Doctor Archive

Just wondering what this will do to us. I hope they are not a replacement. If they can heal even at the novice medic level we might be in trouble, but I don't want to speculate until there is more info available.

What new healing droids, can you post the link to the info? If it is elsewhere in the fourms Im sorry i didn't see it.

Thanks

Check the devtracker and look for the post about the new DE changes.

Would post a link but it will take me 10 minutes to get back here with these slow forums.

I think this is it:

http://forums.station.sony.com/swg/board/message?board.id=droid_engineer&message.id=32089

Specifically:

"

Here are things we are thinking about doing going forward:

We want to make the Droid AI so that it targets healers from time to time. Medical droids have a perception that they don’t work, so to change their functionality, the following additions could be made:

* Add stim and health pack functionality

* Increase Medical Droid accessibility be letting them out of storage in more places that the are now

* Give reduced mind cost to medics

* Automatically stim incapacitated players"

I have no further info than what Sintrosi posted (part os wqhich is quated above.) Those look like things they are considering, but it is the first I had really heard of it beyond suggestions from players as possible considerations for droids.

There was a thread recently, maybe it was on the Medic forum, talking about what kind of functionality would be OK on surgical driods. DE's definitely need some lovin', that's for sure, and some of these ideas might be OK, but we'll really have to mull over them. In particular Adding Stim pack funtionality... if it's for everyone to use and it's on something like an A pack that must be given to the droid before it can use it, for example, that might open up the stim market for lower level medics and that could bea good thing, IMHO. I do know that there are others who disagree with that, though. I would hope, though, that some consideration would be given such that any stim used by the droid would not be of comparable skill as that of a Novice Medic using that stim.

I can say that I would be for wound pack use, but, and this also applies to stims, if we are talking about giving wound and stim packs to our own droids (as medic professionals) and letting the droid heal along with us, then I think that could be an interesting prospect. I'm not really up for even A level packs for anyone's use in a droid, though, as it would be rare where anyone would need a Docs wound healing services anymore. As it is I don;t even bother making anything better than a B wound pack. THere's just no need for anything stronger.

Letting them come out of the datapad in more spots... I think that's pretty much needed. THey aren't combat droids nad we gernally want them away when we are in combat. Letting us pull anywhere would be a big help in kleeping them safe.

Reduced mind cost for us would be really cool, and could make it worth the risk of keeping them out in cmabat.

Auto-stim of incapped players, that may be a better alternative to letting a droid use any stim above as I think less Medics would be opposed to it, since it's a pretty specialized situation. Especially if they still need to get the stim from us to begin with to put into the droid.

Any comments folks have on these, or ideas you might have for Surgical Droids would be cool. I can see about passing on the ideas and adding things in as issues if need be to at least make our voice heard on any of those surgical droid considerations before any real decisions are made on them. IToss out some questions, too, and I'll see if I can talk someone into gettin gus clarifications. Maybe then I can try to run a poll on which of these ideas we like, don;t like or thing should be changed and so on.

Here is an idea you can throw at them.

Give Docs certs for using medical droids. The certs will be on par with our personal use. Let us load up the droid with wound packs or enhancments andlet the droid perform the task and save us our mind pool.

Basically if we can use d's, we get the ability to load a droid with d's.

As far as non-medics using droids that healduring combat, I really don't know. If they load up with stims created by medics/docs I don't have a problem with it too much if it is limited to100 - 150healthand a longer refresh time (10 to 15 seconds). Maybe use the same idea with the certs for stims too. As long as it isn't replacing the medic/doc, I don't have a problem with it.

My "main" character is a Droid Engineer, but my "alt" character is a medic. Let me just say that I, and my profession, for that matter, have no interest in replacing the medic. Not that we could.

My perspective is that an artificially intelligent entity such as a droid will not need many, if any, artificial limitations on them to prevent them from healing. They have extremely low HAM, cannot improvise, and will be basically worthless on the battlefield, especially with new proposed changes for MOBS going aggro on a healer. I don't want to hurt the medical profession, and I like the idea of the cert for higher level doctors being able to use higher level droids.

