Limited uses for recipes

THH

I think the whole crafting system needs more depth; so possible changes could be:

Increased crafting quality of an item leads not only to (slightly more) dura, but also to some increase in its stats, like randomized between -5% and +5% DPS, with a higher skilled crafter more probability to hit close to +5%..
Named crafting: The name of the crafter is stated on the item.. i loved this in UO
Spending KP on Crafting/Gathering based "Perks"/"Skills"... like faster gathering, increasing item stats..
CHANGE OF COLOR OF ITEMS CRAFTED ACCORDING TO THE MATERIALS USED (!!!)
Crafter can dye items, amount and saturation of colors by experience, skill or so...

GamerSeuss

@stkmro as @spoletta said, Recipes in the Cash shop will not happen.

The Devs have 100% promised no pay-2-win/pay-2-advance for FO, and that the cash shop would only really be cosmetics, that are account bound so you can't even sell them.

Recipes in the cash shop would become 'pay-2-win/advance; because if nothing else, people will pay in-world gold for Recipes paid for out of game.

Tuoni

This goes off-topic but I do not think that recipes would go to the cash shop either but something else might. I know they have said no to p2w or p2a stuff but if they need to change the game for f2p then interesting stuff will start to show on the cash shop as well. It is not hard to predict that this will happen at some point after launch when a good amount of players are already left the game and new ones are not coming in anymore, at least not enough.

Logain

@spoletta said in Limited uses for recipes:

This has more to do with the actual difference between a t1 and a t3, than how easy it is to craft a t3.

Not really, if you look at this from a design and mathematical perspective.
And you have to check every suggestion if it does promote or divert from a design goal.

spoletta

@Logain said in Limited uses for recipes:

@spoletta said in Limited uses for recipes:

This has more to do with the actual difference between a t1 and a t3, than how easy it is to craft a t3.

Not really, if you look at this from a design and mathematical perspective.
And you have to check every suggestion if it does promote or divert from a design goal.

It is always an issue of finding the right compromise.
Players want this game to be about jumping into the action from the first moment.
Players also want meaningful progress.

These 2 desires of the community are clearly in contrast with each other.
The recipe system clearly speaks with the "progress" part of the community, but as long as a tier 3 is not necessary to compete with other players, the first part of the community doesn't have a lot of issues.

Tuoni

I think that the only option is to add meaningful longterm progression, but the power ups should be small and horizontal in some cases. If there won't be enough character progression the interest towards the game starts to fade pretty quickly. If the recipe system goes for limited use system then it is hard to call that a progress anymore because you will always loose the progression and you need to start it all over again.

Bullen

All calculations for current durability system (400 armor for 1 week of online in average)

Recipes should be 1 time used for initial Knowledge of item
Then progression kicks in:
0/4: 2 times
1/4: 3 times
2/4: 3 times
3/4: 3 times
4/4: 4 times

Yes. Thats hard. But will stimulate economy and specialization among organized groups.

Not everyone will be Grandmaster. Not even close.
It's not bad at all.

P.S:
For me personally 1 usage only is OK. There are too many recipes on market. Half of them costs nothing already.

Dashiva

Limited use recipes are a terrible idea. Yes the value of recipes declines over time as the market becomes saturated, but this isn't the issue that needs to be solved. The issue that needs to be solved is the randomness by which you acquire recipes. There are over 70 individual recipes for items already and it is a random chance to receive one of those from any t4+ mob.

Most players will only be interested in 2-3 weapons and 1-2 armor sets, this means the large majority of recipes they receive have no use to them, except to sell to other players. The only reason the market gets saturated is because most recipes are useless to the person who it dropped for.

Specific recipes should drop from specific mobs so they can be target farmed.

We do not need scarcity of recipes by adding limited used, crafted items already have scarcity due to material requirements and durability.

Mudz

Been thinking about this some.
Throwing out a few thoughts.

Maybe recipes as drops is not the way to go at all?
Seems like suggestions here just tries to turn it into one additional resource to collect to be able to craft.

Personally I really enjoy the adventure part where you gain knowledge points and learn abilities from fighting monsters.
Can this be applied to crafting in some way?

Could it give crafting knowledge points by finding new resources or using resources in crafting and then use that knowledge to unlock recipes?
Could there be a progression like with monsters that you learn more about the materials (and getting crafting knowledge points) while crafting and unlock more bonuses from the material that will apply to the finished product the more you know up until 100% knowledge of the material?

That would make a difference then if you are a master crafter and have unlocked more bonuses and both the crafter knowledge and material progress matters.

If still wanting to have some drops it could instead be some forgotten knowledge that can help progress the knowledge about resources or the masteries.

Rife

I think it's a good idea, instead of having recipes as an additional resource needed to be farmed for crafting, we can have it "unlocked" instead when a person reaches a certain mastery in crafting an equipment.

For example, only after getting Tier 4 mastery in swords, can you craft the higher tiered swords, or something similar. That way there really will be crafting specializations as it is a grind for each equipment piece.

