Business And Economy Archive
Thread: Ideas to Enhance SWG Crafter Experience
Page 1 of 4
DarthRoe
Tue Mar 01, 2005 11:18 am
#1
I’m fairly pleased with the rate of publishes in the last three months or so, but I can’t help notice that almost all of it is geared at combat (loot, GCW, etc.) and there hasn’t been anything implemented (or even proposed) that is a positive for the crafting community. Many of the fine crafters that I used to work with have left the game altogether, which makes it lonely as a artisan and puts more pressure on the dedicated crafters left in the game.
As a Droid Engineer since beta, I am now just going through the motions in the game, usually just logging in to complete orders and fill vendors before I log off to play a fun game. DEs haven’t gotten any new schematics since April of 2004, and many of the crafting professions have gone even longer. I don’t want to change professions because I am one of the last and most recognizable in my craft, and players depend on me to supply BH droids and other droid items. I can’t just shift to combat since being a DE also requires Master Artisan to be effective, and Master Merchant to make money, so skill points are at a premium.
I realize that crafters are the vast minority in the game, but their survival is crucial to the gameplay of combatants as well. We all hear the stories of frustration that players tell about not being able to find crafted goods like they used to, but no one seems to be concerned about making the game fun for crafters (other than crafters, of course). With that, here are a few ideas to bring back a little bit of fun for artisans:
New/Improved Schematics
This is the most important thing, in my opinion. Having new things to craft opens up not only new markets, but it gives crafters something to look for in new resources and such. In the same vein, existing schematics need to be looked at and adjusted comparatively. It makes no sense that some subcomponents of droids take more components themselves than an entire vehicle, which only uses big blocks of metal!
NPC Crafting Orders/Quests
Instead of generic artisan missions through a terminal, it would be more immersive and interesting to get profession-specific missions that yield profession-specific loot. My idea is to add missions to NPC trainers, so that you can customize the mission for a specific profession. Imagine a Master Weaponsmith being able to go to a weaponsmith trainer, get a mission to craft something that meets a minimum specification, and receive a mounted laser rifle display to hang in his shop. The possibilities are endless!
Improved Sales Tracking/Vendor Interface
There are lots of ideas for these on the Merchant board, so I won’t go into a lot of detail. The main points to make the crafting professions less cumbersome in this field are to allow quick and easy relisting ability on vendors, and some sort of in-game tracking that does what the third-party Merchant’s Friend does separately.
Contests/Rankings
Just as progress in the Galactic Civil War battles are tracked and reported, how about a planet- or galaxy-wide measure of the top crafters in each profession, based on vendor sales? It may be motivating for crafters to maintain their place in the standings, be it for status or even increased sales.
Galactic Civil War Interaction
Not just crafting factional equipment (which is a must), but rewarding factional crafters in real ways for contributing to their cause in the war. Perhaps awarding a small amount of faction points along with XP for the building of a factional item, or having factional NPCs award crafters for crafting missions they give out.
There are many more ideas out there, and the crafting profession boards are even more detailed with specific ideas to enhance their gaming experience. Basically, I just think that we crafters need a visible effort made to keep us logging in and having fun when we do.
Message Edited by DarthRoe on 03-01-2005 10:45 AM
Akoogari
Tue Mar 01, 2005 11:57 am
#2
/signifthiswereapetition
I really like the giving of faction points when making factional items. E11s, scout blasters, and the 3 suits of Imp armor should give Imp faction. And obviously the rebel armors and maybe a gun or two should give them faction.
I like this post *****
EdOWar
Tue Mar 01, 2005 12:44 pm
#3
Great ideas! You're right, most of the attention goes to the combat aspect of the game (though to be fair, combat drives the economy in the first place).
I'd like to see a lot more R.I.S. type crafting quests. It seems most of the new crafting items are in the form of limited use loot drops. A couple of challenging crafting quests to get new schematics would be a lot of fun. And they should beput in for all crafting professions, not just AS or WS.
Slim Vargo, Corbantis
Kalano
Tue Mar 01, 2005 2:10 pm
#4
They won't ignore crafting forever. Well at least parts of the crafting world. A few combat professions are on our sides. Well, commandos are. they don't like that their weapons cost way to much in resources and time to make them. They at least understand the worth of their weapons is not worth the cost to produce.
All we can do is hope, pray, and wait. Someday they will see us as more than just as craft providers and more as a player group that wants to have fun too.
jediding
Wed Mar 02, 2005 1:08 am
#6
those are some great ideas. Lets hope the devs show us some love 
Nema0879
Wed Mar 02, 2005 1:28 am
#7
/agree
I want every crafting profession (yes, that includes Smuggler and BE ) to have an RIS equivilant to achieve .... That couldn't be that hard to implement ... and even if they only added one profession per patch .... it would be a start ....
) to have an RIS equivilant to achieve .... That couldn't be that hard to implement ... and even if they only added one profession per patch .... it would be a start ....
Mor-Dan
Wed Mar 02, 2005 1:58 am
#8
unfortunately, the combat profs make up more of a % of the servers than we do, so good luck getting anything for what general players consder to be the fat cats of SWG: crafting professions. we are evil because we price things out of their reach. it is OUR fault that joe blow came by last week and bought 15 cases of brandy forcing the chef to raise their price a little so more product stays up longer, as any good business man would do. we are a secondary group. i feel bad for shipwrights and architects the most though. they have been given the most impossible situations and told to just deal with it.
DarthRoe
Wed Mar 02, 2005 8:06 am
#9
Kalano wrote:
All we can do is hope, pray, and wait. Someday they will see us as more than just as craft providers and more as a player group that wants to have fun too.
QFE
If they saw crafters in the same light they do the power-gamer combatants, I think we already would have seen much of the above.
Kalano
Wed Mar 02, 2005 5:00 pm
#11
One thing that would greatly increase my crafting life.
Being able to harvest in watery areas. I find way to many good spawn sites that are nothing but swappy inland areas all on Naboo and Rori. Heck, i would go so far as to make havesting platforms that can be used on the freaking Oceans. Way to many spots that we could have a harvester if we were allowed to use. Also, being able to place harvesters on steep slopes and other hard terrain. Heck, scouts can do that with camps, the whole freaking ground change for them. I placed many camps on mountians and islands and had the ground or water change to fit my camp.
Why can't we mine anywhere we want? Why are we so restricted in placing havesters but not camps and homes? camps are the easiest to place, housing is second but not very far past harvesters, but good freak, unless you only use personals, you heaviely restricted all the time. Not fun nor cool.
Flatfingers
Mon Mar 07, 2005 5:15 pm
#13
Great work, DarthRoe!
I personally favor acomprehensive revision of the entire crafting system. I think crafting overall needs to berethought tofocus more on making the craftingprocess fun in its own right,rather thanbeing designed primarily to insure thatsomeonegrinds out "product"for non-crafters.
Frankly, I think crafters are due a Crafting Upgrade once the Combat Upgrade goes live. (A view I suspect the Smugglers won't share.
) We've discussed this in more detail in the Crafting: A Blueprint for the Future thread.
But until/unless that happens, I think your ideas are excellent suggestions forincremental improvement. I'd love to see any or all of them implemented.
--Flatfingers
Page 1 of 4