Development Cycle Archive
Thread: IC 1-17 Star Wars Galaxies Combat Profession Mix and Match
Applecorc
Sun Mar 21, 2004 8:37 pm
#248
I have been a rifleman from when I Started the game and have never droped it, nor will. one thing I have learned is that the devs have accualy done afair job with this class 
(good job, now work on the other ones 
) but the major down fall is the costs, i.e. time, HAM, & acc. andI know that you are going to fix the HAM cost.
There are 2things that would solve the balance issue with Rifleman and would help to fix the other ones. First, create a max range for every class. If, as you have said before, it is not possible to attack things farther than 64m away then lower themax range on carbines and pistols. 40? for carbine and 25? for pistols. And to make the prof. more realistic, allow us to conceal ourselves from other players, but make the command take 45-90 seconds to apply (w/o combat of course.) and with that ability it would justify the high recycle time.
(good job, now work on the other ones ) but the major down fall is the costs, i.e. time, HAM, & acc. andI know that you are going to fix the HAM cost. There are 2things that would solve the balance issue with Rifleman and would help to fix the other ones. First, create a max range for every class. If, as you have said before, it is not possible to attack things farther than 64m away then lower themax range on carbines and pistols. 40? for carbine and 25? for pistols. And to make the prof. more realistic, allow us to conceal ourselves from other players, but make the command take 45-90 seconds to apply (w/o combat of course.) and with that ability it would justify the high recycle time.
my 2¢
Jjustin
Sun Mar 21, 2004 9:35 pm
#250
I don't mean an entire tree of crafting xp. We would just get a schematic (sp?) at the Master Level that would give us the ability to craft a special weapon or the ability to upgrade that time of weapon.
I would hate to see part of the combat trees turned to crafting...ugh...but I would like the ability to make an incredible weapon. That would also give each class a good way to make extra money.
mashster
Mon Mar 22, 2004 4:59 am
#251
I think that there whould be a type of skill bonus for related professions.For example, if you have mastered Pistoleer there could be a skill bonus grantedif you then learn another ranged combat profession such as rifleman, that would not be available for characters who hadn't mastered pistoleer. This would reflect the idea that a master pistoleer would have combat skills applicable to rifle usage that would give him a slight advantage over a rifleman with no other combat profession. This skill could be contained within the existing rifleman tree or in a separate skills box.
This could work one of two ways:
1. Skill bonuses are granted solely for professions that you currently hold.
2.Skill bonusesare granted for professions that you may have mastered and then dropped. The idea behind this would be that you don't instantly forget everything you have learnt if you drop a trade but instead are rewarded for learning more professions.
I think it would be reasonable to assume that a Master rifleman who had previously mastered pistoleer/carbineer etc would have a slight combat advantage over a Master Rifleman with no previous combat trades under his belt.
Zon-
Tue Mar 23, 2004 9:25 am
#252
This games a joke when you can kill things afk...
::shrug::I do not intend to use this post as a bash on SWG, but I personally feel that something needs to be done about this game. So here is some of my "constructive critisim" about the game.
Durring thebegining of SWG I would say that I have probally had the 3 most fun months while playing a game. However as soon as player equipment equipment quality increased the game started to go a bit down hill... Back then when everyone was leveling and some what n00bish people actually gotten together to fight things because a lot of animals on the server were hard to solo.
Right now I have a friend that can solo every thing in the game with the exception of two things,(krayts, and the Gorax). and with the proper equipment I am able to tank 10 or more hurton huntress with ease. I even can go afk to do some laundry and I'm still alive.
Personally I think that the DEV should add several higher end NPC's and MOBs. I know that they are trying their best with the geo cave, corvette, and the droid invasion, but honnestly these spawns are in a small concentrated area which can easily be camped. I would like to see higher level spawn spread out over a larger area on a planet. I mean when the droids invaded Theed, I honnestly had a blast trying not die and would say that it was the most fun I had had with this game within several months.
