Entertainer Archive
Thread: Master Entertainer Box making it wanted by all Ent profs
LeBob
Mon Mar 07, 2005 10:41 pm
#14
I personally have not liked feeling like I must master Entertainer to be a full fledged Musician...
The current version of the not in our Top Issue list is as follows:
- Aspecial new ME-only holo-emote or other currently available holo-emotes with the exceptoin of the "All" option.
- Abilityto place a PC theater.
- Aboost in BF healing.
- Ability to /register
- Certification for playback and effects droids
Maybe this is a different approach from what the majority of us would actually like though?
Should the issue be reworded to show that we want Musicians to feel less obligated to take up Master Entertainer as many IDs and Dancers currently do,and that Master Entertainer should offer something more generic to its three elites?
Allia_Rain
Tue Mar 08, 2005 2:19 am
#15
Maisland wrote:
I think N'Jessi hit it right on by saying that Master Entertainer should have something to make it wanted for its own sake and not because it has something that should by rights go in one of the elite professions.
LeBob wrote:
Should the issue be reworded to show that we want Musicians to feel less obligated to take up Master Entertainer as many IDs and Dancers currently do,and that Master Entertainer should offer something more generic to its three elites?
Yeah, that sounds like the best way to go to me as well. Maybe give master entertainers the abilitly to run gambling mini games, if given a decent interface that could be very popular for player partys.
Hobbytla
Tue Mar 08, 2005 3:56 am
#17
LeBob wrote:
Should the issue be reworded to show that we want Musicians to feel less obligated to take up Master Entertainer as many IDs and Dancers currently do,and that Master Entertainer should offer something more
genericunique and specialto its three elites?
Take out the healing tree and replace it with something interesting!
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This is copied from a post I did on the musician forum, so I'll add that here too.....
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You can't really compare a combat special to an "entertainer special" (instrument, dance/song, flourish). The content for a combat player is not their specials but what the specials can do, which monsters or NPCs they can defeat, and how useful they are in PvP. I admit that I think my Pikeman has some cool moves when she fights, but that's not why I choose one special over the other. For entertainers (=dancers/musicians) the "specials"IS the content. Yes, there are additional benefits for other players to us doing our thing, but that benefit isn't really the "entertainer content". And, it doesn't matter in the least for the game mechanics what intstrument or song/dance is used.
If you create an artificial need for the master entertainer box you might achieve people spending the skillpoints for it, but, you have also admitted defeat in making "entertainer" a worthwhile profession in itself. Instead of stretching your imaginatin or vision to define "master entertainer" you withold content from the elite and specialized professions.
Again, you could say that about the combat professions too. My pikeman is "better" if she also has master brawler. But it doesn't really effect her content in the immediate and direct way which it does for entertainers. The content for a combat stays the same - you are just more effective. Yes, there are certain monsters which you might defeat only bybeinga combat stacker - but you can also chose to attack that monster in a group, and thereby get access to this specific content. There is no such indirect access to entertainer content - you either have to spend the skillpoints or be denied.
Perhaps it would be valid to compare entertainers with medic. Then again, the elite professions that come from medic are the SAME. A doctor is an advanced medic, and a combat medic is a specialized medic. BE is a hybrid profession, and never requires more than 1 tree, other than for personal convinience. Image design, musician and dancer are individual and separate professions, unique from each other even if they are also related.
And as we all know, there are really only two commodities in this game; RL time, and skillpoints. *holding her breath until the urge to comment on AFK play goes away*
Tralmek
Tue Mar 08, 2005 9:49 am
#18
I've always been on the other side of the Musician debate about Master Entertainer. I think it's fine to require M. Ent for Mando and Ceremonial, because it's pretty much the only thing which makes M. Ent any semblance of desirable. They tried to get Dancers to take M. Ent by giving them two dances there. Of course, that doesn't work all-too-well, because the new dances are just spinoffs of dances they already have. For whatever reason, they chose to ignore ID altogether in the M. Ent box.
Since the Devs have been reluctant in the past to redistribute skills, no matter how unwisely placed they are now, I don't see it as an option to take Mando and Ceremonial away from Master Entertainers. It is a bonus, and should remain a bonus. I don't like spending the skillpoints either, but heck, we can still be Musicians without being M. Ents, just like a Droid Engineer can be a Droid Engineer without being a Master Artisan for components which are required for his profession.
I've always been an advocate of adding something for Image Designers to the Master Entertainer box. Of course, many ID's take this as an affront, because they think I'm an eee-vil idiot Musician trying to talk about something with which I have no experience, or they think I'm advocating removing skills from Image Design and putting them in Master Entertainer. I am neither ignorant, nor in favor of "nerfing" any Entertainment profession.
