Black Desert Online – Crafting

Black Desert Online is still pretty fun now that I’m into my 3rd week.  Seems like a learn something new in the game every day.   Mainly what I’m learning is that it seems like one big crafting game.  Sure there’s combat and the world is really well drawn, I was impressed just yesterday when I was climbing over a rock and noticed the details of lichen moss growing on the rock.   The graphics in this game are certainly a far cry from the early days in gaming.

 

Crafting –

In Black Desert Online there is so much of it that one could easily forget that combat exists other than to complete quests that allow you to get more storage space for more crafting materials.    All of the professions are available to you at the beginning of the game and through standard questing the game introduces each in turn.   Cooking & Alchemy, Fishing, Blacksmithing, Farming, Gathering, Mining, and I’m sure I’m forgetting something here.    The Temptation is to just go buy  1000 of some material and just level up a skill all at once, but that would be impossible, you would never have the energy for it.

 

Energy –

Almost everything you *do* in Black Desert Online takes energy, kind of like in Life.   Gather from a bush, swing your pick at a mining node, cook 1 meal, chop at a tree, skin a wolf the list goes on and on.   The makers of BDO limit you by only starting you off with a small pool of energy – 10 points.   This energy refreshes at a fixed rate, so even if you decide to spend a day trying to gather as much wood or ore as possible, you’re bound to hit a wall where you cannot do anything for a bit of real time.   The refresh rate is approximately 1 energy every 3 minutes.  As you level up, your pool of Energy increases.  Also helps to talk to NPC’s around the world because as your character “learns” about the people around them, they get more energy points.

ALTernative Energy Sources –

Yes that’s a Really Bad Pun! I know.    So what if you need to craft 15 beers but only have 8 energy left after mashing up potatoes to make flour?   Here come the ALTS!  Make an alternate character, level them up to 10 or so, get them to your home base town.  Then when you have some task to do that requires a bunch of energy, just hop on one of them and craft away!   Yes, you will need these beers for your workers.

Workers –

In Black Desert Online you can’t possibly gather all of the materials you need for everything and craft it all yourself.  Even with ALTernative Energy you’d never be able to finish crafting everything.  So BDO lets you hire Workers.   To have a worker you must have put enough contribution points into a town to have purchased a Lodging.  Then used more contribution points to connect to a collection node outside of town.  Then you can send your worker out to gather whatever that node provides.  Start with Potatoes!  Lots of them!  If you’re just starting out potatoes should be your primary focus.   Workers when you hire them start off with a certain amount of Energy points.  The workers then use 1 Energy for every trip to/from the gathering point.  When you send them on a collection run, you’ll see that each trip to gather materials will take a certain amount of time.  There is the option to adjust how many times they repeat that task.   The main thing to watch is that if they have a max of 15 Energy then you wouldn’t want them to repeat more than 14 times.  Then they are tired and need to go rest in the lodging you have for them.   Aww poor worker!  Not sure how fast they can recover their energy if you just leave them resting in the lodging.  But if you feed them Beer that you made with crafting, they can recover their energy instantly.  To cook beer you need 5x potatoes and some items you can buy at the vendor (water, leavening agent, sugar) and this is why potatoes are so important.   Yes you could use other grains like Wheat, Barley or Corn, but Potatoes are abundant near the town where you get your first worker.

Fishing –

This has been my best money maker in Black Desert Online.  Once you get to Velia and have the option to buy a fishing pole, do it.   Importantly Fishing does not use up your Energy reserves.   So if you need to kill time between gathering runs, fishing is the way to go.   Fishing was the first “mini-game” I noticed in BDO.  If you want to do it actively you just get a pole and go to the water’s edge, equip the fishing pole then hit <Spacebar> and wait.  Eventually you’ll hook something and a Mini-Game starts.  This is where you have a Choice.
Play the minigame -or- Do Nothing.
If you do nothing it will consider you “afk fishing” and after about 3 minutes it auto catches the fish or thing on your line.  (there is an option to not loot anything of crap value) Then it automatically starts fishing again as if you had hit the <Spacebar>  again.
If you do the fishing minigame it’s a lot faster to continue on.  You hit <spacebar> again to show that you’re active, then a slider bar comes up with an icon moving back and forth.   Hit <spacebar> while it’s in the good area, then it will give you a sequence of WASD keys and what order to press them in.   Actually that’s pretty clever way to make sure that people can’t bot the process.  Only thing to note here is that in both modes (afk vs active) every time you cast your line the fishing pole loses 1 durability.  So while afk Fishing your character stops fishing either when your bags get full or the pole “breaks”.   There is no repairing the fishing pole, just sell it back to the vendor and buy another.  This durability is a thing for all of the gathering tools as well.  Mining picks, butcher knives and everything else loses 1 durability for every time you use them.  No repair available, just get a new one.  No buying one thing that lasts from L1 to L60.  Even some of the furniture that you have in your home takes durability loss.

Enough for now, as I learn more I’ll post more.