CLOK BBS

Keep prospect.

-move away from the 5000/card smelting recipes, teach them.
-remove fishing/farming/logging masteries (has anyone ever taken those as anything except a prereq to other artisan abilities?)
-add artisan specific crafts/designs/patterns
-instead of IV dripping new materials to the import shop, give artisans the abilites to smelt these new metals.
-artisan only mine (any artisan can dig a new shaft in it.)
-make it more likely in artisan mines to hit glittering caverns
-give artisans the ability to craft weapons that can do more damage than non-artisans can create
-give artisans facilities that BOOST their rolls like other guilds have for their relevant crafts
-let artisans put in special requests, and give them a quote for costs, to get rare materials in. So we can order them and be charged a fee to get them, instead of doing a random drop at random times for materials.
-remove the contract board, or revamp it to require orders to be placed using possible crafts. Also if kept, include an ability for artisans to remove the request from the board, because it's too rediculous (exquisite weapons for 5 riln anyone?)
-allow artisans to repair bloodglass weapons.

please give more details about what makes certain things better- ie: riversteel. Reported to be more durable. Effect: lasts longer, needs fewer repairs. Kinda nice, I don't think combatants are going to go crazy over it, unless it does more damage, presents the chance for more crits, etc. Or they just want something that looks a bit prettier and more unique than "a steel shortsword"

If possible, try and give us a point spread on artisan abiltities, so we can choose general abilities appropriately in preparation of some artisan love.

ie: 2 mining abilites, 1 lapidary ability, 2 leatherworking abilities, 2 smithing abilities, that are specific to artisans.

When I joined the game, generalization wasn't a thing. And when I said that I love crafting, it was hinted that if I was dedicated to crafting, that the artisans is the way to go. By crafting superiority, I would sincerely like to have it considered as more than "you made a more durable thing". Right now, that appears to be limited to bloodglass (breaks), celestium (very rare, very expensive, only boosts damage versus nethrim).

sona wrote:Keep prospect.

It's not on any chopping blocks that I'm aware of.

-move away from the 5000/card smelting recipes, teach them.

Agreed. We're moving toward this for special smelting, tanning, forging, etc. procedures for special materials to give to Artisans.

-remove fishing/farming/logging masteries (has anyone ever taken those as anything except a prereq to other artisan abilities?)

But they're my favorites! Just kidding. They're going away.

-add artisan specific crafts/designs/patterns

They have some, and we'd be happy to add more.

-instead of IV dripping new materials to the import shop, give artisans the abilites to smelt these new metals.

You'll be happy soon.

-artisan only mine (any artisan can dig a new shaft in it.)

Nothing mining-related is likely until we get around to a mining overhaul. (High on priority list)

-make it more likely in artisan mines to hit glittering caverns

Probably not.

-give artisans the ability to craft weapons that can do more damage than non-artisans can create

See notes on riversteel below.

-give artisans facilities that BOOST their rolls like other guilds have for their relevant crafts

I wasn't aware these existed, but improved facilities/tools is something we're considering very favorably for artisans.

-let artisans put in special requests, and give them a quote for costs, to get rare materials in. So we can order them and be charged a fee to get them, instead of doing a random drop at random times for materials.

Might work as a non-certain thing. Some things are meant to be rare.

-remove the contract board, or revamp it to require orders to be placed using possible crafts. Also if kept, include an ability for artisans to remove the request from the board, because it's too rediculous (exquisite weapons for 5 riln anyone?)

Being able to remove silly requests is a good idea. Some people put nonstandard requests and get them fulfilled by NPCs, which I believe is why such is accommodated.

-allow artisans to repair bloodglass weapons.

Bloodglass is non-repairable by design. Useful to the warrior for whom money is no object and can buy frequent replacements for the massive damage boost it provides.

please give more details about what makes certain things better- ie: riversteel.

More durable so needs repairs less frequently, holds a keener edge and grants a damage boost to pierce/slash/hack/rake damage.

... appears to be limited to bloodglass (breaks), celestium (very rare, very expensive, only boosts damage versus nethrim).

As mentioned above, Riversteel gives a modest damage boost while being extremely durable. Yay!

I have a couple more unique metals planned, as well as some unique leathers that require special treatments or processes to make use of, and some special wood treatments. Good?

Is that damage boost to max damage, or just damage over all. I've two stilettos of riversteel and I don't notice any difference in the max damage, it is still 30, at least the last time I checked which was when it was first released.

I'm going to paste Sona's post below and highlight the things I agree/disagree with:
Keep prospect. Yes oh god yes.

