Bio Engineer Archive

Thread: Experimentation Changes, Alternatives

Redguard
Tue Mar 16, 2004 1:26 pm
#14




Since G just posted the plan to implement experimentation changes has been halted it's time the player base thought of some ways to add diversity into crafting. I was not in favor of this particular change but something is needed to create diversity of product. I can understand why the dev team was trying to make the change but there must be other alternatives. Many of us are going to count this as a victory but it's best we start comming up with acceptable ideas that we all can live with.


This post is intended to gather up alot of the ideas discussed in the Test thread regarding the experimentation changes and have a discussion unencumbered by the fear of the nerf it would have become. We shouldexplore some of the ideas and provide some insight as to howthe changes they propose could havesome positiveaffects to SWG.Lets do this people and provide an opportunity for us to give something back to the game that the dev team can work with and we can deal with.


Obvious issues such as Hologrinding,duping/exploits, prenerf items have had a problematic affect upon the games economy. While we must learn to live with the legacy of past mistakes we need to also lean to live with progressive changes. We need to also face the facts that not all changes are going to be popular and SOME balance adjustments will be required.


Lets break it down into 3 categories:


1. Economic Improvements: What can be done to fix the economy of SWG?


2. Crafting Improvements: What changes can be made to create more diversity of product?


3. Generic Improvements: What can be done to SWG to make game play more enjoyable?





Given the choice between style over substance. I'll take a sandwich.
Redguard
Tue Mar 16, 2004 1:31 pm
#15


Since G just posted the plan to implement experimentation changes has been halted it's time the player base thought of some ways to add diversity into crafting. I was not in favor of this particular change but something is needed to create diversity of product. I can understand why the dev team was trying to make the change but there must be other alternatives. Many of us are going to count this as a victory but it's best we start comming up with acceptable ideas that we all can live with.


This post is intended to gather up alot of the ideas discussed in the Test thread regarding the experimentation changes and have a discussion unencumbered by the fear of the nerf it would have become. We shouldexplore some of the ideas and provide some insight as to howthe changes they propose could havesome positiveaffects to SWG.Lets do this people and provide an opportunity for us to give something back to the game that the dev team can work with and we can deal with.


Obvious issues such as Hologrinding,duping/exploits, prenerf items have had a problematic affect upon the games economy. While we must learn to live with the legacy of past mistakes we need to also lean to live with progressive changes. We need to also face the facts that not all changes are going to be popular and SOME balance adjustments will be required.


Lets break it down into 3 categories:


1. Economic Improvements: What can be done to fix the economy of SWG?


2. Crafting Improvements: What changes can be made to create more diversity of product?


3. Generic Improvements: What can be done to SWG to make game play more enjoyable?




Given the choice between style over substance. I'll take a sandwich.
Redguard
Tue Mar 16, 2004 1:39 pm
#16


Since G just posted the plan to implement experimentation changes has been halted it's time the player base thought of some ways to add diversity into crafting. I was not in favor of this particular change but something is needed to create diversity of product. I can understand why the dev team was trying to make the change but there must be other alternatives. Many of us are going to count this as a victory but it's best we start comming up with acceptable ideas that we all can live with.


This post is intended to gather up alot of the ideas discussed in the Test thread regarding the experimentation changes and have a discussion unencumbered by the fear of the nerf it would have become. We shouldexplore some of the ideas and provide some insight as to howthe changes they propose could havesome positiveaffects to SWG.Lets do this people and provide an opportunity for us to give something back to the game that the dev team can work with and we can deal with.


Obvious issues such as Hologrinding,duping/exploits, prenerf items have had a problematic affect upon the games economy. While we must learn to live with the legacy of past mistakes we need to also lean to live with progressive changes. We need to also face the facts that not all changes are going to be popular and SOME balance adjustments will be required.


Lets break it down into 3 categories:


1. Economic Improvements: What can be done to fix the economy of SWG?


2. Crafting Improvements: What changes can be made to create more diversity of product?


3. Generic Improvements: What can be done to SWG to make game play more enjoyable?





Given the choice between style over substance. I'll take a sandwich.
Redguard
Tue Mar 16, 2004 1:40 pm
#17



Since G just posted the plan to implement experimentation changes has been halted it's time the player base thought of some ways to add diversity into crafting. I was not in favor of this particular change but something is needed to create diversity of product. I can understand why the dev team was trying to make the change but there must be other alternatives. Many of us are going to count this as a victory but it's best we start comming up with acceptable ideas that we all can live with.


