Jobs of Zalanthas - aka things you spam for coins

[Ath]

So there are many jobs in Zalanthas, these are fully automated tasks that can be done within the game world to provide characters a way to make some coins.  I will fully admit, not all of them are balanced at the moment, and this is of interest to staff.  You can see all the current "jobs" here:  http://armageddon.org/help/view/Jobs  --  The issue with job at it's core is the risk vs reward vs gameplay.  We need to make sure there is risk involved, we need to make sure the reward is worth the risk, and that the gameplay is fun and intuitive/realistic.  Not all of these are easily done in a game world as vast and different as Armageddon's.  So the hope for this next topic is to go over a few of these jobs and try to really get down and dirty with them (you see what I did there?).  I will be asking general and specific questions on particular jobs, and seeing what sort of idea we can get from the players.  I may even put together a few polls that will be subtopics off of this main one.

As with my last topic, there is a disclaimer here.  There is no promise that any of this information will be used, staff still has final say on it, but we do have great interest in hearing what you have to say.  This information may or may not affect any current or future planned projects, it could just be for informational uses.  We do ask that this topic be kept on topic... I will delete posts that are of no relevance to the topic and if it continues to be derailed, I will just close it.  The feedback we are hoping for is informational feedback, constructive criticism, and anything that can provide us with some sort of insight into the topic at hand.  This is not here to complain or whine about something in the game that you don't like... if you don't like it, tell me why and give some constructive feedback on it.

So the first area I want to focus on is jobs in general.  Are they necessary?  Are there enough of them?  Do you think they can be easily abused at the moment?  If so, do you think we should implement caps or limitations?  Which of the jobs is your favorite, and why?  I want honest here guys, if you use it because it's an easy way to make cash, be honest.  I'm not saying anyone here abuses things, but I would love to hear your thoughts on it.

NOTE:  There is no reason to go in depth into any mechanics, and if there really is some sort of exploit or something broken with any mechanics, please don't post it here.  Please send that information up via a Bug Request on the Request tool and we can talk about it more there.

[Hauwke]

My favourite job, used to be salting. Until it was nerfed, made harder. Which while realistic just makes it more annoying then anything.

Dung scraping is a good one. It too can be annoying and tedious with the fact it is actually limited, which does make sense to be honest.

Clay digging, is abusable, but -very- time consuming to be abusable.

[evilcabbage]

well, this begs the question: where else are independent people going to get money, if they're not crafters, but jobs?

the risk with the salt job is (currently i believe) you have to go deeper into the salt flats, find the actual deposits of salt, and not get eaten by a mek.


a job that could use some modification is the tailoring in red storm. unless it's changed recently, the second you hit journeyman in tailoring you basically have free money falling into your hands.

i believe i've also seen glass deposits not three steps out from allanak. i believe that the forage table should be modified so glass has to be found further out - near where it usually spawns. in spider country. otherwise that's a ludicrous source of money that you have access to for the risk of "maybe" there's a beetle or a spider or a scrab nearby (but let's be real, that's so unlikely).


i have no opinion on the lumber yard in morin's because i have never utilized it. maybe someday.



also with the forage changes, -most- of the forage-based jobs (to include salting) are actually easier because gathering the materials is simpler. it's based on your strength, endurance and forage skill. if you have high strength, deposits are a joke.

[Lizzie]

I've never gone salting so I have no opinion about it.
Clay digging: limited experience. Risk of getting there and back is minimal *most* of the time. Reward is equally minimal, since you have to work hard-core for a long period of time to earn even enough to cover the cost of food and water to get there and back. Personally, I feel this is more of a group-effort activity.
Spice-sifting: significantly harder to do with the new delay changes combined with the existing storm code. There's also more frequency of "unfriendlies" showing up, whether in the form of local creatures or PCs. However the reward is higher, and so I feel this is mostly balanced.

Something I would think helpful without unbalancing: Every time you bring in more than "x" grains in a single sifter's worth to the NPC, you get an automatic one-time waterskin refill discount at the waterseller next door. Has to be used before you use your sifter again. So it's more like a bonus that can't be stacked or racked up. A "You got more than the average, so have an extra sip of water today, on the house" kind of thing.
I feel this idea could work with all the "auto-quests." Bring in more than a certain value of product, and they spot you a bonus good for that delivery only. A discount on a filled waterskin, or half price on a single barrel of ale at the Gaj, maybe your next mount rental is only 10 sids etc.

[nauta]

well, this begs the question: where else are independent people going to get money, if they're not crafters, but jobs?

An independent with the skinning skill can hunt, and this brings in a lot of money -- probably too much money.

