Dancer Archive
Thread: Protest the 2 minute delay on (addition to) buffs!
Brainplay wrote:
To the person that said they can buff in under 5min with the current system: If that methods doesn't include t'ssolok or a new connection and video card then can you plz post those somewhere. I did my first buff at novice and my second at lvl4. I've yet to be able to get a full buff in under 5 and usually have to go a full 8. I thought passive buffs were for less then a single target buff too. Plz explain.
Brainplay wrote:
I'm a combat medic on sunrunner. I'm a dancer on kettemoor. My language was not inappropriate and does not warrant a report. I was replying to the nay sayers who wanted it to be complete RP. I AGREE, 2min is not too much to ask for a decent buff and enraged that it will cause other problems as well. However, you have still not answered why the 30sec ability should be removed other than saying its an exploit. Incidently your evidence explaining why it is an exploit is hardly rock solid. I enjoy roleplaying as much as the next person and I like to be socialable like many others. However, take into consideration that I may not want to be socialable with you the dancer or a patron. The dancer was a pragmatic choice to enhance guild capabilities by being able to heal fatigue, wounds, and buff.I do not enjoy spending time dancing in the cantina as much as I do in the field with other guildies and neither do some other dancers. I dont likeNOT being able to heal battle fatigue in a camp or being able to buff myself. I do help out others as much as possible by healing them, passing out info and cash to other dancers, and giving out free buffs when I'm in the mood since it doesn't take me as long anymore. I of course will charge when I need the money. I am socialable during this time but its usually while in tells with friends or on guildchat. Dont try and demonize me because I dont fit into your little social clique as there are many others out there just like me who worked their way up this professions tree's for the abilities and the abilities alone. If you meet me you'd like me. But there's more of a chance you meet me as a combat comrade than a dancing buddy. Those long hours in the cantina are over for me and I'd rather be dancingin a camp with by friends around me and my sword in my hand. This isn't a "social class". You are just a social person and there's nothing wrong with that. There is nothing wrong with my version of this class either. If they took away our ability to heal and buff then maybe I can call OUR profession a "social class" but saying we're entertainers just doesn't cut if thats all you can use in your arguement.
To the person that said they can buff in under 5min with the current system: If that methods doesn't include t'ssolok or a new connection and video card then can you plz post those somewhere. I did my first buff at novice and my second at lvl4. I've yet to be able to get a full buff in under 5 and usually have to go a full 8. I thought passive buffs were for less then a single target buff too. Plz explain.
I'm not demonizing anyone dear, but don't tell me that the developers sat down and said to themselves, "we want to give the players the ability to sound like a broken record by start/stopping constantly so they can give 30second buffs and get more XP." You want these things done quickly. So do we. The problem that I tried to tell you is that the /startdance, flourish 1-5, /stopdance method IS NOT DANCE! Its a seizure. It looks broken and choppy. The /startmusic, flourish 1-5, /stopmusic IS NOT MUSIC. Its a skipped record. I'm not saying these things don't need to be done fast so we can force you tosocialize. I'm saying that this current paradigm is an unintended quirk in the coding that turns music and dance into a farce. Because these things should sound good and look good to get the full effect. The fact that you can do the things faster and with greater XP by making them look and sound ugly means that something is wrong. Its like the novice marksman using the old "area of effect" chain macro to do 10,000 points of damage to a Kryat dragon in 1 hit with his scout blaster. It was great for the marksman, great for the distribution of kryat tissues and pearls, but it turned the game into a farce. Because novice marksmenwith scout blasters SHOULDN'T BE ABLE TO DO THAT under normal conditions.
Now you keep saying I think "I'm better than you" because I tend to socialize. I'm no better or worse than an AFKer, mecanically speaking, and that's the reason I socialize with the patrons. How do you think live entertainers are supposed toget an incomeif we don't? The ONLY thing a live player can do better than a bot is attentiveness to the patrons. Its what we do to find some place in the economy of the server. Because unlike the bot who does what it does 24/7 with no boredom to contend with, no need or desire to be more or less entertaining than the next dancer for tips, and no way to abandon its station if mistreated, live players somehow have to emphasize the things they can do better than the unattended ones in order to get tips and XP from players who can get EVERYTHING we have to give them from an unattended character FOR FREE.
