Eric,

Please, PLEASE address this. I've played a bit on the PTS, and the gearing really makes me want to cancel my sub for the following reason:

I was running on a toon that was mostly 270 (everything except for one relic). So, my character gear rating was 269. The game would *only* drop level 270 gear for me (flashpoints, vendors), and I never got the specific relic I wanted, so I never swapped it in. I finally decided to test if the remaining relic was the issue, swapped out my nice 252 relic for a pretty garbage 270 on, tried random vendor, and instantly got a lvl 272 piece.

 

This is fundamentally broken! Players that like to keep BiS gear, or particular relics, necessarily will get useless loot thrown at them over, and over, and over, and over again, never being able to move up in gear rating. This is far from "playing your way".

 

The way the possible gear levels are calculated for player drops NEEDS to be shifted. If you are within 1-2 levels of the next tier, it should ASSUME you are at that tier, since most of your gear is that (or higher) already.

 

Please, PLEASE respond. I almost never post, but this issue has me seriously doubting that I want to continue to play.

--Mop

It sounds as though you know how to gear, you just choose not to do it correctly. Therefore, you wont gear successfully up the ilvl tiers. This would be similar to a player knowing the ops/fp mechanics, but choosing not to follow them. Most likely wont end well. Thats not a BW issue. Play how you want - but there are rules to follow regardless.

It sounds as though you know how to gear, you just choose not to do it correctly. Therefore, you wont gear successfully up the ilvl tiers. This would be similar to a player knowing the ops/fp mechanics, but choosing not to follow them. Most likely wont end well. Thats not a BW issue. Play how you want - but there are rules to follow regardless.

That’s the issue Oleg. How is a person supposed to intuitively understand this system when Bioware keep promoting “play your way”. What are the rules and regulations? Where does a player find them in the game?

It is overly complicated compared to our previous systems. You can’t blame the player if Bioware don’t design ways for people to “easily” understand. By easy, I mean zero brain power to figure out or massive neon signs to say why the 180” changes and how this system work.

None of this has been done on the pts. We have had to figure it out ourselves and tell Bioware if it’s too hard to understand. Which in my opinion, it still is for the average player who just wants to jump in and play and get their gear without having to do google research.

I think we should all know by now that Bioware won’t put a tutorial in the game because theyve never done it in the past. They rely on word of mouth or people googling it after the brain trust works it out and spreads it or posts the info.

Ops and flashpoint mechanics are different. You can’t really compare the two.

Ops and flashpoint mechanics are different. You can’t really compare the two.

I just did.....

Sadly this is the case and can be the best solution. If you have mismatched pieces that don’t give you total i270, i272, i274, etc, then your next drop will likely be less or the same and not an up grade.

 

You can replicate this the same if you are just using fragments to gear (like I’d did with a bunch to understand the ilvl). If you don’t make sure all your gear is at the same or similar ilvl, then you basically get the same stuff over and over.

 

I think this is international so that you do go back to the vendor to use tech frags and not just try and grind through. The mixed approach of doing both content and vendor RNG is certainly going to be the fastest. But that also means wearing gear that maybe be worse in secondary stats than the piece they replace. That isn’t ideal and can make some classes feel really clunky to play or a bit broken. This is a problem if you are trying to clear harder content.

 

But here is the catch. Bioware probably won’t tells us at launch and have not told any of this and some people will just try and grind it out and get frustrated and angry because it won’t represent their idea of “play your way”. Basically they’ll have to find this out on their own and it can be a bit overly complicated to do so.

 

This system also starts to have issues the closer you get to 306 ilvl. From about 302, it is extremely had to get upgrades in content even if all your gear is ilvl 302 or even a bit closer to ilvl 303.

When you get to ilvl 304 - 306, it’s even worse because you are nearly always getting much lower gear than your ilvl. Which means it’s either not working or it’s by design to make you go to the vendor to use tech frags to artificially slow down your gearing.

Both scenarios aren’t good for 99.99% of people who, A. Don’t like RNG, B. Want to gear progressively through content, C. Want gear faster

 

You also have an issue when you reach ilvl 306. Musco has stated that you should be getting horizontal upgrades through out content. So once you reach all 306 ilvl gear, the only horizontal gearing is set bonus or mod’able gear.

