Larian Studios Forums Divinity - Original Sin Divinity - Original Sin - Enhanced Edition Lv 5 Crafting\Blacksmithing vs divine-tier loot.

I think something is fishy here..
I crafted dagger at level 12 and it is better than anything i've found later in the game, no matter what tier the item is. Found level 16 divine-tier dagger and it is still having less damage (though got some other cool stuff on it) than my hand-crafted stuff, none of the items seem to be doing better than craft. Was that intended? If yes, then what's the point of high-tier loot? :\
edit: i am currently testing various crafted weapons - it seems this is about daggers exclusively, crafted ones are very very strong, other types of weapons are what i guess they supposed to be.. a stepping stones till you find something solid in loot.

I think the biggest advantage loot you will find laying around has over crafted stuff is extra stats. Your dagger may have more damage, but I've never seen more than a one or two +1's on a crafted item. It gives you the option of either having a ton of extra stats skills on your found loot, or crafting if you're going for raw damage numbers, which I think works fine from a gameplay perspective.

[quote=RedliwLedah]I think the biggest advantage loot you will find laying around has over crafted stuff is extra stats. Your dagger may have more damage, but I've never seen more than a one or two +1's on a crafted item. It gives you the option of either having a ton of extra stats skills on your found loot, or crafting if you're going for raw damage numbers, which I think works fine from a gameplay perspective.[/quote]

I disagree with you and provide a screenshot.
http://images.akamai.steamusercontent.com/ugc/389920012468364600/F625CF9D8B26CB142A6FF9E83F4620963EA5BACC/
I just tried to craft other types of items - none of them ended up better than the ones i've found. This is the thing about daggers.. They are coming up too good compared to loot.

We finished Classic DOS with an almost fully crafted green / white gear on us, as it was the best damage output and stat customization we could get too.

This is a debate as old as videogames : which should be better, crafted gear or looted gear ? Any way you look at it, the issue is the same : "what is the point of high-tiers loot" vs "what is the point of investing in the crafting skill?". It all depends on people's own sensibilities. Some prefer to kill the dragon to get their gear, other prefer to spend time at the forge. Both will probably be annoyed the other way exist because "why spend hours at the forge when I can kill X to get Y" or "why bother with killing X when I can chill at the forge to get Y".

There is no way out of this.

However, yes, I'll admit that higer level drops in classic DOS were quite inferior to lower level crafts, which is both surprising and a little disappointing. Craft and drops should at least be equivalent in stats.

Keep in mind that you can further enhance looted/bought gear through crafting. In fact, you can add a SECOND elemental upgrade if the weapon dropped with one already on it. The exception is Tenebrium gear (weapons made from tenebrium, not necessarily anything with tenebrium damage on it) which can't be used in crafting at all.

Once upgraded on a whetstone, with a second element damage, and a forgotten soul, that Divine gear drop might be quite a bit better than the crafted one.

Also, crafted crossbows are absolutely terrible, so you have to rely on the drops which can do godlike damage when upgraded with a bowstring and element.

Anyway, as far as the question of "which should be better", I think this particular game has enough uses for crafting outside of making those weapons that if crafted weapons and armor ONLY existed to fill the holes in your loadout, it would still be good enough. Crafting skill to upgrade legendary equipment, or to make various consumable items, is still crafting skill well used.

Blacksmithing on the other hand would probably be better off cut (merged into crafting), since about the only thing it's good for is making weapons and damage-enhancing bladed weapons.

IMO Crafted gear, at least in a single player RPG, should always be better then found gear. MMO's this should also hold true, but there should be "Raid Drops" that are needed to craft items that are better then the gear found in the raid.

Here is my logic:

1. Found gear will be obtained no matter what you do. You are going to kill that dragon eventually, so it means every character is going to have the "Sword of I Pwned a Dragon". Its not "Special" and you didn't have to do anything to get it that every single other player who is playing the game didn't or isn't going to do eventually. IE. it 100% guaranteed loot that everyone will have, and as such should be designed in such a way to be "good enough" to beat the game with.

2. Crafted gear, on the other hand, requires a player to invest skill points, time, effort, thought, etc into making items that a player who chooses not to do these things wont have access to. A player is choosing to use your crafting system, it is an optional component, not something that is a 100% guarantee that a player will do it. As such, players who choose to invest in crafting should be rewarded with "better" items earlier then if they would have just spent the time killing the Dragon.

If both are "Equal" then there is never a reason to bother with crafting. If you can do and experience everything in the game without ever once crafting anything, then the crafting system is a waste of time.

IMO, DOS:EE falls in the realm of, not enough "power" in the crafting department to really make it worth putting more then a single point into it (from a min/max perspective, maybe you like crafting). The same is true for lock picking, as 95% of doors in the game can be opened with a key.. and usually the key is only meters away from the locked door... such a wasted skill... but I'm digressing now.

I personally would like to see the crafting system revamped in a mod to make it more complete for one, but also more useful overall.

Ah, weird you'd find Crafting lacklusting in DOS. If anything, it's actually very handy and the only way to get the most powerful items available. Either by crafting them yourself, or, as pointed out by Sotanaht, improving found items.
Not to forget crafting is also about "everyday needs" like arrows or the incredibly useful snow boots. Or potions. Or, now, grenades.

I'd say there are all the reasons in the world to bother with crafting, really. And to be honest, I think they did a nice job in Classic DOS balancing out crafted and looted items. The issue was that loot quality was all over the place, which is something supposed to have been fixed in EE ( I think )

Yeah, i suppose when I said "not worth putting more then 1 point in" it might have come off as me saying "not worth doing at all".

But yeah, 1 Point + Altruistic + gear = 5 crafting. I cant see putting in more then 1 point again, unless you just like crafting..

But, I still wish it was "Better" then it currently is, mostly because of the lack of "Breadth" of crafting recipes and how its extremely biased towards "food" and "melee weapons".

Keep in mind I'm the guy who dumped the crafting table onto the divinity wikia :p.

It just seems to me that it lacks a few "key" recipes to make it "complete". Maybe someone down the line will make a crafting overhaul mod to fix some of these issues.

You dont get it guys, it's the daggers that are overpowered.
Other crafted items usually ending up being worse than their blue looted equivalents.
With daggers though, lower level crafted one is always better than DIVINE item that even 2 levels above me. Other colored daggers the same level dont even come close to it. It is definitely some sort of mistake.
[quote]IMO Crafted gear, at least in a single player RPG, should always be better then found gear.[/quote]
I would agree with you if this game offered players to obrain legendary item sets, some you can find and some craft using schematics and having high skill level. In divinity you craft pretty much the same stuff you find, nothing memorable.