Development Cycle Archive
Thread: IC 1-17 Star Wars Galaxies Combat Profession Mix and Match
H: Health (includes: 'bleed' = health bleed,'blind' = character do not move in the correct direction if a move is performed and has a huge decrease in aim -if the shot is very bad the character can unvoluntary hit a friend instead of target-)
A: Action (includes: 'handicap' = action bleed, 'stun' = character is set to 'sit' position, 'knockdown' = player is as incapacitated for a few seconds)
M:Mind (includes: 'depression'= mind bleed,'amnesy' =action-list cleared + unable to attack/move 1s, 'fear' =the character run away2s to 3s)
Ranged Fighters:
Marskman: basicranged fighter (required for any ranged fight), special: light H A M ones
Pistoleer: medium fire speed, high damage variation (ex: 50-250 every 2s), best aim: 0m to 10m, special: H
Carabineer: fast fire speed, constant damage (ex: 70-80 every 1s), best aim: 0m to 30m, special: A
Rifleman: slow fire speed, high damage (ex: 250-350 every 4s), best aim: 40m to 64m, special: M
Close Combat Fighters:
Fencer: fasthit speed,medium damage (ex: 70-80 every 1s), best aim: 0m to 1m, special: M
Swordsman:mediumhit speed,medium damage (ex: 130-170 every 2s), best aim: 0m to 2m, special: H
Pikeman:slowhit speed,high damage (ex: 250-350 every 4s), best aim: 0m to 3m, special: A
Teras Kasi Artist: fasthit speed,high damage (ex: 90-100 every 1s), best aim: 0m, special: medium HAM ones
Special Fighters:
Bounty Hunter: ability to do all the different damages types at a constant rate (medium HAM specials) and an hability to track opponent,good resist against: bleeds and blind is a seeker droid is out
Commando: ability toreduce armor rating of vehicles and structures by 1 rank down to none, can 'plastic' these same targets but it should need 15s to be at less than 5m to 'plastic' it, 'plastic' could do about 50k damage in its best version, high damages elsewhere but high chances to miss as a counter-effect
Smuggler: ability to faint death and to death-poison a target sensitive to poison
Creature Handler: can use up to 3 creatures to fight with him, only agros above a certain level should remain agro to a ranger
Ranger: ability to track creatures, discover weak points allowing him to multiply his damages up to a x3 multiplier against creatures and also to be totally hidden from creaturesif not doing an attack-special if he's more far than 50m from target, only agros above a certain level should remain agro to a ranger
It allows each person the "opportunity" to be unique and diversify their character, filling up holes in their currentprofession. I also like it b/c it allows me to try out a profession while i'm focusing on one that I like. Forexample, I'm in the process of mastering Pistoleer, but I always wanted to know what it was like to be a Ranger. This mix and match gives me the opportunity to do both without much penalty to me.
There should be extensive bonuses for mastering ANY profession. For example, pistoleers would only get a +5to dodge per skill box, but when they hit master they get an additional 20. Another example would be +assemblypts to crafters (i.e. +5 along the skill tree, but +30 at master). Basically, reduce the amount of bonues throughoutthe skill set and buff up the Master level. This will give Mastery of any prof a much greater reward. Secondly,the certification of weapons and crafted schematics should follow the same premise. As a pistoleer, it sucks tosee that my best weapon is no where near the same level of the launcher or scatter pistol. Shouldn't pistoleers beable to use ALL types of pistols?
What are some neat combinations that would be good for the game?
I would like to see some sort of inherent bonus for those who Master two certain professions. This would furtherthe desire to master any profession. For example, if someone masters Weaponsmith and Carbineer, this personshould get an added bonus to repairing his/her carbines, and be able to make even better ones. He/She wouldalso get an added bonus to using the carbine, say increased accuracy. Another example could be a MasterBE/CH. They could make uber pets and have higher exp. success rates. I think this type of reward formastering multiple professions would just further the desire to master rather than dabble in a profession.
Anything else you want to say on this subject?
I like the current system of skill points, but I'm concerned about what will happen in the Space Expansion.
Obviously, this Expansion will bring about many new profs to enjoy, but I would be disheartened if I would haveto give up a mastered profession just so I can pilot and X-Wing and toss a pro torp down the Emperor's throat.
I just hope the devs realize that we don't want to give up hard-earned profs to pilot starships. Random thought: what about a second set of skill points, say only 100 pts, but they would be strictly used for piloting starships? You can call them Pilot Skill Points and build a smaller skill tree w/ various "Piloting Licenses" to master. This would alleviate anyone's concern about losing their current template.
The Mark: "I'm worth more alive!"
Timujin Khan: "Your worth enough dead."
Very soloable. There will always be a 'min max' template but its variable with the mix and match (i.e. no class thats simply superior till it gets nerfed). Easy to build a group that works. Role play flexability.
* What do you think the weaknesses of professions mix and match are?
You can't balance 80 skill lines. Loss of 'paper, scisor, stone' balance mechanism. Too much self reliance is bad in a social game.
* How do you think we should maintain the unique skillset flavor the game is built on?
Concentrate each proffesion more on its strengths (i.e. nerf some lines, buff others), weight the powerfull ability to the master box or higher up the tree (e.g. stim B needs to move up dificulty, it is absurd that I heal for 1k Health or 300 wounds a pop).
