Cut down on clutter. I hate when I have to fill all my bags with tons of junk to prepare for crafting, and then fill them with even more junk when I start crafting. There should be some kind of individual player workshop where you can craft and also store all your crafted materials and items.
"This".
Also, I normally hate crafting but find that in reality I like "making things".
So I don't want to make 59 items just to level crafting and then vendor trash them.
I'd like each item I make to be a wanted item. It might not be top shelf but it is something that can be used. I also like having a say in what I'm making.
To me "crafting" is normally just collecting bits so one can make bits only to press a button and out comes the item.
I'd prefer having a say in what the item does (whether that's stats or something else that's fine) and in a few cases I would like some agency in what that item looks like.
I've used this example before but there was a Neverwinter Nights (the single player game) mod that allowed a player to access and change all the bits that comprise armor and weapons. NOt just color but there must have been something like 15 different pauldrons, several blade choices, multiple breastplate options.
Sort of one of my pet peeves in the elder scrolls games as they have all these great designs but if one wants "the best" you end up with only one or two choices. How about allowing the player to access all the designs but the color and stats might change with what is used for material.
So in the Elder Scrolls example you would never want Steel armor at high level. It could look great but it's "Steel". How about having the "steel" design but having it be a little darker when made of Ebony for example?
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I think...but not sure...what he is saying is that there is market aspects of a game and then there are crafting aspects and I would agree those two are for the most part logically separate.
If the main or only reason to craft is for market then the game is failing at its design in crafting in my opinion.
The market and the crafting aspect are separate but interlinked. If you ask your buddy what they are doing in Wurm while they imp a sword to 99 QL they might say "crafting" but if you also ask your buddy what they are doing while they are cutting 100k bricks to build a fortress they might also say "crafting".
Yes, crafting that is going to support a large scale economy needs to have some capacity for mass production of items that are commonly consumed. It's still a crafting system though.
agreed, they do intersect. and I am just suggesting that if the majority of people feel crafting is mostly for trade then there is something wrong with the design of crafting which for the most part is because the game in question just dosent take the subject matter very seriously.
Somewhat on a side note I have been playing around with a single player game in early early early access called Kingdoms. How its AI works is facinating to me and the main attraction but when it comes to the subject of crafting and trade what I like about it is that you can build your own store, and AI will come to trade items automatically and it helps the status of your village and that is an intersection I find very compelling. I dont want to just sell my stuff on market, I want to have my own market, maybe with features that set mine apart from someone else like a pub that gives quests or whatever. I like ideas going in that direction
and yes Wurm has this idea of 'build your own market' but I dont think people use it much. They trade yes, but not randomly by going to a market which is why I think AI is helpful in such a concept
Please do not respond to me, even if I ask you a question, its rhetorical.
The market and the crafting aspect are separate but interlinked. If you ask your buddy what they are doing in Wurm while they imp a sword to 99 QL they might say "crafting" but if you also ask your buddy what they are doing while they are cutting 100k bricks to build a fortress they might also say "crafting".
Yes, crafting that is going to support a large scale economy needs to have some capacity for mass production of items that are commonly consumed. It's still a crafting system though.
That makes sense.
Star Wars Galaxies tried to combine the two using schematics. You would craft small scale to create a schematic and then plug that into a factory to mass produce. I like the idea of that, but do wonder if that doesn't make all of the small scale crafters irrelevant.
It really depends on how gear is used in your game. For instance in Darkfall where gear was lost upon death, general gear for going out in PvPing was gear I could generate the value of in roughly 30 minutes (Meaning that as my ability to make gold went up, so too did what I considered to be throw-away gear.) While gear I wore PvEing was gear I could generate the value of in 60-90 minutes (Given that PvE profits were what was driving these times I used to judge how disposable gear was).
Finally, for fights where the stakes were high such as if our city was under siege, I wore the best gear I could afford to replace.
Your mass-production crafters would be the ones making my PvP gear. Your small scale crafters would be the ones producing my siege gear. The ones making may PvE gear would fall somewhere in-between.
