Increased Adamantine Drops

[Regular Ordinary Birdman]

Ideally people wouldn't camp Perfidus; we've put multiple systems in place to prevent that behaviour and make it as hard as possible. It's not something we encourage, so we won't make it easier or common.

We could possibly set up a system akin to what is used for looting chests, making it less profitable to farm/camp it, rather than a hard permanent cap. That way people wouldn't feel compelled to spend a unhealthy amount of time there, and instead would only gather adamantine when they head to Perfidus to clear the dungeon.

With the current system in place it in a way encourages camping. Players who do finally manage to pull a party together with individuals willing to cooperate will kill everything in the area and stay for an amount of time until they have either had their fill of rocks, no more will drop, or the group meets some arbitrary rock quota that the players have set. This long camping at least from a player perspective is deemed necessary because every rock has a % chance to be adamantine. So the more rocks you smelt the more likely you are to get an ingot; additionally because groups specifically for rock collecting are so difficult to get, naturally you will want to stay and collect as many rocks as you can because you don't know the next time you will be back.

I saw a few ideas in here including concepts from yours that I think could be applied to alleviate a lot of the problems...

1) The Meteorite event itself could be made rarer and the drop chance increased to compensate. - That way instead of lugging and camping around for 80 meteorites players might get like 10 drops on high spawn and 0 drops on low spawn.

The area would be treated like a chest and if a player has already looted that day it will not give further meteorite events. Each rock would have a somewhat more decent chance for adamantine. (Maybe 10-25%) to compensate for the lower volume. What all this accomplishes is that: other players will be more willing to help each other and form the group. Currently the process of Rock collecting is a huge favor for one player, and the others generally get nothing out of it except a teammate who they deem too encumbered to go through the temple since everyone wants to get done quickly. When the task itself is less burdensome but still a rare occurrence; it maintains the challenge of collecting, and at the same time does not inhibit the overall group. Usually, Perfidus groups will either do one or the other: Rock collect, or Temple. Rock collection is a burden on the whole party because not everyone benefits but when the rock value is increased, and rock supply is decreased to compensate it is less of an 'Camping' task and more of something the group can do prior to the temple and no one feels left out or inhibited by feeling the need to select an activity as opposed to just doing both. It should also be treated as a chest so that this sort of thing wouldn't be looted by the same person on multiple trips.

2) Including other sky metals in addition to adamantine.

With the proposed 'less meteors, but higher chance' suggestion adding other metals as a possible reward from the meteorites would also make the challenge to get something in particular more difficult. Because then not only do you have to find the meteorites on a good spawn, you also then have to hope you get the ones you need. At that same time with the added difficulty of trying to collect what you need, the broadened variety also becomes more inclusive to others in on the reward and it's not just the one guy who wants adamantine. Not everyone needs adamantine which is something this discussion has established quite well... Barbarians in particular don't and I believe Warlock won't truly need it either once it is released. When you add other metals into the mix you make the activity more inclusive but also more challenging as there is no guarantee they will get precisely what they want, but someone else in the group might get something they need; and or they get nothing at all and that just happens sometimes.

What I really think would be a good goal for the meteorites if they receive a change is to make the grind less tedious and time consuming and more challenging, rewarding, and accessible.

Edit:

Lastly, the overall difficulty and EXP reward of Perfidus could be increased to around or even greater than the Sithicus dungeons. I have heard it said by a couple of people that Perfidus feels over all very underwhelming from a lore perspective as very powerful demons and devils such as Pitfiends are felled in great numbers when higher levels and large groups go to deal with the area. It's not unheard of either to see character trivializing encounters in Perfidus such as 'Pit fiend smashing' or 'Malthor Stabbing'; when actually having an encounter with a pitfiend should be considered traumatizing and typically something that should require a level 20 party to deal with (At least according to the D&D 3.5 Stat block stating that Pit Fiends are CR20; and yes I understand CR didn't turn out to be what they expected, but intentionally a single pit fiend is supposed to be a boss for a level 20 party.)

