Droid Engineer Archive
Thread: Please help me understand your change of heart.
Well, I dont want to ruin CH, so I dont think you could have Level 60+ Droids, but I dont see a problem with level 50. I dont know tho, I wound have to think about it. A combat droidshould be strong.
Battle Droids in Ep 1 were not that strong. Thay had a blaster that was ok. Maybe they could act like Stromtrooper NPC's. The way a DE makes the droid would determine its armor and damage. Or, what if the DE made the Battle Droid, and had to buy a blaster from a Weaponsmith, so you could havelots of combo. Like a Krayt made Carbine in the..."camp's?" of a battle droid, and that would effect its CL.
I will admit I always wanted a Destroyer Droid, I have liked them sense I first saw them, and they are what made me enjoy DE. I thought everyone else liked them too so I use them as an example alot.
How DH is done would need alot of thinking, as it cant be the same as CH, and has to be a profession that "needs" DE in order to work. But now im just hopingthe DH Profession does not go poof before its even worked on. It has alot of potential.
A lot of potential? Name some. 4 skill trees, 18 skill boxes. I see one more broken profession.
A few questions
A DH profession, made up of 19 boxes, what the hell do you fill those 19 boxes with?
How would a DH profession not make the CH profession obsolete and/or not kill it's uniqueness?
GamerProX wrote:
Well, I dont want to ruin CH, so I dont think you could have Level 60+ Droids, but I dont see a problem with level 50. I dont know tho, I wound have to think about it. A combat droidshould be strong.
Battle Droids in Ep 1 were not that strong. Thay had a blaster that was ok. Maybe they could act like Stromtrooper NPC's. The way a DE makes the droid would determine its armor and damage. Or, what if the DE made the Battle Droid, and had to buy a blaster from a Weaponsmith, so you could havelots of combo. Like a Krayt made Carbine in the..."camp's?" of a battle droid, and that would effect its CL.
I will admit I always wanted a Destroyer Droid, I have liked them sense I first saw them, and they are what made me enjoy DE. I thought everyone else liked them too so I use them as an example alot.
How DH is done would need alot of thinking, as it cant be the same as CH, and has to be a profession that "needs" DE in order to work. But now im just hopingthe DH Profession does not go poof before its even worked on. It has alot of potential.
It helps me understand your position in that your talking about CL50 Droids. I do not envision the need or the system that could balance such high droids myself. Nor have i seen anythign in the Star Wars storylines to make me think CL50 droids are needed.
I envision Combat droids as CL8-10-12-and maybe15. For them to be availible to more folks is not as "impossible"
But ya no way would i want to see any system that gave any exsisting class a CL50 droid. I will agree with you on that. Certs won't work for it, DE's would be too uber with it. ant that has been your position. IF a DH class was made you better dang well have the same str as a CH though, why else would you do it?
So you would end up with a mechanical CH...it just doesn't seem nifty enough to spend dev time to reproduce anothe CH with diffrent skins. Look cool? ya, but what purpous would it serve?
To me you expect to large a combat droid. That is where I differ with ya at least.
However, since that won't happen for awhile and we will see these combat droids... I do not see how having a DH class would help anyone. The statements from TH previously that having certs for droids would make combat easy... isn't that kind of the point? You purchase better weapons, armor, pets... droids to make life easier, to make that trip smoother and more successful. If you are concerned about making these droids overpowering in the game, tone them down a bit. I would rather the DE class be looked at as a Weaponsmith then a Creature Handler. We are crafters, we sell products that are programmed to obey their master. That is all, and that is all that I want to be. So, going with the Weaponsmith route, having a cert system makes a lot of sense to me.
To me, droids are NOT pets. They are just as functional as my vehicle. If we see Droid Handler, what is next? Vehicle Handler down the line when vehicles incorporate guns? City Handlers since Architects could be termed 'uber' for being able to craft furniture, houses, and city structures... where does it end?
In case anyone missed it, in the Roundtable Discussion in "In Live"
Thunderheart wrote:
Krovex wrote:
I have nothing but respect for you and all the others who make SWG great. But please take a look at this link. don't let the words of the few spoil it for the rest.
http://forums.station.sony.com/swg/board/message?board.id=droid_engineer&message.id=52116&view=by_date_ascending&page=1
I read the whole thing. I sent a link to the thread and the sentiments expressed to the dev team.
In response, Runsabre will be posting a big overview on the design challenges this afternoon. It's trickier than it seems.
For instance, if a grouping of professions gets "Droid Certifications", then you instantly get a migration of people to that profession to get the combat advantages. The advantage is simply doubling your combat balance. For instance, If Im a Carbineer and I have a droid, I've essentially doubled my combat abilities. So If I group with someone else who has access to high level droids, 2 players = 4, 4 players = 8 and so on.
