Development Cycle Archive
Thread: Weekly Rountdable Discussion (Week ending 1-10-04)
if you can ran't about any bug here then hi 2 all... as a Master ID i am sick of the MANY, not just one, bug that pisses all of us ID's and customers off!!!!
i can their hair color, and it stays the same until the server is reset, when i click on hair to see what it looks like on them, it doesnt show it on them, so its hard to judge from the lil pics that aren't high detail either!
bah!
Heretic05 wrote:if you can ran't about any bug here then hi 2 all... as a Master ID i am sick of the MANY, not just one, bug that pisses all of us ID's and customers off!!!!
i can their hair color, and it stays the same until the server is reset, when i click on hair to see what it looks like on them, it doesnt show it on them, so its hard to judge from the lil pics that aren't high detail either!
bah!
hey, not to belittle your post, which seems quite important, but i think that this might fit better in the ID forums. work this out with the correspondent. get it put in the top 5 etc. if this is a large a problem as it sounds like, then it should be no problem to get it put at the top of the list. i think it would get better attention there. more efficient posting being the goal here. well... my goal, anyhow. the correspondents are VERY available to the people (in my experience) and the TH is explicitly paid to be available to the correspondents. this has worked for me in the past, i highly recommend it ^_^
I know im beating a dead horse, but pets are still messed up. they despawn during combat and the dont follow well. i know that some peeps are happy thatfaction pets are pvp only, but its really stupid when im running with my atst andi get jumped by a non-faction mob and get beat down while my atst just watches?I knowSOE talked about wanting the creature handler to be the only one that can pull 3 pets, but nowthey have become theclass to have in a group. All i see now ispeeps looking formaster CHs, thats it.With the advent of all the Holocrons, most peoples characters are all messed up, the balance of the game has been thrown off. I know that SOE had intended the game to have the "traditional" group, from what ive seen, it dont happen that much. Peeps do group, but not the way SOE intended it to be. Its all about having a master CH in the group, they now seem to be the dominant class in anyhunting group.I think that SOE should allow PVE faction pets again, 3 pets but only 1 atst , that will insure that people wont be so dam strong that they can take krayt dragons by themselves, because thats really why the atst was nerfed anyways. Faction pets allow non-combat classes the ability to fight, either in a group or in doing faction based missions. how can a artisan class get any faction points without em? especially when yer starting out a new character. Just my 2 credits worth. Have fun flaming!
S1ave1 wrote:
Starport Wait TimeSolution -
I've read a ton of complaints on the 10 minute wait time for shuttles and I believe that I have a suggestion that would be a nice compromise.
- Could you please just change a starport on Corellia to act the way Theed does.
That way, any traveler that needs to go from, say Rori to Dantooine, doesn't have to worry about missing a connection. Theed and Kor Vella (for instance) would always allow immediate departures.
I'd say Coronet, as would most people, I imagine.
I'd also like to see something like this:
The largest player city on each planet gets an option called Transportation Hub, which allows them to catch a shuttle out of it every 2 minutes. Only one city per planet would be able to get this perk at a time. Perhaps it should be a paid city specialization. When the Space Expansion is released, I'd like to see Theed and Coronet have instant shuttle access at the Starport, and make the Transportation Hub on each planet - if they have a Starport -get shuttles every 4-5 minutes rather than every 10. It would preserve Theed and Coronet as metropolises while emphasizing the power of player cities, and giving the biggest cities an outstanding bonus.
KittenofDestiny wrote:
TH,
Will this get hot fixed in sometime please?
"Can lightsabers get old and "break"?
"We will have item decay in the game, and this will affect lightsabers as well. However, a Jedi has the knowledge necessary to maintain a lightsaber, preventing such decay."
Oh, in case you didn't know, it takes more than just being "force sensitive" to claim you are a jedi. See all those boxes before Jedi Padawan? Yeah. You have to get through all those before you're even considered a Novice Jedi.
Of course, I'm not claiming to know if the skill works or is even in the game, but he did say "Jedi" not "Force Sensitive Character".
This is a repost from its own thread in the now-defunct Discussion Forum, but I like the idea a lot, and it would help add to the mysteriousness and danger of the high-end adventure planets, emphasize the value of Scout and Ranger skills, and be a nice corollary tothe new "Imperial Crackdown":
FOCUS ON THE WILDERNESS - Ban vehicles and mounts on Dathomir, Endor, and Yavin
PROBLEM: Vehicles have made the planets smaller and opened up what used to be dangerous territory to even the newest characters.