[Zyemeth]

Simply having a guaranteed way to get to Perf instead of relying on luck with the mists then relying on luck that the rocks actually are addy could make enough of a difference. Having a chance to have a chance to get what you want is bordering on lootbox level odds. One game of gambling the dice should suffice. That or if keeping mists as they are, making it a 10 percent smelt to addy chance would be just as good. Any more complicated solutions seem excessive.

[Maffa]

What I find particularly cruel is lugging around tons of material to get next to nothing in yeld. I would rather have meteors crumbling upon pickup so that you know it's a dud rather than forcing/convincing a flatbed truck character (and I do thank inkcorvid for the input) that has no real reason to come.

As far as I am concerned everything could stay the same except for the tons of weight one has to carry back. That sounds particularly cruel. Everything else is just RND, it's the same when one hunts for whassaname item by the hags, it can drop, it may not, if it does not just try again next time.

[EO]

What I find particularly cruel is lugging around tons of material to get next to nothing in yeld. I would rather have meteors crumbling upon pickup so that you know it's a dud rather than forcing/convincing a flatbed truck character (and I do thank inkcorvid for the input) that has no real reason to come.

As far as I am concerned everything could stay the same except for the tons of weight one has to carry back. That sounds particularly cruel. Everything else is just RND, it's the same when one hunts for whassaname item by the hags, it can drop, it may not, if it does not just try again next time.

That was put into place because otherwise people would just camp the area endlessly until they filled their inventory with pure adamantine, and brought back large quantities. By having to carry heavy rocks on you you have to leave the area at some point; at that point the low percentage is to control how much adamantine is actually produced.

Increasing drop rate won't lead to less farming/camping (people farmed when they were guaranteed adamantine), it'll just lead to more adamantine circulating in-game. It's unfortunate but it's a mechanism to counter farming/camping of the area. If people just ventured there, gathered a few rocks as they did the dungeon, and left, all these wouldn't be necessary.

[Kleomenes]

I like the idea of meteorites occasionally dropping other rare metals without affecting the rate of adamantine drops. It increases the "we got something" feeling without increasing adamantine.

I really like the idea of there being a varnish that in part replicates Adamantine's Damage oak. EG if greater magic varnishes did it.

I like as well the idea of giving Steel some damage soak, to reduce this thrust to Adamantine (I played on a server once where all armour and equipment slot combos gave varying amounts of DR and AC was lowered, so have armour function like.. armour. It was cool)

Its natural people will want to optimise with the "best" equipment, but that is lessened when the gap between best and second best is lower. Currently though Adamantine's damage soak is highly longed for.

As to where I'm coming from. My smith character is shelved currently, at the cusp of entering the Adamantine grind, so I've never actually done it. I have played some characters wanting adamantine. My current character is not going to want much at all, due to weight issues!

[noah25]

Honestly I would be more inclined to make it harder not easier. I have found it relatively easy to get adamantine alone on three different characters with three entirely different classes and builds. As Mab said earlier its an elite crafting ingredient not standard issue. As someone who plays a craftable goods merchant, its already annoying to have leve 4 characters not want your gear because they are "saving for adamantine".

1) if you are paying 500,000 for a full plate as someone said earlier you got ripped off. Standard pricing per ingot has never been 60k+ an ingot.

2) I have forgone adamantine on some characters simply due to weight. Its better but not THAT much better and it is super heavy.

3) Frankly, there are adjustments with tailoring and leatherworking that make me go "eh, do my most my characters even want addy"

[transcend]

Simply having a guaranteed way to get to Perf instead of relying on luck with the mists then relying on luck that the rocks actually are addy could make enough of a difference. Having a chance to have a chance to get what you want is bordering on lootbox level odds. One game of gambling the dice should suffice. That or if keeping mists as they are, making it a 10 percent smelt to addy chance would be just as good. Any more complicated solutions seem excessive.

Agreed with this take.

