Entertainer Archive

First, I must state where I'm coming from on this. Many of you will see in my signature the details of my combat character and wonder why I'm posting in an entertainer forum. What it doesn't say is that I do have a 'softer' side; I have a quad-mastery entertainer on another server whom I'm very proud of and a deep love for the professions. I am never AFK when I play, and always try to be chatty. I just wish I had more reason to be there and chat, because when it's good, it's like no feeling in the world .

As of Publish 20, battle fatigue has been removed from the Star Wars Galaxies universe. I feel that this is really the final nail in the coffin of what was the most amazing social experiment ever attempted in an MMORPG. That is, only if things stay 'as they are' and are not augmented with further improvements to how it works currently.

If changes are not made, the entertainer scene that once existed, the giant never-ending party that was The Cantina, is gone forever, and I truely feel that they might as well remove the class from the game entirely rather than continue to string along people who are still hoping for the glory days to return. Changes must be made, as quickly as humanly possible, before those few anchors of the cantina are gone forever.

I have come up with a way to save the Entertainer Class in this game. I do not purport that my solution is the only, or even the best; rather that it is a possible solution to the problem, with many of the holes of the current system taken care of. I ask that you comment, offer additions to, analyze and critizise in the vein this is posted: As a way to help. In other words "I'm not perfect, don't flame, help, please"

We must begin with what damaged this otherwise well-crafted class. In my opinion, there were two main setbacks right near the beginning of the game that hurt us the most. Namely, the Holocrons and Mind Buffs (hear me out!).

First, we all know what impact the Holocrons had on our class. People would pick up entertainer just to grind through and drop again. They were not interested in the rather different type of gameplay that entertainer provided. It was one of social interaction and groups helping anyone and everyone, rather than just the few moments they stopped in previous before they headed back out to kill more roaming creatures. The 'goals' are totally different from that of every other class in the game; not to be 'the best' dancer, but rather to be there to relax, enjoy and just chat. This lead to a rather deeply engrained hatred of the professions in general: "Oh god dancer? I hate you SOE... where's the stupid trainer." So, they'd just afk macro it. This meant rather than actually trying to enjoy the different classes (as SOE had obviously intended), they just had to 'wait till my macro gives me my next box'. Overall, they couldn't make money, they couldn't be where they wanted to be (on the battlefield), instead they had to pay money to 'not use' their account while they went through a horrible time in their 'life'. Of course, they weren't there, so they setup spammy 'watch me, tip me' macro shouts. This made the cantinas HORRIBLE places to go to very quickly, as people HATE spam. Sure the regulars, the true entertainers could just /addignore, but that 'customer' coming through the door had no chance to see our little /waves or /greets when there were 5-10 bots there spamming constantly. This lead to a huge drop in the social aspect of the cantinas. Since that's what the true entertainers were there for at first, they started leaving.

Next, came Mind Buffs. I know what you're saying, "mind buffs are bad? That's how I made my living as a dancer!" I ask that you look at it from an outside perspective. 'Joe Combat' wants to PvP. Since you have to have 'the best' to compete in PvP, he'll NEED a mind buff if he expects to kill 'Frank Combat' in the streets of Theed. Since "those entertainers that I HATE" (see above) give the mind buffs, he'll favor a bot over a live entertainer any day. He doesn't have to tip, he doesn't have to even ask. Just follow the instructions in the spammy macro the bot is running. By giving us something that seems helpful on the surface, gave rise to one of the most HORRID things seen in MMO gaming, the entirely afk 'player'. Since it's some combat person's alt, you can bet they farmed tons of mobs and got it the best skill tapes, or bought them, running the price of these well out of the range of any true entertainer's price range (as a pure entertainer, really, when did you have 25 mil, or more, to just drop on a +25 skill tape, when all you want to do is be social?). So, I contend that mind buffs were a good idea, but in the overall effect, they really hurt us.

As it stands now, battle fatigue, the one reason people had left to 'have' to visit us, is gone. They no longer have a direct reason to even see us, as the 10% buff to faction/xp is forgoable in favor of never seeing us again. To some point I say 'good riddance', but overall this is nothing but bad. Who will that social player talk to now? The 1 or 2 others dancing and playing with her? The 1 or 2 customers he'll see every hour or so of gameplay? And what if one of those few customers still 'hates' us for what the Holocron put him through so long ago? Isn't it cheaper to just open up an IRC client?

