Droid Engineer Archive
Thread: Sodan's Hybrid DE Proposal
Daker-Naritus wrote:
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We're on the same page, man. We differ on how to get there, but we need strive for common ground. In the end, I believe we're going to have to follow the wisdom of Woody's post even if it cannot be mandated:
http://forums.station.sony.com/swg/board/message?board.id=droid_engineer&message.id=68276
Daker-Naritus wrote:
HOWEVER, here is the problem I keep running into... This smells JUST like the certification proposals that the devs already killed because they "give additional checkers to all current professions without spending any further skillpoints." I can't think of any way the devs would accept it.
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Yep, that's THE issue. Your varaint is a good one with majority support -- but the devs have already show down the "certs for combat classes" idea that we ALL wanted. #2 is where its at. Or as this plan does it, #3 changing one profession and requiring skills from another. Not un-precedented in the existing pre-req system.
Thankies. Lots of people contributed to this idea.
Seniv wrote:
I like the idea Sodan, kudos to you...Making DE a Hybrid notto the extent of destroying the profession itself is a great idea. And if I read this right, it will keep players that want to go CH/DE in check so they are not over-powerful (having tons of pets/droids doing their bidding).
Sodan-droiddreamer wrote:
Kollos wrote:
I stand by my argument, however. You can't have it both ways. There are pure combat professions, there are pure crafting professions, and there are mixed professions. [SNIP]
If the Devs implement all of our bug fixes, plus give us new (and useful) utility modules, plus implement some sort of variant of this proposal, then Droid Engineer would be overbalanced.
Yeah, like I said, man, we're goign to have to agree to disagree. I think this plan improves the DE profession at zero cost to craftign becase it makes combat droids available to those who spend the right skill points: Dabblers in 0040 DE and DEs in 0004 Marksman.
Fair enough. I don't think this plan improves DE because, in order to be balanced, it gimps crafters. Crafting abilities that would have made DE balanced as a crafting profession would have to be removed in order to add the combat abilities you propose.
We're talkin past each other here for one reason: Playstyle. I beleive that people should have a CHOICE as to what kind of DE to play if they spend the extra points to do it. You want DE to remain what it is today which will result in no new combat droids for anyone anytime soon. Sure, you say you want a mini-tree, but that's dead and floating in the water. Mini-tree=no new combat droids for anyone.
This is one of our problems. You like to try to frame this as a playstyle difference, when that's simply not true.
I already am a hybrid, but I did it outside of Droid Engineer. I did it the way you're supposed to do it - by mixing and matching the professions provided to us. So please stop trying to blame this on play style because you're getting nowhere with it. It's about the design of the game, and more specifically the design of the Droid Engineer profession.
I'm not sure there is any more point in discussing it because I think it just comes down to playstyle. As I have ALWAYS argued regarding a hybrid approach, hybrid is the middle ground that allows you to craft and me to play with my droideka. If you don't want combat droids, then don't use them or spend the points for them. Clearly there are a lot of people that do. It might be cool of you to support them in that cause even if you disagree; especially if its of no impact to your playstyle, except that you'll have more droids to sell.
You have yet to refute that this system proposed is somehow "wrong" other than as a matter of personal preference. Why? its grounded in the same skillpoint expenditure that is already fair and already in the game.
Huh? That's a specious argument. You have yet to prove that it is somehow "right" other than as a matter of personal preference.
You have tried to make it look like it is grounded in the same skillpoint expenditure that is already in the game, but as Daker and I have tried to point out, it really isn't. You're giving new abilities to some Droid Engineers for free, and it doesn't matter whether or not that's 0.5% of all players or 50% of all players. The Devs have said that it's not going to happen that way. They may change their minds, but right now you're banging your head against a brick wall that the Devs constructed.
I'm still trying to figure out a way to give everyone access to the new combat droids that virtually all of us want without impacting the crafting ability of Droid Engineers.
This is going to sound kind of silly, but try to see past that. Do you think Chefs would have been happy if, instead of the awesome revisions they got, they had been given a Combat Gingerbread Man instead? Sure, a few of their existing cookies would have been tweaked a bit here and there, but no real effort would have been put into the tweaks because of all of the effort required to make the Combat Gingerbread Man balanced. That's how I see this proposal.
Kollos wrote:
Furthermore, I would argue that CL 35 combat droids are a gimped combat side to the profession as well simply because a Creature Handler gets so much more than that. So we end up with a profession that has less than its full potential as a crafting profession and also less than its full potential as a combat profession. How is that not gimped in both regards?
So in the same post you argue that we're overbalanced AND gimped on the combat side. As far as debate style goes, I think that stands for itself.
/sigh
Aren't you the one who's always going off when you think that people misread your posts? Go back and read it again, and this time pay attention.
I argued at the beginning of my post that IF all of the changes you propose are made ALONG WITH all of the changes you assume are going to happen, that THEN AND ONLY THEN Droid Engineers would be overbalanced. In what you have quoted here, I'm pointing out that if we DO NOT get all of the additional crafting abilities needed because they've been removed to keep us balanced, THEN we'd be gimped. Two very different parts of the post based on two very different hypothesis.