My idea for ID in Master Entertainer has been to add small and temporarythings (which would be actual additions, not moving things from ID) to M. Ent. These would include, but not be limited to small ID craftables (masks, makeup kits?), new holo emotes, the ability to perform extremely temporary cross-species changes. (limited to the ones the ID has available in the ID tree at that time.)
As an ID, if these were added, I would find M. Ent VERY tempting, but it wouldn't make me any less able to ID than not having Mando makes me any less of a Musician, or not having an Exquisite Dance Leotard Schematic makes a Tailor less of a Tailor. These changes would be nice, but not necessaryfor ID's.
LeBob
Tue Mar 08, 2005 10:13 am
#19
I used the word 'generic' to mean that the perk could not be attributed to ID, Musician or Dancer specifically so that each of the three elites would want the perk in Master Entertainer, but they would not feel like it particularly belonged to their profession.
I would really like to see more people's stances on this, because, as you all know there is an "Entertainer Upgrade" on the horizon, and now is the best time for us to achieve changes.
LyteFoot
Tue Mar 08, 2005 10:20 am
#20
Tralmek wrote:
I don't like spending the skillpoints either, but heck, we can still be Musicians without being M. Ents, just like a Droid Engineer can be a Droid Engineer without being a Master Artisan for components which are required for his profession.
Actually no we can't be like a DE. We can't buy those components and use them to make our product better. Yes we can find and include a master ent in a band but we can't be a complete musician ourselves without it. A DE is still a complete DE without master artisan, the artisan has a direct market for his output and the DE has all the capability to complete every droid type. The DE also needs parts from musicians for the playback unit, it doesn't diminish the DE in any way. The lack of one song and instrument in a master musicians repertoire because he doesn't have master ent makes him incomplete and unable to meet the very description they gave MM of being able to play all instruments.
Can an MM perform, yes but he can't perform fully. The very best song for certain celebrations like weddings is ceremonial which prevents an MM without ME from being functional for those situations. I'm giving up skill points I don't use just so I can be a complete musician. Not a slightly better musician, a complete musician, as a master I should be able to play anything a person requests from me and without ME I can't.
Tralmek
Tue Mar 08, 2005 11:27 am
#21
At this point, anyone with at least Novice Musician can "buy" the Mando skill, because we can use playback droids, so the only portion of Master Entertainer that would seem to gimp a Musician would be the ability to play Ceremonial (which we could use the droid solo on if need-be). Good music for ceremonies doesn't have to be Ceremonial, we have several other songs which could work too: Folk, Waltz, and Ballad are good ones.
Mando and Ceremonial are tools of the profession, sure, but they are not really necessary to being a complete Musician. Sure, a Droid Engineer can create any droid with his skills alone, but in order to do that, he needs something only Master Artisans can craft. So, the DE finds what he needs from a Master Artisan. A non-M. Ent Musician can easily find someone to make a droid and program it with Mando and/or Ceremonial, and thus be able to perform his "complete" profession. Take heart in the fact that if we didn't have playback droids, we can still perform the functions of our profession. A Droid Engineer couldn't even make one droid without having a Master Artisan for components.
DarkY0da
Tue Mar 08, 2005 11:32 am
#22
Well here is my concern, if Master Ent was made into a perks for ent profs. Or into something utterly not related with all sorts of really cool stuff.
If it's just a perks box, then it needs to be good enough that people are honestly going to be willing to spend the extra SP to pick it up. Which of course half the people will then argue that they "need" it and how unfair it is that they have to pick it up.
If it's something not related at all then the stuff has to be really super ultra cool... which I tend to think won't happen since if you make it worth while to pick up then you have made it worth to much and stuffed to much stuff into.(far more then in any of the Elites master boxes).
That was why I was suggesting things that would be different from the elites but that the elites would have something comparable.(Quest for the Xantha, maybe even with a Fame system in the game a top 10 ranked Musician could learn the ability to play the mando and ceremonial.)
And for Master IDs the ability to do Body tats and more piercings. Limited amount of schematics for them. But that those things also be gained through Loot that IDs can get as well as Loot drops for Combat types to bring in to get done.(and at Master Ent maybe the ability to craft different schematics that could then be sold or given to IDs that don't want to pick up Master Ent).
For Dancer maybe some "holo" type abilities where you can teach players for a short amount of time Basic(or if ME/MD you could teach them a wider range of dances) Or maybe the ability to create a holo of yourself like a mirror image that would dance with you...(need help with some better dancer ideas here...)
