Game Developers, Wake Up About Rare *Creation* Mechanics

[Arronicus 642]

I'll remember that in the upcoming Nahjo nerf thread.

Nahjo priests were done with random spell assortments, and happened to get a good enough roll on the list to wipe out the usefulness of a few of the other priests. This has nothing at all to do with player actions, and needs to be fixed/nerfed simply because an added element to the game (Nahjo's spell list) made previous heavily used elements no longer desirable/less useful. Please compare apples to apples, not apples to leather boots.

[Audrel 2,223]

Actually the exact opposite of this (Rare upon creation far surpasses Rare upon improving) is what brought this situation to the forefront of my attention. How? Over the past several months I have been working on raising blacksmithing from the mid 40's to now 90 by the usual method of improving items. In all those thousands of improvement actions I have never once improved an item to Rare.

 

Now contrast this with those players who focus on creating Rares with the intent solely to sell them with the create and trash method. Since this method is preferred by those with the intent to sell them I can understand why they would come up with all sorts of reasons to defend the current status of Rare creation; but, on the other hand it is not really fair treatment to those who improve items for skill or use enhancement.

 

The current way Rare creation functions it is a system that mainly benefits the create and destroy grinding money makers. Which is why I bring this up as in need of a drastic adjustment to more benefit the players who actually play the game for their enjoyment rather than just to make coins for conversion and export. A poorly structured system currently that seems to at least be in harmony with promoting the game as a possible money maker in order to draw and retain more players to it; thus, this old common theme emerges in this Rare creation system and is defended by the same mentality.

 

More of the same really, in a slightly altered form. Why not focus on benefiting the players who actually improve items for their own and others use, as well as attempting to raise their skill with this Rare system? The current Rare creation system does the exact opposite of this and focuses those benefits on those who attempt to create Rares for the sole purpose of self profits in coins. A fact that should at least be faced, I would think.

 

=Ayes=

 

The way I figure it, 1000 spindles is 1000 actions. Up to a silver in work and don't have a rare one yet. 2000? 3000? It's easier to buy a rare one or imp my own and maybe get a rare out of that. At least the operations are going to something other than my altar. That 85QL plain spindle does just what I need it to do, minus a tiny QL bonus.

If I am going to grind thousands of operations, I'm going for the sure money... bricks or mortar. Not some rare lottery I might never win. It's not broken to me because even as it is, there's other ways to grind out silver that are a lot more profitable.

 

Again, this is all based on my own experiences. My personal experience is that I have a far better chance at a rare imping the items I already have and use than to sit there deliberately trying to make a rare item. The time not doing that is spent in skilling something I actually want to do.

 

EDIT: Maybe making 1000 spindles is what someone actually wants to do also.

Edited July 28, 2015 by Audrel

[Dairuka 888]

Nahjo priests were done with random spell assortments, and happened to get a good enough roll on the list to wipe out the usefulness of a few of the other priests. This has nothing at all to do with player actions, and needs to be fixed/nerfed simply because an added element to the game (Nahjo's spell list) made previous heavily used elements no longer desirable/less useful. Please compare apples to apples, not apples to leather boots.

 

People are opting to mass create, because previous methods of improving are no longer desirable/less useful. This boot tastes like apples. It's widespread too.

 

My main issue with the rare system, is with the fact that improving is so worthless as a method that you almost have to mass-create for a chance to get a rare. This current system is undeniably flawed, because people are actively shutting off the drum rolls to avoid being disappointed yet again.

 

The reason improving was nerfed, was because one could argue that rares are far too common. Yet creation was mostly left alone, and as a result the drum rolls are still turned off. So logically, rather than increasing the improvement rate for rares. Differentiate the existence of junk, and non-junk rolls. Soft cap the number of non-junk rolls for both Improving and Creating, and remove the random failure rate from Improving. This will lower the number of rares overall, while making drum rolls far less of an irritation for those of us who don't mass create (A far larger number of people.) You might actually see people turn on the drum roll effects again.