But there’s the biggest issue, the system doesn’t do that. It keeps dropping 302 - 304 gear with the occasional 306 mod or enhancement which is useless as you’ve not had mod’able gear drop.

Now either the system is broken or made to work like this. If it’s number two, then Eric hasn’t really been forth coming with the whole truth. If it’s number one, then it needs to be fixed.

Which is the purpose of all this testing and feed back.

The more people that test and provide accurate feed back across their own multiple tests to see if all their tests average the same, the more useful the feed back is to Bioware to refine the system,

I think the gearing "rules" are pretty easy to understand as long as you know how the moddable gear drops work.

Say you start at 270. Whether you use the vendor or get drops you'll slowly work your way up to 272 for all your pieces before you can get to 274. However, weapons are now only moddable from the vendor which means the barrel / mod / enhancement can be random.

Those three things...a sub level of RNG if you will, are NOT tied into the "horizontal / upward" only gear progression (based on what I've seen). With anything moddable you'll have to get either the pieces you want from the targeted RNG vendor...buying a barrel and hoping for a DPS version instead of a tank version...same for Mod / enhancements...that will be easier than buying a gun and hoping all of the "guts" are your level.

As you get up in gear, at 304, rather than waste tries with the gear slots to get to 306, because moddable gear from the vendor is a detriment to climbing the ladder at the high level, go for the guts to fill in moddable armor.

That's how most people are going to wind up doing it.

Crafting is going to take a HUGE hit with 6.0 unless they change the mat requirements.

You can't buy/sell loot drops anymore (confirmed on PTS) since they're legacy bound. You won't be able to buy the one offs to make up a low i-rated item. You'll HAVE to use the vendor...

The more I talk about this, the more I talk myself out of resubbing.

Just going to have to wait and see.

I think the gearing "rules" are pretty easy to understand as long as you know how the moddable gear drops work.

 

Say you start at 270. Whether you use the vendor or get drops you'll slowly work your way up to 272 for all your pieces before you can get to 274. However, weapons are now only moddable from the vendor which means the barrel / mod / enhancement can be random.

 

Those three things...a sub level of RNG if you will, are NOT tied into the "horizontal / upward" only gear progression (based on what I've seen). With anything moddable you'll have to get either the pieces you want from the targeted RNG vendor...buying a barrel and hoping for a DPS version instead of a tank version...same for Mod / enhancements...that will be easier than buying a gun and hoping all of the "guts" are your level.

 

As you get up in gear, at 304, rather than waste tries with the gear slots to get to 306, because moddable gear from the vendor is a detriment to climbing the ladder at the high level, go for the guts to fill in moddable armor.

 

That's how most people are going to wind up doing it.

 

Crafting is going to take a HUGE hit with 6.0 unless they change the mat requirements.

You can't buy/sell loot drops anymore (confirmed on PTS) since they're legacy bound. You won't be able to buy the one offs to make up a low i-rated item. You'll HAVE to use the vendor...

 

The more I talk about this, the more I talk myself out of resubbing.

Just going to have to wait and see.

You have always done a better job at presenting this sort of thing than I have. Well done again ! And yes I have noticed essentially the same thing regarding drops. Plenty of it … just need to get the right stuff !

I plan on doing some testing on deconstructing stuff tomorrow. I have a full inventory of items that are useless... soooo I'll see what shakes out. Hopefully that part of the system is still intuitive.

I'm not ready to unsub just yet. I have began to clean out some old inventories from all of my alts ...etc. But that was something that was needed any ways !

Hang in there bud !

I think the gearing "rules" are pretty easy to understand as long as you know how the moddable gear drops work.

 

Say you start at 270. Whether you use the vendor or get drops you'll slowly work your way up to 272 for all your pieces before you can get to 274. However, weapons are now only moddable from the vendor which means the barrel / mod / enhancement can be random.

 

Those three things...a sub level of RNG if you will, are NOT tied into the "horizontal / upward" only gear progression (based on what I've seen). With anything moddable you'll have to get either the pieces you want from the targeted RNG vendor...buying a barrel and hoping for a DPS version instead of a tank version...same for Mod / enhancements...that will be easier than buying a gun and hoping all of the "guts" are your level.

