Goblin Squad Member
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There seems to be some confusion about what exactly happens with Gathering Kits. We're hoping a dev could come on and clear this up.
For example:
You cannot drive someone off the claim and continue extraction from it. The claim is locked to the finder. Whether you can steal what they have extracted it is neither here nor there. If you cannot take over the claim and continue extraction then the mother lode is bound to and owned by the discoverer.
If we find you extracting and you have only got 10% of the possible output from the other lode and we kill you we will not be able to access the 90% of the lode yet to be extracted.
This doesn't seem right to me.
My own understanding of what happens is that if I discover a Gathering Node, then I am the only character who can place a Gathering Kit on that particular Gathering Node. If I fail to do so in the allotted time, that particular Gathering Node disappears. Once I place a Gathering Kit, it will function independently, regardless of where I am or what I do. It will continue to function until it is either destroyed, or it exhausts the resources in that particular Gathering Node.
I think some people are getting hung up on this paragraph from the blog, thinking that those "exclusive rights" persist after the Gathering Kit is activated.
Once you discover a gathering node, you'll have exclusive rights to it for a limited amount of time, after which the chance to haul in the resources from the gathering node disappears. You can't pass these rights off or have them stolen from you, either directly or by showing another player the site; if you find the gathering spot, you are the primary character that must be involved in a gathering operation there.
While, to my mind, the paragraph that follows it makes clear that those rights terminate once the Gathering Kit is activated.
Once you've activated the gathering kit, all bets are off.
Fair enough then and the disagreement was caused by the blog post being interpretable in different ways. Though frankly I still don't think the minimal binding of till a kit is activated is justified.
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Goblin Squad Member
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I see a lot of locked nodes and unobtainable resources. I hope I've read that wrong or that I am misinterpreting things.
What's to stop someone from killing the node finder and camping the node and holding it for ransom then killing him once he unlocks it?
Again, I hope I'm not see the whole picture here, which is very possible.
-Areks
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Goblin Squad Member
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I see a lot of locked nodes and unobtainable resources. I hope I've read that wrong or that I am misinterpreting things.
What's to stop someone from killing the node finder and camping the node and holding it for ransom then killing him once he unlocks it?
Again, I hope I'm not see the whole picture here, which is very possible.
-Areks
It was the first public iteration. It is a fact of software development that you go through 10 flawed ideas before you refine it into something usable. They have said that they are reiterating, hopefully they will address some of our concerns.
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Goblin Squad Member
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Of course, the gathering kit level was the "second" level of resource gathering. Being able to find a gathering node might require a significant amount of points in that resource harvesting skill.
Being that skill ups are real time based, at least initially I'd have to wonder how many people are actually going to spend time upping to "gathering kit level" just to run around and lock nodes. Even so the nodes are supposed to be randomly placed upon generation and we don't know how long the "limited" time they are locked is going to be.
If it's a matter of nodes going locked and then unlocking and resetting to be found in a slightly different location taking 10-15 minutes that wouldn't seem so egregious to me. If 20-30 minutes that would seem a bit long but I could live with it. Anything over 30 minutes though say is too long and probably should be adjusted down.
Now, how many gathering kits can a given player put down at the same time? How long do they run before completion? How many gathering kits can one player carry?
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Goblin Squad Member
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... it concludes in lots of untapped nodes.
Those nodes just go back to the pool to be recycled elsewhere in the hex.
Now, how many gathering kits can a given player put down at the same time?
I would hope we can place as many as we want, with the real limit being determined by how many we can find and protect.
How many gathering kits can one player carry?
I would hope that's entirely based on our Encumbrance :)
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Goblin Squad Member
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Your interpretation is correct, so far as the blog is concerned. That said, we're internally batting around some adjustments based on forum feedback. :)
Please Please Please !!!
I am begging you
Please !!!
Seriously on my knees I am begging you
Do not start binding things to characters. We should not go down that road. It does nothing more then choke off resources.
Areks is correct, you can just gank people and get around it, or it will go unused.
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Goblin Squad Member
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... it concludes in lots of untapped nodes.Those nodes just go back to the pool to be recycled elsewhere in the hex.
Now, how many gathering kits can a given player put down at the same time?I would hope we can place as many as we want, with the real limit being determined by how many we can find and protect.
How many gathering kits can one player carry?I would hope that's entirely based on our Encumbrance :)
Yeah, strength and stamina should play into the encumbrance for that.
