Droid Engineer Archive
Thread: Discussion: Hand-crafting vs. Factory-crafting (relating to Quality of product)
LonelyGhost wrote:
Random snips....
...Let me give you an example from my experience.../snip (custom weapons, 50% Composite, Ubese vendor)
Excellent examples. It actually onlu highlights the issue I have with the big businesses. Why *would* anyone try to set up the system you speak of?! Why bother when Joe Industrialist has every possible armor combination of a vendor right around the corner?
Because there is NO ONE that provides every possible combination of everything. Another example... Rocket launchers are HORRIBLY inaccurate. However they can be crafted using accuracy stocks to me much more accurate. All the industrialists on my server do nothing other than to maximize damage, which makes them worthless. Only the hand crafters are experienced enough to know about and make the accurate ones that are workable.
There ARE things that players want that crafters don't realize because they NEVER talk to their customers... I have now provided 3 examples of items that crafters could sell me, and that I would buy a BUNCH of if people would just ask me.
My point, one you have not, and cannot, refute is that big business does NOT replace the hand crafters who sell items directly to the customers instead of by vendor. There IS a demand for customized goods, and the industrialists CANNOT kill that.
Its *EXACTLY* this kind of thing I would love to see changed. I would LOVE to find Crafters in their shops, hand-crafting goods for special orders and walk-in's. That would be very cool! But, again, why shoudl they?
See, that is my point....That's not what you want. You want a bonus for hand-crafting so you can stick stuff on a vendor. Contact with the customers is key to understanding the market, and you fail to understand that there IS a market for customization already. This is ESPECIALLY true for droids, and you have little to complain about..... If you are hand-crafting FOR customers, you understand the market and make your own customers.
If you are hand-crafting for a vendor, you are no better than the industrialists, and you don't deserve to be sought out. Again, if you think that you deserve a bonus for sticking the same goods industrialists make on a vendor just like industrialists do, you are wrong.
Most people just go to the Industrialist shop where there is NO wait, and they get what they need. These people generally DONT want interaction, they just want to get back to looting and slaying. If there was a *reason* to seek out the SPecialized crafter, boy, how cool would that be?!
This is wrong.... Remember there are 2 kinds of customers....(1) service and (2) convenience. Are there some that want no intereaction? Sure. BUT (and that is a HUGE "but") there are also plenty that love interaction. That, in itself, is a reason for a specialized crafter.
The problem with this proposal is that it DOES NOT make a reason for people to interact with customers. It instead forces all crafters to hand-craft to be competitive, after which 90% of crafters will simply stick everything they make on vendors.
There is no added incentive to craft FOR customers, there is just an incentive to hand-craft. As I have stated that is nothing more than a bonus for a certain playstyle (which is wrong).
...People who value convenience and one-stop-shopping got to Wal-Mart. People who value service do not. There are BOTH types of customers in the market, and consequently a market for BOTH types of crafters.
We agree! But there is that little problem that it is too expensive and too unrewarding for some people to try and run a custom, service-oriented shop under the WalMart's shadow.
Why? This is just a statement, and a non-sensical one at that. You are saying that the hand crafters can't compete with the industrialists but NEVER explain why. Why is it expensive to run a custom shop? Houses and vendors cost something like 2000 credits a day. Are you telling me you can't sell a single droid every day?
If hand-crafters can make the EXACT same goods, charge the EXACT same price, place their vendor on the overhead map in the EXACT same way.....why are they disadvantaged.
The reality is that most players these days are going to the overhead map and jumping from crating vendor to vendor until they find what they need. Price isn't an object. If your shop is the one they find the object in, they will buy it (unless the stats are not up to par).
In that circumstance, why are hand-crafters disadvantaged?
If what you are really saying is "I'm pissed off because there is a powergamer on my server that cranks out goods like crazy and makes more money than I do." That is silly. That power game would STILL be ablr to create more hand-crafted goods than a casual gamer, and so the hand-crafting bonus would do NOTHING to prevent this.
...Hand-crafters can do everything industrialists can do, do do everything industrialists do, and there is no justification for them to recieve any "premium" or bonus just because they craft things the way they want to. If they are providing excellent service to customers, the customers will appreciate and pay for that service. If they are running throught he crafting process in a little different way, pushing tool buttons instead of factory buttons, I just don't see the need to reward that.
Maybe I and others have been talking too much about the "reward" thing. Its not really all about the "reward". To me, its more about giving MORE people the chance to play this GAME and have fun. Its not fun to have to resort to taking charity from a Guild member or to run survey missions because you cant afford to pay the maint on the Windmills you are using to power your 1 medium and 3 personal harvs.
Again, this is silly. I have always hand-crafted. I don't sell a lot of droids, but I DO have fun selling the ones that I do sell. Why is fun 100% proportional to sales numbers?
Also your point about harvesters makes no sense... If you aren't making and selling 900 droids a day, then you don't need to harvest the materials to make 900 droids a day and don't have that expense.
I have had 8 heavy harvesters and 2 fusion harvesters running all week. I spent about 30k on harvester maintenance this week. You are telling me you can't sell enough droids to make 30k in a week? As a hand crafter, I know that is not true.
If you are hand-crafting a bunch of items everyday, then your vendors would be just as full as the industrialsists, and the customers would not be able to tell any difference. Full vendors = people fill find what they need and buy from you. There would be no "disadvantage."
...Both Industrialists and hand-crafters can charge the EXACT same price for similar quality goods. The only difference is that IF an industrialist spends a bunch more money and resources to make more goods, AND IF the industrialist can actually attract enough customer to buy those goods, they can make more money in the same amount of time. You will note that those are two REALLY big ifs. They have to both spend a truckload more money AND find customers to buy their mass produced goods. That is no simple task, and is not any easier than hand-crafting to be sure.
The established crafters have already filled in most of the requirements you state. Its the NEW crafter, and ONLY the new crafter, that is at a *significant* advantage in the face of the Industrialist operations. The Established people HAVE the millions they need, the fleets of harvs, the return customers, the word of mouth, the best resources, the distribution networks..... Again I ask, would it really hurt the Industrialist to cut back maybe 20% of their sales? Sales that will go to the standard, hand-crafting players? Those "other" people trying to have fun in the same profesions?
BUT that has NOTHING to do with hand-crafting.... It has to do with new crafters trying to break into the market.
AND that is a BAD thing to be promoting. Think about what you are saying... You are saying that new crafters need to have a means to make BETTER goods than crafters who have been playing for over a year.
You are saying that experienced crafters don't deserve to be able to keep their client base, and should have their customers be able to be stolen by new crafters, who have been at it for a week, just because those crafters utilize a bonus to make same-quality goods?
Whatever...respectfully, I disagree.
