Bioware's real Intent is finally coming to fruition...

[heythereqt]

Level sync IS awesome. It's the best thing to ever happen to this game, period. I can do whatever wherever I want. This would have been ALL FINE if they didn't nerf the companions TOO much.

 

Yes, they needed a nerf and yes they were overpowered. But they nerfed the number too much...

 

Also, that's a little tin foilish there holocron

 

Pretty much hit the nail on the head here. I completely support level sync, and was enjoying the game far more with it introduced in 4.0.....until the companions were nerfed into legitimate uselessness. That's the problem here, not the level sync. The whole situation would be far more enjoyable if they had just tuned their strength down by a small margin.

[OceanwaveII]

You are correct. I was going to quit after lvl sync but wanted to play through the new content while the companions hooked me so I stayed. Now I will quit for good.

 

The dailies take forever and the cc from the mobs there simply annoy me as I have run them thousands of times. I feel like my character is lvl 10 and I have no power although I am running 216 ops gear. I used to use dailies to test my power when I got new gear, now it's just boring being gimped everywhere I go. It simply isn't fun anymore.

 

It is indeed time to move on and honestly I miss playing a real game. I'm looking forward to finding something new. BW had a good start but due to never ending bugs and so many annoying game decisions it simply no longer does anything but annoy me.

 

I don't support microtransactions so I wont buy from the cm, I got everything I own through hard work and now I have to work even harder for it, no thanks.

 

I know they wont change it and have already told my friends this is it for me. A few of them agree and haven't been on since the patch. My guild of like 90 people sees like 3-4 people on and usually it's just me lol. Time to turn off the lights and shut the door.

 

 

Eh there dumb and incompetent game designer , but there not idiots , they start losing subs then there goes the whole plan of story based content per month The Logic of there patch is the majority of the people playing are causal according to there metric only a tiny precentage do hardmode content or even ops , . They'll reverse it as quietly as possible to try to avoid it leaking onto game media . hence the complete silence .

[Holocron]

Pretty much hit the nail on the head here. I completely support level sync, and was enjoying the game far more with it introduced in 4.0.....until the companions were nerfed into legitimate uselessness. That's the problem here, not the level sync. The whole situation would be far more enjoyable if they had just tuned their strength down by a small margin.

 

But see, that's the rub, they didn't really nerf companions so much, as they just really restored them to what they were spec wise prior to 4.0. The only difference now, is that we can't gear companions, and our levels are nerfed.....ala level sync.

[Fallensouls]

But see, that's the rub, they didn't really nerf companions so much, as they just really restored them to what they were spec wise prior to 4.0. The only difference now, is that we can't gear companions, and our levels are nerfed.....ala level sync.

Dont forget they nerfed our toons as well in revan and before this new expansion so yea a bad experience all around Id say

[MaximusRex]

So, all the fanboiz who slobbered all over themselves about how much they love the new level sync system, and at the same time blasted away at anyone who tried to point out the horrible flaws/nerf........how do you all feel now?

 

It's still awesome, thanks for asking.

[Allamirr]

A rank 50 companion is worse then a fully end game geared Treek in 3.0 atm. They wind up stop healing you til you put them in and out of pacify. I am just so fed up with them and this game in general.

[morfius]

Nope... they just overdid things listening to elitist crybabes.

Level sync is not bad at all, it just had to be 4 levels above content (average value of over leveling before 4.0).

Companions without gear has to take stats not from grind/money sync but from player gear + presence.

Nerf had to be done so companion output would be ~ 80-85% of average player performing same role... currently they are below 50%.

On top of that they are bugged and AI is messed.

[Darkwords]

OP is spot on

[artbunny]

So, all the fanboiz who slobbered all over themselves about how much they love the new level sync system, and at the same time blasted away at anyone who tried to point out the horrible flaws/nerf........how do you all feel now?

 

 

I feel perfectly fine, thank you!

