1.2 Hard Mode loot. Why raid when you can just run dailies?

You know - I'm fine with this as long as without the same presence stat, the raider can't power through the same content. If they want to do dailies for repair money, then I guess they need to build a set of presence gear too.

So I take it you would be fine if raid gear was only usable inside raid instances?

Yes my friends and I raid together. However none of us will stay here if you can buy raid gear just by doing dailies. You are encouraging people to skip the content and ask for handouts that way. It sounds like a poser to me. I keep saying if people want raid gear however they are casual a system can be designed for them as long as it still requires them to kill raid bosses. Why because then they are playing the content, not avoiding it.

O and BTW we could have cleared all of hard modes, (SOA if we stop getted the bugs) but then what? Not a single person cares for doing Nightmare modes, the most we talked about it is lets down a few bosses to get 2 the extra pieces of rakata gear. Not for the challenge not for titles. These things are pointless to us really. Give us gear and a good social environment and we are happy.

Story mode allows them to see the content.

Allowing them to purchase "raid gear", which is really just PvE gear is the nature of the modern MMO. If they cannot buy it, then they will end up leaving.

It's just common sense for a business to attempt to appeal to the larger segment of players - and you, Gavin, are not in the larger segment. Raiding has never been.

Thank you for clarifying that your raid group only raids for gear and not the challenge. Remove the gear carrot and suddenly you, and your raid group (if you are telling the truth) are ready to run to your corner, pull the ePeen card and cry foul.

I'd rather have a healthy game, full of players at max level that can be recruited easily from than have a small, sickly game where the developers cater to the those that call themselves "hardcore raiders" that are barely more than a small group of players with a lot of time on their hands. They can't see the forest for the trees because they are blinded by their demands to have a special cookie that no one else should be allowed to have.

No because here is why. The Solo content I am talking about should be Different then the current dailies.

Solo content should be this. 15 to 30 minutes in a instance like event. (Story line like quest) so I can only be you and your companion. Now you can in these Solo Instances have spells for both you and your companion that now are active and Presence increases how good these spells are. (all this would need to be developed and tested over a month or 2 to get it right) in any case these instances will require you to use just about all these new spells.(remember they can only be used in solo instances no where else). Now the solo content should be tiered much like Raiding, it should take you a month or so to go from 1 to another, not hit tier cap in a week. like raiding does with lock outs.

Yes raid gear can help if you are T3 raid gear doing a T1 Solo instance as long as you have 2 or 3 pieces of solo gear. However if you are doing T3 gear you should be in at the very least half T3 Solo gear, yes the rest can be T3 raid gear. This allows players who want to raid and way to down the solo content without having to devote the same amount of time to soloing as to raiding.

Solo content should be like raiding as in it should be gated so you dont see T3 geared people after 1 week of soloing. There should be time spent = progression.

This could encourage also solo players to spend time raiding for more content.

now for why raid gear should not be only for raiding. Solo content (AKA Solo instances where you get solo epic gear from) is different then daily quest, or flashpoints, or datacron runs. These are all considered non end game well besides daily quest. However these PVE areas are meant for getting credits for repairs, or to use the GTN, or a ton of other non end game progression oriented activities. Yea they maybe be tied to it in some way its just not like you can go to the GTN work and buy T3 Raid or Solo gear.

Actually no its not. Purchasing raid gear started in WoW with really WTOLK where the all mighty dollar became more important then Quality. Yes it's about business sense however the problem is this. You can say its business related if you don't hand out the gear, however guess what there are more games that do that then don't Right now there is a much larger group of people that want to earn it then want it handed to them. I am on a server that use to be over populated and had an hour queue. After the raiders discovered how easy the content is and (this was asked at the Guild Summit) why is the gear the same between nightmare and hard mode. Just a heads up a few hard core raiding guilds are having attendance issues because of these 2 core issues. They are not ever going to come to the SWTOR forum and argue over it. They did just this, cancel their accounts and left the game. Right now my server is heavy most nights because people are coming here from other servers. Not because these players came back.

Yes if tomorrow SWTOR patched in where we could go to the GTN work and buy gear for credits we would leave. What is the point of raiding and beating your head against the walk with bugs or even truly hard content if 1 person can screw up and wipe the raid. Go do dailies buy the raid gear. Really there is no point to raiding if this was the case. We raid to progress, progressing in an MMO is getting better gear. If progression meant getting a new spell that increase my healing by 5% I would do that.

