Printing Press Feedback

[Borin Drakkmurl]

I know, I am a few years late on this but, this week was the first time I actualy set out to use a printing press and, despite the fact that each individual thing needed to copy a book isn't all that complicated, doing the whole thing, specially considering some of the items are only ever crafted for this singular purpose, turned out to be more convoluted than expected.

For example, I had a notebook I wanted to make copies of.

It ended up being easier to just manualy copy every note into the five new notebooks, and copy paste descriptions from a doc for the description, than hunt down a carpenter, harnak, an alchemist and a printing press (I really thought the Cordor Library would have one, but alas.)


For quality of life reasons alone, wouldn't it be easier to have certain npcs sell the needed items for the process, seeing as they are only really used for this?

[Mattamue]

tldr; oof that must've been rough clicking all those notes, there are player groups out there with components that are willing to share and be inclusive in printing/copying

Disclaimer that as a player I've made and sold a lot of phrasebooks. 697 of them. The whole book and history aspect of Arelith really caught my attention and I build a character with tradeskills so that it could make each part of the printing process. So, to put it plainly, I personally am not for the idea of making all that investment basically worthless by putting the items in a vendor.

That being said, I am not attempting to gatekeep bookmaking either. It's funny you mention Cordor because that's one of the few places that doesn't have an active library and bookmaking group that I'm aware of. Widen your search a little bit on the surface to Arcane Tower, Bendir, Brogendenstein and you'll see there are characters and groups that are interested in bookmaking in each of those places and they've also already solved the printing press requirement logistics.

You have my sympathy. I cannot imagine copying 35 notes in 5 new notebooks. The "use item" is always a full round even with haste. I know from experience. That must've been like a half-hour of clicking.

You don't have to join the groups I mentioned, but with a little bit more searching you could have found the components you needed and saved yourself a lot of clicking. I know that's tough sometimes when you don't know if there are characters out there that have what you're looking for. There are plenty of printing presses in the module and plenty of folks willing to share components for printing and RP if you search a little more.

[Borin Drakkmurl]

tldr; oof that must've been rough clicking all those notes, there are player groups out there with components that are willing to share and be inclusive in printing/copying

Disclaimer that as a player I've made and sold a lot of phrasebooks. 697 of them. The whole book and history aspect of Arelith really caught my attention and I build a character with tradeskills so that it could make each part of the printing process. So, to put it plainly, I personally am not for the idea of making all that investment basically worthless by putting the items in a vendor.

That being said, I am not attempting to gatekeep bookmaking either. It's funny you mention Cordor because that's one of the few places that doesn't have an active library and bookmaking group that I'm aware of. Widen your search a little bit on the surface to Arcane Tower, Bendir, Brogendenstein and you'll see there are characters and groups that are interested in bookmaking in each of those places and they've also already solved the printing press requirement logistics.

You have my sympathy. I cannot imagine copying 35 notes in 5 new notebooks. The "use item" is always a full round even with haste. I know from experience. That must've been like a half-hour of clicking.

You don't have to join the groups I mentioned, but with a little bit more searching you could have found the components you needed and saved yourself a lot of clicking. I know that's tough sometimes when you don't know if there are characters out there that have what you're looking for. There are plenty of printing presses in the module and plenty of folks willing to share components for printing and RP if you search a little more.

That is great to know, and I will keep all of that in mind!

But it still leaves us with a bit of a problem, though at what point that is just something someone has to deal with, rather than a server-side issue, I'm unsure:

Time.

If you're someone like me who, on average, can only manage a couple of hours of play time a day, sometimes even less, sometimes a little bit more, then suddenly all of that searching can impact what it is you do or not in the time you have while logged in. Add to that time zones, and a task that could be achieved reasonably fast with the right people, can easily turn into a weeks long process.

Suppose that's on me, though.

Thanks!

[Mattamue]

I don't think it's on you as a fault or error in any way. I think the crafting system is designed to encourage interdependence and reliance on other players.

Taking that week to find and network with other players is an investment. Maybe a little longer for you compared to someone who plays more often, but there's no way around that. Either way you still have some opportunity for story:

Were those sensitive notebooks? Do you need to arrange a dead-drop for both RP and timezone reasons? (There are a few public permanent storage chests in the module that would survive a reset.) Is this an opportunity to ingratiate yourself with one of those groups to get info or undermine them?

