Seriously.

I just came back this month after a year away, and opted to play through and finish Shadow of Revan, and finally wrapped up Ziost.

Revisiting this story makes me damn depressed for what the devs did with this awesome lead in to the next expansion, only to crap all over it with the KotFE storyline. Even with dealing with Revan again, I enjoyed the storyline WAY more than the new expansion stories, even though the new ones have a higher production quality.

Anyone else feel the same way, and that the writing team really screwed the pooch until it was howling with the KotFE story?

The damn shame of it was that I think, story plot aside, KotFE and KoTET were two of the strongest expansions BioWare ever released when you consider their quality of life improvements to the game.

Damn - I don't think I've ever played a more frustrating game in the manner of it having so much potential, and being so fun, yet had a creative vision that did everything it possibly could to prevent it from reaching the heights it could have gotten to as an mmo...

Just damn...

I give them credit for what they attempted to do with Knights but for me it's a big fail.

All the effort that went in for something to replay maybe twice but then spacebarring through every other character really hurts.

It's also so easy and linear that it feels like I'm just watching a movie and not actually playing.

I'm the opposite, I really enjoyed Kotet/kotfe. Not that it didn't have it's flaws, all the story in the game does, but I enjoyed Kotet/Fe the most!

SoR was alright. What I did like is how they actually made a whole planner again rather than being locked into chapters without seeing the presence of other people. I really missed that in the latest expansions. Areas like Zakuul don't count as they were still really limited.

I also enjoyed the Knights chapters... once or twice.

After that, there's nothing to see or do, since every single character goes through the exact same story. Your Light/Dark choices really don't even matter.

And the "combat"? Seriously, it's so linear and boring and stupid-easy that it really is just like watching a movie... which would have been cool if that's what it really was, but to "play" it 20+ times? No way. I think I did up to chapter 9 of KotFE on all my characters, but then as each chapter came out I did on fewer and fewer and I've only completed KotET on ONE character since there's just no reason to do it on all of them... maybe 2 just so you can try Light/Dark options.

Another fail is all of the generic companions we recruit with no personalities or unique skills or any conversations worth caring about.

Again, I love that they tried something different, but I just don't think it worked. Just look at all the people complaining about no operations or group stuff.

I'm just worried that they won't be able to recover from this and, personally, this will probably be my last subscription period once it runs out after subbing since launch cuz, as it is right now, I just don't care about what's going on in the game, which makes me sad. I'll need to really see/feel something special for me to keep it going.

my ONLY issue is how the Emperor gone a 360 with its personality and thinking....

i personaly liked the NEW changed emperor

but i hate when MAIN characters Instantly change Personality out of tin air and this drasticaly with 0 buildup ....

like BOOM now your like this deal with it..... you were totaly different for thousands of years but who cares BAM your like this now......

awesome lead in to the next expansion

 

the new ones have a higher production quality.

 

quality of life improvements to the game.

I mean it isn't all bad is it?

Did I like the change made to the emperor? Not really, they lost everything I liked about him in the transition to Valkorian, Vitiate to me had far more potential and simply had Star Wars written all over him, Valkorian seemed "generic villain". They set up the story quite nicely in SoR and Ziost, dark and foreboding, and then it went all.... keeping up with the Valkorians. I not saying it was all bad, there are highlights for me in some of the chapters, but mainly ones where companions returned. I just wasn't vested in Valkorian and his offspring due to a serious lack of backstory or connection to that backstory, however tenuous the link that was given (Vitiate is now Valkorian, oh okay..... ***?!).

Production values definitely stepped up a notch, and that really has to be praised as it was partially lost in everything else, especially the new cinematic intros and music production (great job!).

QoL was subjective. They went over the top with some of the core game mechanic changes and quite simply didn't think some of them through very well at all in my opinion (Level sync being one major change that sucked a lot of the life out of the game for me and made it less enjoyable).

I mean on the whole, it wasn't all bad, but the bullish pushing of the community down a funnel while refusing to listen to the feedback certainly detracted from the experience. This is why I'm hopeful Keith will learn from the lessons of Ben and take feedback into account and act on it. Time will tell.

