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Should Bioware revert to the old game mechanics?


andrewpicoman

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This is something that has been bugging me for some time now. I've been playing since the game first came out, and in the first few years, I enjoyed the game. I was on basically everyday, had an active guild, everything. As more and more changes started to come, I slowly started to pull away from the game. I also noticed many others doing the same. My once very active guild went from hundreds being on everyday to someone else logging on maybe once or twice a month. I recently just logged back on after about four years. The game is unrecognizable. I remember back in 2015 when Knight of the Fallen Empire was just being released. That brought me back into the game for a short while and I played through it, but just never really enjoyed it. That's not what I don't really like though. What I don't like are all the changes they made in this patch, such as level sync, choosing your companion's combat roles, turning cunning, fortitude, willpower, and strength into one mastery stat, all armor basically becoming adaptive armor now, etc. I hated them all. I also hated the new crafting system and skill tree. I used to have a crafting empire, but now, it doesn't seem to be worth it. And don't even get me started on the new character selection screen music. This is not the game I came to enjoy. Does anyone else feel the same? That they should revert to the old mechanics?
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The companion stuff is just fine:

* I like being able to choose a companion based on who the companion is rather than what its combat role is.

* I like not having to gear up companions, even though my main class back then was a Trooper, so had Aim on all companions.

 

I don't see the problem with one mainstat for everyone, and that change finally put an end to the gentle pleasure of killing a mob and getting a nice shiny new Assault Cannon which had Cunning as a mainstat.

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I do agree that it is nice that I don't have to gear up my companions now and that I can take my favorite companions rather than someone meant for a specific role, I just really miss the old system. It just feels strange after four years of playing with Khem Val as a tank, that he now heals me. It destroys the immersion in my opinion.

 

I see what you mean about getting an assault cannon with cunning when you are a trooper, which iirc used fortitude. While it makes it easier, I felt like it really made finding and/or crafting gear almost pointless. When I first started, I remembered having some toons crafting gear for others while on others, I would go out and try to get a certain piece of gear. In a way, I felt like it destroyed crafting and part of the in-game economy. Of course, there are other things doing this too, but I feel like when actually going out and crafting the gear yourself or going to do heroics and getting modifiable gear (gear that I actually miss because they usually looked good and were great due to the customization), for example, become nearly pointless, then it starts to affect everything. Again though, just my opinion.

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Ultimately, people want more customization, especially with outfits, and cartel market options, so the implementation of adaptive armor is not only a positive thing, it has little to do with game mechanics.

 

Companions available for certain roles: ultimately, this was a good move too. First, it allows players to play with the companion they want, rather than the one which will supplement their spec the best. Second, it evens the playing field for new characters ... Jedi Knights not getting a healing companion until Balmorra was more tedious than challenging ... and really, the devs have been clear that getting people to play and enjoy the core story content is the most important thing. Story progress should never really be blocked because the character cannot survive the encounters. There are other challenges in the game.

 

Companions not needing gear any more: I'm mixed on this. Realize that, aside from set bonuses, companions benefitted from BiS gear just as much as the player character, so collecting 1-5 additional whole sets of gear (sans relics) was tedious and expensive, though it did add some complexity. It certainly would be less tedious now, since there is a surplus of gear. I can imagine kitting out companions in a full set of Amplified Champion with unlettered mods is relatively straightforward. However, I believe they needed to overhaul companion affection into influence to account for game mechanics and story choices that didn't involve companions you could or would be able to actually summon. What they were able to do with NPCs in KOTFE/KOTET was far beyond how companions reacted at launch. I much prefer that system, and so if some of the "baby" of Companion Gear had to be thrown out with the "bath water" of Affection to make way for Influence, so be it. Not to mention, it made introduction of monetized companions much easier. I don't fault the Devs for making companions you can purchase ... I'm sure there's a subset of players who really like it, at the very least people who liked Beast Handler-type classes in other games. That opened the door to in-game reward/reputation/loot companions, including the Gamorrean, Rodian, Ugnaught, and H2-WF companions.