 

As you get up in gear, at 304, rather than waste tries with the gear slots to get to 306, because moddable gear from the vendor is a detriment to climbing the ladder at the high level, go for the guts to fill in moddable armor.

 

That's how most people are going to wind up doing it.

 

Crafting is going to take a HUGE hit with 6.0 unless they change the mat requirements.

You can't buy/sell loot drops anymore (confirmed on PTS) since they're legacy bound. You won't be able to buy the one offs to make up a low i-rated item. You'll HAVE to use the vendor...

 

The more I talk about this, the more I talk myself out of resubbing.

Just going to have to wait and see.

But remember, we’ve been testing and had unlimited resources to figure stuff out, the average gamer isn’t going to want to work it out or have unlimited resources to do it.

Personally, I’ll be using the vendor a lot to target specific gear pieces that don’t drop fast enough until I get to 306. I doubt I’ll be using modded gear before then because as you pointed out, modded gear (weapons for instance) don’t always drop the same ilvl internals.

Once I have all 306 gear (including weapons), I think it’s reasonable that horizontal gearing should take over. Remember those vendors were only added after feed back asking for a direct place to buy the set pieces. Before that, we were going to have to rely on horizontal RNG drops to get those sets.

The issue for me is the horizontal progression has been nearly non existent under my testing. Just about everything that drops is lower than 306 and I’ve only gotten a few set pieces out of the hundreds of drops. That does not instill confidence in Eric’s claims about horizontal gear progression. It doesn’t work as advertised and we shouldn’t be getting drops lower than 306 if our ilvl is 306 (as well as Augments).

(I know you don’t disagree with that, just trying to lay it out for anyone reading who doesn’t understand the situation)

Crafting is going to basically be killed off so they can make people focus entirely on RNG gearing. Which really annoys me.

Are they going to add Augments and kits to that RNG vendor next? They may as well if they make it near impossible to craft or too expensive to buy on the GTN. People will just use 228-242 Augments and not bother with the new ones.

You might find this part funny (or even sad), I had actually unsubbed (was on preferred) because of the announced changes and another matter. I resubbed because it wouldn’t let me pts test without a sub. And I’m a firm believer if you don’t help, you’ve only yourself to blame if you don’t get what you want and I didn’t want to be a hypocrite whiner about the game. If you do test and Bioware still don’t listen to the 99.99% of testers, that’s totally on Bioware.

The testers like you, me and many others have given them tonnes of feed back on the RNG gearing concept and the crafting. Everyone but Oleg seems to hate RNG and Bioware refuse to listen or change path.

Everyone has said how bad the crafting system is and Bioware added more nodes and didn’t actually understand or ignored all the feed back on what was broken (and it was not needing more nodes, which they admitted was just a mistake on their part to start with),

We’ve literally had the least amount of communication from them on crafting than any other feed back request. Which means they had zero intentions on changing it, regardless of feed back, so why did they even bother asking for it?

My time card was for 60 days. So I will give it a try when live, but I have serious reservations about renewing a sub again.

My confidence had been building with changes they were making. But the ones they are ignoring have drag it back to a realistic expectation. Bioware will do what Bioware have always done. Do what they want at the expense of players leaving the game.

I plan on doing some testing on deconstructing stuff tomorrow. I have a full inventory of items that are useless... soooo I'll see what shakes out. Hopefully that part of the system is still intuitive.

Don’t expect too many fragments. This is based on my own tests of cargo holds filled with gear.

Deconstructing and Tech fragments

 

I’ve deconstructed about 250 items (give or take).

Both whole armour pieces, whole weapons, armour and weapons with the internals ripped out and done separately. This includes all lvl of gear from 268 to 306.

I also ran the same test with ear, implants and relics.

 

There is so much data that I’m not going to post it all as it’s 2am here. So I’ll summarise a bit.

Deconstructing has its very own form of RNG to get tech frags

 

Here is an example :

I deconstruct 4 chests and get the following tech frag drops -

268 chest - 4, 4, 4, 3,

298 chest - 12, 5, 5, 4,

304 chest - 5, 5, 8, 6,

306 chest - 5, 5, 5, 4,

 

I repeated these test on every item you can deconstruct and got similar results. ie, all over the place. There is no standard number of fragments per item type or item lvl.

