Salvage Level Limits

[Flehmen]

Personally I would link the mastery AA's to skill level, not player level (something like first one at 100, second at 200 and third at 250 or something),
...

This seems a little better. Unfortunately, tied to skill levels like that the AAs cramp the ability to increase TS level caps. As far as game balance, I see no difference between your level 1-20 toon being 300 in TSing as compared to your main. You still have the clicks to click to get there so the amount of involvement is equal.
An artisan might be a little faster in that other sub-combines will be easier, but I 'd suspect we'd still all have extra toons for the bank space. You can get UBER L33T gear from TS at level 20 but almost all of that is also level capped, recommended, or otherwise restricted somehow already.
No skin off my nose tho, as described, 30-40 extra hours grinding(I won't call it gameplay) and you have all the AAs you need for NTCM, another 30-40 hour grind and the level for the rest of em. This is assuming the new 1-2 hour per AA at level fomula can be extended to low levels.
Some solo missions in CR would be cool to get me some specific AAs. Since I suspect that the AA grind is going to be solo or in MM where you are just a "solo" warm body filling up the numbers.

[Twistagain]

Hmmm...what if the percentage of your XP that could be sent to AA was capped based on level? For instance, you can only move twice your level (rounded down to the nearest 10%) to AA.

So, At level 5, you can move 10% to AA.
At level 10, you can move 20%...
At level 50, you could move 100%.

That would keep someone from building up a lot of AAs at low levels (power levelling) when the AAs wouldn't require as much XP. They'd be levelling up at the same time, increasing the XP required to get an AA.

[Kcalehc]

The major problem with linking them to skill level is as you skill up the tradeskill mastery's do less and less for you (except on the extremely difficult non-capped combines) - so having to wait until 250+ skill to get Mastery Level 3 is self-defeating...

Well sort of. Although, as you know, success increases your chance of skilling up, so an increased chance to skill up at higher skill (where it generally starts getting expensive) is still a useful thing, no? And it would help if success caps were removed too. Possibly some other fiddling around required but personally I think the basic idea is sound.

- stuff about levels and %'s -

Yeah that'd work, good thinking. Although you'd have to be sure to set the amount of xp required for an AA between each of the intervals so that you could actually get a few. There would then be the powerleveled twinks that got to level 50 with the max number of AA's that could be gained while levelling up, but with clever level capping they would still not be excessively overpowering.

[Telorea]

On a related note:

Once you are above level 51 it becomes pretty easy to max your primary class stats with gear, and so most of the "Inate xxxx" AA become worthless.

When you are below level 51 and you would actually find Inate Stat AA useful - you cannot buy them.

[melkorr]

Doesn't that kindof assume a player who is either shortsighted, or just doesn't plan on getting better gear? As has been said, a +2 bonus to a stat isnt gonna help much. All my low level toons have 5 radiant flowstones of stats they need. My tinkering mule is wearing 5 radiant starflow, and my alchemy mule has 5 radiant boneflows. So it's not like stats are that hard to come by. And I'd much rather spend the 3k or so per base stone, cut it to radiant, and pass it off to the alt, than waste AAs on something I know will someday be useless.

[Pootle]

On a related note:
Once you are above level 51 it becomes pretty easy to max your primary class stats with gear, and so most of the "Inate xxxx" AA become worthless.
When you are below level 51 and you would actually find Inate Stat AA useful - you cannot buy them.

Doesn't that kindof assume a player who is either shortsighted, or just doesn't plan on getting better gear? As has been said, a +2 bonus to a stat isnt gonna help much...... And I'd much rather spend the 3k or so per base stone, cut it to radiant, and pass it off to the alt, than waste AAs on something I know will someday be useless.

I agree they are usless now, but you do have to remember that when these AA were first introduced, people were not maxing their stats and gear had way less stat boosts then it does today.
But saying that, even back then, the other AAs were considered to be more value for money.

[Boleslav]

The issue is that back in they day I was level 25 making the first Enchanted Imbued Dwarven Plate on my server. I could be the best smith possible at level 25 and my skill was directly related to the time I spent on it, not on how many orcs I killed.

(How many pelt bearing animals I killed did seem to have something to do with that as well... also how many hours I spent farming lava rocks in Najena cause I couldn't get them anywhere else at my level...)

Now, I can't be the best smith (or insert your tradeskill here) possible without spending AA for mastery and salvage. A low level toon is at a decided disadvantage compared to a higher level one when trying to play primarily as a tradeskiller.

Trying to make it so a lower level character can be the best tradeskiller possible within the context of today's game sounds like quite a challenge to me though.

Boleslav
Sacred Destiny - Tunare (E'ci)
Paladin of Brell in his 75th Campaign

[Mondrivun]

I guess my biggest complaint is that most AAs are level restricted or progressions of level restricted AAs that make sense. Allowing a level 51 character to open additional tradeskills by removing the 200 level cap was a wonderful addition to the game. However, the next AA increases for Mastery and Salvage all occur many experience levels (depending on which skill) later. I feel that valid arguments can be made for reducing the required experience level for Salvage and the Mastery series of AAs. There may be valid arguments for keeping them where they are, but as I perceive it, the expansions that introduced these AAs were for "high" level people, so that is what level the AAs were set to.

