Smuggler Archive
Thread: Revamp Discussion: Contraband/Missions PART 2 (Solutions)
- Visibility reducing over time (perhaps at high skill levels, it drops faster)
- Being able to proactively reduce visibility (through Missions or possibly ID changes).
- Knowing when you've been Bountied
- Knowing when a Bounty on you has been taken up.
- Knowing who has taken up the Bounty on you.
- Ability to confuse/delay BH Tracking Droids
- Ability to have the Bounty itself removed by completing some sort of extended Mission/Quest.
- If all else fails, combat abilities to delay and escape from Bounty Hunters.
GamerProX wrote:
To be honest, sense a *vast* amount of players in the game want Jedi, and the BH Missions that come with them, most of the people complaining against PvP are just doing so to get a free pass in the game. I mean come on, yeah, let me do everything I want in the game with no RISK. That would be lots of fun.
BH in general, is a PvP Profession, you dont pick up BH just to hunt broken NPC Marks for 30min and get 20k for it. You Pick up BH cause your hoping and hoping for Player Bounties, cause Player Bounties are 100 times more fun, NOT cause we like killing players, but cause YOUR NOT A NPC! You have a mind of your own, youcan plan and think, you can try to out smart us, you can hire help, almost limitless.
Its not being Uber or Owning someoneso dont Label me!!
You guys cannot see, cause you dont understand that you have the power right now to take something away from BH community we have wanted from day one, and you have the power to give it. By even thinking about a BH NPC, your gonna have BH players freaking out, but you dont understand that and thats the problem.
I think GM's idea for Low/High riskMissions was great! But they *STILL* complain, they want PvP removed fully. Get your awsome stuff for no risk. Forget the movies, Han vs Boba, lets not do that, lets have it be a stupid NPC you can trick your way out of. Maybe im ranking, I dont know, but I have a passion here cause Player Bounties would keep me with SWG and away from WoW, its so closeI can taste it. But I have to depend on *you* and thats not a very comfortable place to be, no more than some awsome feature for Smuggler resting on the views of BH's....and BH's are complaining about that feature cause they dont like dealing with the "possible" Smuggler stealing an item, or who knows what.
I still think people who wear sliced stuff, use it, should have to deal with PvP, I dont have the answer cause I cant understand the views of people who are so against any form of PvP. I have to leave it in your hands and hope you do whats right.
Message Edited by GamerProX on 06-22-2004 06:07 PM
Message Edited by GamerProX on 06-22-2004 06:07 PM
Neutral Imperial Agent
Smuggler_Caylin wrote:
If they were linked, it would be too easy for the PVE players finding themselves with a PVP consequence.
If they are seperate and able to be operated on seperatly, then there is no reason for concern.
Infamy (or a law abiding faction)is just something I've always seen as an easily placed faction on our character info. We could monitor it and adjust it within a PVE environment.
I'm picking up what you're putting down. However, I maintain that thinking of this as a PvE-PvP thing is a bad idea and unhealthy for the future of the profession. We need to acknowledge the difference between PvP and a Bounty. I'm in a faction but I'm covert all the time and don't PvP, I don't have stun armor, or stun weapons, I don't go around buffed all the time (I'm rarely buffed), I roleplay and I go for style over functionality (I wear a padded armor chestplate). But I still think it would be awesome to have a Bounty Hunter come after me, so long as I have the Smuggler abilities to escape the Bounty somehow. I certainly don't expect a Bounty to be a straight up PvP fight. I expect it to be very very different, and characterizing a Bounty as PvP is in my view terribly counterproductive to making the whole process fun. Don't jump ship on us this early in the game.
This shouldn't be about "PvE players" and "PvP players". It's about Smugglers.
HOTDOG wrote:
Idunno, Ternque. I think it would be possible under the proposal that GM has now- although I don't necessarily like the idea of seperating missions by military and non- military.
I could see faction recruiters giving out missions to meet an NPC at this WP and then that NPC would tell you to smuggle weapons past certain blockades or to smuggle plans (in the case of the Empire).
Also, those random factional NPCs that spawn in the wilderness sometimes have missions like this- that would be cool too.
What I am afraid of is that it might come down that missions that give visibility HAVE to be factional (Reb/Imp)- thus keeping PvP in the GCW. Which would be cool by me but I think less immersive.
