State of the Game: My Opinion (Please share your thoughts)

[DarthKhaos]

On this point, and the other you mentioned regarding Legacy costs, there are virtually no money sinks in this game. I know you mentioned in your OP that you've been fifty for a couple of months now and just recently hit one million credits, but I wager a lot of the population is sitting on at least five times that. Money sinks are important in my opinion, otherwise your economy is pretty much useless.

 

I would be curious to know what you've been spending your credits on?

How can you say this in the same breadth? Legacy Cost & No money sinks? Rocket Boots anyone? 2Mil just for the base ability without lower cooldown upgrades.

 

Oh and as for the crafting list. Sort by Rating. It'll make your life MUCH easier.

Edited June 21, 2012 by DarthKhaos

[RSLeMire]

No way am I reading that wall o text, I just wanna say good job prefacing with "My Opinion" in the title... most people on these forums do not know their opinion from fact or the subjective from objective.

[SocraticSteve]

No way am I reading that wall o text, I just wanna say good job prefacing with "My Opinion" in the title... most people on these forums do not know their opinion from fact or the subjective from objective.

 

You should really try reading it. It doesn't take THAT long. I put a lot of effort into it and people seem to like what I have to say.

 

*waves hand*

"You want to read my post."

 

[Degarmo]

Great post, SocraticSteve. The endgame part really sums it up for me. Add in there about endgame crafting. So, we need items from Hardmode FPs, which have a CHANCE of dropping one - and I need three, to make the orange items which can be easily supplanted by other in-game items. So, essentially, we're spending a whole lot of time for a costume change that's going to cost an assload to both make and then transfer out/in the mods.

 

My wife's quote was, "So, in order to make this stuff, or get better gear, I have to grind daily comms so that I can do an instance, which I've already done, just on a harder difficulty, so I can have a chance to get a drop? And who sat around the meeting table and said, 'yeah, this is fun.' "

 

As far as PvP, I'm with you. Control points on each planet, along with fortress-type areas (like keeps in other games) to raid and control with galaxy-wide rewards for the side that has X amount of them, maybe even areas that only open up for your faction if you control enough areas or different areas. There are a lot of ways to make that work where it would be fun for a good deal of time.

Edited June 21, 2012 by Degarmo

[mattgyver]

Great post, SocraticSteve. The endgame part really sums it up for me. Add in there about endgame crafting. So, we need items from Hardmode FPs, which have a CHANCE of dropping one - and I need three, to make the orange items which can be easily supplanted by other in-game items. So, essentially, we're spending a whole lot of time for a costume change that's going to cost an assload to both make and then transfer out/in the mods.

 

My wife's quote was, "So, in order to make this stuff, or get better gear, I have to grind daily comms so that I can do an instance, which I've already done, just on a harder difficulty, so I can have a change to get a drop? And who sat around the meeting table and said, 'yeah, this is fun.' "

 

As far as PvP, I'm with you. Control points on each planet, along with fortress-type areas (like keeps in other games) to raid and control with galaxy-wide rewards for the side that has X amount of them, maybe even areas that only open up for your faction if you control enough areas or different areas. There are a lot of ways to make that work where it would be fun for a good deal of time.

 

loved the quote. It's so true, who came up with that idea, disgruntled DMV workers?

[Degarmo]

loved the quote. It's so true, who came up with that idea, disgruntled DMV workers?

 

LOL - I think you may have caught on to something there.

[Chessack]

I agree with a lot of the OP's points.

 

To take up just one issue, Social Points... I think the #1 problem with this is that most Flashpoints are just a quick dialogue and then 99% combat. Esseles gets farmed because it actually has enough conversations to cause you to gain points in a realistic way. Almost all the FPs after that (at least those that I have tried) are so much more combat-heavy that it doesn't make sense in terms of the time it takes, to bother with them. Even on-level you can do several Esseles runs in the time it takes to do an on-level run through the two Jedi Prisoner missions, and you'd get 5 or 6 times the social points because there are so many more conversation spots in Esseles.

 

The huge failure here is not the SP system per se, but BW's inability to come up with enough Esseles-like, story-driven FPs. Too many of the FPs are just one or two convos and then 500 battles -- they remind me of City of Heroes missions, which were all combat, all the time. Way back at launch people accused BW of doing a 'bait and switch' with Esseles, because you could get to it very early, and it gave you a false impression that all FPs would be great stories like this. That's sure what I thought. Then you actually do all the other FPs, and you find out that they're almost all combat, no story. Hammer Station, Athiss, Mando Raiders, Taral V, Maelstrom... I don't think there are as many social points available in all of those combined as there were in Esseles all by itself.

