Interesting thread

[Zuklaak]

Found this thread over at evilgamers.
http://www.evilgamer.net/forums/show...106#post207106

500?

[Aanuvane]

Well, it will give us all something to do again

[Zopharr]

Blah

Well, it will give us all something to do again

Yech...skilling up all over again. Two toons maxxed out, wonder if I really want to bother again.


The original system had some good points. When you could only specialize in one one tradeskill (when only one could get to 250, and later only one could hit 300), that encouraged cooperation between tradeskillers - someone else was likely better at making subcomponents than you were, and a 250 smith/200 all else selling smithed goods wasn't really in competition with a 250 tailor/200 all else selling tailored goods

With the creation of AAs allowing everyone to get to 300 in everything, and the addition of 'must have' quests for power-gamers that encouraged/needed maxxed tradeskills (the PoP gate clicky, shawl 2.0, etc.) that essentially looked at tradeskillers as a timesink, it seemed like at least half of each guild was tradeskillers. The market became flooded and prices dropped.

Add to that...what is there really to buy nowadays with plat? With everything past T1 items being no-drop (I remember buying Velious raid drops and being able to get my tank pretty well kitted out way, way back) it's hard to see why it's worth bothering with the bazaar at all. When we had taskadds, one could at least use money from tradeskilling to buy taskaddss, in effect making time spent tradeskilling fungible with time spent exping. I actually had a pretty good relationship with two groups, making armor for them in exchange for taskadds for alts. Understanding that many do not like taskadds - and not wanting to reopen that debate - I think that all can at least agree that it helped boost the player economy.

With the player economy now...why bother? I came back from a year deployed, saw that there was nothing really to buy in bazaar other than some of the T1 augs, and have pretty much sat out the bazaar this year other than setting up a buyer to get materials for armor for my alts. With 9m in the bank, and nothing to buy, there didn't seem to be anything worth spending it on.

If they do a cap increase while making it so you can max out in only one skill - you can be a fletcher *or* a smith *or* a tailor, etc. - so a yoon can't be self-sufficient, then that will enacourage some trade. Even then, they would need to scale up many recipes to make items worth buying - and for consumables, at least, not require components that require essences, etc. (Or make them easier to get in lower tiers.)

If they continue with the current pattern, though - more AAs required to increase skill caps (time sink =! content), everyone can 'specialize' in everything, and even consumables requiring items that drop more frequently in higher tiers, then we will get more of what we have had the last few expansions. Power gamers who have more time reach the caps quicker, get more of the rare components faster, make a killing for a couple of months charging exhorbitant prices for a few weeks until the masses catch up (and not really having anything to spend the plat on), followed by a collapse in prices, followed by a lackluster player economy for another 10 months until the next expansion comes out.

Blah.

[Aanuvane]

We all may have different reasons why we chose to get lost in the insanity of tradeskills. For me personally, tradeskills have never been about making plat or selling things in the bazaar. They were for making things for myself, supplying my guild with tidbits and helping out friends (though I will admit I made a little plat making Amalgamators at an early point). It was about having something else to do once in a while besides incessant "grinding" and or the quests that went along with tradeskills (it probably was the coldain shawl 1.0 that first got me going in tradeskills). Am I looking forward to 200 more skill ups in one or more trades? Maybe not. Will I be the first "remaxed" no. For me personally tradeskills have been a diversion, an accomplishment to add to list of things I've done in EQ and for the opportunity for people to tell me I'm crazy because I've maxed so many other people's tradeskills just because I could.

[Draggar]

Nooo!!! I'm just starting to get all my skills to 300!

Also, now when you get maxed out those high level items will be easy to make.

Edit: Looks like they're in the live version, too.

[MareeTP]

It would help a lot with getting more people involved in enjoying tradeskilling if somehow the high failure level on high level items would be reduced or eliminated. Those are points of pain and frustration that really don't add anything positive to a person's gaming experience. If instead components would be more difficult to obtain, but the final combine a sure success, it would inspire more people to be involved in the process, I think. At least then, even while struggling to obtain the components, you'd know there was a certain reward for your efforts, instead of a 30% chance at failing and having to start the entire process over again. This failure rate to me seems to be incredibly frustrating and as obsolete as a dinosaur, given the way gaming has moved forward in the last few years. There should be a way to challenge players without contrived frustration.

[Jinaabu3169]

I haven't researched what information may be available on the notion of expanding the tradeskill system, and I imagine it is most likely set in stone at this point. but, here are my thoughts.

I would not like to see the max limit extended beyond 300. there are 2 reasons why I think that is a bad idea. First, everything currently is wrapped around 300 being the max; trohies, AAs, skillup rates. If they simply extend the max to a higher number and scaled everything to match, it will be a real mess. It is already a super high combine-skillup ratio now. My last tradeskill took almost 400 combines to get the last 8 points. How many combines would it take to get to 400? If it scaled, it would be a number that would not appeal to most current tradeskillers, not to mention anyone considering starting from scratch.

This ties in with the second part of why this is a bad idea. Currently, maxing out any tradeskill requires buying components in the market. It is impossible to 'farm' that many components on your own. The last time I maxed a smithing, I collected every ore I found for 3 months. This got me to about 230. I still had to purchase in the bazaar over 1000 additional ores to finish. Scaling up this amount means 1000's more components would have to be purchased.

I believe the best way to implement a path beyond 300 would be to make it an entirely seperate process, one that can not be begun until the previous max has been reached (max trophy not needed, since this really only affects the success of current recipes). One that is completely independant of the previous process, including recipes and even the AAs. Scaling for skillups would need to be reset, and I would wholeheartedly ask for the aquisition of the components to be feasable on your own, without relying on other players to help gether them for you.