NO Addons please. There is another solution!

[ZeroNeutral]

Well firstly I don't rly like dps addons cause then u have some moron whining about dps output and some little twit who thinks he is king because he has found a way of fooling the addon.

 

That said there are good addons, and I miss not having a threatmeter to see if I am holding threat and need to taunt.

 

On the reverse side I also remember addons causing crashes and lag.

 

Then there are the people who get aggravated because the DPS add-on clearly indicates a lack of DPS, but since they themselves don't like DPS add-ons, they don't use them, and therefore have no idea what's wrong with their DPS. So now that person thinks some little twit is thinking that they are a king and whining about DPS.

 

The value of an add-on is determined by the user. I really really like DPS add-ons, especially what was done in WoW with Recount, because Recount gave a lot of clear data regarding each encounter and could actually reveal weak points in the group.

 

I have no comment about people abusing a meter to gain points on the same meter, that's just... I don't even. Used correctly it's a wonderful tool.

[Shabe]

I'd prefer no add ons that gave you combat feedback, like dps meters, threat meters, when to activate certain ability mods, no healbots.

So basically addons that allowed you to mess with where your toolbars are and the gui scale. Possibly the font and style of frames too.

[ZeroNeutral]

Again no black-and-white... Blizzard took the dangerous path of not changing and letting the community evolve, and only parsecs after it integrated obvious improvement in the UI. If Bioware listens to the community it doesn't need an addon to show it's implemented. Blizzard ignored feedback, therefore addons were the only way...

 

Vent is an voice application for any game... if BW created voice chats I'd used them, sure.

But it's a good example... if I can't use vent one day, should I be banned?

 

Fortunately, there'll be room for everyone.

 

There is almost no reason why someone can't use Ventrilo or Teamspeak 3 for the purpose of listening to a raid leader speak. If someone can't use Ventrilo or Teamspeak 3 to HEAR voice-chat, then they don't have speakers, a sound-card, or etc... in which case, why are they Operating?

 

Blizzard embraced add-ons from the start, so I don't understand your point about improving their UI. You seem to argue that it took a long time for Blizzard to adopt improvements to their UI from user-made add-ons, and that if BW is faster with their own improvements, then they won't need add-ons since the functionality will be in the game.

 

However, you are not taking into account the fact that the creation of the add-ons themselves is what gave Blizzard the idea to eventually upgrade their UI to match the functionality of a user-made add-on.

 

Since BW does not currently have a system for user-made add-ons, then how would BW even get the ideas to improve upon their UI if people are not contributing any user-made material? The only way BW would get new ideas are from suggestion boxes, forums, polls, internal testing, etc. By allowing others to create for their game, BW will be getting free input into how their own game works in the hands of the players.

 

Edit: Some games have even taken user-generated content to the extreme by making the life of the game dependent on it! I.E. Little Big Planet, Spore

 

I believe that allowing users to create content for games gives the developers insight into what players enjoy, what their game does and could do, and what someone else thought that maybe they didn't.

Edited December 23, 2011 by ZeroNeutral

[OtaconSolo]

i dont like addons that much. but gotta say, some are really useful, at least in my experience with wow. for me at least heal its more fun with a healbot. but i can survive with out it.

 

i think if they put addons on the game, you have the choice to use them or not. so its really a matter of who is playing not if there is addons or not. i would like to have the choice though.

 

also, gotta say that im totaly agreed with @zeroneutral on ^ that.

Edited December 23, 2011 by OtaconSolo

[muleDArule]

/sign

 

no addons

 

if there is need for addons, than i prefer that your dev team implementing it. i am paying a monthly fee for this game and i dont want to waste time to always be on top of the uptodate addons.

 

so please keep this interface improvement in house.

 

thank you

[Xarnith]

Addons are a tool, attempting to say they ruin a game, is akin to saying the chainsaw ruined logging by making is easier and faster. What you don't realize is the high end raiding guild have always used combat analysis to weed out bad players who are riding on the coattails of other, and for self improvement. before they were called dps meters, they were called combat parser, the read the combat log, and gave a report back after the fight. all the meters did was improve it to be a real time readout instead of a after the fight recap. and you can be as sure as soon as BW enables the combat long, raiding guilds will be using them again, until addons are available.

 

Addons don't make people bad players, but they surely can help make them better players. certain screen formations, ui settings, and tools help you improve. would you not use a mileage monitor while biking if your intent was to lose weight? or build endurance? sure you could guess you went farther then the other day, or made the trip faster, but if you really wanted to know for sure you would use a tool to tell you.

 

Addons will come, UI, and utility, thats what is needed of a AAA mmo, it saves them time and money finding out what people like for a UI, and what tools are needed in-game by the community. One of the largest ways you can see how blizz listened to their players is by taking the very popular UI addons, and incorporating them into the standard game. The reason they never prohibited addons was becuase it saved them the time and money to research what was needed, and how to best implement it in a way the community would understand/approve of.

 

Last, jerks will be jerks, that guy saying you suck because he beat on on a dps meter? ya he'd still be a jerk with out one, but that other guy, the one saying "hey if you do this it might boost your numbers a bit, i know it for me" with out a good tool compare would never be able to improve himself, nor help you do the same.

[SanSamurai]

Addons simply add to a game. We all know the UI needs more customization options. BW will get to it when/if they get to it. Addons will fix that a week or so after they have been enabled. There's no "edge" in that. Or well, there can be if you're a clicker, but you'll still lose to hotkeyers(zomg, lets remove hotkeys! They're imba!)

 

Meters provide information and you need information to get better. Nobody ever got to be a pro without someone or something pointing out what was done wrong and what was done right. No "unfair edge" in there. Just information which good players will use to become better and bad players will still suck. This will also tell who sucks and whether he/she strives to improve or just doesn't care(at which point he/she can be kicked and the others can start enjoying the game agai).

 

If you don't like addons, don't use them. Just be good enough that nobody will notice. Form guilds that don't require the use of any addons, it's up to you. If I make a guild, I decide the rules and you follow them, if you want to stay in the guild. If you make a guild and I want to stay in it, I follow the rules you make. Simple as that.

 

And sure, there will be elitist jerks who get their **** hard for topping dps charts, but again, you don't have to play with that guy. I personally have never linked a dps chart unless asked by someone else in the group. And most often I didn't link it incase I had topped it.

 

And then there's the 20000 potential roleplaying related addons that I would very much like to see. They provide no edge. They are there just to make the game more immersive for us roleplayers. Is that so bad?

[ZeroNeutral]

Addons are a tool, attempting to say they ruin a game, is akin to saying the chainsaw ruined logging by making is easier and faster. What you don't realize is the high end raiding guild have always used combat analysis to weed out bad players who are riding on the coattails of other, and for self improvement. before they were called dps meters, they were called combat parser, the read the combat log, and gave a report back after the fight. all the meters did was improve it to be a real time readout instead of a after the fight recap. and you can be as sure as soon as BW enables the combat long, raiding guilds will be using them again, until addons are available.

 

Addons don't make people bad players, but they surely can help make them better players. certain screen formations, ui settings, and tools help you improve. would you not use a mileage monitor while biking if your intent was to lose weight? or build endurance? sure you could guess you went farther then the other day, or made the trip faster, but if you really wanted to know for sure you would use a tool to tell you.

 

Addons will come, UI, and utility, thats what is needed of a AAA mmo, it saves them time and money finding out what people like for a UI, and what tools are needed in-game by the community. One of the largest ways you can see how blizz listened to their players is by taking the very popular UI addons, and incorporating them into the standard game. The reason they never prohibited addons was becuase it saved them the time and money to research what was needed, and how to best implement it in a way the community would understand/approve of.

 

Last, jerks will be jerks, that guy saying you suck because he beat on on a dps meter? ya he'd still be a jerk with out one, but that other guy, the one saying "hey if you do this it might boost your numbers a bit, i know it for me" with out a good tool compare would never be able to improve himself, nor help you do the same.

 

Kudos for actually using logic. Very well posted. We share some ideas here.

 

Clearly the calculator has ruined math by making it trivial to equate.

[ZeroNeutral]

Addons will come, UI, and utility, thats what is needed of a AAA mmo, it saves them time and money finding out what people like for a UI, and what tools are needed in-game by the community. One of the largest ways you can see how blizz listened to their players is by taking the very popular UI addons, and incorporating them into the standard game. The reason they never prohibited addons was becuase it saved them the time and money to research what was needed, and how to best implement it in a way the community would understand/approve of.

 

This is probably the main reason that we will see add-ons in SWTOR... saves time/money.

[DarthMyr]

I personally hate those DPS/heal meter programs.

They ruined WoW for me. I played a ret pally from day one and I did pretty good except for solo, which was a PITA having no pulling ability.

But 5 mans, raids, did what I was supposed to do, what hybrids are meant to do. Fill in where ever there's a need. Very few wipes in any group I was in. I could be DPSing then stepping back and throwing some extra heals around, even off tanking when needed.

When ever some one had a look at the percentages I was in the middle for DPS, but same for heals. After BC it was "your a ret pally you should be putting out more DPS", etc. Playing became more of a formula with rotations, and burst damage, and less about paying attention and reacting as needed. H@ll a trained monkey could play a pally after awhile.