Add 'elite elite' proffesions to suck up skillpoints and incentivise specialisation, then implement rock, scisor, stone, for these 'elite elites'.
* What are some neat combinations that would be good for the game?
I'd like to see a viable support template, lots of people like this role and it bearly exists in Squad leader or Doctor or combat medic, furthermore there needs to be content that would demand a group consider a Squad leader or Ranger.
I'd like it to be posible to totaly specialise in rifle and gain range and maybe damage, totaly specialise in pistol and be able to fire two at once, totaly specialise in carbine and have large AoE special effects.
* Anything else you want to say on this subject?
I like the system but I think it should be posible to specialise.
respectfully, i think you are fiddling while rome burns. before you rebalance any prfoession the combat system needs to be signifigantly reworked. as it is there is little strategy to combat, and once a player masters most combat professions, little challenge as well. there are litterally dozens of specials that are so powreful that you can simply spam them at the enemy and wait until they die. for me it really doesnt matter, since i cant justify renewing my subscription to a game with as many flaws as swg. but i might look back at it in the future, and if it is much better then i could see myself trying it out again. the problem is swg wont have a future if these critical flaws are not promptly corrected. the serious players will all leave for newer, and possibly better products. it would be a shame for this game to die, simply because the developers are to busy changing illegal hairstyles to correct the real problems.
i hope the game gets better sinceit has more potential than any other product on the market, unrealized potential that is.
This seems like a voting thread so here I go...
I Vote for greater bonuses at a Master level.
I Vote for scaling bonuses up to Master level*.
I Vote for the balancing of 250 point templates**.
I Vote against the notion to nerf stacking.
I Vote against any and all anti-"ham damage" sentiment.
I also beleive that the reversed skill points of the Elite Proffesions are the root of theNovice Stacking templates. If you make it cheap to take the whole of "Counter Insurgency" then players will take it. Personally I don't see that as a problem. It becomes aproblem when there is no way around active defences such as Dodge and Counter. A Master Rifleman has the same trouble shooting him as a novice marksman. The Dev team need to make Masters worth taking, and the templates to would be balance are Fencer/Pistoleer, Swords/Carbineer, the templates like that should equal to 100%, not the Elites on their own or a combination of Novice skills. My thoughts are only applied to combat proffessions.
* Not the current +10 accuracy for Shooting I, II, III, and IV, but +5 for Shooting I, +10 for Shooting II...
People who wish to play purely combat oriented classes should benefit from it over a person who is a Combat/Crafter (for instance).
Joraan Sett
Corbantis
See above. Be very very very careful. Your players view this game as a giant math problem. So should you. If you don't know exactly how every one of your models behaviors in the presence of every possible variable, you will find yourself surprised at your players' abilities. And your players will be annoyed because their choices don't yield predictable results. Again - more points spent on combat should mean being better at combat. It's up to you to figure out how you measure "being better at combat." That'sa hard problem - that's why you're professional game designers.
What are some neat combinations that would be good for the game?
You already have the warrior-medic combination (just take a few boxes of medic and buy good kits), which is great for soloing. Perhaps having some advantage to being a creature handler and a squad leader together. As it is, an SL who can't find a group ends up having wasted a bunch of points. If you don't like giving SL's CH abilities, perhaps the ability to control more factioned NPC's? Or perhaps control them more effectively?
Anything else you want to say on this subject?
Let me tell you a story about a company called Turbine who wrote a game called Asheron's Call. Near the beginning of the game's life, there was a character called Wi who was convinced that all the monsters attacked him. Even if other players were closer. Even if other players were doing more damage. Even if he wasn't even in combat. It became something of a running joke. This trait became known has "having the Wi flag."
Turbine, of course, denied the existence of such a flag. They'd been over the algorithm the game uses to choose targets again and again and it simply wasn't there. It was random but weighted toward players closer to the monster, that's all, nothing to see here, move along.
About three years later, a Turbine developer was randomly reading over that code and noticed something funny. It turned out that there was a bug in the weighting algorithm. The affect of the bug was that the game would pick a random number to decide which character to go after, but it would assign some players numbers that would never come up. For example, you might get attacked if the number was from 3.2 to 4.0. But the number was always from 0 to 1.0.
Not only that, but the ranges were sorted based on an internal ID that was unique to each character and constant for that character's life. The result? There really were some players that would always be the preferred targets of monsters in any group regardless of whether they were closest or not.
The moral of this story is that your players know how the math behind your game works a lot better than you do. And when they tell you something is screwed up, it really is screwed up. And the louder you claim it's all working perfectly, the stupider you look when you actually do find the bug that your players were telling you about for three years.
So use your calculator ahead of time, know all the answers before the players do, and don't release anything until you know exactly how it's going to behave.
And have your testers use THEIR calculators. If your calculator tells you that your tester should hit the monster 80% of the time, for example, and his calculator says he's only hitting it 65% of the time, this is not just an anomoly. Or maybe it is, but only a knowledge of statistics and the willingness to apply it will tell you for sure. There are real answers to these kind of questions - it's only laziness that stops game companies from finding them.
--Insomnia