Droid Engineer Archive
Thread: Why do yall bother? Do I have this right?
Ok I am very new to the game. I have been playing about a week and I am coming up on engineering 4. I really wanted to be a DE, so before I invested the credits and time to the skill I wanted to check out the forums.
I had noticed in my limited gametime that there are hardly any Des compaired to the other professions, especially CHs. I wondered why cause droids kick arse in all the movies. So just by skimming over yalls posts I have come to the following conclusions, and I want yall to verify/correct them if you feel they are incorrect.
1. DE is quite possibly the most difficult skill to master.
2. DE requires tons of resources. This game seems to have many credit sinks and not many ways to get them besides lame job terminals. ACK!
3. All droids suck atm. There has been one named combat droid that is OK from what I read but generally too fragile compared to the creatures available to CHs. There has also been mention of a Surgeon droid that is ok but not really needed for anything.
4. Droids for the most part don’t sell very well. From most posts I have seen it seems you have to be at the beck and call of all buyers and just sorta get lucky to make a sale.
5. The Devs do not have any plans in motion to make Des even close to CHs. So why in the world would anyone want to be a DE? (kinda like the title of my post) when with the same effort I can be a CH with less effort and get a much better payoff at the end. Not to mention that creatures sell quite well on the market. At least its my opinion that all the suggested fixes for the class are quite lame. The fact that they are not including the speeder/bike making skill in DE astonishes me as it would pretty much balance out the CH and DE class…at least if its as bad as everyone here is saying.
So if I have this right why the hell would anyone want to be a DE? Am I right on these points or are there actually some good things about being a DE? If so what are they?
Thanks in advance
Shakz
Your choice to come to the forums is both a blessing and a curse. 
You haven't read everything, though. Changes are coming with the next push (January). You are actually coming aboard at a good time. Grind your way up, learn what you can make that is useful (hopefully making some sales too), and you'll be good to go when the new stuff hits.
Shakz wrote:
1. DE is quite possibly the most difficult skill to master.
Not really, architect takes more resources, armorsmith takes more time, and BH/commando take mroe skills/time. Trying to master it without grinding on the other hand, its tough but not impossible.
2. DE requires tons of resources. This game seems to have many credit sinks and not many ways to get them besides lame job terminals. ACK!
You get them by selling the droids you make. Yes, on you're way up if you go the grinding route this doesn't work too well, then it does take some credits.
3. All droids suck atm. There has been one named combat droid that is OK from what I read but generally too fragile compared to the creatures available to CHs. There has also been mention of a Surgeon droid that is ok but not really needed for anything.
Droids aren't nearly as usefull as they could be, but they will benefit just about every profession out there (you just have to show them why). The primary thing they provide for people is mobility, the ability to craft/heal on the move, without having to be tied down to one particular location. THe probot (the combat droid you mentioned) isn't really fragile, and will take more damage than any of the non-CH pets out there right now (though it doesn't look like it since you can't heal them). With the upcomming creature balance these will be the tank to have for non-CH's (aside from another player, which is how it should be). They have 40% medium armor, and only about 100 points of HAM less than the CL10 pets everyone will be restricted to, which have no armor.
4. Droids for the most part don’t sell very well. From most posts I have seen it seems you have to be at the beck and call of all buyers and just sorta get lucky to make a sale.
This depends on a couple things, location, prices, and you're quality as a businessman. I personally can't stop selling them, but I know other DE's who have trouble selling one or two a day. (again, this is from a masters prospective, before you get there sales are hard to come by).
5. The Devs do not have any plans in motion to make Des even close to CHs. So why in the world would anyone want to be a DE? (kinda like the title of my post) when with the same effort I can be a CH with less effort and get a much better payoff at the end. Not to mention that creatures sell quite well on the market. At least its my opinion that all the suggested fixes for the class are quite lame. The fact that they are not including the speeder/bike making skill in DE astonishes me as it would pretty much balance out the CH and DE class…at least if its as bad as everyone here is saying.
Thisis morea matter of what you want to do, if you want to make droids, be a DE, if you want to kill stuff and be good in combat, be a CH. They aretwo completely seperate and distinct classes. As for the CH's having a good market to sell pets on, with the new patch that market will drop right out fromunder them, as they'll really only be able to sell toother CH's that are too lazy to tame their own pets.
So if I have this right why the hell would anyone want to be a DE? Am I right on these points or are there actually some good things about being a DE? If so what are they?
