From the patch notes:

http://www.swtor.com/patchnotes/482014/game-update-2.7-invasion

In the equipment tooltips, mods/enhancements now display their Item Rating in parentheses instead of their Item Level.

In the 2+ years I've been playing, I've never paid attention to the "Item Rating", as it is not as useful as the actual "level" of the gear.

For example, my Vanguard is currently at level 47. Prior to 2.7, I could look at the character sheet and see (40), (42), (48) next to the mods in my gear. At a glance I could see how many levels behind my gear was, making the decision of when to upgrade quick and easy.

Now it says (108), (116), (120), which has very little meaning to me. I have CTRL-RIGHT-CLICK on the gear to inspect the mods and see how the gear level relates to the rating.

So my question is, why was this changed? What is the purpose of showing the rating on the tooltip instead of the item level? Is this useful for someone? Because for me (an altoholic who crafts their own gear upgrades), it's a step backwards. A reverse QoL.

How is the number 120 supposed to intuitively represent "level 47 gear"?

Because I bet a lot of people were confused about the required gear rating that shows in the quest description for operations and were clueless about how to check it.

Now the ones that play for over those 2 years get even more confused...I for one have to spend a few moments before I get used to it

I believe that part of the reason is that gear of the same rating is roughly equivalent. With item level or rank, you have to say not only that level, but also its rariity (green, blue, purple). Plus, the level before never exactly matched the level required to use it, and post-L50, of course never was related to your actual level.

Also, previously if you inspected a mod, I think it only ever said its ranking and rating, never its level. The only time you saw the level was once it was slotted.

I'm finding this incredibly inconvenient. Before I could tell where I stood at a glance. Now I see a bunch of numbers that are entirely meaningless to me. A huge pain in the rear. Who in their right mind would think this was a good idea?

Now I'm not saying this is important enough to sour the game for me entirely on its own, that's obviously not the case. But when the game is starting to lose its lustre anyway for a person, enough little things like this can be the straws that break the camel's back.

And the straws seem to be coming thick and fast at the minute.

I believe that part of the reason is that gear of the same rating is roughly equivalent. With item level or rank, you have to say not only that level, but also its rariity (green, blue, purple). Plus, the level before never exactly matched the level required to use it, and post-L50, of course never was related to your actual level.

 

Also, previously if you inspected a mod, I think it only ever said its ranking and rating, never its level. The only time you saw the level was once it was slotted.

It doesn't tell me level req of individual mods like it used to do. Example: My Commando's assault cannon has 76 mods in it. My Commando is level 30. It's ok up to level 34, they are level 29 like item level requirement says (this hasn't been changed). But let's take chest piece from that same Commando: 62, 76, 72. Game says level req for that chest piece is now level 29. So I should be fine? Nope! That armoring with item rating of 62 is level 23 armoring and I can't see that before I Ctrl + RClick chest piece and inspect the mods more closely.

To show rating instead of level, as we were used to from start until now it is really confusing. Haven't found ONE man who is content with the change. As one of my previous poster said, I knew in one look where I stand or the people I was inspecting stood. Now I am blind.

All I see are senseless numbers, and can't quick evaluate the gear difference between 156 rating and 168 besides mathematically comparing numbers. It is 69, 72? The player inspected has 75 gear, indicating a good raiding player, who has completed NiM content? Now I have literally no ideea. Just a bunch of numbers.

Really, I don't understand the decision to put us evaluate/remember higher numbers (3 digits) instead of lower ones (2 digits). It is about ergonomy at least, if not habit after 2 years of playing.

At least we could get an option to choose how they should display (rating/level), not erase all what we have learned about gearing level in 2 years of playing...

I find the change horrid and really broke the fun of the game for me...

All I see are senseless numbers, and can't quick evaluate the gear difference between 156 rating and 168 besides mathematically comparing numbers. It is 69, 72? The player inspected has 75 gear, indicating a good raiding player, who has completed NiM content? Now I have literally no ideea. Just a bunch of numbers.

