Truth about SWTOR's Competitive PvP and how to fix it.

[Invictusthetaru]

There is no greater niche in ranked, including smashers, than the carnage / combat mara / sent. Period.

[-Mythix-]

I'm all for arenas, but don't kid yourself into thinking that arenas will be somehow more "balanced" or have a higher comp variety than RWZs.

 

Resolve is also fine, they just need to revert it to pre 1.4.

 

I can see it now, EA implements 2 vs 2 arenas to start...mass hysteria ensues on forums about how they always go up against 2 man pre-mades!!! Lol

Edited December 19, 2012 by -Mythix-

[-Mythix-]

There is no greater niche in ranked, including smashers, than the carnage / combat mara / sent. Period.

 

All of this.

[Bronaimeth]

Then i would say you are very short sighted. A lot of people like to play a class they enjoy and some of those classes do not help in rated's. take in 2 healers, 2 tanks, 5 smash and roll people. That is what happens and we all know it. Like the OP said you cannot fault people for using the system the way it was designed, but we know many of the competitive players roll the FoTm and we all see it. So why do rated's get rolled every time because of the system. That is not enjoying the game but just the opposite. Ranked is broken period.

 

Well you can't take in 9 players for ranked.

[Rhyn]

Well you can't take in 9 players for ranked.

amazing how people miss the point. fixed ok

[madtycoon]

All these people saying arenas/deathmatches would be a bad thing are delusional. Right now theres only 3 forms of PvP in the game when you log on. Random Warzones, Ranked Warzones and dueling. Dueling isn't even really encouraged by the developers and favor certain classes, because of the lack of abilities. There's no "durotar" in this game and the out of bounds area is much too small. This leaves warzones, which are horribly designed. It is incredibly too difficult to recap a node when you lose it on maps like civil war. Respawn timers are way too short and respawn locations were never really thought out properly. A lot of times its better just to die or /stuck. Horrible design. A lot of maps are also too small and cramped. This results in cluster****s like civil war mid and most places in voidstar, where there just isn't enough room to spread out and utilize things like position and kiting.

 

Arenas would give another option for PvP when you log on. Cross server queues for both warzones and arenas would definately have to take priority though, but can they even do that? who knows.

 

It would also allow you to queue for competitive PvP with less people. How many times do you log on and want to do ranked or something, but don't have 8 people? so you just queue normal warzones full of undergeared or imbalanced teams. Introducing smaller scale PvP fixes that problem.

 

4) Resolve should work more like this: Stuns need to follow a DR curve. They need to grow less effective on

every stun that is shot at toward the player. (Effective = Cut duration)

 

DR on CC should be in the game, but there should be more CC added to the game. The resolve system is idiot friendly and makes it easier, because you only have to monitor a white bar. Its funny how mezs which are dispellable and break on damage give half a resolve bar and stuns (which can be chained 3 times before white bar) give so little resolve. It's almost like the developers are saying, its too hard for our players to chain CC on a healer to get a kill on a dps, so we'll just reward people by mindlessly zerging stuns into one target until its dead.

[FrankLee]

Resolve is probably my biggest gripe in this game.

Any time you make a pivotal game mechanic out of a "pause" button, you're doing it wrong. It is too easy to be killed in one cycle of full resolve to make it feel like the system works properly. There are literally dozens of ways to be stunned, and only one way to avoid it or break it.

Also, the resolve bar lets me see how much resolve a person has and stun or not stun accordingly, but I can't tell for crap who's going to be affected by my kick/snare/root. Either put them on the same mechanic or give me an easy way to see that I'm about to waste my best defensive skill.

Further, I PvP to be in to the action relatively quickly and not have to commit for hours. The time I spend behind the timer doors, or running back to a node - a complete waste and painfully obvious. Voidstar door timer is actually longer than the warning timer on the deserter debuff. Fix one of them. The hypergate WZ... if you die you're looking at a long wait behind a gate, and then a serious walk back to anywhere to fight. Annoying, and pointless. The round is 2 minutes or so, and it's easy to spend half of that time in an unplayable state or location.

[Ramtar]

Well you can't take in 9 players for ranked.

 

9th one is lag.

[Cial]

OP nailed it. Well said.

[randiesel]

+1.

 

I didn't have time to read the other 11 pages, but read the first and mostly agree.

 

Cross-server pvp would greatly help and it's a friggin JOKE that they don't have it in by now. I laugh at BW, not commend them for any efforts put in thus far as they take way too long and simply don't tell us, the paying customer (notice I didn't say player) anything anymore.

[Smashbrother]

+1.

 

I didn't have time to read the other 11 pages, but read the first and mostly agree.

