Upcoming Cultural Changes

[Ngreth Thergn]

ok so im tryign to take all this in and it seems all of don cultural stuff is changeign but it has also been stated from what i read that tinkering is not really beign messed with, so does that mean the combines useign tinkering are staying the same? Specifically the ones useing the yttrium ore

Nope, they are changing too. Yttrium will no longer be used. They use the same system.

[Ngreth Thergn]

I'm a little bit troubled by this. It sounds like the DON "master" level equivalent cultural recipes for tinkering will now require 2, rather than 1 farmed item.

yes. It will be 2 farmed items... BUT the same NPC drops both... it will just be the cultural stuff is rarer on those NPC's than the template stuff.

It also sounds like I may need to raise my tinker's smithing skill even more than it is now (his smithing skill is currently at 199) to make the "armor templates" required for the final cultural combine, unless, of course, I can make the templates on another character with high smithing skill and transfer them to the tinker for the final tinkering combines. I really prefer not to raise his smithing over 200 for now, because at level 16 he cannot get the AAs needed to raise another trade skill above 200 should that become necessary in the future.

Yes. You will either need to raise your smighitn skill, or make the templates with an alt. The templates are tradeable.

In my case this is about recipes for leveling up my tinkering trophy to level 7, and I'm concerned that some of the recipes that were viable for this purpose may wind up being greatly less so for some of us.

In my case, for example, my 300-skill tinker is level 16. He's obviously not capable of farming items in high level zones, so any recipes that require no drop components from high level zones are unavailable to him.

Up until now he was capable of using the recipes for Master's Servolinked Greaves and Master's Servolinked Cuirass (both with "difficulty levels" of 304) for leveling up his trophy because the one dropped item required isn't "no trade." I was able to farm the small bricks of yttrium ore over in The Deep with my level 75 rogue and transfer them to him.

I hope that situation isn't going to change with the new recipes. I mean, it's bad enough that I'll now have to farm two things (one for the template and one for the cultural combine) without having the entire process become completely unfeasible because at level 16 he cannot farm some no trade item required in the new recipes.

Can you help me out by clarifying the situation he's going to be facing without giving away any details you'd rather not reveal at this time?

You will still be able to make the final combines you mentioned (I think they have a higher trivial now, giving you better "yeild" to your trophy), they no longer have a min fail rate (or success cap), and the drops will still be tradable. The NPC's you hunt may have changed, but that rogue should still be able to hunt for it.

Additionally you can make the symbols now with tinkering, which give you even more different combines (though admittedly the symbol patterns are more difficult to get than armor patterns)

[Ngreth Thergn]

votecount += 1;

I have a chronal stone in the bank. The odds of it becoming a wearable aug are zero when an AAAA costs what it does. Even if I farm every farmable component, the ore alone costs thousands and thousands of plats for what is really a weak aug. Cost of the conversion widget should be proportional to the benefit to the toon and to the player level REQUIRED by the aug.

While I at least partially agree that the stats may not be worth the effort of making an AAAA... the price I do not agree on. People at that required level should be able to afford that, especially people able to go on the raids to get the Chronal stone in the first place. They cost about 18k to make, with many gnome hours of work. If your feel your Gnome is gouging you find a better gnome and/or farm the parts yourself (where I will at least admit the possibility of, though I have not decided, that the effort part may fail to come up to the standards of the aug...)

[Ngreth Thergn]

One thing I noticed about the DoN cultural armor is that when my Dark Elf SK was ready (lvl 55) to make the DoN Master's armor, it was, for all practical purposes, impossible to get the Midnight Stones I needed by myself. It has been my experience that getting people to help you farm DoN armor components that don't drop very often is, at best, very difficult. And the prices I see for DoN armor components in the bazaar make buying them not an option. Luckily someone in my guild was soloing in PoN and saved some Midnight Stones for me. Even so, I was in my mid-60's before I was able to effectively farm the MS's by myself.

To use Master's armor as an example, since you can wear it at lvl 55, I don't think you should have to wait until you are 15 levels higher before you have a reasonable shot at farming the components.

Another thing I noticed was a big difference in the difficulty of getting the cultural drops for DE and Ogre Expert armor. DE Expert armor requires Acrylia Ore which I found I could farm reasonably well from the Tribals in DSP in my mid to upper 30's. Yet to make Ogre expert armor I needed Dark Ore, which is farmed mainly in the Turigan (spelling?) mines, which was very difficult in the low 50's. There may be other examples of this, but this was the one I noticed. I hope the changes will address this type of problem.

this is exactly the type of thing these changes are supposed to address.

A final question I have is concerns the number of combines needed to skill up in a given tradeskill. I heard that one person did 700 combines to get from 296 to 300 in Smithing. Will the changes address that? Or will doing those 700 combines not be so painful because the components needed will drop more frequently?

While I don't believe obtaining the Grandmaster title in a given tradeskill should be easy, I also don't believe it should be a mind-numbing experience that tests the endurance of a player more than anything else.

Neranya

While it does not address the amount of combines, it does instead address the drops. The drops for the templates will be more common and available in more places. And 700 is a bad run. I would expect something on the order of 150 on AVERAGE to get from 296 to 300, but bad luck CAN happen. I have also seen reports of people with awesome luck that got that in 4 combines.

[uncleshmoozo]

Not an answer to your question, but you might want to look at sunshard ore for your tinkering trophy. The 2 precombines for the sunshard armor are made with either tinkering or jewelcraft. Chances are very good you could find someone to buy the unfinished product from you since it is then used for 300+ trivial tailoring, smithing, or research.

