Godrich gave mechanical lore a new definition. It isn't using your dexterity to manipulate an object. It's the transformation of a substance from one form to another. Example: breaking and combing powder isn't like to teach mechanical lore in the future. However, carving a limb into a longbow would as it has effectively changed the object into a new item.
There will be 6 lore skills that mechanical lore will turn into:
The mechanical lore split will be very similar to the musical lore proposed split with a set amount of 'bits' being moved into other skills from the current mechanical lore skill.
The new lore skills will hopefully be part of the proposed 'career system'. People will have a guild they belong to but it would be their 'hobby' while their 'career' would be how they earned their coins. No one would be forced to have a career but this would allow those that wish to do so, to RP that role.
Jeremael is now in charge of substances.
Damissak is now in charge of forging.
Godrich hopes to have each set system (the above lore skills), have several stages. Each of these stages will be time-consuming. This allows more player interaction and a richer creation system.
Example:
one person may gather raw ore change it into bars (iron, etc) for forging.
the second person may then use several of these bars to make a type of metal (steel)
the third person may then create a weapon from the metal
The above is a basic example and may even have more steps. The idea is that the first stage may teach metal working from 0-25 ranks, the second level may teach from 25-75 ranks, etc.
Each step would take time and someone at a higher level wouldn't learn from a simple step of changing raw ore to bars. Therefore young players could come in and be able to help, while older players would avoid time consuming steps by purchasing bars or metals from the younger players at a price lower than they would buy them from a shop.
New lore skill called engineering that will start at '0' ranks for everyone.
Alchemy will likely be a career and you'll probably have to spend TDP's for formulas. However the skill in alchemy would still be needed to complete the formula successfully.
Other lore skills may also have TDP costs associated with parts of them, but nothing has been set in stone yet.