Howdy, Stranger!
It looks like you're new here. If you want to get involved, click one of these buttons!
Quick Links
Do we need Gear Drops?
maskedweasel
Member LegendaryPosts: 12,195
Recently I started a small survery that had 4 simple questions regarding gear, end game, etc. I have to say I'm pretty amazed by the responses so far, but I also have a lot of questions - one being, Do we NEED gear drops at all?
One of the most picked choices on question 3 is:
Whats more important: MMO CRAFTING:
****Crafters make the best (or comparable) items in the game.
It got be thinking, if crafters can make the best items (and gear) in the game, (or comparable) why should we have drops anyway? Remove gear and weapon drops for a moment, instead add materials and money as drops. Couldn't players just push that back into the economy to buy what they need or assist others in creating for them instead of grinding day after day with a small percentage to get 1 piece of an overall set?
Wouldn't it just be better for players to support their dedicated crafters, and the crafters thereby supporting their adventurers?
Comments
Think of your audience on these forums. This audience (I think) would prefer that there not be gear drops and that you collect materials and craft the gear you need. I don't know if that's what your average gamer wants though. You're going to end up with gear from the mobs you kill, so why not just skip the boring process of making the gear and get gear drops?
I think there's some merit in having a crafting style economy where players craft gear, or even where they can have gear crafted by NPCs. It would need to be 'more' than the crafting in WoW or Rift though. I don't think it should necessarily be a whack-a-mole mini-game in the style of Vanguard, but your choices of materials and the mixture of materials should have an impact on the final product.
I can not remember winning or losing a single debate on the internet.
meh, logic kind of goes out the window for this question. Yes we should support our local crafters and gear drops detract from that to a certain extent. But the simple fact is that people like gear drops. Its one reason ppl attack yon beasties. If all you got was a experience, why not stay safe and kill 15 not so powerful creatures instead of the mighty ones. Simple answer.... they drop goodies.
I self identify as a monkey.
While such system would be a good addition to existing loot system to co-exist with, I suspect that the feeling of achievement is greater when you loot a "Sword of black doom" from a corpse of a dragon you slain, rather then receive same sword but it is man made, even if from the scales of the same dragon.
I think that the survey answer may be affected by the peoples desire to make crafters more valuable rather then just "that best pre-heroic sword maker" or a pot maker. And there are other ways to do that, rather then removing monster loot all together.
Well, I'm saying incentivise the materials they drop, not the gear. For example, if you kill a dragon, why not have a chance to harvest a dragons claw that could be sold to a crafter (or traded, whatever) to make a rare warhammer.
With the right kind of crafting system, these kinds of items could be rare depending on who you trust with your materials.
I have been saying that mobs should drop components for crafting instead of gear for a long time. You would still go and kill the boss for the same reasons you do now. The only thing that changes is that someone would have to craft that weapon. This is the only way to have a real player run economy.
I think Fallen Earth's lack of gear drops has worked out well in isolation. The issue is that everyone can be a crafter, and how hard it was to interact socially with such a huge map.
"Never met a pack of humans that were any different. Look at the idiots that get elected every couple of years. You really consider those guys more mature than us? The only difference between us and them is, when they gank some noobs and take their stuff, the noobs actually die." - Madimorga
As and adventurer, seeing nothing but crafting components drop would get old really quick. Seems like only component drops would benefit the dedicated crafter and those that do not craft would be left lacking.
As for my vote, yes there needs to be gear drops, but I also believe items that drop should be appropiate to the type of mob. Mobs that can use the items, drop the items. Those that cannot use items would drop components that could be used to create items (Item using mobs could drop components as well).
Yea, I understand that and it would be good and makes sense. But I the other post said, people get a better boost to their sense of 'oooohhh' if you get the black sword of ultimate power. I'm a crafter by nature and definitely would be happy with the claw of ultimate crafting power, but for most ppl, I just don't think they would have the same reaction
I self identify as a monkey.
I hate to bring it back to UO again, but it was able to do both. Let me explain.
