Bug or "Feature?"

[Zanaspus]

Bear with me please as I'm sure this info is somewhere that I'm not seeing. After 2 years of EQ, I finally started tradeskilling .

Today, I made a successful combine on my Grandmaster's Baking Spoon. It has listed slots primary, secondary, range, ammo. Problem: I can equip it in my ammo slot just fine, but I do not get the benefits of the stat enhancements when I do. Is this normal? Having trouble trying to figure out why SOE would do this (not really as I Have been playing for 2 years ). The other slots enhance the stats just fine, but I'd really like it in ammo

[Oona Wynterbreeze]

For as long as I can remember that's the way it's always been. (Been playing since Dec 2000) No stats in the ammo slot.

[Rewde]

Correct. NO stats in ammo, except for the TS mod or fishing.

[Zanaspus]

I apologise in advance. The smartass in me won't let me sleep.

Does the above imply feature or extremely longstanding bug?

[Oona Wynterbreeze]

I think (not 100% certain) it's a feature.

[Zanaspus]

OK, never liking the that's the way it's always been concept, after I posted that, I logged in, went to a chat room and had a pleasant conversation with a GM about this. In essence, it is obvious with the concept of "hotzones" that you would like players to explore all aspects of the game. Wouldn't giving the GM tradeskill item that power entice more folks to want to explore tradeskilling?

He liked the idea (but then, he's paid to). I went in game, bugged the same message, did a feedback with the same message in the hopes that someone at SOE would like it.

Now I figure if all those who like tradeskills were to do the same thing, someone at SOE would have to like it a whole lot less.

What say all of you?

[Verdandi]

It's a feature. My understanding is that the ammo slot's original purpose was to hold, well, ammo: arrows, shurikens, throwing daggers, that sort of thing. There was no need for stats to work there since they were about to be chucked anyway. (There may not be ANY ammo items from the old world with stats.) For a long time there were very few items that could even be equipped in ammo at all by anyone who couldn't throw (including shaman). I didn't get my first ammo item until Velious, and then it was a pointless throwing hammer I couldn't throw.

When trophies came along, we were told that the ammo slot on them was just to give us another place to store them. If you had better gear for your other slots you could still keep your trophy close at hand by leaving it in your ammo slot, if you didn't have actual ammo that needed to go there. People pointed out that that was not all that convenient since you still had to swap the trophy into another slot to get the tradeskill bonus. So, the devs changed it so that you could get the skill bonus from items in your ammo slot. But they deliberately chose not to let you get all the stats (which may have even been easier, since that's how all the other slots work).

So, given that they've already made one change to accomodate tradeskill trophies in the ammo slot, and that they deliberately chose to make it work only for skill bonuses and not any other stats, I don't think they're like to move on this one.

Not that you shouldn't or can't try...but that's the history, and my take on it.

[Kakg]

The other reason why the ammo slot need to be changed to allow tradeskill modifiers is that as soon as the new tradeskill UI came into use it became glaringly obvious that fishing flies had absolutely no effect on fishing skill whatsoever. As the only place where fishing flies could be equipped to allow the tradeskill modifier to work was the ammo slot it was obvious that the slot had to be changed to permit tradeskill bonuses to work from there.

I distinctly remember two things about that change coming into force. Firstly that some of my tradeskill trophies stopped being equipable in the ammo slot when I was sure that they had been previously. And secondly that the devs clearly stated that the ammo slot was not intended to be another source of stat increases and so only tradeskill modifiers would work from the ammo slot.

[Zacatac]

Ammo slot items allow you to have some features of the item, but not the stats.

For example, the GM hammer in my ammo slot will give me no stats, but does give me the 5% mod to skill (as shown in the UI).

As a magician, I have a summoned item that can go in the ammo slot which gives me ultravision, but not the +AC, when equipped there.

Summoned: Coldstone
MAGIC ITEM TEMPORARY
Slot: NECK PRIMARY SECONDARY AMMO
AC: 5
Effect: Ultravision (Worn) at Level 50
WT: 0.1 Size: TINY
Class: ALL
Race: ALL