issues with the artisan guild

[clayton]

Issues with the artisan guild

Hey guys. These issues I'm about to mention may seem like complaints, but if everyone was satisfied with the status quo, or was just complacent about everything, the BBS in large part wouldn't exist. So here we go.

Usage of guild points.
Currently, there is zero incentive for artisans to do tasks, aside from gaining points towards a promotion.
Before the coaltion was burned to the ground, artisans had only two uses for their recognition points. A mining permit, and a logging permit.
These were simply for one use only, and the guild points required for them were EXTREMELY high. The mine was especially not worth it for most of the artisans because most of the ore and gemstones were nearly impossible to hit unless you had a high enough skill to even see them, let alone hit the vein.
Now, those permits are obsolete, because the coalition as we knew it is gone, and the north and south exits once you enter the gate have still not be worked on and opened to the public, or to the artisans for that matter.

Now, the artisans as I said, have nothing to use their recognition points on, so they just build and build and build.
I would like to propose some suggestions on how they can be used.

If Haiban is now the new center for the mercs and artisans, even though it's open to everyone else as a starting point for new players, why don't we have a store, maybe inside the warehouse on the south road, where only traders can obtain tools for their particular trade. Only instead of using riln, they can use their recognition points, provided they have guild points.
If they don't, well they'll just have to buy their tools as the public stores, or perform missions that will give them some guild points, which they can then use in the artisan-only store.
Another suggestion for guild point usage is ... Master Locke can dish out one-time permits that will give you access to a particular facility for 3 hours, instead of one hour, and it would require, say, 2000 recognition points.
The permit would be taken from them when they entered the appropriate facility just like the one-hour permits do.
Another type of permit Locke can dish out, is a 24-hour pass for a particular facility. It would also be taken upon entering the appropriate facility, and it would cost 5000 recognition points.
The previous permits for 6000 and 2500 recogntion points were outrageous because of the risks involved, and the fact that artisans earn very very little guild points, compared to the other guilds.
At least with these proposed permits, artisans can get their money's worth out of their use.


I have no idea why traders/artisans were denied the ability to gain guild points by selling things at the markets. I mean, that's like denying a mercenary, the ability to gain guild points by killing things.
crafting, selling, mining, stone working, etc, is what an artisan is suppose to do, so why don't they get credit from their guild for doing it. The majority of guilds get rewarded for killing infested or nethrum creatures. That's their incentive to increase their combat skills. An artisan should get incentive for working on their profession skills, and buy selling things at the various markets, is how they'd achieve that, along with being paid for their effert.

I've written a few posts suggesting additional types of missions artisans could be given to encourage them to work on certain skills, but that fell by the wayside.
The biggest issue I have is with the use of the recognition points, so I'm just going to leave it at that.

Purchase orders
We come to my next issue, the purchase order system.
This was just sort of.. put in halfway, with no fine-tuning.
I don't see any reason why we can't put our crafting mark on the item. I mean, what overall baring does that have on the product. At least the person who placed the order would have an idea who worked on their request, and that person could seek that artisan out in the future if they were impressed with their work.
Another thing is, artisans need a way to communicate with the order placer, if need be, to work out the finer details, or to have the order modified if aspects of it just aren't capable of being dealt with. I'm going to use an example here so everyone can see what I mean.
Order number 6991: 40 - order arrow with silver heads of good quality out of elm wood shaft with silver head for 500 riln
Now as you can see here, this person wanted silver arrowheads. This is not possible in the game.
We can paint the arrow shaft silver, but that's as far as that goes. Now for 500 riln, that's very cheap to want 40 arrows with any kind of broadhead attached to them.
If I were filling that order, I'd want to know if they wanted silver painted arrows instead, with just sharpened ends, or if they'd like the elm arrows to have iron or steel broadheads, or bodkins, or even stone arrowheads on the ends.
I have no way to find any of this out, unless I was able to contact the customer.
Another issue is, some of the orders are just nonsense. By that I mean, we don't have any ability at all in-game, to fill them, so they sit, and sit, and sit. Some of these orders Clayton's looking at, have been there for several months, which means not even the most skilled traders/artisans were able to deal with them. There should be a time period in place, and that time limit relayed to the person upon placing their order. Something like one month should be long enough for any artisan, skilled on not, to deal with the order that was placed. After such time, that order should be automatically terminated, and that person's riln returned to them. Or, they can just suffer the loss of however much riln that put in as a downpayment. *shrugging*
Another issue dealing with the purchase order system, is artisans get zero guild points for being able to fulfill any of the orders.
Even if they earned 10 guild points, it would at least be something.
Another issue, is the handling of large orders.
I have not tried this myself, because there wouldn't be any profit in it if it worked out this way ... but say there was an order for like ... ten casks. Ok obviously ten casks would not fit in a package, so you'd need a handcart or larger container. I don't know if the handcart would actually be sent along with the order, but if it did, you'd be out the cost of the handcart, since that's not caculated into the offered price for the order.
If a person ordered ten casks, and offered 5000 for it, the system would have to be configured to add the cost of a large container onto the offered price, so instead of simply paying half the total offered price (in this case 2500 riln), the additional cost of the handcart or large container would have to be added on, so the person would have to put down 2700, or 2800 riln to cover that cost.
Also, since the purchase orders system was put into place, permits were added in for various facilities, adding to an artisans overall costs.
So now, we have to factor in 50 riln for a permit an artisan's going to have to fork out ahead of time to use the appropriate facility. If he or she would be adding that into the cost of the item dealing face to face with a customer, the same thing needs to apply to the purchase order system as well.
I know that logically, the system's not going to know if a customer's order is going to need the use of a facility like the leather shop, or the saw mill, etc... but it needs to be calculated in anyway as a business cost.

