Custom Crafting ESGs vs. Heavy Mercantile Crafters

[Heade]

So, Brokkr had mentioned in another thread that the design idea behind changes to subguilds and core classes was that no subguild, including extended subguilds should have "better" abilities in a particular area than the "best" core classes in that area. I contend that this isn't the case with the crafting ESGs and the core mercantile classes.

As custom crafting has long been an extremely valuable and sought-after IC ability, it is unbalancing and doesn't make sense for the core mercantile classes not to get it while some warrior-type can do so with a subguild. I think this clearly infringes on the main appeal and ability of core mercantile classes, making the subguilds far superior in many ways. As a fervent mercantile player, I find myself asking why I would bother with a heavy mercantile class at all. Currently, we're in a state where the following is the situation:

Amos Crafter, who has spent his entire life focused on being the best at making things can't custom craft a pair of boots without taking up a subguild choice, leaving him without a real subguild.
Jono Warrior, who has spent his entire life focused on being the best at killing things can custom craft jewelry among the best in the land, in his spare time between killing Meks.

This situation doesn't make sense in-game, and doesn't follow the theme of no subguilds outshining the best "core" classes in their fields. Crafting ESGs are clearly superior to the core mercantile classes in this respect.

I understand that a big part of the reason for this change has been to alleviate staff workload regarding custom crafting. I suggest that this would be better served by taking custom crafting away from the ESGs and giving it solely to the heavy mercantile classes, while leaving the 0-cost custom crafter sub available to be taken by light mercantile and mixed classes, should they want access to custom crafting. This would simultaneously tackle the issue of custom crafting lower-tier items, as well, since the custom crafter sub would be able to be used by classes that don't get crafting skills up to master, necessarily, while keeping heavy mercantile characters valuable.

The more I have experienced this new setup, the more I dislike it. I've pretty much decided not to play heavy mercantile characters any more, instead opting for crafting ESGs to get my crafting/merchant fix as long as the policies stay as they are. The gameplay is simply far superior and allows you to have a character with more depth insofar as skills go.

What are other people's thoughts?



EDIT: Alternative take...Custom Crafting and Master Crafting don't need to be the same thing. You could keep custom crafting, limiting it to simple, non-fancy, journeyman-level crafts or w/e, and let players know that it is pretty much solely for easier items that anyone can craft, and re-introduce "Master" crafting to the heavy mercantile classes as part of their core setup. And have them have seperate limits on how many a player can submit. So, for instance, if a heavy mercantile character -DID- take the custom crafter subguild, that would allow them up to 1 master craft per month, and 1 custom craft per month capped at no higher than journeyman difficulty and 2 common materials. Right now, there is very little reason for a heavy mercantile PC to spend their monthly CC request on something simple that anyone can make when it won't be beneficial to the character themselves, really. Making fancy stuff happens because it makes sense for the character to attempt to show off their capabilities to the fullest to whoever they're trying to impress, and to fetch the best price in the game world. A change like this would encourage more balance and lead to an expansion of easier crafts that DO get used by other players in the game without taking away one of the defining elements of playing a heavy mercantile/merchant character.

[Vex]

I have always assumed, it was done to throttle workload.

It might have worked better, as a limit-per-year character option, where you can choose to have a custom craft enabled pc, up to three times per year. Just a prompt, during pc creation, and you yes/no, to have it on a pc. This provides the same limit as a special application, but, without a requirement for additional processing, which seems, to me, very reasonable, given the sub, is zero karma. It also eliminates being limited, to a single, otherwise empty sub.

By eliminating it as a sub option, and instead making it a limited option for everyone at the account level, it would let people who do not preference heavy craft based characters, to also add more lower end items, that might be relevant, such as characters who wan to be hobby artists, utilizing the draw skill. Rogues could draw up plans, mercenaries could make their own off-brand weapons to sell to broke runners, and merchant-types could function as prior (if desired), and magickers could also have custom crafts, as they did prior to the new system.