 

I decided to then rip out the internals of the main and off hand weapons.

And to compare them properly, I also kept some weapons whole and made sure they all had the same lvl hilt, mod, enhancement.

 

Here is an example of 4 whole light sabres

288 - 4x whole weapons 9, 4, 6, 4 = 23 total tech frags

 

Here is an example of Pulled internals from 4 light sabres

288 - 4 x hilts - 4, 4, 9, 12 = 29

288 - 4x Mods - 9, 4, 4, 9 = 26

288 - 4x Enhance - 9, 9, 12, 4 = 34

From the same 4 weapons I got = 89 total tech frags

 

As you can clearly see. You get more tech frags from pulling the internals out to deconstruct.

But you can also see that the same items deconstructing to get tech frags are still completely RNG

 

I repeated this experiment right up to and including 306 armour sets and weapons with both internals and seperate.

Conclusion is this is yet another layer of RNG hidden under the already bad RNG.

 

 

RNG vendor for DPS specs drop more tank items than DPS items. It’s completely crazy. (I took a picture that I’ll post when I wake up to show what I mean).

 

To gear 3 DPS characters with 306 Armouring, mods and enhancements.

Each one costs 300 tech frags.

 

Which requires :

21 versatile armour

21 lethal mods

21 crit, accuracy or alacrity enhancements

63 x 300 = 18,900 tech frags

 

But in trying to get those, I often got tanks ones instead

12 resistive armouring

24 warding mods

19 bulwark enhancements

5 steadfast enhancements

60 x 300 = 18,000 tech frags

 

Basically it cost me 36,900 tech frags instead of 18,900 tech frags because the vendor wasn’t dropping them for my spec.

As you can see, you don’t get many tech frag for deconstructing. Which is bad if you’ve spent 300-350 tech frags for an item at the RNG vendor and end up having to deconstruct it for 4 tech frags. It would have been more appropriate to let’s us return the item for a refund or at least give us 50% of the tech frags back if deconstructing or returning.

That’s the issue Oleg. How is a person supposed to intuitively understand this system when Bioware keep promoting “play your way”. What are the rules and regulations? Where does a player find them in the game?

 

It is overly complicated compared to our previous systems. You can’t blame the player if Bioware don’t design ways for people to “easily” understand. By easy, I mean zero brain power to figure out or massive neon signs to say why the 180” changes and how this system work.

 

None of this has been done on the pts. We have had to figure it out ourselves and tell Bioware if it’s too hard to understand. Which in my opinion, it still is for the average player who just wants to jump in and play and get their gear without having to do google research.

 

I think we should all know by now that Bioware won’t put a tutorial in the game because theyve never done it in the past. They rely on word of mouth or people googling it after the brain trust works it out and spreads it or posts the info.

 

Ops and flashpoint mechanics are different. You can’t really compare the two.

You can read a guide to learn to play your class, you just cant read a guide on how to gear.

It sounds as though you know how to gear, you just choose not to do it correctly. Therefore, you wont gear successfully up the ilvl tiers. This would be similar to a player knowing the ops/fp mechanics, but choosing not to follow them. Most likely wont end well. Thats not a BW issue. Play how you want - but there are rules to follow regardless.

The "correct" way is a broken and horrible design, end of discussion.

Don’t expect too many fragments. This is based on my own tests of cargo holds filled with gear.

 

 

 

As you can see, you don’t get many tech frag for deconstructing. Which is bad if you’ve spent 300-350 tech frags for an item at the RNG vendor and end up having to deconstruct it for 4 tech frags. It would have been more appropriate to let’s us return the item for a refund or at least give us 50% of the tech frags back if deconstructing or returning.

Trixx

I really appreciate the way that you, Darev and Dasty present actual facts. ( Please note: there are a couple more that have also provided valuable information with facts as well. But these came to my mind this AM. ) These items are indisputable and stand a reflection of what we can expect... not unfounded speculation. Often times I present things that really have happened to me in game... but I don't have some of the specific information that you obviously have. Well done !!

