Lessons from red scrips for 3.3

[RiceisNice]

I love crafting in 2.xx as many of us did. I found the whole thing enjoyable, even the grinding of the jobs there is enough options and things to learn, cross classes to get etc that kept me entertained.

Gathering (miner / botany) is quite literarily "go here press x 4 times repeat", it has no cross class skills beyond Ward abilities and it's Leve quests give somewhat garbage exp. It's a painful system that could do with a re work.

However like some people have stated Fishing is the anomaly to this rule (at least for some people) and i find it super relaxing.

I more or less agree with this. With Botanity/Mining, until you get to the unspoiled nodes, it requires your full attention which can get repetitive. Favors only exasperates this problem by adding a layer of RNG and the time window to it (5 minutes, formerly 15, which i still want to smack the developers for somehow thinking it's a good idea). It's not a very good framework to work with, espesically when it starts demanding items in large bulk or a lot of items across the board (which 3.x really hit it with, big time)

[Ashkendor]

I more or less agree with this. With Botanity/Mining, until you get to the unspoiled nodes, it requires your full attention which can get repetitive. Favors only exasperates this problem by adding a layer of RNG and the time window to it (5 minutes, formerly 15, which i still want to smack the developers for somehow thinking it's a good idea). It's not a very good framework to work with, espesically when it starts demanding items in large bulk or a lot of items across the board (which 3.x really hit it with, big time)

Yeah... our ingots/nuggets went from requiring 3 ore to requiring 5, leather went from 1 skin to 3, and lumber went from requiring 3 logs to 5 (those two still make absolutely no sense to me whatsoever, lol). It's pretty obnoxious imo. x_x

[Roth_Trailfinder]

Gathering items for the recipes is a good thing. Gather Aurum Regis Ore to go with the Raziqcoat and the other stuff to make the Aurum Regis Ingot.

Doing Favors to gather the items, with an unhealthy dose of RNG, to hand in for other materials to make that Aurum Regis Ingot is entirely too tedious and boring. Cutting the total time for each Favor from 15 minutes to 5 minutes, while increasing the concealed node pop rate by 200% (not by the 300% the English patch notes said) was a step in the right direction. Reducing each one to about 90 seconds, while guaranteeing a concealed node after each depleted node, would be better. Simply buying a set of 20 Red Ooids or Void Nuts or w/e for a Red Gathering Token would be the best thing they could do.

Yeah... our ingots/nuggets went from requiring 3 ore to requiring 5, leather went from 1 skin to 3, and lumber went from requiring 3 logs to 5 (those two still make absolutely no sense to me whatsoever, lol). It's pretty obnoxious imo. x_x

Those increases are why I pay for the extra retainers. 2 Mining retainers get me plenty of ores and whatnot. 2 Botany retainers sometimes feel like overkill, but are quite valuable. 3 combat retainers are there just to match the overall intake of the two miners or the two botanists, use-wise. And the last one is a token Fisherman. He usually goes on Quick Ventures rather than targeted ventures though.

[Katchoo]

Yeah... our ingots/nuggets went from requiring 3 ore to requiring 5, leather went from 1 skin to 3, and lumber went from requiring 3 logs to 5 (those two still make absolutely no sense to me whatsoever, lol). It's pretty obnoxious imo. x_x

This is probably one of the MOST infuriating things with crafting in HW and it's completely contradicts the changes they made in 2.xx in regards to things like Fleece drop rates etc.

[Ashkendor]

Those increases are why I pay for the extra retainers. 2 Mining retainers get me plenty of ores and whatnot. 2 Botany retainers sometimes feel like overkill, but are quite valuable. 3 combat retainers are there just to match the overall intake of the two miners or the two botanists, use-wise. And the last one is a token Fisherman. He usually goes on Quick Ventures rather than targeted ventures though.

Yeah same here. I work my retainers like crazy lol. 2 miners, 1 botanist, 1 fisher, and 3 DoW atm. Fisher is valuable for getting Rock Mussels, which are otherwise kind of time consuming to fish. I really wish it could catch more useful stuff, though. Mogpoms are ok and there's a couple others but a lot of it is utterly useless. I'm seriously considering another botanist as my 8th.

