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Cost/reward of differing flashpoints desperately needs to be fixed.


SoonerJBD

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Assuming you are running flashpoints to grind the mats to upgrade gear or even for leveling, there is simply never any reason to do most of the newer ones. Crisis on Umbarra, Objective Meridian and The Nathema Conspiracy are the worst. They are more difficult, but the bigger issue is that they take orders of magnitude longer than most other FPs and for no greater reward. Someone almost always quits the group the moment these pop. A tier below are Traitor Among the Chiss (which is only palatable if you have a stealth that can sneak you to the first boss and past innumerable trash mobs), and, oddly The Esseles because it takes forever even though you can sleepwalk through it.

 

If you are going to have such a wide variation in the difficulty level and time invested to complete certain flashpoints, there needs to be corresponding better rewards. If I got twice the materials or something from doing those longer FPs, maybe it would be worth considering. As it stands, I’m simply never going to do them. I will quit the group and switch to a different toon and hope for better RNG on my next group finder pop. This has been a problem for far too long, and I’ve never seen the Devs even attempt to address it.

Edited by SoonerJBD
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Part of why I stopped doing my favorite activity. They used to have a minor difference in reward for the different tier of flashpoints (I may be thinking of another game I play), but the gap between a MM Traitor Among the Chiss (I actually love this one minus the excessive trash mobs) and a MM Foundry is so laughable that the lack of a reward difference makes it logical to write off entirely. I wouldn't count Esseles and BT though, they're meant to be story introductions to the concept of flashpoints and are rather quick even with the bonus boss. Its just a slog to have to do for the 15 thousandth time 💀
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Ops have been like this forever. It won't change.

 

EV and KP are super easy, even on HM. Gods is hell. It's never been balanced gear there either

 

Ops hit different, though. You don’t have to do random ops to farm gear. If you want to farm gear doing flashpoints, you have to use group finder and keep every FP checked or else you don’t get the big lump sum of FP-1 stabilizers. Flashpoints are built around group finder now. Ops aren’t.

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Part of why I stopped doing my favorite activity. They used to have a minor difference in reward for the different tier of flashpoints (I may be thinking of another game I play), but the gap between a MM Traitor Among the Chiss (I actually love this one minus the excessive trash mobs) and a MM Foundry is so laughable that the lack of a reward difference makes it logical to write off entirely. I wouldn't count Esseles and BT though, they're meant to be story introductions to the concept of flashpoints and are rather quick even with the bonus boss. Its just a slog to have to do for the 15 thousandth time 💀

 

Esseles and Black Talon are still too long because of all the dialogue, which ends up being way worse if you get someone who won’t spacebar, which happens more often than it should in group finder. Those two are easy, but they take forever, even if you are using spacebar. Esseles is worse. Black Talon is actually OK as long as people are smashing spacebar.

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I think this depends quite a bit on the type of player that you are. I do absolutely agree that the rewards for different flashpoints and operations should vary. This would introduce a higher degree of motivation and it would also be just. I also don´t understand why this never was implemented.

However, even so I play all the fps (also the longer ones) or different operations (if possible and if there are groups) in equal manner, because for me gear is secondary. Each fp offers different content and a different experience, you can test your skills in different situations and against different adversaries, you can get achievements, sometimes decorations and similar drops - so for me it is still motivating. And I prefer Ruins of Null or Crisis on Umbara a thousand times than always running the same fps like Hammer Station of Athiss.

My recommendation for those that like to play all fps in equal measure:

1) Veteran Fps: Select only those (in groupfinder) that you actually want to play, even if this implies that you won´t get the weekly. Otherwise you will almost constantly have to do the same 2 - 3 fps over and over.

2) Master Mode Fps: here you can select all, because only lv.80 Players can participate and each fps has really the same chance to drop.

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Assuming you are running flashpoints to grind the mats to upgrade gear or even for leveling, there is simply never any reason to do most of the newer ones. Crisis on Umbarra, Objective Meridian and The Nathema Conspiracy are the worst. They are more difficult, but the bigger issue is that they take orders of magnitude longer than most other FPs and for no greater reward. Someone almost always quits the group the moment these pop. A tier below are Traitor Among the Chiss (which is only palatable if you have a stealth that can sneak you to the first boss and past innumerable trash mobs), and, oddly The Esseles because it takes forever even though you can sleepwalk through it.

 

If you are going to have such a wide variation in the difficulty level and time invested to complete certain flashpoints, there needs to be corresponding better rewards. If I got twice the materials or something from doing those longer FPs, maybe it would be worth considering. As it stands, I’m simply never going to do them. I will quit the group and switch to a different toon and hope for better RNG on my next group finder pop. This has been a problem for far too long, and I’ve never seen the Devs even attempt to address it.

