Gems "worthless" lategame

[Mr.M]

I actually wanted to post about this earlier but forgot it all the time - why the heck do gems become so worthless after the new world diamonds appear? That barely makes any sense

Their value drops almost to the price of grain, fish etc... I would expect them to be still AT LEAST 4, since most of the new world gems are in ♥♥♥♥♥♥ provinces anyway

Thoughts on this?

[tonypa]

Everyone wants new shinier stones. Gems are so yesteryear, and so not shiny.

[Erik_Rex]

all events that changes prices are "random", there is no garantee that "New world diamonds" will trigger.

[Mr.M]

https://eu4.paradoxwikis.com/Price_Change_events#New_World_Diamonds

[Pozz]

Gems are truly outrageous!

[Mr.M]

Originally posted by Pozz:

Gems are truly outrageous!

Not what i had in mind, but yes.

"Taric gay, Taric nice ass" - what i tend to say when i get him ( ͡° ͜ʖ ͡°)

[Venboven]

I know this is an ancient thread, but yeah gems really suck late game. I wish they upped their value from 5 to start with, and then by late game they would decrease to 4. That would at least put them in the "somewhat valuable" category.

[Zorlond]

Matches the real world. Gems were just a bit of shiny for the stupid-rich to have, they had no use or purpose beyond that. The only reason diamonds got mainstream is because of the earliest days of advertising were so successful they created an industry out of nothing. And they only maintain their prices through fake scarcity.

[Venboven]

Originally posted by Zorlond:

Matches the real world. Gems were just a bit of shiny for the stupid-rich to have, they had no use or purpose beyond that. The only reason diamonds got mainstream is because of the earliest days of advertising were so successful they created an industry out of nothing. And they only maintain their prices through fake scarcity.

Just because gems had no physical value to things like industry doesn't mean they didn't have value in general. Gold is a useless metal which we only just recently started utilizing in small amounts in computer chips and wiring. In EU4's timeframe, gold had no industrial purpose at all. But yet it was HIGHLY valuable. Same thing for gems. Both gold and gems are pretty useless when considered literally, but people like shiny things, and so they are valuable.

Considering that only a couple of provinces in the game even produce gems in the first place, their value by scarcity alone should be justifiably increased. And yes, gems were scarce and rare back then. With modern mining, we know that some gemstones like diamonds aren't as rare as they used to be, but yet they stay overpriced because of deceptive media and industry norms. However, you have to remember that in EU4's timeframe, diamonds were still considered very rare. And you are also completely forgetting that "gems" represents a plethora of many many different rare gemstones. Many are still rare today.

[Zorlond]

Originally posted by Venboven:

Just because gems had no physical value to things like industry doesn't mean they didn't have value in general. Gold is a useless metal which we only just recently started utilizing in small amounts in computer chips and wiring. In EU4's timeframe, gold had no industrial purpose at all. But yet it was HIGHLY valuable. Same thing for gems. Both gold and gems are pretty useless when considered literally, but people like shiny things, and so they are valuable.

Sorry, flawed analogy. Gold had a use, it was the perfect material to make money out of, precisely because industry had no use for it, in addition to being reasonably durable, hard to fake, and somewhat rare. Gems did not make good money, as they simply could not be standardized until the industrial age.

[Venboven]

Originally posted by Zorlond:

Originally posted by Venboven:

Just because gems had no physical value to things like industry doesn't mean they didn't have value in general. Gold is a useless metal which we only just recently started utilizing in small amounts in computer chips and wiring. In EU4's timeframe, gold had no industrial purpose at all. But yet it was HIGHLY valuable. Same thing for gems. Both gold and gems are pretty useless when considered literally, but people like shiny things, and so they are valuable.

Sorry, flawed analogy. Gold had a use, it was the perfect material to make money out of, precisely because industry had no use for it, in addition to being reasonably durable, hard to fake, and somewhat rare. Gems did not make good money, as they simply could not be standardized until the industrial age.

And that's exactly why gems don't work like gold. Gold = instant money in EU4, because well, it WAS money. Gems obviously are not, good observation captain obvious. Gems were a trade good. People valued them highly and would pay large sums of gold to obtain them. This is why gems need to be valued higher in the game. They are valuable, and they are scarce. I do not know how to explain it any simpler than that.

[EmpressMelanie]

Give gem control to the estates, little burst of money and free mercantilism then you can build state houses on them too for extra governing capacity.

[Malvastor]

Not exactly the same as OP's issue, but I think some of the trade goods in general are handled a little oddly. Like the "Coldest Period of the Little Ice Age" event. The flavor text mentions that crops are ruined, wine is spoiled, and fish flee the usual fishing grounds- and then the prices for those goods go down, instead of up like you'd expect from a sudden shortage of vital goods.

Likewise, some events that describe a good becoming more plentiful (from a new source or improved production methods) result in the value going up, instead of down like you'd expect from a sudden glut.

I would say that they're conflating "price per unit of good" and "overall value of industry" in the trade good value figure, as that would help some cases make more sense (e.g. the Little Ice Age doesn't cause the value of a bushel of grain to drop, but it does collapse the value of overall grain production). But then there are some events that run the other way, meaning that fish as a good loses value when the Little Ice Age makes fish unavailable and when the Grand Banks fisheries make them plentiful.

I suspect a better solution would be for at least some of these events to modify the goods produced value of relevant provinces, instead of the universal trade good value. So a climate shift would reduce the amount of grain produced, but not the value of it. Which would allow for the price of grain to go up, while countries whose climates changed would still be hurt by not being able to produce as much of it. It would also allow for economic shifts to be localized; it doesn't make sense for grain in China to plummet in price because there's an ice age in Europe.

[Zorlond]

Originally posted by Venboven:

And that's exactly why gems don't work like gold. Gold = instant money in EU4, because well, it WAS money. Gems obviously are not, good observation captain obvious.

And yet apparently it needed to be explained to you that comparing gems to gold doesn't work. You made the connection, after all.

Originally posted by Venboven:

Just because gems had no physical value to things like industry doesn't mean they didn't have value in general. Gold is a useless metal which we only just recently started utilizing in small amounts in computer chips and wiring.

If you decide to be 'Captain Oblivious', that's on you, not me.

[Exarch_Alpha]

Gems are way too low value, agree that they either should be priced higher, or not have value decreasing events at all. I´d rather have cocoa than gems and that doesn´t sound right.

[Mr.M]

Interesting that this revives...

Originally posted by Zorlond:

Matches the real world. Gems were just a bit of shiny for the stupid-rich to have, they had no use or purpose beyond that.

...i am pretty sure ivory also has no real use or purpose beyond being rare and nice-looking (aside from being good material for primitive tribes/nations), yet both ingame and irl its pretty valuable?