 

I feel like the reduction of 4-combat stats to Mastery isn't really a huge change in game mechanics. Functionally its the same, it simplifies loot tables and the crafting of item modifications. I speculate that the devs had some database performance issues that the simplification addressed. I don't think this change was a big loss either, though there are some caveats (see below.)

 

The loss of skill trees is probably the only major thing I moderately dislike. I was never enough of an end-game player when they existed to really seize upon the benefits of hybrid specs, but I imagine it was a balancing nightmare. Players tend to be of the opinion that they should be able to excel in any form of content regardless of the spec they choose. The notion that, say, Anni/Watchman should be better at PvE with Carnage/Combat better at PvP, for example, seems to just be unacceptable for players. Maybe I'm reading the forums wrong, but that's how it seems to me. And that sentiment was even more so with hybrid specs. "Every spec should be viable at everything" is a very different standard than "every spec should be exceptional at everything," and the latter standard definitely wasn't achievable pre-3.0 and probably isn't even now. It is an aspect of simplification, or if you prefer "dumbing-down" the game, which sacrifices individual customization for the sake of game balance.

 

That being said, translation of skill trees into disciplines+utilities didn't truly fundamentally change gameplay ... I mean, I think of fundamental changes to gameplay mechanics as the change from the combat queues of vanilla SWG to the more SWTOR-like abilities (with casts, cooldowns, and channels) system of the New Game Enhancements of SWG. Nothing like that even comes remotely close in SWTOR.

 

The one area of dumbing down that I dislike is crafting. I really dislike the changes in 6.0, but I'm not going to repeat all that here. SWTOR's crafting will never hold a candle to SWG. I don't want to make the post much longer than it already is, but the introduction of assembly components in 4.0 (or was it 3.0?) followed by the nested and quality-tiered assembly components of 6.0 isn't "exciting" or "interesting" in my book. Its function to act as a credit/material sink adds tedious complexity to launch SWTOR crafting without making it intellectually stimulating. Despite adding complexity, it also doesn't really fundamentally alter the mechanics of crafting compared to launch.

 

Bottom line: I don't think any of the major changes really fundamentally altered SWTOR, at least comparing it to SWG's fundamental transformation. I mean, I've been here since closed beta and the game pretty much plays the same as it did at launch. Gather resources from nodes or buy from players, use a recipe, sometimes RE a new recipe, every outcome is the same. Drag your ability to the toolbar, press its keybind or click it, do the next ability, wait for cooldown to come back and repeat your rotation as necessary. None of this has really changed.

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The loss of skill trees is probably the only major thing I moderately dislike. I was never enough of an end-game player when they existed to really seize upon the benefits of hybrid specs, but I imagine it was a balancing nightmare.

I was around at the time they introduced Disciplines, and the elimination of hybrids was a driving reason for the move, with balancing cited (by the studio) as the major problem with hybrids.

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Now that I'm thinking about it, I think EA/Bioware should do what WoW did with classic servers. I've never played that game, but the idea sounds like what I would want. If there was a way to keep your current characters on their current servers, and then if you would like to, create new characters on the classic servers. It'd be the best of both worlds.
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Now that I'm thinking about it, I think EA/Bioware should do what WoW did with classic servers. I've never played that game, but the idea sounds like what I would want. If there was a way to keep your current characters on their current servers, and then if you would like to, create new characters on the classic servers. It'd be the best of both worlds.

Are you sure? This idea pops up from time to time, but if you want "true" classic, then you have to consider...

Don't forget to include in all the joys of "Classic":

* the almost-total lack of end-game content

* having to "use" taxis as "source" before you could use them as "destination"

* having to pay credits for ability training

* having to pay gobs of gobs of credits for speeder piloting that doesn't make that 8K credit speeder go faster

* no zero-cooldown option on quick travel

* no 120% and 130% speeder piloting options

* having to unlock *all* QT points by clicking on them before you can QT to them (there's still a few like that, and they are... annoying)

 

Etc.