Basically believe since the DEV has been fixing professions and general mechanics of the game, they have neglected to introduce new and harder attackable mob/npcs that arenot concentrated ina particulararea inthe game. I personally feel that by adding harder NPCs would add a lot more content to the game
Snoopy-Scylla
Thu Mar 25, 2004 9:01 pm
#253
What do you think the strengths of professions mix and match are?
It allows for variety of combinations of different points of views.
How do you think we should maintain the unique skillset flavor the game is built on?
I would like to see some advanced specific progressions. A novice of any profession besides the basics should be given choice of weapons, creatures, medicines, techniques, etc etc etc.
A carbineer who focuses on DH17 short carbines would receive extra speedor damage or new attacks and so forth by choosing to spend their skill points in a Dh17 short specificskill tree, rather than thecarbineer one.
A doctor who chooses to focus on enhancing their crafting techniques to create better medicines at the cost of a higher required meduse innate to their specific profession allowing them not to be able to sell these medicines to individuals whofollow the normal doctor tree. This possibly requiring more skill points per skill than normal to prevent stacking with other professions, say novice is 10, intermediate is 8, advanced is7, expert is 6, master is4, profession mastered 2.Yes this doctor might have problems doing anything else such as mastering a combat profession, but their skill with buff packs and other medicines would make them valuable additions.
Creature handlers who can focus on specific pets and raise themto their fitting. Perhaps by requiring longer growth times (say a week or more)for their specific pets but the CH may train them to their liking. A CH who wants a more combat intensive pet can focus on pet combat tactics, allowing them to raise their specific pets with higher HAM's than normal pets or higher combat damages. A CH specific breeder classwho specializes in raising pets withbetter resists or different damage types for attack rather than kinetic and so forth.
A teras kasi artist who focuses more intently on his meditative abilities. Perhaps somewhere near mastery of this path powerboost2 is granted adding mindtimes 1.5 or 1.75 or some multiplier above the current. Better mods vs. bleeding or poisons or knockdown can be granted through a series of meditative buffs allowable to a TKA who follows this path such as boostbleeddefense or boostKDdefense.
Abilities such as these listed above can be extracted from all combatitive and non-combatitive classes and put into a profession all of its own above or in tandem with those currently in place. Mastering the offensive row of an advancedcombat class would open up a skill tree for new offensive techniques unique to each profession, perhaps leading to the weapons specialization granted to this player allowing him to choose a preferential weapon of choice. Mastering the defensive row of a specific combat tree would allow them to research defenses vs. particular defenses. Perhaps someone wants huge dizzy defenses, they can take up a skill tree row,or perhaps posture down or up or KD for mastering another skill tree row. Have these defenses not become part of the basic professions or the advanced professions, but a specialization within the combat profession that can only be achieved by working toward it and spending the time and points. Mastering the crafters row in doctor would open up the enhanced crafting profession such as the one described above. Have an armor smith who chooses instead of being able to create all armors focus on specific types, further enhancing them or adding bonuses (defensive or offensive) to them. Or a weapon smith (as a lot I know do) who focuses on JUST ranged weapons or melee weapons, not bothfurther adding to their power, special cost, damage types, and so forth. A merchant who can focus on their dealings. They earn an interest when they sell items as one specific profession. Say an item sells for 50,000. A merchant who masters this interest professions automatically earns up to an additional 25 percent incredits from SoE on their purchases. Thus making the item worth 62,500 if mastered to the merchant.Perhaps a crooked merchant profession possibly to go with some smuggler as a super elite profession where this merchant sells black market items such as those that are not identifiable to the empire (or other players till they own the item unless they have certain skills to detect these as sliced for example. Ora crooked merchant with the ability to erase the record who created a particular weapon that allows the merchant to sell a weapon that on a random generator, lets say after 2500 shots are fired, that just breaks to a negative condition. Thus not allowing them to be traced except through who sold it. This could be quite an interesting feature for those who buy and resell weapons as the traceable trail would be negligent. A politician who specializes in militia. This militia profession could patrol the landsof their own cities for people with illegal goods possibly, they could patrol other cities for smugglers or crooks who have robbed or deceivedmembers of the politician's home city thus granting them a sort of group tef vs the politicians current group or party regardless of factional alignment allowing them to be punished for their dealings.
