New Tradeskill AA Ideas

[Kemie Dreamshadow]

I would dearly love an AA that reduced the failure rate on "trivial" combines. Between various alts I have characters that can make everything to go with a 4A (including the 4A). Imagine my pain and frustration the other night when my 300 tailor (with max trophy and mastery) failed 6 out of 8 prepared sporali skin combines (trivial 276), salvaging only one witheran bile (max salvage). This is one of the components it has been particularly hard for me to get ahold of.

It seems that no matter your skill or stats, the random number generator is what kills you in tradeskilling.

So somehow reducing the fail rate or increasing the salvage rate for those with max skill, trophy, and current AA's would certainly get my vote.

Kemie

[Kemie Dreamshadow]

It seems that no matter your skill or stats, the random number generator is what kills you in tradeskilling.

Speaking of which, I do not think it reasonable that there is even a 1% chance of it EVER taking you 1000 combines in anything to achieve 1 skillup point. This happened to me during the course of my tradeskilling several times. Folks nearly give up in frustration with even a "low" run like that of say 250.

Kemie

[Aldier]

Imagine my pain and frustration the other night when my 300 tailor (with max trophy and mastery) failed 6 out of 8 prepared sporali skin combines (trivial 276), salvaging only one witheran bile (max salvage). This is one of the components it has been particularly hard for me to get ahold of.

There is a hard coded success rate on this combine because of the extremely brittle nature of the skin. Also, any trivial combine, that is above 260, makes no difference to be 300 vs 300+15%+mastery3. Trivial combines only look at raw skill and the 40 skill/1% adjustment if no hardcoded caps.

I am in favor of some more salvage.

Also, the idea of decreasing the skill per 1% reduction in failure rate would be very nice.
Currently its 40 skill/1%.
3 levels of an aa get it down to 25 skill/1%, (5 skill per aa... maybe 7 or 9 aa per level). I think it would be harder on the coders to try and adjust the trivial combine to compare to a modified skill (the idea of allowing the tradeskill mod to increase the skill of no-fail (thinking 300 skill, no-fails being 100 going to 345 skill, no-fails being 145)

[Bobaten]

Pretty sure the hard cap is on the second baking combine, not the tailoring combine. In any event, this hard cap is 85% success, no that much worse than the base 95%.

[EloMist]

My idea is simply to create on failure a piece of "faulty moonglade armor". It clearly has some defects that made it completely unusable, hense the "fail" and it's now a large lump of something! Instead of the whole pile "vanishing" on fail, assuming Salvage doesn't save anything other than a smithy hammer, let it save the big steaming lump of failure. The "Faulty Moonglade (or other) armor can be scraped off the anvil and tributed for a large sum consummerate with the "price" it could go for, within reason of course. So- GM armor that fails, or is broken down, or changed from "Attuned" to "Tribute only" can be tributed for 30k (perhaps higher) and the "faulty elegant moonglade" could be tributed for far more?

What takes the upper hand in this? Salvage or the faulted return. Certainly, I see no justification in both, and would generally be offended if the game makes the decision for me. I've actually managed to salvage up to 4 or 5 parts (very rare, but I've seen it happen) of a combine. While there are times I *might* want one way, or the other, I would always want to be able to make that choice for myself on a case by case basis.

[Ngreth Thergn]

It seems to me, if I'm remembering correctly, that when armor was made for people irl, that it had to be custom made. If it wasn't you risked dangerous gaps, and all kinds of other bad things.

Thankfully, in EQ, you can loot or buy a shiney new BP and it fits beautifly and all the stats are there. You don't need to take it to a blacksmith to get it tweaked to fit you or anything else.

So, back to my original idea, with the addition of someone elses (whom I forgot to quote), I can understand why the Ogre in Charge doesn't want people making infinite pieces of armor to tear apart and remake for skill up. (though perhaps some version of non usable armor would be good for this, a lot like those single use clicky spells casters make for research skill up.) I can also see where he wouldn't want people tearing apart old GM armor, or the nice new stuff and remaking it for someone else after they tired of it.

I can't come up with a great remedy for that. So I'll try and incorporate it into a new idea. Since what I'd really like to see, is that old gear that is upgraded, no longer usable and can't be passed on to anyone else be made useful, even if just for tribute. Perhaps some sort of flagging that makes it no drop/notrade/no-anything-but-tributable?

