Smuggler Archive

First of all ..... welcome back, Greenmarine !

a) Loot drops .... VERY bad idea.

Why ? Loot tables have been broken so many times in the last 2 years .... a proven fact. It will be the Krayt/Pearl/NS loot fiasco all over again - too little, too many, none, some of these, none of those , camping this, loot stealing that ....requiring constant tinkering and rebalancing and repairing by the devs. Especially if the loot is linked to certain bug/balance-problem prone areas like DWB / corvette/ avatar platform.

If you MUST introduce loot components, make them galaxy wide (not specific location) loot drops from CL 54+ mobs (aka a single Elite combat profession can get them).

If you MUST introduce loot components, make a “Trade/Modify window” like the Image designers (or Enchanters in WoW) that does not require exchange of multi million items … or you will have a CSR nightmare all over again when people get conned to hand over their Krayt weapons to a swindler -.. and come screaming to CSR.

If you MUST introduce loot components and DON’T make a trade window, make them limited use factory run schematics for smugglers (e.g. 2 uses … one for the customer bringing the item, one for the smuggler).

If you MUST introduce loot components and DON’T choose any of the methods mention above, make the risk / reward proportional (this means a DWB loot item better give you a FANTASTIC slice that is NOT hitting the hard cap).

b) Slicing components …. GOOD idea

But make these components rewards for smuggler missions. With dangerous missions giving the components for high end slices. And make “tier5” master smuggler slices .... help us avoid smuggler tinkerers that only take the slicing tree. DO NOT add slicing first and smuggling missions later. Add smuggling missions FIRST, with slicing components as rewards.

There is nothing cooler than Jabba or Nym telling you “Solo, my buddy, I am satisfied with your performance on this smuggling run. As a sign of my pleasure I award you this crate of high performance military issue trigger assemblies that recently fell off a shuttles loading ramp ! I am sure you will put them to good use.”

c) Weapon breakage ….. WHY not ?

make it a MUCH smaller probability. And e voila … REPEAT CUSTOMERS for a profession. Link it to level of slicing so only master smugglers can repair the best items. And suddenly you have a reason why people should be Master Smugglers. But I get that nagging feeling that some of your coders used integer variables (with insufficient capability to handle small numbers ) instead of floating point so you cant HANDLE small probabilities, which is the reason why weapons have broken so soon on TC. And as this is a basic problem at the lowest level that is almost impossible to solve you scrap weapon breakage. Which sounds like a more likely reason than “Its not fun anyway !”

d) Slicing Process

what happened to the slicing mini game ? I was really looking forward to that. Anyway.
Please spread the slicing points over ALL FOUR smuggler trees and give a hefty bonus for master smuggler. So only a Master Smuggler can do the full 100 points and up to tier 5 individual slices. DO NOT swamp the smuggler community with slicing only tree dabblers.

Have fun

Novarider

(Master Smuggler, Naritus .... 22 months and waiting)

Gordon jesu christo bennet!!!!! this has gone from mana from heaven

to hell in a handbasket inside of 24 hrs!!?!?!?

By having hi level loot drops in unfeasibly hard places , your gonna create a 2 tier master smuggla system where only the power gamers will be the ones able to gain access the the hi lev loot drops , chargin silly money for top lev slicin , so an unbalancin situation is bein created here ,

so not only will I have to squeeze in grindin to get my second mastery up quicker to survive these new insane loot drop areas, thus diminishing enjoyment cos i gotta grind my a$$ off , ( i dont get a lot of time to play , rl commitments an such)

when I eventually get to cl80 , I gotta spend all my time loot campin to get stuff to make good money , I thought all of this was supposed to be on its way out of this game , not encouraged.

the loot drops must be pulled out of the dungeons , theme parks , accessible to all , not just uber players and groups , as I said , an unbalancin situation is developin here , not good.............................

*rant contd* so the new hi lev loot drops are gonna be like gettin pearls from a krayt ,

great idea , so i spose they'll cost billions of creds , and will only be available to the uber rich.

this stinks.

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DARTHBAYLOR wrote:

*rant contd* so the new hi lev loot drops are gonna be like gettin pearls from a krayt ,

great idea , so i spose they'll cost billions of creds , and will only be available to the uber rich.

this stinks.

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Yes it sucks but at least you dont require them to play. People will adapt and make do with lower slices or pay premiums for the high loot slices.

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GreenMarine wrote:
Don't trash your upgrade kits. We're going to see about adding a salvage option to them that turns them into one of the new components, randomly. (With the higher level ones being rare, etc). Also, the high end components can now be found on Krayts, etc.

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Sounds like the only way many of us are going to get the really good slices is by stocking up on weapon upgrade kits now and salvaging them after the upgrade in hopes of getting just one or two good components.

