Your experience with the group finder?

[Dystopic]

I've had about 2 days of absolute fail and everything else has been pretty good. Group finder is glorious for leveling alts to if you hate questing. Leave alt in cantina, than just do two dungeons after Qing as tank or heals. Done for the day on that alt after a couple runs. Edited July 2, 2012 by Dystopic

[DarthSabreth]

Im happy it was implemented but i was in que for 6 hours and no que poped. They really should have gone with the cross server LFG tools.

[RobertMcDonald]

My experiences with the Group Finder so far have come in three forms: a.) trying to do daily group quests on my level 50 Imperial Agent; b.) trying to do Flashpoints on my Imperial Agent; c.) doing Flashpoints on my level 41 Jedi Sentinel with my wife’s level 41 Jedi Shadow (spec’d DPS at the moment). In all cases, I’m DPS.

 

First and foremost, it’s an amazing improvement over the grueling, tedious, often ineffective experience of looking for a group in General chat. Especially as a DPSer, we’re a dime a dozen, so finding groups is exceptionally difficult sometimes. That said, there are some issues (beyond the bugs).

 

I notice that no one seems to be using it for “Planetary Destinations.” In part, this could be because you can’t edit what you’re queued for without dropping out of the queue for others (e.g., if I want to do Black Hole dailies and queue for a Flashpoint, but along the way decide I’d like to add Planetary Destinations to the list of what I’m interested in, I have to reset my position in the Flashpoint queue in order to queue for Planetary Destinations as well). I would imagine this isn’t the main reason people aren’t queuing for Planetary Destinations, but I would imagine it’s a factor. If I had to guess, people could be avoiding queuing for Planetary Destinations because they’re afraid they’ll lose out on doing a Flashpoint, which they consider much more important. Or it could just be sheer ignorance—perhaps people don’t think to use it for that, only for Flashpoints.

 

Another issue is the time it takes to find a group as DPS. It took my wife and me over an hour to find a group for a Flashpoint tonight, and it often takes my Imperial Agent 30 to 45 minutes. I suppose this really isn’t an issue with the Group Finder so much as the mechanics of TOR and the makeup of the player population—with 4-man content requiring 50% of the group to be non-DPS (far and away the most popular choice to play as, especially without dual spec), it really brings the problem of the so-called Holy Trinity to the fore. (Namely that tanking and healing aren’t roles that are anywhere near as desirable as DPS—certainly not enough to make the player population be split 50/25/25 DPS/tank/healing.)

 

One solution, which I have absolutely no expectation to ever see implemented, would be to allow companions to be able to fulfill the rather unpopular tanking and healing roles. Much more realistically, a dual-spec option would allow people to play a role that they don’t enjoy as much (i.e., tanking or healing) in order to do group content more often. Or Bioware could incentivize playing the less popular tank/healing roles (though, really, this is trying to convince people to do things they don’t really want to do). Without fundamental changes to the mechanics of the game, dual spec seems to be the only real solution to the queue problem, and it’s an imperfect one because some people just don’t want to tank or heal. (I for one am certainly am not interested in healing without access to mods, though that’s a separate issue.)

 

I’ve also noticed that, since the game doesn’t check to see if a player is actually spec’d for the role they’ve chosen, some people seem to queue as DPS and end up being tanks or healers instead (which is obviously a disaster). Sometimes this is an accident, of course, but I know people sometimes game the system, hoping they can jump ahead of the DPS line, so to speak, and have their group carry them. It’d be nice if the game had some way of making sure you could only queue for things you can actually do, both in terms of spec and gear.

 

Lastly, one other thing that would be handy (though certainly not critical) would be to have some sort of estimation of the timeframe before a group is formed for your chosen role. I often play while my daughter is taking a nap, and sometimes there just isn’t enough time to queue and actually do anything before she wakes up—some indication that I can expect an hour wait before finding a group would be nice. It allows players to plan around when they’re actually going to get to play a bit more (assuming you don’t want to do anything else but group content).

 

Again, though, all that aside, it’s a great feature and I’m definitely glad to have it! I’m just also eagerly awaiting whatever future refinements Bioware makes to the system.

 

TL;DR: Group finder good but has some issues.

Edited July 3, 2012 by RobertMcDonald

[Kaisernick]

love it

could not do battle for illum or false emperor as spamming never worked even after tranfers.

ive even been able to do taral v mealstrom prison and the empires at the right level which is grand.

