1.2 The Baffling patch

[Olympic]

I think this is a good game overall, and I think it will eventually get better. Game is still new and just about any game I can remember was full of issues in the first year.

 

That being said, as far as PvP goes:

 

Expertise is a dumb idea. Building PvP around Gear is a dumb idea.

 

Yet, so many people seem to like it and can't even fathom how things would work otherwise.

 

While I agree with you OP, I don't find any of it baffling. You build PvP around bad ideas and the PvP is going to be bad.

 

They lost a huge segment of the PvP population that plays for open world (non war zone) PvP with Ilum. Their not-so-baffling remedy was to focus on making a bad PvP concept even worse. Its total Lucy-and-the-football stuff going on here.

 

As I have said, and will continue to say, the trained monkey's will keep pressing the lever for their sugar treat.

[Ahhmyface]

My champ geared friend was getting 3mvp votes a game. /shrug

[Angel_of_Cain]

There are definitely strange directions being taken by BW in this patch but I do think it's time to dispel the myth that there will be a widening of the gap between people with gear and those that don't.

 

1. Most people that do reach 50 that intend on PVPing have some credits or the means to get those credits. Let's be honest, completing all the belsavis dailies alone net enough to buy 2 pieces of recruit gear. That's not small change and it's not unreasonable costs either.

OK, i do agree with this one unless people are lvling through PvP only (Which the devs said was possible) the credit reduction on WZ's are ridiculous.

 

2. In case people aren't aware, the PVP dailies and weeklies yield WZ comms. Surprisingly, they yield enough that it's probably FASTER than it has ever been to get BM gear when comparing how many comms you needed to get a single BM commendation pre 1.2. That is assuming you win the WZ against top geared opponents, which is unlikely unless you are the faction who is outnumbering (mostly Imps)

 

3. No valour Req on BM gear. So basically, if I know I'm going to PVP at 50, I can easily earn the credits, get Recruit gear and then immediately start completing dailies for WZ comms to get BM gear. If you complete your dailies each day, that's a BM chest piece in the first week of starting to PVP at 50. Again, assuming you win against top geared opponents.

 

So basically, I'm calling Bull on all the crying about the growing equipment stats gap people are talking about. Simply doing ANY WZ's will get you BM gear, even if you lose every single time and eventually you will get your set. If you loose every WZ and still get comms and you are trying to get BM gear that way: Try working a job for $2.00 per hour to save up to buy a BMW, because that is what this grind is.

 

 

If you are on a server in which your faction is the outnumbering faction, then you will have no problems getting BM gear because you will always start with 8 in the WZ. The people playing the outnumbered faction will come to the conclusion "this isn't fun anymore. this sucks, i'm doing something else" which means fewer people of one faction will play WZ and the high and mighty outnumbering faction who is defending 1.2 will be playing all alone. but i guess it's good you can now play against the same faction in Voidstar and Novar Coast right?

[doglawur]

totally agree with you OP. i dunno what they were thinking. its apparent the pvp team doesnt play their own game. i mean, how could they? as u said, its a fast pace deathmatch now. which really sticks. what i liked about tor was the slower pace tactical style the pvp had. u needed team work to succeed. imo thats how pvp should be

 

now its just a flying mess. not to mention the nerfs to comms / credits. even the winning team is getting less than before the patch (i think i got 83 comms and 2700 credits for a win, compared to 100 comms and 5k credits 2 days ago).

 

this patch really made me question my sub in tor. im a hardcore pvper. thats all i do. this patch really punishes a player like myself. roll an alt you say? well i like to lvl via WZs with my alts and guess what? cant do that either since i would make next to zero credits. how would i pay for training? the game would force me to pve quest which i hate thus leading me to just not bother playing.

 

i hope they come to their senses and fix alot of these "changes". if not, ya ill unsub which is a shame cuz i do like the game.

