Will Crafted Items Stop Dropping in Hunting Loot?

Just wondering if the crafted guns will ever stop dropping in hunting loot? Its kind of the only part of the economy i don't really get in Arkadia. Everything that drops in loot is also crafted. And the drop rates on stuff are also pretty high. Now i've personnally loved having items drop like crazy here more then i'm used to on "other" planets. But i also feel bad for crafters. It has almost made all arkadia guns MU value drop to almost TT value they all seem to be at max 120% now and a lot of them dont even sell on auction. The market is almost flooded with ark weapons now.

I just wonder will things shift eventually? I've always thought that it would work that you would have like a 50/50 crafted and looted guns in the SIB skill progress? like you buy a crafted only gun for level 5 to 10 but buy a looted only gun for level 10 to 15 sort of situation?

I"m not really agaist stuff being closer to TT value but just being able to move product for a little % is better then crafters having to TT most of what they make which is what it's starting to look like out there.

What are your guys thoughts?

 

Very interested in Dev's response on this. As a hunter and crafter, I'm not sure what answer I want to hear. It's nice to loot items with MU that actually sell - and I think weapons do sell. But it does make it tougher to break even when crafting as hunters can afford to sell looted weapons for less than the cost to craft them.

Armour is a slightly different situation. Main issue there is lack of demand even though the armour is very good. Am often not real happy to see armour in loot as I know I will probably have to TT it. I can craft some armour but generally dont as there isnt room in my booth to hold complete sets and its too risky to list on auction. If SFE can get their costs worked out, we might see demand for Arkadian armour improve and then it will be worth looting also.

Regards,
KikkiJikki

 

If there is an excess of looted guns, it will drive the crafted price down. If there are not enough looted guns, it will increase the MU of crafted ones. But the other factor is that if MU goes too high, they become less economical to use and people will use off-world guns instead.

 

Hi,

difficult topic. Neil mentioned the main problem already - the MU has to be finely balanced, or it hurts one side, or the other.
Whereas Arkadian weapons should be quite suitable for the export, so I could imagine the crafters (that create most of the full TT ones) might maybe survive a slightly lower MU on Arkadia. But this is speculation.

What I liked was the way as it was on Calypso, where there was different series of weapons, one looted, one crafted. Breer & Ryker, Breer and Korss, for instance.

Allow me to go into "wildly speculating mode", and formulate a few ideas about it. Be warned, there will be theses that will make you go berserk; this is not for the faint of heart:

1. Not exactly topic, but all ranged weapons have a much too low MU. There should be no MU on ranged weapons below at least 150%, else all melee weapons are automatically overprized - melee weapons don't use TT available ammo, so the MU is payed for the complete cost of use, while the MU on ranged weapons only touches a rather small percentage of the cost of use.
   But this is a system wide problem, and only mentioned for the sake of completeness.
   .
2. Making the initial weapons (the 1*series) available as loot, as crafted, and as TT purchasable makes the BP's for those quite useless. Why craft a LAW-101 (L) when I can buy one from TT? Just a waste of the MU of the ingredients.
   I'd love to see a toned-down version of the 101 in the TT instead, maybe as "LAW Trainer V.2", maybe even UL, matching the dam/sec and the dam/pec of the Opalo.
   
   This would give a meaning to the crafting of the initial weapons, and to the looting one of them. Used the laser carbine as example, same for the other inital weapons.
   .
3. Imagine a twitch in the storyline ending the availability of any Herman and MAKO products in loot - IFN finally succeeds to uncover the groups within these companies that are providing the smugglers with a part of the production, losing contraband all over the planet due to daily casualties.
   For sure, the smugglers would need to find a replacement for the deliveries, and would start an own rogue company:
   • In loot we'd now find the weapons from the Smuggler company, for sure every now and then they'd lose a transport. IFN is everywhere. These weapons would be a bit more advanced, a bit better stats.
   • The crafted Herman and MAKO products are now unrivaled. The don't hit the quality of the looted guns, but are always full TT (if desired) and widely available.
   • And now the trick: The looted guns would have a slightly higher MU then the crafted ones. A point for the hunters.
     And with clever balancing the drop rate of the looted guns the MU of the crafted ones can be adjusted, and be kept at a satisfying level. A point for the crafters.
     As long as the crafters don't flood the market too much - but then the loot rate of key minerals can be adjusted. A point for the miners and traders.

Yes, I know, there will be a lot of missing links in what I wrote. It just "wild speculation", lacks any deeper thought, and might cause the end of the world as we know it.


But maybe there's some ideas in it that could be interesting.


Have a good time!

 

1. Theres a reason I dont bother crafting melee....
2. When I started crafting here it was on the TT weapons and armour - to skill up and get bps. They are cheap enough to grind and then TT. Cant afford to do that for the other weapons.
3. Interesting storyline. If the drop rate is high enough it will still screw with crafted weapon MU but as you said, its a balancing act.

