Baron, for your sake.. please see my sig.

 

And funny how everyone always complains about Sorc changes while barely anybody complains about Sage changes. Guess the QQ is on the Imperial side.

 

Honestly, I PVP as a Sage, have from the start. I miss my pre 1.2 spec, it was fun but very OP. I see the changes now and see some nerfs and some extra tools and 1 change that will require me to change the way I play my class.

 

I see a challenge, to still be nr 1 in damage done despite all the nerfs. And you aren't changing any Dev's minds about changes like this. Not in one MMO has an ability change ever been taken away from going live. Devs will always prefer testing changes like this in the field and tweaking it after receiving live numbers. So better live with it and adapt then rage on a forum, it will keep yourself a lot calmer.

Just say I told you so when they finally do admit their mistake and change things again. This is the way Multi-class PVP balancing has always gone and always will go.

 

"Scissors is fine!

Nerf paper.

 

Sincerely,

Rock."

 

Dear Devlonir,

 

Thank you for your sincere and well intentioned post.

 

I only talk about sorcs because my im very attached to my sorc (which is my main), whereas my sage is level 20-ish and I havent touched her in several months. But either way sorcs and sages are the same thing - only opposite factions, so whatever applies to one applies to the other. Either way Im sure you know that number of people who bother to post on forums is only a small segment of the playerbase - so maybe there are many 'pubs out there who feel just the same way, but dont think there is any point in posting it on the forums.

 

Though I dont think it is fair to call mere protest and objection QQing. To me that is unfair and is belittling the objections and the feelings of the people who are voicing out. To me QQing is more of a denegatory term to refer to meaningless aimless moaning that is not worthy of attention. So please don't refer to the protests in this thread as such.

 

I dont expect these changes to be rolled back now. Im well aware of Bioware's arrogant stance of "We know what is best, and We get to tell you what IS and ISNT fun because this is our game!". I only continue to post with the (fools?) hope that keeping up the pressure, will cause them to backtrack sometime shortly in the future.

 

The question is when? After how many sorc/sage main players unsub and leave with a bad taste in their mouth? That is the worst way to part from something you love...

 

I guess you can just sense the despair, disillusionment and downright disappointment in the tone of my voice of the last paragraph of my 2nd last post

I play assassin and I am having tons of fun. I don't agree with some of the changes proposed. The assassin has very few 30m attacks and now electrocute will go from 30m to 10m. Why? How will the assassin kill the robots in Alderan? I am specifically talking about the robots which take care of the Jedi statues. They are too far away for any other attack.

 

Also, force lift is great for the sorcerer but we don't have anything close to that for the assassin. Whirlwind only lasts 8s and mind trap has a 10m range and a long cooldown. What gives?

 

All being said, kudos on the game. I am loving it.

I play assassin and I am having tons of fun. I don't agree with some of the changes proposed. The assassin has very few 30m attacks and now electrocute will go from 30m to 10m. Why? How will the assassin kill the robots in Alderan? I am specifically talking about the robots which take care of the Jedi statues. They are too far away for any other attack.

 

Also, force lift is great for the sorcerer but we don't have anything close to that for the assassin. Whirlwind only lasts 8s and mind trap has a 10m range and a long cooldown. What gives?

 

All being said, kudos on the game. I am loving it.

 

For once I'd like to see a game give us our awesome powers and then, just leave them alone. Period. Just once.

I think the Core issue isn't the specific changes. It's the perception that they are creating with their changes. far too often lately, the changes they make have no correlation with the general feeling of the populace, nor with the data that the testers that often post show.

 

I think people are frustrated because Bio came out and said they were making changes that very few people really wanted. and wanting a change is totally different then being OK with a change. the people who often defend the patch are usually from the position of they are OK with the changed. not that they wanted them. but it doesn't impact their gameplay.

