Slicing: Why it had to be nerfed.

[Whitemane]

I agree that a nerf was needed, as I stated in one of these threads, I made over 3 million credits in the last week with slicing. I think that it was too severe, and will impact the non slicers more than the slicers in the long run, and will suppress pricing on crafted goods to a point where it is no longer profitable to craft.

 

Right now it isnt profitible to do so. ( I have 400 Armormech 400 scav 400 UT) It is profitible to sell raw mats to all the people who didnt take the gathering skills they needed and instead took slicing.....

 

IMHO when everyone and their dog takes a skill simply due to the fact it is percieved as the hands down the easiest way to make money it needs looking at ...

[Lankybrit]

Slicing is fun. I find things all over the place to slice and am getting a decent amount of credits from them. I haven't done a single Slicing missions yet, and don't see the need to. BTW, for reference, I'm only level 14, so can't really speak about Slicing at higher levels.

 

Cheers.

[KrelosDarksky]

You may have an argument that Slicing is not worthwhile, but a broken profession that few or none take is better than one that everyone takes and leads to a ruined game. By the way, I don't think anyone who runs Scavenge missions is making a profit selling materials on the market so in that same sense it is losing money.

 

 

/agree

 

 

 

 

and want to add ... (stated by Vibal_Magus in another thread)

 

Flipped through the first 20 or so pages here, 150 is a bit to get through. Just a couple of things, probably nothing new, but worth reiterating if that's the case.

 

1.) A tradeskill who's only function is to increase inflation is bad for the long term health of the in game economy. All characters rely on credits, the ability to generate credits without gameplay is silliness. Cash sinks (repairs, mounts, training) are added to MMOs to maintain the balance of intake and outake of cash. Trivializing those costs is harmful to all characters who are NOT generating mass credits in this manner.

 

2.) The fact that a small sub-set of the players were able to generate millions of credits within the first week, through a single crew skill, does in fact warrent immediate action. The fact that they did so within the game system does not change the severity of the impact on the economy. The fact that it was "legit" makes it a nerf, not a bug fix. Semantics do not change the necessity.

 

Slicing was poorly designed from the start, and the issues with it should have been evident before the game was even put to beta.

 

 

 

Slicing needed to be cut down and it should have been done a week ago.

 

Be thankful, those of you that had the opportunity to take advantage of the system before the change, for the credits you 'earned.'

 

.

Edited December 28, 2011 by KrelosDarksky

[Allmark]

I enjoyed this post a lot.

I'm gonna jump off a limb and say that you majored in Econ lol

[Jjix]

Really, the choice was between 1) a fast growing economy that normalizes rapidly, with the downside that some people who understood the bubble early get really rich (which is what tends to happen during such times) . . . and 2) a sluggish economy that will take months, if not longer, to start to feel vibrant. That was the choice, slicing is really just the scapegoat.

 

If everyone took slicing, inflation would rapidly reduce the value of slicing and other crafting professions would be perceived to be more lucrative. The ONLY reason slicing is so valuable now is because nobody had any money when the game launched, so of course making money from the npc environment was more lucrative than making money from other players . . . because other players were all broke!

 

My plan -- and I assume the plan of many -- was to ride the slicing bubble until it either broke or died down, and then switch to the other crafts once money was circulating about. People who thought they could level the other crew skills to 400 and instantly start making mad cash must have been pretty deluded . . . you can't make money selling your stuff if no one has any to spend.

 

And I have no problem that they made that mistake, but instead of recognizing the mistake they blamed it on a scapegoat . . . slicing. "Those guys over there are making a lot of money, no fair!" When in fact, slicing has absolutely nothing to do with why the other crew skills are currently not that profitable. In fact, slicing was meant to provide a quick solution to that problem.

 

The only reason the other crew skills are not that profitable is because there isn't enough money in the economy. Nerfing slicing is just making it longer before that needed money enters circulation.

Edited December 29, 2011 by Jjix

[Daragoz]

And, people like me are left in the cold... broke, and unable to craft, sell, purchase, or even level correctly while others laugh and troll saying they are doing fine when they really are not.

[sdlaurin]

those who cried until they nerfed slicing were clearly trolling and want the game to fail. BW failed hard by listening

[Onomas]

slicing didnt need ot be nerfed.

