[Kurron Nye]

Firstly I think using grinding alone to advance is a poor substitute for actual content. Grinding is filler, the melamine of the MMO world.

That being said, here are some ideas to make gaining crafting XP more fun but still keeps it challenging.

1. Use XP. Early SWG had this concept. Say a player buy s a crafted sword, and he kills something with that crafted sword. The crafter who made the sword gets an XP reward aka use XP. A crafter who make things other players actually use get rewarded for that. It also encourages crafters to also be more of a merchant because the more of their gear in other players hands, the more XP they gain.

Use XP is not a huge value, more of a steady trickle, and better yet, you gain use XP when offline. Beats the hell out of staring at the crafting table for hours at a time.

Use XP is not a replacement or even an alternate form of XP, just an augmentation of the current XP systems.

2. Crafting Missives. Missives where you actually have to craft items using real recipies and real resources, and add in a bit of travel to boot. Something to get you out of the same ol crafting hall and into the world.

Maybe missives that send you between the various crafting outposts.

Also have specific rewards rather than the pot-luck reward system that w/o's give. It would be VERY nice to do a missive knowing that I can save up and get a good shirt for carpentry rather than get stuck with getting something for a blacksmith instead.

3. Tie the complication rates to some stat rather than them being totally random. Players should have some control over the volume of complications they receive. The LAs Vegas style of complications is highly frustrations to all crafters.

I am not saying remove complications or even how you resolve them but to tie the complication rate/types to actual player stats. There is no reason why players should not have some form of control over the rate in which they get complications.

4. Mulitple choice selection of rewards for work orders. I touched this when talking about missives. That is its no fun as a carpenter to wind up getting outfitter stuff.

Another alternative is to set up an NPC vendor ala EQ-LDON expansion. You earn crafting points by doing w/os which you can redeem at the crafting supply merchant for the specific item you want.

That way you cans ee that 'Wow there is this saw I really want', so you actually have a tangible goal when doing the w/o grind (other than gaining XP or being able to do a recipe)

That is an element that I like in adventuring, that is I can see what the reward for the quest will be, and I can make the detemination wether or not I feel its worth doing for that item.

5. More crafting quests. need I say more? Quests are a much more interesting way of gaining crafting XP than doing w/o's (and you often use your real recipies and make actual items in the course of a quest).

So none of this makes crafting easier or quicker, just makes it more interesting. (I do not think crafting needs to be quicker or easier but yes, it is as dull as watching grass grow and I dont think it has to be that way)

[Diablo]

I like #1 but would you give experience to crafters for non-equippable items that are still being used... for example, housing bricks that are put into a house. In other words if the items is equipped and used it gives experience to the crafter, but does the same thing happen if the item is used to create something like a house... what about stacked items like magic arrows?

[Tonev]

/applaud!

I really like this and think if they would have even remotely made an attempt to make crafting like this, instead of the mindless grinding of WO type dynamic, a lot of crafters would still be around.

I think you should put in a pllication to $OE as they can use someone with a common sense approach.

/two thumbs up

[Zelos]

1. Usage XP - No thanks, crafters are already too stingy with non-adventuring-gear items. Have you ever tried to get mithril fasteners? Why on Telon would we give them even less incentive to make consumables or housing/ship components?

2. WOs are missives. As for having people travel around, that just makes the grind worse.

3. Complications already are tied to station skill. Additionally, there are things you can do mid-combine to decrease your chances of a complication. People just don't use them because they like to use the same action over-and-over until a stage is completed, then move on to the next one.

4. Choosing rewards - Set it up.

5. Quests - only if they were more like the "Tonic" quest and less like the bring me 5 toughened leather strapping, 4 trilliant cut amethysts, 3 defender's ingots and a partridge in a pear tree type quests that 80% of all crafting quests today are.

[Gecon]

Well, if I would design a game, I would definitely NOT reuse what I found in Vanguard.

Rather, I would link Crafter Level to Adventurer Level, like I've seen in my previous MMORPG, Lineage 2. Make ingredients hard to get, make many people involved in crafting, but dont make crafting some separate grind.

[mrbandersnatch]

Originally Posted by Zelos

3. Complications already are tied to station skill. Additionally, there are things you can do mid-combine to decrease your chances of a complication. People just don't use them because they like to use the same action over-and-over until a stage is completed, then move on to the next one.

Sorry OT but I had to ask. LIKE WHAT? I keep hearing about these legendary ways of decreasing the chances of a complication but after a LOT of experimentation I have to say : To me complications seem largely random.

Please, I and many others would LOVE someone to detail how to avoid complications but at the moment I look at this very much like Yeti sightings.

