So where is the TSO info?

So where is all the great Trade skill TSO info? Friend has told me about a lot of great changes to TS, heck a unicorn TS mount. The NDA is lifted and there is nothing in the TS forums about all the great work domino has done?
Things I have heard about but can’t confirm
1. New TS faction requiring, or solo, group of crafters to help npc’s in an instance. Can receive gems and rare resource drops. Will we see “70-79 chat lvl 75 alchy lfg pst” cause that’s awesome.
2. Unicorn mounts at max faction with +25 to all harvesting skills, and personal hot air balloons that act like sokars.
3. Lots of TS fluff from the gems, Pics would be lovely =P
4. A lot more stuff to do on the adventure pack island Marr
Just kind of bummed that no write ups yet.

The only thing I know about tradeskills in this expansion is that one of the General Achievements they added in will give you a 3.0% chance to harvest a 2nd time automatically (without counting against the 3 harvests per node rule) at the first point. I'm guessing it increases by 3.0% for each of the 5 points you can put into it.

Yes, where ARE all those crafters who've been in beta and have been DYING to tell us about the great stuff that's coming up? SPILL ALREADY!

Lets see here.. The Beta patch notes:
09-22:
TRADESKILLS
Tailors now have recipes for crafted canvas, ruckas, and broadcloth vests.
Outfitters are now able to produce vest versions of cloth armor in the level 10-19 range.

.....
That's all there is relating directly to Tradeskills other than the fact that you can earn Grobb, Tupta, or Survival Accord faction through tradeskilling if you want.

madhatr wrote:

You may see crafters looking for groups, but I would assume most of these instances would either be done within groups of friends or done solo, its the nature of crafters to do so.

There is a unicorn, it is white, it has a horn, it has saddle bags, it has 25 to all harvesting skills, it is crafter obtained, what more could you want ot know about it?
The hot air ballons act in a manner similar to sokokars, taking you from point A to point B.

I have not taken any screenshots of anything in beta. However, most of the TS stuff you use the 'gems' to get is not really fluff, that is from the other factions crafters can work on.

Most of the crafting content is based here, but definatly not all of it.

It all sounds wonderful, but I'm wondering why a unicorn. Will the unicorn stack with the solstice earring? The hot air balloons sound great too. Will there be fixed points that they leave fro and travel to? Like the sokokar posts?
Thank you all for posting so far and thank you Domino and other devs for all the new toys.

Silken@Butcherblock wrote:

Hot Air Baloons are the only way you can travel around in Moors of Ykesha. THey took out the Sokokar Posts.

Galldora wrote:

I don't have a lot to say, because I don't look forward to this expansion, neither adventurer wise nor crafting wise. I won't be able to be part of much of it, so instead of saying a lot of negative stuff, I think it is probably better to stay silent.
I hate grind and this time there is more grind crafting-wise(I see it as grind, other probably don't) than there was in RoK.
Hm, I should probably stop now But I'm sure others will be very happy and this expansion will be just what they have hoped for. And I'm happy for those people, honestly.
edit: inserted the word crafting-wise to make it more clear that I talk about crafting...here on the crafter forum.

There are currently 3 tradeskill zones, but rumor's running around about a 4th top secret tradeskill instance <.< >.> Steamfont, Antonica, CL each have a different set up, for example the Antonica instance is a revamped Firemyst Gully where you get to supply the Dwarf's with new armor and other supplies to fight back the undead horde. They're even kind enough to give you the spoils of victory.
Then there's the new Faction of the Far Sea's Trading company and the rewards you can earn for gaining faction with them, including but not limited to the new tradeskill mounts that are all quite spiffy.
I'm not going to give to many details as I don't want to ruin to many surprises or the fun of discovery I think the Tradeskill Team needs a round of applause though for all the fun things that are headed our way.

There's a bit at the end of my Beta Tour writeup http://eq2.allakhazam.com/sdetail.html?story=15718
DenMum and I were on the same tour - I'm sure she'll be along soon with her usuall great stuff

Ah wonderful.. crafter content requiring groups. .
I've been sitting with two peices left on Proof of the Pudding for a month now on my WS.
Group crafter content will be great for a couple months, then it will be just like PoP now, spam for hours and pay people plat per combine for completions IF you can find them.
Im with the other poster, the more of this expansion I see, the less I want to pay for it. I can sub to EQLive or Vanguard for forced grouping.
"New" Far Seas Trading company Faction? I've been maxed on that faction since killing thousands of Dervs and many FSRs in CL as a noob.

will there be a minimum TS level to do all these in the new expansion? or will it be any tradeskill just gotta do writs for X faction?

Rainmare@Oasis wrote:

The recipe book I scribed on the tour was level 50.

I have yet to complete a tradeskill instance but here is what I can tell ya:

Crafters will be flocking to village of shin as that is considered the 'hub'. There is a faction merchant there that sells crafter jewelry sets, mounts, and orbs that take you to said instances and back to village of shin.

Here are some notes I took on my website to reference back, mostly from the beta forums since that info is purged when the game is live. Everything/anything is subject to change obviously hehe.

i want screenies of teh unicorns

Liljna wrote:

The only thing I can think of that you could mistake for grinding in TSO as an adventurer is the shard loot. Since you earn them for running any of the 20 heroic instances, its not a grind, thats what you call playing the game.

Lasai wrote:

Looks like Befallen's TSEpic channel will be busy, likely the default channel for Tradeskill groups.....One can hope right Galasya?

A friend and I went and duoed one of the tradeskill instances, the Firemyst Gully one. We were both 80 sages. Here's what it consisted of:
1.) Pick up quest at Mara HQ, and head to the zone.
2.) Zone in, run to dwarf camp. Pick up a subquest to make 3 upgrades for his army, to help them fight off the undead in the zone.
3.) Do each of the subquests 4 times, there are 9 types of items that you can turn in, so that's 36 subquests to complete the zone. For the two of us that meant 18 rounds of crafting 3 items, per person. You need no crafting supplies of your own, all of the supplies can be picked up from clicking items around the camp. Yup, that's right, you don't even need to bring fuel!
4.) Once all subquests are complete the dwarf army moves out to attack the undead. Follow at a decent range or you'll get pwned by the red aggro undead. Enjoy as the epic dwarf leader chops up the army, and accept your main quest reward, which is faction with the Far Seas Trading Company Supply Division, some money (IIRC), and a Far Seas token that you can trade in for other goodies.
5.) Open the chest that drops and split the phat lewts. We got a torque (disco!) that gave plusses to Artificing, and it's part of a 3-piece set; when worn together it grants +1% tradeskill xp. We also got a hidebound pelt. I hear that Far Seas tokens may drop from these chests too, as well as other t8 rares.
It took the two of us about 3 hours to finish. We started with no clue what to do, and worked from there. Would be much faster with more people, and it would have been faster if we weren't both sages, as the other class items would have taken less time. It was fun, we talked while we crafted and groaned about how hard it was to make a shield as a sage! I'm looking forward to doing this on live, although I'm sure it will get repetitive. Crafting with other people is less boring than crafting alone, though

When subcombines were removed, some crafters cried foul and wanted the interdendency back. Epics did a good job of this, and kudos to Dominoe (who is my fav dev, I mean where would crafting be without her??) and now with this you can run them solo (albeit slowly) or with some crafters for a change of pace; great idea, and who would have thought an expansion featuring tradeskilling!!