A Symptom of Imbalance.

[SteelCross]

It is morning on a West Coast server; about 8 AM local time. The game, Voidstar. Republic attacks first, spawn in 4 to 8 in Empire's favor. The game is halted from ending just before the clock runs out and we eventually make our way to 8 v 8 but not before at least one person gives up openly in Ops chat. First round is more than half way over. The Empire team, existing in a population more inclined to PvP and so geared well through Hutt Ball, doesn't have a player who is not in at least mostly PvP gear. If my loss rate was 50/50 (about) instead of a win in every 7 games, I'd be sitting pretty too. Picture painted.

 

Empire runs through the Voidstar to the back room fairly easily and blows all doors open to the objective but they do not enter until the final minute. Every empire player encircles the Republic spawn, one even managing to jump up onto the ledge outside the spawn ray shield. They begin to tug us out of our spawn if we don't come out willingly. No longer could one even choose to get kicked for being a deserter. They farm us for several minutes solidly. The symptom.

 

So, what is my assertion? On my server, and I suspect others (and in the 50s bracket) gear has created such a large gap in capability that the WZs are not functioning as intended. While I know that 1.2 is supposed to be addressing how it is distributed, I fear that is a system of loss - win equivalency isn't instituted, the momentum any particular side gains will be unstopable.

 

The solution? I'm neither a programmer nor 'hardcore.' I'd initially suggest a 3 loss = 1 win solution to keep people playing in the face of losing constantly. Worse than losing 6 out of 7 games is knowing that, at that rate, I will be incapable of completing my daily or weekly quests in any sort of reasonable time frame. By the time I get a set of gear, the momentum of the opposite faction will have carried them several levels of gear higher, depending on rate of release. I feel I am the more patient and relentless of some of us, as well.

 

I suspect some people will not care for the idea of rewarding 'the losers.' I suggest that, worse than that, is repeated games of what is essentially The Harlem Globe Trotters v Your Local Middle School with the Globe Trotters in it to win it. The Middle School kids are good dudes and they try hard, they just don't have the experience or funding the Globe Trotters do. I wouldn't pay to see that game, even if I was one of the Globe Trotters, would you? Because, ultimately, you are paying to see that game.

[Arethel]

Pretty sure we all talked about the huge issue the Illum 1.1 bug was creating and everyone not exploiting it in the community was up in arms.. and Bioware did nothing. For some reason, I really don't think they care about the current state of PVP and how imbalanced it is.

[SteelCross]

Pretty sure we all talked about the huge issue the Illum 1.1 bug was creating and everyone not exploiting it in the community was up in arms.. and Bioware did nothing. For some reason, I really don't think they care about the current state of PVP and how imbalanced it is.

 

I believe they do. 1.2 is addressing a number of the major problems (comms, for example) and it's only nearing 2 months from release. I think our frustration makes us lose sight of how responsive they have been. Most people aren't even 50 yet. I think what we can do for them is brainstorm good ideas up and present them. I hope we can do that here.

[Arethel]

I believe they do. 1.2 is addressing a number of the major problems (comms, for example) and it's only nearing 2 months from release. I think our frustration makes us lose sight of how responsive they have been. Most people aren't even 50 yet. I think what we can do for them is brainstorm good ideas up and present them. I hope we can do that here.

 

Anyone that thinks Bioware is responsive never played Rift. Just saying..

[SteelCross]

Anyone that thinks Bioware is responsive never played Rift. Just saying..

 

Correct, I didn't have the pleasure of playing Rift. I played Galaxies, WoW, Guild Wars (some count it, some don't), WAR, and AoC. In relation to all of those, I think BW is responding at a decent pace. In fact, some of those games had serious flaws the entirety of their existence.

[Moosestick]

I agree that it seems to be a problem of capability.

 

Not capable of forming a premade.

Not capable of doing one set of weeklys and 2 sets of dailies with bags saved up to get full pvp gear.

Edited February 20, 2012 by Moosestick

[Natharon]

lol I am a republic player and if I know the win is in the bag I will tell my team to completely stop going for the objective, ie 5 score in hutt ball, don't cap the core in voidstar, and farm the other team mercilessly. That type of behavior isn't limited to one faction.

