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Spirit of Vengeance required content?


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I've never been able to complete this on 3 toons. And it is un-fun enough I'm reaching the point where I don't care if I do finish it. I'm assuming since it's purple story mode I will be locked out of any future story content if unfinished. Is this a true assessment?
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Ditto.

 

I think so. I am unable to Abandon the flashpoint. I can do other solo flashpoints, heroic missions, etc, but can't do any Group stuff because I'm locked in. The game refuses to let me leave this flashpoint. In Activities in theory I can do Enclave that follows, but I haven't tried yet. I don't know if it would officially count as part of the Story.

 

Until they fix this flashpoint so that it can be completed with the gear the game gives you in true Story Mode as was the case for every Story mandated flashpoint before it this is where the game ends for me. I will also grudgingly accept that I am able to Abandon the flashpoint, never ever complete it, and move on. I still have other characters playing the Stories and all will stop before this one. I still have many, many hours of play time left, but I haven't decided yet if I will start new characters when they are done.

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If you flatly refuse to take the time that's necessary to get higher-rated gear, then yes, you're going to have problems with SoV, but that refusal is entirely your responsibility.

 

That said, I'll say what I've said before: SoV in advance-the-story mode is tuned higher than it should be for main-story content. (The Enclave FP that follows it is significantly less demanding, for what it's worth.)

 

One final point: "I know how to play my class" implies that you are aware that sometimes you must up your gear in order to continue, and that you recognise and accept those times. When I hit Jennur's Horde in GW1, I failed *miserably* at it, so I did what was necessary to succeed (er, slow down and not aggro five million Margonites(1) all at the same time, mostly).

 

Lesson for the day: If something is hard, that's an opportunity to learn to play better. (Jennur's Horde taught me that in *spades*.)

 

(1) No, not really five million. It just felt like five million. I should also note that in a game where the max player level was only 20, the Margonites could be up to level 28. They were not the highest-level NPC enemies.

 

EDIT: one other point: the main-story missions don't give you any gear higher than 268-green rating. Main-story modes after the end of Mek-Sha should not be based on a refusal to wear gear that's higher than 268, since ordinary open-world foes drop 270-276.

Edited by SteveTheCynic
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I use the gear the game gives me, and yes that should be enough for playing the Story as it has always been. I'm well aware the Heroics, Group Flashpoints, Operations, Uprisings, Veteran Mode, Master Mode, and PvP are harder contents. Those events require the better gear. The players who enjoy them may enjoy them. I'm here for the Story. I start with Class Story Chapter One and get gear, go to Chapter two and get gear, go to Chapter three and get gear. With the gear I got in Chapter 3, I go on to Ilum and finish it. The gear I get from Ilum is enough to go to the Fortress and defeat Malgus. The gear I get from defeating Malgus I conquer Tython/Korriban. The gear I get from that I defeat Darok and Arghous. The gear I get from that I defeat Revan. The gear I get from that I do 16 chapters of stuff and defeat Arcann. The gear I get from that I do 10 chapters of stuff and defeat Vaylin or Vaylin & Arcann then defeat Valkorian. The gear I get from that I defeat Gemini and Zildrog. The gear I get from that I defeat Malgus again. The gear I get from that I defeat Tenebrae/Vitiate/Valkorian.

 

That is all as it should be. I need not do any Heroics, no group Flashpoints, no PvP, no Uprisings, no Operations (unless you choose to before defeating Revan). I haven't even mentioned Makeb. I've done it but have also skipped it and still defeated Revan, Vaylin, Arcann, and Valkorian. Never had to upgrade equipment on Fleet. Never had to increase a Companion to level 50, even though for Spirit of Vengeance you are forced a Companion you never had before. I just played the game, played the Story, as it was.

