Tradeskill Epic Quest Bottleneck....

AratornCalahn wrote:

Heheh ... let's hope not! But if so, I heard rumours Beghn's looking for a job.

DominoDev wrote:

OUCH! A solid hit, I think .. lol.
Well, if you need people to personally attest to whether or not you are really needed here in the US .. try to schedule a personal interview around the time of the FF and where ever it's being held this year and then ask for volunteers from the FF to be your witnesses. *laugh*
I've rather enjoyed this quest. I had a few stumbling steps along the way but otherwise totally enjoyed it, even when I was cursing Domino for the NO Zone books/pieces for the Scholar quest. I've only ran into one "grumpy-gus" but as he's always been a "grumpy-gus" and always will be, I truthfully wasn't surprised, annoyed but not surprised. As Domino says there will always be Jerks. Luckly for most people the Jerks are out-weighed by the dozens of other people that are genuinely happy to help out for this quest.
I, myself, have camped back and forth a few times to my Alchemist & Provisoner to help someone out with their parts. Working on getting my Sage the levels and factions to do her next. This quest has given me that little extra push to actually level her as my Adventurers aren't going to be T8 for some time so I have been dragging my feet on most of my crafters. /shrug.

Kaisha@Permafrost wrote:

I can just see the queue... complete with protest style signs declaring our love of Domino, and chants.

MrWolfie wrote:

why so negative about this quest, that it seems 99% of people that have completed it really enjoyed doing.
I see we play on the same server. In all my time here I have never struggled to find a crafter to make any item i needed, and at a reasonable rate.
I know, i for one will always make the item for anyone that asks and at the same rate I charge for any craft I do, fuel cost + whatever the customer wants to tip. And i know there are plenty of other crafters on our server that will happily do the same.
It may have been 'forced cameraderie' for you, but for most of us, it was an enjoyable rare event for crafters to come together to achieve something.
Where you there for the building of the griffon towers or the spires? this was another example of people working together. I was involved in both these events, and lost count of the amount of people that passed fuels around to strangers or obtained components for them.
Its events like these that show we are a great community as a whole and not everyone is as insular and mean spirit as some may have us think.

I was dreading the Great Bottleneck as I finally got to that part of the quest.

Within 15 minutes I had my first 4 updates. The hardest class to find was a weaponsmith, but I had that too within the hour.

Great Quest. I went from -40k faction with BW to Master Provisioner with a nice robe in about 10 hrs.

I agree that it is a good quest upto the commissioning part. This has annoyed me, what has getting 8 other pieces from other crafters got to do with being a Master Provisioner, master trader maybe.
I would rather have had to get all three ROK factions, and have a 3 special recipes from each for the class to turn in.
I believe all characters on an account are seperate bodies (we just can't log them in together) and therefore should have been able to make the items for each other.

I had a great time doing the epic quest series on my carpenter. I did the initial BW faction quest (New Lands, New Profits) with a level 28 dirge. I did spend some time thinking angry words at Domino Dev when I kept getting one shotted on my way up the hill but it seemed like a huge accomplishment when I finally was not agro to the beasties there. When the epic quests where released I didn’t have the required faction but I did enough writs the first night.

I had no problem running around zones with beasties that conned orange or red to me. I did have a bit of a bottleneck on the final quest as my crafting raid could not find a tailor who could make our robe. Once I did finish I have made several picnic baskets for other crafters at cost (with the occasional one plat tip). They either came to me or I met them on the Sinking Sands docks. I personally liked the interdependency of this quest and hope that someday we can do a fabled version of the epic quest like the adventurers : D

well ebon clusters are 6p and climbing on my server. Thank god for the dfc armor, or t5 fighters would be hosed. With all the prices on t5 rares skyrocketing, i pity the first time player who wants t5 mastercrafted. At least I dont think the pelts or roots have climbed.