As for people being upset that folks want adamantine and see it as the end game:

Once/if rarer metals make for better drops, like Red Steel or maybe if/when Arandur and the other ones become a little less excruciatingly rare, demand for adamantine will decrease. As of when I played actively, it was the most prolific material, and pretty much quintessential for a non-caster character who needed equipment. These days, going for steel might actually make more sense to me, but decreasing offer does not decrease the grind, just makes it longer. It's not a thing that's exclusive to PoTM. I could point at Ultima Online Forever or pretty much any freeshard, where the rare relics dropped by the main 4 bosses are highly sought after, particularly one worth 60,000,000 gold, because of its net benefit for people who are elite tamers (it basically makes your end-level pet become a killing machine). 

[DM Sinister]

I've been around for a while now, not as long as some people but 5-6 years. I've had many characters. Only one has ever had Addy "gear". That is to say they have adamantine armor and sword. Its hard as it is to get the adamantine and yes it is a grind - but I enjoyed it. Organising groups, fighting off demons/fiends, the slug back with rocks all for the slim chance of possibly having some ore. It made it that much more special when we got some. I don't think it needs to change.

That being said, if it was to change, nothing horrifies me more than some of the alternatives suggested here:

-Locking it behind a level
-A cap on how many a character can earn, through a quest
- Removing the falling rocks and replacing as a rare drop.

None of these appeal to me. The economy for Adamantine has shot up, prices are ridiculously high compared to four-five years ago where it was 20k an ingot. Greed and "farming" has taken over. Ingots seem to be in the control of a select few that have the ability to go to Perf in small groups (talking 2-3) as opposed to the larger groups. Moving it behind a lvl lock really puts those players who enchant/like to keep around the 12-14 range away from a commodity. I understand the metal is not much better than steel and the Devs see steel as the major metal and Adamantine not being a big thing - however, the DR is a must for mundane and frontline characters. There are alternatives but these are just as rare and often the benefits of a crafted-addy armor over a shield/helm that has Dr out weighs these "alternatives". I understand another option was brought in with Tailoring but there are few who can craft it, those that can charge insane prices and the resources needed to make them are suffering the same problems of overfarming and being in the hands of a select few. I am also aware there are other metals that have similar properties that drop from "rare loot" - but I have never seen any of these. Only heard of them and again, they are in the hands of rich players who pay through the tooth for them or the select small cliques that horde.

If its just the DR of Adamantine that is attractive, then more alternatives such as varnish, steel DR or even adding DR in via enchanting would be more appealing. Heck, even making the path to Perf a little easier to take away from some of the RNG would be welcome. Perhaps even expanding Perf to be bigger, more dungeons etc..(Though that's a diffrent topic/thread).

Removing the falling rocks and replacing it as a rare drop just shifts the issue and is not a fix. It moves it to those that have the means to hit places that it will drop and will just make the economy on the ingot even worse. The idea of limiting to 4 ingots or so PER character via quest also fills me with dread. At that point I would be resigned to the fact that I will never get adamantine armor on a character again. Which leads me to my opening statement:

- Getting adamantine, is our choice as players. To grind it. To hunt for it. But that feeling of accomplishment you get from all that hard work and finally getting some end game gear that had blood and sweat go into it, is liberating.  I know the server wants to move away from the grind but Adamantine, to me, is one of the few areas of the server where the grind makes sense. Prisoners of the mist, its gothic horror, low magic, fight for survival atmosphere is the reason I love the server. Getting that bit of armor, that weapon that gives you an edge, after months of searching, hunting and crafting adds to that flavour. I know this is not to everyones taste.

I met some great players who I spent of lot time with on one character, built up a good IC relationship with, some great RP, memorable moments and fantastic game experiences simply because we spent 12 months farming Adamantine. None of us had been to perf. Realising we were under-levelled/under equipped the first time we went. The interactions we then had to get ourselves into a position where we could as a group start to farm it. The success of our first rock. The triumph of defeating our first pit fiend. The horror of our party nearly wiping. Seeing our progress over 12 months as we levelled, geared up, made our first addy sword, interacted with others to join us. We never farmed to keep the ingots and sell. We did it because it was something new, we had never been to perf, none of us had addy gear. When we finally all had our gear we got a sense of achievement. I still talk to these players on daily basis. Some have moved on from POTM, some I play other games with. But it was POTM and Adamantine collecting that brought us together. As a community should.

