Standing on the fleet because of lifeless worlds

[Rileysoph]

Why does everyone spend 90% of their time standing on the fleet? (imo)

 

Probably with my characters i've spent 99% of my time standing on the fleet with them.

 

Why? Because the worlds are lifeless.

 

NPCs just stand there waving their arms about, worlds have no day/night cycle, 95% of the content you can do solo, I just feel like there's no community in the actual game apart from guild events. The planets are just there for levelling, simple as that. I have no reason to go back to other planets apart from doing events whether bioware made or guild made. LIke i said there's no environment changes so i know that when i go back i'm going to see the exact same world again.

 

I'm on a PVP server and when I do my dailies, reps just walk past me all the time. Sure, i stick my pvp gear on and kill the pve gear wearing reps, but that's no fun, no challenge. People don't seem to want to do pvp, they just want to do their dailies and go back to standing on the fleet.

 

PVP in this game is a joke especially with pre mades who have been playing together for 2 years go up against a group of solo's, it's also a joke because of the lack of warzones and faction imbalance (TOFN, reps win 80% of the time)

 

I remember a while back bioware gave us this chart with where players spend most of their time (if anyone can find it ithat would be great) and the majority of it was on the fleet.

 

What this game needs:

-Day/night cycles

-Level 55 daily areas on all planets

-Keep the bounty event always up so players have a reason to go to old planets

[tekhiun]

I agree with your suggestions, besides the day/night cycles, thats really low priority for me

[Jerba]

Yeah, I remember the chart, I believe it was from one of the blogs for the Chevin event where they showed how the event helped bringing level 50 players back to lower planets.

 

However, in my opinion, the reason why players stay on fleet has nothing to do with the planets not being attractive anymore.

Instead, I believe the reason is that most players will search for raids in fleet chat, and even though you can create server-wide chat channels, you'll miss most LFGs unless you are on fleet.

Also, there is no place in SWTOR with as many vendors and terminals like the fleet. You can unlock some things for your starship, but not all of them, like no mod station and no quest terminal, so the fleet is the best place to be for these things.

Edited January 6, 2014 by Jerba

[Rileysoph]

and even though you can create server-wide chat channels, you'll miss most LFGs unless you are on fleet.

.

 

Wait you can actually make a chat channel that displays every message said on the server??

[Zandoezan]

Well i found a spammer's char standing just next to the inventory bank on the Fleet. Aviro or something he was called, a lvl6 Trooper, so what's he doing on the Fleet with that lvl? Spamming and that is all.

 

So there are people who use it to advertise their nonsense.

[Jerba]

Wait you can actually make a chat channel that displays every message said on the server??

No, but you can convince everyone on your server to type "/cjoin lfg", that way people will use that chat channel when they are looking for more players.

It is working fine on my server, but unfortunately not every server has this.

 

What this game needs:

-Day/night cycles

-Level 55 daily areas on all planets

-Keep the bounty event always up so players have a reason to go to old planets

I don't think that a day/night cycle would help make the planets attractive, they already are very attractive. You do know that there have been daily quests on Hoth, Belsavis, Corellia, Voss and Ilum since 1.0 that are still a challenge at level 55? Not to mention all the additional daily areas they have added over time. And since 2.0, we also have GSI daily quests on pretty much every major planet; most players just don't want to do them because they rather stay on fleet.

Edited January 7, 2014 by Jerba

[Aries_cz]

Why does everyone spend 90% of their time standing on the fleet? (imo)

 

Probably with my characters i've spent 99% of my time standing on the fleet with them.

 

Why? Because the worlds are lifeless.

 

NPCs just stand there waving their arms about, worlds have no day/night cycle, 95% of the content you can do solo, I just feel like there's no community in the actual game apart from guild events. The planets are just there for levelling, simple as that. I have no reason to go back to other planets apart from doing events whether bioware made or guild made. LIke i said there's no environment changes so i know that when i go back i'm going to see the exact same world again.

