What’s a sandbox MMORPG without its gathering and crafting gameplay loops? Fans of Pantheon: Rise of the Fallen have gotten their first taste of these essential gameplay elements in a recent developer stream, which took a pretty close look at the MMORPG’s base crafting and gathering systems.
The stream goes out of its way to point out that the system is currently operating at a fundamental level as the devs continue working on the underlying engine that creates items and rules that govern harvested items. That said, the devs also don’t want crafting to merely be about selling things to other players; they want it to be about making players feel as if they’re becoming a tradesperson.
As for the actual gameplay itself, the stream went on to showcase a character cooking items with the devs pointing out that individual ingredients will have their own stats that change the food items being made, while a look at mining noted that gameplay for gathering is very simple right now but the items gathered will need to be refined and smelted into usable materials. The stream also confirmed that materials from gathering nodes can produce better quality ores out of sheer luck or when in a dangerous area, talked up a rare material that can come from gathering known as Celestium Dust that can apply stats to raw materials, and also noted that players will get to customize their crafted equipment based on the ingredients put into it.
The stream then took a look at weapons crafting, which starts with players taking base schematics for pieces like sword blades and hilts, crafting those items, and putting them together. The schematic system is noteworthy here because there are rare versions of these schematics that allow players to create different styles of weapons. All of the pieces lock together to create customized and more powerful weapons overall.
In other Pantheon news, there was a roundtable discussion with Visionary Realms’ CEO Chris Rowan who, among other things, talked about the formation of the studio, the assurance that the game’s beta was going to be for testing and not for marketing, and the passing of Brad McQuaid and tech lead Kurt Habetler among other things. Both videos are embedded below.
