Droid Engineer Archive
Thread: Droid Decay System 2.0
- Added How does this system effect me?
- Added Vitality vs Integrity
- Added Droid Integrity Experimenation
- Added Module and Armor Intergration
- Revamped Droid Decay system
- Changed Restoration Kits
- Changed Reconditioning
- Changed Droid Batteries
- Changed Auto-Recharge Module
- Removed Droid Power Generator
- 1 Diagnostic Circuit
- 1 Capacitor Discharge Unit
- 1 Unit Delivery Cartridge
- 1 Redundant Power Supply
- 1 Repair Unit Casing
- 20 Units Metal
- 15 Units Lowe Grade Ore
- 15 Units Chemical
- Experimental Charges: OQ 66% UT 33%
- Experimental Effectiveness:
- Power OQ 66% Con 33%
- Success Rate OQ 33% Mal 66%
- 40 units of Aluminum
- 20 units of Inert Gas
- 50 units of Steel
- Experimental Integrity: OQ 50% Con 50%
- Experimental Effectiveness:
- Battery Storage OQ 50% Con 50% (Up to 100 Charges)
Message Edited by Drashk on 07-03-2004 04:59 PM
Jenden wrote:
The only problem I'm seeing is with the length of time a droid is good for (even with only the base 100/100 integrety its one hundred batteries which, even considering a droid being used constantly gets a half hour per battery, gives you 50-75 hours of battery time before you do any form of restoration. add that in and your looking at at least 75-100 hours of droid life. at an average of 2 hours per day, thats over 2 months worth of use before they need a new droid. While I do think they need to last longer than weapons/armor, something more along the lines of one month sounds better to me (especially since this is assuming the lowest possible integrety).
Personally, I think 2 months is about right, maybe even 3 or 4. I say that for 2 reasons:
(1) There are alternatives to droid crafting stations and medical modules... If we make it too annoying/costly to own a droid, people may decide just to use regular crafting stations and hospitals instead.
I think armor and weapons are a little different. You can use those to help you make more money faster by fighting better mobs. With droids you are either (1) using them in combat (where they are hopefully going to decay fast anyway under this plan) or (2) using them for crafting/healing convenience. I personally wonder how many of our customers are going to want to buy, train, and tradeout a brand new crafting/medical droid every single month...
As long as we get repeat business from combat droid decay and non-combat droids decaying every once in a while, I think we will already have more business that we can shake a stick at.
Non-combat droids don't necessarily need to decay just as fast as combat droids, just as long as (a) they do eventully decay, and (b) the mix of combat and non-combat droids together provides a strong DE market.
I think a good measure would be: Heavily used combat droids: 1 month; light used combat droids 2-3 months; heavily used crafting/medical droids 2-3 months; lightly used crafting/medical droids3-4 months.
(2) If the devs do it right, we should (hopefully) be getting improved sales and droid decay from the JTL expansion, and the astromech use in starships.
Ideally, astromech would lose battery life (and condition under Drashk's plan) while they are out flying, and I think we would be reasonable in asking for droid vitality loss upon starship death in space. This might alleviate some of the need for quick decay.
I guess my main point is that people are going to have to have several droids functioning at once very soon... They will haveany combination ofastromechs for spaceflight, a combat droids for combat, a crafting droids for crafting, medical droids for healing, harvesting droids for harvesting, etc. With the advent of module quality and stacking...specialized/separated function droids are more important than ever, and more people re buyign multiple droids. I don't think the system should be structured such that people have to rebuy multiple droids every single month. Every couple of months, yes. But if we make droids too expensive/annoying to own, the increased sales will be counterbalanced with the loss of sales, and the end result will be a wash (making us no better off).
Message Edited by Daker-Naritus on 07-03-2004 12:48 AM
Daker-Naritus wrote:
Personally, I think 2 months is about right, maybe even 3 or 4. I say that for 2 reasons:
(1) There are alternatives to droid crafting stations and medical modules... If we make it too annoying/costly to own a droid, people may decide just to use regular crafting stations and hospitals instead.
I think armor and weapons are a little different. You can use those to help you make more money faster by fighting better mobs. With droids you are either (1) using them in combat (where they are hopefully going to decay fast anyway under this plan) or (2) using them for crafting/healing convenience. I personally wonder how many of our customers are going to want to buy, train, and tradeout a brand new crafting/medical droid every single month...
As long as we get repeat business from combat droid decay and non-combat droids decaying every once in a while, I think we will already have more business that we can shake a stick at.
Non-combat droids don't necessarily need to decay just as fast as combat droids, just as long as (a) they do eventully decay, and (b) the mix of combat and non-combat droids together provides a strong DE market.
I think a good measure would be: Heavily used combat droids: 1 month; light used combat droids 2-3 months; heavily used crafting/medical droids 2-3 months; lightly used crafting/medical droids3-4 months.
(2) If the devs do it right, we should (hopefully) be getting improved sales and droid decay from the JTL expansion, and the astromech use in starships.
