Forums » Crafting and Gathering

A quick word about Crafting in Pantheon

    • 255 posts
    December 27, 2020 5:53 AM PST

    I like what I have read so far, and thanks for the update.

    • 19 posts
    December 27, 2020 10:08 AM PST

    Looking forward to crafting!! thank you for the preview

    • 2 posts
    December 27, 2020 11:32 AM PST

    the facilities and tools you are using

     

    QQ: Does this suggest that their may be crafting stations that are more difficult to reach (say, in a dungeon or difficult to clear area) that might entice players to visit based on the properties of the crafting station?


    This post was edited by Zorx at December 27, 2020 11:33 AM PST
    • 1992 posts
    December 27, 2020 12:23 PM PST

    We've been told that there will be such places, where a skilled Craftsman will be able to forge items that can not be created elsewhere. They specifically revealed that one of those would be a forge deep in the icy dungeon of Amberfaet, which is in the land of the Dwarves.


    This post was edited by Jothany at December 27, 2020 12:25 PM PST
    • 2419 posts
    December 28, 2020 1:58 PM PST

    @Nephele,

    Are you also looking closely at what items are going to be dropped by NPCs in the world, specifically named/bosses or are you creating this stat-adjusting crafting sytem in a vacuum?  How are you going to reconcile these variable stat creations with what drops in the world?  Which is being developed first, dropped items ala Short Sword of Ykesha from EQ1 (which was quite desireable), or these variable stat items?  What is the foundation, the baseline, upon which everything is being built?

    EDIT:  A scenario.

    Lets say that at tier 1 (levels 1-10) that the best weapon you can obtain is 8 damage with a 30 delay.  A crafter at that level might decide to improve the damage, and due to skill level, can only take it to 9.  But say a level 20 crafter who has their skill maxed out for that level comes back to that same sword.  How much better can they make it? Could a level 50 crafter revisit that sword and both improve the damage, decrease the delay and add, for argument sake +1 str, +1agi and +1dex?  Or is that tier 1 sword going to have artificial limitations placed upon it such that the maximum improvements allowed are extremely minor, say just +/- 1 point for damage or delay but no additional stats?  Unless you're thinking about what a level 50, max skilled crafter who is using the best available tools and the best possible crafting station can do to very low level item,  you're going to end up with horribly unbalanced newbie gear completely destroying game balance. 

    What about armor then?  What limits would a level 50 armor crafter have on making low level gear?  Could they add just +1str to every armor piece for a warrior, or +1dex for a rogue, or +1wis for a shaman?  VR has told us over the years that even point will matter, yet here you are opening the door to having low level gear give a character +9 to a single stat...at level 1.  Or what about balance if you add +1 AC to ever piece of armor at that tier.  How far out have you thought about this?


    This post was edited by Vandraad at December 28, 2020 3:48 PM PST
    • 1785 posts
    December 28, 2020 5:37 PM PST

    Vandraad said:

    @Nephele,

    Are you also looking closely at what items are going to be dropped by NPCs in the world, specifically named/bosses or are you creating this stat-adjusting crafting sytem in a vacuum?

    We're actually building out the itemization rules side-by-side for crafting and loot, and we'll also be tuning both of them together whenever we have to make changes during testing.  You can expect crafted items to be generally equivalent to looted items, taking risk/effort into account.  Obviously, creating something that is on par with a dungeon or raid drop is going to be tougher and require more than creating something that is on par with vendor equipment.

    • 1785 posts
    December 28, 2020 5:42 PM PST

    Vandraad said:

    What about armor then?  What limits would a level 50 armor crafter have on making low level gear?  Could they add just +1str to every armor piece for a warrior, or +1dex for a rogue, or +1wis for a shaman?  VR has told us over the years that even point will matter, yet here you are opening the door to having low level gear give a character +9 to a single stat...at level 1.  Or what about balance if you add +1 AC to ever piece of armor at that tier.  How far out have you thought about this?

    Your ability to add stats to items during customization will be limited by the item you're making.  So if you're making a bronze breastplate (as an example), you're never going to be able to add more than probably +1 or maybe +2 at most to it no matter how advanced you are :)

    It's worth noting that difficulty scales both based on the materials you're using (bronze is easier to work with than steel) as well as the customizations you're applying (a normal steel sword is easier to make than an imbued blood steel sword of the inferno).  That's where progression matters - sure, you can make the attempt to customize your items assuming that you have the right materials and components to use, but do you have the right techniques, equipment, and skill to be able to succeed?

