The trash skipping is staggering.

To be fair, if you're decently geared for HM FPs then just about the only gear that's really worth getting is the columi drop off the last boss. Everything else will be about even with what you have or even a downgrade. That's another reason people tend to skip content.

Not all the time for a newly specced 50 its improved gear

OF course trash skipping is not a bad thing since most of the time, it's a waste of time.

Look at all the trash in EC from the tanks to the mine field. To much trash and not worth the time and the path to the chest is not even in the same route to the actual boss.

Then you have the trash from the minefield to Kephesis. The only saving grace there is you can say the chest is worth it but if it was really was worth it, people wouldn't strive to skip it in the manor that was available (and lets just say it took a lot of thought to figure out how to skip that trash)

and those are just operation mobs. It gets even worse in some flashpoints with trash that does nothing but create a speed bump and doesn't really make for an interesting encounter.

I could see the argument of not skipping a boss but if you don't need a drop off it I also have no problem skipping them. It's not bad design as it gives players some choice in the way they want to run a FP.

I've never seen a group deny someone a boss kill if they asked for it.

Trash drops nothing worthwhile so there not worth killing. There are not rewards for killing them in most cases worth the time it takes to actually kill them. This goes double for FP cause at least in operations you have a chance at chest loot.

There is simply no reason to kill every single mob in an instance and if it's skippable. I don't think it has anything to do with game testing. It's just something gamers was to have in small portions not pack after pack.

If you had smaller amounts of trash but more interesting as an encounter it would not be so bad but just copy and pasting some mobs in your way is really not the way to do it and when done that way, gamers will skip it.

I'd say the vast majority of the time my groupmates are cool about mobs and ask if ppl wanna do skippable stuff, and when I'm on my healer or tank I'm always willing to do whatever content ppl need. Like, I haven't done the turret boss in D7 in a while but every time someone said they wanted to we did.

Every now and then I see people whining about a trash mob being pulled, but I'm always quick to defend whoever did it. Why more people don't tell the whiny spoiled children to stop being whiny spoiled children I don't understand tbh.

Trash can serve many purposes:

1) Artbitrarily increase time to clear

2) Introduce new mechanics

3) Give a living feeling to an area

4) Provide experience (in game i.e. leveling up)

5) Provide experience (as in training for the player)

6) Provide fun / challenge

Most of the trash fights in the flashpoints of TOR seem to be there simply to increase time to clear and give a living feeling to space. I am 100% happy for all these mobs to be skipped because they don't serve much of a purpose.

The fun / challenge is the ultimate goal of trash, however fun is both subjective and short lived, whilst challenge is also subjective. Its almost impossible to create fun and challenging trash pulls which dont feel like a massive pointless grind.

I personally feel like the only mandatory trash pulls should be the ones which introduce new mechanics and ones which serve as a challenge. Most bosses in most MMOs have trash before them that introduce you to certain mechanics of the boss, and likewise many bosses have tough trashpulls before them that serve as a gear / skill check.


Best designed trash I've ever seen was in Ost Dunhoth, a 12man raid in LOTRO during Mirkwood expansion. That place was a 6 boss raid with only 9 trash pulls in it. Each trash pull was very challenging, requiring tactics of their own and were easy to wipe on, but because there were so few you didn't feel it was a grind.

But there are some FPs where sneaking around the mobs actually fits the FP.

Taral V springs to mind - Oteg says he would like to limit the killing as much as possible. As a matter of fact, the issue comes up in one of the conversations that killing is going to become more likely and Oteg is OK with it.

In Battle of Ilum, you are trying to sneak in a steal a stealth shuttle, killing every mob and boss in your path is not very sneaky

Which leads to False Emperor, you are using a stealth craft to get on board the space station. To face off against Malgus, sneaking around makes sense.
not a very good analogy because in order to skip the commercials you either have to DVR the show and delay watching it or you have to watch it online usually a week after release. comparing this to FPs - you get into an FP, if you want to skip trash you have to wait 15 minutes and then you can go go go otherwise you have to kill all trash.

Those in this situation need to speak up more. every time I run an FP I ask the question "quick run?" and nine times out of ten the answer is yes (or no response). Playing a tank I have some say and if someone like you were to speak up and say, "um, I would really like to kill all bosses." my response would be, "fine, we will." if others have an issue with that, TFB, they can leave, but they need to realize that the extra time it would take to kill all bosses is most likely less than a DPS having to wait for the lockout and the time it takes to find another group.

It's called communication, if you don't use it, then shame on you.

but it was bioware , who made the stick, and earned money by selling it

yes the "gearheads" are the loudest part of the players,,but not necessarely the BIGGEST part

the current gamedesign was made made for the current playerbase,,a match made in heaven

it doesnt look like a long term relationship though

I agree this why I started asking upfront. Here is the responses I got over the weekend...Kick voted out...complaining leading to tank or DPS leaving.....whinning of they are just here for coms.

I say oh well I will wait for another group that actually wants to run the fp (skipping trash is ok) the right way.

Sometimes I am in a hurry and sometimes I am not.

Yesterday I had a group doing HM D7 and we did the bonus boss for fun. It was fun since I had never done that boss before and it took us only 10 - 15 (I believe) extra minutes to complete the FP with the boss. Killing EVERY boss.

But yeah T5 and BoI are the worse for skipping, (and Maelstorm Prison if you happen to get two stealthies to CC stuff)

For me it depends really.

Pre-50
Just depends really. It's always kind of worth it to me because you'll get a random drop, you'll always get cash money, and xp is xp. So it doesn't really matter to me. I think I'll skip the occasional mob to kind of get that halfway point between constantly moving/progressing and still getting the XP and Cash from the trash. Mini-bosses I'll always push for getting. Doesn't matter if it "doesn't drop anything good". It's still good xp. It's still money. And it's still a chance to get something good/fun.

Post-50
Unless it's a persons first time in the FP/Op...I fully agree with avoiding trash...but I'm torn at a point. For myself, I fully endorse killing trash if it means a Bonus boss is unlocked and we get to fight him. But I'm also for killing all "Boss" types in FPs/Ops, whereas a lot of people would rather skip Bonus & Mini bosses. To me, it's cash, it's crystals, it's possible commendations and it's a possibility at descent gear. Plus it's fun. Makes me laugh when people want to skip these bosses because I've had 2-3 times where we did bonus boss/mini-boss and actually got some pretty nice gear off him.

Basically, it comes down to some groups just wanting to be "Efficient" @ 50. I get it...but I don't necessarily enjoy it. And, at times, I disagree with it.