Suggestions to fix professions/work orders for War Within

Gameplay Professions
1

I’m sure there’s dozens of threads like this already, but I didn’t find any. So I started a new one. I’ve seen a couple youtubers/streamers share their thoughts on crafting improvements, and I thought I’d share the ideas i’ve had bouncing around in my head since launch.

Problems

  1. Public work orders suck aren’t used enough for many reasons
  2. Quality - it’s 5 quality or gtfo
  3. incomplete reagent work orders
  4. difficulty in maxing professions because once you’re past a certain skill level, only high investment items return any skill increase, which usually need to come from work orders

Solutions

Work Orders
Remove the ability to create incomplete work orders - these are currently only used to scam players who don’t know the value of the reagents they’re providing. It’s a nice thought, but I have yet to see it used in a non-scammy fashion

Have more crafted items be warband-bound. Things like alloys, special hides, bots of cloth, spell threads, armor kits, sharpening stones… This was one of the biggest surprises with dragonflight. I truly though they’d use the work order system, only to find the AH was the go to spot for 95% of crafted goods still. This alone would increase the number of work orders so high we could remove the cap. It also makes it easier to regulate the economy, because all your AH prices are now on base materials, and any “effort” cost comes from commissions. The reason to make it warband-bound is so that players can still “share” between their warband, and any extra materials generated(from multicraft/resourcefulness) could be shared. The goal here is to move more crafted items away from AH fodder and into the work order system.

In addition to the above, allow work orders to have a quantity. Let me request 20 bolts of cloth, or 100 obsidian alloy. As long as I provide the materials, what’s it matter? This will cut down on frustrations from the above when the switch is made. This also makes multicraft more valuable, because players players who provided resources for 10x alloy could receive the ingredients back after only using enough for 5.

Professions
Improved UI - players need to be able to see all patterns granted by a specialization, important features, and skill bonuses

Blacksmithing/leatherworking. I honestly think these two need to be split up into 2 professions each. It’s kind of crazy that I can have two toons for each of these that are far along with completely different specialization spending. Honestly, I feel we need to separate these out into weaponsmith/armor smith and leatherworker/mail crafter. The only one of the 4 that would need a bit of love would be mail crafters, and I’m sure the team could think of something to give them. The point would be to prevent newer players from “trapping” themselves by trying to specialize into to contradictory trees, while also providing each profession a more unique identity.

Quality - Quality was a great idea. I loved it. But it’s current implementation means that anything besides a 5 quality is a failure. And if anything besides 5 is bad, then why do we have it? I think quality needs to have it’s primary power contribution removed. Crafted items should use the same progression track as other items, with them being created on the appropriate “track”(veteran/champion/heroic/mythic). Then quality could have two purposes. It could increase the initial drop on the track, all the way to 4/8, or it could increase the odds of a “good luck” proc, which I’ll add in the next section. This would remove the pain of not getting a 5 quality item, because you’d be able to upgrade it just like your other gear. And when you recraft an item, if you change it’s track/season, it rests to 1(+ quality bonus). And for trade goods, quality could improve multicraft/resourcefulness chances.

Inspiration - Because inspiration is tied to skill/quality, it currently is frequently “required”. And as we know, anything required is bad. So instead of inspiration providing a mandatory bonus to item level, what if it provided a chance at a “good luck” effect. Maybe it provides a random tertiary stat. Maybe it provides a random visual effect. Maybe it provides a unique transmog look. The point is that inspiration would not provide any more player power than a lucky drop does today. But it could still provide things that players would want. Then we’d just need another crafting item to “lock in” an inspiration effect, so that players would be able to save these effects through recrafts if they got something they really wanted.

And that’s it. I’m sure tons of people will hate these ideas, but maybe some discussion could lead to good ideas that would allow the Dev team to deliver an even better crafting experience for war within or midnight.

2 Likes
2

On inspiration: I don’t think it is ever required for a craft now. Back before mid season 2 blacksmithing weapons required it if trying to embellish at max ilvl, but they hotfixed that out so they are always guaranteeable without inspiration. I personally like the duality of being able to choose: Illustrious Insight to max rank a craft or re-recrafting for inspiration procs. It gives a dual path to max quality gear. I think the RNG aspect of inspiration should be looked at though. I think it would be better if each time you crafted and didn’t get an inspiration proc, you got a stacking skill bonus (basically after X attempts you get guaranteed craft at max rank). I think this better fits the fantasy of a crafter where as you keep reworking it, you get better an better until you accomplish your goal. It would also help with pricing a recraft cycle approach if you knew you could hit it in X attempts max.

