Could Survey and Treasure Maps Stack, or at least not be Unique?

Alanar · May 2016

As someone who does all six crafting writs on eight characters each day (soon to be twelve after DB), I spend a significant amount of time managing my survey maps. Now that crafting bags are here, I'd say survey maps have become the most painful element of inventory management. When I saw the new change that allows a survey report to pull a map out of either my inventory or my bank, it occurred to me that maybe the same infrastructure could allow survey maps to stack, or at least to no longer be unique. That would make crafting writs significantly more enjoyable for me and likely for others as well, letting me collect the writ rewards for longer, and then go and get a bunch of materials all at once as I have more time.

Treasure maps have the same problem, though less frequently. A typical scenario here would be someone who is buying Wrothgar maps as a way to obtain the BOP sets that are slow to get in other ways. For these scenarios, having treasure maps not be unique would significantly decrease the amount of time just managing inventory, and increase the amount of time finding treasure. This change would also make treasure maps a bit more efficient to use, which would likely increase their value in the game. As I was shopping today, I saw quite a few maps selling for below the amount of gold that you find in the chest, indicating that in most cases, the rewards just aren't worth the time. Making the maps easier to manage would help decrease the cost of using them and maybe make them a bit more rewarding.

Wrecking_Blow_Spam · May 2016

Yes I agree with this, only do 3 writs on 2 characters but I like to let the maps pile up but the not allowing duplicate maps bugs me.

More so they disappear now, as I've lost a couple of surveys due to me not putting them in bank and accidentally run near the origin of the survey location whilst doing something else.

sunskater · May 2016

I don't believe the survey's disappear if you leave them in the crates, and I don't believe that fact will change with DB. I recall making a trip to Coldharbour with a Clothier survey and six crates --- each containing the same survey map. I just went to the farm location and repeatedly gathered nodes while logging in an out, opening a crate to activate a new map each time. Granted, it isn't stacking, but still more convenient than I'm reading.

OTOH, I am one of those people who believes the easiest way to ruin an RPG is to give everyone a flying mount. You can have too much convenience in a game like this. ;-)

sunskater · May 2016

EquinoxS wrote: »

Yes I agree with this, only do 3 writs on 2 characters but I like to let the maps pile up but the not allowing duplicate maps bugs me.

More so they disappear now, as I've lost a couple of surveys due to me not putting them in bank and accidentally run near the origin of the survey location whilst doing something else.

When DB drops, the current plan is to leave the maps alone until you actually touch a rich node. But...if you have the same uncrated map in your inventory and your bank, I believe they both wave bye-bye.

helediron · May 2016

The survey maps stay in writ containers, and can be looted one-by-one. After harvesting, run a hundred meters away, open container and return back to harvest second round.

Wrecking_Blow_Spam · May 2016

Can the writ containers be transferred via the bank?

helediron · May 2016

EquinoxS wrote: »

Can the writ containers be transferred via the bank?

No, writ containers are bound to player, and cannot be saved into bank. Survey maps can be transferred to bank, But only one can exist in inventory and one in bank.

BenevolentBowd · May 2016

sunskater wrote: »

When DB drops, the current plan is to leave the maps alone until you actually touch a rich node. But...if you have the same uncrated map in your inventory and your bank, I believe they both wave bye-bye.

This is a known issue on the PTS 2.4.3 which it sounds like they will be fixing.

"Known Issue: If you have two copies of the survey report (one in your inventory and one in your bank) then both copies will be consumed as you harvest the nodes from the survey site. We are working on fixing this issue."

Alanar · May 2016

helediron wrote: »

The survey maps stay in writ containers, and can be looted one-by-one. After harvesting, run a hundred meters away, open container and return back to harvest second round.

Yeah, this is what I do today, usually with 6-9 containers of each type at a time. It's a little annoying just because if I have 3 containers for each of 2 woodworking survey locations, I have to keep opening containers until I find the one that matches the spot I just harvested. Annoying, but tolerable.

