Crafted weapons brutally nerfed???

[kreen]

Originally Posted by Shinto

After doing a bit of research on the subject, I have a bit more information about this. It appears that all tier 1 weapons (possibly others also, but I could not confirm this) have been reduced in power by one grade. So a grade A weapon now has the stats that a grade B used to. There may be some variation, but this seems to be the trend.

That said, I do not think this has "killed" the blacksmith profession. The items that I can make now are actually more appropriate for my level than those I could before the patch. That does not make me happy about the situation, but I can at least accept it.

It was known before the patch that weaponsmiths, unlike armorsmiths, had a distinct advantage over dropped weapons. Now adventurers and crafters can obtain comparable items in the first weapon tier.


By the way, I also have made more cash from blacksmithing than I have from adventuring. I think this was somewhat of a balance issue. Now, with the weapons adjusted and the Attuning Dusts available, smiths simply have to make enhanced weapons to profit.


One last thing: The throwing hammers are actually bugged. They are not the only items to have this problem, and this bug was known before the nerf.

I would actually say its a 2 grade drop, at least for copper weapons, can't speak for higher tiers. Thats certainly true for copper daggers and longswords anyway.

pre patch
copper dagger A grade - level 13 - 12/13 dmg
post patch
copper dagger A grade - level 6 - 5/6 dmg

Basically copper stuff is worthless now as you can go out adventuring and trip over stuff better than this in 5 minutes and why would anyone ever bother with copper daggers now, within an hour of starting a new character doing the starter quests you have out grown it. So from a wood elf/raki point of view, by the time you actually reach Ca'ial Brael and broker and crafter area - copper daggers, even grade A ones are useless to you.

Before the patch you could make grade A stuff that was better than equivalent level vendor bought stuff and matched the best equal level loot out there, now loot is just much much better.

I actually liked the fact that at level 9/10 crafter where you could reliably make copper grade A weapons, you had a market that spanned up to level 14 adventurers. It worked well given the difference in levelling speed between adventurers and crafters.

In my view, perfect crafted stuff (grade A) should be equal to some of the best loot otherwise what is the point in crafting? Obviously Sigil do not share this view.

From a weapon point of view no adventurer will settle for a drop in dps just for an extra customised few points on an ability stat. Grade A Crafted weapons should match dps of equivalent loot and then be able to add extra stats bonuses that the customer can choose, otherwise no one will buy weapons.

[Drek]

This pretty much reduces weaponsmith from a profession to a hobby.

My crafted weapons seem unable to compete with dropped loot.

Yesterday I actually put away my newly crafted grade A tin shortsword with 9 dps cause a guildie offered one with 12 dps.
Which is no minor difference.

And what happened to the stats in parenthesis?

Pre-patch you were able to see the potential stats of the weapon, for when you reach the same level as the weapon I reckon. Whereas now you can only see what the stats are at your current level.

I had my concerns before, with the lack of effective ways to cycle items out of the market to make room for new wares, but these changes pretty much is the final straw.

[kreen]

Originally Posted by Drek

This pretty much reduces weaponsmith from a profession to a hobby.

My crafted weapons seem unable to compete with dropped loot.

Yesterday I actually put away my newly crafted grade A tin shortsword with 9 dps cause a guildie offered one with 12 dps.
Which is no minor difference.

And what happened to the stats in parenthesis?

Pre-patch you were able to see the potential stats of the weapon, for when you reach the same level as the weapon I reckon. Whereas now you can only see what the stats are at your current level.

I had my concerns before, with the lack of effective ways to cycle items out of the market to make room for new wares, but these changes pretty much is the final straw.

Yes, pretty much my view right now.

They nerfed themselves actually with the dust vendors because they removed the only item sink they had. No point in deconstructing loot for dusts now since you can just go buy everything you need from a vendor next door to the crafting area. And with repair costing 1cp and completely risk free then nothing ever breaks.

Now there is no way to get items out of the market and in a few months there will be enough stuff flowing around to flood the market for characters of all levels - nothing gets worn out and nothing gets removed out of the game.

I know some folks hate decay, but without some form of item sink the crafting game very quickly dies

[BloodyTeeth]

But the dusts don't really add to much extra, I had to adventure from Dahnarg to LN to get a few just to try it. But yeah it should be harder to get I guess. Being a low level crafter (6) who will afford the weapon you make with a rare dust. I'm not sure what the answer is, I however do not want crafting to become easy in any way.

[kreen]

Originally Posted by BloodyTeeth

But the dusts don't really add to much extra, I had to adventure from Dahnarg to LN to get a few just to try it. But yeah it should be harder to get I guess. Being a low level crafter (6) who will afford the weapon you make with a rare dust. I'm not sure what the answer is, I however do not want crafting to become easy in any way.

Dusts would not have been that rare actually since you can deconstruct loot greater than mundane quality to get dusts. There is an awful lot of very cheap loot out there with common status.