 

No, I think your Nostalgia-O-Matic goggles are unusually rose-tinted.

So no, I think this is not really a good idea.

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Now that I'm thinking about it, I think EA/Bioware should do what WoW did with classic servers. I've never played that game, but the idea sounds like what I would want. If there was a way to keep your current characters on their current servers, and then if you would like to, create new characters on the classic servers. It'd be the best of both worlds.

 

Absolutely not. There is no content/story in the game that you cannot access now, except for some [HEROIC 2+] missions on the starter planets... I’ve advocated for the return of all that, as have others, elsewhere. But the majority of missions are still available to this day. There is no reason to have a vanilla server which will be missing, in addition to the quality of life changes described by Steve:

1). Everything about strongholds

2). Everything about GSF

3). Heroic space on rails missions

4). Reputation

5). Legacy gear

6). All events

7). TEN out of the 11 operations plus all of the event ops bosses and the three single ops bosses

8). More than half of the 25 flashpoints we currently have

9). All arenas and most of the warzones we currently have

 

Should I really go on? I mean that doesn’t even include hours of cinematic storytelling over eight planets

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Are you sure? This idea pops up from time to time, but if you want "true" classic, then you have to consider...

 

So no, I think this is not really a good idea.

 

Okay, so assuming it has the QoL improvements included, maybe not make it true 1.0 something like 1.2 or 2.0, I don't think it is necessarily that bad of an idea. If you don't like it, it's as simple as not playing it. I just think this would be a look back for veterans who have played the game since launch.

 

To address some of what phalzen said:

1) Strongholds - In my opinion, a waste of credits. It really is just another place to keep a mail box, cargo bay, etc. Other than that, there really is not much to it.

 

2) GSF - I was actually excited for GSF when it came out. I wasn't really impressed though. I haven't tried the queue lately, but last year (shortly before onslaught launched), I would rarely get a match. I don't think it is an entire loss.

 

3) Reputation - If you go between 1.0 and 2.0, reputation will be an option.

 

4) Legacy Gear - Something I don't necessarily see as a necessity, but if you're that serious about, BtL gear was added sometime in May 2012, so still between 1.0 and 2.0

 

5) Events - Not necessarily every event. I remember the rakghoul event was first added in 1.10. I believe the Gree event was also added sometime around 1.5 or 1.7. Sure, there are other events that would not be available, but again, this is meant to emulate 2011-2012 SWTOR, not 2020 SWTOR.

 

6) Newer ops were added in after launch between 1.0 and 2.0.

 

7) Flashpoints and PvP - Half of the fps doesn't seem right, but I can check again. With PvP, of course you're losing a lot of maps. This isn't supposed to be modern PvP though (which is quite **** iirc, which seems to be the sentiments of many people I've spoken to; feel free to disagree) , this is supposed to be 1.0 to 2.0 PvP.

 

It all comes down to preference in the end. As I said above, if this were a thing, then you shouldn't play it. That goes for everything: Don't like it, don't play it. If it's just an extra server or something, you don't have to play it. I could go on and list reasons for why I think this should be a thing, but it's not worth it. Not only do you two have your minds made up, but EA/Bioware doesn't listen to their fan base.

 

One other option out there though is to make era-specific servers. Keep the modern ones, but add new ones (or even bring some of the old ones back) that have the game set at different update periods.

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To address some of what phalzen said:

1) Strongholds - In my opinion, a waste of credits. It really is just another place to keep a mail box, cargo bay, etc. Other than that, there really is not much to it.

 

2) GSF - I was actually excited for GSF when it came out. I wasn't really impressed though. I haven't tried the queue lately, but last year (shortly before onslaught launched), I would rarely get a match. I don't think it is an entire loss.

 

3) Reputation - If you go between 1.0 and 2.0, reputation will be an option.

