Suggestions for future updates to the crafting system

Redwulf_ESO

I originally posted this in the Crafting section, but it may be more appropriate here, hope no one minds the double post.

I write this in hopes that we, as a community, can begin asking the direction ESO plans to take the crafting professions in future updates. I’ve always enjoyed the crafting systems in most of the games I’ve played, but have found that there does not seem to be a huge customer base in ESO; like I’m used to in other games. The largest customer base I seem to have, are the people I give away traits to for research. That just seems to re-affirm that there is a huge number of players looking to master the crafting lines. But if we all master the crafting lines, will we have any customers?

I believe there are 4 types of player’s when it comes to crafting:

1. Those who absolutely have no interest.
2. Those who primary interests in the game focus around PvP and PvE, but wish to be self-sufficient and never intend to sale the items they make.
3. Those who primary interests in the game focus around PvP and PvE, but still want to craft to make things for themselves and friends.
4. Those who primary focus is to be a crafter, intend to sale items to other players, and do some PvE and PvP.

Right now, I believe that the system benefits the player groups described in 2 and 3, but the 4th group that I fall squarely into, cannot really flourish. This is because the current system allows anyone to master the crafts, and make just about anything they want with minimal effort; enchanting being the only exception that does take effort to reach level 40. There is also the problem of the abundance of skill points, and players simply wanting to use them and crafting is the logical area to toss them in to. I have only met a couple of people that fall in to group 1, and that severely limits the number of customers out there.

I have no idea what ESO wanted out of the crafting system, and what their overall goal was when they created it. Hopefully, their intention was not to have everyone were they could craft everything they needed, like it is now; if so, then they might as well remove it from the game and just have NPC’s sale all the crafted stuff. However, if they intended that everyone could be self-sufficient, and then have a group that can make the higher end items, then we need to look at how to alter the current system to allow for this.

I believe that no matter how difficult, or easy, you make the crafting system that there can always be an overabundance of people doing it. Given that fact, neither making inspiration gain harder, or easier, will change this since people will always just grind their way through it.

What will set this 4th group apart from others? I think these are the long term time, and skill point, investments. So, one aspect that should not change is the time requirement of researching, and I understand that many of you will disagree with me on this. However, I do think that there is not enough of a reward once you’ve researched 8 traits, for the 4+ month time investment that is required. The second aspect should be a greater skill point investment, making it a tougher to manage allotments if they wish those characters to still be viable in PvE or PvP.

The following ideas are based on trying to satisfy three objectives:

1. That anyone should be able to craft and be self-sufficient.
2. Make master craftsmen sought after for items of greater power.
3. Trying to work within the boundaries of the current system, so a major overhaul is not needed.

I see this being done on a couple of different levels, mostly limited to adjusting the current passive level requirements and the addition of new passive abilities; as well as changing how inspiration is gained at varying levels. Most of these ideas are aimed at Blacksmithing, Clothing, and Woodworking but some can be used for the others.

• Adjust the level requirements for passives, like Metalworking, to be available at lower levels. So by the time they reach level 20, they can make all items up V12.
  1. This would allow players in groups 2 and 3, described above, to be able to make white items for their level, without the need to master the crafting line.
  2. This would also allow them to skill up crafting at the same speed they level.
  3. Inspiration gain to this level would become slightly easier to obtain.

• Add an additional passive, taking the idea from Enchanting and Provisioning, to all crafting lines for improvement; so you would then have a Tempering, Tannin, and Resin Improvement passive; adding one for Alchemy, granting the ability to make green, blue, purple and yellow potions.
  1. This passive would become available at level 10 opening up the ability to make green items, then blue at 30, purple at 40, and yellow at 50.
  2. Inspiration gain between levels 20 and 30 would be equal to what is currently required.
  3. Inspiration gained by deconstruction between levels 20-50 can only be received from player made items, and only from other accounts; NPC dropped items will no longer provide inspiration, but will provide materials.
  4. Inspiration gain between the improvement levels would become increasingly more difficult. The goal here is not to make it so easy that everyone does it, but creates a good time investment to reach level 50; similar to researching.

