Artisans - In need of Clarification

During the latest livestream there was a question in relation to Artisans.

Margaret: Okay our next question is from Masao who wants to know: You've mentioned that the highest skilled players in each artisan class won't be masters of all. How deep is the specialization. Will it be as specialized as armor smithing or more specific like plated armor smithing, or even a specific as steel plated armor smithing?

Steven: When we reference not being masters of all that doesn't mean you're not a master within your own one of the three artisan types, which is you know crafter or gatherer, processor. You will be a master of one of those, you will not be master of the other two. So for example if you're a master of you know crafting, and we'll reveal this later with some of the blogs that I know are already written up about professions, but the professions exist within those paths and as you master one of those paths you get to master the professions that are in it as well. It's just about the amount of time you spend in mastering it.

I would like to put the focus on that last sentence.

So for example if you're a master of you know crafting, and we'll reveal this later with some of the blogs that I know are already written up about professions, but the professions exist within those paths and as you master one of those paths you get to master the professions that are in it as well. It's just about the amount of time you spend in mastering it

(Paths: Gatherer|Processer|Crafter)

From the way Steven answered this question, it kind of seems like he's saying that when you've mastered a profession within a path, you can then go on to master the other paths. And over time, master all of the professions within a single path. (Ex: Processing)
That is at least how several people have interpreted that answer of his to imply.
Personally I'd like to believe that he just explained himself very poorly in regards to that question, but that is what it seems to imply.

Which means that, since you need Artisan Points to use in the Paths,
either you will have a limited amount of Artisan Points in total
or you can infinitely gain Artisan Points its just that the requirement for gaining them will (exponentially?) increase.

I've also added a poll where you can vote on which way you think is the better one, which way you'd prefer.
https://www.strawpoll.me/18404000

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Comments

Wandering Mist

I'm honestly fine with being able to master a path rather than an individual profession. Of course, this kind of thing is entirely dependent on exactly how the professions work, as well as how the world is designed around the resources needed for the various professions.

ziltch

I am not fine with it, all I can see it doing is that the longer the game stays alive, the more closed off the "economy" will become as more and more people master more and more branches in a Path. Requiring less and less interaction with others to get things crafted or processed for them.

It also changes it from "Needing tens of dozens alts" to cover all professions to needing 2 alts (+ main).
Tho it will take time and be inefficient in the beginning, it's completely possible if that is the case.

Karthos

The crafting system in Albion appears similar to what I feel like they are describing here. You basically leveled up based on how much of a specific item you craft, where wether that be plate helms or a wooden staff. (Correct me if I'm wrong, it's been a few years.)

The system actually on my server helped crafter keep a market going because instead of everyone just cranking out plate armor, you had separate individual crafters selling plate helms, plate chests and plate shoes.

Crafters became very important.

Azryil

What was mentioned in the last livestream seems like a more simplified system than what I was expecting. Personally I like the idea of mastery to the category rather than sub specializations, but I really don't have all that much interest in crafting. My plan was always to go the gathering route and find someone else to do my crafting or make an alt to handle crafting.

Dygz

Crafters will also be affected by racial and Node progression. There will be features, like recipes, which will limit what individual Crafters can work with. And some those recipes will be exclusive drops that are not available to everyone. There will be Winter Dragon recipes and crafting resources that are not available to characters who did not participate in the Winter Dragon World Boss event.
There will be crafting recipes that are only available to characters who belong to a specific religion or social organization. It may be that specific crafting stations or tools are only available from specific social organizations or in buildings built at a specific Node.
There are many ways for the Ashes devs to implement diversity among Master Crafters.

Nagash

It does seem like they backtracked about crafting. The way they where speaking about it before seemed like you could be a master armour smith but an ok weapon smith but now it looks like you can be a master at both which does take away from the point of woking with others.

T Elf

I'm not sure they have nailed down crafting at this point in time, so we get fuzzy info because they haven't focused on it yet.

EvoW

ziltch wrote: »

I am not fine with it, all I can see it doing is that the longer the game stays alive, the more closed off the "economy" will become as more and more people master more and more branches in a Path. Requiring less and less interaction with others to get things crafted or processed for them.

It also changes it from "Needing tens of dozens alts" to cover all professions to needing 2 alts (+ main).
Tho it will take time and be inefficient in the beginning, it's completely possible if that is the case.

This. At some point, only the most trusted or veteran artisans will be able to process/gather/manufacture at the highest efficiency, we need to have a bit more specializing

Azryil

Steven clarified this a bit on discord

Wandering Mist

ziltch wrote: »

I am not fine with it, all I can see it doing is that the longer the game stays alive, the more closed off the "economy" will become as more and more people master more and more branches in a Path. Requiring less and less interaction with others to get things crafted or processed for them.

