Musician Archive
Thread: Buff Concerns
I am a Master Musician and while the buffs arewonderful, I have several concerns about them.
1st... and most important... We are unable to buff ourselves. If doctors are able to buff themselves we should have the same option. I am not partial to what method this would take (target self or a craftable item such as headphones or a mirror for dancers) as long as we are given the option.
2nd... Dancers have been given the ability to buff the Mind stat while we were given the secondary stats of Focus and Willpower. While these are inportant stats for regeneration of the mind, some people do not bother with buffing secondary stats. I have already encountered several people who said they would rather find a dancer and pay them to get their mind buffed and then skip the secondary stats. This will hurt the potential income that musicians will recieve from selling buffs. I think that musicians and dancers should be able to buff ALL of the mind stats, or pick which one of the three to buff just like a doctor is able to apply a buff to a particular stat.
3rd... There are some (actually very minor) bugs with the buffs right now, such asa stat dropping below its lower level as the buff wears off, this needs to be addressed.
4th... If possible there should be some kind of notification when a buff has achieved its maximum effect. A system message like "%TT has recieved the maximum stat increase from you" or something would be nice.
These are the problems that I have noticed. Please add any other concerns that you may have.
Amen to not being able to buff yourself. This needs to be addressed. But rather than the timer idea of "you have performed long enough" or whatvever, how about an automatic timer, that will apply the buff after the required time playing is met. It might give the same message to the recipient as a Doctor buff would. i.e. "Pabbie has increased your focus/willpower by 450" so the recipent, and me, both know that its time to buff the next person. Also, the bug that raises the Max, but not the Active stat, (ie, focus of 450/900)I'm sure its been reported, but it happens to me quite frequently andits bad for buisness. Would you rather they tell thier friends "Yeah I got this killer mind buff from a musician." or "Musicians mind buff is a waste, its bugged, go to a dancer instead." Dont think I need to explain further. Overall, HUGE improvement to our class as a whole. Thanks to NewJedi for doing such a good job. I have been reading these boards for a long time, im just a woman of few words. 
-Pabbie San
-Part Master Musician, Part Commando, 100% BIRD KILLAH!
Is buffing the same as healing? Cause i am able to heal my own mind wounds and i am a Master Musician.
2nd... Dancers have been given the ability to buff the Mind stat while we were given the secondary stats of Focus and Willpower. While these are inportant stats for regeneration of the mind, some people do not bother with buffing secondary stats. I have already encountered several people who said they would rather find a dancer and pay them to get their mind buffed and then skip the secondary stats. This will hurt the potential income that musicians will recieve from selling buffs. I think that musicians and dancers should be able to buff ALL of the mind stats, or pick which one of the three to buff just like a doctor is able to apply a buff to a particular stat.
As an Image Desginer, I will always prefer a Master Musician buff to a Dancer buff. Hehe. However, that is my preference. I've always considered the Musician buff the more powerful and more useful of the two.I guess many people will usually go for a buff in pool rather than stats. Well, I know Riflemen and IDers will appreciate Musicians.
Imcus wrote:
2nd... Dancers have been given the ability to buff the Mind stat while we were given the secondary stats of Focus and Willpower. While these are inportant stats for regeneration of the mind, some people do not bother with buffing secondary stats. I have already encountered several people who said they would rather find a dancer and pay them to get their mind buffed and then skip the secondary stats. This will hurt the potential income that musicians will recieve from selling buffs. I think that musicians and dancers should be able to buff ALL of the mind stats, or pick which one of the three to buff just like a doctor is able to apply a buff to a particular stat.
This really disappointed me. I was thinking of taking up Musician to be able to provide buffs and healing for friends (a dancing Trandoshan just doesn't fit my persona). I'm not sure why the designers chose to implement such an artificial segmentation - it's not going to hurt anyone if both dancers and musicians can buff all 3 mind stats. In fact, quite the opposite, it'd probably provide a more diverse and enjoyable RP experience.
Both primary and secondary stat buffs are important, but given typical population distributions, primary stat buffs will always be more popular and in greater demand. Secondary buffs fall into that "it'd be nice but not necessary category". I mean, there's a reason these are called "secondary stats" and not "co-primary stats".
I'd love to seethe entertainer correspondents push this issue with the developers.
Opinion from a Rifleman...
