Architect Archive

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"HOWEVER, how many master weaponsmiths are currently making CDEF weapons? (not very many)

How many master armorsmiths are making bone armor? (not very many)"

So you are saying there is no point to decay on low end items because noone buys them... but it's ok if all the high end ones do decay because thats what Masters make?

Actualy I think that isn't too bad a compromise... no decay on small houses and harvesters... anything bigger decays. You dont NEED anything bigger, so it's a perk that should be payed for.

You just argueddirectly AGAINST your claim that player turnover will support our economy on its own? These weapons DO decay, and yet there is (or will be)virtualy no production as there is insuficientdemand.

Houses and installations and factories and furniture is what architects make.

None of these ever decay, without decay the profession WILL die. That is not acceptable.

The answer is not batteries, the answer is not income through pay maintenance ( worst idea I ever heard), the answer is not new products as they will also saturate in a short period of time, the answer is not power-ups.

The answer is not GCW installations alone, although that would be re-newable, it is a very small market and only a tiny niche of what we would normally sell.

I do not agree that they should totally let a profession die.
I don’t think they should never spawn a new creature as that would let the combat classes die.
I do not think that weapons should not wear out as that would let the weapon smiths die.
I do not think that houses an installations should never decay as that will be the end of the architect profession.

I understand that you disagree, but you will never convince us that we should just let the architect profession die. I do not think you would be willing to support changes that would let your main profession die either.

Daker writes:

You have 2 choices: (1) Grind like the rest of us (artificially created market for you) or (2) accept an amount of money for your services that we feel is reasonable. I include #2, because if you hike up prices too much, other players will tell you where to shove those prices and stop buying.

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Maybe you should start an architect in one of the old servers. Maybe you will get a clue about crafters then.

To the point, crafters grind and the grinding is more tedius and boring. And in order to grind they have to get the resources too. So they have to spend money to grind. To get miney they have to run missions (those were the same destroy or deliver missions before they introduced the artisan missions). The missions crafters do dont give any exp, just a little cash. To thatlater missions to keep our harvesters running since sales are so sparse. Since we grind already why would more grinding make our profession more enjoyable?

Accept an amount of money that is acceptable to you? Yes, if you were reaonable. Yes, if you had a clue. Otherwise I see me doing cash missions to be able to sustain myself to able to 'sell' to you. I would propose a different way. You buy at the price the crafter feels is reasonable. I am not going to sell you at bellow cost or with a marginal win of 3000 credits an item that I spend the last 3 days working on (harvesting the resources, doing missions to sustain harvesting and do the crafting itself) ... No I am not going to seel at yur 'reasonable' price, I ll have more fun destroying the item

Quote:

<Insert spurious argument about how much money Architects must have here>

This isnt about money (beyond an amount needed to enjoy the game as much as any other class).

If you gave every architect 1,000,000,000,000 credits today... How will they make and sell structures 6 months from now... or 12 months.... or however far ahead you see market saturation happening?

You are right.. I am not starving now. In fact in my small guild I am by far the "Richest". But the credits are usefull for what? If I dont have any game to play in six months then how does being rich help me?

Ichose toplay a builder, and I want to keep on doing it. If the class goes away so do my subscription dollars. Extend that toother crafter classes and pretty soon you have about the dullest MMORPG on the market. The ONLY things goingfor this game right now are it's 'Star Wars' name, and its crafting system (player economy). Everything else has been done better elsewhere.

Once the market saturates, theturnover of player cannot possibly support more than a small group or architects. This assumes that everyone that quits just lets their structures rot.. Some do, but somesell all their structures and some sell their entire account.

Quote:

"So, they aren't going to do that work anyway? Forced structure decay and being able to repair your house by plugging in a new deed is already in the game isn't it?........ It isn't? Oh. They are going to have to reinvent the wheel regardless. Might as well give it an acceptable name."

Ok... now its you that is being silly.... BOTH ways of doing it require the coding for decay.

Your way need a repair kit created for every single structure ( a generic one wont do because you need to use up appropriate materials that equate to building the structure being repaired), plus all of the repair logic coded for every structure.

My way requires NO object creation, NO repair logic, only the addition of a structure replacement option on the radial. I have no doubt that my option would be a heck of a lot easier to code, test and impliment.

Quote:

"HA!!!! Bullstuff. You make your own houses for cost."

