Yes, I kind of did things backwards, in that I started playing EQII before I started playing EQ and there is a world of difference between these two games, with EQ being a lot more complex than EQ. I do, however, keep the two games separate in my mind when playing them, because of the complex differences between them, and I have been immensely enjoying EQ with my friends. I would, however, like to post some of my observations about trade skilling in EQ, so here goes: 1) I love that there are oftentimes subcombines that must be completed before crafting the final product and that tradeskill classes rely heavily upon other tradeskill classes to be able to complete products. However, due to the many changes that have come about in the game since it's introduction, most, if not all, stat crafted items are pretty much useless, even at the current level of our low level characters. Perhaps a boost in stats on these TS items, to make them more equivalent to the Defiant gear might make these items more viable? 2) I don't mind going out and foraging or farming or picking up ground spawns to gather my tradeskill components. In fact, it gives me a reason to go visit those lands that I missed as I leveled up, and I love checking out all these lands of Norrath 500 years in the past. The drop rate, however, is absolutely horrendous on some items, and makes one re-think whether they even really want to continue leveling up their tradeskill class. I have been picking up Brell's Bounty in Brells Rest for weeks now, leveling up my beastlord's baking, and get a better rate on those mushrooms than I get on items that are supposedly both foraged and body drops...one very specific example is Steaming Water that I want to use to level my beastlord's brewing. I spent practically the entire day yesterday visiting the four zones that this water is supposed to drop in, on my mage, just killing everything in all four zones, and did not get a single drop. Today I spent the last nine hours both foraging and killing mobs in two of those zones, and got all of two drops of this water. Two days of farming for this item, and only two bottles of water as opposed to two rounds circling Brell's Rest and then the Cooler and ending up with 125 mushrooms. My friend has been harvesting Relic Fragments and getting a better drop rate on them, though that drop rate is also low enough to discourage one from leveling their tradeskill as well. He gained 33 Relic fragments after spending the entire day foraging in the same zone. At 250 brewing, the recipes that I can find to skill up on now either require Relic fragments or this insanely impossible to find Steaming Water. I was hoping to find the drop rate on the water to be much better than the drop rate on the Relic Fragments, but have found the total opposite to be true instead. :/ 3) I think it is quite reasonable to expect failed combines, especially for recipes that are not trivial to you, but I find it quite annoying that after spending so much time farming these mushrooms, that a recipe that became trivial at 68 (Prepared Brell's Bounty) and has been trivial for some time now, as my beastlord was at 244 baking, that there should be any failed combines, especially since skillups seem to be quite rare and I can produce as many as 20 or 30 Smoked Brell's Bounty Stew before getting another skillup to begin with. The loss of even one potential skillup to a trivial recipe kind of irks me, because I feel that we are already getting a 'kick in the bucket' from the rare skill ups we get from the final product, and I feel like that is a 'double whammy'. This isn't quite as onerous as the extremely low drop rate on certain items, but it is still enough to make one feel kind of discouraged about leveling their tradeskilling. I know things in EQ do take a longer time to accomplish, and I am not in a rush to reach end game, and I like taking my time getting there, but there is a huge difference between taking one's time to enjoy the adventure, taking time to smell the roses per se, and the incessant repetitive grind of trying to farm mats to skill up one's trade-skill class. I actually don't mind the time it's taking to pick those mushrooms, but I cannot even begin to fathom spending months upon months to come up with just a handful of Steaming Water in order to skill up brewing. That just isn't going to happen. Most likely, I will end up going with the Relic Fragments, but the time to invest in harvesting those isn't nearly as good as collecting the mushrooms, so again, an onerous grind that I simply will not find in any way enjoyable. Is it really necessary to make the drop rate so low? I do want to level up my brewing as well as my baking, but at the rate the items are dropping for leveling up brewing, I question whether it will even be worth the time invested to do so. :/ Is there anyone out there who has leveled Brewing up who might know of some easier recipe to get past 250 brewing? Perhaps a recipe that uses a ground spawn as opposed to a foraged item that almost never drops? Feedback on this would be very much appreciated. Thank you!
http://www.eqtraders.com/items/show_item.php?item=4976&menustr=080030000000 Ground spawn in Kaladim at the farm. You get 11? of both fungus and mushroom each cycle. I don't recall the repop timer on them, but it isn't terrible.
Corking Device requires a foraged item, Branch of Sylvan Oak...what is the drop rate like on this foraged item? If it is a pretty common drop, then this might work. Thank you, Arhok. Edit: Recipe trivials at 335...from 250, that might be quite a stretch, with a lot of failed combines. Still, if it's easier to farm the components needed, it might be worth it.