• Instead of sets being based solely on how many items you have researched, it should instead be based on a passive and how many items you have researched. This change would allow the players in the groups 2 and 3, described above, to make some basic sets without needing to reach higher crafting levels; the passive could be set to 5 points.
  1. At level 3, the first passive will unlock (no skill investment); Sets of (2) items can be crafted with no researched traits for all sets up to the current 6 trait sets.
  2. Between levels 26 and 34, passives open up for sets of 3, 4, and 5 for all sets up to the current 6 trait sets; requiring the current number of traits to be researched.
  3. At level 42, the next passive unlocks allowing the player to use the current 8 set stations.
  4. At level 50, the last passive unlocks to allow players to use the new stations that will be located in the new PvP zone; and hopefully will allow crafters to create PvP based sets.

• With the changes to how sets are crafted, we can now adjust Researching so that players can only begin researching at level 20.
  1. Adjustments to the passives, like Metallurgy, would then need to scale between levels 20 and 40.
  2. Additionally, a new Researching passive would be created allowing you to research up to 2 traits; additional passives would be available at levels 26, 30, and 34, each adding an additional 2 traits.

• Adjust the Hireling passive to levels 3, 25, 42. At level 3, the hireling should only bring appropriate materials. At level 25 they begin to bring items for improvement and at 42 come twice a day with an improved chance from higher level improvements. Hirelings should also be set to a 23h 45m, or 11h 45m timers.
• Add an additional passive for learning motifs, and can be based upon the same 4 skill point allocation that improvements are based on.
  1. White: Available to everyone.
  2. This passive would not become available until level 30 before opening up green motifs, blue at 36, purple at 42, and yellow at 50.

• Separate the skill lines in Blacksmith and Clothing. Blacksmiths would be divided in to Heavy Armorers and Weapon Smiths. Clothing would be divided in to Light Armorers and Medium Armorers.
  1. This would make all the research time divide evenly in to the proper groups.
  2. Splitting these up will introduce an additional skill point investment.

The above changes to the crafting skill lines would now benefit all types of players, allowing each to still do crafting if they choose to. The new changes would not only add in a higher degree of rarity for higher end items, but also adds in an additional skill point allocation that only more dedicated crafters would want to expand upon. I see these as a first step in improving the existing crafting system.

Additional steps could then be done to add additional skills, adding in even greater diversity and a greater player based economy.

• Merchant Skill Line:
  I see this as a new guild, and you acquire points based on your individual crafting levels. Passives are opened up based on how many learned passives you have in a crafting skill line, and each passive open grants 2 inspiration points. For example, if I have 40 passives learned in Heavy Armor, I will have gained 80 inspiration points towards the Merchant Guild, leveling me up to guild rank 2. Guild ranks open up passives like:
  1. Allow players to place more items up for sale on their guild store at any one time.
  2. Allows additional bank space to open up, restricted to crafting materials.
  3. Grants you the ability to choose what level materials you would like to receive from hirelings, instead of always just getting the highest.
  4. At the highest rank, the ability to purchase materials; like tempers, resins, and aspect runes.

• Grandmaster Line:
  I see these skill lines venturing in to the Veteran Rank, and adding on to passives for additional skill investment.
  1. Additional traits that can only be learned once reaching this level.
  2. New crafting stations that are introduced in to the game.
  3. New motifs that are introduced in to the game.

The next problem I see is how to fix the current influx of 50th level crafters, most of whom I imagine fall in to the player base of 2 or 3 stated above.

In Conclusion, with the additional skills added as outlined above, and splitting up some of the current crafting lines, I can see characters being solely dedicated to crafting. Currently it can take up to 24 skill points to master something like Blacksmithing, but adding in the 4 additional passives described above it could now take roughly 40 skill points; and instead of getting both weapons and armor, you now only get one or the other.

Using me as an example, I have roughly 220 skill points, and I would now need to dedicate roughly 180 of those to crafting, instead of the 66 I currently have invested to master the same lines. This may be a bit high, the skill allotments should not be such an investment that I cannot have some survivability when I’m out collecting resources; but I only need 5 skills and some passives to survive. If I choose to, I could even forgo the survivability and master all 8 crafts; this should remain possible for those more daring then I.

