Creature Handler Archive

I understand the sentimental attachment issue with BE pets... I've mentioned it as part of the reason why there is such a strong desire for a fix to these pets. For me personally it wasn't so bad, I only had a couple that I used and I felt less attached to my BE pets than I do my wild tames... for me, the wild tames had a story or adventure to acquire them, whereas my BE pets were bought off a vendor. I know some of you feel differently about BE pets, so I feel bad for those of you put in the position of losing your favorite or special pets.

I also understand the perspective of those of you who paid a fortune for these pets pre-CU. I'm not saying it's right by any means, but also many pre-CU weapons, armor, foods, etc. all converted very poorly and needed to be replaced, so the conversion issue is not unique to creature handler. This is an unfortunate reality of the conversion process we've dealt with... some things converted well, others converted to garbage.

I was (and am) merely speaking from my own personal opinion that it may not be fixed to your (or anyone's) satisfaction in the near future, if at all, and that your pre-CU pets may be forever shadows of their former selves... it was just my recommendation that you clear the datapad of them unless you are very patient (or very attached) and move on to new pets, as most wild tames are superior to the pre-CU BE pets.

Again, I am still pursuing this as an issue, but I have no ETA of a fix, if any fix is to be forthcoming at all.

CH and BE pets are back in the crapper once again. RIght when it looked like it would be viable profession, its smashed all to pieces. First off, we do have attachments to our pets, and devs need to realize that. Just like someone that has a Clothing Attachment with +20 to Weaponmsith Experimentation, and they were a weaponsmith. I value my pets I've fought beside that much. Second, pets arent callable in different zones on Kashyyyk. Which makes one of my elite profession useless. Thirdly, I might as well go tame a wild creature instead of buying a BE pet since they are worthless right now. Not to mention on my server extremely expensive, since I have yet to find a single BE that is still in business. They have all repecced to something different or quit the game because of the CU. There is no way to get these "new" BE pets on my server. So whats the point? Also, the CL65 Varactyl is near worhtless except its a mount.It is nothing special. It is not better than any other useless CL65 pet yu tame int he wild, that can be smacked down by a creature 5 levels lower than it. CH is just all screwed, pardon my language.

Message Edited by potatotr0ll on 05-27-2005 01:59 PM

The point about the Varactyl brings up another issue.

All creatures of a given level are identical in every way as near as I can tell. Defense, the same. To hit, the same. Health, the same give or take some "process error" (random amount), equal to (roughly) 100 * level. A level 65 pet is a level 65 pet is a level 65 pet. You never need more than one pet of a given level (or even level range, since a few levels do not really matter).

They need to change this. Each animal should be UNIQUE. In the old days a "level 25" pet might have had high HAM but no armor or resistance... or medium HAM and some resistance, but no armor... or whatever. That is,they VARIED. Now, all pets of a given level have the same in all stats as far as I can tell from my datapad... And that means they're boring.

Pets need to be given back their individuality. A level 65 brackasett should be fundamentally different in some way from a level 65 Crystal Snake. They should not be the same except for appearance.

C

I agree with the last post... pets should be different.

right now there is no difference between a level 20 bantha whatever and a level 20 cat, or a level 20 anything... they should ALL be different, and god forbit, random.

(devs should focus on adding more elite/different stats on RARE pets, give us something to look for in a lair)

Well I just logged in today to see what was going to happen to my pets after pub17. I was dreading this allready as the post I had read thus far indicated that BE pets were going through another stat change. Fortunately I was pleasantly surprised that none of my pets had a stat change so they should still work as they did right after the CU. Looking at my pets though I notice that as mentioned before my BEs at the time of the CU converted their HAM to 100 times their level so level 60 has a 6000 HAM but my Veractyl and my Grand Wrix that I caught native have HAMs at 200 times their level. So I guess I'll be on the look out for some wild pets to tame. Hopefully the few BEs on my server will get up to speed quickly.

Ko thanks for keeping us aware of what is going on.

