Bio Engineer Archive
Thread: A fair price for our labour of love?
I know there are, what, 2-3 "abilities" that a ch gets in that third column of their tree, but I've never used those. Maybe someone can comment on their effectiveness, I sure don't know (and I think my CH even qualifies to use them but I never have... doh!).
But with weapons of course, a good "special" pushes up the damage, what, 5x or more over the base value of the weapon? There is definitely nothing of that magnitude for CH's right?
PlainWhiteSocks wrote:
hmmmm.... I need to read-up on CH I think. It was my impression that if a non-ch and a ch paired off against each other using the same quality pet the CH would win hands down. I thought they had some special commands that only a CH could do that would tip the scales in their favor.
Dilf wrote:It's funny to see that after....say what 14 months.....that the bio people still complane about the lev 10 uber pets? Ya i'm a mch and I have 6 of them but i still use them for show....but i have my combat pair and the supper tank too!!!! Sad thing is i have been mch for say what 1 month after the game launch....HaHa and my alt has been Master Bio for 14 months...Ya i make the uber pets thats all people want....Ya i make the ch uber pets too.....Ya i sell them for 300k.....But when i go looking for a gun for my BH....I LOOK IN THE LOOT MADE VENDORES.....Sure the pets are strong but still a CH can get even better pets.....that have light armor.....more damage.....can't for get the the better ham.....No i don't make a killing off of them....but then i did read some of the people's time lines for making them hehe....i wish i could make 6 of them in 20 min hehe.....u guys are sad....to try and make it sould like its easy....no im not trying to rip people off....i just make them.... what they ask for....but then again i make them a third gen and pull off a pet like this 10k to 11k health 9k to 10k action 3k to 5k mind with 60% kin and 45% blast and damage thats from 40 to 150and yes its your famus merek kima gsp and savage dna typbut then i do make a nice lev 18 with 12k ham and light armor too heheSee when u sell a product....u make what people want.....if i sold these pets for anything less i would be a slave to the people that buy them....i want to do more then just make pets....i like bio but im not going to live my in game life getting dna every dayWhat Bio need's is u people to spend your time trying to get us new typs of skinns, and stop the flaming the ubers.WE have uber guns, uber melee, uber meds, uber armor, and yes the uber pets
In the original post there was no mention of flaming uber pets. These have been around for a year and have not been nerfed yet. This means that they can't be a high priority for the Devs, and as such could be considered a minor problem. I believe that in the current combat system, these pets are actually more balanced than the pets the Devs were intending for Non-CH.
The idea behind this thread was to find out what is a FAIR price to sell these for. This guy is charging 50k-1mill for them. Is that fair? Is he ripping people off? Should we all increase prices to charge the same, or uncercut him rather publically to shame him? Those are the sort of questions I am trying to get answered. There are plenty of other threads to debate the legality/morality of these pets.
Dilf wrote:LOL, i started that post with that in mind....But then just got off track.....It just gets old the people that complane over some things......but i charge 300k because i have too!! and like i did say in my post its to to the fact that i want to have a life besides sampling dna......i sell 2 typs of ham pets the uber and the hurrton pup vonitor.....i sell them for 60 to 80k.....its all about supply and demand......its like that in the real too!!!......u have to sell them for what u feel is right....i have a bio on my surver that sells them for the 1 mil too....i drouped my prices down from 500k to 800k after the solo group nerf.....well good luck!!!
despite the poor grammar and gaudish font, he has a point. Something is worth whatever someone will pay for them. If people are happy enough to pay that much then I suppose we should let them. The best we can do, it seems, is to try our best to educate people and try and get them to reduce their bids while pressuring the devs to clarify their presence in the system.
I hate to admit it, but I skip over most posts with very large fonts. All my previous forum experiences have caused me to read any font more than a couple of points above the average as screaming. They hurt my ears--or do my eyes hurt, and then theyhurt my ears? All I know is that something hurts.
Zadokk wrote:
...gaudish font...
Hylidex wrote:
I hate to admit it, but I skip over most posts with very large fonts. All my previous forum experiences have caused me to read any font more than a couple of points above the average as screaming. They hurt my ears--or do my eyes hurt, and then theyhurt my ears? All I know is that something hurts.
Zadokk wrote:
...gaudish font...
Don't mind me.Since taking upBE a year ago I have been a babbling idiot with a taste for bugs.
