Ranger Archive

From the Harvest Droid Lovers camp:

For the love of god listen to him!

At the low end of the scale they work fine as a solo ranger. My numbers are here.

Now the HB rating that is needed to equal the harvesting of a Master Ranger is proably higher than it was before. It would be nice to establish what rating is needed.

In a few I'll be able to get in game, I'll come back with matching numbers for a larger creature.

EDIT: Ok its a bit later and looks like every computer in the state just broke (cept mine) I'll be working for a while.

Message Edited by agent156 on 03-22-2005 06:05 PM

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JBMat wrote:
1. Droids do not see group bonuses or nerfs. We all know why, let it rest. Can we get this changed - maybe. Not worth time and space debating, but damn we are gonna look stupid asking the Devs to fix a change we asked for. Really stupid, BH stupid even.

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I really think you are wrong on this one JB. I am pretty sure the droid saw the 40% reduction (thats the nerf right?) when you were in a group. It just didn't cause a 40% reduction if it was the only thing you were grouped with.

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JBMat wrote:

First off, although I do think harv droids are crap, I did report this as a bug, and did it first, as it was late late late where Owen was. That was my responsibility as the Scout Corr. Done and done.

Here is what is has people riled up - Two problems, not one. One may be fixable, one we may have to live with.

1. Droids do not see group bonuses or nerfs. We all know why, let it rest. Can we get this changed - maybe. Not worth time and space debating, but damn we are gonna look stupid asking the Devs to fix a change we asked for. Really stupid, BH stupid even.

Well, am gonna stop there.

"we" asked for this?

Sometime back in April May of 2003 (I dug back through the posts) this was asked for.

The majority of the people who are experiencing a problem, or perceive current droid performance as an issue, may not even have been in game at that time and a significant number of the people discussing it back then appear to be out of the game now, or, at the very least, no longer scout / ranger.

You really do seem more interested in crowing about how you told 'us' so, likewise, you had great fun telling the BH that you told them so.

Tell you what. Let's just leave it at that. JB was right, everyone else is a deluded fool. Folks, don't even think of asking for something that's not working right to be looked at because the Scout Corry says you're wrong.


Me, I'm dropping out of this thread before I end up dropping out of the Ranger forum altogether.

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JBMat wrote:

Paks, we may agree with a difference in wording.

Droids/pets grouping with a player do not invoke the 40% nerf. At one time they did. It's not the droids/pets seeing the nerf and getting to ignore it. I think it's a case of them being exempt from the programming nerf, hence they are also exempt from the latest changes. It's logical, it's probably one line in the programming someplace.

Old method:

When you go to harvest, the game checks your group status. If it was a player and pet/droid group, the nerf was not invoked.Essentially the droids were exempt in this method (think of a yes/no flow chart, it makes sense). Instead of 60%, you got 100%. Call that 100% the old rate. And we can call this the nerf sequence.

Now, the nerf sequence has become the bonus sequence, but the Devs probably forgot to fix the coding, meaning the old code is still in effect for droids . Hence, the droid can't see the new group bonuses and harvests at the old rate.

Fact is, there is probably some more code someplace that makes the droids exempt from the nerf/bonus sequence, grouped or not, I just simplified it.

I am taking into consideration it is easier to change what is there than it is to write an entire new code sequence, and this method often leads to problems if someone forgets all the factors the old code affected. If you think about, the new group bonus change was introduced pretty quickly in response to our screams of anguish. It almost has to be buggy.

JB

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I am still confused though. I know that pets caused the 40% reduction at one time and this was removed. So grouping with only your droid would not cause the nerf. However, If I grouped with you and the nerf was incurred, the droid would then see the 40% reduction and harvest accordingly.

So you said that droids were exempt from the nerf, but they were not exempt from the nerf if you were grouped with another player. However, now they are exempt from the bonus when grouped with another player. The code was there for droids to see the group nerf - why would it be difficult for it to be there to see the group bonus? Is this the part that we would sound stupid for asking it to be fixed? Or is this the part you reported as a bug and expect will be fixed in the future?

I was one of the people who said that pets should not count as a group if they were they only thing you grouped with. I did not think they should cause the penalty to trigger, and I do not think they should cause the bonus to trigger. However, when grouped with another player they should have seen the penalty (which they did) and they should now see the bonus (which they do not).

Frankly, when pets counted as a group not only did they get a portion of the harvest, they also got a share of the loot you looted off NPCs. This really made no sense to me. I could maybe see that they had chowed on a portion of whatever critter you were attacking - but what were they doing with all that cash? I think we had some guessees involving spice and fast twi'leks, or maybe Hakai was getting rich cleaning out those Graul pens and wasn't telling us, but anyway you look at it it just made no sense to me.

