You’d have to nuke WoW to get it to fail because they have such a large player and fan base. It’s not really the best example. .

From what I have read and seen on some of the you tubes lately Wow is losing its player base. It has lost some of its influencers due to a few things (the game and the lawsuit) so it is possible they are hurting themselves right now.

Swtor does have a couple abilities more per class. On Jugg tank I've got three full bars, though this includes class buff, resource regen, medpac, adrenal and stim. Even if we take all of those abilities off (and that's being generous, I definitely would never take medpac and adrenal off my bars, Ideally I'd even have an extra slot for an offensive adrenal too), that still leaves me with 31 abilities on jugg tank. (Vengeance has one less, Rage one more).

 

Compare that to guardian on the PTS, there I have 25 abilities, excluding class buff, regen and items. That seems much closer to what Dractacula described than what's current live. Especially since I'd need at least two extra slots for medpac and adrenal, ideally a couple extra for a variant adrenal and maybe clicky relics. A similar thing seems to hold true for Marasents we've seen on PTS vs Live.

 

I'm not saying swtor should emulate the amount of abilities that FFXIV has. But if the assumption is that they should, it looks like PTS is going in the right direction, at least ability numberwise.

Those aren’t ability’s, they are extras. And to be fair, not all classes or specs have as many as the others. Take Deception Assassins for instance, they have the least amount of abilities of all the class specs I play (and I’ve 87 Alts, so I play most). Where as MM snipers have the most abilities.

I’m not totally against a small amount of Pruning for completely useless abilities or to reduce Desync in the game. What I’m against is pruning useful and iconic abilities and then making us choose between the rest.

My favourite class is my DPS Warriors. Both Jugg and Mara (Guardian/Sent) and if BioWare feel they need to nerf a few abilities to:

A. Increase game performance and get rid of Desync

B. Get rid of useless abilities

Then I can get behind that. But that’s not what they are doing or they’d be targeting abilities that cause the Desync and not prune useful abilities.

Abilities they could get rid of on the DPS Warriors is limited, but there are 3 they could do that fall into A. or B. category.

A. Remove blade Blitz (mad dash). This ability was only added in 4.0 (or was it 3.0) and while it is a useful ability, it causes Desync on the game. The immunity and gap close utility you gain from it could be added as an extra leap for gap closing and the immunity could be merged with another DCD. Then the loss wouldn’t be that bad and we’d gain some performance from the game engine.

B. Remove Cyclonic Slash (sweeping slash). It’s an AOE that does hardly any damage and uses lots of resources and it’s not part of any rotation and doesn’t have any extra utility. There are better options if you have a group to take out or need an AOE.

B. Remove Force Clarity (Furious Power). It’s a brand new ability with 6.0 that’s only a multiplier of damage. It could easily be combined as a utility choice, passive, part of gear bonus or merged onto another ability.

And to be fair, ever class got something like this from 6.0 and it wasn’t needed. Some classes like Deception Assassins ability is pretty much useless unless you wear a specific tactical.

Which brings me to my last point. BioWare say they want an easier job at balancing stuff. But then go and add 20+ different gears sets and tacticals that make balancing 100x harder. Then for good measure, they add amplifier modifiers that complicate it even more.

Surely we can all see how ludicrous that is when they already find it too hard to balance classes and abilities. But instead of admitting that mistake and fix it by removing some sets or modifying them, they decide to nerf our class abilities and blame that for their inability to balance properly around the gear they added in 6.0.

TTK is mostly up in pvp due to the sets and tacticals. It’s got nothing to do with abilities. AND that has been proven in mid bracket pvp where people don’t have these sets or tacticals. All you have to do get a bunch of lvl 70 players together with the Ossus gear sets (which have the old pvp set bonuses on them) and play pvp and you can see that most of the balance and TTK problems are from the lvl 75 gear sets and tacticals.

And BioWare is treating us like complete idiots (like we don’t play the game and can’t see through the lie) by telling us It’s the class abilities that have mostly been in the game for 7-9 years causing the imbalance issues and not them adding all that gear in 6.0.