 

Both my end-game characters and my minis that are still being leveled have a lot of fun with this game; I didn't notice any rise in difficulty since the latest patch during leveling, the weekly planetary Heroics as well as Solo Star Fortress FPs.

 

All in all, I very much like the current state of the game and am looking forward to see how Bioware might expand things like the Alliance system come 2016 (e.g. more Alliance quests, more involvement of companions in such quest chains etc.).

 

I am sorry to see that you have a completely different experience of the game, OP. It makes me kind of wonder if we are playing the same game at all, for all the issues you describe I cannot find in my game. Nothing I do in this game on a regular basis takes long or feels tedious at all, and the latest patch didn't change my gaming experience one bit. My characters still don't die, or rarely lose more than 50% health, and things like the planetary heroics take exactly the same time they did before this TUE.

 

Which leads me to the belief that the "nerf" to the companions cannot have been that fundamental, and therefore makes your whole conspiracy theory a rather doubtful affair in my eyes.

[horrorfaneightys]

Pretty much hit the nail on the head here. I completely support level sync, and was enjoying the game far more with it introduced in 4.0.....until the companions were nerfed into legitimate uselessness. That's the problem here, not the level sync. The whole situation would be far more enjoyable if they had just tuned their strength down by a small margin.

 

Yep. I'm still fine with level-sync, though I was unsure about it before the implement. But what's really got my goat is the major nerf to companions. If they were going to do it, they should have done it almost immediately, not a month later. They gave us all time to get used to it, and have fun with them, before they took them away. That was a very poor decision.

[nagada]

So, all the fanboiz who slobbered all over themselves about how much they love the new level sync system, and at the same time blasted away at anyone who tried to point out the horrible flaws/nerf........how do you all feel now?

 

I feel fine about both level sync and the companion nerf. But I don't really think I slobbered. Maybe my mouth watered just a little though.

[Holocron]

I feel perfectly fine, thank you!

 

Both my end-game characters and my minis that are still being leveled have a lot of fun with this game; I didn't notice any rise in difficulty since the latest patch during leveling, the weekly planetary Heroics as well as Solo Star Fortress FPs.

 

All in all, I very much like the current state of the game and am looking forward to see how Bioware might expand things like the Alliance system come 2016 (e.g. more Alliance quests, more involvement of companions in such quest chains etc.).

 

I am sorry to see that you have a completely different experience of the game, OP. It makes me kind of wonder if we are playing the same game at all, for all the issues you describe I cannot find in my game. Nothing I do in this game on a regular basis takes long or feels tedious at all, and the latest patch didn't change my gaming experience one bit. My characters still don't die, or rarely lose more than 50% health, and things like the planetary heroics take exactly the same time they did before this TUE.

 

Which leads me to the belief that the "nerf" to the companions cannot have been that fundamental, and therefore makes your whole conspiracy theory a rather doubtful affair in my eyes.

 

Have you been running a lot of heroics, or visited any high level npc areas? Maybe you just haven't noticed yet, but the times and numbers of tries to accomplish things has increased greatly since the nerf.

 

What does this mean? It means yeah you can still get through it, but it takes a lot longer to do it! It's cumulative too based on what you are doing. Three extra minutes here, ten minutes extra there, 7 minutes there, etc etc. and before you know it, your night of trying to relax and achieve some progression has just been severely handicapped!

 

I don't know about you, but I have a life, and my in game play time is really precious. We should have options, but I digress the real purpose of level sync was to buy the devs more time to add content, and give them the ability to produce less overall content in a given year. It is purely lazy design, and that would not normally be supported by a player base, but the cash shop props up profits, and so it keeps them in jobs they otherwise likely would have lost.

[xxHellsmokexx]

This thread explains it perfectly. I'm surprised it hasn't been removed. Although people might not be able to identify the issue bothering them in the long run it will lead to them getting bored and leaving. No matter how they ease this in, the results wont be good.

[Vankris]

Level sync IS awesome. It's the best thing to ever happen to this game, period. I can do whatever wherever I want. This would have been ALL FINE if they didn't nerf the companions TOO much.