My fear is that if it's just generic perks that there will be No Master Ents. And if it's perks that aren't tied into the Elite Ent professions then there will be to many of them or they will be just too good making Master Ent far better then any of the Elite masters.
I have never "needed" to be Master Entertainer to be a Master Musician. ME just gave me a Music perk that I wanted bad enough to spend the SP to be a Master Entertainer. I do feel bad for all the MM's don't have ME and think they are incomplete, and I think giving us the ability to get our own stringed intrument would help. But I did rather like the addition of being able to learn Mando and ceremonial through a fame system. But I don't think the answer is to nerf ME into uselessness for it's Elite Professions.
(I think I'm rambling...)
If it's just a perks box, then it needs to be good enough that people are honestly going to be willing to spend the extra SP to pick it up. Which of course half the people will then argue that they "need" it and how unfair it is that they have to pick it up.
If it's something not related at all then the stuff has to be really super ultra cool... which I tend to think won't happen since if you make it worth while to pick up then you have made it worth to much and stuffed to much stuff into.(far more then in any of the Elites master boxes).
That was why I was suggesting things that would be different from the elites but that the elites would have something comparable.(Quest for the Xantha, maybe even with a Fame system in the game a top 10 ranked Musician could learn the ability to play the mando and ceremonial.)
And for Master IDs the ability to do Body tats and more piercings. Limited amount of schematics for them. But that those things also be gained through Loot that IDs can get as well as Loot drops for Combat types to bring in to get done.(and at Master Ent maybe the ability to craft different schematics that could then be sold or given to IDs that don't want to pick up Master Ent).
For Dancer maybe some "holo" type abilities where you can teach players for a short amount of time Basic(or if ME/MD you could teach them a wider range of dances) Or maybe the ability to create a holo of yourself like a mirror image that would dance with you...(need help with some better dancer ideas here...)
My fear is that if it's just generic perks that there will be No Master Ents. And if it's perks that aren't tied into the Elite Ent professions then there will be to many of them or they will be just too good making Master Ent far better then any of the Elite masters.
I have never "needed" to be Master Entertainer to be a Master Musician. ME just gave me a Music perk that I wanted bad enough to spend the SP to be a Master Entertainer. I do feel bad for all the MM's don't have ME and think they are incomplete, and I think giving us the ability to get our own stringed intrument would help. But I did rather like the addition of being able to learn Mando and ceremonial through a fame system. But I don't think the answer is to nerf ME into uselessness for it's Elite Professions.
(I think I'm rambling...)
Drygo
Tue Mar 08, 2005 11:41 am
#23
Ok...this is my question, and I don't ask it to be sarcastic or confrontational or anything like that...but...
Why is it so important for some people that Master Entertainer be so important to everybody? The other novice professions are not like that, so why does ME have to be? Some people do Master the novice professions for their extra perks. But, there are a lot of people who don't, and why should they have to feel like they need it to be complete in their profession.
And, maybe you may think that the mandovial isn't needed to be complete because you can get a playback droid or whatever. But, there are a lot of people, such as myself, that hate, hate, hate the fact that I have to get Master Entertainer to get it. How many TKM's do you know who are really upset that they didn't Master Brawler? Anyone?
Why are people trying to force others to get ME to feel complete? We already cost too many skill points for our benefits, and now people are trying to add on more. Why?
Maisland
Tue Mar 08, 2005 1:50 pm
#24
I think N'Jessi hit it right on by saying that Master Entertainer should have something to make it wanted for its own sake and not because it has something that should by rights go in one of the elite professions.
LeBob wrote:
Should the issue be reworded to show that we want Musicians to feel less obligated to take up Master Entertainer as many IDs and Dancers currently do,and that Master Entertainer should offer something more generic to its three elites?
Tralmek
Tue Mar 08, 2005 2:04 pm
#25
It is important to me for Master Entertainer to be important to all the Elite Entertainer Professions. I certainly don't want M. Ent to have things that are absolutely necessary to be complete in one's Elite skills, but everything in Master Entertainer needs to give some sort of desirable bonus to the elite professions.
Master Brawler provides something for every elite profession as well as bonuses to stack on existing skills:
+20 Beserk
+20 Intimidation
+5 Melee Defense
+5 1-handed Toughness
+5 1-handed accuracy
+5 1-handed Center of being duration
+5 1-handed weapon speed
+5 2-handed Toughness
+5 2-handed accuracy
+5 2-handed Center of being duration
+5 2-handed weapon speed
+5 Polearm Toughness
+5 Polearm accuracy
+5 Polearm Center of being duration
+5 Polearm weapon speed
+5 Unarmed Toughness
+5 Unarmed accuracy
+5 Unarmed Center of being duration
+5 Unarmed weapon speed
+5 Ranged Defense
+30 Taunt
+20 Warcry
Beserk 2
Intimidate 2
1-handed Lunge
2-handed Lunge
Polearm Lunge
Unarmed Lunge
Warcry 2
Marksman does the same thing.
