Entertainer Archive
Thread: A newbie question on AFK entertaining
Chessack wrote:
Akelan wrote:
You might get significantly better tips from people doing 25K missions on Lok or Endor than you do from people that are on Theed or Coronet for the other vendors, especially if a hunter on Lok did not have to spend 1700 cr just to get to somewhere that he could find the entertainer in the first place.
I'm sorry but... This is bull. I play on the Naritus server. I spent all Saturday on Endor this past weekend as a near-master dancer. I lost thousands of credits on the total trip.
Yep. I'm afraid we're not as needed as we should be in the more remote places.
Like I've said before, first thing I did after mastering music was to head out to remote and dangerous areas thinking I could make a good living where I thought I'd be needed most. I was barelyneeded at all.
First of all the population on the remote planetsis way lower than I thought it would be. I thought there would be enough thingsof interest going on in remote places that there would be a fairly steady flow of player population showing up to PvE. With just a few exceptions of playing smack dab in the middle of prime time I haven't found that to be the case at all.
And of course the first thing any player does, if they do make their way to a remote and dangerous planet, is clone. Andrightfully so since the ability to do so is there.Once in awhile you get someone who forgets to clone and they'll be searching for an entertainer if they get DB'd.Other than that,BF creeps up pretty slowly and players can play a long time before BF or mind wounds are a big enough problem that they have to find an entertainer. Throw in a bot that's got the area coveredto begin withand there's very little chance that even a single entertainer is going to be able to make a living in remote areas.
I'll probably have someone throwing tomatoes at me for this but in my opinion they shouldn't have put cloning stations on the distant and dangerous planets. Either that or they should have made the cloning on those planets cost a fortune.
Give players plenty of reason topay the highshuttle fees and leave Corelliaforthose more distant and dangerous planets. Get rid of the cloning stations and afk entertainers who give it away for free. Thenmaybehealers and entertainers could make a living out there.
I have too often stood outside a cantina on Dantooine or Dathomir in need of healing and never known there was an entertainer in the cantina beside me, because the tells didn't make any "noise" and SWG has not yet implemented the music from a cantina as an "environment" sound, so you can stand ten meters from a full concert band and never know they are on the other side of the wall. If you're in a place where people don't expect to find you, Shout once in a while, and use some emotes or actions that can be detected in spatial.
One suggestion that I have made to other crafters, and might apply very well in a situation like this one; Get a peko peko as a pet, and have it named something like "Now Appearing, Moonlily", or something better than my spur of the moment suggestion here. Call the bird outside the Cantina entrance, and command it to Stay, then go in and set up for the performance. Anyone in the outpost will see the pet, and anyone even casually passing a cursor over it will see you are performing.
I have also rarely seen posts that tell the community in general on a server that someone will be performing on Dantooine or Yavin 4 or wherever. I can tell you there will be a lot of lonely radioactives miners on Yavin 4 in the next day or two on Naritus, with the recent appearance of a 900+ PE , 850+ OQ radioactive there. If you have never seen the results, sampling a high-PE radioactive now can deliver more than twice the wounds that an uncloned death does. Many surveyors accept that risk, since the result can be wound or damage and is random, but those that gamble and lose will be much in need of service. Taking advantage of things like the current activity with the Warren and the jedi holocrons is a very smart way to get started, and again, I applaud Moonlily for giving it a shot and hope she can make it a success.
It will take work to change the expectations, and I would not expect it to happen quickly, because it is so much against the current practice on most servers. If you're on Naritus, send a tell or an email to Ake'lan. If you're up for tying to make a change, and ready to dedicate a week's effort to it, I will be glad to see your travel costs covered, and possibly see of I can get a crew to come check out your performance. Dantooine is pretty busy now with the Holochron craze; it might be an opportunity. I would still expect it to be slow to start with, but once people know, I think it's a good possibility.
When we find people building bigger buildings outside the outposts because the cantina in the outpost itself is too small for the crowds, we'll know that there has been a change for the better.
entertainer whos AFK.
Just wanted to show a little support to you guys who are actually 'playing' their
characters.
