The Art of Optimization: Liberating the Gloves Slot

I think ice boxes should always provide bait points in addition to their original rewards. The cosmetics and raffles essentially share the primary currency, which traces back to bait points.

Currently, raffles have a weekly limit, and the reward pool is also limited by character level. Therefore, there seems to be no reason to make bait points difficult to obtain for low-level characters.

At higher levels, clearing BPQ five times is more than sufficient to obtain 7 blue coins, along with over 500 yellow coins. This can be accomplished in less than an hour of BPQ for a week's worth. The only artificial time gate is the time spent afk fishing.

The observed drop rate for the current raffles also appears to be less favorable compared to the past when it used to be one raffle per day. In the past, I could get more than two chairs and several pouches within a week or two, amounting to an average of about 300-500mil worth of rewards for two characters by the end of the event.

It seems that the development team is becoming cautious about the game being optimised for maximum profits and gradually shifting the game towards requiring optimisation to avoid losing mesos at lower levels.

 

Sorry, no screenshots prepared for this entry.

Tried farming DGP for around 2hrs and had more than 50 equip drops but no 6/2 blouse. Don’t feel the need for any further upgrades so I’ll stop.

Can’t think of any goals that is reasonably achievable within my limited play time and still have what I feel is meaningful progress, in terms of gears and/or meso.

Previously, T10 ring took around 3 months and got me around 700mil and a 10 all stats ring.

FM challenge took around 1.5 months and got me 2bil, in which I was able to use the meso to buy a 2/4 goggles and a 9wa cape. Currently sitting at 1.2bil.

My +5 dex upgrade took around 1.5 months and got me a few decent pieces of gears, like 18/2 and 19/0 skirt, and a 13 dex earrings, on top of the above goggles and cape, plus a couple of fun scrolling moments.

The summer event is meh. I think it’s more worth spending the time in consistent farming, over multiple characters for the raffles. Have gotten the 3 all stats ring for Shadower, so don’t feel the need to earn points anymore. I still have enough coins for cosmetic coupons so I’ll probably change my Shadower’s face.

Market situation is meh. Decided to spend 150mil for some fun scrolling session on items like earrings, gloves, goggles and skirts before I end this journey and didn’t went quite well. It was worth a shot.

Currently I have:
50mil meso
1.2bil meso in reserves
2/3 str/dex spectrum goggles
7wa pink adv cape
lost motivations

Overall, I’ve already achieved what I wanted for this journey and I’m pretty happy about it. So I’ll officially end this journal.

Thanks for reading!

 

Bonus read!

Regarding the impact of the ML’s HP challenge on the server's population, here are my thoughts.

Personally, I believe that the HP challenge primarily serves as assurance for players who were hesitant to play the server due to concerns about "ruining" their characters with insufficient HP to participate in contents without HP washing. While the HP challenge may encourage these players to play, I have reservations about how many will persist long enough to complete the full HP challenge up to lv180.

Those willing to settle for the HP challenge often lean toward the casual end of the spectrum, and reaching 4th job can already be a significant challenge for them. It's likely that over 80% of them may leave before even reaching lv100 for the first HP challenge.

Another group of players comprises those with high-level unwashed characters, including both existing players and returning ones. Returning players might stay for a while to participate in the HP challenge but could eventually encounter different challenges related to sustaining their characters and upgrading gear in the current state of economy. A small percentage might find motivation to progress further after "fixing" their characters, but a substantial portion may leave when they perceive that they cannot keep up with the economy. These are the players who once abandoned their unwashed characters and may very well do so again due to the difficulty of progression for them.

Non-casual players typically would not consider the HP challenge as a means to supplement their HP, so these groups remain mostly unaffected when it comes to staying in the server.


In summary,

while the HP challenge may attract players in the short term, many of those who initially embrace it may not stay because the main challenges in the game still revolve around leveling and acquiring gear, which can be difficult for more casual players to keep up with in the current state of economy. It's highly probable that a significant portion of players who initially intend to engage in the HP challenge won't even reach lv100 for the first challenge.

In essence, there is no fundamental alteration to the server from the early game to reaching the 4th job. So, the end result will likely revert to the current state within months.

 

Felt like there were some loose ends I would like to tie up.
So here's another wrap up update.





Sold both my 2/3 goggles and 7wa cape at 120mil and 550mil meso.
Which topped up my reserves to around 1.853bil after tax.



Also had some other couple of sales, like this Maple Claw from the FM challenge.

Cleared my remaining three CSS20 scrolls that I bought at 8mil meso each, and two CSS3 that I had gotten from raffles.





Also a couple of Polearm Att 30% scrolls. Before the event, I had acquired more than 60 of them at 100k-500k meso each. Now they're flying off the shelves at 900k meso each, and got me back the meso I've spent after more than 25.



There were also a couple of undisclosed Coorie FM transactions, together with more Polearm scrolls, totalling to about 100mil meso of profits, and quickly topped my reserves back to 2bil meso.



Decided to use some of my Polearm Att 30% scrolls on my previously obtained PSB from raffles but it boomed.



Unhappy with the PSB result, continued to use more on a clean 87wa Maple Karstan I had obtained during the Anni Event.

Passed 2x30% initially, then passed 2/4 60%, finished off with another passed 30%.
Not sure how much this would fetch.



With my remaining 50mil spending meso, I had decided to scroll another DEX bathrobe as I was unsatisfied with the previous 19 DEX.

Managed to create another 22 DEX and I am very happy with it.

That doesn't mean I'm gona start playing my pewpew again because see what I've prepared...



Oh yeah, a new set of purple-text crossbows. Wonder which job it is?

And lastly, I levelled my Bishop to lv180, and Shadower to lv155, leaving me at a very satisfying spot to truly conclude this journal. Changed my Shadower's face as well.

Here's the clean stats without any event items:



Am contemplating whether to wash out my INT, but not without a new goal first for Shadower which I have none for now.

Thanks once again for reading.