The Future: What comes after Artifact Equipment?

supermrblob · January 2015

I was thinking about this recently and wanted to bring this up on the forums.

Currently artifact gear is BiS. But Cryptic has to announce new gear someday - the players need something to grind for and to advance their character - it's not an MMO otherwise. Right now, I can see 4 possible scenarios:

New gear introduced is:...

Artifact Gear that is new BiS - Everyone who already invested in current gear gets screwed. If you want new BiS, you need to refine everything again... with no unbound RP! This is potentially the worst scenario. It could cause people to stay on their current BiS gear instead of refining new gear to make it BiS, since a green/blue/purple Mod 6+ Artifact Piece will probably still be subpar to current legendary gear. Thus for most current BiS toons the new gear (and by extension the whole Module) could potentially be pointless.
Artifact Gear that is worse than current - This seems silly, no-one would want it. This scenario is out of the question.
Normal Gear that is new BiS - This could happen, but it means we all wasted our RP on now obsolete gear. You will see lots of pissed off players. Furthermore, it also means that current artifact gear becomes completely and utterly obsolete - although it could be more difficult to get the new gear, the new gear would still be so much stronger than current gear at green (since by definition is has to be better than current gear at legendary), while also requiring no refining! The biggest problem is potentially the outrage that we had to waste so much RP ($ or time or both) when right around the corner new gear comes out that is better and free.
Normal Gear that is worse than current - This could happen too, but it means that there is no more progression for current BiS players. This does not make anyone happy, including Cryptic.

To summarise:

Option 1 results in most BiS players not grinding for new gear, and those who do need to re-refine with no unbound RP.
Options 2 and 4 result in all BiS players not grinding for new gear.
Option 3 results in a lot of people angry while rendering current gear completely and utter obsolete.

Am I missing something? It seems all potential options have issues. Is there a solution?

piejal · January 2015

There is still shirt, pants, and ring
After that i hope dev not gonna lauch new artifact equip type that we already refine
if they do that i believe more than 70% player not gonna change and spend money to refine new artifact
I understand that company need some update that can give income from zen purchase
there are many option like make rank 11 enchanment or make legendary artifact equip become requairement to craft new bis equipment
they can even make upgrade to rank 11 need component that only can get from zen storeor craft component that must buy with zen with legendary artifact to craft new bis equip
or maybe lauch new item kit that can add + slot enchamnent that can only get from zen
or create 1 more slot equip artifact or slot for earring, sunglasses, sock, tatto equip
i don't care how, just don't make our effort and money become useless and don't mess with pvp balance

thestaggy · January 2015

The obvious next step is artifact gear and rings. Precedent has been set. By the end of the year high end toons will probably have 30k GS and everything will be orange.

healary · January 2015

There can be more artifacts than just shirts, pants and rings.

Artifact armor set are always a possibility. Then come artifact companions and mounts... and let's not forget artifact artifacts.

But, what I think is a totally new system that will wipe everything out. The question is whether it will come with a level cap raise.

frishter · January 2015

They've not done artifact rings yet and there's also better armour sets that could come out. They could also come out with new special enchantments or a new type of item or system like artifacts brought in the first place.

I suppose they could also have refineable skills and feats or the ability to make new enchantment slots in existing gear. They have released new artifact belts in mod 5 so there is always the option of other choices. Though the difference between choices of regular artifacts and equipment is that artifacts actually give back more or a better return rate than the abysmal equipment does. Fix that and people may be less ####ed off at having to upgrade.

rashylewizz · January 2015

I'm guessing artifact rings, artifact shirts and pants and artifact mounts

chaelk · January 2015

welcome to MMO101- end game gear grind , where what you have, is never going to stay the best.

rashylewizz · January 2015

chaelk wrote: »

welcome to MMO101- end game gear grind , where what you have, is never going to stay the best.

This isn't MMO101, this is Refinement Simulator 2015

sangrine · January 2015

Not long ago, star trek online adopted a new equipment/gear upgrade system.
The big difference between STO and NW is that, in STO, you can upgrade all your old gear instead of replacing it.
Sadly, neverwinter upgrade system requires you to replace your equipment/gear which is very disappointing.
STO's upgrade system, can be costly, but it's light years ahead of NW since you can continue using all your favorite gear. Absolutely no need to throw out anything.

I put a lot of time/effort into getting my Fomorian/Fallen Dragon weapons. And now those weapons are simply pieces of salvage.
Makes me sad. Neverwinter dev's are backing themselves into a corner.

koalazebra1 · January 2015

artifact race soon, metallic dragonborn is just the appetizer

cxyen · January 2015

koalazebra1 wrote: »

artifact race soon, metallic dragonborn is just the appetizer

this made my day lol.

loboguild · January 2015

My money is on some sort of enchantment that can be empowered or whatever. Wouldn't be surprised to see Black Ice gear resurface again as well.

katbozejziemi · January 2015

Level cap increase making all your gear obsolete so you can grind from scratch.

