Rifleman Archive

Thunderheart once again pulls an ace out fo his sleeve and gives the community a clearer way to talk to the devs using a format familiar to the dev's and better insight into how the devs get things done.

Clicky to example post (smuggler)

The serve is up....

Anatomy of Smuggling: a Smuggler’s Vision Doc



In response to our discussion in the Smuggler Revamp Delayed thread, Ipseck suggested:




--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Ipseck wrote:
OK now, instead of griping about past transgressions and 'being strung along for so long' and 'oh woah is me' lets set all that aside and try to work with these folks, and not make excuses for our attitude(s).

That being said, we need a starting point in order to work with you, TH. We need some form of direction, outline or something so that we can organize thoughts and ideas into a format that you're familiar with. We need a "this is where we're at, what do you think? And we want to try and keep things organized into concepts a, b, c and d" type of post.


--------------------------------------------------------------------------------



This is really an excellent idea and something I’ve wanted to do for quite some time. This is a great opportunity to try and accomplish this, so here we go.





Smuggler Revamp Community Vision Doc



Overview

1-2 Paragraphs about the vision of the smuggler profession. This is a short, concise overview and is a summary. The first paragraph should be a clear mission statement and the second should clearly state the vision of the final smuggler “vision”.



Salient Details



In one or two paragraphs, identify the key challenges, such as defining the essence of PvE and PvP smuggling in a virtual environment. Then list the elements of those details:

Smuggler / BH visibility
Bullet List
Bullet List




The Good and the Bad

Make a short list of what’s good and what’s bad, objectively stated. This is so we don’t throw away the baby with the bathwater. 2 lists with maybe a sentence or two for clarification.



Skill Tree Changes



Here is a list of the skill trees. We should make a list of bullet points of changes and/or activities for each tree. Don’t focus on the numbers; focus on the quintessential statement of the change.



Underworld: (example)

Goal Statement: 1 sentence.

Specialized Delivery missions that provide PvE encounters during the travel portion. These encounters can come in the form of direct combat, threatened combat in exchange for the smuggled item, or non-combat encounters seeking to bribe or convince the PC to give up the item.
Rewards
Immediate Travel Tokens
(This, for the record is extremely complicated)

Equipment buff programs
Datadiscs to further adventure
Ethical decisions that effect the smugglers reputation.
City and travel combat.
· PvP smuggling whereby a player can contract another player to take a shipment from point a to point b.

(Just as an example, this is a great statement of a single sentence that probably amounts to months of work by multiple teams. Some challenges are, “where do they take it from and to? How is it registered? How is it discovered? How do you prevent it from being exploited by a player with two accounts?” etc…)

Spices:

Goal Statement: 1 sentence.



· Redoing unused or superceded spices.

· Adding new spices.

Slicing:

Goal Statement: 1 sentence.



· Adding a vehicle durability slice.

Dirty Fighting: (example)

Goal Statement: 1 sentence.

· Increasing melee bonuses and abilities.

o Eye gouge: Melee blind attack.

o Trip: Melee Knockdown attack.



Details

Here, we should have a basic 1-2 sentence describing the focus that defines the key details of “the big picture”. Then list the details.

Update/fix Smuggler skill box descriptions
Bullet List
Bullet List




Pool of Wishlist Items

Finally, lets make a list of things to choose from so in the event that something in the core document turns out to be problematic, we have a list of things the devs can choose from as an alternative.

Bullet List
Bullet List
Bullet List




Notes:



Try to keep in mind how things work in the SWG environment. The farther away we get from what is existing, the more raw code there is. The more we use what is existing in new exciting ways, the more we can get into the revamp.
Be forewarned, we need to minimize new art assets so what we do ask for should be vital.
Please, no UI requests. That team is pretty much booked through space. I’m looking into any possibility of the ID window being re-used to some extent, but my guess is that slim left town.






Process:



1. The community should compose and have a majority endorsement of the plan. Kick around the ideas and then pull it together into a rough draft. I will lurk and pop in as needed. It’s helpful if there is one official correspondent thread. This way, SC can email me the link and I can drag it to my desktop.



2. Appoint some “devil’s advocates” to tear apart the plan and poke holes through it so we can firm it up and make it a better plan. Again, I will lurk and pop in as needed.



3. Smuggler_Caylin will take the rough draft and email it to me.

Message Edited by CraftAddict on 05-02-2005 09:42 PM

This should already be trickling through the correspondant forum by now, but in case it isn't, there you go.

Note: Notice the mention of limited available resources in art and UI.