Companion Change Feedback

[Costello]

I've played through on various classes now and the class is what matters to how easy the content is, things that make a difference.

 

Self-Heals. Companions as a healer and they can struggle if I take a lot of damage quickly but with some self-heals I can keep above 80% nearly all the way through as opposed to when I don't have self-heals and the companion never catches up.

 

Cleanse. Similar to the heal, so many opponents use dots and while companions have a heal/cleanse it doesn't seem to be forth coming.

 

Taunts. Once a healer companion takes so much damage they start healing themselves, only high health, low defense and low heals means they can spend the rest of the fight healing themselves. Happens a lot less if once they get the focus on them you can taunt them off even if you are not a tank.

 

Dots. Its so much easier on my Shadow to dot the npcs and even if i have to run away from ground based damage my healer cant heal me through I'm still damaging them and keeping dps up. It allows for kiting and for taking out adds while focusing on the main target.

 

Chain-able ground target Aoe attacks. The option to chain aoe attacks to take down groups of mobs while keeping all of them focused on me makes life easy. It also makes the adds a ease.

 

Ranged DPS. It almost goes without saying its much much easier if you can hit someone from 10+ meters than if you have to be within 4. A lot of special attacks are aoe damage focused either on the player or the boss and require movement to get out of. If you can move while maximizing dps much easier than everytime they do a massive aoe circle of damage based on them you have to run off.

 

Stealth. Once again the option to kill a few mobs and then reset the fight helps if its a tough fight. But also makes missions ease if you want to avoid the killing.

 

So before deciding on how to fix the companions it might be worth looking at class balance and why some people find the fights easy or difficult might be more to do with their class than influence or gear rating or even their ability to play/know their class.

[IanArgent]

Not all companions are created equal. That's the thing that baffles me the most. Some comps, typically the ones who were originally healers, are better healers than the ones who were originally DPS or Tank. Same goes for the other two roles. Basically we're in the same situation we were pre-4.0: we're going to use the comps who are the best (in this instance) healers and disregard all the other ones, which defeats the purpose of making all comps do all things.

 

They should have given all the comps the same stats across the board in all stances. But for some reason they didn't and it just doesn't make any sense.

 

This may be related to the (alleged) "bug" that comp mainhands still have effect on performance.

[TaliRa]

Lvl 65 Mara, comp lana Beniko. Tried solo star fortress again Alderaan. Beniko went down like a lead balloon again. Unable to progress. But thats alright. I'll just go back to GW2, at least that death grind has better rewards. BTW BW kiss my sub good bye.

[AngFour]

This may be related to the (alleged) "bug" that comp mainhands still have effect on performance.

 

That's probably it. Vector, Rank 32 at the time, was equipped with a blue electrostaff (level 61 IIRC) that dropped in one of my solo Star Fortress runs. I put it on him because it looked pretty cool and I like having Vector look cool. Talos, also Rank 32 at the time, is equipped in one of the purple "Devoted Allies" blasters because it also looked cool with the outfit I put him in (if you haven't noticed, my running theme is that I'm all about having my customizable companions look cool ). And Talos out performed Vector by a bit because his stats were a bit higher.

 

That should really be looked at. All comps should have the same base stats and essentially be cookie cutter outside of their looks and personalities and that is most certainly NOT the case at the moment.

Edited November 22, 2015 by AngFour

[IanArgent]

So before deciding on how to fix the companions it might be worth looking at class balance and why some people find the fights easy or difficult might be more to do with their class than influence or gear rating or even their ability to play/know their class.

 

This. Now it may actually be a design intent that some advanced classes be "harder" than others. (I say AC, rather than class, because of the big change in capability between Sentinel and Guardian). If so, that needs to be documented IN-GAME.

[musdude]

Wow, update to companion characters making them even more weak and healing much MUCH less than pre 4.0.2 update. Just terrible. Massive number of NPC bodies on the ground, getting surprised by mobs because they don't render because of massive number of bodies on the ground.

 

Wouldn't be a huge problem if my companion could heal, but the last update "fixed" that didn't it. Can't run around without attracting 3-4 mobs (which I cannot see) and my companion either doesn't heal enough or at all.

 

Please increase companion healing to at LEAST pre 4.0.2 update. The game is no fun at this point and I will not be resubscribing until both issues are fixed. Just a terrible update. I have no clue what you all were thinking with this one. Use your heads......

[Ramalina]

So I spent some time with an influence lvl 27 Senya in DPS mode doing weekly heroic missions with my lvl 65 Seer.

