HELP! Why Do You Craft?

[Niami DenMother]

Late last week I got tapped to join in a player panel on crafting at SOELive, and one of the topics it we'll be discussing is why folks craft in an online adventure game. So, while I have some pretty good ideas on my own, I'd like to turn to the community and ask - Why do YOU craft?

~Mum

[Windru]

ummm, well, I think I craft because it's a part of who I can be...Be all you can be. Which could be a little OCD, since I'm trying to do it on 15 characters (on Cazic Thule.)

[Jinaabu3169]

I tradeskill so I can equip my characters. For the last two expansions (when I got serious about TS), the cultural allows me to upgrade to T3 as soon as I finish the symbol quest. I am not in a guild, because I usually only play a bit on the weekends, so obtaining T3 via the content is unlikely unless I get rot drops. I box a lot, so I have maxed tradeskills on several characters to make the armor, and I have one char that has all skills maxed to create all of the other misc things (seals, weapons, bows, augs, etc)

I try to sell some, but keeping a trader up constantly in order to make it worthwhile is not usually an option. With the offline traders coming up, I may do that more.

There is also the minor satisfaction of having completed something in the game that not many have done.

[Zuklaak]

For me, it is to be self sufficient, as I solo mostly or now a days molo.

[Paloverde]

In 1999 I started tailoring to create something I could wear, from tattered pelts and because a kind player gave me a tailoring kit and some patterns. Today, wearing the best cultural armor is not possible for me because of the difficulty of the cultural aug quest and that raid augs are requried also. However, I was inspired by a former guild leader, Starry Knight, and continued to work on my skills, with help getting the first quest shawl and then the second one. YEA!

I continue to develop my skills for a sense of personal achievement.

I continue to USE my skills to help others. (I help train strangers who need skill for their 1.5 epics. I equip others with jewelery, etc as I sense a need.)

[Niami DenMother]

Thanks, folks! Keep those answers coming!

~Mum

[MareeTP]

I started when I needed items for my character that I could not otherwise obtain (BBC sandwiches). With each tradeskill, I found other items that I wanted for my characters and raised that skill - reluctantly at first - but after a while the whole process became addictive. Then it moved into a completionist type of of mind frame and I found I enjoyed it more and more. Ive repeated some tradeskill routes on different characters all the way to the end to be able to craft the class speciific armors for them.

The best thing about being able to tradeskill is to be able to make items that are still useful and desirable for myself and friends at high levels of play. I like being independent of the bazaar and able to provide for myself.

[Xerius]

I craft in any game because I enjoy being able to equip myself from my own efforts. The idea that something I do in the game world can change the world, even to such a small extent as simply creating something I will use myself, appeals to me.

In EQ at the beginning, I developed a second goal. My Erudite Wizard took up Smithing to outfit my wife's Warrior with Banded armour, and in the process I became quite involved with one of the early Smithing websites of the day. That interest prompted me to keep Smithing in hopes of being a pioneer, the first player in EQ to find the trivial point of Banded Cloaks, and having found that, tradeskills became a badge of individuality, as the only player on Veeshan who could reliably make Banded Cloaks until others pushed their Smithing up to the same level.

During Velious, tradeskills became a badge of individuality for players in general, as it marked the first large scale multi tradeskill quest, so I crafted to join that elite club, one of the few to hold the Coldain Shawl, and the fact that Velious crafted armour was again desireable to players (during Kunark, tradeskills were of minimal use) made it something I wanted to pursue, as my own characters and that of friends and family could benefit from my efforts. In other words, I could again make a small difference in the world. This same dual purpose, that of distinguishing myself by being one of the players to do the multi tradeskill quests that have continued to show up, and the ability to add something to the world that will benefit others, has kept me tradeskilling to the current day.

As an afterthought, I suppose I continue to tradeskill as well because it still enables me to be a pioneer, finding a new spell recipe, running across the occasional old recipe that nobody has happened to try before. Essentially, I derive a great deal of pleasure from aquiring the knowledge of a branch of EQ, and enoy the ability to pass that knowledge on to others.

[Draggar]

Mainly for fun but also to get some fun gear as well as good useable items like Mistys, Kaladim Constitutionals, etc. Also to get some lower end starting items for guildies (pie tins, cake rounds, etc.).

Plus, it gives me something to do if I have a little bit of time but not enough to go hunting.

[Heathin]

While my response is likely too late to help with the main reason, it is still a great question. I began as a way that I could enhance our playing experience. Stat foods was the beginning for me. By keeping drops and learning to cook, I could add stat food to all of my friends and guild. My interest expanded from there. I created alts so that I could master all the tradeskills, with the exception of poison, as this was long before AA's allowed us to obtain 2nd masteries. I maxed all TS at 250, then remaxed at 300.

My friends and I are older than most other players. We play often, but we don't raid. TS is a great way for me to help keep us in updated gear. I also look forward to tradeskilling when I want to log in and get something done, but don't have an hour or more to devote to playing.



My friends and I recently returned to the game, and I am busy adjusting to the current game. Of course, my first course of action was to supply us all with some of the fantastic new stat food. (Unfortunately, yes the pun was intentional)

[Egat Bearskinner]

Nice to hear from you Denmum!

I started crafting initially because (to my newbie eyes) it would be a path to great riches. It didn't take long before I realized that I would probably invest more platinum in raising a tradeskill than I would ever earn with it. Still, I truly enjoyed wandering between Kelethin and the Commonlands selling kits of banded armor, in fact, I view those days as some of my favorites out of twelve years of EQ gaming. I grew to envision my character as a smith who happened to adventure as a sideline. As time went by I found more goal oriented reasons to craft: the opportunity to raise more than one skill beyond 200, raising skills beyond 250 and finally the evolving trophies. Once those goals were achieved crafting lost a little of its joy for me but I still make it a point to farm up rare components from past expansions and create items I had not created before. There is no reason behind it other than simple joy and curiosity.

[Sharrien]

Answer is a bit late, but maybe it will serve you in the future.

I started crafting mainly to have useful things for my characters. The introduction of cultural armor was the driver that both encouraged and funded getting max skill on my main toons. I know that EQ design shies away from giving much power via tradeskills because then being able to merely purchase the products makes them "free", however, I think that it is necessary for there to be useful things to make for anyone to want to do tradeskills. And there are a bunch of us that really like tradeskills, so we really want useful things to make!

[Lenwu]

I do it for the love of it, i just came back to the game since being gone from '08. And wow its changed, i left when Anguish was in and i already maxed my skills and have trophys. So what to do now? I want to go back to working on my trade skills again but not sure to where to start. So any help would be be appreciated.


*edit*
Ha! guess i need to update my siggy lol

[Paloverde]

@ Lenwu

I am thinking the trophies that you have are the original trophies. See my earlier post in this thread. There are new trophies. It may be that the trophies you pesently have will be used to complete the new trophy quests.

There have been HUGE changes in Jewelery, Poison, Potion crafting. The results are much better. Poisons and Potions are in demand. The way that the jewelery components are assembled finds that craft a hidden beauty. There are some fine baking and brewing recipes with stats, including Armor Class. Tailoring and Smithed armor is used by raiders so market is not high, but there are some excellent crafted weapons. Pottery produces some orbs which fit into a new armor slot and enhance stats of the player. (Guidance may be needed in the selection of which orb is correct for a particular player.) Skilling in fletching remains difficult for some categories of players but just got better with the VoA expansion and even better with RoF.

Good luck as you return to the trades.