Crafting Difficulty Descriptors

[Riev]

I'm with X-D on this one, considering the code does allow for this kind of thing. AND recipes are now stored properly in the database.

I'm not calling for a "massive rework of all recipes", but in fact you CAN require more than 1 tool in a recipe, and even require a quality level TO that tool. You don't want people using "a bone grill" to cook eggs? Bone grills are now terrible quality, and pans are Decent quality, and you require a decent quality cooking to make eggs.

Effortless crafts having the failure rate they do feels atrocious. Why should I, someone with a mastered level of skill, and the tools of the craft, fail upwards of 1/5 effortless crafts? At least a descriptor of "easy" suggests that mistakes could be made, but "effortless" sounds like... well. There's no effort involved in creating this thing.

Its kind of ridiculous to say "YeAh BuT TaKe AwAy ThE PaN", and I don't think its an argument that someone who respects the playerbase would come up with.

[Narf]

Effortless crafts having the failure rate they do feels atrocious. Why should I, someone with a mastered level of skill, and the tools of the craft, fail upwards of 1/5 effortless crafts? At least a descriptor of "easy" suggests that mistakes could be made, but "effortless" sounds like... well. There's no effort involved in creating this thing.

Its kind of ridiculous to say "YeAh BuT TaKe AwAy ThE PaN", and I don't think its an argument that someone who respects the playerbase would come up with.

Currently, if a craft is effortless without a tool and you use a tool the craft can raise to 100%.

[Riev]

Effortless crafts having the failure rate they do feels atrocious. Why should I, someone with a mastered level of skill, and the tools of the craft, fail upwards of 1/5 effortless crafts? At least a descriptor of "easy" suggests that mistakes could be made, but "effortless" sounds like... well. There's no effort involved in creating this thing.

Its kind of ridiculous to say "YeAh BuT TaKe AwAy ThE PaN", and I don't think its an argument that someone who respects the playerbase would come up with.

Currently, if a craft is effortless without a tool and you use a tool the craft can raise to 100%.

Staff informed me the other day that "effortless" has a specific fail rate that I am not sharing here, because its not in a helpfile.

The craft "can" raise to 100%? That seems pretty ambiguous and anecdotal. Maybe it can. Maybe the tools that exist currently just aren't good enough. Or maybe... just maybe... if you're using a tool and the craft is 'effortless' it shouldn't have a failure rate in the double digits.

[Narf]

Effortless crafts having the failure rate they do feels atrocious. Why should I, someone with a mastered level of skill, and the tools of the craft, fail upwards of 1/5 effortless crafts? At least a descriptor of "easy" suggests that mistakes could be made, but "effortless" sounds like... well. There's no effort involved in creating this thing.

Its kind of ridiculous to say "YeAh BuT TaKe AwAy ThE PaN", and I don't think its an argument that someone who respects the playerbase would come up with.

Currently, if a craft is effortless without a tool and you use a tool the craft can raise to 100%.

Staff informed me the other day that "effortless" has a specific fail rate that I am not sharing here, because its not in a helpfile.

The craft "can" raise to 100%? That seems pretty ambiguous and anecdotal. Maybe it can. Maybe the tools that exist currently just aren't good enough. Or maybe... just maybe... if you're using a tool and the craft is 'effortless' it shouldn't have a failure rate in the double digits.

It stops being anecdotal after a certain sample size.

Currently my successes with an effortless craft, that then had a tool added on top of it number in the several hundreds consecutively.

I'm not claiming this is true for all effortless/tool combinations. Just that it can be true.

[Riev]

It can also be true that you're lying, on the internet, to protect your own interests. Is it? Probably not. But it CAN be!

Regardless, unless the staffer that sent me information is intentionally lying (which CAN be true!), Effortless Crafts have a significant failure rate. I failed 3 effortless crafts, with a tool in hand, in a row. Random numbers being random numbers... why am I failing an effortless craft with a tool?

And, again, Narf... it CAN happen. So why doesn't it happen on a more normative basis? You're arguing that nothing should change, because sometimes its okay. My position is that sometimes should be a little more often.