 

4) Legacy Gear - Something I don't necessarily see as a necessity, but if you're that serious about, BtL gear was added sometime in May 2012, so still between 1.0 and 2.0

 

5) Events - Not necessarily every event. I remember the rakghoul event was first added in 1.10. I believe the Gree event was also added sometime around 1.5 or 1.7. Sure, there are other events that would not be available, but again, this is meant to emulate 2011-2012 SWTOR, not 2020 SWTOR.

 

6) Newer ops were added in after launch between 1.0 and 2.0.

 

7) Flashpoints and PvP - Half of the fps doesn't seem right, but I can check again. With PvP, of course you're losing a lot of maps. This isn't supposed to be modern PvP though (which is quite **** iirc, which seems to be the sentiments of many people I've spoken to; feel free to disagree) , this is supposed to be 1.0 to 2.0 PvP.

1). Lots of people like decorating. In Daniel Kaufmann's "Dr. SWTOR" Ph.D dissertation, he found that for a large majority of people, customization/personalization is the most important aspect of the game to them. This is another piece to that puzzle. It's also not just about decorating, its also about creating a social space. You could make the argument that Guild Flagships would be sufficient for that, but then you would lose both the ability to create space for RP reasons/non-guilded friend gatherings AND personal space.

 

2). That's you but there are a subset of people who only subscribe for GSF, and people like me who enjoy it and feel space content is iconic to any Star Wars game.

 

3-6). Well, see, now you're moving the goalposts. Is it launch, or not? 1.7.3a (the last update before RotHC) wasn't the same game as 1.0. And the only recurring event at that time was Gree. And at that point they had added two more FP, three more ops (for four total), and two more WZ (for five total).

 

7) Launch FP:

Esseles/BT, Hammer, Athiss, Cademimu, Mando Raiders, Red Reaper, Collicoid, Directive 7, Taral V/Boarding Party, Maelstrom/Foundry, Battle of Ilum, False Emperor (12 per faction, 15 total)

1.0-2.0 Kaon, Lost Island (17)

2.0-3.0 KDY, Assault on Tython (x2), Korriban Incursion (x2), Manaan, Legacy of Rakata (24)

3.0-4.0 Blood Hunt, Battle of Rishi (26)

4.0-5.0 Star Fortresses (x6) (32)

5.0-6.0 Umbara, Copero, Nathema (35)

6.0-current Objective Meridian (36)

RE: pvp: right, because Ilum pvp was working so well.

It all comes down to preference in the end. As I said above, if this were a thing, then you shouldn't play it. That goes for everything: Don't like it, don't play it.

No, it doesn't come down to just "preference." I don't want the developers, as stretched thin as they are, wasting time trying to develop this, when they could be fixing what's broken on live and adding new content.

 

I'd love to see actual numbers on what % of current WoW subs are STILL playing their classic servers now, after a year. I'd bet its less than 10%. Even if we were to assume that the exact same percentage of players of SWTOR would be interested in playing a 1.x server (which is a pretty BIG assumption), is that still truly worth the time, money, and effort, to develop and provide electricity/physical maintenance/worldwide internet connectivity, for such a server? Not to mention no bug fixes for whatever was still in the game at 1.7.3a, and no customer service support? Or do you feel you are entitled to those things, too, which adds ongoing expense to your request?

Edited by phalczen
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To pick one thing:

I agree on Skill trees. I don't know why each and every developer jumps on this simplicity wagon...

 

The skill trees added a certain depth, some path had to be chosen, some choices to be made, but most importantly it looked like a tree xD

Seriously the tree like structure supports "building something up" rather than just selecting a button...

 

Not for no reason Path of Exile (A HUGE PASSIVE NODE TREE game) is so succesful!1!

Image Passive-Tree

 

I personally have never seen a problem with skill trees, as a player, yet weirdly all western devs just do it wrong. Please stop turning pc-games into oversimplified console titles.

 

YES, bring back this "old" good mechanic. Why because it's better.