[bpphantom]

Had a few hours over the weekend and needed a break from the quests on Taris so I popped into the queue and within a minute I was in an Athiss FP. The next day did the same and got my Hammer Station done. I hadn't done either of those previously so I'm still seeing the LFG Tool as win.

[netskink]

Lfg is one of the reasons i unsubbed. It was a much needed tool poorly implimented in typical bioware style.

 

I used it once. I will have to really bored and lonely to try and do it again.

[SaberBladeUK]

My experience keeps getting worse than worse. Found another group who were up to the KP Droid like myself, but one of the people was dumb enough to have both dps and tank selected. As a result there were 3 tank spec players in the group and I was told to leave, despite me being grouped as a tank, being the best geared in the group (not just the best geared tank) and having the most experience with it, yet had to deal with people trying to kick me and being abusive because I didn't want to leave because of a bad player (who I know, was a old guild member who was kicked for being Needer who'd steal everything and anothing) who doesn't have a clue how to play, and advertise himself as a shadow healer if he thought it would get him into a raid.

 

Now that was on Rep side. On Imp side i was kicked for starting fights in EV. The entire raid was inexperienced and being a Marauder, they didn't seem to like that I was starting fights after we beat Gharj. I wouldn't have had to, but the raid would just stop and wait after every single fight as if they were trying to figure out a 9 point on plan for every single bit of trash that was in front of them.

Edited July 3, 2012 by SaberBladeUK

[MasterKayote]

Now that was on Rep side. On Imp side i was kicked for starting fights in EV. The entire raid was inexperienced and being a Marauder, they didn't seem to like that I was starting fights after we beat Gharj. I wouldn't have had to, but the raid would just stop and wait after every single fight as if they were trying to figure out a 9 point on plan for every single bit of trash that was in front of them.

 

Yeeeah I would have kicked you too. Youre playing with other 7 people, if they want to take it slow, specially if they already asked you to stop multiple times ... you should respect that. As for the first one ... sounds bad but judging from that second paragraph, id say there is more to it.

[SaberBladeUK]

Yeeeah I would have kicked you too. Youre playing with other 7 people, if they want to take it slow, specially if they already asked you to stop multiple times ... you should respect that. As for the first one ... sounds bad but judging from that second paragraph, id say there is more to it.

 

I would have understood if people were explaining things, or discussing tactics, wanting to take it slowly to better learn but no one was doing anything, at all. I'm more than happy to try explaining something to a person if I think I can help, but there was no tactics talk, no explaining what to expect, no advice, nothing from other people and I was being mostly ignored. People wouldn't even move unless to follow someone or start a fight unless someone (me) started it. The first boss started normally, the tanks actually did something. I gave some instructions which were mostly ignore but we cleared the towers and Droid okay.

 

I know I said originally after we beat gharj, that was a mistake. We never even got to him. It was the second set of trash, after you go down the thin bridge and have to walk around the edge. One guy got a major bug up his *** about a non tank starting one fight and after a five minute wait of doing nothingt, got insulting and started a kick vote as I had started a second trash fight.

 

If I had been starting fights and pulling trashing all the way through, yes I can understand, I'd want to kick a guy for that toom, but two fights just to help move things along, and people still ignored advice when it came to what to do with those trash (like push off the Eternals).

[Alterin]

My only gripe with group finder is it doesn't seem to take into consideration 2 man content or the Esselles/Black Talon normal mode flashpoint which is both set for duo's and well before the level that anyone is a tank. It really needs to not require a full group for all planetary destination content or the first set of flashpoints. Or maybe, just noone is queueing for planetary destinations while leveling up.

[Nindoriel]

They should make it cross server.

[jbluzb]

mostly positive. I was able to do flashpoints I never tried because of the difficulty in finding groups. (What is hard is from time to time people will quit in the middle of a flashpoint.)

[Ancaglon]

They should make it cross server.

 

Prior to the server "mergers", I would have said this was the way to go, but with the high population destinations, it would do very little to alleviate the slow queues for DPS, since there won't magically be a server full of tanks and healers. It MIGHT help finding people when you're at certain points in the levelling process -- for example, neither my 41 scoundrel DPS nor my 38 sentinel have gotten a group through GF even after waiting 40 minutes apiece -- but at 50, there are certainly enough people queuing.

 

As BW have said, the flipside is that there would be no significant penalty for people who choose to be loot ninjas or behave like idiots, because even if they're ignored by the other 3 people in the group, there's tens of thousands of people who will unwittingly continue to group with them via a cross-server GF. (Even on the big servers as of now, there are still some who act this way, but over time the consequences of their actions will tell, and they'll either have to quit the game or do the much harder job of repairing their tarnished reputation).

