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The Making of Verdantis Mines

Discussion in 'Developer Work and Blog posts' started by Sea-Wolf, Mar 23, 2017.

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  1. kaeshiva

    kaeshiva Avatar

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    I'm not suggesting that all mines should be low level. I simply think that having a low level mine - with low xp nodes and easier monsters - would go a long way to helping introduce people to mining and to crafting. New people join the game, they want to go get materials to have some gear made, and the question always comes up - where can I mine ? And the answer is nowhere, not til you're adventure level 70+ . And even then, your mining progress is hampered by fighting the majority of the time.

    At the moment, crafting is not very rewarding. Its frustrating and wasteful to watch an entire 8 hour play session's worth of material farming net you absolutely nothing due to bad rng rolls and things breaking. With a huge resource grind (or cash grind), nil customizability, and an astonishing number of items breaking even trying to put a couple of bonuses on ....the only way to combat this has been to throw obscene amounts of materials into it. Making the mines even more of a slog than they already are hampers this option.

    I have no problem investing the time - years even - to get nice things. What I do object to, is wasting my time, and that seems to be the direction more and more often these days. It used to be ok that well at least I got some XP - but the skill decay garbage has ruined that for adventure xp, and the harsh scaling of the xp curve with crafting (millions of xp to get 1% succes? ugh) have kinda killed that aspect of it. I'd happy spend 50 gold ingots per enchant rather than 5 if I could pick the bonus I wanted and didn't have to worry about it breaking. At least that way, potential customers could order gear and you could give them a price. As it stands, its a complete crapshoot. Making mining less accessible / more arduous is going to make the entire system a lot more painful than it already is - and its pretty painful.
     
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  2. Alexander

    Alexander Avatar

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    I like the concept of the Ancient City Ruins and can see some lore behind all of this, with speculation as to the original builders. Really like how this is coming along.
     
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  3. Bowen Bloodgood

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    I realize my comments mostly pertain to Serpent's Spine but I wanted to put it here in hopes to avoid a critical issue with Verdantis that Serpent's now has.

    Now first.. I love the new Serpent's Spine for the most part. It's very creative. Lots of variety. It's obvious a great deal of care when into it. But it's now suffering from one great problem. Ore density is very low. I was exploring in Serpent's Spine for about 2 hours today and apart from the lowest chamber I could not for the life of me find a good place to actually mine ore. (and everything down there kicks my near level 60 butt so I still can't mine there) It's essentially lost its value as a mine unless you're there for gems.

    I am now back in old Verdantis and I'm here for one thing.. ore. It won't matter how awesome the new Verdantis is if there's no place I can really mine as that's the only reason I'd go and want to experience the place..

    I really like what I see here so far.. but mines are for mining..
     
  4. Arya Stoneheart

    Arya Stoneheart Avatar

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    If the trend is to make mining ore more difficult, this will discourage crafting - blacksmithing, masterworking and enchanting.

    It will also increase the prices of all the crafted gear that involve those three skills.
     
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  5. Bowen Bloodgood

    Bowen Bloodgood Avatar

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    To be fair I don't think that's the actual intention. Crafting is hard enough with the high material demands and with the exception of Owl's Next, Serpent's Spine was probably the easiest mine and you still needed to be around level 40+ just to hang out in the first chamber. All the others are 5 skulls. New players, particularly less hardcore ones are going to be reliant upon the player market for a good while. If suddenly all the good mining are tier 7+ it wouldn't be a good thing. Tier 5 is pushing it as is but I think doable.

    Ultimately you want to control the overall input of ores (or any resource) into the world but you can't really do that well through area difficulty because player levels vary too much. It's either too hard or too easy in terms of mobs and area design. There is no sweet spot in that regard for players ranging from level 10 to 100. Not the way levels and power are set up.

    What you can control reliably is node density, node difficulty, harvesting speed and output etc. Too many nodes, too much output.. not enough nodes.. and the area loses its value as a mine. Especially if it's a lot of work to be there.
     
  6. Chatele

    Chatele Avatar

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    I am with you 100% here. I use to mine in Serpent Spine mines, I don't go there any more, not worth the hassle.... I now mine at Verdantis and I am hoping it doesn't end up like Serpent mines..... MINES should have tons of ore , gems etc in them, That's what MINES suppose to have. That is the only reason I go to them, To explore them, and to Mine without having to die just to get some ore ....
     
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  7. Chrystoph Reis

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    I have to disagree with this in general.. .however, adding kobolds, elves or what ever as miners.. .you should be able to do things like A) rob them for whatever they have mined (including skills like pickpocket), B) Kill your way to their stores, Hijack carts etc. All miners worth a damn should be dropping ore on death. I have no problem with Abandoned mines having lots of ore nodes... but mines being worked on like Graff... should have mobs dropping the ore they've mined on death as well.
     
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  8. Wintermute of CoF

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    As others have mentioned, I am more interested in density of nodes than an absolute number.

    The answer is encounters and the outskirts of control points.
     
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  9. kaeshiva

    kaeshiva Avatar

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    Yes, and based on the new mining changes, that might actually end up being better ore per hour for all of us
     
  10. Chatele

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    Guess we need to get use to the new mines, because they are going to do it to ALL MINES ..... ..... It is what it is ....
     
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  11. Duke Gréagóir

    Duke Gréagóir Legend of the Hearth

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    *is now signing the - don't change elysium mines posting *
     
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  12. Sentinel2

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    Just finished watching the Postmortem. I'm disappointed. And very concerned. If I wanted real life I wouldn't have bought into the game. I would have jumped into a second job instead :)

    I'm a miner. But slowing down our mining rate even further doesn't seem to be very productive. Are any of the devs mining regularly and interacting with these changes? Or is Chris making the adjustments based on metrics only? It sounds more and more like all the mines may be nerfed in the same manner. Instead of slowing down the respawn rate, the new tactic is to just make the mine so large you are greatly reducing how much you can pull out of a mine anyway.