 

Yes, they needed a nerf and yes they were overpowered. But they nerfed the number too much...

 

Also, that's a little tin foilish there holocron

 

OP comp allow you to faceroll content. Overleveling content would achieve the same thing.

 

The idea of level sync is to bring some element of danger to the player visiting lower level planet (bioware said exactly that). But that can only work i companion are at a reasonable powerlevel. Before 4.0.2, there were no danger of ever dying doing lower level content.

 

The very idea of level sync was defeated by the companion being too powerful. The concept of level sync can only work (as intended) with reasonable companion powerlevel (like they are since 4.0.2)

Edited November 20, 2015 by Vankris

[xxHellsmokexx]

OP allow you to faceroll content. Overleveling content would achieve the same thing.

 

The idea of level sync is to bring some element of danger to the player visiting lower level planet (bioware said exactly that). But that can only work i companion are at a reasonable powerlevel. Before 4.0.2, there were no danger of ever dying doing lower level content.

 

The very idea of level sync was defeated by the companion being too powerful. The concept of level sync can only work (as intended) with reasonable companion powerlevel (like they are since 4.0.2)

 

Doesn't matter what Bioware says, it gives you the feeling that you are weak and it sucks. My gear matters nowhere other than flashpoints and ops. There is no other reason for me to gear really. No matter how much I upgrade I wont notice the change other than in those two situations I mentioned.

 

lvl sync "as intended" will break the game. The game isn't that much fun to begin with, most are here because it is Star Wars and that's it. This game can't afford a change like this but hey, that's my opinion. Time will tell.

 

It simply sucks and it is boring as it feels like all my hard work was for nothing. To top it off lvl 20 players in said flashpoints and ops are bolstered to my level pretty much as well, what is my motivation to gear up? There is none.

Edited November 20, 2015 by xxHellsmokexx

[TUXs]

And I agree, and didn't even have an issue running through old recycled content, however the nerf AND the level sync together are an issue.

 

Exactly!!!

[Holocron]

Doesn't matter what Bioware says, it gives you the feeling that you are weak and it sucks. My gear matters nowhere other than flashpoints and ops. There is no other reason for me to gear really. No matter how much I upgrade I wont notice the change other than in those two situations I mentioned.

 

lvl sync "as intended" will break the game. The game isn't that much fun to begin with, most are here because it is Star Wars and that's it. This game can't afford a change like this but hey, that's my opinion. Time will tell.

 

It simply sucks and it is boring as it feels like all my hard work was for nothing. To top it off lvl 20 players in said flashpoints and ops are bolstered to my level pretty much as well, what is my motivation to gear up? There is none.

 

Well said!

[Princess_Chibi]

OP allow you to faceroll content. Overleveling content would achieve the same thing.

 

The idea of level sync is to bring some element of danger to the player visiting lower level planet (bioware said exactly that). But that can only work i companion are at a reasonable powerlevel. Before 4.0.2, there were no danger of ever dying doing lower level content.

 

The very idea of level sync was defeated by the companion being too powerful. The concept of level sync can only work (as intended) with reasonable companion powerlevel (like they are since 4.0.2)

 

Thank God you are here to explain what Bioware developers had in mind with level sync as though you sat in the room and listened to their piss-poor rationalizations... It's such a comforting thought Bioware Austin has you on the payroll....

 

Stop being a yes man. There was no rational thought behind taking high level "heroes" and turning them into meat puppets by dropping their levels depending on their planet. Do you really think if Yoda decided to sit in the middle of the desert on Tatooine, one of those obnoxious rats could even touch his HP bar? And yet, that's exactly what the devs have done to us... They didn't introduce an element of danger, they increased unnecessary factors of annoyance; and those things are NOT equal.

 

Here's the problem. If the high levels against sync are right, it's an annoyance system designed by the devs to slow progression of players versus BW having to work harder to put up more content. If the newbies supportive of level sync are right about "introducing danger", then by your very own logic, it was put into place to slow players down and keep them from progressing quickly ("facerolling" as you put it), for no greater reward than pre-4.0.

