>How do I learn more about player owned caravans

These two links explain pretty much everything you would ever want to know about caravans.

https://elanthipedia.play.net/mediawiki/index.php/Player_Owned_Caravans
http://lostonawhim.com/trading/caravans/

>How do I get one particulary the blacksmith caravan

The blacksmith's caravan was sold at the recent GuildFest, at this shop:
https://elanthipedia.play.net/mediawiki/index.php/Custorian%27s_Creations_(2)

>and does it do what I hope it does?

If you mean, "does it allow you to blacksmith on the road?" No. It does not. It does however look really neat.

>Can I really have my own Tinkers" Wagon?

Yes. There is a customization sold that is a "tinker's caravan" at this shop:
https://elanthipedia.play.net/mediawiki/index.php/Primp_My_Ride_(2)

>meaning Blacksmithing caravan?

Currently caravans do not have actual crafting tools on them. So no anvil/tub and no spinning wheel/loom.

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Salute a drowned sailor? You ought to brush up on your protocol, Kasto.

>I hope that tools are added at some point in the future.

No! MINE! Hsssssss!

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Weapons for Sale:
https://elanthipedia.play.net/mediawiki/index.php/User:CARAAMON#Wares
Hunta Talna Kortok, built by Gor'Togs, for Gor'Togs
http://www.angelfire.com/rpg2/caraamon/home.html

yes, it would be nice if the caravan did more things. While these things are suggested, i think one thing should be remembered. Placing and moving a caravan around the map is not a simple task.

In the era (always) of traveling from mus'pari to hib in under 2 minutes, traveling from riverhaven to crossing in 5 seconds, traveling to faraway islands in under 10 minutes, it should be noted that traveling with a caravan takes way way way longer.
You just cannot say, "hey, lets go to vipers with the caravan and do stuff", then be there within 5 seconds. Without a caravan, you can travel basically anywhere on the main continent in no time at all.

But to go from crossing to riverhaven with a caravan will take you no less than 10-15 minutes, not 1.
Not only that, but you just cannot log out of the game. You have to go stable your caravan, lest it die and you get charged 10 plat and lose all your pending contracts and commodities. Then your caravan is only instantly available in the future from that ONE stable. Not any stable in the game. Thoes can take HOURS to retrieve your caravan from.

Therefore, when people suggest things like "you should have the ability to hire a hireling anywhere your caravan is", or "your caravan should be able to do xyz", i do not think that is generally by default overpowered. First you would have to have a caravan active. Then you would have to position yourself where you would want with your caravan. This can take 100x more time than without a caravan. Then when you are done, you have to take the time to stable your caravan.

TL;DR: All this boils down to the fact that caravan travel is infinitely more time consuming than travel without a caravan. Therefore it would be nice if caravans were not considered an overpowered trader asset if it did anything more useful (for the trader that is) that what it does at the moment.

>I mean if I had to of course I would and I would make for that extra time as well, but still why couldnt it be possible to set it up like a camp?

The former Trader GM's wanted this too but it was too resource intensive.

Regards,

Sortny/Braunwen

>And why would a caravan that is trader owned need to stable?

Protection from crashes, zone unloading, and memory management, I'd guess.

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Weapons for Sale:
https://elanthipedia.play.net/mediawiki/index.php/User:CARAAMON#Wares
Hunta Talna Kortok, built by Gor'Togs, for Gor'Togs
http://www.angelfire.com/rpg2/caraamon/home.html

>change it so that caravans kinda work like a boat. You tell them to go to xyz from the stable... and you basically disappear from the world as it starts you on your journey.
ehh, isnt caravan routes + interior of your caravan effectively this? You can work basically any skill that you could work anywhere, inside your caravan, while you travel on the route.
What if i wanted to stop the travel and stop half way at arthe dale, cause someone asked for help? Never again will you find a deader to drag/help.
While i might add that it would be nice to customize the routes your caravan can take, or possibly have a way to direct your caravan while inside the caravan.

> They could even incorporate random events like an attack by Raiders that use quest mechanics to balance to your level.. I would think it would be a lot more fun.
ok, so you suggest that hogs and child goblins to invade caravans, as most traders wouldn't be able to handle much above that. Secondly to balance the constant directed threat at the caravan, we would require a substantial contract profit increase if our caravans were susceptible to specific invasions. Death costs ALOT of potential coin.

>Most traders are off in their own world anyways when they are running routes.. this would just be more scripted and maybe provide a better experience. (and potential mini-invasions would also help reduce scripting)
Traders do not need automated mechanics to test if we are afk. Insinuating this is ludicrous.

>I have to ask, are you serious?
Are you?

You're only purpose here, KROONERMANREVENGE, is to provide troll responses to posts, so i cannot imagine you are.

