81 replies to this topic

[Vanpry]

Because crafting and resource gathering has become completely dependent on killing/leveling. Crafting should be very independent of adventureing, not completely but if a character should be able to go from 1 to 100 skill say in black smithing without having to go kill monsters. Now for crafting skills that require hides normal animal will of course have to be hunted but no light, medium, sturdy, pristine, etc. hides on progressively higher level mob animals.

Oh and one other thing that pisses me off about LOTRO crafting which imho is one of the better ones. WTH is there so much stuff that needs to be bought off npcs. If I need a raw chicken leg let me go kill and butch a GD chicken and collect my own legs.

Please for those of us that love crafting let give crafting back to the crafters. I know I've said this over and over again, and I will keep saying this until someone gets the hint.

OK sorry. /end rant

[Jergis]

-I don't think all crafting has been bad, i just think you have to find the fun in it. LotRO i enjoyed to some extent, though i ran out of bank space pretty quick even when trying to sell those goods i could. I tend to hoard materials and finished products as a crafter. I like to keep a stack or two at all levels of proficiency for raw and finished just in case. My Troll in WoW filled up bank space on the alchemy weeds/potions in a flash, i couldn't sell those agility potions fast enough. So, i guess my issue is bank space!

Can it be done better? Sure. And i hope Alganon takes the good from what you saw in UO and other games to heart.

On the point about no combat progression, while theoretically i suppose it's possible it isn't terribly logical in a fantasy setting. No one wants to be Bob the Carpenter, Slayer of Warped Boards and Layer of Plumb Lines. It's not heroic. At all. Ever. Having said that, i think it'd be a great option to offer players and i hope they include it. I just really don't know how to make it possible as even crafters need seed money for materials and such. There's only so much you can scavenge in a town full of adventuring souls. PotBS had an interesting take on crafting, i did like the resource management end of that system and the possible craft tactics it presented.

Anywho, i do look forward to the info and hope they make it fun again for you and all of us.

Jergis

[Vanpry]

Well in UO I had Termite the Tree Bane, The Hand God Ore Bane and Zoey Deer Bane. LOL I like crafting. All of those characters had minimum to decent combat skills. They wouldn't be fighting dragons but I didn't have to kill dragons, ancient liches, or elder gazers. I could hold my own against orcs and about mid skill mobs. In UO you had little need for cash beside buying pick axes, hatchets and tinker tools to start, plus with a little tinkering you could create your own tools.

[Syndic]

There are at least 2 other games I know of where you could level crafting without having to adventure.

EQ2 does although harvesting your own resources could be a bit on the hard side when having to dodge much higher mobs. The only problem I had with it is you still had to choose an adventuring class even though you had no plans on using it. BTW as the devs like to say, it's not easy but it is doable, for me though it was easier becuase I did have at least 1 adventuring character who could harvest for them all, but generally I just bought from the broker. I did the crafting epic quest on a level 7 adventurer and it required running around level 70+ areas, you just needed to practice dodging NPC's.

Same goes for Horizons, I did mainly crafting, I wasn't really interested in adventuring but managed to get my character to 23, some of my crafting levels were in the 80's so was harvesting around high level mobs, again just a bunch of dodging. The problem I had was the engine itself, I'd find myself walking into the area only to find 4 mins later I'm surrounded by mobs that just took ages to load, and agro radius' were quite large, making it very inconvenient and frustrating to level.

I will join you Vanpry in saying that a crafter should be able to get from 1 to max without having to have any adventuring experience of your own.

[Vanpry]

The beauty of allowing this is. If you choose not to just craft you don't have to. This would be completely optional.

[Berek]

I did the crafting epic quest on a level 7 adventurer and it required running around level 70+ areas, you just needed to practice dodging NPC's.

How many times I've done this in MMOs, I cannot count... . There are of course these dangerous areas in the game, but I don't know of a location that forces you to adventure into an unreasonably high area for something that is meant for a much lower character's level, whether that be involved in crafting or otherwise.