 

I would look to yourselves before complain about gear differences. BM gear is marginal compared to champion gear, and 90% of the time bm gear has the wrong mix of stats anyways. I've obviously been in complete stompings, and have been completely stomped. Unless your group is fresh 50's, its their ability not their gear.

[Arethel]

lol I am a republic player and if I know the win is in the bag I will tell my team to completely stop going for the objective, ie 5 score in hutt ball, don't cap the core in voidstar, and farm the other team mercilessly. That type of behavior isn't limited to one faction.

 

I would look to yourselves before complain about gear differences. BM gear is marginal compared to champion gear, and 90% of the time bm gear has the wrong mix of stats anyways. I've obviously been in complete stompings, and have been completely stomped. Unless your group is fresh 50's, its their ability not their gear.

 

And you assume Champion gear is mega-easy to get when you lose 99% of your WZ matchups and get camped in Illum (read - NO BAGS). I really think people miss the point here.

[diogolp]

On the flipside, on my low pop server the repubs can pretty much coordinate themselves and run 8 men premades, arranging themselves into an ideal composition of healers/tank/dps, and pretty much win nonstop for several hours. At most they face a 4 man group and 4 pugs, which can make things close, but not enough...

[Arethel]

There are certainly different experiences depending on which server you play on. Which brings to question why there are no talks of server moves yet? All of my frustration would go away if I could get off Dark Reaper and onto a Repub-zerg server where the imps were outnumbered 4:1 and I could ruin their life and listen to them cry on the forums. That's balance right?

[TUXs]

There are certainly different experiences depending on which server you play on. Which brings to question why there are no talks of server moves yet? All of my frustration would go away if I could get off Dark Reaper and onto a Repub-zerg server where the imps were outnumbered 4:1 and I could ruin their life and listen to them cry on the forums. That's balance right?

 

There have been talks, but no details.

 

Honestly, roll a new toon on a new server. I know that's probably the last thing you want to do, but it's the BEST thing you can do to help you enjoy the game. Roll on Helm of Garush. We have a very good balance, Imps still dominate, but I have no problem getting my 150 kills on Tuesday night in a matter of 90-120min.

[Kaane]

I feel your pain. I am on the west coast server republic side. There are 21 republic people in the fleet and 95 on empire side. I can't even get my regular 3 win daily completed. I have full cent gear and half champion, i would call myself an decent pvper. Problem is gear imbalance is huge. I always check HP of our vs their groups. All our sages have 14-15K HP tops, our shadows have 14K hp's average. Everyone on the empire side has 2-3K more HP for every class. We just get stomped, it's not even funny. Only time I win is in the evening when 3 or 4 BM;s that actually exist on republic side login and we barely get can get some wins.

 

Even when we make premades we get destroyed or slowly lose, but the ratio of wins, is just horrible. I already made an empire toon and it seems like that is the only answer, but I will just contribute to the problem and stomp the people just like me on the republic side.

 

This has to be fixed, but i fear it is already too late. Since the gear is already in players hands, so it is unlikely the balance will be restored until there is a gear reset.

[Thundartwothree]

There are several symptoms of imbalance in the game, most notably is the faction imbalance. But you first have to ask why there is an imbalance in the first place? Well its nothing huge but its a ton of litte things and a few very noteworthy thing that lends itself to the problem.

 

First we have the mirror classes not really being mirrored, the Imperial side of the ACs have several advantages over the Republic so called mirrors(I'm not going to list them all, I'm sure we've all seen enough of the lists). It looks like some or all of these are being addressed, but it may be to little to late.

 

The second one is subjective, it has to deal with what is percieved as better, we're talking about art style and story. Its percieved in that the Imperial side of things has the better of these two over the Republic. While you and I may dissagree, the fact remains that people looking to purchase the game look at what people have said both in the official forums and other sites and see several people stating this, so if the "community" says one side is better over the other, people comming fresh to the game will jump on what is being called better.