Or how about since the new cultural combines have such a terrible fail rate, and I've seen people spend millions on one BP only to have someone fail on it 4-5 times with max everything, give them a little something back for their frustration and loss of pp, components, time?

My idea is simply to create on failure a piece of "faulty moonglade armor". It clearly has some defects that made it completely unusable, hense the "fail" and it's now a large lump of something! Instead of the whole pile "vanishing" on fail, assuming Salvage doesn't save anything other than a smithy hammer, let it save the big steaming lump of failure. The "Faulty Moonglade (or other) armor can be scraped off the anvil and tributed for a large sum consummerate with the "price" it could go for, within reason of course. So- GM armor that fails, or is broken down, or changed from "Attuned" to "Tribute only" can be tributed for 30k (perhaps higher) and the "faulty elegant moonglade" could be tributed for far more?

Unfortunately with current salvage that is not feasible. I can try and think of some way to possibly make it work, but i currently do not even see a good code + data solution either.

[Ngreth Thergn]

I would dearly love an AA that reduced the failure rate on "trivial" combines. Between various alts I have characters that can make everything to go with a 4A (including the 4A). Imagine my pain and frustration the other night when my 300 tailor (with max trophy and mastery) failed 6 out of 8 prepared sporali skin combines (trivial 276), salvaging only one witheran bile (max salvage). This is one of the components it has been particularly hard for me to get ahold of.

It seems that no matter your skill or stats, the random number generator is what kills you in tradeskilling.

So somehow reducing the fail rate or increasing the salvage rate for those with max skill, trophy, and current AA's would certainly get my vote.

Kemie

well that particular combine is a bad example. It has a built in fail rate on purpose.
As for it in general, I am not sure about the need to reduce the base 5% except possibly with the other ideas about narrowing the range that it turns to no fail as others have suggested.

[Kaliaila]

I would much prefer to give the "tanks" the ability to "research" tomes.

I'm guessing (hoping?) that by "tanks" you mean pure melee, and that that ability to "research" would include mechanoinstructions considering that there are a number of those instructions which are decidely melee centric. So, using the same logic as with the pure melee making tomes instead of casters, then it would stand to reason that those melee should be able to make the mechanoinstructions just as well as the casters can.

Originally Posted by EloMist
Based on current thought that has been expressed from above, my desires lie more along the lines of improving the general ease of tradeskilling.

Enshrinement -

Allows you to set up any forge as a cultural forge. Special components? If so, perhaps increased ranks could reduce this to unneeded.

hrm. Intersting idea, with components... but may not be reasonable code wise (there is getting code changes then there is getting code changes! )

Could just make that AA a requirement in order to use a copy and paste of the cultural combine but with the additional components included in the recipe. So instead of having to code the AA to work a certain way it just is checked for when Joebob attempts the combine with the additional components in a non cultural forge. If they don't have the AA or it is a cultural forge they just get DNC.

Originally Posted by EloMist
Bound Assistant -

This AA sets up a special relationship between a character and one other character on the same account. This AA would make available a new container slot in the purchasing character's inventory. That character will receive a token that is attunable and can be placed in that slot. Upon logging in another toon on the same account, that other character may remove the token, once equipped however, it dissappears and becomes soul-bound to that character. These 2 characters may now exchange otherwise no-trade tradeskill flagged items between each other. Thus allowing a tradeskiller a means of storing patterns, etc.

Interesting idea, may be anoter one that is too large of a code change.

Bound Assistant sounds awesome, but it is one of the AAs suggested to a problem which could be solved a much simpler way. Remove the patterns all together. Instead of having all of those Patterns for XXXX Armor Slot and YYYYY Armor Slot Symbol Patterns. Instead simply give the book 2000 or 3000 or whatever arbitrary number of uses that is reasonable for the number of patterns currently obtained. The ancestral book would just straight replace the pattern as the Templates already serve the purpose of designating what slot of armor you are making. For the various symbol books, you would just additionally add a Generic Symbol slot patterns/molds to the npc vendors which would be required along with the appropriate book in the final combine. You could probably get away with charging more this way in the long run than is used up in making a whole book of patterns at any level.


Onto the actual point of the thread, most of the main good AAs have been said: More/Improved Salvage, Forage Filter for the CLASSES that get the ability, the various Triggered TS AAs (TS Lesson, Mentor, Improved chance at success, etc), reduction of the skill difference needed to get change no-fail value, and others. Some do need to take into consideration that at some point the skill cap WILL be raised again just not sure when it will so ones such as those that deal with the rate at which combines become no-fail need to be designed with that in mind. But for the most part most seem to have tried to build in limitations somehow.

