Crafting in General - OMG Fix It

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Originally Posted by Reika

I don't believe in casinos.

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Well a casino is completely random. =p Crafting has it so you can stack things in your favor, however, it' is not 100% viable.

But you said crafting is always a gamble >.>. Same thing as always random to me. Crafting shouldn't be a complete 'try your luck' game. And like Jinko said, skills shouldn't 'randomly' appear, they should be there until you use them. Randomness of ability testing skill? We're more likely to use them once they pop up since we may not see it again. RNG controls that too... If i took the time to rank up a crafting class, gather the marks and get the skill, I should see that skill available through the whole synth until I am ready to use it.

Biggest temp fix they can and should do with the current crafting is add touch up to materials, parts, and food, and make the skills you set available until you use them.

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Originally Posted by Reika

But you said crafting is always a gamble >.>. Same thing as always random to me. Crafting shouldn't be a complete 'try your luck' game. And like Jinko said, skills shouldn't 'randomly' appear, they should be there until you use them. Randomness of ability testing skill? We're more likely to use them once they pop up since we may not see it again. RNG controls that too... If i took the time to rank up a crafting class, gather the marks and get the skill, I should see that skill available through the whole synth until I am ready to use it.

Biggest temp fix they can and should do with the current crafting is add touch up to materials, parts, and food, and make the skills you set available until you use them.

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It isn't a casino, which would be truly random. How many times do you fail a synth that you have stacked in your favor with abilities you have learned and equipped? Nothing is perfect. 100% success in this game And we do have some control over the 'fate' of the synth based on the actions we choose that are just standard, rapid, etc as well. The randomness of the abilities showing up is a test of skill because you must do your best with what you are given; provided the situation at hand. Allowing all your abilities at the beginning would make crafting even more dull. It would only be like the same three clicks repeatedly, and then done. Is that really what you want? We might as well go back to insta-craft if that's your desires. I mean, what skill is there to be had with all your best abilities always ready for you at any given time? All that proves is you ranked up a class, got an ability, and now you spam it in a boring synthesis rotation.

Also, as far as touch up goes for materials, I would agree with you as long as that item being made does not stack past itself. I think the idea behind 'touch up' is detailing a precious item, mainly finished items. If they made a cake that could only be 1 in a stack, I would say that should have touch up. However, touch up does not make much sense on several items being made. How can you focus detail on 6 tuna miqa'bobs? Then you have the argument of single item synths that are food or materials, etc...but how do you touch up a stuffed cabbage? You can't put icing decoration or something. Then from a realism standpoint, that doesn't make much sense either.

Edit: I agree that abilities should do what they are supposed to do and not be broken. It's enough that they are random to get in your ability pool in the first place. The effect of the abilities shouldn't be random too.

If i spent the hard earned marks to get those skills, ranking up multiple classes to get them, then yes that is what I, and I am sure others, want. People have already testified that most of these skills dont do jack shit anyways, me being one of them. Perfection may be the only skill worth getting. there is no test of skill. you select an action and hope the RNG gods dont hate you. There are plain broken recipes too, like fleece which has a big easy factor to creating it, even if its the whole 10 ranks above you.

The whole thing is broken, random, and very much needs to be worked on.

Hello people!
Maybe some people will not agree with what I'm saying here but anyways.
The only thing i want to serious complain with craft is use too much time and Skill point bar is too huge!
Lets said I'm 35 with leather craft with 56000 total skill point. And get like 500 skill point each time (if lucky).

56000/500= 110total.

Each time craft use like at least 3min from you sit down choose option and playing mind trick with should I push wait or stand or rapid or ability etc.

110*3=330min

that is like 5hr!? and after rank up another 5-6hr for rank up? and than another rank up 6-7hr!? I mean serious o.o; that is like a nightmare.........

My wishlist for craft is:
Reduce skill point bar and time please. Today lot people like fast pace. This pace with craft is too slow seriously I mean serious.

Thank you for reading :)

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Originally Posted by Sawamura

Hello people!
Maybe some people will not agree with what I'm saying here but anyways.
The only thing i want to serious complain with craft is use too much time and Skill point bar is too huge!
Lets said I'm 35 with leather craft with 56000 total skill point. And get like 500 skill point each time (if lucky).

56000/500= 110total.

Each time craft use like at least 3min from you sit down choose option and playing mind trick with should I push wait or stand or rapid or ability etc.