 

Next we have bugs, and we'll look at the bugs mainly in PvP areas. Ilum, the big one, probably the biggest in terms of whats causing these imbalances. We have kill trading(This ones not faction specific, and not really a bug) allowing people to inflate gear gains. We also have bugs in regards to turrets, these favored the Imperials, next up is a culmination of all these little events. Outnumbering, its very prevalent on Ilum moreso than in WZs(We'll get to why WZs can be very one sided) if one side is outnumbered in Ilum not only does it lead to frustrating play, it also leads to very large gear inflation on the outnumbering side, due to valor gains and so on. So now on Ilum on lopsided servers, the outnumbering faction has the advantage of numbers and due to this advantage they have a large advantage in gear(Gear isnt everything but it helps) and while they have both of these advantages they have a larger pool of players drawing from a larger pool of talent.

 

In WZs we have other notable issues with bugs, such as exploits(These are not faction specific, but play a small role) We have people exploiting the number of players in a WZ, while this may be fun for a fast game for a team that abuses these exploits on the flip side you've ruined enjoyment for the other team, while also inflating the gear gain for your team. We have bugs in Civil War, which favors the Imperials, the cannon on the east side of the map even if capped several seconds after the one on the west will register its damage faster, causing what is in effect a false win if both sides never control the middle turret.(While we could argue that the Republic could capture the east cannon first, its widely accepted that its faster for the Imperials to head east and the Republic west at the outset of the match). Note: that this is considered a bug from Bioware and is being corrected in an upcomming patch.

 

Lastly we have a growing problem with Hackers in WZs and other area. While this is not faction specific, the more players on one side, the greater the chance that there will be more hackers from that same side. And up until now we have not seen many, if any fixes for these from the developers.

 

These are just a few noteworthy examples causing the larger issue of population imbalance, and while not every bug or exploit favors the Imperials, an overwhelming number does indeed do so.

 

TL:DR, I'm not making one. It'll take you 4 minutes to read.

[Powderhorn]

I think you have to get used to the idea that the Republic, on most servers, will be under-represented. As players, you'll have to do the organizing yourselves. We had to do the same on my server, and now the Republic actually makes a damn good showing of itself both on Ilum and on WZs.

 

How do we do it?

 

First, it took about a week of solid effort to organize. Lots of inter-guild communication. We also created a channel specifically for level 50's, and whispered every 50 in the server (using the WHO function) to get in there (and why they should).

 

We then used that level 50 channel to coordinate across the faction. We would run premades for WZs and do fast strikes on Ilum. We'd load up ~20 Reps, hit Ilum all at once, stick around for a little bit until the Imps showed up, and when they showed up en masse, we'd queue for WZs and leave.

 

As republic players, you need to be a very mobile force. You need to hit and run, and be supremely organized. It will make the wins more consistent, and it will also make them more satisfying.

[Nadrojjj]

And you assume Champion gear is mega-easy to get when you lose 99% of your WZ matchups and get camped in Illum (read - NO BAGS). I really think people miss the point here.

 

You sire are exactly whats wrong with this game.

 

I can understand your complaining about inbalanced factions as that seems to be a large complaint across servers, but you saying that champion gear is difficult to obtain? Really? I you lack the ability to farm at least one bag per day while pvp'ing then you are doing it wrong, ESPECIALLY when as you stated you don't tend to win any games. If you aren't winning and have no chance farm coms. I love how people ***** cry and moan about not winning warzones. Get three other friends, come up with a strategy and execute said strategy. Put in more effort or find another game to play.

[Stranger_LDR]

Hey, but we'll have chat bubbles!!!

As everyone already knows.. mr.developer lies all the time. They dont have teams working on this and working on that. They have 1-2 people stressed out to do loads of work they can't manage, hence failure.

 

I just wish there was a single player mode support, where I can enjoy storylines offline and then forget this awful piece of poor IT craftmanship.

[Arethel]

You sire are exactly whats wrong with this game.

 

I can understand your complaining about inbalanced factions as that seems to be a large complaint across servers, but you saying that champion gear is difficult to obtain? Really? I you lack the ability to farm at least one bag per day while pvp'ing then you are doing it wrong, ESPECIALLY when as you stated you don't tend to win any games. If you aren't winning and have no chance farm coms. I love how people ***** cry and moan about not winning warzones. Get three other friends, come up with a strategy and execute said strategy. Put in more effort or find another game to play.