Sorry I do not nor will I ever raid for nothing. Yes titles, gear which you can buy without raiding much like WoW. I would rather go watch a cooking show rather then spend time doing nothing. At least with the cooking show I would learn how to cook something.

Gavin, please go Re-read my entire post instead of just clipping a tiny bit you don't agree with.

I did I disagree with you period. You still want people to get raid gear for not completing the content. If people don't want to raid but they want to solo they should be given solo gear for completing solo content.

Would be nice, but you know, your 'raid gear' is PVE gear. not 'raid gear'. There is no stat on it that says "Raid" or anything else that buffs your performance while raiding and only raiding like the expertise stat does for PVP. As for you suggestion of Presence. If you ONLY have that stat on then ONLY your companion improves and not you. Therefore making soloing IMPOSSIBLE if you are playing "Pokemon in Space".

If you are so 'hard core' about raid gear only being for raiding, then you should in fact be trying to get Bioware to make a tier of gear with a raid only stat. This stat would improve everything while you are in an Ops zone but be useless everywhere else since it's RAID gear.

Until such time as that is implemented, 'Raid gear' is still Player Versus Environment gear. If BW wants to include alternate and more time consuming ways to obtain better PVE gear that doesn't involve getting 7-15 other people working together regularly then good for them for providing ALTERNATE METHODS to obtain something.

If your guild is going to fold just because joe somebody can get the same piece of gear as you but taking them over five times as much effort then I can say with pride that SWTOR will be better off for the loss.

Pride of accomplishment is one thing. Ego and gear based E-peen is nothing to be proud of.




Edit:
Here is an outstanding example from my time in FFXI.

Relic weapons. Best weapons in the game. People who ran Linkshells (Guilds) that did Dynamis (raids) would get the currency faster and complete their weapons before normal people.

HOWEVER

The average player could buy currency from others and work towards the weapon on their own. Only in the last two stages would a group be required for the items. (However the group now is substantially less with the level cap increase)

You need to read my post about solo content gear. The presence gear will be the best for this, raid gear will not. It means there is a new totally separate set of content. Its like raiding but its not a true raid, its more like a solo flashpoint. Anyways Both sets of gear in the normal world will be just fine however the gear itself can be setup to not be interchangeable Yea if a person who raids again has a few pieces of raid gear and the rest in solo gear the solo content is do-able.

O and FYI if you read it I say there should be spells that you can only use in Solo content, that are affected by the presence stat. The only problem with 2 ways of gearing is that developers would need to pay attention to both sets of content instead of just raiding.

If you read that you will see I am saying have 2 different progression paths and there is very little interchange ability of the 2 unless its 2 Tier levels lower then what you have of either solo or Raid gear.

Gavin -

Seriously, why do you care if item level 146 gear is obtained in a way via diffrent than raiding. Im interested in hearing a logical reply. What does it matter?

If you were to get something that made you visually stand out at the Republic Fleet, like glowing augs or weapns, something to let everyone know your guild is the best on the server?

I don't get the argument. All Hardcore raiders that I know, really want recognition for being the best, first and foremost. And I absolutley think they deserve their due for that. They are the ones who figure encounters out. They are the ones who make the Tankspot videos that the sheep follow. Cool.

Why is it necessary for a guild that WATCHES Tankspot videos, then completes the encounters - to hold superior gear over a casual player? Some people don't have the time to raid. They are every bit as good of players as people that raid 5 nights a week.

Honestly - I think some marginal raiders, that happen to be in good guilds that carry them, get concerned that:

1. A casual player will out perform them in combat, because they no longer have the gear advantage, it comes down to skill.

2. Thier concept of what is difficult and awesome and "The Hardest Thing to Do In the Game" - becomes shattered when casuals clear the same content.

The encounters should come down to mechanics and skills, not gear wars.

I could be every bit as good as the Healer clearing NM modes, but I don't have the time to raid 20 hours a week to gear up fast enough. So I should be withheld from content, because a gear curve says that an inferior player to me that has more time to play the game, gets to keep progressing, because his gear affords him the right to make more mistakes?

Doesn't make any sense dude.

Unless you want your superior gear for E-Peen reasons. Then it makes all the sense in the world.

But titles, trophies, glowing weapons - all of these things will give you the recognition you desire - and still allow very good casual players the opportunity to see and complete content based on skill, not on a gear hampster wheel grind fest.