Do they really think we are ALL that freaking stupid that we will buy into that by excuse without questioning their real motives. That’s what makes me angry the most, being outright lied to.

From what I have read and seen on some of the you tubes lately Wow is losing its player base. It has lost some of its influencers due to a few things (the game and the lawsuit) so it is possible they are hurting themselves right now.

Definitely agree, some has to do with their latest expansion and not listening to the player feed back. And the other has to do with their legal issue and company culture towards women and minorities who work for them.

I have some old RL friends (who play WoW) who’ve started to msg me about going to FFXIV because their whole guild is moving there. These people had played WoW since launch and no other games. It’s like a religion for them and we’re definitely addicted.

But it goes to show that even the big games can mess up. The takeaway is dont alienate your core fans. And don’t ignore their feed back. Luckily for WoW, they have so many players, that they could lose half and they’d still have more than swtor and plenty of time to rectify their mistakes. Swtor doesn’t have that option and I wish the devs would realise that and stop gambling with the longevity (life) of the game.

Edit: I just read this on Reddit. https://www.bbc.com/news/technology-58017429

Zepla was herself once a WoW player - but left years ago for FFXIV during its poorly-received Warlords of Draenor expansion. She thinks many players have been frustrated for years.

"Common complaints have included frustration with poor class balance, 'out of touch' developers, and needlessly complex, RNG-heavy game systems. Put simply, many players haven't felt listened to. They've not felt their time has been respected. And they are tired."

Bioware could learn some lessons from this, but I think we know they won’t.

Those aren’t ability’s, they are extras. And to be fair, not all classes or specs have as many as the others. Take Deception Assassins for instance, they have the least amount of abilities of all the class specs I play (and I’ve 87 Alts, so I play most). Where as MM snipers have the most abilities.

 

Well yes you can consider them extra, which is why I didn't include them in the final count. Still the PTS versions of Guardian and Sentinel are closer to what Dractacula said about FFXIV than current live versions are when it comes to number of abilities.

 

I’m not totally against a small amount of Pruning for completely useless abilities or to reduce Desync in the game. What I’m against is pruning useful and iconic abilities and then making us choose between the rest.

 

My favourite class is my DPS Warriors. Both Jugg and Mara (Guardian/Sent) and if BioWare feel they need to nerf a few abilities to:

A. Increase game performance and get rid of Desync

B. Get rid of useless abilities

Then I can get behind that. But that’s not what they are doing or they’d be targeting abilities that cause the Desync and not prune useful abilities.

I'd add another category, get rid of some of the ridiculous extra mobility they added to all classes with 4.0. Here's where every class got an additional movement ability and suddenly made some of the least mobile classes, like Guardians, able to zip across the battlefield.

Abilities they could get rid of on the DPS Warriors is limited, but there are 3 they could do that fall into A. or B. category.

 

A. Remove blade Blitz (mad dash). This ability was only added in 4.0 (or was it 3.0) and while it is a useful ability, it causes Desync on the game. The immunity and gap close utility you gain from it could be added as an extra leap for gap closing and the immunity could be merged with another DCD. Then the loss wouldn’t be that bad and we’d gain some performance from the game engine.

 

I agree with removing Blade Blitz, but mostly because it completely doesn't fit the Guardian, making them way too mobile imo.

 

B. Remove Cyclonic Slash (sweeping slash). It’s an AOE that does hardly any damage and uses lots of resources and it’s not part of any rotation and doesn’t have any extra utility. There are better options if you have a group to take out or need an AOE.

 

It's the only AoE spammable. As such it's used by tanks and focus when they need AoE damage. It's not a lot, but it's better than Slash when you're hitting multiple targets. Additionally for Vigilance it's actually an integral part of the max AoE damage rotation if you don't have Cut to Pieces equipped. (Spreading one dot buffs its damage by 25%, in addition to the 25% utility makes it actually do pretty solid damage for a spammable AoE).

