Architect Archive
Thread: Future of the profession
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WeasleMASC
Sat Jul 17, 2004 11:15 am
#1
I write this because I see no other simular thread. Most professions have one stickied. You know everyone looking for changes in their profession in order to "fix" broken aspects. Or even to allow some of the things I do see here. like color changes, GCW crafting things like this.
On the Bloodfin galaxy I am certainly one of the servers "biggest" or at least biggest named Architects. I have made literally 1000's of medium and 1000's of heavy harvesters. I have made and yes already spent sever hundred million credits. maybe billions I dunno. I have run over 200 harvesters all at once. I have made 29BER fusion back in the day, and 14 BER mineral/gas/flora/chem... regular harvesters on that one day thing. I still run 8 strusture factories, and additionally have a ton of extra storage. So to say it simply I have dont it all in Architect.
I do however have a concern for the profession. Prices are dropping, or have dropped. Cities are built out, and the only demand for new houses is when players switch planets, thery forget to maintain their old house, or they are part of the trickle of new players to the game. Medium harvesters specificly have been totally saturated. hologrinding is done. Static lot swaps are long forgotten and new ones are much much less frequent. Heavy harvesters are declining in sales and in number. I have been able to keep well over 100 heavy harvesters in stock on my vendor for a while now. Sure I could drop price to pathetic levels and sell em faster, but the point remains that the profession is wilting.
I want to know what the game has in store for my profession? I want a few moew house designs. I want the 12 exp points I have mean something. I want to be able to make factories that work faster. I want to make factories that hold more. same with houses. I want to make building of different color maybe. I want to make military structures. I want to continue to be an architect, but I can see very few reasons to do so at this point.
I stand to make more mooney selling the millions of server best resources I harvested over my career than I do making anything in my datapad.
I am not a complainer, nor am I complaining now. I just want to know what the general concensus is. I definately want to hear from someone about what the plan is. What are you going to do to make Architect worth the points? especially after shipwright comes out and no one cares about planets any more.
I pre ordered this game because of the promise of Architect and Urban planner.
someone please let me know what I can expect in the future?
or should I just talk my Arch and just use my PvP alt?
weasle
Bloodfins finest 
Dvnce
Sat Jul 17, 2004 1:15 pm
#2
the game aspect which directly involves us Is not as bleak as the view is begging to look to some.. I totaly Understand this feeling... I have been an arch for almost a year now.. ...
As far as our future... There are some good things in the works.. although nothing as been said specifically I know More structures will be coming.. More furniture.. and almost every profession has a tuneup planned if not a complete over haul.. and the devs are no where near done with player cities...
since my time as correspondent the devs have grown tremendously in how much they actually listen to what we are saying the players want.. Which is awesome for everyprofession...
As for problems with our profession we are one of the lucky ones that really dont have many to deal with... and what we do have to deal with are mostly inneffective attempts to gate our production.. I mean realistically the vision was that maybe if you had been in the game as long as I have playing only an architect we would in the near future be working on our 1000 house and 1000 harvester... but instead we have people mastering in 18 minutes and pumping out 1000 structures in there first few weeks..
a few of us( the correspondents ) are pretty much demanding.. that since we are having the jedi rebalance .. combat rebalance ... that we too need to have a Social Game Rebalance... and a Crafting Rebalance... there are better ways to gate certain aspects other than just annoying blocks that are easily oversteped...
As for as Hope for something better... I dont like to waste my time.. it is too valuable for what I do in RL.. I was seriously going to qive up on this game about 1 month and a half ago.. But.. what kept me here and .. actually is beggining to make the game fun again.. was a small glimpse of the future I was given... So is there Hope? Hell Ya..
I know this may not be exactly what you are looking to hear.. ( and I will reread it when I get a little more sleep and add or take away from it if need be) I will put some deep thought specifically on the questions that you have posted here and write up a request to share some of this glimpse into the future and send it straight to TH's Personal Email...
WeasleMASC
Sat Jul 17, 2004 2:24 pm
#3
Let me reply and flesh out my thoughts a wee bit better for your sake and for everyone that might read this threads sake.
I was an SWG Architect the minute that my friend e-mailed me a developers note about what professions they were planning for the game. That was surely over two years ago. I can live without the City Planner profession. it is kind of redundent and is better left to Sim City .
