Why crafting generally sucks in online games

So, after trying out the initial crafting system for Shroud of the Avatar, it’s obviously still in the VERY early stages of development – so I don’t necessarily want to talk about specifics of where it stands right now. However, I do want to put forth some ideas based on my overall experiences with crafting in other games.

The truth is crafting sucks in every game because none of them - not a single game I have ever played – really gets it “right”.

You see, I am a real-life crafter. I make things (lots of things) in the real world: jewelry, clothes, furniture, art, food; honestly there isn’t much I haven’t at least tried to make. For any given craft endeavor, there is quite a lot of work, and time, and yes, even failure. And I persist throughout all this hassle despite the fact that I could just BUY this stuff because crafting gives me the ultimate prize:

Creative Freedom

When I make something myself, I am in complete control. I decide which materials I want to use, how durable it needs to be, how it works, how it looks…even what it is worth!

The problem with crafting in games is that all of the emphasis is placed on the code-driven mechanical process (gathering materials, clicking tools, gaining skill points, making proficiency checks) instead of on the player-driven creative process (deciding on a shape, adding an embellishment, selecting enhancements). And while we are talking about materials and tools, let’s not forget the INSANE number of items one has to tote around until they have enough of the right items, and are in the right location to even make something. And every game does this – it’s a PAIN!

In real life, I have a house to store all my crafting materials, and a workspace where all of my tools are ready and waiting for me. I typically gather stuff here and there and stockpile it in bins until I am in a crafting mood, at which point I sit down and get right to work. Ultima Online replicated this particular aspect quite well (even if it failed on the creative freedom facet) – and to this day, that is still the only game crafting experience I ever even remotely enjoyed. So here is what I would love to see in Shroud of the Avatar when it comes to crafting.

Crafting Stations

These should be complete workspaces containing all the necessary tools (saws, tongs, needles, knives etc.) and incidental ingredients (thread, salt, wax, coal, etc.) to use them so that all the crafter needs to bring to the table is their primary raw materials for that craft: wood for carpentry, ore for smelting, fabric for tailoring, etc. This one feature would drastically reduce item count in the game and streamline player inventories. It’s a huge time savings that removes tedium from the crafting experience and actually allows for greater immersion because there is less digging through bags for this tool or that component, and more making stuff.

To make it more interesting, public crafting stations could be basic and give players the ability to make ordinary items, while player made crafting stations (placed in homes) could be more robust and enable a wider range of craftable items through an assumed expansion of the tools and ingredients that come with that station. So a public carpentry table might allow the crafting of stools, but decorative thrones could only be made from a player-crafted station. This leads to the next area of contention.

Patterns, plans, and recipes

By tying the complexity of items to the crafting station, players can have immediate access to the items that can be produced at that station, based on the tools and incidental ingredients that station automatically has. This information can be presented in the form of a book on the table that provides the basic guides. Better stations provide more options because they have a wider range of tools and ingredients, with the best stations having all the necessary supplies for every craftable item of that skill type. Patterns and plans could also be obtained from other other sources, and in this way we begin to address one of the most critical components of a good crafting system.

Progression

In every game I have played, the ability to work with certain materials has always been dependent on attaining a specific level of skill and the progression usually goes something like linen, wool, cotton, silk, etc. But in real life, once I have a pattern, it really doesn’t matter whether I use cotton or linen or wool. If I am building a bookcase, I can follow the plan using oak or mahogany or pine and still get…a bookcase. It’s the complexity of the pattern itself that requires more skill. Of course, the material I decide to use WILL affect other qualities of the finished item, but I’ll get back to that in a moment.

So if the material is essentially irrelevant, the progression of items then becomes dependent not only on the tools and supplies available at a crafting station, but on the complexity of the design itself. Straight sleeves are easier than puffed sleeves. Ladder back chairs are easier than scroll-back chairs. So while any player can walk up to a tailoring station with a pile of cloth and make a plain tunic, only a crafter with the proper pattern and/or skill has the option to put a collar and puffed sleeves on that tunic. And that sets the stage for the ultimate crafting experience.

Creative Freedom

The two major elements that give players creative freedom are item design (the finished look of the product), and attributes (special properties that affect the usefulness of the item).

Allowing players to pick the final look of an item based on the crafting station and their known patterns gives crafters the opportunity to create truly unique looking gear and items. So for instance, when forging a sword, the crafter has a choice of blade styles and hilt designs, which they can mix and match to create the look they want. Exactly what the selection of options available to choose from would be dependent on the quality of table being used, and the patterns the crafter has obtained from vendors, as loot, or through skill progression (if it ends up being a point or level based system).