 

B. Remove Force Clarity (Furious Power). It’s a brand new ability with 6.0 that’s only a multiplier of damage. It could easily be combined as a utility choice, passive, part of gear bonus or merged onto another ability.

And to be fair, ever class got something like this from 6.0 and it wasn’t needed. Some classes like Deception Assassins ability is pretty much useless unless you wear a specific tactical.

 

I agree, so it's a good thing this is one of the only two abilities that has actually been completely removed from Guardians. In addition to Freezing Force, which had its slow effect rolled into a passive choice. Definitely agree with the Sin ability as well, I only use it to extend Shroud with the set bonus on some bosses.

Should've removed it from Sentinels as well rather than adding it as an option, but ah well.

 

Which brings me to my last point. BioWare say they want an easier job at balancing stuff. But then go and add 20+ different gears sets and tacticals that make balancing 100x harder. Then for good measure, they add amplifier modifiers that complicate it even more.

 

Surely we can all see how ludicrous that is when they already find it too hard to balance classes and abilities. But instead of admitting that mistake and fix it by removing some sets or modifying them, they decide to nerf our class abilities and blame that for their inability to balance properly around the gear they added in 6.0.

 

TTK is mostly up in pvp due to the sets and tacticals. It’s got nothing to do with abilities. AND that has been proven in mid bracket pvp where people don’t have these sets or tacticals. All you have to do get a bunch of lvl 70 players together with the Ossus gear sets (which have the old pvp set bonuses on them) and play pvp and you can see that most of the balance and TTK problems are from the lvl 75 gear sets and tacticals.

 

I don't agree with this entirely. TTK definitely went up with 6.0, but it has been steadily increasing for a very long time. Just rolling back 6.0 sets won't suddenly fix it all.

No, iam not talking about plot of a horror film where subscribers of this game are cutted in pieces (they already suffered here enough), iam talking that ability pruning in wow resulted in subscribers leaving the game. People just didn't like what happened to their classes and devs there made a typical mistake which many did in the past - they thought that by pruning abilities and making the game more CASUAL they will draw attention of new players who aren't playing mmo games because of how "hard" and complicated such games are. But this is a mistake. Players want more ways to play the game, more content, more feeling that content is rewarding enough, class balance, and alive end game content. Swtor always provided enough abilities for players to play ALL TYPES OF CONTENT as they wish or want to play. It is one of advantages of this game, the advantage many mmo games lacking now.

 

Players leaving this game, same as new players aren't not because of ability sets but due to: 1. lack of content, 2. lots of bugs,3. certain types of content are in DEAD state (for example, team ranked, uprisings, star fortress etc). If you think that ability quantity is the problem you just lying to yourself, it is not the reason why this game has problems. And what you are doing is just taking away one of advantages this game still has.

I came back to the game after a long time away, liked it well enough, settled on a Guardian as my main, spent a good chunk on it, played the PTS, just decided to cancel my sub because of it. I liked the way my Guardian felt, and no sooner than I started playing again did Bioware throw it away. The PTS is for tweaks to the numbers, not foundational changes to underlying direction, and anyone who thinks they're going to get something very different than what they can see today is fooling themselves. It's anecdotal, but at least anecdotally, you were right in my case.

I came back to the game after a long time away, liked it well enough, settled on a Guardian as my main, spent a good chunk on it, played the PTS, just decided to cancel my sub because of it. I liked the way my Guardian felt, and no sooner than I started playing again did Bioware throw it away. The PTS is for tweaks to the numbers, not foundational changes to underlying direction, and anyone who thinks they're going to get something very different than what they can see today is fooling themselves. It's anecdotal, but at least anecdotally, you were right in my case.

I feel the same way. Right on the money. I have 4 Guardians, 6 Sentinels, enjoy each and every one of them. But now whit all those skills removed it will feel like a mobile game, so yeah....anecdotal.

Folks need to understand as well that you can lower the skill level all the way to the floor of the basement level of hell itself and there will still be people who can't do it. I'm all for helping those who need it and want to learn, but at some point folks also need to stand on their own two feet without someone holding their hand forever. That may sound elitist to some, but at some point the training wheels have got to come off if folks are to learn and improve. Simply because they can't master SWTOR over night doesn't make this a bad game anymore than not mastering something like Magic the Gathering over night doesn't make it a bad game. I don't want to see this game start to tank like WoW almost did, or like SWG actually did.

