Creature Handler Archive
Thread: Making CH Competitive
Ryyger wrote:
Barb-Wire wrote:
Ryyger wrote:
OK I'm confused then. What combat professions do not have to equip a weapon?
ch is not a true combat profession.
we HAVE to take up an entire other profession to deal damage. ever try to kill a piket lair with a rancor?? your gonna be there a while with that "weapon"
And why is it that you don't see that as a problem again?
that isnt what i was getting at. i was merely making a comment on CH as it is now. it is not now a combat elite profession. it used to be one. but the devs decided that we are no longer a combat elite profession but a support profession. if we get turned back into a cmbat elite then some huge sacrifices will be made in the form of how we use our other 144 skillpoints. so basically we will not be drastically better off after a "fix" than we are now. the pain will just be shifted in a different direction. they are not going to allow us to have our bofa treats and eat em at the same time.
Barb-Wire wrote:
Ryyger wrote:
OK I'm confused then. What combat professions do not have to equip a weapon?
ch is not a true combat profession.
we HAVE to take up an entire other profession to deal damage. ever try to kill a piket lair with a rancor?? your gonna be there a while with that "weapon"
And this is part of the entire problem with the CH profession. Back in beta, Holocron's "vision" of CH was not that of a combat profession, and time ran out before retail to do any tweaking to CH. Aside from the RP aspects, the only useful skills within the CH tree are combat-only related. The profession has become a combat one through actual play and the design and direction should now reflect this.
Tangent post warning.
I would like to be able to train creatures emotes. They don't even have to do anything. I just want to look at my womprat and say "Go knaw on his leg." and get (Kennedy) gnaws on %TT's leg.
1) Reinstate the MaxCL vs. MaxCL For Multiple Pets stats. Right now, using two pets is already a risky chore, and 3 is downright worthless. Raise the MaxCL when using multiple pets.
2) Do away with pet vitality. It looks good on paper, but in implemntation has little actual effect - except to suck the fun out of using pets in pvp or even pve, particularly those rarer ones that can take days or weeks to find.
2a) Related, BE pets seem to be the measurement of CH power. It's stupid, but true, even though many of us don't like using BE'd pets. If the devs must keep pet vitality, have it on BE'd pets only, not wild/tamed ones. Since BE'd pets are the power-gamers/ pvpers choice, anyway, let them deal with the vitality thing, since a BE pet used for such things applies to game balance much more than weak, wild pets used for fun outdoors in pve. Since BE'd pets tend to be little more than meat shields, anyway, it makes sense. But the rare (read: wild/tamabe) pets shouldn't have this limitation, since they're not nearly as powerfulAND areexponentially more difficult to obtain.
SioBabble wrote:
Vert,
To be honest, I don't believe ANYTHING the devs say about their future plans. They'll always come up with some excuse NOT to nerf the other combat profs and delay the "combat rebalance". Why? Because the subscription cancellations would come so fast that they could not keep up with them, and the doors would be shuttered at SWG central within a week.
I don't think we'll ever see the combat rebalance's final steps implemented. If we do, they can nerf the creatures in the same swoop that they nerf the TKAs, the riflemen, the CMs, the heavy swordsmen, the fencers, the pistoleer, the carbineers, the commandos, the BHs, and everyone else.
I want my pre nerf critters back NOW. I'm tired of waiting for this pack of amateurs to get their act together. I have no confidence in the current live dev team. It is painfully obvious that the second string is on the live game now. They're dropping the ball left and right. The crafting nerf that they planned on foisting on everyone in publish 7 would have done exactly the opposite of their stated intention, and the effort to stop it was led by master crafters who stood to benefit in game from the change, but who are mature enough and care enough about the game to put that aside and do the right thing for the entire crafting community. Unlike the devs. It is painfully obvious that these guys do not know what they are doing; they don't play the game, they don't understand the dynamics. Furthermore, the only people on the forums they listen to are the nerf criers, with a handful of exceptions.
Vert,
This is a great post. Unfortunately, there are too many answers. I see distinctly 3 types of CH. Tamers, PvEers. and PvPers. While the first two live intermingled with each other. They do not always relish the PvPer. Even we cannot live and let live. It is though we do not recognize each other as possible extensions of ourselves. Take for example the BH. There is potential to PvE, PvP or solely run BH missions. There are no questions within that community. Killing is killing, whether for pleasure of fun. Almost any profession has the PvE/PvP, with some third distinction if it is a combat class. Smugglers being the better combat class because they offer so much crafting wise plus are a great combat class. Drugs/Slices, Faction Missions, PvE and PvP.
All that being said, we cannot individually present what we believe to be better for PvP without realizing what each other uses PvP for. I have actively participated in any PvP 3-4 times this New Year. The December Patch utterly destroyed CH in PvP. So I really am inclined to agree and we have told JustG in his own thread that until the combat rebalance we should be reinstated. It is with great respect for your argument that I can agree that if the rebalance were going to happen we should remain this stifled. Sky, a few others and I, remain skeptical that SOE as any combat rebalance in mind. Marketting the Space Expansion will become priority. You need to convince the Devs that this is a fruitless endeavor when I feel less that 25% CH's will actually spend money on a newer bugged expansion.