 

Hey there,

 

It's like you are an audience plant! This is something we have been very recently talking about that we want to start spending some time on addressing. Taking content outliers (like Flashpoints that are dramatically longer than others) and working to bring them more in line with each other.

 

If I can hijack the thread slightly we would love to hear your "<insert content> is too <easy / hard / long / short> compared to other content of its type>". And beyond just general feedback about entire content, feel free to get really granular. Bosses that are particularly rough or unfun, travel routes that take too long, etc. This can be your airing of grievances but please be specific so that we can build actionable feedback from it.

 

I wouldn't expect these changes in the super short term (like the next couple updates) as it will take time to audit and start making changes. But it is definitely something we have interest in doing.

 

Thanks all.

 

-eric

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Hey there,

 

It's like you are an audience plant! This is something we have been very recently talking about that we want to start spending some time on addressing. Taking content outliers (like Flashpoints that are dramatically longer than others) and working to bring them more in line with each other.

 

If I can hijack the thread slightly we would love to hear your "<insert content> is too <easy / hard / long / short> compared to other content of its type>". And beyond just general feedback about entire content, feel free to get really granular. Bosses that are particularly rough or unfun, travel routes that take too long, etc. This can be your airing of grievances but please be specific so that we can build actionable feedback from it.

 

I wouldn't expect these changes in the super short term (like the next couple updates) as it will take time to audit and start making changes. But it is definitely something we have interest in doing.

 

Thanks all.

 

-eric

 

 

No... No you don't . You were told hundreds of times over that R4 was not a SM ready for pugs. You did nothing about it.

 

This is why threads get derailed and personal attacks start.... which is INDEFENSIBLE on the part of those people.

 

You have shown time and time again that you do NOT listen to feedback. Then you go silent because you cannot defend the non-decisions you guys make... and then you apologize again for being so quiet and pledge to do better.

 

I feel for you guys... you have very few people left compared to when the game was at its peak. You are not being supported enough by EA.

 

But please.... for the love of all that is holy ... stop this cycle.

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I wouldn't expect these changes in the super short term (like the next couple updates) as it will take time to audit and start making changes. But it is definitely something we have interest in doing.

-eric

 

What would maybe take less time than balancing all the flashpoints and changing them significantly might be to give us a better queueing system.

 

I play online racing games and when people can see where other people race; those places fill up with drivers straight away; until they get bored then there's another mass migration to other tracks & car cetegories.

 

I think most of the problems with the flashpoint queuing system is we just can't see what people are queuing for.

 

And i'm going to be honest; I'm never going to queue for every flashpoint in master mode.

There are 100 different bosses, with potentially different boss mechanics; I just simply can't memorize that many.

I'm only going to queue for the ones I know how to do and am prepared for.

It doesn't matter how much you incentivise it with breadcrumb rewards.

 

Give people some real choice and things might just get better organically.

 

The fact that people still use general chat to organise story mode operations is very telling how bad the queuing system is; if the queuing system worked people wouldn't use general chat.

 

you should look into this first before you start overhauling flashpoints

Edited by Inyahin
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What would maybe take less time than balancing all the flashpoints and changing them significantly might be to give us a better queueing system.

 

I play online racing games and when people can see where other people race; those places fill up with drivers straight away; until they get bored then there's another mass migration to other tracks & car cetegories.

 

I think most of the problems with the flashpoint queuing system is we just can't see what people are queuing for.

 

And i'm going to be honest; I'm never going to queue for every flashpoint in master mode.

There are 100 different bosses, with potentially different boss mechanics; I just simply can't memorize that many.

I'm only going to queue for the ones I know how to do and am prepared for.

It doesn't matter how much you incentivise it with breadcrumb rewards.

 

Give people some real choice and things might just get better organically.

 

Unfortunately they cannot give the players choice... then Hammer Station is the only one that pops.

 

I get what you are saying though. The main problem is you HAVE to queue for all of them to get the big FP-1 rewards. But the other problem is some of them can take an hour to do.

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Hey there,

 

It's like you are an audience plant! This is something we have been very recently talking about that we want to start spending some time on addressing. Taking content outliers (like Flashpoints that are dramatically longer than others) and working to bring them more in line with each other.

 

If I can hijack the thread slightly we would love to hear your "<insert content> is too <easy / hard / long / short> compared to other content of its type>". And beyond just general feedback about entire content, feel free to get really granular. Bosses that are particularly rough or unfun, travel routes that take too long, etc. This can be your airing of grievances but please be specific so that we can build actionable feedback from it.

 

I wouldn't expect these changes in the super short term (like the next couple updates) as it will take time to audit and start making changes. But it is definitely something we have interest in doing.

 

Thanks all.