 

You're right though, like with how Nahjo came to be: Good design in Wurm is a bit of an oxymoron so I'm not holding my breath. A soft cap would require a modest investment of time and effort. While a failure rate is more than likely as easy as changing an interger... if you think they won't ninja-nerf Creating rares without a word from the community, rendering the drum roll even more heinous an affront to most people's eyes and ears, then nothing I can say will ever get through to you. After reading through this thread, I think we'd all deserve that ninja-nerf too.

Edited July 29, 2015 by Dairuka

[Wargasm 1,928]

You keep saying the same thing over and over again.  "It's easier to create rares rather than imp them".  No, it's not.

 

You are choosing to compare a series of creation actions to a serious of imping actions.  Similar to the false logic that priests make SO much money just taking 20 seconds to cast a high enchant, when those that scrutinize them fail to consider the additional time spent to acquire ropes/squares/locks to make that cast possible.  Similarly, you are choosing to discount the hours it takes to craft the pieces to make the tools.

 

If you want to compare the 20 seconds it takes to cast a wind of ages 100 (4 silver) versus the time it takes for one character to dig 4,000 dirt (4s) then OMG Rolf better nerf priests, otherwise the economy is going to tank.

 

You also forget that 99% of blacksmiths don't keep their rare wnidow maxed just to spend 30 minutes imping a few tools.  99% of the creation rares are done with a rare bonus already activated, the other 1% are blind luck (like the time I made a rare longsword when I was crafting 30 of them to improve for grinding WS).

 

All you have done is state your opinion with zero evidence to support it.  I'm venturing to believe that the only knowledge you have on this subject is what you read on that "rares guide".

[Dairuka 888]

You keep saying the same thing over and over again.  "It's easier to create rares rather than imp them".  No, it's not.

 

You are choosing to compare a series of creation actions to a serious of imping actions.  Similar to the false logic that priests make SO much money just taking 20 seconds to cast a high enchant, when those that scrutinize them fail to consider the additional time spent to acquire ropes/squares/locks to make that cast possible.  Similarly, you are choosing to discount the hours it takes to craft the pieces to make the tools.

 

If you want to compare the 20 seconds it takes to cast a wind of ages 100 (4 silver) versus the time it takes for one character to dig 4,000 dirt (4s) then OMG Rolf better nerf priests, otherwise the economy is going to tank.

 

You also forget that 99% of blacksmiths don't keep their rare wnidow maxed just to spend 30 minutes imping a few tools.  99% of the creation rares are done with a rare bonus already activated, the other 1% are blind luck (like the time I made a rare longsword when I was crafting 30 of them to improve for grinding WS).

 

All you have done is state your opinion with zero evidence to support it.  I'm venturing to believe that the only knowledge you have on this subject is what you read on that "rares guide".

 

Moving the goalpost.

 

Your fake statistics are flawed, but feel free to disprove the cited source anyways. This guy has made more rares in days of creating, than I have in years of improving, as a tool and weapon merchant.

 

Chapter 5

 

Try it and smile

 

 

some GUESSMATICS here :

 

Spamming with 2 chars for 3hours

about 1k creations needed

 

1k shafts = 1s

1k iron = 1s

 

the chance of getting at least 1 rare in this session is pretty high!

 

1 pickaxe – 6s now

=4s earned

 

 

Note if the maximum rarity window is 30secs your ressources are lowered significantly!!

 

 

 

This could be yours after some Days

 

Feel free to test it out and tell me !!

Changes possible

 

 

I digress though. I'm merely arguing for the value of the soft cap, the fact that the creation system is flawed, and the fact that the improvement system needs love.

 

I don't know how I got co-opted into the pro-change group. I couldn't care less what happens, because I have drum rolls off. I was originally neutral, and only got pulled into this mess to defend my ideas.

Edited July 29, 2015 by Dairuka

[Arronicus 642]

People are opting to mass create, because previous methods of improving are no longer desirable/less useful. This boot tastes like apples. It's widespread too.

 

My main issue with the rare system, is with the fact that improving is so worthless as a method that you almost have to mass-create for a chance to get a rare. This current system is undeniably flawed, because people are actively shutting off the drum rolls to avoid being disappointed yet again.