This post is intended to gather up alot of the ideas discussed in the Test thread regarding the experimentation changes and have a discussion unencumbered by the fear of the nerf it would have become. We shouldexplore some of the ideas and provide some insight as to howthe changes they propose could havesome positiveaffects to SWG.Lets do this people and provide an opportunity for us to give something back to the game that the dev team can work with and we can deal with.


Obvious issues such as Hologrinding,duping/exploits, prenerf items have had a problematic affect upon the games economy. While we must learn to live with the legacy of past mistakes we need to also lean to live with progressive changes. We need to also face the facts that not all changes are going to be popular and SOME balance adjustments will be required.


Lets break it down into 3 categories:


1. Economic Improvements: What can be done to fix the economy of SWG?


2. Crafting Improvements: What changes can be made to create more diversity of product?


3. Generic Improvements: What can be done to SWG to make game play more enjoyable?





Given the choice between style over substance. I'll take a sandwich.
Redguard
Tue Mar 16, 2004 1:43 pm
#18




Since G just posted the plan to implement experimentation changes has been halted it's time the player base thought of some ways to add diversity into crafting. I was not in favor of this particular change but something is needed to create diversity of product. I can understand why the dev team was trying to make the change but there must be other alternatives. Many of us are going to count this as a victory but it's best we start comming up with acceptable ideas that we all can live with.


This post is intended to gather up alot of the ideas discussed in the Test thread regarding the experimentation changes and have a discussion unencumbered by the fear of the nerf it would have become. We shouldexplore some of the ideas and provide some insight as to howthe changes they propose could havesome positiveaffects to SWG.Lets do this people and provide an opportunity for us to give something back to the game that the dev team can work with and we can deal with.


Obvious issues such as Hologrinding,duping/exploits, prenerf items have had a problematic affect upon the games economy. While we must learn to live with the legacy of past mistakes we need to also lean to live with progressive changes. We need to also face the facts that not all changes are going to be popular and SOME balance adjustments will be required.


Lets break it down into 3 categories:


1. Economic Improvements: What can be done to fix the economy of SWG?


2. Crafting Improvements: What changes can be made to create more diversity of product?


3. Generic Improvements: What can be done to SWG to make game play more enjoyable?





Given the choice between style over substance. I'll take a sandwich.
Redguard
Tue Mar 16, 2004 1:48 pm
#19





Since G just posted the plan to implement experimentation changes has been halted it's time the player base thought of some ways to add diversity into crafting. I was not in favor of this particular change but something is needed to create diversity of product. I can understand why the dev team was trying to make the change but there must be other alternatives. Many of us are going to count this as a victory but it's best we start comming up with acceptable ideas that we all can live with.


This post is intended to gather up alot of the ideas discussed in the Test thread regarding the experimentation changes and have a discussion unencumbered by the fear of the nerf it would have become. We shouldexplore some of the ideas and provide some insight as to howthe changes they propose could havesome positiveaffects to SWG.Lets do this people and provide an opportunity for us to give something back to the game that the dev team can work with and we can deal with.


Obvious issues such as Hologrinding,duping/exploits, prenerf items have had a problematic affect upon the games economy. While we must learn to live with the legacy of past mistakes we need to also lean to live with progressive changes. We need to also face the facts that not all changes are going to be popular and SOME balance adjustments will be required.


Lets break it down into 3 categories:


1. Economic Improvements: What can be done to fix the economy of SWG?


2. Crafting Improvements: What changes can be made to create more diversity of product?


3. Generic Improvements: What can be done to SWG to make game play more enjoyable?





Given the choice between style over substance. I'll take a sandwich.
Redguard
Tue Mar 16, 2004 11:08 pm
#20

Pervel


Basicly we're dealing with an economic system that generates alot of money for players but takes little out. The credit surplus creates a deflationary spiral which means that while we may charge more for our goods we're getting less. We should be at least. Many people are content to dump resources on the market for 2.5 cpu. or create items and sell them well beyond cost of production.Some of these people are hologrinders, hunters, inexperienced or involved in lot sharing schemes that allow them a large number of lots to place harvesters on.


This complicates things for the new crafter. He may be able to buy cheap resources but where is he going to get the credits from when he's competing with people who have access to a huge amount of resources or dont care about the cost of production because they're not invested in the crafting class (Hologrinders). Many of the low end items that people can craft are so inferior to established crafters that even most newbies will wait and buy the better gun. Add to this legacy items such as prenerf FWG5's and the new crafter has a snowballs chance in Hades of turning any sort of profit from their trade until they hit master.


