Dancer Archive
Thread: Poll: Skill Point Investment (yeah..again :P)
Metricula wrote:
I am happy with the skill point expenditure of Dancer.
Have you guys thought about what entertainer SP removal would do to IDs? There goes my entire source of income. While IDs serve the same "luxury" function as tailors, people still give us money to make them pretty. In your debates, don't forget that IDs are entertainers too and I don't want our Skill points reduced more than they already are. IDs offer an often-used commodity. If We have our SP taken away, then you could use the same argument for tailor.
Anyway, dance should still have committed skill points because it's still a viable profession.
ID is very viable and a good potential source of incoem,dancer is fast losing all its viability. You do still offer a service, whereas the dancer buffs, no one can even decide if they are useful. No one can deny that your skill makes a profound impact on a character, something real and tangile (in so far as you can with pixels) while some crafters would not use a dancer buff if we PAID them.
FaedraDelauney wrote:
ID is very viable and a good potential source of incoem,dancer is fast losing all its viability. You do still offer a service, whereas the dancer buffs, no one can even decide if they are useful. No one can deny that your skill makes a profound impact on a character, something real and tangile (in so far as you can with pixels) while some crafters would not use a dancer buff if we PAID them.
I'm a dancer too. I don't want a cantina full of even more AFK spambots wearing fulls sets of armour.
Anyway, what happens to ID? Does it keep is SP and become a singular profession? Maybe you could take away the entire entertainer tree and be left with just the three elites, ID being the only one to require SP investment and no longer being an elite class. No thanks, that makes it even easier for hacks to be IDs.
Anyway, I'll leave it at that since it's starting to stray from the topic...
ID is a needed profession and does not suffer the same problems like Dancer and Musician have.
DanceRulez wrote:
Well my opinion on this is kind of out of scope with this poll, but I will give it anyway. I don't think this game is ever going to include any significant "entertainer game" or entertainer content. The game is two years old now, and such content does not exist now and there's no indication that the devs have any intention of spending any significant effort on developing such a thing. Therefore I think that the issue of entertainer skill points versus combat skill points should be made moot by the creation of combat skill points and non combat skill points. Since the devs seem to want to focus efforts on improving/fixing the combat game and adding content geared almost exclusively to high level combat, why continue to force players to either go full combat, or full non combat and excluded from much of the game content? (Yes some go hybrid, but I'm not sure of many that feel as useful as if they were CL80.)
It seems to me that it's time to just split the skill pool and allow CL80's to pick up Dance, or Merchant or something. Conversely, entertainers could pick up a couple of combat skills and participate in hunts and quests and no longer feel so left out of the game if they wish. A lot of other games do this (eg. EQ2) since their main focus is combat as well, with other professions available as useful support professions that you may pick one or two of. That way you can spend your time doing whatever you like whether it's the combat profession or the support profession.
Anything else would seem to be about as productive as trying to decide the best sized mesh for the screen door on a submarine...Message Edited by DanceRulez on 10-17-2005 03:35 AM
Quite honestly, the above conveys my point of view far better than I could have done myself.
Alphessa wrote:
I am dissapointed this topic has reared its ugly head yet again especially at a low point in our history ( RoOW and lack of Lvl 1 content ) its like rl politicians holding the same referendum over and over again until they get the answer they want. Does our corr have some inside information here and is trying to justify the changes in the devs mind , are we to be superceeded by a npc and pushed out of our game because we asked for it ?
Alphessa
No..emphatically not. I have no inside information.I have had no (even subtle) indication that the devs want to remove our sp investment. In the past there was some indication that reduction of sp investment was something they*might* beopen to discussing however the circumstances of that are long past. As stated in my original post, from my observations most dancers seem to equate their sp investment with their value of the profession. To me it is simply one barometer of what others are thinking.
For the record: For me personally, sp investment does not equate with profession value. Time investment does. It is where I spend my time, not my skill points that define my gameplay. I spend my time dancing and would continue to do just that, whether it cost 106 sp, 250 or 1000.
Message Edited by Esharra on 10-17-2005 08:34 PM
Esharra wrote:
I am in favor of a partial reduction in the skill point expenditure of Dancer.I think the skill points cost is just too much, and limits us to so little content, a reduction in points might help everyone from the Hybrids to the Grand Masters
I favor a partial or complete reduction of the skill points needed for Dancer. Or at least give us some combat levels so wedon't die constantly when we leave the cantina.
