And so it has happened...the World of Warcraft Arena curse has come to GS...

[LordArtemis]

...as a result of poor design choices in my opinion.

 

During testing you were warned this would happen, you were warned that adoption would not be as widespread as it could be, early access would create almost permanent disparity which would in turn turn off potential players, and a lack of design complimentary to joystick control (tighter reticule), lack of on ground option ala BF2 (using simple standard appearance models) and leaving out any PVE aspect would create a balance and design burden that would perhaps outstrip adoption.

 

Now, it would be foolish IMO to say that GS has not seen some limited success among the playerbase....and certainly some options have been added since launch with respect to play options and appearance.

 

But this system remains a pale example of what it should have been. It seems to me you are already hitting the nerf/boost cycle...a cycle that will not likely subside any time soon.

 

Glaring weaknesses should exist for each ship, and counters to each strength. Right now, playing in certain ways, certain types of ships can dominate the landscape.

 

Again, you were warned of this.

 

I would recommend you seriously reconsider your current reticule size, add joystick control, and start working on a PVE element to the feature, as well as a 40 percent nerf across the board for upper tier upgrades, reducing the nerf as you go down the upgrade ladder. The most powerful setup should only give a mediocre edge over a new ship IMO...Skill alone should be the deciding factor, allowing anyone with enough patience to become a master.

 

Just my two cents. I do not believe the design direction this feature took was a wise one, and I feel it is still flawed in many ways.

Edited April 30, 2014 by LordArtemis

[Kalphitis]

...as a result of poor design choices in my opinion.

 

During testing you were warned this would happen, you were warned that adoption would not be as widespread as it could be, early access would create almost permanent disparity which would in turn turn off potential players, .

 

I was totally with you for this first part. I was all like 'Heck yea - preach it baby!'

 

Then I read the rest of your post...

[LordArtemis]

I was totally with you for this first part. I was all like 'Heck yea - preach it baby!'

 

Then I read the rest of your post...

 

Hehe

 

Well, certainly many different folks have ideas on what can be done to improve the feature, and I certainly do not claim to have the definitive answer. It's my vision, but that doesn't mean it's the right one.

 

But I think there is a reasonable consensus that the direction they chose to take is not one that was universally popular across the playerbase...and I can speculate that they have the very participation numbers to prove it.

[Korithras]

You don't like it, don't play. Simple as that. You'll be one less target in my crosshairs.

[Elly_Dawn]

You don't like it, don't play. Simple as that. You'll be one less target in my crosshairs.

 

isn't that self-defeating the purpose?.. one less target means one less player meaning lower pop chances... not a good thing in my opinion... but, i too have all but quit playing because of some questionable choices, especially with nerfing scouts e.g. the Type 3, that thing makes no sense aesthetically, 4 thrusters and less maneuverability and speed than the Type 1, whut?.. not to mention the EMP Field that doesn't have range for anything, as everything it's supposed to stop has greater range than the EMP... and, of course, the obvious favoritism with the bombers... i was really hoping bombers would change the dynamic of the game, well as they say, be careful of what you wish for, you just may get it (just not how you expect/want it)...

Edited April 30, 2014 by Elly_Dawn

[Sidenti]

If one is expecting a stand-alone game that compares with the likes of Freelancer, Wing Commander, the X series and so forth, then yeah. Disappointment will abound.

 

And I'm not saying Bioware built a great framework for what it DOES have. They didn't. Upgrade tiers + staged rollout ALWAYS equals disappointing feature. ALWAYS.

 

In the end, however, Bioware wasn't building a stand-alone game for the masses. They built a narrow, popcorn minigame feature for one certain niche of their population. Probably would have worked rather well had they gone with more in-depth playtesting, but I'm pretty sure the magnitude of the work they need to do on SWTOR overall prevented this.

 

Bottom line?

 

It's not a standalone game. It's a minigame for people who like multiplayer arcade-style shoot-em-ups. And that's all it'll ever be.

 

Enjoy it for what it is. It helps take the sting out of thinking about what it could have been. -bp

[Sindariel]

You don't like it, don't play. Simple as that.

 

An advice that many players have followed in the past weeks, which has lead to queue times from up to 30 min and a steadily decreasing GSF community.

