Slicing post-nerf, please look at the numbers BW

[Pansophist]

Slicing is profitable on nodes not missions just like every other gathering profession. Missions are for a shot at the big selling Items (Missions, and Cybertech designs) and will lose you money just like you lose money on every other gathering skill mission but get a chance at rare resources.

 

If you want money from cybertech go out and farm nodes. You'll make lots of cash. If you want to make money off missions use mission skills. Those will net you profitable resources for the GTN on success.

 

Also note that the set up of slicing missions being always profitable pretty much made it an open invitation for credit farmers to exploit. Removing that is a good thing.

 

Not true. UWT and TH are both profitable from missions. You just end up having to vendor the items you get (unless you decide to make it more profitable through the dismal GTN)

[Hamoct]

I had 400 slicing.. I dropped it now for Biochem... no point now.

[Xfraze]

Well, my friends and I are of the opinion that the problem with slicing wasn't the amount of credits being earned, but rather, at what level they were being earned at. Currently, there is no level cap for the crewskill levels. So a level 20 could be earning money intended for players closer to level 30-40 which is actually a lot.

 

A better fix IMO would have been to lower the credit gain by about 15-25% and also set level caps for all the crewskills.

[DavePete]

I qualify to answer this, I guess. While I leveled I bought a ton of stupid flavor items, a second cargo bay, full rank 5 ship upgrades. I still had a ridiculous amount of credits when I hit 50, paid for all my skills, my friend's speeder and speeder training.. spent about half of what I had, really. Now I'm almost back to where I was when I reached 50, even after the nerf, because I stopped sending companions out to farm and started doing it myself.

 

It's still awfully easy to make credits hand over fist, but people need to stop trying to use the missions and go strictly gathering. There are plenty of places filled with faction-friendly NPCs (or no NPCs) that spawn a lot of slicing nodes.. this includes Ilum, which I know has been mentioned before.

 

Good to know. I shall follow suit. Thank you kindly for the reply.

[bmarsh]

As a 7 year WoW vet with alot of experience in server economics I feel like I can comment on this situation uniquely.

 

As a player, I have become very used to the prof. grind, the recipe hunt, and the mats gathering that other MMO's have required in order to become successful at your chosen skills. I've leveled to max crafting on many lvl 85's, and had hundreds of thousands of gold flowing both ways through the auction houses on a daily basis.

 

That being said, lets take a look at this situation honestly. Slicing is the non crafters crew skill.. A simple and easy way to say "ok, go find me money". And thats exactly what it did, just a bit too well. As previous posters have shown, you can make a ridiculous amount of money with no work with how slicing was pre-nerf. Lets be fair, it needed a nerf to some degree. But even with the new nerf, slicing is by no means a waste. The mission items are still very useful to professions and can be very profitable. The augments, though lacking in places, have also proven to bring credits in to the bank. And lets not leave out the random lockboxes you WILL find throughout your leveling, that is free money just sitting on the ground.

 

Do I think Slicing needed a nerf, Sure I did. Do I want it to increase just a little bit so that missions are less likely to LOSE credits? Sure I do. But it isnt the tragedy that some people are making it out to be. You have to factor in a number of things here, the time that missions take, the price of those missions, and the return in credits/mission items/augments. When you compare that to a dedicated crafter who has to take more time to actually make the items, reverse engineer, spend money on missions for blue/purple quality mats, and find a buyer, suddenly the nerf makes ALOT more sense.

 

To those of you who are whining and complaining, calling Bioware out, and threatening to quit the game: Deal. With. It. The game has officially been out for 1 (read: one single) week. It will take weeks/months to get a real economy flowing in this game. The "value" of the credit is going to fluctuate wildly until some things settle out. Be happy that Bioware cares enough to TRY to balance things for everyone so we can all derive enjoyment from the game. Things are going to change, every class is going to have moments where they are brokenly powerful, or comically underpowered. Balancing a massive game is a huge challenge.

 

If you want to help this game develop positively then by all means, let your voice be heard. But do it intelligently and do your homework. There is a stereotype for us hardcore gamers, please don't personify it too greatly.

 

Keep working Bioware, and Keep gaming brothers and sisters.

