Creature Handler Archive
Thread: What is SOE's vision for Creature Handler?
Holocron wrote:
I would not expect a straight creature handler to be as powerful in combat as a straight combat guy in any of the advanced combat professions
I assume you are referring to Master Pistoleer, Master Rifleman, Master Carbineer ... etc?If so, could you explain to me why CH has a higher skill requirement then, if it should be less powerful in your vision?
Trying to cite tradeoffs in other regards makes little sense to me as the CH balance is revolving around the CHs who are using the most powerful *combat combinations*, to the severe detriment to those who are primarily CHs.And the Pokemon/MR comparision is not built into this game *at all*. The fundamental reasons I say this are:
1) Creatures grow independantly of how you treat them
2) All creatures of X type are created equally (with the exception of texmaps
3) There is no true "training" of creatures - your character levels up, and with the right amount of clicks, a creature learns a command. It has no skills, no benefits to fighting more frequently, nothing that makes it fundamentally common to these other games, where a creature *progresses over time*.
In beta I had a hanadak called "Bush" (talking bout name scan) and I totally enjoyed having him. Even though I could tame/get a stronger pet I kept him and enjoyed having him. I remember how my every-day XP-grind team used to watch him grow over time and even often throw a remark in terms of "Omg Bush grew". I had a feeling that everyone on Endor knew him. I sueed to RP with him, slapping him and saying to people that that makes my pets more aggroessive. (And what an idea... what about making pets somewhat like the Black and White game)?
Well I loved my pet then because whenever I was in trouble, I would send him to save me. As carbineer, I would tank 2 mobs and then I would send him to tank a third mob that would aggro. People ask "do we have a tank?" and I say "Me, TKA and Bush"
Well I'll tall you about my pets now. I have a dew hambaba and a tusk cat. I hate them all because they don't listen, do stupid things and get themselves hurt because of that. And then I have to buy stims to heal them up, unless there are medics looking for xp in the area. Now tell me how can I care about something that is an expense to me instead of being help to me. Every time my pet gets incapped I think "Now I gotta heal him", and when Bush used to die, I would think "Now I gotta pull him out healed and he will be like my good ol' faithful Bush".
For some reason I just have no feelings for my pets. Maybe cause I just hate the nerfs, and the hate moved to them. They are all the same to me.
(CH 3/0/0/4 btw)
The problem lies in the fact that they designed the game so players can in effect cross train.
This is a good thing in many ways and bad in others. When said individual doesn't need you to heal him, has a pet to tank and is decent with a pistol why would he need to group especially with group xp being borked.
If you start limiting what individuals can do you start moving away from the original concept of the game.
In other words If a pistoleer owns a MCH in PvP. Then you tell the CH he can't use a weapon because he has pets. The reaction would be why can he heal while using KD or something similar.
If you open this can you'd start a frenzy worse than Oprah at all you can eat shrimp night at Sizzler.
Instead ask yourself why you feel I as a MCH shouldn't be on = footing with other elite classes even after spending more points than most elite classes to get there.
Because I can spec a weapon and get even better?
Well you can spec a pet and get even better as well no, while spending less points than I did to not be as good as you in PvP.
Again there's no more 3 rancors per MCH. It's one pet who's tempermental about fighting and needs to be constantly told to kill while I'm within a certain range.
On the other hand you have a MP who can spam KD keep you and your pet on his back while doing very very good amounts of damage.
First thing you and Raph needs to do is stop with the MCH is Uber in PvP. Those days have come and gone.
PvP is all about KD atm and that's got nothing to do with MCH.
A rifleman can put my lights out with one shot and a BH....meh don't even need to go into that.
Maybe we'll just have to agree to disagree but frankly Raph saying and you co-signing that MCH shoudln't be on par with other Elite's is him talking out of his bumhole.
Alot of people moaned about Creature Handlers. It created some problems for SOE, probably some lost accounts. They made a choice to try and re-assure the user base by nerfing the **edit** out of us making us the scapegoats and in fairness nerfs were needed to a point.
Oddly though I don't recall seeing alot of post about Gurreck armor.
