Why crafted items should retain a +1 stat level bonus...

syko809

Robbmrp wrote: »

So much for the original statement "Crafters will be able to make the best items in the game" or however it was worded. Yet again crafters get the shaft on this and are losing out to dropped gear.

@ZOS_GinaBruno, @ZOS_JessicaFolsom what's the point in ESO crafting and researching traits if people can only get the best gear from drops? So a crafter can improve those, so what. It's easy for someone to go from 1-50 in crafting. Then all they need is 3-4 skill points for the decreased improvement costs and they can upgrade their own gear. This is a complete waste of time to research traits that won't be needed because dropped items are better.

Why should anyone new to the game actually research items based on this? There's no reason to at all....

I already have 8 traits for heavy and a lotfor medium to light and I started playing when it came out for councel sooo how exactly is this takingyou 6 months again

AGAIN EVERYTHING IN THE GAME REQUIRES YOU TO PUT TIME AND EFFORT INTO IT AND IF YOU DONT YOU ARENT GONNA GET ANYWHERE FAST

khor5581rwb17_ESO

They should make some item for crafting only drop in dungeon, and craft set have a better gear then dungeon gear. This will make both win win situation. You need to pay to buy the craft material if you dont like to play dungeon. If you want best gear, you can spend time to craft yourself a set or pay someone to do the job and you supply the material

lolo_01b16_ESO

DDuke wrote: »

Oh, because crafting (or having someone else craft) your BiS gear the first 5 minutes you reach level cap is fun... not.

As long as the effort of crafting is close to zero, it should always be weaker than dropped sets (not currently the case).

Why would I run trials or dungeons, if I can just craft better gear with 10x less effort involved?

I don't want to wear Hunding's Rage, I want to wear Vicious Ophidian which took me hundreds of hours to acquire a full set, going through the most difficult content this game has to offer.

Gear strength must always match the effort & skill required to acquire it. MMO basics.


Itemization has been a problem in this game ever since launch, and I for one am glad to hear they're finally working to make it better.

Exactly this.
I have more than 100 BoP items on my bank, as I don't want to deconstruct gear that took me up to 100 and some even more Dungeon runs to get it. Unfortunatly almost none of these sets are equal to sets that I can craft without any effort.

Best example are Master Daggers. You might think a weapon named like that, which I finally got after 30 vdsa runs might be usefull. But they are nowhere equal to Ashen Grip maces, a set that requires just 3 traits researched.

Iluvrien

J2JMC wrote: »

Stalwart385 wrote: »

That +1 doesnt mean much to me. What matters are the set bonuses. That will determine the demand.

If the set bonuses are good, crafted will likely be prefered. For the customized type, slot and trait alone.

No idea why they are going back on their original plan though.

I mean they aren't removing the bonus from crafting. They are bringing up the stats of dropped gear so all gear in game regardless of how it's obtained will have equal stats at the same level.

The actual effect of which is removing the advantage that crafted gear has. If dropped gear and crafted gear have the same stats then the method that used to provide an advantage (crafting) no longer does so and has, by effect, been nerfed.

But of course ZOS gives itself an out, which you have just eloquently stated:

"Well yes, we have made crafted gear less appealing... but we didn't do it by nerfing anything!"

Crafting should be made harder, the better set effects should be tied to increased trait knowledge.. etc.
But making crafting less appealing? Thanks, but no thanks.

Flaminir

I don't think the problem is the fact that they are bringing drops to the same power as crafted. I totally support that... There should be overall equality between the methods of obtaining the sets.

I like the idea of using a blend of dropped & crafted & can see value & viability in both.

For me the problem is that the balance of the crafted sets (& the quantity) is all out of whack....

• 3/4 trait sets that are the most powerful? - No... the 8/9 trait sets should be noticeably stronger. They should incentivize the effort to get 8/9 traits researched & the gold / time required for nirn research.
• 23 new sets in imperial city , yet only 3 crafted sets!? - No.... again, parity (Or at the very least a vague attempt at it.... just 3 new crafted sets is totally weak sauce).

One thing that could help with this a lot is jewellery crafting. This would go a LONG way towards giving crafting a boost, and introduce a new dimension of flexibility into builds.

Romo

jircris11 wrote: »

Hiero_Glyph wrote: »

After watching the ESO presentation at QuakeCon 2015 I was both excited and confused. The idea of having to grind for all of the same items again at a higher VR is one thing, but to rebalance crafted items and remove their inherent stat advantage over dropped gear is a huge mistake. Let's put this in context and compare the effort involved in acquiring both.