-move away from the 5000/card smelting recipes, teach them. If they're generalization abilities I'm not taking them. Just saying. Other than cards, how else are we supposed to get them? I mean i'll be honest. without looking, I forget them, so, if I was tought I'd have to be tought like 30 more times. Partially this is because everyone wants iron/steel/cobalt.
-remove fishing/farming/logging masteries (has anyone ever taken those as anything except a prereq to other artisan abilities?) I agree, and, I never would if I didn't have to.
-add artisan specific crafts/designs/patterns. I believe there isn't much an artisan shouldn't be able to craft. I think it's a bit amusing that we can't craft shovels or other things of that nature.
-instead of IV dripping new materials to the import shop, give artisans the abilites to smelt these new metals. I agree in some respects, however, if that's the case, let's be honest. Riversteel would be extremely common and basicly rule out steel at this point. If that was to be done, the requirements to smelt the new alloys should be a pain in the ass to get -- not just in Gad/Mascond's mine.
-artisan only mine (any artisan can dig a new shaft in it.) This mine is going to be a billion rooms wide. Mascond's mine is really an artisan mine imho. I think that if artisans had the ability to dig their own mines, well, great. I would get rid of player mines and make artisans the only ones able to get mines period in that case.
-make it more likely in artisan mines to hit glittering caverns. No
-give artisans the ability to craft weapons that can do more damage than non-artisans can create. I like this. We should have to spacificly craft a weapon for it, however, there should be some sort of drawback. It breaks, needs repairs more often, etc. I also think that alloys can accomplish this (see bloodglass weapons).
-give artisans facilities that BOOST their rolls like other guilds have for their relevant crafts. Do they actually boost their rolls? Huh. I didn't know that. I know they have an automatic lesson when in those rooms which would be nice.
-let artisans put in special requests, and give them a quote for costs, to get rare materials in. So we can order them and be charged a fee to get them, instead of doing a random drop at random times for materials. I can get behind this. It needs to be heavily controled so selestium doesn't become the new thing.
-remove the contract board, or revamp it to require orders to be placed using possible crafts. Also if kept, include an ability for artisans to remove the request from the board, because it's too rediculous (exquisite weapons for 5 riln anyone?) Yeah. Removal of posts seriously. It is our board and no one's going to fill a bullcrap order like that. We can't even get rid of it, either.
-allow artisans to repair bloodglass weapons. It's glass. I disagree -- I enjoyed the fact you can't repair it.

Ok, now, here is a couple things of my own.

I really hope that, when generalization finally is a thing that we have to spend all 18 of our abilities on the general abilities and the artisan abilities. My artisan is a firearms enthoosiast and would like to, some day, be perficient enough to be able to use them effectively -- collect his own pelts, defend himself if needed. He would totally be a revolver fan kind of guy. I think that there needs to be something different. if I log in and am forced by this new change to craft and nothing else, I'll switch to another character, which is what I and I'm sure everyone else is trying to eliminate with this. I guess what I'm saying is don't force us to be into just one aspect of the game. The same could be said for combat -- allow them to be herbalists or have something neat to do that isn't just 18 combat abilities. I guess we can pick and choose and take the artisan abilities that we want, but, I mean artisans. Crafting is what we do. I can't help but to feel bad for elemancers, either. They have to waste a point on an ability that allows them to join a guild. Something seems wrong about that to me -- it's kind of silly.

Sneaky wrote:Is that damage boost to max damage, or just damage over all. I've two stilettos of riversteel and I don't notice any difference in the max damage, it is still 30, at least the last time I checked which was when it was first released.

Overall damage. It was overlooked on initial release but has since been implemented.

re: moving away from card recipes:

1) Include them as a set of commands with a guild-only ability.

smelt:

smelt show
smelt describe

smelt rose-gold
-if you have the proper ores in a container (you take X <type> ore, and Y <type> ore, and place them in the furnace, pulling the bellows)
-if you don't have the proper ores, it shows you a list similar to build supply, "you need X <type> ore, and Y <type> ore to make rose-gold"

2) make the recipe public, but only artisans have the skill to make the bars. So, the recipes might be on plaques at forges, but only artisans would have the skill to make them without the ores getting slagged.

also,

making tool qualities matter, and maybe have them help weight rolls a bit, in the way that superior weapons boost your rolls, tools could boost your crafting rolls based on quality.

Yay, Artisan love! Artisans have been in need of a rework/adjustment for some time now, and I'm glad they are finally getting what they deserve.

