Making scrolls?

[Nite_Prowler]

Why can't some spell-casting classes, like wizards and clerics, make their own scrolls rather than being forced to buy them from some other wizard or cleric?

I understand that wizards can scribe scrolls which is basic D&D ... but someone has to make them, why can't certain classes make their own.

Seems like a logical concept to me

[helpfulguy1234]

Really a failure of the whole crafting system, wands, scrolls, pots etc.

Turbine got so much right with Asherons Call crafting, shame they phoned it in on this one.

[Eantarus]

Do we really need another crafting system, though?

[helpfulguy1234]

Do we really need another crafting system, though?

No we need a better crafting system :p

[Annex]

Of all the things the developers could spend their limited time on, I would not put this in the top million.

In a game more true to Dungeons & Dragons, potions, scrolls, and wands would only come from treasure chests, at far lower rates than we see in DDO. Arcane spell casters would not learn spells when gaining a level. To learn anything new, arcane spell casters would need to research items found in chests.

Divine casters would have a more easy time of things.

In such a world, a detailed crafting system for making potions, scrolls, and wands makes sense. Player characters would find items, research them, and if the research was successful, gain the ability to make more, given the proper ingredients. Divine casters could make things without the research, but would only make such things available to agents of the faith.

It would obviously take significant programming effort to create such a system.

Here in DDO, our player characters can buy great gobs of practically everything from vendors. Very quickly, player characters become massively wealthy, effectively resulting in unlimited supply.

While all spell casters should have the ability to make items, building the system would take a great deal of time and almost no one would use it because practically everything is readily available for peanuts. Even if such a system were built, the few restricted items would remain restricted so as not to break the game.

Such an effort would consume a great deal of developer time for almost no benefit.

Then I consider at all the bugs that need fixing, all the dungeons I want to see, all the clothing items I want...something like this is just not even slightly important to me. I am sorry.

[gravisrs]

...wands, scrolls, pots etc.

Turbine got so much right with Asherons Call crafting, shame they phoned it in on this one.

Imagine such crafting system:
- you buy blank potion/blank scrolls/blank wand (the higher spell level the more expensive)
- start casting spell "on" such - effectively producing magical consumables - where your caster level, spell DC, spellpower is taken into account
- according to the "power" of outcome (CL+DC+spellpower) - UMD and ML is evaluated to use such items
- for economy balance - plat is consumed during this process (the better outcome consumable - the more plat)

I have some ideas how to incorporate this to current cannith crafing system if you want to hear more.

[droid327]

Most spells that aren't for sale are so for a reason - they want to preserve the utility of classes that get the spell, and players that slot it. If you could just buy a stack of 100 ddoor scrolls on the ah, then there'd be no value in paying a bigger opportunity cost for that utility.

The list of spells that aren't already on a vendor, but aren't being deliberately excluded from easy access, is likely quite short. Any offensive spell, of course, would be pointless to scroll too.

And no one is going to bother crafting scrolls you can just buy.

[Tyrande]

Why can't some spell-casting classes, like wizards and clerics, make their own scrolls rather than being forced to buy them from some other wizard or cleric?

I understand that wizards can scribe scrolls which is basic D&D ... but someone has to make them, why can't certain classes make their own.

Seems like a logical concept to me

Casting from scrolls is slow and it takes up the main hand, same thing with wands. That's why nobody is doing that after mid-heroics.

Also, casting from scrolls is lacking the spell power and DCs on them; although if you can make Power Word: Kill or Power Word: Stun or Otto's Irresistible dance scrolls those will be interesting... (since they have no save)

I played a warlock in the pen & paper D&D, so never had the need to actually use scrolls or able to craft some of those wizard scrolls.

[Nite_Prowler]

Most spells that aren't for sale are so for a reason - they want to preserve the utility of classes that get the spell, and players that slot it. If you could just buy a stack of 100 ddoor scrolls on the ah, then there'd be no value in paying a bigger opportunity cost for that utility.

The list of spells that aren't already on a vendor, but aren't being deliberately excluded from easy access, is likely quite short. Any offensive spell, of course, would be pointless to scroll too.

And no one is going to bother crafting scrolls you can just buy.

The simple solution is to make them BTC once made.

[Eantarus]

No we need a better crafting system :p

We really do.

Imagine a single unified crafting system where you could craft item blanks, add metal types, produce augment slots, then add enchantments, etc.

Wouldn't that be something?

[droid327]

The simple solution is to make them BTC once made.

