Tradeskill Armor

[moghedancarns]

No, we do NOT have to give reasons for it to NOT be nerfed. We need to know why it DOES need to be nerfed.

It needs to be nerfed because you can by it with the profits of 5 hours of Farming, the length of one raid. This was proven to be FALSE... it takes a week or more of farming... 20-30 something hours. Yes, a bunch of people working together can do it in 5 hours, but that more or less is a point in our favor.

It needs to be nerfed because some mid teir people still wear it over raid drops. This was proven to be FALSE... either the drops for the slot are uncommonly poorly done, exceedingly rare and the guild has moved on without it, or this is pure hyperbole.

The nerf is not a nerf, it is a minor rebalancing of fairly unnoticable changes. This would be false. If this were true, you would not bother to do so at all. You have far too many far bigger fish to work on. Changing out useful stats with useless stats is a nerf; and the stats, other than primary stats, are quite useless, as it requires vast quantities for even minor changes. Removing raw HP/Mana/AC and replacing with an equivilent value of INT/WIS/STA/AGI is a nerf, as it reduces the length of time that the armor can be expected to last. It may make it less attractive to higher tiered raiders with full stats already, but it will make it less attractive to low end 65s as well as most are not capped, but are not massively far from capped either.

Reimagining Imphide and DM Chain are laudable goals. However, they are also impossible goals. Chain classes include both SHM and ROG, and leather classes include MNK and DRU. As these two sets of classes are diametricly opposed, there is no combination of stats that will work reasonably well either, and you will get substandard armor for both. They also include the Beastlord and the Ranger, which benefit from all of the stats. Thus, you will have so-so monk and rogue armor, decent BST and RNG armor, and Shaman and Druids will wear Shadowsilk. However, all of the "nerf it" threads seem to center on DM Plate and Shadowsilk.

 

[Daelius]

There's been a variety of points made in this thread, with a lot of arguing back and forth over the power that is tradeskill armor. Yes, tradeskill armor at teh max level is very powerful, having a few pieces of deepmetal myself. And yes, it is more powerful than some of the lower-tiered raid armor. There was a time when that lower-tiered raid armor was dropable, which in turn made those spots into farming places for those on a much higher tiered players. Then the items were made no-drop, and they are now considered underpowered compared to tradeskill armor.

Yes, you can spend the plat to completely deck your toon out in deepmetal/shadowsilk. The amount of time/money spent into those tradeskills should yield some highly desirable armor, with some pieces still failing after maxing out the tradeskill. Or, you could go and raid several mobs that you can kill already, and get upgrades for people that may or may not be better than tradeskilled armor, which doesn't cost the buyer anything besides time. I would personally prefer to get my upgrades via raiding, as it is a sense of accomplishment and it doesn't cost me anything besides time. I'd rather be spending the money either on alts or saving for a charm, which is something you can't do by raiding.

For the casual player, who may not be able to raid, its nice to have that armor thats attainable without raiding. But that doesn't mean that the armor isn't overpowered. I see many new raiding guild's main tanks with the deepmetal bp and legs and ususally severl other pieces, besides maybe the thurgadin quest pieces. The bp and legs are the big ones, as i cant think of better gear until tier 2-3. There are many people who still have shadowsilk pieces until tier 4-5 easy, maybe even 6. Maybe they aren't raiding every night, or maybe double auged shadowsilk is simply better than a lot of raid gear, which shouldn't be the case.

In the end, i'm for rebalancing tradeskill gear. Certain rare combines i would say should remain untouched, but others are just too powerful and need a rebalancing.

Its tne same thing as when the item changes came in. People are resistant to things that will affect their characters negatively, even though it is the right thing to do.

 

[Syalara]

Why dont you wait and see the changes before getting your panties into a bunch?

No, we do NOT have to give reasons for it to NOT be nerfed. We need to know why it DOES need to be nerfed

No, you either have to deal with it...or not. Until the changes are in, nobody really has an argument that isnt based on assumptions and/or worst case scenarios.

