Author Topic: Faster Crafting  (Read 4851 times)

Khornite

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Re: Faster Crafting
« Reply #25 on: December 22, 2019, 08:22:08 PM »
I'm personally wholeheartedly against the idea. We already have an XP cap applied to normal experience gain progression; which occasionally is the driver for people to slow down and... Pick up a craft.

Seconded. It would just discourage people from picking up a craft even more. Why bother at that point?
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MAB77

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Re: Faster Crafting
« Reply #26 on: December 22, 2019, 10:05:51 PM »
I think he means capped over time, but I thought RPXP was separate from the cap...

Yeah its a lapsus, I meant general XP. Anyhow, our goal here is to allow crafters to get more adventuring time and reduce significantly the grinding aspect of crafting. By design, the grinding played the essential function of keeping master crafters rare. If we take the grind away, we need to replace it by a different mechanic to keep the balance. A capped crafting XP system is a good way to achieve that goal. A player would no longer have to grind for boring hours and hours, but instead would be required to spend just a small amount of time daily at the crafting halls to progress. The crafting XP capping would mean that it will still take a few months to master a craft, but overall you'll still have passed significantly less time in the crafting halls to master one. And just to reassure everyone, rising to a crafting level where one can make serviceable gears would be kept reasonably short. It's really mastering the higher tiers that'd take longer. You would not be stuck a full month just crafting copper.

Now if you disagree with that stance, please come up with alternatives to keep master crafters rare. We'll seriously evaluate all options.
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Dante101

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Re: Faster Crafting
« Reply #27 on: December 22, 2019, 10:34:30 PM »
I think he means capped over time, but I thought RPXP was separate from the cap...

Yeah its a lapsus, I meant general XP. Anyhow, our goal here is to allow crafters to get more adventuring time and reduce significantly the grinding aspect of crafting. By design, the grinding played the essential function of keeping master crafters rare. If we take the grind away, we need to replace it by a different mechanic to keep the balance. A capped crafting XP system is a good way to achieve that goal. A player would no longer have to grind for boring hours and hours, but instead would be required to spend just a small amount of time daily at the crafting halls to progress. The crafting XP capping would mean that it will still take a few months to master a craft, but overall you'll still have passed significantly less time in the crafting halls to master one. And just to reassure everyone, rising to a crafting level where one can make serviceable gears would be kept reasonably short. It's really mastering the higher tiers that'd take longer. You would not be stuck a full month just crafting copper.

Now if you disagree with that stance, please come up with alternatives to keep master crafters rare. We'll seriously evaluate all options.

Keep the grind and drastically reduce the cost of templates for armor and bows.  I'd prefer to have the ability to craft for a few hours without fear of capping while I'm only halfway through the load of ore I just dragged all the way back to the smelter.

SardineTheAncestor

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Re: Faster Crafting
« Reply #28 on: December 22, 2019, 10:41:49 PM »
Please no caps. That doesn't reduce the tedium, that just divides it up. As much as we want to say our server isn't an MMORPG experience, introducing systems like daily caps is exactly what an MMO would do. When we call "clicking a table" grinding, as opposed to what it truly refers to (the endless fighting of enemies), we are missing the point, again, of what makes alternate progression fun & what makes progressing at your own pace fun; the freedom to pursue those angles. Little is liberating about being locked up in that crafter's den with a 1 in 20 chance of anyone showing up & likely being short for words as they just want to mindlessly complete their task. Unless we bring someone with us we're probably out of it. And even then, it's a very soul sucking experience compared to challenging fights, which we wouldn't have more of when capped, we'd just have more junk in our inventory weighing us down. Or giving it away to newbies because of an overabundance of stuff we'd be wasteful to use when we can't get XP from it.

EDIT: Caps (especially dailies) were devised first as a way to artificially make certain things scarce in MMOs and were quickly decried by the communities of players who really like spending their time actually doing stuff, rather than waiting. They did not last long when MMOs were at their most legitimate and least scummy. Later, they retook the stage as a transparent set of addiction tricks by the time "games as services" became the norm and publishers started having more influence than designers & developers in determining how the game would be.