110*3=330min

that is like 5hr!? and after rank up another 5-6hr for rank up? and than another rank up 6-7hr!? I mean serious o.o; that is like a nightmare.........

My wishlist for craft is:
Reduce skill point bar and time please. Today lot people like fast pace. This pace with craft is too slow seriously I mean serious.

Thank you for reading :)

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Yah that way everyone can be a rank 50 crafter!! /sarcasm If you cant stand the craft grind, stick with DoW, crafting isnt for everyone.

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Originally Posted by Reika

If i spent the hard earned marks to get those skills, ranking up multiple classes to get them, then yes that is what I, and I am sure others, want. People have already testified that most of these skills dont do jack shit anyways, me being one of them. Perfection may be the only skill worth getting. there is no test of skill. you select an action and hope the RNG gods dont hate you. There are plain broken recipes too, like fleece which has a big easy factor to creating it, even if its the whole 10 ranks above you.

more, sooooo.
The whole thing is broken, random, and very much needs to be worked on.

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I dont really know how random it is, truth is, if you have the trainings, and skills, and are using the right type of crafting, its generally pretty easy to craft anything within 5 levels of you. I like more exp and harder synths, so i aim for things 7-9 levels higher, some seem harder than others, but i dont rock a magic craftsmanship set, sooooo.

Im just saying, if your really saying that you cant win most of the time with the right levels and stats, i have to disagree, oh yeah sometimes i get screwed, but majority of the time, definitely not.

The worse parts is early on when guild marks were rare and you couldnt get the reccomended teachings, that would often lead to fails, but now you get marks a lot

Lets look at this from a realistic standpoint regarding skills, if I decide that I want to make a cotton tunic, I have the materials and the required "skills" then shouldn't I be able to use those skills when I see fit and not when random chance tells me I can.

I have no issue with being able to use the skills only once per synth that makes sense (well at least as far as balancing is concerned).

Vanguard's system for crafting was much more intuitive and required you to use multiple skills and tools to maintain equilibrium of progress and quality.

I think this game tried to copy Vanguards crafting system and fell massively short.

I really like this guys idea on how to fix synthesis: http://forum.square-enix.com/ffxiv/t...s-to-Synthesis

I think this would make crafting a lot more fun and take out a lot of the randomness that we have currently.

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Originally Posted by longtallsally

Yah that way everyone can be a rank 50 crafter!! /sarcasm If you cant stand the craft grind, stick with DoW, crafting isnt for everyone.

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I'm sorry with what I write at below hurt you feeling or so so. But you keep reading I will thank of take you time for reading it.
First off
When you write like this doesn't make you look smart or anything. Trust me with this one.

You look at the present. But miss look at the future badly. I don't mind use 5hr to get one rank up with each time. I can just do like 1-3hr for DoW and DoL and use like 1-2hr for DoH each time play.
However I do mind. We need to use 5.5hr for the next lvl and 6hr for another lvl and 6.5hr for the next lvl and +10hr for a lvl . If we don't point it out now. Maybe Square Enix will really keep increase DoH total skill point same with DoW.
Beside did you really think Square Enix will let us have all craft to max level? I bet when they put new max level they going to allow us to have only 1 or 2 craft for max level.

Anyways let's go back to the reason why I complain with Skill point bar and time.
Let's have a lil math here. I know lot people will think this no sense. But let's see.
Lets said each past 50 rank increase 2000point
500 skill point each time you make not count fail or get lower the 500.

Lets just said Rank 51 need 102000 for simple and easy to see to understand.
102000/500skill point=204 item for rank up to 51 for lot people will see no big deal!
204*3min=612min = 10,2hour! Still no big deal!
lets said 52 need 104000 total..... ok lets ditch from each lvl and sum up 51 to 60 rank that is total 1110000 skill point you need.
1110000/500=2220item
2220*3min=6660min=111hour
Lets see what happen "If" Square Enix make 1min for each craft.
2220*1min=2220min/60min=37hr! Yay

Lets said Square Enix put increase board rank quest and reward 2000 SP and you do all DoH and DoL board quest. you get 22000SP each day.
1110000/22000=50,45= that is like 50day.

That is lot of time. Lot of people will chicken out or just find a way to use some cheat craft or so so. That being said where is the "FUN" is? Tell me that seriously I can't find it. with only push Stand or wait or ability etc for +111hr or every single day doing all boardquest with running around get item? While I only have like 3-4hr to play max.
Are you tell me I can just find a way to cheat or just quit? Craft leve cant even use leve link and at sametime Total SP is same as DoW and DoL. And each Localleve camp is so far away without teleport. And even you do craft grind like you said you still need to get mat n shade and crystal.