Doing a single, or even 3, crafting professions to mastery is still obtainable by those that fall in to either group 1 or 2. This new system just becomes harder for everyone to do everything, unless they make several alts and level them up enough to get 40+ skill points to invest. Doing this however, would affect future enhancements with a Merchants Guild since they would not be high enough level to gain many of the benefits.

For those choosing not to master it, but just be self-sufficient, the cost should be about the same as what it is now. However, if they want higher end gear, they’ll actually need to seek out a master craftsman.

I did not delve in to Alchemy, Enchanting, or Provisioning to much. But briefly, Alchemy should be adjusted to grant the ability to make green, blue, purple and yellow potions, along with being able to create poisons that can be applied to melee weapons. Enchanting overall seems fine to me, everything you should be able to make is available, and has limited item placement to prevent OP; though I think they need to add in Jewelry Crafting so we have something to do with all those jewelry enchantments.They are in the process of revamping provisioning, I'm looking forward to hearing more about that.

I know I cannot anticipate everyone’s view point, this is simply my idea of a system I would want to play based on staying within the boundaries of the current system.

Thank you for taking the time to read this, and I look forward to seeing others opinions and where ESO plans to take crafting in the future.

- Red

AlyennahsCrafting

I've been thinking about improvements to crafting as well, but I'm not sure it is necessary to make all the changes above. If I understand correctly, your aim is to allow any player to make any item without too much difficulty, but to make it difficult to make certain items so that there will be something to do for veteran crafters, something only they can do. I do not think it is needed to make crafting up to level 50 that much harder, I already find it quite a grind as it is, especially the 4-month it takes to research every trait of an item.

I was much more thinking along the line of what you call the Grandmaster line. My proposal would be to simply force players to specialize at a certain point. For instance, once you have all 8 heavy armour traits, you can become a Master Armourer, allowing you to make armour of better quality (quite simply: higher armour rating, with a better efficiency in using materials) and at least one or preferably several, unique crafted sets that can only be made by a Master Armourer. Or, once you hit 8 traits on both swords and greatswords, you can become a Master Swordsmith, allowing you to make swords of superior quality. But most importantly, you can't do both with the same character! With additional specialization options for making daggers, etc, if you still wanted to make all possible items as a master craftsman, you would need to turn each and everyone of your characters into a crafter, which I'm sure not very many people will do. This would lead to less competition, hence hopefully lucrative sales. For woodworking, you could think of specialization into Master Bowyer or Master Fletcher (allowing you to make special ammunition for bows), plus master craftsman options for each various type of staff and for shields. As a clothier, you could make either master level light armour or medium armour, but not both. I'm also thinking that to achieve that master level, you would need to apprentice. In Skyrim there were a few NPC's that would put you through some training to allow you to become a better bowman, for instance, so something like that. You would get a new skill line, gain experience in it and finally earn a skillpoint in order to choose your specialization, with bonuses. (BTW, I've noticed that it isn't always visible who made what item and think that for any crafting item that should be always visible, even if just so people can say, hey, I like that item, I want one too and now I know someone I can ask to make one for me)

The advantage of this is that no overhaul of the current system would be needed, it would just fit on top of the current system, allowing everyone to craft at least regular versions of any item by themselves, but allowing crafters do put in the time and really master their trade. As a crafter, I would enjoy doing those assignments and would be very happy to be able to make stuff most other people won't be able to supply.

I do agree that the ability to craft and improve jewelry should be added soon. I've understood this will be in an upcoming expansion, hopefully with new set items, but there is no ETA afaik. It seems pretty much essential as I for one am getting tired of trying to find level appropriate items for my characters, never mind set items, which are almost impossible to find, although this is mostly a trading problem.

While on the subject of trading, I think that is a whole separate issue, but I've made some recommendations in another thread. In any case, more trading slots in a single guild will not really adress the issue, as that is that you can't meet the client directly, see my proposal at the above link.

Also, hirelings automatically giving you level appropriate materials won't work, as that would seem to mean that you would never get the low level stuff once leveled up, but that you would be swimming in dreugh wax (eww!) and the like, which are still fairly lucrative to sell and would therefore probably just be sold.

More bank space would be terrific, I am swimming in materials now and all my non-crafting alts are starting to feel like pack animals.