I just wanted to put my thoughts into the thread which summarise as:

-I understand why people hate the grind.
- I understand the server wants to move from the grind.
-I will be a little sad to see adamantine move further away from peoples grasp.
- I don't think level locking and limiting the character life total gain of ingots is a good move.
-I like the current meteorite grind.
-Open up Perf/make it easier to find
-If Steel is the go to, then extra DR sources would be welcome.
- could DR be added to Steel via enchanting?

[stefan pall]

I would say it's great as it is!

It s utterly unnecessary with the recent add of tailoring items with same DR.

Steel is (without ANY upgrades) powerful enchanted (darksteel with GMW maxed out is actually a superior weapon since you cannot dispel it).

Recent downgrade that took away the adamantine construct bonus made it a lot weaker too.

Yes it s nice to have a plate of it (if you can afford the weight)  but by no means necessary.

And that s about it.

It SHOULD be rare, it's completely optional, and that s that.

All the complaints I see is :

- too much time to get it (like you actually need it)
- it s too expensive
 ( frankly - considering how useless coin is at higher levels except to buy top tier equipment, 60-80 k an ingot is an absolutely realistic price, and actually gives people that can't get it a chance to have some at least )

If I'd do anything - I'd revert to old construct bonus so it actually feels like weapons, too, are worth the effort.
But that s it.

[stefan pall]

I've been around for a while now, not as long as some people but 5-6 years. I've had many characters. Only one has ever had Addy "gear". That is to say they have adamantine armor and sword. Its hard as it is to get the adamantine and yes it is a grind - but I enjoyed it. Organising groups, fighting off demons/fiends, the slug back with rocks all for the slim chance of possibly having some ore. It made it that much more special when we got some. I don't think it needs to change.

That being said, if it was to change, nothing horrifies me more than some of the alternatives suggested here:

-Locking it behind a level
-A cap on how many a character can earn, through a quest
- Removing the falling rocks and replacing as a rare drop.

None of these appeal to me. The economy for Adamantine has shot up, prices are ridiculously high compared to four-five years ago where it was 20k an ingot. Greed and "farming" has taken over. Ingots seem to be in the control of a select few that have the ability to go to Perf in small groups (talking 2-3) as opposed to the larger groups. Moving it behind a lvl lock really puts those players who enchant/like to keep around the 12-14 range away from a commodity. I understand the metal is not much better than steel and the Devs see steel as the major metal and Adamantine not being a big thing - however, the DR is a must for mundane and frontline characters. There are alternatives but these are just as rare and often the benefits of a crafted-addy armor over a shield/helm that has Dr out weighs these "alternatives". I understand another option was brought in with Tailoring but there are few who can craft it, those that can charge insane prices and the resources needed to make them are suffering the same problems of overfarming and being in the hands of a select few. I am also aware there are other metals that have similar properties that drop from "rare loot" - but I have never seen any of these. Only heard of them and again, they are in the hands of rich players who pay through the tooth for them or the select small cliques that horde.

If its just the DR of Adamantine that is attractive, then more alternatives such as varnish, steel DR or even adding DR in via enchanting would be more appealing. Heck, even making the path to Perf a little easier to take away from some of the RNG would be welcome. Perhaps even expanding Perf to be bigger, more dungeons etc..(Though that's a diffrent topic/thread).

Removing the falling rocks and replacing it as a rare drop just shifts the issue and is not a fix. It moves it to those that have the means to hit places that it will drop and will just make the economy on the ingot even worse. The idea of limiting to 4 ingots or so PER character via quest also fills me with dread. At that point I would be resigned to the fact that I will never get adamantine armor on a character again. Which leads me to my opening statement:

- Getting adamantine, is our choice as players. To grind it. To hunt for it. But that feeling of accomplishment you get from all that hard work and finally getting some end game gear that had blood and sweat go into it, is liberating.  I know the server wants to move away from the grind but Adamantine, to me, is one of the few areas of the server where the grind makes sense. Prisoners of the mist, its gothic horror, low magic, fight for survival atmosphere is the reason I love the server. Getting that bit of armor, that weapon that gives you an edge, after months of searching, hunting and crafting adds to that flavour. I know this is not to everyones taste.