30ish plat to make Brut Champagne, you can enchant 20 Gold Bars in a single cast so that step isn't all that annoying. Just loot diamonds and also gain XP or work on whatever else you want to do and then use auto-combine. If you're Gold can either /buyer to get someone else to do the sub-combines or /trader to get paid for doing super cheap auto-combines like Soda Water, if you're not Gold can /baz and if you luck out can decide between spending the time or plat for Soda Water and a large quantity of Champagne Magnum is unlikely to be for sale.
Ouch, expensive to make...but I think my mage can enchant the bars. If she can't, my enchanter friend can. Thank you, Rickate
For baking do picnic thing, cannot remember full name, there many subcombines but you make around 10-16 items per subcombine. Need fruit, eggs, brownie parts (drops a lot in sof expansion 1 zone example dragonscale hills). Example you need marmelade sandwich, 1 fruit becomes like 50 something around. If you serious about ts and wanna invest more than the first 3 aa ranks in each then do your self a favor and get trophy + max it, because when above 325 skill it become a lot harder.
So I have been making the Brut Champagne as suggested, and making some good progress, but am pretty disappointed in the number of failed combines for making the Champagne Magnum's. Recipe is trivial to my Jewelcrafter, yet out of 1k combines, she had 44 failures...this seems kind of high for such an expensive recipe that is actually trivial by almost 50 points. Each bottle costs around 30p to craft, and merchant only buys the final combine of champagne for 2p apiece. I am on my second round of 1k bottles to craft, and 9 points to go to hit 300 brewing. This is quite a plat sink, and I'm only glad I can afford to do this. I really feel for those players who don't have the resources that I do and can't afford to do this. Ahh well, no one ever said life is gonna be fair. It really would be nice if the merchant would pay closer to the actual cost of crafting the item at least, so as to alleviate some of the cost.
If it costs 30pp to make, and you are saying that you are getting ready to make a second thousand. So if you made 2000 of them, it would cost 60kpp? Thats honestly not that difficult to get if nothing else by going and wiping out low level zones for diamonds. I realize that is a boring endeavor, but so is tradeskilling in general...
I don't think you understand how EQ tradeskills are coded. There is a 5% failure rate for all combines, even if you are over the trivial number. This failure rate can be lessened by two things...the first 3 ranks of mastery aa for a tradeskill which can cut the failure rate in half. Also, once you are 100 is unmodified skill over a trivial, the failure rate will start to drop as you climb in unmodified skill...until once 200 in unmodified skill above a trivial, you cannot fail (e.g. any trivial 100 or lower never fails for someone at 300 unmodified skill). Note that the 301-350 skill progression does not seem to matter for this (so 100 is still the highest no fail you can get, even if your skill gets to 350). 1000 combines should equal 50 failures. You got 44. You are ahead of the game. As for what you should be doing to get to 300, you should look at The Ultimate EQ Tradeskill Guide in the EQ Traders forum: http://mboards.eqtraders.com/eq/for...i-mods/36211-the-ultimate-eq-tradeskill-guide There are several alternate paths listed there.
Thank you, Daedly and Goodn for your input. I understand perfectly how the Tradeskills are coded...but, this game is very old and the current way things are coded does not necessarily mean it is how it should continue to be coded. We want more people playing the game, but the way it is coded now, and the extremely horrendous drop rate on items, makes tradeskilling less than desirable to skill up in, for the most part. I am doing it myself despite the long tedious process because I am not one of those people who likes to rush to end game. I take my time in order to ensure I am enjoying the content and the satisfaction that comes from doing so. Still, I do not enjoy extremely long tedious grinding sessions doing the same thing repetitively over and over again, and this is the one thing that will deter me from my path to tradeskilling. If it will deter me, then I am sure it will deter many others as well, especially those who do love to rush through things. I may not like to rush through things, but who am I to deny those who have a different play style than myself, and if it gives us more players in the game, then let it be so. I would like to see this game live long beyond that of any other mmo out there. I am also very much aware of EQTrader's TS guide, but as stated in my original post, the drop rate on items needed is so horrendously low as to make it too tedious, even for those of us who like to take our time doing things. Hence, why I am making the Brut Champagne. Even if a specific recipe doesn't call for a low drop rate item, many of them require trivial sub-components that do require items with extremely low drop rates. I also have to take into consideration that my highest level forager is only at 130 foraging and she cannot go any higher at this time, which means that yes, the drop rates on these foraged items will be quite low. With that said, my beastlord brewer did hit 300 brewing yesterday and I am done skilling that up for a while. She is at 259 baking, and will continue to make Brell's Bounty recipes until she hits 300, at which point, she will once again stop for a while. It has been an interesting process, of which, for the most part, I have enjoyed, but only because I did skip the extremely tedious grinding of farming very low drop rate materials.
