Entertainer Archive
Thread: Learned from a weekend of buffing.
I only had 2 failed buffs. Both as musician. One was because the person had been listening to another musician, but that musician went AFK. Their listening to me stopped them listening the other musician, triggering the buff. They came back a half hour later (I assume they died, as they said they would be back an hour and a half later) and I was able to give a successful buff. The other was because they were trying to watch a dancer at the same time. A third person thought it failed but it hadn't.
Here are a few things I observed.
- Having and advertising a better and faster buff isn't enough to draw people away from a buff-bot. Only the unavailability of the buff-bot was.
- Nor was the fact that he was dancing in boxers.
- Even then, some people just went without.
- No, I didn't do this. I can thank his customers for running off without disbanding, taking him out for up to an hour at a time.
- "invite plz" is a 1337 speak for "Can I get a mind buff please?".
- Many players don't know any other way to get a mind buff.
- When I added a comment that players didn't need to leave their group to my advertisement, I got a few more people coming in for buffs.
- The fear of losing their place in the buff-group was probably my single biggest loss of customers.
- Players will wait for their doctor buffs to drop so they can get rebuffed, but won't spend the same time to go to an entertainer.
It was in my weekend of buffing that I wrote the timer alias I posted the other day.
One trick I found for making sure a buff was being applied... I had shoes with +1 mind enhancement on them. Before I started a buff I would take them off. Before I started flourishing I'd look for the appropriate amount of healing xp coming in. This was 4 when I was dancing popular or playing the mandoviol, 6 when I was playing the ommni box. Part way into the buff, I'd put the shoes on after doing 5 flourishes. The next xp tick I'd see 1 healing xp per person I was buffing. I also learned that you didn't need all the mind enhancement gear on at the end of a buff, you only needed to have it all on together sometime during the buff (But not the very beginning.) As a dancer, I had +1 in a vest that I really wasn't happy with the look of (I was a big rushed making the clothes to put the tapes into, and most of the tapes were +1) so I'd put it on for one flourish in the middle of the buff then take it off again.
If you're capped on healing xp, you can always drop master and a box or two of healing, then re-train the healing xp. Or once publish 10 goes live, turn it in with the new village quests. Being below the cap of healing xp and knowing how xp for buffing is granted really helps me give reliable buffs. I avoided two potential failed buffs by catching them at the start. In one case the /setperform didn't work, and in the other the person wasn't listening to me. I never had a problem with /setperform when I had them targetted, but for the Ommni Box, I had to use the name, and that is where the problem was. Watching healing xp also allows you to "catch" people trying to claim it didn't work to stiff you or to get a double buff. Or in the case I had earlier, the person who thought it didn't work at first, I knew it had. (I didn't have to call them on it, it was an honest mistake on their part.)
Panthu wrote:This seems like a terrible amount of silliness for a Casual/Social Profession's one intended way to make an income.Doc buffs are more straight forward, and their fiction is based in Science and Engineering!
In terms of unintended silliness, yes, there's a lot of unintended silliness with entertainer buffs (bugs).
On the other hand, I would personally despise the intended silliness of finding/buying uber resources, maintaining enough tivoli (is that the right food?), and spamming involved with doctor buffs
.(but mostly the resources and crafting)
Dantooine is a different matter. I'd say that a little over half the business was people coming in looking for a buff on their own. A few got buffs because a friend/groupmate told them to. And a few did respond to the shouting. (Which I was doing a lot less than the doctor outside.)
I don't like to say things this way as it makes it sound dirty, but when the buff bots are gone, we'll have an opportunity to define how we give buffs. Just like how doctors have people trained to get in line (Some damn straight lines too. Some of the dancers I've worked with could learn a lot about getting into lines from those people.) we will have the chance to figure out how we will be giving buffs.
But we need to be willing to give buffs for it to work. If you just dance or play music and refuse to give buffs, we will not get very far.
So does anybody have a suggestion? When I'm buffing I find it easiest to be group leader. If I'm not, and I have a lot of people to do, the group leader will either be inviting a lot of people for me, or more likely I'll just drop out of the group and ask for a reinvite when I'm done. If a dancer/musician team up, I can see them being in a group by themselves. So we are probably going to get a divide of groups in some cantinas between masters and non-masters. That would be for people actively intending to buff. Casual buffing would be just 1 person at a time when you have a reason not to leave the group.
And positioning, right now a lot of people park themselves in the entrance or in the alcove at the top of the stairs when they are buffing. I will state up front I don't like people doing that. (And I play a character that is pretty full of himself and would want to be somewhere that is the center of attention.) It turns it into a game of one-upmanship. Someone goes into the alcove, so someone else goes to the table across from the alcove, then someone else the corner across from that, then someone goes into the front room... At the same time people that come in for healing will sometimes stop there to get healed, so the main group then doesn't get healing xp since the person is likely running their own group. I try to go to a corner in the main room, in one of the side rooms, or towards the back by the bar. If I'm a musician with the main group I'll stick with the other musicians, if they are so organized.