For dropped gear you have to find where the item drops and grind it out or use a key/AP to have a chance to get the one you want. This is completely RNG based but you always get something for your efforts and you are rewarded instantly upon completing the required condition.

For crafted gear you first need to research the required number of traits to even craft the set. In the case of IC, most assume this will require 8 or even 9 traits. This takes 6+ months of research to craft a full set, not counting the time and money needed to acquire the items for the research. While many players have completed the research, the time investment required to do so is massive. Now add to this the fact that you need to acquire resources to make the items in question and that these are only found from deconstructing or using TV stones (for vr15-6) and you have yet another grind wall in place to slow this process.

So in the end you have one system that is RNG based and can be completed in a day if lucky, and another than requires 6+ months of effort to even be able to use and yet somehow ZoS sees these as equal. I'm sorry but crafters have earned that +1 stat level advantage on their gear. What's worse is that the crafted sets are useful but not exclusively so and many players use the dropped sets for the bonuses they provide anyway. I mean, is there any in-game data to support the fact that crafted gear is OP and needs to be nerfed? Beause that is what ZoS is doing by removing the slight stat bonus, not to mention completely ignoring the massive grind/time wall that crafting requires.

Please don't nerf crafted items.

Sadly its another case of devs listening to those who dont like crafting and want raid (dropped) armor to be the best. sadly that makes it so people such as my self who can not pvp/raid unable to compete.

This.

Plus the attempt to increase the need for this silly DLC with its pandering to the same type of peeps.

Hiero_Glyph

Let's be honest though, if ZoS wants to make crafted gear the same as dropped sets in terms of stats then they need to reduce the research time barrier. PC players are obviously blind to the time investment at this point since they have all of the research completed (or know someone that does) but console players have just started and still have a very long way to go and now their effforts are being ignored by ZoS.

Let's not forget that the 3 new crafted IC sets will likely require 8 or even 9 traits (hopefully we find out today on the PTS). That's a huge amount of research for sets that are no different than dropped ones of the same rank. Anyway, I'm not against making items statistically the same but crafting research needs to be reworked if this is the case.

Tavore1138

This release seems to be all about gating content.

New sets will be at least partially gated behind a wall of looters, crafting materials will also fall behind the same gate unless your crafter wishes to repeatedly run dungeons to get gear to break down. Basically this seems like a step towards making this like every other tedious MMO with content designed for the few not the many.

As for those saying good sets should be gated behind hard content... Newsflash if I can run SO it ain't all that hard and it can be run twice in the time it takes a crafter to gather a stack of ore, let alone enough ore to refine in order to drop the necessary gold/purple mats to make a top set. Even with RNG I suspect top SO speed runners are going to fill out a set in less than the dozens of hours it can take to gather and refine enough mats to make and fully upgrade a set of armour, not to mention the time to learn the full set of traits. It may not be as groovy and l33t as whaling on Manti for a few minutes but it takes significant play time.

Don't get me wrong I am really impressed that you people knocking crafting are so skilled compared to us humbler players but we all pay and play the same game and the attitude gets a little grating after a while, especially since the current crop of devs seem to agree with you. i just hope once you've driven us all away it will still be fun for you.

snackrat

Seems a shame to be making this change, to be honest. Dropped sets are already out-performing crafted sets come end-game, regardless of crafted kits' increased base stats.

Pangnirtung

SuraklinPrime wrote: »

Don't get me wrong I am really impressed that you people knocking crafting are so skilled compared to us humbler players but we all pay and play the same game and the attitude gets a little grating after a while, especially since the current crop of devs seem to agree with you. i just hope once you've driven us all away it will still be fun for you.

This exactly.

What some people don't get is that we can all play the same game differently. Like PVP? Great. Love PVE? Wonderful. More power to both sides.

If ZOS would somehow come out with sets that are equal but different. How about a dropped set for Dragonknight that is different but no less powerful than what a crafter makes but both are unique be it appearance or slightly different stats?

What is discouraging on here is those narrow minded players that see the game from ONLY their perspective. I am NOT PVPer but look forward to what the IC might offer me. Because I don't PVP doesn't mean that I moan and begrudge PVPers their content.

More and different please.

Rinmaethodain

Hiero_Glyph wrote: »

Let's be honest though, if ZoS wants to make crafted gear the same as dropped sets in terms of stats then they need to reduce the research time barrier. PC players are obviously blind to the time investment at this point since they have all of the research completed (or know someone that does) but console players have just started and still have a very long way to go and now their effforts are being ignored by ZoS.