In other words, create some situations where gear slowly crafted on a smaller scale is really good, and some situations where mass produced gear is really good. You don't have to cater exclusively to either type of crafter.
Crafting in terms of games simply means building things as opposed to going out and killing things for stuff.
No, it doesn't.
Says Gdemami based on... "Nuh-uh!" with no logic to back it up. However I've consistently heard everyone else refer to things like cutting thousands of bricks in Wurm, crafting thousands of arrows in Runescape, cooking up hundreds consumables in WoW, LotRO, SWTOR etc. as "crafting".
Now I'm supposed to accept a new definition because Gdemami says so?
Do you have any ideas on how to make the crafting process itself more engaging?
Crafting is the builders equivalent of combat. A well developed crafting system should look to provide the same entertainment value (via engagement) that would be provided by killing mobs for an item of similar value. Simple mini games simply do not cut it.
I do agree that the type of entertainment generated by treasure seeking and treasure building does not need to be identical, but they should both be consistent with development in the game. If the game requires high personal skill, then it should apply to both forms of entertainment. For example: It doesn't make sense for most of the game to be based on character development and group play, only to have crafting be based on personal skill and solo interaction.
Sadly, developers see crafting as a tack on system, rather than an extension of the systems used for the core game.
Do you have any ideas on how to make the crafting process itself more engaging?
Crafting is the builders equivalent of combat. A well developed crafting system should look to provide the same entertainment value (via engagement) that would be provided by killing mobs for an item of similar value. Simple mini games simply do not cut it.
I do agree that the type of entertainment generated by treasure seeking and treasure building does not need to be identical, but they should both be consistent with development in the game. If the game requires high personal skill, then it should apply to both forms of entertainment. For example: It doesn't make sense for most of the game to be based on character development and group play, only to have crafting be based on personal skill and solo interaction.
Sadly, developers see crafting as a tack on system, rather than an extension of the systems used for the core game.
very well said.
to be clear not all developers do that but the so called 'mainstream' ones do and its a disconnect
Please do not respond to me, even if I ask you a question, its rhetorical.
I do agree that the type of entertainment generated by treasure seeking and treasure building does not need to be identical, but they should both be consistent with development in the game. If the game requires high personal skill, then it should apply to both forms of entertainment. For example: It doesn't make sense for most of the game to be based on character development and group play, only to have crafting be based on personal skill and solo interaction.
'High personal skill' implies exclusivity, in terms of crafting - limited supply. When your supply is limited, you won't get much 'group play', you limit number of interaction and volumes.
That is the point I was making before - you have to pick what type of economy you want in your game.
I do agree that the type of entertainment generated by treasure seeking and treasure building does not need to be identical, but they should both be consistent with development in the game. If the game requires high personal skill, then it should apply to both forms of entertainment. For example: It doesn't make sense for most of the game to be based on character development and group play, only to have crafting be based on personal skill and solo interaction.
'High personal skill' implies exclusivity, in terms of crafting - limited supply. When your supply is limited, you won't get much 'group play', you limit number of interaction and volumes.
That is the point I was making before - you have to pick what type of economy you want in your game.
Personal skill vs Character development has no effect on supply. For reference, i will call an FPS a game of personal skill (the better your reaction speed and agility, the better your performance). Whereas a traditional MMO is more often based on character development (the better skills/level of your character, the better your performance). If you were to compare Warframe (?) and WoW (?) combat, you would see that they both have similarities, but that they have a very different approach to how well you can kill mob X. However, neither one reduces the amount of mobs in the games, as that mechanic is not controlled by the player.
Both looting items and crafting items add more items to the game. Both should have the same amount of 'group play' in the same game (i.e. if killing mobs for items is social, crafting items should also be). The key is to make crafting something that a player who enjoys the core gameplay would also enjoy (rather than making it something that requires a different user).
Except you really don't. First off high-personal skill could mean any number of things. If crafting were a mini-game like the OP talks about "high-personal skill" probably refers to the skill in playing the mini-game. We'll say blacksmithing works like Fable 2:
In this case skill would be how good you are at landing the white dot on the green bar when you press down. You could make it so that the more accurate you are, the better sword you make. In this case that does imply a limited supply of high quality swords. Only the best people can make them.
