Droid Engineer Archive
Thread: After Reading the Posts this Morning, a Compromise Proposal
I just want to point out something about the trade federation guys...as everyone seems to like using them as the reasoning for letting non-combatants have droideka (etc)
They didn't control the droideka - the ship they were on did. Remember that Anakin blew up that big ship? Thats what was controlling the droids, not the trade federation guys directly.
Of course the improved droids in AoTC had some basic AI integrated so they could fight simply without the control ship. So I'm not saying that we can't have nice combat droids, just wanted to point that out.
The single branch profession seems like a good compromise to me; you can, as has been said, always add another branch later.
Pre-reqs....hmm. I'd say that Engineering IV or perhaps any of the 'combat xp' branches in the elite professions.
Alternatively makeit without prerquisites but just need a lot of combat xp to progress (along the lines of an elite profession's branch rather than ranged support). That would allow everyone to have better combat droids but effectively prevent low level characters having high level droids. I can't see a mere marksman getting too far into the branch, simply because by the time they have amassed the needed xp they will have also developed more weapons skills. The only thing is this idea is pretty nasty on crafters - needing maybe 500k combat xp to master without any combat skills would be difficult. Still your average weaponsmith would only need to invest 5 SPs to get a level 15 droid which would be a more than adequete bodyguard. Controlling a small squad in combat should require some experience of combat.
I guess I'd see the mini tree something like:
Novice Combat Droid Control (+ 5 CD levels) 6 SPs 500 Apprentice xp
Intermediate CDC (+5 CD levels, +1 Combat Droid Control) 5 SPs 60k Combat xp
Expert CDC (+5 CD levels) 4 SPs 85k Combat xp
Advanced CDC (+5 CD levels) 3 SPs 120k Combat xp
Master CDC (+5 CDC, +1 CDC) 2 SPs 150k Combat xp
EagleShard,
thanks for the SW history lesson
. I guess my point was the merchants relied upon the battle droids as their method of combat, although the merchants themselves were not trained in combat.
I see this as similar to what SWG merchants would do. Personally, I'm a crafter (Karana)with two combat professions, just to defend myself when I'm attackedin the field. I may be able to drop some combat skills now that we have vehicles which can outrun aggressive mobs, but I'd love to be able to rely on a hybrid combat/medic droid that I crafted to protect me, at least long enough for me to escape!
They shouldimplement Droid Handling XP, just like Creature Handling XP. If they didn't, and just used Combat XP, thentoprogress up the droid line you would never need to call a single droid, since you could just get Combat XP with your weapon.
Care should be taken to make sure droids aren't just robotic creatures.
Ywi wrote:
5. Proposals that this mini-prof have prereqs like engineering or some other skill tree
I think it should remain without prereqs except either mastering an elite/hybrid combat profession, or mastering DE (or any elite profession as discussed in #3). The reason is I want to include every combat profession. Again, with BH only having 33 points left, getting the engineering line would leave them with 4 points (that's a pretty skimpy mini-profession).
I must reiterate that I have issue with this point. Why are we reserving combat droids for combatants, when it is not the combatants that would make the most of combat droids? It is not only possible, but probable that a well to do politician would use a droid as a bodyguard. No talkback, no paycheck... But he still has to learn the basics of droid handling to program and maintain the droid. Even autonomous droids in the movie required assistance to perform maintenance and repair. And while there may exist a Droid repair&program-o-matic 5000 that requires no skill to use, it would simply be too combat upsetting to let anyone use a powerful combat droid. There must be some investment.
Also... why should we be obliged to make sure the droid handling mini-profession is available in its entirety to BH? Regularly in the films, we see BH as stealthy individuals. And the game should maintain that status. Sending a Droideka or rabid Protocol droid after their mark is in no way stealthy. I can see a BH using lesser droids, primarily as distraction, but a full blown assault droid? 33 points is simply too low of a cost to justify the use of heavy assault droids. Novice CH alone requires 49 skill points, and even then they don't get much for that.
My envisionment of a possible implementation... take with a grain of salt if you wish.
Droid Technician (not a full profession, let's call it a proficiency if you wish, as it is only a basic skill set.)
Novice(15 skill points) +2 Droid Use(DU)
2 lines(2,3,4,5 skill point boxes respectively) for a total of 28 skill points. Each line gives +9 total DU(maybe 1,2,3,3?)
So, "mastering" the Droid Tech proficiency allows you to use 30 CL combat droids at the cost of 15+28=43 skill points. Respectable though not insane.
But, DE's need their own bonuses too, since while they are primarily focused on assembly, a certain level of familiarity with maintenance, programming, and repair will obviously come as a result of that. A DE might get +2 DU at MDP, +3DU at MDCT, +2DU at MDR and +3 at MDBP for a nice clean additional 10 CL levels. Possibly another +5DU at MDE, such that a "master" DT and MDE could use a 45 CL droid. Respectable, but not a small investment either.