 

Any way you slice it, they gimped high end toons with virtually no cause and absolutely no benefit to us; the laziest solution I can imagine would have been to provide Yavin credits x2 to level sync'd high end toons to at least make dealing with trash have a purpose (money). Can you imagine having multiple toons and now running the Gree event? If it took you an hour to clear dailies before, now it's 2 hours. 2 hours at 24 toons means 48 hours straight. Gree events last for a week..... Suddenly progression that was previously possible (faction influence grinding, gear, item collecting) is now mathematically not. The SMART thing to do, would have been to add new content areas with mobs beyond max player level with increased rewards.

Edited November 20, 2015 by Princess_Chibi

[ChristienB]

Honestly, I wasn't sure beforehand if I would like, or for that matter dislike, level sync. I figured I'd wait and see. I did, and honestly, I don't mind it. I started a new toon specifically to check it out, and managed to stay above level without difficulty. I also haven't minded being downgraded much going to older planets with my max levels. Level sync is not game-breaking, in my opinion.

 

Am I unhappy at the moment, yes. But, it's not level sync, it's not just the companion nerf, it's a combination of many things. Before anyone jumps on me for not liking the companion nerf, let me first say I do NOT want them back to 4.0 levels, I just think the nerf went a little too far. I am also unhappy with many bugs lingering for years and Bioware meddling with stupid things before stomping those out. But, I digress... I actually started this post to say that we need to stop attacking each other and belittling those who do not share the same opinion as we do. Think the game needs to be more challenging and like the hardcore stuff? Right on! You are entitled to that opinion and style of game play. On the other side and want to burn through stuff because you don't have tons of time to play, or whatever else? Also right on! You are also entitled to your opinion and style of game play. Throwing insults back and forth, each blaming the other side for a Bioware decision gets us nowhere but way off topic.

 

Every play style is required to keep the game healthy and player base robust. We should not be making other players the enemy here (well, except in PvP maps ). Can we all let people express how they feel about the game without attacking each other and their opinions?

[ChristienB]

Ops account so old he could be my accounts dad.

 

The force is strong in this one. I give this a 10/10

[azudelphi]

Not really... this has nothing to do with level sync and everything to do with the numbers game is skewed too far on the nerf side; some companion power needs to be reclaimed. But companions were on the overtuned side before. There are three major issues at play here, and level sync is not among them:

1. Companion outputs were too high

2. Companion outputs were nerfed too low

3. The stealthy approach to implementing the change live

[Darkbloom]

Level sync is absolutely awesome, and there is a reason why nearly every MMO on the market is moving towards it.

 

When even WoW moves towards level sync, you know it's time to wake up and ask why most players love it so much.

 

Now onto the companion nerf. I am certainly not naive enough to think that people posting on forums has anything at all to do with why Bioware nerfed companions.

 

ALL MMOs' end games are a grind. ALL. No exceptions. Way back when I actually raided (That was a LONG time ago), raiding was a grind. People who say otherwise just aren't telling the truth. You farmed the same damn bosses over and over again to get gear to fight the one boss you couldn't kill yet. That's a grind.

 

Bioware nerfed companions because the companions were allowing players to get through the Alliance grind too fast, and if that happens, Bioware knows beyond any doubt people will simply leave the game. They won't get mad. They won't write forum posts. They'll just leave.

 

I argued against nerfing companions way back when people still hoped our forum conversations might affect Bioware's decision making. (Such idealists we were. Lol.) There are better ways to extend the grind but still make it fun. MUCH better ways. But I don't think Bioware is being run by people who have any solution to anything other than buff to stupidity or nerf from orbit.

[ChristienB]

3. The stealthy approach to implementing the change live

 

And this^

[rsparrowk]

Holocron for Pres 2016

[Master-Nala]

I like level sync more than I thought I would. I also wouldn't mind if it was optional, with the caveat that the devs would probably remove any rewards or Conquest progress for not being synced.