Returning Player's Thoughts (Mostly PvP)

[Takory]

I've been a fan of MMORPG style Tab-Target PvP since playing Anarchy Online years ago. I've played both AO and WoW since release on and off, resulting in a lot of experience and interest in any game that does it well. Well over 300 days /played in WoW and roughly the same in AO. If you've played AO you'd know it's riddled with PvP balance issues and generally 1 or 2 classes dominating during FOTM game changes, because of this I've gained a tolerance for dealing with balance issues and generally can have a good time even if there is nothing I can do during a fight due to balance. AO gets a pass due to its age and engine limitations, and generally the community left in the game will be playing it regardless of game design issues.

 

I bought SWTOR at release excited for a big MMORPG that was science fiction themed for once (albeit Star Wars), and having loved Mass Effect 2 I was interested in the voice acted questing, but mainly there to end game PvP. Right away the questing and combat felt really good, coupled with decent graphics and amazing sound effects and feel during a fight, I was amazed at how well the combat was designed, it actually had some weight to it and was FUN. Keyword there, no other MMORPG nails the feel and weight of a fight like SWTOR does. Sound effects and animations were very well done for MMORPG combat, and IMO the best I've played at the time, and by far the most fun. Sniper kickback is a great example. I joined a Warzone map and played Huttball for the first time and was blown away. I understand a lot of people don't like it but I found it a refreshing change to the standard TDM style PvP. For once, a level felt like a true obstacle, not just another arbitrary map for the same death match destruction. The map felt like another player you had to work against and knocking 3 people + the huttball into a fire trap was beyond entertaining to me. For once, an MMORPG made PvP FUN. I understand the balance issues, and why hutball is hated due to certain classes dominating ball carrying, but even when I've lost matches or completely wiped 0-6 I still had fun and was entertained, which is worth more to me than winning. Fun should be the focus of any game, especially PvP, but lately games are trying to be too many things at once, giving up a lot on the fun side to cater to the 1% who only play competitively. I took a long break from SWTOR due to RL getting in the way (Military) and returned over Christmas break.

 

PvP Complaints:

 

These are mostly vents and frustrations during my reintroduction to swtor end game PvP. These are my opinions and although some have been mentioned, I feel the need to say something about it. I care about the MMORPG community because Its been in my life for a long time. I hope this doesn't come across as a hate post, that is not my intention.

 

I power leveled 7 characters to 65 during double XP with the intention to PvP casually and maybe try solo ranked. I liked the idea of Solo Ranked as it appealed to the casual competitive side of me. Used the dulfy PvP guides and played every class in the correct PvP gear/aug'd/etc. I have every single AC in mixed 204/8 or full 208 gear with correct mods/enhance/etc minus Marauder/Sent. I've spent close to 20-30m messing with build designs, from balanced ones, to dulfy's recommendations and straight wacky ones (all alacrity conceal Operative for endless rotation, backstab is up after 3rd lacerate, 25sec CD stun, Sorc/Sage Healer killing build). The stat changes feel WORTHLESS, resulting in a frustrating experience and waste of time and creds. For instance, it's pointless to spend the money on power augs for sniper when you can get the free bolster in Warzone. The difference is around 8-12 ranged weapon dmg from full power vs full bolstered mastery. Why would anyone spend the amount of credits to purchase the MK-8, 30k to add, and the Aug itself for virtually no change besides character sheet stats. No other game have I spent this much effort to see almost no difference in the way my character performs.

 

These are rhetorical questions, but It would seem that Bioware has overlooked the PvP in this game completely. Sorc/Sages are a perfect example of this, where do you even begin with a healer that has an immune bubble, mobility of a melee, and teleport. WHAT. If you've played WoW sages/sorc healers are basically Warlocks(Teleport)/Priest(Absorb shield straight ripped from wow)(Life Grip)/Paladins(Immune bubble) rolled into one class, which is insane on just a mechanic level, not to mention they have the best heals in game. Balance design is inherently a problem in MMOs, it can be fixed with 1 patch, and again, I have high tolerance for it. This is why I mainly played my Concealment Operative and hunted Sages/Sorcs in every WZ I played. Hunting Sages/Sorcs was my favorite, and even if we lost the match, I enjoyed locking down FOTMs. What I can't begin to understand or deal with is the QUALITY OF LIFE issues with PvP.

 

Why is 4v4 arena in the Warzone rotation?!

Why can't I choose what maps to not queue into?

Why is everyone allowed to leave and re-queue with no consequences?!

Premades

Performance Issues in Warzones

CC chaining is by far too frequent.

 

Warzones are so hit and miss, to the point where you're on the side face rolling and It's not even remotely fun, or you're being face rolled and you see 3 or 4 people leave. This can be fixed by implementing a deserter buff similar to WoW to promote people to play or just flat out prevent >2 people premades, or premades all together.

