My Proposal to fix slicing and crafting as a whole (Just the facts)

[Zennshi]

Deleted.

 

Edit : because I am done with this game and hope it falls on its face

Edited January 15, 2012 by Zennshi

[Zennshi]

deleted.. Edited January 15, 2012 by Zennshi

[Zennshi]

Delted! Edited January 15, 2012 by Zennshi

[Zennshi]

deleted.a Edited January 15, 2012 by Zennshi

[Zennshi]

deletedzx Edited January 15, 2012 by Zennshi

[Zennshi]

Reserving posts.

[DarthTHC]

Posting this while your posts are still under construction, but it will be just as true when you've finished as it is now...

 

You do not have all the facts. You do not have the telemetry data BioWare has access to. You do not know the specific design goals for Slicing. You do not know how BioWare wants it to compare against other crew skills. You do not know how the skill actually does compare against other crew skills, across all players, like BioWare does.

 

You are necessarily short on facts because BioWare has not and probably will never share this level of detail.

 

Suggest you title your post ...(Just the assumptions).

[Zennshi]

Posting this while your posts are still under construction, but it will be just as true when you've finished as it is now...

 

You do not have all the facts. You do not have the telemetry data BioWare has access to. You do not know the specific design goals for Slicing. You do not know how BioWare wants it to compare against other crew skills. You do not know how the skill actually does compare against other crew skills, across all players, like BioWare does.

 

You are necessarily short on facts because BioWare has not and probably will never share this level of detail.

 

Suggest you title your post ...(Just the assumptions).

 

Um. How about you wait till I finish constructing instead of assuming what is going to be said

[zerobounds]

Writing it all up and then posting is a much better approach.

[DarthTHC]

Um. How about you wait till I finish constructing instead of assuming what is going to be said

 

So far I'm spot on. You've linked to opinion posts. *shrug*

 

EDIT: But maybe I'll help with some facts I generated.

 

After the Slicing nerf I ran and tracked 500 slicing missions of varying levels. Summarized:

 

• Overall: 500 missions / 129,323 credit profit for an average of 259 credits per mission across all missions.
  
• Rank 5 missions, all qualities: 76,605 profit over 164 missions for 467 profit per mission.
  
• Rank 5 Rich & Bountiful missions only: 59,129 profit over 95 missions for 623 per mission.
  

 

Rank 5 Rich & Bountiful is the highest profit category of slicing missions.

 

Anecdotal evidence could be fun too...

 

I have a character who is level 17 and sits on Fleet chain running Underworld Trading missions (focusing primarily on metals) and selling those on GTN. His UWT is currently around 250. When I started he had about 17k on him. Now he's over 117k. I only flip to him to run missions when I'm between stuff on my main.

 

I have another character who is level 24 and mostly sits on Fleet chain running Investigation missions. Her Investigation is under 200, probably way under. She started with around 28k credits. She now is approaching 80k.

 

I call that anecdotal evidence because I'm not tracking the detail behind those missions and sales as I have with the 500 Slicing missions.

Edited January 4, 2012 by DarthTHC

[Zennshi]

So far I'm spot on. You've linked to opinion posts. *shrug*

 

EDIT: But maybe I'll help with some facts I generated.

 

After the Slicing nerf I ran and tracked 500 slicing missions of varying levels. Summarized:

 

• Overall: 500 missions / 129,323 credit profit for an average of 259 credits per mission across all missions.
  
• Rank 5 missions, all qualities: 76,605 profit over 164 missions for 467 profit per mission.
  
• Rank 5 Rich & Bountiful missions only: 59,129 profit over 95 missions for 623 per mission.
  

 

Rank 5 Rich & Bountiful is the highest profit category of slicing missions.

 

Anecdotal evidence could be fun too...

 

I have a character who is level 17 and sits on Fleet chain running Underworld Trading missions (focusing primarily on metals) and selling those on GTN. His UWT is currently around 250. When I started he had about 17k on him. Now he's over 117k. I only flip to him to run missions when I'm between stuff on my main.

