We observed the same tonight: People who queued solo for story mode Esseles got quick and frequent pops. 50s queued solo for FPs and tier 1 HM FPs never got a pop. Four people (tank, heals, 2x DPS) queued:

 

- all solo: no pop

- 2 groups of 2: no pop

- group of 3 and one solo: no pop

- queued as full group: *instant* pop & transport

 

This defeats the purpose of the group finder. I guess it's a test result, but one that makes me hope it won't go live in this version.

 

And yes, with the group finder somehow borked and causing long, long waits, plus lack of information regarding the conditions under which the titles are granted (i.e. does queuing as full group count? when is the actual deadline? Midnight? Noon? Reset time?) I can understand the frustration. If someone is queued for hours without getting a single group, not because there are not enough people but because the tool is broken, it's hardly their fault that they cannot run 4 FPs within one day under the (vague) conditions required for the titles.

This may have been mentioned before, if so, sorry for the duplicate.

 

I think the group finder needs an option, to set group size. That way if you're low level and queued for the 'starter' FPs, you're not waiting for a 4 person group, when a two person group is capable of running the FP.

 

Maybe have it be time based... wait X minutes for a group of 4, then fallback to looking for a group of 2 - for the instances that are 'recommended for a two person group'. It's less social points, but less time waiting as well.

Parallel Thread:

I just spoke to a customer service droid. I found this out:

 

1) The titles are only gained by doing 4/8 queues on a single character

2) The event ended yesterday

3) He said keep up on the news for PTS to see if there is any new developments

 

I'm sad because I out-leveled Esseles on my level 10 (then 15 character - I shouldn't have done Coursant in the background between pops) and did 6 on him and then 2 on my level 50 transferred character.

I AM FEELING SO Happy.

 

I mean nobody on the developer team felt the need to clear things up and do a little post on the forums for a week and people did a lot of research e.g. with twitter to get at least some information.

 

Now that the event has ended they come up with a definition that I would have been able to complete any day beforehand. I just thought the wording was player and not character and using different characters would give them a better sample size as well.

 

:mad::mad:

A very good idea, I wasn't even aware of the fleet shuttles until i got to around level 40. A nice big shiny icon indicating the shuttle would be great.

Marking fleet shuttles on the map has been asked since beta but it's seen as a low priority convenience only feature by the leads.

 

I'm not too familiar with Rift's system, but the main point is that this game needs a reliable system to separate fresh 50's from instances that they won't be able to complete so that the other players don't get frustrated. If Rift's system works as well or better than WoW's then I'm all for them implementing it. I just don't want 1.3 to go live with this oversight because players will get very frustrated.

Rift system is not only a well thought system but it's nicely polished down to the UI and even associated sounds.

For example it goes deep into your talent trees to check to what role you are allowed to queue for. And with not dual but 5 specs and a choice of 3 among 8 talent trees you can guess it's much more complex than TOR.

 

Compared to Rift system TOR looks like the rough draft you start with.

However the producer has the gun on the head so he's obliged to send something to the famished players.

 

Still with the feedback, provided the devs implement the requested changes: we can end with a great tool ; probably ending with something even better than DDO. Although it won't be in 1.3. Maybe, and I mark my words, maybe around 1.5.

Edited June 27, 2012 by Deewe

First off, thanks for adding the group finder! Its a great feature to have, especially for those who like to FP grind.

A few suggestions (many have already been noted):

 

1.) Add an average queue wait time that reflects the mean wait time across the server.

 

2.) For lvl 50 FP, a gearscore would be a great idea.

Because MANY people do NOT want the same system as other MMOs. The closest I can think of that might work is Rift's system, but even it still needs to be perfected and worked out and changed to work with TOR's system.

 

As long as it's NOT in player hands to decide, I'm fine with it.

Agreed but at least do it as well as what other MMO do around.

My feedback:

 

The group finder function is great, it's never been easier to get a group. As mentioned preivously, it does tend to choose your roles for you. However, if you reselect your role before every que then your fine. I've yet to have it send me as a random role.