. On the day of launch I set fourth trying to figure out this game and did nothing but advance up engineering 4. me and my friends had houses pretty early on and well I was there for all of it. I was the Architect for my 10-15 frinds that were playing and one of the very few architects on talus. Eventually the econemy matured a little people could afford to pay what a harvester was worth. Houses were springing up everywhere and they all needed furniture. I saw a way to make very good money (on a CPU level) mass producing furniture. I made my first million right around when player cities came out. I never much got into making houses as there was very little profit in it and well no variation or experimentation. so I got in on harvesters and have yet to leave. 10BER medium harvesters in conjunction with the birth of the hologrinder made me millions. tens of millions hundreds of millions. I did cross server lot swaps to keep up with the demand I had for low grade. I hired dozens of guild mates and others to harvest ore for me full time. I never had enough oreeven when I was bringing in 4-7 million a week at one of my 10x10 100 harvester fields. I have recived and filled order of 200+ heavy harvesters. I have recived and filled many orders orders of 200+ 10BER medium harvesters. I provided housing and harvesters for free within my guild. I totally gave up on furniture and basicly did my best to save money for space expansion (so I could buy a star destroyer) yes this was my joke but it was also kinda my plan. all this while I never did any PvP never did any other profession(mastered artisan without trying but you know it hels as Archie) eventually took novice pistoleer to make it easier to tend my harvesters. I have 8 structure factories, and often would borrow 3 from one friend and 2 from another when I had to pump out tons of walls to meet a largeorder. I have all 8 of those factories packed full of resources. I also have 3 small houses 3 medium houses and 2 medical centers all used for storage. I do not have any decoration in any building. everything is for function.
So yeah Like I said I really really pushed this profession as far as it possibly could be pushed. I have tought countless other Architects how to craft and what to charge and well all that mentor crap. I up untill recently could sum up my entire SWG gaming experience to be centered and built around this profession.
Give me achance to make decent money at my chosen crafting profession much like every other profession has.
I am not saying I want harvesters to fall apart or something so I can make more money, but my PvP alt character is not cheap. he has easily cost me a couple hundred mill to set up. If I cant make good money as an Architct I need to do something else. and I dont want to do anything else. If even 1 type of house is added for each planet type, there will be a demand to keep architects going for another 2 months. if after those 2 months another house is introduced, than you just bought me another 2 months. if they raise the MAX BER possible(keep the crafting rules the same) just 1 point on all manner of harvester(within reason) you just get all of us busy for at least 2 more months.
furniture can go F--- Its self. I am an Architect, not a damn Interior designer. this game has bent its self over backwards for interior design. You can make 1,000,000 different furniture styles and you have done nothing for the architect community. there might as well be a "designer" profession that includes furniture painting and Image design. I have run a multi million dollar construction company IRL. I have worked with dozens of architects, maybe hundreds, and not a single one of them worked with furnature. They would be offended to do so.
ok I have lost my focus again now.
One last huge pressing question.
What to do after JTL and everyone heads off to space never to land anywhere near my vendors again?
will I get to design space stations? no I didnt think so. So please talk to people and figure out what we face ASAP. Actually we can figure it out and work together, but well its time to start.
all that being said. I have a whole lot more of summer to enjoy. sso thats enough of this. besides I am off work now
thanks for the reples and I will be back
Pawlin
Sat Jul 17, 2004 2:43 pm
#4
First there is no need to bash the furniture. If you don't like it thats fine then don't build it. But it is part of our profession and some of us enjoy it. Ya its not exactly the same as making houses but its closer to it than other professions and it complements our house sales. It was a game design choice to combine furniture and housing and I think it was a pretty rational one.
WeasleMASC wrote:
...What to do after JTL and everyone heads off to space never to land anywhere near my vendors again?
will I get to design space stations? no I didnt think so. So please talk to people and figure out what we face ASAP. Actually we can figure it out and work together, but well its time to start....
It remains to be seen if any of the spaceships will require components from existing professions. That is a possibility.
However, I do know that spaceships will require a lot of resources and they are very likely to decay in some way. This will raise demand for resources. Which will in turn raise demand for harvesters.
Locs
Sat Jul 17, 2004 3:37 pm
#5
I have Read through this ( about 10 mins of solid reading lol) and you 2 have inspired me to great things for that i thank you, and now i am begining to question what the use is in JTL, personally i get money from harvesters not houses, not furniture, not city Building but tonnes from Mdium and Large harvesters, i treat my self to a painting or 2 some times but thats justa bit of fun
So thank you to Weasle and Pawlin and to Mr CRS, you probably made me the richest i have ever been lol not 100 of billion richness but about 9-10 mill rich and hoping t expand, thanks.
shaunly
Sat Jul 17, 2004 4:21 pm
#6
Thanks for the posts guys, it's always interesting to read about what may be happening in our profession. My sentiments rest with those who would like to see some improvements in our profession in regards to experimentation and/or additions. I have my doubts as to how quickly we'll see any attention from the Devs though b/c they seem to have alot of other revamps in mind ... and other urgencies are bound to come up with the expansion's release and other updates.
