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Slicing Needs a serious Fix @ 400!!!


L-RANDLE

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Am a "late to the party" guy? I just leveled a toon to 50 and went Armstech, Scav, and Slicing. I was ok with the fact that Slicing 400 missions was not supplying the credits in abundance like it once was, but I need it to get Aug Kits and Augments and since I have a main with BioChem 400, I already had multiple means to produce credits when I needed them. When I got to Slicing 400, I was shocked at what has/had been happening on said missions.

 

Which brings me to my argument... Grade 6 Slicing Missions need to get their timer reduced or the rewards need to be buffed, specifically on Grade 6 Sliced Tech Parts.

 

1. On my BioChem toon, Bioanalysis Grade 6 Abundant missions are around ~35mins, even a Mission Discovery Mission on BioAnalysis is only an hour. Slicing abundant is around ~50 mins for a "good" lockbox, and well over an hour for bundant Sliced Tech Parts and a Mission Discovery is around 2hours(!). This is a gathering skill and should be treated like the others. Scavaging is not that long, neither is Bioanalysis.

 

2. If I want to craft a 49/50 purple Implant, I only need 2EA Radioactive Paste(Grade 6 Dipolomacy (a MISSION SKILL)), and that piece is significantly more powerful than an augment. To craft purple augments, you need 4 Advanced Neural Augmentors. If you want this new form of Slicing to resemble a "mission skill" like Diplomacy, then at least drop the requirement down to 2EA.

 

3. The drop rate for Slicing Mission Discovery 340 is WAY to low. I would not have so much of a problem with 1 or 2 if I actually got the mission more, to get the mats, to make augments. As it is now, I think I might have gotten the mats once or twice using the "regular" Abundant Tech Parts mission, and only when using a purchased Mission Discovery, do I get some Advanced Neural Augmentors with some regularity. Then, its only two, and it takes over 2hours. Seems like I get more investigation and Diplomacy mission drops than I do the actual Slicing drops I need.

 

 

TL;DR

Either:

1. Decrease the amount of Grade 6 purples needed to craft augments down to 2EA

2. Increase the drop rate on Mission Discovery Slicing 340 on Abundant Lockbox runs (which are still longer that any other gathering skill).

3. Decrease all the timers on Grade 6 Slicing to fall in line with the other Gathering Skills.

 

And while you are at it BW please add a better way to get Aug Slot Component Material. Either vendor or Slicing mission would be great. thanks...

 

/RANT

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What you want and what is good for the community are two VERY different things.

 

You want more sliced parts, I get that. But if YOU get more sliced parts then so does EVERYONE else. this will depress the value of said sliced parts. YOU may not care about selling sliced parts on the GTN, but a LOT of others do care.

 

the point is, your suggestion is by its very nature selfish. I am NOT saying that was your intent, but when you make suggestions like this you have to ask yourself, "how will this affect the entire game?" not just your little corner of it.

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What you want and what is good for the community are two VERY different things.

 

You want more sliced parts, I get that. But if YOU get more sliced parts then so does EVERYONE else. this will depress the value of said sliced parts. YOU may not care about selling sliced parts on the GTN, but a LOT of others do care.

 

the point is, your suggestion is by its very nature selfish. I am NOT saying that was your intent, but when you make suggestions like this you have to ask yourself, "how will this affect the entire game?" not just your little corner of it.

 

It's not selfish to ask a gathering skill timer and/or materials required to craft be brought in line with other gathering skills. If anything, I am decreasing a barrier for the community. It already takes 420k to augment mk6 slots, which is a 100% credit sink. That does not even account for the TONS of credits sunk into actually getting the augments/kits. In reality, your suggestion is actually selfish because you seem to be concerned about "devalued" products which affects your bottom line, while not caring about other skills that are not afforded such luxuries. There is no way a implant should sell for less than an augment, but ask I look at the GTN right now, the mats are almost double for same tier purple mats and the "good" augments are 2.5 times more expensive than an implant. I am sure other items from other crafts have similar issues versus the augment thing...

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am a "late to the party" guy? I just leveled a toon to 50 and went armstech, scav, and slicing. I was ok with the fact that slicing 400 missions was not supplying the credits in abundance like it once was, but i need it to get aug kits and augments and since i have a main with biochem 400, i already had multiple means to produce credits when i needed them. When i got to slicing 400, i was shocked at what has/had been happening on said missions.