At this point I hear you saying, "But wait Tick, for135 skill points I can only use a 45 CL droid, when a MCH can use a 70 CL Kimobunny for only 106 skill points!" This is true, but there is a big difference that is I feel inline with the Star Wars universe, and that is availability. In this system, a CL30 droid requires a significantly lower expenditure of skill points than a comparable CL30 pet. So what choice do you make? Get a CL30 droid with mod bays that you can fully program on your own for 43 skill points, or a CL30 pet that has no mod bays, and you can't even teach it half of its commands for a minimum of 63(I think)skill points? That alone right there is 20 skill points. That's a novice skill and 2 boxes, and any medic who buys stim B's can tell you what that is worth.
So what we have here is a system where a very nice combat droid is available to anyone for a smaller skill point cost than an equivalent pet. This translates into a larger potential customer base than CH's, which is good since DE's are artisans, and simply put CH are not.
1. Make /register a command available to DE's at garages. Most of them are hard to find and there are few of them in the first place. After registering, the DE would have access to the newly added public weapon/droid crafting station and get a bonus to repair much like the doctor at a med center. Also provides a money sink because a percentage of the repair fee charged would go to the garage for facility use.
2. Either go with the mini profession model or add it to the existing hybrid profession trees. Give novice combat droid control to the novice of an elite profession and add bonuses and upgrade certs as they progress up the trees. When master is reached give an extra combat droid. Total of 2 combat body droids for all elite professions with the exception of squad leader(I'll get to that next)
3. Squad leaders get a total of 5 combat droids. Sounds good to me and besides...they suck and need some help. Say 1 droid at novice SL, 1 at the top of each of the 4 skill trees in SL and 1 more at master.
Before you get all bent out of shape about the SL bit, let me add this. Each character would have a max combat droid cl to have out at once. Say that MSL has a max of 300 TOTAL cl pool. So if a droidika had a cl of 60, then 5 droidicas are able to be out at once. As the cl gets lower because of lower lvl droids ONLY SL may have more than 2 out at once. This would eliminate dabbling in SL for more combat droids by placing the extra droids at the tops of the trees.
You'll notice that I was specific the whole time in saying combat droids, med and crafter chasis driods don't seem to enter into the current debate at all with the exception of stairs and being able to call them inside.
Any suggestions are taken, insults to anyones intelligence are ignored. They are just suggestions for the devs after all.
OOPS, posted to wrong thread/forum.....
OK, so as many of us have been saying from the beginning, according to TH's post in the Weekly Roundtable Discussion, http://forums.station.sony.com/swg/board/message?board.id=in_live&message.id=1743#M1743.
ANY proposal that will be concidered MUST take these points into account:
AdlerTagmann wrote:
This idea is a good compromise.
I think making the mini droid tree available to MDEs is a good idea.
Also allow all players to have ONE non combat capable droid out in addition to their allowed combat droids. MDEs could have 2 non combat droids out at a time.
Just some thoughts
Thunderheart wrote:
Secondly, handling droids is bigger than a single tree, but smaller than a whole profession. Technologically whether its 1 tree, 2 trees or the typical 4 trees is going to have a bearing on things (as it relates to coding the changes).
Secondly, handling droids is bigger than a single BRANCH, but smaller than a whole TREE. Technologically whether its 1 BRANCH, 2 BRANCHES or the typical 4 BRANCHES going to have a bearing on things (as it relates to coding the changes).
Don't confuse people any more than they already ARE......
Ywi,
What's thereasoning behindmaking mastery of any elite profession (whether limited to combat or not) a prerequisite for controlling higher level droids? I'm leaning towards your other suggestion, of using App XP or Crafting XP orCombat XP (crafters could earn this slowly using low level combatdroids and creatures, or evenwieldingCDEF weapons).
The most similar profession is Creature Handling, imho. There's a reasonable barrier to entry; you need to spend 49 points to get novice CH, and at that point you can still only control CLVL 15 pets (which actually aren't that bad). So in CH's case, you've only gotten scouting experience (not even trapping XP), and yet now you're certified to usebetter combat pets. Droid handler could be similar. You'd naturallyneed Engineering IV and some other line, either from Artisan or somewhere else.
CLVL 30 is very high as you daid; consider that a Graul Mauler is lvl 31 or so...
If a compromise is to be reached I think this is an awesome idea. One thing is how many points it would take to complete because some hybrid professions IE bounty hunter, have very few points at the end of mastering. I would love this mini-profession if it took so few skill points that any master elit fighter or hybrid fighter could get it.
I am 110% wholeheartedly against an entire new tree taking the normal amount of points as I think it would make people just not buy the new droids.