 

1 hr slicing = 1-2k profit now with 1-2 companions roughly

 

1hr gathering with 3 gathering skills i managed to get roughly 240 mats. At 20 credits each average sale price thats 4800 credits per hr if they sell. Not including sending my companion out on missions to get other things you are looking at around 5500-6k profits.

 

Pvp/warzones last around 20 minutes each, can do roughly 3 per hour. Take home about 1500 credits each not including the commendations. Thats 4500 per hour not including sending out your comanion on missions while you fight. Average take home 5500-6k per hout.

 

How is slicing so bad when you can make just as much doing the other 2 options? Its just something for people that have no clue to b**ch about to make their jibberish sound important.

 

Most those people that rushed to 50, had 5 companions to work with so did make a killing. Any lowbie wont make that at all. Its the facts of life. You wanted instant riches, and instead of just shutting the hell up and picking slicing, or even making an alt for slicing to make riches, you killed the profession and the trickle down effect it had.

 

You guys are idiots. I think thye should charge you guys 1500 and 60 minutes to farma node and then tell me it was still a bad thing. I made more from doing the other things than slicing. The nerf was overkill, 70% reduction this early in game was just a ignorant move on BW part.

[Ezoran]

You are losing money running missions. You were never intended to make money running missions. You make money harvesting nodes.

 

 

 

missing the dev post that says this was their intention originally, since it did go through the betas and headstarts and wasn't until massive QQ arose, that it was nerfed to unprofitability.

 

 

is that post further in this thread? or, are you simply reading the minds of the developers and their original intention when creating slicing?

[Daragoz]

slicing didnt need ot be nerfed.

 

1 hr slicing = 1-2k profit now with 1-2 companions roughly

 

1hr gathering with 3 gathering skills i managed to get roughly 240 mats. At 20 credits each average sale price thats 4800 credits per hr if they sell. Not including sending my companion out on missions to get other things you are looking at around 5500-6k profits.

 

Pvp/warzones last around 20 minutes each, can do roughly 3 per hour. Take home about 1500 credits each not including the commendations. Thats 4500 per hour not including sending out your comanion on missions while you fight. Average take home 5500-6k per hout.

 

How is slicing so bad when you can make just as much doing the other 2 options? Its just something for people that have no clue to b**ch about to make their jibberish sound important.

 

Most those people that rushed to 50, had 5 companions to work with so did make a killing. Any lowbie wont make that at all. Its the facts of life. You wanted instant riches, and instead of just shutting the hell up and picking slicing, or even making an alt for slicing to make riches, you killed the profession and the trickle down effect it had.

 

You guys are idiots. I think thye should charge you guys 1500 and 60 minutes to farma node and then tell me it was still a bad thing. I made more from doing the other things than slicing. The nerf was overkill, 70% reduction this early in game was just a ignorant move on BW part.

 

 

I wish I could have said it that well.

[Ezoran]

oops, better nerf space missions quickly. i make lots of profit (more than slicing per hour) with absolutely no risk for my rewards, even moreso with the daily missions. PLUS craptons of XP for no risk on easy peasy missions.

 

 

the list WILL go on. because it DOES go on.

[Onomas]

I wish I could have said it that well.

 

Sorry i made a lot of typo's. I try to type faster but make more mistakes. I guess i could have been a little more polite about it. My apologies :/

[Meeporized]

My point was what you call "inflation" i call normalization and once the economy normalized around a level 50 player base the entire economy will shift and slicing would become obsolete as other sources of income become more profitable.

 

I completely understand the concept of a "print money" button but when that button can only produce a set amount no matter what then why would it be worth investment if there are other areas of growth that have a much higher potential for return?

 

Slicing only appears to be a "print money" button now because there is no market for:

 

- augments

- high end crafted items

- high end materials

- expensive vanity items

- mods/ship items

- companion items

 

The current market population is almost exclusively leveling characters and the initial wave of level 50's that are more than likely the foundation of the initial wave of raiders.

 

My whole point is that the market isn't MATURE enough at this point to make such a rash decision and all economic theory points to an eventual decline in the value of slicing as most people view it.

 

edit: i'll grant that BW has access to the actual statistics and my conclusions are based on personal observation but I just find it highly unlikely that 2 weeks could be enough time to determine the overall effect slicing in it's previous state would have had.

 

Thats one good reason why they should've waited to see if it really needs to be fixed.