Let's not forget that the 3 new crafted IC sets will likely require 8 or even 9 traits (hopefully we find out today on the PTS). That's a huge amount of research for sets that are no different than dropped ones of the same rank. Anyway, I'm not against making items statistically the same but crafting research needs to be reworked if this is the case.

The fact that PC players got trough researching without problems just means there is no need to mess with research timers. If PC players did that then why do you think console players are worse than them and they cant achieve same thing?

Making "nerfing" crafted gear (making it less significant than all other gear) will now set back all crafters and potentially take away interest in buying gear from crafters.

Letting people achieve all traits easier will even more hurt true dedicated crafters who invested time into getting all traits and will lead to flooding market with fill trait crafters thus making crafted gear even more worthless.

starkerealm

Korah_Eaglecry wrote: »

starkerealm wrote: »

Faulgor wrote: »

Some people are wildly exaggerating the difficulty of crafting.
Their new approach seems to be the right one.

Not even the difficulty, just... I mean... okay, right now, I hit Vet14, 20 minutes later I have the best gear I'm ever going to see on my character until something new drops, unless I go in for the Helmet farm... that's a balance problem.

How is it a balance problem? If you can do it, everyone else can do it.

It's an intercharacter balance issue, not an intracharacter balance issue.

The problem is, you have multiple paths to get endgame gear. When one of those paths is easier, faster, and produces a better final product, you have a balance issue, because the other paths are (effectively) false options.

So, as a player in crafted gear, especially at lower levels, there's a serious balance issue. It's not that I have a better character than you. It's that very easily crafted gear is significantly better than moderately rare drops. For a level 20 in crafted green gear, their equipment will statistically match dropped blues. At that point they need to get a purple drop to have something better than what was produced with the basic mats and two honing stones... and that's the balance issue. Items become just currency waiting to be liquidated, rather than, "oh, I found a neat thing here."

It gets worse when you're at higher levels and producing blues, because they'll match dropped purples at their level, so unless you find a dropped gold (I'm not even sure this can happen in normal content), then your drops will be at best equivalent to what you're wearing, and probably inferior. Again, this is with a fairly minimal investment. (2 Green and 3 Blue mats per item.)

And, all of this is just flat out ignoring the part that (baring a handful of (mostly high level) sets) with crafted items, you can pick what you want your gear to look like, and create a tailored appearance you want, as opposed to looking like you just ransacked the armor stand and grabbed everything that wasn't nailed down.

So, you're left with, there's a legitimate option, and then trash options. It doesn't matter if we're both taking the "best" option, if the other route wasn't an inferior choice all along.

starkerealm

Flaminir wrote: »

I don't think the problem is the fact that they are bringing drops to the same power as crafted. I totally support that... There should be overall equality between the methods of obtaining the sets.

I like the idea of using a blend of dropped & crafted & can see value & viability in both.

For me the problem is that the balance of the crafted sets (& the quantity) is all out of whack....

• 3/4 trait sets that are the most powerful? - No... the 8/9 trait sets should be noticeably stronger. They should incentivize the effort to get 8/9 traits researched & the gold / time required for nirn research.
• 23 new sets in imperial city , yet only 3 crafted sets!? - No.... again, parity (Or at the very least a vague attempt at it.... just 3 new crafted sets is totally weak sauce).

One thing that could help with this a lot is jewellery crafting. This would go a LONG way towards giving crafting a boost, and introduce a new dimension of flexibility into builds.

Yeah, a year later and I still don't know what's going on with the trait priority on crafted sets. The 8 and 9 trait sets are... I can think of two I might use someday. I mean, I have a character in Twice Born Star as a gag, and I've messed around with some of the others on lowbie characters to see if anything clicked. But, seriously, once you get past the six trait sets, they get horribly situational or downright bad. Two star signs? This is what nirnhoned unlocks? Really? If Star Signs were a major buff, or Twice Born Star also beefed the sings up, it could be interesting...

It's just frustrating. I might actually try to get something out of the Mara set.

Worst part is, a lot of these sets are things that, thematically, should be really cool. "Way of the Arena?" It sounds like a snazzy gladiator, maybe weapon damage and armor set. No... break free cost reduction and all stats.

Iluvrien

starkerealm wrote: »

So, you're left with, there's a legitimate option, and then trash options. It doesn't matter if we're both taking the "best" option, if the other route wasn't an inferior choice all along.

