Herbs

[Greneth]

in conclution its not just about making herbs more powerful its about makingpeople who enjoy herb gathering not feel like they should be out grinding orcs instead. if peoople feel obligated to do things they hate because the things they like are a waste of time. why bother leaving HQ.

I enjoy throwing snowballs at people when I travel to Icewall, doesnt mean I should be rewarded for it. Herbing in itself is a reward, you reap the benefits of the herb and a small amount of XP. The problem is no one thinks of it as a reward because any schmuck can join the Gardeners and become a Pro.

If anything the Gardeners need to be removed and all Herbalism removed from any Racial, Layman or OCC which does not use spells. Laymans should have their skill lowered and Occupational Guilds raised. And add in maybe a small boost to the effects based on skill. Not only would this improve the market but would be extra incentive to join a guild that has access to them. And perhaps remove some of the complacency within the game due to the benefits of herbs as they would not be as accessible.

And to prevent massive amounts of crap spamming the AH, just transform the useless herb vendors we have now which I'm sure still have some of the same herbs from the 90's sitting in them into the herb version of the AH.

[Icarus]

Since the herb change I know of four Hero and under who have successfully forced a Myth to retreat, two were due to bugs, one due to an item thought unobtainable and the last was a Legend who was an idiot and got a mouthful of Faerie Dust and dropped all his crap while chasing. I would love to see the logs of a single RH taking on a Myth and winning without the use of a bug in a saferoom. I can maybe see it with imbuements and the Legend/Myth not paying attention, but you would have to do more then just say it happens on a daily basis. Because I just dont see it nor hear about it and while I may not play as much I still talk to quite a few actives out of game.

Well, if the use of safe-room is a "bug", perhaps you should petition a peace upon entry to all saferooms? It actually applies to all saferooms. Icarus was being chased by Saya, using the 'cling' thing vampires had. He ran to a saferoom, using herbs he could stay alive, and he did enough damage that Saya had to retreat. He didn't kill the bugger. Icarus was a rising hero or small hero at the time.

As a small character, I too have limited strenght.

Well which is it are you a Myth killer or not?

Never claimed I had killed, I said I had forced one to retreat.

And no magic wasn't made more potent with the introduction of guilds, magic in general was made more potent. There had to be a form of checks and balances with the herb change and potency was one of them to all forms, believe Petros has a note about it floating around here somewhere.

LoD is crap, not because of the exp but because of the fatigue. I can think of 5 other unpopulated runs to do which yield less exp per mob but more in the long run due to more of them and the clearing time.

Again, herbs; herbs to lower fatigue are abundant, and using one per 3-5 minutes are enough for a small character not carrying enough to be loaded down to a crawl.

Magic has a time and place to be used, the point of it is that when you do use it... no one else can compare. Ask any Scop if they run around throwing spells left and right, ask any Mage they will both tell you the same thing. That when they do, they wont be doing it for long during that session nor for the next week or so. They learn when its cost effective to use and they stay within their boundaries to avoid such situations.

Dont fix something that aint broken.

Rangers while they do suck in general actually have access to probably the best way to get exp up till champ, way quicker then any other guild could solo. Reading your posts I think you need to expand your knowledge and think for a bit on the skills you have access to and what ALL is available for you to use in game. If you need to heal so consistently that it is a problem then you need to either figure out your gear and items or move down to something less challenging. My Ranger hit Titan and I never once had any complaints about mana usage, hell I only used it when I got a nasty special or two and for groups. And I wasnt even RoI. I say wait for the recode coming in after 2025

No, you see, Greneth, I've been RoN before, and in RoN I didn't have the problem. RoN have a much more efficient way of avoiding damage than the RoI have, as well as other benefits I'm not planning to comment on here, as did RoG. Grinding quickly w/o mana consumption isn't the issue, the issue is the time you actually need the mana, that being failing on cleanses, having to aid others who have no way of cleansing etc.

If anything the Gardeners need to be removed and all Herbalism removed from any Racial, Layman or OCC which does not use spells. Laymans should have their skill lowered and Occupational Guilds raised. And add in maybe a small boost to the effects based on skill. Not only would this improve the market but would be extra incentive to join a guild that has access to them. And perhaps remove some of the complacency within the game due to the benefits of herbs as they would not be as accessible.

Didn't I say that earlier?