However, in Fable 2, what your skill in this game actually translates to is how fast you accumulate gold. If you can time it right on the first pass every time you make swords faster and get more gold. In terms of a MMO crafting system this would probably mean faster sword production as opposed to more straight gold. So a highly skilled blacksmith may make items 2 or 3 times as fast as the less skilled blacksmith does but they all make the same thing. In this system there is no "limited supply" issue.
The other thing is you seem to think that a system in which there is a limited supply of high quality goods and a massive quantity of low/average quality goods cannot coexist. Why? If I walk into a shoe store IRL I'm going to find some 10$ bargain brand puddle stompers, 30$ High Tec hiking boots, and 300$ Made in America steel toed Danner workboots all in the same store.
What is preventing someone from making it so that in their game you will find a plentiful supply of crap boots anyone can make in a minutes, moderate supply of decent boots most people can make in 10 minutes, and awesome boots that would take a master craftsman an hour? Is there some reason all these items cannot exist in the same gaming world?
No mini-games. I would rather approach an MMORPG as a simulation rather than a game, and that includes crafting. Multiple steps to represent processes.
One craft per character. Make the craft skills rely on interdependence, and try to encourage that to be other people as opposed to alts. If you are a carpenter building a wagon, you should need to buy the hinges from a blacksmith, and the seat cushion from an upholsterer, not build it all yourself.
Cumulative success. Success in creating intermediate steps builds a product's success. A wagon with a superior axle but a splintery seat is not going to be as good as a wagon with average axle and seat.
Correction of failures. A failure isn't always the end. In many cases, it should be possible to correct mistakes my salvaging the components and retrying the assembly.
No instant results. All processes take time. A finished product should never be the result of a single click / process. Characters can't be running off to fight a wolf invasion and expect to be able to make progress on their craft.
Limits to merchants. A character should not be able to make a hundred helms and expect to sell them to a convenient merchant for cash. Speculative crafting didn't become a thing before the late Renaissance, everything was made to contract.
Skill .NEQ. product. Never has any craftsman attempted to learn their skill by making finished goods. Craftsmen practice their processes on scraps that will never sell. Making a final product should never have a chance to improve a skill.
Just some condensed ideas I've had on crafting over the years.
One craft per character is fine for crafting as a minor side activity, but not a major component of the game. Otherwise, it's like building a big game world in a combat-heavy game and saying that each character is only allowed to kill monster in one zone. You never get to play most of the game that way.
The 'one craft per character' idea was my attempt to make MMORPGs more simulation than game. Historically, people could not learn more than one craft because knowledge was hoarded. A master/teacher would not teach a student without a commitment from the student or their family. That commitment usually involved years of dedicated work, and frequently a substantial payment up front to 'choose' the student. Students who did not complete their obligations to their master were viewed with suspicion, and rarely found a second tutor to teach them a second craft.
The practical purpose of this kind of restriction is to promote players depending on other players, not being able to do everything themselves. Given the opportunity, players tend to try to do everything for themselves in a game. This tends to reduce the opportunities for players to interact with others. In real life, people are more than happy to buy bread and beer from a grocer, buy furniture from a store, or cars from a dealer. They don't try to make everything themselves, even though the knowledge of the crafting processes are far more widely available.
The final reason for the general difficulty for my approach to crafting was to support an actual market in-game. In a game where there are 1000 players on a server, all capable of doing everything for themselves, there's no real customer. I was hoping that restricting the number of craftsmen would increase the number of consumers, allowing normal market factors such as supply and demand to operate normally. (In most games, S&D seems to operate on the material level rather than the product level -- the finished product sells for X, but the component to make that product costs 100X. That pretty much guarantees that crafting can never be a profitable situation). I was counting on the difficulty of crafting to weed out (or prohibit) the non-serious craftsmen, leaving only the dedicated to pursue crafting and leaving a number of customers to buy their goods. I was aiming for 10 craftsmen for every 1000 characters, so it wasn't an everyone does for themselves thing.
