Graphics option: turn off flashy visual effects

[Bobsy]

Every time I return to this game it seems that there are more and more visual effects for buffs, debuffs and so on. When I play solo or in small groups I find them ultimately very distracting and unnecessary. They're also rather 'un-Star Wars' - when Darth Maul got ready to fight, giant glowing purple runes didn't float around him, and when Luke and Vader were duelling there were no red or blue bubbles surrounding them for defence. Essentially it can break immersion for those wanting a more authentic Star Wars experience.

 

I get why these are there - they're fast-identifiable visual shorthand in multiplayer situations - PVP and Operations especially. Indeed, on the rare occasion I take part in PVP I would want all these effects switched back on. And obviously I don't want this to affect other people's play - if they want to see the effects, they should. So what I'm asking for is the ability to switch off the more intrusive visual effects locally for your client only. Ideally an option would be:

 

Show graphical effects for powers:

• Always
  
• When in groups
  
• In PVP and Operations groups only
  
• Never
  

[Jesira]

I was thinking about this earlier, I hate when my sentinal has centered stacks and is glowing blue. It's distracting and annoying to me, same with my marauder with the red. I'd love to be able to turn them off for my own sake lol.

[nerdofprey]

This has been bugging me since forever. The Force has always been totally invisible in movies, shows etc. and it drives me nuts in video games where it's all sparkly wizard stuff.

 

I've been able to halfway come to grips with it by imagining that these are "auras" that can be sensed by Force-users, but I'd rather just be rid of them.

 

Same goes for the green glow from healing. My character walks around half the time engulfed in flames and coated in green slime, and it's not the look I was going for...

 

All due respect to the art team who clearly put a lot of work into making these effects visually interesting and convenient for multiplayer situations, but given the option to disable all of them permanently, I would not give it a moment's hesitation.

[Kendaric]

Yes, please. This has bugged me forever, especially on Force-users.

[Kromulous]

This is an excellent suggestion. Outside of PvP and occasionally flashpoints, I see no purpose in keeping it mandatory when all it does is make every fight look like a firework show. I know that loads of people play this game for the story and as such like to immerse themselves as they do in any other BioWare RPG. An option to turn off flashy combat effects would be a great addition in this regard.

[Unchosen]

Very good suggestion. So many awesome screenshots get ruined because of the effects.

[branmakmuffin]

essentially it can break immersion for those wanting a more authentic Star Wars experience.

Since SW takes place in an entirely fictional universe, there is no such thing as an "authentic" SW experience. What that means to you does not mean the same thing to others.

[Bobsy]

Since SW takes place in an entirely fictional universe, there is no such thing as an "authentic" SW experience. What that means to you does not mean the same thing to others.

 

1) Of course it's fictional. My meaning was to have it authentic to the rest of the fiction, which is why I referred to the both the original and prequel movies as not sharing the SWTOR visual effects.

 

2) I made it clear (I hope) in the original post that this should not be a global option that affects other peoples' play, but a local one that only affects whether the effects appear on your own client. So to reiterate: this suggestion will have absolutely no effect whatsoever on players if they don't want to switch it on or off. It is an entirely harmless change! Isn't that better for everyone?

Edited August 15, 2015 by Bobsy

[Nightblazer]

ok well how do you taken into account force abilities that have visuals. You release that it couldn't be an all off or all on toggle.

 

They would have to factor in abilities like Force Lightning, Force Storm, Force Project, etc. Also what about sage's telekinetic abilities like disturbance. I'd look kinda odd to see them through their hands forward and magically 5 mobs take x amount of damage.

 

So they would have to go through each and every single ability and create exceptions for those that need to have visuals.

 

Easier said then done. I can see why you would want it, just don't see them implementing it.

[nerdofprey]

Lightning is supposed to be visible so that's not an issue. Abilities where a Jedi throws a physical object too. Obviously we wouldn't want to lose laser blasts from guns either. This is completely about secondary effects: glowing hands, flaming auras, that kind of stuff.

 

I really wouldn't have a problem with stuff like Disturbance having no visual effect at all, but maybe there's a compromise there.

[Nightblazer]

The main issue I see wth them doing this is if there is a need to analyze every single ability and see which and which shouldn't show. Also you have no problem with disturbance not showing, however others may want it to show.

 

So if you make a toggle option and there are some abilities that do or do not show that your happy with but others aren't then you make that groups upset or if such an option is introduced, it more then likely is going to create nit picking as to which ones should or shouldn't show and people upset that it hides some effects they do not want to hide but another group may feel different.

