Goblin Squad Member
|
Well of course, the first question is whether you intend to be adventuring focused or production focused. Obviously the activity profile is very different between a barbarian with a mining sideline, and a dedicated commoner.
With the currently-available feat training options, it is difficult or impossible for most characters to reach Tier 2 without having trained at least some production skills. However, the fact that you have to train them does not have to mean that you have to use them. How much time you spend on production is completely personal preference.
When players are choosing to train production skills, one of the primary drivers is likely to be what ability score that skill trains and requires. If you're looking for a way to raise Con, you're going to narrow your list down to the Con-based skills before you worry about gathering vs refining vs crafting.
If you intend to do little or no work with your trained skill, you may as well make it a gathering skill if that meets your ability score requirements. Pick up rocks and sticks when convenient, dump them on the market, free money. Refining takes a little more time and effort, managing supplies and production queues. Crafting finished goods is significantly more work since you need the products of multiple different refiners to assemble a usable item; you'll be working the market much harder if you go that route.
So the answer is "do as much as you like" and "find the niche that suits you". There's no optimal decison here; it's all personal preference.
|
Goblin Squad Member
|
Those are difficult questions. End game is a bit of a confusing phrase to use with PFO, though I could see it used for when most important features are implemented, and Siege Warfare can begin. A neverending "Endgame" of sorts can then begin.
When you take this very recent quote from Stephen:
But, in general, there was no attempt to match refining and crafting recipes together at the same ranks so someone leveling up both got synergy out of it. Instead, they're meant to be done be completely different players. Someone trying to make leather armor should ultimately check the market for the padding. Meanwhile, a weaver who got to rank 7 is very excited, because now he can make padding, which is an in-demand item.
it looks like that you will have to dedicate a lot of your XP and time to Crafting disciplines, in order to become the best at it. That means this goes at the expense of being a combat-ready character.
However there are diminishing returns here, so at first the "power"curve is pretty steep. Power, as in "useful". The lower level skilltiers are very cheap in XP-cost compared to the higher levels. So I am sure you can be a somewhat skilled Leatherworker, and also quit skilled with the spear in a year, but you will not be the best in either of them.
I am sure you can contribute to both a fight, and the Economy of your Settlement though. So that would make you ready for end game imo.
I have no idea how many truly dedicated "narrow" Builds we will see in the first year. I am currently leaning towards very dedicated builds, but that could easily change. My Sitting Duck build would be such a dedicated build. He would be pretty useless in Combat.
As to the balance between Crafter-focussed and Combat focussed builds, I think we will see a nice mix. I think a lot of people will make both, not for self-sufficiency (one crafter alt will not really suffice) but because resources, trading, transporting and Crafting are such an important part of the game; and it is fun to a part of that too, and not just fights.
|
Goblin Squad Member
|
When we begin EE and our characters are real, we will also have little more than a stick to work with. People will have to rely on one another much more closely than we have been in Alpha, and we will all need weaponry, armors, gear, and everything. We will have to make everything ourselves and that means that everyone will want to be gathering, looting recipes, and trading these to those who can best use them to the community's advantage.
So I think initially we will be gathering based but with the proviso that part of gathering is also hunting (since recipes are drops).
Later the balance of activities will evolve. And we will only see that evolution by living through it.
|
Goblin Squad Member
|
I think ultimately the 'balance' of training and effort will vary greatly between characters.
Time passes at a set rate for everyone. That means experience will accrue gradually and must be spent judiciously. Survival will normally be a major early concern, but since feats grow rapidly more expensive and every resource node provides opportunity, yet is inaccessible until you train to harvest it characters will acquire the initially inexpensive harvesting skills rather early, simply because they are available and inexpensive and just a little time in the wilds leads to frustration if nodes cannot be accessed without it.
More difficult is estimating the proportion of characters who will focus their training on refinement and production.
I suspect that the greatest accumulation of raw resources and recipes will be in those settlements that are most martially inclined, since they will probably have the fewest crafters and so many will acquire low level gathering skills (due to low cost). The market in those martial-oriented settlements will likely burgeon with low level raw resources and recipes.