 

I'm on a PVP server and when I do my dailies, reps just walk past me all the time. Sure, i stick my pvp gear on and kill the pve gear wearing reps, but that's no fun, no challenge. People don't seem to want to do pvp, they just want to do their dailies and go back to standing on the fleet.

 

PVP in this game is a joke especially with pre mades who have been playing together for 2 years go up against a group of solo's, it's also a joke because of the lack of warzones and faction imbalance (TOFN, reps win 80% of the time)

 

I remember a while back bioware gave us this chart with where players spend most of their time (if anyone can find it ithat would be great) and the majority of it was on the fleet.

 

What this game needs:

-Day/night cycles

-Level 55 daily areas on all planets

-Keep the bounty event always up so players have a reason to go to old planets

 

Well, I am going to disagree on the imbalance. I play on TOFN exclusively, and unless something changed drastically since middle of December (my last PvP, then I had to start studying), the win/loss ratio was pretty much even, no matter what side i played on.

 

Premades vs PUGs, that is always going to happen. God forbid that people from one guild play a multiplayer game together.

 

Have you considered that people stand around on the fleet because everything is there? All vendors, PvP/PvE terminals, so it is an ideal place when waiting in queue for flashpoint or pvp.

 

Keeping the bounty event up permanently would defeat the purpose, because nobody is doing the missions once their reputation is maxed out. So, there would be more people on old planets at the beginning, but it would slowly go down. And content creation simply cannot keep up with content locusts in any game.

 

New daily zones, that i could get behind, sure, more stuff to do is always good. However, it takes bloody long time to actually create and implement it.

 

Day/Night cycles, are, in my opinion, not needed. If they chose to mimic the real time, it would suck for people who can play at only one time of time (most people play at night). If they chose to use some artificial time for each planet (as they should, because each planet should have different time of day on it), it would probably reduce many of the dramatic effects on planets in stories...

[JPryde]

What this game needs:

-Day/night cycles

-Level 55 daily areas on all planets

-Keep the bounty event always up so players have a reason to go to old planets

None of this would make me spend more time on different planets. Lvl 55 daily areas I would visit, but regardless of the planet they are linked to (assuming it would be similar to black hole, section X). Day/Night cycle I do not miss at all. Bounty Hunter event I stopped the instant that I maxxed our reputation and achievements.

 

Then again, I am already spending hardly any time on fleet. Basically I only visit fleet to refresh daily and weekly missions and then go my merry way.

 

I can either be found in any OP (granted, those start on the fleet), in any FP or doing one of the daily areas that are already there with my abundance of chars. Ironically, I spend most of my time on fleet with a low level char, waiting for GSF fights to pop up (that char is leveled exclusively by GSF as an experiment).

 

On my server, you do not miss out on any information, if you are not on fleet, as our SNG channel (german for LFG) is commonly used by nearly everyone.

Edited January 6, 2014 by JPryde

[Einobi]

Why does everyone spend 90% of their time standing on the fleet? (imo)

 

I am one of those who stands around the fleet 90% of my time just because I am waiting in an fp and pvp queue. I try not to do any other things because it is annoying and disruptive when you are IMMERSED in what you are doing and a queue pop up and you have to STOP what you are doing to go into fp or pvp play.

 

Basically standing around doing nothing and perhaps occupying our time trolling the gen chat is not our preferred choice. I would not put it down as we have no choice. We have a choice to not play the game. We choose to wait for our play at the moment. The time when we are tired of waiting, we will leave. That is it.

[PLynkes]

In the absence of more story content, I'd love it if there were lvl 50+ Daily areas on all the planets. Either in the same mould as Section X and the Black Hole, or even more spaced out in the normal game world like the ones on Makeb (though I guess they'd have to put them out of the way if they did it like that, so lower-level types don't blunder into the bad guys too readily). Would be really cool to have a reason to go back to Tython and Korriban and places like that.

