Smuggler Archive

---

ana-mo-cara wrote:

I do not think limited schems will go over all that well. Armorsmiths and
weaponsmiths have really stirred up alot of greif over this. With good
reasons. Haveing a heck of a time getting the schems. Haveing to stockpile
schems in inventory. Haveing to make huge bulk runs to get the most out of a
schem. I also didnt hear anything about them makeing the armors required
faction kind of thing. So maybe they are going along the line that they are
going to let all the armorsmiths make these. After all no other crafter is
getting smacked with a factional requirement to create.

Maybe this would be better if worked on a backwards line. Allow the
players to buy armor coats, and go to a armorsmith shop and look at faction
armor recon and heavy. Then buy it and apply the skin they bought from the
recruiter. The result nobody has to stockpile these items to fill orders. The
player comes with the certification for the armors and they slap it on a
generic faction armor deed and boom.

While I like the thought of faction specific crafters. I see no reason
that the armorsmiths get singled out for this new glory. Afterall would we as
smugglers like to be told oh year rebel smuggler dude you can only slice for
rebels.

Maybe the system could be two teired. The armorsmith can just go buy the
cert from the recruiter, and the players would have to pay xp for the certs to
use the armors.

---

The Infamous Caylin Borealis - First Master Smuggler on Bria
One of the Four Horsemen of the Smuggler Apocalypse!
:The Ghost with the Most:

Cause Im an a$$hole at times, this post has been deleted

Message Edited by Cloudchasing on 01-23-2005 10:54 PM

• Crafters are actually penalized for handcrafting in the current system.
  Things like critical failures can sometimes mean that one out of five times
  your not going to reach the stats that the resources should merit. This leads
  to crafters working till they get a best stat, and then they mass manufacture.
  If hand crafted items were able to bring about even a marginal bonus this
  would be less of an issue. So lets not demonize people for deciding not to
  waste resources taking risks.

• Crafters are compelled by schematics to factory crank out items. Serial
  numbers if your not familiar with them. The item has the same stats but the
  numbers do not match will not work.

• Crafting is extremely time consuming. Not on all items but on enough
  items. That it degenerates into a total nuisance to hand manufacture. Which is
  easier spending an hour and a half repetitively clicking out a proton grenade
  component after component, or running out five schematics and using a factory
  to do it. There is absolutely no bonus to giving yourself carpal tunnel
  producing the same nonsense over and over again. Its only interesting the
  first times as you try to work out the best combinations.

• Why do crafters generally dislike temp schems. It reduces the profession
  to the status of manufacture monkeys. Crafters work hard to develop the skills
  to make quality goods for other players. Reducing a crafter to simply being
  given an item and then handcranking the item out for the player. Is slightly
  less then rewarding. After you get run through the ringer one this two dozen
  times you realize your no longer a person to the person with the schematic
  your like a city garage. There to go through the motions. This is not a true
  combat crafter relationship. The crafter would much rather be there to provide
  you the full service. You come in you can find what you want.

• Crafters do not live in their houses. Sometimes they go offline sometimes
  they have to go check a harvester. Result the crafter just cannot sit around
  all day waiting for the next guy to come through the door with a temporary
  schematic.

• Crafters have vendors for a reason. So that they are not penalized for not
  being on all day long. Telling a crafter now your going to do half your
  business hand to hand Is discriminatory to crafters with very little play
  time.

• Whats the plan serialized armor components for faction armor. Limited
  schematics mean one thing and one thing only. You got 1 2 3 goes at this. So
  on the first go you need to make five hundred.

• Non secure vendors mean no offline orders from crafters since crafters
  cannot lock purchases off to a specific player.

• If armorsmiths have to buy faction armor temp schems, and somehow they can
  only be made to be used once. Who loses the little guy who cannot afford
  to go spend a fortune on buying faction points, or spend hours on end running
  faction missions to buy the schems.

• Crafters are equal halves what the crafters make themselves and what the
  public demands of them. If you dislike something about the crafting in the
  game. You have to come to the realization that part of it is what the players
  demand. When players demand that they should be able to get items in crates.
  When players demand that they can buy seven or eight of the same item to get
  perfect slices.

