Droid Engineer Archive

Hello fellow DE's.

I placed a "stupid" personality chip in a Protocol droid a couple weeks back. I've had him out from time to time hoping to see some sort of random comments or speech. Well, I haven't seen him say a single thing at all. When using the converse programming functions, the only thing he does say when you teach him a command is "Okey Dokey" and that's it.

I also have an old Probot who had a personality chip installed (way back when they could be installed in Probots) and he does say things randomly and without prompting by me (randomly in combat, after I speak a command, etc).

So, my questions are: Have anyone of you noticed certain personality chips not working or not working in certain droids? What are your general thoughts on these chips?

I recently made a protocol droid for myself, and used a 'slang' personality chip. I primarily just wanted to see what it'd be like.

Well, the droid was essentially mute for two days, and then suddenly it 'sprang to life' on me, but ONLY while I'm 'converse'ing with it. Primarily, when I program commands it says things like 'OK now, what d'ye be wainting me to learn?' -- Yes, with 'wainting' misspelled like that.

It is frustrating that we cannot craft and try out all the different personalities (or module combinations for that matter)on droids without destroying or giving away some due to the 5 droids in datapad limit. But truth be told, the conversing droids rarely speak unless you are programming them. We rarely, if ever, need to give them a verbal command unless we are having them patrol. They cannot repair, so there is no verbal repair command for them to respond to. Mainly the only command you will normally use is for 'follow me', and as the droid does this automatically anyway unless stuck or told to stay, this is a moot issue. The cool comments that the probots would use (back when personality chips could be installed in them) were usually during battle. Since none of the conversing droids can fight, we don't get any of this, and they all seem... pretty dull and lifeless.

One way the devs could fix this would be to have conversing droids react to overheard 'key words'. Or the devs could give us talking battle droids. I don't see either of these happening anytime soon if ever.

Panatlee Thillik'arzk

Master Droid Engineer/Sniper/Master Artisan

Lowca, Naboo -- South of Theed at -4283, 3379
Home of the Tribute to Master Bounty Hunters

"I am not a Droid Engineer, but I play one on Lowca"

Another thing that I think would be useful is if 'converse' worked for ANYONE on talking droids, and the script you got changed depending on your status with regard to the owner of the droid.

So strangers might get a simple greeting with information about a shop, while regular customers might get a list of specials, and actual friends and PA members of the owner could get yet another set of conversations they could have with the droid.

Of course, it would be nice if those conversations could lead somewhere, such as to the droid offering information from data storage, items from item storage, or simply to lead the person to a pre-designated location.