On quality: I like the thought process behind quality, but I think the implementation is too overly done currently. I think a better route would be 2 quality ranks: Perfect and Average (or whatever names). Basically when you get max skill, best prof gear, correct talents, you can guarantee perfect either through insight or X recraft cycles. Prior to that, you just have to rely on recraft cycles with lower skill increasing the number of max (X) recraft attempts or you just pump out an average item if the buyer doesn’t care. I think this gives everyone a path to max rank crafts regardless of how skilled up they are and allows them to play in the market earlier. Caveat to this is it would allow for rank specification in public work orders as everyone could do them at max rank.

Side note: A lot of people aren’t 5 star or bust. About a 3rd of my requests don’t care about max quality, either because they value saving gold more or because it is a pvp item and the actual quality doesn’t matter due to how the pvp upgrade item works.

I like the server identity aspect of it. I think the UI needs help though so average folks can find a crafter.

  1. I think the UI should provide a means to send a message to the order placer regardless of faction and if they are online or not. This allows crafters to let the order maker know if there is a problem with their public order. Currently you can only send messages to online folks of the same faction through the interface. It also allows for crafters to look for customers and let them know they can do the craft personally if the order is updated a certain way.

  2. I think each server should have a crafter listing (like how the in game guild crafter list works) that is “opt in”. Crafters who want to do personal orders can add themselves to the listing and update it when they get new patterns. Players can remove themselves from the listing when they want. The listing would allow the order placer to send a message to the crafter (similar to #1).

  3. Better notifications: The character select screen should show when you have a personal order available. When you log in the guild interface should alert if there are any guild orders available and what professions they are in (with an ingame option to disable of course). There should be a method to setup a main character to receive ingame notifications if any of your alts across your account get an order (with an option to disable).

In terms of specializations, I think that each specialization path (bottom node) needs to have a pattern that easily gets you to 100 skill without needing a time limited material. You still need to max out all the talents to guarantee perfect crafts regardless of your skill, so keeping that low either due to timelimited materials/work orders/rep seems like overkill. Just gate it behind the final node of a specialization tree and ensure each final node has a pattern that does that.

3

Definitely some good points here. Professions were one of the features I anticipated greatly coming into Dragonflight. Early implementation was chaotic, but I think it’s landed in a spot where the wins are fun and the losses, while still a largely a downer, are kind of easy to ignore/avoid if you just don’t care about bulk goldmaking. Take that take with the grain of salt that my main is Alch/Insc for mostly selfish reasons revolving around ease of personal supply/buffs. My take is probably limited.

That said, here are a few wandering ideas…

  • Blind systems – The systems are too broad and are mostly unsympathetic to the diversity of products and quantities that professions churn out. For example, we all apply to the same work order system and its limits, regardless of product, and that’s super weird. As an alchemist producing on-demand consumables, I have the same max order fulfillment as a Blacksmith that, in an ideal situation, creates a max-level item for players once in a tier. I can create stacks of items with a single order charge, while reagent crafters burn that charge on something that might amount to a x1 or x2 craft. It’s just off.

  • BoP vs. BoE – This is from the perspective of an alchemist, and it factors into the above idea. We have some crafts that are seemingly unnecessarily tagged as BoP (professions tertiary phials, for example - huh???), whereas other crafts that seem like they should be BoP for how rare the recipes are are tagged as BoE. Stuff like Dracothyst, Ultimate pots, etc. – you can make these via order, but you’re also competing directly with the AH. Multicraft chances help with this distinction, but not clearly enough to draw people to the order stations. In almost every situation, the AH is just an easier grab for consumables, and we fight against that. Why?