>Especially dying in random areas, not hunting areas, where there is little traffic and you could sit and rot awhile

That's stupid regardless of what guild you are playing. Die, depart, done. You lose less than 1% of your total exp bits across every skill.

>Being dead cripples your earning potential.

This is true for every guild.

>How would you recommend automated mechanics for combat-based guilds?

Apples and oranges. Combat has risk. Injury, death, burden increase leading to the above, etc. AFK route running has 0 risks.

>Sure, we might be able to stand there and let them beat on us, but we are NOT a combat guild.

Which has what, exactly, to do with the price of corn in Ohio? The suggestion was for a flex critter to attack. The initial response was 'lol baby goblins and hogs lol'. There are traders who have significant combat ranks. That was literally all I said.

>Our minimal combat-based requirements are for defensive purposes

Then perhaps you should be able to defend yourself. Caravans were quite typically targets of opportunity because of the wealth they possessed. Combat guild or not, that seems to be what the suggestion was about, targeting a rich caravan for theft/looting.

>This seems counter intuitive to the guild.

I wasn't aware when you signed up to the guild, and chose to lead a caravan through the wilds of the world, you were promised peace. If you want to avoid combat, perhaps you should stick to crafting (lore primary), or selling gem pouches, bundles, working tables, running auctions, or one of the many other non-combat things you could do.

It's not like the supposition will ever even come to pass. No one with an ounce of common sense thinks a GM is going to waste his/her time writing something for so little return.

>You're only purpose here, KROONERMANREVENGE, is to provide troll responses to posts, so i cannot imagine you are

1: Your. You're means 'you are', which makes no sense in the context (You are only purpose here)
2: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Troll_(Internet)

See, just because I disagree with you, doesn't make me a troll. Just because I point out logical inconsistencies and places where you jump to unwarranted conclusions, doesn't make me a troll. I'd have to be doing it just to irritate you, and you're not really interesting enough to warrant that.

Plus, frankly, your posts are very emotionally invested, and I'm not. You said 'traders can't combat' I said they can. You said 'traders don't afk' I called that bald faced ridiculous. You said 'death costs alot (also, you meant 'a lot', alot is not a word)' I replied with 'depart coins'. You then resorted to pointing, waving, and calling me a poopoo meany head.

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I'm a badger, I be badgerin'

Well there was other discussion but will first hit this..


>>ehh, isnt caravan routes + interior of your caravan effectively this? You can work basically any skill that you could work anywhere, inside your caravan, while you travel on the route. What if i wanted to stop the travel and stop half way at arthe dale, cause someone asked for help? Never again will you find a deader to drag/help. While i might add that it would be nice to customize the routes your caravan can take, or possibly have a way to direct your caravan while inside the caravan.

No. Because depending on where you want to go there are a lot of other things you might have to do to get there, especially between provinces. It could also provide traders the option to sell passage on their caravan. I envision it as direct routes, even across the sea, with appropriate times baked in of course.

As far as stopping and asking for help. Depending on how it would be set up.. if you are on a long haul from say shard to theren or something.. if you needed to stop, it could evaluate how long you have been on your route, and have break off destinations. So you could still stop along the way if an emergency came up.. Would you randomly run across a deader? No. But I rarely do that anyways.

>>ok, so you suggest that hogs and child goblins to invade caravans, as most traders wouldn't be able to handle much above that. Secondly to balance the constant directed threat at the caravan, we would require a substantial contract profit increase if our caravans were susceptible to specific invasions. Death costs ALOT of potential coin.

Clearly you don't understand how quest mechanics work. The mobs on the prison quest adjust to the player. The same mechanics could be used... and the 'raiders' would always be equivalent of the trader. It would always be a fair fight. And hogs and goblins?? seriously? Most of the traders I know, while not barbarians by any means, can handle their share of combat. But that wouldn't matter.

And yes, maybe if you are attacked (remember I said that there is the potential for the raiders to happen) maybe the contracts could be adjusted to give a bonus. Though that risk is already there. If you walk your caravan into an invasion... you don't get any additional increase.. so frankly that is just kinda greedy. Which, Cheers!, since I will assume you are just RPing your trader.


>>Traders do not need automated mechanics to test if we are afk. Insinuating this is ludicrous.
I didn't even necessarily mean afk.. but 99% of the people running routes regularly are scripting the entire time. To not understand that is just plain naive at best. And it isn't even about that as much as it would be to add some excitement to the routes. You could do other events like random peddler selling rare goods.. or random environment issues like a downed tree you have to chop away.. who knows. Anything would be more fun than it is now.

>As far as stopping and asking for help. Depending on how it would be set up.. if you are on a long haul from say shard to theren or something.. if you needed to stop, it could evaluate how long you have been on your route, and have break off destinations.

