New Operations Urgently Needed

[Fossman]

It makes me contemplate why I've defended this game and whether or not it's worth it for me to continue my subscription. I'd rather give my money to Trion. Hell, sometimes I'd rather give my money to Blizzard and I effing HATE what's happened to WoW.

 

This is how im feeling too. I mean I hate to jump ship because what they have so far is good. Its just not enough to keep me entertained untill the next big update in like what? September? We dont even know...they really need to learn that a little communication with the player base goes a long way. (Not those garbage FAQs)

Edited July 28, 2012 by Fossman

[dcgregorya]

Have five level 50's. All of which are in AT LEAST Rakata.

 

Been legacy 50 for months. Have 15~ Million credits to my name. (Don't care for more).

 

I am a raider, why is it selfish to ask for more content when it is the part I most enjoy and desperately needed? I've done most everything else the game has to offer to keep me busy.

 

The $15 from every person who is at that point in the game right now, added together, wouldn't pay for a single cutscene. I'm all in favor of new content but at some point you need to realize that characters who blow through things faster than everyone else will be left hanging for a while. Just common sense IMHO.

[Fossman]

The $15 from every person who is at that point in the game right now, added together, wouldn't pay for a single cutscene. I'm all in favor of new content but at some point you need to realize that characters who blow through things faster than everyone else will be left hanging for a while. Just common sense IMHO.

 

Its been 8 months and in that time we've only seen 1 major content patch ("Major" being a small 4 boss raid and another flashpoint). The rest has just been fluff. Is that really an acceptable release rate to you? I dont like comparing swtor to other games but in terms of content they have just fallen sooooo far behind everyone else. I dont even care if I have to wait another 4 months for a new raid as long as they have OTHER things to do. For now the EASIEST simplest thing that they could do that would go a long ways with the player base is to just simply communicate more. Give us REAL time tables for content updates. Personally speaking if I dont see major changes by september im just gona let my sub run out. I hate to be one of "those" people but I just dont see the value in an MMO without any real endgame or other new content.

[pure_laced]

Just activated WoW again.

[AlyxDinas]

TSW have been out for a month and has released 7 new quests (which, if you play TSW, is a big deal; quests are not "go kill monsters")

 

You know those weren't developed in the interim between launch and the release of those quests, right? The same way that Kaon and the content of 1.1 wasn't something that BioWare made in a few months. It was already there, pending internal and player testing.

[Kilg]

Personally I see one major advantage (or let's call it hope) that SWTOR carries, compared to some other games:

Even the ppl that complain here and threaten to unsub mostly agree in the fact that the game is actually good!

Most ppl WOULD love to continue playing this game, IF there were more content.

 

That means for me that as soon as Bioware fixes this, the game can have a future.

[Fossman]

Personally I see one major advantage (or let's call it hope) that SWTOR carries, compared to some other games:

Even the ppl that complain here and threaten to unsub mostly agree in the fact that the game is actually good!

Most ppl WOULD love to continue playing this game, IF there were more content.

 

That means for me that as soon as Bioware fixes this, the game can have a future.

 

Exactly. I just think its gona take too long at the rate theyre going. The longer they wait to give us ANYTHING at all the more subs they're going to lose. I really hope that they understand that.

[lexiekaboom]

You know those weren't developed in the interim between launch and the release of those quests, right? The same way that Kaon and the content of 1.1 wasn't something that BioWare made in a few months. It was already there, pending internal and player testing.

 

You know that has nothing to do with my comment right?

 

I'm comparing post launch content from one game to another. Someone had said SW:TOR post game content was great, I was showing that it was well below what is now considered normal. I also give the example of borderlands DLC, which will be finished long before the game is released. I don't really care if the reason we get no content is because they are horribly slow to create content or if they are horrible at planning content so they always have something "in the pipe" near finished, the result is the same. We are not getting new content at a rate that is even close to other current gen MMOs dispute paying $15 a month. We also got less lunch content then pretty much any MMO I have ever played.

 

I'm also showing that every game has a release schedule now and you know exactly when to expect new content, generally on a 1 - 4 month cycle, except SW:TOR.