    PS:  I totally just made up "imbued blood steel sword of the inferno" but you get the idea.

    • 2419 posts
    December 28, 2020 6:23 PM PST

    Nephele said:

    Your ability to add stats to items during customization will be limited by the item you're making.  So if you're making a bronze breastplate (as an example), you're never going to be able to add more than probably +1 or maybe +2 at most to it no matter how advanced you are :)

    It's worth noting that difficulty scales both based on the materials you're using (bronze is easier to work with than steel) as well as the customizations you're applying (a normal steel sword is easier to make than an imbued blood steel sword of the inferno).  That's where progression matters - sure, you can make the attempt to customize your items assuming that you have the right materials and components to use, but do you have the right techniques, equipment, and skill to be able to succeed?

    PS:  I totally just made up "imbued blood steel sword of the inferno" but you get the idea.

    First off, you, as a designer/developer must assume that everyone will have the right techniques, equipment, skills, materials and components and will make these items and you then must balance the game around everyone having those items and using them. If you (the plural you, meaning everyone at VR) is not thinking this way, well, you're all clueless and this game will suffer severly for such short sightedness.

    But now onto the main issue:

    The problem isn't adding +1 to a single armor piece, it's adding +1 to each armor piece..9 slots worth.  So unless you're going to 'magically' prevent us from adding, say, wisdom, every armor piece, someone will put +1WIS on every armor piece. How unbalanced will a wisdom based character be with having +9 wisdom starting out at level 1.  This is twinking, plain and simple.  Yes, this won't be an issue early on, but twinking never is an early days problem. It's a problem 1 year+ down the road.

    • 1785 posts
    December 28, 2020 6:42 PM PST

    Vandraad said:

    The problem isn't adding +1 to a single armor piece, it's adding +1 to each armor piece..9 slots worth.  So unless you're going to 'magically' prevent us from adding, say, wisdom, every armor piece, someone will put +1WIS on every armor piece. How unbalanced will a wisdom based character be with having +9 wisdom starting out at level 1.  This is twinking, plain and simple.  Yes, this won't be an issue early on, but twinking never is an early days problem. It's a problem 1 year+ down the road.

    Honestly, twinking is an entirely separate discussion and is broader than crafting.  It's a valid concern but (unless we decide to start slapping strict level limits on items), itemization alone isn't going to solve it :)

    I would be interested to hear how people think about twinking in general - the good, the bad, the ugly - but that's probably a subject for a separate thread.


    This post was edited by Nephele at December 28, 2020 6:42 PM PST
    • 633 posts
    December 28, 2020 6:43 PM PST

    Vandraad said:

    Nephele said:

    Your ability to add stats to items during customization will be limited by the item you're making.  So if you're making a bronze breastplate (as an example), you're never going to be able to add more than probably +1 or maybe +2 at most to it no matter how advanced you are :)

    It's worth noting that difficulty scales both based on the materials you're using (bronze is easier to work with than steel) as well as the customizations you're applying (a normal steel sword is easier to make than an imbued blood steel sword of the inferno).  That's where progression matters - sure, you can make the attempt to customize your items assuming that you have the right materials and components to use, but do you have the right techniques, equipment, and skill to be able to succeed?

    PS:  I totally just made up "imbued blood steel sword of the inferno" but you get the idea.

    First off, you, as a designer/developer must assume that everyone will have the right techniques, equipment, skills, materials and components and will make these items and you then must balance the game around everyone having those items and using them. If you (the plural you, meaning everyone at VR) is not thinking this way, well, you're all clueless and this game will suffer severly for such short sightedness.

    But now onto the main issue:

    The problem isn't adding +1 to a single armor piece, it's adding +1 to each armor piece..9 slots worth.  So unless you're going to 'magically' prevent us from adding, say, wisdom, every armor piece, someone will put +1WIS on every armor piece. How unbalanced will a wisdom based character be with having +9 wisdom starting out at level 1.  This is twinking, plain and simple.  Yes, this won't be an issue early on, but twinking never is an early days problem. It's a problem 1 year+ down the road.

