Earthrise QOTW: My Pal, The Robot

[Kavadas]

Hi there!

This week we're taking a look at Robot Companions. Enjoy! We asked our developers:
"A feature that's been announced and explained in a few lines is a robotic companion for the player. Can you expand on the roles and capability of the robot? Will it die? have inventory space? Get in the way? Fight, Craft, Retrieve items from enemy corpses?"

And they said:
Robots, anyone? We got them, right here in Earthrise.

Robotic Assistants in Earthrise will be important companions that players will be able to craft and employ as they explore the island of Enterra. There will be several different models and their abilities range from assisting your combat, to providing healing and repairing aid on the battlefield, helping you out with item management and even providing some limited crafting functionality that otherwise would require a journey back to a crafting station. Designs used in crafting a robot are even more important compared to designs used in crafting normal items as they will be able to not only modify its qualities, but also its behavior. Some other uses that robots will provide will be bending the way the security looks up at your character, from forging temporary disguise for a criminal to making sure the security aid comes faster by alerting your Faction before your character can call for help. Robots, like every item in the game, will have Durability which will lower as it gets damaged and when they use their abilities; so even a robot that has never taken a dent, but has been extensively used, would require timely repairs. It is a clever tactic to take down an opponent's robotic assistant first, but only if you got enough Shield that has you covered while you take your opponent's fire.

We of course welcome your comments in the thread below.
~ m.
Original Link (http://forums.play-earthrise.com/index.php?topic=2320.0)

[Campbell]

Good moneymaker right there, being a robot builder.

[Kavadas]

I dabbled a bit in droid engineering in SWG and it was pretty entertaining. I really enjoyed the basic droid system they had in place back then and it was one of the few things SWG had that actually made the game feel "sci-fi" when it mostly felt like a fantasy MMO with a sci-fi skin slapped over the top of it.

And speaking of SWG's droid system it appears that Earthrise is using a very similar system.

[Valdin]

I think that might be an understatement Campbell.

That means either there are going to be a shitload of robot crafters and it will be a very competative market. Or its going to be an extremely complicated crafting system which only the most dedicated crafters will be able to do.

I am hoping for the later of the two lol. It just seems like it is too beneficial of a crafting set to not try and get.

[Valdin]

I love crafting and I am going to be watching the crafting and harvesting system a lot closer as they release more info on it. For some reason it has always been something that i like to do and I have always been good at it.

The one thing i loved about the crafting system in SWG was the fact that you could always make everything (at least well). For instance on our server (Flurry) we had a steel, i cant remember the exact type but it didnt spawn anywhere in any quantity or quality for almost 8 months. That was the steel that was required for the lvl 5 driod storage units. It was just amazing home much that one resource made the price of good droids skyrocket.

It does look like they will be using a simlar system which draws me even more to the game.

[Cooke]

I'm curious how this will affect combat and how they'll balance robot use with robot cost. It sounds like there's going to be a lot of trips to the cloner in this game because of the open PVP and it could be prohibitively expensive to have one.

Guess we just don't know yet.

[Valdin]

I agree Cooke. It also seems like it is going to make a difference in PvP cause it doesnt matter how much you hurt the guy if he has a droid so many meters behind him healing him while you fight.

The one thing I am really liking about this game is that it seems like it is going to be much more complex and mature than your average MMO. Seems like we might see some of the old faces from Pre-NGE days of SWG. They keep giving us good info like this I think it will appeal to alot of those players.

[Kavadas]

Seems like we might see some of the old faces from Pre-NGE days of SWG. They keep giving us good info like this I think it will appeal to alot of those players.

That's not necessarily a good thing IMO. The average preCU player still carries a lot of e-baggage with them.

In fact, one trip to MMORPG.com's forums reminds me how preCU players will never let "it" go and that's not really something I want dragged into Earthrise.

[Valdin]

Valid point and I do agree with that.

But I also think a lot of those players just dont have anything else to play so they keep going back to bitching about it. A lot of those names on MMO pop up in WAR and AoC and a few other game forums. I think a lot of them will move on if given a game they can get into.

Granted I am bitter about the whole thing but not bitter enough to still keep at it for over a year. Some people just have nothing else better I guess.

The game may not get those specific players back and that very well may be a good thing but i would love to have players like them. I loved the Pre-CU community in galaxies. At least on my server it was a very mature and fun group. We always had fun and made up our own events and all in all just enjoyed the game.