New social gears : Dead on Arrival?

[ScarletBlaze]

If the crafters were able to make the orange mod stuff it might not change what people will buy considering almost every item I can craft is all one color. The main reason people get the Social Items besides it being modable it that it is a differnet color/look than you can get with the crafting.

 

In order to make the orange modable crafting viable they will need to make it where it is better than the social items in stats and in design (different styles and different colors) or we still back to everyone wanting the social one.

[Pandabutt]

And there it finally is: the "Playing the game is elitist" argument. If you aren't PVPing, running endgame PVE content (both HM FPs and Ops would count here), or crafting things to sell to other people, what exactly is left? The only thing remaining is that you are trying to play a single player RPG and then crying that you picked a game in the wrong genre. No, doing things does not entitle you to gear, you have it the wrong way around, the gear comes from doing things, not entitlements. The only people who are acting "entitled" are the people who want to get gear without playing the game.

 

It would be a huge slap in the face to crafters if they added augment slots to social items. Basically, they would be saying "We're making crafting worth the effort by giving you something that is not currently available at a cost that is significantly lower than you can sell things for, but you know those vendors you've been ************ about since launch? We're gonna give vendors that are even easier to access the exact same thing we gave you to try and make you competitive. Eat a dick."

 

 

 

QFT. The only line I don't spacebar anymore is "Yes but I-I understand my lord." I know it's in response to me telling her to pick up a blaster and fight Republic scum, but I like to pretend I told her to pick up something else and not be quite so violent.

 

You totally misinterpreted my post. I'm saying the people who believe that their one method of doing things is the only way, are elitists and need to stop complaining about the game being turned into an even playing field. IE, PvPers who think that PvP gear should be the best in the game period, or Raiders who think Raid gear should be the best period, or Crafters who think that everyone should buy the best stuff from them.

 

To balance things out properly there NEEDS to be endgame quality gear available from just playing the game.. and yes PvPers, Raiders, and Crafters are in an elitist mindset of "our way is the only way" and I'm sick of it, as I'm sure most of you are as well. The game shouldn't cater to the elitist, infact I'm not even asking for it to cater to anyone at all. Casual gamers want to be able to play on par with the hardcore elitist, and the design path that tOR has taken has actually made that possible.

 

The problem here is that the elitist groups are constantly bickering about who's method entitles them to have the best gear instead of realizing that noone is entitled to the best gear. NOONE not even causal gamers are entitled to jack squat. We all pay the same monthly subscription to play the game, we all have different play styles. I've said it before and I will say it again and I will keep saying it till it gets through.

 

Adding content for EVERYONE will NEVER, I repeat NEVER!!!!, make content pointless. Raid gear and PvP gear will still have unique visuals and special mods that can't be obtained through other means, Crafting will still make the superior mods and have unique visuals that appeal to more people than the social gear. Not everyone likes the looks of Social gear.

 

The arguments about "people who care about stats will just take Social 1 gear" are ridiculous, do you realize how few people there are that care ONLY about stats and don't care what so ever about how they look? Honestly there arn't very many, take a look around, ask around even you'll find most of the people you run into put time and effort into finding the pieces for that one look for their character.

 

 

 

If you want so badly for crafters to corner the market on augment slots then how about this solution. Synthweave and Armormech get a new craftable item to apply an augment slot to any unaugmented item. This craftable requires 400 to make and takes 30 minutes to make, or if it has a low craft time has a failure chance.

Edited February 28, 2012 by Pandabutt

[Aloro]

If social gear comes with augment slots in it from the vendor, that gets in the way of crafters having a market for crit orange items, because its faster and cheaper to get social gear.

 

Erm, no. It's not faster; it's more or less the same. For most people, we're comparing buying something on the GTN to buying something from a Social Vendor. There's little meaningful difference.

 

I do see your point though, and agree that crafted goods should be desirable, one way or another.

 

The best way around it would be to add schematics for the social gear to the vendors of the same level, and have the crafted version of the gear still have the social rank restriction. This would allow social gear to stay on par with crafted gear.