Bulk treasure maps are much more painful. A few months ago, I bought about 60 Cyrodiil treasure maps in one run. Just holding them in my inventory required 8 different characters, and then to harvest the maps (with my single V16 toon), I had to swap characters 14 times. That's 1 character swap for every 4 maps. If the treasure maps were not unique items, then I still would have had to use the same amount of inventory space to carry them, and I still would have had to run to each location, but I wouldn't need to swap between characters so often.

sunskater · May 2016

BenevolentBowd wrote: »

sunskater wrote: »

When DB drops, the current plan is to leave the maps alone until you actually touch a rich node. But...if you have the same uncrated map in your inventory and your bank, I believe they both wave bye-bye.

This is a known issue on the PTS 2.4.3 which it sounds like they will be fixing.

"Known Issue: If you have two copies of the survey report (one in your inventory and one in your bank) then both copies will be consumed as you harvest the nodes from the survey site. We are working on fixing this issue."

Thank you very much for clarifying this. I wasn't sure...definitely good to know.

Gargath · September 2016

Any ETA or any progres in dealing with "uniqueness" issue?

The bug/feature is still there, within an hour I found two the same maps and had to destroy one to loot another:

Vangy · September 2016

I agree.... But imagine this... you avidly stack up on these surveys once ZOS makes the change. Your bank has 100 blacksmith survey 3 : wrothgar. You are tense with anticipation of all the tempers u are going to get from refining. You quickly draw the writs from bank and rush to the area on ur trusty steed. There be the ores! You quickly harvest the ores and run out of area to reset writ and then run back to where the ores are supposed to spawn.

But nothing is there. Pissed you run farther away thinking that the range might not have been enuf to reset.

When u come back, nothing is there again.... Perplexed you open ur inventory but alas, your whole stack of 100 writs are now missing. FUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUU~

Ticket to ZOS never gets answered and you are now prolly half a mil gold short. GG

medusasfolly · September 2016

Vangy wrote: »

I agree.... But imagine this... you avidly stack up on these surveys once ZOS makes the change. Your bank has 100 blacksmith survey 3 : wrothgar. You are tense with anticipation of all the tempers u are going to get from refining. You quickly draw the writs from bank and rush to the area on ur trusty steed. There be the ores! You quickly harvest the ores and run out of area to reset writ and then run back to where the ores are supposed to spawn.

But nothing is there. Pissed you run farther away thinking that the range might not have been enuf to reset.

When u come back, nothing is there again.... Perplexed you open ur inventory but alas, your whole stack of 100 writs are now missing. FUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUU~

Ticket to ZOS never gets answered and you are now prolly half a mil gold short. GG

Sadly, I could see this happening.

helediron · September 2016

Now in PTS surveys stack in bank and inventory. And strangely the stack didn't vanish after harvesting one. It actually worked. O_o

Elmour0Fudd · September 2016

sunskater wrote: »

I don't believe the survey's disappear if you leave them in the crates, and I don't believe that fact will change with DB. I recall making a trip to Coldharbour with a Clothier survey and six crates --- each containing the same survey map. I just went to the farm location and repeatedly gathered nodes while logging in an out, opening a crate to activate a new map each time. Granted, it isn't stacking, but still more convenient than I'm reading.

OTOH, I am one of those people who believes the easiest way to ruin an RPG is to give everyone a flying mount. You can have too much convenience in a game like this. ;-)

No problem with working for an improvement, but 90% of my bank space it full of bound maps which I haven't used yet if I could stack them would love it,
But we know it won't happen.
Yes you are right they are fine inside the crate but that then block's your primary carrying space and when you have to drop a 0 gp piece of rubinite armour ect, sort of bite's a bit
anyway interesting though but different people different setup's and priorities just the way it is.

Have fun all

ELDARTHVADER · September 2016

helediron wrote: »

The survey maps stay in writ containers, and can be looted one-by-one. After harvesting, run a hundred meters away, open container and return back to harvest second round.

have, i harvest then pull map from container crate, log out/log in. bam harvest!

Stopnaggin · September 2016

In the PTS patch notes 1.6.0 surveys will stack. Didn't read anything about treasure maps though.