Those meters and PVP ruined playing a ret pally for me.

Isn't a game supposed to be about having fun? I've found most add-ons are for either the lazy (can't pay attention to who needs heals or buffs) or anal retentive (we all have to play this way) and they suck the fun out of playing a MMO.

 

Ret pallies ARE supposed to be full DPS, let tanks tank and healers heal, they should be cutting it.

For Regular instances you can get away with it, but for Most raids dps needs to be at a certain level raid wide to be successful

[xlDARKSIDElx]

I agree to an extent that the development of addons can influence the evolution of a game. But they really do help a lot. I mainly want addons that I can customize my UI with. I dont need DBM or other "Raid" addons.

 

I would like to be able to have 4 quickslot bars on the bottom with smaller icons. Bigger health bars and threat/dps meter. Other then that I am fine. And I dont consider those to be game changing/breaking. They just help you do things more efficiently and make me more comfortable with the UI.

[Zierk]

I read a lot about people missing addons. "I need healbots, dpsmeters, threatmeter..." You can do just fine without these, it's just a different game, we just have to adapt. Healbot, for instance, turns a very interesting game into something pulled out of a 90's Nintendo!

As for the meters, I have a suggestion: an <End Flashpoint/Operation Report>, just like in the end of Warzones. Voilá, you can consult who's doing their jobs right. DPS, Healing, Protection, MVP vote also (why not?)... It's all there.

Please NO addons. Don't turn this very enjoyable game into a big load of numbers popping out of my screen...

 

 

P.S. I do admit that some customization options on UI are needed.

 

 

 

/sign

[Zierk]

Ret pallies ARE supposed to be full DPS, let tanks tank and healers heal, they should be cutting it.

For Regular instances you can get away with it, but for Most raids dps needs to be at a certain level raid wide to be successful

 

 

 

I love how people come to SWTOR to debate WoW. /lol@wowplayers

[MariusZane]

Fine with cosmetic add-ons, anything else is a no-go.

[POFNAR]

you can get your addons here http://us.battle.net/wow/en/

[ZeroNeutral]

I love how people come to SWTOR to debate WoW. /lol@wowplayers

 

Not only that, but the guy was claiming that Add-ons ruined his hybrid ability in WoW as a ret Pally... clearly it wasn't the huge changes made to the class after TBC which basically made it impossible to hybrid (as the game stands now,) it was the add-ons that did it. And the fact that the guy wasn't able to cope with people telling him that he's playing incorrectly, while backing up their claims with hard numbers, the add-ons did that too.

 

The fellow wanted to heal and DPS and add-ons ruined it for him.

 

Edit: to be clear it was NOT the glaring changes made to Pally itemization or talent trees that made it impossible for this gentleman to hybrid, it was add-ons.

Edited December 23, 2011 by ZeroNeutral

[KalSpiro]

Not only that, but the guy was claiming that Add-ons ruined his hybrid ability in WoW as a ret Pally... clearly it wasn't the huge changes made to the class after TBC which basically made it impossible to hybrid (as the game stands now,) it was the add-ons that did it. And the fact that the guy wasn't able to cope with people telling him that he's playing incorrectly, while backing up their claims with hard numbers, the add-ons did that too.

 

The fellow wanted to heal and DPS and add-ons ruined it for him.

 

Edit: to be clear it was NOT the glaring changes made to Pally itemization or talent trees that made it impossible for this gentleman to hybrid, it was add-ons.

 

Yup, that's how I read it, because based on his description HE was still able to do what he designed his character to. The GROUPS would not let him do it because he wasn't following formulas which were created through the use of these add-ons. They weren't giving him hard numbers relevant to his build, they were giving him numbers based on how they felt his build should be designed, which had nothing to do with his build.

 

So yes, none of those things were the reason. It was the micromanagement of the game that became the ingrained basis of the gaming culture as a result of rampant use of add-ons that ruined it for him.

 

It's good to see you also understood what he was saying, as you obviously were making a straight commentary and not using sarcasm to not only put down his view of events but also make yourself somehow look superior.

[Geoduck]

Fine with cosmetic add-ons, anything else is a no-go.

 

Absolutely this.

[ZeroNeutral]

Yup, that's how I read it, because based on his description HE was still able to do what he designed his character to. The GROUPS would not let him do it because he wasn't following formulas which were created through the use of these add-ons. They weren't giving him hard numbers relevant to his build, they were giving him numbers based on how they felt his build should be designed, which had nothing to do with his build.

 

So yes, none of those things were the reason. It was the micromanagement of the game that became the ingrained basis of the gaming culture as a result of rampant use of add-ons that ruined it for him.