Also, a "few months" to master a craft is a bit generous. That might be how it was before the XP was nerfed, but it doesn't happen nearly that quickly anymore. It's far beyond several months now. It would be a 6-month mission, 4 days each week, for 5ish hours each time, minimum, even with a good modifier, not starting at level 2, dedicating most of your time to it, and you'd still have time left over.
« Last Edit: December 22, 2019, 11:25:40 PM by SardineTheAncestor »
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Khornite

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Re: Faster Crafting
« Reply #29 on: December 22, 2019, 11:27:03 PM »
Yeah its a lapsus, I meant general XP. Anyhow, our goal here is to allow crafters to get more adventuring time and reduce significantly the grinding aspect of crafting. By design, the grinding played the essential function of keeping master crafters rare. If we take the grind away, we need to replace it by a different mechanic to keep the balance. A capped crafting XP system is a good way to achieve that goal. A player would no longer have to grind for boring hours and hours, but instead would be required to spend just a small amount of time daily at the crafting halls to progress. The crafting XP capping would mean that it will still take a few months to master a craft, but overall you'll still have passed significantly less time in the crafting halls to master one. And just to reassure everyone, rising to a crafting level where one can make serviceable gears would be kept reasonably short. It's really mastering the higher tiers that'd take longer. You would not be stuck a full month just crafting copper.

I think generally people would just be happier being able to craft more than one item at a time. Unless I'm reading the room wrong, most people seem generally okay with the EXP rate (some exceptions) and would like to see more items able to be made in bulk. Making 50 individual arrowheads is a pain when you then have to make each stack of arrows individually. Even for a master crafter, that's just "why am I bothering" levels of boring.

As for those exceptions, later stages for alchemy is a LOT slower than the later stage for other crafts just because of how rare the ingredients are. Alchemy as a whole is kind of just forgotten in terms of ingredients, that's easily solved by making alchemy stuff more readily available. As it stands right now, electric varnishes are basically useless. Then cold varnishes can only be harvested in the ice palace and in Perfidus, as far as I know. Acid is all over the place because of how common oozes and puddings are. Fire is pretty decently spread out. Magic varnishes are alright, as well. Negative is fine, vampire teeth are plentiful. But the key issue with Alchemy is when you process the essence into varnishes and it's all done one at a time and can take ages.

Leather working (all three branches) seems slower in terms of progression in relation to other crafts, the exp could just use a slight boost all around.
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MAB77

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Re: Faster Crafting
« Reply #30 on: December 23, 2019, 12:25:38 AM »
In regards to arrowheads, because they are considered a "crafting component" by the system and not a fully "crafted product" (that would be the arrows), it is impossible to craft them in bulk. This has to do with how the crafting script works and it cannot be corrected with the current system.

It is different for varnishes, but we purposefully decided not to allow bulk crafting for those for various reasons, mostly balancing issues. This will be reviewed if we come to change how crafting xp progression works.
« Last Edit: December 23, 2019, 12:37:03 AM by MAB77 »
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Khornite

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Re: Faster Crafting
« Reply #31 on: December 23, 2019, 01:01:18 AM »
It is different for varnishes, but we purposefully decided not to allow bulk crafting for those for various reasons, mostly balancing issues. This will be reviewed if we come to change how crafting xp progression works.

But if we have the components needed, why shouldn't we be able to take 5 resin and 5 essence and convert them into 5 varnishes with one use of the crafting tool? That's what I'm talking about when I talk about speeding up crafting. That doesn't influence EXP and balance in any way at all. If we have the herbs for 5 Heal potions, you make 5 heal potions with that one use of the crafting tool. With alchemy already, if I have 5 vampire teeth and put them on the crafting table, one use of the tool gives 5 essence. I don't see how balance or exp factors into this. Not trying to come off as rude, I just don't see how these two things play into each other.
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MAB77