Nothing against the CB's or whatever (ever told them Jawa tunikas are nailed to the bottom when they move? ;D ) but in a CB' or OB you cannot simulate the real starting of an economy since people know all that stuff will get deleted anyway. So the 2 Weeks wich were actually really painful to establish an economy at all (with all the things going on right now) are way to less to decide to nerf it furthermore. I mean yes there were people getting a load of money from it but a friend of mine never had Slicing and used only Treasure Hunting and did net by now at least 3x the amount of Creds than i did in my 5 days with Slicing (i got around 300k if you deduct all the money i had to invest in Investigation and Armstech)

 

So i think the nerf is not as bad as people make it to be but its more like it got "over"nerfed now excluding everything else because a lot of people got angry about it

 

btw yeah i know the Chat one might be a bigger case i just wanted to say that this balancing thing shouldnt come that early.

[decadosleepless]

Well, because noone is listening to anyone arguments... another question... what is purpose of Slicing now? What is it good for? (and pls, dont tell me missions and augments, because its yield is horrible/ its value is on 0).

 

So far, it looks like BW cut their way to compensate economy of OTHER crafting...that isnt working. So far, it looks like no crafting is now profitable...

 

So, what is slicing good for now?

[decadosleepless]

Pvp/warzones last around 20 minutes each, can do roughly 3 per hour. Take home about 1500 credits each not including the commendations. Thats 4500 per hour not including sending out your comanion on missions while you fight. Average take home 5500-6k per hout.

 

Great example! Warzones are another example of "printing money". But more profitable and giving XP as bonus. But...it doesnt hurt anybody, does it? Problem is...with slicing "nerfed" ingame economics could begin to crumble... because other crafting skills arent profitable too...

 

Will Warzones become a new slicing, emergency system of BW?

[Zennshi]

No, he's simply wrong. It would merely lead to inflating the whole economy over time, because the money supply would keep expanding and not be offset by in game money sinks. This tends to happen anyways in MMO economies without anything like slicing. You have to be very careful about how a game introduces new money into its economy -- and giving each and every player a license to print money over and above the sources of money created in game could only lead to one result down the line.

 

What is inflation? Too much money chasing too few goods.

 

I'm baffled by an alleged economics major uptopic who doesn't understand this rather obvious point.

 

In economics, inflation is a rise in the general level of prices of goods and services in an economy over a period of time.

 

Once again - if scarcity is what drives prices upwards, it really is only a problem to those who have only money and those who can't/won't sell.....

 

:/... you are making this too simplistic and blowing everything out of proportion

[Kashaan]

My god... Yeah, WE KNOW it needed a nerf. There is no intelligent person who used Slicing on these forums that won't admit it needed a nerf.

 

 

The point is, it was too much. A 71%+ nerf was just ridiculous. 40-50% would have been perfectly fine... so that instead of losing credits on average, you gain a small percent.

[Tickletime]

in my opinion, the way i see missions is an easy way to raise a tradeskill without having to go farm. you are spending money for the convenience, slicing was making a ton of money in addition to that which was a little ridiculous and BW did the right thing

[ZingFreelancer]

On the other hand, Mission skills do not have nodes, players need to run missions to recieve the products. So, Mission skills had to run missions, and gathering skills needed to gather nodes, but Slicing was the best of both worlds, having both nodes to gather and profitable missions. This clearly wasn't be design.

 

You are correct, but you are forgetting that you use gathering skill to run missions atop of gathering nodes to maximize your profits. So in theory you can run around gather boxes and run slicing missions at same time.

Scavenger can gather nodes and run missions too, but all scavenging material can be found from nodes. Also scavenging nodes re-spawn about tree times faster then slicing nodes.

 

 

This would never had happened in slicing because it produces raw credits. Having 2 slicers running missions was twice as much profit as having 1 slicer running missions. Having 8 was 8 times as much profit. Unlike with UT and flooding the market, there was no reason not to have every character you had with slicing.

 

TOO MUCH FOCUS ON CREDITS!

You are forgetting that slicing is also the source to augmentations, cybertech blueprints and missions. So far I sliced far far more nodes in the world then I've run slicing missions and I only found 6 mission schematics from nodes, the other 25 or so came from running missions.

 

Do I even need to explain how great mission schematics are? I totally love UT mission schematics! Slicing missions need balancing, but not by nerfing credit return, but by switching time consumed on Lock box mission with Augmentation mission.

 

 

If slicing missions does not profit you end up with: You might make money, you might find a schematic, but risk vs reward is to steep, it is safer to focus on something else.