 

the problem is, for allot of people, these small things do impact their gameplay. In PvP the balance is justified. But the impact to Pve obviously has ALLOT of people hyped up and aggravated. What I find amazing is how many people are frustrated with it, and yet those that are siding with Bio can't see that. look at all the posts about the same exact subject, and how much controversy it has started up. it's worse then what happened with the healers in 1.2 (I know some sorcs/mercs may disagree, but the over post count for the involved threads is higher now then it was for the sorc threads back in 1.2)

 

S no matter what you want to think about it, it is a VERY touchy point for many. I wasn't impacted by the 1.2 healer changes when they happened, but I can understand why the healers felt the way they did. And at that time, Bio had actually listened...and cut back on the nerf. Many may have not agreed with the scope, but Bio at least listened. which is the EXACT reason why people are griping now. In hopes that Bio will listen, and possibly make some adjustments.

 

Plus, for many, the changes are doing exactly what Bio said they wouldn't do, which is make change for PvP that would impact PvE. you may not think that it has a noticeable impact, but the volume of those against it say otherwise. so it's really additional salt in an otherwise open wound.

 

Edit: after reading my own words, I want to note that this isn't to take steam away from those who are not liking the PvP impact as well. It was a general comment on why many are voicing their opinions. I just happen to come from the PvE side, to the posts discussing it from that perspective are impacting me the most.

 

On a personal note: the actual changes themselves don't upset me as much as their approach to the whole process. It seems disingenuous at best, and at worst, lacks integrity.

Edited September 16, 2012 by Elyx

Seriously, just remove the BH Mercenary Pyrotech tree from the game if you're not going to do something to make it viable.

 

Now that I'm on prof 4, I realize how ridiculously underpowered that class is and why I was so frustrated trying to level my first toon.

 

I'm serious. This sucks.

If you have problems leveling a pyro merc then you need to L2P. Sorry, but that is just the way it is.

In regards to the 20 sec cool-down on force speed for inquisitors.

 

Does this mean that tank-sins are going to have the ability to damn near spam force speed? Tanksins can reduce force speed cooldown by 10secs, which means that they'll force speed every 10 secs. This can create an unfair advantage in pvp; especially huttball and ALD.

 

In regards to the changes regarding crowd control.

 

By Bioware's own admission, the original idea was go in as stealth, and use it on an unaware opponent from a distance. which is more or less the point in pvp. Now, you'll have to make your opponent aware of your intentions and presence. Sounds like a change made for ****** players to me. Sure, everyone gets frustrated when it happens to them, but that's why in pvp, you need teamwork. You need a buddy to back you up, for those situations. You need to call inc, you need to use your head. This change will have a negative affect on pvp.

Edited September 18, 2012 by cool-dude

In regards to the 20 sec cool-down on force speed for inquisitors.

 

Does this mean that tank-sins are going to have the ability to damn near spam force speed? Tanksins can reduce force speed cooldown by 10secs, which means that they'll force speed every 10 secs. This can create an unfair advantage in pvp; especially huttball and ALD.

 

In regards to the changes regarding crowd control.

 

By Bioware's own admission, the original idea was go in as stealth, and use it on an unaware opponent from a distance. which is more or less the point in pvp. Now, you'll have to make your opponent aware of your intentions and presence. Sounds like a change made for ****** players to me. Sure, everyone gets frustrated when it happens to them, but that's why in pvp, you need teamwork. You need a buddy to back you up, for those situations. You need to call inc, you need to use your head. This change will have a negative affect on pvp.

 

Once the ball gets rolling on nerfing, its only the beginning of the negativity. I guess the 'up' side is they will eventually get around to nerfing every class, but then, some other class will have a slight 'advantage' and that will of course have to be addressed, and why all of a sudden did so and so class get their powers back? (Whineathon) oh, ok, we'll take it back again ad infinitum. . .