What perplexes me is why everyone is complaining that they'll have to specialize their Artisans down to a certain aspect of crafting. They are called ARTISANS, their craft should be an ART. And just like art, you don't see many artists, alive or dead, who can or once could paint a painting, carve a sculpture out of whatever medium they wanted, and work with pottery on the side. I suspect most people will try to specialize their Artisans to be blacksmiths, but this is good too, because it'll make those that choose to be carpenters, leatherworkers, or woodworkers that much more valuable, especially now that not everyone can take up those professions. Generalization did more than make guilds unnecessary for abilities, it also helped to narrow character focus and keep people from being Jacks-of-all-trades. Do I think we could use a few more ability points? Definitely, and I fully expect that the amount of points we are granted to change in the coming year as things are figured out.

I know there is going to be much howling and knashing of teeth, but overall, I love how limited generalization made some skills.

This to me, would be equivalent to telling an udemi: you can druidry, or you can melee/archery. But you can't both. Tell elemenacers, "you can magic, but you can't have enough points left over to take any physical combat." and other such comparisons. Now, I know some people are fond of alt armies, but there should be some benefit to focusing on one character. (two max?)

sona wrote:This to me, would be equivalent to telling an udemi: you can druidry, or you can melee/archery. But you can't both. Tell elemenacers, "you can magic, but you can't have enough points left over to take any physical combat." and other such comparisons. Now, I know some people are fond of alt armies, but there should be some benefit to focusing on one character. (two max?)

Actually both of the things that you mentioned is pretty much how it's been going. You can be a hardcore druids and get a few physical skills, but if you want to be a bowmaster you will sacrifice a lot of druidic stuff.

Elemancers can barely afford anything in generalization depending on their build. They are either all magic, or they are weaker at it and can do combat.

Everyone, with the exception of those who are guildless, has to make some hard choices with generalization. Artisans shouldn't be exempt from that.

You don't need an alt army to be the best, you can focus on a few things and RP your character that way, I don't see why you wouldn't be able to.

sona wrote:This to me, would be equivalent to telling an udemi: you can druidry, or you can melee/archery. But you can't both. Tell elemenacers, "you can magic, but you can't have enough points left over to take any physical combat." and other such comparisons. Now, I know some people are fond of alt armies, but there should be some benefit to focusing on one character. (two max?)

All that sounds reasonable. Specialists will always outperform generalists within their field of focus.

And the benefit to focusing on one character is that your time isn't split between other characters resulting in higher skills, better equipment, more reknown, and other cool stuff. You can either have a whole Sona or half a Sona and half some other person. There's only so much time and resources available.

there's a deeper issue on skills - skill plateauing. If a generalist reaches a certain point, while mastery is rare, 90% of attempts will be exquisite, and they might get a masterwork once in awhile anyways.

re: Sona

option 1: gets pretty good at most skills, maybe masters a number

option 2:
char 1: good at 1-2 things (mining-leatherwork)
char 2: good at 1-2 things (combat-herbalism)
char 3: good at 1-2 things (skinning-mining)

result of having to alt to get more skills: lack of motivation, potentially in the long term, less interested in character interaction (building those skills takes time)

We all have concerns and issues with generalization. To me, the limitation thing plays to the strength of weekend warriors, who'll show up, play once or twice a week and that's good. I suppose it's the dedicated players that get hit.

progression abilitiies:

apprentice <ability>
journeyman <ability> (when moving up a rank in ability, refund AP from previous, each increase in ability giving an incremental gain, like apprentice: 10%, journeyman 20%, artisan <ability> 30%

Mining:
Could we have mining bundled up like the others? can/should prospect be bundled into "artisan mining?"

Presently speaking, based on what has been released and seen in the teaser, I'm looking at 3 craft sets, 2 gather sets, and 0 combat sets. I admit, one of the sets i'm looking at is ability heavy, but I still think completeing 3 sets should be doable. One mechanical trouble I believe is that generalization mirrors the artisan guild abilities, this effectively causes a huge point sink for us, one because we're expected to be able to get our own material supplies. One way to alleviate this necessity, might be to introduce an artisan supply store that sells even basic materials at under market cost to due paying members (leather in qualities up to exquisite,copper, tin, zinc, iron, coal, and maybe even electrum and cinnabar. The last two kinda rare in mines though, so I wouldn't be heartbroken if they weren't included.) This means artisans can focus on their crafts without feeling the pressure to be the gatherer as well as the crafter. We can determine our own prices (if we wish to do so), by considering out cost to purchase materials, instead of gauging our effort to find materials, and spend our precious crafting time in that way.

My personal breakdown would be right now
blacksmithing
leatherworking
herbalism

mining
skinning

we can bring even that down to just the blacksmithing, leatherworking, herbalism, and I believe that will take all 18 pts, if we have a way around gathering.

