Forums » Crafting and Gathering

Some thoughts on Crafting

    • 563 posts
    April 4, 2016 4:34 AM PDT

    Sarim said:

    ...

    I also don't see a problem with higher end stuff competing with dropped items, especially if making said higher level items requires drops from adventuring. Of course it should not be possible for a crafter to make uber_breastplate just from vendor bought items! But if you include harvesting in high level, dangerous areas, and/or drops from difficult monsters, why should such items not be alternatives to dropped items? It's the designers job to make sure that neither route is significantly easier than the other.

    I'm of the same though, if a crafted item takes a certain level of material (dungeon/raid) I think it should compete with drop items from that level of dungeon or raid. Perhaps it's sellable, or maybe (more preferably to me) its locked to a member of the guild that the crafter made it in :) but I do think that crafted gear (made with dungeon/raid drops) should be equivalent/superior (depending on the rarity of the drop) to the dungeon/raid the drops are obtained from :)

     

    Rachael


    This post was edited by Rachael at April 4, 2016 4:34 AM PDT
    • 556 posts
    April 4, 2016 9:03 AM PDT

    Baulkin said:

    I really like the idea of crafted items not competing with loot.  Some general ideas come to mind.

    1.  Tailoring:  

    Non-Combat Social Gear that effects how NPC's treat you.  Put on your "City Cloths" and receive better prices from merchants by not traveling to the city baker in bloodstained mail.

    Cold Weather Gear with no armor value but perhaps prevents a debuff from traveling through the Tundra. (I'm thinking a Hooded Cloak or something of that nature)

    2. Tinkering: 

    Craftable Constructs:  Non Combat Pets that can be crafted.  Something like a small clockwork that can work as a pack mule (extra bag slot, without weight).  Limited to 1 out at a time.

    Eyewear: Head slot items with no Combat stats but that grant vision effects.  Could be something as simple as low light vision or something as awesome as the ability to see footprints left by mobs pathing.  (Would be a much cooler method of tracking btw...i'm looking at you Rangers).

    3. Smithing:

    Horseshoes: I loved them in Vanguard but im biased.

    Repairing Items: If item degredation is a mechanic I would love to see the repairs done by players and not NPC's.  If it is done by NPC's Smiths should be able to craft the only item that allows repairing outside of cities.  Without the ability to craft combat weapons or armor smithing would need a defining ability...this would be a good one.

    4. Magecraft:

    Identify:  Maybe it's my inner Dungeons and Dragons player coming out but it would be interesting to me if the full stats of Magical items could not be defined without an item first being identified.  I wouldn't mind the occassional cursed item being out there as well...

    Spellcraft: The ability to craft single use scrolls that other classes could imbue with with a spell.  I would suggest the scrolls have a long cooldown, long cast time, and a decent chance of failure.

    5. Fieldcraft:

    Foraging:  The ability to obtain simple food and drink from the wilderness.  (Should have no stats and not have the duration of prepared food/drink)

    Camping:  The ability to craft a camp for your group.  (Non combat Health and/or Mana regen bonus)  I would treat the camp bonus as an "aura".  It could also attract other people to come to you if you are out soloing and encourage social interaction.  I like the idea much more than spamming bandages and afking.  Camps should require different materials to make be they indoor or outdoor.  You could even make the camping  materials be only obtainable through foraging.  The other Idea was to have them create a "safe area" from wandering mob agro...which would be nice if your healer needs to put his/her kids to bed. I'm conserned that kind of functionality would be abused tho.

    I'll post some more ideas later, need to head to work.

    -Baulkin

     

     

    Such good idea's here! I just wanted to add to a couple of them.

    1. Tailoring - I love your idea's for the city clothes and evironmental reductions and I would like to add something else ... cosmetic. I know cosmetics don't really mean a lot to most of the old EQ players but for some odd reason it is huge in MMOs. People will invest boat loads of time to make their character have a distinctive look.

    2. Tinkering - Not much to say here. Tinkering is usually what games use as a catch all trade skill. So many things can be done here and there have been great ideas already stated about this one.

    3. Smithing - I personally don't think this should be in. If we are keeping drops/crafted seperate then this goes against that idea. Maybe tie in some stuff with tinkering but keep smithing out. 

    4. Magecraft - there have been a few games that have done the identify type stuff and it does work. I do like the idea and hope they put it in. I think this should also be tied to a research for spells as well though. Allow them to create ones usable with alternate manas and create some of the 'runes' to alter spells. This could be the biggest profession in the game. 