I still want to know why some DPS classes lag well behind others in PvE when the developers said a few months ago that their target is to have all the DPS classes perform within 5 percent of each other in PvE. The data from parses and SimC shows certain DPS classes are 10 percent or more ahead of others in best-in-slot gear. And the changes in 1.4 did nothing to address this discrepancy. The best-performing DPS classes did not get their damage nerfed. The lowest performing DPS classes did not get damage buffs. Is Bioware abandoning this target? Do they just cave to whatever the PvPers want and to hell with PvE? I'd like an answer from one of the developers but don't expect I will get one.

In regards to the 20 sec cool-down on force speed for inquisitors.

 

Does this mean that tank-sins are going to have the ability to damn near spam force speed? Tanksins can reduce force speed cooldown by 10secs, which means that they'll force speed every 10 secs. This can create an unfair advantage in pvp; especially huttball and ALD.

 

In regards to the changes regarding crowd control.

 

By Bioware's own admission, the original idea was go in as stealth, and use it on an unaware opponent from a distance. which is more or less the point in pvp. Now, you'll have to make your opponent aware of your intentions and presence. Sounds like a change made for ****** players to me. Sure, everyone gets frustrated when it happens to them, but that's why in pvp, you need teamwork. You need a buddy to back you up, for those situations. You need to call inc, you need to use your head. This change will have a negative affect on pvp.

 

If I remember correctly, the tank tree do not have cd reduction for force speed anymore. You can only do that in the infiltration tree, which has the max. cd reduction of 5s. That makes the shortest cd for force speed 15s.

 

If you want unfair speed in civil war, look at the scoundrel/operative, where they can get almost constant 50% speed boost out of combat

Edited September 19, 2012 by kjng

Developers, implement a simple rule check on changes, treat it like a business...

 

1) Is this change to help us or to help customers? If it is only to help you, do not do it.

2) Is this change taking away any sense of power or abilities? If so don't do it.

3) Is the change relevant beyond the math weighting of ability? Often ability weighting changes or doesn't always apply, thus making the concessions wrong or poorly implemented.

 

So Cone Knockback?

Fails on #1, sure it helps you balance, but doesn't help any customer of the game. Very few players have a problem with it being a full 360 degree knockback. Especially considering the games ability to handle facing direction and lag, this is going to 'hurt' players as it will add more confusion. Right now, doing a Maul or a Force Push in the 'correct' direction is hard in PVP as all it takes is one player to have a crappy connection and even the players on nice 15ms fiber connections get screwed.

 

Force Speed?

Does it really outweigh the reduction of the Stun feature? In the match it looks like a nice trade, but in reality, players that were not range stun dependent, will exploit the heck out of this. Sorc/Sage already are tanking in PVE/PVP and now they can FR more often and heal themselves easier. Why not just give them a KILL EVERYONE button?

 

 

There are some really strange things with the way the stun balance is being implemented, and instead of working to solve the problem in programming by creating a new dynamic, it seems like the developsers are taking the easy/lazy way out, and altering the current ability set to compensate.

 

In the live game, taking a Guardian and a Sage at 50, the Sage will be able to take more damage and outlast the Guardian if they focus on force armor, heals, and distancing from damage. And they can spike far more damage as well. How does this MAKE SENSE, when one is a damage/healing class and the other is supposed to be a tank?

 

This is where the game is off balance. Sure a game cannot ever be truly balanced unless everyone has the same abilities aka HALO. However, in an MMO, cross balancing should be resolution, so that Class A is the balance to Class X, and Class B is the balance to Class Y, and Class C is the balance to Class Z, and on and on.

 

Using this concept, what profession is the 'balance' to sorc/sage? I can't find one that beat them in a duel or one that can out damage them or one that can take more damage than they can.

 

Do you want this to be flavor of the month? And we all spend time rolling sage/sorc and stop playing the other classes?

 

I could be completely wrong, but I don't see the counterpoint or in game proof yet.

Just additional thoughts, and still a lot of concern for 1.4 changes.

Developers, implement a simple rule check on changes, treat it like a business...

 

1) Is this change to help us or to help customers? If it is only to help you, do not do it.

2) Is this change taking away any sense of power or abilities? If so don't do it.