Finally, one more thing that I think should be mentioned: dyes. As it stands now, everyone needs to play the whole game in order to be able to use every dye available, just so they can dye their own armour the way they want it. That not only eliminates the option for crafters to compete on being able to deliver items with certain dyes, but also forces everyone to play certain content just in order to be able to use a certain dye, while in the mean time being forced to wear items in colours that they just don't like, without any alternative available to them. I would much rather be able to learn a certain dye through deconstructing an item, created by someone who has the appropriate dye, or at least to be able to sell items with certain dyes after putting in the time to get the relevant achievements, allowing other people to buy stuff that doesn't make their eyes bleed. Imho it is only logical that if dyes are tied to achievements, that more of them should be tied to crafting, but that crafters should be able to sell items which are dyed. With the current system, I'm sure many people won't have access to certain dyes that they want, even though this is an RPG and people should be able to play their character the way they want to. If they decide purple is the last colour their character would wear, they shouldn't be forced to wear anything that colour.

Redwulf_ESO

Adrah, thank you for your feedback and I like the ideas you had on the grandmaster line for specialties; although I do not think they should be limited to a single character. I think if a character has enough skill points, they should be able to specialize in as many different areas as they can.

I guess I was not clear enough in saying that I do not think it needs to be any more difficult then it currently is, and that a major over-haul would not be required to implement what I’ve outlined.

I was actually trying to say in some ways make it easier for folks that want to be self-sufficient, allowing everyone to be able to make up to V12 green items, and 2 piece sets, by craft level 20. After that, the inspiration needed would roughly be the same as it is now; with the exception that more skill points will need to be invested.

So for the majority of people they could stop at level 20 and could can make pieces themselves as needed while leveling, and have the following passives; using Woodworking as an example:

• Passive Abilities (costs up to 14 skill points)
  1. Woodworking IX; allows use of Sanded Nightwood
  2. Keen Eye: Wood I-III
  3. Lumberjack Hireling I
  4. Resin Improvement I; allows use of Standard (green) resins
  5. Set Creation I; allows the use of 6 trait crafting stations, and the creation of 2 set pieces.
  6. Motif Research I; allows use of Common (white) Motif Books for Woodworking

Right now, every level 50 (craftsman) can apply any motif (that they have the book for), make up to legendary items, create any set that they have researched and they only need to spend 9-12 skill points to achieve this.

With the changes I proposed, it would be a significant increase to skill points to achieve the same thing, in-turn making people less likely to be able to make everything; and crafting becomes more specialized.

So, for those wishing to become 50th level, it’s no harder (leveling wise) then it is now, but will need have the following passives to achieve what I listed above; using Woodworking as an example:

• Passive Abilities (costs up to 41 skill points)
  1. Woodworking IX; allows use of Sanded Nightwood
  2. Keen Eye: Wood I-III
  3. Lumberjack Hireling I-III
  4. Resin Improvement IV; allows use of Legendary (yellow) resins
  5. Set Creation V; allows the use of 8 trait crafting stations, and the creation of 6 set pieces.
  6. Motif Research IV; allows use of Legendary (yellow) Motif Books for Woodworking
  7. Research Expertise IV; allows research of up to 8 traits in Woodworking
  8. Wood Extraction III
  9. Carpentry III
  10. Resign Expertise III

Of course, these passives can be played with to make it more realistic for people to be able have a single character to do any number of crafting they want, but still hard enough to make “mastering” all of them difficult, and at the cost of being able to have any combat skills.

- Red

LonePirate

I am pretty simple with my wish list. I would like:

-- an additional skill to research four items at once with a 30% time reduction
-- another skill level that increases the extraction rate of materials and improvement items
-- another skill that reduces the improvement chances to require 1 green/2 blue/3 purple/6 gold for 100%
-- more Woodworking items like spears and crossbows, for instance
-- new hireling emails to replace the repeated final email that is currently sent
-- more motifs
-- alternate the two a day provisioning hireling emails so that one email a day contains beverage mats and one contains food mats (instead of the higher number of beverage mats I receive now)
-- allow mats and improvement items to stack to 1000
-- greatly improve the 2, 3, 4 and 5 piece bonuses for the crafted sets that require 8 traits
-- implement an 8 piece set bonus for the 8 trait crafted sets that is truly outstanding
-- add crafting stations that create PVP specific gear

Woogawoman

I would love it if there were a real benefit to researching all traits on all items. Today, anyone can get a full set of 8-trait armor by getting individual pieces from individual crafters. There's no real reward for being able to make the whole set yourself.

Perhaps they could add crafted sets that only work if all items were created by the same character? Imagine an 8-trait set with that requirement - a much smaller percentage of players would have put in the time and effort to get through all that research.

On a different note, I think it would also be interesting if there were sets where you had to have multiple, specific traits researched per item in order to create the items. That wouldn't alter how crafting skill gains etc. work now, but I would find it very interesting and thematic.

For example: Death's Wind - which primarily adds Armor and Max Health - could require Impenetrable and Infused (or other). (I am not suggesting any of the existing sets be changed, but I wanted to give a tangible example.)

Which leads to my last idea, which is to add new traits that are actually a combination of other traits. So a specific item would still only have one trait on it, but some new traits would be added that you could only apply by using multiple gemstones. There could be two trait combos, three trait combos, etc. That would certainly reward dedicated crafters.

Redwulf_ESO

@LonePirate,
Most of your ideas I could see as perks in what I described in the Merchants Guild.

For the provisioning, pvp crafted sets, additional motifs points; its been announced that all of these are currently in the works.

@Woogawoman,
I could not agree more that for the 4+ months it takes to research 5 items up to 8 traits, there should be some really nice bonus if it's made by the same character.

I really like the Death's Wind example, but that might be a big overhaul and my goal was to keep things within the boundaries of what they currently have.

But how about a simple % set bonus to all stats, think of it as the same stats increase as if the armor were V14, if all the pieces are made by the same person. The bonus would not work if you had a 5 piece set made by two people, even though if you just used 3 pieces created by one person you would; and you could add the 4th and 5th as they get them for the full 5 set. That would make people seek out those who can make multiple pieces of a set, and also have customers return to you as you learn more.

Another idea is to also apply those same bonuses to lower set items, like Death's Wind that only requires 2 traits, but if an 8 trait character makes it then the bonus will apply. This one I'm unsure of, because then only 8 trait craftsmen would get the work, making it unfair to those just starting out. Maybe once you have 1 more trait learned then the required minimum you can get the set bonus.

Even with this, I still think the sets need to be altered again to scale the bonuses based on how many traits it takes to make. Having the same 118 Max Health bonus on both a 2 trait, and 8 trait (2) item set does not seem right to me.

But, I guess it's all about the 5 piece set bonuses in the end so you can mix and match as needed. I just think the bonuses need to be moved around, or re-thought about, or perhaps they just need to rethink how these bonus work for research.

Maybe you just can get a list of "selectable" 5 piece bonuses to apply instead of just one as you scale up. So if I'm at 2 trait station, I only have a single 5 set bonus to choose from. But as I get up to 8 traits, now I have many more options to choose from; some of those can be bonuses from currently dropped only.

- Red

LonePirate

I would fully support adding a bonus to the 5 piece bonuses that would only apply only to the person who crafted the pieces. This would reward those people who invested the time and effort into collecting and researching multiple traits. Something like a 1% increase to all stats or even a single stat would be a worthy incentive.

Woogawoman

That's actually two different (but related) ideas on the bonus:

• Anyone gets a bonus if they are wearing a set that was all crafted by the same character (my original idea)
• Only the person who crafted the set gets the bonus (LonePirate's idea)

The second one is really a more specific application of the first rule. I think following the first one would do a better job of building a crafting economy.

Wyld

I would not go for the 5 piece bonus for those that crafted the set for 2 reasons.
1) This would require Every player that wishes to be top gear competitive to do their own crafting.
2) This would not be good for a healthy economy, due to reason 1. No reason for a crafter to sell if everyone makes their own gear.

Redwulf_ESO

I think that point on the 5 piece bonus has been misunderstood.

Lets say I was looking for a 5 piece set, and I go to Wyld and he makes all 5 pieces for me. Now, that set gets a bonus since it was made by the same crafter; no matter who is wearing it.

However, if I had to go to Wyld and Woogawoman to get that same 5 peice set, I would no longer receive a bonus to that set since I had to get it from multiple crafters.

Wyld and Woogawoman, I completely agree and the whole point to this was for folks to get a bonus from crafters that have put the time in to researching, especially 8 traits, instead of being able to go to 5 different crafters and get the same thing.

So this thread is all about trying to have a sub-set of crafters out there that people will seek out for the best player made gear, while still allowing others to craft gear equal to drops, and everyone else the ability to craft decent gear to offset an items they are missing.

I think crafters that can make 8 trait Legendary quality armor, should be as rare as folks that can become Emperor. The time investment to research is dead on IMO. Now I just think it should take more skill points so someone that's invested 8 skill points and time, is not equal to others that invest 24 skill points and time; as far as making the same items, not other passive bonuses that do not effect what can be made.

- Red

rpweed

This is kind of a solution without a problem. Why would we (more specifically, I) want to forego the freedom to not specialize for one in which a handful of individuals can dictate the rate, quality, and/or cost of my own character's progression; even if, in turn I can dictate the same to others?

Woogawoman

I'm afraid I don't follow what you are saying. If the rule is that you get a bonus if your set was crafted by the same person, that could certainly include crafted by you. Since I assume you'd be the same person the whole time.

LonePirate

Woogawoman wrote: »

I'm afraid I don't follow what you are saying. If the rule is that you get a bonus if your set was crafted by the same person, that could certainly include crafted by you. Since I assume you'd be the same person the whole time.

While I am personally not opposed to a set bonus for gear crafted by the same person, I prefer a gear bonus that applies only to the crafter so that people have an incentive to craft and dedicated crafters are rewarded for their work. These bonuses do not need to be significant; but something is needed. A 1% bonus to Max Health per piece is small enough not to be game breaking (in PVP) but it is enough to be noticeable by the player using the gear.

duncan_cougarpreeb18_ESO

While this one agrees with several of the above ideas and suggestions, requiring even more skill points would be a real pain for those who fall more into category 3 than 4, that is those who would still like to also do some PvE and/or PvP and do some quality level crafting (for more than on skill)

For this reason, a still attractive but possibly simpler proposal to make researching all those 8 traits (and for all items of a given profession) worthwhile not just to the crafter but also to the rest of Tamriel.

1. Every item that you crafted yourself and for which you know all 8 traits can be increased in its level. This also applies to those given / sold to others.

With this e.g. an item with improved quality can be upgraded from level X to X+1.

To make this not overpowered this should have a cost attached, e.g. the difference in basic materials and only one temper of each respective quality.

To go from VR1 (fine) to VR2 (fine) that would be only one extra material and one fine temper.

To go from VR3 (epic) to VR4 (epic) that would be all the required base materials for VR4 but only one fine, one superior and one epic temper etc.

Obviously those only applies to those items you made yourself and have all traits researched. And since the name of the crafter is engraved in each crafted item, those who want to have cheap upgrades, have to go back to their crafters.

The later creating a steady business for those, while spending the time and effort to get all those 8 traits items for research worthwhile (already for a single item)

2. When having all 8 traits researched for a whole group of items, like for all light or all medium or all heavy armor or all metal weapons or bow, (cross-bow?), shield, respectively all staffs you can improve any item of that group for one temper less than normally required, having mastered the whole group.

By that master crafters would require 1 fine, 2 superior, 3 epic and only 4 legendary tempers for 100% success rate (with fully developed skill line here), instead of the 2, 3, 4 and 5 tempers currently required for a new item

Again distinguishing the dedicated crafters from the casual one, creating a business for improving items.

Combining 1 and 2 might be overpowered, but sure would make researching as many traits as possible for as many items as feasible that much more worthwhile.

Another option (to be discussed) could be instead of just one temper for each as in point 1. above, also one less than normally required.
In that case, the later example would require then 0 fine, 1 superior, 2 epic and only 3 legendary tempers for 100% success rate, which would be better than now, but still not that attractive / viable for full time crafters.

3. In addition to this - and actually quite a separate topic - instead of having three identical crafting station in each alliance providing the same crafted sets, make it so that when entering the other alliances as part of the Veteran quest Cadwell's Silver and Gold, those actually become either
- improved versions of that sort of set or
- crafting stations of sets currently only available as looted / dropped set items
- or something completely new.
requiring one more trait, respectively two more traits to be researched than for the original set. So a 2 traits required in your starting zone would become a 3 traits required in your first veteran level alliance zone and a 4 level in the one after that. For 6 trait sets it would be then 7, respectively 8 traits required.

4. Add crafting stations with boni for PvP in the PvP areas. Make those directly inside the gates of each alliance requiring only 2 or 3 traits.
And in addition add higher trait number ( 6, 6 (7?) and 8 ) crafting stations to the outposts as <hint>there would be some room for that there at the side of the front room opposite of the transitus shrine </hint>, with those boni only available if that outpost is
a) connected to your alliance transitus network and/or
b) better boni at those outposts that are further away from your home area,
c) and/or requiring that your alliance controls 2, respectively 3 of the outposts.
This would also help in making controlling these a point of higher interest for AvA.

LonePirate

duncan_cougarpreeb18_ESO wrote: »

3. In addition to this - and actually quite a separate topic - instead of having three identical crafting station in each alliance providing the same crafted sets, make it so that when entering the other alliances as part of the Veteran quest Cadwell's Silver and Gold, those actually become either
- improved versions of that sort of set or
- crafting stations of sets currently only available as looted / dropped set items
- or something completely new.
requiring one more trait, respectively two more traits to be researched than for the original set. So a 2 traits required in your starting zone would become a 3 traits required in your first veteran level alliance zone and a 4 level in the one after that. For 6 trait sets it would be then 7, respectively 8 traits required.

4. Add crafting stations with boni for PvP in the PvP areas. Make those directly inside the gates of each alliance requiring only 2 or 3 traits.
And in addition add higher trait number ( 6, 6 (7?) and 8 ) crafting stations to the outposts as <hint>there would be some room for that there at the side of the front room opposite of the transitus shrine </hint>, with those boni only available if that outpost is
a) connected to your alliance transitus network and/or
b) better boni at those outposts that are further away from your home area,
c) and/or requiring that your alliance controls 2, respectively 3 of the outposts.
This would also help in making controlling these a point of higher interest for AvA.

I love the idea of improving or changing the crafting stations in the veteran zones. That certainly would be an extra incentive or reward for VR players.

As for PVP stations in Cyrodiil, I have a strong suspicion that the Imperial City will contain a crafting station or two. It's too bad we won't know for certain for another couple of months at the earliest.

Redwulf_ESO

rpweed wrote: »

This is kind of a solution without a problem. Why would we (more specifically, I) want to forego the freedom to not specialize for one in which a handful of individuals can dictate the rate, quality, and/or cost of my own character's progression; even if, in turn I can dictate the same to others?

No one is saying you cannot specialize, you can specialize in anything you want. I was just saying that (time investment being equal) someone investing 8 skill points in a craft, should not be able to make the same quality, level, motif, and set bonus as someone with 24 points invested; as it is now.

duncan_cougarpreeb18_ESO wrote: »

While this one agrees with several of the above ideas and suggestions, requiring even more skill points would be a real pain for those who fall more into category 3 than 4, that is those who would still like to also do some PvE and/or PvP and do some quality level crafting (for more than on skill)

Yes, and that is kinda the point I was making. For you, you want a well rounded character (more category 3) and even though the skill points are higher, you could still easily master 2-3 skill lines and have enough points left over for PvP and PvE. However, you could no longer master all the lines unless you were dedicated to crafting, and forgo (at least on that character) PvP and PvE.

Duncan, I do really like your ideas on the Vet Area crafting stations. Also, they are planning on new crafting stations, it was mentioned in that hour long video at QuakeCon (I think), in Imperial City and I imagine it would be more PvP based sets; they also mentioned new Motifs would be added too.

Perhaps, with the introduction of the Champion System, they may introduce some way for us to distinguish ourselves from others beyond just research; if additional skill investment is not the answer.

- Red

duncan_cougarpreeb18_ESO

As already stated, there are some very good ideas in the above (not going to quote all).

Right now every merchant (even chefs) can repair every piece of hardware, any style, any level without any crafting station in sight.

Let's introduce a repair skill (1- 4 skill points) that unlocks when you crafted your first 6 trait item and let's you do basic repairs merchant style (base materials only though). This one would put the level at 6 traits, so that even casual crafters and those starting with crafting, can have some early on success with this, as - less if you are dedicated to crafting - 6 traits can be researched in about a week, more if you are casual about it and do research only now and then. But in that case you can still go to one of the merchants or a crafter.

Once the skill line is unlocked you can start putting skill points in it if so desired and have reached the required proficiency

The next level unlocks when you have mastered a craft at 50. Once you spend a skill point you can then repair/improve items to a permanent 0.5% bonus for each trait (known at that time) for that particular item permanently (so these can be sold) on all stats for that item (damage/armor, trait special).
If a new traits is known items can be improved further, but requiring again the materials needed for a repair. Those are the base materials for said item in a number appropriate for the state of repair (but always at least one)

The following level unlocks when you have mastered 8 traits for any of the items in that (sub)line. Now you can repair/improve item those 8 items with an added 1% bonus on all stats for that item for each trait known for that particular item.

So let's say you know 8 traits for axe, but only 6 traits for hammer.
The axe could would have a bonus of 5% instead of the 4% without this, while the hammer would still have 'only' 3%.

The final level unlocks when you have mastered 8 traits everywhere in that (sub)line. Now you can repair/improve an item with a 1% bonus on all stats for that item for each trait known for that particular item and 2% bonus for mastering all, netting you a 10% bonus total.

The sub-lines here would be weapons and heavy armor for blacksmithing, light and medium armor for clothing and bow/shield (possibly cross bow?) and staffs for woodworking (that one needs better balance, maybe place siege weapons here?).

This would make crafted armor - when made by a master - best of its class or at least a serious contender for some of the rare dropped items.

And while I am at it, in the client panel for crafting at the clothing station, please introduce an icon for light and one for medium armor (maybe one full white and the other just the outline?).

SBR_QuorTek

Only a few things need to he switched around, alchemy gathering of materials!

The gathering of flowers and the likes system is excelent though, but dropping 1 columbine per node or whichever else is rather silly when it should be more like 3-4 per node, I have a good reason for this... anything alchemy made is instant use.

Provisioning... it is silly you only can find the food in crates and places like that, instead make it a forage system and let us use mills and the likes to eg. create flour and more... use same drop rate as with usual provisioning system, due to that these buffs last up to 2hours.

Redwulf_ESO

@duncan_cougarpreeb18_ESO
I like the idea of the skill line for repairs, but I think improving items on repair would be a bit overkill. I think just simply being able to repair something would be all that's needed. Perhaps you could only repair styles you have learned as well.

@SBR_QuorTek
I agree about the gathering of flowers, it would be nice to get a little more out of those. They are doing a complete revamp of provisioning and stated that ingredients will be found in places that make more since.

duncan_cougarpreeb18_ESO

Redwulf_ESO wrote: »

@duncan_cougarpreeb18_ESO
I like the idea of the skill line for repairs, but I think improving items on repair would be a bit overkill. I think just simply being able to repair something would be all that's needed. Perhaps you could only repair styles you have learned as well.

Well at some point in time between now and the Oblivion crisis, expert armorers learned to not only repair, but improve items ... Just saying ;-)
(and to even higher values, well that's progress to look forward to, yes?)

Redwulf_ESO wrote: »

@duncan_cougarpreeb18_ESO
Perhaps you could only repair styles you have learned as well.

and that goes without saying

Gyudan

Enclosed is a screenshot of my current researchs ongoing with 4 characters, as I believe few others have reached similar levels and it may bring something to the discussion.
I strongly agree with OP regarding how easy is currently is to have access to the most commonly used crafted sets and the complete lack of crafting economy. I hope Zenimax takes some of the suggestions posted above into account and makes crafter a valid career path in the game.

One idea is off limits in my opinion though: repairing should not be linked to crafting, anyone should be able to repair his gear easily, as it is currently the case.