And do you know why we point the problem out? You think we are point it out cause for fun or just want to complain so we can read the post? The answer is NO. We point problem out is: Because we who play this game want it to improve.

So thank you for reading :). If you think I said is no sense that is fine btw :D.

Also, one-time use abilities like Culmination etc. should not "fail to take effect". If im using space in my ability bar, have to wait for the ability to pop up, and it only works for one action anyway, it should always activate. Especially if i payed 12k guild marks for it, like Clean Slate. Failing to Clean Slate on r.12 or whatever Cotton Yarn as a 50 weaver while trying for HQ mats is ridiculous and a waste of 6 action points. Not to mention that the "increases success/quality of next action" just seem to actually make your next action fail harder anyway.

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Originally Posted by VenusDoom

Also, one-time use abilities like Culmination etc. should not "fail to take effect". If im using space in my ability bar, have to wait for the ability to pop up, and it only works for one action anyway, it should always activate.

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Yes, yes, yes, oh god yes.

The one shot deals are all pretty much useless, which is amazing since they take up pretty much 80% of the skills you can use. If anything if they want to keep them as they are they should be 1-2 slot points at most. I can't think of any good ones I put on my bar except Harmonize and Perfection.

Clean Slate has a pretty limited use due to the fact that you can get +3 quality off NQ mats with it. If it worked all the time you wouldn't need +mats for anything but 35+ synths. You can still get a pretty good success rate if you use it at 40% progress or below. On average you can pull out 80-100 quality alone off that.

After you get Inspiration and a couple stat quality enhancers you don't even need it regardless (from a 35 synth or below perspective at lvl50).

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Originally Posted by Radaghast

The one shot deals are all pretty much useless, which is amazing since they take up pretty much 80% of the skills you can use. If anything if they want to keep them as they are they should be 1-2 slot points at most. I can't think of any good ones I put on my bar except Harmonize and Perfection.

Clean Slate has a pretty limited use due to the fact that you can get +3 quality off NQ mats with it. If it worked all the time you wouldn't need +mats for anything but 35+ synths. You can still get a pretty good success rate if you use it at 40% progress or below. On average you can pull out 80-100 quality alone off that.

After you get Inspiration and a couple stat quality enhancers you don't even need it regardless (from a 35 synth or below perspective at lvl50).

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If the skill is too good if you can use it 100% whenever you want, then nerf it slightly.

I'd rather have 100% consistency and reliability with a decent skill, than a really good skill that has a random activation and a random chance at failing.

Sometimes randomization is good and adds variety:
http://forum.square-enix.com/ffxiv/t...Dynamic-Erozea

But not in this case.

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Originally Posted by RisaCooper

I really like this guys idea on how to fix synthesis: http://forum.square-enix.com/ffxiv/t...s-to-Synthesis

I think this would make crafting a lot more fun and take out a lot of the randomness that we have currently.

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Yes, he had a lot of good ideas.

HQ'ing is random enough that having Clean Slate be 100% activation wouldn't be too broken. Even the times i start with +3 mats and manage to have Clean Slate work and I can get my materials to 500-700 quality, generally they still NQ, or maaaybe +1. And that's after doing the synth twice pretty much (Clean Slating) and painstakingly bold-ing 18 times, using all my other abilities in the mix. Turns out to like a 4 minute synth each just for the RNG to decide to give me NQ cotton yarns/nuggets/whatever. All the broken things add up to colossal broken-ness.

Oh yeah, and then I Hasty Handed undyed canvas with NQ mats and no support, for a quality of NINE, and got 3x Undyed Canvas +1. Dont get me wrong, i was pumped about my canvas, but that's just not right lol.

Yeah although I can't say 100% I'm fairly sure once you break the quality tier it has no bearing on increasing your chance to HQ by adding more quality. So essentially you can stop around the 270-300 range and finish the synth. That should save some time.

I've literally synthed hundreds of 300+ quality synths and have seen no difference in the +3 rate. Moon cycle, facing east, hopping on one foot and all that jazz don't effect it either.

Lengthy first post coming up, here's a few suggestions for the whole "Materia" system and some for crafting.

Removable, destroying materia
As mentioned before, it is a giant bummer to customize your favorite weapon and not being able to re-do that customization with better components found later on. Allow us to insert new materia by destroying the old in it's place.