 

Yeah, great advice....

[Sidenti]

An advice that many players have followed in the past weeks, which has lead to queue times from up to 30 min and a steadily decreasing GSF community.

 

Yeah, great advice....

 

Conversely, it's not like we can make people play a facet of the game they don't like or find entertaining just because WE do.

[Kuciwalker]

street hobo with sign about the end times crap

 

we were warned oh no ahhhhhhhhh whatever shall we do without joystick support

[Itkovian]

In the end, however, Bioware wasn't building a stand-alone game for the masses. They built a narrow, popcorn minigame feature for one certain niche of their population. Probably would have worked rather well had they gone with more in-depth playtesting, but I'm pretty sure the magnitude of the work they need to do on SWTOR overall prevented this.

 

Well, I wouldn't call it a popcorn minigame by any means. There's a lot of depth in GSF already, and mastering it requires a lot of dedication and skill, not to mention the enormous potential for growth. Popcorn minigame is what I'd call the previous space combat... GSF is leaps and bounds beyond that.

 

However, you certainly are correct that Bioware wasn't making a stand-alone game. It's an additional game mode grafted into our existing game, and to have expected GSF to equal a full blown stand-alone space sim was certainly unrealistic.

 

Instead, their current approach allows them to introduce new features throughout the lifecycle of the main game, as GSF is meant as an addition to TOR, some other gameplay mode we can engage in (like Warzones or Operations). New roles, news maps, and no doubt new game modes will come, and GSF itself will probalby finance its own improvements (since it generates its own revenue stream).

 

As for the OP, it's the same old refrain: GSF is doomed without joystick support and PvE integration (he was even suggesting being able to board ships at one point). Once again the alarm bells are being sounded prematurely: GSF seems to be doing quite well for what it was meant to be, and hopefully will continue to do so in the future (but the again, I guess anyone who expected GSF to compare with X-Wing will invariably feel that it is a failure).

 

Thank you.

 

Itkovian

[Korithras]

isn't that self-defeating the purpose?.. one less target means one less player meaning lower pop chances

 

No, not really. People who whine about this sort of thing are the people who whine about class imbalances, looking for the easy win instead of actually learning to improve their skills so that they can overcome the challenge put before him. Pilots like that are the kind that I blow away three, four or five times in a single game. They provide no challenge so I won't be missing them. As for queue times? I've not noticed it being terrible on my server. Guess mine just appreciates GSF more than others.

[SammyGStatus]

LOL'd @ Kuci's quote

 

Anyways, Joystick support is meh (imo). We play the rest of this game with a mouse and keyboard, and while they lack support of joysticks, using a mouse seems to be more accurate (my first computer back in 1994 had a game that used the joystick. It was very cool... before mice became optical and the trackball didn't get stuck from dirt / fuzz / lint, etc. Don't get me wrong, for certain games like full fledged sims, I'd be irrate if they didn't at least SUPPORT the option of a joystick.... But this is an mmo. What other part of SWTOR could utilize a joystick well? I don't think I'm able to find many places if any at all (minus racing around the fleet).

 

Truthfully, the queues seem to be increasing in total time. Grouping helps, but I lack the understanding how they sort players into matches (seems like it's FIFO, but if 6 players are que'd and a group of 4 ques, does that screw up the order for the last 2 solo que players?) Players shouldn't have to xfer or create new toons on different servers. That alienates them from everything else they've come to love about the game (If I'm in a NiM progression group AND I want to play GSF, I better hope I started out on TEH or The Harbinger, because these two servers get pops). Places like Jung'Ma only pop once every round, meaning only one game at a time. This means that if I want to GSF there, I have to spend a lot of time waiting (and can't be running FPS during this time either). The question then becomes "Is giving up the guild I've become friends with, the PVP rivalries, and this albeit small GSF community worth the severly decreased queue times?" If yes, you can pay $20 for a transfer, but again you're still sacrificing more than you should have to. If no, you're forced to create an alt on a server that you'll exclusively use for GSF, requiring you to restart your entire legacy, all achievements, and all abilities for your ships. This is asking too much - matchmaking is the #1 issue they need to fix. The game has enough balance for right now to worry more about losing players / keeping current players interested / drawing in new players rather than give that armor pen a slight nerf (just an example... I like armor pen )

 

Temporary solution: Group up, /cjoin GSF, advertising for people to que in fleet, and go to a server that plays host to a lot of matches (until the underlying issue of X server ques is addressed)

Edited April 30, 2014 by SammyGStatus

[Verain]

Some interesting points for sure.

