Questions Re Resources Acquired While Training Mining and LJ to GM

[Tina Small]

I've just finished training an elf character to GM in mining, lumberjacking, and fishing on Arirang. (Edited to add: Used no SoTs, no SoAs, started character with 50 mining and 50 lumberjacking skills). Out of curiosity, I kept track of the number of boards and ingots she acquired during the process. All mining was done in Trammel walking from spot to spot and smelting ore on a fire beetle after depleting the ore at each spot. Recalled to the bank after going through 20-30 shovels. Lumberjacking was also done in Trammel with two pack animals in tow and recalling to the bank after both were completely full of boards.

Here is what my little elf resource gatherer acquired in boards and ingots:

62,620 plain boards
13,080 oak boards
5,670 ash boards
1,290 yew boards
0 heartwood boards
0 bloodwood boards
0 frostwood boards

82,660 total boards

12,323 iron ingots
1,599 dull copper ingots
1,138 shadow iron ingots
838 copper ingots
716 bronze ingots
484 gold ingots
177 agapite ingots
49 verite ingots
0 valorite ingots

17,324 total ingots

Here is what she got as uncommon fish while training up to GM fishing, NOT including normal fish (didn't have enough room in her bankbox to keep them all and apparently I pitched the fish steak from them too so can't estimate how many there were):

Shore Fish

31 pike
34 pumpkinseed sunfish
38 yellow perch
41 redbelly bream
43 bluegill sunfish
49 smallmouth bass
53 kokanee salmon
53 uncommon shiner
53 green catfish
54 brook trout
54 walleye
59 rainbow trout

Deep Water Fish

97 captain snook
98 shad
99 mahi-mahi
100 black seabass
104 yellowfin tuna
104 red grouper
105 bonefish
105 gray snapper
105 cape cod
108 blue grouper
109 amberjack
115 bonito
115 red snook
116 bluefish
117 haddock
122 tarpon
127 cobia
143 red drum

Total Uncommon Fish 2,551

My couple of questions are:

(1) Why is the yield for ingots, especially iron ingots, so low compared to lumberjacking? This is absolutely my biggest gripe about resource gathering to be able to train crafting skills. It takes me FOREVER to get enough iron ingots to train both blacksmithing and tinkering and it is really aggravating to feel like the only way to really get them done in any kind of timely fashion is to supplement what my resource character gathered by purchasing ingots that were probably gathered via scripting.

(2) If I had mined and lumberjacked in Felucca, would I really have ended up with double the amount of ingots and boards as I got from sticking to Trammel?

(3) If you are gathering resources to train up blacksmithing, tinkering, and carpentry, are you considerably better off in terms of getting iron ingots and plain boards for training if your resource gatherer is a human character and then do the quest to become an elf character after you no longer need to gather resources for skill training?

(4) If you want to do a lot of the fishing quests (say you want to get a 120 fishing power scroll), are you better off doing your fishing and questing in Felucca? How much time do you end up wasting waiting on VvV fights so you can get to fishmongers? Do you lose your quest crates if your ship is scuttled?

 

[Poo]

hmmmmmm

i think most of my training was done on the fel side, once i was finished i just banked all the resources and moved on to my next guy to train.
but looking at your totals i would have to say that yes i gathered about double to triple the iron ore you got.

as to changing the character to elf or human i just assigned my resource gatherer to be elf and my mule (guy with smithing) i have as human.
i KNOW you have enough empty characters that you can have a different resource gatherer and mule!

as to getting enough resources to train tinker and smithing you really dont need too much in the way of iron to get you to 120 smithing anymore.
there are a couple listed ways to train that take very little resources.
shirkens, circlets ect ect ect.
and with tinkering you just need to get high enough to make lockpicks and then you can ride that for a long ways.
somewhere i have written down how much it costed me to make all my mules on every shard but i cant find that sheet right now.

 

[Dot_Warner]

My couple of questions are:

(1) Why is the yield for ingots, especially iron ingots, so low compared to lumberjacking? This is absolutely my biggest gripe about resource gathering to be able to train crafting skills. It takes me FOREVER to get enough iron ingots to train both blacksmithing and tinkering and it is really aggravating to feel like the only way to really get them done in any kind of timely fashion is to supplement what my resource character gathered by purchasing ingots that were probably gathered via scripting.