Here is my take on that. I have been in the process of re-tooling my droid shop the past 3 weeks. I took a brief hiatus while I hologrinded my last 12 non-crafting professions before patch 10. In the interim, I lent some of my rare resources and tapes to a new DE who was just getting started, and he quit the game without giving them back (yes....ouch).
Do I deserve to IMMEDIATELY be able to take advantage of a bonus and make the same droids that all the other established DEs on the server (who didn't take a break) do? Heck no I don't. I will have to work to make my shop as good as theirs again.
....Practically, there is NO difference between the goods of the good industrialists and hand-crafters. The difference is the amount of customer interaction the crafter wishes to have.
The difference is in the volume of business. The glut of product offerd up by the Industrialist, top quality product even, makes the same top-quality product harder to move if you do not have a reputation for having a stuffed vendor like many Industrialists. How many of you, when you take your last sip of Brandy, think to yourself..."Hmmm, I think I will head to Tatooine and see who's selling Brandy there. Maybe I'll score a great deal on it." What I suspoect many of us think instead is "Hmmm, I can drop by (insert Industrialist name) on the way out to (insert destination). I dont care that they charge 20% more than the market value, I dont want to spend the time looking for Brandy...I just want it as fast as I can get it!"
Ahhhhh....now we get to what youREALLY want.... You want volume...you are upset that they can sell more and make more money.
The only problem is....industrialists CAN'T just stock their vendors with high quality product. To make top quality product, you need top quality resources. Top quality resources are NOT easy to find.
So lets say your buddy Joe industrialistuses all his resources and makes 1000 droids and puts them all on his vendor. He sells them all in a week.
What now?
If he is selling in volume, he is using up all his rare high-quality resources faster than others that don't. That means that he will (1) have to eventually use worse resources to keep selling in volume, or (2) close up shop until high-quality resources come available again.
Theoretically, hand-crafters who do not sell in volume SHOULD have an advantage over industrialists, because they do not use up high quality resources as fast as the industrialists.
That is the fundamental flaw with your argument.... You are talking about the power-gamer vs. casual/new player aspect of the market, and NOT the industrialist vs. hand-crafter aspect. The problem with this is that power gamers can hand-craft more goods than casual/new crafters, so this proposal does nothing to fix that.
The people who you are talking about that stock their vendors with everything under the sun are not industrialists, they are powergamers... It takes a BUNCH of time to manage that many factory runs for that many different items. There is nothing you can do to remedy the fact that they spend more time online than you or work harder than you, so they can make money than you. That is just the way of the world. If there was a hand-crafting bonus, they would STILL be able to hand-craft more goods than you, and you would STILL be making less money.
....If you are saying someone who puts in no time building their business should be able to make EXACTLY the same product through hand crafting, and that experienced players need to be "equalized" with new and less experienced players, I beg to differ.
I am saying that if people dont have the CAPACITY to put in 10 or more hours a day with maybe even a couple acconts, that they should STILL have a chance to draw enough sales so they can have FUN playing the game. Its not about making Joe NEwbie on par with TK...its about making Joe Newbie able to have FUN *DESPITE* the difference in time in game each day. What you speak of hints at Elitism, and that can be a dangerous thing. Yes! Established crafters have advantages due to time and effort spent. But currently the chasm is wide. Is it really going to hurt the Insustrialist to make the same 1,000 items a week, but sell 10% less because *some* people want that little extra boost hand crafting can bring? Will the Industrialist stop having FUN?
Exactly, you are talking about power gamers vs. casual gamers. That has NOTHING to do with this issue.
Fun is NOT = amount of money coming in. If a power gamer spends 10 hours a day making droids and sells 100 of them, and you spend 1 hour a day making droids and sell 10 of them, why is that wrong?
Under your hand-crafting proposal, wouldn't that power-gamer STILL be able to hand craft for 10 hours a day and make more droids than you?
Along that same line, if a power gamer spends 10 hours killing mobs and gets 10 million xp, should a casual gamer be able to get 10 million xp in 1 hour just because they play less.
There is no reason to equalize power-gamers and casual gamers. They spend more time playing, they deserve any advantage they get.
....Sure, in the initial setup, but inside of week or two it's down to a quick harvester/factory runs every couple days and stocking the vendor.
That is exactly the point of this thread. Stop the factory madness! 
Crafting is about more than loading schematics all day long.
So.....what....let me get this straight.... Crafting is not about factory runs (which, by the way just let you enjoy the game while your goods cook), it is about running though an endless cycle of clicking through the same crafting window, over and over, an infinte number of times to make stuff?
Again, respectfully, I disagree. I like a little hand-crafting, and do it for a lot of my stuff. However, if you are saying that running though the same crafting window 10 times to makethe components for asingle droid, and then repeating that process50 times a day to make enough droids to say in business, is "rewarding"....... I'll stop there....
Factories allow you to run through the boring craftingwindows once, and then make similar items (at a SLOWER pace than hand-crafting, mind you) without having to sit in your shop for hours on end staring that the same windows for hours on end. They allow you to run around and interact with the world and other people (maybe even recruiting customers)instead of doing the same monotonous combine over and over.
That is not madness...that is genius, and I thank the developers for providing that option.
...Supply and demand would indicate the above, but I meet very few new crafters, and even fewer with the vision of an operation of the scale of producers leaving the market.
You meet very few crafters, you say...I wonder why? Is it because many who start down that road quickly realize they have no chance to get a decent slice of the pie? ALso, why does it have to be a vision of such magnitude? Do wepresume that a crafter must have the kind of volume many of us are used to seeing? Instead of these new crafters each trying to build an operation as large as the departing Industrialist, maybe there would be 10 new crafters to replace one Industrialist?
The pie is WAY to big for you to say that you can't find any customers. I am shocked that you are saying you can't find people to buy your goods. If I had to guess, I would wager the real problem is that you are sticking stuff on your vendor, are not talking to or trying to recruit new customers, and then don't understand why no one is visiting your vendors.
That is exactly the reason why I have rarely kept a vendor for anything but repair kits and BH droids.... The best place to hand craft droids in the middle of a busting city, where almost everyone you meet would be extatic to buy one of your custom made, hand-crafted droids.
...Experienced crafters, for example like TK and Audio, deserve to be rewarded for the long hours they have put into gathering resources, skill tapes, and streamlineing their crafting process so that they can provide a great product to their customers.
Do they deserve to be "rewarded" at the expense of others? Again, would it really be less fun fo them to cut back maybe 10 or 20% of their production? Its gotta be a weight off, doing less. Running a big business, even in SWG, is work.
Experience is NOT = Big business. Those experienced crafters would STILL be able to hand-craft better goods than the newbie.
They deserve to take advantage of the experience they have built. That is not at the expense of others, it is something they have EARNED.
They real question, and the thing you are advocating,is whether a 3 day old DE should be able to make better droids then them at THEIR expense. I see no logic in that.
