...Just because YOU don't plan guilds Conquest events doesn't mean none of us do.

 

In fact we do. For a small/medium guild it is even more important. However, since we are not one of the big boys, the only chance we have to finish in the top 10 much less win is if "big" guilds don't get a headstart by crafting the week before. We are active but can't make up for millions of points generated off of alts before the Conquest Week even starts. We can hold our own if there isn't a head start involved. We don't have enough alts to make pre-crafting viable. That takes a big guild.

 

All the big guilds are going to start at the same point so winning conquest for them will be no different after the changes. There will be a possibility of active smaller guilds to be competitive by crafting though.

What exactly are you planning? Every week has heroics, flashpoints, uprisings, operations, Invasion Force crafting, killing commanders, GSF, and PVP and they are all worth basically the same number of points. Do you really need to "plan" for a specific setting to be "competitive" (outside of lining up final boss runs I suppose which is also a lucrative CQ point generator). The only things that vary are crafting (whether Invasion Forces are repeatable or not) and the NPC kills on planets (a really minor impact). Now with no guild bonus it won't even matter which planet you choose to invade. I just don't understand this whole "planning" thing (outside of crafting anyway).

 

We actually plan heroics groups, Ops gatherings, 'fun runs' (which vary with content by the day of the week and other planned activities such as scheduled hard mode groups). Flashpoint groups also for that matter. Yeah, that can be done on the fly too but planned ones tend to get more of the whole guild involved, excited and participating.

We actually plan heroics groups, Ops gatherings, 'fun runs' (which vary with content by the day of the week and other planned activities such as scheduled hard mode groups). Flashpoint groups also for that matter. Yeah, that can be done on the fly too but planned ones tend to get more of the whole guild involved, excited and participating.

 

Pretty much how we do it is have days designated for the type of content. Wednesdays might be heroics, Thursdays might be Uprisings, Saturday and Sunday for Operations. So it is planned ahead of time though not to coincide perfectly with the Conquest event. Small guilds have almost no chance of winning anyway but it is nice to have a chance to finish in the top 10 during crafting weeks (we used to finish there fairly regularly when a planet with multiple heroics was featured as well but since the mergers, not even close, and that was on Harbinger the highest population server at the time).

Edited March 13, 2018 by DWho

My take on things:

 

Firstly... We need more information. As things stand guilds can't make accurately guessed decisions on conquest targets.

 

Planet 1

Low point requirement to complete

Low reward for completing that conquest

 

Planet 2

Medium point requirement to complete

Medium reward for completing that conquest

 

Planet 3

High point requirement to complete

High reward for completing that conquest

 

This is too vague. We'll at least need some numbers relative to current conquest points for guilds to decide what their default conquest target should be. Not just the size of the guild but also the member involvement. That small guild with very involved members may be able to compete for that planet 3, at least getting personal scores, but will they be able to get the guild score? That huge guild may be able to get the points for the guild conquest, but a lot of members may find themselves short. It would be good for a guild to be able to work this out before 5.8 hits.

 

Secondly you want to surprise players, but that hurts players because you seemingly don't want to address the root of that problem. Crafting weeks are the problem for the huge gaps in points and not seeing if some guild gets to those points will make other guilds drop from competing in those weeks altogether. How many guilds pick a target after seeing where the big point guilds settle?

 

There are guilds that do an all-in conquest once in a blue moon, they plan ahead, spark each other's interest, pick a target they stand a chance of winning. Generally this was the Total Galactic War one where there were better odds of avoiding the big point guilds, at least for the guild I'm in.

 

After the server merges I seemed to be one of the very few within the guild still interested in conquest, but even the guild leadership was like "It's no use" on the planned all-in. I was hoping the revised conquest was going to change that, I still hope so, but I am doubting it more and more.

 

It may spark interest in personal & guild rewards, but the good old all-in conquests are likely going to the big guilds, who may not even go all-in because there's little competition or added benefits. Smaller guilds will waste another day before picking a target if they want to go all-in, just so they can avoid the crafting guilds. A schedule would help for that. Maybe change the crafting objectives to daily ones, that way people can still get points but not millions in a day.