 

The lack of joystick support absolutely removed this game from consideration for several of my friends, who were ecstatic about X-Wing / TIE Fighter types of games. "No, it's fine, the mouse is fine" doesn't cut it with these guys. It's probably the worst decision that they've made, but I'm betting anything it was made with good reason: adding joystick support would require a lot of stuff into the code base that would be used literally no where else in SWTOR, and that would require EXTENSIVE testing, and this out of a game where you have to edit locked config files just to have it not tell the monitor to go into an invalid mode on windows boot.

 

early access would create almost permanent disparity which would in turn turn off potential players

 

This isn't really as big of a deal as you make it out to be, though. It just doesn't matter much- everyone is building towards maxed ships. Yes, the first several games are jarring, but the early upgrades make a huge difference, and it isn't the end of everything. Everyone who cared about early access had it- if the game isn't good enough to be worth 15 bucks a month, then IMO it probably isn't worth complaining too much about in the mind of whomever makes that decision. I resubbed to get gunship (gunship gunship gunship) despite not being very into the whole ground game thing here (I play WoW, heroic raiding, arenas, and RBGs when I can get them, so this was very much extra sauce).

 

There's a bunch of dollar related complaints about this game, and the only one I sorta feel is the ship to fleet req for the purpose of powering upgrades. Even that isn't really a big deal, I just feel it's kind of a whale trap. Whales should be courted with value, not dubious player power. Armonddd in another thread pointed out that he had dumped hundreds of dollars- as someone who buys everything GSF related immediately from the Cartel Market, I'm probably not quite lined up with that magnitude, but I'm not TOO far off. The difference is, I think that the cartel ships and colors deliver pretty great value to the play experience, but the req transfer sorta doesn't. I'm not opposed to a bit of P2W, but if it was something like 1200 cartel coins and the ship gains X ship req and counts as mastered (can only be done once per ship), you'd probably see some players buy that for every ship.

 

It seems to me you are already hitting the nerf/boost cycle...a cycle that will not likely subside any time soon.

 

We aren't really though. The biggest change was to barrel roll, a powerful movement power. The nerf changed the game, but it was meant to shift the meta, and it did. Meanwhile, changes to underpowered and overpowered components are made very gradually, and most are left to themselves. I don't feel like a rollercoaster at all.

 

Right now, playing in certain ways, certain types of ships can dominate the landscape.

 

That's a fair complaint, and the game does need some tweaks. I'm personally convinced that cluster missiles are rather overtuned in the current meta, as no ship can really ignore them happily (the longer lockon missiles have plenty of ships who will never notice them). But, does this need to result in a nerf? The ships that use the cluster missiles are fun to fly, and they aren't by themselves forcing other ships entirely out. I think that the nature of the game prevents the worst effects of an imbalance.

 

I would recommend you seriously reconsider your current reticule size, add joystick control, and start working on a PVE element to the feature, as well as a 40 percent nerf across the board for upper tier upgrades

 

Reticule size: I'm not sure if this would help that much. Do you really feel that this is causing a lot of issues? I think this would kind of lower the skill floor AND the skill cap, and while the first is a good idea, the second sort of isn't.

 

You'd bake the lost effects in, of course. I don't think a 40% nerf should be the thing. I'm more of the opinion that:

> The cost of requisitioning a new whatever should be 250 in all cases (need quads? 250)

> A ship should get a bit of a bigger boost out of the gate, starting with some baseline req to spend, even if only 2000.

> The 10000 tier should be less, like 7000.

> The 15000 tier should be less, like 12000.

