Entertainer Archive
Thread: Everyone Afkers nowa days?
Drygo wrote:
I'm sorry...I was so frustrated tonight and I just had to vent, and this seemed like an appropriate place.
A Master Musican and myself (master dancer) went to the Dantooine Mining Outpost and performed for an hour and a half. Previously I had been leading one of these solo group thingies, which I am usually loathe to do.
At any rate, myself and my colleague were pleasant, we greeted customers, etc. We said we were not only giving free live mindbuffs, but taking care of the solo group as well so that nobody had to worry about anything.
Guess what happened? Not one combatant spoke to us (well, there was one who I trained in TKM), and not one combatant joined our group when we invited them, not one combatant got their buffs from us. In an hour and a half, time and time again, we were passed over for a bot. There was even one person in the group who was in the Cantina, disbanded, and asked for an invite into the bot group, and I fail to see how in the heck this person didn't know we were buffing what with all the spatial and group I was putting out.
People LOVE their bots. People claim, "oh if you just did what you do better" you'd make a living. I don't know *why* I keep trying, when I know that that's not true. Every single time I have tried to go and take business away from a bot, I have failed. And, I have failed MISERABLY.
End the freaking afk already! I'm in one of my "losing patience" phases. I'm about to get violent.
It's beyond frustrating, I know.
Almost every single NPC cantina is plagued with "Invite plz."
THAT is THE level of socialization in cantinas now. It's really pathetic. A bunch of Pavlov's dogs drooling around a food bowl that never stops feeding them.
It occurred to me the other day, while in Dantooine Mining Outpost's cantina, that an ATK buffing bot would be about the only way to combat these stupid things. The thought of it is kind of disgusting, because basically - you become one of "them."
You spam, you run macros, you do everything, but it is how you play our game now in an NPC cantina.
This still won't draw players away, because they all have their little favorite bot, and run right up to them the moment they step through the door.
*sigh*
Look, I don't think I've ever said it before, but I really think public entertaining for buffing/healing purposes is DEAD. I think it's dead and buried and getting moldy underground. It's mostly lost to us, and it's completely pathetic of this Dev team to allow this to happen. We've warned them, we've screamed at them, some of us have quit, others have fought long and hard to avoid it. All to no avail, we're screwed, and the Devs go AWOL with our stupid announcement last week.
So, basically I'm just saying - screw the bots, they killed our profession, and they can all go take a flying leap into the Sarlacc. The fact that this game fosters such an environment disgusts me even more - the fact that nothing has been done, no effort has been made, no announcement over "positive changes" can happen in a timely fashion. All of it adds up to one thing - BOT CITY in cantinas, and a joke of an "Entertainer's game" in SWG.
I think I need to chill out and get more coffee, this morning I'm feeling very upset over our current state.
2) Charging for buffs in Mos Eisly, Bria - Don't charge a damn thing. Some people will tip you only 500 credits, as they're new, and others might tip you 100 thousand. Hell some might not tip at all but thats the business.
Send me a mail in game if you want a nice buff macro, I use it and it makes giving buffs for individuals real fun and easy. I wrote it up and it has complete instructions on how to make your own with personal feel. I actually activly ask people if they need a buff with my /ooc alias.
That said... I don't generally dance in public cantinas anymore. I certainly don't go there looking for pickup groups. On my server (Naritus) at least, coronet is AFK zombies, Dant Mining is AFK zombies, Dath Science is AFK zombies, Theed is AFK zombies... and no other cantina has a single dancer, musician, entertainer, ever, period.
My band, Hyperdrive (which sadly is down to 3 reliable members, 2 of whom are now pondering quitting as a result of unhappiness with what they have so far heard about CURB) has been doing a "cantina revival tour" since the beginning of this year. For 3 months, every week we have performed in a different public venue -- places like Nashal Cantina, Restuss Hotel, Endor Smuggler's Outpost. I bump the concert thread on my server board every week and send a mass mailing to my guild and other people (mostly other ents or former ents who still play the game but I never see entertaining anymore) on my friends list. In general, the audience turn out has been almost non-existent. We usually get maybe 5 or 6 guild members who show up, I suspect more out of pity than anything else, because they feel bad if we end up playing to an empty room all night. Each week, I'd guess that maybe ONE person who is not in our guild, has bothered to come watch.
So, that is it for me performing in public cantinas. I used to love it, way back when... there were lots of entertainers and you could get into a pickup group and do a jam session with them, and have tons of fun chatting and whatnot while you healed and danced and played music. But those days are over. So after our tour ends (which will be in about 3 weeks I think) that's it. I'm not going to bother to schedule another one. We'll just go back to performing in our town's cantina, which is open to the public of course... but which no one but our guild ever seems to use.
I'm still an at-keyboard entertainer when I entertain... I just don't do it much anymore because there's not much point in doing so in the public venues anymore.
C