 

Em.. you think SWTOR is a "hardcore" PvP game????? bwahahhahahhahah Sorry sir, but

nothing could be farther from reality. Any game that there is no loot or consequences when you kill another player and that is totally dependent on gear and not skill, is not a "hardcore" PvP game. I would call SWTOR a "hardcore" PvE game that threw in a carebear version of PvP as a side note. (E.g. the Ilum debacle..)

[bakedpotter]

There are definitely strange directions being taken by BW in this patch but I do think it's time to dispel the myth that there will be a widening of the gap between people with gear and those that don't.

 

1. Most people that do reach 50 that intend on PVPing have some credits or the means to get those credits. Let's be honest, completing all the belsavis dailies alone net enough to buy 2 pieces of recruit gear. That's not small change and it's not unreasonable costs either.

 

2. In case people aren't aware, the PVP dailies and weeklies yield WZ comms. Surprisingly, they yield enough that it's probably FASTER than it has ever been to get BM gear when comparing how many comms you needed to get a single BM commendation pre 1.2.

 

3. No valour Req on BM gear. So basically, if I know I'm going to PVP at 50, I can easily earn the credits, get Recruit gear and then immediately start completing dailies for WZ comms to get BM gear. If you complete your dailies each day, that's a BM chest piece in the first week of starting to PVP at 50.

 

So basically, I'm calling Bull on all the crying about the growing equipment stats gap people are talking about. Simply doing ANY WZ's will get you BM gear, even if you lose every single time and eventually you will get your set.

 

Lol yea if you win every single match you can gear up to BM in 2 weeks. Its around 12k comms to get set. If you dont win EVERY SINGLE WZ then, NO, no you can not gear up easier now than before. Solo Qs are done and that unfortunately makes up more than 50% of the pvpers in the game. Better hope that you have full geared guilds on both sides constantly Qin or have casuals that are masochists cuz itll soon be around 20 people on each side Qin. Im glad i got most of my pieces and all but I would like to roll alts and i do solo q when im on in offtimes. Catering only to hardcore gamers is a fail model for MMOs and i say that as a hardcore gamer.

Edited April 13, 2012 by bakedpotter

[venjinze]

holy ****

 

This is the easiest of any MMO to get PvP gear, doesn't take that much time. I swear people have no patience in this community, everything is 'NOW NOW NOW'. The patch has been out for 24 hours and people are already complaining about gear differentials, You are throwing out speculation without actually giving the patch at least a couple of weeks to see where these apparently incapable people are gearwise.

[Bazzoong]

I am completely baffled why champ/cent gear was left alone while BM gear has increased expertise. I am completely confused and frustrated with that decision.

 

Ok, I will end your confusion.

 

Cent gear was completely rubbish and gets removed and replaced by recruit gear which is better.

 

Champ gear was way to good, unmodded it was better than unmodded bm gear, also the mods and enhancements in champ gear where over the top, people where able to stack stats like surge and power to high. So this gear gets removed by not putting expertise on the mods and enhancements.

 

The whole thing serves to "streamline" available stats more and make it impossible to break certain thresholds on above mentioned stats without severe loss on expertise.

[FireSomething]

I will take your word for it, seeing the formulas on the previous pages leaves me no doubt.

 

So I will rephrase sentiments - even though based on the percieved numerical changes - I am a bit disappointed with the dmg boost, even though it may bring the dmg output closer to the inteded 100%.

 

What makes SWTOR combat (PvP) appealing was the length of the fight, and therefore the chances of your opponent making a mistake - or in his case, me making a mistake - greater, thereby making combat more tactical.

 

I will honestly admit, that I havent played 100+ WZ's in 1.2 which might be required to adjust to it - but shortening the fights are a step in the wrong direction.

 

I hope my sentiments are clearer, even though the math is not backing me up.

 

But with the way expertise is working now is not making the fights shorter. Between 2 evenly geared players they will take exactly the same amount of time as they did pre-patch as long as the increases to endurance on the PvP gear matches the stat inflation on the other gear.

