Thanks for the reply Alex. Another quick question - is there any chance of the regular PvP maps having their rewards buffed, particularly in terms of XP?

Unless I'm mistaken, both Arenas and the other Warzones will give out the same XP, Comms, Credits and whatnot.

 

How long are your average Arenas in testing? Is it more efficient (time wise) to do Arenas than let's say Novare Coast? (Potentially the longest Warzone)

Still loving the arenas, especially the anti-stealth and solo/group queue mechanics. Well-designed. New huttball map looks cool, nice to have a new bit of coolness going on Quesh. I'm not really affected at all by the removal of Ranked Warzones, but the fact is that normal warzones and their comms vs ranked ones was somewhat designed around Ranked Warzones, so I hope you have some kind of alternative (I believe you mentioned ranked arenas?). Probably my favorate piece of info is that PTS is scheduled to drop on the 16th.

 

Also, in reply to this post:

You mention about increasing the rewards for winning but I think one of the key reasons why people bail on Warzones is due to the small rewards when losing.

 

I am a firm believer that losers should never be rewarded but due to the nature of this game, I think that a minimum pay out of say 100 Warzone coms should be introduced because the grind is great.

 

I am almost certain that this will help see a drop in quitters. The other night, I lost and I was only given 67 coms as the battle was a heated one and went on for ages. Our team suffered 7 leavers. Essentially it was 15 minutes of pain for just 67 coms.

 

I'm still not convinced that Arenas is the way forward but the last man standing rounds kind of removes my fear now as its a fight to the death, which is better.

 

Will players be locked in? So if 2 players die quickly, then 1 leaves, will they have a de-buff? Or will ALL players be locked in for the entire duration of the 3 rounds? Something I would favour.

 

Over to you Alex

I don't believe this was adressed in the initial blog. Yet, I would definitely like to see something done about this. The fact of the matter is that a good game doesn't bend for the scrubs and losers. There's no need to change the loser rewards so that people don't whine and bail like little babies. You set the rewards how you want them, and then penalize them for leaving. Just like group finder. You know why they leave? So that they can get the rewards faster. That's the only reason. Thus, it becomes logical to make it so that bailing from even the worst match is not as effective as continuing through it. For example, a 15 minute to 20 minute lockout from arenas.

 

PS: By the way, one small error. You say here the location for the three arenas are "Corellia, Tatooine, and an Orbital Station" but the first one looks like Makeb, not Corellia.

Any chance Season 1 Rank will be making it to 2.4?

My entire guild is based on 8v8 ranked wz's . We transferred to Tomb of Freedon Nadd with a lot of other guilds so queueing for ranked would be viable again. And now you screw us over by removing the one thing I still enjoy doing from the game? That's just perfect. Edited August 14, 2013 by DesparadoIV

No respecs while in a Warzone or while in the PvP queue.

 

But alex, do you comprehend the major issue that what happens if the matchmaking system in a warzone puts 4-5 healers together? Are we forced to heal our enemies to their death?

 

What is the point of having FIELDrespec as a PVPer if you can't USE it in the fields? I understand the removal of it in mid-Warzones. But letting us using it just at the beginning before the game starts IS A CRUCIAL THING!

 

You didn't do well at all with the 8vs8 ranked warzones for over a year, now you're removing it and now you're about to destroy normal warzones aswell.

 

Don't.

Edited August 14, 2013 by Sammennn

I'm on Prophecy of the Five, try again.

 

And you still say that nobody cares about ranked? There's a whole lot more then "a dozen" players on my server (ToFN) that actively play ranked. A small % of the entire playerbase, but that's to be expected for hardcore content. I don't get how you can pull something like nobody cares about ranked when I know a good amount of players that are passionate about this aspect of swtor. Idk how things are on your server (or even if you're involved in this aspect), but here the removal of 8v8 will bug a whole lot of guilds.

Advertising a new huttball map is really quite simply not... worth much of anything with the report of removing 8v8 ranked.

 

While I certainly would expect 8v8s ranked warzones to be a bit less popular with the advent of the arenas, this is still a terrible, awful, shockingly bad idea. As has been said before, you will alienate and lose large chunks of the PvP community. As has been said, there are entire guilds which exist solely to do ranked warzones. They will enjoy arenas, but will not be satisfied with them.

 

I have already spoken to a number of avid PvPers, and the consensus is fairly simple: just because they are imperfect, don't deny those of us who like them the chance to do them at all! If the que is slow, then it is slow. We deal with it now, we'll deal with it then.

 

The logic is simply and unquestionably bankrupt. People are unhappy with the lack of support for 8v8 ranked, so to alleviate it you take it away altogether? That's like a guy who stops giving his wife flowers even on Valentine's day because she's mad at him for not doing it the rest of the year.

 

As you have shown the willingness to do in the past, I very, very strongly encourage you to change this decision. It will have devastating effects on the community and it is, frankly, without any logic to it at all. One of the complaints from the PvP has been a lack of things to do: adding a new one while taking away a current one leaves things in precisely the same situation. I know I won't be the last to offer this opinion.

Edited August 14, 2013 by Skolops

Any chance Season 1 Rank will be making it to 2.4?

 

"Speaking of Pre-Season, our current plan is to let folks have a (short) window to practice the new Ranked games before rolling out Season 1. Stay tuned for more details on the one-time Pre-Season titles and Season 1 as we get closer to October!"

 

So Season 1 is incoming shortly after 2.4 it sounds like.

If you have come up with a working matchmaking system based off rating for Arenas, why could you not have just implemented that into RWZ?

 

A true matchmaking system in RWZ would solve all of the problems addressed in this blog; mismatched teams, more accessible to players of different skill levels, etc.

 

 

Removing RWZ entirely is not a smart move.

 

 

So Season 1 is incoming shortly after 2.4 it sounds like.

 

And Season 1 was coming shortly after Preseason was first started, along with cross server queues! I wouldnt count on anything the devs say being true.

Edited August 14, 2013 by cashogy_reborn

You have some matchmaking it appears for solo arenas; does that also apply to the classic warzones?

So how long will it take before the 4v4 queue is the same as the current 8v8 one? I'd say that in about a month of two there is going to be like ten to twelve teams in queue per server, every new team will get stomped on and quit after a few evenings and we'll be flipping back to this chapter and asking what went wrong.

 

Please reconsider keeping a 8v8 warzone queue even if we don't have a ranking system for it. Even if I've not been extremely active in them myself the few times I did participate it was a whole new game from playing normals, there was such a higher level of play that made it so much more fun and thrilling to play. Sure the current system it not perfect but try to fix it instead of scrapping it.

Last question:

 

-If I respec outside of a warzone, and leave all of the points unspent - can I spend the points in a warzone?

 

(Sins commonly do this more than other classes)

Solo queue for ranked? I may have to pvp again

 

I'm curious how viable tanks will be in these smaller arenas though - being a Shadow tank myself, I stopped playing warzones once our effectiveness was dropped awhile back (note - I still jump in one occasionally, but I wind up being nothing but a node-defender, or follow people around with guard on), so I'm hoping with 4v4, utility roles will have more of a purpose...even in deathmatch.

nice. this look like a good system.

cant wait

Some of my questions on pvp update in general:

 

1)about the rewards from arenas (ranked/unranked comms)? how are they like? and the overall pvp gearing up process?

2)Bolster in arenas?

3) any class changes in 2.4?

 

Looking forward to coming back to 2.4 with this.

Greetings,

 

Well I've applaud to you Bioware, this looks very good, at last some quality updates on PVP, can't wait to participate and entertain the Giradda the Hutt and Baron Deathmark...

 

Thank you,

Best regards!.

Realizing this blog is about the warzones and arenas specifically; when are we going to hear about changes to gear?

 

Also; will the dailies and weeklies be the same as they are now as far as missions go?

Very nice additions 2.4 looks to be a big update to and I am glad where it's headed. I really like you guys are making Arenas and simplifying the warzone window. Looks great.

 

To the people who misunderstood them removing 8v8 ranked for the other warzones. They said they are just doing it now because I don't think a lot of players did that. Plus they said it was just for now No biggie about it. You guys are getting arenas. You should be thrilled! Focus on the positives of the patch. I think it's a great thing they are doing and if their data shows not a lot of people played the other ranked them I'm sure they are not just doing it to make you mad

 

2.4 looks to be another great patch. Is that another huttball arena I see? YES it is I can't wait for that after 2.4. You teasers you. Keep up the good work on the game. It's great you keep adding stuff to it and I'm happy to see such great things being implemented

 

Look to the future guys, be optimistic and focus on the positive things are that are of whatever is coming

/facepalm.

Will there be some sort of spectator mode for dead participant ?

 

Also, I commend you on the courage in removing ranked 8vs8.

Not sure if my question was read:

 

Is the Matchmaking system based on the player's class archetype or on the player's current spec.

OMG !

Can't wait guys Finally you're going in the right direction!! Just please, listen the feedback about the PTS testing and try to release all of these contents with the less number possible of bugs Then, you'll have for sure my subscription! Carry on with these contents, this is what we want!