Lately, harvesting has become a major irritation. Most areas have either been strip harvested or damaged by aqua and taint demesnes. It is extremely difficult to keep up with the loss of herbs, through herbrenewal and replanting, simply because harvesting takes far less time than replanting and letting the herbs grow. There are no restrictions on the amount harvested. For me, it only takes 2-3 seconds to harvest a single herb. 3 minutes to completely harvest a room's crop of that herb (60). We have several with the ability to harvest. At current, many areas do not have enough herbs to supply each herbalist. Not only that, but there are those out there who will completely strip the herbs.

In summary, herbs are an unlimited resource (that is, if it is true that, if an area is completely cleaned of herbs, a single plant will grow somewhere in that area and replanting can start from that.. and there is herbrenewal in Ecology). However, they are a severely limited resource, and there are no means implemented to stop people from controlling that resource except for time... and there are several things in the game to lessen the amount of time it takes to harvest (unless I'm mistaken and balance lowering skills don't apply to harvesting).

What I suggest to fix this problem is the implementation of a system similar (not the same) to Imperian's. People will only be able to harvest a certain amount of a specific herb per room per IG month. The person can only harvest the herbs that they have learned how to harvest. The amount harvestable would be dependant upon skill level.

Example: Herbalist learns how to harvest chervil. Herbalist has not harvested for the IG month. Herbalist goes to a forest room, harvests for chervil, and is able to harvest # herbs from that room. Herbalist goes to next room and does the same. In order to make sure that there are enough herbs for everyone, the amount that may be foraged could be a percentage or a set amount, but never enough to make the total herb count for a specific herb drop below 1 in that room.

Other additions could be applied..
1. Someone may not harvest from the same room for 6 IG months if they have just harvested from it. The idea behind this is to allow the herbs to grow back without being kept at a very low level by a single person.
2. Instead of making it a set amount or percentage of the herbs in the room, a total set quota for _all_ herbs could be applied. I.e. someone's total for the month is 1000, which may be split between any herbs that they're able to harvest (500 galingale, 500 yarrow... 100 of ten different herbs.. etc), even if it does strip a crop. However, if they do strip the crop, they will not be able to harvest from that room for an IG year.
3. Herbs will never go below 1 unless destroyed by fire or aqua/taint demesne.

Other than that, I would be content if harvesters were simply not able to harvest past 1.

Le sigh, I had six paragraphs typed out and then the power went out. Looks like it'll be a short version now.

I think your original premise that herbs are an extremely limited supply is flawed. You say most places are stripharvested. That isn't true by a long shot. If the Divine were to give an exact total for all the herbs in the game right now I think you'd find the number to be surprisingly high.

Strip-harvesting used to be more of a problem in the earlier days of the game. It really isn't much of a problem anymore. The plants are there, you just have to find them. A detailed map and a quick check of HELP GEOGRAPHY every now and then will do wonders for how many herbs you harvest. If one herbalist knows where to get herbs and another one doesn't that's not a game flaw, its a market advantage.

Herbalists are fairly spoiled when compared to other trades. If the villages have no steel because someone bought it all out, someone who forges is just going to have to wait for the supply to renew itself. That or do commodity quests that require far more effort than replanting an herb does and produce far less. If an herbalist finds a place stripharvested they have a lot of options available to replant that area.

Coded limits on how many or how often you can harvest are not needed and should not be implemented. If changes are necessary at all then they should be changes that make replanting speed more on par with harvesting speed. Reduce the balance time on planting an herb, increase how long an herb can exist in your inventory before being replanted.

I'd think about supporting your proposed system only if my Gloves let me harvest twice as much as someone without them. Also, 1k is far too low. I can harvest three times that number in an hour if I try a bit, let alone a whole day.

I agree with Anarias. The situation over a small area may look bleak, but when you consider the entire map, you've got quite a lot of herbs available to be harvested. We don't need limits or our own personal herb supply in each room.

Most herbalists will replant here and there because they know that the supply will nearly die off and they'll lose money if they don't. I'm sure that some of those newer to the trade won't realize this at first and may go overboard with the harvesting, but hopefully they'll be educated one way or another as to how things work. It would be nice if the help files gave just a little bit more information on the hibernation cycles, though how many people would still not read that?

It would be nice if the herbs could be replanted after a longer period of time or if the replanting didn't take away so much balance. Not absolutely necessary, but it would be nice.

I know theres Herbrenewel but how about a high (high as or higher than Expert) that lets an herbalist soak some herbs in their inventory and plant them? Would take time to do it, maybe even a little bit of power so that the herb is given back magic to survive after drying out.

I don't know WHY you're all having such a problem with stripharvesting. The places I harvest have tons of herbs, because I carefully cultivate them and ensure that there are herbs around.

There aren't any stripharvesters where I go... just people not bothering to plant. Nor do I think this system is necessary... it's part of the downside of having such an easy moneymaker. You have to put in a LOT of time and effort.

When I *do* find stripharvesters I get REALLY annoyed, but it's... just not as common as you seem to be implying.

I came on the other day to find maybe 5 herbs in the entire section of Southern Serenwilde around Mother.