 

Cross-server pvp would greatly help and it's a friggin JOKE that they don't have it in by now. I laugh at BW, not commend them for any efforts put in thus far as they take way too long and simply don't tell us, the paying customer (notice I didn't say player) anything anymore.

 

X-server queues are in the back burner and are NOT coming anytime soon. They said so in some podcast recently. It upsets me that it's not coming, because x-server would pretty much solve all of the RWZ problems, but it is what it is.

Edited December 20, 2012 by Smashbrother

[Hairyzac]

the reason we have threads like this is because not enough people/teams que up for ranked. there isnt a shortage of premades queing up for normals... so commen sense should tell you that most dont care about rateds. and when i say dont care about rateds, i mean, they dont care about what rateds are intended to be... and that is top level competitive PVP.

 

im not saying there are not people who love and want top level competitive PVP... im saying you are not going to get that type of play by opening up solo ques for rateds or by giving bigger rewards( incentives ) for people to que up for rateds.

 

Lots of people want to try to work their way to a competitive level in ranked. Now the big barrier of entry, WH gear, has been knocked down. The other big barrier of entry is not having cross sever or opening up free xfers to high pop PvP realms.

 

Common sense tells you there are more people q'ing normals because it is easier to get 1-4 people than it is to gather 8 competent players to play competitively. But even so, that has become easier since gear is so easy to get now.

 

We all understand there are struggling servers out there when it comes to the ranked scene. That doesn't mean the players there don't want to play ranked. It means they have no way to xfer to a high pop PvP realm. And since there is no cross server, they are in essence...screwed.

[fixate]

Class balance is always going to effect group compositions and no matter what you do or say about it that fact will never change. Believe it or not most people really enjoy playing a class that doesn't limit their low skill level.

 

This thread seems pointless and it just reiterates what everyone has been saying forever, at this point they know we want cross server, they know we want balance changes made and people have brought up an arena system many times before and if you think class balance is a glaring problem now... haha oh wow I can just picture the rivers of tears.

 

For the record, when I play ranked - I win.

 

For the record, you don't - especially against us.

[RyderQuanTy]

if people made team is masses it would not matter what class or gear you have you would play vs a simmilar team via the match making system. What they need is a team orginizer so you can find a group.. just sighn up in the time slot you play and make 20 man groups.

 

If you wont arena death matches go to outlawas den and allow pick up and drop of of daily pvp there to get things started.

[Rogoo]

There will NEVER (ever) be a competetive PvP in any sort of a vertical progression based game.

 

It's gear based and grind based, and not skill based.

 

Serious PvPers just don't do such stuff.

 

Guess why Dota 2 is a true e-sport ?

Edited December 20, 2012 by Rogoo

[Xinika]

X-server queues are in the back burner and are NOT coming anytime soon. They said so in some podcast recently. It upsets me that it's not coming, because x-server would pretty much solve all of the RWZ problems, but it is what it is.

 

That's like comparing it to server merges. It will only be a temporal fix for an inevitable problem.

[foxmob]

I just don't see how smaller teams would do anything different than ranked does now. You would have a few teams with the "best comps" (I'm not saying skill doesn't have anything to do with it but you better believe people will complain about it) rolling over players who wanted to just wanted to play and brought 2 Gunnery Commandos with them. In smaller arenas you're still going to get Smashed for 6-7k, you're still going to get bubble stunned, you're still going to be eating back to back 4k HiB/RS.

 

I can solo a smasher on my healer and my VG. some smashers rape me. but those are the best players on the server. smashmonkies are a problem en masse in melee. so no, it wouldn't be the same dynamic at all. I haven't read the rest of the thread yet.

[cashogy]

X-server queues are in the back burner and are NOT coming anytime soon. They said so in some podcast recently. It upsets me that it's not coming, because x-server would pretty much solve all of the RWZ problems, but it is what it is.

 

cross server would NOT fix the Ranked WZ problems. it would for 2-3 weeks, but it would eventually deteriorate into the exact same situation we have now.

[DarthMaulUK]

I think they need to add solo pvp areans, and pvp tournament, i think it would be cool to have server wide tournaments, were you can join and raise up the ranks on a 1v1 system, and maybe everymonth have a new tournament

 

Maybe have some events in the VIP area of the cantina. expand it and place a ring in there and space for people to watch

[Xinika]

cross server would NOT fix the Ranked WZ problems. it would for 2-3 weeks, but it would eventually deteriorate into the exact same situation we have now.

This here.

[Utopii]

The solution is stop expecting great things from this game. PvE is boring and mundane and PvP is not competitive and never has been nor will be. The focus now is cartel coins.

