to get from fiat to Fuel or from ETH on L1 to Fuel.

Pretty sure this is a priority already (although it also has a dependency on Immutable)

2) Augment this with a way to very easily get Fuel inside overworld:

2a) In-game conversion

[Convert Now]```
(lossy enough that mostly people won't do it as the 'normal thing' to ensure each Fuel maintain an identity and as a bonus the conversion ratio also serves as a 'Fuel price variation limiter')

or

**2b)** Put Fuel buying inside the Overworld interface.

```You don't have enough Crypton, you can buy 100 Crypton for 0.001E

[Buy Now]```

(probably simpler and better)

[normal galleon]

Great example Johnny, now imagine if all those currencies in RuneScape costed money and if they were required to play the game. The people who would've played that are pretty much 0.

We ask the player to essentially open 2 'card packs' to obtain illuvials and 1 more 'card pack' for crafting. And ontop of that grind for many hours. It's off-putting for the usual gamer.

If we can combine the 3 fuels into one, as a cost of entering the OW, other 2 fuels can be converted to something you earn within your runs, rather than something you have to spend on constantly. That way the shards and crafting items will be still tied to fuel, and to the price it takes to enter a run. You just find them within your run instead of having to spend on each. So the price of 1 run in either stage will have to be adjusted to take this into account.

[scarlet comet]

Personally I don't think it shifts the needle in a notable way. If Zero didn't exist, I wouldn't have any objection, but unwinding all the Zero stuff, all the NFT sites, and mechanics base on multiple Fuels, to smooth out something that could be made smoother in much simpler ways feels like the wrong choice to me. (Yes I understand you can just keep all that stuff Zero side, but it kills the connection IMO)

A fuel pack feature is something the UX folks wanted to get in for example. It simply gives you enough Fuel of each kind to do several runs, crafting, shards, etc. By that time I'm pretty sure the player figures out what to do and can decide what they want to buy.

You can just make that purchase front and centre for new users. A very simple change which doesn't require unpacking a whole bunch of the Zero stuff.

Anyway, I've said my piece, I don't think this breaks anything if it goes ahead, I just don't think its worth it.

[normal galleon]

Same but opposite stand, I think the current model can work if we find the right playerbase, but for widespread adoption I think it's gonna be hard and it's better if we reduce the feel of having to spend on each step and it's done upfront as we enter the run. I think the games are in a pretty good and fun state, especially with finished arenas and is just the model handicapping a larger playerbase. But that's just my opinion, we'll see

[scarlet comet]

Fair enough. I can't disgaree, ultimately just an opinion based on my analysis (as is your stance based on your analysis).

Updated my post to reflect a more moderate stance 😉 (its hard not to use overly emotive language when making a point)

[high obsidian]

If it was resources earned in game, it would add an element of fun (like gathering resources from rocks and plants to create and level up our gear), but this is like having to buy USD, Yen, and CAD to do different functions in the game which feels really janky, especially because it's not adding additional fun to OW players. The complexity is a hassle and feels dirty because each time you're having to go buy some random currency on the market, not collect a resource by playing. I can see this being fun or having value in ILZ but in OW it adds zero value and doesn't feel good to have to go buy a secondary currency after already buying crypon and finding 3 stage 1's you want to fuse.

tbh it's one of the main reasons I feel too embarrassed to recommend OW to friends right now who game and are semi-familiar with crypto but never got into NFT's. The game is fun, graphics are amazing, capturing is addicting, but they will take 5 minutes to try to understand that you have to pay to enter the region to try to capture the coolest illuvials, that you have to find pokeballs and can't use them until you pay to cure them, that you have to pay to evolve the illuvials, and that you have to buy different currencies for each of these tasks with real money. I can already hear them laughing at how nft scammy it sounds and bowing out without trying what I think is already a fun creature capturing game. Totally different (make or break) vibe than learning a crafting system.

[scarlet comet]

Don't think of them currencies, think of them as resources. You have to use the currency ETH to buy the resources.

(and you can can discover those resources in the Zero game)

I really don't think its going to sound any more or less 'NFT scammy' to have three things that cost Fuel which you buy with ETH vs three things that cost Solon, Crypton, Hyperion which you buy with ETH. (EDIT: okay maybe like 2.5% less scammy)
It is still three things you pay for.
And if thats the only issue then the 'Fuel Pack' solves it.
