Why the new Operations are threatening to kill the game.

[Overmind]

Haven't checked honestly. Is it just the trash, or the boss fights as well?

Bosses seemed the same, but all intermediary enemies seemed very strong compared to a few days ago.

[FerkWork]

Did Bulo post nerf. One shotted him with zero complications and tbh not much effort. Fight is very tame now. Which makes it weird considering Torque and his schenagins. Now with invisible fire Edited May 1, 2015 by FerkWork

[Never_Hesitate]

The biggest nerf is imo one which is in the patch notes, it's the 204 mainhands that will be available from the boss on ziost

[Overmind]

A 204 MH will significantly help the new Op, as it is the most important item on a character.

Personally, I don't want to see it drop at last boss from last Op.

 

I like challenges and impossible missions as long as they don't depend on others phux1ng up things and in Ops, that happens too often.

[Grayseven]

I have to say that I'm becoming a bit concerned with the new paradigm of Boss fight designs.

 

For the most part, SM operations are easy. There have been a couple of bosses that seemed to be tuned to a HM level or had mechanics issues because the game can't handle the mechanics, but other than those few exceptions the SM's are very easy.

 

Hard Mode fights feel more like the old NiM's where perfection is the only route to success. One person screwing up once can wipe the raid which is bad enough on 8 man but ridiculous on 16 man HM's.

 

Then there is something in the Dev's handbooks that I can only call "piling on". Forget phases where different mechanic sets happen at different times, now these Dev's want to pile on heaps of mechanics that can hit you in a rolling avalanche of destruction.

 

Healers are stressed to the max trying to keep players alive and heaven help them if they triage wrong and pick the wrong player to heal. DPS can't get through a rotation without having to interrupt a cast to move out of something, seemingly non-stop. Tank mechanics now require two tanks in near perfect synergy in order to choreograph a maddeningly complex series of tasks, some made more difficult by requiring the tank to search their buff bar to click off one single buff before they can do anything else.

 

Take the new Ziost boss as a prime example of how Dev's designing HM's are piling on the mechanics. Avoid purple rifts, avoid big white circles, avoid cleave, avoid orange circles. Don't heal the cursed player and hope to hell they don't get smacked with the curse after getting DoTed by the cleave. Hope you don't get the orange circles right after getting stunned while getting your color for the rift channel. Hope you have the right healer comp to give good AoE heals (in other words, bring an Operative/Scoundrel). Hope the Boss doesn't cross a rift while running to do his channel (right, like missing a rift will happen). And the whole curse thing is just stupid. When you have fights putting out as much damage as these new ones do...raid wide...and the fact that HoT's are an integral part of every healing class (and there is no way fast enough to rid yourself of these HoT's in time to do any good) means that you've put in a mechanic that basically requires healers not to use a major portion of their arsenal on anyone but themselves since even the tanks get can this curse...

 

Sorry, but I've just about had enough with this. I don't consider myself an elite player but I do consider myself in the top 25% and the level of frustration I'm experiencing with the new HM paradigm is close to the point where I'll drop my sub, go preferred and simply stop financially supporting a game that seems to be designed by sadists who want to cater to the top 1% of end game raiders.

 

I'm not surprised that the Ziost Op boss drops a 204 MH. The only people who will successfully do this are seasoned ToS and Ravagers HM players who are probably already geared up in 198's...or people willing to pay to be carried by a top tier progression team.

[FerkWork]

I haven't tanked the Ziost boss yet (everyone been wanting by friggin healer cause no one else wants to bothered to level one /s) but on the playstyle of the past Ops vs the New HM tanking has been slightly easier with coordination of tank swaps. So tanking is simpler than DP HM is (take Bestia for example, compared with any boss besides Revan, Cora and Master and Blaster, tank coordination is simplistic and in case of UL non existent.)

 

Heals, well with the Devs Obsession with AOE damage (personally I think they just want to kill Stealth Rez but I digress) and spike damage combined with some RNG does make healing quite the challenge particularly on an Op healer who is kind of short in the burst healing department post 3.0.

 

What I think is the hardest job now is to be a DPS. Not only obey the mechanics but pass very high DPS checks at the same time. And if a single DPS dies you are most likely going to hit enrage. This leads to a lot of finger pointing and grumbling.

 

Also, Ziost boss I will never heal that again. Fight is dumb.