 

Another option would be to give crafters some of the nicer looking items; that way people will still have a reason to buy the crafted items.

[Aloro]

If you could learn to make the social items then you could create a critical success version of one (with the same social level requirements).

 

Now that's a fascinating idea; what if crafters could RE items that didn't come from crafting recipes? That would open up crafters to basically be able to make anything in game, in theory. Provided there are adequate throttles to prevent the markets from flooding immediately with the best items (e.g. some of the better recipes have timers, or require mats from raids, or require some sort of grinding, etc), this could work very well indeed.

[Astridd]

If social gear comes with augment slots in it from the vendor, that gets in the way of crafters having a market for crit orange items, because its faster and cheaper to get social gear.

 

Not if social gears have unique look ABC while crafters get unique look XYZ. Isn't it acceptable term to share the market? Unless crafters want to monopolize entire orange market under their foot, beyond their 'useful and rewarding' status, which crafters been asking for quite some time.

 

Now about this 'faster and cheaper' part...

 

If you had to travel all around the galaxy, scan the surface for hours, place extractors, hunt nightsisters and high quality evian meat, and then experiment again and again on your epic crafting station to manufacture hanful of stuff out of your factory while paying their bills all through the uptime......,

 

Then I will call it stellar effort, pat you on the back, and say 'you deserve to monopolize this market, shut up and take my credit for the best stuff in this server, you earned it.'

[harpuax]

Social gear is not , should not, and will not be for those people who "care about stats". It's social gear.

 

Everyone cares about stats. No one wants to be subpar. For this reason ALL current orange gear (social, drops, etc) will be subpar come 1.2. Crafted gear with augment slots will be BIS for everyone. So if you want a look you have now (maybe in the bank due to high end gear currently) you can kiss it goodbye or be subpar. We will all be at the mercy of the look of whatever is available from crafting.

[Pandabutt]

I've thought of another solution... one that will certainly make everyone happy... I think atleast...

 

 

How about they just make ALL orange gear have augment slots, no crit craft needed... any and all orange you craft will have an augment slot.

 

If all orange gear has augment slots then I fail to see the issue. And don't even think about saying "social is easier to get" as your argument again. If all orange gear has augments then people will go for the set that suits them best. It will be exactly the same as the market is now on oranges, people go for what they want.

[ShadowOfVey]

I agree on this.

 

If the gear is going to be innately statistically inferior due to the lack of augment slots, it defeats the entire purpose of people being able to take whatever armor appearance they like by moving mods from their high end gear to the new armor.

 

There should be no penalty in stats for choosing a certain appearance, that's the main reason mods etc exist to begin with.

[LogicalPremise]

Casual gamers want to be able to play on par with the hardcore elitist, and the design path that tOR has taken has actually made that possible.

 

And this right here is why I ignored most of the people in this thread.

 

Because, really, that's the nutshell of the argument right here, perfectly ensconced in a finely crafted mount.

 

Hardcore player pays $15 and invests 100 hours into said game.

Casual player pays $15 and invests 10 hours into said game.

 

If the opportunity cost of the hardcore player isn't rewarded then your MMO simply will not retain hardcore players.

 

If the hardcore players were not a signfigant portion of the player base, then why are all the patches, the RotR operation, and most of the bugfixes and emergency bugfixes centered around PVP and end-game?

 

Instead, we have arguments such as this, which basically constitute murdering logic and replacing it with sentiment. Social gear , by it's very name, should be taken as gear that is there for fluff purposes. That's why it was all originally light armor, so that anyone could wear it. Yes, it had mods. I have no clue why. Social gear should be something that goes in an appearance tab like every single other MMO out there, but instead Bioware makes it into an actual game armor.

 

And ties it to a mechanic that basically says "repeat this same content over and over". That's identical to how PVP and Raiders get their high-end gear. Except that you don't HAVE to repeat "high-end" content or fight other people, you can simply do basic easy quests and run BT/Es repeatedly and eventually you'll get there.

