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Artisan classes have wonky interdependencies
neuroguy
Member
I am bit confused after getting the full list of artisan professions. I thought the original reason why we would not be able to specialize across the three categories of gathering, processing and crafting was to create interdependencies so that players would need to interact with others. That kind of led me to believe that there would be some symmetry or pipeline from each gathering skill to a respective processing and crafting one. But as things stand, it seems like (just my impression, maybe others have a different one) that some gathering skills feed into more processing skills than others while others have no clear pipeline at all.
For example mining seems to be the sole gathering skill that feeds into metal working and masonry for the processing skills and then into armor smithing, weapon smithing, jewel cutting & maybe arcane engineering for the crafting skills. While hunting and fishing both feed into cooking which doesn't really have a crafting skill it clearly feeds into. There are random ones too like farming with no clear associated gathering or crafting skill and other ones with clean pipelines like lumber jacking into lumber milling into carpentry.
If these assumptions are more or less correct, then the demand for mining & hunting goods will be several times that of fishing goods for example. It feels strange to try to economically balance the different skills as they stand because their interdependencies are seemingly not balanced.
Personally, I would advocate for no restrictions as I think the game has so many layers of interdependencies and need for social interactions already that artisan specializations can be left to player preference. But in light of these highly asymmetrical and irregular interdependencies, plus the confirmation of essentially crafting mini-games I think the artisan skill specialization restrictions should be loosened some? It feels strange to force players to specialize in only mini-game artisan specializations if they choose one, while allowing for the selection of less interdependent (or borderline independent) specializations like farming. I think just locking players out of the rest of their artisan skill pipeline is sufficient for the stated goal, so if you chose lumber jacking as one skill to specialize in you can't specialize in lumber milling or carpentry but I don't see why a player can't choose scribe + animal husbandry + mining to specialize in. There should already be synergistic reasons to pick several crafting or gathering skills, so why not give players more freedom to engage with artisan skills based on personal preference?
For example mining seems to be the sole gathering skill that feeds into metal working and masonry for the processing skills and then into armor smithing, weapon smithing, jewel cutting & maybe arcane engineering for the crafting skills. While hunting and fishing both feed into cooking which doesn't really have a crafting skill it clearly feeds into. There are random ones too like farming with no clear associated gathering or crafting skill and other ones with clean pipelines like lumber jacking into lumber milling into carpentry.
If these assumptions are more or less correct, then the demand for mining & hunting goods will be several times that of fishing goods for example. It feels strange to try to economically balance the different skills as they stand because their interdependencies are seemingly not balanced.
Personally, I would advocate for no restrictions as I think the game has so many layers of interdependencies and need for social interactions already that artisan specializations can be left to player preference. But in light of these highly asymmetrical and irregular interdependencies, plus the confirmation of essentially crafting mini-games I think the artisan skill specialization restrictions should be loosened some? It feels strange to force players to specialize in only mini-game artisan specializations if they choose one, while allowing for the selection of less interdependent (or borderline independent) specializations like farming. I think just locking players out of the rest of their artisan skill pipeline is sufficient for the stated goal, so if you chose lumber jacking as one skill to specialize in you can't specialize in lumber milling or carpentry but I don't see why a player can't choose scribe + animal husbandry + mining to specialize in. There should already be synergistic reasons to pick several crafting or gathering skills, so why not give players more freedom to engage with artisan skills based on personal preference?
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Metagaming and min-maxing abound, players already have enough 'strength' once their social situation is set, adding more just overmultiplies the power of it.
Basically I go even further than 'every player should't be self sufficient' to 'I don't think every friendgroup should be able to be self-sufficient'. The Economy suffers in this case, and I say that as a player who HAS such a friendgroup that would instantly be self-sufficient if given just two less restrictions, one of which I am not even sure exists.
I also disagree based on experiences in other games, that the interdependencies are asymmetrical, other than Cooking, but Cooking actually needs to be considered slightly separately in most games, and hopefully 'livestock raising' is not powerful ENOUGH to provide all the meat required for a server.
I don't think we can say that because Cooking has no 'higher level output' that it matters. Metalworking/smelting needs to have one MOSTLY so that you're not selling to NPCs. Cooking already has an actual end-market. The 'crafting skill' that relies on Cooking is 'Fighting', or, in some games 'everything else'.
I think the reason is for a way of balancing activities in general.
Those who gather will spend more time outside of the node, being involved more often in PvP. So balancing advancement in gathering will take such aspect into account too. They will get benefits to all gathering activities when they become master gatherers.
Those who process, will spend more time in nodes or freeholds and might want to get benefits to all kind of intermediate processing activities.
I see this as a reward.
If each would be separate, then one would not be able to become master in Processing, but only in let's say Metalworking. Then grinding/leveling has to be done for Weaving and Tanning too.
Of course the grinding can be implemented anyway, also separately but at least there is a common greater group which will benefit all these.
Sorry I had a big deadline so this is super delayed. I think a lot of what you are saying is highly contingent on how you define things like 'self sufficient'. I think in a game with soft friction, being 'self sufficient' is not that big a deal. Just because you can gather and craft some nice items to sell does not take into account the variable that is the rest of the server. They may ransack your node or your caravan or mess up your supply line somehow.
With regards to cooking, that is exactly my point. I am not arguing that it makes no sense that cooking has no crafting profession that uses its products. I am arguing that from a design standpoint it is asymmetrical to the rest of the professions. So if someone specializes in processing, cooking provides an entirely different interaction with the market than the rest and so it just feels more and more arbitrary to force players to specialize in one artisan category.
Sorry I had a big deadline so this is super delayed. I absolutely see your logic, the one about having a common greater group benefitting from them is a compelling argument. I will say though, that this is still not consistent (cooking for example) and gathering also is not quite consistent. Even if it was consistent though, I think personally, I don't think it is a good idea to make people hyper-specialize in a playstyle as it is not what most people will enjoy. If you have this giant game with so many things to do, you should not force players to specialize in one niche too much. Just because someone enjoys PvE or PvP more, does not mean they should be forced to make a choice that makes them much much more effective in one and thus locking them into that if they want to be 'efficient'. I will say though, if this is their rationale, I'd be more accepting of it, because at it stands it feels quite arbitrary.