[Delirium]

Effortless, just like easy, is a range. You were likely at the top of the range while Narf was at the bottom.

Please refrain from insinuating other people are lying just to win Internet Points.

[Narf]

And, again, Narf... it CAN happen. So why doesn't it happen on a more normative basis? You're arguing that nothing should change, because sometimes its okay. My position is that sometimes should be a little more often.

I didn't argue anything. XD and you implied that effortless crafts have a high chance of failure even with a tool in hand.

I know for a fact that that's not always true, and wanted to correct the impression that it was universal. You can have effortless tasks that, with a tool in hand, have 100% chance of success.

I'd have no problem if they narrowed the "effortless" moniker to a smaller range or took a look at some of the basic crafts to make sure they had a more realistic failure rate. But if you want to argue that, you have to start from a solid understanding of what's already true in the game.

[X-D]

Well, High chance...I never made that claim. My thing is ANY chance.

Also, as to tools, If I have no tool on lets say, fletchery, and I type craft bone, It does not give me effortless return on arrow shaft. So, I expect a chance to fail. But with a tool it says effortless, I do not expect to fail, At all, That is the meaning of the word.

effortless
[ˈefərtləs]
ADJECTIVE

    requiring no physical or mental exertion.

IE, one could succeed in this while asleep.


It is anecdotal if no other player has been able to repeat it, the term anecdotal does not mean from a sample size.....it means in your experience. Eeesh.

[Riev]

Just because someone's experiences are different, doesn't necessarily mean there is no issue.

X-D is arguing it better than I can. EFFORTLESS crafts, tool or not, should not be failing. Certainly not at the rate Staff told me that it does.

I don't care about Easy.
I don't care about your Sample Size.
I don't care that its a range, or a spectrum.

My position is effortless shouldn't be returning failures at the rate that it does. Change the word from effortless to something else, for all I care. Change the fail rate, change the terminology. It makes no difference.

[X-D]

All I am saying as well.

The Word is the issue not the fails.

Change effortless to Nearly effortless...problem solved.

Or make it truly effortless...problem solved.

[Krath]

Effortless, just like easy, is a range. You were likely at the top of the range while Narf was at the bottom.

Please refrain from insinuating other people are lying just to win Internet Points.

How is there a range for something that requires ZERO effort to do. This seems be in complete contrast to the word Effortless.

[Delirium]

The same way there is a range for novice, apprentice, journeyman, advanced, and master.

We don't see exact skill levels, we only see descriptive approximations.

[Krath]

I guess I am in the same boat as X-D..Change the wording from effortless. There should be no range for effortless based on definition alone.

[Brokkr]

So you want a 7th category added, one that is equivalent the the 'impossible' category that currently exists, only for a situation where you cannot fail?  And you'd like it to use 'effortless' descriptor,  because you've drawn conclusions about how it 'should' work, despite IG observations? I don't know the reasoning behind it not being that way currently, if I had to guess it was either an oversight or not wanting folks to know when something it no-fail.  I'd have to do a bit of exploration to see if this would work as I think you'd intend, due to room bonuses and when the are and are not applied.

There are most certainly some skills that hit no-fail levels.  I believe crafting is one of them, but is recipe and bonus dependent, I'd have to relook when it is truly no-fail or just really small.

I thought the eggs analogy was good, given the amount of crafting done out on the dunes, instead of a room specific to that craft (like a kitchen for cooking) with things at hand for cooking.  So like it's as if the system was designed to levels that are 'roughing it', and then you add bonuses to get to normalized levels, rather than vice versa, as a design decision.  For nearly everything, it isn't possible to get to no-fail without those bonuses.

[ArmaJunkie]

I always took the 'effortless' descriptor as meaning I didn't really have to think much about doing it, cuz I've done it so many times. Like, teaching myself to smith knives in my garage. At first, it was really hard, but now I can just grab a piece of metal and get to work, and while I'm pounding away at it, I can think about what I'm going to eat for dinner. But ... that doesn't mean something bad can't happen. Materials are never perfect, even tools can mess things up, I can completely miss a strike and hit the wrong spot. I don't know. In my head, no matter how good you are at something, there should be a chance to fail

And forgive us old Gary Gygax enthusiasts, but that thing about taking ten was never in real D&D (LOL sorry anything past 2nd edition was pfft) . One was always a failure, balanced by twenty always being a success.

