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Phase I of Alpha Two testing will occur on weekends. Each weekend is scheduled to start on Fridays at 10 AM PT and end on Sundays at 10 PM PT. Find out more here.
Check out Alpha Two Announcements here to see the latest Alpha Two news and update notes.
Our quickest Alpha Two updates are in Discord. Testers with Alpha Two access can chat in Alpha Two channels by connecting your Discord and Intrepid accounts here.
Weaponsmithing and Copper
MrWeapons
Member, Alpha Two
in Artisanship
I want to express my frustration with the lack of support and balance for players attempting to progress as weaponsmiths. The current system for gathering resources, particularly copper and nickel, creates unnecessary barriers that make crafting feel more like a chore than an enjoyable aspect of the game.
For example, the amount of copper required to craft even the most basic weaponsmithing item, such as a copper shield, is substantial—8 copper per shield. Two weeks ago, I spent 8 hours searching for copper nodes and only managed to find 3 small nodes, yielding a total of 6 copper (which still needed refining). Over the past few days, I’ve spent 2–3 hours per day mining and searching for nodes. While I’ve seen slight improvements, it’s still not enough to craft more than one shield at a time. This level of scarcity is frustrating and unsustainable.
Copper and nickel are both Tier 1 (T1) resources labeled as "common," yet they are anything but common in practice. Without a full guild dedicated to mining and gathering, it’s nearly impossible to progress as a weaponsmith. Players are left unable to craft basic tools or gear without spending days farming resources that simply aren’t available. This grind-heavy approach mirrors issues seen in other games like World of Warcraft, where players often feel like they need to spend their entire week farming materials just to enjoy one day of actual gameplay. Games that become this tedious risk alienating their player base, leading to disengagement or destructive behaviors like griefing—both of which signal a downward spiral for any game community.
Suggestions for Improvement
To address these issues and ensure the game remains fun, entertaining, and accessible to both new and long-term players, I’d like to propose some solutions:
Increase Resource Availability:
Add more copper and nickel nodes or clusters in early-game areas. For example, I’ve noticed basalt and granite clusters appearing in some locations but have yet to see anything similar for copper or nickel. Are these clusters missing because they haven’t been added yet or because demand has made them impossible to find?
Reduce Crafting Costs:
Create a entry level recipe for weaponsmith and armorsmith that requires just 1 copper or nickel. it would still have the wood and mold requirement. The recipe should be a reward for a quest. It could also be a named mob drop.
Make T1 resources common again:
Create a mining pick that allows a user to mine a specific ore type from any node but at a much smaller drop rate. it would only work on a large deposit but the result would be one copper or nickel. and the tool would be used up after 180 minuites.
Allow higher-tier nodes (e.g., T2) to yield smaller amounts of T1 resources alongside their primary materials. This would reduce reliance on T1 nodes.
Introduce Alternative Resource Acquisition Methods:
Add ore drops to monster loot tables at a rate similar to blue drops. Humanoid enemies could drop ore (e.g., T1 resources at levels 5–10, T2 resources at levels 15–20), while animals could drop herbs or seeds. This would diversify resource acquisition while integrating combat into gathering.
Improve Accessibility for New Players:
Ensure casual gamers aren’t turned off by the time investment required to progress in professions like weaponsmithing or armorsmithing.
The current system disproportionately impacts new players or those without access to large guilds, making crafting professions feel inaccessible and unbalanced. By implementing changes like these, the game could better support its diverse player base while maintaining its core appeal.
Thank you for considering this feedback. I hope these suggestions can help make the game more enjoyable for everyone—whether they’re hardcore crafters or casual adventurers.
thank you for your consideration.
For example, the amount of copper required to craft even the most basic weaponsmithing item, such as a copper shield, is substantial—8 copper per shield. Two weeks ago, I spent 8 hours searching for copper nodes and only managed to find 3 small nodes, yielding a total of 6 copper (which still needed refining). Over the past few days, I’ve spent 2–3 hours per day mining and searching for nodes. While I’ve seen slight improvements, it’s still not enough to craft more than one shield at a time. This level of scarcity is frustrating and unsustainable.
Copper and nickel are both Tier 1 (T1) resources labeled as "common," yet they are anything but common in practice. Without a full guild dedicated to mining and gathering, it’s nearly impossible to progress as a weaponsmith. Players are left unable to craft basic tools or gear without spending days farming resources that simply aren’t available. This grind-heavy approach mirrors issues seen in other games like World of Warcraft, where players often feel like they need to spend their entire week farming materials just to enjoy one day of actual gameplay. Games that become this tedious risk alienating their player base, leading to disengagement or destructive behaviors like griefing—both of which signal a downward spiral for any game community.
Suggestions for Improvement
To address these issues and ensure the game remains fun, entertaining, and accessible to both new and long-term players, I’d like to propose some solutions:
Increase Resource Availability:
Add more copper and nickel nodes or clusters in early-game areas. For example, I’ve noticed basalt and granite clusters appearing in some locations but have yet to see anything similar for copper or nickel. Are these clusters missing because they haven’t been added yet or because demand has made them impossible to find?
