Rare and Limited Edition Items

[Jester]

I was thinking there could be a special stamps that could be used on an item that denoted date and person using it. The simplest implementation of this would be
Crafters using the stamp at events on items that are freely handed out to those participate. These would have no use, they would simply be up for collection.

The main point where this idea would really get started, however, would have to be items that are of historic importance, or merely very old (These would be done by people submitting sample item ideas). Just like wine in particular increases its value, as do paintings done by masters, these could be quite rare and have quite hefty conditions to acquire them.

This would also open up the possibility for forgery. Players (And NPCs!) could attempt to create something identical to an item that is worth quite a lot. This would open up an actual use for consider, as well! Appraising could be the method used to detect a forgery.

Story Events could have at their conclusion an item that was of great historical importance to Davism, or a painting done by a Master (player's could come up with sample descriptions). It could also easily be an item of lesser value, like an old copy of the Erra Pater or a bottle of wine, for shorter and less intense Story Teller's events. This would allow a much easier reward system, I'm not sure what is used now but it seems to me that it would be hard to come up with rewards that weren't over-powered or under-powered in some way. This method would make for easy rewards in my opinion. The item(s) found at the end of an event could have value based on the difficulty of the challenges that had to be overcome in the story, as well as the story's complexity.

I thought this would open up a way for rich people to show off and compete, a neat system for collectors, easier story telling rewards, and open up possibilities for those who wanted to be more shady but not part of the thieves guild. I would love to hear any feedback, and of course I don't expect to see this system coming in to play for a long time even if staff and players like the idea. It would require a lot of work to fully or even partially implement. It's just something that popped into my head this morning and I wanted to share it.

[Zeita]

I think this is a very nice idea and I'd love to see it. There are certainly items of historic value, artifacts and so forth in game that are impossible to differentiate from something whipped up yesterday.

[Voxumo]

I'm actually vehemently against this. I do not feel that 'collectible' items would truly benefit the game in any meaningful other than someone's bragging rights. Do I feel like there should be items of importance in the game, such as the diamond chalice, yes, but I do not think it should be a standard.

Also most story teller events don't have rewards. They aren't quests in a mmo, and as such there has never been a need for rewards. Yes there have been a few stories that have had rewards, especially back in the early days of the story teller system, but it seemed to have been slowly phased out.

[Jester]

Collectible items wouldn't have to be thing, that's just where my idea started. I actually started to think it was worse and worse as I developed the idea further.

However, being able to buy expensive paintings and such would give Gentry and Noble's the ability to say "Haha I'm better than you, my gallery is bigger" and such. Right now its more like "I have a ton of money! I think I'll just buy a really big house!" from what I've seen.

I was thinking ST more in the sense of developing PVE quests, as in that other thread. Players being able to set up basic PVE quests could be interesting. Having a scholar go along with a group of guards to explore a ruin or finding a riddle that leads to a cache of books seems like it'd be fun to me, but what do I know. All I do is sit in bars and engage in small talk.

[Voxumo]

Well to be fair, staff are in the works of upgrading papercraft into an overall 'arts' skill which from what I understand is suppose to have better painting capabilities, and sculptures, among other things. I think once that is in, there will be a much better pool of items to 'spend wealth' on. However any decent painting is worth the silver, because it's not easy doing descs for those things. Trying to paint a picture via text, can't be easy.

I don't deny that it would be 'fun' I just don't think it makes sense for the game/theme. The games never really been about PvE. I went into further detail about this in the other topic.

[Temi]

Making things rare and special always seems to come down to - if anyone can do it, people will treat it as anyone can do it and just personal tastes, rather than worth extra money. And players here really value their ability to be creative with their strings, so we don't want to restrict that too much. An unchangeable stamp with date and creator could possibly work, but I don't know that it thematically makes sense. How do we track such a date ICly? We have trademark stamps for merchants, which I wouldn't mind if people wanted to use in RP more, though I haven't really seen it previously.

One thing that we had added in with jeweling is special appraisal messages. These are only staff set, so not everyone can just string up whatever they want, limiting its availability, and if you use the item as an ingredient in a craft, the message goes along with it. It can go on an extra special jewel to certify that this is indeed that rare sort of jewel, and the jewelry it's placed on will have this in its appraise message as well. It's a system we can use more as people like, which fits a different angle of a similar niche.

[Jester]

I can see that I will have to explain this idea in more detail. I will do so once I finish writing it out.

Well to be fair, staff are in the works of upgrading papercraft into an overall 'arts' skill which from what I understand is suppose to have better painting capabilities, and sculptures, among other things. I think once that is in, there will be a much better pool of items to 'spend wealth' on. However any decent painting is worth the silver, because it's not easy doing descs for those things. Trying to paint a picture via text, can't be easy.

I don't deny that it would be 'fun' I just don't think it makes sense for the game/theme. The games never really been about PvE. I went into further detail about this in the other topic.

The intention wasn't to limit it to PVE, it was to give more flexibility to STs. This way a player could make an ST about retrieving a rare artifact without having to make it rare by including information few people know or just saying it was rare.

[Temi]

The appraise stuff could potentially work for you as is, with staff intervention, for the story stuff.

Code: Select all

appraise ruby
Temi carefully considers a large, scintillating star ruby, called the Star of Dastur.

This 'a large, scintillating star ruby, called the Star of Dastur' is a kind of prop.
 It weighs around 0 pounds.
You estimate its value at 50 silver.
It looks to be in excellent condition.
It appears to be made of stone.
The size of a strawberry, the six-rayed star within the ruby seems to
move beneath its surface as the precious jewel turns.  Clearly the jewel
known as the Star of Dastur to those familiar with such things, it was
originally mined in that march. 

[Applesauce]

Not sure I understand what this would add beyond what already exists in terms of tooling extra descriptions.

There already are IC paintings and other collectibles or special items, and some do have their artist/date info tooled onto them (if the creator chose to do so). Nothing stopping you from doing that for anything and everything you create, and it's already supported in the game. Not saying I'm against it, just if you want to do it it seems like the ability is already there.

As Temi said, though, there's no coded enforcement of artistic skill, only technical skill. So if I can physically make a painting and you can physically make a painting, nothing's stopping them both from being the most beautifullest paintings on Urth. Beyond the IC value of someone knowing X made Y item, anything can literally be copied and pasted no matter how rare it supposedly is.

And really, if I can already perfectly reproduce a masterful sculpture or painting via copy/paste, how hard would it be to "forge" a simple name and date?

[Kinaed]

I don’t mind putting a creation date timestamp on crafter objs, then putting in the appraise section how old it generally looks.