Oh wow. I didn't realize it had been so long since I checked in on forums. Im sorry to all you guys that "really really missed me". hehe
Ok here I go, same as usual with a question.
If I wish to smith or fletch and have the best chance to make an awesome weapon or bow, beside the basic 120 smith or 120 fletching skill what other skills augment my chances. Does magery help for instance? Or does arms lore help? Anyone have this info? PM me if you don't wish to put it out in public. I have a few nice runics and I hate to waist or use them without doing the very best possible. Any help would be greatly appreciated. Or ....I could buy or trade something for the info I guess also. hehe I think its time I upgrade my axe ive been using for a year and the bow I use which is very basic.
Also I am still seeking a super nice set of mage gear. (armor, jewelry, other stuff) As well as Hrrm good jewelry for Scatatch. She is still looking. It seems Very good jewelry is indeed rare. or?
On this server you only need Smithing (and sometimes, assistance from Ancient Smithing Hammers) when crafting items made via smithing or that utilise smithing level for whatever reason (socketing..etc). Now when crafting a piece of armour or a weapon you have a chance (anywhere between like 0% and 100%) to craft it exceptionally. Exceptionally crafted items have inherent bonuses, exceptional weapons have 35% Damage Increase by default and exceptional armour pieces gain several bonus points of resistances that are distributed randomly amongst the different resistance types. The chance to make an exceptional item is based off of your level in whatever craft we are talking about as well as the items perceived crafting difficulty, that simple little sword is easy to make for a smith and as such you'll not even need that much in smithing to get to a point where it is impossible for you not to craft it exceptionally every time. Though something more difficult like say the Daisho needs 60 smithing to even have like a 2% chance to craft it to begin with and as such at 120 smithing you will probably only have a 95%~ chance to craft it exceptionally. You chances are shown to you on the tools under each craftable item's own personal section (as well as material costs and skill requirements)
Obviously bows and crossbows requires Bowcraft/ Fletching instead of smithing..etc.
What is most important is things like weapon base speed and it's special moves, you want weapons with useful special moves and good damage range and as low a speed as your set can manage, lower the weapon speed the slower it is by default but with enough stamina and swing speed you can even get the slowest of the slow to be very fast.
There is at least equipment piece that I can think of that requires both Smithing and Tailoring to make, it is the mace class weapon known as the Tessen. It requires 80 Smithing and 50 Tailoring with 120 in both you'll have a craftable chance of 100% but an exceptional rate of only about 75%~. There are as I recall other non equipment based items that require multiple crafting skills to use or make but other than the Tessen I can't think of any relevant ones in this case.
When it comes to socketing you only use smithing level, socketing anything (including pets) requires that the person doing the socketing as smithing. Socketing with 120 smithing is doable but not recommended unless the items you are using are easily and consistently replaceable as you have a very real chance of destroying the item you are trying to socket. For any hard to replace base items or things you'd rather not lose then it is highly recommended that the smith as a +30 (or better yet a +60) Ancient Smithing Hammer for socketing attempts so that failure and catastrophic failures are highly unlikely. Socketing pets requires that the socketer can use the pet without it going feral also be sure the pet is bonded to the socketer just in-case failure happens and the pet dies, as if it is bonded the pet can be ressed. If you want to socket a pet then I suggest you try to get your smithing onto your tamer just so you can do it without having to spend bonding deeds or waiting 2 weeks to get the whole socketing thing done with for it, much quicker to raise and drop smithing or soulstone it back and forth when it comes to pets.
When making a serious suite for a character I personally suggest that you look at what prefabricated (I.E Artifact or Pseudo-Artifact) items already exist and if those are ok for you to get away with using as they'll be easier to replace than outright random heavy runic items or monster loot. After this you'll be able to decide what items you still need and that based on your knowledge have no decent prefab options, it is these pieces that you'll have no choice but to make using runics or having favourable RNG as in the case of jewelry. It is a near fact that outside of being a heavy Druid staff user you'll want to have runic made weapons as prefab weapons are almost entirely worthless for all but Druids and Book-based Mages. I also suggest asking around with some of the other ancient players or crafter centric players as they may surplus items that where to them not what they where wanting but to you might be perfect and will save you time and runics.
Runic tools themselves are tiered, Copper Runics are weak as are their Tailoring counterpart (Spined Kits). So for smithing and fletching based items you'll want Verite or Valorite runics and for tailor based items you'll want Barbed kits for best effect. Also please do consider base material you use to make the item with as well,...making weapons out of Valorite for a character that uses Consecrate Weapon is pointless because of what CW actually does and for those mobs with equal resistances (like full 90s) then CW or no CW you'll be doing about the same damage by default anyway, so check what each base material does so you can see if there is something more beneficial or useful.
There are mobs ingame that can drop random tiered runics, One of them only deals in Hammers, another only deals with Fletching and the third that I know of only deals with Sewing kits. 2 of the mobs are old and rates are low due to who made the mobs in the first place the other is newer and the drop rates are better/ fairer but in turn this third one is much harder to kill than the older 2.
For mage gear make sure the items are either inherently or actually spell channeling/ mage armour or you'll suffer issues that you don't need to suffer and for likely little to no gain, as for jewelry you'll just have to get lucky or hope that someone else got lucky for you....unless some of the existing prefab jewelry pieces are suitable again look at what people are wearing and/ or ask around via PM for tips on useful pieces or locations. So to recap weapons are typically best made from runics, armour will be a combination of prefab and runic made and jewelry is artifact or happenstance. Lastly do not put any augments into an item until it as all it's sockets finished you don't want a catastrophic failure to cause you to lose the item and any augments you placed in the item, save things like spell channelling deeds..etc until all sockets are done as well for same reason.
Zerker and some of the other consistent players will be a good start for items or information and if you see a name you are not familiar with but that seems to have a advanced character/s then there is no harm done approaching them either, remember to look at what people are using especially the ones you know are successful in what they do for item ideas.
Your awesome foray,,Thanks for your time and input.
So, hehe I guess Im on the hunt for varioius unknown types of drops hehe. LOL man I have so much to learn still.
You're welcome, if you have other questions about special things and custom features then fire me a private message and I'll be happy to give you some direction if I am able to. Just be sure to let me know just how much info you want, some people just want a nudge in the right direction others want much more.
Something I should've included in my previous post but for whatever reason didn't, is that some moves have penalties attached to them Divine Fury gives the user a temporary penalty to their Defence Chance Increase, Protection gives a resisting spells and casting time penalty and necromorphs fluctuate resistances depending on the form (though most have fire resistance weaknesses). So if you think you'll be using Divine Fury somewhat regularly then it is a good idea to "overstack" DCI in order to offset all or a lot of the penalty, Necromorphs users should consider emphasising extra fire resistance...etc.
Be sure to check your intended set up to make sure something like these penalties might not trip you up for while some of the penalties are not as big of deal to some builds they are exceptionally painful to others, the DCI penalty is especially painful on archers and mages, but not that big of a deal for tamers and melee characters due to how they play or what other things they have.