> The really HUGE upgrades- such as distortion missile break, heavy laser armor piercing, railgun armor piercing, burst laser cannon armor piercing- should be made BASELINE to these weapons. The thing where charged plating is basically a starman versus lowbie ships is probably not good design, with only rocket pods offering an early access to this. So if your meta is a good one, new ships are hard countered by anything running charged plating. The weapons could be changed in some manner- for instance, you could reduce the damage of heavy laser by 8% and give it back with a talent while baselining the armor ignore, or you could increase the shield penalty on distortion field and give it back with their final talent or whatever.

 

This assumes that all this stuff is fine- you might disagree, but don't post that. The point is that if something exists at all that is necessary for the component to function, it should be baseline or third tier at most.

 

PvE would help this game immensely, but it is really crazy expensive which is why they don't do it.

 

If you could get a dev here, I'm positive they would tell you this if they could. Concerns regarding budget and development become ludicrous whenever anyone fires straight on this topic, in any game and most products. It doesn't help that there's so many armchair programmers who will come in and talk about how easy it is, etc. Rest assured that developing PvE content would be the BEST thing they could do, but also pound for pound not at all a cheap one. I think it's worth talking about and asking for- even limited pve, where you do ground game quests leading up to a need to do a precision run, or do something interesting in a solo space- would add a whole lot of interest to the game.

[LordArtemis]

You know guys, there is no need to feel threatened because someone posts some less than stellar feedback on this feature you happen to enjoy. It happens you know...sometimes folks may not like what you like and may express that displeasure.

 

There is no need for the drama, all it does is makes you look pretty silly IMO. Its hardly a resounding indictment lol.

 

Have to like the hobo comment though. Way to dial up the drama to epic proportions.

[DamascusAdontise]

Joystick? No (this has been evaluated over and over - floating reticule and joystick = no good - sorry

 

PvE? No, except maybe a tutorial with moving targets. We have A LOT of stuff that needs done and a standalone PvE system is much too cumbersome. its really its own game, and we already have space PvE (and how many people play that?)

 

Early Access causing a gear gap that exists today? Yes definitely, is it a all world ending failure.... no certainly not. many MANY games with SWTOR's particular game model utilize dynamic unlock-able gear and abilities / tiers of components etc. If you don't like that, sorry too bad, should have read more before you got involved with something that requires a time investment your not able to make. (sorry if thats harsh, its up to you as a gamer to decide what kind of games you want to play, many choose not to play games like this and thats fine)

 

Now where I agree with you is that we need to get people into components faster, and there have been so many good suggestions IMO the following could be added easily and would help greatly...

 

Right Away Stuff: 1 additional daily mission (like ground PvP gets) + Cadet Requisition Bonus (Big increase in requisition earned for first 25 / X matches.) + cartel market requisition boosters (x boost for x hours) + Double xp weekends work for ship req.

 

Stuff For Later: Ability to "try" out gear before you buy it - Tutorial with freebie base component unlock(s) - Free ship unlock for x weeklies + x dalies completed - Reputation with vendor etc

 

GSF is a few good ideas from being a really great add on. Its not a crappy side "popcorn" game as some would have you believe. The most constantly negative people on these forums have an agenda and here's a hint: its not to make the game better. Dont listen to these people, GSF is a great game and with a few additions will be much more balanced and new player friendly.

[mr_sim]

...as a result of poor design choices in my opinion.

 

So right from your title I suspected you were a QQing troll, who knows very little about this gamemode. I can only guess at your motivations, maybe your upset about the devs spending time here. Maybe your looking to feel right about this so called Warning, or maybe you really are a troll and Galactic Star Fighter is next on your rotation.

 

I knew right away BTW that you would probably say nothing useful when you called the gamemode "GS" when everyone who actually plays it knows that it's GSF to avoid ambiguity as GS means so many other things in context.

 

During testing you were warned this would happen, you were warned that adoption would not be as widespread as it could be, early access would create almost permanent disparity which would in turn turn off potential players, and a lack of design complimentary to joystick control (tighter reticule), lack of on ground option ala BF2 (using simple standard appearance models) and leaving out any PVE aspect would create a balance and design burden that would perhaps outstrip adoption.

 

Hmm yet it is being played, many severs have excellent que times.

 

Joystick support is just an excuse made by people who won't play it either way.

