Artisan Archive

Hey all,

Based upon some conversations I had at Fan Fest, I think there is at least an outside chance that we might see a vehicle revamp, perhaps not a huge one, but some more updates (like multi-passenger).

I thought it'd be timely to discuss ideas for a revamp so we can present a good, solid proposal.

One good idea for a revamp can be found here

Some other thoughts:

Improve experimentation, allow experimentation for:

• Speed
• Terrain Negotiation
• Armor
• Durability

I'd also like to see the deeds reflect the stats, resemble the final product, and be customizable during crafting.

Post your thoughts below.

Guru

The more I think about it, the more I like a single or double optional slot for upgrades/functions
Leaving vehicles fairly as they are with the upgrades being a seperate add in that is optional.

Someone like myself would perfer terrain negate over all around speed, shields over terrain negate.
and I do think having lines to experiment on for those may and will take away from the non HumArts.

Even if it must be an optional slot at crafting time, it would be better then leaving it as experimentation.

i thinka speedometer would be cool

oh and id like a trailer....with storage....that cant be attacked or disabled....

---

Cygnusaa wrote:

i thinka speedometer would be cool

oh and id like a trailer....with storage....that cant be attacked or disabled....

---

definately gimme saddle bags or a travel tote, would work so much better for 50 items instead of 5 droids when I have to deliver.

Here's my idea for a vehicle revamp.

dig it!

---

Ani_cul wrote:

---

Cygnusaa wrote:

i thinka speedometer would be cool

oh and id like a trailer....with storage....that cant be attacked or disabled....

---

definately gimme saddle bags or a travel tote, would work so much better for 50 items instead of 5 droids when I have to deliver.

---

see my vehicle revamp idea...

vehicles should have storage. and it SHOULD be attackable. but also defendable.

challenge and interdependency is what makes this game great. making things too easy and allowing too much independence takes away from the community, and ruins the game.

that's why there should be more professions including Freighter, Miner, and Vehicle Mechanic.

hehe i was just pointing out that i mentioned saddlebags and cargo holds in the vehicle revamp proposal i made a while back.

maybe i should just repost the whole thing in here... hmm

here's the main points of my Vehicle Revamp idea from the link above:

1 - firstfigure out a way to allow passengers in the exsisting 2 seater vehicles (they did it! ), and then create multi-passenger vehicles like sail barges, or sand skiffs for transporting people and goods, and maybe some assault type vehicles for transporting troops. i know vehicles don't, and probably can't have weapons. but assault vehicles should have some guns. maybe make it similar to a baseturret interface, but have the guns be weaker. that would make for some more fun and interesting base raids. (to prevent everyone showing up to a baseblasting away with their assault vehicles see my next point)

2 - they should reduce the amount of items we can carry around. *gasp!*i know they just increased our inventories, but to compensate the loss of inventory space they should add storage compartments to the vehicles. (if a vehicle isdestroyed [different from disabled] with items in it the items are deleted. see point #5. this would prevent having everyone take their assault vehicles to attack bases because they'd need to clear out their storage so they didn't lose any important items). this would make things like the transportation (or even smuggling) of goods more interesting and immersive. and if they made larger vehicles so they could hold more items then someone could even open up a shipping company! (there would be some way for utilizing the new cargo holds they've added to ships, so we can load cargo from vehicles to ships so bulk cargo can move off planet)

saddle bags for the creature mounts and bikes. a "trunk" for the 2 seaters. and a cargo hold for the larger vehicles they've yet to create (bulk freighters, ect.)

i'll follow up with my alternative ideas about inventory space, and finding a use for Binary Load Lifter droids!!!

3 - while making things very convenient, storing and calling vehicles is such a silly idea. we shouldn't be able to store our vehicles anywhere except in a PARKING GARAGE!!!it would make sense to pull into mos eisley and park (store) your bike in the garage, and walk to whereever you're going. parking garages should be similar to starports for the ground game. they would also cost a fee to store your vehicle there (maybe a weekly charge even). you could have your swoop stored in Mos Eisley, your X34 stored in Bestine, and be riding your sand skiff around. or you could just leave yourride outside the building you're going to. but that would mean it would decay. storing your vehicle in a garage would repair all decay.

4 - decay rate of a vehicle should be slowed down tenfold, and instead of worrying about the vehicle's condition so much, add a "fuel" bar that we would be mindful of while riding around. fuel would deplete around the same rate that vehicles currently decay. we already have things like petro-chemicals and various energy types in the game. maybe artisans could craft a fuel-cell for vehicles? it would be very similar to droid batteries.

5 - the only time a vehicle should be disabled/destroyed would be in combat.first a vehicle would be disabled, and then the attacker could perform a "deathblow" on it to fully destroy the vehicle.

you may say "well what if my swoop gets destroyed?" and to that i say "well a swoop is a very delicate vehicle and shouldn't be taken into combat situations".if your swoop is destroyed, call a friend and have them pick you up. maybe next time you'll take a more suitable vehicle into the field.
of course to prevent downtime they would have to increase the speed of all vehicles a bit so that people don'tgetfrustratedthat they can't travel as fast as they used to in their swoop or AV-21. or better yet, allow players to customize their vehicle's engines similar to how we do with ships. but keep artisans as the crafters of the vehicles and their parts. i've heard that they can't really make vehicles go any faster than swoops because of world object loading times, so the current swoop speed would be the top speed for engines.
perhaps the crafted parts for vehicles could be engines, shields/armor, seats, and cargo holds (that way players could decide whether their larger vehicles would be used to transport people or cargo)