    Not sure what the problem is here, since someone could just camp or purchase world drops that have +1 wisdom and give those to their twink character.  Unless you're saying it shouldn't be possible at all to have a particular stat on every slot available, and the game should be made to assume that certain slots will never have a specific stat.

    • 2419 posts
    December 28, 2020 7:22 PM PST

    kelenin said:

    Not sure what the problem is here, since someone could just camp or purchase world drops that have +1 wisdom and give those to their twink character.  Unless you're saying it shouldn't be possible at all to have a particular stat on every slot available, and the game should be made to assume that certain slots will never have a specific stat.

    It isn't that someone couldn't camp such items, but does a full set of gear exist in the world, wearable by a level 1 character mind you that has +1WIS on every slot?  If so, then the issue with a level 50 crafting putting +1WIS on every piece of crafted armor for a level 1 character is a moot point.  But if it such a combination of gear does not exist, then there is a problem. 

    My point with all this is that you cannot look at a single piece of gear, by itself, and determine if it is over/under powered. Instead you have to look at all the combinations to determine if the whole is overpowered.  Is a suit of craftable gear, wearable at level 1-10 with no reductions in efficacy, that provides +9WIS unabalanced if, as VR has stated time and time again, that every stat point will matter?  How much more powerful would a level 1 WIS based character wearing the newbie gear the game gives you compared to that of a level 1 WIS based character wearing a full set of gear that provides +9WIS.

    Should that be possible?
    Should there be limits on what stats can be applied to a particular piece of gear?
    Should there be a limit, per tier (1-10 as a tier, 11-20 as a tier) such that you can't stack stats to such a degree?
    How would such a limit be explained?  by some 'magic' BS?

    But given what Nephele said in the initial post, such limits would not exist.

    • 1315 posts
    December 28, 2020 8:59 PM PST

    @Vandraad

    What you are worried about is item scaling by level being eroded once enough time has passed for players to hit max level in both adventuring and crafting, flooding the market with high value items.  Its safe to assume that any stat combo that you can craft, one can also loot per the stated goal of always wanting more than one source of equavelent items. So crafting will not create a min max situation that will not already exist from drops.

    Your worry about the effect of high level gear on low level players with out some form of scaling is valid though, but it is better directed at a twinking thread or a scaling thread.  Leveling could just award raising your stat, hp and mana caps, you still need to get the gear to make use of that cap.  Likewise if you have +9 wisdom total added to a base of 10 but a cap of 15 then you are better off with 5 wis and 4 con at that level.

    • 612 posts
    December 29, 2020 6:03 AM PST

    Just thought I would toss in the relevant info that was given in how Stats on items and buffs effect low level characters vs high level characters... The following obviously applies to crafted items just as much as dropped items:

    May 2, 2017  (source) - Discussing the idea of items and buffs 'down scaling' when used by low level characters.

    *** Note: Joppa was speaking on stream while they were adventuring, so some of the following Text was broken up by them talking about the fights/pulls they were doing at the time. So if you are watching the source video; I am quoting only the relevant things to the above discussion that he said.

    Joppa said: ”The first thing I want to talk about is this issue of buff scaling and item scaling. One of the things we felt people were voicing the most loudly after the last stream is wanting some clarification on what was said during the stream about buff and item scaling on lower level players.

    To clarify this is not something we are going to be addressing artificially. What I mean by that is you are not going to equip a higher level sword and see the stats magically degrade. Or a buff is not going to land on a level 1 player and magically give them less strength or stamina or whatever it is.

    So just to give an example of how we are planning to address this, if a level 1 player equips a level 40 sword the players level and skill is naturally going to play a role in how much damage you are able to do with that weapon. If the sword has a damage range of 1 – 20 let’s say, the 1-handed sword skill of that level 1 player is very low. So while equipping that sword they will still see that 1 – 20 damage range and that would still be available to them, but since their weapon skill is very low it’s not likely that they are going to see a max damage hit for 20 damage with that weapon.

    It works the same with buffs. Let’s say a level 40 shaman comes by and buffs the same level 1 player with their strength buff. They are still going to get the full amount of strength that the buff gives but again because their weapon skill is that low, they may with that buff be able to hit the max damage of the weapon, they may be able to start hitting for 20 damage but their weapon skill is going to be what governs ultimately the damage they are going to be able to do.