But good looking gear is only the beginning. There are also material qualities to consider; what happens when you mix and match different substances. And THIS is where the joy of experimentation should come into play – because, yes, experimenting is FUN!

From the base pattern of a leather tunic that requires leather and metal studs, the crafter can choose to combine a specific type of leather (dragon, hydra, basilisk) with any number of metal stud options (copper, brass, iron) and get an item with different special properties. Maybe dragon leather is resistant to fire, while hydra leather resists electrical damage. Iron studs may negate the hydra effect while brass would not. Some combinations might be highly beneficial while other combinations might not have any bonuses at all. The idea is to let crafters come up with their own arrangements of appearance and properties rather than letting the game mechanics dictate what a crafter can and cannot make and what it looks like.

When crafting mechanics are streamlined and the interface is focused instead on the creative process of each item, crafting becomes a dynamic aspect of the game where experimental and imaginative crafters are of real value to other players. Being able to craft useful, attractive items that are distinct even from what other players make puts dedicated crafters in demand based on the unique items they can create.

If only a game would do this, I’d be a happy crafter…

 

Good points here. I agree that patterns should dicatate what you should be able to make. Perhaps there can be as many patterns as there are styles of weapons, armor, furniture etc...That's alot of patterns tho, but maybe part of the fun is finding patterns in your travels.

I'm all for the aspect that once you can work tailoring you can work with all cloth...maybe higher skill just makes the quality you achieve with all types better...Hence we are looking at mostly cosmetic features anyway (hopefully)...but also, that leads to many different options for crafting...

I'm loving these ideas.

 

I sort of agree that crafting should be "just the important stuff." L2 started needing dozens of things and then went this way. In Aion you gathered the important stuff and bought the rest as a gold sink from NPC vendors near the crafting station.

But I think there could also be an interesting mechanic (PvP or otherwise) where the town is out of some important thing, like say salt or water or power, and this needs to be restored or a large amount of crafting is stuck. e.g. a town may have say four weak-points which take away something important...but if they're not dealt with there could be a full fledged siege. There might also be a growth option where a group quest creates a trade route and now there's say ice available in the town which expands crafting possibilities.

I'm OK with creativity as long as the focus is cosmetic. Design your own patterns or whatever.

I'd like to see some sat or work orders / crafting dailies which matter not just to the player, but also the town. The town needs armor (or food, whatever) badly or the NPCs get weak. Perhaps you actually see them wearing your armor. I think of crafters like the citizens in civilization - they make the city stronger, as well as improve culture and technology.

 

Crafting Stations:

Absolutelyl should have multiple crafting stations. You go in my garage or my friends garage and we have all sorts of stations setup, there is our table saw, our section with tools for working on cars/motors, I have my saw horses setup for use with my circular saw, my friend has his welding station setup, and his table for grinding, and his section with the lathe, and another for his drill press. So many different sections if you just go into our 2 garages setup for very different purposes.

If all you do is some sewing, bead work, soldering, that sort of stuff yeah, you only need a table to sit at and good lighting. Bigger projects require more space and specialized equipment than smaller scale projects. I completely disagree with your assessment.

Patterns/Plans/Recipes:
There has been some reveals on this subject in the Dev+ section I can't share here, but you aren't too far off with what you suggest. (Not exactly the same, but not out of the ball park)

Progression:

This is because games tie ingredients to certain levels. linen they make cheap and for lower level characters, silk is more expensive for higher level characters. It's a way to tier costs and keep crafting costing money. In Wow's case this was gathered from creatures of tougher levels and so if you didn't personally kill them you had to go to the AH which was priced according to difficulty. This goes for most of the materials used.

I don't think we'll see this in this game. I can't guarantee it but I think we'll be free to use the materials we want, as long as we use the right items we'll get the outcome with the different material instead. Much like how UO handled it.

Creative Freedom:

This has been brought up before in many threads. Complete with visuals to show what they mean. I don't like it. The reason why, is you are actually limiting what items can look like with this type of system. So you'd never be able to pull some of the really cool and exotic looking items because their hilts and blades and things wouldn't match up. So you can have a big variety with a lot of different options, yet you then limit it within a specific style. If you make it so there is no restriction in styles you get some stupid/ugly/unrealistic looking items.