[Riev]

Deposit hacking can be absolutely ridiculous, but most especially because the Mine's Pockets seem to be deeper than they used to be.
Salting is still good coin, but definitely not the "I just made 10,000 coins last year doing a thoroughly boring chore".
Clay, I only did in Tuluk, and was hardly ever worth it. Couldn't afford the water you'd waste after a day in there.

I think if anything were to be changed, it would be to make every job's "output" be monetarily worthwhile to crafters. Like cotton in Tuluk... you could get paid per boll, but if you wanted to keep it, you'd be charged... and then could charge -more- to a PC that wanted to be a spinster. With clay, some PCs would want that fresh wet clay. Obsidian mining, only at times and for limited use, glass so far as I know is just vendor trash. Dung could be dried for firestuffs but otherwise, its also vendor trash.

I like the jobs, especially when people don't need to leave the city but ARE stuck doing a thoroughly gross job just to get by. I'd just rather there be two avenues: Either sell to an NPC for a low level of coin and be relatively limited, or sell to PCs who might actually -want- those resources and will pay as much or more than the NPC so they don't have to spend a day getting it themselves.

[Ath]

Deposit hacking can be absolutely ridiculous, but most especially because the Mine's Pockets seem to be deeper than they used to be.
Salting is still good coin, but definitely not the "I just made 10,000 coins last year doing a thoroughly boring chore".
Clay, I only did in Tuluk, and was hardly ever worth it. Couldn't afford the water you'd waste after a day in there.

I think if anything were to be changed, it would be to make every job's "output" be monetarily worthwhile to crafters. Like cotton in Tuluk... you could get paid per boll, but if you wanted to keep it, you'd be charged... and then could charge -more- to a PC that wanted to be a spinster. With clay, some PCs would want that fresh wet clay. Obsidian mining, only at times and for limited use, glass so far as I know is just vendor trash. Dung could be dried for firestuffs but otherwise, its also vendor trash.

I like the jobs, especially when people don't need to leave the city but ARE stuck doing a thoroughly gross job just to get by. I'd just rather there be two avenues: Either sell to an NPC for a low level of coin and be relatively limited, or sell to PCs who might actually -want- those resources and will pay as much or more than the NPC so they don't have to spend a day getting it themselves.

Could you explain more on the Deposit hacking?  Are you meaning that it's easier to get coins from it?

Salting I have seen a decline in use, but I think it is because the fact it isn't as worthwhile to get the tons of coins from it as it used to be.  The issue is finding the balance on it.  There really isn't a good way for us to see if people are even using it much now is the problem, so getting feedback is important.

I do think it is important that you can "use" these items... clay is a good example and likely a good point for us to follow in the future.   Thank you for this feedback.

I've never gone salting so I have no opinion about it.
Clay digging: limited experience. Risk of getting there and back is minimal *most* of the time. Reward is equally minimal, since you have to work hard-core for a long period of time to earn even enough to cover the cost of food and water to get there and back. Personally, I feel this is more of a group-effort activity.
Spice-sifting: significantly harder to do with the new delay changes combined with the existing storm code. There's also more frequency of "unfriendlies" showing up, whether in the form of local creatures or PCs. However the reward is higher, and so I feel this is mostly balanced.

Something I would think helpful without unbalancing: Every time you bring in more than "x" grains in a single sifter's worth to the NPC, you get an automatic one-time waterskin refill discount at the waterseller next door. Has to be used before you use your sifter again. So it's more like a bonus that can't be stacked or racked up. A "You got more than the average, so have an extra sip of water today, on the house" kind of thing.
I feel this idea could work with all the "auto-quests." Bring in more than a certain value of product, and they spot you a bonus good for that delivery only. A discount on a filled waterskin, or half price on a single barrel of ale at the Gaj, maybe your next mount rental is only 10 sids etc.

I really like the idea of turning in items for a return of another item, rather than coins.  This is actually something we've talked about staff side, it's actually really exciting to see others bring this idea up.  Would you think this could be used for multiple of the jobs out there?  I personally look at the existing jobs not as a constant source of coins, but a great place for someone getting started to make coins.  Just thowring this out there, but maybe the Allanak "Jobs" give a chit for your work, and you turn the chit in for food, water, tools, or maybe some coins, but you'd get a reduced amount of coins, the value of it would be from the objects you could get.  Do you think that could work?  (Idea here, doesn't mean it will happen )

well, this begs the question: where else are independent people going to get money, if they're not crafters, but jobs?

the risk with the salt job is (currently i believe) you have to go deeper into the salt flats, find the actual deposits of salt, and not get eaten by a mek.