    5. Fieldcraft - This could be really good or really bad. If you are kept to only a couple crafting skills then this would rarely get used imo. But if you can do them all then there would be no reason not to do this. I think there would need to be more involved than just forging food and building camp fires though. Don't really have any ideas of what could be done however. Maybe being able to create shelters that would save a group from extreme weather/climate statuses for a time? Would need to be highly watched to keep from having it abused again though. Double edged sword here.

     

    Some that were not mentioned here,

    6. Alchemy - Absolute must have. Potions play a big role and are always used. 

    7. Enchanting - While I don't want to see things become 'the norm' and all gear has those must have enchants, an enchanting system could do wonders for keeping mudflation down. Deconstructing magical items could give you magical components to then enchant a piece with something from the deconstructed item. Kind of similar to ESO's system but you wouldn't 'learn' how to craft it. Rather need to get the ability each time from a different item. Let's say you break down a lower level chest, it could give you an item that would upgrade an armor piece with maybe 2 ac. Higher level raid type gear may give you 5ac and 25hp. Not game breakingly huge but an increase and a reason to take more items out of the game.

    8. Carpentry - this would be more for housing in the future but could include furniture, fletching aka arrows since doing bows would be going against the dropped vs crafted theory, and possibly boats. 

     

    Things that go aginst the dropped vs crafted premise,

    Blacksmith/Armorer

    Jewelcrafting - Unless it only applies climate related things 

     

    I love the idea of keeping things seperate to keep crafting relevant however I would still like to see ways to better your gear via crafting. Whether that comes from an upgrading type system or enchanting. 

    • 174 posts
    April 4, 2016 10:07 AM PDT

    I believe crafting items should compete directly with dropped items.  As an avid crafter I don't want to be relegated to make items that augment drops.  This seems more an approach to appease adventurers, which I also consider myself.  I want to make armor, weapons,etc.  Differences should come, as mentioned in earlier posts, from difficulty in sourcing materials, as well as skill sets.  Crafting items should certainly be difficult enough that loss of items, and or quality, are an ongoing concern.  Like adventuring, should you have a bad streak of tradeskilling, you should lose experience, in effect proving you are not as skilled a craftsmnan as you believed. 

     

    • 57 posts
    April 6, 2016 5:05 AM PDT

    My viewpoint is that for the most part I would love to see crafted items complement dropped items.  I would also love to see crafted items allow for stop gap items on 'dropped' slots (i.e. gear types that preferrably can be filled by the environment, but at a lower level and/or quality).

    Using Neverwinter for an rough example, I would love for the concept of different types and quality of clothing to be worn under armor.  One such example would be for a heavy armor crafter to be able to craft fine ringlet style clothing that might allow for a mitigation is certain types of damage while adding a minor armor class boost.  A medium armor crafter might make fine leather clothing what would provide enviromental resist against cold and disease.  Light armor tailors on the other hand could make fine silken garb that could be embroidered with runecrafted items to allow for minor mana regen and/or increased mana pool.  The player, based on his class armor restriction, could then themselves could then decide on what type garb to augment his character.

    Similarly items could be crafted for weapons (such as sheathes or honing stones) that prevent item wear.  Leather wrapped hilts for example could be permanently augmented to a particular weapon to decrease the chance of a player loosing their grip and being disarmed during combat (loved that disarming ability in EQ).  Similarly quivers, pouches, or sheathes could be modified to allow for a greater ammo carrying capacity.

    Again in short I think that there are many ways in which crafting can be used as a complement to dropped gear that keeps both equally relevant


    This post was edited by DaveBowers at April 6, 2016 5:08 AM PDT
    • 556 posts
    April 8, 2016 2:39 PM PDT

    Chimerical said:

    I believe crafting items should compete directly with dropped items.  As an avid crafter I don't want to be relegated to make items that augment drops.  This seems more an approach to appease adventurers, which I also consider myself.  I want to make armor, weapons,etc.  Differences should come, as mentioned in earlier posts, from difficulty in sourcing materials, as well as skill sets.  Crafting items should certainly be difficult enough that loss of items, and or quality, are an ongoing concern.  Like adventuring, should you have a bad streak of tradeskilling, you should lose experience, in effect proving you are not as skilled a craftsmnan as you believed. 

     

    I actually agree with you. However I also see where Brad is coming from. Having them directly compete usually ends up with crafted gear falling off and becoming useless after the first 1-2 months of new content. Having things augment gear, cosmetic gear, environmental gear, etc come from crafting means that it will always be in demand. Well at least as long as there are people playing the game anyway.