If a company can produce a limited amount of product... lets say 10 machines a week... The materials cost 200 and they sell for 1000 each, itsincome is 10,000 and its cost of goods sold is 2,000. Net gain 8,000

If instead of selling one itdecides to use it itself, it can now only sell 9. Itsincome was just decreased by 1000 to 9000. Its cost of goods sold reduced to 1,800, but it has an additional 200 materials costs. Net gain now 7,000

Yes... I pay less cash out than you would.... but I have my income decreased, which you wouldn't.

The only advantage that I have over you is that (for the cost of all my skill points and the time spend managing harvesters) I dont have to go find a store that sells the deed.

Quote:

"Over 50% of home owners get nothing from their houses. They have them as pretty things. Structure decay = more cost for nothing= Bad. Any additional money is not inconvenient...it's extortion.

100% of furniture owners get nothing from their furniture. Even in shops, they are merely pretty things. Furniture decay = more cost for nothing = Bad."

I hate to break it to you, but FUN things are why alot of people play these games. They like to actualy interact with other people and do interesting stuff.

As you pointed out yourself, a great number of the houses are owned by people that absolutely do not need them. And yet they pay a bunch of money to aquire them knowing full well that they come with an ongoing running cost. What makes you think that this changes anything?

Obviously the scale of the decay on items that generate no income is important.... at some point even I wouldnt own one... but noone has discussed where that point it. You simply contend that any cost will put people off which is quite clearly FALSE

And here we agree.... (it had to happen at some point )

You are right that harvester decay will have the largest impact on us for the long term. When you consider the fact that most people using them have more than one, and the fact that more than one house is (semi) pointless thats pretty obvious. Add in the fact that MANY combat characters use them as yet another form of income (since they cost almost zero to run, and produce a huge revenue), and clearly they will constitute a very large structure pool.

Perhaps they should introduce this first to "Test the Water". I think it a cop-out that would still lead to everything else getting decay eventualy... but I'm willing to have them try this just to get the ball rolling.

PosiTech,

On a side note, I dont believe for one moment that decay will put more money in my pocket. What I believe will happen is that I will keep my prices where they are and absorb the cost of decay into my own profits.

Decay will hurt me and my business,but I can see it is theright decision to make. I believe that decay will make architect a tougher profesion, leaner, fewer architects will be able to stand the heat.

That is part of what needs to happen, toweed out Architectes that cant compete and reduce supply while maintaining a small demand. My desire for decay is a pretty slow decay rate, and only felt in the riseing costs of pay mantenance andextractors loosing efficiency.

Jesus I thought this thread was going to die. I see it is just going right into the **edit**ter.

Daker look man, you came here to voice your opinion in a constructive manner, fine your more than welcome. But you have been hit with vailid arguements time and time again and you just try to double talk and disproove them time and time again while you don't seem to have a solid grasp on how any crafting proffession in this game works.

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Daker-Naritus wrote:

Dayln,

If you want the continued comfort of the game always giving you something to do (like combat professions have), why don't you agree to let the game do the same for architects?

Architect missions.

If you want comfort, you can grind boring NPC missionslike the rest of us. You have continually said youdon't want this for your class, so you can stop complaining that we have it, couching it as a "perk."

This is 100% not an option. This completley contradicts SoE's idea of a player run economy. How can you not see that? Whyare only Architects to get a "false demand"? Explain to me why we should not have a market like any other crafting proffession? What sets us apart and makes us different?

Really, if they took missions out of the game tomorrow, I wouldn't care. Really it would be perfect. Then I would just take up Teras Kasi (no armor or weapons needed) and see the world. What I really want to do is to explore the world and stop grinding xp and credits. However, at the moment, I have a 1000m rope with one end attached by my waist, and the other to a mission terminal. This is why I am so opposed to any more costs I have to pay...

This is your choice. Go start a TKA, they are pathetic, I have one. Unless you are a medic/doctor/dabbler they are the suck. They have good dmg and to think you don't need armor or weapons? Play one barefisted and without armor, you only last long enough to see the smear mobs make of you. Not to mention they can't attack while moving, ranged mobs contantly kite, their ham costs are rediculous, 75% of their moves are pointless etc... TKA is not the promised land. If you want to explore go explore, if you want to grind missions day in and day out go ahead. If you feel that you have a rope tied around your waistYOU and SoEtied it there, not Architects.

