The Viability Of Crafting

[*Miraie]

Yis. That is good to hear. The thing about good builds is that if you really want to optimize, you'll need to make them with the desired content in mind. A build for soloing Gatecrasher Carceri is very different from a build supporting a party of mixed ability characters doing Carceri (who can be a crafter) or a crafter focused around grinding stuff in the Abyss with the help of a henchman or okay AC/AB/Damage.

[*Ceremorph]

Some of it may have to with the peculiarities of our server and setting. A great for-example is summons: most servers use the base OC settings, and most of the summons you get are going to suck, especially at lower levels, while here, a L3 or 5 character is really going to get a lot out of the long-lasting summon II or III. Also, even if you're not taking a class that grants henchmen, they're available to "hire" in several variations (although most people just love the thugs from the Night Market in the Hive).

[*Mick64]

Well, it's normal that a character who wants to be able to craft every recepy in the game should be weaker then characters who don't. You can't have your cake and eat it too, as they say. I think the problem (Mechanically) with your character is that you want him to be too many things at once, so he ends up lacking in some of them. You want him to be a top-tier crafter. You want him to make the best golems. You want him to be able to cast all the big spells. You want him to be able to melee.

It's good that you like RPing him though, that's the most important part.

[*R0ninknight]

I have started a seperate thread discussing this after being asked about it. After a little bit of conversation with about a dozen people separately I've concluded that I'm the only person that believes all items should be craftable so I'm not really expecting anything here at all. I should edit that- all but major artifacts (being unique or requiring a diety to craft by definition) should be craftable by a mortal studying crafting in the multiversal metropolis of Sigil. -That- would be realistic to me. Items poofing out of nowhere without a way for them to exist (I.E. nobody crafted them because they're not craftable) breaks disbelief for me but apparently I'm the only one. I'll list a few things that I noticed right away, though, since the question was posed:

I can't put +1 regen on boots even though I'm wearing Boots of the Stalewart Defender right now.

I can't find a single helmet enchantment recipe that I'd actually use. I'm not a wizard so +Int is useless and I don't want a simple +5 to one skill as an echantment. I've found plenty of awesome loot helmets, though.

I can't craft anything close to a Holy Avenger- is that an artifact? I understand it has a major list of abilities so I'm willing to let this slide. If something isn't an artifact, though, canon says its fair game.

I can't craft quarterstaves that can be recharged like the Staff of Controlling, ect.... I'm not able to sell the normal mage staves that are craftable because no one wants them because they are all substandard to the loot staves. That's an entire market up in smoke in a bad way.

Should they cost xp and mad resources to craft? Oh yeah. Should they be craftable to justify their existence? In a perfect world, yes.

I'm also noticing that its much, much cheaper to just buy crafted items from a player merchant than it is to craft things yourself. Is this intentional?

The PW already requires burning 2 more feats than normal (!!??!!) to cap crafting (the skill focus feats).... and so far taking all the crafting feats, completely focusing on it, has proven to be a failure. He can't make the best no matter how good he is- a level 30 character has little reason to contact a crafter because the loot they get will be hands-down better from what I've seen. It also costs so much money to make something that you might as well just use loot. That makes all crafted items temporary placeholders and everyone spending feats on combat abilities stronger than anyone spending feats on crafting.

I hope this stems from only my personal experience and objectively it isn't true server-wide. I have thought of this and its one reason I've been quiet so far on this topic until recently. I also know this PW has to be a lot of work. I also know that if I was building and designing something I don't release something until the crafting process is also released (at least that's always been my style in the past).

There is also a lot of good things in crafting such as the alchemical bombs and the extra materials based on the planes. This system is off to a great start- just finding these things listed above is like finding a mustache on the Mona Lisa. So... great work, just please fix the mustache! :D

[*Miraie]

A lot depends on the build you use. I think an Abyssal Bloodiron Scythe with +3 Vampiric and DC20 Blind is superior to any scythe you can obtain in game as long as you use a wand of Holy Sword and a wand of Keen Edge on it:

Scythe, alchemical silver
+5 EB
2d6 vs Evil
4d6 veri stronk crits
+3 hisspiric regenregen
On-hit blind DC 20

Similarly, I've obtained the following enchantments quite recently:

• Three blades with +3 vampiric regen (to be used with Holy Sword and Keen Edge)
• +5 Charisma to cloak (for UMD)
• +5 Constitution to boots (more hp is tasty and the boots don't come with it)
• +1 Regeneration, +30 hp and 22SR clothes (Duelist ho! The minor amount of SR actually helped me to level by deflecting inconvenient spells - including curses in the Abyss). I use a wand of Improved Mage Armor instead of an expensive armor enchantment.
• +5 Dexterity and +4 Fortitude belt.

