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Slicing Lockbox Changes Intended?


lull

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UPDATE:

The response below was received.

Hey all, thank you for reports into this issue. We escalated this to the development team and after investigation, got confirmation that this was a bug.

 

It's being worked on now and a fix should be rolled out in a future patch. In the meantime, it'll be added to our known issues list.

 

It appears that slicing lockbox mission returns may have been significantly reduced. Is this intended?

 

I'm not trying to start another debate about the returns. I'm only trying to determine if these changes are intended. If so, may we have some additional information regarding the extent of the changes and the reasoning behind them? Were returns lowered in general or maximum and minimum changed to increase the spread, etc.

 

I track my mission returns (not just for slicing) and while I've only received results for a few missions since the 1.2 patch they have all been the lowest I've ever seen without a failure. Some of my sample sizes for individual missions are in excess of 100. I've seen the drop in missions in multiple tiers. As an example, Finding Our Way costs 1,930 credits, since 1.2 I've gotten returns of 1063, 1071, and 719. Prior to 1.2 my lowest return was 1440. Across my samples (again in excess of 100 for this particular mission) I only have a few less than 1600 and those are all pretty old.

Edited by lull
Update to include response from StephenReid.
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I'd like to know this as well.. there's no mention of this change in the patch notes and I can't imagine this was intended, unless it's some form of punishment.

 

Rich Yield: Class 5 Lockbox mission costs 2025cr - returns Jeweled Medium Credit Box with 659cr

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On the PTS I tracked 100 slicing missions and found that Moderate was your best bet if you wanted credits.

 

Rich was in general a loss unless it was a critical success and then there was a larger return, it also in my small sample size, 100 missions, had a higher chance to crit for schematics.

 

Try running the moderate missions and see if you are getting better results for credits.

Rich over time will give you better criticals but if it doesn't crit will return for a sizable loss.

 

In my limited testing Abundant had a slight positive return and Bountiful had a large negative return.

 

Alodar :)

Edited by Alodar
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So what is the purpose of slicing missions now? Just for fast skilling up? Can skill up fast enough on world lockboxes.

 

Running a rich scavenging mission for 2025 credits will yield materials worth 12,800 credits.

Edited by Hajizan
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And this is what happens when they publish incomplete patch notes along with not allowing all players to participate in PTS testing, that is we get changes that aren't documented and are unexpected, and whether intentional or not, never have a chance to provide feedback or get clarification before they go live.

 

I'll adapt, but the piss poor communication with this patch coupled with the inability to copy over characters to test all aspects leaves me scratching my head and saying 'W T F Bioware'.

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And this is what happens when they publish incomplete patch notes along with not allowing all players to participate in PTS testing, that is we get changes that aren't documented and are unexpected, and whether intentional or not, never have a chance to provide feedback or get clarification before they go live.

 

 

All players were allowed to participate in PTS testing.

I levelled a Guardian to 23rd level, and chose to test slicing because I figured most folks would be testing crafting.

 

There was nothing stopping you from doing the same.

 

 

Alodar :)

Edited by Alodar
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All players were allowed to participate in PTS testing.

I levelled a Guardian to 23rd level, and chose to test slicing because I figured most folks would be testing crafting.

 

There was nothing stopping you from doing the same.

 

 

Alodar :)

 

Umm..yes there was something stopping me, the lack of a copy character function as most of the changes I wanted to test were for level capped actives or level capped crew skills.

 

And repeating the drivel Bioware has spewed along the lines of "You could have leveled to 50, geared up, leveled all your trade skills, and relearned all your rare / RE schematics and tested too" is a crock of you know what.

 

So let's stop being disingenuous. Stuff wasn't tested as thoroughly as possible as no sane person was going to re-level on the PTS and only a small handful got copied correctly.

 

Even Bioware has admitted their test process leaves a lot to be desired and that they want to have the ability to do character copies.