    People who come back with the comment that we're trying to embrace reality. Screw reality. I'm playing a video game. Not looking for additional employment :)

    Spend the time mining. Go to the mines regularly for hours (like nearly every day) and let us know if the opinion has changed.

    Yeah I'm worried. And the "suck it miners" comment didn't help...
     
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  13. Cordelayne

    Cordelayne Bug Hunter

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    Thank you and amen to that brother! :D
     
  14. Bowen Bloodgood

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    I am attempting to keep an open mind here. If only because we do not yet have a completed and fully balanced product.. but this feels like one of those changes where these is an obvious disconnect between devs and players that you see is so many other games. My only comfort at the moment is the reassurances that "if" further changes need to happen (and I'm sure we all think these won't even be an if in that regard) that they'll be made.

    I really begin to worry about single player balance here. With all the cloned mines, I couldn't really do any real mining until I was nearly level 40 as it is. What is this going to mean for the low level experience? Economy wise it amounts to a massive drop in supply. While crafting more or less demands x4 the resources of any weapon or item.. because you all know we'll never be truly happy with anything less than exceptional.. and assuming we don't fail any of the 2-5 mastercraft and enchanting attempts.. each fail there multiplying the amount of resources needed again.. and not even considering the amount of resources needed to skill up.

    I play a lot.. for the amount of free time I have. and it takes me all week to get enough ore for 1 attempt at a suit. With the cloned mines. Between the dispersal of ore in Serpents and the increase in mob activity I expect that if I spend 3-4 hours a day all week.. it'll probably take more like a month. How long is it going to take to make a full suit of +5 plate?

    Sure there's plenty of ore in the bottom but at level 60+ all the mobs are still red. Only players level 70+ (on average) will be able to mine down there unless they're in a group.

    That's all pretty hardcore if something isn't done to reduce the overall resources needed.
     
  15. Malimn

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    Well here is my method for the upcoming change... Since they do not listen to us in regards to what we feel is balanced in game, I am going to stop buying their products / digital items and I have already spent over 4-5k in real cash for this damn game and for now I am done buying items from them... This is partially my fault for supporting a game for as long as I have without waiting for a more polished product.

    You can bet your ass if I was complaining about PVP stuff not being balanced @Chris would be all over it and you know what... It is our turn to complain and complain until things are fixed... Are they nerfing how you can gather hides and other materials as well in the near future?? God I hope not... OH and Chris for your comment a few months ago where you stated if your non PVP then your a coward... Well sir I used to be an Anti-PK in UO and I take um-bridge to that and as a Veteran of the first Gulf War and Somalia I take offense to that.. As a major part of the dev team you might want to curb some of your more "Questionable Comments" and in my eyes it just makes you look like a child who is looking for attention. As far as your PVP comments I just do not wish to play that role anymore and prefer to now just play with friends and go out and hunt together for a common goal. Now if the world was like UO where it was a free for all then yes, I would be forced to go anti PK again.

    @Lord British
    This is a game and now you and your staff is turning this game into a MAJOR grind to obtain a single item and as someone who has played your games since U1... This is really starting me to doubt your sanity in the regression of this game. People play games to ENJOY and not have to constantly do the same thing over and over again and then all of a sudden have things take 2-3 times as long to now make / obtain. So lets look at the game mechanics.. One hour = One day in game.. So lets say you have a casual player who puts in 15-20 hours per week to play your game.. Lets go with armor since this is what I am working on.. Currently it takes 2-3 weeks (In game time) to make a suit of armor based off current spawn rates.. So now your changing the spawn rates down to 1/3 to 1/4 of what it used to be... So now it is going to take a player (in game time) 8 to 12 weeks to make a suit of armor.. Hell you had 4 years to nerf / fix this and then 9 months later after persistence you make a change.

    All the devs are doing now is killing the casual gamer by making things harder and harder to make.. At what point will you punish those who have exploited the system with experience gain crap with the spawn points, those who exploited the system to obtain ridiculous exp pools and crazy GM's... You seem more focused on punishing the players who do not cheat than those who have used exploits in the past. Those of us who are in our middle age years, know this is a marathon and not a 100 yard dash type of game... Now your taking it from a marathon to a tri-athonlon that runs for 60 days straight.

    Respectfully,

    As starting to get pissed off backer of this game.
     
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  16. Malimn

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    Hmm... Just realized something... You know by making the resources harder and harder to obtain, you just increased the value of those who sell these for real cash in game.. WOW!! Instant markup on items people will pay real cash for!

    WAY TO GO PORT! (Being sarcastic)
     
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  17. Arya Stoneheart

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  18. Bowen Bloodgood

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    This in of itself.. is a very good thing. Excepting they DO listen.. but listening is not the same as agreeing with.
     
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  19. Malimn

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    OH... and yet another thought :)

    Used to make 500 exp per ore node mined and now that that has been cut in 1/3 as well.. This now increases how slow it is to make exp in game as a crafter.. Can make over 100k per hour fighting and now going to be around 20k per hour mining?? Where is the balance / trade off @Chris and of course @Lord British now for fighting mobs because I can gain a LOT more experience per hour fighting mobs / beasts than I can crafting.

    Doh... forgot to add @DarkStarr
     
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  20. Chrystoph Reis

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    I would have to say, if you are spending that much time mining that it bothers you... you did indeed get another job and are not playing a video game.
     
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