The company determines success based on how much money the game brings in not by what people perceive as successful. The cost of development vs revenue generated.

 

Your case for developing raids does not take into account the cost of development and potential revenue. BW knows what they are doing. It's highly likely they concluded that the cost vs revenue was not favorable for raid compared to story development. It all comes down to money. Can we stop making silly arguments that aren't focus around money, because you are never going to convince management if you can't show them the money.

 

That is part that you raiders don't understand. BW has concluded that further development of raids is not as profitable compared to investing money into other parts of the game or in a completely different game. BW did not come to this conclusion without having solid data from the previous 4 years. Raid development for FFXIV and WoW is still viable, but maybe for swtor it is not.

 

Essentially, what you want is BW to continue to invest money into developing a portion of the game that is no longer as profitable or to lose money. NCSOFT spent extra millions of dollars into Wilstar, but never recovered. At some point, a company needs to cut there losses. I'm not saying BW is losing money by developing raids, but they are the only owns that have access to the data pertaining to player participation, cost of development, and other factors that we the general player base have no access. That is why your arguments are weak. At best you can say you want raids, but to try to make a valid argument for the development of raids without access to BW data is an exercise of futility. You will not convince any one with any power in the development of this game with those arguments.

I think first you miss the entire point of my argument. Many people say in a blanket statement you can only do one or the other. This has been proven time and again to be false on two levels. First more than one game has done both, second these games tend to be more successful.

Next you miss why the expac is the way it is. This game never really recovered, in EAs eyes, from the launch debacle. Yes for us it was great, the f2p transition initially looked promising, but in the end if you read the earnings calls starting in 2014 things were not meeting EAs expectations. This results, in the corporate world, in smaller budgets. BW themselves has stated that fully voiced cut scenes is the lowest up front content they can make.

With that in mind what does having, after the initial launch, an expac designed around 45 minutes of story every 30 days and that to play this content you must be a subscriber? What does all the departures of key staff (either leaving BW or transferred to other projects) tell you? What does the fact that since Episode 7's launch the period of "light" server load steadily increasing tell you? It tells me that A. They designed an expac around a very limited budget (going with the least expensive content and unloading staff) because EA gave them a more restricted budget than they ever had before, that to maximize profits to get back into EA's good graces they went back to what amounts to a subscription based model and lastly that the plan isn't working out well.

Why? Because you make a final error. It is NOT just about OPs. People like to paint it that way because raids are the knee jerk target but it is far more than that. I know players who have never stepped foot in an OP, both solo and dungeon/FP runners who have left or are planning to. Why? Because when they are done that 45 minute chapter they have nothing to do and they don't think 14.99 a month is worth 45 minutes of story. It's not about OPs. Just as launched showed it is about having something to do when the story ends. Do you have quest lines in the open world off the Golden Path of the Story to do? Do you have a new FP? Yes OPs as well, but not alone, it's about a balance of content.

Now with this new model can they be successful? Perhaps but after studying the industry it would require changes to the financial model and likely server structure. I know both would be marketing headaches because people would cry "doom!!!!" But you can't change the paradigm of a game without changing logistics as well.

Even if you meant MMORPG instead of the much broader MMO term, that statement is only partially true.

Lineage 1 still holds the second place.

I couldn't find a ranking for 2015 that included FF or SWTOR, but (at least according to Superdata) in February 2016 SWTOR was in the Top 5, while FF was not.

FF does not and will not release any data pertaining to sub numbers and active accounts. Their opinion is if they have more than 500k subs then they are successful and according to Yoshi they are very succseful.

Why are people still mad about no new raids?

1. Some people are just mad to be mad. It's the oppressed/neglected/persecuted syndrome. Exhibit A: MCB

2. People who believe "when they are done with that 45 minute chapter they have nothing to do and they don't think 14.99 a month is worth 45 minutes of story" aren't engaging in what else has been left on the table for them to do:

a. crafting

b. creating that new Sith female dark side trooper and /punishing Aric every chance they get [cough] (sorry, TMI)

c. decorating strongholds!

d. role playing with other players (despite the drama surrounding the lack of labels for RP servers, they could)

e. running heroics with friends in their guild

f. helping newbies in their guild learn the game and helping in general

g. dressing up their companions in ridiculous outfits (what's with that all-red getup with the wings on the helmet?)

h. playing GTN god (muahahaha! I control the rubat crystal supply on 4 servers!) [obligatory mustache twirling]

i. creating toss-away guilds just for fun! <Fat Cats> is now hiring all body type 4 Cathars! (see d.)

and I'm sure 50+ more things if I sat here long enough and thought about it.