 

But wanting something and actually doing something about it are two different things, so we'll just have to wait and see if they actually step up and deliver in the future.

Edited by DawnAskham
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Umm..yes there was something stopping me, the lack of a copy character function as most of the changes I wanted to test were for level capped actives or level capped crew skills.

 

And repeating the drivel Bioware has spewed along the lines of "You could have leveled to 50, geared up, leveled all your trade skills, and relearned all your rare / RE schematics and tested too" is a crock of you know what.

 

 

You chose not to test.

You don't need to level up to 50 to test crew skills, you just need to be willing to put in the effort.

You weren't willing to put in the effort test.

Which is absolutely fine, you don't have to test if you don't want to.

But choosing not to test is a you issue, not a BioWare issue.

 

 

Alodar :)

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On the PTS I tracked 100 slicing missions and found that Moderate was your best bet if you wanted credits.

 

Rich was in general a loss unless it was a critical success and then there was a larger return, it also in my small sample size, 100 missions, had a higher chance to crit for schematics.

 

Try running the moderate missions and see if you are getting better results for credits.

Rich over time will give you better criticals but if it doesn't crit will return for a sizable loss.

 

In my limited testing Abundant had a slight positive return and Bountiful had a large negative return.

 

Alodar :)

 

I've run a few more missions (almost exclusively moderate or abundant) and these seem to be either unchanged from prior to 1.2 or showing slightly increased returns. Unfortunately, my sample size for moderate and abundant yield slicing lockbox missions is quite low.

 

Your comments regarding Rich missions almost describe the way it was prior to 1.2 generally speaking and based on my experiences. These missions (rich and bountiful yield) would be negative or offer very small profits. The crits were what kept them profitable.

 

Since patch 1.2, the low end on these missions seems to have dropped considerably. Based on the level of loss I was seeing, I don't really want to just take my chances that after several tries I'll get a crit that will bring my average profit into positive territory. I'm skeptical that would even happen considering the apparent changes as they would have had to increased the crit yield significantly to make up for the scale of losses I have noted.

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You chose not to test.

You don't need to level up to 50 to test crew skills, you just need to be willing to put in the effort.

You weren't willing to put in the effort test.

Which is absolutely fine, you don't have to test if you don't want to.

But choosing not to test is a you issue, not a BioWare issue.

 

 

Alodar :)

 

Shhhh you are off topic.

 

Stealth nerf or no is the topic please go back to it.

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I've run a few more missions (almost exclusively moderate or abundant) and these seem to be either unchanged from prior to 1.2 or showing slightly increased returns. Unfortunately, my sample size for moderate and abundant yield slicing lockbox missions is quite low.

 

Your comments regarding Rich missions almost describe the way it was prior to 1.2 generally speaking and based on my experiences. These missions (rich and bountiful yield) would be negative or offer very small profits. The crits were what kept them profitable.

 

Since patch 1.2, the low end on these missions seems to have dropped considerably. Based on the level of loss I was seeing, I don't really want to just take my chances that after several tries I'll get a crit that will bring my average profit into positive territory. I'm skeptical that would even happen considering the apparent changes as they would have had to increased the crit yield significantly to make up for the scale of losses I have noted.

 

The Rich Critical Missions I acheived on the PTS, for I believe level 2 and 3 missions, were large. There were no level 4 Rich LockBox missions on PTS if memory serves.

Rich Criticals were often in excess of 5,000 credits and sometimes a couple of crafting missions thrown in. (My testing spreadsheet is on my home computer so I don't currently have access to it and am going by my own faulty memory.)

I haven't had the opportunity to test since this has gone live and I only got to test up to Bountiful level 5 missions due to limited play time on PTS.

 

 

Alodar :)

Edited by Alodar
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Mission rewards for slicing are definately down on what they were. Pre 1.2 i would get at least a similar return on cost most of the time, now its around 40% less each mission.

 

If missions are not even at least cost effective, it does make it a bit worthless.