The reason players try to do everything themselves is that only doing a few things a huge number of times each is boring. If a game says that that's the only way you're allowed to play, then the game is boring and you should quit.
Real life has an enormous number of things that you can possibly do. That's the thing that prevents you from doing all of them. Unless you can recreate that in a game such that only allowing a player to do a small fraction of the things available means he still has a ton of things to do, such restrictions will kill your game for lack of content available to a given player.
Cut down on clutter. I hate when I have to fill all my bags with tons of junk to prepare for crafting, and then fill them with even more junk when I start crafting. There should be some kind of individual player workshop where you can craft and also store all your crafted materials and items.
That's not a problem of too many types of materials. That's a problem of a bad inventory system.
That's not a problem of too many types of materials. That's a problem of a bad inventory system.
It could be both or either. But I agree that crafting mats that takes up too much space is annoying.
Now, if you have a system with more realistic carrying capacity you could put a limit on weight instead of bagspace and that is actually a more logical mechanic in any ways. while 5 small gems is more then 4 full plate armors they are far easier to carry.
You don't need to keep it realistic for that to work fine either, if a character can carry 50 pounds or 500 doesn't matter for that but when you limit yourself to a certain amount of slots we tend to throw away stuff and get issues with crafting mats that just is silly. It is not hard to carry to carry 200 different kinds of flower petals IRL but in many MMORPGs it can't be done but you can carry 50 chainmails without any problems. And irons bars stack (in 25-250 stacks generally) so you can carry tons of that but not enough small spice bags for a chef.
You can of course also solve it like GW2 with a magical something that teleports it to your bankslot for crafting mats, depend on how realistic you want things and even that option make more sense then system like EQ2s (my character carried enough huge boxes to fill a huge truck with no penalty, I had weapons and armor for 2 platoons on me among other things. The magic teleport thing still is more logical then that).
That's not a problem of too many types of materials. That's a problem of a bad inventory system.
It could be both or either. But I agree that crafting mats that takes up too much space is annoying.
Now, if you have a system with more realistic carrying capacity you could put a limit on weight instead of bagspace and that is actually a more logical mechanic in any ways. while 5 small gems is more then 4 full plate armors they are far easier to carry.
You don't need to keep it realistic for that to work fine either, if a character can carry 50 pounds or 500 doesn't matter for that but when you limit yourself to a certain amount of slots we tend to throw away stuff and get issues with crafting mats that just is silly. It is not hard to carry to carry 200 different kinds of flower petals IRL but in many MMORPGs it can't be done but you can carry 50 chainmails without any problems. And irons bars stack (in 25-250 stacks generally) so you can carry tons of that but not enough small spice bags for a chef.
You can of course also solve it like GW2 with a magical something that teleports it to your bankslot for crafting mats, depend on how realistic you want things and even that option make more sense then system like EQ2s (my character carried enough huge boxes to fill a huge truck with no penalty, I had weapons and armor for 2 platoons on me among other things. The magic teleport thing still is more logical then that).
I like encumbrance systems and not having items emailed around. I am surprised that people find is acceptable to have to click and make many items like swords to raise your skill. It feels more natural that making a sword should take a much longer time that our click approach. Thinking of armor/weapons here rather than baking cookies.
Kyleran: "Now there's the real trick, learning to accept and enjoy a game for what
it offers rather than pass on what might be a great playing experience
because it lacks a few features you prefer."
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FreddyNoNose: "A good game needs no defense; a bad game has no defense." "Easily digested content is just as easily forgotten."
LacedOpium: "So the question that begs to be asked is, if you are not interested in
the game mechanics that define the MMORPG genre, then why are you
playing an MMORPG?"
I like encumbrance systems and not having items emailed around. I am surprised that people find is acceptable to have to click and make many items like swords to raise your skill. It feels more natural that making a sword should take a much longer time that our click approach. Thinking of armor/weapons here rather than baking cookies.
Me too but there are also other factors like how good blade you make, your skill and certain materials.
A really good blade should more be something your character makes when you are logged off then something you spam. A crap blade by a master is another matter, that could go rather fast and it have little impact on the game if it does. Having good items taking time just limit the numbers and mean crafter will earn more for each weapon with the additional benefit that it encourage but doesn't force crafting your own stuff.
