For me - I think "Best gear" should come from every single avenue that the game offers gear. That doesn't mean any one thing that offers gear should offer ALL of the best gear - but best gear in equal measure. So between crafting and drops, half should come from each - but perhaps not the same slots for all classes.
Having said that - again, for me, this is a thread that I formed about INTENT. What I REALLY, REALLY, REALLY want to see again - is a game where guilds are working on gear TOGETHER - not so that it's members can e-peen better than any other guild, but so that they, as a guild, can conquer whatever the guild targets next.
Getting better gear, for me, should be about making myself better for someone else (my guild) not about making myself better than people so that I can act like the stuff my avatar is wearing makes me somehow better than someone else wearing "lesser" stuff.
Wandidar said:For me - I think "Best gear" should come from every single avenue that the game offers gear. That doesn't mean any one thing that offers gear should offer ALL of the best gear - but best gear in equal measure. So between crafting and drops, half should come from each - but perhaps not the same slots for all classes.
Having said that - again, for me, this is a thread that I formed about INTENT. What I REALLY, REALLY, REALLY want to see again - is a game where guilds are working on gear TOGETHER - not so that it's members can e-peen better than any other guild, but so that they, as a guild, can conquer whatever the guild targets next.
Getting better gear, for me, should be about making myself better for someone else (my guild) not about making myself better than people so that I can act like the stuff my avatar is wearing makes me somehow better than someone else wearing "lesser" stuff.
Man I completely agree with everhthing you wrote in your post. I hope that my post kinda echoes what you said, it's not exactly the same thing but it's what came to mind when I read yours...
I think one of the biggest disappointments, for me, in the newer mmos has been the change in attitude of the players from working together for the sake of the shared experience to a nearly competitive race for new gear. (one could probably argue that was facilitated by game mechanisms but that's a different discussion)
At one time (in my experience) players worked together to explore new zones and dungeons and complete complicated, long, quest lines and generally helped each other out, enjoyed each other's company and the shared experience. Many of those adventures we still talk about today. If that lead to a new item for one of us.... Ok cool. The loot was almost a by-product of existing and adventuring in that world, it wasn't always the motivation. Sure sometimes there would be a particular item one person was going after but it seemed like that was usually some long-term goal. Somehow that all slowly changed to running as quickly as possible through instances and quest lines that no longer held any meaning and were almost instantly forgotten, where not much was spoken, to get some new marginally better item. Repeat day after day until you finally just stop.
So, yeah, Wandidar, I think I am also really, really hoping for something similar to what you described and I sure hope Pantheon delivers it!
And yes, I realize that this just sounds like some old dude just remembering a time in the past thats now gotten a bit foggy and better over the years and to that all I have to say is, Get off my lawn!
I really agree with OP. I keep hearing people talk about "BiS" gear, and what I truly hope, more than anything, is that there IS no BiS gear in this game. To me that's a WoW concept, and my general take on MMOs is "if WoW did it, it's not worth doing." WoW only had two options in my opinion: Copy EQ verbatim, then water it down to be easier, or come up with a never-before-seen concept, that made the game even easier/generic.
In EQ, there was real discussion about what gear to get. It was rare enough/hard enough to get that you simply WOULD NEVER get all the top gear from an expansion, and "top gear" was a relative term. Things were balanced in a way that the CLOSEST you could come to "BiS" gear was with weapons, and even that was controversial. Some classes, your epic was a no-brainer. Some classes that wasn't true. During PoP era, the "best" bows for rangers were actually crafted items, and the "3 best" bows were debated. Also, new "best" gear was often such a marginal upgrade, that it wasn't seen as completely necessary. In WoW and it's bastard spawn games, the upgrades are always so drastic that OFC you need to invest the time to get it. (And by invest, I of course mean spend exactly one nights worth of play time because nothing in that game takes the patients of EQ era games).
Where there is a clear order of "best gear" that gets replaced by "the next one option for best gear," and that gear can be obtained with minimal effort, that's when you see the game revolve around gear. When the gear gives only a minimal boost to ability from the last slot, and takes days/weeks/months to obtain, that's when you see people playing the game for other reasons than just "get best gear," and as OP said, getting new gear is more about being useful to the group/raid than your own personal showing off.
Amsai said: Cant agree with that Hieromonk. Not saying there is a right or wrong way to be clear. I just think if anything should be better its the drops. Like the Icebane the legendary sword that killed 10k frost giants and things along this line. Drops csn be ancient and powerful artifacts with a history and lore. And should be something man is no longer cabable of achieving. No offense but I want the legendary sword Icebane not Hieromonks sword of Ice.
