[For seasoned players grown disaffected: An invitation to quit.]

The Tl;DR translation

 

If you are so angry with the game that you take it out on other players, maybe you should find a new game.

 

 

/signed

[Lazy As Sin]

I use my fleet pass to travel to the fleet when I am on my ship......docked right outside the fleet. I can't be bothered with elevators.

[I think they should remove the subscription fee.]

The OP seems to be your pretty standard childish response to something they do not like. "I do not like the way this is done, so everybody must not like it, and anybody who DOES like it must obviously work for EA/BW or is a fanboy"

 

When someone is angry over something that other people are perfectly content with, they tend to fly into an unspeakable rage.

 

"Why doesn't everyone have the same irrational outrage over this minor issue like I do?"

[CM and Rest of the game are 2 different Dev teams.....]

See the problem is, you think this is all far fetched conspiracy because you are ignorant about how most companies work. It's not a conspiracy, it's not the end of the world, it's just a really bad decision and way of treating your customer, which is why EA has earned the title 'Worst Company in America' two years in a row.

 

Your whole argument is, "I'd like to give them the benefit of the doubt so I refuse to believe that CM might be a higher priority than content", whereas all empirical evidence disagrees with you. I know its a tough pill to swallow but it is what it is.

 

The "worst company title" is evidence of nothing (and you call me ignorant) it is an arbitrary award that has little consensus or specific requirements of what qualifies as "bad" and there is no scale to determine the delineating variations of what different customer bases are looking for in a product. A company that makes bad video games can hardly be considered worse than a company who spills billions of gallons of oil causing near irreparable damage to the environment. If you think otherwise than I have no argument that can penetrate that skull of mush.

 

You have no idea what I know or do not know, and based on many of the responses who either partially or totally agree with me, I would say I am not coming from way out in left field.

 

Your empirical evidence is not that at all, it is anecdotal evidence. You pick and choose things that support your point of view while ignoring general logic (i.e. making money is always going to be good for the game and will provide more resources as a whole, this applies to all businesses)

 

I do not guarantee that I am right. I do not guarantee that you are wrong. But I am as certain as you are that neither of us know more about the game than BW/EA - so until actual empirical evidence emerges showing the correlation between increased CM development and subscription loss/lack of development in other areas, than I will continue to take what they give me at face value and prepare myself to throw it back in their face if they say or do something to the contrary.

 

Conspiracy theorist was an extreme and inaccurate label for those whose perception is that the content is not rolling out quick enough, I admit to that.

[CM and Rest of the game are 2 different Dev teams.....]

if customers are less than impressed with the perceived focus then the producer really should take note, ignoring the playerbase didnt work out too well for sony.

 

This is a key point for sure. Perception is reality when it comes to customer satisfaction. Really good point.

 

It hurts that you said my post was irrelevant........./tear

[CM and Rest of the game are 2 different Dev teams.....]

At this point, people (including myself) are just repeating the same arguments and are only being further entrenched. All I can say is that I refuse to believe that BW/EA are really so short sighted as to just sap as much from the Cartel Market as they can before letting the game go under. It seems more probable that the success of the CM is going to be a boon to the overall development of the game (call me a glass half full guy i guess).

 

Or.......this is all a secret conspiracy to empty our wallets with little regard for the customer or the game.

 

Maybe the conspiracy theorists are right......but how often is that ever the case?

 

The metallic stench of aluminum foil is burning my nostrils.

[CM and Rest of the game are 2 different Dev teams.....]

good point. there was 1.6 ancient hypergate which was not Cartel Market.. it was one new warzone and heroic space missions.. that you need to buy the purple tier-seven ship upgrades .. where were they sold again... oh yeah, the Cartel Market !!!

 

1.5 introduced the Cartel Market, along with HK that you can unlock for your account after you earn him through questlines.. via the Cartel Market.

 

1.7 brought two weeks of the Gree event to us, along with the reputation system which includes alot of titles and achievements which require the Cartel Market.

 

2.0 was the Rise of the Hutt Cartel - which was DLC and you had to pay for either with real-world cash or via the Cartel Market

 

2.1 was entirely Cartel Market.

