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Trephination

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Everything posted by Trephination

  1. I think you misunderstood what was said. The second dev post was in response to someone who asked about S1 tier rewards unlocking the armor sets for all classes instead of only the class/character the reward was earned on, to which the reply was no.
  2. Anybody know if this change made it into patch 3.2.1? That patch is scheduled for next week but I don't remember hearing about it in any of the PTS notes.
  3. Try a mouse button for your modifier, it's the only thing that has worked consistently for me. Any bind that has a preset default won't work most of the time. Alt shift ctrl are no-goes. P.S. quite astoundingly Madtycoon is the only other person in this entire thread who knows what you're talking about. But that's just a star wars thing.
  4. This is just the nature of an MMR-based system. The first 10 or so matches are considered "placement" games to help land the player in an MMR range fitting of their skill to allow for more enjoyable and competitive matches in future games. As such, they are given a much heavier weight than non-placement matches to speed up the process significantly. Unfortunately, MMR only works in a large player pool and SWTOR's pool of 11 ranked players per server isn't going to cut it in that regard. You'll always be matched with people hundreds of MMR different from your own, simply because those players are the only other ones in the queue to play with/against. I'm sorry to say it, but the only solution for proper matchmaking in a game with a smaller, but still respectable population like this one is cross-server queue, and it's just never going to happen here.
  5. hangover, go home you're drunk. I'll miss playing with you anyway, so take care. p.s. add LS to the list of guilds I killed to be safe - that will cover every one I joined.
  6. Last day of my sub so I dunno if I can post again after this. I'll be giving wildstar a try with some of the ranked crew, and playing dota 2 / dayZ in between. Peace everyone, was a fun year and a half of ranked.
  7. We're gonna try to be on around 9-10 pm est to play tonight.
  8. You misunderstood me. All the examples I gave--except the highlight obviously--are hypothetical mistakes that new groups who want to be respected in the competitive community might make. You might not personally care much about what other teams think of you. I wouldn't know. But I can almost guarantee that there is at least one person on your team who doesn't feel the same way, and objectively speaking you are setting off on the wrong foot. Ball's in your court really, you guys are a good group of players and you aren't at the point of no return yet.
  9. People are a lot more perceptive to passive-aggression and subtle antagonizing than anything overt, so the latter is surprisingly preferred. The psychology of "You mad, bro?" etc.
  10. Friendly advice because I applaud any team that actually makes an effort to form up, even if it is after a lot of us have left the server. If you want to be respected by the opponents that form the community you're trying to break into, do not publicly post unrepresentative highlights of you beating them once or twice. Don't spam dumb things in say or emotes if you win a round, don't say something like "well played!" when you 2-0 sweep a team of any caliber, and keep Ironhide on a leash. gl
  11. I think BW is actually being pretty diligent about monitoring the leaderboards for the kind of exploits you're talking about--one of the few things I will credit them for as far as PvP development goes. Put an in-game ticket in describing whatever exploit you want fixed and see if anything happens. For many players what you're suggesting is akin to only being allowed one character, because there are 50 other games I'd rather play than hit the solo or reg queue.
  12. Some really fun and tough games with you guys. We're looking forward to playing you again and meeting the rest of POT5.
  13. I was thinking last night about the original plans for ranked PvP, and remembered this announcement post from last year: http://www.swtor.com/blog/pvp-game-update-1.2 Here are a few choice quotes from said post: Needless to say, it was a sad bit of reflection, and I am no longer the SWTOR optimist I once was.
  14. Agreed. I've had similar ideas for a while. I think that certain casts like dark infusion, healing scan, and kolto injection could also use a a slightly shorter cast time (and a slightly smaller output / cost to match). Movement in SWTOR often feels too constrained to have such harsh penalties for casting. You're permanently slowed by 50-70%, constantly rooted without DRs of any kind. Healing as a merc is very sluggish because of this combined with pushback / long casts to interrupt. Sorc is similarly punished, but gets by because of innervate. The only thing that might need to be worked out here is lockouts to go along with interrupts. If we get rid of pushback and lower some cast times, interrupting might need to lock out more than just one ability to actually reward people for stopping a fast cast. I hope this sort of thing is at least being thought about by the devs because merc and sorc healers are a mess.
