Keith, please either change the gearing so dedicated pvpers can gear up as fast as OPS players or increase Bolster to 242

At the moment pvp is ridiculous, it doesn't matter what lvl of skill you are if you have the lowest gear. The people with highest gear have such a big advantage that people with much lower skill, but max armor are smashing people.

Pvp is all I do and it is no longer fun when the gear gap is so big. I've already had PvP people PM me to say they are unsubbing again because of this gearing.

Some actually came back to the game with 5.2 to give it another chance. Now they are leaving again and I'm sure others who stayed subbed while waiting might start unsubbing too.

 

There needs to be a major change to gearing, Bolster or the gear system for pvp. This slowly, slowly approach just isn't cutting it or getting to the heart of the matter. Pvp is skill vs skill, not gear vs gear, this system is destroying pvp.

 

5.0 put a major dent in the pvp community and I'm afraid 5.2 is doing the same. If something isn't done in the next few weeks I'd expect most pvpers who don't already have the highest gear will stop pvping or even worse for you guys, unsubscribe to the game.

Personally, I'm probably going to stop playing till it's fixed. If my sub runs out before it's fixed, I'll let it lapse.

Edited April 21, 2017 by Icykill_

Yes, they need to make the bolster enough so gear doesn't matter.

Then what would be the point of obtaining the gear in the first place?

 

Making the NiM gear easier to obtain for doing only PvP and for tirelessly grinding wouldn't also be fair towards those of us who still raid and even more - what would be with us who already spent thousands of unassembled components for new GEMINI gear?

 

The drop rates are OK now, especially since 246 also provides bonus, and one can't just expect to have all top NiM gear for zombie farming PvP for one week. Some would just like to have everything served on a silver pladder I guess...

Edited April 20, 2017 by orujd

Yes, they need to make the bolster enough so gear doesn't matter.

 

So, for PvPers, what would be the point to even try to get gear? If bolster wil give you max stats, that would be just BS. Bolster gives worse/less geared players opportunity to compete with those with BiS gear, not to be equal with them. If bolster would get you up to same stats as BiS geared players, what would be the reason to farm components?

 

And well, if

Pvp is skill vs skill, not gear vs gear.

then let just everyone run in 128 rating gear and hope to be bolstered?

 

All they need to do is increasing amount of Unassambled Components (maybe add some of them as reward for completing 2nd daily as well) we get from completing wz/mission and gearing would be much easier.

Edited April 20, 2017 by goryllobumbum

Only part I don't like is the difficulty of obtaining top tier hilts/barrels now, since 246 can't be crafted.

 

The time it takes to reach top tier on a new character is higher, but to make up for it the CXP gain for PvP has increased and the T3 legendary drop rate has also increased. Only the hilt crafting issue bugs me.

Edited April 20, 2017 by Eli_Porter

Raise the bolster in PVP over the gear.

 

You choose the type of thing in your gear slots, it is the max level of that by bolster.

 

PVP should be player vs player, not gear vs player.

 

I really loved it when they made BIS PVP gear available to all in an easy manner pre 5.0.

 

PVP really took off, and nearly everyone that played had the gear they needed.

 

You don't have to raise the rate of gaining gear, just make the gear not relevant in PVP beyond the type of stat's you put in the slots.

 

PVE operations can have a progression. It'd be nice if specific gear and ratings dropped from different bosses based on difficulty.

Edited April 20, 2017 by ThrakhathSpawn

Well I was not subbed for the last 4 weeks and before that I only did a nim op once every 1 or 2 weeks and now I'm not that far from full tier 4 on my main already, but u are a "dedicated pvper" and can't gear up? The only thing I can agree on is that gearing alts sucks. THe command rank should haven been legacy from the start.

 

Maybe you should spend more time playing and less time posting on the forums.

Edited April 20, 2017 by invertioN

Well I was not subbed for the last 4 weeks and before that I only did a nim op once every 1 or 2 weeks and now I'm not that far from full tier 4 on my main already, but u are a "dedicated pvper" and can't gear up? The only thing I can agree on is that gearing alts sucks. THe command rank should haven been legacy from the start.

 

Maybe you should spend more time playing and less time posting on the forums.

 

This.

So, for PvPers, what would be the point to even try to get gear? If bolster wil give you max stats, that would be just BS. Bolster gives worse/less geared players opportunity to compete with those with BiS gear, not to be equal with them. If bolster would get you up to same stats as BiS geared players, what would be the reason to farm components?