 

Borrowing from my EVE online experience on this, the solution may be quite simple.

In EVE, the loot is mostly the bare bone version of an item, and majority, 100% in most cases, of the more advanced version of the said item is crafted by players.

So to apply this concept for EU and Arkadia, what can be done is introduce a "trainer' series of the item, and set it to reduced ability, such as lower TT and stats, and/or no attachments. With this, using weapons as an example, we now have 5 levels to a given series, CAP-101 Trainer, CAP-101/A/D/J. With this, make the trainer loot only, and all the others crafted only.

By doing so, no matter how much trainers are dropped from the loot, it will not effect the supply for the advanced crafted versions. The limited ability of the trainer will encourage the player to switch to the advanced versions. The market price of the crafted versions, will now be 100% dependent of the supply and demand. The lower TT of the trainer will also prevent it from effecting the demand for the advanced versions when we have excessive supply.

jc

 

Sorry jim, not liking that one. In our efforts to help crafters I don't really wanted to see hunters screwed over and thats what that feels like to me. Substandard weapons sound like TT food.

 

The hunters can still do whatever they are doing because of the availability of the trainer version, ie: cap101T, cap202T, cap303T, and so on ...

Let me use an example from EVE to show why advanced versions should not be in the loot. For easier understanding, I will use EU terms to show the example. There was a TT+4 ship engine booster that was market priced at 14m, the lower TT+3 version was priced around 1m. In one of the updates, EVE added the TT+4 booster into the loot and that created a mess in the market within two weeks. That TT+4 booster dropped from 14m down to less then 250k in two weeks. Many crafters lost big time because of this "non-player controlled" supply availability into the economy. This also made the lesser advanced versions useless since the more advanced version was cheaper to obtain.

What we are seeing currently on Ark, and likely EU in general, is the same effect on this excessive booster drop from the loot. Our economy is not a true economy that is based on the forces of supply and demand of the given planet, but an economy that is driven by how often the item drops from the loot pool. As long as this is happening, we as players can never expect a stable market condition, as this will change as new VU introduces new mobs, hunting events, or other factors that can cause an surge of loots to the market.

What this approach offers is a pure players controlled market for the more advanced items. Keep going with the already mentioned example, the market will not be over flooded with the 10/101s weapons because everyone is hunting caraboks and getting those 10/101s, hence making zero demand for crafters to craft them. With this method, hunters still can keep hunting with their 10/101T versions, but now we also create a true player demand base for the advanced versions, because the market is no longer effected by how much are dropped in the loot based on an unknown equation from MA.

jc

 

@Jim....think what Kikki meant is ...no one want to lot TT food or trainer weapons....hunter use to hunt to find items which are useful and in best case useful with a good MU ......when all what drops is only oil, hide and other common stuff..also tt or trainer guns....why should i hunt i.e. Yuka or Scoria.........the MU from oils drop always and so i hunt only for tt ......makes no sense

 

I would like to see trainers drop from carabok since that is the mob on which they'd be very useful. But they'd have to be super-low TT or they'd never drop.

Edit: let me clarify, I'm only talking about the current trainers that are given out by missions now.

 

And I totally understand, but to keep it in balance with the other two professions ...

Miners can only "loot" materials, and crafters can only loot BPs. Both of these professions MUST rely on buying and selling with other professions to make their living. Hunters, however, is the only profession that can be 100% self-reliant as they can loot their own armors and weapons.

IMHO, keeping the loot to only basic and unique items (smugglers) should be more then plenty and helps to keep a fair balance. Otherwise there is no need for hunters to take any role in supplying the economy, hence the existence of the TT food blackhole, as they have no need for the other two professions to survive.

jc

 

Hi,

this is very interesting to read

Good point!

But we shouldn't forget:

Right, hunters need to find nice stuff in their loot, too - like miners that find strange signals (hmmm ...) or something out of the ordinary (hmmm ...), and crafters that find BP's and gems.

Dropping "nerfed" versions of the weapons in loot wouldn't match this (well, except maybe for Carabok, as Neil mentioned). They'd get no sufficient MU, and would be TT fodder this way. And TT fodder in loot is what nobody loves, right?

This why I'd drop slightly better versions, just not this much, and with a lower TT.

Example:
Herman CAP-202 Jungle (L), Dam/Sec 29.8, Dam/Pec 2.861, max.TT 100 PED
Herman CAP-202 Smuggler (L), Dam/Sec 30.8, Dam/Pec 2.818, max.TT 40 PED

This Smuggler (L) would be a very nice pistol, and could be looted. It's basically a highly pimped, thus more fragile version of the standard UL smuggler pistol, made to be an emergency weapon, in cases when the standard version doesn't have enough power, or has broken. Every smuggler worth her salt carries such one in a special holster, hidden at the back.