 

Maybe BW thought it would be too much to have Esseles-level story in all those FPs. OK, fine... then don't have such high social point requirements per social level. But the way the SP system is designed, it's like they expect us to get Esseles-style SPs from every FP, but then they didn't put enough convos in for us to earn them. I know people who permagrouped all the way to 50 and couldn't get much traction on Social Points ... and most of what they have came from regular missions, not FPs.

 

The FPs after Esseles have honestly been a huge disappointment to me. I expected Esseles and what I got was mindless combat. But I think it's not the SP system that is the problem here -- that's the symptom. The problem is that all those FPs are at this point is mindless combat.

[SocraticSteve]

My wife's quote was, "So, in order to make this stuff, or get better gear, I have to grind daily comms so that I can do an instance, which I've already done, just on a harder difficulty, so I can have a chance to get a drop? And who sat around the meeting table and said, 'yeah, this is fun.' "

 

Hah, it's funny because it's so sadly true.

 

And in regards to the last post, I agree. When I did Black Talon (most of my time has been Empire side), I thought it was awesome because we were having all of these group conversations. It was really like a group story we were all getting to participate in. I was getting to see the personality of other people's characters. Then there were the FPs after that... and hardly anyone got a chance to talk.

 

So, yes I would love for FPs to have more conversations, but I feel like the Social Point system should encourage ALL forms of player interactions, not just Flashpoints.

[Holden_Dissent]

Ever try questing in a group? I got 2 levels of social just off doing that. It's way more fun too.

[swilldog]

Very nice points, OP. Not sure I agree with all the suggestions, but nothing I see here that necessary disagree with, either.

 

Having said that, and to mirror what a few others have pointed out here, this game turned out to be a pretty significant letdown for me in a way that I can sum up in one word: Rails.

 

Space combat is a rail, world progression is a rail, companion acquisition is a rail, each class story line is a rail.

Even if you make some novel choices for light/dark, you're still running the same quests each time, with only small variations if at all. There's a defined narrative arc, and there's no deviation from planet to planet. You wanna do your class quests? You MUST do the same planets as everyone else in the same order as everyone else, with a few meaningless and all too brief interludes for little "pop-in" moments either on a previously visited world or to some off world location (usually a ship).

 

And when you level an alt, the first world and a few minor blips along the way are the only things that differentiate your experience with that of all the other classes in your faction.

 

Granted, you could choose to do only your class quests and then hope you get lucky enough to be able to run flashpoints for the rest of your XP to 50, but that's assuming you have a reliable group of friends or a very active and social server - something I've not found thusfar. I guess you could PvP your way up the ranks, too, but that's a lot of waiting and a godawful amount of Huttball.

 

The initial perspective of this game is that it's big. But it's really quite small. Each planet you visit has playable areas about the size of Staten Island, space is a system of monorails with a bunch of needless running through empty space ports and unnecessary empty docking bays and orbital stations. It's a game that speaks of great ambition but only executes on a tight budget. Maybe they bit off more than they could chew, maybe Lucas Arts forced them down a path they weren't prepared to go. But it feels a lot like they didn't want to overcommit to something risky, and weren't prepared to move forward once the game's limitations became apparent.

 

It's not so much a galaxy as it is a tri-state area.

[Goretzu]

Hah, it's funny because it's so sadly true.

 

And in regards to the last post, I agree. When I did Black Talon (most of my time has been Empire side), I thought it was awesome because we were having all of these group conversations. It was really like a group story we were all getting to participate in. I was getting to see the personality of other people's characters. Then there were the FPs after that... and hardly anyone got a chance to talk.

 

So, yes I would love for FPs to have more conversations, but I feel like the Social Point system should encourage ALL forms of player interactions, not just Flashpoints.

 

 

 

It really, really should. The social points systems just seems like something that wasn't actually playtested in the context of not "does this work", but rather "does this actually encourage people to BE social"..... of course it doesn't, it actually encourages people to level in fixed groups if anything.