Destroy weapon, keeping materia
Likewise, we keep on changing weapons, maybe we want to keep a materia we are really in love with, that fits our playstyle, or is pretty rare. Destroying the weapon to keep the materia is another good compromise when we just need to get better gear, and it eliminates some weapons from the market. More power to our Blacksmiths and whatnot, I suppose.

Don't give it a "Break if fail to attach materia"
We are already compromising with choosing what to keep, don't make "materia attaching" a stupid game of chance where it breaks our weapon or materia if we "fail" to attach it. Imagine me sacrificing my lovely sword to keep my even more so beloved rare materia, gained from an otherwordly Notorious Monster. Only for it to break when getting attached to another sword. BAH! Failing a synth is already incredibly punishing and counter-productive!

Materia Leveling
Leveling weapons, equipment in general, and skills is a rather common thing to do in MMO's nowdays. The reason is because having to nurture different aspects of your character is engaging and gives you a bigger list of things to do (reputation fits in this aspect). I would strongly suggest to give us ways to level up our materias, be it by grinding some form of experience directly from combat, or by a form of item infusion.

A Cap
With all honesty, you chose a hard-to-please demographic, catering to both casual and hardcore players... I would suggest merely giving a VISIBLE cap on the materias, in the case they do level. No invisible cap to get people complaining about. Just make it so after X amount of "EXP", the numbers change colors and the player is aware that that materia will no longer be receiving EXP. Another method is for the player to have to chose the (maybe one, maybe just a few) current "actively growing" materia so that they don't level them all up at the same time and have to swap from "actively growing" materia to "actively growing" materia after hitting the "cap". Making incredibly huge amounts of points required will only cater to the hardcore and discourage the casual, giving invisible tiny caps will only go unnoticed by the casual and enrage the hardcore who's been grinding it for hours and wasn't even sure he was on some "Materia Fatigue". You guys chose the target, you'll have to juggle with it.

Interacting Materia
I would like to suggest you make it so it's not just a number-stacking game. Making, much like in the original scenario, materia that by itself have no effect, that must be combined with other to enhance or activate. Such as combining some "enhancement-type" materia with a "base" materia so the base is increased in power, or maybe make it's power far more effective when fighting a certain type of enemy (birds, beastmen, etc.), or maybe make that materia affect all of your party in a smaller effect, for example, if the base increased MY "Cure Potency", it will increase everyone else's by a smaller amount.

Get creative, think TWICE before adding "VIT+1"
It has been mentioned before, Dex+1, Piety+2 and so on are not only easy, uncreative enhancements, they are all too uninspiring. Enhance individual skills too, things like this:

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Originally Posted by Biggs

Don't just boost 1 or 2 points of dex or add plus 1 to evasion, give us something inspiring. When you call a system materia, it conjures up images of me infusing my breastplates with skills like permenant protect and shockspikes. Making my boots randomly have the chance to activate featherfoot at no stamina cost to me each time I am attacked would be the business.

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Things like that, giving elemental damage to a particular skill (Fire damage on Heavy Strike, for example), making skills AoE (skills that weren't of course, like Concussive Blow) at probably a higher cost (more TP or Stamina, for example), lowering a specific skill's cooldown, or another's Stamina Cost, be able to grant your gear greater elemental affinities or, as mentioned by the Biggs there, permanent buffs, perhaps at a halved or lowered effectiveness, to not make the spells themselves useless. I'd have protect 24/7, but lowered on effect. Hey, at least I don't have to SLOT protect to use it now!

No Dumbing Crafting Down
It CERTAINLY needs fixing in many ways already pointed in this thread, but taking out progress bar really scared me. I'd like to see what exactly is being thought. I hope with all my heart you don't turn the crafting here into everywhere else- Click, watch, done. It would be meaningless to be a "full class" as an Alchemist if it has little to no interaction, like in every other game where I cook "50 roasts" by writing 50, clicking craft and literally opening my DS or PSP while it plays itself. It hasn't been said what will be done with craft system, just that the progress bar will be taken out, I hope it stays or at least it keeps being very interactive, proper to being it's "own class".

