Today’s Friday Feature showcases a write-up by community member Gin’bilu’alelu about the Smuggler Profession. Learn tips, tricks, and more! Thank you, Bill!
Quick with a joke, but quicker with a blaster.
Taking the jobs and the risks that the others won’t.
Star Wars-y and iconic.
Smugglers are as integral to the Star Wars galaxy as the Jedi Knights and X-Wing pilots are. After all, it was not Ben Kenobi that made the Kessel Run in twelve parsecs, nor was it Princess Leia that conned her way into ownership of Cloud City. But take heed as you begin your journey into scum and villainy, newcomer; even the best Smugglers get boarded sometimes. And when that day comes, you had best be ready.
This week’s Friday Feature is courtesy of player Jacobus with contributions by Kelta. Thank you for the excellent breakdown of EiF’s profession choices!
For those of you familiar with the rise and fall of Star Wars Galaxies during live, you’ll remember several professions to choose from during the Pre-CU and CU eras. NGE shrunk that number to nine linear professions. There was good and bad to be found in both systems and the developers of Empire in Flames have combined all of the good into one brand-new system!
The developers here put it best: “Think of the professions as what you do and the skill trees as how you do it.” With Empire in Flames you build your template by investing skill points into branches across several skill trees ranging from rifleman to pistoleer, artisan to armorsmith, or musician to image designer. All of that, I’m sure, sounds familiar. However now there are eight trees which have been set aside as “professions.” These professions allow you to play with builds you enjoy while also finding a unique niche in the galaxy! Professions
Bounty Hunter
Bounty Hunters have a whole slew of special abilities which can be used with any weapon from sword to pistol, rifle to pike, in order to apply states, bleeds, fire, or just unadulterated levels of damage. Bounty Hunters also make use of the Bounty Hunter Mission Terminals to get access to NPC bounties which have some rather profitable payouts in addition to a chance to drop some decent loot.
Unique Skills & Abilities
Droid Track: The ability to use droids to track NPC bounties across the galaxy.
Rich Movepool: Bounty Hunters have access to more specials (and therefore more states and debuffs) than any other profession making them a powerhouse when it comes to DPS.
Commando
The commando has access to heavy weapons and blast damage allowing them to deal serious damage against turrets and walkers in GCW events, as well as anything else with those specific vulnerabilities. As Masters of heavy weapons, they can use:
plasma flame throwers and their specials to inflict action burns
acid launchers to do the same to the mind pool
launcher pistol with blast damage and access to all of the pistol specials one may learn as a pistoleer.
Unique Skills & Abilities
Rocket Launchers & Grenades: With these weapons, commandos can do massive amounts of damage in one volley.
Doctor
Doctors are some of the best healers in the galaxy. What gives the Doctor their edge is in their abilities to heal states, heal from a distance, and heal over an area. Those skills make them a much better healer for groups or large-scale engagements than the pocket/single-target healer that is the typical medic. Additionally, they are able to buff players beyond their normal levels to bolster the numbers found floating in their health and action pools for an added edge in combat. Also, a doctor with a good understanding of crafting can produce some very good medicines for themselves or those in the market.
Unique Skills & Abilities
Area Heal: In large engagements where many players are taking damage, this is a welcome reprieve.
Ranged Heals: Able to heal from a range, a doctor is able to keep themselves further from danger and therefore healing longer.
Heal States: Be it something like blind, dizzy, or stun or something more pressing like bleeds and fire, the doctor is able to cure the state and remove the disadvantage.
Buffs: Though not necessary like they once were given the redistribution of HAM stats in Empire in Flames, buffs are still a necessary bonus when every point matters.
Entertainer
Entertainer is a great complement for the other professions that were a part of its line on live. They are able to earn a new fame stat which increases the payout for entertainer missions and they get access to more flourishes and instruments than one otherwise would as just a dancer or musician.
Unique Skills & Abilities
Fame: Money tight? Well for anyone famous enough, the NPCs on the mission terminals will be more than happy to pay larger sums for someone worth the notoriety.
Merchant
Merchants are able to run a business like no other. They set up vendors and have some interesting ways to cut costs when it comes to things like overhead, maximizing their profits or the profits of those utilizing their unique service. As a Merchant, crafters can make some serious money by getting their product out there rather than just waiting for referrals or requests. With the server’s reliance on merchants over the bazaar terminal, their services are invaluable!
Unique Skills & Abilities
Lower Maintenance Costs: This helps cut down overhead on your place of business for better profit margins.
Hire & Dress Vendors: This will allow for branding as well as organization of your goods for your shoppers.
Ranger
Rangers are the explorers and frontiersmen of the galaxy, having better terrain negotiation and burst run duration than any of the other professions, an ability to track players, NPCs, and animals, as well as added defenses against wild creatures they may encounter. Additionally, they can craft and throw traps in order to apply all sorts of debuffs and snares to both creatures and players. All of that coupled with a unique ability to harvest organic resources from felled animals makes them unrivaled hunters. Lastly, when all is said and done, rangers can also craft and set camps in the wild in order to provide the benefits otherwise found back in cities.
Unique Skills & Abilities
Harvest: Rangers are the only profession able to harvest animal resources for crafters, giving them a rare niche in the galactic economy.
Traps: Throw these can help prevent animals or players from escaping and can complement your build with debuffs you may not otherwise have access to.
Smuggler
Right now this profession is waiting for the Underworld Release which will come after the Jedi Release on the current development road map. However that does not make them useless by any means, as they have access to some specials that are unique and damaging and (just as is the case with bounty hunter) weapon agnostic. Smugglers also have the ability to purchase faction points, effectively buying their way into the good graces of either the New Republic or the Empire. Skilled slicers, Smugglers can also assist crafters by slicing weapons and armor for better results and they are able to slice mission terminals for bigger paydays.