 

Assuming I'm interpreting StarParse correctly, she did about 70% as much damage as a PvE geared healer in gear that averages to about item level 212.

 

That seems a bit weak to me. In 3.0 I seem to recall Nadia in SM ops/commendation gear consistently parsing higher DPS than my healing sage when questing unless I got really lucky with strings of crits. I can't compare Nadia directly yet, but I'm assuming that at this point all melee lightsaber using companions are all pretty much in the same place (unless there are bugs I haven't noticed yet).

[Makillda]

Whoa,

 

You need to LtR.

 

The one key word is his toon was a "Healer".

 

Healers and Jugs got a pass on the nerf.

 

He kept a nerfed-to-the-ground companion and himself alive in the heroic Star Fortress, something a great many people have stated was impossible. I, personally, still solo them on a Hatred Assassin in 208 gear with Lana healing me.

 

But by all means, keep moving the goalposts and making more excuses why it's impossible after 4.0.2.

[Makillda]

Common theme, 216 gear. Speaking of balance, why should anyone need 216 gear for a mission that drops 208?

 

Please retry in sub 208 gear and report back. When I see more than a handful say they could do it in sub 208 gear, I will consider it well balanced.

 

It was not meant to be soloed in crappy gear. It's a heroic.

[Lord_Sleepy]

It was not meant to be soloed in crappy gear. It's a heroic.

 

Than the reward should be higher, you should do a heroic to get upgraded gear not downgraded gear.

[Beltane]

It was not meant to be soloed in crappy gear. It's a heroic.

 

Your logic is faulty.

 

In an MMO the point of doing content is generally to get gear better than you had from doing that content.

 

If you need gear greater than 208 to complete a flashpoint that gives 208 gear... it's not working as intended.

 

If it drops 208 gear you should be able to complete it in gear worse than 208 gear, end of story.

 

This is like saying you need HM raid gear in order to clear a SM raid.

[Ariadnea]

Veeroa Denz is getting Tech Power while she has a Force Skill set, this making her sub par and vastly weaker than companions under her influence rank.

?

 

Veerona Denz and Choza Raabat BOTH have this problem. I checked all the force user companions last night. BOTH have Tech Power which is not applying to their Force abilities, making them far worse than similarly ranked companions.

 

I had already spent considerable resources ranking up Veerona before I realized this...

[Joefjr]

Something that would help with solo play would be if companions would automatically heal back to full health after exiting combat, this would make it less slow because we wouldn't have to stop and heal up our tank comps after every or every other pull. This wont effect them in combat just reduce down time, or our regen skill/toys could work on them twice as fast as they do on us.

 

I do agree that they were a little on the strong side, but also i have Legendary, all crons, as well as human giving me an extra 548 presence.

 

 

About tank companions:The intention of influence ranks was as we got more they would become more effective at their given role, however this is NOT the case with tank role companions. We can not gear our companions any more giving them better gear with tank stats, giving them better mitigation. Presence only increase their DPS, HPS, and HP. Right now a Rank 50 Tank companion will take the same amount of damage as a Rank 1 companion, this has to change. I would suggest letting influence grant .20% dmg reduction per rank so at rank 50 it would give tank companions 10% base dmg reduction bring them up to around 37% with armor. This would also help with companions loosing dmg reduction thru armor when they are lvl synced on lower planets, which stems from companions getting their stats based on their lvl armor included.

[LordArtemis]

One little side note, you can dismiss and respawn comp, or you can spawn your speeder and dismount to fully heal your companion in seconds.

[WinterSera]

Companion Voice Box -

 

I have only played one of my many alts with a companion in a different role since the companion role change. I have played my agent with Vector as tank/heals opposed to his original role of dps. In either role of tank or heals he uses Kaylio's voice box and very rarely his own. Any chance of this being fixed?

 

I have played my main, marauder, through KotFE and haven't really played with other companions other than Pierce (once I got him back), Lana and Theron in assigned roles so haven't ran across this issue . . . .yet.

 

Just weird to have Vector out but have Kaylio's voice/phrases during combat.

[Joefjr]

One little side note, you can dismiss and respawn comp, or you can spawn your speeder and dismount to fully heal your companion in seconds.

 

Which causes them to loose their buffs, and when opening up combat from speeder they take a few seconds to react. What i suggested is about streamlining pulls which was possible before nerf as well as when we could gear them up. Having to constantly mount/dismount or dismiss/re-summon after every pull or every other pull is part of the slow and grindy problem, not to mention that class regen/toys work slower on companions than they do us.