So it's never been a case of "there's nothing to do." It's "I only choose to engage in one feature in this game and when I've exhausted myself on it I feel compelled to come to the forums and complain that there isn't more of this one feature."

FF does not and will not release any data pertaining to sub numbers and active accounts. Their opinion is if they have more than 500k subs then they are successful and according to Yoshi they are very succseful.

You can actually make an informed estimate however. They do release total registered accounts. Their definition of "registered" accounts is someone who actually paid for a subscription the free with purchase doesn't count. Then you can look at average subscription losses and their own statements regarding of where they stack up. Number crunchers doing stuff like that pegged the FFXIV sub numbers at between 800k and 1.5 million. Not WoW numbers but still damn good for a 100% subscription based game. That 500k number is from before they launched in China.

Even if you meant MMORPG instead of the much broader MMO term, that statement is only partially true.

Lineage 1 still holds the second place.

I couldn't find a ranking for 2015 that included FF or SWTOR, but (at least according to Superdata) in February 2016 SWTOR was in the Top 5, while FF was not.

Well if you actually followed Superdata Research itself you would know the reason for that is because they confabulate all revenue now, so while they list SWTOR as Pay 2 Play, they include microtransaction sales so it is an apples to oranges comparison. Also tbh that makes me question their results, you can come up with reliable estimates of subscribers based on a number of metrics... How do you estimate microtransaction revenue?

That is why I tend to use earnings call language from the Companies themselves as a better guide to performance.

As an example, in 2013 they said SWTOR made 165 million. 139 of that being microtransaction. How did they break it down like that? I can see estimating the subscription revenue. We knew where the subs were for much of the launch year and 2012 and as they did the f2p transition they actually gave the percentages of subscription loss, but EA has never provided direct numbers for revenue and has always included SWTOR with non-MMO games on the balance sheet.

You can actually make an informed estimate however. They do release total registered accounts. Their definition of "registered" accounts is someone who actually paid for a subscription the free with purchase doesn't count. Then you can look at average subscription losses and their own statements regarding of where they stack up. Number crunchers doing stuff like that pegged the FFXIV sub numbers at between 800k and 1.5 million. Not WoW numbers but still damn good for a 100% subscription based game. That 500k number is from before they launched in China.

You do not need to have an active account or sub to be registered.

There is absolutely no evidence whatsoever that KotFE and its story-centric content approach is failing.

This game is bringing in more revenue than every MMO out there except for Lineage I (WoW in Korea), WoW, and Tera, which is very popular in Korea. Korea is much more interested in online gaming than the West, which should be pointed out.

For all Ghisallo's "input" regarding FFXIV, it is unavoidable that KotFE has outperformed FFXIV in revenue. We can be fairly certain that KotFE was cheaper to make than previous expansions too, so whether people like him like it or not, KotFE has been a revelation in MMO games.

You don't have to make new raids with an expansion to be successful. BioWare story with a Blur Trailer and tempting microtransactions is outperforming FFXIV, which is probably the highest quality MMO in the world right now.

KotFE is proving that there is a sizable demand for BioWare storytelling and that you also don't need to cater to the traditional MMO audience to be successful in the genre.

If KotFE has been as profitable as it looks, I really doubt BWA will ever make that content anything more than a long-term, secondary priority. I anticipate BWA reinvesting more into this approach moving forward, because if these chapters end up being meatier and for them to ramp up the character engagement, it will be even more popular.

There is absolutely no evidence whatsoever that KotFE and its story-centric content approach is failing.

 

This game is bringing in more revenue than every MMO out there except for Lineage I (WoW in Korea), WoW, and Tera, which is very popular in Korea. Korea is much more interested in online gaming than the West, which should be pointed out.

 

.

1. the game is not bring in more revenue than any other mmo. in fact the revenue that swtor is earning is never and has never been openly state in any outlet even EA stock reports. its combined into the over all earnings and always just stated as a biproduct of all of EA's earnings. honestly that is just a smart company move. no company wants to ever say exactly what is earning and what is not so people like us keep comsuming.

2. while it is possible you are on a server that is high activity centered most if not all of the servers are dying a slow and painful death. yes it can be fixed and yes they dont have to admit it but can and still should change design direction and yes still milk the heck out of the cash cow called star wars.