Crafters on Crushbone have been super fantastic. Crafters who are able to make the items often log on, spend 30 minutes to an hour in Teren's Grasp advertising they are making the TS Epic items. No one is charging anyone anything but fuel costs. People are all being very nice and taking the time out to help their fellow crafters. I find this attitude so refreshing. Of course we are back to business undercutting everyone the very next minute. But Hey, its been fun so far.

pebyr wrote:

the price of ebon and the other required items did shoot up on my server (ebon up for just under 1pp a piece to about 6pp), but has now settled back down to usual prices.
Also, Hidebound pelts shot up to 12pp at one point (these are used for the new mannequins) , but they have also dropped to the usual 2-3pp price.
A lot of this was caused by the re-sellers trying to exploit the demand, buying up the cheaper items and reselling them.

Although, one thing that did make me smile and have a 'you deserved that' thought was the player on my server that bought up all the smoldering material on the broker (usually <1g each) and re-proced them all at 6g. He had 400 for sale Thursday evening.
Yesterday, he still had the vast majority of them up for sale at 2g, and had been undercut by many more people at the normal rate.

Apart from these resellers (who are thankfully in the minority), everyone on Splitpaw has been really great. With most of the crafters that I have had help from not requiring any more than the rare resource. And I can see this continuing. As I have posted before, anyone I can help on Splitpaw, just bring me the rare and the fuel cost and i'll be more than happy to help

DominoDev wrote:

Never say never.

Kalyyn@Splitpaw wrote:

MrWolfie wrote:

There are agreat, great many things in this gamer that only have one way to complete them, would u like all of these changed to?
Im all for content that can be solo'd or duo'd, i do a huge amount of duoing with my wife and i find it highly enjoyable. But, we have to realise that just because we choose to play in a certain way, doesnt mean that we are entitled to achieve everything. It goes back to the old argument of 'just because i choose not to group with 23 other people, why should i not have access to the best fabled gear?'
I do understand the sense of achievement you get from completing hard content as a duo, one of my favourite things to do is to see just how hard a mob i can solo with my wiz, and you would be very surprised just what can be achieved with a little effort and persaverance.
As much as I enjoy this, I also enjoy the very different aspect of completing something as part of a greater-whole, working together with others to achieve something that couldnt be achieved solo.
I really enjoyed this quest, and the working with others was a fun part. I really dont see getting the updates for this in the future being difficult at all. There will be a growing number of lvl 80 crafters as time goes on, and i would guess most would want this quest done.
As I said before, in all the time I have played on this server, even back in the days of true inter-dependancy (which i would hate to see the return of btw), I have never had a problem finding a crafter to help me and always at a reasonable rate. There are a lot more helpful people out there than you seem to think. By the way u describe your playstyle, as trying to be as self-sufficient as possible, i would guess you rarely try and find someone else to help, which is probably why you dont realise the help is out there.

There will always be under-utilised content, as the game grows and levels rise, the lower level areas will become less used. This is a common factor to almost all MMO's. I dont think this means that the content is wasted. As long as people enjoy it for a time, even if its only a year between expansions, then it was content worth having.

If you are not interested in 'community' you did have a choice, dont do the quest. You dont have to have that master crafter title, you dont need the cloak, the earring isnt a 'must have'. You can still craft just as well without any of them. No-one forced you to go out and interact with others.
But if you do want the nicer items, you do have to put a little more effort into it. What is the alternative? If the items for the quest where no-trade, you pop to the broker and buy them, or log an alt and make them, either way, its just a matter of crafting a few more items, wheres the challenge or fun there??

When the griffon towers where being made, i started at the nek dock station, there where a whole bunch of us there helping each other and getting it done. We then moved, as a group, on to nmarrs and commonlands, by the time we got to bone lake, it was done, by you it seems. Now great that you did that, but you made the choice to hit that tower on your own, and bypass the groups working on the others. because you chose not to participate in the community there, doesnt mean it didnt happen.

Overall, I really believe that this quest is a roaring success and wil continue to be so. And it seems the vast majority of people thathave done it agree. There will always be those that would like things done differently, but you cant please all of the people all of the time, just aim to please as many as possible.

I read in another of your post that you have cancelled your account already. I wish you well in whatever you decide to play after EQ2, i;ve tried many, and none come close for me. But its the community that make it, which you seem not to want to be a part of, so i would guess you will find somewhere that you are happy.
Have you tried oblivion, perfect world for the insular and self-sufficient.

