So... my PvE guild team with 0 expertise (and 0 PvP experience) will go up against a PvP team with WH/EWH gear to get the right to enter a PvE instance with PvE rewards....? Uh, huh?

Can't really see this appealing to mainly PvPers nor mainly PvEers.

Hopefully we'll see it on the PTS soon to clear up the the confusion.

It is true MMO's should not STOP new content development to fix bugs and that all MMO's have plenty of bugs. The problem is that UNLIKE most MMO's, SWTOR's development is generating new bugs much faster than it can quash them while old ones go unfixed. They are piling up. This was not always the case with this game.

 

The problem was two-fold. First was the massive cut to the game's budget and staff last Spring. Before that happened, bugs were fixed at a decent pace. While not all bugs were fixed, they were at least fixed faster than they were generated. Major issues like a memory leak were actually resolved (mostly) in a fair amount of time.

 

The second was the introduction of the six-week major patch development cycle. The moment Bioware announced that, I knew what was coming, and everything that has transpired since then has justified my concerns. With reduced money and manpower, not only would each major patch see fewer existing bugs fixed, but with such a short development cycle there would not be enough time to ensure that new content and features are properly completed and tested before they are released, to say nothing of unintentional new bugs.

 

The result is that every patch will create more bugs than it fixes and/or introduce broken content. This is exactly what has happened. For instance, Heroic space missions, a major feature of 1.6, were broken when released and a month later they still have not been fixed. A large portion of the playerbase, that is, everyone using 32-bit Windows, cannot play this game without constant crashing due to a memory leak re-introduced in 1.4. Four months later, it still has not been fixed. It was fixed in about one or two months the first time around, before the budget cuts. It is offensive that you dismiss such major issues affecting so many people as "whining."

 

Most MMO's in my experience at least strike some semblance of balance between the fixing of old bugs and the introduction of new ones. Not so here. Here the bugs are piling up like cancer cells. Bioware has stretched the limits of their meager development budget and staff past the breaking point with this ridiculously short development cycle. And this wasn't always the case. The situation was pretty well balanced before 1.4.

 

Bioware needs to either adopt longer development cycles (or re-adopt them, rather) or put more money and resources into the game so they are able to do more in less time, or preferably both. However, since money and resources are not forthcoming due to EA's loss of confidence in this game, the only realistic option is to extend the development cycles. They should never have shortened them to six weeks to begin with. It was not realistic.

 

They could also, with their existing budget, redistribute their funds at least temporarily to address the imbalance. It is true that software development companies have different departments that do different things. So they can't have everybody in the company work on bugs. Artists and designers can't go through lines of code to fix bugs. However, what a development company can do is adjust the size and money they allocate to each department. They can lay off 10 people from the new content department and hire 10 people in the QA department.

 

Bioware needs to embrace the Blizzard philosophy of "we will release it when it is FINISHED" not "we will release it whatever state it's in to keep to the schedule."

So true.

Add to that their new philosophy of "Cartel market rules!" which means they are dedicated to CM almost exclusively and you get another reason why bugs are being put on side track.

So, I really wonder how many bugs they will fix in 1.7?

Yet what happens is that group gets more content and pve-pures get less content, because this content offers pve gear but is exclusionary to the people who don't enjoy pvp. Assuming of course the gear offers pve goodies and also is only in a pvp flagging area.

 

Do you understand yet what the issue is, or are you going to say (again) that your group has as much right as others to the same content (because if we start down this path, then we will need to offer another special reputation grind system in a purely pve area, perhaps involving petting rainbow unicorns and escorting them across a field of flowers, to put off the pvp lovers and make them start writing up equivalent protest posts).

 

Put simply, this content actively excludes an entire group of people who might otherwise like the rewards and the grind, if it wasn't for the location of this content.

The only issue here is PvErs whining about possibly having to dome PvP to do some optional end-game content. There will already be PVE rep areas, unless Voss became a contested area and I didn't notice. Warzones actively excludes an entire group of people, Operations exclude an entire group of people. There will always be a group of people who are not interested in some aspect of the game. I for one dislike Operations/Raids and PvP. So I don't do them. I also don't jump on forums and whine about being 'forced' to do things when I'm not.

The only issue

The only issue (should this be the case) is excluding pve players from pve content.