...This it the part of your argument that has no weight and no sense to it. Any two crafters that are crafting the same quality product, whether they are a new crafter or an established crafter are facing the same demand.
Sure, the same demand, but not the same sales. I refer you to my Q above about where do YOU go when you need new Equipemt? Do you look around, or go straight to someone you know because you KNOW they will have what you want?
I already always have to look around...it is rare for me to find a fully stocked vendor that has everything I want. I just (5 minutes ago) bought a new set of ubese (I burn through ubese like water) and it took me 3 different vendors to find a full set. Is that convenience? I spent an hour to find a full set of armor.
If I had a person who hand-crafted that I could have gone to to have them make me a full set, I would have gone straight there. In that respect, hand-crafting is MUCH more convenient for the customer, because they can ALWAYS get EXACTLY what they want.
And again, THIS is why granting a small bonus to hand-crafting will spread out the sales a tiny bit. If you KNOW your regular vendor has "standard uber" equipment on it, but that you will probably be able to find some "extra uber" stuff if you shop around a litle bit, your money will be spread outsome.
And that power gamer that stocks the regular vendor would then start making the "extra uber" hand crafted model and you would STILL derive no benefit. They money will STILL not be spread out....just because they spend more time stocking vendors does not make it wrong.
...The only way this makes any sense in the context of the discussion is if you define "casual gamer" to be "someone who does not use a factory" and then define "powergamer" to be "someone who does use a factory". But those are both absurd definitions
These definitions are pretty well established. Powergamers have multiple accounts and play all the time. Every day, maybe? 10 hours or more? 30-50 hours a week? Casual gamers play on the weekend, maybe at night after they get off work, and after the kids are asleep. You seem to be *trying* to be difficult now. I (obviously) love a good debate, but it sours it when people do that.
I have one account. I play 5-6 hours every other day.I play at night after my wife goes to sleep.I hand craft.
I have never had any problems paying my crafting house/harvester bills or finding customers for my goods.
The point was valid.... Power-gamer is NOT = person who uses factories. Casual gamers use factories too. Power-gamers CAN hand-craft too, and CAN hand-craft faster than a casual gamer. Why is that not a fair point?
...WalMart's don't really exist in this game and it is impossible for anyone to really be put out of business.
Are you crazy!? Yes they can, and DO exist! ANy vendor that has more than 800 lines of goods IS a WalMart! Guess what? There is a shop on my server with more than 8 vendors, and ALL of them have at least 500 items on them. They are run by a single layer with (at least) 4 accoutns, and who uses his familites accounts for lots too. And yes, he has large lot-swapped harv farms. SO, in the face of this person, gobblng up sales due to the low prices and plentiful selection, 2 people I "took under my wing" quit. They joined SWG to be in that profession, and could not do it. They weren't willing to make this GAME into a job, which is what would have been required to even attempt to compete with this person. No one I know likes to run missions for cash...and they shoudn't HAVE to as a master of a profession. They did not expect to make millions, but making enough to be able to go out and have fun would have been great. So, its true that they weren't "put out of business"...they never got it off the ground!
So what. So...what.... That "power gamer" would STILL be able to hand-craft and put goods on vendors faster than you.
You can't stop people from playing the game more than you. When people play more, they are going to accomplish more. There is nothing wrong with that.
...Large shops have no real power in this game the way they do in real life. The only power anybody really has over anybody else is via the setting of their prices. People can't lower their prices below the cost of the resources and still make a profit. This fact in general keeps prices up to a point where new players can afford to come in and compete.
Man, I ought to come to your server! Large shops offer the ability to get anything you want, as fast as you can boogie on over to the location. Large shops run by Industrialist offer solid, low-ish prices. The cost to pull resources is about .5cpu. Thats HALF of 1 credit. And thats if you BUY your power at 1.5cpu. Thats a pretty low number for a new person to meet and be able to grow at all. Running missions to pay for harvs is not fun.
There you go again.... Why are you ASSUMING that you can get EVERYTHING you want at large shops? You can't! I have already provided 5 examples of things that I want that I can't find at these one-stop mega-mall shops.
Your point is wrong. There ARE things individual, hand-crafters CAN offer to consumers....IF... THEY... ASK the customer. The problem is not that you can't compete, the problem is that you are not trying to compete.
If you can't best a power-gamer on production capability (something this hand-crafting proposal WILL NOT fix) you have to find another way to do so. My way is to seek customers out and provide personal service. The way I prefer to buy goods is though personalized service.
...Apparently not. Because they had that opportunity, as we all do. And they didn't take it.
They had the opportunity, and did not get the sales. Again and again I have said it, but is true. There is NO reason for people to shop around for stuff when they KNOW they can get the exact same (or better) thing at an Industrialist shop. But a hand-crafted thing, with a small bonus might prompt them to seek out an alternative source for their goods. SOme of them at least.
Dude, this is BOGUS.... I'm sorry but it is....
You are saying that you want to be a hand-crafter that makes "extra-uber" goods for people...
So....if these people are coming to you for these hand-crafted, customized goods.....why can't they get what they want?
If they are asking you to make goods for them, why can't you give them what you want?
That is the flaw with all of your logic.... If you are hand-crafting for people, you are giving them EXACTLY what they want. If a customer comes to a hand-crafter and asks them to make something, they can ALWAYS get what they want. Always is much more comvenient than the whatever-is-on-the-vendor ata mega-mall.
You problem is not with the crafting system....your problem is with power-gamers. The problem is, hand crafting does nothing to prevent powergamers from dominating the market. If fact, you CAN'T do anything to prevent powergamers from dominating the market. If they spend more time playing, they spend more time earning. That isn't wrong.
Edit....fixed the text size...
Message Edited by Daker-Naritus on 09-12-2004 10:35 AM
Brennox wrote:
Daker-Naritus wrote:
babyblue_d wrote:
Daker-Naritus wrote:
As another example....for 6 months now I have been looking for a set of 50% composite. I don't want the 85% composite that is on every vendor in the galaxy. What I want is a encumberance experimented suit of armor with lesser resists that I can wear WITHOUT being buffed. I can't find a single hand-crafter that is willing to make it for me.
you just helped us make our point ... theres no reason to hand craft .. why do it? most wont.
these changs would fix this. and this is part of the core argument. why should anyone hand craft if customer service is the only reasson and the trade off is you make less cash whats the point .. its ezer to stock a vendor with tons of stuff knowing if one player dont buy it another will. this would be enoff reasson for SOME to store the factorty and start hand crafting again not for others and thats why it wont hurt the game but help it
Totally not true. The point it shows is that there IS a market for hand-crafting...people just aren't tapping it....
And people arent tapping it because its so depressingly small that a single AS could satisfy an entire servers demand, because lets face it, who uses up the most armor?
Powergamers do.
I go through a set of ubese armor every week... I am not a power gamer.
And what kind of armor do powergamers want? The 'best', which what alot of other people also want, simply because there IS a 'best' in armor -> high resist.
