Droid Engineer Archive
Thread: The Future of Droids A discussion on future droid development
Excellent post Virtanis.I'm going to do a little cut and paste magic and add this to the growing lists of suggestions and ideas for TH to take a look at and pass along.
Sinnare wrote:
Dra, respecfully, isnt this all just redoing everything that has been done. There have been focus upon focus, discussion upon discussion, i would say we are more at the point of soe telling us ok we took what you said and here is what we came up with. I think you are an awsome choice to replace sin, frankly your test center work is was really appriciated. But seriously how many times are we gonna do the same exact thing.
What i want is to here that they have heard the 120984785748758937589375845903 posts by the community so far and are actually doing something with them.
I can appriciate wanting to start fresh but seriously this horse is dead glue gone.
Sinnare,I started thisthread before I was chosen as the DE Correspondent in hopes of gathering infomation from the communityso that there was an indepth discussion on what the current generation of DE would like to see. If you will take a look at the current DE head count, and compare it to the DE head count that was createdby TeileIcebladeless than 5 months earlier, you will note that a lot ofnames have changed. With theHoliday Season and Holo-grinders,many more Droid Engineers have appeared that have just as valid a voice in this topic as those that have been around from day one. A community is based around bringing together those from all walks of life that have something in common.This new round of discussion has brought up many great points, some of which have been around for a while, some of which are seeing a large make over, and some that are being newly voiced.
As I stated earlier, this community is alway in flux and what may have been thought of as popular opinion before may not be popular opinion now.Since I was chosen as the DE Correspondent, I have poured over hundreds of posts, here and the Correspondents forums, and I can tell you that threads like this, and a few others that have been made recently, are extremely beneficial to what I am trying to do for the community. A Correspondents mission is to be the voice for the community, but the only way that I can be thatvoice is by finding out whatissues are currently criticalto the community and having the numbers to back it up. I respect Sintrosi for the work that he has done in the past; however as the new Correspondent, there is a lot of work that I have been catching up on due to his absence, that goes further back than many have guessed.
I understand and respect your belief that this thread, and those like it, are beyond the equine grave, but for me this is like a newly crafted droid that still needs its programming.
Okay, all...
In an effort to stoke the fires a bit, I've come with a possible combat-related module idea that isn't directly a "weapon", per se.
I believe we need such ideas to keep the discussion based on players and less on their tools.
The basic idea:
"DAT (Droid-Assisted Targeting) combat module"
This module would/could:
- Be a module that gave increases to Speed (DPS), Accuracy or Damage output (or some small increase to all these?). These could be obviously worked out later.
- Be a module that would require an accompanying part that was installed by a Weaponsmith (which would 'link' the weapon, usually ranged, to the droid's "DAT" module). Note that this means that you'd have to have BOTH:
- - A weapon that had a "Droid-Assisted Combat Transceiver" installed (to link wirelessly to the droid)
- - A droid with an installed "DAT module" (providing 'targeting data', code optimization and enhancement' and other such things...to make up the bonuses).
This is, in essence, a way for your droid to help your weapon fire better/fast, etc.
I'm not sure how this would play out on sliced weapons but I'm sure that could be addressed.
In addition, I'm not sure how to address the impact (positive and/or negative) that this could have on Squad Leaders. Perhaps the idea could be expanded to, in some way, include them and/or 'buff' their standard group commands.
The basic idea is that there would be a combat-related module for droids, which would add some interdependence to Weaponsmiths and the weapons they could build.
Thoughts? Comments? Should I try to detail this out further?
Good discussion and feedback would help me to further flesh out such an idea...if you all think it's worthwhile, that is...
/bow
Respectfully,
Almost stay as is with the ability to fit two lvl 6 armour to a probot to give medium 60% resists which would take it beyond the CL10 lvl and into the droid cert realm. Each droid that currently exists to allow only certain modules to be fitted as determined by the droids function. eg
Mouse- data module
DZ70 -weak combat (or up to lvl 2 combat if the current lvls for modules are used)
Probot -medium combat (or up to lvl 4 combat if the current lvls for modules are used)
LE-repair module
Power-Power, data and/or storage 3 items
Surgical- Medical module and/or repair
WED- Crafting stations, and/or data
Astromech- General purpose , Storage 3Items, crafting stations, data and/or repair
BLL- Storage 10Items, data and/or repair.