 

I hope they do bring the rest of the Ops in HM down to DF and DP level. Next patch needs to hit UL and Torque. Then another one hitting Revanite Commanders (A boss that is deceptive in difficulty and where you fail in the last phase if you don't burn enough in the previous ones) and Master and Blaster. Then one smaking Cora and Revan. Then go back to the old system of SM is for anyone. HM is mid tier casual progression. NiM is for top tier progression. No need for double dipping.

 

Others may and will disagree with me but whatevs I play for fun not having to check Parsec ever fight to see if we can clear it. I don't like extreme raiding where someone breaths down my shoulder and questions everything you do. Did that once. Big mistake and hated it. I prefer to be a filthy casual who is slightly asleep while playing

 

-A scrub player who usually tanks and is 7/10 in the new Ops HM.

Edited May 6, 2015 by FerkWork

[mynameisbugged]

the new ziost boss isnt too hard. My group cleared it after only 2hrs - yup 2 hrs for a new boss. That said we are a 7/10 hm team, and i do have some qualms about the new boss. For one, it's too damn long(9min fight for us) and 1 screw up is more likely as the fight gets longer, and this fight isn't very forgiving for screwups. Second, is that it's possible for the boss to throw the biting wounds debuff on the dps that eats terrible shout(boss becomes untauntable during it) and that can really mess up some raid groups - don't think this is intended.

[AAAAzrael]

I'm not surprised that the Ziost Op boss drops a 204 MH. The only people who will successfully do this are seasoned ToS and Ravagers HM players who are probably already geared up in 198's...or people willing to pay to be carried by a top tier progression team.

 

A guildie of mine killed it 4 times on Monday night in various PUG's. I killed it last night in a PUG. Your argument is invalid.

[FerkWork]

A guildie of mine killed it 4 times on Monday night in various PUG's. I killed it last night in a PUG. Your argument is invalid.

 

Classic forum response I can do it, here's some anecdotal evidence, ergo argument invalid. Pugs on my server can't even kill it on SM let alone HM. Does that invalidate your argument? No but it doesn't invalidate his either.

Edited May 6, 2015 by FerkWork

[AAAAzrael]

Classic forum response I can do it, here's some anecdotal evidence, ergo argument invalid. Pugs on my server can't even kill it on SM let alone HM. Does that invalidate your argument? No but it doesn't invalidate his either.

 

He used general statement using word "only". If you make a general claim it takes single counterexample to invalidate that. It's basic logic.

 

There is a lot of things that you can criticise about the new instanced boss, but not being puggable isn't one of them. I though it wasn't as well when we first killed it on Monday, but looking more into it and then fact that you can ditch one tank and take one more healer or 5 DPS depending on how good your healers are makes it very puggable and even easy.

[FerkWork]

He used general statement using word "only". If you make a general claim it takes single counterexample to invalidate that. It's basic logic.

 

There is a lot of things that you can criticise about the new instanced boss, but not being puggable isn't one of them. I though it wasn't as well when we first killed it on Monday, but looking more into it and then fact that you can ditch one tank and take one more healer or 5 DPS depending on how good your healers are makes it very puggable and even easy.

 

Touché.

 

I 10 manned SM 16, but I find the boss lazy design of shoving every AOE into a fight from other fights into it. Heck, the amount of I/E damage you can go 4 heals and 4 DPS (with 2 with taunts). Annoying thing is that Curse needs to come before Cleave and make cleave never target a cursed person.

[AshlaBoga]

A guildie of mine killed it 4 times on Monday night in various PUG's. I killed it last night in a PUG. Your argument is invalid.

 

Now go try that on 16 Man Hard Mode.

[Rithoma]

A guildie of mine killed it 4 times on Monday night in various PUG's. I killed it last night in a PUG. Your argument is invalid.

 

This comes down to the question of what is considered a PUG?

 

I would bet the people you were in there with were experienced HM raiders that you had probably known before or at least guildies of HM raiders you had known before. And you probably all joined TS. If any group that is not a permanent raid group is considered a PUG, then you actually pugged it. Congratulations.

 

The PUGs that others here are referring to are actual random people from the fleet or Ziost who are strangers and who don't join TS. That's a completely different thing.

 

I personally have pugged 8 and 16 SM so far. While the 8M group got it down easily, the 16M group was a total mess and I haven't tried pugging 16M since. I did that with a full guild group. Admittedly, the 16M PUG was on Monday and a lot of people obviously weren't familiar with the mechanics at that time. Especially the DoT cleave caused many difficulties and it is that mechanic in particular that wipes 16M SM pugs, because additionally to the people who always seem to have a hard time not standing in bad come the people who don't realize they are being targeted by the cleave and therefore keep it even on the people who are trying to move out of it. Let's give it a few weeks till most people have accustomed to this mechanic and it will be perfectly puggable on SM.

