As some of you may have already noticed from our patch notes for Game Update 1.1, we’ve made adjustments to several high-end, purple, player crafted items on the BioChem and Cybertech professions. Simply put, we reduced their overall impact on gameplay and I wanted to explain why it was necessary.

 

 

BioChem crafted medical kits were too good. In fact, they were too good both in the amount of healing they provided (often more than half a character’s health) and the frequency they could be used (every 90 seconds!). This was negatively impacting the game for everyone else. We’ve seen significant chatter both in and out of game about how players not picking up the BioChem professions would be ‘stupid’ and ‘gimping themselves’. This indicates that a small number of competitive players have been denying access to high end content based on whether a player has the BioChem Crew Skill.

 

 

Cybertech grenades, especially when stacked with additional power-ups and other temporary buffs, were creating combat damage burst potential higher than we were comfortable with and caused player versus player engagements in the game to resolve faster than intended. In fact we have additional changes to classes and consumables currently in internal testing to deal with faster than anticipated kill times in player versus player combat in a future patch.

 

 

 

The design intent for the game is that your choice of crafting profession should not become a requirement or ‘gating’ mechanism for participating in competitive content (PvP) and high end endgame challenges. While we certainly want players that engage in the crafting game to reap rewards for their effort, we don’t want one or two crafting professions to become the de facto ‘must have’ choice for everyone, which is what happened here.

 

 

We are extremely careful with this type of change, and understand that it can be frustrating for our players when we make them. Please understand, we make these changes not because we like to mess with your character, but because they are required to ensure a level and fun playing field for all players of the game.

 

At the same time, we understand that people that changed their profession because of the events described above will likely be unhappy about these changes – and while it’s easy to say ‘that’s how it goes in MMOs’, making modifications like this is something we’re always cautious about doing. At the same time, both player feedback and the data gathered from hundreds of servers made it very clear that this issue needed to be dealt with decisively now with only a small minority of players at endgame level and the vast majority of our characters in their 20s to minimize the number of affected players.

 

 

TL;DR: Fancy words for ‘we nerfed BioChem and Cybertech endgame products’ because they were so good that players started considering them mandatory. Your choice of profession is not supposed to be the deciding factor for participation and success in endgame content. We still believe that BioChem and Cybertech are very worthwhile Crew Skills, especially considering the significant fortune players with these professions are able to realize on the GTN... they are however no longer the ‘golden ticket’ into endgame content.

 

Oh gee thanks George

 

FOR YET NERFING SOMETHING ELSE! Why don't you people worry about people's fp's in the game and how they are unable to play. But I guess skill nerfing takes a higher precedence....

 

Thanks again for NOTHING...

 

My advice, imho, to you, is to go back to making single player games like KOTOR because OBVIOUSLY you have no clue as to what you're doing here. Because of all of this nonsense, I've cancelled my sub - I just can't take the apathy any longer...

Edited January 13, 2012 by DarthSublimitas

My suggestion to the community is this, if you find any more glitches, xploits, etc... keep them to yourselves and use them to the max. At the rate that we're being nerfed and sequestered, we'll be lucky we can make enough money for lunch tomorrow...

Listening to your customers is great, but I hope you realize that the people on the forums aren't in the majority. They're the very vocal minority. I don't even have a Biochemist, but I can say that "nerfing" the high end medpacs and such is silly, for the simple reason that they don't scale with your character. I'll also mention, even if they are nerfed, it will continue to be the best profession until you give the other professions something meaningful to use.

Then why do you add such perks to some professions? Items players craft should never be "Binds on Pickup", but instead something you trade with other players. You would save yourself from lot of hassle if everyone had access to these same items via trading.

 

because these people, to quote Kreia, "are a bunch of imbeciles and fools whose only direction is pointed downward."

 

Why don't you just dump the game in the garbage because that's the dirction it's going...

Edited January 13, 2012 by Notannos
language

Not sure what you think is going to happen when you force people to have Biochem as a mandate now to use these. Most people will just switch back, so where there was some crafting diversity there is now less. Really need the head crafting guy to go into some massive in-depth overhaul mode for the entire system. Ive a few ideas that some will like, some wont.