Which neatly brings us back to the 'no content for people who don't fit the PVE vs PVP dichotomy' philosophy, which boils down to you saying 'because I don't like PvP no one should have the option of playing context with mixed PVE and PVP elements'..

The problem with your angle is, it's a whole new system they're introducing which is being withheld from those who don't like pvp.

It'd be fine if they just had some content, I mean who would care if it was just a matter of a handful of quests...but excluding people from a whole system (reputation system)? That's too much content to hog.

Do you understand yet?

They are going to have to (if they haven't already put this in place) add access to this system in non-pvp areas.

It is true MMO's should not STOP new content development to fix bugs and that all MMO's have plenty of bugs. The problem is that UNLIKE most MMO's, SWTOR's development is generating new bugs much faster than it can quash them while old ones go unfixed. They are piling up. This was not always the case with this game.

 

The problem was two-fold. First was the massive cut to the game's budget and staff last Spring. Before that happened, bugs were fixed at a decent pace. While not all bugs were fixed, they were at least fixed faster than they were generated. Major issues like a memory leak were actually resolved (mostly) in a fair amount of time.

 

The second was the introduction of the six-week major patch development cycle. The moment Bioware announced that, I knew what was coming, and everything that has transpired since then has justified my concerns. With reduced money and manpower, not only would each major patch see fewer existing bugs fixed, but with such a short development cycle there would not be enough time to ensure that new content and features are properly completed and tested before they are released, to say nothing of unintentional new bugs.

 

The result is that every patch will create more bugs than it fixes and/or introduce broken content. This is exactly what has happened. For instance, Heroic space missions, a major feature of 1.6, were broken when released and a month later they still have not been fixed. A large portion of the playerbase, that is, everyone using 32-bit Windows, cannot play this game without constant crashing due to a memory leak re-introduced in 1.4. Four months later, it still has not been fixed. It was fixed in about one or two months the first time around, before the budget cuts. It is offensive that you dismiss such major issues affecting so many people as "whining."

 

Most MMO's in my experience at least strike some semblance of balance between the fixing of old bugs and the introduction of new ones. Not so here. Here the bugs are piling up like cancer cells. Bioware has stretched the limits of their meager development budget and staff past the breaking point with this ridiculously short development cycle. And this wasn't always the case. The situation was pretty well balanced before 1.4.

 

Bioware needs to either adopt longer development cycles (or re-adopt them, rather) or put more money and resources into the game so they are able to do more in less time, or preferably both. However, since money and resources are not forthcoming due to EA's loss of confidence in this game, the only realistic option is to extend the development cycles. They should never have shortened them to six weeks to begin with. It was not realistic.

 

They could also, with their existing budget, redistribute their funds at least temporarily to address the imbalance. It is true that software development companies have different departments that do different things. So they can't have everybody in the company work on bugs. Artists and designers can't go through lines of code to fix bugs. However, what a development company can do is adjust the size and money they allocate to each department. They can lay off 10 people from the new content department and hire 10 people in the QA department.

 

Bioware needs to embrace the Blizzard philosophy of "we will release it when it is FINISHED" not "we will release it whatever state it's in to keep to the schedule."

You make some good points, and my point is not against this at all. It was a response to the first reply immediately asking for bug fixes before new content. It is a very unreasonable thing to request, as you also said. I do see a few flaws in your reasoning that weaken some views and may need revisiting because of that, but in general you are right.

Let me point out the most important flaws of reasoning I see:

1) delivering new content every 6 weeks does not equal a 6 week development cycle. Probably, the only way this could be achieved internally is to create 'patch teams', like Blizzard had. These are basicly a group of core programmers, probably senior level, that stay with a patch from design to delivery, which will probably be closer to a 3-6 month cycle than a 1,5 month one. The trick to getting this right is strengthening these teams when that is required with the more flexible, often junior, programmers and other developers when the patch is in a critical phase. This is something that takes time to get right, which shows in the growing pains and can also be a reason why bug fixing does get an increasing backlog at this time.

We cannot criticize this system in it's first 6 months from the consumer side, when there is still room to grow and improve it on the developer side.

2) the point of 'firing staff here and hiring new staff there' works great on paper, but in practice it never works. Throwing more developers, QA, or whatever at a problem never results in it being resolved quicker in a complex situation such as software development. The amount of extra effort needed to communicate and coordinate all these workers, as well as the loss of sense of 'ownership' of an issue by the software engineers, usually has a tipping point where more people actually result in less productivity instead of more.

