Slicing post-nerf, please look at the numbers BW

[dynastynyy]

I have run and tracked 645 slicing missions at 400 skill since 02 February. 91 of those (14%) returned at least 1 mission. 116 of them (18%) crit.

 

What is your skill? Are you running orange missions? Yellow? Which rank and yield missions are you running?

 

skills been at 400 since early release...ive tried running all orange, all yellow, etc...not one of them is critting for me anymore. If I get a mission/crit every other day, it's alot.

[CedricDur]

You are either bugged or in a streak of very bad luck. See my screenshot a few posts above. Not all were good (speederbikes and some of the spaceship upgrades I just vendor).

 

A lot of the complaints here boil down to the GTN and low pop servers, not slicing in itself.

 

P.S. Still waiting on my request about what credits people had when they leveled. If memory does not fail (posting on the phone atm) I had 200k at level 28, 400K at 32 and 2.200 mill at 47 (with stuff bought from the GTN, blue spaceship upgrades and then purples and a few inventory upgrades as well as another bay for my bank).

 

Edit: fixed phone caused spelling and wrong numbers. It was 2.2 mill at level 47, not 1.2 mill.

Edited February 13, 2012 by CedricDur

[DarthTHC]

I run them in this priority: (republic side)

 

1. Finding Our Way

2. Taking Back Control

3. Azure Databanks

4. Plug the Leak

5. Be Careful What You Read

6. Pointing Fingers

7. Missing Probes

 

Arranged accidents used to be great with a high rate of crit but I find (for me at least) that it's no longer the case. Perhaps the imperial version gets better results. Don't know if the nerf killed it or I just had a really long bad streak.

 

If I was going for simply credits and not using the GTN the list would look much different.

 

That said scavenging brings in more on average. 1485 credit abundant yield missions to get back 4-6(8-10 if crit) of a resource that sells for 500-1000cs per unit is pretty damn nice. Talkin Durasteel and Zal Alloy but I've seen these and other mats (even low level mats) shift to higher numbers.

 

Then there are other potential yields when you add crafting to the equation.

I'll take a look at the other gathering professions and see how they hold up.

 

My top 5 crit missions are:

 

• Be Careful What You Read - 30%
  
• Pointing Fingers - 28.6%
  
• His Home is His Castle - 24.4%
  
• Off The Grid - 22.2%
  
• The Azure Databanks - 18.1%
  

 

It's interesting that scavenging missions can pull real profit. I'll have to look into that on my server.

[DarthTHC]

You are either bugged or in a streak of very bad luck. See my screenshot a few posts above. Not all were god (speederbikes and some of the spaceship upgrades I just vendor).

 

A lot of the complaints here boil down to the GTN and low pop servers, not slicing in itself.

 

P.S. Still wainting on my request about what credits people had when they leveled. If memory does not fail (posting on the phone atm) I had 200k ar level 28, 400K at 32 and 1.200 mill at 47 (with stuff bought from the GTN, blue spaceship upgradrs and then purples and a few inventory upgrades as well as another bay for my bank).

 

Your numbers seem to correspond with my memory of my first character to 50. I only really paid attention at the points I had to buy mount training. At each point, I had roughly double what I needed to do all my training and buying of mounts at those levels.

[DarthTHC]

Lol, always has to end in an insult. "Lazy" is not the proper description. Remember, it's a game.

 

"I have these things I could get 20,000cr or more for, each, if I just spent 5 minutes posting them on the GTN but instead I'm going to spend 1 minute selling them to a vendor for 200cr each."

 

That's not lazy?

 

It's not meant to be an insult. It's simply a method of doing things. In my line of work, "lazy" can actually be a compliment.

 

The devs aren't going to give you a "Put 2,000,000 credits in my inventory now." button.

Edited February 13, 2012 by DarthTHC

[Blattan]

My top 5 crit missions are:

 

• Be Careful What You Read - 30%
  
• Pointing Fingers - 28.6%
  
• His Home is His Castle - 24.4%
  
• Off The Grid - 22.2%
  
• The Azure Databanks - 18.1%
  

 

It's interesting that scavenging missions can pull real profit. I'll have to look into that on my server.

 

Just for clarification: Are we calling a mission that gets a mission or schematic a crit?

 

I ask because my small sample size (that I have to go through and compile all the data) suggests there might be different "levels" of crits. (Or maybe just different levels of success...)

 

And just for a quick comparison without compiling all the data, my crit rate (if only counting when getting a mission/schematic) with Pointing Fingers is 12.5% - Imperial side.