 

BF2 gameplay would not be as easy as you think. For one thing the star fighters and ground players don't physically scale. I would love to see a combination operation where there are both space fighters and ground combatants, but such things will take a lot of time and the necessary AI assets may not exist yet.

 

Simple fact is that GSF was a Free expansion and did generate interest in the game.

 

Now, it would be foolish IMO to say that GS has not seen some limited success among the playerbase....and certainly some options have been added since launch with respect to play options and appearance.

 

"Limited" hilarious. Next lets talk about how Nightmare operations have also seen limited success among the player base. What's that more people GSF then people play current level NiM operations. That can't be true..........oh wait, it is.

 

But this system remains a pale example of what it should have been. It seems to me you are already hitting the nerf/boost cycle...a cycle that will not likely subside any time soon.

 

Yeah those nerfs that only happen during game updates that are done across the board affecting every role equally, and are clear choices on the devs part based on consistent player experience in the game. We should just buff the heck out of one class of ship then the game can be broken but we don't need to fix it cause we broke it on purpose.

 

Right now, playing in certain ways, certain types of ships can dominate the landscape.

 

False

 

Again, you were warned of this.

 

Was there like a memo or public email I missed? Maybe I need to check my junk folder.

 

I would recommend you seriously reconsider your current reticule size, add joystick control, and start working on a PVE element to the feature, as well as a 40 percent nerf across the board for upper tier upgrades, reducing the nerf as you go down the upgrade ladder. The most powerful setup should only give a mediocre edge over a new ship IMO...Skill alone should be the deciding factor, allowing anyone with enough patience to become a master.

 

There's nothing wrong with the reticule size. I have no Idea what you are talking about on this one.

 

Joystick support is on the backburner there is not enough vocal demand for it to make it a priority.

 

PvE blah blah blah. I want them to takes as much time as it takes to do PvE right.

 

40% nerf across top tier upgrades? Have you actually researched the top tier upgrades? I think not, This is an extremely ignorant statment based wholly on assumptions and not at all on experience.

 

Currently the upgrades are just good enough to make them worth grinding for. If there is no grind then the game looses players. Ship upgrades do not trump skill in any way and it has been proven time and time again that skill trumps all, no exceptions.

 

Just my two cents. I do not believe the design direction this feature took was a wise one, and I feel it is still flawed in many ways.

 

You speak of wisdom yet you seem to know nothing about GSF. Of course it's still flawed. name a game without flaws I'll wait..........................nothing thought so. GSF is certainly playable and enjoyable and I for one am extremely satisfied with the mature development that BioWare has put into it.

[LordArtemis]

You speak of wisdom yet you seem to know nothing about GSF. Of course it's still flawed. name a game without flaws I'll wait..........................nothing thought so. GSF is certainly playable and enjoyable and I for one am extremely satisfied with the mature development that BioWare has put into it.

 

You speak of opposing opinions but only present little other than snark IMO. Fortunately for me your validation of my opinion is not required, your suspicions about my motivations are baseless, and your viewpoint is just as skewed as anyone elses, a platform that certainly disqualifies you from judging anyone else.

 

That said....you could be correct about all of it, sans the snark of course. I could be completely off the mark. As my post history demonstrates, I post because I would like the game to improve...even if my suggestions are garbage.

 

And they very well could be.

 

Lets stack your reply against my OP and let forum members decide for themselves where "agendas" may hide. I think the answer will be obvious.

 

Again, there is no need to be so threatened by my opinion. It's just an opinion, its not the word of god.

 

On a side note, your snark wasn't too bad...except for this....

Was there like a memo or public email I missed? Maybe I need to check my junk folder.

 

You can do better than that. That was just lazy. If your going to make some kind of attempt at a battle of whits, at least bring your best guns for goodness sake.

Edited May 1, 2014 by LordArtemis

[Livedwatermelon]

Oh what GSF could've been.......I was hoping for Battlefront 2 style space missions.......but oh well. I guess sitting on a control point with a gunship is just as fun........-_-

[LordArtemis]

Though this has a bit of snark, this is actually a pretty good counterpoint, Intelligent, sensible. If I could counter a few points...