[Snowrose]

First of all unlike snowball tossing (as fun as it is) herbalism has been a huge part of every zone in genesis since the 90s and its one of the big differences between genesis and generic fantasty muds that are still around. enourmous amounts of work have been put into the herb interface, hundreds of hers each with unique short and long descriptions. I also admire the gemstones even though there are not as many.

I was trying to think of ways to appease the people complaining herbs/potions are useless these days. especially those who have spent time in the past forgoing grinding/questing in favor of herbing. Without changing to much for the people who like the statas quo. I also try to suggest things ive seen done before in genesis to make it easier to fit in. since we already have potions i figured that could be a good template to making a way to combine herbs into something higher level players would feel is worth the cost.

also in the modern days of facebook and mmos which has caused an increasingly sour opinion of standard grinding practices.
and often have increased focus on collection, pets and crafting. Diversity is a must to modern gamers. It is very important to have some optional activites to grinding and quests. Genesis has had this years before it was "cool". between herbing and more recently market/foodcart quests.

[Zar]

I won't drop my 2 ccs about herbs which was abusable before and it is not logical now.
But I don't see any "easy" fix here.

But I do know that Rising Hero went to Arena Tournament and won both tournaments:
- Rising hero and below
AND
- Hero and above

In final he fought Bigg who was legend at the time.
RH ate about 50-60 herbs that increased combat stats.
He had plenty of healing herbs and he won!

So old system wasn't good. A new one is somehow boring. There are only a few useful herbs.
So once you are stocked you don't need to herb any more.

I have about 10000 herbs and I'd love to have way to use them which I don't have now.

[Snowrose]

So old system wasn't good. A new one is somehow boring. There are only a few useful herbs.
So once you are stocked you don't need to herb any more.

I have about 10000 herbs and I'd love to have way to use them which I don't have now.

This here is my point ^^^^^^^
its not about making herbs more powerful or exclusive its making herbs more usable, fun, and interesting.

Thank you Zar.

[Greneth]

I won't drop my 2 ccs about herbs which was abusable before and it is not logical now.
But I don't see any "easy" fix here.

But I do know that Rising Hero went to Arena Tournament and won both tournaments:
- Rising hero and below
AND
- Hero and above

In final he fought Bigg who was legend at the time.
RH ate about 50-60 herbs that increased combat stats.
He had plenty of healing herbs and he won!

So old system wasn't good. A new one is somehow boring. There are only a few useful herbs.
So once you are stocked you don't need to herb any more.

I have about 10000 herbs and I'd love to have way to use them which I don't have now.

Plenty of herbs that are useful, just because they aren't to you doesn't mean every guild doesn't have a use for them. For instance Chicory is a favorite herb for curing fatigue, most people only stock up on it. I can be done herbing 4 times as fast as those who do that by using 4 other herbs out there that are just as good and one which is better. This problem goes way beyond just herbs, it applies to EQ as well. Its not the best so therefore it's useless.

Could a little innovation go into it by use of things like potions, alchemy etc? Sure. But I dont see a need to fix something that is not broken, specially when I can think of 15 other things that are broken and are in need of being fixed.

Icarus: You're stretching now, it's obvious your problems stem from the lack of a recode of the Rangers and less of what the game needs. Clearly any RH could outlast in very very special situations, wouldn't be the first time. But no, it does not happen on a daily basis.

LoD is crap, I dont care how you wish to spin it. I can give you exp rates, clear times and prep comparisons vs consumption and benefits. I dont even know why were debating about it, use it to your hearts content.

And RoI have a much better way of dealing damage, it matters little because avoiding has absolutely nothing to do with it. And here is where the contradiction comes in where its obvious this is about the rangers and not herbs on a global level. Don't like not having mana for cleanse, well don't be in areas where you have to use it multiple times. If you're talking about PvP, just run no point in even trying until you get your recode. It sucks, it really does but all I can say is just hold out till some wizard decides to poke his head in that mess of a code and stick with it. Imagine how the PoT feel, they have it much worse then you do. Yet that guild has more fun then any other I've been apart of.

TBH I missed the posts between you and Windemere and had to go back and re-read it, but yes I do agree with that Herbalism shouldn't be available for everyone. It's annoying to know that as it is apart of the Occupational guild I am being taxed for it and a fighter can just go join the Gardeners and be much better at it then me.