 

-eric

 

Besides mat reward the vast majority of these longer Flashpoints have great Deco drops available in them but they are so inconsistent it's terrible and even sometimes never drop at all. A more efficient way of obtaining them needs to be accessible. Whether it's token drops that correlate into a vendor or achievement opening one or whatever. Back to the topic at hand. Length of time for a Flashpoint should be one factor. Also needing to be considered is number of bosses and quantity of trash mobs. Mobs should drop mats, bosses should drop mats, and mechanic checkpoints need to somehow as well. If a short FP drops a certain amount of materials than Med should drop twice as much, Long one three times, and Mechanically heavy ones that are a Pug nightmare should have a quantifier like 4 times as much as well. Carrot. Stick.

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IMO it seems that the overall objective was to slow down the entire process of gear progression.

** YES it is correct that there are not that many good groups to hang with doing the progression thing.

** "Ques" take longer. While the overall time involved is less .. getting into said group can take time (IMO this is a part of the plan).

** That said I wouldn't be surprised if someone hasn't already "maxed out" and is complaining about being bored.

** There was a time where I might have challenged the statement: " Gear IS the endgame" ... But NOW I'm not so sure that statement isn't pretty much right on target.

 

IMO we still need some way of making better use of the TOTAL resources we get from running most of what we spend time doing (Tech Fragments being at the top of that list).

 

I still want that "Third Option". (There's got to be a way to simply make better use of the resources we already have at our disposal.)

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Hey there,

 

It's like you are an audience plant! This is something we have been very recently talking about that we want to start spending some time on addressing. Taking content outliers (like Flashpoints that are dramatically longer than others) and working to bring them more in line with each other.

 

If I can hijack the thread slightly we would love to hear your "<insert content> is too <easy / hard / long / short> compared to other content of its type>". And beyond just general feedback about entire content, feel free to get really granular. Bosses that are particularly rough or unfun, travel routes that take too long, etc. This can be your airing of grievances but please be specific so that we can build actionable feedback from it.

 

I wouldn't expect these changes in the super short term (like the next couple updates) as it will take time to audit and start making changes. But it is definitely something we have interest in doing.

 

Thanks all.

 

-eric

 

Thank you for asking.

 

I have a few suggestions in general regarding flashpoints, and a few issues with specific fps.

 

Conquest points:

 

There's a gap in conquest objectives and player levels. I don't have any level 71 or 75 characters atm so I can't check the exact treshold where they change, but I have a 76. There are objectives for certain flashpoints that we need to finish on Master Mode for the extra points and it's present at least on lvl 76 already. But we can't get into MM fps anymore on lower than lvl 80! That is actually a good thing, but there are no objectives for people who are past the "veteran mode" level but not yet lvl 80 for MM. Some of the flashpoints are also so difficult a casual players might not even want to try them on MM, but they won't get anything if they do it in veteran mode. Lower levels still get their conquest points from the same flashpoint, even if it's less than from MM. Level 80 players should get something from the specific fps too, because not everyone wants to or is capable of running them in MM. You are now limiting content from people based on their level, and I don't see the point of it.

 

Suggestion: don't level lock conquest points on flashpoints, allow everyone to do the difficulty level they want to and still get the extra points. Adjust the points according to the mode they choose to run (story, veteran, master)

 

Improving group finder:

 

I'm all in favor for giving more rewards for longer and more difficult flashpoints. In addition I'd like to see group finder completely random, especially since we only get the rewards from it being random.

 

Suggestion: Remove the option to cherry pick the easy flashpoints.

 

What caused a lot of resentment in 6.0 was the HS spammers forcing anyone in the queue to join their farming. If someone still wants to run only only one flashpoint over and over again, they can form a group on fleet and walk in. That's what we already do for the difficult ones, we are not forcing randoms to join the more challenging runs, but HS farmers can still force us to join their runs if we use group finder. Group finder being completely random would be in line with PVP and GSF being random too.

 

Specific flashpoints that could use some tuning:

 

* Ruins of Nul stairs before Malgus was changed with 7.1. We can't use the grapple in combat anymore, which was added to prevent people from running through without killing them I guess? The problem is you can't get 4 people to click the grapple at the same time, not even with voice comms. The group gets split and it takes forever to get through because someone is always in combat, fighting the mobs alone. We had an incident where healer managed to click first and had to kill the adds, and you can imagine how long that took. Meanwhile the rest of us were dodging the red aoe without being able to do anything or without getting any heals. Change it back please.

* Ruins of Nul Malgus fight is very unfriendly for melee. Relentless assault takes too long, it's usually when melee dps go for a bio break because they can't do much most of the time anyhow. There's no reason to prolong it because it does get boring after a while.

