GDC Online 2012: SWTOR's Damion Schubert dissects story as a mechanic

If you take WoW for example there is A LOT to do compared to SWTOR. This may be due to the fact that WoW is an older property. Agreed it could all be viewed as a "grind" but, all of these variable results skinner boxes we play that are known as MMORPGs are each and everyone one a grind fest in one form or another.

Can you be more specific? I see this posted all the time without sufficient follow up. I'm curious beyond, dungeons, raids, pvp, and fishing are available after max level.

PVP, space, flashpoints, etc. Allow you to gain xp outside the normal 'path'. It's not required to do any of those things but they exist to give you options on how to level. Once you've over leveled a planet you can skip the planet non story quests if you choose.

I have leveled more than 1 character doing PVP only and the story quests. I have done others through the normal story arc and planet quests. Sometimes I out level Taris because I've done it so much and want to skip it, the game will give you those options.

Level 50 engagement is up to you. There's flashpoints, ops, pvp, dailies, space, etc. If you played another game what would you be doing there? Pretty much the same thing I think when you reach the max level.

I've never felt as constrained levelling either, even though the story in the class quests is great, it's not enough to make up for everything else being the same.

•Too many quests
During development, the staff discovered they had a quest problem — there were too many. Damion used the example that initially when players started, quest givers gave them too many problems to solve all at once. He mentioned that there were a series of six or so quests lined up where they all talked to you and wanted you to be the solver of problems. To solve this problem, they removed the excessive conversation quest content and placed in bonus quests that you would obtain automatically or pick up throughout the world. In another conversation related revelation, Damion mentioned that due to the way BioWare writes stories, Consulars ended up with more conversation choices than Smugglers.

•Class story path inconsistencies
Getting people together in the same place is arguably the most important thing for an MMO. Early in development, the group noticed that due to the way the stories were structured, players of the same faction sometimes would not end up on the same world at the same level. The writers and designers then had to preform what Damion calls “quest surgery” to get the quests to work on the planets in the same scope of the original story for the class.

PvP is 3 WZ, there is no RvR.
Space is basically Star Fox [1993] and is mind numbing past doing it on 1 character.
FPs? Some are really nice (mostly the story heavier ones), but even those do them a few times and it's horrible, and it's no good when on solo or when on for a short time (Raiding and Dungeons were old at the turn of this century in EQ1, they haven't really progressed past that - although some of SWTORs story bases ones are as close to genuine progression as I've seen).

As for L50 I've played well over a dozen MMORPGs over the years, but I've never felt there as little to do as in SWTOR. (bear in mind what made me quit WoW was realising all their was to do in Burning Crusade at max level was dailys and grind another season of arena gear).

I've never felt as constrained levelling either, even though the story in the class quests is great, it's not enough to make up for everything else being the same.

If you go to the DH article (linked above Post 60) you will see that this may have been by design to synchronize class quests:

•Too many quests
During development, the staff discovered they had a quest problem — there were too many. Damion used the example that initially when players started, quest givers gave them too many problems to solve all at once. He mentioned that there were a series of six or so quests lined up where they all talked to you and wanted you to be the solver of problems. To solve this problem, they removed the excessive conversation quest content and placed in bonus quests that you would obtain automatically or pick up throughout the world. In another conversation related revelation, Damion mentioned that due to the way BioWare writes stories, Consulars ended up with more conversation choices than Smugglers.

Class story path inconsistencies
Getting people together in the same place is arguably the most important thing for an MMO. Early in development, the group noticed that due to the way the stories were structured, players of the same faction sometimes would not end up on the same world at the same level. The writers and designers then had to preform what Damion calls “quest surgery” to get the quests to work on the planets in the same scope of the original story for the class.

^Really?

Not buying it.

To your original post, after sleeping on it I think we are reading too much into a focused comment made by one person and really shouldn't take it as the direction of the game.

This is not just ''one person'', lol. This is the boss of the content. If he says (translated) they are not working on end-game but on alts, you know they are doing just that.

But maybe this is the only way for the game to survive for a while longer, get people to play alts. That's what Bioware is best at, the story-telling and single-player aspects. Focus on that.

Just don't bill it as a MMO, just because a few thousand people are on the same servers.