Dancing was my first love in this game-- but I haven't even logged on to my dancer (who I used to be able to call my main
) in weeks, simply because there is NOTHING to do. Everyone I used to dance with? Gone. Crafters looking for dancer-applied buffs? Maybe one every three days. Content options? I did the theater quest long ago, and even did the noob ent quest just to have something to do. I can't DO anything else in the game, except dance and socialize... And there's no one left to socialize with!
I miss dancing terribly on my CL80, but my god-- at least I can do quests and explore high-level areas. At least there's content. At least I'm not standing in a half-empty-half-AFK cantina hoping someone comes in who doesn't immediately ask "Can you give a WS buff? Is there an ID here? lol **edit** r u doin dancin noob lol?!"
If the devs are planning on adding a significant amount of content andgetting rid of AFK entirely in the next several months... Then leave things as-is. But since I sincerely doubt that's going to happen, I think a sp reassessment is a good idea.
I favor a partial reduction of the skill points needed for Dancer
(I am not in favor of removing the skill point requrirement entirely)
My suggestion would be to reduce the point cost of master dancer and master musician by 16 points each and disperse combat levels and defensive bonuses thoughout the elite entertainer professions skill trees allowing entertainer/combat hybrids to reach CL 80. Perhaps, ranged defense and accuracy for musicians, melee for dancers, never to equal that in a true combat profession but enough when combined with another master combat profession to make the character viable.
Why, I belive this is the best solution:
1.) "I hate combat, I have no interest in it" - For those who have no interest in combat they can still be Grand Master Entertainers and enjoy the full range of these professions and any enhancements to all these professions that may one day come.
2.) "There's not enough in it now to make it worth all the points" - For those who would like to enjoy entertainer but still engage in what seems to be the main push of "new stuff" this gives them the option to do so without deconstructing the entire entertainer profession.
It gives people who put all their points in entertainer an advantage in entertainer skills, gives those dissatisfied with the amount of content for the entertainer professions access to much of the PvE game solo and the rest of the game in groups, and unlike zero skill points prevents thousands of dabblers from harming the people who are devoted to the entertainer professions. It does not hurt combat monsters becasue it will never be the uber combat build.
And on an aside:
As to Warryyr's comment that, "the spastic glowfest of pretty aura-colored plasma beams and rippling radiant light shapes emenating from your enemy doesn't seem out of place in WoW. Whereas, in SWG, I can honestly say I've never seen such bizarre special effects in any Star Wars movie during combat, even with the CGI love affair of the prequels."
- I could not agree more, very Un-"Star Warsy", ruins immersion, and causes lag, adds nothing.
Well I have two entertainer toons and two combat toons so I can see a couple of different sides to this.
On a personal, and slightly selfish level, I would love to see dancer become a zero skill point profession. My main reason for this is that my Jedi character, who in my eyes will always be my main character as she was my first, used to be a master dancer. I would love for her to be able to dance again, and my friends always say how obvious it is that I miss dancer (never miss an oppertunity to get up on stage and do the dance emote). Now I do currently have a master dancer, and another toon who is working on it, but as a dancer who has become a Jedi it really makes me sad I lost those skills and can never pick them up again (A jedi who is less than a full jedi template is easy pickings for a bounty hunter)
Now as I said, that is a pretty selfish view, but its the one I have. For my entertainer toons I am quite happy with the fact that dancer costs skill points, although I can't say it wouldn't be nice to be able to take them out of the cantina sometimes and join in a bit more. So on this side of thigs I would say a reduction would be nice. But honestly what I would prefer would be for them to make the skill point investment worth it. Back in the day, pre-cu, my current Jedi character was a master dancer, master swordswoman, and I was always very aware that of those two professions dancer had cost me more skill points, for the amount of content they gave me access to I always felt this was unfair.
So I support:
1) zero skill points so my Jedi can dance again (selfish, but you wanted my opinion)
2) reduced skill points so my dancers can join in with things outside the cantina
3) keep the skill points the same, but only if they make the investment worth it.
Since 3 won't happen then they should go with 2.
NB I am a master politician (on my jedi), and wear that title with pride. Just because it didn't cost me any skill points doesn't mean it was easy to get. Sure it doesn't mean as much as when I saw a Master Politician title before the skill point removal, but it still makes me feel good that I have it, and know that most don't. Maybe they could make Dancer zero skill points but really hard to master.... that might not be a good idea, but its just a thought.
