Smuggler Archive
Thread: The Do's and Don'ts of working with your Slicer
as for the idea of a set, base price, it may look good on paper (or screen as it may be), but the reality is, it's better business to have fluctuating prices, i may charge a master comando wearing a full set of composite armor a cirtain ammount to slice his flame thrower, while i maycharge a novice marksman wearing the starting clothes's cdef pistol for a considerably lower ammount, if not for free. also i tend to have a set *range of prices* different for weapons and armor/PSG's, but i always cut the price by 1k if it is below a set % (which is also different for weapons and armor/PSG's) that i tell my customer before any transactions are made.
DO: set up a time to get large quantities of items sliced with your smuggler
DO NOT: get impatient and spam your smuggler with /tells when he doesn't immediately respond to the one you sent him/her when they logged on. Us smugglers know the dreadful 15-20 minutes of /tell-hell whenever we log on, be patient.
DO: let your smuggler know in advance if you need to bank tip
DO NOT: pay a smuggler in advance, then get upset in the unlikely event that he/she loses their connection, *IF YOU PAY IN ADVANCE, IT IS AT YOUR OWN RISK!!!
DO NOT: accuse a smuggler of failing the slice when he/she tells you that the item in question has been sliced before, unless you made the object yourself, only the smuggler can tell you weather or not it has been sliced.
finally,
DO NOT: expect the smuggler to give you back your item(s) untill you have successfully paid him/her. slicing tools may not be the most expensive things, but it does cost us credits. also, we may or may not be in it for the money, but we are cirtainly not in it to lose money.
Do you accept money as tip, or do you insist cash in secure trade?
chown2 wrote:
I'm not a master yet, so I'm not slicing for a living, but I do slice containers. The other day, I had a guy tell me he'd tip me the money afterwwards. He came through and gave me the money (using the bank option, which explains why he wanted to tip me), but I was thinking he might cheat me. I really didn't care that much because I needed the experience.
Do you accept money as tip, or do you insist cash in secure trade?
If they insist on a tip, they get their gear back After I get paid. I have a whole speel on it in my Bio. I ask each customer to read befoer we do business.
last line of it says: i don't get paid, you don't get your items back. savy?
I have a set of SLICING INFO hot keys set up which effectively let people know in an abbreviated form most of the information about slicing. If the player presses me hard....I SPAM them with the macros.....letting them know slicing is RANDOMIZED for slicer and for master smuggler alike; that improvements are speed OR damage for weapons, not both; base efficiency increase or encumbrance reduction for armor NOT BOTH. One macro tells them to UNEQUIP what they are trading to me as poofing weapons and armor is not what either of us wants. One macro gives my price for slicing which is 2500 per item across the board....weapon or armor piece the same, so if it is agreeable they can proceed. Another apologizes for the use of macro to inform them, but explains that my fingers are tired from explaining all this a thousand times and more...and I am really very happy to slice for them.
This is the first time I have visited the SMUGGLER forum. Let me explain my price of 2500....because I see some people are charging less. I certainly intended to charge less and was one of the lowest price slicers on Gorath. The day I got MASTER SMUGGLER, I got a deluge of slicing requests all at once. I got a lot of emotional backlash from slicing results as well. The TELL-HELL I live with is pretty constant. If I wanted to continue in the profession, compensation would need toconsider the emotional attrition that goes along with being the target for players' fantasies about results not being fulfilled.... I raised my prices. Most of the Master Smugglers who were my mentors have now retired from play; either they left the game, gave up Smuggler or are playing other characters. I haven't done this. I am adequately compensated for my time spent slicing. Players who are happy with my work still tip me. I can also gift players either with free slicing when I feel like it, or with spices. I enjoy helping people improve their weapons. I still remember before I was a smuggler how happy I was the first time a slicer improved my guns.
