Overall in regards to the craft list I felt Vangaurd was stated abit wrong cause how could we gather resources without the ol'exploring routine?
It's been a while, but I'm pretty sure I never took my master crafter/master diplomat character past adventurer level 6. Most adventurers preferred to pay their bills in resources than money, if I recall correctly. It was a lot of fun while it lasted, but lack of population caused it to fall off fairly early on.
I will agree that Vanguard's crafting system is/was epic and way ahead of its time, but it really can't compare to PotBS, which requires guilds and production-line managers to successfully churn out the big hulking ships necessary tor so much of the game. I briefly operated a ship production line, and was responsible in the early days of PotBS for producing a number of widely-used tools on the subject to help people manage their own lines. Then again, I haven't played in years, and it could be different in unknown ways now.
Darkfall's crafting system is great, but it has one critical flaw: everything in Darkfall can be looted. If you want to craft anything, you basically need to take an army with you to protect you. This is, of course, the problem with everything in Darkfall, so...
If only they would have left Silus as the 'crafting guy' in Vanguard. Unfortunately he was promoted beyond his skill set to Lead Developer and set about a 2 year developmental rampage that utterly destroyed the game, his repuation and any hope of working for anyone but SOE.
pretty good list. I am glad that FE got nearly the top spot and everything that anyone has ever told me about SWG suggests it deserved #1.
That was a good list. I think MMOs shoud be better around crafting, the fact that EQ2 made the list suggests MMOs overall could do a much better job in the crafting department.
I miss playing FE
Please do not respond to me, even if I ask you a question, its rhetorical.
Although my time in Horizons was short lived, a lot of posters did bring up a good point. Horizon did in fact have one of the more in depth crafting systems of any MMO. I still feel SWG is by far the best crafting system ever developed, which really makes me wonder why no one else even attempts to utilize it's design.
Horizons wow memories , i think alot of players never even played that game but it's true it had a very good crafting system with all the tools you had to carry and the floating discs needed to carry your harvests .
also i dont like runescape much but it had an interesting crafting overall worth mentioning.
Not a bad list, haven't played them all and probably will never play some. I am really surprised Ryzom didn't make the list. Istaria also have a decent crafting system and UO should of at least got an honorable mention for being the measuring stick for so long.
I have to agree with other members posting on here. Horizons/Istaria should easily have made this list. Aside from making armors, clothing, tools, jewelry, weapons, shields, dragon scales, cargo disks, food, backpacks, and bags, Istaria also has a complete construction set to crafting.
For dragons, this means 3 dimensional lairs, multi-level labyrinths of the player's own personal design. For bipeds, plots are available across Istaria in regions from desert to temperate, swamp to tundra for completely personalized construction. Both types offer crafthalls (yes, these actually work for crafting, holding the machinery needed), storage (silos, storehouses for organics, halls, houses, guildhalls, lairs), binding shrines (guildhalls or dragon halls or shrine chamber) for quick recall back to that location, vaults (for accessing your vault storage), and a myriad of decorative features such as trees, snowmen, archways, walkways, fountains, dragon murals, boulders, walls, pillars, and banners. Construction is done by creating construction materials from raw materials and placing on unfinished frameworks that have been planned by the player.
Another aspect of construction in Istaria includes the developer-placed crafthalls and construction projects that appear with upcoming patches. These offer all levels of construction classes to aid in the further use of resources in Istaria. They may further the lore (Dralnok's Doom and the Selen-Balit Bridge), they may be only crafthalls (Acul, Dalimond, Chiconis, Kirasanct, Genevia Island, Scorpion Island, etc.), or they may be decorative or protective (Defender's Gate eastern wall extension).
Personal gear can be simple or complex, with technique placement available based on tier (1 for tiers 1 and 2, 2 for tiers 3 and 4, or 3 for tier 5 and 6). Also, dye kits for armors and weapons add extra color for bipeds, or make for easy sorting for dragon scales.
C`gan Weyrsinger
Order Shard
Istaria
With the introduction of broken items in the most recent patch, crafters can make superior biped weapons. Further broken items are being added in upcoming patches as the system develops.