    If you take that same level 40 sword and put it in the hands of the level 40 player. That same sword, the stats are not going to change artificially, but that sword is now going to do much more punishing damage. I hope this will handle things much more ..."


    audio became very difficult to hear so they had Joppa fix his audio issues and then he continued:

    Joppa said: ”Just to finish that line of thinking. If the level 40 shaman strength buff lands that level 1 is going to probably be able to hit for that max damage amount of the weapon now, with the additional strength. But again the weapon skill will continue to play a significant role in how much damage you are ultimately able to do because your weapon skill is so low. Take the same sword and put it in the hands of a level 40 with level 40 weapon skill and that same sword will be much more punishing.

    Now in addition to that, one of the following up questions is something like: what about procs? What about clickies? We are very much ok with having required levels for procs, for clickies, so it won’t be where a level 1 is able to pick up a level 40 sword with a level 30 proc, you may have to be level 30 to use the proc or use the clicky. The last thing on that note is worn effects, things like an items innate haste or regen we don’t have any plans to restrict that based on level."

    Aug 17, 2018 (source) Question: Will you be able to Twink Alts?

    Joppa said: ”Yes, the answer is yes. Like we said earlier most gear will be trade-able, I think that’s really important for the social aspect, the shared world all that stuff. The way I think it will be best to manage the absolute power creep of being able to pass down these top tier items to level 1s who can just go out, is to some degree managing it through their various skills; so if your weapon skill is really low which it will be as a level 1, then you are not going to get the kind of effectiveness out of that Flaming Sword of Sovereignty we mentioned earlier that you would at level 50. That’s not an artificial component, that’s literally your weapon skill is just not able to be high enough to masterfully wield this weapon. It gets a little murkier when you are dealing with armour because armour is all just passive for the most part. We do have skills planned to govern things like shield usage and even things like armour proficiency’s and different things. For the most part I think we want to embrace that, when you’ve put in the time and the work and you’ve got a weapon that is just sitting there and it’s awesome and you’ve got another player or character that you want to play then you should be able to hand that over, and we will see how that goes. I think it’s important.”

     

    This was how they were planning to deal with things back a few years ago and we know that things can change, so it might not be exactly like this anymore. Yet it does show us that they do understand the complexity of having low level characters wearing items that give lots of stats that are not on items which are tuned for that level range. I'm guessing they will do their best to balance things so that a Twinked player will have some advantages, yet won't suddenly be crazy overpowered and doing things like solo'ing mobs 5 times their level or something else equally outrageous.

     
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    • 1315 posts
    December 29, 2020 8:13 AM PST

    @GoofyWG

    It will be interesting to see if any of that changed with the refactoring.  Saicred sounds like the one keeping an eye on the system level math now.  Would be interesting to beg for some beans from him on the subject of diminishing returns of stats by level.  In the text you quoted it would appear that Joppa was saying that the real controlling factor is weapon skill level and not character level.  It may be a fancy formula that ultimately says that it takes X ranks in a skill to fully utilize Y stat bonus of the controlling stat but with an additional lesser function based on the full value.  You would likely still get secondary bonuses like mana, hp and carry capacity.

    • 1921 posts
    December 29, 2020 8:59 AM PST

    What's being danced around is the fundamental design decision of limits or caps, by level:

    Regardless of the source (buffs, gear, drops, crafted, consumables, passives, actives, deity, potions, more) is it currently a launch day design goal that all effects, stats and numerics will have either or both soft and hard caps, per level or tier, by player ?

    Has this design decision been made, and if so, what is it?  That's all that really needs to be known, at this pont.
    I'll explain what I mean;  There are 22 (iirc) slots for gear.  If any single stat can be applied to each piece of equipment, for example, then a level 1 player could theoretically have +22 STR, WIS, DEX, whatever, if they're twinked.  But it doesn't stop there.  What about consumables?  Stat food, drink, potions, pourable flasks, poultice, unguent, salve, and more can also add long and short term effects to spells, stats, faction, and more.  Similarly, buffs from spells does the same.

