Future Profession Gating

[Dorn]

So, currently out of the list of professions quite a few are gated behind requiring an ability point. Some of them let you pick up a few levels before (Herbalism/Skinning mostly) but most flat out need points spent.

Forging (4 different abilities)
Knapping (2 ability points needed)
Lapidary
Leatherworking (3 different abilities)
Skinning
Herbalism

My question is, is this just how far you've gotten in looking at gating professions or can we expect further in the future when it is gotten round to out of the current professions available? IE, do you think that gating for...

Cooking
Carpentry
Farming
Fishing
Logging
Mining
Pottery
Woodworking (And it's derivatives Bowyering/Fletching)

Are on the table or have they be looked over and decided that there is no need for it? In their current incarnation that is.

[Vaylon]

There's something I wonder about...

From what I understand, the staff implemented ability point requirements for crafting skills because they dislike characters who can do everything, and the intended effect was to encourage people to collaborate more instead of just grinding up those skills on their own. However, the actual effect, at least from what I can see, appears to have been to drive away most of the people who actually had those crafting skills, with blacksmithing being a notable exception.

I also wonder how many alts were created in the wake of general abilities. Did people feel the need to make a "crafting alt," a "combat alt," and so on?

In the end, my opinion is that CLOK is such a small game already that it's probably counterproductive to implement changes that restrict play. Maybe if we had something on the order of 100 active players, it might be more feasible to have divisions of labor.

[Slaidh]

Is there any real demand for anything other than blacksmithing? I think the other crafting skills need to be made more useful or more interesting for people to actually demand them. Blacksmiths can use special metals like celestium, riversteel, and bloodglass. The only special skins I know of with special properties are drakolin scales. Shardling hides would make a good middle ground and they're mentioned in Exotic Leatheworking (which I have), but do they actually do anything?

[jilliana]

As things are turning out, it's really hard to create even a reasonably versatile character. I think that a lot of the abilities could stand to be condensed.

Jilliana used to be able to do things that actually make sense for her type of character. Now the majority of her slots are filled with combat-oriented abilities when she started as a more versatile character.

I hate to sound like a Negative Nancy, but I dread any new incoming abilities because the nineteen we are afforded just doesn't seem to be enough.

I have seen an increase in alts and it is because they do seem to aim towards being one type of character. I completely understand the reasoning behind one character that knows how to do everything under the sun, but it is always nice to see a character that is filled out and interesting instead of one-dimentional.

[Fayne]

I have to agree with all of this stuff. I feel like I have zero room to wiggle with my character. My ability slots are almost completely used up just giving her abilities that she has already become known to use. I can't develop her in any directions without either severely limiting what I can do and sticking mainly to combat skills, or by giving up abilities that a number of people already know she can do. And with it taking a month to unlearn abilities, yoi can't give one up unless you're absolutely sure you won't want to use it again for at least two months.

I do like the concept behind the point system and so many proffesions requiring abilities to use. But in practice, it has really restricted character growth and development, and in many cases has even caused characters to become more bland. I find myself wanting to play alts more frequently these days, but I don't want to get in that habit again, and I would stress even more about choosing my abilities carefully.

[Kunren]

Kinda the point so far as I've seen, in that characters aren't supposed to be so versatile, at least without giving up other things. Jill, you said most of your slots were taken by combat slots so you couldn't take up other things that you used to be able to do? A purely combatative character will have pretty much every slot filled thanks to all the combat abilities possible to get to be as strong as possible. They won't be as strong if they have to take other things as well, which seems to be where your character is. Technically someone could do combat without any abilities at all though, unlike many forms of crafting, which seems to actually be in its favor for saving ability space.

[Dakhal]

There are some things I've raised an eyebrow about. Such as why Tracking needs to be blocked behind 2 other skills, being Bushcraft Basics and Trailblazing. I can marginally understand the purpose behind the Bushcraft Basics, but only just- but I feel that a tracker really wouldn't necessarily need to know all the best paths to take, because I sure as heck don't know the best paths to take when I'm out hunting and I can still track game.