[Welsper59]

I more or less agree with this. With Botanity/Mining, until you get to the unspoiled nodes, it requires your full attention which can get repetitive. Favors only exasperates this problem by adding a layer of RNG and the time window to it (5 minutes, formerly 15, which i still want to smack the developers for somehow thinking it's a good idea). It's not a very good framework to work with, espesically when it starts demanding items in large bulk or a lot of items across the board (which 3.x really hit it with, big time)

While I agree with what you said and most of the person you quoted, I'd like to emphasize that your mentioning of repetition is the name of the game with crafting and gathering. They're not intended to be really in-depth activities in MMORPGs, unless that was part of the games entire point. I think SWG was the only game to truly market crafters and such as full-fledged roles, despite standard craft functions and play, but it was a very different time and different player mentality back then. It was very much a role aiming for RP type of players. Well 1.0 did too, but that REALLY fell flat before it could even give an honest try lol.

1.0 had a rather in-depth RNG style of gathering, instead of the standard mindless action/click style. The only thing is, given how often a "full-time" gatherer tends to do the activity, I'd imagine it'll be a far greater negative in the long-run for everyone. For anyone wondering about that, just go to the Gold Saucer and try the mining and botany mini-games. Now imagine doing that for an hour or more at a time, then apply that to doing it everyday or however often you would log on to gather as said "full-time" gatherer. At some point, we would all hit that "I don't want to think anymore" state of mind.

Some people might like it regardless, but it really is one of those "simple is better" type of decisions. Crafting and gathering is generally an afterthought in MMORPGs, not just for devs but for players as well. Most of us have it in our minds that it should be simple and straightforward because of the fact that we're expecting a need to have repetition for a very long time to gather/craft what we want. Personally, crafting and gathering are huge, and sometimes sole, reasons why I play the genre. I just try not to delude myself into thinking a large portion of the playerbase feels the same, otherwise that'd just be illogical lol.

[FoxyAreku]

Favors are indeed stupid. Especially since you have to give up gearing your gatherers to do them enough to gear your crafters.... :/

I have no problem with red scrips as they are though. Way easier and less expensive than the synths for 2.0 master books were.

[RiceisNice]

While I agree with what you said and most of the person you quoted, I'd like to emphasize that your mentioning of repetition is the name of the game with crafting and gathering. They're not intended to be really in-depth activities in MMORPGs, unless that was part of the games entire point. I think SWG was the only game to truly market crafters and such as full-fledged roles, despite standard craft functions and play, but it was a very different time and different player mentality back then. It was very much a role aiming for RP type of players. Well 1.0 did too, but that REALLY fell flat before it could even give an honest try lol.

It's something that needs to be kept in check. Doing it for 5-15 minutes at a time is outrageous, especially if you can't break inbetween or otherwise do other tasks. In the case of the increased requirements for crafts, you have to gather so much more to make a single craft, which is required for at least 2 other crafting classes. For example, mythrite nugget; a single node only has 4 hits, but you need 5 sands for a single craft. You'd also need a myhtril ore from 2.0 gathering. Mythrite ingot, you need 1 of the said nugget and 4 mythrite ore, where it's a hidden item on a node that isn't shared with mythrite sand. Repeat that for titanium. augum regis and hardsilver.

Favors are a beast of it's own where you need to commit to those 5/15 minutes for the entirty of it. That leaves DFing not an option because you;d want to make the most out of the favors too. You'd have to gather 10 of each item (which was a minimum of 10/30 minutes, assuming you were lucky enough to get 10 items in one favor) to make one/three material craft, and the finished crafts required anywhere from 1 to 5 of those materials. It's become a gigantic and convoluted time sink, and I don't think no one can find it fun to stare at the screen for 5-15 minutes at a time to gather items.

[Ashkendor]

For example, mythrite nugget; a single node only has 4 hits, but you need 5 sands for a single craft. You'd also need a myhtril ore from 2.0 gathering. Mythrite ingot, you need 1 of the said nugget and 4 mythrite ore, where it's a hidden item on a node that isn't shared with mythrite sand. Repeat that for titanium. augum regis and hardsilver.

This is precisely why I just buy nuggets from the Vath vendor now. xD

[StouterTaru]

If your replacing one form of entertainment with another because the the original content is too tedious then there is definitely something wrong with the content. And while certainly content gets repetitive over time isn't that why we pay the monthly fee? To get incremental updates to keep things fresh?

If your enhancing your enjoyment of content with entertainment from another source, fishing as an example, then that seems perfectly reasonable to me.

You're still projecting your own expectations of the game onto everyone else. Not everyone wants to ride the roller coasters non-stop the entire time they are at the theme park. Some people enjoy spending some time relaxing and watching the country bear jamboree.