Furthermore, the issue is that if you fire 10 designers now to hire 10 Q&A engineers, you are basicly throwing away a resource you might need in the future again. You would probably do better in simply repurposing those 10 designers as temporary Testing staff in the last phase of a development cycle, seeing they had the first idea it is logical for them to test it's final delivery.

3) Now, the point that this game seems to spend too little effort on QA is something I do agree. I mean, not when it comes to stuff like memory leaks and crashes on some setups etc.. those are things very easilly missed in a QA cycle but will immediately come out after it goes live. It is really the fact that sometimes simple things break during a patch. Easy stuff every Regression Test should look at, like Unify Color on companions, if certain daily quests work, etc.. The fact that these, quickly spotted but not always gamebreaking, bugs go Live proves to me the effort in QA, right now, is too low. Maybe they should use the extra money they make from Cartel Coins on hiring new staff to change that in future patches.

Then again, if they did that.. we wouldn't notice it untill probably RotHC or the patch after that because of time needed to work in new staff and create systems for all the new staff to perform to the best of their ability.

Which neatly brings us back to the 'no content for people who don't fit the PVE vs PVP dichotomy' philosophy, which boils down to you saying 'because I don't like PvP no one should have the option of playing context with mixed PVE and PVP elements'..

You always have the option even on a PvE server - that's what the flag is for and that's fine. Just don't force people who want to see the PvE content to get flagged for PvP because that excludes large amounts of the playerbase for what...to give the gankers an easy time of it?

Where have i heard this song before about PVE/PVP people crying about having to go to a pvp zone or even the solo grinders crying over the fact that they had to do a HM FP..????

Oh yes it was the exact same song and dance for the HK quest line, where pve people complained about having to go to the den, solo grinders about having to go to FP and the PVP players about having to do PVE.

I personally like to mix it out from time to time, i can play some pvp and pve and if i dont want to play pve or pvp i dont. its not like there is no option. Did i get HK hell yes did i get ganked in den NO.

People are making a much bigger fuzz about this than needed

The problem with pvp in this game lies in the VERY bad idea of expertise stat which induce pvp specific gear ...

If i could pvp with efficiency with my pve gear i couldn't care less. I would go pvp only when really needed but i could do it.

Here, i have to do pvp over and over to get the pvp stuff without which i'm just a target.

Forcing pve people to go in pvp areas is like saying "Hunting season is open, go kill the easy targets they (almost) can't do you any harm"

revamp pvp, get rid of expertise then it will be playable ...

Every time I play a game that has "pve servers" and "pvp servers" I end up rolling my eyes at the same ignorance.

On a "pvp server" pvp is the focus, but pve is still part of the game, and there for anyone that wants it.

On a "pve server" pve is the focus, but pvp is still part of the game, and there for anyone that wants it.

A "pve server" is not an environment sans pvp.

A "pvp server" is not an environment sans pve.

They are both part of the game. The content is there for everyone to enjoy.

If you hate to pvp, then skip it. If you absolutely must do every scrap of pve content, but have to pvp to get there, you have a problem, not me. Think about the fact that you want to punish people that want to enjoy the entire game, because you have some sort of prejudice.

And just to clarify, I think people that only want to do the pvp content are missing out, but I also believe the exact same thing of people that only want to pve. You are both missing out on half the game.

Imagine calling Nintendo back in the '80s and being all like "hello, Nintendo? Yes I'm calling about your game Mario World. Yes it's great! I really like the missions where I run and jump. No actually I'm calling about a complaint. I really hate swimming. Yes, I'd like to see a different version of Mario released for people like me that are afraid of water. What do you mean, that's not how the game was intended to be!? I'm the customer, I pay money for your games. Do you not want my money?"

Rofl. Just ... yea wow. Ha.

You always have the option even on a PvE server - that's what the flag is for and that's fine. Just don't force people who want to see the PvE content to get flagged for PvP because that excludes large amounts of the playerbase for what...to give the gankers an easy time of it?

This is correct.

I'm a pvper, personally, but everyone who has opposing opinions to the one above need to shut it. Not everyone thinks the same way you do, as in "hey it is fun to mix it up" or whatever. It is fun, but again not everyone thinks the same way you do and maybe there are ppl who just aren't good at pvp, so forcing them to go into a contested area might not be the same kind of fun that you are going to experience.