Don't be a hypocrite - if you want to rant and rave about people not paying attention to what you write, then you damn well better pay attention to what other people write.
Substantively, I agree with Virtanis that in light of the armor nerf 35 droid levels, rather than 25, is where the balance should be. But this proposal has ALWAYS been flexible in that regard. We expressed the suggested droid levels as a range to allow the devs the final call based on factors like HAM, armor, special attacks and other considerations. The fundemantal trade off is still there: 78 Points for 35 Droid levels.
(Rancors are lvl 36s pets, BTW, to give you something to compare with.)
35 Droid lvls is fine with me. I don't care to be uber. This isn't the Droid Handler class we're proposing. Its a hybrid approach and its balanced according to skillpoint expenditures.
I've said before that this is not a PvP template, CHs rarely make for good PvP, especially the dabblers these days. Its far more suited to PvE and that's ok with me. I don't think adding lvl 40 droids (under ONE variant, MDEs get +5 droid levels) to the game is that objectionable, especially where the numbers add up.
I don't believe it is a PvE template either. It's simply not good enough at combat, nor is it going to be good enough at crafting. It's going to be gimped in both regards so that no one will be satisfied. This is why I do not like any of the multitudes of hybrid proposals that have come and gone - every single one of them makes Droid Engineer a gimped profession that can't do anything well.
Kollos wrote:
If we're going to be given new checkers, let's at least get the same color checkers that we already have, okay?
Again, man. That is purely a question of playstyle. This proposal assumes bug fixes and addtional functionality. (Good luck selling entertainer modules to pennyless entertainers BTW). Under this proposal, you get to play in your style and I get to play in mine. If you're a good DE, you will MAKE MILLIONS selling to DE dabblers.
Yeah, right, you mean like all the Creature Handlers that were making millions off of CH dabblers before that was fixed?
Get real. At least selling CH pets required some effort, unlike making a schematic and churning out a bunch of factory-made droids. People dabbled in CH because it was far easier to dabble (and get CL50 pets while dabbling, not CL 36)than it was to Master. That's not true of Droid Engineer - it's trivial to Master DE with a macro and a few hundred thousand resources.
It's not a play style issue, it's a game design issue. Hybrids are simply a busted game mechanic unless they are very carefully designed. This is an add-on hybrid, not one designed from the ground up to fill a niche like healers. It duplicates (poorly) the abilities of other professions and, in the end, makes for a less-than-desireable result.
As I have already pointed out, I will get all these new abilities for free if your proposal is implemented. My play style specifically will be greatly enhanced by your proposal. So explain again how this is a play style issue? Or are you chastising me for arguing against my own play style? /boggle
Kollos wrote:
Here's a question for the Devs, really, but maybe others will have an idea of an answer. What CL of pet is workable for everyone if that pet cannot be healed by anyone but a Droid Engineer?
Huh? Droid stims are usable by all.
We're into hypotheticals here... I was testing an idea. What if Droid Stims were restricted to Droid Engineers? Would it be possible to get higher level combat droids available to everyone if other people couldn't heal them?
Since Droids are being nerfed into oblivion with the removal of their armor, would it be reasonable for CL 20 combat droids to exist if the only people who can use Droid Stims are Droid Engineers?
They already said no to CL 10+ droids without any skills/time expended.
Yeah, I know, but what we don't know is which armor paradigm that statement was made under. Did they say that because Droids had medium armor with 40% resists? If so, what's that armor worth in CL terms if the Droid in question cannot be healed by just anyone? That's the question I'm asking. (Do you see where I'm headed with this as a benefit to Droid Engineers?)
Creature pets are balanced at CL 10 because anyone can heal them. What CL of droid would be balanced if it couldn't be healed except by 0.5% of the character population?
If CL 10 pets are currently balanced, then part of that balance equation includes their ability to be healed in combat. How much CL is it worth to remove that ability to be healed? Surely at least double the CL, wouldn't you think? Now allow them to be healed, but only by one specific profession. Doesn't it make sense that Droid Engineers are the only people who can repair (heal) droids?
Huh? Droid stims are usable by all. Not sure where you're going with this.
See above.
P.S. Stop arguing! The different points of view have been adequately presented, and you've hit a wall. You're degenerating into petty bickering, which does no one any good!
Message Edited by Alacrity on 03-10-2004 06:34 PM
EricTheGreat wrote:
The only hangup I have with the plan, is giving any kind of bonus to master DEs. A bonus would mean a MDE only droid (droideka?) else what would be the point of the extra bonus?I cant quite come to terms as whether that means giving free combat mods to MDEs already. Purely from trying to look at a dev standpoint, I can see that as being the only major blockage to all their past reasons for saying "No." But this has been adressed in one of the variants.
Actually, as I see it, that's the stroke of genius in this proposal. The Master DE bonus (or at least the one I'm referring to here)is just the ability to call a 3rd Droid (while everyone else doing the hybrid thing can call 2).
