ZOS, why are we mining alloys?

Minyassa · July 2018

I don't understand. Did you not even bother to google jewelry metals or did you just paw through someone's mom's jewelry box and take a wild guess? We don't mine steel, we mine "high iron" and use it to make steel, which makes sense. Why in the world are we mining pewter and electrum? You could easily have made it all make sense by making copper the first level, then having us mine tin or lead for the pewter at the next level. Then you have silver, that's fine, and then next should have been mining gold to make electrum with. I'm baffled as to why you chose to buck any pretense of logic with this when you actually made real herbs and real mushrooms and even paid attention to how those plants look and some of their actual properties. I'm extremely disappointed, this is not up to the quality levels you've previously displayed.

VaranisArano · July 2018

That's because all of the flowers and mushrooms are invasive species from TES 3 & 4, aka the work was already done. Jewelry nodes are pretty much "Is it metallic, cool-looking, and has a good chance to be mistaken for a rock? Lets use it!"

But then, we adventurers are in the business of strip mining Tamriel. In Oblivion, I very nearly singlehandedly caused the extinction of nirnroot in the Rumare Valleey. So farming in TES games is always a little silly and divorced from reality.

The_Protagonist · July 2018

Very good observations, shows a clear shift in their business ethics and probably in their staff too. Little things like this when seen cannot be unseen. +1 insightful.

DaveMoeDee · July 2018

The_Protagonist wrote: »

Very good observations, shows a clear shift in their business ethics and probably in their staff too. Little things like this when seen cannot be unseen. +1 insightful.

Are you being sarcastic?

What is the deal with people who try to link everything with business ethics? Please elaborate on the reasoning that leads one to that conclusion.

Solariken · July 2018

I agree, amateur development on this front.

Nestor · July 2018

Repeat after me, Games are not Reality, Games are Not Reality.....

Malacthulhu · July 2018

Oh you googled something about something in a fantasy game, ya don't do that. Technically, I suppose if you find gold you find iron and electrium. Jewel crafting should have been an expansion of blacksmithing however I think the developers and marketing people are wise and know their fanbase well. They know we want content to last as long as possible with multiple seperate grinds.

Obsidian3 · July 2018

It just cracks me up that copper looks like a dried turd

jedtb16_ESO · July 2018

Minyassa wrote: »

I don't understand. Did you not even bother to google jewelry metals or did you just paw through someone's mom's jewelry box and take a wild guess? We don't mine steel, we mine "high iron" and use it to make steel, which makes sense. Why in the world are we mining pewter and electrum? You could easily have made it all make sense by making copper the first level, then having us mine tin or lead for the pewter at the next level. Then you have silver, that's fine, and then next should have been mining gold to make electrum with. I'm baffled as to why you chose to buck any pretense of logic with this when you actually made real herbs and real mushrooms and even paid attention to how those plants look and some of their actual properties. I'm extremely disappointed, this is not up to the quality levels you've previously displayed.

lol...

don't you remember mining ebony ore?

Judas Helviaryn · July 2018

People tend to forget that a good fantasy world is one that is rich in lore and background, and at the very least tries to be believable without relying on the "Word of God" trope to explain why everything is the way it is. The whole "fantasy = unrealistic" argument is silly when it comes to established giants like TES.

High iron itself has irked me for a while, but the OP is right with the alloys. There's a clear shift in focus on the quality (and believability) of the game, and we're slowly losing those little touches that made the game an immersive experience, and worthy of the Elder Scrolls moniker.

newtinmpls · July 2018

The_Protagonist wrote: »

Very good observations, shows a clear shift in their business ethics and probably in their staff too. Little things like this when seen cannot be unseen. +1 insightful.

Sigh...I agree, but on the other hand the slow thoughtful and beloved development you see in a single player game really cannot be sustained over time, and to please (take that with a grain of salt) it's many players and semi-constantly bring in "new" things, the watchful eye for details has has to go the way of the dodo.