The reasons for the change have been given by the person making the changes, you either chose to ignore them, or just dont agree with them and think repeating yourself is going to mean anything. You may as well stomp your feet and hold your breath.

 

[Tyvec-a-tron]

I am truly sorry I did not go through all of the content in order. I am also sorry that people cannot see what balancing is and that people only care about how they are affected as an individual. I am honestly tired of all of the whining. I may not have raided through all of the content from Tier 0 to Tier 10, but I have done encounters in ALL of those tiers. Not sure who you are, but I am sure I have WAY more raiding experience than you, so yes, my opinion is pretty sound when it comes to different content. You all can act like you know what you are talking about all you want, but NONE of you have said WHY it shouldn't be changed other than "we want nice dropable gear". The devs aren't going to keep it as is if you have NO argument for keeping it that way. None of you even suggested alternative ways to change it, leaving the devs to use only the changes they were thinking of.

Instead of suggestions, this whole thread is just full of bitching. Well, grats you all on doing nothing to protect your precious TS armor and doing the exact opposite. The devs have no where else to turn to except for what they think up. gg

I don't think you actually gave a sound response to any of my points. It's like talking to the wall. Bulleted:

What about your raid experience (or lack thereof) in the early tiers makes you an expert on how the TS gear allows lower guilds to bypass content and affects that raid game?
Where do you draw the line on droppable gear and its acceptableness into high tier raiding?
People bypass content all the time using assorted methods, what makes TS armor a culprit beyond that?
Why screw over the casual, non-raider on their top end?
And finally, how is a raid character wearing TS armor into mid-high tiers detrimental to the server?

If you're going to again respond with "I know more than you, stop bitching," don't even bother.

 

[Daelius]

regardless of what happens, there are going to be people wearing tradeskill armor into later tiers for various reasons. It's one thing though that people have it on because their guild has progressed faster than they have. On the other hand, on a tier 4-5 encounter, there should be little question whether the gear you are going to loot is going to be better than that piece of tradeskill armor you are wearing.

It is not about so much tier 1-3, just breaking into the raid game kind of stuff. To rebalance all tradeskill armor to be replaced in early tiers in not feasible. As long as people can add 60 mana and 10 ac to their armor, its going to be a toss up. I think the issue is that even later-tiered gear is arguably not replacing shadowsilk/deepmetal, and there lies the problem. A rebalance is needed to fix this, and i support that.

 

[Spiritplx]

My raid experience where I did Water/Torment/Air/Etc and people DID NOT need certain items because SS was better would be a fine example.

I have NOTHING against finding ways to make your raiding experience easier, but when it makes items obsolete where no one ever gets the items because dropable gear is better, it is a waste of time for the developer who made it.

In my opinion, you draw the line that dropable gear is in the Tier 0-1 range, but that is not my decision, so I am not sure why you even ask me that.

Why screw over the low end? The high end had 80% of its items nerfed, hence the REBALANCING to the lower tiered items.

Seriously, are people reading what I write? When have I said its detrimental? I am simply saying that IF you are still wearing TS armor in LT then it IS indeed overpowered. You could have just not gotten your special piece of loot, but for the most part, we did not stay in certain zones simply for the fact that TS was BETTER.

I have done plenty of raids with alts and other toons with the low end stuff, and even the two new bosses added in Darkwoods and Oasis (or wherever) were pretty much crap because TS armor was just better.

But seriously, there is no point to give "sound" arguments to any of you when NONE of you are reading what I, and several others, are writing.

Again, it is YOUR items that are getting changed. Not mine. I do not need to convince the staff to not change them, but apparently you all think I have to defend my arguments for their changes. Do something more productive with your posts and tell them how to change it or give examples of Tier 0-3 items from raids that are better than TS and make it worthwhile to even do that content so that they do not have to change TS items. Arguing with me gets you nowhere, but it does keep me busy at work. I also love how you somehow know exactly what all I have raided and on what toons. Did not realize you were stalking me.