• This is kind of the elephant in the living room aint it. Everyone knows it
  is there but ignores it, because they do not like the ugly truth about it. Any
  smuggler who has the gall to stand up and say I hate mass production it sucks
  needs to take a serious long look in the mirror. Why you know why your part of
  the problem. How many of us in this forum can stand up and say no I have not
  crate sliced for a client, or I have not crate sliced for a vendor. This is
  the disquieting thing. Sure you love making oodles of money when the option
  passes your way. Just ignore that people are generating huge numbers of items
  in order to get around slice randomization. We all know what our slicing does
  to the community. We know that perfectly good items are getting shoved out
  twenty at a time. So that they can be sliced, and the ones that miss the mark
  in the garbage they go.


• 
  
  Everyone step back for the quest for the perfect armor/weapon. In this
  corner mister mass manufacturer. The guy who sells crates of helmets. That's
  right we have football teams in this game the armorsmith. In this corner the
  guy with the laser knife. The man that carries AUKs on every part of his body
  the smuggler.


• 
  
  I just cannot believe any smuggler would have the gall. To come on this
  topic and denounce mass manufacturing. That's like a member of NAMBLA calling
  Larry flint a pervert.

The Infamous Caylin Borealis - First Master Smuggler on Bria
One of the Four Horsemen of the Smuggler Apocalypse!
:The Ghost with the Most:

I proabably woulda hit upon the same points in a similar fashion(well, to be completely honest, I woulda been more mean ), but he happened to make this post while I was asleep, and Ijust don't have the time for all that typing you did while I'm here at work. :?

Message Edited by Nicolas_Frost on 01-23-2005 02:35 AM

---

Smuggler_Caylin wrote:

While I agree that hand crafting should get more a push in the game system as is. The problem is that there are alot of issues with a number of items in general. Just to give you some examples, and please do not flame me for this guys, but alot of people really have no semblance of understanding what is involved in making some items.

• Crafters are actually penalized for handcrafting in the current system. Things like critical failures can sometimes mean that one out of five times your not going to reach the stats that the resources should merit. This leads to crafters working till they get a best stat, and then they mass manufacture. If hand crafted items were able to bring about even a marginal bonus this would be less of an issue. So lets not demonize people for deciding not to waste resources taking risks.

They are not penalized,they simply have an alternative method to producing items that has no random factor to it. Not getting the stats you want because of a critical failure does not mean the weapon/armor is worthless, it's just worth less. You are also hinting at the concept of risk vs reward. Those who risk should be subject to an appropriatereward.

• Crafters are compelled by schematics to factory crank out items. Serial numbers if your not familiar with them. The item has the same stats but the numbers do not match will not work.

Quite familiar and understood for a long time, having mass produced products in the past.

• Crafting is extremely time consuming. Not on all items but on enough items. That it degenerates into a total nuisance to hand manufacture. Which is easier spending an hour and a half repetitively clicking out a proton grenade component after component, or running out five schematics and using a factory to do it. There is absolutely no bonus to giving yourself carpal tunnel producing the same nonsense over and over again. Its only interesting the first times as you try to work out the best combinations.

Which is why many players are pushing, correspondents included, that the process to make many of these items is simplified. There is just no reason for it to be so tedious.

• Why do crafters generally dislike temp schems. It reduces the profession to the status of manufacture monkeys. Crafters work hard to develop the skills to make quality goods for other players. Reducing a crafter to simply being given an item and then handcranking the item out for the player. Is slightly less then rewarding. After you get run through the ringer one this two dozen times you realize your no longer a person to the person with the schematic your like a city garage. There to go through the motions. This is not a true combat crafter relationship. The crafter would much rather be there to provide you the full service. You come in you can find what you want.

I've always enjoyed personally crafting to the playerand their needs. I have a lot of experience being a 'monkey'.Many become manufacturing monkeys when people keep spammingthem for whenthe vendors will berestocked. They have no concept of the time or effort put into creating what they want. When someone asks me to tailor a droid to their needs, what type of clothing they want to wear or how they would like the stats on their weapon/armor I am more involved with their decision making process. I attempt to customize the whole thing to what they need and I enjoy every last minute of it. The use of factories only facilitates this interaction if I want it to. If hand crafting received a bonus as I've seen many crafters and correspondents actively pursue in their issue lists and daily talk, then crafters are in a better position to ask for the prices and respect that they feel they deserve.