[LeperJack]

What are all you people going to say when my level 50 character sends a couple hundred thousand credits (that took about an hour of grinding to earn) to an alt I just made?

 

**** MAIL IZ OP. NURF TAHT MAIL GAIZ.

 

And could you explain the difference?

[Renifizzle]

Well, my friends and I are of the opinion that the problem with slicing wasn't the amount of credits being earned, but rather, at what level they were being earned at. Currently, there is no level cap for the crewskill levels. So a level 20 could be earning money intended for players closer to level 30-40 which is actually a lot.

 

A better fix IMO would have been to lower the credit gain by about 15-25% and also set level caps for all the crewskills.

 

This seems like a reasonable request, although think of the perspective of a purely crafting alt.

 

Someone simply wants a level 11 alt who can craft level 50 synthweaving items to complement their artifice trade. If this were true then the alt would have to level to 50 before it can craft these items. This is a HUGE investment simply for a crafting alt.

 

Also BW implements the limitation of number of companions usable per level. I think this is the enforced ceiling you are looking for.

[BobFromMarketing]

I'm running a 100 mission spreadsheet to see what my balance is just based off splicing missions. It'll take me a few days to a week to complete but I will publish it when I am done. Keeping track of mission name, quality, rank, item bonuses, yield, and cost.

 

So far after a dozen or so missions its at around +2000 credits. We will see where it is after 100. Only a few missions have ran at a loss, I am a sith inquisitor so there is no massive bonus for me on the missions.

 

My slicing is maxed as well.

[StandardInsanity]

I'd rather play right now then post a long and well thought argument, but add my voice to the crowd of:

 

Yes, slicing needed a nerf. They swung too far in the other direction, rendering slicing a money sink and not comparable to the other gathering skills.

[psiphre]

this will probably get buried 130+ pages in, but the real solution here would have been to limit the rate at which lockbox missions spawned into the available mission list. that way, it would have kept each individual slicing mission profitable, while still limiting the overall influx of credits into the economy. Edited December 28, 2011 by psiphre

[DarthGammon]

Losing money on a few missions is nothing if it's making money in the long run.

 

Not really. Losing money in the short term negates how worth while the profession is. I simply wont make enough money to generate enough credits to even repair lvl 50 gear in any reasonable amount of time let alone be rolling in credits like so many were QQing about.

[Niveksix]

Its gambling...

[Mogget]

I enjoyed slicing. I have limited play time and as such I would rather spend it playing the game opposed to watching the GTN and crafting. I've been following these threads closely hoping to see a dev response to the over nerf.. Nothing yet.

 

the problem imo was the abuse.. I am not sitting on millions of credits. I did not level numerous alts to slice. With ppl doing that, yeah that's a problem. As many have said.. Post 50 the return on slicing is really not that amazing. makes me wonder if capping the amount of companions on missions per account per server (per mission type..i.e. Only so many slicing missions) would have been a better idea (if even possible)

 

I agree with your first paragraph. And you are right about abuse. Trying to curb the abuse by destroying a skill was a major mistake. I see a update coming soon. There has been too much of a response in a very short time for the devs not to do something about it. Quick fixes never work. A whole lot of ductape on a 3000psi nitrogen bottle holds, but not for long. This is going to have effects as bad as the abuse in the end.

[Deathmvp]

Something I was just thinking about.

 

I know you can sell gather mats from the other profesions on the AH and possible turn a very good profit but I was woundering how much do they sell to vendors for?

 

What I mean is if the misson cost 200cr 3min and earns 6 of x with each x worth 40cr to a vendor meaning they make 40cr profit (13.3cr/min) (these are made up numbers as I can not cheak at work). How much are ther other making or losing at min. I say this as one of the reason many say this had to be nurfed this bad was all the others are losing and this one was making money. I wounder now is the realy the case or is it the gathers are all make and it is just the crafting part killing the poeple. Many of the people I know that did alot of slicing do almost no crafting at all.

[Ashanor]

To those of you who are whining and complaining, calling Bioware out, and threatening to quit the game: Deal. With. It. The game has officially been out for 1 (read: one single) week. It will take weeks/months to get a real economy flowing in this game. The "value" of the credit is going to fluctuate wildly until some things settle out. Be happy that Bioware cares enough to TRY to balance things for everyone so we can all derive enjoyment from the game. Things are going to change, every class is going to have moments where they are brokenly powerful, or comically underpowered. Balancing a massive game is a huge challenge.