REASONING: But adventure planets should be dangerous. They should be wild. And because of their history, their bordersshould be under tight Imperial control.
Endor is supposed to be a staging ground for the new Death Star, Dathomir is supposed to be a remote prison location, and Yavin is under investigation for its recent Rebel presence.
PROPOSED FIX: As such, the Empire should crack down and ban all vehicles and mounts from Dathomir, Endor, and Yavin.
Banning vehicles on Dathomir, Endor, and Yavinwould accomplish several things that would enrich SWG:
1) It would stress the wild nature of each of these planets.
2) It would make expeditions on these planets more difficult and make distance meaningful.
3) It would force people to carefully avoid aggressive, dangerous creatures rather than cruise by them fearlessly.
4) It would make resources on these planets more valuable due to the difficulty of traveling around them without risk.
5) It would make Rangers and Scouts very useful group members for expeditions into adventure planets.
I'd appreciate any feedback and responses you might have to this idea. Thanks in advance!
http://forums.station.sony.com/swg/board/message?board.id=Development&message.id=1006001&page=1
Some criticism and followup comments from the original thread (plus a few extras):
ASHRID wrote:
YES!
and while we're at it lets jedi mind trick everyone so they forget the speeder bike chase on Endor in ROTJ!!!!
I've heard some daft ideas in my time but this is one of the worst......
Imperial Troopers guarding the planet had those speeders.
Not everyday travelers. Not even just regular Imperials. Just like a police officer can't take a gun into an airport, or Fort Knox, or the White House, so too would everyday Imperials be forbidden to bring vehicles into adventure planets for "security reasons."
As for harvester runs, hey, people managed to do it before mounts and vehicles, they can do it again. How quickly everyone forgets . . .
atimes wrote:
Why can't something ever be made simpler in this game without people complaining about how it's ruining something? So Dath the uber death planet is a little easier because we can ride around. All that means is a casual guy like me can have a little fun and explore the planet and just have a good time running around enjoying the content the planet has to offer without having to worry about a trip to the cloning center every 2 seconds.
Mind you if you actually want to get something done on Dath you still have to fight and in order to fight you still have to get off your speeder bike.
Dathomir wasn't intended to be a casual planet you could joyride around. Most planets, sure - in fact, 7 of the 10 are joyride material with player cities on them-but the adventure planets were supposed to be dangerous and not for everyone.
Also, I've always been able to stroll around Dath, Endor, and Yavin without being aggroed. Even during Beta, when Endor was on Super Death Mode and people were bleeding to death after one or two hits, all it took was some patience and strategic use of the overhead map to make my way around. Maskscent also helped, I'm sure, but I only had Exploration 3 or so. Back then, going big distances was an accomplishment and didn't require fighting at all.
Regardless, if people could do it before, they can remember how to do it again. Making it to the Imperial Prison used to mean something. Now it's just a few minutes' ride away on a speeder, and you can pretty much buzz past anything that might have made you cower in fear before. That reduces the danger in what's supposed to be a supremely dangerous place, and so I'd like to get us back to the days when crossing Dathomir was an adventure.
atimes wrote:
Vehicles were always meant to be in. They were supposed to be done at launch. If we had them at launch like the devs intended then this post wouldn't even be here.
The worlds are large by design. Adding vehicles makes the game no less difficulty. It just means you can ride around in relative safety. Remember to FIGHT these mobs you still have to get off your bike and then you are in the same boat as the l337 d00dz
Just because the Devs meant for vehicles to be in at launch doesn't mean that they would have kept them in on adventure planets. The devs have made a lot of changes based on feedback and based on how they've seen the game pan out. Krayts got bumped up in power because people were taking them down with ease. Same goes for many creatures.
The Devs have always stressed that they wanted adventure planets to be high-end content. Well, with vehicles, they're no longer high-end, since people can travel very far very quickly. Why is it that many of thehigh-end resources in the galaxy - I'm thinking Combat Medic and Doctor, especially, but also Tailor- come from adventure planets? The answer I'd give is that the Devs intended for those resources to be difficult to recover. Well, with vehicles, especially, they're VERY easy to recover. Ride out, drop some harvesters, ride back.
What did Doctors and CMs do before? They got help from friends. They took out expeditions to protect them. And it helped with the interdependence of the game. Nobody could just stroll out like it was 500 m from Bestine and drop a harvester, and then stroll back every few days to check it. In many cases, the rares market was driven by danger.