I think this is what the devs/DMs want us to do with the crafting systems. I don't think they want a single character to be able to solve every obstacle. Recently I needed a runic material crafted and it took a few weeks to happen. A story came out of it. Not a lot of conflict, but there's a history to an item now that's a little richer thanks to the characters involved in creating it rather than just farming it myself, for example.

[Gouge Away]

I think forcing interdependence works a lot better on one-time and very important items. It's just busywork on the little things.

I think it's a bit of a shame that paintings and books are so time consuming to create and copy as I seem them as basic tools for creativity and embellishment not the basis for a quest to scour the isle looking for ingredients and crafters willing to assist.

When someone needs their special end-game weapons and armor they'll put up with almost any obstacle to get it and indeed it can be a quest where you make contacts for the character's life. But when you have to rely on finding several others for something relatively simple you (or, I, at least) start reconsidering the character concept. Especially when it's a purely RP item like a book.

As it stands now a lone crafter can churn out some extremely high end items completely on their own but when I tried to gather all the stuff I needed for a painting a while back I spend a whole Saturday afternoon and couldn't pull it off. That seems like a thing to take a closer look at.

[Marsi]

It ended up being easier to just manualy copy every note into the five new notebooks, and copy paste descriptions from a doc for the description, than hunt down a carpenter, harnak, an alchemist and a printing press (I really thought the Cordor Library would have one, but alas.)

A lot of roleplay fluff items have been swept up in the trend of over-complicated supply chains for trade goods. For example, I don't think I'll ever make another IG painting again with how bizarrely nested their creation has become. Arelith can't sustain very complex economies and thinking this Archeage-esque market is going to assemble to support the production of purely roleplay items is overly optimistic.

The only design philosophy that makes sense to me is that roleplay props should be as easy as possible to make, with only a nominal resource cost.

[Seven Sons of Sin]

You should be able to buy printing oil.

I see that as the greatest burden to the printing process, because a) harnak seeds are a quest, and b) iron ore means cave-delving which takes more time.

It's a lot for a single book.

I'd make 1 flask of printing oil cost like 1-3k, and toss them around the module where it makes sense. Make it expensive so that you can short-cut if you want to, but also it offers incentive to just still crafting it yourself for a stockpile.

Although with the inflation of gold on the island, I don't know if 1-3k is "expensive."

[Batrachophrenoboocosmomachia]

I think I added a (pricy) ink merchant in Dis, but ink had been on my list to add merchants for elsewhere. It's one of those things where I'm cautious about adding crafting products to the module for sale because picking the wrong price points either A.) decimates any opportunities for a player economy to establish itself if too low or B.) makes them being for sale meaningless if too high since no one will buy them. Given that the ideal price point for most goods will shift over time... It's just not something I like to do casually.

I'll add it to my list to look into again, it's a fair observation.

[Skibbles]

If you think that's bad try painting a picture, an exclusively RP object unlike some books, without the super engaging tinker-grind for dye.

Really though it can be pretty tough and I sympathize.

At least in the case of book binding you might be able to easily locate one of several enormous magical towers/keeps where the stuff is likely to be stockpiled and pay for the service.

[Gouge Away]

I think I added a (pricy) ink merchant in Dis, but ink had been on my list to add merchants for elsewhere. It's one of those things where I'm cautious about adding crafting products to the module for sale because picking the wrong price points either A.) decimates any opportunities for a player economy to establish itself if too low or B.) makes them being for sale meaningless if too high since no one will buy them. Given that the ideal price point for most goods will shift over time... It's just not something I like to do casually.

I'll add it to my list to look into again, it's a fair observation.

This seems like exactly the sort of thing you'd like your settlement to provide for you to represent the convenience of living in a city. What if warehouses could buy or sell some crafted components like printing ink from citizens?

[OleBlighty]

I think I added a (pricy) ink merchant in Dis, but ink had been on my list to add merchants for elsewhere. It's one of those things where I'm cautious about adding crafting products to the module for sale because picking the wrong price points either A.) decimates any opportunities for a player economy to establish itself if too low or B.) makes them being for sale meaningless if too high since no one will buy them. Given that the ideal price point for most goods will shift over time... It's just not something I like to do casually.

I'll add it to my list to look into again, it's a fair observation.

This seems like exactly the sort of thing you'd like your settlement to provide for you to represent the convenience of living in a city. What if warehouses could buy or sell some crafted components like printing ink from citizens?

Makes sense!