It is my opinion that adding skill point intensive classes above and beyond the current classesfor further specialization would allow for more exciting, more interesting and a whole new area of skills to consider. No longer would you see the stacking of professions such as rifleman-fencer-tka in such a huge proportion in my opinion, more skill points would be tied up in these professions described above obtaining new offensive or defensive skills allowing players who like specific professions or weapons or crafting combinations of these to have more power in the game overall.
On a separate note
How about the creation of some strict PvP serversor some non-pvp combat intensive server?? These servers would allow those players who heavily enjoy PvP to have a world of their own (say even have it mandatory that upon joining this server you are allotted 200 FP to a faction of your choice plus a speeder bike (keep reading to find out why) and there is no such thing as covert except maybe2-4 minuteperiod during loads upon first joining SWG or upon death thus disallowing clone camping as 2-4 mins should give anyone time to get on their bike and get away), or those who enjoy following the story lines and content in the game without much PvP to have worlds of their own without factions. Maybe a disclaimer warning users when they sign up for these as to what they are getting into. Just an idea. 
What are some neat combinations that would be good for the game?
See above but In particular
Perhaps a crooked merchant profession possibly to go with some smuggler as a super elite profession where this merchant sells black market items such as those that are not identifiable to the empire (or other players till they own the item unless they have certain skills to detect these as sliced for example. Ora crooked merchant with the ability to erase the record who created a particular weapon that allows the merchant to sell a weapon that on a random generator, lets say after 2500 shots are fired, that just breaks to a negative condition, unrepairable. Thus not allowing them to be traced except through who sold it. This could be quite an interesting feature for those who buy and resell weapons, as the traceable trail would be negligent.A politician who specializes in militia. This militia profession could patrol the landsof their own cities for people with illegal goods possibly, they could patrol their cities for smugglers or crooks who have robbed or deceivedmembers of the politician's home city, say with these illegal good, thus granting them a sort of group tef vs the politicians current group/party regardless of factional alignment allowing them to be punished for their dealings within city limits. Thus making for some interesting trade dealingswithin some player cities depending on the mayor or politician.
Anything else you want to say on this subject?
SoE has huge potential for this game in combination with lucasarts. Keep the content coming.
Simmeon
Mon Mar 29, 2004 3:57 pm
#254
At first I thought this was a good idea and at the starting profession level I think it still is. But later in the game most of the players meld into a few specific areas of expertise. There seems to be a "best class" perspective going on with a few variations. Most everybody has scout skills, creature handeler skills, basic medic skills and the best skill trees out of two or three more advanced professions. This creates little diversity in the game as it feels like every body take three or four, like I said before, "best classes". There's no differential like you see in other games. Take EQ, you have roles that each class play such as the tank, nuker, mezzer, healer and so on.. but instead of roles every character in SWG leans towards the tank/mage idea of having the best of both worlds and the least amount of drawbacks. Sure, the classes have drawbacks, but they can learn other skills to compensate for this. The only professions that I hear people really want in their group are Creature Handler and Medic/doctor and possibly Commando for damage. Anything else is, "yea whatever, you can join, we need more people for Rancors". I just think later in the life of this game there are going to be two or three templates for the best path to take to be succesful in this game.
Nojj
Tue Mar 30, 2004 7:16 pm
#255
Welcome to Levelquest: Dungeons of Star Wars
We're currently hard at work changing over to a class-based system. We apologize for any confusion you had thinking that there skills in this game.
I would like to congradulate the community for turning Star Wars into a game about which class you picked and what role you will be confined to.
Rather than work to make an innovative skillset system (by the way TH, thanks for reading my other post and closing up all those threads), we're fighting about whether the Bounty Hunter class should be better at combat than the Pistoleer class. I read all this nonsense about "Hybrid-Classes" and "Dabbling" and I think to myself why.
Isn't SWG supposed to becutting edge? Then why are we dragging ourselves back to the RPG stone-age?
Now this has been said by myself and others many many times: Move away from this "You are your Profession" mentality!
Rather than try and balance every combat profession by juggling modifiers and shifting bonuses.