And it's danger that's once again lacking now that you can access distant locations more easily than ever. Even on regular planets it's a bit too easy, but on adventure planets, rapid transport isvery much against the concept of having a dangerous place where not everybody could safely travel.
Close to the heart of it all is that Rangers and Scouts seem fundamentally worthless now. I'm neither, really, other than a bit of Scout, but I'm bothered by the fact that Rangers, especially, have basically been severely marginalized by vehicles and mounts. Why bother to travel with a Ranger? What's their role now that people can travel very quickly by themselves? Who needs camoflauge when they can get in a Swoop and buzz by red cons? There should be areas where only Rangers can travel quickly and where Scout skills are highly useful. The adventure planets should fulfill that role. Going there should be like climbing Mount Everest or cave diving- you go in by foot and face the world on your own.
Kershakk wrote:
I would invite the original poster to sweep these planets for resources, three times a week without fail, and every third time go find a 80% density of a particular steel, in an available flat surface and do this on foot alone. Also be sure to run back to it at some stage to retrieve the stuff from the input hopper so it doesn't overflow and also do this on foot. By the way also do this with no more than 40-50 points invested in *any* combat profession.
I understand you would like to feel like when you visit these planets it's dangerous and exciting but you see - that's your choice to go there. To stay abreast of the resource game, crafters must go, and go often. Crafters typically do not have a lot of combat skills or a personal army at their beck and call.
So what it was done before? It didn't mean it was FUN. Humans lived without electricity, cars and planes for millenia. You try take them away now and see what happens.
Option A) Pay Scouts and Rangers who have Surveying skills for waypoints to great resources.
Option B) Use other resources that are easier to access.
Option C) Pay for the resources you need and let others harvest them.
And there are other options, too, but those are the big three.
I've seen plenty of crafters burn out fast because they wanted to do everything themselves rather than divide the labor. A good many of them had multiple millions of credits, but instead of paying people to do some of the work, they insisted on soloing 100% of the game. To some people, profit is all that's important, not sanity. There's something to be said for outsourcing work you don't want to do so that you can focus on what you like. There's always SOMEBODY who will take your job and the odds are that they'll even like the work. It's a player mission and is something unique, after all.
It doesn't have to be that hard for a crafter to get the resources. It should just take some cooperation when you want to go into dangerous places for their resources, just like it should take some cooperation to take down the most dangerous enemies in the game.
PS - I used to run a high-end med component harvester operation for a Doctor friend of mine back on Dantooine and Lok in the early days when my feet were my only means of transportation. Dangerous? You bet. Challenging? Yep. Could the Doc have gotten into the areas I went to drop the harvesters? Not safely. But did she need to? No, I arranged to get free stims in exchange for handling it for her. It was a great operation, I had lots of fun, and she got the resources she needed without having to leave her home. It would work just fine for others, and the general odds are that you can find great veins of resources about 500-1000 meters from any given Starport.
http://forums.station.sony.com/swg/board/message?board.id=Development&message.id=1006001
EpiFett wrote:
Hear that sound?
/FLUSH!!!!
It's the sound of this entire thread since basically TH posted it, then abandoned it.
They didnt want any "weekly" discussion, they wanted a single place they could ignore to take the place of the SWG forums closing down...
*Looks at calendar*
Hey, guess what today is, genius?
That's right. The weekend.
How many people do you know that work 7 days a week without a break?
That's right. Not many.
Hear that sound?
Yeah, that's you. Quit bitching already. You can't just go off about them abandoning the thread when you haven't given them a chance to respond.
You can do this now... Just right click on your guildchat tab and select medify tab and select private messages and click add to channel.
Xytroncore wrote:
I'd love to see /tells appear in your chat window when you're in guildchat just like they do when you're in spatial, I miss tons of tells because I just can't see them since I'm very rarely in spatial. Is this a possible change in the future?
Continued from above, on how to overhaul Smuggler:
IDEAS FOR UNARMED DIRTY FIGHTING:
I'm not sure if this should be its own branch on the tree, or if it should be inserted directly into Dirty Fighting. I'll leave that ambiguous for now.
Regardless, I think it's important that Smuggler Unarmed Dirty Fighting moves be useable while a pistol is equipped in your hand (and also while totally unarmed, of course). It would be like Pistoleer's Unarmed Melee Defense moves, and would be genuinely dirty - people wouldn't expect an unarmed attack while you were holding a pistol.
