Information I scrounged from VG's forums about Crafting : Vanguard Discussion

This list of FAQ's was originally posted by Ringarion, if someone else has already done this then please feel free to flame me all you wish. I just have not seen this in an easy to find location for the new forum members so I thought I would post it.

Again, major kudos to Ringarion for compiling this for everyone.

1/ Can a person master more than one skill in crafting?
You can master 2 skills one is your primary and one is your secondary. Secondary trades will grant you basic recipes for that particular trade.

In regards to crafting your character will have a crafting level and a primary and secondary trade.
Here is a list of the crafting trades that will exist in V:SOH

Herbalist: Potions and infusion
Blacksmith: Metal weapons, armor, vehicular and structural components
Woodcrafter: Wooden Structures, vehicles, furniture and weapon/armor components
Stonecrafter: Jewelry, structural, furniture, focus items
Outfitter: cloth and leather armor and armor components and bags

1b/ You said Vehicular and structural... could you elaborate?

We will have craftable vehicles and buildings in regards to player cities. The blacksmith will help make thes things possible.

1c/ 7. In reference to the list of classes you posted are those the names of just the base classes or both the base and specialization classes?
Those are the 5 trades for Vanguard, each one of those has 2 specialty trades within it that can be chosen.

1d/ does primary/secondary refer to the specializations? In other words, if I choose to be a blacksmith, and specialize in armor, weaponsmith would automatically be my secondary? Or does primary/secondary refer to two different professions?
Two different professions

2/ Can a person master ALL skills in crafting granted they had an infinite amount of time to do so?
>>No

3/ Will it be VERY hard to master a given skill (I.E. swordsmithing)
>>Crafting is a sphere meant to be as involved as adventuring which means become a max level crafter will take approximately as much time as becoming a max level adventurer.

4/ If i am making a piece of armor that is a fine piece of very expensive platemail, will the successful end result always yield the same piece of armor? or is there a touch of randomness that allows one to have a lucky roll and get a superior piece?
>>You control how well you do. Producing a superior piece of equipment is based on the decisions you made during the process and how well you managed the problems that appeared. You make the decisions when you craft and produce an item based on how good or bad you did.

5/ are there any possibilities for a divine creation, like a masterpiece, or something touched by the gods that give whatever your trying to make a LOT better than the piece you were trying to create?
E. The concept of masterpiece items will exist in someway. Not exactly how you described but there will be a notion of it.

6/ Is the system difficult? or is it just a grab the wood, put it in box, grab the ore, put it in box, hit combine?
The system is much more involved then that. Crafting has three stage refining, finishing and assembly. Since most assembled items require different materials item assembly will require interaction with other crafters.
As far as the other two parts of the process they are more involved and based on your skills and decisions. You need to decide what you want to use during the process and you have to actively make decisions based on the situation. Do I continue to pump the bellows and try to get my heat to the required temperature, am I going to get rid of this complication that has come up or am I going to try to discover a recipe by adding this material and seeing what happens.
Our system is a turned based contest that will require a bit of strategy if you want to produce the best items consistently. Skill are also a big part of it as they skills you choose to raise within your crafting trade can grant you access to more powerful remedies or higher level expendables.
Tools are also important part of the process as differing levels of tools can help you work your material more effectively so you can save your precious action points and get through the process safely.

There will also be inspiration that is gained based on how well you do during crafting. This inspiration is a pool that you can build up and use it during the crafting process or to enhance your chances of successfully experimenting on an item.

7/ are there craftable items that require the aid of a magic user to imbue the item?
H. There will be aspects of this, but most imbuing will be done through the crafting trades that specialize in doing that like the imbuer specialist that is a branch off of the herbalist tree.

8/ How are you eliminating the tedious-ness of crafting items over and over?
>>Crafting recipes are each made up of a different set of actions you have to perform in a particular order. Each of these actions cost and take from a pool that is known as the action pool. The max amount of action points available vary with each recipe. While your are crafting and performing these actions you will have problems arise that can affect many aspects of the process. You can have up to three of these on you at a time and which ones will occur is based on the crafting station you are using, its quality, the recipe and the material you are using.
So the low quality furnace in Tursh may be more susceptible to problems like cracking crucible or furnace. While, because you are working copper, you run into a problem that you never see when working iron.

Crafting the same items over and over will be resolved by the work order system which will focus more on the crafter helping to fill the needs of a city while advancing down different paths and getting access to different recipes. So Blacksmith A could have a set of recipes that are completely different from Blacksmith B at the same level and skill due to the choices they made as they increased their skills and produced items for a location.