Combat becomes out of balance and too easy. If that were the case all combat would have to be increased in difficulty. If 4 players suddenly have the same combat ability as 8, you can see how things would spin out of control.
The alternative is to stick put a "droid handling tree" in with Droid engineers. The confusion came in because over the past few weeks, DE's have stated they would prefer to be a crafting profession. In the shakeout, it seems the issue has many angles.
We're going to try and get to the bottom of it this week.
Basically what you're telling TH is that we don't want to be able to make decent combat droids, and we want to make utility droids instead. F--- that.
I want to make combat droids, and I don't want to make C3PO. I don't want to make R2D2. I'm long past tired of making medical droids and crafting stations at minimal prices. I don't want to spend my time building annoying knicknacks that can store 10 items.
I want to make goddamned useful Droidekas that are just as destructive as I can possibly make them, and I want them to be used on actual battlefields to blow away actual sentient creatures. If a Droid Handler profession is the way to achieve that, I'm perfectly willing to see that done. DL70, here we come!
---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Thunderheart, this community has got two factions in it, and you need to realize that. The first camp, my camp, is the group which always believed that a Droid Engineer would be sort of a hybrid class which produced and used its own droids heavily, sort of along the lines of the medical classes. So I'd be able to build my droideka, run it, maintain it when it gets broken, and even potentially upgrade it to be better over time - suppyling a valuable role for me as a self-contained professional. The second group is a purist crafter group that always planned on just selling crafting stations, and maybe a few minor combat droids here and there. Nothing that's a real battlefield tool, to be certain - just utility stuff.
This is the clash - people like myself who love the general direction droids are headed, and those who want us to be the most flexible utility droid crafters possible. And you probably will never see this gap bridged.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
My only concern with the path presently sought is that it might be rediculously overcomplicated to have both a Droid Engineer and a Droid Handler class, to the Droid Engineer's detriment. The stuff we make is exceptionally complicated, and thus we can't easily just kick out spare parts for distribution constantly. Indeed, with some of the proposed changes to Merchant, which few of us can spare the skill points for, it would be nearly impossible for us to interact with any significant number of customers. And on the reverse side, damage WILL be done to droids, and for them you can't just hit a stimpack.
Droid Engineers, to be most effective, already MUST have Master Artisan. Sure, it's not required, but the only efficient arrangement at present mandates that we must get that class to make this work. So we are already paying out as many skill points as a Combat Medic, almost, just to be workable - this screams for a hybrid solution.
My colleagues are saying loudly that they don't want to see Droid Handlers swarming all over the place, and that they don't want Droid Engineer itself to become a handler class - there's a solution for that. Make Droid Handler into an elite-elite hybrid, a unique sort of class. Only a person who has BOTH Master Artisan AND Droid Engineer Mastered can use the powerful combat droids. That lets you develop droids in the system which are just as powerful as any CH pet, without any fear of people dabbling. It also means that a Droid Engineer can get the skills without having to pick up any remote trees with our few remaining skillpoints.
Combat stays fairly balanced - the low level droids are still out there, but the heavy-duty ones are much scarcer. Not everyone and their brother can pull out a wickedly overpowered droideka, but they'd be common enough that people can use them. Paired with a certification system that lets double-Masters in elite combat professions use a medium combat droid, and Masters in a single elite combat profession use a light combat droid, you pretty quickly get results that should make almost everyone happy.
High level combat droids for a few, lower level ones for others(enough to be seen a lot), increases in business all-around, and all the crafting stations and so forth still being sold.
THIS is what the system should be, not a world of one extreme or the other.
Lifesavers wrote:
Simple, make the cert system unstackable. Say you go carbineer/fencer (for example). Make only 1 profession count as the Droid handling cert. So you get points from 1handed up to master fencer OR carbine to master carbineer. Just make them unstackable, can i say it again... MAKE THEM UNSTACKABLE you get a non uber profession cert!
Theres one main problem with this (and I'll be assuming these are noticeably more powerful than CL10 otherwise whats the point). You've now raised the potential strength of every charachter in the game. Ok, so now you need to make the environment tougher, otherwise whats the point. Simple enough, but now, inorder for a character to be where they originaly were in terms of combat stats (and where they are supposed to be) they are required to use a combat droid. I know there are quite a few people out there that don't like combat pets in general, and droids are no different in that regard. Is it fair to dimish their strength for something that doesn't have anything to do with their profession?
There any reason why "Creature Handler" couldn't have "Creature" dropped from it and that class would then be the "Handler" profession?