Crafters made the most widely accepted gear, most people used armor and weapons crafted by blacksmiths. Due to the amount of materials and crafters, this made their production affordable enough to lose in the situation that you were killed and looted. At the same time, however, there were very difficult mobs in the world that had a chance to drop something magical, like a weapon or armor, that had stats that were slight increases over those of crafted items. Granted, a large part of what made this work was a full loot system upon death, so players would bring out magical items or special gear for situations in which the risk was lower, but in a large majority of activities, it was simply safer and more effective to bring out crafted gear that you had no issues with losing.
"This is life! We suffer and slave and expire. That's it!" -Bernard Black (Dylan Moran)
Personally I'd love to see a system where a player picks their gear cosmetics at the start of the game and the stats of said gear grows with them as they level. Think of it as a secondary leveling experience. Give players a chance to change the cosmetics for a nominal in game currency fee and the ability to change the stats through more rigorous in games means like quests and you have no need for gear drops.
We don't need gear drops no.
A game can let the player progress through gear or skills. It can also be about player skills instead.
I think gear is far too important in most modern MMOs and CORPGs (Guildwars excluded). I seen Wallace sword (if it indeed was his sword, historians aren't 100% sure) and my first thought was: "What a piece of junk". Still he was one of the greatest warriors ever.
Sure, some other leaders have fabled mystical swords like Genghis meteorite steel forged "Blade of mars" but gear does not make a warrior, skills does.
I think GW2 is the right direction here, where all items of a certain level have about the same power and it is more about looks than stats.
Of course I could go further and live with a game where you never need to upgrade your gear if you don't want to. I think a more realistic combat system would be possible and more fun than the current one. Realistic do not mean twitched based, real swordplay is more about wits than speed or even strenght.
It also annoys me that most MMO gear looks like it is designed by someone who never even hold a real blade and far less know how to use it.
I think MMO crafting should be about creating a piece of art. The thing you make should look unique if you so want it to or just standard if that is what you like. Crafting is really the only thing APB got right.
TCoS had exdactly that feature.
This sounds pretty similar to how Champions Online and City of Heroes did it, lots of options up front and stats change as you progress but your costume stays the same.
I think the toughest thing would be the initial procurement of gear. I think if gear was more widely available, and much more diverse, I think players would be more willing to participate in the economy.
Maybe have some basic lower tier NPC vendors to start and everything post level 15 is player created gear or something like that.
It just sounds like so many people don't like the idea behind repetitive work to get the chance to receive the drop they want (and in some cases, drops bind and can't be traded, or bind on equip). Wouldn't it just be easier with a more free style market where all players are forced to participate in the economy?
Of course some restrictions would need to apply to crafters and sellers and all that, but it could work.
Interesting, I never got around to playing it, but good to know it has been tried. From what I've heard about TCoS that was not the reason it didn't do as well as it might have.
Why not just skip the boring process of raiding to get gear drops and just give the players the best gear the first moment they log into the game.
Agreed. Make ingridients drop. Or even some old mails, weapons that are ancient and corroded, partially destroyed and then you have to aquire some ingridient and give to crafter to repair it to former glory.
Well anyway any system will be better than current loot drop or some weird kind of "medallion" , "tokens" whatever drops that you exchange at npc vendors...
Maybe because killing the mighty ones is much more fun then killing 15 not so powerful creatures. I thought we play because we want to have fun and there is no fun in staying safe.
I'd be happy if all gear came from drops rather than crafters. If I can just buy the best gear for my class, I'm going to hit the max level then run on over to IGE.com to buy enough gold to give myself the best gear then bam, I'll be competing with players that put weeks and months into getting gear for their toons.
The reason that poll turned out the way it did is because a large portion of this site's userbase are fans of sandbox MMORPGs where crafting is an entirely separate character advancement path, and these people do nothing but log in to mine rocks or to chop wood all day. They have to find some way to make themselves feel important in a world dominated by big guys swinging heavy swords, so they figure the best way to do so is to make those guys 100% dependant on them to progress through the game.
Crafted gear should be superior then dropped gear. However, completely removing drops from mobs is aswell a bad choice, but let me explain in detail by using a typical fantasy-style MMO with plenty of different mobs.
We need a vast plethora of materials/ressources that is in part gained by harvesting and in part by reprocessing the loot dropped by the mobs.