As for mailing items to your bank that isn't really a great system but it is still better then limited slots, unlimited weight and many crafting mats. Having carrying capacity is superior in my book as well.
So once again you having an argument with yourself because you are not actually addressing the points.
dude..read my signature that has been like it is for almost a year now.
rule 1: if you reply you are participating.
stop replying
If you're repeatedly quoting someone who has been on your ignore list for the last year, you're doing something wrong.
I never said he was on my ignore list for a year. Actually read my signature and figure out what I was talking about. In fact, when I wrote that reply he was currently NOT on my ignore list, however now he is
Please do not respond to me, even if I ask you a question, its rhetorical.
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Also, I normally hate crafting but find that in reality I like "making things".
So I don't want to make 59 items just to level crafting and then vendor trash them.
I'd like each item I make to be a wanted item. It might not be top shelf but it is something that can be used. I also like having a say in what I'm making.
To me "crafting" is normally just collecting bits so one can make bits only to press a button and out comes the item.
I'd prefer having a say in what the item does (whether that's stats or something else that's fine) and in a few cases I would like some agency in what that item looks like.
I've used this example before but there was a Neverwinter Nights (the single player game) mod that allowed a player to access and change all the bits that comprise armor and weapons. NOt just color but there must have been something like 15 different pauldrons, several blade choices, multiple breastplate options.
Sort of one of my pet peeves in the elder scrolls games as they have all these great designs but if one wants "the best" you end up with only one or two choices. How about allowing the player to access all the designs but the color and stats might change with what is used for material.
So in the Elder Scrolls example you would never want Steel armor at high level. It could look great but it's "Steel". How about having the "steel" design but having it be a little darker when made of Ebony for example?
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Somewhat on a side note I have been playing around with a single player game in early early early access called Kingdoms. How its AI works is facinating to me and the main attraction but when it comes to the subject of crafting and trade what I like about it is that you can build your own store, and AI will come to trade items automatically and it helps the status of your village and that is an intersection I find very compelling. I dont want to just sell my stuff on market, I want to have my own market, maybe with features that set mine apart from someone else like a pub that gives quests or whatever. I like ideas going in that direction
and yes Wurm has this idea of 'build your own market' but I dont think people use it much. They trade yes, but not randomly by going to a market which is why I think AI is helpful in such a concept
Please do not respond to me, even if I ask you a question, its rhetorical.
Please do not respond to me
Finally, for fights where the stakes were high such as if our city was under siege, I wore the best gear I could afford to replace.
Your mass-production crafters would be the ones making my PvP gear. Your small scale crafters would be the ones producing my siege gear. The ones making may PvE gear would fall somewhere in-between.
In other words, create some situations where gear slowly crafted on a smaller scale is really good, and some situations where mass produced gear is really good. You don't have to cater exclusively to either type of crafter.
You can either focus on crafting as entertaining, fun activity or robust economy but you won't have both.
Now I'm supposed to accept a new definition because Gdemami says so?
I do agree that the type of entertainment generated by treasure seeking and treasure building does not need to be identical, but they should both be consistent with development in the game. If the game requires high personal skill, then it should apply to both forms of entertainment. For example: It doesn't make sense for most of the game to be based on character development and group play, only to have crafting be based on personal skill and solo interaction.
Sadly, developers see crafting as a tack on system, rather than an extension of the systems used for the core game.
to be clear not all developers do that but the so called 'mainstream' ones do and its a disconnect
Please do not respond to me, even if I ask you a question, its rhetorical.
Please do not respond to me
Just look at what you wrote: 'High personal skill' implies exclusivity, in terms of crafting - limited supply. When your supply is limited, you won't get much 'group play', you limit number of interaction and volumes.
That is the point I was making before - you have to pick what type of economy you want in your game.
Both looting items and crafting items add more items to the game. Both should have the same amount of 'group play' in the same game (i.e. if killing mobs for items is social, crafting items should also be). The key is to make crafting something that a player who enjoys the core gameplay would also enjoy (rather than making it something that requires a different user).
