Image Designer Archive
Thread: Some thoughts on improving ID
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trev33b
Thu Jun 03, 2004 5:28 pm
#1
I'm not an ID, nor do I currently have any desire or incentive to be one. With the recent exception of stats migration and perhaps the occasional image change that characters may want I don't see much reason that anyone would want to become an ID. However, in a game that offers massive customization of many different things, I think it's appropriate to have an ID profession. It just doesn't seem like much fun.
So, how can we change that? I think the key is to make ID's meaningful to the game. Introduce some new ID abilities that have some impact on how the game is played and put those in the forefront. Make it desirable for folks to seek out image designers for help.
Since image design is mostly about changing people's appearances, then why not make them masters of disguise? In game terms this would mean having the ability to change the everyone's perception of a character they do their work on.
Perception Buffs
----------------
In effect, I'm talking about perception buffs. These may not all be the best of ideas, but I think it might be a good place to start the thinking.
Faction Buffs:
The first one that comes to mind is a faction buff. This would temporarily add or remove some amount of faction points for a particular faction to a character. A faction buff would be applied to a character and last a couple hours (similar to the health/action buffs a doctor can provide). It would allow a character to possibly talk or do missions with NPC's they might not normally get to talk to. Note that because this buff is a modifier and is temporary, you can not actually spend any of these faction points.
I would imagine that the list of factions that an ID may give buffs for would depend on how far through the ID skill tree they are. Perhaps starting with the common thug factions, through local authorities, and then up into the more advanced or esoteric organizations, such as the rebellion, imperials, and black sun. The main idea for the progression being that it's more difficult to infiltrate the higher level organizations.
Overt Buffs:
As a variation of a faction buff, this would allow an ID to make a character look like an overt Imp or Rebel. In game terms, the character would get all of the benefits of doing so. However, the character would also get all of the 'negatives'. For example, a rebel disguised as an overt imp would con red to other rebels and killing rebels would give him real imp faction.
The cool thing about both the faction and overt buffs is that they would allow an ID to become more intimately involved with the overall GCW and perhaps make them feel involved.
Racial Disguise:
The Master ID being very good as modifying the looks of characters, might be able to perform masterful make-up jobs to temporarily change the race of a character. While technically not a buff, because there's no game mechanic, this should probably still be a temporary & timed change. This one's primarily for roleplay.
If we wanted to have this affect game play, we could consider having the racial bonuses of the disguised race apply as well, but this might end up being an exploit.
False Title:
The ID could be able to generate a new title for the target character. This would time-out as well like the other buffs. Might want to prevent ID's from performing this on themselves.
Glamor Bonus:
Give ID's the ability to increase the effectiveness of entertainers by donning them with glamor. This might be in the form of unusual hairdos (think princess leia or queen amidala) or perhaps to simply make the entertainer's clothes gain a subtly shimmerring glow.
---
Some of the big benefits of these types of suggestions is not only be a part of the SWG universe, but it may give them additional avenues for gaining xp which hopefully makes them a little less boring.
That's about all I've thought of for the moment. Opinions? Other ideas?
So, how can we change that? I think the key is to make ID's meaningful to the game. Introduce some new ID abilities that have some impact on how the game is played and put those in the forefront. Make it desirable for folks to seek out image designers for help.
Since image design is mostly about changing people's appearances, then why not make them masters of disguise? In game terms this would mean having the ability to change the everyone's perception of a character they do their work on.
Perception Buffs
----------------
In effect, I'm talking about perception buffs. These may not all be the best of ideas, but I think it might be a good place to start the thinking.
Faction Buffs:
The first one that comes to mind is a faction buff. This would temporarily add or remove some amount of faction points for a particular faction to a character. A faction buff would be applied to a character and last a couple hours (similar to the health/action buffs a doctor can provide). It would allow a character to possibly talk or do missions with NPC's they might not normally get to talk to. Note that because this buff is a modifier and is temporary, you can not actually spend any of these faction points.
I would imagine that the list of factions that an ID may give buffs for would depend on how far through the ID skill tree they are. Perhaps starting with the common thug factions, through local authorities, and then up into the more advanced or esoteric organizations, such as the rebellion, imperials, and black sun. The main idea for the progression being that it's more difficult to infiltrate the higher level organizations.
Overt Buffs:
As a variation of a faction buff, this would allow an ID to make a character look like an overt Imp or Rebel. In game terms, the character would get all of the benefits of doing so. However, the character would also get all of the 'negatives'. For example, a rebel disguised as an overt imp would con red to other rebels and killing rebels would give him real imp faction.
The cool thing about both the faction and overt buffs is that they would allow an ID to become more intimately involved with the overall GCW and perhaps make them feel involved.
Racial Disguise:
The Master ID being very good as modifying the looks of characters, might be able to perform masterful make-up jobs to temporarily change the race of a character. While technically not a buff, because there's no game mechanic, this should probably still be a temporary & timed change. This one's primarily for roleplay.
If we wanted to have this affect game play, we could consider having the racial bonuses of the disguised race apply as well, but this might end up being an exploit.
False Title:
The ID could be able to generate a new title for the target character. This would time-out as well like the other buffs. Might want to prevent ID's from performing this on themselves.
Glamor Bonus:
Give ID's the ability to increase the effectiveness of entertainers by donning them with glamor. This might be in the form of unusual hairdos (think princess leia or queen amidala) or perhaps to simply make the entertainer's clothes gain a subtly shimmerring glow.
---
Some of the big benefits of these types of suggestions is not only be a part of the SWG universe, but it may give them additional avenues for gaining xp which hopefully makes them a little less boring.
That's about all I've thought of for the moment. Opinions? Other ideas?
ToppDog
Thu Jun 03, 2004 6:10 pm
#2
Thanks trev! You're a prime example that even non-ID players think the same as we do. We have also discussed similar types of changes to our profession as you have, & we all thought very highly of them & expressed that to the devs. However, they obviously felt stripping the entire player base of a vital function & forcing ID's to have to do it for 10 mind-numbing minutes at a time would somehow be better for the game.
Maybe posting your ideas in the general forums wouldn't be a bad idea either. If the devs can see that these good ideas are also coming from non-ID's maybe they will bother to look them over.
Just_Bri
Thu Jun 03, 2004 11:56 pm
#3
Something I wouldn't mind too much losing as an ID if I got something to replace it would be Twi'lek lekku styles. I mean, these are supposedly muscular appendages that are even used by the Lukku with thier own signlanguage.
To not let the Twi'Lek move them themselves is sort of akin to telling a TK that he/she can't move his/her arms without assistance.
/lekku forward
/lekku back
/lekku left
/lekku right
/lekku crossed
"Your headgear is preventing you from arranging your lekku in that manner."
"You do not have lekku to arrange."
I also recomend some animations to go along with it. To cut down on the number that would have to be put into the system you could have all the arrangments take place from a lekku forward position. Moving, for example, from lekku back to lekku left would play the lukku back animation in reverse to put them to the lekku forward possition and then the lekku forward to lekku left animation would play. Finnally, a twitching lekku animation could be put in for when the player was speaking with the lekku.
Something that would perhaps replace the "lekku styles" would be head bones. Many of the Twi'lek shown in assorted works of Star Wars art had a variety of bumps and/or protrusions on thier heads. If a few of those could be worked in, it would probably make everyone involved quite happy.
***Edited for spelling***
Message Edited by Just_Bri on 06-04-2004 02:59 AM
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