They were just a bunch of numbers before as well.

You just learned to read them.

It isn't hard to do it again.

I'm finding this incredibly inconvenient. Before I could tell where I stood at a glance. Now I see a bunch of numbers that are entirely meaningless to me. A huge pain in the rear. Who in their right mind would think this was a good idea?

 

Now I'm not saying this is important enough to sour the game for me entirely on its own, that's obviously not the case. But when the game is starting to lose its lustre anyway for a person, enough little things like this can be the straws that break the camel's back.

 

And the straws seem to be coming thick and fast at the minute.

I like this change. It's been needed and makes sense. Being able to see item ratings on everything should have been done long ago. Before, if you looked at a mod you couldn't see it's level OR it's rating, just its number (which is different from both) until it got slotted, where the primary slot would show its rating, and the others would show its item level. Item level was inconsistent -- was a 33 green better than a 31 blue? How about a 29 purple? No idea, unless you look at all the stats. And earpieces? Implants? Forget about it! No ratings OR levels. No way to tell at a glance if it was decent without a comparison item.

I agree that in the short run, those of us used to the old system will be disoriented. Eventually we will learn to cope with it, and everyone will be better off.

It's a mess this way. And for leveling is simply horrific.

I'm slowly leveling an assassin, a powertech and an operative. Checking what mods I should upgrade or not is an annoying endeavour, very counterintuitive, which is always a bad thing.

It would be really nice to have the option of looking the mods as before. This is really annoying.

They were just a bunch of numbers before as well.

You just learned to read them.

It isn't hard to do it again.

Maybe for you progression raiders because there's only 3 set of numbers that are relevant but for everyone else it's not.

Can you tell me level of these without cheating (Excel, in-game...)?

Item rating 50

Item rating 80

Item rating 96

"How is this relevant?" You ask. Well, it's kinda important to know when to upgrade since you don't want to run around with mods that are 10+ levels below character's level.

They were just a bunch of numbers before as well.

You just learned to read them.

It isn't hard to do it again.

Thats the biggest thing I don't understand about all this complaining.

There is nothing illogical about the change you just have to change the numbers you are looking at.

All this does is unify all of the numbers. The minimum operation numbers (in game), augments, everything now all match up and is ultimately less confusing if people would just think for a minute instead of knee jerking that its a "mess" when its actually less of a mess.

Maybe for you progression raiders because there's only 3 set of numbers that are relevant but for everyone else it's not.

 

Can you tell me level of these without cheating (Excel, in-game...)?

Item rating 50

Item rating 80

Item rating 96

I'm not really a progression raider.

I haven't said, that I already adapted to the new system, so I will get the levels wrong.

Whilst leveling the only number I ever paid any attention to in mods was the level requirement and that is still there afaik.

I only start to pay attention to the other number once I hit 55 with a char

I'm not really a progression raider.

I haven't said, that I already adapted to the new system, so I will get the levels wrong.

Whilst leveling the only number I ever paid any attention to in mods was the level requirement and that is still there afaik.

I only start to pay attention to the other number once I hit 55 with a char

That's the point. Previously level was in tooltip, no need to ctrl+rclick anything. Now you have to memorize every item rating from 10 to 55 or you can always use more time to check the level of mods (read: requires more time).

That's the point. Previously level was in tooltip, no need to ctrl+rclick anything. Now you have to memorize every item rating from 10 to 55 or you can always use more time to check the level of mods (read: requires more time).

The level on the mods was always of by about 1 level so that didn't help too much and now you can just compare the item rating you have to the one that the vendor sells and you'll have the same effect as if it were levels.

No need to memorize from 9-55 you can just learn the ones at 55 and compare the ratings on lower ones

Basically I welcome this change. We used to have 3 different numbers that actually were standing for the exact same thing:

Advanced Example Armoring 34

Item level (78)

Item rating 180

I think it is good that they are trying simplify and standardize these numbers, because have 3 of them is just a bit confusing and I hoped for a change like that for a long time.

