CUEmu - Thread Posts

Lesia

Sun Jun 06, 2004 10:09 pm

This reminds me of EverQuest. When people finished playing they would set uptheir avatars in the bazaar to become vendors and sell thier L00tz. Some people bought second accounts to create permanent vendors that were never played. Dancers and musicians have been degraded to similar vendors with the exception that they have playable skills outside of buffing (such as a variety of dances and songs). Some of us choose to usethese skills and feel the buffvendors are interferring with our play and socialization.

Iunderstand the use ofbuff vendors, but hopeSOE will come up with something of value that an ATK player can offerand a buff vendor cannot. Wouldn't it be nice to have people seek out somethingfrom live performersthat give us a reason to play our class other than the pure enjoyment of being an entertainer?

Panthu

Mon Jun 07, 2004 12:26 am

#15

It's only the NPC Cantina Buff Bots that advertise their "owner's" shop that really bother me.

I think the AFKing on any level is a sign of somethings being wrong in our Profession, but it's only a symptom.

I won't AFK for that reason and because I think it does hurt other Ents and how we are viewed. I do not get mad at the people doing this for their city or PA though.

I think making our healing attended only would be a good treatment for this symptom until we can get some heftier design improvements, but it doesn't really address all of the reasons why people are AFKing Dancer. I hope we will be able to work on those issues soon.

P A N T H U Y GlitterUsagi
M i n d B o d y S p i r i t
Dancer ImageDesigner Doc

Xyrdre

Mon Jun 07, 2004 12:42 am

#16

The general feeling about any and all AFK "entertainment" from the Dancer forum is that it invalidates our profession by replacing us with a machine. By providing AFK services, buffbots (and even just leveling AFK dancers BF/mind wound healing) have created a situation where much ofthe rest of the player base no longer sees us as valuable, since these things can be done by a robot with no active player behind the keyboard. Our professions are largelyseen asNPC's.

Tipping for healing has dropped off to almost nothing. Most dancers and musicians see very few buffing customers comparitively now as well, as it is much easier to "stiff" a buffbot for that tip... and well, a lot of players like the idea of getting something for free. Go figure.

Plus, the AFK buffbots and healers can give away two of our only marketable services for free 23/7, whereas no living person can do that. Again, replaced by a machine, and invalidating the usefulness of us, the entertainer players.

Many of us feel that the only way to save our entertainer professions from oblivion is the erradication of AFK... or at least the removal of the ability to perform our services passively.

Also, it is my belief that buffbotting in a player city cantina does not make it any less damaging to the profession as a whole... unless nobody knows you're there. If people learn that there is a buffbot somewhere, they will go there to get the free buffing - unless it's just so far out of the way that it isn't worth the time for the shuttle trips. This is rarely the case, in my experience... people would walk a mile for free things, and they often do.

I would ask then that anyone who cares about the entertainer professions... anyone who is playing the professions out of love and enjoyment... anyone who would like to see a healthy future for our professions... please rethink buffbotting. Come back over to the Light Side, and help us make our professions something to be proud of once again. Stay at the keyboard, and entertain... don't fall to the Dark Side of simply being an automated script that jacks out the game mechanics side of our profession. For the heart and soul of our roles is in our ability to interact with others - to entertain - not just to be a button to push to remove BF and double the mind pool.

Deila Karlossi , Blue Glowie of Dancers, and become more powerful than you could possibly imagine...

Chronos400

Mon Jun 07, 2004 5:03 am

#17

Forgive me if someone else has already posted this, I haven't had time to read all the responses. Personally I can't stand buff-bots but will tolerate them in a player city because they're usually their at the request of their guild. But in a public cantina I won't put up with it. So...

HOW TO DISABLE BUFF BOTS:

Nearly all buff bots will have a 'joingroup' command in their afk macro so that when a customer who wants a buff invites them to their group the will automatically join after a few seconds/minutes. If there are two buffbots in one cantina simply invite them both to your group, wait until they automatically join, then make one the leader and quit the group - they're left stuck to each other and can't join any other groups, which means they can't give away free buffs (very damaging to those of us who make a living from buffs as I'm sure has already been said).

If there's only one buffbot in the cantina just invite them to your group, then run around and invite any other afk entertainers you can find, and when at least one other afk entertainer has joined make them the leader and then quit the group. I've done this quite a few times and it works fine.I hope you can put it to good use

Master Dancer, Valcyn.

