Not Happy. Taugrim From Pro Guides,Pro Gameplay On Patch 1.2

[kweassa]

Actually, the fact Taugrim pointed out SWTOR pre-1.2 had "best balance among all MMORPGs" is a statement to his good credibility, unlike the people who just can't seem to shake the old "holy trinity" combat scenarios.

[Xsorus]

Actually, the fact Taugrim pointed out SWTOR pre-1.2 had "best balance among all MMORPGs" is a statement to his good credibility, unlike the people who just can't seem to shake the old "holy trinity" combat scenarios.

 

Pre 1.2 for Swtor pretty much did have the Best Balance Among all the MMO's currently out there.

 

The Difference between the MMO's is simple, in other games, usually if there is an "overpowered" class it's pretty much kicking the crap out of every other class in that game at that time.

 

In Swtor, while there are classes that are more powerful the others, They honestly weren't so overpowering that they simply were not killable at all in a 1v1.

 

Tank Assassins for example, people keep bringing them up, and while they're amazing at 1v1, and in huttball, I could still crap on a Tank Assassin a good 70% of the time on my Powertech, and at least 50% of the time on my sniper if they were equally geared to the Sniper.

 

At the same time, a good Tank Assassin could crap all over a Marauder which gave my Powertech trouble.

 

The balance wasn't completely out there in terms of glaring oped Gameplay...

 

This game didn't have Bright Wizards, or For example, My Pyromancer from Rift, or Whatever Class was currently overpowered at any given patch in WoW, or my Valkyrie from DAOC.

 

Every Class could compete last patch...

[viLe-]

"For whatever reason (lower Endurance on gear, gap between damage and mitigation provided by Expertise, etc), the opposite is the case. TTK is down dramatically, and this has taken away SWTOR’s best attribute in PVP: drawn-out fights that allow for tactical gameplay. Fully-geared Battlemaster players melt under any kind of focus fire. PVP is now a gibfest."

 

This is the biggest issue, followed by the reward changes that made leavers a huge issue again and some very questionable class "balancing".

[kweassa]

"For whatever reason (lower Endurance on gear, gap between damage and mitigation provided by Expertise, etc), the opposite is the case. TTK is down dramatically, and this has taken away SWTOR’s best attribute in PVP: drawn-out fights that allow for tactical gameplay. Fully-geared Battlemaster players melt under any kind of focus fire. PVP is now a gibfest."

 

This is the biggest issue, followed by the reward changes that made leavers a huge issue again and some very questionable class "balancing".

 

Agreed.

 

The one thing that surprised me the most was that no penalty for deserters was implemented whatsoever.

[Jeopardydd]

Agreed.

 

The one thing that surprised me the most was that no penalty for deserters was implemented whatsoever.

 

 

if you give no incentives to stay in a match and penalties for leaving, then people are just going to quit playing the game.

 

you basically can't force people to continue to play in a situation when it's a complete waste of their time.

[Tadus]

Great read. A lot of this stuff is already posted, but he put it into a good summary. A must read for BIOWARE. He might have come out as a bit less logically driven than in previous posts, but I think this is partially due to the frustration of having a very enjoyable system made less enjoyable.

[kweassa]

if you give no incentives to stay in a match and penalties for leaving, then people are just going to quit playing the game.

 

you basically can't force people to continue to play in a situation when it's a complete waste of their time.

 

True, but having played PvP in all sorts of games for 16 years, there's this certain pride as a PvP enthusiast one would like to appeal to.

 

Fighting for the fun of it, the challenge of fighting another human being instead of a dumb AI... while things certainly have changed nowadays, one still expects PvPers to have that kind of pride.

 

Bah. Guess I'm just too old to understand brats who only play for rewards and munchkins who only flock to OP/FotM classes.

[Jeopardydd]

True, but having played PvP in all sorts of games for 16 years, there's this certain pride as a PvP enthusiast one would like to appeal to.

 

Fighting for the fun of it, the challenge of fighting another human being instead of a dumb AI... while things certainly have changed nowadays, one still expects PvPers to have that kind of pride.

 

Bah. Guess I'm just too old to understand brats who only play for rewards and munchkins who only flock to OP/FotM classes.

