Sobrik is Free: Bioware's Lack of Ambition is Disturbing [SPOILERS]

[shyba]

It's baffling how people can wish for open world phasing because they want their decisions to have weight when they don't even realize the implications of such a feature. Empire and Republic would be completely 100% segregated to the point that they should split the games into two different games, much like City of Heroes and City of Villains

 

Except for a large part of the game they already ARE. The first 4 planets in the story lines are completely cut off (Nar shadda only shares bonus area) Balmorra and Taris are explored in different times for each faction, so can't share them since one is sub 20 and the other is mid 30's Tatooine/Alderaan and everything post Balmorra ARE shared though but none of those carry massive story sweeping changes (Except MAYBE Corellia, I never bothered to do those ones since i was already 50 and wanted to finish my story :<)

[Bluejayoo]

I agree. Lack of phasing in a current generation MMO is pretty pathetic. Other games have been doing this literally for YEARS...

 

Particularly in a game that is all about story.

 

Bioware is great at making RPG content, they are great story tellers, but I have come to the conclusion they are not good programmers.

 

Look at the pathetic patcher system. A 15 year high school student could have programmed a better patching system (take a detailed look at the log files it generates if you are wondering what I am talking about).

[Sizzurps]

Phasing should have been used in regard to Sobrik. This is just bad game design - pure and simple.

[borghe]

Some phasing would have done the world a ton of good to appear less static, I agree.

 

That said, including phasing would have created other problems ( not being able to interact with players in the other phase, to just cite the most common one from WoW ). But the segregation of the world into instanced and non-instanced zones also is problematic.

 

Eh, it's difficult to find a good solution. Maybe include a dynamic event where imperial forces recapture the city every few hours?

these are the same problems every phased game has, and they all work around them in their own ways. still, I think it's mostly agreed that the benefits due to the immersion of phasing outweigh such cons.

 

It's baffling how people can wish for open world phasing because they want their decisions to have weight when they don't even realize the implications of such a feature. Empire and Republic would be completely 100% segregated to the point that they should split the games into two different games, much like City of Heroes and City of Villains

IMHO that's extremely limited in scope. That's to insist that both the republic and empire side's "win" their quest. Balmorra for example. Sure you could have a republic phased version where the republic fights back the empire and wins. and you could have an empire phased version where the empire fights off the rebellion. OR you could have one where the republic tries rebelling and the empire fights it off, and one side wins and one side loses. Say the empire wins fighting off the rebellion, but the "winning" quest conclusions for the republic side are then getting important information collected, or getting important persons off of the planet, etc. IMHO for star wars to be truly great, the same grand story would exist for all 8 classes and two factions, and the individual stories happen inside of that. so the empire keeps/loses control of Balmorra and both sides' stories reflect that.

[shyba]

these are the same problems every phased game has, and they all work around them in their own ways. still, I think it's mostly agreed that the benefits due to the immersion of phasing outweigh such cons.

 

 

IMHO that's extremely limited in scope. That's to insist that both the republic and empire side's "win" their quest. Balmorra for example. Sure you could have a republic phased version where the republic fights back the empire and wins. and you could have an empire phased version where the empire fights off the rebellion. OR you could have one where the republic tries rebelling and the empire fights it off, and one side wins and one side loses. Say the empire wins fighting off the rebellion, but the "winning" quest conclusions for the republic side are then getting important information collected, or getting important persons off of the planet, etc. IMHO for star wars to be truly great, the same grand story would exist for all 8 classes and two factions, and the individual stories happen inside of that. so the empire keeps/loses control of Balmorra and both sides' stories reflect that.

 

they do reflect that in the stories (just not in actual layout ) empire wins early republic takes it back later while empire is busy blowing up Taris AGAIN lol

[Iskareot]

Well a couple things here should be said and this needs to get straight.

 

So now... the OP is (sounding like) HE WISHES the single player side of things shined through more then the MMO things being he wanted things to stay to HIS storyline more so even in a visual aspect throughout the game.

 

lol.. Ok so thats a first... SOMEONE mad the game is NOT SINGLE PLAYER DRIVEN ENOUGH... Ok I get that

 

However the comments about the things we had in BETA THAT HE NEVER SAW... again I repeat very loudly...

 

In CLOSED BETA -- prior to the 3 weeks of hell known as the WEEKENDER invasion.. we had the color to chest matching and we had some other misc things.

 

Now then, SEEING SOMEONE COMPLAIN ABOUT SOMETHING HE NEVER HAD OR REALLY KNEW ABOUT IS SILLY>

 

 

I repeat... only a few thousand knew what it was like or how it worked for sure.

 

So with all the people asking or crying for it, the MATH DOES not add up.

 

My point is... YOU CANNOT PLEASE EVERYONE... ever and this post proves it.

[Nullcrobicus]

complaining about phasing is the pinnacle whiny nerddom. you freed the city, bro. what does it matter if it doesnt look like it or not? do you want to go sit in a free sobrik and bask in your glory? the idea of phasing itself is anti-mmo. until a game comes along that both changes as you progress, but also replaces the "quests" you did with new ones for the people that follow you, I won't be impressed by any games phasing.