You want to heal. That's great. I'm starting to think that maybe what we need as classes is to take ourselves out of the healing cycle all together and let you medics and doctors do it. Because I'd still be a dancer, even with all the skill points in it, and moreover, it would solve a lot of our problems as a class with individuals who don't like to do this thing doing it for reasons other than being entertaining to see and hear. After all, I don't get tipped for my healing abilities. Unattended characters can do that for free. I get tipped for things other than that.
But don't start redefining whatis good and badare simply because it seems to fit better in the context of your needs. Unless you are willing to say that the "broken record sound" that comes out of the sliterhorn is pleasing to your ear, then that sort of sound shouldn't be superior in a game mechanics sense to a sound that does not start and stop in such a fashion. Make it so buff times are shorter. I'm all for that. But don't claim that this 30 second gibberish is the best way to do it. It just reminds us that we are in a flawed game, rather than a game that seems to make sense.
Brainplay wrote:
I'm a combat medic on sunrunner. I'm a dancer on kettemoor. My language was not inappropriate and does not warrant a report. I was replying to the nay sayers who wanted it to be complete RP. I AGREE, 2min is not too much to ask for a decent buff and enraged that it will cause other problems as well. However, you have still not answered why the 30sec ability should be removed other than saying its an exploit. Incidently your evidence explaining why it is an exploit is hardly rock solid. I enjoy roleplaying as much as the next person and I like to be socialable like many others. However, take into consideration that I may not want to be socialable with you the dancer or a patron. The dancer was a pragmatic choice to enhance guild capabilities by being able to heal fatigue, wounds, and buff.I do not enjoy spending time dancing in the cantina as much as I do in the field with other guildies and neither do some other dancers. I dont likeNOT being able to heal battle fatigue in a camp or being able to buff myself. I do help out others as much as possible by healing them, passing out info and cash to other dancers, and giving out free buffs when I'm in the mood since it doesn't take me as long anymore. I of course will charge when I need the money. I am socialable during this time but its usually while in tells with friends or on guildchat. Dont try and demonize me because I dont fit into your little social clique as there are many others out there just like me who worked their way up this professions tree's for the abilities and the abilities alone. If you meet me you'd like me. But there's more of a chance you meet me as a combat comrade than a dancing buddy. Those long hours in the cantina are over for me and I'd rather be dancingin a camp with by friends around me and my sword in my hand. This isn't a "social class". You are just a social person and there's nothing wrong with that. There is nothing wrong with my version of this class either. If they took away our ability to heal and buff then maybe I can call OUR profession a "social class" but saying we're entertainers just doesn't cut if thats all you can use in your arguement.
To the person that said they can buff in under 5min with the current system: If that methods doesn't include t'ssolok or a new connection and video card then can you plz post those somewhere. I did my first buff at novice and my second at lvl4. I've yet to be able to get a full buff in under 5 and usually have to go a full 8. I thought passive buffs were for less then a single target buff too. Plz explain.
As aquick side-note before comment; PoetDancer did not ascribe the term "social class" to dancers or entertainers. The devs did. Please argue with them about that point. 
From everything I've ever read or heard about the entertainer professions, they were not specifically designed to fulfill a role in greater insulating guilds from the rest of the community of the game by providing for greater self-sufficiency. Insular guild self-sufficiency is another issue entirely, and many feel that it hurts an MMORPG quite a bit, but that's for another discussion entirely. We were intended to bring the greater community together at times, in the cantinas and showhalls throughout the galaxy. By having players "staffing" these locations, there would be encouragement to have certain places of neutral ground where players could find one another to form hunting groups, make friends, or just findanother personoffering a service that was desired.
We do a lot more than many people may realize... we're more than what some think of as just "inane chit-chat". Wewere intended to facilitate connections and interaction between other players - a completely social role. Uses of the profession as guild buff-bots, or as perma-healers for the guild so that members would not have to go out to interact orinclude entertainers in the economy, I'm sure were not the intent, even if this occurs a great deal. I'm not saying it's an exploit of any kind... just that it is mostlikely completely outside of the vision for the profession. Again... facilitating connections and interaction between other players is social by nature, hence, "social professions".
