Entertainer Archive

I was just thinking (a dangerous pastime, I know) and I thought of something radical and different, but I've not decided whether it's a good thing yet: combining dancer and musician elite professions into 1 line - the performer.

The tree would look something like this:

• one line: musician (instruments, light effects, songs)


• one line: dancer (dances, light effects)


• one line: musician healing (bf healing/buffs)


• one line: dancer healing (bf healing/buffs)

Prerequisite: possibly master entertainer or dancer/music/entertainment healing.

I was thinking about the medic profession, and how bioengineer kind of splits off and does its own thing (sort of like image design) while the two "main" professions sprout from master medic. However, combat medic and doctor are very different classes. Dancer and musician are - from a combat point of view - functionally the same (except for the stats buffed). From an entertainer point of view, they are very different, aesthetically and role-play speaking. But it seems that to get all the roleplay value out of being both master dancer and master musician, you have to spend a ridiculous number of points on battle fatigue healing and wound healing, essentially duplicating the skills on the other tree.

The above proposal would have the following results:

• Entertainers would be able to do both dance and music without expending an obscene number of skill points to essentially duplicate healing ability.


• Dabblers (i.e. buff bots) would have to expend the same amount of points, if not more, in order to achieve both 75% buffs.


• Master Performers would be able to buff 3 stats, putting them closer on par to doctors who can buff 6.


• More content for your skill points. It seems ridiculous to spend 2 lines on faster battle fatigue healing and faster wound healing, when really the novice version is fast enough for most people.


• Tying buffing to entertainment healing, instead of dancing/music (which makes more sense).


• Even if you are a dancer and have no interest in music, or vice versa, the point allocation for becoming a Master Performer is about the same as master musician/dancer at the moment, so it probably would make little difference.


• Extra points to play with other professions.


• Master entertainer as a prerequisite would make the mandeviol not such a hot issue.

Now what are the downsides? Well I'm not really sure. Perhaps the point cost will be too low causing every combat type to pick it up to get all the buffs. Perhaps it will cheapen the profession. Perhaps dancing and music are too dissimilar to be crammed together that way. And of course, jamming 2 professions into one means that the devs can ignore cries for content, reasoning that taken as a whole, the dancer/musician hybrid has enough content.

Any thoughts on this matter? Again, I'm just throwing it out there - not sure if it's a good idea or a lousy one, and I want to see what other angles the community has, which I haven't thought of.

I actually like it, I love dancing and music, but my first passion is ID. I am unwilling to drop this so I am stuck deciding between Master Dancer with 4/0/4/3 in musician, or Master Musician with 4/0/4/3 in Dance. THis would solve that problem and I could become more of that "pure entertainer" that I strive to be.

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Chessack wrote:
I love this idea, n'Jessi. Let me suggest a slight alteration.

Healing XP is paifully slow to get. Let's not keep 2 lines of it. Just one line, as it is in Entertainer, applying to both BF and wound healing, for ANY form of entertainment (just as it is in Entertainer). The branches could then be:

Music Knowledge - Songs, playing instruments

Entertainment techniques - Making instruments, visual FX, buffing

Dance Knowledge - dances, decreased falling rate

Entertainment healing - For music and dance, for BF and wounds

Otherwise though I love the idea, as it'd mean I could both dance and play without allocating every skill point I have to doing it.

C

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I thought of that exact arrangment, but here's why I did not propose it.

1. Buff bots that want to buff alone only go up one line. To me that seems that buffing, the arguably most "useful" (to the generalpublic) part of dancer/musician, should require a hefty point investment to keep out the dabblers or guild buff bots.


2. Buffing gives healing experience so it makes more sense to tie it to an entertainment healing line.

I would not be adverse, however, to the following arrangement, though it does not have entertainment healing for buffing:

Music Knowledge - Songs, playing instruments, music buffs

Entertainment techniques - Making instruments, visual FX,

Dance Knowledge - dances, decreased falling rate, dance buffs

Entertainment healing - For music and dance, for BF and wounds

Buuut we'd have to figure out what kind of xp entertainment techniques used (perhaps something to do with light effects use).

I'm not trying to take away from the choices - merely trying to remove skill point investment in duplicative lines (i.e. bf/wound healing). And, although it would take learning dance to play the narg - learning the narg would require an identical point investment as now. Think of it this way - for smuggling, you have to learn spicing and slicing, and lekku, even if you just want to get pistoly things at master (ummm like I know anything about smuggling).

This is not a substitute for content! We still have the dance knowledge and music knowledge lines essentially intact - and desperately needing more content. What I'm trying to do is cut down on the duplication, and allow for entertainers to master both while still having enough points left over to do other stuff. And.... to give us buffs of 3 stats, instead of 1 or 2. That's all.

um

this is a surprisingly good idea. like, surprisingly good.

from a game design viewpoint, what determines the skill point cost of a set of skills? the answer is something like "power". so the Master Bounty Hunter skill set costs a heck of a lot of skill points because it is supposed to be very powerful. the same with Master Doctor. the thinking is that if the point cost for these skill sets was *not* high, they could be combined to make a very *over*powered character ... Master Bounty Hunter / Master Doctor for example.

as you pointed out the healing lines in Musician and Dancer are duplicated, and the requirement to master the Entertainer profession in order to complete the set of dances / instruments / songs is just an unnecessary skill point sink. combining professions to reduce the skill point cost is worth looking at. thanks for suggesting it

An interesting idea, and I've done both Master Dancer on another server, and am a Master Musician on Starsider/Master Entertainer, but honestly, for myself, I have no interest in dancing on Starsider, and I love playing a musician. On the other server, I enjoy being just a dancer. I do think we could use more content, however, in the trees we do have.

Still, it's an interesting idea..