Stacking amounts – revisited

[Dessellion4]

<p>Although there have been several changes made to stack sizes in EQ2 since launch I think it's time to have another look to see whether any further improvements to benefit game play could be made.  As it stands at present the game allows various stack sizes depending on the item being stored.  Stack sizes are the same regardless of the container i.e. bags, boxes, room slots, bank slots or guild slots. These, as far as I can discern without research (and I'd be grateful for any corrections), are how things "stack" at present:</p><p>                                                         Stack size            </p><p>Collectibles                                         20?                     Easy to split stack to pass on</p><p>L&L items                                         20?                     Easy to split stack to pass on</p><p>Raws                                                  50                       Easy to split stack to pass on</p><p>Rares                                                 50                       Easy to split stack to pass on</p><p>Potions/Poisons                                 20 charges           Easy to split stack to pass on</p><p>Food/drink                                        20?                     Easy to split stack to pass on</p><p>Ammunition                                       100                     Easy to split stack to pass on</p><p>Fuels                                                   100                    Easy to split stack</p><p>Totems                                               1 (5 charges)       Can't split by charge</p><p>Other items e.g. armour, furniture spells etc                                           1                         Can't stack even if identical</p><p>From this it's easy to spot two things, firstly that stack sizes still vary considerably, and secondly that, leaving aside furniture etc for the moment, totems cause the biggest problems when it comes to use and storage.</p><p>Taking the second point first, why are totems singled out for such treatment?  Taking a recipe to pristine creates 3 totems which take up 3 slots in your bags, 3 slots in the bank and 3 slots in the guild bank.  Creating food or drink to pristine makes 2 items but these stack up to 20?  When you want to split a stack of food you just drag some out of the stack.  When you want to give a charge from a totem you have to pass the totem to the other person, they use a charge and then pass it back.  This is also the case with individual charges of potions etc, the difference being that in your bags it's possible to stack the same type of potion.  In my view a much better arrangement for all items carrying charges would be to allow stacks to combine charges in your bags up to a certain amount.  It would then be possible to remove up to a maximum number of charges at one time to pass around.  For example you might have 35 charges of SOW totems in one slot in your bag but could drag out say 10 charges at a time.</p><p>On stack sizes generally I can see the case for fairly small stacks in bags you carry on your person, if only from a realism point of view.  Bank slots, however, and particularly guild bank slots deserve a different treatment.</p><p>How many guilds actually use their guild banks for everyday run of the mill items like raws, potions, food etc.  Once the guild gets to a certain size the answer is probably - none.  Guild banks are not infinite in size and there are many valuable items, such as spells and rares, that take up the slots leaving no room for the lesser stuff.  Yet the lesser stuff is also needed.  Taking a recent raid as an example, we needed Master's trauma remedies for FTH.  This resulted in a call to go and buy them from the broker.  This from a guild boasting at least half a dozen Alchemists capable of crafting said potions.  How much more convenient it would have been had a stack been available in the guild bank.  But with a maximum stack of 20(?) my guess is that this would rarely happen.  If, however, the stack size was set to say 1000 charges how many guilds would choose to use one slot for such an item, probably quite a few.  Taking this a step further how many guilds would find it useful for their tradeskillers to have stocks of raws readily available.  In this case a maximum stack of say 10,000 or even 100,000 raws such as rosewood or iron clusters would benefit everybody.  Adventurers would readily do some extra harvesting to stock the guild bank, and tradeskillers wouldn't have to rush to the broker to fill that rush order.</p><p>I said above that there are other items difficult to stack and I finish with these.  As an example, how many carpenters keep stocks of furniture lying around for the casual shopper.  How convenient if identical items could be stacked, 30 elm chairs or 20 iron sconces.  This is readily extendable to most tradeskills.  I agree with the retention of small stack sizes when on your person, but call for some thought to be given to banks, and particularly guild banks, to get some more loving.</p><p>Grateful for any views people might have on these proposals. </p>

[Crinaeae]

   I agree heartly with increasing the stack size for guild banks.  Our guild is small, yet still, we have to work to keep any space in our guild bank.  And to be able to stack rares in such nice numbers would greatly help our crafter not have to keep running back out to harvest, when those who do not can actually stack them in the guild bank.  Here's a question though.  We can put boxes and bags in our personal banks and fill them with things, why then can we not do the same with guild banks?