I have to agree with Istaria, i think the ONLY thing i did in beta for that game(when it was still Horizons) was craft. I experience very little of the actual meat of the game because i just like to gather mats and craft. Also i don't craft in EVE, i do some exploration but from observance, it has a unique crafting/economy system.
Although my time in Horizons was short lived, a lot of posters did bring up a good point. Horizon did in fact have one of the more in depth crafting systems of any MMO. I still feel SWG is by far the best crafting system ever developed, which really makes me wonder why no one else even attempts to utilize it's design.
thank you, because i'm also asking me a lot of times why no new mmorpg tries to copy the concepts of swg, istaria or ryzom concepts.
take istaria as example, imagine alone the concept behind the property (for all who did not know this game http://community.istaria.com/pg.php/faq_property ) it took me half a year mainly crafting to finish my own property and the constructions on it. not very casual friendly, sure, but hell it was a challenge and the satisfaction once it was done ... and does anyone remember the weekend events where 150+ people were needed only to build a big bridge to connect two islands? gatherers all over the world, in the mountains, in the woods and dragons acting like mules to reduce the time of transportation.
well, better i stop now before my pathetic nostalgic trip gets more and more out of control ....
Why is Fallen Earth on the list? I downloaded the free trial of Fallen Earth, found myself wacking on mineral nodes like in WOW.
Pre-NGE SWG was the only crafting system worth mentioning.
-Durability loss from use. Ammunition consumption...Requiring constant purchasing of player crafted stuff.
-No drops from NPC's, everything had to be crafted by players
-Mining thumpers. Put one on the ground and extract resources over time. (not grind/wacking mineral nodes).
-Constantly shifting raw materials, requiring a player to search out resources that aren't fixed.
-Raw materials with differing attributes, effecting end product.
-Experimentation producing the same type of weapon/armor with differing attributes.
-Factory player owned structures for producing larger numbers of items.
No other game has come close to SWG's economy. Eve Online would come close, except you have to grind/wack on mineral nodes with mining lasers.
A proper economy should be the basis for a realistic PVP system, SWG didn't have that. All Player Owned STructures in SWG was invulnerable.
A good game would have a SWG type of economy, along with destroyable player owned structures BUT (big BUT) those player owned structures should not take weeks/months/years to grind (Eve Online), it should only take minutes and hours so losing your assets to PVP wouldn't be such a big deal. Sort of like an RTS game.
Crafting should be a means to an end, not something "for players pass time". I was a master-ranger in SWG, I sold hides to armorsmiths, and I enjoyed it even though I didn't like the fact that it took forever to grind for a tiny house or houses were invulnerable, etc.
For swg I don't understand why the reviewer puts PRe-NGE since the swg crafting system is still unique to this day... Apparently the person never played past pre-nge or they would know the swg system is still a very unique crafting system.
I have heard nothing but negativity about what the NGE did to the SWG economy. Although that was like....5 years ago.
Agree SWG crafting is the best. I was a hardcore PVP'er. Yet, I did just enough crafting to start a small business. Similar to the size of a hole in the wall pizza place in your town. Just big enough to cover my daily travel fees. As funny as this sounds, it really made me feel like a mini-entrepreneur.
Best part? Looking at my watch in RL to see if its time to check my harvies. Its like checking the oven to see if my apple pie is ready.
Haven't posted on this site in ages due to reality, but here goes:
It would be cool to know what criteria the OP used to judge which game has good crafting and which game does not. Is it ease of making a crafter? Is it lack of monotony, is it being able to affect the outcome of the items you make, relevance of tradeskills in the game, what role it has in the game's economy?
I haven't played PotBS or Darkfall Online so can't discuss their relevance on this list.