But I also will throw this out there. If droids become more prolific, and they require the services of the medical profession, then the medical profession has an opportunity to also become more prolific. You can set the prices of a stimpack, but you cannot set the prices for healing in the med center.

And be honest, how many times have you been the only healer in a medical center? Go to Talus every once and awhile to see what I mean. I want to sell a droid to the person who does not dabble in scout or in medic, who honestly has a need for a medic's skills, but doesn't have access to a medic for whatever reason. Maybe the solution is to only have them use the "good stuff" in a medical center. That way, if a medic is already present, then it is a non-issue.

I will always want real live humans as medics in any combat situation that I find myself in. I will even want real healers in the medical center. The dabblers are the ones that I don't care much for. The ones who get in your group with a medic tag and are the first ones to go to the cloning center because they just want to level up TKA.

I just wanted to say, that as a Droid Engineer, and as a Medic (going for doctor), I personally have vested interest in both professions benefitting. And I don't get the feeling from my fellow DE's that we want to replace anyone's job.

I have to agree with SinjenRandall. My main is 4-4-4-2 doc (boy, do I hate crafting meds) but I'm completely in favor of the proposed medical droid changes.

I will love having a medical droid that can stim me when I'm incap'd so I can help my friends instead of waiting out 90 seconds to wake up. (It's true that the notes say the medical droid would react to nearby creatures, so if it were dangerous for the 'droid, he probably would simply run. This is one reason why droids won't replace PC medics. We aren't programmed to run when it gets dangerous.)

If we supply the meds for a medical droid, I couldn't care less what level stimpacks or woundpacksthey are (provided the droids only got base heal). Stim Es? No problem. Constitution woundpack D? Sure. You'll pay a lot for that, of course, but it's more money for me. I'm even fine with Cure Poison packs and Cure Disease packs -- hey, something has to counter those combat medics and nocuous kamuriths -- but I draw the line at Revives and Enhances. I'll sell high-level meds to droids, no problem.

A droid will never replace a player in a battle because I can anticipate and prioritize in a way that a limited AI can't. If I see a player with full health and mind and 1000 action damage I know without looking that he's standing at range and spamming specials (probably /eyeshot). I won't heal him immediately -- I'll go stand near the commando in composite who's taking token damage from a dalyrake because I know the dalyrake is venemous and I'll be needed there more (but I'll keep an eye on him to make sure he doesn't draw an aggro). I can work with another medic and divide up the combatants: I'll heal the ranged guys and the CM will heal the brawlers, maybe. I can tell the difference between healing a graul for 6000 damage and healing a rifleman-dancer for 250 and prioritize correctly. And even if you could program a droid to make healing decisions as a player might, the droid doesn't know when to /burstrun or /warningshot or /feigndeath.

The only, only, only problem I have is how to set the price of medical droids at the med center. I have always had a problem with this. It would be lovely to see the medical centers have a purpose, of course, and a money sink would certainly benefit the stability of the economy. It all but guarantees that medics will be paid less than the money sink rate, however, unless the player-driven medic has a competetive advantage: wound healing speed, perhaps. If the going rate is 10 credits per point of wounds, then medics will get tipped 9 per (or nothing). If the going rate is 100 credits per wound, the medics will get tipped 99 (or nothing). Why is there a money sink being put into the game instead of secure payment for healing?

Other than that, I have no complaints over medical droids. Bring 'em on.

I would just be happy if the medical droid would allow me to store all my stimpacks in IT's inventory, but still be able to use them as if they were in mine. Basically a way to free up space and keep your inventory organized. Either make the / commands more versatile (better AI for stimming, high damage on player = use the best power stim, etc, and also to make /healstate auto-heal whatever state is on the player, ie without an arguement) so you can just use macros, or let us drag the stims from the droid's inventory to our own toolbar and have it work that way.

Now there's a though. Kill two birds with one stone, in a sense. We've long talked about the problems with inventory management (an issue constantly hovering around the #12 spot) and the need for being able to search subpacks or a "medical bag" for organizing all of the meds we need better and still allowing us to use radial or / commands to heal. Not sure if it can be done, mind you, but I think it's a pretty interesting idea. Anyone else?