Minyassa · July 2018

jedtb16_ESO wrote: »

Minyassa wrote: »

I don't understand. Did you not even bother to google jewelry metals or did you just paw through someone's mom's jewelry box and take a wild guess? We don't mine steel, we mine "high iron" and use it to make steel, which makes sense. Why in the world are we mining pewter and electrum? You could easily have made it all make sense by making copper the first level, then having us mine tin or lead for the pewter at the next level. Then you have silver, that's fine, and then next should have been mining gold to make electrum with. I'm baffled as to why you chose to buck any pretense of logic with this when you actually made real herbs and real mushrooms and even paid attention to how those plants look and some of their actual properties. I'm extremely disappointed, this is not up to the quality levels you've previously displayed.

lol...

don't you remember mining ebony ore?

I don't have a problem with fantasy materials that don't actually exist in the real world. That's actually the BEST way to go in a fantasy world, because then you can make up whatever goofy rules you want to about a material and you don't look like an idiot. But using things that DO exist in the real world and using them BADLY is definitely *not* the way to go about making a quality fantasy game. It just really makes them look incredibly lazy.

Malacthulhu wrote: »

Oh you googled something about something in a fantasy game, ya don't do that. Technically, I suppose if you find gold you find iron and electrium. Jewel crafting should have been an expansion of blacksmithing however I think the developers and marketing people are wise and know their fanbase well. They know we want content to last as long as possible with multiple seperate grinds.

Couldn't help it--didn't google it, I am a professional jeweler. If someone uses real life existing professions in a fantasy game there's aaaaaaaaalways gonna be that small percentage of people that they instantly annoy if they don't even bother to do the most basic of homework.

jedtb16_ESO · July 2018

Minyassa wrote: »

jedtb16_ESO wrote: »

Minyassa wrote: »

I don't understand. Did you not even bother to google jewelry metals or did you just paw through someone's mom's jewelry box and take a wild guess? We don't mine steel, we mine "high iron" and use it to make steel, which makes sense. Why in the world are we mining pewter and electrum? You could easily have made it all make sense by making copper the first level, then having us mine tin or lead for the pewter at the next level. Then you have silver, that's fine, and then next should have been mining gold to make electrum with. I'm baffled as to why you chose to buck any pretense of logic with this when you actually made real herbs and real mushrooms and even paid attention to how those plants look and some of their actual properties. I'm extremely disappointed, this is not up to the quality levels you've previously displayed.

lol...

don't you remember mining ebony ore?

I don't have a problem with fantasy materials that don't actually exist in the real world. That's actually the BEST way to go in a fantasy world, because then you can make up whatever goofy rules you want to about a material and you don't look like an idiot. But using things that DO exist in the real world and using them BADLY is definitely *not* the way to go about making a quality fantasy game. It just really makes them look incredibly lazy.

Malacthulhu wrote: »

Oh you googled something about something in a fantasy game, ya don't do that. Technically, I suppose if you find gold you find iron and electrium. Jewel crafting should have been an expansion of blacksmithing however I think the developers and marketing people are wise and know their fanbase well. They know we want content to last as long as possible with multiple seperate grinds.

Couldn't help it--didn't google it, I am a professional jeweler. If someone uses real life existing professions in a fantasy game there's aaaaaaaaalways gonna be that small percentage of people that they instantly annoy if they don't even bother to do the most basic of homework.

you've never heard of ebony?

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ebony

Zorgon_The_Revenged · July 2018

Crabs don't usually carry great swords and a small amount of gold, but mudcrabs have a habit of dropping them when killed.

Don't loose too much sleep over it.

Minyassa · July 2018

jedtb16_ESO wrote: »

Minyassa wrote: »

jedtb16_ESO wrote: »

Minyassa wrote: »

I don't understand. Did you not even bother to google jewelry metals or did you just paw through someone's mom's jewelry box and take a wild guess? We don't mine steel, we mine "high iron" and use it to make steel, which makes sense. Why in the world are we mining pewter and electrum? You could easily have made it all make sense by making copper the first level, then having us mine tin or lead for the pewter at the next level. Then you have silver, that's fine, and then next should have been mining gold to make electrum with. I'm baffled as to why you chose to buck any pretense of logic with this when you actually made real herbs and real mushrooms and even paid attention to how those plants look and some of their actual properties. I'm extremely disappointed, this is not up to the quality levels you've previously displayed.

lol...

don't you remember mining ebony ore?