 

The FPs in SWTOR are a mixed bag, there are some great story ones, and some pretty alternative non-story ones (or less story ones) and then there are some pretty standard MMORPG ones..... although in fairness I don't think I've come across a bad FP in SWTOR, the worst were just ones I wasn't really bothered about doing again, which is better than most MMORPGs.

[Lotharo]

I agree with all the things that were summed up and I also agree that they should focus on current state of the game before putting in alot of new content. The game needs to be more fun to play before people will stay for any new stuff or to attract new people.

[nartiuslightlord]

Great Post OP.

 

Some hard choices have to be made about the current direction the game is heading. but it might be to late to fix all of this the way it need's to be fixed.

 

I will love my sorc and keep subbing for a bit longer. my hope is they wise up and start getting creative with allowing us to have more freedom and choices. and start purging all the the corruption that is Wow from the current design.

 

Themepark's are dying and people that have been spoon fed epics and instanced PVP and class nerfs and 200ft tall boss creatures are getting a bad taste in their mouths.

 

This game needs to innovate fast. story is great but not enough.it needs to move away the tradional themepark design and start going off the rails and start innovating like it's big brother SWG. or it will sink like the NGE who wanted to be like Wow.

[Heideggar]

To add to the OP's list:

 

- Terrible Customer Service

- Lack of communication by Devs on important issues

- Lack of many game functionality/features that are standard in other MMOs.

- Lack of playing experience by Devs to properly balance PvE and PvP issues.

- Poor Client/Server coding scheme for environment loading.

- Lacking a lot of quality of life features.

- Lack of a "I'm a star wars hero, I matter." feel. Did you guys see how fast those speeders traveled in Return of the Jedi? You Devs should go watch the original three movies at least once in your lives.

- Space Combat is on par with a roller-coaster. It was nice seeing the scenes of the mission the first couple times, but since I can't actually drive this sucker, I'm clearly not the pilot of my own ship. Enemy ships going -past- me so I can shoot them from behind is beyond retarded. No sense of realism whatsoever with that. But you have to do that since you won't let me pilot my own ship.

- Lies and Half Truths. Devs knew rated warzones weren't going to be ingame for a -long- time. They knew their combat log feature sucked. They don't even address current 1.3 changes on the PTS, where hundreds of people are voicing and viewing their opinions. They are desperate to keep people paying instead of working hard to increase people's desire to play, and that's what's the worst of it all.

[DarthOvertone]

Wow. We have Socrates and Heidegger in the same thread. That's pretty impressive from a philosophical standpoint.

[Rachiia]

I finally cancelled, today.

 

Overall, I agree with the OP about customization, crafting, etc., but for me the biggest problem is the gear grind. SWTOR has a very engaging storyline and is lots of fun while you're leveling, but the endgame is a gear grind and that gets tedious after a while.

 

I know this is common in most MMOs, but it doesn't have to be this way. I don't know if GW2 is going to be a great game - I'd've stayed in SWTOR, if the endgame was more fun - but at least they have the right mindset:

http://www.arena.net/blog/is-it-fun-colin-johanson-on-how-arenanet-measures-success

 

Just in case you don't want to read the whole thing, I'll quote this from the article:

"When your game systems are designed to achieve the prime motivation of a subscription-based MMO, you run the risk of sacrificing quality to get as much content in as possible to fill that time. You get leveling systems that take insane amounts of grind to gain a level, loot drop systems that require doing a dungeon with a tiny chance the item you want can drop at the end, raid systems that need huge numbers of people online simultaneously to organize and play, thousands of wash/repeat item-collection or kill-mob quests or dailies with flavor text support, the best stat gear requiring crazy amounts of time to earn, etc."

 

Essentially, his position is the subscription-based model of MMOs leads to this treadmill-like gear grind. Imo, that's where SWTOR is and it is where it keeps going. More dailies, anyone?

 

The endgame gear grind is what I find most boring. I would love to have many of the other things the OP mentions, but I don't think the game will become more interesting or fun unless the grind is fixed.

 

Maybe if the game went F2P like Guild Wars - where you still pay for the game and expansions, the BioWare team can focus more on the fun aspects of the game rather than the grind aspects of the game.

Edited June 22, 2012 by Rachiia

[Saltydogg]

If you think this is a fps please go onto bf3 as i could do with my knife kills badge.

 

LOL knife kill badges, someone likes to pve alot in this game.

