Proposal: HQ mat-to-HQ mat conversion of 100%

[Dyvid]

This example is a short of explanation that I expanded on in the thread: http://forum.square-enix.com/ffxiv/t...g-Improvements

IN short it says: IF you are high enough above a synth that you get no SP or XP, and you are totally maximized in all regards to make HQ (best gear for your rank, max support, bold synth, foods, attributes tweaked perfectly, guild abilities, new moon, remembered to sacrifice your goat, sold your soul, and your first born child to the powers that be) then you should have about 75% chance to HQ +1, and you balance rarity of +2, +3 from there. Basically, if you go balls to the walls hardcore, you should HQ SOMEHOW. IN 100 synths, that is 75 +1 items, which if you think about it, is a lot. But it is also a LOT of effort to get ALL your variables maximized. (this % would need to be adjusted to reflect things like... can we see our guild marks on local leves, allowing us to selectively maximize our abilities... will pumping our class specific or elemental stats ACTUALLY help us instead of just looking cool... will food actually be worthwhile... etc.,)

Whereas if you have the baseline gear at rank, no support, no buffs, bold synth, neutral moon, no abilites, etc., you should have about 5% chance to HQ +1 (that's about 1 in 20) and decrease from there. So that in 100 synths you have five +1, say two +2, and one +3.

I agree with becasue it makes sense that master craftsman should be able to use the finest ingredents to make HQ items. But a novice shouldn't have the same amount of luck.

[Peregrine]

A novice should be able to get the current chance of +3. But yeah it's embarassing right now for high-levellers. In fact, our R30 GSer showed both me and a R44 up the other day by synthing a brass ingot +3 before we did. BRASS INGOTS are the bane of our existance. Nearly R50 smiths. Brass. We are CONSTANTLY behind the Aeolian Sword counts and waste SO many mats. And all of us have had it up to here with the futility of it all.

If your team can farm Broken Aeolian swords faster than three of you can make +3 brass ingots, something's got to give. And it's only BRASS!!!! Forget silver. Forget ELECTRUM.

Now our alchemists need dozens of steel and silver ingots for HQ mortar and alembic synths.

I'm gonna die.

[origamikitsune]

Exactly my point. This has to be balanced though, however, because if it is too easy for master crafters to HQ, and too hard for novice, then the master crafters create such a monopoly on the market that it becomes impossible for a novice to break into the economy and earn gil. After all, why pay 100g for an NQ item when a +1 costs 75g?

My idea, I think, is a good place to start, but not perfect. I don't know if you read the link I provided, but in that thread I provided an expanded explanation that looked at it from a DoW/DoM point of view on the economics. It comes down to the idea that someone who does all combat leves, every 36 hours (but nothing else), should have enough gil in rewards to afford a couple of +1 items every tier of gear by the time they are at-rank for that tier of gear (assuming they are at least attempting to save up a little gil without spending it willy-nilly). Some who is good at saving gil and shops around a little, and makes some effort at selling at standard prices in the markets should be able to afford a full set of +1, or maybe a couple NQ gear, a couple +1, and a single +2. A casual player who is REALLY good at saving gil and GOOD at playing the market should be able to afford a nearly full set of +2 at most. I would expect to see full sets of +2 and any amount of +3 gear affordable only by the people who, again, go balls to the wall to achieve that.

Unfortunately it is really hard to do that when the economy is so screwed up. As it is right now, there is sooooo much gil remaining unspent that I have no idea how there can be any sort of stable economy. And that is on top of the difficulties in balancing the economy in a severely player driven market.

[Peregrine]

I think if we achieve balanced HQ markets that have perfusion of HQ mats, with HQ gear that HQ's in the stats you buy the HQ gear for in the first place, then the economy will stabilize itself and square can then tweak what's wrong with it. Which there will be several things wrong with it as long as one levelink night nets 230,000 gil and there's no equivalent to take it out of the server except people quitting. Which that's the only reason inflation hasn't gone completely nuts.

I'm trying to fiddle around with a HQ floor concept, but when I run it by people they always say the same thing: SE will NEVER be that kind to its players. It needs to be something simple like the XI 10, 30, 50 tiers, but it needs to make sense. And it's got to scale...which is also tough.

Quality HQ1 HQ2 HQ3
0-100: 10% 0 0
101-200: 30% 10% 0
201-300: 60% 30% 10
301-400: 90% 60% 30
401-500: 100% 90% 60%
501-600: 0% 100% 90%

Is that unfair to certain crafters? If it is fair to all crafters, is it too generous? Keep in mind this is for materials that you CANNOT touch up. You get ONE shot at the HQ.

[Peregrine]

Quality HQ1 HQ2 HQ3
0-100: 10% 0 0
101-200: 30% 10% 0
201-300: 60% 20% 10
301-400: 90% 40% 20
401-500: 100% 60% 30%
501-600: 100% 80% 40%
601-700: 0% 100% 50%

How about that one, with HQ1 rates going up by 30%, HQ2 rates by 20% and HQ3 rates by 10%? That's more stingy on the HQ2 and 3's.