In fact we do. For a small/medium guild it is even more important. However, since we are not one of the big boys, the only chance we have to finish in the top 10 much less win is if "big" guilds don't get a headstart by crafting the week before. We are active but can't make up for millions of points generated off of alts before the Conquest Week even starts. We can hold our own if there isn't a head start involved. We don't have enough alts to make pre-crafting viable. That takes a big guild.

 

All the big guilds are going to start at the same point so winning conquest for them will be no different after the changes. There will be a possibility of active smaller guilds to be competitive by crafting though.

 

Your exaggeration to continue to try to make a point about what a huge difference this makes is kinda making me laugh, to be honest. But I don't have to prove that it won't make much difference, the next crafting week will do that on its own.

 

No one gets a head start "the week before". They start the DAY before, and don't earn those points until they log in the following day when the conquest event begins (usually only a few hours) later. No one is making points "before the Conquest week even starts". That's not possible, sorry. They might be sending out crafters the night before, but they are decidedly NOT earning any points before the invasion event officially begins.

 

It does not take a big guild, either. I myself earned almost 11 million points in the first hour of a crafting week's contest. To act like you couldn't do the same is ludicrous. You are making an argument just to argue because your guild is unwilling to load up their crafters the night before. That's not the same thing as being "unable to compete". Sorry, again.

 

When all those alts are stalled by a few hours, you will still not be able to compete if you weren't able to compete before. To argue otherwise is silly. A few hours isn't going to magically boost the number of crafters you have vs. a big guild, or even a small/medium guild (like mine) who has people with tons of heavy crafting alts. It will delay you getting left in the dust, but it will not prevent it or even help keep it from happening. It just plain won't.

 

Again, you'll see when the next crafting week hits.

 

The only reason it might be different is the change in large/medium/small planet yields. Not knowing what conquest is coming up will make absolutely NO difference at the end of the week, which is the only time the leaderboards matter.

Edited March 14, 2018 by PennyAnn

In fact we do. For a small/medium guild it is even more important. However, since we are not one of the big boys, the only chance we have to finish in the top 10 much less win is if "big" guilds don't get a headstart by crafting the week before.

Sorry to break it to you, but you will not gain any advantage here. Quite the opposite. Speaking for my server (simply because I know it): there are a few guilds that are big/dedicated and/or crafter heavy. So any planet one of those guilds attacks a medium sized guild might want to skip, they are not going to win. Head-start or not, it just does not matter - the headstart just gives you an idea whether or not those guilds are "serious" about the attack, or just casually going in. So if you log in and see them at 5 mio at the start you might just want to pick another planet. I have seen a guild up with 30mio points on Friday just to be obliterated by a crafter guild in just 2 days. 8 companions at lvl 50 and stockpiles of mats will easily accomplish that. So when you can't plan ahead as a smaller guild to build up enough stock to seriously craft, the decision when to go in will be much harder.

 

For all other conquest objectives: a smaller guild will always be inferior or at least have worse odds, unless the system changes so that individual points are not added up.

 

Making the schedule random just sucks. It does not do anything to help smaller guilds, it does not fix any issue with conquest, it just makes planning impossible and decision taking harder (which planet to invade...). Add to that the obvious inability of BW to launch announced conquests like this week it is pretty likely that Revenge of the Revaintes will never come up again...

@Eric @Keith I was really disappointed to see the same old tired mats for rewards. Any chance we can receive the new mats as rewards when we complete our goals?

Or guild rewards even?

This will especially hurt the lil guilds who prep for crafting week for months in advance. And we all know how RNG works in this game. Im foreseeing that this will be the biggest complaint after 5.8 hits.

 

That statement makes the major assumption that larger guilds do not plan ahead, as if by magic only small guilds would ever plan ahead. Does not make sense. Small guilds planning ahead doesn't help them when the big boys are planning ahead, too. There's no implied level playing field here just based on planning ahead.