  • Quality – It’s hit and miss. IMO, it’s miss because the granularity and profit gains/losses of qualities is a confusing mire. I also admit not having a clear solution or a clear take on whether this is better or worse than what we’ve had before. What I can say is that I wish that there were more interesting examples like the withering healing pots, where you have a quality that describes how much health and how much damage you take. With something like that, you actually have choices up and down the lines of quality. As a rogue, if I’m not using the new heal/HoT pot, I might actually opt for a lower quality withering pot to avoid overcapping health and unnecessarily bringing that much incoming damage into fights. Sort of interesting to think about…

  • Unsupplied Work Orders – In an ideal situation, the only reagent that should ever be optional is Artisan’s Mettle. The system we have at the moment, one where buyers can just ship an order without supplying a single reagent, helps what exactly? Okay, they don’t have the mats, and they, for whatever reason, don’t want to move ~100 yards to the AH, so we allow this out where they can just send it in and get their item? O…kay. Or maybe it’s about giving them the +QoL ease of just submitting an order where they add a tip commensurate to the value of mats that they haven’t included. That sounds great in theory, but it essentially amounts to WoW’s analog for trickle-down econ. Some might pay, most absolutely won’t. Here’s a recommendation: if they don’t include mats, force a minimum tip. Solved.

I could go on for sure, but I gotta bounce. Food for thought.

4

Work orders need to be a separate thing.
Not reliant on professions.

A little thing that lets people get items that otherwise would be hard to get or w.e.

They need to be BOP

The rest of the things in professions need to be BOE.

This is insane that they , in this need to want to force communication, and for crafting orders to be used, made it so a lot of crafters, either miss out since someone else got to max first, picked the right path first, is known first etc…

Spamming trade chat is not fun.

1 Like
5

Mail crafting should go back to Blacksmithing under the armor smithing section. As mail has nothing to do with leatherworking at all. As a mailler in real life, I find this insulting that mail gear is crafted under leatherworking. Besides some of the early patterns for blacksmithing in the game create mail armor. Then after a certain level, you find absolutely no patterns unless you are a leatherworker. So Blizzard put mail armor back over to blacksmithing and not in leatherworking.

6

An interesting thought as this situation is a holdover from the original profession design that complemented Hunters and Shaman switching from Leather to Mail armor, and Paladins and Warriors switching from Mail to Plate, at level 40.

Out of curiosity, how would you do this without creating such a huge advantage for Blacksmiths over the other manufacturing professions?

7

Give the weapons to engineers???

8

Goes against the fantasy that Hodor advocated for given the weapons we use in game, but could work.

Would finally give Engineers some major crafts that other players actually need for once, lol!

9

The fantasy is that mail craft in wow comes from skinning lizards, dragons and other beasts with SCALES. Wich is why its part of the leatherworking prof. Sorry if a real life activity do not translate into a make believe fantasy world really.

1 Like
10

Biggest thing - being on a world that had zero work orders ever - work orders, if they continue, need to be region-wide - not just server wide.

1 Like
11

The whole system is ridiculous and convoluted. Needs a whole makeover. I’ve played every expansion since BC. I’ve never taken a break until Shadowlands. Came back, played through and was able to achieve all my profession goals. Now, forget it. Stopped before Dragon Isle, I started just a few months ago and have only been able to max 1 profession and that’s just the 100 skill points, not including the knowledge part. As I no longer raid, my time is spent working mainly on professions and completing all the quest lines. I’ve never done professions for money, it’s always been personal goals and stuff for the raid group/guild. Would be nice if they gave it another look.

12

Yeah this.

I would rather see region-wide work orders first, before they attempt to do NPC work orders.

Since things are moving towards region-wide anyway (guilds, consumables, etc), seems the right place to start to solve low-work order problem.

Another idea (unpopular I’m sure) to make MORE things BOP to force the use of craft orders. This works better after the region-wide work order change, so low-pop realms can benefit even if there’s not crafters on their realm.

I don’t mind the public orders where people don’t supply any/all mats. But I do think better UI to call this out is important. Sure, it seems a big use of this system is to scam the unsuspecting crafter. But if you don’t know what you’re doing you shouldn’t be doing it :pirate_flag:

And because of that, a better tutorial that’s more forgiving of mistakes on specializations for new users would be nice. Eg, when I did engineering, I accidentally specialized in Explosives as my second one. Took FOREVER to get to skill 60 to get the spec I really wanted. Being able to respec (and lose knowledge in that spec) would have been nice, and since I didn’t put any knowledge in it wouldn’t have cost me anything in this case. Losing knowledge would prevent abuse.