It depends on what kind of player you are as to weather there are any good things or not. If you enjoy helping people, making people happy, working with droids, and solving problems (a.k.a. finding ways to work around all the bugs and quirks) then its a great profession. If you want to go out hunting all the time and participate in a lot of the combat based parts of the game (pvp, GCW, hunting groups etc) then this won't help you (though you'll still have plenty of skillpoints to pick up another profession).
DarthBukai wrote:
When you finally make MDE, your RL johnson grows to 16 inches. Though this can be a problem for female players, I've had no complaints.
Woot!
My real answer:
We got into this because we initially beleived 'droids would be an important, integral and nigh indispensable part of life in SWG. We wanted to perform the service that would make these little jewels available and viable to the community, thus serving said community. We stick with it because we have hope for the future.
When you finally create a droid without bugs, a droid with all the bells and whistles, it's a joy to watch them do whatever they can.
All that and the fact that making MDE makes your RL johnson grow to 16 inches.
As for CH's: the reason there are so many of them and the profession is so fun to play for so many people seems to be fairly simple, IMO: For better or worse, CH and player cities, appears to be the thing that the majority of the Dev teams resources were focused on during the late summer and fall of this year. It follows immediately that the profession is going to be fun to play for a lot of people because that is where development time and resources have been spent in recent months. Or so it seems to me as a new player looking at the recent history of updates.
I'm not faulting that. They have to approach one thing at a time or everything will take longer to implement. This I understand. Tthough I do find it odd that a SW RPG would focus on wild animals before focusing on droids. /puzzle. My only hope is that the reason droids have been pushed back is because they know that one will be harder and wanted to do the easy one (CH) first.
One can hope. And wait. I guess.
Well when I first started thinking about becomeing a DE I had one think in mind for the mastering of this skill.......
http://www.starwars.com/databank/droid/droideka/index.html
As has already been said all over these forums...this would make an excellent droid for DEs only.
Thank you all for your replys so far. Coming in from the ground lvl I am really interested in yalls input. I will most likely still become a DE and just revert the skill if it pans out to be a total loss (fixes are lame)
In other games I have played a nerfed profession that starts at release normally stays that way for a very very very long time...1year plus. I am really hopeing thats not the case with this game.
Shakz
Shakz wrote:
1. DE is quite possibly the most difficult skill to master.
2. DE requires tons of resources. This game seems to have many credit sinks and not many ways to get them besides lame job terminals. ACK!
3. All droids suck atm. There has been one named combat droid that is OK from what I read but generally too fragile compared to the creatures available to CHs. There has also been mention of a Surgeon droid that is ok but not really needed for anything.
4. Droids for the most part don’t sell very well. From most posts I have seen it seems you have to be at the beck and call of all buyers and just sorta get lucky to make a sale.
5. The Devs do not have any plans in motion to make Des even close to CHs. So why in the world would anyone want to be a DE? (kinda like the title of my post) when with the same effort I can be a CH with less effort and get a much better payoff at the end. Not to mention that creatures sell quite well on the market. At least its my opinion that all the suggested fixes for the class are quite lame. The fact that they are not including the speeder/bike making skill in DE astonishes me as it would pretty much balance out the CH and DE class…at least if its as bad as everyone here is saying.
1. Really depends on what is difficult for you. For me, Brawling is insanely boring and 100 times more "difficult" than grinding on ADFU's all day.
2. Yes, a "crap ton" of resources, as my friend says. It's still less than Architect (I believe) but still fairly steep.
3. I'd hate to say that "droids suck", but they're not without use either. Yes, most droid models and configurations have little or no use right now, but it's the promise of the future that keeps many of us DE's in the game. One day..... droids will do MUCH more than they do now, we hope.
4. They're not high sellers, because most people understand that the products aren't terribly useful or effective. Improve their usefullness and effectivity ***DEVS***, and they'll sell more. The ball is in the Dev's court right now, and we're waiting for them to pass it back (or miserably fumble, like usual).
5. Heh... um, not going to defend the Devs here. They've proposedneeded fixesand never made them; they've claimed that bug fixes were "the easy things" and then turn around and say that some problems "just can't be hotfixed", they've congratulated us on feedback given, then come back and say "more feedback", then want everything funneled through the correspondent, then claim they don't have enough info, ad infinitum. Why would I stay in DE? Cause droids *are* Star Wars, to me... not cowardly gurrecks. I'm not interested in power or a bigger Poke-Pe|\|is, so I'm not a CH and don't care to own a creature pet. I'm sticking around because the Devs have repeatedly, openly, and vehemently stated that fixes, changes, and improvements are right around the corner. If they pull though on these promised improvements, then I'll pull my finger back from the cancel button, cause that's where it is right now. We shall see.....
