Chef Archive

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wilibus wrote:

One of my biggest complaints about this game is thetime sinks they put everywhere. Having filling not clear after cloning is just that a time sink. In my opinion it is wrong, if you died buffed, you don't need to wait three and a half hours before your old buffs are gone and you can have a doctor re-apply them. It is my opinion that after cloning you should start witha clean slate for any and everything concerned with buffs.

Sitting around watching the fight waiting for your filling to decay isn't fun, plain and simple.

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Message Edited by Mayor_Woosh on 10-19-2004 12:25 PM

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sciguyCO wrote:

Let's keep this going, but I do want to emphasize a couple things:

1) Food is different

Food is different from doc buffs. Food is different from entertainer buffs. Food is different (though not as much) from spice buffs. Just because they lack the time sink of waiting before rebuffing doesn't mean that they don't have their own downsides. I wasn't aware downers extended past cloning.

To get rebuffed by a doctor, you have to find a player who's invested the 140 skill points (for Master doc) who's willing to spend a few minutes (less with Havla) and around 8-900 units of resources (plus the factory time to make subcomponents). You assume the doc made his own buff's, instead of purchased ready-made ones off a vendor. In reality, you can be 0/2/4/0 in doc, and buff as well as a master if you purchase your packs from a good craftsman with 12 exp points. Now all the sudden, it doesnt seem like such a big deal to give a doctor's buff, does it?

To get rebuffed by an entertainer, you have to find a player who's invested the 106 skill points (for Master Dancer/Musician) who's willing to spend the 5-10 minutes to buff you. This is the only one I cannot rebutt, luckily for me, on my server, there are a plethora of people that invest 15 dollars in another account for a buff bot so it is pretty easy to get an ent buff anytime someone wants on ahazi, without having the hassle of searching for an atk entertainer.

Spices can be rebuffed immediately without another player, but can only be taken one at a time, have a shorter duration than food, and have the downer period after it wears off. but if you die while taking spice, you are able to take it again the instant you clone. Nobody here is insinuating that if you live, filling should be cleared instantly.

So basically it is as I said earlier, you think we should be punished for being able to sell our goods off a vendor instead of having to sit in a starport hand-crafting items to sell. To take your point further, then why does the buff run out upon death? The "cost" you are paying is the difficulty in having to find said player to give you the enhancement yet again.you also forget the other profession's "buff's" chef's items emulate, squad leader's enhancements. No other profession can give melee or ranged defenses or state defenses to other players.

2) Not all foods can be "debuffed"

A common argument being put forward is that since the food buff is removed, removing the filling won't unbalance anything. This is wrong.In your opinion. No offense meant, but you are the coorespondent, not the devoloper in charge of our profession. Your "opinion" in this area would mean a lot more if backed up by the devoloper.A lot of foods have a filling cost that is "owed" past the time that the buff wears off. Time duration foods like Vercupti andCanape don't last until the filling wears off. They can be if we choose to make them that way. Triggered foods like Synthsteak, Havla, Ormachekand Smuggler's Delightcan easily wear off before the filling is digested (although this depends on other factors). Instant effect foods like Blue Milk and Nutricake don't have an effect that can be removed when cloning, since you get the bonus immediately upon eating the food. I fail to see you explain where the guy who just died would have the advantage over the guy who didn't with his stomach clearing upon cloning.

If filling was removed when cloning, zerging players (at least smart ones) wouldn't be rebuffing with two +400 Brandy. They'd take an Canape or two and use 33 fill, 700 Mind Heal blue milk. Instead of a one-time +800 mind, they can heal 2100 Mind damage. I still fail to see a situation where the recently cloned person would have the advantage over the person who didnt clone, and therefore did not loose all his enhancements. There is no combination of food/drink you can come up with that makes you more difficult to kill then the guy who still has his doctor and entertainers buffs in addition to his food/drink buff's.

Filling limits your food use in two ways: first is the number of simultaneous buffs you can have active at one time starting with an empty stomach. Second is the "downtime" you owe (in the form of digestion time) as the tradeoff for the food's benefit. Time sinks can suck, but they are a necessary part of the game. I think 45m is a bit long, but you only hit that max if you die immediately after stuffing yourself full. 30m should be just right. Now if they'd only fix that bug... I admit this would be no issue if they fixed the 30 m to 45 m filling clearing. It is pointless to assume (you know what they say about people that assume) they are going to fix a bug that has existed since the minute the chef's revamp went thru, what, 8-9 months ago? If I saw a ground swell of support to repair the 30m bug, I would be more willing to let go of the filling removing upon death issue. Until then, I am going to have to keep beating this horse until it is dead.

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sciguyCO wrote:

I think some of the pro/con positions might be split on whether the posters are heavy into PvE vs. PvP.

The categories may be getting different levels of death penalty regarding the remaining filling, and that may be something to look into.

1. Low-level PvE: if you're complaining that you can't take more brandy after dying from Durnis as a Master {combat prof}, you have bigger issues.