So how would you solve this balance issue, that you are sure exists, without devaluing crafting in terms of both self-crafting and crafting for order?

Because the gating of materials behind group/PvP content (grinding for gold to buy mats just to make a tiny profit or even a loss is just as much of a trash option) and the reducing the relative efficacy of crafted gear is not a solution that is likely to produce two legitimate options either.

Attorneyatlawl

DDuke wrote: »

Oh, because crafting (or having someone else craft) your BiS gear the first 5 minutes you reach level cap is fun... not.

As long as the effort of crafting is close to zero, it should always be weaker than dropped sets (not currently the case).

Why would I run trials or dungeons, if I can just craft better gear with 10x less effort involved?

I don't want to wear Hunding's Rage, I want to wear Vicious Ophidian which took me hundreds of hours to acquire a full set, going through the most difficult content this game has to offer.

Gear strength must always match the effort & skill required to acquire it. MMO basics.


Itemization has been a problem in this game ever since launch, and I for one am glad to hear they're finally working to make it better.

Amen.

Iluvrien

Attorneyatlawl wrote: »

DDuke wrote: »

Oh, because crafting (or having someone else craft) your BiS gear the first 5 minutes you reach level cap is fun... not.

As long as the effort of crafting is close to zero, it should always be weaker than dropped sets (not currently the case).

Why would I run trials or dungeons, if I can just craft better gear with 10x less effort involved?

I don't want to wear Hunding's Rage, I want to wear Vicious Ophidian which took me hundreds of hours to acquire a full set, going through the most difficult content this game has to offer.

Gear strength must always match the effort & skill required to acquire it. MMO basics.


Itemization has been a problem in this game ever since launch, and I for one am glad to hear they're finally working to make it better.

Amen.

And the fact that this is specifically flying in the face of what ZOS has said about the importance of crafting since before launch?

starkerealm

Iluvrien wrote: »

starkerealm wrote: »

So, you're left with, there's a legitimate option, and then trash options. It doesn't matter if we're both taking the "best" option, if the other route wasn't an inferior choice all along.

So how would you solve this balance issue, that you are sure exists, without devaluing crafting in terms of both self-crafting and crafting for order?

Because the gating of materials behind group/PvP content (grinding for gold to buy mats just to make a tiny profit or even a loss is just as much of a trash option) and the reducing the relative efficacy of crafted gear is not a solution that is likely to produce two legitimate options either.

Honestly, if it was up to me, I'd probably be designing a very different itemization system.

What ZoS is doing IS a legitimate approach though. Bumping the cap, and then restricting access to the new tier of crafting materials in a way they haven't before, so that collecting crafting bits involves more work.

Originally, that was (I think) the intent with requiring so many mats with the gold upgrades. But, over time we just collected and horded those to the point that it trivialized their system.

Which suggests that the current solution is also limited. It'll work until people horde enough of the Tier 10 mats, and then we'll be right back where we are today.

That said, snapping the blind +2 level modifier off of crafted gear is kind of necessary. And yes, the thread title lies. It's a +2 level adjustment or a +1 VR adjustment. Not just a +1 level modifier. I get why it was there originally, but with the current itemization it invalidated dropped items in a way it really shouldn't have.

Iluvrien

starkerealm wrote: »

Honestly, if it was up to me, I'd probably be designing a very different itemization system.

All well and good, but how about sharing that system with us so we can see how you would solve this. Perhaps you will give ZOS a few ideas about how to approach this.

starkerealm wrote: »

What ZoS is doing IS a legitimate approach though. Bumping the cap, and then restricting access to the new tier of crafting materials in a way they haven't before, so that collecting crafting bits involves more work.

Except that it doesn't require more work. The players who already indulge in group/PvP will continue to do so, perhaps with a few more people encouraged to join their ranks because of their desire to stay up-to-date as crafters. What it does do is make being a solo crafter almost untenable. That, for me, is not a legitimate approach.

starkerealm wrote: »

Originally, that was (I think) the intent with requiring so many mats with the gold upgrades. But, over time we just collected and horded those to the point that it trivialized their system.

Which suggests that the current solution is also limited. It'll work until people horde enough of the Tier 10 mats, and then we'll be right back where we are today.

