Musician Archive

Entertainers need some work to remain a viable and fun set of professions. Currently our most common benefit of mind wound healing and battle fatigue healing are passive abilites that are open to anyone to recieve for as long as we are performing. Some have suggested that they become activated abilities so that payment can fairly be asked for. Others suggest that someone will always give the benefit away for free (as it's needed to skill up), and that changing the service to a pay per use ability would ruin the cantina and entertainer atmosphere of the professions. I agree with both sides to an extent, that there should be a passive benefit of entertainers for all to enjoy to keep cantinas running, and that we need a pay per use ability to make us a respected, valuable, and in demand profession to use.

My solution is simple. Leave wound and battle fatigue damage as passive heals that anyone (who has not been /denyservice) can recieve. Change how our mind buffs work to an active service that must be applied. The mind buffs need to be scaled to be of similar power as doctor buffs, and MUST have an increased duration similar to doctor buffs (1.5-3 hours). These "private shows" should take no longer than 1-2 minutes to achieve full effectiveness.

I'd suggest that a mind enhancement skill rating of 100 (Master) should give 1.5 hour buff, and that each other band member can add thier mind buff rating up to a capped rating of 200 (for 3 hour buff).

My friend Sinda, a Dancer, just mentioned a similar idea to me, and I'm all for it. Our current mind buff lasts a max of 30 minutes, and to achieve that we have to play for the listener for fifteen minutes. That's a very inefficient and short-duration buff. I'm not sure I care whether it's a targeted buff or not, but I wouldn't mind that approach.

Elsewhere, Holo has just floated another possibility: a mind heal for entertainers, squad leaders, or medics to use in the field, during battle. What do you think of that idea? I've posted a separate thread on this in this forum with the URL of Holo's post on the matter; you can also find Holo's comments via the dev tracker.

ok, so let me see if I read this right. We will be able to heal the mind bar in the field?

hmm ok, so, I'm in a group of 20. 2 entertainers and 8 doctors, 10 tanks. I heal the 8 doctors blue bar and they heal the red and green bars of the tanks, thus allowing non-stop combat? Cause, I mean if I can heal their blue bar faster than it costs them to heal my action then theoretically that group could go for hours before needing a break, say like holding the fortresses for the manditory 2 hour they are attackable? Boy, that would through a wrench into any faction that doesn't have alot of entertainers... Laying seige would also change as well.... or hmmm kill the musicians, then the doctors then the tanks?

ok, would be interesting.

Chaple

Attack the medics first will become attack the musicians first!

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Klixx wrote:

We will be able to heal the mind bar in the field?

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Ugh, I don't want to be some strange Bard-like musician on the battle field. That would start taking this game even further from star wars and into the realm of Everquest. I don't see why they give us a buff, but make it so short and so hard to apply (15 minutes of passive watching to gain the benefit? isn't the cantina full of enough afk people?). Extend the duration, make it a "private performance" deal so that at least one valuable but non essential skill can be used for some creds, and maybe up the benefit so that mind healers are less necessary and we'll have gold. I'm not against another class, such as medic, getting mind heals, and I liked Holos idea that medics doing mind heals take mind wounds, as that actually reinforces the need for Cantinas, making them busier and us more in demand (and of course may as well buy a quick mind buff while you are there).

Putting musicians on the battlefeild is just a bad idea though.

Chaple: Heh, if you can find a group with 8 doctors, you have better connections than I do. But yes, the idea is to extend the life of PvP combat so that it doesn't result in instadeath from mind damage. It wouldn't have to be "constant" never-ending combat; one could limit the duration or frequency of mind heals, just as medic heals can't be spammed constantly now. Also, the entertainer heal could be a sort of low-level "heal over time" rather than a directed, targeted heal (which might better be the province of the Squad Leader). It could be thought of as the lingering after-effect of playing in the camp -- which, actually, we already have, courtesy of our Focus/Willpower buffs.

Dweller: I don't think an entertainer mind heal would have to involve people playing drums or dancing in combat, a la EverQuest. It could instead be a less-visible heal-over-time that begins when you perform in camp between battles. As I just mentioned to Chaple, we already have a Focus/Willpower buff, which in effect is a heal-over-time mind heal. It's just a lousy, short-duration, inefficient buff. So conceptually, we already do heal mind damage -- just indirectly. I'd support making that heal (that buff) more effective. That way our role in combat is to wield a gun like anyone else, so you don't have the jarring image of a dancer or musician wiggling whileblasters fire.

I would think that entertainers or squad leaders would be able to do this via something called "Morale Boost" or somthing along those lines. Entertainers would probably have a HoT effect, and could be roleplayed by citing verses or something (i.e. singing your national anthem after having half your platoon gettting blown apart by artillery fire, Hearing someone reciting"charge of the light brigade" as you prepare to storm an enemy fort.) But this should be able to be done on the battlefield as well as in the rest areas and should be triggered as opposed to passive. Squad leaders should have a straight-out "Get your &$$ back in there and fight soldier, and that's an order" quick-burst mind heal that would give a substantial heal to the mind pool, but cause the squad leader some serious mind damage (or wounds).

First, entertainers (not master, though) do get a passive benefit from BF healing - Experience points.

Second, allowing entertainers the ability to do things out in the field, like play war music or dance to distract enemies, doesn't require all entertainers to go out and do so. Just because some entertainers are out in the field doesn't mean you'd have to poke your head out of the cantina once in a while and join them. There has never been anything wrong with giving a class a few more options that don't step on the toes of other classes.

Third, I don't see what's wrong with the group that has a better mix of players dominating a spawn. If you can put together a group that can keep the combatants continuously fighting, more power to you. A lesser group should be left out in that case, because they can't compete.