Droid Engineer Archive

I know I'm gonna get flamed for this, but I'm going to say it anyway.

It's our own fault that the DEVs are looking in to a Droid Handler class. Why? I don't think we left them with much of a choice.

I bought the game a few weeks after release (the "date registered" under my name seems to reflect the date they first charged me, after my 1 month free). I bought it knowing that my character was going to be a DE. I started lurking on the forums not too long after that, and started posting a couple months later. Sorry for the history, but I wanted to make sure it's clear where I'm coming from.

In the time that I've been reading the DE forum, I've seenan attitude change. Initially most of the posts were dedicated to fixing bugs; now an overwhelming majority are devoted to combat droids. It seems like at some point we gave up on getting our bugs fixed and just said, "At LEAST give us something we can sell - we want droids that fight."

Thus, the debate began. During this time, the DEVs rebalanced creatures and creature handling, resulting in a "ceiling" for owning pets. In short, the maximum difficulty of any pet (other than faction pets) owned by any unskilled character would be uniformly limited. That extended to probots, which actually got a bit of a boost from the process.

So, having done that, how do we go about getting stronger combat droids? The way I see it they had a few options:

1. Stronger combat droids for everyone. Not gonna happen because of the CH balance. Say goodbye to option #1.

2. Stronger combat droids for DEs only. The community seemed split 50/50 on this. In such a case, it becomes the DEVs call, and I think the DEVs designed DE as a crafting class, not a combat class. Option #2 is probably not an option.

3. Stronger combat droids with certifications. This seemed to have community support, but no one could agree on what a "fair" cert system would be. Add the fact that however it was implemented it would be exploited, and I think it's safe to say the DEVs didn't see this as an option either.

4. Stronger combat droids with a new class to use them. By process of elimination, the winner.

Now I don't like it any more than anyone here, but I see it as the only viable solution to the collective voice of the masses. If we want combat droids, this is how we're gonna get it.

One more thing before I sacrafice myself to the flamethrowers: Hopefully with the "new communication" mandate from the DEVs this is something that will be discussed long before we get to an implementation stage. Look for it in the "In Concept" forum and hope it appears there before it appears in the "In Development" forum.

/emote crosses fingers

Flame on!

not much of a droid invasion if the new droids go to a new class is it? especially when alot of us will give this class up if this is put through to live

Woohoo! The phantom 1-star. God, I love this community.

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Yoshudda wrote:
not much of a droid invasion if the new droids go to a new class is it? especially when alot of us will give this class up if this is put through to live

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I'm still not supporting a DH class, I'm just saying that I recognize how we got there.

Also, "Droid Invasion" implies more droids or more diverse uses for droids in the game. That doesn't necessarily translate in to changes for the DE profession. At least not from the perspective that the DEVs seem to be taking, the one I outlined above.

For the record: my vote on DH = NO. But I don't see a way around it.

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OrionsByte wrote:
Woohoo! The phantom 1-star. God, I love this community.

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Well, that keeps me busy 5 starring you.

I can't believe how negative some people are, I can't wait to try both DE and DH once they get implemented one way or the other.

No flame from me,I think your post isvery good actually and I agree with it. It is nearly impossible to keep everyone happy, there are too many different opinions depending on what profession you are, its a constant weighscale tipping from one side to the other, you make one side happy and the other isnt. People dont understand how hard it is to get it all to balance out with so many variables.

Personally I dont see the problem with a droid handler class, the problem is that everybody want to be able to do everything and cant stand that they have to sacrifice some things in order to do other things, I would rather see that combat droids arent usable by everyone otherwiseit would be just like a few weeks back when pets were absolutly everywhere, now that they fixed up the CH profession you see way less pets and creature handlers and I think thats great, I would rather see just a handfull of people with combat droids rather than an infestation of combat droids all over the place. Sure it would be good for sales but not good for the game.

Seems likea pretty fair summary, OrionsByte.

I think that a lot of people, in their zeal for getting new combat droids, forget that the Droid Engineer profession must remain balanced and that combat is not the only "balance" factor in the game. We fight like crap because we are supposed to fight like crap... giving us combat droids that make us better at fighting makes us too powerful. Creating an all-new profession to use powerful new combat droids means that they have a lot more flexibility in making those new combat droids cool while still keeping the game balanced overall.

The problem is TH was at the meeting last night. We voted no on that. We voted yes on certs. He's posted a blatent lie.

Likely, this would be an elite profession. I think alot of DE's will pick up DH if the basic profession requirements were not insane. As is, we can be Master Artisan, Master Droid Engineer, and Master Elite-whatever withsome points left behind. Now, if they start adding pre-reqs like Scout and Brawler/Marksman, DH could very well be out of reach for a DE to master without having to drop Master Artisan (a much needed profession).

Nicely put Orions. I think it does show a logical progression, unfortunately for us. But, I don't think it is all our fault. If droids had been given the time and initial development in the early stages of creating this game, it would be the CH's that would be crying, not us.

Ok but who would get the certs? Sure you vote for certs but for who?

My guess is the DH class would follow similar pre-reqs as CH, except since you need to know about mechanical things rather than nature, change Scout skills to Artisan/Engineering tree. Thus, to get DH you would need Ranged Support IV from Marksman and Eng IV from Artisan.

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OrionsByte wrote:

3. Stronger combat droids with certifications. This seemed to have community support, but no one could agree on what a "fair" cert system would be. Add the fact that however it was implemented it would be exploited, and I think it's safe to say the DEVs didn't see this as an option either.

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Not quite.TH never asked DEs or their correspondant to try to reach a concensus. In the mean time, Drashk has succeeded inidentifying a solution that I think most DEs agree with (at least 65%), and this could have been done much sooner if TH didn't have his head in the sand.

All along people have been talking about balance saying (1) we don't want uber droids, because that would be unbalancing, and (2) the reasonably powered combat droids need to have SOME kind of cert system to keep them out of the hands of noobs. No there hasn't been a concensus on what that cert system should be, but which makes more sense:

(a) take DE's suggestion and take a couple ofdays to come up with a concensus as to who should have the certs, or

(b) spend 6 months developing a new Droid Hander profession that no one asked for or wants