3. if you do not see how think and weak the new story is honestly i am not sure even if the fire was falling truly from teh sky you would or for that matter anyone that is so rabidly into the game would ever see it. I have been there for many many games including swtor. yeah swtor i still love and want more from but i have after kotfe seen that the currently direction of the development is well beyond weak. and they dont like to read it on the forums nor admit it at all. its just a prduct of bw wanting to save the job the have.

4. recycle content, even companions while super exciting for some one who has never played swtor will seem epic but it is a miserable failure for a paying subscriber. they know it and really kotfe was a decision made long ago prior to force awakens release to milk the hell out of unknowing new subs that join due to the lust for all things sw that we the sw fnas have.

so yeah they need to wake up and change direction HUGE. but will they no. bw and probably ea at this point is milking swtor in a maintance phase. sad but true.

There is absolutely no evidence whatsoever that KotFE and its story-centric content approach is failing.

 

This game is bringing in more revenue than every MMO out there except for Lineage I (WoW in Korea), WoW, and Tera, which is very popular in Korea. Korea is much more interested in online gaming than the West, which should be pointed out.

 

For all Ghisallo's "input" regarding FFXIV, it is unavoidable that KotFE has outperformed FFXIV in revenue. We can be fairly certain that KotFE was cheaper to make than previous expansions too, so whether people like him like it or not, KotFE has been a revelation in MMO games.

 

You don't have to make new raids with an expansion to be successful. BioWare story with a Blur Trailer and tempting microtransactions is outperforming FFXIV, which is probably the highest quality MMO in the world right now.

 

KotFE is proving that there is a sizable demand for BioWare storytelling and that you also don't need to cater to the traditional MMO audience to be successful in the genre.

 

If KotFE has been as profitable as it looks, I really doubt BWA will ever make that content anything more than a long-term, secondary priority. I anticipate BWA reinvesting more into this approach moving forward, because if these chapters end up being meatier and for them to ramp up the character engagement, it will be even more popular.

My problem with the site you got those figures from ( I've seen it also ) is it's completely pie in the sky assumptions ...

As has been mentioned previously in this thread some games don't release their data at all for sites like that to access thus they seemingly don't get ranked at all yet could very well doing better than this game.

I personally don't know either way, I'll just judge it on whatever figures EA release personally because that site came across to me as a "please give us money for more stats!" that may or may not be correct than anything that can be called concrete statistics.

BW has not publicly stated that any raid is under development otherwise they would have announced it already.

For someone who seems to put a point across of people basing their views on facts you sure do make a lot of assumptions yourself.

Remember KoTFE? Remember when they got announced? Do you truly believe they weren't developing that for a significant portion of time prior to announcing it? Before that do you you think they hadn't had it planned before even beginning development even further in advance?

In other words don't assume "they've said nothing" to mean "they're doing nothing".

What more do you want? Are you really that dense to think that BW will publicly make an announcement saying operation or raid development has ceased or temporary put on hold. No mmorpg company will ever make such a statement due to the marketing and RP problems that would arise. It's better for them to keep quiet and say nothing

But if raiding isn't that big of a deal and the focus should be on story as that is where the money is what harm is there in announcing there is nothing coming? No harm done if they don't feel the raiding part of their customer base is that big to not justify making any more content for in the first place.

They won't do it because they know there is a significant interest in raiding that they don't want to completely alienate. The fact they know this also means they are more than likely going to bring more raids in the future.

Yes, no doubt they will put less resources into developing of raids which means it will take longer to develop.

My only hope is it's not 3 years like PVP ( but meh who really cares about PVP that much anyway )

It's not just SWTOR, but other mmorpgs I played are shifting away from raid development. WoW and final fantasy are the only two left that continue to focus heavily into raid development.

Yet other games still include it because they know it's popular ... example The Division added incursions, if it's so unpopular why even bother? Destiny is another game that comes to mind that could have ignored it completely but took in on board instead.

For all this hyperbole about games shifting away from raiding there is little evidence supporting the view.

Mark my words. Four months from now BW will say nothing about raid development. Eventually, players who only played swtor for raids will leave or adept and change with swtor.

I'll take that bet.

Why are people still mad about no new raids?