I, too, was once an SWG beta-tester, and I thoroughly enjoyed the game all the way up to it's first death, the NGE.

But all of this; the industry, the developer community, the demographics of those who play today...this is all the end-result of culture-evolution.

We live in a world where mediocrity is celebrated, incompetence is rewarded, and recognition for merely existing is an expectation. The Spartans of ancient Greece would /spit on our world today, and would also crush us in droves, if not for our fancy weaponry and cowardly authorities.

But, such is the world we live in.

It's a merchant's world, and the old-school breed are dying off, ever more rapidly.

The only way to restore the Golden Age of the Sith is by following the rule of two, and unfortunately for us, Darth Bane hasn't been born yet.

Wait a second, losing 80% of the playerbase is no big deal, but 10% is? Dude you need to quit going to the clubs on Nar Shadda because you're talking out of your exhaust port.

You clearly did not take your time to read the message, refrain from being so aggressive.

That person said that if 80% leave, but there is the same amount of new players coming to the game plus 10% more, then it is a good change for the game.

10 - 1 = 2

10 - 8 + 8 + 1 = 11 (8 leave, 8 new + 1 additional person compared to the state of the game before the change)

clearly 9 < 11

so yes, as I see it is an increase of 10% in the player base is better than a loss of 10%

That person said that if 80% leave, but there is the same amount of new players coming to the game plus 10% more, then it is a good change for the game.

The problem with your math is that there won't be that many new players coming to the game, I assure you.

The problem with your math is that there won't be that many new players coming to the game, I assure you.

Exactly!

And even if more come in than leave, past experience shows many of those will leave within the first 3 months and we end up with less players than we had before the expansion launches. You really saw this happen in 5.0 and 6.0. It’s less obvious with 3.0 and 4.0, but it also happened.

Part of the problem is Bioware are always trying to get new players that are a different demographic to the current player base instead of retaining the ones they already have and bringing old players back. If you have a large loyal core players base that is happy with the game they will bring in new players naturally by word of mouth (or social media).

If your core player base feels neglected and some choose to leave, that is also reflected by word of mouth (social media) and turns away new players from trying the game.

I don’t think Bioware themselves know what they want their own game to be or what the core players should be. That’s obvious by the constant switching back and forth between MMO model to solo RPG model and back to MMO model.

Even when they know who the most stable subscriber player base is in the game, they go out of their way to drive those players away with bad decisions and ideas.

I refer to a statement the dev team posted during the 3.x to 4.x game period where they said pvpers were the most stable subscribers.

And then Bioware went and ruined the pvp eco system with massive changes in 5.0 that drove the majority of Pvpers from the game. Since then, they have consistently made bad decisions to drive even more from the game.

If Bioware use analytics and data to drive their decisions, why would you purposely make changes that none of the core pvp player base at the time wanted or supported. Why would you continue to keep driving more of them from the game and ignoring their pleas to stop ruining the pvp eco system?

I don’t believe analytics drive Bioware’s decisions. I believe they massage the data to fit their own narrative of what the creative director or producer wants instead of what the players want. Which means many of the poor choices over the years were based on personal egos and monetisation managers at Bioware driving their vision. They don’t care about what the players want.

That is why I think with so few “loyal” players left in the game, that these changes are going to drive many more players from the game than it ultimately brings in. Next year might be the 10 year anniversary, but I also think it will be the last year of development before they shutter the game or it goes into full maintenance mode.

The game can’t afford to haemorrhage more players because the devs want to experiment again.

Long time ago when i first started i remember levelling up took some time and combat was genuinely challenging. At least that's what i remember, a few years later i come back and i level like lightning and combat was no issue.

I didn't mind as i like games more for their stories. But combat is also an integral part, it's what takes you from story content to story content.

