Forums » Crafting and Gathering

Crafter's Roundtable: Customization

    • 1785 posts
    July 24, 2018 6:29 AM PDT

    For this week's crafter's roundtable, we have a not-so-simple question for all the crafters out there.  As always, this discussion is brought to you by the crafting addicts over at Pantheon Crafters.


    How do you think customization should work with regards to creating items? What aspects should you be able to customize about the things you make in Pantheon, and what should be the limits for what you can do?

     

     

    • 337 posts
    July 24, 2018 7:25 AM PDT

    Quick 2 cents:

    First, this is probably not the specific direction your question is heading, but it does deal with customization.  I have always enjoyed crafting systems that use skill modifiers in crafting.  If Im a more experienced smith, my plain steel dagger should have better quality than a crafter of less experience.  Now, whether that shows up as slightly less delay say from better balance, or slightly increased damage from better sharpness or quality of the finished product, or even durability, something should make even normal items just a bit better than others. And since we're all friends here, dont be ashamed because you would be the one bragging to your buddies that you parsed your fights from yesterday and your rogue's new steel dagger that has 5.35 damage totally blows away your buddy's steel dagger that has 5.25 damage. This also becomes a way for high lvl crafter to still participate meaningfully in the commerce of the newb. This works for anything.  Potions last slightly longer or slightly better, down the road furniture that is made has levels that more detailed trim only shows up if its quality only hits a certain point.

    Second, I love the concept of imbuing becuas it opens up so many possibilities, and not just for procs or an additional spell, but for meaningful purpose to the device.  You use an item that for instance can float (insert backstory for why here) and you use it in crafting your warhammer. Now your warhammer's weight goes down, delay goes down.

    2 cents spent...

    • 168 posts
    July 24, 2018 4:20 PM PDT

    Nephele said:


    How do you think customization should work with regards to creating items? What aspects should you be able to customize about the things you make in Pantheon, and what should be the limits for what you can do?

     

    I also may go in the wrong direction here but feel the need to chime in on this particular topic.

    I would dearly love it if they just cut-n-paste the DAoC gemcrafting into Pantheon. Face it; stats are a type of customization and the opportunity to "take a chance and overcharge an item" is also a type of customization. Now to the subject debated in more than a few places on these forums; Dyes. I am a huge fan of dyes of all types for crafted gear. Crafting in most games has generally dabbled in letting a player differentiate himself from the masses in some way or other. I have zero problems with letting a player play the way they want to even if it means seeing hot pink chainmail on a troll warrior. I may not like it but I am paying $15/mo to do what I want, I feel I must allow others the same courtesy.

    Now, I do differentiate a bit between Base Character stats imbuing and imbuing of attributes such as improved run speed, improved chance of a potion crit, Improved chance of feign death success or something like that. Imbuing through gemming maybe should stick to the base stats Con, Dex, Str, Charisma, Int, Wis, etc. No logical reason to say this other than a gut feeling that openning that can of worms may lead to game mechanic imbalances.

    • 337 posts
    July 24, 2018 7:29 PM PDT

    I agree with you, Dashed.  i'm not a programmer, but it seems logical to me that customizable dyed items would put additional strain on the back end. I may be way off on that and hopefully someone can chime in on how dyes affect performance.  My thinking is that playing with stats is just an additional variable in a calculation, whether battle or environment. I do love dyes though.

    But imbuing just for its own sake, you're right, I don't like that either.  It needs to make sense to be immersive.  Just like I think that all clothes should affect CHA somewhere.  There should always be someone who either likes you or dislikes because of what you're wearing.  Race and class faction checks are already there, add them to clothing or weapons where it makes sense. You walk into a rogue hangout and "wanna see Stanos," you should get dissed for carrying a wand; it just makes sense. I digress.  It needs to be immersive, so i shouldn't be able to imbue my bracers to make me run faster, but if they enhance my pickpocket attribute, that makes sense. But it needs to be in line with Pantheon's core concept, so it should be super rare that you have the ability and materials to do it.

    • 1315 posts
    July 24, 2018 7:59 PM PDT

    Dashed said:

    I also may go in the wrong direction here but feel the need to chime in on this particular topic.

    I would dearly love it if they just cut-n-paste the DAoC gemcrafting into Pantheon. Face it; stats are a type of customization and the opportunity to "take a chance and overcharge an item" is also a type of customization. Now to the subject debated in more than a few places on these forums; Dyes. I am a huge fan of dyes of all types for crafted gear. Crafting in most games has generally dabbled in letting a player differentiate himself from the masses in some way or other. I have zero problems with letting a player play the way they want to even if it means seeing hot pink chainmail on a troll warrior. I may not like it but I am paying $15/mo to do what I want, I feel I must allow others the same courtesy.

    Now, I do differentiate a bit between Base Character stats imbuing and imbuing of attributes such as improved run speed, improved chance of a potion crit, Improved chance of feign death success or something like that. Imbuing through gemming maybe should stick to the base stats Con, Dex, Str, Charisma, Int, Wis, etc. No logical reason to say this other than a gut feeling that openning that can of worms may lead to game mechanic imbalances.

     

    Having one of the stone mason specialties carve runes out of various object could be a way to achieve this. The runes could be optional ingredients to add magical effects to other otherwise mundane crafted objects. The characters that the “Rune Carver” chooses to assemble together and on what tablet sets the magical effects. There could be many hidden synergies that must be discovered over time.

     


    This post was edited by Trasak at July 24, 2018 7:59 PM PDT
    • 768 posts
    July 26, 2018 3:14 AM PDT

    Trasak said:

    Having one of the stone mason specialties carve runes out of various object could be a way to achieve this. The runes could be optional ingredients to add magical effects to other otherwise mundane crafted objects. The characters that the “Rune Carver” chooses to assemble together and on what tablet sets the magical effects. There could be many hidden synergies that must be discovered over time.

     

    If I'm not mistaking they already said something similar would be the use of stonemasons at a certain level. It is definatly a good way to lead adventurers towards crafters in order to upgrade/improve and imbue their equipment with extra's that might be required against certain mobs or in parts of the world with hazardous environment... not to forget the personalization of that player's outfit and gear.

    • 24 posts
    August 13, 2018 9:29 AM PDT

    i feel a Scribe would be more so the one to put magical Runes on something, unless a blacksmith were to hammer them in on creation (less likely for a interdependant culture). i do see the desire for customizting certain things such as color of gear, but i know they also want items to be iconic, similar to Thunderfury or Hand of Ragnos from WoW. maybe make it so you can only dye crafted armor? or if you ever modify a peice of equipment it is permenanty bound to you, e.g. soulbound, and cannot be unbound by any means? or unbinding it strips everything from it and makes it back to a base grade dropped item? as for how you can manipuate the color of items, it's not too hard to program, though it would be a very low priority at the current time. but maybe a late beta stage implimentation?