Droid Engineer Archive
Thread: DE's I need two things from you please
DE's should NOT be the only ones to use the new combat modules unless your talking about crafting, I mean what the heck is the purpose of giving a minority class the ability to use their own droids and not others? Thats like saying a weaponsmith only can use a t21.
I dont know why droideka's are so hard to implement, they are IN the game already just give them a level and abilities on par with the current non CH pet schemes. (sure yer going to jack the CL down for non CH's but dont nerf a droid b4 u nerf animals, that was the biggest complaint out there when u killed the probot but then gave non CH's the ability to have animal pets better)
Bring back or put in innate abilities, like a lifter droid already having inv storage and a storage module wld just add to it. Its kinda dumb a r2 can hold as much as a BLL.
Make the data storage useful , like holding wps if anything, that shldnt hurt anything
I dont see a hjealing droid limited to wound kit A abilities, thats same par as most newbie medics and hospitals are really still too much downtime specially if you have CM throwing diseases around left and right.
I would even like to see some small uses for droid with the patrol like feature, say adding wps's from cantina to hospital but allow it to deliver maybe things like stimpaks. or a Go To person command and waiting for a return option or giving admin rights to droids.
There are a ton of ideas for droids, that should IMO take precedence over any CH changes, heck if this class was done right you woulda been prolly nerfing droids b4 any animal changes since droids were more popular, now they are just some added boons.
Thunderheart wrote:
What things and which professions?
It might help to ask other professions what kind of droids they would find useful? 
Quote from TH:
Im stilltrying to understand what makes you tick and I had some questions, so here goes...
There needs to be more usefull things for droids to do for certain professions.
What things and which professions?
What items seem like the most important and which professions have interdependencies that are a lot of fun?
What entertains you folks?
There have been a bunch of threads on this, one started by Sintrosi at
http://forums.station.sony.com/swg/board/message?board.id=droid_engineer&message.id=24426
However, I dug through my old treads and pulled out some ideas I had:
My suggestion would be that droid modules be left alone for now, but that EVERY droid model be given some special advantage that no other droid model has. It doesn't have to be much...just something enticing to differentiate it. Some of my ideas included:
(1) R-2's (and 3's 4;s and 5's): Give a 5% bonus to slicing when around droid(R2 was always hacking into stuff in the movies).
(2) Treadwells: Give a 3-5 pointexperimentation bonus to all crafting when around droid.
(3) Protocol Droids - Give a 10% reduction to travel costs (protocol droids smooth situations out with others); allow anyone around droid to understand any language (not much use with the prevalence of language skills, but allows players to roleplay if they don't pick up languages).
(4) Lifter Droids - Surveying and sampling functions. Make it so that you survey a resource yourself to set the applicable resource. You would then hit some command in the droid's radial, after the droid would then walk to the highest concentration of the material (note: I am talking about the absolute highest, not just the one on the radar). The droid would basically continuously survey and change direction to face the new highest concentration and would stop when it go to the absolute highest. After following the droid to the highest concentration, the droid would also have a command to sample just like artisans can. This allows double sampling (the player and the bot), and could be used to avoid the ramifications of sampling radioactive materials. NOTE: Sampling function should be limited to artisans
(5) Surgical Droids - Give an extra healing bonus (like 10%) to all medics around the bot.
(6) Power Bot - Allow it to recharge other bots as a replacement for batteries (NOTE: need to have 2 out at once)
Quote from TH:
The medical droids had better be certed to Master Medic/Novice Doc/Novice CM then, because with this idea a player can simply replace the Player Medic with a Droid
Thats definately a concern. It changes the focus of both "when" and "where" players go to get healed and thats a key activity.
NOTE: I think a 10% bonus to healing will be much better received than an actual healing function. This prevents the need of a cert to use the droid, it preserves the usefulness of the droid for healing, and it keepsthe medicsfrom being pissed that they are being replaced by droids.
Quote from TH:
When it says only DE will be able to use these combat modules do you mean that only DE will be able to asemble these modules or that only DE will be able to use combat droids of any form?
Which would you prefer and why?