 

which brings me to my argument... grade 6 slicing missions need to get their timer reduced or the rewards need to be buffed, specifically on grade 6 sliced tech parts.

See below! You have to compare the effort to do "sliced tech part missions" to mission skills (i.e. investigation or diplomacy)

 

1. On my biochem toon, bioanalysis grade 6 abundant missions are around ~35mins, even a mission discovery mission on bioanalysis is only an hour. Slicing abundant is around ~50 mins for a "good" lockbox, and well over an hour for bundant sliced tech parts and a mission discovery is around 2hours(!). This is a gathering skill and should be treated like the others. Scavaging is not that long, neither is bioanalysis.

Slicing is in fact special as it is both: a gathering and a mission skill - which other gathering skill yields purple mats?

 

2. If i want to craft a 49/50 purple implant, i only need 2ea radioactive paste(grade 6 dipolomacy (a mission skill)), and that piece is significantly more powerful than an augment. To craft purple augments, you need 4 advanced neural augmentors. If you want this new form of slicing to resemble a "mission skill" like diplomacy, then at least drop the requirement down to 2ea.

It is indeed strange that augments sell a lot higher than implants but that's a question of supply and demand (in fact I made millions selling augments but had difficulties selling good implants - unfortunately, the prices for augments tanked lately on my server).

Looking at the requirements for crafting implants, you have to compare biochem to cybertech: earpieces as a "small" item cost two mission mats as well.

An augment is considered an _item modification_ albeit an expensive one, thus it needs 4 mats (like the armstech barrel, cybertech mod & armoring and artifice enhancement).

 

3. The drop rate for slicing mission discovery 340 is way to low. I would not have so much of a problem with 1 or 2 if i actually got the mission more, to get the mats, to make augments. As it is now, i think i might have gotten the mats once or twice using the "regular" abundant tech parts mission, and only when using a purchased mission discovery, do i get some advanced neural augmentors with some regularity. Then, its only two, and it takes over 2hours. Seems like i get more investigation and diplomacy mission drops than i do the actual slicing drops i need.

In another thread we complained about the crit rate of the _regular_ tier 6 slicing missions:

http://www.swtor.com/community/showthread.php?t=499390

 

Actually, after patch 1.3.4. my crit rate is consistently around 20% (30 crits in 147 missions = 20,4%).

 

That should be sufficient to craft a few augments per day.

In fact, I never use slicing mission discoveries as they are a) rare "drop" as you said, b) they are ridiculously expensive on the GTN

 

And while you are at it bw please add a better way to get aug slot component material. Either vendor or slicing mission would be great. Thanks...

As a biochem crafter you're lucky as you can always craft "cheap" implants to rev.eng. for augment components and send them to your armstech (always craft green ones, the bonus yield when crafting blue ones or even purple ones is negligible) - Compare the mats needed to armstech (...argh...).

 

Don't despair, Slicing will work out. Just keep your companions doing missions continuously. And if you want to earn money, simply craft purple mid level augments (the "purple yield" for lower tier missions is much higher) - they are in high demand and competition is much lower. Augment crafting and augments are not just for lvl 50!

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It's not selfish to ask a gathering skill timer and/or materials required to craft be brought in line with other gathering skills. If anything, I am decreasing a barrier for the community. It already takes 420k to augment mk6 slots, which is a 100% credit sink. That does not even account for the TONS of credits sunk into actually getting the augments/kits. In reality, your suggestion is actually selfish because you seem to be concerned about "devalued" products which affects your bottom line, while not caring about other skills that are not afforded such luxuries. There is no way a implant should sell for less than an augment, but ask I look at the GTN right now, the mats are almost double for same tier purple mats and the "good" augments are 2.5 times more expensive than an implant. I am sure other items from other crafts have similar issues versus the augment thing...

 

OK then how about some proof that what you are suggesting is not a good thing...

 

In the game World of Warcraft, in the Wrath of the Lich King expansion, there was a gathered material known

as Frost Lotus. It was a rare drop that came off gathering other material nodes. The original spawn rate was 5% (approximately 1 in 20 nodes generated a Frost Lotus). The material was highly prized because it was required to make flasks (analogous to exotech stims). They roughly sold for 100 gold a piece (roughly analogous to 20,000 credits).