Edited July 29, 2012 by lexiekaboom

[lexiekaboom]

Personally I see one major advantage (or let's call it hope) that SWTOR carries, compared to some other games:

Even the ppl that complain here and threaten to unsub mostly agree in the fact that the game is actually good!

Most ppl WOULD love to continue playing this game, IF there were more content.

 

That means for me that as soon as Bioware fixes this, the game can have a future.

 

The problem is the amount of content that's needed, and some design choices that were made with loot.

 

With amount; people are not going to be happy with anything less then a full explanation or a release schedule. 4 more raid bosses with the prospect of 4 to 6 months before the next update isn't going to cut it this time around because we've seen how that goes, and it didn't hold anyone's interest for long. No one is coming back unless there is a lot of new content for them to try. I would say 9 raids, tiered, which could be done as 3 raids at 3 difficulty levels where you have to unlock higher levels would be reasonable, provided there is enough of a mechanic change between the modes that it takes a raid or two to adjust. This would but it in line with something like EQ2, which release about that much new content every 6 to 8 months. It's worth noting that EQ2 is free to play, and the total cost of buying these raid zones is around $5 to $10, so we are basically asked that SW:TOR gives us, for $120, about the same content EQ2 would give us for $10. Not unreasonable.

 

I mean Bioware could just solve the problem by having a release schedule; you will get this in 4 months, this in 8, this in 12, this in 16. That would keep a LOT of people interested. But either because they are honestly completely unable to meet deadlines or because they get off on keeping players in the dark, Bioware has a strict no ETA policy.

 

Loot is the biggest problem. Let's assume you can do lost island hard mode because you're in a guild or you don't suck. Did you know that, without raiding, you only need 5 weeks to COMPLETELY gear your toon? This is because black hole gear is all you need, you buy it with tokens, and you pull in 59 tokens a week just doing quests and HM. If you raid, add 40 to that and reduce the time needed to be 100% done with end game content to an unbelievable 3 weeks. Add Nightmare Pilgrim to that, 2 weeks. That's right, SW:TOR has 14 days worth of end game content for some people.

 

You could say "OH, OH, OH, you need champign gear" ... you real don't. The stats change is minor at best, and net negative for some classes.

 

MMO's need rare loot. They need BIS items that require you to get lucky and do the same boss over and over again as part of the motivation to do the same boss over and over again. Flash points should have rare bosses that drop BIS non-armor pieces and raids should have the same for BIS armor. The idea of completely gearing my toon in 14 to 35 days is just laughable, and this isn't even "I have no life" playing. This is logging on once a day for about 40 minutes to do a flash point, and spending an hour or so a week doing the black hole quest line.

[AlyxDinas]

You know that has nothing to do with my comment right?

 

Of course it did. The comparison was of two games releasing content relatively quickly after launch. Both of those games had the resources for that content in development before launch finished. That's generally how dev cycles go. There's a lot more downtime between going gold and publishing than you think.

 

Now, we can rightly discuss the question of provision of content in TOR. But comparing TSW's first content update to TOR's, developmentally, they're identical.

Edited July 29, 2012 by AlyxDinas

[lexiekaboom]

Of course it did. The comparison was of two games releasing content relatively quickly after launch. Both of those games had the resources for that content in development before launch finished. That's generally how dev cycles go. There's a lot more downtime between going gold and publishing than you think.

 

Now, we can rightly discuss the question of provision of content in TOR. But comparing TSW's first content update to TOR's, developmentally, they're identical.

 

Except in the case of TSW the devs said, 3 days before the game was released, that the update would be coming on July the 31st, and a full list of all quest, features, and content was posted online.

 

In SW:TOR case we got the date of "whenever" for 1.1 and didn't even know what was going to be in it until months after release when we got a trailer.

 

I would love to work at a place where telling my boss "Yes, I made sure to plan ahead in the development cycle and I will have the next step of this project for you on exactly the 31st, with a clear time line of where it is going from there" and "I can't give you and ETA and I don't know what it will look like, you'll get updates as they come. We are basically making this **** up as we go along" are developmentally identical.

