Slicing post-nerf, please look at the numbers BW

[vPSOD]

To Dorkfrey: Back in my college days we had MUD's and MMO's as you know them today didn't exist. Then Ultima Online came around. It had great game concepts that I very rarely see repeated or repeated well. There were real consequences for PvP. The crafting system was larger than what is available in any of the large modern MMO's. They had crafting systems that were useless other than for Roleplaying. Being able to bake cakes and make and dye non-armor clothing. Money was gathered by trading items that for all intensive purposes were all consumable. Everything had to be "farmed" from gold, to crafting ingredients, to of course leveling abilities. Economy can make or break any multiplayer game. Just like economy can break real life societies. A balanced economy gives everyone a challenge. I can understand anything saying, "but I want to experience and enjoy leveling and/or end game without having to deal with the economy BS." However if there is a single way for an individual account to significantly get ahead in the economy game, then it WILL throw off the economy balance and could spell the end of the game for many. When economies get out of balance then you start seeing items that developers intended to be worth lets say 1000 currency to now sell for instance 10,000-100,000 currency. This imbalance makes the developed cost to entry higher for those starting out or for those who don't, in this case slice. I'll leave you with this: Imagine if a subsection of players had a second account that all they did was have a character logged in, in a cantina, and scripted to send their companions out on slicing missions 24x7. There would be few items to clog up their inventory and it might even be more cost effective to script destroying objects than bothering with the GTN. Slicing returning any profit could potentially be unbalancing for just that reason. Edited January 5, 2012 by vPSOD

[xDoomsDayx]

To Dorkfrey: Back in my college days we had MUD's and MMO's as you know them today didn't exist. Then Ultima Online came around. It had great game concepts that I very rarely see repeated or repeated well. There were real consequences for PvP. The crafting system was larger than what is available in any of the large modern MMO's. They had crafting systems that were useless other than for Roleplaying. Being able to bake cakes and make and dye non-armor clothing. Money was gathered by trading items that for all intensive purposes were all consumable. Everything had to be "farmed" from gold, to crafting ingredients, to of course leveling abilities. Economy can make or break any multiplayer game. Just like economy can break real life societies. A balanced economy gives everyone a challenge. I can understand anything saying, "but I want to experience and enjoy leveling and/or end game without having to deal with the economy BS." However if there is a single way for an individual account to significantly get ahead in the economy game, then it WILL throw off the economy balance and could spell the end of the game for many. When economies get out of balance then you start seeing items that developers intended to be worth lets say 1000 currency to now sell for instance 10,000-100,000 currency. This imbalance makes the developed cost to entry higher for those starting out or for those who don't, in this case slice. I'll leave you with this: Imagine if a subsection of players had a second account that all they did was have a character logged in, in a cantina, and scripted to send their companions out on slicing missions 24x7. There would be few items to clog up their inventory and it might even be more cost effective to script destroying objects than bothering with the GTN. Slicing returning any profit could potentially be unbalancing for just that reason.

 

You have 1 major flaw in your theory. There is absolutely NOTHING a person needs to go from 1-50 that they would need to buy from another player. The quests rewards pretty much do it all for you. Now lets get back to some of those other interesting statements.

PVP had real consequences in UO eh? Then why were there people that would simply camp out and kill people as they leave towns? If there was any real consequences to pvp, you wouldnt have that kind of stuff happen. You want real consequences, lets do it right. You want to murder someone, great, attempt it. If you attack someone, you win! woohoo! but now you can't play the game for 24 hours. Say, 24 hours later you come back and kill someone else, well now you cant play for 48 hours. The cycle just keeps getting better! Now, was it worth it? Maybe, the guy could have been a real jerk! But you know what that stops? The real ******s that think they are better than you simply because they can click a button or circle strafe you faster than you can do it. it gets rid of, I am playing an evil bastard that thieves to make a living! You still can exact your revenge, but it will cost you if you really want to do it!