If anything I'd suggest you spice it up because it's pretty sad I have EXACT same interaction for all of my 50 ranks, with ALL of the Disciples of the Hand. There is no difference when crafting as a Blacksmith or a Carpenter, so as it stands, you CAN say "I enjoy Pugilist far more than Gladiator", but you CAN'T say "I enjoy Goldsmith far more than Alchemist" because they all play the exact same way in the Disciples of the Hand, as opposed to the Disciples of War.
I'd suggest checking http://forum.square-enix.com/ffxiv/t...s-to-Synthesis out, for a very good example.

Failing a Synth, not BREAKING a Synth
This needs to get addressed. Perhaps not remove synth failure entirely, but this is absurd. I am not even talking about the horribly damaged rate that has been pointed out by my other fellow poster (specially the OP), I am talking about the act itself of breaking a synth and losing everything (which has also been discussed, mind you). Hear me out here, how about instead of just plain blindly losing all your very hard earned Khroma Or-- I mean, incredibly rare and expensive items by turning to smoke on a failed synth, we just get a "bad grade result"? Say you are making an Iron Sword, and fail the synth, you turn out with a "Unfinished Iron Sword" or "Iron Sword -1". This Iron Sword could still be salvaged by being taken to a person with a rank higher than that required by the sword, perhaps by 5 or 10 ranks, with just A (don't make it an obscene amount of equally rare items, for Christ's Sake, it beats the purpose) item to "finish" the work, like an Iron Ore, or better yet, a simpler item like a Whetstone, maybe a -2 would need more materials (or of higher quality, ie. +1). With NO chance to fail because we'd end up in the same place, you are already paying your failure with paying someone for their services AND additional materials. If you really just don't want a giant influx of swords in the market for some reason just lower the material drops or increase required items to make them, don't just have it disappear because Lady Luck wasn't home tonight. This is just a random idea, but I suppose it helps the economy AND frustration a bit, while also creating some more player interaction.

I apologize for such a lengthy post, thanks for taking your time to read it.

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Originally Posted by Lionix

Lengthy first post coming up, here's a few suggestions for the whole "Materia" system and some for crafting.
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I apologize for such a lengthy post, thanks for taking your time to read it.

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I quite like all of the ideas presented here. Especially approve of not dumbing down crafting, but make it more interesting and interactive.

Regarding failing synths, SE has already already introduced the concept of upgradeable weapons via the goblin daggers/gladioli/longswords, that start at broken ~> blunt ~> fixed. Perhaps this would be a suggestion to make the 100% / 0 dura condition more palatable. In such a case a broken version of the target item is produced. Combining this with a de-synthesis system, the crafter then can choose to (a) vendor the results (b) de-synthesize the result (c) fix the result, or take it to someone that can fix it.

I would also like to see the amount of material lost be based on % completed, thus providing incentive to do as well as possible on a synthesis, even if it looks impossible to succeed.

Finally, I very much hope that the developers make removal of excess items into more a positive experience than a negative. Having rare materials break in a synthesis is not fun, and agree with Lionix 100% that removing items should be something that players look forward to, as in de-synthesizing, breaking weapons to extract materia, etc.

What a truely beautiful/fun game this would be if crafting required SKILL instead of MINDLESS GRINDING. I understand that the value of a high rank crafted item CURRENTLY comes from the countless compiled hours of dull grinding we put into the item. I would like to think there could be some other source of value in crafted items. That source of value should be the skill required to craft the item. A crafting setup that requires skill is challenging/fun and the resulting crafted item still has a high value. A crafting setup that requires mindless hideous time consumption is more along the lines of work, and I perfer to be paid in American or Yen for my work, not gil. Crafting should require dexterity, reaction speed, or intellect. Crafting should be something that you have to practice to get good at, and should require increasing skill as rank increases. The current crafting game requires absolutly zero skill at every rank and therefore it is boring me to death. The graphics are the only thing that give it some sort of merit at this point, and after watching the same synth 5 times I have lost all interest in the visual stimulant. Youre right crafting isnt for everyone but it should be if you want the game to be a success. The majority of people that pick up the controler to try crafting should be able to say, "this is so much fun that I could see myself putting 100 days of compiled gametime into this in a year and I would love every minute of it."

I haven't ranted on this is a while.

I've started leveling up my Archer recently, so decided to make myself a Plumed Willow Shortbow, which is a R26 crp synth. I got myself as many HQ ingredients as I could find, thinking I had a good chance of HQ'g this @ R50. Long story short, I ended up almost failing this, and had to use every ability I had just to make the damn thing, and finished within 1 failed attempt of a total synthesis failure. ><

I really hope they're planning on fixing this soon.