 

This is why people are laughing themselves silly. The argument that "the augment slot must give teh givens!" for social gear or it is "dead on arrival" is either spurious or hypocritical. You have a method of obtaining unique appearance orange gear for nominal cost and grinding. But the grind is of no serious difficulty , except staving off boredom and shattering your spacebar.

 

Yet you want benefits on par with those who have spent a greater amount of effort and imply that not doing so is unfair.

 

PVP gear provides special PVP bonuses.

PVE gear provides better stats.

Crafted gear has a critical chance for an augment slot.

 

IF any improvements are made to social gear they should be unique to social gear so that they aren't mirroring a benefit from other armor types. Otherwise, what is to imply that "social gear should have a built in expertise bonus" or whatever else pops into mind.

[Zannis]

We're currently in a position where min/maxers feel compelled to wear their epic gear, no choice. The new system will shift and have the min/maxers feeling obligated to wear orange gear with an augment slot. This too will pigeon hole players into an 'obligated' gear choice.

 

Please implement a mechanic that would allow us to use augments on Tier gear. Some people actually like how the end-game sets look, and would like the option of remaining in their tier gear to be a valid one.

[finkelmana]

I completely understand the social gear thing, as people want to look different and unique. It is rather boring when everyone looks the same. Social gear gives people the flexibility to do just that.

 

However, social gear completely negates the armormech crewskill. Whats the point of crafting armor that no one wants or needs to buy? There has to be a reason for armormech to exist.

 

The problem here is fundamental design. Its a catch-22. Social gear is worthless without augment slots (for those who want that 1% extra) and armormech is worthless if social gear has augment slots.

 

And no the answer isnt allow armormechs to make a "belt buckle." Once a player has their social gear of choice, they will only buy the item once.

 

The only real solution I can think of is that social gear needs to be a customization that gets applied to armormech made gear. Like the cuzomizations you get for your companions. This way both sides get what they want. The armormechs have a purpose and those who want to look different can.

[Astridd]

Update 03.14.2012

You will not be able to retrofit existing items with augment slots, but this is something we're discussing internally as 'we probably want to add this', so any of your feedback is worthwhile to us. If/when we offer that option, it will be added in a way that does not devalue the crafter community.

 

1.2 patch note did not mention any changes to social gears, except for imp version of Coruscant dress and suit for the repub. It seems currently we won't be getting extra slotted social gears at 1.2, but they are considering it at least.

 

My feedback stays the same : as long as social gears remain orange, it deserves to be competitive with other oranges. Or it will be pretty pointless to introduce heavy-medium versions along with 'dramatic' plans of yours.

[face_hindu]

Update 03.14.2012

 

 

1.2 patch note did not mention any changes to social gears, except for imp version of Coruscant dress and suit for the repub. It seems currently we won't be getting extra slotted social gears at 1.2, but they are considering it at least.

 

My feedback stays the same : as long as social gears remain orange, it deserves to be competitive with other oranges. Or it will be pretty pointless to introduce heavy-medium versions along with 'dramatic' plans of yours.

 

You can't craft social gear. Hence, you can't crit-craft social gear. Hence, you can't get social gear with aug slots.

 

Social gear is... social, and you'll never get to buy auggied oranges for 300 creds, if that's what you want. I'm thinking auggied oranges will be in the 500k range once the dust settles.

[Lazzer]

I think the point is that all aspects of the game should be utilized for the best armour.

 

In my mind the best armour in the game should consist of:

 

1x Critical success orange shell with 3x PvE slots, 1x crafted only Aug slot, 1x PvP slot.

 

All of the slots should be fillable from all areas of the game but the top end mods ahould come from specific areas:

 

*The PvP slot should be fillable by a nodrop high end PvP award.

*The PvE slots filled by nodrop Operations rewards.

*The Crafted slot by an aug that is crafted in 2 pieces and needs to be combined in a dodrop hard to obtain container.

 

This makes crafting viable, if you don't do highend PvP you have the best PvE equipment in the game (with moderate PvP stats), if you don't do Operations you have the best PvP equipment in the game (moderate PvE stats), if you do neither you have a moderate suit for all environments BUT if you spend time doing both to an endgame standard you can have a suit that it the best armour in the game for both PvP and PvE.