  15. I made a thread about this a couple days after 2.4 released, and you're right--it's gotten predictably worse since then. http://www.swtor.com/community/showthread.php?t=687656 While interest in arenas was at its highest, the vast majority of players still weren't interested in the group queue because the exact same rewards are available in solo queue. Only in solo queue, matches are generally quick and one-sided with faster pops, allowing the general population to farm their gear and rating much easier and faster there. This was nothing more than taking the path of least resistance. The point is competition alone is not enough for the vast majority of players. They need a carrot to chase. Almost nobody will admit it, but most people either don't care about or haven't yet experienced hard-fought competition. Interestingly, once the incentive is there a lot of those players will find that they enjoy it and competition becomes the driving factor for some of them again. Not all of them, of course. There will always be a large population of MMO-gamers that just needs a carrot. Here, though, there isn't one. I've seen this happen in 10 different games, and anybody else who remembers first getting into competitive PvP, whether it was 20 years ago or 1, will tell you the same. Set apart solo and group queue, regs and ranked. Incentive. If you want people to try something hard, it needs to be there. Then let them decide if it's fun afterwards.
  16. Pretty much right on. DPS as a whole, with the exception of madness sin and both operative specs, are quite balanced in arena. I've seen everything besides those classes work well, anyway. Tanks are ok, but not as closely balanced as DPS. Hybrid PT is acceptable but touching the line, jugg is good, sin is bad (but it's getting buffed soon). Healer balance is atrocious. And when I say atrocious, I mean merc and sorc healer do not exist in high level arena games. To most people I know and play with, they aren't considered ever, and may as well not be in the game. The only way I can see fixing these two is with extreme measures, like fully removing caster pushback from the game or shortening the length of all their hard casts. Hopefully something along those lines happens soon.
  17. Season 1 delayed: http://www.swtor.com/community/showthread.php?t=692424 Guess the whole +12 / -13 rating thing wasn't intended so they're trying to fix it.
  18. Good changes overall, although I'd still argue that it should be Force Camo being nerfed instead of Undying. Vanish is a tool that just doesn't belong on a warrior class for so many reasons, while undying is counterable and makes synergistic sense. Oh well. I applaud BW for making incremental changes instead of sweeping ones, but I'm surprised that healers are still essentially untouched. The disparity between healing ops, sorcs, and mercs is so massive that using a sorc or merc is almost like playing a man down in a relative sense. I want to see changes to sorc and merc healers that make them more resilient against pushback while casting, as well as an overall decrease in cast times for their main heals. Watching a merc stand still trying to cast the same 2 second main heal over and over again is painful. Anyway, good job for now
  19. Apples and oranges. The queue I'm talking about is premade vs. premade, making this premade vs, pug comparison entirely moot. I see where you're coming from now, though--almost too transparently. You're upset about the unfairness of premades in the regular warzone queue (I agree, that's an unfortunate consequence of low population), and now you're out for revenge against the mean people who like to play with friends. But how, exactly? By watching more of them get bored and leave? Are you familiar with the phrase "cutting off your nose to spite your face"? There could definitely be perks for solo queue as well. In fact, I'd like both queues to succeed so myself and everybody else can enjoy them both. Making rewards equal, though, creates the problem I have already outlined and probably won't be restating any more.
  20. You might want to re-read the OP. I'm not suggesting harming solo queue in any way, but rather further motivating players to use the group queue. I'm not sure why you seem to have such disdain for grouping up, but you might find it more fun if there was a slight nudge in the form of a few cosmetic perks. Are you misunderstanding that we're talking about two separate queues? I'm saying the group queue--as in one premade of 4 vs. another premade of 4-- is suffering.