Still, I enjoy being an architect. I haven't enjoyed the prosperities others have listed here in terms of making millions of credits, but I'm a recent master and missed the holo-grinding harvestor rush. Still, I've seen consistent, if not steadily increasing, business on my vendors ... particularly after I setup a merchant tent about a week ago. I've been surprised with the items which have been selling ... plants, paintings, and furniture have been some of my best sellers. True they are not the most profitable items, but they don't take much with regards to resources either.
I wish I could figure out how to make more though b/c my current build includes TKM to supplement my income as necessary and I would like to be able to ditch that in favor of more merchant and perhaps master artisan. Oh well, guess I'll figure that out at some point.
Anyways, in reading this thread, I'd really love to see some quotes from the Devs regarding where the profession is going b/c I can understand how it could get stale after a while.
Pawlin
Sun Jul 18, 2004 12:45 am
#7
Dvnce,
Is there any word from the DEVs about anything in the future for architects?
Weasle is not alone in feeling that our profession is dying a slow, silent death. Supply and demand will keep a few architects business going. But what new and FUN things are there to keep us interested?
WeasleMASC
Mon Jul 19, 2004 1:23 pm
#8
So you say you want to make more money?
no problem I can tell ya the best way for an Architecvt to make substantial amounts of money. but as you read, There is a limiting capacity to it and well you will never make money like Chefs do these days, or as Weaponsmiths and Armorsmiths have.
First off you need to make medium Mineral harvesters. you need to be able to make the 10BER ones. this is not really hard at all, you just gotta be sure to have some decent resources.
also if it is at all possible always be sure to be everything in as large of factory runs as possible as each harvester in this profession can take alot of resources and well to make a schematic you basicly loose alot.
10 BER mediums take very little resources to make and you can sell them for extremely low amounts and still make a decent profit. I sell mine for, well, alot and I dont feel guilty doing it. I suggest naming your schematic 10BER med mineral or something with that in it for the convenience of your customer.
and I dont feel guilty doing it. I suggest naming your schematic 10BER med mineral or something with that in it for the convenience of your customer. when you can afford to put a few of these aside, you need to start setting up fields of static harvesters.
you can make characters on other severs and you can have people from those servers place harvesters for you. its pretty easy to do. but be sure not to waste the swappers time. Just keep doing this untill you have a field of harvesters on your server. if you are on the admin list and have efficiency in the merchent tree you get a 20% deduction in their maintenance cost. this may not matter much when you are running 10 harvesters, but trust me, when you are running 50, 100, 200 it really adds up.
use these statics to always harvest ore. even if the best concentration is something like 20% you still are getting it way cheaper than 1 CPU. and when you make harvesters you should be getting 3-6 CPU.
anyways with architect you get loyal customers when you are always stocked.
and when some incredible resource spawns those water harvs will fly off the shelves. or the gas will, whatever. if you are ready, and you help out some big time crafters on your server when somewthing spawns, then you are set. but the problem is Architect truely becomes another job for you as maintaining all those harvesters is something that weoighs on yout and well it eventually becomes un-fun. but well it is a way to get rich.
also as soon as you can you need to make your generators in runs of 1000. it is such a pain to mess with smaller runs of generators. and I know it may sound crazy, but it is the single best simplification to your crafting experience.
Oh yeah and why does SOE wait like 6 months and change everything at once. if they just pop out a few structures here and there it would make it more enjoyable and prolongue consistant business. but in every profession they seem to hold everything back till the last bit is done that let it all loose. I think it would be easier for them too. but I am not programer so who knows
weasle
Sevardos
Mon Jul 19, 2004 4:49 pm
#9
You're under-estimating furniture - big time in my opinion.
In the 3 months I've started selling it (when I opened my shop), I've made 12M in furniture ALONE. You might scoff at that number, but I look at is this way, I make a higher cpu and I don't have to keep running for resources.
Furniture is an add-on like batteries for an electronic toy, fries with your burger, etc. It also keeps the revenue flow stable because I find harvester sales to be streaky - you can have little to no sales in almost week, and then one day your vendors get cleaned out. I find furniture to be a constant and steady revenue stream.
Anyways, not necessarily disagreeing with the original poster, just responding to the furniture comment.
