[Yellow Mage]

The armor and weapon degradation seems like a fine and dandy idea in theory, except for one thing - suppose I farm all my weapons and armor to dust. I had better have had a pretty freaking good farming session if I'm expected to even function any more. Also, not all armor and weaponry is crafted - NM drops and AF immediately come to mind.

I'm sorry, but it would seem to be a terrible idea to put such a system in FFXI at this point in the game.

[Aksannyi]

Originally Posted by Firewind

You're talking to someone who QQ's every time they are beaten to a cure by a RDM on someone so a Cure V only does 200

OMG that drives me fucking crazy, damn trigger happy RDMs, go enfeeble something.

What if instead of having to buy all new stuff (that would piss me off. I have a lot of HQ stuff that I don't especially wish to replace) you just have to get a crafter to repair it. I'm sure prices would end up being fairly reasonable. I sure as hell don't want to buy all new gear when my old stuff gets worn out, fuck that. I've easily got 30m+ worth of equipment on my character. No fucking way am I re-spending that.

But to repair it? Sure, bring on the crafters. Or something. Make it so that items don't actually get traded. You have to be in a party with them for them to repair your stuff. And maybe it's just like a spell or something they can cast that repairs all of your cloth-based armor, if they're a clothcrafter. Get a smith for your plate/mail armor, etc. Pay a crafter about 2k every three months or so to fix my shit? (Maybe more frequently, depending) Sounds good.

[Takelli]

Originally Posted by Yellow Mage

The armor and weapon degradation seems like a fine and dandy idea in theory, except for one thing - suppose I farm all my weapons and armor to dust. I had better have had a pretty freaking good farming session if I'm expected to even function any more. Also, not all armor and weaponry is crafted - NM drops and AF immediately come to mind.

I'm sorry, but it would seem to be a terrible idea to put such a system in FFXI at this point in the game.

I actually agree to the idea. But they weapons or armor shouldn't break. They should just become "unusable" until they are fixed for a price of course. It wil be another money sink as well which can be good OR bad.

The weapon goes from 100% to 15%, and the damage out put is but by 85% until it is fixed, or something like that. And the price to repare the item depends on how badly it is damaged, how rare it is, the actual cost of the item and so on.

It wont be too hard to add, but it will also take time to add in though. But then ther will be people QQing about how much it costs to fix some stuff, and how their weapon's "broke" during an exp battle, or a NM fight.

[Firewind]

I think crafters being able to repair things was the whole idea Aksannyi. I'd probably go crazy if any of my PLD or COR AF got destroyed. Those AF sets look too cool to have destroyed.

[Aksannyi]

The armor degradation thing is really done up in WoW, you don't pay players to fix it but just NPCs, but really you do a lot more with NPCs in WoW than you will in FFXI. (For example, NPCing stuff in FF is just not worth it, but in WoW, only some stuff is worth AHing.) I find that every day I have to repair two to three times, depending on what I'm doing. If I'm raiding it might be more, depending on if the group is retarded and gets me killed a lot. I had a particularly lovely day today, I got killed about six times in succession by the same mob (was a bitch, then I figured the strategy) and all of my gear was broken, as in, unusable. I could wear it, it just wouldn't do anything. Repairs cost me 30g from totally broken to 100% fixed. I'm a cloth wearer, though, so that's actually fairly cheap. But in an average day, I, a cloth wearer, probably spend about 50-75 gold on repairs.

On an average day, though, I make at minimum 300g, and have made up to 1000g. So it's not a huge goldsink. I would hope that if SE were to implement something like this, it wouldn't be a retarded gilsink the way some other shit is. Seriously I love OP warps and the WG warp but I must spend like 6k a day using them.

[Armando]

The armor and weapon degradation seems like a fine and dandy idea in theory, except for one thing - suppose I farm all my weapons and armor to dust. I had better have had a pretty freaking good farming session if I'm expected to even function any more. Also, not all armor and weaponry is crafted - NM drops and AF immediately come to mind.

I'm sorry, but it would seem to be a terrible idea to put such a system in FFXI at this point in the game.

Simple solution: Make the mob's level a factor. Why would my armor degrade against mobs so weak I could kill 50 of them while AFK? Why would my weapon, for that matter, if I'm beating them senseless so easily?

In my opinion repairs should be done primarily by player crafters. There should be an option to have guild NPCs repair them, but at a steeper price.

[Aksannyi]

I really like this idea, it would breathe an entirely new life into crafting, as long as items for repair are not steal-able in any way. Make a new type of trade window or something for repair purposes only. Hell, make it an automatic amount based on how many items a person needs repaired. (1 item? 100g, 2 items, 250g, etc.) It would add up. Don't give the players any power except the power to level their craft - say to like, 80, so people who are leveling crafts up to 60 only can't jump on that bandwagon for all eight crafts.

