Droid Engineer Archive
Thread: Have our goals been clouded?
EricTheGreat wrote:
Is CH just a scout profession? What about BE? Just because we come from the artisan tree does not mean that we are strictly an artisan profession.
I agree. Not only are we born into the galaxy from character creation "With a pistol" in our hand but... I don't see one weapon related skill in the scout profession skill tree. Yes we are labeled non-combat and they are labeled combat. I firmly disagree.
I also disagree that some of us are credit greedy. Only a person with well over a million credits in thier bank would even think to make that statement. Im sorry Jenden but you are a great Merchant and happen to be in a good situation either by location or the quality of people on your server or perhaps the ONLY droid engineer on your server... the rest of us are not.
progman63 wrote:
It's obvious that you, Eric and Sodan just can't let the other have the last word.
So let's turn this into your own personal little debate thread.
The rest of us will leave so you three can be alone.
I don't think Jenden would ever agree to a threesome. He's want EVERYBODY to be in on it. 
lol!
Jenden wrote:
sorry, didn't see your post about keeping it on topic til I had responded, I'll stop now.
I was having a bad day out at Jabba's Palace and was just fed up with everything.
Sorry, and tnx.
Everyone has valid opinions but some of them are just diametrically opposing.
I have noticed an obviousshift in goals once someone who is trying to work through DE, or any crafting type profession, hit's Master.
And I think many times it deals with not only pricng and need for money, but also available (discresionary - sp) credits free in the economy.
I hesitate to even mention this. It could be used by some nefarious dev to institute another poorly designed money sink.
Not ALL masters are by default richer And that's the problem with any money sink they've but into the game so far - it hits the rich and the poor equally, not just the rich.
While players are trying to amass the resources, XP and skills necessary to reach master, theirattentions are usually focused on keeping things going without killing themselves playing some 'stupid' game. And depending on their style while playing a game, WILL revolve around money to pay for things like maint and resources or other needed items. So these players will be more conscious of receiving a good payout for the work they're putting into theprofession they've chosen.
Once I see many players hit Master, they drastically drop prices. Sometimes very close to cost. Again, it depends on how they play the game - if they really are interested in becoming stinking rich (a valid goal for some), just having fun, or some point in between.
The disparity between Novice and Master is another issue that I believe needs balancing. But what to do or how to do it has no easy or obvious solution.
When you first begin, many times you're buried under numerous different demands. Once you reach Master, you can relax a little and your focus shifts from getting there, to doing something with it now that you have it.
I don't like to generalize and say that all Masters are rich and all Novices are poor. That may be the case for the majority in any profession. But it's not always true. And I wouldn't want anyone to latch onto this 'fact' and make some knee-jerk reaction that affects the mechanics of the game without addressing both possibilities (rich and poor Novices, rich and poor Masters) and taking them into account when implementing changes in the game.
That's why, while everyone groans at some sort of income tax, I support this solution as a money sink. If you only have 100cr to your name, payyour 2 pence and remain focused on working on your profession. But if you have several million in the game, I think it's only fair to say that you could stand to lose a little of that without it drastically affecting you.
The problems of designing, balancing, and impementing such a system would still have to be handled responsibly.
It would make no sense to hit everyone equally as hard since that would defeat the entire purpose of instituting a money sink that was based off how much money you had. A flat fee would remove money from the game, but notpursue the players who could be viewed as the real 'problem' of having too much money in the game.
What to do if this tax is automatic from your bank and you don't have the funds? How could players hide money to avoid the penalty? What tax rate would be fair and not result in hurting the economy?
Everyone would have their own opinion, but I'm a bit leery of anything that would make the game even harder for players on the low end of the market.
Vampiric_Hoshi wrote:
Using that same logic, you may as well become a tailor to fight too.
You may be on to something. Tailors (and chefs) have no inherent combat skills either, but they must defend themselves while making harvester runs too! Let's help our artisan brothers out by making sure they get effective combat tools as well:
- Tailors should be able to craft high quality towels. When combined with water, you get a very stinging melee weapon on par with none. Soloing stormtroopers will be a snap: "Stop! You are under arrest...ow!...Surrender immediately...ouch!...Cease your attack now...ow!..."
