Droid Engineer Archive
Thread: Centralized Droid Issues (17/11/03 8:16pm PST)
This list is updatedas neededand is meant to supplement the work done by the current correspondant and provide an idea of where this profession currently stands. Please read it over and provide any information you have regarding any of these issues, or any new issues you may have discovered.
I am a Master Droid Engineer on Bloodfin (Lime Akob). I also participated in the beta as a DE and bring a lot of knowledge of the profession from those days. I also read just about every single post in the DE forum and have a good idea of where this profession stands. However, I am one person and need your help to make sure that we've got all the real bugs nailed down, so we don't have DEVs chasing issues that don't exist due to confusion on our part.
Many, many, many thanks and respect to all those who have contributed to this list and to the Droid Engineer profession in general. Thanks to Sin (our correspondant) for continuing to sticky this thread for all to see and read and learn from... And my personal thanks to Tyim for starting this thread during beta. Special thanks to any dev that cares to respond to this post.
1.Recent Updates
2.Bugs
3.Uncertainties
4.Dev Issues
5.Wishlist
1. Recent updates
A.Edited skills bug to reflect recent changes.
B.Removed Droid Deed issue with the bazaar.
C.New dev promise added.
2. Bugs still in evidence
A.Droids are not giving any UXP.
B.Droid names use the standard name filter.Droids should use a modified name filter that allows for numbers in the name.
C.Droids with no attack capabilities none the less have attack speeds and damage base modifiers in the datapad.
D.Resource properties and experimentation on droid parts has no noticeable effect on final droid.There is no point to experiment either on droid components or the final product.
E. Droids often stop following without reason. This is a generic pet problem as it happens to all pets, not just droids.Pets seem toget stuck on invisible zone boundries.Walking up to about 10-20m from thepet and re-issuing a 'follow' command fixes it (most of the time).
F.Item Storage Module 2s come out as Data Module 2s during the assembly stage. What you seem to get at the end is a Data Module 2. This is only a NAME problem. The module is said to function as it should - as an ItemStorage Module 2.
G.Multiple crafting stations in a single droid breaks the crafting modules in the droid. Only one of the modules seems to work when this happens. Crafting modules also seem to break when the droid's crafting field intersects crafting fields from other droids orstationary crafting stations.
H.EXPLOIT: Cluster modules not only fit into cluster module sockets, they fit into service module sockets.This allows cluster modules to fit into cluster modules ad infinitum.Clusters should only fit in cluster sockets. Otherwise you're further exploiting the idea that the droid frame used is irrelevant.
I.Droid Customizationskill onlygoes to +64 at Master.
J.Repairmodules do not functionat all when placed in an LE Repair droid or Power droid.
K.Medical modulesaffect the effectiveness of stimpacks. Reports say that a stimpack is more effective when a medical module-equipped droid is nowhere to be seen (unless it contains a level 6 module).
L.Some experimental values for droids and droid components are always 0% regardless of the resources used. If they're going to bealways 0%, don't show them.
M.Droid deeds need to show ALL the modules installed and any important properties associated with those modules.
N.EXPLOIT: By telling a droid to stay, running 800m (need to cross a server zone?) or so away and calling another droid, you can effectively call all your droids at once.
O.Droid Storage Compartments use Artisan Experimentation instead of Droid Experimentation. It's a DE craft, it should use DE skills, not Artisan skills.
P.Item storage modules do not work with Surgical Droids (basic and advanced). The option to use item storage is not available in the radial menu.
Q.Droid customization isborked. No xp is gained from colouring droids, the colours don't always hold. R# units have random colours when they are first tamed and randomly change until the droid is customized.
R.Droid customization tools give General Crafting xp instead of Droid Crafting xp when crafted.
S.Droids suck batteries like there's no tomorrow ever since they no longer recharge on store. Please find a happy medium.
T.After calling or storing a droid, the datapad radial menu doesn't immediately update to reflect the status of the droid, causing the store item to appear after storing the droid. This seems to be a general radial menu problem with 'optional' items in the menu.
U.Armor resists sometimes degrade.The armor resist changes to a vulnerability and it isn't just visual.
V.Crates of droid batteries don't tell us how many charges the batteries in the crates have until you remove them from the crate. Buyer beware until this is fixed.
3. Uncertainties
A.Patrol point list is not saved between store and call, is this by design?
B. Some droids, when given a repair module, gain a 'repair other droid' option in the program menu. Some, when out, add a 'repair' option in the radial menu of OTHER droids. I can only assume that both are possible. 'Converse' droids do not have a programmable 'repair' command, but usually allow the repair option to appear in nearby droids (I've never seen this myself). Seems a little inconsistent.
C. Power droidsare the onlydroid with a non-modular function (ignoring combat capable droids here). Repair droids have had their repair systems removed and changed into a module. R droids have had their crafting functions removed and changed into modules. Power droids remain as an inherent function. Can we get some consistency here?
D. Some of the advanced droids are using 'Converse' instead of 'Program' for programming. Nobody seems to know how to name these droids. Can it be done?