Going back the the pool though, I am not sure is correct. If the finder gathers even 1 piece from that node it may be lost as if it was completely gathered. Then of course count against the hex for over harvesting.
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Goblin Squad Member
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Your interpretation is correct, so far as the blog is concerned. That said, we're internally batting around some adjustments based on forum feedback. :)Please Please Please !!!
I am begging you
Please !!!
Seriously on my knees I am begging you
Do not start binding things to characters. We should not go down that road. It does nothing more then choke off resources.
Areks is correct, you can just gank people and get around it, or it will go unused.
Whatever the problem is, asserting it exists is not informative unless you can describe it and make it intelligible. 'It does nothing more than choke off resources' is an inadequate description, Xeen. How exactly is this a problem from a game design perspective?
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Goblin Squad Member
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Going back the the pool though, I am not sure is correct. If the finder gathers even 1 piece from that node it may be lost as if it was completely gathered. Then of course count against the hex for over harvesting.
I don't see that as likely. It wouldn't make sense to count resources as gathered unless they were gathered. Thus, I don't really see the big issue that everyone is concerned with when it comes to invading other people's hexes and working them. If you find a mothernode, it either times out without a kit and nothing happens to the hex's resource totals, or you use a kit and gather it as anyone else could. How exactly is this going to lead to people shutting down a hex's production, or "locking down nodes"? I mean, whether you kit it or not the mothernode is on a timer (whether a normal timeout timer from not kitting, or the timer until the gathering is finished/destroyed if you do kit), so I don't see how locking down a node would be possible. The key here is "Once you discover a gathering node, you'll have exclusive rights to it for a limited amount of time, after which the chance to haul in the resources from the gathering node disappears."
Furthermore, if you do not kit a mothernode nothing happens to the hex's resource totals, and if you do kit someone else can merely claim the kit's resources as their own, so you could just be helping whomever owns the hex if they catch you in the act. Really, if someone invades your hex with a sizable enough force that they can find mothernodes, kit them, and maintain the kit against both the NPC attacks and your own attacks, then I think they deserve the resources they can pull out of it.
Maybe the issue is coming down to what the timer is on the window to kit a mothernode? I don't see it as being longer than an hour, personally.
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Goblin Squad Member
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Whatever the problem is, asserting it exists is not informative unless you can describe it and make it intelligible. 'It does nothing more than choke off resources' is an inadequate description, Xeen. How exactly is this a problem from a game design perspective?Your interpretation is correct, so far as the blog is concerned. That said, we're internally batting around some adjustments based on forum feedback. :)Please Please Please !!!
I am begging you
Please !!!
Seriously on my knees I am begging you
Do not start binding things to characters. We should not go down that road. It does nothing more then choke off resources.
Areks is correct, you can just gank people and get around it, or it will go unused.
Choking off resources can possibly stifle the economy. With a high turn over rate for items, locking resources to players will slow the extraction of crafting materials and quite possibly drain the economy of usable items leading to undue inflation.
This was what I inferred Xeen was referring to by choking off resources. In my opinion, "choking off resources" is clear enough a descriptor of the problem for anyone else to draw the logical conclusion of economic impact given the supporting information we have been provided by the developers.
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Goblin Squad Member
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From what I understand, if you discover a node but do not tap into it, it will respawn elsewhere within the same hex.
I could see this becoming a problem if you have a group of exploration-griefers playing a version of "Whack-a-Mole" with the nodes. This would require a great deal of players doing it, but it would overall deny easier access to harvesting in that hex while they were there.
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Goblin Squad Member
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I like the idea of attacking a nation by preventing its gatherers from gathering, thus starving them of materials for crafting and stretching their economy thin. Any form of attack that isn't just a flat-out assault on their settlement gets my thumbs-up, as I like warmongers using their noggins. However, that's off topic.
I don't think it is possible to choke off resources with a few people by gathering in another nation's hexes, based on what has been said in the blog. As I said in my last post, you only have exclusive rights to a mothernode for a limited amount of time, after which it disappears, and more than likely all the resources stay in the hex's resource total unless they are gathered (to program it otherwise wouldn't make any sense, in my opinion).
@Areks, are you concerned with individuals slowing down a single nation's gathering a significant amount, or are your concerns for the economy as a whole? How do you see this system as choking off resources, as opposed to a normal sandbox game's gathering which does not involve mothernodes at all?