- Certain styles of clothing from past decades will make any MOB cringe, letting you just get on your way and out of their sight.
- Hats have many potential ranged capabilities. Think Oddjob in Goldfinger.
- And for chefs...nothing beats a good cream-filled pie when you come face-to-face with lag-spawned enemies.
- Tomatos offer good ranged weapon support. Plus, they cast dizziness on your opponent, as he wonders if that's his own blood or tomato juice that just stained his composite armor.
- Melons, already an integral part of the game, will make an excellent chef grenade.
Vampiric_Hoshi wrote:
Creature Handlers were designed to tame dangerous pets and gain abilities to use those pets in combat.
Droid Engineers were designed to build and sell droids.
The only comparrison between these two elite professions is that they both involve pets.
We ARE NOT a combat profession. We ARE NOT a combat support profession. We ARE a crafting profession.
Well, there ARE more comparisons between CH and DE and there will be MORE comparisons if they do implement the combat droids in Jan or Feb like they say they're planning on doing.
DE will build and sell c-o-m-b-a-t droids. That will make them a combat support profession.
ALL of the arguments I've seen that 'we're just crafters' merely rely on symantics to make a point - we've never built combat droids before, now we will.
So how do we deal with it? Arguing about it will not change the fact.
I don't want to hijack this thread and turn it into another combat droid discussion - let's go start another thread to do that.
I am new to the game but already see the things you guys are talking about. I agree with both sides of this arguement. While ch should not be the predominant class and have so much power, the introduction of a super powerfull combat droid would just be giving charactors another pet to use. The fact is that the majority of players in the game want to play soley to be the most powerfull in the game! I may not be as brushed up on my starwars, but I have seen all the movies and in everyone, the droid primarily assists the human owner.
That being said, for the combat issue a combat droid should have abilities that help it's OWNER in combat and not be just another item that can kill storm troopers or whatever!
Here is an example: owner pistoleer has robby the robot 9000 combat droid in which say he links to it with a chip in his head that allows the droid tointerface its superior targeting system with the owners brainto guide pistoleer owners hand for a more accurate shot.
Wait here is a better one! Robby the robot 9000 combat droid has an emp pulse module that has an area effectthat reducesenemy blaster effectiveness for x amount of time.
or some sort of concussion pulse that disorients enemies
Do you see what I am getting at? The combat droid would still have some abillity to fight itself, but in essence provides the owner with all sorts of different advantages to combat thus adding better and more complex strategy to the game and more FUN!
Make combat droids unique not equal to or greater than other pets! That is my point!
!
I became DE to do three things and three things only:
1) Make Droids.
2) Sell Droids.
3) Get rich doing it.
So far I have done all three. And before your brain fires off its standard electrical synapses forming a thought, NO I do not put a ridiculous markup on my droids, and NO I dont charge more than most people. In fact I charge less that most... and if people would realize that an economy in-game is the same as an economy in RL then they might actually have no trouble with paying harvester maintenance and what not. I mean, the basic rules still apply.
A) Gather materials needed to produce a product, however you can. Sample, harvesters, whatever.
B) Make product, and keep a decent amount of stock in. If youhave nothing to sell, you wont sell. Simple. If you walked into a large grocery store and saw they only had a few cans of soup and a couple carrots... you'd walk right back out. Lost business, just like that.
C) Keep competitive prices. Dont charge through the room and dont do bargain basement prices... either way leads to lost business and no credits. Find a happy medium for your pricing.
D) Give good customer service. If a person has a question about a droid, or how a part works, take a few seconds and tell them. Don't be all snotty superior in your reponse... be nice about it, and show them you want to help.
E) Word of mouth. I dont mean hawking in the spamport. I mean that when you sell a droid, tell the person that if they need anything else to send you a mail, as well as thier friends. Build a good reputation for treating customers right, and providing them with a quality product and service that will keep them coming back.
F) Keep a clean shop. I can't stress this enough. If your shop has extra weapons and imperial orders laying all over the place or 3000 torches lining the walls, people will walk out, because they think its somebodys house instead of a shop. Keep it organized, clean, and business will come in.
Thats really about it. Follow those simple basic easy-to-do rules, and you'll do just fine.