 

As the expansion progressed and demand for flasks increased, players started complaining that there was not enough Frost Lotus to go around and an increase in the drop rate was suggested. It was additionally suggested that there be an NPC vendor that one could trade in other materials for Frost Lotus. Blizzard added Frost Lotus nodes to one area to increase the availability, but that was not enough. Every day you would see at least five new threads dedicated to people screaming for more frost lotus.

 

Well, Blizzard eventually gave these players EXACTLY what they wanted - they increased the drop rate from 5% to 7.5% (a 50% increase), and they created a vendor to trade in a Frozen Orb (analogous to Biometric alloy dropped at the end of every FP) for Frost Lotus (among other things).

 

Can you guess what happened next? First, the number of frost lotus and flasks skyrocketed. Initially those, like you who simply wanted to be more self-sufficient, hailed this as a boon. Of course those, like me who tried to sell their wares saw the value of the products crash. But then after a while, those like you, were back complaining that it was no longer worth being self-sufficient because frost lotus and flasks were dirt cheap.

 

Can we say...Be careful what you wish for, you might just get it?

 

My point is, what you are asking for has already been tried and it failed to make those intended to be made happier, actually happy.

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I've run the level 6 slice mission to get neural augmenters 24 times (yes I've kept count), 2 slicers, 4 comps each with 10k affection including Scorpios with the +2 slice crit (so 6 have been run with Scropios), and haven't received a single crit, each time getting 4 subelectronic data modules. Seems to me the chance of this has been nerfed and the only way to get neural augs is to get a 340 slice mission which drop so infrequently from the lockbox mission compared with invest which drops 80% of the time.

 

I know before I could expect at least 1 crit from 4 missions or so, now I can't get one at all. I'm now sure this was a deliberate nerf on Bioware's part, I was going to post on the boards about it and saw this post, so thought I'd mention it here.

 

Utter joke

 

Edit 28 missions now and no crit... the level 6 slice part mission is clearly bugged

Edited by Chemic_al
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I've run the level 6 slice mission to get neural augmenters 24 times (yes I've kept count), 2 slicers, 4 comps each with 10k affection including Scorpios with the +2 slice crit (so 6 have been run with Scropios), and haven't received a single crit, each time getting 4 subelectronic data modules. Seems to me the chance of this has been nerfed and the only way to get neural augs is to get a 340 slice mission which drop so infrequently from the lockbox mission compared with invest which drops 80% of the time.

 

I know before I could expect at least 1 crit from 4 missions or so, now I can't get one at all. I'm now sure this was a deliberate nerf on Bioware's part, I was going to post on the boards about it and saw this post, so thought I'd mention it here.

 

Utter joke

 

Edit 28 missions now and no crit... the level 6 slice part mission is clearly bugged

 

Can we say small sample size? Recently I ran ten grade six sliced parts missions and two critted. Does that mean the it's broken? No, it means I was lucky and you were not.

 

Random does NOT equate to Even - you will have clusters of both good and bad streaks, but in the VERY long term it will average out to an approximate value of the crit chance.

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Can we say small sample size? Recently I ran ten grade six sliced parts missions and two critted. Does that mean the it's broken? No, it means I was lucky and you were not.

 

Random does NOT equate to Even - you will have clusters of both good and bad streaks, but in the VERY long term it will average out to an approximate value of the crit chance.

 

Small sample size? Yes, you could say i was EXTREMELY unlucky, but come on, 10k companions, one with a +2 slice crit, it should have critted least once.

 

I'm well aware of how probability works, but this is a bad joke, because as I said even with comps with 0 affection, I never had any problem getting a reasonable return on them. And how is it that the Data Race mission is critting and the level 6 slice part one isn't then, not that I want invest 340 missions, but I'm getting them....

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Your rate doesn't increase just because you send more companions out. Each individually have the same percentage, except one has a 2% higher chance. Lets say that with 10K affection your crit rate is 10%. So you have 4 companions with the following crit rates: 10%, 10%, 10%, and 12%. That doesn't mean you have a 40% chance of a crit. With only 38 missions you haven't even run 10 mission with each companion. So I would say you are just about even on your crit with about 1 in 10 missions.

 

With any random system, you will have dry spells and rich spells. All of your companions are running on a dry spell. This is the reason I refuse to run these mission, I just do the 340 missions for my mats. With 2 slicers running lock boxes all day I don't loose money and when I get the 340 missions I am happy.