 

The sooner you realize the sooner you can stop making pointless threads about something we all know and have been dealing with since launch.

[Jorojus]

I normally dont say alot on these forums, but I like the way the OP tried starting up a constructive discussion about the PVP, wich I love in this game. Otherwise I wouldn't play pvp every day like the lot of you.

 

After more of a year playing this game I guess I can give a pretty good opinion on my view of the pvp in swtor.

 

Cross server is something that is rly needed to get ranked going, and it would be just more fun than playing the same people over and over. On the Progenitor we have 1-2 guilds that could field a ranked team every night if they rly wanted too. Besides that there are about 5 other guilds I think that could be able to make a ranked team but don't want too because they know that they'll get smashed. I dont know how it is on other servers?

Atm we organize ranked for pug players almost on a daily bases, with 16 players on same faction and dividing them on two teams basicly ignoring the rating we get as team or as player.

 

With cross server and a decent rating system that pre-fixes teams against eachother based on their rating, teams would be more willingly to que up for ranked when they at least have a chance of winning.

 

Besides that, make a pvp system where gear is all alike and everyone has same expertise, so anyone that wants to pvp just puts on gear with expertise so we only have to grind for good looks and not for even stats.

 

Class balance is pretty good imo, I've played every base class to 50 leveling them in pvp, and they are all wh geared so I know what I am talking about.

But when I say class balance is pretty good I mean both teams or factions have the same tools, they are available to anyone so you cant disagree that you cant balance "teams" yourselve its after all a team based game, not a solo game.

I do realize that nobody should be forced to reroll another class because his class isn't viable in the game.

 

About class balance I got some stuff wich would work out just fine imo;

I only speak about the specs that I played, I dont speak about any spec or class that are fine imo either.

 

Warning !!! Wall of text ahead;

 

 

Operative (concealment) : I play concealment operative since day one, I had fun in lowbie pvp and didn't even get to 50 before all the nerfs happened. I still play my operative every day cause I absolutely love the playstyle of it.

I think we got great utility compared to most classes (assasins not indeed ...) and maybe that's why our overall damage is lower but still, see Juggernaut text for what I mean.

Maybe give us back some increased armor debuff on acid blade or give us an autocrit on backstab that is produced by the proc we get on lacerate wich gives us another tactical advantage or make the damage on shiv and or lacerate a bit higher.

 

Operative (lethality) I have played and I like it with high damage in normal wz's but it seems there isn't much whine about this spec on these forums cause people dont play it alot I guess. They rather have burst wich is more viable in all the warzones wich is normal because burst is an important factor in the warzones we got atm. In ranked its not viable enough because of operative survivability and the spec takes too much time to build up damage, healers can easily outheal the damage that has been done before the dead of the operative with hot's.

 

Operative (medic) is ok, imo. A real good one can give you a hard time especially if you dont realize when you need to stun him but with 2 players that know what they do any healer is killable.

 

Sniper; I am leveling a gunslinger atm, I rly like the class, its OP in lowlevel and a good sniper can rly put pressure on an enemy team, on the other hand LOS is a pain. Haven't yet played full tree so cant judge about any. Sniper seem fine in any spec if you talk about class balance.

 

 

Sorcerer (bubblestun): Bubblestun is just stupid, 3 second hardstun on everyone in the team? Everyone can safe their own stun as long as they got a bubble on them + it fills resolve way too less compared to a normal stun. Make the hardstun on the one that casts it only and I can live with a 3 second mezz on players that the bubble is cast upon and fill the resolve bar in comparison with an 8 second flash.

 

Sorcerer (healer, no bubblestun) requires more skill to play effectively then a normal player but I know some players who are pretty damn good at it.

 

Sorcerer (dps), again, needs a bit of a higher skillevel to play decent but its possible. (atm playing 20/21 hybrid with bubblestun wich I mostly only use on myself) altought I haven't played this one in ranked, I do have played against sorc dps in ranked and when we saw a dps sorc in an enemy team that was the player that died the most easy and most times ofc.

 

Assassin; I am still leveling one, Assassins are a pain in the *** too most teams, imo Assassin middle tree can be a little compared to operative concealment. Only that the assassin can hit alot harder than the operative can with 2 or 3 abilities + assassinate. Altough I can kill any assassin / shadow on my server if I get the opener on them, Assassins can do more damage and have more effective "not damaging abilities" (defensive cd's + controlling abilities) force shoud should be an ability in the tank tree only, the shield ability should be something similar as operative with same cd and the damage on some abilities can be tuned down a little bit imo. I hit an infiltration assassin for 3-4k hits on crit with my operative while he hits me for 4-5k crits, both war hero augmented.