Edited July 29, 2012 by lexiekaboom

[Fossman]

The problem is the amount of content that's needed, and some design choices that were made with loot.

 

With amount; people are not going to be happy with anything less then a full explanation or a release schedule. 4 more raid bosses with the prospect of 4 to 6 months before the next update isn't going to cut it this time around because we've seen how that goes, and it didn't hold anyone's interest for long. No one is coming back unless there is a lot of new content for them to try. I would say 9 raids, tiered, which could be done as 3 raids at 3 difficulty levels where you have to unlock higher levels would be reasonable, provided there is enough of a mechanic change between the modes that it takes a raid or two to adjust. This would but it in line with something like EQ2, which release about that much new content every 6 to 8 months. It's worth noting that EQ2 is free to play, and the total cost of buying these raid zones is around $5 to $10, so we are basically asked that SW:TOR gives us, for $120, about the same content EQ2 would give us for $10. Not unreasonable.

 

I mean Bioware could just solve the problem by having a release schedule; you will get this in 4 months, this in 8, this in 12, this in 16. That would keep a LOT of people interested. But either because they are honestly completely unable to meet deadlines or because they get off on keeping players in the dark, Bioware has a strict no ETA policy.

 

Loot is the biggest problem. Let's assume you can do lost island hard mode because you're in a guild or you don't suck. Did you know that, without raiding, you only need 5 weeks to COMPLETELY gear your toon? This is because black hole gear is all you need, you buy it with tokens, and you pull in 59 tokens a week just doing quests and HM. If you raid, add 40 to that and reduce the time needed to be 100% done with end game content to an unbelievable 3 weeks. Add Nightmare Pilgrim to that, 2 weeks. That's right, SW:TOR has 14 days worth of end game content for some people.

 

You could say "OH, OH, OH, you need champign gear" ... you real don't. The stats change is minor at best, and net negative for some classes.

 

MMO's need rare loot. They need BIS items that require you to get lucky and do the same boss over and over again as part of the motivation to do the same boss over and over again. Flash points should have rare bosses that drop BIS non-armor pieces and raids should have the same for BIS armor. The idea of completely gearing my toon in 14 to 35 days is just laughable, and this isn't even "I have no life" playing. This is logging on once a day for about 40 minutes to do a flash point, and spending an hour or so a week doing the black hole quest line.

 

I gotta agree with you on the loot issue. I really dont think they put enough thought into it. Seems to me they were more worried about letting people customize their looks. What they should have done is just have straight gear with a traditional cosmetic system. But I suppose they needed ANOTHER gold dump.

 

some ultra rare legendary drops would be nice as well. Might give me an incentive to continue running the same raid for 4 months straight after already being fully geared.

 

as far as content releases I think the main issue there is just a massive failure on BWs part. I think the game engine they chose was a mistake from the beginning. It might have gotten the job done at first but at this point I think its hitting them that its not so easy to develop new content for it. Then the layoffs just compounded the issue even more. Essentially development of this game has been slowed to a crawl. I almost get the feeling that they are a little embarrassed by it. CSR dont even police the forums anymore. They refuse to answer any of the serious questions in the weekly Q&As. I would be very interested in seeing how many subs have been lost just in the past month.

[Griad]

Would be nice to get some smaller content tweaks, make a Nightmare mode for all FP, that yields rakata, make some ingame events like rakghoul and overall just something that will make u wanna do some of the endgame

[lexiekaboom]

 

as far as content releases I think the main issue there is just a massive failure on BWs part. I think the game engine they chose was a mistake from the beginning. It might have gotten the job done at first but at this point I think its hitting them that its not so easy to develop new content for it. Then the layoffs just compounded the issue even more. Essentially development of this game has been slowed to a crawl. I almost get the feeling that they are a little embarrassed by it. CSR dont even police the forums anymore. They refuse to answer any of the serious questions in the weekly Q&As. I would be very interested in seeing how many subs have been lost just in the past month.

 

Not many. In fact the game is likely gaining subs, based of server population numbers from a variety of sites. You see, all the people who wanted a good, flushed MMO with an end game and updates already left, and FTP to 15 is getting new people hooked. The people playing the game now are split between casual players and SW fanboys, and neither group is effected by the problems we are talking about.

