At the end of the day it's about money. BW understands that if they make the earlier stuff more boring and take longer to complete more people are apt to purchase the level 70 tokens off the CM. I've been playing this game for 8 years. I already spacebar through every story conversation because I've seen them dozens and dozens of times each. I just up and skipped to Ossus on my last 8 or so because I just no longer care about the early story or the companions. You think I--and many other vets--are interested in it taking longer?

 

Those 70 tokens are looking more and more desirable, and that is what BW is banking on.

 

This could very well be true for some. I've been here just as long as you, and I never spacebar through anything. I still play through everything from lvl 1- to Dantooen. (Except usually Makeb, but I've even been playing through that on my last few characters). I've never bought a lvl 70 token, because I'm in no rush to get to endgame. I enjoy the stories, and it's no different to me than replaying Mass Effect or Dragon Age for the umpteenth time. I can recite most of the cut scenes verbatim, but I still enjoy watching them.

 

I think that's the biggest issue BW has with SWTOR. Trying to cater to so many players with so many different play styles.

This could very well be true for some. I've been here just as long as you, and I never spacebar through anything. I still play through everything from lvl 1- to Dantooen. (Except usually Makeb, but I've even been playing through that on my last few characters). I've never bought a lvl 70 token, because I'm in no rush to get to endgame. I enjoy the stories, and it's no different to me than replaying Mass Effect or Dragon Age for the umpteenth time. I can recite most of the cut scenes verbatim, but I still enjoy watching them.

 

I think that's the biggest issue BW has with SWTOR. Trying to cater to so many players with so many different play styles.

 

I did, a masters datacron. Just went through the entire class story and beyond without having to worry about gear or level

 

I've also made a boosted Trooper because it's the only way I could get one through to romance Theron without romancing Aric. Grumpy cat is too hard to resist . Anything I do in game though I've never skipped cutscenes or dialogue. Story is life!

 

Don't care about increased difficulty but there has got to be a better way then increases to mob hp, turning combat into a boring grind fest.

Edited October 17, 2019 by Suzsi

Who even talked about rewards among the people who think that mobs who take longer to kill are just not fun ?

You can give any rewards you want, if i don't like the content and think it's more annoying than fun, i'll just not play it.

 

I'm not bothering with ranked PvP even though there's an armor i'd like to have and would gladly spend rl money on this one if it was a CM outfit, because to me PvP is the absolute opposite of fun.

I nearly never go to Makeb because that planet if awful, full of silly mobs who can spot you even if you're on a stealth character.

I've tried Oricon once before i realised i'd never see the whole story unless i group because there's only a bit of story that's not in ops (which is utterly silly, either you can do everything solo, or nothing not just a bit in the middle)

I've been to Dantooine only once, that was not fun, and the H were just as awful as Makeb with stupid mobs who can see you on stealth characters...

So i don't have the max rep on these 3 planets, because they're just not fun, though the decos are nice, i'm just not bothering with them.

 

I try as much as possible to avoid Copero because it's full of annoying mobs who are constantly shouting in my hears and take forever to die, and whenever i have to do that FP for story purpose (i think i did it only twice actually, once on my main and once on a stealth character, the other 2 characters who are beyond Copero i just skiped from the end of KOTET or Iokath to Ossus), i have to mute the game just to go through, unless i'm on a stealth character. Which is sad because the planet itself is trully beautiful.

Edited October 17, 2019 by Goreshaga

At the end of the day it's about money. BW understands that if they make the earlier stuff more boring and take longer to complete more people are apt to purchase the level 70 tokens off the CM. I've been playing this game for 8 years. I already spacebar through every story conversation because I've seen them dozens and dozens of times each. I just up and skipped to Ossus on my last 8 or so because I just no longer care about the early story or the companions. You think I--and many other vets--are interested in it taking longer?

 

Those 70 tokens are looking more and more desirable, and that is what BW is banking on.

 

I want it to take longer. Not just because enemy HP is higher; I want a game that requires I play at a minimum level of competency which provides satisfaction upon completion. Since 4.0, SWTOR's story content hasn't been that.