Edit: @Bludd, I think it'll only respawn elsewhere if you gather a gathering node, it turns into a mothernode, and then you do not gather the mothernode. Furthermore, I think it respawns as a regular node, not as a preexisting mothernode, because as far as I know the only way to find a mothernode is by gathering, not by merely running around and observing.
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Goblin Squad Member
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Going back the the pool though, I am not sure is correct. If the finder gathers even 1 piece from that node it may be lost as if it was completely gathered.... it concludes in lots of untapped nodes.Those nodes just go back to the pool to be recycled elsewhere in the hex.
Well, "if the finder gathers even 1 piece from that node", then it's no longer an "untapped node".
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Goblin Squad Member
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... locking resources to players will slow the extraction of crafting materials and quite possibly drain the economy of usable items leading to undue inflation.
I'm not sure that's accurate.
Consider Areks has discovered the very first Gathering Node (A) in Hex B. At that point, two possible Futures branch.
In Future 1, Areks is the only character harvesting in Hex B, he places his Gathering Kit, and he reaps a huge bonanza of High Purity Resource.
In Future 2, there are over 1,000 characters harvesting in Hex B and everyone but Areks already has a Gathering Kit handy. While Areks is running back to town to get a Gathering Kit and help from his friends, everyone else places their Gathering Kits and proceeds to collect the resources. When Areks finally gets his Gathering Kit activated, Hex B's resource pool is depleted and he collects only Low Purity Resource.
There is no reason to believe, at this point in time, that the quality of the resources coming out of Gathering Node A is set at the time the node is discovered. I believe the rational assumption is that the quality will be determined either when the Gathering Kit is activated, or better yet as each unit of resource is collected.
For these reasons, I don't believe it's accurate to say that those resources are in any way "locked down".
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Goblin Squad Member
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Going back the the pool though, I am not sure is correct. If the finder gathers even 1 piece from that node it may be lost as if it was completely gathered.... it concludes in lots of untapped nodes.Those nodes just go back to the pool to be recycled elsewhere in the hex.Well, "if the finder gathers even 1 piece from that node", then it's no longer an "untapped node".
I hope that's not the way it is. These are the sinks and drains of the economy here, don't charge me 80 gallons for a trickle of water.
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Goblin Squad Member
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From what I understand, if you discover a node but do not tap into it, it will respawn elsewhere within the same hex.
I could see this becoming a problem if you have a group of exploration-griefers playing a version of "Whack-a-Mole" with the nodes. This would require a great deal of players doing it, but it would overall deny easier access to harvesting in that hex while they were there.
If you have a group of "exploration-griefers" running around in a Hex in enough force to effectively play "Whack-a-Mole" with the Gathering Nodes, then your problem isn't that you're not able to harvest, your problem is that you can't secure your territory.
This sounds like a Feature, not a Bug.
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Goblin Squad Member
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I hope that's not the way it is. These are the sinks and drains of the economy here, don't charge me 80 gallons for a trickle of water.Going back the the pool though, I am not sure is correct. If the finder gathers even 1 piece from that node it may be lost as if it was completely gathered.... it concludes in lots of untapped nodes.Those nodes just go back to the pool to be recycled elsewhere in the hex.Well, "if the finder gathers even 1 piece from that node", then it's no longer an "untapped node".
I don't think you're responding to what I wrote.
Our current understanding is that the quality of resources in a Hex is determined by the Hex's current Resource Pool, which gets depleted as resources are harvested.
While it's true that a node that has had 1 unit collected from it is no longer "untapped", that doesn't mean that the Hex's Resource Pool has been depleted by the entire Gathering Node's worth of resources.
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Goblin Squad Member
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I believe the rational assumption is that the quality will be determined either when the Gathering Kit is activated, or better yet as each unit of resource is collected.
Though I like the concept behind that second one, that could be a real pain for inventory management. Or maybe it would all stack; but then how could you sort the purer samples from the impure ones? In any case, that's neither here nor there, and if they can get a system working for that, I would like your resource purity to be affected in real-time while gathering.
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Goblin Squad Member
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@Shane Gifford, they're going to have to crack that nut regardless. If you're running around a Hex and all you ever get is Harvesting Nodes, you're still going to end up with a variety of purity levels.
I think it's an interesting problem, though. I wonder if it would make sense to simply blend it into your current stack.