Just wait until they allow us rangers to hire entertainers to heal BF in their camps!
Ill be looking to hire a master dancer, musician as soon as its put into place.
I forgot to mention what you were fixing.Oops. I actually took up Musician after creating a new character, simply because the hunting groups I'd been in before never had any. Combat skills let me join them on adventures to other planets.
I started the thread to honestly ask a question; is this a reasonable thing to do. What I got, despite a number of suggestions about how to change the status quo was more whining and specious arguments about how it is not possible to fix this. When I went to see for myself the difference between the macro entertainers in the remote cantinas and the "live performers", I felt a little like the ones looking through the window in the end of Animal Farm - I looked from one to the other, and I couldn't tell the difference.
I have met some nice people in the cantinas, and had fun chatting with them and the people that wandered in to rest and heal up from the ranges, and I am enjoying the experience with those people. I am afraid, however, that once I have gained adequate skills to be of real value to my PA, I am less likely to be found in a cantina than out with the guild, simply because it is more fun to be with them and have every person there be "there" than to be in the cantina in a 20 member, 5 person group.
Akelan wrote:
Every large group of entertainers in the cantinas in Theed, Coronet and Bestine is on the average 1/3 to 1/2 AFK at any given time. The very people making all the noise about AFK entertainers ruining the profession seem to be perfectly willing to actively support the practice if it adds to the numbers in the group and gets them experience.
Yeah, those are not the people complaining about AFK Macroers. People who complain about them can't stand those zombie groups and go elswhere.
C
Akelan wrote:
I started the thread to honestly ask a question; is this a reasonable thing to do. What I got, despite a number of suggestions about how to change the status quo was more whining and specious arguments about how it is not possible to fix this. When I went to see for myself the difference between the macro entertainers in the remote cantinas and the "live performers", I felt a little like the ones looking through the window in the end of Animal Farm - I looked from one to the other, and I couldn't tell the difference.
I have met some nice people in the cantinas, and had fun chatting with them and the people that wandered in to rest and heal up from the ranges, and I am enjoying the experience with those people. I am afraid, however, that once I have gained adequate skills to be of real value to my PA, I am less likely to be found in a cantina than out with the guild, simply because it is more fun to be with them and have every person there be "there" than to be in the cantina in a 20 member, 5 person group.
(Emphasis mine)
You completely missed the point yet managed to hit the nail on the head. If you can't tell the difference, why would you avoid cantinas? The answer is simply - there IS a difference. The way this is hurting the community isn't so obvious on the outside. It may look fine... AFK people mean there is more entertainers out there, looks good on the outside? But when you get past that to the meat of the issue, you find that you are not alone. A LOT of people avoid public cantinas for the very same reason. I'm a master dancer, and I'd still be going back to cantinas if they were still FUN. But, with all the zombies, they aren't. Now, tell me how often do you see masters AFK? Almost never. So by supporting the AFK entertainers, the community is shooting themselves in the foot by driving off entertainers like you and mee that would stick around in favor of entertainers that will disappear as soon as they get master, if not sooner.
If you get a few tells about being needed to dance/play in Lok, maybe rather than turning up your nose, you might turn up your awareness, and realize the market for performing.
Err... when I get a few /tells I will think about it. So far, no one asked me, so I stay where I have fun.
You want to see the end of AFK entertainers? Make them unnecessary.
You want to see the end of aimbots in CS ? Make them uneccessary.
Funny statement, isn't it ?
lighten up, entertainers. most players don't pay any attention at all to the AFK ones.
I do. Most players don't pay attention to entertainers or macrotainers alike.
and if someone wants to AFK entertain in an out-of-the-way spot on a remote adventure planet to help other players and level up over time, more power to them.
Do you really think that this good samaritan would be there if Macrotaining gave no xp ? He would vanish faster than you could die on said planet. Macrotaining has just one goal: personal gain. XP or cash, preferably both.
nvoigt wrote:
lighten up, entertainers. most players don't pay any attention at all to the AFK ones.
I do. Most players don't pay attention to entertainers or macrotainers alike.