 

so the last update we've gotten was 1.4 - Terror From Beyond; 1.4 did not include any Cartel Market mostly because the Cartel Market did not exist then. 1.4 dropped on september 26, 2012. so the last non-Cartel Market content we've gotten was over eight months ago. so the non CM dev team must be working on a Doozey of a 2.2

 

I don't know where to begin with this nonsense. I'll let someone else jump all over this one.

[CM and Rest of the game are 2 different Dev teams.....]

So you think that saying someone is working for EA is an attack ? I mean, EA has stooped pretty low, but not so low that insinuating that someone works for EA will be construed as an attack.

 

The issue is that when someone calls someone a "troll" or a "fanboy" they are trying to undermine that person's argument whether it is legitimate or not. By saying "oh you may say X but you are just a fan boy" they are trying to diminish that person's argument by attacking their credibility. The same principle applies when refering to someone as an EA/BW employee. You are trying to undermine any argument they may have by saying essentially "how can we trust anything this person says, they work for the company. It is a common logical fallacy and is called the "ad hominem" fallacy. Attacking the person rather than the argument itself.

 

Something tells me thought that you are playing possum when you pretend to not know why saying someone works for EA is an attack. Its no different than calling someone a troll or fanboy.

[CM and Rest of the game are 2 different Dev teams.....]

I am glad to see that there are a lot of intelligent people who see my point on this. I was worried I was going to be lambasted with outrageous ridiculousness. Thank (most of you) for your well thought out posts and explanations that went even further than my OP.

[CM and Rest of the game are 2 different Dev teams.....]

You're arguing that what BW has said about separate teams is BS. The flaw in your logic is that you have not a single piece of evidence to support that.

 

Nowhere in this thread have you said "I don't believe when they say two teams don't impact each other." That, I would've agreed with. But they've also never said two teams don't impact eachother.

 

Quite the opposite. They explained in multiple interviews AND in the investor call, that the revenue the CM team is bringing it has allowed them to devote more resources to the Content team.

 

 

Lets put it this way.

Content team + NO CM = game shuts down.

Content team + CM team = profit, allowing content to continue and even be increased.

CM team + no content team = vast majority of the playerbase leaves, not wanting to pay to play a costume design game.

 

Seems like a no brainer to me.

 

EXACTLY - it does not make sense to anyone with a brain that the CM being successful would in anyway hurt the overall game development. Are you all really such conspiracy theorists that you believe the only thing this game cares about is making a quick penny on the CM? I would like to think EA/BW have a little better forsight than what some are giving them credit for. It is not a revelation in any way to say that if the CM becomes the primary focus of the game that people will start to leave in droves. Don't be so arrogant to believe that YOU know this and the devs do not. They are fully aware of the line and will take great pains to not cross it.

[CM and Rest of the game are 2 different Dev teams.....]

I don't really care if you take my word or not. Believe what you want. Just don't tell me to believe that. I believe what I see and looking at the posts of many others a lot of people think that way. They have actually zero interest of telling us the truth if they were moving people from content development into cartel market.

 

I am not telling anyone what to believe. I am saying that you, me, John and Jane Doe have no ground to stand on if we say things like "the CM is sapping resources from the Devs". Of course, we can all believe whatever we want. My ultimate point was that I think a lot of people are simply choosing to believe what fits their perception rather than taking and (key point) HOLDING the devs to their word. It's not as if we are blindly following, we are simply using the available evidence to develop an informed opinion. In my opinion, there is little evidence that shows a trend that would suggest the CM is overshadowing the development of the rest of the game. I completely understand what your ultimate point is, all I am suggesting is that maybe your perception does not match exactly the reality of the situation.

[CM and Rest of the game are 2 different Dev teams.....]

So your only argument is "because they said so". Rock solid.

 

It is certainly a better argument than because YOU said so, and you did indeed say a lot of things that may or may not be true, so tell me why I should take your word instead of theirs? They at least are working on the game every day, are employed by the company, and have a vested interest in telling as much of the truth as possible. Whereas a poster like you or I is bound by no such thing......so yeah I am going to go with what seems like the best evidence until I see a reason not to.