[The7DeadlyVenomz]

Eh, fuck that old school D&D. 3.5 introduced me. 5e made me.

I don't have a problem with effortless being the best descriptor, but I completely understand what they are saying when effortless still gets you a fail per 3-5 tries. That's baffling.

[X-D]

I am moderating my own post as I did something I accused Brokkr of. And did not read his entire post.


Sorry.

Brokkr, Take a look, nobody is asking for more then it to make sense. No extra levels, Just, hey, You will not drop it in the dust or You might...that is it.

Simple, Is it effortless or is it ALMOST effortless?

Huh.....come on....

[X-D]

Armajunkie.

The problem is, Nobody is saying anything about something on the level of smithing knives. Now, I have been smithing for oh, around forty years, The two first things I learned was leaf hooks and nails, Now I assume the same for you. I do not know how much experience you have but Let us look at nails, This is an item that needs no grinding, no heat treat. And even if you were to fuck it up somehow, it almost always can be recovered. This level of craft is ALL this thread is about when you are a master of said craft, IE, I can make a Sword 99% of the time, nails are so easy I could make them WHILE forging a sword.

(self moderated)

[ArmaJunkie]

I once had a PC that had Advanced in a crafting skill, I think.... and I failed something like twelve times in a row. So, I totally get what you all are saying about that, and would have to agree, shouldn't fail that often even at that level.

Maybe I don't get exactly what is being asked for, because it sounds like some are saying that if the descriptor was changed from effortless to 'very easy' or something, all good. I thought you all were saying there should be a 0% chance of failure when you reach that level.

Also should consider the other end of the spectrum I think. We can be in the middle of nowhere, with only moonlight, and no tools, and still have success with a lot of crafts. Even weapons that I would consider master quality can be done like this.

So, are we talking about changing the percentage chance of failure to 0 for some things? Or just asking for a better descriptor?

[mansa]

If I had my way, I'd make these suggestions:

The "Difficulty" displayed after you use the craft command is based on the expected success rate, rather than the current skill percentage.

I'd put it in terms of 15% brackets.

effortless -> 90% success rate or more
easy -> 75%
manageable -> 60%
mediocre ->  45%
difficult -> 30%
impossible -> 15% or less




Ultimately, the tricky thing I think would be to change the skill percentage/success rate change, but if that's not possible, changing the brackets of the success rate would be better:
effortless -> 100% skill percentage or more.
easy -> 75%
manageable -> 50%
difficult -> 25%
impossible -> 0% or less

So you want a 7th category added, one that is equivalent the the 'impossible' category that currently exists, only for a situation where you cannot fail?  And you'd like it to use 'effortless' descriptor,  because you've drawn conclusions about how it 'should' work, despite IG observations?...

Exactly!  Well, maybe not "unable to fail", but just something where your skills/bonuses are over 95%~100%.

[Incognito]

While we are on the subject, let me also add in here that it is a definite discouragement, monetarily and otherwise, when an effortless craft fails and you end up losing expensive ingredients.

Yes, we are all aware that crafting fails destroy ingredients based on the craft recipe database.
We are also aware that crafting in certain areas might be beneficial and other areas might be detrimental.
Crafting success can be augmented with the use of tools, and better quality of tools.

Still doesn't explain an effortless craft eating up a costly or hard-to-find ingredient.

I'd even go so far as to say that even if an "easy" craft fails, lets say 4 times in a row, that's cause for concern. Of course it's dependent on random number-generation, but still, that's not how it works in RL.

A possible solution could be to modify the crafting code, to take into account the ease of crafting level, and then apply it to the recipe database craft fail effect.

