Is there some reason why the reward for my hard work is 'stealable'?

[Missing_Minds]

Soul Gems should in no way be "yoink!"-able items.

Agreed. I mean just look at how much Pokemon could have been re written.

*Ash caught Xyzzy. Congratulations!
*Brock uses "ninja loot"
*It was highly effective.
*Ash loses Xyzzy.
*Ash uses "Whine on the forms"
*It was not very effective.
*Brock uses "Change characters"
*Ash can no longer find Brock to compete to regain Xyzzy.
*Contest over, Ash loses.

Seriously, in PnP what sort of caster would throw a soul trapping gem at someone? They are going to hold onto it and suck that creatures soul to them.

[PNellesen]

If it makes you feel better, the devs have finally acknowledged that it is an issue that needs to be looked at.

Cool. I remember the first time I ever saw one, I had no idea what it was and since it dropped right after a monster I was fighting was killed, I thought it was something like a Treasure Bag and picked it up. I was then politely informed that it was someone else's (and why), and I gave it to them and apologized, and felt like a fool in the process. Hope they fix it reasonably soon, especially now that they're used for Cannith Crafting.

[oldkraft]

I'm a bit confused by this concept of "ninja looting

Maybe no wonder, but 'ninja looting' as the epic scrolls went, were a problem, especially since no message of the drops were public to party initially, so pple sometimes sneaked them up their sleeve and didnt put them up for roll, as decent buddies did.

However, Soul Gems Are Not Loot.
Not at all.

They are crafted items.

They dont come from nothing, but from a certain mechanic that a player has invested in and built up for himself.
In the last month every strong essence of dominator (2) that I have hit at, has been taken, and 'given to the rogue'.
Heck, when I raised the issue, I got labelled 'unfriendly'...by pple I see as very straight with loot-rolls and stuff. They just didnt 'get it'... So a change in drop-mechanics is much needed..
Sad ofc - again - to see some 'shiny picking' be taken away from the adventure and the graphics, but pple cant handle it.
Would prefer the instadeath-solution for the laughs though, must admit to that.
And well ... they can still go rip off some newbs in Whisperdoom :-D

Oldkraft uses : Epic Souleater, Vacuum GS Maul, and sports capped wizzies too.

[toughguyjoe]

First off, let me say that I think casters of Trap the Soul should have full rights to the gems they create.

Now, I would like to dispel the myth that it is "Hard" to make Soul Gems.

Time consuming does not = Hard.

Yes you have to crunch down those fragments you find in you know, 80% of chests, and yes you have to level a character to level 15(or 16 in the case of a sorcerer) but none of that is "Hard"

Merely time consuming.

[Fomori]

I agree with your premise that they could just make them drop into your inventory, since you cast the spell and spent the components.

However I seriously disagree with your 'hard work' statement. All you did was collect some components and click a button to cast the spell. If you are referring that your save DC is much higher because you have certain hard to obtain gear, or that you had to spend time upgrading to the correct dragonshards, then please call it what it was ... grinding. Grinding is not hard, only time consuming.

[oldkraft]

Fomori, Toughguyjoe :
Grinding dragonshards ? sorry you are not up to date ;-)
here we go :

This is not so much about the old ways of wizzies running a bunch of 'depths of deneith 3'
- or nowadays the tunnel quest in Lordsmarch halfway through ...
- for adamantine ritual purposes.

Initially you could also use the random drops from Greensteel Vacuum
to farm certain types of soul gems with, but that is long nerfed.
The gemcatchin' property in The Souleater,
as well as in the possible GS soultrappers,
spawns gems so rare that the items are not useable for a targetted gem grind,
only for the slowly building up of a bank of assortments, much like 'collectables'.
It is not reliant on any 'caster ingredient'.

Wizzies still run their rather expensive solo ingredient-based soul gem campaigns,
no doubt, and dont have 'this problem'.
Which is to protect the provenu from making epic and GS weapons,
in the light that all soul gems now have a value somewhere in game beyond trophy.

Still recommend the PoP gem solution ;-D

[Bradik_Losdar]

Now, I would like to dispel the myth that it is "Hard" to make Soul Gems.

Time consuming does not = Hard.

Yes you have to crunch down those fragments you find in you know, 80% of chests, and yes you have to level a character to level 15(or 16 in the case of a sorcerer) but none of that is "Hard"

Merely time consuming.

Hehe. Not hard eh?

Lets put it melee terms.

Say you have a sword in addition to your other swords that you like to use in special circumstances. Now every time you swung this sword at a monster, it got a save to avoid all damage. In addition, it put you on a timer as to when you could swing it again AND it automatically decayed a little (regardless of whether the monster took damage or not). Not only this, but to repair said damage you could only use an expensive (or time consuming) collectable that had to be placed in the Stone of Change - which artifically slowed down the whole repair process to a snails pace. Now do that OVER and OVER and OVER...every time you go questing.

Oh, but then after all that work, a monster finally takes damage from your special sword, but some dude presses backspace U and steals the credit and XP for the kill...

You'd probably end up throwing the **** sword away wouldn't you?

Does it make sense now?