Board Thread:Fun and Games/@comment-33185350-20180315151029/@comment-26149161-20180407163252

LOTRMod wrote: You can't balance the mithril PVP situation by making it rarer. Making a problematic resource rarer doesn't fix the problems - it only narrows the pool of players who are able to obtain it, and exacerbates the stratfication between hardcore and casual players. Significantly rarer mithril would only serve to elevate the hardcore players even further while driving away newer players. We would be much more open to considering a strong decrease to the utility of mithril (e.g. lowering the armour to only iron tier, but giving it natural protection against polearms) than any significant rarity increase. The armour modifiers have indeed achieved something in this direction.

Also, for the record, this book item is not supposed to imply a distinction between "Mithril" and "True-silver"; it is supposed to represent the techniques that would be required by a skilled craftsdwarf to forge a coat of mithril armour, as opposed to any old blacksmith going into Moria looking for mithril and attempting to make armour from it. We would be open to considering an alternative name. I agree--if mithril exists in the lore-friendly, powerful form, it will continue to create the dichotomy between haves and have-nots. Therefore, I'd like to propose a radical (and therefore configurable) solution: put a moratorium on mithril. Mithril takes away from the gameplay, as others have explained, through how OP it is, how people hoard it, and how everyone rushes the Misties for it. Just like any singularly powerful item in any game, it is a constant chase to get it so you can reach the top tier of players. That same chase is what made Meneltarma's mithril cause such problems. Though the modifiers have helped in many ways, they don't fully solve the issue, and perhaps making mithril uncraftable would.

There is lore backing for this solution as well--though I should mention that I came up with the lore solution after the problem, and I'm not using the issue to push a lore agenda. We know only dwarves knew how to make mithril, and we knew how little of it there was, so it both solves the problem and is supported by the lore to have no mithril gear.

However, many players still want to play with mithril, and we need to account for that. So, I propose that the craftability of mithril be made configurable--perhaps with a somewhat more challenging crafting method a la multiple Dwarvish blueprints--and furthermore have the armor and weapons still availible in Creative mode. That way, servers and players can choose whether they want craftable mithril, and even on no-crafting servers the admins can give out mithril to special players or for RP purposes.

That's just my two cents, but I look forward to the mod team's decisions on the issue.

Ithilion, Discussions Moderator (Auta i lómë)