This leaves us with a collective dislike in the minds of the average combat players out there, and now no really compelling reason for them to continue to visit us. How in the world can it get worse? Simple answer to that is neglect. It will get worse, day by day, so long as this state persists. No candy coating, no nice way to say it. Every day in the cantinas will get less and less fun. Sure you'll get a good customer from time to time, or you'll get a good conversation once in a while... but really it's nothing like it was, and you know as well as I do that the only direction is down. (it hurts more than I can describe to type that)

So, how can this be fixed? As I said, I have a 'solution'. It's probably not fool-proof, but it's a decent idea. I hope to hear from others on it!

Part 1: Removal of recursive macros.
With the Combat Upgrade firmly in place, recursive macros are not quite as needed to the game as they once were. If you check back through my posts, you will see my arguments for keeping them and even expanding upon the macro system. I do not believe this anymore, and can truely see where and why I was wrong in my position. They encourage AFK play more than they assist atk players now. I know everyone that just plays combat will absolutly hate me for saying this kind of thing, but being popular and being right are not always the same thing. (again, my view, please, express yours in a THOUGHTFUL maner, thank you.) Also, yes, this does hurt entertainers as we can no longer focus on chatting while we're entertaining. I have a solution to that below.

Part 2: Expansion of the buff system.
Yes, I did just argue that buffs are bad, but with the removal of our need as passive healers, what else is there? What I suggest is not just making our one buff 'better', but to give us a large selection of them. Things I can think of off the top of my head:

• General combat speed buff (5% or so, granted in the novice trees)
• Ranged Combat Speed Buff (10-15%, granted in the elite trees)
• Melee Combat Speed Buff (10-15%, granted in the elite trees)
• Healer Class Buff (5% to anything to do with Medic, Combat Medic, Doctor)
• Combat Medic State Buff (10-15% to Combat Medic 'States' like Electrolyte Drain)
• Combat Medic DoT Buff (10-15% for Combat Medic Poison, Disease, Fire)
• Healing Buff (10-15% to heals from abilities, not stims)
• Doctor Buff Buff (goofy name, yes. 10-15% to the power/duration of Doctor Buffs, given to the Doctor)
• Buff Buff (again, sorry... 10-15% to what a doctor gives you, given to the patient)
• General Combat Damage Buff (5%)
• Melee Damage Buff (10-15%)
• Ranged Damage Buff (10-15%)
• Crafter general experimentation buff (5%)
• Crafter experimentation buff (gives 1/2 an extra point to a crafter, that way they only need one of the craftable clothing items to hit 11 point)
• Crafter Efficiency Buff (makes crafting in tools faster, and schems crafted during the buff run faster in the factory)

The list goes on and on. I'll expand more upon this as time allows and it comes to me (feel free to suggest better names/more of them!). Also, notice the tiering in the above example. Buffs in those tiers are NOT able to be applied concurrently. As in, you can't have both a general combat speed buff and a melee combat speed buff at the same time. One or the other, they overwrite each other.

Notice also that I do recommend that they go up to 15%, and I'd be very willing to go to 20% (given that they do something similar to doc buffs). This makes it again worthwhile for someone to come and get that buff. Also, it allows for interaction between the customer and the patron, they can ask for which buff they want. Could even be kind of like an ID session: The entertainer targets the patron and does a /buff command. The entertainer gets a picklist of all the buffs they can give (with descriptions and %) and clicks OK. The patron can either accept/deny the buff then (quick pop up that says what entertainer is trying to give what buff). This is so they won't accidently get something overwritten that they didn't want. Then they are set to /watch or /listen automatically and it works every time (taking care of the watch/listen bugs of before).

Part 3: Entertainer's Book
The idea behind this it would be either an item in their inventory, or a seperate tab on the datapad (preferrably in the inventory, I'll explain later). This Entertainer's Book would allow an entertainer to map out dance steps (flourishes), changes to dance, etc. This would replace the macro system we'd loose from recursive macros. The idea would be you could setup a 'routiene', a dance to do, the flos, even switch dance/music and more flos, the special effects, etc., and the game would run through them in order, waiting for each to complete properly before starting the next. You'd be able to 'jot down' your performances in this book, and they'd loop just like macros used to, but the only things that could go in here are those pertaining to entertainers.