 

Joystick? No (this has been evaluated over and over - floating reticule and joystick = no good - sorry

 

Fair enough, but the point is that the float is far too large. A tighter float radius along the X and Y axis would provide coaxial control, which would allow a joystick to be used while still promoting keyboard use if desired.

 

PvE? No, except maybe a tutorial with moving targets. We have A LOT of stuff that needs done and a standalone PvE system is much too cumbersome. its really its own game, and we already have space PvE (and how many people play that?)

 

Thats fair I think. What is Biowares motivation? After all, the current PVE space game is probably not doing well and was not well recieved generally. I don't agree, but can't argue your logic on this one.

 

Early Access causing a gear gap that exists today? Yes definitely, is it a all world ending failure.... no certainly not. many MANY games with SWTOR's particular game model utilize dynamic unlock-able gear and abilities / tiers of components etc. If you don't like that, sorry too bad, should have read more before you got involved with something that requires a time investment your not able to make. (sorry if thats harsh, its up to you as a gamer to decide what kind of games you want to play, many choose not to play games like this and thats fine)

 

Aside from the snark I get what your trying to say here. The sorry, too bad comment is a bit silly. This isn't compulsory, neither is playing the game, so to make that comment is self defeating. You do not tell potential customers "sorry, too bad". You give them what they want.

 

And either they have done that or they have not. I think they have not, you may believe they have. Both are fair points of view IMO. It's not "sorry, too bad" on either side of the fence. It can stay as it is or it can change, as many MANY things have.

 

Otherwise you make a good point that actually points to my point...folks can choose not to play it. I contend far too many have likely done exactly that.

 

Now where I agree with you is that we need to get people into components faster, and there have been so many good suggestions IMO the following could be added easily and would help greatly...

 

Right Away Stuff: 1 additional daily mission (like ground PvP gets) + Cadet Requisition Bonus (Big increase in requisition earned for first 25 / X matches.) + cartel market requisition boosters (x boost for x hours) + Double xp weekends work for ship req.

 

Stuff For Later: Ability to "try" out gear before you buy it - Tutorial with freebie base component unlock(s) - Free ship unlock for x weeklies + x dalies completed - Reputation with vendor etc

 

I agree, excellent suggestions.

 

GSF is a few good ideas from being a really great add on.

 

I'm not sure I agree with that, but I will agree that perhaps it just needs a few tweaks to increase it's appeal. I certainly could be completely off base.

 

Its not a crappy side "popcorn" game as some would have you believe.

 

Yea, I don't buy into that either. I think it certain has it's merits, and it is a HUGE improvement over the original space combat feature.

 

The most constantly negative people on these forums have an agenda and here's a hint: its not to make the game better. Dont listen to these people, GSF is a great game and with a few additions will be much more balanced and new player friendly.

 

There are a few folks I know of that would cause me to agree with you on this point. But I would mention that there are a few white knights out there that deserve to be ignored as well.

 

It tends to be the folks in the middle that I listen to...

[LordArtemis]

Oh what GSF could've been.......I was hoping for Battlefront 2 style space missions.......but oh well. I guess sitting on a control point with a gunship is just as fun........-_-

 

Well, I think it's a bit more involved than that lol. It is actually quite a bit like BF2 IMO, it just lacks the "on foot" and turret play that that game had, and has an upgrade system that creates far too much disparity bottom to top compared to that game.

 

I would have liked to see something like what we have now, but with a lower curve across the upgrades.

[LordArtemis]

Some interesting points for sure.

 

The lack of joystick support absolutely removed this game from consideration for several of my friends, who were ecstatic about X-Wing / TIE Fighter types of games. "No, it's fine, the mouse is fine" doesn't cut it with these guys. It's probably the worst decision that they've made, but I'm betting anything it was made with good reason: adding joystick support would require a lot of stuff into the code base that would be used literally no where else in SWTOR, and that would require EXTENSIVE testing, and this out of a game where you have to edit locked config files just to have it not tell the monitor to go into an invalid mode on windows boot.