Edited by HottesIce
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Okay, so assuming it has the QoL improvements included, maybe not make it true 1.0 something like 1.2 or 2.0, I don't think it is necessarily that bad of an idea. If you don't like it, it's as simple as not playing it. I just think this would be a look back for veterans who have played the game since launch.

 

To address some of what phalzen said:

1) Strongholds - In my opinion, a waste of credits. It really is just another place to keep a mail box, cargo bay, etc. Other than that, there really is not much to it.

 

Everything that Steve mentioned, unlocking taxis, quick access points etc remained a thing until 4.0 I believe. So 2.0 era would still have all that crap to deal with.

 

The major advantage of SHs were the legacy stronghold bays that allowed sharing between characters. That was a massive advantage for crafters [until the mat bank] and impacted every player, not just subs. I used to mail gear bought with planet-specific commendations, one mod at a time to new chars. Subs were able to do more than 1, but still pretty inconvenient for a long time.

 

As phalzcen said, why would we want this? What's the benefit that would account for the cost in resources? OWPVP? Sounds like you weren't a fan. No level sync? Because this game isn't EZ mode as it is? Skill trees?

 

To pick one thing:

I agree on Skill trees. I don't know why each and every developer jumps on this simplicity wagon...

 

Not for no reason Path of Exile (A HUGE PASSIVE NODE TREE game) is so succesful!1![/b]

Image Passive-Tree

 

To each their own but I literally lol'd when i saw this. That might look cool to you but to me it's massively over-complicated, like I'd need a novel-length instruction book to figure it out, and yeah I'll pass.

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I do not really see why we should go back to any of the old stuff. I can actually hardly think of anything which was "old" back then. What we got was only QoL improvements, like it was mentioned with companions (no gear, changing roles...), skill tree (which had to be removed due to hybrids) etc. Crafting did change but the change is not that crazy compared to the old ways. I really cannot see much that has changed.

 

When you read the thread about introducing "SWTOR Classic server" you will see that we still have swtor classic now, but with QoL improvmenets so there is no need for something like this. I would say the game is great the way it is now and needs no changes.

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The only thing I'd like is not in the new or the old. I want to turn off all xp. That's it.

That won't happen (i.e. turning it *all* oiff so you gain none at all) because it would:

* Bust someone's experience when he turns it off too early, and somehow arrives on Quesh at level 30 and can't progress his story because the medical NPC won't give him the shots, so the shuttle remains locked. Our poor schmuck then cannot figure out what he turned off when and cannot progress.

* More to the point, it would mess up PvP bracketing - you'd find a bunch of people that lock themselves right at the top of a lowbie or midbie PvP bracket and consequently pwn all the new arrivals.

 

A "slow me down" option, sure, why not, but not a "no progress at all" option.

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After reading how long OP's break was, I can't help but wonder if it's really just a case of culture shock more than anything. Four years is a *long* time to go not playing an MMO, even one as slow in the development department as SWTOR is.

 

ETA: People are always complaining about the "dumbing down" of skill trees, and they seem to forget that all that choice was really just the *illusion* of choice. If you wanted to perform your best, you took X, Y, and Z skills. Period. Yes, even if you were going for a hybrid build. And I say this from experience: I played both WoW and SWTOR in the Before Times when they had those trees.

Edited by ThePocketFox
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ETA: People are always complaining about the "dumbing down" of skill trees, and they seem to forget that all that choice was really just the *illusion* of choice. If you wanted to perform your best, you took X, Y, and Z skills. Period. Yes, even if you were going for a hybrid build. And I say this from experience: I played both WoW and SWTOR in the Before Times when they had those trees.

 

Isn't that the truth? There is an entire discord server dedicated to hashing out the best in slot tacticals and set bonuses for each discipline. Sets have been nerfed, but there have been very few buffs, and most of the recommendations haven't changed since Onslaught launched. The whole point of horizontal progression was to give choice, but again there do appear to be clear winners. And, in typical Bioware fashion, the nerf sledgehammer comes first, followed by neglect for months, rather than bringing the underperforming sets up to snuff. I have to give them credit though for trying the horizontal progression approach, and sticking to it with their sets introduced with Dxun Master (Nightmare) mode.

