Personally I enjoy the process of optimising my time by crafting one set of things while gathering resources for the next, I see that as a fun part of progressing through the game.
As some of you have pointed out the economy is at the heart of this, with decisions being made over whether to crafting something yourself or buy it being interesting at all levels. I would say that applies to basic tools as well as more advanced things.
There are a couple of upcoming mechanics which will feed into this: Firstly progression will add skills that reduce crafting time. Secondly there are Engines, which are add-ons to machines which increase the power of the machine. Some recipes will need a certain amount of power to be able to be crafted, but also using a machine with high power will make recipes craft faster. The idea behind these mechanics is to allow the specialised crafter to have advantages in time (and therefore fuel) over someone who has specialised in other areas, so they can produce more items quicker and cheaper, and make money selling them.
There are actually several layers of problems with the current time delay system. First, I generally use copper hammers, however, the added advantage of upgrading to iron is sometimes ok, iron is less plentiful, but the crafting takes approximately the same time. In the case of gold or silver hammers, the wait time and resource cost are considerably more expensive. Currently it takes me an average of one stack of copper hammers to find a gold vein. If I also collect copper and coal while I am at it, then this is at least somewhat synergistic. However, a gold hammer only lasts marginally longer than an iron hammer, but takes considerably longer to fabricate and has a significantly higher material cost. This additional cost is compunded with silver, since it requires not just silver and iron, but also a multi stage crafting process.The long crafting times and the expanded materials list actually make gold hammer considerably less valuable than iron, because the additional effort significantly outweighs any gains.
Making the durability reflect at least a major portion of the added difficulty, resource gathering, infrastructure needs, and crafting time would go a long way toward making the post iron equipment viable. Just like adding middle stages in real production does not add a 1 to 1 cost increase, the value of these multi-stage, multi-resource crafted items should not have such a linear durability/usefulness curve.
A gold hammer, however, does allow you to mine gems, and a silver hammer allows you to mine hard coal. There are more gains there, not just speed of mining and durability.
As was responded, you are forgetting to account for the fact that Iron cannot mine hard coal or gems. Which increases the value of silver and gold hammers. But also I donât see why complain. A gold hammer lasts me a solid 3-4 days of mining. Why? Because I donât mine with it unless I find gems. Once you have a plentiful supply of iron you upgrade to iron wares since copper is obsolete to you. You continue to use that iron forever until you run across something that needs silver or gold, you then take our the silver or gold, use it, then put it away and take out your iron again.
The point of silver and gold items lasting as long as they do is because they are not meant to become total replacements to iron or copper tools. They are meant to be used wisely, you spend 30 min making a stack of iron so you can mine for days with it, while you spend 30 min making 1 gold hammer so you can mine the same amount of time, but wisely. Lets put it another way, you are a painter. And you have your âeverydayâ paint and your âgoodâ paint. Now your good paint costs say $100 to get, while your everyday paint is $1. To be recognized, like many painters want, you decide to make a portfolio by making nice paintings to present, but not sell. Intelligently, you would use your everyday paint to make the exhibition paintings, and when you get a commission you use your good paint. It would be foolish to waste your good paint for a portfolio piece, because then you have none left when a commission comes around. The same principle applies to the tools as they are designed now (and as I hope they continue to be designed). Gold and silver tools are not meant to be used abundantly, they are meant to be used wisely, like the good paint.
The only âexclusionâ from all this is obviously the titanium tools. Which are obviously the best (at the moment) in both durability and functionality, which is probably why the material is so rare to attain.
I know, but I also know that in the final product titanium is suppose to be better. Just trying to make Yamateh understand that gold and silver tools take longer to make because they are special tools, not common ones. And not because of the material cost, but because of function. In other games silver and gold tools have less durability than other tools, but are incredibly important to have and expensive. We should consider ourselves lucky that they at least last longer than other tools(even if by a little) and actually bring more advantages than just being able to break higher tier blocks.
When you enter a mine most of what you see used are iron and steel tools. But when it comes to specialized digging (like say diamonds) more specific tools are used that last significantly less than the standard iron or steel tool, but unlike those tools they do less damage to what you are mining. Another analogy to use is drilling tips in production. Steel or titanium tips are used for almost everything, but once in a while you need to use diamond tips because the wear that will happen to the steel or titanium tip is massive. And in an effort to maximize the steel or titanium tip, you use the diamond tip for that work. Diamond tips donât really last that long either, but they are incredibly useful at drilling certain materials, and they will last just as long drilling those specific materials as the steel or titanium do drilling their specific materials (not really, there are margins and really complex equations that actually go into it, but the life expectancy for a steel drill is roughly the same as a diamond drill, obviously so long as they drill their respective materials)