[Putok]

So... wait. Let me get this straight.

 

You completed the story for a certain planet. And you want your outcome to be permanent forever. What if someone else wants to complete that mission line?

 

Are you saying missions need to be first come, first served? So If I level faster than everyone else, on my Jedi Knight, and beat the last boss of the Jedi Knight story, he should be dead for everyone because I killed him?

 

This isn't a single-player game. If you want to play a game where one person can change the entire game world for the rest of the game population, go play EVE or something. It's fun, and your actions make a difference. One big sandbox.

 

But the nature of an MMO like this, where everyone has the chance to go through the same storylines... you can't do that. It doesn't work. Everyone needs a chance to play the same content and achieve their own results.

 

WoW does this in virtually every single zone since Cataclysm. Your actions in quests permanently impact the gaming world, thanks to phasing.

 

It's the one area where SWTOR is light years behind in terms of questing/storytelling. They're using BC quest mechanics, basically (which isn't terrible, I liked BC), but WoW is half a decade beyond that.

 

I do think it would behoove bioware to implement something akin to the phasing in WoW. It dramatically increases immersion, and makes what you do in quests feel far more

"real", better tying you to the story. Doing a quest to plant blessed seeds on a plain ravaged by fire elementals, and then life begin to bloom and grow from them (and stay there, forever) is pretty cool.

 

To someone that's done a lot of questing in Cataclysm, I could easily see the lack of this in SWTOR being something that breaks immersion.

 

It's not something I've come to expect in new MMOs. I'm under the impression that it's actually rather advanced technology, and somewhat difficult to implement, given the amount of time it took Blizzard to get it to this level, and the fact that both Rift and SWTOR (with massive budgets and huge teams) have not implemented it.

[SnaggleFox]

I know the story missions are supposed to be solo. But they could make certain ones like this into raid size quests and make the city contestable. When one raid finishes the quest, they take the city for their faction. And it goes back and forth.

 

One problem I see though is the lack of people able to do it at one time.

[LordKrell]

The funny thing is that if they implemented phasing in the way OP wants, people would STILL complain, but about other problems. For example, how you can't see your friends because they aren't on the exact same quests as you, or how you can't harvest a ressource node because it's in another phase. The latter problem is still a problem in WoW to this day.

[blargness]

The funny thing is that if they implemented phasing in the way OP wants, people would STILL complain, but about other problems. For example, how you can't see your friends because they aren't on the exact same quests as you, or how you can't harvest a ressource node because it's in another phase. The latter problem is still a problem in WoW to this day.

 

Evolve the phasing features? Provide an option to swap to the phase with your groupmates in it?

 

edit: complaining about something else (which apparently having an opinion is complaining these days) means they aren't complaining about this thing at the very least.

Edited January 6, 2012 by blargness

[shyba]

The funny thing is that if they implemented phasing in the way OP wants, people would STILL complain, but about other problems. For example, how you can't see your friends because they aren't on the exact same quests as you, or how you can't harvest a ressource node because it's in another phase. The latter problem is still a problem in WoW to this day.

 

simple harvest nodes ignore phases (i STILL don't get why that doesn't exist in WoW <.<) and party leader dictates the phase you are in yay i can help friends (or get help!)

[Revelationjp]

As a rp'r, a can see your point. As a techie, i know that problems can often outweigh the simplistic view a lot of people have.Yes, phasing could be used. But consider that this is still a young game. If it were me making the calls, I would say to my peons "hey, lets leave it all open for now, and when we have enough population going to support a lot of phasing, then we'll go full tilt." I can hear the cacophany of "fanboy" already, but all i'm doing is shutting down my selfish "i want it now" reflex for 5 seconds in order to look at things from their perspective. You only have yourself to please. They have 2 million people to please. and every flippin 1 of them has a different top five list.

[Meleoffs]

they do reflect that in the stories (just not in actual layout ) empire wins early republic takes it back later while empire is busy blowing up Taris AGAIN lol

 

**** Taris, I'm glad Malak destroyed that worthless heap of a planet. Those rakghouls *shudder*

[Zamm]

Well a couple things here should be said and this needs to get straight.

 

So now... the OP is (sounding like) HE WISHES the single player side of things shined through more then the MMO things being he wanted things to stay to HIS storyline more so even in a visual aspect throughout the game.

 

lol.. Ok so thats a first... SOMEONE mad the game is NOT SINGLE PLAYER DRIVEN ENOUGH... Ok I get that

 

However the comments about the things we had in BETA THAT HE NEVER SAW... again I repeat very loudly...

 

In CLOSED BETA -- prior to the 3 weeks of hell known as the WEEKENDER invasion.. we had the color to chest matching and we had some other misc things.