2. Mid-level PvE (mobs that you can usually handle without buffs, but definitely handle more efficiently with buffs). Penalty: a harder time with the same level of mobs, or having to drop to easier mobs until the filling wears off enough to get you back to peak performance.


3. High-level PvE (mobs you cannot handle solo without buffs). Penalty: cannot handle the same mobs, have to go after easier ones until filling wears off.


4. One-on-one PvP: Assuming both players start off buffed or buff themselves during combat. Penalty: the player who dies is now at a disadvantage and cannot go back and attack their original target until loser digests enough (in addition to getting doc buffs) or the winner's buffs wear off.


5. Group PvP (base/town raids, BH squads going after Jedi): The attacking group already has an advantage due to being able to buff everyone up prior to the attack. Penalty: the group that sends their enemies to the cloning center the fastest (removing their buffs) gets the advantage in the overall battle. Reinforcements either come in weaker or come back later (due to digestion delay). Err, I have to intervine here and set the record straight. As someone who is retired from base destruction, you have some misconceptions in this area. assuming there isn't 5 am base raids occuring, the defenders always have the advantage over the attackers. your cloning center is 30 meters away,you have doctors and entertainers around(so there is zero penalty for loosing those enhancements).The attackershave to clone elsewhere, then rejoin the battle automatically later due to shuttle waits, and rebuffing waits. Filling is rarely an issue for dead attackers, as until they rejoin the battle, their filling is for the most part already decayed toa level that it is manageable for them, and not an issue. Besides that the battle is already in most cases over, and thus filling obviously isnt an issue then. (the base is blown up, or the defenders have stopped the countdown, and have reclaimed control of the base and the surronding area)

I will definitely say that as I player, 99.99% of the time I fall into groups2 and3 (with the veryoccasional 1-on-1). When I'm not cheffing, I'll be doing some hunting to check for new creature resource spawns or supplement my supplies, maybe taking some missions for supplementary cash, using food to keep my stats up. Heck, I hardly ever get doc buffs unless I'm doing a major resource hunt against high-level creatures. So I admit I'm probably not having the negative experiences with filling many people are talking about. I am trying to take all playstyle types into account, though.

In my opinion, I think that keeping filling after dying in categories 2 and3 is acceptable. In both situations, death usually means that you overstretched yourself. You made a mistake in oneform or another, and the penalty is having to spend some time at non-peak performance. There's nothing preventing you from going after creatures matching your un-buffed level.

Category 4 is similar. You got beat by another player. If you can come back at peak performance (all buffed up), then instead of the winner having the advantage (due to retaining their buffs), you get the advantage because you have more remaining time on your buffs or can re-buff differently to adjust for your opponent's tactics and damage type. Why shouldn't the losing player have some penalty? He lost, in the "uber1337" group that solely pvp's, that is plenty of penalty already. No go further, in a 1v1 duel situation, now they wont be able to duel for 30 or so minutes, because it wont be a fair fight. doesnt pvp rankings factor in there somewhere, isn't that the penalty now?

{note: I hope using "you" in the above isn't taken personally, but it reads a little better than using"a player", "he/she", etc. Feel free to substitute "Kriles" in for every mention of "you".}

I admit, having two players continuously swapping clone activation and downing 4-6 doses of food each time would do wonders for my character's bank account. It already does wonders for doctors and entertainers bank accounts

Category 5 is where I have the least experience. What kinds of situations are most common? Base/town raids? Groups of rebels sweeping through Theed (or Imperials through Anchorhead)? How long do these last? These can be hours of fun, but generally turn into 20-30 minutes of fun, as once 1 side has been killed, and their stomachs are full. they are less inclined to get their butt's beat repeatedly, and they wander off elsewhere. (these groups generally have doctors and entertainers with them now mind you, so there is zero penalty in death in that reguard. Which side (attacking/defending)has a greater initial advantage, and how much would that be affected by players coming out of the clone center with full food buffs? I pretty much described a general base raid, as far as city combat goes, you have a group of 1 faction, ganking opposing factional players in theed. (either side) you get into load killing overts with slow computers, a lot of /bo trans exploits when people are starting to loose, and other cheesy actions, which mainly occur because they dont want to face the current penalty of death. Loosing pvp rank, and dealing with a full stomach. The affects would be less people using the /bo trans exploit(which you cant even get SOE to comment about), since they would at least have a fighting chance if they died of regaining their precious pvp rank. (which i could care less about, I personally havent done any pvp since that went live)

I think the relative penalty/suckiness of the food filling remaining will get influenced by some changes coming with the Combat Balance/Revamp/Upgrade (which I unfortunately can't go into detail about, and actual numbers are still up in the air). Food buffs will still make you more effective in combat, but I believe that the relative difference between buffed and unbuffed will be narrowed. Also, Mind damage will no longer be the main bottleneck in determining combat. And I'm going to stop myself there (since I'm probably treading a thin line even posting that).

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