But this is just really disheartening...I spent a lot of money pre CU on the pets that I have but back then money was a lot easier to come by. Now I am going to have to buy all new ones?!?!?!!!! That just sucks. Add to that the number of BEs that have left my server. I've only found 2 active BEs thus far on Intrepid and they are not yet masters so the pets they are making are well below what I am looking for. The only Master BE from before the CU that is still on the server hasn't started making pets yet due to the bugs BE has/had. And with the decrease in pet HAMs now will only serve to make them more obsolete.

CH is an elite combat profession, yet we do less damage with our pets by a far cry then any other elite profession and I believe even the basic combat professions like marksman or brawler do more damage then our pets do. Granted my reason for being a CH has more to do with the fact that I like pets and my pets are my friends...but we are a combat class so we should be able to be effective in combat which we are not.

The pet tanking issue is still unresolved.

I just got back from a run to the Hidden Village, with brief diversion to mug and pillage a random spawn of Nightsister Rangers I encountered on my way back. It was not a successful battle. I barely managed to kill the first one, while the second one incapped and slew me.

At the outset, I pulled out and grouped with a Mature Reptilian Flyer (CL-69) to see how well it would tank for me. I sent it in at the start, and allowed it to fight alone until it had lost 25% of it's health, and then I jumped into the fray using a Tusken Rifle. Iinitiated my attack with an Improved Underhand shot. Then, with my base Ranged Shot selected as my default auto attack, I went to work, tossing in the occasional random special attack about every third or fourth attack.

Every one of my attacks, including my base Ranged Shot and my weakest damage-dealing special attack (Improved Confusion Shot, which does about a third of my base attack's damage while possibly inflicting some state changes), out-damaged my pet, even when I had Emboldened and Enraged him. As a result, I immediately drew the ire of my targets, and could not lose it for the duration of the fight. My pet trailed uselessly behind.

My Shots' Damage:

• Base ranged attack: 654 base, 354 actual after target's armor mitigation


• Improved Confusion Shot: 327 base, 177 actual after target's armor mitigation


• Improved Underhand Shot: 490 base, 265 actual after target's armor mitigation


• Improved Eyeshot: 523 base, 283 after target's armor mitigation


• Advanced Critical Shot (while target was standing): 1248 base, 676 actual after target's armor mitigation


• Advanced Critical Shot (target knocked down): 1243 base, 841 actual after target's armor mitigation

My Pet's Damage:

• 265 base, 143 actual after target's armor mitigation (target standing)


• 152 actual after target's armor mitigation (pet emboldened)


• 155 actual after target's armor mitigation (pet enraged)

• As noted, all of my attacks out-damaged even a high-level pet's attacks


• As a result, I drew the aggro immediately and kept it for the duration of the battle


• All damage numbers locked into a single value upon the outset of the fight. All Advanced Critical Shots I fired did the same damage; all Ranged Shots did the same damage as the first ranged shot; etc. Likewise, the pet's damage remained unchanged after the first attack. Is there a broken randomizer in the combat code, or is this working as intended?


• As a result, the tweak to damage ranges is nullified.


• Conclusion: Pets cannot tank for a high-level combatant.


• Possible fixes:




• Increase damage modifiers for Embolden and Enrage Pet special abilities


• Introduce a "Pet Roar" or some similar equivalent to melee specialists' Taunt ability


• Urge LucasArts to yank SOE's Star Wars license and award it to a game company that has a clue about how to design a good game

ok firstly the CU killed a bunch of my pets cuz i triedto keep HAM, now level 189+, cant be fixed according to CSRS

i got very upset, i had a trio of horses i used to call, now i cant

Patch 17!!! OMG what have you done now?

my level 10 horse had to loose half his stats!

my levle 50 Rancor which was on halved stats thanks to the CU is now un callable!!! I tamed it, how can this be?

my level 1 rancor is nerfed also

PLease why do u make CH so useless Devs, what is the point, or intentions here? I mean now I cant do anything!!!

I am Ranger CH and 2 days ago it rocked, now I cant even take on a kreetle

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Lanni_Istari wrote:

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SioBabble wrote:

Ko, my nominee for the new number five issue is PET SPEED

In particular, the inablity of ANY pet to keep up with you on a mount

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I'd like to see some pets with high enough running speed to keep up with a speeder so I would support this issue.

