o.O Overkill on the crafting Dumb down?

[Velo_Vandore]

I find this all really interesting, and can empathize with both sides of the argument! Quite recently, just before reading the proposed changes from the developers regarding crafting, I posted my own concerns with the current system, based on my experience as a beginner; level 10 gladiator interested in crafting my very first gear upgrades for myself:

Gulp... Bronze Gladius is HARD to make! Is this right? I need leatherworker r4, goldsmith r11, blacksmith r20!, and armorer r11. By the time I make this I don't know if a rank 6 sword will be any use . Why is the bronze gladius recipe blacksmith r6 when you need to be blacksmith r20 to make one of the components?

Perhaps I'm looking at this the wrong way. Should I be keeping all my crafting ranks 10 or so above my gladiator rank? Is crafting targeted at high level/endgame players? Will I need to just buy gear for my current level (10)? At what levels should you actually think about upgrading gear?

For anyone interested, VydarrTyr gave some very insightful responses (link to thread) which helped me understand the current choices available to new players.

My first reaction to the proposed updates (developers thread), was relief and satisfaction that I would now be able to create my own gear, without having to participate in overpriced trades at the market wards for gear. However, I've read a lot (not all, so many!) of the posts in this thread and share concerns about the changes being overkill.

The current system has great charm, and building a weapon from the ground up, with a realistic list of components/parts has great appeal, and would make the completed armour feel all the more special to me despite its rank and stats. Also, I can empathize with high level crafters who have put a lot of time into the current system, and feel their achievements will be smashed by the new recipes, and render their coveted skills obsolete.

I really feel that simple accessible recipes can be introduced without the need to change the current system at all, and I have started a new thread outlining my ideas! For me the perfect solution would be as follows:

• basic bog standard gear (minimal stats) available as levequest rewards (a COMPLETE set of gear should be attainable at each new levequest set (rank 1-10, rank 10-20, etc), through levequest rewards, and relevant to class based on levequest type)
  
• better (fair stats) gear available from simple recipes (recipes don't necessarily need to be free of parts but it is fundamental that the required rank to produce any part of this recipe be no more than 2 ranks above the equipable gears optimal rank)
  
• best gear (excellent stats) should be made available through difficult recipes (similar to the current recipes in the game). Completing these recipes will only be possible for the most dedicated Disciples of Hand, as completion of components/parts in the recipe may require various Disciples of Hand ranks to be 5 or 10 ranks above that of the final products optimal rank to wear.

Please read the complete thread here if you are interested. I would love to hear some responses.

Cheers,

Vel

[Arcell]

Refined materials would be too low a level to grind on. Can you imagine a level 25 blacksmith trying to grind to 26 on iron nuggets? Not gonna happen.

Finished items are also not an option for grinding, at least not a valid one. The shard and gil costs are far too high. It would bankrupt all but the most wealthy, who coincidentally are already at cap, hence the wealth.

It is those intermediary recipes that are the grind staples. Without them, things will be very rough indeed. Unless they have already anticipated that (one would hope) and have come up with a solution already. Maybe they have. Maybe they will tell us on Tues.

Finished items are also not an option for grinding currently. The shard and gil costs are far too high currently. Refined materials would be too low a level to grind on currently. Without them, things would be rough indeed currently.

Of course they've already anticipated this. If we can see it so clearly and so quickly, obviously the professional game developers who do this every day as their career would see it. When you work in game development you learn to look for the holes in systems before even thinking of implementing them. Yes sometimes things fall through the cracks and that's where the community perspective comes into play. Occasionally a different viewpoint was all they needed to see a apparently problem but something as basic as this would be extremely obvious to all of them.

Things are changing and I wouldn't be surprised to see them put something in place of the intermediary recipes we are losing in terms of SP gains. Currently the changes are worrisome but the system is changing.

Edit: Not to mention we don't even know much about the true details of the full system. It's hard to pass judgement on a system that we know so little about. Personally I'm trying to be optimistic and hope for the best but even I am just hoping at this point.

[Amineri]

Yoshida had a chance to speak about the large discussion that has been revolving around the recently announced changes to crafting.

I will be eagerly awaiting the update on Tuesday.

