Catalyst Recipes | Patreon Poll #50

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Hey Patrons!

In this poll I’d like your opinion on alchemical catalysts. Design-wise they come from a time when any given combination of items could only have one recipe output, and energy was a static resource that couldn’t be produced by sacrificing consumables. Both of those aren’t the case anymore though, which leaves catalysts feeling a bit like unnecessary complexity. I’m curious what your preferences are when it comes to potentially removing them from the alchemy system.

The results of this poll will help me determine what place alchemical catalysts should have in the alchemy system.

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Please vote for all the options that you like, not just for your one favourite! I allow multiple votes as it means that a higher proportion of people will end up voting for the winning choice.

All patrons are encouraged to share their opinion by commenting and voting, but currently only the votes from Golden+ Supporters are counted when determining a poll winner. Votes from Shattered Supporters are worth double!

Keep catalysts as they are

Fairly simple, this option would keep catalysts largely as they are, including the existing recipes for most elixirs, brews, and spells.

Remove catalysts entirely

This would streamline the process of higher-end alchemy by replacing catalysts with alchemical energy in most recipes. A few recipes might get changed up a little more, but I’m largely confident that I can still make everything consistent while removing catalysts from the alchemy process entirely. Here’s what might happen to brews, elixir, and spell recipes:

• Alchemize might change to require any scroll + any potion.
• Recipes that require specific items (boss items, honeypots, etc.) instead of catalysts would be unchanged.
• All other recipes would have the catalyst removed, and have energy cost increased by around 5-10, depending on balancing.
• Aqua blast might get turned into a brew (quantity unchanged) to thematically fit its only ingredient being a potion.
• Feather fall might become an elixir (quantity unchanged) for the same reason as above.

This would simplify the process of making a lot of higher-end recipes, hopefully making them a bit more accessible. Even the guidebook itself would be able to be simplified, with the entire page on catalysts removed. Players would also largely be able to just chuck in potions or scrolls to see what they might make, rather than having to put in multiple items for most higher-end recipes.

Remove catalysts from recipes only

A third option that’s a bit of a compromise. This would still streamline alchemy like the second option, but also keep catalysts around as their own recipe for people who want to use their effect directly. The recipe would likely change to be any potion + a seed and any scroll + a stone, and the output might be renamed to ‘unstable brew’ and ‘unstable spell’ or similar. This would mean that people who want a random potion/scroll effect would still be able to get one.