a job that could use some modification is the tailoring in red storm. unless it's changed recently, the second you hit journeyman in tailoring you basically have free money falling into your hands.

i believe i've also seen glass deposits not three steps out from allanak. i believe that the forage table should be modified so glass has to be found further out - near where it usually spawns. in spider country. otherwise that's a ludicrous source of money that you have access to for the risk of "maybe" there's a beetle or a spider or a scrab nearby (but let's be real, that's so unlikely).


i have no opinion on the lumber yard in morin's because i have never utilized it. maybe someday.



also with the forage changes, -most- of the forage-based jobs (to include salting) are actually easier because gathering the materials is simpler. it's based on your strength, endurance and forage skill. if you have high strength, deposits are a joke.

So I need to look at this, but I don't think you're right here.  There was some changes back in the day on it, but either way... having strength should help with hacking/mining IMO.

As for Tailoring... yes... I realize that completely with Storm.  It is an area of interest for sure.

As for Glass, I know what you're talking about, it's something that could be changed with some new stuff we have so it could be better controlled where the deposits show up.  I'll add that to my list of information, it's a very good point.  Not sure when or if it will get done, but I can see it as valuable feedback for now.

---

Keep the feedback coming, I love what we have so far.  Thank you!

[RogueGunslinger]

I think current jobs function well, I really like dung and dung selling. I'd like to see new jobs though.

Hauling. Hauling obsidian and stone from one part of the city to another. Hauling water from the temple to certain establishments.

Scoria mining to clear the road could be automated for pay at the miner place(if it isn't already).

Body removal. Pay like 15 coins for dropping a corpse off at the pile, randomly generate corpses about the city.

Street sweeping. Generate dust and debris, give 'sids for cleaning it up.

Gith scalps, Scrab heads, Scorpion/angk/Kagor clearing, Drov Beetle removal should all pay from certain establishments.

It's be cool if you could get a job in taverns for waiting, serving and whatnot.

[Riev]

Deposit hacking, with a decent skill and stat roll, just requires the ability to fend off the occasional scrab for the most part. In the course if maybe 20 RL minutes, you can make a few small off a single deposit.

Granted, they don't appear everywhere and it may take some scouting to find one, so this may be pretty well balanced, all things considered.


Concerning chits, I've tried on a few characters to get things like this working... where you're not just shifting coins around (Tuluki Legions had a chit/quartermaster system that worked out pretty well). It'd actually be kinda nice if the Trade Ministry set up a sort of "Centralized Job Post" where work around the city, that helps the city, gets rewarded in food and water. Think Byn, but on a wider scale. You're clearing stables? That'll get you some good food. Bringing in obsidian and glass? Worth a couple skins of water and a pack of rations.

I don't know how that'd balance, either, if someone just collects all the "free" food and water for a day, but sounds like that'd eventually work itself out!

[LucildaHunta]

Off the top of my head, I think a little courier service would be a nice addition and also newbie friendly. You go to the building, let's call it UAS, type package, the npc gives you a package and generates a random "Take this package to the armor smith in the bazaar." You go to Salarr and type "deliver". The npc armor smith says, "Thanks, I've been waiting for this hammer! Here's a tip." You get 10-20 coins. Not a lot, but enough to afford to fill up your skin, afford a meal with a little something left over.

The bonus is newbies can learn the city in an organic way. What about, code abuse? Put a limit on how many jobs a PC can do a day, say three. I don't think you can really get around code abuse in mini game type jobs. Really it's just a nice quick way to earn some coins and for newbies a good way to learn various locations in the city.

[Cabooze]

If I mention the most amazing moneymaker in arm, it would be revealing too much ingame info.

[Jihelu]

Mining + the occasional gem is ridiculous money, I've found.


I've never spice silted for money so I've no idea about that.


Salting is pretty decent money.


Never tried picking up dung for money.

[Ath]

So I do agree, it would be nice to add some new things in, but that isn't the focus of the thread.  Lets focus on the existing jobs and the questions I've asked throughout the thread if we could.

[thewolfen3]

Spice sifting is the only income source that makes you feel you're contributing to the world. At least, that's how my characters see it, you know?