That sounds like a system suspiciously close to the way ships track themselves, and that is a nasty beast.

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Weapons for Sale:
https://elanthipedia.play.net/mediawiki/index.php/User:CARAAMON#Wares
Hunta Talna Kortok, built by Gor'Togs, for Gor'Togs
http://www.angelfire.com/rpg2/caraamon/home.html

>> That sounds like a system suspiciously close to the way ships track themselves, and that is a nasty beast.

Not even close. More like. you started at x and are going to y. system would be able to know what potential stops are along the way. It wouldn't just drop you anywhere. It would stop at a trader outpost along the way.

I am not proposing a grid system with xy coordinates that lets you stop at any point like a boat. More like in WoW.. you jump on the flight path from tanaris to go to durotar (a long flight involving multiple stops along the way that it converts into one flight) and if you get DC'd you end up at the next flight master along the way and would just have to restart the journey from there. Except more interactive.

>> i would like to see how we would use a caravan to travel across the sea. but between provinces is obvious. How much time would you expect such a thing to take, compared to 4 seconds per room? (current caravan travel time)

It is code, not real life. It would be a simple transition of "your caravan loads itself onto a trader guild ship destined for so and so". done. Easy.

I also think the current travel time needs to be faster, if only by a second. but you would just take the current time to travel the boats and maybe make it shorter since the trader guild would run their own special ships. Maybe for using services like that it would be deducted from the final profit you are given for turning in a contract.


>>i dont run across deaders very often either, but getting stopped to ask to sell a pouch or do an adoption is frequent enough for me. in addition The idea's at the begin of your post about your caravan being able to provide services were great. I liked the part where you limited the amount you could transact before you had to return to "Base". That way you could be rated for a certain amount of transactions before you had to reconcile your books. As you got older, maybe that limit would slowly increase, or possibly through time as you performed more and more sales.

And I am not suggesting that you would HAVE to utilize this option.. just that it would be an option for running routes -- which would make it more interesting for traders running routes in general. Also, as it is now, you are asked to sell pouches or bundles in a city.. when you are there to turn in a contract.. which wouldn't change at all under my suggestion.

That also sounds good to me.. makes circling worth something. Just like it is tied into trader shops.

>>no, sorry, i do understand. I was just slightly exaggerating the limits of common trader combat. i think you got my drift :)

Not really.. you were kinda insulting.. child goblins?? come on now. and again if you know how the mechanics work.. that entire argument was silly. :)

>>i would estimate the same percentage for anyone out hunting. or just a slightly lower percentage for anyone crafting or doing ANY experiencing building exercise. And honestly, if you were to create an automated mechanic to test for scripting, i assure you that response to it would be commonly scripted.

I don't doubt it would be. Again, that isn't the point though. The point is to add more excitement to running routes so that they aren't so completely boring.

The problem with that is that it is harder to add in creative ways to improve running routes without it potentially spilling out onto the rest of the game. (which wouldn't necessarily be a bad thing, but takes a LOT more time and effort)

You could incorporate the idea of a guarded route into my idea.. and it would definitely add cool factor.

With my idea, of trade routes as their own 'rooms' -- think treadmills where you would plod along and feel like you were moving, but it would mostly be illusion, it would be easy to implement quests that would let traders accept missions requiring guards to go to xyz rare destination. Yet would require a lot less development on the GMs side of things. If all they have to create is an interesting destination for where you turn in the contract and cargo.. and maybe even a small vendor as additional reward of rare fluff.. it is a lot less work than asking for an entire new unexplored place only reachable by caravans as they are now. (the development of that is WAY more involved.. think connecting areas, lore, NPCs, monster areas, etc.. which are all great.. but take a TON of effort and time)

We can ask for the moon.. but it probably won't get done. Hell my idea probably won't get done.. but it wouldn't be a long project, especially for the base code. The guarded mission contracts would take longer, but the rest could be implemented fairly quickly.

some quick pseudocode:

set up the main method to put them into a room when they tell their caravan to go.. (maybe checks against what contracts they have, to see if it is one of the guarded missions or rare destinations)

activate atmospheric messaging to make it appear like they are plodding along.

call the method for the route they are taking, (have a route set up for every viable destination, crossings to river, river to crossings, etc etc etc)

have it set the 'time' they are on the route

call an event method that would randomly spawn xyz

spawns could include just random atmospheric messaging, raiders, rarely a random peddler, passerbys that would wave, etc. could even include options for different routes have different potential spawns.

once the 'time' ran out, it kicks the player back out, puts them outside the destination guild stable -- end of run.

Pretty easy to do, light on the code, yet lots of potential for addons.