Your emotion is clouding your logic and judgement. If nobodys watching either type of entertainer, there's a hell of a lot of BF and Mind Wounds out there.
and if someone wants to AFK entertain in an out-of-the-way spot on a remote adventure planet to help other players and level up over time, more power to them.
Do you really think that this good samaritan would be there if Macrotaining gave no xp ? He would vanish faster than you could die on said planet. Macrotaining has just one goal: personal gain. XP or cash, preferably both.
Yes. I get FAR more experience at the keys in Theed than I do away from the keys on Rori or anywhere else. I imagine I'd get more experience AFK in Theed than I do AFK on Rori as well, butI won't do that because I respect the ATK entertainers when they're present. So yes, I'd take less or no experience on an adventure planet to help the people adventuring there. No problem.
However, as I've stated before, I'd much rather walk in to that out-of-the-way cantina, find another entertainer at the keys there, have a brief but pleasant conversation, and move on. BUT THEY WON'T GO THERE SO I CAN'T.
2cr from a new entertainer ... please be gentle. 
My secondary character is nearly novice Dancer now. I have found that a good personality trumps AFK any time, and I have gotten good tips and XP in medium-traffic places like Mos Eisly, Moenia, etc.
I do not find the AFK folks threatening my fun. If these is one AFK dancer in a cantina, and me, I seem to get plenty of socializing and tips and heals. In Theed, I am just a little fish, so I accept the extra XP and I don't expect as much interaction, but I do get more contacts and sell more resources.
But my main contention is that AFK is not poisoning people's minds against the class. I say this based not just on my novice dancer, admittedly just a few weeks,but on my main character's experiences. I spent a lot of my 'medical school' time in cantinas. I did a lot of soloing as well.
A respectful note to my elders in the profession... I recognize some folks have personal enjoyment reasons for limiting AFK. I respect that. But I don't feel it is reasonable to bolster that argument with the idea that the basic respect issues we sometimes see are, at heart, AFK issues. Dig deeper and you will find that anybody who allows an anti-AFK prejudice to spill over to all entertainers, probably has another axe to grind as well. So far I am 6-for-10 in my conversations to that effect with individuals in cantinas, when I probe their no-tip policy. The other 4 declined to converse at all. 
So why do people look down onhard-working non-AFKentertainers, fail to tip, etc? I'll give three alternate views to the AFK thing.
a) Many don't look down at all at us! They are chatty, flirty, respectful, generous. In the medium markets, more than half my customers are nice. Maybe 75%. I am not sure if it is because new folks hang out in the big cities andnew folks are poor, or if the smaller crowd encourages social interaction, but the clients are nicer. Attributing it to something specific, whether my reasons above or the AFK zombies in Theed, is what we call "bad science". All I know is, I make out just fine with most people. By make out, I mean have a good conversation and get heals/tips, not ... well, you know. These people respond to conversation, bandflourish, a good libretto, costumes, acts, etc. Frankly, the system just works for me, quite often, because these folks seem to be plentiful where I go.
b) Some people are cheap, or powergamers who see no need to pay for a fre service. There may be a lot of folks who claim they don't tip because there are so many AFK'ers, etc. Be careful what you try to do to please such people. I find they are often cheap folks with a ready justification, who will fall back on the "well, you don't use any consumeables" when you point out you are not AFK. So you could give up AFK macros entirely to pander to a group that will still stiff ya on tips.
c) Some players just don't consider it entertainer real job. At the base level I think a lot of the players just want to kill and be uber, and respect those who are more uber than they are. Just listen to them amongst themselves. "Duel me!" "eyeshot ownz". Many will, at best, ogle the dancers while they heal. Some will tip, many will not. You will NOT get the respect of thse people by removing the AFK folks.
The (b) and (c) folks won't tip or give respect just because SOE removes AFK entertainment options. It is their fault, not the fault of the AFk entertainers. Do not get into a bitter civil war trying to correct an endemic problem based more in human nature than in the specific mechanics. Be nice, love each other, and spread that love to the minds of your clients.