[Skidrowbro]

I found this post on MMO-Champion and I think this makes a lot of sense. Of course it's talking about WoW but it most definately pertains to this game.

 

"Solid or not, the GAME was better before.

 

If a new MMO comes out with a bunch of crap like LFD and LFR, way too fast level up and overpowered damage against NPC's and monsters as WoW has NOW, why bother playing it?

 

Soon they'll make it in a way where you don't have to kill bosses, you just que for loot and if you are lucky you win an item that later you can sell for real life money on the AH, cos you won't really need it on your toon."

Edited June 23, 2012 by Skidrowbro

[Valkirus]

I found this post on MMO-Champion and I think this makes a lot of sense. Of course it's talking about WoW but it most definately pertains to this game.

 

"Solid or not, the GAME was better before.

 

If a new MMO comes out with a bunch of crap like LFD and LFR, way too fast level up and overpowered damage against NPC's and monsters as WoW has NOW, why bother playing it?

 

Soon they'll make it in a way where you don't have to kill bosses, you just que for loot and if you are lucky you win an item that later you can sell for real life money on the AH, cos you won't really need it on your toon."

 

That poster sounds bitter to me and like he has a axe to grind. And like most of those...he likes to exaggerate. TOR does not have LFR. And if it pertains to this game, why are you still playing it? I am still having fun in WoW, thus I still play it. I stopped having fun in TOR, reason I have not been playing it for the last month. But my reasons for not playing have nothing to do with his points.

[Skidrowbro]

That poster sounds bitter to me and like he has a axe to grind. And like most of those...he likes to exaggerate. TOR does not have LFR. And if it pertains to this game, why are you still playing it? I am still having fun in WoW, thus I still play it. I stopped having fun in TOR, reason I have not been playing it for the last month. But my reasons for not playing have nothing to do with his points.

 

You stopped playing because you failed in your crusade of trying to get an x-server LFG. Don't worry, I'm sure the devs will pander to that type of crowd at one point and then they will end up exaclty where rift is at.

[Jakarn]

I really hope the powers that be notice this thread because everything the OP talked about is needed. I think the game has enough content after 1.3, and now they need to go back and refine the stuff that is there.

 

I read this thread while I was waiting for the last patch for TSW, I just got out of playing the beta and thought I would write something here, I was standing in the teleport room and there was about 40 players all standing around not one of them looked the same, some had the same shirts or pants but no one looked exatly the same. There is no dye in this game just so many different varities of gear. Armour dosn't play any part in TSW it is just cosmetic.

 

I think the gear grind thing started in WOW, it was in WAR as well, playing WOW I remeber all the posers strutting around the main city in the brand new level 50 stuff, all I could think of was damm that looks stupid, you did all that grinding for that.

 

I think most people are over the end game gear grind, in this game it is even more stupid. I think I had my orange gear by about level 25, and I like the way my character looks and I have been adding to it so by the time I hit 50 he will be just the way i want him to be, but oh no the game says you can't wear that armour at 50 you have to wear this stuff. I play a bounty hunter so I'm stuck with what looks like an ironing board stuck to my chest.

 

The crazy thing is SWTOR has done all the work, all the artwork is already there (just look at the Armour and Sythweaving crafting recipes). I don't think anyone wears green armour anymore, but if it could be turned into orange as the OP says imagine how many combinations there would be and people could use their imagination again. So turn all the level 50 stuff into empty orange gear (some people might want to wear it) and just give us mods and inhancements at end game.

[Kalfear]

Nice post steve and good reflections of your personal veiw.

 

I agree on some like the dyes and a more indepth crafting system (really all that needs to happen is they need to add wear and tear to the quality of all equipment and then crafter items would become more usefull and wanted)

 

But I disagree on all your lowering costs because it just reads to me like you want all those items handed to you with minimal effort.

 

Personally I have no issue with legacy costs and think they could be even higher so even less players get them because one of the main things killing this game is nothing is special or unique and everyone gets everything handed to them for most part.

 

I currently have not purchased any of the legacy items and never even had more then 400k credits at one time on my main, so this isnt me wanting it hard so others cant get what I have already. This is me wanting it harder so the reward actually have meaning and worth. They dont right now and lowering the costs make them even more meaningless.

 

As for guild stuff, I just feel there is so many more important things to focus on right now that guilds need to take a back seat.

