Crafting in Runes of Magic

I'll admit it: I like crafting in MMOs. There needs to be a point, but for reasons beyond my understanding, I enjoy the process of performing simple tasks repetitively to make something I can use. I've maxed out two professions on two characters in WoW, have a third working its way through leatherworking and recently I've tapped into Runes of Magic's system.

RoM is a little different to normal MMOs in that you don't have to limit yourself to specialising in one or two professions – the whole gamut of repetitive clicking is open to you. It's actually a fairly clever system, because it means you can spend time on the professions that matter to you, without forcing you down paths that may not right for the pair of classes you end up playing. The dual-class system in RoM encourages sticking pokers in several fires, as it were.

Recently there's been a complete overhaul of the RoM crafting system too, which means that you can learn recipes of any level whenever you want, you just can't craft those items until you reach the requisite level. If nothing else this has emptied half the slots in my bank for more important items – such as the materials needed for actual crafting: and you'll need a lot of some material for RoM, Mountain Demon Grass for instance... an outrageous amount.

There needs to be a reason for this crafting though. Thankfully, there's a very good reason to at least get some crafting on the board, and that is the first gear sets for your characters. There is a set for each armour class, and each one is made up of four parts, including a helm – which is otherwise impossible to get at the level you can craft them. All these recipes are sold by Uncle Kaga outside the Windmill at the edge of Logar, and when we say sold, we mean he gives them you for free. You do need to get your crafting up to level 3 first though – not that hard.

My main character is a Mage/Scout, and I'm sorely tempted to get a full set for both classes, as the four-set bonus is incredible - my Mage for instance would benefit from: +32 magical attack, +14 intellect and +14 wisdom. This is on top of the stats of the items themselves, which tend to be quite impressive. Not bad for gear that can be first worn at level 15, upgrade to more specific armour at level 20 and then upgraded for the final time at level 22. All through crafting.

You either need to spend some time in the auction house, and get ready to scan for bargains, or you need a helpful high-level mate to run you through the Windmill Basement dungeon to get the materials for this gear. All the characters in here drop fragments of various types that can be used for making the equipment, and the boss will drop an actual item as well.

In order to actually get inside the Windmill instance, you'll need to grab a Gloomy Vapor Stone or two from Golo in either the Dead Tree Cave or Barren Caves in the Howling Mountains. Turn this item into Uncle Kaga and he'll turn it in a Dark Flame Vapor Stone, which will give you an hour's access to the instance. In that time you can run the dungeon as many times as you want – try and clear your bag space before going inside though...

The ingredients for each piece of armour does differ a little, but essentially you'll end up using all the items from Windmill Basement. For example, a core component of the tailoring recipes is the Tiny Magical Remnant, which is made from 3x Worn Robe, 3x Broken Wand, 2x Damaged Repeating Crossbow, 2x Crimson Hog Hide and a single Damaged Battle Axe. It seems like a lot, but you'll easily fill your bags with such things on a normal run (we're talking a hundred or so of each). You'll also need Smashed Fire Essence Fragments or Water fragments and Elemental Crystals, which drop off the end boss in Windmill or can be grabbed from the auction house for surprisingly little cash.

Once you have the basic level item, you can then upgrade it – using a combination of items from the auction house and/or drops from a Windmill run. This intermediate stage of gear is impressive for level 20, but you'll quickly want to upgrade the items again to the level 22 epic versions, which again uses a mixture of the same ingredients that are gathered from the instance along with a few other world crafted items – generally quite simple ones. Alternatively you can check out the auction house to see if any of the items have been put up there – sometimes for less than they'd cost to make yourself.

The sets are: Hochim (mail), Ventis (cloth), Yolta (leather)