P.S. Nwaij = <3

 

[Nwaij]

I don't think you actually gave a sound response to any of my points. It's like talking to the wall. Bulleted:

What about your raid experience (or lack thereof) in the early tiers makes you an expert on how the TS gear allows lower guilds to bypass content and affects that raid game?

no experience needed to see this really, just look at the stats of dropped items (low tier raidtargets) vs TS items

Where do you draw the line on droppable gear and its acceptableness into high tier raiding?

I draw the line somewhere behind level 65. But see below

People bypass content all the time using assorted methods, what makes TS armor a culprit beyond that?

You are aware that you can max tailoring & blacksmithing way before you hit level 65 if you farm all the stuff yourself? It takes a long time, given. But its possible, and lvl40ish toons should not be able to get gear of that power.

Why screw over the casual, non-raider on their top end?

Wait what, depmetal is the be all end all for non-raiders? Someone missed the droppable gear from zones like HK, FR & Rust...

And finally, how is a raid character wearing TS armor into mid-high tiers detrimental to the server?

Who ever said its determinal? People just used this to show how out of whack TS gear is. And I know what I talk about here, I used SS waist till IP level.

If you're going to again respond with "I know more than you, stop bitching," don't even bother.

I know more than you, stop bitching :toot:

 

[Skorge]

Why dont you wait and see the changes before getting your panties into a bunch?

No, you either have to deal with it...or not. Until the changes are in, nobody really has an argument that isnt based on assumptions and/or worst case scenarios.

Lol man you sit here and tell people not get your panties in a bunch when it is you that seems is the most upset of all. You sit here and defend up and down about this issue.

I just don't understand your logic, really.

First of all, you must have no clue on how it is to be a casual player. Obviously you must have a lot of time on your hands to be able to play a video game 24/7. I'm going to give you the benefit of the doubt and assume you aren't aware of the fact that there are people out there who play MMORPGs that have lifes -- people who are married, have children, have jobs, have friends, like to exercise, and other hobbies.

To these casual gamers time is everything. It's not about skill, plat, or anything else - it's about time. We casual gamers just can't log in for 8 hours a day and thus we can not raid. So, because of time issues we are unable to acquire the best gear in the game.

That is why they made TS armor - to subsitute for raid gear - to help us casual gamers fit in and feel strong, because let's face it: a good chunk of this server's population is the level 65+ folks.

Who cares if its as good as tier 1 or 2 or 3 gear. Screw it, just let us casual gamers have that and be done with it.

So my question is why do people like you have to be ruin it for people like us. I mean there has to be a reason you are defending this decision up and down. Is it because you wear full TS armor and really think its too powerful? Let's turn the situation around and pretend it is YOU who are the casul player and have full TS armor.

Then would you be arguing for the nerf or against it?

 

[robopirateninja]

I don't think you actually gave a sound response to any of my points. It's like talking to the wall. Bulleted:

What about your raid experience (or lack thereof) in the early tiers makes you an expert on how the TS gear allows lower guilds to bypass content and affects that raid game?
Where do you draw the line on droppable gear and its acceptableness into high tier raiding?
People bypass content all the time using assorted methods, what makes TS armor a culprit beyond that?
Why screw over the casual, non-raider on their top end?
And finally, how is a raid character wearing TS armor into mid-high tiers detrimental to the server?

If you're going to again respond with "I know more than you, stop bitching," don't even bother.

I can field some of these:

-TS gear makes it possible to skip the tiers of raid mobs that drop items worse than TS items. Fusion made extensive use of TS items to speed our progression through the lower raid tiers. If you can't comprehend that then arguing about game mechanics is pretty pointless.

-I don't mind, and I don't think Felyn minds stuff like a mantle of the forest combine being really good, but having a one-stop shop of gear that's better than raid gear and easier to get makes raiding those tiers obsolete.

-I don't know what "assorted methods" you mean, the people you're accusing of bypassing content in this thread seems to be limited to newer players who join a guild that has already established itself beyond entry level raiding. There's nothing to be done to combat this, if you can kill something with 17 members instead of 18, the 18th slot can go to whoever you need to gear up. The reason this isn't as unacceptable is because the guild as a whole already progressed through those tiers, and will STILL need to farm backcontent to a degree, but there's no reason to gear a char through DHK just so you can gear them in torment to gear them in OP when you could just knock out IP and be done with it. It doesn't make sense and it would make it even harder for newer guilds to break into raiding if all the old guilds completely cleared all the tiers below them every time someone joined.