6 - bringing your vehicle with you when travelling.
i was thinking about how it would work when you traveled to a planet where you don't own a speeder.
it would be kinda silly to have to own a speeder on every single planet.
i like the idea of loading your speeder onto your MP ship. that keeps with immersion very well.
but not everyone has a MP ship.

so at first i thought we could rent any type of vehicle (except the AV-21) from an NPC found at every starport.
but on second thought i realized renting vehicles could cut deeply into the vehicle sales of artisans.

so instead of being able to rent any type of vehicle, we should only be able to rent the X34 and the Speeder Bike.
this would make buying a vehicle a good option if you were going to be on a planet for a while.
of course they'd have to allow us to own at least 4 (maybe 6) vehicles in our datapads. that would allow us to own vehicles on up to 4 different planets. i don't normally travel to more than 4 planets in my everyday playing.

here's how vehicle rental would work:
you land at a starport and seek out the vehicle rental broker (found at the front desk maybe?). choose which vehicle type you'd like to rent (only X43 or Speederbike).

you keep that vehicle until you leave the planet. you can store it in any parking garage just like normal, but as soon as you leave the planet, it would poof from your datapad. also you can NOT modify a rental vehicle by swapping out parts.
the vehicle rental idea is pretty immersive because it gives more of a sense that your VISITING a planet, and not just freely travelling across lightyears and parsecs. also vehicle rental would be a credit sink, something the devs seem to always look for.

i think that both ideas would work well togehter. allow those with MP ships to take their vehicle with them. and allow those without MP ships to rent vehicles from the starport they land at.

a more immersive inventory and finding a use for those Binary Load Lifter droids (this DOES have to do with a Vehicle Revamp because it's a key part of my revamp idea):

perhaps an alternative to reducing our inventory space, would be to flag certain items as being "heavy" items. meaning we can NOT place these items in our invetory. "heavy" items would be any resource stacks, starship and vehicle parts, and crates of large items like crafting components. this is where the Binary Load Lifter droids come into play! (finally a use for those big monsters! )

here's how i envision a "heavy" item system working:
let's say you're shopping for resources. you find a good vendor and purchase the resources. but to retrieve those "heavy" items you would bring along your Binary Load Lifter friend. simply have him follow you, and he acts like an extension of your inventory that is able to hold "heavy" items. then you go outside to your vehicle, open up the cargo hold, and place all the items from your Lifter droid into your cargo hold. then you take off for your workshop and reverse the process so the resources go back to your Lifter droid. you can also drop items from your Lifter into your house or factory.

but you CAN NOT store your Binary Load Lifter with any items in it (unless it's got a storage module)!
however, you CAN store vehicles (in a garage only) with items in the cargo hold. also you CAN transport vehicles between planets via Multi-passenger ship while the vehicle has items in its cargo hold.

and for when you're crafting, you simply have the Lifter droid out, nearby, with the neccessary resources or components loaded into the droid's inventory and it works the same as if it were in your own inventory.
basically the Binary Load Lifter becomes a crafter's best friend, and an extension of your inventory to hold crafting items.

also when a person who doesn't own a Binary Load Lifter purchases a starship component, you will be able to somehow allow them to access your Lifter droid's inventory so that they can plug the components into their ship or vehicle.
how you allow them can be as simple as a droid command you can toggle on or off, or most likely add them to an admin list. you would follow them to the starship terminal, or vehicle garage, and allow them to choose the components they'd like to load. then the components they'd like to take out would go into your droid, and they could load them back into their own vehicle.


you may ask, "why bother?". well to that i say, IMMERSION and CHALLENGE.

immersion because it makes no sense to be able to carry the world on your shoulders. 100k units of steel, gemstone, radioactive material? how does it make sense that we can carry that in our pockets or backpacks?
it doesn't.

challenge because of this:
i know the system we have right now is convenient. but i feel it's too convenient.
we're able to just go anywhere, at any time, and pick up anything, and drop it anywhere.
we don't have to THINK very much when moving through this virtual world.

having a system of limitations, and needing tools or interdependency to get things done is VITAL to a successful MMORPG. this "heavy" item system, along with my other Vehicle Revamp ideas would provide us with choices and challenges, and more interdependency.

examples of good MMORPG interdependency:

- say there's a resource vendor on Rori which has a certain type of resource you need. your workshop is on Corellia. you'd like to purchase this resource, but don't spend much time on Rori so you have no vehicle there. also you're not much of a space jockey so you have no multi-passenger ship.
you now have to make a choice.
do you hire a frieghter pilot to transport you and your cargo vehicle to and from Rori?
do you hire a frieghter to retrieve the resources from Rori and deliver them to your workshop?
do you contact the resource seller and have them deliver the resources to your workshop?

- say a person who doesn't own a Binary Load Lifter purchases a starship engine, they want to load this new engine into their ship, but they can't just carry it off on their back from your shop. so they schedule a delivery to the starport they're docked at. you, the Freighter, will be able to somehow allow them to access your Lifter droid's inventory so that they can plug the components into their ship or vehicle.
(how you allow them can be as simple as a droid command you can toggle on or off, or most likely add them to an admin list.)
you could meet them at the Shipwright shop and allow them to load the new engine onto your Lifter droid, or they could hire you to actually purchase and deliver the engine to the starport where their ship is docked and meet you there.
you would follow them to the starship terminal and allow them to load the engine into their ship. then the old engine would go into your droid, and they could load it back into their own vehicle's cargo hold. or they can sell it to you, or just have you dispose of it, or destory it on the spot.


i know it sounds complicated, but i think it would be fairly simple. and it would DEFINITELY be more immersive and promote more interdependency.