 

Out of all 7 classes I have, only 1 really feels efficient AND fun while playing Warzones, Operative. I played Madness Sorc and can top charts like all the rest but it's simply not challenging enough (not fun). Operative Lone Wolf style hit and run tactics are great and by far a super fun class to play in huttball/node harassment. Tossing heals to friendlies while jumping in to stun/peel/burst down a target is great fun. Just the fun I had on my operative was worth the sub $ alone.

 

Warzone game performance is absolutely the worst I've ever seen. I'm running I7-4770k(h100I)@4.4ghz/780ti(SLI Forcing 1 card)/16g/1TB SSD in air540 full Noctua NF-F12 fans. It's not a heat issue, it's not a ME issue. The game performance is completely unacceptable for an 8v8 PvP match, and renders having a 144hz monitor useless. (Did the Dx9 library install, unparked CPU (honestly if you know computers you'd know that this doesn't do anything unless you're on a laptop stuck in power saving mode).

 

I can deal with one or two of these Quality of Life issues on their own, and the balance problems will always be an issue in any MMORPG, especially PvP, but ultimately doesn't way in to my decision to not renew.

 

Once you play all the classes (minus mar/sent) you realize all the builds are basically identical, and make the devs look insanely lazy once you inspect all the abilities. Every class has some sort of 5% dmg modifier, something you toss at the target to make ability X instant and do Y more dmg, etc. This would be fine if it was one or two classes but it's literally every class, and the mechanics to due so aren't unique, they're IDENTICAL. There isn't a single class that feels truly unique minus the operative with Roll, and even then the DPS rotation is the same as others. They are all too similar, a burst discipline, a DoT disc, and overall Class role (Tank/healer) disc. Unbelievably lazy design. This is the reason I'm quitting, on top of the performance issues and frustration with QoL issues in PvP it's just not worth the continued $.

 

There's irony in that even though all the builds are basically the same, the game is still completely dominated by 1/2 ACs. Every class has the same CC, knocks, stuns, etc. Some vary by frequency but for the most part everything is a clone, yet still, balance is god awful. I can't take this as anything other than lack of care by game designers, and they're clearly out to just milk it for money with the cash store now.

 

I hate to see this game follow the same mistakes that AO and other gone f2p-maintenance mode MMOs made, and the last remaining people that seem to be in the game will be playing it regardless of the issues, playing the game unconditionally, but that's the way it seems. I've seen it happen many times and this time I know not to stick around.

 

MMOs are in a very weird state. When I first started playing MMOS in 2000, if the game play was bad, people quit, if the devs stepped up and made the game better, people renewed. Simple. If they game got stale, people quit, devs made new levels/game mechanics, people renew. A simple system that rewards devs/game companies by making something worth paying for, and gives the customer a voice by voting with their wallet, saying we will play when you do things right and won't when it's garbage. Now a days they're basically getting away with murder by making it F2P, not fixing anything, and focusing on Cash shops to milk it for all it's worth. Gaining most of their money from impulse buying and non-game design items and shortcuts. Seeing as this is a video game, and not a doll dress 'em up game like most seem to think it is, gameplay reigns king for me, not adding a new robe to my character for 5$.

 

I truly believe swtor to be a fun, uniquely entertaining game and I know the main way it pulls in money is from the Voice acted story, and after playing it through 7 times and noticing my decision made basically no difference, I can't commend them for such a mediocre story experience (60-65). It's sad to see such a good, FUN, game be ruined by poor dev involvement and lack of care. I honestly don't believe the devs play their own game. So many aspects of this game were next gen just ruined by improper maintenance and lack of conversation with their player base.

 

I did try solo ranked and that's when the balance issues started to truly shine. A game should allow the customer to play what one wants, not what works during X.xx patch.

 

The worse thing a game can do is make its customer feel as if the choices made by the player, whether by stat allocation, discipline, or in fight rotation, were pointless and unrewarding.

 

TLDR: Classes are too similar for PvP to be interesting and fun in the LONG term. Game riddled by class balance issues. I can't see why anyone, would ever bother to play this game competitively.

[JMCA]

PvP would be dramatically better if they did class balance entirely from that perspective instead of making sure everyone can do operations relatively equivalent in damage output.

 

Ex. burst damage was fantastic a while ago, and you had to be good at sorc / sage to be able to kite and heal/dps. Now sorcs aren't scared of anyone because nothing kills them fast enough.

 

Why did that happen?

 

Because the burst classes were too high on a single target parse list for training dummies.

 

Seriously.

 

BW has been trying to please both sides, when really they should just write off operations and let it be unbalanced in favor of PvP.