 

A lot of people that are perceiving the fights taking a shorter amount of time are most likely having trouble with a spec that was changed in the patch or they are trying to PvP in PvE gear which is not something that BioWare wants to encourage.

 

If you mainly PvE it should be easy to pick up enough PvP gear through the recruit vendor to be competitive. What it stops is people that mainly PvE coming into PvP and rolling people that primarily PvP because the gear is the same or better. It offers two different progression paths with a low barrier to entry to each but a time investment goal to the player in each path. This is the fundamental way that MMO games work. They give you a progression path usually gear wise that you work through with a combination of skill and time investment where skill usually reduces the time investment required.

[Vaipyr]

 

But wait you used just 1 med pac each wz and since you did 10 each day thats 70 wz total.

 

Not if you're gearing up you didn't. Otherwise you're just being dumb. If you're saving up to buy gear why are you burning comms on crap like meds/stims for unranked matches? That's just silly and your own fault.

[Zekeiele]

Its ok...I'm sure the "Iag" crowd that like to keep any small edge other than skill will enjoy the long Q times ahead.

 

Personally I don't farm and don't enjoy a non competitive game at all but that's just me.

 

Nice take OP.. hopefully Bio has enough sense to make some adjustments to a system that was good but needed tweaking and zone variety.. not wholesale changes.

[Yamirashi]

wrong. people who do not like PvP do not have to participate at all. there is no need for any of the PvP gear in endgame PvE; you actually get kicked from groups most times if you try to do ops with PvP gear.

 

i do not understand why bioware made this change to begin with, there was nothing wrong with the current system

 

 

 

I believe you missed the sarcasm there... >.<

[Gjorind]

Overall, I can't complain too much, but the OP does have some good points.

 

The overall gain for a loss is very small. While I do think that losing should have consequences(a smaller payoff ideally being the major one), when a game is gear based, and that gear is only obtainable by doing what that gear is made for, a mechanism for obtaining that gear really needs to be in place. At current, I rather question whether or not that is the case.

 

You can earn your weekly "participation" quest just by showing up. You must win to get the daily three wins, and must win nine to get your weekly. If your server is plagued by premade teams that will close down any that oppose them(including lesser geared premades), you will struggle.

 

Sure, you'll get it eventually, but a full set of BM gear at 25-45 comms per match seems a little steep, especially when you consider that if you're really eeking it out that slowly, your opponents will all be in the war hero stuff by the time you get there.

 

The second is the payout vs. medals earned. I certainly have no objections to not rewarding players who do not participate. Personally, I think they should be banned, people that take up a spot and intentionally do nothing ruin a playerbase anyway.

 

However, there is a situation, and I ran into it twice last night, in which it is exceptionally harsh punishment. When you are placed in a warzone after it has already begun, and there isn't enough time to garner even the rudimentary four medals, you get nothing. No credits, no comms, no valor. A complete waste of time through no fault of the player. In one of these, I was even placed in late enough to have this happen on a victory.

 

Now, I typically gain 12-14 medals per match on average, so knowledge of how to get them certainly isn't the issue. Even recognizing my predicament and intentionally attempting to "farm" myself to the lowest payout number failed on the second attempt simply due to not having the time to get them. I believe that a person should either have the option of not joining a match in progress or have the medal payout requirement reduced(if you are only in 25% of the match time, only need one medal, for example) to avoid this situation.

 

Credit payout is shockingly poor. An equivalent amount of time in PvE will yield upward of five times the credits of a win and a many, many more than a loss(I got 638 credits with a nine medal loss at one point). It sure couldn't hurt if that went up.

Edited April 13, 2012 by Gjorind

[Chocula]

this post should be stickied. and if bioware isn't reading it and paying attention, pvp will croak. and if it does, so does the game.

[Zekeiele]

LOL at all these "PVPers" that don't use every legal advantage to win..."don't use med packs while gearing up" are you kidding me ?? are you a PVPer or a PVPgeargrinder ??...