If Vets with a zillion characters don't want to play old content, then there should be a way for them to skip it, but the more important issue is that the content be worth playing even once. Gameplay so easy you can't fail isn't gameplay, and BioWare should be more afraid of boring their players with pointless content than frustrating them with challenging content.

Edited October 17, 2019 by ReverendAnderson

Mobs shouldn't die in 1 hit, except at the lowest levels. There's this thing called a "rotation".......... And if you don't need to learn it until max level, then it may never be learned. SWTOR is not a 4-button adventure game. Edited October 17, 2019 by Rion_Starkiller

Mobs shouldn't die in 1 hit, except at the lowest levels. There's this thing called a "rotation".......... And if you don't need to learn it until max level, then it may never be learned. SWTOR is not a 4-button adventure game.

 

Have to agree here mobs shouldn’t die in one hit.

But you also shouldn’t need to do full rotations on all trash mobs, I don’t mind if gold stars are much harder or silver is a little harder. But making silver nearly gold lvl and trash above silver lvl is going a bit far in open world.

Flash points and heroics are a bit different and should be balanced a little harder than open world or story.

 

Anyway, only 5 days to go to find out how they balanced after pts 3 feed back.

Edited October 17, 2019 by TrixxieTriss

I want it to take longer. Not just because enemy HP is higher; I want a game that requires I play at a minimum level of competency which provides satisfaction upon completion. Since 4.0, SWTOR's story content hasn't been that.

If Vets with a zillion characters don't want to play old content, then there should be a way for them to skip it, but the more important issue is that the content be worth playing even once. Gameplay so easy you can't fail isn't gameplay, and BioWare should be more afraid of boring their players with pointless content than frustrating them with challenging content.

 

this is very close to my view at the this. Things like Master Datacron or whatever should be available and accessible to players that want to get to the final.

 

Also: good idea would be to allow us to revisit our own story cutscenes. Like watching and instagram of our lives or whatever.

However on new characters (ie different gender, different alignment) cut scenes should be earned, not opened by simply going further. Beat the content to earn new cut scene/

 

In an Ideal World I'd like it it be something like that:

 

IF and WHEN I get new ability, I want the need to use it.

Well designed game play would demand of players to use their new abilities in order to go further.

 

It needs to be immersive, and it needs to teach (gradually) the players how to use all of their assets.

You got new ability called Master Strike? Use it on mobs and mini bosses and watch what it does. Might come in handy with a Chapter Boss or Final Boss or whatever group content you might want to participate in the future.

Edited October 17, 2019 by jstankaroslo

Always thought fun should be the primary reason to do anything in the game. If the fun factor is missing why even subscribe and play? And if people prefer doing bare minimum and only rewards can motivate them to do harder content - this would suggest that there is some kind of problem with the fun factor.

Fun is different for different people. A lot of people don't find it fun that things have gotten so easy. If nothing's challenging and everything has the same end result, I don't see how that's fun.

 

...or they will simply leave if the game is no longer fun for them.

Some will leave and be upset regardless of what the expansion brings. But I think that the reality is clear. When 4.0 came a lot of people had left because they knew that operations had been abandoned and casual play was becoming the norm. It also brought back a lot of people. It was initially hailed as a big success and the most successful expansion to date. Well at least for a few months, then people started leaving again. So 5.0 should've been the turnaround but it made it worse. They again went against group content and took the rewards and spread them around in a full RNG fest. More people left AND we got server merges afterwards.

They tried to turn it around and refocus on group content...sort of. It was a panic reaction that didn't work well because it was very hit and miss...mostly miss.

 

SWTOR isn't dead but with the casual and story focus that had come with the last two expansions the reality is that the game lost more players than it gained. The server merges proved it. And part of the problem is that they've been too one-sided on the issue. So for me it makes sense to change direction and yes some people will leave, but there are also people coming back. The result will lie in the balance thereof. That's the same for every expansion but as I explained, the balance has not been good with the last two expansions.

 

 

Remember what happened when Copero came out and people seen those early guards in the city? Pretty much nobody liked that and it wasn't even that hard, just a boring slog full of bullet sponges. They soon toned it down.

I expect the same thing to happen with 6.0. Most of the people looking for harder content left with 4.0 and 5.0. Changes coming with 6.0 will alienate a lot of story \ casual players in order to please the audience that's almost gone from the game.

Same thing happened with the skytroopers but I'm not advocating more bullet sponges. I am saying that it should be a little bit more dangerous and that challenging content should be rewarded appropriately.

 

Copero was a bad idea for more than one reason. They did a lot better with the Ossus content, except that the rewards were ridiculously OP for what it was and it completely annhilated the Ops rewards into the ground.

 

I mean we're talking about healer comps not being godly anymore. I'll tell you something I saw today on Ossus. A guy was afk on the spot of Scarjaw or Razorclaw. He was afk, the mob had respawned and was locked in combat with the healer companion. The fight took ages until it reset and restarted. The healer comp never died and this person by being afk effectively blocked others from completing this quest.

 

That's why healer comps need to be nerfed.

 

Also boss fights in FPs and Ops have mechanics that can be completely ignored because people don't really get consequences from them. But that doesn't work everywhere even in SM and then groups wipe and people quit. They quit because they can't be bothered to learn one or two mechanics. They feel they should win just by showing up and doing some pew pew. Maybe that's what they find fun but for a lot of people who raid that's not fun and these people are ruining the fun of others because content has to be dumbed down.

 

And let me reiterate....BW have made a number of decisions that drove a lot of people away. I'm only back because 6.0 promises to be more interesting than it has been the last few years. And I will only stay if that delivers. So either way someone will leave. But we had another round of server merges after 5.0 and for the long term the game needs to change some things.

 

And if there are some boring bullet sponges that everybody hates, you'll know they'll be nerfed soon enough. At least we agree that that's not a solution, but I do think things should feel a little more dangerous and that you have to pay attention at least a little bit to your survival. We'll see next week I'm sure but I for one will enjoy it if the game gets a bit more challenging and not so focus on making everything dead easy and catering to instant gratification.

I thought I posted in this thread but can't find it so I must've decided not to, lol. Here are two things I think could help and it wouldn't screw with everyone like a mob buff will.

 

1. Legacy on/off switch - The Legacy buffs make both player and companion stronger so if they give us an on off switch then those that want a challenge can turn off the buffs and experience the game as if they were new.

 

2. A difficulty adjuster - Allows you to adjust your level to 2 > the mobs, = to the mobs or 2 < the mobs level on that planet. So Korriban being level 1 - 10 you could scale your level to 12 (2 >), 10 (=) or 8 (<) then mobs.

 

When you put in place a buff to normals then the new players, that have no buffs because they don't have the Legacy buffs, will suffer the most and possibly find it too hard. To me it sounds like players with all the Legacy buffs and possibly even twinked or super geared are finding leveling content too easy. Normal mobs should not have their difficulty increased because others want to make their leveling experience trivial. Any buffs to mobs should be taken from a new players stand point and none other.

i like the idea of a new game plus where everything is scaled to max lvl

 

1. Legacy on/off switch - The Legacy buffs make both player and companion stronger so if they give us an on off switch then those that want a challenge can turn off the buffs and experience the game as if they were new..

 

You already have the ability to not use those. All you do is right click on the buff and it removes it from you.

Mobs shouldn't die in 1 hit, except at the lowest levels. There's this thing called a "rotation".......... And if you don't need to learn it until max level, then it may never be learned. SWTOR is not a 4-button adventure game.

 

Rotation is fine for bosses and elites but not trash, Don't see Luke wailing away on a single storm trooper for several minutes they drop in 1 hit. It doesn't even fit with Star Wars

Edited October 17, 2019 by Suzsi

Rotation is fine for bosses and elites but not trash, Don't see Luke wailing away on a single storm trooper for several minutes they drop in 1 hit. It doesn't even fit with Star Wars

 

It would be an incredibly long movie if he did

Rotation is fine for bosses and elites but not trash, Don't see Luke wailing away on a single storm trooper for several minutes they drop in 1 hit. It doesn't even fit with Star Wars

 

Luke struggled when rescuing Han from Jabba (ROTJ). Even got hit in the hand (artificial one). This is a good movie.

Jedi facerolled through droids in Phantom Menace. This is a bad movie

Luke struggled when rescuing Han from Jabba (ROTJ). Even got hit in the hand (artificial one). This is a good movie.

Jedi facerolled through droids in Phantom Menace. This is a bad movie

 

Jabbas palace was full of seasoned bounty hunters and a rancor. It was more like a heroic level dungeon then standard trash.

 

Droids should be easy, they run on standard programs with no instinct or variation. Only exception is special droids with stronger weapons and armor plating. Stormtroopers, skytroopers, basic hostile animals all the same with the same basic training or natural preditior design.

 

Imperial Troops, particularly front line are also tossed in by the empire as nothing but canon fodder and they all die with a simple saber reflect off a lightsaber. If they get in a good shot, sure ot hurts, but they also fall like tissue paper when hit.

Edited October 17, 2019 by Suzsi

You already have the ability to not use those. All you do is right click on the buff and it removes it from you.

 

I think he means things like what you get for getting through all your convos with your comps (max health going up, etc), datacrons and so on. Stuff that can't simply be turned off.

Jabbas palace was full of seasoned bounty hunters and a rancor. It was more like a heroic level dungeon then standard trash.

 

Droids should be easy, they run on standard programs with no instinct or variation. Only exception is special droids with stronger weapons and armor plating. Stormtroopers, skytroopers, basic hostile animals all the same with the same basic training or natural preditior design.

 

Imperial Troops, particularly front line are also tossed in by the empire as nothing but canon fodder and they all die with a simple saber reflect off a lightsaber. If they get in a good shot, sure ot hurts, but they also fall like tissue paper when hit.

And let's not forget that at that time Luke had minimal training with Obi-Wan and Yoda and had to practice pretty much everything by himself while the prequel Jedi all had years of training with masters who had themselves years of training.

 

Our own Jedi and Sith are supposed to be be the strongest and are supposed to have years of training behind them (well except probably the SI), why should they struggle against weaklings with blasters or vibroswords ? Or worse with their bare hands... There's an heroic on imperial side Nar Shadda where you have to kill 20 prisonners, and most of them come at you with their bare hands, how are they even able to survive more than 1 second against lighting and lighsabers ? That's just ridiculous.

That our character could struggle against other Jedi/Sith, expert soldiers or seasoned Mandos, ok, but against anything else ? Nope, they should be able to finish them in 1 strike.

Not being able to take them down like that is actually breaking my immersion, my character feels weak and their lighsaber feels like a kitchen knife, and not a good one.

 

And in most RPGs, when you have the best gear available and go through older places, you just have to look at the mobs for them to die. Why should it be different here ?

 

 

Jabbas palace was full of seasoned bounty hunters and a rancor. It was more like a heroic level dungeon then standard trash.

 

Droids should be easy, they run on standard programs with no instinct or variation. Only exception is special droids with stronger weapons and armor plating. Stormtroopers, skytroopers, basic hostile animals all the same with the same basic training or natural preditior design.

 

Imperial Troops, particularly front line are also tossed in by the empire as nothing but canon fodder and they all die with a simple saber reflect off a lightsaber. If they get in a good shot, sure ot hurts, but they also fall like tissue paper when hit.

 

I like the way you put it

But, when I'm on Tython and Satele tells me the Gnarls are very dangerous, they should be, because in game world the Gnarls is a place where many Jedi died. If I meet a Fleshrider, and it has cut scene showing how dangerous it is, I don't want it to die in one hit. The main JK antagonist on Tython should be a worthy foe, and it should be our first really epic fight. Not to mention Baras, The Emperor etc.

Now it seems like in Raiders of The Lost Ark, when Indiana Jones just one shoots the muscle sword wielding goon. Funny once, but if the whole movie was like this, no one would watch it.

 

And let's not forget that at that time Luke had minimal training with Obi-Wan and Yoda and had to practice pretty much everything by himself while the prequel Jedi all had years of training with masters who had themselves years of training.

 

So Luke was on starter planet and had to put some effort? Guess what, I want this game to be like this

 

My point is: the hero needs to win of course, but needs to have a hard time. Like Luke with Jabba's goons.

The movie/game with main hero facerolling droids/troopers whatever is boring.

Or silly. Where do you think Chuck Norris memes came from?

I like the way you put it

But, when I'm on Tython and Satele tells me the Gnarls are very dangerous, they should be, because in game world the Gnarls is a place where many Jedi died. If I meet a Fleshrider, and it has cut scene showing how dangerous it is, I don't want it to die in one hit. The main JK antagonist on Tython should be a worthy foe, and it should be our first really epic fight. Not to mention Baras, The Emperor etc.

Now it seems like in Raiders of The Lost Ark, when Indiana Jones just one shoots the muscle sword wielding goon. Funny once, but if the whole movie was like this, no one would watch it.

 

 

 

So Luke was on starter planet and had to put some effort? Guess what, I want this game to be like this

 

My point is: the hero needs to win of course, but needs to have a hard time. Like Luke with Jabba's goons.

The movie/game with main hero facerolling droids/troopers whatever is boring.

Or silly. Where do you think Chuck Norris memes came from?

 

I'd like the BOSSES to be a challenge. Bosses include like the last fight you do on each planet before moving to the next, like the guy on Tython or Baras or the Emp etc but trash taking a long time to kill is just boring as hell after you've done it a few times. That distinction is also important or things just become a big eyeroll grind fest which quickly looses the fun factor.

 

In original SWTOR it took the average player several months to level one toon to max and a LOT of those first players dropped off quickly after because the replay value wasn't there. SWTOR from the very beginning didn't hold it's launch numbers.

Edited October 18, 2019 by Suzsi

 

In original SWTOR it took the average player several months to level one toon to max and a LOT of those first players dropped off quickly after because the replay value wasn't there. SWTOR from the very beginning didn't hold it's launch numbers.

 

Not so. It took maybe a month or two doing it casually or less if you were really dedicated. And the reason swtor didn’t hold its numbers after launch was because of the lack of end game content for raiders, etc. and pvp. Not because the replay value wasn’t there. Hell, there were 8 class stories to get through. Unlike now where it a generic story for every class.

It was a major oversight to push it out before it was fully finished, but EA had them on a schedule and said they could add more of the end game stuff after launch.

Edited October 18, 2019 by TrixxieTriss

Not so. It took maybe a month or two doing it casually or less if you were really dedicated. And the reason swtor didn’t hold its numbers after launch was because of the lack of end game content for raiders, etc. and pvp. Not because the replay value wasn’t there. Hell, there were 8 class stories to get through. Unlike now where it a generic story for every class.

It was a major oversight to push it out before it was fully finished, but EA had them on a schedule and said they could add more of the end game stuff after launch.

I stoped playing a month or so after i first started playing. Why ?

Not because of the lack of engame content, but because the leveling process was awfully slow, you had to spend too much time killing trash, loosing time completely getting out of your class story to play all the not necessarily interesting planetary quests who are the same for every classes of the same faction, and even with all that as i was F2P at the time, i was constently underleveled so i had to loose even more time killing yet more trash just to get to the next planet.

 

I gave up before even finishing my 1st class story (i think my first SI who was my most advanced character was somewhere on Taris), because i though the game was absolutely boring and not fun to play, and as i was constently being distracted from my class story, even that felt underwhelming.

 

It took my friend who got me into the game in the first place a lot of effort and the nice KOTFE trailer to convince me to come back, and when i came back i deleted my old characters, made new ones and was really happy to see this had changed and i was finally able to concentrate mostly on the actual class story.

 

So not everyone gave up because of no endgame content.

Edited October 18, 2019 by Goreshaga

In original SWTOR it took the average player several months to level one toon to max and a LOT of those first players dropped off quickly after because the replay value wasn't there. SWTOR from the very beginning didn't hold it's launch numbers.

 

the main reason was slower XP gain rate than it is now. They upped xp gain rate roughly x12 right before 4.0.

Now you can level up just doing purple quests (class and planetary), back then you needed almost EVERY quest. Or pvp or FP.

 

I stoped playing a month or so after i first started playing. Why ?

Not because of the lack of engame content, but because the leveling process was awfully slow, you had to spend too much time killing trash, loosing time completely getting out of your class story to play all the not necessarily interesting planetary quests who are the same for every classes of the same faction, and even with all that as i was F2P at the time, i was constently underleveled so i had to loose even more time killing yet more trash just to get to the next planet.

 

And I stopped playing a month after 4.0 hit. Why? Because the leveling process was awfully fast, and you don't get to fight trash, just faceroll them.

Our anecdatas don't prove anything, and there is no way for the devs to please everyone.

 

I like PLAYING this game, I like using my characters abilities. You do not like it obviously, the game play is as you put it "loosing time".

 

The bottom line is: they're gonna change the difficulty a bit and everyone has to decide if that makes them play the game or quit the game. I can't wait to see how its gonna be, but frankly I don't have much hope.

Probably I'll do the story on one or two characters and if leveling will be still poor, I'll unsub again.

From PTS, planet sync will be 2 levels lower per planet cap than previously, your comp in heal mode will heal for 15% less, and some content according to posts on the PTS forum are indeed harder. People asked for it, guess they got it.

Great. Maybe I'll actually have some fun leveling now. Been pouting about the facerolliness for years.

Just wish they'd tune down the XP gain so I could actually do all exploration and bonus series again without reaching max level before I'm even one thirds done with planets. Story bosses die like super fast atm too it's pretty sad.

 

So not everyone-

Who would have thunk.

Edited October 18, 2019 by Kiesu

I like PLAYING this game, I like using my characters abilities. You do not like it obviously, the game play is as you put it "loosing time".

I don't like spending all my playing time killing trash, that's why i try to avoid them as much as i can, especially when the fighting style is not really to my taste and when my characters look weak not oneshooting trash.

 

I don't mind a boss being harder and taking longer to kill, that's what a boss is supposed to be, but trash is just that : trash and should die easily and quickly, especially when you have decent to good gear on you.

 

And we're clearly not looking for the same things in a video game, i don't play for challenge and hard content, but for escapism : discovering different places, exotic species, interesting characters and good storylines. Pretty much what i expect from a good book but more interactive and immersive, being the main character of the story.

 

Anyways, my sub already ran out, i'll wait as prefered to see how the new difficulty goes, and watch YT vids about the Onslaught story before deciding if it's worth resubing or not.

Edited October 18, 2019 by Goreshaga

Great. Maybe I'll actually have some fun leveling now. Been pouting about the facerolliness for years.

Just wish they'd tune down the XP gain so I could actually do all exploration and bonus series again without reaching max level before I'm even one thirds done with planets. Story bosses die like super fast atm too it's pretty sad.

 

Do what jstank and I do: get the White Acute Module [available during 2xp weeks] and use it during regular leveling. It reduces xp gain to 2.0 levels. There's some difference if you're subbed while using it versus unsubbed [the xp rate is higher while subbed], and it's not a consistent rate - on the early planets from starter to about Alderaan, you'll notice that the xp rate is fast enough that you'll still skip many exploration quests [on my most recent alt, I skipped all of balmorra's and Tatooine's planet quests], but by the time you reach the Act 2 planets, it'll slow you down tremendously and you'll need to do FPs or heroics or something to stay at level, otherwise the planets will red-line by around Belsavis. You can toggle it off anytime though.

 

The problem with the WAM up to now is that while leveling is slower, the fights still aren't all that difficult, even if you're underleveled. With the changes to difficulty, you might finally start using up all those medpacks sitting in legacy storage.