To the Devs working on Disciplines: Remember the NGE?

I'm speaking of them for any use -- my 55 Scoundrel is a giant mess (and admittedly more of a struggle to play in certain spots than other characters) because none of the trees appear worthy pursuing in full. It's a rotten build because nothing looks worth taking (I'm not at home so I can't get into details of why right now). Doing endgame group content with that character wouldn't change the massive mountain of MEH that is the upper half of all three trees.


Only if there's a "capstone" skill you give a damn about for that class.

The "greater good" is balance in a game where balance is everything...everything from PvP to PvE revolves around balance and the traditional trinity roles. This move has nothing to do with more content...where did you get that idea? It's about balance and making it so that a 5 level cap increase doesn't break the entire flipping game.

There's only one capstone skill that I've seen that is totally worthless... and it's not for a sorc / sage.

Flame Burst for tactics Vanguards appears worthless to me. Then again, I take full knowledge that I haven't fully studied that class yet.

But see, that is EXACTLY what they're eliminating with this update Max...that entire middle section of nearly every freaking class that had to expand with fluff skills for 2.0, is being eliminated so we didn't have to add in MORE fluff "skills" for 3.0.

Frankly, they have already removed choice in many trees with the level 55 skill tree revamp. It removed many hybrid builds. The bottom line to this being successful is that their are still trees with terrible top end skills. If this addresses those classes that have hybrids due to this failure to provide value in the top of the tree its a non-issue for most people. I do agree that this makes the game feel "easy-mode", but frankly when you respec today most classes its not like your speccing into something crazy. I do agree with you that this better feel like an enhancement. I don't like when they do things that make the game easier to code over service.

Just remove the entire selection. Make me pick a tree and give me everything in the tree. If I get a choice of a couple things from another tree let me just pick the 3 things you want us to pick between. Don't make me waste time with "pretend" options in the tree/discipline that I am specc'ed into. You can take this really crappy skill or this shinny one is a pretend choice. Frankly, this game got really simple with the introduction of 51-55. Its going to get even easier with 3.0.

The issue with the NGE was that SWG was designed to provide complex gameplay. It wasn't a raid game. They saw wow's raid style easy to play and wanted those subscriber numbers. The failure was that its paying customers rather enjoyed the complex hard to balance system with crafting We enjoyed the unique snowflake feel. SWTOR was always a raid game. It always mimic'd wows mechanics.

SWTOR was never about unique characters. Its skill system was about some choice but they always intended you to take the top skill in the tree. Its was poor skills that allowed hybrids and created balance issues. They are just "fixing" it. I just hope they get ride of the illusion that I have choice in my tree. Stop pretending that anyone takes certain skills. All that does is lets players make stupid decisions. Like a skill point to lightning charge damage or armor when in lightning stance, but you are a tank running dark charge. Or a juggie running a stance and dropping points into a stance you don't use like increases damage of x when in Shin-choo when your in Shien. The choices you legitimately have are like 3 things.

They will never be able to balance the game. It just makes it easier. Last I checked we still have different skills and abilities by class. Some heal tree is going to be vastly superior than another from another class. It just reduces the risk of making a hybrid OP spec.

I personally dont like the skill tree so I am looking forward to seeing how the disciplines will work

Yet another person referring to MMO when trying to put group play above solo play . Again MMO simply refers to massively multiplayer online . It does not mean that the "multi players " must group guild or in any way be social while doing so.

It simply is referring to many people accessing the same environment at the same time. Solo play should be the core of an mmo with groups / guilds being side dishes and completely optional.

People who advocate forced group play are simply thinking of themselves.

I agree there should be solo play options in the game because many players don't want to group all the time or sometimes may just be hopping on to get something done in a short time span. The differentiating factor of an MMO, however, is the ability to group and play with other players. If you don't stress that point and those options, then there is no reason to make an MMO when a single player RPG gives you SO many more options to delve deeper into the story, the skills, and the environment.

I'm not saying single player content isn't important (I play solo a lot), but the group factor makes this different than single player games. Buying an MMO to play solo content with other people around is the same as buying a semi truck to go to the grocery store. It will get the job done, but is extremely inconvenient compared to a normal car.

City of Heroes did something similar, enhancement diversification and global defense nerf. there was a similar outcry when they did it, but it allowed them to make invention io system which resulted in much more powerful characters and a huge diversity in builds. successful builds, not just a bunch of gimped builds. if the debs dont have to worry constantly about game breaking balance bugs they can make new, different content, not just another flash point.