New Tradeskill AA Ideas

[Nolrog]

I am afraid you are still not catching on fully.
The reason I suggested only allow empty containers to be dropped into that special slot was because I had read somewhere that adding more bag slots, or increasing the capacity of the largest bags beyond 10 would be a practical impossibility (I could be wrong though).

I don't see how a 9th slot that only allowed empty containers and a 9th slot that allowed anything would be vastly different. They would still have to code the 9th slot, but then put the restriction on it to only allow certain things (and then add a flag to the containers to indicate which would be allowable and which would not.)

[Jinaabu3169]

Well, first off, don't think of it as a 9th slot. Think of it as a new 'worn' slot, kinda like a powersource. They already have a flag on portable tradeskill containers that they check when you click on it.

From an abstract view, they would make all portable tradskill containers stationary just like a forge. The difference would be that the action you take to open the tradeskill container would not be clicking on an object in the environment, but rather an icon in the Inventory window. This icon is customizeable by dropping an icon of the different type of portable containers in a new box on the window. You would, in essense, 'equip' the tradeskill container.

Oher than that, interacting with mixing bowl would behave exactly like a forge.

It may never happen. But I am tired of fishing to get crab and tuna, converting them on the fly to 1lb items so I don't have 20 different size fish in my inventory, and having the excess trickle over into the mixing bowl causing me to have to bank some fish before I can experiment. Not to mention the fact that while I am fishing, I have 6 less slots to store the fish in (assuming I will not have to experiment before I shuffle inventory, in which case I have 10 less).

Bottom line, I don't want autoinventory to be able to go into portable tradeskill containers. I also want access to all 80 inventory slots while using a portable tradeskill containers without any of those 80 being within the tradeskill container itself.

I can dream, can't I?

[Aldier]

Well, first off, don't think of it as a 9th slot. Think of it as a new 'worn' slot, kinda like a powersource. They already have a flag on portable tradeskill containers that they check when you click on it.

From an abstract view, they would make all portable tradskill containers stationary just like a forge. The difference would be that the action you take to open the tradeskill container would not be clicking on an object in the environment, but rather an icon in the Inventory window. This icon is customizeable by dropping an icon of the different type of portable containers in a new box on the window. You would, in essense, 'equip' the tradeskill container.

Oher than that, interacting with mixing bowl would behave exactly like a forge.

It may never happen. But I am tired of fishing to get crab and tuna, converting them on the fly to 1lb items so I don't have 20 different size fish in my inventory, and having the excess trickle over into the mixing bowl causing me to have to bank some fish before I can experiment. Not to mention the fact that while I am fishing, I have 6 less slots to store the fish in (assuming I will not have to experiment before I shuffle inventory, in which case I have 10 less).

Bottom line, I don't want autoinventory to be able to go into portable tradeskill containers. I also want access to all 80 inventory slots while using a portable tradeskill containers without any of those 80 being within the tradeskill container itself.

I can dream, can't I?

Perhaps you are carrying too much other junk around then.

You can use a portable container through the tradeskill UI and not have to worry about items being in it. And in that situation, its not that hard to find a bank. Basically you want all tradeskill containers to function only like stationary containers and have a special slot added (inventory, equipped, its still another slot they have to make). It's not bad, just I think a generic inventory slot would be more effective overall and more generally accepted by the entire EQ player base as many don't care about tradeskills, but if you said we could each get 2 more general inventory slots they would be more interested. However, from what I recall, when they added charm and then powersource slots took a lot of work from coding.

It's an idea, just not sure it would be very likely to happen.

[Jinaabu3169]

Perhaps you are carrying too much other junk around then.

Yes...yes I am. But, I am an adventurer as well as a devoted tradeskiller. Between the two, my inventory and bank space is at a premium

It's not bad, just I think a generic inventory slot would be more effective overall and more generally accepted by the entire EQ player base as many don't care about tradeskills, but if you said we could each get 2 more general inventory slots they would be more interested.

Yes, I am sure it would. But we have been told in no uncertain terms, that additional inventory space (either by making bags bigger, or adding slots for additional bags) was not going to happen.

However, from what I recall, when they added charm and then powersource slots took a lot of work from coding.

I am sure that the bulk of the coding was how the new 'equped' slots interacted with stats. The new slot would be entirely independant, so I would imagine the coding would be significantly less.

I realize that non-tradeskill players would have no interest at all in this. But, in my defense, I did make the suggestion in the 'General Tradeskill Discussion' area

[thomenthechanter]

Mmm... I recall (and can link a few posts) that bags can't be made bigger without a massive code change, but I don't recall them ever saying "no" to more slots.

Being a moderately avid tradeskiller and adventurer, I understand the crunch. I'm giving away some stuff that's been collecting dust in my bank to make room for tradeskill stuffus, and that's on each of my four toons. But by the same token, with a few more revamps like Ngreth has done with Tailoring, Smithing, and Research, I may not need that much space anymore. I got rid of *tons* of spell pieces under research, and I took much glee in dumping all the "[low|medium|high] quality [cat|wolf|bear|hopper] hides" right into the trash can... er.. guild hall vendor.

[Ngreth Thergn]

I am afraid you are still not catching on fully. When you walk up to an oven (stationary), you click on it, it opens, and allows you to bake and you get use of all 80 of your inventory slots. Basically, the '9th' slot would make all portable tradeskill containers 'act' as stationary ones.

The reason I suggested only allow empty containers to be dropped into that special slot was because I had read somewhere that adding more bag slots, or increasing the capacity of the largest bags beyond 10 would be a practical impossibility (I could be wrong though).

