Most players between an eternal and a stack of exalts

On the other hand, they will be used less because crafters won't be dumping hundreds into an item; crafting will be far far more about finding an already good multi t1 base and throwing an poe exalt at it than it will be about crafting 6T1's that you want from a base white item - there will be a whole lot more of "welp, good enough!".

As a counter to my own idea, though, I suspect in general more people will be willing to try exalting, since the whole concept of "don't craft it from scratch unless it's worth eternaling / for lulz" will be somewhat defunct.

The only thing to consider here is alterations have a somewhat "fixed" price due to merchants. You'll still see people buying 10-15:1c and flipping, but it's not like alts are gonna be 5 per chaos or something.

Let's be honest - if you're trying to break into that upper echelon of wealth, eternals aren't going to singularly make or break your chances. For a long time they've solely been a "big chip" in your stack for most people; only a very select few ever used them, so there's never been any practical or functional difference for most players between an eternal and a stack of poe exalts. That's essentially what Grinding Gear Games even said, that only a few people even use them.

If you're trying to get to wearing mirrored gear, seriously - if eternals not dropping is going to stop you, you were never going to get there in the first place. Price increases on mirrorable gear are negligible at that point, comparatively - sure, a couple extra days of flipping, but that's it, really, and if you could make it there now, taking a few extra days after 2.0 shouldn't be an issue.