I am familiar with quite a few post begging for many many Ch fixes none of which have come to pass.
that's an invalid comparison...
Comparing someone who trained CH + 1 combat profession and saying they'd own someone who just trained a combat profession is like apples and oranges (and because of this CH's can't be equiv. to a combat profession).
The fact is, the one who only trained in the combat profession still have alot of skills to dump into a secondary support skill (medic, doctor, or combat medic)or intosecondary combat skill(eg. advanced range skill tree + advanced melee tree) which easily matches someone who's trained ina CH +1 combat tree..
AlsoIassumed BE profession was the crafting tree for pets...while CH was the combat-oriented tree for pets..
So if Ch is half-half, what's gonna be of BE? Half-nothing?
I'd rather have CH tree require master scout and maybe another skill tree (organic chemistry from medic that BE's currently are required to train in) and make it a decent tree instead of having it "half-half" as you envision it..
Just my 2 cents
Holocron wrote:
Yes, we DO feel we have made many positive changes for CH's. We've made major strides in keeping your pets from being deleted, getting stuck, and so on. We saw those are the top things that we needed to address--whether or not your pet runs away in a fight seems less important if you can't manage to have a pet at all. (This is why store moved btw).
lol, here's where I disagree Holo... Keeping pets from being deleted, getting stuck, and so on, is just you guys fixing your own bugs... yes it HELPS us, but it is no REWARD to us, it's you doing what you SHOULD do, so don't make us thank you for it.
Then you nerf us to the point where we don't even know what role to play, much less what to plan on for the future... as soon as we think the worst of the nerfing is over, you cook up another idea to ruin the profession (and by you I mean SOE, or the people doing CH, or whoever).
These so called "positive" changes are just bug fixes for bugs that should be fixed, or never should have happend... they're not gifts, and they certainly aren't something to counteract the horrible times you've been putting us through.
Also, you claim to not understand why we feel there is no incentive to become a Master CH... and blame it on the fact you don't have a high CH character. Here's the simplest reason... a person with 4/4/4/0 (that is the tiers in order on ctl-s) can call a single Rancor or any other level 50 creature. A Master CH can do that, and call a level 20 creature, what you fail to realize is that level 20 creature doesn't mean jack! Master CH gets a +1 to pets out... but you take the glory out of that by limiting us to 70 CL at once... so I can call 3 level 23s or 2 level 35s, but those really don't work out that much better than just one rancor (or one gurreck pre-nerf). There is quite literally NO reason to Master CH as it stands now, no incentive, no bonus.
CH was the only profession that looked interesting to me, and I never intended to be a combat class with my pets, but that's what you started CH as, and what we got used to... you've nerfed that to heck, without replenishing a fun role to play. I'm sticking to my guns (no pun intended) and keeping Master CH to see how mounts work out, I strongly suggest mounts only be granted by Master CHs to give SOME advantage to the Master CHs and for once not give all the glory to the dabblers (your dabbler support is good and all, but it's really killing CHs and is what allowed CHs to become so overpowered in the first place, in my opinon).
Could CL levels be assigned to Creature Handlers as well as pets?
A master creature handler with only novice pistol skills would be CL50 and allowed to have 100CL's worth of pets to compensate,
whereas,
A master creature handler with any advanced weapons skills would be allowed 60 or 70 CL's of pets as it is now
and
A master creature handler with no combat skills would be allowed 120 - 150 CL's of pets
Couldn't the same point system which determines the difficulty of missions we are given be used to implement something like this?
Then the creature handler could determine how best to balance his character as opposed to the devs doing it and getting flamed all the time
I read this is another thread and thought it was a great idea
And this makes good sense....with one assumption. A CH can indeed wield two powerful weapons. He can master pistol, rifle, etc as well as master CH. And if there is a way to allow ALL players the option to MASTER two elite weapons and wield them, then I'd be for that.
But I'm opposed to the idea that any noob can go run a few missions and get a faction pet or buy a droid and then be on an even playing field as a CH who has MASTERED two combat profs.
