Smuggler Archive
Thread: So what does a smuggler really do?
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edacsac
Fri Jun 10, 2005 1:05 pm
#1
Hello fellow smugglers!
I just switched my ranger to a smuggler this last final respec period, so now I am a master rifleman / master smuggler. I'm happy with the combat mods I've picked up, so I can hunt better, and the root/concussion shot is the coolest special shot I've ever had! But what does one do as a smuggler outside of group hunting?
I was looking at the current spice market and it looks pretty unprofitable at the moment, and I hear slicing is broken? Did I make a huge mistake? I partially made this change as I head towards FS, and seeing how scout xp is worthless there, and ranger doesn't do anything really, I knew I could at least get some combat mods and a root with smuggler and be a little more useful to the group during hunting.
But now I need to replace the money maker.
VitoGenovese
Fri Jun 10, 2005 1:16 pm
#2
Mostly we sit around and make smart assed comments on the forums about how broken we are and have fun anyway just to spite it. Then we laugh about it. If you are looking for an "Uber Template" smuggler probably isn't in it as the main. If you are looking for a profession full of people that rock your lame ass, well, here we are. Prepare to get rocked!
edacsac
Fri Jun 10, 2005 1:30 pm
#3
So from what I understand, every proffesion is broken? hehe... Don't mind me, I'm a very casual player and I'm not around enough to know everything thats going on. Any good advice for an ex ranger flopping to smuggler without having to grind or learn anything about the smuggling profession?
Alpha_Bits
Fri Jun 10, 2005 1:30 pm
#4
Hate to break it to you but if you picked up smuggler to breeze you through the FS grind, there are plenty of better templates for doing that.
Slicing is... well, it's not what most people would like it to be. Apparently if you slice low-mid grade weapons it's good, but it basically does nothing to high-end weapons and it has been reported to make REALLY high-end weapons actually worse. Mostly the slicing market is on hold until the slicing 'mini-game' gets implemented... in the near future /crossfingers.
If you want to make money as a smuggler, selling faction is probably the most viable market right now... make sure you make it up to Colonel in rank to maximize profitability.
And other than that, pour yourself a cold one and have some pie.
Alpha_Bits
Fri Jun 10, 2005 1:32 pm
#5
OH... and a quick tip... if you feel like asking 'Hey, guys... so how do we sell faction?' or something similar, first go read the FAQs in the stickies on this forum, it'll tell you all you need to know to get started with most of our 'skills'...
SwenLaransa
Fri Jun 10, 2005 1:34 pm
#6
edacsac wrote:So from what I understand, every proffesion is broken? hehe... Don't mind me, I'm a very casual player and I'm not around enough to know everything thats going on. Any good advice for an ex ranger flopping to smuggler without having to grind or learn anything about the smuggling profession?
Read the stickies
Smugglers are special since we're always broken. Even when we're 'fixed' we're broken. Just like the trail of promises the devs have laid before us. Shattered dreams. It's why we spice. We have to. Reality is just too depressing to face.
VitoGenovese
Fri Jun 10, 2005 1:36 pm
#7
Its not that we are any more broken than any others, its just that some other professions are infinitely more useful than we are at the moment. We have 1 special that works till the next mini-publish where it is getting changed possibly for the better. You can get this, and a slightly better offense/defense and a better selection of weapons with pistoleer. Our damage is miniscule compared to say rifleman. Ultimately if you are an FS grinder I believe that Rifleman/BH is the ultimate "grinders template". We are broken but we are better off than say...crafters or commandos. Poor commandos.
edacsac
Fri Jun 10, 2005 1:50 pm
#8
I'm not really a FS grinder, butit might be nice to get there one day. I thought smuggler sounded cool anyway. Believe me,smuggler is already more fun than ranger. Ranger was a drag on combat ability. Also, I never chase"uber". I just want to be mroe useful in my group, and smuggler does the trick so far.
PikechickLei
Fri Jun 10, 2005 1:51 pm
#9
Hee hee. Heehehahahahahahhhhaa HAHHHAHHAAHAHAAA... /snicker.
Sorry, that's the funniest thing I've read all week. It's really funny because you used to be a ranger, but that's also a good thing because it means you're already used to what you just walked into. To help ease your transition, I'll explain what a smugger does and compare it all with what a ranger does.