[Ebjelen]

<p>You forgot fuels, stacks of 100.</p><p>You also missed the most valid point for the devs: Fewer, larger stacks means a lot less DB space. Maybe not so much space for one bank account, but across thousands of people it's a lot. I wonder if anyone has done the math on that?</p>

[Rijacki]

Totems are a hold out on the old system where potions and poisons were also multi-charge "baubles".  Why totems weren't changed with LU#24 when the rest were, I will never know. Potions and poisons make up to 10 doses per combine.  Totems make up to 15 doses per combine (which would make them awkward to change into stacking doses, 3/4 of a stack per combine with 2 combines for 3 stacks).  Potions and poisons require the same amount of fuel no matter what level the recipe is (5 for common and 4 for rare, another annoying and odd inconsistancy).  Totems vary, like all other tradeskill recipes, in their number of fuel per combine based on the level of the recipe.

[Dessellion4]

<p>Good point about fuel stacks being 100.  I hadn't put that in because usually I only usually carry fuel when in the tradeskill instance, but of course with recent encouragement to get out and about when tsing there is the potential to need stocks of fuel just about anywhere in Norrath.  Not much use being able to use the forge in Kelethin when the merchant won't sell my Arasai fuel.</p><p>On the point about boxes within banks, I toyed with putting that in but thought it asking for just too much.  It does make sense to me, however, to have the same ability to place and use storage boxes in guild banks in the same way you can in personal banks and room slots.  It would make it a bit harder to find things but then it's very easy to re-name boxes as e.g. Tier1 Mage Spells.</p>

[Deson]

<cite>Rijacki wrote:</cite><blockquote>Totems are a hold out on the old system where potions and poisons were also multi-charge "baubles".  Why totems weren't changed with LU#24 when the rest were, I will never know. Potions and poisons make up to 10 doses per combine.  Totems make up to 15 doses per combine (which would make them awkward to change into stacking doses, 3/4 of a stack per combine with 2 combines for 3 stacks).  Potions and poisons require the same amount of fuel no matter what level the recipe is (5 for common and 4 for rare, another annoying and odd inconsistancy).  Totems vary, like all other tradeskill recipes, in their number of fuel per combine based on the level of the recipe. </blockquote>I'm looking right now. Totems are the same fuel across all tiers like poisons-4.  Totems not stacking annoys me greatly. It was one of my first feedbacks and a few woodworkers posted about it before they ever said a word about changing poisons.While I agree by and large with the OP, if all they did was change totems I'd be significantly happier.

[Noaani]

<cite>Deson wrote:</cite><blockquote>if all they did was change totems I'd be significantly happier. </blockquote><p>If they changed this, I would be much more inclined to use more totems than I do at present.</p><p>The way they stack (or, as it happens, do not stack) annoys me so much I just go without for the most part. </p>

[Rijacki]

<cite>Deson wrote:</cite><blockquote><cite>Rijacki wrote:</cite><blockquote>Totems are a hold out on the old system where potions and poisons were also multi-charge "baubles".  Why totems weren't changed with LU#24 when the rest were, I will never know. Potions and poisons make up to 10 doses per combine.  Totems make up to 15 doses per combine (which would make them awkward to change into stacking doses, 3/4 of a stack per combine with 2 combines for 3 stacks).  Potions and poisons require the same amount of fuel no matter what level the recipe is (5 for common and 4 for rare, another annoying and odd inconsistancy).  Totems vary, like all other tradeskill recipes, in their number of fuel per combine based on the level of the recipe. </blockquote>I'm looking right now. Totems are the same fuel across all tiers like poisons-4.  Totems not stacking annoys me greatly. It was one of my first feedbacks and a few woodworkers posted about it before they ever said a word about changing poisons.While I agree by and large with the OP, if all they did was change totems I'd be significantly happier. </blockquote> Last time I made some at varying levels might have been before potions were changed to a static amount of fuel.. after LU#24.  4 fuels is the same as RARE potions and poisons, the commons are 5 fuel (with another of the incredibly annoying inconsistancies of tradeskilling). But.. would woodworkers want a reduction in the number of doses per combine (like Alchemists got a reduction per "dust", though it was "loam" before) just to have them single dose stacking?  Woodworkers make, as I said, up to 15 doses per combine vs 10 of potions/poisons.