 

how's this for your "pride"? the more you stay in losing WZ's, the farther and farther you fall behind the other side in gear, and by a very large margine as well.

 

lets say you get 40 comms per match (which is actually on the high side for losses), and you play one full match per 30 minutes (playing + queuing)

 

that's 84k coms to get WH armor

 

that's 2100 matches.

 

that's 63k minutes, or more than 43 full 24-hour days of play time. or that's more than a year of playing 4 hours a night 5 days a week (playing 20 hours a week for a full year). that's only time spent doing nothing but pvping. add time if you want to, say, craft or go to the bathroom.

 

by that time, there will be multiple new, better sets so you won't be even in gear even after all that time.

 

and that's with a fairly high number of coms won from the losses.

 

and that's without having to get your BM gear first, which is a whole 'nother grind.

 

yes, you get some from dailies, and you win win from time to time when you get with a premade and against pugs...but come on....

Edited April 15, 2012 by Jeopardydd

[veyl]

Although I agree with most of his post:

 

-Him bringing up Sorc/sage pull is absolutely laughable in a pvp environment. There are multiple ways to counter it, if you don't know how, you're not playing competitively. Also, sorc/sages are much weaker across the board now so killing them is a joke. More importantly: Pull is only "OP" (to bads) in huttball. That's 1 of 4 WZ's folks. It's not game breaking.

- Time to kill is slower? No. you die much, much faster. Burst wasn't nerfed across the board because marauders/sentinels still exist and Healing was ABSOLUTELY nerfed (cept for smuggs/ops) so people aren't kept alive as long as they used to be.

 

But the rest of the post is pretty spot on.

[kweassa]

how's this for your "pride"? the more you stay in losing WZ's, the farther and farther you fall behind the other side in gear, and by a very large margine as well.

 

lets say you get 40 comms per match (which is actually on the high side for losses), and you play one full match per 30 minutes (playing + queuing)

 

that's 84k coms to get WH armor

 

that's 2100 matches.

 

that's 63k minutes, or more than 43 full 24-hour days of play time. or that's more than a year of playing 4 hours a night 5 days a week (playing 20 hours a week for a full year). that's only time spent doing nothing but pvping. add time if you want to, say, craft or go to the bathroom.

 

by that time, there will be multiple new, better sets so you won't be even in gear even after all that time.

 

and that's with a fairly high number of coms won from the losses.

 

and that's without having to get your BM gear first, which is a whole 'nother grind.

 

yes, you get some from dailies, and you win win from time to time when you get with a premade and against pugs...but come on....

 

Economics was never a factor in PvP.

 

Either you commit to a fight and see it through, or wimp out. There's PvP for ye.

[Jeopardydd]

Economics was never a factor in PvP.

 

Either you commit to a fight and see it through, or wimp out. There's PvP for ye.

 

 

sure it was.

why do you think there's gear to get in the first, if not for player progression to keep people coming back?

 

people defend the existence of gear differences with the idea of player progression....and then have no problem when the system is set up in such a way that progression is effectively not there for those who don't have good gear already.

 

the ability of some people to keep two conflicting ideas in their head at the same time without realizing it never ceases to amaze me.

[Blurps]

Meh, I'm having fun. You guys spend way too much time complaining. Learn to be a happy a little(not talking about just this game)

 

Oh I'm having plenty of fun and am quite happy, thanks for asking. Just not in SWTOR anymore.

 

- Time to kill is slower? No. you die much, much faster.

 

Huh ? That's what he said. Lower not slower.

Edited April 15, 2012 by Blurps

[SuperSair]

Pre 50 PvP is where it is at guys level an alt and let the excrement storm roll over.

[Pvpingwithnoobs]

Very good write up and sums what a lot of pvp'ers feel.

 

It's a shame there will always be some jealous of others popularity, certainly their ability and knowledge of the games they play.

 

But tbh, considering how many agree with what Taugrim is saying, i feel sorry for those who have made themselves look utterly foolish by trying to slate him without any productive counter argument.

 

Keep up the good work Taugrim, with any luck instead of BW just giving out free game time, they might actually come up with some solutions very very quickly, because otherwise 1.2 will be the patch remembered as the ice berg that sank the game.

 

Got to love the fact all the $100's of millions spent on the game, the one thing they couldn't afford was common sense.

Edited April 15, 2012 by Pvpingwithnoobs

[iceperson]

jan 2012 was a good month for trolls me thinks

[DarthPolarBear]

I do hope Bioware takes note of this, at the moment they have made a right pigs ear of the pvp compared to what it used to be overall. yeah im glad for some of the classes balances but not at the expense of the entire PvP.

 

the operatives are giving me flashbacks to Rifts rogues that would just stun and stun by the time you got free you had such a health deficit that you had no chance in defeating them. Its just no fun, and quite disappointing really.

 

The war zone med-packs seem pointless now as well since you take so much damage so quickly its hardly worth it to live that extra few seconds, and since for some reason they took out the vendors in the war zones which im not sure why they have you have to hibernate on the fleet between warzones when that's not always what you want to do when your questing.

 

Either way i hope Bioware sorts this out because as it is now its just not fun for me, and i was loving the pvp before

[Utahtio]

I feel like I have to just make my voice heard (whether it matters or not) and say that I agree with this 100%.

 

I don't want PVP to be an insta-gib situation. I recognize that Bioware doesnt want healers to be massively OP, but buffing damage across the board doesnt seem like the best solution.

[Varicite]

how's this for your "pride"? the more you stay in losing WZ's, the farther and farther you fall behind the other side in gear, and by a very large margine as well.

 

lets say you get 40 comms per match (which is actually on the high side for losses), and you play one full match per 30 minutes (playing + queuing)

 

that's 84k coms to get WH armor

 

that's 2100 matches.

 

that's 63k minutes, or more than 43 full 24-hour days of play time. or that's more than a year of playing 4 hours a night 5 days a week (playing 20 hours a week for a full year). that's only time spent doing nothing but pvping. add time if you want to, say, craft or go to the bathroom.

 

by that time, there will be multiple new, better sets so you won't be even in gear even after all that time.

 

and that's with a fairly high number of coms won from the losses.

 

and that's without having to get your BM gear first, which is a whole 'nother grind.

 

yes, you get some from dailies, and you win win from time to time when you get with a premade and against pugs...but come on....

 

lol, I like how your slipperly slope argument acknowledges the fact that new gear sets will come out eventually, but doesn't acknowledge the fact that Rated Warzones will also be coming out before that, cutting the grind for gear (and everything else) down by a full third for anyone playing in RWZs.

 

That's 21k minutes, or 14 1/2 days of playtime, or just under 2 months if you only play 4 hours a day. If you lose every single match every single day for 2 months, that is. So realistically it will take less, probably half of that.

 

That's also not taking into account that they are going to be raising the rewards for participation across the board soon, cutting that grind down even further.

 

Oh, I'm sorry, am I ruining your doomsday prophecy? :c

[revial]

I'd respect Taugrim a lot more if he'd just post here, rather than always linking to his blog trying to monetize his opinions. It's hard to take anyone's opinion at full face value when they are just a step removed from people who outright try to sell info to MMO neophytes.

 

He's a solid pvper, but I still think he's crying a bit over 1.2. Healer throughput was out of control, and now damage is, so let's give Bioware one more shot to try to find a middle ground. In the meantime, I see nothing wrong with dps having some time in the sun. Healing has only had that spot for years in virtually every pvp MMO ever made.

 

The problem with 'long tactical pvp combat' is that it puts way too much emphasis on healing. Deserved, or not. While I enjoy long, tactical fights, I have to believe there is a way to achieve that without making one archetype the most important piece of an 8 man team. In WoW, finding a player who could play a healer was always your #1 concern. Every other 'position' was relatively easy to find, and the healer role is the one role where I have ever played with people who I didn't really like, simply because it's that important. I dream of MMO pvp where I can value every other position equally.

 

As for rated warzones, the insinuation that Bioware is scrapping solo rating makes me think they are going to be far less successful than they could have been. It's great for those of us able to put together an 8-man premade, but we're going to have another WoW, where 5% of the teams are serious, and the other 95% are just randomly put together to farm their comms through loss after loss. I'd prefer Bioware spend the time to fix whatever was the issue with solo ratings, so that everyone feels like they can 'compete' at some level, thus ensuring a higher likelihood that when I and my friends join a game, our opponents aren't going to just be sitting outside their spawn afk.

