Don't raise the level cap...

[Sendai_S]

Please for the love of all that is good and just in the world.

 

There are plenty of ways to promote growth and development in a game and raising the level cap is NOT one of them in my opinion.

 

• Go sideways. Add bonus skills via a new experience bar but keep the level cap at 50.
  
• Try to be less of a WOW clone and more original. I personally HATED WOW. I love Star Wars so I'm over looking it for now.
  
• Increased level caps are intimidating to players who want to start playing a game who've never played that game before. I wouldn't start playing a game largely into it's life if the level cap was too high... I'd feel like I would never get there.
  
• This is the kinda thing that has ripple effects on the rest of the pre-existing content. PVPers will be complaining about imbalances again. Which adjusting for PVPers always screws up the content system for those that like PVE.
  
• Seriously, go sideways. Add the new abilities to a separate tier of abilities that are only accessible after 50. Look at the highly successful City of Heroes for inspiration. They didn't raise the level cap. They did a master level and then the new content accessed hidden modifiers associated with the advencement.
  
• Ripple effects. This will screw with current end game content. But it actually screws with all content.
  
• Go sideways. I can't say it enough.
  
• Don't be a WOW clone.
  

 

Honestly, this is the kind of thing that keeps me from starting a game. And I know I'm not the only one. You can "add extra levels" without actually ADDING extra levels. Think outside the damn box for once.

 

Also, as a side note, you don't give us enough quickbars in the game already and you're planning to add more abilities? /foreheadslap

Edited June 5, 2012 by Sendai_S

[CJ_SAX_MAN]

Too high of a level cap? 50 isn't that high, what are they raising it to? 55 or 60? That still isn't that high. Hell comparing it to WoW, Vanilla WoWs starting cap was 60, and they are at what now? 90 with the new panda expansion, SWTOR is nowhere near that.

[CJ_SAX_MAN]

You have 4 quickbars you can use, how is that not enough for you?

[CJ_SAX_MAN]

if you "add extra levels without adding extra levels" That will imbalance the pvp much much worse than raising the level cap.

[MajikMyst]

I don't see any reason not to raise the cap.. It is nice to have do a little leveling again.. It can introduce some new abilities, different armor sets, and so forth..

 

As for WOW?? Is WOW the only MMO that increases the level cap??

[Valkryie]

If half of your actual pointers weren't "Go Sideways" i might actually take you seriously, but i cant because all your pointers are the exact same.

[skypunk]

I'll be the one that actually agrees with OP. I was never a fan of level cap increases myself. A new system to unlock new pieces of gear and abilities would be a fresh idea. Unlike the OP, I still play WoW and am drudging the upcoming level cap increase, mostly because of my 7 85's...

[Cheops]

I tend to agree.. i've been playing MMO for along time.. and i think there are ways to expand without level cap increase but not sure with this style of game.. would like to hope so.. if anyone remembers way back when.. WOW actually said they didnt want to get in the habit of raising cap and wanted to keep it at 60.. but well we can see how that has gone..

 

But like i said not sure if its possable to not do it in games like this.. Look at UO its never had a level cap.. because there is no levels =) pre-NGE SWG was the same.. no level cap because of no real levels..

[Sendai_S]

You have 4 quickbars you can use, how is that not enough for you?

 

I know how to play my toon. And I don't like opening my powers window to have to access my vehicles and pets. There are some classes that have enough room and some that do not.

[Sendai_S]

if you "add extra levels without adding extra levels" That will imbalance the pvp much much worse than raising the level cap.

 

Very arbitrary statement. As truthfully, was my original statement. So allow me to elaborate.

 

They have it within them to completely balance PVP in our game by balancing the abilities to work differently versus players than they do versus mobs. However they do not go this route. I'm not aware of any game that takes the time to have two different types of combat engines yet, and when there is one it will rule the PVE and PVPers with an iron fist... but that aside....

 

The "level cap" increase is a red herring if you will.

 

First of all, from a marketing stand point - those people seem to think more = better. This is NOT true.

 

First point. Banked Experience.

We have not been banking experience that we should have been getting since we all reached level 50. There are plenty of reasons to think this will be a stink point with a lot of people. Especially with Legacy XP as a draw to show that we still did in fact get XP.

 

Assuming XX is the new level cap.

 

A large majority of us just want to play and NOT have to level more. The ripples in this pond are as follows.

• Now we need to get XP again to reach whatever arbitrary level they plan to set it at.
  
• All of this is in the name of "adding new skills."
  
• Will level 50 dailies be adjusted to lvl XX values right away? Or will they become cake walks to those of us at lvl XX? Thus feeling like a waste of time but unfortunately still necessary for us to waste time doing because there is no other way to reliably make money?
  