The use of this book must be intuitive, so any entertainer could easily use it from the get go. When you open the book, you'd see a 'list' of your routienes. Click 'create new', and get a list on the left of stuff you can do (the songs, flourishes, special effects, pauses, etc on tabs) and an empty list on the right. Drag and drop from one list to the other. Name the routiene, and click ok. Click that performance you just created and you will loop through it forever, just like old recursive macros did .

As for why I would prefer it to be an item rather than in the datapad: Expandability and interaction. When you take novice entertainer, you get a free book with room for 10 seperate performances. As you grow as an entertainer, you might find you want more... so you can go out to an artisan and they can craft you a better book with room for 50, 100, or 250 routienes! Make these new items VERY cheap to craft, taking a few fiberplast for pages and some metal for the 'lower end' books, maybe as complex as 'wood' for the higher end ones. Use the Mystical Tomes graphics for them (no need dedicating more art team devs to this than needed). On top of this, make them tradeable. If you wrote the routiene they can always be modified by you. If you buy a routiene book or are given one, the routienes are not modifiable. So, we now have another new way entertainers can help out each other, by giving them these cheap books complete with a couple routienes they can start with and then when they get more into it, they can make their own. This helps build community and even lets some entertainers gain fame amongst themselves as they watch others perform their dances/songs.

Please note: I purposely did NOT include /say statements in these routiene books. Songs and the like are still best left to the non-recursive macros or aliases.

This plan would be a good start to fixing entertainer and getting us back to doing what we do best: be social and entertaining to both each other and the combatants out there. It starts mending the burnt and destroyed bridges we've had from the Holocrons and the previous buff systems. It starts getting people more interested and active in the entertainer community.

In closing I really hope something is done, quick. I miss many of the friends I made in the cantinas, as they have left for other games. Please, I don't want to loose more when we could make it more robust, more fun, and start to bring back the glory days of old

/bmoc

what a great post, and what great ideas

been sitting for an hour thinking on it, and i must say its perfect.

im so close to dropping my dancer, so disapointed in the devs right now.

i cant come up with a better way to help the ent proff, then the one u posted, love the idea about a rutine book.

i truly hope they hear u out, cos as u say this profesion is dieing and fast.

thanks for a great post

---

aradz wrote:
Part 1: Removal of recursive macros.
With the Combat Upgrade firmly in place, recursive macros are not quite as needed to the game as they once were. If you check back through my posts, you will see my arguments for keeping them and even expanding upon the macro system. I do not believe this anymore, and can truely see where and why I was wrong in my position. They encourage AFK play more than they assist atk players now. I know everyone that just plays combat will absolutly hate me for saying this kind of thing, but being popular and being right are not always the same thing. (again, my view, please, express yours in a THOUGHTFUL maner, thank you.) Also, yes, this does hurt entertainers as we can no longer focus on chatting while we're entertaining. I have a solution to that below.

---

I think a much better way of stopping AFK "play" would be to do two things; first remove the ability for a player to stop themselves from becoming flagged as AFK (the only way to stop the tag should be by using your keyboard or clicking your mouse while the game is in primary focus, i.e. you are not tabbed out of it); second when a player goes AFK the game should stop processing any commands from macros and the player should be unable to perform any skill annimation.

This would instantly stop people from AFKing through any profession without reducing any functionallity in the macro system that could generate hate towards us for having it nerfed.

---

aradz wrote:
Part 2: Expansion of the buff system.
Yes, I did just argue that buffs are bad, but with the removal of our need as passive healers, what else is there? What I suggest is not just making our one buff 'better', but to give us a large selection of them. Things I can think of off the top of my head:

---

We are going to be given buffs at some point in the future, but they have indicated they will be non-combat only so I guess we will still only offer 10% XP gains to the combat players. Who knows if at some point in the future if they will give us some buffs that help out combatants a little, however if they are long term (i.e. 3 hours) I suspect they will not be stronger than 10%.

---

aradz wrote:

Part 3: Entertainer's Book
The idea behind this it would be either an item in their inventory, or a seperate tab on the datapad (preferrably in the inventory, I'll explain later). This Entertainer's Book would allow an entertainer to map out dance steps (flourishes), changes to dance, etc. This would replace the macro system we'd loose from recursive macros. The idea would be you could setup a 'routiene', a dance to do, the flos, even switch dance/music and more flos, the special effects, etc., and the game would run through them in order, waiting for each to complete properly before starting the next. You'd be able to 'jot down' your performances in this book, and they'd loop just like macros used to, but the only things that could go in here are those pertaining to entertainers.