(The first time they buy they buy one thing, and then by playing and using the stuff inside that thing they learn about the different types of Fuels and can then go make better decisions about how much they need of each based on what they want to do in the game)

I would add this is another reason I didn't like the fuel is not ERC-20 direction ... becasue it would be a great "ah hah" moment if you had excess of one fuel and then sold it back, maybe even for a profit! I could see this making the whole web3 thing click for a lot of people.

[wise venture]

Most people hated the experience of getting into a craft or quest and realizing you were short (resource X). So, back to the Grand Market/Auction House/Whatever. To start with, not a great experience - especially if the forgotten thing is no longer affordable because (some reason).

Now, add to this the microtransaction hellscape of Diablo 4, and you have a game no one wants to play. Continuously reminding people they are paying money for something without letting them enjoy the game for a few minutes ... is not fun.

Maybe the continuous ringing of cash registers is music to your ears. But it isn't fun for people outside of Illuvium stakers or land holders. And if the demand never gets beyond those two groups of people, then the whole thing will end up shutting down, anyway.

It isn't that people can't grok three separate MacGuffins. It is that they are required to pay for three separate MacGuffins - continuously. For everything. Unevenly. If that user experience had some kind of richness, or lore, or rationale, then fine - there's some entertainment value to be had. But there isn't. Not outside of Illuvium Zero. For all Arena players or Overworld players are concerned, you could call it Coke, Pepsi, and Mountain Dew ...

"But the market" yatta yatta yatta.

A. It already isn't a free market.
B. Why does there even need TO BE a market? It's a captive audience.
C. I was down with the ERC-20 version of things. Make the fuel, sell it to the blockchain, and people that wanted it could buy it. That did not happen and will never happen.

So, let's wrap this steaming turd of broken promises in an appropriate baggie and do something that will at least advance adoption of the game.

[scarlet comet]

Maybe I missed a feature which allows you to infuse mid run, but if not then having one Fuel or three would not help either way. Where inside the run do you need Fuel?

As to "getting in to a craft" how would being short be any different with one Fuel or three? (maybe a little more common) I found it frustrating to not have a correctly infused gem, or not have enough XP on an Illuvial to fuse, but that problem is going to exist regardless of there being one Fuel or three. You can be short Hyperion, or you have one fuel you can be short Fuel. But getting the right amount of Fuel is much less complex than getting all of the other things you need (Particularly if alchemy or purchasing is available inside the Overworld interface).

[scarlet comet]

If your point is to remove any need for transactions other than for travel that is fair enough. A reasonable point (even if it wasn't reasonably made). Removing the Fuel types might follow from this, but its a totally different change to suggest, not to mention a much larger change with wide reaching ramifications ... it should be put in its own thread.

This thread is about merging to one Fuel because it in itself will be "much more understandable" to new users, and presumably moves the needle on how much people play.

Undoubtedly there is some number of users N who drop off because they have to buy a second type of Fuel. I think there are lots of ways to reduce N to a meaninglessly low number, while retaining the current Fuels.

For example, the first time you are short Fuel:

"Hey Rook, Fusing needs Solons but you only have Cyptrons. I'll trade you 100 Solon for 100 of your Cryptons, but just this once you hear! Next time you will need to bring the right darn Fuel!"

[Trade Now] [Cancel]

This feels 'fair' while teaching the user about different Fuels.

Maybe it could lead to a quest where you unlock a lossy alchemy NPC:

"Again! Seriously rook. Alright [Do Task X] and I'll trade you solon for Crypton in the future, but I'm taking 10% off the top for my troubles"

I just don't think its worth giving up on the connections between games to maybe stick a few more users, particularly when stickiness problems have very little to do with having three Fuels right now.

But then again, its not like its the end of the world, I guess a vote will decide 🤷‍♂️

[wise venture]

What connections between games? The entire point I've been making is that there is no connection. It could be Coke, Pepsi, or Sprite. It can be Red Rock, Green Rock, Blue Rock. There is no connection to the word "Solon" in Overworld other than the fact you are forced to buy it. There's nothing special about it in that game or in that context. It could Snips, Snails, or Puppy Dog Tails for all anyone in OW could care. You can't farm it. You can't find Seismic Quartz that has a few Hyperion in it. The connection is 100% arbitrary.

You don't want it to change because ... you don't want it to change. Cool, cool. That's fine, I guess.

But several of us think that Aaron's Option 3 is the likely way things will move forward. And with that, there won't even be direct selling from Zero to Overworld. And we've offered a few different versions of how that might simplify the process of selling and buying to make both game experiences a bit more streamlined. That's it. You're allowed to hate it, love it, whatever. We were just trying to give it spin that might help people out.