[THDAVEMAC]

this is BS! my companion s**k* ! if people dont want to have beast companions then dont lvl them.. i have 16 toons and finally enjoyed doing the fortress quest with my lvl 37 lana .. now i cant even beat down a gold with out slinging heals to her .. they are useless now, it was comfortable to play the game with out relying on other people to finish a H2 .. and most dont want to grp as well. do you think people want to do the same quest 6 times in a row to get a weekly done?? not to mention if you have more then 1 toon. i have spent a week doing this lvling on one toon and get lana influence to 37 so she can keep me alive .. you might as well make them all tanks and all of us become heals to keep them alive and waist more time. even if you made these GF, a dps can wait 4 hrs for a que .. i know, i have been there. I am just about done with this game. QUIT NERFING S***! if elite players are not happy because they are not getting there A**** whipped, then dont use your companions if you that great. with this lvl sync, companion nerf crap this game is getting worse and worse to play ... ITS NO LONGER FUN !.... its frustrating and useless. come home to kick back and relax and play SWTOR... not anymore .. looks like you guys have made enough money and want to shut it down. why not just make us all lvl1's with out companions! looks like swtor ftp and battle front to me ( i know EA wont mind). quit changing things and FIX THIS !

[Morganha]

A random person and I attempted the Tattooine Heroic Star Fortress. While going through, we attempted to defeat one of the paladins. We were defeated by him numerous times. We tried putting our companions in DPS, Heal, and Tank spec and several combinations of the three. We were both DPS classes and specs and it was absolutely impossible to defeat the paladin. The companions heal specs could not heal through the damage, and the companions' tank specs couldn't withstand enough damage for us to kill him.

 

We were both level 65. His companion was around influence level 40 and mine was at influence level 25.

His gear was mostly 208/216 gear and My gear was mostly 216 with three pieces at 208 and two pieces at 220.

I am not new to my class and certainly not new to the game. I've been playing a long time and have followed the knowledge of how to play my class very closely and have always made sufficient changes to continue playing my class with sufficient skill to perform well in minor and major aspects of the game.

 

After we gave up on the Tattoine Heroic Star Fortress, I attempted a heroic Alderaan Star Fortress with another random person and we skimmed through it, including defeating all of the paladins, with no problem.

 

The heroic star fortresses are completely unbalanced to begin with. Secondly, the companions are of no help. They are weak and their influence seems to have no affect at all.

Before the companion nerf, I was happy to have finally been able to solo all the content and play through it with little to no hassle and enjoy the experience of the content and missions without being challenged to a point where it felt like a job.

 

I have no desire to sit in front of my computer for 36 hours straight and only get a 3rd of the dailies/weekly's done on a single toon. I have multiple toons that I would like to do these things on.

The change in the companions has made it impossible to juggle all of this on multiple toons.

 

This game has become a job. It has become world of warcraft. This game has become tiresome and tedious.

 

Before the companion change, I was able to enjoy the game. I have read dozens upon dozens of posts and dozens upon dozens of threads of people who feel the exact same way.

 

I respect the fact that you want your game to be a certain way. However, if people don't enjoy the change, then that really says something. When people openly state, "I was finally able to enjoy the game and play casually; getting plenty of content done and still have time to put dinner on the table"...then that really says something as well.

Edited November 22, 2015 by Morganha

[Ghisallo]

Your logic is faulty.

 

In an MMO the point of doing content is generally to get gear better than you had from doing that content.

 

If you need gear greater than 208 to complete a flashpoint that gives 208 gear... it's not working as intended.

 

If it drops 208 gear you should be able to complete it in gear worse than 208 gear, end of story.

 

This is like saying you need HM raid gear in order to clear a SM raid.

 

Your logic is actually faulty because it fails to include an important fact. BW has a proven habit in this game of screwing up itemization. They did the same thing in SoR with some of the FPs. They were actually dropping gear lower than the recommended gear listed in the GF.

 

So if you want to see intended difficulty please read the OP in context. Now if you follow that path what gear do you come out of the KOTFE story with? Next after grinding H2 missions what gear do you get? Then the Solo SF? Finally h2 SF. If you follow that path 208 year is NOT the gear that should be considered the base for H2 SF. So why does it sometimes drop in there....see the first paragraph. That drop rate needs to be fixed, not the difficulty.

 

So much of this debacle has been based around assumptions, largely informed by what the players desires vs what all of the facts tells us.

