The Crafting System

ArchivedUser

Kadin said:

@Ferryman pure crafter usually mean a "Crafting Bot", the only way to resolve that is to make the crafting system something like the combat system where its a B**CH to macro.

Pure crafter is person whose main interest and activity in game is at crafting. And what i ment by this is, that player who wants focus only/mainly to crafting should have possiblity to do that without be totally dependend of other players.  

ArchivedUser

As far as "crafting" classes goes, since animal husbandry is likely, what about some kind of farming related class? One that can crossbreed plants or better the growth timers, etc.?

ArchivedUser

Here's my guess.
1. Blacksmith
2. Tailor
3. Farmer
4. Wainwright 
5. Alchemist
6. Animal Breeder
7. Chef

ArchivedUser

Darxy said:

As far as "crafting" classes goes, since animal husbandry is likely, what about some kind of farming related class? One that can crossbreed plants or better the growth timers, etc.?

Well, we know that you will be able to grow crops on your freehold, and it appears that anyone will be able to do this.  That said, everything in Ashes is player driven.  It would make sense that you get the seeds / tools / bug killers / dirt enhancements from a potential farmer artisan class.  Perhaps these guys would specialize in farming past just being able to plant and pick basic crops.  They could be able to sell us fancy seeds, GMO foods, whatever.  

So far almost nothing is going to be provided by NPCs other than quests or training.  Would definitely continue the theme for us to have farmers.  I've met a lot of people on discord that plan to make their freeholds the most important part of their game life, and i could see having a mega farm (Harvest Moon anyone?) be a big draw.  Also, since other people can see your freehold (unlike WoW farmville), it will be cool to wander past a big field of crops (maybe with some dairy cows from the animal husbandry folk!).

ArchivedUser

What I'm missing is guild professions.

Yes, a swordsmith would be cool. But, they are basically a one man thing. A mason who could ensure the city has stronger walls in guild wars or the architect who can ensure that higher buildings are possible in the metropolis or a sculpor whos statues give certain boosts to the district they are in. 

That would also encourage people to invest more into their guilds.

ArchivedUser

@Lestati

Architect was in my personal list of professions i'd like to see.  As so many things are player driven, and building is a key feature in Ashes, it only makes sense to have an artisan class or two that can assist with that.  I would expect that players will be responsible for providing plans for you to use on your freehold, possibly even be needed to create the buildings for you.

I don't think any artisan will be able to help with city or castle defenses (other than providing materials).  It has been mentioned more than once that the mayor / king will be the person that controls how city/castle resources are spent and what defenses will be implemented.  Seems like it would be cumbersome, if not counter-intuitive to have a mayor decide to invest in better walls or gates, and then be forced to also find a player crafter that can make that happen.  Would be a serious issue if you spent the resources, but then can't find a crafter with high enough skill / willingness to do the job for you.

That said, all of the adventure classes have siege skills that they can use if multiple of that class band together, like the summoners can have a siege golum.  We know dedicated crafting will be a valid gameplay choice, so it might make some sense if crafters also have siege abilities.  Like we've seen trebuchets in the siege videos, what if forming siege weapons or defenses was something that artisans could group together and produce?  While I have no problem with them just building stuff for others to use, it would be interesting if they had some kind of active siege skill that required channeling or whatever (basically just actively doing something) as part of the siege.  

ArchivedUser

viktorbelmont said:

I've met a lot of people on discord that plan to make their freeholds the most important part of their game life, and i could see having a mega farm (Harvest Moon anyone?) be a big draw.  Also, since other people can see your freehold (unlike WoW farmville), it will be cool to wander past a big field of crops (maybe with some dairy cows from the animal husbandry folk!).

I think that would be super awesome too! I love life skill type stuff in games so I am really looking forward to a big farm freehold!

ArchivedUser

viktorbelmont said:

@Lestati

Architect was in my personal list of professions i'd like to see.  As so many things are player driven, and building is a key feature in Ashes, it only makes sense to have an artisan class or two that can assist with that.  I would expect that players will be responsible for providing plans for you to use on your freehold, possibly even be needed to create the buildings for you.

I don't think any artisan will be able to help with city or castle defenses (other than providing materials).  It has been mentioned more than once that the mayor / king will be the person that controls how city/castle resources are spent and what defenses will be implemented.  Seems like it would be cumbersome, if not counter-intuitive to have a mayor decide to invest in better walls or gates, and then be forced to also find a player crafter that can make that happen.  Would be a serious issue if you spent the resources, but then can't find a crafter with high enough skill / willingness to do the job for you.