Complete removal of the general cluster module unless it can be made to work properly. Still have different numbers of module slots on the different types and Adv droids. R3 Adv has 6, R2 has 4 etc I can never think of a R3 I have manufactured with out a GCM it always has them and 6 slots, using that many resources and effort for a R3 you might as well use 2GCM so might as well have it inbuilt and just have 6 slots.
I know this is limiting and unifying the droid types but I believe the benefits would outweigh the downsides, at the moment most people seem to be earning a few hundred k then getting a R3 with everything as their last and only droid purchase.
Make every module cost a lot more resources so there is a justification for a larger price difference between a droid with 1 module and 2 so that people will have more of a choice , rather than between “R3 with everything 60k, R3 with food/chem. 50k”
Many more types of modules added and be able to fit into appropriate droids (slicer module, entertainer module basically something useful for every profession, I’ve read many good ideas on these boards much better than I can currently think of, I did particularly like the idea of a slicer/decoder droid being required for the capture of GCW bases and the minesweeper idea. If there was a greater difference in the recourses required for different module lvl there would be more of a price difference and more of a choice, perhaps this is related to most people being well off
I don’t believe limiting droids will limit droid sales but will rather increase them as people will need more/newer droids for specific functions and with an addition of many more module types this would further diversify droids functionality.
Off the top of my head I think it might be technically hard to customise the appearance of droids beyond the current colouring. Maybe a selection of base, middle and top for example a LE middle mounted on a WED base with a hemispherical head or an astrometric with a multi arms instead of dome this could possibly be tied into the functionality of the droid, the models exist but it might be technically difficult to split them.
I find it a little hard to discus the combat capability of current models even though it is coming because I don’t quite agree with it.
OK, so what's to stop all droids being fitted with aggression modules? Well, nothing, but it takes up anther module slot that could be put to better use in sugical drds, service drds, protocols etc.
Well, I will put in my 2 cents here. I will preface my comments by saying that I was a DE in Beta, but was horribly disillusioned by the terrible state the profession was in throughout beta. I had hoped it would be fixed by now since I have picked up DE in addition to WS. DE really impacts a lot of core systems and my comments will only impact more systems. I would hope that by July we get something other than combat droids, below are some ideas I have had. Sorry if I have repeated others ideas.
Lets look at the basic models we have:
Binary Load Lifters (BLL): Why can't these haul anything? Early in beta there was talk of using "teamsters" (not the union guys, people who haul stuff and founded that particular union). The original concept was for certain creatures and these droid modelsto be neccessary to do things like move large quantities of ore around. That idea was dropped somewhere along the line leading to a completely useless droid class. How do we fix this?Let peopleuse the BLL to carry extra material. They can only do this when called, not when stored. What will this allow? You can move stuff between planets (provided scripting is written to allowdroids tostay out during travel), you can move stuff from your harvester to storage and from storage to the shop/factory. It is rediculous that I as a human can carry around potentially 60,000,000 units of steel. The BLL should figure in here somehow. Encumberence maybe?
Protocol Droids: Why aren't they doing the majority of translation? The current problem with languages is everyone speaks all of them. It would be more realistic if each language took one point each to understand and one point to speak. This would create an instant market for protocol droids and give them part of their intentional use according to SW lore. A more game centric use could be thata protocol droid might be able to help you negotiate a better price/reward for NPC quests. This would enhance NPC quests over traditional terminal quests andprovide a market for protocol droids consistant with SW lore. We would need a new feature, "negotiate" put into various droid personality chips for this to be put into the game.
Astromech Droids: Well, they don't navigate because the space expension isn't out yet. However, they better add to the navigation skill of pilots from day one. Oh, and pilots need to have navigation skill in order to arrive somewhere quickly. Otherwise they get lost and take longer/run into some trouble. As far as current uses, R2D2 was quite adept at hacking Imperial systems. Astromech droids need to be able to help smugglers slice. Current uses as crafting platforms aren't a bad idea - but crafters need to be able to call them without a camp (hopefully fixed in the Feb patch). Oh, and maybe we can get them to carry drinks to patrons for the entertainer professions. 