You have 2 choices: (1) Grind like the rest of us (artificially created market for you) or (2) accept an amount of money for your services that we feel is reasonable. I include #2, because if you hike up prices too much, other players will tell you where to shove those prices and stop buying.

This is where I became infuriated. Grind like the rest of us? You truley have no idea what crafting is all about. You click a terminal, hit acept twice and run out 1000m shoot some **edit** which BENIFITS you unless you are a master and come back 15 minutes later 10k richer, your a commando, faction destroy missions net you 4.7k per at novice. Here is my night before I even get to think about playing for fun. I check and restock my vendors. I re-regigster them on the planetary map. I then head to the roof of my and check the resources to check for shifts (on Tatooine). Asuming none of my stuff shifted I head over to Naboo / Corellia and do the same. In the process I amswer about half a dozen tells from morons thinking I am going to sell them a medium house for 35k. Depending on my harvester layout i need to pay up power and retireve resources from them. I then load up my factories to run for the night and restock anything that may have sold off my vendor in the meantime and fill any orders I may have. This process start to finish averages about my first 2 hours of playtime. God for bid there is a shift on the resource I have then my night is shot, and usually have to stay up later than normal to beat all the dam miners to it. So dont talk to me about grinding, you have no idea of the concept. I dont head over to the commando board and bitch about it though, why? Because IT IS MY CHOICE, no one is holding a gun to my head and making me do this, and no one is holding a gun to your head and telling you to run missions day in and day out.

As for your number 2) man I don't even know where to start. Accpet the fact that you are only willing to pay less that what i can sell the resources for? Get real. Just me I get plenty of these assanine tells a night, I even posted one in this thread. It actually works the contrary my friend. I tell you to shove it, I refuse to sell anything unless I make a mosest profit from it. I am not looking to rape people but I charge what I feel is fair regardless of our defalted prices, i get a lot of laughs and surprisingly enough I get my fair share of sales. Most of those starting with how much for XXX, i tell them the price, oh ive seen them for much lower thanks anyway. An hour later... Actually can you make me XXX i want it now. Why is this? Because the lowballers are dying, bored, or quiting. I keep enough resources on hand to make what you want when you want it. Find a lowballer that will do that. When they are extinct you will get more architects telling YOU to shove it not the otherway around and prices will start to climb again. Nothing but good in my eyes.

That is why my advice to you is leave house and furnituredecay alone. Take away redeeding on houses...make harvesters decay...great, whatever. But if you push for more, you are selfishly pushing for something that is going to incite a mob beating of architects.

Houses should be made no redeed after 12-24hours. Agreed. Harvesters need to decay in a fashion where they are DESTROYED compleley, i don't care if it takes a day or 6 moths they need to be taken out of the economy. Furniture by itself will be fine the way it is with no decay, adding more variety will be enough. It is not unreasonable to think that people just wouldn't redecorate their hosue for a change or see something cool someone else built and go out to get the stuff to do the same.

Look Dayln. You are never going to understand my viewpoint until you try it. Start a brand new character on a server. Stay out of all the artisan professions, and master marksman, dabble in medic, and then work your way up to an elite or hybrid combat profession. Grind missions until you are blue in the face to expensive guns, expensive armor, and expensive stimpacks (because everything we buy is expensive). Then try to save up 150k for a house with decorative furniture that you are proud of, but that costs you thousands of credits in maintenance each week and does nothing for you. Start grinding missions again, because by that time your equipment will be starting to wear out and you need to replace it. Then imagine that an architect comes along and says, "I want your house to fall apart so I can charge you more money for it...go grind some more missions." Piss you off a bit? Me too.

OK this was the 2nd that pissed me off. Maybe Dayln can't completley understand where your coming from but I can. Well no I really can't, but I have taken your suggestion.

Let me fill you in on a little fact, I have 6 account. Yes 6 rediculuos I know so save your OMG 6 accounts??!!?? Here is what I have played with so far...