Everyone has varying opinions, but hey this is the Internet so who cares about actually respecting other people's opinions right?

You are no more forced to do this than you are to play Warzones. No one is holding a gun to your head to make you do it.

http://img543.imageshack.us/img543/8949/pvpforced.jpg

Sorry, could not resist to make this after reading that

Also, everybody, quit your whining, as we do not know anything about what will be there

 

If you hate to pvp, then skip it. If you absolutely must do every scrap of pve content, but have to pvp to get there, you have a problem, not me.

So when we join a PvE server we should expect to be forced into doing something we don't want to do, and that we chose a PvE server specifically to avoid doing? Quit talking out your arsehole...

So when we join a PvE server we should expect to be forced into doing something we don't want to do, and that we chose a PvE server specifically to avoid doing? Quit talking out your arsehole...

So avoid doing it, nobody is forcing you. Your arsehole is the one with prejudices. Not mine. Have a nice day cupcake.

So avoid doing it, nobody is forcing you. Your arsehole is the one with prejudices. Not mine. Have a nice day cupcake.

Why should I avoid PvE content on a PVE SERVER because PvPers want to harrass players who they know can't fight back? And yes, we are being forced. To do PvE content (the entire point of the game) we are being told we have to PvP or not do it. That is being forced. If you can't see the problem then I'm wasting my time trying to explain. Describing colour to the blind and all that...

Why should I avoid PvE content on a PVE SERVER because PvPers want to harrass players who they know can't fight back? And yes, we are being forced. To do PvE content (the entire point of the game) we are being told we have to PvP or not do it. That is being forced. If you can't see the problem then I'm wasting my time trying to explain. Describing colour to the blind and all that...

Because you've fallen into the naming convention trap, like so many before you. Instead of "PvE Server" it should really say "Standard Content" or something similar, and instead of "PvP Server" it should say something like "PvP Focused Server".

Nobody is forcing you to do anything, but you know what? It's probably easier for you to just quit a fourth time. Cry.

Because you've fallen into the naming convention trap, like so many before you. Instead of "PvE Server" it should really say "Standard Content" or something similar, and instead of "PvP Server" it should say something like "PvP Focused Server".

 

Nobody is forcing you to do anything, but you know what? It's probably easier for you to just quit a fourth time. Cry.

"naming convention trap" = "**** I made up to back up my invalid argument"

So Bioware has fallen for this same trap? Because, well, they named the servers, and those servers and definitely divided into "PvE" and "PvP". Please stop making stuff up. And I've never quit, so I don't know what you're talking about.

Your tears are delicious.

Yes, as a PvPer, I imagine pissing other people off is something you get off on. Hence why you want PvE to be mixed with PvP

I'm not a PvPer, I never said I was. I just said I wasn't scared to do all of the content in a game, rather than just pick and choose the bits and pieces that don't tax me too much.

Also, your tears are in fact not very delicious, have you been getting enough iron?

Glad that the PvPers are getting a little something something, but if I'm forced to PvP to get PvE rewards, I'll simply not bother and wait for stuff to become available on the GTN. I've got no problem with them adding more PvP stuff, smeg knows they've needed to, but I rolled on a PvE server for a reason.

Still, there's many many people that will be very happy with the addition of more PvP things to do, and more happy gamers is never a bad thing.

I'm not a PvPer, I never said I was. I just said I wasn't scared to do all of the content in a game, rather than just pick and choose the bits and pieces that don't tax me too much.

 

Also, your tears are in fact not very delicious, have you been getting enough iron?

I'm not scared to PvP. I PvP occasionally, and I have no problem with it. What I do have a problem with is new content being added for PvE that requires PvP to obtain. As I've said, PVE servers are PvE for a reason. Trying to do PvE content and having 10+ of the other faction ambush me is not fun at all, except for the cowards who can't fight alone.

Bioware made servers to contain those people for a reason...

but if I'm forced to PvP to get PvE rewards

People are not forced to "PvP to get PvE rewards", they are offered the chance to play the game to get game rewards. If this event isn't for their tastes then they simply leave it be and hope the next one is.

I'm sure the tokens will be traded just like in all the other events, so if people are so dead set against entering a PvP zone but must have the items from it, just run dailies and buy the tokens for the stuff you want.

P.S. that's not aimed at Darthgroond, just his quoted phrase seems to be something which is a common view among the people complaining here.