On a more serious note, I think monster damage is fine where it is. Their damage gets massive if you're not prepared.
Yeah, I'm not calling for the module to be scrapped and rebuilt from the ground up because it's too hard for me. I love playing my characters - both of them are healers - whether I have to heal or not. I wisely chose a role that has more combat assignments than "wait, heal, wait, repeat."
But the fact is, consumable use is part of any RPG worth a play. If you can coast through the game on autopilot, then something is wrong with the game. You can't do that here unless you overlevel the content, and even then accidents happen all the time, even without lag, glitches, and so on.
As to that, I think this thread is an excellent example as to why we do not comment on every suggestions. Passions run high, and understandably so, look how far sideways this one went while all we said was we were temporarily disabling the crafting of the heal potions until we find a fairer alternative for their distribution and usage among players.
That isn't to say that we do not read you nor value your feedbacks, quite the contrary in fact. Every line you submit is carefully read and we hold discussions as needed within the Dev team. Already we are considering changes to our new combat feats precisely because of those valuable comments. But it's easy to get stuck in debates that serve little purpose. It's usually best to wait to have something of significance to announce before diving in a thread. In an ideal world we would provide feedbacks on all suggestions, in practice there is too few of us to be able to do so. Keep in mind we're just a bunch of volunteers with our own lifes and limited time to devote.
So please don't take it personal if your suggestions gets no immediate acknowledgement, but do know that we do read and consider all your suggestions.
As to the current thread I will remind you all that we keep it open so that you may provide suggestions as to how to proceed with heal potions in the future.
This crafting system was deliberately designed with a long grind in mind. I think everyone part of its implementation knew full well the investment required would have an effect on peoples' willingness to get all those levels, and then just kill their character off and start a new one. I'd be really surprised if anyone putting it together didn't think there would be big stockpiles of healing potions on max or near max level characters. Just like I'd be surprised if anyone involved in the implementation of enchanted gear didn't think it was best in slot across the board and that has consequences of its own.
Since we're talking about availability, I can't even buy basic potions that mid-level herbalists are making, everything I want is always out of stock by the time I get to a merchant.
I really believe that for everyone's benefit, you'd have to change this from the ground up if you want to have an effect on the availability of just about anything. Everything from the method in which levels are gained, to the locations and frequency of herb spawns. Even consider adding a class made just for crafters to be that much better at it than the dedicated adventurers, and a feat not unlike Muse (but which can be taken at any level) that lets you be better at one craft, or take more crafts than other people can.
This would be great for fighters who need potions the most - after all they have the most feats to spend on this sort of thing, even if the Combat Form feats go through. You could also introduce a "Resourcefulness" automatic feat for
every mundane class which gives them a small bonus to their crafting skill or gives them extra resources when they're on the forage. Give that to them for free to make sure they can adapt to the new system, in a server where casters dominate the solo game.
I would go with the ability to pick a profession or two rather than have to grind levels. Sure, grant bonuses for people who are actively on the task, but only up to a point. It's okay if you can make 100% of the heal potions you attempt if you mastered that profession instead of the others, and most importantly, the herbs in question are a precious and rare thing.
If real life and limited time is a concern, and of course it is, maybe we can make some changes to the way crafting works to benefit people who are more interested in the RP of it but not so much the hundreds of hours of cookie clicker.
Grandmaster crafters would be hurt very badly by this change considering the time they invested to master every craft, but believe me when I say they're not doing it for validation. They're doing it to be useful to their party and they're doing it for love of the game. No one is burning hours away at this for the sake of spite.
The current change is too imprecise a solution, that's why many oppose the change, and it won't mitigate any further "damage" to the server's "economy" at all.
Also, I don't mean to say I've taken it as a personal slight, or I think my suggestion was wrongfully ignored or glossed over, but I think you'll see a lot more healers if you introduce mechanics that say, "hey healer!" like the wounding mechanic which is well countered by healers, but with anything instakill-style it's up in the air if the healer will be able to help or not. I think it's relevant to this discussion as much as people playing healers or not is relevant.
I think adding a cooldown is the simplest and most elegant solution. It's effective retroactively without needing some way to replace existing potions.
For all the stuff I posted above, I still think so too.
People will adapt their playstyle to accommodate for this change. Everything else is going to take a lot more work, and probably wrong the people who put in so many hours to be able to make them.