In this case, we dont need recipes at all.

spoletta

But then we tie the crafting to a massive grinding, which is probably against the intentions of the game.

Logain

@spoletta said in Limited uses for recipes:

But then we tie the crafting to a massive grinding, which is probably against the intentions of the game.

Call me stupid there, but could you explain how repeatedly gathering resource X (required to craft item Y) is grind, but repeatedly collecting recipe A (required to craft item Y) isn't grind?
If anything, fully unlocking something after a specified amount would be less grind than constantly needing to repeat forever, or wouldn't it?

My favorite so far is a combination of some of the suggestions mentioned.

Exploration is rewarded through progression with crafting by PoI based resources
Crafting is rewarded and limited progression ensured through progression by crafting
A talent tree/enchantment recipe like gating of higher specialized (tier) items
City technology is required to 'scribble recipes', promoting travel and cities

You can 'reuse' existing functionality and no new system is required from a programming perspective.

spoletta

What I find good in the recipes (limited only) is that you can't actually farm them. You can only trade for the specific one you want.

I also find it good that you can potentially link their drop rate to neutral alignment, so you give these players an incentive to flag neutral.

Problem is that I have run some math on it, and unfortunately it doesn't check.

Devs stated that they want items to last at least 2-3 weeks, and considering the effort in crafting and enchanting one, I feel like this is a correct approach.
So a player runs through a set+weapon (5 items) in 2-3 weeks.

Even assuming that a recipe will have only 5 uses, which feels extremely limited, it means that to keep them relevant the average drop rate for them should be one in 2-3 weeks. This is clearly too low.
As such, I don't feel like there is a way to make recipes relevant.

Clinion

@spoletta Theoretically, it may seem that limited uses for recipes even with a very low drop chance seems irrelevant but I think we also need to consider some other factors.

Right now, as the population is extremely low, the PoIs are almost never contested. That allows single players to farm and craft whatever they want. However, if population increases in the future and competition begins, then more items will be damaged and more needs to be crafted again.

Furthermore, as you said, the recipe drops will be random. That means some recipes will be less demanded compared to other ones and in the end, people will need to work/grind harder to obtain those specific recipes.

spoletta

@Logain I agree on some changes being potentially good in that area.

Material KP should not be obtained by finding them only once, it should have a 0-100% gauge like mobs have and offer a lot more KP in total. This way a player can start as a gatherer and get rewarded with KPs for his activities. You balance this additional amount of KP by having additional crafts being unlocked with KP, and masteries indeed being more like a crafting talent tree (non easily respecable) than a simple grind of materials.

This encounters the demand of those that want to be able to specialize in crafting. A crafter player would invest more points in crafting than in talents/skills. As long as the crafting talents offer only modest bonuses (no more than+10% damage/armor/resistances/durability in total), it would integrate well in the game.

In the end the KP would still be balanced, so a character would still be able to get everything in the long run, both combat and crafting.

Tuoni

@spoletta said in Limited uses for recipes:

But then we tie the crafting to a massive grinding, which is probably against the intentions of the game.

Massive grind is still less than infinite grind of limited use recipes.

What it comes to the intentions against grind... Devs have already showed that their statements are in contradiction with the implementation. They have just used this fancier word knowledable instead of grind. There is already a huge amount of grind in the game, tight to the KPs, abilities, resources and recipes. Therefore, nothing really changes if there will be progression systems also for professions and especially for crafting.

I am not personally against grind in general because the game needs it for character progression. However, I understand why this divides opinions because Fractured was marketed as less grindy game. Imo it is quite hard to create a sandbox MMORPG without a decent amount of grind because that is good from longterm perspective.

Mudz

Trying to structure my thoughts to maybe be alittle bit easier to read the suggestions:

Knowledge points and resource/material bonus unlocks:

Harvesting:

Initial exploration Knowledge Point bonus for finding a new resource type through harvesting, including bonus resources when found.
Entry into the book of knowledge for that resource or bonus resource with some general information (no knowledge percentage gain at this point).

Processing:

If purchasing a resource and not learning about it by harvesting you gain the initial Knowledge Point bonus from processing the resource instead.
(Any type of processed material that is created by combining several base resources gets the initial Knowledge Point bonus from processing or crafting using that material.)
Entry into the book of knowledge for that resource/material triggered here instead with some general information (no knowledge percentage gain at this point).

Crafting:

If purchasing a resource or a processed resource and not learning about it by harvesting or processing you gain the initial Knowledge Point bonus from crafting with the processed resource instead.
(Any type of processed material that is created by combining several base resources gets the initial Knowledge Point bonus from processing or crafting using that material.)
Entry into the book of knowledge for that resource triggered here instead with some general information (no knowledge percentage gain at this point).
Resource knowledge increases with crafting using that specific resource, gaining Knowledge Points up until 100% knowledge and unlocking bonuses like unlocking abilities from monsters.
Information regarding bonuses to be updated in the book of knowledge once learned.
Smaller bonuses initially and then slightly better at the end.
This would mean that you don't know everything about a resouce from the start and will only be able to craft items with the bonuses you know for the resource used.
<Resource> (Main component used in crafting)
<Bonus1>: Unlock at 25% knowledge of that material
<Bonus2>: Unlock at 50% knowledge of that material
<Bonus3>: Unlock at 75% knowledge of that material
<Bonus4>: Unlock at 100% knowledge of that material

Crafting masteries:

Gain mastery levels like now by crafting a specific item.
Unlock new specific masteries using Knowledge Points when you have reached high enough level in the previous mastery.