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Goblin Squad Member
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Going back the the pool though, I am not sure is correct. If the finder gathers even 1 piece from that node it may be lost as if it was completely gathered. Then of course count against the hex for over harvesting.I don't see that as likely. It wouldn't make sense to count resources as gathered unless they were gathered...
I can see Xeen's point if "finding" a gathering node consists of interacting (clicking on) with it and thus pulling at least one resource from it at which point it lights up as a Gathering node.
If, on the other hand, you do not have to interact with the node, just merely be in proximity to it to see it pop up as a Gathering node and without withdrawing any resources from it, then in my view an issue exists as others have outlined.
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Goblin Squad Member
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Going back the the pool though, I am not sure is correct. If the finder gathers even 1 piece from that node it may be lost as if it was completely gathered. Then of course count against the hex for over harvesting.I don't see that as likely. It wouldn't make sense to count resources as gathered unless they were gathered...I can see Xeen's point if "finding" a gathering node consists of interacting (clicking on) with it and thus pulling at least one resource from it at which point it lights up as a Gathering node.
If, on the other hand, you do not have to interact with the node, just merely be in proximity to it to see it pop up as a Gathering node and without withdrawing any resources from it, then in my view an issue exists as others have outlined.
Each harvest node is only good for a very few items before it gets used up and you have to move on. However, based on the current resource totals in the hex, there's a chance that any particular harvest node might have hidden wealth: harvesting it reveals that it is, in fact, a gathering node.
I think it's clear that you have to interact with a Harvesting Node in order to discover that it is actually a Gathering Node. I'm not sure what difference it would make whether you think of that as having interacted with the Gathering Node or not. For my way of thinking, you haven't interacted with the Gathering Node until you've activated a Gathering Kit on it.
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Goblin Squad Member
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@Shane Gifford, they're going to have to crack that nut regardless. If you're running around a Hex and all you ever get is Harvesting Nodes, you're still going to end up with a variety of purity levels.
I think it's an interesting problem, though. I wonder if it would make sense to simply blend it into your current stack.
Different types of items should automatically stack into different piles when introduced to an inventory. That includes different levels of purity for a given item. This is a common feature in almost every game (I have not played them all, only the majority of AAAs and a host of F2Ps) out there today and even so with Ultima Online back when it launched in 1997. Even in Eve which this games seems to look to often for inspiration.
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Goblin Squad Member
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@Nihimon, yeah, I thought about that only after I put the post in. Should be interesting to see how they deal with that.
@V'rel and Xeen, maybe I'm working off a different assumption for what's going on here, so I'll just walk through my view of what I think's going to happen and you can point out where I differ.
I'm attempting to disrupt an enemy's economy by gathering in his hex. I gather for an hour, and then one of the nodes I'm working on becomes a mothernode. Lucky me, I can deplete his resources much faster this way! Now, I have to call in a bunch of my buddies, to help secure me while I gather using a Kit.
If, however, I strike this mothernode, but I don't have a bunch of buddies to help me so I can't set up a kit, after a given amount of time (unknown as of yet, but let's work with one hour), the mothernode simply disappears. The resources from it are not taken out of the environment, so there is no change to the quality of resources coming out of the hex as a result. Another regular gathering node, not a new mothernode, pops up somewhere else inside the hex. There is effectively no change in the hex's resources from before I hit the mothernode to after it.
Is this how you understand the system, or did you picture something else?
EDIT: @V'rel, I guess the effectiveness of that depends on the granularity of the purity system. If there are 100 level of purity (which I don't think will happen), then a normal item stacking method would remained cluttered up and bad. If there are less than 10, I could see the normal system being okay.
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Goblin Squad Member
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@V'rel and Xeen, maybe I'm working off a different assumption for what's going on here, so I'll just walk through my view of what I think's going to happen and you can point out where I differ.
I'm attempting to disrupt an enemy's economy by gathering in his hex. I gather for an hour, and then one of the nodes I'm working on becomes a mothernode. Lucky me, I can deplete his resources much faster this way! Now, I have to call in a bunch of my buddies, to help secure me while I gather using a Kit.
If, however, I strike this mothernode, but I don't have a bunch of buddies to help me so I can't set up a kit, after a given amount of time (unknown as of yet, but let's work with one hour), the mothernode simply disappears. The resources from it are not taken out of the environment, so there is no change to the quality of resources coming out of the hex as a result. Another regular gathering node, not a new mothernode, pops up somewhere else inside the hex. There is effectively no change in the hex's resources from before I hit the mothernode to after it.
