Some innovations are worth losing.

This is about essence gathering. It's harder to get than anything else. It wasn't before.
Wisp Isle is not good for anyone needing enough essence for construction. There just is not enough of each resource and the various tiers are partially mixed together which makes it even more irritating. And there's no vault and no portal there. If you asked, many crafters would tell you they hate Wisp Isle.
Ever since the residue appeared on Istaria, wisps have mostly gone into hiding. The existence of residue would be okay (although I feel like I'm walking in snot) if the residue gave more essence. In some areas there's not enough residue either. There are supposed to be wisps that give you more of the resource, but in practice, most wisps are "weakened" wisps. I have yet to find one glowing or pale that is not weak.
Someone told me that safe areas have fewer wisps so I went among the treants and didn't find any wisps there.
So, I am suggesting that residue leaves and the wisps return. Or else, have big mounds of the goo. A few, please!

Forgot something. When you do get essence from a real wisp, they don't change in appearance and they move around. If you are lucky enough to have found a spot where there is more than one wisp, you can't tell which one has not regenerated yet.

I have always found all wisps in short supply. If you need an enraged wisp of any type, better hope 1 or 2 drop what you need. There are so many empty areas of Istaria looks like some spawns could be added to these empty areas. Anyway, any additions would be appreciated. If anyone wants to know where the empty areas are, I will be glad to point them out. Slimey on Order

I rarely if ever go to wisp isle anymore cause of exactly what your saying.

Pales I get in Bristugo (2 spots)

Glowings I get in VoR. The VoR spot is a bit of a run from the landing pad but at least it has an essence circle right at the field, could use a pad and/or gate there (hint hint) and plots there enlarged so maybe someone would build a vault. Not a big field but has several regular wisps and couple of enriched and an enraged or two i think.

Dims are the only ones I have a bit of trouble with, Genevia isnt very good, I use NT mostly I guess.

Residue exists because wisps are susceptible to the disappearing spawn issues, if residue did not exist then there'd be times where essence would be impossible to get.

But yes- i 100000% agree, essence is soooo tedious to get...
Would love rich/ml residues and wisps that gave similar amounts that rich/mls do (for their associated type - normal wisps and enriched wisps, in my experience, do not give as much essence as their rich and motherlode counterparts for other materials)

Also, kill wisps once you've gathered from them. Then the only wisps around are full, no need to keep track of what you gathered already.

Yesterday I found that the wisps are back at Drift Point after I don't know how long an absence. There's a shop and vault right there. What a relief. Only weak wisps though.

forgot to add places i mentioned earlier, Bristugo VoR and NT not really enough for more then 1 or 2 gathering at a time.

If regular wisps were equivalent to rich nodes and enriched wisps were equivalent to mother lodes, that would make the whole process of gathering essence so much more pleasant than constantly hunting for the next wisp, sucking it dry, killing it so you don't confuse it for a full one, and repeating the process...

Residue should still stay for the times when one wisp or another happens to be the broken mob of the week though.