Because one of the original devs probably thought it was "realistic" for metal to mysteriously disappear during the smelting process, contrary to logic and the laws of physics.

While wood, on the other hand, converts 100% to boards 100% of the time...again, contrary to logic (knots, rot, damage, etc. which would be unsuitable for crafting)

(2) If I had mined and lumberjacked in Felucca, would I really have ended up with double the amount of ingots and boards as I got from sticking to Trammel?

Maybe? Call it the hypothesis for you next experiment!

(3) If you are gathering resources to train up blacksmithing, tinkering, and carpentry, are you considerably better off in terms of getting iron ingots and plain boards for training if your resource gatherer is a human character and then do the quest to become an elf character after you no longer need to gather resources for skill training?

Probably? I've always found it a little weird that the elves, who allegedly revere nature, are better at strip mining and deforestation.

(4) If you want to do a lot of the fishing quests (say you want to get a 120 fishing power scroll), are you better off doing your fishing and questing in Felucca? How much time do you end up wasting waiting on VvV fights so you can get to fishmongers? Do you lose your quest crates if your ship is scuttled?

You're better off buying a 120 scroll and saving yourself the inevitable expense of carpal tunnel surgery and/or your hairline from pulling it out due to how god-awful the fishing quests are.

I don't think Fel increases your rare fish chances or your overall success rate at pulling up fish and not motherfracking footware.

Do people still VvV?

As far as I know, you only loose your crate if your ship sinks or you quit the quest.

While fishing is obnoxious, crabbing/lobstering = /wrists.

 

[Pawain]

I mine in fel Delucia your pattern will refresh before you do the whole thing. You can also go in the cave. Have guards on a macro. You do get more ingots, you will get overweight at one spot sometimes. I buy cheap jewelry that adds str.

I replied because I saw you had 2 pack horses. You can now drag around 4 giant beetles and a Fire Beetle if you so desire. Your old Beetles turn to 1 slot when you click the button.

The failure at smelting needs to go away at 105 mining.

 

[Pawain]

Gold ingots are so plentiful in Blackthorns, I started training tinkering and smith with those ingots when I got to that level.

 

[Tyrath]

What your numbers tell me is randomizing wood and ore is why pretty much only idiots like myself still gather our own resources instead of buying 60k stacks for a few bucks from the scripters via the 3rd party RWT websites. Gotta admit those 60k of each ore packages are tempting. And mine on Merch ships for Ag, Ver and Val.

 

[Dot_Warner]

Randomizing ore/wood was the single laziest thing the devs (not the current ones) have ever done (seconded by the "NOT A MIRROR!" of Trammel) to combat a game-breaking failure to enforce the ToS.

 

[MalagAste]

Getting Shadow Ingots is also easy down in the Orc Cave near Yew...

 

[skett]

I just buy the higher tier wood and ingots from the scripters, you no the ones that caused the random resource change that only hurt the honest players nvm......
In anther thread what keeps players playing and causes players to quit this is casused me to stop playing for years.
All my main characters are crafters to make items now is a F-ing joke grind and they suck after all that boring grind for months.
I don't want an " easy button" I just want a game that's fun and that I can make top notch gear.
It far easier to just buy items and gold from off site sellers anymore.
I wonder all the time why would any logical person make these changes and all I keep coming up with is Greed not saying the past devs are profiting off the those sites but sure makes one wonder why would you punish the honest players ? And make it impossible for the average player to ever get the required resources, recipes keys, quest, and on and on grind to be able to make an item that now is worthless. But yet every UO website that sales items for real money has an unlimited amount of what ever resources you need?

The loot system needs a serious revamp and crafter should always be on the top other wise why the hell do we need crafters ?

Sorry about the rant I'm just so sick of all the past and current devs not listening to there people/players.

 

[Tina Small]

hmmmmmm

i think most of my training was done on the fel side, once i was finished i just banked all the resources and moved on to my next guy to train.
but looking at your totals i would have to say that yes i gathered about double to triple the iron ore you got.

as to changing the character to elf or human i just assigned my resource gatherer to be elf and my mule (guy with smithing) i have as human.
i KNOW you have enough empty characters that you can have a different resource gatherer and mule!

as to getting enough resources to train tinker and smithing you really dont need too much in the way of iron to get you to 120 smithing anymore.
there are a couple listed ways to train that take very little resources.
shirkens, circlets ect ect ect.
and with tinkering you just need to get high enough to make lockpicks and then you can ride that for a long ways.
somewhere i have written down how much it costed me to make all my mules on every shard but i cant find that sheet right now.

