Impressions of Chapter 1 from ATS: of special interest to those who forage.

[tleilaxu]

Interesting how there have been as many posts to this thread as to the wishlist and yet we aren't getting any official response from Nevvy on the issues with patch 1. If there reasons for the changes and vision for the game are so sound and logical, why not tell their customers these things?

~Elf

And this is just within one day of the start of the thread.
How bout it Nevrax? What do you have to say?

[lazarus]

Currently, I am a lvl 105 harvester and crafter of weapons, armor, and jewlery at around Q70. I do not want to level harvest anymore, with the exception oof increasing my focus pool and regen. What I *want* is to be able to gather enough materials to advance my crafting at a decent rate.

In the current system, I have two choices: Run a 4x100 action with the -32 brick and harvest non stop (my focus drains away, but at a rate I can handle with Focus Self Heal). Or jump to a 6x100 action with -64 that I can perform TWICE. And then sit for 5 minutes. This is a no-brainer. I go with the -32. I would like to see MORE Extraction Counterparts. I would have loved something in the upper mid 20s. I would like a -40 right now. I CANNOT drive a -64, so I am stuck using the -32 until when, level 200? I have no idea.

AND THEY ARE TAKING THE -32 AWAY!?!?

This *FLOORS* me. Completely baffled. The only message I can glean from this: "We want you to sit down". I am not interested in sitting down. Thanks, done that enough in other games. Why cripple the system that defines your game as unique and different?

I didnt log in last night for the first time in weeks. I figure: Why bother? I will wait patiently for the patch. I will respec my character. I will evaluate the changes. I am 90% confident I will find the new system unplayable and that will be about the end of it. I see how fast Nevrax moves. The changes made in Patch 1 will not be "tweaked" for weeks, perhaps a month.

I am not interested in sitting down.

I might be able to help you a bit here. I'm currently level 108 in harvest and your first paragraph might as well have been written by me

If you can, try the following action:
Gentle speed 2
Gentle rate 3
Gentle quality 4
Terrain brick appropriate for where you're digging
-64 Credit brick

Take a 35 second source time and whatever other goodies you want. My prospect action uses a -125 credit.

You should have the same 1200 focus as me, and max regen. I also have a +400 self heal focus.

With the setup listed above, I can pull three q100 mats per source almost non stop (maybe 15 to 20 seconds between sources), and with the stanzas source mode is irrelevant, you'll get 3 out every time with virtually no blowups.

I'm hoping this will still work for me after the patch, as I can pull a stack or two an hour easy and it's much less stressful than messing around with source modes etc.

I'm sure you know some good spots with tons of sources in a reasonable small area, and believe me, once you get going you won't look back.

Hope this helps

[mikwana]

The main problem as I see it now is that after the patch, it will no longer be possible to get 3k xp per harvest action. In both fighting and crafting that is still possible as long as you are either fighting a mob of the appropriate level, or using a mat of appropriate level.

Without mat spec, it is impossible to pull a mat high enough level to get 3k XP on your main harvest line all the time. The way the ql level is capped, you may start out getting 3k xp, but eventually as you near the ql level of the extraction you are forced to use, you end up with 1k xp per pull. At higher levels it takes at least an hour of constant harvesting to get 1 level. After the patch, expect this time to double. Is it fair to ask harvesters to spend 2 hours for 1 level?

This was a joke right? After the patch, warriors and casters will NOT be able to fight those 3K mobs. The blind exploit/bug will be fixed and damage output raised that they will die far too fast for the healers (even with doubled heals) to keep up with. Crafters can NOT make 3K per item. Even if they do get lucky and succeed if crafting something far above their level (only really possible when using a high craft from one area on another, say, 150 in heaving working on the 60 in light), the failure rate and the drastically reduced XP from failures makes it something that just doesn't happen (not in my experience anyway).

As for 2 hours for one level... that is still, IMO, flying through. that would make 500 hours till you were 'done' with nothing left to accomplish. That's less than two months for the people who are proceeding at this rate, and FAR above what the time is for the targeted player (granted that's an assumption...) But for every harvester who is flying through, there are those on the ooposite end of the bell curve who are slow while the majority sit in the middle. Those on the front of the curve will always complain about a change, those at the rear will usually champion it, and those in the middle will just shrug or nod and go along with it, and enjoy themselves at any rate.

[tleilaxu]

This was a joke right? After the patch, warriors and casters will NOT be able to fight those 3K mobs. The blind exploit/bug will be fixed and damage output raised that they will die far too fast for the healers (even with doubled heals) to keep up with. Crafters can NOT make 3K per item. Even if they do get lucky and succeed if crafting something far above their level (only really possible when using a high craft from one area on another, say, 150 in heaving working on the 60 in light), the failure rate and the drastically reduced XP from failures makes it something that just doesn't happen (not in my experience anyway).

