One problem is that if the crown price of energy hits the roof, the crafting costs for 5** weapons will hit the roof.
The other big problem is that lets say you find or buy the recipe of your desired 5* weapon (but you don't have the 4* prerequisite weapon for this), before you could simply trade one from someone who is selling it. Now, you MUST make the 4* (and probably 3* versions etc) yourself.

3*
Old Craft Cost==========New Craft Cost
5500c + 1000c + 100EN ~ 4000c + 1000c + 200 EN

Crowns:Energy===Cost + Recipe======Cost - Recipe
==============Old=====New======Old====New
4000c:100EN====10500c ~ 13000c====5000c ~ 9000c
5000c:100EN====11500c ~ 15000c====6000c ~ 11000c
6000c:100EN====12500c ~ 17000c====7000c ~ 13000c
7000c:100EN====13500c ~ 19000c====8000c ~ 15000c

4*
Old Craft Cost==========New Craft Cost
15000c + 2500c + 200EN ~ 10000c + 2500c + 400 EN

Crowns:Energy===Cost + Recipe======Cost - Recipe
==============Old=====New======Old====New
4000c:100EN====25500c ~ 28500c====10500c ~ 18500c
5000c:100EN====27500c ~ 32500c ====12500c ~ 22500c
6000c:100EN====29500c ~ 36500c ====14500c ~ 26500c
7000c:100EN====31500c ~ 40500c ====16500c ~ 30500c

5*
Old Craft Cost==========New Craft Cost
45000c + 5000c + 300EN ~ 25000c + 5000c + 800 EN

Crowns:Energy===Cost + Recipe======Cost - Recipe
==============Old=====New======Old====New
4000c:100EN====62000c ~ 62000c====17000c ~ 37000c
5000c:100EN====65000c ~ 70000c====20000c ~ 45000c
6000c:100EN====68000c ~ 78000c====23000c ~ 53000c
7000c:100EN====71000c ~ 86000c====26000c ~ 61000c

Consider 4* + Old system
Needed 200 CE, But patiently saving 100 ME, means you only need to buy 100 CE
So even if the Crown to CE market is very expensive, you only needed 100 CE of it.

Consider 4* + New system
Needs 400 CE, But patiently saving 100 ME, means you need to buy 300 CE
Now if the Crown to CE market is very expensive, you need 300 CE, whch would be problematic.

It is never the same cost. It is more expensive in every situation.

As mentioned by other posters: It only looks roughly the same initially, at the current exchange rate, and only for that item. Truthfully, it's much more expensive because CE will invariably rise in price (of crowns), and now that 4* items cannot be sold (and 3* items cannot be pre-leveled), the cost of making a 5* item really forcibly includes the cost of making 3* and 4* items- all three of which, mind you, have had CE costs boosted tremendously.

Right now there is an excess of CE, because a lot of players were hoarding it to buy premade 5* items or to craft items to sell. That suddenly isn't true. And a lot of people that previously planned on buying CE to craft with it suddenly stopped, since CE crafting requirements suddenly jumped. Thus, CE really isn't being used in game right now, due to both the lack of players online (boycotters) and to people waiting for some kind of solution to this before crafting (demand for CE).

However, IF this isn't rolled back, and IF people still choose to play, you can definitely expect to see CE prices for crowns jump, especially if the auction houses fees stay as ridiculous as they are (failing as a cr sink since no one wants to lose 10% of their net assets).

There's a flaw in you calculations, you're making ce = crowns an absolute equality, while in reality, crowns are ""free"", and ce is worth cash.
Someone somewhere spent $3 to $4 for the 5* item you're now wearing.
The crowns are variable as how you get them.

Also, now that ce is more important to crafting, the ce prices are going to go higher and higher.
And crowns are worth less and less, so there is no reason for selling ce in the market.
My advice: Hoard as much ce as you can now.

I appreciate you guys running these numbers. I know the market fluctuates, but I was curious all the same.

• Tsuyoi
  However, IF this isn't rolled back, and IF people still choose to play, you can definitely expect to see CE prices for crowns jump, especially if the auction houses fees stay as ridiculous as they are (failing as a cr sink since no one wants to lose 10% of their net assets).

