Crafts make us feel rooted, give us a sense of belonging and connect us with our history. Our ancestors used to create these crafts out of necessity, and now we do them for fun, to make money and to express ourselves.
---Phyllis George
We have seen the materials used for metals and it was, and still is, a treat for me. Even moreso that they have added it to in game weapons and architecture.
I have surmised that the same will be done for cloth and leather. With the HDRP we will be able to see a variety of leather grains and colors from known as well as the more exotic creatures of Terminus. Will we be able to make soft and scaly emerald colored snake leather boots and gloves? Or how about smoky, grey and silver cloaks made from the silk of spiders nesting in the Mad Moor? The possibilities will be exciting and probably dangerous as we engage in crafting in Pantheon.
Have you folks thought about what's next for crafting and what lies in store for us?
I am optimistic that crafted gear - and social connections to crafters - will be more desired by Adventurers in Panth than they were in previous games where I crafted.
My reasons for this are:
1. In previous games, I generally found that I had already received more powerful loot drops than whatever level of gear I could craft. So except for the beginning levels, neither I nor potential customers had much interest in the majority of items I could craft. VR has stated the intention to do better at striking a more equal balance in the power of crafted gear vs. loot drop, at any given level. Turning crafted products into more appealing upgrades, for more players over the course of leveling, should do good things for crafters.
2. VR has also stated the intention to make gear and it's stats/bonuses more situationally specific. This increases the value to players of having multiple items at various levels that fill the same slot and serve the same purpose, but with different stats/bonuses depending on the conditions or the enemy one is facing. VR has also suggested that they don't want mobs to be regularly dropping large amounts of loot that mostly goes as vendor trash. So I think - assuming they accomplish their goal in reason #1 - players will be turning to crafted gear to supply this extra need.
3. The addition of Techniques to the game will, I believe, particularly increase the appeal of crafted weapons. There are 20 known types of melee weapons, and strong indication that there will be a few more. The 12 Classes that we have info for can equip an 'average' of 8 weapon types each. Until all the Techniques have been found, analyzed and listed on a spoiler site, I think that a large % of players will want one weapon of each type available to them (at least) in their early levels in order to explore possibilities and choose among their options. I think some number among the min/maxers and competitive players will likely want to upgrade their weapons and related skills throughout most of the game. As described above, I think loot drops will be insufficient to fill this need, and so crafted weapons will fill the need.
4. The mechanic for gaining recipes, schematics, patterns, etc. and the specific aspect that they will be limited use, and need to be re-acquired regularly, gives crafters strong reason to build relationships with numerous friends & acquaintances who don't themselves craft. Conversely, I think that mechanic also will encourage a fair number of non-crafting players to seek out those same relationships with crafters. I expect this because while some lower level recipes may be bought, it appears that many will be available as loot drops or quest rewards. When adventurers wind up receiving one of these, it will likely have almost no value to a vendor, but could have high value to a crafter. Would YOU throw that away? Or make friends with a crafter who buys it from you?