I like solid facts... as opposed to some who have provided failed attempts at what is commonly referred to as reductio ad absurdum (or a form or ridicule) in order to demonstrate their points.

If we were in the arena of purchasing and or inventory management one of the primary things I would be looking at in order to make choices would be SOLID FACTS. Some of he other things I use to review before deciding to "place on the shelf" for inventory was:

1. How critical was the component to the operation of equipment that we had sold as a company … customer support item

2. The over all expense of the item ( if not more than "X" number of dollars I'd get just one if it were critical to the operation of major equipment)

3. Availability if needed in an emergency ( was it something that could be easily shipped in overnight without the freight being ridiculously expensive )

4. And finally how many did we actually sell in the last year. Sometimes if the part were REALLY critical to the operation of equipment that we sold and it was NOT too expensive ( I would discus this with the CEO and other board members for final approval if it were needed) then I would still place ONE on the shelf for emergency access. You would be surprised how many times that bailed out our service department over the weekends to order a part THEN wait another 24 hours (on top of an entire weekend ) of lost revenue.

I used this RL illustration of some of the decisions that I was face with and made in order to take care of customers. For some this seemed a little outside of the box. But in reality it worked and made things better for everyone.

Perhaps for some people what many of us like are ideas that seem out side of the box for a MMO. Yet the simple fact is that certain aspects of this game has already worked in the past. Things changed. I have no idea WHY those changes were implemented. IMO... it's no longer important to remember who to blame !! That ship has already sailed and sank !! The important thing to do is to find those things that work the best for this game.

OK... I'm going to stop right here. There are some that will jump on that last statement and ridicule me personally for being the one person who is trying to make a choice for the entire community. NO ! Just simply NO ! That is not the case for one minute !!!!

Again.. Let me restate my appreciation for the facts that you and others have taken the time to present in a better fashion than I have. I agree with that and your conclusions thus far.

To me personally: I don't give a rats AZZ whether the idea(s) came from 1.0 / 2.0 / 3.0 / 4.0 / or (dare I say it) 5.0 :eek: … BUT if the idea(s) WORK (or worked) then for crying out loud USE IT (or them) !!!!.

I'll go out on a limb and suggest that this will work in other areas too :

1. companions

2. s/h areas

3. crafting

4. PvP

5. other areas !!

Anyone thought about the ilevel and gearing like this.

A piece of ilvl 284 can have 274 mod and 290 armoring, so by getting a bit lucky you could upgrade pieces faster than the ilvl+2 method would work, obviously it's credit sink if you need to rip mods/stuff out.

I stopped reading through everything, but I didn't see anyone mention that with loot drops selected for Arsenal Merc, most of the offhands that dropped AND were obtained from the vendor were generators. Which arsenal does not use. Tried swapping it to the other options and some pistols dropped but still a lot of generators. I would be hopping mad if I got a generator from the vendor once this is live!

Also for some reason, my healing sorc was getting sniper rifles on friday, but over the weekend all was well, so not sure there.

I personally like the difficulty hike but a lot lot lot of folks were fussing and whining and MANY of the guildies who came over just to do the achievement for the speeder were /aghast/ at "green drops" and could not comprehend that they had to equip them to eventually get blue and then up. They were highly upset at seeing my purple and then yellow despite how many times I explained the ratings. Expect a lot of fussing and "I quit's" from people who cannot comprehend things.

Just more mob mentality where the defender loses track of who is arguing (even though the point remains), so it turns into a semantic debate. Classic forum banter. Can we get back on the topic of why RNG is best for loot acquisition, please?

Speaking of semantics, and unicorny opinions aside, the topic is 'all acquisition,' not specifically RNG. 9/10 troll attempt though.

Trixx

 

I really appreciate the way that you, Darev and Dasty present actual facts. ( Please note: there are a couple more that have also provided valuable information with facts as well. But these came to my mind this AM. ) These items are indisputable and stand a reflection of what we can expect... not unfounded speculation. Often times I present things that really have happened to me in game... but I don't have some of the specific information that you obviously have. Well done !!

 

I like solid facts... as opposed to some who have provided failed attempts at what is commonly referred to as reductio ad absurdum (or a form or ridicule) in order to demonstrate their points.