[DarthTHC]

Just for clarification: Are we calling a mission that gets a mission or schematic a crit?

 

I ask because my small sample size (that I have to go through and compile all the data) suggests there might be different "levels" of crits. (Or maybe just different levels of success...)

 

And just for a quick comparison without compiling all the data, my crit rate (if only counting when getting a mission/schematic) with Pointing Fingers is 12.5% - Imperial side.

 

When the text on the mission result dialog indicates the success was greater than normal, I count that as a crit. Normally that means the mission will return something in addition to the lockbox.

 

My sample size might be too small for Pointing Fingers. I'm going to keep tracking missions until I hit at least 2,000 total and will post results at the end.

Edited February 13, 2012 by DarthTHC

[Volki]

"I have these things I could get 20,000cr or more for, each, if I just spent 5 minutes posting them on the GTN but instead I'm going to spend 1 minute selling them to a vendor for 200cr each."

 

That's not lazy?

 

 

No, it's not. It's a game. It's called "choice". Whiners took my choice away.

 

Besides, you're assuming my server pop will pay that much, provided I ever get those items.

 

You're too hung up on what MMOs did in the past.

[DarthTHC]

No, it's not. It's a game. It's called "choice". Whiners took my choice away.

 

Besides, you're assuming my server pop will pay that much, provided I ever get those items.

 

You're too hung up on what MMOs did in the past.

 

What choice are you missing, exactly?

[Grayseven]

Slicing, contrary to popular belief, is not a normal gathering profession. To continue to take that line completely ignores what slicing was originally designed for.

 

Even so, no other gathering profession loses whatever it gathers upon a successful mission, whereas Slicing can return a negative amount on a pretty regular basis.

 

Yes, you can Slice "nodes" but I don't see the difference between that and gathering resource nodes in the wild while being able to run gathering missions. If your resource gathering mission had a chance to take resources from your inventory instead of give them you'd be throwing a massive fit.

 

The only Slicing missions that should lose money are the unsuccessful missions, just like every other gathering profession mission out there. Every successful mission should return more credits than the mission cost.

[PhoR]

Even so, no other gathering profession loses whatever it gathers upon a successful mission, whereas Slicing can return a negative amount on a pretty regular basis.

 

What you're essentially saying is that every time I run an archaeology mission, the materials I get from said mission can ALWAYS be sold for more than the mission cost me, which just isn't true and depends HEAVILY on GTN pricing on your server.

 

Although I agree that a successful credit box mission should not be returning less than the mission cost to run, I think people are blowing the "problem" out of proportion and making grandiose claims about other professions in order to support their desire for a "credits button" in the game.

 

 

Sure, if you compare it to running Underworld trading missions, it looks weak, but that's because UT is "broken", not slicing. Underworld metals are currently used in Armormech, Armstech, Cybertech, AND 2/3 of Synthweaving patterns. Demand is enormous compared to other mission materials, and obviously inflated pricing is going to reflect that fact.

Edited February 13, 2012 by PhoR

[Grayseven]

What you're essentially saying is that every time I run an archaeology mission, the materials I get from said mission can ALWAYS be sold for more than the mission cost me, which just isn't true and depends HEAVILY on GTN pricing on your server.

 

Although I agree that a successful credit box mission should not be returning less than the mission cost to run, I think people are blowing the "problem" out of proportion and making grandiose claims about other professions in order to support their desire for a "credits button" in the game.

 

 

Sure, if you compare it to running Underworld trading missions, it looks weak, but that's because UT is "broken", not slicing. Underworld metals are currently used in Armormech, Armstech, Cybertech, AND 2/3 of Synthweaving patterns. Demand is enormous compared to other mission materials, and obviously inflated pricing is going to reflect that fact.

 

No. What I am saying is that every time you run an Archaeology mission, you get something on a successful mission. Value of anything gathered is subjective based on server economy, but you always get something. The Archaeology equivalent would be you LOSING 4 Rubat Crystals from your inventory on a successful mission....

 

And I'll be honest. There are very few crafting materials that won't return more credits than the mission to gather them costs on all but the sparsest servers. Running level 2 Investigation missions nets me 1500 credits per successful mission and there are those cheap but profitable gathering missions in every gathering profession.

 

No one in their right mind wants slicing to go back to the massive credit tap, but it isn't unreasonable to expect a mission return higher than the cost of the mission itself.

[PhoR]

The Archaeology equivalent would be you LOSING 4 Rubat Crystals from your inventory on a successful mission....

