Basics
Q: How many points does it take to master a profession?
A: 1000.
Q: What do you get when you’re maxed out?
A: Besides pride? You can potentially find every schematic, you can use any material, you can make the very best ordinary stuff, and you can also make “master grade items.”
The best master grade items are better than any gear you find in the game, period - including Unique items, which are dropped from world bosses.
And speaking of Unique items - they’ll be awesome, but their stats will be fixed. Someone who has mastered his profession will be able to customize his items for his customer.
Q: You’ve said you can only master one profession, but you can still dabble in the other six. Define dabbling.
A: 200 point ceiling.
Q: Can you change your mind about which profession you’re going to master?
A: Yes, but the exact mechanism is not yet final (7/28/2011).
Q: Can you craft anywhere in the world? Or do you need a special workbench?
A: Crafting can be done anywhere as long as you have the materials. Bear in mind, of course, that making something on the fly without having a customer in mind means not being able to properly customize the item.
Also, we’re talking about ways to build hubs of crafting action, and there are lots of options on the table. Anything from vendor location to time reductions for crafting in a particular area. So we’re happy to hear feedback on this topic!
Q: Is the crafting level tied any way to your combat skill level? In other words, can you max out your craft skill without having a lot of regular skill points?
A: There is a tie between crafting level and skill point level - meaning there will be some missions to advance your crafting level that you can’t get without having a certain number of skill points.
There are systems where people can have level one alts with maxed out craft skills, but in such systems, you might as well let every individual master everything, because that’s what it comes down to.
With that said, we’re aware of the frustration that can accompany our chosen design, and we have not yet set in stone where we will set the hurdles. That decision will be made with feedback from our players.
Q: How can I sell what I make?
A: There will be an auction house. You can consult the AH from your PDA, but you cannot send or receive items without being at a “mailbox” for lack of a better word.
Q: The timer in the screenshot was long. What did the timer mean? Can you do other stuff while the timer is ticking?
A: Experimentation timers are a bit long right now, though we’re still messing with them. You can do stuff while it ticks down, though, you don’t have to stand there and stare at the interface. And see above about potential ways to reduce that time.
Q: Will there be some kind of "craft queue?
A: No plans for that.
Q: How will you raise your skill in your profession? Make 40 of the same schematic for a possible point each time until you unlock a higher tiered schematic, rinse, repeat?
A: You COULD level up that way. /shudder
Not only would that be a miserable grind, and one you inflicted on yourself, but you’d be an embarrassment. You would be a high level crafter with one schematic to your name, and then when you go back to “do” new schematics (because you downloaded them from a website, you weenie), you wouldn’t get anything (skill-wise) from the process.
Making gear for people who need it and experimenting whenever you find something new would be more fun. Good grief, ANYTHING would be more fun.
Q: Does the quality of the weapon affect damage output? Or the quality of the armor affect damage received?
A: The quality of the gear has an affect on your stats, and that can affect damage. So, a definite maybe? It depends so much on which stats we’re talking about and the context in which the gear is being used.
Professions
Q: What’s the difference between the Biotech and Chemist professions?
A: The Biotech is more focused on augmenting items, whereas the Chemist makes consumables. Though we did end up deciding to give the Biotech the ability to make dyes for you to apply to your gear.
Q: If anyone can experiment with schematics, what does the Inventor do?
A: They make gadgets. The extent of gadgetry remains to be discovered, but of the most immediate interest are the jetpacks and harvesters. Inventor-made jetpacks will fly farther and longer for less energy. Harvesters will… harvest more. Etc.
Schematics
Q: Can every level of crafter discover every schematic?
A: No. Your ability to discover grows with your skill. If you try a combination and it doesn’t work, the problem might not be the schematic - the problem might be you. Try again in a few skill points.
Q: Is the system of schematics discovery scripted, meaning we can find only schematics that have been coded by devs?
A: Yes.
Q: If ANY player combines the same items, will it produce the same result each time?
A: Yes, meaning a schematic that makes a hat will always make a hat. But no, in that the stats on that hat will vary depending on skill.
Q: Will people just go to a website to see how to get item "XXX", enter the ingredients and "find" the recipe?
A: Eventually? Probably. Anyone trying to stop the internet from being the internet needs a hobby besides tilting at windmills.
But there are some things to keep in mind:
One, we’ll constantly be adding new things. And we won’t tell you what we added, either. We’ll just say we added in X new schematics, have at it.
Two, if you do find something awesome, maybe you shouldn’t be in a hurry to put that schematic on the internet ;) Unless someone gets the item from you and reverse engineers it, or unless you are the target of successful espionage, the only way someone can make the item is by experimenting on their own. With the sheer number of components out there, you could stumble onto something amazing. Reserve it for your guild’s benefit.
Q: Can you craft all schematics in all locations, or are some schematics tied to a claimable place? (In other words, I’m only able to make the Wicked Helmet of Doom in Dominus Mine Base #2 -- so as to make certain places a desirable place to control.)
A: Currently, anywhere at any time, but awesome idea, sir or madam ;)
Q: Does each schematic have one look to them and you play with the stats within it, or are the looks of the items also selectable during the creation process?
A: The former. The stats can change based on the quality of the material (in the schematics where that applies) and the skill of the crafter. The look of an item is not adjustable during creation.
Afterwards, you can apply dyes, which are available from the Biotechs.
Q: How do you communicate schematics?
A: You can give someone an item you made from your own schematic, and they can reverse engineer it. You can tell someone what the materials used were, and when that person makes their first item, they will know the schematic. And someone can steal the schematic from you (though at this time, 7/28/2011, we are not ready to discuss the espionage system).
Q: Are any schematics one time use only, or are they all permanently added to your library?
A: Currently all permanent, but that could change!
Materials
Q: When one of your experiments goes horribly wrong, do the materials vanish?
A: No.
Q: When I plant my harvester, will I know what grade of ore I’m going to get?
A: Nope. Good luck!
Q: Items appear to potentially require a lot of ingredients to create. Can you go into any more details on this? Are these "extra" ingredients reasonably easy to come by? Can you just purchase them from an NPC in order to craft what you need without a major time investment or serious grinding to get them? Are they fairly standardized components used in many/most schematics?
A: Yes.
Q: From the website: "There are ranges even within each quality. One rare item will more than likely have different stats from an identically produced and named rare item." What affects these different outcomes of the same schematic? I see the crafter's skill level plays a role. Is there any other factors that also change the stats?
A: Well, you put in the highest grade stuff, you get better stats.