 

1. Some people are just mad to be mad. It's the oppressed/neglected/persecuted syndrome. Exhibit A: MCB

 

2. People who believe "when they are done with that 45 minute chapter they have nothing to do and they don't think 14.99 a month is worth 45 minutes of story" aren't engaging in what else has been left on the table for them to do:

a. crafting

b. creating that new Sith female dark side trooper and /punishing Aric every chance they get [cough] (sorry, TMI)

c. decorating strongholds!

d. role playing with other players (despite the drama surrounding the lack of labels for RP servers, they could)

e. running heroics with friends in their guild

f. helping newbies in their guild learn the game and helping in general

g. dressing up their companions in ridiculous outfits (what's with that all-red getup with the wings on the helmet?)

h. playing GTN god (muahahaha! I control the rubat crystal supply on 4 servers!) [obligatory mustache twirling]

i. creating toss-away guilds just for fun! <Fat Cats> is now hiring all body type 4 Cathars! (see d.)

and I'm sure 50+ more things if I sat here long enough and thought about it.

 

So it's never been a case of "there's nothing to do." It's "I only choose to engage in one feature in this game and when I've exhausted myself on it I feel compelled to come to the forums and complain that there isn't more of this one feature."

Or maybe people would just like more raids? They don't need to fit your criteria to be annoyed about it you know ... they are entitled to be annoyed. MCB was a special case in that he was proclaiming the death of the game regardless unless they got cross server queues ... here people are just asking for new content.

Will the game die if it never got more raiding? *shrug* hard to say. It would certainly become less and less populated over time but then if they are putting in significantly less money to the game then it doesn't have to earn as much as times past.

Well if you actually followed Superdata Research itself you would know the reason for that is because they confabulate all revenue now, so while they list SWTOR as Pay 2 Play, they include microtransaction sales so it is an apples to oranges comparison. Also tbh that makes me question their results, you can come up with reliable estimates of subscribers based on a number of metrics... How do you estimate microtransaction revenue?

 

That is why I tend to use earnings call language from the Companies themselves as a better guide to performance.

 

As an example, in 2013 they said SWTOR made 165 million. 139 of that being microtransaction. How did they break it down like that? I can see estimating the subscription revenue. We knew where the subs were for much of the launch year and 2012 and as they did the f2p transition they actually gave the percentages of subscription loss, but EA has never provided direct numbers for revenue and has always included SWTOR with non-MMO games on the balance sheet.

They try to claim I believe they buy data from gaming companies but I honestly don't personally buy it ... too easy for them to ******** their way to making moeny from anyone willing to throw some coin their way.

Unless they are buying all relevant data equally from all games their ranking statistics are flawed from the outset.

I've made this point earlier (possibly in this thread, but I don't think so).

First: I want to see more group-focused and group-available content; for both PvP and PvE. It's something that is unique to the medium, and should be taken advantage of.

That having been said, I don't know that adding new "classic" raids is worth the effort necessary. PvE group content is the hardest to balance between difficulty and fun. Look at how much past-deadline the Eternal Championship was. That's basically 10 Ops/FP bosses (only as solo PvE content, it's easier to balance). Ops (and many FPs) also take too long to play through for casual player, at an hour+ per (plus form-up time). Finally, there's a difficulty curve issue. If they were to add an op today, it would either have to be more difficult than Rav/ToS, and thus only accessible to players who have progressed to the level to clear that content (a fraction of a fraction), or be easier, and thus, out of place on the curve (and not acceptable to the veteran playerbase). Not to mention the issues with requiring voice comms to run content in a game that doesn't have built-in voice comms.

New Tactical FPs would be a start, as well as world bosses at endgame. Maybe some Ops-type content where there is no "trash" and you can pug at your own pace - drop in and out after each boss without losing your personal progress against the content rewards (the progression would have to be somewhat non-linear). Several things to break the paradigm of group contents requires self-organizing groups with rigid composition requirements that don't reflect the character-type demographics.

Experience. Normally if a so-called "casual" questions that raiders should exclusively get all good items in the game and/or are the most important group in a game etc, the response isn't nearly as polite and constructive as yours.

 

 

 

Agreed. I am not totally against them adding more raids down the road (I can't complain about most MMOs not catering at all to my interest if I not willing to let other groups have a piece of the cake either), I am just against making them the sole focus of everything "endgame" as they did for the first couple years of this game's lifespan. Remember when every single content update read like "Added: 1 new raid, 2 new Flashpoints, 1 new PvP arena"? If I remember right they didn't add any new planet until Makeb released and I can't remember any planet ever being released as a "free" content update, unlike raids which they released all the time.

Btw, Flashpoints are just small raids - instances stuffed with scripted bosses having silly mechanics. Same thing, just a little less hard to properly execute for their smaller group size.

