what started it?

[drael]

I entered Norrath just before the luclin routes were discovered. Being a loner and kinda stubborn, I wanted to pay my own way. Two life long friends set me up with a charred Tulwar, netherbain chitin and 25 plat. Food was an early priority. I feared mine would run out before I could afford more.....then I wanted that piece of armor.....then I discovered the bazaar and all the wonderous things one could buy with plat so I farmed for things to sell to those tradeskiller nuts who had more money than time. (sigh, i never did get to experience EC shopping)

Now that time has passed and I have 3 characters over 50....I'm one of those insane people with more plat than time - and 3 people wanting a shawl makes for a busy family of skillers..... Besides, somewhere along the way it became fun!

Thanks to all for sharing their story!

[rugenpayne]

back in 2000, I did jewelcraft. It made sense to me, from a roleplay standpoint, that a dwarf would be good with metal and gems. I never enchanted it, just made it and gave it away or sold it back to vendors. When people found out I was doing that, I got a lot of "Are you crazy? Only enchanters do jewelcraft!!!" so I just quit telling people.

Then the shawls came out. HA HA! /chuckles Only enchanters, indeed.

I started down the path to mastering all of the trades because of the shawl, but after getting tailoring to 155, I quickly decided I'd rather fail the combines and refarm them than continue doing it....

then came Aid Grimel and my own personal desire to complete it, much like the shawl.

Woe is me. STILL not looking forward to the tailoring portion. Even blacksmithing seems tame, although I am looking at some of these "Ribbon" recipes with some interest. (although I have to say, mass pulling everything on the south islands of hollowshade and aoeing for hours on end to GM blacksmithing is quickly growing very very boring)

Mostly because I work 3rd shift, and my evenings after work are when everyone is asleep/at work, I do trades to pass the time and relax before I head to bed to go back to work the next night.

[GraemeFaelban]

Originally posted by rugenpayne
Woe is me. STILL not looking forward to the tailoring portion. Even blacksmithing seems tame, although I am looking at some of these "Ribbon" recipes with some interest. (although I have to say, mass pulling everything on the south islands of hollowshade and aoeing for hours on end to GM blacksmithing is quickly growing very very boring)

Try it sometime with a non AoE character if you want boring.

[Sylphan]

I got addicted to tradeskills gradually, one step at a time. When EQ first opened, jewelry sold well. At the time it was assumed that you could list all the jewelers with /who all enc, so it was a constant bother. I developed a hatred of the stereotype and I'd have done just about anything to avoid that stereotype, even taking up other skills instead.

1 I think my first inspiration was big profit. Pottery was useless but there was one recipe that could make lots of money and I spent many hours that week in Kaladim making and selling items to the merchants. It was nerfed (sort of) in the next patch, but by then I was rediculously wealthy, or so I thought.

2 Another early interest was handmade backpacks. At the time the 'bazaar' on my server was the EC tunnel every Saturday. There was a druid who was there every week offering to make handmade backbacks for anyone who would bring him three HQ bearskins. I soon realized he was making a tidy profit, but it was still a great deal for me. But after awhile he stopped coming and I still wanted more... so I became a tailor myself.

3 I ended up with a smattering of brewing, smithing, etc. just to support my tailoring. Which worked out well because there were a few other recipes that made a profit selling to merchants -- I still remember making oodles of fish rolls and selling them all. At that point I was a casual tradeskiller, doing things as they interested me. Then a few things happened that sucked me in: cultural, the 200/250 caps, and the shawl quest.

4 I took up smithing hardcore at that point for all of the above reasons and more. It seemed the 'right' thing for high elves to do, as it was their culture. I really wanted to wear chainmail on my caster. Having smithing over 200 would be my 'reason' for not doing jewelry... only one skill allowed above 200. I made a very nice profit skilling up on dyed fine plate armor (for the first month, then the market died). And I was the pioneer -- I found the fine plate trivials and I reported all my cultural stats to EQ Traders. (Cultural robes eventually became my reason for finishing up tailoring too -- it seemed I 'should' do it since I was the right race).