However, at least on my server (Red Eclipse) people used the item level number as a reference to the quality of the gear. For example: "My gear is 72/78 with set bonus." Therefore, I think they should have got rid of that Item rating number instead of the item level number, because most people were more used to those. Not sure what is like on other servers though. Even the number in the item's name could be adjusted to that system to make it even less confusing. Or changing the level number to the number from the item's name would probably have been still better than using the item rating number. The option they chose was probably the worst one.

I'm not really a progression raider.

I haven't said, that I already adapted to the new system, so I will get the levels wrong.

Whilst leveling the only number I ever paid any attention to in mods was the level requirement and that is still there afaik.

I only start to pay attention to the other number once I hit 55 with a char

Exacly.

Being a progression raider shouldn't be required to easily recognize what level those mods are by just looking at their rating

What do yo think a new player will see think of when looking at 50 mods on his/her lvl 23 character ? what the heck does that mean ?

What do yo think a new player will see think of when looking at 50 mods on his/her lvl 23 character ? what the heck does that mean ?

Do you actually think that a new player looked at a level 50-55 mod until now and went "ah, I totally understand what these numbers mean" and they don't understand them now just because it's a different number?

Exacly.

Being a progression raider shouldn't be required to easily recognize what level those mods are by just looking at their rating

 

What do yo think a new player will see think of when looking at 50 mods on his/her lvl 23 character ? what the heck does that mean ?

They will think its a number and notice that it goes up as their gear gets better...

Because I bet a lot of people were confused about the required gear rating that shows in the quest description for operations and were clueless about how to check it.

If it actually reduces the number of people queuing for content they're nowhere geared for, then I'll happily live with the annoyance.

Basically I welcome this change. We used to have 3 different numbers that actually were standing for the exact same thing:

 

Advanced Example Armoring 34

Item level (78)

Item rating 180

 

I think it is good that they are trying simplify and standardize these numbers, because have 3 of them is just a bit confusing and I hoped for a change like that for a long time.

 

However, at least on my server (Red Eclipse) people used the item level number as a reference to the quality of the gear. For example: "My gear is 72/78 with set bonus." Therefore, I think they should have got rid of that Item rating number instead of the item level number, because most people were more used to those. Not sure what is like on other servers though. Even the number in the item's name could be adjusted to that system to make it even less confusing. Or changing the level number to the number from the item's name would probably have been still better than using the item rating number. The option they chose was probably the worst one.

The choice of what to reduce I could get behind. They needed to condense the numbers somehow though.

I would wager that they have some sort of plan on condensing these numbers and they wanted to avoid as much of a *****torm as possible by not dropping it all at once (just look at how much drama a freaking tooltip is causing)

They will think its a number and notice that it goes up as their gear gets better...

Yes, Captain Obvious, the number 6 beats the number 5, that's brilliant.

A lvl 20 character with Mod(50), is it properly geared ? slighly undergeared ? Or is it trash ?

The level on the mods was always of by about 1 level so that didn't help too much and now you can just compare the item rating you have to the one that the vendor sells and you'll have the same effect as if it were levels.

No need to memorize from 9-55 you can just learn the ones at 55 and compare the ratings on lower ones

Is for example item rating 80 good for level 43 character or should I replace it? How I can know if it's within 5 levels from character's level without ctrl+rclick? You do realize that there's not enough planetary comm's to upgrade mods every time you level up?

Is for example item rating 80 good for level 43 character or should I replace it?

As I've written before give it some time and you'll learn.

I need this time as well so stop trying to prove your point with the nonsense of "do you already know everything new and every facette of it?"

How I can know if it's within 5 levels from character's level without ctrl+rclick? You do realize that there's not enough planetary comm's to upgrade mods every time you level up?

Do it every 4-8 levels that suffices.

(You can't even upgrade your mods every time you level up through planetary comms because the vendors only sell a new tier every 2nd level )