Account 1 and my primary: Master Architect, Master Artisan, Master Merchant, 0-0-0-2 Tailor

Account 2: 0-3-0-4 Weaponsmith, working on getting Merchant

Account 3: Master Medic, Novice Doctor, 0-0-4-1 Bio Engineer

Account 4: 0-2-0-2 Dancer - Image desiner (forget stats)

Account 5: 0-3-4-4 TKA, 0-4-2-0 Smuggler, some medic skills, used to be doctor

Account 6: 3-2-2-4 Creature Handler, 0-0-2-3 Bounty Hunter

Some other various hodge podge skills thrown in on all of them

I have 2 primary combat classes. The crap your spewing about grinding missions his horse crap. I can out profit my architect any day of the week just running misisons. I hate missions so I don't. Your only possibly madnatory expense for doing a mission is meds if you are a medic, and travel cost. Otherwise it is free money, and dam fast money too. You bitch about 150k for a large house when you can esily make that in a night maybe 2? Then to say you can't be bothered to shell out anything else after that? That's ludicrous. Combat classes make money the fastest in this game only 2nd to weaposmiths because of their overinflated prices (at least on my server). So don't come crying to me about have to "grind credits"

Now, before you give me some sad (read: totally exaggerated) story about how dried up your market is (despite that fact that over 20% of the hardcore players on this forum don't have houses yet), I don't want to hear it. I know, and will be the first to admit, thatarchitectsMAYhave problems in the future. I am telling you house and furniture decay is not the answer. Please open your narrow mind and think of something else.

And finally the 3rd. Cut your **edit** and take your own advice my friend. You keep claiming this is hypothetical, made up and exagerated. Do you understand the simple F'ing fact that this is not a in the future probelm??? This is a right f'ing now problem that will continue to worsen as time goes on. You bought **edit** from an achitect this past week, great thank you very much. You are one dam person not the economy incarnate. Our maket has done not a single thing but decline steadily since the 1st month. Who are you to tell us what the answer is if it is not decay? The only one with a narrow mind here is apparently you. You bring up bogus arguments like do weaponsmiths and armorsmiths make CEDF's and Bone Armor anymore to try and proove a point??? Wake up those are Aritsan made items and any new jack out of the character get can make for themselves same with personal harvesters. You hate missions and having to get more money, you want everything handed to you on a silver platter and that has become the basis for your argument. Pathetic.

I will lay it out clear as crystal what this class needs to be viable long term. If you can come up with a legitamate solution to any of these points I may post here again. Until then, I'm sorry it had to come down to a flaming post like this. I had a lot of respect for you when this thread started but you mutated it into personal attacks and a pissing contest which is accomplishing nothing. I try to refrian from posts like this, and the fact that it is coming from me, hopefully makes something click.

ARCHITECT MAJOR ISSUES THAT MUST BE ADDRESSED FOR LONG TERM SURVIVABILTY OF THE PROFFESION.

1.) Working and Meaningfull Experimentation - Architects need to be able to differentiate their products from one another.

2.) Our experimentation needs to be brought up to 100 like every other crafter so we can experiment as effectivley with only 5 points and the best material you can only reach half of the intended value.

3.) There needs to be a "purpose" for housing for EVERY player aside from storage. Player Cities will half address this, but certain people may not be interested in cities either. There needs to be a reason for owning a house for the avg player that is not madatory but appealing.

4.) Items we craft NEED to decay. This is what the devs intended, and weather you like it or not will be implemented at some point. We are trying to push for sooner rather than later. There have been many heated debates about what kind of decay apparently. But ultimately they need to leave the world at some point to generate demand for more.

5.) Large structures need to be gated to dabbling architects. 0-0-4-0 is not an acceptable template when it could eaisly replace a Master.

6.) Resource requirements and Critical fails need to be addressed. We are required to use an extreme amount of resources compared to any other crafting proffession. While it is logical, it is deistating from a gaming standpoint. If you critical fail something like a PA hall that is 55k in resources gone. That amount of resources lost in a single combine could easily supply any independant crafter for a few days if not a week.

When ALL of the above are addressed then and only then will I feel comfortable with the long term survivabilty of the proffession. If you are not in agreement of these 6 points or can't offer a legitamate solution (one being consistant with other crafting proffessions) to them, I will not be responding to you.

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Just some quick replies...there's no point in me rebutting anything you have said anymore.