 

The mass creation happened over a year ago too though, people just didn't actually -create- the item, they just cancelled over and over till they got the rare window. Sure, with the imp-rarity nerf, more do creation, but some did it before.

As for the second point I've quoted, yes, I completely agree, imping for rarity IS in a terrible state, and ought to be buffed to at the very least being on par with creation. Heck, I'd even be ok with creation taking a small hit in favour of imping being significantly higher, but things like making it so the higher your skill is, the better chance you have of getting a rare? Ugh, no thanks. 

[Dairuka 888]

The mass creation happened over a year ago too though, people just didn't actually -create- the item, they just cancelled over and over till they got the rare window. Sure, with the imp-rarity nerf, more do creation, but some did it before.

 

Yeah, and they nerfed that method. They could just as easily nerf Creation on a whim.

 

As for the second point I've quoted, yes, I completely agree, imping for rarity IS in a terrible state, and ought to be buffed to at the very least being on par with creation. Heck, I'd even be ok with creation taking a small hit in favour of imping being significantly higher, but things like making it so the higher your skill is, the better chance you have of getting a rare? Ugh, no thanks. 

 

That's actually why I originally opened up the idea of a soft cap. It's to get people thinking beyond the skill system, and beyond the random number generator to limit the number of rares coming into Wurm, without destroying the appeared value of a drum roll. Like the new god system, the current rare system is flawed (always has been), and there needs to be a better way to address it than to stick our heads in the sand and say it's fine, while the sword of damacles hovers over our heads.

 

Right now, the mechanic is an irritation. People get actively angry when they get yet another farming drum roll. You hear it all the time in GL-Freedom and Freedom. This is not how something intended to be celebrated should be.

 

It needs a second glance from the development team. I don't want the easy fix, with Creation to end up with a failure rate, making the drum roll even more heinous.

Edited July 29, 2015 by Dairuka

[Wargasm 1,928]

I already have disproved the source from my adventures standing in front of a forge for the last 2 years. 

And you can call my generalized percentages flawed statistics, but you cannot deny factual math.  You're choosing to continue ignoring it though, that's cool.  You're making it pretty clear why no change is needed because you clearly can't do more than look at the time he spent creating the tools.

 

How long did it take him to mine that much iron?  To cook it from ore into lumps?

How long did it take him to create the pickaxe heads?  (1.5 kg of iron each, btw)

How long did it take him to make however many shafts/handles for the tools?

 

Like I said, you're choosing to ignore the legwork required to make that many rares in "some days"  (how many days?  2?  3?  7?)

[Dairuka 888]

I already have disproved the source from my adventures standing in front of a forge for the last 2 years. 

And you can call my generalized percentages flawed statistics, but you cannot deny factual math.  You're choosing to continue ignoring it though, that's cool.  You're making it pretty clear why no change is needed because you clearly can't do more than look at the time he spent creating the tools.

 

How long did it take him to mine that much iron?  To cook it from ore into lumps?

How long did it take him to create the pickaxe heads?  (1.5 kg of iron each, btw)

How long did it take him to make however many shafts/handles for the tools?

 

Like I said, you're choosing to ignore the legwork required to make that many rares in "some days"  (how many days?  2?  3?  7?)

 

Spamming with 2 chars for 3hours

about 1k creations needed

 

 

This could be yours after some Days

 

I cut down on the required reading, so that you'd actually bother to read.

 

Your conjecture isn't proof.

 

Even if you doubled the cited creation time to account for the gathering of materials. This guy has made more rares in a week of creating, than I have in years of improving, as a tool and weapon merchant.

Edited July 29, 2015 by Dairuka

[Wargasm 1,928]

Oh I know how to read.  But you don't know how to do math.

 

Do you honestly believe in 3 hours time he mined, cooked and created all the materials AND assembled THAT many rares with two toons?

 

Oh, keep in mind, one is non-premium.

Edited July 29, 2015 by Wargasm

[Dairuka 888]

Do you honestly believe in 3 hours time he mined, cooked and created all the materials AND assembled THAT many rares with two toons?

 

Even if you doubled the cited creation time to account for the gathering of materials. This guy has made more rares in a week of creating, than I have in years of improving, as a tool and weapon merchant.

 

We're going in circles here. Your conjecture still isn't proof.

Edited July 29, 2015 by Dairuka

[Wargasm 1,928]

The reason we're going in circles is because neither of us has 100% factual evidence.  I cannot prove to you how many rares I have ever made from improving vs creating, because I flat out cannot remember.  I cannot prove that it takes X hours/days to make one rare, because I don't know exactly how much iron he needed to make however many horse shoes he had to make.  I can tell you I've done it both ways, I can also tell you that I don't hike up my rare window every time I plan to stand in front of my forge to grind smithing.

 

You on the other hand, have no proof that he didn't take longer to create them.  Sure, he said it, so it must be true.  But you have yet to present any personal experience as to how easy or difficult creating rares is.  I have, because I knew the process before that forum post was made, and I have made a few tools that I wanted for my own personal use with MY signature on them.\

 

Now look, I'm not trying to insult you, I'm certainly not trying to convince you that you're wrong, I'm more so trying to get you to show me something other than what one guy said he did.  I'm trying to make you realize that it takes *alot* longer to make that many rares than you think it does.

 

By the way... horseshoes are a pretty weak argument considering the difficulty to make and that they're only worth 2-3s each. 

[Dairuka 888]

Your argument is with him then. Not me.

 

If you don't like that I cited the source, that's fine - but putting the onus on me to prove the source, when you're the one questioning it's validity is insulting. Do your own damn legwork.

[Wargasm 1,928]

Not so.  You believe his numbers, you tell me why you believe him.  Do you believe everything you read is true?

[Dairuka 888]

Do you believe everything you read is true?

 

I don't believe anything you've posted in this thread as you've provided no tangible proof, and only fallacious fantasies and made up statistics, so the answer to that question is no.

 

We're done here. Call me when you've got some actual proof.

Edited July 29, 2015 by Dairuka

[redbearing 25]

the conversation seems mute to me. there a plethera of items that cant be improved and otherwise wouldnt be able to be rare. that is also fixable. but in the argument that people spend this time doing so. if they take that time and resources to do so they should have a chance. even with more than one account they are allocating time and Ram aka memory usage on their system to do so. its all very arguable sure but what would be the ultimate gain from this? fixing it so that everyone can have fair rare chance? well its not. take away creation rare chance and those that cant imp lose out improvement actions are much more common than creation ones. if someone wants to take the time to do creation let them!

[Slickshot 1,195]

I don't believe anything you've posted in this thread as you've provided no tangible proof, and only fallacious fantasies and made up statistics, so the answer to that question is no.

 

We're done here. Call me when you've got some actual proof.

Can we all act like adults please? Civil disagreement and discussion is great, but devolving into taunting because you're frustrated is just bad sportsmanship.

[Wulfgarr 810]

i really see no problem. I have played for a year and half and there has been certain people knowing how to make a rare for the whole time. The method has changed. So changing the % of creation and imp is good enough for me. If people want to spend 20h a day in front of a forge to make a rare horseshoe wopadidooo go ahead, i aint spending my gametime on that. What i do hate is the drumrolls on imp with succesfull imp and do not turn rare. Makes me sad.. DRUMROLL - yeah, oh nvm didnt go rare.

[Wargasm 1,928]

I've just concluded my little test today, and I'm thoroughly convinced that Picotto is lying.  You want proof Dairuka?  Here it is.

I wanted to make a rare awl.  In order to do that, I'm creating awls, one after the other, trying to get what we're calling in this thread a "Creation rare".

TL:DR

Iron Lumps-  35 minutes of mining, 15 minutes of melting.
Shafts/Handles-  2.75 Hours
Awl Blades-  4 hours
Making Awls- 4.5 Hours

Rares acquired-  1
Time spent (1 toon)-  12 hours

----------------------------------

Warning:  Maths below

I started with a BSB full of shafts and iron lumps.  I did not have to take the time to mine the 300 iron in this case, but it would have taken me:


Iron Lumps:  5 mining actions =  31.7 seconds.  Add in a few seconds to rest, drink water, etc and we'll call it 35 seconds for easy math.  75 Mining, 80 ql w72 rare pick, for those wondering.

4.8

5.2

6.8

7.2

7.7

300 Iron lumps were needed in order to make 1,000 awl blades, so that took me 300/5=60 sets of actions * 35 seconds = 2100 seconds = 35 minutes.

After spending 35 minutes to mine the iron ore, I would probably spend about 10-15 minutes cooking it into Iron Lumps.

Shafts:  I need 1000 handles, which means I need 100 shafts.  Action timers with a w64 carving knife @ 80ql and 65 carpentry.  34 seconds, call it 40 with rest.  100 shafts, 20 sets of actions... 40 seconds * 20 sets = 800 seconds.  About 14 minutes.

5.3

5.6

7.3

7.7

8.1

Handles:  From here, I need to carve 1,000 shafts out of these 100 shafts.  Actions based on the same carving knife and carpentry skill as above.    39.1 seconds per set of actions.  1,000 / 5 = 200 sets of actions.  200 * 45 seconds = 9,000 seconds = 150 minutes = 2.5 hours

6.0

6.4

8.3

8.9

9.5

Awl blades:  Time to fire up the forge!  With my trusty 80ql w60 small anvil, I start making awl blades, but realize I only have an 80% chance to succeed due to my 15 blade smithing skill (which is now 20).  I need 1,000 awl blades, whch is 200 sets of actions.

200 sets of actions *  57.3 seconds (call it 60 seconds) = 12,000 seconds = 200 minutes = 3 and 1/3 hours.  Add another 20% due to my failure rate (which seemed much higher) and you're sitting at 4 hours.

8.4

9.2

12.1

13.2

14.4

Now I have my wagon full of awl blades, my BSB full of handles, and I'm ready to start making the awls themselves.  it only took me 7 hours, but I'm ready to make my rare Awl, so I start creating.  Now, going by the guide, with a 10 second rare window, I only need to make one awl every 20 seconds, so I can get more rares from my resources.  

Creating an awl takes me 7.7 seconds.  According to the wiki, Awls (not the blades) improve with blacksmithing, and fortunately I have 95 skill.  99% creation chance, though i did fail a few times.  Anyway, I only need to make one every 20 seconds (from the guide), so I would wait 8-10 seconds before clicking my crafting window to make another one.  

For easy math, lets go with 7.7 seconds creation + 7.3 seconds rest = 15 seconds.  I didn't want to cut it so close to 20 that I might miss the window. But if I were to use the full 20 seconds, it would take 33% longer than the math below, furthering my point.

That means I'm about to perform 1,000 15 second actions.  That's 15,000 seconds with 95 blacksmithing, which translates to 4.5 hours.    This was not *exact*, because I would sometimes que 5 actions to go AFK for a minute.  

I ended up getting my rare awl after about 850 creations.

Based on these numbers, it would be more profitable in my case to make mortar as opposed to fooling with all these crafted parts.  Using my 95 blacksmithing skill to make a blacksmithing tool, WoA and high QL tools for creation, I'm fairly confident that my numbers aren't dragged out by a lack of skill.  It would take other people with less skill and worse tools much longer to complete the same task, especially with the use of a non-premium alt, as is mentioned in the rare guide.

The last rare awl sold at 12s buyout on an auction.  12 silver for 12 hours of work for a 95 blacksmith seems pretty fair to me.  What's so game breaking about this?

[glauc 3]

Here goes Ayes... Again...

 

Random, useless, uninformative, ruserious?

 

Nothing wrong with the current system and you propose nothing for items that can't be imped to rarity.

[Chiqa 742]

I have made a fair number of rare grinding ws to 90. Not a single one was during creation. I have more than a few rares on my deed , 90% of them went rare during imping. Very few of mine came from creation. All that said I just do not see it as broken.