[DuckOfDeath]

1. No thanks. This is basically free xp for crafters and really has no impact on making crafting better in any way just easier.

2. You can use up your resources in the WOs if you like but I would rather keep mine and use up their resources. And I would rather just grind crafting than have to run around all over the place between grinding crafting.

Also not sure what WOs you are doing but all the clothing is generic for any crafter, the tools are always ones I can use, materials are always ones I can use, recipe drops are always for my class although not always for my specialization, and dusts/powders/shards are really the only things that I might not be able to use but are easy to trade or sell.

3. Complications are tied to your station skill and scale to the degree of difficulty of the WO. Yes sometimes they can be frustrating but it is manageable and adds a bit of risk vs reward to WOs. You can risk doing the higher WOs for better rewards but more complications that might cause you to fail or you can manage the complications in easier WOs for a lesser reward.

4. You really only get set rewards from quests and WOs arent quests. Grinding WOs are more like grinding mobs and when you do that you get random drops. Random drops are a mainstay of grinding and trying to get that rare drop (mostly recipes in VG) is part of what gets people to do the grind.

5. Supposedly 1/3 of all quests in the game are crafting quests. Many of them are the kind you are asking for where you run around looking for some item a guy wants then you fix it and give it to him. Lots of running around, some crafting, and a set reward. Some are another type you are asking for with simple grinding quests where he asks you to make a few things (often half the things you need some other crafter to make) and give it to him after using up your own often rare resources. Other quests include the style, tier, boat/house, guild, etc.

The thing about many of these quests is that they are interestingly much of what you are asking for but something I dont think many other people are interested in. Why would I want to run around just to do more grinding or whay would I want to use my own resources? Most people would rather just grind without running around and without using their resources. So how do you make them want to do quests? Well for starters you should make it more interesting.

One thing I have thought about that would be really fun is to have crafting quests combined with adventuring quests. For example, lets say there is a quest to defend a small outpost from attack. When you accept the quest a few NPCs spawn with crafting quests and a 10 minute timer before the attack starts. One NPC might be in charge of defenses and have an artificer make pit traps or fix holes in the outpost wall to limit points of attack. One might be in charge of the militia and for every weapon or armor a blacksmith makes an NPC is added to help in the defense or an existing NPC is upgraded to do more damage or take less damage. There could even be a large weapon that requires all the different crafters to combine to make. Anyway you make as much as you can before the timer runs out to increase your chances of success in the adventuring mission. Then when the attack starts you get to see your work in action.

[shamusmacgowan]

I don't like number 1, it'd be too damn easy to get a lot of xp that way, it's too much the free ride.

The rest I'd be willing to see talked about.

[Poldano]

A lot of responders are saying that use XP is a free ride, but I don't think it has to be. For example, anything that goes into a house structure is non-retrievable. There is very little free ride with getting a bit of XP from housing materials that are used to make a house. Other kinds of items are more problematic. Any gear that is soulbound has a single point of soulbinding that could be the trigger for the single use XP award for the item. Things that are not soulbound are more problematic. Boats, I gather, are not soulbound, so there is some possibility for abuse there. The solution is to make a boat soulbound, or something very much like soulbound, the first time it is activated.

Those complaining that crafters are stingy with their time and capabilities should consider that use XP is a further motivation for crafters to make things for other players rather than grind WOs for levels. Right now, that's an exclusively either-or solution. If pounding out single mithril fasteners, for example, with relatively high risk of failure would gain XP when used in an end product, then more crafters would be willing to do so at lvl 41 than grind up until they can make the fasteners less tediously.

[Gecon]

Soulbound is another thing I wont reuse in an own game design.

[DuckOfDeath]

Originally Posted by Poldano

A lot of responders are saying that use XP is a free ride, but I don't think it has to be. For example, anything that goes into a house structure is non-retrievable. There is very little free ride with getting a bit of XP from housing materials that are used to make a house. Other kinds of items are more problematic. Any gear that is soulbound has a single point of soulbinding that could be the trigger for the single use XP award for the item. Things that are not soulbound are more problematic. Boats, I gather, are not soulbound, so there is some possibility for abuse there. The solution is to make a boat soulbound, or something very much like soulbound, the first time it is activated.

If I remember correctly the way you got use xp in SWG was not xp from equiping the item (also that would be seriously abused in SWG as nothing was soulbound). Basically use xp is a small percentage of xp gained whenever your item was used to gain xp (up to 10% more xp from what you got crafting it). For example lets say you made a gun then when someone killed something with your gun you got use xp. Thus the idea of it being free xp.