Did anyone think that maybe these "professions" should really be made into skillsets? How about having the weapon based "professions" such as Pistoleer and Pikeman contain your weapon modifiers like speed and accuracy. Then have other "advanced professions" contain the specials.
Under thecurrent system Riflemen can't use Heavy Acid Rifles. But I thought they we're riflemen! What happened?
Under a more perfect system professions like rifleman, pistoleer, and carbineer would be more like a skillset. You gained boxes in the skillset to raise your skill with the type of weapon. They would contain very little specials. You would gain boxes in Pistoleer to gain weapon skill and boxes in Bounty Hunter to get specials with the weapons.
As it stands the current system CANNOT BE BALANCED. It can't even come close to balance because if you change one of the "classes" abilities then it unbalances something else!. Moving to more of a "class-based" system only makes this worse!
PROFESSIONS ARE NOT CLASSES! THEY ARE SKILLSETS!
Just look at what we're doing! Even the professions forums are set up in such a way as to make us think more towards classes!
Every time we cry nerf we hurt the game. Everytime we scream about "Stopping the dabblers" we hurt the game.
My suggestion to all those people is to go play Anarchy Online. You'll love the class system they have. Its space-based so you'll have lots of fun.
Personally I know that nothing I say is really going to deter people in this community from making the biggest mistake any MMORPG can make. But I have to try... I have to scream it over and over even thought I've lost all hope.
So welcome to the future of SWG where you pick a class and thats all there is.
My advice to the developers is stop listening to the community. Shut down the forums and just make the game, just make YOUR game.
People will play it, trust me.
Nojj
Tue Mar 30, 2004 7:17 pm
#256
Welcome to Levelquest: Dungeons of Star Wars
We're currently hard at work changing over to a class-based system. We apologize for any confusion you had thinking that there skills in this game.
I would like to congradulate the community for turning Star Wars into a game about which class you picked and what role you will be confined to.
Rather than work to make an innovative skillset system (by the way TH, thanks for reading my other post and closing up all those threads), we're fighting about whether the Bounty Hunter class should be better at combat than the Pistoleer class. I read all this nonsense about "Hybrid-Classes" and "Dabbling" and I think to myself why.
Isn't SWG supposed to becutting edge? Then why are we dragging ourselves back to the RPG stone-age?
Now this has been said by myself and others many many times: Move away from this "You are your Profession" mentality!
Rather than try and balance every combat profession by juggling modifiers and shifting bonuses.
Did anyone think that maybe these "professions" should really be made into skillsets? How about having the weapon based "professions" such as Pistoleer and Pikeman contain your weapon modifiers like speed and accuracy. Then have other "advanced professions" contain the specials.
Under thecurrent system Riflemen can't use Heavy Acid Rifles. But I thought they we're riflemen! What happened?
Under a more perfect system professions like rifleman, pistoleer, and carbineer would be more like a skillset. You gained boxes in the skillset to raise your skill with the type of weapon. They would contain very little specials. You would gain boxes in Pistoleer to gain weapon skill and boxes in Bounty Hunter to get specials with the weapons.
As it stands the current system CANNOT BE BALANCED. It can't even come close to balance because if you change one of the "classes" abilities then it unbalances something else!. Moving to more of a "class-based" system only makes this worse!
PROFESSIONS ARE NOT CLASSES! THEY ARE SKILLSETS!
Just look at what we're doing! Even the professions forums are set up in such a way as to make us think more towards classes!
Every time we cry nerf we hurt the game. Everytime we scream about "Stopping the dabblers" we hurt the game.
My suggestion to all those people is to go play Anarchy Online. You'll love the class system they have. Its space-based so you'll have lots of fun.
Personally I know that nothing I say is really going to deter people in this community from making the biggest mistake any MMORPG can make. But I have to try... I have to scream it over and over even thought I've lost all hope.
So welcome to the future of SWG where you pick a class and thats all there is.
My advice to the developers is stop listening to the community. Shut down the forums and just make the game, just make YOUR game.
People will play it, trust me.
