Orion
Lead Designer
As we draw closer to putting this in front of more eyes, I wanted to set proper expectations and guidance on what the first wholly craft driven event will be.
The Combe Forester Event
This is the first crafting event implemented and will not be the last. We chose a gathering profession first to prepare and test some interesting new possibilities and to prepare players for the future of crafting. The event is set to run for ~4-5 days and then go on hiatus for ~2-3 weeks before returning. The quest associated with the event is available daily and you can always reset access to the quest with mitrhil coins.
Why Combe? Why forester?
As stated above, the goal was to make the first crafting event something accessible and useful to all players and we wanted to ensure that all players understood that the goal with these events is not to lock out lower level players, rather, these are meant as accessible pieces of content that are agnostic to all levels. What better way to do this than place the first event near the hub of everything Bree.
We knew that we could not put this in Bree proper, and while there were other locales that did vie for the honour, ultimately Old Bauman and Mason Thorne convinced us that their quaint little lumber camp on the edge of the Chetwood had broad appeal to the masses. We set about enlisting the aid of Thorne's family and suddenly, the Combe Event took shape.
Forester satisfied a niche that we felt had broad appeal and won out over a push from Scary, which offered to host the prospecting tournament. We expect that Scary will have its day and that prospectors and scholars will have a reason to rejoice and show off their skills at some point in the not too distant future. For now, the centralized location to Bree and the fact that the Combe Lumber Camp is a unique bit without any immediate threats within its bounds made it the ideal location for the first crafting event.
What to expect?
The event is on a scheduled rotation that will settle somewhere near 14-21 days off and 4-5 days on. The event is on a standard daily reset timer that you can bypass with mitrhil. The event is announced to Breeland territory when recruitment for the event begins. This is just to let players know that they can head to Combe and accept the quest that allows them to participate in our first competition. Once at the location, you can, if you have Forester as one of your professions, accept the quest from the event coordinator, Mason Thorne's son. Once you accept the quest, you cannot leave the area of the Combe Lumber Camp or you will fail the quest and have to reacquire it from the event coordinator.
Your first step on the way to becoming a competitive Forester, is to register with the event judge, Mason Thorne's daughter. Once the first contestant registers for the event, another announcement goes out to Breeland informing players that the competition has its first contestant! When another player joins the contest, or two minutes expire, a third announcement alerts Breeland that the event will begin in two minutes. During this window any number of players can acquire and register for the event. But once there are three competitors registered, or that short window of time is closed, you cannot acquire the quest for the event.
Now all you need to do is wait for the judge to say; Go!
The Event Proper
The event is a series of objectives all relating to actions undertaken by Foresters in their everyday activities. You cannot use your axe or harvesting tool. You MUST collect one that is provided for you. Then you must harvest some wood, refine it, get it judged, gather bear skins, refine those and get them judged, sample brew from nearby taverns and inns, then collect a caber and carry it through a race course. Special prizes are given to those who complete the activities first, and second, and all participants receive a participation ribbon and if they did not finish first or as a runner-up, they receive a second participation ribbon.
It's not overly complex and should take only a few moments to complete. The event will reset every few minutes after it completes so that it is available as often as it can be while it is active.
Wait, what are winner, runner-up and participation ribbons?
As stated earlier, this is the first of what should become an event for each of the professions. And then, once all the professions have their first events, we will expand to multiple events available throughout the game world that all feed into the wide array of crafting events. To increase simplicity and accessibility we decided to unify the reward set for the craft events so that all crafters on an account contribute toward the reward goals. And so, each crafting event will have these uniform reward of a Winner Ribbons, a Runner-up Ribbon, and participation ribbons. This allows players to build toward the rewards that they want, and provides continuous advancement along the track for the account and server that they play on.
Each of the ribbons has a cap, per account/world, to encourage you to spend along the reward tracks presented for each profession.
Additionally, to allow for those who are unusually unlucky, you will have the ability to trade out of the lowest ribbon (participation) at a 10 :1 ratio for the second tier, and 100:1 ratio for the top tier; the inverse is also true and you can trade out of the top ribbon for 10 of the mid or 100 of the lowest. This provides a flexibility for storing your rewards for those items that you really want.
What can I get?
Of course there need to be rewards for a competition, and let us face it ribbons are nice, but we want something that we can show off, or see, or that has an actual effect on my character. The event quest, when finished provides a large amount of Forester experience, which should be appealing to new and seasoned foresters...but there is more.
So, without further adieu, the reward suite.
Consumables
Whetstones: There are three whetstones that increase the critical success chance of forester recipes for a short period of time. These come in small stacks.