 

I do have a few peeves though. Yesterday I saw alot of players drop groups because a tank died once, some dropped because they didn't want to group with a certain class and I even had a healer ditch our group in the middle of a fight for no reason. I think people that do this should recieve some sort of lockout in a way. Perhaps, make them unavailable for GF que for 10 minutes or something. Now, sometimes the group just cannot beat the flashpoint and we wouldn't want those who cannot beat something to recive a lockout on GF. So maybe if you have the entire group exit the flashpoint together, then disband, they won't recive a GF lockout.

 

Sometimes players sit in a GF que for about 20 minutes or more and to have people join a group just to drop it, without even trying the fight in some cases, is counter productive to what the GF is there for.

One thing that I found frustrating last night was that there was no way to track your progress toward forming a group. I was a lined up in the LFG tool for a while and had no idea if I was 30 seconds from a group or 3 hours.

My feedback:

 

The group finder function is great, it's never been easier to get a group. As mentioned preivously, it does tend to choose your roles for you. However, if you reselect your role before every que then your fine. I've yet to have it send me as a random role.

 

I do have a few peeves though. Yesterday I saw alot of players drop groups because a tank died once, some dropped because they didn't want to group with a certain class and I even had a healer ditch our group in the middle of a fight for no reason. I think people that do this should recieve some sort of lockout in a way. Perhaps, make them unavailable for GF que for 10 minutes or something. Now, sometimes the group just cannot beat the flashpoint and we wouldn't want those who cannot beat something to recive a lockout on GF. So maybe if you have the entire group exit the flashpoint together, then disband, they won't recive a GF lockout.

 

Sometimes players sit in a GF que for about 20 minutes or more and to have people join a group just to drop it, without even trying the fight in some cases, is counter productive to what the GF is there for.

 

THumbs up to this idea. I decided to try group finder last night.... couple minutes later i was starting BP with a group. Halfway thru, the one DPS says "oh... guilds raiding bye" and quits. Leaves 3 of us in there thinking ***?

Anyways, i got out my best dps companion and we finished and got BH comms... all good. I do think that random quitters should get a lock out, and if they do it a lot, then they get special debuff so we can tell who these people are. my 2 cents

On PTS you did gain a debuff for leaving a freshly formed GFT Party and were unable to queue up for 10 minutes.

 

However when you were longer in the group and the party fell apart after 20 minutes there was no debuff involved which is fine with me, as in that case we discovered that the party didn't work (rather we had some 3 instance bug problem and were unable to continue).

Why isn't Nightmare Pilgrim in the group finder?

Why isn't Nightmare Pilgrim in the group finder?

 

That fight has too many mechanics for a pug group honestly.... not like the other world bosses

One thing that I found frustrating last night was that there was no way to track your progress toward forming a group. I was a lined up in the LFG tool for a while and had no idea if I was 30 seconds from a group or 3 hours.

 

You are thinking of WoW's. The times are estimates and do sometimes vary a lot however. But it is getting better as times goes on in estimating the time left to form a group.

You are thinking of WoW's. The times are estimates and do sometimes vary a lot however. But it is getting better as times goes on in estimating the time left to form a group.

It doesn't matter if he is thinking in WoW's.

 

Any information about who is queued, how long it takes on average the median of the last 1 hr and the last 30 formed groups does give add a little bit of insight to the black box.

 

Are queue times high because we lack of healers or tanks or because there are not enough people in the queue to form a proper team. I don't need a tooltip in the GFT tool telling me what I did queue for. But a tooltip giving me a hint about what to expect would help me as I can plan my questing and travelling different?

 

Takes longer than 30 minutes on average, I can travel to a planet. Less than 10 minutes? Travelling won't work out as once I arrive I might get a pop and I won't return where I started off.

Agree with the gear check, though this has to go beyond just a name check as some of us (like me) pull out the mods to keep custom gearing. An examination of stats is also needed for that.

 

The examination of stats would be more useful than an actual evaluation of gear/mods level. Probably something that totals up your Main stat, power, crit, and surge for healers/dps and main stat, defense, shield, and absorption for tanks.