I'll play a bit of devil's advocat here, namely with Fallen Earth. If you add FE to this list, why not add WoW, why not add LotRO? Let me explain before anyone flames me. Ok, so you can make tons of useful things, that's great, but how is the crafting and resource gathering *really that different* from WoW's or LotRO's in their mechanics? Looking at harvesting, in WoW or LotRO, you do it through randomly-appearing resource nodes that you click on once to harvest a resource. Same thing in FE, you click on a resource node once, you get a resource from it. In WoW and LotRO, you can use your resources and any other materials to pop out one item, same with FE. The only tangible difference I can see is that you can produce things while offline or while fiddly farting around somewhere in the game, but the downside is that each item takes longer to 'bake' as it were than in either WoW or LotRO. There is no other way to get resources easily without going through what I like to call 'the harvest grind' to get them.
A big issue that makes me not want to see FE anywhere near that list is that any crafting character can craft anything since there is no limit to how many tradeskills you can skill up. The only limitation one seems to have is inventory and bank space. If anyone can be a crafter and can make anything, and your game economy is based on what items players make, you're going to end up with a sluggish one at best.
I agree with the rest, though I think the OP only touched the tip of the iceberg for EvE's complexity. Most of EvE is about resources and fighting over them, or fighting over blueprints. Then there is the optimization aspect in order to make the most ISK out of time spent inventing or manufacturing.
I am surprised though that there was no mention of UO's or ATitD's as many on here have already said. And then there is also DAoC's which I think should be mentioned not due to the superfun aspect of crafting (it wasn't fun in the slightest), but because of spellcrafting. It was one of the few games that allowed people to customize their gear according to their playstyle. Spellcrafted gear is still integral to every level 50's template, even to this day.
Yeah, FE and WOW seem like the same thing to me.
If I were to make a list of crafting games it would include SWG and nothing else.
One crafting system I didnt see mentioned at all: The Matrix Online. Damn near everything that you can loot in that game was also craftable except for the really rare or unique items. And the crafting UI actually worked very well, too.
SWG a mere Scar? If you took all the salt in the world/universe and had a gaping wound big enough to put it in then that would be how I feel about what they did to SWG. I pour over reviews every year looking for someone to make something comparable but no, nothing, ever. I've tried them but they just leave a hollow feeling.
You would think, with as many people who pine over SWG crafting someone would copy pre-nge crafting. AGH, have to quit thinking about it......just want to beat the crap out of whoever did that to the best MMO I've ever played.....
Another vote for Horizons/Istaria - easily on par with Eve Online in complexity and depth... It's a crafter's paradise where making things is just as important as beating stuff up, and the player housing (that you also have to craft) actually achieves something other than displaying trophies.
SWG had the best crafting of any mmo I've ever played. Everything was very engrossing, like trying to find the best resources, storing them, selling them, learning how to experiment and craft better stuff, having your own vendors and stores. It was really incredible.
I've played and crafted extensively in all those games except Darkfall. Before I weigh in I'd have to ask by what criteria do you determine "Top" crafting systems?
I find comparing any of those offerings against EVE's crafting system is like comparing an F-22 or Mig-23 aircraft to the Wright flyer. They have similar form and like functions, but they are so vastly apart in complexity and capability that you shouldn't compare them except to say they are all significant in their own unique role.
Does "Top" mean easy, fun, quickly rewarding at many skill levels? Does it mean the percentage of player population with well advanced crafting skills? Does it mean the relative significance of the role player crafted items play in the game context? I suspect if you applied each of those criteria seperaterly you'd find different rankings.
Comments
Well, I lol'd when i see Darkfall and not Mortal Online in that list... crafting in MO is Awesome!
It's been a while, but I'm pretty sure I never took my master crafter/master diplomat character past adventurer level 6. Most adventurers preferred to pay their bills in resources than money, if I recall correctly. It was a lot of fun while it lasted, but lack of population caused it to fall off fairly early on.
MO and UO are missing here
I will agree that Vanguard's crafting system is/was epic and way ahead of its time, but it really can't compare to PotBS, which requires guilds and production-line managers to successfully churn out the big hulking ships necessary tor so much of the game. I briefly operated a ship production line, and was responsible in the early days of PotBS for producing a number of widely-used tools on the subject to help people manage their own lines. Then again, I haven't played in years, and it could be different in unknown ways now.