Advantages:
1. It's already in and balanced.
2. There won't be issues with a CH/DH having asmall army of"things" out. The current rules would apply to whatever type of pets they have out (number and level).
3. Minimal coding/design changes/errors.
4. People won't have to decide on an "either/or" basis (this could be a disadvanage from a Dev perspective depending on the outcome your after, but taking the other things into account I think it's a win/win for Devs and players). If they want "metal" or "flesh" pets, they just buy from the appropriate class (DE/BE).
5. It'd cut down on the "thin on the ground" syndrome that seems to be sneaking in to SWG. This applies to thetime devs can spend "per class, per dev cycle".
6. It'd cut down on arguments between two very similar classes (CH/DH). Any hint of balance being out of whack between the two will result in "holy wars" on the boards and a lot of unhappy players from one profession or the other.
Why would we need a "new" profession that basically copies whats already in? The only real reason I can think of is marketing. "Come play the ALL NEW Droid Handler class, just one of SWG's 37 exciting professions!". While that may be good for the marketing department, I don't thinkadding a pile of specialized classes will actually be that good for the game itself(apart from obvious exceptions like a "Pilot" class for the SE for example), otherwise we'll just end up with a bunch of "fluff" classes that are too specialized to do anything beyond their core role.
Thunderheart wrote:
KeithJB wrote:
The big 'balancing' issue I forsee is whether to allow level 10+ (combat Bio pets) with level 10+ combat droids?
Personnaly, I would not. Maybe if its tied to the already present "Max level of pets" limitation for balancing issues. This would only apply to Creature Handlers.
For example if I were a Master BH and a 3400 CH I would have a limit of 31 with regard to 'pet level'. Then the max level of Droid AND CH pet I should be able to use at once would be 31. However, CHs are not allowed to have more than one Bio pet out until they also get to Management III - so we already have blancing issues. I see no problem introducing code where only those CHs with Mangement III can have their Bio pets out with a combat droid. If you follow my suggestion above with regard to using droids to balance, CHs would only be allowed to have a combat droid via another profession (e.g. Bounty Hunter, Ranger, Comando, Squad Leader etc.).
I do see balancing issues here but each profession as they stand now are NOT balanced so the distribution of the droids can go along way in resolving this.
Thats a smart post.
The flip side is that all the professions are being balanced so the combat droids would throw all of that out of whack.
The balance issues specifically are:
- # of allowable pets
- # of skill points and experience points spent to gain the ability to handle the big droids
I caan think of a few professions droid companion off hand:
Pistoleer/Carbineer/Riflemen - Droideka
Bounty hunter - MKII Probe droid - a high powered probe droid to really help with the hunt and "aquistation"
Chef - Assistant, produces low level foods for the chef to compliment his masterpiece (think of the restaurant in Episode II)
Brawler,Marksmen, (Scout?) - BattleDroid - weak, but provide some much needed support
Creature Handler/Bioengineer - thumper droid (if you've ever read dune you get the idea) This droid distracts creatures to enable a CH/BE to do his job - high attrition rate with these droids though
Smuggler - Storage droid (Only once the smuggler rework has been done)
Squad leader/Medic/Doctor - Medic Droid - Not nearly as effective as a medic/doctor or dancer, but every little helps
Commando - Have yet to think of one, as it has to be strictly anti-tank and NOT PvP effective really
Droid Engineer - what ever they like - they should be able to show off there wears!
I do not believe that they should ever be as powerful as creatures at there max, but i do think that they should be substantially more powerful than the current droids and really help a profession (they should also suffer decay)
Just a few ideas as to how to balance them with the up and coming profession balance
Sureshot
Hi Thunderheart,
(I probably don´t speak for the majority of DEs)
I ´m happy you don´t like a cert-system, that would (only) allow Master Combat-Professionalists, who reigncombat anyway, to use the strongest Combat Droids. Idont see a sense in giving Über-Players additional Überpets also. And I don´t have skill points left to get the ability to controll my own droids this way.
I would be glad, if I, as a Droid engineer, would be able to use my own (powerful) droids. I can´t seeproblems ingiving droid engineers the additional opportunity to be not only crafters but half comatants.
Why not give all Players easy Combat Dorids (LVL 10). And why not split/double the"DH"-Profession. I meanthe skills, which are necessary to controll stronger or more droids , will befound in both professions CH and DE, but they don´t double. - This way crafters, especially DEcould use High-Level Droids by advancing through theDE Profession, Combatants could reach it by learning CH Skills. The "DH" skills are some how mirrored.
