Crafting and Professions

ArchivedUser

Just to be clear whats the difference between the 2? Since theres a limit in the craft skill tree im a bit confused. Under professions i'd put things like fishing, sailing or even city council member-basically jobs or pastimes. For crafts i'd put gathering/processing, alchemy, blacksmithing. It'd suck if it was all the same and i want to be a master blacksmith but also want to fish in my spare time but i can't have both because i ran out of skill points.

A different question: Can alchemists also make poisons and enhancement drugs and not just be limited to potions. Also will there be apothecaries in the game? They'd make for good business partners for an alchemist.

ArchivedUser

From my own limited knowledge, the two are one and the same. People just keep using them interchangeably. 

Professions are broken into three categories: gathering, processing, and crafting. We'll have three profession skill points that we can divvy up between the trio, so you'll have to place your points in whatever way you wish to explore. A master gatherer, processor, or crafter will likely need all three points in one category to hit their peak capabilities. It's all about choosing how you want to progress. Everyone can't be the best at everything.

As for your second set of questions, I'm afraid I don't know enough to answer.

Hope this helps, though.

ArchivedUser

Going off the wiki, it doesn't quite work like that.

The three Artisan classes are Gathering, Processing, and Crafting. You can choose to work on all three, but its going to be a big time sink to do that. 

From there, you gain skills such as Alchemy and Blacksmithing, but they don't appear to be mutually exclusive. You should be able to fish in your spare time, you just might not get very good at it quickly if you only do it super casually. 

Seems to me like you can, theoretically, delve into & eventually master all of these subprofessions but the time investment would be bordering on the obscene. That said...if you play FFXIV becoming an "omni-crafter" is regarded as a massive time/$ investment but isn't actually out of the reach of anyone.

Just guessing here, but I imagine setting up a core craft->refine->produce gameplay loop that allows you to do all of that by yourself for one (1) crafting profession would be at about the same time investment of leveling all crafters to 70 in ffxiv (Months+), while actually become proficient in Every crafting, gathering, and processing profession available would require 24/7 play for a long ass time.

As for the alchemy questions...those sorts of things are usually alchemy crafts. Whether they're relevant to gameplay is a separate thing. And yes, players can open their own shops and sell whatever. Assuming potions are useful, an apothecary-esque shop will probably pop up.

ArchivedUser

Crafting is the production profession... profession is used to describe all of the artisan classes (gathering profession, processing profession, crafting profession).

EDIT: Also each tier in the artisan trees cost the same amount of points so if you want to fish (a gathering profession) You'd start investing points into the gathering (I'm assuming certain branches would benefit specific gathering professions over others), each tier would cost more and require a certain amount of points in the previous tier. So if you wanted to be a great fisher, you'd focus on that all the way up to the top tier. If you wanted to do that and also cook (a crafting profession), then you'd have to split those points between the two. I'm not sure if there is a cap on artisan points but I am sure that getting to top tier in one would be enough points to probably only get you half way through two trees.

ArchivedUser

Professions are like jobs and crafting-type jobs are a part of that so like blacksmith or tailor would be craftsmen but a fisherman job would still be a profession.

ArchivedUser

Bummer. I hope they give us some spare points beyond mastering one craft. that way i can put some into gathering and fish on some spare time

ArchivedUser

VoidShadow said:

Bummer. I hope they give us some spare points beyond mastering one craft. that way i can put some into gathering and fish on some spare time

Thats what i was thinking or just make the things like fishing experienced based.
 Like bdo where the more you fished the higher the level or the more you walked you gained strength, you eat you get more.... i forget but im sure you guys know lol.

Like i wanted to just fish for fun while boating around the sea, but i kinda dont just wanna waste points if every point matters for your craft.

There should be a separate non skill point system for life skills, but then you have to decide what the craft and life skills are.

ArchivedUser

So epiphany... is there going to be life skills and not just crafting?

I dont think i've heard anyone mention that life skills based from experience like bdo would be incorporated.

ArchivedUser

Pinkberry said:

So epiphany... is there going to be life skills and not just crafting?

I dont think i've heard anyone mention that life skills based from experience like bdo would be incorporated.

Something like cooking i'd like to be experience based as well but i doubt it will happen.

ArchivedUser

Not sure why they'd want to limit profession skill allocation. Just make it more and more expensive. I want to be able to get more out of my main. If I spend 80% of my time on my main I want to still be able to become more proficient of a crafter. I understand they don't want self reliant crafters but what would be wrong with allowing someone to slowly learn how to do something under the same category? Become one of the best enchanters on the server and sub into cooking on the side. Idk.. maybe it is pointless.. I just want to feel I'm getting progress out of my character.

ArchivedUser

I’d really like the ability to become a master crafter and opportunity to master multiple/all professions. I’ve always liked being self sufficient but happy that this takes a good amount of time to master all. In ESO I’ve maxed them all on my main however that’s been a journey of 12 months to do which seems fair but also rewarding. 

ArchivedUser

@Parrot86 Well, some good news and bad news on that front. You will be able to become a master crafter. Your opportunity to master them all will come on multiple characters though. The way crafting professions will work, unlike ESO, will be a set amount of crafting skill points. By mastering a certain tree in either gathering, processing, or crafting you will reach the pinnacle of your profession. You won't have enough points to do it on one character.

ArchivedUser

UnknownSystemError said:

@Parrot86 Well, some good news and bad news on that front. You will be able to become a master crafter. Your opportunity to master them all will come on multiple characters though. The way crafting professions will work, unlike ESO, will be a set amount of crafting skill points. By mastering a certain tree in either gathering, processing, or crafting you will reach the pinnacle of your profession. You won't have enough points to do it on one character.