You tried to make one bow expecting the best results? If that's all it took the market would be flooded with HQ's.

You failed to noticed that he is R50 carpenter crafting a r26 recipe and almost failing it. That was the highlight of the BS experience. It wasn't about him not being able to HQ, it was about the crazy fail rate on something 24 ranks below him.

One sample means nothing.

What gear was he using?
What abilities does he have slotted?
Unlucky with an unstable lightning? Ice?
Is the craft based on magic craft or craftmanship?
Does it take a book that the crafter doesn't have?
Just dumb awful luck failing one synth? How many are you doing at one time.
Spamming bold too often?


I don't have these amazing fail rates I keep reading about. I fail every once in awhile, but were talking things well within my rank, not 26 below it. That's usually something I'm trying to HQ and deliberately take risks spamming bold and the like. Even then it's fairly easy to determine when to actually stop bolding and standard to finish according to how much durability you have left.

Something is off...

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Originally Posted by Radaghast

One sample means nothing.

What gear was he using?
What abilities does he have slotted?
Unlucky with an unstable lightning? Ice?
Is the craft based on magic craft or craftmanship?
Does it take a book that the crafter doesn't have?
Just dumb awful luck failing one synth? How many are you doing at one time.
Spamming bold too often?


I don't have these amazing fail rates I keep reading about. I fail every once in awhile, but were talking things well within my rank, not 26 below it. That's usually something I'm trying to HQ and deliberately take risks spamming bold and the like. Even then it's fairly easy to determine when to actually stop bolding and standard to finish according to how much durability you have left.

Something is off...

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the crafting system? I almost failed a r12 recipe at r50 a few times. just completely random and out there.

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Originally Posted by Radaghast

One sample means nothing.

What gear was he using?
What abilities does he have slotted?
Unlucky with an unstable lightning? Ice?
Is the craft based on magic craft or craftmanship?
Does it take a book that the crafter doesn't have?
Just dumb awful luck failing one synth? How many are you doing at one time.
Spamming bold too often?


I don't have these amazing fail rates I keep reading about. I fail every once in awhile, but were talking things well within my rank, not 26 below it. That's usually something I'm trying to HQ and deliberately take risks spamming bold and the like. Even then it's fairly easy to determine when to actually stop bolding and standard to finish according to how much durability you have left.

Something is off...

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Agreed. Square has so many variables in the crafting system it is almost impossible to tell when somebody is doing it "right." (whatever that is >_>) I'm not a Japanese culture expert, but am I right in assuming that they equate complexity and intricacy with skill and intelligence? Well something like that? Anyway, I'd love to have some Japanese > English perspectives on this system and it's so-called problems.

Let me tell you both why his clothes dont matter, since he is R50 making a R26 recipe item. ONE main thing: The tool. Compare stats of a r27 tool to a r42 or 47 tool. BIG increase in stats right?

Same thing with me and the r12 recipe. How much of each stat do you think a person has at rank 12 with a rank 12 tool, then how much to you think a person has at r50 with a r47 tool. and my R47 tool is +1, more stats. Totally naked i have over 70 in every stat, more than a r12 recipe would ever need. more than a r26 recipe needs.

And Im saying again, something is off because I don't fail recipes that far below my rank, like ever. So there's obviously some other factors were not seeing.

Just a guess but the plumed requires both the bowyering book as well as the guild buff to not get any durability/success penalties. I remember back in the day trying to do a simple cavalry bow and failed because I was getting lightning unstables nonstop due to not having bowyering. It could require magic craft over craftmanship. Who knows I've never bothered to try to make one.

It never ceases to amaze me how certain people are freely inclined to go off about something totally impertinent to a particular post point.

Thank you, Reika, for pointing out what I assumed to be inherently obvious. It isn't about the succes rate of the HQ. It's about the near failure of a synth 24 ranks below me ><

It shouldn't matter what I'm wearing or what books I have with that rank disparity, but if you must know, I have very good gear. I have every book available for carpenter, weaver, leather, and I even have a brand of wind, which is the most common unstable element for crp. For abilities equipped, Fullfillment, Tender Touch, Preserve, Perfection, Brand of wind. Since I was hoping to HQ this, yes, it goes without saying Bold would be a factor in this, and yes, I do know when to stop. When the current synthesis system decides to go into its RNG rage mode, without regard to skills, there's not a damn thing you can do about it, and it's just plain wrong. Oh, and when I get better quality from a standard attempt as compared to bold, it's just one more thing that's broken about this entire system.