Reeka, why do you keep telling me how much money other players make? I play 6 to 10 hours a week (because I work 12 to 14 hour days...when I post I do so when I need a break at work). Of that time, I usually spend 1 hour running to and feeding the meter on my house, 1-2 hours babysitting harvesters (only part of the time...only need 3 resources, so I only harvest when there is something good), 1-2 hours trying to avoid the griefing imperial guilds on my server who camp every rebel mission terminal on the server to be asses, and whatever time is left (3-5 hours) grinding missions. This is what REALLY pisses me off...I HAVE to spend what little time I have grinding missions, because there is no other way I can afford the costs of the game. Remember money = playtime. All those "rich" combat players have lots of money because they spend lots of time getting that money. Are they charged any more from their structures because of all that playtime?

Please remember that when you guys push through decay on houses, the cost of that decay is EXACTLY the same for rich players who grind high dollar missions efficiently 50 hours a week, and poor players like me who don't andcan barely afford the maintenance on my harvesters. Sony doesn't scale decay or maintenance based on playtime, so you are inmany instancesrobbing from the poor to make yourselves rich.

Now, for the rest of you.......I came here saying I don't like the idea of decay on structures, and proposed several ideas.

Your response: We hate those ideas...we want decay on everything.

I say, but you won't be running out of customers anytime soon. There are several other games like star wars out there, and they still get new players after years in existance. Also, player cities will be coming soon, and architects will need to build thing for those cities.

Your response. Nuh uh! Star Wars will never get any more players, ever. If there are 10000 players in the game now, we won't have anyone elseto sell to when wesell to all 10000.

I say, ok, maybe somedecay on harvesters is needed, but I don't think there should be decay on houses and furniture.

Your response: No, no compromises...we want decay on everything. We NEED to continue to make things with EVERY single schematic we have.

I say, ok, but I hate moving furniture...do you think that could be left without decay?

Your response (not Reeka): Nope I want furniture to fall apart.

I say, ok, fine. But, buying a new house every couple of months is really expensive, maybe we should implementa cheaper repair kit. You guys will already be making much more money just from all the players who currently use the same harvesters over and over andwho will have to rebuy them if they decay.

Your response: Nope. We are the "richest people we know," but we want to continue to charge you full price. We don't care how much it costs you.

I retreat...I say, you know...charging a bunch indecay on structuresis going to force me to grind missions a lot more to keep up. If I was able to make more profit from my house that would be one thing, but I can't so this is justextra cost. I don't think decay on houses is a great idea. Take redeeding away on them, but I don't think they should decay.

Your reply: Nope. Everything will decay. You shouldn't whine about grinding missions. I have a friend whois unemployed andpulls in 1 million credits a day. Why can't you afford that?

Out of all of this, I have learned only one thing: You guys are being greedy, uncompromising butt heads.

I provide constructive ideas.

I concede my ideas may not work.

I concede harvester decay.

I concede house decay.

Where in all of this thread has any of you compromised in any way? Where in any of this thread has any of you offered any constructive idea besides "make everything we make fall apart?"

I give up. Really this is a non-issue. I logged on last night and destroyed my house. I have engineering 4, so I can make my own harvesters. I really don't care what you do anymore. Enjoy your extortion.

Well the way I see it. Driving an economy requires innovation and new products. If in real life the US was still building products from the 50's eventually everyone would have one of everything and in many cases multiples. The problem with SWG is that players really don't "create" things. We create things under the restrictions of what it is SOE wants us to make. If you further add to it that EVERYTHING architects make are exactly the same regardless of level of ability in the profession, quality of the resources used to make it, or the experimentation put into it, we are basically selling cookiecutter items.

Guess what? That renders the original poster's assertion that there will be enough rollover in PCs to keep archi's in business. I don't think it will happen any time soon, but eventually there will be enough out there that making anymore is relatively pointless. I do have to agree that housing(if it is to get decay) should be a very long decay on the order of like a real life year. Houses in the real world eventually crap out that and population expantion create a housing market that is either good or bad. I also think they shouldn't bother with putting any decay on furniture. I meanwell made furniture can last a very long time anyway.Instead, they should try and introduce newer styles with more customization. They should have one time schematics for exotic type furnitures. Like do a quest and get a schematic that makes 5 wicker chairs or something. In order for that to be viable there should be some exclusivity to the items though.

Here is where I differ with the original poster. Machinery should deffinately decay! Companies replace their equipment ALL THE TIME. It drives a large portion of our economy capital expenditures. Harvesters and factoriesshould have efficiencies and decay that are directly affected by the level of proficiency of the crafter and the quality of materials used in making them. There are far too many people able to run up 4 boxes in our profession and take a huge chunk of the profits from it. Installations are where I make next to ALL of my credits. If I can make a highly efficient and decay proof harvester as a Master I can compete with the wanna-be's on a quality basis. As of now it makes no difference whether you buy one from someone who invested 60 some-odd skill points or someone who invested 20 to climb installations. They are the same product!