SabrakVorn
Wed Mar 31, 2004 7:36 am
#257
Aankhperkare's idea was great, but could be taken one step further, for each completed branch, there is an extra bonus, for example, take Brawler and Marksman pistol, you get pistolwhip (know it's already in the game) Master Brawler and Pistoleer, you can now h-h with your pistol drawn.
for non-combative players combos would also be possible, new schematics for Crafters, eg. Master Medic/tailors -a Surgical Gown. Weaponsmith -Combat Skill- Able to craft better specific weapon types.
So what I'm saying is Masters get enough of a bonus already, some more than other admittedly, but balancing aside for one moment, combine and enhance the masteries to create aditional skills, and possibly certs, rewarding people who master skills, but if minor bonuses exist for completed tree combinations, dabblers would be rewarded also.
as for the balancing, well it is a truely horrendous task, but here's my 2 cents
IT'S ALL IN THE RANGE.
Melee combatants, should always win over ranged combatants...IF and that's a big if, they get into h-h combat. No ifs or buts, you are gonna get mauled.
Mele combatents of different types, but of equal training, and armour/buffs should be a tie. for different reasons. A TKA because he is fast, A Swordsman because he deals a lot of damage.
Also cap bonuses, so for example Melee defence has a max from Master Fencer of +40 and from Master TKA +30 (not sure the actual pts, but bear with me) but take both only the highe value is used. But if you trained in both of these skills, you would reach the cap faster, halfway to mastering both, you would have recieved +20 from fencer and +15 from TKA = +35
So why would you bother mastering the professions, when half way up the tree you get all the bonuses, true but you would have none of the special skills, put them all up the tree near the top. This again helps the dabblers but does not penalise the Masters (don't forget the even better skills I suggested for Multiple Masteries)
Hope my thoughts make sense and you like.
Nord-Infinity
for non-combative players combos would also be possible, new schematics for Crafters, eg. Master Medic/tailors -a Surgical Gown. Weaponsmith -Combat Skill- Able to craft better specific weapon types.
So what I'm saying is Masters get enough of a bonus already, some more than other admittedly, but balancing aside for one moment, combine and enhance the masteries to create aditional skills, and possibly certs, rewarding people who master skills, but if minor bonuses exist for completed tree combinations, dabblers would be rewarded also.
as for the balancing, well it is a truely horrendous task, but here's my 2 cents
IT'S ALL IN THE RANGE.
Melee combatants, should always win over ranged combatants...IF and that's a big if, they get into h-h combat. No ifs or buts, you are gonna get mauled.
Mele combatents of different types, but of equal training, and armour/buffs should be a tie. for different reasons. A TKA because he is fast, A Swordsman because he deals a lot of damage.
Also cap bonuses, so for example Melee defence has a max from Master Fencer of +40 and from Master TKA +30 (not sure the actual pts, but bear with me) but take both only the highe value is used. But if you trained in both of these skills, you would reach the cap faster, halfway to mastering both, you would have recieved +20 from fencer and +15 from TKA = +35
So why would you bother mastering the professions, when half way up the tree you get all the bonuses, true but you would have none of the special skills, put them all up the tree near the top. This again helps the dabblers but does not penalise the Masters (don't forget the even better skills I suggested for Multiple Masteries)
Hope my thoughts make sense and you like.
Nord-Infinity
Tigernight
Wed Mar 31, 2004 7:52 am
#258
What do you think the strengths of professions mix and match are?
It gives players the ability to be more than one thing. Also makes it possible to craft and still engage in combat. Unfortunately, half craft and half combat means you are going to still be inferior to someone who goes all out combat.
What do you think the weaknesses of professions mix and match are?
Defense stackers are born. It's bad enough that people are running around in 80% resist armors, their defenses are so high most combat specific templats can't hit them and a half and half template can forget it. The defense cap has been speculated to be at 120. I was checking my TKM/Commando and I have around half that, with no adds to my armor or clothing. I think the cap is still set far too high.
How do you think we should maintain the unique skillset flavor the game is built on?