1:guild(artisan blacksmithing)
2:guild(artisan leatherworking)
3:gen(blacksmithing)
4:gen(blacksmithing:armor)
5:gen(blacksmithing:blades)
6:gen(blacksmithing:heavy heads)
7:gen(leatherworking)
8:gen(leatherworking:advanced)
9:gen(leatherworking:exotic, pre-req for artisan leather)
10:gen(herbalism focus)
11:gen(herbalism:advanced)
12:gen(herbalism:cultivation)
13:gen(herbalism:adv. cures)
14:gen(herbalism:adv. enhancers)
15:gen(herbalism:fertilizers)
16:gen(herbalism:adv. healing)
17:gen(herbalism:herbicides)
18:gen(herbalism:enhanced poisons)

about herbalism, we're not yet sure how many of herbalism abilities are going to be cross-dependant on other herbalism abilities. So I may be able to pick and choose a little bit there.

artisan leatherworking:

Being true masters of leatherworking, we are able to create armors that are lighter than those found elsewhere, that offer the same quality of protection. Gotta keep those lightly armored folks lightly encumbered in leathers. Just a thought.

Artisan ideas redux: because I'm getting bored with the artisans and don't want it to become a log on, earn 10,000 riln or more a day, do some odds and ends, log off repetatively, maybe make a bunch of people exquisite weapons for free. Because bored grinding and why not?

idea 1: personal material storages (included with guild fees): holds maybe 150 standard bars, 100 flitches, up to 100 stones/gems. Pretty straightforward, but means we have access to materials we want/need, that we provide. Pretty much expands upon having storage wagons, which is nice, but at a certain point, you just start ditching everything in your wagon but materials anyways, and the benefits of paying dues still feel pretty weak. (lowered workyard costs, being able to buy from the import shop on occasions that it does get restocked, est. 1-2 times month, max.)

idea 2: release recipe to riversteel, make bloodsand available at much more regular intervals, riversteel gives us something new to play with, people ask for it, I think most of the supply in game has been drained by now.

idea 3: allow master artisans to sacrifice X material, once a day, week, or month to guarantee a single masterwork piece. Makes masterworks a bit less rare I suppose, but also might keep master artisans from spending day and night just pumping out endless streams of materials to get that 1 masterwork and flooding the game with exquisites.

idea 4: start introducing requests from various hamlets, towns, etc. To gain faction, and occasional gifts from them. Have them repeatable, maybe 1/50 sword weapons delivers, pieces of armor delivered, logs/cants delivered, nails delivered, and give some sort of achievement for that town. It'd mean tracking a hamlet or town's growth, maybe adding stuff to it.

I'm starting to struggle a bit more in trying to make artisans more fun, That could just mean i'll stick out more grind days, do give aways, or mine and make a good amount of riln. There doesn't feel to be anything more immediate and worthwhile to push for. I'm really hoping some stuff will come together to make it more interesting than having Sona re-direct to grinding out combat stats.

sona wrote:idea 1: personal material storages (included with guild fees):

This is coming with the rentable work areas in the Haiban expansion, but will require daily rent in addition to guild fees.

idea 2: release recipe to riversteel, make bloodsand available at much more regular intervals

Like I told you in-game, there simply wasn't enough interest in bloodsand last time I released it... I'll try it again and see if it goes any better the second time around. Perhaps with lower prices.

idea 3: allow master artisans to sacrifice X material, once a day, week, or month to guarantee a single masterwork piece.

It's a cool idea, but sorry, I'll officially state now that there is never going to be any system or mechanic in place that gaurantees a 1.15 quality item.

idea 4: start introducing requests from various hamlets, towns, etc.

Kinda what I envisioned the automated purchase order list population system to be. Minus the faction and gift rewards. The benefit of using this is you'd get more money for your products than selling to market or pawning, but you've already basically said riln isn't an issue. With making 10k riln a day, what other kind of gifts do you need?

I'm starting to struggle a bit more in trying to make artisans more fun, That could just mean i'll stick out more grind days, do give aways, or mine and make a good amount of riln. There doesn't feel to be anything more immediate and worthwhile to push for. I'm really hoping some stuff will come together to make it more interesting than having Sona re-direct to grinding out combat stats.

Keep in mind you don't have to do nothing but grind riln and craft stuff. Maybe try socializing with some people, don some of your handmade armor and weapons and poke at the infested, see if anyone's interested in joining you on a joint venture, offer to mentor an up-and-coming craftsman. There's a number of things you can do, the possibilities are really endless and entirely up to you.

