This seems more like an issue of the balancing team at work....
<Possible MA conclusion> The crafting system was unchecked for a long time, and needed a tweak:
*PROBLEM- Crafted items selling at lower than the cost to manufacture.
* Older players manipulating the prices, selling cheaper than manufacturing costs, forcing the little guy out...
This is fine in a normal economy when the bigger business can make more items cheaper, by gathering the materials in a larger amount, saving money manufacturing in larger amounts. This would be crafting.
However when the item gets sold at under the cost to manufacture, the general philosophy is to regain some of the money back, in order to click the BP again... maybe resulting in a BP drop, a global, or a HOF.... and somehow making up in volume. This would be gambling, and result in heavy depositing to stay afloat. <MA would love you>
-In all fairness... how a player spends their PED's is their choice, and if they want to buy market share with forcing out the competition, that's just business....
-But, it does reduce the amount of competition, and if a new crafter emerges on the scene, the new player may keep the prices aligned with the costs of production, or reduce them for a "fast" sale. <more times than not, a fast sale is chosen>
-we cannot blame the new guy, they may not know how to price a item with the MU of materials, and the cost of success... some things have to be learned the hard way, and most just use the cheapest sale price -1.
*PROBLEM- Lower MU of crafted items, and a negative flow sale price, will mean less players will attempt to click the BP. especially if the BP contains high MU materials, and hard to make components.
The real question is.... Who owns the Blue Prints? does MA own them, or is there a residual given to the BP's home planet for each use?
-With a high chance of success, and a low MU of a finished item, players simply choose to make the item themselves instead of purchasing from the AU. Or, more gamblers run the print, and flood the market till the MU is zero.
-High MU materials deter players from attempting BP's, without good reason... ex. who in their right mind would make a F-104 <5 Dunkel Plastic for a 66 PED TT item, each would have a 500 PED MU... each tier 0 has a MU of +11.57> (Most of the f-104's in game now were old Enmatter finders switched after the mining VU.)
-If the planet partner is not getting the projected / promised revenue from the BP's, they may complain, and cause adjustment to happen <maybe the case now>
-PP's rules, and conduct are secret. There is whats posted, and there is what takes place.
ex. David from Arkadia had to be asked in an interview "with the new Treasure hunting arriving on Arkadia, why does RockTropia have it advertised on their forums as a coming attraction?"
ex. Arkadia released its line of weapons, and they instantly replace all of the tired, old, uneconomical weapons on Calypso. The AU gets flooded, and nobody cares about a Karma Killer, or the like. Someone complained.... Something happened.... The weapons were "rebalanced" huge gaps made, and brand new Calypso <not shared> models were released, making Calypso once again #1... then 1 PED TT event weapons get released, sealing the deal. The new PP content promises new weapons from ARK to fill in the gaps created. But how long will they last?
- We dont know enough about the PP's, and the balancing systems in game
*PROBLEM- Less players crafting will cause the materials market to drop significantly
At some point, players will buy cheap materials speculating on a "new" fix. and the prices will level out, the more players complain in forum, the lower they can get. To some players this would be by design. Once again, its a free market dynamic, and speculation is not illegal. Market manipulation is, but incredibly hard to prove, and even harder to deal with fairly.
*PROBLEM- 100% condition gambles... -Quantity is crafting- -Condition is Gambling-
- If the slider is on 100% condition, the the end result has nothing to do with the name of the BP, its all about the residue, globals, and BP drops. ex. 5k clicks of RE-102 for residue
- If the slider is on Quantity, the players wants the finished product, at a reasonable cost for sale. The old formula had an average 30% success rate, so materials x3 +about 60% <avg> of the value of the finished product in residue.
Grinding BP's is a part of the game, and needed for discoveries... However how is grinding a useless BP for residue a part of the game? where does the residue come from? Your gains are from someone's losses... but it shows that there is some connection with all of the BP's, not an individual pool <hard to prove either way>.
**There are too many things going on behind the scenes, and too much speculation to know exactly what is happening, or to warn everyone off of crafting. I still see large condition HOF's rolling, and BP grinders have not stopped.... It seems the only thing that has stopped is the quantity +Res Clicker. MU's of materials will drop, MU's of items will rise, but at some point it will all level out.
The only two things we Know for certain:
There is someone behind the scenes working, and we hope they know what they are doing
Its expensive testing with trial and error.
Goodluck