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Winter/Spring 2018 Roadmap Update


KeithKanneg

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Hey everyone,

 

<snip>

[*]We’ve added powerful new Augments for those who need additional stats to help take down Izax in Master Mode. Or, you simply want to be OP! In this new Flashpoint, we’ll provide legacy-based Crafting Patterns (Bind-on-Pickup – BOP) which will drop randomly off mobs and Bosses. If you’re one of the lucky ones, you may also find a Bind-on-Equip (BOE) version of the same patterns. We’ll follow up with the materials needed to craft the Augments.

<snip>

 

 

Some clarification on this please. Are the schematics bind on legacy (BoL) with the item crafted being either BoP or BoE or are the schematics themselves BoP and BoE?

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Just in case it continues to get lost throughout this thread and others:

 

My questions to Keith and Eric:

 

The roadmap mentioned a complete revamping of conquest. I know you said a forum post or blog would come out eventually that would explain it a bit more. But..... Ive got a guild full of very conquest focused members who are kind of freaking out about this. They and Im sure a good portion of us here in this forum post, are worried what the revamping all entails.

 

1) Will it turn out similar to CXP where literally every npc you kill gives you a tiny bit of conquest points? Or is it just more objective focused like adding a few dailies areas to the objective board.

 

2) How will this effect Crafting Weeks? At the beginning of conquest, crafting weeks used to be months in between each other, now they are merely weeks apart. This doesnt give many guilds, especially small guilds, a chance to renew their resources to max efficiency. Will we see Crafting weeks go back to their original schedules? Or will they be completely eliminated by the new revamped version of conquest?

 

3) Are you removing any current Objectives or Events? Are you adding any entirely new Events and or Planets?

 

4) Have you considered giving out the weekly rewards as soon as the conquest week ends instead of on Tuesday at restart? This would eliminate the chance of guilds kicking members on Monday to ensure those members dont receive their weekly guild rewards which happens fairly often.

 

Thank you!

 

I too am an officer of a conquest-focused guild, so would appreciate clarification on these points.

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and he just proved your point too (again). See his latest response above.

 

Oh, I have him on ignore. But I have absolutely no doubt that he reiterated himself, again... and then gave himself a pat on the back for being the forum savior and helping everyone see the error of their ways. :p

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Oh, I have him on ignore. But I have absolutely no doubt that he reiterated himself, again... and then gave himself a pat on the back for being the forum savior and helping everyone see the error of their ways. :p

 

Yeah pretty much exactly that.

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Yep, for the 1% of players who rush thru content and believe they are the average player.

 

Not sure about you, but i still havent completed all of the content and we are a year into it.

 

What exactly are you doing in the game if you didn't manage yet to play through those maybe 2 hours of new content in 2017? Are you delaying it on purpose? I also take my time with content and I explore a lot. But even I only needed a few hours to see EVERYTHING new that was added in 2017.

 

No big expansion for last 16 months. How long i must see Vaylin ugly face when i start the game? 6.0 on november/december?

 

Yes! Can we please get a new picture in the launcher? Vaylin does NOT belong there. And even if she would, that particular image looks really bad and it annoyed me ever since.

 

maybe Theron was forced to abandon Alliance for all our sake because that was only way to stop Order from destroing Alliance?

 

I am the no. 1 force in the galaxy with the most powerful army at hand and allies everywhere. I find it very unlikely that a sudden massive threat appears out of nowhere without my Alliance noticing and that can only be stopped by Theron going undercover and doing a 1-man-job.

 

I'd still like to get a Yellow response addressing the angry, vociferous community that is not at all happy about Arcann being advanced as a romance.?

 

Adding myself to this list. I find the Arcann-romance highly disturbing. Not even my insane Sith Warrior would go for it.

 

However... I don't feel that a living Arcann, wondering around free, has been adequately addressed by the story. Given the body-count Arcann is responsible for, he's without a doubt the most hated being in the entire galaxy. You realize he's responsible for at least 10 Trillion Deaths? I really feel like this should be addressed.

 

Yes. I found and still find it more than odd that these facts are completely dismissed within the storyline. "Arcann is a mass murderer? Oh well, but he's a nice guy now. The past is the past. Let's focus on today. Blue milk, anyone?" Sick.