 

1) Commendations give rewards that are far too good. Both from daily reward vendors and as people progress leveling up. Rewards from these merchants should not be equal to prototype player made. If the same gear is to be used on these vendors, it should be the green quality gear. The cost of missions in time/credits to craft green, RE for blue, and then to craft a blue is grossly out of line with the cheap cost and insane ease of obtaining commendation items.

 

2) Infinite use clickies for any crafter should not be. Infinite use items that are ONLY for a given crafter are even worse. Crafting perks should be along the lines of a 10-15% boost in item crafted, or 2x the amount of use. Making an item that lasts forever, does not remove credits from the system once a crafter has it. That is what consumables are supposed to do.

 

3) Weapon/Armor making classes need to be revamped. All crafted gear should be orange. Orange gear should then have the option to have 1/2/3 augments on top of the mod slots. Augs/mods will likely need to be adjusted to prevent players being vastly stronger than mobs at a given level. Cooler looking armor should of course, be higher level requirement(can also increase the chance of RE success as it goes higher and is more expensive)

 

4) Crafting consumables should not require raid drops. Crafted consumables should come in decent sized batches. These are for use, not for rare/lucky events. In the case of biochem, raid drop requirement makes more sense in the implant line.

 

5) All crafting classes should have a desirable consumable that only they can craft. This item should be useful for pvp/raids. This item should be useable by others. Biochem, by its nature, should produce more variety and have more unlinked CDs on these than other crafting classes.

I find it hilarious that in the first month after the game is released the three most popular crafting proffesions got hit with the nerf bat.

 

The other proffessions are in need of some buffs, no question there, but nerfing the ones that actually work is a bad idea.

 

In Boss fights I don't generally get to use my med packs more than once, sometimes twice if it goes on a long time. What are the timers on my med packs gonna look like now? I only use them for o **** moments, if they heal less than half my health will they even be useful? The sad thing is even with these nerfs Biochem will still be OP compared to the other crafting professions.

Thank you for this change, it was long overdue.

 

These professions were VASTLY better than the others. BioChem had a huge game impact, and was well on the way to being a qualifier for top tier content.

 

Each crafting profession should provide roughly equivalent benefit and these two were way out of line with the others.

 

Also thank you for taking the time to write out your reasons (something that was lacking when the Slicing changes happened).

Theses changes to Biochem are minimal and do not bring it in line with other crafting professions as they currently stand. If your intention was to make it non-mandatory to have, I'm afraid you missed the mark. At max level it is still easily way more usful than all of the other tradeskills combined.

Thank you for this change, it was long overdue.

 

These professions were VASTLY better than the others. BioChem had a huge game impact, and was well on the way to being a qualifier for top tier content.

 

So you think that trading a HoT for an hp increase buff on the medpack reduces the appeal of Biochem? They're still infinitely reusable.

It is nice to see that this was such a massive issue yet being stunlocked and 2 shot by IA/Smugglers is months off from being dealt with Edited January 13, 2012 by Suba

Solution to this problem is to buff other crafts.

 

Artifice = Ability to create BOP Hilts/Crystals that grant some form of unique proc, i.e. x damage on hit, abs shield on hit, etc.

 

Synthweave = Ability to BoP Modable armor with some form of unique property as above with Artifice where armor created has an additional slot or something that can have some form of synthweave only mod, similar to the listed above for Artifice.

 

Armormech = See Synthweave paragraph above.

 

BW does need to buff the other crafts to bring them more in line with Biochem, I hit 400 last night and do not have any of the 400 stuff yet.

Since you are addressing Cybertech in patch 1.1, could we possibly get some feedback on the missing Cybertech schematics which are currently on the ARTIFICE trainer?

 

A number of high level Mods are being shown as trainable on the Artifice trainer, and are missing from the Cybertech trainer. Players with either Crew Skill are unable to learn these schematics.

 

While you are addressing Cybertech in 1.1, perhaps you can move these schematics to the correct trainer at the same time?

We plan to give all crafting and gathering professions additional and ongoing attention, yes.