 

Now then, SEEING SOMEONE COMPLAIN ABOUT SOMETHING HE NEVER HAD OR REALLY KNEW ABOUT IS SILLY>

 

 

I repeat... only a few thousand knew what it was like or how it worked for sure.

 

So with all the people asking or crying for it, the MATH DOES not add up.

 

My point is... YOU CANNOT PLEASE EVERYONE... ever and this post proves it.

 

 

Being in beta doesn't make anyone more special..

That said..

You have no idea what you're talking about..

 

Chest Sync was there long after the weekend warriors got in.

It was taken out in either the last or second to last build.

 

Basing your point around something that you got very clearly wrong (however small it was) makes me glad you aren't deciding anything in this game..

[Surakis]

never heard of phasing?

 

much older games than swtor have pulled it off.

 

Lack of ambition is spot on

 

And phasing causes its own problems, say with folks grouped together on different phases of a quest.

[Orientz]

Hey OP, is this your first MMO?

[PanikSpreder]

Yes but that phasing means that you can not be in the same phase as people who have not completed that quest line yet. So you want to splinter the population between different phases on whether they completed that quest chain or not. What about Empire and Republic then not interacting at all between the two sides? Since one side would have that area under Empire control and the other side would be Republic.

 

A fun fact specific on Balmorra. Empire and Republic is not sharing the same planet. Its 2 different "maps". As an Empire you actually start out in Sobrik which is filled with trainers, vendors etc and as Republic you just stroll in there to nuke PvE mobs (no Empire player content what-so-ever).

 

Same goes for all the minor bases around the map. I didnt pay attention to it as Empire as it was my first time there, but on my Republic character I noticed it quite fast. So World PvP is non-existant on this planet simply due to it being 2 planets really.

 

In the end they could have taken the last step and phase it for the players that saved the planet from the Empire and make Sobrik either a ruin, make the shield deactivated etc.

[Dezziedc]

Actually, WOW does this all the time with their "phasing" technology ... it affects no one else but you.

 

And the OP is correct, it should be an expected feature of any current/new MMO.

 

Actually I don't think it should be expected at all. I hated phasing in wow because once I had done the quests in that phase I couldn't go back and help friends do it. Some like it, others don't. I don't think it should be expected.

[Asuka]

LOL, it's called phasing. Guild Wars does this to great affect. I'm not going to explain it to you.

 

And that's only one possible solution.

 

Guild Wars isn't persistent world so it doesn't count.

[Pink_Saber]

No, you're wrong still.

 

Phasing != instancing.

 

nice try though!

 

Phasing is certainly a type of instancing, and this would put this guy in an instance separate from anyone who had not completed this quest.

 

Asking for phasing is, indeed, asking for more instancing. There's no way around that.

[Mannic]

The OP's objection does highlight one of the real drawbacks to trying to tell a "hero's journey" in an MMO.

 

It's just so obvious that your character is just another avatar running around throwing switches that if you don't willfully unsee the world, you will quickly notice that you are not, in fact, impacting anything.

 

A real SPRPG can incorporate these things but an MMO just cannot do it well, even with phasing. I still believe that Bioware would have been better off making the mother of all SPRPG's, making it cross-platform, selling it for $59.99, and selling 10 million or 12 million units, than trying to insert the mother of all SPRPG's into an MMO, making it PC-only, and hoping and praying they can keep half a million subscribers for a couple year in order to justify the expense.

[JJDrakken]

I'm on Balmorra now and there's a large city under Imperial control called Sobrik. A few missions ago I successfully sabotaged and destroyed this giant shield generator that floats above the city making it impervious to conventional Republican and resistance attacks

 

Sorry, but when did that political party invade Balmorra? Should we ask Romney & Gingrich & them how the war fairs on Balmorra, how does it effect american interests?

 

Do you mean Republic?

 

 

JJ

[Cormey]

Either way you still end up with everyone who's done those quests saying;

"I just saved Balmorra!"

"No, I saved Balmorra."

"Didn't i save it two months ago?"

"No you didn't, i did!"

"Hey, are you guys talking when i saved Balmorra?"

"Did someone mention Balmorra? i'm the hero of Balmorra!"

Edited January 25, 2012 by Cormey

[Kellindell]

WoW did this with instancing just fine. Essentially all people who have completed the mission will see Sobrik as a free republic area, anyone who hasnt completed the quest series will see it as an imperial area in need of regime change.

 

 

So... wait. Let me get this straight.

 

You completed the story for a certain planet. And you want your outcome to be permanent forever. What if someone else wants to complete that mission line?

 

Are you saying missions need to be first come, first served? So If I level faster than everyone else, on my Jedi Knight, and beat the last boss of the Jedi Knight story, he should be dead for everyone because I killed him?

 

This isn't a single-player game. If you want to play a game where one person can change the entire game world for the rest of the game population, go play EVE or something. It's fun, and your actions make a difference. One big sandbox.

 

But the nature of an MMO like this, where everyone has the chance to go through the same storylines... you can't do that. It doesn't work. Everyone needs a chance to play the same content and achieve their own results.