I do not think decay on factories and harvesters should be quick but it should exists at the very least on those items. I am also advocation repair droids for the DE profession to get a little more involved in the economy. Much like a weapon or armor repair kit a repair droid can be used to repair some decay to a harvester. They can be called in proximity to an owned or admined harvester, residence or city. It would add a little more realizm to the world to have some repair droids spraying sparks around and it makes perfect sense to implement

All right, I haven't read through this entire thread, but I am going to share my opinion on the matter anyway

First off, Houses and furniture should not decay, period. Yes, IRL, these things do decay, but a brand new house built today can and should last until this game has run its natural course. Forcing players to replace houses and furniture on a periodic basis doesn't make any sense, and would only serve to irritate your customer base.

Factories and harvesters are another matter, entirely. They "do stuff," and should wear out over time. I'd like to see novice architects able to build factory and harvester repair kits that work in much the same way that weapon repair kits do (um, without there being a chance that the factory or harvester will be destroyed). These kits would extend the life of the installation, but would not do so indefinitely.

Once a factory or harvester is no longer functional, the owner should have the opportunity to bring the useless deed to an architect who can load it into a build schematic, where it would take the place of the walls that normally go into the manufacture of a new harvester. Thus, the harvester could be essentially rebuilt, much like you might do to an old car engine. The rebuilt harvester would last 80% as long as a brand new one, but would otherwise function as a new harvester.

Daker,

I had pretty much given up on this thread since it didn't seem to be going anywhere... but I thought your latest post was worth discussing.

First the issue of house maintenace costs vs equipment costs....

I won't presume to argue with you over the costs you are personally experiencing. But I will say that I suspect they are unusualy low on the equipment side. There is VERY strong demand for weapons ands Armor, and I dont think this can be attributed just to player churn or to the player base reaching Master level this far into release (though the Master level effect I am sure is still somewhat significant). I would guess your low costs are party becuase of your limited playing time, and also because you have been lucky so far with repair kits. I know several people who used 90%+ kits on their equipment only to have the equipment *Poof*. Your ratio of equipment costs vs housing costs probably accounts for alot of your stance on decay, and I have to say I can understand that looking at your numbers.

To address your specific points...

(1) Maintenance is OVER half the cost of owning a house, and NONE of that money goes to architects. Basically, this artifically inflates how much houses cost, making it WAY too expensive to own a house before you even take any decay proposal into account.

Agreed, maintenance is a big cost over the long term in relation to the original purchase price. Looking just at the maintenance costs though suggests that they are not actualy high, rather the acquisition cost of the original structure is waaay too low. I recently build a large house for a friend (a non-combat ex-entertainer) and was concerned that she would struggle with maintenance on such a large structure. Her reply was 'No... just a couple of missions a month will pay for it'. In fact her husband now wants a large house also

I believe the consensus is that Architects do not want any of the maintenance money directly diverted to them. We want to craft, and not just recieve on ongoing income.

Perhaps a mixture of reduced maintenance fees (or possibly there eliminatiion) along with the introduction of SLOW decay would be the best compromise. Obviously a mechanism for pain free structure replacement would have to go along with this.

In effect you would be diverting maintenance money to us.. but we would have to work to get it by building stuff. This would also take extra resources out of the economy which is what SOE wants.

Quote:

(2) Architects don't charge too much for houses, they actually charge too little. HOWEVER, because of the MASSIVE resource amounts that architects need to build houses, and because no one would ever buy a house at normal resource prices, architects have to charge an amount of money that is too much for the average player to have to replace every year, but not enough to properly compensate the architect for how much they should be getting for the resources they use to build it.

I think your conclusion about our prices is correct.

From our end I can see that reducing the resources would give us the margins we would need... but I am concerned since SOE wants more resources taken out of the economy not less, and structures that we build are by far the biggest way that this happens.

I am not sure how to get around both needs. The only way that leaps to mind would be to make it much harder for non-architects to obtain Ore (for which we are by far the biggest consumer), while at the same time making it much easier for Architects themselves. Perhaps a heavy Ore Processor (akin to the fusion for power....high output) that is Certified to Architects only. This would reduce the resource supply in general, but balance the ore production for architects... our material reaquirement would remain high, but the major element of it would become cheaper per unit... giving us the needed margin. Tricky balancing act.

