The only MMORPG I have played is EQ2. I quickly found that I preferred crafting to fighting.The only problem was that it equally as quickly became clear that Sony did not take crafters seriously. I hung on until the expansion and the upgrades, hoping that things would get better, it didn't. If anything it was worse with crafting not really being taken into account bugged beyond belief and just IMO an add on that would be dealt with(maybe) after the REAL stuff i.e fighting was sorted out.

I have left the game in discust and would love to find a fantasy MMORPG that does take crafters seriously. so if anyone is playing a game with a good crafting system, either in beta or on release I would be grateful to hear about it

I' d say you could try one or more of the following:

Saga of Ryzom (14day free trial)
Horizons
SWG (granted, not a fantasy setting)
A Tale in the Desert

All 4 have really in-depth crafting systems.

I would have to say Star Wars Galaxies hands down has the best crafting system I've seen.

yea, SWG probably wins there, but if you MUST have fantasy, Saga of Ryzom has a pretty complex craft/harvest system. Just a suggestion.

I've only played 2 MMORPG's. SWG and EQ2.

IMO, SWG is the best. But it is very time consuming and complex. All of their resources have stats and each proffesions needs different attributes. And the available resource spawns are always changing. You will become a resource hoard in this game.

I suggest you check out the official SWG forums and SWGcraft.com which can give you a better idea of how complex the resources are. The later is maintaned by players who update the current resources aval. for each planet.

i don't know which MMORPG has the best crafting system, but i know one of the worst:

eternal-lands, it's absolute unbalanced (ressources - xp), high failrate and it's very hard to level up there and the best story is:

you can't sell all item's which you craft hard to NPC's and no player will buy them (like low level swords - only solution is to drop elsewhere or donate to the newbies which wont have them sometimes).

sometimes it's absolute annoying..

Another high problem is the unbalanced economy if you ever get the levels to craft something a other player will buy. example: an enriched fire essence which you need to make iron greaves costs 5.500 - 6.000gc, no player on the market channel buy's greaves for more than 8.000gc (good price).

SWG if your trying to make a great, unique item. WoW if you're trying to grind out a bunch of crap to gain XP.

Thanks to all for your suggestions, I am looking at a game that I think should have the kind of crafting that I want, it's Dark and Light. If you haven't heard about it check it out, they have a "prequel" coming out soon which is free to play called Settlers of Gannareth which will be free for 6 months until the actual game comes out, and the crafting system looks interesting......

www.darkandlight.net

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Originally posted by Djin
I would have to say Star Wars Galaxies hands down has the best crafting system I've seen.

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OMG I agree w/Djin

But seriously, if you want to craft SWG is the game for it. If you want to be just a merchant/crafter you don't even have to kill monsters. Allthough, its easier to lay down harvesters and miners when you can clear the area of aggro mobs.

If I've gotten it right. Then I think Wurm (http://www.wurmonline.com) has the best crafting system. And a fun gameplay too.. I havn't played much other games. But between the ones I have, this is the best. Nice "tech-tree" and so. And it's nice that the dev's listen to you :)

FFXI is fun to craft in, but to become a top crafter it will probably take you about a year if not more, unless buying gil, which isn't recommended.

You could also check out Irth at www.irthonline.com , it revolves A LOT around crafting, has many many different crafts, the game doesn't feel like it's quite complete yet though, but worth to look at. Very nice community.

I would of agreed with u 3-24month's ago on the fact that swg was the best crafting game but now it's the worst, stat's no longer have any meaning on your equipment(a level 1 pistol will kill a enemy as fast as a level 88weapon) all dependent on charcter level.

Also no decay on items has totally destroyed the small business sim economy that was swg, but that's soe for you

I would have to say SWG is one of the best and I have played a Master Tailor, Master Armorsmith, Master Doctor, Master Combat Medic. All had a ton of crafting to the professions.

Yet you must take it with a grain of salt. The huge changes with the NGE have put crafters as 3rd or 4th class citizens now. SOE sure handed them their walking papers IMO. Now with no decay of any kind from death or use! Crafters of fixed itemed will have little to no business with in the next month or so. The only profession now that has return business is the chef for food buffs. With loot drops being better than any crafter can make its hard to sell anything that is not the highest end stuff.