Only thing that I can think of that might be interesting, but would surely be a coding nightmare, would be an AA that would summon an all in one container that could be used for any (non-cultural/quest related) TS combine. Or even have one for each TS where the container you get would be able to do all combines for that TS. For example You could just click the Baking AA and the container could do the mixing bowl combines and the oven combines, and so on as long as the combine is for baking. As mentioned this would exclude cultural and quests which use specific containers.

[Bara]

I would much prefer to give the "tanks" the ability to "research" tomes.

Since my main tradeskill PC is also a warrior I'd also rather the ability to "research" tomes be implemented this way. I would also prefer to have all tomes produced marked as "No Trade", or at most; tradeable only by shared bank slot (tradeable only within the same account). Might get some tanks hooked... errr, I mean addic.... Bah! You all know what I mean!

[gggrant]

Since my main tradeskill PC is also a warrior I'd also rather the ability to "research" tomes be implemented this way. I would also prefer to have all tomes produced marked as "No Trade", or at most; tradeable only by shared bank slot (tradeable only within the same account). Might get some tanks hooked... errr, I mean addic.... Bah! You all know what I mean!

Depending on what Ngreth meant by "tanks" this might be viable. If "tanks" means all classes that get melee tomes, all fine and good. If not...

[Aldier]

Some do need to take into consideration that at some point the skill cap WILL be raised again just not sure when it will so ones such as those that deal with the rate at which combines become no-fail need to be designed with that in mind.

It does not matter what the skill cap is for the point a combine becomes no fail. A person with 250 skill and a person with 300 skill both have 0 chance of failing a combine under 50. WHEN, its not a question of if, the skill caps are raised, the point of at which combines are no fail is going to go up anyways. The proposed aa for this would not matter if you were 200 skill or 300 skill or 400 skill. It really depends on the numbers though and it pointless to speculate on them at this point.

[Maevenniia]

I once posted this idea for melee research of tomes:

There should be a new Skill, restricted to the melee/hybrids who have discs...maybe call it Mentoring.

... they would have to take their Apprentice to PvP with them in the Arena (or maybe a special training arena accessed through guild lobby), and use special Teaching Disciplines that work only in the arena, and mimic the usual disciplines (one Teaching Discipline for every combat discipline they get, so a warrior would have Teach Defensive", for example, or "Teach Rampage", but these teaching discs would not do damage) They would have timer refreshes as fast as the Combine button) and be used in combat with their student. Using similar skill up calculations as tradeskills, the RNG would calculate the likelihood of skillups and of success.

They would get skillups in Mentoring, such that the higher skill they had, the more likely they would succeed.

And maybe a mastery AA for the skill, to improve chance of success or reduce the time it would take in PvP to get a "Success"

Success would result in the Discipline tome popping on the Mentor's cursor, which he/she could then hand over to their student.

It would be interesting as it would require active participation from the Skill-er and the "Skill-ee"

Alternately, maybe instead of PvP with teh student, the Mentor would PvP against training Dummies in teh teaching Arena, in order to produce these tomes, still being required to clcik on their "Teach ___ Discipline" button as often as a conventional tradeskiller has to click Combine (to prevent afk pvp creation of tomes)

[Dalmoth]

I want a freaking Tool Belt

Used tools are added to this list (just like keys are to the keyring) and there after your always considered to have this item for future combines. Any item that is returned from a normal combined could be added to this if you want to not have to go through a mark tools. The goal here is to eliminate the need to have 30 inventory slots full of hammers, needles, tongs, files, pans etc....

[Iliyanya]

I want a freaking Tool Belt

Used tools are added to this list (just like keys are to the keyring) and there after your always considered to have this item for future combines. Any item that is returned from a normal combined could be added to this if you want to not have to go through a mark tools. The goal here is to eliminate the need to have 30 inventory slots full of hammers, needles, tongs, files, pans etc....

EXCELLENT IDEA!! I would have a couple of bags freed up in my bank with this!

[Taffany]

Another AA idea

While not strictly a tradeskill AA, I'd like to see an AA that would allow me to reset all NPC vendors in the current zone. Of course something special would have to be done for the few vendors with limited supplies of things.

Taffany