For example :
Effortless - chance of failure < 5% - chance of losing ingredients on failure per recipe 0%
Easy - chance of failure > 25% -  chance of losing ingredients on failure per recipe 20%
Manageable - chance of failure > 40% -  chance of losing ingredients on failure per recipe 50% 
Difficult - chance of failure > 70% -  chance of losing ingredients on failure per recipe 70%
Impossible - chance of failure > 90% -  chance of losing ingredients on failure per recipe 100%

Currently, no matter what difficulty level a craft is, if you fail, you lose your ingredients 100% of the time, based on what is specified in the recipe.

In short - apply a percentage to losing the ingredients (after skill failure), instead of having it set to directly applying the loss of ingredients on failure.

Yes, you will fail from time to time, because sometimes you get a bad roll, but because you're an expert at something, atleast you won't end up losing your ingredients every single time you get a bad roll and fail the craft.

This would be a good balance to the crafting system IMO.

[Narf]

I'm a bit worried about some of these suggestions. In a vacuum it sounds great to create a level of craft that has no realistic failure level, or by reducing waste of easy crafts. The problem comes in that there's an equally unrealistic aspect of play that makes things too easy on crafters; that is the time required to craft something. A person can put together complicated furniture, or cook a banquet in a matter of a couple minutes. This was a sacrifice that was made for playability, and as a game decision it makes sense, but one of the things that balances the very rapid turnaround time for crafts is the unrealistic chance of failure or material waste.

If we do something that makes crafting easier, there needs to be something to counteract the 'playability adjustment' to the time scale that crafters can create things that would (and does) allow crafters to just churn out ridiculous amounts of items in a given game day.

Maybe change up 'effortless' items to be certain success, and not waste components, but have some sort of 'quit timer' like clock on creating crafts that prevents a character that has recently completed a craft from starting a new one until a certain amount of time has passed. The quit timer's length might be based on the size or complexity of the item, so a character could make things like arrows without any delay beyond the crafting delay, but if they tried to make a table (or a tent) they might be stuck not crafting anything else that particular game day.

Personally, I'm fine with making things easier that realistically should be easier, but I think that needs to be coordinated with an effort to make things realistically more difficult that should be more difficult assuming it can be done without sacrificing playability.

[creeper386]

In reply to Narf, I'd much rather big complicated crafts be broken down to involve multiple steps then anything else. I'd rather have more crafts broken down into steps that just make more since then just combining some random raw ingredients into this complicated item. Might make crafting more intuitive in my mind as well.

I'm definitely against making it so crafts couldn't craft all day after a craft happens, but I do agree with the sentiment.

Sitting at the bar, "Oh yeah, I can't make you any arrows. I'm working on a table today."

[Pariah]

In reply to Narf, I'd much rather big complicated crafts be broken down to involve multiple steps then anything else. I'd rather have more crafts broken down into steps that just make more since then just combining some random raw ingredients into this complicated item. Might make crafting more intuitive in my mind as well.

I'm definitely against making it so crafts couldn't craft all day after a craft happens, but I do agree with the sentiment.

Sitting at the bar, "Oh yeah, I can't make you any arrows. I'm working on a table today."

100%.

This is why I hated SOI crafting.  It was super cool the way it did it in steps and such and could be fleshed out, but the ooc timers on it were insane.

I made a bow an hours ago, I can't make anything else yet.

[X-D]

SOI crafting...Oh my.....that made me develop Tourette syndrome.

Leather bag, two tanned hides. Cool, Got two hides....Go find tanning room with all the right stuff, have the right tools begin tanning hides, 20 minutes later, one destroyed, other on tanning rack to dry, tan another, put it on rack and LOG THE FUCK out because it will be a Real life 30 hours till they are leather.

Log back in 2 days later, get my leather, Go to ANOTHER room because Although I have all the tools and other parts needed to stitch this bag, For some reason I also need a leather crafting table.

And that is a NOVICE craft...Pretty sure my last SOI pc logged out for the last time in a leather craft room in isengard.


Am I ranting...Maybe.


Still, I am only looking at this because I think if it says effortless it should be. At the very least a fail should not cost you the material. You know it is harder to rip some cloth to shreds then it is to cut it into strips right?