[nauta]

I want to second Reiv's point: I enjoy jobs where I know I'm contributing to a PC.  Hence, jobs like plant gathering and foraging for rocks and hunting are high on my list, and jobs like obsidian/glass mining and salt foraging are low.  Ways to motivate interaction with jobs:

o Automated tasks should generate materials usable by PCs (Reiv's point).  Glass and salt, and to a lesser extent, obsidian are not very popular among PC crafters, for instance.

o Benefit from selling to a vendor should be small compared to selling to a PC.  At present this is pretty good, although I'd like to see it lowered a bit if the material is local and raised a bit if the material is foreign (see the next point)

o Materials from one area fetching a higher price in another area, e.g., wood selling better in the south than in the north.  This would encourage people to hire Byn (or other) escorts to move material, and thus create more interaction, even if the ultimate purchaser is an NPC in the south.  This could use the most looking into (and would be complicated, I admit), but I'm always surprised when I take a product unique to the north and find I can't even sell it in the south (to NPCs).

o Job locations in public places -- this is where the Red Storm tailor quest is low on the list.  It encourages you to hide away.  By contrast, salt foraging and dung digging and so on -- these require you to go out and potentially encounter other PCs while you work.

By the way, we should start pushing the term 'gong farmer' for dung scrapers.  See https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gong_farmer.

[Ath]

o Materials from one area fetching a higher price in another area, e.g., wood selling better in the south than in the north.  This would encourage people to hire Byn (or other) escorts to move material, and thus create more interaction, even if the ultimate purchaser is an NPC in the south.  This could use the most looking into (and would be complicated, I admit), but I'm always surprised when I take a product unique to the north and find I can't even sell it in the south (to NPCs).

This is already done.   Maybe some of the other materials need to get tweak for it, but I can say without a doubt wood is jacked up in the south.

[nauta]

o Materials from one area fetching a higher price in another area, e.g., wood selling better in the south than in the north.  This would encourage people to hire Byn (or other) escorts to move material, and thus create more interaction, even if the ultimate purchaser is an NPC in the south.  This could use the most looking into (and would be complicated, I admit), but I'm always surprised when I take a product unique to the north and find I can't even sell it in the south (to NPCs).

This is already done.   Maybe some of the other materials need to get tweak for it, but I can say without a doubt wood is jacked up in the south.

Yeah!  I was thinking about some cases with furs that are (according to the help file) coveted, e.g., goudra, turaal, etc., and unique to the north, yet fetching less than what they'd fetch in the north -- and in some cases being unsellable.  I'd have to go back and double check, I just remember being surprised in a couple cases.  (I think part of the problem is that the Luir's hide guy pays pretty darn good for furs.)

I'd also like to see reasons for southerners to come north to sell -- but, hehe, what have they got down in the south?  Scrab bits?  Pfft.

[Delirium]

^^^ This, also, I can't ever seem to sell lumber for a decent price in the south unless to PCs.

[Riev]

o Materials from one area fetching a higher price in another area, e.g., wood selling better in the south than in the north.  This would encourage people to hire Byn (or other) escorts to move material, and thus create more interaction, even if the ultimate purchaser is an NPC in the south.  This could use the most looking into (and would be complicated, I admit), but I'm always surprised when I take a product unique to the north and find I can't even sell it in the south (to NPCs).

This is already done.  Maybe some of the other materials need to get tweak for it, but I can say without a doubt wood is jacked up in the south.

Yeah!  I was thinking about some cases with furs that are (according to the help file) coveted, e.g., goudra, turaal, etc., and unique to the north, yet fetching less than what they'd fetch in the north -- and in some cases being unsellable.  I'd have to go back and double check, I just remember being surprised in a couple cases.  (I think part of the problem is that the Luir's hide guy pays pretty darn good for furs.)

I'd also like to see reasons for southerners to come north to sell -- but, hehe, what have they got down in the south?  Scrab bits?  Pfft.

I'd imagine it may be worthwhile to investigate "northern-style" crafts that don't sell well/at all in the South. Currently, yes, wood items sell better in the South (marginally), but Obsidian has never sold "as well" in the north. Now with Luir's kind of being the only place to sell and make your coins in the northlands (Blackwing maybe but hahahhaha), it might be worthwhile to look into the returns of traders crossing the Red, or making a dangerous foray into elf territory.



However more on topic: the clay digging in the south might be a viable alternative but I honestly don't know many that do it. Its distant enough from the city that it could be dangerous, but close enough that people just run there anyway. Its outside of the city which restricts it to indies only, and the crafts from it don't exactly send the playerbase clamoring for the clay. As I don't know what its returns are, I would just like to point out that due to these restrictions, it should probably return a better value than in-city shit-digging, but less than spice sifting (because hey, at least you're in a protected village when scraping clay).

[nauta]

If it doesn't take things too far off topic, one focus question might be (for the crafters out there):

Which materials do you have to send people on a go-fetch quest for, and which can you get locally at the NPC vendors (before PCs populate the vendor with the goods)?