Several thoughts on this:
(1) I think limiting combat droids to DEs only is a bad idea and is Un-Star-Warsy.Everyone can use droids inStar Wars. Droid Engineers need functional droids to sell. If you limit the functional droids that all our customers want (combat droids) to DEs only, you are not giving us things to sell, you are merely giving us the ability to grind missions with the combat professions. The point of a droid ENGINEER is to make droids, not to make one single droid for yourself droid and go out and grind missions with it.
(2) There is a simple compromise between the "every one can use combat droids" idea and the "Only-DE get combat droids idea"...multiple droids. Let all players be able to use all combat droids.This way we have a marketable product to sell. However, limit ALL non-DEs to one combat droid, but let us DEs handle 2 combat droids. Perfect compromise...DEs get a little combat advantage, DE get to sell combat droids. Very simple to implement because it doesn't involve a bunch of certifications.
(3) Also, there are 6 artisan classes, none of which have combat skills, and all who take the exact same number of skill points to master.Why shouldwe get special combat droids to unbalance this system? If a DE wants combat power, they have 158 skill points to spend on combat skills after mastering DE. Giving DE-only combat droids does not balance anything, or fix the fact droids are currently novelties. We need a function for our creations and profession, not the ability todo combat profession type things. We are artisans, and need a purpose for our art.
(4) Finally, no skill is needed to operate a droid. The droids operate themselves, with some commands from the owner. It does not make sense that ONLY DEs can issue these commands.
Really I think the multiple droids idea is the answer to everyone's concerns. Let all players use combat droids, let DEs use more of them. Both sides are happy.
1. I need to know if you agree or disagree with Sintrosi's Plan
Yes, I agree with Sintrosi's State of the Profession address.
2. I need to know if you agree or disagree with the rough DE plan in general
The proposed DE Plan has both it's high points and low. In general I do like the porposed changes to power droids, repairing droids and increase in the number of droids that can be controled. However the other proposed changes are either too limiting, to damaging to the profession as a whole or would remove functionality of other professions.
Some of us have been working on a thread which takes several of the proposed changes, addresses their problems and expands on them while attempting to maintain the fairness of use. It's located at:
http://forums.station.sony.com/swg/board/message?board.id=droid_engineer&message.id=33049
In it I think we have found a possible solution to the distribution of combat droids. Maybe it'll help with the changes that are currently in consideration.
A non-DE perspective:
You need ot add actual combat droids. R2? Combat droid? Not. Probot? Probots are scouts, not fighters. They're programmed to self destruct if captured even. You need to add some actual combat droids. Droidekas are already in game---see lok. Make some crafting certs, give it resource requirements, and give it to DE's.....watch how many people thank you 
Considering it's already in the game, it shouldn't take too long to figure out how to add it into the profession and do it.
DE's are crafters, not a combat profession. Crafters need things to sell to stay in business, and making combat droids DE only would be a bad thing. (Droids in SW can be programmed to listen to anyone, not just those who built them). Sure, give DE's an extra cert, but let everyone use them....thats the purpose of crafters in swg....to sell to others.
Please explain the medical droid functionality and what the proposed changes are. I don't want to have everyone running around with a medic droid and not needing a pc medic/doctor. They want to heal incapped people, thats fine.Just don't give them high level advanced stims or make a solo power leveling option availible to people.
I'm all in favor of having surgical droids the only ones who can have crafting stations and med modules. I think it kills immersion when a probot/mousedroid/r2 is running around allowing people to heal.
Last note- I really wish you'd spend 10 minutes on the pikeman forums.
1. I fully agree with Sintrosi's State of the DE address.
2. I mostly do not agree with the DE Plan.
#1 - I don't want to see R#, protocol, BLLin combat. That goes against the Star Warsiness. We need COMBAT droids.
#2 - We definintely need to take out more than one droid at a time. Read: We need repair droids out to repair our own droids.
#3 - Repair droid functionality. Yes. However most of the points are way off base.
The Medics will have problems with automatically healing droids, unless it is far less effecient. Automaticlly stim incapacitated players? YES. I don't think that a doctor would have a problem with that if he is alone gathering resources when a NPC suprises him.
Exploding MSE's - Sounds like fun at first, but goes against the SW Universe, and it would be very difficult to balance.