Edited December 29, 2011 by ZingFreelancer

[alrighto]

Bottom line here

 

The crew skills needs to be spread out, each one should be as good as the next so that there isnt just one preference on a crew skill

 

This isnt the case, there are much much more slicers than anything else,

 

reason ? because it was imbalance, I myself have picked Slicing for my alts why ? because it was imbalance,

 

So for those of yous that are complaining about Slicing being nerfed too much, what did you expect when half the population picked it cause it was the best money maker ?

[alrighto]

I think what BW wants to happen to people to drop Slicing and pick up other crew skill other than Slicing... there are too many slicers around...

 

The only reason people would do this is to nerf the crap out of it...

[MasterKai]

My god... Yeah, WE KNOW it needed a nerf. There is no intelligent person who used Slicing on these forums that won't admit it needed a nerf.

 

 

The point is, it was too much. A 71%+ nerf was just ridiculous. 40-50% would have been perfectly fine... so that instead of losing credits on average, you gain a small percent.

 

But this is what everyone seems to be missing.

 

You still gain credits when doing slicing.

 

I have my Assassin doing it right now and I only started slicing the day after the nerf occured. Instead of gaining large amounts of credits the missions are now risk vs. reward. At Grade 4 slicing missions I currently make 400+ credits (The actual rewards are in the thousands; but I detract the cost of the mission from the end result) on every successful slicing mission.

 

The risk is that either your companion will fail the mission or you will get a credit case that returns a lower amount of credits than you spent sending your Companions on the mission.

 

But at Level 20, Grade 4 Slicing, each mission costs me 950 to 1020 Credits. Each mission that hasn't failed (Which has been rare thankfully) has successfuly returned an upwards of 990 to 1800 credits. Ergo, I'm making a small profit.

 

Slicing was simply brought into line with the other Crew Skills.

[DaerimClassic]

But this is what everyone seems to be missing.

 

You still gain credits when doing slicing.

Also my experience, with a little bit of record keeping to back it up. I kept track of my cost/profit ratio on 15 mission runs to see how the nerf had affected my income from slicing. I spent 21,295 credits running missions and got back 27,202 credits.

 

A raw profit of 5,907 credits, plus mission schematics.

 

Then I went out into the world and made about 20k running nodes. A 25k profit for a few hours work isn't bad at all. And even with the nerf, mission running with Slicing still net me a 25% increase in my credit income vs running nodes alone.

 

 

The difference now is that average mission returns break even or opperate at a small loss (largest on my list was 20% loss) and the profits come from crits that make up for the small losses of the dud missions.

[Aegamin]

Agree 100% with op.

 

You are supposed to harvest your own nodes. Just like all the other gathering skills. If you dont then it should be a moneysink.

 

Kudos to BW for reacting so fast before slicing inflated the economy completely.

[drdovetalk]

The OP has made an excellent post which many gamers have not understood. When it comes to MMO game design, one must be very careful about how money is introduced to the system.

 

From a macro perspective, money is introduced into the system in only 3 ways. Quest rewards, loot rewards, and selling stuff to vendors. That's it.

Money leaves the system through a wider variety of money sinks like repair fees, travel costs, respec costs, buying stuff from NPCs etc.

 

Contrary to some folk's belief, gathering from a node does not introduce money to the system. The gatherer gains a resource (such as Polyplast), but this is not money. It only becomes money when you vendor it or sell it to another player via trade. And if you sold it via trade, then the buyer has merely transferred money to you. On the whole, the system gains no money. (In fact, if there is an auction house cut, the system loses money.)

 

The dangers of overly high inflation in an MMO are very real. Even WoW is susceptible to this, as shown when the price of epic gems spiked to 5 digit gold figures in the first few days of the latest patch. Overly high inflation makes it difficult for new players to make progress in the game, unless they were wise enough to ignore the crafting crew skills and stick to node gathering skills.

 

Hence, I am supportive of the slicing nerf. Slicing missions should introduce zero money into the game as it is an easily abusable and scaleable means of introducing money to the system. It can easily become the single largest source of inflation in SWTOR.

 

Without a slicing nerf, people will be "forced" to take up slicing on as many toons as palatable in order to keep up with inflation. How can that possibly be fun? Imagine your country giving everyone the ability to print money (instead of aggregating this power in a carefully managed central bank). There would be chaos as everyone struggles to buy and use as many money printers as possible.