I don't have a problem with fantasy materials that don't actually exist in the real world. That's actually the BEST way to go in a fantasy world, because then you can make up whatever goofy rules you want to about a material and you don't look like an idiot. But using things that DO exist in the real world and using them BADLY is definitely *not* the way to go about making a quality fantasy game. It just really makes them look incredibly lazy.

Malacthulhu wrote: »

Oh you googled something about something in a fantasy game, ya don't do that. Technically, I suppose if you find gold you find iron and electrium. Jewel crafting should have been an expansion of blacksmithing however I think the developers and marketing people are wise and know their fanbase well. They know we want content to last as long as possible with multiple seperate grinds.

Couldn't help it--didn't google it, I am a professional jeweler. If someone uses real life existing professions in a fantasy game there's aaaaaaaaalways gonna be that small percentage of people that they instantly annoy if they don't even bother to do the most basic of homework.

you've never heard of ebony?

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ebony

Since they're not actually using it as the wood name for that tier and instead have a made-up metal with that name instead it doesn't bother me. It has become a poetic color name over time, and it's actually pretty common these days for people to have no freaking clue where color names come from any more. So it's a *dumb* fantasy material name, but it's still a fantasy material in this context.

Streega · July 2018

I don't have problem with fantasy materials (like adamantium), but I cringe when real names are used wrong and mixed with artificial. Either stick with real life equivalents, like iron, copper and stuff, or invent completely new ones. Ebony is not a metal, but a hardwood; quicksilver is just another name for mercury and rather useless in blacksmithing, doh; high iron should not be a thing, wth is that? Why is titanium only a jewelery additive? And pewter ore... why not tin?
Having say that, I try to ignore it, because it's only a game. Still, allowing such a mess is rather poor craftsmanship

Elsonso · July 2018

Nestor wrote: »

Repeat after me, Games are not Reality, Games are Not Reality.....

They can certainly do the small things to make it look more like it is.

Obsidian3 wrote: »

It just cracks me up that copper looks like a dried turd

Iron looks like a turd, too. Maybe in Tamriel, copper becomes iron after it gets rained on.

In this game world, unrefined ore is more valuable than all the diamonds and rubies you can carry. I have long ago decided that the people making these decisions have other things in mind besides how it appears in the game. They have seemingly arbitrary decisions that, with nothing more than a tweak to naming them, would make more sense. That only happens when the focus is not on making things have sense, but something else.

Aeslief · July 2018

Obsidian3 wrote: »

It just cracks me up that copper looks like a dried turd

You might want to consider getting checked out by a doctor, friend. And bring a sample.

Pops_ND_Irish · July 2018

Minyassa wrote: »

I don't understand. Did you not even bother to google jewelry metals or did you just paw through someone's mom's jewelry box and take a wild guess? We don't mine steel, we mine "high iron" and use it to make steel, which makes sense. Why in the world are we mining pewter and electrum? You could easily have made it all make sense by making copper the first level, then having us mine tin or lead for the pewter at the next level. Then you have silver, that's fine, and then next should have been mining gold to make electrum with. I'm baffled as to why you chose to buck any pretense of logic with this when you actually made real herbs and real mushrooms and even paid attention to how those plants look and some of their actual properties. I'm extremely disappointed, this is not up to the quality levels you've previously displayed.

Thought this was a fantasy game, not real life ?