This I agree with. The hireling system was created in such a way as to make getting top tier upgrade materials trivially easy. The changes to that system to one that facours more of an active involvement, through refining, are in improvement to that. (and what howls we got from the people who had specifically created 8 slots full of hireling alts to take advantage of the previous system). I also see this as a temporary fix.

starkerealm wrote: »

That said, snapping the blind +2 level modifier off of crafted gear is kind of necessary. And yes, the thread title lies. It's a +2 level adjustment or a +1 VR adjustment. Not just a +1 level modifier. I get why it was there originally, but with the current itemization it invalidated dropped items in a way it really shouldn't have.

True, drops should not be invalid, but neither should crafting and I can't see the popularity of the crafting economy improving after these changes, can you?

ragespell

Attorneyatlawl wrote: »

Jando wrote: »

I'm a "master crafter." The problem I've had with crafting the best gear in the game is that I'm rarely excited about anything that drops in dungeons.

Yep, everyone and their vanity pet is a master crafter or can be trivially if they want. You can buy the finished goods for the cost of materials in 99.9999999999999 percent of circumstances at any hour day or night due to how common and easy it is. There is no difficulty in it. The cost is marginal, running around 25 to 30 thousand gold for enchanting at most, around 12k on each alchemist alt I have done on my mule, and less for the rest (provisioning clocks in at about 5k gold) . The only minute thing is the time gate on traits but as covered above that's easily worked around for the pieces you don't yet have maxed if you even bother to try to max them as there's no real benefit in doing so.

The easiest gear in the game that is also even bind on equip and available for chump change shouldn't be the most powerful and certainly not affected by just being brought to par by a while two spell or weapon power to match drops on the bonuses. Crafted gear is far too powerful and always has been, but this change openly and loudly announced at a major venue, doesn't change anything on that front.

UPrime wrote: »

MaximusDargus wrote: »

I wonder how much more things zos will stealth nerf while they keep everyone busy with IC fireworks

Not saying this is a nerf or not, but how is this a stealth nerf? They openly said that they're going to do this in front of a crowd of people. There's nothing stealthy about it.

I don't think the term means what he thinks or is being used for dramatic effect to support the opinion. A stealth nerf is not announced, often not easily noticed and has an actual impact on the power of a skill or Item to significant effect that someone came across it in gameplay because it wasn't announced wasn't in the patch notes, and was never discussed beforehand. This... doesn't match any of those criteria .

Yup, easy is easy. BUT if ZOS will make a 10th trait, the researches time will be months.
So you have dropped loot that is readily available and crafted gears that could be months away.
What should be more powerfull?

PsychoKRATOS1

Attorneyatlawl wrote: »

DDuke wrote: »

Oh, because crafting (or having someone else craft) your BiS gear the first 5 minutes you reach level cap is fun... not.

As long as the effort of crafting is close to zero, it should always be weaker than dropped sets (not currently the case).

Why would I run trials or dungeons, if I can just craft better gear with 10x less effort involved?

I don't want to wear Hunding's Rage, I want to wear Vicious Ophidian which took me hundreds of hours to acquire a full set, going through the most difficult content this game has to offer.

Gear strength must always match the effort & skill required to acquire it. MMO basics.


Itemization has been a problem in this game ever since launch, and I for one am glad to hear they're finally working to make it better.

Amen.

-
Twiddling your thumbs and tapping in a required sequence isn't skill or effort. I don't break a sweat playing games. The -ability- to win determined by, in this game at least, connection, number of players vs & allied, to you, exploitation of certain ability combos and taking advantage of mechanics not covered by the previous.

Dropped gear offers you set effects and set effect combos that aren't craftable, you can have multiple sets sure, but limited effectiveness, if you need to mix and match to replicate something that can be achieved with one set, it's inefficient, you could achieve a desired effect with one set you get as a drop then strengthen it's bonuses more via another set bonus.
Why should playing a lottery make it so you get good gear, RNG, you're either lucky and get all parts you want in 11 runs or you, by your own choice, farm a location 10000 times
-

MaximusDargus wrote: »

Hiero_Glyph wrote: »

Let's be honest though, if ZoS wants to make crafted gear the same as dropped sets in terms of stats then they need to reduce the research time barrier. PC players are obviously blind to the time investment at this point since they have all of the research completed (or know someone that does) but console players have just started and still have a very long way to go and now their effforts are being ignored by ZoS.

Let's not forget that the 3 new crafted IC sets will likely require 8 or even 9 traits (hopefully we find out today on the PTS). That's a huge amount of research for sets that are no different than dropped ones of the same rank. Anyway, I'm not against making items statistically the same but crafting research needs to be reworked if this is the case.