I mean it isn't all bad is it?

 

Did I like the change made to the emperor? Not really, they lost everything I liked about him in the transition to Valkorian, Vitiate to me had far more potential and simply had Star Wars written all over him, Valkorian seemed "generic villain". They set up the story quite nicely in SoR and Ziost, dark and foreboding, and then it went all.... keeping up with the Valkorians. I not saying it was all bad, there are highlights for me in some of the chapters, but mainly ones where companions returned. I just wasn't vested in Valkorian and his offspring due to a serious lack of backstory or connection to that backstory, however tenuous the link that was given (Vitiate is now Valkorian, oh okay..... ***?!).

 

Production values definitely stepped up a notch, and that really has to be praised as it was partially lost in everything else, especially the new cinematic intros and music production (great job!).

 

QoL was subjective. They went over the top with some of the core game mechanic changes and quite simply didn't think some of them through very well at all in my opinion (Level sync being one major change that sucked a lot of the life out of the game for me and made it less enjoyable).

 

I mean on the whole, it wasn't all bad, but the bullish pushing of the community down a funnel while refusing to listen to the feedback certainly detracted from the experience. This is why I'm hopeful Keith will learn from the lessons of Ben and take feedback into account and act on it. Time will tell.

For me, the reason it was so bad was because of the disrespect they paid to the story before. I too can appreciate them taking a risk, and if KotFE were very similar to what it is now, but they didn't have Valkorion be Vitiate (instead saving Vitiate for a future expansion), I'd be ok with it, and like you, say "well, they tried something different, but a swing and a miss."

Like the other guy said too - it isn't that Valkorion is a bad character - he's interesting and very nuanced. The trouble is, he ISN'T VITIATE - at least not in terms of personality, and like someone else said, the about face, as well as the way the plot of KotFE seemed to be structured as "We want everyone to forget about the rest of the plot and pretend KotFE and KotET is the only plot you know in the game" from design to story made it feel like it was being forced down the players' throats.

And given BioWare's SWTOR history, first crapping on the players with no more class story, and then this, its like they don't care about consistency at all - shoot, the next installment we may all find out Treek was our long lost sister - the writing was THAT bad in terms of coherency and consistency with what came before.

It was just jarring and tonally different from the rest of the game. Breaks my heart in a sense, because when you get players to trust in their experience and their character's story, you don't betray their trust with changes like that.

i did the chapters on only 12 character and i don't do them again until the next story brings a LI back i haven't gotten back story wise. when Vette came back i went and made a new marauder and ran the full story up till the point i got her back. the only thing i skipped was the planet stories like makeb.

and no Quinn is not a LI but i did love ending his live.

i did the chapters on only 12 character and i don't do them again until the next story brings a LI back i haven't gotten back story wise. when Vette came back i went and made a new marauder and ran the full story up till the point i got her back. the only thing i skipped was the planet stories like makeb.

 

and no Quinn is not a LI but i did love ending his live.

12 characters? Are you mad?

I've done KotET on two chars (one LS on Rep side, one DS on Imp side). I've got a few chars parked on chapter 9 of KotFE. I got a multitude of 70s that won't ever even start KotFE. Because it have no replayability whatsoever. You play it once on DS/LS each, and that's that. There's nothing left. It's just tedious, and I won't even start on how disconnected it all feels towards the class stories and even RotHC/SoR.

For me, the reason it was so bad was because of the disrespect they paid to the story before. I too can appreciate them taking a risk, and if KotFE were very similar to what it is now, but they didn't have Valkorion be Vitiate (instead saving Vitiate for a future expansion), I'd be ok with it, and like you, say "well, they tried something different, but a swing and a miss."

 

Like the other guy said too - it isn't that Valkorion is a bad character - he's interesting and very nuanced. The trouble is, he ISN'T VITIATE - at least not in terms of personality, and like someone else said, the about face, as well as the way the plot of KotFE seemed to be structured as "We want everyone to forget about the rest of the plot and pretend KotFE and KotET is the only plot you know in the game" from design to story made it feel like it was being forced down the players' throats.