Now if you like fantasy & a mix of SicFi look at RF Online its been released outside the US and will be coming to US/UK in Feb closed beta is starting this month. The crafter is called the specialist and they create almost all the player used ammo and get this they are also the rez-er in the game. The get to build turrets that you can place in tunnels to help defend yourselfs. Not to meantion the specialist can get some nice combat skills to helpout in the group. They will be highly sout by teams and guilds.

Pla.

I've found that Everquest 2 and Horizons have had the best crafting of any MMORPG i've played. I'd personally try EQ2 if your looking for crafting or wait until RF Online debuts. Hail to the King, baby.

Even tho I didn't like the game itself (and I like it even less now with the new changes), SWG had good. It was varied enough to make sure you could get diffrent stats with diffrent, and complex enough to feel that you could actully make a good item if you realy wanted.

The crafting system in Saga of Ryzom was also good, but IMHO the skillsystem didn't make it as quite as good as SWGs'.

EVE!!!!

Eve by far has be best crafting system in any game.  Why in fact EVERYTHING is player produced.  The market in Eve is totally player driven...100%.  You want it, all you need is the blue print and mins and the skills, and wallla, its built and yours.  You can mass produce and sell you product to other players and compete with other players for that market. 

THIS GAME ROCCORS!!!

I guess it depends on what you want out of a crafting system. I could go on and on comparing systems in games I've tried, but I think I'll just stick with the best and the worst that I've seen.

SWG was pretty good, and by far one of the most rewarding "harvesting" systems I've seen in any game. I loved maintaining harvester equipment every time I logged on before doing anything else. This IMHO was done better than anything else. You could easily be just a "crafter" and enjoy it. The only problem I found with the system, (unless it was improved since I played it), was the market system. I thought it was simply riddiculous how much travelling people had to do in order to buy stuff off of other players. A more centralized system would have been so much better.

EQ2 blew chunks as far as I am concerned in terms of crafting. To be profitable you had to be among the first or only active crafters that provided items in high demand. Demand for items was pretty low particularly after the interdependancy nerf. Not much unlike DAoC's system, because the progression was so slow, robotic and uninvolved, it encouraged botting, and in the end botters were the only players making any kind of tangible profit. EQ2's market system missed the mark bigtime, even after they included "offline selling". The market was so oversaturated with botted goods that profitability was pretty close to not worth it.

WoW was probably the most "balanced" crafting system I've seen in a game yet. It was a simple, rapid type of system that any player type could enjoy and find rewarding at any tier of the game. For example, if you wanted to make your own armour as you levelled, you could do this easily as you raised your level, while you were in the field. You couldn't progress your trade unless you also levelled your character, which helped ensure that "Level 1 Bot" crafting was impossible. Harvested and crafted items of any tier retain value quite well, and the auction-type market system has to be the best I've seen in any game yet.

Ultimately, I believe (from my own experience) that any successful crafting system has to be rapid (to deter botting/unfair advantages), rewarding (to encourage participation) and the goods produced should always have value/demand at any tier in a game (to establish need for engaging in the activity). Very few games have achieved this.

At moment only best crafting games are a tale in the desert and wurm online and also haven and hearth, but if you can wait a month there is a new one coming out called xsyon.

Fallen Earth anyone?

SWG and nothing else comes close

I've always liked Vanguard's crafting system myself

Originally posted by Choma

I've always liked Vanguard's crafting system myself

i add to that and also lord of the rings online. good ones.

I think you should try Istaria.. ( ie... Horizons). It's an older game. BUT...you can download it and play the human race for free, for as long as you want with only a few restrtictions such as being unable to buy a plot. There are dozens of crafting schools and you can switch between all of them at will...examples

the usual blacksmith, armor smith, tailor,.spell crafting..blah blah

plus plot building...carpenter, mason, enchater...and some others

PLUS...you have dragon players. If you sub up there is a whole world for dragon crafting, scales, and lairs.