[Master-Nala]

Give every planet mission terminals, PvP terminals, & all commendations vendors and I would only use Fleet as a travel hub. Edited January 6, 2014 by Master-Nala

[Einobi]

Give every planet mission terminals, PvP terminals, & all commendations vendors and I would only use Fleet as a travel hub.

 

They can't sell all the convenience travel unlock if they make it so convenient for players. This is a game that profit from the pains of players if you observe carefully.

[JPryde]

They can't sell all the convenience travel unlock if they make it so convenient for players. This is a game that profit from the pains of players if you observe carefully.

That logic is flawed, as there is no convenience travel unlock apart from "jump to fleet". All the other ones are basically useless. When did you ever need a fast travel to Coruscant or Dromund Kaas? And the one to black hole is easily done by going to fleet and using the priority travel.

 

Most of my chars travel like that... port to fleet (no cooldown, no cost), then move to the priority transfer and port to makeb, oricon, czerka, black hole, section X... whatever is necessary. My lvl 55 chars last visited Coruscant for the bounty event...

[DataBeaver]

The fleet has one advantage that hasn't been mentioned yet: relatively short load time. The only playfield with an even shorter load time is the player ship (not counting various space stations related to class stories). I love the scenery on Alderaan and Voss, but I don't want to spend multiple minutes per character on loading screens when managing my crew skills.

 

I'll also have to agree that the fleet is the easiest place to find groups for operations. Group finder is woefully inadequate for that, as it only offers two operations in 8-man SM and no possibility of filtering candidates. In theory some planet could fill the role as well, but no planet has all the services that the fleet has.

[Corsiero]

I actually spend as little time on Fleet as possible, especially since the Life Day event. I tend to park my 55 characters on the daily planets. I only ever go to Fleet to hand in missions or go to vendors. I prefer the GTN on my ship. My lower level characters tend to stay close to Dromund Kaas or Coruscant for the PvP vendors. Otherwise, my levelling characters were on the planet they were last left on. Characters without ships have no choice but to be parked on Fleet.

 

If I ever need to find groups I have guild and various voice chat programs. I have plenty of choices on what to do.

[Karkais]

Give every planet mission terminals, PvP terminals, & all commendations vendors and I would only use Fleet as a travel hub.

 

Giving every planet galactic trade market would be a start.

[Corsiero]

When did you ever need a fast travel to Coruscant or Dromund Kaas?

Under 55 PvP vendor. Missions whilst levelling that require returning to those planets to report in. Macrobinoculars and Seeker Droid pick up missions. Cause I'm lazy. I avoid using my ship to travel unless absolutely neccessary.

[Idunhavaname]

Loading screens is why.

[Andryah]

I don't think that a day/night cycle would help make the planets attractive, they already are very attractive. You do know that there have been daily quests on Hoth, Corellia, Voss and Ilum since 1.0 that are still a challenge at level 55? Not to mention all the additional daily areas they have added over time. And since 2.0, we also have GSI daily quests on pretty much every major planet; most players just don't want to do them because they rather stay on fleet.

 

/Agree.

 

In addition, there IS actually more going on in the environment on the planets then the OP is willing to admit. Anyone that spends some time on a planet actually looking at the nuances of conversations between NPCs, overhead flights of different aircraft, ground batteries firing into the air, local weather (yes folks some of the planets DO have weather), etc. etc. knows there is actually quite a bit of ambiance taking place on the planets. It's just that it does not earn credits or comms or cookies for stopping and admiring the attention to detail.. so most players simply miss it.

 

The core issue with so many players camping fleet is that it is a one stop center for transactions of every type + players spamming PuG-lfg. In that regard, they serve their purpose and they do offer players a space-limited crowded place to hang if they need crowds around them to feel like the game is alive.

 

Personally, I do most of my transaction type activities on the capital worlds except for lfg. They are as easy to get to as Fleet, and only the ship hangers are poorly located. I only go to fleet for specific things that can only be obtained at Fleet. For lfg, I use my guild channel as I don't do PuGs in MMOs as they are more toxic then beneficial IMO.