Facts huh. Lemme count the facts in the post you quoted.

 

Don’t expect too many fragments. This is based on my own tests of cargo holds filled with gear.

 

Subjective, not fact.

 

As you can see, you don’t get many tech frag for deconstructing.

 

Subjective, not fact.

 

Which is bad if you’ve spent 300-350 tech frags for an item at the RNG vendor and end up having to deconstruct it for 4 tech frags.

 

Subjective, not fact.

 

It would have been more appropriate to let’s us return the item for a refund or at least give us 50% of the tech frags back if deconstructing or returning.

 

Subjective, not fact.

 

You were saying something about facts?

Quoting for posterity. I read the data post. My mistake and I'll admit that. The conclusion is still biased though. I personally don't have a problem with the RoR of tech frags.

It sounds as though you know how to gear, you just choose not to do it correctly. Therefore, you wont gear successfully up the ilvl tiers. This would be similar to a player knowing the ops/fp mechanics, but choosing not to follow them. Most likely wont end well. Thats not a BW issue. Play how you want - but there are rules to follow regardless.

I could see your argument applying if someone was in full 258 gear and didn't want to swap out *anything* and were complaining that they weren't getting decent drops, but we are talking about *one* piece, because it was a relic with an actual benefit as opposed to the other ones that dropped. This is hardly "similar to a player knowing the ops/fp mechanics, but choosing not to follow them."

How many people will get bit by this because they don't want to swap out a 268 or lower rating enhancement for a higher-level one that doesn't have the right stat mix and won't be as effective at dps/heals/tanking? Having 1 or 2 slots below the "item threshold" shouldn't prevent higher-level items from dropping, it just holds up all of progression.

--Mop

Quoting for posterity. I read the data post. My mistake and I'll admit that. The conclusion is still biased though. I personally don't have a problem with the RoR of tech frags.

Do you not understand the fundamental purpose of feedback?

It's supposed to be subjective. Bioware can gather objective information any time it wants to off its own servers. What it can't gather are player thoughts and impressions. That's why there's a PUBLIC TEST SERVER in the first place.

I stopped reading through everything, but I didn't see anyone mention that with loot drops selected for Arsenal Merc, most of the offhands that dropped AND were obtained from the vendor were generators. Which arsenal does not use. Tried swapping it to the other options and some pistols dropped but still a lot of generators. I would be hopping mad if I got a generator from the vendor once this is live!

 

Also for some reason, my healing sorc was getting sniper rifles on friday, but over the weekend all was well, so not sure there.

 

Yes, I brought this up about Arsenal Mercs two weeks ago, at the same time I brought up tank drops for dps classes.

It seems to have been missed by them or ignored. I’m going with missed as they did fix the tank drops.

Do you not understand the fundamental purpose of feedback?

 

It's supposed to be subjective. Bioware can gather objective information any time it wants to off its own servers. What it can't gather are player thoughts and impressions. That's why there's a PUBLIC TEST SERVER in the first place.

No it's not. Feedback is not subjective. Your thoughts and opinions are not feedback. Saying you don't like this or not like that is not feedback. You don't get to dictate what should or should not be done with feedback.

Feedback is only useful if it's unbiased. You can give math on the RoR of tech frags. What you don't do is give your opinion on the amount of frags. What you don't say is "this is not enough frags according to me". That is for Bioware to decide, not you. You can identify a problem you have with the game, but only Bioware can decide if it's relevant. As soon as you say "well I don't like this", your feedback becomes a whine.

Feedback is only useful if it's unbiased. You can give math on the RoR of tech frags. What you can't do is give your opinion on the amount of frags. That is for Bioware to decide, not you.

Actually, when Bioware ask for feed back, they also want your opinion. You only need to go to all of the threads created by them in this forum to see them asking for opinions.

Now wether they ask for a specific opinion or not could be debatable. You are incorrect by saying our opinions aren’t feed back.

If you’ve ever professionally done alpha or beta testing or closed beta testing, you would know that game developers also want opinions on things they may not have considered or things they haven’t always asked for.

I think your definition of what feed back is a little too narrow when it comes to game testing.

