Armorsmith Archive

The post-CU armor system has been subject to alot of complaints from AS's on this forum, and I think it's apparent there are two types of people on two sides of the issue: People who are senior, experienced armorsmiths, and, well, people who are not. I think part of the reason there is so much disagreement is that those people who are not, don't really understand what goes into becoming an armorsmith that people will regularly buy from.

Such Armorsmiths can usually say most if not all of the following:

• They've mastered Armosmith. Duh.


• They've used SP on additional, supporting professions to AS, such as Master Smuggler to do their own slicing, Tailor 0200 for Synth Cloths and Reinforced Fiberplast Panels, or some set of Merchant skills to ply their wares.


• They've has accumulated +15 to +25 in Armor Experimentation Tapes. If they're not at +25, (or at least +20,) they're usually working his way up to that.


• They've accumulated a couple million units of resources, (yes, I said million,) to make the armor that people buy. Right now, that means composite, composite, and more composite, which means intrusive ore, solid petrochemical, polymer, nabooian fiberplast, polysteel copper, and wooly hide. That, and a little bit of other stuff.


• They've spent a significant amount of time and credits perfecting their armor template, a mix of layers and segments and experimentation points that produce the results they want, which is to say, the results their CUSTOMERS want.


• They usually own 10 harvesters and 2-3 factories

How does the CURB changes to Armor hurt us? Let's examine:

The UT vs. SR change totally invalidates our old resources en masse. Fortunately, this doesn't appear to be an issue any longer, but consider: We don't accumulate that many resources for fun: We do so because we are continually seeking better resources. There is often not one single resource in an armor combine where the stats don't matter. This is something that is unique to armorsmiths. EVERYTHING is important. We accumulate resources because good stats are the only way we can hedge against a temporary dearth of good resource spawns, something we have no control over. And unlike nearly every other profession, we live and die by our stats. Nobody really cares if their swoop is 88% or 92% durability, and even if they did, nobody could tell from just looking at it. OUR ARMOR IS NAKED, with all the numbers sitting right out there to be weighed, measured, and, (sometimes,) found wanting. No other profession is under such a microscope. No other profession is so tightly bound to the quality of our resources. Ask an Architect what the OQ+SR of his Intrusive ore is and he probably won't even know what those acronyms mean.

The changed resource requirements invalidate huge blocks of our resources. The million+ resources I accumulated weren't obtained by accident - They took hours of my time, going from resource vendor to resource vendor, often paying exorbitant prices for a resource that has been out of spawn for months. In those cases where we've been able to harvest, we often do so at great risk. I personally got killed 6 times dropping harvesters on a particularly good spawn. I'm not complaining - That's the price of doing business.

The increased resource requirements devalue everything in our stock. Now that a chest plate requires 5 times as many resources, (a conservative estimate, if you look at the schematics,) the current resources are worth 1/5th as much. Either that, or the chest plate is going to cost 5 times as much. Neither option is particularly palatable to armorsmiths. We already spend an inordinate amount of time and SP on our professions, so much so, in fact, that we're usually alts, and now we face the prospect of higher resource requirements and longer factory runs, taking up more time.

The reduced experimental complexity invalidates the 30 million credits we spent on our skilltapes. We didn't create the system that gives us more experimental boxes than we have experimentation points. We merely adapted to it by accumulating exp+ skilltapes, at HIDEOUS personal expense. Ask any armorsmith: Not 1 in 50 skilltapes were looted. They're always purchased off forums, or the occasional vendor, from combat professions. Now we're looking at a single experimental bar, with ten points of experimentation to use. As for our extra two points? Lotsa luck to ya, buddy! Don't let the door hit you in the !@#$ on the way out!

Too many of the optimizations that we spend time and credits on have been invalidated by the CURB armor system. As for evening out the playing field, it ought to be enough that the new AS comes up in an environment that is FAIR.

Let's be clear about the distinction between EVEN and FAIR:

FAIR in ths case means everyone has the same opportunity. If some people succeed given that opportunity, that's because they're good at what they do. If some people fail at it, it's because they suck at what they do.

EVEN in this case means everyone is forced to produce the same thing. It's the NFL system of armor: Everyone gets an inferior product, but the guys not spending any time or money on their craft do alot better because while they alone put garbage in, EVERYONE gets garbage out. Make no mistake: Evening the field requires you lower the ceiling, not raise the floor. Will the armor post-curb protect any better? Will it be eaiser to wear?