The fact that PC players got trough researching without problems just means there is no need to mess with research timers. If PC players did that then why do you think console players are worse than them and they cant achieve same thing?

Making "nerfing" crafted gear (making it less significant than all other gear) will now set back all crafters and potentially take away interest in buying gear from crafters.

Letting people achieve all traits easier will even more hurt true dedicated crafters who invested time into getting all traits and will lead to flooding market with fill trait crafters thus making crafted gear even more worthless.

-
Pc players were able to join the console version via an account transfer, copying your progress onto a console GT/PSN.
A person, in general, is impatient and want their stuff yesterday, however, if they're nerfing craftable gear, which they are, strengthening the armour value and stats on items earned through RNG reward delves/undaunted/bosses, to the strength of craftable gear , no real benefit of craftable gear other than control over appearance, craftable item stat nerfing, then why not decrease research time. Or at least have ways of further decreasing rs time.
-

Hiero_Glyph

MaximusDargus wrote: »

Hiero_Glyph wrote: »

Let's be honest though, if ZoS wants to make crafted gear the same as dropped sets in terms of stats then they need to reduce the research time barrier. PC players are obviously blind to the time investment at this point since they have all of the research completed (or know someone that does) but console players have just started and still have a very long way to go and now their effforts are being ignored by ZoS.

Let's not forget that the 3 new crafted IC sets will likely require 8 or even 9 traits (hopefully we find out today on the PTS). That's a huge amount of research for sets that are no different than dropped ones of the same rank. Anyway, I'm not against making items statistically the same but crafting research needs to be reworked if this is the case.

The fact that PC players got trough researching without problems just means there is no need to mess with research timers. If PC players did that then why do you think console players are worse than them and they cant achieve same thing?

Making "nerfing" crafted gear (making it less significant than all other gear) will now set back all crafters and potentially take away interest in buying gear from crafters.

Letting people achieve all traits easier will even more hurt true dedicated crafters who invested time into getting all traits and will lead to flooding market with fill trait crafters thus making crafted gear even more worthless.

I'll be honest, your point is the absolute worst kind of argument because your entire justification rests on a system that will no longer be relevent. It's the 'back in my day...' argument except that we no longer live in your day and movies cost more than a nickel, come in color, and have a soundtrack instead of a guy playing a piano. The point is that if crafted gear is going to be the same as the dropped sets then there is no reason to keep the massive research time sink. It becomes antiquated as soon as the rebalance happens.

If ZoS is going to rebalance crafted sets then they need to rebalance the entire crafting system; it's a mess. I mean if Orsinium comes with a 10th trait then maxed crafters will require 2-3 months to research the new trait while 'master' crafters with just the 4-5 useful traits will have it done in a week or two, or in a few days using an alt. How is that even remotely balanced?

Again, ZoS needs to provide incentive to have research completed, not remove the incentive to using crafted sets and then place yet another grind wall in the way of crafters. As I noted previously, having the ability to craft master sets which require 9 researched traits and give the +1 stat level bonus would separate the maxed crafters from the 'master' crafters with just a few important traits. Personally, I'm fine with crafted items have the same stats but there needs to be some reward for all of the time and effort crafting requires in order to truly master. Right now the more your learn, the more the system penalizes you which is not a good concept. ZoS needs to reward crafters with at least the 8 base traits researched or vastly reduce the research time sink.

Rinmaethodain

ragespell wrote: »

Attorneyatlawl wrote: »

Jando wrote: »

I'm a "master crafter." The problem I've had with crafting the best gear in the game is that I'm rarely excited about anything that drops in dungeons.

Yep, everyone and their vanity pet is a master crafter or can be trivially if they want. You can buy the finished goods for the cost of materials in 99.9999999999999 percent of circumstances at any hour day or night due to how common and easy it is. There is no difficulty in it. The cost is marginal, running around 25 to 30 thousand gold for enchanting at most, around 12k on each alchemist alt I have done on my mule, and less for the rest (provisioning clocks in at about 5k gold) . The only minute thing is the time gate on traits but as covered above that's easily worked around for the pieces you don't yet have maxed if you even bother to try to max them as there's no real benefit in doing so.

The easiest gear in the game that is also even bind on equip and available for chump change shouldn't be the most powerful and certainly not affected by just being brought to par by a while two spell or weapon power to match drops on the bonuses. Crafted gear is far too powerful and always has been, but this change openly and loudly announced at a major venue, doesn't change anything on that front.