Edited November 22, 2015 by Ghisallo

[Bothan]

• Level: 65
  
• Item Rating: 200-208
  
• Discipline: Saboteur
  
• Companion: Corso Riggs
  
• Companion role: Tank
  
• Influence level: 12-26
  

 

Over the past couple of days (post-"nerf"), I've gone through all of the PvE weeklies (Tatooine, Corellia, Hoth, etc.). During that time, I raised my influence with Corso and upgraded my gear. This is reflected in the 200-208 and 12-26 ranges, above.

 

Corso? Yeah, Corso. I realize a lot of people hate him, but I'm not one of them. I was irritated they'd pulled him. Story-wise, I couldn't resolve either him or Bowdaar abandoning my ship. Corso's my second in command, and Bowdaar owes me a life-debt. Both should have gone out of their way to try and find me. BW better have a damn good explanation why Theron had my ship, and Corso wasn't with it.

 

Anyway, up through Voss and Makeb, all missions were on par with my pre-KotFE play -- easy to mildly challenging, depending on the world and the corresponding level sync.

 

By the time I'd finished everything up to Voss, I'd raised Corso's influence and upgraded my gear (average 208, a couple pieces are at 216).

 

Voss was more of a challenge, but was doable. One of the missions spawns four yellow dogs, which killed Corso and damn near killed me. Before that, in the same chain, there's a boss-level NPC who killed me twice. Fortunately, there were other nearby players who came in and helped. He was the only one of the boss-level creatures that gave me a problem. The gormak commander was fairly easy, in comparison.

 

By the time I'd reached Makeb, I had Corso up to 26 influence and had all my gear at 208 or higher (so far, I only have two pieces at 216).

 

Makeb was a pain in the arse. Three of the missions I completely gave up on, as I just couldn't do them. For example, that stupid gas trap. Another had a pair of manned turrets, which would alternate their shielding. I had to run from this. I don't recall why the third one gave me trouble, but I ended up abandoning all three.

 

After Makeb, I tried one of the H2 star fortresses. I gave up on it after being slaughtered four times by the praetorian -- twice with Corso tanking, twice with him healing. I'm puzzled as to how this is supposed to be doable solo. Should it be challenging? Yeah, it's an at-level H2, and I haven't maxxed my gear or influence. If I had, maybe it'd be easier. I don't know. But until that point, I'm not sure why anyone would expect to accomplish it solo.

 

---

 

Following up, I just did a solo star fortress run, with the same stats as above. It was really easy. Easier, I think, than pre-4.0.2. But that's also likely because I'm better geared and have higher companion influence.

Edited November 22, 2015 by Bothan
added feedback

[DarkSaberMaster]

A random person and I attempted the Tattooine Heroic Star Fortress. While going through, we attempted to defeat one of the paladins. We were defeated by him numerous times. We tried putting our companions in DPS, Heal, and Tank spec and several combinations of the three. We were both DPS classes and specs and it was absolutely impossible to defeat the paladin. The companions heal specs could not heal through the damage, and the companions' tank specs couldn't withstand enough damage for us to kill him.

 

We were both level 65. His companion was around influence level 40 and mine was at influence level 25.

His gear was mostly 208/216 gear and My gear was mostly 216 with three pieces at 208 and two pieces at 220.

I am not new to my class and certainly not new to the game. I've been playing a long time and have followed the knowledge of how to play my class very closely and have always made sufficient changes to continue playing my class with sufficient skill to perform well in minor and major aspects of the game.

 

After we gave up on the Tattoine Heroic Star Fortress, I attempted a heroic Alderaan Star Fortress with another random person and we skimmed through it, including defeating all of the paladins, with no problem.

 

The heroic star fortresses are completely unbalanced to begin with. Secondly, the companions are of no help. They are weak and their influence seems to have no affect at all.

Before the companion nerf, I was happy to have finally been able to solo all the content and play through it with little to no hassle and enjoy the experience of the content and missions without being challenged to a point where it felt like a job.

 

I have no desire to sit in front of my computer for 36 hours straight and only get a 3rd of the dailies/weekly's done on a single toon. I have multiple toons that I would like to do these things on.

The change in the companions has made it impossible to juggle all of this on multiple toons.

 

This game has become a job. It has become world of warcraft. This game has become tiresome and tedious.

 

Before the companion change, I was able to enjoy the game. I have read dozens upon dozens of posts and dozens upon dozens of threads of people who feel the exact same way.

 

I respect the fact that you want your game to be a certain way. However, if people don't enjoy the change, then that really says something. When people openly state, "I was finally able to enjoy the game and play casually; getting plenty of content done and still have time to put dinner on the table"...then that really says something as well.