Maybe take the time to read my various posts in this thread to fully understand my many issues with the current crafting system, as opposed to drawing an inappropriate and incorrect conclusion that I'm going off about not HQ's a single, stand-alone synth. If you're too lazy to read the posts, it could simply be summarized as follows:

1. Remove the massive RNG crap in the coding.
2. Make success rates and HQ success rates more in line with skills.
3. Fix all the broken abilities, some of which are totally broken.

Nothing more, nothing less.

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Originally Posted by zzapp

It isn't about the succes rate of the HQ. It's about the near failure of a synth 24 ranks below me ><

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It helps to note that 24 isn't just a number, it's freakin' half the total value you can possibly accomplish. It's half the game, 24/50.

Does Materia crafting system mean we'll actually get Materia like in FFVII?

Ok, I just found this topic and I'm new, etc. I've been crafting for a bit and this is what I've found to be consistently successful -

http://img217.imageshack.us/img217/6...dsynthtips.png

I don't know if it works with Bold/Rapid Synthesis, or how much of an impact the gap between your rank and the item's rank will have. But standard synthesis with items equal or lower than my rank have come out quite fine.

Maybe it's old, I don't know. But I'll share it anyway just in case.

I am just fine with the fact that there is a codependancy between crafting classes BUT, and I do mean BUT, if a player is making a level 24 item, any and all parts should should also be level 24.

I think the materia crafting thing should be another craft job. In order for it to be affective though, it is paired with the other craft jobs already in the game.

Meaning you can't do it solo but could be paired with doing it with, lets say....leatherworker. On the recipes you can make on leatherworker, you can combine it with your rank on materia to enchant armor, tool, etc. based on what stat the player wants on it. And the higher rank you are in materia, the more stats/abilities you can enchant to that said armor, tool, etc.

I hope I did atleast a decent job in explaining what I mean.

I really dislike the crafting system in its current state. If you're not dealing with the rage inducing randomness of it, you're dealing with the boring monotonous grinding involved. A crafting mini-game is a great idea I think, but can you even consider pressing ONE button over and over again for hours upon end until you reach your desired level a mini-game?

If SE absolutely refuses to reduce the exp needed to level, then at LEAST make the damn mini-game interesting. Fire element goes unstable then a bomb spawns and tries to kill me? Awesome. Earth goes unstable and titan spawns to punch me in the face? Great. Add *anything* to change things up.

Also, Don't force me to run to a hundred different towns just to turn in the stupid quest. It's fine if I have to go to horizon to turn in a quest, maybe I'm going there anyways to level, but why do I have to go to drybone too?!

And lastly, Please add more level-appropriate leve's. I hate going to get my dose of crafting leve's only to find out they only have level 20's available and no 25's. I'm leveling 2 crafts and I've had days when I've only been able to get ONE level 25 leve and the rest are level 20's.

/end rant

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Micronowski

I really dislike the crafting system in its current state. If you're not dealing with the rage inducing randomness of it, you're dealing with the boring monotonous grinding involved. A crafting mini-game is a great idea I think, but can you even consider pressing ONE button over and over again for hours upon end until you reach your desired level a mini-game?

If SE absolutely refuses to reduce the exp needed to level, then at LEAST make the damn mini-game interesting. Fire element goes unstable then a bomb spawns and tries to kill me? Awesome. Earth goes unstable and titan spawns to punch me in the face? Great. Add *anything* to change things up.

Also, Don't force me to run to a hundred different towns just to turn in the stupid quest. It's fine if I have to go to horizon to turn in a quest, maybe I'm going there anyways to level, but why do I have to go to drybone too?!

And lastly, Please add more level-appropriate leve's. I hate going to get my dose of crafting leve's only to find out they only have level 20's available and no 25's. I'm leveling 2 crafts and I've had days when I've only been able to get ONE level 25 leve and the rest are level 20's.

/end rant

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The crafting system in 14 is a step forward from most, but I agree that there is still a ways to go. The combat system had many, many successful (and unsuccessful) MMOs plus the Final Fantasy (and general JRPG) series as examples of how to build a combat system. Unfortunately that experiment turned out poorly.

Given the lack of good examples, the crafting (and gathering) systems are pretty good. Kind of like when the first (J)RPG games were coming out the combat systems were often rather clunky and unrewarding. Does this mean I'm all starry-eyed and satisfied with the system as it is? Heck no.