 

* All new flashpoints in general are very melee unfriendly. Adds are playing tennis with melee players and it's not fun. Reduce or remove the amount of knockbacks from trash mobs. Things like that should be saved for boss fights.

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Yess, nail on the head, also can we up the weekly reward for fps or bring the cost down for upgrading per piece , lets say i have 1 toon and am only skilled enough to do the vet flashpoint weekly thats 30 per week along with what you get per boss in fps its incredibly low , it shouldnt take that long , or at the very least offer new gear in the adaptive war spoils shop not reskinned old outfits. But i digress thats something else. And the same thing can be said for operations aswell as flashpoints.
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Hey there,

 

It's like you are an audience plant! This is something we have been very recently talking about that we want to start spending some time on addressing. Taking content outliers (like Flashpoints that are dramatically longer than others) and working to bring them more in line with each other.

 

If I can hijack the thread slightly we would love to hear your "<insert content> is too <easy / hard / long / short> compared to other content of its type>". And beyond just general feedback about entire content, feel free to get really granular. Bosses that are particularly rough or unfun, travel routes that take too long, etc. This can be your airing of grievances but please be specific so that we can build actionable feedback from it.

 

I wouldn't expect these changes in the super short term (like the next couple updates) as it will take time to audit and start making changes. But it is definitely something we have interest in doing.

 

Thanks all.

 

-eric

please see this thread:

https://www.swtor.com/community/showthread.php?t=1007898

 

R4 SM is not a real SM. Fix please. TLDR: only nim and hardmare raiders have been able to clear it so far. and even nim raiders have been complaining about it.

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Hey there,

 

It's like you are an audience plant! This is something we have been very recently talking about that we want to start spending some time on addressing. Taking content outliers (like Flashpoints that are dramatically longer than others) and working to bring them more in line with each other.

 

If I can hijack the thread slightly we would love to hear your "<insert content> is too <easy / hard / long / short> compared to other content of its type>". And beyond just general feedback about entire content, feel free to get really granular. Bosses that are particularly rough or unfun, travel routes that take too long, etc. This can be your airing of grievances but please be specific so that we can build actionable feedback from it.

 

I wouldn't expect these changes in the super short term (like the next couple updates) as it will take time to audit and start making changes. But it is definitely something we have interest in doing.

 

Thanks all.

 

-eric

 

Oh, talk about opening a can of worms Mr. Musco! Okay... I'll start with Un-Fun Bosses The idiot Droid on Copero!:mad: The trash mobs are annoying enough but that droid sucks all the fun out of that gorgeous scenery!

 

Malgus on Elom :rolleyes: Seriously, why does he dart around doing almost nothing while the comps run around and you're like, yeah this is dumb.

 

Personally, this is all in SM btw...

 

But now the most awful thing about SM FP's is that they give you NOTHING at max level. :mad: Some people can't harder Modes and they should at least give Conquest Currency. What the Hay, Mr. Musco. Why do we SM players not matter.:confused:

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Hey there,

 

It's like you are an audience plant! This is something we have been very recently talking about that we want to start spending some time on addressing. Taking content outliers (like Flashpoints that are dramatically longer than others) and working to bring them more in line with each other.

 

If I can hijack the thread slightly we would love to hear your "<insert content> is too <easy / hard / long / short> compared to other content of its type>". And beyond just general feedback about entire content, feel free to get really granular. Bosses that are particularly rough or unfun, travel routes that take too long, etc. This can be your airing of grievances but please be specific so that we can build actionable feedback from it.

 

I wouldn't expect these changes in the super short term (like the next couple updates) as it will take time to audit and start making changes. But it is definitely something we have interest in doing.

 

Thanks all.

 

-eric

 

One option that may be worth considering is the return of the the two tiers of Group Finder flashpoints.

 

It’s been a long, long time now, but: prior to Update 2.0, Hard Mode flashpoints in the Group Finder were divided into two groups, based on difficulty. The “Tier 1s” were substantially easier than the Tier 2 category. So, this allowed players to queue up for a HM FP each day without risking accidentally getting an extremely hard one. There was one problem, however: the Tier 2 list never actually had more than one flashpoint: the famously difficult Lost Island Hard Mode.

 

Maybe the two Tiers should return. The Fractured Alliances flashpoints could probably all fit into Tier 2s.

 

Even better: the old pre-2.0 system allowed someone to gain double daily group finder rewards, if they were willing to complete LI HM and a Tier 1 HM FP. This could also feasibly return, offering a second round of daily rewards for anyone willing to queue up for an extra hard Master Mode.

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If I can hijack the thread slightly we would love to hear your "<insert content> is too <easy / hard / long / short> compared to other content of its type>". And beyond just general feedback about entire content, feel free to get really granular. Bosses that are particularly rough or unfun, travel routes that take too long, etc. This can be your airing of grievances but please be specific so that we can build actionable feedback from it.