 

Very few games have ever done crafting well. For most games it is simply an after thought. Frankly I think Vanguards crafting and diplomacy system was by far superior than just about anything that has been put out there. Here is the real problem with crafting. people are LAZY! They want to craft, but they dont want to do the legwork that crafting needs. You want better pricing on things to keep them from being inflated, there is a simple fix for that. Make MATS BIND ON PICK UP. That way crafters have to do their own legwork instead of paying others to gather for them. This keeps the cost down since they dont have to pay the prices people try to gouge others with on the auction house. Would crafters like this? Hell no they wouldn't. They are lazy and dont want to do all that work themselves. Would this create a more diverse market? I believe it would. Crafters can now actually be competitive in their pricing and with them having to do it all themselves, its going to make the crafters much more wanted. That is, if they fix the real problem of not needing crafters in the first place!!!

 

On a final note of inflation. I have been playing mmos for more than 20 years now. I started out with a little gem called meridian 59. I can tell you that in almost every single mmo since then, the market for items has always been, how can I put this, Outrageous is the closest that I can come. There are SOME genuine people out there that want to play a crafter and make a modest living at it. MOST of the rest of them do it because they know it can make them rich. They aint doing it because they think its fun, they do it because they think they are going to be rich! These people are the ones that cause prices to sky rocket. ok, they are not the ONLY problem, the other part of that has been the gold sellers. but its a catch 22 here. If the crafters wasn't so greedy about milking everyone for every last dime they had, there wouldn't be a need for gold sellers.

 

Now, they are not the only reason for gold sellers. The other is the rest of the players who are greedy and want to sell that great drop that they probably needed on when they in fact couldnt even us it and then put it up on the auction house for outrageous prices. Thus further need of gold sellers. You want an economy that works in games, it aint going to happen. The only way to make an economy work is to slap every greedy sob that wants to rob you blind for any special drops. I could sit here and give you 100's of examples of that, but I am pretty sure everyone here has already seen it before. If there is anything that you take away from this, remember, we are playing a freaking video game here. Its not real world, I am not really an evil sith and all most of us want to do is have fun. If that means I want to sit and send my folks out on a few missions and bring back some credits while I sit there and talk to people in chat and dont want to fight, then what is it really harming? If I abuse the system, then I should be punished for it. But lets not punish everyone because SOME people are abusing it.

[DarthMalet]

Simply put, this game is not for casual players anymore.

 

Most of my friends joined because of the whole "no grinding and no need for trade skill" thing. 10 of them are leaving now, 6 because of the change and 4 because of the other 6 =p. 2 of them have already gotten their money refunded. We are currently down to 4 people playing this now.

 

I truelly enjoyed the game how it was in the beginning and I wasn't abusing slicing. I had one character with slicing and inbetween quests I sent my companion out. It made it so I could afford things for my girlfriend, some of my friends and myself. Admittetly I can see how the skill becomes broken when there are people out there abusing it, but this nerf went way to far.

 

We just wanted a hassle free MMO with a good story and we had that for the first weeks. The nerf showed us that they can turn this around in a heartbeat without thinking about it for a second or warning us.

 

We don't want to grind, but thats what they are forcing us to do now after the nerf.

[eskachig]

To Dorkfrey: Back in my college days we had MUD's and MMO's as you know them today didn't exist. Then Ultima Online came around. It had great game concepts that I very rarely see repeated or repeated well. There were real consequences for PvP. The crafting system was larger than what is available in any of the large modern MMO's. They had crafting systems that were useless other than for Roleplaying. Being able to bake cakes and make and dye non-armor clothing. Money was gathered by trading items that for all intensive purposes were all consumable. Everything had to be "farmed" from gold, to crafting ingredients, to of course leveling abilities.

UO was certainly groundbreaking. But it was only fun for a small group of hardcore players, and a frustrating chore for pretty much everyone else. Constantly being ganked is just not fun for 99% of players, it really isn't.

 

PVP had real consequences in UO eh? Then why were there people that would simply camp out and kill people as they leave towns? If there was any real consequences to pvp, you wouldnt have that kind of stuff happen. You want real consequences, lets do it right. You want to murder someone, great, attempt it. If you attack someone, you win! woohoo! but now you can't play the game for 24 hours. Say, 24 hours later you come back and kill someone else, well now you cant play for 48 hours.

PVP had real consequences in UO - especially for the loser. What you're describing is, well, stupid.

[xDoomsDayx]

UO was certainly groundbreaking. But it was only fun for a small group of hardcore players, and a frustrating chore for pretty much everyone else. Constantly being ganked is just not fun for 99% of players, it really isn't.

