Weaponsmith Archive

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Thodious wrote:

p4samwise wrote:

Hence, novice smiths, who aren't able to craft the really cool guns yet, could make their living by specializing in subcomponents and selling them to masters. Since the novice smiths are specializing in subcomponents exclusively, the parts they make are BETTER than those made by the masters, and the masters have an incentive to buy from the novices. Presto - a true "apprentice" system, and a more complex economy.

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Unfortunatly you have forgotten the determining factor in making an item ... quality resources. By the time a novice smith has tracked and collected the resources required to make a worthwhile product, they are no longer novice smiths.

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I've forgotten no such thing. The resource gate is importantbecause it keeps upstart novices from instantly outperforming masters. The important thing is that it's not an impassable gate. Consider this:

1. Master weaponsmiths wishing to make absolute top-quality items without using one of their own "signature slots" on trivial subcomponents might find it worthwhile to seek out apprentices and supply them with resources in exchange for their work.


2. If novice smiths actually have something to do (gasp! no!), they might not find it necessary to powergrind through the entire profession (egads!), which would give them enough time to amass their own resource stockpiles.


3. The basic items that novice smiths would be producing typically have less stringent resource requirements. It's far easier to find high-quality resources if they don't have required rare types.
   

This is a very interesting idea, but after considering it from a few angles I think it may be more trouble than its worth.

Looking at it from the solo players point of veiw. I feel it really could make things unbareble. A good sized PA could organize co-operation between WS and even other crafters who just pick up that novice Wsmith box so they can do their part to help the main WS. Of course this wouldn't be a common thing but it only takes one organization like this to be the best on any given server and lock up any chances for solo players. I understand your point about any solo smith being able to re-master to get new specilized schematics and therefor compete with organized smiths, but I don't think this would work the way you described. Re-mastering a profession is a pain and AXP requires other players help, exactly what a solo player doesn't have or doesn't want. SOE has to cater for this type of player as much as they cater for the community based player. And given that every smith is working towards one day being the best on the server, I think we may be killing the game goals of the solo smiths with a system that favors specifically the group style approach.

Of course player co-operation is a difficult thing to acheive at this level, so what is more likely going to happen is there will be certain smiths who are just really good at certain weapons. They would probably become common to see smiths advertising what models they have chosen as signature weapons and doing thier main trade in these fields. For us this is no big problem, unless of course you want to make it all, which is pretty much maddness even under the current system. However from a buyers point of veiw it could be very nasty. They would have to track down whatever smith makes the weapon they want in order to get the best. In fact Wsmiths would probably limit thier selection based on signature models, so a specific weapons would become even harder to find. Even under the current system we have players complaining they can't find the weapon they want because no one makes it, or no one keeps it in reliable stock.

The main thing with this system is it would give non-masters and new masters more value in the system. There is a heck of a lot of trust that would need to go into a partnership between weaponsmiths. One would be the established master and the other would be the novice or new master. The old master would have to give the newer smith resoruces to use on the schematics they made, the resoruce gate is just too large for it to be any other way. Some of these resources are going for 100 c/u and are extremely precious to the old master, they represent that WS entire career. They would have to readily turn them over to another player who may only have been in the game for a month or two, not much time to build a trusting relationship.

All up my opinion is that while there are some benifits to this system I think these would be largely over shadowed by the added drawbacks that would come with it.

I'm also a strong believer in not messing with something that already works. The average player will be a novice WS for about 1 or 2 months before hitting master, less than this if they are really putting everything into it. Thats just a drop in the ocean considering they then have another 2-3 months to gather resources of good quality, and then even more time to get into the top 5 best known WS on thier server. So the time period that this change is aimed at is really not very large, however the effects of the changes are very wide-reaching.

During my time as a novice I didnt make hundreds of thousands of credits every week, but I did make enough on things like power-ups, energy sales, artisan missions and a really nice line of CDEF and tier-1 guns I used to produce. It took about 7-8 weeks and the whole time I was learning the game. Working out stuff like the bazzar, harvesters, factories the WS shopping list, what mattered for each weapon model, who used what and what was used by no-one. How much should I sell a weapon for, how much should I pay for something, how good was the best and who made it. What niche needed to be filled on my server.

When I look back I remember I wished I could have had more then, but so does everyone who starts out at something new. As the song says, we want it all and we want it now .
These days I feel that the time we spend in novice should be a little bit hard, it is the same for most classes. Combat classes dont really make good money till they get up levels. There is a lot to be learnt in the novice stage, money and position comes later. So I like the way the game is set up atm.

Lastly I just like to say that specilization in the current system is very possible and can even be a better game than the make-all approach. I specilize mainly in heavies and munitions with a secondary in melee. I've been playing that way for about 6 months and its great. Working with other smiths is also great. My partner Az' is a firearms specilist and we have been running a steady shop together for a long time now. I totally reccomend it, it just makes everything easier.

I would be against this. The dynamic of smithing has changed too much already with all the loot drops. The pay off for smithing is as it should be, at the master level.

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Big-B wrote:

Um no. I think one of the great things about being a Master Weaponsmith is that theyre are few that will really stick with it. There really only needs to be a few weaponsmiths per planet and I think the devs have done a great job with keeping it that way. If we make it to easy to be a WS then everyone will jump on the the bandwagon and go WS just to make their own guns then drop it and do what they really want.