Non-human mobs drop raw ressources (or better yet, you need to salvage the mobs for these materials), like skin and bones. A wolf dropping a sword is bollocks and totally unimmersive.
Human mobs tho sure drop gear, or what are they using to fight you? This gear is made out of raw materials again and should be reprocessable to make new gear out of it.
Boss-mobs in dungeons shouldn't drop gear better then crafted gear aswell, but only different maybe with additional rare materials, when the loot is reprocessed or whatever.
This way we've good reasons to kill mobs other then for the experience points.
Additionally there has to be harvesting, like mining different types of ore, cutting wood, collecting herbs.
Basically we look at the same mechanics as in your typical fantasy MMO, but we've effectively removed the epic loot and we've created a system, where crafting becomes viable again and a market for ressources and goods can flourish.
This however will only work, if we limit the abilities of the players, so that a single player can't do it all on his own. We all know the preofession-systems needed, so it's no problem either.
We all know a few MMOs where there's a system similar to my proposed one and this system should become standard for all MMOs instead of the epic loot drops.
Gear drops are pretty much the only thing that keep me going sometimes. When things start feeling tedious, and suddenly you find something great or just some random equipment piece you know you can sell, it kind of gives a second wind to continue on with the grind.
Not much else to say on the matter other than I would have probably given up on most games much sooner without the drop incentive.
Well, crafting requiring collaboration is (currently) number 3 on the list of whats more important, but its very close to being number 2, which means that it does have some importance in the community. I completely agree that you should need other players to create the best gear, but I'm also not against having a system so crafters can put money back into the pockets of the adventurers in an AH setting.
I like the idea that certain mobs should drop certain items, for instance killing a warrior mob might drop used swords and torn and beaten gear that the player could possibly equip and use, but selling that off or having a crafter repair it would be even better.
As we speak of this... SWTOR will have a system, where you can re-engineer looted equipment with a chance to get a higher tier blueprint in the process. Re-engineering white to green, green to blue and blue to purple, etc..
This actually sounds good aswell as we can make the looted equipment into something better by crafting.
We do play for having fun. At least I do. But the simple fact is some ppl have fun by acquiring gear. And logically, the best gear comes from the toughest creatures (usually). I'm not opposed to a system where you get crafting material or some such. But the simple fact (I believe) is that people like to acquire gear and they enjoy doing it by killing stuff. Its not a matter or not having fun. Its a matter of different people enjoy different aspects of entertainment. For some its getting kills in PvP, some its getting the best gear, some its just seeing the sights... It all depends on the individual. My only contention is that a lot of players like the getting gear part.
I self identify as a monkey.
As long as gear has any kind of stats, it has to be obtained through at least two sources, which are in this case, crafting AND PvE. I don't think it's good design to trust crafters to always provide the player with nessesary armor, when they need it, how they need it. What if none is on? Am I supposed to wait couple of days with those dragon scales before I can get my uber armor just because I can't find an appropriate crafter? That's an issue with such system imho.
Not to mention that having to pay to the crafter in order to receive your new Dragonscale armor ruins the feeling of achievement, it no longer feels that you wokred hard for it, but just went and bought it.
I am pretty sure that in TCoS gear was purely cosmetic, without stats to advance, except for weapons.
Firstly I think your poll is heavily biased by the audience here on these forums.
Just as there is a strong subset of MMO players who love crafting there is also a strong subset of players who like finding & collecting items.
I think games need to have both good crafted items & loot drop items. In AoC for example crafted items are mostly crappy (beyond a few specialist pieces or sets for certain raid encounters) by comparrison to the high blue items & of course far weaker than any purple raid gear. Making crafting in effect not a very common source of gear.
Fallen Earth's idea was interesting, pretty much anything you bought from vendors could be found as loot (albeit very rarely) and also crafted. The developers always said about 98% of the ingame items were craftable and from my own experience it was true. When you found an item it was usually in disrepair and had to be patched up where a crafted item obviously was built with full durability as were vendor purchased items. I kinda liked the fact that nearly every item in the game could be crafted.
I mean there is no reason not to allow even Raid items to be crafted, you can still keep them rare and hard to make by putting certain components that only drop from mobs/bosses in Raid instances.