 

And well, if

 

then let just everyone run in 128 rating gear and hope to be bolstered?

 

All they need to do is increasing amount of Unassambled Components (maybe add some of them as reward for completing 2nd daily as well) we get from completing wz/mission and gearing would be much easier.

 

Most dedicated pvpers don't care that much about gear except to min max stats in the percentages they want. I'd happily play with 128 gear if it was bolstered because that's pretty much what happens pre lvl 70 and it's by far the best gearing setup for pvp in this game.

There are ways to still make gear grind relevant by keeping the same rewards in case people also want to do pve content.

Well I was not subbed for the last 4 weeks and before that I only did a nim op once every 1 or 2 weeks and now I'm not that far from full tier 4 on my main already, but u are a "dedicated pvper" and can't gear up? The only thing I can agree on is that gearing alts sucks. THe command rank should haven been legacy from the start.

 

Maybe you should spend more time playing and less time posting on the forums.

 

I'm guessing you don't play pvp

Most dedicated pvpers don't care that much about gear except to min max stats in the percentages they want. I'd happily play with 128 gear if it was bolstered because that's pretty much what happens pre lvl 70 and it's by far the best gearing setup for pvp in this game.

There are ways to still make gear grind relevant by keeping the same rewards in case people also want to do pve content.

 

Don't you see a bit of hipocrisy in that? You don't want to grind to get BiS gear, but you want BiS stats. For me it's simple. If you want stat balance which satisfy you, work on it, don't expect game to do that for you just by boosting your current stats. Giving people bolster to max rating will just hurt people who commits their time to obtain BiS gear.

Giving people bolster to max rating will just hurt people who commits their time to obtain BiS gear.

 

Some might argue they should be hurt. PVP is about skill, not grinding.

Bolster needs to go back to above top tier gear like it was in 5.0 before 5.1. That was pretty much perfect. As it is now, the grind to get gear in PvP is ridiculous. There should be no need to grind for BiS gear to PvP - that's a PvE mentality that has no place in PvP. Edited April 21, 2017 by stoopicus

Bolster needs to go back to above top tier gear like it was in 5.0 before 5.1. That was pretty much perfect. As it is now, the grind to get gear in PvP is ridiculous. There should be no need to grind for BiS gear to PvP - that's a PvE mentality that has no place in PvP.

 

Then what would be the point of having any gear above 128 rating or whatever you choose to use? You do know that even top tier gear would be bolstered to this "above top tier gear" rating, right?

Edited April 21, 2017 by Halinalle

Then what would be the point of having any gear above 128 rating or whatever you choose to use? You do know that even top tier gear would be bolstered to this "above top tier gear" rating, right?

 

OWPvP, and tunign your gear values.

So, for PvPers, what would be the point to even try to get gear?

 

This was the general question overall when Galactic Command was introduced.

 

Its fairly obvious that the largest part of the swtor population are casual PVEers who only play simple content. They were still complaining they have it hard to get gear cause they cant do ops or PVP. So they got the GC system, which makes them get gear with the story and heroics they do all day.

 

However the KEY QUESTION is WHY THEY NEED GEAR?? Since they get level sync everywhere, that makes the OP, they get bolster in SM FPS, SM OPS basically in all the easy content, you can go there litteraly naked (which was proven by numerous videos).

 

So Yes, we have a system at work here that suits the majority of players, but they actually dont need the gear

Its fairly obvious ...

 

You didn't answer the question. You changed the subject just to prove your point.

Edited April 21, 2017 by Halinalle

Don't you see a bit of hipocrisy in that? You don't want to grind to get BiS gear, but you want BiS stats. For me it's simple. If you want stat balance which satisfy you, work on it, don't expect game to do that for you just by boosting your current stats. Giving people bolster to max rating will just hurt people who commits their time to obtain BiS gear.

 

This is pvp we are talking about, not pve. Pvpers in this game have never wanted a gear grind because it makes gear gaps in pvp.

You can go right back to launch to see all the gearing changes they adjusted and tried for pvp up untill 4.0.

We've already been through this type of grind fest 3 years ago for pvp. They saw it didn't work then, so they changed it to prepackaged pvp gear which you got when you first tried pvp.

Problem was people didn't know what it was and lots of them sold it. (That was before the cartel market, so they hadn't put in place a system to stop you from selling anything to a vendor).