Thanks for clarification, I’m not totally against that and I’m a bit of an Alt-aholic so I’m pleased you can still do all. Do you know if you will need to level your character fully to be able to master a professions or could a lowbie exist purely for crafting purposes?

ArchivedUser

The crafting line is said to be separate from the combat progression. That said, certain materials needed for higher level crafting will only come from certain bosses/mobs/dungeons so rudimentary combat level will be required unless you plan to pay for it all with currency. Also the limited knowledge we know of how recipes will work will require travel and reputation standing with certain npc organizations, which to gain standing with them may require different types of quests to advance.

ArchivedUser

Parrot86 said:

I’d really like the ability to become a master crafter and opportunity to master multiple/all professions. I’ve always liked being self sufficient but happy that this takes a good amount of time to master all. In ESO I’ve maxed them all on my main however that’s been a journey of 12 months to do which seems fair but also rewarding. 

You're also limited in what you can do since your account freehold (house outside of the city/settlement itself) will have a limited amount of features. So you can put in a smithy and a forge, or a garden and a greenhouse, or a ranch and a kitchen, etc, so you'll be limited on that front as well.

The devs don't want people becoming self-reliant hermits.. they want people talking and trading and adventuring together. That's one of the main purposes for limiting what you can do craft-wise.

ArchivedUser

Loyheta said:

Parrot86 said:

I’d really like the ability to become a master crafter and opportunity to master multiple/all professions. I’ve always liked being self sufficient but happy that this takes a good amount of time to master all. In ESO I’ve maxed them all on my main however that’s been a journey of 12 months to do which seems fair but also rewarding. 

You're also limited in what you can do since your account freehold (house outside of the city/settlement itself) will have a limited amount of features. So you can put in a smithy and a forge, or a garden and a greenhouse, or a ranch and a kitchen, etc, so you'll be limited on that front as well.

The devs don't want people becoming self-reliant hermits.. they want people talking and trading and adventuring together. That's one of the main purposes for limiting what you can do craft-wise.

Ok thanks, I take it the larger the freehold the more features it can have? I presume the cities themselves will have all crafting capabilities built within them but as a character you will be limited by how many you can master?

ArchivedUser

@Parrot86 Freeholds will all be the same size. On that 1/2 acre (quote) there will be different "slots" that you can put structures on of your choice. There will NOT be enough room to be everything to everybody, and since you only have one per account, long-term goals and planning will be a major part of what you decide to pursue. Even though your node may have build the relevant crafting facilities inside its walls, you will still have a limit per character of how many artisan points you can assign in a tree. You could be a middling jack of all, but to truly master a specific line, you will need to drop almost all your points into that specialty. Since they haven't dropped any other information about specifics and are nowhere close to a crafting system reveal, you are in wait and see mode till probably middle of A2-B1 for that with the rest of us.

ArchivedUser

I hope the profession points are not too punishing, in way that there is enough points only to master one branch. It is enough to restrict mastering too many branch with timesink.   

ArchivedUser

As someone that focuses heavily on crafting and likes to main a character to achieve things I really hope they have some sort of progression for people that spend a lot of time on one crafter. Maybe a prestige system for crafters like many games have for combat classes? 

ArchivedUser

Hmm...In a lot of games I tend to pick one profession to focus on for crafting (say cooking) but I gather raws\mats for all professions.  I use what I need for my crafting and sell the rest.  I wonder if that will be possible in Ashes.  Also if there is only one freehold per account, with limited slots, how can you try all the different professions on your alts?  Unless there are public craft halls (which I really hope there are). 

ArchivedUser

@Noemad Exactly that. They do not want everyone to be everything. Meaningful choices is the mantra. You will need to make arrangements with others to use their facilities and make sure your mayor builds the relevant crafting stations/structures for you to visit. We still don't have a confirmed number of character slots, but instead of "I will just make one of everything!" people are going to have to research and plan. When they find out that something isn't working, they will need to reroll. Back to the days of not being able to swap out builds and roles on the fly. Planning, planning, planning.

ArchivedUser

UnknownSystemError said:

 Back to the days of not being able to swap out builds and roles on the fly. Planning, planning, planning.

Not a bad thing.  I remember having a notebook filled with things handwritten in for my DnD pen and paper characters.  Planning things out for them was one of the most fun things about the game.  Maybe we've had it a bit too easy with some games where you can do anything at any time and be all professions all on one character.  This will make us have to actually think about what we want our characters to be and what we need to do to get them there.

ArchivedUser

If the crafting point system will be too punishing, then people who wants to focus on several paths just have to play that around with alts. Trying to restrict too much people who want to focus different kind of lifeskills, will have negative effect to that part of playerbase. Now if we think of sandbox games where usually everybody can do everything, in those games the economy still works totally fine. And you guys know why? It does not automatically mean that every player will do everything even they have this possibility. People will still theorycraft and focus to specific paths to be masters of one/few and not focusing to be jack of all trades. Even some players will be as self-sufficient as possible, most players wont be. Some players will skip lifeskills totally, but most of people are focusing to one or few paths. So eventually the system will be balanced without too much of restrictions and rules. 

I am not saying every path should be done with one character, but i hope there will be system where there are enough points to focus at least for few/some specific paths and max those eventually. Let the lifeskill oriented players focus on their field if they are willing to use lots of their playing time to part of content they want to.