Minyassa · July 2018

MoTeets wrote: »

Minyassa wrote: »

I don't understand. Did you not even bother to google jewelry metals or did you just paw through someone's mom's jewelry box and take a wild guess? We don't mine steel, we mine "high iron" and use it to make steel, which makes sense. Why in the world are we mining pewter and electrum? You could easily have made it all make sense by making copper the first level, then having us mine tin or lead for the pewter at the next level. Then you have silver, that's fine, and then next should have been mining gold to make electrum with. I'm baffled as to why you chose to buck any pretense of logic with this when you actually made real herbs and real mushrooms and even paid attention to how those plants look and some of their actual properties. I'm extremely disappointed, this is not up to the quality levels you've previously displayed.

Thought this was a fantasy game, not real life ?

Fantasy means something that is based upon imagination, not something that is based upon a badly informed echo of real life.

Soleya · July 2018

For jewelry they should have used

Tin
Copper
Silver
Gold
Platinum

ghastley · July 2018

I thought this was going to be about the lack of alloying in the process, which would have been a interesting change. We already combine ingredients in Alchemy, so why didn't we do that in Jewel Crafting? Instead of the dusts, we could have mined pure metals, and made the alloys we needed for the jewelry.

Pewter, bronze, electrum, etc. for the final mats, but mine tin, copper etc.

testd4n1 · July 2018

Minyassa wrote: »

I don't understand. Did you not even bother to google jewelry metals or did you just paw through someone's mom's jewelry box and take a wild guess? We don't mine steel, we mine "high iron" and use it to make steel, which makes sense. Why in the world are we mining pewter and electrum? You could easily have made it all make sense by making copper the first level, then having us mine tin or lead for the pewter at the next level. Then you have silver, that's fine, and then next should have been mining gold to make electrum with. I'm baffled as to why you chose to buck any pretense of logic with this when you actually made real herbs and real mushrooms and even paid attention to how those plants look and some of their actual properties. I'm extremely disappointed, this is not up to the quality levels you've previously displayed.

I'm sorry, I couldn't hear you over the sound of me casting magic at burning man. Wait... that was Valkyn Skoria.

driosketch · July 2018

Streega wrote: »

I don't have problem with fantasy materials (like adamantium), but I cringe when real names are used wrong and mixed with artificial. Either stick with real life equivalents, like iron, copper and stuff, or invent completely new ones. Ebony is not a metal, but a hardwood; quicksilver is just another name for mercury and rather useless in blacksmithing, doh; high iron should not be a thing, wth is that? Why is titanium only a jewelery additive? And pewter ore... why not tin?
Having say that, I try to ignore it, because it's only a game. Still, allowing such a mess is rather poor craftsmanship

Lorewise, even the fantasy materials are off. (Since when was Dwarven ore a thing before this game?) But basically they just needed different names for every tier, style and trait. (This is why gold is not a material in jewelry, it's already a currency.)

I mainly think of crafting as a game mechanic, rather than part of an immersive world, because that's all it is. It was designed that way to keep it simple and symmetrical. An immersive crafting system would have Bosmer bows made of bone, not wood, and chain mail or other light metal medium armors instead of just leathers. But that would be less intuitive to the average player, crafters would just be hardcore players who learned the alloy recipes, and probably edit the wikis and online guides. ZOS decided to change it to be accessible to all, (I was there in beta for that design change.)

Ignoring the material inconsistency is probably the best advice. That is, unless there's an add-on that can be made to rename all the materials in your UI. Just don't forget and ask if anyone has "tin" in zone.

Pops_ND_Irish · July 2018

Minyassa wrote: »

MoTeets wrote: »

Minyassa wrote: »

I don't understand. Did you not even bother to google jewelry metals or did you just paw through someone's mom's jewelry box and take a wild guess? We don't mine steel, we mine "high iron" and use it to make steel, which makes sense. Why in the world are we mining pewter and electrum? You could easily have made it all make sense by making copper the first level, then having us mine tin or lead for the pewter at the next level. Then you have silver, that's fine, and then next should have been mining gold to make electrum with. I'm baffled as to why you chose to buck any pretense of logic with this when you actually made real herbs and real mushrooms and even paid attention to how those plants look and some of their actual properties. I'm extremely disappointed, this is not up to the quality levels you've previously displayed.