[obtuse quartz]

He means connection between zero and OW. But alas Yang we agree that this connection is not that important for the overall project, and this is coming from a landowner. If landowners are a significant % of the OW player base we have a problem. Prioritizing new OW players experience should be the priority. Johnny seems to think N in his example isn’t a particularly high number, I tend to think it would be high.

[obtuse quartz]

This idea is certainly a great approach to make the existing system better if we do stick with the 3 fuels, But if you lean into that approach and also end up selling lots of fuel bundles, it begs the question, why bother at all?

[obtuse quartz]

The huge difference is that you get all other items and things you need from crafting in game. So you go grind them by playing the game, rather than having to pay another $1.50. Almost all games require you to grind out a huge range of items you need in game. Almost zero make you pay for multiple different resources with real money. I agree with Yang so strongly that repeatedly having to pay just really sucks as a user experience, and agree 1000% with @high obsidian that repeatedly asking people to pay money makes it feel very scammy to non crypto people. I’ve pitched this game to two friends and they both said this exact thing

[somber locust]

It basically feels like you have to keep pumping quarters into an arcade machine but worse, because it also locks you out of content if you don't. I definitely wouldn't touch this game as a web2 player knowing this is how fuel and the Illuvium ecosystem works. The first thought that runs through my head from a web2 perspective is, "wait... I can't even earn fuel in any way but I constantly need it to progress in the game? That's such a scam!"

It's why as soon as the open beta launched and I played a little bit, I was immediately disappointed. I knew this was not going to hit home with anyone in web2.

Even for a game like Warframe, you could basically farm the game for rare items and parts, and basically sell those items in the marketplace for their in-game paid currency, platinum. The difference between Warframe and Illuvium, however, is there is no in-game system for a web2 player to farm without paying in fuel first. I understand bots are a concern and people are afraid of p2e value extraction, but games like Warframe who operate under this model have still managed to address those very issues, maintain a healthy thriving and dynamic market, items of value maintain their value, all while the game holds AAA status with high acclaim in web2, as well as being a financially viable project.

I honestly think one of the actual major hurdles is that the Illuvium community just doesn't like the idea of giving up a $10,000 price tag for their rare NFTs in favor of a system that has less of a price discrepancy between the highest and lowest value items, but would be more accessible for web2. This project as it currently exists is clearly a game for the few and privileged, not the masses. We're banking on generating revenue from a high price tag that a few are willing to pay instead of a low (or optional) cost that many are willing to pay. It's things like this that are going to destroy any prospects of mass adoption and positive sentiment from the web2 community

[obtuse quartz]

To be fair they do have this with stage 0 runs

[somber locust]

Yes, they do. I mean if they can pull it off with Stage 0 and that's all we need for mass adoption, great. It just doesn't seem likely at the moment based on what I'm seeing.

The team has said they're working on new features and implementing more stuff into OW so it's really just a wait and see at this point.

But also... We have a 30 dollar pricetag for Palworld that I pay one time and I don't get gated from the content... I'd take that over paying for 3 or 4 stage 3 runs

[high obsidian]

I think if we're talking about a player that loves city builders like ILZ and who will play that game, move those 3 resources into OW and use those 3 resources for different tasks, it serves a purpose and I have no issue. The problem is that (IMO) you're niching your audience down way too far to have only players that want to play both ILZ and OW. Almost nobody I know loves both of those types of games. So let's assume (maybe I'm wrong) that most potential OW players won't care to get immersed into land and ILZ, now you have no reason to have 3 fuels for different tasks. What purpose/value/fun do solon and hyperion serve in the OW that crypton alone would not? I would argue it only adds confusion and the money aspect of it adds a scammy and needlessly annoying learning element to the game. If you have to buy crypton to enter stage 1-3 OW, then perform quests or tasks in game to earn solon and different tasks to hunt for or earn hyperion, then I think treating fuels as resources makes sense. But strictly in the context of OW, nothing distinguishes the 3 fuels other than what they're used for, which makes the diversification pointless. I think in trying to force interoperability of all 3 games, it's going to hurt growing a larger player base drastically. This is essentially what gauntlet solves for Arena right? It lets TFT type players get into Illuvium without needing to enter OW or city builder.

Keeping 3 fuels in ILZ and converting them to 1 fuel to sell in OW and all future games seems to make the most sense. Buying one in-game currency does sound less scammy (NX in maplestory is an easy sell). I think you're underestimating the effect of this when you talk about 2.5% less scammy or getting N players to a meaninglessly low number; we gamers are a sensitive bunch, and for those not elbow deep in crypto, even more so when it comes to entering a game that pushes frequent microtransactions in your face, 3 currencies will push a lot over the edge of skipping out.

