Feedback regarding Crystalshaping

[Seranthor]

Xarog, Bluster all you want, TG has decided how it IS going to be. You do not have the ability to change that. So as I see it you have a few options.

1) Suck it up and accept it and play HZ
2) Dont accept it and continue to play HZ, knowing full well that regardless of what you say its not going to change to suit you.
3) You can move on to another game.

Know that regardless of which of the above 3 options you select that the TG decision to mould the crafting schools to the way they want is how its going to happen.

[Xarog]

I'm sorry if you guys don't agree with me, or don't understand why I'm so adamant about this. But that's hardly a reason to either torpedo the thread.

[Xarog]

Xarog, Bluster all you want, TG has decided how it IS going to be. You do not have the ability to change that. So as I see it you have a few options.

1) Suck it up and accept it and play HZ
2) Dont accept it and continue to play HZ, knowing full well that regardless of what you say its not going to change to suit you.
3) You can move on to another game.

Know that regardless of which of the above 3 options you select that the TG decision to mould the crafting schools to the way they want is how its going to happen.

Option 3, please.

But I would like to think that Tulga is interested in hearing what their players have to say. I believe that's why they created this thread, even if they didn't intend to listen to everything everyone said. Regarding what I do or do not say, or how tulga does or does not react, what's it to you? There is no purpose in telling me what tulga will or will not do, especially when there are obvious uncertainties regarding how things will be changed.

Btw : http://dictionary.reference.com/search?q=bluster&db=%2A

I'm not blustering. You aren't forced to listen to what I have to say, in no way do my views pass any comment about me as a person, or anyone else as a person, and I have made absolutely no threats to anyone whatsoever.

Just because I do not accept your argument as valid is no reason to accuse me of blustering.

[Xarog]

In Horizons we have a level based skill system. You gain skills across the board in a set pattern for every level you gain in that school.

Once you gain a level, you gain skill.

Traditionally, you used skills to gain those levels. Now that is no longer the case, and the rules for determining which skills do and which don't give experience are arbitrary.

Horizons is Level Based progression. If you want skill based progression, go play Oblivion.

This is the third time you should be reading this, Kumu : I do not want a skill based system in Horizons, but it is a more sensible alternative to the proposed changes.

Definition of sensible : rational, logical, subject to reason.

[Seranthor]

Just because YOU dont see the logic or the rational in what TG plans for crafting does not make it illogical or irrational. There ARE some certainties in what TG has in store for crafting changes. Perhaps YOU would find the information if YOU looked for it... its out there... its published... Now, whether you make the effort to read it, understand it and plan for it that is purely up to you. I can assure you that you'll be better off when you wipe the blood from your face and open your eyes to what IS going to happen and what YOU will have to deal with IF you decide to stay.

[Xarog]

It is not arbitrary.

The skill you use to make a finished product in the Dragon Lairshaper school is ALWAYS lairshaping.

Thus, lairshaping gives you experience.

The definition of a finished product is what's arbitrary. the resources you use the lairshaping skill aren't a finished product, because they're still processed into a lair.

Or they are a finished product, but then so are bars, orbs, crystals, bricks etc. etc. etc.

You most certainly DO want a skill based system because you ********** and moan about not gaining exp for using crystalshaping. You want your use of crystalshaping to increase your skill in crystalshaping. You have said that quite a few times.

Yes, I want everything I do in the game to be reflected directly towards my character as an improvement. A skill system is not needed to accomplish that.

Yet you put forth none.

You're free to disagree, but you'll excuse me if I don't accept your ipse dixit statements as proof that you're right.

[Xarog]

Just because YOU dont see the logic or the rational in what TG plans for crafting does not make it illogical or irrational.

The logic is sound if you accept the base assumptions. I do not accept the base assumptions, thus the disagreement.

There ARE some certainties in what TG has in store for crafting changes. Perhaps YOU would find the information if YOU looked for it... its out there... its published... Now, whether you make the effort to read it, understand it and plan for it that is purely up to you. I can assure you that you'll be better off when you wipe the blood from your face and open your eyes to what IS going to happen and what YOU will have to deal with IF you decide to stay.