Thanks. I'll look into that.

[DAMGLAAN]

changes

are there gonna be mod or stat changes going into effect with the new recipes?In tss u can quest armor with mod effects at lvl 20 thats better then lowest teir cultral and so on up.

[uncleshmoozo]

yes. It will be 2 farmed items... BUT the same NPC drops both... it will just be the cultural stuff is rarer on those NPC's than the template stuff.

That's a bit of a relief, though I do hope that the cultural drops are not vastly more rare than the template stuff unless I'll be able to use the smithing steps from the new "master" level templates to get my rogue's smithing skill a bit closer to 300. He's currently at 264 and nearly finished with Shadowscream ... and when I get to 267 I hope to never, ever see another owlbear or sonic wolf.

Yes. You will either need to raise your smighitn skill, or make the templates with an alt. The templates are tradeable.

Thank goodness they are going to be tradeable!



I'll most likely make the templates with my rogue who is my main smithing character. The only reason my gnome mage even has a 199 smithing skill (or any smithing skill at all, really) was to do the smithing combines needed to make the master level cultural ore used in the tinkering combines.

You will still be able to make the final combines you mentioned (I think they have a higher trivial now, giving you better "yeild" to your trophy), they no longer have a min fail rate (or success cap), and the drops will still be tradable. The NPC's you hunt may have changed, but that rogue should still be able to hunt for it.

That's great news.



I do hope he'll still be able to solo the mobs. If you put the drops needed on mobs that are roughly similar in difficulty to the mobs which previously dropped the master level cultural drop items I'll be fine, but it would be really difficult to assemble a small group just to farm large amounts of tradeskill drops off of mobs that are likely going to give no significant amounts of experience (if any at all) and no significant benefit other than to my tinkering alt's trophy level.

(Note that I'm really not anticipating a problem here, just pointing out that one could crop up if some care isn't taken in the selection of the mobs that will be dropping the needed materials.)

Additionally you can make the symbols now with tinkering, which give you even more different combines (though admittedly the symbol patterns are more difficult to get than armor patterns)

That's certainly a good bit of news, though it won't really affect folks like me whose tinkering alt is just level 16 and holding. At that level the quests needed to get the expert and master Books of Gnomish Culture are a bit awkward, to say the least and the grandmaster's book quest is probably undoable since it involves getting instanced versions of DON missions.

Since the only real market for those items involves the grandmaster level symbols (and to a much lesser extent the master level symbols) he's pretty much not going to be bothering with that. But that's okay. I didn't really make him to make symbols anyway. I made him to make the various quirky, but useful widgets that tinkers are primarily known for.



By the way, I hope I don't come across as overly negative in this post because on the whole I am very, very pleased with these changes. I think they will prove to be hugely beneficial to the community as a whole and also to my dwarven smith who may be able to cap off his smithing using some of these new recipes. The previous master level cultural drops needed for my dwarf were reportedly so rare that it wasn't even worth the bother of farming them at all so any improvement in that area will be welcomed with open arms.

Oh, and one last quick question. Is Purescale Ore still going to be used to make the various grandmaster's waters or should I put my small stash of that to use before the patch, too?

[Ngreth Thergn]

are there gonna be mod or stat changes going into effect with the new recipes?In tss u can quest armor with mod effects at lvl 20 thats better then lowest teir cultral and so on up.

Not at the time of these changes.

[Ngreth Thergn]

Oh, and one last quick question. Is Purescale Ore still going to be used to make the various grandmaster's waters or should I put my small stash of that to use before the patch, too?

Water stuff changed too. Water is also no longer an extra step, it is just part of the symbol combine. It uses the same cultural stuff the armor does.

[uncleshmoozo]

Water stuff changed too. Water is also no longer an extra step, it is just part of the symbol combine. It uses the same cultural stuff the armor does.

Thanks, Ngreth. I guess I've got some to sell to somebody who's making symbols before the patch.

[Rawckett]

Has the patch with these changes been scheduled yet?

[Rawckett]

Thanks. I'll look into that.

Silver Conduit (Trivial at 290):

http://www.eqtraders.com/items/show_...27482&menustr=

[Ngreth Thergn]

Has the patch with these changes been scheduled yet?

Just the names. (4/18/07) the rest of it not yet scheduled since we are still waiting on the code change.

[uncleshmoozo]

Silver Conduit (Trivial at 290):

http://www.eqtraders.com/items/show_...27482&menustr=

Actually, my tinker's skill is already maxxed out at 300, so that recipe doesn't really do me any good. I need recipes with a "difficulty" (formerly "trivial") of over 300 to fully evolve his trophy now. True, the silver conduit can be used to make items that do have a difficulty over 300, but, well ... put it this way.

I spent a little time trying to farm some sunshard ore from the juggernauts down in Sebilis, and I have to say that the drop rate is such that I think I'd rather wait to see what the new recipes are like before I decide to pursue that path in earnest.

On the other hand the jugs are an amazingly prolific source for a staggering variety of high end Kunark era spells, some of which still sell for decent plat in the Bazaar. They also drop a variety of mid-to-high end gems (including blue diamonds) and those sell for good plat to merchants, though, of course, I do keep some of them for my personal tradeskill needs.

[Bobaten]

The best place to farm sunshard ore is from vendors near mobs that drop sunshard ore .