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Re: Faster Crafting
« Reply #32 on: December 23, 2019, 06:40:05 AM »
For one thing bulk crafting multiplies the amount of crafting XP one receives, 10 items at once granting 10 times the XP makes it much faster to learn a craft. That is one of the reasons why we have an abundance of herbalism masters over all other crafts. Allowing bulk crafting of varnishes would make it easier to allow the powerleveling of alchemy and that is not something we particularly wish to encourage.  Do consider though, that varnishes are really useful products, often better and longer lasting than spells playing the same functions. Keeping them crafted one at a time was one way of keeping varnish supplies lower. Now of course, this is idea behind the current system. As we are revising the system so that players would pass less times at the crafting table, bulk crafting of varnishes is definitely something we will reconsider.
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APorg

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Re: Faster Crafting
« Reply #33 on: December 23, 2019, 07:38:44 AM »
Personally I'd be on board with the idea of Craft XP having a soft cap like dungeon XP, so that it encourages periodic bursts of craft activity punctuated by other stuff, in exchange for Craft XP being buffed in general.

It's not going to please everyone but it seems like a good trade off to me.
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StreetSamurai

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Re: Faster Crafting
« Reply #34 on: December 23, 2019, 08:36:20 AM »
Keep everything but have using the tool kit to do all the rolls separately, automatically, and quickly. Quality of life isn't a bad thing and we might get more crafters, but it won't be the end of the world and maybe my alts will actually have reliable suppliers. Do you know how long it has been since my druid found a leatherworker to do chitin? Well, they're level 6 now and using ironwood... Everyone's a blacksmith.

They're still gathering the items and doing the dungeoning needed to get gold ore but that's okay, that's adventure. The table isn't an adventure. Even in Arelith there was a demand for crafted items because 1.) the crafted items were some of the most powerful things on the server (like here) and 2.) there's always people leveling and making alts. If you make it less of a pain to gear and craft, it becomes less of an ordeal to try new concepts and that's more gp for people that want to make steel instead of high-ticket adamantine.
« Last Edit: December 23, 2019, 08:40:52 AM by NoLove »
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Kaninchen

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Re: Faster Crafting
« Reply #35 on: December 23, 2019, 09:44:50 AM »
A few weeks ago, someone asked my PC to do some alchemy for them. I said yes, and then it took a combined 5 hours of my life to do. Definitely wasn't an enjoyable experience, and I'll never do it again with the current system in place for turning essence into resin. It was especially annoying on reagents I have zero chance of failing with.

"For one thing bulk crafting multiplies the amount of crafting XP one receives, 10 items at once granting 10 times the XP makes it much faster to learn a craft"

Is there a multiplier somewhere I'm not aware of in the exp gains? Or are you saying that it multiplies the XP simply because you are doing it at at faster rate?
In my experience, it just helps me craft faster, not gain levels, as it gets to a point where the reagents needed to gain XP are scarce, so it would result in just depleting what I have in my inventory faster, until I'm able to find a group going to one of three places I can get materials I can get exp from distilling.

MAB77

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Re: Faster Crafting
« Reply #36 on: December 23, 2019, 12:30:28 PM »
Crafting XP is granted based on the number of crafted product made. A potion that'd give you 10 crafting XP alone would grant you 100 crafting xp bulk brewing them 10 at a time. So yeah bulk crafting is the fast track to mastery.
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Khornite

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Re: Faster Crafting
« Reply #37 on: December 23, 2019, 12:53:10 PM »
Crafting XP is granted based on the number of crafted product made. A potion that'd give you 10 crafting XP alone would grant you 100 crafting xp bulk brewing them 10 at a time. So yeah bulk crafting is the fast track to mastery.

...What? If it's the same amount of materials and the same amount of output and the exp is kept at the same rate, this makes no difference. The only thing that is faster is the actual table crafting portion. If a varnish gives 10 exp and you have the materials to make 10, it makes no balance difference if you get 100 exp in 6 seconds vs 60 seconds.

The reason there's so many hebalists at high level is because of the reward level of the craft. Set up shop with a good stock of potions and I've seen people make 100k in 20 minutes. The server's low magic nature makes potions a requirement for a lot of characters, there is always a demand. The practice of selling herbs has been in place for as long as this server has been around, prerty much, ensuring a steady stream of herbs can always be obtained during a given season. Then factor in the number of potions that exist which provides no slow-down portion for leveling as there's almost always a bigger potion to make for more exp. Then consider that the higher DC for converting essence into a varnish is DC 25, a little over halfway through mastery, so all that bulk crafting of essence into varnishes won't even grant exp after a certain point.