The use of this book must be intuitive, so any entertainer could easily use it from the get go. When you open the book, you'd see a 'list' of your routienes. Click 'create new', and get a list on the left of stuff you can do (the songs, flourishes, special effects, pauses, etc on tabs) and an empty list on the right. Drag and drop from one list to the other. Name the routiene, and click ok. Click that performance you just created and you will loop through it forever, just like old recursive macros did .

As for why I would prefer it to be an item rather than in the datapad: Expandability and interaction. When you take novice entertainer, you get a free book with room for 10 seperate performances. As you grow as an entertainer, you might find you want more... so you can go out to an artisan and they can craft you a better book with room for 50, 100, or 250 routienes! Make these new items VERY cheap to craft, taking a few fiberplast for pages and some metal for the 'lower end' books, maybe as complex as 'wood' for the higher end ones. Use the Mystical Tomes graphics for them (no need dedicating more art team devs to this than needed). On top of this, make them tradeable. If you wrote the routiene they can always be modified by you. If you buy a routiene book or are given one, the routienes are not modifiable. So, we now have another new way entertainers can help out each other, by giving them these cheap books complete with a couple routienes they can start with and then when they get more into it, they can make their own. This helps build community and even lets some entertainers gain fame amongst themselves as they watch others perform their dances/songs.

Please note: I purposely did NOT include /say statements in these routiene books. Songs and the like are still best left to the non-recursive macros or aliases.

---

I like this. I would say though that looping should not be automatic but an option that can be selected, this makes the routines a little more flexible. I do think though that either the ability to write them, or to trade the routines to other players should possibly be saved till the top of the knowledge branch of Dancer and Musician (this would give a new meaning the skill titles gained there).

My guess is that if it takes a crafted item to trade and store the routines then it will require that they are stored server side, this could mean that the Devs would be much more hesitant to implement it, if they were stored in a client side file it would mean that database storage would not be an issue and in theory you could have less restrictions on the number and complexity of the routines you could create. The downside of having the routines stored clientside is that you would only be able to trade them in person and it would be unlikely that once you had traded one that the only the creator would be able to edit it, even if the feature to stop editing for the non-creator was implemented I'm sure it would not be too difficult for someone to create a progrm that changed the owner.

Very insightful, and great suggestions.

I had a musician at one time, but am all combat/healing on both of my toons now. However, I really enjoy the conversation and comraderie in cantinas.... yet another (formerly?) great aspect of this game. I'd continue to visit, and hope that others will to, and not just the players who are visiting to start their grind for the day.

I hope those suggestions are seriously considered.

Very well thought out, and if indeed that did happen I would come back to Musician,I loved the profession but not as it is now , i just dropped all my entertainer and musician and went TK and fencer with doc 4004. I still get the tells from people asking for me to come play at parties or to stop by the cantian or guild city and play , but now it is just as a spectator. I wont lie i miss it alot , but i just cant see my self devoting time to somethign that doesnt have a clear purpose.

I make a point to go to what ever city im in cantian and tip a few people who are ATK even if I dont listen to them.(my wife kept her dancer even though she doesnt like to do the dances anymore , she is hoping it will get better. I am just distrustfull and dont believe it will ever get better.)

Anyways good job and I love the ideas

Aeros

I agree that buffs, and the holocron era, were the reasons the professions are in the state we are in.

Buffing, however, unless it remains passive and transparent, will kill the professions.

And it will kill the professions, just as it killed the professions before the CU. When the things patrons go to the cantina to receive have nothing to do with the act of dancing or playing music, but rather, something that is done in the course of dancing or playing music, then nobody really cares about the dance or music at all. They only care about the "/" command we do, or the radial menu click we do, or some other contrived "gimmick" that is supposed to reassure us that we "do something important."

This begs the question (and I think this is a serious question) of, "why do I even have to dance for a set time in order to give the player a buff, and why does the patron have to sit through a dance or music when all they want is the buff?" Because frankly, dancing or playing music means nothing in the relationship between patron and performer in the solution outlined here. The only thing that is really valued by either party is the ability to do this:

The entertainer targets the patron and does a /buff command. The entertainer gets a picklist of all the buffs they can give (with descriptions and %) and clicks OK.

