Development Cycle Archive
Thread: In-Concept Open Discussion (Week Ending 4-5-04)
commando revamp:
problem(s):
commando is currently a extremely ineffective class. It focuses on extremely high damage, at the expence of speed/accuracy/range/defence.
flamethrower: Before the DoT nerf, commando was frustrating but useable with tkm. After, commando has no chance in pvp. the reason? with the flame DoT now useless, flamethrower is now based on front loaded damage, on the prinicle of one hit killing your oppenent. the flaw with this is with buffs and armor, commandos front loaded damage quite frankly, sucks. hitting for 150 damage and then taking 10 seconds to reload is not a good position to be in for pvp.
heavy acid rifle: just a clone of the ft, without the DoT. almost neevr used becuase of higher HAM costs and lower over all damage.
grenades: grenades are ok speed, bad damage, horrible accuracy, limited use weaposn with considerable HAM costs. only current realistic use is increasingc ombat xp modifier.
rocket launchers: bad speed/nice damage/blast/limited use. great for taking out turrets. the only bone i have to pick with these way too hard to make. they cost about 40k, campared to 12k for its energy damage counterpart.
launhcer pistol: cool gun. nice damage, nice speed, blast damage. unfortunatly you have dabble in bh or pistoleer to get anything from it.
ive never used the acid beam cannon of lightning beam cannons before becuase they have worse damage then the particle ebams and rocket launchers.
unarmed requirement means nothing, as commandos have no unarmed specials
solution:
-increase to hit modifiers on grenades drastically. if a cm can throw a desease pack at 90m why cant grenades be used at 40m?
-increase damage on flame DoT a little. with fire blankets, making the DoT have a purpose would be helpful.
-make rocket launchersfaster/cheaper to make, the 5 proton grenades discourages WSs from selling these cheap
-combine theFT and HAR trees, and make a small arms fire tree. this would include accuracy mods/specials for lp, and and mods/specials for assualt carbine (something for longranged)
- i know this is wishful thinking but an e-web cert at master commando would be awesome
- unarmed special on the field tactics line. this could ranged from pushing enemy backwards 10m to unarmedheadhit2 to a cert for electric damage vks to a kd
im sure i and many other commandos would greatly appreciate a revamp.
thank you very much,
a viable use for bases: gcw at least on the ahazi server is really suffering becuase there is no benifit from putting up bases besides ego boosts and bragging rights. lower the costs, only have base admins able to see vuln times (or make way to deal with spy alts). base admin being alerted when base is getting attacked would also be nice.
maybe a 20% bonus for mission $$$ from a base terminal, able to control territory, player bounty mission terminal, cheaper faction perks, stuff like that would go a long way for gcw.
I figured i'd throw this idea out to you all and get your reactions. I apologize if this has been covered already.
Tailor Module:
By adding this module a tailor see's an additional option on the radial menu of the droid. This option will open a window and allow the tailor to choose an item to display to the client, the number of items could depend upon the quality of the module directly effected by the experimentation used. The display would be at the default height of an item when you drop it in a house. The display would be transparent and have a blue tint to it so as to show the 'holo' effect that has been seen in movies, there would be color selectable however it would be difficult to view due to the ammount of blue from the image. While giving the DE's something to craft and make droids more requested it will also give tailors a tool with to display items before crafting. The ultimate goal however is to futher the immersion into the starwars universe, after all what is StarWars with out your holo projectors?
So what do you think?
This game is designed to have no "leveling up." There is still an experience grind, which I guess is to be expected, since it is a revenue earning Time Sink for the company.
With no "Leveling Up," there is no natural way to raise HAM values or stats. And yet Weapon, creature, and NPC attack values all rise steadily throughout the game. This FORCES players into using Armor and buffs in the game, which I believe was not the original intention.
If Secondary Stat buffs were REMOVED from the game, then Armor would work as intended. Regeneration Rates would not be so high as to overshadow the requirements of Doctor Healing. The natural attributes of Wookies and Trandoshans would also work as intended, and not matched/overpowered by another race with a buff.
Lower Primary Stat Buffs down to +50% of a characters current stat, and lower their Duration as well. Makes Buffs a perk of having a Doctor on the Battlefield, and not just a Requirement for hunting. Groups should require Doctors for on the spot healing. WIth regen rates so high, it is really not required to have a Doctor on Hand ( i know this from experience... "when in rome" as they say ).
I have actually made the conscience decision to stop using buffs, to add difficulty to the game. But I know I am the rarity to this end. Overpowered Buffs and Armor are where 90% of the "the game is too easy" complaint comes from. Cap armor resist at 50%, remove secondary stat buffs, and lower Primary stat buff power and duration, and the games difficulty will be brought back in line with what I believe was originally intended.
And keep raising Creature NPC/HAM values, but at some point cap the amount of damage possible by a Single Attack.