 

I had my difficulties. The Final Boss on Manaan was a nightmare until I learned to get him in the Fire Ring. I could defeat Revan even before I knew what the red and blue globes meant. I just waited it out until everyone was back and Revan no longer invulnerable. It took many deaths, but I completed the Voss Walker quest before they nerfed it to normal but still hard level. Vaylin was frustration until I learned to get out of the red area when she floats. I even defeated the infamous Sentinels of Iokath, taking a number of deaths, before I learned the Stomp strategy. Even before them setting up the turrets, lasers, and guard rails was a challenge because it was too easy to draw aggro and be mobbed to death. I needed to slow down a bit, take few enemies at a time. Some of my characters can complete it without dying. Others couldn't, but all could complete it. Again, all without ever having to go to Fleet to improve gear using only whatever the game gave me.

 

I do not apologize for expecting/demanding Spirit of Vengeance follow the same protocol.

Edited by Hadsil
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The problem is this is still a game, and giving you a free instant pass because you're not willing to work at it would not keep it a game, but turn it into a cut scene.

 

If you are truly unable to do something solo, have you tried asking for help in this MMO (which stands for massively multiplayer online). These games offer a solo solution, but that is a courtesy not a right. You are free not to play a game which has given you a WARNING that it's an online AND a multiplayer game, so if you cannot solo this then ask for help.

 

If you don't want help you're better off playing the original kotor 1 and 2 which are single player games of a similar design. It might sound harsh, but it's very frustrating seeing people on the forums resort to 'well the content is the problem not me' and I don't want the developers to make things even easier because one or two voices demand it, I am willing to be the bad guy and fight against it to ensure I get a better gaming experience by keeping a challenge in places.

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I do not apologize for expecting/demanding Spirit of Vengeance follow the same protocol.

You *should* apologise for *demanding* it, because that demand is equivalent to imposing your view of how the game should be played (yes, even the "follow the story" part) on all the other players.

 

I actually enjoyed it, in the state in which it launched, even though I thought it was overtuned, because it made me think about what I was doing rather than just mashing buttons. Yes, I have well-developed characters (duh, I've been playing SWTOR since 2013), but I develop them because I enjoy refining my gameplay, and part of that refinement is improving their gear.

 

Anecdote: back in the day, before IRL stuff intervened and imploded the group of actual humans, I was always amused by the light-hearted complaints from my guildies about my Commando doing too much damage (and therefore making tanking hard work). On the other hand, the day she finished off the two hovertanks in Explosive Conflict(1) was great fun, and the cheering over Mumble was deafening.

 

If I didn't put some effort into souping up my characters, that wouldn't have happened.

 

(1) We failed the DPS check (no comments from the back row, please(2)), and they enraged at 5-10% health each. They rapidly wiped out everyone except dear Kylath, who refused to yield to a pair of overgrown hopped-up children's toys, and *she* then wiped *them* out.

 

(2) It was our first time running that one as a guild Ops group, and my first time running it *at*all*.

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I'd have to agree that most people's problems with SoV are a 'learn to play' problem. This is not an 'elitist' opinion.

The base game is so easy now, that you barely need to do more than just spam attacks to roll through most content**. Too many people, therefore, have little experience with things like mitigating damage (defensive skills), proper positioning, kill order, etc. So, when they get to SoV it is a challenge.

 

** You basically have to take no companion and remove your armor, to make it a challenge.

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Getting my way does not stop others playing their way. This is not Story Mode despite what it says. It is one mode, high difficulty. You can have true Story Mode for casual players along with Veteran and Master Mode for those who enjoy such things. Your way prevents me from enjoying the game, and it is insulting to insist I'm playing wrong. I know what I'm doing, I've been doing it for 75+ levels already.
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Getting my way does not stop others playing their way.

It does, because some people want a bit of challenge when they advance through the story. As I said above, I actually enjoyed playing it with the increased difficulty, even if I think they overdid the increase a bit. But only a bit.(1)

This is not Story Mode despite what it says. It is one mode, high difficulty.

I would describe it as "needs good gear" rather than "high difficulty". If it was really high difficulty, it would require a high level of mastery of abilities and combat methods, combined with very good gear.

You can have true Story Mode for casual players along with Veteran and Master Mode for those who enjoy such things. Your way prevents me from enjoying the game, and it is insulting to insist I'm playing wrong. I know what I'm doing, I've been doing it for 75+ levels already.