While in a real economic modelbusinessesthat make inferior goods often go bankrupt it needs to be understood that this is a game and for the sake of balance and equity everyone who becomes a crafter should have the opportunity to succeed. You're right about the experimentation changes. It would have limited the opportunity to those who allready had a great deal of economic power (established masters with skill tapes etc) and limited the chance for the new crafter to succeed.


There needs to be some way to establish play friendly money sinks to takecredits out of the economy. Player cities have allready done this to some extent but I've known people who have bankrolled city costs by themselves for a time. Vehicles also presented an opportunity for a money sink. It makes sense that if an artisan can make a vehicle he should be able to fix it but what the dev team opted for was garages. I would imagine that at some point there will be a galactic salestax which will take a few more credits from the game. The challenge that the dev team has is to make it so that it doesn't hurt the pocket too much, affects everyone equally and won't stagnate trade.





Given the choice between style over substance. I'll take a sandwich.
darknacht
Tue Mar 16, 2004 11:13 pm
#21
The old saying goes....there are lies, d a m n lies, and statistics...but there is one more...economics theories
Redguard
Tue Mar 16, 2004 11:15 pm
#22

Arcid posted:






Another thing would be to have seperate distinct "Ideal formulas" for each seperate stat, if such things as utilising values as negative numbers for particular slots were implemented, you could set the formulas up so that the ideal mix for one aspect of the construction would mean that the other aspects are horrible (Imagine a piece of armour that was made with over 6000 units of the ideal metals, now think how much that would weigh, and how much the HAM for that would be





The issue here is that an item made from 6000 units of anything would generate way too much xp. Experience is based on the amount of resources used in the craft. This is why the Master Artisan can use vehicles to craft his way into almost any craftingprofession with comparative ease.The dev team probably wouldn't implement this as it would be seen as a huge shortcut to grinding through the profession. While the player base may love this idea I'm sure a lead designer wouldplace it under never going to happen file.




Given the choice between style over substance. I'll take a sandwich.
SpaceGolfer
Tue Mar 16, 2004 11:27 pm
#23

First off, the economy is not broken. Secondly, real world economic strategies will NOT work in a Video Game that is not designed to emulate a real-world economy.


As a non-Master WS, I have my own opinion about making experimentation more diversified. DON'T TOUCH IT!


Here's why, right now, the other fields for weapons, Durability, Range, and Efficiency mean just about nothing anymore. Due to skill mods on the proffessions, Range and Accuracy Modifers don't mean much so why bother experimenting on that line. Weapons are so easy to repair and put back into service, why bother with durability? And with Doc Buffs, who cares about HAM Costs? So that leaves us to just focus on Damage and Speed and if we happen to have any other EX Points left, toss them in another area. Being a former combatant, I know that all anyone cares about is damage per second. That's it.


What I suggest is making the other values on a weapon more meainingful. Make the HAM costs a PERCENTAGE OF TOTAL instead of a static value. Make the RANGE VALUES MORE MEANINGFULL so that a weapon with +80 at ideal range will hit A LOT MORE than a weapon with +30. And probably my most unpopular idea will be to REMOVE WEAPON REPAIR ENTIRELY. Maybe then people will actually CARE about DURABILITY.


Those are my suggestions. Stop messing around with EXPERIMENTATION!!!





Arguing on the internet is like competing in the special olympics. Even if you win, you're still retarded.


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cwhooks
Tue Mar 16, 2004 11:46 pm
#24

I think the biggest problem with variability is that nothing is really constant with any of it. Even with this new system, depending on wha tyou experiment on a great success could be 2% or it could be 8%! Some items have 1 experimentation tree, others have 4! In most cases when you have more than 1 experimentation tree, there really is only 1 choice in which tree to experiment on. All of the others are just 'also rans'... So either we need to get ALOT more milage out of our points so that those alternate trees mean something, or we need less trees with more meaingful choices...


For weapons, why not just have two trees? One tree would be max damage and speed. The other min damage and ideal range... Forget about HAM and wounds, just let those be constant. Which would make balancing HAM in the future a tad bit easier... I think it would be interesting to see the variability in weapons with those as choices!


Note: I'm only a weaponsmith, so I'm not sure about the other crafters, btu if everything had 2 experimentaiton trees, instead of some items havign 1 and others have 4... It would be easier to balance experimentaiton for everything!