Now... before anyone tries to play the "you don't know what the devs intended" trump card here, let me leave this one open. If I am completely wrong about the intended nature of entertainers, let a Red Handle post it here and clear the air. If I see a developer step forth and say, "No, you're wrong. We intended them to be automated buff-bots to keepeveryone holed up in Guild halls so that players wouldn't have to interact very much" , I'll apologize for my naiivete and we can all drop it. But, being an ex-game designer myself, I just don't think that's really what's going on here.
Bleh, you should know better then to doubt me. The 2 minutesis only a minimum, you can still build the buff during the period once its working properly. Right now I can still max buff someone in abou 2 min 20 seconds on TEST CENTER (the only freekin server I play on but am leaving for a while) I've got the best sources you could ask for, you guys on live have nothin to worry about.
Groovymarlin wrote:
I'm sorry Raven, but I think you're wrong. If this was the case, I'd be perfectly fine with it, since I've never given a 30 second buff. The shortest buff I give is four minutes, so a two minute minimum is not a problem for me. However, according to the players who have tried it on Test Center, the two minutes is in ADDITION to the normal buff time, not included in it. And that is what I have a problem with.
If you have tried this on Test Center and gotten different results, please post about it!
Message Edited by Ravenmist on 04-26-2004 03:26 PM
Understandable, funny tho, in a way I can talk more freely now then when I was a Correspondent about this stuff. The Devs intend it to be a 2 minute minimum only in which the buff will build during that 2 minutes. The issues with 2 minutes adding on on TC is a bug they will fix according to the Devs I've spoken to. Just wait and see, they'll fix it and you'll have nothin to worry about unless you think 2 minutes it too long.
kirah_ashlin wrote:
Ravenmist, we've been asking for days now for clarification and all we've gotten is "confirmation" from other players on the TC that the 2 minutes is actually being tacked onto the existing buff time - nota singleword from the devs one way or another. If you know specifics, please feel free to share with us. I'd love for you to show me that my concerns are unfounded!
I'd try it out myself on the TC but I can't seem to get it to work on my pc.
Ravenmist wrote:
Bleh, you should know better then to doubt me. The 2 minutesis only a minimum, you can still build the buff during the period once its working properly. Right now I can still max buff someone in abou 2 min 20 seconds on TEST CENTER (the only freekin server I play on but am leaving for a while) I've got the best sources you could ask for, you guys on live have nothin to worry about.
Raven, I'm sorry. I wasn't so much doubting you as just asking for clarification/more information. I didn't know that you still have "the inside track" on what the devs intend, even though you're not our correspondent anymore. I also did not know that you only play on Test Center. I guess I'm just not up on my Ravenmist trivia! 
This is good news though. I will feel even better when we get "official" confirmation of this from TH himself or via Panthu. (Note to Raven: I'm not doubting you! Just nervous!) And holy moley I hope they manage to fix this before it goes live tomorrow morning. Eek! 
*Edited to add: Raven you must have some serious groupies here. I got one-starred just for saying I thought you were wrong. 
Message Edited by Groovymarlin on 04-26-2004 08:08 PM
FuschiaD wrote:
*GASP* Next thing you know I'll be booing the AFKers... what have you people DONE to me!
ROFLOL!!
Okay . . . I'm taking your word for it, RM . . . you'd better be right!
Of course, the shortest buff I've done is 4 minutes. I guess its time to try out the 2 minute 20 second buff on Roho . . .
Yajedi wrote:
The only thing this change will do is decrease the number of times I call on an entertainer for a buff, and increase the amount of food/drink I buy from chefs.
This is a great change... just not for the entertainers.
Grrrrrrrrrrrr......................... So true, but I hate to hear that.
I've always done the five minute buff, since I hit master. And you all know this, but buffing up to 20 people in five minutes is pretty f'in swift, I think. I get my PA together once before they all go out, we group up in Moe's, I buff, the groups split up and go out buffed and happy. As usual, the fix sounds like it's screwing those of us who were being honest about it, and driving off the ones who weren't.
*sigh*
Moments like these make me wonder why I keep dancing. OH yeah, cuz I like to dance. *cough*