Weaponsmith Archive
Thread: Weaponsmiths and JtL
FreeEnterprise wrote:
I beg to differ, all of us are "gimped" by your standards. We should be omnipotent crafters able to make droids, food, clothes, structure, weapons and armor. This is in essence what shipwrights are, the sole crafting class for JTL.
EEMAN wrote:
do ok? smuggler is the most broken profession in the game. Slicing was a bone thrown at smugglers because they never actually developed their profession because time ran out. Since then its been promise after promise to revamp smuggler including delayed beyond JTLS and the combat balance and the GCW revamp.
See, i still have my long-term fingers crossed for Smugglers - If the Devs take a step back after JTL is released, then they can't fail to notice that in the Star Wars universe a smuggler is the most appropriate profession after pilot. As soon as JTL goes live (if not, already) they should be working on slicing of ships ID's, unique abilities in flight made possible from their knowing how to re-route all the ships power to either shields or engines, or overcharge the guns for one last assault. If you have a non-navy ship and want it upgraded (not built, i mean upgraded in anyway) then the devs should lift this "no slicing of components for ships" crap and have them as the main source of "tampering". Wouldn't make ships Uber - it works with weapons and armour, so why not with ships? One might go a bit faster, one might have slightly better shields, one might have smuggling compartments installed...
the potential for smugglers is endless in space, but first it has to become more than just the frag-fest it will be up there, whilst the devs aim it solely at combat. When we can dock with capital ships/space stations/other freighters, interact with other NPC ships and their crew, have to slice IDs to get landing permission at faction-controlled starports,THEN it'll start to get interesting. At the moment, its cheaper to just go out and buy XvT, or Rogue Squadron, and play that instead if all you want is fighting...
Oob
On the contrary I think this would make the profession a truely astounding one. True it could potentially complicate the grind for shipwrights but think about it. Have the professions that truely understand what they're doing with weapons/armor to craft those items for the ships. This makes the most sense. The thing that really gets me here is how resource intensive this will be for the shipwrights. There will be massloads of resources used and still no place for most normal(non powergamers) to store all the needed resources lol. This profession will be gimped by this alone. The only way to fix that is to require components from other professions(ie weaponsmiths/armorsmiths/droid engineers). That way the Shipwright won't have to keep 3 totally different sets of resources to make really good ships, not to mention this will keep old material spawns rotating as the mass amounts of resources used in these ships will only allow a couple truely good ships to be made before that specific resource is used up and everyone is going to have to shift to a current resource in order to gather enough units.
EdOWar wrote:
FreeEnterprise wrote:
EdOWar wrote:
turboloff wrote:
my oppinion is that the shipwright should require parts from other profession, otherwise the shipwright would be "overpowered". face it; making a ship isnt the same as making a mousedroid or a laser rifle.
I fail to see how shipwright would be overpowered by being able to make all ship-related components.In my view making a guild hall or a city hall isn't the same as making a mouse droid or a laser rifle, either. Does this mean that architect is overpowered too? In order to be a viable profession, shipwright needs to be able to make the bulk of ship related components,perhaps requiring onlysome Master Artisan components. If shipwright requires components from weaponsmiths, armorsmiths, artisans and droid engineers, it will be a completely gimped profession and the only people that can compete effectively in it will be guilds and power gamers with multiple accounts (for the record, I'm a power gamer with multiple accounts
).
The ground-based crafting professionswill see a drop in sales for a month or so, but the ground game isn't going to go anywhere. There will still be people who can't afford JtL, or don't want to play a space fighter sim. And even for those who do go into space, eventually the novelty will wear off and they'll get nostalgic for a DW bunker run, hunting NS or going to the Geo caves again. Also, a lot of your competitors are going to take up shipwright, leaving more of the market for those of us who stick things out.
Slim Vargo, Corbantis
Because unlike the current system, once JTL is released ships will be the only items purchased........as it is now houses are not the only item required to play SWG, ships are the only item required to play JTL. So.....I am pretty sure you can figure the rest out on your own....
From the rest of your post I can only gather 1 of 2 things, either you are planning to do shipwright outright once JTL comes around, or you are burying your head in the sand......there will be NO groundgame once JTL comes out, sure it will exist, and sure some people might play it, but I am betting somewhere in the neighbourhood of 5% of the potential customers will be all thats left. Thats 5% of the credits currently being spent on groundgame related equipment.....sorry, but thats not enough return for me, going from 200 sales a day to 10........ I am keeping my hopes up that the devs see how badly this is going to destroy the current playerbase that are crafters, and pull something out of their bag of tricks to keep us subscribed.
Message Edited by FreeEnterprise on 09-27-2004 09:51 AM
Yes, I plan to do shipwright, but I also intend to keep Weaponsmith as well. I'm not sure where you get the idea that there will be almostno ground game once JtL goes live, other than from your imagination. I have read plenty of posts from people saying they have no intention of buying JtL or going into space.
No doubt, ground based sales will drop noticeably, but again it will only be for a month or so. Granted, people who get JtL will split their game time between space and ground, but that's not the same as spending all their time in space. Remember, the combat revamp is supposed to come out a month or so after JtL (provided it isn't delayed again). This will spark new interest in the ground game.
Making shipwright dependent on 3 or 4 different types of smiths will completely gimp the profession. No other crafting profession has that level of interdependency. If you want a piece of the space game, then become a shipwright.
Slim Vargo, Corbantis
jason67 wrote:
On the contrary I think this would make the profession a truely astounding one. True it could potentially complicate the grind for shipwrights but think about it. Have the professions that truely understand what they're doing with weapons/armor to craft those items for the ships. This makes the most sense.