Look carefully at those words you wrote, "true Story Mode," which tells us that you think there is One True Way to advance through the story, and, obviously, that the said One True Way is *your* way. It isn't, because there isn't any such One True Way.

 

And *your* way inhibits other people's enjoyment because it makes the story-progression boss-fights *dull*.

 

(1) See also my comment on a thread about the Dantooine heroics, emphasis added:

Gunnery Commando with almost complete 252 with 236 and 240 augments everywhere over here. R50 Lana got squished rapidly, and ran in circles collecting missiles and shooting it any way that was off-cooldown and compatible with shoot-while-move. Took a while, but I took it down.

 

Most fun I've had in a SWTOR PvE fight in a long, long time

 

((rest snipped))

("ran in circles" == *I* (er, dear Kylath(2)) ran in circles, naturally)

 

(2) Yes, the same Kylath as above.

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Sigh.

 

No.

 

True Story Mode means at the same story mode difficulty all previous mandatary story flashpoints have been, precisely meaning including only needing the gear the game gives you and not the more powerful elite gear of 306. Those who want the harder difficulty challenge while playing the story can still do so because as in previous story content you would be able to choose your difficulty level. At its current state I am denied that ability. I cannot choose the same story mode difficulty as previous mandatory story flashpoints. I must play the high difficulty that I cannot finish because I do not have the elite gear of 306. I don't have the time needed to get 306 gear. I shouldn't have to need the elite 306 gear to finish a mandatory story flashpoint. It was never needed before and didn't need to be needed.

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True Story Mode means at the same story mode difficulty all previous mandatary story flashpoints have been, precisely meaning including only needing the gear the game gives you and not the more powerful elite gear of 306.

 

"only needing the gear the game gives you" is a funny (not Ha Ha funny) thing to say. The only way to get gear to use in the game is through playing the game. That includes 306 gear. 306 is not elite gear; used to be that BiS end-game gear was only obtainable by elite players through MM Ops, solo bosses and so on. Not anymore. BW has democratized it beyond the wildest expectations.

 

Even ignoring all that: This FP can be done in unaugmented, unamplified, non-set-bonus 268 gear without a tactical. I have done it, others have done it.

 

Those who are having issues will get a lot of help on the forums if they ask with details of their Discipline and the situation they're facing.

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No.

 

True Story Mode means at the same story mode difficulty all previous mandatary story flashpoints have been, precisely meaning including only needing the gear the game gives you and not the more powerful elite gear of 306.

No.

 

There's no such thing as "True Story Mode". You're just pulling that out of your butt. Story Mode in SWTOR is whatever BW wants it to be.

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OP is right. Ever since swtor consider itself a story driven mmo it should offer that storymode option. Let's face it, it's not a true mmo, in the sense that you need to group up in order to see the whole story, like you have to in wow, or everquest, for example.

 

If you want challange and group play, it's also your right, and that option is there; it's called veteran and master modes. Feel free to play them.

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The mere fact it's called "Story Mode" does not in any way determine it's difficulty.

 

You could say that Call of Duty has a "story" (go here, kill these people, blow this up), but it too gets harder as you go along. 🙂

Edited by JediQuaker
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True, but skill and gear are two different things. I agree that content should be harder as you progress, but it should require more skill; timing your interrupts better, learn to use cc, line of sight, kite etc. You shouldn't have to be forced to do content you don't want, just to get gear to do the content you want. Storymode gear should be enough for that.
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There is a difference between hard and cannot finish through no fault of your own.

 

The Voss Walker quest was infamous for its difficulty, but it was not fun because it required repeated deaths. The only saving grace was bad guys you killed didn't respawn, so you could eventually reach the Boss Fight which itself was very difficult to defeat. They finally listened and scaled it back. They lowered the number of add on skytroopers in the Boss Fight. You still need to kill them off and stay out of the red area before the Boss fires its big weapon. Getting to the Boss Fight they scaled down the numbers. You still get pummeled and need healing, but you can actually reach the healing circles before doing so. It's still a tough quest and experience will get you through it without dying.