 

This isn't the fantastic and dramatic death of SW:TOR, it's the slow burn. It's why it's not going to convert any of the new subs into long term players and why people are going to be in a cycle of quitting as soon as they reach 50. It's called "churn" in the industry, and it's not always a failed model. You stop caring about how many people stop giving you money and concern yourself only with new people giving you money. You're cell phone company does this. You cable provider does this. As long as "people in" is greater then "people out" on a month to month basis you can keep this up forever.

 

The problem is MMOs do not have a limitless player base to draw from. The "new in" is going to go down while the "old out" is going to remain constant until something is done about the lack of content.

[Fossman]

Not many. In fact the game is likely gaining subs, based of server population numbers from a variety of sites. You see, all the people who wanted a good, flushed MMO with an end game and updates already left, and FTP to 15 is getting new people hooked. The people playing the game now are split between casual players and SW fanboys, and neither group is effected by the problems we are talking about.

 

This isn't the fantastic and dramatic death of SW:TOR, it's the slow burn. It's why it's not going to convert any of the new subs into long term players and why people are going to be in a cycle of quitting as soon as they reach 50. It's called "churn" in the industry, and it's not always a failed model. You stop caring about how many people stop giving you money and concern yourself only with new people giving you money. You're cell phone company does this. You cable provider does this. As long as "people in" is greater then "people out" on a month to month basis you can keep this up forever.

 

The problem is MMOs do not have a limitless player base to draw from. The "new in" is going to go down while the "old out" is going to remain constant until something is done about the lack of content.

 

Idk last report said they were down something like 700k subs. I would not be surprised one bit if they were well under 1 mill total subs at this point. The game just has no longevity. Anyone who does 5 minutes of research on the game can see that. The fact that CSR isnt policing the forums and dealing with all these "Doomsday" threads is really hurting them in the long run. Honestly as a consumer if I went on another games forums and I saw threads like this I would never consider buying it. They dont need to delete them. But a little discussion and communication from the devs would go a long way towards easing peoples minds.

[lexiekaboom]

Idk last report said they were down something like 700k subs. I would not be surprised one bit if they were well under 1 mill total subs at this point. The game just has no longevity. Anyone who does 5 minutes of research on the game can see that. The fact that CSR isnt policing the forums and dealing with all these "Doomsday" threads is really hurting them in the long run. Honestly as a consumer if I went on another games forums and I saw threads like this I would never consider buying it. They dont need to delete them. But a little discussion and communication from the devs would go a long way towards easing peoples minds.

 

https://forums.eveonline.com/default.aspx?g=posts&t=138362&find=unread

http://forums.thesecretworld.com/showthread.php?t=41198

http://forums.thesecretworld.com/showthread.php?t=48605

http://us.battle.net/wow/en/forum/topic/6201271322

http://us.battle.net/wow/en/forum/topic/6201550704

http://sto-forum.perfectworld.com/showthread.php?t=100151

 

Not really sure what MMO you would play then. Most MMO that are based in the western world value free speech and allow players to express their opinions even when they are negative.

 

Every single MMO ever that has forums has constant "the sky is falling" threads, as you can see above. Going around and deleting every post that speaks negatively about your game isn't the answer.

[Fossman]

https://forums.eveonline.com/default.aspx?g=posts&t=138362&find=unread

http://forums.thesecretworld.com/showthread.php?t=41198

http://forums.thesecretworld.com/showthread.php?t=48605

http://us.battle.net/wow/en/forum/topic/6201271322

http://us.battle.net/wow/en/forum/topic/6201550704

http://sto-forum.perfectworld.com/showthread.php?t=100151

 

Not really sure what MMO you would play then. Most MMO that are based in the western world value free speech and allow players to express their opinions even when they are negative.

 

Every single MMO ever that has forums has constant "the sky is falling" threads, as you can see above. Going around and deleting every post that speaks negatively about your game isn't the answer.

