Torin wrote:As it is, you can get resources like ore as an incidental byproduct of hunting, which can be very fun. A repetitive trade system would make you choose between hunting and getting resources. Given that getting resources is going to be boring, you're shifting some portion of player hours from fun stuff to tedious stuff.
I think you romanticize the prospects of getting resources through hunting far too much. I'm not making you "choose between hunting and getting resources," I'm giving people something to do when they might otherwise be bored. Fact is, things like ore hunting aren't done with a group - it's one person going alone for "hours" to the same places in the middle of "nowhere." It's not very fun.
I'm not suggesting we shift people from doing "fun stuff" to "tedious stuff", this is a suggestion so that people can be doing from "no stuff" to "some stuff" (considering this *can* be an activity that can be done solo, as well as in any amount of spare time you have... instead of being so bored you leave to the library).
If I want something like wheat, I can't go out and grow some, nor can I buy it from someone who farms it. I have to get lucky - either finding it myself (not while out hunting, certainly!) or by finding someone who hasn't sold it to the bakery for 10c as soon as they found some.
Things that drop certain resources (like MNW dropping ore) would still happen - see, you can still hunt and get some "bonus" resources if you want. Also, things like gold and tin would only be able to be mined where they're located now... which means you'd still have to have a group to go get you there - chances for interaction with others!
Overall, it wouldn't be taking anything away from the "good" part of resource gathering (not that there's much good at all in the current way resources are gathered), but it would add additional things for people to do (if they want - no one is forcing them, like you seem to think) and add some skill in the process, instead of just random chance.
Helpful GM exclaims, "Mystics can fly and walk through walls. They don't need boats on the water, and they can teleport at will!"