Hello all. I'm not normally on your forum, but thought I would check it out. As you know, riflemen are highly desirous of mind buffs. I can only speak for myself, but when I am searching for buffs Idefinitely want BOTH sets of buffs and will seek out both a master dancer and a master musician. But to be honest, if I could only pick one, I would pick the musician. Here is why: If my secondary stats are buffed, then my main, unbuffed bar will regen very quickly. Sitting around waiting for our primary (first) mind bar to regen is the curse of the rifleman. My opinion is that those people who only buff the main bar are wrong. Once they have used up the main bar, then they are in for a long wait while it regens. Anyway, good luck with your profession. I didnt post this on the Dancer boards, but feel free if you think it is worth it.
Buffing secondary stats is the better our of the two imo. Being able to give a faster regen rate is better than making them have more mind. For long duration battles ofc. In pvp in the 1min long fights i guess a bigger mind pool would be better since u never really get a chance to regen any anywas.
The MAJOR problem (I dont agree with the original poster that this is a minor problem) is that we FUBAR ppls stats.. ie when the buff wears off people are left with below normal secondaries.. making the game unplayable for them (Ever watched a doctor try to regen mind with 150 willpower? yeah )
This really needs to be fixed asap... Lots of musicians dont even know they cause this.. I mean, if you hated the guy, yeah give him a mind buff that would mess up his stats for hours.. but really.. i would rather it work properly :/
/annoyed
...Don't know WHAT happened on that last post! I don't think I even pressed a button!
/endannoyed
Anyway, Imcus...
I only wanted to say that I wouldn't worry about 'losing standing in the community'. Every profession knows of bugs like this and people (sadly) usually aren't surprised when things like that happen. Now (also sadly) there are a lot of immature people who play this game who might accuse you of evil deeds when mind stats go berserk,but I'm not sure there is anything you can do about those people. Have some faith that a (hopefully) vast majority of players wouldn't react that way, nor listen to such unproven accusations.
You might check a post out that I added to one of the threads stickied above in this forum (I think its the one aboutthe ins and outs of mind buffs). There MAY be a solution (though not a pretty one) to the screwed up stats. Hope it helps, and Good Luck.
1. The devs are quite aware that most dancers and musicians would like a self-buff, and both I and the Dancer Correspondent have mentioned the issue to them. I certainly would like the ability to self-buff. My guess, however, is that the stat bug (see below) is a higher priority. I'll keep you posted on the possibility of a self-buff as I learn more from the devs.
2. I personally prefer our buff to the dancer buff, because the secondary stats are especially important to me. Those are the stats that control whether you can wear armor. They are the ones that determine regeneration, incap time, downtime, etc. If I could take only one buff, I'd take ours over the Dancer buff. I also think ours lasts longer, but that's just based on anecdotal evidence.
3. The stat bug can be more than just minor; I've seen it dip stats 250 points below normal. But it can be minimized or avoided if the recipient of the buff refrains from accepting other buffs, such as Doc, Dancer, spice, or food buffs, during its duration. But yes, I see this as the biggest issue with our new buff.
4. Somebetter notification about the buffwould be nice. I'll mention this to the relevant dev.
-Ricky Starwalker, Chilastra, & Richie Starsider, Test Center, Master Musicians
Jyss, you are right... it is a major problem. When I first encountered it I only received a 20 point loss to my stats, that was tolerable. Last night I experienced firsthand the problem with my focus and willpower dropping to an unbearable 150 points each. Something has got to be done with this bug and FAST or we will lose even more respect in the community. I can see it happening... I went to see musician ---X--- last night and he poisoned my mind stats so I could not heal... blah, blah, blah... Some people will not accept this as a bug and will be quite upset.
On the other concern of Musicians getting focus and willpower while dancers have the main mind bar... While there are those intelligent beings who will see the advantages of faster primary stat regeneration, there are still the masses of people who will say that as long as the bar will heal when I rest all I need are bigger primary stats, or some other excuse of their choice. While these aremost likelythe same cheap people who do not bother tipping for services in the first place I still believe we should be given the opportunity to buff any/all of the mind stats. As it was stated above "they are called secondary stats, not co-primary stats" so many people will not think our buffs are as important as a dancers.
I do not believe it's constructive to take the approach of our buff vs. their buff because I feel that dancers should be able to buff focus and willpower as well. My issue is with the segmentation of buffs and why the devs have elected this approach.
I do not believe the general populace will appreciate secondary stat buffs, similarly to the way everyonefocuseson max damagefor weapons. I believe that our buff will be less valued when mind healing is eventually put into the game. I believe that customers would appreciate one-stop buffing rather than having to seek out both a Dancer and a Musician. I believe that the developers should rethink this artificial segmentation. I believe that I'll still give Musician a whirl, even if I can't buff the almighty primary stat.