Randy,
I think I addressed just the issue you brought up with my posts about making another elite-elite profession (just like theupcoming Urban Planner profession).
This new profession (which you have to have master CH to get) will allow you to have a higher level of pets but it would be at the cost of more skill points, so you wouldn't be able to get that Master Pistoleer/Carbineer/Rifle.
The new class would also have skill trees for improving the combat effectiveness of the creatures (damage, defense, to-hit), increase their regeneration (creatures made for battle can "get it together" faster), increase the variety of attacks they can do, etc...
This is a perfectly viable solution, in my opinion. A lot of people wouldn't like this because they are trying to get CH back to pre-patch, which is insane. Q and Holo have already stated that they do not want CH to become too powerful. Therefore, they don't want pets to be too good in battle. Simple, make CH's spend more skill points (read: new class on top of Master CH) to get more combat abilities for their pets.
This is like my fourth or fifth post on this. I have YET to see anyone shoot it down. I will continue to post about it until I am blue in the face because I think this has a lot of potential.
For you guys that are complaining that the clevel is too low, would you be willing to give up your other combat profession to raise it? If not, then you are trying to bake your cake and eat it, too, and that's just not going to happen, Q and Holo have already stated that. Let's try to think of some good ideas here.
And this makes good sense....with one assumption. A CH can indeed wield two powerful weapons. He can master pistol, rifle, etc as well as master CH. And if there is a way to allow ALL players the option to MASTER two elite weapons and wield them, then I'd be for that.
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See, the thing is the smarter, tactical players are already useing two weapon lines ; Not two weapons at once, but a Bounty Hunter has access to 2 good weapon lines for example-Carbine and Pistol. What have the better ones been doing? Macroing the use of both weapons in a single fight. They might start out wih a carbine based "Knockdown" (Before the nerfs), then swicth to Eye,Torso, Health shots and end it up with a Bodyshot or 2. This is just throwing something out there, the real macros will be different
You can use the full power of two or more advanced weapon lines currently, so i take all these "You cant compare them" posts with a grain of salt -per say. Pets currently dont do squat for damage compared to any player combat class -elite or not.
quote from Roarrk
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I hope I can be clear in this, although I expect it to be long. Our profession is screwed right now. It is no longer very fun to play. We play games for fun. Raph, I was one of the people beating the drum to have creature handlers reduced in power some because I was able to run out and destroy creatures like Rancor that I should have never been able to approach alone, even as a master. No single character should. By this same token, creature handlers running through the streets with 3 rancors was just plain stupid and should have never been permitted.
Players entered this game with the expecation that creature handlers would be creature handlers... those capable of wielding fearsome beasts (not pets) to do their bidding. We wanted to go out and find a loyal companion to raise, care for, grow attached to and fight with. We did not want a creature that would be disposable, start off at its maximum potential and then decay. We wanted creatures that would start young and need training to become more and more powerful, not weaker and weaker through fighting. You gave us creature handlers that could call 3 rancors immediately. That was taken away (thank you) and replaced by creatures that decay and are disposable razors... shave three times with them then throw them away. You replaced 3 rancors with EVERYONE now being equivalent or better than novice creature handlers. I know train pets to sell to people that have far more commands than I had as a novice creature handler and all they have to do is pay me a few credits for these or have a friend give them away. There is no longer anything UNIQUE about my profession other than my creatures can be more powerful than other people's creatures that could care less about pets and see them as a useful meatshield.
As a novice, I went out and trained a grand wrix baby. This was my steadfast companion. I was planning on keeping him forever and he was a roleplaying friend. I sold him yesterday after an outing on Endor destroyed his statistics because he would not store, could not clone, warps around, stops following ,etc. You made my pet be disposable. Your entire model is flawed. You started the problem by starting people with the best creatures (3 rancors, etc) for no work. You now continue the flawed model by making creatures start at maximum potential (I'm ignoring the baby part because it is so brief and we do nothing but wait for them to grow) and then decay. What sort of fun or reward is that? They are tampons that get bloody and then we throw them away now. Like other players, I am currently growing a new baby grand wrix to replace my old friend I sold.