So why should we even, on either side of the patron/performer relationship, even bother with the formality of making me as a dancer dance for a set time, and more importantly, bother the patron with the formality of even having to /watch for a set time? Seems to me it is a waste of both our time, when all he really wants is a buff, and all I really want is to give him or her a buff.

No. That's a doctor's game. In fact, it is even more of a doctor's game than our Pre CU game. And not only that, but it is an inefficient and wasteful doctor's game, because a doctor's buffing mechanism is just so much more straightforward, quick,and certain.

The difference between we and doctors is that they have active healing and enhancements as their defining criteria. However, what makes us different than doctors, on a fundamental level, is that we have passive healing and enhancements. And just because one is active, and the other passive, in no way means that one is subject to unattended "play,' and the other not. Both can be automated today, and its because neither profession has to respond to an ever changing set of circumstances.

Here is a repost of my idea as to how to end unattended activity, while at the same time make the cantina game a game of active choice, while at the same time preserving transparency, passivity, and the things that make us more than simply a "poor reflection of medical professions."

Hereare the realadvantages and disadvantages between live and unattended performers:

Unattended Character:

Advantages:

1) Predictable (they always want to buff, because they have no "wants" other than what they are programmed to do)

2) Can dance forever.

3) Has no desire to do anything other than dispense mechanics.

Disadvantages:

1) Boring.

2) Cannot respond to changing circumstances.

3) Cannot make decisions to be better than what it inherently is.

Live Player:

Advantages:

1) Fun to be around.

2) Can respond to the environment around them.

3) Does what it takes to make the most out of what he or she is (makes a /watch fun).

Disadvantages:

1) Unpredictable/variable (sometimes, we just don't want to do the things the patron wants, because we have "wants" independent of others).

2) Cannot be at the keys forever.

3) Have a desire to do more than stare at the grey walls of Coronet Cantina.

So as we can see, there are certain things buffbots and the like can do better than us, and always will. However, there are certain things that buffbots and the like cannot do, and never can. So what we need, more than anything else, is a system thatfacilitates what we do well, and downplays our disadvantages. Conversely, we also need a system that downplays what unattended characters do well, and exposes what unattended characters do poorly.

The way these professions are structured tended to place the emphasis on those things unattended characters could do well: exist, dispense mechanics reliably, and be available to do these things whatever the time, and whatever the conditions. And moreover, the disadvantages of the unattended characters never really became glaringly apparent to the ones they served.

So how do we do this? Its really very simple.

We change the venues from a static environment to a dynamic environment.

What do you think would happen if getting an entertainer mission (now extended to a half an hour) made you twice as effective for the duration of the mission, and allowed one to choose which buff would be applied at the time of mission selection? So instead of granting a +10% experience inspiration, you--and anyone in your group--could grant a 20% inspiration for the duration of the mission?

What if patrons could see you could give a 20% inspiration because you were in a special section of the venue that was reserved only for those who were running a mission? And what if players from all over the galaxy could see that your band or troupe was playing at the time, through the holonet terminals at every starport in the galaxy, and on a scrolling marquee outside the venue?

What if when you took the stage and started performing, all other acts stopped dancing or playing, and couldn't start up again until your mission was over?

What sort of player do you think could best adapt to the new system?

The one who could adapt to changing circumstances? Or the one who is parked and left to run its script?

The one who is more than willing to do what it takes to put on a better show? Or the one who is merely "content" with dancing the same boring dance, shouting the same boring spam, and running the same boring script in the MO 24/7?

So yes. We need a solution, and a change. But unless the change makes sense, and facilitates what we do, then it will only create confusion, attempts at automation, stress, and animosity.

Message Edited by PoetDancer on 07-21-2005 03:11 PM

Some good points there Sirii, and I like the ideas around the missions and how they would work.

Message Edited by PoetDancer on 07-21-2005 06:04 PM

I'm a -huge- proponent of this idea (see my response back in June that is similar to this, over in the musician forum) Although I still would like greater control over the lyrics of my songs and have a little more precision as to when the lyric goes off with a flourish... the audience might not care about whether the flourish they hear goes with the lyrics they see, but it's a big thing to me as a SWG performer that I can be as accurate as possible.

Although I'm not sure that the musician professions is the first social experiment in a MMORPG, it definitely is the most unique. Go here to see one of the more ambitious social experiments in online gaming. Only about 2500 subscribers, but a neat experiment nonetheless.

Message Edited by Steve_12_08 on 07-22-2005 09:55 AM