 

hmmm lets see i know I have reinforcements coming as I am slowly losing a 2 VS 1 on a turret..."if I can just hold out 15 more seconds"...."ahh screw that med pack" i almost have enough for an implant!....Really?

 

gtho with that garbage.

[Brytag]

Em.. you think SWTOR is a "hardcore" PvP game????? bwahahhahahhahah Sorry sir, but

nothing could be farther from reality. Any game that there is no loot or consequences when you kill another player and that is totally dependent on gear and not skill, is not a "hardcore" PvP game. I would call SWTOR a "hardcore" PvE game that threw in a carebear version of PvP as a side note. (E.g. the Ilum debacle..)

 

when i say "hardcore" pvper i meant thats all i do. i log in and pvp for my whole gaming time. i lvled via pvp and thats all i care to do in the game. so ya probably not the best choice of words that i used.

[BDutch]

I just can't believe we are having to deal with gear inflation/refreshing this soon after release. The fact that they even had to provide a rating 124 suit for cash only... when the game has been out how long? I can't imagine how insane the math is going to get with an actual expansion. How do you even approach balancing PvP with variables that large over such a short period of time?

[FireSomething]

this post should be stickied. and if bioware isn't reading it and paying attention, pvp will croak. and if it does, so does the game.

 

This thread is a typical post-patch "the sky is falling thread" since everyone here has had exactly 1 day to play the changes, and a lot of the stuff people are reacting to like the expertise changes are just misconceptions. About the only things I agree with in this thread are the WZ comm payout is a little low compared to the usefulness of the gear you get from it, and that some of the healing changes may have been a little harsh. But if the sky is indeed falling BioWare will most likely see it and catch it as they have with quite a few other things in this game so far.

 

Overall this game has actually made significant progress for only being out for 5 months. About this time in Rift's initial lifespan devs were killing world event bosses as they spawned so the servers wouldn't crash due to everyone attacking it at once.

[kenbenobi]

Good post that describes the current in problems and their influence on the PvP situation. I agree with every point of it (beside you being a sentinel ).

The geargap will soon clear the WZs of the players that have no real chance of catching up I fear.

Seeing no way to achieve the carrot (bm gear and yes I grinded bm gear via the bags, it was painfull but I didn't get steamrolled the whole way) with 20-30coms I doubt that the newcomers will do more than try PvP out and than move on to PvE or another game.

 

I agree. Geargap is huge and now pvp in mainly about gear. I believe that the pvp will wither. Very few new players will enjoy endless premade faceroll catering the strong. Not too many enjoy hitting the helpless ones without a challenge.

[Jpixie]

But with the way expertise is working now is not making the fights shorter. Between 2 evenly geared players they will take exactly the same amount of time as they did pre-patch as long as the increases to endurance on the PvP gear matches the stat inflation on the other gear.

 

A lot of people that are perceiving the fights taking a shorter amount of time are most likely having trouble with a spec that was changed in the patch or they are trying to PvP in PvE gear which is not something that BioWare wants to encourage.

 

I do mainly PvP, and actually the two classes that recieved the least changes, Sniper (MM) and Assassin (Dark). It might be because the opponents were PvE geared, or atleast less than full BM (which would be a suprise on ToFN) - but they went down fast and might very well be why, there were numerous higher hits than pre-patch. My Sniper now passed 5k crits, which of course is very snazy, but greatly discouraging for the opponent. Might have been fluke, but happened in 2 out of 4 WZ's which is a very different ratio compared to before.

 

Im hoping the math holds up, and the difference in the killfest will even out quickly as people adjust, but I'm not encouraged as to the development of PvP if it doesnt.

[Seyyah]

There are definitely strange directions being taken by BW in this patch but I do think it's time to dispel the myth that there will be a widening of the gap between people with gear and those that don't.