 

Personally I am fine with the drop rates. Plus is a 28 point increase really worth the stress? That is the difference in stats between having 14 purple vs 14 blue augments. I am fine with blues until I get enough Neural Augmenters to get the purples.

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See below! You have to compare the effort to do "sliced tech part missions" to mission skills (i.e. investigation or diplomacy)

 

 

Slicing is in fact special as it is both: a gathering and a mission skill - which other gathering skill yields purple mats?

None, but it has items in open-world, it should be treated like any other gathering skill.

 

It is indeed strange that augments sell a lot higher than implants but that's a question of supply and demand (in fact I made millions selling augments but had difficulties selling good implants - unfortunately, the prices for augments tanked lately on my server).

Looking at the requirements for crafting implants, you have to compare biochem to cybertech: earpieces as a "small" item cost two mission mats as well.

An augment is considered an _item modification_ albeit an expensive one, thus it needs 4 mats (like the armstech barrel, cybertech mod & armoring and artifice enhancement).

 

I could accept this comparision, but at the same time, mods/enh/armor produce more stats, and impact the game significantly more than augments do. I didn't look, but I venture to guess that those don't sell as well as augments do.

 

 

Can we say...Be careful what you wish for, you might just get it?

 

My point is, what you are asking for has already been tried and it failed to make those intended to be made happier, actually happy.

Do you think I am actually trying to make monopoly money on this or any other craft for that matter? LOL, actually it would make me quite happy. How do you think I get credits on my Biochem toon? Selling purple implants? LOL, ok...

 

Also what do you mean by "self-sufficent"? I see self-sufficent as the means to produce goods instead of buying them from someone else, and, as my previous post states, I obviously don't have a problem being self-sufficent...... /sarcasm

 

You want facts for "better" for metagame, but I am advocating balance for real game.

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None, but it has items in open-world, it should be treated like any other gathering skill.

Well, BW patched/changed the skill with SWTOR already released, so this maybe explains why Slicing is so "special".

Shouldn't slicing missions actually be more demanding than others because of the "double power"?

 

I could accept this comparision, but at the same time, mods/enh/armor produce more stats, and impact the game significantly more than augments do. I didn't look, but I venture to guess that those don't sell as well as augments do.

You are right - all modifications have more stats than augments and in terms of effect armorings and barrels are worth much more (with their damage & armor rating) - There is certainly a large imbalance here but not only for augments (think about mods > they cost _the same_ as armorings but do not provide more than stat bonuses - and consider implants & earpieces as well: they provide much more stat changes than modifications and cost half the purple mats to produce).

As for the difficulty to craft (and the pricing of) augments: it's the (fine-)tuning of your stats, to reach the final 5% you have to spent unproportionally more time and/or money than for the first 95%.

Considering the pricing on the GTN, it maybe was not BW's intention that purple tier 6 augments are selling for a 100k, but like that it's at least a good source of income. Again it comes down to demand.

Augment slots & Augments are a luxury: not essentially necessary but very nice to have and very expensive (a credit sink as you already said but at least more useful than a mount for 1mil).

 

Your general criticism is probably right - the crafting process could profit from an overhaul/rebalancing (i.e. skill based results and not sheer luck, there are many threads out there), but in my opinion the current "rules" at least create a consistent system. You can always use it to your advantage.

As a practical example: the difference between blue and purple augments is _very_ small, so craft blue ones for yourself (esp. while leveling/gearing up) and sell the purple ones until you are rich (did this with an alt, the relative profit margin is ridiculous).

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Your rate doesn't increase just because you send more companions out. Each individually have the same percentage, except one has a 2% higher chance. Lets say that with 10K affection your crit rate is 10%. So you have 4 companions with the following crit rates: 10%, 10%, 10%, and 12%. That doesn't mean you have a 40% chance of a crit. With only 38 missions you haven't even run 10 mission with each companion. So I would say you are just about even on your crit with about 1 in 10 missions.

 

With any random system, you will have dry spells and rich spells. All of your companions are running on a dry spell. This is the reason I refuse to run these mission, I just do the 340 missions for my mats. With 2 slicers running lock boxes all day I don't loose money and when I get the 340 missions I am happy.

 

Personally I am fine with the drop rates. Plus is a 28 point increase really worth the stress? That is the difference in stats between having 14 purple vs 14 blue augments. I am fine with blues until I get enough Neural Augmenters to get the purples.