It also changes it from "Needing tens of dozens alts" to cover all professions to needing 2 alts (+ main).
Tho it will take time and be inefficient in the beginning, it's completely possible if that is the case.

What you say will happen regardless of whether you need 2 alts or 10 alts to cover all the professions. The only difference will be in how long it takes. The only way to prevent this is to restrict players to only making 1 character per account.

Nagash

arzosah wrote: »

Steven clarified this a bit on discord

well that is disappointing

Azathoth

So theoretically 3 alts could master all the artisan professions. But he makes it sound like that would be an intensive feat. So having a large set of players doing that, although more likely the longer players have max level characters, seems less likely.

In all honesty, if you have three alts that master every artisan profession you clearly picked that route for your game time. So I don't see a huge problem. I do want/expect "labor intensive" to be an accurate statement and having a single master being equivalent to the play time required to get to max level. Making 3 alts masters of all artisan professions a time equivalent to maxing 9 characters (assuming 3 masters per path for ease of argument).

If that is somewhat accurate, I don't see the difference in a guild full of players that each have multiple max level alts to fill necessary roles in that group, allowing the guild to function with a smaller member cap.

If I am off base, and leveling multiple masters is quick, then I totally agree with the general dissapointment in this thread.

Amist

Dissapointing, but we'll have to see how it works out. I would really hope that becoming a master of a profession is hard

Nagash

If levelling is quick then they have shot them selfs in the foot. I really need to see this in action during the alpha tests because them explaining in is causing more problems than helping

Caeryl

Incredibly disappointing. That’s just... a complete 180 from how it was explained before, and it sours the part of the game I was most looking forward to.

If there’s no specialization, which as it stands there isn’t (no, the vague overreaching title of “Crafter” or “Processor” is not even remotely a specialization system), then my enthusiasm for crafting is gone with it.

Professor Posh

azathoth wrote: »

So theoretically 3 alts could master all the artisan professions. But he makes it sound like that would be an intensive feat. So having a large set of players doing that, although more likely the longer players have max level characters, seems less likely.

In all honesty, if you have three alts that master every artisan profession you clearly picked that route for your game time. So I don't see a huge problem. I do want/expect "labor intensive" to be an accurate statement and having a single master being equivalent to the play time required to get to max level. Making 3 alts masters of all artisan professions a time equivalent to maxing 9 characters (assuming 3 masters per path for ease of argument).

If that is somewhat accurate, I don't see the difference in a guild full of players that each have multiple max level alts to fill necessary roles in that group, allowing the guild to function with a smaller member cap.

If I am off base, and leveling multiple masters is quick, then I totally agree with the general dissapointment in this thread.

My friend here has a point.

Wandering Mist

Thinking about this more, one of the side effects of this is that you will potentially only need to bring 1 master gatherer to the hardest dungeons. If you could only master a single profession you would need to bring a master of each profession in order to get the most resources out of it.

Is this a good or a bad thing? Hard to say really.

Amist

wanderingmist wrote: »

Thinking about this more, one of the side effects of this is that you will potentially only need to bring 1 master gatherer to the hardest dungeons. If you could only master a single profession you would need to bring a master of each profession in order to get the most resources out of it.

Is this a good or a bad thing? Hard to say really.

I'd say a mix of both. Having to make sure that you entire guild is slotted perfectly to fit just what you want to do inside the dungeon, would be really really hard. But then again, having to coordinate with your mates to get the best outcome is also a huge part of the MMO experience

ziltch

Yh it's all based on personal preferences, for me personally being able to master all crafts is a 180 from their previous statements and feels like its devaluing crafters.
The longer the game is alive, the more closed off people can become because they'll be less reliant on other players and local economy circles will get more and more closed off.

While tru that you can get the same effect from multiple alts, less people are inclined to making that many alts.

And it is a difference between
main + 2 alts
to
main + 15 or more alts

I can only assume that professions will have less depth and be less complex than original assumptions and/or they felt like limiting players to 1 profession was a bad idea.

Professor Posh

I truly think there will be that one day where your curious minds would want to see what it's like to be a master of something else and not just what you're already used to. I also think it would allow players the chance to be unique in a way for example: You could have person A as a master of only smithing but then have Person B as a master of 3 or so skills meaning person B would stand out more and show how knowledgeable that person is. Having players with numerous amounts of mastered skills would be a rarity anyways (from the way Steven puts it) so I don't think there's anything to worry about. Please tell me you understand what I'm trying to say here.

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