I always use all of my abilities except for status abilities that break on damage. I don't care about the meta or an ability being useless. I just press buttons, it's a simple state of mind that i think some people, mostly casual players can relate to, and the amount of abilities in the game is good as is. I just simply read the tooltips and decide on the best way to apply all of my abilities in snyc. This takes no time at all and any new player can take the time to do the same. Usually my first ability bar is full with my main combat abilities and then separating the rest based on whether or not they are situational or passive abilities on my other bars. I got so used to this that all my toons abilities are ordered the same way, and i don't know if this gets changed that i would be comfortable with it.

The game is also so freaking easy, i seriously doubt anyone who complains about it being hard, has played any game other than maybe minecraft. The learning curve only starts after you have reached lvl75. After 75 you have to think about item rating, gear sets, tacticals and these are just the things i, a pretty casual player knows about, and even then you don't have to bother with them if you don't plan on doing harder stuff. But even before i knew of all these i didn't find anything that was too challenging. Heroics, easy with a healing comp. Flashpoints again, easy with a healing comp, a comp pretty much solves every basic story challenge the game could throw at you, and if someone wants to go deeper into the game content like veteran and master modes, then obviously they will have to do some research, and use the gear sets, tacticals etc. You can't take that out of a game no matter how much you dumb it down. But if you dumb it down too much for the new players that you hope will keep playing the game, then you screw over people that are already invested in the game as it currently is.

I came back about a few months ago and finished the last of my class stories and wanted to become a "veteran" player by learning all that i can, getting as much achievements as possible and just get better at the game. I was planning on saving up my money and kitting out all 16 of my characters with stuff from the CM. That might seem dumb to some, but i just wanted to have fun. It seems though that this game has truly been going downhill, i heard some people saying this in game but i didn't believe them. After reading through this thread, I'm questioning whether or not i should keep putting my energy (and money) into this game. Mainly because i don't know how much I'm gonna be interested in it after the update rolls out, but also because if the update truly sucks, and a lot of people leave, then it's gonna be a matter of time until bioware decides maintaining support for the game isn't worth it anymore.

This is just the simple take of a casual player though. Hopefully the stuff i said makes sense.

Edit: I did some detective work and i found my old account, it was made in 2013. Wow. I wish i had set up a security key. In this case someone could fact check me about how the levelling and other stuff was in 2013.

Tomb of Freedon Nadd server. This server doesn't even exist anymore.

I am less concerned about ability pruning then I am about how affective what is there. On one hand there needs to be a challenging environment for the elite gamers but there also needs to be space for those like me who just play to blow off steam. I want to see the trainers active so I can level a character and see what the new way looks like

long time casual player

Can't believe i haven't mentioned this yet (and, as far as i've noticed , no one else has mentioned this yet either) ....

 

What about HEALERS?!?!

 

I have a Guardian alt, but my main has always been a healer (Sage) since 2011 , never respec'd (except when the game forced me to upon 1st login after new update----see 4.0 & such) And , particularly in PVP & NiM ops (or other Level 75+ content) , every single 'heal' skill on my toolbar is useful & significant.

 

Again , we still don't know the extent of what exactly BioWare is up to with this whole LotS 7.0 update, so i'm def. NOT one of those "game is gonna die" types ( *especially since people have been claiming "SWTOR will die" since 2012 lol ) .

 

I'm just a bit skeptical and, as a healer main, i'm very very curious/confused as to how the heck BioWare is gonna handle all this. I don't have the Livestream link handy at the moment but does anyone recall whether or not BioWare mentioned the effect 7.0 might have on HEALERS specifically ?

 

p.s. i hope they "prune" god-bubble so i won't be tempted to use it in Ranked PVP anymore

Considering there history with sorc over the last few years its prolly goodbye bubble phasewalk mental alacrity/polarity shift bye instant heal bye instant tornado and a flast 50% output nerf XD

Long time ago when i first started i remember levelling up took some time and combat was genuinely challenging. At least that's what i remember, a few years later i come back and i level like lightning and combat was no issue.