 

And given BioWare's SWTOR history, first crapping on the players with no more class story, and then this, its like they don't care about consistency at all - shoot, the next installment we may all find out Treek was our long lost sister - the writing was THAT bad in terms of coherency and consistency with what came before.

 

It was just jarring and tonally different from the rest of the game. Breaks my heart in a sense, because when you get players to trust in their experience and their character's story, you don't betray their trust with changes like that.

That pretty much sums up my exact opinions about both expansions as well! The break between Ziost and Keeping Up With the Valkorions was like getting halfway through playing one game and then jumping into the middle of another for the second half, it was THAT jarring in terms of lack of narrative consistency and character motivation. The fact that the new story was boring with little to no replay value regardless of class, alignment, and faction was just the extra turd icing on the crap cake we were being force-fed.

12 characters? Are you mad?

 

I've done KotET on two chars (one LS on Rep side, one DS on Imp side). I've got a few chars parked on chapter 9 of KotFE. I got a multitude of 70s that won't ever even start KotFE. Because it have no replayability whatsoever. You play it once on DS/LS each, and that's that. There's nothing left. It's just tedious, and I won't even start on how disconnected it all feels towards the class stories and even RotHC/SoR.

i do intend to push all my 52 chars trough it at some point, if i will survive the madness i do not know

Having played KotFE and some of KotET, I'm actually skipping those expansions. The dull companions is what's killing me. Would like to join Vaylin/Arcann anytime.

I don't like playing an alliance leader, again. (Played a consular where you had to do the same thing.)

Barely any class specific options. My light side healing sage can't teach anything to Vaylin, or vice versa? What about converting her to the light side? That's what my sage did before the expansions.

Actually, the point is, choices do not matter and/or are limited.

Would like to see an update for these expansions. Don't care about class balance at all, since I don't play PvP anyway. Though I know many people do.

Well at the very least I'm glad there are others out there who feel the same way I do. The sad thing is I have very little hope that anything will change. In another thread the lead writer Charles Boyd defended both expansions. I hate saying it but if he thinks that level of writing is what makes it passible then we may need a different lead writer, one that understands the importance of consistency and continuity within an overall story.

But I doubt that will happen. From here on out I think the game is going to have just spatterings of group content here and there, is the use what budget they have just to tell stories through operations and flashpoints. And maybe daily areas.

I sadly think the time of invigorating and interesting stories in SWTOR is over. I think the game has a solid enough Foundation that with the right creative team and the right marketing it could absolutely make a comeback, however I think they got the producer this game needed one producer too late. They needed the guy they have now back before they made Knights of the Fallen Empire Knights of the Eternal throne. They needed someone who was a player- focused producer to be able to step in and say "hold on we can't do this because it's going to screw over the people playing and drive off the number of people who will be upset about the change of Direction with the story. Not to mention stalling out on group content while we work on these things is going to drive off the guilds who are usually run by people who do operations."

Too little too late now I think. Such a damn shame. This game will always be known for unfulfilled potential, and I am willing to bet that the wrong messages will be taken from this game for future games. What I mean is, people will look at the fully voiced over MMO and think that this is what caused SWTOR to fail as well as the 8 Class stories, when in truth those were the reasons why people played the game in the first place and were what drew people to the game.

Strategically, the reasons the game ended up failing to live up to its potential goes back to a couple of decisions made by the original team that did not pan out or backfired.

The first of those decisions was to do unlimited class story. Eight class stories when you have a definitive beginning middle and end can at least be budgeted for. In fact, you can even make more money by selling alternative class stories once the originals are completed and you would have a known budget for what that would take. Not to mention by having a concrete beginning middle and end to the story you better are able to Pace the story out over the Myriad of planets and can write a compact and entertaining story that doesn't drag in spots because you know from the beginning where the story is going.