When that gearing didn't work they moved onto actual pvp gear with expertise and pvp Comms. At the time Bolster was new and they messed it up badly. By the time we got to 4.0 they had mastered Bolster and had refined the gearing so there was never a noticeable gear gap. Gearing for pvp in 4.0 was near perfect, they'd spent all that time since launch to get it perfect and then changed it to this stupid system.

What you need to understand is pvpers are about playing other real players to pit our skills against them. We don't want or need gear gaps to pvp because it muddies the water. The most successful pvp games out there are ones that don't even require you to gear for stats. Most stuff is bling and has nothing to do with the person gaining an edge over someone else.

We used to have that in swtor, but it is no longer the case. The games are now about who has the best gear and the 100s of hours to grind for it. Skill is a diminishing factor because people are using gear as a crutch to coast by. The only people I know that "actually" want a gear advantage are those who need it to win. Everyone else wants skill based pvp to play against other people.

Real pvpers want skill vs skill, not gear vs gear.

Gearing for pvp in 4.0 was near perfect

 

Get 190 rating modifications and 186 relics and bolster gives you best stats?

Edited April 21, 2017 by Halinalle

Don't you see a bit of hipocrisy in that? You don't want to grind to get BiS gear, but you want BiS stats. For me it's simple. If you want stat balance which satisfy you, work on it, don't expect game to do that for you just by boosting your current stats. Giving people bolster to max rating will just hurt people who commits their time to obtain BiS gear.

 

That rationale might work for PVE when you are fighting the computer, but for PVP you need everyone to enter with the same stats in order to make skills the deciding factor. Those of us who only PVP do not care about gear or stats; or to rephrase: we only care in so far that everyone are on the same level. That is why the previous system was infinitely better.

 

The current system basically requires that you only ever play the same toon, as entering PVP with subpar gear will kinda* make you explode.

 

* (Skill > Team > Class > Gear)

they don't care, they don't read.

 

you're sub = you're happy.

 

seems their only statement. you all know what you do to show to them you're not happy.

Get 190 rating modifications and 186 relics and bolster gives you best stats?

 

Every single character was able to obtain 208 gear and even out the playing field for ranked and normal warzones in a matter of two weeks. Even with only 3 hours a day, you'd be able to play on a level playing field in a matter of two weeks. Sure, you could always optimize a bit with single-modification purchases, but the margin was slim for many classes. The margin between optimized 208 and non-optimized 208 gear was there, but it was nothing too serious to begin with.

 

And with PvP commendations being tied to your legacy instead of your character, equipping and using a new character was a matter of two weeks too. Still better, I could use all these tokens I didn't use on my main to equip an alt. There was no period of time that my alt was seriously impaled by any gear disparity, or simply a "victim" in any given warzone - someone who can't do sh*t against anyone.

 

The old system encouraged familiarity with your class and your skills more than it did obtaining gear. Gear was a side note. It was done with in a week or two, and most characters after your alt didn't require any additional farming at all. It was a system that was meant to pit players on equal levels against each other fairly quickly. This actually made me play three(!) characters in PvP quite regularly. My healing sage, my madness sorc, and my combat sentinel. I was actually equipping my mercenary for PvP prior to 5.0, making it nearly 4.

 

The new system discourages having alts to a ridiculous degree. You have four tiers of gear to slog through, the last tiers take an immense amount of PvPing, and the tokens aren't transferrable. If you want to start a new character, you have to start from scratch. In essence, you have to become the "victim" all over again. And even if you aren't the victim, chances are you won't enjoy PvP because killing other players becomes ridiculously easy. When I'm playing a class with the appropriate gear, killing anyone below me becomes easy.

 

The old system was designed to get as many new PvP players on an even footing as possible. Join the game, level to 65, and be ready to do competitive PvP in a matter of ~2 weeks without feeling like a victim. The new system penalizes in that regard. Either you invest months into farming GC ranks, you join up for the newest PvE stuff to farm GCXP efficiently, or you spent months farming the components to slack through four tiers of gear. The most efficient way to farm gear for PvP now is to do PvE. That is ridicule in itself. When PvE players, to which I count myself, are forced into PvP for the most simple of things, they immediately ***** and moan about how they don't want to do it. Need these ten games for a companion? Oh, Bioware! Why am I forced to do this PvP-sh*t stuff for a PvE thing?! But gaining gear for PvP more efficiently through PvE is alright. It's only PvP players who are forced into PvE. Might as well let them participate.

