Topic
Loam - once a valued commodity, now a worthless bag-filler?
With the changes to urth blocks, I find myself digging more loam than I can use. I know there is some proportion used in blockmaking, and some for projects but I can't help but think it's now a junk item.
Anyone else?
Replies
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I agree. There's too much of it. I've tried selling them in the Auctions, but they don't sell. Now I just give them away.
Perhaps they will be valuable again when (hopefully many) new players enter the game and will want to expand their houses. - God I hate loam.
- I was under the impression that donating and vendors would prevent anything worthless.
- I donated 4k loam yesterday - will keep saving it up to donate from now on :) Get so much for free (loam) when gardening!
- and need a lot of dirts for all the homestreet projects :(
- we need a dirt upgrade card - get x percent more dirt and less loam per digdigdig
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What's funny is levelling up soil appreciation gives you more loam.
The problem is that loam -replaces- dirt in a dig. Loam should instead be an added bonus, but dirt is always dug each time regardless. - I ended up unlearning the top levels of Soil Appreciation in the hopes of getting less loam. My loam overflow isn't as bad as it used to be, but it would be great if it was a bonus rather than a replacement, as Lorraine suggests.
- @Lorraine I agree. At 75 dirt per crop plot restoration, I find myself needing dirt much more than loam.
- Yes, the higher level skill now seems to be a hindrance since loam isn't really used for much. Hopefully, they balance this out at some point. Tempted now to unlearn SA5 at least...but suspect we'll eventually need it...the question is when...it might be worth that 9+ day relearning penalty just to get more dirt than loam for now.
- I noticed that something was off, too - I have five large plots in my backyard, and what with the restoration, I actually managed to run out of earth and still have quite a bit of loam left.
- My only use for loam now is donations, really...
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I didn't play around with blockmakers much when they had the A AA AAA and Brick blocks, because I didn't figure I'd never use them (street projects weren't around, etc etc), so I don't remember the recipes. Because those blocks came in different tiers, they had different balances of earth vs loam and loam I'm guessing was quite valuable on the higher grade blocks.
Now that they removed most of those recipes, leaving us with just one unified block, it gives loam very little use outside of that one recipe. Earth is ultimately what winds up being used in all the garden projects.
Honestly, they should cut the earth cost in garden restoration quite a bit and add in a significant loam requirement, especially if they don't intend to change the current dirt pile/soil appreciation yield system. -
Even when it is worth selling, people will sell it for under vendor price like they do about everything else.
>.>
<.<
-.- - Earth is fine and useful and sometimes runs out under the demands of crop bed renewal, loam I just stack up till it's worth dumping in the round file for img.
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That's the problem Benzyl. Earth is needed too much, Loam needed way too little. Thing is, with SA5 you get loam more often than you get earth from a dirt pile, and the two rewards are currently mutually exclusive. This makes it very tough to keep up with the garden restoration requirements, let alone making Urth blocks.
Also, loam, by definition, should be richer, rarer, and more valuable than standard dirt. Currently, it's the opposite in terms of how those items are used in gameplay atm. - This is a definite problem; add more loam quantities in items, such as a more equal loam:dirt for urth block ingredients.
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Loam might be nice to allow you to upgrade the quality/size of your garden or herb plots.
Might as well put it to use. - It is high in minerals, vitamins and fiber. Why can't we eat it?
- Id eat mine. Often. MMMM LOAMS.
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I unlearned the top two Soil Appreciations so I wouldn't get as much loam.
Takes a little longer to dig but significantly less loam. - Tool vendor buys it for 8 currants, i think.
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*ssshhhhh*
we werent supposed to talk about that~ - It'd be nice if large gardens took 50 earth and 25 loam to restore, instead of 75 earth.
- Start using it for the machine badges at other people's houses and stuff sheesh peoples!
- i have found the giants like it quitw a bit
- I think they made a change to loam received from gardening. I did my 5 large plots this morning and no loam! I did get a fuel cell and a ruby and that's the first time i got either of those from gardening!
- Yeah I got a fuel cell and ruby this morning too. A very nice surprise indeed
- Anyone who doesn't want loam is welcome to donate it to me. :)
- my only issue is when i'm digging for urths, I never get enough. instead a ton of loam...
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Because higher level Soil Appreciation skill gives a greater chance of getting loam instead of Earth, it is probably a bad thing right now. I bought quite a bit of earth at what I thought was a reasonable price of around 60c per lump (20 times it's list value) but for some reason people are selling loam at auction for 5c (please take note you can sell it to most vendors for 6c or the tool vendor for 8c).
As Lorraine said, the real solution is to change the cost of fixing gardens to have much less earth and to include loam (perhaps get rid of the earth entirely). Another possibility would be a way to use a high level Soil Appreciation skill to extract earth from loam - maybe using a shovel (2 energy + 1 loam + 1 unit of shovel wear + 1 second = 4 earth would be less than generous but people would be doing it).
Alternatively they could just make loam useful for something in the quantities it is generated. - +1 to making loam the primary ingredient for restoring gardening plots (it's what you would use in a real garden anyway, see loam).
- I'm sticking mine in an SDB because I just *know* that if I get rid of it all, a Really Cool Thing that requires lots of loam will be introduced. See also, donating all my Planks before Furnituremaking was introduced.
- I agree with Batsgirl. Store it up just in case of...something.
- you all can be happy now...your loam has a use!
- @phelps.mike Oh? Do tell! :D
- Change log beat him to it, Pascale. =) "Restoration projects for gardens now require more loam; high-level herbalism now drops less loam (fuel cells and rubies instead?!) — bonusy!"
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What Changelog said! Watering, planting and clearing of herb plots now results in less loam bonuses (but more rubies and fuel cells), and restoration of all gardens now requires Loam instead of Guano.
Thanks for your feedback as always! - Thanks Mart!
- Love the change from guano to loam. :)
- Off to re-learn Soil Appreciation 4 and 5. Thanks, Tiny Speck!
- Awesome, thanks!
- I love that Tiny Speck is so responsive to feedback! yay for a great change :)
- Whoa, thanks for the change, especially from guano to loam....and oh, goodie... Rooooobbbbbbieeeeees!! :D
- Dude, awesome! Thanks for the fix, TS - you guys are great.
- TS works in mysterious ways.. lol
- Yessssssssssssssssss. Thank you!
- Yippee!
- Loam instead of guano?? Oh THANK YOU~! Feeding batterflys is such a pain!
- So grateful for the change. Still wish digging dirt piles would give more urth on average. Got 12 urth and 8 loam from digging two piles 5x each :(
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So happy to have a loam-sink again.
Additionally happy to have insanely responsive developers, a well as rubies and fuel cells... - Way better now ~Thank You! I think it's awesome how awesome our Awesomers are! =)