 

1. Most people that do reach 50 that intend on PVPing have some credits or the means to get those credits. Let's be honest, completing all the belsavis dailies alone net enough to buy 2 pieces of recruit gear. That's not small change and it's not unreasonable costs either.

 

2. In case people aren't aware, the PVP dailies and weeklies yield WZ comms. Surprisingly, they yield enough that it's probably FASTER than it has ever been to get BM gear when comparing how many comms you needed to get a single BM commendation pre 1.2.

 

3. No valour Req on BM gear. So basically, if I know I'm going to PVP at 50, I can easily earn the credits, get Recruit gear and then immediately start completing dailies for WZ comms to get BM gear. If you complete your dailies each day, that's a BM chest piece in the first week of starting to PVP at 50.

 

So basically, I'm calling Bull on all the crying about the growing equipment stats gap people are talking about. Simply doing ANY WZ's will get you BM gear, even if you lose every single time and eventually you will get your set.

 

you my friend are greatly mistaken and subject to a bitter surprise soon if you even dare using 1 medpac every match... what? oh yes... if i want to pvp then i should have gone biochem...

 

ignorance is a bliss...

[Rexicute]

im sorry miss uber player 1231232131 but I dont want to log on every day and do dailies just so i can play a portion of the game i enjoy. Id rather log on que up and have some fun. I didnt realize that after working my 10 hour shift at work that id have to come home and put in another shift at BioWare inorder to play a portion of the game that i was enjoying...

 

If you dont intend on putting in the effort or the same amount of work that someone else has, what did you really expect? Do you really expect the new guy(with no work experience) at your job to roll in and in 2 weeks be promoted to middle management like yourself? No? Why not? He enjoys his job and works no more than 30 hours a week... even if he is only sorting mail, but you know what he enjoys it so that should entitle him to the same rewards people who have worked there for a decade receive!

 

Your arguement put in another manner so that you can understand thoroughly what you are asking for.(if you are wondering you are the new guy)

 

This mindset in large is the main problem with the MMO community today.

[Malcho]

I have to say i completely disagree im a lvl 50 sentinel 55 valor only geard in mostly centurion few champ and 2 bm as of last night but i am doing like 50% better in pvp thanks to damage being better even versus battlemaster geard people

 

i dont know if its expertise is nerfd or the damage increase from patch but i think you should get your self 1 or 2 bm bits and try its much more balanced then it was before with lowgeard versus high geard (it was impossible)

 

plus its like 10 times easiar to get battlemaster gear now thanks to it being only from warzone commendations although i agree quest rewards should be like double only thing i dont like is a merc still hit me like 5k post patch lol xD

 

Basically the patch is good because you're melting face so I should get 1 or 2 "bits" of BM gear and join the party. Except I have 7 pieces of BM (albeit I'm a seer) and am getting nuked down in 3 or 4 hits. Soooooooo......

Edited April 13, 2012 by Malcho

[kendashFathbring]

holy ****

 

This is the easiest of any MMO to get PvP gear, doesn't take that much time. I swear people have no patience in this community, everything is 'NOW NOW NOW'. The patch has been out for 24 hours and people are already complaining about gear differentials, You are throwing out speculation without actually giving the patch at least a couple of weeks to see where these apparently incapable people are gearwise.

 

 

And PvP should never ever be about gear. IT should be about skills and who is the better player *nothing else in ANY situation* that's when PvP is balanced. All stupid players from WoW wanted a gear based game - it ruined PvP like all gear based pvp does for a PvPer. It's impossible to catch up now since 1.2 went live, at least you could get your "easy" 4 medal valor before which was a very good change so players would be able to get their BM gear easier. Yes for PvP gear should be easy to obtain, i'd MUCH rather see the legacy stupidily overpriced worthless abilities be purshased from valor ranks instead so you would be rewarded for being a good pvper, now you're just rewarded for not having a life and because you already got your gear.