Recipies:

When you reach a specific mastery level for an item you unlock the possibility to spend Knowledge Points to learn new mastery specific recipes from that Tier.

Drops:

If anything should drop as loot it could be "forgotten knowledge" or "lost techniques" that can be used to gain some progress in knowledge of a specific resource/material or a crafting mastery.

OlivePit

@spoletta said in Limited uses for recipes:

@Logain I agree on some changes being potentially good in that area.

Material KP should not be obtained by finding them only once, it should have a 0-100% gauge like mobs have and offer a lot more KP in total. This way a player can start as a gatherer and get rewarded with KPs for his activities. You balance this additional amount of KP by having additional crafts being unlocked with KP, and masteries indeed being more like a crafting talent tree (non easily respecable) than a simple grind of materials.

This encounters the demand of those that want to be able to specialize in crafting. A crafter player would invest more points in crafting than in talents/skills. As long as the crafting talents offer only modest bonuses (no more than+10% damage/armor/resistances/durability in total), it would integrate well in the game.

In the end the KP would still be balanced, so a character would still be able to get everything in the long run, both combat and crafting.

Yes ! give KP mastery for farming crops ! need to farm 100 of same crop to become master !

@Mudz said in Limited uses for recipes:

Trying to structure my thoughts to maybe be alittle bit easier to read the suggestions:

Knowledge points and resource/material bonus unlocks:

Harvesting:

Initial exploration Knowledge Point bonus for finding a new resource type through harvesting, including bonus resources when found.

Entry into the book of knowledge for that resource or bonus resource with some general information (no knowledge percentage gain at this point).

include KP for us poor resource/crop farmers ! to the 100% limit of the crop/resource.

Processing:

If purchasing a resource and not learning about it by harvesting you gain the initial Knowledge Point bonus from processing the resource instead.

(Any type of processed material that is created by combining several base resources gets the initial Knowledge Point bonus from processing or crafting using that material.)

Entry into the book of knowledge for that resource/material triggered here instead with some general information (no knowledge percentage gain at this point).

Crafting:

If purchasing a resource or a processed resource and not learning about it by harvesting or processing you gain the initial Knowledge Point bonus from crafting with the processed resource instead.

(Any type of processed material that is created by combining several base resources gets the initial Knowledge Point bonus from processing or crafting using that material.)

Entry into the book of knowledge for that resource triggered here instead with some general information (no knowledge percentage gain at this point).

Resource knowledge increases with crafting using that specific resource, gaining Knowledge Points up until 100% knowledge and unlocking bonuses like unlocking abilities from monsters.

Information regarding bonuses to be updated in the book of knowledge once learned.

Smaller bonuses initially and then slightly better at the end.

This would mean that you don't know everything about a resouce from the start and will only be able to craft items with the bonuses you know for the resource used.

<Resource> (Main component used in crafting)
<Bonus1>: Unlock at 25% knowledge of that material
<Bonus2>: Unlock at 50% knowledge of that material
<Bonus3>: Unlock at 75% knowledge of that material
<Bonus4>: Unlock at 100% knowledge of that material

Crafting masteries:

Gain mastery levels like now by crafting a specific item.

Unlock new specific masteries using Knowledge Points when you have reached high enough level in the previous mastery.

yea, need 4/4 plate mastery to unlock slayer set.

Recipies:

When you reach a specific mastery level for an item you unlock the possibility to spend Knowledge Points to learn new mastery specific recipes from that Tier.

Like it. Need to have 3/4 mastery of iron to unlock plate armor.

Drops:

If anything should drop as loot it could be "forgotten knowledge" or "lost techniques" that can be used to gain some progress in knowledge of a specific resource/material or a crafting mastery.

Kp boosts to mastery path for each resource. Find a scroll of plate armor, read it and it gives 20% towards plate mastery.

Antoniius

@Logain said in Limited uses for recipes:

In order to answer, I'd say one first has to ask for the design pillars the developers had previously announced for Fractured and if they are still intended. Then one would have to check if the proposed solution is in line with the intention.

As far as I recall in the first few statements by Prometheus, the basic gist was 'getting competitive within less than a dozen hours of playtime', 'avoiding grind, preferring and promoting exploration'.
Am I recalling this wrong and/or is this no longer the case?

I totally agree with your posiotion. Do we want a grind game? answer this question and the other answers will come by themselves

OlivePit

bump for visibility as it is still a live topic of discussion.