• Crafters do not live in their houses. Sometimes they go offline sometimes they have to go check a harvester. Result the crafter just cannot sit around all day waiting for the next guy to come through the door with a temporary schematic.

That's why I appreciate emails in the game. I talk to who I want, when I want. If one uses the tools at their disposal and try to associate/make friends with other players then chances are they will quite easily manage to get what they need to make what they want and use their time to craft what they feel the market desires. They don't have to 'sit around' for anyone.

• Crafters have vendors for a reason. So that they are not penalized for not being on all day long. Telling a crafter now your going to do half your business hand to hand Is discriminatory to crafters with very little play time.

I remember hand-crafting everything and never once looking at a factory unless the part required an identical serial #. I was on a budget back then. Seeing as how I personally hand crafted and sliced over a couple thousand weapons before I could afford to use one I don't have any sympathy. The game has allowed people to cater to too many others and has lost the personal relationship with the other players. Vendors should be an item of convenience, not one of necessity. One player should not have to fill the needs of one thousand but that's how it works right now. It's also part of the reason why new players are unable to compete until mastery as the market is completely cornered by mass producing masters.

• Whats the plan serialized armor components for faction armor. Limited schematics mean one thing and one thing only. You got 1 2 3 goes at this. So on the first go you need to make five hundred.

That's the problem, we shouldn't have to be making 500. We have some massive thing going on with crafters where they feel they need to supply the server by themselves. It's not healthy for the game or for that person I imagine.

• Non secure vendors mean no offline orders from crafters since crafters cannot lock purchases off to a specific player.

That's another request many of us want to resolve. Such as sending items through mail.

• If armorsmiths have to buy faction armor temp schems, and somehow they can only be made to be used once. Who loses the little guy who cannot afford to go spend a fortune on buying faction points, or spend hours on end running faction missions to buy the schems.

Very few players are active participants in the GCW right now. Hopefully that will change. If mass producing is resolved in a worthwhile fashion, then the small time players will have their shot to meet part of the demand instead of the guys with 100billion credits and unlimited high-end resources. We suffer from a serious glut of resources and a horribly broken economy.

• Crafters are equal halves what the crafters make themselves and what the public demands of them. If you dislike something about the crafting in the game. You have to come to the realization that part of it is what the players demand. When players demand that they should be able to get items in crates. When players demand that they can buy seven or eight of the same item to get perfect slices.

And that shouldn't be needed. We should address the problems with mass production and why it has to be done. Predictable slicing and other alternatives will hopefully become a method of the future that we can work with to resolve the games crafting overload.

• This is kind of the elephant in the living room aint it. Everyone knows it is there but ignores it, because they do not like the ugly truth about it. Any smuggler who has the gall to stand up and say I hate mass production it sucks needs to take a serious long look in the mirror. Why you know why your part of the problem. How many of us in this forum can stand up and say no I have not crate sliced for a client, or I have not crate sliced for a vendor. This is the disquieting thing. Sure you love making oodles of money when the option passes your way. Just ignore that people are generating huge numbers of items in order to get around slice randomization. We all know what our slicing does to the community. We know that perfectly good items are getting shoved out twenty at a time. So that they can be sliced, and the ones that miss the mark in the garbage they go.


• 
  
  Everyone step back for the quest for the perfect armor/weapon. In this corner mister mass manufacturer. The guy who sells crates of helmets. That's right we have football teams in this game the armorsmith. In this corner the guy with the laser knife. The man that carries AUKs on every part of his body the smuggler.


• 
  
  I just cannot believe any smuggler would have the gall. To come on this topic and denounce mass manufacturing. That's like a member of NAMBLA calling Larry flint a pervert.

I used to spend 8 hours a day, hand crafting and slicing my clamps and knives from resources I was sampling (Not harvesting) SAMPLING by hand. I sliced thousands of weapons and armor, interacted and spoke specifically to every person I sliced for and I did it gladly. I even sliced for free if they brought me the materials. I've been on all sides of the fence.

I didn't even begin to tap into the demand for the service. So yes, I hate the current methods ofmass production with a vengeance. I feel it is not only killing our economy and forcing players into mastery in order to competebut destroyingthe player interaction that a MMORPG should be promoting. Hand-crafting for the individual needs to be fun and rewarding with it's own sense of risk. I've lived it as a smuggler who has been here since launch, it's time that we went back to the basics and make this game fun and rewarding for everyone.

---