But I'd also very much like to see the 15 second wait to call a pet waived if the CH isn't in combat. This is a big part of the reason I don't group. Usually, by the time I get my pet(s) out and grouped, the fight is over because other combat classes don't have the patience to wait for the CH to get his pets out.

It would also make grouping as a CH much nicer if the CH doesn't have to be standing next to the group leader (or be the group leader) to invite a pet to the group.

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Prior to the CU, the big cat skins (gurreck/wrix, GSP/razor cat) could pace an X34. This is the only reason I have an X34, so that I can ride it and trail my cats close behind.

The four-limbed avains(pekos, rep fliers, lantern birds) prior to the CU could pace a swoop or AV 21 on level ground without much effort.

The reasoning behind the 15 second timer on pet calling has NEVER been adequately explained. Prior to early 2004, you could not call pets or vehicles in the wild at all without a camp. What this did when vehicles came out was to force everyone to invest 15 points in scout to call vehicles away from cities. Vehicles were very buggy, would poof on you for no reason in the middle of nowhere, and a lot of people were very upset with this. Pressure was brougth to bear on the devs to remove the camp call requirement, and part of the reason was that for several months in 2003 there was no camp call requirement due to a coding bug that instead of allowing you to call a pet near your declared residence, you were allowed to call a pet outside of a 'bubble' around your declared residence, with absolutely no ill effects in game play.

The devs insisted that there were 'griefing concerns' that they could never articulate that required a camp calling mechanism. The problem with that assertion was that a great deal of PvP takes place in metropolitans zones where pets are instantly callable. Still, the 15 second delay was imposed on calling critters, droids, faction pets, and vehicles when the camp calling requirement was revoked. There has NEVER been a reasonable explanation for this, probably because it's established fact that the developers often don't understand many of the game mechanisms that the players have long ago figured out, which of course is utterly appalling.

Message Edited by SioBabble on 05-28-2005 11:05 AM

• Re-balance tamed pets with their level. As stated a lvl 69 shear mite should beable to kill a lvl 60 npc or animal, the level of the pet needs to matter more in terms of attacking players and npcs.


• Allow customization of pets: Let armorsmiths craft armor to fit pets (a good looker too). Ability to do "quest" like things to get your pet better at a specific thing; Like taking a lot of damage but not dealing a lot, or running fast after your bike, or dealing a lot of damage, and so on.

I believe the new #5 position should go to the issue of pet speed.

I was just finishing up my measurements of mount speed, when the pet speed changed happened. Since then, I've tried to think of a reason why the speed reduction would be justified. I can't. It just doesn't make sense. One of the main reasons I feel it has to be a bug it this. I've measured the flatland speed of every mount (see the CH FAQ). When I'm riding a mount, and have another of my mounts following me, the following mount does NOT move at its previously measured speed. It slows to the speed of a running person, just like every other pet. That makes no sense at all.

Actually, the first time I noticed the slowdown was with my droid, thenimmediately checked the petsand foundsimilar behavior. This reinforces my feeling that this is a bug involving all following minions, whether they be droids or pets.

Major Bugs: (Rebalancing of pets would be my choice, it seems like the largest issue to every style of CH out there)

1. Rebalancing of pets needs to occur. I don't want to be forced to use 3 female narglatches the rest of my CH profession because they are sooo much better than everything else. I mean heck, the GSPs I have are 1 lvl higher, 23, and are like 3k health and do less damage. Narglatches are like 6 or 7k health, the only ones of their kind for anything near their level. I'd say many animals need an increase in health, and all creatures need an incrase in damage. The increase in damage would help fix some of the issue of levels not mattering when up against a player (or npc?).


2. Pets are way too slow!! They only keep up with me if I'm on the ground.


3. For calling and using pets, along with trading, the wrong difficulty level is being used. Instead of their current difficulty level (so say a baby that's 2(15)) it is using their projected adult difficulty level. This sucks for using babies, 'cuz there's no reason to use them when they do so much less damage than an adult version of them that I could call instead for the same amount of sacrafice to level of called pets.


4. Also I wouldn't mind hearing, as many others would, why in the world we have to wait 15 seconds for calling pets? We have a lot of scout, that should make up for not having a camp down and calling it. Think of it that way, CH should beable to call instantly and everyone else is left with how it is.