That said, all of the adventure classes have siege skills that they can use if multiple of that class band together, like the summoners can have a siege golum.  We know dedicated crafting will be a valid gameplay choice, so it might make some sense if crafters also have siege abilities.  Like we've seen trebuchets in the siege videos, what if forming siege weapons or defenses was something that artisans could group together and produce?  While I have no problem with them just building stuff for others to use, it would be interesting if they had some kind of active siege skill that required channeling or whatever (basically just actively doing something) as part of the siege.  

What if public projects require public effort ?
From materials to tools, manpower or even animal power.
Not forgetting lots of trade participation and organising them.
There would be no wonders of the world without such.

Granted you cant expect the game to do all that for you without killing it.
But you do need to provide the tools and framework to enable the players to do it.
Which is essentially what we are doing with the artisan classes.
This just take sit one stage further with the collaboration and coordination of those trades.

ArchivedUser

@Rune_Relic

For materials public input is already a thing.  One of the main purposes of the caravan system is to deliver supplies to the node itself to meet the requirements of whatever the mayor is wanting to build or spend resources on.  When the mayor wants something that requires anything other than gold (which is auto provided via taxes), shipments to the node have to be made via caravan (may also be some kind of local drop off for resources already at that node).  It's possible that those supply runs may also include production parts like gate pieces, ballista components, or processed goods like stone / masonry.  We know that caravans can at least be upgraded through parts made by an artisan (possible that a caravan requires everything from an artisan, we don't know yet), so it's also possible that there may be city parts that can be built as well.

For major collaborations, i'm thinking there may be events that happen that artisans may be able to contribute to, like the opening of the gates to AQ in WoW Classic.  Something that everyone knows about, and can help contribute to.  I wouldn't think that artisans would be required in any significant way for some of the more automated things like node management.  Not saying it's not possible, as everything is player centric in Ashes, but there has to be a limit to what we expect players to supply.

ArchivedUser

@viktorbelmont
Agreed. Its really a wait and see moment.
We have no idea what the depth of Ashes systems will be in regard community involvement.
You have cited many good examples in your post that its a fundamental part of Ashes gameplay.

ArchivedUser

I hope crafting will actualy include various interesting minigames instead of
"get all mats together, click craft button and go afk until you made all 200 iron bars. Then call yourself a 'master' crafter of a special kind, even if your only accomplishment is to click the craft button and grind gold for mats".

ArchivedUser

*Pipe dream*

I want leveling to 50 to be so hard that it takes a full year. That the most prestigious profession is an alchemist because of their ability to help with leveling. I want environmental danger like poisonous gas, lava/heat fatigue, ect.. to basically need alchemist to create potions to help counter-act it. I want exploding potions, poisons, and utility potions (invisibility or longer underwater stamina) to be in-game.

*end rant*

But yeah one of the crafting roles has to be Tattoo artist. They mentioned a tattoo system, so i'd only make sense that it would be a player made. 

ArchivedUser

@Guildart

I'm fairly sure you're already aware that a year leveling is seems to be out of the question.  The ballpark number provided for leveling was about 45 days for the average player to reach a concept max level of 50.  Actual max level and leveling time have not been cemented yet, but its most likely going to be around that ballpark.  Intrepid doesn't want things to be an actual grind (doesn't mean time not spent)

 TheLazyPeon_Q&A_2017-05-15#.5B24:20.5D_Is_the_game_going_to_be_leveling_through_quest_or_grind.3F

Is the game going to be leveling through quest or grind?[12]

1. No grind. Grind sucks. We hate the grind.
2. Need to disassociate the word “grind” with “time”
   1. There’s a lot of things that involve time that can progress your character
   2. Repetition won’t be a part of that progression
   3. We want enough stuff to do in the game where you “can’t do them all”
   4. Want people to see the fruits of their effort while they are doing things.
   5. We want it to be fun, we don’t want it to be work
3. We’ve designed a lot of different paths for you to choose from

Keep in mind that leveling to 50 as a character, and leveling your professions are two different things, while you can level your character via crafting, if you choose to level via adventuring you still need to also work on crafting.

As far as artisan prestige, there will be a number of roles that will shine brightly, and unlikely for any to outshine the rest.  If anything will, it will be Animal Husbandry.  Flying is almost non-existant, and better modes of travel will always be in ultra high demand.  Animal breeders that make mounts with amazing special traits will probably be able to demand a king's ransom for them.

We do know there will be environmental dangers, but no idea if artisans will be able to help with them, not a bad idea though.  Steven has mentioned Alchemy as one of the few confirmed artisan classes multiple times, and it seems to be rather near and dear to him.  From comments made healing / utility / poison potions have basically all been confirmed (for poison it's unclear if those are class restricted or not), and alchemists may have "fun" flavor potions.  Hopefully you find a bottle you enjoy drinking.