Anyone elses thoughts?
Tiaga wrote:
I don't like to say things this way as it makes it sound dirty, but when the buff bots are gone, we'll have an opportunity to define how we give buffs. Just like how doctors have people trained to get in line (Some damn straight lines too. Some of the dancers I've worked with could learn a lot about getting into lines from those people.) we will have the chance to figure out how we will be giving buffs. Heh
But we need to be willing to give buffs for it to work. If you just dance or play music and refuse to give buffs, we will not get very far. Agreed.
So does anybody have a suggestion? When I'm buffing I find it easiest to be group leader. If I'm not, and I have a lot of people to do, the group leader will either be inviting a lot of people for me, or more likely I'll just drop out of the group and ask for a reinvite when I'm done. If a dancer/musician team up, I can see them being in a group by themselves. So we are probably going to get a divide of groups in some cantinas between masters and non-masters. That would be for people actively intending to buff. Casual buffing would be just 1 person at a time when you have a reason not to leave the group.
If I'm buffing, I always try to be group leader as well. In a less populated Cantina, like the Mining Outpost on Dantooine or Theed lately (hologrinders are leaving, yay), I will even take charge of the entertainer group (those that are not afk, of course), and invite people in for buffing after the requisite payment is met.
InCoronet, I'll often dance by myself and invite people in when I'm buffing. But, either way, I always make sure I'm the leader (or my master musician partner can be the leader). But, IMO, buffing's a business and it's easier to control if one of the master buffers is leader.
And positioning, right now a lot of people park themselves in the entrance or in the alcove at the top of the stairs when they are buffing. I will state up front I don't like people doing that. (And I play a character that is pretty full of himself and would want to be somewhere that is the center of attention.) It turns it into a game of one-upmanship. Someone goes into the alcove, so someone else goes to the table across from the alcove, then someone else the corner across from that, then someone goes into the front room... At the same time people that come in for healing will sometimes stop there to get healed, so the main group then doesn't get healing xp since the person is likely running their own group. I try to go to a corner in the main room, in one of the side rooms, or towards the back by the bar. If I'm a musician with the main group I'll stick with the other musicians, if they are so organized.
Egads, yes, I hate when people park themselves at the entrance too. If another Master Dancer is doing this, I'll sometimes leave because they'll get all the business anyway, and I refuse to go up there. (Sounds like buffbots, lol, but at least they're live.)
I just like to be on the main dance floor...where on the main dance floor isn't a huge issue.
Anyone elses thoughts?
The problem, as with anything else, is you can't control human behavior. Even if the people on the boards actually agreed to an accepted standard of behavior, it'd be extremely difficult to get everyone in game to agree to it. But, I think things like the /ent channel and coming together as a community would do wonders. Our population at the moment is small compared to other professions. I think when/if the buffbots are gone, it'll be a great opportunity for the entertainer community to come together and start from the bottom up in regards to Cantina ettiquette. I have tried my best in regards to that to visit Mos Eisley where all the noobs are...discourage spamming, etc. Like I said, you'll never get everybody to agree on everything. However, being the kind of people we are, social players, I think we have a better chance to keep things cordial and "spread the word" than most professions do, especially since many servers have already taken it upon themselves to form a tight knit community as a result of buffbots. Perhaps it's a blessing in disguise.
I guess the important part is to never force anyone to do anything they don't want to. But, I have hopes that this game is going to get better and by being nice to one another (seriously), we can bring more and more up and coming entertainers into the fold. I'm actually surprised at how well things are already coming together on Kettemoor, no small part due to the /ent channel and the efforts of people such as yourself and Tandaava.
Somehow doctors have conditioned people to get in lines, and the standard charge is 10K. Nobody balks, it's quite an interesting phenomena. As far as I know, it happened pretty naturally. Maybe this will happen naturally as well. And, if it doesn't, there's no harm in providing a gentle push in the area of Cantina ettiquette.
...well it seems RThree is the show and im just there to buff most the time..(ive gotten far more complements on his light shows than my buffs) I like dancing to the side and find that that's where it's easiest for me to keep an eye on what's going on when I am group leader. But I have had problems there so it's clearly not the end all solution and I'm certainly willing to hear what works for others and why it works.Yes, that would certainly be more straight forward in my mind.
CoretDenvin wrote:
My Alt is nearing master musician. I use her for guild mind buffing and for master merchant.
My question is this...
The buff process for dancers and musicians is a long, boring process that fails more times then it should.
What if the process was changed to a single buff command (ala /healenhance) that drained the Dancer/Musicians mind and/or action pool dramatically by performing a spectacular flourish that enhanced the targets mind.
That would avoid buying buff packs like docs and puts the focus on the dancer/musicians talents/skills while still allowing the buff process to move along much faster. This could even be done like a normal flourish so that an entertainer wouldn't have to stop doing their routine.