1) You can slice stuff. CU kinda borked this but we're all hopeful that it will be fixed and rebalanced "soon". Slicing provides a very useful function in the game and will make you everybody's best friend until they get what they need out of you, and then you'll feel useless again. As a ranger, you experienced the same thing with /areatrack.
2) You can sell faction points. Apparently some people have found ways to make lots of money doing this, but I'm not one of them. Most people, when I tell them how much a single faction point costs (100-150cr), decide they'd rather go overt in space and blow up enemy ships for an hour or two. Though the increased faction point limits and the removal of the old restriction that kept us from buying points over the 500 mark have eased the pain considerably, you still need to be a colonel in your respective faction in order to delegate the points at any kind of profitable ratio. Expect to shell out several million credits to buy yourself up from a corporal to a colonel.
2a) I would assume that the new GCW 'planetary control' minigame has made factional bases more in demand, and you might be able to make some money selling Special Forces structures to the PvP d00dz. Chances are, though, that their uber guild already has a master smuggler on the payroll and they get their stuff through him.
2b) Overall, selling faction points is about as exciting and useful as your Survival tree grind. Love those high-tech camps, by the way.
3) You can manufacture spices. I say "spices" only to be kind, since in reality, though you can make as many as 15 varieties of spice, all of them are useless except for the Big Three of muon gold, booster blue and neutron pixie. Of those three, only neutron pixie sells at any sort of pace to make it worthwhile to put a few crates on the bazaar. This is a great way to pay the rent and keep your swoop repaired, but it's not going to get you that krayted renegade pistol you've been eyeing. In terms of time/energy invested and the return you get on that investment, it's a lot like how collecting good wooly hide for the armorsmiths used to be.
4) You can understand Lekku. The importance of this cannot be stressed enough, as outside of smugglers, the only people who can understand Lekku are Twi'leks. This allows you to eavesdrop when two U.S. Marines pretending to be lesbian twi'leks are talking dirty to one another in the back of the cantina and taking turns on who gets to be the slave.
5) You can feign death. As far as I'm concerned this is the single greatest ability the smuggler gets. Used correctly and intelligently, feign death can allow you to get into places and accomplish things which, for other people, might require powerful groups and hours of combat. It's a lot like camoflage in that regard, and also with respect to it not working all the time and invariably failing when you need it most.
6) You can root things, as you've already discovered. No one's sure how much longer this is going to last, but everyone can agree that it's not going to last much longer. Concussion shot is wonderful, and it's also not working the way the devs intended it to work. Currently you can solo pretty much everything in the game that doesn't have a ranged attack. Take advantage of it while you can. Me, I'm stocking up on krayt tissues and pearls to sell in the lean times ahead.
Ultimately though, being a smuggler is an attitude rather than a list of abilities. We're the unloved offspring of a game which doesn't want us, brethren only to the squad leaders and commandos (and many of us are commandos as well, so that we don't feel quite so keenly that we've wasted 29 perfectly good skill points on Unarmed IV). We're feared by the Jedi, exploited by the bounty hunters, and loved by the masses (at least until the clamps run out). At the moment, we're the flavor of the month. Everyone and his brother is a smuggler right now, because concussion shot is simply too overpowered to ignore. As soon as that gets fixed and the bounty hunters adjust their templates to follow the next great exploit, we may be able to settle back into our traditional roles.
As a longtime smuggler, people come to me for all kinds of things. I know where to find the best weaponsmiths, where to find the best armorsmiths, the best shipwrights. I can look at your FWG5 and tell you if it's good or not, because I've sliced thousands of them and have a good idea of what their stats should be. I have Player A wanting to sell their AV-21 and Player B looking to buy one, and I'm the one who puts them in touch. None of these things show up when I press CTRL-S, but it's exactly what a smuggler really does.
Hope that answers some questions, and welcome aboard.
P.S. I almost forgot....
7) You can use bomb droids!
Sorry, that's the funniest thing I've read all week. It's really funny because you used to be a ranger, but that's also a good thing because it means you're already used to what you just walked into. To help ease your transition, I'll explain what a smugger does and compare it all with what a ranger does.