Maybe a compromise is having dusts available on the vendor for tier 1 only, higher tiers have to decon stuff to get amateur and greater dusts.

However, the fact remains that no sane adventurer will purchase a crafted weapon if it has lower dps than a level equivalent looted weapon just because the crafted one comes with a few extra points of dex or a 2% chance of a critical hit. DPS has to be comparable at a minimum for the crafted item to be attractive.

[Drek]

Originally Posted by kreen

However, the fact remains that no sane adventurer will purchase a crafted weapon if it has lower dps than a level equivalent looted weapon just because the crafted one comes with a few extra points of dex or a 2% chance of a critical hit. DPS has to be comparable at a minimum for the crafted item to be attractive.

Amen!

[FEDS-91]

What happened to the whole 'Crafted items will always be better than looted' mantra? I know $OE has zero creative control, but after what they did to crafters in SWG, still makes me nervous whats going on here.

[kreen]

ok played around with crafting copper stuff a bit more today to see if I could make anything people would want to buy and I think I can. However, its not worth my time to bother at tier 1 as I would barely make a profit given the price of comparable loot on the brokers.

Adding enhancements appears to improve the damage of the weapon somewhat, whereas it didn't before in my limited experience anyway.

basic copper longsword grade A - level 11 - 11/14 dmg +4 strength

strength enhanced copper longsword grade A - level 11 - 11/18 dmg +7 strength

It costs me 40cp to buy the strength dust from the vendor and the sword uses 5 copper ingots. My guess is I could sell at 2-3sp and get a few sales.

However, I would need to harvest my own copper ore, I do this anyway, but its just not worth it in terms of time for a 2sp profit.

Doing the same with a dagger that uses 2 copper ingots results in a 7-8 dmg level 6 weapon with +4 strength. No market for this at all, the starter quests give similar weapons for free.

Possibly, it will get better at higher tiers since dust is 40cp for novice or amateur and I should be able to sell at a higher price, I am just not sure I want to put in the effort to get beyond my current level 11.5. I think I'll take a break from crafting and finish off my diplomacy quests and get back on to adventuring - I'm level 10 bard, soon to be level 11 it seems

[Shinto]

After reading the skepticism, I looked even further into this. Below are a few lists of items. These stats do not even include the other attributes of the weapons, and in that category, crafting won.

(Items are listed in level order. Anything without a marked grade is either dropped or vendor-sold.)


Daggers
Gwartak Clan Dagger (Grade A), level 8, 5.45 DPS
Worn Dagger, level 8, 2.22 DPS
Darkmage Xyxl's Dagger, level 9, 5.00 DPS
Brute's Dagger of Striking (Grade B), level 13, 8.00 DPS
Tin Dagger (Grade A), level 16, 6.82 DPS
Voyager's Dagger, level 16, 5.33 DPS
Tarnished Dagger, level 18, 7.56 DPS

Longswords
Brigand's Longsword (Grade B), level 8, 4.00 DPS
Brigand's Longsword (Grade A), level 11, 5.45 DPS
Colonist's Longsword, level 11, 3.27 DPS
Living Tree Longsword, level 12, 6.30 DPS

Greatswords
Copper Greatsword (Grade B), level 12, 6.98 DPS
Rusty Greatsword, level 13, 6.87 DPS
Sentry's Greatsword (Grade A), level 15, 10.77 DPS
Rune-covered Greatsword, level 15, 10.77 DPS

Greatspears
Sentry's Spear (Grade A), level 10, 7.08 DPS
Temporene Infused Greatspear, level 10, 7.54 DPS
Traveller's Greatspear, level 11, 4.62 DPS
Greatspear of the Vault, level 12, 10.89 DPS
Rusty Greatspear, level 13, 6.87 DPS

Edit: By the way, the information I read said that crafted items would be comparable to dropped items, and that the best items would likely require a combination of adventuring and crafting to obtain. I never read that crafted items would always be better. (Is the old faq still up?)

Edit again: I added the Brute's Dagger of Striking. Try finding that DPS on a level 13 drop. :P

[Dread Quixadhal]

Originally Posted by Shinto

Edit: By the way, the information I read said that crafted items would be comparable to dropped items, and that the best items would likely require a combination of adventuring and crafting to obtain. I never read that crafted items would always be better. (Is the old faq still up?)

I'm not sure where, but I *do* remember reading that crafters would have the incentive to produce and sell their goods because they would make goods sooner than they would be available as drops.

I assumed that would mean that a level 10 crafter would make weapons that were slightly superior to the kind of drops a level 10 adventurer would typically get.

That made sense, as it gave the adventurers a choice. They could buy from players and get better loot, or they could fight higher level mobs for the same loot (but more risk). It seemed like a good balance, since it would cost them more cash to avoid the added risk.

If that's no longer the case, then crafters may as well ignore all recipes that aren't unique and unattainable through adventuring. The only other way around that would be to lighten the level/proficiency requirements on crafted goods... so that the crafter dagger would be on a par DPS-wise, but would be wieldable sooner.