It's a neat perk, but it's really nothing special. Sure, call 3 combat droids, but the total CL must add up to 35. It's not even a real advantagefor non-combat purposes, because the key problem we've had all along is simply the need to be able to call 2 droids(for repair or recharging purposes).
Alacrity wrote:
Hey, Sodan - have you shot Thunderheart or Runesabre a PM asking them to read and comment on this idea? If such an approach needs a more "Official" stamp, have TK-421 do the honors.
P.S. Stop arguing! The different points of view have been adequately presented, and you've hit a wall. You're degenerating into petty bickering, which does no one any good!
Message Edited by Alacrity on 03-10-2004 06:34 PM
Yep, I PM'd the devs that accept PMs and asked them to check it out. TH said he'd "check" it, but I have not heard back. I'm sure TK is already doing his job in this regard.
My hope is that they're giving this a careful look and looking into how to make it happen!
You're right about the bickering, but look at it this way: free /bumps without violating board policies! lol! But seriously, I think the bulk of the arguments have been addressed. And I think the vote thread is going well. I am going to say that there is consenus that Variant #4 go forward. Dissents is duly noted, but I think the community has spoken.
It would be excellent to get some feedback. I am keeping my fingers crossed and I think we've done as much as we can to get this in the devs hand in a constructive form. Dear devs: Pls bless out plan and then tell us how its great, followed by your implementation plans. 
/givecookie devs
Sodan-droiddreamer wrote:
Yep, I PM'd the devs that accept PMs and asked them to check it out. TH said he'd "check" it, but I have not heard back. I'm sure TK is already doing his job in this regard.
My hope is that they're giving this a careful look and looking into how to make it happen!
This is the reason why I havent said much on the subject. I dont want to put so much effort into something only to have it shot down like every other proposal.
Tk better get to work, else id have his wookiee hide thrown into an old soviet style gulag (updated to year 2373298732 Gungan standards, of course)
EricTheGreat wrote:
Sodan-droiddreamer wrote:
Yep, I PM'd the devs that accept PMs and asked them to check it out. TH said he'd "check" it, but I have not heard back. I'm sure TK is already doing his job in this regard.
My hope is that they're giving this a careful look and looking into how to make it happen!
This is the reason why I havent said much on the subject. I dont want to put so much effort into something only to have it shot down like every other proposal.
I know, man. We're all burned out. But I looked at the "Droid Invasion" and was so underwhelmed by it, that I just had to give it the old college try. My sense from many of the posting was that people wanted some way of getting combat droids in the game.
If the devs don't make it happen -- meh -- we tried at least. I think they want a way to put cool droids in the game too, however. Here it is!
Sodan-droiddreamer wrote:
I know, man. We're all burned out. But I looked at the "Droid Invasion" and was so underwhelmed by it, that I just had to give it the old college try. My sense from many of the posting was that people wanted some way of getting combat droids in the game.
If the devs don't make it happen -- meh -- we tried at least. I think they want a way to put cool droids in the game too, however. Here it is!
Kollos wrote:
Sodan-droiddreamer wrote:
I know, man. We're all burned out. But I looked at the "Droid Invasion" and was so underwhelmed by it, that I just had to give it the old college try. My sense from many of the posting was that people wanted some way of getting combat droids in the game.
If the devs don't make it happen -- meh -- we tried at least. I think they want a way to put cool droids in the game too, however. Here it is!
And we'll keep trying! I won't be satisfied until there are truly useful utility droids in the game, because that's what you see all over the place in the original movies. If we don't get something satisfactory in patch 8, then we'll just keep plugging away at them, right?
Well, at some point we'll have to start talking about Space Expansion goodies. That's so far away though! And they have already said development is locked up till year's end.
Its just not star wars without lots of droids.
Sodan-droiddreamer wrote:
Well, at some point we'll have to start talking about Space Expansion goodies. That's so far away though! And they have already said development is locked up till year's end.
Its just not star wars without lots of droids.
Is it a plan to make Item Storage modules hold more items?Shhhh! Don't let the smugglers hear you!
Kollos wrote:
Sodan-droiddreamer wrote:
Well, at some point we'll have to start talking about Space Expansion goodies. That's so far away though! And they have already said development is locked up till year's end.
Its just not star wars without lots of droids.
What is this Space Expansion you speak of?
Kollos wrote:
And we'll keep trying! I won't be satisfied until there are truly useful utility droids in the game, because that's what you see all over the place in the original movies. If we don't get something satisfactory in patch 8, then we'll just keep plugging away at them, right?
and thats the crux of the problem. Patch 7/8 is ours, after that. Nothing. (Unless the userbase gets up in arms and asks for a droid. which I somehow doubt it). So you need to look at it like this, Patch 7/8 and nothing else for 2004. (2005 is debatable). Its been state very clearly that 2004 has been planned and theres no other time. Though I would hope Space would add something, though I doubt it will be out in 2004, we'll see what they say at E3.