Biochem is the best because it is the only profession designed competently.

[VioletZero]

Out of all the crafting professions I've leveled, Biochem was the only one that I got any sort of mileage out of.

 

I'll be one of the first people to tell you that something that I am using and sunk time into can be overpowered. Hell, I spent a hefty amount of time on my Mercenary and I can tell you that it is completely overpowered and needs a good nerfbat. (But that discussion is for another thread)

 

But Biochem is nearly perfect. While I might say that the cooldowns for med-packs and adrenals are a little too low(90 seconds? Really?), it is a great crafting skill that provides very nice perks with items that are made to be distributed. But I never really feel like I have an unfair advantage because of Biochem. And above all else, it's a very fun crafting profession. It's right where it should be.

 

If only I could say this about any other crafting skill in SWTOR. I want to see what this game has to offer in terms of crafting. And when I find out that all crafting skills but one are useless at every level, this is a huge disappointment. And not just for me.

 

The MMORPG player is used to time sinks that start out like crap but get much better later on. I can only imagine the disappointment when they spend so much time in a skill like Armormech and find that it is utterly worthless.

 

I won't tell you how to fix skills like Armormech and Synthweave that craft items that are in direct competition with Operation gear, but I will say this: Don't nerf Biochem because it is the best crafting profession. At least make an attempt to make other crafting professions worth a damn first.

 

If you feel that it is unbalanced in other respects. Like the aforementioned cooldowns being too low, then that is fine. That's a different issue from where I am standing. But as a crafting profession, Biochem is great. And it should stay that way.

Edited December 31, 2011 by VioletZero

[kainsec]

Biochem works well i would agree but it suffers from the same problem slicing did which was why it had to be nerfed (not arguing if the nerf was too much different topic no trolling). You are shooting yourself in the foot if you don't take it. What biochem does it does too well. Unfortunately the purps having the biochem requirement on them is the only thing that makes them desirable, otherwise one biochem could supply the entire server easily.

 

A soloution to the problem would be to introduce schematics from raid bosses and world bosses that make stims, medpacks, and adrenals with charges and their effects (minus adrenals obviously), magnitude (heal, power buff ect) as the final biochem only products, persist through death so it's not one and done constantly requiring you to refill and reapply after death or after time.

 

If I could get one of those with maybe 5 charges on them I would still demand them but it would feel much less mandatory if your a serious hardcore player that you have to play biochem.

[WickedDemiurge]

I'd really like to see usefulness buffs, not nerfs. Crafting should leave someone thinking, "I am so glad I decided to spend time doing this fun thing," and not, "I have to do this thing I hate," or "I'm 400/400 and I wish I had never bothered."

 

Also, any OPness Mercs have instantly goes away as soon as you get to Huttball. Hop, hop, hop, hop, hop. Best indicator you will win is a single, good level 50 sith.

[VioletZero]

I've built up some infamy for my arguments against the people saying that Slicing was fine before. So I know I'll get flack from them in this thread.

[austindavo]

Out of all the crafting professions I've leveled, Biochem was the only one that I got any sort of mileage out of.

 

I'll be one of the first people to tell you that something that I am using and sunk time into can be overpowered. Hell, I spent a hefty amount of time on my Mercenary and I can tell you that it is completely overpowered and needs a good nerfbat. (But that discussion is for another thread)

 

But Biochem is nearly perfect. While I might say that the cooldowns for med-packs and adrenals are a little too low(90 seconds? Really?), it is a great crafting skill that provides very nice perks with items that are made to be distributed. But I never really feel like I have an unfair advantage because of Biochem. And above all else, it's a very fun crafting profession. It's right where it should be.

 

If only I could say this about any other crafting skill in SWTOR. I want to see what this game has to offer in terms of crafting. And when I find out that all crafting skills but one are useless at every level, this is a huge disappointment. And not just for me.

 

 

Totally agree here. The lack of consumables or highly desirable products in the other areas limits viable end game crating to biochem.

[Aryndelin]

From what i've seen: Biochems benefit majorly from end game crafting (stims/meds always useful), cybertech is somewhat useful thanks to the reusable grenades (particularly the stun grenade) + ship mods. Other professions seem to get the shaft.

 

Ill be honest and say i dont know much about other equiptment skills than armstech so my experience stems from that.

 

Im currently at 400 armstech, during leveling the only thing i made was barrels. No snipers, no pistols etc. While it was lovely during leveling this made me realise: "why the hell do i want to spend time and effort creating weapons when i can focus on getting good barrels and simply upgrade the orange weapon i have or find?".

 

Simply put: armstech was, until i hit skill 400, useful for one thing only: Barrels. You go through content too fast to be able to dabble into something else (and frankly barrells is too good not to craft while leveling).