 

The #1 priority for this game sHOULD BE social content and community building content (not talking guilds, talking server wide). Things like Paazaak, Swoop Racing (ala KotOR1), cantina pit fighting, DAoC style RVR with capturable bases that give a faction (not a guild, not a group of players, but the whole faction) bonus so the COMMUNITY comes togather as one. EQ2 style housing, Rift public grouping, EQ2 mentoring system, stuff like that. Concepts that reward and bring togather the entire community of a faction and not just a select guild or group of who ever.

 

Till the social content and community building content put in, this game will continue to bleed subscriptions as right now, when the content done (and that only takes 3 weeks to 2 months max to do) there is no reason for the average player to log back in. There is nothing in place to pull them back in. There is no community!

Edited June 23, 2012 by Kalfear

[Darth_Victus]

State of The Game: My Opinion

 

I first want to say that I have always respected Bioware for their devotion to story and producing quality games. With that said, I'd humbly like to share my opinion of the game so far.

 

First, your accomplishment of finally bringing engaging storylines to the MMO genre is MUCH appreciated. Full and complete voice-acting has been standard in most genres of games for years, and it's about time MMO's caught up. Most importantly, I have been having fun playing the game and I hope to continue to do so for some time. However, I feel that there are some things that are holding the game back from being as great as it could be. There have been many times when I thought that something could have been done better or felt incomplete, and some times that I was left shaking my head wondering what in the world you guys were thinking.

 

Don't get me wrong, you guys have done several things well, but I feel that with several elements you have followed the traditional MMO formula much too closely, or just dropped the ball. So I'd like to outline and explain my biggest concerns about the game, and make suggestions of how they could be fixed.

1. Customization needs to be a higher priority.

-Specifically, we need more options and it needs to be MUCH easier to customize our characters. In a game with an actual storyline, we're supposed to feel an emotional connection to our character. In order to do this, our character NEEDS to feel like an individual. I currently don't feel this way. I don't feel that I have created my character's appearance. I feel like I have done the best I could with what is available, but I don't really feel unique. This is especially true in the early levels.

 

I remember in a recent podcast you guys said that you like to give us a task to accomplish things. But it should NOT be a task to customize our appearance! Now I don't mean we should have all options available to us immediately, but as it is we have to work to change our clothes! As a level 50 with high grade gear, it would cost me more then 100,000 credits to unslot all of the mods out of a piece of armor. This is ridiculous! I have to pay 100k just to change my pants?! I have been wanting to change some of my character's clothing options, but have felt that it's simply not worth spending all the credits because I'm low on credits as it is. So even if I have the clothing I want, I can't afford to wear it!

 

We also need more freedom to customize. Any character should be able to look however they want, regardless of class or faction. I feel like my character's appearance is more based on how you the devs think he should look, instead of how I want him to look. Why does my Sorceror HAVE to wear robes? Why does my Bounty Hunter HAVE to wear heavy armor? Why can't I dress them the way I want to?

 

And why is there still no dye system? Personally I feel like this is something that should have been in since launch. The ability to change the color of our armor and equipment seems like a basic feature to me. This is one of those cases that have left me shaking my head in confusion. I know it's not a game breaking omission, but it's a basic feature. The lack of things like this leads to the current "incomplete" feeling I have about the game.

 

If I were to put the game's current level of customization on a scale from 1 to 10 with 10 being along the lines of APB (custom body proportions, face scaling, custom textures and other things), I would place SW:TOR at about a 4. I would like to see it at about a 6 or 7.

 

Suggestions to fix the problems with customization:

 

-Remove the credit costs to unslot modifications, allowing us to change out pieces of equipment for free.

-Remove faction and weight class limitations from all armor.

-Make all armor become adaptive, so that it acts as the highest weight class available to a character, (allowing anyone to wear any armor, provided they meet the lvl. requirements and whatever.)

-Make an orange Custom class version of ALL models of armor available.

-Create some kind of dye system that allows us to choose the colors of our armor, and if possible our weapons. (This needs to happen as soon as possible, at least for armor.)

-I would also like to see a voice pitch feature, which would allow us to raise or lower our character's tone of voice.

-A larger number of options at character creation would also be appreciated. For example why are Humans the only ones with facial hair options? A separate facial hair option would be nice for cyborgs and any other species that can have it.