[scarlet comet]

I might be wrong, obviously we are just making an analysis based on what we have experienced before and what we see here.
I just think its easy to get caught up in thinking one thing is more significant than it is.

I think if the first purchase (the thing that is pushed in the face of new users) was a Fuel pack that gave you each Fuel in enough quantity to support several runs, crafts, etc, then it would be moot. Its one transaction that lets you play for a certain amount of time.

I don't think this would feel "micro-transactiony" at all, you could even use this to give them some extra things that they might need in the pack (gems, shards, ores, some bonus equipment, whatever). Basically ensuring that one purchase will give them a full experience. Basically the opposite of micro-transactions.

I don't think its harmful to have some left overs of certain Fuels. I think this could actually be positive with regards to engagement (encourage people to do something else: "Hmmm... I've got 50c of Solon left over, maybe I can craft this item and sell it").

After you have done a few runs its easy to work out what you need, so you can start tailoring what you buy, and you can always continue to buy the 'packs' if you want.

I also thing people underestimate how world breaking it is to have 3 fuels in the world that you are mining from, and then have them all role up to one. Its not a big deal right now, the lore is still being revealed and built. But I'd much rather go the other way where the lore is expanded. There is some lore about these Fuels in the internal docs, and fleshing this out to build stronger bonds between games is a positive IMO.

[harsh lily]

This is our problem. I agree with you. Now, it seems that too many people in Illuvium discord want to change what has already been created for the sake of chasing this "mainstream adoption" obsession...

Too many changes will break this game. The reason most people aren't successful in life is because they aren't patient enough to just let their plants grow.

[wise venture]

Exactly.

Illuvium needs to focus on gameplay and making things more fun. I understand microtransactions and the idea that we can get X to buy Y, but ... honestly, comparing to Hearthstone or Marvel Snap, the complexity of "getting things" in Illuvium is like turning sand into your own computer CPU & GPU to play on.

The most popular games of these sorts have (1) resources you can earn, (2) rare resources you can maybe earn, but mostly want to buy, and (3) resources you can only buy. Illuvium has these tiers, but also a lot of in-between and overlapping spaces. You can earn shards, but also buy them. You can "earn" fuel in Illuvium Zero, an entirely different game, but you can't transfer to your Ranger. You have to go to the marketplace to sell and then re-buy your fuels (which is currently a terrible experience they are trying to fix). Or you just buy it if you don't want to play IZ.

The complexity of navigating all these possibilities is not because the game is as deep as Baldur's Gate 3. In fact, Illuvium is very grindy and hard to progress in IZ, OW, and Arena. There's a lot of time and mental energy you need to invest to be good at any of them, and for what? In the case of IZ, maybe a few bucks in fuel if you own T3+ land. In the case of OW, maybe a few extra holos or nicer illuvials - but that's a big maybe because there are a lot of moving parts tied to the RNG, too.

There's just nothing in the Illuvium experience that WARRANTS this level of complexity.

[buoyant rapids]

lets do this

[normal galleon]

Ask Aaron what they have planned already, switching to 1 fuel is a good start but more adjustments are needed. Unless it's some sort of secret, once we know we can pitch in more feedback

[buoyant rapids]

the proposal can just say fuse 3 fuels into 1 for use outside of IZ and let the team figure out the details

[normal galleon]

Would be better if we know what they have planned already. Maybe it's attacking the issue from a different angle.

[frigid mantle]

Can we also merge overworld stages in the meantime? Having stage 1 2 and 3 makes absolutely no sense from a gaming or lore(whatever little there is) perspective

[meager pebble]

I love how you guys come in here with loaded terms like 'makes absolutely no sense'.

so if having only one stage is what really makes sense... I wonder then, how would you implement different game difficulties? The only way I see it possible is if each region had different difficulties. And how would you handle it for the F2P players?

[frigid mantle]

Good questions. Sadly I'm done trying to figure out how to improve the game. I'll just give my feedback every once in a while, which I just did. Cheers

[waxen oracle]

Lets go! How many upvotes are needed?

[carmine mason]

25 in #1126838877429182506
upvotes here in #1020759212172775464 are just for gathering sentiment.

[gaunt jungle]

This is correct! Community Council reviews & monitors channels in the discord, and social media platforms for ideas & discussions that are gaining traction.
