Development Cycle Archive

The description of the patch 7does not match the end result:

"Toward creating a stronger crafting experience" - The intention of the patch was to help crafters, not hurt them, right?

"Crafting experimentation has been enhanced" - You reduced the effectiveness of experimentation (because its now scaled to resource quality). That's a nerf, not an enhancement.

"this will give master crafters more of an advantage over less skilled crafters" - two items to consider: 1) non-masters currently have a tough time selling anything, and you are making it worse for them. 2) Being a master is not nearly as important as collecting high quality resources over a long period of time. So you're not improving masters, you're rewarding long-time resource hoarders.

And, unfortunatly, this will create a huge pre-nerf market as well as increased pressure for masters to find skill attachments, which means more people using 3rd party software to camp loot while AFK. So, the reprocussions of this change outwiegh the gains (if any).

As a previous poster on the WS forum said,

I was *hoping* that this new system would allow us, with high quality resources, to max damage/speed faster, and put more points into HAM, condition, or range. With more points to spread out there, it would allow each weaponsmith to be different -

• only one stat is improved fromskill attachments that have more than one skill shown.


• many skills are left over from beta and don't do anything.


• many attachments tecnically work but the stat improvement has no value (adding to structure complexity does not let you craft structures above your skill level).


• loot campers use 3rd party software to camp loot containers while AFK, and CSR's don't do anything about it. These guys sell the loot at auction for millions of credits, so creating more demand for experimentation point skill attachments just encourages them.

So, again, we all ask why the DEV's keep changing the system instead of fixing the bugs. Every change creates new bugs, and all-in-all I think this patch hurts crafters as a whole more than it helps them.

So, again, we all ask why the DEV's keep changing the system instead of fixing the bugs.

Looks to me that someone found the million dollar question.

The root question devs is WHY are you doing this. Are we complaining about this? Is this part of the combat revamp?

I thought we wanted crits in assembly and crits in experimentation reduced. Not sweeping changes that no one likes.

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Logix wrote:

This system, while reasonable on paper, is not a suitable fit for the game.

Smiths of all kinds depend on diversity. In a world of cookie-cutter products, you must have something that stands out. For every suit of armor, the only possibility should not be Effectiveness or Nothing. For every weapon made, the only , it should always provide as many options as possible to the crafter.

With the old system, taking another route in Experimentation did have a disadvantage, but the options were still there. With the new system, no matter how good you're making your weapons or armor as a Master, you will be wasting all of your experimentation points to max out its main quality. Since the vast majority of high-end products require specific rare resources, nine times out of ten you will never have experimentation points left over for anything else. When I used to make Republic Blasters and only use the 6 or so points to max it out, now I must use all ten. Weaponsmiths will be able to max damage and that's that. If I try to cater to Range- or HAM-specialized weaponry, the penalties for the loss of damage are even greater than they are now. Moreover, Armorsmiths have been completely deterred from specializing in low- and medium-HAM suits. It's not a viable trade-off at all, anymore.

Additionally, this sets a greater dividing line between the new Smiths and the elder Smiths. Having 10 experimentation points will no longer be the deciding factor between a "bad" and a "good smith". That bar has been raised to 12 experimentation points with this new system. Experimentation tapes are so utterly ridiculous for most to acquire that placing such a high dependency on them just isn't fair. They should be a pleasure for high-end "elite" crafters to partake in, but never a necessity for all crafters to sell quality products to their customers.

As for the Amazing Success change, I don't think it's all that it's cracked up to be. Amazing success simply raises the bar for experimentation -- Great successes become the "new" Moderate success. Instead of smiths trying to craft a schematic over and over again to get an "All-Great Success" schematic, they will craft it over and over again trying to get a "9 Great and 1 Amazing Success" schematic. So we're back to the same frustration many smiths endure: Crafting over and over trying to get that elusive "perfect" schematic. Putting a different label on it doesn't mean it's not the exact same problem. This too, places ridiculous dependency on skill tapes and things like Research Centers, because having both of those means you will net the highest likelihood of amazing successes.

In summary, I think this is a change better left unimplemented. The biggest problem many smiths face is the huge dividing gap between newer Smiths versus elder Smiths, who have the most time, money, resources, skill tapes and Research Centers. Right now, that gap already wide enough to make it immensely difficult to get your name on the market, but only time, money and resources are the factors that are required. With this change, you put a greater dependency on all of those factors and move skill tapes and Research Centers from the "optional" field into the "necessary for your business" domain. Implementing this system is taking an enormous step backwards in trying to bridge the gap and promote diversity among smiths.

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This was posted on the weaponsmith board:

"We're in a see saw. Everything in the system is interconnected - - especially crafting. On the list of community and correspondent items that need to be fixed, critical fails and experimentation is on many of the crafter's lists. The critical fail mechanics werent broken, but players didn't like the flat 5% chance - - especially if one was a master, so the developers changed that. Now, there are bonuses and the crit fail thing is considered solved.

Then there is experimentation. Back when we fixed it the first time, it basically switched the functionality of resources. Experimenting with poor resources produced good numbers and experimenting with good resources produced bad numbers (forgive me for oversimplifying things).

To fix the system as requested, we have to make resource quality play into things and thats going to change it. So we're going to change the way crafting experimentation works, wait for the majority of the legacy items to drift out of the economy and look to see how things are progressing.

The pain here is that this constitutes a paradygm shift in experimenting and yeah, that is going to be painful, but its a key issue players have asked for and it's good for the game.




Kurt "Thunderheart" Stangl
Assistant Community Relations Manager"



It seems to me that everyone is against this save the artisans.

It looks like they are going ahead with this no matter what though so all of our constructive posts trying to 'call off the dogs' are for not.

I'm glad we have this board so we can constructively talk about these issues and still have nothing done about it.

Bravo!

If we did a straw poll on these changes, here is what we have:

Artisans (FOR) Single bar experimentations
Weaponsmiths (AGAINST) Multibar experimentations
Armorsmiths (AGAINST) Multibar experimentations
Droid Engineers (AGAINST) Multibar experimentations
Architects (AGAINST) Multibar experimentations
Bioengineers (AGAINST) Multibar experimentations
Doctors/Combat Medics (AGAINST) Multibar experimenatations

I'm REAL REAL glad the artisan community will get the 'changes they have asked for' at the exepense of the ENTIRE rest of the crafting community. Do you guys not see the writing on the wall or are you so blind you can't see what people are asking for?

I particularly love how you keep throwing in that 'we asked for this change'. That's a load of horse *&%* and you guys know it. We DID want less failures but not at the expense of ruining the entire crafing experience for some people like myself that's sole enjoyment from your game is the crafting experience.

The only community that benefits from these changes is the guys making speeder bikes, powerups, and survey tools.

EVERY OTHER TYPE OF CRAFTER IS HURT BY THESE CHANGES!

Ok devs let's try another approach.

You see how every single multi bar crafting profession hates this change so I'll ask this.

Tell us how this new system will benefit those type's of crafters. . .in other words how can those crafters consider this good?

Is this once-rejected poor idea still going?

Post constructive arguments? Why bother - you ignore and patronise those who have pointed out the flaws saying "we asked for it".....

"Wedo listen" that oft repeatedsound bite that you are so fond of repeating. It is clear that you have made a purchase from La-La Industries and do not want to hear sensible arguments.

Is this post constructive? Any post that airs problems, puts a point of view or even gives an emotional reaction is feedback which can be used constructively. It is not what is posted - its how you interpret those posts.