Ideally, astromech would lose battery life (and condition under Drashk's plan) while they are out flying, and I think we would be reasonable in asking for droid vitality loss upon starship death in space. This might alleviate some of the need for quick decay.
I guess my main point is that people are going to have to have several droids functioning at once very soon... They will haveany combination ofastromechs for spaceflight, a combat droids for combat, a crafting droids for crafting, medical droids for healing, harvesting droids for harvesting, etc. With the advent of module quality and stacking...specialized/separated function droids are more important than ever, and more people re buyign multiple droids. I don't think the system should be structured such that people have to rebuy multiple droids every single month. Every couple of months, yes. But if we make droids too expensive/annoying to own, the increased sales will be counterbalanced with the loss of sales, and the end result will be a wash (making us no better off).
Message Edited by Daker-Naritus on 07-03-2004 12:48 AM
I think there are a couple things that will keep this from happening.
1. there's way too much money in the system. I saw a post the other day on my server forums (don't know about the rest of them) where people were talking about how much money was considered "barely afloat", "doing ok", "average", "well off", etc... The general consensus was anyone below 5 mill was pretty much on welfare. While I know these results are scewed (a lot of the population is broke with a small number having insane amounts of credits), I also know they're a lot closer to the truth than a lot of people want to admit. Even for the people who don't have tons-o-cash, when any elite combat profession can go run missions for 20-30k a pop and get 200k+ an hour, they can make the money if need be.
2. I think droids have worked their way into peoples daily routine enough (and even more so by the time something like this came out) that they would just get a new one automatically. For some people its just a good business decission, a Doc without a droid is out of business, anyone with a creature harvesting droid will make the cost of the droid back quickly, BH's actually have some small chance to take out jedi with detonation droids, etc. For others they just like having the droid around (I know a lot of entertainers who love their effects droid, some people just constantly have their droid hanging around, etc). And for those that its just a minor convenience (crafters, combatants), by the time a system like this went in to place they wouldn't even think twice about getting a second one. They've always had one, so they figure they need a new one.
3. Storage. People want as much storage as they can get, and for this reason alone they will buy more droids.
On the Integrity Decay Vs Battery Charge, I think your system is still a little too complex.
How about this :
A droid start with an integrity of 100. No need to experiment for that.
Full charge of a droid with integrity of 100 = 100% charge, and the maximum charge drop with the integrity.
Meaning a droid with integrity of 56/87 will have a maximum charge of 56%
Integrity Repair would drop the maximum integrity of the droid.
This works much more like vitality lost, and is more easy to understand for the customer.
The lost of integrity should be based only on recharge.
Vitality system could stay and be usefull for the combat droid. Or not.
As said before, the storage module is an issue.
Maybe make it so that at 0% power, you can pick items, but not put anything in the droid. This should solve the problem.
On the power sources :
I think that if we have a decay system based on power supply, all the power sources should decay the droid, but at different rate. Otherwise, it would let the door open for diferent kind of exploit I think.
Droid batteries should decay a droid faster than other sources. They should become some kind of emergency power supply that doesn't have enough technology to perfectly fit all the different droid type, and so would decay all the droids because it is not adapted to them.
The power droid shouldn't need batteries, would drop integrity when it recharge another droid and the other droid would loose integrity too, but at a lower rate than with a battery.
Now, for the Auto-Recharge Module, I think it's not going to happen.
I believe that make a droid last longer without the need of manual recharge is not something the dev want, and that even with a decay system they won't like it.
Same with the super-battery idea.
That's why I proposed on another thread some kind of Droid Power Station, based on your previous proposal, that is a furniture to put in houses or ships.
This station would allow to recharge a droid for a longer duration than a battery and with a lower decay rate too.
This station would also have a limited number of use.
And it could be made public by merchant or DE so everyone could recharge his droid at a shop for a small fee.
Power Droid and Droid Power Station would decay the droids at a lower rate because they are much more complex systems that can fit all the specifications of the different type of droids.
What do you think?
Message Edited by Gavvot on 07-04-2004 12:57 AM
could be, and I can only hope the combat balance nerfs everything as much as people think it will.... anyway, this system lends itself to easily be tweaked, so I think timing isn't a real critical issue at this point. First we need to get all the major stuff hammered out/down, then worry about details.
Daker-Naritus wrote:
I agree about the money now, as we speak, but:
(1) The combat balance is going to turn the current money system on its head...money will be much harder come come by.
The devs have already said that:
(a) Weapons are getting nerfed;
(b) Weapon specials are getting nerfed;
(c) Armor is getting nerfed; and
(d) Buffs are getting nerfed.
IMHO, money is about to become 4-5 times harder to obtain through missions, making that 70k to 80k amonth closer to 400k per month. That will still be a lot of money.
(2) I was really talking about annoyance more than money. At times, I have started going without armor (or just buying really cheap, disposable armor) because the current armor deecay system goes way too fast for me. I get REALLY annoyed that I have had to buy a new set of armoir every 3-4 weeks lately, as it is just a waste of time.