    Even just the issue of stacking each, some or many of those is a consideration.  This was, in some games referred to as categories, as in, you could have an effect from songs (bard), spells (buffs), food/drink, and potions, but that was it.  There were limits on categories of both positive and negative effects.  In some cases, there were stacking limits on some or both, too, as in you couldn't have more than 2 poisons or 3 bleeds active, from the same source.
    Again, similarly, mobs would only accept DoTs, burns, bleeds, or similar status effects from a single source, so you couldn't place 76 DoTs on a Raid target, Group Feign, and wait for it to die.

    All of the above?  It's caps.  Caps, caps, caps.  What are the limits?  Are there limits?
    If there are limits, then at least it's been considered.  If there are no limits, then.. we're all in for a bad time.  Again. :D

    To Vandraads point, is it as simple as +1 stat per level?  As in, at level 1, you could have +1 WIS, but no matter how many buffs, super-crafted-fragilistic pieces of gear, or legendary boar sandwiches you consume, you only get +1 WIS?  Then at 50, you can have +50 WIS? Or can you, via several categories, push that soft cap towards the hard cap?  Then, what is the hard cap, because once there's a single level 50, the twinks will be in Terminus, fast and furious.  Once a single guild has all the Alts or Accounts required to have Master/Max/Level 50 crafters of all kinds, then every single character in that guild will always and forever have the best crafted gear possible, in every slot, from 1-50.

    Whatever the numbers are isn't as important is whether or not this fundamental design decision has been discussed and decided, at least in theory or on paper, at some point in the last ~7 years.

    • 18 posts
    January 6, 2021 11:32 AM PST

    Nephele said:

    vjek said:

    Will this mechanic of enhancement, customization, or enchanting be limited to the crafter making the item only, or will it also be possible for customers to apply any/all/some/more/many of these effects themselves, after the item has been created?

    For now, customizations will only be applied during the crafting process itself.  We're setting things up from a technical perspective so that we can support after-market customizations later if we want to, but no plans for that just yet.  I would rather get a robust crafting system in place first, and see where that leaves us, than try to set up two potentially conflicting systems side-by-side.

     

    I prefer it this way as it allows crafting to be focused on by the crafters.  Granting other access to do it post-creation kind of takes the responsibility and fun away from the crafters.  Besides, if you were a warrior and found some rare gem to add to your sword hilt, for example, you'd likely not have the skill or knowledge required to properly place it into your sword hilt without breaking it or damaging one or the other.  I feel like crafters will feel more important in the world if they're left to do the item customizations while the warriors and gatherers focus on their place in the world.

    • 902 posts
    January 29, 2021 3:49 AM PST

    Cool beans Nephele. This is definately something I am now really looking forward to.

    Nephele: At the moment, failure means the item doesn't get created at all, try again.  We haven't made a final decision on whether some portion of the materials/ingredients will be lost on failure yet - we're just not at the point of locking tuning details like that in, really.  Once it's fully implemented, crafting will not be a simple combine button or a passive interaction.  There will be some gameplay there where you (as a player) have to intelligently use the tools and abilities available to you to succeed.  Of course there will be some randomness in the process to keep it interesting and to try and prevent "I win" macros, but most of the emphasis will be on what the character has access to, and the decisions you as a player make during the crafting process.

    In EQ when I became a master fletcher, I seem to remember losing the entire object (arrowhead and ingredients for example) on some combines and some of those were using rare ingredients. That hurt at the time, but once I completed it, it really was a joyous moment. I also seem to remember that you were never 100% sure of a combine, no matter your skill.

    For higher status items and obtaining higher skills, I would argue for that feeling again. Yes, on fails, I was down, upset and annoyed, but after a successful, hard to combine object... man, I still remember how I felt. Relieved, ecstatic and grinning. I miss those feelings from any game these days.

    Forgive me if I have missed this question/answer, but will there be visual effects that can also be put on equipment? Glows, colours, sparks and the like?

     

    • 612 posts
    January 29, 2021 6:12 AM PST

    One thing to keep in mind when having the possibility to fail a combine, is the fact that sometimes your combines will be done for other players using their components. So it would behoove the Dev's to put in a way for players to both check the potential success rate of the player they are approaching for the combine, and a way for the player to observe the attempt where they see the result.

