Remag_Div Posted October 1, 2012 Share Posted October 1, 2012 THE ISSUES When you design an MMO, one of the main focuses should be endgame. "How do we keep players involved and interested in our game once they reach the level cap?" No matter how long you make the grind from 1-50, you always have players that reach it far earlier than the you expect. And in this case, the grind from 1-50 is not very long, so players can reach endgame rather quickly. This game has a lot to offer if you want to take your time and complete all 8 class quests, 100% the codex, and fully explore everything. Most people do not do this. Endgame currently is poorly thought out and managed. You created many awesome planets, but they are designated for leveling and class quests. Then, after all this cool adventuring, gaining companions, finishing your class quest, and being level 50, what are you left with? Either create an alt and experience another class quest (and progress on the same planets so that initial cool factor is lost) or you're forced to queue on the Fleets 4 warzones to grind for PvP gear or flashpoints to grind for PvE gear. Over and over and over. For such an interesting leveling experience that's quite fun, you couldn't have dropped the ball any harder when it comes to endgame. And you continue feeding us more warzones and flashpoints to queue over and over and over on our Fleets. IDEAS TO SPICE THINGS UP 1. I really wish you could implement some open world PvP mechanics that would get level 50's back on places like Tatooine, Alderaan, Coruscant, Hoth, etc. It's a crime you designed these beautiful, iconic worlds of Star Wars lore yet you restrict these areas for leveling up. Once you are level 50, they are a forgotten memory. This is bad design. These would have to be instanced zones as you don't want a group of level 50's to truck roll level 10's trying to level on Coruscant on PvP servers. Basically like how Black Hole is set up on Coruscant but more expanded and including more planets. These zones can have the following gametypes: 1. Territory Control - Similar to how Ilum was. 2. "CTF" - Republic and Empire fight over a weapon, item, person etc. placed randomly on the map and you need to successfully bring it to your base to win. 3. Standard TDM - First side with 100 kills wins. These gametypes can be rotated so there's always something different going on in the zones and it's dynamic and requires good teamwork. Killing players and having your faction win objectives grants you Valor, Credits, and Warzone/Ranked Warzone Comms. Maybe even something extra like reward the "best" player during a round of CTF or TDM some extra swag like gear and augments. Add Daily / Weekly / Monthly leaderboards. --- 2. Combine the above with some expanded space. Free roam, space PvP, Guild Ships that guilds can actually decorate, customize, and hang out in and play a game that KotOR is known for: Pazaak. In fact, why not add Pazaak to EVERY cantina or certain cantina's on planets to get people off the Fleets and into the game world to chill, talk, and RP in actual Star Wars environments! Add rewards for players who win or have players gamble their own Credits and even Items if they get challenged to a game of Pazaak. Winner takes all. Add Daily / Weekly / Monthly leaderboards. --- 3. The ability to do the above with cross-server functionality. Similar to how WvW works in GW2. Anything that involves PvP can be cross-server. Regular Warzones, Ranked Warzones, the Open World zones listed above. More players, faster queue's, and add the ability to keep Daily / Weekly / Monthly leaderboards of top servers / guilds. --- Doing anything remotely similar to any of the above would drastically improve TOR, IMO. If you have any other suggestions, please post them as well! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Remag_Div Posted October 2, 2012 Author Share Posted October 2, 2012 Since there's no objections let's get this started Devs! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Kushluk_ Posted October 2, 2012 Share Posted October 2, 2012 I agree with you on the point that endgame in SWTOR is too much of a drag with very little variety. SWTOR should be applauded for a great and fun journey up to level 50. But sadly post level 50 content loses out for me because of that "grind" feel. I have 3 level 50 characters who I rarely play as anymore because I get bored with the endgame content after running it so many times. So I am in support of something along the lines you mentioned being implimented into the endgame. Most of what you mentioned is pvp, which not everybody is interested in even though you and I are. They will need something non-pvp to keep them coming back to the game as well. Pazaak would be a great addition and open space combat seems like it could be a tough add at this point but would be nice as well. Something fun though, that wouldn't require dangling a reward (new gear) over their heads for them to be interested in. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Remag_Div Posted October 2, 2012 Author Share Posted October 2, 2012 Yes, true. There is way more PvE content in this game than there is PvP. Perhaps having a world event every month to get people to explore the planets and work together would be cool. Adding Pazaak to cantina's would definitely help the RP community and get people to hang out in cantina's. Customization of personal and Guild starships would be really neat. Basically giving you an empty room and you can loot/purchase furniture, pictures, gadgets, etc. to make it your own. This is what I really loved about SWG's ultimate sandbox world. Guild could literally build their own empires with houses, guild halls, shops, cantina's, etc. Decorating your home was fun and always interesting to acquire a new painting or piece of furniture. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Petnil Posted October 2, 2012 Share Posted October 2, 2012 remove the fleet. Most people use groupfinder anyways to queue up. For those who dont put the instances on the planets that fit their lv. That way people would be forced down on a planet. Make sure all planets have a trainers and gtn and all that were on fleet, exept a few things like lightside/darkside vendor. Your idea about all planets have a lv 50 pvp area. I dont know. Depends on the pvp concept. I did a bit in wow and most of the time i didn´t like it much. The one i liked best was Alterac Valley. It had some pve elements with some npc bosses defending some bases you had to kill/defend. So each faction needed a defence team and an assault team. Later in wow it ended up as a zergfest with noone playing defence and all attacked so that kinda ruined the fun. Also lets have a "have group will travel" feature. Some means of summoning your party to where you are. Make the cooldown reasonable, like an hour or 2. that way it will make it easier to get your guildmate to come help do that hc quest on belsavis you cant solo without him having to go through several loading screens. The travel + loading screens end up taking alot longer than the quest he had to help with. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Petnil Posted October 2, 2012 Share Posted October 2, 2012 And lets have a world chat. General chat like now for each planet. And a world chat that includes all planets. Trade and pvp should be worldwide too ofc. Without a world chat everyone just ends up on the same planet. Then removing the fleet is kinda pointless. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Kynesis Posted October 3, 2012 Share Posted October 3, 2012 Hmmm.... planet-based guild ships... world control via PvP... So, if you plugged those ideas together you could potentially have a valid use for guild ships - those guilds which 'control' a given world have a ship in orbit there, to which their members can travel quickly - ostensibly for the purpose of operations (PvE) or world bosses (PvP). On the ground you might fight over landing areas, secure compounds and collect resources (aka dailies) and perhaps weapon emplacements - whoever controls the weapon emplacements can drive away other guilds orbiting ships. There would probably have to be more turrets than the maximum number of ships allowed in orbit (else everybody will have one there and remove the element of competition) which ensure that there's a maximum time any ship may remain in orbit. There's potential there for some kind of competitive space mission structure as well. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Remag_Div Posted October 3, 2012 Author Share Posted October 3, 2012 remove the fleet. Most people use groupfinder anyways to queue up. For those who dont put the instances on the planets that fit their lv. That way people would be forced down on a planet. Make sure all planets have a trainers and gtn and all that were on fleet, exept a few things like lightside/darkside vendor. My suggestions are also trying to get people off the Fleets, but the removal of the Fleets altogether would be bold, but at this point I'm not against it. The more you think about it, the more the Fleets act as a crux. I understand BioWare's thought process behind it, though. Have a centralized place where players can hang out, queue for PvP, and form groups to complete Flashpoints. However, they made the Fleets a little too convenient. At level 50, there's practically no reason whatsoever to ever leave the Fleet unless you're doing dailies. Most MMO's I've played never had a designed hub area quite like the Fleets. Sure, even without the Fleets, players usually designate certain areas and create an "unofficial" hub area. Since most endgame content is instanced with queue's anyway, I would like to see how the game would develop without the Fleets. It would be an interesting experiment and would force people to actually go to different planets and interact. Also lets have a "have group will travel" feature. Some means of summoning your party to where you are. Make the cooldown reasonable, like an hour or 2. that way it will make it easier to get your guildmate to come help do that hc quest on belsavis you cant solo without him having to go through several loading screens. The travel + loading screens end up taking alot longer than the quest he had to help with. I like that idea, as well. A good feature to add if they were going to remove Fleets. And lets have a world chat. General chat like now for each planet. And a world chat that includes all planets. Trade and pvp should be worldwide too ofc. Without a world chat everyone just ends up on the same planet. Then removing the fleet is kinda pointless. Sure, why not! Would be pretty hectic, though. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Kushluk_ Posted October 9, 2012 Share Posted October 9, 2012 Need more people talking about this. Time for a friendly bump Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Majspuffen Posted October 10, 2012 Share Posted October 10, 2012 3. The ability to do the above with cross-server functionality. Similar to how WvW works in GW2. Anything that involves PvP can be cross-server. Regular Warzones, Ranked Warzones, the Open World zones listed above. More players, faster queue's, and add the ability to keep Daily / Weekly / Monthly leaderboards of top servers / guilds. I believe this would be detrimental to SWTOR. Right now, one of the unique things about SWTOR is that there are no cross-server queues, unlike any of the other popular MMORPGs. WoW is so riddled with cross-server functions that even the world zones are cross-server now. That's awful. The main thing I loved about World PvP in wow was griefing on my own server, causing love and hate and recoginition among players that actually matters. Fortunately, Bioware seem to realize the power of having no cross-server functions, seeing as they said it was a last resort for them. I just hope they'll stay true to that. As for World PvP, there are many factors to consider. The first one is that there's been a lack of incentive to engage in World PvP in the past, or so Bioware said. Another issue is faction imbalance. On my server, the Empire is much stronger than the Republic. The first issue could be tackled with story, I feel. We need a reason to do something. If the Empire/Republic demands that we fight over a certain planet, then we'll fight for it. If enough players are there, the community should do the rest. The second issue conflicts with the first issue. If they were to implement an incentive, a tangible reward for world pvp, then faction balance plays a huge role all of a sudden. This might sound crazy but I'd say there shouldn't be any rewards. Not in terms of gear, at least. Take a look at Rated Warzones. Why do people play those? In order to gear up? No. People play because of rankings and competition. In world pvp faction balance will play a huge role, and if one side is stronger than the other, no doubt they'll conquer most of the wpvp objectives. But that will just make the occasional victories for the opposite faction all the sweeter. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
EnkiduNineEight Posted October 10, 2012 Share Posted October 10, 2012 I might adsk you look into some endgame suggestions I have made. Please see the threads here: http://www.swtor.com/community/showthread.php?t=530312 - Improvements to Open World PVP (Give the end game meaning and a raison d'etre) http://www.swtor.com/community/showthread.php?t=530325 - Improvements to End Game/Space missions/open space 'planets' where people play as their ship, doing gathering, fighting pirates and on pvp servers, each other. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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