 

For Spirit of Vengeance, it would be nice to scale down all the enemies, but the main problem is really the Second Wave of add ons for the Final Boss. Characters die getting there, but enemies you kill don't respawn so you can reach the Bosses. They are very difficult. The first one leads with its almost instant kill so you need to get out of the danger zone fast. The second one is a numbers game. Get rid of the help first, starting with the healers. Third one is the easiest; it's just a fight. The Final One has strategy. Again kill the healers first in the First Wave. For the Second Wave you're just dead. Doesn't matter if you go after the snipers first or the mob. You just die.

Edited by Hadsil
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I would like to point out that literally every game nowadays has an easy mode which is for people who just want to enjoy the story and if solo-story mode is too easy for you you have (technically) three harder modes for more of a challenge however solo-story mode is the easiest possible difficulty therefore it should be beatable by everyone which is most assuredly not the current state. Thus if you can beat the harder difficulties you really have no reason to complain at all about the difficulty of solo-story mode. If you still feel the need to do so the problem lies with you not anyone else.

 

:mad:If the hardest difficulty is too easy for you can petition for another difficulty or for an upgrade for that difficulty, however what effects one difficulty does nothing to any other. Programming and game design just don't work that way.:mad::mad:

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I would like to point out that literally every game nowadays has an easy mode which is for people who just want to enjoy the story and if solo-story mode is too easy for you you have (technically) three harder modes for more of a challenge however

What if I want a challenge *while* I advance the story? How do I do that in post-KotET SWTOR story-by-FP? (Except in SoV.)

solo-story mode is the easiest possible difficulty therefore it should be beatable by everyone which is most assuredly not the current state.

No. It should not be so easy that a 95% blind man who can move only one finger can do it. (Yes, it's an extreme, exaggerated example, but that 95% blind quadraplegic is a member of "everyone".)

:mad:If the hardest difficulty is too easy for you can petition for another difficulty or for an upgrade for that difficulty, however what effects one difficulty does nothing to any other. Programming and game design just don't work that way.:mad::mad:

Be careful about who's in the room when you decide to lecture people about how "programming and game design" work. You might find that there are people in the room who do one or the other (they are different disciplines) as their day job. You know, like me. I've been a professional programmer for more than thirty years...

 

And for some people, the complaint is not that the hardest difficulty is too easy, but that the *only* difficulty that allows us to advance the story is too easy. There is *no* harder "advance-the-story" difficulty than Solo-Story for any of the FP-based story segments released after the end of KotET. (You can advance the Ilum and Revan stories by doing their FPs in any mode, but the Traitor arc and Onslaught+ stories can only be advanced in Solo-Story mode, which earlier FPs don't even have.)

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What if I want a challenge *while* I advance the story? How do I do that in post-KotET SWTOR story-by-FP? (Except in SoV.)

 

The same as was done in other mandatory story flashpoints. Before you enter you are given the option to play it in Story Mode, Veteran Mode, or Master Mode, if they chose to have done it in the first place or decide to do it in a future patch. Choose Veteran or Master for your challenging needs.

 

I don't remember where, but somewhere in game options you can also select your default difficulty setting for playing the game.

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The same as was done in other mandatory story flashpoints. Before you enter you are given the option to play it in Story Mode, Veteran Mode, or Master Mode, if they chose to have done it in the first place or decide to do it in a future patch. Choose Veteran or Master for your challenging needs.

 

I don't remember where, but somewhere in game options you can also select your default difficulty setting for playing the game.

 

What you are missing there although SteveTheCynic already pointed it out is, except for the chapters there is no option to play the actual story, as in the quest or FP moving the story arc further, in different difficulty levels. That was possible with the old classic FPs, but those were in no way mandatory to the main story and just required you to do the FP in any mode to finish the FP related story quest.

The first actually mandatory FPs were part of Shadow of Revan. It's been a while since I played them and honestly can't remember if there really ever was an option to choose the difficulty as you write, but ever since the chapters of KOTET and KOTFE that option wasn't given anywhere.