I didn't mind as i like games more for their stories. But combat is also an integral part, it's what takes you from story content to story content.

This was the first mmo I went hardcore at back at launch in 2011. Its like my highschool sweetheart, we've since moved on due to differences of opinions and not fulfilling desires but I always get a fire in me thinking about it. Yeah back before the Dark vs Light event players actually had to visit and do nearly every quest on every planet to level up. It was one of the best features of the game actually because this games main story is an amazing product. But now you can do one class quest and hit level 30 before you have time to think.

I stopped playing full time back in 2015 ish, but I occasionally come back to see how things are going. And the very best thing about this game in my opinion, is the combat and how each of the classes play. Hands down some of the best mmo combat in the business, I've tried nearly all of them too. But when they start making big shifts in how the class combat behaved I got a real bad feeling in my gut. The removal of iconic abilities was truly heartbreaking, flamethrower on bounty hunter became a flame fart, master strike/ravage became a 1 GCD spasm attack, no more Death from Above on my favorite class PT? It was absurd. I just can't fathom the effects more pruning will have on the state of the game. I honestly believe this game will lose one of its greatest assets, its combat.

You keep bringing up these mythical new players having all these issues, yet you've refused to tell us who they are. You also say "the amount of buttons the game can get away with without being a turn off to newer players" is what we should go with, yet you refuse to quantify what that is. Are we talking 3 buttons? What about 5? Maybe 7? Or what about 10? Do we stop at 12, or do we go to 15?

Final Fantasy got every class down to about 12 buttons for DPS 15 for Tank 15 for Healer... Never lost players. In fact it gained players as it got simpler. Stormblood was the pruning of abilities and everyone loved it...

(...) Then they go on holidays for 6 weeks like they always do and we won’t get any fixes till the end of February 2022.

 

That’s nearly 3 months of time where the game will have a bunch of possibly game breaking bugs and unbalanced combat issues.

That is what drives players from the game and makes them unsub.

The end of the year expansions/updates have been a constant issue, with the team understandably going for holidays for weeks. I don't understand why they can't delay them to spring.

For the record, the game was released in December 2011 but they had a team on deck to respond to the launch issues (clearly it is suicidal to launch an MMO with your devs on vacation, why can't the same logic be applied to updates?). The first expansion, Rise of the Hutt Cartel, was released in April 2013: that's how you do things.

Then the hellish spiral started, Shadow of Revan launched in December 2014 and all the subsequent expansions/updates followed the same pattern.

TL;DR Don't release a major update when your team is gone for the Holiday season.

Final Fantasy got every class down to about 12 buttons for DPS 15 for Tank 15 for Healer... Never lost players. In fact it gained players as it got simpler. Stormblood was the pruning of abilities and everyone loved it...

Strange... seeing as a screenshot of my PLD from ShB has over 30 in-combat moves, NOT counting stim/adrenal/med pack equivalents OR out-of-combat things like mounts, quick travel, or even the rocket-boost equivalent, which IIRC is usable in combat (it's been a while).

I also remember people discussing how much more fun they had on AST before the cards were dumbed down to 2 variations with different names instead of a bunch of cards... and I only played the game casually.

Strange... seeing as a screenshot of my PLD from ShB has over 30 in-combat moves, NOT counting stim/adrenal/med pack equivalents OR out-of-combat things like mounts, quick travel, or even the rocket-boost equivalent, which IIRC is usable in combat (it's been a while).

 

I also remember people discussing how much more fun they had on AST before the cards were dumbed down to 2 variations with different names instead of a bunch of cards... and I only played the game casually.

Yeah, I remember similar, and I see way more Gunbreakers out there than Warriors (Warriors have way fewer buttons to press, both are tanks).

I agree with that statement. But 60 buttons on 6 bars isn't content.

Except... SW:ToR is far from 60 buttons on 6 bars. Every class's main rotation is around 6 to 8 buttons. Tanks have more buttons because of Defensive Cooldowns and Taunts. And Healers have more buttons because well, there's more heal buttons than most DPS have in their rotation.

