tmone

Thanks, I will look into those. Thanks for the explanation. I think we are definately leaning toward specialized fields of blacksmithing that the player can pursue. And thanks everyone else. Everyone is being so helpful here and we really appreciate it. I gotta go for now but will be back later.

A similar idea was mentioned but yours is good too, thanks. I proposed the smith would earn experience and then when they had enough they could "spend" it to experiment in a specialized field (weapons, armor, tools). This would then unlock basic items in that category. Later with more experience they could choose to unlock the next tier of items in that category or unlock the basics in another category. Still all just ideas right now, maybe these ideas can be combined in some way. Depending on the way things are implemented this may be something that needs to be done. Not sure if there will be automatic items or not, maybe if we require simple preliminary items it would work with those. NPC strikers could work, that's an interesting idea. Interesting, perhaps we could introduce some "uber" items that require a few highly skilled smiths to create. While that is an excellent idea and would be very fun to experiment with I think it may be beyond our abilities. But who knows until we try. Thanks! I hope so too hehe. Could be a while but it is a game I hope we can accomplish. Thanks for your support!

Experience will definately be a factor. The quality of work will certainly improve with experience. Heat treating is hardening, correct? So a heat treated piece of armor would withstand more punishment. Is this done with chemicals or just knowing how to heat the item? Right, the more experienced they are the more accurate they are, resulting in a quicker finish. We might have them gain strength and stamina as they work. So it would go up with experience as well. Also a fighter would build similar traits through combat so would have an easier time with heavy smithing tools but would still need to earn skill in using them. Yea, I think working together might be fun and definately could give time advantages. As long as it is fun for both players and one isn't just clicking the button mindlessly or something. Needs to involve skill. Not sure that currency will be involved yet. Perhaps later but for now we're thinking the smiths will just work for the good of the team. We're thinking it's sort of a clan vs clan competitive game. You will just join a game session that lasts an hour or two maybe and at the end one team will be conquered and statistics will be shown for various things. So there will be leaderboards for the best smiths, such as who made the best weapons, who's weapons inflicted the most damage...things like that. This brings up something I was thinking about. A smith could use up his stamina to hurry and make an item that was needed but then he would be too tired to make anything else and would need to rest. So you could sorta toggle a speed mode to work faster but it would burn you out if you used it too much for too long. Wounds could also factor in and the player should seek healing else work slower and produce lower quality items. Perhaps some day I will do just that but right now it's not really and option. Thanks for your input!

Archie, thank you for the armouring info and the pics. That is very helpful. So could it possibly just be broken down to these stages: 1) flatten an ingot into a sheet. 2) form on stakes, reheat as needed. 3) grind/polish to finish I will do some research on this but if you can answer any of these questions that would be great. I imagine the armor is made from multiple sheets and fastened together in some way when worn? Do you reheat the entire sheet or just specific parts of it as you hammer those locations? It seems armoring is going to be a tougher technique to implement...

Right, we want to simplify it enough to make it fast paced but also keep it fun. We thought about something similar. Teams will have to hold control of mines and as long as they are under their rule then npc miners will continuous harvest the fuels and ores and perhaps even include the smelting process at these camps. Players will have only basic skills, they will be able to try to forge but may take a few tries to make anything decent. The more a player does the more he learns. Be it fighting or smithing or whatever. Also, if the player doesn't keep up his practice in a particular field his skill will degrade. I'm not sure how important fire management will become and I'm not sure if you just mean keeping the forge hot or keeping your item hot. But, I do think it could add a bit of strategy to have to keep your item properly heated. Trying to decide if you can get those few extra strikes in before it gets too cool. Done properly you could shed precious minutes off of the creation of the item. Remember the teams are in a state of war and every minute counts. Good ideas, I'm glad you gave me a visual explanation of what you thought. That is always helpful. Definately jotting that down. It will likely be something similar. Maybe they can pull off making an advanced item but the quality will be so bad that it will be about as good as using a lower quality item. Therefore a waste of resources. I had an idea about how "level ups" may work. After earning enough experience in crafting you can "spend" this experience to "experiment" in a area of your choice. So you could select from weapons, armor, or tools. Maybe even a specific category within those categories. Or keep it simple and upgrade to the whole next tier of every weapon. This way smiths could specilize in different areas, someone on the team could focus on armor while another did weapons and yet another did tools. Thanks for your input! :)

Good ideas, nice and simple. Thanks.

Can you use the same tools to make armor and weapons? Would you use a different type of anvil? I'm kind of lost on how armor is made as weapons have been my primary focus so far.

1: We have tossed around the idea of having strategic mining points that would have to be held by a team. As long as you control the mine then npc miners would continuously harvest from it. The opposing team would likely try to take over mines of precious metals to have the advantage that metal may give in what items it makes. This only leaves transportation of the metal back to the forge to be used. Players would go out and collect the metal in carts or something like that. It would be in the teams best interest to send out an escort party to collect large quantities of metal. This should add another element of strategy. Of course single players can still collect a small amount of metal to bring back to the forge as well. 2: I will have to look into the bellows. We are open to any ideas here. It can even be a fantasy design that doesn't really exist as long as it seems possible. 3: There may not be enough players to go around for that many jobs. I'm thinking if teaming on a forge will be an option that it will likely be limited to two people to keep it simple and fun. 4: Some of those jobs may be possible to include. Maybe simply magical engravings of some sort to improve different qualities of items. Anything that can be made fun is a possibility. The quenching mediums may be a bit too advanced at this point. Tempering may be included later also but for now I want to get some basics sorted out. The system can always be build upon if it would improve gameplay. But that could certainly fall under advanced skills. I like your idea of selecting the proper region to heat in the hotspot. Once a flow is worked out for how an item should be created this could come into play.