 

 

 

This isn't really as big of a deal as you make it out to be, though. It just doesn't matter much- everyone is building towards maxed ships. Yes, the first several games are jarring, but the early upgrades make a huge difference, and it isn't the end of everything. Everyone who cared about early access had it- if the game isn't good enough to be worth 15 bucks a month, then IMO it probably isn't worth complaining too much about in the mind of whomever makes that decision. I resubbed to get gunship (gunship gunship gunship) despite not being very into the whole ground game thing here (I play WoW, heroic raiding, arenas, and RBGs when I can get them, so this was very much extra sauce).

 

There's a bunch of dollar related complaints about this game, and the only one I sorta feel is the ship to fleet req for the purpose of powering upgrades. Even that isn't really a big deal, I just feel it's kind of a whale trap. Whales should be courted with value, not dubious player power. Armonddd in another thread pointed out that he had dumped hundreds of dollars- as someone who buys everything GSF related immediately from the Cartel Market, I'm probably not quite lined up with that magnitude, but I'm not TOO far off. The difference is, I think that the cartel ships and colors deliver pretty great value to the play experience, but the req transfer sorta doesn't. I'm not opposed to a bit of P2W, but if it was something like 1200 cartel coins and the ship gains X ship req and counts as mastered (can only be done once per ship), you'd probably see some players buy that for every ship.

 

 

 

We aren't really though. The biggest change was to barrel roll, a powerful movement power. The nerf changed the game, but it was meant to shift the meta, and it did. Meanwhile, changes to underpowered and overpowered components are made very gradually, and most are left to themselves. I don't feel like a rollercoaster at all.

 

 

 

That's a fair complaint, and the game does need some tweaks. I'm personally convinced that cluster missiles are rather overtuned in the current meta, as no ship can really ignore them happily (the longer lockon missiles have plenty of ships who will never notice them). But, does this need to result in a nerf? The ships that use the cluster missiles are fun to fly, and they aren't by themselves forcing other ships entirely out. I think that the nature of the game prevents the worst effects of an imbalance.

 

 

 

Reticule size: I'm not sure if this would help that much. Do you really feel that this is causing a lot of issues? I think this would kind of lower the skill floor AND the skill cap, and while the first is a good idea, the second sort of isn't.

 

You'd bake the lost effects in, of course. I don't think a 40% nerf should be the thing. I'm more of the opinion that:

> The cost of requisitioning a new whatever should be 250 in all cases (need quads? 250)

> A ship should get a bit of a bigger boost out of the gate, starting with some baseline req to spend, even if only 2000.

> The 10000 tier should be less, like 7000.

> The 15000 tier should be less, like 12000.

> The really HUGE upgrades- such as distortion missile break, heavy laser armor piercing, railgun armor piercing, burst laser cannon armor piercing- should be made BASELINE to these weapons. The thing where charged plating is basically a starman versus lowbie ships is probably not good design, with only rocket pods offering an early access to this. So if your meta is a good one, new ships are hard countered by anything running charged plating. The weapons could be changed in some manner- for instance, you could reduce the damage of heavy laser by 8% and give it back with a talent while baselining the armor ignore, or you could increase the shield penalty on distortion field and give it back with their final talent or whatever.

 

This assumes that all this stuff is fine- you might disagree, but don't post that. The point is that if something exists at all that is necessary for the component to function, it should be baseline or third tier at most.

 

PvE would help this game immensely, but it is really crazy expensive which is why they don't do it.

 

If you could get a dev here, I'm positive they would tell you this if they could. Concerns regarding budget and development become ludicrous whenever anyone fires straight on this topic, in any game and most products. It doesn't help that there's so many armchair programmers who will come in and talk about how easy it is, etc. Rest assured that developing PvE content would be the BEST thing they could do, but also pound for pound not at all a cheap one. I think it's worth talking about and asking for- even limited pve, where you do ground game quests leading up to a need to do a precision run, or do something interesting in a solo space- would add a whole lot of interest to the game.

 

Thanks for the reply, this is a really good counterpoint.

 

I would point out that there is a way to provide ground combat that would have a lower development curve...but it would still be pretty tough. Using low poly standard appearance models like in BF2.

 

The standard single object meshes in BF2 for characters run around 100 polys....and that is crazy light. Scripting for animations may not be possible using current tools, depending on what they use to build the meshes. That might be the biggest stumbling block.