Hi all,
For those who are straight interested in the ideas, skip this small "intro".
I have been playing swtor for a few months now, I know you guys are having your hands full with improving the game while we are pushing for its limits, but here's a few things I think would improve the experience. As a side note, it's my first mmo, I haven't pushed endgame content to its limits (though I have a few lvl 50 fairly geared up, but still...) and I am certain some of the following ideas have been previously mentioned throughout various topics or are in the pipeline for the future versions, but still, I'll give it a shot at compiling my wish list to Santa, I'll leave it to everyone's discretion to figure out weather it's a good thing or not. Depending on the feedback, I might fork this "gather all" thread into threads of interest. Best of luck!
Improvement areas:
Character morphology evolution Force alignment effects Companion customization Legacy perks - inheritance - Interactive maps Defections Multiplayer mini-games Speeder "tuning" Server improvements Default key bindings
So let's get started:
1. Character morphology evolution
Many have complained about either the limitations upon initial character design and further ingame tweaks. How about the following three types of "morphology changers" ingame:
Cross-act morphology changer: Say you start with a skinny character (fresh padawan/acolyte) and as the story unfolds, you can pick weather you increase the body mass or not or weather you add scars/tattoos or not after some epic battles. In my opinion, it will give a better "feel" for the evolution of the character than either having to design a bad-looking "end-game" character from the start or ending up with a skinny character (unless we choose to, of course). Now I think that this changer would easily fit best between acts, but maybe there are other points where this can be done (flashpoints? ops?...)
In-game morphology tweaks: At some point, we all pick a character with a funny haircut, but then invest so much time in it that we don't feel like rerolling it just for a ridiculous haircut (or beard for that matter). Same goes with implants or whatever species customization there is. How about having a place in game, or accessible after some particular event (let's say we have to earn access to this customization after some sort of a mission), where we can update some minor facial customizations (or let's be crazy about it, decide to draw some tattoo on the face/body of our character)? It could be having your hair/beard cut (humans), implants updated (cyborgs), jewelry changed (sith/twilek/human(?)/miraluka), "patterns" updated (twilek...) and so on.
End-game morphology changer: Essentially, reset/renew your character. I can think of a "natural" way of doing it for "force sensitive" characters: essence transfer (for dark side/sith for the least). Maybe cloning for the rest? Anyway, achieving this should be a "hard" thing to get, say, after a galaxy wide mission + a group required here and there, something that requires some fighting for. Maybe this could also be the point where we can change the species or gender of our character (and maybe rename it) - of course, after "acquiring" the right for that specific species that is, either through leveling or buying it through the legacy.
2. Force alignment effects
Going light as sith and dark as jedi is something we end up trying at some point, but most visual effects (let aside dark side alignment eye/face "effects") remain unaltered, I think there are at least three classes of visual effects that can be implemented to provide a better "feel" for the character's alignment:
Regen: Example - dark aligned jedi introspects with "red" glowing or sith warrior like, light sith warrior "meditates" instead of "raging", maybe imperial agent displays "kill lists" when going dark, bounty something similar... Playing with colors seems to be the easiest thing to implement rather than mixing class visuals. Gray would default to current class "visuals".
Improved "body" dark/light-side alignment effects: Body decay, glowing effects...
Power shifts: Since all classes are mirrored, I believe some of the attack visuals can be "exchanged" depending on the alignment (e.g. a dark jedi using sundering assault visuals). Though, I believe this is the most difficult to implement.
3. Companion customizations
As far as I understood, this is scheduled to the next update, but I think it will only concern skin "uniformization". Ideally, I was thinking something along the lines of the ideas mentioned in the first section where you can give your companion a haircut or paint/tattoo...
4. Legacy perks - inheritance -
Legacy storage bay(s): Just like we have a store place for each character, it would be great if we could have one accessible by our legacy (let's say available after a certain legacy level). This would make things so much easier to share items between characters rather than just mailing things to one another (including money). For crafters too it can make things a lot easier by just having a "legacy bay" or two where they just "dump" whatever they gather with each character for their advanced crafts.
Legacy map(s):Last but not least, "map" inheritance. I spent quite some time revealing the whole map of the various planets I've visited, Alderaan is amongst the worst from that point of view... So how about allowing legacy characters to "inherit" a map revealed by an ancestor? I am not saying the whole set of codex entries/bind points/taxi unlocks, just the map as if it was explored, then we'll naturally unlock what's required.
------
As a side note, you might want to decrease the prices of the legacy "experience" enhancers, costs roughly 2.5m credits to unlock them all and it certainly does not feel like a good investment. Just saying.
5. Interactive maps
This is something I have previously suggested, but I believe it could be useful to have the possibility to add "pins" to maps (say, similar visual to mission objectives but different colors). For solo playing, it can be useful to roughly pinpoint where datacrons are not to miss one along the road. For group/ops, it can be used as rally point, world boss pinpoint, strategy path or strategic positioning (let's say only the group leader can push these pins for simplicity). I am thinking a limited number of pins per maps (10 should be enough for the time being I think, assuming roughly 5 for datacrons, 1 for the world boss and 3-4 for rally points/other notifications while all being reused in ops).
6. Defections
How about allowing characters to switch sides? Of course, this should not be possible until the end of the class storyline is achieved. That would essentially entail a population migration so it may not be a brilliant idea, but I find it intriguing. Say, a dark jedi goes dark warrior or something like that. After all, that's pretty frequent in the star wars universe. Maybe by adding some friction to this process it can be transformed into an interesting experience.
7. Multiplayer mini-games
I see two approaches to this. Either "in the house" developed mini-games like the many mentioned in various threads (pod races, space fights, unlock the datacron...) or, a more "open" approach where players can contribute by creating their own "zone" (a bit like in Starcraft II with custom maps). I could elaborate on each, but I do see the problems with both approaches. In the first case, it is merely creating games within the game and may be seen as a digression from the main storyline, while in the latter it entails providing a "phase creation" tool and then figuring out how to moderate each submission. I am am just throwing this idea into the sea, let me know if you think it is worthwhile.
8. Speeder "tuning"
Add a sticker, change the flame colors, add a boombox... you name it. After all, we do spend quite some time on the thing, might as well make it "mad max" style.
9. Server improvements
Last but not least, I would love to see the limit of characters increased. First of all, I'm one of those who wants to explore each story line (regardless of the advanced class). That makes 8 characters... Fills a server. You only need to like two advanced classes and you end up with having to either chose another server or delete your characters. I'd find it great if we could have this limit increased, say 16 to make everyone happy, including those who level up each advanced class and species with both dark side/ light side ending.
10. Default key bindings
Just as you made it possible to have a custom interface, I'd love to have the possibility to save a custom key binding configuration, it can be a pain resetting the whole thing whenever I create a new character, so much easier if I could just "load" it and make minor alterations.
---
Many thanks for reading this through, let me know what you think and if you wish me to fork some of these ideas into independent threads.
-Net-os