The thing with bloodglass is that people do not know what to do with it. It is pretty much the only thing they can spend money on (and it is A LOT of money) that will eventually break and they cannot do anything about it. And since it has glass in the name, I think people believe it will break sooner rather than later. As in "I swing my 10000 riln longsword at an armored enemy and it shatters on the third strike". Bloodglass used to cost 1500 riln a bar and was unlimited and still did not sell very well.

Ardor wrote:The thing with bloodglass is that people do not know what to do with it. It is pretty much the only thing they can spend money on (and it is A LOT of money) that will eventually break and they cannot do anything about it. And since it has glass in the name, I think people believe it will break sooner rather than later. As in "I swing my 10000 riln longsword at an armored enemy and it shatters on the third strike". Bloodglass used to cost 1500 riln a bar and was unlimited and still did not sell very well.

Basically this. Its a lot of riln for a fragile thing, and most people don't realize how much of an advantage it gives since they don't wanna use it.

Wanna make bloodglass more popular? Make weapons have a random repair value that causes them to break irrepairably after so many repairs are performed, or make it so that every repair makes it lose durability faster, so eventually that sword is going to break after a couple swings. I prefer the latter idea. The trade-off is making masterful weapons less commonly used, but come on, once you are well established enough to make those masterful weapons proud, you should be able to make riln easily enough that throwing 10000 riln into one every two or three months isn't going to be that bad. No one should have hundreds of thousands of riln constantly sitting in their bank waiting to be used (except Artisans, and honestly they have little to use it on, so no need to be jealous).

Weapons do have this value already, however master blacksmiths from the artisans have an ability to flat out negate that happening.

Yes, they can prevent quality from reducing. That's why I'm a fan of making items less durable with each repair regardless of who repairs it or how much the quality drops. Or make it so that weapons have a random value between 5 and 10 that is how many times it can be repaired before automatic and unavoidable quality loss.

Ah. I would just stop using weapons entirely, since unarmed is very much a viable option.. and my fists never break permanently. I mean I get the want for it, but materials are limited as is and having players requesting multitudes of high-rarity metals means that newer players will never have a chance at getting them unless there's a higher saturation in availability. Making other weapons break isn't going to make bloodglass any more popular, it's not like it's even expensive to get a weapon like that made- and they are FAR superior to any other weapon... unless you're fighting nethrim. Now, that's the real kicker there, most people want a weapon that will kill nethrim.

Well, the thing about newer players not getting rare materials, that's kinda the point. Celestium and sunsteel are like this already, being rare to the point that I've never heard of raw celestium being available, and have never seen anything made of it. I've seen sunsteel items, but extremely few. Bloodglass and riversteel are not as rare, but still rare. New players shouldn't have the opportunity to get these weapons until they've been playing for a few months, due to both cost and rarity. As for weapon breakage, how realistic is it that we can infinitely repair weapons, and how conducive is it as a riln sink? If we were really going for realism, weapons with a sharp tip, point, or edge would be repaired by sharpening them at a grindstone, which takes away material. And going away from realism, the way we currently repair things by heating them up and forging out cracks and dents, would ultimately weaken the item more and more over time. Right now, people use exclusively exquisite and masterful items once they have the riln to buy them, amd then get them repaired when they need it. If the majority of items out there are exquisite, they aren't exquisite anymore, they're average. I think weapons should break eventually, that way not only do we have a riln sink, but Artisans also have more work that isn't "repair this for me" and exquisite weapons become, well, exquisite again, and well-crafted becomes something that people actually accept.

I'd actually be a fan of setting up things to only be repaired so many times and allowing artisan blacksmiths the ability to add a bit of bonus durability when the item is repaired. That way weapons still are cycled, youd get say 3 repairs from them and artisans would still be the best people to find when it comes to repairs.

This is just a suggestion however.

I came from a game where all armor and weapons got 4 repairs from brand new on them, regardless of being a player-crafted or enemy-dropped item, with rare exception being that players could donate money to the server in exchange for rewards to spend at a special market, where you could purchase such things like buying stuff that would grant an extra 2 repairs, and custom description for the original item (i.e. turn a Longsword into a Dark Obsidian Blade with 6 repairs) and we also made the durability last longer (or shorter!) depending on the artisan's skills who repaired it, so someone just learning to repair might only give a weapon a few swings before it would need another repair, whereas the guild leader might repair a weapon and have it last twice as long as it normally would.

This method felt wildly successful, and you also paid better prices to experienced players who put in the time and effort to level up, so they felt rewarded for their efforts. We didn't seem to have any issues with item cycling at all, but we also had a chance to lose equipment upon death which we don't have here, big pros and cons to that one of course!