Weaponsmith Archive

somehow I doubt it. I heard something about it getting worse, but I don't know the details.

Ugh - boards - I love them.

Anyway, I am looking through the patch notes from TC, and I see this:

"Fixed experimentaiton formula to use hte correct range when determining how much an item attribute changes. The formula was supposed to be based on teh resource max range, but was using the entire attribute range..."

Am I wrong that this could be MASSIVE??!!

My theory, for a long time, has been that there are coded minimum and maximum ranges for specific stats on certain resources. For example, the conductivity range for copper is very high. The conductivity range for iron is very low. I don't think we've all just been unlucky and haven't foundthat 1000 conductivity iron yet - I think that something much lower (say 300 for purposes of this example) is the maximum conductivity in an iron.

If this change means what I think it means, it looks like future experimentation will take into account the stat, given the range of possible stats for that resource! Therefore, if iron's max cond is 300, then an iron with cond 300 will allow you to experiment whatever stats are dependent on conductivity as high as possible. Assuming the schematicwas based on100% conductivity, but called for iron, that weapon could be experimented to 100%. Up until now, it sounds like weapon schematics have still looked at all attributes as if there were the possibility of a 1000 stat.

If I am correct, couldn't this revolutionize all the weapons out there and vastly rebalance the available weapons? Am I being clear? Is this old news? Any thoughts or comments?

Wow, you might be right. If it used to be the max range that would explain why plumbum and polonium and other types of weapons sucked so bad.

However, if it scales to max range for the resource type, then that doesn't make any sense unless I am missing something.... Why would they be different then? If polonium maxes at 400 OQ for example, and 400 OQ polonium is equivalent to 1000 OQ copper, then why not just make all resource types in the range of 0-1000? It would seem to equal out.

Very interested to see how this plays out. If someone on TC can play with this, I would love to know if weapons like the elite carb won't suck anymore.

Your interpretation would certainly be significant if background assumptions regarding resource range are correct. I tend to agree with you that there are background ranges. If plumbum iron could truly spawn at a conductivity of 900, then the laws of probability lean heavily against every spawn being agonizingly low. That being said, experimentation against the actual range would conceivably open up the potential for higher stats weapons.

The only thing holding me back from rejoicing is the fact that they are nerfing most weapons down. This would push weapons back up in stats if I am reading it correctly. I find it hard to believe the dev's will reverse course unless they are compensating for the removal of the PH's from FWG, Scatter and Launcher.

My personal preference would be for them to make a change like this, combined with a fix on the components and TRASH the whole tissue enhancement nonsense.

I hope you're right. Somehow I doubt it, but I really hope you are.

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Mirkurius wrote:

Wow, you might be right. If it used to be the max range that would explain why plumbum and polonium and other types of weapons sucked so bad.

However, if it scales to max range for the resource type, then that doesn't make any sense unless I am missing something.... Why would they be different then? If polonium maxes at 400 OQ for example, and 400 OQ polonium is equivalent to 1000 OQ copper, then why not just make all resource types in the range of 0-1000? It would seem to equal out.

Very interested to see how this plays out. If someone on TC can play with this, I would love to know if weapons like the elite carb won't suck anymore.

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They wouldnt want you to be able to use Iron in a part that requires "any Metal" and uses conductivity at 100%... but if a component requires Iron, then 400 (or whatever it is) would be the theoretical 1000 on the calculation side...

This could be a good thing.

Read a bit closer... this is a HUGE FREAKING NERF.

Here is the thread why,

http://forums.station.sony.com/swg/board/message?board.id=TestCenter&message.id=32934

If this goes through ALL crafters will be hosed. And so will combat professions.

Funny that not even crafting worked right before the game was released...

Even though it is the most important aspect of the game in terms of economy/combat/EVERYTHING.

Who'd have thought?

Now I really want to play FFXI...especially after grinding most of the way to master WS...

The guy who posted that was full of **edit**, and wasn't even from the TC. He had no idea what he was talking about (check out the responses from the guys from the TC).

There's no *nerf*, but no gift either...all that's happening is that the max you'll be able to experiment will be dictated by the resources you used, not the full range of the attribute.

In other words, if your resources allow for 70% Damage Experimentation, then each Experimentation point, out of 10, will be worth 7%. So, if you only have 5 Experimentation points, you'd only be able to reach about 35% Damage.

All this does is widen the gap between Master Weaponsmiths and non-Masters. 10 Experimentation points will allow you to get 100% experimentation, determined by your resources...so even if you were building a T21 which only allowed you a max of 50% damage, you'd have to spend your 10 points to get to 50% damage...not spend 3 points to max out the damage, then 3 points in Durability and Efficiency like you can now. Novice Weaponsmiths who could build (theoretically) equivalent T21s because they'd be able to max out damage with 3 or 4 Experimentation points, can now only get very, very little experimentation in.

You guys follow me here? It's not anything for Masters to really worry about...it's just definitely going to put non Master smiths out of business entirely.

This isnt that big a deal with our normal production weapons as we can just toss away the ones with any failure in them just the max condition will be lower across the board and no more experimenting on HAM costs. The BIG nerf is for the guns that are made using droped components when any failures will automaticly reduce the stats of the gun and not just keep us from spending as many pnts in durability.

Dtox, my understanding of this issue (not sure I am right) is:

Before max possible experimental quality was dictated by the item which is usually 100%. However, were were a cap anyway which was the resource stats. If I for example experiment on a repair kit using 930 Cond copper I could max reach 93% experimental quality.

Also, we always had a cap how many points available to experiment. if you have bad resources you don't get all 10 points to experiment on that stat.

What I think is the change is that before we got 7% for each exeprimental point we put in with great success. Now people report lower than that.

What I think is changed is that before I guess that 7% was 7% of maximal possible experimental quality for the item which is 100%. Now it is based on resource quality instead. So if resource quality is 800 you would get 7% of that= 5.6% for each experimentation point (and great success).

This doesn't kill the crafting business. it will make it harder for us non-masters to compete. Also those how has made schematics pre-patch and have the resources will be able to make better weapons than will be possible after patch (assuming schematics and existing weapons are not touched).

In general I think it is reasonable that experimentation works this way. This make using good resources more rewarding. But I think they should tweak the numbers. For example change 7% for great success to 10% or aht ever is reasonable.

However, I can't understand that SOE puit effort fixing anything that is not broke (it is according to how it was supposed to work but how says it must work that way) and will only upset a lot of people while there are lots of other stuff which doesn't work.

What people is also talking about is that missing stats on aresourtce is counted as zero (for example missing conductivity on Polymer/Gas etc). But hasn't it been like this for a long time? I tested that some time ago and to me it seemed to work that way.

Yes, I think DTox is right

I see the difference. It will affectexperimentation significantly, but not in the way I'd hoped.

Now I want my theory put in place! I am almost positive there is some sort of coded ranges for certain attributesin certain resources. I think that schematics calling for those resources should factor in the actual ranges of relevant values that will be encountered!

That's what I want.