Question: Success rate of enhancing leather armor.

[hawkeye_pike]

Good monster loot items are rare, but they are there. Sometimes I pick up a nice shield, iron armor, or some nice leather armor pieces to take them home for enhancing.

Now, the enhancing business seems to be a bit strange. My crafter has 110 Blacksmithing and 110 Tailoring.

Enhancing shields with valorite ore has approximately a 90% success chance, enhancing armor with any kind of leather fails in 95% of the attempts.

My question: Is this intended? Why is it so difficult to enhance leather items, while it seems so easy to enhance metal items?

 

[Borric]

I havent tried to enhance shileds in a long time so Ill leave that out. As far as leather vs. metal on armor enhancements, both are extremly low success chance. And I have seen quotes saying that it is working properly. The reasons were to keep uber stuff from flooding into the game.

...

It could use a bump in success rates, IHMO.

Borric

 

[Lynk]

I save everything that "could" have a use after enhancing and throw it in a bag. When said bag is full, I'll hop on a crafter and try to enhance. I usually get a few pieces that end up doing nothing but sitting in my armor stockpile because I have no use for it.

 

[Old Man of UO]

...

Enhancing shields with valorite ore has approximately a 90% success chance, enhancing armor with any kind of leather fails in 95% of the attempts.

My question: Is this intended? Why is it so difficult to enhance leather items, while it seems so easy to enhance metal items?

This has been answered in the past by the developers, but I can't remember who or the exact details. It was intended and maybe someone else can fill in the details. But it goes something like this...

Each property that you are enhancing has a 25% (?) chance of failure, which means 75% chance to succeed, when enhancing. Each additional property of the material used to enhance increases the risk of failure. Such as material with 3 properties used to enhance has a 0.75 x 0.75 x 0.75 x100% = 42% chance of success. Four items is 32% success, and so on.

Also, enhancing a property that already exists on an item (such as luck) increases the risk to fail (such as using spined leather that adds luck), and the higher the item property the greater the risk of failure. Although I don't remember the specifics of this risk.

Does that answer your question? Did I remember it correctly?

 

[athos_uo]

The following answer is one of explanations about enhancing by devs as I know.

MrTact might have explained once a little about it... but I can't remember.

Cf: No.4 of FoF, February 29, 2008

"Is there any difference in the success chance between enhancing wooden items or leather and metal?"

Not necessarily - success chance is actually a function of the intensity of the properties you're changing and the number of properties on the item, not which skill you're using. Of course enhancing armor with gold, which affects six properties (bonuses to four resists, luck, and lower requirements) is, in general, more likely to fail than enhancing a weapon with bloodwood, which only affects two (hit point regeneration and hit life leech,) but if that weapon already has near-max intensity on either of those properties, or has several other properties, it may have a smaller chance of success.

In short, while determining the actual success chance of enhancing is complicated and depends on several variables, all the crafting skills use the same formula.

 

[athos_uo]

I have found some explanations by Hanse.

1st, May, 2003

Enhancing success rates get into the small percentages if you use special materials that add multiple effects and high resistances. For example, the current failure rate for only enhancing one resistance that is currently at 13 is 33%. If you use a material that enhanced two 13 resistance types, then you roll twice... against a 33% failure rate. You can see you'd have quite a low chance, if you were using a material that enhances 4-5 resistances (my calculations might be wrong, but it's around 13% for five properties - because we drop decimal points). Properties other than resistances do not use the same algorithm (obviously, luck would be impossible to enhance with if the trend kept going up to 40...).

-Hanse

2nd, May, 2003

Actually, I posted that the trend does NOT go up to 40. I was referring to luck. Luck is a different effect and uses a slightly different calculation for failure rate than resistances. The trend is linear, though. The material and skill you use is irrelevant.

- Hanse

3rd, May, 2003

If a material only enhances some resistances, it only checks against those resistances. It does not check all resistances.

So, for verite (which enhances all five), you would have roughly a 15% chance with a 2/13/13/13/13 suit. With valorite, which does not enhance fire, you would have a 23% chance minus the durability percentage chance. I believe the durability check is not as hard as a 33% failure rate for 13 resist in fire (this is a guess...but it seems logical...I'm out sick and can't check the numbers). So, it would be slightly easier to enhance that piece with valorite than verite. The material you use affects the percentage failure rate based on how many and which resistances you enhance.

- Hanse

8th, May, 2003

With 13 resist, you have a 33% chance to fail. You have a 23% chance to break the item. You have a 67% chance to succeed. Of course, that's for only one resistance. The numbers I mentioned are total fail rates. Break fail rates are about 10% below failure rate per each resistance.

The only effects taken into consideration for success are ones that are compared against. So, if you have a lot of effects on the item that are not modified by enhancing it, you are not penalized for those extraneous effects.

The rest of this information has been repeatedly asked for. I just finished calculating the chances.

Durability chance: 20% + (Current durability NOT the magical effect * 0.025). Drop all decimal points. 50 durability on an item is 21% chance to fail. 100 is 22% chance to fail.

Lower requirements: 20% + (Current lower requirements * 0.25). Drop all decimal points.

Luck increase: 30% + (Current luck * 0.5). Drop all decimal points.


-Hanse

 

[Old Man of UO]

That is what I was thinking of Athos... the 33%. Thanks for the correction.