Technically it would have to cost you rubat crystals to even run the mission, and then only return a portion of what you spent on it, and killing mobs would have to drop rubat crystals, as well as getting rubat crystals as quest rewards...

but I know where you're coming from.

 

If they like the current overall return from slicing, then they could adjust the top returns down in order to adjust the low returns to at least break even.

 

Also, I can't believe that no-one has commented on the response we just got:

 

We are planning major some additions/modifications to slicing in the next major content patch, which will be Game Update 1.2.

So it looks like they've already got some updates in the works.

Edited February 13, 2012 by PhoR

[DarthTHC]

No. What I am saying is that every time you run an Archaeology mission, you get something on a successful mission. Value of anything gathered is subjective based on server economy, but you always get something. The Archaeology equivalent would be you LOSING 4 Rubat Crystals from your inventory on a successful mission....

 

And I'll be honest. There are very few crafting materials that won't return more credits than the mission to gather them costs on all but the sparsest servers. Running level 2 Investigation missions nets me 1500 credits per successful mission and there are those cheap but profitable gathering missions in every gathering profession.

 

No one in their right mind wants slicing to go back to the massive credit tap, but it isn't unreasonable to expect a mission return higher than the cost of the mission itself.

 

You aren't comparing logically.

 

If I run a Bioanalysis mission, I'll get nothing (fail) or something. The something that I get might be worth more than what I spent on the mission or it might not. If it's not, then I lose the cash/credit value between what I spent on the mission and the value of what the mission returned.

 

If I run a Slicing mission, I'll get nothing (fail) or something (a lockbox). The something that I get might be worth more than what I spent on the mission or it might not. If it's not, then I lose the cash/credit value between what I spent on the mission and what the mission returned.

 

See how it's the same?

 

Then you go on to compare it to a Mission skill. Slicing is not a mission skill. It is a gathering skill. Therefore we need to expect its missions to work like missions in other gathering skills. Compare it to Bioanalysis, Scavenging, Archaeology. Not Investigation and Underworld Trading and Diplomacy.

 

By the way, if you can get 1500 profit from a level 2 Investigation mission, keep doing that. That's astounding.

[Cyrosage]

Gathering Skill.

 

Take another gathering skill, say Bioanalysis. Run it up to 400. Run Rank 6 missions. Sell what you get on the GTN. Is that profitable? I guarantee it's not. Slicing is exactly the same.

 

Well, but it's different. Now that you have that 400 Bioanalysis skill, run a few Rich yield Rank 5 missions with it and post those gains on the GTN. Is it profitable? Maybe. Maybe not. And it might be over the course of 100's of missions, but then again it might not. Sort of depends on your server's economy.

 

But with Slicing, the Rank 5 Rich Yield missions are profitable over the course of 100's of missions. And that's when you consider only the credit box value and completely ignore the gains from crits - missions that sell well.

 

Your complaint that Slicing shouldn't act like a gathering skill is farcical. It is a gathering skill and works somewhat like one, but better.

 

Oh, by the way, the Rank 6 Abundant Yield mission is profitable, too.

 

 

Basically, no. I scavenge. If successful, I get mats to make stuff (GTN price is irrelevant). When I slice, if successful on rank 6 lockbox missions, I almost always get 200 credits less than I paid. That is NOT something to be used in any way. Very rarely I might get just over 300 credits profit. Then boom, failed mission which cancels out the profit for the last 10 missions. With scavenging, I get mats, use mats, make things, get personal bonus for myself, my companions, and maybe even sell some stuff. But I got something more useful than bare credits (which by themselves can't make anything).

 

By saying it is exactly the same, your usual argument, is saying for scavenging I would invest 10 durasteel but get back 8 durasteel. That is what happens with slicing. 2000 credits for 1800 returned. Slicing is the only skill with some missions that do not convert your investment to something else. Therefore, it should at least return more than invested since you are also investing time as well right?

 

It has been said time and time again (not by me) "run rank 5". You say rank 6 is profitable. I lost a ton of credits the first day of the nerf by running rank 6 missions. That's how I discovered the nerf in the first place (skipped patch notes).

 

Also, my first post you replied to explicitly referred to rank 6 missions and the fact that the "gathering skill" defense did not cover the fact that you can run missions for credits at a general loss at rank 6.

 

The current return on rank 6 lockboxes is simply too small.

 

Finally, "farcical" is insulting. I have had my own posts flagged and edited for less than that. Be careful with your wording.