Reward certain classes that have to invest in one mastery to gain another with the best overall skills. Like commandos, bounty hunters, rangers, squad leaders, ect. These guys are the true "masters" in the game. They invest a lot of points to get where they are, the should be at the top of the food chain so to speak. Also, most defensive/offensive mods should be found in the mastery box to eliminate the dabble monkey's. What happened to CH is appropriate.
What are some neat combinations that would be good for the game?
Not sure what you mean here exactly, but, I think Squad Leaders and Commandos should be able to team up and make battlefield constructs, like extra heavy weapons for sieging bases.
Anything else you want to say on this subject?
Yes, never allow defense stackers to be born. Fix the existing classes to make each one desireable in some way. Don't allow templates like rifleman/combat medic, rifleman/tka, rifleman/doctor, combat medic/fencer or swordsman or tka rule the day. There's a lot of professions out there that need to be represented. People are going to either play what is uber, or what they enjoy. Unfortunately, the people that play the uber either outnumber those who play what they like, or those who play what they like are giving up and playing what is uber in order to compete. This needs to be resolved for the good of the game.
It gives players the ability to be more than one thing. Also makes it possible to craft and still engage in combat. Unfortunately, half craft and half combat means you are going to still be inferior to someone who goes all out combat.
What do you think the weaknesses of professions mix and match are?
Defense stackers are born. It's bad enough that people are running around in 80% resist armors, their defenses are so high most combat specific templats can't hit them and a half and half template can forget it. The defense cap has been speculated to be at 120. I was checking my TKM/Commando and I have around half that, with no adds to my armor or clothing. I think the cap is still set far too high.
How do you think we should maintain the unique skillset flavor the game is built on?
Reward certain classes that have to invest in one mastery to gain another with the best overall skills. Like commandos, bounty hunters, rangers, squad leaders, ect. These guys are the true "masters" in the game. They invest a lot of points to get where they are, the should be at the top of the food chain so to speak. Also, most defensive/offensive mods should be found in the mastery box to eliminate the dabble monkey's. What happened to CH is appropriate.
What are some neat combinations that would be good for the game?
Not sure what you mean here exactly, but, I think Squad Leaders and Commandos should be able to team up and make battlefield constructs, like extra heavy weapons for sieging bases.
Anything else you want to say on this subject?
Yes, never allow defense stackers to be born. Fix the existing classes to make each one desireable in some way. Don't allow templates like rifleman/combat medic, rifleman/tka, rifleman/doctor, combat medic/fencer or swordsman or tka rule the day. There's a lot of professions out there that need to be represented. People are going to either play what is uber, or what they enjoy. Unfortunately, the people that play the uber either outnumber those who play what they like, or those who play what they like are giving up and playing what is uber in order to compete. This needs to be resolved for the good of the game.
Willix
Fri Apr 02, 2004 3:46 am
#259
Well you could rework BH, now a BH is dependent on Scout and Marksman tree and then the Bounty Hunter tree , leaving a BH with almost no points left. The gain he gets is not very much , he doesn't get really good skill mods compared to other fighting proffessions. Compare them with the others and ya will quickly see the disadvantage a BH has. Also the weapons ain't that great, LLC is nice but in PvP its almost useless, Bounty Carbine, which Bounty carbine? A BH must use a normal carbine and that ain't to good. The Scatter is the only reasonable good wep , but the specials ain't that great no more especialy after you brought in the fire blanket, the bleed anyone with the right med skill can stop and the Eye shot takes ages , which in a battle ya never get. In the Star Wars universe BH were feared persons, but in game the advantage is quickly slipping away, For instance , a Rifleman can be TKA also and then some fencer skills , which gets them huge skill mod defenses. A BH is a fighting char , but with the current skill mods this proffession will die out , sincea lotare remodeling their BH to other skills. So i think a quick revamp for the BH would be in order before there are no BH left in the Galaxy.
Salutations,
Willix Darkblood.
Willix
Fri Apr 02, 2004 3:59 am
#260
Goodbye then, if you don't understand that it should be balanced and therefor some things need to be changed , then you should vamoos. Nice that you might have a nice proffession with advantages, but others might want that too. The game should be balanced which it surely ain't now.
Willix Darkblood.