-Oh and of course the ability to put any hood up or down.

 

2. The current crafting system is broken.

-So far I have tried Synthweaving and Cybertech, and have had two VERY different experiences. My main experience is with Synthweaving, and I'm sorry but it's just ridiculous. The crafting system is so complex, cumbersome, confusing and unintuitive that I hardly use it. This is another feature that has left me shaking my head. I was really excited by the prospect of crafting in the time before launch, but have been severely let down.

 

When I open my Synthweaving window, I am greeted by a massive list of recipes; most of which are for items that no one will ever want and there is no reason for me to make. And for every green recipe, I can reverse engineer it to learn up to 17 variations of that item. Of course in the time it would take to get the one I want, I could easily outlevel the item and obtain a better item through questing or Flashpoints.

 

Now, as a Synthweaver, I basically just look for recipes for orange items to see if they offer any kind of new cool appearance. But I see no real reason to try to craft and sell any items because I never needed to go on the markets to find armor so why would anyone else? When I have sold crafted items on the market I can only seem to sell them at a price that barely gives me any profit, and is therefore not worth the hassle. Of course I now have the option of making Augments, but finding recipes on the market that are good enough is hard to do, and if I do find one it is insanely overpriced.

 

That has been my experience with Synth, and I imagine Armormech is quite the same. My limited experience with Cybertech has been quite different. From what I've seen it should be a lot easier to keep my moddable gear upgraded. Plus, I get to make unique ship upgrades, speeders, and usable grenades? Yeah, I think I'll get a lot more use out of this.

 

Suggestions to help crafting:

 

-The system needs to be simplified and made easier to understand and use.

-Every item we make needs to be something useful that people would actually have a reason to buy, not a bunch of pointless fluff.

-The team really needs to go back and really figure out what the role of the different crafting professions should be and how they fit into the game as a whole.

 

-As it is, I regret taking Synthweaving and wasting so much time on it, as I get very little use out of it. I was thinking a way to improve Synth and Armormech would be to basically make them the tailors of the game. To do this, Synth and Armor crafters could learn to make an orange customizable version of most armors in the game. Perhaps when reverse engineering an item, there could be an option that would allow you to choose between receiving crafting materials or learning to make an orange item that looks just like that item (that has the same level requirement). This would be great. While on the fleet I've often seen people link an item and ask if there is an orange version of that item because they like the look so much. Imagine if you could just give that item to a crafter, they reverse engineer it and then make an orange version for you! (although if the item is bound they wouldn't be able to trade it... hmmm that's a problem.)

 

But anyway, some kind of system like this would really open up the options for clothes. Plus there are many armor models that are just going to waste because they are used on pointless items. I mean every planet has those Light/Medium/Heavy armor vendors but I've never bought anything from them because their items are trash with stats so low they're useless. Those are Art assets (work your employees put time and effort into) that are being completely wasted. If we could RE those items into orange item recipes, they'd actually get used.

 

Of course Synth could only do this with Willpower and Strength based items while Armormech could do it with Aim and Cunning based items. And I'm sure you would want to block off certain items like Social gear that are rewarded by other means.

 

3. Social tools need fixing.

- Most of the social tools and features need to be overhauled. The guild system feels like a bare minimum feature, the team search function is a bad joke, and the whole Social Ponts system makes no sense at all.

 

Now, I know the team search function is being replaced in 1.3, so I won't say much except that I really can't believe that such a useless tool was ever implemented and that it took this long to fix it. I'm sorry but this just seems like a terrible lack of analysis and judgement. In a recent video you mentioned how a team search function was "one of the most requested features." But the thing is... we should not have had to request a functioning team search feature! That's something that should have been a given and in since launch. This is the same way I feel about an armor dye system. We shouldn't have to ask for some of this stuff!

 

Another feature that has left me shaking my head is the Social Points system. I honestly don't know what the idea behind this was. If it was meant as an incentive to group up, it failed horribly. The current need for Black Talon or Esseles farming is clear evidence that the system doesn't work. Why do you only get Social points from group conversations, and why be rewarded when you get the lucky conversation roll? If the idea is to promote grouping and community, players should receive social points for any and all interactions with other players. I think it should basically be a system like Experience, that you only earn in a team and the larger the team the faster you earn them. So, playing with one other person doing basic missions you'll gain social points slowly. In a four man team, you'll earn them three times as fast, then give bonus social points for completing Heroic missions and Flashpoints. Do an Operation and earn them at an even higher rate. Take down a world boss and get a big mess of points. Also... PVP! Complete warzones or accomplish goals in open-world PVP and get social points (even if you're not on a team). And there should be greater rewards besides a few sets of Social armor. Maybe some special pets, or special consumable items that buff your whole team- like a team Stim. Special emotes also work.