[Crimzon]

Honestly, you guys are making much too big of a deal about HQ rates.

HQ3 Weapons SHOULD be ultra-rare in my opinion. It should feel like a major achievement for crafters when they make one.

Also, too much stock is being put into trying to acquire ALL HQ3 mats. Does it give a better chance to HQ3 a weapon? Perhaps, but not as much people think. Of course if you go from starting with all NQ mats to all HQ3 mats, its a giant swing in starting quality but changing 1 part/2 parts alone isnt nearly that significant.

If an finished item uses 5 parts to make, each individual parts rise in single quality will affect the starting overall quality of the synth by approx 20 points. That means instead of gathering all HQ3 mats, if there is that ingot thats incredibly hard to get that you are only able to get a +2, thats only 20 less quality you are going to start the synth with. Even a +1 will only affect it by 40. Is having that extra 20/40 going to affect what tier you finish the synth at? Not always.

These quality numbers go down even further with the more parts you add. If an item is made of 6 parts, each time a single part changes quality by 1, it affects the starting quality by only 16.7 points. So going from a +3 mat to a +1 mat will only change your opening synth by 33 points.

My point is I see too many people spend wayyyy to much time trying to get EVERY material for a synth to be +3 before attempting, asuming it's the only way to HQ3 a weapon. Don't get me wrong, it does help, but slightly. I have HQ3'd an Oak Composite Bow at 205 quality without a single touch up and also NQ'd crab bows at 450 quality using all HQ3 mats. There will always be some luck involved.

The ONLY thing I would like to see added to balance out the difficulty of some weapons to HQ3 compared to others (due to a larger # of mats being mob drops), is an ability on each class (maybe a trait you can acquire via individual crafting guilds with marks) that lets you use 'Touch Up' on parts. I think that would allow crafters a little more control over trying to get all HQ mats should they so desire without breaking the HQ rates by altering their %s.

[Alise]

I think Air Bomb in my server already have 4x R50 DoH classes, but he still say he only best at making +2.
the chance for +3 of finish product is just too low now.

[Rentahamster]

Lots of HQ items on my server...

[Peregrine]

If you want to make a +3 of a tool or weapon that matters you need majority +3 materials since the starting quality is a skewed average of the initial part qualities depending on part significance. Usually the hardest to HQ mats determine more of the quality, as in the case of Aeolian scimitars. NQ Broken Scimitar+NQ Buffalo horn sword grip+Brass Ingot+3+Brimstone+3 doesn't start at 150 quality. It starts at 75. Brimstone+3 and Brass Ingot+2 starts at...45. With 75 quality I can get it over 100 and bump the HQ rate to 20% or more with a small chance of HQ2, but a 70 quality finish has about a 1 in 15% chance to HQ1. No chance to HQ2. That's a big difference with just using a +2 instead of +3. And if you use a +1...forget about a +1 sword. You have a better chance that the sword fails than to get a +1.

If you drop so much as one +1 into your vat even with all others at +3, you might as well resign yourself to a small chance of a +2 and no chance of +3. With a mix of +2's and +3's you have a small, small chance. With all +3's you have a 10-20 percent chance.

A lot of new R50s get cocky with the rates of +1 endgame pieces they can make. I've made about 20. I've made 1 +2 steel chaser. I've made zero +3s. If everything were as easy as a Jade Crooks, then ok. But they're not. Jade Crooks are the easist-in-league.

The +1 market's drying up. People will continue to get lucky on +2s while overproducing +1s. But to make +3's and settle for +2's is a whole other league that a lot of crafters think they will be in, but in reality there's just no way. Jade Crook is the batboy in this league.

[Solipse]

Instead of leaving iron ingot+3's up to a lottery of a bunch of random smiths trying to get lucky, design them to be the property of the smiths who deserve them because of true effort. Not mere time and mat spam.

You seem very preoccupied with what people deserve based on some random list of things you require them to have done. It sounds like someone who's only spent 500 hours on blacksmith is much less deserving than someone who's spent that an 200 hours mining, huh?

Perhaps once you've completed your 20,000th iron nugget synth the game should only give you +3 iron nuggets from then on because, hey, you deserve it, right?

Once you start getting into the topics of 'deserve' and 'random smiths', the amount of bias in your comments pretty much guarantees that anything you are putting in on the matter is going to be slanted toward yourself-as-primary-benefactor. Honestly, it sounds like you're just miffed that someone who might play slightly less than you made something you haven't been able to.

Your mind ability is fairly low. You don't have clothcraft leveled, so obviously you don't have the mind to quality ability. Your alchemy isn't leveled, so obviously you don't have hand of the gods. These are all things that make HQ'ing nuggets incredibly easier and possibly things that these 'less deserving' smiths have gone out and done to make it easier to create the items you are saying they don't deserve.