 

I love your avatar, is that a representation of your IMPERIAL toon? Give me a break. So, you are saying that even while losing - I'm gaining bags.. and I guess the 50-60 comendations I get per match would only take me LOSING about 15 WZ's a day to farm the 800 needed to outright buy a bag. If you think for one second that I'm going to be your ***** for 15 matches in a row to get ONE bag, while you finish your daily/weekly and get hella-lots-more commendations and probably finish 6-8 bags (depending on weekly reset) .. you are highly delusional.

 

Strategy doesn't count for **** when I get two-shot by a BM+ Operative in my lowly Champ gear. I dare you to fill my shoes.. come make a republic toon on Dark Reaper and see how long you play.

 

Edit: Verified - Nadrojjj plays a Marauder and seems to think everything is peachy with this game. You also come of as a total douche in almost all of your posts. Go away.

Edited February 20, 2012 by Arethel

[ForceWelder]

To the OP, Voidstar is the absolute worse warzone design in the game so far. I cringe every time it pops.

 

Why you ask?

 

Because it gives a huge advantage to the first round attackers. The defenders have to deal with a 30 second speeder ride which the attackers don't have to bother with. And by round 2, when the attackers become the defenders, the teams tend to have their player balance with near equal players facing off with each other and those same defenders now don't have to deal with riding a speeder while the match is in progress.

 

Then of course there are the barriers.

 

I have personally been held back behind a barrier for almost 30 seconds. Thirty seconds is enough time for a door to be blown and the opposing team to reach the next door and place a bomb. Entire matches have been won or lost depending on when respawning defenders are finally let out of the barrier.

[Nadrojjj]

I love your avatar, is that a representation of your IMPERIAL toon? Give me a break. So, you are saying that even while losing - I'm gaining bags.. and I guess the 50-60 comendations I get per match would only take me LOSING about 15 WZ's a day to farm the 800 needed to outright buy a bag. If you think for one second that I'm going to be your ***** for 15 matches in a row to get ONE bag, while you finish your daily/weekly and get hella-lots-more commendations and probably finish 6-8 bags (depending on weekly reset) .. you are highly delusional.

 

Strategy doesn't count for **** when I get two-shot by a BM+ Operative in my lowly Champ gear. I dare you to fill my shoes.. come make a republic toon on Dark Reaper and see how long you play.

 

To be honest all I hear is whine, whine, whine.

 

I play on anchorhead, I play imperial, while we outnumber the repubs maybe 3-1, they are highly organized. They have 3-4 pvp guilds that straight faceroll warzones. Illum is a great time because they use these forums to communicate back and forth not only with themselves but also with the opposing faction. You don't want to grind 15 warzones to get a bag, fair enough, I do. I would say I play at least 15 a day and win maybe half of them. You are handicapping yourself by not putting in the effort. If you really wanted it you would put in the work required.

[Ozzone]

Which brings to question why there are no talks of server moves yet?

 

Think about that for a sec. Logic dictates if servers are experiencing low population, then merge them.

 

That's the logical solution. Now throw in politics and public relations. It will contradict statements they keep making on how popular the game is and how subscriptions are increasing. Of course they could play damage control and merely state they "overestimated population" and started up more servers than they really needed.

 

But you know how the gaming and mmo community would see that.

Edited February 20, 2012 by Ozzone

[Thundartwothree]

Think about that for a sec. Logic dictates if servers are experiencing low population, then merge them.

 

That's the logical solution. Now throw in politics and public relations. It will contradict statements they keep making on how popular the game is and how subscriptions are increasing. Of course they could play damage control and merely state they "overestimated population" and started up more servers than they really needed.

 

But you know how the gaming and mmo community would see that.

 

Logic would have dictated that there be a system in place at launch that prevented one population for growning no larger than 10% larger than the other population. It would have solved any forseeable problem with pop. imbalances.