I think there should be some seriously powerful unarmed moves, with the obvious catch being that you have to get very close to use them.
Possible Unarmed Dirty Fighting moves:
- Crotch Kick - operates as a Dizzyand has a low chance of a KD
- Eye Gouge - operates as a Blind and targets the Mind pool
- Finger Break - operates as an Intimidate and targets the Action pool
...and just for the hell of it...
- Pimp Slap - operates as a Stun (like Last Ditch)and causes a10-second delay (like Panic Shot)
I also think that some other unarmed/combat bonuses are in order, such as
- Melee Defense (perhaps give+2 in every tier of DF and +5 at Master)
- Ranged Defense (same as above)
- Dodge (same as above, but +5 in every tier and +15 at Master)
- Busrtrun Efficiency (maybe +10 at every tier and +25 at Master)
- Pistol Accuracy While Moving (maybe +5 atthe last two tiersand +10 at Master)
Building on their Brawler foundation, it's important that Smugglerscan take a beating at close range, which is why I'd be in favor of the Melee Defense. Dodge and Ranged Defensemake sensefrom the perspective of having nimble Smugglers jumping in and out of shadows avoiding trouble. Burstrun Efficiency and Accuracy While Moving makes sense to me in the sense that Smugglers are supposed to be quick. and evasive. Note that Terrain Negotiation is NOT in there, because that deals with the outdoors, whereas Burstrun Efficiency deals with getting the hell away in general.
In addition, there needs to be a Feign Death overhaul. Feign Death needs to have a big chunk of its effectiveness - maybe 20% or so - put in the Master-level box. It's low-hanging fruit. It's changed a bit now, but in general, anyone with a bleed shot can simply go into bleed/FD mode and solo just about anything, given a lot of time. It's too easy now. Start FD out slowly and give a big bonus at Master Smuggler. Make it ahealthy chance that even a Rogue will fail to successfully FD. The 70% chance we have currently is automatic, it seems. There needs to be a chance to fail an FD. Anda Master should have the best chance of FDing, much more than a Rogue. Perhaps give a Master a 95% of successfully FDing, and give a Rogue a 75% chance.
IDEAS FOR SPICE AND OTHER SHADY SUBSTANCES:
Bottom line - experimentation needs to work and be worthwhile, allowing us to tinker with the stats of our spices and ideally, as Masters, create our own custom spices using a variety of ingredients.
Anyway, here are some ideas:
1) Spice Experimentation - allowexperimentation to reduce downers, augment certain effects, reduce other effects, and basically make it worthwhile to use different ingredients rather than whatever's laying around. Put a big chunk of experimentation and assembly skill in the Master box, maybe 25% of the total.
2) Spice Side-Effects - give us a wider variety of side-effects - not just puking, but maybe various states like Dizzy, Stunned, Blind, Intimidated, etc. Make the side effects for high-end spices more severe and longer-lasting than the low-level spices, which should have very minor side-effects.
3) Prolonged Spice Usage- give us the ability to stack spices for up to 6 uses followed by a massive downer, etc. If you take 6 consecutive spices, don't just make it a case of simply tacking on 6 of the same downer for exactly 6-times as long - instead, add an additional10-15% penalty on top of the standard 6downers to stress the damage to the system that a hard-core spicehead takes. There has to be a hard hit of downtime and vulnerabilityfor getting such a serious benefit.
4) Add Master-Level Spices - either bump Neutron Pixie and Muon Gold up to master and install some substitutes for Spice 4, or allow the Master-level skill to be full experimentation. Either way, it would be nice to have a way to distinguish a Master's spice from somebody who just climbed the Spice ladder of Smuggler. Dabblers with Surveying and Merchant skills can destroy Master Smugglers in the spice business.
In addition to simply adding spice and experimentation, here are two peripheral issues that would bring depth to the branch:
The Poison Defense, I just like for the idea of having shady characters develop immunities to shady substances (I keep thinking of "The Princess Bride," where the Smuggler-ish hero built up total immunity to a deadly poison), plus I like the idea that nobody else in the game has such a defense. And while it would be great to allow Smugglers to use poisons - and then only at extremely close range and on single targets -I would beopposed to letting us craft poisons. That's Combat Medic territory (I'm not sure why,but that's how it is and I can accept that).
SMUGGLER-SPECIFIC WEAPON CERTS:
Another perk that many Smugglers wantis acertification in a special weapon.