 

The problem I ran into was having my Commando Healer dropped into Lost Island. This character came from a low pop server and hadn't done any flash points since Mando Raiders. Red Reaper would have been more appropriate for that character, based on gear at the time.

 

If they are going to keep the system as is, then perhaps they should give everyone a full set of Recruit PvE gear when hitting 50, just like the recruit PvP gear but with PvE stats.

 

If LFG is going to skip new fifties straight to Lost Island, give new fifties free gear appropriate to run Lost Island. It seems fair since new fifties are put into the 50 PvP bracket and given gear appropriate for that.

 

Someone who leveled up doing flash points might not need the gear, just as someone who leveled up doing PvP wouldn't need the current PvP recruit gear.

Did something change? can you solo collicoid war games now? because why would you make Normal ModeCollicoid war games ineligible for level 50 on the Group Finder when you have to have 3-4 people to get past that force field section?

just like you type here, you could type ingame asking what FP you like to do ! the time you spended here, could of got you into a group for that FP !

just like you type here, you could type ingame asking what FP you like to do ! the time you spended here, could of got you into a group for that FP !

 

I'm sorry Kozz, but that doesn't answer the question I asked. Please try again though.

I am having a ton of difficulty with this. I'm level 19 and I'm trying this tool for the first time. I select my roles with no problem, but then I cannot choose any flashpoints. they are all greyed out and I cannot select any of them. I am not in a group. I've reset all instances. I should at least get to be able to choose arthiss and hammer station? Not having a group finder was my biggest complaint about the game so far and now that it is here I am just frustrated by the fact it isn't working for me. Is any one else having this trouble? If so what was the fix/ I'd like to complete these flashpoints before I gain too much level and it is a cake walk for me.

you may have left-over quests from started FP in your quest log. e.g. [Group] FP Athiss.

You need to abondon those first before joining the GFT.

 

Also you need to have less than 25 or 24 quests in your log. Meaning if you quest log is full you cannot join the GFT.

hi everybody! in 2 days i didnt make a single mission using the group finder (im a sentinel), is that normal?

The mouse-over text on the icon that explains what you've queued up has a remarkably poor layout. Part of that is my difficulty reading anything in the game's font, but the way the text is formatted -- aka the way all of the queues run together instead of having a hard return after each -- is really frustrating.

 

Also, there is no information of any kind of just how long a person can expect to be in queue for. I understand that this information would be whimsical at best, but having an average of time spent is better than nothing.

The problem I ran into was having my Commando Healer dropped into Lost Island. This character came from a low pop server and hadn't done any flash points since Mando Raiders. Red Reaper would have been more appropriate for that character, based on gear at the time.

 

If they are going to keep the system as is, then perhaps they should give everyone a full set of Recruit PvE gear when hitting 50, just like the recruit PvP gear but with PvE stats.

 

If LFG is going to skip new fifties straight to Lost Island, give new fifties free gear appropriate to run Lost Island. It seems fair since new fifties are put into the 50 PvP bracket and given gear appropriate for that.

 

Someone who leveled up doing flash points might not need the gear, just as someone who leveled up doing PvP wouldn't need the current PvP recruit gear.

 

Lost Island is in a separate category to the other HM flashpoints (shares the same daily BH commms though). So if your not geared enough for it then dont select it on the main panel of the group finder, you will still get the comms.

Lost Island is in a separate category to the other HM flashpoints (shares the same daily BH commms though). So if your not geared enough for it then dont select it on the main panel of the group finder, you will still get the comms.

 

They weren't talking about HM, they were talking about normal. If you look at the Group Finder, you'll see Lost Island is in the normal mode Flashpoint list. So is Red Reaper. They were saying that Red Reaper is probably more appropriate for a fresh level 50 than Lost Island, so maybe Lost Island shouldn't be in that same set of normal FPs required for the random.

They weren't talking about HM, they were talking about normal. If you look at the Group Finder, you'll see Lost Island is in the normal mode Flashpoint list. So is Red Reaper. They were saying that Red Reaper is probably more appropriate for a fresh level 50 than Lost Island, so maybe Lost Island shouldn't be in that same set of normal FPs required for the random.

 

Or you could check only reaper and uncheck LI