 

Before nerfing slicing, they should have been fixing the prices at level 50. Costs for repairs, training, and everything else are astronomically high and need to be lowered SIGNIFICANTLY. Like, 80-90% nerf like they did to slicing.

[Xfraze]

This seems like a reasonable request, although think of the perspective of a purely crafting alt.

 

Someone simply wants a level 11 alt who can craft level 50 synthweaving items to complement their artifice trade. If this were true then the alt would have to level to 50 before it can craft these items. This is a HUGE investment simply for a crafting alt.

 

Also BW implements the limitation of number of companions usable per level. I think this is the enforced ceiling you are looking for.

 

I really hate to use this argument, but in almost every game I've played, crafting level has been tied to character level in some way. The only exception I can think of is FFXIV, but even in that game, raising your crafting level also raised your character level since the crafting professions are their own class.

 

It's a huge investment for sure, but it prevents the economy from being flooded to a certain degree as well. Before the slicing nerf, I was seriously about to roll a bunch of characters and just have them slice nonstop as soon as I got my first companion character.

 

Personally, it seems like they have the infrastructure for what I suggest in place. The drop down menu for crew skill missions has level ranges attached to them. I was surprised when I learned that I could completely disregard the ranges posted there.

[Pansophist]

There are two problems at hand in my eyes:

 

One: Crafting missions, like SO many others have mentioned, are not level capped. They should be. This would have been the easiest fix in the world.

 

Two: The knee-jerk reactionary nerf. Similar to SWG, these kinds of reactions ruin games. Patches need to be well thought out, focus on primary issues, and not just to the whims of the community crying because they didn't level fast enough to see what the benefits of slicing were, they just saw the short term gains of others.

 

It's sad, really. I hope this isn't an indication of future 'balancing' efforts on Bioware's behalf.

[bmarsh]

Before nerfing slicing, they should have been fixing the prices at level 50. Costs for repairs, training, and everything else are astronomically high and need to be lowered SIGNIFICANTLY. Like, 80-90% nerf like they did to slicing.

 

I dont disagree, though I would say that it was a bit of both that was needed. Slicing needed to be pulled down some, and those higher level prices that you mention, need to be reigned in a bit as well. As I said, the economy is going to go through some drastic changes in the coming months, as people max their skills, and really get into high end pvp/flashpoints/operations.

[Belkiratwo]

this will probably get buried 130+ pages in, but the real solution here would have been to limit the rate at which lockbox missions spawned into the available mission list. that way, it would have kept each individual slicing mission profitable, while still limiting the overall influx of credits into the economy.

 

 

 

The real solution would have been to let the economy mature and not make decisions based on a 2 week old market.

[JadeBranch]

Now you're like every other craft where you don't earn money going on missions.

 

 

 

Except those other crafts have other purposes. Slicing's only purpose was to make money. If you lose money using slicing then it should just be removed from the game.

[Methenu]

Okay, here are some numbers to look at:

 

Mission Spent Gained Net

Moderate Class 6 1415 1615 200

Rich Class 5 2025 2451 426

Abundant Class 6 1485 2131 646

Moderate Class 6 1415 1758 343

Moderate Class 6 1415 1183 -232

Abundant Class 6 1485 2181 696

Rich Class 5 2025 1798 -227

Abundant Class 6 1485 1340 -145

Moderate Class 6 1415 1329 -86

Abundant Class 6 1485 1801 316

Rich Class 5 2025 2119 94

Abundant Class 6 1485 1866 381

Rich Class 5 1930 2669 739

Abundant Class 6 1485 1400 -85

 

It's been reduced to ashes now. No reason to run the missions at all. Just go for the boxes as you're questing. At least that way you are guaranteed a positive return.

[LeperJack]

That being said, lets take a look at this situation honestly.

Yes, lets.

 

Slicing is the non crafters crew skill.. A simple and easy way to say "ok, go find me money". And thats exactly what it did, just a bit too well.

Could you show how it did it "too well" please?