Edited March 22, 2018 by xordevoreaux

Sorry to break it to you, but you will not gain any advantage here. Quite the opposite. Speaking for my server (simply because I know it): there are a few guilds that are big/dedicated and/or crafter heavy. So any planet one of those guilds attacks a medium sized guild might want to skip, they are not going to win. Head-start or not, it just does not matter - the headstart just gives you an idea whether or not those guilds are "serious" about the attack, or just casually going in. So if you log in and see them at 5 mio at the start you might just want to pick another planet. I have seen a guild up with 30mio points on Friday just to be obliterated by a crafter guild in just 2 days. 8 companions at lvl 50 and stockpiles of mats will easily accomplish that. So when you can't plan ahead as a smaller guild to build up enough stock to seriously craft, the decision when to go in will be much harder.

 

For all other conquest objectives: a smaller guild will always be inferior or at least have worse odds, unless the system changes so that individual points are not added up.

 

Making the schedule random just sucks. It does not do anything to help smaller guilds, it does not fix any issue with conquest, it just makes planning impossible and decision taking harder (which planet to invade...). Add to that the obvious inability of BW to launch announced conquests like this week it is pretty likely that Revenge of the Revaintes will never come up again...

 

It was not about winning, that was never going to happen. It was about finishing in the top ten (and getting encryptions to unlock parts of your guildship). When big guilds are allowed to stockpile points the day before (or week before or whatever), they have a tremendous advantage over even active guilds. A guild with 3 active players and hundreds of alts can easily best a guild of 100 active players who don't pre-craft objectives. Besides that, it isn't random. It tells you right on the conquest screen what is the next event so those guilds whining about it being random can quit complaining.

...No one is making points "before the Conquest week even starts". That's not possible, sorry. They might be sending out crafters the night before, but they are decidedly NOT earning any points before the invasion event officially begins...

 

Since you want to use a semantics argument I will clarify it for you. Pre-crafting invasion forces and war supplies is an EXPLOIT (that is it is a game mechanic used in a way it is not intended). In addition, pre-crafting war supplies and Invasion forces generates large numbers of CQ points with zero time spent on it during the CQ week. Hope that is clearer for you

Since you want to use a semantics argument I will clarify it for you. Pre-crafting invasion forces and war supplies is an EXPLOIT (that is it is a game mechanic used in a way it is not intended). In addition, pre-crafting war supplies and Invasion forces generates large numbers of CQ points with zero time spent on it during the CQ week. Hope that is clearer for you

 

No one was ever banned for loading up a crafter to cash in the points the next day. Not an Exploit. It has never been punished by Bioware, and they don't just give people a pass on "exploits".

 

You do not generate the points until you log in. During the CQ week. I think it's pretty clear, alright. Clear that you are pushing this to try to make some kind of point because you couldn't compete with larger guilds on crafting weeks. Guess what - you still can't.

 

You are the same person who also said: "What exactly are you planning?" with regard to conquest weeks being random and not announced... and when I answered that question directly, tried to act like you didn't ask it in the first place. Oh, and you plan CQ too (even though you want to know exactly what the rest of us are planning), but are somehow being cheated by bigger guilds just because they were employing a tactic that you also could have used.

 

Now, none of this matters. Your complaints about conquest crafting have obliterated the system for everyone with Bioware's response in the new Conquest Patch. Congrats. Now everyone loses out. GG.

Edited March 23, 2018 by PennyAnn

No one was ever banned for loading up a crafter to cash in the points the next day. Not an Exploit. It has never been punished by Bioware, and they don't just give people a pass on "exploits".

 

You do not generate the points until you log in. During the CQ week. I think it's pretty clear, alright. Clear that you are pushing this to try to make some kind of point because you couldn't compete with larger guilds on crafting weeks. Guess what - you still can't.

 

You are the same person who also said: "What exactly are you planning?" with regard to conquest weeks being random and not announced... and when I answered that question directly, tried to act like you didn't ask it in the first place. Oh, and you plan CQ too (even though you want to know exactly what the rest of us are planning), but are somehow being cheated by bigger guilds just because they were employing a tactic that you also could have used.

 

Now, none of this matters. Your complaints about conquest crafting have obliterated the system for everyone with Bioware's response in the new Conquest Patch. Congrats. Now everyone loses out. GG.

