A Certain Middle-Aged Man’s VRMMO Activity Log c16

So uh, hi, and thanks for all your comments!

“Thanks to [Stealth]’s concealment the Wild Bear won’t figure out where the arrow came from even if he’s. .h.i.t with it”, it should be “figure out the arrow’s coming until he’s. .h.i.t with it.” Cla.s.sic case of a.s.suming the content instead of reading it. -_-;

The VRMMO Activities of a Certain Old Man
Author: Shiina Howahowa

 That day it started with one statement.

“Lately haven’t the number of people taking [Cooking] increased? I’d like to learn some dishes myself, but you gotta pay to get Recipes, right?”

That was Nora’s one statement.

Reiji and Nora, who came to buy food from me, let that statement out while stuffing their cheeks.
I put on a stern expression.

“Aaa~… buying Recipes is just about impossible, they aren’t really sold.
The reason is kinda long. This isn’t just my policy, it’s how all the crafters have been dealing with it.

That was my explanation, but…

“Now I’m interested. Mind going into the details?”

Reiji said, curious.
Since it really IS a long explanation I gave them White-Peach flavored Potion Juice before I began.

There’s an unspoken agreement among the current Crafting Skill players about not selling Recipes.
There are two reasons for it, and the first is a story about the money involved.

The time and money to develop one Recipe is pretty hefty.

The thing is, you have 10,000 pieces to look through.
That’s the kind of process it is.

Since that’s the kind of process it is, a LOT of funding is absolutely necessary to find the correct 50 pieces.

Even I’ve sunk a lot of money into creating new dishes, but if it weren’t for this long explanation of mine no one would be able to tell.

Also, in regards to profit, Horned Rabbit with Water Herbs is terrific, but since the meat is tough you need Salt at 10Glow, Mixed Spice at 20Glow, Herb at 10Glow; it takes at least this much money.

Right now I can gather Herbs to cover what I make, but for the times when the demand is too much I have to buy it from the NPC.

The net profit I’m making at this point is reduced to about 60Glow for every new dish I come up with, and even the profit disappears into further research and development for improvements.

The only way I could afford the Werewolf Leather Set I have equipped now was to stop spending money on Recipe research until I somehow got 86,000Glow.

Now, this down-and-dirty behind the scenes coverage of the reason why Recipes aren’t being sold had two parts. This second one is much deeper.

There’s a huge possibility that there’s a hidden stat to go along with Crafting Skill Level.

This isn’t just my belief. When a large group of Crafters came together to discuss Recipes, I heard a story about a Weaponsmith.

That Weaponsmith was pretty skilled. The Great Swords he sold were consistently an 8 in Quality.

Let’s say a Quality 5 Great Sword has an attack power of 100.

At Quality 8 it’s 160, incomparable to the others. (For Cooking it’s the taste that improves.)

After all, strong equipment will protect you and you can hunt more efficiently to earn money quicker.

There was a player who saw his thriving business.
That player thought that if he could get his hands on that Great Sword Recipe, there was easy money to be made.

So, with a large amount of money he bought the Recipe from the Weaponsmith.

After that he gathered all the materials required and hammered iron like mad, ma.s.s-producing Great Swords according to the Recipe
Of course his [Weaponsmithing] level skyrocketed in no time.

Now then, if they were Quality 7 or 8 Great Swords there wouldn’t be a problem.

no matter how much he hammered away, he never got anything other than Quality 5 Great Swords.

That player was convinced that the Weaponsmith cheated him with a fake Recipe.
It seems he stormed in and demanded that his money be returned.

It became a huge fight and, seeing no end to it, they decided that the Weaponsmith who developed the Recipe would make it according the Recipe he had written while in front of several Crafter witnesses.

Immediately after he finished, the Great Sword was handed over to the witnesses.
This was to ensure that the sword the Weaponsmith made wasn’t switched for another.

The result was a Great Sword with a Quality of a stunning value of 9.

This was definite proof that the Weaponsmith who sold the Recipe committed no fraud.

From these results, as far as Crafting Skill level is concerned it only lets you make the item.

That was the rumor that was quickly spread.

More importantly, this suggests that there’s more than one way to make something.

As more people take [Cooking] there may be more and more players who will make Horned Rabbit meat dishes, but with stuffed cabbage, soup, grilled skewers, stewed dishes – there are actually tons of variations to try.
They may take different flavors, they may take different forms, but all of them are products that have been perfected.

In the game, actually there’s not just 1 possibility for a Recipe.

It’s definitely a tough task to find 50 pieces that fit together from 10,000.
‘Cause there’s a ton of “right answers”

So, going back to that Weaponsmith’s story and that Great Sword he made, another weaponsmith’s forging method and Recipe are, for the most part, different.

And all the ways are “correct”, see?
However you look at it, between finished items of the same Quality, neither is inferior.

All the Crafters who had gathered decided that this was, without a doubt, how things worked.

When imitating that person’s Recipe, it’s impossible to reach the original’s Quality.

For that reason, selling a Recipe to someone could actually prevent their growth as Crafter.

This explanation and the one on the Info Site is long, but there’ve been people who don’t believe us and try to call us out, saying, “Crafters are making this up to keep others out of the profits.”

……

I’ll teach the basics, though. From there it’s best if you go and work your own puzzle to completion.”

And now that the explanation is over, the two who were listening while drinking Potion Juice…

“Hee… so there was a story like that, huh~ … so that Info Site’s article wasn’t just a bunch of people trying to monopolize the Recipes.”

That’s what Nora muttered absentmindedly.

“Weell, it can’t be helped that you took it that way but … the truth is the truth, ya know?”

There’s always people who don’t believe the truth even in real life.

With just age as a factor there’s a lot of things you can’t do, things impossible for you and things decided for you, for example.

Try it just to try it, if it doesn’t work then look around for another way.
That’s the way I like to game.

There’s no Skill Writeup in this extra.
This is the feel of how this world’s Crafting and Recipes work.