Thread: LI's have killed Weaponsmith Crafting

In my opinion, LI's have killed Weaponsmith Crafting. When over 50th level who wants a lousy sword when you are trying to advance your LI? And 2nd age weapons? Forget it. First you need a Symbol of Celebrimbor and those don't come easy. Secondly, many 3rd age weapons are just as good as the 2nd age one. So, you bust your behind making a 2nd age one and then hope it will sell. And don't get me started on rad or on how skirmish marks have ruined crafting.

The Devs really need to take a good hard look at crafting and the economy because right now it is messed up.

Yes, this is true, but...

LI's aren't going away.

So we deal with it. AKA don't craft. Especially since there is nothing at 65 worth crafting for an off hand.

Originally Posted by Rawlor

Yes, this is true, but...

LI's aren't going away.

So we deal with it. AKA don't craft. Especially since there is nothing at 65 worth crafting for an off hand.

Actually I hope LI's go away in the form they are in and make Weaponsmith's more viable again.

Originally Posted by Rwraith

In my opinion, LI's have killed Weaponsmith Crafting. When over 50th level who wants a lousy sword when you are trying to advance your LI? And 2nd age weapons? Forget it. First you need a Symbol of Celebrimbor and those don't come easy. Secondly, many 3rd age weapons are just as good as the 2nd age one. So, you bust your behind making a 2nd age one and then hope it will sell. And don't get me started on rad or on how skirmish marks have ruined crafting.

I disagree. Weaponsmithing is still very lucrative in lower tiers T1-T4. Weaponsmith is also one of the premier endgame professions, assuming you have guild rep. Do another check on your AH and see how many Axe, Sword and Halberd LIs are available. My guess is probably zero to none. Those items are always in major demand. Reforging 3A LIs can make you very good money and the mats aren't difficult to come by at all.

All Second Age crafting pretty much goes toward kinmates. While it isn't that big of a deal right now, since you can usually sell a Symbol for more than the item (unless it IDs huge), Weaponsmiths will be able to make out big time as Symbols become more available in 3.2.

I am actually pretty satisfied with Weaponsmithing right now. I have a SM WS and WW so I can make all kinds of Legendary weapons for all my kinmates. It is about to become even more lucrative with the new availability of Symbols in Enedwaith.

Originally Posted by Rwraith

In my opinion, LI's have killed Weaponsmith Crafting. When over 50th level who wants a lousy sword when you are trying to advance your LI?

Classes who wield off-hand weapons?

The Devs really need to take a good hard look at crafting and the economy because right now it is messed up.

Contrary to popular belief, there are weapons under level 50, too. No, srsly. I find on Elendilmir that lower to mid-level crit weapons sell pretty well on the AH. Not everyone crafts or has an alt or a friend who does and those are the people who support other crafters by purchasing stuff from the AH.

WHERE do you get all these Legendary Fragments necessary to make crafted LI's? I work practically non-stop on leveling up and deconning worthless LI's and I still have gotten about 15 Legendary Fragments in all these months since SoM came out! It's yet another crapshoot -- some people are lucky and get tons. Other people (yes, ME) get precious few!

In fact, my luck overall is like this. I keep informal track of my crafting crit successes, and I never get the stated percentage (when I add up my occasional good times and all my really bad times of crafting). The base chance for crit (without crit items and scrolls, but with my critted tools) is 25% -- mine runs around 17%. My success, based on my supposed crit chances with scrolls, critted tools, and crit item, falls far shorter. With a supposed 81% chance for a crit, it usually takes me three tries, i.e. 33% crit success. I plan for this, I make the components ahead, and just plow ahead and make the items and take my insanely low crit results.

Fortunately for me, I don't worry about making money from crafting. I don't worry about the economy. I just do what I can, and keep on going. If I was trying to make money from my crafting .... well, I'd be crazy by now. It's true that there are plenty of other ways to generate money, so I will concede that to Turbine. Just kind of tired of the everything a crapshoot (apparent) philosophy of the game design.