Some items like powerups would be funky... But I think most people would prefer powerups when you could just choose a tree with the bonus you want, rather than the random assignment stuff.


At the very least each point on experimentation need to have a constant value! None of the 1-8% increase in % for a great success depending on the item or the phase of the moon!



Battleaxe - Bloodfin galaxy.
Surveyor of Lok and 12 point Master FS Weaponsmith.
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Mall.....800m from Theed starport at -5139 3399.
_____ Deliveries use any vendor named 'BA's ...'.
WILDMAN_SOLO
Wed Mar 17, 2004 2:53 am
#25

Redguard it doesn't matter if meaningfull choices were implemented as customers very rarely look past 1 stat on a weapon and thats DPS.


A good example I have from my experience:


I made a load of T21 riffles (not factory runs as I didn't have enough resources to make a full crate at the time). Due to the craptastic polonium iron I had at the time of making this batch damage / speed was maxed out and left me enough to experiment the other lines to get a decent result. The end result on these guns were respectable damage (max topped out at 375ish) and less HAM costs.


These riffles still sit on my vendor, because 5 weeks later i got my hands on some slightly better alantium and polonium and made a load of T21s that maxed out at just over 400 the HAM costs on these were no where nearly as good as the ones on my previous batch however I was still able to sell these higher damage versions for 20K more than my previous ones.


The HAM efficient versions just won't sell as the damage rating is not good enough for what people want. I will end up selling them to some novice riffleman at cost as I will never be able to sell them otherwise.


SOE needs to understand that with all these mega foods / buffs people only care about one stat on their weapon and thats DPS.


HAM means nothing as when you are buffed out of the wazoo you can special till the cows come home


RANGE/ACCURACY means nothing as you can pay a AFK whore looter 4tehwin for SEAs out of borgle cave


DURABILITY means nothing as even Ray Charles or Steveie Wonder could repair a weapon as all they need to do is buy a 99.999999 reoair tool and have the same chance as everyone else of fubaring or fixing.


The only solutions to this are :


1. Reduce effectiveness of buffs and Food so people have to make a choice between spaming specials with a high DPS / high HAM weapon and depleting pools faster or Using a slightly lower DPS / HAM efficient weapon. HAM costs in General would require a revamp in the process,as it is a well known fact that using a HAM efficient weapon at best only gets you maybe an extra shot (if you are unbuffed)


2.This businees with SEAs needs nerfing hard and fast. It is screwing everyone and only the AFK dickheads are cashing in. SEAs screw the whole system and were implemented in a piss poor way. Hmm i know lets make loot drops that will end up having a major impact on the game spawn in a cave you could camp with a novice baboon at no risk. Yeah thats ticket, these SEAs won't screw things up when they start being sold for millions (refer to trade boards for the proof of this AFK loot whore mongoring)


3. Get rid of the ability to repair weapons as it is now. Still have repairing in but make it so other players from a non crafting profession will fubar any repair job 100% of the time and masters of said profession can only repair a weapon say 3 times max before it gets fubared, put a switch in like the "this weapon has been messed around with by a smuggler to make it better" that currently exists, so people know the weapon has been repaired. e.g this weapon/armour has been repaired x times by a smith.


This idea makes plenty of sense, hell my TV is broken, but I know where I can get it fixxed I can take it down to my local chemist because he is a skilled electrician ?!?!!!!!! yeah right, the same principle whould apply in SWG. Also how many times can you repair something beofre it actually falls appart. This should apply to everything , weapons , armour , vehicles etc etc.






=Upde Harris= 12pt Master Weaponsmith and smuggler of Chimaera server - Voted 20th Best WS on the server !!! WOOT
Idiva Harris - 12pt Master AS and Merchant
Ancient Weapons and Hokey religions are no match for a good blaster at your side !!
Visit =Upde= Weapons Inc. in RFR Guildhall Kintha on Tatooine (2k from Mos Eisley) for all your weaponry needs.
Redguard
Wed Mar 17, 2004 1:10 pm
#26

Thanks for the response Traigus:


The firstquestions that needs to be answered then is what will help Doctors be a lomg term viable class?


Why mustDoctors/Medics travel all over the galaxy to get component parts? I can think of few other professions that have this requirement.


Why does it seem that you almost have to take artisan as a skill to get sample/survey for medical resources? Resource gathering appears to be a pretty big issue with your class. I can't really think of any otherprofession that has to depend on others as much as yours. You must craft but you're not a crafting line profession.





Given the choice between style over substance. I'll take a sandwich.
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