Thought this was a fantasy game, not real life ?

Fantasy means something that is based upon imagination, not something that is based upon a badly informed echo of real life.

Hehe

Lady_Sleepless · July 2018

Minyassa wrote: »

jedtb16_ESO wrote: »

Minyassa wrote: »

jedtb16_ESO wrote: »

Minyassa wrote: »

I don't understand. Did you not even bother to google jewelry metals or did you just paw through someone's mom's jewelry box and take a wild guess? We don't mine steel, we mine "high iron" and use it to make steel, which makes sense. Why in the world are we mining pewter and electrum? You could easily have made it all make sense by making copper the first level, then having us mine tin or lead for the pewter at the next level. Then you have silver, that's fine, and then next should have been mining gold to make electrum with. I'm baffled as to why you chose to buck any pretense of logic with this when you actually made real herbs and real mushrooms and even paid attention to how those plants look and some of their actual properties. I'm extremely disappointed, this is not up to the quality levels you've previously displayed.

lol...

don't you remember mining ebony ore?

I don't have a problem with fantasy materials that don't actually exist in the real world. That's actually the BEST way to go in a fantasy world, because then you can make up whatever goofy rules you want to about a material and you don't look like an idiot. But using things that DO exist in the real world and using them BADLY is definitely *not* the way to go about making a quality fantasy game. It just really makes them look incredibly lazy.

Malacthulhu wrote: »

Oh you googled something about something in a fantasy game, ya don't do that. Technically, I suppose if you find gold you find iron and electrium. Jewel crafting should have been an expansion of blacksmithing however I think the developers and marketing people are wise and know their fanbase well. They know we want content to last as long as possible with multiple seperate grinds.

Couldn't help it--didn't google it, I am a professional jeweler. If someone uses real life existing professions in a fantasy game there's aaaaaaaaalways gonna be that small percentage of people that they instantly annoy if they don't even bother to do the most basic of homework.

you've never heard of ebony?

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ebony

Since they're not actually using it as the wood name for that tier and instead have a made-up metal with that name instead it doesn't bother me. It has become a poetic color name over time, and it's actually pretty common these days for people to have no freaking clue where color names come from any more. So it's a *dumb* fantasy material name, but it's still a fantasy material in this context.

Or Ebony It's a in world Elder Scrolls thing.

Runs · July 2018

In cases like this, and certain fish(I'm looking at you Minnows)... I just tend to believe maybe the words on Earth and the words in Tamriel may be similar but a little different definitions. Not everything needs to match precisely that way.

Moomins · August 2018

driosketch wrote>

Lorewise, even the fantasy materials are off. (Since when was Dwarven ore a thing before this game?) But basically, they just needed different names for every tier, style, and trait. (This is why gold is not a material in jewelry, it's already a currency.)

Gold is the currency of Tamriel, Kahjiit knows this is true, but the gold currency is processed gold. Why not use native gold (unprocessed gold) as a material in the form of flakes, nuggets or grains? Kahjit understands that this native gold could then be processed with other metals to form alloys... This one suspects that those who understand jewelry know this is how it is done in the real world...

That is this one's suggestion for the day.

Easily_Lost · August 2018

Obsidian3 wrote: »

It just cracks me up that copper looks like a dried turd

What about Iron Ore.

Minyassa · August 2018

Runs wrote: »

In cases like this, and certain fish(I'm looking at you Minnows)... I just tend to believe maybe the words on Earth and the words in Tamriel may be similar but a little different definitions. Not everything needs to match precisely that way.

Can you imagine filleting a minnow? LOL! I skinned a shrew* once just to see if I could do it but I dunno if I could've carved it like a turkey. xD

*My cat got it and left it on the doorstep, I did not go out shrew-trapping just for skins, I promise.

Veinblood1965 · August 2018

It could be worse, there could be in game turds that look like actual iron. Can you imagine actually thinking it was iron and then hitting it with your pick?