Ahh, Hylidex, I hypothesize that you have either used the internet chat rooms ('talkers/muds/mushes') or AOL for some time now, for it to be that automatic. (I myself have been since early '94; I almost "hear" people while reading. Not always a good thing; some people are just blind and need the font to see.)
Anyways, as far as ubre-CL10 pets... W-t-* (that's banned??) ? I've been selling them at 55k, or 60k with mount, since I started producing them. If I can manage to sell them for enough money that I only need to be "commercial" for one day out of every 30... wow. But then, I am attempting to single-handedly start a recession in Kettemoor. Not seriously, but I do like to poke inflated bubbles.
Note: Embolden *does* do something; it lessens the chance your pet will run like a scared little baz-nitch from combat. It also applies a mild "buff" to the pet. Over all, it won't make the difference between live or die, but it can be handy to reduce the number of times you have to stim them. Enrage... I dunno. I think that applies the "berserk" state to your pets; about as useful as the "berserk" skill is to a brawler. I agree, though, that CH needs to have at least a few commands or modifers to make them stand out. (I'm biased... I am a CH as well as BE, and I sell almost exclusively pets.)
The upswing in CL10 uberpet sales and CH general I've noticed. But I didn't realize I can charge enough to cover my expenses for a month or two in the process. As for these pets being an "exploit" or "overpowered"... if they are, then it is because the Devs made them that way. To all inquiries regarding this issue, the Devs say "the system works as intended". Thus, while the Devs may think "overpowered", the system makes them that way. Hell, I add another 1k to Action and it only goes to CL 11. Then I find the 3rd generation of the same pet is 6k-2k-3k, 38% Kin & 21% blast, all other stats EXACTLY the same, and it's CL 15. If God (:"devs") have that sense of humor... so be it.
The CURB will make all of this a moot point, anyways. I expect all statistics and such to change, given the grand overhaul of the HAM system as envisioned. Ya'all on Team "We Have A Better Idea God" probably can see what is coming... but... Darn NDA!!
Oh, and P.S. Anyone on Kettemoor that finds a CDEF *anything* that does that kind of insane damage (best pistol I ever owned did a max of around 200)... I might buy it with my ill-gotten "uber-pet" gains. I can use only CDEFs, you see.
Message Edited by Felisconcolori on 02-21-2005 02:07 AM
Felisconcolori wrote:
Ahh, Hylidex, I hypothesize that you have either used the internet chat rooms ('talkers/muds/mushes') or AOL for some time now, for it to be that automatic. (I myself have been since early '94; I almost "hear" people while reading. Not always a good thing; some people are just blind and need the font to see.)
Anyways, as far as ubre-CL10 pets... W-t-* (that's banned??) ? I've been selling them at 55k, or 60k with mount, since I started producing them. If I can manage to sell them for enough money that I only need to be "commercial" for one day out of every 30... wow. But then, I am attempting to single-handedly start a recession in Kettemoor. Not seriously, but I do like to poke inflated bubbles.
...
The upswing in CL10 uberpet sales and CH general I've noticed. But I didn't realize I can charge enough to cover my expenses for a month or two in the process. As for these pets being an "exploit" or "overpowered"... if they are, then it is because the Devs made them that way. To all inquiries regarding this issue, the Devs say "the system works as intended". Thus, while the Devs may think "overpowered", the system makes them that way. Hell, I add another 1k to Action and it only goes to CL 11. Then I find the 3rd generation of the same pet is 6k-2k-3k, 38% Kin & 21% blast, all other stats EXACTLY the same, and it's CL 15. If God (:"devs") have that sense of humor... so be it.
The CURB will make all of this a moot point, anyways. I expect all statistics and such to change, given the grand overhaul of the HAM system as envisioned. Ya'all on Team "We Have A Better Idea God" probably can see what is coming... but... Darn NDA!!
Message Edited by Felisconcolori on 02-21-2005 02:07 AM
LOL. I'm older than you might think. My first computer-based forum was in 1974, before the internet, before chat "rooms" per se (although live chat did occur), before personal computers even. Back then, timeshared computers were the way the masses had access to those dark, refrigerated rooms with false floors and special dust precautions. I've never done internet chat rooms, and my few experiences with AOL were under duress. I'm so old I miss CP/M.
Back then, the computers were accessed via teletype machines (the real TTY) or IBM selectrics with cradle modems. The teletype always amazed me how it could spit out up to 10 cps. (I think the modems were 30 baud, but that made them faster than the terminal, already.)