With doc buffs encumberance is almost a non-issue execpt for the few that dont get a standard buff and the helmet.
Ok....and hand -crafters can make 75% ubese JUST like the industrialists do. There is no quality difference between hand-crafted and industrial goods.
However, implementing a handcraft bonus combined with the combat revamp (aka doc buff and armor nerfs)WILL in fact create a very big market for handcrafted armor, in both the PvP "we gots to have the best" and PvE "High kenetic low encumb plz" scene.
No, it will give a bonus to a certain playstyle and force all crafters who want to remain competitive to hand-craft. It will force people to stare at the same crafting windows for hours on end to keep their vendors filled with items, instead of using a factory (at a MUCH slower pace) to do monotonous combines over and over.
The problem is, there will STILL be one-stop-shops, run by powergamers, who over an hand crafted model of every good under the sun. This proposal does nothing to fix that.
Do it, i say, do it and we'll pick up the pieces afterwards if anything goes wrong, but atm crafting the best of the best is simply a matter of lot trades, lots of cash and multiple accounts.
That is a bad idea... "Let make a change that could have drastic effects on the player economy and then worry about whether it is a good idea later." That has happened many times before, and the players have never appreciated it.
Daker-Naritus wrote:
Brennox wrote:
Daker-Naritus wrote:
babyblue_d wrote:
Daker-Naritus wrote:As another example....for 6 months now I have been looking for a set of 50% composite. I don't want the 85% composite that is on every vendor in the galaxy. What I want is a encumberance experimented suit of armor with lesser resists that I can wear WITHOUT being buffed. I can't find a single hand-crafter that is willing to make it for me.you just helped us make our point ... theres no reason to hand craft .. why do it? most wont.
these changs would fix this. and this is part of the core argument. why should anyone hand craft if customer service is the only reasson and the trade off is you make less cash whats the point .. its ezer to stock a vendor with tons of stuff knowing if one player dont buy it another will. this would be enoff reasson for SOME to store the factorty and start hand crafting again not for others and thats why it wont hurt the game but help it
Totally not true. The point it shows is that there IS a market for hand-crafting...people just aren't tapping it....
And people arent tapping it because its so depressingly small that a single AS could satisfy an entire servers demand, because lets face it, who uses up the most armor?
Powergamers do.I go through a set of ubese armor every week... I am not a power gamer.
And what kind of armor do powergamers want? The 'best', which what alot of other people also want, simply because there IS a 'best' in armor -> high resist.
With doc buffs encumberance is almost a non-issue execpt for the few that dont get a standard buff and the helmet.Ok....and hand -crafters can make 75% ubese JUST like the industrialists do. There is no quality difference between hand-crafted and industrial goods.
However, implementing a handcraft bonus combined with the combat revamp (aka doc buff and armor nerfs)WILL in fact create a very big market for handcrafted armor, in both the PvP "we gots to have the best" and PvE "High kenetic low encumb plz" scene.No, it will give a bonus to a certain playstyle and force all crafters who want to remain competitive to hand-craft. It will force people to stare at the same crafting windows for hours on end to keep their vendors filled with items, instead of using a factory (at a MUCH slower pace) to do monotonous combines over and over.
The problem is, there will STILL be one-stop-shops, run by powergamers, who over an hand crafted model of every good under the sun. This proposal does nothing to fix that.Do it, i say, do it and we'll pick up the pieces afterwards if anything goes wrong, but atm crafting the best of the best is simply a matter of lot trades, lots of cash and multiple accounts.
That is a bad idea... "Let make a change that could have drastic effects on the player economy and then worry about whether it is a good idea later." That has happened many times before, and the players have never appreciated it.
I cant resist a good argument
Youre very skilled at finding the worst interpretation of my text, so let me straighten it a bit.
"I go through a set of ubese armor every week... I am not a power gamer."
I have an AS friend who keeps his vendor stocked to the brim with 30% base, 71% kenetic ubese. ANY handcrafter trying to compete with his 8 factories and 10 harvesters for your business, would have to either know you personally, sell lower quality or sell at a loss.
If you are claiming to use up a set of custom crafted low encumberance ubese on a weekly basis, then you my friend are among the so very few. As most everyone tends to just get a decent set of high resist armor and get doc buffs (regardless of wether they can wear their armor unbuffed).
Hence my comment of "a depressingly small market".
"Ok....and hand -crafters can make 75% ubese JUST like the industrialists do. There is no quality difference between hand-crafted and industrial goods."
There is a VERY big difference between being able to reproduce an amazing succes subcomponent 1000 times and then reproducing an amazing succes assembly on the armor and simply NOT being able to do so.
There IS a quality difference between handcrafted and factory made AS WELL as a price difference. Handcrafted items suffer critical failures, they suffer 'good' or even 'moderate' successes. Factory made is cheap, fast and guaranteed to have top stats.
Again a handcrafter would be out of time and business filling his vendor with lower stats armor then the factory user.
"No, it will give a bonus to a certain playstyle and force all crafters who want to remain competitive to hand-craft. It will force people to stare at the same crafting windows for hours on end to keep their vendors filled with items, instead of using a factory (at a MUCH slower pace) to do monotonous combines over and over.
The problem is, there will STILL be one-stop-shops, run by powergamers, who over an hand crafted model of every good under the sun. This proposal does nothing to fix that."
Hmm, interesting, "force a certain playstyle" you say?
Forcing people to stare at a window you say?
Monotonous you say?
And best of all, you claim that someone who pours his heart, soul and time into creating a large amount of these top items is 'merely' a powergamer.
Let me put a different spin on that. Instead of simply powering up the ol' factory with a 1000 count schematic and going off to have fun hunting, in the knowledge he is in fact amongst the top crafters of the server, mr powergamer now has the choice:
- Sit in his house near his crafting station and build a large stock of high quality goods, losing quite a lot of them to lower experimentatoin and crit fails OR
- Do the same as before and simply accept the fact that hes NOT in fact amongst the top crafters on the servers but amongst the top crafter DABBLERS.
Before you go all out on me saying he invested the skillpoints and how he is sacrificing time building items, thats NOT infact what makes him a REAL TRUE AND HONEST HEART AND SOUL crafter.
The REAL crafter is the guy sitting in his house doing 'monotonous' combines and anxiously clicking the experiment button, hoping to get that great item.
Now theres nothing bad about crafter dabbling, quite the contrary, there is a huge market for low cost high quality goods, but there is also a decent market for that little extra umph on your rifle, or that extra percent protection on your armor or that minute longer lasting canape.
The problem at this time is that those two markets overlap, giving 100% of it to the factory user.
"That is a bad idea... "Let make a change that could have drastic effects on the player economy and then worry about whether it is a good idea later." That has happened many times before, and the players have never appreciated it."