Since it takes no training to move material, expect some of those 'martial' characters to get into moving resources from settlements where they accumulate to other settlements, eventually allied, that are more crafting-based. Caravans will help pass the time profitably.
|
Goblin Squad Member
|
Something to point out that everyone is hinting at but hasn't blatantly stated:
You do not pick Mining and Weaponsmith for your Fighter and that's all you need to produce weapons for your characters lifetime. In PFO to do something like that you would need: Mining, Smelting, Weaponsmithing, Logging, and Sawyer. Five different 'crafting' professions, there might actually be more in that chain and more complicated chains depending on what crafting you are going for.
Generally every Gathering has 1 or 2 possible Refining options and every Crafting option requires outputs from at least 2 or more Refining options.
|
Goblin Squad Member
|
@ Crazy River
I hear you, it will be tough to pick your first skills and deciding on that path. But the redeeming factor here is off course the fact that you never *lock* your character into *any* path. It is a classless system. So if you decide, after a few weeks of playing, that you want to focus more on Combat rather then Crafting after all, you can simply do that with the same character. You will have "wasted" some of your XP on skills that you may not have much use for after all, but actually they are never truly wasted, if you decide later on to go further along that path.
And there will off course be skills that are generally useful for any role. Having a good chunk of hitpoints never hurt anyone. Also the system works such that when you increased a certain attribute by taking certain crafting skills, that increase is not lost and may very well help you with a more combat related skill too.
I am sure there will be templates that are rather "general" early on, and will keep a lot of options open untill you get to somewhat higher levels and you will have to make more serious choices; also because the XP cost is going up fast if you want to take a skillpath higher then the first few levels.
|
Goblin Squad Member
|
And yet another way to frame the question...
If I would like to be a substantial crafter and adventurer, will this take longer than might truly be feasible? (Given xp is solely related to time)
i'd say you can do both, but will have to narrow/specialize in both roles. You will lag behind the specialists but I currently believe (hope?) that lag will be less apparent as we reach higher levels and the power curve flattens out.
Very rough rule of thumb is that half the xp cost of lvl 20 put you somewhere around lvl 15-17, so you could think of it as "fighter16/weaponsmith16" vs "fighter20" vs "weaponsmith20"
For the adventurer, the difference between 16 and 20 is 1-2 extra keywords in play (if you have top notch gear). For the crafter, though, it may be the difference between having and not having a key t3 recipe.
Note that Refiners and Crafters can be 100% dedicated alts just sitting safely in a settlement. Expect most large guilds to have 100% dedicated crafter characters. Gatherers on the other hand actually need to stay alive in the field, so there is good synergy between adventuring and gathering.
I definitely wanna see the highest tier of at least one craft and I hope that they are all deep and interesting.
Nothing says you can't wield a sword as a blacksmith, but it stands to reason that you can't be a front liner (in fact, it would be stupid from a real life standpoint, to study something and then throw it all away on the battlefield.)
I read something about how it will take a year or something to max a crafter. I hope that is true.
It'd be nice to somehow implement a system so that there weren't a bunch of top tier crafters, though. By a bunch... meaning like every game where there are plenty around. That ain't real. Would be interesting to have to put in work on your crafter in order to stay at the top. I don't know how that would work, but opposed to just skilling one to max then shelving him for when you run out of gear.
Something should be given to the players who wanna main a crafter, IMO.
|
Goblin Squad Member
|
Different player personalities will tend to do different things.
In EVE many players do both with different characters however the stereotype is the PvP fraternity regard trade/mining/crafting players as "carebears" who somehow lack the necessary "right stuff" in terms of guts or whatever to be allowed to play at all whilst the industrial/trade players think of the PvPers as cheap thrill seekers just out for fun at any cost with no long term goals or patience.
|
Goblin Squad Member
|
I think there will be an extremely wide variety in how players choose to specialize their characters.
I personally will be focusing narrowly on Wizard and broadly on all Gathering Skills, with no Refining or Crafting at all.
Same idea here. I'll be focusing heavily in the Rogue role but will pick up just enough of the Gathering Skills to get resources as I pass Nodes by.
|
Goblin Squad Member
|
I think there will be an extremely wide variety in how players choose to specialize their characters.