Is this how you understand the system, or did you picture something else?
For what it's worth, this is exactly how I understand the system.
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Goblin Squad Member
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Going back the the pool though, I am not sure is correct. If the finder gathers even 1 piece from that node it may be lost as if it was completely gathered. Then of course count against the hex for over harvesting.I don't see that as likely. It wouldn't make sense to count resources as gathered unless they were gathered...I can see Xeen's point if "finding" a gathering node consists of interacting (clicking on) with it and thus pulling at least one resource from it at which point it lights up as a Gathering node.
If, on the other hand, you do not have to interact with the node, just merely be in proximity to it to see it pop up as a Gathering node and without withdrawing any resources from it, then in my view an issue exists as others have outlined.
Each harvest node is only good for a very few items before it gets used up and you have to move on. However, based on the current resource totals in the hex, there's a chance that any particular harvest node might have hidden wealth: harvesting it reveals that it is, in fact, a gathering node.I think it's clear that you have to interact with a Harvesting Node in order to discover that it is actually a Gathering Node. I'm not sure what difference it would make whether you think of that as having interacted with the Gathering Node or not. For my way of thinking, you haven't interacted with the Gathering Node until you've activated a Gathering Kit on it.
The way I see it, you have interacted with a node once you have retrieved at least 1 resource from it. Single clicking on it (based on a double click to interact world) is akin to looking at it from a distance. So I guess it might be more appropriate to say "having physically interacted with a node".
Since you have to physically interact with a harvesting node for it to update and tell you "hey, I am now a Gathering Node", in my view it has changed states (from harvest to gather) and thus is a "new" node that hasn't been interacted with. At which point I agree with the finder having a limited time to drop a GK on it or the resources go back into the Hex pool to spawn for another player.
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Goblin Squad Member
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@Nihimon, yeah, I thought about that only after I put the post in. Should be interesting to see how they deal with that.
@V'rel and Xeen, maybe I'm working off a different assumption for what's going on here, so I'll just walk through my view of what I think's going to happen and you can point out where I differ.
I'm attempting to disrupt an enemy's economy by gathering in his hex. I gather for an hour, and then one of the nodes I'm working on becomes a mothernode. Lucky me, I can deplete his resources much faster this way! Now, I have to call in a bunch of my buddies, to help secure me while I gather using a Kit.
If, however, I strike this mothernode, but I don't have a bunch of buddies to help me so I can't set up a kit, after a given amount of time (unknown as of yet, but let's work with one hour), the mothernode simply disappears. The resources from it are not taken out of the environment, so there is no change to the quality of resources coming out of the hex as a result. Another regular gathering node, not a new mothernode, pops up somewhere else inside the hex. There is effectively no change in the hex's resources from before I hit the mothernode to after it.
Is this how you understand the system, or did you picture something else?
EDIT: @V'rel, I guess the effectiveness of that depends on the granularity of the purity system. If there are 100 level of purity (which I don't think will happen), then a normal item stacking method would remained cluttered up and bad. If there are less than 10, I could see the normal system being okay.
No, this is pretty much how I imagined it from what was written, though I was unsure on a few finer points. But that's why I keep Nihimon around. Oh, and I agree on the levels of purity part. If there are more than 10 for a given item, well on the one hand it would be a pain to resource gather, but if they actually used them all to make truly different items then this crafting system would have so much depth I'd buy rounds for the dev crew for 3 months.
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Goblin Squad Member
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@V'rel, I guess the effectiveness of that depends on the granularity of the purity system. If there are 100 level of purity (which I don't think will happen), then a normal item stacking method would remained cluttered up and bad. If there are less than 10, I could see the normal system being okay.
Stephen Cheney partially addressed that: Quality in general has been largely abstracted. For raw materials, in particular, it's irrelevant. See this post. What matters for raw materials is "concentration," "purity," or whatever synonym makes sense. Each unit of a raw material is identically useful in refining (and ultimately crafting), but some are lighter than others so it's easier to carry them home.
I read that to mean in the course of mining iron, for example, I might find some "pure iron" that weighs 1 encumbrance and counts as one iron in smelting. I might find some "common iron" that weighs 2 and counts as one for smelting. And as the hex gets depleted, I'll find more and more "iron dross" that weighs 5 and counts as one iron for smelting. (edit: weighs/names are merely example, not from GW.)