 

Like I said, the guild system could really be expanded. At the moment it's basically just a group Friend list. I haven't had any experience with the guild bank as my Guild has basically been dead for a couple months.

 

Ways to improve the guild system:

 

-Let us inspect guild members even if they are offline.

-Let us search our guild for crafters and inspect their recipes. Then let us basically place an order with the item that we would like that person to make us. Then, whenever they are on, they can look at their orders, craft the items, and have them automatically sent to the recipient.

-Guild coalitions or whatever you want to call it would also be nice. Allowing larger groups to communicate.

-Some kind of in-game event calendar would also be great.

 

Other social features we need:

 

-Legacy friends! So that we can see if a friend is online regardless of what character they are on and regardless what faction that character is.

-Legacy banks to easily share items among our characters.

-Cross-faction chat. If I understand right, custom chat channels are locked by faction. Change this. Let's say I'm on a Republic character but some people are making a team to do an Imperial Operation I've been wanting to do, I'd like to know.

-Also, Chat groups. Essentially, just let us look at a list to see how many people are in a custom chat channel and who they are.

 

The market also needs to be improved. Combining the neutral market with the faction markets is a good start, but the system needs improvement.

Suggestions:

-If I sell a stack of items the price I enter should be the price per item.

-If I'm selling a stack of items the buyer should be able to buy as many of them as they want, instead of having to buy the whole stack.

-When I search for items to buy and I arrange them by price, it should be by the price per item.

-When on the Purchase tab, if I click drag and drop an item it should do an automatic search for that item.

-It would also be nice if there was some way to place an order for something we needed then have a crafter or supplier fill that order.

 

4. PVP could use some love.

-I'm not a hardcore PVPer, but I do enjoy it and it could be expanded upon. First of all would of course be open-world PVP. Tatooine's Outlaw's Den is a dead zone, and I never got to try Ilum's PVP before you guys killed it so I'm not sure what the problem was there, but fixing those areas and giving us a reason to use them should be high on the PVP list.

 

After that, ranked warzones would be nice as well as cross-server warzones, if that's possible.

 

Other issues:

There are a few miscellaneous things I'd like to add:

 

- What is with the insane prices for things like legacy rewards or some vehicles? Honestly I feel like I'm being punished because I DIDN'T abuse Slicing when I could. I've been 50 for a couple months and only recently hit 1 million credits for the first time and only when focusing on making money, and I'm a pretty regular player. I can't imagine how a casual player must feel. Maybe I'm alone on this one but the prices for some stuff seems way too high.

 

-The end-game system needs to be simplified and/or explained to the player. I mean, as a player, I shouldn't HAVE to go on the net to learn how to play the game. I'm still not positive on how everything works. So I need Tionese Crystals and Tionese Comms to get Tionese gear. And I get those from completing Hardmode FPs. Why is there two different Tionese resources exactly? I get Columi Comms from completing Ops, but I can also earn trade-in items that will give me a whole piece of Columi gear. I don't know how you get Rakata gear, I'm guessing from Hardmode Ops? And then Black Hole gear has better stats then my Columi gear but doesn't provide me with the Set Bonus for the Rakata Force-Master gear. So, I dunno. Skip the Black Hole gear? But then what am I suppose to do with all the Black Hole Comms I earned? Campaign gear gives me the bonus and has better stats, but I have no idea how you get Campaign gear. And then there are all the Daily Comms I've been working on earning. Let's see the mods are equal to Tionese gear, so wait I should have gotten those before earning the Tionese gear? Dang it! And then there are earpieces and implants which are better then the Columi ones, but can also be earned from the Rakata gear vendor, so... um, ok. Then there are relics which I don't think can be earned elsewhere. So use the daily Comms on the relics and the earpieces/implants, or just use them on the relics and get the earpiece/implant some other way? So, once I get all my gear up to Tionese level there's no reason to do HM FPs anymore? Ok, quick question... WHAT THE **** IS GOING ON?!?!