 

 

PVP had real consequences in UO - especially for the loser. What you're describing is, well, stupid.

 

Wait a minute. You admit that pvp in UO was really only fun for 1% of the players but then you say my idea was stupid? really? You still get to loot their stuff, so there is consequences for the loser. What it does though is make it less frustrating for the other 99%. Again, just because its PVP, doesn't mean you always have to kill each other. Just consider the loss of time of playing the game as you been caught for murdering someone and went to jail. Frankly I think it would fit right in with the RP crowd very well. I know that concept wont work with every game but if the game is designed as a pve game with pvp thrown in, then I think it would work great.

[Amiracle]

Simply put, this game is not for casual players anymore.

 

Most of my friends joined because of the whole "no grinding and no need for trade skill" thing. 10 of them are leaving now, 6 because of the change and 4 because of the other 6 =p. 2 of them have already gotten their money refunded. We are currently down to 4 people playing this now.

 

I truelly enjoyed the game how it was in the beginning and I wasn't abusing slicing. I had one character with slicing and inbetween quests I sent my companion out. It made it so I could afford things for my girlfriend, some of my friends and myself. Admittetly I can see how the skill becomes broken when there are people out there abusing it, but this nerf went way to far.

 

We just wanted a hassle free MMO with a good story and we had that for the first weeks. The nerf showed us that they can turn this around in a heartbeat without thinking about it for a second or warning us.

 

We don't want to grind, but thats what they are forcing us to do now after the nerf.

 

 

And you don't see anything wrong with this statement?

[LeperJack]

And you don't see anything wrong with this statement?

 

I took cybertech so I could make things for my wife, my guildmates, my other characters and have some money left over after selling some items I made.

 

My cybertech "supports" every other character on my account (on his server) with his profits from selling gathered materials and his crafted goods.

 

Here's the best part: He's level 15. I've run the Esseles a few times for kicks but he's never even made it to Coruscant.

 

That's right, a level 15 character that never leaves the fleet, and makes enough money with one companion to support an entire account's worth of characters as well as make donations to other people... with no slicing.

 

Nerf Cybertech, Underworld Trading and Scavenging? Because apparently making money is wrong, right?

[Dorkfrey]

A balanced economy gives everyone a challenge. I can understand anything saying, "but I want to experience and enjoy leveling and/or end game without having to deal with the economy BS." However if there is a single way for an individual account to significantly get ahead in the economy game, then it WILL throw off the economy balance and could spell the end of the game for many. When economies get out of balance then you start seeing items that developers intended to be worth lets say 1000 currency to now sell for instance 10,000-100,000 currency. This imbalance makes the developed cost to entry higher for those starting out or for those who don't, in this case slice. I'll leave you with this: Imagine if a subsection of players had a second account that all they did was have a character logged in, in a cantina, and scripted to send their companions out on slicing missions 24x7. There would be few items to clog up their inventory and it might even be more cost effective to script destroying objects than bothering with the GTN. Slicing returning any profit could potentially be unbalancing for just that reason.

 

I won't go into my history suffice to say I was mudding back in the late 80's. That makes it decades.

 

Now, to answer your point here... We have a game, that crafters are pretty much superfluous to.

 

For example - most crafts, cannot easily craft anything which cannot be bought at a better quality easily with commendations or credits. Note - the huge wave of cries that Biochem needs to be nerfed since it actually functions (I don't believe it needs a nerf by the way - but clearly I'm an idiot for seeing something working, and not trying to break it - I must be an idiot because I'm not jealous right?).

 

Now - within this world, crafters can *just* supercede it BY... crafting artifact gear, which take time/money to make. That means though - they need people with "spare" money to buy them.

 

If you want crafters to be viable in such a game, there needs to be spare - or free money floating around. An abundance of wealth so to speak. We started out - with such an abundance, that - had a capped earnings amount. Crafting in earnest - started - people made stuff - that was at the time comparable and in some cases superceded commendation gear.

 

You have to see - at that moment in time, we didn't have an abundance of 50's, with large amounts of cash coming into the system. We had - pockets of wealth (tiny wealth on the grand scheme of things - because the costs I'm seeing rise are well above what Slicing's max earnings were) - that slowly were being distributed around. This got hacked off, and the market stalled. Now, it may well pick up in future - but we've been forced into a depression - where the only option of getting out is to grind.