I believe that's all I can think of in regards to the artisans. If I think of something else in this thread, I'll post a follow-up.

[merin]

I don't think we should get points for selling at the market. If we were, I'd just fill a wagon with copper ore, sell it, and rince and repeat.

I do feel that we should get guild points for either crafting something or gathering needed materials, though.

[Elystole]

Have you read the Purchase Orders wiki article? Some of your questions are answered there.

I don't see any reason why we can't put our crafting mark on the item. I mean, what overall baring does that have on the product. At least the person who placed the order would have an idea who worked on their request, and that person could seek that artisan out in the future if they were impressed with their work.

It is in the Coalition's interest to keep purchase orders anonymous. This is why crafting marks are removed and client's names are not mentioned on the purchase orders list. Please do not try to bypass this through OOC communications.

In other words, the Coalition wants its brokerage fee. If you put your craftmark on a good then the buyer will just go to you directly in the future and the Coalition doesn't get its cut.

Now as you can see here, this person wanted silver arrowheads. This is not possible in the game.
...
Another issue is, some of the orders are just nonsense. By that I mean, we don't have any ability at all in-game, to fill them, so they sit, and sit, and sit. Some of these orders Clayton's looking at, have been there for several months, which means not even the most skilled traders/artisans were able to deal with them.

Items requested do not necessarily have to be handcrafted goods made by the trader or resources that the trader has to gather themselves. Traders may be required to actually trade to acquire some goods.
Just because a requested item isn't easily obtainable in game or even recognizable does not necessarily mean it is an invalid purchase order.

You're going to have to RP some things. Send out a few npcmails, send an email to the GM, etc.

I have not tried this myself, because there wouldn't be any profit in it if it worked out this way ... but say there was an order for like ... ten casks. Ok obviously ten casks would not fit in a package, so you'd need a handcart or larger container. I don't know if the handcart would actually be sent along with the order, but if it did, you'd be out the cost of the handcart, since that's not caculated into the offered price for the order.

Items that are provided for purchase orders cannot have crafting marks on them. You cannot turn in multiple items at different times, so small items should be placed in a larger container. Orders too large can be turned in as the contents of a wagon (the wagon will be emptied).
...
If the customer requested multiple products, the trader must either furnish a container or have them in a wagon in which their mount is pulling. Note that ALL items in the wagon will be considered part of the purchase order.
...
Be careful when turning in containers or wagons that only the contents of the purchase order you wish to fulfill are in them.

So the solution to your problem is to load your items up in an otherwise empty wagon (don't leave your tools or raw materials in there) and then turn in the order. They'll empty out your wagon and leave you the wagon.

Finally, if you don't like the price of a purchase order (because it doesn't include the cost of containers or permits or whatever), don't take the order. It's that simple. It's not like you have to fill purchase orders to advance. Ideally, the person who placed the order should come back, see that their order still hasn't been fulfilled, and offer a higher price.