I can't say too much without breaking the NDA, but you should know that crafting ship weapons is very different from crafting ground-based weapons. The expertise you have as a weaponsmith will be of little use to you in making ship weapons. Same goes for shields and armorplating for ships.
The thing that really gets me here is how resource intensive this will be for the shipwrights. There will be massloads of resources used and still no place for most normal(non powergamers) to store all the needed resources lol. This profession will be gimped by this alone. The only way to fix that is to require components from other professions(ie weaponsmiths/armorsmiths/droid engineers). That way the Shipwright won't have to keep 3 totally different sets of resources to make really good ships, not to mention this will keep old material spawns rotating as the mass amounts of resources used in these ships will only allow a couple truely good ships to be made before that specific resource is used up and everyone is going to have to shift to a current resource in order to gather enough units.
Again, I can't say too much, but the resource problem isn't going to be as bad as you make it sound. Shipwrights won't have to track the resource mix of four professions, and the only part that uses tremendous amounts of resources is, obviously, the ship chassis.
FreeEnterprise wrote:
Besides, nothing says shipwrights would be DEPENDANT on anyone.......they make ships.....and thats IT!!! The weapons systems and armor systems could be added to the ship by the ship owners, and purchased from armorsmiths and weaponsmiths....thereby not "gimpsing" shipwrights at all, they still have a viable product to sell.
Ah, I see. So someone has to run to one vendor to get the ship chassis, power plant and engine. Then run to another vendor to get the weapon. Then run to a third vendor to get the shields and armor plating. Then run to a fourth vendor to get the astromech droid.
Of course, some enterprising guild, or power-gamer with multiple-accounts (like me),will set up a one-stop mall for all ship components so people won't have to do all that running around.So the individual shipwright with one account, just starting out with little in the way of money or contacts will find it virtually impossible to even get off the ground, let alone eventually compete someday. Which was my original point in the first place. We have come full circle...
Slim Vargo, Corbantis
FreeEnterprise wrote:
Besides, nothing says shipwrights would be DEPENDANT on anyone.......they make ships.....and thats IT!!! The weapons systems and armor systems could be added to the ship by the ship owners, and purchased from armorsmiths and weaponsmiths....thereby not "gimpsing" shipwrights at all, they still have a viable product to sell.
Ok, let's just assume for a second that this is a good idea. Fast forward 3 months from JTL's launch. The power-gamers have all ground their way through whatever piloting profession they choose, there are enough shipwrights around to meet demands finally, and the "buzz", if you will, is starting to wear off.
What then is the shipwright's purpose? Remember, the chassis (which is all they would be making if you outsource all peripheral components) is never destroyed. When you die in space, the chassis is only damaged, but is reparable. So there is never a need to buy a new ship unless you need an upgrade. But once all the power-gamers have the ships they want based on whatever is percieved to be the most effective (one fast, one heavy combat, and one multi-passenger i'd imagine), then the demand for ship chassis' will drop off considerably. The only sales the shipwright will then have isto new players, and to the casual players / roleplayers, who just want to switch around their ships for fun.
I'm also gonna take a shot in the dark and guess that the chassis capabilities (i.e. how much stuff you can cram into it) are determined solely by the ship model, and have nothing to do with resources or experimentation. If I'm right about this, shipwrights would then have no way to distinguish themselves from one another.
So what you've got in the long run is a profession of people taking enormous amounts of resources, shoving them into a factory, and popping out completely indistinguishable products for a customer basewith little to no chance of return business. Sound familiar? That's why the architects got experimentable harvesters and was the impetus (however failed) behind the addition of decaying light fixtures. Before that though, architects abandoned the profession in droves once the initial demand subsided because there was no longer a market for what they made.
Seriously, when's the last time you bought a house? From an economic perspective, this would make ships the houses of space.
FreeEnterprise wrote:
Ahh I see so its ok to completely obliterate an entire years worth of work in long time WS's but heaven help the lowly shipwright just starting out, we must hand him the key to the city....
Well then, you might as well quit now. You apparently believe that the ground game will stop almost completely, though you have no evidence to support that notion.Don't worry, people will still buy your weapons, thoughyour sales will drop for a while. Here's the evidence I have to support my position:
1) The veteran players that get JtL will likely spend much more time in space...for a month or so. They will buy considerably less ground-based items during that time period. But eventually the novelty of space will wear off, and they'll want to start doing some grond based stuff again. They'll likely split their time between space and ground.
2) The combat revamp comes out about a month or so after the JtL expansion is released. Many, many people are looking forward to the combat revamp. This will reignite interest in the ground game.
3) Another 6 weeks or so after the combat revamp is supposed to be the GCW revamp. Provided it's done properly, this will also attract people to the ground game. Also, it may give traditional crafting professions a wider, profession-specificrole to play in the GCW.
4) JtL will attract new players. Pilot profession requires 0 skillpoints, meaning they'll have 250 skillpoints to invest in ground-based professions. A good percentage of them will invest some of their points into shipwright I think, but that still leaves over a hundred skillpoints to invest in other ground-based professions. Don't you think that the majority of them will try some ground-based combat professions? Even if only to see how the other half of the game plays?
The ground game isn't going to die. When Exceptional/Legendary weapons started to drop, many smiths claimed that it was the end of the profession. I should know, because I was one of them...and I was wrong. Maybe I'm wrong about this too, but I find it very difficult to believe, as you do, that 95% of the ground game is going to disappear.
Slim Vargo, Corbantis
FreeEnterprise wrote:While what you say may or may not be, the problem is writing off all current professions in order to advance 1.
You're assuming there will be no ground game after JTL. I think some people will like playing JTL, and others will prefer the ground game.
After all, in JTL there's no....Mmnph!
[scuffling noises]
This is the NDA police. There is no post here. Move along. Move along.