Mod tag %XX%

[GiTiB]

The mod tag %XX% does not seem to work as intended in version 3.50b2

It can be tested with a character with 0% in the timbercraft skill, trying to make a staff (%60%) with a decent handaxe (and a decent slender trees I guess), in my understanding it should give 60% bonus to the skill putting it at 60%, which should give mostly some decent staffs, but it gives only crude ones.

It is a bit painfull for starting characters with low skills.

[PALU]

No, I think you misunderstand how modifiers work.
If I understand it correctly, your skill (and tools) determines the quality of items you can potentially make. The modifiers then affects the success roll, so with a massive bonus you'll almost always manage to make the best you can make, but it won't make you a master.

You need a skill of 20 to be capable of producing decent items, 40 for fine, and 70 for superior ones.

It's supposed to be a slow going for starting characters with low skills. If you don't like that you should probably start with better characters, rather than making the game easier. Also note that making it easy means you'll reach the top a lot faster than intended, which can be boring.

[GiTiB]

I'm not trying to make the game easier, a lot of low level recipe have %XX% modifier, like staff, juniper bow, loop snare. If it was not intended to help low level characters and boost their skills then I don't know.

edit: Actually I never thought about boosting low level character, what I thought is that you don't need much skills to make a decent staff so that would make sense.

[PALU]

If you have a skill below 20 you're simply not good enough to make a decent staff because you don't really know to go about making it decent.
A decent staff has had the bark removed, and the surface smoothed (with a clumsy, inexperienced hand wielding the knife). It also has to remove all branches without leaving knobs and nicks. In that process, the staff has an even thickness, so the amount of wood removed is the same all around (or rather, probably slightly more at the bottom, to give it the same circumference as the top). All it takes to degrade the staff is one unlucky slip with the knife somewhere in the process (and UrW doesn't yet include that slip ending the path in your other hand or a leg...).

Edit: Added missing negation in the first line and corrected a jumbled sentence further down.

[caethan]

Here's how that tag works:  https://www.unrealworld.fi/forums/index.php?topic=143.msg653#msg653

Your base skill dominates crafting quality.  The modifier makes certain recipes easier to roll high, but the results of that high roll will still be determined by your base skill.

So for a base skill of 5% you will always produce a crude or rough result.  But the quality modifier can affect which of those you'll get.  With the lowest modifier, only 1% of your results will be rough, while with the highest modifier, 19% will. 

[GiTiB]

I see, I wasn't able to spot this effect in my own tests.

edit: when I go to a forest and cut the first branch I see as makeshift walking stick, I guess I make only crude ones, I feel bad now. All my life is a lie.

edit: a quick test, with the %60% tag and 0% skill I've got 12.2% of excellent roll,  for 0% skill alone I've got 0.9% of excellent roll,  (test with 1000 roll for each case), it confirms your results.