3) Is the change relevant beyond the math weighting of ability? Often ability weighting changes or doesn't always apply, thus making the concessions wrong or poorly implemented.

 

So Cone Knockback?

Fails on #1, sure it helps you balance, but doesn't help any customer of the game. Very few players have a problem with it being a full 360 degree knockback. Especially considering the games ability to handle facing direction and lag, this is going to 'hurt' players as it will add more confusion. Right now, doing a Maul or a Force Push in the 'correct' direction is hard in PVP as all it takes is one player to have a crappy connection and even the players on nice 15ms fiber connections get screwed.

 

Force Speed?

Does it really outweigh the reduction of the Stun feature? In the match it looks like a nice trade, but in reality, players that were not range stun dependent, will exploit the heck out of this. Sorc/Sage already are tanking in PVE/PVP and now they can FR more often and heal themselves easier. Why not just give them a KILL EVERYONE button?

 

 

There are some really strange things with the way the stun balance is being implemented, and instead of working to solve the problem in programming by creating a new dynamic, it seems like the developsers are taking the easy/lazy way out, and altering the current ability set to compensate.

 

In the live game, taking a Guardian and a Sage at 50, the Sage will be able to take more damage and outlast the Guardian if they focus on force armor, heals, and distancing from damage. And they can spike far more damage as well. How does this MAKE SENSE, when one is a damage/healing class and the other is supposed to be a tank?

 

This is where the game is off balance. Sure a game cannot ever be truly balanced unless everyone has the same abilities aka HALO. However, in an MMO, cross balancing should be resolution, so that Class A is the balance to Class X, and Class B is the balance to Class Y, and Class C is the balance to Class Z, and on and on.

 

Using this concept, what profession is the 'balance' to sorc/sage? I can't find one that beat them in a duel or one that can out damage them or one that can take more damage than they can.

 

Do you want this to be flavor of the month? And we all spend time rolling sage/sorc and stop playing the other classes?

 

I could be completely wrong, but I don't see the counterpoint or in game proof yet.

Just additional thoughts, and still a lot of concern for 1.4 changes.

 

You make alot of good points. Sounds like a rock/paper/scissors+Sage/Sorc setup, and balancing like that probably does need to be addressed. My issue has been with changing a basic ability, like the 360 knockback into a cone. What good is that? I get resisted alot of the time with my Sage when I do that anyway. The cone idea is just lame. Reducing the distance of the Assassin's lightning is lame. Maybe having new dynamics to address these issues sound more like the answer. Another thing that might work is if random PvP groups could learn how to work as a team and not run in alone into a heavily-entrenched enemy position to feed enemy kill counts.

Every patch you nerf things for PVP that will have an unintended impact on PVE. Do you think force stun isn't used in PVE?

 

I'm trying to think what Ops bosses can be stunned....

 

Hmm. Ok, how about stunning Flash Point bosses...

 

Yeah. The rest of the PvE content is a speed bump.

Using this concept, what profession is the 'balance' to sorc/sage? I can't find one that beat them in a duel or one that can out damage them or one that can take more damage than they can.

 

*snicker* Do they not have Sentinels/Mauraders on your sever? I know there is much drooling over Combat spec (damn fine tank killers), but Watchman's 6 second interupt basically turns anything with a cast bar dependency into so much walking sashimi, and having Sage/Sorc's knock back restricted to a cone makes them that much easier to run down and butcher. 2/3rds of the angles of approach are now missing their best anti-melee bulwark.

In regards to the 20 sec cool-down on force speed for inquisitors.

 

Does this mean that tank-sins are going to have the ability to damn near spam force speed? Tanksins can reduce force speed cooldown by 10secs, which means that they'll force speed every 10 secs.

 

If you read the patch notes you'll find that Shadows/Assassins do NOT take 10 second off of the the new base of 20. They can with skill points take 5 seconds off (minimum cooldown of 15 seconds). A bit faster than before, but not as bas as you're thinking.