 

I have another character who is level 24 and mostly sits on Fleet chain running Investigation missions. Her Investigation is under 200, probably way under. She started with around 28k credits. She now is approaching 80k.

 

I call that anecdotal evidence because I'm not tracking the detail behind those missions and sales as I have with the 500 Slicing missions.

 

I think you posted a few times in the other thread, *wave* if not it was probably in another slicing nerf or buff thread, but this isn't just about slicing, it is about the economy as a whole

 

Keep in mind, these are suggestions. There are no facts when a games dynamics can change overnight.

Edited January 4, 2012 by Zennshi

[Thanatosx]

After the Slicing nerf I ran and tracked 500 slicing missions of varying levels. Summarized:

 

• Overall: 500 missions / 129,323 credit profit for an average of 259 credits per mission across all missions.
  
• Rank 5 missions, all qualities: 76,605 profit over 164 missions for 467 profit per mission.
  
• Rank 5 Rich & Bountiful missions only: 59,129 profit over 95 missions for 623 per mission.
  

 

I agree Rich missions generally are the best bang for your buck, but your results from tracking have been no where NEAR what mine have been, though I've only tracked about 300 total so far. Your numbers are much higher. I can't see my numbers coming near yours, which tells me that the RNG can make things very imbalanced/skewed.

 

I'm curious though, how long did it take you to run those 500 missions?

Edited January 4, 2012 by Thanatosx

[ErikModi]

One thing I think I'd really like to see is for crafters to have the ability to add traits to items, instead of getting completely different schematics.

 

Allow me to explain.

 

Take Artifice. Currently, each power level of crystal has a few different schematics, such as a Red Fortitude Crystal that increases Endurance, and a Red Critical Crystal that increases crit rating. These are the base crystals, made with Grade 1 components, and provide a +2 to the stat in question at green level, +3 at blue, and +4 at purple. Now, how about we just have a "Grade 1 Red Crystal," which provides +2/+3/+4 to a stat, and then allow the crafter to select when making it if it is a Fortitude, Critical, etc. crystal. This would cut down on the somewhat redundant naming procedures currently in place, as instead of having Critical, Perilous, Mortal, etc., you'd have Grade 1 Critical, Grade 2 Critical, and so on. This would be a boon to Artifice, but INCREDIBLY more helpful to Armormechs and Synthweavers. I've only dabbled in Synthweaving, and am already a bit daunted by the new schematics that REing can give you. As you RE, instead of getting completely new schematics, you can get new traits to add to gear.

[Zennshi]

One thing I think I'd really like to see is for crafters to have the ability to add traits to items, instead of getting completely different schematics.

 

Allow me to explain.

 

Take Artifice. Currently, each power level of crystal has a few different schematics, such as a Red Fortitude Crystal that increases Endurance, and a Red Critical Crystal that increases crit rating. These are the base crystals, made with Grade 1 components, and provide a +2 to the stat in question at green level, +3 at blue, and +4 at purple. Now, how about we just have a "Grade 1 Red Crystal," which provides +2/+3/+4 to a stat, and then allow the crafter to select when making it if it is a Fortitude, Critical, etc. crystal. This would cut down on the somewhat redundant naming procedures currently in place, as instead of having Critical, Perilous, Mortal, etc., you'd have Grade 1 Critical, Grade 2 Critical, and so on. This would be a boon to Artifice, but INCREDIBLY more helpful to Armormechs and Synthweavers. I've only dabbled in Synthweaving, and am already a bit daunted by the new schematics that REing can give you. As you RE, instead of getting completely new schematics, you can get new traits to add to gear.

 

When you say.. daunted, you mean... In a good way?

 

It is true it has the jewelcrafting syndrome... at least give it sub categories

Edited January 4, 2012 by Zennshi

[Kaelok_Muhar]

Here are a few of my proposals in relation to the state of slicing :

 

1) Put slicing back where it was. Stay with me on this, I will explain.