Though i do deservea nomination for "worst PR ever" award for putting it in those words (right after "DeathStar", wth was the emperor thinking?), my point was to implement a basic sytem like this and tweak it to perfection afterwards. Not simply blundering about on the crafting system and pray it lands on its feet.
Respond please 8)
As I cited in a previous post, yes there is. I can send you a WP to the shop run by the Industrialist. Its a great shop! I've gotten stuff there too, when I needed it "right now". Its top-of-the-line, and theres plenty of it.
Out of how many craftable items? How many people *can* use Rocket Launchers? How many people *want* to use very light Composite? Dont remember the 3rd... What you say is correct in that there *are* things to be made by hand that are more useful. But these items represent a tiny fraction of the total market, and excludes whole crafting area's. Name something outside of WS or AS maybe even?
Of course not. Those people who LIKE to sit around to get the random special order can and do get business. But thats not the point. You are drifting into vendor vs. Trade sales. This is about making the game more rewarding to those who do NOT have the tens of millions of creds and resources and dozens of lots at their disposal. Whether they sell through a vendor or not isn't the thrust of this proposal. Its about the crafting itself and the end product. Not the distribution. Well, in a way its about distribution because one of the problems is the little guy cant move much in the WalMart's shadow.
The reality in the game refutes your statement. If even *half* of the consumers liked interaction, then the big businesses wouldn't be nearly so profitable and sucessful. Will people *accept* interaction? Sure! Do they seek it out? I really doubt it. I dont. I want the items I'm shopping for. I dont like to RP, and I dont want to jabber with people while shopping. But if that were a side-effect of being able to get a slightly better piece of equipment, I would accept it. Hell, we have a unique and ground-breaking Entertainer system. How many people do you know go to a new Cantina and "chat" with the people there while you wait for your BF to heal (all1 of them not AFK, at least, heheh)? I bet lots of people use this time to hit the head, or grab a snack, make a phone call, catch up on the forums, etc...
Ever get some clothes made for you by a Taior? I have. I've actually played a Tailor for about a month (broke the 750k barrier for the first time as a Tailor way back when). I sat there while the Tailor made some clothes, tried them on, etc, till I got what I wanted. *This* is a possibility witht he new system. Will it happen for sure? Maybe. People will probably STILL craft for their vendor. But thats fine too! Like I said, its not about the distribution methodes, its about the small guys having something to make that people *want*!
Sorry, I thought the "concept" of Walmart explained it enough, but I'll spell it out for you then. Large businesses run more efectively due to greater resources, larger production runs, more lot's available, multiple product lines (clothes, homes, weapons, etc...), and consequently more sales. More sales at a smaller profit, but the sales volume is enuogh that its *still* profitable! Why is it expensive to run a custom shop (ignoring the whole "means of distribution" part)? You only get 10 lots...thats 2 for a house, 1 for a factory, and 7 for power and resource harvs if you go all solo, and the most efficient. Probably 2 power harvs, so 5 mediums (really are the most efficient). Thats about 50k resources a day on 70% or more, for a single resource you need. 1,440 a day times 7 (power too), plus house, factory, vendor(s) is a lot more than you allude to. 10k a day in harvs alone. Say 12k a day total expenses. Thats set. You cant go any lower unless you have Efficiency IV. 12k a day to a new player is pretty high. And that doesn't even include the re-deed costs. Its not about ME selling a single droid a day, its about the guy new to the game trying to sell a droid. Remember, this person is trying to gain SKILL in DE while he sells droids. He needs creds to run his harvs to get the materials to grind the profession out (remember that many crafting profs are useless until you are amster). So he has a pretty tough challenge ahead of him. Especially when so much business goes to the WalMarts. We are lucky (kind of) in that experimentation on our parts means nothing for so much of our product. Poor Chefs! Poor Weaponsmiths!
SO, to sumit up for you, small crafters cannot compete because they cannot meet the volume requirements that are an incredible incentive for people to just go there and get what they want. Once again, how many times do you run around looking for a new Brady vendor? Or do you just go straight to a crafter you *know* has hat you want because they always make so much of it? They therefore get fewer sales, and therefore make very little money. It takes creds to keep an operation open. And, the biggest part? They probably arent having fun having to scrape by so much.
Because for now, people are used to the Holo-vendor problem, and rarely visit random vendors looking for stuff like Weapons, Armor, Brandy, etc. They go where it is familiar and where they *know* they can get what they want.
Yes, but the volume would be reduced enough that their product will sell out. And there will be people who still need that product. It is literally impossible for a single powergamer to craft a hundred of every single Weapon in Weaponsmith in one day. Lets take 22 items from WS, the most popular ones. If it takes 60 seconds to make each one, times *50* items per, thats 20 hours. 20 hours to make 50 of each one. Ask a popular WS how many T-21's or FWG5's they sell a day. So what happens is they either keep mass producing and make a few special items with the bonus, or they just cut down on the number of items they make. They run out, and people have to look elsewhere for goods. New business for many more people.
Because sales volume = being able to maintain your business without resorting to the disgusting missions.
Of course *I* can, but its not about ME, its about the new players without the 8 heavy harvs and 2 fusions. Its about getting them a product *THEY* can sell!
I am saying that BOTH groups can make great stuff by hand-crafting, but the Industrialist ALSO can mass produce to fill the needs of more people. Remmeber also, that new people wont have all the uber resources from 9 months ago, and that little boost may STILL be a little less than the "standard" stuff made in factories.
Same Quality only if they both use the same resources, and somehow the new person has more points than normal, yes. As to stealing clients? Not likely. Maybe for those few iitems that it really makes a difference. Remember, the hand crafter can only make a small number of items at a time due to creds and resource limits. This isnt a VOLUME operation, its a specialty one.
ITS NOT ABOUT ME!!
But really easy to get with 2 or more accounts, and/or tens of millions of creds to buy it all up. How many rich Doctors do you know that usually get most of the new uber meats because they advertise 100-150cpu for it? Immedietaly leaving behind anyone without their deep pockets.
I wish droids DID sell that fast, hehe. But remember, its not just about is. Its about the whole crafting game. Besides, 1000 droids is like, what, maybe 250k resources? The powergamers get them in lots up to and over a million during the time the resource is around.
So your saying that the powergamers *do* deserve to have more fun than the casual players?
Yes, but those 600 items (in popular lines) will be gone within a day or three, and I doubt even powergamers want to spend every second in-game staring at a crafting window. So what happens is the multitudes run out of stuff, and go looking elsewhere. Spreading the business around a little.
Correct. Fun ALSO means not having to run survey missions to pay for your personal harvs to try and get more skills to be able to make better stuff. And then find out that people with money just go to their nearest favorite Industrialist anyway.
It has EVERYTHING to do with this subject. It has to do with making the time spent in game rewarding to people who CANT run the big businesses....and the best part is...IT DOESNT *HURT* THE BIG BUSINESSES!!