So sorry if I was one of those screamers and moaners (no comments from the peanut gallery) who caused this to be broken, or working as intended in some sucky way.

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JBMat wrote:

First off, although I do think harv droids are crap, I did report this as a bug, and did it first, as it was late late late where Owen was. That was my responsibility as the Scout Corr. Done and done.

Here is what is has people riled up - Two problems, not one. One may be fixable, one we may have to live with.

Situation one is of our own doing. If we get told to suck it up and have a nice day, we have no one to blame but ourselves for asking for the change in the first place. There are no counter arguments, we asked for it, we got. We can only hope for a freaking change, and were I a Dev, I would want the entire profession doing the "Monty Python mea culpa head bonk line" before I changed anything. I don't see this as a hotfix, more of waiting until the revamp. Be prepared to buy a brown cassock.

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No they did not invoke the group-penalty, but that is besides the point JB!

Fact is; before the change. If you used your droid in a group, you would get hit with the grouping-penalty.

Fact is; after the change. If you use your droid in a group, you do not get the grouping-bonus.

That doesn't add up and none of those points has anything to do with the change that stopped counting 1 player and a pet/droid as a group. Those are the cold hard facts JB.

Stop the "I told you so" line of thinking.

We did never ask for a change in the way droids worked in group situations (with other players). Only that grouping with your droid shouldn't count as a group.

Two completely different gameplay scenarios. That they share code is not our fricking problem. It's up to the Devs to code it right.

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Vorpaks wrote:

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JBMat wrote:
1. Droids do not see group bonuses or nerfs. We all know why, let it rest. Can we get this changed - maybe. Not worth time and space debating, but damn we are gonna look stupid asking the Devs to fix a change we asked for. Really stupid, BH stupid even.

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I really think you are wrong on this one JB. I am pretty sure the droid saw the 40% reduction (thats the nerf right?) when you were in a group. It just didn't cause a 40% reduction if it was the only thing you were grouped with.

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The droids did see the 40% penalty. Otherwise, it would have stuck in my mind and many others that harvesting droids were the way to get around the group penalty.

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JBMat wrote:

2. Droids grouped with a Master Ranger do not harvest as much as the Ranger does alone. If the little tin cans are hard coded to stop at 125 (the old max) then add in the veghash bonus, this is certainly true. Does anyone know this for a fact? Any numbers? I don't see any.

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Not sure I understand what you mean, JB. Are you saying that you thinkdroids can never get as much or as more than a master ranger? I can say that it doesn't matter whether a droid is grouped with the ranger or not (as long as the ranger is not grouped with any other player), and this was the same before and after the group harvesting change.

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JBMat wrote:
1. Droids do not see group bonuses or nerfs. We all know why, let it rest.

But, droids did see the group nerf. Grouping with others, and using your droid (you don't actually group the droid), you'd still receive the -40% group harvest penalty. That is a fact.


Can we get this changed - maybe. Not worth time and space debating, but damn we are gonna look stupid asking the Devs to fix a change we asked for. Really stupid, BH stupid even.

With all due respect, you're perpetuating some self created myth. Who is this "we"? What exactly were "we" asking for? The "We" were mostly creature handlers and it related to pets.. It never really related to droids.

This really needs to be cleared up...
From '03 until early '04, people complained about grouping with pets. CH's need to group so they can monitor their pet's HAM. Since they were their "weapons", they felt the harvest penalty was unfair.

This had more to do with pets than droids, and the argument was way before Harvest Droids and combat droids ever came about. When they DID get released in April '04 with the "Droids Rebuilt" publish, HDs never needed to be grouped with to begin with. During the same time, pet/droid grouping was removed in TC.

The simple fact is that harvest droids have nothing to do with being a group. It's basically a tool for harvesting (Should your weapon count as a group? Your armor? Pets? Droids?). Harvest droids don't need to be grouped and function to boost your harvesting ability, and that includes stacking with Veghash -- which, until recently, was the only other harvesting bonus that existed in the game. Now that harvesting bonuses are applied to grouping, the droids should take that into consideration.

I know you don't like harvest droids... Can't blame you.. I hate them too, and I'm a rifleman. I don't think that makes you biased about presenting these issues to the Devs as a corr. I'm sure you have, and will continue to..

What concerns me is that you keep saying "we got what we asked for" and that we lacked forsight, and yet, the "we" were creature handlers expressing a valid problem trying to harvest while using their pets, and the removal of group penalties never had any relationship to the way harvest droids worked. If anything, I think you might be misunderstanding how harvest droids actually work. None of what anyone ever asked for had any effect on any changes to harvest droids... ever.

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Message Edited by JBMat on 03-23-2005 07:44 AM

Message Edited by JBMat on 03-23-2005 07:48 AM