Welcome to MMOs.

untamedengineer · January 2015

There are also other options:
Artifact armor augments (i.e. sockets/glyphs) that can be added to current armor.
Additional equipment slots opened up through augmentation on the characters

burkaanc · January 2015

hopefully they increase max level and scrap the artifacts(legendary artifacts a bit below BiS epics for new lvl cap)

from gear i think only weapon should be artifact, upgrading 1 artifact equipment is fine, maybe 2(weapon + offhand), leveling too many items is a pain in the <font color="orange">HAMSTER</font> and WILL kill the game, seen similar failures before

hopefully after increasing level cap theyll return to smth like pre-mod1. hard dungeons that drop the good stuff(as hard or harder than old t2 mod0, depending on dungeon) then some easier content(about as difficult as running t2 in mod2), and a real challenge like CN in mod0 dropping the artifact weapons

and then some skirmishes for the "casuals"

henry404 · January 2015

I can't help but wonder about those new Augmentation Cubes. Those could be applied to all sorts of stuff...

kattefjaes · January 2015

burkaanc wrote: »

hopefully they increase max level and scrap the artifacts(legendary artifacts a bit below BiS epics for new lvl cap)

Yeah right. I am not sure that even PWE are stupid enough to do that. People will just go elsewhere if they've half-killed themselves to get a bunch of orange artifact equipment, just to have it obseleted at a stroke. Right now, the sunk cost fallacy is what is keeping many people (me included) playing Neverwinter. Render it useless and there's little or no point to stick with it.

Yes, I know that f2p games prefer churny, bewildered new players who buy random <font color="orange">HAMSTER</font> that they don't understand, who then leave shortly after. However, an exodus of that sort is still to be avoided. Players are content, and the experienced players that run guilds, help people gear up and generally look after their interests are content too. Playing only with the fellow bewildered will impoverish the experience, and potentially chase the new players away too.

hustin1 · January 2015

Artifact augments that go into a special augment slot -- let you use an augment and a summoned companion (but not a second augment) at the same time.

oclos · January 2015

IMO, new level cap eventually and a new level of gear rather(e.g. divine, or divine grace or smthg), than gear that makes obsolete the current or future gear. Everyone stays happy this way(people still have to grind more, but at least they don't have to start all over again and probably less grining for new players to reach legendary so they can have a shot as well) and they've done it before in other games. That doesn't exclude artifact gear for gear types that aren't yet released ofcourse.

reiwulf · January 2015

Artifact mounts, artifact companions, artifact characters, artifact zones, artifact modules, artifact artifacts.
Still lots of new options

daggon87 · January 2015

I see other artifact gear (ring sets first) and another level of refining state over legendary, attainable through a quest, a craft, a campaign objective or whatever.

thyralion · January 2015

We didn´t have artifacts before mod whatever it was, they just added three new slots for "gear" out of the blue.
So we could have artifact glasses, artifact shoelaces, an artifact bycicle. Our names are all the same colour btw, how about an upgradeable nametag to show off how legendary you are?

or maybe they come up with something you can enjoy rather than buy... lol, nvm.

moljinir · January 2015

Before they add more Artifact gear, they will have to introduce content to support players with 30k+ GS. I think they will shift their focus from new Gear to new (hopefully more challenging) content. As the game stands now many players are far over-powered compared to the content.

katbozejziemi · January 2015

kattefjaes wrote: »

Yeah right. I am not sure that even PWE are stupid enough to do that.

PWE has nothing to do with the game's design.

People will just go elsewhere if they've half-killed themselves to get a bunch of orange artifact equipment, just to have it obseleted at a stroke.

Just like people leave every other MMO when new gear comes out that is better than their current one, right.
Also, people who have all orange artifact equipment right now definitely did not "half-kill" themselves to get it.

matthiasthehun76 · January 2015

Every part of the body and on companions will be artifatc equipment and hurra we will have a bigger gap and more tensions between normal, casual, legit players and wallet warriors, exploiters, bot players.

I don't even dare to think, where it all will lead, the game is on a brink now on the PC and only a good and totally revised economy could turn it back to old glory.

gphxgphx · January 2015

All I know is with the current artifact system it seems sometimes that I spend more time dragging refinements from tiny window to tiny window than I do playing. It's a lot of work. For MMOs to be work is fine as long as it's in the wide world. Work in tiny windows is drudgery of the sort one should be paid to do. I love just about everything about the game but if it turns out I'm expected to drag a million RP into each and every inventory slot I'm outta here.

Unknown · January 2015

This content has been removed.

henry404 · January 2015

An artifact bicycle. Love it.
Let's see them work that one into the world Lore....

katbozejziemi · January 2015

reiwulf wrote: »

Artifact mounts, artifact companions, artifact characters, artifact zones, artifact modules, artifact artifacts.
Still lots of new options

Artifact enchantments

YO DAWG WE HEARD YOU LIKE REFINING

djarkaan · January 2015

Legendary dyes color (chromatic Rainbow)
Legendary Potions or health stones(Heals the whole party to 100% hp with 100% temp hp)
Legendary ID Scrolls (ID all in inv with one scroll)
Legendary inv bags (60 slots/)
Legendary Profession Assets (equip one gives 100% chance of rank 3)

lirithiel · January 2015

Somehow Cryptic think that adding all this artifact equipment is a sure-fire way to keep the playerbase happy because hey, it gives them something to do in the absence of any meaningful content. I cannot see myself continuing on this road if artifact rings or artifact armor sets come out in Mod 6. I mean they just brought out new rings in Mod 5 FFS...

The Future: What comes after Artifact Equipment?

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