We then can reach out to the OP or prepare a proposal to be posted in #1126838877429182506 - this is where we have 2 weeks (14 days) to gain 25 upvotes to go to Council voting.

ICC & IMC are aware of this thread and discussions have been ongoing around this idea

@graceful axle any updates you can share? 3 fuels > 1 fuel

[graceful axle]

Will look into this tomorrow morning as it's 1AM and i ain't working on a Sunday night lol. Late night thoughts are:

I don't have anything particular to add here for now. We have talked about a number of IZ things in the council meetings as we brought up the feedback thread by @carmine mason. But i don't have anything concrete written down or remembered around fusing IZ fuels. 🤷‍♂️ While i do think it has merit to an extent, I haven't personally informed with the team yet, nor have I given it too much thought. (but i see Aaron responded right at the start of the thread so team knows?)

If we want to write up an IIP about this, lets do it though! Hit me up @cursive solstice or anyone else who wants to add their thoughts and I'll throw us all in a group to see whether we can give this a body to vote on. (8-10 hrs from now)

I'll see if i can reach out to the team this week and see how/when they would be ready for a proposal like this to pass. I understand that we all want to make decisions but if this proposal takes a significant amount of time, as it may impact not just the overworld but the website, all trading, backend etc. then we may want to weigh off the significance of the proposal to getting other features done.
I will first need the team's estimates as it "might be simpler than i make it out to be".
Not to demoralise you guys just yet 🙂
also @waxen oracle

[waxen oracle]

Thanks for follow up

[graceful axle]

Since you were the most recent proponent, ill direct this to you. I reached out to the team to get their take on the situation. This idea will touch on a number of aspects of the project. But ill take the site as an example.

As you know, we have beyond coming up which, if the proposal is passed, will require two leaderboards that are hopefully presented on the official site. We previously had one and so the site will require updates in anticipation of wave 3. [Deadline 21 november so it takes precedence]

Then, we have previously passed the proposal to remove the bonus Fuel system, which requires an overhaul of the fuel sales system on the fuel exchange. Also the site. And then finally this new idea would once more overhaul the fuel exchange but now change which fuels are presented and which fuel you can buy/sell.

Now, since im not on the team im taking the liberty of providing outsider estimates:

Each feature probably will take 1-2 months so by the end of december the web-team may have time to start working on other things. The team may want to change the marketplace filter system or require other fixes on the site by then as the site/marketplace has plenty of things that require a second look.

What i propose is the following:

Going off of my informal roadmap on community - based tasks only, the team will have time to work on their own ideas or this starting January. So there is no rush to get this to the team for now. By then, we will re-open this topic and see whether team/community sentiment has changed. Maybe the team will fix things themselves and maybe the upcoming three months have given further justification for the three fuels in the other games. If not, the proposal would reach council in February and would only delay implementation by at most a single month 👍

Next week i will see whether the bonus fuel and this idea could be combined through our new council-question sheet. If this is not possible, then i suggest we start writing this idea out on the day the bonus fuel system is removed. Is that fair?

[waxen oracle]

Sound great, many thanks. Also @cursive solstice started this thread, so I am tagging him aswell to know

[hazy stone]

The discussion revolves around simplifying the payment model in Illuvium Overworld (OW) by fusing the three current fuels into one currency, which proponents believe would enhance user experience and make onboarding easier for new players.

Pros
**Simplification: **Reduces complexity for new users who currently need to manage multiple currencies.
Less Development Work: Frees up resources for the team by eliminating the need to balance three fuels.
**User Experience: **Easier for players to understand and engage with the game, similar to other successful games that use a single premium currency.
Cons
Loss of Strategic Depth: Some players argue that different fuels create a more engaging and strategic gameplay experience.
Potential Devaluation: Concerns that this change could diminish the value of existing land plots tied to specific fuels.
Market Dynamics: The current system allows for arbitrage opportunities that might be lost with a single currency.
Overall, opinions are divided, with some advocating for the simplification while others emphasize the importance of maintaining the complexity for gameplay richness.

[carmine mason]

please stop spamming all feedback channels with chatgpt summaries... everyone interested in that can do it for himself.

[hazy stone]

Trying to be helpful.. what does posting pros and cons summaries hurt exactly?

[carmine mason]

it adds not really value.
Also chagpt misses often stuff which could be important and can lead to a false interpretation of what is going on.
And as i said, everyone who is too lazy to read can do exactly like you do. No need to clutter all post with that.