 

Now for the end game: I have fearful feelings armstech will be utterly redudant at this stage. The orange gear is worse than a upgraded old blaster with the lvl 49 epic barrell. The same goes to the "blue" gear. And the barrel itself is about 100-200 points of damage (according to torhead so take it with a pinch of salt) lower than Hardmode FP or operation gear.

 

Wether armstech is saved by the RE discovered stage 2 epic recipies remains to be seen. (and something im checking out atm) Also there is no recipies datamined (pinch of salt again!) for armstech, while i saw loads for cybertech/biochem (which are actually useful).

If there is no raid/hardmode FP recipies for armstech and if the stage 2 RE schematics of blasters are worse than FP HM/raid gear (of course crafting maths for these gotta be raided for ) then armstech is utterly useless. (And obviously ill go bio right away ).

 

That said, my fear is simply "how useful is EQUIPTMENT based crafting skills (armstech, armortech, synth, artifice.) " at lvl 50?

 

Take a look at cybertech and you wonder "why didnt they distribute the mods crafting over several skills rather than so many in one?". Cybertechs benefit from underworld trading which can discover orange schematics, not direct benefit but a indirect one.

 

Again, crafting seems poorly thought through, extremely poorly balanced.

2 skills stands above the rest, with 1 being the obvious raider choice. (pvp'rs will probably take cybertech for the grenades ).

 

Biochemistry, as the OP said, seems nicely done and having looked at datamined recipies it gets better. I wouldnt want this nerfed/changed. im happy with this skill (even if i dont ahve it) since it works well.

Sadly the same cant be said about other skills and i sincerely hope i prove myself wrong when exploring crafting the comming week. If not, ill give bioware an earfull.

 

Ugh long post, but im glad its out of my system

[VioletZero]

While Cybertech does indeed put itself above most of the other crafting professions as having SOME sort of benefit to it, I still feel that it is on the underpowered side.

 

It's not worth the time and effort it takes to get to 400/400.

Edited December 31, 2011 by VioletZero

[Randomness]

Wait, cybertech DOES get reusable grenades?

 

I'd about given up hope upon not being able to RE the basic ones (despite them saying "right click to RE")

 

Edit: Upon research, it looks like the reusables... are level 50 only? How does that make sense? (As in, shouldn't there be lower level ones - the same as biochem?)

Edited December 31, 2011 by Randomness

[Aryndelin]

While Cybertech does indeed put itself above most of the other crafting professions as having SOME sort of benefit to it, I still feel that it is on the underpowered side.

 

It's not worth the time and effort it takes to get to 400/400.

 

well i said "it put itself above others but below biochem" since it does have some uses at lvl 50. Granted it doesnt compare to biochem

 

ill also correct myself, barrell lvl 49 epic gives: 336-448 damage range, the epic sniper i saw gives about 505 top if i recall right. Thats not that bad (granted stats on epic was alot higher). Again ill give armstech a good try and check out RE recipies and such and report back.

Edited December 31, 2011 by Aryndelin

[Angelsix]

OK, so if Biochem is the best profession, what is best to go with it? Bioanalysis, to keep finding stuff while questing? Diplomacy, to get stuff, a bit expensively to Biochem with (including needed purple materials)? Slicing, to get stuff to sell?

[VioletZero]

Wait, cybertech DOES get reusable grenades?

 

I'd about given up hope upon not being able to RE the basic ones (despite them saying "right click to RE")

 

Edit: Upon research, it looks like the reusables... are level 50 only? How does that make sense? (As in, shouldn't there be lower level ones - the same as biochem?)

 

>_>

 

That's a very good question. Why not have reuseables at lower levels like Biochem?

 

Anyway, the only reason I say that you need Biochem is because it is the only profession worth a damn.

 

See, Biochem was designed in a way that not only provides very nice rewards to the crafters themselves, but also makes it a very good investment to buy because of the prototype stims that persist after death.

 

So you don't need it. All you need is a good guild crafter or luck on the AH. And you'll be more confident to use the stims because of how safe they are.

 

This was a brilliantly designed crafting system and it would pain me to see it nerfed to the same useless level as other crafting skills.

Edited December 31, 2011 by VioletZero

[bobo_fett]

OK, so if Biochem is the best profession, what is best to go with it? Bioanalysis, to keep finding stuff while questing? Diplomacy, to get stuff, a bit expensively to Biochem with (including needed purple materials)? Slicing, to get stuff to sell?

 

Slicing seems to work for a BH, you just have to play the market

[JediEwokFluff]

But Biochem is nearly perfect. While I might say that the cooldowns for med-packs and adrenals are a little too low(90 seconds? Really?)

 

Ssshhhhhhh...

[VioletZero]

Ssshhhhhhh...

 

I kind of felt that the medpacks were a little cheesy in terms of balance. They really should just be "That extra boost you need at that special moment" and not "Something I use every once in a while.