The trade, of course, being that everyone could only do it with three pcs, per year, and people who burn through many pcs a year could find themselves running out early. A sub option, as it is now, eliminates this as a complaint, but... I feel, overall, the game would be richer for expanding options, instead of constraining them. It is a creative hobby by nature, and custom items is a fairly standard feature that most new players from elsewhere, will want and expect.

[Heade]

Thanks for your thoughts Vex!

I might get behind a system like that, so long as people understand that you were suggesting up to 3 CHARACTERS that were CC enabled per year, and not up to 3 CC SUBMISSIONS per year.

Still, I'd rather do something that just gave the heavy mercantile characters that ability from the start. Your system would just make me only ever play 3 HMCs max per year, and since HMC characters add a lot to the gameworld, I don't really think we want fewer people playing them. The current system is just really disappointing for heavy mercantile classes, while the vast majority of other classes hold pretty good appeal. The lack of CC on HMC is just a shadow over an otherwise incredible development by the staff on the new classes.(I have only 1 other complaint that doesn't belong in this thread, but otherwise really like what staff has done with the main classes.)

[yousuff]

Thanks for your thoughts Vex!

I might get behind a system like that, so long as people understand that you were suggesting up to 3 CHARACTERS that were CC enabled per year, and not up to 3 CC SUBMISSIONS per year.

Still, I'd rather do something that just gave the heavy mercantile characters that ability from the start. Your system would just make me only ever play 3 HMCs max per year, and since HMC characters add a lot to the gameworld, I don't really think we want fewer people playing them. The current system is just really disappointing for heavy mercantile classes, while the vast majority of other classes hold pretty good appeal. The lack of CC on HMC is just a shadow over an otherwise incredible development by the staff on the new classes.(I have only 1 other complaint that doesn't belong in this thread, but otherwise really like what staff has done with the main classes.)

Bumping this thread, the ability to custom craft was to encourage players to make lower skilled crafts. It's had the opposite effect as players have to throw away a subguild to actually craft anything, making their character less codedly powerful. While coded power is far from everything, it can detract from whatever role you initially intended as the whole point of subguilds is to properly flesh out a character. I only need to look at the amount of approved custom craft requests to confirm this. Heavy crafting classes should be allowed to custom craft at least one of their skills, perhaps chosen at chargen aside of choosing the custom crafting subguild or an extended class. Also why should only mundane characters be allowed to custom craft? A miscreant vivaduan is in no way less adept at making lockpicks. Nor is a artisan krathi any worse at making rugs. I like Vex's idea, but with a slight tweak, perhaps you can only custom craft 3x a year with a single character unless you have the custom crafter subguild?

[Dar]

Can affiliation to merchant houses fix the issue?

An artisan without a custom crafter subguild can MC one item every 4 rl months.

An artisan who is part of MMH that established a workshop type location and has enough years played behind them can MC every 2 months.

An artisan who is part of a GMH and have underwent some kind official in house secretive training, and gained access to special house equipment and workshops can MC every month.


Anyone/custom crafter can MC once a month without any training, or prerequisite. They are freaking savants. 

[Delirium]

I HAVE GONE THROUGH THE SUPER SEKRIT TRAINING

I WILL NOW PROCEED TO MAKE.... an embroidered linen shirt with RED thread instead of GREEN!!

The onlooking crowd recoils in shock and gasps in scandalized delight.

Joking aside, the whole reason mastercrafting was renamed customcrafting is so that people wouldn't feel the need to only make fancy stuff. Further limiting the ability to make new things for the game will only encourage people to treat their new creations as rare and exceptional.

Needless to say I just want the ability to make most items to be standardized in a web form, take a minute or so to proof-read and approve/deny, hit a button and bam the craft is in the game. But until then I guess staff will have to keep the workload minimized however they can. Even if I disagree with the way it's currently being done.

[Brokkr]

Needless to say I just want the ability to make most items to be standardized in a web form, take a minute or so to proof-read and approve/deny, hit a button and bam the craft is in the game.