I do not want any extra slots. What I would like is to not sacrafice the ones I have due to portable containers. Now a spit and some of the others make sense to sacrifice bag space for the convience of portability. But with things like a mixing bowl, we don't have a choice....we have to sacrifice the bag space.

Once again, the mixing bowl, equiped in this special slot (can not be equiped if there are items in it), should behave identically to an oven. It is empty when you open it (because it 'technically' isn't in your inventory), allows tradskilling without sacrificing any bag space, and automatically puts anything left in it back in your inventory (or hand/on the ground) when you close it. Experimenting, etc work exactly the same.

The idea is fairly straightforward, I think.

Oh, and I am a she =) (and spelled my name wrong because I rushed registration, it should be Jinaabi )

well... that extra container spot is not in your inventory, but in the "zone". So it would definitely be something flaky, and perhaps still fairly heavy in code... it would somehow have to put the container in the zone, and then open it...

[Ngreth Thergn]

The problem with more player inventory slots is memory.

It really adds up faster than you think. Have you track the player, their stats their inventory, and then X 1000 or more... starts to really add up.

each item is 6 items (the item and 5 aug slots) then each item also has to store a bunch of information... charges, cooldown time, and probably more... * 10 + bag then * number of players online...

The bank is at least temporary memory, and does not need to be cached for fast access like player inventory.

So in order of "ease" bank space / more inventory / larger bags.

None of these are trivial though :/ even the bank space. Especially since we are hitting UI size issues with the current bank, probably entailing a re-design... making it even longer... and even then, probably easier than more player spaces, and way hugely by a very large and giant (and I need more adjectives here... but you get the point...) easier than larger bags.

[Jinaabu3169]

well... that extra container spot is not in your inventory, but in the "zone". So it would definitely be something flaky, and perhaps still fairly heavy in code... it would somehow have to put the container in the zone, and then open it...

I could see that for a forge, but the mixing bowl is already in the 'zone'.

How about this... we make a new equipment slot..say...a nosering. Mixing bowl is All/Nosering, (must be equiped *and empty*, effect: open Mixing Bowl), then add the *return all items to inventory* code from the forge to the mixing bowl.

That is being a bit facetious, but hopefully that would shed some light on it.

I am assuming of course that the forge and mixing bowl are basically the same thing except how you activate them. You may be telling me that although they look identical when opened, they are, in fact, two entirely different things...

[thomenthechanter]

Well, sort of, Jin.

As Ngreth mentioned, there's an amount of memory assigned to each item, be they stationary in the zone or in your inventory. That amount has to be 5 "chunks" of memory in size, because each item can have up to four aug slots. (That is, programming details of linked objects and aggressive memory management aside.)

Each item carried in the inventory has to be cached on the server for quick reference. So, the effect of carrying the biggest bag in the game is 10 * 5 chunks = 50 chunks, which is cached in memory on the server while you're logged in. Let's say each chunk is 2 Kilobytes --- which I think is much smaller than the actual. That means each "bag" increases the load on the server by 100 kilobytes per player. Multiply that by a thousand players, and suddenly you're talking about 100 megabytes of extra data to cache on the server.

Since EQ is a zoned game, each time you cross a zoneline, the game has to make sure all of your gear gets moved from one zone to the next. It's not just your computer doing the work of loading the next zone; the server's making sure you don't accidentally drop a bag along the way. That adds some memory management traffic.

Whereas since there's only one of the stationary container, and thanks to scripting it's impossible to leave anything in the container... its draw on the server is comparatively small. In fact, it doesn't have to cache anything between uses -- it starts "empty" every time.

[Aldier]

I could see that for a forge, but the mixing bowl is already in the 'zone'.

How about this... we make a new equipment slot..say...a nosering. Mixing bowl is All/Nosering, (must be equiped *and empty*, effect: open Mixing Bowl), then add the *return all items to inventory* code from the forge to the mixing bowl.

That is being a bit facetious, but hopefully that would shed some light on it.

I am assuming of course that the forge and mixing bowl are basically the same thing except how you activate them. You may be telling me that although they look identical when opened, they are, in fact, two entirely different things...

It sounds like they are 2 entirely different things.

A mixing bowl is not in the zone it is a portable container. It is part of the character's inventory. A forge is a stationary container. It is part of the zone files like any other object, door, item in the zone itself. To get the part of the code that returns all items when you close the container, it sounds like the container has to be a stationary container in the world. So when you bring the mixing bowl in with you, you would have to find a way to move it to be a part of the zone and not a part of your character's inventory and then you could proceed to use it where it was separate from your inventory.

[Zatz-Combine]

how about 4 more shared banks slots!!

[Nolrog]

how about 4 more shared banks slots!!

I'd rather have 4 (or 8) more regular bank slots.

But as always, it comes down to code time.

[Zatz-Combine]

8 shared would be better then normal bank slots, Halas pies need to get moved to the trader mule or storage mule if not giving them away, making MTSCs for tribute take a lot of room as well when you have to make with an alt.

[thomenthechanter]

Your mileage may vary. Some folks move items more than others, and others need to store more stuff across multiple toons.

It doesn't affect me one way or another on my mains, thanks to the circumstances of where Thomen lives.

[Nolrog]

8 shared would be better then normal bank slots, Halas pies need to get moved to the trader mule or storage mule if not giving them away, making MTSCs for tribute take a lot of room as well when you have to make with an alt.

I disagree. If you get 8 shared bank slots,then the total number of slots, is 8. If you get 8 more regular slots, then you have 64 total slots, 8 slots per character, x 8 characters = 64 slots. I'd rather have the 64 slots, than the 8 in the shared.