As I said, this is a suggestions forum, created for the pupose of listening to player suggestions. I am excercising that privelige by making my suggestion. Doing so in no way interferes with you or your life, and you are free to ignore this thread if you so wish, just as everyone else is.

[LaughingOtter]

I happen to really like use-based skill systems, but the very short time I was in the Wish beta showed me how a bad use-based system can totally bog down game play. To make a knife or an axe, for example, you had to learn to chop the wood, learn to cut the wood into boards, learn to carve the wood, learn to mine the ore, learn to smelt the ore into ingots, learn to shape the blade, learn to sharpen the blade, and learn to make the pommel, and finally learn to make the freaking knife itself. Oh, and you needed to learn to make the molds for the metal ingots, and you had to find the tools, and you had to buy apprenticeships to learn these skills, and the formulae...

I just want to make a freaking axe so I can do this stupid (tirade of obscenity) quest!

Net result: leaving the beta hating the game and unwilling to play it if they paid me to do it.

I submit that the complex crafting system is one of HZ's strengths. However, the more complex the system, the more unwieldy a use-based skill system gets. An unwieldy system results in loss of playability. Playability directly impacts subscriber retention and thus, game longevity. Horizons could not, IMHO, retain this excellent crafting system if it were changed to pure use-based skill improvement. To maintain playability, it has to be class-based, and that means realism is going to be sacrificed to some extent.

Core skills is going to move HZ as close to a use-based skill system as I think the game can get. You are entitled to disagree, but, frankly, if it costs TG your subscription at the same time it helps retain three more, that's a net improvement in survivability for Tulga.

*cues up "The Circle of Life" and fade out*

[Xarog]

I happen to really like use-based skill systems, but the very short time I was in the Wish beta showed me how a bad use-based system can totally bog down game play. To make a knife or an axe, for example, you had to learn to chop the wood, learn to cut the wood into boards, learn to carve the wood, learn to mine the ore, learn to smelt the ore into ingots, learn to shape the blade, learn to sharpen the blade, and learn to make the pommel, and finally learn to make the freaking knife itself. Oh, and you needed to learn to make the molds for the metal ingots, and you had to find the tools, and you had to buy apprenticeships to learn these skills, and the formulae...

I can accept that, on the face of it. I'd like to believe that if TG chose to do it, however, that they could do a better job of it.

I submit that the complex crafting system is one of HZ's strengths. However, the more complex the system, the more unwieldy a use-based skill system gets. An unwieldy system results in loss of playability. Playability directly impacts subscriber retention and thus, game longevity. Horizons could not, IMHO, retain this excellent crafting system if it were changed to pure use-based skill improvement. To maintain playability, it has to be class-based, and that means realism is going to be sacrificed to some extent.

But it doesn't have to be. TG could decide simply to give the secondary skills a reduced amount of experience - say a 10th of what it is now (I can accept that making the base items contributes less to the school than the finished product - hell, I could even recommend it on the fact that it's closer to real-life) and I would be happy.

I heard another excellent idea today in IRC - only give experience for working with products that are in the same tier or lower that your characters current craft school is in. there's your bootstrap problem instantly gone without the loss of realism.

Core skills is going to move HZ as close to a use-based skill system as I think the game can get. You are entitled to disagree, but, frankly, if it costs TG your subscription at the same time it helps retain three more, that's a net improvement in survivability for Tulga.

I don't disagree with this either.

[Guaran]

.... I submit that the complex crafting system is one of HZ's strengths. However, the more complex the system, the more unwieldy a use-based skill system gets. An unwieldy system results in loss of playability. Playability directly impacts subscriber retention and thus, game longevity. Horizons could not, IMHO, retain this excellent crafting system if it were changed to pure use-based skill improvement. To maintain playability, it has to be class-based, and that means realism is going to be sacrificed to some extent. ...

You hit the nail on the head.

I must say that after all the myriad of crafting I've done in Hz. And how I was SOO looking forward to getting a lair.. at how disenchanted I became with it (laircrafting, Hz's first foray into a use based craft system).