By saying the game will have unlimited class story from the beginning, all that meant was eventually budget would dry up for the 8 Class stories and we would end up in the situation we are in now.

The other creative decision that bit them in the rear end and I know players will not think this is the real reason because of their disposition, but the fact that they went subscriber-only at the beginning and did not do the planned Cartel Market meant that they felt the pinch of every left subscriber. The Cartel Market rescued the game when subscribership was dwindling. If they had it from the beginning, they may have had enough budget to make Makeb and maybe a few planets afterwards with all 8 Class stories. Not having the freemium model in place from the beginning hurt the game.

Other decisions ended up hurting them big time as well. Not understanding how quickly players would churn through the story content is a major one, and wasting development time on the original space version of the game that played like a rebel assault minigame was development time that could have been better used to add more class story or even the quality of life improvements we eventually got.

Even with these early mistakes, when the development team got rolled over and they were able to get enough cash in from the cartel shops to start developing content again, the producers in charge sadly were just a yes-man interested in making quick money on a project EA no longer considered to be a major part of their portfolio. With better to leadership back then from the top the game could have recovered.

Sorry for the rant but it's frustrating. This game had so much potential, and now it's squandered all that potential and I don't think it'll ever be any more than it is right now. It's almost like seeing a 40 year old 7ft guy on a basketball court in the neighborhood with skills that could have easily allowed him to play in the NBA but he never made it because for all his potential, he just kept screwing around doing other things and never really dedicating himself to being a top-flight basketball player, even as people around him were trying to support him and push him in that direction. And now that life has passed him by and that opportunity is gone all that is left is Regret about what could have been.

Well at the very least I'm glad there are others out there who feel the same way I do. The sad thing is I have very little hope that anything will change. In another thread the lead writer Charles Boyd defended both expansions. I hate saying it but if he thinks that level of writing is what makes it passible then we may need a different lead writer, one that understands the importance of consistency and continuity within an overall story.

 

.

Can you quote the post you're referring to? That aside, I don't want a new writer!! I like Charles!

That doesn't mean there aren't any flaws in the latest expansions however. But I'd like to see what you mean by Charles defending both expansions.

Fallen Empire was a great story but what made it suck was two things

1) Poor class story deviation - What made SWTOR's premise so impactful for players was that every story was unique, and considered their class features, personification and plot direction carefully in its design.

Fallen Empire + Eternal Throne completely ignored this.

It's like basically neglecting the core thing that made the game famous in the first place

2) Poor game content follow up - no new dailies, no new mundane grinds, barely any new flashpoints, uprisings was a nice idea but very lacklustre in the reward system. Veteran and Master difficulty came so late, Fallen Empire Master difficulty came on Eternal Throne's release. and again, poor rewarding and follow ups.

And then they just slap a grind system on you like CXP and expect you to basically repeat something you've been repeating for the last 3 years.

It's one thing to give people stuff to do, but if its not rewarding, who the hell is gonna do it?

This also came with horrible class balance changes, where 3 classes who weren't top tier got nerfed to oblivion, another 2 were completely neglected and 2 got far too much attention to call it "class balancing". Player's struggle to feel the 'growth' concept that people tend to anticipate during expansion releases. No new abilities, nothing fun and innovative to play with and admire/appreciate your class even more

Nothing new in pvp. No new areas to visit or explore with free roaming, the only areas you could access were so hardwired to the plot, you cant even revist 90% of those areas with the exception of odessen & Old world where there is nothing to do.

Kinda hard to even call it an expansion.

But hey, at least they updated the Cartel Market freque- ... give me a break

Huge budget spent on cinematics, trailers, cutscenes, new textures, faces expressions....The production values are almost as good as any Hollywood blockbuster or top-notch anime.

Only they forgot to make any meaningful story, forgot that it's STAR WARS, made no memorable stories or villains or locations or anything awesome.

- Can anyone remember what Gault and Vette were doing robbing a spaceship, can anyone remember what he Gemini programme was all about, can anyone remember why Vaylin went back to her childhood prison? What the agenda was with the scions? What Tanno Vic was doinf before being reunited, how all your former companions conveniently ended up on Zakuul without knowing who you were? What you had to go to Darvanis for?