Unique Skills & Abilities
Slicing: Be it a terminal for a larger payout or improving weapons and armor, this is how a smuggler will make their money.
Squad Leader
As the name implies, this is a profession designed to lead groups into battles and other content. Squad Leaders possess abilities which can increase the damage output of their group, increase the group’s speed and mobility, help with wounds, utilize system messages for better communication, etc. They are a valuable asset in the increasingly tough instanced dungeons being released and an absolute necessity in the large-scale PvP offered by the Galactic Civil War events.
Unique Skills & Abilities
Retreat: This temporarily allows for better movement speed and terrain negotiation for everyone in the group.
Volley Fire: Makes the attacks of those in the group more effective as a whole.
Of Special Note: Devs reserve the right to set aside this entire plan, if it’s not full implemented when JtL drops from SWGEmu. Likely getting back to it someday…(only slightly teasing?)
Bam! Done! *drops mic and walks away*
Alright, I was slightly tempted to ONLY post the above. But I love EiF and it’s Community. That actually is the Roadmap however. Oh, right, there are no dates are there! There have never been dates associated the release of our publishes. This is by design. We are a small team of volunteers. Everyone of us has something outside of EiF that puts a roof over our heads and feeds our families. However that’s not the reason there are no dates. EiF doesn’t want to promise something and not be able to deliver. Since launch, there have been family emergencies, equipment failures, internet failures, work demands, SWGEmu tweaks that break EiF. All things beyond our control. We don’t want to disappoint by not delivering on promises. That’s why our road map looks the way it does.
An Empire in Flames is a post-Endor server offering a new, unique Star Wars Galaxies experience!
What’s the 10,000 foot view?
Empire in Flames began conceptually before the shutdown of the live servers with a design friendly to Roleplayers, PvE players, PvPers, and pilots. It started as, “What’s your ideal server?” It started with a new profession system, expanded to housing and races, and dreamed of a Galactic Civil War in practice instead of imagination. In short, it’s the concept of a Star Wars game as dreamed by a small group of long-time Starsider players – players who were RPers, PvErs, PvPers, crafters, and pilots, none of whom fell into the trap that any of the major combat systems – pre-CU, CU, or NGE – was by any means perfect.
A new profession system
Empire in Flames offers a new approach to the system – one that combines the best of the ideas of the NGE and pre-CU.
Trees are categorized as “professions” and “skills.”
Professions cost no skill points (though they require XP to level). However, a player can only have ONE profession at a time. Professions include:
Bounty Hunter
Commando
Doctor
Entertainer
Merchant
Ranger
Smuggler
Squad Leader
Abilities acquired from professions can be used with any weapon, or even unarmed. Professions offer enhancement, access to specialized skills like slicing, vendors, creature harvesting, and so forth.
Skills, on the other hand, require skillpoints and can be freely mix-and-matched. They, too, require XP to level; however, all skills can be learned from their novice box up. Prerequisites are not required.
Skillpoints have been adjusted to allow a player to pickup approximately 2 1/2 trees, with some exceptions. (Image Designer, Dancer, and Musician together reach 250 points, for example.)
A new approach to housing
Like most branch servers, Empire in Flames offers additional housing options not available on Basilisk – and a few not available on any other branch server. However, player cities take a central role; player houses are required to be built inside city limits.
No more crust of housing on the edge of the no-build zone around NPC starports. No more endless sea of houses on Tatooine. Instead, players have more reason than ever to cooperate – “home” is now a community.
New Races
While “new races” are proliferating across the branch servers, they started with Empire in Flames. After unauthorized use of our code on other servers, we decided to release them for other servers to use…and used they have been. Still, we’re not resting on our laurels – we’re working to add even more options, even when it means we’re pestering Timbab for a new tool to make it happen.
A New Setting
The decision to move post-Endor is partly driven by roleplay, but also by a desire to implement a proper Galactic Civil War. While the immediate ramifications of the time shift are largely cosmetic, it does mean new themeparks will be coming – after all, Jabba the Hutt, Darth Vader, the Emperor, and Xizor are all dead.
How will you position yourself to rise to power?
We respect existing lore that has happened before Endor, but past that we will be creating our own lore, pulling bits and pieces from varying sources. We simply don’t think the way things go in the new canon with Jakku and all makes for very compelling gameplay or storytelling, but we also can’t trod down the path of Legends as its over saturated and restricting.
Crafting Revamp
One of the most controversial changes we have adopted is a crafting revamp for weaponsmith and armorsmith.
Instead of the old crafting system, we moved to a “core”-based system. The base of every weapon is a core, whether it’s a pistol, carbine, rifle, or melee weapon. The core determines critical stats like HAM cost, damage, and speed. Additions like stocks, scopes, and customized barrels are done at the weapon-level to modify those core stats. In essence, any weapon or armor can be made good. Empire in Flames is more than powerhammers and T-21s and composite armor.
A Roadmap Forward
Post-launch, the next three major patches are planned: Galactic Civil War, Schisms of the Force, and Underworld. The first is to bring a proper Galactic Civil War to the galaxy; the second to implement the Jedi profession; the third to reveal black markets, smuggled goods, player bounty hunting, and Crime Lords.
Along the way, other content is planned – new themeparks for the New Republic and the Empire, a three-faction questline over the fate of Jabba’s criminal empire, and a series of post-Endor based heroic encounters.