• If they do alter the dailies, how long will it be before we can start to do them again? How much cash will I need ahead of time saved up to support leveling to the new cap? The price differences from lvl 40 to lvl 50 were astoundingly different.
  
• Assuming income scales as it has for the new levels if the average for a daily mission on Ilum is 10.5k credits per daily, will the new planet keep to the curve or will it undercut the value of it's daily missions?
  
• Let's face it. There has to be new dailies with a new level cap. It wouldn't make sense to not have them. Especially with a new planet.
  
• And honestly - with all the dailies I've run - I should instantly be at the new cap already. Hell, my main could be level 90 by now. Pick a level cap and stick to it.
  

 

Now that said, PVP relies on gear. And honestly, the skilled players are not always the geared players and viceversa. Essentially this game seems to follow a PVP model of - "the first one to the top wins and will keep winning -- all else who follow will never be as good." This is purely a result of the "expertise" gear mechanic. It's entirely possible to PVP wihtout it. But someone some where in some game that the Dev's at SWTOR un-originally copied decided to add gear that changed PVP - in what seems like a bad way to me.

 

Expertise is 100% unnecessary. The level 10-49 Warzones bracket PROOVES that. However this mechanic is added - as near as I can tell - to be another timesink in the game to make us grind more. Especially those of us who like to do both PVE and PVP. It has nothing to do with skill. It's who gets there first. The PVP models they keep poorly implementing in the "real world" pvp area is a pure example of that. That wasn't even a design. Ilum was an after thought. If any investor played this game and was a hardcore PVPer he or she would have been wretchedly embarassed by Ilum. If the guy who designed that wasn't fired - he should have been - especially if it was his only job.

 

(I will maintain to this day that DAoC was the best RVR/PVP of all time and why no one blatantly rips off the New Frontiers addition of DAoC for their own game is beyond me... especially Bioware who supposedly had Mythic people workign on this game ./ugh)

 

But PVP is 100% controllable - new side abilities that they add to your characters are 100% modifiyable to NOT work on other players if deemed too powerful. Heck you may not even know it but you probably have several skills that you don't even realize do NOTHING in PVP (which brings up a completely separate issue about the UI - but that is for another thread). For example, there is a Knight skill that allows you to backhand a target for an extremely large amount of damage, that is dependent on stunning or slowing the target, however it will NEVER work in PVP jsut as it doesn't work on certain mobs in the game. PVP targets are essentially "strong" mobs with certain immunity buffs (not really but for the sake of our arguement that's how I will desribe it...)

 

So if they added abilities by using say, a second XP bar - let's call this one Black Hole XP - then progressing up that new XP bar gives you all the added "levels" without changing your official level. And the abilities that they add - however they do add them, will have to be balanced into PVP to begin with so whether they do it horizontally by being relatively original or by copying another game that I personally believe to be horrid, either way is going to hvave to be integrated into their new system.

 

The proposal of going sideways and keeping 50 as the main level cap is in my humble opinion, a great way to NOT break the currently working game systems.

 

Bottom line is that PVP is something they will have to balance regardless of them doing it the "copy WoW" way or the "more original and much less current end-game breaking new XP bar" way (which quite frankly is very similar to the way legacy works and might even make the use of legacy better....)

[Sendai_S]

If half of your actual pointers weren't "Go Sideways" i might actually take you seriously, but i cant because all your pointers are the exact same.

 

My pointers were more of trying to stress that they should do something less akin to "stealing from Blizzard" and more akin to being "revolutionary" and "ground breaking".

 

This game has it within itself to be so much more than it is.

[Sendai_S]

I don't see any reason not to raise the cap.. It is nice to have do a little leveling again.. It can introduce some new abilities, different armor sets, and so forth..

 

As for WOW?? Is WOW the only MMO that increases the level cap??

 

I don't know if wow is the only game to raise it. If it is, it soon won't be if BW goes through with these plans. As I stated before - the odds are quite good I will quit playing if they do that.

 

DAOC was lvl 50 - but they added Master Level Abilities from the Atlantis expansion and through PVP you gained points that in turn gained you realm ranks from RR1 to RR10 - within each RR was 10 steps and each step granted you a point to spend on skills. Some skills cost 1 point and some cost more - there were skills that cost 8 - some were incremental steps requiring the first tier to cost 1 the next 3 and so on. It was a great system and not entirely overpowering. It also took a good amount of time to attain those skills so you know if someone was using them that they earned them. Unlike SWTOR where we had lvl 50's four days after release. Bottom line in DAOC - they did NOT add additional levels.