 

Slicing functioned as a necessary evil, but it also had a purpose, to pump money into an economy. Some of you call it "printing money", which is partially correct, but there is a reason why this is a good thing in the current state our economy is in. You must also realize a few things, if slicing is "printing money" then things like skills buying and repairs are "burning money". When the outflux of money is higher than the influx, this is what is called deflation, which eventually causes a depression. The issue is that, as of right now there are fixed costs for certain goods and services. This is the skill trainers, and the repair people. Their prices never change no matter how broke you are, because as far the giant market is concerned they are pawn shops with a never ending credit supply, so they can "print" all the money they want and charge you what they want, because they don't care about you or anyone.

 

These vendors basically shut out half of the possible goods that can be traded by merits of it is dirt cheap compared to a crafted equivalent. Slicing was making more money than any other trades because of this, because crafters couldn't sell greens that were replaced by quests the very next level, and so in order to make goods to sell they would have to reverse engineer which is an enormous money sink.

 

Edit 1/2/12

 

2) Level cap it. Easy and quick.

 

3) Plug out a formula that is dependent on level

 

IE : (I really haven't given this much thought yet)

 

Yield = (Integer range of x to y)Character level * Quality level/ Mission level - Mission cost

 

So in this example, a level 15, who gets a green box (numbered 0-5 : 0 = fail, 5 = purple) on a level 49 - 50 rich mission (which normally costs ~1500), with say an integer of 90 would make something like 50 credits before factoring in mission cost. But a level 15 doing a level 10 mission where the integer is 90 with a green box would make 270 credits before the mission cost.

 

That actually worked out pretty well, I was doing the math and calculations as I went! It might be problematic at level 50, but that is why there is a range of integers you can mess with if the yields are too high.

 

Edit 1/4/12

 

4) Perhaps we can look at this in a different way. I was thinking today about what slicing was and talked to a friend about his experiences with SWG. In the game world itself, slicing defined as :

 

 

 

But who does this come from? No one, but why does it have to come from no one? Why can't it come from somewhere? Then an idea hit me. Why not from the very vendors, repair bots, and GTN traders that burn holes in our pockets? What if Slicing lockbox missions instead had no chance of losing credits except by failures, but the yield would depend heavily on the amount of money being sunk into vendors, repairs, and trade fees?

Like if the money that slicers made, was directly related to the amount of money players spent at the vendors. I hope I repeated that enough.

 

 

If slicing is the art of breaking into secure computer systems and lockboxes, and players aren't ever the targets, why can't it be the empires computers and/or droids?

 

Lets put some numbers behind this, let us assume the crafting changes I suggested were put in as well just for the sake of the argument.

 

be it anywhere from 1 to 100% of the money that would be essentially, burned. Is applied at the beginning of each day, and each slicing mission would give a certain yield.

 

This yield would have a minimum value which would net a profit, however the yield would not be anywhere near what it could be if there were less slicers running missions.

 

You could feasibly do this with anything that earns an insane amount of money (like space missions). What this would do is essentially keep the deflation/inflation in check. I have not put numbers behind it, but the idea sounds pretty solid. Anyone care to contribute to my laziness? Or tell me why this is a bad idea?

 

 

5) Change the way missions work when logged off. Stay with me on this, this can apply to slicing as well as the other professions.

 

What if they made the missions take twice as long, when the player is logged off of that particular character?

 

 

I have been saying this for weeks but the ******* who believe themselves to be economic experts claim its ruining the economy. I think crippling the slicing returns and nerfing the ammount of mission discoveries and schematics we get has sent that market through the roof with inflation. I'm selling 900 credit schematics for 5k.

 

 

The great thing about slicing was it kept costs down and everyone had money in their pockets, you can make money with any profession. The counter arguement I have is when people in other professions pay for a grade 6 material mission. They wouldn't like the open a box and get a yield thats on par with a grade 2. They say they wanna get what they pay for and because we expect the same result we're nuts. If I pay for a grade 6 credit box mission and dump 2.4k into it. I expect to break even and not end up losing 800 credits.