 

Flashpoint weekly:

Please, please, please change the vet weekly flashpoint quest so that flashpoints we actually like running count again rather than making us queue for all of them. For example, my preferences are:

  • Hammer Station (don't hate; it's quick)
  • Battle of Ilum
  • Battle of Rishi
  • Assault on Tython
  • Korriban Excursion
  • The False Emperor
  • Depths of Manaan

If I only needed to queue for those, I'd be doing vet FPs a hell of a lot more and on more characters than I do now. At the moment, I ran flashpoints on Saturday night (for the stuff to disintegrate to unlock the mods) and that's the first time I queued for them since 7.0 went live. And I only did those because loads of lower levels players were queuing for Hammer Station so I got lucky. If any of the newer ones had come up, I'd have quit and taken the debuff (looking at you especially Traitor Among the Chiss. How can one FP need so much trash? And shout so much trash? :()

 

Redundant Areas:

I don't know if this fits the thread, however I'd like to see old areas made use of. Ossus bosses were fun to do and Rishi is such a lovely area it's a shame that we don't have dailies there. Is there a way to upgrade the drops on the Ossus bosses to make them appeal to people again? Can the general quests on Rishi be made into repeatable dailies?

 

Unranked PvP Weekly

12 wins is intolerable and some days you need 12 if you can't do several WZs in one sitting. Please reduce these. 9 would be better (keeping wins count as 3).

 

Oricon

This is the only area that I'd like to see the Op changed to or added as a soloable FP (don't hate me), even if it's harder than most soloable FPs (to the level of Vet Star Fortresses). It's the only area that I think non-ops runners miss out on with regard to the story within the OP.

 

Trash mobs

Too many trash mobs in normal content and many flashpoints. Please lower the amount of trash mobs (looking at you Sky Troopers and House Inrokini).

 

Class Companions

It was great to see Talos Drellik getting some love in 7.1. Please can we see a bit more of our old class companions? I know many of us ask this a lot, however it would make our day if this happened (as well as ensuring sub money is thrown at you for many, many months more :D )

 

Brain Chapters

Never, ever put another mind chapter in the game like Echoes of Oblivion or KotET Chapter 9: Eternal Throne.

 

Finally, the new daily area on Manaan is great but it is very dark; why does the water kill me when I fall off? Can there not be hooks we can use to pull ourselves back up rather then being killed and respawning at a med droid point or base?

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we would love to hear your "<insert content> is too <easy / hard / long / short> compared to other content of its type>". And beyond just general feedback about entire content, feel free to get really granular. Bosses that are particularly rough or unfun, travel routes that take too long, etc. This can be your airing of grievances but please be specific so that we can build actionable feedback from it.

 

Thanks all.

 

-eric

 

The issue, in most cases, is length of time the Flashpoint takes to complete. I call them Time Wasters. In some cases it is the relative difficulty of the Flashpoint, Nathema immediately springs to mind. This results in rage quitting, you can spend an hour on the Flashpoint, only to receive no completion rewards at all, because the group dissolves at the last boss. In other cases, the reward for time spent just isn't there. I know, for me, if I get a pop for a Time Waster, I just drop the group. I would rather wait for the lockout to expire, and go do other content, than waste my time on the Flashpoints in question. This is a list of the Flashpoints that I personally feel are either not worth doing on a rewards level, or because the difficulty level isn't worth the rewards given, or the toons in question haven't reached the point in the story for the Flashpoint.

 

The Esseles/Black Talon - Because this Flashpoint is the first accessed by Lowbies, it can take forever. Lowbies have a tendency to want to watch the cut scenes, which are very nice, but for vets this is tedious and make what should be a 10-15 minute speed run take more than an hour do to the length of the Flashpoint.

 

Blood Hunt - Long and complicated, and can be cancer for lowbies. Get a lot of rage quits at the twins. Better to just avoid it.

 

Maelstorm Prison - Rage Quits, length, lack of reward

 

Taral V - Length not worth rewards

 

Crisis on Umbara

A Traitor Among The Chiss

Nathema Conspiracy

Objective Meridian

Spirit of Vengeance

Secrets of the Enclave

Ruins of Nul

None of the late game Flashpoints have a high enough level of rewards to make them worth doing via GF. And since these are all tied into the story directly, unless the toon has already been through there, or you just don't care about Chronology......

 

Kaon Under Siege

Lost Island

These are just too long, and in the case of Lost Island, the difficulty level of the boss isn't worth the level of rewards given.