Well... that sound all nice and everything, but after 1 year of playing how rare will that "Ancient Frostbane Sword" actually be.
More importantly we know a Dragon didn't forge/make it, just collected it and threw it on his treasure pile. It is Ancient, because PEOPLE made it thousands of years ago. If it is truely an artifact, there is only one. But we all know everyone in the guild will own one within months... so it is not truely rare, nore an artifact.
What I am suggesting is that Drops will be more powerful, because they will be more prevalent. So you can have your powerful & legendary "FrostBane" sword. But that will not stop 20 crafters from all coming together to perfect their own version... which might take years to complete, etc. The Player Made stuff I am talking abouty is so uber rare, that nearly no 2 people would have the same. They would be unique and ultra rare. But... as I have stated, more powefrul than the once a week "FrostBane Sword", that drops rarely off a mob that lives 30seconds after spawning..
I do understand why you want the "Legendary FrostBane Sword"... because it will be much easier to get, than the player crafted "Sword of Ice".
I would be a big fan of seeing crafted gear be better than most dropped gear, with rare exception. "Oh, but then everyone will be the same!" Wrong. You just have the mats for the "best" gear come from raid encounters. EQ did this pretty well from time to time. Yes there should be really cool weapons, but they should be rare. Yes there should be really cool pre-dropped gear, but also rare. What I'd love to see is more of the Vanguard approach, where you need to have a tradeskill so others need you, and you need to rely on others to help you make the gear you can't. I'd much rather see a game where a raid boss drops a bunch of crafting mats which can be forged into the best gear of the game, then a game where you slay a giant lizard and find out he had a legendary tunic, a magical scepter, and a perfectly crafted greatsword on him for some reason.
I realized one other important thing to get back to the original discussion. Gear should never look rediculous, except maybe weapons. I'm not opposed to looking cool, but in WoW, the armor was often ABSOLUTELY ridiculous looking. It would look like ceremonial ornate armor, not something you'd actually go to battle in. People wanted to showoff like "look, I too have the one option for best gear, just like 34756238456234895 other people!!!" Meanwhile, my ranger in EQ had chainmail that looked like, well, chainmail. When I upgraded, it continued to look like chainmail. In fact, from a gear standpoint, the only visual difference between my ranger in full Kunnark gear and my ranger in top Omens raid gear was the color. The only thing that really changed in appearance was the weapons. Now those WERE a bit of a prestige item if you had an epic, but while there were many reasons to get your epic weapons, showing them off was much further down the list than helping the raid and being useful to your group.
The idea of high-end Crafted Gear is that it takes many... many.. many different materials to make one item. And many... many.. many different people to make. All these component can come from all different sectors of the economy. Not all material will ever be truely identical, so the final product and it's abilities or stats will never be identical...
As an example, harvesting lambs wool for interior padding and warmth in cold climates.. but your guild does not have a GrandMaster skinner, or if you do perhaps he doesn't spend 15h a week roaming the lands and harvesting and applying his trade, or expertese in aquiring high quality wool for the guild. So that Guild now must purchase it from a known person who has esablished themselves as a great source of such material.
Amsai said: Thats where youd be wrong Hieromonk. Im just a fan of killing things and getting loot. Never havr cared much for economy or crafting. Its an aesthetics thing. Has nothing to do with whats easier or harder. You kill the bad things and you get the awesome loot is a great concept I have loved since like 1987.
This make your own or buy your own stuff has always seemed to cheapen the experience (to me) regarless if it was actually expensive or long and drawn out.
As to the to much tslking about BiS stuff. That should take care of it self with the situational gear for atmospheres. So the Frostbane sword might be the best sword for a particular class but only in certain atmospheres, you might really need the Firebane sword for anothet area. Same gies for spells and abilities and the Devs have said as much.
As to everyone gettiing that powerful legendary sword of such and such. Nope. Not everyone will have the drive and skill to do so. And even those that do my mind can get around the concept of everyone having a legendary sword more easily than believing that mere crafters can replicate what the ancients created.
I admit that this is me being heavy handed with my opinion but thus has how I have always envisioned and wanted in every game I play. Any game that forces me to craft is always extremely annoying to me. Not just because i dont care for it. But because of what Ive said above.
But Im noy unreasonable either. A good mix of dungeon, quested, raided, crafted gear would work. Though if I remember correctly on MMORPG Brad did ask for some ideas like crafting enhancrments to dropped gear to keep both drops and crafting relevant.