 

Now, I'm not going to go into your scripted bot arguement, because I genuinely believe that cheating is wrong. But I also genuinely believe that MOST people wouldn't dream of doing that. In every game, you'll get cheaters. However, in every game, you'll STILL get many more who it wouldn't occur to - to cheat. But if you have to cut off every avenue that a "cheat" can take, you're cutting off many more legitimate avenues for your average player. A case of punishing the masses for the behaviour of a few. Which - if you started getting punished for the actions of a few - you'd start being peeved off.

 

People have gone into this in more depth than I have, with better arguements, and if you're still unable to see it - you're not capable of learning or having your perspective changed.

 

One friend of mine, totally thinks the nerf was totally needed because a level 15 had 100k. End of story. While he sees all of the rest of the fallout, and says how really bad it is for everyone else, nerf totally had to happen, really hard and all the rest, because his viewpoint cannot comprehend anything beyond his own experience - and the thinking that a level 15 having 100k was totally WRONG - he feels offended by this. As a player - he played WoW since a few weeks off of it's start date. He didn't have a max level character until I literally dragged him through WoW in Cataclysm. He still doesn't have high level characters on this. You cannot explain the bigger picture because he can only see the child waving £5 and thinking that's wrong.

 

This nerf, affected more than the slicers. It crashed the whole economy. It probably will recover. However - it's forcing people away from casual if they wanted to craft. You can call my attitude BS if you wish. You can say that grinding is a good thing. At the end of the day however - slicing was - chump change. It was minimum wage. It was also the beating heart of a fledgling economy that has now tanked.

 

And on that note: I'm off to start reaping the GNT for mats to convert and vendor. I make more money doing that than slicing did pre-nerf. Cheerio.

[BobaFaceroll]

Simply put, this game is not for casual players anymore.

 

Most of my friends joined because of the whole "no grinding and no need for trade skill" thing. 10 of them are leaving now, 6 because of the change and 4 because of the other 6 =p. 2 of them have already gotten their money refunded. We are currently down to 4 people playing this now.

 

I truelly enjoyed the game how it was in the beginning and I wasn't abusing slicing. I had one character with slicing and inbetween quests I sent my companion out. It made it so I could afford things for my girlfriend, some of my friends and myself. Admittetly I can see how the skill becomes broken when there are people out there abusing it, but this nerf went way to far.

 

We just wanted a hassle free MMO with a good story and we had that for the first weeks. The nerf showed us that they can turn this around in a heartbeat without thinking about it for a second or warning us.

 

We don't want to grind, but thats what they are forcing us to do now after the nerf.

 

Serious? You and your friends should go out and play the game with Slicing leveled. You bring in a ton more credits than a character without Slicing. Once I got to Alderaan with my Slicer I regularly had to stop to open all the credit boxes filling my inventory before I could loot anything else. By 'regularly' I mean every 15 minutes I'd wind up with full bags until I opened the dozen or more money boxes I'd picked up while killing things. There's lots of nodes to slice out there...and they're all filled with free money.

 

You don't have to grind. Get out of the space station to make your money and you'll be fine, it's just laying around everywhere waiting to be taken.

[MnMrMustard]

So... over 1 week after the nerf of slicing and the depression just gets worse on the GTN.

 

All materials now sell for less than default. Vendoring on some actually gets you more than GTN.

 

No one buys green or blue equipment. The only one that people will buy are armor mods and some lightsaber crystals but only a few.

 

Everything else comes RIGHT BACK. In the week before slicing, my bank alt, who I mail equip to, made 150k on the GTN. That's just one week. He's made 10k this past week.

 

BW, are you out there? If this was supposed to be a way to kick start the market then be nerfed, it TANKED EVERYTHING.

[DarthTHC]

Please look at the numbers now Bioware.

I am not jumping up and down saying "PUT IT BACK". I am saying, however, that now it loses money.

 

Why should I pay 1400 credits on a C6 lockbox search for a box that returns 1000 credits?

Why should I pay 1900 credits for a high reward C5 lockbox that returns 1400 credits?

Remember your design goals BW, slicing is a mission skill for non-crafters. It is a way for them to utilize the crew skills to make money or get gear without entering the crafting world. This skill is no longer profitable as a mission skill.

