Architect Archive

You know I spent several days grinding out items working as hard as I could to get to architect. The MORNING after I finally make novice architect they patch the game and make italmost impossible for me to continue in this profession. If I had known these changes were going to be made I would have never spent that 33kxp to become an architect ... I could have used it to master artisan. Though I understand alot of the adv artisan professions are screwed in one way or another.

Anytime you make changes that siginifigantly affect a profession you should allow players the option of turning in the skills and regaining all the xp that went into obtaining those skills. I worked my way up to architect with a set idea on how it was supposed to be. After i finally make it the rules are changed and I get screwed.

I'm a semi casual gamer. I seem to be spending all my time performing maintenance work just to get a few resources before they dissappear and I have to start all over. You wanted to make harvestors more attractive than macro sampling. But you also wanted to make it harder to run a harvestor. So you make it harder to run a harvestor and you nerf sampling. great............

The only reason I was doing any crafting in the first place was because it was setup in a away I could deal with.

Did I macro sample. Yes because you put the functionality in the game.

Did I let harvestors rot? Yes because the costs of maintaining the harvestors were out of sync with what the harvestors provided. (Now its even worse.)

Did I produce crappy items and not bother to sell them? Yes because your system made it easier to craft/destroy rather than craft/experiment/sell. There is no xp bonus for experimenting on an item and since in alot of cases you cant tell what improvements have been made on an item there is no point with experimenting... it just increases the time it takes to make the stupid item.

How can you fix it?

1. Increase the time it takes a resource to Turnover from 5-8 days to 3-4 weeks. IRL Mosting mining spots last several years. The game ones should last at least 1 in-game year. This will make running harvestors more convienent and plausable.

2. Allow harvestors to run below 100%.

A. Harvestors become less efficient the more damaged they become.

B. Harvestors that are severely damaged start suffering total failure chances where if the harvestor suffers a failure it breaks down and If it suffers a critical failure it permanently breaks down and cannot be repaired.

3.Remove the credit cost of Harvestors/Structures.

A. Add a schematic to crafters for Structural repair kits. Varying kinds for varying structures.

B. Add a schematic to droid engineers for modules that give droids the ability to maintain and repair harvestors.

4.Remove the need for me to go out ever few hours to check on my harvestors.

A. Add a schematic to Droid Engineers for modules that will allow droids to create a remote interface between your data pad and the harvestor allowing you to remotely operate your harvestors.

B. Direct link to power sources removing the tedious step of me having to collect materials from the wind collector and put them into the harvestor. Or at least let droids do it.

5. Have resources actually match the kind of planet they are on. Why am I harvesting wood on tatooine? Why is solar power not uniform or fairly uniform over a desert planet? Of course weather effects not included.

6. There is nothign wrong with macro sampling.... you can only do one resource at a time anyways. Making the skill cost more doesn't really hurt macro'rs anyway. we just adjust our macros accordingly. To be honest though I find it odd that in most cases I can sample more than a harvestor. For every 1 resource I can sample by hand I should be able to get at least 5 through the simplest of harvestor. What should be done is improve the gathering of harvestors to help offset the cost of repairing them (which should be substantial considering the cost of a droid and the repair kits and such.)

7. When Harvestors are not operating they should decay at a greatly reduced rate.

8. Harvestors that breakdown or reach 0% effectiveness do not immediately disappear. They remain for 7 RT days. This allows time for the more casual player to come and either repair or take down.

9. Harvestors that have not been operating for a long time can suffer permanent failure upon startup.

10. All materials int he harvestor at the time it is broken down should be returned to the player.

11. Instead of harvestor farms how about showing just one harvestor and each additional you put down adds on like a node. The more nodes you have the more it costs in repair kits to maintain but it only takes up one lot. Of course there would be a limit on how many nodes one could put on but it would improve the crafters ability to harvest without letting non artisans to overrun the planet with buildings.

The ideal situation would be you setup your harvestors - you link power generators tot he harvestors. You setup an npc or droid to maintain the setup. you provide the necessary kits to allow repairs and such. if anything goes wrong your npc/droid can communicate to you remotely and allow you to fix it through them.