Smuggler Archive
Thread: about us
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sodi
Fri Feb 25, 2005 6:42 am
#1
well it would seem i got my account banned from the forums for overreacting to the feign death change 2 weeks is a long time). The posts on that issue were deleted and im not going to post it again. As i was kind of expecting it and all i can not hold any grudge but neither can i let this issue drop so easily i need tobe convinced either that i am right or t hat i am wrong and we basically have not gotten any word for this change in advance.
Fortunately for me i have nice friends 
So what do you think about this change? should it really be allowed? why are we the only profession being fixed negatively?
So they have done.. for example they fixed the d owners so you will not get incapacitated or killed, but before that they fixed spices so they would have downers,, at almost the same time they rewamped chef so you would have uber food and drink.
Panic shot was fixed so it will not hold a person for 10 seconds if you attack that person, yet as the system is now the only way to keep the person frosen is to peace right after the shot. and now feign death is useless (especially if you feign when you are bleeding or burning).
What do we get back for all that? Well absolutely nothing. On top of it all we have to be declared (special forces) if we want to delegate and the autopull from crates has been changed. Now for the autopull some people would argue that other professions dont autopull from crates when doing things.Are the crafting professions then not pulling components directly from a crate when crafting? Id love to see a tailor or an armorsmith have to manually remove every component manually to craft. They would probably go mad just at the notion of it.
Then what makes us so very different? Why are we the ones getting all those "fixes"?
Yes i might have spelled things wrong and i might not be the most polite person... It certainly doesnt help me when im angry either.. Still i should probably thank the devs for making me feel SOMETHING.
Oh and by the way check this out 
: http://scumbunny.keenspace.com/d/20001215.html
: http://scumbunny.keenspace.com/d/20001215.htmlAnd before flaming me for it i just thought it would be fun to post that link here and i certainly mean no offence by it.
sodi
Fri Feb 25, 2005 6:26 pm
#2
thought id bump this so everyone gets a fair chance to see that link
TomoRainer
Fri Feb 25, 2005 6:58 pm
#3
We keep getting nerfed because our class was pasted together at the end of beta and most of our skills were never given more than a week or two of testing. End result, big problems pop up down the line (notably with Panic Shot and FD, though I'm also of the opinion slicing is way out of whack--it creates such enormous disparity in this game) and are met with forceful "solutions" that, partly out of necessity, come in the form of big fat nerfs.
Since there was never much if any long-term vision for our class, major changes keep getting delayed because a revamp will call for a complete and utter revision of the profession. That takes major time and developer resources for the good of a single one of the game's 30-something professions. But with a game this huge and, until recently, hugely understaffed, serious Civil War-type triage was the name of the game: and since smuggler was fatally wounded from the get-go, we've been left in solitude to continue our long and painful and occasionally noisy death.
If this sounds like an apology for the devs, it isn't. But it is my take on the why behind the state of Smuggler.
Since there was never much if any long-term vision for our class, major changes keep getting delayed because a revamp will call for a complete and utter revision of the profession. That takes major time and developer resources for the good of a single one of the game's 30-something professions. But with a game this huge and, until recently, hugely understaffed, serious Civil War-type triage was the name of the game: and since smuggler was fatally wounded from the get-go, we've been left in solitude to continue our long and painful and occasionally noisy death.
If this sounds like an apology for the devs, it isn't. But it is my take on the why behind the state of Smuggler.
yimaz
Fri Feb 25, 2005 7:10 pm
#4
We always talk about iconic professions but take it beyond that point and break SW down to its core to really see where SOE is with the game...
Atmosphere - when I watcha movie now I feel like Ive "been there" so SOE gets high marks for that.
Rebellion - getting better
Jedi - Working on it
Emprie - Getting better
Underworld - A few Quests/Theme parks and when ask about the Underworld people are told - next expansion.
/shrug
Message Edited by yimaz on 02-25-2005 09:11 PM
SpinningCloud
Fri Feb 25, 2005 7:25 pm
#5
I pretty much agree with Tomo...
I'd add that I've been where the devs are many many times...in meetings setting priorities on bug lists and feature lists.
Questions asked when setting such priorities are;
1. How many customers have we lost over this issue?
2. How many customers are we likely to lose if we delay this feature?
3. How much of an effect are the upset customers having on the rest of the customer base?
4. How many more customers will we gain if we add this feature?
5. How can we pacify the existing upset customers?
Let's see...for Smugglers wanting smuggling the answers they see are probably along the lines of;
1. Not many, maybe 25 over a two year period based upon the number of 'I'm quitting' posts on the forums.
2. Maybe another 25 over a two year period...they seem to have a lot of patience seeing as how long some of them have been smugglers.
3. Hardly any, most other players don't visit their forum and we contain their complaints to that one forum and don't often go there ourselves so as not to draw other players into the fray.
4. Not enough to justify the effort unless we made a major expansion out of it and we have our resources accounted for for the next few years so that's unlikely.
5. They seem to settle down every time we give them some new thing to find or craft. How about we make an art change on the 'crafter's appron' and call it a 'dealer's appron' to go with the gaming table we gave them?
Sorry but it's all about what brings in, or retains, the most revenue. They can only look at us for an indication of what is causing them to gain or lose customers. If we sit around waiting patiently figuring they know whatwe want they can ONLY come to one conclusion; they're still paying and not complaining so we don't need to spend our resourceson them.
I've been there and done it many times in my career; what threatens the revenue gets the attention, what doesn't doesn't. They are not going to spend unless they think they will gain, or retain,more than they spend. We, fellow smugglers, haven't come close to threatening the revenue in their minds. I'm not sure how we can actually. That's probably why I'm rather pesimistic about the whole thing.
sodi
Sat Feb 26, 2005 12:31 am
#6
heh not only is it true but if we try to get the attention of others we get punished as in stay in your bench and wait till you rot 
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