Sitting around for 10 hours waiting for a creature to heal is not fun. Begging bio engineers to sell pet stims that they have to fish for hours and stuff to make and are pissed off about having to make is not fun. Hunting for a store command and wondering if it is going to work is not fun. Seeing the entire world running around with fighting creature is not fun. Three rancors running through the streets is not in the spirit of Star Wars. Me taking the hits because it is cheaper for me rather than my creatures is not fun. Me running 250 meters to get my stopped pet yet again is not fun. Seeing players run around with 9,000 HAM wickedly powerful stormtrooper "pets" and AT-STs blasting the hell out of me is not fun. One shot kills are not fun.
Many of us strongly resent being likened to pokemon. Screw this pikachu, I choose you crap. Give us a solid companion we raise, improve, amplify and grow attached to. Revoke EVERYONE having creatures in the lame excuse of saying that everyone can ride a horse... so they should all ride horses type of argument. We're not talking about cats and dogs. We're talking about deadly mythical creatures. I can't even tell who is a creature handler anymore because EVERYONE is running around with creatures. That is the great vision of creature handlers? We're not distinct at all. More numbers do not make something distinct. We want more than that.
If you have to, make an elite-elite profession of Beast Master or something that allows us to amplify our creature's abilities beyond lame tricks. Let us control when they attempt a knockdown move, ranged attack or when to actually flee from combat. Let us throw away our weapon and focus on maximizing our creature as our weapon of choice.
You are truly cheapening us and it's not about us wanting to be power gamers. It's about us wanting to be able to enjoy the game, be interesting characters and professions, having a unique identity and having fun. Step by step this game is becoming a chore as a creature handler. I went from being an adventurer focused on caring for my beast to a peddler of small creatures to the highest bidder... a creature handler that came to view combat as too expensive to be worthwhile, irritated with all the bio engineers who will not make stimpacks out of rightful protest (they don't want to be pet medics).
Increasingly people are talkingi about quitting this game everywhere I go because it simply is losing the fun. As a creature handler I'm now running around with my creature stored because the ONLY possible outcome from combat is that my creature will eventually degrade. Think about how stupid that is.
Fact - Not everyone should be a creature handler and the current "pet" system makes everyone a novice one
Fact - Our creatures can only go downhill
Fact - Our creatures are disposable
Fact - Our creatures are buggy
Fact - Having mounts in a game does not require everyone having creatures as pets
Fact - You are upsetting many people
Fact - We're not all a bunch of power hungry immature idiots
Fact - We are cancelling our subscriptions and writing negative reviews
Fact - This can all be fixed
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/agree 1000000000%
Mori-Mori wrote:
i think of CH as a complemetary combat skill. i don't expect or need it to be a stand-alone combat skill. I'm satisfied with the caps, although the master CH seems a little pointless.
This position is exactly how I see CH. It's a complimentary skill. My creatures don't really kill things for me: they provide an excellent (read: 5500 HAM, at my current CH level) defense against some really nasty creature and me.
Mori-Mori wrote:
and why have the command skill trees been made pointless by allowing pets to retain their commands upon transfer? you can spend much CH exp and skill credits to get commands like group or guard, or you can have someone teach these commands to your pet. then you can use these higher level commands WITHOUT HAVING THE SKILL. that ain't right.
Well, technically non-CHs don't have the skills to train their pets and we're the ones that give them pets that attack. I think the problem with creatures knowing commands that others trained them is okay. I mean, if a friend of mine doesn't have the ability to teach a pet "play" yet, I think it's perfectly alright for me to teach it for them. Perhaps I can extend this as a business and can obtain credits for it.
The entire argument that "non-CHs shouldn't be able to use the attack skill" is silly because we're the ones that gave them the ability in the first place! The solution is simple: don't train a skill if you don't want the person to getting it to have the skill. I would suggest that we be allowed to "untrain" a creature. We would get no xp if we untrained a creature (and would receive no xp if we trained it again... nor would anyone else get the xp if they trained the creature the skill).