I met some great players who I spent of lot time with on one character, built up a good IC relationship with, some great RP, memorable moments and fantastic game experiences simply because we spent 12 months farming Adamantine. None of us had been to perf. Realising we were under-levelled/under equipped the first time we went. The interactions we then had to get ourselves into a position where we could as a group start to farm it. The success of our first rock. The triumph of defeating our first pit fiend. The horror of our party nearly wiping. Seeing our progress over 12 months as we levelled, geared up, made our first addy sword, interacted with others to join us. We never farmed to keep the ingots and sell. We did it because it was something new, we had never been to perf, none of us had addy gear. When we finally all had our gear we got a sense of achievement. I still talk to these players on daily basis. Some have moved on from POTM, some I play other games with. But it was POTM and Adamantine collecting that brought us together. As a community should.

I just wanted to put my thoughts into the thread which summarise as:

-I understand why people hate the grind.
- I understand the server wants to move from the grind.
-I will be a little sad to see adamantine move further away from peoples grasp.
- I don't think level locking and limiting the character life total gain of ingots is a good move.
-I like the current meteorite grind.
-Open up Perf/make it easier to find
-If Steel is the go to, then extra DR sources would be welcome.
- could DR be added to Steel via enchanting?

This.
It s great as it is.

[SardineTheAncestor]

I like the idea of very temporary markets for rare materials popping up from time to time, but I think what's rough about it is it's Perfidus, and with Perfidus you kind of have to dial up the suspension of disbelief to 11 because of where it stands thematically.

It is cool to farm a group and go on the hunt for this stuff, promoting group efforts is always good. Just having to do it in a place like Perfidus is probably where most people lose a little immersion since you go from the land of the werewolves and ghouls to what feels like actual hell, the criticism has been brought up before.

Finding Perfidus is the easy part, hoping the rocks don't stop falling almost immediately is purely luck based, and then staying immersed in an area like that for two hours or more while you seek out meteorites is the hard part.

If you were searching an entire domain for traces of this stuff rather than running in circles, it might be different. Not saying it needs to get harder. You can do much worse, but it takes more to deter people than ridiculously powerful enemies, we will seek those out just for the fun of defeating them. It's the scenery, that's the beginning, and maybe more of a scavenger hunt type vibe rather than doing magic bag tetris, getting everyone on the same rest cycle, and farming powerful fiends for hours on end.

[McDuck]

Adamantine is fine wher it is. It could maybe a higher chance of melting. But thats about it.

Ther still people farming it. Or getting it on comission.

Just the time you need to invest to be able to get ther is one, Two is then  you need to carry the heavy rocks to.

I do not think this should be easy acces at all. Seeing in the past people farmed it on the day and sold it for lower number sure.

But those moostly went lower to people in the closer circles. the past years i have played adamantine varied on price always cause of suply and demand

Demand is high yes. But thats because people finaly seen what enchanted adamantine brings.

Mab said it well. You can run every thing on enchanted steel. Adamantine just gives a litle edge overal wich can be outdone by a few wards.

Tailoring replaced some of those needs, But moostly on the side for casters. They had no equivelant to it. Wich Kudo's to the team still. Tailoring is amazing.

I think it is good that such metals like Adamantine. Are harder to get cause it is endgame over the edge stuff.

and a lvl 11 should not be walking with adamantine. He can not even enchant it at that point. So why so early is my question more. Cause the need what i have seen already In just a few weeks of returning. Fresh misters [i give this a lvl range from 2 to 12] Already wanting adamantine, Wile not even half ready to face those dangers.

If people realy want it. Ther way's to get it. Not going into the mechenical aspects of this to much.

[umtic]

If adamantine was so "vastly superior" to steel I may understand, but in reality it is so marginal that it's rarity is a non-issue. Enchanted steel will serve you just as well most the time.

For weapons, the advantage it confers vs steel is readily nullified by using a strong tier 2 magical varnishes (and those are easy to acquire) or by casting Greater Magic Weapon at a certain level. I understand the appeal of not having to use resources to reach the same bonuses, but that does not make it in itself a reason to make adamantine faster to acquire. You have options at your disposal precisely so you don't have a need to grind for an adamantine weapon.

Steel and adamantine provide the same AC bonus on armors. I agree the DR difference makes it more significant, but even then there are options around that one and I would rather add more options to acquire that same protection than make adamantine easier grind.

For any any other item types, adamantine is just wasted anyway.

Trust me you DON'T need adamantine gear. It's fun to have sure, but it's not worth grinding for it. That's a choice you make, not an obligation. That being said, rest assured we will discuss the possibility of increasing adamantine spawn rate at the next Dev meeting, but I would rather suggest one, or a combination of the following changes instead:

• Steel armors to provide DR 2/-. (This diminishes the advantage of adamantine over steel)
• Magical varnishes to provide DR 1/-, 2/- or 3/- on armors based on the strength used.
• Increased drop rate of Arjale rocks, used to produce green steel, the alternative to adamantine.
• Move adamantine to loot drops (precisely to entirely remove that grinding mentality about it)

BTW you may have noted that Cynnabril Rocks (used to produce Red Steel) had there drop rate increased significantly of late. That is precisely to shift the focus from adamantine. Red Steel, for those asking, is a metal from the eponymous D&D setting, behaves exactly like steel with the advantage that it is significantly less expansive to enchant XP wise.

I like those suggestions much more than increase drops of adamantine. By the way, increasing drops of rare metals as you did for Cynnabril, would be very much appreciated.

[SardineTheAncestor]

I also think the loot box idea is solid. The way I'd want to acquire adamantine and other rare metals would be through limited drops, especially on dangerous creatures and high DC chests. Roaming border to border through a whole high difficulty domain to find it in dangerous places is much more appealing to me at least, compared to walking back and forth in the same zone for 2-3 hours, or whenever the rocks stop falling. But, that would probably require a new domain.

I don't think the grind needs to be reduced, that the investment needs to be less, that it needs to be easier for lower level characters to get in on it. I think it can be fun to get on the grind with a group of people you like RPing with. It's just a bit repetitive right now and I don't really like that Perfidus is the place this grind occurs.

What I like about Perfidus is that it takes at least a minimum level effort to find and get to, and escape can be fraught with its own perils especially if you are relying on buffs for carry weight. There have been times my group had no way to get back except to fight through ooze city or something, moments like those felt epic. But other domains could eventually be just like this, Perfidus doesn't have to be the only one.

What I don't like about Perfidus is that you're slapping these fiends around as a fairly secondary reason to being there, with the metal being the main goal. It does feel like it breaks theme a little, and overall that area does feel pretty basic and dated. It's so old now that people have found fairly reliable ways to mitigate the threat of soloing there, even avoiding combat entirely while farming adamantine.

Worse, you can dungeon log with the adamantine if you don't have someone with the carry weight to bring back the thousands of pounds of meteorites. It may seem like playing in bad faith, but the truth is most people don't want to have to return on their own or with a reduced group if even one member of the farming party decides to do it, and it's almost guaranteed someone will have to stop playing after 2-3 hours of farming, typically with limited breaks due to the monster respawn timers.

A main reason I support the loot box idea is that it would directly kick this behaviour to the curb. No hard rule gets put in place, no finger-wagging at an anonymous few, the game mechanic just changes, making the behaviour unnecessary. Overall, cutting the carry weight limitation completely and just going with limited loot drops would smooth out this whole experience and make it more of a surprise to come across the metal. There's still a grind and still RNG involved, but you don't need dragons and pages on pages of magic bags as an entry level to farm, just the willingness to play the high level content frequently. That lowers the bar for more people to participate and you could maybe bring the farm outside of Perfidus, even if the ore still has a chance of dropping there too.

tl;dr Yes to above, sounds to me like it will just improve gameplay & increase variety over farming the same spot for hours.

[McDuck]

I don't get why people do not want to grind a litle. Or put a litle bit more effort in aquiring some thing that just gives a bit of edge.

Ther plenty of people able to get it with some cunning.

It sounds more like people just complain cause they want it to be trown in ther lab all the time.