I really think that 2-3 months is a better timeframe for buying new droids...
The new power supply power station or auto-recharge module is a separate thing, the decay in itself is pretty small.
It's a new stat for the droids, and it is decreased by recharging.
The kit to restore integrity is already there. We can use the reconstruction kit that the current only use is Droidsmith Toolkit with very few adaptations based on vitality pack of the pets.
That would be the core of the decay system, the other stuff would make it complete.
Jenden wrote:
The only other thing I would change is the reconditioning kit. I still think a lot of people get very attached to their droid, and I would rather have a system where they could get the original droid fixed without the possibility of failure, but at the cost of essentially getting a new droid. I'd say have the kit take about the equivalent of 4-5 modules worth of resources/parts, and have it use up a chassis of the droid type being reconditioned. This would make it too much of a pain for people to just do this instead of getting a new droid, but if someone specifically wants that droid back this makes it possible.
Not all Droid Engineer will be wanting to go on the quest to get this skill, which will make it special and rare in its own right. The DEVs seem to be all about creating a chance of failure in a system, with a few exceptions. Failure rates produce turn around. Some people might get upset if thier favorite droid takes a crapper and is destroyed during the Reconditioning process, however this is part of the risk when you want to use a droid in a certain manner. One major effect that this decay system will have is that it will create a high rate of turn over for the first few months after it is introduced, because all of the older model droids will be dropping off with thier low Vitality/Integrity rating - base 100/100.This will get rid of many of the Legacy Cluster mod droids that are still running around out there. It may make some customers unhappy, butthis is one of those game design choices that needs to be done, in order to set into place a system that will improve theeconomy.
One more thing I thought of, item storage. There needs to be some way to retrieve your items from a storage droid that has become disabled. Especially when a system like this first comes into place, a lot of people wouldn't think about their stuff, until it was too late. I still get people who are scared to use the item storage modules due to their buggy nature right after release, and I'd hate to go through something like that again.
My thought on this would be something like a corpse and looting. If you call the droid after it is disabled/destroyed it appears as a smoldering pile of droid. You have the ability to retrieve the items from the droid, but can not place any items in the droid. After a certain number of calls, you would get the option to remove all items from the droid or lose them from the droid self-destructing and erasing itself from the data pad.
Daker-Naritus wrote:
(1)I think we need to specifically list all modules that do not work when the droid runs out of power (basically all except item and data storage), and specifically state that crafting stations and medical modules do NOT work unless the droid is powered.
I know it is obvious from what you have said, but the devs haven't seemed to be able to grasp this concept yet, despite over a year of requests by DEs.
It is my personal belief that droid need to be 99.9999% non functional when they are out of power, and that just isn't happening for droid crafting stations and some low-power medical modules (sometimes they work, sometime they don't for me).
The devs should have corrected that for us a long time ago, and I think we need to keep specifically stating it until they fix it...
I feel that all modules should be effected by the low power status, including crafting stations and storage modules. There is some sort of system already in place to accomidate for low power status. We especially see it in the functions of all of the new modules. The DEVs will have to work on the power status, if they wish to design a decay system for droids based on something such as recharging, otherwise they will creat yet another exploit in our profession that goes without being addressed for many months. (Cluster Mods)
(2) Jenden pointed out a problem earlier that I think is a huge one: How do you deal with all those people who pull their droids, quickly buff/heal/craft and then store them? That process provides little battery drain/decay.
Maybe we should include an additional change to the proposal: All droids lose 10% (of the total 100%) of their battery life when they are called. Easliy recharged when needed, but it does cause some decay over time under your plan...
What do you think?
The quick pull artists will be effected by the system, just not on the same speed as many would like. Adding something like a call discharge will punish the larger droid user population. A system can't be devised to cover all types of game play, no matter how much the system is adjusted. We just have to accept that there will still be a market out there that won't be effected that highly.
Straker_Atrella wrote:
Drashk, you mentioned several times a droid "auto storing" when it is incapped. Is that an old thing? When my droid gets incapped, he just lies there until I heal him.
This might be an older function that was removed from the game. I'm positive that it was around the time of Publish 7 and only assumed that it was still around. When ever a droid or pet used to be incapped, the droid would auto-store about 30 seconds later, unless the pet/droid was healed. I remember it so well, because at that time we didn't have a means to heal out droids.
From everybody else in the game, it sucks, what do they gain? They wont meekly roll over and say "it's ok DE's need resell value." People will gripe, complain, and even stop using droids. Sure, some people like Docs are forced to use droids, so they will, crafters as well. Who else?
Yes, in the eyes of many this will be a nerf, plain and simple. This is one of those changes that will piss people off, but it will also lead to strenghtening the economy. The game economics will be affected by a change to the droid sales market and may even lead to changes in other crafting professions, such as Architects or Tailors. There might be a few that stop using droids, but when you take into consideration the other changes that will take place with droids, after JTL, there will be a larger droid market in the long run.