Yeah, for tinkering after lockpicks stop giving good gains, I usually do gargoyle earrings and necklaces (esp nice because they give arms lore gains) and then rings. For smithing, it's usually cutlasses, krysses, shurikens, circlets, and boomerangs. Would like to see what it cost you in resources for both skills if you find your sheet!

 

[Tina Small]

You're better off buying a 120 scroll and saving yourself the inevitable expense of carpal tunnel surgery and/or your hairline from pulling it out due to how god-awful the fishing quests are.

I don't think Fel increases your rare fish chances or your overall success rate at pulling up fish and not motherfracking footware.

Do people still VvV?

As far as I know, you only loose your crate if your ship sinks or you quit the quest.

While fishing is obnoxious, crabbing/lobstering = /wrists.

So far I've only bought one fishing power scroll and that was a 105. I enjoy fishing in UO and have a character with fishing on practically every shard. I've tried making headway with the fishmonger quests quite a few times on a couple of shards, but they just aren't worth the effort. My biggest gripes about getting lobsters and crabs are the cumbersome process of opening the traps after you pick them up, finding the released crabs and lobsters when they get flung all over your pack, and re-stacking the empty traps; worrying about being interrupted between setting out a long line of traps and sailing back to the start to pick them up; and the ridiculously low rate for getting named lobsters and crabs.

 

[Tina Small]

What your numbers tell me is randomizing wood and ore is why pretty much only idiots like myself still gather our own resources instead of buying 60k stacks for a few bucks from the scripters via the 3rd party RWT websites. Gotta admit those 60k of each ore packages are tempting. And mine on Merch ships for Ag, Ver and Val.

The only favorable thing I have to say about the randomization is that I now have a slightly better chance at getting valorite and heartwood/bloodwood/frostwood than before the change because the scripters aren't hitting those spots all day long and not letting anyone else have a chance at them. I agree on getting ores from the merchant ships. Really wish the dev team would add frostwood to those too.

 

[Tina Small]

I wonder all the time why would any logical person make these changes and all I keep coming up with is Greed not saying the past devs are profiting off the those sites but sure makes one wonder why would you punish the honest players ? And make it impossible for the average player to ever get the required resources, recipes keys, quest, and on and on grind to be able to make an item that now is worthless. But yet every UO website that sales items for real money has an unlimited amount of what ever resources you need?

Yep, it doesn't make any sense to me either, Skett. After seeing it happen over and over, I have my own theories about it too.

 

[TB Cookie [W]]

My thoughts, not on the original post, but on where the post has gone.

I think randomisation of gathered resources had to be done, we all had runes to all the exact spots, and it had got too easy, and especially too easy for scripters.

The problem now is, it has got too hard for the genuine players.
They do have to bring the ratio's up for the normal player, I hardly get anything myself.

There is a battle against scripters, and it's a hard one to win, you make it hard for a scripter = you make it impossible for the normal player.
They need to find a away round this, spot the scripting patterns, and penalise them, without penalising the normal players.

There is a guy who afk scripts Blackthorns on both Tram and Fel, on Drach and Europa, he has 4 characters farming non stop.
We kill him non stop in Fel, sometimes we drive him away for a bit, we do what we can on Drach Fel, sometimes we get him killed Europa Tram, and we probably don't reach Drach Tram, we do our bit against scripters we find and know about, but we cannot be there all the time, and they are relentless.

Then once, I tried to actually hunt in Europa Tram BT myself, on my thrower. My thrower does not need to move to kill the mages, so he sits there for an hour killing them, but this is the thing, every 20 minutes (might be less), the game physically removes you, and throws you into the prison cells, covers you in poison and sets npc's on you. Now, I escape this every time, but it's really disturbing and annoying to my hunting pattern as a genuine player to have to go through this, so their anti script mechanics have made it impossible for a real player, yet somehow, the scripters still keep on going. I cannot hunt in Tram for this reason, which is fine, I wouldn't want to anyway, I always hunt in Fel, but I was stunned when this happened to me.