Edited May 7, 2015 by Rithoma

[Shoraan]

I joined a group of seemingly experienced raiders who were looking for a tank for the Ziost boss (8m SM) and we managed to complete it in the first attempt. My thoughts after that were "That was easy", considering that I usually play a healer and not a tank.

 

Yesterday I joined a complete PUG group (16m SM) for the same boss. We couldn't even get him down to 60% before we wiped. And that was the best of five or more attempts. This time I played a healer and it was really bad (leading me to think that the healers in the 8m group must have been really good).

 

As a healer I found that new boss to be a nightmare on 16m. So many circles on the ground, it seemed as if I was playing "the floor is lava". I needed to run somewhere for a specific mechanic, but there were a dozen circles between me and the place I needed to be. AoE healing is absolutely frustrating when everyone is running around like headless chicken, trying to find those small spots where it's currently safe to stand.

 

Less than 30 seconds into the fight the first people died. I thought I was a decent healer but being out of range all the time and the raid wide damage really made it hard. It felt like the boss cast Mass Affliction every 10 seconds.

 

A fight where I need to focus more on keeping the dps alive instead of healing the tanks feels wrong to me.

Edited May 7, 2015 by Shoraan

[WDA_Compy]

I have to agree with the poster in the first post of this thread, we have seen this problem with our guildies as well.

[AAAAzrael]

This comes down to the question of what is considered a PUG?

 

I would bet the people you were in there with were experienced HM raiders that you had probably known before or at least guildies of HM raiders you had known before. And you probably all joined TS. If any group that is not a permanent raid group is considered a PUG, then you actually pugged it. Congratulations.

 

The PUGs that others here are referring to are actual random people from the fleet or Ziost who are strangers and who don't join TS. That's a completely different thing.

 

I don't see why people who don't join TS and don't try should be able to clear HM on first week of new content. It's very PUGable, I have no done it more times, with people I didn't know before, or I hardly play with. Of course I will usually not join HM PUG if it's not from one of special channels for raiders. There is no point in wiping for hour with people who can't move out of circles. It's called HM for a reason.

 

That being said of course the fight can be solo tanked and generally had a lot of lazy design, although I must say I find it kinda fun. Healing with 2 heals is really interesting.

[Island_Jedi]

The purpose of this thread was to address the state the sm and hm ops were in. Now that the dev's have corrected that issue to an extent and enough for me, please let this thread die. The mission of this thread was accomplished and I feel what is being discussed here needs to be put into another thread. Appreciate the support of the thread, but its time to move the discussion elsewhere. Edited May 8, 2015 by Island_Jedi

[Lord_of_Stone]

The purpose of this thread was to address the state the sm and hm ops were in. Now that the dev's have corrected that issue to an extent and enough for me, please let this thread die. The mission of this thread was accomplished and I feel what is being discussed here needs to be put into another thread. Appreciate the support of the thread, but its time to move the discussion elsewhere.

 

Yes, because nerfing the new ops has certainly stopped the game from being killed. Look at all the guilds coming back to raid.

[AlrikFassbauer]

This comes down to the question of what is considered a PUG?

 

I would bet the people you were in there with were experienced HM raiders that you had probably known before or at least guildies of HM raiders you had known before. And you probably all joined TS. If any group that is not a permanent raid group is considered a PUG, then you actually pugged it. Congratulations.

 

My assumption as well.

 

Those who were there FIRST were most likely not real PUGgers.

Rather progress players. Because they want to be FIRST everywhere.

[Septimiur]

I also think they need to make it all a bit more melee dps friendly. If we want to play melee, for the most part we have to tank it. I imagine there are a few guilds that do take melee dps along. Keyword being a few.

[Historyhawk]

Totally agree with this and the OP. Maybe tune the damage on Bulo a bit down too.