Cosmetic Upgrade Crafting Ingredients: As part of this update, we are introducing the ability to alter the appearance of the harvesting tools that you use when collecting and refining wood, and tanning hides. These come in several varieties: Dwarf, Hobbit, Elf, Westernesse, Stone, Ornate, Gold, and Mithril hatchets, and Dwarf, Hobbit, Elf, Westernesse, and Ornate hide stretchers. These crafting materials must be used with a new Modifiable Forester Axe, also available in the craft event reward track.
Recipes: Each recipe provides a one shot recipe to either add the cosmetic appearance to your crafting tool or, to upgrade the crafting tool to a new enhanced version - more on that a little later.
Lucky Stone Setting: This is another crafting ingredient added to the game that we will discuss the importance of in the New Crafting Behavior section, later in this post.
Cosmetics
Outfits: There are five new lumberjack outfits that you can earn. These cannot be dyed and they are broken into Black, Blue, Red, Gold, and Mithril attire pieces.
Titles: I will admit that these are a bit cheeky, but we are all here to have fun, and I think paying homage is a great form of flattery. There are 8 purchasable titles, and another five titles that are earned by contintued participation in this inagural crafting event - each specific for foresters.
Emotes: There are 5 new emotes that you can earn.
Skills: There are two new cosmetic based skills that you can purchase, each related to the event and humorous to behold.
Permanent Effects
Emotes: There are 5 new emotes that you can earn.
Skills: There are two new cosmetic based skills that you can purchase, each related to the event and humorous to behold.
Traits: There are 5 traits you can purchase to increase your chance to critically succeed with forester recipes.
Housing
Decorative Furniture: There are three new display pieces for outside your home.
Usable Decorations: There are two new usable pieces of decoration that provide you a short alteration or benefit for your forester abilities and skills.
Right now, these are on the bubble for inclusion at the outset, but they are still planned for the future.
Harvesting Tools
This is the big one.
There are 54 iterative versions of the new forester tool. One of these, the Modifiable Forester's Axe, purchased with your ribbons is the introduction of our new approach to top tier crafting.
The tools, when combined with a cosmetic upgrade ingredient, listed in the consumable section, changes the appearance of the harvesting tool when used in all crafting interactions. These baseline changes account for 8 additional variations of the new forester axe tool.
When the new base forester axe is modified with the lucky stone settings, also listed in the consumable section above, it gains - Let me put a pause on this, and just say that these account for the other 46 variations of the new forester axe that are available.
New Crafting Behavior
As we move on through the year, we are getting closer to revealing some of the important upcoming changes to the crafting system on the whole and this event provides us the opportunity to reveal an integral piece of the future of top tier crafting: Upgradable items.
The Modifiable Forester's Axe is the first item that allows for this crafting behavior. At tier 0, the harvesting tool functions much like the current universal harvesting tool. When upgraded once, the item takes on a quality that, when used in harvesting, provides a small chance to generate a rare component relative to the level of the harvested node. Each successive upgrade to 5 increases that chance. As we add more profession events and the successive Modifiable Rewards, we will also introduce recipes to combine these tools into a single utility tool.
So what does this mean for crafters in the future. While the future is still malleable we are thinking along these lines: there will be a selection of items for each production profession that has a Modifiable Output. These new outputs are upgraded, all using the new Lucky Stone Setting, currently only available in this singular crafting event. This means that we will need to expand access to the lucky stone setting. This means that you will likely see the Lucky Stone Setting available on the Delving barterers, potentially as a weekly reward in a selectable capacity, and maybe as a new reward for Featured instances. The lucky stone setting will be needed in larger quantities for each upgrade level and so we want that access to be steady, not too quick or too slow; this is to imply that we will likely take a while to balance the acquisition against the primary path - the crafting events.
As far as how upgrades might work, we want to only tease this a bit here and say that the upgrade path of the available Modifiable Crafted Items will all likely have five upgrades available, and each upgrade will either, increase statistical contributions, add essence slots, or add specific effects to the Modifiable Crafted Item. These items will only be available to craft by those with mastery in the new "top tier" crafting tier and potentially require craft guild access, or acquisition from othr reward paths - as I said, the details are still malleable and formative. They will compete directly with instance items and their max upgrade item level will likely compete directly with raid gear - though it will lack the tradition set bonuses which raid gear supplies.
Closing
We hope you enjoy this sneak peek at the first craft event we are adding. We look forward to your thoughts, feedback, and dialogue. Also, tell us what profession you might want to see next. We have plans for each of the professions, but it might be nice to see the order in which you want us to roll them out to you.