[hazy stone]

Does it now? What did it miss here? Clutter all posts, It's just one post amongst many.

[carmine mason]

you posted it in 4 threads until i pinged you to stop it

[hazy stone]

Yeah 3 different threads with 3 different summarys

And I didn't stop because you told me too bro

[carmine mason]

ok

[graceful axle]

We had a pretty clean ending to this thread where i informed Kibo and Ligyron how it would take significant time before this idea would be introduced in the ecosystem.

We agreed on reopening the conversation once the "Remove bonus fuel IIP" was finalised by the team.

Now people have to scroll up to find the status of the idea since it will probably be a while before this gets taken up. The summary doesnt detail the current status and only provides basic insight. So ideally this would be posted at the start of the community sentiment round when the team is ready to work on a new proposal.

This is not the agreed upon time to reopen the debate. Lets do that in a couple months (not official timeline. But let the starting time be roughly when the bonus fuel system is removed) 👍

[buoyant rapids]

@cursive solstice

[scarlet comet]

I'm sorry but what!? Random people who have almost no understanding of how ecosystem works are allowed to post whatever idle junk pops in to their head but @hazy stone isn't allowed to post a summary?

What difference does it make if it was generated by ChatGPT or a person. Would it be different iftheye read the posts and come up with their own summary?!? I don't see anything in the rules that mentions using ChatGPT/AI, there's no way you can consider a reasonable summary "spam".

[hazy stone]

Thanks Johnny as a council member I read through all feedback before making my vote but I am constantly trying to come up with ideas to bring value to the community and using chatgpt to make summaries for the community was one of them. @carmine mason had me questioning if it was helpful.

[scarlet comet]

I think it is, but even if it wasn't that doesn't mean it isn't a valid way to express yourself according to the rules of the forum.

[carmine mason]

if i remember right, i came online, saw fresh posts in feedback ideas channels and as always hoped in to see what's been discussed.
saw like 4 threads getting summarized by chatgpt in like 20 mins, some of them counting like 20 posts total written buy a discord member sending like 20 messages total last month. So i assumed this is going on for multiple other channels.

Besides me having seen summaries of chatgpt not really been accurate, left out important stuff because it's not mentioned multiple times in long textes or because of restrictions the user sets for the summary, The value of the message was for my understanding not really there, since everyone too lazy to read the whole discussion could do that at any given time himself and is responsible of himself using that tool to get "proper" info in his summary

Is it against discord rules to work with ai, no not that i know of.
Was it too harsh, maybe.
Was it too much to summarize a 20 post thread, maybe maybe not.

[scarlet comet]

But "accuracy" is not part of the forum rules. 90% of the stuff that is said here is not accurate, it's mostly peoples opinions expressed as fact. A lot of the time ill-informed opinion.

[carmine mason]

fair enough.
But that's also their opinion stated, that's also part of the reason this discord here, if its a wrong or a right opinion in your opinion ( 😄 )
Using chatgpt to summarize is not his opinion stated but rather saying all those people sadi xyz.

[scarlet comet]

But that's not a rule. As a mod your job is to enforce the rules. As a mod if you say "please stop" it isn't just "my personal opinion is that you should stop" it comes with the weight of your moderator status and the implication that something will be done about it.

If you think a council member shouldn't be posting poor summaries, that's a different thing altogether. Something you should raise in governance.

[carmine mason]

spaming is not allowed.
As stated above i considered it as spam.
Might be wrong. I guess some woudl agree and some not. (or i'm just crazy and am the only one)

[scarlet comet]

I mean I dispute the idea that these posts are not useful and reasonably accurate (ChatGPT is highly unlikely to have any bias towards specific Illuvium matters, and my experience tells me the newer models do a FAR better job of summarizing a topic fairly than most people)

But even if they are not accurate how can posting a thread specific message in a handful of threads be considered spam?

Anyway whatever, talking way too much on a small thing. Lets all go look at those ETH tickers climbing higher by the minute.

[frigid mantle]

Lol one guy trying to be helpful so that people dont vote him off now that he's been called out, and another guy who has miserably failed in this project and left after calling everyone delusional, now get together to question a simple and polite request made by a mod. A mod who has been more helpful than both of them altogether for years now. Lovely

[hazy stone]

Dr Spoon is definitely a great mod 👍

[graceful axle]

@cursive solstice @waxen oracle just getting back to you: This update adds the fuel merging and removes bonus fuel. 👍 told ya it would happen in and or around february! informal roadmap ftw.