I will admit, that the use based portion isn't necessarily the biggest turnoff of laircrafting tho, it's the absurd complexity of it all. It practially requires a Deluxe ( not teleportable, 10 item stack ) type of cargo disk. Using a tarbash for the most part isn't an option, unless you have a bunch of silos ALREADY at your disposal, to make laircrafting workable. So you are stuck making what you can in the field, the unit's to be placed, using a deluxe disk, which you then have to carry the units on person to the lair. It's tedious and slow.

To me it's too time consuming and complex. There's little fun in it. I believe the intermediate resources need to be re-thought out. something. They took a "Wish" style approach, and basically removed the FUN component.

We all play Horizons to HAVE FUN. not do an assload of work.

My nice big lair sits empty...... unbuilt. planned stuctures deleted..


[not even touching one of the comments Xer made...]

[Lycaunoss]

Xarog. The bootstrapping thing is actually taken care of with the current implementation of lairshaping more or less. Your level at lairshaping effectively limits the ammount of xp that you can obtain. I think it does a good job at allowing higher level crafters to do higher tier crafting through the use of teched scales and such. It works and it actually works well. Real bootstrapping would occur if we could make scales and get xp as a lairshaper. So I'm not sure why that would be a big deal for you.

Guaran. The strange thing about laircrafting is that it's brutally bad if you don't have storage or machines to work with in your lair (or conveniently close to your lair). Once you get silos and machines it gets a lot faster and less painfull. The problem is that it's a pretty big hump to get over to get to that point.

[LaughingOtter]

My nice big lair sits empty...... unbuilt. planned stuctures deleted..

Man, I'm sorry to hear that.

I agree that you need a huge storage infrastructure to do lairshaping without going nuts. I'm building three lairs and will be helping on a fourth that a guildie just picked up. Right now, that's taking six silos, one storage chamber, and two-five different guild connies just to juggle resources and store finished units for application.

All of this bears on the thread topic, BTW; Guaran's disenchantment and the logistical infrastructure I have to use are both direct consequences of the existing complexity in lairshaping. Look at the huge number of lairs people paid a lot of cash for that are sitting empty or under-developed. Adding an additional class for dragon resource processing is the only 'consitant' way to get class XP for crystalshaping. While it might be a desirable class to have (a combination miner/gatherer class with, say, 10 or 11 points/ level in smelting, stoneworking, etc), it's an extreme solution to have to go to to address an issue that is, on the whole, utterly insignificant.

[Xarog]

Lyca :

Xarog. The bootstrapping thing is actually taken care of with the current implementation of lairshaping more or less. Your level at lairshaping effectively limits the ammount of xp that you can obtain. I think it does a good job at allowing higher level crafters to do higher tier crafting through the use of teched scales and such. It works and it actually works well. Real bootstrapping would occur if we could make scales and get xp as a lairshaper. So I'm not sure why that would be a big deal for you.

I think you misunderstand where my objection lies.

I don't have a problem with the idea of you not getting lairshaping experience for making dragon scales. Lairshaping has got absolutely nothing to do with making scales, so not getting experience is as it should be.

I do have a problem when the game tells me I can't get better at something by practicing that something - it's just something that flies in the face of common sense.

Regarding what you say about teched scales, you have a point. Tulga could make exceptions to the "same tier" rule if it IS infact a primary skill for your class. If you're already that good at it, then you should get kudos for that fact, I guess. It was a suggestion, and it wasn't meant to be the perfect solution to everything - I just thought it was a good idea that would solve tulga's problems and leave me satisfied at the same time; some changes to the idea isn't all that unreasonable.

Otter :

While it might be a desirable class to have (a combination miner/gatherer class with, say, 10 or 11 points/ level in smelting, stoneworking, etc), it's an extreme solution to have to go to to address an issue that is, on the whole, utterly insignificant.

I'm sorry that you feel common sense is insignificant. But I agree it's an extreme solution, and entirely unneccessary - especially when there are other, easier, alternatives.

[Xarog]

This INCLUDES crystalshaping.

But that's the problem. It shouldn't include crystalshaping. If the devs are going to effort to make sure that gemgrinding does not make you a better scalecrafter, then they should make sure that scalecrafting does not make you a better gemcutter. That's logically consistent.

[AA0]

hehe, with the ignore list on the forums here, it looks like you are all crazy fighting with yourselfs

[Xarog]

If that's the only way you feel you can prove yourself right, more power to you.