 

Anarchy Online was lvl 200 at release more than 8 years ago and as one of the first Sci-Fi genre MMO games it is still going strong. I played it. Doing some research they apparently have added 20 more levels to the game so now the level cap is 220 if you are a paying subscriber and 200 if you are a free player.

 

City of Heroes is another game that I know intimately. And it is still a fantiastic game, despite the rather limited AI of the PVE opponents compared to SWTOR. They didn't increase the level cap there either, instead going sideways and creating a new sub-system for adding abilities referred to as the Incarnate System. It's a story-driven device to add abilities to the characters in the game. It requires a grind but it does so in a fun way most of the time. The added powers are modular as well, so you can swap them out at will in your power system once you ge them completed. I believe there was a 2 minute cool down from a fight before they could be swapped out to other abilities tho. Another example of successful and innovative additions without forcing a traditional grind.

 

SWG is not even worhty of the conversation as it was at first a levelless game. But then Sony got weird and worried about WOW and ruined it by converting it as best they could into a copy of WOW. This lesson alone shows us that copying WoW is not always a good thing. SWG had a strong and dedicated following - the massive exodus from that game when that happened and subsequent attempts to lure more players did little to save it. They even had to refund a large quantity of players the money they spent on an expansion pack that they released 3 weeks prior to the bombshell that they were doing this. I got my money back. Did you?

 

I have little experience with other MMOs. I played WoW for a month when it came out - I hated it and never subscribed to it after the 1st free month was over. I found it trite and insulting. The quality was fine but the content was not to my personal liking ultimately. To each their own.

[Blisst_uNF]

Too high of a level cap? 50 isn't that high, what are they raising it to? 55 or 60? That still isn't that high. Hell comparing it to WoW, Vanilla WoWs starting cap was 60, and they are at what now? 90 with the new panda expansion, SWTOR is nowhere near that.

 

I've never been a fan of level based systems, for me they break the immersion. Seeing low level Jedi/Sith with high rank titles in the story just bugged me. Also, can you provide a good argument to keep the level-based system in MMO's? Really they're a throwback to pen and paper RPG's, and just follow along with the preexisting convention. There's absolutely no reason they need to remain in newer RPG's. Many RPG's (digital and otherwise) have given up the level based system in favor of newer systems that provide plenty of character ability and customization without the necessity for a level abstraction.

 

You have 4 quickbars you can use, how is that not enough for you?

 

Because we use ALL of our abilities effectively and like to have a realistic number of utilities handy?

Of my 3 50's, only the marauder has free buttons on the quickbar, my merc and my assassin are completely overloaded.

 

if you "add extra levels without adding extra levels" That will imbalance the pvp much much worse than raising the level cap.

 

Your above statement is patently untrue. If the new abilities are designed around the level 50 abstraction they can be done so keeping the power shift minimal while still providing a bunch of new utility for current players. Bunches of new abilities went in with 1.2 that didn't change PVP or OPS at all, simply by tying them to companions. What's more they're tied to every character you play regardless of level. Very clever implementation IMO.

[thewatcheruatu]

You know...when I think about it, I could actually see how raising the level cap might be a good method whereby BioWare can reevaluate their current gear progression dynamic and maybe tweak the formula so that on-level content is never faceroll easy. But...I don't think they'll do that.

[Sendai_S]

You know...when I think about it, I could actually see how raising the level cap might be a good method whereby BioWare can reevaluate their current gear progression dynamic and maybe tweak the formula so that on-level content is never faceroll easy. But...I don't think they'll do that.

 

I believe it's a bad idea for a few reasons.

 

• It negates previous content or forces it to be rebalanced.
  
• It intimidates new players from picking the game up.
  
• It has a ripple effect to all existing endgame systems. And thusly, more issues will need to be fixed.
  
• PVP is currently 10-49 and 50s. What will it be now? 10-49 and 50-55? (presuming 55 to be the new level cap)
  
• What about the current operations? They'll either need to be re-balanced or they will become obsolete content and an expansion shouldn't negate content.
  

 

There's more - that's just the stuff off the top of my head.

 

They need a better game plan than "Copy WoW" in my opinion.

 

We have legacy XP.

 

Call any post50 XP the Master Level XP and use that to unlock the new skills.

[Penfookio]

if pvp get unbalanced who cares don't like the class you playing reroll

[tdoyle]

I dont see the harm in boosting up the Lvl cap I love lvling I hope they keep raiseing it and I now alot of ppl would love to see bioware raise the lvl cap

[Oronoco]

I think a lvl cap raise is a bit daunting. but it is also a great opportunity.