[Nindoriel]

Prior to the server "mergers", I would have said this was the way to go, but with the high population destinations, it would do very little to alleviate the slow queues for DPS, since there won't magically be a server full of tanks and healers. It MIGHT help finding people when you're at certain points in the levelling process -- for example, neither my 41 scoundrel DPS nor my 38 sentinel have gotten a group through GF even after waiting 40 minutes apiece -- but at 50, there are certainly enough people queuing.

 

As BW have said, the flipside is that there would be no significant penalty for people who choose to be loot ninjas or behave like idiots, because even if they're ignored by the other 3 people in the group, there's tens of thousands of people who will unwittingly continue to group with them via a cross-server GF. (Even on the big servers as of now, there are still some who act this way, but over time the consequences of their actions will tell, and they'll either have to quit the game or do the much harder job of repairing their tarnished reputation).

 

There's still realms with a low population, and even on a high pop server queues can take very long for some flashpoints.

Edited July 4, 2012 by Nindoriel

[SajmanPeetee]

Respecced my healing Operative to concealment DPS today and put the LFD tool away.

 

It's just not fun healing all the mindless DPS. When you ask them to play better they tell you to buzz off because 'they are playing to have fun'

 

Well, you're ruining my fun so cya.

Edited July 4, 2012 by SajmanPeetee

[Valkirus]

There's still realms with a low population, and even on a high pop server queues can take very long for some flashpoints.

 

Yeah. Hundreds in NA alone. It is easy for those on high pop servers to say the same server one is working fine, but the other 100+ ones are out of luck? They may as well close those down. Sure, they could have transfered and if they had....the issues others have complained about concerning server transfers would have been worse. This game is heading to the point having free transfers to any server, ( like Rift has now ) will not have any major impact because the low level of players will be too low to make much difference.

[Valkirus]

Respecced my healing Operative to concealment DPS today and put the LFD tool away.

 

It's just not fun healing all the mindless DPS. When you ask them to play better they tell you to buzz off because 'they are playing to have fun'

 

Well, you're ruining my fun so cya.

 

Put those dps on your ignore list. As a healer, if you are on a high pop server, you will still be in demand. And those jerk dps wil eventually get to where they are on so many ignore lists, they will have issues getting into grps. I am assuming the tool will not put you with someone on your ignore list.

[Ancaglon]

Yeah. Hundreds in NA alone. It is easy for those on high pop servers to say the same server one is working fine, but the other 100+ ones are out of luck? They may as well close those down. Sure, they could have transfered and if they had....the issues others have complained about concerning server transfers would have been worse.

 

If you choose to stay on a low population origin server once you've been given a destination, then I'm sorry, I don't really have a lot of sympathy for you not being able to get groups quickly.

 

If you are still waiting for a destination, then I do sympathize, but the problem will go away once you're on an active server, hopefully within a week or 2 at most.

 

Either way, It isn't reasonable for BW to be asked to spend a lot of extra development effort for the sake of satisfying, shortly, the 1-2% of hold-outs that won't move but do want to group, mostly with people that have moved, because the free migrations for everyone will be done long before all the required development work for cross-server groups.

 

While I do agree somewhat that Bioware may have consolidated too many origin servers onto a single destination -- my old server was one of 10 that got merged to The Red Eclipse (EU English PVE) -- I'd much rather have this problem than the problem of not having any groups available at all.

[RobertMcDonald]

Prior to the server "mergers", I would have said this was the way to go, but with the high population destinations, it would do very little to alleviate the slow queues for DPS, since there won't magically be a server full of tanks and healers. It MIGHT help finding people when you're at certain points in the levelling process -- for example, neither my 41 scoundrel DPS nor my 38 sentinel have gotten a group through GF even after waiting 40 minutes apiece -- but at 50, there are certainly enough people queuing.

 

Precisely. The only other thing it could help with is queuing at weird times (e.g., noon on a Pacific server will be harder to find a group than peak hours, though closer to peak hours for servers that are Eastern).

 

The real problem is the "Holy Trinity," not the lack of cross-server LFG. (Well, the Holy Trinity problem is compounded by TOR's 4-man groups compared to, say, 5-mans in WoW. In TOR, DPS make up 50% of the group while in WoW it's 60%, which is a little better. Really, though, I'm not sure what the ideal ratio would be, as I have no idea how the player population is split on DPS/tanking/healing. I'm just sure it's not 50/25/25, nor even 60/20/20.)

