No each profession has a gathering profession. Foragers only gather small potion items; herbs, clams, etc. Mining gathers coal, ores, etc. Tanning gathers leather from hides, etc. Not that other profession won't need items gathered or crafted to make other items. No 1 profession will gather everything. the NPCs for crafting are merely the "Craft" objects you need to be near; forges, alembics, looms, etc. The NPCs involved in Professions while either; Train you up in your profession or send you on a quest to learn a recipe. In addition, Profession skill levels are going to be tied to character level so there is a minimum level to acquire higher skills levels and stronger recipes.
are you going to let the players learn a skill such as weaving,
Yes that exactly whats planned. Allowing a choice of 2 from 8 professions a character can learn.
You'll need a database to keep track of who knows what first of all. That involves creation of algrithms and capacities to deal with looking up a player's skills, level of skills and so on. Ultimately, that could even require another server, simply dedicated to that particular database
TMWA already does have a skill system. The professions are set-up to show up under their own skill tab called "professions". There is no need to add anything to the server code.
Are the developers and admin on board with such extra processes?
Yes, it's mainly longtime active players asking for this.It's not anything extra work wise asides from the initial scripting of the professions which I've already done. Whats left is extracting recipes from current quests and writing new recipes where NPCs didn't already have recipes for.
Will the game remain free to play considering this creates more effort, which likely will cause some to ask for payment in some form? Honestly, has that been considered?
The game will always remain free. We are a 503 (c) non-profit involved with
Software for the Public Interest This project will, as long as I have breathe in me, remain Free and Open Source. The project is run by many who believe in keeping this game free and open.
say gather white fur, herbs, iron ore, coal then set up as a shop to sell these.
The exact system you complained about happening is what TMW does currently in-game. Anyone can gather everything needed. Thus rarely does anyone goto someone else for materials or reagents other then maybe coal. The point of professions is to put more resources into players hands so they do sell more and move money and resources among each other. Currently the economy is quite stagnant.
I've been working on the skills/professions framework for about 2 years now, I'm pretty certain the mechanics are fine. I agree it's hard to see it without it being on a server. It's such a divergent to how TMW does anything typically, but it's a step in the right direction. Let me explain why professions.
Professions accomplish some major things:
1) Chars are limited to types of materials they can produce by be limited to 2 professions.
1a) Makes alts a more valuable resource to level as it increases the profession count & thus types of material player has on hand.
2a) Players will have to trade or interact more to gain resources. This increases the social aspect and economic aspects of the game.
3a) Adds alternative action when grinding. By moving part of the resource collection out of the monsters and into NPCs your harvest diminishes boredom and the effects of simple bots or semi-afk grinders.
4a) By putting the more valuable nodes in areas with tougher monster & PvP enabled areas access is controlled in ways other then just base level or base skill of character as outside elements can "kill" you before you can finish gathering.
2) Economics
2a) By allowing players to control the supply and demand through their own character actions they will augment the drop rates when they are bad. example: Coal is currently the most often farmed as you need a lot of it. It's on the ManaMarket becuase it fetches a nice price and semi-tolerable to farm. The price of Coal in game fluctuates but so does the supply. Currently a large set of items are unobtainable this way and thus can not enter the economy.
2b) Multiple paths for farming. As few real options exist for acquiring wealth and resources currently; Its red slimes, coal or rares.
3) No one yet has a profession.
3a) Old players & New players will start on a pretty even ground.
3b) Helps lower levels level better and less boring.
The amount of code added increases the current content by about 8 fold. It requires very little change on the server data. The majority of the additions are the new NPC "nodes" or "craft objects". Quests in-game will still allow anyone to complete them, but going forward there will be profession specific quests. The NPCs added are being worked on being added via a script method so it's not a complete pain in the butt. The NPCs for professions are already in game and can be changed slightly with a function call to become a "trainer" in a profession.