I agree with you. I couldn't stand it if the only missions that are high risk are factional smuggling missions only. I want to deal dirty with Jabba!!!!
is this at all a possiblity GreenMarine?
MailekEOC wrote:
Here is a suggestion that my friend thought up.
It really kills the immersive feeling when you see smugglers yelling "I'll slice your locked containers, or slicing weapons and armor 100 credits per %".
Slicing is considered an illegal actiivity by the Empire and anyone advertising this should be dealt with. So what the devs should dois implement awareness on the imperial NPCs and/or city guards. So whenever a player uses the words slice, weapons, armor, containers in the same sentence in the presence of an NPC guard, they will conduct a search on them (or call in for a search team).
Trouble with that is then we'll get people spamming $cl!cing C0nt@in3rs for free!
Vampirerobot wrote:
So here are some questions you guys can answer:
- Assuming you are a Master Smugglerwho plays 1 hour a day and say 2 hours a day on weekends (casual player?), how often would you expect to get Bountied for your activities? What is too often? What is not often enough?
- Once Bountied, what percentage of the time would you expect to get away without a fight?
- If the Bounty Hunter catches up with you, what percentage of those fights would you expect to win?
I am a casual player Master Smuggler who prefers PvE, but would not mind PvP at all...just for the record. In answer to your questions:
1. I would expect that it would take months to acrue a player bounty at that rate. Too often would be twice a week, not often enough I think would be 3 months. Note that what I think is not enough is the same as whatI expect it to be realistically speaking. I'd LIKE it to be maybe once a month or so.
2. I would expect to get away 60% of the time without a fight, using our Smuggler guile to escape.
3. I would expect to win all of them, would I win all of them...no, but I would expect to win all the time. Realistically I think I would win 65% of the time, given my template and how well I think I can do in PvP (of which the only PvP I've done is fun duels with guildmates).
I think that is all reasonable, and I appreciate your efforts Vampirerobot to poll peoples opinions on this specific circumstance.
-Arashi
Bloodfin
This is actually other then making sure we have the skills to escape combat with a BH my biggest concern for this revamp so far. It's already been said the penality is the same overall except it's not PVP (which still is harder then an NPC). That said though, there should not be too big a difference for rewards between PVP and PVE missions. Yes should be some because their is a challenge but not much or what exactly the reward could be. From this thought that's a huge difference is how much a Smuggler could make spice wise. Personally using this format PVP should get 1000 to deliever and PVE get 650. This format gives PVE still enough to sell but gives a smaller advantage to the PVP risk of 1/3rd more as a bonus chance. If the reward is too big of a difference it would force to much PVP for the majority of people who do play MMORPG's. So I'm really interested since we already know there is going to be PVE and PVP what the ratio of skimming the two forms of Smuggler will have.
How about this instead?
High risk = deliver 1000 units of glitterstim component A for a reward of 10 Nym enhanced vibromotors. You may be able to skim 100 units and not get caught. If you get caught be either patrol or from skimming, you get 100 Infamy points and a100 visibility points.
Low (no) risk = deliver 100 untis of glitterstim component A for a reward of 1 Nym enhanced vibromotors. You may be able to skim 10 units and not get caught. If you get caught by either patrol or from skimming, you get 100 Infamy points (or 10) and absolutely zero visibility points.
This way even a PvE minded smuggler can still earn the same types of rewards from their missions, but since they are low (no) risk, you don't earn as many potentially from a skim-job.
Organ wrote:
I just feel the need to throw in my two cents. To the smuggler concerned about being dragged into PvP with bounty hunters I say this: The Dirty Fighting Tree is full of techniques that are meant to get the smuggler out of desperate situations or situations they can't handle. I'd say coming toe-to-toe with a bounty hunter would be one such situations, so allow the smuggler more abilities to escape. Allow smugglers the ability to call out their vehicles during combat, without delay with a signifigant blow to vehicles condition or use of the smugglers HAM.