 

Please consider adjusting it so the profit margin is smaller, not a complete loss now.

 

Please give BW some constructive forum posts on this topic, thank you.

 

 

EDIT 12/28/11 9AM MST

I apologize, I have not been able to keep on top of this properly for the scope of this thread.

 

Also, the numbers I got were a result of previously unaccepted mission rewards vs the new item system. It appears that there is now a higher chance of uncommon T6 boxes doing the Moderate/Abundant missions so the profit margin isn't quite as atrocious (read: loss) as it initially seemed.

 

SPREADSHEET LINK

 

SirFlashington has done me the favor of compiling a live editable google spreadsheet that you can enter your results in. I forsee this getting wildly out of control if not edited responsibly, so if you have constructive feedback that you would like to give to the community and BW, please enter good information.

 

 

Where did they say that? Slicing is a Gathering skill. Mission skills cannot access nodes in the world. Slicing can.

[DarthTHC]

See, here - you make the basis of your arguement - that it was because I was one of the people who missed out. And am sadface about it.

 

Sadly - you fail to get the rest of the points made - which are still salient.

 

And no - my Artificer, made more money than my Slicer did. Two alts. The JOKE profession made more. Noticably more. But that's beside the point: BECAUSE YOUR WHOLE ARGUEMENT IS THAT I'M BUTT HURT.

 

No - the fun of this game, for quite a few was being able to play, and get by - without ever needing to grind. We'd done FFXI, we'd done WoW - and we were led to believe - that we would be able to play without the endless grind (and that was what was touted by Bioware - because they were breaking the mold - supposedly). We didn't need to grind endlessly to just *play*.

 

The crafters I knew - delighted at Slicers having money, because they could sell stuff and play the game and make things for fun, without needing to run a business (In many cases - a second business - if you need this explained, they already run one in real life, like I do too), the others - burnt out raiders who've had enough and just wanted to enjoy the game for what it was - we didn't need to do much to be able to sell things and buy and enjoy the game. We'd never have been super rich, but we never tried to.

 

Maybe the idea of being able to just play a game - and enjoy it offends you. I don't know. But don't you dare accuse me of wishing to exploit the game. Without some "FACTS" to back you up.

 

Because - from where I'm sat with my friends, who've discussed this, we earned more with there being slicers around - even when we weren't one. We had more fun. We didn't need to play so hard to get enjoyment from the game.

 

I'm sorry being "casual" offends so much. I truly am.

 

And yes - people are leaving for the points I made, which you SKIRTED around, trying to make insults. Pro skills there.

 

Re-read what I said: When things are hacked and chopped, makes people feel less comfortable with a game. They'd rather go back to something they liked second best, but knew it wouldn't get messed over as soon as the massive nerfbat swung.

 

Tweaking, adjusting and generally - making the game better are all well and good, but wrecking a craft without so much as an explaination of how/why - with such a massive kneejerk reaction - begs consideration.

 

But it's okay - you can just call me an exploiter, instead of someone who's been gaming online for DECADES now - even going back to the original MUD's, and hasn't exploited those either. Makes your point more valid right? If you can call me names.

 

 

 

The problem about which you are complaining may not be that Slicing now brings in too little money, it may be that repair and other "credit sink" costs are too high.

[Skuldar]

They overreacted based on who-knows-what criteria, but they'll never admit that. They're fumbling to foster an infant economy, which is not surprising for a company with no MMO experience. It was simply a mistake to make any drastic changes this early before seeing the true shape of the economy.

 

Instead of a modest adjustment to Slicing coupled with buffs to other crafting skills, they just nuked the offending skill to a fraction of its past, with insufficient or misguided analysis given to the likely consequences.

 

Using Slicing as an economic lever (not saying they did this, just responding to speculation) does not make sense when they can use money sinks to affect everyone at the same time . Money sinks are essentially the tax rates of the game, so they are the logical lever to influence the money supply. Granted, badly designed crafting skills can potentially cause instability, but how was Beta not sufficient to illuminate bad design, as opposed to simple mis-tuning?

 

What they should have done is clarify what their vision was for Slicing, how it had gotten so far away from that vision, and what action they intended to bring it back on course. Instead they offered a vague motivation and nerfed it so bad that they all but imply that they should just take it out of the game.

