Musician Archive

I am new to the profession... Brand new...

I have been doing some AFK playing, in a cantina that is not populated late at night and early in the morning...

Why? So I can catch up... I have played with some people and they are genuinely nice, but when all I can play is SW1 they get bored and leave, or I feel bad for limiting them...

I have noticed alot of people in my 2 nights in the profession who come in and are so happy to see an entertainer that they tip me even though I am AFK... Just last night, without even MH2 or MU2 I made 5k in tips... People were just happy, whether I was there or not...

Now during busy times I am attentive and participate, but if I dont see anyone in the Cantina for an hour... I am not gonna press buttons and sit there staring into space...

Once I have a few more song under my belt, I plan on heading to a more populated cantina and joining in the band... Right now, I tend to hit the outskirt cities... I even had a Master Musician come in yesterday and I offerered to give him front stage and move to a side room so as not to harm his show... He was gracious enough to play SW1 for 2 hours with me and I am happy to say I am working up MH3 and MU3 now...

AFK Entertaining only kills the business when it directly interferes with a real performance or someones real attempt to put one on... Its not always a bad thing!

Forget about tip or experience "stealing". Forget about how LAMErs make the rest look bad. Forget that LAMErs make the title meaningless.

I don't know about the rest of you, but I didn't buy a Massively Multiplayer game to play with Non Player characters, and if you're AFK macroing while watching TV, you're not playing your character.

In fact, I rather prefer the computer generated NPCs over LAMErs. They don't throw insults into message board posts.

I just might have sided with the paradigm that non-AFK entertainers should compete with AFK entertainers, except for the fact that AFK entertainers didn't earn any bit of what makes it harderfor non-AFK entertainers tocompete against.

Oh, did I mention unattended gameplay is forbidden by the EULA?

Why bother have entertainers at all? Let's set up some healing terminals in the cantina. They're just as entertaining as LAMErs, and don't clutter up the main floor! Ohhhh, it all sounds so exciting and fun!

---

*** Edit: No sexually explict material allowed on the forums.

Message Edited by Jeassa on 09-06-2003 09:41 AM

lol..the only counter argument you can come up with is an insult. Nice.

---

Pendarin wrote:
lol..the only counter argument you can come up with is an insult. Nice.

---

Your use of the word "counter argument" [sic] erroneously implies that you made an argument.

As a non-Entertainer, it is astounding to me that this is even an issue.

Perhaps I'm overly naive, but I tip musicians and dancers because they heal me, and because I recognize that tips may very well be their primary source of income, and because I've seen how much the payoffs for the Entertainer missions suck. Whether they are AFK or non-AFK makes no difference to me. If I come in with a big chunk of black in my blue bar, and I leave with a full blue bar, I've gotten a service. THAT'S why I tip. Not interaction. Not requests for tip. Not because you're playing Virtuoso on an Omnibox or dancing around in a jacket and no shirt.

Also, as someone alluded to above, I would rather have an AFK entertainer in places like Narmle or Restuss or Nashal than not have one at all. There have been times when I was hunting around Bela Vistal that I would die and re-clone back at Bela Vistal (where I was not registered), and have to take the shuttle to Tyrena (And let me give a shout out to the Tyrena Cantina Crew of Tempest, the best Cantina band and dancers on the server) just to get healed.

I agree. I just dont like seeing AFK for so long, from some people.

~Q~

I AFK perform.

I really don't carehow other people feel about it. People can come into my frequently empty favorite cantina to heal while I'm gone. In exchange, I get xp and occasionaltips.Everyone ismore than welcome to not watch and not tip, it's not like it's a big secret that I'm AFK. I figure I'm doing something nice for them and I get to come back from work to some extra skill.

If your problem is with macroing xp, just say so and stop pretending it's all about Musicians. And when you're done saying it, I'llpre-emptively mention that I don't care about that opinion either. Maybe if you can get the dev's ear you can convince them that it was stupid to put their own macro program in the game.

But don't hold your breath.

This is about several things.

This is about an exploit to gain xp unattended, which is clearly against the EULA (Even though I could quote the exact section till I'm blue in the face and people like you will deny it)

This is about ruining the reputation of the entertainer classes for those who actually care to entertain. Sure, some players could care less, but some do care.

This is about an entire class being treated like healing NPCs because of a few who act like it.

This is about people parking themselves in the middle of the cantina, setting a macro and walking away while spamming the cantina, annoying other performers and people just stopping by alike. And I know somebody will say "But I don't do that". You may not, but as long as the system allows it, people will. So the system needs to be fixed. And if this prevents you from doing it in the back room quietly out of the way thats just finem, see my first point for why.