 

Of course the rate doesn't increase because you send more companions out, but each extra run should bring the overall return closer to the expected mean. More runs the less likely the expected outcome of them all failing to crit.

 

I have since run 8 more missions and still yet to see a crit. At 10% chance, this dry spell is turning into "bug" for me. It's not like the lockbox missions aren't critting, just the slice parts.

 

And yes, if I'm actually trying to do something useful like make money, and my lockbox missions only seem to return invest mission and other crap I don't want, how else am I supposed to get the level 6 slice parts?

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I have since run 8 more missions and still yet to see a crit. At 10% chance, this dry spell is turning into "bug" for me. It's not like the lockbox missions aren't critting, just the slice parts.

 

I run Slicing on 8 chars nonstop when i am on and there is no "bug" as you call your perception of randomness.

 

Bad streak - thats it.

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What you want and what is good for the community are two VERY different things.

 

You want more sliced parts, I get that. But if YOU get more sliced parts then so does EVERYONE else. this will depress the value of said sliced parts. YOU may not care about selling sliced parts on the GTN, but a LOT of others do care.

 

the point is, your suggestion is by its very nature selfish. I am NOT saying that was your intent, but when you make suggestions like this you have to ask yourself, "how will this affect the entire game?" not just your little corner of it.

 

Your own reason to oppose his request is rooted in your own selfishness.... kettle, pot.

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The tier 6 abundant lockbox slicing mission takes less than 35 minutes with a companion with 10K affection. There are no higher lockbox missions.

 

I have made out tickets requesting why the 10K affection companions I have with +10 Slicing fail more often then my other companion that did not have 10k Affection and only +5 Slicing?

 

The failure rate for Yuan is 1 in 3 and I get nothing at all vs other companions that fail only 1 in 8. Explain that one?

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You cannot get augment pieces in the open-world.

 

Which is why I advocate the change. Since lvl 50 purples cost only 2EA of "rare" purple items(like mission skill materials), why shouldn't augments, no?

IDK, poster ConnorSalak said I should compare it to getting these materials to make mods/enh, I would suspect it is not as difficult as the Advanced Nueral.

http://www.torhead.com/item/6dAe0hH/ciridium

http://www.torhead.com/item/dhbEf7y/dallorian-alloy

Can any UT folks out there chime in on this? Speaking from the Diplomacy side my Grade 6 Medical Supplies drops about as frequently, but again, it only cost 2EA for my Implants.

 

 

 

Anyway, I think they might have ninja buffed it...

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The slicing purple parts a re a much sought after item, and I dont agree with changing the requirement to 2 or increasing drops on lockboxes. The only thing I would go for is a slight reduction in the time to complete the missions.

 

I have a 400 Slicer and 400 Armormech on 2 different toons. So if I need those neurals I'll just buy a 340 Mission unlock from the GTN, for around ~70k, complete it, then mail the parts back to my armormech. Also, I've always gotten 4 on the purples unless I crit, then I'll usually get 5, and some legacy drops.

 

They are supposed to be rare. Those purples are a big part of the economy and one of the ONLY items that are ALWAYS sought after. I think its good for the server for something to be in want.

 

One more thing, the profit margin is not enough to really sell the purple augments and make a lot of money. Although the market has died down a bit, a big portion of my income comes from selling level 21 and 22 blue augments.

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The slicing purple parts a re a much sought after item, and I dont agree with changing the requirement to 2 or increasing drops on lockboxes. The only thing I would go for is a slight reduction in the time to complete the missions.

 

I have a 400 Slicer and 400 Armormech on 2 different toons. So if I need those neurals I'll just buy a 340 Mission unlock from the GTN, for around ~70k, complete it, then mail the parts back to my armormech. Also, I've always gotten 4 on the purples unless I crit, then I'll usually get 5, and some legacy drops.

 

They are supposed to be rare. Those purples are a big part of the economy and one of the ONLY items that are ALWAYS sought after. I think its good for the server for something to be in want.

 

One more thing, the profit margin is not enough to really sell the purple augments and make a lot of money. Although the market has died down a bit, a big portion of my income comes from selling level 21 and 22 blue augments.

 

What server are you on as on?

As on my server that would be a dead market. Augments at level 20 to 30 do not sell for much or very fast as a glut exists for them.

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