I really don't like the direction this has taken. I thought the "breakage" system was a wonderful idea. Very immersive with great risk vs. reward decisions to be made before having a weapon sliced. If weapons were breaking too often or the system was too confusing then Ithink thoseissues should have been addressed and fixed as opposed to scraping the whole idea in favor ofloot items.I'll withold final judgement until I see some more information on this new slicing system, but as it stands right now I'm concerned.

Ever since the CU this game has been taking a turn away from player created items and focusing more and more on loot drops. If you're going to require components in the slicing process I would rather see them be insanely complex schematics that would require lots of named resources and couldn't be produced in a factory as opposed to some loot drop that I'll never get because I'm not willing to put in the time it would require to find one.

I'm starting to get the idea we've taken slicing just as for granted as the general populace has.

My suggestion would be to have the rare loots off high-level ground mobs, then combine that with rare drops in space (preferably off specific NPCs, maybe the tier 5 missions in Kashyyyk, which are currently rather pointless reward-wise, or entirely new ones) and eventually as either rewards for uber smuggling missions and/or drops from the NPCs on our missions.

Make all those drops or rewards as rare as you want, but with that kind of spread, you'll allow a lot of different playstyles a shot at finding the upper-level stuff while at least giving any devoted smuggler a chance to get his hands on the great stuff even if he isn't a god in space or on terra firma.

I dunno , I give up , they dont listen to a word we say , they're in fairy land ,

loot sys will create an unbalanced 2 tier , only open to the powergamer uber class ,mega rich , loot campers,

breakage jammin sys , open to all , risks can be explained easily , players choice , jus make jamms take longer to appear (everyone carries more'n one gun dont they?), rtn business for the smugs , all happy campers.

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I feel sad

Wow, that was some thread to wade through!

Just a few thoughts:

• I can accept that the very best slices will need more effort to attain. However there really needs to be a lot of attention spent making sure that the very best slices are not the ONLY slices that are practical and useful.

The other tier slices need to be competitive in their effects so that they are the staple slices of the playerbase - providing a steady income for the Smuggler and a benefit that is achievable by everyone. If that isn't the case, then people will ONLY want the high end slices. That's when, if the components are in insane places like DWB only, we'll be in the realm of unbalancing things so that only the rich, large guilds and l33t campers can achieve them.

• If the usefulness of slices is sorted along those lines, then fine, make the high end components hard to get. BUT, make them hard to get in different places and in different ways.

There have been some genius suggestions in this thread, and I can't understand why they can't ALL be used. I'd rather wait a little longer for it all to be put in place than be palmed off with a 'new' system that no one wants. We are customers, and who in their right mind would think they can ignore what their customers want?

So, why not have the components drop not only in DWB, Avatar, corvette (providing there's a balance pass to make the difficulty sensible), but also:

• Have them drop in containers linked to the CL of the MOB
• Have the ability to skim them from Smuggler missions
• Have them drop in space linked to tier of the enemy
• Let Smugglers salvage them from junk.
• How about being able to salvage parts from already sliced weapons/armour? Rather than just trashing something with no condition, you can salvage a random component from it first? The level of the component would be linked to the level of the slice on the item.
• Hmmm, what about those nice jawas that we can talk to and trade with?

For immersion's sake (they're illegal) I don't think we should allow crafting of these things, but that's just me.

I actually kind of like the way that you can take your toon into the realms of being a Slicer rather than a jack of all trades Smuggler. You can specialise in being a top Slicer and spend your time and money making sure you have all the equipment necessary to do the best slicing possible.

I sincerely hope that we're listened to, as while I REALLY appreciate GM taking the time to give us a heads up, it's pointless if the discussion is started and then what we think and would like is ignored.

Or make use of the pointless jawa junk traders thing that only smugglers can do.

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GreenMarine wrote:
Weapon & Armor breakage has been removed. - Great, this was completely unworkable and would have pretty much made slicing a thing of the past.

Removed for three reasons: 1) It was difficult to understand the breakage system. 2) It happened too often. Although it could be slowed, 3) it just wasn't fun anyway.

I've adjusted weapon slice bonuses and costs across the board - As long as we can't make the weapon worse...

Adding a crit chance should now be more of a worthwhile gamble. Certain combinations of slices are no longer patently better than others. Different types of slices should be more competitive. However, the numbers are still subject to change.

Some slices will now require components to apply. - Free no, but this is going to end up costing people more for a slice that it did for the weapon!

Slices are unlimited item upgrades. I don't believe they should be free. The breakage system was too harsh a penalty. Instead, I'm enabling plan B. There are 9 components used by the current set of slices. Components cover a range in rarity and the difficulty of location in which they drop. For example, rebuilding the firing pin (level 4 fire rate) or applying a feather trigger pull (level 3 crit chance) now requires a Delicate Trigger Assembly, which drops in Death Watch Bunker and Avatar Platform. We may have to tweak the drop rate a few times to get it right.

This stuff should go to Test Center in a day or two.

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*hands GM some beer and pie* Don't let them get ya down, big guy.