I personally will be focusing narrowly on Wizard and broadly on all Gathering Skills, with no Refining or Crafting at all.
Ditto. Quite literally. Looks like I need to pick Nihimon's brain on the TSV forums for a little wizard primer before 9/15. Athough later on I may focus on enchanting. Depends on how the tech trees sort out.
|
Goblin Squad Member
|
Same idea here. I'll be focusing heavily in the Rogue role but will pick up just enough of the Gathering Skills to get resources as I pass Nodes by.I think there will be an extremely wide variety in how players choose to specialize their characters.
I personally will be focusing narrowly on Wizard and broadly on all Gathering Skills, with no Refining or Crafting at all.
Unfortunately, you will not be able to avoid training the gathering, refining or crafting skills if you need to raise your attributes to advance in your role levels / skills.
I'm hopeful that they make the appropriate changes. Although, I could see the same rationale placed on crafters and forcing them to train certain combat skills in order to advance as well.
Example: you can not craft a tier 3 axe, if you do not have Axe Specialization 2. How could you craft a weapon if you don't understand how it is used?
|
Goblin Squad Member
|
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
Adressing a theme in the OPs different versions of questions:
It's long been the rule of thumb it will take about 2 1/2 years to completely max out in a single class, including commoner or expert. If you were splitting your xp evenly between a narrow type of adventureing and narrow type of crafting, it would take 4-5 years before you're maximum skill in anything.
Getting the low-end levels of any skill is fairly painless and won't delay that 2 1/2 year goal noticeably so I think a lot of people will have basic gathering to take simple advantage of nodes they pass. Plus, training the first few levels of mining and smelting is a cheap way to boost your Constitution if you need a higher level as pre-req for other skills.
Speaking from experience in two other games with this type of advancement system, EVE and The Secret World, it's much better to narrowly focus on one thing at first and get GOOD at it or your skills will be so spread around they soon aren't up to par at anything (if necessary a week or two of experimentation to see what you like most before putting months of training into it is totally recommended). When you have that one thing to fall back on then you can expand into other broader areas without a lot of hassles.
|
Goblin Squad Member
|
Also remember that xp accumulates no matter what you're doing. If you want to spend the first month of ee standing around in town and blowing up your chat box, you'll end the month with just as much xp as someone who was farming escalations or cooking ingots the whole time. Spend a day picking up achievements for whatever you finally figured out you want to do, and you'll be completely caught up with the rest of your cohort.
Goblinworks Executive Founder
|
The first person to craft any given item in EE will be someone who spent all of their experience towards crafting that category of items.
It will not be possible to be producing the best stuff while also being a competent adventurer. It remains to be seen if it is possible to produce enough to influence the economy using little enough xp to be reasonable, and I think it is very likely that the most effective gatherers will invest significantly in not dying.
Read this whole post before you jump into wanting to reply. It starts shallow and then tries to dig deeper.
Shallow end:
From a strict trade economics standpoint: Specialize, Specialize, Specialize- and then trade off your specialization for the things you need.
At the character level, this means pick your expertise and run with it, to the exclusion of all else.
At the settlement level, this means pick your specialty - gathering raw materials and recipes, military might, refining, or crafting. Then trade the things you need with other settlements.
The basic idea is that, when we each specialize and trade, we are able to go much farther than if we each try to do everything on our own. IRL, this is fundamentally how teams and global trade work.
Digging Deeper: Characters
I personally will be focusing narrowly on Wizard and broadly on all Gathering Skills, with no Refining or Crafting at all.
As has been pointed out, the higher you go with a skill, the more it costs. So, for example, Nihimon’s wizard could spend 1,000 xp to get the next level of a spiffy wizard ability; or, he could spend it on getting a 3 levels of dowsing and 1 level of mining (or whatever 1K xp buys).
This example could be turned around, and someone who wants to build a devout crafter could also build up a touch of combat prowess for smacking the occasional goblin.
This approach is probably the most common sense thing for a player to do with their character.
The one big question, however, is this: At level 20, as the best crafter or wizard you can possibly be in the game, how much spare change do you have for off-point skills and feats? I’m not sure that any of us know the answer to this; and quite frankly, I’d prefer GW leave it a mystery for us to find out.