-Nobody's getting screwed, we've had the best of it for a long time. There's still droppable gear that's even better than TS gear that casual players can farm for or kill for in groups.

No, we do NOT have to give reasons for it to NOT be nerfed. We need to know why it DOES need to be nerfed.

It needs to be nerfed because you can by it with the profits of 5 hours of Farming, the length of one raid. This was proven to be FALSE... it takes a week or more of farming... 20-30 something hours.

Farming 100pp an hour is fucking ABYSMAL. You can make more than that afk at ice giants killing green con mobs. People being terrible at farming doesn't make an overpowered item less overpowered.

 

[Spiritplx]

This is a game where the more time you put into it, the better your character becomes. Why should casual players have the same opportunities that people who play the game a lot have? Doesn't really make any sense at all to me. I am not trying to talk down to you, but that is kind of how life works. The harder you work for something, the better the reward.

Also, please don't talk shit about people having no lives. I for one have a full time job and raid when I get off of work to relax. Just because your life may be more hectic than others, it doesn't mean other people "don't have lives". It is just tired bullshit people always say when they cannot invest as much time, or otherwise do not make their time efficient while playing a game. We all have shit to do, you are not special.

The developers know not everyone can raid. That is why there ARE dropable items that are very good and other non-TS items that are on that same tier. However, this is NO reason that all items should be equal just to make it easier on the casual person. You can do basically all exp. zones with no issues using full TS gear (save for HHK royals/basement, FR, and Rust factory).

Saying something should not be changed to protect the casual player is a pretty :dumb: statement in my opinion.

 

[Skorge]

This is a game where the more time you put into it, the better your character becomes. Why should casual players have the same opportunities that people who play the game a lot have? Doesn't really make any sense at all to me. I am not trying to talk down to you, but that is kind of how life works. The harder you work for something, the better the reward.

Also, please don't talk shit about people having no lives. I for one have a full time job and raid when I get off of work to relax. Just because your life may be more hectic than others, it doesn't mean other people "don't have lives". It is just tired bullshit people always say when they cannot invest as much time, or otherwise do not make their time efficient while playing a game. We all have shit to do, you are not special.

The developers know not everyone can raid. That is why there ARE dropable items that are very good and other non-TS items that are on that same tier. However, this is NO reason that all items should be equal just to make it easier on the casual person. You can do basically all exp. zones with no issues using full TS gear (save for HHK royals/basement, FR, and Rust factory).

Saying something should not be changed to protect the casual player is a pretty :dumb: statement in my opinion.

You are making it out like TS armor is the end-all, be all, and it's not. Put a character who raids 24/7 next to a casual character. I gaurantee you that player who raids 24/7 won't have any TS armor on, so why are you arguing?

I just don't get it. You are sitting here trying to tell me that TS armor is the best shit in the game it sounds, at least that is the way you are arguing.

 

[Syalara]

Lol man you sit here and tell people not get your panties in a bunch when it is you that seems is the most upset of all. You sit here and defend up and down about this issue.

I just don't understand your logic, really.

First of all, you must have no clue on how it is to be a casual player. Obviously you must have a lot of time on your hands to be able to play a video game 24/7. I'm going to give you the benefit of the doubt and assume you aren't aware of the fact that there are people out there who play MMORPGs that have lifes -- people who are married, have children, have jobs, have friends, like to exercise, and other hobbies.

To these casual gamers time is everything. It's not about skill, plat, or anything else - it's about time. We casual gamers just can't log in for 8 hours a day and thus we can not raid. So, because of time issues we are unable to acquire the best gear in the game.

That is why they made TS armor - to subsitute for raid gear - to help us casual gamers fit in and feel strong, because let's face it: a good chunk of this server's population is the level 65+ folks.