 

I can understand his point of view and agree with it. It wasn't necessarily and exploit, but it was something that was abused. It was ridiculous that people were able to queue up 8x5 war supplies on Monday nights on multiple characters and then have over million conquest points within the first 10-15 minutes of conquest starting on Tuesday morning. Those players abused the system for years and now everyone is paying the price.

 

Now, once they burn through their stockpiles of Invasion Forces, they're going to be stuck with everyone else and having to piss away more resources to try to maintain the status quo.

 

Granted, the new craft system is pretty harsh. Especially on non master crafters. What should have happened was they should've added a daily limit on crafting war supplies and invasion forces and then added in the donation as another way to gain additional points.

Edited March 23, 2018 by PorsaLindahl

Since you want to use a semantics argument I will clarify it for you. Pre-crafting invasion forces and war supplies is an EXPLOIT (that is it is a game mechanic used in a way it is not intended). In addition, pre-crafting war supplies and Invasion forces generates large numbers of CQ points with zero time spent on it during the CQ week. Hope that is clearer for you

 

whatcha talking about Willis???

 

"Pre-crafting" IFs and WSs is regular part of leveling up crew skills... if it were an exploit you couldn t do it outside of conquests. There is nothing else to do with surplus mats

I kind of like how this thread has grown to an ugly festival of pointing fingers between players. Keep up the good work.

 

Feedback to BioWare (and pointing finger)

People seemed to like the grind and it was a reason to play. This did not fix anything or change how larger guilds will always have an advantage. Results are not going to change. People will just cap less characters. Why you ask? Because the tune with reward difference between conquests is trivial, even insignificant. That's the only motivation you provide and it's clearly not enough.

 

When I heard of the changes I figured you didn't do much UX research on what your players actually were doing to get points. Smaller guilds never had any chance of beating larger guilds except during crafting weeks. Now, this was a huge miss on your side, BW.

 

All in all, what you managed to do was to change the quality of the grind to worse. It's still a grind and you made it less enjoyable. Get your act together and please, pretty please, UX research before you shoot with a shotgun. Conquest playing was not a small part of this game.

 

Thanks,

Dr'Slime

Edited March 23, 2018 by Ruskaeth

No one was ever banned for loading up a crafter to cash in the points the next day. Not an Exploit. It has never been punished by Bioware, and they don't just give people a pass on "exploits".

 

I'll pass that onto our guild, so that they can "pre-craft", too.

 

Everybody should be given this information.

 

But some people rather like to hide this information from others.

I'll pass that onto our guild, so that they can "pre-craft", too.

 

Everybody should be given this information.

 

But some people rather like to hide this information from others.

 

This isn't something new. They've been doing it for years. While technically it's not an exploit, it has been abused.

This isn't something new. They've been doing it for years. While technically it's not an exploit, it has been abused.

 

Abused... maybe. But anyone could have done it, it was not an "exploit" or ever described as such (edit: by Bioware) - same with operations lockouts. Nothing stopped anyone from doing it except their own objections. Those very objections (many voiced loudly and repeatedly here on the forums) moved Bioware to dismantle the entire system. I guess, as long as no one can be happy about it, then it was a success?

Edited March 23, 2018 by PennyAnn

I'll pass that onto our guild, so that they can "pre-craft", too.

 

Everybody should be given this information.

 

But some people rather like to hide this information from others.

 

It wasn't hidden knowledge. Anyone doing crafting could look at their crafting panel, use their BRAINS and say, 'Oh, I can load up ahead of time. Just like I can do ANY crafting offline ALL THE TIME while leveling my crafters up. And you STILL don't get that the mats don't magically appear in those pre-crafters inventory. They farm them. Every Day. All the time. Not just on crafting weeks.

 

Doesn't matter to me anymore. I'm done with crafting. But I hope you enjoy the daily farming YOUR crafters need to do to get mats. On EVERY planet. While sending out their comps non stop when doing any other activity they can fit in while constantly farming ALL planets. Hope you didn't need those people for any group activities.

 

Oh wait. I need to tell you more 'secrets'. They need at least 8 50 influence comps. 9 would be better so they can use one while sending out comps. They optimally should have a life curcumstance that lets them log on their muliple crafting toons at least 5 times a day to resend comps or make intermediate components too.

Edited March 23, 2018 by Kyrra_T