Creature Handler Archive
Thread: What does the currently in discussion topic of pet permanent death have to do with *BALANCE*?
I say nothing at all.
Pet perma death does nothing at all to our situational combat effectiveness that fixing the instant heal on storage(something I KNOW they were aware of the day they moved pets over to the datapadinstead of inventory since I personally reported it thatvery day)issue does not.
The pets still have the same exact effectiveness once they remove datapad instant healing. All killing our pets does is punishes us if we make a mistake and one of our pets gets incapped (How many times do you fight anything higher than a bantha that is agressive and doesn't insta-DB you if you get incapped?). Then we are faced with a death penalty *at least* an order of magnitude greater than any other class in the game. Anyone else dies, the WORST they can get is having to do a corpse run and some HAM wounds. 2 hours TOPS unless they don't get a doctor to heal the wounds.
If the proposed permadeath goes in, if we get in to something bigger than we can handle, we're going to lose ALL active pets if we make 1 mistake. Take, for example, a master CH who prefers pets from endor and dathomir. To replace *ONE* mistake, that player will have to spend somewhere around 15k in credits for tickets, moving clone data, etc. On top of that, 3 high level pets takes hours to successfully tame since we cannot count on maskscent one bit anymore. After both these things, we then must wait 10 days or so while our new babies grow (using less than fully grown pets if they are subject to permanent death is not an option)
After all this, then we can hunt again.
HOWEVER, in a given battle, how is a Creature Handler with permanently dying pets weaker than one with pets that don't permanently die(assuming they fix the insta-heal thing)? In both cases, once a pet is out of health it is out of commission for the fight. It's just that if it dies, the Creature Handler must under go massive penalties to recover. Try as I might, I just cannot see how this change would balance the class any. All I can see it doing is adding massive penalties for making one mistake, or being victim to 1 bug or losing connection once.
Without insta-healing pets, you are already giving a large amount of downtime to the class. But, this is downtime that I agree with.
In a not really related note, CH is TOO easy to reach master in due to various bugs and as such, are ahead of the pack in regards to power, but once the other combat classes catch up, the relative power of creature handlers will go down fast. The survivability of a top-end pet vs. a master of something like TKA or Pistoleer is something like 5 seconds or so unless massive changes were made since the very end of beta. How can you make such sweeping changes to the creature handler class on basis of comparing them to folks who have just attained an elite combat class, and who are SEVERELY limited equipmentwise?
Fix the insta-heal bug, fix the transfer of inappropriate pets to low level creature handlers, fix all the overpowering BUGS. BUT, do not make such a hamfisted change as killing our pets on incap or reducing their stats massively until there are examples of other maxxed out professions to compare them too.
If permadeath doesn't do anything then what is the problem?
Permadeath DOES do something. It makes you worry about sending a pet in to a situation that is too far over his head. That is what they are trying to accomplish, so it obviously works.
Permadeath does nothing to the effectiveness in the class in a given situation just as the destruction of another class's entire set of equipment on death with a waiting period of 10 days to purchase new equipmentdoes nothing to its effectiveness in any given combat.
By your reasoning, that would mean that that too would be ok. I think, though, that it would not be welcomed by anyone either.
Please inform me of ONE other non-pet class that has to worry about this and we'll talk about balance. There are none PERIOD.
If a TKA or Pistoleer gets in over their head, they get sent to a cloning center, get to spend some time in a cantina watching dancers, and have to seek out medical attention.
Sending a CH to do all that PLUS spending hours finding new pet/s, 5-10 days growing the pet, just for making the same error that another class can make. The penalties just dont add up.
Having a 1 hour pet timer OR HAM wounds like we get I would totally agree with. But if they do this change then I want all other combat classes weapons to be destroyed if they get DB'd in combat. Then thngs would be even.
TraDogNight
Actually Creature handler is my profession. But I am not a power leveler. I don't try to squeeze every last experience point out of the game by sending my pets up against mobs that were designed to be taken down by 15-20 people and not by one man with 2 or 3 pets, where the one man usually doesn't even want to get his hands dirty, he just wants his pets to do the work of a full group.
