Droid Engineer Archive

For the hybrid problem :
I'm Master DE, master artisan, novice musician, Merchant advertising 4 and novice TKA +1 skill.

Sure I sux in PvP big time, but I have no problem to hunt, I can spend time in cantina, and build droids.

Only problem I have with the barked module atm is not really related to it.
I use barker module + Effect module, very effective advertising, but last 30 minutes instead of 1 hour.

But it's not that big deal as even if the batteries are out, the droid still give the waypoint.

The other problem I have is people laking of imagination to use those droids, Player Cities not allowing such droid, and people refering to them as spambot, even if a vendor in a tent in front of a shuttle port do spam more than a droid as it does not require batteries.

Where do you see issues and theories ?

I'm only giving facts here.

I guess I don't really see a failure because I never afk macro spam.

What I would like is a timer system that influence the use of batteries.
I like have the droid on speak every minutes for some fun purpose, but honestly, staying next to it, I find it annoying.

So if I would be able to put it on 1 minutes when I want to to have some fun, and lets say on 1 bark every 5 minutes in front of a spaceport and then, the batteries last at least 2.5 hour, I would be happy.

On the auto-store issue, I don't seem to have that problem, but I'll try to do some testing to be sure.

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Gavvot wrote:
Where do you see issues and theories ?

I'm only giving facts here.

I guess I don't really see a failure because I never afk macro spam.

What I would like is a timer system that influence the use of batteries.
I like have the droid on speak every minutes for some fun purpose, but honestly, staying next to it, I find it annoying.

So if I would be able to put it on 1 minutes when I want to to have some fun, and lets say on 1 bark every 5 minutes in front of a spaceport and then, the batteries last at least 2.5 hour, I would be happy.

On the auto-store issue, I don't seem to have that problem, but I'll try to do some testing to be sure.

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One simple answer. I walk through the top buying and selling areas on one of the biggest servers SOE runs looking to see how many merchant barker droids were being used. I did this during prime time on the server when people in these areas was the thickest. I counted zero merchant barker droids being used and this wasn't just one day but several days in a row. I just don't see any other fact, theory, point, or issue being relevant. If nobody is using these droids, who cares about the rest of their merits.

Well each time I go to the theed spaceport on a not so populated planet on a not so populated city on a not so populated server I see between 1 and 3 droid barking.

Each time several days in a row.

That is pure simple fact.
But if only your facts matters, I'll do just like you and ignore your 'arguments'..

Nuff said.

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Gavvot wrote:
Well each time I go to the theed spaceport on a not so populated planet on a not so populated city on a not so populated server I see between 1 and 3 droid barking.

Each time several days in a row.

That is pure simple fact.
But if only your facts matters, I'll do just like you and ignore your 'arguments'..

Nuff said.

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Not sure which server your on, but on Eclipse, 1 to 3 would still be considered absolutely pitiful given that there are usually between 30 to 50 Macro AFK shouters in each city, Bestine, Theed, and Coronet. When I was checking, I looked in all three cities over several days during primetime. I counted zero merchant barker droids and that's all three cities combine and all days I checked combined.

I'd expect to find at least 10 in each city, each night, to even give Merchant Barker Modules something better than an "F" grade. It flunked.

Server is FarStar.

AFK spammer is almost inexistant in theed, except the people teaching skill sometimes and the people looking for skills, but they don't stay the 1 hour.
I never go to coronet, and in fact, since patch didn't even had time to leave the planet.

Fact is, because of the high requirement on merchant skill and battery issue, it won't replace afk macro-spam.
But I don't think it was intended (sadly).

Also I don't think macro-spammers and people using barker droids are the same.
I use sometimes my barker droid, but I never did spam before.

Well, weither they thought about it or not, Macro AFK Shouting is a direct competitor to Merchant Barker Droids. And our droids have had their arses blown completely out of the water by the competition. This means we DE's don't have a real market with this product.

Arden,

I think you're making very valid and important points.

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ArdenStarmariner wrote:
Two problems with merchant barker droids that pretty much render then used by nobody and everyone is back to Macro AFK shouting:

1. The battery only keeps them going for about an hour.

2. The owner has to be online or at least Macro AFK'ing.

What's the point. The owner might as well, just return to Macro AFK shouting in Theed and Coronet. The old drop your droid to do the advertising while you hunt doesn't fly because the skill point requirements force most people to go either pure combat or pure crafting. OMG, we can't have hybrids. That would unbalance and destory the game! If they can hunt, they dont usually have merchant advertising 4. While they could advertise for an owner who is busy crafting, most pure crafters don't stay online very long. They do their crafting then log an alternate pure combat character on.

Until droids can be pre-recharged with multiple batteries so they can operate 8 hours or more unattended and can continue do their jobs without the owner being online, there will be no real market for these merchant barker droids. I don't see that this would be a problem. After all, the droids vicinity speak on triggers when players walk near instead of shout across the entire area they way AFK spammers do. So they are less offensive than what's already going on in the game. Eclipse is one of the biggest and most populated servers in the game. And when I pass through Coronet and Theed, I don't see a single merchant barker droid being used. What I see is every one of the Macro AFK shouters doing what they have always done and my spatial tab spinning so fast that I can't even read it. I have to go to my group chat tab the entire time I am in those cities. I can't blame the Macro AFK'ers. Why bother with something that will tie up valuable skill points when there's a method you can use for free?

Gotta chose the lesser of two evils here, the merchant droids or the Macro AFK shouters and right now, people are finding Macro AFK shouting the more attractive method to go with...

Message Edited by ArdenStarmariner on 05-07-2004 07:31 AM

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I whole heartedly agree. With the way they are now, might as well afk shout on your char, and then you won't be limited by the 128 character limit.

They should be able to be left out whether you're online or not, and just run until the battery goes. Makes a lot more sense.

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TheRealTK421 wrote:
First off, naughty naughty....you're not supposed to have out 2 droids.


Try just using one and see what happens.


In addition, are you going AFK at all in this situation?


Does anyone else seem to have these kinds of issues?



/bow

Respectfully,

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