Droid Engineer Archive
Thread: Please help me understand your change of heart.
Mapai wrote:
One nice compromise would be to give Master DE the use of 1 DE specific Combat droid(could also be used as a DH). The DH proffesion could still have more types and more power droids so combat people would not flock to DE to gain the use of the DE combat droid, as those points would be better spent on DH. But the DE still have something Cool that we can use.
I disagree. In poll after poll and discusion after discusion, the majority of DEs have stated that they want to be able to use all the droids they can build, except fro skill-based droids like BH droids or medic droids (unless they have those skills). Whether we get an extra, DE-onlydroid is another matter and not as important as beign able to use and sell ALL of our droids.
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Keep
/bow
Thunderheart wrote:
Well, I'd like to understand the change of heart.
That's the point of this entire episode. There never was a change of heart. I'm sad to say that this entire situation is an example of how poor our communication has been on our future.
We've asked for a Dev to come help us figure out what's best with actual constructive two-way communication. Now you know the reason why.
This issue has been beat to death on the DE forums, since launch, and has been summarily put down as a "bad idea". I simply do not see how you could have thought that what we told you was "We want a Droid Handler profession". Can you explain that please?
Once again, you come and ask US to tell YOU information. However, we DEs enjoy very little in the way of constructive information from the Devs TO us regarding the different scenarios.
Was it not clear to you when Drashk point blank told you that that '85% of the DEs will hate this idea'?!? How was that not properly telling you our feelings on this idea?
How could you possibly misunderstand or misread that?!?
I honestly think you owe the DE community a response to this, man. You have lost a LOT of "face" with the profession regulars now...I can assure you. I'd hope that you (or someone else) would step up to the plate and explain this in DETAIL.
Way back when, when I asked, DE's proclaimed that they were a "crafting professions" and not a "combat professions".
Okay...and how did you take that to mean "We want a Droid Handler profession"?!?!
It's true that we are a crafting profession. So are Combat Medics, technically. They craft.
It's not as black-and-white as you paint it. I think that right there shows that we need serious, two-way discussion with the "strike team" over our future.
I mean no disrespect here but...I find it hard to see how you can empathize with our situation, given that you are (mostly) a Commando. I tend to believe that leads you to view our status with a fairly limited outlook. In a way, you don't (or can't) understand the mindset of a crafter, since that's not your playstyle.
What we want: We want to make droids that ALL players can use. It does NOT make sense that player would have to be "special" (i.e. use skills) to use a droids. That is the entire point of droid. One doesn't require any special training to use them. You program it....it follows commands. It's as simple as that.
In addition, we find it very strange that we'd not be able to use the very droids that we can create. How much sense does that make? Does it seem right to you that we'd be able to craft ALL of the 40-something parts that are needed to make droids, operate a factory and harvesters, select a proper configuration of droid modules and armor, program it and NOT be able to operate the very product we build?
I know that others will give a better explanation of the overall communities viewpoint here but I can safely say that DEs want to make better droids for ALL players...not just for the special few.
Correspondent aside, this opinion was driven by post on this board. I see a big change of heart now.
Then this simply proves that you have not been paying attention properly. I fear that you've sort of read what you wanted to see/hear, instead of listening to (and truly understanding) the issues and arguments that have been put forth.
I simply do not see how you could have taken any of the posts in the last 6 months to mean: "We want a Droid Handler profession".
We want to craft droids. We want to be able to use all of the droids we make. We want all players to be able to use all of the droids we make.
This is what makes sense for the profession and what makes sense for the very definition of what "droids" do.
What's your motivation?
Just a quick note...
I'd be very careful, in the short term, about coming to this forum and asking for yet MORE information on "what we want". If you really HAVE been paying attention, you'd know that this is something we hate more than anything (since this is basically how we've been treated since launch).
Do yourself a favor and do what you tell us players to do...
Read the stickies.
I mean no disrespect with that comment. I just happen to believe that you CAN do this. It will help.
This is an important thread. Off topic posts and rants will be deleted.
