Encourage the Usage of Consumables in Medicine and Devices in the Revamp

As was discussed in the Discord, I feel that the server could heavily benefit from the creation of consumables in the form of Devices, Engineering and Medicine.

For elaboration, I feel like the player base is in desperate need of additional outlets of economic flow. With the removal of durability, players will have no real reason to engage with crafting and it’s facets after reaching a specific point and achieving their most optimum build. I feel like introducing consumables in various forms could solve this issue.

Medicine at the moment, in legacy, feels somewhat hollow. Stims are essentially minor products which last for a short period of time to simply boost your stats, which you cannot benefit from unless you bother to dump the skill levels and SP necessary into medicine to properly use a stim. Medicine could benefit from the removal of requirements on stims and classing them into a more general drug category with a variety of interesting effects akin to Force Powers for Mundanes/Standards with the obvious repercussions depending on what substance is used. Instead of Force Heal, the PC could ingest a Kolto Pill or inject a Kolto Needler as an example. This also opens opportunities for illegal/criminal activities such as producing various Spices and other illegal substances. Illegal for their effects or illegal for the materials needing to be sourced/bought from specific shady vendors unlocked via questlines related to Smuggler/Cartel.

Devices seems to be one of the ways that Mundanes are intended to be brought into balance with Force-Users, but I’m personally not the biggest fan of denying Force-Users access to devices and drugs. Concentration was the best suggested fix to the balance issue- You cannot concentrate on the Force wholly while attempting to manage certain devices, and you cannot maintain focus on the Force while your body is yoked up on Spices.

As for Devices, I’m aware it’s still an in-concept idea. I personally feel that Devices should become a line of consumables next to Medicine’s drugs with the same vein of action. There are legal devices, and illegal devices. This promotes activities for overlooked factions like Smugglers and Cartel, giving them opportunities to be sources of these things, and to get them to players who are interested in purchasing. I’m not sure if Devices should be the craft, or the ability to use. It’s another vein of thought that Engineer can pick up an additional perk tree for SP investment (Like how Engineer can pick up both Engineer Blueprints and Lightsaber Blueprints at the moment). Realistically speaking, if a Force-User wants to pick up ALL THREE TREES (1. Blasters, Harvesters, Mods, Starships 2. Training Sabers 3. Device Crafting) would be an intense SP investment and take a significant amount of OOMPH out of any area of the rest of their build.

I feel that unlocking the illegal variants could be an NPC quest that checks for your current faction alignment. Smugglers and Cartel both have the option to pursue a questline after reaching a certain level of medicine or engineering/devices, mirroring reaching 15 Force Skill and being able to do the Crystal Cave quest and pursue Lightsaber Blueprints.

A link to the relevant discord conversation in the SWLOR discord is below: