Lower the insane difficulty of pottery

[Ekcin 2,407]

As there is so much talk about "QoL" as an objective of the devs, some skill branches might be reinspected. In this case, pottery.

 

I have been grinding pottery for a while, reaching skill level 85.88 recently. Skill gain is not really bad, easier than, say, weapon smithing. But imping is frustrating and a pain. Obviously, the imping difficulty (or whatever commands raising quality)  has been set to unreasonable if not completely insane levels.

 

I am practically unable to raise the ql of clay items even close to my skill level. To my experience, smelting pots are bit easier to imp than clay jars. My best clay smelting pots are reaching 85.45, more than 3 levels below my skill. Even in the lower 80s, imping is widely going in circles, often losing more due to failures than gaining by successful improving.

 

I do not see much sense in this behaviour which considerably differs from that of blacksmithing, weapon smithing, fine carpentry, masonry and others. Maybe it has to do with the smelting pot nerf last year, I don't know. Anyway, I fail to see a point in simply frustrating and annoying crafters that way. 

[Retrograde 12,013]

No difference between it and any other skill. Difficulty is the item you're imping ql

 

Could be the hand having no inherent ql but it's not a difficulty thing. 

[Ekcin 2,407]

6 minutes ago, Retrograde said:

No difference between it and any other skill. Difficulty is the item you're imping ql

 

Could be the hand having no inherent ql but it's not a difficulty thing. 

I don't know the exact architecture of crafting trees. It may well be that it is not difficulty in the narrower sense, but it is something depending on items, making it practically impossible to imp  smelting pot ql beyond skill level, worse with jars, where it is close to impossible to get to ql82 at skill level near 86. Whatever the reason, do something about.

Edited January 10, 2020 by Ekcin

[Oblivionnreaver 5,174]

so, there's a few things to consider here

 

imping with your hand cannot use enchants and can't be imped

imping with water probably sucks too (i dunno if this is true or not, it's not as bad as tempering but i doubt think water counts as a 100ql tool, probably uses your skill as the tool ql)

imping pottery does not get the 2x bonus to imp amount that armor and pretty much all tools/weapons get (if you can wear it, or if when you hold it as a weapon, you swing with the item instead of your fist, you imp it 2x as much)

 

it could do with a bit of love, pottery is so rarely used i don't think many people have stopped to think "hey this sucks"

[Ekcin 2,407]

Thing is that I am not speaking about skill gain. That one is not really worse than any other skill I have in regions of 80 and beyond, and there is nothing to object. It may not be exceptionally fast, but certainly ways faster than, say, weapon smithing. And it is ok that some skills are rising slower than others.

 

Further on, I do not see much difference when imping by hand or (unenchanted) water, compared to entchanted spatula and shaper, or (also unenchanted) clay. That would, in my view, concern skill gain rather than ql gain (correct me if I am wrong).

 

According to the .77*skill+23 formula, I should be able to imp towards a soft cap of 89.90 ca. In fact, imping jars towards 81.50 is an ordeal already, so is imping pots to 85.50. at a skill of 85.89. The imping tool does not make much of a difference, as far as I could see.

[Ostentatio 1,970]

4 hours ago, Ekcin said:

making it practically impossible to imp  smelting pot ql beyond skill level, worse with jars

Different items aren't more or less difficult to improve; it just depends on the item's current quality. Heavier items use more material, but that's it. A smelting pot and jar are equally easy to improve.

 

 

You're right that enchants don't really matter for QL gain, at least per action, although WoA means you can improve faster by doing more actions per unit time. Enchanted clay actually is pretty viable, since you can combine the enchanted clay with non-enchanted clay and it will keep the enchantments.

Edited January 10, 2020 by Ostentatio

[gorgian 181]

Wish coc'ing a glove had effect on pottery...  

Edited January 10, 2020 by gorgian

[Eobersig 1,006]

Pottery could also use an imbue like other crafts have to assist with the ql gain while imping. Potion of pottery anyone? Now, if we could only imbue our hands ... imbuing water should work cause one can also imbue lye.

[zCat 39]

Being able to use a cloth glove (with CoC/WoA) instead of a hand, would be great

[ChampagneDragon 971]

First skill I took to 90, and that was before affinity meals and learned affinities. 

 

My biggest problem with pottery is with the exception of smelting pots, there is no real need to imp high. I can't remember the last time i did a pottery job for someone else. I did talk to someone about imping a jar up to 95 ql, but when he saw the price he skipped it. People see the need for high quality tools, weapons, armor, etc, but not pottery.

 

Edit:

 

summary: grinding pottery is worthless, and that is dumb. (from someone who is at 95.xx pottery)

 

Edited January 10, 2020 by ChampagneDragon

[Ekcin 2,407]

38 minutes ago, ChampagneDragon said:

First skill I took to 90, and that was before affinity meals and learned affinities.

My biggest problem with pottery is with the exception of smelting pots, there is no real need to imp high.

..

Edit:

summary: grinding pottery is worthless, and that is dumb. (from someone who is at 95.xx pottery)

seems you missed the smelting pot nerf. Though I was not happy about at the time of the patch, I clearly saw the point and still see it. Thus there is a reason to grind pottery up, more exactly, two reasons: high ql jars and high ql pots. There should be more ql advantages at other pottery items like dishes etc. though in my opinion. But changing that now would not make ppl happy.

 

As said, pottery grinding proper is not that hard, but getting items to high ql is. And if Ostentatio says that there is no difference in items other than material consumption (which I do not care a real lot as even some 10kg of clay last for really long time unless imping large amphoras), I fail to understand why I can barely but at least soso imp pots at least to my skill level while jars get into the step forward - step back loop 4 levels earlier already, all of that as if I had already reached the soft cap.

Edited January 10, 2020 by Ekcin
error correction

[Sidereal 1,119]

On 1/10/2020 at 5:46 AM, Retrograde said:

Could be the hand having no inherent ql but it's not a difficulty thing. 

 

Wait, so the fact that the crafting window shows the hand as being 50.0ql has no real basis?  I always wondered why water was 100ql and hands were only 50ql, given how problematic that would be for high level pottery work.