Since GW can give us some randomish mix of pure, common, and dross ore based on the current fill of the hex's iron count, I'd bet there will be less than 10 gradations. I wouldn't be surprised if there were 6 or fewer. There's only 6 coins between a penny (1%) and a dollar (100%).
I'd also expect that the quality will shift as the company draws down the lode; each ore the lode yields will be checked against the current resource counter.
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Goblin Squad Member
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Since you have to physically interact with a harvesting node for it to update and tell you "hey, I am now a Gathering Node", in my view it has changed states (from harvest to gather) and thus is a "new" node that hasn't been interacted with. At which point I agree with the finder having a limited time to drop a GK on it or the resources go back into the Hex pool to spawn for another player.
Okay, that's exactly the way I see it, too :)
... that's why I keep Nihimon around.
It's nice to know I'm good for something :)
Stephen Cheney partially addressed that: Quality in general has been largely abstracted. For raw materials, in particular, it's irrelevant. See this post. What matters for raw materials is "concentration," "purity," or whatever synonym makes sense. Each unit of a raw material is identically useful in refining (and ultimately crafting), but some are lighter than others so it's easier to carry them home.
Doesn't this still leave the same general problem, but now with Encumbrance instead of Quality? If I have 10 units of Pure Iron Ore that weigh 1 Encumbrance each, and I add 1 unit of Crude Iron Ore that weighs 2 Encumbrance, then do I have a stack of 11 units with 12 Encumbrance so that if I pull off one unit it now weights 1.2 Encumbrance? Or am I able to separate out the Pure from the Crude?
It seems reasonable to me to have a stack of Iron Ore in my inventory that shows me the total quantity and encumbrance, but then opens up like a bag when I double-click it so that I can see the quantity and encumbrance of each discrete purity level so that I can separate them for trading.
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Goblinworks Game Designer
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I'm attempting to disrupt an enemy's economy by gathering in his hex. I gather for an hour, and then one of the nodes I'm working on becomes a mothernode. Lucky me, I can deplete his resources much faster this way! Now, I have to call in a bunch of my buddies, to help secure me while I gather using a Kit.
Correct.
If, however, I strike this mothernode, but I don't have a bunch of buddies to help me so I can't set up a kit, after a given amount of time (unknown as of yet, but let's work with one hour), the mothernode simply disappears. The resources from it are not taken out of the environment, so there is no change to the quality of resources coming out of the hex as a result.
Correct.
Another regular gathering node, not a new mothernode, pops up somewhere else inside the hex.
Not exactly. Chance of a gusher is independent per node. There's a (very, very small) chance that several people could get access to a gusher in the same hex from different nodes. In that case, you'd all get to place your kits and if they're going simultaneously you'd be draining the hex resources faster and each would get less than if only one was running. Similarly, if one person had a kit on hand and plopped it down immediately, and everyone else took half an hour to get a kit and get back, the first guy would have half an hour of really good production, then it would start to drop off as everyone else drained the well (and their production would be pretty bad even to start with since the first guy already drained a lot).
But, as noted, the chance of that happening is pretty low (particularly since if one guy gets a gusher and uses it quickly, the chance of anyone else getting one is lowered since the total resources in the hex are going down).
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Goblin Squad Member
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... if one person had a kit on hand and plopped it down immediately, and everyone else took half an hour to get a kit and get back, the first guy would have half an hour of really good production, then it would start to drop off as everyone else drained the well...
I believe the rational assumption is that the quality will be determined either when the Gathering Kit is activated, or better yet as each unit of resource is collected.
Excellent!
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Goblin Squad Member
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Stephen Cheney partially addressed that: Quality in general has been largely abstracted. For raw materials, in particular, it's irrelevant. See this post. What matters for raw materials is "concentration," "purity," or whatever synonym makes sense. Each unit of a raw material is identically useful in refining (and ultimately crafting), but some are lighter than others so it's easier to carry them home.Doesn't this still leave the same general problem, but now with Encumbrance instead of Quality? If I have 10 units of Pure Iron Ore that weigh 1 Encumbrance each, and I add 1 unit of Crude Iron Ore that weighs 2 Encumbrance, then do I have a stack of 11 units with 12 Encumbrance so that if I pull off one unit it now weights 1.2 Encumbrance? Or am I able to separate out the Pure from the Crude?