Scout and Medic build on skills needed for their Elite professions. Artisan provides components needed for its Elites.
Entertainer grants almost nothing whatsoever for its Elite Professions. Bonuses to wound healing? We already heal fast and the Devs just halfed the time for healing, so those bonuses are worthless. 1/2 of the dances granted by Master Entertainer are broken. Musicians are the only ones given something by M. Entthat can truly help them in their field.
Entertainer is the odd profession out, receiving next-to-no return for our Skillpoint investment in Master Entertainer, and having only one truly desirable thing in the entire box.
I don't see moving Mandoviol or Ceremonial as an option, because the Devs have been reluctant to move skills and such before, so asking for these to be moved is a futile effort which will expend our energy and get us nowhere. Therefore, we need to add new content to the Master Entertainer box to make it more desirable for the other Elite Entertainers.
IMHO some things that are not options include:
Healing bonuses - we heal swiftly already
Buffing bonues - may as well not encourage buttbots to pick up M. Ent
Permanent ID changes
Things that would be options:
Unique dances
Unique holoemotes
Temporary ID changes
Masks
Entertainment Advertisement (let everyone know where we are & what we're capable of--especially useful for ID's)
Drygo
Tue Mar 08, 2005 6:14 pm
#26
Sorry, but I just strongly disagree.
The examples that you listed for all of the other novice professions are not necessary to feel complete. Sure, a TKM may want a bonus to certain stats. But, I'm going to ask this question to you again...Have you ever met a TKM who has said that he or she is upset because he or she feels they need to give up more diversity in their template because they *have* to get Master Brawler in order to feel complete?
I'm guessing the answer is no. And, I'm guessing that answer holds true for all of the other professions, including Marksman and Artisan. What tailor do you know that is pissed off because they don't have something in the Master Artisan box? Hobbytla offered a great analogy that nobody else has addressed. Having Mandovial and unique dances and songs in ME would be the same as having the color blue offered in Master Artisan. That is, a Tailor would have to use up more skillpoints to get Master Artisan to feel complete. Otherwise they could *never* make a blue article of clothing.
I would say that you are right. Entertainer *is* the odd man out. But, that's because Musicians are basically required to get Master Entertainer to not only feel complete, but to arguably have the best instrument available in the game. And, the consensus seems to be divided around here. You've got about half the entertainer population that resents the fact that you have to get Master Entertainer to be complete. Can you show me those kinds of numbers in any of the other novice professions? I would even venture to say that the fact that we get next to nothing in our professions is even more of a reason to not put a required dance or ID skill in that box. What if you really only want to be a musician and don't care at all about dancing or ID? We're supposed to be expected to just use up 34 extra skill points for minimal benefit? What would make it worth it really? 3 new songs, 3 new instruments? More than you can get in an elite profession? That just does not make sense to me.
My list of things that are completely unacceptable at Master Entertainer:
Unique Songs
Unique Dances
UniqueInstruments
Unique forms of ID'ing.
What is acceptable at Master Enterainer:
Bonus to Battle Fatigue Healing
Advertising
Being able to purchase player event perks
And, yeah, I could go with the masks and holo emotes thing.
Perhaps the ability to craft certain instruments or props for dancing.
Crafting props and instruments would be like the Master Artisan who makes things that elite crafting professions need. But, a Master Musician would not feel incomplete if they could not *make* a Mandovial. And, it would put ME's in demand because somebody has to make the Mandovial to play. But, the Mandovial could be used by the Master Musician. So the *MUSICIAN* can play all the instruments and songs.
In other words, things that enhance the entertainment professions, not things that one feels they have to have. That's how it works with all of the other professions. Even though I am primarily a Master Dancer, I do have Master Entertainer because I enjoy playing the Mandovial. But, I didn't always have ME, and I remember being incredibly thankful that Dancers didn't have to pick up ME to be complete like the Master Musicians did. Even as it stands now, instead of spending an extra 20 points for Mandovial, I would have instead liked to spend those 20 points going up the Musician knowledge line.
I *really* don't want to see this happen to the dancers and ID's as well.
Message Edited by Drygo on 03-08-2005 05:56 PM