Droid Engineer Archive
Thread: Sodan's Hybrid DE Proposal
Daker-Naritus wrote:
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
AudioOrgana wrote:
/sigh
Kollos, did you read the initail posting and the variants?
Both of those things are covered. In a way, this is basicly the same thing as a mini-profession, it just has overlapping prerequisites.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Damn it people, we read it, we don't agree...please try to be open-minded.
The problem isn't that it is like a mini profession, the problem is that the mini profession is contained INSIDE the DE profession, for no good reason (other than the weak, self serving argument that it is "too hard" for the devs to cut and paste of the skill tree template and create 2 trees instead of reorganizing the 4 current trees of DE)
This encourages players to take up all the DE prequisites to get combat droids, thereby making it very easy for those players to build on those abilities and flood the market with DEs.
It wouldn't be that "easy". There are 3 more trees of DE to gain, and a pretty big skill point cost. Most of your arguments seem to forget that skill points arestatic at 250, you don't get any more. They aren't credits that can be easily gained by running missions. If people want to become DE's then so be it. They could do that anyway, without this proposal.
DEs get the ability to make droids because they spend all the prerequitie points in crafting to get that ability. What this plan is suggesting is that combat players should be allowed to spend prerequisite points for great combat droid abilities (through the artisan tree) and then finish the rest of the DE tree with NO OTHER crafting prerequisites.
This would be the worst possible outcome.
If a Master Weaponsmith (a master of crafting) wants to use a weapon, he has to spend a bunch of COMBAT skill points to do so. If a master Weaponsmith wants to get even better at crafting (building on prior experience) he can take up DE without further prerequisites.
Bad choice of analogy. This proposal requires a crafter to take up a combat profession to use their wares. Sound familiar? It's mid level droids we're talking about, so continue that to mid-level weapons. DL44? Scout Blaster? It would take less skill points to use those than to be able to use the combat droids that are included in this proposal.
This plan turns that whole concept, and the banance of the game, on its head and gives crafting players great combat ability (CL30+ pets) with very little additional combat skill point investment, and it gives combat players great crafting ability (DE) with very little additional skill point investment.
CL 30+ pets are not that huge in terms of the skill point cost. The uber-template people won't go near this as they could more easily spend the skill points in CH or some other elite combat profession to get more combat skills.
You're not "giving" abilities away, they are earned by the skill points spent in the respective trees. And the 0040 "dabbler" would not be able to craft any droids except an MSE droid with level 1 modules. That's not unbalancing, and it's definitely not "great crafting ability".
Message Edited by duncje on 03-08-2004 01:41 PM
Daker-Naritus wrote:
duncje wrote:
"It's not balanced."--It costs one more skill point (78 to 77) to get the CL30ish combat droids in this proposal, than it costs to be able to control CL 36 pets. That's balance. You want to add a separate mini profession that would be far tougher to balance, and where would you put it?
Duncje,
For the FOURTH time.... Simple skill points is NOT (NOT NOT NOT NOT NOT NOT)equal to combat ability.
By your logic a master weaponsmith/armorsmith/chef should have the same combat ability as a bounty hunter, just because they spend the same skill points.
That is NOT balance.
If you spend skill points on combat ability, you get combat ability. If you spend skill points on crafting. If you spend a little on both, you get a little of both.
HOWEVER, what this plan calls for is people spending skill points on crafting ability and getting BOTH crafting ability AND combat ability out of it. Not to mention the fact that almost a THIRD of the skill points you are spending under the plan cost 200 cr and are for basic novice professions (artisan and marksman).
I do not see how you could POSSIBLY think that is balanced.
In the game, a masksman spending 78 skill points gets a gun that they can shoot and that is it. Under your plan you are giving players the ability to have a CL30+ droid shoot a gun and tank for them (shooting power + extra ham), as WELL as the ability to craft all things in the engineering tree AND easily move on to MDE.
That is crazy...
Your post is an argument against a profession that's currently in the game--Creature Handler.
CH's get combat tanks and damage, do they spend any skill points in Combat skills? NO. And they can tame their own pets, so that equals the "crafting" ability that you're claiming the DE dabbler gets under this proposal (which is a false assumption).
Daker-Naritus wrote:
Sodan-droiddreamer wrote:
Uh.. no one uses pets in PvP man. Get with it.
Daker-Naritus wrote:
Shian_Tavkin wrote:
Dont BS me Daker, read what I said. Combat Specialists. A Commando is not a combat specialist, nor is a Rifleman etc etc. The PvP templates for the combat specialists do not have a single point free for anything Artisan, they are all min/maxed in a variety of combat professions and you know it.
Anyone who has an uber pvp template is not going to be benefited that much by a CL20-30 droid anyway. How does that limit them at all?
Additionally, they spend a truckload of skill points on COMBAT NOT CRAFTING. If a player divides their skills between crafting and combat, they deserve to be weaker.