 

"You can afford to buy things appropriate for your level."

"You can afford to buy things other people make. (and will have to as you have limited your own options to make things)"

"You can afford to pay for repairs and other money sinks."

 

Although in end game most of this "You can afford" is bankrolled by your early surplus rather than actually being able to maintain--meaning that eventually you WILL go broke at high levels with slicing. (pre-nerf, now you just go broke from the start)

 

 

As previous posters have shown, you can make a ridiculous amount of money with no work with how slicing was pre-nerf.

Could you qualify "rediculous?" Because what I'm seeing is "less money than you make with minimal effort at level cap in a quarter to half the time." Now I'm seeing "Less money than you can make with minimal effort at character creation in equal time."

 

Lets be fair, it needed a nerf to some degree.

Why, exactly? Elitism of "yoo gotta earn dem skillz and mountz?" Jealousy of "I'm failing at playing pokemon crafter and going broke catching all the recipes so you must be too?" Idiocy of "no one's buying anything. You know what we need? Less money!!!"

 

But even with the new nerf, slicing is by no means a waste. The mission items are still very useful to professions and can be very profitable.

Sure. You know what are also very useful and valuable? Purple materials gathered from other gathering skills. I have plenty of those, and far less mission discoveries and schematics from slicing... you have about the same chance to get them.

 

The augments, though lacking in places, have also proven to bring credits in to the bank.

0.o

 

Uh... yeah, when you vendor them I guess you do technically get some money back. not as much as what you spent to get them, but if that's your definition of profit, I think I may understand why you and likeminded individuals don't understand how the game economy works.

 

And lets not leave out the random lockboxes you WILL find throughout your leveling, that is free money just sitting on the ground.

Yeah! Almost like... other... gathering skills where you can sell the gathered components for more money than what you get from a world lockbox. *headdesk*

 

Do I think Slicing needed a nerf, Sure I did.

I understand why, I just am not sure you understand why it didn't.

 

I appreciate you have much experience dealing with economies in other, older, established games where certain things work very differently simply because of skill layouts and couplings as well as the fact that they ARE older and more established games, as opposed to "brand new."

 

Do I want it to increase just a little bit so that missions are less likely to LOSE credits? Sure I do.

That's very... generous.

 

"less likely to lose money." How sweet. See, I have two crafters right now. Both have asinine amounts of money for their level, and it has jack all to do with slicing.

 

Here's my secret... it's so secret, I need to spell that "sekrit."

 

matter o' fact, I'm going to put it in a spoiler box.

 

 

I SELL THINGS I MAKE. I OCCASIONALLY SHOUT IN GENERAL THAT MY ITEMS ARE ON THE MARKET.

 

I DON'T MAKE THINGS PEOPLE WILL NOT BUY IF I CAN HELP IT.

 

I DON'T BUY EVERY PATTERN AND BREAK EVERYTHING I MAKE TO TRY TO GET PATTERNS NO ONE WILL EVER BUY.

 

I ONLY CRAFT LOW LEVEL EPICS WITH THE UNDERSTANDING THAT I AM LITERALLY FLUSHING MONEY DOWN THE TOILET.

 

 

Some crazy stuff in there, I know.

 

But it isnt the tragedy that some people are making it out to be. You have to factor in a number of things here,

 

the time that missions take, the price of those missions, and the return in credits/

Has been figured repeatedly by folks kind enough to track their data. Since you were in WoW, (I'll admit, I haven't played since I got my Kingslayer title--back when that meant something) consider this:

 

Tell a level 85 player that they now can only make 8 gold a day from the craft they just leveled. Tell a level 20 player they can make up to 8 gold a day from the same craft.

 

You're going to have vastly disparate reactions. In the end, the level 85 player is going to tell you where you can shove your patch notes. This is very much exactly what is happening.

 

Back to our game: The level 20 player having 30k income a day is actually not a big deal, because in a week, half the server is going to be making half a million just trying to get from their ship to the cantina to grab a beer.

 

mission items/

Rare result. Comparable to purple crafting mats, only they show up less often and are less valuable. So... Shorter end of a shorter stick, that you just snapped in half.

 

augments.