9/ Will there be a way for crafters to customize finnished items they have created ?
Yes this will be possible, through something you actively decide to do during the process (decide to shape your sword blade like a katana instead of a long sword) or as a part of experimentation.

10/ will our chosen class, race have any impact on our crafting abilities ?
No

11/Will you have to be a certain level in combat to achieve certian levels in crafting? ie... are they systematicly separate but you will need to have a certain combat level to be able get to specific materials to craft... etc...
No, each sphere of gameplay in Vanguard exists on its own. Adventurers are not required to craft to excel and crafters are not required to adventure or harvest to excel.

12/How does gear affect the crafting?
Crafters will use almost as many equipment slots as adventurers. This gear will grant bonuses much like adventuring. The tool belt will determine how many tools the crafter can have ready during a crafting process

13/ There have been hints that craftable items will not be on par with the looted items, is this true?
The best items in game will require all three spheres to participate. Can a crafter make an item that is on par with the looted sword from Nagafen’s long lost cousin. Possibly but it will take as much effort to get that sword crafted as it does to defeat that dragon. I will not allow crafting to be some back way for players to get epic items with minimal effort.

14/ Will there be critical fails on assembly of an item?
Right now assembly is a guaranteed combine as long as the recipe exists. We believe in the idea of time vested. If you invested the time it took to get to that point then we will give you an item that is equal to that amount of time with no chance of losing it.

15/ Will there be strong interdependency between crafters is?
If all I am asking you to do is be a crafter and I am telling you that it will be as involved as adventuring then interdependence has to exist. At some point the adventuring warriro is going to need his friends to help him do something same goes for crafting.

Part of the reason I decided to add the secondary trade concept was to help crafters produce items if they are unable to find or purchase the needed components. Excelling at crafting will be possible through the work order system where you will not be required to be interdependent and you are not filling your inventory with a bunch of useless items that you end up giving away ruining the market for a lower level crafter who just learned how to make that item and is interested in selling it.

16/ Silius, you mentioned tools, is the idea to be something based on different types of the same tool producing better results?

Yes the apprentice hammer and the mighty hammer of shaping are both hammers but the hammer of shaping is more effective and could possibly be required to execute a particular action.

17/ Are tools above the beginning levels crafted?

There will be tools that can be crafted and much like other items tools can be enhanced, but not all tools will be acquired in this way.

18/ Can tools have imbued effects, I.E. as in bronze axe of foresting?
Yes

19/ So I'm I correct in my thinking that the act of crafting itself will be a "mini-game."
If so, is it turn-based? (>The metal starts to melt, what would you like to do now?) Or more of a "twitch" system?
Turn based, with a possible option of making some recipes time based.

20/ How exactly does harvesting fit in. Is it a subskill of the crafting sphere or is it available to all three? Are any of the harvesting subtypes something that can be mastered...or does mastering them preclude mastery of the normal crafting trades?
Harvesting is available to all characters and is linked more to adventuring. It is not attached to the crafting sphere.

21/ I've heard mention of resource qualities in several other threads. Can you go into more detail about this? Is it a very general quality like low, medium and high grade ore or will there be an entire set of stats for resources that effect the final items built with those resources like SWGs resources?
There will be resource grades. Resources themselves do not have a set of statistics, but there is a relationship of what a resource adds to an item based on different item types.

22/ You confirmed in this thread that it would be possible to customize crafted items with a guild crest. Can you elaborate a bit more? Will it be more on par with WoWs tabbards or something more subtle like the embossed outfit Aragorn wore when he took his army to the Black gates of Mordor?
I am sorry if I implied that we would be doing something specific like guild crests. That as of yet has not been decided upon. Customizing items will exist as I described it before and every item made will have a maker’s mark on it.

23/ Will there be a place in game where crafters can go to find work orders posted by other players and likewise post their availability? This would serve as a guaranteed work system that would be far better than watching an auction channel spamming by or trying to read 10 different messageboards.
Posted work orders by other players is an interesting idea. But I want to make sure we don’t create an environment where there is a bunch of faceless interaction. Buying things from an auction house removes that aspect of shouting out an auction and actually talking to and interacting with other players thus meeting people and gaining friends.
You bring up a good point though and we want to keep you in game as much as possible when you are actually playing so that is something we will have to discuss in further detail.

24/ You mentioned in this thread that you could "opt out" of a particular class. Can you elaborate on that? Will you be giving up all skill gained to date on the class you dropped or could you just relegate the skill to your secondary skill and just drop down to being able to create the basic recipes for that skill?
The plan now is that you will remove your skills and start on a new path but you will retain your crafting level and attributes. Shifting your primary to a secondary and losing all recipes but the basic ones is a possibility.