The people who did it know the dangers behind it. And if they wher able to aquire larger quantities is because ther wher at the point they could almost solo the entire server

Mainly are Mages. But i see plenty of people who go with just a few tricks up ther sleave mining.

Gating it behind a lootbox. Makes it even worse. It will be camped on daily bases wich will not solve your problem and only make it worse.

If weight is an isue, You should not be the one mining it 

[Anarcoplayba]

I don't get why people do not want to grind a litle. Or put a litle bit more effort in aquiring some thing that just gives a bit of edge.

Ther plenty of people able to get it with some cunning.

It sounds more like people just complain cause they want it to be trown in ther lab all the time.

The people who did it know the dangers behind it. And if they wher able to aquire larger quantities is because ther wher at the point they could almost solo the entire server

Mainly are Mages. But i see plenty of people who go with just a few tricks up ther sleave mining.

Gating it behind a lootbox. Makes it even worse. It will be camped on daily bases wich will not solve your problem and only make it worse.

If weight is an isue, You should not be the one mining it 

+1

I said it before and will repeat: I prefer the actual system than gating it behind lootboxes.

Actual system: people gather (or not) and put actual effort and time on it.

Lootbox: People will grind the same dungeon again and again and again to have luck.

Grinding addy is not harder than Sithicus. It is fairly doable with a medium leveled well built group. It is good XP and yelds even hides, horns (that no one collects because they should be lighter) and reagents. Win win win. The only downside is that, yes, it is hard, but come on: create a consortium. Make people share the resources. It is even a great RP plot.

I'm gonna tell you, I had the luck of gathering 4 ingots in ONE trip. That is half a full plate.

[SardineTheAncestor]

You haven't read my post.

I never said to decrease the amount of investment that goes into it or that the grind need to be reduced. I said the opposite: preserve it for those who enjoy that. I had fun with it. I'm sure others will. Feel free to quote where I said it should be taken away from those who have fun with it.

I said I'd like to see it spread out over multiple zones, rather than a fairly simple cycle that repeats over one map for potentially 2-3 hours. The total time in the hunt for the ore doesn't need to change, the supply doesn't need to change, I just think it'd be more interesting if it was somewhere else.

I acknowledged that a kind of cunning goes into it and I'm aware it's been the same way for years. I know people who have soloed it. I know most of them did it without engaging in combat, and those who did fight the fiends had no problems soloing it just as well.

The weight of the rocks is obviously going to be a consideration for anyone who can hang for 2-3 hours (especially those who gather the other reagents in the area as mentioned by Anarcoplayba). Few classes have the means to carry 2000+ lbs of meteorites, even with several magic bags dedicated to the task. Even if it isn't an issue for the party or individual doing the farming, the option to dungeon log is still there. The real issue with weight is that it can be mitigated by simply logging out. It's not a real obstacle.

"Gating" it behind a lootbox doesn't make it worse or make it more likely that it'll be camped. It could be found in several high level dungeons/dangerous enemies in the Mists. Those are already "camped."

I have no problem with the grind personally and I like that it causes groups to form from time to time. If people find it fun and want to continue doing that, I'm not here to rain on their parade. I've not called it too hard, harder than Sithicus, or called for it to be easier. I'm supporting an increase in variety.

[zDark Shadowz]

The older ways of grinding it out didn't have patrolling hordes. They do now.

Consequently, patrolling hordes makes it a ninjaloot place now for people with stealth & detection, just wait for them to leave the rocks before you pick them up and avoid (or lure away) the things that see you from everything else. Set aside a drop point (and an alarm or regular trap) and haul them out later.

It was admittedly more difficult when they would stay camped in their spots and only the malebranche with its fear did the patrolling. They at least had the semblance of guarding the rocks.

The beguiler class with its stealth, reloadable invisibility and later on time stops to halt aggro means all you need at most is stealth gear and a weapon with frosty ammunition if you want to cool down rocks from a distance, which varnish cheaply provides. No combat involved. Haul the rocks out to a drop point and suffer the encumberance on the way out.