In the end...honestly? They still have so much catch-up work to do in terms of content for the rest of us that they'd probably need to add more story content for 2-3 years before they could add a raid again. Not saying they should actually do that, but to get back on even terms in terms of attention, they'd need to. Just to put the raiders' complaints about currently not getting new raids into perspective.

 

 

 

Yes, as I said, raids are hard only because it's difficult to make 8/16 people execute the required steps in exact unison. Other than figuring out the silly scripted mechanics in the first place of course, but that's what most raiders use YouTube for anyway. There is nothing "elite" about raiding, like grinding it just takes time. That being said, I am not going to tell you what sort of content to enjoy. In an ideal world, there would be content for all of us and we all would get nice stuffz as a reward. In reality we're competing for the devs' limited resources, for I don't think they can reasonable develop a meaningful number of raids -and- a meaningful number of story episodes at the same time.

 

 

 

As I said above, I want this game to allow me to play all the content in a group if I want to. My (one) gripe with the story content is that it basically forces you to solo it (you get discouraged from playing it in a group by getting no credit for the episodes you didn't start yourself). I might never set my foot into a raid or even a hardmode FP, but I still would like to quest with friends.

Raid is hard because it's hard to form a group. you have to get exactly 4DPS+2healers+2tanks and a few subs, set time and all of these people need to be willing to spend all these effort, but modern players no longer want to spend so much effort on forming a group anymore.

What I don't understand about the raiders is that sure, it's understandable if they want the new raid to stay hard. But they don't even want those old content, which they've already done and got bored, to get nerfed and let more people enjoy. They also fail to understand not everyone is able to find a group willing to keep trying on HM.

Not a raider; but if you'll recall from the thread you kicked off about this, it's because nothing in the game is supposed to be trivial any more. Everything is scaled (more or less) to your power level (level sync) or your power level is scaled to the content (bolster).

Not a raider; but if you'll recall from the thread you kicked off about this, it's because nothing in the game is supposed to be trivial any more. Everything is scaled (more or less) to your power level (level sync) or your power level is scaled to the content (bolster).

But it worked only because there is no new ops, even at level it could also be nerfed with the mechanics. If Bioware release new ops in the future, how many people would stick to 3-4 years old NIM ops anymore?

But it worked only because there is no new ops, even at level it could also be nerfed with the mechanics. If Bioware release new ops in the future, how many people would stick to 3-4 years old NIM ops anymore?

Are there no new players? Should the Ops chain not be a progression of difficulty for them? It's not all about farming gear? (And if it is, you can get your gear treadmill on via the easier ops anyway).

Are there no new players? Should the Ops chain not be a progression of difficulty for them? It's not all about farming gear? (And if it is, you can get your gear treadmill on via the easier ops anyway).

How many new players are going to stick with these old ops fro months rather than the new ones? Even at prime, there were only 5% of the people running them.

No, ops are simply game content like everything else, when its targeted group had moved on, it needs to be rescaled for other people to enjoy.

How many new players are going to stick with these old ops fro months rather than the new ones? Even at prime, there were only 5% of the people running them.

 

No, ops are simply game content like everything else, when its targeted group had moved on, it needs to be rescaled for other people to enjoy.

That makes no sense - the enjoyment of an op is at least as much a job well done as anything else; it's not like there's much story to any individual op.

That makes no sense - the enjoyment of an op is at least as much a job well done as anything else; it's not like there's much story to any individual op.

But what happens when the majority had done it for years and had moved on? Like all other content, ops have their lifespan. Actually it matters more to ops since you need a group to do it.

For that matter, making them "easier" will just encourage new players to blow through them quicker, instead of progressing through them in a moderated pace.

THIS is what MMO needs to do and what most of them are doing. If a game wants to attract new players, it needs to let them be able to level/gear up quickly and follow the majority's step rather than start from the beginning. Otherwise a lot of the new players will stay away because too much time and effort requires to be spent to even catch up.

But what happens when the majority had done it for years and had moved on? Like all other content, ops have their lifespan. Actually it matters more to ops since you need a group to do it.

So why make it even easier? What do you want out of an Op where teh enemies can't even do damage to you? If the answer is "gear," please just stop now.

So why make it even easier? What do you want out of an Op where teh enemies can't even do damage to you? If the answer is "gear," please just stop now.

Because more people will start to try it. It was NOT targeted for the majority, if the raiders had moved on and it was left untouched, the content will pretty much stay dead. Do you prefer it?