 

One thing that worries me about this nerf, aside from the sheer severity shown so early in the game, is that it shows their paramount concern is their vision of how we should use the game features, as opposed to letting us find our own most enjoyable styles of play despite what the designers originally had in mind. I hope that the Slicing nerf was a response to a potential crisis that their numbers were pointing to, but their lack of communication and the severity don't argue in favor of that.

[Zakkana]

which is not surprising for a company with no MMO experience. It was simply a mistake to make any drastic changes this early before seeing the true shape of the economy.

 

This is no real excuse though. How hard is it to buy a copy of WoW, EVE, Rift, etc. and spend some time examining things there. In the real world, you do research.

[Cyrosage]

People keep defending that it is a "gathering" profession. There are missions you pay for to earn credits, aka profit. I almost never profit, and when I do, it's maybe 200 credits on a 1400 credit/30 minute mission. That is the complaint. The missions should be fixed or removed. Thinking they added the missions so you could "buy" skill-ups is an absurd idea. Thinking you should have to run lower level missions because a few people have shown that THEY statistically got higher returns (RNG woo hoo) is also absurd. Why have higher level missions if they are less profitable (or not profitable)?

 

If you don't have a problem, why troll this thread? There are plenty of people who are actually disappointed who don't need the thread steered in the wrong direction, so when.. if.. there is an official post, it will be directed to the right idea.

 

Also, as a side note: Prior to nerf, a 1400 mission generally yielded 3000ish. So, if I actually had 5 companions and sent them all on missions, I could profit enough in 30 minutes to buy ONE level 34 skill-up. It's not our fault as customers that there were people who abused the system with alts and made millions of credits. Mission level cap would have prevented the ridiculous income at low levels, and helped with the alt abuse. At high levels (with only one character), slicing was not actually too OP. Sure, nerf it a little, but not kill it for everyone.

[FrancoisTogruta]

I won't go into my history suffice to say I was mudding back in the late 80's. That makes it decades.

 

Now, to answer your point here... We have a game, that crafters are pretty much superfluous to.

 

For example - most crafts, cannot easily craft anything which cannot be bought at a better quality easily with commendations or credits. Note - the huge wave of cries that Biochem needs to be nerfed since it actually functions (I don't believe it needs a nerf by the way - but clearly I'm an idiot for seeing something working, and not trying to break it - I must be an idiot because I'm not jealous right?).

 

Now - within this world, crafters can *just* supercede it BY... crafting artifact gear, which take time/money to make. That means though - they need people with "spare" money to buy them.

 

If you want crafters to be viable in such a game, there needs to be spare - or free money floating around. An abundance of wealth so to speak. We started out - with such an abundance, that - had a capped earnings amount. Crafting in earnest - started - people made stuff - that was at the time comparable and in some cases superceded commendation gear.

 

You have to see - at that moment in time, we didn't have an abundance of 50's, with large amounts of cash coming into the system. We had - pockets of wealth (tiny wealth on the grand scheme of things - because the costs I'm seeing rise are well above what Slicing's max earnings were) - that slowly were being distributed around. This got hacked off, and the market stalled. Now, it may well pick up in future - but we've been forced into a depression - where the only option of getting out is to grind.

 

Now, I'm not going to go into your scripted bot arguement, because I genuinely believe that cheating is wrong. But I also genuinely believe that MOST people wouldn't dream of doing that. In every game, you'll get cheaters. However, in every game, you'll STILL get many more who it wouldn't occur to - to cheat. But if you have to cut off every avenue that a "cheat" can take, you're cutting off many more legitimate avenues for your average player. A case of punishing the masses for the behaviour of a few. Which - if you started getting punished for the actions of a few - you'd start being peeved off.

 

People have gone into this in more depth than I have, with better arguements, and if you're still unable to see it - you're not capable of learning or having your perspective changed.

 

One friend of mine, totally thinks the nerf was totally needed because a level 15 had 100k. End of story. While he sees all of the rest of the fallout, and says how really bad it is for everyone else, nerf totally had to happen, really hard and all the rest, because his viewpoint cannot comprehend anything beyond his own experience - and the thinking that a level 15 having 100k was totally WRONG - he feels offended by this. As a player - he played WoW since a few weeks off of it's start date. He didn't have a max level character until I literally dragged him through WoW in Cataclysm. He still doesn't have high level characters on this. You cannot explain the bigger picture because he can only see the child waving £5 and thinking that's wrong.