Probe droids: I guess they help you find prey now, I haven't actually tested this. There was a rumor going round of using MSEs as smart bombs. Well, the probe droid is the closest thing in the SW universe that did this with its self destruct mechanism. Although I would be loathe to include this feature, it belongs here. Also, how about using probe droids to increase your sensor range beyond the 64 m or at least give you some kind of rough idea (such as /con)of what is ahead at a greater distance than you can "see".
MSEs: Well, these guys seem pretty useless outside of a Wookie soccer match. However, they can store data. Maybe their best use is to store afew waypoints or possibly some schematics. Another use could be the ability to download your private crafting station's memory. Then, if you are near a public crafting station withyour MSE, youcould hook it up and make items normally availableto you only atyour homecrafting station.
Power Droids: They should function by providing power to something. They should be able to hook up to at least a small harvester and provide it with power either short term orat a reduced extraction capacity until you can go get more power. They should also be able to repower yourother droids in the field (this requires the ability to call at least 2 droids at once). Another use for power droids could be advanced camps - the ones with hospitals and crafting stations. These things require power, and a power droid would make sense as the source of that power.
Well, thats all I can think of for now. I know I'm talking about a lot of rescripting and patchwork into many of the SWG systems. But to be perfectly blunt, many of these features should have shipped with the game. The only reason DE was even included as a professionwas because you can't have SW without droids. Many of these ideas were bandied about in beta, this stuff isn't new and should even need said. It could have been done right from the start. Unfortunately shipping time pressures took whatcould have been a great profession and made it a wreck. From what I have read tonight at gamefaqs, not even the mighty Blizzard is now immune from corporate bean counters thesedays as all of Blizz's main founders are now gone. I guess it could be worse, look what happened to Black Isle when the programmers tried to stand up to the corporation for the sake of producing a good game. 
STUN
ELECTRIC
ENERGY
BLAST
TheRealTK421 wrote:
Okay, all...
In an effort to stoke the fires a bit, I've come with a possible combat-related module idea that isn't directly a "weapon", per se.
"DAT (Droid-Assisted Targeting) combat module"
- A weapon that had a "Droid-Assisted Combat Transceiver" installed (to link wirelessly to the droid)
- - A droid with an installed "DAT module" (providing 'targeting data', code optimization and enhancement' and other such things...to make up the bonuses).
The basic idea is that there would be a combat-related module for droids, which would add some interdependence to Weaponsmiths and the weapons they could build.
Thoughts? Comments? Should I try to detail this out further?
Good discussion and feedback would help me to further flesh out such an idea...if you all think it's worthwhile, that is...
/bow
Respectfully,
I have you beat by about six months.
http://forums.station.sony.com/swg/board/message?board.id=droid_engineer&message.id=7354&highlight=#M7354
Same basic idea, but with a few differences. Nobody seemed to care about mine, though. Hehe. Good that you bring it up here, though, you are more vocal and more respected.
)1. Healing droid -- Gimme back my 15 skill points to use a stimpak and put it in the droid. When I get to 50% HAM on health or action, hit me with a stim. Stims loaded into droid so not infinite capacity. Bought from Docs to give them some income too. Maybe module levels to correspond to the 5 stim levels. But just to stim B is probably all anybody would need. Or increase healing treatment ability as module increases as in medic. Targetable by mobs as per creatures.
2. Repair Droid -- Expand repair functionality to include weapons and armour. Load with weapon/armour repair tools so the capacity isn't infinite. Module levels give repair bonus like Skill Tapes to the droid.
3. Survey droids -- One for each type of survey tool. Choose what to survey for from list of what's available at a site and send droid out to find the highest conc within range. Module levels increase range.
I'm sure these have all been brought up before. I just didn't see 'em in any recent posts.
http://forums.station.sony.com/swg/board/message?board.id=droid_engineer&message.id=64286
But to make it short, its Droid Engineer only combat droids that would breath life back into this profession. Utility droids are nice but its a backwater market which won't have the momentum to keep sales going for very long. It will peter out, especially given how droids never wear out. Combat and combat related products will always be the primary and self-regenerating market.
Frankly, I don't much care what all you pure crafters think anymore. IMHO, you ruined the Droid Invasion.