 

If I could do it my own way: I would split the talent trees once more at the tip of each tree (effectively giving each current player 6 options). and use legacy lvls to grant points in those sub-sections. Legacy lvls could even grant abilities. Say your legacy is level capped, and you start a new character, said new character would need to hit legacy first, and then the 5 lvl markers to inherit the more impressive legacy moves. (obviously I wont try and invent the details but that's an example)

 

That would be my negotiation. increase legacy lvl cap, and its affect, while keeping character lvl low.

besides 50 is such a nice round number it just sounds good.

 

this thread is on the same topic and I expanded on this idea a bit there.

Edited June 6, 2012 by Oronoco
link to more similar stuff

[Dyvid]

I think WoW has left a bad taste in everyones mouth. Blizzard was clueless on how to raise level caps without breaking their game. If BW is raising the cap this early then they planned to raise it before launch. Mostly likely it'll be 3 -5 levels.

 

Honestly I did like FFXI Merit system. After you gain X amount of xp you get a merit point that you use to either buff your primary stats, secondary stats, abilities, and by new abilites.

Edited June 6, 2012 by Dyvid

[Ramahospitality]

Here's the things. The E3 announcement said 'coming this year". Not in 1.3. So we may not even see the level raise until fall or even the Holidays. Edited June 6, 2012 by Ramahospitality

[Rheshalea]

SNIP

 

A large majority of us just want to play and NOT have to level more.

 

SNIP

 

 

How do you know the majority does not want to level more? I can tell you, 100% of the people I know personally who play TOR, DO want more levels. Granted, I only know I do, my husband does, and his brother does, but still 100% of 3 people want more levels.

 

I realise this is something you feel very strongly about, but please don't make facts up. It undermines your otherwise very valid opinions - heck, you even made me think it might not be so bad if we didn't get more levels.

[murshawursha]

I believe it's a bad idea for a few reasons.

 

• It negates previous content or forces it to be rebalanced.
  
• It intimidates new players from picking the game up.
  
• It has a ripple effect to all existing endgame systems. And thusly, more issues will need to be fixed.
  
• PVP is currently 10-49 and 50s. What will it be now? 10-49 and 50-55? (presuming 55 to be the new level cap)
  
• What about the current operations? They'll either need to be re-balanced or they will become obsolete content and an expansion shouldn't negate content.
  

 

So these arguments are all well and good, except they're still applicable even without raising the level cap.

 

Think about it. Even if the level cap never went up, as more content comes out in the future, they're going to add new tiers of more powerful gear. Whether that more powerful gear has a level requirement of 50 or 55 is irrelevant; people are still going to have to work their way up all of the earlier tiers of endgame gear, and once they get to the best gear, early endgame content is still going to be faceroll easy.

 

So really, what's the difference?

[Oronoco]

I think WoW has left a bad taste in everyones mouth. Blizzard was clueless on how to raise level caps without breaking their game. If BW is raising the cap this early then they planned to raise it before launch. Mostly likely it'll be 3 -5 levels.

 

Honestly I did like FFXI Merit system. After you gain X amount of xp you get a merit point that you use to either buff your primary stats, secondary stats, abilities, and by new abilites.

 

I think they planned to raise it as well.

I'm really hoping, if it must happen, that its a huge jump like like 25 lvls all the way to 75 and a full 1-2 chapters of content. Something really big like that would be way worth it and put the current endgame content well enough into mid game that balancing out pvp brackets and raid gear would be negligible. who cares if some fully geared lvl 50 is in your WZ when you have a lvl 74 on your team with moves that could smush Palpatine like gum under a table.

[thewatcheruatu]

I think they planned to raise it as well.

I'm really hoping, if it must happen, that its a huge jump like like 25 lvls all the way to 75 and a full 1-2 chapters of content. Something really big like that would be way worth it and put the current endgame content well enough into mid game that balancing out pvp brackets and raid gear would be negligible. who cares if some fully geared lvl 50 is in your WZ when you have a lvl 74 on your team with moves that could smush Palpatine like gum under a table.

 

Yeah, that's sort of what I was getting at above when I said it might be a good opportunity for BioWare to reevaluate their gear progression dynamic. If they raised the level cap even five levels, then a level 55 character even wearing gear with blue mods in it might stand a chance against somebody who grinded out the uber level 50 stuff. It's an opportunity for BioWare to--in my opinion--correct some mistakes they may have made and try not to make them again moving forward.

Edited June 6, 2012 by thewatcheruatu

[Qishari]

Hello all,

 

We do have a thread for the topic of not raising level caps. Please continue your discussion in the ongoing thread: http://www.swtor.com/community/showthread.php?t=471929