The plot was full of holes, no-ne cared much about the Valkorians, no-one wanted to be frozen then awakened with nothing changed in the meantime.

I'm sure they would have retained more players if all that money and effort had been put into new planets, new dailies, new maps, new questlines, new events, new operations, new pvp maps, more spaceflight. - Class specific stories or elements of story.

Such a wasted opportunity to make this game great.

2 people on Nar Shaddaa this lunchtime. - just 2.

Did they blow millions of dollars to keep 2 people on one server amused?

I'm sure they would have retained more players if all that money and effort had been put into new planets, new dailies, new maps, new questlines, new events, new operations, new pvp maps, more spaceflight. - Class specific stories or elements of story.

^^ This right here ^^

I give them credit for what they attempted to do with Knights but for me it's a big fail.

 

 

SNIP...

Same here. I get they tried to put in some effort to make the solo story as good as class stories but that was never going to happen.

SOR, KotFE and KotET are all so terrible in their own ways I found it best to just pretend they never happened and skip them on as many alts as possible.

What went wrong? bw and their story writing took a nose dive combined with the design and development of the current game around pushing those less than interesting one story for all spawn fest scenarios. Only a hand full of chapters striking interest while the rest are just complete let downs.

Things change. Producers make mistakes since they are only people too. This game had a lot of passion put into it but also made a lot of mistakes. But with a big project like that it's bound to happen. Of course I agree with your criticism regarding the story though but what's done is done.

I don't play KOTFE and just stop with Shadow Revan. Though I thought SOR had quite a long list of story problems as well but it had that one class mission and even the class mails you get between the Forged Alliances flashpoints help for replayability.

I understand your frustration but in the end it's a game and the moment that frustration consumes you when thinking about the game you need to stop and unsubscribe. I took a one-time sub for the summer and enjoy myself and look forward to the next patches and I like the changes they made recently. That's all there is.

Can you quote the post you're referring to? That aside, I don't want a new writer!! I like Charles!

That doesn't mean there aren't any flaws in the latest expansions however. But I'd like to see what you mean by Charles defending both expansions.

The post might be erefering to this Developer post:

http://www.swtor.com/community/showthread.php?p=9339708#edit9339708

The thing that 'troubles' me in that post is the comment about condensing the 3 'seasons" of KOTE Something into 2, and eliminating the companion return so that now they're just trying to bring them all back fast. There's no indication that there's a genuine follow on the the KOTE series which leaves our characters all stuck as rulers/leaders of a large alliance or empire, even for those of us who really didn't want to go down that road. We could have pretty much every remaining companion come back on a passenger shuttle announcing, "We're home!" Ok they won't do it that lame but ...

Can you quote the post you're referring to? That aside, I don't want a new writer!! I like Charles!

That doesn't mean there aren't any flaws in the latest expansions however. But I'd like to see what you mean by Charles defending both expansions.

Hard to do on my mobile phone right now but if you check the dev tracker look for posts from him.

It was a soft defense but a defense nonetheless where he claimed that Knights of the Fallen Empire in Knights of the Eternal Throne were by the Numbers the two best expansions BioWare ever put out for it Star Wars the Old Republic.

That seems to be in defense of the story criticisms. However anyone can make numbers look like anything so I don't know if they were counting initial playthroughs or subsequent playthroughs. I also don't know if they were counting all the subs that left after the first month that it launched period I don't know if it involved the feedback at the story was really bad. It was just such a cut-and-dry statement that it didn't really leave any opening for feedback. At the same time he did go on to say that despite the numbers they did accelerate the timetable because of the pacing issues for the first part and said that was an example of feedback working anyway despite the numbers.

The thing to keep in mind is that the thing he changed based on feedback with something structurally however the story he is crafting seems to be in his mind based on those dry comments above actionable criticism.

Things change. Producers make mistakes since they are only people too. .

