How deep should professions be? How long should it take to level?

Do you want your profession adventure to be a long and memorable one? Full with quest chains, rare resource hunting and a bit of hard work? Should professions be something that spans the whole lenght of the expansion to max out? Should it even be possible to max out a professions?

Or do you want it world of warcraft style? Should it be something that takes a couple of hours to max out? Should professions just be a minor feature that you level super fast and find materials for it super fast?

Share what you think!

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Vhaeyne

I want crafting to be so deep that the only way to make a sword in game is to make that sword IRL. Then mail it to intrepid studios for them to scan it into the game.

Truthfully, I want a lot more depth than WOW. I don't want quest chains, but I do want hard work. I want professions to take as long as possible to max out.

shadowmaster335

why not best of both worlds, where it doesn't take a few hours to reach max level, but not to the extend that you can spend 10 hours to gain a single level, ala ESO launch time
also in regards to quests, i could easily see you had to find some legendary/mythical tome somewhere of great significance to that proffession, wasn't it the elves that was known as the master smiths in the lore, if so you could have to find a lost elven city where they kept their knowledge of the crafts in order to reach "master" tier

Littlekenny21

I would much prefer a leveling time closer to wow classic. Levels actually felt like they meant something.

For professions, I would like something where they are extremely deep but specialised taking longer to level than class levels.

Dygz

Artisan leveling should take as long as Adventurer leveling.

Asgerr

I would expect the leveling of Artisan skills to take double the time of adventuring ones, mostly because we'll be doing much more fighting than gathering and crafting at first.

However, even were the Artisan skills level up fast, or at least faster, you would then still be reliant on what recipes you can get your hands on.

So, you might reach max level quick, but still be unable to craft some of the best gear, until someone defeats a raid boss who drops an epic recipe, then sells it to you, to craft them a weapon.

daveywavey

I'd like it to be a long levelling process. If it's too short, artisan professions will just become an alt-thing, and no-one will bother making a proper artisan character. With a long levelling process, when you see a Master Artisan, you know that they're something special.

HiddenDaggerInn

I'm hoping for a very long process, I want a master craftsman to MEAN something. In most games crafting is easy and everyone will dabble in it and then selling their wares for super low prices because they just want to sell it.

Since gathering in this game will be far different as resources will be depleted from areas and then you will have to find them elsewhere and never in the same location, it will make gathering a more tedious and profitable job. And I believe their will be far fewer people doing it, because it's harder.

Crafting should be the same, long process but enjoyable,., not super repetetive making the same things over and over.

When I reach a master in my profession, I want to be super proud to see my signature on that item and am really looking forward to a rewarding crafting system.

Cat Quiver

Considering castle sieges can and/or will happen on the 4th week after launch and you'll need a master of each tree, I'd say it should take less than a month. But with "scarcity" of materials compared to other games, this will make the ecosystem matter, and because one guy got some semi hard to find mats might mean he locks someone out of progression for now since they needed the same mats.

Jamation

Cat Quiver wrote: »

Considering castle sieges can and/or will happen on the 4th week after launch and you'll need a master of each tree, I'd say it should take less than a month. But with "scarcity" of materials compared to other games, this will make the ecosystem matter, and because one guy got some semi hard to find mats might mean he locks someone out of progression for now since they needed the same mats.

I don't necessarily agree with connecting one system to another. Even though sieges might be opened, it shouldn't have any relation or influence on the artisan leveling system itself. Whether, players choose to grind out levels is one thing, but the system should be strong enough that it's leveling system isn't reliant on other factors.

As someone who "mains" gathering/crafting in other MMO's for profit/guilds I've always found it's much more fun and beneficial in the long run when it takes a good chunk of time to get to the high level things. It separates the artisans who do it on the side, versus those who will be dedicating the majority of their time to their mastery. However, it shouldn't be so long/difficult that only a handful can do it, but it should be challenging enough that it's a noticeable time-sink. If it's too short then everyone will be a "master" and it lessens the meaning of the term and would weaken the market as you wouldn't need to travel to the next town over to find a master XYZ because there's probably 10 in your own node.

I can't give a number since it'll be hard to judge until testing as I don't know how much EXP is given per item, does EXP drop off or stay at a flat rate and just the EXP threshold increase, what's going to be the max level and how much EXP would it take for each/each milestone/in total, would you be able to just set up a huge queue and walk away (etc etc).

Basically, it should be challenging enough that not every player wants to dedicate the amount of time it would require to become a master. The population of master's will increase as time goes on, but may fluctuate based on people leaving the game, or not online as often etc, so it should still be a fairly sought after bunch.

Vhaeyne wrote: »

...Truthfully, I want a lot more depth than WOW. I don't want quest chains, but I do want hard work...

shadowmaster335 wrote: »

...also in regards to quests, i could easily see you had to find some legendary/mythical tome somewhere of great significance to that profession...

I actually really like quests in regards to crafting/gathering BUT not in terms of gaining EXP or such. One game I liked how they did it was FFXIV. Every 10 levels or so they'd have you talk to someone knowledgeable in the field you were working on. They followed a little story as they had you gather a few materials and teach you new skills/some basics and would reward you with a basic tool you'd probably be outleveld for anyways. It was a nice blend between tutorial/lore. Unfortunately, they made it mandatory for some aspects, such as learning new recipes and such.
I would actually love a lore"ish" questline teaching you about how your artisan profession impacts the world and why it's important/how it started up in the new land. Perhaps they'll even teach you things you didn't know before, or have you visit a place you didn't realize would have such good resources. I think these kinds of quests should definitely be optional though.