After PC's private networks arose. The most popular I knew was Fidonet. These were not always-wired networks, but those on the backbone sent packets to each other several times a day. Those farther out usually connected once a day. Forums existed in BBS format like this for quite some time. My best quote from that time era was, "Why would I want a faster modem? I can't even read at 1200 baud as it is."
I understand larger fonts in order to see, but the default font on this forum makes the larger font bold at the same time. I also hear people when I read. I've seen larger font posts that weren't loud, but they were thinner fonts. I think anyone with eyesight problems probably has some method of reading the posts to begin with--the simplest being to adjust screen settings. I doubt that posters of large fonts do so to make them more readable to themselves, since that is the only post they don't need to read.
To come back on topic, I can't call these pets exploits the way I understand the word. An exploit is taking advantage of a game bug--by doing the series of events that induce the bug--in order to bypass the normal rules of the game. In other words, exploits are, quite bluntly, cheating. An example of an exploit that has now been fixed (and so I think it is safe to talk about it) was to call a pet near a shuttleport, take the shuttle to another shuttleport out of range of the first pet, and to call another pet. Then travel overland back to the original pet, and suddenly you have bypassed your skill limits to have two pets out. This circumvented the normal check to see if you were qualified to call a second pet, and allowed you to double your power in combat. If both were level 70 pets, that gave you 140 levels of pets under your control and an unfair advantage in combat.
The elements of an exploit are clear there, although this exploit is less game-impacting than, say, duplicating credits. It was only by a bug in the game that it could occur. The pet owner took steps to circumvent the normal coding of the game. It allowed the pet owner to do something that was clearly against the rules of the game (control twice the pets he was certified for). It gave an unfair advantage to a player (in this case the pet owner.)
The high-HAM CL 10 pets may be a result of a bad algorithm, but it isn't a game bug. Nothing beyond the normal crafting process was done to create these pets. No one violated any game rules. Even a representative of SOE has stated that these pets were unintended but not exploits. I think the same could be said for buffs that can increase my hit points by 5 times while also increasing my ability to absorb damage and ability to recover by 3 times. Clearly, this power was never intended, but I don't see how making or giving such buffs could be called an exploit. Normal game mechanics created them. How can anyone possibly say that a certain power of buff is acceptable, but beyond a certain power is an exploit.
I've watched a few of these high-HAM pets in combat. I'm surprised at how quickly they go down considering their HAM. The only thing I can think is that the invisible secondary stats are very low. Perhaps if those stats were visible, people would be laughing at those pets instead of calling them exploits. "Sure he has 10K Health, but he has a constitution of ONE???"
BE's are the only profession I know that has had to endure validity checks. That is a terrible blow to a profession. Imagine a doctor buffing, another doctor making buffs. The combatant gets buffed and goes out into the field. The first time he takes damage, he gets a message, "Your buffs have been checked and declared invalid. You are not able to use these buffs."
Play the rest of that scenario in your mind.
I used your message as a springboard to go off on my own direction. I have no disagreement with anything you wrote at all. Pet validity checks have been a sore spot for me since they happened so long ago. I don't take kindly to being accused of cheating, and with the message "This pet is invalid," what else were my customers to think? The fact that it often didn't appear until after the pet was grown was terrible! People wasted time on those pets, thought they were getting a great deal, and suddenly felt swindled. I got way behind in pet research after that, because I just didn't have the stomach for trying to "optimize" pets with the chance that they might turn out to be invalid as a result. I even ignored messages about the highest level 10 possible, because I surmised that they would be invalid, too, once the developers caught up with them. I didn't want any more accusations of cheating.
I have only ever sold one of the high-powered pets, and that was last week. I put it on a vendor for 90K, and it was gone in hours. I named the pet "WARNING--E-mail Hylidex for important information BEFORE taming this pet." I was not contacted. I've written out a description of the whole controversy behind pets and an offer to refund if contacted immediately, to be sent in e-mails to purchasers. I really don't expect anyone to take me up on it, but I want never again to be accused of cheating.
Edit: corrected a typo and highlighted.
Message Edited by Hylidex on 02-21-2005 09:57 AM
LloydPickering wrote:
The idea behind this thread was to find out what is a FAIR price to sell these for. This guy is charging 50k-1mill for them. Is that fair? Is he ripping people off? Should we all increase prices to charge the same, or uncercut him rather publically to shame him? Those are the sort of questions I am trying to get answered. There are plenty of other threads to debate the legality/morality of these pets.
These non-ch pets have no armour, no constitution to speak of, not overly impressive resist so they will go down relatively fast in combat - especially against NPCs.