 

It's not like anyone raids anymore anyway.

 

That's just my opinion though.

[CaptRogue]

It's not like anyone raids anymore anyway.

 

That's just my opinion though.

 

Yes, that is JUST YOUR opinion. That you're dragging into every topic you can. Give it up. We get it, you hate raids. Now move along.

 

OP,

Just one thought, as it stands you can't choose PvP maps because the low pop that plays WZ's now. Same with Arenas.

[Suromir]

PvP would be dramatically better if they did class balance entirely from that perspective instead of making sure everyone can do operations relatively equivalent in damage output.

 

Ex. burst damage was fantastic a while ago, and you had to be good at sorc / sage to be able to kite and heal/dps. Now sorcs aren't scared of anyone because nothing kills them fast enough.

 

Why did that happen?

 

Because the burst classes were too high on a single target parse list for training dummies.

 

Seriously.

 

BW has been trying to please both sides, when really they should just write off operations and let it be unbalanced in favor of PvP.

 

It's not like anyone raids anymore anyway.

 

That's just my opinion though.

 

no one raids huh. couldn't be more wrong. Either way there's something you need to seriously realize. SWTOR has never, and will never, focus on PvP. SWTOR was never meant, never was, and never will be a PvP focused game.

 

So stop deluding yourself. Especially with comically false statements like no one raids anymore. The Focus is PvE, so your "suggestion" for them to write off balance in favor of PvP is a horrible idea. That's like telling a Pizza joint they should foucs on sushi and ditch the pizza when their sushi is only a very limited selection on their menu and isn't very good.

 

But tell yourself what you want. Doesn't change the fact you're wrong and BioWare would be fools to follow your "suggestions" in regards to PvP.

[Wraiven]

Great post...I actually read every bit of it. I myself have the same issues with this game. However, I take a look around at the alternatives and see the same exact problems with them as well. I can't even name a game that does not have a cash shop anymore. I miss games like City of Heroes when the game revolved around playability and fun rather than cash shops. I miss the game when it was ran by Cryptic Studios and not NCSoft. Sadly, that game switched to the cash shop F2P and then died. I hope one day people wake up and stop buying in to this "Free to play" crap and stop buying from cash shops. That will be the ONLY way we force companies to build great MMO's again. Until then, we get this half baked version of MMOs.

 

Good luck to you man...I would leave the game with you if there were anything worth leaving for. Sadly, all MMO's are just as much crap as this one. I do find the PvP fun, so I'm here for the time being. Had high hopes for Everquest Next when I heard it was going to be 15 a month stand alone game without a cash shop. Then the primary developer quit the game and now it's going to be F2P straight out of the box with a bunch of crap in a cash shop. Same ol crap. It was the great white hope that failed before it was even released.

 

I have hopes...one day, a great Sandbox game with a theme park play style with great PvP will be invented with great graphics and game play that will never go F2P. Sounds like a fairy tale, doesn't it?

[Volthammer]

Great post...I actually read every bit of it. I myself have the same issues with this game. However, I take a look around at the alternatives and see the same exact problems with them as well....

 

It's funny you mention this. I was just at the Rift website for little other reason than nostalgia and decided to go over their PvP forums. The exact same complaints, man. The very same ones you read here. PvE rewards being gated by forced PvP, etc., and people griping like crazy it. LOL

 

Did all the MMO companies just get together and say, "Hey, let's ALL do things the exact same way!" I know that's what happened in my own industry.

[Takory]

It's funny you mention this. I was just at the Rift website for little other reason than nostalgia and decided to go over their PvP forums. The exact same complaints, man. The very same ones you read here. PvE rewards being gated by forced PvP, etc., and people griping like crazy it. LOL

 

Did all the MMO companies just get together and say, "Hey, let's ALL do things the exact same way!" I know that's what happened in my own industry.

 

Too funny. I was on the Wildstar forum doing the same thing, probing for potential issues, their PvP forums are riddled with doom and gloom and the current state of that game seems far worse than SWTOR or even any MMORPG out atm. Recurring themes lately.

[AlrikFassbauer]

Is there a set "industry standard" ?

Or are companies merely following "the trail of money" ?

Edited January 21, 2016 by AlrikFassbauer

[Wraiven]

Is there a set "industry standard" ?

Or are companies merely following "the trail of money" ?

 

With every last MMO (With the exception of EvE? Somebody else will have to comment on that one) doing Lock Boxes, I would say the industry standard is "the trail of money" lol.

[sheldN]

i agree on almost every point u made, but im afraid devs wont even comment on threads with such effort put in like this.

and it f***s me up that im always coming back to this game like a boomerang just to see nothing has changed.

its that "my minds tellin me no..." thing u know