How do you feel about Tradeskills?

[Purloin]

As I see it the problem with tradeskills is twofold (i) tradeskill development requires IP allocation at the expense of other skill;
(ii) only certain character types can tradeskill.

I am no fan of DAoC but Funcom should take a look at their concept of tradeskilling, while it too has problems I think the overall approach is better.

For instance, if there were a different set of points earned from trades, call them TI for tradeskill points, then as you hunt and kill thing you get IP as you make things you get TI, thus theroetically a level 1 character could tradeskill to top of his craft w o leveling
Secondly why not have access to specific types of tradeskills a little more availabe, say weaponsmithing for enforcers and soldier, tailoring for MA, pharacy skills for Drs, etc.

Certainly there are many ways to do this but the main thing I would like to see is tradeskilling become viable for all and at a much lower level than currently.

Just one mans opinion.

[__________Souldoctah]

I don't think everyone should be able to do tradeskills. I think only certain classes should be to do tradeskills. Engineers should do Weapon Smithing, Mech. Eng. and Elec. Eng., Traders should do everything equally well (i.e. not a specialist), Docs should do Pharm, Crats do Psychology, etc. Keep each tradeskill specialized. That way, you keep the economy under control, but yet have more items resulting from tradeskills out on the market. If everyone was able to do Tradeskills, then heck, why even bother doing tradeskills? Just raise up the skill yourself, duh.

Keep tradeskills limited to certain classes and give more XP rewards for Tradeskills. That is the only way to have them actually flourish.

Take a hint from Everquest, this game's granddaddy...Tradeskills on EQ ended up being, essentially, a waste of time. Because they weren't skill based, all it took was a few hours of making items, provided you had the money or the time to collect the parts, and then all you did was keep making combines, rapid-fire, til you get your skill up. Simple, right? Yeah, sure, but when you get like 80 people on a server who are masters of a certain tradeskill, guess how much you're going to sell that super high-level item you just made? Yeah, you guessed it...whatever the NPC will pay for it.

Point? Making tradeskills widespread would allow for anyone to be able to increase their skill, thus ruinning the tradeskill market. I see why tradeskills are so expensive to do currently in this game... if they were cheap, why would you bother fighting? Another Duh!

Folks need to realize that there are only 2 limiting factors to Players: Level and Money. If it doesn't take cold, hard cash to raise your skill, then you have to set a level limit (hence why the best tradeskillers are the higher level peeps). If it didn't take levels to master tradeskills, then money is a limiting factor (like in Everquest), so if you essentially had unlimited money (which you end up having late in the game anyway), you could just about master any tradeskill you wanted.

In the end, it's a lose/lose situation, where only high level players are going to be mastering tradeskills...this is giving everyone an equal playing field, of course.

If you made tradeskills only available to certain classes, then folks who want to do tradeskills can pick those classes and do their skills, thus you've introduced a 3rd limiting factor outside of level or money...class. Now that class is a limiting factor, you won't get a level 200 with everything and then some, bored out of his mind, dumping all his extra cash on a tradeskill, simply because he can, because he's not of the correct class.

Let's see an example:

Doctors (of which I am one) can use their Pharma skill to create various drugs...for this example, let's say First-Aid stims. There is an even spread of First-Aid stims available to make...some QL 1s for level 1 players...QL 5 for 5th level...etc. etc. etc. At level 1, gainning proper resources from fighting little mobs that aren't too tough, he can gain about half a level from tradeskilling for each level he gets from killing (this ratio can be adjusted for different classes). However, now he's got these QL 1 stims, and he made them for much cheaper than what the Vendor Terminal sells them...so, he can sell them off to players for a proper price, and cheaper than a Vendor Terminal. Thus, the Doctor is encouraged to raise his skill some more, got a proper reward, both monetary and XP-wise, and he helped out his fellow gamers by giving them items cheaper than vendors.

In the same world, there's a Soldier who doesn't have any tradeskills available to him...but, damn...he's got a big ass gun and can blow up stuff like nothing. He rakes in cash from killing a lot more mobs than a Doc can, and yet he levels up about as fast as the Doc who did the Pharm, considering that the Soldier can kill way more mobs than the Doc can in the same amount of time. So now, lo and behold, the Soldier needs First-Aid stims to heal himself after battle...he goes over to the Vendor Terminals, and realizes that he'd have to dump a ton of cash for some stims...but, wait, here's the Doc who just made a whole batch of stims, and is selling them at about 75% off what the VTs are selling them for! Excellent!! So now the Soldier goes off and happily buys some stims from the Doc...thus, now the Doc and the Soldier end up with about the same XP, and about the same amount of money.

end example.

So, in the end...I think that if you're going to do tradeskills, you know you want your character to do tradeskills...so you won't choose a Soldier. If you want to kill stuff, you pick a Soldier. If you want to make Pharmaceuticals, you pick a Doctor...