[DarthTHC]

Technically it would have to cost you rubat crystals to even run the mission, and then only return a portion of what you spent on it, and killing mobs would have to drop rubat crystals, as well as getting rubat crystals as quest rewards...

but I know where you're coming from.

 

If they like the current overall return from slicing, then they could adjust the top returns down in order to adjust the low returns to at least break even.

 

Except that it appeals somewhat to gamblers and gamblers really like the "wow" factor behind the big crits. If it balances out over thousands or tens of thousands of missions (which is certainly the way BioWare is measuring it), then BioWare will be happy.

 

I, for one, would prefer to have the "wow" factor than to know that every mission I run gives me a static, boring 7% profit.

[Morpholinium]

I really have to wonder what your mission selection strategy is, that you've been losing credits running high level missions.

 

I've been pretty distracted this week, so I've been parked in fleet running gathering missions on my two crafting-capable characters.

 

Just running level 40-48 bountiful or higher, and filling in with top tier abundant (based on mission availability) lock box missions, I've come out with ~75k profit, ignoring mission schematics since they were 90% investigation anyway.

 

I've actually pulled similar with my treasure hunting missions, although that admittedly was post-GTN sales of relics and misc blues.

 

If you're returning a net loss over anything more than a few mission span, you're doing something wrong.

[PhoR]

Basically, no. I scavenge. If successful, I get mats to make stuff (GTN price is irrelevant).

 

GTN price is NOT irrelevant because instead of running the mission for those Scavenging materials, you might have been able to simply buy them off the GTN for less money.

If that were the case, you didn't "gain" scavenging materials, you just lost money.

 

Anyway, most of the discussion in this thread is irrelevant now anyway as we've already been told:

We are planning major some additions/modifications to slicing in the next major content patch, which will be Game Update 1.2.

Edited February 13, 2012 by PhoR

[DarthTHC]

Basically, no. I scavenge. If successful, I get mats to make stuff (GTN price is irrelevant). When I slice, if successful on rank 6 lockbox missions, I almost always get 200 credits less than I paid. That is NOT something to be used in any way. Very rarely I might get just over 300 credits profit. Then boom, failed mission which cancels out the profit for the last 10 missions. With scavenging, I get mats, use mats, make things, get personal bonus for myself, my companions, and maybe even sell some stuff. But I got something more useful than bare credits (which by themselves can't make anything).

 

By saying it is exactly the same, your usual argument, is saying for scavenging I would invest 10 durasteel but get back 8 durasteel. That is what happens with slicing. 2000 credits for 1800 returned. Slicing is the only skill with some missions that do not convert your investment to something else. Therefore, it should at least return more than invested since you are also investing time as well right?

 

It has been said time and time again (not by me) "run rank 5". You say rank 6 is profitable. I lost a ton of credits the first day of the nerf by running rank 6 missions. That's how I discovered the nerf in the first place (skipped patch notes).

 

Also, my first post you replied to explicitly referred to rank 6 missions and the fact that the "gathering skill" defense did not cover the fact that you can run missions for credits at a general loss at rank 6.

 

The current return on rank 6 lockboxes is simply too small.

 

Finally, "farcical" is insulting. I have had my own posts flagged and edited for less than that. Be careful with your wording.

 

Now you're comparing a skill that was designed to give returns to players who don't want to work as hard at crafting as others to the combination of a production skill and a skill meant to feed that production skill. They act differently. Why do you find this surprising?

 

I wonder which Rank 6 missions you're running. The only Abundant Yield Rand 6 mission is profitable. I've tracked its results 150 times and it has returned an average of 334 credits (when counting lockboxes only) profit. It has crit 27 times, or 18% of the time, so there's certainly more profit in it than just lockboxes.

 

I don't run Moderate Yield missions because my experience has shown them to be minimally profitable at best and there are plenty of other profitable alternatives. I can keep all my crew out on profitable missions and never have to worry about running Moderates.

 

If you're hung up on "Rank 6", I don't know what to tell you. The data shows there is more profit to be made at other ranks. You may believe the returns on that rank are too low, but BioWare seems to have watched returns over the millions of Rank 6 slicing missions that have been run since the adjustment and they haven't given any indication they'll make any upward adjustment. It seems our only option is to understand the system and then maximize our return on what BioWare has given us, if we want to continue Slicing, so that's what I choose to do.

 

I'm considering challenging you to report the post in which I wrote "farcical". If BioWare takes action against that, it will certainly tell me something.