[clayton]

clayton wrote:I don't see any reason why we can't put our crafting mark on the item. I mean, what overall baring does that have on the product. At least
the person who placed the order would have an idea who worked on their request, and that person could seek that artisan out in the future if they were
impressed with their work.
Wiki wrote:It is in the Coalition's interest to keep purchase orders anonymous. This is why crafting marks are removed and client's names are not mentioned
on the purchase orders list. Please do not try to bypass this through OOC communications.
In other words, the Coalition wants its brokerage fee. If you put your craftmark on a good then the buyer will just go to you directly in the future and
the Coalition doesn't get its cut.
---------------
Seeing as how the only thing the coalition did was have a clerk behind the counter to take the order, that wouldn't be that great a loss if the customer just sought out the artisan directly.

In any event, I guess that means the communication between customer and order fulfiller would be a moot point, because if communication were possible, the customer would then know who the artisan was who wished to fill their order, removing the annonimity.
On the flipside, if there was an issue with an order, and it was ironed out by communicating directly with the person who placed the order, the order would be fulfilled, the items unmarked, and the coalition will get its precious ten percent order placement fee.

Another issue is, some of the orders are just nonsense. By that I mean, we don't have any ability at all in-game, to fill them, so they sit, and sit, and
sit. Some of these orders Clayton's looking at, have been there for several months, which means not even the most skilled traders/artisans were able to
deal with them.
Wiki wrote:Items requested do not necessarily have to be handcrafted goods made by the trader or resources that the trader has to gather themselves. Traders
may be required to actually trade to acquire some goods.
Just because a requested item isn't easily obtainable in game or even recognizable does not necessarily mean it is an invalid purchase order.
You're going to have to RP some things. Send out a few npcmails, send an email to the GM, etc.

----------
I have actually just made an attempt to do that prior to writing the post that started this thread. Granted hardly any time has past and Loke is a busy guy, so Clayton can't expect him to get right back to him, so I'll wait a few days for some mail to readch me on what Locke thinks I should do in order to fill the "odd" orders.
Clayton did ask in the letter to Locke how he can best go about filling the orders, and he has listed the particular orders he's having trouble with.

One order that's probably never going to be filled, is the order for 100 lockpicks of steel. Only a thief or Utasa can craft those, excluding any NPC's we don't know about who also have that skill.

Finally, if you don't like the price of a purchase order (because it doesn't include the cost of containers or permits or whatever), don't take the order.
It's that simple. It's not like you have to fill purchase orders to advance. Ideally, the person who placed the order should come back, see that their
order still hasn't been fulfilled, and offer a higher price.

------------------
That would be nice, or just simply cancel the order. Unfortunately, some of those orders I have a feeling, were placed by chars who are no longer played, thus, the order is doomed to sit there indefinitely, which is why I suggested they have a time-limit, and after the time runs out, they are exsponged from the ledger. If that person who placed the order finds their order's been removed, they'll just have to place it again.

Have you read the Purchase Orders wiki article? Some of your questions are answered there.

I don't see any reason why we can't put our crafting mark on the item. I mean, what overall baring does that have on the product. At least the person who placed the order would have an idea who worked on their request, and that person could seek that artisan out in the future if they were impressed with their work.

It is in the Coalition's interest to keep purchase orders anonymous. This is why crafting marks are removed and client's names are not mentioned on the purchase orders list. Please do not try to bypass this through OOC communications.

In other words, the Coalition wants its brokerage fee. If you put your craftmark on a good then the buyer will just go to you directly in the future and the Coalition doesn't get its cut.

Now as you can see here, this person wanted silver arrowheads. This is not possible in the game.
...
Another issue is, some of the orders are just nonsense. By that I mean, we don't have any ability at all in-game, to fill them, so they sit, and sit, and sit. Some of these orders Clayton's looking at, have been there for several months, which means not even the most skilled traders/artisans were able to deal with them.

Items requested do not necessarily have to be handcrafted goods made by the trader or resources that the trader has to gather themselves. Traders may be required to actually trade to acquire some goods.
Just because a requested item isn't easily obtainable in game or even recognizable does not necessarily mean it is an invalid purchase order.

You're going to have to RP some things. Send out a few npcmails, send an email to the GM, etc.