 

And while we are discussing Group Finder, could we please get Kuat Drive Yards added back into the rotation. This Flashpoint is fairly quick and easy, and a Flashpoint that has Cheevos tied to it, and was always great for XP for Lowbies. It is the only Flashpoint not listed on GF, and no reason was ever given for its removal, nor has any acknowledgement been given by the Devs for the reports that have been made about this. I myself reported this both to the Suggestions Forum, and the Bug Report Forum quite some time ago. Some kind of information, either an acknowledgement from the Devs that this is an issue that is being looked at, or some kind of explanation for having removed it from the rotation, would be appreciated.

Edited by NeoBlakkrstal
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Hey there,

 

It's like you are an audience plant! This is something we have been very recently talking about that we want to start spending some time on addressing. Taking content outliers (like Flashpoints that are dramatically longer than others) and working to bring them more in line with each other.

 

If I can hijack the thread slightly we would love to hear your "<insert content> is too <easy / hard / long / short> compared to other content of its type>". And beyond just general feedback about entire content, feel free to get really granular. Bosses that are particularly rough or unfun, travel routes that take too long, etc. This can be your airing of grievances but please be specific so that we can build actionable feedback from it.

 

I wouldn't expect these changes in the super short term (like the next couple updates) as it will take time to audit and start making changes. But it is definitely something we have interest in doing.

 

Thanks all.

 

-eric

 

Remember several years ago, when the group finder still had the flashpoints listed in level brackets? You should do something like that again and group flashpoints based on their length and complexity and adjust rewards accordingly. We told you a long time ago that just having all flashpoints in one pool is a bad idea, especially in veteran mode, when you have people on the team who are not ready yet for more complex fight mechanics. A level 16 player has no business getting thrown into the likes of A Traitor Among the Chiss or Lost Island, they will just hinder the rest of the group and everyone will have a bad time.

 

So make different difficulty / length brackets, something like beginner, intermediate and expert flashpoints and have different tiers of rewards based on the selected bracket.

 

Example:

 

Beginner Bracket: The Esseles, Hammer Station, Taral V, The Battle of Ilum

 

Intermediate Bracket: Korriban Incursion, Czerka Core Meltdown, Depths of Manaan, Colicoid War Games

 

Expert bracket: Ruins of Nul, The Nathema Conspiracy, Objective Meridian, Spirit of Vengeance

 

Make it so that people can decide to only queue for specific brackets, but they will still get credit for weeklies and gain specific rewards when queuing for all flashpoints in a selected bracket. Increase the rewards based on what bracket(s) you are currently queuing for, with the most amount of rewards being offered to queue for everything.

 

I know your goal is to get as much runs to pop as possible, but you have to understand that certain content simply isn't meant to be run with a completely random group. There's too big a chance that the group will contain people who just aren't ready for that content (yet). Flashpoints (and operations. Looking at you, R-4) are not equal to one another. Whether it's the mechanics or just a lack of polished balancing, everyone is going to have a bad time if a group of random people can't function together in a group when there are people in it that don't have enough of a grasp of their class yet or still lack core abilities because they aren't at a specific level yet. You need to remember that the flashpoints at launch were actually balanced in such a way that they wouldn't become available until a certain level, both mechanically and in terms of combat rotation, and let me tell you, your recent attempts at balancing classes and shuffling abilities around to different levels has not helped matters in the slightest when it comes to running veteran flashpoints. What good is a level 15 damage dealer in a flashpoint with bosses that require constant interrupts?

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Hammer station is my favourite, I'm said that I need to toggle all of them.

 

When you have a job or a family, hammer station was the blessing that still let you get goog gear in 6.0 .

 

Many of the new ones are too hard, too long, or just bugged.

Edited by PallyHk
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Hey there,

 

It's like you are an audience plant! This is something we have been very recently talking about that we want to start spending some time on addressing. Taking content outliers (like Flashpoints that are dramatically longer than others) and working to bring them more in line with each other.

 

If I can hijack the thread slightly we would love to hear your "<insert content> is too <easy / hard / long / short> compared to other content of its type>". And beyond just general feedback about entire content, feel free to get really granular. Bosses that are particularly rough or unfun, travel routes that take too long, etc. This can be your airing of grievances but please be specific so that we can build actionable feedback from it.

 

I wouldn't expect these changes in the super short term (like the next couple updates) as it will take time to audit and start making changes. But it is definitely something we have interest in doing.

 

Thanks all.

 

-eric

Thank you so much for your response. Here are my thoughts on Mastermode flashpoints. Thank you for removing sub-80 from Mastermode flashpoints as the rest of the team was carrying them… but we tried to be nice about it without kicking players. I will say that everything below is based on me being the healer usually for queuing purposes. (i330) I DPS around 20k single target in mastermode flashpoints. I effectively heal around 20k. I am not the best player around by any means.

 

Group composition: 320 dps. 324 tank. 324 dps 328 healer. This is the kind of composition I mostly see.

