Ive been running IMF, and noticed a similar change.
The crystals havent changed, but orbs have most likely decreased as listed here.

Fire crystals got a global shift upon arcade redux part 1, which you may have missed all the threads complaining about radiants.

no its not just you the orbs are soooooooo hard to find now i mean there 99% that u cant and 1% you can

And you dont get shinings in JK

Bopp? Zeddy? Please help this poor child. ^^^^^^

Loads-Of-Money and Vetius, the drop rates may have been adjusted way down. It's hard to get reliable data on such changes from week to week, without having an army of players carefully monitoring their drop rates.

It seems to me that Three Rings has designed the orb/fire crystal system so that crafting and heating are still tied to energy, but in a flexible way. Three Rings can fine-tune the drop rates at any time, to alter the economics of the game slightly. This probably helps them stabilize revenue or something.

Anyway, there is good news. While you are running RJP (or whatever) looking for orbs, you are also earning crowns. Those crowns can be traded for energy, which can be traded for orbs. So, even if you can't predict when you're going to find enough orbs, you can predict pretty well when you're going to be able to buy enough orbs.

I've found six so far, so I was able to make both Silversix and Blackhawk. They're definitely harder to find, but I'm not starved for them anymore.