Interesting post by Moorguard

[miir]

You've touched on something fairly substantive here, and it's a point that's difficult to get across in a way that people will accept. In fact, some will probably get mad at me for even bringing this up, and I apologize in advance for derailing this thread.

Crafting is indeed a combination of skill and luck, and we'd definitely like the system to favor skill. Pure random chance would mean that everyone would end up with similar results over time. Clearly, as you point out, this isn't the case.

It's the same thing with adventuring. Two people can have the same gear, be the same level and class, fighting the same mobs. Yet they report vastly different results, one claiming they are hopelessly broken and the other saying they do just fine.

So what's the difference? Is it random numbers, or player skill?

I don't know if I've ever seen anyone on an MMO message board complain about their class and then admit "But then again, I might not be playing my class very well." On the other hand, you can hardly look at a gameplay-related thread without multiple people blaming the designers, the random number generator, some dark corporate scheme, or any number of factors as to why they can't do what they want to do. Sure, there can be legitimate issues that cause real gameplay problems. But when there isn't, and it's a situation where one person says their class stinks while another person thinks it's great, how do you figure out who's right?

It wouldn't be logical to assume that everyone plays this type of game with the same level of skill. Certainly not everyone who throws a baseball pitches like Kurt Schilling, and we don't expect them to. Computer games may not make the same physical demands as a sport, but that doesn't mean skill isn't important.

Ever since the days of the Atari 2600, video games have addressed this fact. In many console games, you get to pick the skill level at which you play. Computer games, too. I personally don't feel any shame if I try out an FPS on "beginner" mode while some 12-year-old kid is playing on "super extreme" setting; I hereby acknowledge that I suck at FPS games. But you shouldn't need to be the best at something--whether it's baseball or Quake--in order to enjoy it.

MMOs, of course, don't have a difficulty switch that can be changed for different skill levels of players. By the very nature of MMOs, you have to make the playing field as level as possible. While some classes might be more straightforward to play than others, I would venture to guess that the goal of most MMO designers is to make every class have some elements that reward skillful play.

But as soon as you do that--as soon as you make it so one player can outperform another based on the way they use the tools available to them--you introduce inequality. Because I will tell you this: a poorly played character, regardless of how technically well-designed or well-balanced its class may be, is broken in a fundamental way. And except in the most obvious cases, it usually isn't the player who gets blamed for that: it's the design team.

Again, I say this not to anger anyone or to escape culpability for bugs or broken features. We certainly have our share of those. But even if every bug is fixed and every ability has some kind of parity, there will be people swearing that their class is utterly broken. So at that point you either have to blame the random number generator or else find another factor that is responsible.

Anyway, sorry for editorializing, it's just an issue I think about in this job. Please feel free to get back to talking about ways to enhance the crafting process.
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Moorgard
EverQuest II Community Guy

[Sylvos]

That is the most polite "How about you just suck at this game" post I've ever read by a designer. I like it, it's ballsy, its cutting edge, its honest.
Complaining about class balance? Perhaps you just suck! That rocks, more game developers should take that stance.

[miir]

He's not a dev, he's a community rep.

[Xzion]

maybe thats why i think my class is so rediculously overpowered
i out damage brigands and swashes and tank almost as well and hold aggro better then guardians

[masteen]

Wow, having a crafting system dependant on LUCK is a fucking GREAT IDEA! Who needs to go to Las Vagas, when you could beat you head against a virtual wall in EQ2?!?!?

[miir]

Wow, having a crafting system dependant on LUCK is a fucking GREAT IDEA!

One again, your bizzaro world logic comes into play.

Every single RPG in history has elements of luck, you fucking retard. You know all those dice in D&D? They add an element of luck into every aspect of the game, weather it be combat, disarming a trap or in dialogue with a NPC... it shouldn't be so much of a stretch that EQ2 has incorporated that into their crafting system....

Or perhaps you think a 100% skill based system is preferable...


Do you even fucking think before you start typing?
Idiot.

[Ajran]

Yes because 300 fucking combines and 20k of materials for the chance to get ONE skillup was so much fucking fun.

[miir]

We're talking about EQ2.

[Chmee]

Yes because 300 fucking combines and 20k of materials for the chance to get ONE skillup was so much fucking fun.

I wasn't fond of EQ1's tradeskills, partly at least because of what you mention.

EQ2 trade skills don't work that way though. Luck only really determines the quality of the item you make, which has a fairly minimal impact on experience (and luck doesn't have that big of an impact there even). Higher quality end products give you very slightly more experience (but usually take more time, you might actually make more exp by making crudes if resources aren't a limit). You do get a sizable bonus the first time you make a pristine for one particular item, but given that when I am actively working at making a pristine end result I am usually successfully something like 95-99% of the time, its not really much a problem.

[Erolz NTurnet]

Luck only really determines the quality of the item you make, which has a fairly minimal impact on experience (and luck doesn't have that big of an impact there even). Higher quality end products give you very slightly more experience (but usually take more time, you might actually make more exp by making crudes if resources aren't a limit).

I never expected it to be a hoot and a holler but damn, it's terribly boring and provides little challenge as it is now. If I could play a /gems type or something for pristines, I'd do more.. I'd probably get less pristines but at least it would be semi-interesting.

I'll give them credit though. At least it does take some skill to craft (usually) up to a point. After that, you're just at the mercy of the random number generator. Trying to finding that balance between player skill and tick randomness must really teh suck for some poor devs out there.

[Imprecate]

I've found out that there are certain patterns to which using the crafting abilities can never go below pristine. If I word this shitty, sorry, just got off of an 18 hr shift at work, but, I don't think its luck in this case. I got a provisioner to 30 with my pristine bar NEVER below full. Sure it goes down a bit, but positives every time with 1 or 2 negatives wont hurt. It took awhile to find the combinations in which to use the skills, but once found it, I never lost a pristine again.

I do not know if this is a bug, or if this is how it is supposed to be, but the certain order that I chain the 3 abilities in is always positive.

In response to the post above about the experience difference in the item combines, for every "new" pristine item you make, its a huge xp bonus, around 11% at 30. Given that I'm a provisioner, I have many different food items to make (I cannot personally state that this works for all craftsman classes, as I have not played them), therefor, making 1 pristine of each food is another craftsman level.

By using the pattern I found, as stated above, plus making 1 of each new item per level, im at around 80% of my level, then have the grind the last 20 out. I got to around lv 25 first night.