 

Blood Hunt - Medium Difficulty. Medium. Well balanced.

 

Battle of Rishi - Final Shield Squadron Unit 1 hardest thing about it is the blue circle on the last boss does wider damage than the radius shown. Mechanic heavy. Difficult to almost impossible to complete.

 

Assault on Tython - Final boss does so much damage to everyone that the Healer must be of the best in the game. Shadow tanks are 2 shotted. Almost impossible to complete.

 

The Nathema Conspiracy - Everyone bails. This is the hardest mission in the roster. Stupid hard. Almost impossible to complete.

 

Athiss- Cake walk. Short. Fun. Easy. Pretty sure this can be soloed.

 

Mandalorian Raiders - Medium length. Medium to Easy difficulty. Well balanced.

 

Maelstrom Prison - full 320 gear can be completed with extreme difficulty. One 330 can carry the whole team. Long but doable. Well balanced.

 

Objective Meridian - Long… everyone bails. I don’t know how hard… nobody stays.

 

Ruins of Nul- Veteran mode is so long and hard I even bail on Master Mode of this one.

 

The Red Reaper- One 330 player can solo with comp in about 20 mins. It is short. While 4 players May fail. Mechanic HEAVY. Spectacularly Fun. Well balanced because it is short but mechanically heavy. Almost impossible to complete and at the same time the second easiest flashpoint.

 

Legacy of the Rakata - Medium length Medium difficulty. One player can solo the first bosses but fail beyond that. (rancor and rakata boss) Well balanced but the final bosses Darth Arkous and Colonel Darok are group killers.

 

Crisis on Umbara.- the last boss and so many adds makes this fight VERY hard. Long mission. Everyone bails on this. Long. final boss hits us with aoe that we cannot see underground.

 

Czerka Corporate Labs- the first boss has i think 12 million health… to put this in perspective Red reapers first boss has 4 million health. Most groups fail on first boss because the healer just cannot heal for 12 mins straight. Almost impossible to complete because team falls apart.

 

Cademimu - Easy. Mechanic Medium. Medium length. Fun and rewarding. Well balanced.

 

Koan Under Siege- #nope.

 

Taral V- Pretty long distance traveled. Pretty sure this mission can be soloed. Cake Walk. zero mechanics. Well balanced.

 

The Battle of Illum- Cakewalk. first boss is a weak player culling device. Long distance traversed. Well balanced.

 

Spirit of Vengeance - First boss has a cleanse mechanic nobody knows. You cleanse, we die! Group killer. Long mission. Scores of enemies. Rewarding. Difficult.

 

Depths of Manaan- tricky mechanics. With a good tank this mission is duable. Hard and rewarding. Medium length. Difficult

 

Korriban incursion - almost as hard as Assault on Tython. Is doable but hard. Difficult

 

A Traitor Among the Chiss- long. Difficult to almost impossible to complete.

 

Czerka Core Meltdown- fairly difficult. Medium length. Mechanic medium. Difficult

 

Hammer station- the easiest Flashpoint in the game. Hammer Spammer, Hammer Force. So easy that often the mechanics are completely ignored by the dps. I think the difficulty needs to be raised. The mechanics are brute forced, leaving the healer to have to pick up the slack. Spam this mission for sure but at least learn it if the player base is going to spam it. To easy! Please make this mission twice as hard please but leave the bonus boss alone.

 

Lost Island- the rancor knockback on one boss is easily the hardest thing about this mission. The second hardest thing is the enrage timer on the last boss. Third hardest thing is back to the rancor. The switches mechanic is group killer as the healer needs to single target heal everyone at once. It is hard to do. Fairly long. Oh and the first boss is a group killer too. Mechanic heavy Difficult to almost impossible.

 

Directive 7- cake walk. Long mission. Mechanic heavy. Well balanced

 

The esseles- very very long. Can be soloed. Very long. Zero mechanics. Very long. I will drop if this mission show up. I will actually turn the game off and go to a different game for presumably 15 mins… turns into the rest of the day.

 

Secrets of the Enclave- hard. fun. long. mechanic medium. Well balanced.

 

Thanks again for working on Star Wars: Knights of the Old republic.

 

I LOVE LOVE LOVE the loadouts. Unfortunately we cannot have nice things because of cheaters.

 

May the force be with you.

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Hey there,

 

It's like you are an audience plant! This is something we have been very recently talking about that we want to start spending some time on addressing. Taking content outliers (like Flashpoints that are dramatically longer than others) and working to bring them more in line with each other.

 

If I can hijack the thread slightly we would love to hear your "<insert content> is too <easy / hard / long / short> compared to other content of its type>". And beyond just general feedback about entire content, feel free to get really granular. Bosses that are particularly rough or unfun, travel routes that take too long, etc. This can be your airing of grievances but please be specific so that we can build actionable feedback from it.