 

 

Just my idea.

[Astridd]

You can't craft social gear. Hence, you can't crit-craft social gear. Hence, you can't get social gear with aug slots.

 

Social gear is... social, and you'll never get to buy auggied oranges for 300 creds, if that's what you want. I'm thinking auggied oranges will be in the 500k range once the dust settles.

 

It's about providing various path to the gears : it could be crit-craft, could be dungeons, warzones, social ranks, etc. I don't see crafting exclusive slots fulfill that goal. Why even have other designs when you know they're doomed to be inferior and unused.

 

And about the price tag - you missed the other side. It says : "Social Rank Required"

[face_hindu]

It's about providing various path to the gears : it could be crit-craft, could be dungeons, warzones, social ranks, etc. I don't see crafting exclusive slots fulfill that goal. Why even have other designs when you know they're doomed to be inferior and unused.

 

And about the price tag - you missed the other side. It says : "Social Rank Required"

 

You can take any path you like to make enough creds to buy the best gear if you don't choose to craft it yourself. However, running normal Ess or BT with 3 guildies for 2 straight days is not a path that leads to the best gear, thank Lucas.

Edited March 18, 2012 by face_hindu
added coordination conjunction

[Astridd]

You can take any path you like to make enough creds to buy the best gear if you don't choose to craft it yourself. However, running normal Ess or BT with 3 guildies for 2 straight days is not a path that leads to the best gear, thank Lucas.

 

Because sitting around GTN pushing crew button is oh so special and sacred?

 

Not to mention there are people who gain social ranks via slower methods.

[face_hindu]

Because sitting around GTN pushing crew button is oh so special and sacred?

 

Yeah because spamming crew skills is free.

 

We had this discussion a month ago, Astridd. Leveling crew skills costs CREDITS. Lots of CREDITS. You know this. Why are you being so childish?

[Astridd]

Yeah because spamming crew skills is free.

 

We had this discussion a month ago, Astridd. Leveling crew skills costs CREDITS. Lots of CREDITS. You know this. Why are you being so childish?

 

Once again I don't need to label you childish to make my point, here it is:

 

CREDIT huh? You mean pile of those 10k rewards and stuff you get for opening 4 boxes or killing 6 pub npcs under a minute?

 

Social rank costs too, whether you want to admit or not. Time, effort, group members, or whatever incorporeal resources I can't convert to credits.

 

I'm not asking best shell in the universe for nothing. IF players paid equivalent effort to get that shell, it deserve one more hole, as long as it's orange. Balancing it from there is up to the developers.

[face_hindu]

Once again I don't need to label you childish to make my point, here it is:

 

CREDIT huh? You mean pile of those 10k rewards and stuff you get for opening 4 boxes or killing 6 pub npcs under a minute?

 

Social rank costs too, whether you want to admit or not. Time, effort, group members, or whatever incorporeal resources I can't convert to credits.

 

I'm not asking best shell in the universe for nothing. IF players paid equivalent effort to get that shell, it deserve one more hole, as long as it's orange. Balancing it from there is up to the developers.

 

Okay, Astridd. It's easier (less time commitment and effort) to get to 400 in a craft and 2 gathering skills (edit: and then crit craft orange gear) than it is to get Social VI.

 

Wow, you're so right.

 

EDIT2: And I didn't "label you childish". I was asking why you are being so chidish about this. Maybe I should have said petulant. Ok. I label you petulant.

Edited March 18, 2012 by face_hindu

[Game-Hermit]

So?

 

 

its vendor bought SOCIAL gear

 

not crafted.....not a drop...VENDOR BOUGHT

Orange gear is just a model/texture and has no bearing on performance. There's no reason for it not to have a way to add an augment slot to it, preferably with some item made by crafters.

[Drewser]

Social gear is not , should not, and will not be for those people who "care about stats". It's social gear.

 

Nailed it!