Of course the total would be high, because there are hundreds of rooms with herbs. Some have 2, some have 60, most have anywhere in between. Would this be a total of all in the game, rifts, on persons, etc, or simply those not harvested? Even still, there are certain herbs that are, most of the time, on the brink of being strip harvested. Sargassum comes to mind. The last time I went to harvest sargassum, the majority of the rooms had between 5 and 12 sargassum, and not all of the Inner Sea was planted. I'd guesstimate half of it was. Now consider how many rooms actually have herbs in them and how many do not. Consider how many of those rooms with herbs in them have all of the herbs they should have (omitting those in hibernation). There is a large lack of herbs total.

When I speak of strip harvest, I usually speak of the herbs either being harvested to 0 or to a bare minimum, where there is not enough to supply other harvesters.

Finding out where herbs grow is not a problem. The problem is when there are few places (reishi anyone? how about sargassum? sparkleberry? merbloom?) where a certain herb grows or where it can't grow because of aqua/geo demesnes. Then there are also the locations that are exclusive to a particular organization. Not allowed into the communes? There are only a few places outside the communes to harvest those herbs. The same for the planes. The Basin is just too small for everyone to have an unlimited, unrestricted amount that they can harvest.

I suppose it would also be a market advantage to keep crops low so that there is no competition.. Remind me to buy out all the commodities in the shops, keep them low, and then resell for profit.

Herbalism and other tradeskills are not similar. It costs nothing to harvest except for time. A single harvester can gather far more herbs than another tradeskill can with commodities. Commodities cost gold, herbs do not. Replanting takes an enourmous amount of time, effort, and risk compared to other skills. I suppose this is to offset the ease in harvesting. Either way, a single person could come along and harvest what you've just planted. Nature growth seems to be random.. I've used it on multiple rooms only to have certain rooms need it again minutes later. It takes quite some time for herbs to regrow. As it is, unless someone is rather wealthy with gold, commodities are more evenly distributed than herbs are. As I've said, a single person can wipe out an entire herb crop without any cost at all.

And then you would have those that wait until someone replants and then swoop in to collect on the other person's efforts.

As for the idea of harvesting gloves granting more than a single plant.. I like that idea.

When most of talk about strip-harvesting, we mean harvested to the point where there is none left. Zero. They've taken all of them. I won't harvest below 10 (5 sometimes), but if I came on every day for a week and everywhere I looked there were only 10, that's not stripped, that's just me being unlucky. There is usually plenty to supply other harvesters. It's just the random asshat here and there who strips everything.

I harvest to 10 or 5 also, which I consider a reasonable amount to allow the herb to grow back on its own and not get wiped out of the area. That's as considerate as I'd expect any other herbalist to be. We're out to make money and keep our trade alive, not make sure everyone has a fair share of the herbs.

Again, another issue that ought to be solved by players using currently available mechanics. You don't need hardcoded solutions to your every little problem. Get some herbalists together, replant like nuts, go wild with nature growth and guard, and grief the hell out of anyone who strips. This problem arises from players, so it ought to be solved by them, rather than just making it impossible to strip herbs.

If people are strip harvesting, then keep a closer eye on things, and see who's doing it. Then punish them

Zacc, give us a good IC reason for everything you proposed, and it will look a lot more feasible. To my eyes, at least.

I'm under the impression that the majority of the game doesn't want a Lusternia version of Oakstone..

Keeping a closer eye on strip harvesters is near impossible without having more than one person watching the area. I've been keeping an eye on a certain spot for a while. I've even used my demesne to watch people enter the area and leave. However, it's always harvested when I'm not logged on.

Also, punishing strip harvesters falls under the Avechna system. There are but so many actions that can be taken before you have an Avenger hunting you down or a karma curse stuck on you.

Even if a system like the one I suggested never happens, it's still reasonable to make strip harvesting impossible. The only people hindered by it would be those who strip the herbs. The benefits of such would be that herb counts are steady and replanting less frequent. To counter the ease in making strip harvesting impossible, other affects could be used to counter it.. things such as random fires, disease, locusts, and whatnot. Not only would it add a bit of spice to a dull tradeskill, it would require people to actually interact in regards to saving the plants.

So I've changed my mind.. Instead of a system like the one I originally suggested, I like the one above much more. Add more diversity and spice to herbs. Make strip harvesting impossible, but also make plants more susceptible to damage by means of disasters such as fires, disease, locusts, snow, and others.

The original idea would be difficult to turn into IC, but this one is easier. A heavy rain causes flood and drowns the plants. A bolt of lightning or a hot scorching sun sets the plantlife on fire. A swarm of locusts swoop down upon a village and starts eating the flax. A diseased plant appears and begins to spread throughout the area. As for the strip harvesting, the remaining 1 of that plant could be considered the main plant itself (a bush, tree, stalk, root, whatever) where all the harvestable pieces come from. When an herb is harvested down to 1 all that remains is the main plant, and when someone tries to harvest that, a message along the lines of "There are no harvestable sprigs of marjoram upon the bush" or "Harvesting anymore from the marjoram bush would kill it!" could be given.

Though, it would also work, and bit more plausible, to let people harvest to 0 but never destroy the plant through harvesting. The plant would remain at 0 and begin growing like it normally does. "0" would mean that there are no more harvestable pieces from the plant. If the plant does not appear in the room at all, that means it has been destroyed (through demesne or disaster) or has gone into hibernation.

Here is a hypothetical situation.. Let's say that roses are some sort of curative. You remove all the blossoms. The plant still remains, and the flowers grow back eventually. It doesn't just die off instantly.