  21. Not sure why it's necessary as I feel I was quite clear, but I'll reiterate that I'm not suggesting any change whatsoever to solo queue. Cliff notes: 30+ arenas in progress right now, 28+ are solo queues on Bastion. What needs to happen: motivating perks in the form of cosmetic rewards for doing group queue and a server merge to increase player pool
  22. Interesting. I'd imagine the situation is slightly different on BC as a result of an overall smaller population in comparison to the "super servers" (POT5, Bastion, TOFN). There probably aren't enough people in queue to sustain proper matchmaking in either queue, there. The reality is that your situation is a vision of what's to come for the more populated servers soon enough if something isn't done to ensure that matchmaking can take effect in both solo and group queues. Server merges by region and a monthly / bi-monthly Bioware-sponsored 4s tournament on the PTS are what I'd propose to ensure that teams are matched appropriately.
  23. There is a certain hilarity in this issue that makes Bioware's response to it even funnier. The very existence of these relics is a joke in the first place, considering how atrociously useless they are when working as intended. There is no bug fix needed here. There is no code to crack - delete the damn things from the game and be done with it. Misleading some poor tank into spending his comms on the equivalent of a ~30 HPS trinket is a crime in game design.
  24. Yes, I believe what you experienced is exactly the issue. There are few groups making the extra effort, and those that do put themselves out there are discouraged by the very same issue of there not being appropriate competition to face when they do queue. And thus, they give up and go back to solo queue. There are many good and capable players in the solo queue right now that would see success and have more fun if they grouped up, talked to each other, and made a team. The satisfaction of playing with proper coordination and teamwork in a group of friends does not compare to playing roulette solo queue, but most players have to be made to see it. As for your question on matchmaking, the system in place does attempt to match teams of similar rating against one another. I suspect the reason for you seeing little variation in opposition is that there aren't enough teams in the group queue for matchmaking to work properly at this time. I will say, though, that I do not condone nerfing the rewards for solo queue in any way. In fact, I'm quite impressed with the success of solo queue and I believe the rewards are generally appropriate. Instead, the addition of perks for participating in group queue are what I would choose to focus on.
  25. Ranked Arena is currently the most fun and the most boring PvP content SWTOR has ever seen. While great by base design, there is one glaring flaw holding arenas back: the lack of differentiation between solo and group queue reward is killing group queue. That is to say that because the reward for participating in both solo and group queue is exactly the same, the general population is taking the path of least resistance and sticking to solo queue to farm gear and rating. This would be fine if there was some other form of competitive group PvP left in the game, but with the removal of both structured world PvP and ranked 8v8, we're at the final frontier. But it's not too late. As I already said, group queue arenas are very well-designed and it's only the small pool of players in queue preventing their potential from being realized. The solution is twofold: create differentiation by reward for participating in solo and group queue, and consider a second round of server merging (preferrably by region). Currently on the Bastion server there are 30+ arena games in progress, with only 2-6 teams in the group queue on a nightly basis. If Bioware considers adding unique mounts, gear, titles, achievements, and any other form of purely cosmetic reward for group queue rating then this content has a chance for revitalization when season 1 and the upcoming expansion kick in. My worry is that unless something is done to encourage group competition there's going to be very little reason for the existence of teams and PvP guilds. Without these things, it is going to be difficult for PvP communities to remain intact, and thus the social benefits of playing an MMO in the first place will suffer. PvP players want competition and tough, hard-fought games. The problem is most of them don't realize it until they're pushed in that direction by some sort of motivating structure. Without a push, the vast majority will take the path of least resistance to acquire their rewards. I believe these changes are quite reasonable and hope that Bioware considers these suggestions for season 1 and the upcoming mini-expansion. The success of arena in SWTOR is in reach, but we will not get there without a few more steps in a slightly different direction.
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