13

Be careful what you ask for. Almost every time Blizzard has taken something from server to cluster to region (especially RDF and AH) they solved almost nothing that they wanted to. Low pop servers would have more available crafters, but would see even less public work orders under the current system. NPC work orders, if done on a per character or per account basis rather than open to everyone, would actually provide more opportunities even if a player did not care for the selections provided during each time period.

I’m not sure how they could make more things BoP. Advanced material components (Alloys, refined Hides and Scales, empowered Bolts, and possibly Embellishment items) would be the next step in that scenario, but I shudder to think of how that would screw with availability. The current system is lightly biased towards crafters because only finished products are bound to the creator or orderer. If you change advanced components to BoP you shift to a much larger system bias to crafters. Crafters won’t fill public work orders for components, and they will raise their asking prices for each item to compensate for the necessary bag space and the perception/belief/reality of the requestor not being able to provide them. This could be partially alleviated by allowing NPCs to fulfill work orders as well as place them, but that seems counter to the design of the overall system trying to bring players together.

The only practical way to create more public work orders is to break the system designed advantage to Personal and Guild orders. Add minimum quality to Public (but have to allow variance for Inspiration), limit the number of private/guild orders a crafter can fill per day, allow recrafts as Public Work Orders, etc. While possible, I don’t see Blizzard making this situation a reality.

While I disagree with your example (I found Explosives the best way to skill up Engineering after the initial recipes), your points about better explanations of what each specialization tab provides/does, and allowing respecs would be beneficial up to a certain number or percentage of KP or equivalent.

14

Explosive specialization is actually really smart to level engineering. The 2 daily boxes of explosives will get you to 100 without depending on WOs at all. And you aren’t loosing knowledge at all, some nodes in there are really useful to avoid the explode in your face situations.

15

I like the Crafting order system in general. I don’t like that I need to find a crafter to get things done when I have characters that can do those orders on another server. This seems ridiculous to me. I have a raiding guild and a social guild and I’d like to be able help both but can’t because they are on different servers. I’d like to see the recrafting system changed so that you need to progress the orders through public and not go straight to the max gear. This could be done by, including the recrafting into the public ordering system and that making having the previous item crafted to a certain level as a prerequisite prior going to the next craft so a max ilvl item would need to be crafted 3 times, once for base (spark of dreaming), once for wyrm crest, and once for aspect crest. Slightly reduce the cost to get the enchanted crests and make options to buy with “higher” level currency. When going for the aspect craft, if it wasn’t on the public system, I think it would still work fine. Allow the public system to be cross faction and cross server to allow for crafting anywhere anytime. Have minimum prices too for crafting would be great. Like 1k per craft on gear items if you provide mats and 5k if you don’t. It would be good to increase the price for minimum required rank. So someone starting out can fill an order at rank 1 for dirt cheap and still level their crafting. But a person that has the skill to make an item at min rank 4 or 5 can’t fill those super cheap orders. Inspiration is a good idea but can be a real pain to explain that to a person wanting something crafted. I think a failed inspiration on a craft should increase your chance of an inspired craft so that after say 5 crafts, when maxed, you are guaranteed an inspired craft. I’ve spent over 20k on mats before for a 10k craft and have it fail 12 times in a row, even though I have had a 38% chance of inspiration. There needs to be some kind of protection against that in game. Also I’d like to see a way to get your spark back if you mess up a craft. I did this once and went months wearing a leather item on my hunter. Maybe recover through enchanting and then transmute the sparks into the new season spark would be a good public order for an alchemist. I’d rather see the public order system clogged and everyone using their allotted public orders each week. In the event that not all orders are getting filled within 48 hours bliz could release and extra public order to each person to fill the gaps so that it becomes more of a community event rather than trade channel camping of professional gold seekers. I also think these public order limitations should be account wide all professions and not just per character and their current profession. While having the order system is great, finding someone that can do the highest level gear on some servers can be difficult. I would like to see blizzard address this. On another note now that a lot of people have maxed out their profession skill points. JC is maxed for me but LW isn’t even after a year at it(25ish to go). Anyway I’d like to see some way to use all those extra points. Maybe they could be used to level old out of date JC or something like that. Rant over. Hope someone from Bliz reads this and takes the ideas on board.

16

This wall really critted for extra dmg. :smiley:

There is a way to use the extra points, a vendor who sells 25 mettle for 10KP.

1 Like