 

Not saying that they should delete those posts just that they should be doing more to prevent them from popping up. Alot of that crap could be prevented just by talking to the player base

[RazielHex]

Not saying that they should delete those posts just that they should be doing more to prevent them from popping up. Alot of that crap could be prevented just by talking to the player base

 

You underestimate the entitlement factor of children, fools, and gamer neckbeards.

[Fossman]

You underestimate the entitlement factor of children, fools, and gamer neckbeards.

 

Do I?

[AshlaBoga]

Question for all MMO veterans (I.E more than just one mmo).

 

Is the speed at which they release new content: World Events, Flashpoints and Operations

normal?

 

Or is this slower than most?

 

For example:

 

Did/do EQ and EQ2 release Dungeons and Raids more often than SWTOR?

[Fossman]

Question for all MMO veterans (I.E more than just one mmo).

 

Is the speed at which they release new content: World Events, Flashpoints and Operations

normal?

 

Or is this slower than most?

 

For example:

 

Did/do EQ and EQ2 release Dungeons and Raids more often than SWTOR?

 

Its much slower than Rift. They put out major content updates every month or 2 at least. Plus they have events constantly. I mean the next patch coming out for rift is going to more than double the size of their map. In addition to new raids and instances. Im not asking that much from the swtor devs. But for the love of god at least give us a freakin time frame on upcoming updates

 

But its not just the speed its the quality and longevity of the content that matters to me. The last major update just didnt have enough to justify such a long wait for the next one.

[pure_laced]

Question for all MMO veterans (I.E more than just one mmo).

 

Is the speed at which they release new content: World Events, Flashpoints and Operations

normal?

 

Or is this slower than most?

 

For example:

 

Did/do EQ and EQ2 release Dungeons and Raids more often than SWTOR?

 

Everquest had expansions that started out once every year, but then turned into about one every 6 months. Each expansion brought a ton of new zones, quest areas, dungeons, end game pve bosses, etc. EQ Release Timeline

 

I started with original release and played it solely until mid 2005.

 

WoW was a little different. They would release about a new expansion once a year, but in between would have mini content patches adding dungeons, new zones, end game content etc. This was pretty regular for awhile.

WoW Release Timeline

 

The main thing is that both HIGHLY successful MMO's released content that was engaging for awhile. Not 4 bosses and not release stuff for months. Most of WoW was 8+ bosses in an endgame, and then they would add filler dungeons, raids etc before the next xpac release.

[Utania]

Regardless of how frequently they release content compared to MMOs, there isn't enough variation in the end game to keep people.

 

I wouldn't say that I've blown through content and we are still working on HM EC, though through attrition as our gear people got bored and left, leaving us with a re-gearing cycle

 

I'd missed out on doing flashpoints whilst leveling so 1.3 meant that I was able to go back and experience them, but I've done maybe 5 a week and am now looking at optimising gear rather than upgrading and they are getting a little boring.

[pureeffinmetal]

As much as we need content now, the lack of communication is the killer.

 

Nightmare EC should have been in 1.3. I frankly hope it will be out before 1.4 but am not expecting it.

 

Despite all of this if Bioware told us today that TFB will be released in 1.4 in the next 2 months and will include all 3 difficult modes (ideally with 8+ bosses)...you'd go a long way to making a lot of raiding guilds happy.

[Sir-Phobos]

Question for all MMO veterans (I.E more than just one mmo).

 

Is the speed at which they release new content: World Events, Flashpoints and Operations

normal?

 

Or is this slower than most?

 

For example:

 

Did/do EQ and EQ2 release Dungeons and Raids more often than SWTOR?

 

In Everquest 1, content updates in between expansions were rare, but the game has something like 19 expansion packs now. However, the difficulty of the raids, leveling speed, etc, meant that people running out of stuff to do was not the norm. Only the hardcore raiders would actually beat all the raids in an expansion before the next expansion came out.

 

In fact, if memory serves me, the Avatar of War was not beaten for the first time without using an exploit until the night before the next expansion came out. The Gates of Discord expansion was not beaten by anybody before the Omens of War expansion came out.

Edited July 30, 2012 by Sir-Phobos