• Tsuyoi
  no matter how you calculate it, ce to cr or cr to ce, no matter what the energy market is, be it 4k cr for 100ce or 8k cr for 100ce, THE TOTAL CASH spent on the game by all collective players will have to just about triple for the same number of people to get the same number of 5* equips as before. Right now that won't be that obvious, since there's still a huge pool of CE in players banks in the game. But once that runs out, unless people magically start spending 3x more real money on this game than they did before, there will be far less ce to go around, and far less 5* items.

Your posts have a very "sky is falling" attitude with them, and a sense of illogicalness as well.

To address the first post I quoted, you aren't even correct in that. The auction house is doing very successfully even though it's not really as efficient as it should be, and people are putting up their items for sale just fine, even if they have to lose 10% of their item value. I don't see it failing as a crown sink right now, it's actually the opposite.

With the second, I don't see how the number of 5* equips in the game HAS to be the same. Pre-update, the amount of 5* was so much that people could have 5* armor+hat AND 5* armor+hat and not see that as "expensive". It's hilarious to actually see a Vog Cub outfit with a Skolver costumer over it, and it's even more funny that plenty have done that (even I wanted to and could eventually in a week). Therefore, post-update of course will have less 5* crafts created, and I fail to see how that's a bad thing, especially if the main suspicion that OOO just wants to artifically extend the time it reaches their assumed endgame of beating Vanaduke is true.

Aw man! I just got jipped! Before the patch, I bought a Vog Cap recipe for 45k. I was going to craft it for 300CE and 5000c, once I get the dough, but now they raised it to 800CE?! I want my 20k back!

balticbear
There is nothing illogical or alarmist about saying that CE prices will rise or that people will have to pay significantly more cash for the game to remain somewhat like it is.

*sigh* Just because I disagreed with a part of his post doesn't mean I disagreed with ALL of it. Read what I posted again; I did not contest that CE prices will rise or people will have to pay more real money to get what they wanted before.

I'm only criticizing his claims that:

1. The auction house is unsuccessful. Its doesn't matter what you think the Auction House will look like in the future, as I'm disputing his claim that it won't be used since "no one wants to lose 10% of their net assets". We obviously see that's wrong.
2. There NEEDS to be the same ratio as 5*-per-player after the update. If we were at the point where many 5* users could use their EXTRA 5* equipment as COSTUMES without any issues, the idea of there being a balanced amount of S-Class items in the past is inaccurate.

Please people, when replying to my post, critique only the things I say, not what you feel like I'm saying.

Sure, for a free-player who is content with crafting each line once, costs are barely nudged upward. That's fine for me. However, for cash players who buy all their CE and earn crowns in dungeons (and I believe a substantial portion of the playerbase prefers to keep the currencies separate like that, as well, of course, as those who buy all their CE with cash and also sell some of it for extra crowns. Players who occasionally supplement their CE with cash but mostly buy it with crowns are more-or-less in the same boat as free players, except their CE supplement goes away a lot faster now.) Basically, for all the crying that this update hurts free players... as a free player I gotta say, I don't feel hurt. It hurts people who were in the crafting business, because of the 4*/5* thing, but nick recently announced there will be an adjustment to that, so, wait for it. The crafting costs, however, really really hurt cash players.
Hurting the paying customers was probably not the smartest choice.

Now, the higher crafting cost makes it more expensive to craft -multiple- of the same item, meaning it's now extremely costly to replace your Gran Faust with a UV Gran Faust and so on (which pretty much everyone is going to want to do eventually, for whatever their favorite 5* gear is, maybe more than once if they first get an affordable 'low' or 'medium' UV and later a 'very high' or 'maximum!') That's fine... I'm sure that was intentional to make those UV 5* weapons rarer and more expensive. Well and good, but it would have been far, far better to increase the -crown- cost of crafting than the CE cost. Increasing the CE cost to multiply three rings income on gear that every player is seeking to get into the end-game content... that just smacks of sheer profiteering and a lot less of game balance. Cut the auction house take back and get some of the needed crown sink from crafting costs, and return the CE cost to what it was. That's still ... 2x weapon, armor, helmet, shield... 5 bucks a pop -just- for the last stage in crafting for each end game character. Never mind the previous parts of crafting, the gate energy to collect materials, alternate weapons and extra slots and tokens... 5 bucks -minimum- to be an end game character, and now it's been pushed up to over $20 to be a minimally viable endgame character -in addition- to the cost of playtime (gates). Sheeesh.