This is about the general lack of respect of the master titles for the performing professions, due to the attitude that we all just macro to get there.

This is about driving real entertainers out of the cantina because they are sick of the way they are treated, and sick of being surrounded by zombies in what is supposed to be a social profession. This in the end just makes the problem worse, and a stop needs to be put in.

This is about playstyle. If it isn't your style to hang around cantinas and entertain people, don't do it! FInd another profession! Seriously, you don't see me in the pistoleer forum whining about all the mindless killing it takes to get to master, do you? I'd be laughed at. But I don't because thats not my play style. Well guess what, it's the exact same thing. If it isn't your play style, don't do it.

There is not reason for an afk dancer musician to steal tips from a Live player. First off your live and interact with others so you should draw the customers. Dancers are needed in some remote areas and at times afk'ers are the only choice at that time.

I do agree that if your afk'ing you should be at home or in the back room off to the side.

I think AFK macroing is abused in a way. I do AFK macros when I'm working on something on my other computer and such but not in large towns where I would be an annoyance. I take the time to go over by myself in the corner of one of the small of set rooms of the cantina and play my jazz for a while. I think it's just polite. My biggest thing for other AFK'ers is that they don't become offended when they get booted from a group because you're holding a better crowd of entertainers down. It's different helping out someone that is new with SW1, but I won't let an AFK'er keep us on SW1 or some crappy song. They get ousted.

Simple Solution: When you go AFK (no matter how that is triggered) your queue is cleared (including any paused macro/alias commands) and your character stops whatever he/she is doing.

There would be no more AFK entertainers, samplers (miners), or campers (scouts)... there would be AFK characters, but they wouldn't be doing anything except standing still.

What's wrong with this solution?

Here's the much harped EULA quote:

"You may not decrypt or modify any data transmitted between client and server; you may not use or distribute macros or other programs which would allow unattended game play. "

This is the only quote in the EULA that deals specifically with unattended game play.

First off, this cannot be interpreted tomeanthat unattended game play is, in and of itself, forbidden. It also does not expressly forbid the use of macro programs or any other third party program in conjunction with SWG.

What it does say you absolutely cannot do is use"macros or other programs"that let you keep "playing" while AFK. The placement of "other programs" implies that this rule only applies to "macro programs". What is left only vaguely implied is whetheryou canuse SWG's in-game macros to allow unattended gameplay. That leaveslittle question as to whetherusing third-party macro programs to facilitate unattended gameplay is against the EULA. But is the in-game macro tool a "program"? Technically speaking, no. Looking through the user manual, the macro portion of the Abilities and Commands screen is never referred to as a program. It is a very small part of the larger program that is the SWG client, making it a utility, a feature, or an option.Very arguablynot an executable program.

The point being thatthis is not a simple yes/no answer. It's drowned in legalese and you sure can't expect the average player to understand exactly what they're getting at. Then you look at the game itself andsee what's easily accomplished within the game'svery specificcode, and it's pretty easy to assume that looping macros were intended to be part of normal gameplay. Then you look at the EULA and, even if you can't tell what they're referring to with "macros or other programs", it's certainly clear that unattended gameplay is not expressly forbidden.

Just for kicks, look at the enforcement issue. How is it that hundreds of people, the very focus of this complaint, using macros toallow unattended gameplay have been allowed to continue doing so, with not a single known case of a macroer being punished for doing so? Regardless of how you choose to interpret the EULA, you have to consider the possibility that this portion of the EULA is either considered un-enforcable or that in-game macro's simplydo not constitute a breach of the EULA as far as SOE is concerned.

I recognize that the frequent use of macros to master the Entertainment professions cheapens the profession in a sense. However, while it will never be respected as being a difficult achievement, it will still be valued for the service that it really is. We're still giving up a whole bunch of skill points for the profession, and that means something in itself because so few others care to do so.

The rest of the arguments presented here are largely conjecture and, at best,situational.The factthat so many people macroalso makes me less willing to work my arse off for something that can be easily gained while I'm at work.

What I most vehemently disagree with isenforcing any individual'spersonal beliefs on the rest of the player community for any reason whatsoever, especially when it appears you're just personally slighted for having "worked" ("played"?)hard for something that is so easily attainable.

If you can solidly prove your case that unattended macroing is forbidden and that SOE did not intend it to be possible with their own macro tool (or perhaps even get a dev to announce in plain English how to interpret that portion of the EULA), then I'd say you have a leg to stand on.

Otherwise, try not to be so surprised when your complaints fall on many sets of deaf ears.