Sorry for the double posts, but I just have a lot of questions about crossbows..this one more specifically having to do with ammo.

I have some frog-crotch bolts and they appraise at moderate/moderate/moderate. When you have both moderate slice and moderate puncture, which damage is factored when you attack? Are they all factored to some degree, or does one take precedence depending on the type of foe you're dealing with?

I've read that some people have tested slurbows with normal bolts versus a normal HX with quads/pulzones, and they test around the same. When the slurbow switches over to quads/pulzones, the testing still shows the same, which suggests some sort of cap. I'm wondering what happens if the slurbow uses frog-crotch bolts, which evens out the damage across slice too. Mind you I'm taking all the results of this testing from second-hand but if someone knows about this area please do elaborate.

Speaking personally - I get quite a kick out of the arrow damage options and hope to see a similar potential array down the road for Crossbows and or Slings.

Samsaren

>Is this actually true? Last I checked basilisk was 22 and ice-adders were 22. (total damage)


I'm not sure they were all mastercrafted, but looking over someone's spreadsheet of damage types for all arrows (angiswaerd, elsrael, sabre, basilisk, hele'la, soot, and ice) they ALL add up to 22 pts of total damage.

Seems good to me actually, that they all do the same damage just distributed differently.

>> Seems good to me actually, that they all do the same damage just distributed differently.

>> You are adding ranges. The numbers can differ within those ranges.

Yup. I'm aware.

Just seems strange you can create an arrow that does 22 damage total at 140 skill w/ tech and the arrow created at 1000+ skill does the same 22 damage total. I'm aware that its 22+ elemental which gives it technically an overall effective high increase in damage. But we are also building up a lot of magic resist skills/spells in the future so "elemental" could end up in the same boat as physicals.

I'm also aware that right now creatures/people have generally lower elemental resistance. But most of the time it's just best to total the damage up since it's quite difficult to tell if a monster is resistant to damage. Esp when its low numbers like fair/moderate, on elemental. Unless, they are totally immune of course.

How is tinkering progressing Kodius?

>>and what? elemental arrows?

Soot-stained, ice-adder, jagged-horn, and drake-fang arrows all have elemental damage.

As a crafter, I'd rather the current system where its more noun changes (and the odd rare/swapable/multi coverage item) as you gain more skill then having some super weapon at the top of the heap. Everyone running around with scimitars, bastard swords, and using the same bow/arrow is boring. The folks who are gonna work the skill in the 1k+ range are going to work it regardless, and the work order / prestige system goes a solid way for rewarding those that pour the effort in.

Samsaren

>> It may not be enough for you to want to train the crafting skills that high to make those items, but it's enough for others.

Erm. You are forgetting that for every 1 person who wants to train to 1000+, there is probably 1,000 people who are just training to 150 to get the best arrows.

Not sure how you don't see that as a problem. You can make the "best" arrows in the game by like... week 1 or week 2. Yay... risk reward and all that?

>> The best arrow is relative. That arrow won't provide the same amount of damage in every situation. All the different templates allow you to pick the most damaging arrow for each situation. The more rare types of damage (elemental) are gated behind higher ranks needed to harvest and make those arrows. It's not a problem because the system is designed to give you choices, not the absolute best weapon ever.

It's not relative because we don't have access to that information unless the creature is blatantly immune, but even that can be sometimes hard to tell. There's not really any "choosing" unless in niche situations or "feelings" that one does more damage then the other. Even if a person ran enough tests to determine a creatures damage resistance, (extremely difficult since almost all weapons have 3 damage types) this would be worthless on the next monster and you would need to repeat tests.

So, in theory swapping damage is worth something, in realty, certainly not. It comes down to total damage. Is it worth making an arrow at 300 the same as an arrow at 1000? Nope.

>> You do realize that A, immunities to damage show up in appraisal, B you can appraise the creatures armor (where applicable). Discovering creature weakness isn't all that difficult. That said, if you want to just stock up on Elsralael arrows and go bananas, you can.

Yup, see the first line of my post.

>> It's not relative because we don't have access to that information unless the creature is blatantly immune, but even that can be sometimes hard to tell.

>> If you're really hung up on this issue about arrows, I highly, highly suggest you not look into the smithing skill at all.

Mmmm. I've been forging for a long time. Forging is a lot different then shaping. Total damage generally increases with template difficulty (mostly due to weapon weight), barring some exceptions. Plus, there is a 1000 other reasons to get higher smithing.

Let's not even get into the discussion about bows where very rare woods are essentially identical and mean nothing. (Azurelle ,copperwood, silverwood with comp bows). And, no a 5-10 durability difference isn't worth having 3 separate wood types. I'd personally like Kodius to do another pass on shaping before he switches over but doubt that's going to happen.

>>Difficulty

This goes back to when I first wrote crafting and 300 ranks took a long time to get. Capping a Tier 6 item requires about 300 ranks with a technique. I realize you get 300 ranks upon rolling up a character now :P But short of nerfing everyone (which would be ridiculously unpopular) I am handcuffed on this.

A broadsword is also tier 6, as is most of the armor types...


No, my secret plan will be to introduce reactive ingredients with negative workabilities.

You can use tier 1-9 templates to make all the normal weapons out of them, and get a partial bonus.

Or you can use new tier 10-12 templates to get a full bonus. Thus we create the need to potentially have more/different weapons.

The bonuses would not affect 24/7 combat. They'd be used entirely in events, PvP and special challenges.


The new materials will be dangerous as hell to work with. They'll be dangerous to your tools. My hope is this opens an entire 1000+ skill arc for late-game content.

---

"I have no data yet. It is a capital mistake to theorize before one has data. Insensibly one begins to twist facts to suit theories instead of theories to suit facts."
- Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, Sherlock Holmes

>>where very rare woods are essentially identical

>> I don't understand. The affinities are higher with rare wood bows. This directly affects the damage multiplier the bows provide...

I'm talking about comparing the very rare woods...

A composite bow made out of Azurelle, Copperwood, or Silverwood are basically identical. An Azurelle Composite bow has 8 workability but is almost twice the weight of Silverwood. The only difference appears to be in durability and density/weight. Weight doesn't actually do anything so we are scratching our heads.

A longbow has the same problems with Goldwood, Azurelle, Copperwood, Bloodwood, and Mistwood. They are basically identical except for durability and density/weight (which does nothing.) So we are left with "looks" and durability.

Hope that makes sense.

>>what do you expect

I don't expect anything. I'm not in charge of all game design decisions :chuckle: Things are what they are and I do my best to accommodate outside influences.

Good to hear that some people are taking their time though!

---

"I have no data yet. It is a capital mistake to theorize before one has data. Insensibly one begins to twist facts to suit theories instead of theories to suit facts."
- Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, Sherlock Holmes