[CM and Rest of the game are 2 different Dev teams.....]

They may be different but real content people are obviously understaffed and underfunded.

Why is it obvious? Is it because there are specific things in the game that you have expectations for and would like to see and since the game does not have those things "obviously" the devs are underfunded or not doing their job

 

"If cartel market team is growing it is guaranteed that other team is going down"

 

So by the same logic, if the cartel market weakens than the FP's, OPs, and PVP will all magically get better? The mroe the CM grows the more budget the entire game has to work with, which can only be a good thing. It does not pass the smell test to say that a successful CM = bad game every where else.

[CM and Rest of the game are 2 different Dev teams.....]

And those that feel resource allocation between CM development and core game development is not impacted by which team Bio / EA believes will generate the largest return are also delusional.

 

It is clear to anyone other than the most ignorant that a designer creating armor models for the CM has a different skill set from an engineer working on the core game code, and thus each would be a separate resource.

 

However it is also clear to anyone other than the most ignorant that Bio / EA does not and will not allocate unlimited resources to SWTOR as a whole, and thus will maintain a finite number of total resources.

 

Those finite resources are then allocated to various activities (e.g. core game, new content, CM) based on business goals - which for EA the primary goal is to generate the maximum return on their investments.

 

So while the CM team does not necessarily take resources away from other development, as players increase spending for CM items each month, they shift the primary revenue model from an ongoing game subscription model towards a micro-transaction digital goods model.

 

As the CM become the primary revenue generator for EA, they begin allocating more and more resources towards the CM and micro-transaction and less towards ongoing development focused on the subscription model.

 

So in the end, the more people spend on CM items, the more EA makes off selling digital goods instead of providing an ongoing game experience, the more likely SWTOR becomes a giant online version of Dress up Barbie in Space.

 

Your argument is logical but is also highly speculative. Do you work for EA/bioware? if so than I defer to you because you would obviously know. If not, you have no more right to speculate on the inner workings of the business than I do. The difference is that I am not speculating, as BW has stated exactly what I said in my original post. You can either take them at their word and hold them to it or you can develop you own (IMO misguided) perception of what is going on even if it has no basis in reality. I choose the former, and the moment I perceive that indeed a disproportionate amount of resources are being allocated to the CM I will eat my words. Right now though, you cannot categorically state that this is the case because how do you really know?

[Random dye packs are no different than random color crystals]

I must disagree with the OP about how similar dye is to crystals:

 

Color Crystals: 4 variations per color. Color limited to pack bought (So you can target what you want). Never a requested item (outside of request for more colors).

 

Dye Packs: 20+ variations. Color totally random (within odds established). MASSIVELY requested as a customization ability.

 

As far as I can recall, the inference from BW was that the majority of these dyes would be available via vendors/crafting, not the bulk from the cash store. They were very careful to never give numbers. This interview is carefully phrased to give an appearance of balance in numbers (http://ootinicast.com/2013/04/dye-modules-in-game-update-2-1/) giving the impression that it wasn't another plain money grab.

 

My suggestion to fix a lot of this is simple, allow the dyes to be RE-able

I am not saying they are the EXACT same, but to say they are not even similar just does not make sense to me. And yes, you can "target" a cartel pack for a specific color but you are not even guaranteed to get a crystal at all, so it is even MORE random. At least with the dyes you know you are getting some kind of dye pack.

 

It seems that the only big difference people can come up with is that they are not reusable. I admitted to this difference but I stand by everything else and even argue that is is easier to get a color dye you want than a specific rare color crystal (especially since 2.1 has been out for a few days and the dyes are going to be popping up on the GTN like crazy)

[Isn't the Cartel Market technically pay to win?]

You are right and wrong OP. You can get the 69 mods from crafters and the GTN and those are good enough to run all the end game content. So in that sense, you could view it as a pay to win, but since you cannot get the best mods or the set bonuses its not technically pay to win.

[CM and Rest of the game are 2 different Dev teams.....]