Let me paint a scene of how it would work: We have our dashingsmuggler, Ikachiceh Organ, who has just royally screwed over the Jabba Faction. Ika appears on the bounty hunter terminals and someone takes the job. The bounty hunter finds Ika and engages him in combat. Ika delays the bounty hunter with Panic Shot long enough to pull out his swoop bike and make an escape. Ika then proceeds to risk removing himself from the bounty hunter terminal by slicing into it (as proposed before). I think that smugglers making daring escapes from their pursuers would make for a great time, and it allows the more clever bounty hunters to find ways to stop their prey from making such escapes.
The class has 3 skills that can be used to "escape", of these 3 skills1 work as they should.
1) Feign Death leave you open to blackbar greifing. Along with depending how mad the BH is at not killing you you could be forced to lay there a long time.
2) Low Blow actually works pretty much as it should.
3) Panic Shotdue to complaints of delay action styles being abusive and too powerful this along with other delays were nerfed. Even unnerfed as the game is there is simply no time to if your in the wilds to escape. 20 second timer gives on Panic shot gives you 5 seconds if your computer fast to open data pad, call, your swoop, mount swoop, and then to get clear of the BH's attack range. This is simply no do-able. As it stands you would get your bike out, maybe even on it before it is destoryed by even a half good BH and then your dead. And this is all if you have not accidentaly attacked the BH again or someone else has (possible grief/exploit issue) since hiting them a second time after Panic Shot releases the player to attack you.
Smugglers need revised styles and new unique skills to actually escape. Such as being able to call a speeder instantly (without going to your datapad even). Along with this new skill, Panic Shot needs to be revised into either longer delay or making sure a BH can not do anything for that 20 seconds (such as mount a bike to chase you). Along with this it would be nice to have a style that when/if the shot lands on the BH it makes their screen white out for so many seconds and forces untargetting (and unaviable to target anything forsay 20-30seconds) of the Smuggler. This would allow the Smuggler with it's revised skills to mount their swoop and escape leaving the BH to not know the direction of said Smuggler.
Smuggler_Caylin wrote:
If they were linked, it would be too easy for the PVE players finding themselves with a PVP consequence.
If they are seperate and able to be operated on seperatly, then there is no reason for concern.
Infamy (or a law abiding faction)is just something I've always seen as an easily placed faction on our character info. We could monitor it and adjust it within a PVE environment.
What the hell does Jabba need military goods for? If anything his thugs are equiped with randomly aquired weaponry (sliced no doubt). Gangsters arent the military - they are like a business entity with a good Sears shotgun. They don't deal in high tech military weaponry. They aren't terrorists.
Maybe factionalized smugglers can take the military missions, but they would be smuggling for their faction, not Jabba the Hutt. You won't go to Jabba's palace and get an option to smuggle for the rebellion or the empire. Doesn't make sense.
Maybe you could go to a special "Rebel Smuggling Outpost" or "Imperial Illicit Item Requisition Outpost" to take a military goods smuggling mission.
Sounds like a pain in the ass. My bet is that just coding smugglers to work for crime bosses would make the most sense. Smugglers deal with underworld bosses. Having smugglers smuggle for factions isa great idea, but that would be more to code. Being able to smuggle illegal guns for the rebellion past Imperial blockades has always been a dream of mine (kinda like the one where I go to Endor and burn Ewoks alive with aflamethrower - but that is my deepest fantasy).
Then again, I think in my mind that there is a HUGE distinction between the characteristics of an underworld smuggler and a professional factional smuggler. Accommodating the two characters seems to be a bit of a challenge under one smuggler profession. For instance, a factional smuggler might be military trained for combat - underworld smugglers would use dirty fighting tactics. Also an underworld smuggler wouldn't buy military faction, while a factional smugg would. Try going to run missions for Jabba as a Rebel smuggler and see how hard you get laughed at in his throne room.
My point is that there is a distinction. A resolution to my "idea discrepancy" here is that Rebels and Imperials actually hire underworld smugglers to do their bidding. We know that the Empire uses Black Sun in secret (shhhh don't let it out). Maybe the Rebels pay smugglers on the side to move stuff. Who knows? Just playing around here
Message Edited by Ternque01 on 06-23-2004 01:08 PM
Jabba would want military grade items if not for protection from other Hutts and criminal groups then to simply sell to people who did want this type of gear.
To me Factional do military gear and food stuffs to smuggling people/strikeforces, and secret data for said factions. Regular smuggling consists of many types of goods including military grade, and yes slaves (which if caught could give you bad faction standings).