Pretty much does the same thing as loading it up with stims and using it, so ya, I think it is a great idea. Just not sure how they will handle it when you store the droid. Sounds like it could be abused for storage space.

Well for one, you could make it non-attackable. (and of course have zero combat use). That way a medic could leave it out at all times. For another, you could limit it so each player can only have one of these droids, further that there could be levels of them, with certs that you gain as you advance as a medic/doctor. Beyond that even, make it so ONLY medical stims can be stored on it, not resources or guns or whatever else you might want to store.

I think that about covers it, right?

I guess it would depend how it is implemented.

If it is case of droid anyone can use, just load up with stim and wound pack so it can heal anyone's damage and wound on command anywhere anytime, then I am not all that sure if that would be good for doctors. Would be good for our business, but not all that good for us as profession.

Sure Droid can't anticipate like doctor can, and 1 droid will not be a match for any healer, but if everyone in group have one of these droid out, tell all the droid to go to main tank, and constantly have em heal him, then 3 - 15 droid sure will take place of any healer out there or two.

Now if these medical droids are doctor/CM/Medic use only, and they are used only to improve our ability, then I am not too against it.

I guess I can't really say one way or another until I know more about it.

Here is how I would invision a new medical droid.

First there would be more than one, with each successive level being more powerful and requiring a higher level cerfitication (gained through the medic/doctor trees). Honestly I don't think CM's need more than what they would get through the medic tree. Note: you have to have at least novice medic (maybe higher) to use one of these droids at all).

• Level 1 Enhanced Medical Droid


• Level 2 Enhanced Medical Droid


• Level 3 Enhanced Medical Droid


• Level 4 Enhanced Medical Droid

Level 1 Enhanced Medical Droid
This droid would be useable by novice medic (or perhaps 1 or 2 boxes into the crafting branch). This would provide 5-10 inventory slots to place stims and woundpacks (and only stims/wound packs). The player should be able to use these stims as if they were in their own inventory. That is, by dragging and dropping into the toolbar or use of a macro with / commands (such as /healwound, /healstate, /curepoison, etc). This droid could also provide a small increase in effectiveness to it's owner, perhaps 5-10%.

Level 2 Enhanced Medical Droid
This droid's certification would come at Master Medic and would be very similar to the previous level of droid, just more powerful. So perhaps 10-15 slots of inventory and 10-15% increase in effectiveness of the owner's healing/buffing, etc.

Level 3 Enhanced Medical Droid
This droid's cert would come with at least 2 boxes into the crafting branch of the Doctor class. This would allow a seperate distinction for doctors (as opposed to regular master medics and combat medics). This droid would hold 20+ stims etc, and would affect the owner by 20% or so.

Level 4 Enhanced Medical Droid
Master doctors only. Essentially identical to the level 3 droid, except this one could provide a small, but constant mind regeneration buff. Say 100-200 worth, and only when the droid is called and nearby.

Important Notes
None of these droids would be attackable and none of them would have any offensive capabilities at all. Due to the special abilities of these droids, it might be nice to have them use energy (resource) instead of droid batteries, with an accesible menu showing it's power requirements, power status, etc.

The reason I think the certs should be in the crafting branch is because most people who are merely "dabbling" into the medic/doctor class are not likely to spend the points/time crafting. This really should be a "reward/feature" for people who are more... dedicated to the profession and plan on mastering it.

Players would only be allowed to have one of these droids in their datapad at any time. This would be to prevent storage exploits.

What issues this fixes
Medical component organization within the player's inventory. Keeping it on the droid would be very very useful to me personally, and I imagine most people would feel this way. As the droid would only hold those items and can only be used by medics+ it wouldn't be something that can be exploited for the purposes of storage.

This also provides some more exciting benefits for medics, combat medics and doctors to look forward to. Furthermore, with the doctor specific higher level droids, this would provide a nice distinction between the Doctor and Combat Medic classes. This might also help balance (master) doctors and combat medics in regards to the mind poisons CM's can use, what with the small regen of mind for the master doctor level droid.

Anyway, I think that about covers everything in regards to what I was thinking about with a new line of medical droids. Thoughts, comments, etc are all welcome.