 

The only real way to avoid it would have to toggle for every single individual ability so you get it the way you want but that's not feasible either.

 

That's the main issue. Some may want some of them but not this one, others may want this but not that.

 

Again I'm not saying its a bad idea and i can see why it would be cool, I am just don't feasibly see it happening anytime soon if ever. Just being realistic is all.

Edited August 16, 2015 by Nightblazer

[Kendaric]

The others in the group would be completely unaffected in what they see. LOTRO has a similiar system in place and it really helps.

[Lalainnia]

Yup would also love to have the ability to turn of friendly damaging aoe circles

[Eralesa]

It's a neat concept but it's a very bad one for PVP. If they made the visuals turn off only for you I don't see the harm in it. But healers would really love to see the flashy lights that a jedi shadow gives when they're popping all of their cooldowns so they can counter it with their own; otherwise all of those damage buffs would slip through and the healer wouldn't see the damage coming until it was too late.

[Bobsy]

It's a neat concept but it's a very bad one for PVP. If they made the visuals turn off only for you I don't see the harm in it. But healers would really love to see the flashy lights that a jedi shadow gives when they're popping all of their cooldowns so they can counter it with their own; otherwise all of those damage buffs would slip through and the healer wouldn't see the damage coming until it was too late.

 

I've said it twice now so here it is a third time:

 

The toggle would be client-side only and would not affect what others see in any way. So if I, as a player toggled visual effects for buffs off and then entered a warzone, I wouldn't see the visual effect for saber ward when I switched it on, but everyone else would.

 

This would not affect the gameplay experience of other players at all. This is simply for greater immersion for those that wish it.

 

 

ok well how do you taken into account force abilities that have visuals. You release that it couldn't be an all off or all on toggle.

 

They would have to factor in abilities like Force Lightning, Force Storm, Force Project, etc. Also what about sage's telekinetic abilities like disturbance. I'd look kinda odd to see them through their hands forward and magically 5 mobs take x amount of damage.

 

So they would have to go through each and every single ability and create exceptions for those that need to have visuals.

 

Easier said then done. I can see why you would want it, just don't see them implementing it.

 

I did say right at the start that this was for the visual effects for buffs and debuffs. Not active powers like lightning, because obviously not.

Edited August 16, 2015 by Bobsy

[Jesira]

It's a neat concept but it's a very bad one for PVP. If they made the visuals turn off only for you I don't see the harm in it. But healers would really love to see the flashy lights that a jedi shadow gives when they're popping all of their cooldowns so they can counter it with their own; otherwise all of those damage buffs would slip through and the healer wouldn't see the damage coming until it was too late.

 

I think the request is for it to be client-side, so only it only affects that specific player on their own screen. The bright glowing blue or red aura's are seriously obnoxious, and unsightly...Not to mention totally immersion breaking..In WildStar, and GW2 you're able to control how much of the visual queues you see, I think SWTOR should do the same.

 

Literally everytime I'm on my Sentinal I have to be in the mood to stare at aura's the entire time, so it's actually made me not bother playing that character on many an occasion. I'm sure lot's of players don't really mind or care, or even notice but there are also a lot who notice all of that and it get's to be too much visual stimulation lol...Totally irritating.

Edited August 16, 2015 by Jesira

[Joshwar]

I'll add another point to this discussion besides the immersion breaking aspect for those that matters to. As these visuals have gotten more and more complex since launch my machine completely craps out when there's 4 sorcs spamming lightning storm in a warzone, or tons of other effects going on.

 

Yes, I know my machine is ancient, but when SWTOR launched I could run the game on medium settings. Now I have a hard time running on lowest. They've added more and more visual junk to the screen that's completely unnecessary. I wish could turn off about half these effects so I don't get frozen in place for 2 or 3 seconds during fights or pvp sessions just because my machine is trying to catch up with all this "cool" visual crap. Some of it is great and necessary, but I tend to watch a person's buff bar / debuff bar as a healer more than I watch whatever visual clue an ability might give.

 

If this were client side it wouldn't affect anyone else's experience, but it would dramatically improve performance on my machine where I'm jammed up with 12 players all glowing and burning and mass force storming (which I know people do to crap out people's computers on purpose. 3 Sorcs spamming lightning storm can make any of the best machines slow down enough to make a difference in gameplay. 3 earthquakes from sages don't have the same issue, at least not for me.

