Development Cycle Archive

What To Do: Create things that the characters can show off. I call it the "free T-shirt" effect. Trophies are nice. I really like the idea of unlocking new titles this way, too.

What To Not Do Under Penalty of Losing Your Eternal Soul: Do not create any loot that would perceptably affect combat, PvP or PvE.

The second you do this, you will create endless squabbles about people - and then PAs - and then alliances - camping the uber mob or the uber dungeon so that only their members can get the uber loot, so that nobody can defeat them in combat. It will also create a huge incentive to exploit, anyway you can, so as either to camp the uber loot or to break camper's monopoly on the uber loot.

There were more fights - and don't mean PvP play fights, I mean knock-down drag-out vicious lawsuit-threatening flamefests - over this in Anarchy Online than over anything else I've ever seen.

You've already come perilously close to this with the Krayt tissues.

Badges and Location badges. More paintings & Ornaments would be nice also.

Nothing like doing a Advanced quest on Dathomir that requires you to kill a Dark Jedi Knight and Dark Jedi Master...and the end reward is 1800 credits....(This is not a joke, 1800 credits was a reward for the mission)

You can find the guy who gives the quest in the Imperial Prison...I forget his whole name but it begins with an L...and hes in the very back of the prison in a cell..

"That said, it is a common request for us to make better loot and we do aim to please. Every publish has seen an improvement on loot table and rewards, but we know there is more we can do without upsetting the crafters.

What reward would motivate you to do a long, hard quest or dungeon? "

What I'd love to see is more loot drops of items that are used during crafting to make the final product better, andperhaps even new schematics the various crafters can use.

You don't have to have some super elite armor or weapon drop or as a quest item, but you could have the schematic to build it drop as a data cube that can only be activated by a master crafter of that type item. When activated the data cube is destroyed but it's schematic is permanantly known by that crafter.

For instance an armor that only wookies can wear could be one of these schematics. Or rather one schematic for each piece of armor, except the bracers and bicep pieces which would be both sides in a single schematic. Droidecka schematics for a DE. A medium or large harvester schematic that takes the same space as a personal harvester for architechs, but is simply taller (ie a tall slender harvester that can be placed in tighter areas). A schematic to make different barrels for current weapons that would change the type of damage done by that weapon, such as a plasma barrel that adds heat damage to the DX2 pistol so now it does Heat and Acid damage.

Thus you have good loot items that don't hurt crafters and in fact help crafters.

Mandalorian armor.

New schematics for weapons or armor.

PAINTINGS. Works of art, period.

New (NON-schematic, non-tradable quest loot) Would make them more trophy's as well as a nice item to use, but under par with Master smiths. Non tradeable makes them true Trophy's

New items (Schematics High AND low end) Would make new market for both high and low lvl smiths.

Unique Faction perks. (Very high end,faction quest only, non-tradeable) Ultimate trophy's

Untameable creatures tameable ( Canyon Krayte,Kimo's,less HAM and stats of coarse)Quest item, traded basically

Cybornetic Enhancements(that effect statsand appearance)

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Make other items work, or broke items fixable IE Binoculars actually can used as binoculars other and 50creds at the junk vendor

Skill tapes that work.

Highend weapons components to have weaponsmiths make us better weapons.

Treasure maps that actually lead us to some highend loot.

Cash rewards for quests need to be scaled up to be comparable with missions of the same difficulty and typefrom the terminals.

Beyond that, a random roll on the current loot tables (excluding the junk) would be anadequate quest reward. Skill enhancers are so impossible to find, I've got a grand total of three since launch (all three are the broken armor enhancements).

Sockets for weapons and armor are past due and would allow the expansion of the enhancement system for both random drops and quest rewards. Some have even suggested socketing droids and structures, which gives some interesting possiblities for customizing crafted items after purchase.

The schematics as drops idea is nice but how would that work so that the person who finds the schematic is assured that they'll get the item that can be created from it? I mean if it's required that the schematic be brought to a crafter then how will safe trade be handled? If it's a one use only schematic, as has been suggested, then I see a problem with the person who found the schematic handing it to a crafter to bebuilt. And if it's not a one use only schematic then the world will be flooded with the itemin no time,causing the item to lose value, in terms of beingworth hunting for,quickly.And I suppose it would be seen as horrible for crafters if whoever found the schematic were able to use a generic crafting tool and create the item for themselves. I'm late to this uberthread and haven't read more than the first two pagesso maybe these questions have already been addressed somewhere here and I'm not aware.