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yeah i agree with u and that. most of the fun of being a smith is outselling the other guy and being the best you can.andi woudl quit if i were forced to partner with another smith.

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Thodious wrote:

Hey you wanted discussion.

"We already had that and everyone hated it" isn't discussion. Especially when the statement is false.

It doesn't matter if its based on loss of schematics, or novices getting bonuses in making sub-components, or getting a few extra points for "specializing". I sincerely doubt you will get any respectable number of wepsmiths to endorse your idea.

People don't want to be at the mercy of others to be able to produce top-quality weapons. I have enough of a time coming up with tissues, and other enhancements. The last thingI want isto have to find someone else to make (for example) powerhandlers or barrelsto be competitive.

Okay, so what if the "signature" thing gave you 12 experimentation points instead of 13? If you really wanted to do everything yourself, you could get some skill tapes and get 12 experimentation points and be as competitive as you want.

The main thrust of the idea is this: let novices make something that's useful, but doesn't put them in direct (and unfair) competition with master weaponsmiths. Letting novices make subcomponents that are as good as those produced by a master (or perhaps very slightly better... again, see above, "very slightly better" probably just means a few more points of durability!) seems like the best way of doing it.

Edited in case this needs clarification: the fact that they're making subcomponents means they aren't in competition with masters, because nobody is going to buy a rifle barrel to use as a weapon. The novices will be completely at the mercy of masters to provide them with work.

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Message Edited by p4Samwise on 02-17-2004 12:08 PM

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Fenrix wrote:
Its nota bad idea, but surely A master should always be better than a novice.

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This is oft-repeated, but I don't think it's necessarily true in all cases. What of a "novice" weaponsmith who doesn't yet know how to make a laser rifle, or a curved sword, or a proton grenade, but does nothing day in and day out but craft rifle barrels? Might he not be able to produce rifle barrels just as good as the rifle barrels produced by a "master" who only crafts them occasionally? Should knowing how to craft proton grenades really affect the quality of one's rifle barrels?

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Thodious wrote:

p4samwise wrote:

The main thrust of the idea is this: let novices make something that's useful, but doesn't put them in direct (and unfair) competition with master weaponsmiths. Letting novices make subcomponents that are as good as those produced by a master (or perhaps very slightly better... again, see above, "very slightly better" probably just means a few more points of durability!) seems like the best way of doing it.

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While I agree with you that it would be nice for intermediate wepsmiths to be able to make something useful and/or competitive ---I don't see any solution that makes one wepsmith dependant on another being particularly popular.

Agreed. Note that there is no "dependence" as such, though. Cooperation is possible, and perhaps encouraged. It is not required. That's why I mentioned schematic loss at the start of my post - the problem with schematic loss was dependence, and that's why the idea I'm proposing does not entail dependence.

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Another driving force behind this idea: currently, if you want to specialize in, say, laser rifles, you have to master the production of EVERY weapon. The "signature" system would in fact let you take just the firearms and techniques trees, takeperhaps laser rifles and power handlers as your signature schematics,and be able to make laser rifles on par with a "master", but not compete in anyeither ofthe other twoschematic trees, or compete well in makingany other firearms, because you don't have those extra master signature slots or base experimentation points. Seems like a pretty fair tradeoff, but it'd cut back on that "master or nothing" syndrome we have right now.

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While I'd love to be able to drop the munitions line and the melee line and still be able to make first rate guns, there has to be a some reason (or perk) from the master box. As it stands, its a couple of experimentation points and some schematics. Take that away and the master's box becomes worthless.

If the master box got an extra couple of signature schematics, plus one signature schematic for each subtree, it'd be very worthwhile. It'd bepossible to drop munitions and melee and makesomevery first rate guns, but you'd be unable to make anything but guns, and you'd probably only be able to make one or two guns at really top quality.

And really, if all you want to make is nice DH17 carbines, is there any reason to force you to master melee and munitions to do it? Tailors who just want to make spec-ops backpacks aren't forced to master the formal wear tree. Why should weaponsmiths who just want to make a couple of guns be forced to master the melee tree?

Not to mention that for everything which is NOT a signature schematic for you (which is most things, assuming my proposal of 1-6 signatures per smith), your base experimentation points still count a lot. The master gets near-signature quality on everything he makes, and gets more signatures than anyone else, to boot. In other words, the perk of being a master is incredible breadth - you can make ANYTHING, and in almost every case you can make it better than everyone else.

Believe me, master won't become any less worthwhile just because a novice smith can make nice rifle barrels, or even nice DH17 pistols. There's demand for a LOT of different weapons.

Message Edited by p4Samwise on 02-18-2004 12:13 PM

[edit - Apologies for use of the term "masturbatory". I get angsty when people complain that an idea which encourages or even facilitatescooperation in a multiplayer game is inherently bad because it "forces" interaction. Applying that logic, weaponsmiths should automatically be able to build heavy harvesters, since right now we're forced to deal with architects to obtain them.]

Message Edited by p4Samwise on 02-19-2004 01:39 PM