Accepted "Skillbooks" as viable Credit Sinks

[Conundrum]

Skillbooks A Workforce Skill Enhancement Initiative​

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Proposal: Introduce a skill level increasing Book ("Skillbooks") as a consumable item for all existing skills.

Availability: All non-combat skillbooks should be made exclusively available through the "Permit System" and require a substantial cost (Over 250 credits) to acquire. Meanwhile smugglers should have access only to combat skillbooks, as per their illicit nature.

Item description: "This captivating book is tailored to hobbyists, encompassing a diverse range of fascinating topics catered to the reader's interests. Within its pages, one can delve into meticulously crafted guides and insightful footnotes that accompany each subject, with many of them having relevance to existing work opportunities."

How it works: You browse the "Skillbook" area of the bartering skill and there's just a single item there for each skill. Every consumption of that item offers an amount of XP based around your current level, or automatically levels your skill up by one level. There could be a potential cooldown to prevent over-use, although given the expenses involved I am uncertain if that is necessary.

Reason for Suggestion: As it stands the skill grind isn't particularly engaging and mostly involves buying ingredients to break them down to get a little bit of XP at a time. From what I hear it seems most give up after a certain sufficient point, level 30 or so. I believe by offering more alternatives to leveling up skills, especially through a more convenient format, we can encourage players to put themselves at a bit more risk without the hightened fear of losing so many excessive hours grinding behind the crafting benches. This would also enable the Combine economy to have greater relevance, as these books would not be made available through chip sellers. This, combined with a more liberal economic policy that forbids rampant examinations of transaction logs, should contribute to a more easily extorted economy overall by both sides.

These skillbooks would act as an always relevant credit sink to help combat possible inflation as well, should it ever become an area of concern as it has with the Chip Economy.

 

[Inspector Orlok]

Not a terrible idea but I think instead of it just flat out giving XP. I think it would be better to give a multiplier to the skill.

So for example if you use the "skillbook" you get 2x XP for the duration of one hour.

If you flat out give levels or XP from the "skillbook" it could lead to a situation where people have 45 levels in medicine when they really haven't even crafted anything medical wise. Same goes for cooking, crafting and even smuggling.

 

[Kamilisha Haijulikani]

Not a terrible idea but I think instead of it just flat out giving XP. I think it would be better to give a multiplier to the skill.

So for example if you use the "skillbook" you get 2x XP for the duration of one hour.

If you flat out give levels or XP from the "skillbook" it could lead to a situation where people have 45 levels in medicine when they really haven't even crafted anything medical wise. Same goes for cooking, crafting and even smuggling.

Whichever is the path of least resistance for developers. I'd rather see one perspective of this proposal implemented than none.

 

[gb_]

I have done this in Ordem (another Willard branch). It was a fairly simple item that increased your skill instantaneously, but you could only use it to a certain degree. After you reached X levels, you wouldn't gain anything from it. I don't know how the current grind/balance is right now, though. It does seem a bit easy to just be able to buy it from bartering... but I need to admit that the writing license doesn't seem that appealing (at least on my branch's server). Maybe that would incentivize people to acquire it? (I have no clue how many people have it now.) But still, it's a really delicate situation that needs a lot of thought to be put into.

 

[Marfarious]

I HAVE BEEN SAYING THIS SHIT, I said "add cookbooks and crafting recipes, you can buy the book/recipe, find it, or learn it from another player." i hate all of you

 

[toby]

I HAVE BEEN SAYING THIS SHIT, I said "add cookbooks and crafting recipes, you can buy the book/recipe, find it, or learn it from another player." i hate all of you

what

 

[rey.jazzy]

+support

would b rlly helpful to ease the grind that players have to undergo. i'd imagine it could b something like audiobooks, only a skillbook has multiple uses until ur char has read the whole thing. each use incurs a cooldown like audiobooks, and when u have read it say 4/4 times the respective skill goes up a few levels. at which point u can't use another skillbook for the same skill because u would've already learned everything u COULD learn from a specific skillbook.

if a skillbook costs too much or u can't risk exposing urself aboveground as a rebel, u can buy one from other players. a GM could look at the skill level of a given player, they'll /me writing a skillbook from scratch if their skill is high enough, the GM could spawn them one at which point the player can sell it for chips or something

 

[Robert]

Skillbooks and how to get them is in progress. For those who don't know, skillbooks do exist, just not obtainable atm.