Example - If the Highest HAM value for Health is 1350 (for wookies, unbuffed) we should not see a single attack doing more Health damage than about 337/338 (about 1/4 the value).
Obviously, such a strike would seem to hit much harder on a character with a lower Health stat (which is intended). Buffs and Armor would lower this value (which is intended).
If buffs and armor are capped, we should not be seeing damage in the 1000's (i.e. one hit kills). Bring damage, buffs, and armor in line with the fact that we don't "Level Up" in this game. Please.
Some random thoughts:
Better random events...why does everything in the galaxy wanna kill me? How about, for example, a group of escaped night sister slaves (ifI have negative NS faction) approach and ask for assistance in killing their previous masters? Artisans could be approached by npc's and asked for assitance in surveying for minerals. Not just a big "i" in a circle over their head, but actually have them start conversation.
More mundane distractions...PvP or PvE non-combat interaction like sports games, interactive high stakes gambling (how did Han Solo get the Mellenium Falcon again?), political systemsbesides mayors in player cities, protocol droids that are annoying and pester players and question their actions and refuse to be "stored"
Creature Handlers that have non-combat pets. Used for a milk and meat source, like a herd of sheep/cattle. Domestication of animals for food is a basic step for civilization, why would people only harvest from wild creatures in a sifi setting?
More content for high end toons...All buffed up and nothing new to do, you can only hunt krayts forso ong before it gets old. Sure it takes time to code, but using existinggame components, detect if a group is not really challengedand have something pop on them that is unusual. Super groups of overt Rebs could be attacked by a company of Stormtroopers and ATST's, maybe even an ATAT. Player cities could bebesieged by Jabba's thugs, who send an email to the mayor demanding 20% of all taxes for protection or they'll tear up the city. A player comes home, and their house has been ransacked, and Jawa's left clues as to where they ran off to with some of the players things. A lone Imperial player comes home, and 20 or so Rebel troopers are hiding and waiting to kill them, complete with a TEF when they walk in the door.
Most importantly:
Tools for player run events. Let players make npc'sthat can be /conversed with, and let the player running the event make the conversation. A limited selection of hostile npc's should be placeable in event locations (prolly best in that event creator's structures only). Objects or terminals (built by crafters of course) that are interactive, like letters, datapads, etc, with info relating to the player createdevent/quest. The ability tomake loot piles/magseal containers the event creator can place objects in as a reward. Finally, let those who played in the event grade it, thus awarding the creator perhaps with more tools or just bragging rights.
Most player run events I was involved in were parties that had alot of over priced vendors, and a band...lame. Give us the tools to make our own content, and you SOE can get paid for it, lol.
Can't find it
Thunderheart wrote:
JWing wrote:
TH, any more newsfor us poor Smugglers? throw ua a bone baby....
This week, I want to have the In Concept Take Away complete. Ill go over the details with Smuggler_Caylin and then we'll post a follow up in the smuggler's forum.
1. Resource navigation in inventory for crafting & factory loading.
2. Merchant Networking Skill
3. Synthetics
4. Fusion - Fision
5. armorsmith/tailor fitting station.
6. batching factories
7. Bazaar / Merchants
Given an interface item (craftable by a master artisan with DE component) which is used as a module in a protocol droid. Conversation with the droid can bring up 'market analysis' screen. The Merchant must have sufficent skill in in Survey to get statistics on Resources. Further elite crafting professions: Architect, Armorsmith, Droid Engineer, Weaponsmith, Tailor, Chef, Bio Engineer, Doctor, Combat Medic can get statistics for all items under (Variation of
All data is dated.
Asking Price - average, min, max, standard deviation (for items listed at the time of system reset)
Selling Price - average, min, max, standard deviation (only for transactions on vendors)
Level 1. 7 days Local Resource Prices
Level 2. 5 days Planetary Resource Prices Novice - Local 'base' Prices
Level 3. 3 days (gets historical data)
Level 4. 1 day Main Planets Resources Prices Planetery Prices
Master Galatic Resource Prices. Galatic Prices
Give a Bio Engineer or Chef (?) the ability to craft a schematic which emulates a specific given organic resource (but only to a % less). Works as follows.
You need 1000 units of Talus Avian. (lost in crafting but not required in final schematic.)
2 units of Talus fiberplast. (All synthetic resources require fiberplast from the named planet.)
1 unit of Talus beans.
1 unit of Talus wheat.
The result should always be inferior to the base. OQ on the results should be capped at 75% of the OQ of the source (for a master with 100% results on OQ.)
Give master artisan the ability to craft schematics which turn radioactives + material of given catagory into a specific named catagory. (This is for example so that people can construct things which require crism ore on a server which hasn't seen crism ore for 3 or 4 months.)
This type of crafting requires a special structure. The actual crafting must be done at the structure. A critical failure in any step of this crafting can damage the structure and the crafter.
To make Crism Silicastic Ore, you need Silicastic Ore (base) & Radioactive.
To make Vedusii Amporph Gems, you need Amorph Gems & Radioactive.