I accept that people make mistakes, but this is a whole studio with EA behind them looking over their shoulders. - There must have been meeting after meeting where BW told everyone that their vision of the future was one that would propel this game to the next level. - When that didn't happen....What happened then?

Besides, they have the whole community ready and willing to throw ideas into the pot. - They have the bucks enough to hire great programmers, artists, animators and move-makers..... but (strangely) not voice actors and writers? something doesn't compute....

One man at the helm has (had) a lot to answer for.... One can only hope that new leadership can turn this around in time.

( "Apology accepted, Captain Needa!" )

12 characters? Are you mad?

 

I've done KotET on two chars (one LS on Rep side, one DS on Imp side). I've got a few chars parked on chapter 9 of KotFE. I got a multitude of 70s that won't ever even start KotFE. Because it have no replayability whatsoever. You play it once on DS/LS each, and that's that. There's nothing left. It's just tedious, and I won't even start on how disconnected it all feels towards the class stories and even RotHC/SoR.

I've gone through it completely on 22 characters now. I have about 6 that are somewhere in the storyline between chapt 4-12.

And while I didn't enjoy it as much as SoR....I did enjoy it. Especially the chapters where companions returned

To understand why FE/ET feel so underwhelming when compared to SoR or any earlier content you need to understand the shift in focus.

For SoR and earlier content the story ranged across many planets, dealt with many factions, and offer many choices but was still fundamentally focus on Your Character are the main protagonist.

That all changed with FE and they doubled down on that change in ET.

Ok so there's still a few location shifts, but nowhere near as many as in earlier content.

There's really only one faction now - Zakuul - but there's a two or three mini-gangs within that.

Choices no longer matter at all - 99% of players end up exactly the same as everyone else, no matter what choices you made.

However, the HUGE shift in focus is that Your Character now becomes the antagonist, and the Protagonist is Valkorion.

A more honest title for FE/ET would have been "Keeping Up With The Valkorions" Season 1 and Season 2.

Your character no longer matters - you are, allegedly, the leader on the Alliance, but you are told what to do by Theron, Lana, Valkorion, even SCORPIO. You are their puppet, you do as they say, when they say - and what few dialogue choices you are given allowing you an attempt to resist their control of your actions are only there to reinforce the fact that you have NO CHOICE, you are NOT IMPORTANT.

What matters is telling Valkorion's story, making him and his children the singular focus of pretty much EVERY dramatic moment in what passes for story in FE/ET.

This wouldn't have been quite so much of a problem if a) the story was good, and b) it was handled intelligently. Unfortunately neither of those actually happened.

I've read Charles' comments on how they cut FE down because the feedback on pacing was negative, unfortunately they did nothing to address he negative feedback about the quality of the story.

So what went wrong with FE/ET?

It starts with the fact that he lead story/content designer was the person responsible for the very worst class story by a mile. A class story so badly handled it was painful to play through it.

Next comes the desire to have a "mono story" that fits everyone - when in fact the story makes no sense at all from the point of view of a non-force use, little sense from light side force users point of view, and only marginal sense from anyone else.

The content itself is boring to the point of nausea. How many more "run down corridor - fight three skytroopers - run down corridor - fight three skytroopers - run down corridor - fight four skytroopers - run down corridor - fight boss - run down corridor - fight three skytroopers - run down corridor - fight three skytroopers - run down corridor - fight four skytroopers - run down corridor - fight boss - run down corridor - fight three skytroopers - run down corridor - fight three skytroopers - run down corridor - fight four skytroopers - run down corridor - fight big boss" do we have to suffer through before someone realise this isn't exciting content, heck its not even good content, in fact its appallingly bad content.

And just to show just how much they DON'T "get it" they did the same on Iokath, except they made the physical layout of the planet a grind-fest barrier to what little enjoyment is still to be had from the game.

Someone at Bioware, or EA a few months back made a difficult but necessary decision as regards the Lead Producer and that has started to pay off already.

That same person needs to make an equally difficult, and even more necessary similar decision about the Story and Content leads.

Then the game can start to be turned around.

All The Best