Which is why Powergamers wont do it either. They will make a dozen or two items by hand to supplement their main production runs. This leaves room for smaller crafters to run their business.
Enough to run a business without another income stream. Remember, THIS ISNT ABOUT ME!
Not what I'm saying, and impossible anyway. It gives them something a notch above a *factory* item made with the same materials. Look, this isnt a magic bullet solution. There are better ways to make this happen, like reworking the means by which we get and hold schematics, and the assigning of when we get experimentatino points. This is a short-term fix to help the casual gamer have a way to make some creds selling by hand.
You are to be commended! If this were the norm, much of this would be an issue. Unfortunetaly, most of us are impatient and wont "shop around".
But will they keep it up? Remember, 20 solid hours of hand crafting for 600 items.
Accomplish more is great! We need these people around anyway. But the curve is just too great right now for many casual gamers to keep it up. Give them a more attractive product and maybe it will help.
Its not supposed to fix it. Meeting the volume is NOT the answer. Its making the hand-crafted items more palatable to people.
Again, this is not about the *distribution* of goods. The casual gamer isnt on enough to serve in that capacity anyway. Its about making their products more attractive. Hand-crafting does not mean sitting in your shop waiting for someone to drop by to get something from you. It simply means not using a factory to produce it. If I'm not there, they cant get it, but the vendor is. And its also why the Industrialist is so succesful....the items they sell are almost ALWAYS on the shelf to be bought.
Of course not. But its wrong that new players and casual gamers have such an obstacle to overcome. If I wanted to be a dominating AS, I could be so within a week. I have the creds to buy what I need, and the production capacity to do it. It just so happens its not fun for me. But a new/casual person isnt able to make that choice. I dont want them to get as rich as the Industrialists. I dont want THEM to dominate te market. I dont want the Industrialist to go out of business. I just want everyone to be able to look forward to logging on and playing their crafting profession. Not dread logging on because they have to run missions to make enough to pick up their harvs...unless they are lucky enough to have made a sale or two off the bazaar.
Brennox wrote:
I cant resist a good argument
Youre very skilled at finding the worst interpretation of my text, so let me straighten it a bit.
There was a good interpretation? (just kidding :smileywink
"I go through a set of ubese armor every week... I am not a power gamer."
I have an AS friend who keeps his vendor stocked to the brim with 30% base, 71% kenetic ubese. ANY handcrafter trying to compete with his 8 factories and 10 harvesters for your business, would have to either know you personally, sell lower quality or sell at a loss.
If you are claiming to use up a set of custom crafted low encumberance ubese on a weekly basis, then you my friend are among the so very few. As most everyone tends to just get a decent set of high resist armor and get doc buffs (regardless of wether they can wear their armor unbuffed).
Hence my comment of "a depressingly small market".
Ok but my experience is that everything you just said is wrong. I have an armorsmith friend who used to make me HAND-CRAFTED 75% ubese that I could wear without buffs.
Since he left the game, the ONLY thing I have been able to find is 71% to 74% ubese that I CAN'T wear without buffs.
So you see the difference and the problem...here is a hand-crafter that made armor better, with lower-encumberance than the new "industrialists" out there.
I can't exactly explain why he could, but I do know a couple of factors that helped:
(1) He didn't mass produce armor. That means that when he found good resources, he didn't blow through them in a week like some of the super-power-gamers did. That means he made better armor for longer.
(2) It doesn't take much to max out armor's effectiveness if you are using decent resources. You DO NOT have to have perfect assemblies to get 75% on ubese.
(3) He REALLY knew what he was doing. He paid attention to exactly what players were waiting and paid attention to more than the OQ of his resources... He looked for the whole package, and ended up with a product that had BOTH 75% resists AND low HAM encumberance.
Put simply, the stuff he made rocked because he paid attention to detail.
"Ok....and hand -crafters can make 75% ubese JUST like the industrialists do. There is no quality difference between hand-crafted and industrial goods."
There is a VERY big difference between being able to reproduce an amazing succes subcomponent 1000 times and then reproducing an amazing succes assembly on the armor and simply NOT being able to do so.
There IS a quality difference between handcrafted and factory made AS WELL as a price difference. Handcrafted items suffer critical failures, they suffer 'good' or even 'moderate' successes. Factory made is cheap, fast and guaranteed to have top stats.
Again a handcrafter would be out of time and business filling his vendor with lower stats armor then the factory user.
Wrong....Ra Wrong Wrong Wrong. Again, it is not hard to max out ubese if you pay attention and use good resources.
You DO NOT need amazing successes to do it. If you get amazing successes, you can pile more experimentation points into condition. If you do not, the armor, worse case scenerio, ends up 72% to 74% resists. There is little difference between the 2...
There is NOT a quality difference between hand crafted and factory crafted goods. That is silly. Hand-crafted goods co through the EXACT same crafting process to make a schematic. What there is, is a crafting VARIANCE with hand-crafted goods. It is not always for the worst... Sometimes the result might be a little worse, sometimes it is even better...
Factories are guaranteed to have uniform stats. That is not always better. Perfect example: I was getting 75% ubese from a hand-crafter...your friend uses factories to make 72% ubese. If hand crafting is so inferior and factory grafting guarantees superior results, explain that difference...
"No, it will give a bonus to a certain playstyle and force all crafters who want to remain competitive to hand-craft. It will force people to stare at the same crafting windows for hours on end to keep their vendors filled with items, instead of using a factory (at a MUCH slower pace) to do monotonous combines over and over.
The problem is, there will STILL be one-stop-shops, run by powergamers, who over an hand crafted model of every good under the sun. This proposal does nothing to fix that."
Hmm, interesting, "force a certain playstyle" you say?
Forcing people to stare at a window you say?
Monotonous you say?
And best of all, you claim that someone who pours his heart, soul and time into creating a large amount of these top items is 'merely' a powergamer.
Let me put a different spin on that. Instead of simply powering up the ol' factory with a 1000 count schematic and going off to have fun hunting, in the knowledge he is in fact amongst the top crafters of the server, mr powergamer now has the choice:
- Sit in his house near his crafting station and build a large stock of high quality goods, losing quite a lot of them to lower experimentatoin and crit fails OR
- Do the same as before and simply accept the fact that hes NOT in fact amongst the top crafters on the servers but amongst the top crafter DABBLERS.
Look I will agree on the critical fail problem...I freaking hate it. I made my first lightsaber last month and criticaled on it (there was some major swearing going on that night)
However, hand crafters currently have EXACTLY the same choice you advocate.
Crafters can currently (1) let their factories do all the work to make goods (NOTE: some of which will be worse than hand crafter goods, and some of which will be better) OR (2) they can do what I do....go out and meet people and do the final combines for them on their doorstep (ideally with factories doing most of the rote subcomponents).