The Combe Forester Event
This is the first crafting event implemented and will not be the last. We chose a gathering profession first to prepare and test some interesting new possibilities and to prepare players for the future of crafting. The event is set to run for ~4-5 days and then go on hiatus for ~2-3 weeks before returning. The quest associated with the event is available daily and you can always reset access to the quest with mitrhil coins.
Why Combe? Why forester?
As stated above, the goal was to make the first crafting event something accessible and useful to all players and we wanted to ensure that all players understood that the goal with these events is not to lock out lower level players, rather, these are meant as accessible pieces of content that are agnostic to all levels. What better way to do this than place the first event near the hub of everything Bree.
We knew that we could not put this in Bree proper, and while there were other locales that did vie for the honour, ultimately Old Bauman and Mason Thorne convinced us that their quaint little lumber camp on the edge of the Chetwood had broad appeal to the masses. We set about enlisting the aid of Thorne's family and suddenly, the Combe Event took shape.
Forester satisfied a niche that we felt had broad appeal and won out over a push from Scary, which offered to host the prospecting tournament. We expect that Scary will have its day and that prospectors and scholars will have a reason to rejoice and show off their skills at some point in the not too distant future. For now, the centralized location to Bree and the fact that the Combe Lumber Camp is a unique bit without any immediate threats within its bounds made it the ideal location for the first crafting event.
What to expect?
The event is on a scheduled rotation that will settle somewhere near 14-21 days off and 4-5 days on. The event is on a standard daily reset timer that you can bypass with mitrhil. The event is announced to Breeland territory when recruitment for the event begins. This is just to let players know that they can head to Combe and accept the quest that allows them to participate in our first competition. Once at the location, you can, if you have Forester as one of your professions, accept the quest from the event coordinator, Mason Thorne's son. Once you accept the quest, you cannot leave the area of the Combe Lumber Camp or you will fail the quest and have to reacquire it from the event coordinator.
Your first step on the way to becoming a competitive Forester, is to register with the event judge, Mason Thorne's daughter. Once the first contestant registers for the event, another announcement goes out to Breeland informing players that the competition has its first contestant! When another player joins the contest, or two minutes expire, a third announcement alerts Breeland that the event will begin in two minutes. During this window any number of players can acquire and register for the event. But once there are three competitors registered, or that short window of time is closed, you cannot acquire the quest for the event.
Now all you need to do is wait for the judge to say; Go!
The Event Proper
The event is a series of objectives all relating to actions undertaken by Foresters in their everyday activities. You cannot use your axe or harvesting tool. You MUST collect one that is provided for you. Then you must harvest some wood, refine it, get it judged, gather bear skins, refine those and get them judged, sample brew from nearby taverns and inns, then collect a caber and carry it through a race course. Special prizes are given to those who complete the activities first, and second, and all participants receive a participation ribbon and if they did not finish first or as a runner-up, they receive a second participation ribbon.
It's not overly complex and should take only a few moments to complete. The event will reset every few minutes after it completes so that it is available as often as it can be while it is active.
Wait, what are winner, runner-up and participation ribbons?
As stated earlier, this is the first of what should become an event for each of the professions. And then, once all the professions have their first events, we will expand to multiple events available throughout the game world that all feed into the wide array of crafting events. To increase simplicity and accessibility we decided to unify the reward set for the craft events so that all crafters on an account contribute toward the reward goals. And so, each crafting event will have these uniform reward of a Winner Ribbons, a Runner-up Ribbon, and participation ribbons. This allows players to build toward the rewards that they want, and provides continuous advancement along the track for the account and server that they play on.
Each of the ribbons has a cap, per account/world, to encourage you to spend along the reward tracks presented for each profession.
Additionally, to allow for those who are unusually unlucky, you will have the ability to trade out of the lowest ribbon (participation) at a 10 :1 ratio for the second tier, and 100:1 ratio for the top tier; the inverse is also true and you can trade out of the top ribbon for 10 of the mid or 100 of the lowest. This provides a flexibility for storing your rewards for those items that you really want.
What can I get?
Of course there need to be rewards for a competition, and let us face it ribbons are nice, but we want something that we can show off, or see, or that has an actual effect on my character. The event quest, when finished provides a large amount of Forester experience, which should be appealing to new and seasoned foresters...but there is more.
So, without further adieu, the reward suite.
Consumables
Whetstones: There are three whetstones that increase the critical success chance of forester recipes for a short period of time. These come in small stacks.