Based on my experience here, crafted items are useful for at least two potential reasons:
1) Available on demand, or at least more reliably than a purple drop or a very expensive luxury item.
2) Fits some build needs (Abyssal Bloodiron, armor materials providing DR or AC vs evil, and other nifty things like damage vs evil weapons if you can't UMD) or item slots (ie. boots that don't provide CON, but have an enchantment slot). Optimizing. Oh. Shields. You can craft a 0 Arcane Spell Failure light shield, which is an optimal way of increasing AC for many spellcasters. A plenty of things in this category.

Could we have more crafting? Probably. Then again, it is all very situational. I think we are a bit short on ring, amulet and helmet enchantments at least. The silver lining is that there's a plenty of reasons to go to Under Sigil and gamble for better pieces. A +5 universal saves ring or a +5 STR ring would not be nearly as valuable if you were able to craft it on demand. Still, I would not mind seeing some options in these categories.

Making everything craftable sounds neat in theory, but it would also require a lot of balancing. Do we really want to give people access to staves of magi that they can, say, fill with the spells they'd rather have on a single item that is easy to recharge? Would it have to cost so much that making it is not worth the effort? Moreover, someone would actually have to do the crafting things. I'm not entirely convinced a massive crafting overhaul would be worth the effort it requires, although I am open to diffent perspectives.

Edit: Oh, I almost forgot! I have one very nice staff enchanted by Ms. Chassiel. It provides Assay Resistance, Summon VII and Invisibility Purge - all very good things to a Warlock, especially if they're use/day. They're not universally useless. Mileage may vary depending on the spells you pick, though.

[*Mick64]

A few things!

First, while some loot items may be stronger then crafted items, this is definitely not always the case! As a personal example, my newest character is about halfway done getting her endgame items, and all of them so far are either 100% crafted, or loot items which have been enchanted for greater potency. Some item types crafting might be underwhelming because of how good some loot items are (Longswords....), but in other cases crafted items are more competitive for many builds (Not a lot of armors who can compete with +5 +30 Aurorum armor). And let's not forget that it doesn't have to be fully one way or the other. Taking a loot item and then adding some enchantments can be a great tool. One of the reasons the Blindfight helm is so good isn't just because it gives a great feat, but that you get that feat AND you can then add two enchantments of your choice on top.

I can't find a single helmet enchantment recipe that I'd actually use. I'm not a wizard so +Int is useless and I don't want a simple +5 to one skill as an echantment. I've found plenty of awesome loot helmets, though.

Well, +4 Will is available on a helm and is useful for nearly everyone. That said it's true that some enchantment slots really don't have that many choices (Helm isn't really one of them though. Rings get nothing but AC, for example) and this is perhaps where I most sympathies with you. Some types -could- use a little more diversity.

I'm also noticing that its much, much cheaper to just buy crafted items from a player merchant than it is to craft things yourself. Is this intentional?

This is odd, as far as I know (With the exception of golems for golem masters), crafting costs exactly the same for all players. Perhaps you need suppliers who will sell you the materials you need at a lower cost?

a level 30 character has little reason to contact a crafter because the loot they get will be hands-down better from what I've seen. It also costs so much money to make something that you might as well just use loot. That makes all crafted items temporary placeholders and everyone spending feats on combat abilities stronger than anyone spending feats on crafting.

Again not true from personal experience. I have a level 29 character who went looking for a crafter the other day because he wanted a more specialized armor for a certain area (To use instead of his usual OTHER crafted armor). These armors where also cheaper then most of the top-tier armors sold by PC merchants.


Finally, and perhaps most importantly, about not -all- items being craftable...

First thing, just because you can't craft an item doesn't mean nobody in the multiverse can craft the item. Even the best PC crafter isn't the best crafter in the multiverse, or maybe he just doesn't know the specific technique / magic / material to make a certain item. Maybe he just doesn't have access to them. Maybe the knowledge has been lost to the ages. There are a lot of reasons why he may not be able to craft something. That's the "IC" explanation.

The OOC explanation is manyfold. First off, letting players pick and choose any enchantment existing to put on items would lead to heavy power-creep as everyone would have all the best possible combinations on all their slots. While also having the issue of making loot drops worthless to anyone with a minimum amount of coins as you could easily make a better crafted item without even trying hard.