UPrime wrote: »

MaximusDargus wrote: »

I wonder how much more things zos will stealth nerf while they keep everyone busy with IC fireworks

Not saying this is a nerf or not, but how is this a stealth nerf? They openly said that they're going to do this in front of a crowd of people. There's nothing stealthy about it.

I don't think the term means what he thinks or is being used for dramatic effect to support the opinion. A stealth nerf is not announced, often not easily noticed and has an actual impact on the power of a skill or Item to significant effect that someone came across it in gameplay because it wasn't announced wasn't in the patch notes, and was never discussed beforehand. This... doesn't match any of those criteria .

Yup, easy is easy. BUT if ZOS will make a 10th trait, the researches time will be months.
So you have dropped loot that is readily available and crafted gears that could be months away.
What should be more powerfull?

No it wont be months for 10th trait. 4th passive caps research time at 30 days. no matter if its 10th 15th or ove 9000th

starkerealm

Iluvrien wrote: »

starkerealm wrote: »

Honestly, if it was up to me, I'd probably be designing a very different itemization system.

All well and good, but how about sharing that system with us so we can see how you would solve this. Perhaps you will give ZOS a few ideas about how to approach this.

If I was designing the system from scrap, I probably wouldn't tie it to character level at all. I'd stick with the various material tiers, but with a branching skill line (think of the smithing tree from Skyrim), where advancing to materials past tier 2 came with a mix of characteristics. Increased damage but decreased speed.

Either as part of the existing skill lines, or as part of an overall combat proficiency tree. Equipping an Ebony Tier weapon at level 1 would be possible, but it wouldn't have a significant advantage over using an iron one if you already had the Iron proficiency. Possibly even with penalties. So full ebony armor might slow you down some if you're not proficient. It would still provide more armor, but it wouldn't be as effective as it would be if you were specced into it.

While iron hide might provide an armor boost, fell hide a spell resist boost, while shadowhide provided a stealth boost. Without those boosts you'd be looking at something that was better than hide or rawhide, but not by much.

I'd probably also implement passives for the individual racial styles. So your Breton gear works better for spellcasting, while your Redguard gear works better for stamina consumption.

Dwemer could be higher base stats, but simultaneously harder to upgrade to higher tiers.

At that point, I'd actually look at rearranging the crafting materials, so you'd have frequent access to the bottom tier stuff like iron, but rarer things like ebony would be scattered across the map, it would just be rare. Maybe one in 15 or 20 nodes would produce ebony, one in 3 would produce steel, and so on.

Like I said, I'm not a huge fan of the itemization in game. I like the idea of having a weapon that is your character's. As in, they've tricked it out, and it's the weapon that belongs to them, while at the same time allowing you to find alternate weapons that do something else better, but might not be the right choice for you.

Iluvrien wrote: »

starkerealm wrote: »

What ZoS is doing IS a legitimate approach though. Bumping the cap, and then restricting access to the new tier of crafting materials in a way they haven't before, so that collecting crafting bits involves more work.

Except that it doesn't require more work. The players who already indulge in group/PvP will continue to do so, perhaps with a few more people encouraged to join their ranks because of their desire to stay up-to-date as crafters. What it does do is make being a solo crafter almost untenable. That, for me, is not a legitimate approach.

Short term? Yes. Long term, one of two things will happen. Either when Orsinium hits, we'll see Vet 15/16 content for solo players, and with that tier 10 drops. Or the crafting materials (and general tier 10 drops) will make their way onto the guild kiosks at more reasonable prices.

And, honestly, if you're grinding enough to hit Vet 16, you're probably going to have the cash to buy up garbage whites and greens that get listed in guild kiosks for crafting scrap.

Now, I could have a faulty understanding of how the Tier 10 materials will be handled long term. So... I think it's a little early to worry, but we'll see, once the IC goes live on the Test Server, what's up.

Iluvrien wrote: »

starkerealm wrote: »

Originally, that was (I think) the intent with requiring so many mats with the gold upgrades. But, over time we just collected and horded those to the point that it trivialized their system.

Which suggests that the current solution is also limited. It'll work until people horde enough of the Tier 10 mats, and then we'll be right back where we are today.

This I agree with. The hireling system was created in such a way as to make getting top tier upgrade materials trivially easy. The changes to that system to one that facours more of an active involvement, through refining, are in improvement to that. (and what howls we got from the people who had specifically created 8 slots full of hireling alts to take advantage of the previous system). I also see this as a temporary fix.