This waypeople, who like to get the Droid-Perk have to invest additional skillpoints -> No Über-Überprofessions like MasterCommando with Master Droid is possible -> no unbalancing. Droid engineers could control their own products and have fun in crafting and fighting. And balance between DE and CH isn´t touched, well CH get al little more, but I don´t mind. Well you could put less Skills into the CH-Tree. ))
And by the way, of course I want to see LVL 50-droids, this is Star Wars not Animal Wars.And of course I want to see those Über-Droids in Master DE.
Thunderheart wrote:
KeithJB wrote:
The big 'balancing' issue I forsee is whether to allow level 10+ (combat Bio pets) with level 10+ combat droids?
Personnaly, I would not. Maybe if its tied to the already present "Max level of pets" limitation for balancing issues. This would only apply to Creature Handlers.
For example if I were a Master BH and a 3400 CH I would have a limit of 31 with regard to 'pet level'. Then the max level of Droid AND CH pet I should be able to use at once would be 31. However, CHs are not allowed to have more than one Bio pet out until they also get to Management III - so we already have blancing issues. I see no problem introducing code where only those CHs with Mangement III can have their Bio pets out with a combat droid. If you follow my suggestion above with regard to using droids to balance, CHs would only be allowed to have a combat droid via another profession (e.g. Bounty Hunter, Ranger, Comando, Squad Leader etc.).
I do see balancing issues here but each profession as they stand now are NOT balanced so the distribution of the droids can go along way in resolving this.
Thats a smart post.
The flip side is that all the professions are being balanced so the combat droids would throw all of that out of whack.
The balance issues specifically are:
- # of allowable pets
- # of skill points and experience points spent to gain the ability to handle the big droids
Going to try this once more. Droid Certs will work, and here is how ...
Combat Droids:
Assume there are 4 levels of Combat Droids... Light, Medium, Heavy and Jugernaut.
For every existing Elite Profession, place the Certs for each Combat Droid type in the existing skill tree.
However, the Cert is NOT automatic. When you complete a skillbox that includes a Combat Droid Cert, it provides the OPTION to gain the Cert. If you excersize that option, it costs skill points. You can't excersize an option for a higher level Combat Droid unless you've exercised the options for the lower level ones first.
Again, exercising the option to gain the Combat Droid cert costs skill points significant enough that a player could not become a Master Pistoleer, Master Combat Medic, AND Jugernaut Droid Certified.
Such options should have no bearing on the mastering of the profession as it exists, so that if no Combat Droid Certs are exercised, the player can still master the profession without penalty.
How To Implement:
Simply take the currently planned DH skill tree, add up how many points a player would minimally spend to attain a Light Combat Droid Certification, then apply that total point value to Light Droid Certs and insert them across the board within the existing skill trees. A Light Droid Cert might even work in the masteries of the starting professions, like Master Marksman and Master Brawler. Remember, they don't automatically receive the Cert when they hit Master Marksman, but only gain the option to spend the skill point total associated with with Light Droid Certification.
Simply repeat this process for Medium, Heavy and Jugernaut Droid Certifications, bearing in mind that a player will not gain the option to excersize the Heavy Droid Cert until they have excersized the Light and Medium Droid Certs first.
The total points spent to gain all 4 Combat Droid Certs should probably total in somewhere around 65 spent points to maintain balance and prevent uber-templates of duo-masteries plus droid certs.
Utility Droids:
The Certs for Utility Droids would be gained automatically within the existing professions. Each Utility Droid Type within a given profession should match the profession in which it is gained. For instance, a Utility Droid that seeks out the highest concentration of a given resource on a single planet would be a Cert gained automatically by Crafter Professions, somewhere fairly high in the Elite Crafting skilltree ... perhaps even at Master level only.
Certs for Utility Droids should not cost addtional skill points in thefashion that Certs for Combat Droids above would since Utility Droids have little or no impact on combat balance.
They're just cool tools.
Why This In Lieu Of A Droid Handler Tree:
1) It is elegant.
2) It infringes less on a players planned professions.
3) It is manageable and alterable over time.
4) It is fun.
5) It makes more sense, since controlling a programmed droid is far different, and should be far easier, than controlling a wild beast, hence not requiring a seperate grind through a seperate skill tree.
6) It is flexible, and allows for doing fun things like making a difference between ranged attack, and melee attack, combat droids. These differing types can be added over time to fit the profession in which their certs are gained. For instance, a melee profession would benefit from having a ranged attack type of combat droid, and conversely, a ranged profession would benefit from having a melee attack type of combat droid. Recall these benefits all come at a significant skill point cost.
7) It places wonderful treats of utility droids within the existing professions that could, and should be able to, use them.
8) It creates natural market demands across the board for all players for the products of DE's.
9) It is a smarter system rather than the"Here's a new skill tree to grind" system currently being considered.
Lodacai