Littlekenny21

I would like it to be in such a way where a crafter specialises within their field so you might still have to travel to another node to find your shortsword master crafter and even then, I would like there to still be a choice between the different master crafter with some being better at different stat combinations than others.

Cat Quiver

Jamation wrote: »

Cat Quiver wrote: »

Considering castle sieges can and/or will happen on the 4th week after launch and you'll need a master of each tree, I'd say it should take less than a month. But with "scarcity" of materials compared to other games, this will make the ecosystem matter, and because one guy got some semi hard to find mats might mean he locks someone out of progression for now since they needed the same mats.

I don't necessarily agree with connecting one system to another. Even though sieges might be opened, it shouldn't have any relation or influence on the artisan leveling system itself. Whether, players choose to grind out levels is one thing, but the system should be strong enough that it's leveling system isn't reliant on other factors.

There will be people who hit those requirements in time, whether they still exist then or not. As long as it stays only one of each needed, it should not be that much of an influence to all but a few leveling artisans in upper guilds.

Khronus

I would like it to be a very long process that requires each path to use the other 2 paths as often as possible. I'm ok if there isn't crazy quest chains for artisan paths but it would be cool to unlock a long quest chain once you have MASTERED the path.

What I am really nervous about is allowing players to master too many things. My ideal vision would be if you choose to go down the gathering profession, you get to access ALL gathering paths BUT could only master 2 of them. I very much hope that we aren't able to be self sufficient as this directly impacts the social aspect in a negative way.

tautau

On a well populated server, two years after launch, I would hope that there would be no more than ten or a dozen top level crafters in each profession. I other words, Master Crafters ought to be very rare! Even being a '2nd from top' would be enough of an achievement that players seek out your help making valuable items.

How to get there? Certainly a lot of crafting experience as well as quests ~ perhaps with a choice of quests rather than a single path of them. But that is secondary, what matters is that experts be unusual.

Dygz

It should not be more difficult for Artisans to reach max level than it is for Adventurers to reach max level.

Dygz

Cat Quiver wrote: »

Considering castle sieges can and/or will happen on the 4th week after launch and you'll need a master of each tree, I'd say it should take less than a month. But with "scarcity" of materials compared to other games, this will make the ecosystem matter, and because one guy got some semi hard to find mats might mean he locks someone out of progression for now since they needed the same mats.

Even if we did need master crafters to successfully win a Castle Siege, there is no reason that we must be able to win a Castle from the Ancients the first month or even the first three months after launch. If it takes three months for Artisans and Adventurers to reach max level.

Cat Quiver

Dygz wrote: »

Cat Quiver wrote: »

Considering castle sieges can and/or will happen on the 4th week after launch and you'll need a master of each tree, I'd say it should take less than a month. But with "scarcity" of materials compared to other games, this will make the ecosystem matter, and because one guy got some semi hard to find mats might mean he locks someone out of progression for now since they needed the same mats.

Even if we did need master crafters to successfully win a Castle Siege, there is no reason that we must be able to win a Castle from the Ancients the first month or even the first three months after launch. If it takes three months for Artisans and Adventurers to reach max level.

Just going by the info that is currently available which says you'll need one of each to even start a siege on the fourth week. 45 days of 4-6 hours per day to hit max level is the current estimate. So unless they lock them out for longer or make the gear requirements very high some are going to probably get taken at the end of the first month.

BlackBrony

I'd enjoy if being a crafter would mean being helpful to someone.
Not just sitting there crafting stuff because I need to level it, but making it so that I'm crafting because I will be selling that stuff soon, allowing me to buy new mats for my next crafting.

If I understand correctly mats should be scarce, therefore crafting just to level wouldn't make sense. This will apply for most of us except those in hardcore guilds where everyone will be dropping all their resources on 3-4 guildies to make them master asap.

Jamation

Cat Quiver wrote: »

There will be people who hit those requirements in time, whether they still exist then or not. As long as it stays only one of each needed, it should not be that much of an influence to all but a few leveling artisans in upper guilds.

That's what I was attempting to say in my post. There will be people who grind day and night until they hit the requirement, but outside systems, like siege timing, shouldn't influence the actual system of how fast it takes to progress through the artisan levels.

To clarify with an example: if it takes 1 million EXP to hit master artisan and based on player behavior it should take 8 weeks to hit that mark. It shouldn't then be lowered to 500,000 EXP just so it can hit that 4 week threshold.
Basically, how fast it should take to level an artisan class shouldn't be reliant on when a siege could take place, or any other system for that matter.

LKJeremy

For me, crafting should feel worthwhile. I would love to see it where crafted Weapons and Armor are good in the end-game content. Maybe that even means you need to find materials that are only available off of very high level mobs and use those resources to make the items. Sure, you could get a drop off of something, but if you go through the challenge of crafting your own item, it would be worthwhile. This, for me, would be somewhere in between the difficulty of Everquest 2 (before they made it easier) and what they were shooting for in Vanguard.

Khronus

@BlackBrony I agree that it would be terrible to be forced to just craft endless amounts of items just to level the skill. My guild will indeed be funneling materials to certain players to level them up based on what we feel will be most beneficial for the guild but we will also be using this for the citizens around us.

I'm hoping that crafting will be slower and more meaningful vs checking a crafting wiki and seeing you need 600 "x", 1400 "y" and 72 "z" to get to lvl 75 cooking type of thing.

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