Now there is one more piece to this whole puzzle: the interdependence of skills and feats.
You do not pick Mining and Weaponsmith for your Fighter and that's all you need to produce weapons for your characters lifetime. In PFO to do something like that you would need: Mining, Smelting, Weaponsmithing, Logging, and Sawyer. Five different 'crafting' professions, there might actually be more in that chain and more complicated chains depending on what crafting you are going for.
If I understand Duffy correctly, being a top-notch crafter also means having basic competancy in some gathering and refining. Alpha players could elucidate this issue more for us.
Then, finally, there is this:
Very rough rule of thumb is that half the xp cost of lvl 20 put you somewhere around lvl 15-17, so you could think of it as "fighter16/weaponsmith16" vs "fighter20" vs "weaponsmith20"
This isn’t the path to being the greatest at anything (at least not very quickly); but is a solid path to being a major asset to your settlement, which takes us to the next step....
Digging Deeper: Settlements
Large settlements have more players, more characters, and more ability to have specialists while still maintaining a robust defense force. The one thing large settlements will not have is access to all the resources they need. For that, they will have to trade- quite possibly across the entire map- to get necessary ores or rare essences. Further, depending on how settlement building works, a large settlement may also still be limited in its ability to develop higher level refining and crafting skills quickly without focusing on one to the exclusion of others.
Small settlements, however, are going to be more challenged. To thrive, they will need to decide which way they want their players to go: Each character is specialized with dedicated defenders, gatherers, refiners, and crafters - OR - Most characters split specialization between military might and gathering, refining or crafting. Small settlements still have to manage escalations and, later, PvP threats. As the settlement grows, this will all become easier. But early on, going one way or the other (strict specialization or multitasking) will be vital to the settlement’s success.
In time, I suspect all settlements will want to specialize to some degree in one or a few branches of the resource/refine tree, depending on what is available to them, locally. For example, settlements in the mountain areas will obviously specialize in ore mining and refining.
Crafting, however, depends on lots and lots different refined products (or so it seems). A settlement that specializes in crafting will want to be centrally located along secure trade routes, as it will always and forever be dependent upon other settlements for their access to common and rare components, alike.
What does all this have to do with your character? If you are in a large settlement, coordination will not be as big of a concern to you. If you are in a small settlement, it will be a tremendous consideration. If you want to build a level 20 crafter, think about fully about how a settlement will help you do that beyond just the training you will require.
Edit: I had one minor oversight in the post above: There is no xp cap. So the real tradeoff in double dipping or generalizing in something is the question of how much time are you willing to delay your character reaching lvl 20 in something by.
Since it will take 2 to 2.5 years to reach the top, spending a month or two worth of xp on something else early may be well worth it, especially if that diversion creates a lot of extra value for your character during its 2 year growth period.
But...
The first person to craft any given item in EE will be someone who spent all of their experience towards crafting that category of items.
|
Goblin Squad Member
|
Now there is one more piece to this whole puzzle: the interdependence of skills and feats.
You do not pick Mining and Weaponsmith for your Fighter and that's all you need to produce weapons for your characters lifetime. In PFO to do something like that you would need: Mining, Smelting, Weaponsmithing, Logging, and Sawyer. Five different 'crafting' professions, there might actually be more in that chain and more complicated chains depending on what crafting you are going for.If I understand Duffy correctly, being a top-notch crafter also means having basic competancy in some gathering and refining. Alpha players could elucidate this issue more for us.
At maximum separation of training, a top-notch weaponsmith might not spend any xp on mining and smelting, but the weaponsmith needs parts from smelters and sawyers, and the smelters and sawyers need raw materials from miners and loggers. That means anywhere from one to five people are involved in the production chain for one greataxe, for example.
I think Duffy's main point was that if a player learns one crafting skill as a sideline to a fighting career, that player will need parts and raw materials from multiple refining and gathering fields.
You do not pick Mining and Weaponsmith for your Fighter and that's all you need to produce weapons for your characters lifetime.
In other games, sometimes that really is all you need. In this game, it's not.