Some people want to see an unarmed weapon, such as Brass Knuckles or a Garotte, which might go a long way towards making Unarmed justified in the tree.
Others want a special pistol, perhaps the BlasTech DL-44 that Han Solo had. See
http://www.alaska.net/~rockwell/starwars/starwars/hblasterpistol.html for more information (courtesy of Thorginson)
Another option is to grant a cert in aSmuggler-only weapon attachment- some kind of quick-draw mechanism we could attach to a pistol that gave us the guaranteed first attack as soon as combat were initiated. It would be like one of those forearm attachments that instantly moves a gun into your hand, ready to fire. Make it craftable by a Smuggler and take resources similar to a FAN, and make it a one-use powerup (that could work in addition to another powerup, but expire after one use). It will give Smugglers a slight edge in the opening moments of combat since we'll always get the first shot (though Smuggler on Smuggler contests could get interesting), but it won't tip things too far.
Another way of handling the quick-draw mechanismconcept- maybe less complicated -would be to give all Smugglers a special "Smuggler Counterattack" move, which would bounce the first attack of any given combat back at an attacker for full damage but no state changes or DOTs. It would effectively give Smugglers a quickdraw skill to keep them from being hit first in a fight and responding with catlike reflexes. That sounds like something that would almost have to be a Master-level skill, and I'm not even 100% confident in it.
EXPANDED SLICING ABILITIES
Make it more customizable for high-level Smugglers. Add new sliceable attributes, like HAM on weapons. Let Smugglers push a huge bonus into Minimum damage at the expense of not raising Max Damage at all. Many of us have talked about Master Smugglers getting the ability to pick the exact attributes that they'd like to boost. Perhaps another Master Smuggler ability should be to slice multiple attributes - such as HAM and damage. It might be a fair tradeoff to only allow a single Smuggler to slice a weapon multiple times - so no going to Smuggler A one day to get HAM and then going to Smuggler Z a week later to try to get damage down - the first Smuggler "makes his mark" on a weapon and rigs it in a unique way.
In addition to slicing weapons, armor, containers, and terminals, Smugglers want to slice more things, like travel terminals (for reduced ticket prices), droids (to make them do more damage or heal at a better rate), and how about, oh, MagSeal containers (!).
EPILOGUE AND A LOOK TOWARDS SPACE-BASEDCONTRABAND:
You'll notice that Underworld is hinted at in terms of content, but not really mentioned. It's my hope that we'll get a new branch to replace it -include the Unarmed bonuses I mentioned above in addition to the current PVP bonuses and hopefully some shady Pilot-specific skills like Cloaking Device, Secret Storage Compartment, etc. Make it all stackable with upcoming Pilot moves for the Space Expansion, like pistol moves are between Pistoleer and Smuggler. Maybe call it Dirty Piloting...
Okay, maybe not - trysomething likeContraband.
If I had to write a general wishlist for the overhauled skilltree, it would have these four branches:
- Spice and Poison-related bonuses
- Dirty Fighting and other combat skills
- Slicing and some defensive skills (Dodge and Accuracy While Moving - things that deal with agility)
- Contraband - Dirty Piloting, PVP,and Customs Agent Persuasion (ie, Unarmed Dirty Fighting)
- MASTER BOX - significant additions to all skilltrees, access to unique gear, ships, spice, etc, plus access to the best content (unique themeparks and quests, like RIS Armor for Master Armorsmiths)
Okay, those are probably all the best ideas I've had over the months. I'm hoping for some feedback, and I'll be sure to update and clarify anything that gives you any doubts.
Thanks!
http://forums.station.sony.com/swg/board/message?board.id=smuggler&message.id=44969
Apolo13 wrote:decay+insurance should go out off pvp deaths .
each time im incap and end in clone its a 2400 credits insurance , so much for the PVP boost this game needs ...
PVP can save this game from geting boring , take decay+insurance out of PVP deaths .
they're already going to do this. it was announced some time ago. they said they were doing it for all the same reasons you mention here. ^_^
Fix thechair bug. When you sit in a chair stop the bug where you slide out or sometimes don't even sit in it correctly the first time.
I'd like to see the possibility of sharing a house with someone and be able to declare residency too, now only the owner can do that, so if I want to become a citizen I must buy my own house instead of sharing it, I think it'll help avoid huge cities if people could share a residence 
For example (numbers are max number of residents in said structure)1-2 people in a small house, 2-3 in a medium, 3-4 in a large and so on.