Gathering & crafting economy rebalance
Wilderness gathering got a full pass. Node cooldowns are now 2x longer (T1 nodes respawn in 1.5 minutes, T8 in 6 minutes), but yields are 2x higher — base harvest is 6 materials instead of 3, scaling up to 28 at high skill levels. Each resource tile also has roughly 50% more nodes. The net effect: each trip to a tile rewards more materials, but you wait longer between harvests. Less frantic clicking, more satisfying payoffs.
Crafting recipe costs across all four disciplines have been increased by 1.5x. This applies to Biosynth, Alloycraft, Signal Etching, Crystallography, and Masterwork recipes. The higher yields from gathering offset the cost increase, but stockpiling materials now matters more.
Wilderness node harvesting now requires the matching gathering skill level — same thresholds as the idle work order system (T1 at level 1, T4 at level 17, T8 at level 47). No more harvesting Neutronium deposits at Salvaging level 1. Locked nodes show a lock icon and the required skill level.
Yields now scale with your gathering skill level instead of your crafting discipline level. Salvaging 40 improves alloy node yields; Alloycraft level no longer matters for wilderness harvesting. This was a bug — the wrong skill was being checked.
All gathering and crafting balance values have been centralized in balanceConfig.ts for easier tuning going forward.