 

99.9% of all WZ's i play i win or loose only depending on my teams gear situation vs other teams gear situation. I see the same players more or less in every WZ on both rep and imp side and i know from the START if i am going to win or loose this WZ just by looking at my teammates and my oponnents - that's how insanely gear based this game WAS before 1.2. Now with 1.2 live it's going to be impossible to catch up with 0 rewards and dailes/weeklies from illum removed....and getting no valor, no credits and no commendations for STAYING in a loosing WZ just made me rage quit and un-sub and it will stay like that. Afterall, GW2 and D3 is around the corner which will probably keep me entertained compared to SWTOR.

 

I'm sorry but gear should matter, it should never be required to be competetive. SWTOR PvP died yesterday across all servers because the stupid design decision to increase the differences between new players/casual players and hardcore players/grinders. Not to meantion the fact that they didn't make the most important change needed for PvP: Warzone maps are frigging small so that killing a player doesn't really matter unless you kill him so he have a 60 second wait time (which is plain luck) he'll be back to interrupt your bomb or tower cap before you can take it anyway....since you'd probably not fend off the other defenders before he got back out.

[Seyyah]

If you dont intend on putting in the effort or the same amount of work that someone else has, what did you really expect? Do you really expect the new guy(with no work experience) at your job to roll in and in 2 weeks be promoted to middle management like yourself? No? Why not? He enjoys his job and works no more than 30 hours a week... even if he is only sorting mail, but you know what he enjoys it so that should entitle him to the same rewards people who have worked there for a decade receive!

 

Your arguement put in another manner so that you can understand thoroughly what you are asking for.(if you are wondering you are the new guy)

 

This mindset in large is the main problem with the MMO community today.

 

you my friend are comparing apples with oranges... your example can not be applied to what we are discussing here... but anyways...

[venjinze]

And PvP should never ever be about gear. IT should be about skills and who is the better player *nothing else in ANY situation* that's when PvP is balanced. All stupid players from WoW wanted a gear based game - it ruined PvP like all gear based pvp does for a PvPer. It's impossible to catch up now since 1.2 went live, at least you could get your "easy" 4 medal valor before which was a very good change so players would be able to get their BM gear easier. Yes for PvP gear should be easy to obtain, i'd MUCH rather see the legacy stupidily overpriced worthless abilities be purshased from valor ranks instead so you would be rewarded for being a good pvper, now you're just rewarded for not having a life and because you already got your gear.

 

99.9% of all WZ's i play i win or loose only depending on my teams gear situation vs other teams gear situation. I see the same players more or less in every WZ on both rep and imp side and i know from the START if i am going to win or loose this WZ just by looking at my teammates and my oponnents - that's how insanely gear based this game WAS before 1.2. Now with 1.2 live it's going to be impossible to catch up with 0 rewards and dailes/weeklies from illum removed....and getting no valor, no credits and no commendations for STAYING in a loosing WZ just made me rage quit and un-sub and it will stay like that. Afterall, GW2 and D3 is around the corner which will probably keep me entertained compared to SWTOR.

 

I'm sorry but gear should matter, it should never be required to be competetive. SWTOR PvP died yesterday across all servers because the stupid design decision to increase the differences between new players/casual players and hardcore players/grinders. Not to meantion the fact that they didn't make the most important change needed for PvP: Warzone maps are frigging small so that killing a player doesn't really matter unless you kill him so he have a 60 second wait time (which is plain luck) he'll be back to interrupt your bomb or tower cap before you can take it anyway....since you'd probably not fend off the other defenders before he got back out.

 

I dunno bud, I've never had an issue w/ gearing myself out in any game. I work fulltime, take some MMA classes, and have an attention starved GF. I probably get about 1.5 hours of gametime a night. I expected more of a grind from this game to be honest, but I had just come from Aion, so in contrast, this game was ridiculously easy to obtain PvP gear. I guess this topic is subjective. I like the game but soon as GW2 is out, I'm gone. I'm one of the geared people and I don't find this game anymore fun than the lesser geared.