Since it has a quite low TT it wouldn't be very useful for normal hunting, but would make a great panic gun, and would get a good MU because of it's relatively high Dam/Sec.
Dropping in sufficiently low numbers it wouldn't hurt the crafters too much, the crafted CAP-202's would still have better eco, and wouldn't "die" this quickly.

And because of the low TT it could drop easily in normal globals even.

Dunno if this would work, just an idea. ;-)

Have fun!

 

Hmm. Reality is that as a hunter you rarely loot enough weapons and armour to keep you supplied. And when you do loot items they arent necessarily useful for that hunter. Half the armour is the wrong gender. When I hunt kadra I loot a lot of Cap-202s and they arent something I have a use for. So I have to buy the weapons used in hunting kadra.

Huons can almost supply enough cap-303 type weapons to keep you going on them but its not sustainable in the long term.

The only thing that interferes with hunters buying from crafters is the UNL gear. UNL weapons are great for hunters, not so good for the overall economy.

 

Kikki,

this is a problem with L armor and UL weapons generally. I'm not sure if it was such a good idea to implement - armor is always something where you need a full set to make it useful, in the correct gender.

Quite sure that I rarely sold any looted L armor, often the offers in auction was much too many, and too low priced (MU), to prevent me from just TT'ing it. I might, as an old player, be blessed with my assortment of quite good UL armors, be in a rather comfortable situation. But, IMHO, for any serious player a set of UL armors is still mandatory (Shogun, Gremlin or better for Arkadia).

Those are offering protection against a quite limited number of possible damage types, but are very well designed and can, using the approbate plates, be very finely adjusted to the current mob. Where the L armors, with their "jack of all trades" approach and the not given repairability can be be quite a problem. Had a set once, dunno what anymore, harness broke, none in auction. Ouch.

Would L armors be craftable-only the situation might be better. Offer and demand might balance, and there'd be less of "nearly-wasted" armor parts on the market.

The UL SIB weapons - well, I have an UL Embra and I just love it, but no crafter anymore will sell me a sword like this, and I have no real use to craft me a comparable Rutic slow anymore. It's an awesome weapon, eco beyond good and evil, binding an insane amount of PEDs in game, but its existence is a curse to any crafter. Including me myself.

I understand that such extreme TT weapons (1.5K PED min. condition, and this is a beginner sword!) need to exist, to fill the insane HoF's loot windows. But they aren't beneficial to the in game economy at all. IMHO.

Especially, if they don't drop from mobs where they'd make sense to use against. IMHO, any gear drop from a mob should be made so that you'd be able to use the item for the current job - Huons should drop armor and weapons suitable to use for them, as well as Jori - this stuff would just be smaller, suited for Jori hunting.
I never understood why my UL Embra had to drop from a Phasm, a mob that you cannot even scratch with it.

This is a mine field. A lot of items are already out there, and the sheer existence of those (eventually very high MU ones) might make it impossible to change the future direction. But for long or short EU has to decide. L or UL, or, when mixed, how. And looted, or crafted.

This is a game breaking issue, very important. It has a lot of influence to the in game economy, and MA will sooner or later have to decide.

Have fun!

 

Xandra actually thinking about it L armour in loot that is also crafted is a good idea. Because say you loot 2 or 3 pieces of an armour you can get a crafter to complete it for ya. And you may be more likely to do so when you've looted a couple pieces.

So the key would be to make sure the BP's have looted and the other pieces can be some what common in loot.

 

As a crafter/hunter I can see both sides to the issue here.

As it is now the weapons (atleast blp/laser) have different variations of the same gun with different stats (jungle, arctic, and desert). Why not leave 2 of these types in the loot for hunters, and have the other 2 crafted only.

example: herman ark-10 (L) and herman ark-10 arctic (L) would be lootable.
herman ark-10 Desert (L) and herman ark-10 Jungle (L) would only be craftable.

As the 2 crafted weapons add better stats hunters can decide if they want to purchase one from a crafter or try and loot the lower stat gun for personal use.

Not sure if this would be a suitable fix for the issue the op had but after reading the thread this is what popped into my head.

SpikE

 

yea i'm cool with that. heck i'm cool with the non-artic non jungle looted ones are almost TT food too.

 

for me as a hunter its pretty simple

if guns are too high priced i just buy them on calypso.

Prices must go down to boost the economy. lower gunprices means more use of them, means more loot, means lower prices of ingredients, means cheaper guns.

To boost the economy we have to work and ask fair prices. we all benefit from fast sales and much crafting.

just my opinion

 

Bit of a connundrum. Not sure how we can bring the price of crafted weapons down given the cost to craft them.