Radioactive must be supplied 10:1
The 'base' is supplied 1:1
the crafting station serves as the factory. The rate of production shouldn't be too high. (for example 1000 units a day.) This structure should have a chance of catastrophic failure if maintenance runs out with radioactives in the hopper.
I've thought of two implementations for this. The easy method is you load this fitting station up with garments. Crated or loose. The end user gets a display where they can "try on" the garment in a sub window. (They don't really wear it.) The end user can select the exact colors they want and then buy the item directly from an 'attached' vendor.
This is something needed for tailors & armorsmiths. Basically you load a factory up with multiple schematics and the factory generates product on a rotating basis, demand basis (attached vendor or fitting station), or by que. The point being that the tailor or armorsmith shouldn't have to log on to the game every 4 hours to run the next set of garments. I'm sure this could be usefull for weaponsmiths too (their demand basis might feed subcomponents into an attached factory??)
7a. filter by 'keyword'. The idea is simple. I want to find crism ore. I type "crism" into a field in the bazaar window and then refresh and then I sell all listings where crism appears in the name / type.
7b. link Merchants to bazaars. Some level of merchant skill should allow a vendor to be linked to local bazaar termainals. a higher level links to planetary ... Basically if someone is looking for something the merchants pays a maintenance fee to be listed on the terminals accessable across the galaxy.
7c. fix field widths. <PREMIUM> does not deserve so much space on the listing. The tree window takes to much space when the bazaar window is stretched to cover the entire window. I want to see more information on the item name itself. For example I want to be able to see CRISM ORE which is hidden now...
I just came back to hunting (after trying nearly every other facet of the game)and the bottom line is this:
Player cities / server load / dev mischief / something I havent even thought of have COMPLETELY destroyed the whole concept of being a Ranger ( or just a wandering hunter of any kind ) on many planets.
Anybody can grab a couple of missions and hop on their speeder and then run 1000-2000m outside of town , destroy the lairs, and repeat.
Sorry, TH, but THAT AINT HUNTING.
It's grinding, which is NOT fun.
When I started playing this game you could grab some camps and head for the hills, get WAAAY out in the sticks somewhere and find all sorts of sport. You were far from civilization and most of the things about being a Ranger were quite useful ( I know because my bro was one back when I was just a noob CH ...ahhh the good old days).
Now that I'm coming back to hard-core hunting (or trying to), I have quickly realized that (even on the adventure planets, although not quiteas bad) IT'S POINTLESS TO GO MORE THAN 2500 METERS FROM TOWN BECAUSE THERE'S NOT GONNA BE ANYTHING TO INTERACT WITH!
As hard as it is to justify some of sp / rewards ratio's in the Ranger class, I am certainly willing to wait for our turn in the cycle to take a look at that....
BUT FOR THE LOVE OF GOD RANGERS NEED SOME METHOD OF SAYING "HEY, SERVER, I'M WAY OUT HERE IN THE WILD TRYING TO BE ALL 'RANGER-Y' , HOW ABOUT THROWING ME A FRIKKING BONE AND SPAWNING SOMETHING FOR ME TO INTERACT WITH?"
(it's early so I'm not sure if this makes sense, but what I'm trying to say is that I feel this issue is bigger than any other when it comes to having fun as a ranger [ or even a scout/combat class that likes hunting].....the wilderness is on life support and we NEED a way to force spawns in our area ASAP)
Actually, I dont care if this "forced spawning" is given to Rangers, Scouts, or Soccer Moms, but it sure would be a nice perk for Rangers and would definitely give us some clout when LFG
HI just a few questions:
Is there going to be more faction perks? i.e. Imp scout armour, Imp storm commando armour, rank markings on uinforms, Rebel fleet trooper uniform with helmet. things like that....
Is there going to be more factions? i.e. Gungans, Trade federation...perks would be really cool for these...but if you do could they be sub-factions then Jabba, Nym, Borvo, Valarian could be sub-factions as well with new theme parks...
Will there be a bounty hunters and smugglers guild?
Will NPCs be able to mount creatures or be fixed mounted NPCs? Like Tuskens on Banthas like in star wars-a new hope and Jawas on Rontos, and Sandtroopers on Dewbacks...
Will Dark and Light Jedi have different quests from the begining? because the path to enlightenment in the starwars films and expanded universe goes like this "the force has a light and a drk side. The light side represents peace, serenity, knowledge and goodness from the heart. The dark side is filled with fear, anger and aggression."
Combat on vehicles? Like in Return of the jedi with scouts shooting on speeders....may be a new speeder like a Flash speeder.
Will there be more armour and weapons for all races? or will each race get there own armour? or will different prof. get different armour and weapons? that are special...!!!
Can there be more missions for your chosen Profession or be a Quest? that only you can do depending on your Prof. you wish to do it with. That the reward is unbelieveable...and the quest cannot take like two hoursto do many be 10 hours min