Of all of those only number 1 is needed, the others are extra, people could live without them.
The LAST thing that anything the DE profession needs to do is make Droids more of a pain in the arse or annoying. Many people in the 2-5 catagory will either stop using droids, or limit their use of droids so much, they never decay.
Only Bounty Hunters are dependent on our droids. Ask anyone that was around during the time of Perma-death about droid sales. Even when Perma-death was sweeping the galaxies, people still bought droids. With JTL coming out, droids are supposed to become an essential part of many systems. People will keep on using droids simply because they use droids in the game.
In particular, under your current system, people still need to use batteries or a Power Droid, more and more often as the droid decays. Many people don't use droids now because "batteries are annoying." For example, an R3 TANK droid with 5 auto repair modules already burns through batteries like crazy, then you cut that in half?
Under your system, the customer gets no bonus. Any decay system that is implemented needs to give the "users" something back, or else they simply stop using droid. Yes you have your auto recharge module, but then you lose a combat module, or a harvesting module, or something else. Again a loss.
I think that if a decay system like this is added, a 100% battery charge should last 1 hour reguardless of what modules are installed. This would be a bonus for most droid users. There aren't many user end gains that can be made from a system that is targeted at creating turn over, besides the ones that they have already been getting for free, which is unlimited - or nearly - droid usage.
This is why I strongly feel that the answer to our Droid decay problem is the removal of the one major annoyance that Droids currently have. Add a power core, power core dies, the droid dies. Everything else you said could still apply, no drop in droid function as it gets older, just make it smoke and whine or something. All the repairs and such would still apply.
Power Cores only change future sales of droids and do not effect current droid owners in any shape. Adding a power core along with the above proposal would make matters more complex than they need to be. Just my opinion though.
People attached to their droids? I just had one of those ideas that make you actually shout "omg duh." We all know some people like/love their droid and don't want to lose him. How about this... When the droid "dies" it is no longer in your datapad, but reverts back to a dropable item (like a statue,) colors and name would remain exactly the same. So while good old R3 59 may not be out hunting with you, he can stay in your house as a happy memory.
I don't think that this could happen, due complications that could pop up with storage. Once a droid is gone, it should be gone for good.
Daker-Naritus wrote:
As long as we get repeat business from combat droid decay and non-combat droids decaying every once in a while, I think we will already have more business that we can shake a stick at.
Non-combat droids don't necessarily need to decay just as fast as combat droids, just as long as (a) they do eventully decay, and (b) the mix of combat and non-combat droids together provides a strong DE market.
I think a good measure would be: Heavily used combat droids: 1 month; light used combat droids 2-3 months; heavily used crafting/medical droids 2-3 months; lightly used crafting/medical droids3-4 months.
This is about the amount of time that I had in mind as well. We aren't trying to re-invent the wheel, by going from 0 droid turn over to 1000% in one month. Droid decay should be a gradual system that slowly effects the average droid user. Even if a droid lasts for 6 months before it is destroyed, the point is that the droid is destroyed and will lead to the droid owner buying a new droid.
Gavvot wrote:
How about this :
A droid start with an integrity of 100. No need to experiment for that.
A lot of Crafters like a more complex crafting system. After having spent months crafting cookie cutter droids, many DE would welcome a change in the crafting process that ends up resulting in a more diverse droi market. Being about to experiment on the Integrity rating would make DE a better rounded crafting profession.
Full charge of a droid with integrity of 100 = 100% charge, and the maximum charge drop with the integrity.
Meaning a droid with integrity of 56/87 will have a maximum charge of 56%
Integrity Repair would drop the maximum integrity of the droid.
This works much more like vitality lost, and is more easy to understand for the customer.
What you are suggesting will make less people use droids in the long run. This would make it so that the droid lasts a lot less time per charge. What I was suggesting happens in gradual stages. What you are suggesting will be a constant situation and will lead to people becoming mad at having to recharge so often. Most Droid Owners don't have a clue as to how things work for our profession and they usually don't really care, as long as they can do what they want to do with the droid. Simply telling a customer that their droid will lose the ability to charge to full power will sufice many.
The lost of integrity should be based only on recharge.
Vitality system could stay and be usefull for the combat droid. Or not.
Combat droids will need a balancing decay system, which is why Integrity loss is linked to incapping. The Vitality system would be completely removed from droids and replaced by the Integrity system.
On the power sources :
I think that if we have a decay system based on power supply, all the power sources should decay the droid, but at different rate.
Droid batteries should decay a droid faster than other sources. They should become some kind of emergency power supply that doesn't have enough technology to perfectly fit all the different droid type, and so would decay all the droids because it is not adapted to them.
To simplify the system, I removed the idea of an additional power source. I thought about it for a while and realized that the entire charge process would have to be revamped in order to accomidate for using multiple types of power sources.
Now, for the Auto-Recharge Module, I think it's not going to happen.