Now that said, I see no reason for them not to let us use different hides and combinations of items for a similar but different result for effects. The difference though, is you only see a difference in colors, not overall look. I'm also against players being allowed to put in their own graphics, it dilutes and changes RG's and SD (concept artist) vision and would lead to very different styles/feeling to the world.

 

This actually touches on another thing I hate about game crafting: grinding for skill points.
And honestly, that's the only reason to have things like work orders because the whole idea behind them is to give crafters a way to get rid of all the crap they have to make to gain the skill needed to unlock a new item.

Why not break away from that model entirely and let crafters gain new items organically through the crafting process itself? Maybe there's a random chance when making a sword that you have the inspiration for a new style of blade? That style then gets added to the selection of blade styles available when making swords. Or maybe there is a quest that teaches a new recipe, or an actual pattern is found as loot from a monster or chest?

Imagine, with just five different styles of blades, five different cross-guard styles, and five different hilt designs, a crafter could make over 100 different styles of swords. And this doesn't even take into account variations on material. And they wouldn't have to grind skills to make any of them.

Let skill level dictate things like durability, or enhancement modifiers. Don't tie it to WHAT can be made, just how WELL it is made.

 

Sorry, I don't think I was very clear on that point. There would be DIFFERENT stations (such as carpentry, smelting, tailoring, etc.) but the tools and incidentals for a particular craft would be part of the station for that craft, rather than something the player has to carry around all the time.

 

Ah, now that makes sense.. I can see that and get behind that. (Although unlikely in this game since they already have sold/made separate crafting stations and tools).

 

Cosmetic changes to items shouldn't be too hard; virtually every MMO has some variation in player avatars, so changes in gear would likely be handled similarly. Doesn't make the concept all that easy though.I made another thread that also had some of the stuff you talked about here (different materials) but with more of a focus on mechanics. (https://www.shroudoftheavatar.com/f...r-suggested-alternative-crafting-system.6670/)

It'd just be nice to see less rigid recipes at the least.

 

I would think some tools should be portable...like the scissors for making bandaids on the road...

 

Bandaids on the road...ah, those were the days...

Yes, I suppose some carried tools could be appropriate, just not ALL of them. Maybe we could have a multi-tool...I carry one of those in real life.

 

Or maybe you could "attach" a tool to the station. If it breaks or if you get an upgrade, you can replace it. But each station could have "slots" for each appropriate tool.

This would also go well with prosperity tools, and not negate that aspect of the marketplace. If anything, it would make it more desirable. Public stations would not have this feature.

 

Tools are one thing, materials are another. Now if you also had slots for ore or what have you, you could load several stones of ore and not carry it around? The better the table, the more slots for materials. So a master smith could have a station with a prosperity hammer he never has to replace and slots for all types of ore and multiple raw materials. He still has to farm or buy mats, but can then drop them off at his table and voila.

Basically, combine storage with the station, AND make it smarter to boot so when I go to craft I can dynamically choose from what's stored in the station. Anything else I have to have in my bag.

 

I really like this idea by the way.

 

I had a lot of the same ideas for weapon crafting. Having the design effect the way the weapon works. A target weight range for swords and axes so they aren't too heavy but aren't so light they give in to air resistance. Making top heavy blades be slower with more hacking power while blades being balanced more towards the hands are a bit more lively. Wider blades being sturdier but heavier, longer blades having that extra length but also being heavier (and harder to balance just right). It wouldn't have to be too realistic but it would be cool to be able to design your own weapons.

For non swords protrusions could be used to hook weapons so they recover slower from a parry (if you have the training to do that). Sacrificing some of the power on an axe to make it smaller and double bitted so that it's quicker on the upswing.

 

I LOVE this idea. LOVE LOVE LOVE! I typically find crafting to be a tedious part of most games that I must do to get what I want (Skyrim.... I'm looking at you!). This would remove a great deal of that tedium. I hope the devs take a look at this thread and give it some serious thought!

 

I have to agree, crafting should be a really rewarding experience and not a tedious one.

 

I think crafting in this game (an UO) is expected to use many items which are found in the world including the harvested items in wooded areas and reaped from hunted animals etc. The benefit of this system is you can have many items in the world, see them visually and interact with them.. They help to make the virtual game seem populated and you can pick them up or do what ever you want with them... In UU you can throw them if you want to.

I think that is pretty correct and not really flawed so far...
I don't think any one is expecting a crafting revolution in this game, they just want it to be fun and worthwhile.

Maybe they could somehow improve the way custom items were designed so you could interchange various images and textures with dozens of options. The result could be 1000's of different design combinations, but that could be seriously difficult to build from scratch... Unless they can use some Unity features or modules, that would help on the design process a lot.