There is no virtue in rewarding the Arizona Cardinals of the Armorsmith profession. They put little to no work into their craft beyond the initial grind, (which any serious armorsmith will tell you represnts 5% of the total work,) and should therefore receive little compensation for their efforts, or, more to the point, lack thereof.

I've mastered 4 different crafting professions. And of the four, Armorsmith took, by far, the most effort and thought to do well. I don't think it's at all unreasonable to argue that AS takes more work and knowledge than any other craft. Too many of the changes to the AS profession reward the inept and apathetic for their indifference.

THAT is why we are angry.

Message Edited by foobar0 on 04-12-2005 01:48 PM

Your point about getting the skilltapes from your guild is excellent, Kessian: It illustrates that sometimes the expense is so onerous that we simply CAN'T afford the tapes. We have to borrow them instead. But someone's getting hosed when those tapes becomes irrelevant. Whether it's you or your guild, SOMEONE gets the fuzzy end of that lollipop.

I think thats our biggest concern. We're basically losing our individuality, what differentiates a true Veteran MAS from random nub trying to learn the ropes. Now all armor will essentially be the same with a possible slight difference in overall stats and condition. I liked the complexity, i liked making all those billion of comp armor gloves in attempts to find the best combinations, i think we all did. It was a rewarding feeling making a peice of armor that could stand toe to toe and even surpass other ASes work. Now we get 2 lines to expirament on and only one of them matters. The only thing now that seperates 12pt smiths from 10pt is HAM costs and depending on the type of armor, condition. But condition has never really been a deciding factor for any of our customers. Its all been on effectiveness and then to encumberance. So what will seperate our armors after the CU? Nothing.

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foobar0 wrote:
Your point about getting the skilltapes from your guild is excellent, Kessian: It illustrates that sometimes the expense is so onerous that we simply CAN'T afford the tapes. We have to borrow them instead. But someone's getting hosed when those tapes becomes irrelevant. Whether it's you or your guild, SOMEONE gets the fuzzy end of that lollipop.

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fuzzy is to nice of a term, I'd more like the flaming porquipine version.

I've been a 10pt MAS for about a month and afew weeks now. all the way up that ladderto get there I sold what I made, any of my top stuff. I was able to sell it to players that couldn't aford the high end stuff. Right now my Wookie armor is the best stuff I have My comp is alright, but nothing like the doubles and triples out there. I sell 80kin, 52Elect, and a flux of 47-56 range for a base. still sellable. makes nice PvE, doesn't cover all bases, but does the job. who knows where things will be at when CU comes and resources are all over the place.

I agree with people in this tread so far. the AS profession didn't need tinkering. or if tinkering at all, have it as a segment enhancer. The three lines of experimentation make it more of a challange. Combat people wanted a challange, let them have it. we got our challange with working with the experimentations we got.

props to the peeps that have thier ca exp tapes. I have 4 1 pointers so far. I'm still selling well. I even have a feature where I will delever. heck gets me out of the house.

the thing I like about the CU is the stackables. that will be sooo sweeeet. I'll actualy have inventory room. For a short time. I like the fact we can customize looks. but that's not a nesseity. if I have to do that "cover layer" and add in alot of hide, where I mod looks,(I forget what that last layer is called), then the stats on this item better darn good.

I have a bad/good feeling some of out "speical named" resources for minerialswill be only found on astroids ( as per the Wookie expansion), how that works will be interesting.

I can see some good come with this CU, I can see some bad out of it.
hope Ohram is able to send our concerns to them.

As for the armor certification, over all not bad Idea. I doubt there will be a mass change to TKA, there will still be a need for armor, always.

there is alot of work, and alot of dependacies to AS, hope things go well.

Message Edited by Wallid on 04-12-2005 11:13 PM

I totally agree with you, it is a stupid change and most of accumulated resources will be worthless due to the new schematics.

Looks like I am heading out of business by canceling my account in protest.

I agree with what you said and the thing that makes this the most difficult is that it isn't being done for any real reason. There is nothing wrong with the current armor crafting system. A lot of professions (carbineer, smuggler, squad leader, etc.) have been begging for a revamp/upgrade, I don't think we have? We weren't complaining about the old system yet we are being forced into a new one. At least the old system made sense and it was based on two years of successful game play by many smiths on many servers.

Why do they insist on 'fixing' what isn't broken? I could deal with it all a LOT better if they just gave valid, legitimate reasons for the changes. If they want new players to be able to compete with vets then why did they create vet rewards? Especially the rediculous anti-decay kits?

well stated.

/sign