I believe that make a droid last longer without the need of manual recharge is not something the dev want, and that even with a decay system they won't like it.Same with the super-battery idea.
The thing about the use of the auto-recharge module is that it would take up a module slot on a droid, which limits what certain droids can have installed. I can see where you are coming from, in the thought of the DEVs not wanting a auto-power droid, but I think that they will opt for it based upon the fact that its use causes turn over and it is something that many would like to see added.
That's why I proposed on another thread some kind of Droid Power Station, based on your previous proposal, that is a furniture to put in houses or ships.
This station would allow to recharge a droid for a longer duration than a battery and with a lower decay rate too.
This station would also have a limited number of use.
And it could be made public by merchant or DE so everyone could recharge his droid at a shop for a small fee.
Power Droid and Droid Power Station would decay the droids at a lower rate because they are much more complex systems that can fit all the specifications of the different type of droids.
I dropped the Droid Power Generator idea for the same reason that the station won't work. It leads to charging a droid over 100%. If this function is added, that means that we could used droid batteries to do the same and would make the current battery listing pointless, since most would want to charge their droid to 1000% or some such number. The charge status needs to stay at 0 to 100%.
Drashk wrote:Gavvot wrote:How about this :A droid start with an integrity of 100. No need to experiment for that.A lot of Crafters like a more complex crafting system. After having spent months crafting cookie cutter droids, many DE would welcome a change in the crafting process that ends up resulting in a more diverse droi market. Being about to experiment on the Integrity rating would make DE a better rounded crafting profession.
I know that alot of crafters want more experimentations, I also know that alot of crafters hate to have to experiment on everything without having half the points needed to do so. And having to wait for months after mastering the profession to finally have the right resources to expermient with.
Adding more experimentations without any other change would only acheive that to be a good DE you'll have to be force sensitive and have skill tapes.
I don't want that.Full charge of a droid with integrity of 100 = 100% charge, and the maximum charge drop with the integrity.Meaning a droid with integrity of 56/87 will have a maximum charge of 56%Integrity Repair would drop the maximum integrity of the droid.This works much more like vitality lost, and is more easy to understand for the customer.What you are suggesting will make less people use droids in the long run. This would make it so that the droid lasts a lot less time per charge. What I was suggesting happens in gradual stages. What you are suggesting will be a constant situation and will lead to people becoming mad at having to recharge so often. Most Droid Owners don't have a clue as to how things work for our profession and they usually don't really care, as long as they can do what they want to do with the droid. Simply telling a customer that their droid will lose the ability to charge to full power will sufice many.
I don't get this.
It will be more easy for the customer to understand that system.
The recharging rate isn't that much higher than yours, it's just more gradual.
I mean, integrity is at 91%, power is at 0, the customer use a charge on it, the droid is charged at 91%.
It's easy to understand, and will in fact force the customer to use the 'droid version of vitality pack' more often.
Yeah, it goes faster, but if the customer can manage the intergity of his droid easily, it shouldn't be a problem.
It works well with the pets.
Of course, with that system, the 'droid version of vitality pack' wouldn't be a quest item but a regular item craftable by all DE.The lost of integrity should be based only on recharge.Vitality system could stay and be usefull for the combat droid. Or not.Combat droids will need a balancing decay system, which is why Integrity loss is linked to incapping. The Vitality system would be completely removed from droids and replaced by the Integrity system.
I don't see why linking them.
The most important for a combat droid is his HAM. The vitality deal with that.
The HAM on an utility droid is irrelevant, so integrity should be used there.
Sure, Combat droid will be more work as they have both vitality and integrity, but I don't really see that as a problem. Vitality is already there, and this would bring an integrity system that make sence for all the droids.
The thing here is that the combat droids already have a decay system. Maybe it isn't perfectly balanced, but it is there.On the power sources :I think that if we have a decay system based on power supply, all the power sources should decay the droid, but at different rate.Droid batteries should decay a droid faster than other sources. They should become some kind of emergency power supply that doesn't have enough technology to perfectly fit all the different droid type, and so would decay all the droids because it is not adapted to them.To simplify the system, I removed the idea of an additional power source. I thought about it for a while and realized that the entire charge process would have to be revamped in order to accomidate for using multiple types of power sources.
The entire charge process will have to be revamped in order to add integrity decay. And there is already a system on the droids to make them use more or less power depending of the activated modules (entertainer/auto-repair for exemple).
Now, for the Auto-Recharge Module, I think it's not going to happen.I believe that make a droid last longer without the need of manual recharge is not something the dev want, and that even with a decay system they won't like it.Same with the super-battery idea.The thing about the use of the auto-recharge module is that it would take up a module slot on a droid, which limits what certain droids can have installed. I can see where you are coming from, in the thought of the DEVs not wanting a auto-power droid, but I think that they will opt for it based upon the fact that its use causes turn over and it is something that many would like to see added.
I think the main reason they'll be against it is the lack of need to care from the user.
