I posted this concept as a comment in a thread on a different section of the forum, but thought I should put it here too, since it's really a suggestion for the devs. I'm new to the Taleworlds forum, so I hope that's okay.
As many have noted in other places, and I've seen that changes from TW devs are currently in the works in regards to making crafting certain weapons more likely to teach you related parts, which I think is great, so I think we can all agree that the current system for learning patterns is in dire need of improvement. The main issue is that between the randomness of unlocks, and especially with how many different parts there are across so many item types, it adds a massive time sink that doesn't feel good in any way as a player when you want to get into smithing, especially if you're doing it to craft specific item types for your own use. It's rather punishing, frankly.
While I think the changes in the works sound helpful, as an additional elegant solution to add alongside that, I would propose to have in each part of the world, or maybe at blacksmith shops specifically, add an NPC master-blacksmith that could teach you smithing patterns/parts for local/culture-specific weapons at a cost of money and time. I think it would be reasonable to have to travel to different parts of the world to learn how to make the various local/culture-focused weapons, and in this way, the time the player invests in doing this would now be to gain the knowledge/access to parts, which you would actually seek in an active, intentional manner, instead of purely random, frustrating chance. One could even get the woodcarving shops in on this for teaching you how to make various handles/shafts.
This concept could later even be extended out further by allowing the player to pay these smiths to improve the quality of existing weapons, (such as upgrading a normal weapon to Fine, Masterwork, etc) or commissioning weapons that you can't yet craft yourself, as I believe was an option in Viking Conquest with the "special" weapon and armorer smiths, essentially allowing the player to place a build order for the NPC smiths.
I can't help but feel like these would be pretty easy to implement to the vanilla game, and it could even be done incrementally. Please please please feel free to use this idea, and thank you so much for making such awesome games over the years and continually improving them. Please feel free to ask if any questions or elaborations are necessary, and players, please feel free to add onto this idea or provide critiques/opinions.
As many have noted in other places, and I've seen that changes from TW devs are currently in the works in regards to making crafting certain weapons more likely to teach you related parts, which I think is great, so I think we can all agree that the current system for learning patterns is in dire need of improvement. The main issue is that between the randomness of unlocks, and especially with how many different parts there are across so many item types, it adds a massive time sink that doesn't feel good in any way as a player when you want to get into smithing, especially if you're doing it to craft specific item types for your own use. It's rather punishing, frankly.
While I think the changes in the works sound helpful, as an additional elegant solution to add alongside that, I would propose to have in each part of the world, or maybe at blacksmith shops specifically, add an NPC master-blacksmith that could teach you smithing patterns/parts for local/culture-specific weapons at a cost of money and time. I think it would be reasonable to have to travel to different parts of the world to learn how to make the various local/culture-focused weapons, and in this way, the time the player invests in doing this would now be to gain the knowledge/access to parts, which you would actually seek in an active, intentional manner, instead of purely random, frustrating chance. One could even get the woodcarving shops in on this for teaching you how to make various handles/shafts.
This concept could later even be extended out further by allowing the player to pay these smiths to improve the quality of existing weapons, (such as upgrading a normal weapon to Fine, Masterwork, etc) or commissioning weapons that you can't yet craft yourself, as I believe was an option in Viking Conquest with the "special" weapon and armorer smiths, essentially allowing the player to place a build order for the NPC smiths.
I can't help but feel like these would be pretty easy to implement to the vanilla game, and it could even be done incrementally. Please please please feel free to use this idea, and thank you so much for making such awesome games over the years and continually improving them. Please feel free to ask if any questions or elaborations are necessary, and players, please feel free to add onto this idea or provide critiques/opinions.