Bulk crafting also bring in the danger of wasting more supplies. There have been times where I was so tired of spending time at the herbalism pot that I would dump potions in for practice and lose 10 potions worth of herbs on one brew attempt. Bulk crafting comes with more risks than one-by-one cradting.
« Last Edit: December 23, 2019, 12:57:05 PM by Khornite »
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Re: Faster Crafting
« Reply #38 on: December 23, 2019, 01:09:42 PM »
Crafting XP is granted based on the number of crafted product made. A potion that'd give you 10 crafting XP alone would grant you 100 crafting xp bulk brewing them 10 at a time. So yeah bulk crafting is the fast track to mastery.

...What? If it's the same amount of materials and the same amount of output and the exp is kept at the same rate, this makes no difference. The only thing that is faster is the actual table crafting portion. If a varnish gives 10 exp and you have the materials to make 10, it makes no balance difference if you get 100 exp in 6 seconds vs 60 seconds.


The stated position is that they would rather it take those 60 seconds rather than 6, because tedium makes master crafters more rare and thus makes them feel more special. The system being cumbersome is viewed as a benefit, because it discourages people from participating in it, which makes master crafters more valued. This aside from the point that in most crafts except for herbalism, being anything less than a master is largely useless.

It seems plainly clear crafts are not meant for dabblers - you either sink the time, money, and boredom into becoming a master, or you don't interact with the craft at all.
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MAB77

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Re: Faster Crafting
« Reply #39 on: December 23, 2019, 03:24:53 PM »
In any cases, I will reiterate that we seek to move away from the current model as to allow more time for crafters to adventure and roleplay with others. We are looking for options here. Allowing more bulk crafting will be considered, as will greater crafting XP with a soft cap. Your suggestions can also be regarding the properties of crafted items themselves and their DC, or to add new components. (Don't ask for mithril, it just cannot be implemented as it is supposed to work under D&D 3.5).
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immasturgeon

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Re: Faster Crafting
« Reply #40 on: December 23, 2019, 03:48:18 PM »
Is the time sink for the classic crafted the table time or the material gathering?

I've only done herbalism and alchemy fully and can attest that acquiring materials is much more a hindrance than time spent at the stations.

The soft cap and increased XP gain is attractive to me for this because it reduces the number of components needed to be farmed for mastery, even if it doesn't limit the calendar time too mastery.

Kaninchen

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Re: Faster Crafting
« Reply #41 on: December 23, 2019, 03:53:27 PM »
Having to buy the alchemical containers, and resins, one at a time form the vendor, then load them in one at a time is not a fun, rewarding experience. I'm told that is a limitation of the engine, so can't be helped. 

But I figure if my character has reached a level in the craft, or mastery of it, that the level is at a DC I can't fail at, then I should be able to batch turning essence into Varnish. It doesn't help the DC for making varnish is lower than that of distilling, so I get little to no experience from the process at this point.  :-(


IrishIron

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Re: Faster Crafting
« Reply #42 on: December 24, 2019, 09:56:38 AM »
Some of these suggestions here of what might be done makes me want to hurry up and try to finish learning crafting before these changes are put in. Having a cap of xp able to be earned per day sounds terrible. Sometimes I just want to sit down and work on crafting for multiple hours if I dont have the focus time to go out and rp or dungeon (sometimes this is whole days worth of time for various reasons). Being able to spend the time how I want to when I login is important. If I want to devote large chunks of time into learning a craft faster than others by setting huge chunks of time aside I enjoy being able to do that. Now I feel at a rush like I said to get my craft learning done before things are changed.

Dante101

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Re: Faster Crafting
« Reply #43 on: December 24, 2019, 10:16:43 AM »
Some of these suggestions here of what might be done makes me want to hurry up and try to finish learning crafting before these changes are put in. Having a cap of xp able to be earned per day sounds terrible. Sometimes I just want to sit down and work on crafting for multiple hours if I dont have the focus time to go out and rp or dungeon (sometimes this is whole days worth of time for various reasons). Being able to spend the time how I want to when I login is important. If I want to devote large chunks of time into learning a craft faster than others by setting huge chunks of time aside I enjoy being able to do that. Now I feel at a rush like I said to get my craft learning done before things are changed.