 

And honestly now, the game doesn't explain ANY of this to me?!

 

-And is there any reason to do space combat at lvl 50? The outfits don't excite me much and the only other thing is those item boxes, but I don't really like random item rolls because I don't even know if I'll be able to use the item I get. If not I just wasted a bunch of commendations and a ton of time for nothing.

 

-And although I appreciate the idea behind the Legacy family tree, in practice it just doesn't work well. First, I like to make my characters as unique as possible which means almost all my characters are a different race, so having them be siblings or parent-child doesn't really fit. Second, all of these character's stories are going on at the same time with them being approximately the same age, so again the parent-child thing is awkward. The difference with Luke and Anakin was that Anakin's story really took place long before Luke's. They were dealing with different events in different time periods. Personally, my "Family Tree" is just a straight line. I changed one of my characters so that she was my main's sister, but the rest are just ally, adversary, ally, ally... you get the picture.

 

-Also, I hate the way there are currently Dark-side or Light-side exclusive items. Once again I feel like YOU are telling me how to play my character because I have to follow a set path of Dark or Light in order to obtain certain items. I shouldn't be punished for being unique and not following your set paths.

 

-My newest character has Slicing (as I'm trying to find a better way to make money), and quickly realized that something was wrong. Why is it that any Slicing mission that rewards lockboxes that is rated above Moderate, always results in a LOSS of credits? Even if you succeed, the money earned in the lockbox doesn't even cover the cost to run the mission, making these missions less then a waste of time. They actually waste your time and money without a chance of a reward. I assume this is a result of the "fixing" that happened. A new player who's not as observant as myself could easily loose a lot of money on this.

 

-Why are some color crystals harder to find then others? This seems like a matter of preference, which means you get punished for having a certain preference. Like red or blue? Congrats you'll have an easy time getting the color you like! Prefer purple or pink? Good luck with that! Luckily my favorite color is green, which means it was easy to get the color I wanted once alignment restrictions were removed. I really wish I knew the reasoning behind this.

 

 

Ok, this concludes my post. Now there are several other things I would like to see, but these are some of my biggest concerns. Honestly I think you should take some time off from developing new content to really polish the game as a whole and fix some of these serious issues. I'm afraid that until many of these issues are fixed the game will still feel incomplete. Also, when you look at features, new or old, really examine the reason each decision is made. Like in a recent Q&A you guys said it was suppose to be cheaper to repair Heavy armor to offset the fact tanks would need to repair more, but then you created Light Armor tanks but never changed the cost of repairs. This is something that should have been caught and fixed, not forgotten about until six months after launch. In other words, spend some time to go through the game with a fine-toothed comb and really analyze the game and make sure everything is as good as it can be.

 

Again, all my criticisms come with the greatest respect because I love the IP and the world that has been created from the days of KoTOR 1, and I want the best for this game.

 

Thanks for listening,

~SocraticSteve

 

P.S. As with all my posts, please feel free to share any questions, comments, or to just sound off in agreement because the more interest we show, the more likely the devs are to take notice.

 

 

Very accurate post, and something BioWare should take a close look at. Many of your points are spot on.

[iskoaya]

I really hope the powers that be notice this thread because everything the OP talked about is needed. I think the game has enough content after 1.3, and now they need to go back and refine the stuff that is there.

 

* Original post edited for space *

 

The crazy thing is SWTOR has done all the work, all the artwork is already there (just look at the Armour and Sythweaving crafting recipes). I don't think anyone wears green armour anymore, but if it could be turned into orange as the OP says imagine how many combinations there would be and people could use their imagination again. So turn all the level 50 stuff into empty orange gear (some people might want to wear it) and just give us mods and inhancements at end game.

 

if they did that people would actually have to play longer to max their gear as each armor slot has 3-4 component parts... so add in 2-3x the needed raiding / pvping...

[earthtoearl]

I didnt have time to read the whole thing yet but I agree that switching out gear should be free or at least cost very little, like 1k, NOT 140k. Grinding Dailies does get old. Although more clothing options and customizing I agree with, some gear should not be on some character. IMO many of the jedi robes look like dresses.

 

If not already stated, Crafting is not just for you but to make stuff for others and sell it. Alot of the best gear is crafted. I like the stuff I make with Armormech and Artiface.