I've always used a single Ability bar for my entire rotation. That's only 12 buttons. And I've never felt that I need more than 4 Ability Bars in my almost 6 years of playing SW:ToR.

The end of the year expansions/updates have been a constant issue, with the team understandably going for holidays for weeks. I don't understand why they can't delay them to spring.

 

For the record, the game was released in December 2011 but they had a team on deck to respond to the launch issues (clearly it is suicidal to launch an MMO with your devs on vacation, why can't the same logic be applied to updates?). The first expansion, Rise of the Hutt Cartel, was released in April 2013: that's how you do things.

 

Then the hellish spiral started, Shadow of Revan launched in December 2014 and all the subsequent expansions/updates followed the same pattern.

 

TL;DR Don't release a major update when your team is gone for the Holiday season.

Yeah, that is my main concern here with such radical changes being made. I’ve seen how this plays out each expansion.

1. The expansion lands 2 weeks before Xmas and we have an excited influx of players but the games got problems (bugs or poor balance).

2. The devs go completely silent or rush out a bug fix that causes more problems than it fixes. And they go radio silent till they go on holidays.

3. The holidays arrive and we get even more potential new players, but the old players are pissed off and tell the new players complaining about bugs to get use to it because this is how BioWare operate.

4. Four to six weeks go by with no communication from BioWare about the problems and those new people have all started to leave the game along with many old players who’ve reached the threshold with BioWare.

5. Devs come back to work and say they are working on fixes but give no date. Four more weeks go by and more people leave.

6. Date of the first patch is announced and it’s second last week of February, but ends up being delayed till last week of Feb or first week early March.

7. Patch lands and the fixes don’t work or they break it worse. Which causes more players to leave in frustration.

8. BioWare go silent again for cause of the up roar and it’s April till we here from them about an update in May.

9. By now, 99% of the new people that tried the game in December have left and told everyone what a terrible experience it was.

10. We now have less players than we did before the expansion

Sadly, this is nearly exactly what happens each time. That’s why they shouldn’t release expansions or major content updates in November or December.

It is then usually exacerbated by lack of communication from BioWare. Hopefully with Jackie on board now that won’t happen. Because the lack of communication when this happens is a major factor or why people leave in frustration.

Yup.

 

And it's the same people making the same posts.

 

And they then ignore the people who come forward to disagree

Where the hell is my thumbs up function....

Strange... seeing as a screenshot of my PLD from ShB has over 30 in-combat moves, NOT counting stim/adrenal/med pack equivalents OR out-of-combat things like mounts, quick travel, or even the rocket-boost equivalent, which IIRC is usable in combat (it's been a while).

 

I also remember people discussing how much more fun they had on AST before the cards were dumbed down to 2 variations with different names instead of a bunch of cards... and I only played the game casually.

To be fair, AST complaints weren't that they dumbed the system down (though it was definitely more fun before); they changed it from offering utility to offering RDPS 2/4% or MDPS 2/4% damage (instead of Mana Regen, or TP Regen (Gone), or Damage etc and then being able to Double Duration/Potency/AoE it); it was a lot more than just 'cutting it down' - it changed the complete ability purpose. It's not pruning, it was a complete change of a core part of the job for people.

and who said that big quantity of abilities is a content? No one did lol. But you see it's better to have many abilities than not to have because every player will decide himself what he needs and what he doesn't need. There was a great example when someone wrote about lightning chain ability on lightning sorcerer spec. Yes lightning chain doesn't fit in rotation of a lightning sorcerer but many players using it when playing story content just because they like to see how pure lightning chain is executed from their fingers, they feel themselves as Darth Sidious. Yes, this ability fits only madness rotation but useless for lightning SO WHAT? Let people decide what they want themselves since it is always better to have something even if it's useless than not to have when it comes to MMO. Why? Because those players who would think they don't need certain abilities will just throw them away from their bar but those who willing to use these abilities will take them. Both sides are happy. And if devs will do ability pruning, first group of players i mentioned before won't see any difference but the second group will suffer since they will be deprived of abilities they want to use!