I have 7 crafters and am rather shy when it comes to approaching strangers in game and asking for anything .... (yes I solo a lot coz if it too lol)
So I guess I should be bitter that I can't do it all myself without having to depend on anyone else. Well, I'm not. I love the quest the way it is and really don't believe I will have an impossible time with any of my alts 6 months or so from now trying to complete their's. I may not be able to finish it as fast as I did with my main, thanks to all the awesome crafters on Najena. It may take me weeks or even longer when my alts are ready, but I don't see it as quest-breaker or anything. Norrath ain't gonna stop turning just coz one of my twinks ain't got her cloak yet.
And as for new player's, I really believe if they ask for help in proper channels they will get it. I know I will never mind helping others.
Just my 2cp worth ...

MrWolfie wrote:

It isn't limited to people who aren't insular. It definitely isn't a reward for flirting in chat. I am not a member of any chat channels except the ones for my guild. I find the others beyond distasteful. I joined the level channel to see if anybody would help with the Pudding combines I needed. There were no lack of offers, even though I rarely interacted with any of them - and never in a public channel.

I think it is more of a reward for people who aren't complete [censored] to others. Once people know your bubbly and cheerful attitude, it doesn't surprise me that you would have a hard time getting help with anything.

Not sure if anyone else is experiencing this but, we seem to have a shortage of weaponsmiths on Nektulos. I got a late start on this quest due to the brain melting faction grind with Bathezid's but so far have no major complaints. I rather enjoyed smoking out the bee-hive and throwing books around the library. Anyhow, if anyone from Nek is reading this, i still need WW, WS, and Prov. i'll be spending most of the week at Terens Grasp to help out anyone else who needs the Solvent (and no, i'm not going to charge anyone out of respect for the other crafters who are kind enough to help out).

Smirkey_of_Nektulos wrote:

Nice to see my GF and I aren't the only crafting geeks on Nek server. We have all 9 at level 80 and 6 after this past weekend have their cloaks. This weekend it was pretty easy to get as many formed up in TG to help each other. I can say however as more finish and get their cloaks the harder it may be to get yours. You all know the "I got mine already" mentality of quite a few people.

Chooba@Nektulos wrote:

One of the 4 I personally finished was a a weaponsmith ... just look me up if you still need help. I can be found easy enough usually. /who all crafters

Crafters R Us where all your crafting needs are fulfilled

Kesugeo@Nektulos wrote:

/wave Kesugeo (from Master Provisioner Bammur)
I too am pretty insular and tend to stick with my guild or solo, but getting together for this quest was a lot of fun. I have 7 more levels to go on my WS, and then I hope the to repeat the good times.
*Edit: Forgot to add, if you still need provisioner Chooba, look for Bammur or Toksik.

Wow, I was really surprised to read the responses here. FWIW, this was the most fun I've had in game in a long time. I started a crafting group Sunday morning and the crafters trickled in... after a while we had all nine classes and then new crafters started swapping out as others finished. I'm glad the items have to be comissioned, it would definitely have been lame to just buy them off the broker, and would have cost me a lot more because I'm sure folks would have price gouged. Everyone in our "raid" paid fuel costs and no one asked for more than that (though some tipped). I also made mirrors at cost for anyone who worked on the quest with us, and so did a few others. Good times were had in Teren's Grasp by all!
The only real feedback I would have is 2 Ebons needed but no pelt? /cry... this is encouraging those dens to stay up again in Feerrott while people strip mine for the Ebon.
Other than that, I love the cloaks, and I think the rewards are lovely and fitting. IMO this kind of interdependency is wonderful... you don't have to do the quest if talking to other people bothers you so much. I'm hardly CyberslutX, thanks, but I got my first crafter through in a little less than 2 hours, start to finish. It's hardly impossible (though I agree that the lack of Weaponsmiths is frustrating... please give them more shiny things so people will want to level them up!!)
Also, if you're on Mistmoore, send me a tell and I'll be happy to make the Carpenter/Alchemist item at cost for you... and can probably recommend a few other crafters to pester if you still need other items /evil grin. The items can be made by people who have finished, btw, for those of you who think it will be impossible to complete 6 months from now. By then we'll have a whole army of crafters done, and if anything it should be easier.