Yes, the customer loose a module, but it's not really a problem for most of them. Doc most of the time want the 3 usual and spend 30 minutes thinking on what to add to an R2.
With a Power Station, the player will have to take his droid and bring to either his private power station, or a public power station in a shop.
This require much more things to the player than thinking of adding or not 1 module when requesting for a droid.
And bring him back to the shop often so he can buy other droidsThat's why I proposed on another thread some kind of Droid Power Station, based on your previous proposal, that is a furniture to put in houses or ships.This station would allow to recharge a droid for a longer duration than a battery and with a lower decay rate too.This station would also have a limited number of use.And it could be made public by merchant or DE so everyone could recharge his droid at a shop for a small fee.
Power Droid and Droid Power Station would decay the droids at a lower rate because they are much more complex systems that can fit all the specifications of the different type of droids.
I dropped the Droid Power Generator idea for the same reason that the station won't work. It leads to charging a droid over 100%. If this function is added, that means that we could used droid batteries to do the same and would make the current battery listing pointless, since most would want to charge their droid to 1000% or some such number. The charge status needs to stay at 0 to 100%.
The idea I had was that a station would charge the droid for 100% but the battery would only charge for 20% for exemple.
This way, you can charge the droid to 100% either with a station or batteries.
But batteries would have faster decay on the droid otherwise people will never use the stations.
This way they will still use the batteries, yes, much less often than now, but they will still have some, just in case.
I don't see where there would be a problem with that.
Also, the 100% power on such droids shouldn't be 1 hour of use, it should be longer.
EDIT : Hum, thinking of it again, it would be an auto-recharge module without a module. I think I need more thinking on that one.
Message Edited by Gavvot on 07-04-2004 01:41 AM
TheRealTK421 wrote:
Drashk wrote:
Droid Function
All droid functions should be linked directly to the charge status of a droid. This includes movement, commands, and all installed modules.By linking the charge status of a droid to all functions we eliminate roving Droid crafting stations that blink *Low Power*, lifeless storage units, and following drones. Linking the charge status would ensure that everyone had to recharge their droid, in order to use the functions that it bestows, which will take more of a role as I continue.
I've always been for this, personally. I do think there will be a camp of people that won't want to see EVERY function of the droid taken away. I would say that, at the very least, no installed modules should perform their function but other stuff might be okay. It's okay (to me) to see a moving crafting droid blink ** Low Power **...as long as it isn't getting used for crafting, for example.
It would be good for us to try to nail down the exact behavior for a ** Low Power ** state.
I think that none of the modules should function in a Low Power state. I also don't think that the droid should move at all during this state as well. The reason for this is that a droid owner would have to always keep their droid powered, to promote decay
Integrity Loss
Most agree that some sort of decay system needs to be put into place, in order to create a higher turn over in droid sales. One of the better suggestions floating around is to link Integrity to battery usage. If all droids need to be recharged, then all droids would begin to decay over time, which would lead to a great number of droid resales.
I'd add here that our new sales wouldn't necessarily come in the form of new replacement droids but might be Repair / Reconstruction kits and so on.
I see your point here. I was simply stating that it would help to create a better economy through additional droid sales. The sales aren't the big issue here, its the creation of an on going market..
Integrity Decay Vs Battery Charge
As a droid takes Integrity damage, it loses the ability to fully charge.
You seem to say below that a droid can be fully charged to 100%, if more than one battery is used. I assume you meant that the droid can't be fully recharged to 100% with just one battery, si?
DOH. I messed up my editing a didn't include the changes that correlated with the different chart. I originally had a 10% to 10% ratio, but realized that it wouldn't take long for the droid owner to become annoyed with the quick loss of power. 90% Battery charge at 90% Integrity could happen rather quickly under the right conditions. The scale that is included in the above proposal I think is a better scale. I'll edit the post to include the text that should have been there.
Yes, I did include a passage about being able to recharge a droid to full status, by the use of additional batteries. The nice thing about this is that it only makes the droid decay faster, unless steps are taken to repair the droid.
For every 10% of Integrity lost, the droid automatically drains part of the battery charge added.
[snip]
I dig the table. I think this sort of scaling is about where it needs to be. I'd be curious, though, where droid wounds are going to enter into all this.
It's not enough for us to simply have the system focused on Integrity (vitality) but the inclusion of a method to integrate droid HAM wounds need to be a part of the system as well, in my personal opinion.
This will help to end the times of all Surgical droids never taking droid HAM wounds.
I can understand wanting to include the HAM wound system as well, but I think that in order to distinguish a droid from a pet, we need to step away from HAM wounds, expect for them being aquired in combat. A droid is meant to take a beating and keep on going. I think that we will see a lot more HAM wounds when the combat revamp comes out and especially when higher end combat droids are added. It also comes down to an either or situation. Either we go with a charge decay system that helps to promote droid decay, or we go with a reduced HAM system that will be another system that will need to be created as well.