Edited January 6, 2014 by Andryah

[TUXs]

It's not the lifeless worlds that bother me, it's that EVERY activity at 55 originates from the Fleet.

We need the ability to remotely pickup and turn in missions from anywhere and some sort of Group Finder travel thing for every Ops/FP, not just the ones done via GF.

[Damask_Rose]

I'm only on fleet to pick up quests and clean up my inventory. I would love it if GSI and Bounty Hunter got expanded onto more planets! Other than that, I feel like we already have more than enough daily areas.

[DarthTHC]

I keep my characters planted on Fleet because it's the simplest spot to get to a PvE mission terminal.

 

When I go out into the worlds, I've noticed recently that they're more active. More people are out and about in them.

 

Also, I don't need day/night cycles. Bounty event full-time would be cool. I don't understand why they make some of these periodic events anyway.

[Malastare]

Why does everyone spend 90% of their time standing on the fleet? (imo)

 

That's not an opinion, its a question, and its based on hyperbole, not observation.

 

Example: This weekend the population on Ebon Hawk's fleet was about 300 people (per faction). Dromund Kaas had over 150 people. Voss had 60. Tatooine had 90. Alderaan had 60. Based on DK's population, there were likely 100 players on Korriban and Hutta. So, just looking at those numbers, less than half the people in the game were even on the fleet. Those on planets probably spent a large majority (likely all) of their time off the fleet.

 

So, at least re-phrase the question to ditch the worthless hyperbole:

 

Why do many Level 55 players spend well over half their time on the fleet?

 

The easy answer is: Because the fleet acts as a hub for FPs, Ops, and various endgame quests. It has all the vendors, trainers, and facilities of a home planet, but loads faster and requires no taxis. There are some vendors that can only be found there, and there are very few vendors who don't exist there (Example: a companion customization vendor). It's an easier/faster way for groups to join up on ships.

 

In short: Because the fleet is very useful, and Level 55 characters aren't leveling on planets anymore. It makes perfect sense for them to gather in the most convenient and useful place.

 

Why? Because the worlds are lifeless.

 

Now, there's an opinion. However, it doesn't apply to the majority of people, as I showed above. Most people are out on planets. It's not like people are in the middle of questing on Alderaan and come back to stand around the fleet because they found the Nerfs too boring.

 

So, again, at least try to state what you mean:

 

You're spending a lot of time on the fleet because you don't find the planets worth traveling to.

It's an opinion, and as valid as any opinion is. You're free to express it, but don't insist that you speak for the majority of players.

 

I'm on a PVP server and when I do my dailies, reps just walk past me all the time. Sure, i stick my pvp gear on and kill the pve gear wearing reps, but that's no fun, no challenge. People don't seem to want to do pvp, they just want to do their dailies and go back to standing on the fleet.

 

Two points: First, its unlikely that they stand around the fleet for an hour, then run their dailies, then go back to the fleet and stand around. More likely, they log in, run some dailies, do a WZ or FP or two, then log off. Second, your complaint about PvP is mostly a semi-selfish whine that other people aren't choosing to play in a way that makes you happy. Sorry, but they're under no obligation to do that. I play on a PvP server, too. Sometimes I'm up for some violence. Sometimes I just want to finish a quest and move on. It's my choice, not yours.

 

I remember a while back bioware gave us this chart with where players spend most of their time (if anyone can find it ithat would be great) and the majority of it was on the fleet.

 

I think I remember people talking about that (never saw it, myself), but I suspect you are misinterpreting statistics. There is a difference between "The average player spends most of their time on the Fleet" and "The Fleet is the most common place that players are found". I believe the "chart" stated the latter, not the former. Just because its the most common doesn't mean that they spend most of their time there. If they spend 15% of their time there, it may be far higher than the rest of the planets (eg: 7% each), but still far from the majority of their time.