 

While you may think 215 vs 5 servers is lack of success, Id rather go directly to them to define whether they have been successful, and still are. Id say they have made a pretty penny, and from the sounds of the forums, they have done it "their way," yet another sign of success for many people.

 

There is no parallel universe out there in which the loss of 210 servers can be interpreted as a success. You're trying really hard, but you're the only one who considers this a story of success. You can be sure, no one at BW considers the loss of 210 servers a success. No one ever anywhere would. Except you. For whatever reason.

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6 years on from what was allegedly one of the most expensive MMO development cycles, it doesn't matter how much money EA has, it matters how much money the game is bringing in from active subs. Adding outside money at this point isn't "investing," it's throwing good money after bad.

 

The past happened, all those poor decisions can't be undone. Either live with it or unsubscribe, but the second hastens the death of TOR. And I'm beginning to wonder if the second would be so bad, if it meant I stopped getting into pointless arguments on the forums ;)

 

(There are people I'd miss, though, so I kinda hope everyone decides to live with it, myself. If not, bon voyage, I hope you find something more entertaining)

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What exactly are you doing in the game if you didn't manage yet to play through those maybe 2 hours of new content in 2017? Are you delaying it on purpose? I also take my time with content and I explore a lot. But even I only needed a few hours to see EVERYTHING new that was added in 2017.

It took you 2 hours to complete 4 ops bosses, 2 flashpoints 25 times, gear all of your toons to 248, purchase and decorate the stronghold, and get your companions back? Damn, what hacks are you using?

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There is no parallel universe out there in which the loss of 210 servers can be interpreted as a success. You're trying really hard, but you're the only one who considers this a story of success. You can be sure, no one at BW considers the loss of 210 servers a success. No one ever anywhere would. Except you. For whatever reason.

If the initial boom of paying subscribers necessitated 210 servers to maximize initial profit, and they understood it wasnt going to stay at 210 (which they likely anticipated), I would say it was a huge success to even need 210 servers to start, even if they never had plans to maintain that many in the long run. This is simple business and economics, so im surprised many people dont realize this strategy. Supply and demand.

Edited by olagatonjedi
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Oh, I have him on ignore. But I have absolutely no doubt that he reiterated himself, again... and then gave himself a pat on the back for being the forum savior and helping everyone see the error of their ways. :p

 

Hopefully more people figure him out and put him on ignore and he gets the hint. It's doubtful though. It's impossible to have a conversation and keep it focused with him in the thread. It's just as difficult with him on ignore because I see whole pages full of ignored, ignored, ignored, someone made the mistake of replying to him, ignored, ignored, random post, ignored, ignored, ignored.....

Edited by kodrac
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If the initial boom of paying subscribers necessitated 210 servers to maximize initial profit, and they understood it wasnt going to stay at 210 (which they likely anticipated), I would say it was a huge success to even need 210 servers to start, even if they never had plans to maintain that many in the long run. This is simple business and economics, so im surprised many people dont realize this strategy. Supply and demand.

 

SWG started with 25 servers and then in september 2009 they closed 12 servers leaving 13 servers remaining then two years later they announced they were closing SWG. So while this game started with more servers they have winded up with less servers than SWG did at the end. You might not see having 5 servers as a problem but a lot of people do especially those that went through this with SWG.

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SWG started with 25 servers and then in september 2009 they closed 12 servers leaving 13 servers remaining then two years later they announced they were closing SWG. So while this game started with more servers they have winded up with less servers than SWG did at the end. You might not see having 5 servers as a problem but a lot of people do especially those that went through this with SWG.

I never said I didnt see it as a problem, just that it may not be as big of a deal as people are making it out to be. Just as swg lost 12 servers, it happens with MMOs, because populations and subscriber bases change. Could it be a problem? Yes. Is it definitely a problem? None of us truly know because we dont know all of the reasons behind the change. We can speculate as to the reasons, but speculation doesnt equate to fact, which is the mistake a lot of people tend to make.

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If the initial boom of paying subscribers necessitated 210 servers to maximize initial profit, and they understood it wasnt going to stay at 210 (which they likely anticipated), I would say it was a huge success to even need 210 servers to start, even if they never had plans to maintain that many in the long run. This is simple business and economics, so im surprised many people dont realize this strategy. Supply and demand.

Oddly, I agree with you.