I have to agree with Amsai here and would rather have droped and quest gear be the best. However I am not against a mix of ways if people don't agree. Amsai was just stating the way he would like it personaly and made that abundently clear. That was the only way he was coming off about it no need to be snarky about it. Oh, by the way he never played EQ to my understanding he played FFXI. In my experience if you make just as many options for crafted BIS gear as raid and what not people skip content.
Amsai said: Thats where youd be wrong Hieromonk. Im just a fan of killing things and getting loot. Never havr cared much for economy or crafting. Its an aesthetics thing. Has nothing to do with whats easier or harder. You kill the bad things and you get the awesome loot is a great concept I have loved since like 1987. This make your own or buy your own stuff has always seemed to cheapen the experience (to me) regarless if it was actually expensive or long and drawn out.That being said I do think the drops should be hard ti get As to the to much tslking about BiS stuff. That should take care of it self with the situational gear for atmospheres. So the Frostbane sword might be the best sword for a particular class but only in certain atmospheres, you might really need the Firebane sword for anothet area. Same gies for spells and abilities and the Devs have said as much.So when I talk of BiS its keeping that info in mind.
As to everyone gettiing that powerful legendary sword of such and such. Nope. Not everyone will have the drive and skill to do so. And even those that do my mind can get around the concept of everyone having a legendary sword more easily than believing that mere crafters can replicate what the ancients created. I admit that this is me being heavy handed with my opinion but thus has how I have always envisioned and wanted in every game I play. Any game that forces me to craft is always extremely annoying to me. Not just because i dont care for it. But because of what Ive said above. But Im noy unreasonable either. A good mix of dungeon, quested, raided, crafted gear would work. Though if I remember correctly on MMORPG Brad did ask for some ideas like crafting enhancrments to dropped gear to keep both drops and crafting relevant.
Bro, if you want to kill things and get loot. Nobody is stopping you. Again, we are talking about uber-high-end gear. Not your once a day FBSS style of drop. Or raid drops.
But please understand that Someone may spend 2 months harvesting berries off bushes hanging from cliffs, until they eventually find the elusive "white berry", to hand off to their Guild Alchemist so he can crush the "uber rare" white berry for it's magical properties... (that you KNOW nothing about... because you like to kill things and loot... not craft or harvest)
The seeking and harvesting of that rare berry is just the start of the story, there is still muscle sinew from a rare marsupial and ink from a squid... all materials & components needed for the making of a rare piece of equipment that you care nothing about.
Additionally, nobody said you have to craft anything, ever.. . LOL.
But I suppose you will be buying player made items all the time, regardless. Such as bags, food, supplies, arrows, etc. Even so, that great dungeon loot might eventually break because it's quality & durability is not Grade-A quality and need repaired or replaced.
Do not expet to have the same gear for years... if so, expect to spend oooodles on high-end blacksmiths for repairing and keeping that armor usable.
Amsai said: Thank you Driven. Yes I played XI back in the day and as many here and over at mmorpg can attest (sometimes to their dismay) i definitely dont want a carbon copy of EQ. And I thought I made it pretty clear bit let me specify. My preference is drops only. But my major argument was that droped should be better than crafted if one should be better than the other. And I stand by that. But I am not opposed to mixing things up a bit as a ballance. And driven brings up a good point about people skipping content if they can just craft something better. Oh and I meant it as your first definition of what BiS is but I am in favor of gated content so Im actually on board with you cant come to the raid because you dont have a firesword. Again if you can craft then you can bypass the content that would have required to get the firesword
Crafters and Harvesters do not skip content, they immerse themselves within it, to extract all of it and put that knowledge to work for themselves.
And I thought I made it pretty clear bit let me specify. My preference is drops only. But my major argument was that droped should be better than crafted
Have you ever played EverQuest and Vanguard..?
Have you ever played a game with harvesting and mats.. (ie: EQ, EQ2 and Vanguard)
All those different idea made think of a book I finished recently (The Dwarves tome 1). To destroy their archenemy they need to craft a legendary weapons mentioned in their ancient history. This weapons need a handle made of a near extinct type of trees, several type of ores and jewels to forge the blade, they also need to craft special hooks and runes to put on the blade. But that's not all, they also need a special forge, because there's two type of special ores that can be melded only at a very high temperature that only their forge fueled by a dragon's breath can do it. This forge is located in one of their former realm now taken by orcs. They also need a crafter from each of their kindgoms because each one has a specialty, forge, jewelry, carving,...