 

It's good to see you also understood what he was saying, as you obviously were making a straight commentary and not using sarcasm to not only put down his view of events but also make yourself somehow look superior.

 

Nah, I'd need an add-on for that.

 

Stats for Ret pally had changed over time, and that person wanted to continue the same old rhythm without adapting. When someone pointed out the flaw, it's the add-ons fault. "O M G this person just told me that this add-on is showing that I'm doing less DPS than the tank, what an evil add-on." *heals as ret pally*

 

I guess my point here is: This is a terrible argument against the use of add-ons.

Edited December 23, 2011 by ZeroNeutral

[Xunekaath]

DPS meters are needed to craft builds. This isn't a different game, it's a typical loot based themepark MMO and as such those who wish to optomize, need the information.

 

lol, no you don't.

 

We did fine without add-ons before now, and can do fine without them in the future, people have just become dependant on them, well time to have your withdrawls and relearn how to play.

[ZeroNeutral]

lol, no you don't.

 

We did fine without add-ons before now, and can do fine without them in the future, people have just become dependant on them, well time to have your withdrawls and relearn how to play.

 

Well to be clear, data is required, not the add-ons.

 

Otherwise, how do you know if you're doing more DPS in Lightning or Madness spec? Guess?

 

Taking steps backward > taking steps forward?

 

I agree to disagree.

 

Bring on the add-ons let's see what people can create for this game.

Edited December 23, 2011 by ZeroNeutral

[Spor]

I have no problems with DPS meters to gauge things after the fact and help improve min/max, but anything that simplifies gameplay would suck.

 

I am enjoying the challenge of the encounters (although they are not that hard to be honest). We have had no issues with our tank holding agro, I have no issues with healing without mouse over (even in raids). I would not be against a mouse over healing though, don't get me wrong.

 

The main thing I am against are the add-ons that simplify encounters to the point of not having to know your own limits. Threat meters, mods that tell you when boss skills are coming etc., just seem to make the experience more button mashing than actually an engaging fight where you need to pay attention and god forbid know your class. I would prefer those type of mods be kept out.

 

I would like a more customizable UI for sure though.

 

**edit** I am also evidently against correct spelling **edit**

Edited December 23, 2011 by Spor

[Moveus]

There are some valid arguments for why blanket support of all addons can be detrimental to the game. Most commonly cited was gearscore, which was used in WoW to judge the worth of a player, leading to understandable bitterness.

 

My appeal is directed solely at DPS meters. Clearly, I play DPS.

 

A DPS meter is an objective measure of a DPS class's value to a group. More important than it's use in a group is its use by the individual player to evaluate the end result of changes in ability-rotation and gear setup. Theorycrafting is great up to a point, but in the end, data is necessary to validate theory.

 

If Bioware agrees that DPS meters could cause undue elitism, then create a system wherein only the individual player can see him/her own DPS/HPS.

 

To reference WoW, the addition of practice dummies was a huge step in the right direction to supplement DPS meters. It allowed casual players to improve their ability usage and hardcore players to optimize their gear setup. All in a completely private setting.

 

Understood that this game isn't WoW, however, I challenge someone to explain to me why any given DPS player would be better off not knowing their damage output is.

[Cariborne]

I'm all for Add-Ons, if you don't want them, then don't use them. It's mostly a vocal minority who doesn't like using Add-Ons.

 

Like, a lot of people say they don't like Recount, but even if they made a Recount-type Add-On, they'll still use it. I myself would also like a Recount Add-On as it'll help me see what I'm doing wrong in certain encounters that I'm having trouble with. Am I running out of Force to fast? Overhealing way too much? Etc.

 

I know, a lot of people also want Customizable UI's. I myself don't mind the UI, but even in General Chat you see people who dislike the UI all the time. So, these will show up, or Bioware will add an Option to allow you to customize your UI.

 

Boss Mods, now, I myself used these in WoW since I came from a competitive Raiding Guild, but WoW has evolved to the point where the game itself will tell you the stuff toO avoid, and when it will happen with the Dungeon Journal and Raid Shoutouts. So, again, the game could go either way.

 

Along with other Add-Ons similar to Atlasloot (which is great for planning), or other fun style Add-Ons.

 

So, I welcome Add-Ons if they come, and if you don't like them, simply don't use them.

[Froteus]

Please NO addons. Don't turn this very enjoyable game into a big load of numbers popping out of my screen...

 

Then don't use them.

 

Seriously, I'm going to call the anti add-on crowd "badd-ons" for the simple fact the majority of them are absurdly terrible at gamin and are deathly afraid of someone exposing their suckage. Sorry, I like to know when I'm carrying dead weight. Addons please.