As far as having use xp simply from equiping the item that is even worse free xp. See below.

Those complaining that crafters are stingy with their time and capabilities should consider that use XP is a further motivation for crafters to make things for other players rather than grind WOs for levels. Right now, that's an exclusively either-or solution. If pounding out single mithril fasteners, for example, with relatively high risk of failure would gain XP when used in an end product, then more crafters would be willing to do so at lvl 41 than grind up until they can make the fasteners less tediously.

As far as use xp helping to get crafters to be less stingy I dont think it will help. In the SWG style of use xp it didnt make crafters want to provide high quality items to people. When they were grinding they simply mass produced cheap stuff that they practically gave away so newbs would use them and they get free xp. Then when they were leveled good luck trying to get something from them without having to sell your soul. So basically the guys you needed stuff from are still stingy with their time and money.

Now if you use a system based simply on equiping the item I would imagine it would be much the same. Crafters would simply grind out really cheap useless stuff and give them away for people to simply equip and throw away. Taking orders on single items will not be more enticing from use xp from a single use. It would be more beneficial to mass produce cheap useless stuff than to work on a single item for someone.

Really the only way to entice people to want to craft things for other people s to make it more worth their time and effort. The mass production recipes are a good start as it helps to take the grind out of producing the items that require lots of materials and doing 5 at a time was a real pain.

Another thing that could be done is to provide xp for making quality items. As it is now there is nothing to gain from making someone an item of quality. Why give away xp for people using items when you dont even give xp for making an item of quality? If you give xp for items of quality then it is a true incentive to make things people want instead of just mass producing cheap junk to grind.

Finally to make people want to sell then you need to give them the tools. Being able to sell just 10 things on the broker on each continent is not going to get people to make much stuff (especially when they are already trying to sell drops and rare materials). Besides that all people have as a tool is to spam chat with WTB/WTS messages. Now this is one thing that SWG had done exceptionally well in promoting a true community merchant system. Let people set up stores where people can go to buy stuff. Then stores of real quality items will pop up much like they did in SWG.

[Poldano]

Originally Posted by DuckOfDeath

If I remember correctly the way you got use xp in SWG was not xp from equiping the item (also that would be seriously abused in SWG as nothing was soulbound). Basically use xp is a small percentage of xp gained whenever your item was used to gain xp (up to 10% more xp from what you got crafting it). For example lets say you made a gun then when someone killed something with your gun you got use xp. Thus the idea of it being free xp.

As far as having use xp simply from equiping the item that is even worse free xp. See below.



As far as use xp helping to get crafters to be less stingy I dont think it will help. In the SWG style of use xp it didnt make crafters want to provide high quality items to people. When they were grinding they simply mass produced cheap stuff that they practically gave away so newbs would use them and they get free xp. Then when they were leveled good luck trying to get something from them without having to sell your soul. So basically the guys you needed stuff from are still stingy with their time and money.

Now if you use a system based simply on equiping the item I would imagine it would be much the same. Crafters would simply grind out really cheap useless stuff and give them away for people to simply equip and throw away. Taking orders on single items will not be more enticing from use xp from a single use. It would be more beneficial to mass produce cheap useless stuff than to work on a single item for someone.

Really the only way to entice people to want to craft things for other people s to make it more worth their time and effort. The mass production recipes are a good start as it helps to take the grind out of producing the items that require lots of materials and doing 5 at a time was a real pain.

Another thing that could be done is to provide xp for making quality items. As it is now there is nothing to gain from making someone an item of quality. Why give away xp for people using items when you dont even give xp for making an item of quality? If you give xp for items of quality then it is a true incentive to make things people want instead of just mass producing cheap junk to grind.

Finally to make people want to sell then you need to give them the tools. Being able to sell just 10 things on the broker on each continent is not going to get people to make much stuff (especially when they are already trying to sell drops and rare materials). Besides that all people have as a tool is to spam chat with WTB/WTS messages. Now this is one thing that SWG had done exceptionally well in promoting a true community merchant system. Let people set up stores where people can go to buy stuff. Then stores of real quality items will pop up much like they did in SWG.

I was an SWG crafter on Wanderhome server. I wholeheartedly agree with what you say about the broker vendor limits, but my arguments are directed at supporting usage XP and not at improving the market accessibility. I disagree with some of what you say about SWG crafting, although I acknowledge that the experiences you describe were commonplace.