So please stop complaining that "the only thing they are worrying about is the Cartel Market". They have said on several occasions that it is two different teams that work on content and work on the CM. So those who complain that energy, resources, and time are being wasted are either oblivious to what has been said repeatedly or they are being obstinate and disingenuous.

[Is this the most negative reaction to a patch thus far in SWTOR's brief history?]

Can you explain why they are wrong.

 

Because no one is forcing them to do anything, but the way people complain about it, it is as if they are forced to spend money to play the game which is simply not true. All the things in the game that cost RL money are optional and cosmetic. So, they are wrong to feel that they are being unfairly separated from their money. They complain as if they have no choice in the matter when they do.

[Is this the most negative reaction to a patch thus far in SWTOR's brief history?]

People were raging pretty hard about the expansion, but yeah, the vitriol surrounding 2.1 seems to be off the charts. People do not like to feel like they are being forcibly separated from their money (they are wrong to feel this way, but they feel it none the less)

[The great forum divide]

And it won't be the first time I explain this: Criticism, in itself, is not helpful.

 

Telling the developers they suck does not inspire them to work harder. Telling them that their decisions are stupid does not encourage them to see things your way. Telling them that they should do something in a particular way because that's the way you want it is not particularly helpful or convincing.

 

I've been working as a developer for various companies for a dozen years now. The most important lesson I've learned --and one that I've passed down to the dozen or so other developers I've mentored in that time-- is that the overlap between what I want to do and what the business-side allows me to do is depressingly small. The second most important thing I've learned is that very, very few of my customers will ever acknowledge this.

 

If you actually cared, and you actually wanted to improve the game, you'd show the developers what you like by praising the things they do well first, and then showing --with numbers, examples and so forth-- them how the things you don't like could be improved while acknowledging the fact that the developers are driven by a corporation that insists on making quarterly profit. Insults or empty criticism do nothing to help. They are actually very bad for community interaction, as it teaches developers that the community has no concern at all for the realities of their task.

 

Intelligent post.

[The great forum divide]

So today I was thinking about the nature of this forum and how in my opinion there is a great divide in that their is are people who support the game and people who do not support the game. Now, what interests me is how the forum goers classify each other.

 

See for example it seems to me that any person who makes a positive remark, opinion, anything really are named several things. These include fanboy, Bioware employee, apologist, defender and most recently loyalist. Now on the other side when someone says something negative they are regarded as a troll, hater even if it is legit concerns. Now I am sure your wondering where I am going with this. Well I will try to explain. See one would think a forum of a game or anything really would have discussions about many things with different view points. But here it seems that any discussion no matter if it is a concern a praise or a suggestion or complaint it always devolves into the usual "i'm right and your wrong"

 

In the end I probably made no sense but I guess I just wish this place wasn't so hostile from both sides.

 

Any thoughts or flames are welcome.

 

Unfortunately this is the result when large groups of people gather to discuss anything. It is not a unique phenomenon in this game. Remember the 2012 election? Stupidity and obstinate childish tantrums no matter where you looked.

[2.1 - The Reviews are IN!!!!]

 

Your customers hate this patch, they feel lied to, they are disappointed in a really terrible way. Do you think it's going to blow over?

 

 

You do not speak for me or any other customer. Count me as someone who does not hate the patch. Flawed? maybe. But I certainly appreciate the attempt and hope they will make some adjustments.

[I've never seen a greater sense of entitlement]

the only time i hear about quitting or bluffing is on these forums until i hear it from my guild or people i know in game then i will start to worry about the state of this game

 

as it stands right now i love playing this game so deal with it everyone whining about a customization patch that doesn't force you to spend money

 

Yeah you would think by reading the forums that the game was going to be done by the end of the month, which I imagine some morons actually believe.

[Loving the new dye system! Who else?]

 

All and all it has great potential, and is certainly better than nothing. But I'm not going to dive in with both feet yet...the system needs a bit of adjustment and repair before I'm willing to do that.

 

Completely agree with this

[Loving the new dye system! Who else?]

It's better than having no system to color armor but I do think it could be improved. I doubt they will do it but being able to remove the dyes and put them in another set would be nice, rather than having it destroyed. Other than that I like the system.