25/ Will there be a ranking system and subsequent visible title system for crafters? For example Pirotess the Apprentice, Journeyman, ... Master, Grand Master Armorer?
Yes there will be multiple ways to get crafting titles

26/ If Blacksmiths A and B of the same level might have different recipe books, I’d like to know the chances of their books being significantly different.
The chances are good. There will be multiple points where you decied the path to take as far as recipe acquirement. There will still be a set of recipes that are a part of the crafting trade no matter which path you take.

27/ It sounds like you are going to allow us to manipulate shapes and colors, thus creating uniforms (without actual designs) – did I interpret that correctly?
Colors I am not so sure of, if we do allow for tinting it would be to a very limited degree and would be something you don’t change afterwards.

28/ You said that the expense of legendary crafting is finding the recipe (ie, burning resources experimenting) once the recipe is found… where is the risk?
Not sure I understand what you are saying. There is always risk no matter what you do. The farther you get into a recipe the more you stand to lose as you could run out of action points and lose everything you have used up to that point. Legendary recipes will not be easy to craft.

29/ If deconstruction is put in… what is to stop me from taking apart and putting back together the same thing just to gain skill and save money?
You will not gain skill from doing that.

30/ Are work orders a risk free way to make money?
Work orders could possibly grant a money reward but it will not be a significant one, work orders are mean to provide a way to raise skill, level and faction. You never know what dues you will ah veto pay as a crafter, using the forge of the city guildmaster may cost or you may have some city dues in general that you ah veto pay. The cash rewards for work orders will not be a way to get rich. Yes you can fail at completing a work order much like you can fail at any crafting process. How well you do determines how good your reward.

31/ Will I be able to become a master crafter at level 1. Without any adventuring. I know you said that they are independent of each other, but basically every game has a “cap” of either gathering resources or combining items that are directly related to the level you are. Can I just create a fat looking orc and set out to get my own little blacksmith house (granted I’d have to be rich for that) and become a master blacksmith?
You do not have to be an adventurer to become a max level crafter.

32/ Will there be some aspect of “spellcrafting” where you can make scrolls with enchancements (again, techniques that will add different abilities to the same spell. Fireball with extra damage, or snare, or stun. All up to what the player wants. Making a caster not only be a generic caster, but able to add to his skills as well depending on what he wants?
Crafters will not be a part of ability creation. Not to say that we cannot do it, but after discussing it with Darrin (our combat systems designer) we don’t feel it is something we want to do right now.
But : Enhancing armor and weapons affects all adventurers not just melee, so yes adding a fire gem to your staff may increase the power of all fire spells you cast, where it may add a fire proc to a sword.

33/ Silius, what about item wear/degradation? Will it exist in Vanguard and will crafters be needed to repair the damage? If so, what is to prevent the crafter from running off with your weapon?
No item degredation will exist in Vanguard.

34/ Will fishing be a type of gathering, or will there be no such skill in Vanguard (not needing food after all)?
Fishing will not be a part of the standard harvesting mechanic.
++No food and drink too, no cooking.

35/ Will there be any other freestanding structures that we can build (with functionality) other than buildings?
Hopefully things like statues maybe walls I don’t know this is stuff that needs to be hammered down.

36/ What are the effects of a higher quality forge? Do they simply allow more to be done on that forge, or do they have actual effects on the final product?
Forges affect how well you can execute actions, the severity and chance of complications, the quantity of an item you can work per process (yes you can throw more then on piece of ore in at a time) and they can possibly affect how many slots are available on your crafting inventory.

37/ Will there be any type of planting skill for herbalism. where you plant a seed and a plant grows over time (I recall seeing a screenshot of small plants coming out of a field in a Kojan village) ? In that vein, will players be able to produce any resources of their own, or will resource collection be only from the envionment.
Only from environment atm

38/ Can we expect to see tradeskill components coming off of non-epic creatures or will they be exclusively from the environment? If they are environment only, what is the reason for adding them to epic mobs but not more normal mobs? Many games are creative in using creature drops in their crafting, that make sense (Carapace armor, Bone armor, etc).
Certain recipes may ask for components from creatures, but they will all require a harvested resource when you are producing an item that will be used by a player

39/ How many types of gathering skills are there; and do they each have their own skillset? If so, does higher skill basically give you access to higher "level" resources (ex: You cannot collect this resource unless you have 45 in x skill).
We do not stop you from trying to harvest a material. If you want to try to harvest a tree that is way beyond your abilities as a harvester you will fail in your attempts