Slicing is my Profession. I prossibly do more slicing than any other slicer on Gorath, (volume of work). I almost always have enough crates of hi quality tools with me to take care of requests. (It doesn't matter to me that conductivity on knives and clamps is broken and efficiency rating now removed, maybe someday it will all get fixed. Ilike to know i use the best tools available....and the weaponsmiths I work with know exactly what goes into my WUKs because they are the ones who prepare the schematics for me. I factory run my own tools pretty much....in enough volume so I am prepared for requests. )
I dislike haggling and bargaining about my slicing fees. There are lots of other slicers. They won't be doing it long if they charge too low. I do not worry about competition charging lower.Many slicing-clients are repeat customers and now friends. They don't complain about my fees and frequently tip me because of: availability, good reportage of information about slicing improvement, and trustworthiness; I tend to get good results. Observing the slicing results now as a master smuggler, and before when i was slicer....I have to generalize: way better results now.This isn't whatI expected would be the case when I was a slicer, but it has turned out that way on average. Maybe I use better WUKs to bring up the low end....maybe it comes up anyway.When someoneproposed to pay me less, I do consider it if they cry: POVERTY. Many times I will slice for less if a player tells me they can't afford slicing in a nice way. A player has the option of choosing to patronize another slicer; I also have the optionnot to slicefor a player.
My faction is NEUTRAL. This is a business decision to make it easier for all players to access my services. I cannot therefore sell faction points. I'm glad our game developers don't run international politics, because from my point of view PEACE is a good thing.....to be fair, there should be some in-game rewards for taking the neutral position. Smugglers, in particular, sufferreduced incomeif theytake that position.
Slicing your own equipment: I'm convinced it is jinxed. (I now pass anything I slice for myself to someone else and then take it back....or cart it around for a day or two; maybe this is superstitious, but I have found that if I buy for myself for a vendor and slice I get the WORST results. Hahahah.....the game devels. playing one of their little jokes on slicers, yet again.)
Slicingfamiliarizes the slicer with what is happening in weapon and armor improvements in the galaxy and provides a great observationpoint to get to know many other players. Some of the worse aspects of people's behavior can be revealed when they don't get what they want; but you see some of the finest sportspersonship in the gameas well. The people I have gotten to know (many of them via slicing) are what keeps me playing SWG and keeps me in the profession of Smuggler.
SHADOWS, Master Smuggler, Gorath
Hey Im not a master smuggler but I do get better slices then 10-30% on weapon slices.
And I dont really think there is any add in slicing on Master smuggler its just crap.
I have never sliced anything low like under 17% so what is Master smuggler good for anyway...
About prices being well thought...
I just charge 1k for containers, 2k for armor pieces, and 3k for weapons. I've only had one person complain about the prices, and that was because of the 1k for containers, and I just told him, "look, I'm a master smuggler, I don't need the XP anymore. If you want it for free, go find a novice." 
One more thing I forgot to mention:
If I were to suggest one thing about slicing to society, it'd be to sell your containers on the bazaar. Don't bother getting them sliced, I've NEVER heard of anyone getting anything worth the money or time out of a locked container, and there's plenty of novice smugglers out there who need the xp that would be more than happy to just buy them off the bazaar. That's what I do whenever I find a locked container...
Let me start off by saying that I am not a smuggler, but I am curious as to why a Master Smuggler can't choose which stat they want to slice. It would make sense that someone who is a Master Smuggler can figure out what stat they are slicing. I can understand random slicing up until then though. So let me say this again, when someone masters something they should have the skill and they should have control over what they are slicing.
Well, the reason is, they haven't given it to us. Other than that who knows.
As for the master part, my only question is why would anyone go to anyone BUT a master after that? If only masters can choose the slice then why would you go to a Slicer?
A lot of great Info here, just started Smuggler. About Master Smugglers having a slicing choice. I agree with that, it would be nice if as you move closer to master, you can choose what to slice. Say you can choose onebefore master, but the chances are not as great. Once you reach Master however, the chances are then greater. I guess since there's only two main things you can slice for playersspecifically( armor and weapons; besides containers
there isn't much depth there, but it would be a nice option. Also, i'm wondering what others think about this Q, would it be faster to gain opposing faction just by running missions themselves, or the selling and buying deal? I would like + faction in both Reb/Imp.Thanks for the input.
Glad I found this thread. Wasn't sure if I could pick what I wanted sliced.
Now I won't feel as bad when I don't get the requested slice type.