You are talking out of your arse. I can make 3K on a heavy vest easy. Maybe not for the items YOU are making but my 26 mat heavy vest can and does regularly give 3K xp. This is for a level appropriate craft & is only logical considering XP is based upon number of mats used in the craft.

[korin77]

Ok maybe for those few painful crafts like jewelry and items with small amount of mats, it is not possible to make 3K, the thing is, its still going to be alot easier than harvesting after the patch.

As for hunting, there are those of us who did not use blind in groups and can have easily killed mobs as they are now. After the patch with double the hp? I don't know. I won't comment on that til I actually see it. One of the differences is though that people will no longer be fighting level 200+ mobs at level 100 ish without armor. Those that have leveled too high for crafters to catch up. I guess its time for you guys to harvest because until you get armor appropriate to your level, don't even think about tackling those same mobs you've been fighting.

The crafters won't catch up anytime soon with the new changes to harvesting.

[Fred1l1]

You are talking out of your arse. I can make 3K on a heavy vest easy. Maybe not for the items YOU are making but my 26 mat heavy vest can and does regularly give 3K xp. This is for a level appropriate craft & is only logical considering XP is based upon number of mats used in the craft.

Hm ok now whos talking out the arse eh?

ONE part out of over 50 plans gives 3k exp...not everyone wants to craft heavy armor for just the 3k xp...

3k trollery exp for you

[raynes]

Interesting how there have been as many posts to this thread as to the wishlist and yet we aren't getting any official response from Nevvy on the issues with patch 1. If there reasons for the changes and vision for the game are so sound and logical, why not tell their customers these things?

~Elf

1) Why in the world would Nevrax respond to people complaining about a patch that isn't even on the live server yet?
2) The worst thing they could do is try to justify or explain their thinking to the players. Why? Because no matter what they say people will complain and cry nerf.
3) Your under the assumption that the boards somehow represent the playerbase. They do not. The people who visit the boards are a minority.

And this is the kicker of all the posts I read:

At this point, the leaders of the largest guilds in the game (possibly excepting Heaven's Flame and EoA) have expressed extreme concern at the current state of events.

I knew this would happen and I knew you and your guild would be front and center. This idea that somehow the concerns and goals of larger guilds should have some say in game development and game policy. It happens every game. Well I have news for you, in no way do the developers or Nevrax owe you, your guild, or any player (including myself) and explaination or justification of what they are doing.

And just to make things clear for you and the leaders of the largest guilds in the game. You do not equal the game population. You do not represent what the game population wants. In fact no in game group represents what the game population wants. You might think you do, but I can assure you that you do not.

[tleilaxu]

Hm ok now whos talking out the arse eh?

ONE part out of over 50 plans gives 3k exp...not everyone wants to craft heavy armor for just the 3k xp...

3k trollery exp for you

There's other plans lamer. If you read I was giving an example. Go leard to read.

[shrike]

While I agree with you on both counts, I will also point out that both the material specializations for harvesters and blind for fighters have ALWAYS worked as they do now. It has not been an exploit the blind did not work as it should and the specialities did. It was a failure of the Dev Team to focus on the right things. ...

Never said it was something else. Still, I hear it a LOT that people say that foraging needs to be improved so crafters can lvl as fast as fighters mages but overlook conveniently that the lvling speed of fighter/mages was abnormal, not the lvling speed of (weapon) crafters.

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About the 3k crafting issue. Heavy vests/pants do give 3k, but that doesn't really matter. Because, as tleilaxu said, crafting exp is dependant on lvl. So, you will need the same amount of mats (meaning the same time for foraging, hunting or same amount of dappers to buy them) for three 1k exp pieces or one 3k exp piece. The actual crafting time is quite neglegible.

With exeptions, of cource. Earring vs heavy west is a difference in the lvling speed just from crafting by the factor of around 20! Because of this I doubt we'll see any high jewelcrafters, that tree is simply way too tendious to lvl. Small weapons like daggers or light armor isn't much better there.

[gecker]

If I recall correctly, Nevrax said they expected it would take 6 months playing 30 hours a week to top out at level 250 when the game was released. With the initial easy foraging in PR, source mode changing, mat extract specialization, the source mode macro exploit, standing two steps back, sitting down etc its more like 6 weeks that some are reaching 250. So is it any surprise that foraging is getting a major overhaul? Foraging is unsustainable in its present state. I'm sure there will be some higher levels leaving because of patch 1, but then again some would probably have been leaving in a few weeks anyways because they topped out at 250 and had nothing else to look forward to.

As for me, I have the option to go to some of the higher q mat areas, but I see no need. I'm harvesting near my current level and am supplying mats suitable for my level of crafting. After playing on ATS, the changes in patch 1 don't seem to affect my style of playing much. If anything, they benefit me since now I can move up incrementally in steps of 10 instead of the current steps of 50.