I seea numberof items in the world that aren't craftable as of yet. A number of different pieces of furniture, and potted plants, other than the three that can be crafted now,come to mind. I'd love to have those as decorations.But if thosebecome drops then won't you have the furniture makers asking why those pieces aren't added to the list of what they can craft?

I dunno y'all. I understand this objective...

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Q-3PO wrote:

I'll state this very clearly: It is a design objective to keep crafter integral to the game economy. We do not want to put crafters out of business by making dropped loot better than the best crafted items. Overall SWG is not an Uber-Loot game (like EQ or DAoC) and we don't intend to make it so.

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And I know warnings that this might not be the game for this sort of gameror that sort of gamer have been given. But still I think this game is way out of whack when it comes to pleasing both theplayer typewho primarily enjoys PvE and the typewho enjoys the satisfaction they get in creating something unique for themselves inside their own little part of the world with their housing. I guess you guys must already know the PvE bit is out of whack or you wouldn't be asking players what they'd like to see added for loot. But it's hard as a player, at least for me,to not feel likeI'mcoming in withmy hands tied in trying to offer suggestionsbecause crafters are sooo carefully guarded. That said, I'll give it a shot anyway.

Two things right off the bat...One, you guys totally need togive us the means to raise and lower items inside our houses. I don't think I'm straying off topic here because I'm thinking eye candy is what would play a big part in improving the crappy loot situation. And that being the case it's pretty silly to go back to your house with your painting that you got for lootand only be able to set it on the floor. Two, fix things like the Dark Jedi and the Black Sun amulets so that we can wear them. There might be other examples of items like this that start off looking like a really cool item to find but then they turn into big disappointment. If you drop them in your house they sink halfway into the floor and if you try to wear them they don't show up at all.

Then I'm with the folks who are saying they'd liketo seedecorative items as drops. I think you need to draw a line somewhere and offer artwork to us that doesn't HAVE to come from a crafter. I think there's lots of room to improve and expand on what crafters are able to do. But I don't think that crafters have to be the ONLY source for eye candy in the game. I'm sure there's a boatload of yet to be seen artwork for SWG. And more can always be created. <---(I say that like it's so easy peasy! I don't mean to sound like that.)Still, I'd love to see you start topart with some artworkby letting us find it as weadventure in the game. I think discovery and the possibilityfor it is so important in an online game. And it is so lacking in this game.

Things like skill tapes would be nice too. I'm not opposed todrops coming in the form ofenhancements forwhat crafters can make.Or finding super duper materials for crafters to use. But those sorts of drops are not going to be visually exciting or appealing. AndI personally would like to see the possiblity for finding some specialrawmaterials for crafters tied in with hunting non human creatures and with thesurveying and sampling systemas opposed to tying it in withquests or fighting npcs.Although that might fall into the catagory of"reinventing the game".

I thinkstatic drops are a drag. I think it's unfortunate thatmmogs,and SWG in general, haven't come farther with how quests and their rewards are offered. I wish it all had a much more random feel to it than it does. I wish it wasn't the sort of thing whereyou canalways go to where such and such an npc is and run the quest that will get you such and such an item...over and over and over again. Dunno what the solution is there. This too sounds like it's straying into the "reinventing the game" catagory.Still, I wish quests would some how switch outand over to something else quite regularly.

Lastly, I'm not sure why questsrather than loot in general is what's being addressed here. I'd like to think you guys plan onimprovingdropsthroughout the whole game. Because it's finding some interesting item on a random npc spawn that's going to offerthe excitement of discovery in the long run. Quest drops, unless they're changed out often, are going to be something that you look up on afan site to find out where to go toget the loud speakers or the shisha.Drops that have a much more random feel to them...Finding a waycool drop, offsome totally kick ass npc thatjumps you while you're outhunting in the wilderness, in my opinion, would be more exciting and surprising than standing inline to do a quest where you know what the outcome will be.

Sorry this got so lengthy. :/

Lots of rare schematics would be really nice. I'd like to see few different house designs myself. Perhaps a rare Destroyer Droid, or Battle Droid Schematic. Maybe even something simple as antique furniture "lost schematic". Rare guns and armor unquie to the game would be interesting. Maybe some HOTH clothing and Black Imperial clothing, etc..

Maybe even start laying various items and schematics that will build up to what is needed for vehicles(patch) or starships(expansion)