No way for this to happen.  You have to set the values on the obj.  Make the keywords conform to our standard.  Put the right wear slots.  Fill in pieces like how big it needs to be. Etc. While making sure it is in the range of similar objs (so no backpack that is for some reason 3x as large with no drawbacks).

The only value like that we ask for right now is price, and we often don't go with what players submit because it is so out of whack.

[Delirium]

Needless to say I just want the ability to make most items to be standardized in a web form, take a minute or so to proof-read and approve/deny, hit a button and bam the craft is in the game.

No way for this to happen.  You have to set the values on the obj.  Make the keywords conform to our standard.  Put the right wear slots.  Fill in pieces like how big it needs to be. Etc. While making sure it is in the range of similar objs (so no backpack that is for some reason 3x as large with no drawbacks).

The only value like that we ask for right now is price, and we often don't go with what players submit because it is so out of whack.

Is there a way to document what should be set for the appropriate values so that players can do most of the legwork at the very least?

I know that I've had to entirely guess on prices, personally, because I have no idea how much it should actually be worth.

How can we make it an easier process for staff? Can I help write up some documentation?

[Heade]

Needless to say I just want the ability to make most items to be standardized in a web form, take a minute or so to proof-read and approve/deny, hit a button and bam the craft is in the game.

No way for this to happen.  You have to set the values on the obj.  Make the keywords conform to our standard.  Put the right wear slots.  Fill in pieces like how big it needs to be. Etc. While making sure it is in the range of similar objs (so no backpack that is for some reason 3x as large with no drawbacks).

The only value like that we ask for right now is price, and we often don't go with what players submit because it is so out of whack.

You could standardize a lot of that in a web app, making wear slots checkboxes and such, with dropdown menus for other item values, which would standardize items across the board based on a number of different, static inputs, eliminating much of the need for things like that last part. Pretty much all of this could be done using a spreadsheet, with the sole exception being keywords, sdesc, and mdesc. Those, people would have to type in. But all other item values could be set off of a standard range.

You could even set up an algorithm that automatically applied appropriate keywords using simple if/then, with a few word exclusions if you -really- wanted to streamline it to where all staff had to approve was the basic descriptions.

There might still be item ideas that would require a complete staff build just because they're so distinct from the items generally made, but I imagine this system could capture 95% of what gets submitted.

[Brokkr]

Not really.

A backpack is the same sort of obj a belt pouch is.  The size and weight of those two objects are determined by their sdesc/mdesc ie what it is, but fundamentally they are the same object type and have the same things to set on them.

As for keywords, I am talking about staff level keywords that get placed on items to make them easier for us to search for, or have other functionality.

Most importantly, all of this stuff comes with judgement.  Which is not something you can put into a web app.  Something like that might be able to streamline some things, but there are aspects of the creation process where judgement is needed.  Some items have entire strings of staff side conversation associated with them in the request tool.

We do far more than simply copy and paste on a large percentage of the objects.

[Marauder Moe]

Once upon a time I cross-referenced the price of certain Zalanthan goods, the price of equivalent medieval goods, and the price of modern goods to come up with an approximate USD value of an obsidian coin.  It actually came out to be about $0.25-0.50 per 'sid.

So make a guess as if you were buying something equivalent in the USA, then multiply that dollar value 2x or 4x to get a starting point for obsidian coin cost.

[yousuff]

Difficulty of implementing custom objects aside, would you agree that there are less custom crafts because having a subguild required for it doesn't seem to be working? Players can't properly flesh characters out when choosing this subguild so they simply dont pick it. Extended subguilds are fine for crafting. If you made heavy crafters (and light crafters eg craftsman) able to custom craft items up to at least journeyman quality and you might actually see more of its intended use.

[MeTekillot]

Not really.

A backpack is the same sort of obj a belt pouch is.  The size and weight of those two objects are determined by their sdesc/mdesc ie what it is, but fundamentally they are the same object type and have the same things to set on them.