The sell-your-soul aspect in SWG was only present for the rarest items in high demand. I never had much problem getting things I wanted from vendors, if the resources to make the items were available. Resource quality was a huge determinant, and rare loot drops another huge determinant, of item quality. This created a situation where the crafters who managed to accumulate the best resources and enhancements could effectively name their price. To paraphrase a favorite quote, "they didn't have customers, they had hostages."

As for getting crafters to do things, I consistently did things for customers, and went out of my way many times to do so. About half the time, the customer was no longer interested by the time I actually made the item. My experience was commonplace, as evidenced by discussions in the crafting profession forums. So a large part of what you describe was simply a self-protective reaction by crafters. Remember, they play games to have fun too, not just be craft bots.

Crafting profession experience in SWG was, effectively, general-item grind-only, and as such was brain-dead on arrival. Usage experience was present early on, but was either removed or broken within the first few months. It was also such a small proportion of experience that it was not very useful for predictable advancement. VG work orders are actually an improvement on the SWG grind, because they remove the clutter of common grind items from the market.

SWG crafting had other major problems which were never ever addressed, in spite of the admirable elegance of its basic design. One in particular is relevant to one of your points. The SWG crafting system was seriously flawed in that the masters dominated all crafting because of their ability to out-design even low-level items. This led to the situation you were familiar with, where the active masters had little time for lower-level items, but were the only ones who could make them to the desired standards.

As far as I can tell, VG crafting is more tier-oriented, in that it is entirely possible to create top-level items in a tier at the senior level of a tier. I am currently making quite a good virtual living as a tier-3 crafter, with no real motivation to advance to a higher level just to compete on tier-3 items. In this particular respect, the VG crafting system does not directly encourage "master-itis". What encourages "master-itis" in VG is the mutual exclusion of experience gain and customer service. This is not fundamental to the design of the crafting system, but simply the way some tweakable parameters are set up.

The suggestion for usage XP in VG is not to replace WO XP as the main source experience, but to supplement it. My comments were intended to show how the current VG system puts leveling and customer service in direct conflict, whereas usage XP if done right could help make them a bit complementary. I know there are ways of doing it that would be counter-productive, as you describe. However, you over-estimate the desirability of readily-crafted common items in VG, so I don't think market-flooding would be as much of a problem in VG as in SWG.

First, common crafted items in VG are no competition to common loot. A worthwhile crafted item that can be soulbound requires individual effort and risk and some uncommon or rare ingredients. Items never get permanently destroyed, only damaged with a capability for full repair, so soulbound items are sold to a vendor for a pittance when outgrown, rather than put back into the player market.

Second, if usage XP were limited to one-time rewards and configured to only supplement WO and quest experience, then further restricted by making usage XP less, per time and resources invested, than WO XP, crafters interested mainly in getting to the top might be persuaded to make some useful items on the way there. The obvious "exploit" of making saleable items, then equipping them or transferring them to other players to equip, and finally disposing of them immediately thereafter, would be counter-productive if the same effort applied to work orders yielded greater progress.

Of course, there would be a downside for crafters with usage XP implemented. The higher volume of crafted goods made available by the expectation of some eventual usage XP would tend to bring the price of crafted goods down. This would mean that crafters needing to make quick cash might have a harder time. Also, usage XP does not translate well to endgame crafting. Perhaps a choice to apply usage XP to crafting faction would help with that.

[Kurron Nye]

Originally Posted by shamusmacgowan

I don't like number 1, it'd be too damn easy to get a lot of xp that way, it's too much the free ride.

The rest I'd be willing to see talked about.

Its possible but not probable.

Firstly, in order for the XP gain to be considered 'a lot', you would have to have a LOT of different people wearing your items. That is NOT an easy task, especially with there being comptition. Also people would have to keep your items in use for a while for you to really see the gain. If people are swapping your out gear fast, then you wont see much use XP. This gives the crafter incentive to make gear with staying power. You want an adventurer to keep wearing your item for as long as possible.

Use XP require crafters to also be merchants if they want to get big gains from the system. If you just slap stuff on the broker and hope for the best, odds are you wont get much use XP because every other mediocre crafter does te same thing, so your use XP wil be low. To see really good gains, you would have to be getting multiple people to wear full suits of your stuff, not only proving your worth as a crafter but as a merchant as well.

So you are not getting big XP gain by doing nothing. People gotta be wearing YOUR stuff, not some other crafter's stuff. Plus you have to compete with loot drops and quest rewards.

Also at low levels, people XP so fast, using loot, you do not have to worry about people grinding crafting by doing nothing because they wont be in level approprate gear for very long..that is they will be swapping stuff out at a mad pace up until the mid 20s, making use XP more of a thing that mid to high lvl crafters will be getting.