It seems reasonable to me to have a stack of Iron Ore in my inventory that shows me the total quantity and encumbrance, but then opens up like a bag when I double-click it so that I can see the quantity and encumbrance of each discrete purity level so that I can separate them for trading.
Based on Cheney's statement, I assume the pure iron units and the crude iron units would be two different items. You'd have a stack of 10 pure iron in one inventory slot and a stack on 1 crude iron in another slot. We're not really limited for bag slots though - encumbrance is the only limiter on what we can carry.
Being able to stack all iron together like you suggest might be useful, just for clarity. Not sure what GW plans to do with inventory management like that.
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Goblin Squad Member
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Thank you for your response, Mr. Cheney. At the moment, is the design team's plan in nodes to have randomly distributed nodes which are permanently located in one place, such as Darkfall's nodes, or to have the nodes disappear on use and constantly reappear elsewhere when used, like in WoW? Or is there another method you are planning at the moment?
And for anyone, what do you think the inherent advantages or disadvantages to either of these methods is?
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Goblin Squad Member
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Thank you for your response, Mr. Cheney. At the moment, is the design team's plan in nodes to have randomly distributed nodes which are permanently located in one place, such as Darkfall's nodes, or to have the nodes disappear on use and constantly reappear elsewhere when used, like in WoW? Or is there another method you are planning at the moment?
And for anyone, what do you think the inherent advantages or disadvantages to either of these methods is?
These harvest nodes appear procedurally throughout a hex, so they won't be in totally predictable spots.
I actually think this is a better option than static spawn points because it minimizes the ability of botters to set up harvesting bots.
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Goblin Squad Member
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I actually think this is a better option than static spawn points because it minimizes the ability of botters to set up harvesting bots.
You underestimate the botters capabilities. Screen scanning for nodes isn't that difficult, especially if the art assets used to represent those nodes is fairly regular. It certainly helps out in the fight against botters, but any node that is visible enough to be noticeable by a player is also noticeable by a screen scanner.
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Goblin Squad Member
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You underestimate the botters capabilities.
I didn't mean to imply it would stop them.
I learned a lot about bots in Vanguard because some people in the raiding guild I was in used them. I understand how they work, and the reason it's so hard to stop them. It's why I really wish that new game systems would be designed to make them obsolete.
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Goblin Squad Member
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Whatever the problem is, asserting it exists is not informative unless you can describe it and make it intelligible. 'It does nothing more than choke off resources' is an inadequate description, Xeen. How exactly is this a problem from a game design perspective?Your interpretation is correct, so far as the blog is concerned. That said, we're internally batting around some adjustments based on forum feedback. :)Please Please Please !!!
I am begging you
Please !!!
Seriously on my knees I am begging you
Do not start binding things to characters. We should not go down that road. It does nothing more then choke off resources.
Areks is correct, you can just gank people and get around it, or it will go unused.
Have you played any other games? Games like SWTOR, WOW and others have items that are bound to you. SO you cannot sell them or trade them to others...
That is what I do not want to see at all in PFO. Sandbox games do not bind items to characters.
A gathering node should be no different
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Goblin Squad Member
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@Stephen Cheney, if you're still paying attention, can you verify that Gathering Kits are single- (or limited) use?
It seems obvious to me, since they're player-crafted, but there are some doubters...
Player crafted does not mean single use, in fact it would mean the opposite in other games.
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Goblin Squad Member
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If Stephen happens upon this example, let’s see if I have this correct. Grade me! I used iron ore as the resource and had four parties searching a hex for iron. After doing a little homework I found some information that might be helpful.
An online article states “Iron ores are rocks and minerals from which metallic iron can be economically extracted. The ores are usually rich in iron oxides and vary in colour from dark grey, bright yellow, deep purple, to rusty red.” It goes on to describe some of the percentage of iron ore each type of mineral might contain…so in this description a higher quality iron ore will have more iron. As the quality degrades more of that mineral is needed to make an iron ingot (leaving weights and measures out of it...not sure what direction GW is going to go with that).
Let’s use units instead of pounds or kilos. You need 100 units of raw prime ore to get 70 units of iron ingots. Pure iron popping out of the ground would be 100% and that’s not going to happen, and it would destroy the need to haul and smelt, which will be part of the fun of the crafting system (right Stephen?). See table below:
70% (prime-highest grade you will find prior to smelting. This is the good stuff!)