 

This nerf, affected more than the slicers. It crashed the whole economy. It probably will recover. However - it's forcing people away from casual if they wanted to craft. You can call my attitude BS if you wish. You can say that grinding is a good thing. At the end of the day however - slicing was - chump change. It was minimum wage. It was also the beating heart of a fledgling economy that has now tanked.

 

And on that note: I'm off to start reaping the GNT for mats to convert and vendor. I make more money doing that than slicing did pre-nerf. Cheerio.

 

 

 

+1

 

I finally found my "niche" as well, and I'm out of the hole of being broke. And I can tell you, Slicing didnt need a nerf at all. Think of it what you will; Bioware did nerf it, and from the looks of it they ain't going to put it back, even by a few % more (and good thing if I'm wrong).

 

I now make 3 times as much in the same timeframe. The only difference is that some people are still buying what I make and there isnt too much competition (won't last, but it will allow me to get by and gear my companion and I well enough, expend my inventory up to the 50k mark, and still have enough to spare).

 

On the other hand, I still have slicing level'd. Tell you what, maybe 3-6 missions are worth it now, and That's it. Out of those 6, only 2 are *really* worth doing. 2 out of about 60 possibilities... I'm going to call Slicing broke as it stands right now.

 

Good night all

-- Francois424

Edited January 6, 2012 by FrancoisTogruta

[Skuldar]

On the other hand, I still have slicing level'd. Tell you what, maybe 3-6 missions are worth it now, and That's it. Out of those 6, only 2 are *really* worth doing. 2 out of about 60 possibilities... I'm going to call Slicing broke as it stands right now.

 

Having half the people see Slicing as broken and half see it as now put in its place is part of the problem. Bioware seems incapable of just telling us what that skill is supposed to be for. I'd chalk that up to their letting us discover such things for ourselves, but that stance would argue against the huge nerf they just did after we discovered we could use Slicing to make considerable cash that made us feel rich through mid-levels (and had a side effect of stimulating the economy for all crafters).

 

Since they nerfed Slicing so hard, they obviously think those of us who consider Slicing now broken or badly damaged are wrong, but they won't just come out and tell us why we're wrong, instead leaving that to soapboxing amateur economists. They're also stone silent about the state of item crafting skills at the high end (more than likely, they'll take the lazy route and nerf rewards and commendation turn-ins, making life harder for all non-crafters).

[Treplos]

Hey guys,

 

I thought I would share my Slicing spreadsheet and data with you, after collecting a decent sample size. I went with a re-design similar to "pdxmarcos" for more efficiency (I liked the design and I hope you do not mind ), in case we wanted to compare notes.

 

 

About my Slicing spreadsheet:

 

I've included a lot of info and data calculation, and color tracking for easier viewing.

 

There are a few missions that I do not have access to (Mission shown in Red font). It seems some of the normal missions do not appear for me anymore. For those I included estimated sample for the time being for the sake of total calculations. Those are:

 

"Identify and Neutralize"

"Arranged Accidents"

"Aggressive Fundraising (165)"

"Incriminating Evidence"

"Sabotage and Repair"

"Finding our Way"

"The Azure Databanks"

 

There are Notes on each header that explain the colors, but Red font generally indicates a loss. The SORT tab has an automatically sorted list of the best missions. I've also included an automatic counter for Blue Boxes (sadly both these custom functions/macros do not work in online docs; also conditional formatting that links to other cells does not show).

 

PS: Due to certain limitations and macros unavailability in online spreadsheets, I can make my spreadsheet available for download if people are interested.

 

 

Slicing Table v1.0

 

Enjoy,

Rez

[LeperJack]

The problem about which you are complaining may not be that Slicing now brings in too little money, it may be that repair and other "credit sink" costs are too high.

Compared to what?

 

They were previously balanced around the return slicing offered (not well balanced, as you still lost money "slicing for repairs" at 50)and now that slicing has been nerfed and they are not adjusted you're unhappy?

 

If they lower those costs then the money slicing returns is once again significant and that will just make many people complain that slicing makes too much money again.