[Morticoccus]

So once you got your victory by complaining that slicing was OP you've now moved on to whining about the next useable crafting skill?

 

Clearly biochem and Cybertech should be nerfed because they provide advantages that NOONE else can take (and here's that magic sentence again) unless they pick the skill.

 

You hear that bioware? "Unless they pick the skill"

 

Let's take the other one too, it's like an incantation after all, need all the parts: "Anyone that picks any other skill would be an idiot"

 

There, now if you only repeat those two sentences in enough posts we will have a nerf in two weeks or so.

 

Instead of actually focusing on the bigger problem that is "Why the other crafting skills are useless" And I really do mean "bigger". For bioware to do anything about *that* they'd have to actually put some work in and tweak the equipment available throughout the game, and as we all know they don't have *nearly* enough resources to do that.

 

Because that would, you know, cost money and take time. Instead of adding +60 secs of CD and -500 to 15000 healing to all medkits so they can no longer be used when soloing and reducing buffs from stims so they do nothing visible unless you condense the battle damage to a spreadsheet and run comparisons.

 

Basically you want them to take a sledgehammer and beat down all crafting skills to the same level of uselessness instead of fixing the majority that's broke.

[VioletZero]

So once you got your victory by complaining that slicing was OP you've now moved on to whining about the next useable crafting skill?

 

Clearly biochem and Cybertech should be nerfed because they provide advantages that NOONE else can take (and here's that magic sentence again) unless they pick the skill.

 

You hear that bioware? "Unless they pick the skill"

 

Let's take the other one too, it's like an incantation after all, need all the parts: "Anyone that picks any other skill would be an idiot"

 

There, now if you only repeat those two sentences in enough posts we will have a nerf in two weeks or so.

 

Instead of actually focusing on the bigger problem that is "Why the other crafting skills are useless" And I really do mean "bigger". For bioware to do anything about *that* they'd have to actually put some work in and tweak the equipment available throughout the game, and as we all know they don't have *nearly* enough resources to do that.

 

Because that would, you know, cost money and take time. Instead of adding +60 secs of CD and -500 to 15000 healing to all medkits so they can no longer be used when soloing and reducing buffs from stims so they do nothing visible unless you condense the battle damage to a spreadsheet and run comparisons.

 

Basically you want them to take a sledgehammer and beat down all crafting skills to the same level of uselessness instead of fixing the majority that's broke.

 

Who are you talking to?

[IcyMind]

As a BioChem, I am having a hard time selling stuff in the market. I might try pursuing specific people that are looking for missions, but I don't want to spam and whisper all the time.

[VioletZero]

As a BioChem, I am having a hard time selling stuff in the market. I might try pursuing specific people that are looking for missions, but I don't want to spam and whisper all the time.

 

It's because the market is underdeveloped.

 

Trust me, the min maxers will be happy to either buy blue stims from you.

Edited December 31, 2011 by VioletZero

[Morticoccus]

Who are you talking to?

 

The forum in general.

 

The solution to an imbalanced crafting system is not to apply nerfs to the skills that do give advantages, it is to buff the other skills so they give equivalent advantages.

 

There are only two problems with this: First, doing any sort of editing to the armor and weapon crafting professions require exponentially more work, as they would have to rebalance armor stats, and possibly even create new art and models for new armor and weapons. Generally gaming companies shy away from this because of the work involved, the cost, and the possible negative outcries from people that liked how it was before. Generally people whine more about bad buffs than bad nerfs, because the forums have a habit of stepping on nerf complainers.

 

Second is the entire problem with gaming companies and individual players being on different scales.

 

An individual player that is displeased with his gaming experience matters very little to a corporation of scale, before they will take any action at all this singular player would have to have the support of thousands, even millions of like minded individuals. And when that happens, the reaction is generally too strong instead.

 

One metaphor would be to ask a thunderstorm to light your torch, if it obliges everything around the area will be feeling it too, including you.

[Karthaugh]

I partially agree with this, although personally I prefer cybertech because I find the extra CC incredibly useful in pvp. I think as it stands right now the only 2 useful professions are Biochem and Cybertech(more for pvp purposes for me). all the others are glorified fasion lockers.

[Aryndelin]

So once you got your victory by complaining that slicing was OP you've now moved on to whining about the next useable crafting skill?

 

Clearly biochem and Cybertech should be nerfed because they provide advantages that NOONE else can take (and here's that magic sentence again) unless they pick the skill.

 

You hear that bioware? "Unless they pick the skill"

 

Let's take the other one too, it's like an incantation after all, need all the parts: "Anyone that picks any other skill would be an idiot"

 

There, now if you only repeat those two sentences in enough posts we will have a nerf in two weeks or so.