The other "solution" of letting players craft anything in the loot table is a developmental nightmare because Sigil made the decision of having cool, unique items in it's loot table. You'll notice that all the servers in which all items are craftable have a very linear drop algorithm : Item type X can have up to Y properties, chosen from a pre-defined list, often each determined randomly. Sigil on the other hand has a ton of unique (As in, different from any other item except the exact same one) items that each have a different set of fixed properties, a flavor, a style, etc. What this means is that if we wanted all those to be craftable, we'd need to code up a recepy for every single item in the loot table. Not exactly how I want to spend an entire summer.

Instead it's a balance : You can't craft everything that drops, but you can't have everything craftable drop either. They compliment each other, which IMO is much better then having one source of items totally outshine the other.

[*Sinlinara]

a level 30 character has little reason to contact a crafter because the loot they get will be hands-down better from what I've seen. It also costs so much money to make something that you might as well just use loot. That makes all crafted items temporary placeholders and everyone spending feats on combat abilities stronger than anyone spending feats on crafting.

I want to respond to this part specifically because I don't necessary concern myself with the rest of post.

I've been running the crafting game for a while now, basically ever since I first joined the server back in June. To date I've actually been amazed at how many times max-level characters will come to Aleis for various reasons. Usually it's to enchant their Boots of the Sun Soul +5 with +5 Constitution or their +5 Universal Save cloaks/amulets with Charisma/Wisdom and +5 Armor respectively. Other times it's to request wands and scrolls. Sometimes they just want a spare Bag of Holding. Just the other day Moras requested Aleis to make 20 vials of Distilled Black Lotus Extract, 20 Greater Bull's Strength Potions, 20 Greater Eagle's Splendor Potions, a Green Dragonhide Cloak, and a bundle of scrolls of Greater Heroism.

The way things are currently there will always be things that max level characters need from a crafter, or that they can purchase from a crafter as a luxury item. While yes, people who spend feats on combat abilities will be mechanically stronger in a fight, people who are crafters have much more tools to obtain currency, which they can use to buy the best possible gear or purchase their own residence which can give them greater influence and bonuses in RP. Even just being a well-known crafter has its benefits as it will invariably make you more well-connected and allow you to have more people to work alongside when it comes to RP and events.


Or to put it more simply... While a crafter won't hold their own against a powerbuilder, the powerbuilder still wants to have a crafter as their best friend.

[*Ceremorph]

It all comes down to balance. You'll notice certain enchantments are limited to specific body parts, and the reason behind that is to stay within a certain level of power. As an example, you mention regeneration: if we were to allow regen to be placed on ever item, there would be the potential for a much higher rate than there currently is. But with having specific items such as those boots which have all their enchantment slots used, you've got to make a decision: do I want that extra point of regeneration, but at a cost of not being able to get the highest possible armor class or constitution bonus?

Now as for loot being better than crafted gear: not so. In the case of weaponry, you would have a point, but even then it's not necessarily the weapon that best fits everyone. Sure, longsword users are in a good place, but if you're dual-wielding kukris, a crafted meteoric iron or alignment-based metal kukri with three enchantment slots (+5/keen/vamp 3, for an example) is better than any of the "purple" kukris out there, particularly against what you'll be fighting in the end-game.

Oh, and your "holy avenger"? Damage vs. evil, which can also be gotten from solanian truesteel (and I'm sure you've noticed we have materials for vs. law, chaos, and good as well). And your quarterstaves can be recharged, just not by casting spells on them. You just need an electrifier.

And really that's where it ends. The best armor (short of brazen plate, which requires the use of several additional slots) is crafted oerthblood or aurorum, while (aside from certain classes) you're going to want to use enchantments for the best possible necklaces, boots, belts, cloaks, and so on.

Now I'll admit, the one thing we are lacking is wondrous items, which I would like to eventually get to for some interesting variations and options.

Still, I'd have to say we'll never get to the point of "every enchantment is available on every item", because that would be one more example of power creep, which is something we do try to avoid.

[*Mick64]

Usually it's to enchant their Boots of the Sun Soul +5 with +5 Constitution

You can put +5 CON on Soul Sun +5 boots? :blink:

I need to find a crafter again...

[*Ceremorph]

Usually it's to enchant their Boots of the Sun Soul +5 with +5 Constitution

You can put +5 CON on Soul Sun +5 boots? :blink:

I need to find a crafter again...

Every item has the potential for three enchantment slots, Mick. You know that.
:lol: