After seeing many complaints about the Group Finder, I decided to record my experience of random Flashpoint through Group Finder this week. Does Hammer Station appear that often? What's the other "popular" Flashpoints? Lets see.

 

[Materials and Methods]

Jedi Knight (JK), Sith Inquisitor (SI), Imperial Agent (IA). All lv75, full 306 gear with bonus set.

Each toon went through two random Veteran Flashpoints through the Group Finder with all 23 Flashpoint options were selected. I went through least 6 Flashpoints, 2 for each toon per day.

My play time is between 7AM to 12PM CST, right after the dairy Flashpoint reward was reset.

 

[The TL;DR Results] I have a detailed daily record if anyone is interested...

Total Flashpoints: 44

 

Hammer Station: 19 (~43%)

Athiss: 9 (~20%)

Kuat Drive Yard: 4 (~9%)

The Red Reaper: 3 (~6.8%)

Mandalorian Raiders: 2 (~4.5 %)

Cademimu: 2 (~4.5 %)

Directive 7: 1 (~2.2 %)

Assault on Tython: 1 (~2.2 %)

Depth of Mannan: 1

Boarding Party: 1

Blood Hunt: 1

 

[Discussion]

Yeah, Hammer Station composed of almost half of the Flashpoints I got. Even the second popular Flashpoint, Athiss, occurred only half as often as Hammer Station.

 

One thing in particular that I noticed. It's pretty rare that I got a Flashpoint with four lv70 and up players. It surely increased the chance of getting the early Flashpoints such as Athiss and Kuat Drive Yard, which is the 2nd and 3rd most common Flashpoint appeared in my weekly experience.

 

Hammer Station appeared the most on Tuesday, probably because my play time on my Tuesday was before the weekly Conquest reset but after the weekly 5/5 Veteran Flashpoint Reward reset. I got 4 Hammer Station out of the 6 Flashpoints I went through on that day. The only day I didn't get any Hammer Station was on my Thursday (Wednesday morning in US time). Most likely just coincidence.

 

Met 3 toxic players in the total 44 runs. My definition of toxic is a players who put the group in danger on purpose, being rude in the chat, or ignoring group members who are at low levels and need help on purpose. Those players consisted of 3/132, which is about 2% of the players I've met. Not that high if you ask me.

 

I don't count runs with people who simply have bad sync or accident death/wipes as toxic but some groups need more time to sync, and some formed a thyme pretty quick. Some of those bumpy runs were quite amusing when the people who participated didn't make a scene of it.

 

Over all, is Hammer Station as bad as people say? I guess so. 43% is quite a lot.

Are players who participate the Group Finder bad? Not really if you can take one or two accidents in a run.

Is Group Finder as toxic as people say? personally, I don't think so. But maybe I am lucky.

 

Don't lose hope!

After seeing many complaints about the Group Finder, I decided to record my experience of random Flashpoint through Group Finder this week. Does Hammer Station appear that often? What's the other "popular" Flashpoints? Lets see.

 

...

 

Over all, is Hammer Station as bad as people say? I guess so. 43% is quite a lot.

Are players who participate the Group Finder bad? Not really if you can take one or two accidents in a run.

Is Group Finder as toxic as people say? personally, I don't think so. But maybe I am lucky.

 

Don't lose hope!

 

Interesting! Thanks for posting this. It matches my general impressions from running VM flashpoints in the late evening (US) on Star Forge. A lot of people seem to be reporting toxicity recently, but I haven't run into much myself. Most players have been pretty quiet except for a "Hi" at the start and a "GG" at the end. Maybe we're both lucky!

Interesting! Thanks for posting this. It matches my general impressions from running VM flashpoints in the late evening (US) on Star Forge. A lot of people seem to be reporting toxicity recently, but I haven't run into much myself. Most players have been pretty quiet except for a "Hi" at the start and a "GG" at the end. Maybe we're both lucky!

 

Forgot to say I'm on Star Forge too.

I am the "hi" and "tyfg" person but yeah usually people are quiet. Maybe we're lucky, maybe it's Maybeli... the morning.

You don't take into account that when you select "all" flashpoints, the results are not "random". When you select "all", that means you can be group with "any" players. That includes low level players who have a limited number of choices, and - more importantly - those who have only selected a few FPs like HS for quick CQ points.

Or, to say it another way, choosing "all" does not mean you will only be grouped with others who have also selected "all". You can be grouped with players who only selected Hammer Station, for example.

Yep, in vet category a lot of the hammer stations or similar low flashpoints can be explained by the game "locking" further flashpoints out of the selection at lower levels, especially if it was rare to get lvl 70s or higher.

 

I do wish there was an extra filter like choosing to only group with people looking for all selections as well, but there's probably some sort of ridiculous reason that it's too complicated to introduce

You don't take into account that when you select "all" flashpoints, the results are not "random". When you select "all", that means you can be group with "any" players. That includes low level players who have a limited number of choices, and - more importantly - those who have only selected a few FPs like HS for quick CQ points.

Or, to say it another way, choosing "all" does not mean you will only be grouped with others who have also selected "all". You can be grouped with players who only selected Hammer Station, for example.

 

I did say I noticed it's rare to get all lv70 and up players and it's probably why other than HS, Athiss and KDY came in as the 2nd and 3rd as the most "popular" FP.

 

I think some people deselect KDY because it's long and the last boss can be tricky for new players. The percentage of Athiss is more "normal" since it's relatively short and bosses are not difficult.

 

I should record the ration of player levels but I don't want to pug 6 FP a day lol

It just confirms what everyone knows, but still thank you for taking your time. The thing also is that if people run the FPS for the gear boxes they mostly do it by running the Master mode version which is also quite easy and provides the more rewards. I think in that category the percentage of HS would be much higher.

I'm not surprised at all with the results. But, can we all agree that with the amount of time investment vs. reward from Kuat Drive Yards, that instance needs to be removed from the list of random flashpoints. The last (and only) boss fight is weighted far to heavy to be worth the single loot roll from running that entire flashpoint.

I'm not surprised at all with the results. But, can we all agree that with the amount of time investment vs. reward from Kuat Drive Yards, that instance needs to be removed from the list of random flashpoints. The last (and only) boss fight is weighted far to heavy to be worth the single loot roll from running that entire flashpoint.

 

I think KDY is a good tutoring type of FP but not a good "normal" FP.

Too much walking. Not enough boos break and rewards.

It's good for new players because there are clear objectives, they have to lean how to clear trash mobs and move as a group. It allows a team to form group chemistry and get used to working with different classes.

The final boss fight forces the team to act as a group and learn almost all basic boss mechanics in this game.

If new players can get through that boss fight, they will have no problem with most boss fight.

You don't take into account that when you select "all" flashpoints, the results are not "random".

This is wrong. They are still random, but the choices of other players restrict the possible outcomes. If you're the only all-ist in the queue, and the others are one guy who likes only the Forged Alliances FPs, one who likes them and anything after, and one who likes them and anything before, then the result will be randomly selected from { Tython, Korriban, Manaan, Rakata Prime }.

 

On the other hand, if someone in the queue picked Hammer Station only, and nobody else in the queue cares, then the result will be randomly chosen between Hammer Station and Hammer Station. In this case, it's highly likely that the result will not be Red Reaper.

Picky, picky, picky. 🙂

 

I guess I should have said "not entirely random". 😏

Edited July 18, 2020 by JediQuaker

Forgot to say I'm on Star Forge too.

I am the "hi" and "tyfg" person but yeah usually people are quiet. Maybe we're lucky, maybe it's Maybeli... the morning.

 

Not going to lie, I'm one of those quiet ones but I never get toxic when the run goes bad. I always say np or no worries. IF it goes really bad, someone quits and then I bring out my comp for heals and everything goes up from there so I never complain.

In the last few days I did a bunch of FPs for CQ. After 3 Hammer Stations in a row, I took my own advice and deselected HS from the list. 🙄 🙂

(I really don't need that extra trash reward anyway.)

A lot of people will only select hammer station when they queue vet mode. It is the fastest FP, and unlike KDY, you get gear and mats from multiple bosses.

In the last few days I did a bunch of FPs for CQ. After 3 Hammer Stations in a row, I took my own advice and deselected HS from the list. 🙄 🙂

(I really don't need that extra trash reward anyway.)

3 HS in a row is tiring. There's only so much "your weakness is in your blood" I cant take lol

 

A lot of people will only select hammer station when they queue vet mode. It is the fastest FP, and unlike KDY, you get gear and mats from multiple bosses.

Doing KDY is like running marathon, so much walking. I always feel bad for the poor newbies who don't have rocket boost yet.

summery: people just want quick flashpoints Edited July 28, 2020 by RikuvonDrake

People who only play for the rewards want them quick and thus quick FPs, playing for fun is something else though.

Nobody can tell me farming HS is fun.

People who only play for the rewards want them quick and thus quick FPs, playing for fun is something else though.

Nobody can tell me farming HS is fun.

 

Not true. I do fps for the rewards, but I always select all because fast and easy is boring. If it's HS, I'll just drop the group. Well, used to. I don't do pugs anymore after HS farming got out of hands.

In my experience, most of the MM FPs go VERY fast. I would think primarily it is because everyone knows the FP and knows their characters' abilities and everyone elses' abilities.

 

I do find it odd that in some MM FPs there is someone not space barring through the cutscenes. I expect most have done "this" FP enough that they shouldn't need to watch the cutscenes. When this happens, I'm usually just with the inner "ugh", and then persevere.

 

All that said, I sure wish players queued for MMs more. Even when I'm on tank or heals I can go a play session (1-2 hours) and never get an MM to pop.