StumanKadir
Mon Jul 19, 2004 5:35 pm
#10
I'm not seeing any slowing down in the profession, nor any kind of saturation, in fact the exact opposite. In the last couple of weeks I have chewed through close to 4m units of ore and another mil and a bit of iron and steel. I have had my vendors (furniture and harvs) almost cleaned out on a few occasions and have gone from spending lots of time hunting, to lots of time crafting.
But having said all that, the profession is getting rather stale and has fallen into a routine (with the odd crit failure thrown in to keep you on your toes 
). Experimentation doesn't do much for us, our range of goods is pretty much the same as others in our profession and with the exception of the 6 weekly painting change, we haven't had a new item to craft since Lamps and candle were introduced.
). Experimentation doesn't do much for us, our range of goods is pretty much the same as others in our profession and with the exception of the 6 weekly painting change, we haven't had a new item to craft since Lamps and candle were introduced.I agree with Pawlin thoughin that JTL will have the capacity to increase the business for us as a profession, and that the resources needed to keep fleets of starships in space will be massive.
The other side of the coin to JTL though is that many architects will more than likely make the switch to Shipwright upon JTLs release. This isowing to a "natural fit" that we as a profession has over the other crafting profs (who else is used to dealing in accumulating resources that are counted in the multiples of hundred thousands?). This in turn will lead to a massive dilution of the profession, etc.
There are still some fun things left for us to do (I just recently managed to make my first +43.2 Crafting Stations - something that has taken me close to a year to achieve owing to lack of suitable resources), but not many aside from making money.
Sevardos
Mon Jul 19, 2004 7:18 pm
#11
StumanKadir wrote:
There are still some fun things left for us to do (I just recently managed to make my first +43.2 Crafting Stations - something that has taken me close to a year to achieve owing to lack of suitable resources), but not many aside from making money.
Hehe, I'm on that trek myself now. Although, my success in finding the resources have been fruitless so far.
Fneegan
Tue Jul 20, 2004 7:35 am
#12
The plan is:
The many lots swappings and hoarding of resources has already done it's damaged and we'll feel it's impact. It's just a matter of time.
Sure, the market is still buying and selling - probably evenmore now than ever. This is thepost Hologrind.Of course, there's too much and too cheap and some current players are picking it up on this too - while it last. But, IT WILL SLOWDOWN as other things fall into play.
Your analysis of the current situation seem accurate.
1. SOE will do something about lots, especially cross server lot swapping. Possibly, assigning harvester lots to specific mining/crafting profession only. I see a LOT rebalance and more lotcontrol happening. See:
http://swg.stratics.com/content/?Cat=264&uid=488
"justG - We are looking at ALL lot limits, and the exploits that allow you to have access to many many many lots."
"justG - We are looking at ALL lot limits, and the exploits that allow you to have access to many many many lots."
2. HoloGrinding is gone with Jedi Revamps. There is absolutely no reason to grind professions now and players will tend toremain longer in fewer and chosen professions. This means less of a demand for:
- harvesters, factories, andresources
3.Prices dropping. We see it already happening- resources (high qual resources)for 1cpu.
4. Anticipate many:
- willdrop or reducetheir multiple accounts
- will drop or reduce the sizes of their harvesterfarms
-who have amassed and hoarded resources and crafted items will now be dumping theminto the economy at far lower prices to get rid of their stockpiles, multiple accounts.An increase in sales in the Trade forum.
- many will be staying in one or two professions for muchlonger periods
5. Having this abundancy in lots,resources, itemsand money may have been offset by the hologrinding but now it has to go somewhere. Players are now getting everything for free or for far too little(houses,speeders,credits,stuctures, armor, weapons). Prices will continue dropping.
6. This and JTL, will make a number of current and other established Architects leave the profession for something new, either going combat or a new JTL profession.
7. After this infux of resources and items and established arch for new arch, everything will balance. It's all about balancing the FORCEs....
8.SOE will continue attracting more and new players as they will continue developing and making SWG a great game. More content and player activities to be added.Only good things on the horizon.
Locs
Tue Jul 20, 2004 9:18 am
#13
Hope your right Fnee, nice post BTW. I am gonna be in BIG trouble when the limited lots stuff comes out
i barley got enough rescorces atm, and i got about 30 harvesters down, thats probably nothing for you but for me thats alot, in maintanance and Power
LOL i have jsutr got settled and now there is gonna be a disturbance so that i need to get RE-settled (if thee is such a word)
Hope this dont effect archis too much
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