I know that quirri hides, for instance, are perfect: these don't populate in NPC vendors, and are PC generated (IIRC).  I'd like to see more cases like that.

You could even (to account for off-peak people) make it such that off-peakers could sell to an NPC vendor (so crafters can have access to it), but the items that load by default are much more expensive compared to items populated by PCs.  So, for instance:

The Hides Guy down in Allanak loads with a few chalton hides at 60 sid (since local) or whatever, maybe one or two raptor hides at 160 sid (since foreign).  But if a PC brings in a chalton hide, the price would drop to 30 sid, and raptor hides to 80 sid.  (I'm not sure if the code could handle this.)

[path]

My two favorite jobs are spice grebber in Red Storm and rolling bodies to sell the rags in the Rinth. I think you get too much for the rags. That means I have to self modulate how often I do it to maintain anything like a respectable level of poverty.

I wish the sifting were slightly more lucrative. It's significantly more dangerous, which increases the fun for me.

[Ath]

o Materials from one area fetching a higher price in another area, e.g., wood selling better in the south than in the north.  This would encourage people to hire Byn (or other) escorts to move material, and thus create more interaction, even if the ultimate purchaser is an NPC in the south.  This could use the most looking into (and would be complicated, I admit), but I'm always surprised when I take a product unique to the north and find I can't even sell it in the south (to NPCs).

This is already done.   Maybe some of the other materials need to get tweak for it, but I can say without a doubt wood is jacked up in the south.

Yeah!  I was thinking about some cases with furs that are (according to the help file) coveted, e.g., goudra, turaal, etc., and unique to the north, yet fetching less than what they'd fetch in the north -- and in some cases being unsellable.  I'd have to go back and double check, I just remember being surprised in a couple cases.  (I think part of the problem is that the Luir's hide guy pays pretty darn good for furs.)

I'd also like to see reasons for southerners to come north to sell -- but, hehe, what have they got down in the south?  Scrab bits?  Pfft.

I get what you're coming from, and I will be flat out honest... it's not possible to tweak pricing based on creature type of the skin.  We have some ways to tweak, but not that detailed sadly.  So we leave that sort of "rarity" pricing to interactions with PCs and Roleplaying.  Now, lets work to get back on topic.  We can talk about hunting and all the sort of stuff in another topic, we're trying to focus on the automated jobs PCs can do based on the help file I listed.  Salting/Dung/Clay/Cotton/Spice/Mining (Hacking)  Red Storm Leather/Clothing is another one we can add in, but not as well advertised.

---

So time to change to focus up a bit... so we have some mixed views, that's good to see.  I personally think Clayworking is pretty well balanced as it is very useful outside of just turning it in, and it doesn't give you a ton of money... but enough to "survive" on and start out with.  Mining sounds like it can be great or bad... very heavily based on the luck of the draw it seems since deposits are more random.  Spice sifting sounds like it is good, I still see people using it, but it's not as crazy as it was before due to some changes on the way sifters work.  Salting I am hearing is tough now because of the risk involved to get better deposits.  It also doesn't seem like the sort of job a solo person can do and survive off of it, might be a better group sorta job.  I'm surprised to hear, but Dung has a lot of fans (I personally have never used it), that is interesting to say.

So lets focus on Salting... more so I am talking about current Salting, after the new changes that were put in.  Why do you not use Salting now?  Would you rather it was back the way it was before?  If we had it like before, how would you suggest we change it so people are not walking away with a large in 'sid each time?  Is Salting too dangerous compared to the rewards now?  Can a Solo newbie survive off of salting right now, how about a Solo Veteran?

[Jihelu]

Can you straight up not forage salt anymore or is foraging in the lesser 'salt flat rooms' just straight garbage?


I used to salt a bit here and there but never when my forage was actually good, now I would probably be good at it.


Though the problem with me going into the salt flats is scary giant monsters are there and do I really want to risk being attacked because I can't look North East/North West/etc for pieces of salt?

Not really.

[solera]

As a new PC, what put me off most, was the cost of water in mining and salting, for little gain at the start.  I like the suggestion of part payment in water, if it could be done.

Early days of living poor has always been a good time for me, though I preferred shit bagging and grebbing/cooking roots. The outgoings seem less. Low risk, enjoyable RP.

[LucildaHunta]

The couple times I've seen the new salting area and the changes, it looked a little far away for a newbie. Unless said newbie was into exploring. I think it's doable for a veteran player though. The risk I see from salting tends to be more of a mechanical one. Other than that salting seems fine as is.