 

It's important to remember that we launched not a month ago - we're in for the long haul. Crafting is an important part of the game and we have plans for it

 

Is this a joke?

 

Your solution to Biochem being FAR AND AWAY the best profession is to nerf cybertech?

 

come on, crazy

 

I plan to drop artificing after I make some 50 enhancements (since they're boe anyway!) so that I can switch to Biotech, which is the only profession that gives a player of that profession a meaningful advantage over players without a profession at all. Cybertech's grenades were the only thing that was meaningfully better than what other professions had access to =|

Yes, I think it well lessen the appeal.

 

You're not seeing the biggest change, which is making it so you had to keep Biochem in order to use. Before you could drop the tradeskill after crafting and still get use out of the BOP items.

 

This, I believe, is a decent first step to. Maybe not all that is needed, maybe they are buffing the other skills 1n 1.2, but this is a great first step.

 

So you think that trading a HoT for an hp increase buff on the medpack reduces the appeal of Biochem? They're still infinitely reusable.

Give artificers the ability to make any (even rares) colour crystal for their weapon (only their weapons).

 

Give them a special recipe that makes their own crystal/hilt slightly better than the best one they can make for others.

 

That would go a little way to making artificing more interesting than biochem at level 50.

Edited January 13, 2012 by Selestian

You're not seeing the biggest change, which is making it so you had to keep Biochem in order to use. Before you could drop the tradeskill after crafting and still get use out of the BOP items.

 

This, I believe, is a decent first step to. Maybe not all that is needed, maybe they are buffing the other skills 1n 1.2, but this is a great first step.

 

So now, instead of getting biochem to 400 and then going to another crew skill, people will just stay as biochem. I'm not sure that really counts as "lessening the appeal of Biochem"

 

 

 

TL;DR: Fancy words for ‘we nerfed BioChem and Cybertech endgame products’ because they were so good that players started considering them mandatory.

 

 

 

TLDR from a dev. I got a chuckle out of it. I am not max level or do i PVP much so i wasnt realling seeing a problem so its a wash for me. even though i happened to pick biochem and cyber tech on my two characters i play.

 

Th elittel information i read was the problem of how buffs stack more than anything else but whatever.

As a biochem im really not complaining in the slightest, but is it just me or is this only going to make things worse not better? Best case scenario it hasnt changed a thing.

 

Its especially funny that the main goal was to make it so that biochem didnt seem like a mandatory crew skill, when thats essentially what they did - make it mandatory.

Edited January 13, 2012 by drosalion

Well boyos, just face it, this game is going down the toilet like everything else that EA, i.e., "The Kiss of Death" has touched. I suggest just get out while you can...

Solution to this problem is to buff other crafts.

 

Artifice = Ability to create BOP Hilts/Crystals that grant some form of unique proc, i.e. x damage on hit, abs shield on hit, etc.

 

Synthweave = Ability to BoP Modable armor with some form of unique property as above with Artifice where armor created has an additional slot or something that can have some form of synthweave only mod, similar to the listed above for Artifice.

 

Armormech = See Synthweave paragraph above.

 

BW does need to buff the other crafts to bring them more in line with Biochem, I hit 400 last night and do not have any of the 400 stuff yet.

 

Think these are really good ideas. However, I might do away with the Synthweave/Armormech required mod slots. Take the Armoring mods away from Cybertech and give them to Synthweaving/Armormech as appropriate. Leave Cybertech with *all* Mods (including the bugged ones on Artifice).

 

Then give all the crafting skills BoP/crafting skill required schematics for the mods that they make.

Edited January 13, 2012 by trotsky_tor

Yes, I think it well lessen the appeal.

 

You're not seeing the biggest change, which is making it so you had to keep Biochem in order to use. Before you could drop the tradeskill after crafting and still get use out of the BOP items.

 

This, I believe, is a decent first step to. Maybe not all that is needed, maybe they are buffing the other skills 1n 1.2, but this is a great first step.

 

This is incorrect. There was always a biochem requirement to use the high end items everyone had their eye on. It just used to be lower.

 

Nothing really changed that is going to make this crew skill less appealing. End game, it is still the absolute best crew skill to have hands down, beating all the other tradeskills in usefulness combined.