 

So, yes, color me disappointed that there's no ranked warzones yet, but probably not for the reasons many of you have.

 

Otherwise, I generally agree with what he said. Especially the cost of consumables. I don't know if that was done to try to drive the biochem market or something, but it's pretty counterproductive now to buy pvp consumables if you're trying to save up comms for gear.

Edited April 18, 2012 by revial

[Kalliadies]

so dramatic.

 

Doesnt feel much different to me, Getting the same results as I did pre-patch on all of my classes.

 

the only thing that sucks is the massive grind to get my battlemaster THEN war hero gear.

Edited April 18, 2012 by Kalliadies

[cashogy]

remove expertise heal bonus

 

offensive and defensive expertise are now even again

 

equally geared players would have expertise cancel out, and neither would have any kind of advantage.

 

the point of a pvp stat is to keep raid gear from dominating pvp. equalizing defense and offensive bonuses means if you dont wear pvp youre going to get destroyed, but if you do you are on even ground

 

why this is so complicated, idk

[Cellwin]

lol, I like how your slipperly slope argument acknowledges the fact that new gear sets will come out eventually, but doesn't acknowledge the fact that Rated Warzones will also be coming out before that, cutting the grind for gear (and everything else) down by a full third for anyone playing in RWZs.

 

That's 21k minutes, or 14 1/2 days of playtime, or just under 2 months if you only play 4 hours a day. If you lose every single match every single day for 2 months, that is. So realistically it will take less, probably half of that.

 

That's also not taking into account that they are going to be raising the rewards for participation across the board soon, cutting that grind down even further.

 

Oh, I'm sorry, am I ruining your doomsday prophecy? :c

 

I will live with what ever system they generate unfortantly becuase there is not another game peeking my interests at this point.

However,

Your counter to his statement is flawed, since the RWZ are going to Require 8 Man teams to Que.

No single or 4 man or 6 man..You either have 8 people or you can not even have the option to join RWZ matches to cut the amount of time for the grind down. Cross Server Ques will help the RWZ matches but if they only go with same server teams for a while, the number of RWZ matches even being played are going to be very low, due to population imbalance and lack of large guilds that can even field 8 man teams consistantly again not reducing the time of the grind.

[Varicite]

I will live with what ever system they generate unfortantly becuase there is not another game peeking my interests at this point.

However,

Your counter to his statement is flawed, since the RWZ are going to Require 8 Man teams to Que.

No single or 4 man or 6 man..You either have 8 people or you can not even have the option to join RWZ matches to cut the amount of time for the grind down. Cross Server Ques will help the RWZ matches but if they only go with same server teams for a while, the number of RWZ matches even being played are going to be very low, due to population imbalance and lack of large guilds that can even field 8 man teams consistantly again not reducing the time of the grind.

 

You seem to have forgotten completely about Solo Ranked Warzone queues. You don't need 7 other people to get RWZ comms. : )

 

Also, I'm in the same boat you are: I like this game, and I think it still has a lot of potential. I'm going to wait it out too.

Edited April 18, 2012 by Varicite

[cashogy]

I will live with what ever system they generate unfortantly becuase there is not another game peeking my interests at this point.

However,

Your counter to his statement is flawed, since the RWZ are going to Require 8 Man teams to Que.

No single or 4 man or 6 man..You either have 8 people or you can not even have the option to join RWZ matches to cut the amount of time for the grind down. Cross Server Ques will help the RWZ matches but if they only go with same server teams for a while, the number of RWZ matches even being played are going to be very low, due to population imbalance and lack of large guilds that can even field 8 man teams consistantly again not reducing the time of the grind.

 

wrong. you will have the ability to queue UP TO 8. you can still queue solo or in small groups, but the option will be there to queue a full ops group

[maticlandarr]

I like Taugrim, but him posting offsite means BW will probably not see it. His post didn't highlight anything that isn't already covered on the forums anyway.

 

I like that Taugrim at least made some positive comments since not everything in 1.2 is terrible.

 

Yes, this. I too am thankful for his objectivity. He also isnt the gospel truth. But ive learned a crapload from him.