Rare Items.

What makes an item rare in this game?

Items are not going to be unique (that we've heard) so where is the adventure in getting a rare item? Can't I just wait for someone else to go get the item and then spam them on some global chat/auction site until they sell me the item at whatever price the market demands?

Doesn't this take a lot out of the game when the sword of dragon slaying is essentially on an assembly line?

What if players couldn't get special items and weapons unless they actually performed the tasks needed to get these things? I'm not saying you couldn't sell or trade items, that would be silly. But what if the items and weapons only truly gave you the full power if YOU were the one that found them?

That would make things a lot more interesting in my opinion. Your thoughts?

 

Are we talking rare items or just rare armor and weapons? Because when I hear 'rare' I think "collectables!" stuff I want to gather and put on display as a hobby. Hard to find books, 'ancient' loot like vases, paintings etc

 

I'm thinking about anything that could be considered an item (weapons, armor, books, whatever). To me, it's one thing to have a player make something that take special materials that have to be obtained. But it's another thing entirely to go out and get say a crystal ball of seeing that allows the user to perform special magic...but instead of killing the red dragon in the mountains you give some guy 20k because he has 6 of those sitting in his closet already.

I'm really just looking for the stuff we get our hands on in quests and while actually doing something...I'm looking for those things to be special because we DID something to get them.

Maybe even if we could commission someone in game to go on an adventure for us...that too would be more special and require a little conversation and some wait time rather than just going to the fantasy internet and getting it through secure trading.

 

Rare items are different from Unique items. Rare should be one of those ones that are basically.. well rare. Maybe one person you know has one compared to the other maybe... 300 people who also carry this? I think that perhaps there'd be a certain number distributed to mobs and merchants and then leave it at that.. like golden tickets but they can change hands. Unique though.. that's a one time deal. One person holds the one copy of the weapon and they got it from god knows where.

 

Well part of that is a preference. Some folks would rather just spend money. No is going to force you to trade for rares if you'd rather go out and earn them yourself.

I personally didn't like the rares market in UO.. it just seemed ridiculous to fork over a million gold for a pile of horse poop just because it was rare.. and then it was only rare because of what amounts to a bug.. you weren't supposed to have it in the first place. I guess you could call it an immersion breaker for me.

Rares to me are something that are designed to be hard to find and for the purpose of collecting though some player made items can cross over into 'rares' out of pure interest value to a handful of players. I just want it all to make sense in context for the world.

 

If you craft a chair when the moon is at a certain position or something your chair could glow with moonlight and it would be rare. Or if you crafted a couch when the solar system is in a certain order that only happens once ever 2 real years you get a couch that..... does something else. I think getting rares like this could be cool.

 

Kinds reminds me of the moon forge or whatever it was called in Skyrim. Was a great idea but not well implemented. Basically if you crafted weapons at this forge when the moon was out you're get a magical weapon that did magical damage at night. I never found it very useful since I always made sure my character maxed smithing, alchemy and enchanting. Of course by the time I was done upgrading my weapon adding magic to it was just simply overkill. I kill the tougher dragons in about 1 second without magic weapons if they're stupid enough to land on the ground next to me. Anyway.. back to the topic at hand..

Yes that would be kinda cool and it wouldn't surprise me if there's a little something like that already planned.. but if there is I think I'd rather be surprised.

 

Player-set prices are the responsibility of the players. If something is rare, then it should be expensive/difficult to acquire. This translates into goals for some of us.

I am one of the people who like items as a way to distinguish players from each other. If I choose to spend the time and effort to collect everything purple I can get my hands on, it says something about me. Probably nothing good, but still...