Who cares if its as good as tier 1 or 2 or 3 gear. Screw it, just let us casual gamers have that and be done with it.

So my question is why do people like you have to be ruin it for people like us. I mean there has to be a reason you are defending this decision up and down. Is it because you wear full TS armor and really think its too powerful? Let's turn the situation around and pretend it is YOU who are the casul player and have full TS armor.

Then would you be arguing for the nerf or against it?

If you think this is me being upset at something....guess again.

If you think every raider plays 8 hours a day...guess again.

If you think bitching about upcoming changes without having a clue what the end result of the changes will be is worth anything...guess again.

I used to be decked in full SS btw, pre double augs. I have been playing this game long enough and have raided/soloed/duoed/grouped this server up and down, I have played casually and hardcore and not at all at times. Do not make assumptions about me or my playstyle.

I can tell you SS helped me back then to essentially skip tiers cause when I joined my current guild as there was no need to backfarm items for me......again, this was pre double augs. I also argued against double augs in the first place cause of what I knew firsthand about SS. I still stand by that for shadowsilk atleast, Tempus thinks otherwise and wants to keep 2 slots. Fine. So be it.

If all you casual folks care about is time, how is this change gonna effect anything? Are you suddenly not gonna be able to log in at all? You say you dont care about plat or skills or this and that but you sure seem to care alot about a few points of stats here and there.

You say it should be ignored that TS'd items can be the equal to or better then or 'close enough' to tiers 1-3 raid drops. How can you justify this? Ya casual players have less time, we all get that. So you think they all should have access to raiding level gear that others have to spend months to acquire? Why? Just cause?

 

[Danku]

I really cannot think of a single reason that this thread should not be deleted. No reasonable seeming position will stand. No examples count as anything. No one seems to be listening to anything that does not agree with the position they already hold.

There seems to be 2 positions in this.

1) TS is too powerful! (people who are past TS armor)

2) Don't nerf it! (people who use TS armor)

Changes will be made. In fact, I will say that changes NEED to be made. And yes, I use a ton of the TS armors. But of the changes that need made, not a single one has been truly discussed. It has all been, "You havent read what I wrote." People, they can read it and still not agree. Goes for both sides of this issue. It does not mean they ignored it, it means they do not agree and that is totally different.

I hope for everyone's sake that some of the people that these changes willl affect, will be spoken to and listened to. Going into a discussion while having your decision made is a waste of time. At this point, this thread is 95% wasted time and should be trashed for it.

 

[Syalara]

I am shocked it lasted this long. I agree with ^^

 

[Tyvec-a-tron]

Did not realize you were stalking me.

No one ever does.

Ughh too many posts to respond to.

Nwaij, I think you misunderstood my point about the gear levels, and I obviously mentioned FR/HK/Rust gear a few posts ago.

Tyrone, I wasn't referring to people joining higher end guilds as bypassing content, as that's limited to a single or handful of people. There are ways to bypass content as a guild.

I think your point about Fusion using the gear to move quickly is my biggest quarrel with this thread. Regardless of its relative power in the early raid tiers, many of the higher end players in this thread had to opportunity to excel using this gear, but once they're done with it it needs a change. Do as I say, not as I do and all that jazz.

Finally, lets use the real life example of this bypassing tier. I can sort of see it in regards to Shadowsilk, but Deepmetal and Imp Hide? Look at some of the low tier drops- Husrag's Helm > DM Plate, AWT's Visor > DM plate, Dbalsh Legs > Imp Hide, and D and VD map gear is easily as good as its tradeskill counterparts and is no higher than tier 2 difficulty at best. Yea, not every piece of DM/IH/SS has a counterpart in every tier (or every few tiers even), but how is that the fault of the TS armor? I would go out on a limb and say that people who are using SS in a tier 6 or higher guild have either passed on gear or been passed on gear or there isn't a comparative piece in the same slot to fill to that point (which I find unlikely, and the fault wouldn't lie on the TS armor in any case). It's pretty clear that TS armor is surpassed in overall <set> quality by Tier 4 (even earlier for everything but SS), but there isn't a piece to replace every slot for every class combo by then or even for a while. This is compounded by the fact that a guild gets what they need out of a tier to move on, then bump up to tougher stuff.

