Smithing skill up's biased against silk/leather classes?

[Devilcharm]

My toons in consideration.

-70 Mage, 337 unbuffed STR (maxxed INT tho, 415).
-65 Druid, 280 unbuffed STR, 280 WIS.
-30 Rogue, 255 unbuffed STR.
-5 Bard, 255 unbuffed STR.

Getting the two low levels to 222 smithing was cake, as a matter of fact all toons got to 222 with relative ease. But after 222 doing race specific combines, skill-ups as follows.

Mage, 200 combines to get from 222 to 248, 0.13% skill-up rate per combine.
Druid, 200 combines to get from 222 to 241. 0.095% chance of skill-up per combine.

Thinking the druids naturally lower STR and WIS slowed the skill-ups, I was not surprised and thought it was on track. But going through my inventory I seen I had a ton of leftovers to get two more toons smithing relatively decent. So I started on the bard first.

Bard, 200 combines got it from 222 to 254. 0.16% chance of skill-up per combine.
Thinking the RNG was just treating my bard extremely good I was most pleased with the outcome.

Then came the rogue.

200 combines got it to 255. 0.165 % chance of skill-up per combine.

There I was thinking the RNG treated me very good again, but was most definately suspicious.

Going through my packs on my toons one last time, I seen I had enough velium to get another toon to 222, but was outta a inbetween route to get the minimum smithing needed for it. So off I go shopping through vendors all across norath when in Thurgadin, I find a countless supply of wooly rhino horns. There was my inbetween route =) (not to mention the Magnetics I found in PoK ).

So I get the CLR's STR maxxed at 255 and get him to 222 smithing. Then it dawned on me.
All toons got to 222 smithing fast yes, but the chain/plate classes got there much faster then the leather/silk classes. Seeing that I had enough stuff left over again to do a few more combines, CLR got this.

76 combines to get to 234 smithing. That stays around the consistant 0.16 skill-up rate on the plate/chain classes.

Now that was 3 toons that wear metal getting decent skill-up's. At first I thought that was only pure utter RNG luck on their part. But thinking the RNG could not be with me that much for the low level toons, back to the mage I go to experiment. I bought 200 bricks of Yttrium Ore against my better judgement just to find out as the rogue (gnome) and the mage (HIE) use the stuff for Master's DoN smithing. I split it evenly for the two. 100 a piece.

The rogue went from 255 to 270. A slight slow down from the 0.16 to a 0.15 But still basically in par. Guess the RNG finally started doing it's cruelty :P
Now the mage...
100 combines for 3 skill-ups to get to 251 >.< (that's 0.03) The RNG treated me very mean there. Not only did it cost me a boatload of plat to buy the sub combine items. But it also costed my middle leg buying the yttrium ore just for this little experiment.

Now I did not run the test on the druid as that would be kinda pointless, I need him for tailoring more then I need to run an experiment... and I am low on plat after buying the yttrium. But so far consistantcy shows that plate/chain get higher skill-ups in smithing based on my first hand personal experience. I also hear other silk/leather people complaining on how hard smithing is for skill-ups... but oddly enough, I have yet to hear that complaint from a chain/plate class. I can say from my experience I dont think I will be the first to do it as the skill-up rate is decent.

In all, it leads me to conclude that sony dont want leather/silk classes skillin up on smithing. Which is kinda unfair as chain/plate classes skill up in tailoring just as fast as I did as a chanter. Anyone else experiencing the same thing?

[Ngreth Thergn]

you have to compare stats.

it will be the best of str/int/wis (for smithing, tailoring is only int/wis)

if the str is higher than the int/wis of either other character, then yes... that person will get an advantage.

If not... then you have just had odd luck. one character's worth of "lucky" does not a trend make

[Devilcharm]

It was not one character tho. It 4 toons all low level with a 255 unbuffed STR were getting massive skill up's in smithing. Vastly faster might I add then my main mage with a buffed STR of 365. or Druid with a buffed STR of... what was it, cant remember off hand. Will have to log in and check some time. But it is higher then 255, I can guarantee that.

The classes that use metal as the armor are simply skill-in faster then silk/leather classes on a repeated basis. If it were just 1 toon, I can leave it at the RNG. Two toons is a little suspicious, but RNG can still be played into consideration. But then the third toon... It pointed out most likely is not a meer RNG playing a mean game on my main tho there was a slight possibility. But then the creation of the 4th toon getting better skill-ups with a 255 STR vs. 365, it can not under any sane logical reasons be said that the RNG is favoring them over that of a main with far better stats. There has to be a reason other then sheer luck.