1) You can slice stuff. CU kinda borked this but we're all hopeful that it will be fixed and rebalanced "soon". Slicing provides a very useful function in the game and will make you everybody's best friend until they get what they need out of you, and then you'll feel useless again. As a ranger, you experienced the same thing with /areatrack.
2) You can sell faction points. Apparently some people have found ways to make lots of money doing this, but I'm not one of them. Most people, when I tell them how much a single faction point costs (100-150cr), decide they'd rather go overt in space and blow up enemy ships for an hour or two. Though the increased faction point limits and the removal of the old restriction that kept us from buying points over the 500 mark have eased the pain considerably, you still need to be a colonel in your respective faction in order to delegate the points at any kind of profitable ratio. Expect to shell out several million credits to buy yourself up from a corporal to a colonel.
2a) I would assume that the new GCW 'planetary control' minigame has made factional bases more in demand, and you might be able to make some money selling Special Forces structures to the PvP d00dz. Chances are, though, that their uber guild already has a master smuggler on the payroll and they get their stuff through him.
2b) Overall, selling faction points is about as exciting and useful as your Survival tree grind. Love those high-tech camps, by the way.
3) You can manufacture spices. I say "spices" only to be kind, since in reality, though you can make as many as 15 varieties of spice, all of them are useless except for the Big Three of muon gold, booster blue and neutron pixie. Of those three, only neutron pixie sells at any sort of pace to make it worthwhile to put a few crates on the bazaar. This is a great way to pay the rent and keep your swoop repaired, but it's not going to get you that krayted renegade pistol you've been eyeing. In terms of time/energy invested and the return you get on that investment, it's a lot like how collecting good wooly hide for the armorsmiths used to be.
4) You can understand Lekku. The importance of this cannot be stressed enough, as outside of smugglers, the only people who can understand Lekku are Twi'leks. This allows you to eavesdrop when two U.S. Marines pretending to be lesbian twi'leks are talking dirty to one another in the back of the cantina and taking turns on who gets to be the slave.
5) You can feign death. As far as I'm concerned this is the single greatest ability the smuggler gets. Used correctly and intelligently, feign death can allow you to get into places and accomplish things which, for other people, might require powerful groups and hours of combat. It's a lot like camoflage in that regard, and also with respect to it not working all the time and invariably failing when you need it most.
6) You can root things, as you've already discovered. No one's sure how much longer this is going to last, but everyone can agree that it's not going to last much longer. Concussion shot is wonderful, and it's also not working the way the devs intended it to work. Currently you can solo pretty much everything in the game that doesn't have a ranged attack. Take advantage of it while you can. Me, I'm stocking up on krayt tissues and pearls to sell in the lean times ahead.
Ultimately though, being a smuggler is an attitude rather than a list of abilities. We're the unloved offspring of a game which doesn't want us, brethren only to the squad leaders and commandos (and many of us are commandos as well, so that we don't feel quite so keenly that we've wasted 29 perfectly good skill points on Unarmed IV). We're feared by the Jedi, exploited by the bounty hunters, and loved by the masses (at least until the clamps run out). At the moment, we're the flavor of the month. Everyone and his brother is a smuggler right now, because concussion shot is simply too overpowered to ignore. As soon as that gets fixed and the bounty hunters adjust their templates to follow the next great exploit, we may be able to settle back into our traditional roles.
As a longtime smuggler, people come to me for all kinds of things. I know where to find the best weaponsmiths, where to find the best armorsmiths, the best shipwrights. I can look at your FWG5 and tell you if it's good or not, because I've sliced thousands of them and have a good idea of what their stats should be. I have Player A wanting to sell their AV-21 and Player B looking to buy one, and I'm the one who puts them in touch. None of these things show up when I press CTRL-S, but it's exactly what a smuggler really does.
Hope that answers some questions, and welcome aboard.
P.S. I almost forgot....
7) You can use bomb droids!
Message Edited by PikechickLei on 06-10-2005 01:54 PM
Message Edited by PikechickLei on 06-10-2005 01:58 PM
SwenLaransa
Fri Jun 10, 2005 2:04 pm
#11
Phizuol wrote:
What do smugglers really do? Well I'm a Computer Programmer.
I'm a network administrator.
edacsac
Fri Jun 10, 2005 2:35 pm
#13
Hey, there we go! I do network/server support as well as some scripting and programming. Maybe I did ok switching to a smuggler!
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