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(1) No furniture decay - I think players are pretty clear that moving furniture and trying to rebuy40-50 pieces of furniture for their house to replace is not acceptable.

In principathere has to be decay for everything.

However, I do see your point on the inconvenience factor with furniture. As a major user of it I know i wouldnt be very happy having to constantly check on its status, and replace it when worn out. Keeping tabs on16+ harvesters, a house or 2, several vendors, andfactoriesis hard enough.

Only alternative here though is to continualy introduce new furniture styles, colors etc.Once everyone has their house decorated the only reason they would destroy any of it would be to make space for new stuff.

I am not adverse toa stream of new stuff... I am sceptical that SOE could effectivly keepon top of it.

This scheme would be akin to the fashion industries seasons... every 3months cycle out some of the schematics, and replace them with the new seasons items.

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(2) Home Decay in the Manner Suggested by Posi - You buy a new deed, plug it in with a "repair house" option on your home radial, house reverts to 100% condition and slowly decays. Decay time either 6 months or 1 year. No furniture moving.

3) Cut Maintenance Costs on Houses in Half - Makes the fact you have to buy a new full-price deed MUCH more bearable. Basicially takes part of that HUGE pool of wasted money and converts it into giving architects job security.

Agreed

SOE would probably have to find a way to remove more money from Architects pockets at the same time to make sure it still left the economy.

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(4) Cut Number of Resources Required for Houses- Allows architects to make an acceptable amount of money off of houses, and (maybe) reduce prices a bit to make rebuying houses less painful.

As stated above... not sure this could be done... but maybe something else to have a similar effect.

To be honest though, with a recuring demand from replacement structures I dont think we would be hurting for money... so allowing structure prices to reamain low probably doesnt matter. The number of Architects might drop a bit, but it will auto balance at some point. I just want it to be viable for a "Reasonable" number of people.

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(5) Harvester Decay - Harvesters get 3rd limiting factor (useful life) to go with maintenance and power. Every harvester has a useful life of 10 days (running time), that can be experimented to 15 (or more if you like). At the end of that time, the harvester stops working and can't be redeeded. It DOES NOT decay or fall apart, because if that were the rule, you would never be able to get the full useful life out of your harvester and would end up losing resources at the end of the harvester's life. Instead, the harvester simply stops harvesting and stays until a player empties it and (1) destroys the harvester, or (2) the harvester runs out of maintence, decays, and disappears.

Sounds good... and can be tweaked by SOE tohigher or lower useful life as necessary. Also a great opportunity to make experimentation matter.

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(6) As for all the problems Reeka raised, only one of them actually deals with decay. I have no thoughts about or problems with any of them EXCEPT for the one about REQUIRING players to buy houses. I think that is a bad idea. People already buy houses. Youare not currently hurting for customers withno forced housing. No one HAS to buy anything in this game, and houses should be no different.

Agree completely.... noone should be forced to buy a house (or any other structure).

Much better to make it a worthwhile thing to do by inproving its benefits past the purely aesthetic.

And on top of all that we ALL agree on GCW destructable structures

You can almost feel the love

Yeah I think everyone would agree that maintenance should be reduced if not taken out with introduction of decay.The argument is strong as in fact, decay WILL take money out of the economy and thats what the developers (but also anyone thinking about a healthy economy) want.

What I dont get is why they dont make houses and furniture more usefull to the playerbase? It is a bad game design to have many professions occupied with uselsess crafting. I would like to see ideas on how to make houses more usefull for non-crafters (like how about to be able to clone there, or better healing etc)

lastl, 15 days the life of a harvester? I dont think so! Who would buy a heavy harvester for 100+ cr when he wouldnt even be able to redeemcosts harvesting for15 days at a 100 spot?Harvesters should be usefull for some time depending on the type and experimentation minerals should last 3-4 months at least while heavies 5-8 months

Actually I think pay mantenance is HOW decay should work.

As a machine gets older, the pay mantenance increases until the user decides to replace it. That puts the decision point at the hands of the machine owner and not some atuomatic clock.

The only time a machine should go "poof" is if doesnt not have pay mantenance for some time.