Inkanissen wrote:
We can't see that hidden Constitution stat, but I would not be surprised if it is still 40 as it was before the patch that changed pet making a long time ago.
These non-ch pets have no armour, no constitution to speak of, not overly impressive resist so they will go down relatively fast in combat - especially against NPCs.
Well Im a TKM, and have my stats to have a full mind, with the health and action being around 600 each. (I am going somewhere with this)
I used my bantha to help me in the FS Phase 3 S&D missions. I was able to do them unbuffed solely because my bantha could tank the Sith while I killed them. In that respect it was invaluable. (Although you could say the value there was a 15k buff
I would have got buffed, but there was no Docs around, and its a 5k trek to civilisation) I also used my kaadu in the latest Phase 4 quests(Although I was buffed this time. I don't think it's possible to do without in Phase 4). I used it to carry me round quickly, whilst having some combat skills to get to the pirates so I could get a claim on them b4 some idiot took them down on their own. (In this case it was probably worth another buff worth of time)
All in all, I'd say these pets were pretty useful against NPCs. I admit they can't be used like a CH uses pets, but they can take the bite out of soloing NPCs unbuffed, and are even more useful against animals where most of the dmg is Kin.
Hylidex wrote:
LOL. I'm older than you might think. My first computer-based forum was in 1974, before the internet, before chat "rooms" per se (although live chat did occur), before personal computers even.
...
To come back on topic, ...
The elements of an exploit are clear there, although this exploit is less game-impacting than, say, duplicating credits. It was only by a bug in the game that it could occur. The pet owner took steps to circumvent the normal coding of the game. It allowed the pet owner to do something that was clearly against the rules of the game (control twice the pets he was certified for). It gave an unfair advantage to a player (in this case the pet owner.)
I've watched a few of these high-HAM pets in combat. I'm surprised at how quickly they go down considering their HAM. The only thing I can think is that the invisible secondary stats are very low. Perhaps if those stats were visible, people would be laughing at those pets instead of calling them exploits. "Sure he has 10K Health, but he has a constitution of ONE???"
BE's are the only profession I know that has had to endure validity checks. That is a terrible blow to a profession. Imagine a doctor buffing, another doctor making buffs. The combatant gets buffed and goes out into the field. The first time he takes damage, he gets a message, "Your buffs have been checked and declared invalid. You are not able to use these buffs."
Play the rest of that scenario in your mind.
I have only ever sold one of the high-powered pets, and that was last week. I put it on a vendor for 90K, and it was gone in hours. I named the pet "WARNING--E-mail Hylidex for important information BEFORE taming this pet." I was not contacted. I've written out a description of the whole controversy behind pets and an offer to refund if contacted immediately, to be sent in e-mails to purchasers. I really don't expect anyone to take me up on it, but I want never again to be accused of cheating.
Message Edited by Hylidex on 02-21-2005 09:57 AM
Hmmm. CP/M. I don't think I was quite born then, although I was using FidoNet and BBS systems via a screeching 1200 BPS modem and a pimped C-64. Up until the millenial turn, I was running along at a swift 11 MHZ on a Tandy T1000 with a 2400 BPS, which then was upgraded to 14.4. Of course, I eventually *had* to get a move on... I first found a decent crowd in british based Surfers, and then branched out while sneaking the school's MAAC account on the Lynx world wide web.
/salute Hylidex, for being both honest, forthright, and living when 256k was all the world would ever need.
Hmm. That is an excellent case for exploit vs. not knowing all possible results of a complex combinatory algorithm. In fact, I think you said something similiar not too long ago when I revived the "what the heck do you mean I'm cheating?" notion in my thread about these pets. I don't think there really should be pet validity checks (we can't create anymore "invalid" pets, I think; unless there are still some left over from the pet nerf).
Many of the people I see buying my pets aren't that interested in if they are going to be squished at some later date (I think, after a year, most people assume it'll be safe at least until after the next major work effort is finished). They want to use them for, in varying cases...
1) Bothans riding Banthas while wearing hot pants (only) is funny.
2) Rifleman on the back of a bantha to get away from angry creatures = Good Thing
3) Grinding either Jedi or CH xp. Or both.
Except for the first, they seem to work fairly well. But I think very few people actually read any descriptive text on a vendor/bazaar item, and those that do probably won't think anything odd about it. (Maybe this Hyliguy is gonna try to sell me some stims... I just want the pet... and he sells them so cheap...)