I would say that there used to be an exception to this rule - offhand weapons. But, because we can't craft top-dps offhand weapons, no one wants to use our offhand weapons anyway.

suggestion: make a craftable offhand weapon that actually requires a symbol, and make it 71.0 dps. Give us multi-output to make a few varieties. For the Sword, make a tact crit variety. The stats on it can be worse than what's out there (maybe +22 might, +22 agility, +107 morale, and that's it), but if the dps is top-tier, people will still use it.

Legendary Items have hindered the WS profession a bit but haven't killed it. Just be a bit more clever about what you make and when you put it on the AH and you should do ok. Don't forget about making expendables such as Triple-Traps and all the Burg tools, especially marbles. With new multi-output functionality just around the bend we'll be able to make a more diverse arsenal for leveling toons so be sure to take a look at that and use it to your advantage. Symbols will soon be more attainable and many of us can start making 2nd age 65s for profit, not just for ourselves or kinmates.

Well, here's to hoping that F2P will bring lots of people who want below lvl 50 weapons. Above lvl 50 we can only hope they want a symbol of vitality for their weapon...or is that going to be available in skirmishes also?

The easy way to fix this would be to have crafted third-agers require fewer Legendary Fragments, or increase the drop rate of these Fragments. But, when a crafted THIRD age costs me over 4g in mats rarely is it worth it to make them except as gifts to friends for special occasions. Especially when I can usually find an un-ID'd on the AH for a few hundred silver.

4 gold in mats for one crafted 3rd age LI???? What on earth is costing you so much?

That's 12 gold for 1 mithril flake, 9 LI fragments, about 25 bars of khazad iron and a lump of rich coal (enough to make 3 LI's). I must have a couple of hundred gold worth of flakes and fragments in my vault if it costs that much to make one 3rd age LI.

Weaponsmithing has its place, at level 60 and level 65 to be sure. There is always a demand for those items since there is no control on what legacies you get. How many Forgemasters have dissapointed us ID'ing a weapon? Also, I think there are hints that the LI system will get a relook next year. And that will benefit the weapon making trade.

Originally Posted by GarethB

4 gold in mats for one crafted 3rd age LI???? What on earth is costing you so much?

On Windfola legendary fragments have been going for about 1g each. Symbols of Celebrimbor have dropped considerably down to 20-30g. Frankly I'd rather spend 5g and go for a 2nd age than save 2g and just make a 3rd age.

I mostly agree with the OP. I made a small fortune selling weapons before Moria came out. Then I could hardly give away even crit versions of t6 weapons. Reward and drop off-hands are generally better than crafted. That is something the devs might address.

Instance drops should always outpace crafted gear, else the incentive to run instances vanishes and the game becomes an online version of Morrowind, where everyone can self make the most pimp gear in existence and doesn't need to do anything else.

Very happy that instance drops are good, otherwise my 'friends' would never run squat.

Originally Posted by greendarner

WHERE do you get all these Legendary Fragments necessary to make crafted LI's? I work practically non-stop on leveling up and deconning worthless LI's and I still have gotten about 15 Legendary Fragments in all these months since SoM came out! It's yet another crapshoot -- some people are lucky and get tons. Other people (yes, ME) get precious few!

Lol, if you decon a level 61+ at max 60/60 you get the minimum of 5. I've once gotten 9 from one.
Run NCF and STH about twice and that's about .... 15 fragments in 2 hours lol.

Lotro is not a game for crafters anyway.

Want to know what's really broken? Armor crafting.

How many people do you know who prefer crafted armor instead of instance armor?

Once a char is leveled, he MAY use galadhrim or Mirkwood armor for a while, but what for? At that point he probably has 4/6 Moria anyway and 2 other pieces from other non-raid instances.

Originally Posted by Neumi

Lotro is not a game for crafters anyway.

Want to know what's really broken? Armor crafting.

How many people do you know who prefer crafted armor instead of instance armor?

Once a char is leveled, he MAY use galadhrim or Mirkwood armor for a while, but what for? At that point he probably has 4/6 Moria anyway and 2 other pieces from other non-raid instances.

It used to be better, of course. Crafted armor back in SoA was at least competitive, even if it lacked the set bonuses.

There is exactly 1 build that utilizes crafted armor today... and it's brokenly powerful and kind of a secret, so I'll keep it that way