I have not tried this myself, because there wouldn't be any profit in it if it worked out this way ... but say there was an order for like ... ten casks. Ok obviously ten casks would not fit in a package, so you'd need a handcart or larger container. I don't know if the handcart would actually be sent along with the order, but if it did, you'd be out the cost of the handcart, since that's not caculated into the offered price for the order.

Items that are provided for purchase orders cannot have crafting marks on them. You cannot turn in multiple items at different times, so small items should be placed in a larger container. Orders too large can be turned in as the contents of a wagon (the wagon will be emptied).
...
If the customer requested multiple products, the trader must either furnish a container or have them in a wagon in which their mount is pulling. Note that ALL items in the wagon will be considered part of the purchase order.
...
Be careful when turning in containers or wagons that only the contents of the purchase order you wish to fulfill are in them.

So the solution to your problem is to load your items up in an otherwise empty wagon (don't leave your tools or raw materials in there) and then turn in the order. They'll empty out your wagon and leave you the wagon.

Finally, if you don't like the price of a purchase order (because it doesn't include the cost of containers or permits or whatever), don't take the order. It's that simple. It's not like you have to fill purchase orders to advance. Ideally, the person who placed the order should come back, see that their order still hasn't been fulfilled, and offer a higher price.

[clayton]

Merin: I don't think we should get points for selling at the market. If we were, I'd just fill a wagon with copper ore, sell it, and rince and repeat.
---------------------------------------------------------------------
Ok, I didn't mean, a whole point per item.
Maybe something like 0.01 points per sellable commodity.
You would not be able to fill a wagon full of any given thing and sell it... not all at one market.
Markets have been modified (to my understanding), to only accept a certain amount of a good at one time and not accept any more of that item till it goes off the market.
I've seen it with branches, fish, herbs, etc, so that's not possible.
My argument still stands... members who belong to combat-oriented guils can kill creatures all day long and get credit for it, why shouldn't artisans get credit for doing things that are profession-based. If I took the time to mine various gemstones, smelt down various metals, polish gems, facet gems, etc ... things that my guild encourages me to do, why shouldn't my guild give me recognition for that by giving me recognition points? It's not like the guild points for tasks scale up that much by difficulty. I've seen only one type of task that yields 100.0 points, and those are rare gemstone tasks. even still, you're only require to dig them up, you don't need to polish them. You certainly can for extra money, and the market obviously takes them, and it counts towards completing the mission, but still, you don't get any missions that require you to specifically polish your gemstones.

[merin]

members who belong to combat-oriented guils can kill creatures all day long and get credit for it, why shouldn't artisans get credit for doing things that are profession-based. If I took the time to mine various gemstones, smelt down various metals, polish gems, facet gems, etc ... things that my guild encourages me to do, why shouldn't my guild give me recognition for that by giving me recognition points?

I completely agree, however, I think we should get the points for doing the activities rather than selling at the market, though.

[Rias]

Combat-oriented guilds can get credit for killing creatures of a decent challenge rating to them. The challenge is the important part. There's no challenge in simply selling whatever to the market. You could do (and people did) silly stuff like have your friends give you all their commodities to sell for them, then hand them the riln for it - just so you get credit for doing essentially nothing.

But! Now that they're Artistans, I could see them getting points for actually crafting things (I don't know about gathering and mid-processing, probably only actually finishing a product). I'm not the guru, however, so I can't make that call. Just a personal opinion. And of course, it's trickier because we don't have a lot of scaling challenge with crafting. So I'm guessing the new standard practice would be to simply make nails all day to grind for guild points, and that would make me similarly sad.

[merin]

So I'm guessing the new standard practice would be to simply make nails all day to grind for guild points, and that would make me similarly sad.

In my opinion, commodities aren't a finished product. Sure, you can sell them on the market, however, they are used to...make more things via a different craft, so I wouldn't include them as a "finished product,"

On that note, here's an idea.
1. I craft a dagger blade, get nothing.
2. I craft a dagger hilt, get nothing.
3. I vice a dagger blade and a dagger hilt that I have made, get guild points for that finished product.

I carve a toy, I get nothing.
I carve a wooden rudis, I get something.

Make only certain products give you guildpoints -- things people would really, actually, use in their lives.

Also, make it a few skills:
forging blunt/bladed/armor
carpentry (it requires two skills and can be a pain).
Leatherworking

I don't see a need for fishing, farming, and I would go so far as to even say woodworking are challenging enough to warrant gp gain.