Instead of Power droids being a part of the harvesters, I would rather see the master fill them with power and they do the harvester run (put in power)for the master.
My $.02
One other idea on combat droids:
Why not allowALL players to use combat droids, but give the combat droids a damage bonus/armor bonus when handled bya droid engineer.
We still get combat droids to sell, droid engineers get a combat bonus with the droids through more damage to mobs and less damage to the droid.
Satisifies both camps.
Thunderheart wrote:
Hey there night owls
Ill be the first one to tell you that I am not a crafter. I'm sitting here reading your pains, your desires and your angst, but the commentary for what you want seems very individualized andvery limited in what you want. You'vedone a fantastic job of telling me what you dont want, but only a few put effort inwhat they DO want and it left me withoutthe impression of a central direction that will suit most of your purposes.
Im stilltrying to understand what makes you tick and I had some questions, so here goes...
There needs to be more usefull things for droids to do for certain professions.
What things and which professions?
What items seem like the most important and which professions have interdependencies that are a lot of fun?
What entertains you folks?
Idea: Droids are supposed to be helpful to your needs. Why not make more modules to help different professions other than Medics, Bounty Hunters and portable crafting stations. Example, a Slicing Module. Will be a cert in say Slicing 3, giving the Slicer the ability to use a Droid to aid him in getting more favorable slicing results. Or a Surveying Droid that'll help Surveyors find high concentrations of resources, but you'd have to provide it with a sample. Lots of things can be done.
When it says only DE will be able to use these combat modules do you mean that only DE will be able to asemble these modules or that only DE will be able to use combat droids of any form?
Which would you prefer and why?
I would prefer to see us able to sell combat droids for everyone. I'd rather see 100 probots in Coronet than 100 Cowardly Gurrecks. Also, we need a bigger market to sell to. Medics only buy 1 medic droid, which can even be an MSE. The only reliable repeat clients we have are Bounty Hunters, and thats not much of an income. Give us something to sell, and let it be bad a55 combat droids!
My only gripe is that we are so closely dependent on items from the Master Artisan box and there is no added benefit.
Thats a good point. I'll bring it up.
This truley is a pain. Im lucky in that I have the support of my guild and our Master Artisans help me with all the memory chips and control units and such, but why not move it to Master Engineer, that way Droid Engineers can actually craft their stuff without having to be Master Artisans.
Thunderheart wrote:
Hey there night owls
Ill be the first one to tell you that I am not a crafter. I'm sitting here reading your pains, your desires and your angst, but the commentary for what you want seems very individualized andvery limited in what you want. You'vedone a fantastic job of telling me what you dont want, but only a few put effort inwhat they DO want and it left me withoutthe impression of a central direction that will suit most of your purposes.
From reading through most of these posts, it seems Droid Engineers (for the most part) want the following: 1. Fix known bugs (All known bugs are listed here: http://forums.station.sony.com/swg/board/message?board.id=droid_engineer&message.id=33835) 2. Make droids more specialized (Meaning, Surgical droids are the only droids that can hold medic modules, Repair droids are the only droids that can hold repair modules, etc.) 3. Add content... In that order!
Im stilltrying to understand what makes you tick and I had some questions, so here goes...
There needs to be more usefull things for droids to do for certain professions.
What things and which professions?
What items seem like the most important and which professions have interdependencies that are a lot of fun?
What entertains you folks?
There are several suggestions for this on the wishlist ( http://forums.station.sony.com/swg/board/message?board.id=droid_engineer&message.id=33835) and several other "wishes" here: http://forums.station.sony.com/swg/board/message?board.id=droid_engineer&message.id=24426
Likely the most obvious "types" people have listed for specific professions are: Slicer modules to improve Smuggler slices, Entertainer modules allowing entertainers to "heal" mind wounds and battle fatigue in the field... They're all in those two posts.
And give us Droideka
I dont know what I can do, but there is a lot of talk about Combat Droids. There are a lot of dependencies here so its not an easy, cut and dry proposition...
This falls in under "new content." Your DE "plan" seemed to focus more on new content (3rd on the list) than bug fixes & specialization. While most of us would like to see Droidekas and other types of combat droids, we would rather have all the current droids "work" first.
how very anti-climatic and dissappointing.
nothing planned, just some random ideas, like someone else said, I guess its a start.