 

 

A lot of people are misinformed and claim slicing is a trade skill, it isn't. It's a gathering skill, you shouldn't lose money on gathering skills. You should always get the yield you pay for. They didn't just nerf mission credit boxes, they nerfed them in the field too. When I pull a grade 6 out of a safe I should get 3-4k from it. Not 800 credits.

 

 

Most of the naysayers have no idea the serious effect slicing has on the economy, the economy is not stable now. It's incredibly inflated compared to how it was a few weeks ago. Most of the people in other professions want the inflation so they don't feel like they're crafting in a saturated market.

 

Slicers support the crafters with schematics and other gatherer professions with mission discoveries, they also pour money into the economy and the people being paid are making a profit and it allows them enough room to breathe easy and keep costs down.

 

That's the goal of a good economy, gouging prices and inflation rates are not what makes an economy stable and the idiot that had the idea to nerf slicing over 70% should be tared and feathered. The only reason people have a strong stance against fixing slicing is because they feel they aren't making enough money so they complain.

 

Now that money has become harder to get they are the same people that will put the stims market through the roof and the crafting market to insane prices because they got the epic schematics slicers were giving away like candy before the nerf. To me it seems like the general consensus is that any other skill that makes money that isn't slicing, and gets to name their own rate and be profit hungry gluttons is okay. As long as they don't end up the 99%.

[Zennshi]

I have been saying this for weeks but the ******* who believe themselves to be economic experts claim its ruining the economy. I think crippling the slicing returns and nerfing the ammount of mission discoveries and schematics we get has sent that market through the roof with inflation. I'm selling 900 credit schematics for 5k.

 

 

The great thing about slicing was it kept costs down and everyone had money in their pockets, you can make money with any profession. The counter arguement I have is when people in other professions pay for a grade 6 material mission. They wouldn't like the open a box and get a yield thats on par with a grade 2. They say they wanna get what they pay for and because we expect the same result we're nuts. If I pay for a grade 6 credit box mission and dump 2.4k into it. I expect to break even and not end up losing 800 credits.

 

 

A lot of people are misinformed and claim slicing is a trade skill, it isn't. It's a gathering skill, you shouldn't lose money on gathering skills. You should always get the yield you pay for. They didn't just nerf mission credit boxes, they nerfed them in the field too. When I pull a grade 6 out of a safe I should get 3-4k from it. Not 800 credits.

 

 

Most of the naysayers have no idea the serious effect slicing has on the economy, the economy is not stable now. It's incredibly inflated compared to how it was a few weeks ago. Most of the people in other professions want the inflation so they don't feel like they're crafting in a saturated market.

 

Slicers support the crafters with schematics and other gatherer professions with mission discoveries, they also pour money into the economy and the people being paid are making a profit and it allows them enough room to breathe easy and keep costs down.

 

That's the goal of a good economy, gouging prices and inflation rates are not what makes an economy stable and the idiot that had the idea to nerf slicing over 70% should be tared and feathered. The only reason people have a strong stance against fixing slicing is because they feel they aren't making enough money so they complain.

 

Now that money has become harder to get they are the same people that will put the stims market through the roof and the crafting market to insane prices because they got the epic schematics slicers were giving away like candy before the nerf. To me it seems like the general consensus is that any other skill that makes money that isn't slicing, and gets to name their own rate and be profit hungry gluttons is okay. As long as they don't end up the 99%.

 

The only problem with this is that price gouging isn't inflation. Inflation is a stable rise of prices, not people trying to continue selling at the prices they were.

 

You lose money when you auction things that don't sell. If people are trying to auction things and they don't sell, they lose money.

 

Less money being made = less money being spent.

 

I really don't know why more people don't understand this.