But the cooldown on grenades is still 5 minutes?

 

We've been saying on the forums that it is far too long. If you are reducing the damage anyway, how about balancing them around a shorter cooldown, as well?

 

We currently cannot reverse engineer grenades, even though the UI lets us try. Is the bug that they show up as RE-able, or that doing it doesn't work?

 

What about the other crew skills? I think the key problem is that with the exception of Biochem and Cybertech, they don't offer anything that can't be achieved through other means. People want something unique from their crew skills; something that makes them say, "Yeah, I get to use this because I've got X skill!" and consumables are a good way to do that because there are many ways to get equipment.

 

It would be nice to see for example that those who take synthweaving can wear better armor(or get a boost to their armor) than anyone else and those that take armstech could use more powerful weapons then anyone else.. Just saying. It shouldn't just be about crafting but about also knowing your craft.

Think these are really good ideas. However, I might do away with the Synthweave/Armormech required mod slots. Take the Armoring mods away from Cybertech and give them to Synthweaving/Armormech as appropriate. Leave Cybertech with *all* Mods (including the bugged ones on Artifice).

 

Then give all the crafting skills BoP/crafting skill required schematics for the mods that they make.

 

I like how everyone always forgets Armstech. As it's even worse than artificing, had no BOP items AT ALL...

1) Commendations give rewards that are far too good. Both from daily reward vendors and as people progress leveling up. Rewards from these merchants should not be equal to prototype player made. If the same gear is to be used on these vendors, it should be the green quality gear. The cost of missions in time/credits to craft green, RE for blue, and then to craft a blue is grossly out of line with the cheap cost and insane ease of obtaining commendation items.

 

I completely agree. There is absolutely zero reason for commendation vendors to sell prototype gear. And on top of that, green gear is available on a vendor for credits, making green gear total vendor trash that isn't even worth listing on the GTN when it drops from random mobs.

 

2) Infinite use clickies for any crafter should not be. Infinite use items that are ONLY for a given crafter are even worse. Crafting perks should be along the lines of a 10-15% boost in item crafted, or 2x the amount of use. Making an item that lasts forever, does not remove credits from the system once a crafter has it. That is what consumables are supposed to do.

 

I don't really agree with this. I don't know if infinite use is too much or not, but it's hard to gauge in the game's current incarnation. I know it seems like infinite charges is an "unfair advantage" or whatever, but it's currently compared against crew skills that are literally worthless as they currently stand. The only real unfair advantage might be adrenals in pvp, but that goes for anybody who's shelled out the credits for adrenals.

 

3) Weapon/Armor making classes need to be revamped. All crafted gear should be orange. Orange gear should then have the option to have 1/2/3 augments on top of the mod slots. Augs/mods will likely need to be adjusted to prevent players being vastly stronger than mobs at a given level. Cooler looking armor should of course, be higher level requirement(can also increase the chance of RE success as it goes higher and is more expensive)

 

Yeah, no. See, if you make all crafted armor/weapons orange, then you move the sales paradigm from stat-based to aesthetics-based. Instead of searching for the gear that out-ranks your current gear, you have to search through gear designs to find out what you want, and then you'll never buy a new piece of gear again. It's bad for the economy, and bad for any crafting profession that isn't Cybertech.

 

Though having 1 augment slot for every piece of prototype gear, 2 augment slots for artifact gear, and 3 augment slots on a crit is a great way to make crafted gear relevant (and also make augments actually worth listing on the GTN).

 

4) Crafting consumables should not require raid drops. Crafted consumables should come in decent sized batches. These are for use, not for rare/lucky events. In the case of biochem, raid drop requirement makes more sense in the implant line.

 

I completely agree.

 

5) All crafting classes should have a desirable consumable that only they can craft. This item should be useful for pvp/raids. This item should be useable by others. Biochem, by its nature, should produce more variety and have more unlinked CDs on these than other crafting classes.

 

I don't know about having it tradeable. I think there should be at least one or two items that each skill can make that are BoP and only those skill-users can use. It makes those skills worth keeping after you've crafted the highest level gear.