Musician Archive

Just in case there's anyone missing it in SWG Discussion, there's a big thread started over there this afternoon about Holocron asking for suggestions for ways that entertainers can make more money. Some of the ideas have been bounced around before (cover charges, targeting healing after tips, crafting consumable recordings), so if you've got any ideas, go ahead and post them.

The url is:
http://forums.station.sony.com/swg/board/message?board.id=Development&message.id=392005

heres what I told them and ill tell you (and have told you ) the same

ok I have posted this idea at least a dozen times and it will work and it dose work in real life

at the entrance to every canteena is a NPC owner or promoter

the entertainers go to him and take a gig mission to play in that canteena for X ammount of time for a feey of Y the ammount of time is a slection thing so you can decide to take a mission form 15 or 30 or 45 or an hour the Y pay is baised on your skill level

now so you get this mission go in and every second you perform counts toward your gig mission after your time is done you get paid there should be a short time limit to finish the contract say like 24 hours or even 8 hours but anyway

Now everyone else is charged a cover charge to enter or you can think of it as a two drink minum whatever but this is what clubs do in real life they hire bands to play and sometimes charge people a drink min or cover charge to watch and listen

so the entertainers get there money from the NPC and the players who want healing pay the NPC

if the entertainer dose a realy good job and puts on a good show then maby the players will tip them more but the entertainers dont have to rely solely on these tips they are getting paid for the gig

this is a fair system it a realistic system and this is how it works in the realy world NY and NJ have tons of clubs that have a cover charge or two drink min (and they charge you for the two drinks right off the bat)

the Fee for entertainer gig missions should be in line with the ammount you can make doing other missions

right now you can take two destroy missions finish them both in under 20 min and get 3k and for thouse of you going to say but were risking our lives dont try that line on me bucko I have done hundreds of missions where im pad 1k and I have to go out and kill rockmites minocks womp rats ect... and realy at novice pistoler they dont have a chance in hell of killing me or most of the time even reaching me so they can inflict even one point of dammage

I think this is a little (ok a lot) high and should go down

but for the entertainers lets say a base rate is 250 for 15 min at a low level and wrok up from there so lets say a master musician playing for 30 min should get 1k (less than I can get in 20 min doing 2 destroys and killing kreetles) and just to throw a number out charge a cover charge to the players who go in looking for entertainment 200 credits

its fair

but wait lets say your broke you haev one in every stat becouse you died 4 times in a row you dont even have 200 credits well then you beg pleed with entertainers AND DOCTORS to help you right now this can easly happen with doctors so why not also with entertainers too HUMMM?

SOE and HOLO for once take my idea its good it works its easy to program will solve the problem fast

you can use the existing canteena staffed thing to let fighters know the place is staffed or add somthing like a billboard saying playing for the next X minutes "Faydra"

whatever but please USE THIS IDEA DARN IT

bloody hell ive been screming it at you since beta and if you are worried about usning someones idea legaly well like I said that is the way it works in the real world so your using the realy worlds idea not mine and if your still bothers then pay me 1 new song for all musicians and we will call me paid in full

gosh its like pulling teeth

Posted in both forums.

All right, speaking as a master musician/master entertainer, let me say this. I earn a decent living off tips. Why? I am not afk macroing. I can make 20k creds in tips in a couple hours through player interaction. Does this always happen? No.

I will be the first to admit I do not have many expenses as a musician/entertainer, but I do want to owna house and pay the maintenence fees. I do not want to depend soley on the generosity of others to do so. I also do not want to be forced into another profession to pay my living expenses.

The fix is simple and costs poor and/or cheap players nothing at all to gain our beneficial healing. It also provides incentive to be at the keyboard and relieves non-entertainers ofmost ill-will toward tipping.

What is this solution? Fix the entertainer/dancer/musician missions so they cover the cost of transportation to the destination of the gig and provide a reasonable (open to Dev interpretation) profit to the entertainer/dancer/musician based upon their skill level or specific tier.

DO NOT implement cover charges. This only encourages players to pick up novice entertainer until they are far enough along in their primary profession that they need those extra 15 points. SW1 is overplayed enough as is.

DO NOT implement fixed or variable rate fees for our healing service. Reason: see above. Also creates hostility among entertainers over price gouging.

DO NOT implement /denyservice or a similar command. If a player's behavior is offensive, simply stop playing. "But what aboutthe rest of my audience?" you may ask. Simply announce why you have stopped playing and most of the other patrons will either use peer pressure or dueling to correct the offender. Trust me I've seen it happen when a player is giving one of my dancers grief.

MUSICIANS/DANCERS/ENTERTAINERS

DO NOT beg for tips while at keyboard or in an afk macro. The cheap folks weren't going to tip you anyway and you've just annoyed those who might've been willing to tip you. Remember, your title is not Vagrant.

- Axl, Master Musician/Master Entertainer, Wanderhome

P.S. Here's another way to promote playing at the keyboard (don't nerf macros, they are great for writing songs). Any player who is afk for <specified time> while playing in a cantina gets bounced to just outside the cantina. AFK meaning no keyboard/mouse movement, not just the tag. Also solves the complaints of entertainers in regards to the afkers taking up the prime real-estate.

For those of you who don't read the dev posts regularly, a /denyService option is now in testing on the Test Center. Anyone interested should check it out.

Sorry W-Axl, guess its going in.

well I haev never afk macroed I try to put on a good show work hard at it

everyone who comes in I wave too I smile when they clap bow and say thankyou

I dont play the same song twice switch insturments to get the diffrent songs and I still get crap tips

some people will tip me 500 100 one even tips me 1000 every time he sees me

but for the most part its no tip or 25 credits

I play for hours and make maby 2k while a fighter makes `0k an hour comes in half dead and get fullyed healed

but I dont care about tips I play becouse its fun and I get to meet a lot of new people and make new friends

so if I never get a tip thats fine I just go out and do a few destroy missions

Yeah, I saw the thing about the /denyservice going to test after reading through the money post, N'Raas. Oh well, I think it will just create more problems than it will solve, but perhaps I'm wrong. Will just have to wait and see I guess.

-Axl, Master Musician/Master Entertainer, Wanderhome