 

I wouldn't expect these changes in the super short term (like the next couple updates) as it will take time to audit and start making changes. But it is definitely something we have interest in doing.

 

Thanks all.

 

-eric

 

We'd like sm r4 to be completable by group finder groups

 

Currently the operation can't be completed by random groups thru group finder. It requires a pre-made team

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there is some survivorship bias in this as i would consider my skill level significantly above average. Ill rank the fps in relation to each other from very easy to very hard based on the boss encounters or other required mechanics at master mode and then make a comment if there is something that is noteworthy like excessive lenght.

 

Esseles/Black Talon - very easy. more cutscenes than anything else, if people dont skip youre are stuck here for an hour.

 

Hammer Station - very easy. The name spammer station doesnt come out of nowhere. by far the fastest fp and go to gear farm run that ive been forced into by the group finder too many times. Also nobody wants to do the bonus boss because not skiping adds to get the required kills doubles the time the fp takes.

 

Athiss

Mandalorian Raiders

Cademimu

Boarding Party

Taral V

The Foundry

Maelstorm Prison

Directive 7

Battle of Ilum

The False Emperor

-> these all have in common that they are easy but pretty long if you would do all the trash on the way. In some of them people found ways to skip a lot of it but then you cant do the bonus anymore or in case of Taral V and False Emperor you can literally skip a boss (the droid before the bunker entrance and the gamorrean you can literally just walk past if you stick to the wall). So i would suggest to either reduce the required kills/objectives to do the bonus bosses or completely disconnect the bonus boss from any other objective like in the more recent fps.

 

Red Reaper - medium. Its not the easiest one as it has some mechanics that you actually cant ignore anymore this patch but given you can skip everything as a stealther one of the more farmable ones i dont really like to do.

 

Kaon under siege - medium. its ok.

 

Lost Island - hard. most bosses in here are hard for a casual group, especially bonus boss and last boss. while you can skip bonus last one might often break a group, ive wiped there a lot after the initial 7.0 release with low dps.

 

Czerka corporate labs - medium. trash is really manageable and not as boring given it has some mechanic to it at times but the first boss feels a bit overtuned atm.

 

Czerka core meltdown - easy. very basic mechanics, very few trash packs, good time/effort relation.

 

Assault on Tython - medium or hard. better have a decent healer but again feels pretty fast and the bonus boss doesnt require more kills than you do anyway.

 

Korriban Incursion - medium. same deal as tython but the second boss is the only boss ive seen people struggle.

 

Depths of Manaan - medium or hard. trash packs before the second boss are pretty long and the second boss also requires some idea of what you are doing and a semi-competent heal.

 

Legacy of the Rakata - medium. there isnt too much trash to clear but it feels stretched over a pretty long distance and in return feels pretty long.

 

Blood hunt - medium or hard. almost no trash but has a good pace with bosses that feel like they got easier over the years but still arent easy.

 

Battle of Rishi - medium or hard. last boss is hard for pug groups, length is ok.

 

Crisis on Umbara - hard or very hard. first boss is cheeseable by hiding in the corner, last boss is hard with all the adds that are also hard to find with all the barrels on the minimap counting as enemies.

 

Traitor among the Chiss - very hard. and please do something about the trash before first boss, it takes longer than the rest of the fp if you cant skip it. pug groups will often break on second boss.

 

Nathema conspiracy - very hard. and very long, the trash packs between 1st and 2nd boss take too long if you cant skip and between 2nd and 3rd boss are super annoying to fight with the roots and knockbacks.

 

Objective Meridian - medium. too much trash but you can just walk past it so whatever, also there were differences here between rep and imp and one was significantly harder than the other but forgot what was what.

 

Spirit of Vengence - very hard. this might be my perception due to a bunch of bugs ive encountered here. its also very long but it has a lot of bosses so its not like there is excessive trash packs its just overall takes longer to do than most of the others.

 

Secrets of the Enclave - medium. not sure how hard the final dps check on last boss is for casual groups but after youre in the there isnt much trash and killing the droid on the console serves a purpose.

 

Ruins of Nul - medium. second boss requires some knowledge of what youre supposed to do and ive not done the bonus boss yet given it was disabled for a while.

 

In general fps are lacking a bit of an incentive to do them atm and there is even less reason to do long or tedious ones other than purely for fun knowing you wont get anything form it and people might just quit the group in search of the next spammer station. People used to do them for gear last patch and now they just arent as needed for that anymore. Same thing for HM ops atm that similarly lack any real reward for completing the harder ones (dxun, gods, rav, tos and now r4 i guess havnt cleared that yet).

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