The satisfaction you seek will come in time. None of this is going to happen instantaneously, but I'll be around a lot working hard to help get it right
I, for one, have noticed dramatic improvement in the "customer relations" since you came in... Even if noone else says it, you're doing a good job so far.
.what kind of time frame are we looking at for some of these changes
I really don't know. I have to understand the changes first. I have to understand the changes and what kind of impact they are going to have. My goal is to find all the things you like and enjoy and need. Then I will take that, do some investigation to find out what can happen and when. Then Ill work with the team to do as much as wecan, as fast aswe can.
Take our buglist and wishlist to the devs and have them start from the top and work the way down... Several can be doneeach week and you'll make 3/4ths of the droid engineers extremely happy... with a population this size, you can't get better odds than that... 75% of a community this large will get the devs the most "bang-for-your-buck."
The medical droids had better be certed to Master Medic/Novice Doc/Novice CM then, because with this idea a player can simply replace the Player Medic with a Droid
Thats definately a concern. It changes the focus of both "when" and "where" players go to get healed and thats a key activity.
This is a concern for almost everyone. In the previous two threads I pasted, you'll likely find many "alternative" ideas on how to handle medic droids. For example, Surgical droids are nothing more than "mobile hospitals" now, allowing them the ability to heal wounds over time (like sitting in a camp or hospital would) is a viable alternative to give medical droids more function.
Hmmm, looks like there really was a LOT more thought put into the creature changes than droids.
No there wasn't. Creature Handlers were well under way (almost done actually) when I came on board. Droid Engineers was next and here we are...
Word.
When it says only DE will be able to use these combat modules do you mean that only DE will be able to asemble these modules or that only DE will be able to use combat droids of any form?
Which would you prefer and why?
If these modules will be the worthless"50-56" damage (or less) that a probot can do, Droid Engineers should be able to make these modules.. If you'll allow droids to have combat modules that rival creature handler damage, let weaponsmiths make them and droid engineers install them. All droids should be useable by non-DE's (with maybe one specific DE-Only droid). It doesn't take much skill to use a droid... If "Uncle Owen's" moisture-mining ass could figure out how to handle a Binary Load Lifter, who couldn't?
One small step for droid functionality, one giant leap for DE- Dev relations.
Droid functionality or Droid Engineer Functionality? Which is more entertaining? How do you see each side?
Both... The only reason why people buy the pathetic 10 item storage droids, or schematic-only-holding data modules is for the comfort of knowing they have the best droid possible, and will likely never have to buy another one again. Basically, Giving Droids functionality will giveDroid Engineersfunctionality.
Only a DE will be able to craft them and insert them in droids is my guess.
Is that the way you want it?
As above, It depends on how good they are.
Umm, please tell me more about this. Sounds like it is gonig to be stepping all over me and my fellow healers.
What are your conerns?
As a fellow SWG player, please don't tell me you can't see the concerns medics have in "auto-healing" droids...
I also must admit to looking for a bit more specificity,
Like what?
I think the more specificity people would like to see, is exactly what you did with the Creature Handlers... Right now, your plan is nothing more than "ideas." In the Creature Handlers forum, you posted an entirely new skill tree! As I understand it, right now the DE plan is nothing more than ideas, and the CH plan was nearly finished when you announced it?
help me out on this one. does this mean that only droid engineers will be able to command/use droids that have these modules isntalled, or will everyone
Only DE's would make them. Any Droid owner would gain the benefits of their Droids Abilities...
Good
why do you talk about 1 active pet per player as the maximum in the CH changes thread and here I read that you plan to have more than one active droid. Arent you guys talking with each other?
I dont know, but Ill find out
You'll find out? I thought you answered it in the "Oh my... Sir, he says there are several creatures approaching, Pt 3" thread?
Our plan here is to first impost a very strict limitation: One pet, regardless of type. And later (but soon) to introduce exceptions to the rule based on the particular pet type. For example, your faction rank will be used to allow you to control more and better faction-perk pets. And your profession will influence the type and number of droid pets you can call (or the number you can call in addition to a creature pet). For example: Doctors, Medics, and/or Combat Medics might gain the ability to call a surgical droid even if they already have a pet of some other type called, whereas a Droid Engineer might be able to call a number of droids of any type, etc
There's always more of course, and while these changes sound good, they didn't make me go "YAY!" like I was hoping they would.