The point of that story, was to show how clumsy the anti scripting mechanics are, and yes, they are adversely affecting genuine gatherers.
I am currently training a Lumberjack on another shard, and I still gather manually (mostly), I find it relaxing - the only way to continue playing this game sometimes, without getting upset about some of the stuff, is to completely lower your expectations, and just do what you do for fun - you aren't in it to compete against the Plat earning scripters.


Back to conspiracy theories, I find it astounding that such gold/item selling sites exist, and seem to be doing very well from it all, If I were UO, I'd be hammering them.
But the lack of action against them, makes you think UO are behind them... so it's all about the money, if so, it's such a shame it's that way, If this is the case, it erodes normal players confidence in the game.
I don't mind UO making money at all (I want them to in fact), but I'd rather they were up front about it, or seen to be more harsh on the gold selling sites to protect the integrity of the game, for the players.

 

[Fridgster]

Gold ingots are so plentiful in Blackthorns, I started training tinkering and smith with those ingots when I got to that level.

Yeap great idea. Plus if your working up smithing you can make weapons with the gold ingots then unravel them with imbuing to work that skill as well. Plus you end up with a bunch of residue for imbuing.

 

[Slayvite]

I always used to love annoying the scripters by dropping a water barrel and filling it with water on their recall spot. Fun times.

 

[MalagAste]

I always used to love annoying the scripters by dropping a water barrel and filling it with water on their recall spot. Fun times.

No what was fun was to find out what they were mining and know that they are using a script and drop a piece of that ore on the ground there come back in awhile and smelt it all for yourself...

Used to do that with logs as well... watch where they recalled in and out from drop one log of that kind and just wait... let them bot for you.

 

[Fridgster]

No what was fun was to find out what they were mining and know that they are using a script and drop a piece of that ore on the ground there come back in awhile and smelt it all for yourself...

Used to do that with logs as well... watch where they recalled in and out from drop one log of that kind and just wait... let them bot for you.

At that point would you not be considered a scripter and therefore in violation of TOS?

 

[MalagAste]

At that point would you not be considered a scripter and therefore in violation of TOS?

I'm not the one running the script... I'm just thieving their loots... Was easy to do... Beats trying to kill them though I did know some folk that would purposely lead ogres, gargoyles and other such things over near where they were recalling in and out... that was totally against ToS was luring or some such... but that's how they dealt with script bots in Tram.

 

[Fridgster]

Most effective way to mine high end ore from what I have found is to mine spot by spot. If you find agapite or better mark a rune. If not move to next spot. Fill your runebook with spots then start rotating through your marked spots. I can get about 1200 val ingots per hour this way.

 

[Pawain]

I finally got around to getting some BODs for the first time since the pet revamp.

I got a pie BOD. It really made the ingredients fast. Usually to make 100 dough I go get a drink or do something. Today it made all the things I needed really fast. Like barrel hoops fast.

Did they change speed on crafting multiple items?

Thanks @Cyrah My kitchen works great!

 

[Tyrath]

The only favorable thing I have to say about the randomization is that I now have a slightly better chance at getting valorite and heartwood/bloodwood/frostwood than before the change because the scripters aren't hitting those spots all day long and not letting anyone else have a chance at them. I agree on getting ores from the merchant ships. Really wish the dev team would add frostwood to those too.

The recall scripters were easy to break, just make a wood box and set it where they recalled in. There is a scripter than used to run 23/7 at the brit mine on ATL when I had a house there. I had a crate on all but one of their recall spots so the script got in a loop of recalling to the one spot I didn't block and their house and I replaced crates as needed............ LOL scripter kept bouncing from one mining spot to their house for 12 solid hours. Even paged a GM but none ever showed up that I am aware of.

 

[Tyrath]

Most effective way to mine high end ore from what I have found is to mine spot by spot. If you find agapite or better mark a rune. If not move to next spot. Fill your runebook with spots then start rotating through your marked spots. I can get about 1200 val ingots per hour this way.

I get about 2-4 runs on a spot until it changes to usually copper or bronze.

 

[Fridgster]

I get about 2-4 runs on a spot until it changes to usually copper or bronze.