As for keywords, I am talking about staff level keywords that get placed on items to make them easier for us to search for, or have other functionality.

Most importantly, all of this stuff comes with judgement.  Which is not something you can put into a web app.  Something like that might be able to streamline some things, but there are aspects of the creation process where judgement is needed.  Some items have entire strings of staff side conversation associated with them in the request tool.

We do far more than simply copy and paste on a large percentage of the objects.

I don't see where at all any of what you just said contradicted Heade's proposed methods beside the initial "not really". I'm confused. The web app doohickey could be used to massively streamline the process.

Saying this as someone who believes all rich indies need to be put against the wall.

[Heade]

Some items have entire strings of staff side conversation associated with them in the request tool.

We do far more than simply copy and paste on a large percentage of the objects.

Maybe they shouldn't. Having one big discussion on the implementation of a set of standards for item types would be far more efficient than having a mini-discussion for each item. The latter can also result in a moving of the goalposts over time, which really isn't fair to players and is the sort of thing that leads to cries of favoritism.

I'm not saying that such a web app would eliminate all need for judgement all the time, but it could certainly eliminate some of it, make the entire process easier, more standardized, and could cover the vast majority of the items submitted for crafting if done well.

As far as your example goes, with pouches vs. backpacks or whatnot, a dropdown menu could simply be set up to elect something as a container, and based on what sort of container it is, different options for how much it would hold would then be available, or not, based on the base item container size you chose. Could be something sort of like this:

1-item with a small pocket (ie, boots that can hold a knife)
2-items with a larger pocket(cloaks, pouches, small satchels)
3-medium sized bag/container
4-large backpack/portable container
5-Very large, non-wearable container(chest, trunk, etc)

Then, for each of those categories, you could have an acceptable weight and carrying capacity range dropdown that would allow options within that item categories standardized range. You could also enable/disable wear locations based on the same thing. So while you could make containers 1-3 with relatively unrestricted wear locations, 4 might be back or shoulder only, and 5 would allow none at all.

I'm not saying such a system wouldn't be complicated. It would. You'd need a massive spreadsheet to sort it all out. But it's doable, and if it both increases the frequency of custom crafts available to PCs, AND lowers staff workload? I think that it's something that should be seriously considered.

[Brokkr]

Maybe they shouldn't. Having one big discussion on the implementation of a set of standards for item types would be far more efficient than having a mini-discussion for each item.

Understand that the discussion usually isn't about the item stats.  More likely to be about the world fit, how the description is written, if it would work if certain parts are modified, etc.

Don't get me wrong.  It's a nice idea.  We've discussed web creation in the past.

[650Booger]

I always assumed there was one staff whose sole job it was to go over MC submissions.  if that is not the case, perhaps we could hire a new staff and make it so.

[Brokkr]

Request reviewed by your Storyteller.  Request reviewed and OK to make the item from the Admin for the appropriate group.

then

Storyteller makes the item. Storyteller makes the craft recipes. Storyteller submits item and craft recipe for approval.  Admin reviews and approves item and craft recipes.  Admin makes the craft recipe go live.

The high quality of writing and world fit you see in our items requires something a bit more than a single person looking at what you submit and then making it so.

[650Booger]

thank you Brokkr that helps shed light on the process, and I agree that peer review is critical for maintaining our world quality.

*edited to add*
I have only MCd a handful of items so my experience with the process is limited, but I remember it taking an inconveniently long time between the submission of the MC request and being able to present the item ICly to whoever wanted it, such that whatever plot the item may have been part of was over by the time it was ready.

if the new subclass requirement for the submission of custom items speeds up the process, I am in favor of this change.

[sleepyhead]

I just want there to be some path to magickers being able to CC. If it needs to be spec app only, then fine. I'll accept that. I just really want there to be something.

[Cind]

You guys make great reading.

I kind of agree with the heavy mercantile classes being able to customcraft thing. Even if its only a little bit, or with one skill.