 

I wasn't suggesting this game wasn't initially a success - I think it would be hard to suggest it wasn't. Around 1.7 million people bought a box at around $60 (+/- promos)...it would be difficult to see that as anything but successful.

 

However, dropping to only 5 servers today is a HUGE loss of potential income. Bioware has left so much money out there by mismanaging this game. They had enough interest originally to nearly fill 218 servers...losing that much potential income can't be seen as anything but disappointing to EA.

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Just in case it continues to get lost throughout this thread and others:

 

My questions to Keith and Eric:

 

The roadmap mentioned a complete revamping of conquest. I know you said a forum post or blog would come out eventually that would explain it a bit more. But..... Ive got a guild full of very conquest focused members who are kind of freaking out about this. They and Im sure a good portion of us here in this forum post, are worried what the revamping all entails.

 

1) Will it turn out similar to CXP where literally every npc you kill gives you a tiny bit of conquest points? Or is it just more objective focused like adding a few dailies areas to the objective board.

 

2) How will this effect Crafting Weeks? At the beginning of conquest, crafting weeks used to be months in between each other, now they are merely weeks apart. This doesnt give many guilds, especially small guilds, a chance to renew their resources to max efficiency. Will we see Crafting weeks go back to their original schedules? Or will they be completely eliminated by the new revamped version of conquest?

 

3) Are you removing any current Objectives or Events? Are you adding any entirely new Events and or Planets?

 

4) Have you considered giving out the weekly rewards as soon as the conquest week ends instead of on Tuesday at restart? This would eliminate the chance of guilds kicking members on Monday to ensure those members dont receive their weekly guild rewards which happens fairly often.

 

Thank you!

 

These are all great questions! I am going to be posting a separate write-up about the Conquest changes. I don't have timing yet but it shouldn't be too far away. We can then address and Conquest questions in that thread.

 

Thanks!

 

-eric

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SWG started with 25 servers and then in september 2009 they closed 12 servers leaving 13 servers remaining then two years later they announced they were closing SWG. So while this game started with more servers they have winded up with less servers than SWG did at the end. You might not see having 5 servers as a problem but a lot of people do especially those that went through this with SWG.

 

SWG finally closed because SWTOR was standing up, though, no?

 

Allegedly, the server merges were done because the "new server technology" could support many more simultaneous users per server, and thus the queues would be a-popping to make people who queue happy. But it also makes it look like there's a need for less servers. And of course it basically wrote off the APAC players

 

I'm beginning to think the "maintenance mode naysayers" may finally be correct - in which case I hope they keep it up until I'm done consuming the existing content, and can put out enough content in "maintenance mode" to keep me satisfied. I'm cheap, BTW, the current release cadence has been OK by me. Are there enough people like me to keep the lights on? Nobody knows.

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As much as for some of the people the current situation with the game might be fine there a lot of us on the forum and in the game which see all the potential this game still has and which think how with the regaining the more attention from the BW & EA and a more love from them it could still grow and become successful again ( the entire reboot which did SE made with FF has proven how big the turnaround some MMO can get if there is only a will for it on the developer side ), and which have the opinion how the current long content stagnation is only hurting the game even further because its bleeding the game even more with the remaining number of players ( heck I'm sure how EA & BW can even see that in their track records ).

 

As for the number of the players currently playing on the EU side all I can say is how after the merges the only english server in the peak time now usually has just the number which only 1 of the servers had on which I played when the game got launched.

Edited by Lunablade
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Oddly, I agree with you.

Its really not that odd. :)

 

However, dropping to only 5 servers today is a HUGE loss of potential income. Bioware has left so much money out there by mismanaging this game. They had enough interest originally to nearly fill 218 servers...losing that much potential income can't be seen as anything but disappointing to EA.

Well, if we were talking about money directly, $215M is better than $5M. However, we arent. We know very little about the servers they used in the past and the ones they currently use, as I understand it they also made some changes on the hardware side. Mathmatically, and hypothetically, if 215 servers each host a max of 500 toons, the max population across all servers would be 107,500. However, given tech advances, if 5 servers hosted a max of 10000 toons, the max population would be 50000. Im not saying these are exact numbers to go by, but you can see a huge deviation between a

97% drop in servers vs a 53% drop in population. Again, not saying these are numbers to go by, just demonstrating how the number of servers isnt the best factoid to represent how bad or good things are.