Quick notes:
- There is no change of heart. We have NEVER wanted a DH profession (I think that is known now).
- We are a crafting profession that wishes to make/use their products and have those products be usable by ALL players.
- We want droid design and use to make sense.
- We do not want the DE profession turned into a new CH-style profession. We do not want ANY profession turned into a CH-style droid profession.
- We do not require droids that are ultra-uber and can be used to take over the galaxy.
- We DO want more powerful combat droid options (modules, new chassis, whatever)
- We DO want more options for use for other professions (Entertainers, Smugglers, etc.)
Most importantly...
We do not want the appearance (or the fact) of being misled, miscommunicated with or ignored. The best way to avoid this is for someone, anyone, to actually communicate TO us constructively and engage us...to aid us in collectively designing the best possible outcome for our profession's future. This, as a side-line, will help to shape better droid use for all professions.
Respectfully,
OrionsByte wrote:
It seems to me that what happened was this: the DEVs, from one meeting to the next, discussed the possibility of higher-level combat droids. Eventually the concensus was formed that there were two ways to go: either make the new combat droids DE-only, or keep DE as a crafting only class and introduce a new class for handling droids. At this point it's choice A or choice B, so they bring it to the DE community andask, "Do you want to be a crafting class, or a combat/crafting class?" Our response was, as TH stated, that we mostly want to stay a crafting class. So, based on the DEVs previous discussions, they say, "I guess that means we're doing a DH class."
The problem here is that while we were discussing the problem, we were also discussing solutions to that problem, and that part seems to have been overlooked. Furthermore, I think that the above question was posed to us without fully communicating the ramifications.
Now obviously I'm making a lot of suppositions here, but I doubt I'm far off. FWIW I agree with TH that certs would be abused somehow by someone (and once ONE person does it, everyone will be doing it) but it's upsetting that so much discusssion was overlooked.
I couldn't have said it better, except for the last paragraph.
With any new system, ANY, there will be exploits and bugs. So, you fix them.
If people were allowed to farm 25K credit missions with no risk for weeks, I don't see the problem of the CHANCE of someone getting too many powerful droids.
Observation:
We now haveThunderheart (whom I still support for trying)scratching his head trying to figure all this out.
A whole class scratching their heads wondering where the mis-communication came from.
And basicDroid Engineer issues going six more months without being fixed.
Stormnight-Droid Engineer-Gorath-Rori
Thunder.... How about you give a brife outline of the Droid Handler profession perhaps in the In concept forum.
If Droid Certs speread throughout the combat trees is impossable as you say, i would prefer a DH over rolling combat droid certs into our profession.
I don't think the majority of wanted droid certs spread in every few lines of any marksman skill. I think as long as the droid worked well a diffrent combat Droid certs at Master Smuggler, Master Bounty Hunter and Master Commando would please us.
After all you all are looking for ways to motivate people to master professions instead of dabbling and creating a template.
Might I suggest, TH, that DE's, being the ultimate designers and manufacturers of droids should easily be able to control their own creations. Adding aDH class, for those who want to control droids without actually making them, sounds fine as well.
The obvious argument against this is the comparision thatBE's "make" pets and CH's "control" them, so ergo DE's should "make" droids and DH's should "control" them.
But we are talking apples and oranges here. Droids, unlike creatures, are programmed. There should be no "skill" involved in controlling them except to understand the programmed commands, a skill which all DE's inherentlly know because "they" actually programmed them. They know every nut and bolt. DH's only need learn the skills to change or invoke the programmed commands.
So, I would suggest that yes, DE's be allowed to control their own creations (and in fact due to the fact and to recognize the skill points spent, might even be the very best at controlling them) and that DH's be an added class that can also control droids.
Sure, it's different from the BE/CH relationship, but let's bear in mind, droids are not creatures.
Would allowing DE's to make and control droids imbalance the game? I don't believe so. There are those who like to craft, and those that do not. In other words, there will be some who become DE/Combatants, and those that will become DH/Combatants, but in both cases, similar points will have been spent.