Integrity Decay Vs Incappacitated
Each time that a Droid is Incappacitated and is then auto-stored, it loses 1 point of Integrity. This rule makes it so that there is a chance to keep the droid from losing Integrity instantly. In order to keep the droid from auto-storing, it simply needs to be repaired.
*Alternate suggestion* To create a more aggresive system, each time the droid is Incapped, it loses 1 point of Integrity
I think it should be the latter, personally. The former method seems to open the door to more problems. For example, your droid incaps and you go to heal it. However, you get a 'lag-store' of the droid due to the fact that your heals don't get through in time.
I've seen this personally. I'd be spamming my heals or repair kits and it should be working...but it doesn't take. Any situation like that is taken out entirely if we simply make it a 1 point loss immediately upon incap. Simple...easy.
I'm just afraid that linking the system to Incaps could lead to a lot of droid griefing again, especially when DC comes out, if it does. A group of PCs could camp on a DC and wipe out all of his droids by healing them then incapping them. It has happened before and is why the Vitality system hardly even touches droids now, becuase major changes have happened to how vitality loss is handled with pets to adjust for this.
Integrity Experimentation
Droid Chassis
The Durablity rating of a Droid Chassis would be changed to an Integrity rating. This experimentation field would effect the base Integrity rate of the droid it is installed into. This would be yet an additional bonus provided by using an Advanced Chassis. A Failed Experimenation would result in an Integrity rating of a+0 bonus. A maximum success result is equal to +100.
Hmmmm...I dig the concept a lot. Are you saying that a Max. result would give a droid with 200/200 Integrity?
Or that the +100 is simply a weighted value used in the formula below?
The Chassis would be tied in with the crafting process. Here is an example.
Bobbacca is crafting a Adv BLL. He builds the ADV BLL Chassis and gets an Integrity bonus modifer of +95 (95% success). He decides to install 3 Level 6 Armor modules, each with a +145 Integrity bonus, a Cluster module with 1 Level 6 Storage, 1 Level 3 Sturctures mod, and 1 Merchant Barker module, for a grand total bonus of + 45 (Cluster mod experimenation also effects the over all Integrity rating of the three installed modules.) Bobbacca slaps the ADV BLL together and gets an Integrity Experimentation of 56%. The BLLs Integrity grand total is (+95 (Chassis) +435 (3 Armor) +45 (Cluster Mod) ) * 56%. 575 * 56% = 322. 322 + 100 = Intergrity rating of 422.
Droid Reconditioning
Once a droid's Integrity drops to 0/0 the droid is considered destroyed. As long as the droid as 1 point of restorable Integrity (IE 0/1) the droid has a possiblity of being Reconditioned by a Droid Engineer. A Novice (or Master) DE would need to use a Reconditioning Tool to completely restore a Droid to full Vitality. Using this skill on a damaged droid is not 100% fail safe and is based upon the Droid Customization skill and the amount of Integrity damage. The higher the percentage of permanent Integrity damage there is, the lower the percentage chance of successfully repairing the droid. To restrict the use of Reconditioning, this could be a one time only skill, per droid. Droid Reconditioning is an all or nothing proceedure. The Droid Reconditioning Tool is a limted schematic available through certain Junk Dealers, or a DE specific quest.
Hmmm....is Droid Reconditioning a skill mod or a tool? You seem to suggest both.
Of the two, I sort of like it as a skill mod that's obtained via a DE quest. That means that DEs can really choose to be 'repairmen' or not. /shrug
I'm pretty sure that the DEVs will want some sort of disposable tool to effect the droid. It should be a skill, but can only be used through the use of a tool. The tool schematic could be L3WT.
Additional Changes
Power Droid
To make the Power Droid more attractive to a customer, its recharge function never causes another droid to lose Integrity, nor does the Power Droid ever need recharging. Instead, each time that the Power Droid recharges another droid, it takes 1 point of Integrity loss.
Dig it. Perfect. I see these items causing need for more Power Droid sales to occur...(well, it will help some anyway).
Not having to recharge the droid makes it some what indestructible, since it doesn't have to be used to recharge other droids and won't lose Integrity with normal use. Being that it only has only 1 module slot makes it of semi-limited use, but its function would never need power....
Auto-Recharge Module
The Auto-Recharge Module would allow a droid owner to stack X number of battery charges into a droid, so that it could auto-recharge itself when ever it becomes low on power. The number of charges would be dependent on experimentation. Charges used by this module would be counted towards Integrity decay.
- 40 units of Aluminum
- 20 units of Inert Gas
- 50 units of Steel
- Experimental Integrity: OQ 50% Con 50%
- Experimental Effectiveness:
- Battery Storage OQ 50% Con 50% (Up to 100 Charges)
Comments?
This is a good idea as a first step, I think. The dev. time/work should be easier since it's basically just a modified version of the Stimpack Dispensor module.
That leads me to...
Is this whole thing getting too big?
I really do think we need the decay system but I worry about letting it get so huge and out of control that it's almost more trouble than it's really worth.