[SardineTheAncestor]

I stand corrected then - I've heard about the patrols but haven't been in a long time so figured that was just sporadic DM activity. 

[cooachlyfe]

The older ways of grinding it out didn't have patrolling hordes. They do now.

Consequently, patrolling hordes makes it a ninjaloot place now for people with stealth & detection, just wait for them to leave the rocks before you pick them up and avoid (or lure away) the things that see you from everything else. Set aside a drop point (and an alarm or regular trap) and haul them out later.

It was admittedly more difficult when they would stay camped in their spots and only the malebranche with its fear did the patrolling. They at least had the semblance of guarding the rocks.

The beguiler class with its stealth, reloadable invisibility and later on time stops to halt aggro means all you need at most is stealth gear and a weapon with frosty ammunition if you want to cool down rocks from a distance, which varnish cheaply provides. No combat involved. Haul the rocks out to a drop point and suffer the encumberance on the way out.

Can't Dogai still see high stealth builds? Mostly just curious

[Vallaki Justice]

Through data comparisons between older data and much more recent data, the drop rate was reduced from 5% to 2.5% at some point.

[A humble sage]

Just want to add my two cents based on the kinds of questions people ask my crafter. People seek adamantine because they want to upgrade from steel without knowing how to. The crafting system is in-depth enough that many people don't know what is and isn't possible, and don't know what they want. They get steel around the mid-low levels and assume that it's time to "upgrade" when they've in the mid-high levels. This is really the crux of the problem I think. People assume that steel can be replaced now that they've started to build up fangs for "the good stuff"

The word of mouth they hear about is adamantine, so the assumption is that's the goal. This leads people to pursue it, because it's "better than steel". There are other high-level metals out there as drops, but the information on where to find them and what they do is sparse enough that most people won't be interested in tracking it down.

Because there's so much interest in adamantine, I think it's important that its access remains largely up to luck. The market won't go away, so in order to prevent perfidus from being seen only as a hunting ground for the wealth, it really does need to stay inconvenient to collect.

[Skelni]

Just want to add my two cents based on the kinds of questions people ask my crafter. People seek adamantine because they want to upgrade from steel without knowing how to. The crafting system is in-depth enough that many people don't know what is and isn't possible, and don't know what they want. They get steel around the mid-low levels and assume that it's time to "upgrade" when they've in the mid-high levels. This is really the crux of the problem I think. People assume that steel can be replaced now that they've started to build up fangs for "the good stuff"

Very much in agreeance with this. The materials are only really 1:1 flat upgrades in terms of copper, bronze, iron and steel. Beyond that it's more customized rather than just all out better (barring Adamantine and the special loot-only metals).

Not that I'm saying people need more clear cut guidance on how crafted gear actually works but this definitely works into the confusion players have about the real power level gear holds. Everyone wants to move up from Steel -> Adamantine immidiately because, some dude in the mist camp told them to. They don't even know Dlarun, or Fever Iron. It's not a thing to them.

We wanna take this all the way? Have fun explaining tailored equipment to people. Especially with NCE wrapping up here. I expect Dirge to be bombarded by requests and people not knowing anything about it. They're gonna hear Misty Thread Cloak and just only focus on that without considering alternatives.

• Steel armors to provide DR 2/-. (This diminishes the advantage of adamantine over steel)
• Magical varnishes to provide DR 1/-, 2/- or 3/- on armors based on the strength used.
• Increased drop rate of Arjale rocks, used to produce green steel, the alternative to adamantine.
• Move adamantine to loot drops (precisely to entirely remove that grinding mentality about it)

I think I like this. Yeah.

[JayJay]

The system is fine where it's at, Adamantine is not that difficult to farm. You don't even HAVE to fight the Pitfiends, the whole point anyway is to form parties and relationships and build up and then spin the roulette wheel of whether you get a bar or not. Hyper-inflating spawn rates only makes it more readily accessible and defeats the mysticism and allure behind the resource in the first place. Just talk to people, form parties. Go out and collect and even if you don't find success immediately that's part of the adventure.

[noah25]

Plenty of people will also just sell it to you. Again, nodding to the fact its really not that hard to get if you know what you are doing.