To require the vast majority polledthat like to both tinker out their droids, and also use them, to master 2 professions, is going to be stifling.
Lodacai
Thanks TK421,
More eloquently put than I managed. Hopefully we can get some clear and consise communication BOTH ways, instead of these decrees on high.
I'm sorry for the previous vitrol, but what's the point in having profession forums if the communication there is ignored for half-baked ideas that have no bearing in the actual game?
How many of the devs who have proposed the DH cert system have played a crafter?
How many have played a DE for more than a day?
How many actually read and comprehend the forums?
Unless you say a majority, this basically goes to show how out of touch SOE is in reality from its playerbase.
--D'ruk
A) Since the infamous probot nerf there has been lots of talk of more/better combat droids. And this has been across the whole player base.
B) There have been many posts in the DE forum about DE's not wanting to become a combat class, but a crafting class.
C) While the certification system is a good idea, it could be readily abused. And thus for balance reasons it is not fair to put it in.
And so TH did something like A + B + C = some type of new profession. While not what we want, it does make sense how he came to this conclusion.
Now, I don't agree with the idea of a new profession, but I think that something could be reached. Perhaps not making uber combat droids, but rather improving them a little and adding new ones(combat that is), like the Trade Federation battle droids and droiddekkas. Personally I think Squad Leaders should be able to control multiple droids, but I'm not quite sure how to balance it out.
Thunderheart wrote:
Well, I'd like to understand the change of heart.
There never was a "change of heart", I think you just didn't understand what we wanted in the first place.
Way back when, when I asked, DE's proclaimed that they were a "crafting professions" and not a "combat professions". Correspondent aside, this opinion was driven by post on this board. I see a big change of heart now.
There's no question we are a crafting profession. But from a logic standpoint, does it make sense for us to be able to engineer a droid, but not be able to use it? What innate ability does it take to give an order to a droid? Droids are manufactured to follow orders, there is no real skill involved as in training a pet.
What's your motivation?
7 months of a broken profession will kill your motivation (more if you count Beta). Personally, I think DE's deserve a little bit more as we have such a high reliance on Master Artisan parts, that we are practically required to Master Artisan as well as DE. That's potentially 48 fewer skill points that a DE has to spend on a combat class to cover their butt while they are out in the field looking for resources, etc. DE should be able to control a slightly higher level combat droid than the "common man". I'm not asking for level 50 droids, possibly 15-20 or so, or even 2 level 10 droids. (Yes, I realize that this contradicts my earlier thought that it's not difficult to give orders to a droid, but it could be rationalized that a DE would know his droid better than anybody elseand could get more out of it.)
Most DE's (in myopinion, myself included)would be simply happy with more useful everyday droids, like surveying droids, etc, we've put many good ideas out there. Why must this "droid invasion" focus on combat? Make droids more useful to the everyday, casual gamer. Unless you're a crafter or a medical profession, or a BH, droids simply aren't used by the masses, the way other crafting professions wares are (weapons, harvesters, armor, clothing...)
Reaperss wrote:
TH, in case you missed it (you guys obviously don't read our threads) someone posted parts of a thread between you and our correspondent. We KNOW he told you we didn't want this. How coud you possibly be surprised by our reaction.
Yeah, TH we know that Drashk told you -- conservatively -- that you would tick off 85% of the profession with Droid Handler. Turns out it was more like 90%+.
Thunderheart wrote:
Sketh wrote:
This is not a change of heart.
Please see Drashak's cert system proposed here:
http://forums.station.sony.com/swg/board/message?board.id=droid_engineer&message.id=52473
THAT is what we wanted, not a droid handler class.
That is probably not possible, though I will find out.
Thunderheart, it most certainly IS possible... How do I know this? Just ask Holocron:
Holocron said: "We've talked about having a "Droid handler" profession that would serve as the CH equivalent, and then DE wouild be the equivalent of BE. There's also just rolling the certs into the DE track itself."
http://forums.station.sony.com/swg/board/message?board.id=Development&message.id=502906&highlight=droid+cert#M502906