Ikewe

Tue Jun 08, 2004 8:05 am

#18

Greetings all. Just wanted to say thank you for posting the information on how to disable buff bots. I've not yet found many on Shadowfire (though I know they are there). I was getting extremely depressed about the entire state of the Entertainer Profession these past couple of weeks but now that I've been given my own /killzombie trick <grin> I feel a bit better about things. Now if someone could explain to me the purpose behind playing a massively multiplayer role playing game without actually interacting with anyone I'd be forever in your debt.....

Since this is my first post here I'll add a brief intro: I'm a Master Dancer on Shadowfire who never once danced AFK. I am not a performer in RL so a few of the posts here have gone way over my head... My top priorities for "fixing" the profession... hmm.. would have to be (in no particular order) fixing the current dances, adding dances that look good for all species and genders, providing us with the ability to buff our own minds, making entertainers useful in combat quests (healing at locations like the dungeon, corvette, geolab, etc.. would make us practically invaluable!!), allowing us to register at all NPC cantinas, the ability to turn off the "you perform a flourish" message (in places with lots of spatial chatter things go by so quickly I can barely keep up), being able to call my non-combat entertainer droid while inside a cantina, larger NPC cantinas (especially for those dancers doing the ballet style dances so that they do not have to crash into furniture, walls, patrons...this really does ruin the role play environment when you find yourself doing dance moves with your head poking through a table), and reducing the skill points it takes to become a Master Dancer or master Musician (anyone know why it takes more SP to become a MD/MM than it does to become TKM, Master Rifleman, Master Pistoleer, etc....????) Obviously if I had my way there would be no AFK entertaining but I'm not certain that's even possible to control so I'm just learning to live with it and using my own form of combat to reduce their profitability. I recently discovered a buff bot at an outpost on my server. They did not spam a message or have an auto join in their macro. Instead when you examined them there was instruction that this was someone's alt and if you sent a tell to X they would switch to the buff bot and you could pay 5K fora buff. So I stayed in the outpost for several hours offering mind buffs for 2K.... I am proudly wearing my Master Dancer tag and will continue to try to role play as though my character has something to add to the community.

Ikewe, Master Dancer, Shadowfire

When you wish upon a falling star, your dreams can come true. Unless it's really a meteorite hurtling to the Earth which will destroy all life. Then you're pretty much hosed no matter what you wish for. Unless it's death by meteor.

ArgentWulf

Tue Jun 08, 2004 3:48 pm

#19

Ikewe wrote:

Greetings all.

, the ability to turn off the "you perform a flourish" message (in places with lots of spatial chatter things go by so quickly I can barely keep up),

Hiya Ikewe and Welcome!

I cant help with all your problems, but that one is easy. In you options menu (ctrl-o)you can disable system messages, no problem. Next you can edit each chat boxes properties. Right click on the spatial messages box. Choose modify. In the boxes that pop up remove the systems messages from the spatial box properties. This will rid you of the annoying messages in spatial, however you may still want those around. What I do is have a small separate box with just system messages. Create a new tab and modify it properties to just system messages. Then in the options menu under chat there is an option to color highlight keywords. Add the phrases "tips you" and "heals you" in appropriate colors to make sure you don't miss theses important ones. Then simply drag it to an out of the way area and reduce its size. You still gets messages, but you only need to glance at them once in awhile.

Sorry for going OT everyone, Lei now returns you to your regularly scheduled thread.

Leivi Esava
Galaxy Girl for May 2005
Life is a journey, not a destination, enjoy the ride! A special friend makes it even more fun.

Cillus

Wed Jun 09, 2004 12:49 am

#20

FuschiaD wrote:

I have no problem with those who do it in their own cantinas. But those who do it in NPC cantinas such as Theed or Coronet? To be as succinct as possible: they need to die.

/cheer /encourage

[[Linvuiet Arassa[[

Master Dancer

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Wong Fei-Hung

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Ikewe

Wed Jun 09, 2004 8:05 am

#21

Lei, Thanks for the tip about moving the tab to a separate area. I'll have to give that a try... might be time for a larger monitor....

I do use the different chat colors (thanks Devs!!) and that helps a lot.

Thanks again.

Ikewe

Ikewe, Master Dancer, Shadowfire

When you wish upon a falling star, your dreams can come true. Unless it's really a meteorite hurtling to the Earth which will destroy all life. Then you're pretty much hosed no matter what you wish for. Unless it's death by meteor.

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Thread: AFK Mind Buffing?