 

I'm sorry. But this is definitely a L2P issue. There is no way two live people in 208/216 with some 220 gear, with companions, couldn't defeat a paladin. There is no way.

[Makillda]

Than the reward should be higher, you should do a heroic to get upgraded gear not downgraded gear.

 

It is not solo content just because it can be soloed. If you're in 190s, group up and get your upgrades.

[Makillda]

Your logic is faulty.

 

In an MMO the point of doing content is generally to get gear better than you had from doing that content.

 

If you need gear greater than 208 to complete a flashpoint that gives 208 gear... it's not working as intended.

 

If it drops 208 gear you should be able to complete it in gear worse than 208 gear, end of story.

 

This is like saying you need HM raid gear in order to clear a SM raid.

 

It is not solo content just because it can be soloed. If you're in 190s, group up and get your upgrades.

[Kiesu]

Than the reward should be higher, you should do a heroic to get upgraded gear not downgraded gear.

 

Have you ever done hardmode flashpoints? Those regular ones?

 

Only the last boss and bonus boss drops purples in those flashpoints. And they were mid-tier comm-gear equivalents. All the rest dropped one blue item of lesser value than lowest comm gear item.

For Hardmode Flahpoint you need a team of 4 players.

For Heroic Star Fortress you need one, or possible two people to complete. Equivalent to Tactical flash-point.

What gear does tactical flashpoint drop? Even lower quality items.

[Jeebbers]

Well, here's my story of the tale of two patches.

 

Before 4.0.2:

 

Content was really easy. Even doing the Heroic Star Fortress missions solo, with basic 208 gear on both my Guardian and Assassin I never dropped before 75% health. However, leveling my Marauder, even with overpowered companions and full 192 gear, I still died a lot or almost did even with a healing companion. Marauders and Sentinels have always been really squishy, and I didn't feel that they had enough DPS to solo heroics since it seems a lot of their abilities got nerf'd. Moving on to my overpower sage. Never played my sage after I got him to 50. Somehow, he was the easiest to solo content with. I ran through a heroic area and agro'd 4 groups, just to see how much I could handle. Did not die. Serious?

 

After 4.0.2:

 

Did not think that the 75% nerf was really needed. I did agree that companions did need to be balanced, but not a nerf like this. First thing I did: Solo'd Star Fortress mission. I did it on my assassin twice, because she is the more squishy of my max level characters. I did almost die a lot, and even had to use some of my "oh ****" abilities, but in the end, it was easier then when I did this with other players later on. My Marauder had the worst time after this patch. I was still catching him up with the story, even though he was already max level. Could not kill Revan. Between his annoying stuns, and big bursts of damage, my marauder could not be kept alive by my companion. Died 7 times. Only reason I was able to complete is I stocked up on stimpacks, buff packs, and used Heroic moment twice. The struggle was real. When I got to Ziost, after every pull I would have to sit and heal, and this is with healing comp. I also noticed that the companions do what they did pre-4.0. They like to start attacking, when I really just need them to heal. I don't need Jesasa to run up and hit the mob with her saber a couple times. I needed her to sit back there and heal. Pre-4.0 that was the biggest issue. Companions would start attacking mobs and just stop healing. With my Marauder, it became easier to just use a tank than healing comp, though I would still almost die each time. My marauder was my first toon, I know him the best. I should have no problems with the companions he has. Yet I struggled through the missions.

 

Recap:

 

Jedi Guardian

Level: 65

Gear: Mostly 208

Difficulty: Low-Medium

 

Sith Assassin

Level: 65

Gear: Mostly 208

Difficulty: Very Low-Low

 

Sith Marauder

Level: 65

Gear: Mostly 208

Difficulty: Medium-Very High

 

Jedi Sage

Level: 53

Gear: Some 166

Difficulty: None existent

 

Conclusion:

 

I still don't agree with the companions being nerf'd as they did. I may not have struggled, but it's because I never really have with this game. I used to two man Hardmodes with my buddy and the ****** Pre-4.0 comps. It was hard, very hard, but do-able. But what I see is that other players are struggling a lot. You should never build a game around the best of the best players. There should still be challenging content, but that content should be built around the average player, not the best. I don't think that the companions should go back to how they were 4.0, but you should definitely buff them, and then do some hard thinking about the major game changes you make in the future. Professional game designers, and a team that has been working on a game for 4 years, should know better, and shouldn't have to turn to the community to start to think "Maybe we messed up?"