As of right now I am refarming velium, spiderling silks, and low quality hides and am going to make one last toon. This time either a leather or silk class, get the STR maxxed to 255, and see if they skill up as fast as the metal wearer's. Based from continual expeirence tho, I have 0 doubt it will skill up slower. If I am wrong... well, I'll close this case.

ETA on new toon creation, 3 weeks from this post to get to 222 smithing. Past 222, well that depends on race/class I make. Yttrium ore is undoubtably an easy farm and skill-up path to mastering smithing, but I already have 2 toons that need the stuff on 3 different tradeskills and resale value on the master armor they make is non-exsistant.

[Devilcharm]

Hrmm.... one other thing mighty suspicious here while not necessarily not on subject, it is close. It is a constant with all 5 toons as far as smithing goes on this account. No matter what order I do them in, or they are all done in the same order ( I mixxed and matched ). When making Mistletoe Ctutting Stickles, here is the breakdown

As we all know, the hilt, using the rubies trivials at 180.
The Pommel trivials at 182
The Blade trivials at 183.

On all 5 toons and with the exception of the druid where he had one combine that broke the 100% identicleness... here is the breakdown of the sub combines making stickels. For every 20 failures on the hilts ( the most expensive combine ) you have 2 Pommel failures, and 1 blade failure.

Now the Hilts of the three are the lowest trivial of them, so it stands to mind it should be the least failed item. But it is by far, of the three, THE highest failure rate of them. 20/2/1 This is after 210 subcombine attempts ea of them all for a total of 1050 combines. And it all resulted the same... minus the ONE that the druid had, on a blade.

Now I dont know if Sony is picking on me, but these skill-up rates and the failures on the stickles... it seems to me there is not one pattern, but two. If I am told it is just a mere RNG playing a mean game on me... that is very well beyond coincedence. There are two patterns here and they are both the same. It needs a look into, and like now.

[Devilcharm]

Oh, and yeah. Forgot to mention. The 2 failure rate is on the blade. The pommel's seem to fail the least.

Getting back on subject track. The metal wearer's still get a higher skill up rate then the leather/silk classes... at or about the same percentage as what I originally posted. At this rate, it is for certain they will reach 300 smithing long before the high level toons do with only a 255 STR vs the naturally higher STR of the higher level toons who do not use metal but organics.

[Qaladar Bragollach]

You do not have enough data to draw meaningful statistcal conclusions.

[Dutchy]

Gonna have to agree its not enough data to draw conclusions from but I find it an interesting theory.
I never kept track of my skill up rate when tradeskilling but I did notice the same sort of thing when practising language skills in a WoS group a long time ago. I was on my wood elf warrior and had the lowest wis/int in the group. Yet each and every language that got spammed I hit 100 skill when the casters would only be at 70-ish. May just have been really good luck on my side as well, but it struck my group as very odd.

[Xenephex]

I also agree regarding the amount of data, but wanted to point out one more thing. I've been told on these boards that primary stats above 250 (really above 200) have a very miniscule effect on the rate of skill-ups, so your comparisons of characters that have 265 stats vs. those with stats way above that are probably not having much actual effect on the skill up rate.

[Vivamort]

I wonder if the there is an overflow problem? Let me try to explain what I mean without sounding as dumb as I am in real life.

Maybe there is a max int/str/wis or whatever relevant stat that effects the chance for skill up. For the sake of argument lets say it is 255 or in Binary 11111111(how computers see numbers I am told). So now someone comes along with a 256 in the relevant stat the Binary can not support anything higher than 255 so it starts over... 00000000 or Zero in the stat relevant to skill up check. So using these made up numbers and wonky idea of how this whole skill up check works, that would mean a 415 Int would skill up like 160 Int (the 337 str would be 82 for the purposes of Skill ups)

Did this piece of code get updated when they allowed stats to exceed 255 way back when?

Anyway, just something I thought of while reading this thread... it just seemed extreem that a lower relevant stat character would get a 10x better return on skill ups, regardless of how little data there is... that is a HUGE difference.

[Vivamort]

Whoops I misread! wasn't a 10x difference... please disregard that part of the post!

[Qaladar Bragollach]

As a person with 415 int, I had no issues skilling up smithing.