(i saw all the stuff from your post
What WOULD make you go "yay"?
The little things would make me go "yay." Fix bugs, Put droids under "droids" on the bazaar, put the "object creator" label on droids themselves (not just deeds)... Are these things too much to ask?
Finally i can watch those stupid annoying mouse droids get what they deserve.
LOL
There may bea real reason to be paranoid when I get bored and have a mouse droid follow random people, just for my amusement...
Like my dad always says "When the chips are down the buffalo's empty"......Why does he always say that?
I dont know, why?
"What's good is a plate with nothing on it?" Droid Engineers, Dad.
Will droid power rates be looked at?
I dont know, how does it work and what's the problem?
The problem was, droids recharged themselves when they went into the datapad, so there was little use for batteries. That was "fixed" and now you have to recharge your droid every two minutes or it stops working... Lengthen the time a droid can be out of the datapad before it needs to be charged, and put a "power remaining" indicator on the droid so we know when it's out of power.
Clarify please: "ONLY Droid Engineers will be able to make and use these modules."
Will clarify...
Thanks...
My only gripe is that we are so closely dependent on items from the Master Artisan box and there is no added benefit.
Thats a good point. I'll bring it up.
Thanks again. Droid Engineers need Control Units, GP Modules, Electronics Memory Modules, and Micro Sensor Suites from another profession (at least one non-DE itemin everyadvanced droid). Is this anywhere near balancedwith theother artisan professions?
For example, will the DE community be engaged to provide our suggestions via our Correspondent, or does SOE already have internal design meetings scheduled to tackle these issues?
Yes. Engage me and the Correspondent. We gather the info and I take inside so the team can know what you want; what you like, what you want and what is fun
Before you re-post, read the "Ideas for new modules and droid types" sticky thread, and "Centralized Droid Issues" thread... That's what we like, and that's what we think would be fun.
This sounds good too, I like these things a lot. Having said that: I agree with some of the doctors that this shouldn't be allowed to overrun their profession.
What are your thoughts on counter-balancing that?
Already posted.
Make it so number one.
... er, ah, am I allowed to say that here?
*shrugs* I dont know, but it made me laugh
No, I don't think you should say that here... This is Star Wars, Trekkies are da debil!
its a quarter to midnight and Im going to bed. See you in the morning...
th
11:45? Lightweight... 
Au-Ru Blasterkin - Master Droid Engineer of Intrepid
For the love of god, make your posts easier to quote by those of us that can't use HTML in posts!
Thunderheart wrote:
Hey there night owls
Ill be the first one to tell you that I am not a crafter. I'm sitting here reading your pains, your desires and your angst, but the commentary for what you want seems very individualized andvery limited in what you want. You'vedone a fantastic job of telling me what you dont want, but only a few put effort inwhat they DO want and it left me withoutthe impression of a central direction that will suit most of your purposes.
Im stilltrying to understand what makes you tick and I had some questions, so here goes...
There needs to be more usefull things for droids to do for certain professions.
What things and which professions?
What items seem like the most important and which professions have interdependencies that are a lot of fun?
What entertains you folks?
Hmm. What things and which professions?
2thoughts.
Maintenance droids! The proposed power droid function is a good start... expand it. Create a maintenance module or series of modules that can be put in a droid to allow it to be attached to a structure. Once attached to a structure, the droid would go into "decoration" mode... just puttering around inside or outside the building as a persistant NPC... like a vendor with a small random movement path. The droids would have benefits depending on the level of the module and the structure assigned - they could reduce maintenancerates,reduce power consumption, increase harvester efficiency or storage, decrease manufacture time per item,give bonuses to player "cantina" or "medical center" healing... I think its obvious how useful having these little guys running around a player city, maintaining public buildings would be. Redeed the attached droid(s) when a structure is redeeded and you have all the bases covered. 
Class specific modules and specs! Again, the example of the medic pulling out a Surgical droid "bonus-pet" in addition to his normalpet is a good start. Givingsome elite classes an appropriatebonus droid-pet spec and some skill enhancing modules would go a long way toward encouraging droid use.
