Players who dismiss crafting in favor of "real" combat classes just display only their own ignorance, easily corrected. I very much like the metaphors that people have already offered: the workers in Civiliation, or the miner in Warcraft. People have lazily grown accustomed to combat with magically-infinite resources and magically-immediate construction. It's long past time to take war simulation to the next level.
"Amateurs talk about tactics, but professionals study logistics." - Gen. Robert H. Barrow, USMC (Commandant of the Marine Corps) noted in 1980
"Gentlemen, the officer who doesn't know his communications and supply as well as his tactics is totally useless." - Gen. George S. Patton, USA
If you like that quote, then read these many others by military leaders throughout history. If you're not convinced of the importance of logistics to military combat (even in simulation), then try this longer article. As a long-time crafter in many games, I look forward to finally ditching direct engagement in favor of behind-the-scenes support.
Just as ignorant are the cries that crafters must never enter combat. Do you think a farmer with a pitchfork is defenseless, or a blacksmith with a hammer, or a chef with a butcher knife, or an herbalist with a paring knife? Your combat-offense fixation has totally blinded you to combat-defense. Time spent learning a tool is valuable, even if it's not intended as a weapon. A porcupine lives nowhere near the top of the food chain, but it's a dangerous foe to engage 1-on-1 nevertheless. All a crafter has to do is delay his own death by deterring his opponent from landing a killing blow... until the actual cavalry arrives. A crafter isn't a soldier, but neither is he the helpless civilian that you want to imagine.
Crafting isn't for you? That's fine and good, but please stop trying to suppress an historically vital aspect of combat for those players with the mental focus and attention to detail that it requires.
Good post, and I'll check out those articles for sure, but I have to say, I'd love to be a wizard when Rachel Carson comes at me with a paring knife.
I say give 'em good individual defensive abilities + group buffs like "sword sharpening" and "armor polishing". If food buffs are added to the system, let 'em be field cooks too.
There's a Korean light novel series that I've kinda fallen in love with... "Moonlight Sculptor". It's not "fine-literature" but it definitly has it's moments. The main character is a VRMMORPG player who, after training for weeks to max out his combat stats, finally goes to pick his class... and gets stuck as a sculptor - the weakest combat class in the game.
Or to put it another way, as a dedicated crafter, I spend long hours banging steel on an anvil, digging rock out of a mountain, and piling stones into fortresses. The crossbow I carry, from a certain angle (the front!) looks more like a siege engine, and when I hit you on the top of the head with a big-arse hammer, you have to unzip your fly to breath.
So there.
*edit* Was that a bit over the top? /sigh I have trouble telling...
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Good post, and I'll check out those articles for sure, but I have to say, I'd love to be a wizard when Rachel Carson comes at me with a paring knife.
I say give 'em good individual defensive abilities + group buffs like "sword sharpening" and "armor polishing". If food buffs are added to the system, let 'em be field cooks too.
There's a Korean light novel series that I've kinda fallen in love with... "Moonlight Sculptor". It's not "fine-literature" but it definitly has it's moments. The main character is a VRMMORPG player who, after training for weeks to max out his combat stats, finally goes to pick his class... and gets stuck as a sculptor - the weakest combat class in the game.
The fan-translations can be found here: http://www.royalroadl.com/table-of-content/
Or to put it another way, as a dedicated crafter, I spend long hours banging steel on an anvil, digging rock out of a mountain, and piling stones into fortresses. The crossbow I carry, from a certain angle (the front!) looks more like a siege engine, and when I hit you on the top of the head with a big-arse hammer, you have to unzip your fly to breath.
So there.
*edit* Was that a bit over the top? /sigh I have trouble telling...