Darkfall's crafting system is great, but it has one critical flaw: everything in Darkfall can be looted. If you want to craft anything, you basically need to take an army with you to protect you. This is, of course, the problem with everything in Darkfall, so...
Why SWG pre NGE?
The crafting is still about the same now as it was pre NGE. I think it's the only thing that what few people still play keeps them there.
If only they would have left Silus as the 'crafting guy' in Vanguard. Unfortunately he was promoted beyond his skill set to Lead Developer and set about a 2 year developmental rampage that utterly destroyed the game, his repuation and any hope of working for anyone but SOE.
pretty good list. I am glad that FE got nearly the top spot and everything that anyone has ever told me about SWG suggests it deserved #1.
That was a good list. I think MMOs shoud be better around crafting, the fact that EQ2 made the list suggests MMOs overall could do a much better job in the crafting department.
I miss playing FE
Please do not respond to me, even if I ask you a question, its rhetorical.
Please do not respond to me
Horizons wow memories , i think alot of players never even played that game but it's true it had a very good crafting system with all the tools you had to carry and the floating discs needed to carry your harvests .
also i dont like runescape much but it had an interesting crafting overall worth mentioning.
Vanguard would be No.1 if you'd used the Maddycraft add-on
Not a bad list, haven't played them all and probably will never play some. I am really surprised Ryzom didn't make the list. Istaria also have a decent crafting system and UO should of at least got an honorable mention for being the measuring stick for so long.
I have to agree with other members posting on here. Horizons/Istaria should easily have made this list. Aside from making armors, clothing, tools, jewelry, weapons, shields, dragon scales, cargo disks, food, backpacks, and bags, Istaria also has a complete construction set to crafting.
For dragons, this means 3 dimensional lairs, multi-level labyrinths of the player's own personal design. For bipeds, plots are available across Istaria in regions from desert to temperate, swamp to tundra for completely personalized construction. Both types offer crafthalls (yes, these actually work for crafting, holding the machinery needed), storage (silos, storehouses for organics, halls, houses, guildhalls, lairs), binding shrines (guildhalls or dragon halls or shrine chamber) for quick recall back to that location, vaults (for accessing your vault storage), and a myriad of decorative features such as trees, snowmen, archways, walkways, fountains, dragon murals, boulders, walls, pillars, and banners. Construction is done by creating construction materials from raw materials and placing on unfinished frameworks that have been planned by the player.
Another aspect of construction in Istaria includes the developer-placed crafthalls and construction projects that appear with upcoming patches. These offer all levels of construction classes to aid in the further use of resources in Istaria. They may further the lore (Dralnok's Doom and the Selen-Balit Bridge), they may be only crafthalls (Acul, Dalimond, Chiconis, Kirasanct, Genevia Island, Scorpion Island, etc.), or they may be decorative or protective (Defender's Gate eastern wall extension).
Personal gear can be simple or complex, with technique placement available based on tier (1 for tiers 1 and 2, 2 for tiers 3 and 4, or 3 for tier 5 and 6). Also, dye kits for armors and weapons add extra color for bipeds, or make for easy sorting for dragon scales.
C`gan Weyrsinger
Order Shard
Istaria
With the introduction of broken items in the most recent patch, crafters can make superior biped weapons. Further broken items are being added in upcoming patches as the system develops.
I have to agree with Istaria, i think the ONLY thing i did in beta for that game(when it was still Horizons) was craft. I experience very little of the actual meat of the game because i just like to gather mats and craft. Also i don't craft in EVE, i do some exploration but from observance, it has a unique crafting/economy system.
No mention for DAOC? Spellcrafting was great back in the old days. I used to make so much gold off of that.
thank you, because i'm also asking me a lot of times why no new mmorpg tries to copy the concepts of swg, istaria or ryzom concepts.
take istaria as example, imagine alone the concept behind the property (for all who did not know this game http://community.istaria.com/pg.php/faq_property ) it took me half a year mainly crafting to finish my own property and the constructions on it. not very casual friendly, sure, but hell it was a challenge and the satisfaction once it was done ... and does anyone remember the weekend events where 150+ people were needed only to build a big bridge to connect two islands? gatherers all over the world, in the mountains, in the woods and dragons acting like mules to reduce the time of transportation.
well, better i stop now before my pathetic nostalgic trip gets more and more out of control ....