I can't help but think they're planning something with the eventual collapse of the Vet Ranks. But, at the same time, I worry the existing VR gear will just be hauled over, and tied to CR or unrestricted. Which, doesn't really help the people with VR10 golds stashed in their bank hoping on someday.

Iluvrien wrote: »

starkerealm wrote: »

That said, snapping the blind +2 level modifier off of crafted gear is kind of necessary. And yes, the thread title lies. It's a +2 level adjustment or a +1 VR adjustment. Not just a +1 level modifier. I get why it was there originally, but with the current itemization it invalidated dropped items in a way it really shouldn't have.

True, drops should not be invalid, but neither should crafting and I can't see the popularity of the crafting economy improving after these changes, can you?

Given crafting is still "to order?" Yeah, it's not going to hurt it any more. I'd say the existing 8 trait sets (and twice born star) do more damage to the popularity of crafting than knocking a blind modifier off the items. Especially when a lot of non-crafters (and probably more than a few actual crafters) didn't know it was there in the first place.

Lorkhan

+1 no nerf crafted itens

Tors

You asked for VR removal, what did you think you would get to replace it?

This is the first step in the tiered armour approach of crap games like WoW.

Soon you wil need specific sets of armour to be able to attempt dungeons where the next level of armour can be obtained.

Addons will soon display the ILevel of other players so you can decide if they are l33t enough for your group.


People who only brought this game to PvP will start to feel the hurt fast. With droped sets leading to better droped sets, those unwlling to waste time playing against scripted AI oponents will not have access to the new sets and will no longer be on an equal footing with the PvE crowd.

Where it was once a choice on what you equiped, crafted being an alternative to set items and all players haveing access to almost all armour, the new system will mean gear level > player skill

Dont start crying because this is what you asked for

PsychoKRATOS1

MaximusDargus wrote: »

ragespell wrote: »

Attorneyatlawl wrote: »

Jando wrote: »

I'm a "master crafter." The problem I've had with crafting the best gear in the game is that I'm rarely excited about anything that drops in dungeons.

Yep, everyone and their vanity pet is a master crafter or can be trivially if they want. You can buy the finished goods for the cost of materials in 99.9999999999999 percent of circumstances at any hour day or night due to how common and easy it is. There is no difficulty in it. The cost is marginal, running around 25 to 30 thousand gold for enchanting at most, around 12k on each alchemist alt I have done on my mule, and less for the rest (provisioning clocks in at about 5k gold) . The only minute thing is the time gate on traits but as covered above that's easily worked around for the pieces you don't yet have maxed if you even bother to try to max them as there's no real benefit in doing so.

The easiest gear in the game that is also even bind on equip and available for chump change shouldn't be the most powerful and certainly not affected by just being brought to par by a while two spell or weapon power to match drops on the bonuses. Crafted gear is far too powerful and always has been, but this change openly and loudly announced at a major venue, doesn't change anything on that front.

UPrime wrote: »

MaximusDargus wrote: »

I wonder how much more things zos will stealth nerf while they keep everyone busy with IC fireworks

Not saying this is a nerf or not, but how is this a stealth nerf? They openly said that they're going to do this in front of a crowd of people. There's nothing stealthy about it.

I don't think the term means what he thinks or is being used for dramatic effect to support the opinion. A stealth nerf is not announced, often not easily noticed and has an actual impact on the power of a skill or Item to significant effect that someone came across it in gameplay because it wasn't announced wasn't in the patch notes, and was never discussed beforehand. This... doesn't match any of those criteria .

Yup, easy is easy. BUT if ZOS will make a 10th trait, the researches time will be months.
So you have dropped loot that is readily available and crafted gears that could be months away.
What should be more powerfull?

No it wont be months for 10th trait. 4th passive caps research time at 30 days. no matter if its 10th 15th or ove 9000th

Well it would be... If you research everything 3 a time. Heavy armour is still 2 months. With one additional you do with two metal weapons. So 3 months. Not that long, but why should anyone wait to get into content they want to play? Just a thought.

PsychoKRATOS1

Tors wrote: »

Dont start crying because this is what you asked for

I didn't!!

Savetti

Why bother with dropping gear and sets at end game? Why not actually focus on a good reward system and leave gear to crafters? I am so sick of chasing gear in what seems like every single modern MMO.

SkinnyDG

Someone take the cookie cutter out of zos hands please.

PsychoKRATOS1

SkinnyDG wrote: »

Someone take the cookie cutter out of zos hands please.

Cookie cutter? I thought they just smashed it with a rolling pin.