 

There is some guy on my argument thread whose sole argument is basically "UR JUST MAD WE GOTS PAID BEFORE THE NERF HURHURHURHUR UMADBRO"

 

When the guy didn't even read anything and just ran his mouth. That is the kind of idiocy I want to avoid, but the trolls keep at it even though I have already address the issues time and time again :*(

 

It is like they aren't happy unless they get to ask the question and get my attention!

[Zennshi]

By the way, you see how fast the biochem crafters jumped all over the "nerf biochem" thread, and how some of the first few good arguments were "no no lets just buff the other professions!"

 

"NOO MY MONEY IS ABOUT TO BE GOENZ"

 

Where was that logic when the slicing nerf went in?

Edited January 5, 2012 by Zennshi

[Kaelok_Muhar]

The only problem with this is that price gouging isn't inflation. Inflation is a stable rise of prices, not people trying to continue selling at the prices they were.

 

You lose money when you auction things that don't sell. If people are trying to auction things and they don't sell, they lose money.

 

Less money being made = less money being spent.

 

I really don't know why more people don't understand this.

 

There is some guy on my argument thread whose sole argument is basically "UR JUST MAD WE GOTS PAID BEFORE THE NERF HURHURHURHUR UMADBRO"

 

When the guy didn't even read anything and just ran his mouth. That is the kind of idiocy I want to avoid, but the trolls keep at it even though I have already address the issues time and time again :*(

 

It is like they aren't happy unless they get to ask the question and get my attention!

 

Inflation happens when the demand for the item is high and the money to back those prices isn't there. People that do biochem know this game is new and there's no set rate to undercut competitors or even have a base price for an item. So now that slicing isn't as insane as it was, they gouge the prices and put them through the roof because people will pay whatever they have to get the items they want eventually. They don't care about the economy, they only care about their own income.

 

I had an idiot in my guild the other day tell me that the goal for an mmo economy is to keep costs high so no one but the supplier has money. Then told me I didn't know what I was talking about when I told him he was an idiot. Of course he didn't care because he's biochem and can sell those inflated overrated stims.

[Kaelok_Muhar]

By the way, you see how fast the biochem crafters jumped all over the "nerf biochem" thread, and how some of the first few good arguments were "no no lets just buff the other professions!"

 

"NOO MY MONEY IS ABOUT TO BE GOENZ"

 

Where was that logic when the slicing nerf went in?

 

I think they should put a level cap on slicing growth, put the cases back to the way they were in field and maybe lower the prices of missions to match what we're getting from mission credit cases but leave the in field ones high. Since we're actually farming them. A bioanalysis person doesn't walk up to a grade 6 plant and loot grade 2 herbs. I shouldn't walk up to a grade 6 safe and get 800 credits.

[Zennshi]

I think they should put a level cap on slicing growth, put the cases back to the way they were in field and maybe lower the prices of missions to match what we're getting from mission credit cases but leave the in field ones high. Since we're actually farming them. A bioanalysis person doesn't walk up to a grade 6 plant and loot grade 2 herbs. I shouldn't walk up to a grade 6 safe and get 800 credits.

 

Indeed! There are so many ways to fix it, yet they took the easy cop out!

 

I think I best described this by saying that the best solution to a squirrel wrecking your back yard is not to burn it down!

[Dmase]

Here are a few of my proposals in relation to the state of slicing :

 

1) Put slicing back where it was. Stay with me on this, I will explain.

 

Slicing functioned as a necessary evil, but it also had a purpose, to pump money into an economy. Some of you call it "printing money", which is partially correct, but there is a reason why this is a good thing in the current state our economy is in. You must also realize a few things, if slicing is "printing money" then things like skills buying and repairs are "burning money". When the outflux of money is higher than the influx, this is what is called deflation, which eventually causes a depression. The issue is that, as of right now there are fixed costs for certain goods and services. This is the skill trainers, and the repair people. Their prices never change no matter how broke you are, because as far the giant market is concerned they are pawn shops with a never ending credit supply, so they can "print" all the money they want and charge you what they want, because they don't care about you or anyone.