Doing Chiss or Nathema in Veteran or Master mode simply won't progress the arc. Everyone is required to play the main story in the solo story version, so a change in difficulty there does affect everyone.

Edited by Khaleijo
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I just finished the newest storyline today, including Spirit of Vengeance and Secret of the Enclave. I found them ok, challenging, but not too hard.

I do not appreciate the trend of those newer fps to force you to fight most mob groups, if it isn't significant for the story. I played a shadow and would have loved to stealth to avoid some of the encounters, since they are mostly tedious and not doing much in terms of storyprogression or testing your skills. Maybe a few less groups, but therefore a bit more impactful.

Other than that, it was ok. Tbh, I found some fights in the chapters and the fight against the three emperors in the Kira/Scourge storyline much more challenging.

With the second add wave in SoV, I ran down to the group at the entrance, made them mad at me,so that they would leave the comp alone and then ran back up to kill the two snipers. As a shadow, I used my cooldowns, Heroic Moment (which heals you too over time) and one or two healing nodes and was fine. Every class has some cooldowns you can use, which should help until you reach a healing node. And the companion you get (Whatshisname Ordo) is already level 25, so pretty versatile. He did a lot of healing.

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What you are missing there although SteveTheCynic already pointed it out is, except for the chapters there is no option to play the actual story, as in the quest or FP moving the story arc further, in different difficulty levels. That was possible with the old classic FPs, but those were in no way mandatory to the main story and just required you to do the FP in any mode to finish the FP related story quest.

The first actually mandatory FPs were part of Shadow of Revan. It's been a while since I played them and honestly can't remember if there really ever was an option to choose the difficulty as you write, but ever since the chapters of KOTET and KOTFE that option wasn't given anywhere.

Doing Chiss or Nathema in Veteran or Master mode simply won't progress the arc. Everyone is required to play the main story in the solo story version, so a change in difficulty there does affect everyone.

 

That's the point. They should have done it so that everyone is happy. As it stands now I cannot have the easier Story Mode Spirit of Vengeance. I must play the high difficulty it has when you don't have 306 gear, which means I cannot finish it and continue the story. Why is someone's complaint Onslaught is on easy mode more valid than my complaint Spirit of Vengeance is on hard mode? Why can't we both be happy for some future patch to address this and give the Three Modes for everyone to choose?

 

You can choose your difficulty mode to play Fallen Empire when you start it. On your character load screen where you have the icons in the bottom left for game options, see cinematics, etc. hovering the cursor over one of them will show your default difficulty mode. I set it up when I first started play and haven't touched it since, so I don't know offhand how to change it. It's likely in the game options gear icon. Default mode I'm guessing is for non-flashpoint play since flashpoints are where the difficulty options are given.

Edited by Hadsil
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I have to admit I've given up on trying to do Spirit of Vengeance as well. I can't count how many times someone has told me "it's playable if you want to run it solo" but I hate to say it, it is still not playable, despite the protestations that it's been fixed. The regular NPCs are still way too overpowered and they hit like mini-bosses, the jumping across the firepit on the ship is insane and it's impossible to do it without a team. Not to mention the fact that you can't run Secrets of the Enclave without completing Spirit of Vengeance. The FPs before SoV were challenging but they are playable if you're sufficiently geared. But, even the storymode for Spirit of Vengeance feels like it's jacked up to Veteran Mode.
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I have to admit I've given up on trying to do Spirit of Vengeance as well. I can't count how many times someone has told me "it's playable if you want to run it solo" but I hate to say it, it is still not playable, despite the protestations that it's been fixed. The regular NPCs are still way too overpowered and they hit like mini-bosses, the jumping across the firepit on the ship is insane and it's impossible to do it without a team. Not to mention the fact that you can't run Secrets of the Enclave without completing Spirit of Vengeance. The FPs before SoV were challenging but they are playable if you're sufficiently geared. But, even the storymode for Spirit of Vengeance feels like it's jacked up to Veteran Mode.

 

The jumping thing is super easy, just stick to the right.

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