That still doesnt address the problem of making it pointless to slot anything but offensive spells

There would be almost no reason to actuallly spend a slot on spells like DW and FOM and DDoor if you can just cast them from your pocket

[Nite_Prowler]

That still doesnt address the problem of making it pointless to slot anything but offensive spells

There would be almost no reason to actuallly spend a slot on spells like DW and FOM and DDoor if you can just cast them from your pocket

Exactly!

That's the point of being able to make scrolls.

I see you have never actually played Dungeons and Dragons

[Tyrande]

Why can't some spell-casting classes, like wizards and clerics, make their own scrolls rather than being forced to buy them from some other wizard or cleric?

I understand that wizards can scribe scrolls which is basic D&D ... but someone has to make them, why can't certain classes make their own.

Seems like a logical concept to me

Nice concept, hopefully not wrong execution.

Before we introduce scrolls crafting, maybe they should design a scroll case for it to hold those scrolls that were crafted? and the scrolls themselves BtC? or at least BtA?

[Tyrande]

Exactly!

That's the point of being able to make scrolls.

I see you have never actually played Dungeons and Dragons

With the patience of the DDO gamers nowadays, would people wait for the cleric to read a scroll of mass freedom of movement and a scroll of mass deathward? I would expect casting from scrolls to be at least 10 times slower compared to the actual casting from a quickened spell via macros.

Also, by the time your character is able to cast those spells, your character would have massive spell point pools (>3000) anyways, making the point of creating those scrolls pointless. Unless , of course, you are talking about a battle cleric (or EK caster) who did not invest into wisdom/intelligence/charisma upon level ups.

[shores11]

Of all the things the developers could spend their limited time on, I would not put this in the top million.

In a game truer to Dungeons & Dragons, potions, scrolls, and wands would only come from treasure chests, at far lower rates than we see in DDO. Arcane spell casters would not learn spells when gaining a level. To learn anything new, arcane spell casters would need to research items found in chests.

Divine casters would have an easier time of things.

In such a world, a detailed crafting system for making potions, scrolls, and wands makes sense. Player characters would find items, research them, and if the research was successful, gain the ability to make more, given the proper ingredients. Divine casters could make things without the research but would only make such things available to agents of the faith.

It would obviously take significant programming effort to create such a system.

Here in DDO, our player characters can buy great gobs of practically everything from vendors. Very quickly, player characters become massively wealthy, effectively resulting in unlimited supply.

While all spell casters should have the ability to make items, building the system would take a great deal of time and almost no one would use it because practically everything is readily available for peanuts. Even if such a system were built, the few restricted items would remain restricted so as not to break the game.

Such an effort would consume a great deal of developer time for almost no benefit.

Then I consider at all the bugs that need fixing, all the dungeons I want to see, all the clothing items I want...something like this is just not even slightly important to me. I am sorry.

Agree: I couldn't agree with you more with your 2nd, 3rd and 4th paragraph's above. The closer the game is to D&D the more those things would be "in the game" (a small EA quote there). Hey, I'm onboard with that.
I do agree that an adjustment to the game's economy is really needed to make scribing and other things work better. My take is that they should have never moved from GOLD to PLATINUM as the base monetary system and just keep prices balanced. SSG could easily control the players auction house prices by making the broker vendors be competitive.

Disagree: I have never and do not at this time subscribe to the theory of don't work on something another person wants but work on what I want. SSG could start small with a very few 2-4 spells that could be created in a scroll or spell book through some Spellcrafting skill.

[KoobTheProud]

I'd be fine with a scroll crafting system for Wizards and Artificers - the two classes that inscribe spells off of scrolls. The scriber should have the spell in their spellbook.

The cost of doing this should be substantially more than the cost of buying the scrolls from a vendor. Maybe 10x more expensive. For rare scrolls the cost should be 25x+ to make.

What you get for this is an unbound scroll of the spell with a caster level equal to either your caster level or the max caster level of the spell in question whichever is smaller. The UMD to cast the spell should be as it normally is with an add for every caster level above the normal baseline for the scroll, maybe 2-3x the additional caster level.

This type of crafting system would give everybody greater access to scrolls via UMD while also providing an excellent platinum sink.

[droid327]

Exactly!

That's the point of being able to make scrolls.

I see you have never actually played Dungeons and Dragons

Well we arent playing D&D, we're playing DDO :D

And for game balance reasons, caster classes have a limited number of slots. That's an opportunity cost, a tradeoff they're forced to make between utility/defense spells and offense spells. Especially for innate casters, whose spell selection is a bit more permanent

Asking the devs to simply throw out a tradeoff completely because you want to have it both ways, while understandable, probably isnt a realistic suggestion :D

[Peter_Principle]

I'd love to see this sort of crafting, if for no other reason than to give my wizard alts access to Arcane Tempest!