People will pay a premium for service, which is EXACTLY why I say there is no need fora hand-crafting bonus.
If you force everyone to accept (1) making lower quality goods or (2) spending hours doing combines andsubcombinesin their houses (BTW...I think you are crazy for thinking hours of this on end is exactly what the game needs) I think every part of the game, and every player in the game, is worse off. The quality of goods in the game will suffer (because few will be willing to put in the huge amount of timeto hand craft ALL the demand that this will crate for hand-made goods), players will get pissed off, and we will be in even worse shape then before.
Before you go all out on me saying he invested the skillpoints and how he is sacrificing time building items, thats NOT infact what makes him a REAL TRUE AND HONEST HEART AND SOUL crafter.
The REAL crafter is the guy sitting in his house doing 'monotonous' combines and anxiously clicking the experiment button, hoping to get that great item.
Now theres nothing bad about crafter dabbling, quite the contrary, there is a huge market for low cost high quality goods, but there is also a decent market for that little extra umph on your rifle, or that extra percent protection on your armor or that minute longer lasting canape.
The problem at this time is that those two markets overlap, giving 100% of it to the factory user.
Again...I don't think that is true... As I said, industrialists go though resources faster than hand-crafters, so I think it is unlikely that they can keep the best resources at their disposal to continue making great items. My experience supports that fact.
Additionally, there is nothing keeping hand crafters from hitting experiment hoping to get a great item... A lot of industrialists don't make perfect items. They experiment a couple of times, take the best one, and move on. Because of that behavior, it is possible hand crafters CAN make better stuff than indusstrialists on every attempt. Additionally, most of the time, the net result is that the hand-crafted good is exactly the same as the industrialist good.
I admit critical fails suck, and I would love to see them go away. Giving a hand-crafting bonus has little to do with the fact that critical fails need to die though.
"That is a bad idea... "Let make a change that could have drastic effects on the player economy and then worry about whether it is a good idea later." That has happened many times before, and the players have never appreciated it."
Though i do deservea nomination for "worst PR ever" award for putting it in those words (right after "DeathStar", wth was the emperor thinking?), my point was to implement a basic sytem like this and tweak it to perfection afterwards. Not simply blundering about on the crafting system and pray it lands on its feet.
Let me add that I am NOT saying hand-crafting needs to be left exactly the same. I am all for some alternative system that lets hand crafters doing something special (i.e. (1) adding more looted components to the game, (2) letting hand-crafters migrate the stats of items, etc.).
However, I strongly believe that a bonus is the WRONG way to accomplish this. The bonus will change players expectation of goods (making hand-crafting the norm instead of the exception---a bad thing for all players), and it will not fix any of the aforementioned problems that people are supporting it to fix (powergamers, new players, etc.)
It is a bonus for those that want to hand craft, at the expense of those that want to use factories to do the boring work for them. It is nerfing factories (one of the few HUGE strokes of genius the developers had), and forcing people to do really inefficient, boring combines to compete in the market. It is not rewarding people who immerse themselves in the world and give good service to others, it is giving people who like hand-crafting an advantage so that they can sell more goods on their impersonal vendors (at the expense of other crafters).
I just don't think it is theright addition to the game...
Ive taken the liberty of isolating some 'CONJECTURES' that you are using as 'FACTS'
CONJECTURE - Powergaming crafters 'blow' through high quality resources so fast that the slower handcrafter gets an eventual bonus for being able to use the older better resources that he didn't 'blow' through.
FACT - Powergamers are also powerharvesters, i know, i am one and my AS friend is one too. Both of us harvest between 1000k and 500k of a good resources if it spawns (or even 2000k if it is exceptional).
All high-end crafters i know do the same. All posts by the high-end crafters on my server, both the trade forums and the normal forum indicate that, the higher-up the crafter is, the more he/she stocks in obscene amounts.
Instead of 'blowing' through resources they can make them last for many months, having a choke hold on the market, with large volumes of 'perfect' items.
CONJECTURE - Having an amazing success on an armor assembly will do little more then give it a bit more condition, furthermore, ubese armor made by industrialists is not wearable if unbuffed.
FACT - You are very singlemindedly focussing on one single product in order to make a point about a vast amount of products, not only that but you go about it wrong.
There are multiple lines of experimentation: base, special, encumb and condition. You should see my friend get excited about that +1% special protection or that +1% base resist, it must be an armorsmith thing, but i do know that it makes a big difference to him. He puts everything he can into creating the best resist possible and those are 2 lines, which means an amazing succes in one, would boost both and NOT condition.
So your claim that it would only increase condition a bit is flawed, it would produce better, more desirable and more sought after armor. And best of all a simple schematic would allow him to save that success and repeat it over and over up to a 1000 times. A handcrafter would be blown away trying to match that.
This is just an example of ONE item and for every schematic you claim facvors a handcrafter, i can name 100 favoring the industrialist and then move on to prove that even your schematic favors the industrialist, because THEY MAKE THE EXACT SAME ITEMS, SAME STATS, SAME SHAPE, SAME EVERYTHING, ONLY THE INDUSTRIALIST MAKES MANY, MANY MORE OF IT AT A LOWER COST.
Also, a full set of his ubese has less then 400 encumb across the board, if thats too much for you then you, my friend, have been migrating your stats in silly ways. You also might want to suggest your servers armorsmiths to pay attention to the 'malleability' of their resources to gain lower encumberance.
CONJECTURE - a bonus to handcrafting will make it 'the standard' and players will expect the industrialist to match the handcrafter while maintaining his current volume. Additionally, current industrialist DONT actually make the best items, as they are lazy that way they will just take whichever schematic comes close and 'move on'. While the handcrafter DOES make perfect items and has an exclusive business selling premium goods.
FACT - I guess i didnt spend 20 minutes last night getting that damn 33.2% 16.3% powerup with exactly the right stats and then making a big fat run of 1000 items. It would have taken me about a month of non stop crafting to create that many powerups like that.
THAT is the power of the factory and no amount of stories about handcrafters making better items then industrialists will make it go away.
Industrialists DONT simply accept an inferior schematic, they dont because they are going to spend 1000 items worth of resources. They will keep experimenting and experimenting until they hit the PERFECT schematic. And THAT is what they mass produce, something no sane person would try with handcrafting.
As for high quality hadcrafted goods being the 'standard', there IS no standard. Every player knows that stats can vary wildly between crafters and they all judge a crafter on the WHOLE of his business. Some people might value getting higher stats weapons over availability, those would go to the handcrafter and patiently wait while he/she builds, while others would like to be able to just go in, buy a gun and be off, thats the industrialists business. Many would be inbetween, buying a high powered weapon and a bunch of 'regular' weapons.
Finally, you use the 'premium service' argument. Well to that i say, its got nothing, NOTHING to do with crafting. Its part of what happens AFTER the product is made and is therefore utterly moot to this argument about crafting. Service belongs in a marchant debate.