Except you really don't. First off high-personal skill could mean any number of things. If crafting were a mini-game like the OP talks about "high-personal skill" probably refers to the skill in playing the mini-game. We'll say blacksmithing works like Fable 2:
In this case skill would be how good you are at landing the white dot on the green bar when you press down. You could make it so that the more accurate you are, the better sword you make. In this case that does imply a limited supply of high quality swords. Only the best people can make them.
However, in Fable 2, what your skill in this game actually translates to is how fast you accumulate gold. If you can time it right on the first pass every time you make swords faster and get more gold. In terms of a MMO crafting system this would probably mean faster sword production as opposed to more straight gold. So a highly skilled blacksmith may make items 2 or 3 times as fast as the less skilled blacksmith does but they all make the same thing. In this system there is no "limited supply" issue.
The other thing is you seem to think that a system in which there is a limited supply of high quality goods and a massive quantity of low/average quality goods cannot coexist. Why? If I walk into a shoe store IRL I'm going to find some 10$ bargain brand puddle stompers, 30$ High Tec hiking boots, and 300$ Made in America steel toed Danner workboots all in the same store.
What is preventing someone from making it so that in their game you will find a plentiful supply of crap boots anyone can make in a minutes, moderate supply of decent boots most people can make in 10 minutes, and awesome boots that would take a master craftsman an hour? Is there some reason all these items cannot exist in the same gaming world?
Real life has an enormous number of things that you can possibly do. That's the thing that prevents you from doing all of them. Unless you can recreate that in a game such that only allowing a player to do a small fraction of the things available means he still has a ton of things to do, such restrictions will kill your game for lack of content available to a given player.
Now, if you have a system with more realistic carrying capacity you could put a limit on weight instead of bagspace and that is actually a more logical mechanic in any ways. while 5 small gems is more then 4 full plate armors they are far easier to carry.
You don't need to keep it realistic for that to work fine either, if a character can carry 50 pounds or 500 doesn't matter for that but when you limit yourself to a certain amount of slots we tend to throw away stuff and get issues with crafting mats that just is silly. It is not hard to carry to carry 200 different kinds of flower petals IRL but in many MMORPGs it can't be done but you can carry 50 chainmails without any problems. And irons bars stack (in 25-250 stacks generally) so you can carry tons of that but not enough small spice bags for a chef.
You can of course also solve it like GW2 with a magical something that teleports it to your bankslot for crafting mats, depend on how realistic you want things and even that option make more sense then system like EQ2s (my character carried enough huge boxes to fill a huge truck with no penalty, I had weapons and armor for 2 platoons on me among other things. The magic teleport thing still is more logical then that).
I like encumbrance systems and not having items emailed around. I am surprised that people find is acceptable to have to click and make many items like swords to raise your skill. It feels more natural that making a sword should take a much longer time that our click approach. Thinking of armor/weapons here rather than baking cookies.
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Kyleran: "Now there's the real trick, learning to accept and enjoy a game for what it offers rather than pass on what might be a great playing experience because it lacks a few features you prefer."
John Henry Newman: "A man would do nothing if he waited until he could do it so well that no one could find fault."
FreddyNoNose: "A good game needs no defense; a bad game has no defense." "Easily digested content is just as easily forgotten."
LacedOpium: "So the question that begs to be asked is, if you are not interested in the game mechanics that define the MMORPG genre, then why are you playing an MMORPG?"
A really good blade should more be something your character makes when you are logged off then something you spam. A crap blade by a master is another matter, that could go rather fast and it have little impact on the game if it does. Having good items taking time just limit the numbers and mean crafter will earn more for each weapon with the additional benefit that it encourage but doesn't force crafting your own stuff.
As for mailing items to your bank that isn't really a great system but it is still better then limited slots, unlimited weight and many crafting mats. Having carrying capacity is superior in my book as well.
Please do not respond to me, even if I ask you a question, its rhetorical.
Please do not respond to me
Please do not respond to me, even if I ask you a question, its rhetorical.
Please do not respond to me