When I brain storm ideas and post them, I try to include as many features and suggestions as I can put together. Even if only one or two suggestions make it to the DEVs, our community has succeeded in bringing something to their attention, that they have to take time to consider. I'm just putting together a list of ideas for the DEVs to think about, when trying to develop the system.
I'm wondering if we can't come up with tweaks to this that would:
- Be easier to code, due to existing content/work done by the Devs
- Lead to less growth in our Droid parts/components list (which is already spiralling out of control)
This is a great start, methinks. However, I caution everyone that this sort of thing isn't likely to happen anytime soon. Right now, it's all just talk and getting the best proposed system we can. From there, we'll have to see what the PTB's say...and we can move on it from there.
Aye, all this is is a proposal. It could take many many months for a Decay system to even be mentioned in a DEV meeting, let alone actually becoming a part of the development schedule. The DE community was warned that we wouldn't see much action sent our way until at least the time of JTL.
Gavvot wrote:
I know that alot of crafters want more experimentations, I also know that alot of crafters hate to have to experiment on everything without having half the points needed to do so. And having to wait for months after mastering the profession to finally have the right resources to expermient with. Adding more experimentations without any other change would only acheive that to be a good DE you'll have to be force sensitive and have skill tapes. I don't want that.
This is how the crafting process should be, when you look at other crafting professions. The DE crafting process is borked, in that half of the experimentation values are pointless. Such a change, as the one proposed would give DE a much more dynamic crafting system that takes us one step further from the cookie cutter droids of old.
I don't get this.
It will be more easy for the customer to understand that system.
The recharging rate isn't that much higher than yours, it's just more gradual.
I mean, integrity is at 91%, power is at 0, the customer use a charge on it, the droid is charged at 91%.
It's easy to understand, and will in fact force the customer to use the 'droid version of vitality pack' more often.
Yeah, it goes faster, but if the customer can manage the intergity of his droid easily, it shouldn't be a problem.
It works well with the pets.
Of course, with that system, the 'droid version of vitality pack' wouldn't be a quest item but a regular item craftable by all DE.
Many pet owners don't understand the Vitality system, and how it reduces their pets HAM properties. Directly linking Power to the Integrity rating will only upset droid owners more, because their droids power is a gradual decay. Making so that it takes a while for the average droid user to notice a difference in their droids power consumption will make it so that they are more accepting of the change. It may look easier, but it will lead to a lot more people complaining about the system, which is something that Iam trying to stay away from.
I don't see why linking them.
The most important for a combat droid is his HAM. The vitality deal with that.
The HAM on an utility droid is irrelevant, so integrity should be used there.
Sure, Combat droid will be more work as they have both vitality and integrity, but I don't really see that as a problem. Vitality is already there, and this would bring an integrity system that make sence for all the droids.
The thing here is that the combat droids already have a decay system. Maybe it isn't perfectly balanced, but it is there.
The point of removing the Vitality system from droids is so that we don't have a more complex system. The Vitality system is geared towards pets, not droids. The Integrity system would be strictly geared towards all droids. Having to recharge, repair Vitality, repair Integrity, repair HAM, and heal a droid is asking a lot for a customer base.
I think the main reason they'll be against it is the lack of need to care from the user.
The entire charge process will have to be revamped in order to add integrity decay. And there is already a system on the droids to make them use more or less power depending of the activated modules (entertainer/auto-repair for exemple).
A 100% charge should equal 1 hour, reguardless of what is installed. This will make it so that everyone can figure out how much time it takes before their droid is in lower power status.
Yes, the customer loose a module, but it's not really a problem for most of them. Doc most of the time want the 3 usual and spend 30 minutes thinking on what to add to an R2.
With a Power Station, the player will have to take his droid and bring to either his private power station, or a public power station in a shop.
This require much more things to the player than thinking of adding or not 1 module when requesting for a droid.
And bring him back to the shop often so he can buy other droids
Having to use something like a Power Station limits the usefulness of a droid, simply because people associate droids with freedom of movement. People specificly by a droid with a crafting station because they like the freedom of being able to run around and use thier crafting droid. If someone had to go back to thier house just to fully charge they droid, they might as well just use the crafting station sitting at home.
The idea I had was that a station would charge the droid for 100% but the battery would only charge for 20% for exemple.
This way, you can charge the droid to 100% either with a station or batteries.
But batteries would have faster decay on the droid otherwise people will never use the stations.
This way they will still use the batteries, yes, much less often than now, but they will still have some, just in case.
I don't see where there would be a problem with that.
Also, the 100% power on such droids shouldn't be 1 hour of use, it should be longer.
EDIT : Hum, thinking of it again, it would be an auto-recharge module without a module. I think I need more thinking on that one.
Again it comes down to being limited to the need to return to somewhere to charge your droid. Batteries should stay at a 100% charge rate, except when the droid is damaged. Batteries are a big part of droid use. To mess with this system, by making them less effective, would bring about negative feelings, especially with the addition of a Driod Decay system. This would be considered by many as a double nerf.