So that's my opinion...

Out,
Souldoctah

[Purloin]

Well we can respectfully disagree. Why should you have to be a high level to do tradeskills. There is a third limiting factor, which is playing time, if only high levels can tradeskill then casual players cannot tradeskill.

[Tryk]

I completely dissagree with the doc... As the last person mentions, the TIME is the most important factor in my oppinion. How many times has Soldier X_Unknown come to you for a first aid kit? Do they even know you can make the kit?

I made a emergency treatment kit today. It cost me 30k for a ql32 kit, and I'll be blind 30 seconds when i use it. U think I'll use that every time I get bashed in mission (Yes yes, i know, I'll only have to use it at boss room....) What's the point? Imagine the team waiting for the tank to get his vision back... "Wait guys, i can't see a thing..."

And I made a set of Carbon armor not long ago. Cost me 340k (without the labour), ql 40, for my doc. The engineer was a lvl 60. If I was to list all the engineers level 150 and up, I think I would have had one name, and I can bet you quite a lot of credits that engie didn't have the stuff to make the armor.

There's a ton of things in this game people don't know about, and maybe one or two people try. They end up costing you so much and giving you so little, there's not much point in trying it a second time... and they get forgotten.

Can't remember who mentioned earlier, but it's true: FunCom, stop dropping uber loot in monsters, let us build a society... let us gain the money and levels in different ways than fighting. I would gladly take out my engineer out of the closet, dust it off and start making items and stuff. And I got my agent who's happy to fight. And my doc who heals the team -- and is secretly upping his psychology so that one day he'll be able to analyse crazy atrox who dream they want to have sex

[__________Souldoctah]

See, I think you guys missed my point.

Time is the most obvious limiting factor that any player has, but the factor of time is negated when you consider that for any sort of gain, you're going to need to spend time. Time is what it's all about, hence it's can't be part of the equation.

Time * The rate at which you acquire money = Money
Time * The rate at which you acquire XP = XP/Level

Since any player can focus their time on either XP or Money, essentially time is not really a factor worth considering, because the limitation is really the rate at which one can acquire money or XP.

Let's say a Doctor can get 10,000 Creds in 1 hour solely from killing mobs, during this time, he can also acquire 1,000 XP.

Now, in contrast, a Soldier can get 15,000 Creds in 1 hour, and 1500 XP, solely from killing mobs.

Even though both are hypothetical, they're both reasonable...Soldiers kill things a heck of a lot easier than Doctors do.

Now, let's say a Doctor has the ability to do Pharmacy at all levels, at various QLs, and the products he makes have a decent demand, and he can provide a good supply.

In 45 minutes, a Doctor can get 7500 credits from killing mobs, and 750 XP. Using Pharm for another 15 minutes (assume running around to collect and buy parts), he can make another 4.5K credits from selling his Pharm items, and raise up another 750 XP.

In the end, after an hour, the Doctor would've made a grand total of 12K credits, and 1500 XP.

If the Soldier int he last example would've had to spend 3K in healing supplies, then his total after an hour would've been 12K credits, and 1500 XP.

Thus, both classes have made their XP and Money ratings equal, and time is essentially not a factor.

Now, my point is that in making Tradeskills available only for certain classes, then you add to the XP and Money ratings for those classes, and assuming they have lesser XP and Money ratings in combat, you then equalize everyone's XP and Money gains over time.

A Doctor is not as good as a Soldier in combat, hence a viable tradeskill would add to the Doctor's ability to gain XP and Money, thus making the Doctor and the Soldier equal in their ability to make money and gain XP.

Of course, this is assuming that "they" allow for useful, viable items to be created cheaply by those specialized classes, with QLs ranging from 1 to 200.

Maybe what I'm saying is a bit convoluted...forgive me if that's the case. I really want to see better tradeskills implemented, and I think that my opinion would allow for a better system (of course, everyone thinks their own opinion is the best one =D

Peace,
Souldoctah

[Purloin]

Lets try focussing on where I think we can agree.

Tradeskills need to be improved.

There needs to be a market for tradeskill products in the game economy to make it viable, over a wide range of levels.

Tradeskilling should be a viable alternative style of game play.

Add to this for the sake of argument that tradeskills should be only available to certain character types ( since every account gets 8 slots this should not be a real issue for anyone.)

I would add that the tradeskill player should be able to complete his projects solo.{Edited to add that the quality of tradeskills products should be better than what can be found in stores and the costs to make tradeskills products should be less than the cost of comparable items in the stores}

Beyond these parameters pehaps we disagree, but the key point is that tradeskills in this game need to be substantially improved.

Has there been any word from Funcom on their plans for tradeskills? Have they at least acknowledged the problem/