    If I am looking for a Crafter to make my item for me using my resources, I would want to be able to see the Skill rate of the players who are offering to do my combine for me, so that I can choose a Crafter who would have a higher chance of success. If I'm going to risk my resources, I'd want to hire the most skilled Crafter I can find. So if PlayerA has a 50% chance to succeed and PlayerB has a 85% chance to succeed, I'd want to choose PlayerB. Even if I can't actually see the % chance of success, I should be able to see what their actual Skill in that Craft is so I can make a decision.

    If there is no way for me to see the 'Skill' of potential Crafters of my item, then it opens it up for players to potentially scam me. Perhaps they have a very low skill in that Craft but they assure me that they are a Master and won't fail. But since I can't see their skill, they could be Lying and troll me out of my resources and then when they fail they just shrug and say 'Well there is always a low chance of failure... we just got unlucky.'

    The only way to combat this kind of potential griefing is for the game to allow me to inspect another players Craft skill so that I can decide for myself if I'm willing to risk their potential fail rate, or find a more skilled Crafter.

    The system also should make sure that I can observe the Craft and see the success or fail, so that players cannot cheat me by having a success but then Lying to me and saying something like "Oh no... I failed the combine... better luck next time" only to turn around and walk away with the resulting item and selling it off for their own profit.

    Ideally there should be a special UI maybe called 'Combine Trade' which is similar to Trading items, but this one is for Trading a Crafting. So both players can open this UI up when they are at the correct Crafting tool (ie Forge, Oven, Alchemy table, etc...) where the player with the resources can put in the items needed and add the coins he is offering for the combine and then when both parties agree the Crafter can then hit a 'Combine button' and then do whatever gameplay steps he needs to complete the combine. The purchaser then see's the result and automatically receives the item and the crafter automatically receives the purchase price agreed to.

    They could even have two seperate price options... 1 for a success and a second price for a Failure. So let's say the Crafter wants to charge 50g for a Success and 10g for Failure. Then if the combine works, I get the result and the Crafter gets 50g. If the combine fails, I get nothing, but the Crafter still gets 10g for the effort he made to attempt the combine for me.

    Since both players would need to select 'Agree' before the combine could be attempted, they could hash out prices and such and then both players get what they agreed to. This way there can be no cheating each other. (or at least it makes it extremely hard for people to cheat you).

    • 902 posts
    January 29, 2021 11:34 AM PST

    Rather than seeing a players exact skill level, it would be better to see the chance of success of a combine for the itam wanted. Somethng along the lines of: no chance, possible, likely good chance and probably. That should allow enough assurity without knowing exact figures.

    I think if you have exact figure you could end up with broardcasts like: anyone higher in fletching than 437? Imnot sure I would like to see lots of spam like that, I would much rather see something like: anyone have a good chance or better with crafting a bling bow?

     


    This post was edited by chenzeme at January 29, 2021 11:37 AM PST
    • 1785 posts
    January 29, 2021 4:42 PM PST

    chenzeme said:

    Forgive me if I have missed this question/answer, but will there be visual effects that can also be put on equipment? Glows, colours, sparks and the like?

    This is something that I would like us to be able to do, but we don't want to overuse it.  So the answer right now is TBD - we won't really know for sure until we're at the point of having most of the world built so we can think about where and when we want to use these kinds of visual effects.

    • 612 posts
    January 30, 2021 1:18 AM PST

    chenzeme said: "I think if you have exact figure you could end up with broardcasts like: anyone higher in fletching than 437? Imnot sure I would like to see lots of spam like that"

    The only way to prevent this is if there was no actually skill values at all. Since if a skill value exists, then there will always be people yelling out asking for people of a specific skill value or higher. Even if they can't see another players value they will still ask for people of a set value. The only thing that not seeing the value will do is allow the crafter to scam the other player by lying about his value.

    So unless you are suggesting that players themselves won't even see their own skill value and only have a vague idea of how good they are at something... Which of course brings up the possible skill ratings:

    New as a baby
    I've swung a hammer before
    This is kinda fun
    I might actually know what I'm doing
    I've done it before
    I've done it a lot of times before
    I could probably do it while drunk
    Even asleep I can do it
    I make that by accident when I sneeze.

     

    • 83 posts
    January 30, 2021 8:46 PM PST

    While it is an amusing idea, I think hiding the number from the players is a bad idea. Generally games have trended towards giving the players more information instead of less in the lass two decades, so I think you would get far more complaints with that system than what little (if any) social benefit it would give.