[Vanpry]

How many times I've done this in MMOs, I cannot count... . There are of course these dangerous areas in the game, but I don't know of a location that forces you to adventure into an unreasonably high area for something that is meant for a much lower character's level, whether that be involved in crafting or otherwise.

I'd be happy if I wasn't forced into high level areas just to gain skill in crafting. Copy UO's crafting and resource gathering system and you will make a lot of people happy. If you need to have specialty resources in the high level areas these resources should not be required to gain skill. Gathering doesn't need to be independent of leveling just crafting.

[Syndic]

Gathering doesn't need to be independent of leveling just crafting.

Just remember though if gathering skill is dependant on level then it should go of either adventure or crafting which ever is higher.

[Mouglue]

No one wants to be Bob the Carpenter, Slayer of Warped Boards and Layer of Plumb Lines.

I wanted to be Bob the Builder.
I have to disagree with that statement.
I think there are a lot of people who enjoy the crafting enough to do it full time.

[Vanpry]

I wanted to be Bob the Builder.
I have to disagree with that statement.
I think there are a lot of people who enjoy the crafting enough to do it full time.

I would at least do it 50% of the time. Constantly killing gets old after a while. I think that is really the reason why I can't find contentment in any mmo since UO.

[Jergis]

-I stand corrected. If you want to have a normal job in an MMO and in RL, then there's apparently a market for that particular brand of torture ;^)

I can't kill dragons or cut off heads in my daily life without getting in trouble. I can, however, pour concrete in the ditch in my backyard as the footing for my new fence. I enjoy crafting in games muchly, and thoroughly immerse my playing time in doing so. But i suppose my comment was more toward why people play games generally. I still want to kill the dragon. I still want adventure. And i don't want to have it seem like work when i do decide to craft something.

Again, though, i appreciate that others may want to craft 100% of the time. And i hope Alganon brings us all what we desire out of this potentially-expansive and hopefully-enjoyable pursuit.

Good journey.

Jergis

[Syndic]

That is the part that always spins me out Jergis. People want crafting to be "fun" and "exciting" yet do they really think that these jobs, which is what they are, are really that fun. Oh but if you try to replace crafting with games, like say tetris to see if you succeed, it is not realistic enough. Really stuck in a catch 22 there.

Sure I craft alot, in Horizons it was all I did I hated the adventure side of things but when I look at it all I really did was craft for craftings sake and watching alot of tv (which I must admit was good). There was no goal for me to make things other than to make things so that making things was easier and so on and so forth. In EQ2 I've maxxed all crafting classes but until recent changes it was an uphill battle. I like to craft becuase it helps make me self sufficient and it gives me things to do solo, so far you don't need others to craft so it is always handy to have something like that around.

I do know people who don't do anything but craft though, and it is the biggest selling point for me in games, but I wouldn't say I'd do it 100%.

Anyway another ramble from me that really didn't bring any points out, but it is Friday afternoon and just got home from work.

[Vanpry]

That is the part that always spins me out Jergis. People want crafting to be "fun" and "exciting" yet do they really think that these jobs, which is what they are, are really that fun.

I think this is the pit fall that every mmo has fallen into. They try to make crafting fun instead of challenging and rewarding. So crafting ends up being a joke, ie WoW.

I don't craft because it is fun. I craft because I have a sense of pride that something I crafted is in game. I like the idea of wearing my own armor or weapons that I put time and effort into. Being semi self sufficient is nice too.

[Berek]

One of the problems you see in society in general is Instant Gratification. Everyone wants the end result right away. They want to skip the hard work and just get get get. However, little do many know that the hard work and the road to achievement is often the part you crave or cherish when its all achieved.

For MMOs, everyone wants that instant gratification, so many developers design mechanics to be fun right from the start. If more understood that the selling of an item after that hard work, or some other end-achievement was worthwhile, the hardwork and Delayed Gratification they would see is what makes them happy through the process.