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Hopefully more people figure him out and put him on ignore and he gets the hint. It's doubtful though. It's impossible to have a conversation and keep it focused with him in the thread. It's just as difficult with him on ignore because I see whole pages full of ignored, ignored, ignored, someone made the mistake of replying to him, ignored, ignored, random post, ignored, ignored, ignored.....

 

He made my ignore list which has a grand total of two people on it now. Being a so called "white knight" is fine. There's nothing really wrong with that. Consistent failure to acknowledge other opinions is absurd though.

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I adore Musco, but the lack of response to anything involving the dev's commitment to this game makes me believe the story on Kotaku was an actual leak by a member of the team that actually loves SWTOR and was pissed by the outcome.

 

Using what has happened over 2017 plus the recent roadmap is literal evidence that this game is a low priority and EA/Bioware are using nearly all active development labor on Anthem and that SWTOR, while not officially on maintenance mode, has seen such a allocation of staff time away from SWTOR, it has effectively created that situation.

 

I totally understand, if that is the case, admitting to it is not in the interest of BW. It will hasten the game's demise. By just letting it be an open secret, they can still milk money for a longer period of time.

 

If this was all internet-fandom driven delusions not based on facts or reality, Musco or Keith would was actually step up and absolve our anxiety, in my dreams they would say:

 

"We are reading what you are saying. The negative response to the Roadmap seems to have started with a fabricated article on Kotaku and it has gotten everyone wound up, but this is not true at all. Yes, content has been slow. Major HR changes in the past year have resulted in a slower content release than we would like. We are in the planning stages of another major expansion to this game. A traditional expansion our long-time fans will love. We have great stuff planned. However, we are looking at some serious development hours on this and that expansion is not likely until spring 2019 at the earliest. We do have a number of smaller updates and fan-feedback-driven changes in 2018 and early 2019 that we think you will really appreciate. The best days of SWTOR are not over by a long shot. Just stick with us, we are listening to you, acknowledge mistakes and disappointments of the past year, and are working hard on correcting them! Trust me, in the end, this will all be worth it!"

 

That type of candor and honesty would be all I need to feel optimistic and dive back in (been taking a break since late August and only checking in during game updates). But I know we won't. Musco & Keith's silence is strategic and rational from a business perspective. They gain nothing but brownie points for being honest. Brownie points don't pay dividends or salaries. But that silence completely confirms that the Kotaku article explains the why; and the Roadmap explains the how we are transitioning into maintenance mode, without ever needing to state it directly.

 

It makes me want to cry. I love this game, but I am an adult and an hour or two of content each quarter just doesn't cut it. I will take it, but I was much happier blowing crazy amounts on the CM market and getting short, monthly chapter updates than I am with this.

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However, dropping to only 5 servers today is a HUGE loss of potential income. Bioware has left so much money out there by mismanaging this game. They had enough interest originally to nearly fill 218 servers...losing that much potential income can't be seen as anything but disappointing to EA.

 

On another forum unrelated to gaming, a forum posted just posted this:

 

Never let accountants run your business because they only thing they really know how to do is to tell you why you went bankrupt.

 

And the first thing I thought of was SWTOR.

 

All The Best

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He made my ignore list which has a grand total of two people on it now. Being a so called "white knight" is fine. There's nothing really wrong with that. Consistent failure to acknowledge other opinions is absurd though.

 

He's only the second person on any forum anywhere to end up on my ignore list, funnily enough for the exact same reason as the first - too ignorant to know when they are wrong, even when presented with overwhelming evidence.

 

All The Best

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He's only the second person on any forum anywhere to end up on my ignore list, funnily enough for the exact same reason as the first - too ignorant to know when they are wrong, even when presented with overwhelming evidence.

 

All The Best

I dont ignore anyone, because they eventually they may have something valuable to say, or i can continue to see if they retain their ignorance. I still have hope for many. Ignore just feeds more ignorance.

Edited by olagatonjedi
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AHHHH ARCANNN ROMANCEEE I LOVE HIM SO MUCH :D :D :D :D :D :D :D :D :D :D :D I wonder how its going to work though is it going to be an alliance alert or something classic like the original companion storylines

BUT I AM EXCITEDDD TO FINALLY LOVEE ARCANN EVEN MOREEEE :)

Edited by jediledgends
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