Combat Medic Archive
Thread: Ranged stims crafting
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jfang
Thu Jun 10, 2004 7:31 am
#1
Currently, there are two issues with ranged and area stims. The first is that a master combat medic can't fully experiment them, in that he or she can't get 10 experimentation points for the subcomponents. The second issue is that the range of stims is much lower than poisons and diseases, becausethey doesn't use dispersal mechanisms. When you cross this with attempts to fix range issues with diseases and poisons, stims don't seem to go as far as they should.
I would propose to fix this in two ways. The first, and possibly easier, would be the introduction of "combat medic biological effect controllers, chemical release duration mechanisms, and liquid suspensions". These would be the same as the existing ones, except use combat medic assembly and experimentation, and be usable only in ranged and area stims. The stims could continue to use doctor created BECs, CRDMs, and LSs. They would essentially be an alternate component, like rancor bile is in place of a dispersal mechanism (only they would be craftable).
The second would be to replace BECs with DMs. Honestly replacing the liquid suspensions would make more sense as they are both delivery mechanisms, but would severely reduce the power of the final stim. Replacing BECs (changes and marginal power) with DMs (changes, range, and area of effect) seems like the most benign change, and would help balance the range between stims and poisons.
Loonytic
Thu Jun 10, 2004 7:37 am
#2
this is one thing that has always bugged me about being a Combat Medic.... I hope they do re-work how we make stims.
jfang
Thu Jun 10, 2004 1:22 pm
#3
You bring up a good point jkray8472.
I agree I like interdependency between doctors and combat medics, but doctors should be as dependent on combat medics as combat medics are to doctors. Currently combat medics depend on doctors, but not vise versa. I would suggest that they either add combat medic subcomponents to doctor items, or make combat medics more independent. (Now that you mention it explicitly, I think the former is better, although I imagine the doctors would complain very loudly about this kind of nerf, because we all know how... "poor" doctors are...
)
)And I agree that an unexperimented advanced area stim C should start with high 20's as a range, and not mid 30's. My concern is though that the unexperimented range of area stims is 10m less than that of poisons and diseases, so if they do fix the poison ranges (without simply implementing a hard cap of distance), it will possibly further change the range of area stims. I think it would be better (and probably easier)to try to get them both to be a similar range *then* fix the range bug, than try to fix poisons and diseases without affecting area stims or ranged stims. I say this because I expect it would be a simple change in how crafting works, andchanging of a "if item != liquid suspension" check.
vortexala
Thu Jun 10, 2004 5:40 pm
#4
This is simply for the sake of discussion:
What about taking the DM, IA, and the RC and placing them back into the medic crafting branch, along with half of theCM Experimentation. Move the advanced versions of all the medical componentsto perhaps Master Medic.
Then have the doctor cure packs require 2/3 of the CM components. This will allow doctors to make ok cure packs themselves with the +5 experimentation points they'd get from Master Medic, but for the 'best' they'd have to seek out someone with Master Combat Medicine Crafting. That would make them as reliant on our items for their cures as we are on their items for our stims. Although a balance would need to be struck on this particular case, since Stims are used far more often then cures.
And to provide Medics with a use for the components, perhaps creating a new item for them to use the components in... perhaps a point-blank area stim with a 6m radius.
Just throwing out ideas here...
PsionicHawk
Thu Jun 10, 2004 9:08 pm
#5
By point blank I assume you mean only can target self heh. They have to fix OUR AE stims when they target the self first (slight rant hehehe)
Seriously though. It's not a bad idea. As long as the area stim is weaker then our area stim A(Argument sake... call it Area Stim A-) with a base medical use of 46-50. I'd be all for that.
PsionicHawk
Thu Jun 10, 2004 9:12 pm
#6
In fact, run that by the Medics and Doctors. See what they feel about it.
Pahdbacca
Thu Jun 10, 2004 9:25 pm
#7
Is there a way to make them continue to use CM experimentation if the CM sub-components are put back into the medic tree?
I don't want to go back to the time where Docs could make better infection amplifiers than CMs.
jkray8472
Thu Jun 10, 2004 9:28 pm
#8
I think making the cure packs require a CM component or two is a GREAT idea! Also, perhaps if they can get some sort of inoculation (an idea that's floated around here quite a bit), then make that require the CM components too.
They could probably put those components back in to the medic tree, and allow us to finish them in CM. I suppose that would be only fair, seeing as how CMs have 5 experimental points on the BEC, LS, & CRDM.