I agree with this.  Please, please don't implement an XP cap.  It's a shortsighted solution to address the perceived problem of people "spending time at crafting stations," while hindering a good portion of the playerbase who may - at that point in time - have little desire to do something else.

MAB77

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Re: Faster Crafting
« Reply #44 on: December 24, 2019, 10:22:56 AM »
I think you guys are overreacting. A soft cap can be modulated to suit the needs of the server. In the end that system will allow you to pass significantly less time at the crafting tables and will be less demanding resources wise. A more constructive approach would be to provide your thoughts on how long you feel a casual player should devote time to a craft to master it.
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StreetSamurai

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Re: Faster Crafting
« Reply #45 on: December 24, 2019, 10:31:23 AM »
If you did implement an exp cap it'd be recommended to have the soft cap apply on a per profession level if you aren't planning to merge other crafts. I can't imagine anyone will want to be a leather worker where there is three parts to leather-working (hide-curing, leatherworking, leather boiling, and woodworking for chitin) and a soft cap "encourages" you to have it time-gated for 1-2 months for a single profession.

If we were to look at how soft caps work on potm it'd be like the exp "soft" cap we have now where the hardcore, dorito-eater that hits blind drive and still grinds is a little bit ahead of the guy that stops at blind drive, waits 2 weeks, then goes back to grinding dungeons.

But it's also a bit hard to trust and I'm seeing people mega-leveling (really, the timing for it to be during christmas is impeccable) to avoid it as much as possible in light of it being discussed, too.
« Last Edit: December 24, 2019, 10:36:09 AM by NoLove »
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Re: Faster Crafting
« Reply #46 on: December 24, 2019, 10:36:12 AM »
A cap on crafting xp gain is the exact opposite of what people in this thread have been asking for, and it's a terrible idea. Crafting on PotM is bad, full stop. I've played on a lot of MUDs, MMOs, PWs, and other various online games, and PotM has perhaps the worst crafting system I have seen of any of them. There's literally no redeeming feature to it. A good crafting system would ideally make people get together, explore the server for materials and stuff, and give people something to do in downtime without feeling like an actual job. This system does none of that. It forces people apart so they can run around collecting herbs before anyone else, the majority of the materials are in the middle of nowhere but in easily-accessible places, and the actual act of crafting is a miserable slog.

Honestly, I'd just say pull the entire system and go back to using the in-game one that revolved around and was supported by skills and feats.
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Re: Faster Crafting
« Reply #47 on: December 24, 2019, 10:38:17 AM »
A cap on crafting xp gain is the exact opposite of what people in this thread have been asking for, and it's a terrible idea. Crafting on PotM is bad, full stop. I've played on a lot of MUDs, MMOs, PWs, and other various online games, and PotM has perhaps the worst crafting system I have seen of any of them. There's literally no redeeming feature to it. A good crafting system would ideally make people get together, explore the server for materials and stuff, and give people something to do in downtime without feeling like an actual job. This system does none of that. It forces people apart so they can run around collecting herbs before anyone else, the majority of the materials are in the middle of nowhere but in easily-accessible places, and the actual act of crafting is a miserable slog.

Honestly, I'd just say pull the entire system and go back to using the in-game one that revolved around and was supported by skills and feats.

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« Last Edit: December 24, 2019, 10:40:36 AM by NoLove »
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Dante101

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Re: Faster Crafting
« Reply #48 on: December 24, 2019, 10:48:37 AM »
I think you guys are overreacting. A soft cap can be modulated to suit the needs of the server. In the end that system will allow you to pass significantly less time at the crafting tables and will be less demanding resources wise. A more constructive approach would be to provide your thoughts on how long you feel a casual player should devote time to a craft to master it.

This is an incredibly familiar response from the dev team.  We are telling you what we want, and you are not listening.

herkles

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Re: Faster Crafting
« Reply #49 on: December 24, 2019, 10:56:55 AM »
Maybe if the Devs want crafting to be rare it should require an app to be a master.