 

Not even mentioning that devs are planning to take away substential, crucial abilities which are separating different classes making them unique (such as choice between reflect and mad dash or taking force clarity away). This is even worse than taking insignificant abilities of certain specs.

I am still flabberghasted how people have the gall to argue "Less is better"

It has never been the case in an MMO. I don't care how loaded they make the few abilities more, I actually enjoy learning the ins and outs of every individual skill and applying it when necessary.

As it is now, all classes have the same tools: melees all have leaps, some sort of reflective damage, a hard mitigation cooldown (except PTs maybe), a dotspread spec, a burst spec, etc. All classes have root breaks/immunities, and speed boosts. No doubt to make it easier for BW to balance, create cookie cutter talents, tacticals and set bonuses.

The engine cannot handle 16 players in a warzone using all of these speed boosts -- it is rare that anyone actually moves at 100% (or 115%) movement speed. There is always a speed boost active on someone, which feels really bad to play.

There is little point in rooting someone when everyone has multiple root breaks and escapes. It does not feel impactful to whittle away at 3 layers of defensive cooldowns, making fights drag on.

All classes (Except PT I think?) have some reactive hard mitigation cooldown added at some point, meaning you cannot swiftly punish poor positioning and players who don't properly use their defenses proactively. This lengthens TTK.

PvP at 1.x and 2.x felt a lot more impactful because classes had different identities and different tools. Reflect was a unique to the Guardian, who also had a multitude of leaps. Snipers were a low-mobility turret which could easily destroy and root vulnerable melee. No counterplay is bad, but too much counterplay is almost as bad.

Fact is, if all you do is add power and never regulate it, you *will* get power creep. The only alternative explanation is "there is never too much, and power creep is not real."

As it is now, all classes have the same tools: melees all have leaps, some sort of reflective damage, a hard mitigation cooldown (except PTs maybe), a dotspread spec, a burst spec, etc. All classes have root breaks/immunities, and speed boosts. No doubt to make it easier for BW to balance, create cookie cutter talents, tacticals and set bonuses.

 

The engine cannot handle 16 players in a warzone using all of these speed boosts -- it is rare that anyone actually moves at 100% (or 115%) movement speed. There is always a speed boost active on someone, which feels really bad to play.

 

There is little point in rooting someone when everyone has multiple root breaks and escapes. It does not feel impactful to whittle away at 3 layers of defensive cooldowns, making fights drag on.

 

All classes (Except PT I think?) have some reactive hard mitigation cooldown added at some point, meaning you cannot swiftly punish poor positioning and players who don't properly use their defenses proactively. This lengthens TTK.

 

PvP at 1.x and 2.x felt a lot more impactful because classes had different identities and different tools. Reflect was a unique to the Guardian, who also had a multitude of leaps. Snipers were a low-mobility turret which could easily destroy and root vulnerable melee. No counterplay is bad, but too much counterplay is almost as bad.

 

Fact is, if all you do is add power and never regulate it, you *will* get power creep. The only alternative explanation is "there is never too much, and power creep is not real."

I agree that power creep can become a problem, but there are creative ways to address it that don't involve irreparably breaking classes in the process. Juggernaut and Marauder changes are some of the most uninspired (and damaging) i've seen in a game to date. I have no idea how those changes got past the design phase. More importantly, what's on the PTS is flat out less fun to play.

Bioware needs to address how they choose to balance before they decide on what to remove. Juggs that don't have escapes or damage mitigation, PTs that don't have movement speed or DCDs, and Marauders that are DCD and heal free are still going to be the number one focus targets.

Speed wars is definitely a problem. Not balancing ranged DPS, melee DPS , and stealth DPS based on time on target and CC in their kit is a much bigger one.

If Bioware wants to fundamentally change how the game plays they need to take the FF14 approach and just rework the entire thing. If they aren't going to do that then they might as well just stick to making operations and meaningful story content.

As the game sits right now players are just going to get destroyed by Operatives, Snipers, and Immortal Juggs. PvP on the PTS is an absolute sh*t show right now.