    • 724 posts
    January 30, 2021 10:48 PM PST

    @GoofyWarriorGuy: Another idea. Instead of being able to see the other player's skill, maybe there could be something like crafting "symbols" you get from your crafting trainer for mastering a new level of skill? Like, when you hit 100 skill, you can do a quest to receive the "necklace of the apprentice crafter", at 200 skill you would get the "necklace of the journeyman crafter" and so on.

    When you talk to a crafter, you could ask them to show their current symbol. Or they would wear it anyway if it gives them some extra success rate or something :) Of course this wouldn't give you an exact skill number, but an idea of how skilled the crafter is.

    • 612 posts
    January 31, 2021 9:17 AM PST

    Sarim said: "Instead of being able to see the other player's skill, maybe there could be something like crafting "symbols" you get from your crafting trainer for mastering a new level of skill? Like, when you hit 100 skill, you can do a quest to receive the "necklace of the apprentice crafter", at 200 skill you would get the "necklace of the journeyman crafter" and so on."

    If this was optional, in that the Crafter needs to choose to buy or quest for said Trinket that signifies his Skill, this still leaves open a way for players to still con people into being griefed/trolled. Somebody could just 'claim' they had the skill level you need, but left their 'Journyman Necklace' in the bank because they need inventory space while out adventuring. Or maybe they can say "I just got the skill level the other day and haven't finished my quest to get my new Necklace".

    The player would then need to decide 'Do I trust him?'. Players may think to themselves 'I really want to get this item made now before I need to go to bed... so maybe I'll risk it with this guy who doesn't have a Necklace' and then get trolled when the player doesn't really have the skill they professed to have, in order to have a good chance at success.

    So for this to actually work as a tool to prevent griefing, it would need to NOT be optional. It would need to be something that automatically gets assigned to you and you can't Hide, like an Icon that shows up on your gear page which other players can inspect that shows them your current 'skill range'. This would mean it's basically the same thing as showing you a number value, but instead just changes it into a Symbol. You then need to decide, how often do Crafters get a new symbol. Is there a different Icon for every +10 in a skill? Or is it every +25 in a skill?

    This would also complicate things for the person looking for a crafter, since instead of just knowing "I need a Crafter with at least 145 or higher skill" to have a 90% success rate; He instead needs to know ALL the Icons that are for higher than 145 skill, and in their correct order and know something like: "I need a Crafter who has a Wolfhead Icon, or a Pantherhead Icon, or a Bearhead Icon, or a Sharkhead Icon in order to be 90% sure of success. But if he has a Bunnyhead Icon that means 75-85% failure, or a Turtlehead Icon is 60-74% failure, or a Snakehead Icon is 40-60% failure; so those are not high enough skill. Oh and if he has an Eaglehead icon it means he might have the skill needed, since it's only 15-25% faliure but since it's a such swing for each icon I don't know if he's Low Eaglehead or High Eaglehead skill rating. So better not risk that one either."


    Oviously in the Real world, we can't view a person's skill in a Craft as a nice little number so we can judge if this person has the skill we need in order to get a good product. When a carpenter comes to build a Gazebo in your yard, there isn't a fancy badge that you can look at that says "I have a 90% chance of success at building your Gazebo without errors". For 'Immersion' as people like to say, players may want the game to not show you any number values. But in the Real world... people get scammed and cheated all the time. There is nothing you can do except call the Authorities and hope they can catch the guy and get you your money back.

    But in the Game world, there needs to be a little more security against this kind of thing. If there was rampant griefing in a game, people stop playing that game. So VR needs to take steps to make sure Griefing doesn't happen on a large scale. So sometimes you need to sacrifice a little bit of 'Immersion' and just give people the numbers.

     

    • 83 posts
    February 2, 2021 2:14 PM PST

    It's a part of the social contract man. If you don't want to believe someone who can't show you their symbol, that's your perogative. A smart crafter will keep their symbol on them anyway, it's only a single inventory slot after all. I think leaving the way open to dialogues like this in game (the possibility of being scammed) might actually make the community more robust. It gives people a reason to actually remember the names of people with good skill, as well as those who have been dishonest. Having a definitive way of determining someone's skill every time is nice, but this is one argument I fall on the side of immersion for.