5 Then, with smithing nearly done, the shawl quest convinced me to raise up the remaining skills close to 200. Not because I really cared, but because I had to for the quest. Me and a zillion others.

6 PoP introduced the idea of multiple skills over 200, and my tradeskills came full circle. In order to do PoP smithing you need emblems. So I became a max jeweler to support my smithing, which was intended to be my excuse to NOT do jewelry. And all the focus effects were on pottery so I dumped a whole lot of money into raising it to 250 too. Pottery started out as useless but a way to make money, and PoP turned it into a money sink used to make the best items. If only I'd known how costly that first foray into 'profitable' pottery would be!!

[Rorgg]

Actually, I occasionally still find both brew barrels in PoK busy. If I'm just making a couple of combines, I'll ask the person if I can get in for less than a minute. If it's 10 or more, I'll go to Oggok and do it there.

Ditto smithing for a while after LDoN came out, though that's not been an issue in the last week or two. Again, if I needed a free forge, surprisingly, Oggok was free. Heh. Not too many Ogre tradeskillers I guess.

I've also seen both PoK kilns busy at the same time, but not for long enough that I couldn't get a couple quick combines in. But if there ever is, I'm pretty sure there's an open kiln in Oggok.

[Stugein]

My friend had gotten me into EQ. When I started playing he was level 24 or so. I played until I caught up. Then we would regularly group together, exp, help each other on quests, etc. Was good times. We've always tried to maintain close levels to each other so that we will always be able to group with each other with no issues. Through this I had no real knowledge of or inclination to bother with tradeskills.

One day his computer broke. Bad. Between troubleshooting and waiting for parts to be delivered and a myriad of other delaying issues, he was out of action for several weeks. Not wanting to exp too far ahead of him, I stopped killing blue or > mobs. I stopped doing quests. I got bored. So while waiting for him to get his system issues fixed I decided to finally "figure out what this forge thing is for". Everything went down(up?)hill from there.

So basically I started tradeskilling specifically for use as a timesink (Oh if I had only known).

[Sanna]

That line in my sig that goes "It all started when I wanted to make an arrow" is a nice entry line. ^_^


This was supposed to be a short story.... gomen nasai.... >_<


I rather distinctly remember being lvl 14 or very close to it on my druid. I was generally xping in Unrest at the time, but either I had just been pked there, or was not wanting to run there for fear of being pked, so I was (still!) trying to learn my way around Kelethin. Freaking city, in the trees, no railings, what were they thinking? (Funny side story: once I fell off a piece of the city and took exactly 8 points more damage than total HP... it didn't kill me, I was laying there in the purple, regenning and 'bleeding to death!' I would regen to 1hp, stand up, and lose it again somehow, and collapse back down again. Eventually I survived, but it was quite funny...)


At any rate, I was looking at what all the vendors had, and I noticed this one guy near the warrior's guild sold arrow parts. (Another funny side story: I learned the hard way that every class has their OWN noob quests. I'm a druid, remember? Josylin Greenblade will GIVE me the warrior gauntlets quest, and I can MAKE them in a forge and get Blacksmithing 1, but I sure can't WEAR the dumb gloves!) So I bought the book about fletching from the man, read it, and very carefully spent a whole plat and five gold on the kit, plus some parts to make arrows with. Then I went into the warrior guild and started combining.


I get an arrow! Ooh, five arrows! YAY ME!
/ooc can druids shoot arrows with bows?
the answer comes back 'no'.
/me cries.


/me keeps fletching anyway. I begged someone else to buy the arrows off me, so I could recoup losses and still not destroy or sell to a vendor.


I was mystified when I reached skill 16 and suddenly got this 'you cannot advance your skill with this item anymore' message.

/me is confused.

/me goes to trainer and spends one precious training point in Fletching (17).

/me makes an arrow. "You cannot advance...." Is it level capped? So I took some more arrow parts with me and headed off to Unrest to get some xp. Grouped with, among others, a guy named Daktyl, a ranger. I dinged 15, cheered 'yay', and tried to make an arrow. Still got that odd 'you cannot advance your skill with this item' message.