Currently the emphasis is on revamping the battle system. This is where Matsui-san and the other system designers and algorithm developers are putting their focus. Fair enough ~~ I'll concede that a majority of players prefer fighting over crafting / gathering.

However, after the battle system has been reworked, and Matsui-san is spending fewer hours per week tweaking it, I hope that the battle team (YES, THE BATTLE TEAM) can cross over and help expand upon the crafting and gathering mechanics.

The way to make the crafting and gathering systems fun is to make them more interactive, more engaging, more challenging. I'd like to quote from Matsui-san's post, once again:

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Akihiko_Matsui

Fostering Skillful Play
Creating a battle system that fosters skillful play.
The above is, in a sentence, the rationale behind the coming battle changes. Not exactly the punchiest catchphrase around, but perhaps there’s kindly a soul out there who could word it better. */poke Yoshi-P*

To elaborate, we are aiming to address issues such as the following:
Victories coming with little reliance on skillful play.
Lack of information needed for skillful play.
No sense of accomplishment even with skillful play.
In light of the above, our objective is to implement a battle system that rewards player effort and innovation in such areas as equipment, hunting grounds, and party structure.

Lastly, in conceiving these changes, we have kept one fact close to heart: simply making enemies stronger does not equate to an environment that fosters and rewards skillful play.

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Now I'm going to modify it, with the changes in bold, to what I would like to see the reform concept for crafting/gathering:

Quote:

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Fostering Skillful Play
Creating a crafting/gathering system that fosters skillful play.
The above is, in a sentence, the rationale behind the coming crafting/gathering changes. Not exactly the punchiest catchphrase around, but perhaps there’s kindly a soul out there who could word it better. */poke Yoshi-P*

To elaborate, we are aiming to address issues such as the following:
Successful craft/gathers coming with little reliance on skillful play.
Lack of information needed for skillful play.
No sense of accomplishment even with skillful play.
In light of the above, our objective is to implement a craft/gather system that rewards player effort and innovation in such areas as equipment, gathering areas / crafting material, and party structure.

Lastly, in conceiving these changes, we have kept one fact close to heart: simply making results highly randomized does not equate to an environment that fosters and rewards skillful play.

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If Matsui-san and the battle team were to release the above objective for the crafting / gathering systems, I would be a happy kitten! :D

i dont know how one can fail a craft 24 levels under them with the proper books, and with guild training, i have never even come close to failing such a synth, unless i was just straight gambling the whole time, and didnt get the guild buff, which in all honesty i will probably succeed with.

Far as making crafting more interesting, i had this discussion in another thread, and i think a lot of people dont want it to be more interactive or complex, they just want to get the levels, andmake the stuff with as little problems as possible. Keep in mind most people who are mad in this thread are mad because of fails.

Any mini game to make crafting more interesting will just end up being the same boring repetitiveness that we have right now, simply because doing the same thing 1000000 times is going to get old no matter what you do. Same thing grinding the same mobs (or levs) over and over. It gets old. The difference is other games have other things to do inbetween the tedium to distract from how boring it can be. This game has nothing like that.

They're in the right direction doing things like daily craft quests, if only they were higher than rank 10. Probably once that's fleshed out you could get 10-20k a day into a rank. Anything to break up the tedium of leveling.

Hi All,

I just had to throw in my laughable experiences with crafting, today was the WORST of them by far:

I'm Rank 44 Alchemist, and I just failed making a Rank *1* (ONE) Alchemist Synth (Distilled Water) twice in a row. (>_<) :(

I have all the Training Books, all gear over 95% Repaired, Crafting Support, Crafting Food, HQ Main Hand Tool, Stats set to favor Main Hand Tool as well.

I get 4 synths in a row using NQ Muddy Water to over 275+ Quality, ~70 Durability remaining.

Then 2 synths back-to-back, FAILED, 0 Durability, and with repeated Failed Attempts (one stretch of 7 Failed Attempts in a Row, HUH?!). On White Orbs, on Yellow Orbs, didn't matter.

All under the same Moon, and same Weather.

How does Square even begin to *explain this*?! They can't. I hate RNG so much.

Sorry for the rant, but today's example was by far the worst I've seen of Crafting's Randomness. :(

It's come to a point where the system would be alright if there was a WoW autoleveller.
It takes 10,000 iron nuggets a level on blacksmithing towards the middle of the home stretch. None of that is quality content, it is all poor gameplay. Make it automated.

At least then the botters don't have an advantage any more.