[Arethel]

Logic would have dictated that there be a system in place at launch that prevented one population for growning no larger than 10% larger than the other population. It would have solved any forseeable problem with pop. imbalances.

 

Actually, I don't care about server population as a whole. What I DO care about is letting 100 Imperials into Illum to fight 12 Republic. I understand it's an open zone.. but it's also instanced. The arguement here is .. well .. what do all of the other Imperials do? And the answer is.. I really don't give a ****. Maybe they get frustrated that there is a queue to get into Illum and try to make a Republic toon? Maybe they go find a server where they are outnumbered and have insta'queues? Maybe they go jump off a bridge? There was absolutely no common sense used when creating the game logic for SWTOR.

[SteelCross]

To the OP, Voidstar is the absolute worse warzone design in the game so far. I cringe every time it pops.

 

Why you ask?

 

Because it gives a huge advantage to the first round attackers. The defenders have to deal with a 30 second speeder ride which the attackers don't have to bother with. And by round 2, when the attackers become the defenders, the teams tend to have their player balance with near equal players facing off with each other and those same defenders now don't have to deal with riding a speeder while the match is in progress.

 

Then of course there are the barriers.

 

I have personally been held back behind a barrier for almost 30 seconds. Thirty seconds is enough time for a door to be blown and the opposing team to reach the next door and place a bomb. Entire matches have been won or lost depending on when respawning defenders are finally let out of the barrier.

 

Hey, this is for me! You're totally correct. In fact, just today we spawned in first attacking team with only 6 people. As best I could tell the imperials had even less. We had the first door down by the time the server populated and, once the first door is down, things get chaotic and you have momentum. We were highly disorganized and outclassed by the time the serve populated but, because we started, we won. I would certainly say Voidstar is my least favorite.

[SteelCross]

To be honest all I hear is whine, whine, whine.

 

I play on anchorhead, I play imperial, while we outnumber the repubs maybe 3-1, they are highly organized. They have 3-4 pvp guilds that straight faceroll warzones. Illum is a great time because they use these forums to communicate back and forth not only with themselves but also with the opposing faction. You don't want to grind 15 warzones to get a bag, fair enough, I do. I would say I play at least 15 a day and win maybe half of them. You are handicapping yourself by not putting in the effort. If you really wanted it you would put in the work required.

 

This logic is no different than any other repressive logic. You have no addressed any of the points anyone has made and the way you initiate shows that you don't want to have a conversation about balance, gear systems, match set ups, or any other factors. Fact of the matter is, when everything is in a person's favor, they often delude themselves into believing that they 'earned' everything they got and everyone else should too. I'm glad you responded and I thank you for your time but this is a game I pay to play. The moment 'earning' costs fun, a problem has developed. I don't watch boring movies, read dull books, follow mediocre TV shows, and I don't play games that aren't fun. If all you perceive when you read this thread is people whining, my most humble opinion is you stop reading.

[Risingstars]

Actually, I don't care about server population as a whole. What I DO care about is letting 100 Imperials into Illum to fight 12 Republic. I understand it's an open zone.. but it's also instanced. The arguement here is .. well .. what do all of the other Imperials do? And the answer is.. I really don't give a ****. Maybe they get frustrated that there is a queue to get into Illum and try to make a Republic toon? Maybe they go find a server where they are outnumbered and have insta'queues? Maybe they go jump off a bridge? There was absolutely no common sense used when creating the game logic for SWTOR.

 

That might just be your server. On Hyperspace Cannon we actually have a more dedicated pvp Republic community and more active Battlemasters.

* When the Imperials out numbers slightly in Ilum we actually stand a chance.

* Our win/loss ratio even solo queuing is much closer to 50/50

* Our premade group have a win ratio of close to 95%

* I'm actually having fun and looking forward to rank up to 70 and not just logging in to do the dailies for BM bags then log out

 

But then again I'm blessed to be in the most progressed guild in the server that's 9/10 on nightmare mode ops, and pvping with a group of friends that I really enjoy playing with (oh and the fact that we are all overgeared compared to the average player in WZs is not lost on me, but it's not like we didn't pvp at least five hours a day and having fun)

Edited February 24, 2012 by Risingstars