Thats about what I get. Dont get me wrong its tedious but I've filled quite a few val hammer bods doing it that way. Using gargoyle pick axes for val elementals dramatically increases your ingot count. While expensive the val smelting talisman has its advantages as well.

 

[Petra Fyde]

I guess I must be really, really weird, because the only wood and ingots I've ever bought have been from the travelling gypsies in Ilsh. I do mine in Fel, but I don't keep detailed records of what I get.
I have trained fishing to 120 on two shards and gotten my own scrolls both times. I do, however use EC client - there's a video of my method of crab fishing, it suits me, it won't suit some people.
After many years of getting my own resources I'm happy to say I don't have carpal tunnel.

 

[Shandara]

Most effective way to mine high end ore from what I have found is to mine spot by spot. If you find agapite or better mark a rune. If not move to next spot. Fill your runebook with spots then start rotating through your marked spots. I can get about 1200 val ingots per hour this way.

This may be, but I do so many BODs that I get the Agapite Mining Maps from them. Mostly out of necessity because no one is selling me their Agapite ingots. HINT!

 

[Fridgster]

This may be, but I do so many BODs that I get the Agapite Mining Maps from them. Mostly out of necessity because no one is selling me their Agapite ingots. HINT!

What shard do you play? If i remember correctly i have an abundance of agapite.

 

[BeaIank]

This may be, but I do so many BODs that I get the Agapite Mining Maps from them. Mostly out of necessity because no one is selling me their Agapite ingots. HINT!

I don't remember if the bod rewards include the cauldrons from Vela, but if they do, you will be better off getting one of agapite conversion.
It converts golden ingots to agapite, and golden is really easy to get these days.

 

[Fridgster]

I don't remember if the bod rewards include the cauldrons from Vela, but if they do, you will be better off getting one of agapite conversion.
It converts golden ingots to agapite, and golden is really easy to get these days.

I dont believe they are bod rewards. I think maybe cora?

 

[BeaIank]

I dont believe they are bod rewards. I think maybe cora?

They are void pool rewards and alchemy rewards it seems.
A golden caldron converts 15,000 golden ingots into 5,000 agapite ingots.

 

[Basara]

Also, when you mark those mining spots, keep track of color vs. iron yield and total ore.

Contrary to what the devs 12 years ago thought when they were designing elves, each resource square has its own color chance per swing % (NOT 40% for humans, +20% for elves) and average total ore output (and separate numbers for wood, that work the same way), that stay the same no matter what colored ore is being produced (including spots that are currently iron only, bumped up with PT and/or Garg picks to DC or Shadow). The elven bonuses for ore are more swings, and 1.2x the colored ore chance (so a 60% human chance of colored ore at a spot is 72% for an elf; but alas a human having a 10% chance at a spot only equates to an elf having 12%).

So any high percentage, high ore count, spot should be kept, as it will still stay high output regardless of the specific ore count - and you can always use tools to bump it one or two ore types higher.


And, I second the combo of gold ingots from Blackthorns and the gold-to-agapite cauldrons. Most of my 10k agapite comes from gold ingots. AND, I took a combat miner down there with a couple of the gold smelting talismans, and used up all the charges in both talismans within 3 hours, to help get those ingots.

 

[Pawain]

After many years of getting my own resources I'm happy to say I don't have carpal tunnel.

I remember in '98 I had to stop mining because my wrist hurt so bad from pressing F1 so much. I was younger then and thought I didnt have to use proper positioning. Luckily I have not had any issues with it anymore.

 

[Shandara]

What shard do you play? If i remember correctly i have an abundance of agapite.

Great Lakes is where I fill all my BODs. I have a broker in New Magincia that buys Ingots and Leather too.

 

[Shandara]

I don't remember if the bod rewards include the cauldrons from Vela, but if they do, you will be better off getting one of agapite conversion.
It converts golden ingots to agapite, and golden is really easy to get these days.

I have also obtained the cauldrons from Alchemy BODs. But I use the Gold ingots to fill BODs as well.

 

[BeaIank]

I have also obtained the cauldrons from Alchemy BODs. But I use the Gold ingots to fill BODs as well.

Aye, but you can get 12K+ per hour of them golden ingots down Blackthorn's these days.
Heck, I use golden ingots to fill iron bods because I get them more often than iron ones.