Edited July 29, 2015 by Chiqa

[Tsetse 87]

A good balance would be to limit fantastic items to be made from only improvement action, not creation. This will also eliminate my fear of getting a fantastic dirt.

 

The rest of the system is fine since supreme items are really difficult to make even for a rare spammer.

Edited July 29, 2015 by Tsetse

[Kswords 461]

The rare system shouldn't be something the players can figure out.

It needs to be random, not some dumb "window" you have to catch to make a rare.

[Simyaci 410]

The arguements above are irrelevant as picotto clearly stated he "bought" the bulk iron and shafts. He spent silvers on them. This is the important part.

 

The thing with rare making "without" getting/buying your materials from elsewhere is, you can always have that supreme roll on the last shaft or head you make before you were gonna start attaching them and congrats you got a supreme shaft! And I personally believe those rare/supreme shafts and heads don't function like a rare brick or clay, they don't gıve you a forced roll. They are just sac items. It is of course possible to make valuable rares and make a good ammount of silvers selling them but you need to keep in mind that unless you get the pieces to connect from elsewhere, you might as well get most of your rolls on shafts, handles, blades, heads etc. I don't even mention the logs and iron ores, assuming you buy them from someone. So 'unless' you pay someone a good deal of silver in order to 'gamble' to make silver, you will need a strong dedication to keep trying after the 10th supreme shaft and head while knowing very well that it could have been a supreme tool have the roll happened during connecting the pieces together. 

 

As a blacksmith who is leveling up platesmithing and blacksmithing (and later I'll go for weaponsmithing), I would find it very funny if improve had better chances to make rare since improve is not a gamble at all! you reimprove your stuff to keep them in shape, you improve tools above 70-80-90-95ql to sell them for silvers, you improve them to enchant easily and sell them for even a better ammount of silvers etc. so it is in no way a gamble. The result is of commercial value unlike the result of creation which you end up smelting to get most of the iron back and lose some or just sac for a little bit more rarity window bonus. Creation is a gamble and it is a gamble that usually take a lot of effort or/and silvers to back it up. If there were any shaft/head bulk makers nearby I seriously would have bought them instead of making them myself. The ammount of rare and supreme shafts I got is at least 5-10 times more than the tools. It can be very unnerving. There has been times I made more than 8k creations (not even counting the basic materials or parts) and got nothing! There are times you might need nerves of steel to keep going. There are also times that you hit the jackpot. It is gambling afterall.

 

The reason we all imp is to get the ql higher, not to get a rare item. A rare from imping is a side product, not the goal. That being said, %60-70 of my supremes came from imping. However, it is true that seeing a drumroll while imping and having a big chance to fail can be disappointing.... I think a good change would be to make  the ''drumroll fail' on imping result in multiplying the quality increase of the improving action you did at the moment. For example, if you were about to improve by 0.5ql, rare drumroll fail would multiply that increase by 5x-10x and supreme drumroll would improve even more. Or even better, rare drumroll fail would result in ql increase but the supreme drumroll fail while imping would result in making the item rare and fantastic drumroll fail would result in making the item supreme. You would just get a supreme item and be happy with it, not realizing you just failed a fantastic drumroll.

 

Another good change would be to make rare crafted item making (tools, horseshoes, crates, carts, ships etc.) require minimum 20.1 of the required crafting skill (non-premiums can still get drumrolls on forage and the rare clay, dirt etc. to try chances with building things, sac them or just sell them for few coppers). A non-premium character will have terrible chances with creating rare anyways, unless it is the alt of a high skilled player with a very high ql anvil for stuff like horseshoes or very high ql shafts and handles, giving a huge boost to creation chances on tools. If you are going to have alts to make rare, you might as well pay for their premium.

Edited July 29, 2015 by Simyaci

[rixk 830]

The drums with failed result made sense, when the drums were played in the beginning of the action and the roll, whethere item actually became rare was at the end(talking about imping here).. You started action, heard drums and knew that this was special action... then held your breath to see if you got a rare eventually. Now both of the rolls are being run (almost) at the same moment, why is the drums even played on failed roll?

Edited July 29, 2015 by rixk