Cosmetic Upgrade Crafting Ingredients: As part of this update, we are introducing the ability to alter the appearance of the harvesting tools that you use when collecting and refining wood, and tanning hides. These come in several varieties: Dwarf, Hobbit, Elf, Westernesse, Stone, Ornate, Gold, and Mithril hatchets, and Dwarf, Hobbit, Elf, Westernesse, and Ornate hide stretchers. These crafting materials must be used with a new Modifiable Forester Axe, also available in the craft event reward track.
Recipes: Each recipe provides a one shot recipe to either add the cosmetic appearance to your crafting tool or, to upgrade the crafting tool to a new enhanced version - more on that a little later.
Lucky Stone Setting: This is another crafting ingredient added to the game that we will discuss the importance of in the New Crafting Behavior section, later in this post.
Cosmetics
Outfits: There are five new lumberjack outfits that you can earn. These cannot be dyed and they are broken into Black, Blue, Red, Gold, and Mithril attire pieces.
Titles: I will admit that these are a bit cheeky, but we are all here to have fun, and I think paying homage is a great form of flattery. There are 8 purchasable titles, and another five titles that are earned by contintued participation in this inagural crafting event - each specific for foresters.
Emotes: There are 5 new emotes that you can earn.
Skills: There are two new cosmetic based skills that you can purchase, each related to the event and humorous to behold.
Permanent Effects
Emotes: There are 5 new emotes that you can earn.
Skills: There are two new cosmetic based skills that you can purchase, each related to the event and humorous to behold.
Traits: There are 5 traits you can purchase to increase your chance to critically succeed with forester recipes.
Housing
Decorative Furniture: There are three new display pieces for outside your home.
Usable Decorations: There are two new usable pieces of decoration that provide you a short alteration or benefit for your forester abilities and skills.
Right now, these are on the bubble for inclusion at the outset, but they are still planned for the future.
Harvesting Tools
This is the big one.
There are 54 iterative versions of the new forester tool. One of these, the Modifiable Forester's Axe, purchased with your ribbons is the introduction of our new approach to top tier crafting.
The tools, when combined with a cosmetic upgrade ingredient, listed in the consumable section, changes the appearance of the harvesting tool when used in all crafting interactions. These baseline changes account for 8 additional variations of the new forester axe tool.
When the new base forester axe is modified with the lucky stone settings, also listed in the consumable section above, it gains - Let me put a pause on this, and just say that these account for the other 46 variations of the new forester axe that are available.
New Crafting Behavior
As we move on through the year, we are getting closer to revealing some of the important upcoming changes to the crafting system on the whole and this event provides us the opportunity to reveal an integral piece of the future of top tier crafting: Upgradable items.
The Modifiable Forester's Axe is the first item that allows for this crafting behavior. At tier 0, the harvesting tool functions much like the current universal harvesting tool. When upgraded once, the item takes on a quality that, when used in harvesting, provides a small chance to generate a rare component relative to the level of the harvested node. Each successive upgrade to 5 increases that chance. As we add more profession events and the successive Modifiable Rewards, we will also introduce recipes to combine these tools into a single utility tool.
So what does this mean for crafters in the future. While the future is still malleable we are thinking along these lines: there will be a selection of items for each production profession that has a Modifiable Output. These new outputs are upgraded, all using the new Lucky Stone Setting, currently only available in this singular crafting event. This means that we will need to expand access to the lucky stone setting. This means that you will likely see the Lucky Stone Setting available on the Delving barterers, potentially as a weekly reward in a selectable capacity, and maybe as a new reward for Featured instances. The lucky stone setting will be needed in larger quantities for each upgrade level and so we want that access to be steady, not too quick or too slow; this is to imply that we will likely take a while to balance the acquisition against the primary path - the crafting events.
As far as how upgrades might work, we want to only tease this a bit here and say that the upgrade path of the available Modifiable Crafted Items will all likely have five upgrades available, and each upgrade will either, increase statistical contributions, add essence slots, or add specific effects to the Modifiable Crafted Item. These items will only be available to craft by those with mastery in the new "top tier" crafting tier and potentially require craft guild access, or acquisition from othr reward paths - as I said, the details are still malleable and formative. They will compete directly with instance items and their max upgrade item level will likely compete directly with raid gear - though it will lack the tradition set bonuses which raid gear supplies.
Closing
We hope you enjoy this sneak peek at the first craft event we are adding. We look forward to your thoughts, feedback, and dialogue. Also, tell us what profession you might want to see next. We have plans for each of the professions, but it might be nice to see the order in which you want us to roll them out to you.
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