Edited July 4, 2012 by RobertMcDonald

[Kaisernick]

ill say this the one beef i have is unlike the LFG tool in it that shall not be named once u are done u have to head back to the planet you were on via ship rather than being transported back.

 

id prefer if they updated it in the future so i dont have to ruin back and forth.

[rnmedic]

ill say this the one beef i have is unlike the LFG tool in it that shall not be named once u are done u have to head back to the planet you were on via ship rather than being transported back.

 

id prefer if they updated it in the future so i dont have to ruin back and forth.

 

^ what this guy said. I would also like to see the planet based que to be more detailed with a list of heroics to que for not just a general planet que. Also i cant que for some FP that im a appropriate level for.

[Sammm]

It's really great. It's usually so fast to find groups. I kept the count and so far I used the group finder 11 times. My average queuing time is ~42s.

 

Here're the results:

Run1 = Jedi Guardian, 0s (instantaneous)

Run2 = Sith Juggernaut, 0s

Run3 = Jedi Guardian, 0s

Run4 = Jedi Guardian, 87s

Run5 = Vanguard, 0s

Run6 = Jedi Guardian, 56s

Run7 = Jedi Guardian, 292s

Run8 = Sage Healer, 0s

Run9 = Sith Juggernaut, 28s

Run10 = Assassin Tank, 0s

Run11 = Vanguard, 0s

 

In fact, my main issue is waiting for the other group members to click Ready asap! It's like if some of them weren't even in front their computer during the queuing.

[Sammm]

^ what this guy said. I would also like to see the planet based que to be more detailed with a list of heroics to que for not just a general planet que. Also i cant que for some FP that im a appropriate level for.

 

About the "cant que for some FP", try abandoning the instance quest in your quest list. If it doesn't work, try Ctrl+U twice.

[Mythic_MK_II]

Well;

first experience: unexperienced players who have neve done any HM's.

Second experience: better players.

Third experience: bad tank, complaining about me taking away aggro from the boss even after using my agro negating skill (force camo)(marauder all rakata + 2 BH items experienced in many OPS (not bragging, just fact )

and than rage quited because I told him he sucked lol.

fourth experience: healer in DPS gear, having trouble to heal the tank on Black talon! (I lol'd)

 

It's not as bad as the Main OPS tank had, them saying that he sucked at keeping aggro whilst the rest was dying and the healers being bad aswell.

 

 

yeah. I prefer my own guild members that only do pvp for ALL the HM's over some players that do HM with LFG

[Nindoriel]

It's really great. It's usually so fast to find groups. I kept the count and so far I used the group finder 11 times. My average queuing time is ~42s.

 

Here're the results:

Run1 = Jedi Guardian, 0s (instantaneous)

Run2 = Sith Juggernaut, 0s

Run3 = Jedi Guardian, 0s

Run4 = Jedi Guardian, 87s

Run5 = Vanguard, 0s

Run6 = Jedi Guardian, 56s

Run7 = Jedi Guardian, 292s

Run8 = Sage Healer, 0s

Run9 = Sith Juggernaut, 28s

Run10 = Assassin Tank, 0s

Run11 = Vanguard, 0s

 

In fact, my main issue is waiting for the other group members to click Ready asap! It's like if some of them weren't even in front their computer during the queuing.

 

That's great for you but that's probably not the average wait time for most people.

I used it 3 times so far..

 

1. about 1 hour, group broke up because we wiped on the 1st boss, couldn't requeue

2. about 1 hour 30 min

3. about 1 hour, one in our group couldn't click on a certain panel, so he had to relog, which means he automatically left group. Reinviting him wasn't possible, so we had to get in queue to find a replacement. Ironically he got thrown back into our group again, but it took like 20 minutes til we could continue. I guess there's not so many people in the system to begin with, so if you're unlucky, you don't even get 4 people together. Cross-server would help a lot.

 

edit:

 

4. about 2 and a half hours in queue, then tank leaves because he has never done the flashpoint before. Half an hour later group breaks up.

 

Honestly, big mistake not to go cross-server. Having a tool is useless if there aren't any people to begin with.

I was considering resubscribing, because I hoped the group finder would finally give me something to do, but all I did was wait hours at the fleet for nothing. I'm not gonna continue paying, if all I can do is waste hours doing nothing.

Edited July 9, 2012 by Nindoriel