 

These vendors basically shut out half of the possible goods that can be traded by merits of it is dirt cheap compared to a crafted equivalent. Slicing was making more money than any other trades because of this, because crafters couldn't sell greens that were replaced by quests the very next level, and so in order to make goods to sell they would have to reverse engineer which is an enormous money sink.

 

Edit 1/2/12

 

2) Level cap it. Easy and quick.

 

3) Plug out a formula that is dependent on level

 

IE : (I really haven't given this much thought yet)

 

Yield = (Integer range of x to y)Character level * Quality level/ Mission level - Mission cost

 

So in this example, a level 15, who gets a green box (numbered 0-5 : 0 = fail, 5 = purple) on a level 49 - 50 rich mission (which normally costs ~1500), with say an integer of 90 would make something like 50 credits before factoring in mission cost. But a level 15 doing a level 10 mission where the integer is 90 with a green box would make 270 credits before the mission cost.

 

That actually worked out pretty well, I was doing the math and calculations as I went! It might be problematic at level 50, but that is why there is a range of integers you can mess with if the yields are too high.

 

Edit 1/4/12

 

4) Perhaps we can look at this in a different way. I was thinking today about what slicing was and talked to a friend about his experiences with SWG. In the game world itself, slicing defined as :

 

 

 

But who does this come from? No one, but why does it have to come from no one? Why can't it come from somewhere? Then an idea hit me. Why not from the very vendors, repair bots, and GTN traders that burn holes in our pockets? What if Slicing lockbox missions instead had no chance of losing credits except by failures, but the yield would depend heavily on the amount of money being sunk into vendors, repairs, and trade fees?

Like if the money that slicers made, was directly related to the amount of money players spent at the vendors. I hope I repeated that enough.

 

 

If slicing is the art of breaking into secure computer systems and lockboxes, and players aren't ever the targets, why can't it be the empires computers and/or droids?

 

Lets put some numbers behind this, let us assume the crafting changes I suggested were put in as well just for the sake of the argument.

 

be it anywhere from 1 to 100% of the money that would be essentially, burned. Is applied at the beginning of each day, and each slicing mission would give a certain yield.

 

This yield would have a minimum value which would net a profit, however the yield would not be anywhere near what it could be if there were less slicers running missions.

 

You could feasibly do this with anything that earns an insane amount of money (like space missions). What this would do is essentially keep the deflation/inflation in check. I have not put numbers behind it, but the idea sounds pretty solid. Anyone care to contribute to my laziness? Or tell me why this is a bad idea?

 

 

5) Change the way missions work when logged off. Stay with me on this, this can apply to slicing as well as the other professions.

 

What if they made the missions take twice as long, when the player is logged off of that particular character?

 

I actually like the sound of number 4.

[ErikModi]

When you say.. daunted, you mean... In a good way?

 

It is true it has the jewelcrafting syndrome... at least give it sub categories

 

Not really in a good way, no.

 

How will I know when I have all the available schematics from REing a piece of gear? How much money and time will I have to spend making sure I've got all those pieces? If I choose to ignore getting a certain piece, what happens when someone notices I'm a synthweaver, and wants me to make them exactly the kind of armor I'd decided to ignore making?

[Zennshi]

Not really in a good way, no.

 

How will I know when I have all the available schematics from REing a piece of gear? How much money and time will I have to spend making sure I've got all those pieces? If I choose to ignore getting a certain piece, what happens when someone notices I'm a synthweaver, and wants me to make them exactly the kind of armor I'd decided to ignore making?

 

Ah yes... as is always the problem.

 

I honestly remember those days well when I'd ask an alchemist if he can make mana potions and he says "lol no, I'm a warrior"

 

mind.blown.

[Zennshi]

I actually like the sound of number 4.

 

I know right! Its like stealing from those who steal from us!

[Zennshi]

Bumping