What you are suggesting is that players can now "have their cake and eat it too." By investing some skill points in combat, and the rest in crafting as a DE, but be as powerful as the uber pvp players because they also get an additional CL20-30 pet.
That is exactly what I am telling you is wrong and will never fly with the devs.
Sodan, you misunderstand. The "uber pvp" templates I am referring to (just because I don't know what else to call them) are the same templates that players are using in PvE to tank every mob in the game.
I didn't misunderstand. I know the difference between PvP and PvE. I replied to your thread and what you said.Try being a little more precise with what you write. It will help this debate.
You are giving a bunch of combat tanking ability to crafters...that is not balanced, and is wrong.
Gross mischaracterization, over-simplification and not grounded in the numbers as this proposal is.
I did, man. Will reply soon.
TheWoody wrote:
Hey Sodan, did you get my emails in your message thingy from me today? (think I used the word 'tighter' in the header). Should be two there. The forums went down, so some of my most recent stuff didn't save on them.
Um, didn't he admit that CH requires to non-combat trees for a purely-combat related profession? I guess a crafting and a combat tree for a HYBRID profession is inconsistant with this inconsistency.
duncje wrote:
Daker-Naritus wrote:
duncje wrote:
"It's not balanced."--It costs one more skill point (78 to 77) to get the CL30ish combat droids in this proposal, than it costs to be able to control CL 36 pets. That's balance. You want to add a separate mini profession that would be far tougher to balance, and where would you put it?
Duncje,
For the FOURTH time.... Simple skill points is NOT (NOT NOT NOT NOT NOT NOT)equal to combat ability.
By your logic a master weaponsmith/armorsmith/chef should have the same combat ability as a bounty hunter, just because they spend the same skill points.
That is NOT balance.
If you spend skill points on combat ability, you get combat ability. If you spend skill points on crafting. If you spend a little on both, you get a little of both.
HOWEVER, what this plan calls for is people spending skill points on crafting ability and getting BOTH crafting ability AND combat ability out of it. Not to mention the fact that almost a THIRD of the skill points you are spending under the plan cost 200 cr and are for basic novice professions (artisan and marksman).
I do not see how you could POSSIBLY think that is balanced.
In the game, a masksman spending 78 skill points gets a gun that they can shoot and that is it. Under your plan you are giving players the ability to have a CL30+ droid shoot a gun and tank for them (shooting power + extra ham), as WELL as the ability to craft all things in the engineering tree AND easily move on to MDE.
That is crazy...
Your post is an argument against a profession that's currently in the game--Creature Handler.
CH's get combat tanks and damage, do they spend any skill points in Combat skills? NO. And they can tame their own pets, so that equals the "crafting" ability that you're claiming the DE dabbler gets under this proposal (which is a false assumption).
Icarus-6 wrote:
Daker-Naritus wrote:
...Buying an extra novice profession (about 100cr) and spending 15 minutes with a crafting tool does not entitle you to extra combat ability no matter how you slice it.
Hey, if I'm going to stick up for you because they are claiming that you aren't reading and are distorting, at least have the good graces to read and not distort.
Their proposal requires the person to have 4 boxes of DE, not 4 boxes of Engineering. If you have some way to grind up the Droid Experimentation tree in only 15 minutes building nothing but mouse droids I would like to hear it.
OK stop!!!! EVERYONE JUST STOP!!!! Please take a deep breath, and actually read and think about what I am saying instead of flaming (although I appreciate it Icarus, that respectully includes you).
I was comparing the 2 professions:
CH requires: Novice scout, 2 scout trees, and 2 CH trees (77 skill points) for lvl 36 pets.
This proposal requires Novice Marksman, Novice Artisan, 2 novice trees (ranged support and engineering) and 1 DE tree (78 skill points) for lvl 36 pets.
As you will notice by the emphasized potions, although they take the same number of skill points, FIFTEEN of the proposal's points are spent on a novice profession (100cr, no other requirements)INSTEAD of a second DE tree. Additionally, for the engineering xp, you grab some materials and craft for 15 minutes to grind through the single engineering tree. That is in comparison to the corresponding scout tree, where you have to go out and kill things for a long time and harvest them to get xp.
Simply put, 44 (15 novice + 15 novice + 14 engineering) of the 78 skill points that this proposal calls for is no where NEAR balanced when compared to the work you have to put in to go through scout and CH (only 15 "free" skill points with novice scout).
That is the point I was making...buying an extra novice profession and grinding engineering IS NOT equivalent to having to grind a full tree of combat XP.
If I spend 90 skill points and buy all 6 novice professions, does that mean I should get the same combat ability as someone who spends 90 skill points on marksman? No. If I spend, 90 skill points on weaponsmith, does that mean I should get the same combat ability as someone who spends 90 on brawler? No.