E.Binary Load Lifters (both basic and advanced) seem rather useless. BLLs don't lift any loads, don't have room for any modules. So, from what I'm hearing, they're just a nice droid to look at.
F.Many of the 'level' based service modules stack. However, there arecaps in place which make stacking kind of pointless with thehigher level modules. Also,by stacking lower modules, you can achieve the same effect as a higher level module, reducing the point of using a higher level module. This is further enchanced by the cluster module bug. Also, when crafting the droid, the stacking results show values which do not take the cap into consideration. So a droid while being crafted can show a storage value of 15, but the final storage when the droid is tamed is capped at 10. Which is intended? Stacking or no stacking?
H.Information in the datapad for some droids no longer lists things like the commands programmed for the droid, customization, etc. some of them do. What's the deal?
I.I'm hearing that BH droids aren't using their last charge, making them infinite use. Anyone confirm?
J.Anyone notice if the number of colours available with the customization tool are different than the colours available during crafting?
K.Droidscannot be called while inside acity building.I see no reason to preventus from calling droids in a city. Shouldn't matter if we're in a building or not. If this is intended, then why?
4.Dev Issues
A.Combat modules (usable only by DEs), granting abilities(combat modes, short range blaster, long range blaster, anti-droid reactions, anti-creature reactions).
B.Allow DE's to take out more than one droid at a time (with restrictions).
C.Increase droid repair functionality.Make droid 'healing'work similarlyto the current pet standards.
D.Give droids expendable items to be 'charged' by a repair droid.
E.Add stim and healthpack functionality to medical droids.
F.Increase thenumber of locations wheremedical droids can be called.
G.Allow medical droids to reduce the mind cost of healing.
H.Allow medical droids to auto-stim incapped players.
I.Have all droids take power and wound damage (requires rework of repair droids).
J.Allow power droids to power harvesters (increased maintenance, power droid degrades over time).
K.Allow MSE droids to act as remote bombs.
L.Have more commands trigger animations. Possibly a decoration mode to haveparticular animation repeated. Possibly more personalities.
M.Give protocol droids a stronger role.
N.Add adroid certification system for combat droids.
O.New combat droids in Jan & Feb
5.Wishlist
A.Give us information on droid power levels in the examine window and/or in the datapad. Also,since droid batteries repair mind,how about using mind as the droid's power level indicator? The action pool would also work.
B.Examining droid should give thesame data as in the datapad (for the owner).
C.We really want certain droids to only be able to take certain types of modules. There have been a number of really good posts on this topic, and due to space constraints, I'll leave it at that.
D.Consider droids that can survey and report back on a particular resource. Perhaps even a high-end versionwith the ability to go toother planetsto determine which resources are available.
Ea. Consider droids that can help maintain installations. Senda droid out to pay mantenance. Send a droid out to collect resources. Send a droid out to deliver power. There are many ways to implement this as a viable system.
Eb. Another viable idea for this is to add droid chassis' as optional components in the harvester schematics. One optional slot for mediums and two for heavy harvesters.Allow for apower droid chassis toremove the power requirement at the cost of maintenance and extraction rate. A BLL might increase the extraction rate at the cost of power and maintenance. A repair droid might remove the maintenance requirement at the cost of power and extraction rate.
F. Consider droids that can act as standalone vendors in cities, and/or droids that can act as Barkers. Perhaps even let droids deliver goods to a customer in another city or on another planet.
G. Droids to remember if they were stored or called over a logout. Running around in the middle of nowhere and logging out causes your droid to hide back in the datapad. This means having to go back to town or putting down a camp in order to recall your droid. This is undesireable.
H. Now that perma death has been removed and replaced with the pet 'vitality' system, I have to say kudos for the change. However, it doesn't make sense to give vitality packs to droids. Perhaps a DE equivalent could be used? Same deal, just a different name, and craftable by DEs?
I. There have been several complaints regarding the 5 droid in the datapad limit. While there are some compelling arguments AGAINST this wishlist item, it would be nice to at least have this limit reviewed.
J. Create aslicing module. This module would allow smugglers to get a boost to their slicing ability. We're not interested in putting anyone out of a job here. R2 could slice terminals in the movies, why not our droids?
K.Allow us to drop batteries into the droid's inventoryand have itrecharge itself as needed until the batteries run out.
L.Create an entertainment module akin to the existing medical module to allow entertainers to work ouside of camps, cantinas and hotels. This module would be also level 1-6 with each level giving a little extra boost to the entertainer's skill.
M.Saw a request for a training droid as seen in the movies that 'harasses' its target, pulling aggro. Thisidea is intended togive a little variety to the Novice DE's life. Could also be used as a consumable for training the combat classes.
N.Let usname our droids through the datapad controller. Droids shouldn't need to be 'taught' a name like pets do. The name is programmed into the droid separate from the other commands.
O.Add the creator to the droid view information, not just theowner. When you look at a pistol, you seewho made it. When you look at a droiddeed, you see who made it. When you look at a droid, you SHOULD see who made it.