 

These visuals make more a difference in performance for me than turning on bloom and upping my texture settings up to high. I've tested it out. And the only thing that has consistently changed since launch are them adding more and more of this stuff to the game.

[nerdofprey]

It's also worth noting that the UI has improved a lot and it's now a lot easier to see, organize and react to buffs, debuffs and procs just by looking at your hotbar / HUD, so the flashy effects on the character are not as necessary for feedback as they used to be. A player who's familiar enough with their class could be totally effective without those cues, even in serious group content.

[Kromulous]

The main issue I see wth them doing this is if there is a need to analyze every single ability and see which and which shouldn't show.

 

This is not as hard as it sounds. Game developers like to make it seem as though visual changes to games are extremely difficult and time-consuming, but that's just not the case when you have the game files entirely at your disposal - something we, the players, do not have or there would be two dozen addons doing several variations of this already. Rewriting scripts, AI, animations etc. can be very difficult. Removing textures and particle effects is only very difficult if said visuals are integrated into the actual character animations, which I find unlikely.

 

They've added more and more visual junk to the screen that's completely unnecessary. I wish could turn off about half these effects so I don't get frozen in place for 2 or 3 seconds during fights or pvp sessions just because my machine is trying to catch up with all this "cool" visual crap.

 

I have a pretty good rig and even I notice brief drops in fps during heavy fights. For a game that has its general graphics design derived from a desire to make it available for everyone, much of it is really poorly optimised.

Edited August 16, 2015 by Kromulous

[Nightblazer]

This is not as hard as it sounds. Game developers like to make it seem as though visual changes to games are extremely difficult and time-consuming, but that's just not the case when you have the game files entirely at your disposal - something we, the players, do not have or there would be two dozen addons doing several variations of this already. Rewriting scripts, AI, animations etc. can be very difficult. Removing textures and particle effects is only very difficult if said visuals are integrated into the actual character animations, which I find unlikely.

 

I have no problem with them adding a toggle for the client side, I've never had a problem but how do you address the situation of this:

 

Player A wants the toggle to turn off animations for Disturbance

Player B doesn't want the toggle to turn off the animation for Disturbance

 

How do you make the toggle on the client side satisfy both conditions. Because some players may want ability x, y and z turned off with the toggle but other players may only want ability x and y turned off with the toggle but not z.

 

Even though toggle is client side and only affects the specific client using it, how do you make everyone happy with one toggle.

 

That's the issue on how do they address which ones are turned off and which aren't' with making some people feel like too many are turned off while others feel not enough are turned off.

Edited August 17, 2015 by Nightblazer

[GabbyMe]

I'll sign on this... WoW has an option to turn down spell effects (particle effects), for junk on the ground... fire... spells... etc. and it's on a low, medium, high... sort of scale. So I can set it on medium, and not everything being so flashy. Effects ranging from crap on the ground, to spells a mage is throwing.

 

It seems any performance issue I do have is centered around that... when I do get a minor fps drop :/ And... when I'm bombarded with a bunch of missiles... and suddenly aflame. It's hard to see! Maybe I'm just bad (I know to **** out of the fire, or bad stuff on the ground kthnx)... but an option to tune it down a bit would be nice.

Edited August 17, 2015 by GabbyMe

[Draqsko]

It's also worth noting that the UI has improved a lot and it's now a lot easier to see, organize and react to buffs, debuffs and procs just by looking at your hotbar / HUD, so the flashy effects on the character are not as necessary for feedback as they used to be. A player who's familiar enough with their class could be totally effective without those cues, even in serious group content.

 

Most good players try to minimize their UI and their reliance on it. Those flashy effects give you all the visual cues you need while allowing you to keep your eyes on the action rather than hot bars.

 

When you start staring at hot bars to watch for procs and buffs or debuffs, you tend to wind up standing in stupid in serious group content.

[Kendaric]

Most good players try to minimize their UI and their reliance on it. Those flashy effects give you all the visual cues you need while allowing you to keep your eyes on the action rather than hot bars.

 

When you start staring at hot bars to watch for procs and buffs or debuffs, you tend to wind up standing in stupid in serious group content.

 

They can still do it and leave the VFX toggled on, that´s the beauty with having options.

[Jesira]

I think everyone here in agreement should 5 star vote the topic

[NightWolf_Killa]

Bump

 

developers, support, literally anyone who can do something about this, the glowing visual queues / effect are ruining the game, please fix this or i can't play anymore.

 

Just make it optional, give us the option.