 

I hope that BW can confirm this one way or another and i hope it is just a glitch, not intended.

 

Edit: Just got 855 credits from a "Finding Our Way" (1,925 cost) mission...that is just out of order. Even the medium and abundant yield missions are not working.

Before the patch i was getting more than the cost of "Finding Our Way" 9/10 times (even if only by 100 credits).

Edited by Ferretfur
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Umm..yes there was something stopping me, the lack of a copy character function as most of the changes I wanted to test were for level capped actives or level capped crew skills.

 

And repeating the drivel Bioware has spewed along the lines of "You could have leveled to 50, geared up, leveled all your trade skills, and relearned all your rare / RE schematics and tested too" is a crock of you know what.

 

So let's stop being disingenuous. Stuff wasn't tested as thoroughly as possible as no sane person was going to re-level on the PTS and only a small handful got copied correctly.

 

No doubt the inability to copy characters over did stop a lot of stuff from being tested as well as it could have. I know I didn't test the legacy system at all due to it.

 

The slicing changes, however, were tested. I myself did notice the rewards had been trashed, filed a bug report on it, and started a thread in the PTS forums about it, that included examples of the reward difference for T4 bountiful missions.

 

Of course, nothing got changed due to the feedback, because BioWare has their super secret info and plan and doesn't care what we think. Nor can they be bothered to put something major like "oh, we trashed what you get from lockboxes" in their patch notes under slicing.

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I can also report that after a few hours of slicing today on 3 companions, rich rewards (at least on the 2nd to last tier) are now giving a little under half (1000 credits, Give or take 100 credits) the cost to run a mission unless you crit, compared to pre-1.2

 

The one time I critted within that period yielded about what I'd usually see as the lowest crit reward for that tier (about 5000 credits. Prior I'd seen 5000-8000 credits)

 

That's a bit insane. Even if this was the case on PTS, that's a big enough change that it shouldn't be an unlisted change. Can we get confirmation that this is WAI?

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Its a plot, they nerfed the returns because people will complain about us Setting the market price on the augment components, while we lose our wallets trying to get the stuff. Personally it will be a major loss for me because all schematics will be used by alts and Guildies but they will at least help offset the costs. Then again, the sliced parts missions are double the cost and time as the same tier lockbox missions. Edited by GFLKrazyKat
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Can anyone confirm that augment missions reward mission discoveries?

 

This is mostly what I wanted slicing for, and if I can't cover the cost of the missions with lockboxes, maybe I can sell the augment components to recoup the expense...

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^ this. Plus, 1.2 made the augment missions a little different now and more worth it.

 

Comments like this are off topic. The point of this thread is to understand if these changes were intended as there was no mention in the patch notes and, if they were, to understand the reason behind the changes. I do not want this thread to become derailed by debate over how one believes the skill is intended to be used or the new augment missions.

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You chose not to test.

You don't need to level up to 50 to test crew skills, you just need to be willing to put in the effort.

You weren't willing to put in the effort test.

Which is absolutely fine, you don't have to test if you don't want to.

But choosing not to test is a you issue, not a BioWare issue.

 

 

Alodar :)

 

sorry your wrong testing the new material IS A BIOWARE ISSUE.

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I run rich and bountiful missions to get blue lockboxes and a crafting mission which is in turn used on my other toons for their selected crafting skill to get blue/purple mats. That being said though even blue critical lockboxes that i've opened have 785, 926, or something of the like. The return for what you sink into it, is disappointing and not worth it. There is either a bug because of the 1.2 patch or a ninja nerf or it was changed to now be more based off of companion affection. Edited by xeraphyne
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The returns on the grade 5 rich lockbox missions are SUBSTIANTIALLY lower in 1.2. I am not sure if the remaining missions this way, but that stinks if true. Running the missions as it was previously designed would not make you rich, but would just be above breaking even. Now this appears to not be the case.
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