 

I'm using a hyperbole, obviously, but the point still stands. It's just as ridiculous to force PvP players to do PvE for gear as it is to force PvE players to do PvP for companions they use in PvE.

 

In many ways, the old system did have flaws. However, it was far superior than this system because it actually took this game's unique situation into account. SWTOR has never been, and will never be, a game that favours competitive players and has large percentages of players who readily stick days upon days a week into it. The old system took into account that most players in SWTOR are casuals, and that these people don't want to feel like victims for 0.01% of the population who can farm gear or GCXP 8-10 hours a day for weeks on end.

 

This new system just hands the crown over any kind of warzone to the top 0.01% who can. It doesn't promote level playing fields or access to these game modes.

 

And if we need another argument to go back to 4.0 gearing approaches for PvP, do answer me this question: What upsides does this gearing approach have for anyone in the PvP community that the old approach didn't?

Edited April 21, 2017 by Alssaran

So, for PvPers, what would be the point to even try to get gear? If bolster wil give you max stats, that would be just BS. Bolster gives worse/less geared players opportunity to compete with those with BiS gear, not to be equal with them.

 

You are talking as if getting gear for pvp has some intrinsic value to it. Why do you think someone should need to try to get gear for pvp?

 

If bolster would get you up to same stats as BiS geared players, what would be the reason to farm components?.

Why would one have to need to farm components?

 

Gearing through pvp can just as well be a nice addition you get on the side, sort of a secondary thing if you occasionally want to do something other than pvp. Then it does not matter that much how fast or slow it is.

 

I'm fine with pvp needing gear btw but the gearing is way too slow now.

Some might argue they should be hurt. PVP is about skill, not grinding.

 

Yep, you are right and that's why we had expertise and Bolster on pvp gear. If people didn't have pvp gear and had the highest BiS pve gear (which was always 2-4 lvls higher in stats) they actually nerfed themselves by wearing it instead of getting pvp gear (which was really easy and fast to get). Expertise was a main pvp stat, if you didn't have it and wore high lvl gear you actually hurt yourself.

Pve people used to be extremely vocal about it and said they should remove expertise because they didn't think it was fair that they had spent all this time grinding NiM bosses and now their gear was rubbish in Pvp. When all they needed to do was 1-2 weeks of casual pvp at max lvl to get gear or if they'd bothered to pvp before max level, they could collect Comms and nearly be geared when they hit max lvl. They are now the same people advocating a gear gap because they want to have an advantage. These are the same ones who complained about playing casual pvp for a few weeks to get pvp gear, but now they are able to do all their NM OPs and get better gear faster than pvpers can for pvp, they are happy with the system.

If pvpers wanted to do pve OPs we had to grind the same boring low lvl, unchallenging rubbish for multiple weeks to get geared for the next of OPs because the OPs people "wouldn't let you in" if you didn't have the right gear. It didn't matter that a lot of pvpers could do it without the BiS gear. But we didn't complain, we just left them to their OPs and we stuck with pvp. If they wanted to pvp we would welcome them and if they had the wrong gear we would try and help explain to them how to gear and not hurt themselves. We couldn't kick them out because they had the wrong gear, unlike how they could to us 🙄.

The old system worked better than this one even though it wasn't perfect for everyone. But they could easily adapt this system by increasing Bolster so that people could still wear their high lvl gear and not nerf themselves and people with entry lvl or casual gear can compete on an equal footing. It's a win-win for everyone because they can keep the current reward system to get gear, but the gear is only relevant when in Pve content.

Edited April 21, 2017 by Icykill_

I have a pretty good idea in my honest opinion. I'm letting my sub run out this month, something I've never done for the last 5 years. When I pvp, it's just so boring no matter what spec or class I play. Either my team is garbage, the enemy team is garbage, it's mostly mandos/ mercs who cant actually pvp to save their life, and it takes way to long to gear, etc. What I propose is BW reestablishes gear with EXPERTISE, that way people can't grind ops then go into pvp and wreck with very little skill. (ie, most of the population of this game, because most people are so bad they NEED to play sniper or merc). Anyway, pretty much, just give us what we had in 4.0 and **** this RNG **** because you (BW) take way to long to come out with a very little amount of content. (5.2) And manage to **** everything up when you release less than 10 hours of content in am MMO that took over 3 months to create. BW is mad cuz bad.