For which there is zero market at the moment, and the item system is not going to encourage a burgeoning market later. Augments are random results, and certain augments will be more popular, while others will be literal vendor trash. unlike crafting where I can choose the outcome, my "this is saleable for a price some people will pay but is probably not comensurate with my expense" vs. "this is utter garbage and I have wasted my time and money" ratio is pretty high, as opposed to completely nonexistant.

 

When you compare that to a dedicated crafter who has to take more time to actually make the items, reverse engineer, spend money on missions for blue/purple quality mats, and find a buyer, suddenly the nerf makes ALOT more sense.

This is idiocy. I'm sorry, but i know of no better way to describe this.

 

"If I take the time and money to make things and then purposefully destroy them in a way that is non-profitable and continually do this with items that are non-saleable as opposed to just making things people will actually buy, then I don't make any money and this is bad for me to not make money when I am destroying money."

 

It will take weeks/months to get a real economy flowing in this game.

Actually, the more slicers you had making more money, the more of an economy you have. You have no economy when no one buys anything because they have no money. Crafters cannot sell to people who have no money to buy because they cannot sell their crafts because no one bought them because they didn't have money because no one bought their materials because no one had money because you took a decent way to inject actual money into the economy and give it not only a kick start but small perpetual gains and decided to chop off its dangly bits.

 

I make, no... MADE stupid amounts of money pre nerf. That money came from the very crafts you keep saying are "unprofitable" and a "huge money sink" and "time wasters." it took me minutes. I'll still continue to make money this week--not as much as i made last week, but I can squeeze credits from a stone.

 

TLDR; I don't want the nerf reverted because BioWare stole "my skill." I want it reverted because they just killed my customer base. If you are losing money at crafting, then you fail at basic economics, and you can see if there is a Star Wars expansion planned for Hello Kitty: Island Adventure. I hear it's pretty tough to fail at anything in that game, even the economy.

Edited December 28, 2011 by LeperJack

[RodeoJesus]

Slicing was a nice way for a low-level character to get started on the AH and establish a crafting skill. If you devoted all of your companions to slicing, you had a more difficult time running through the game solo. This wasn't as noticeable if you play the game with a group of friends, but my friends and I all have full-time jobs, and we all work different schedules, so usually I was alone, and it was a drawback.

 

I'm not saying it wasn't overpowered compared to other crafting professions, but the extent to which they've gone to fix it is excessive, and ultimately everyone will suffer for it. The change isn't going to hurt my level 30 character very much, but any new character I decide to create is going to have a ridiculously hard time getting started, which just isn't very fun. I'm certainly not inclined to start spending credits at the AH again any time soon.

 

Essentially, Slicing was a good way to help a baby start walking. Now, they could have just put the babies with slicing in a playpen, which is to say regulate the amount of income by the level of the player. Instead, this drop-kicked the babies in the head, and they'll be lucky to ever walk again.

[psiphre]

The real solution would have been to let the economy mature and not make decisions based on a 2 week old market.

 

i was a slicer myself (still haven't dropped the skill, i think we'll see the nerf partially rescinded), and it doesn't take a rocket surgeon to see that the massive amounts of currency that slicing enabled people to make was hurtful.

 

rate limiting lockbox missions would have nipped remote mission grinders in the bud, limited the amount of currency inflation, and kept slicing an overall profitable skill. 71% was too much, it could have done with 40-50%.

[DarthVaper]

Maybe pointless, but will add my voice to the chorus.

 

A slight nerf would've been wise. People were getting way too rich way too quick, but now its a completely pointless profession that costs far more than it gains.

 

It has also partially killed my interest in the game. Pre nerf, I was logging in 10 to 15 times a day, just to send crew out and check mail for AH sales, and to list new items if anything sold (due to the 50 item limit). Now I feel like I have no reason - the one skill I had invested a LOT of time in maxing out is now just a money sink with no return whatsoever.

 

The only return I do get is augments and the occasional mission discovery, but the ridiculous 50 item limit on the GTN makes it pointless to continue to accumulate them. I've already got a cargo hold full of items that are waiting in line to be sold. So why bother logging in at all? Very smart BW. Kill players' fervor for the game.

 

Scale back the nerf, this was FAR too harsh.