 

Instead of actually focusing on the bigger problem that is "Why the other crafting skills are useless" And I really do mean "bigger". For bioware to do anything about *that* they'd have to actually put some work in and tweak the equipment available throughout the game, and as we all know they don't have *nearly* enough resources to do that.

 

Because that would, you know, cost money and take time. Instead of adding +60 secs of CD and -500 to 15000 healing to all medkits so they can no longer be used when soloing and reducing buffs from stims so they do nothing visible unless you condense the battle damage to a spreadsheet and run comparisons.

 

Basically you want them to take a sledgehammer and beat down all crafting skills to the same level of uselessness instead of fixing the majority that's broke.

 

if you actually read the OP's post, you'd understand she/he wanted the other crafting based crew skilled brought up on par with cybertech and biochemistry.

There was never talk about nerfing, there was talk about balancing.

 

Armstech: Barrels, blasters.

 

Cybertech: Mods, armoring, speeders, droid parts, space ship parts, reusable STUN grenades (and other types of grenades), ear items.

(worthy note: underworld trading that goes with cybertech is th eonly mission skill that gives orange item schematics.)

 

biochemistry: stims (both long term buff and short duration boost) med packs, implants, reusable med packs and stims.

 

Armormech: heavy/medium armor

 

Synthweaving: light armor

 

Artifice: Crystals for blasters and sabers, Enhancement mods, lightsaber hilts, shield generator.

 

I doubt you can come and tell me that crafting is "balanced" after that list.

 

Again, there's no crying for nerfing, we're asking for crafting crew skill BALANCE.

Oh did i mention that armstech cant discover above green quality recipies for vibro knifes (and i think vibro weapons in general) at all? there's no RE schematics for them.

 

Biochem is BALANCED. its smack where crafting should be.

Cybertech get too much goodies (no idea what armoring does in this skill, it should be armormech/synthweaving).

The rest is just useless unless you raid and the raid schematics are useful. Even then they do NOT get reusable items (grenades, stim, meds etc) or anything similar.

 

Hope that clarify what we're on about.

[Morticoccus]

Well I agree with you, if you'd bothered to read my second post you'd see that that is exactly what I am saying.

 

The only problem is that once people win their first victory in a game like this, they will try to get repeat results. Whine more about more crew skills, classes, abilities, difficulty.

 

And if Bioware continues to listen, pretty soon we'll be back to WoW standards.

 

That is why I get a little paranoid, if not scared.

[Hedgeknight]

I'd argue that biochem is the only crafting skill that's truly useful at endgame. As a biochem, you get stims better than can be bought at any vendor. And since you can craft reusable stims, you never will have to sink money or time into collecting resources to use them.

 

Except for Cybertech reusable grenades, pretty much all of the other crafting skills are devalued by alternate means to get the same or better items via other methods:

 

Ilum dailies give armor and barrels that are one rank higher than can be crafted by players as well as implants and earpieces that I think are two ranks higher than biochem or cybertech can craft.

 

The Belsavis heroic dailies give armor, mod and enhancement slot items at the same rank as the best payer crafted stuff and some of them have stats unavailable to player crafters (i.e. tanking stats)

 

Running heroic flashpoints or pvp will get you better weapons and armor than players can craft. In one week of pvp, thanks to some luck with champion bags, I got a pistol and boots that were a couple of tiers higher than the best armor/armstech items.

 

BW should really come out and address their intentions with this system because right now, I'm not seeing much incentive to do anything but drop my current crew skills and level up biochem instead.

[Morticoccus]

Well, the one thing I can certainly say is that out of all the professions, biochem and its gathering/mission skills is the most fun one to level up.

 

The materials are plentiful, the missions actually have an impact on other parts of the game (They give dark/light side points) and you actually craft items that you can, and even desire to, use in your everyday questing.

 

It never feels like a chore.

 

And that is why I do not want this skill to be nerfed into the ground like slicing was.

[VioletZero]

Well, the one thing I can certainly say is that out of all the professions, biochem and its gathering/mission skills is the most fun one to level up.

 

The materials are plentiful, the missions actually have an impact on other parts of the game (They give dark/light side points) and you actually craft items that you can, and even desire to, use in your everyday questing.

 

It never feels like a chore.

 

And that is why I do not want this skill to be nerfed into the ground like slicing was.

 

Much in agreement here.

 

Biochem is a lot of fun to level up.

 

The only grievance I have is that Diplomacy isn't a great mission skill. It never yields anything other than materials and alignment points. And the alignment points in itself can be a problem because it cuts your options in half and sometimes doesn't even give you the options you need with the right alignment.

 

But that's a very very small grievance compared to how helpful and fun Biochem is.

 

And while I will say that Slicing WAS overpowered and needed to be nerfed(for a variety of reasons), I don't agree with making it useless.