Dancer Archive
Thread: Targetable Buff now on Test Center!
Taken from the dancer boards:
Original thread
http://forums.station.sony.com/swg/board/message?board.id=musician&message.id=4572
As most of you know, Musicians have long had the ability to buff Focus and Willpower of audience members. But the patch on Test significantly improves this buff, in most ways. Here are some details:
1. /setperform: Dancers and Musicians now have the option to target a player and type /setPerformanceBuffTarget, or /setperfor for short. This command does work. Supposedly, if you play for just FIVE minutes, doing flourishes and performing reasonably advanced songs or dances, the buff to Mind (by Dancers) or Focus/Willpower (by Musicians) will last a full TWO HOURS. In fact, one of my audience members reported a three hour buff -- and the buff always doubles the Focus and Willpower stats. Nice.
2. Buff message: When youtarget someone , the audience member receives this message: "Richie Starsider [i.e., the Musician] directs their attention to you." The performer receives a slightly buggy message: "You [in my case Richie Starsider] direct your attention to Richie Starsider." Oops; the last term should be the audience member.
3. Passive buff: We can still buff people "passively" -- but it may be that the audience member has to be grouped with the performer to receive the passive buff. I'm getting reports of a 5- or 10-minute passive buff resulting in a 70-80 minute buff -- not bad.
4. Willpower stat bugs. I'm still finding that many recipients take a small hit to their Willpower stat during the buff, or after it wears off: hits range from 5-40 Willpower points. Eating food sometimes cures temporarily, but results in a spice-like downer afterwards. Relogging for 30+ minutes may work better; not sure yet. Focus and Mind don't seem to be affected adversely.
5. Targeting with /setperform. I'd been worried that ommni and nalargon players wouldn't be able to use a targeted buff, since we must keep those instruments targeted. But you only need target the player when typing /setperform; after that, you can target your instrument and play normally.
All in all, it's looking pretty cool. Will keep you posted.
Hawks - Flurry
I'd love to dust off the old fighting robes and join my friends in the field again.
Vanje wrote:
Just out of curiosity, can you only buff one person at a time then or can you perform for multiple people? If this is the case, its going to be a bad thing. People are going to be furious if they have to wait in line to get a buff.
You can also group with the players to give a shorter duration buff. This is pulled from NewJedi's thread (musician correspondent), who has done some great testing 
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1.Duration of "targeted" buff. I targeted one player with /setperform and performed for just five minutes -- and that player later e-mailed me to say the buff lasted for about three hours. ButI also targeted and used /setperformfor a second player for five minutes, and he said the buff dropped within 1.5-2.5 hours.Either way, this marks a huge improvement in the usefulness of this buff! Yay!
2. Duration of "passive" buff. By contrast,a Musician can still buff someone within his own group if they /listen "passively" --that is, without being actively targeted and /setperformed by the Musician. But in this case, the ratio of performance time to buff duration is less spectacular. One guy reported a 72-82 minute buff after a performance time of between 5-10minutes.
3. Buffing ungrouped players. This is a significant change: you can no longer"passively" buffsomeone who is not grouped with you. They must join your group and /listen. However, you can "actively" buff an ungrouped player by using /setperform. I haven't tried using /setperform onmore than one player simultaneously.
4. Targeting while playing nalargon and ommni. Not an issue.The Musician need only target the player and type /setperformbefore performing; then you can switch to nalargon/ommni and play, and the buff still works.
5. Willpower stat bugs. Many players still get slightly borked Willpower stats during or after the buff. Usually it's the loss of a few points. Not sure whether eating food, spice, or extended offline time fixes this.
Great news, and thanks for the information
A question hereunto:
Is it possible to buff themself with the /setperform?
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Aniella (Gorath) Dancer
When New Jedi mentioned this to me last night in tells, I thought he meant for it to be kept quiet I guess not!
My questions for those playing on Test:
* We still buff passively as well as by targeting? If the passive buff is equivalent to the old 30-minute/50% buff, I don't have a problem with that. But I had really hoped that the buff would not take effect AT ALL unless the person were targeted. This turns our one neat benefit into something that we can grant or withhold as we choose. Sure, /denyservice could help here as well, but I see /deny as a negative response to harrassers, not something we want on by default. Also, this enhancement isn't going to have near the effect on AFK Macroers if they still buff to some degree, as it would if they didn't buff at all unless they were at keyboard to target and give the /buff command.
* Targeting multiple players - the group idea has some merit, BUT normally entertainers tend to be in their own groups for the XP bonus. We shouldn't have to leave those groups to buff more than one person.
All we're doing, really, is granting other players the right to gain from our mind buff. Target, buff, target, buff -- as many times as we want simultaneously. The object here is not to make us into doctors, it's to give us control over who gets our buff. If anyone can now watch us and passively get the buff, why can't it simply be translated into an active command to accomplish the same purpose?
Still, this is major progress. I'm excited about the possibilities.
If we still give a passive buff,the targeted buff is completely worthless. The entire point of having it targeted is to give us control of our healing/entertaining beyond /startdance /startmusic.
I see the new generation of afk macroers yet with a shout:
"JOIN ME!!!! AND DO NOT FORGET TO TIP ME AFTER THE MINDBUFF!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!" all 30 seconds. 
Its easy as hell to implement a join command in the macro.
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Aniella (Gorath) Dancer
I don't post much but i read all the time, but for this i wanted to put my 2 cents in....
In regards to people getting upset at having to wait their turns, even with doctor buffs you sometimes have to wait. Either the doctor is busy, buffing someone else or they have to rest, any number of things, and i don't see people getting too unstep. If they was the buff, they will wait and not be rude about it either.
My question, why can't we buff ourselves? When I dance i heal my mind, my battle fatigue, why can't i buff my stats too? A doctor has the ability to enhance his own stats, it should work for us as well.
If this has been brought up and i missed im sorry for bringing it up again
Ekido Yebetrok-Master Dancer - Scylla