[Vanpry]

One of the problems you see in society in general is Instant Gratification. Everyone wants the end result right away. They want to skip the hard work and just get get get. However, little do many know that the hard work and the road to achievement is often the part you crave or cherish when its all achieved.

For MMOs, everyone wants that instant gratification, so many developers design mechanics to be fun right from the start. If more understood that the selling of an item after that hard work, or some other end-achievement was worthwhile, the hardwork and Delayed Gratification they would see is what makes them happy through the process.

Oh so very true. I hope you as a developer and others start to realize this.

[Mouglue]

I know I am going to get slammed for this remark...

Crafted items, (weapons, armor, potions etc) should be BETTER then NPC or MOB droped items.

You can have a fairly "Crappy" crafting system, but if others are actualy buying the stuff you make, then its worthwhile.

If armor and weapons are better gotten off of MOBs or NPCs, then why even bother having a crafting system?

(Ok, now bring on the "We dont want to be dependent on the boring crafting for our UBER weapons talk)

[Vanpry]

I know I am going to get slammed for this remark...

Crafted items, (weapons, armor, potions etc) should be BETTER then NPC or MOB droped items.

You can have a fairly "Crappy" crafting system, but if others are actualy buying the stuff you make, then its worthwhile.

If armor and weapons are better gotten off of MOBs or NPCs, then why even bother having a crafting system?

(Ok, now bring on the "We dont want to be dependent on the boring crafting for our UBER weapons talk)

I think crafted and drops should be equal. No need to have one better over the other.

[Jergis]

-I'm in the equal-ish crowd myself. If i don't want to adventure, i can craft and sell top-quality gear. If i don't want to craft, i and adventure and acquire that same gear. By making one obviously better than the other, there is a *perception* that the devs favor one type of player over another. That is certainly bad for continuing subscriptions of a traditional MMO that looks to encompass all sorts of players in one game to have a number of options to keep them around.

That's not to say the items have to the exact same, though. An uber-sword crafted by Keller the Redheart could have a bonus of +4 to Stamina, Strength, and Agility while having a DPS rating of 15. Measure that against a sword dropped from Krendel the Redfang, Dragon of the South, +5 to Strength and Charisma (who doesn't love a big sword) a DPS rating of 17. The Dragon drop looks better for the DPSer, but what if we make the crafted weapon more durable, less likely to break and less repair required? Over the life of the swords the crafted one lasts longer, keeps your character in the field longer, and saves money. Also, that Agility bump can help with critical hits or dodging enemy attacks, great for an Avoidance Tank build.

At the end of the day, the devs can make the weapons equivalent without making them carbon copies. I hope they do so with a mind towards equivalency, not exact equality.

Jergis

[Mouglue]

By making one obviously better than the other, there is a *perception* that the devs favor one type of player over another. That is certainly bad for continuing subscriptions of a traditional MMO that looks to encompass all sorts of players in one game to have a number of options to keep them around.

Huh? I don't follow that....
By making crafted items better then MOB drops yes the Devs are saying that they care about crafters... But crafters vs ??? what in your statemet.. whats the "Other"

If by that you mean the "Adventurer" then I still dont follow.
They are not saying that the crafter is better..Perhaps they are just saying that the Crafter is worth something.

I wont get into the whole.. Where the heck did that Wolf happen to have that "Two Handed Long sword" and pile of "Gold" hidden anyway... arguments.. But why not have a game with a little more reality in it?

[Mouglue]

I think crafted and drops should be equal. No need to have one better over the other.

I would have to disagree with you there Vanpry..

Think of it this way.. With adventuring you get to go out ahd have the excitement of the hunt... The Thrill of the Kill, the Lust of the Blood... As you do those things, you get bigger and better skills or levels or what ever so that you can go on bigger hunts.

With crafting you get to create weapons and aromr that while bigger then the last thing you created, are still rather worthless because everyone knows that "Freddy the Tree Rat" drops better armor for level xx.
So whats the point of crafting?