- Scout Classes- Modules that give bonuses to stealth, camo, tracking, or taming, would be high on the wish list. And junk that kamikaze MSE idea and try a trap carrier module instead. Allow the MSE to carry a trap to a target 64meters away... double the throwing range. Give the MSE a chance not to get stomped (agro the owner), but hey... if it gets crunched, its just an MSE, right?
- Artisan Classes -Modules that give bonuses to Survey and Sample would be welcome... especially if the range was kicked up beyond current max at survey4. Item repair modules that give a bonus to the use of repair tools would be popular too.
- Medic -As far as medic specific funtions go, I really like the idea of an elite medic-type module doing an auto-stim on incap. Keeping the healer up and functional can make the difference between victory and a wipe-out, and giving an incapped player the chance to get up and run before getting DB'd is just plain brilliant.
- Entertainers - A sound-system module that allows them to heal away from the Cantina in much the same way a medic can heal away from the Hospital.
- There are lots of other suggestions in the sticky thread http://forums.station.sony.com/swg/board/message?board.id=droid_engineer&message.id=24426 Good place to start.
When it says only DE will be able to use these combat modules do you mean that only DE will be able to asemble these modules or that only DE will be able to use combat droids of any form?
Which would you prefer and why?
I don't want to be a droid handler. I want to be able to create droids that others can use. I want ALL my droids usable by anyone. I think to balance this there should be some thought as to a certain level being reached to use some of the more advanced droids. An idea would be to total ALL xp a player has and if it's greater than a preset level they can use this level of droid.
I dig the idea of the mouse droid bombs (reminds me of the myriad movies with remote controlled bombs) however I fear it will be something akin to grenades; useless. Leia lit up a thermal detonator in Jabba's palace & everyone froze, cringed & was seriously worried. I had an imperial NPC throw one at me and it was as effective as a mosquito bite. If this does go live, the MSE droid bombs should require a heck of a lot more resources & componentsthan they do now & do some real damage (500-1000 for example) perhaps based on the quality, experimentation (making master level MSE's worth more than novice) and resources used.
That's my response to your question there.
Oh, I want combat droids like in Episode 1. Once that salute, talk & interact!
How about adding reasons for people to keep coming to DE's?
Indeas include:
*DE's only can heal droids
*Expendable charges for most droid functions
*Upgrades
*Customisation.
What would you DE's like to do or be asked to do day to day when you log in?
I'll make a comment on combat droids. What would wow me would be allowing a bit of other player dependance when assembling one. i.e. Armor smiths make the armor plating, weapon smiths make the weapons and the DE assembles and maintain's it.
TH,
I guess from my perspective as a DE and an SWG player isI would like a few things:
1. Fix the bugs, make droid customization work well and not fade after 20 calls, make quality of droid materials matter, make personality chips matter, allow naming of human-type droids and so on.
2. Give me a better combat droid to sell to the combat professions. Make it certed for only masters of elite professions or master DEs, perhaps the droid for MBH could be even better / faster than the others. This gives us the DEs something fun to use at MDE and something fun to sell to the elite combats. Make the current probot better for sales to non elite-masters.
This also solves one of Raph's stated goals of encouraging specialization. It becomes another neat carrot to get when you reach master pistoleer, etc. These should be significantly better than the CL10 pets a non-CH can get and significantly better than the current Probot. Droidekas fit this bill but that's not my choice to make.
3. Don't put blasters in my R2 unit. I understand the desire to work with the art the dev team has already done but sending my R2 into battle for me just seems wrong. I'd rather wait on the combat droids until we can do it right than shoe horn something in that doesn't fit with the continuity of the movies.
4. Give the power droid and binary load lifter something to do. Obvious choices:
- power droid can distribute power to harvesters (rather than being attached permanently, have the droid get loaded with power from the usual power acquisition methods)
- load lifter can empty harvester hoppers on a rotating basis and drop the resources off in the bank, etc.
5. And my personal big desire: make the protocol droids do language translation for the players. This way folks who don't know shyriwook can call their protocol droid and then carry on a conversation with the wookie without having to learn the language.
Thanks,
Ywi