In this very thread we see the division of CH. Some are tamers, some do not care at all about PvP. It used to be all I cared about at all. The community at large was developing better tactics prior to the nerf. It is not without reason that Novice Marksmen died in my hands (largely because I preyed upon them at the shuttles). My tactic was to allow them to load and move a meter before i sicced my pets who had them on follow. Coupled with a kick mind bleed and my hasty running from the star port I won many battles. TKM, Commandos and BH's often beat my pets. Before anyone criticizes this as shuttle ganking I always waited until the person moved, and SOE did not at that time consider shuttle ganking an exploit.
In my business (real life) all I do is come up with marketing ideas, this is how I would market my pet(s) in combat: (no particular order)
- Combat armor for uber pets.
- Defining ferocity attribute as the ability to overwhelm a single (target) (posture change, counter attack, attack speed, damage bonus checks, inflict wounds, and DOTs.) Giving the CH the ability to modify this attribute through practice or training enhancements.
- Adding /duelpet so that wild pets (not BE pets - no offense) can gain skill points that can be used to modify the pets attributes to either: (A) make the pet more viable for PVP by increasing the pets armor attribute by allowing the pet to wear decayable armor; (B) increasing the pets mind attributes to enhance the pets ability to stick the special move; (C) increasing the pets action attributes to allow a pet to intercept a (target) in order to remove the agro from the CH.
- Adding awesome moves to pets instead of specials 1 & 2 (A) /lockjaw - ability for ur pet to rip away armor and weapons by unquiping them into the (targets) datapad, making them unequipable for several seconds. (I'd be the first to scream nerf if a pet ripped away my VB's and I couldn't equip for 15 seconds, lol just kidding; (B) /stalk - works like the pet command /stay except the pet lies prone or sitting and is unexaminable (hiding the pets owner) great for PVP in this way: if the owner is attacked the pet gets a bonus based on the range or distance from the attacking (target) and has the ability to suprise the (target) and inflict added damage, cause serious intimidation, knock the (target) down, or rip away armor/weapon by unequiping it into the attackers datapad - making in unequipable for 15 seconds.
- Giving the pet greater ability to inflict wounds and large amounts of battle fatigue on their (target).
- Vicious pets should get this: an attack modifier giving the pet the ability to make wounds ache (ofcourse if the pets (target) had wounds). Aching wounds would prevent the healing of action and health bars while under this state. Great for PVP and would add that "oh $#%&" factor if a pet was coming at you while engaged in PVP combat. (A1) Ur wounds are aching so you can't heal, and the darn pet just ripped away ur pistol making it unequipable for 15 secs, and he surprised you so ur still intimidated = bad day at the office. (A2) And here comes the CH with another pet running up to you laughing = cramped back from the cloning room floor.
- Add the ability for a CH to create pet buffs that would work in this way: a buffed pet would use it's vitality as the duration of the pet buff (i.e. if the pets vitality was 100 then the pet would stay buffed for 100 hours - storing the pet in ur data pad would work like stat migration to increase the vitality level back up to the maximum over time) The only modifier that wouldn't increase the pet to the maximum vitality is the pets adjusted vitality based on incaps (vitality hits cannot be increased). A buffed pet that is incapped should take additional vitality hits of up-to-ten. (cool effect = add eyeglow color to buffed pets)
- Animation/area effect attacks: (A) The coiling snake that smothers his (target) causing instant incap; (B) Knocking down a large (target) such as a Mauler or Rancor could cause the pet to topple on top of the attacker causing instant incap (area effect);
- The ability to add decayable weapon disruptors to pets (area effect) that greatly reduces the damage output of ranged weapons (cool effect = looks like a container strapped to pets back)
- Add a pet death strike prior to the pet going down, capable of inflicting massive damage to the pets (target)
- /petescape sending the pet off into the wild escaping combat, but making the pet uncallable for 1 hour if it successfully escapes combat (vitality hit as well)
- The ability for the "dog park" effect of pets agroing eachother. No effect on the pets owners from pet fights.
I'll run with these so far. Hope I'm on to something here...
Vertexon.
There is no simple thing that will tide us over until the entire combat rebalance goes in effect. You guys nerfed ch so hard its a joke to have it as a profession. If your true plan was to nerf everyone to rebalance combat im all for it. But if you are going to keep CH in the current state for months and months, I might as well give it up now.
When I started going for CH I Knew about all the problems that were going on and kept telling myself that the dev's would fix it. Well im 20k points away from MCH and it has gone for bad to worse.
I do not see any light at the end of the tunnel and what you are telling us now is that you are going to put a hold on the combat rebalance. The ONLY THING you could do to fix the current state of the profession (which im curious why you havent run a thread like that since january) is to un-nerf us.
Thats it.
There is not one simple fix that would make us happy. Because the bottom line is we just cant use our pets for anything right now. They are useless. We could spend our points on another ----> ELITE <---- profession and get MUCH better results. If you want to make us happy until you have the time to rebalance all combat roll back our nerfs.
Bruno Salieri