 

This would also mean the cash return at 50 is now HUGELY out of whack, as 100-150k per hour is easily obtained while goofing off. So we'll have to adjust all those down, too. And then we'll need to nerf quest rewards as well, and also rebalance all quest rewards and such between level 1 and 50.

 

Which, again, would have the net effect of making slicing as relatively profitable as it was before.

 

While we're making all these changes, manpower has to be siphoned from bugfixes , maintenance and development, meaning fewer other positive changes in the game.

 

Yeah, that sounds way smarter than just reverting the nerf.

Edited January 6, 2012 by LeperJack

[aedan]

i make anywhere from 300-500 credits from every 4 mobs i pull on Ilum and 10k a pop for daily quests, so something like 50-60k for a half hour. i make about 1000-2000 credits doing slicing missions in the same amount of time.

 

 

Fix your Shtuff

[Skuldar]

i make anywhere from 300-500 credits from every 4 mobs i pull on Ilum and 10k a pop for daily quests, so something like 50-60k for a half hour. i make about 1000-2000 credits doing slicing missions in the same amount of time.

 

Which makes Slicing mission income nearly insignificant at 50 now and entirely supplemental (10% or so of questing income per hour) prior to the nerf. Yet people screamed bloody murder about how destabilizing it was. It may have had a temporary inflationary effect while people level up, but once the bulk are at 50, it would have been harmless.

 

So Bioware blew a huge nerf on something that was inevitably going to fade as an issue because the only scalability it has is leveraging multiple companions.

[LeperJack]

Which makes Slicing mission income nearly insignificant at 50 now and entirely supplemental (10% or so of questing income per hour) prior to the nerf. Yet people screamed bloody murder about how destabilizing it was. It may have had a temporary inflationary effect while people level up, but once the bulk are at 50, it would have been harmless.

not quite.

 

"Inflation" isn't really the correct term since there were no established, semi-stable prices at the time. It allowed the economy to get a good head start towards the stabilization you'd have had at 50, and would have worked as an easy "minimum wage" mechanic that would have had the beneficial effect of actually retarding inflation later on.

 

The fact that slicing was previously only 10% of cap income at 50 meant that slicing would actually be a losing proposition for gold farmers, since you can only farm 8 characters at once.

 

Additionally, because income would have had a limited flow for many players that was still sufficient to cover "convenience" expenses, gold farmers would have been in less demand, as any player (even new ones to the game) could have easy access to what they want. People pay for convenience, and the largest portion of a large-launch MMOs audience will be casual players with disposable income.

 

Some will pay for the convenience of gold farmers if it is available whether they need to or not. The vast majority, however, will find that if they don't need to, they'll avoid the risks associated and skip it altogether.

 

With a minimal market of buyers for the gold/credits they're harvesting, combined with BW's easy access to tracking exploitative behavior, "gold farmers" are less numerous and easy to control.

[Volki]

I started a new character and picked slicing again.

 

The Tier 1 missions for lockboxes (moderate yield) that cost 95 credits give me a 2 credit profit (companion returns with 97 credits).

 

2 credits.

 

Why don't they just come into my house and slap me silly?

Edited January 6, 2012 by Volki

[Skuldar]

I started a new character and picked slicing again.

 

The Tier 1 missions for lockboxes (moderate yield) that cost 95 credits give me a 2 credit profit (companion returns with 97 credits).

 

2 credits.

 

Why don't they just come into my house and slap me silly?

 

Maybe they don't intend for Slicing lockbox missions to turn a significant profit. But if that is the case, they should explain why they even have such missions in the first place.

 

Lack of official communication is really hurting this game. A few simple clarifying statements from Bioware could reduce the complaint level by probably 40% or more.

[MnMrMustard]

Slicing is about gathering. You shouldn't lose money on the rich or bountiful missions unless you fail!

 

Slicing needs to be buffed back up, not as high as it was, or possibly even limited level capped so low and high level characters can actually use it to supplement their income.

 

That was one of the main ideas behind slicing, according to BW. Slicing was supposed to give credits (lockboxes) as well as augments, and critting cyber schematics and missions schematics.

 

Gathering skill missions used to net a profit on GNT, more than slicing did for me at lvl 400, but this tanked along with everything else on GTN.

 

"Help me BW, you're my only hope..."