Eventually, I will get my primary tradeskill character to 60+. Right now, he's in the 1450 club. He will probably stay there until I can obtain the levels and AA to reduce the cost of failures. I have never looked at tradeskills as a profit center, but more as a fun thing to do: loot the items, figure out what I can make with them, or, conversely, hunt in an area specifically for an item so that I can make gear with the loot. I have several mid 30s and 40s characters that are primarily geared with tradeskill made items. Granted, I could go to the bazaar and equip them with the "best" gear available, but I find it more enjoyable to provide them with the gear... Their progression will just be a bit slower

Cheerios!

[Aldier]

The mastery aa were set to level 59 because back when the first mastery aa (JCM) was just for enchanters, it was a class specific aa that required level 59 and 6 in general and 12 in archetype to purchase. The 6 in general and 12 in archetype restrictions were removed earlier this month with the change to the AA window but the level restriction was kept and was used as a template (I am guessing) when they added the other mastery aa.

I wish my tinkerer could get salvage. My main tradeskiller has salvage and is my main raiding character so level restrictions were never an issue, but my tinkerer is only level 18 and the thought of leveling him to 70 just to get 1 aa seems a bit much. Although I am not thrilled with the thought of even leveling him to 51 to get aa exp. I understand the need for level restrictions on aa and a lot of times it is dependent on the expansion they come out in, but I also like to think of it as a reward for the hard work I have put into my character to raise his levels up and gain the aa experience needed to gain the special ability. I would consider it similar to the forage aa that allow my druid to find 2 items instead of one. Any druid can forage, but only through aa exp can my druid find more than 1 item and I believe they are also level restricted.

[Carmaris]

Heh, figured I'd bump this up and save someone else my pain.

Been working on an alchemist, slowly but surely. Leveled him to 60, earned 18AA for Mastery, np. Ground out another 15AA for Salvage, bought the first rank then discovered the level requirement for rank 2.

Not looking forward to grinding him to 70, but then he's just got that 10AA sitting there....

[HaelonTT]

There is a base question underlying all this debate that is being missed. Why are tradeskill AA's tied to your experience level?

Experience level and skill level in a tradeskill are not connected in any way. You can do all the combines you want but it wont earn you an AA or an experience level. You can kill all the mobs you want, loot millions of pelts, but it wont make you a GM Tailor.

Now maybe the answer is as simple as, the coding to tie some AAs to tradeskill levels would be too much, or are impossible with the current game code. I dont know myself, hence the question.

Personally I think your ability to learn advanced tradeskill things(AAs) should be tied to your skill in tradeskills, not your ability to bash a mob. Maybe it cant be done, but it would make more sense if it was.

A real answer to that base question from someone who really does have an answer would be appreciated.

[Ngreth Thergn]

There is a base question underlying all this debate that is being missed. Why are tradeskill AA's tied to your experience level?

Experience level and skill level in a tradeskill are not connected in any way. You can do all the combines you want but it wont earn you an AA or an experience level. You can kill all the mobs you want, loot millions of pelts, but it wont make you a GM Tailor.

Now maybe the answer is as simple as, the coding to tie some AAs to tradeskill levels would be too much, or are impossible with the current game code. I dont know myself, hence the question.

Personally I think your ability to learn advanced tradeskill things(AAs) should be tied to your skill in tradeskills, not your ability to bash a mob. Maybe it cant be done, but it would make more sense if it was.

A real answer to that base question from someone who really does have an answer would be appreciated.

Current code does not allow for it with any ease. It would be possible to do it like I did the tinkering mastery AA, I.E you do a quest, get a book, then clicking on the book itself checks your skill.

The AA system itself does not restrict by anything but level, class and expansion flags.

Additionally, the levels are a bit of "vision." The "Vision" of the AA system is that certain skills are restricted by level.

And finally, until "recently", the hard coded minimum for any AA was 51. This has changed, but we also do have a way of gaining AA points through normal exp below level 51.

I do believe in some cases using combat exp for tradeskill stuff, especially since there is not a good metric of "time spent" for tradeskills. (yes I could do a quest with X combines the equates to some time spent... but to me that is not a GOOD metric, especially since it can be macroed easily...) Using combat exp for tradeskills represent sacrificing some of your "learning" time on tradeskills, and not concentrating fully on your "combat learning"

[Deviator]

i am sure this will be a no just due to the amount of code for just a few tradeskillers... but what about a tradeskill AA system... sort of like the LAA system... where combines give you so much TS AA exp. i know you can do combine exp because of the evolving trophies. maybe it might not be too hard to put something like this together and could then have it without any level restrictions.

[Ngreth Thergn]

i am sure this will be a no just due to the amount of code for just a few tradeskillers... but what about a tradeskill AA system... sort of like the LAA system... where combines give you so much TS AA exp. i know you can do combine exp because of the evolving trophies. maybe it might not be too hard to put something like this together and could then have it without any level restrictions.

as you predicted. No

[HaelonTT]

I had assumed as much, but well, you dont know until you ask hehe.

Thank you for a clear and complete answer Ngreth.

Now, about those new slot 11 wep augs..........well, see my post under JC hehe, ty again.