Making simplifications (removal of parts, sub-requirements, facility access, and training requirements) for low rank items makes the crafting far more accessible for those getting started in crafting. Following it with a gradual progression of increasing complexity and skill level required, allows to draw people in and slowly engage them.

As an analogy for the combat system, at rank 1 there are very few abilities. Abilities and complexity are very gradually added in, thus giving the player a chance to learn and grow into the ability to successfully play and enjoy the class. If a rank 1 battle class were instead given a dozen abilities and required to participate in complex party play in order to successfully advance, the learning curve could well be considered by many to be too steep. However, by the same token if the same simplified combat gameplay from rank 1 were extended all the way to rank 50, such gameplay would also likely be considered unrewarding.

[Xenor]

But you can. Go in the passive mode, change your equip and go back in the active mode. You only can't switch your weapon during battles, the rest (equip and skills) you can.

Yeah but this isn't viable because if a target is engaged changing gear will give you a debuff which will outweigh the benefits of switching to that piece.

[Seif]

Yoshida had a chance to speak about the large discussion that has been revolving around the recently announced changes to crafting.

I don't have anything against these changes but any word on fixing the actual gameplay of the crafting process?

[AJ_Anyia]

I have friends in XIV that love crafting and absolutely hated it in XI. The thing is though, that a lot of times we were put off by the sheer number of things that needed to be made/collected/stolen to make a simple piece of gear. That being said, alongside of XIV's shaky start, it still lacks a deep community so the one's that do like the system as it is at the moment aren't enough to keep the markets with enough gear. Either they're crafting for themselves, Linkshell members or are just plain repairing what's out there. With the way things are right now, repairs are the most common finalized gear related gil sink (in my humble opinion) in the game right now. Whether it's because things are too much of a headache to gather or craft the parts necessary. A great example, I gained 3 crafting levels making the materials I needed to make a single hat. I love crafting, love it. But sometimes I want to hit myself in the head with my skillet repeatedly when I see some of the requirements to make.... oh I don't know, a knife.

[Kamaru]

The Point is to let them know how people feel. You can complain abut the complaining all you want but it is the sole reason these forums were made.

I did not say not to complain, nor did I say if I agreed or disagreed with changes. My issues stemmed from the fact that there will be a time and place for this thread. You got the place right but not the timing since no one knows how these effects will play out. All we got is 600+ post with people arguing over their own hypothetical situations which is pointless (well maybe not pointless since now we are getting a letter from yoshi, but I for one would have rather he spent his time giving more details about other new content instead of throwing water on the forums). When the patch goes live and you are able to see the effects and present real data then you have a basis for your argument. At this time neither side has anything. As I stated the patch will go live regardless of how loud either side screams. Patches are apart of MMORPGs, you may not always agree with them but far more often then not it ends up not being as bad players thought. The trick is to roll with them and learn to work with the system. If a patch does end up being detrimental to game play then you construct arguments with data instead "I think" or "this sucks" arguments, however this rarely happens. So let the debate rage on, player a's opinion vs player b's opinion.

[Kailea_Nagisa]

I just realized this......... do people really think that they are going to make these changes, then not change SP gain and levels of other synths? Because if you do, then your mistaken.

[XxOstiaxX]

It's because of demand and supply. At launch, there were aplenty of hempen gears and cotton gears made by players and bazaared on the steps in Ul'dah. That lasts until almost everyone left playing move on quickly to next tiers, and the faster leveling curve couple with lower newbie entries don't help at all. You outgrow Hempen gears by matter of hours for DoW/DoM and few days for DoH/DoL, most people wouldn't bother to get them. As such there is almost no demand for it, and those few people who wanted it will find no such supply anymore.



Should we compare it to WoW? Really? Why are you still trolling over here? You said stuff it all in ZAM couple of months back and gone.

Why would you even compare it to WoW? NGE was an expansion, that changed the entire game, the changes to the crafting system are limited to that, just the crafting system, and not everybody hates it, just the people that like to press X for 3 hours etc etc.

[Wynn]

Why would you even compare it to WoW? NGE was an expansion, that changed the entire game, the changes to the crafting system are limited to that, just the crafting system, and not everybody hates it, just the people that like to press X for 3 hours etc etc.

You will still be pressing X for 3 hours. Removing parts doesn't change that