 

You can easily see this in overall stats in every wz with assassins and operatives, hybrid tank/dps assassins can still to too much damage imo. But I cant rly judge, haven't played it myself. Did see a post somewhere of highest damage done on a server with an assassin topping 1.5 million damage. No idea wich spec tough, I presume madness.

 

Assassin tanks (28k) are killable from my operative's point of view. so dont need alot of changes.

 

Juggernaut (rage) : Get rid of the autocrit on smash then, "we" juggs will at least need some crit rating in our gear stats just like all the rest of the classes need, or just simply tune down the damage on one or more abilities. Force scream, Force crush, Vicious throw, Smash that are 4 abilities that hit a medium armor player in full wh against a fully geared wh jugg for at least +/-3k hits.

 

Juggernaut (vengeance): is fine for me. Played it, decent damage, fun spec too play with 4 seconds immunity against controlling effects.

Juggernaut (immortal-vengeance): I know a few players that play this spec (16-25) with full tank gear and they are damn hard to kill while they still have nice damage. Cant judge if this one needs tuning or not.

 

On my operative f.e. wich is supposed to be burst I hit a juggernaut (even with acid blade) with my backstab for barely 3k on crit. and that is only one ability. Hidden strike doesn't do much more when I am lucky to get a crit.

And shive and lacerate? "HAHAHA says the jugg, stop tickling me".

Ofc, heavy armor, but still, a fully geared wh sorc I hit for +/- 4500 with crit on hidden strike. A wh jugg smashes a wh operative for 6500k with an aoe ability, come on my grandmother even understands there is something wrong here ...

 

Powertech Pyro: Is fine imo, damage could be tuned a bit lower, but then PT needs a little bit more survivability. Easiest spec to play in the game.

 

Haven't played other three's so far.

 

Mercenary; give mercenaries their 30m stun back, just make different stuns for PT class and Mercenary instead of nerfing all Bounty hunters's and give a 2-3 second root on their pushback wich breaks on damage. And they will have alot more survivability. Also add a slow on target's beeing shot with unload like sorcerer has on force lightning. That might even make them a little OP but still killable.

 

I only got a level 30 commando but I know how easy it is to kill this class, with all the casting they have to do.

 

 

 

 

 

I'd also rly like to see some decent WvW in this game. You could f.e. let players make an ops group with 16 or 32 players wich can que for an objective based big and long lasting (neverending) wz till one side admits defeat. Or make a planet where we can do that conistently, not such a big planet like Ilum but smaller and with a cap of 40 players in an instance.

 

BTW I am rly scared about what will happen to class balance with the new level cap, hope Bioware can give us some information about that quickly. That could rly mess up things imo unless they have been testing secretly for the entire year to remake the entire pvp.

 

How will pvp go on with players that do not buy the expansion? Separate wz's for lowbie pvp, level 50 pvp and level 51-55 or what ? Higher level stats gear again? Big grind or not to get even in stats with players that buy the expansion alot earlier?:rak_02:

[Exilim]

I always thought the biggest thing that would make PvP more enjoyable for more people would be accurate match-making. I think step one to getting more ranked participation is increasing over-all PvP participation and enjoyment.

 

Track wins and losses for all players in all WZPvP and implement a hidden or visible ranking to each character that can be used for match-making purposes. This is an elo system look at league of legends for an example. Even their unranked solo queue has a hidden ranking so you get matched with and against players your level. I'm sure Bioware employs more than a few math majors, put them to work on some equations.

 

Also instead of doing long PvP seasons for Ranked Queue(s) they should do short maybe 5 or 6 week sessions. Reset rankings after each one so people don't stagnant at higher and lower rankings. Start making titles and rewards and hand them out fast and furious. Put fricken ranking boards all over the place on the websites and a terminal in game. People want to be rewarded with stuff and they want e-fame. I want to see posts like "Xsniper-zero just passed Moochie-poo for number one, that's gotta hurt the peen" all over the PvP forums

[stephenalandavie]

I read the cliff notes and just wanted to stick my opinion in, I know the population took a massive whack in the previous months and with the server merges etc it may of boosted. The numbers however did grow with F2P. I have noticed this on my server very much so it has almost doubled in population size to what it was. Spending 3/4's of its time at heavy or very heavy as do all the other European servers.

 

Also in a recent interview Rob Hinkle did state The 2 v 2 or 3 v 3 concept will be coming soon. so that's a bit of good news to.

[Karkais]

I would agree with this statement if the PvP was truly 'competitive'. The issue is, it's not. Win or Lose.

 

No MMO pvp is ever properly competitive. The issue is moot.