[Hajizan]

This thread is still alive? Might as well give it up. BW has proved that they have no idea how to run a mmo.

 

People whine about slicing being OP, level 20 making tens of millions of credits a week

BW looks at numbers, to many credits in the economy, must be slicing.

BW nerfs slicing.

BW looks at the numbers, still to much new credits in the economy.

BW nerfs lockboxes

BW looks at the numbers, still to much new credits in the economy,...

BW finally figures out that people are duping and getting credits from npcs.

 

LOL, BW can't even do simple math and realize that a level 20 cannot make tens of millions of credits in a week by slicing.

[Philmors]

I found the missions for other professions gained from slicing actually make you alot of credits. On top of grabbing resource nods in the world. You'll make quite a bit of cash.

[DarthTHC]

This thread is still alive? Might as well give it up. BW has proved that they have no idea how to run a mmo.

 

People whine about slicing being OP, level 20 making tens of millions of credits a week

BW looks at numbers, to many credits in the economy, must be slicing.

BW nerfs slicing.

BW looks at the numbers, still to much new credits in the economy.

BW nerfs lockboxes

BW looks at the numbers, still to much new credits in the economy,...

BW finally figures out that people are duping and getting credits from npcs.

 

LOL, BW can't even do simple math and realize that a level 20 cannot make tens of millions of credits in a week by slicing.

 

Except BioWare can look at their data and know how much slicing missions specifically return. When they adjusted slicing, they posted that they did, in fact, look at this data and it showed them that the slicing returns were higher than they wanted.

 

On the other hand, I agree with you that in a lot of ways BioWare looks like a bunch of noobs to running an MMO. Then again, they've run an MMO for almost 2 whole months so they are noobs. Hopefully they learn quickly.

[Hologramx]

I started Slicing lately with my alts, and I got sick then stopped playing that alt thoroughly.

 

If I have a 100% success for every mission, I will earn like 10% in total. However, one failures make you lose 100% for that cost and it happened that I failed 5 missions in a row.

No one would want to play this. Forget it. It is a joke. I would say these programmers need to study mathematics from their primary schools.

Edited February 14, 2012 by Hologramx

[dynastynyy]

yehhhh....just dropped this awful skill and picked up Underworld Trading. already making massive profits.

 

Slicing is no longer a viable profitable skill.

[Cyrosage]

Now you're comparing a skill that was designed to give returns to players who don't want to work as hard at crafting as others to the combination of a production skill and a skill meant to feed that production skill. They act differently. Why do you find this surprising?

 

I wonder which Rank 6 missions you're running. The only Abundant Yield Rand 6 mission is profitable. I've tracked its results 150 times and it has returned an average of 334 credits (when counting lockboxes only) profit. It has crit 27 times, or 18% of the time, so there's certainly more profit in it than just lockboxes.

 

I don't run Moderate Yield missions because my experience has shown them to be minimally profitable at best and there are plenty of other profitable alternatives. I can keep all my crew out on profitable missions and never have to worry about running Moderates.

 

If you're hung up on "Rank 6", I don't know what to tell you. The data shows there is more profit to be made at other ranks. You may believe the returns on that rank are too low, but BioWare seems to have watched returns over the millions of Rank 6 slicing missions that have been run since the adjustment and they haven't given any indication they'll make any upward adjustment. It seems our only option is to understand the system and then maximize our return on what BioWare has given us, if we want to continue Slicing, so that's what I choose to do.

 

I'm considering challenging you to report the post in which I wrote "farcical". If BioWare takes action against that, it will certainly tell me something.

 

Designer's intentions? If it worked as intended, it wouldn't have been nerfed. We don't even know if they are really happy with it now, could just be scared to start another 3-thread long topic of people with pitchforks... I compared it to a gathering skill as suggested. You said, and underlined repeatedly, that it works exactly the same, yet say it is different now. One gives you materials to craft with, the other destroys some of your money if you run the specified missions.

 

I'm not "hung up", it was my whole point. Slicing was good for gathering nodes. But, you made very little profit off your rank 6, while I lost greatly off mine. Rank 6 abundant with high affection. You and a few others have had good luck with RNG, but the reason this thread was so long is because others didn't.

 

You say our option is to understand the system, implying I, and many others (look how long this thread is and the ones before it) don't understand something very complex here. You said yourself, lower rank missions have better return. Why. How does that even make sense? Why have rank 6 missions if they are not better than rank 5? Why would they even exist then? Again, that was the point. I believe it is a valid point because it is fact.