I'm thinking, that would be pretty epic seeing the same thing in a game. Learning about an ancient forge, group of players will have to explore to discovery it, it will then serve all the community. But the forge's been extinct for decades/centuries, so they'll need to get a magical dragon fire, by either killing one and stealing its essence or bargaining for its essence. Now that the forge is alive again, expert crafter will be able to create masterpiece beyond imagination. It should be amazing to see several type of crafters doing their art together, each one at his reserved workbench around the forge, each one linked to the hearth where the dragon fire shine with an intense white flame. And when they all finish their part, they activate the forge, all pieces go to the center altar, and after a huge column of fire blind everyone, it's here, a legenday piece of equipment, a masterpiece that will carve its name in History for ages. Of course there have been legendary equipment crafted since ancient times and they should still exist somewhere, but with ancient knowledge, powerful tools, new experiences, teamwork and the best materials, new artifacts will be able to craft their own legend.
The best examples I can find of a crafted item being 'the best' for a given slot were the Blessed Coldain Prayer Shawl and the Ring of Dain Frostreaver IV
Both of these were the results of a long series of quests (8 steps in the Prayer Shawl quest and 10 in the Ring quest) some of which could be done solo, most of which needed a group and 1 point in each where a raid was needed. You needed lots of friends, near perfect tradeskills, an interest in lore and storylines plus devotion to a particular faction. The result is a quested/crafted/raided NoDrop BiS (at that time) item.
Arksien said:
So since THAT is the argument myself and others are making, here's how your counterargument comes across:
Scenario 1: Kill raid mob, get best gear.
Scenario 2: Kill raid mob, take materials that drop off raid mob, and use it to make inferior gear to what he already dropped.
Scenario 3: Get a quest to kill raid mob. Get gear from quest that is of a lower value than what he dropped.
Notice how it no longer matters that there was a quest or materials to craft an item, because you get BETTER gear on your system for simply killing the mob. At that point, saying "it's ok, we can have crafting and questing too, but don't make it equal, make the drop loot better" is very silly. If you don't make crafting, raiding, and questing all equals in the end game, then whichever one is the most powerful is the only one anyone will do. That will literally create the "gear is the goal" mentality that OP is complaining about.
I see your point here, but the scenarios are off. Kill Raid Mob/Complete Quest could be argued to have equal time-sinks; although, I'm hoping for no gear quest rewards outside of some long sprawling epic quest.
However, Crafting has a much longer time-sink, and, has the chance at failure if it's similar to EQ/VG. Assuming no failure, you still would have to gather the materials and have raised your skill to +250 or whatever Grandmaster is, that, in and of itself, is inherently more difficult and time-consuming than simply getting a raid drop or quest turn-in. And, I would hope that a grandmaster recipe wouldn't be as simple as /combine dragon head and a tooth for a sword - it most likely would combine a lot of other materials outside that raid drop.
I don't entirely disagree with you point though, I just don't want to see "Tiered" levels in Pantheon where Raids always better than Crafting which is always better than Quested. I want to see gear, and players find out what's best based off exploration and completion - see Wandidar's points.
Where I agree with Hiermonk (but not his delivery) is crafting has to be relevant at max level or there's no point to it. I don't want crafting to be always BIS gear, but there's no reason that enhancements such as an Azure Dragon Eye couldn't be used to augment the weapon to add "Frost Element" or Frost Damage in Pantheon - as the elements are intended to play a large role. Or, if Hieromonk learned the ancient smithing techniques of the Frost Giants, that he couldn't make some Frost Giant Sword of Awesomeness after obtaining ultra rare materials and using a FrostFire Forge deep within the Raid dungeon.
Wandidar said:@Malsirian - Exactly!
I think we have a lot of kindred spirits interested in Pantheon... And I do have faith that the game will be more in line with what you describe from the "old times" - I can't wait to find out :)
@ Wandidar - count me in to what you want as well. However, I think if Pantheon "captures" EQ's original design, your hopes will be fulfilled by design (i.e. slow progression and keeping items for 10+ levels). By design, you wouldn't be gear seeking everywhere you went because you may keep that item for many levels. I'd argue, if EQ had been designed differently like the gear-treadmills today, replacing items every half-level, those old-times never would have existed. Basically, I think games have failed by design, rather than players have became inherently bad or "less old school" - time will tell I guess :).