Stormblade01
That is the whole point. You are comparing a pet class with a non-pet class, and the people who designed the game just have a different vision of what a pet class is supposed to be from what you do. Too many people have been treating their pets like super weapons instead of like pets. Since the developers cannot control how people treat their pets, their only option to enforce their vision on the game, is to make it unprofitable for players to continue in the style they are using now.
Yes, creature handler is a "combat" profession. But, it is a unique profession, and cannot really be compared with a weapon using profession. You complain about the possibility of losing a pet, that you have taken a week to grow. That is the whole point of the change. TheyWANT you to worry about losing that pet. Up until now, no one has. No one worries about losing a gun. There are thousands of those around. A pet is supposed to be different.
If you get in over your head. You also get sent to a cloneing center. You don't lose any of your experience or abilities. I am sorry, I just don't see the 5-10 days it takes to grow a new pet as being that big an inconvenience. For one thing, you have more than one pet any way, so use a different one while you grow a new guy.
I know we will not agree on this. I don't expect to convince any one. This is just the way I feel, personally. The changes they are making are not going to hurt me and my style of play, and I think they will be good for the game as a whole.
Hers the deal with that Graeme. If you only use your pets on mobs that are no risk for them, then you don't receive XP. And if you don't receive XP then you don't advance in your profession.
My biggest problem with the whole perma death thing is that it makes for a lot of wasted time for somebody playing as a CH.
There are way to many issues with mobs just spawning magically around you. POOF! All a sudden you are surounded by tusken raiders/crimson razor cats/(pick your favorite killer mob). Then your pets dies or you die and your pet dies. Or how about they don't just spawn magicallyand you just, by accident, get aggroed by say a Kusak on Lok. Kusaks are a great example cause they seem to aggro easy and then as soon as you fire at one they all swarm you. Your pet/pets die(s) or you die and your pets die. Now you have to spend 7-10 days replacing that pet(s) and maybe even some money on travel expenses.
This is very unfair for the CH profession if the other professions don't lose their beloved gun of choice and have to spend 7-10 days plus expenses to replace. I am not saying that there shouldn't be some kinda penalty that is incurred, be it cloning your pet at cloning center(just like us and good money sink for SWGeconomy), some sort of cloning with BE class(give them some much needed love), or purchasing a wider range and full grown pets from a BE(again BE love), or just a simply cannot use that pet for like an hour(less time then a PC having to clone, cantina, corpse run).
What really makes me anrgy about this is that it was the bug/exploit that the DEVs left in that screwed it all up for us. Allowing novice CHs to have high level pets(Rancor) did horrible things for the image of CHs. I for one am proud of the fact that I never participated in this horrible practice.
During beta Holo flat out said handlers are a combat class. Not social, not merchant, but combat. Then simulataneous changes such as massive strength reduction and perma-death are suggested at the same time. Yet pets are not supposed to be "disposable".
All of this is completely contradictory.
Maybe all of this needs to be done for the sake of balance, but I must agree with Ferzerp. Let's get rid of the obvious imbalances and exploits first. We will see how it plays out for another few weeks or month, in which time the other professions should be maxxing and getting the best gear. Then we can do another comparison and if we need to reduce the profession further, we do so at that time.
exactly ferzerp,
its so true and i say same.
permadeath has NOTHING to do with balance issues. its only a timesink for all pet users.
it already destroyed faction wars and it now want to punish the rest of the pet holders ;/
its the silliest idea the devs brought out, in no other mmorpg i played (and i played loing and alot) a pet dies for ever. normally u just summon a new fresh one and buff it up. in some games it cost u a component but there u dont have to buy, tame or earn faction poits for it.
to build in a waste of time for no good valid reason is just simply silly, devs rethink that pls. we earn skills, money or factionpoints for pets. we earn the ability for pets and should kleep them.
i kinda liked the "deathpenalty" yesterdays "bug" made, so a died pet was after like 1 hr recallable alive, butthat u call bug. funny that your best idea to solve the problem is unintended bug LOL
no permadeath pls, worry about balance is ok, permadeath does nothing about balance.
and if u think that i would buy a pet tyhen from bio eng, who cried greedy for jst sell reasons for permadeath, no , i wont buy any pet from them just for that reason. i dont reward ppl who slap me and my work in the face.