I don't understand what you think public crafting stations should be, is it to make crafting easier? How do you picture public crafting?

 

Let me start off by saying that these are good ideas. I'd love to be able to control the look of a weapon, piece of armor or piece of furniture. But it seems to me to be a very tall order. Just the amount of work involved in artwork and then mapping that artwork to specified materials, stations and levels is a daunting task. Not saying that it cannot be done, it most certainly can be, but it's not a quick or easy process. Then you have to think of parameters like is an iron dagger made on Station A able to look like an iron dagger made on Station C or are designs unique to stations? Likewise, if abilities are tied to stations and I really like the look of Iron Dagger A but the effect I can get from Iron Dagger C, that creates further problems.

So in the design you have to figure creating, say 5 dagger blade styles and hilt styles for each station, but the styles should be able to cross station boundaries from lowest station to highest. I assume abilities based on materials used need to cross boundaries of stations as well. Then there are the possibilities of new blades not in "normal" knowledge base of all players. Also, the combination of blade and hilt. Nothing saying I can't have a iron dagger blade and a hilt of silver. This adds up to thousands of combinations for just one weapon.

Again, it is not impossible and it would be really cool if someone could pull it off. But to design a game where you could craft every item (within reason, some crafts, such as alchemy won't necessarily make sense to be treated in this fashion) would take years to design, draw, test and map a huge database of possibilities. It's simply not practical and that's more the reason why you probably won't see something like this in a game.

As for materials and tools, they wouldn't really need to change all that much about the game. Simply set up a storage area on the crafting station. Some people really enjoy going out and harvesting materials, even mundane ones. I like going out and harvesting because it gets me out and exploring the world and that, to me, is the best part of most games. I get to see things that few others see because I simply wander aimlessly looking for resources. There have been games I played where I would go to places I'd found while harvesting simply to enjoy the scenery. I don't think that including basic crafting materials helps anything, merely takes away a facet that some people enjoy.

I was thinking, though that if it's only possible to reach the pinnacle of crafting in one profession, that plans or recipes or whatever you want to call them, should ave interaction between crafters. I enjoy the idea of having to interact with other masters of their professions and work to trade for materials or coin for what you need. I think it reinforces the sense of community and player interaction that the vast majority MMOs lack nowadays.

 

I definitely agree that public crafting tables should have a "recipe book" that people can add recipes to as they learn them.

Players are, in fact, already doing this. It's called a wiki. Why not bring the wiki in-game instead of having to alt-tab to see it?

It's created by real players who discovered recipes and wanted to share them with other players, but they are forced to do it outside the game.

It's not as if it should be some big secret how to make a chair. :|

As to your point of:

... I could be wrong, but I THINK that's exactly how SotA's crafting system is going to work. So yay for that!

 

Hmm. Think I will add my two cents here too. First - EQ2 added, at some point, a chest, where you can put all your ingredients, then "automatically" have them be used at any station on your property (I think.. Its been a while since I was in there, but I don't think it worked with the "public" crafting locations. It was also annoyingly limited in how many things you could stick in it, both in type, and number.). I can see two ways to go with that, really, one is to do the same sort of thing, and have your own chest/vault that works across all stations, once in place. The other would be to make it possible to "load" a station with the incidentals. Or, in other words, you would still need to, for your own station, load in the secondary stuff needed to do the crafting, which may include molds, recipes, etc., and replenish the ones that run out, but once "in" the station, you only need to bring along the main items. Its actually quite silly that you need to carry all the stuff around, but also, if you wanted to do some level of realism, also a bit odd to not have to move those things, if crafting some place else. Of course, loading the stations themselves, i.e., having them function as chests too, adds an issue with "public access", and someone using your materials, but, I am sure you could set it to allow/disallow that, or the like.
I just find it annoying to have to dig out what ever it is I need, when I decide to craft, lug it to where ever I am doing so, and then do it, especially if the things have a) weight, and b) size, and thus c) are a pain in the butt, from the stand point of keeping them in inventory. My character in EQ2 ended up super muscled, and carrying like 8 chests, all with "lowers the weight, and has mega capacity", just to carry around the bloody crafting stuff, never mind anything else, and then finding room for stuff you picked up later.... lol Not pretty. I don't mind limits on hauling the stuff around, as long as there is some place to bloody put it, when I don't need it on me. Even better if I don't need to haul it to craft, once I have it stored.