Thanks for the feedback. I will read them and reply after dinner... :)

A tech tree could work. Skills and tools unlock based on your experience level perhaps. Would these higher tier tools be created using your old tools or just the ability to use them become available? I plan to have the basic tools (hammers, tongs, mining picks, etc) available to start but not sure if you should have to create the other tools or just have them available and hinder your ability to use them until you gain the required experience. I hope to involve many different ores. There might be some kind of excavation skill where you have to find veins to mine from. Creating better metals at the cost of time is also interesting. That could certainly introduce some more strategy elements. Teams will have to decide whether to pursue a metal uprade or to continue using the standard metals. This could tie into the alchemist skill to create the new metal? That reminds me, I meant to mention how the players experience might work. I was thinking of a "learn by doing" type of system. The more you smith the better you are. The more you fight the more effective you are with weapons/armor. The more you mine the faster you are at it, the stronger you are to carry more things etc. Different skills will build different statistics such as strength and stamina. Also if you stop using a skill for too long it will degrade a bit. So if you become a great smith and then start fighting all the time you will lose a bit of smithing ability due to not practicing that skill anymore. These are just a few ideas on the drawing board... In reference to 3. I do plan to make temperature control an important aspect. Though it will be sped up greatly so I'm not sure you will be gathering tools or not. Maybe different items will have recommended tools and if they are available you can use them. If not, perhaps you could attempt to use a lesser tool but the item quality would likely be lesser as well. So maybe a list of tools will come up to select from and the recommended tool will be indicated and you make your selection and proceed with that step of the process. Some of this may be too involved though. It's going to have to be balanced to maintain the proper pace. Simple weapons and tools shouldn't take more than 5-10 minutes to create. More advanced items may take a bit longer. Imagine there will be maybe 15 or so players per team. Some of these will have to maintain the defense, some will likely be mining for the smiths and the rest obviously smithing to keep up the supply of weapons and armor. Items won't last forever, some will drop to the ground upon death and can be collected and used again but many times the items will break. This is so the smiths can continue to work rather than just making stuff at the beginning and being done with it. Also you will constantly be improving to better items so many of the old items will become obsolete.

yeah, i see I'll have to read up more on how armor is crafted and those stakes... Hopefully I can simplify it, I want to keep the steps managable.

Well there will most definately be coal and likely wood in some form. I don't know much about fluxes. Maybe you could go into detail with how that might work in game? I do plan to let players manage the temperature on the metal. Though I'm still learning about how hot you would want to keep it and when to quench etc. Thanks for your comments.

Well unfortunately I have no where to build a forge. I'm already involved in other classes at the moment as well so I doubt I could fit in anything else at the moment but perhaps at some point it will be a possibility. I will definately keep that in mind. The system doesn't have to be perfect. Too many times do games just have an endless supply of weapons and armor which leaves me to think where is it all coming from. I wanted to offer the players the chance to actually take and active role in supplying their teams with the items they use. I think it could be a fun system if implemented properly. So, it may not be an exact simulation of how it was really done but hopefully it will be enough to be entertaining and rewarding.

We have been playing with the idea of it taking place in a fantasy setting beneath a mountain. Sorta like the dwarves in Lord of the Rings, think mines of moria... We're not sure exactly how it would work yet but perhaps there would be areas to mine coal for the fuel. Other areas to mine for the ores. The smelting process would probably be simply automated, not sure how we could make that very involved yet. So, players could get right to creating an item. Here is what I'm thinking the process might be like: 1) Select an item to make from a categorized menu. (weapon, armor, tool, etc) 2) Heat the required metal to be used. ( if it's available, else go and collect it first) May include managing forge temperature as well. 3) Begin hammering phase. I'm thinking the hammering will be continuous and you will have to "aim" your pointer at the proper locations on the metal. (At first it will be harder to aim, the pointer will stray on you to simulate lack of skill. The more items you craft the more experience you gain in your hammering making it easier to aim. Different items will be harder to make so if your skill is too low then you will have to stick to easier items until you get better.) 4) While step 3 is underway you will keep an eye on temperature of the metal to make sure it stays hot enough to work. If it gets too cold you have to go back to step 2 and heat it some more and then back to step 3, this could go back and forth a few times. Depending on how accurate you were with your strikes may affect how many times you have to cycle between step 2 and 3. Also thinking that the quality of the item will degrade based on accuracy. So, if you are really bad at keeping a good aim and hitting the proper locations then you will make bad quality weapons etc, which will do less damage or break easier perhaps. I was thinking on the easier items the proper locations would be highlighted for where you should strike next. Then as you start making harder items there will be no highlighting and you will have to experiment to find the proper way to hammer it. This way players can develop and discover their own techniques for certain items and will seperate the good smiths from the bad. Statistical reports will be kept to show who made the best items in the game. I'm not sure how much more involved we should go on the process. I want to simplify it enough to make it fast enough for the game. If all steps are included it may take too long to make enough items for your team to be functional.

Interesting stuff. While this game will mainly be an online multiplayer game, team vs team style, if we develop a single player side there are some good ideas you gave. I really need ideas on the mechanics of the actual smithing process...how it will work in game. Ex. aiming hammer strikes, adjusting temperatures. Whatever you think would make it fun rather than just selecting an item from a list and hitting a create button and waiting for it to say success or fail. That's not much fun and there isn't any skill involved. But, like i said, it can't be a direct simulation. The gameplay will be too fast paced so things will need to be altered to keep it fun. Thanks for your feedback!