 

[Spiritplx]

The thing is (I AM ASSUMING HERE OMG), I do not think Imp Hide will be brought down as much as the other items (mainly shadowsilk). All the TS armor will probably be reduced in power level slightly, but it should mostly be SS.

Also, not sure when I said TS armor is the best in the game (because I know this is false), but for how easy it is to obtain (yes, you can SOLO your way to get it), AND the fact it is dropable (ohi twinks) it is just a little bit too powerful. I am not saying make it crap that no one will use. No one here is saying that. We all (the people who think it should be changed) think that the power level of the armor can be scaled back a bit. If it loses 15-20mana but gains a few stats here and there...this will really not destroy your gaming experience. It is the same reason I wouldn't care if they did not change it. I wouldn't have cried about them not nerfing it saying "I DON'T WANT COMPETITION NERF ALL THE LOWER TIERS LOL", I would have just said that it needed looked at (like I did in my OP). Seriously, if you really think this is about a Steel member worried about Tier 0-5 guilds as competition, think again. Lots of people have been thinking about this armor for a long time, I am just the first one to write about it on the forums. Now I can see why no one did it in the past....

 

[Tyvec-a-tron]

So I had a thought. Instead of perpetuating a pretty much fruitless discussion, I have a suggestion. What if the double augged armor could be made to not accept 2 of the same types of augs (mana/mana, not EQ/HQ type)? This would reduce the usefulness of SS without the dual mana augs but would keep the functionality. Since SS is going to bring your wis/int to the soft cap for the most part anyways, it would be less effective to have a mana/wis or mana/int combo on it, but it would also give people the incentive to customize more based around their character's needs. Not sure if this would actually help or not, but it might.

 

[Spiritplx]

So I had a thought. Instead of perpetuating a pretty much fruitless discussion, I have a suggestion. What if the double augged armor could be made to not accept 2 of the same types of augs (mana/mana, not Game/HQ type)? This would reduce the usefulness of SS without the dual mana augs but would keep the functionality. Since SS is going to bring your wis/int to the soft cap for the most part anyways, it would be less effective to have a mana/wis or mana/int combo on it, but it would also give people the incentive to customize more based around their character's needs. Not sure if this would actually help or not, but it might.

Yay for suggestions! I like this, I am just not sure if it would work (client issues, booo). However, I honestly do not think they will take 30mana off of each item, so in the long run, this change might be even more detrimental than what they might change it to (however, they might just totally destroy the armor and remove even more mana, but I doubt that).

Though I like this change, I really think they want the aug slots to be used for customization and not for "forced" customization. Though for a balancing aspect this would be nice, it also restricts players from using the augs that they want.

So, good idea...not sure if it would work or if it would ultimately be better (cannot tell until we see the changes), but I really like the change of pace of coming up with ideas!

 

[robopirateninja]

I think your point about Fusion using the gear to move quickly is my biggest quarrel with this thread. Regardless of its relative power in the early raid tiers, many of the higher end players in this thread had to opportunity to excel using this gear, but once they're done with it it needs a change. Do as I say, not as I do and all that jazz.

We knew it was overpowered for the difficulty in getting it, that's why we used it. If you look back a couple months I advised that all low-tier guilds do the same, if they're interested in advancing in raid content quickly.

You're right, nobody goes out of their way to hurt themselves, but that doesn't make the problem any less one that needs to be addressed.

 

[moghedancarns]

A wizard with ports to OSM and everfrost and both camps will over 5 hour average 750-900 pp after selling the loot. You might get a nice run on the short, but then you get a long run of the 2pp and a giant blood.

Island Giants are 100-150 if you are fairly lucky.

Rats in DN are 150ish an hour. Goblins in the lake and Mutantions in Las are about the same. Better places are not soloable by base level 65s.



Why are the TS IS OVERPOWERED arguements always based on a TS piece with two augs vrs an unauged raid drop?