60% (excellent)
50% (very good)
40% (good)
30% (fair)
20% (poor)
10% (slag-this mineral is such low concentration most of what you haul is waste, but if it’s all you can get and need iron, you’ll pay the transportation and smelting cost.)
Assumptions:
1) the quality of ore varies from 70% (best) to 10% (worst)-see above
2) the iron ore gathering kit is small enough for a character to carry in their backpack
3) the hex has not been mined in a long time and is considered “untouched”
4) untouched hexes have 700 units or ore in total, 100 of each quality level
5) monster spawn is the same for all parties that create a spawn
6) individual nodes yield 10 units, motherlodes yield 100 units
7) gathering kits are single use (added at the last minute)
8) this many motherlodes are possible. There are so many for illustration purposes only, but not likely in game
Four groups enter a hex from different directions looking for iron ore:
Group 1 is a single guy with a mining pick and no kit
Group 2 is a single guy with a pick and a kit in his backpack
Group 3 is a small party of 5 miners who have a 2 kits in their backpacks
Group 4 is a large party with only one miner and no kit
Our groups all enter at the same time-
Round one
Group 1 finds a node first and mines 10 units of prime ore
Group 2 finds a node and mines 10 units of prime ore (prime down to 80 units)
Group 3 taps a node and it’s a motherlode! They drop their kit and set up a defensive perimeter. They get 80 prime ore and 20 excellent ore.
Group 4 taps a node and it’s a motherlode too! Since the miner that hit the gusher doesn’t have a kit a member of the party goes back to town to get one, which takes time. By the time they get their kit up and running they get 80 excellent ore and 20 very good ore.
All the prime ore and excellent ore are mined out, and 80 very good quality ore, and all the lesser quality ores remain.
Round two
Group 1 taps a node and it’s a motherlode! He has no kit, but luckily one of his friends happens by and the friend runs into town to bring a kit back. He sets up the kit and starts collecting ore, but bandits come and run him off. Since the kit was already set up the flow of ore continues, and the bandits get 100 units of ore (80 very good ore and 20 good ore).
Group 2 finds two nodes and quickly mines them for 20 good ore.
Group 3 finds two motherlodes! They only have one kit left and set up the kit and form a defensive perimeter. Since they can’t spare the man to go to town for another kit, they abandon the second gusher letting it collapse. Their motherlode yields 60 good and 40 fair ore. (We’re getting down to some pretty low quality ore now.)
Group 4 finds 4 nodes in a row that yield 10 units each of fair ore.
All the ore that is left in the hex is 100 slag, 100 poor, and 20 fair quality ore. If the hex is left alone for a while the ore will replenish, starting at the bottom (lowest quality) and slowly getting a better quality ore as time goes by. If anyone comes along to mine a node, the best they could hope for is the highest quality ore that has replenished up to that point.
Summary
Group 1 took a chance, got some prime ore, but lost out to bandits after installing his kit. He escaped with his life, but lost the motherlode and his kit.
Group 2 mined some prime ore, some good ore, and even though he was carrying a kit, never found a motherlode to use his kit on. Just as well. If he found a motherlode he wouldn’t have been able to protect it anyway most likely.
Group 3 did well. They hit three motherlodes and were able to mine out two of them. They let a third one collapse. While unfortunate they did get a good haul and kept enough personnel to defend their find.
Group 4 had one miner and no plan. Lots of defense and no kit. Lots of people watching and one guy working. This group was a union shop sent out by the government.
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Goblin Squad Member
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Player crafted does not mean single use, in fact it would mean the opposite in other games.@Stephen Cheney, if you're still paying attention, can you verify that Gathering Kits are single- (or limited) use?
It seems obvious to me, since they're player-crafted, but there are some doubters...
Shall we make a friendly bet on whether or not Gathering Kits are single-use? I am confident they are.
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Goblin Squad Member
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Choking off resources can possibly stifle the economy. With a high turn over rate for items, locking resources to players will slow the extraction of crafting materials and quite possibly drain the economy of usable items leading to undue inflation.
This was what I inferred Xeen was referring to by choking off resources. In my opinion, "choking off resources" is clear enough a descriptor of the problem for anyone else to draw the logical conclusion of economic impact given the supporting information we have been provided by the developers.
Yes, that is the only result of consequence that we will see from this binding. There are other reasons to not bind resources, but that is the biggest one.