[dev1016] Redundant Raw Materials (or: Why Do I Need 12 Slots of Raw Iron?)

[Rentahamster]

Not everyone minds the "mess".

I do.

Redundant items is bad design. There are few positives, and a whole bunch of negatives.

[Lienn]

I like the way things are here...the variety made things not only better for grinding (just imagine how annoying would be having only one plank type, ine handle type, one swordgrip, etc for grinding purposes) but also made things more realistic. Not all kind of wood can be used to make bows, shafts or handles because some ar too "soft" or too flexible for certain purposes.

About iron materials, i'm sure they already have usage for them that will be exclusive of each kind (like alchemy making sulfur from limonites) so i'd rather wait and see what dev team has in theirs sleeves before asking the removal of these items.

[Ferth]

I'm sorry, but from a grinding perspective I fail to see how using the same exact recipe for making what is essentially the same exact thing is any less repetitive or any more enjoyable when you have the choice of making 8 different things that are all essentially the same thing.

and from an economy stand point it's downright brutal for grinding. Do I want to figure out which handles are going to sell the fastest? which ones will get me the most money? make a small variety of each one and hope? or do I just want to crank out handles secure in the knowledge that someone somewhere can use them for something?

[tymora]

Be interesting if the handles (for example) are interchangeable but give different equipment stats. Say Pine gives +1 control -1 craftsmanship...etc etc

[Winterclaw]

I really wish that FF14 and every other game would do something similar to what EVE did when it came to crafting materials.

1. Everything including the biggest stations and most advanced ships used the same materials. Granted some high end things used a special material or two, but they still all required a ton of the most basic items a day one newbie could gather. In fact in terms of money for time investment, when I left the game, titanium (most basic mat) was one of the more profitable things to go get for a non dedicated mining char. That means every starting the game can have a source of income and profit. Your level 1 miner can sell the same metals to a level 50 blacksmith that a level 50 miner can.

2. For FF14, get rid of all the extra materials. Don't have 10 different types of metal, have one metal (or iron and a precious metal at most). Don't have 15 types of leather. Have leather. Now I'm not against multiple sources, but in EVE, different sources of a material gave you different numbers of the final good. For example the easy source of metal gives you a few things per swing, an advanced one gives you 5-10 times the amount or something like that. A low level creature might give you 3 leather hides, a late game one might give you 20.

3. Dunno how it would be, but in EVE there are special detection skills that allow people to gather mats that aren't normally found in a certain area.

4. A node is only good for a few swings before you have to run off, I'd change that. In even you can gather from the same spot for hours... but if it's overgathered it'll start producing less. So places that aren't visited as often produce more mats (a good way to spread people out).

[tymora]

#1: Iron is already something like that. Armorer uses Iron till rank 50.

#2: Kind of boring.

#3: You already have that - Increases chance of rare materials gathered. Unfortunately, it kicks in randomly.

#4: Supposed to be an anti-bot feature. How well it works is another question though.

[Winterclaw]

You've misread my post. You mention iron, well it isn't the metal you start out working with, nor is it something a level 1 miner is probably going to mine. As for it being boring, I don't really care. A good economy which can involve everyone in the game is better. Plus every other game with a crafting system seems to do the do this metal and then do the same things in that metal scheme. So technically the current system is boring.

On the third thing, it would add nodes for you to harvest instead of increasing chances. Those nodes would be a little better than the average in that area. No comments on how anti botting works.

[alexi14]

I do see his point though in that it's a inventory nightmare. I run around on botanist for like 10 min, hop on fisherman, jump on miner.. My inventory is 100/100 slots and MOST of that is just 1 thing here, 1 thing there.. so few the are worth nothing, but so many DIFFERENT things, that I have no place to put them. Work just to throw them away or NPC them ><

[Reika]

I totally agree with the OP, and with the idea that there are just plain too many of some things in the game. If you want to talk realism.... BEHOLD, as i smelt these iron nuggets.... WITH A FILE! Summoning a forge in the middle of nowhere, which by the way you cannot SMELT with, filing at the speed of sound, generating enough heat from friction with my MND to melt said iron, then using said file to form them into nuggets totally magically!

As you can see..... you can throw the aim at realism out just because of that. Realism would be you placing the materials in the receptical that could actually make them, smelting being a smelter, to make the desired items. So no realism is in crafting besides the crazy amount of materials we have to tote around.

Be interesting if the handles (for example) are interchangeable but give different equipment stats. Say Pine gives +1 control -1 craftsmanship...etc etc

This is something they should do if they plan to have so many handles/grips/whatnot available.

[origamikitsune]

Hmm. This is a tough issue. I for one like the variety for its aesthetic appeal; I despise it for what it does to the inventory. I like the variety it adds to the economy; but its pointless since regardless of variety the market will always sway towards "highest gain" whether that highest gain is the most SP for the least effort or the most gil for the least effort. In the case of ore, sand limonite, that means choosing between 4, 5, or 6 items to make one set of nuggets. People lean towards the lesser, using the others only as they have them (at least, in terms of /purchasing/ it is frequently cheaper to buy the lesser quantity, though not always, that is how it trended when I was buying).

So really it comes down to what is more important? Space or variety? Personally, I think it would be nice to take the middle ground. Iron Sand and Iron Ore, nix the limonite.

Other alternatives include being able to mix and match the limonite, sand, and ore freely. Say, four ore makes twelve nuggets. Five sand makes twelve nuggets. Six ore and ore limonite and ore sand in an combination creates twelve nuggets (see what I did there?). Of course, this would require a dynamic, adaptive system to be truly efficient. With the current system of recipes, I suspect that would literally mean making a database entry for every combination of ore/sand/limonite. That's a lot of new recipes sure, but it is also making the system easier; "Use any of these in any combination" is much more newbie friendly than "Use this, that and that."

Another option is removing sand and limonite and moving iron to a system similar to cotton thread (which is used to make cotton or canvas simply by adding more thread to the base recipe.) So... Make iron ore available where sand and limonite currently are. Make 6x Ore = 12 nuggets say, a Rank 20 synth, make 5ore = 12 nuggets a Rank 30, make 4ore = 12 nuggets a Rank 40. Okay, so I pulled those numbers out of my arse; it is just an example. Properly balanced I think it has potential enough to be at least considered.

Just a few ideas to alleviate the inventory while still providing depth to the system (albeit in a different place).