[Icarus]

And RoI have a much better way of dealing damage, it matters little because avoiding has absolutely nothing to do with it.

Actually, Greneth, I have yet to encounter a layman guild with damage special that have LESS damage to deal than RoI has in combat given into account guildstat. Xar is often brought up as a good example to "how good Ithilien Rangers are". Sure, Xar was impressive, he's also one of the biggest, if not still the biggest, player to roam the Donut, and with guildstats far above most everyone else, of course he deals damage. Most of it came from his militia jab, not from a ranger-attack though.

Yes, Rangers need a recode, but herbs as is now is broken. As you stated earlier "there are other ways to regain mana". True, and these have become more important after herbs fell off the table in such matters. With a skill dependant value of the usage of the herb (you just don't use it well enough with low skill) as well as the limitation of skills in herbalism to the non-magical guilds, this would be quite different, and actually useable.

As Snowrose and Zar also points out, there are MANY of different herbs available, but only a few gets used. Lots of herbs have no real usage or so low worth in it's usage that it's ignored by players today. 15 years ago, someone would be willing to eat 100 blueberries to heal a little, if the person had those, today, noone would bother to carry them and rather go get 4-5 whitehorns instead.

Currently there is one mana herb that actually make you feel like you are regaining mana when you snack down once a minute. There's one healing herb, one or two for fatigue, some specialized herbs for awareness, nightvision etc and the skunk berries. I carry, as I said earlier, at least 1000 herbs, often up towards 2000. (I've sold down since last). The herbs are divided into no more than 10 different herbs. 4 are for spells, 2 are mana herbs, although I tend to use only one of them, 2 are for healing, where one of them is skunk berries while the rest serve special purposes and thus only using one once in a while doesn't matter. Do I herb much? Nope, not anymore, it's close to useless. The herbs I actually use are the spell herbs, and if I need, I'll go get a few, sometimes I'll even get some mana herbs when I travel those parts, but most often I don't even bother doing that... After selling off 300 skunk berries, I still carry over 200. Why get more?

[Snowrose]

I was including in my assesment .... herald, EW, ranger, MM and academic herbs as well as potion herbs and the standard skunks, whitehorn, minnitka, a few stat/awareness herbs the 1-2 mega poison cure alls ect...

sounds like a lot until you consider the following in a lot of cases the herbs are reused, rangers and heralds have herbs in common, academics and EW have herbs in common... potions often use herbs that are valued for other reasons. some herbs have no less then 3 different uses other than just chomping down. if you happen to be in the right guild combo.

so really people use probibly 1-2% of the herbs out there and there are as nemi pointed out thousands. Im sure many miss the day they could chomp on 200 herbs a minute, that probibly wont happen again nor do we really want that. I think all that people want is more variety of herbs uses, herb products. some sort of sliding scales since need increases as a person levels a newbie can chomp 1 a minite maybe have a myth able to chomp 10-20 a minute. maybe herb classes can use an extra 5 of domain specific herbs to better keep theme as a perk for being taxed for herb use.

Noone expects people to change or revert the entire herb system (id hope) but this thread can be food for thought for the wiz who does recode rangers, or if they do add a potion craft guild, or are looking for new places to drop imbues, its not so much that the system is broken, as its a wonderous but underutilized aspect of genesis just due to people find the rewards to be substandard in modern genesis compared to mindless combat/sales repetition.

[cotillion]

From a wizard point of view there are a number of problems with herbs.

- Herbalism skill means very little, you get little additional benefit from being able to identify a herb
- Herb growth is problematic, the 'rarity' of herbs is not enforced in any way. This leads to the more abundant less powerful herbs never being used.
- Some herbs 'cheat' by providing long duration effects making other herbs less valuable.

Plenty to do for whoever wants to fix herbs!

[Windemere]

From a wizard point of view there are a number of problems with herbs.

- Herbalism skill means very little, you get little additional benefit from being able to identify a herb
- Herb growth is problematic, the 'rarity' of herbs is not enforced in any way. This leads to the more abundant less powerful herbs never being used.
- Some herbs 'cheat' by providing long duration effects making other herbs less valuable.

Plenty to do for whoever wants to fix herbs!

OR, everything is pretty good the way it is and I don't think there is any need to reduce the effectiveness/abundance of particular herbs.