Yes, it is up to Bioware to decide to listen to that feed back or act on it. But you’ve zero right to tell people they can’t give their opinion on frags. On that point you couldn’t be more wrong.

So can you please stop this incessant sniping at people on the pts trying to provide such feed back. This isnt the gen section and it’s not constructive. If you’ve some valuable feed back to the devs, by all means post it for them and stop attacking everyone’s posts.

Edit : here are some examples of Bioware responding to such feed back

We have definitely heard concerns about the lack of mods and moddable gear

 

We will absolutely make changes if it is an issue so keep playing and keep sharing feedback

Here are some examples of asking for feed back, which you’ll note will be opinion based feed back because we have no access to internal data to provide such facts as definitive numbers and everyone’s impression could be different.

Ive highlighted and underlined the important part where Eric says this is just for guidance and to feel free to pass on any feed back you have. Which I interpret as opinions too, considering a lot of the changes that have been made up to now have been based on opinions.

Hey all,

 

Phase 3 is now active on PTS. Please head there and test how balance is feeling in all forms of world content. Missions, heroics, Chapters, etc. Please report your findings back into this thread. Some key information we are looking for:

• Does a particular class or spec feel too strong? Too weak?
  
• Do any of the new abilities feel particularly strong? Too weak?
  
• Is there a set bonus that feels too strong? Too weak?
  
• Is there a tactical that feels too strong? Too weak?
  
• Is there a specific set bonus and tactical combination that is over powered?
  

Be as specific in your feedback as possible! The questions above are just for guidance, feel free to pass on any feedback you have.

 

Thanks all!

 

-eric

If this wasn’t the pts, I would choose to use ignore. But as it’s the pts, it’s a possibility you may add some feed back that the rest of us have not seen and I would hate to miss that.

No it's not. Feedback is not subjective. Your thoughts and opinions are not feedback. Saying you don't like this or not like that is not feedback. You don't get to dictate what should or should not be done with feedback.

 

Feedback is only useful if it's unbiased. You can give math on the RoR of tech frags. What you can't do is give your opinion on the amount of frags. That is for Bioware to decide, not you.

Sorry but no. While opinions and tastes are indeed subjective, it does not mean it is not feedback.

PTS is not here to just test as "this work, this is bugged", BW asked us several times how do we FEEL about different things they are implementing.

We can say if we feel X amount of TF is too much or too little.

Of course good math makes a more compelling argument, it does not mean that apreciations as players (even those without it) are not valid. Most of that is probably more valid than what BW think in the matter.

Of course BW can decide to ignore even the best math and logic that shows how wrong they are, like in crafting.

IMO :

Feed back is both factual and subjective. Thus far I have tried to present a bit of both. Usually I will review what others have posted and comment on the "information" that they have provided because they do better at presenting facts that they have discovered while on the PTS.

For now none of this information is completely conclusive. Why … because we are all TESTING … that's why ! IMO .. a part of the process of testing is to provide and SHARE information to help each other. I realize that for some this concept is totally out side of the box. My intent is (or at least should be) to work at specific goals.

edited... until I can think of a more affective means of presenting this …

No it's not. Feedback is not subjective. Your thoughts and opinions are not feedback. Saying you don't like this or not like that is not feedback. You don't get to dictate what should or should not be done with feedback.

 

Feedback is only useful if it's unbiased. You can give math on the RoR of tech frags. What you don't do is give your opinion on the amount of frags. What you don't say is "this is not enough frags according to me". That is for Bioware to decide, not you. You can identify a problem you have with the game, but only Bioware can decide if it's relevant. As soon as you say "well I don't like this", your feedback becomes a whine.

All feedback is opinion and those opinions do matter if the majority agree on something being bad. It becomes the developers best interest to change things, but then again BW is pretty good at making things worse and killing this games player base with every major update.

How easily the armchair devs here (and we all know who they are) are willing to put on ignore anyone who disagrees with them.

Maybe they're simply tired of reading posts that aren't fact-based disagreements and appear to be nothing but poorly disguised trolling?

Guys, we need to stop this arguing, it’s just derailing a feed back thread that Eric will have to scan through and he might miss important stuff.

(Yes, I too was caught in this web).

That’s all I will say on the subject and I will only continue posting on relevant feed back.