Why is Fallen Earth on the list? I downloaded the free trial of Fallen Earth, found myself wacking on mineral nodes like in WOW.
Pre-NGE SWG was the only crafting system worth mentioning.
-Durability loss from use. Ammunition consumption...Requiring constant purchasing of player crafted stuff.
-No drops from NPC's, everything had to be crafted by players
-Mining thumpers. Put one on the ground and extract resources over time. (not grind/wacking mineral nodes).
-Constantly shifting raw materials, requiring a player to search out resources that aren't fixed.
-Raw materials with differing attributes, effecting end product.
-Experimentation producing the same type of weapon/armor with differing attributes.
-Factory player owned structures for producing larger numbers of items.
No other game has come close to SWG's economy. Eve Online would come close, except you have to grind/wack on mineral nodes with mining lasers.
A proper economy should be the basis for a realistic PVP system, SWG didn't have that. All Player Owned STructures in SWG was invulnerable.
A good game would have a SWG type of economy, along with destroyable player owned structures BUT (big BUT) those player owned structures should not take weeks/months/years to grind (Eve Online), it should only take minutes and hours so losing your assets to PVP wouldn't be such a big deal. Sort of like an RTS game.
Crafting should be a means to an end, not something "for players pass time". I was a master-ranger in SWG, I sold hides to armorsmiths, and I enjoyed it even though I didn't like the fact that it took forever to grind for a tiny house or houses were invulnerable, etc.
I have heard nothing but negativity about what the NGE did to the SWG economy. Although that was like....5 years ago.
Agree SWG crafting is the best. I was a hardcore PVP'er. Yet, I did just enough crafting to start a small business. Similar to the size of a hole in the wall pizza place in your town. Just big enough to cover my daily travel fees. As funny as this sounds, it really made me feel like a mini-entrepreneur.
Best part? Looking at my watch in RL to see if its time to check my harvies. Its like checking the oven to see if my apple pie is ready.
SWG'ers know what i mean. LOL
Yeah, FE and WOW seem like the same thing to me.
If I were to make a list of crafting games it would include SWG and nothing else.
Why wasnt Xsyon on the list there is more Crafting then any of these games tbh.
One crafting system I didnt see mentioned at all: The Matrix Online. Damn near everything that you can loot in that game was also craftable except for the really rare or unique items. And the crafting UI actually worked very well, too.
what about eq?
SWG a mere Scar? If you took all the salt in the world/universe and had a gaping wound big enough to put it in then that would be how I feel about what they did to SWG. I pour over reviews every year looking for someone to make something comparable but no, nothing, ever. I've tried them but they just leave a hollow feeling.
You would think, with as many people who pine over SWG crafting someone would copy pre-nge crafting. AGH, have to quit thinking about it......just want to beat the crap out of whoever did that to the best MMO I've ever played.....
Another vote for Horizons/Istaria - easily on par with Eve Online in complexity and depth... It's a crafter's paradise where making things is just as important as beating stuff up, and the player housing (that you also have to craft) actually achieves something other than displaying trophies.
SWG had the best crafting of any mmo I've ever played. Everything was very engrossing, like trying to find the best resources, storing them, selling them, learning how to experiment and craft better stuff, having your own vendors and stores. It was really incredible.
I've played and crafted extensively in all those games except Darkfall. Before I weigh in I'd have to ask by what criteria do you determine "Top" crafting systems?
I find comparing any of those offerings against EVE's crafting system is like comparing an F-22 or Mig-23 aircraft to the Wright flyer. They have similar form and like functions, but they are so vastly apart in complexity and capability that you shouldn't compare them except to say they are all significant in their own unique role.
Does "Top" mean easy, fun, quickly rewarding at many skill levels? Does it mean the percentage of player population with well advanced crafting skills? Does it mean the relative significance of the role player crafted items play in the game context? I suspect if you applied each of those criteria seperaterly you'd find different rankings.