My point is that although the two technically spend the same number of skill points on paper, that is an artificial, unbalanced support for CL36 droids.
Daker-Naritus wrote:duncje wrote:
"It's not balanced."--It costs one more skill point (78 to 77) to get the CL30ish combat droids in this proposal, than it costs to be able to control CL 36 pets. That's balance. You want to add a separate mini profession that would be far tougher to balance, and where would you put it?
Duncje,
For the FOURTH time.... Simple skill points is NOT (NOT NOT NOT NOT NOT NOT)equal to combat ability.
TrueBy your logic a master weaponsmith/armorsmith/chef should have the same combat ability as a bounty hunter, just because they spend the same skill points.
That is NOT balance.
No, but the previous logic those two should be equal. I don't think duncje is claiming that.If you spend skill points on combat ability, you get combat ability. If you spend skill points on crafting. If you spend a little on both, you get a little of both.
HOWEVER, what this plan calls for is people spending skill points on crafting ability and getting BOTH crafting ability AND combat ability out of it. Not to mention the fact that almost a THIRD of the skill points you are spending under the plan cost 200 cr and are for basic novice professions (artisan and marksman).
If I remember right Combat medic does something similiar. Combat skill points and non-combat skill points. I don't believe anyone considers Combat Medic unbalanced.I do not see how you could POSSIBLY think that is balanced.In the game, a masksman spending 78 skill points gets a gun that they can shoot and that is it. Under your plan you are giving players the ability to have a CL30+ droid shoot a gun and tank for them (shooting power + extra ham), as WELL as the ability to craft all things in the engineering tree AND easily move on to MDE.That is crazy...
I don't think that this proposal is at all crazy.
First of all, resources, time and money don't mean much as far as the dev's are concerned. And I agree with that stance. Given enough time all of them vanish away. It doesn't matter how *hard* the xp is to get, the valulable commodity in SWG is skillpoints. It also doesn't matter how *easy* the xp is to get either, in the case of the Novice Marksman and Artisan no xp required argument.
See above...
Sodan-droiddreamer wrote:
Other than arguing that "some people already have this skills" you have yet to refute the balance of this plan 78 points for 25-35 droid lvls just like 77 points for 36s pet lvl. Grinding takes the same amount of steel and fiber as it took you to grind.
Another propblem I have with your agruments generally is that it diminishes the time people have investign in gaining their skills. So some people have 0004 Marksman already. Why do you want to diminish that? Did they not earn those points.
I have talked with Woody, and have reluctantly decided that if this plan is the ONLY way we are going to get combat droids, that I would have to support it no matter how much I hated it.
After thinking about it,I see a major problem with this plan that I think makes it impossible to implement, so here is something for you to think about....
NOTE: I am trying to help you, not hurt you or be criticalhere. Over and over I keep hearing people say that they are voting for this plan because it is "easy to implement for the devs" and is the "only way we will get combat droids" This is a major hurdle you are going to have to overcome to make this a viable solution.
I would agree that we should not submit anything to the devs that is not easy to implement, because we will get shot down and end up getting nothing.
Here is the first major problem that you are going to hear from TH and Runesabre that you need to come up with an answer for:
There are already thousands of DEs acrocc the servers.
What this proposal proposes is to make DE a hybrid profession that has new prerequisites from marksman or other trees.
The problem: How do you convert the DE profession to the hybrid with new prerequisites when people already have the skill?
Do you take all DE skills away from everyone and make them reearn the skill? (Devs will never do this)
Do you grandfather every DE in and let them keep their skills forever? (Devs will never do this, because it gives you too much power--additional combat droids--for no additional skill point cost--existing DEsdon't have to learn the prerequisites)
Do you make it so that DEs can only keep their skills until they drop some, and the ones they drop can't be relearned until they learn the prerequisites? (This is a programming nightmare)
If we are supporting a plan that is "easy to implement" how does a plan that changes the prerequisites for a profession that thousands of players already have fit that bill?
When TH and Runesabre come back saying they can't implement this plan because there is no way to grandfather new DEs in, what do we say in reply?
Addendum, if 2 or 3 are possible answers, how do you deal with the additional problem of people purposefully learning DE (before the patch) so that they can be granfathered in and skip the extra skill point prerequisites?
Daker-Naritus wrote:
The problem: How do you convert the DE profession to the hybrid with new prerequisites when people already have the skill?
(1) Do you take all DE skills away from everyone and make them reearn the skill? (Devs will never do this)
(2) Do you grandfather every DE in and let them keep their skills forever? (Devs will never do this, because it gives you too much power--additional combat droids--for no additional skill point cost--existing DEsdon't have to learn the prerequisites)
(3) Do you make it so that DEs can only keep their skills until they drop some, and the ones they drop can't be relearned until they learn the prerequisites? (This is a programming nightmare)