P.Allow droids to be re-deeded forease of transfer. Since we can only have 5 droids in the datapad, it makes it really tough forDE's to take old droids astrade-ins for upgrades (like a car). We either have to immediately re-sell the droid or delete it. Would make more sense to re-deed the droid so that itcould be sold to another customer as a 'used droid'.
Q.Droid "macros" came up. Let us create macro-like droid programs to have a droid execute a series of commands. Not sure how this would be implemented, but it is an idea.
R.Make the droid deeds show pictures of the droid itself rather than a silly deed icon.
S.Enough with the 'tame' thing... let us 'activate' or simply 'use' the deeds to first create our droids.
T.Review thisdeal withprobots being nerfed because they were too powerful for newbies. In the light of every boy and his dog being able to get something 'better' from a CH, this argument holds less water than an MSE Droid without a storage module. (as it was pointed out to me that an MSE Droid with a level 6 storage module could hold 1M units of water... bigger on the inside than it is on the outside? Don't get me started on that one.)
U.Make BLL Droids useful in 'city planning'. Let us use them to move buildings around without re-deeding. Great for once the player city expansion is released.
V.Please review the customization lifespan. 20 is too short. I have people complaining to me personally that they have to get their customization updated almost daily since they're always calling and storing their droid. I'm sorry, but if my car needed a new paint job because I took it out on the road 20 times, I'd be most displeased.
W. Weapon and armor components have modifiers tovarious properties of the final product. Do the same for droid components... like have the motive system affect the droid's speed.
Please remove 4K
Running mouse destruction is a bad idea in the first place due to the fact that currently the droid will autostore itself upon exploding. This is also a Tiny droid which would mean it does negligable damage to other objects while destroying itself. It's also very unlike star wars. Droids self destruct to destroy themselfs and even data that they carry. The explosive power of the droids needed to be an effective attack would have to be close to packing them as miniture nukes to do decent damage. Even then the droid explodes while the owner is safely a decent distance away.
All the while this brings up crate of mouse bombs and makes everything totally effortless to destroy.
Again I say remove it. It's not realistic.
I think that 2D is not entirely accurate. I have found that since the patch I can only stack modules that I have used high quality materials and successfully experimented on.
I have to have good successes to have 2 medical modules or 2 item modules stack to a level two module. If I don't, then they will not stack.
Granted I have not been a DE for very long, maybe that was the way it was before and I did not notice.
This is something the devs say they are making... good or bad, the issue remains until the devs tell us that they've changed their mind or that they've implemented it. That's the whole point of the dev issues section, it tracks things the devs tell us they're working on. Removing it doesn't make it go away...
ArtyD wrote:
Please remove 4K
Powerlantern wrote:
I think that 2D is not entirely accurate. I have found that since the patch I can only stack modules that I have used high quality materials and successfully experimented on.
I have to have good successes to have 2 medical modules or 2 item modules stack to a level two module. If I don't, then they will not stack.
Granted I have not been a DE for very long, maybe that was the way it was before and I did not notice.
Modules don't exactly stack by level. They seem to stack more according to rating. Two rating 1 modulestend tostack to give rating 2. Yet, for very large values of 1, you can gettwo rating 1 modules to stack and get a rating of 3. However, I'm not sure what this has to do with experimentation not having any real effect on the final droid. Minor effects like these really don't count.
Gorantoth wrote:
F.Item Storage Module 2s come out as Data Module 2s during the assembly stage. What you seem to get at the end is a Data Module 2. This is only a NAME problem. The module is said to function as it should - as an ItemStorage Module 2
The issue is in both NAME and ICON...
Wishlist: A droid that has the same HAM stats as a CH pet and is as effective as a CH pet.
Please? I would truly like to actually say I build Droids.
Arkkyle
Master Artisan
Master Weaponsmith
Master Droid Engy
Minor Archy 4/3/2/1
Absolutely Beautiful. I love it!!
Especially
Consider droids that can survey and report back on a particular resource. Perhaps even a high-end versionwith the ability to go toother planetsto determine which resources are available.
Consider droids that can help maintain installations. Senda droid out to pay mantenance. Send a droid out to collect resources. Send a droid out to deliver power. There are many ways to implement this as a viable system.
I mean come on, you can make Droids for BH that do this. Why no let DE's benfit form something they are creating. I think the above 2 are huge!
I'm not a Droid Engineer....but considering the profession.
Thats is one loooonnnnnnngggggg list!
Makes me wonder if the Devs were even ready to release this profession in teh first place.
I just realized that the arakyd droids already track a target on any planet.
Why cant we have a droid that does the same thing for resources.
Scenerio:
Stackable droid - 5 : Radial menu - set resouce type - Release
You see the droid take off in orbit or something, then as you wait for a minutes (exactly like the Bounty hunter arakyds) you get a message stating that the resource was found on X Planet.
Artisan goes to the planet then:
Stackable droid - 10 - Radial menu - set resource type - Search
The droid creates a way point to the highest concentration found on the planet. (the resource concentration can be a mystery, that way when you get there you may only find 20% or somethig...)
Just a thought.....