 

On a more philosophical note, is choice of sets/utilities/stats always going to be an illusion in an environment where, ultimately, all combat encounters come down to the solution to an equation?

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On a more philosophical note, is choice of sets/utilities/stats always going to be an illusion in an environment where, ultimately, all combat encounters come down to the solution to an equation?

 

There are a few (very few) talent choices in WoW these days that are almost equally good... but again, that's *almost*, meaning the true min-maxers are always going to go for the one that gives them that 10 dps increase or 2% more survivability. And, like I said, there are so few of them I could count them on one hand.

 

So overall, I think I agree with you: in an MMO, choice is always going to be an illusion, at least for those who aim to play at the highest level of content. If you're just messing around, you have a lot more leeway.

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Everything that Steve mentioned, unlocking taxis, quick access points etc remained a thing until 4.0 I believe. So 2.0 era would still have all that crap to deal with.

Ability training costs (including speeder piloting) disappeared after *everyone* squawked about the eyewatering cost of training abilities from level 55 to 60 when 3.0 was released.

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It's just me, but I'm happy with the current state of the game. the only change I would like to see is get rid of the personal phases. it's an MMO not a single player game. Class and Story phases are enough. Edited by Kaigeos
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It's just me, but I'm happy with the current state of the game. the only change I would like to see is get rid of the personal phases. it's an MMO not a single player game. Class and Story phases are enough.

 

And have a couple dozen people fighting for heroic objectives? No thanks

 

If anything, I'd like more zones phased off. It gets tiresome, especially on earlier planets, to start a fight with a group of mobs only to have 1 or 2 people jump in, despite there being no story reason for them to actually be there

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The old Mechanic of the game was totally boring for me no real storyline that interested me and this nonsense of just fighting the same enemies over and over constant boring dailies and tear me up,

 

if we go back to 2011 or even 2013 i pulling my subscription they were the pit days of cheaters.

 

i want new storyline with the likes of the Knights of fall empire it had a storyline and different interaction with other villians,

 

the only thing i miss about the old mechanic is being able to solo the world bosses to Voss.

 

I think it be better if they made the new storyline so people are able to group up with friends or guild to completed.

 

Like it should have been for Knight of the fallen empire should have had option complete in Solo, or group team with different players 2, 3, 4 or in operation team of 8 or 16 or option for guild team of 3 to 100 going through with the level of hardness changed depend on the group numbers the reward then should have been based on level of interaction.

 

The conquest weekly system point need to change as you complete that in 20 minutes on some days it should be based on daily rewards system and the weekly reward being for the guild itself.

 

the rewards also need to be more appealing not just the same decorations, it should be mixture totally random and based on the number of conquest you complete not the reachable point system which should be for the weekly guild reward.

 

As for guilds i have not be in a real guild for 2 years now i just created my own for my own credits cause i got sick of the rules around stupid religion, talking politics and whinging guild leaders whom wanted me to drop everything just to do a guild event that i only got invited into near the end of the operation.

 

Also got sick of seeing my friends kicked from the guild events because friend of the guild leader want his mate in the event, too seeing everyone ignore my friend went he asked for help.

 

So i gave up on guilds which i can not see the point in if they are restrictive or being idoits.

 

Also can not stand this swoop rally event to me it not set up right and its design around mates not for everyone.

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And have a couple dozen people fighting for heroic objectives? No thanks

 

If anything, I'd like more zones phased off. It gets tiresome, especially on earlier planets, to start a fight with a group of mobs only to have 1 or 2 people jump in, despite there being no story reason for them to actually be there

 

Fair point on the heroics, I think all of those should have it's own phase.like Class and Story. that's however not what I was talking about. it's the personal phases that are used from Rishi forward. where if you can share the instance at all with your group mate, that they can't get credit for it, even when they have the very same quest.

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