 

Here are problems I have seen. I pug raid lead a lot. People in full 192 min maxed gear clear under lurker , and sword squadron. People in com gear and 186 seldom can, story mode content needs to supply the story mode gear that enters people into Hard Mode. If you instantly assume I am wrong think about the group your running with to clear this content. NOT pug group you say? then you are progression of sorts and you should be working towards HM content Stop bullying Bio-ware into forcing them to make content that Story mode players " the core" of this game cannot complete. I have 30 guild mates currently that are not 20 year old fighter jet pilots that have reaction time that should be used to bad Story mode content. If this does not change soon there will be a large Exodus of this game. I enjoy playing and helping other people but not everyone is able to beat Under Lurker in SM and this is just in desperate need of fixing. Add more spawn timer to the lurkerlings, give pugs more time to return before collapse and the cross, something needs to be done and soon.

[FerkWork]

Here are problems I have seen. I pug raid lead a lot. People in full 192 min maxed gear clear under lurker , and sword squadron. People in com gear and 186 seldom can, story mode content needs to supply the story mode gear that enters people into Hard Mode. If you instantly assume I am wrong think about the group your running with to clear this content. NOT pug group you say? then you are progression of sorts and you should be working towards HM content Stop bullying Bio-ware into forcing them to make content that Story mode players " the core" of this game cannot complete. I have 30 guild mates currently that are not 20 year old fighter jet pilots that have reaction time that should be used to bad Story mode content. If this does not change soon there will be a large Exodus of this game. I enjoy playing and helping other people but not everyone is able to beat Under Lurker in SM and this is just in desperate need of fixing. Add more spawn timer to the lurkerlings, give pugs more time to return before collapse and the cross, something needs to be done and soon.

 

I've pugged ToS a lot. Only time I haven't completed it is when people don't know that Circles are bad and Can't tell Left from right. People have 4 manned it. I have 7 manned it with people on janky alts. It's not liked you are slowed Like HM. I find ToS is what weeds out the stupid who got by on 16man Carries overgeared for SM DF and DP. I don't queue WZ thinking I should just get a win cause it's regs. Neither do Ops. And I'm a friggin filthy clicker who back peddles everywhere (Dat HO Backpeddle Moonwalk out of CZ)!!

[AlrikFassbauer]

(Dat HO Backpeddle Moonwalk out of CZ)!!

 

I think there is even an emote doing that ...

[Almhath]

Thank you, Island Jedi. I agree. I am a casual player. I have not played in months because 3+ killed the game for me. Regardless of what others want to do, regardless of how "bad" UCs are, all I cared to do was log on sometimes and do SMs for UCs and they killed it. And I'm DPS. I find there is little for DPS to do I the game.

 

I called on the phone. They said they didn't care to hear it there, go to forum. I posted here, and progression players griped. I said that Most players are SM and we support the game, but prog players said toleave.

 

I left.

I'm thinking I'll quit. Why whould I pay for a game that I don't play?

 

 

 

I am a progression raider and can do the SM's in my sleep. I am finding the HM's very rewarding and challenging, but I am also noticing a problem with the current tier of content. The community is not all "hardcore" raiders and I think your casual players are actually what keeps the game primarly funded and viable as a profitable product. I find that the current tier of content is giving progression players like myself the challenge that they want, but as a member of this community I can see how this content has alienated huge swaths of the community.

 

The formula should be very simple,

Storymodes = casual players who want to faceroll content and enjoy the social side of game.

Hardmodes = progression guilds that are serious about raiding and want a challenge.

Nim = content so hard, that very few individuals will ever clear it.

 

I dont understand why you would alienate a huge part of your customer base that are keeping the game alive for the "progressive" players like myself. What we need to understand as a community is that we all need each other to keep this game alive. Making the game more attractive to "progressive" players is an oversight, why? Because you can cater to both groups by making sure your content is tuned for the right audience. Make the storymodes easier, keep the hardmodes as hard as they are now and make the NIM content so hard that clearing it will be a thing of myth and legend. Why not keep both groups happy? Its so simple.

 

The other thing I have a problem with is simply making things hit really hard and giving tight enrages and calling that interesting. I would perfer intricate mechanics that involve the whole raid. I loved the oneshot mechanics of EC, the multilayered mechanics of TFB. SNV was meh, and DF and DP were too easy. I want the Ops to challenge me in interesting ways and not simply be a lesson in not standing in circles.

 

The current content is ok for me, but please fix sm, before the casual players that are a huge part of this game begin leaving more then they already have. Progression players get off your high horses and remember your the minority and while this tier of content is fun for us, its killing the game for many, many other players. Bioware give both aspects of the community what they need and your game will be successful.

[MuzluPasta]

At least we wont get a thread like this in 4.0