Dakyl cracks up laughing and wants to know why the crap a druid is making arrows and btw can he have them since I can't use them? I say sure, we trade some money for some arrows, and I explain my mystification at the message. He directs me to EQTC to learn what the term 'trivial' means, as well as how to get around it, and asks for more arrows (fighting had been occuring all through this). I tell him 'just a minute, I have to make more, and it takes a while since I have to click the stack and type in the number of how many I want.'


At least I wasn't using the slider. o_0

Daktyl proceeds to laugh again at the crazy arse drood and explain that 'if you hold the CTRL button WHILE clicking the stack, you will pick only one item up from that stack.'


/me holds CTRL
/me clicks stack of arrowheads
/me sees only 1 arrowhead on cursor.


/ooc AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA
/ooc AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA
/ooc AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA
/ooc AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA
/ooc AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA
/ooc /hug Daktyl
/ooc /hug Daktyl
/ooc /hug Daktyl
/ooc /hug Daktyl


To this day... Baking 235, Brewing 166, JC 105, other skills whatever they are... I consider myself eternally indebted to Daktyl for telling me that after only 16 tradeskill points.


Druid = forage = too many veggies and fruit to eat (yes, there was a point when I actually destroyed veggies because I had too many o_0), so I looked into baking... bought a mixing bowl in Felwithe, bought a spit in Kelethin... I remember making Berry Pies and then Pound Cakes while xping in Mistmore Graveyard... Went to Jaggedpine (Look Lilosh, I typed it right : P ) in time to make noodles for Pinemyer Pasta... sold said Pasta to a very nice Evil named Drunkenstyles for 20p a stack.. first profit I EVER made at Baking... kept xping on Basilisks for eggs for dough for Halas 10... made 10k off Halas 10 before the 'Great Sullon Halas Price War of Summer 2003'.

Finally got past Halas (and there was MUCH rejoicing) only to realize that MTPs don't move here... waiting for the bank space to free up so I can make Hero Sandwiches...




Had the frightening thought the other day...
"What happens when I reach 250 Baking?? Nowhere to go!"

I voiced this thought to my roommate, and she said, "Duh, you go to another skill."

Oh yeah.

^_^

ALL HAIL DENMOTHER SAMA!

-- Sanna
Told you it wasn't short.

[xaanru]

When I very first started playing EQ, I had only one friend from RL in the game. A level 16 mage, so I was pretty much on my own when it came to everything from gear to advice. Well, I quickly found that the +2 ac tunic you get to start with isn't much help keeping you alive. After buyins several pieces of "leather armor" from a merchant in freeport, I ran across one with patterns. I asked in EC (the merchant zone at the time) about these patterns, and among the snide comments and sarcastic replies I finally found out about tailoring.

My first self-made armor was patchwork leather, filling all but the 3 slots I had bought the storebought stuff for.

Then I made some raw silk for my friend. He was basically equipped with a robe of the keeper and a water crystal staff, and some assorted cloth armor. We mangled the spiders in EC/WC until he had a full set of silk. By this time, I had found eqtraders. I knew the next step was studded leather (and bags). Before long, I had a full complement of large tailored bags, and was ready to make my studded leather. Now, about these studs...

Bought my first stack of studs off a guy doing smithing in North Freeport. Got a couple pieces of armor out of the stack.

Then went to look up how to make studs. WOW only 40 trivial. So at zero skill smithing, I start making my own studs. Got to the trivial pretty quick, but still failed way too many of them. Wondered how to get smithing higher than 40 (by now I had nearly a full set of studded leather. Must have freaked the people in oasis of marr when I would get invited to a group, and show up dressed like a druid).

Anyway, to finish this quick, came to the EQTraders site, to look for skillup path for smithing.... WOW banded armor.... So here I am, 2+ years later and I think my signature explains the rest.

ALL I WANTED WAS SOME ARMOR! (course I still wear a BP (and a few other pieces) I made myself: livestone plate (and hurricane) )