 

What this game needs:

-Day/night cycles

 

Disagree. Waste of resources for no gameplay improvement.

 

-Level 55 daily areas on all planets

 

You mean like the GSI missions? Sure, I believe they've already started work on expanding it.

 

-Keep the bounty event always up so players have a reason to go to old planets

 

How is the bounty event different than the Dread Seed and Shroud missions? Do you think that people will continue to do the even when they've reached the max reputation? I mean, I'm not against it, but they'll need to add/change the rewards to give it any lasting use. Until then, I'd rather see it as a periodic event.

Edited January 6, 2014 by Malastare

[MillionsKNives]

It's not the lifeless worlds that bother me, it's that EVERY activity at 55 originates from the Fleet.

We need the ability to remotely pickup and turn in missions from anywhere and some sort of Group Finder travel thing for every Ops/FP, not just the ones done via GF.

 

*stamp of approval*

[Andryah]

That's not an opinion, its a question, and its based on hyperbole, not observation.

 

Example: This weekend the population on Ebon Hawk's fleet was about 300 people (per faction). Dromund Kaas had over 150 people. Voss had 60. Tatooine had 90. Alderaan had 60. Based on DK's population, there were likely 100 players on Korriban and Hutta. So, just looking at those numbers, less than half the people in the game were even on the fleet. Those on planets probably spent a large majority (likely all) of their time off the fleet.

 

So, at least re-phrase the question to ditch the worthless hyperbole:

 

Why do many Level 55 players spend well over half their time on the fleet?

 

The easy answer is: Because the fleet acts as a hub for FPs, Ops, and various endgame quests. It has all the vendors, trainers, and facilities of a home planet, but loads faster and requires no taxis. There are some vendors that can only be found there, and there are very few vendors who don't exist there (Example: a companion customization vendor). It's an easier/faster way for groups to join up on ships.

 

In short: Because the fleet is very useful, and Level 55 characters aren't leveling on planets anymore. It makes perfect sense for them to gather in the most convenient and useful place.

 

 

 

Now, there's an opinion. However, it doesn't apply to the majority of people, as I showed above. Most people are out on planets. It's not like people are in the middle of questing on Alderaan and come back to stand around the fleet because they found the Nerfs too boring.

 

So, again, at least try to state what you mean:

 

You're spending a lot of time on the fleet because you don't find the planets worth traveling to.

It's an opinion, and as valid as any opinion is. You're free to express it, but don't insist that you speak for the majority of players.

 

 

 

Two points: First, its unlikely that they stand around the fleet for an hour, then run their dailies, then go back to the fleet and stand around. More likely, they log in, run some dailies, do a WZ or FP or two, then log off. Second, your complaint about PvP is mostly a semi-selfish whine that other people aren't choosing to play in a way that makes you happy. Sorry, but they're under no obligation to do that. I play on a PvP server, too. Sometimes I'm up for some violence. Sometimes I just want to finish a quest and move on. It's my choice, not yours.

 

 

 

I think I remember people talking about that (never saw it, myself), but I suspect you are misinterpreting statistics. There is a difference between "The average player spends most of their time on the Fleet" and "The Fleet is the most common place that players are found". I believe the "chart" stated the latter, not the former. Just because its the most common doesn't mean that they spend most of their time there. If they spend 15% of their time there, it may be far higher than the rest of the planets (eg: 7% each), but still far from the majority of their time.

 

 

 

Disagree. Waste of resources for no gameplay improvement.

 

 

 

You mean like the GSI missions? Sure, I believe they've already started work on expanding it.

 

 

 

How is the bounty event different than the Dread Seed and Shroud missions? Do you think that people will continue to do the even when they've reached the max reputation? I mean, I'm not against it, but they'll need to add/change the rewards to give it any lasting use. Until then, I'd rather see it as a periodic event.

 

Lucid, accurate, objective, and point-by-point complete.