I see your point here, but the scenarios are off. Kill Raid Mob/Complete Quest could be argued to have equal time-sinks; although, I'm hoping for no gear quest rewards outside of some long sprawling epic quest.
(Where I agree with Hiermonk (but not his delivery) is crafting has to be relevant at max level or there's no point to it. I don't want crafting to be always BIS gear, but there's no reason that enhancements such as an Azure Dragon Eye couldn't be used to augment the weapon to add "Frost Element" or Frost Damage in Pantheon - as the elements are intended to play a large role. Or, if Hieromonk learned the ancient smithing techniques of the Frost Giants, that he couldn't make some Frost Giant Sword of Awesomeness after obtaining ultra rare materials and using a FrostFire Forge deep within the Raid dungeon.
Arksien said:And I thought I made it pretty clear bit let me specify. My preference is drops only. But my major argument was that droped should be better than crafted
See and that's the problem. You're either misunderstanding what others are saying, or choosing to ignore it so that you can feel right in your head.
Here's the scenarios:
Scenario 1: Kill raid mob, get gear instantly. Timesink 5 hours, difficulty 5
Scenario 2: Kill raid mob. Raid mob drops crafting material. Either craft great item yourself using those mats, or take mat to a guildmate who crafts item for you. Timesink 5 hours, difficulty 5
Scenario 3: Guy asks you to go get the head of raid mob. You kill raid mob, bring back the head, guy gives you great item. Timesink 5 hours, diffuclty 5.
You'll notice, all things are equal in difficulty and time devotion, but there's a variety of ways to get there so the game has immersion and isn't as boring as simply turning on auto attack, walking away, and coming back to gear in 10 minutes.
So since THAT is the argument myself and others are making, here's how your counterargument comes across:
Scenario 1: Kill raid mob, get best gear.
Scenario 2: Kill raid mob, take materials that drop off raid mob, and use it to make inferior gear to what he already dropped.
Scenario 3: Get a quest to kill raid mob. Get gear from quest that is of a lower value than what he dropped.
Notice how it no longer matters that there was a quest or materials to craft an item, because you get BETTER gear on your system for simply killing the mob. At that point, saying "it's ok, we can have crafting and questing too, but don't make it equal, make the drop loot better" is very silly. If you don't make crafting, raiding, and questing all equals in the end game, then whichever one is the most powerful is the only one anyone will do. That will literally create the "gear is the goal" mentality that OP is complaining about.
You only partially qouted me. The rest of that quote would have read "if one should be better than the other." I dont neccesarrily disagree with a varied approach, even for the best gear. But the only reason I became more agressive in this thread is that was NOT at all what Hieromonk originally said. And your entire post seems to misunderstand my point and forget that Hieromonk was first to say he wanted crafted to be best.
Hieromonk said:Mobs drops should always be inferior at the highest level, to what Players can make.
That was near the bottom of page 1. And I was only defending an IF. IF anything should be better than it should be dropped and I explicitly said it was my fricken opinion several times! Read my posts in various threads both here and over at MMORPG.com. I am a big fan of getting things through various methods to make it interesting and a mix (even though I dont prefer crafting) and I have said such on multiple occaisons and given examples. And yes a lot of this is formed from my 10+ years playing FFXI.
The kinds of examples I usualy give are like so: BiS weapon for class X comes from raid Y, but BiS weapon for class A comes from Epic quest B, and yet still BiS weapon S comes from Crafting materials/recipes T. And that can still break down further by specialization and the atmospeheres. And that also means people have to work togeher to get various things from the varied content. Because that raid Y might not have a BiS weapon for you, but you will want to help your buddy of class X, or get the BiS boots for yourself that do drop in Raid Y. And maybe Ill need your help as a crafter to help me get my best in slot head piece. But again thats only for 1 spec on 1 atmosphere. And make no mistake while that adds up to a lot of situational gear there will be BiS as Brad has said as much.
So you see I was just defending against the crafting is best argument and stating that dropped are my ultimate preference. However to keep things fair and varied I agree with a mixed approach to getting gear. I dont want everything that is BiS to come from raids, I want epic quests, and dungeons, and crafting to be thrown into the mix of endgame as well. Also I do find the idea of some really super rare epic items being gotten through a combination of questing/raiding/crafting. Thats a neat idea. I hope this more fully explains my position and what I was originally saying to Hieromonk. And Id like to think Im being at least reasonable with being open to a mixed approach. Again search the forums for my posts on this subject, im pretty reliable. Though most of those posts are usaualy in threads relating to "Raids should offer the best things".