The current problem with poisons and disease ranges is this: the packs are default 40m with advanced DM components. If they put the hard 64m cap on it, the unexperimented range on the packs will still be maxed out. If they can lower that baseline (perhaps by lowering either the baseline poison/disease OR the DM), and make it comparable to the area stims...I think that the advanced Area Stim is in a good place. 3-4 experimental points to max out the range...giving some variation.
It also gives me a huge advantage as a 12 point CM...b/c my stuff can be max range, and still have excellent power. If range doesn't need to be experimented, then people can max out their experimental bar, and the extra points are "pointless." (no pun intended)
jkray8472
Fri Jun 11, 2004 12:45 am
#9
Actually, I kind of like the slight interdependence that CMs have with Docs b/c of the subcomponents involved in this. A CM can make "decent" subcomponents, but he can contract out with a doctor for the best stuff. That interdependence between crafting professions has been an ongoing trend in SWG...they don't want one person to be able to do everything himself.
As far as ranged and area stims go...I think that they are a lot closer to your proposed experimentation changes than the poisons and diseases are. I'm a 12-point experimental CM, and by dropping 4 of my points into charges/range, I can make my Area Stimpacks have a range of 32m (64m toss at master--which is the max range for the stims). By experimenting a dozen times on them, I managed to get a schematic with about an 850 heal, 32m range, 30m area, and 50 charges per stim.
Someone who experiments purely for power can get a 900-1000 power using the same resources as me...but the range will only be 25m or so (50m at master). By forcing us to balance the range versus power issue, they have actually increased the variability in the market for area and ranged stims.
I haven't done much with Ranged Stims...b/c I consider AreaStimCs the bread-and-butter of CM healing. But I can do some further tests.
Don't forget that the conductivity of the non-ferrous metal you use directly affects the range of the final pack! I've noticed that Platinite copper oftentimes has a very high CD...mine has CD of 960 or so...
Pahdbacca
Fri Jun 11, 2004 1:23 am
#10
vortexala wrote:
Pahdbacca wrote:
Is there a way to make them continue to use CM experimentation if the CM sub-components are put back into the medic tree?
I don't want to go back to the time where Docs could make better infection amplifiers than CMs.
Don't see why not, Pip. They currently take CM Experimentation only. So even if someone has MCM and MD they only get the 10 experimentation points on the CM items. All it would be doing is moving them to a different skill box and granting them earlier in the progression.
Basically giving Master Medic +5 CM Experimentation and +5 Medicine Experimentation. Both lines would be seperate, with seperate skill mods/bonuses, but both would be contained within the same skill boxes/branch.
That would work for me
jfang
Fri Jun 11, 2004 6:43 am
#11
Count me in too. As long as something in the doctor tree required combat medic components, I'd be all for giving half of the combat medic assembly, experimentation, all subcomponent schematics to master medic (assuming it still used combat medic assembly experimentation).
I can just imagine what doctors will say, since they "already have it so hard harvesting dolovite iron and class 4 liquid pertrochemical fuels"... 
I think we actually all have a concensus here. That's... unusual... 
jfang
Fri Jun 11, 2004 6:52 am
#12
jkray8472 wrote:
The current problem with poisons and disease ranges is this: the packs are default 40m with advanced DM components. If they put the hard 64m cap on it, the unexperimented range on the packs will still be maxed out. If they can lower that baseline (perhaps by lowering either the baseline poison/disease OR the DM), and make it comparable to the area stims...I think that the advanced Area Stim is in a good place. 3-4 experimental points to max out the range...giving some variation.
Didn't I allude to this in a different post? Well, no matter. I agree that area stims range (which is the same as advanced stims, because they don't use DM's) is much more interesting than advanced poisons and diseases. I actually need to think when I craft them. (*gasp*) I think the last time I crafted an area stim schematic I had my last two experimentation points put into effectiveness, and it took me 5 minutes to decide to click "run experiment" and commit them there instead of range. Much more fun than my current "effectiveness-effectiveness-effectiveness" crafting of poisons and diseases.
I think it would be better if they revamped the base line and reduced the base range of poisons and disease (presumably tweaking the numbers elsewhere to compensate for weakening poisons and diseases).
Again though, the problem is they need to make non-advanced DM poisons useful, advanced DM poisons not overpowered, and keep them in balance with ranged stims. I don't think that tweaking just the poisons range will do anything, as an advanced DM will add 15+m over base range and a regular one will add maybe 5+m, and you need both to match aset ranged stim range which doesn't use a DM. Did that make sense?
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