Reduce Crafting Costs:
Create a entry level recipe for weaponsmith and armorsmith that requires just 1 copper or nickel. it would still have the wood and mold requirement. The recipe should be a reward for a quest. It could also be a named mob drop.
Make T1 resources common again:
Create a mining pick that allows a user to mine a specific ore type from any node but at a much smaller drop rate. it would only work on a large deposit but the result would be one copper or nickel. and the tool would be used up after 180 minuites.
Allow higher-tier nodes (e.g., T2) to yield smaller amounts of T1 resources alongside their primary materials. This would reduce reliance on T1 nodes.
Introduce Alternative Resource Acquisition Methods:
Add ore drops to monster loot tables at a rate similar to blue drops. Humanoid enemies could drop ore (e.g., T1 resources at levels 5–10, T2 resources at levels 15–20), while animals could drop herbs or seeds. This would diversify resource acquisition while integrating combat into gathering.
Improve Accessibility for New Players:
Ensure casual gamers aren’t turned off by the time investment required to progress in professions like weaponsmithing or armorsmithing.
The current system disproportionately impacts new players or those without access to large guilds, making crafting professions feel inaccessible and unbalanced. By implementing changes like these, the game could better support its diverse player base while maintaining its core appeal.
Thank you for considering this feedback. I hope these suggestions can help make the game more enjoyable for everyone—whether they’re hardcore crafters or casual adventurers.
thank you for your consideration.
5
Comments
Regardless of if the current amount of copper available is correct or not, there are a bunch of problems involved in raising Copper availability from 'The Myth Of Copper' to 'Daily Ration of Copper', particularly if it's done by increasing the availability of copper nodes out in the world.
In a game like Ashes, it's very difficult to make crafting professions feel balanced, and the 'large guilds do things' will probably always shine through.
Copper being rarer than Iron could be anything from 'an illusion' (I doubt it) to 'the person currently doing Econ knowing that they can't achieve the longterm goal by making Copper nodes anything more than legends'.
So I'll ask a simple question to maybe help the conversation along:
"If you learned that the 'Econ team' had actually lowered the availability of Copper Nodes on purpose over time, what would you think the reason was?"
and i agree op that the current system is a big negative for new players or not being in a very big guild
I got up this morning at 3 am CST to try my luck during a different time of day. I live in CST USA. Guess what, I was able to find some copper. I spent several hours and mined 24 copper. This tells me that our Alpha is overloaded compared to what they thought the testing load was going to be OR the system "as currently designed" is not meant to support a popular game. Meaning that there is a lack of dynamic balance by the code its self-based on load or volume of crafters / miners.
This will result in a bad economic model and crafting bottle necks. Those bottle necks are leading to bad player behaviors, ie Theft, Macros, Bots, Griefing and other activities by users that signal a games decline,.
The net result, if the mining system is working as planned, will be one that has seasoned gamers abandon crafting aspects of the game. The newly attracted player who have not had 20+ years playing MMOs will be turned off and the game will die from lack of new and younger players.
I have hope that December 20th will be an opportunity for Intrepid to show a better flesh out crafting / gathering vision of a sustainable game path.
Thats a lot of assumptions you made by anecdotal "evidence". It's not a "signal of game decline", we're in alpha and you're testing, so don't worry about the games decline before its even finished.
Right, but you can't blame players for opting out of spending their time doing something that doesn't directly benefit them on the grounds that it might potentially help someone else who comes along when those respawn.
The solution can only be 'find ways to make basalt and granite more needed' (Mayoral commissions to mine nodes would work, if the question isn't bugged)
... or that there is enough copper to support the current playerbase, but most of it sits in storage because trading is frustrating at the moment.
Which is exactly what steven outlined during last week's stream.
take lyneth for example, its got the piratesoftware zerg and they mine everything cos there is that many of them in a small area , when they or other guilds arent mining everything there is plenty of copper and zinc to be found.
the biggest problem is too many people in one zone with limited nodes. with 21 zones, seas and underrealm 10k people wont seem like much , split just between the zones thats only 500 people a zone and not all of those people will be out gathering, not to mention the further out of a metro you go the more resources youll find as people will stick closer to the metro's come release. atm its alpha and not even the crafting / econ focused phase.
just watch in P2 as tropics and desert get gatherables and player stalls are brought in the market will be flooded with copper and zinc
Started down the Arcane Engineering path and quit very quickly as I saw the insane requirements
So I went to carpentry to actually test "something" ..... Then we run into Weeping Willow scarcity at level 10
Not practical and certainly not fun
It's not any different on vyra. We have dwarf guilds with very active and dedicated miners.
Servers right now have 1/4 the total number of players that live servers will, so the player density things you brought up aren't relevant - there will be just as many players compared to the number of nodes on release as we have now.
I hope this is an unintentional bug rather than a feature... but at the moment once a material goes into a crate it can no longer be used for crafting (only for buy orders). It's treated as a different item and cant stack with other materials.
Plus the dope hits from difficult copper finds? Much better than anything else, oh yeah man.
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Agreed - I think it's clear that gathering and exploration are going to be tied together.