Respond please 8)
Message Edited by Brennox on 09-13-2004 01:36 PM
- First of all, this is a great discussion/debate (i.e. very very little flaming or silliness).
- There's no "they" that have any plans to do anything about anything....this is all just talk.
- The possibilities we discuss here would touch on any/all crafted products...everything. All the time.
- This is neither an 'Anti-Industrialist' thread nor a 'lets-prop-up-newbies-that-won't-work-hard' thread.
- This is a thread to see if there's some way to affect a change to crafting to make it more fun and interesting, help the economics of all servers and provide some more interesting markets/products.
Personal note: I would like to see a much better 'rares' market for every product that's craftable in the game. Right now, it's not a big deal to find out how's got the best ______ and go grab a bunch of factory crates from them. We all likely do it, for some product or another. What I think would be much better for the economy is that every craftable have a true, functional 'rares'/BEST market that would give that item some real value (which right now, it really doesn't). As it stands now, anyone that's been playing the game (for any reasonable amount of time)has the best of everything possible...or very well near it. That means that the "best" isn't rare....and that seems.......................................................wrong.
Even if it sounds like I have already made a decision or come down on one side or the other...I haven't.
I both run factories and hand-craft...so I can actually see both sides and recognize some of the pros/cons on each side as well.
There have been some great aspects of this discussion that I think will help a lot as we move forward. I will make sure that the proper peeps get/see this thread when or if it's time for it to be needed.
/bow
Respectfully,
Message Edited by TheRealTK421 on 09-13-2004 08:38 AM
While I would love to see a proposal outlined in this thread added, I think a much more significant and worthy fix is in order...and I spoke of it once already. Nerf harv ber's and mission payouts. There can be no doubt that our economies are hyper-inflated. The credit is worthless. If we could buy a Snickers bar in SWG, it would cost about 200 creds at least. Until something like this happens, nothing significant is likely to fix anything. Yes, it would still be cool to buy better equipment, and the volume of that equipment would be much less than the current "best" stuff produced by all the Industrialists (hand crafting takes too long to make that much in one sitting). But as long as people are pulling multi-millions of units of resources out of the ground...a SINGLE player even....there can be little done. Not all nerfs are bad. Most are not, actually, when taken in the context of the whole game.
Malitevv wrote:
On some of the points made by others: i do know handcrafters who sell stuff baby, there is one who has a vendor right next to mine at the mall that I sell out of. /shrug. your entire argument was premised on the assumption that my answer to that question would be no. well it's yes. dunno what else to say. no my questions based off your answer to your self .. did you need to think for a while before you got your answers? my bet is yes. your weaponsmith is a "maybe" and if so you say the color of your armor makes adiffrence. let me remind you that comp armor is still colorable by the players after its crafted.so i find that statment hard to believe... then again maybe you dont were comp. but the point is its not about the answers you give me its about how many _____smiths you had to name to yourself befor you got the the hand crafter. for meI Could only name one weaponsmilth out of 6I know on my server, and he only does it on request for a custom look. his vendors are stocked with factory run goods. This is a test your self sorta thing you will know the answer and thats whats important.
The reason architect vendors are sometimes an exception is likely because 1) architects make the friggin' factories so access to a factory is very easy for them. 2) demand for architect products is very low. Most players never have to shop at an architect vendor more than once, hence archictect vendors tend to accumulate a lot of cruft on them over time.
not True ...im a delivery boy for UPSon my server (just like the real one) and I once helped move 2000 harvestors/factorys for a guy that was seting up a vendor on tat for the partyI mentioned in the my story on the other thread ..I asked the guy if he would need us to help him move some stuff back after the fact. he told me he expects to sell out.after talking to him he said harvs and factorys sell regulerly.
For food items: these are similar to BH droids in terms of what the customer wants. Nobody wants to buy them if they aren't in factory crates,cause they take up too much storage space. The same is true of meds. Anybody who tries to run a hand-crafting business off food or meds is a fool. it is impossible to succeed at that endeavor, because it is contrary to what the customer wants. hopefully none of your friends who quit were trying to do that.
again this helps move twords the point we are trying to make ... we cant put the factory guys out of bussness and thats not our goal its to be able to compeat ... example: same as above for meI would buy it all in crates except for my synth steak and flame out which i would buy made by hand because i only carry a few on me but i want them to be the best. this would spread my credits to more then one vendor.
In any case, I don't mean to be saying that industrialists and wal-mart type shops do not exist in this game. What I am saying is that they don't have the power to stop you from selling your items. But for some of us thay do. They certainly are an obstacle to you if you are foolish enough to try and build a hand-crafting business around rapidly decaying commodity items like meds or food or bh droids (just examples, there are others). but the only advantage they have over you for other types of items is name recognition. but quite frankly, that is going to be true no matter what the crafting rules are.
any crafter who wants to runa business in this game is going to have to go through certain paces. he's going to have to work hard at advertising his shop. he's going to have to accept the fact that for a few months his shop will suffer a net loss and he will have to subsidize that loss by doingmissions on the side and spending quite frugally (I made that latter point already and it was dismissed as an "unreasonable" requirement). I suppose some people may have done all that and still not been successful. But in my experience, the crafters who quit because its "too hard to compete" in an existing market, are largely people who never advertised and never accepted the fact that businesses run at a net loss when they are struggling to establish themselves.
for me thats allI do now.WhenI was a factory crafter everyone knew deloos got the droid in stock check him out. ThenI stoped factory crafting and my bissness slowed a bit not a lot but it slowed then the vendor sold the last of the factory stuff andI was stocking by hand MANY of my customers thought I was giving up the profession and asked me where thay could still get droids (becouse my vendor was not 100% stocked 100% f the time)I started a "custom order service" whereI send you a "catolog"as we chat in tells about the best droid for you. thenyou come to my shop and i build itas you hang out and check out my shop (its been stated that I have one of the coolest shops on the server)its a fun expereance for me and them. but most dont like it thay would rathere seeme point them to myvendor.I still addvertise.I still wear my master tag. butI only get 1-2 custom orders a week now. and NO walkins, yesI get losts of orders from friends (guild mates) but im not counting them becouse there orders are made free of charge. so doI want to see my bisness pick up yes. becouseI dont make enoff cash? no i brough in 4 mill last week from the DWB and am going back tonight for my weekly guild raidI want this becouse im not makeing sales witch for me and my play style is = to fun.
Message Edited by Malitevv on 09-13-2004 12:40 PM
Message Edited by babyblue_d on 09-13-2004 03:05 PM
Snikrop wrote:
You're sounding more and more like a dev these days
What's that mean?
/bow
Respectfully,
Message Edited by babyblue_d on 09-13-2004 03:12 PM
that to me means you do you job VERY well
TheRealTK421 wrote:
What's that mean?
/bow
Respectfully,