Make it so that stuff degrades slowly over time, make a new trade window that really functions in a similar way to the trade window, but does not give the option to complete trade - so that all repairs can be conducted while this window is open. The items NEVER EVER go into the hands of the crafter. EVER. That way, nothing ever gets stolen this way. Even R/E stuff can go into this repair-trade window and can be repaired but can not be traded.

They could implement this sort of system, but seriously if they made it so you actually trade your stuff to people expect a lot of "OMG Jerkfaceplayer stole my Cuchulain's Mantle" GM calls and threads on BG. DON'T FUCK IT UP SE.

As though they're listening and actually going to implement this. -.-

[Icemage]

^
I don't have an issue with R/EX items not being able to break permanently, but for crafted items, I have no compunctions about making them permanently break and vanish. It'll force people to take better care of their gear and keep it repaired so they don't have those embarassing moments when their weapon breaks and they have nothing to bash that nasty fanged thing breathing down their necks, and it'll give the crafters a boost since it'll take items out of circulation which they can then make more of.


Icemage

[DakAttack]

What kind of mechanic would be used to repair armor and weapons, and would it require materials? Probably a light crystal, and maybe a few ingots or pieces of cloth?

[Omgwtfbbqkitten]

Allowing players to repair things is a pretty terrible idea, they'd end up charging more than the NPCs probably would. Or steal your stuff and sell it. Human nature leans to greed without something to keep it in check.

Remember the days when Haubys and Scorpion Harnesses were things you were wary to lend out? Yeah, that.

Only downside to the whole concept of repairs is it does give mages leverage when it comes to asking for money in order to be raised. They'd get the short end of the loot in PTs under such a system, so they have to make it up somewhere, even if it doesn't seem that noble.

[Armando]

That's like saying allowing players to teleport each other for a fee is a horrible idea. Or comissioning a crafter for a fee is a horrible idea.

Basic supply and demand. Because of just about everyone needing repairs on a regular basis, crafters can't charge me my dick, both my nuts, and one lung each time I need a repair. Players won't pay that much for something they'll have to do on a weekly basis. I would also assume that there would be enough competition among the crafters, since it would obviously be a quick and easy way to rake in profits without even having to synth an actual item and wait for it to sell; similar to Teletaxi-ing or offering Warp II's and Retraces. The NPC prices would also provide a hard ceiling for how much crafters can charge before player will ignore them.

[Aksannyi]

Well that's what I was saying, BBQ, is that they should make it a set amount that goes to the crafter based on the number of items they are fixing, and that they need to make a new "Repairs" window in which you place your items but the crafter can not remove them from the window. They'd need to safeguard it.

This is, of course, SE we are talking about, so I don't see it ever happening the way I've described.

---------- Post added at 12:37 AM ---------- Previous post was at 12:32 AM ----------

Originally Posted by Armando

crafters can't charge me my dick, both my nuts, and one lung each time I need a repair.

[Omgwtfbbqkitten]

Basic supply and demand. Because of just about everyone needing repairs on a regular basis, crafters can't charge me my dick, both my nuts, and one lung each time I need a repair. Players won't pay that much for something they'll have to do on a weekly basis. I would also assume that there would be enough competition among the crafters, since it would obviously be a quick and easy way to rake in profits without even having to synth an actual item and wait for it to sell; similar to Teletaxi-ing or offering Warp II's and Retraces. The NPC prices would also provide a hard ceiling for how much crafters can charge before player will ignore them.

Except there doesn't really need to be repairs from players to start with. Allowing everything outside of R/E to degrade to the point of breaking would already be selling extra weapons and armor to tanks and melee alike. As I illustrated with SAM, the "one and only" mentality behind Hagun would be crushed. Not only would they start looking to other GKs as a fallback, they'd look more seriously into using those bows and arrows. If your Hagun can degrade, then for long sessions you'd want to find ways to avoid whittling it down to nothing.

Tanks obviously would be bringing more than one kind set or armor or shields. Eventually some of this stuff is going to break and be lost, so crafters only stand to benefit from items that can be destroyed, just as they benefit from the consumables market.

I think this would be difficult to implement in FFXI, but not for FFXIV at this point.

[Armando]

Is there really a need to have equipment degrade to the point of breaking without giving the option for repair though? For starters it doesn't make much sense, but setting that aside (since so many things never make sense), you would move a much larger amount of raw materials simply allowing weapons to be given maintenance indefinitely. I don't like the idea of my equipment being 100% temporary. I'd rather have, in the worst of cases, a break that essentially transforms the gear into a "-1" (think of the broken fake Bigoron Sword in Ocarina of Time. It's still in your inventory, and useable, though gimp.) I don't want to be bringing multiple sets of equipment just because, either - that's part of what I dislike about gear swapping in the first place!

Besides, if you make Hagun repairs require a costly ingot, then most people will avoid whipping out Hagun on a whim, and the rich will continue to recklessly hack everything down, keeping the value of the ingots up.

[Firewind]

Elder Scrolls probably had the most reasonable system of weapon degradation where if the condition of a weapon or piece of armour dropped to 0/100 it was still usable but you would lose all combat bonuses from it until it was repaired again.