40/ Will crafters be able to create their own workstations or will players be using stationary crafting sites.
Both

41/ How does the shape/look of a piece of armor/weaponry occur? Are we given a list of appearances to chose from based on our decisions, or do the decisions we make solely determine the final graphic of the weapon.
Based off of actions you decide to use during the shaping process

42/ I believe I read that some recipes will be gained automatically by leveling. Is there any reason for this, as the adventurer sphere (specifically casters and spells) has gone away from the automatic spell gain to more creative ways of learning spells.
Nowhere have I said you automatically get recipes. The only way a recipe will be added to your book without you interacting with an npc is if you discover it through the crafting process

43/ I don't know if this can be gone into further, but will we see item augmentation similar to EQ1's LDON (or Diablo-style) augments (where a gem with x stats can be added onto y armor stacking the effects of both the gem and the armor onto the final product).
There will be ways to enhance items, but it will not work like LDoN

44/ Will we see crafting groups in terms of item creation (such as creating a boat or a house) or will grouping be just for gathering.
Yes you will.

45/ In terms of environment interaction we've heard of instances where a crafter might need to build a bridge or pick through a collapsed cave; are these still doable in your current crafting system? If so, how often can we expect to see a crafter related obstacle while adventuring (to get to secret areas perhaps)? Will this be more of a rare occurance or a common thing?
The ability to craft a bridge could be done, if we have plans for it still I cannot say. Removing a cave in would be done through harvesting skill, making a bridge not sure but this system can definitely support it.

46/ Will crafters be able to imbue spell effects into an item such as right click effects (ex: Journeyman Boots in EQ1), and constant effects (such as focus and regeneration).Yes

47/ How are the item names determines? Are the recipe names set in the game or is the name generated based on the ingredients used and the final quality of the item? Will the crafter ever have any say in what the item is called (ex: You have a fire gem you are going to add to a sword, you have the option of adding the following to the beginning of the name: [Fiery], [Flaming], [Scorching], [Blistering] Blade of X).
Customizing the name of an item we wont be doing, the item will receive its name from its parts.

48/ Will a majority of components needed for recipes be from gathered resources of will merchants carry the bulk of the common components?
Expendables will be something you purchase (flux, and charcoal)
Harvested resources will make up the rest of it

49/ Will we be seeing tier resources, ala EQ2, where, for example, there is 1 type of root, 1 type of wood, 1 type of stone, 1 type of herb that you can obtain from a certain gathering skill range, to be used on a similar crafting range? (As in, from level 1 - 5 you need a blue root for most of your recipes, that can be gathered from newbie areas 1 - 5; from 6 - 10 you need a red root that can be gathered from level areas 6 - 10).
Resources will have upgrades and increase in number as you enter higher level areas

50/ Will tools degrade with use and need to be repaired? Also, can we expect to see different looks with different tools similar to the way that weapons have different looks based on rarity/etc. (ex: Flaming Axe of Foresting would look different than a common ax).
Tools do have a nothing of degrading. It is actually more like having charges. Some tool actions will take 3 charges from the tool where as others may take only one. If you deplete this tool you can still use it at a penalty that gets worse and worse everytime.
Tools will have different looks where it is appropiate much like adventuring.

51/ Will there be any types of crafting raids in the game? If so, could you describe a theoretical situation where this might occur?
There may be a situation where you have to go to the bottom of the dungeon in order to forge a powerful blade. While this is happening spirits spawn to stop you so your adventuring friends must hold them off while you try to complete the recipe.

52/ A big concern for myself, and probably others; Will crafting involve alot monotonous clicking or will most of the effort be done by our brains (as in, you have to think about what you're going to click more than just mashing the same few buttons to get through a creation cycle (ala EQ2))? My main concern with EQ2's system was that crafting a quality component could take up to 5 minutes of clicking the same couple buttons over and over at a workstation (though a "minigame") to try and "beat" a progress bar that was always going down (you trying to keep it up, and make it increase). It got to the point where my hand would start burning if crafting for more than an hour and made me completely quit crafting altogether.
Our crafting is a mingame that involves thinking and character skill. It will take as long as you wan tit because it is all turn based. If you want to make quick decisions then that is up to you.

53/ How will recipe books be organized? Will players be able to manually organize and create their own lists or will the game do this for us?
There should be plenty of filters for recipe books that will allow you to organize it in many ways. I want to also get a notes portion added to the recipe book

54/ In regards to furniture is it actually going to have a peupose besides as decoration in your home?
Furniture will have a use.

I didn't compile this just posted and cleaned up, enjoy!

Loraik

nice info