Every Thaumcraft server I make, I end up in the same predicament. I can never begin Rift Studies and discover the Emptiness because I cannot get a primordial pearl for the Impetus Cell. I've collapsed dozens of rifts, and I have never obtained a pearl. Thus, I have come up with an item that could solve this issue and make it possible for players to progress more easily.

It is an object called a Primordial Collapser, similar to a Causality Collapser, but a rift collapsed by one will always drop a primordial pearl, nodule, or the like. It should be accessible before the player obtains a pearl, so that it provides a source for the first pearl a player will obtain. It could be unlocked after discovering the Eldritch, for example, and not primordial pearls.

The infusion should be extremely expensive, consisting of a Causality Collapser in the center, two or three nether stars, and a void seed, and it would require 100 of each primal aspect with an instability of very high or dangerous. It may be overly expensive, but it is an infusion of desperation, encouraging players to get their later pearls elsewhere.

The item itself could look just like a Causality Collapser, but slightly more radiant, with a faint primordial pearl in the center, similar to the nether star in Greater Foci.

I believe that this item would make Rift Studies and the Emptiness much more accessible to players and still difficult to reach.

I'm down with Motes only. You typically only get Motes or Nodules anyway when collapsing rifts, and their use is strictly limited towards going where There Might Be Pearls.

For a while I haven't been super happy with how hard it is to get pearls. Lategame we solved this by the bosses dropping pearls, but the first pearl still normally needs the collapser. I think having something to help for that first pearl is a good idea, but I don't want it to be easily farmable. I think in addition to an expensive recipe, I would want to enforce some additional constraints:

• The rift won't drop void seeds
• The pearl will be limited to a smaller size

That probably sounds a bit harsh, but I don't want to make the primordial collapser completely overshadow the causality collapser.