Are ops/raids outdated?

[Gaspodia]

I understand, so if their main focus is not raid, then they should left it there rather than rescale it.

 

Why would we want to go back to a point where only 2 ops dropped the best loot? With the rescaling we have *all* the ops available for gearing and relevant gameplay.

 

I'm not sure what server you are on, but certainly on TRE general chat is full of ops related chat as soon as the reset time ticks over and continues on until late into the evening. That doesn't sound to me like anyone in game wants to go back to 2 relevant ops...

Edited March 15, 2016 by Gaspodia

[TX_Angel]

I understand, so if their main focus is not raid, then they should left it there rather than rescale it.

 

You could debate that front to back until the cows come home. It isn't going to be changed back at this point, for better or worse.

[MichaelStuart]

Out of curiosity

 

Would removing lockouts (at least in SM) in any way improve the situation?

[IanArgent]

Why shouldn't they?

 

If it's something they actually enjoyed doing, and they mastered it, then why wouldn't they go back and do it from time to time for fun?

 

Why not have the various levels of difficulty for each Ops set up so that people who want to play through to see the story content that's otherwise gated off can do it with somewhat simpler mechanics and fights that require one to being genuinely trying, but don't hinge on razer-perfect rotations and all-BiS gear?

 

What's sometimes said outright, and sometimes written between the lines, by quite a few vocal "Ops players", is they're not really enjoying the actual Ops, it's quite literally the gear-grind-gear-progress-etc hamster-wheel of getting rewards that let you do the next content for more rewards and so on, that they're hooked on, and if they're just doing "old Ops", then they don't get their fix. (And I'm sorry if that sounds more judgemental than I want it to, but it's very hard to talk around it without just saying it -- I don't mean it to be inflammatory.)

 

I'd love to see flashpoints tuned for 2+2 (player/comp) groups and Ops tuned for 4-man groups. It'd be hard to still respect the trinity for the 2+2 groups, though.

 

This would be in addition to the current setups

[Max_Killjoy]

Ops are expensive to develop, I suspect the ROI for them is rather poor when looked at directly, which is why we have gotten only 2 new ops in years.

 

Oct 2013 is the last time before Rav/ToS came out that we got new ops, and that would be DF/DP. It is now March 2016, or 2.5 years later. Rav/ToS came out in 2014, so we went all of 2015 without a new operation, and it looks like we may well go all of 2016 without one too.

 

It is clearly not important to Bioware to make new ops.

 

It would be a real shame if they're looking at each little bit of the game for RoI, instead of looking at the holistic game and whether a broad selection of players in numbers are paying for it.

[robertthebard]

Honestly, not really even arguable. Can't really take you too seriously if you want to debate this point.

 

Really? So people in full 192 gear in TBC standing in the laser knew what they were doing 2 years ago? What's hard to take seriously is the "But it's on the internet, it must be true" mentality required to believe that people didn't complain about noobs in HMs/Ops under the old system, and how everything was butterflies and rainbows in the Progression scene. Of course, it's either denial, or ignoring all the threads to the contrary, so that one can blame those "filthy casuals" for the any and everything.

 

I'm reminded of a discussion on Alderaan the other day, where a guy was blaming casuals for the removal of gear from comm vendors because he wanted to use it for cosmetics. He disappeared from chat when I asked him why, if he'd wanted to have that gear as cosmetic, he didn't have it done prior to it's removal, since we'd had cosmetic slots for far longer than the gear's been missing. He wanted to blame those "filthy casuals" for his laziness, but when I didn't bite on the catch phrase and run with him, he ran out of argument. Maybe his guild asked him the same question when he went to check with them about how to respond to someone not "toeing the party line" about casuals being the root of all evil?

 

Of course, it's really hard to take someone seriously when they cherry pick one point out of a post, even though an example was given in the very post that bears out the line they decided to respond to. Bad players have always been bad. They didn't have to be casual to be bad. Gearing up never required that you be skilled, just lucky on the die rolls at all the right times. I'm sure mine wasn't the only guild that carried average or below players to a full set of end game gear.

[IanArgent]

It would be a real shame if they're looking at each little bit of the game for RoI, instead of looking at the holistic game and whether a broad selection of players in numbers are paying for it.

 

That would be a shame, but it's harder to show causality vs metrics for the overall health, especially when they don't isolate changes

[TX_Angel]

It would be a real shame if they're looking at each little bit of the game for RoI, instead of looking at the holistic game and whether a broad selection of players in numbers are paying for it.

 

I agree completely... But I don't believe that they have anyone in management left at Bioware who gets that point...

 

Not everything is metrics. Sometimes you need a vision and some faith. After all, the game had to be designed and created before any metrics existed.

 

Look at Apple under Steve Jobs and Apple under Tim Cook, to see the difference between a vision guy and an operations guy.

[DarthDymond]

I agree completely... But I don't believe that they have anyone in management left at Bioware who gets that point...

 

Not everything is metrics. Sometimes you need a vision and some faith. After all, the game had to be designed and created before any metrics existed.

 

Look at Apple under Steve Jobs and Apple under Tim Cook, to see the difference between a vision guy and an operations guy.

BW: "This wasn't fitting with our vision of the game, so we made a change"

Player A: "Rawr! Your 'vision'?? How about actually listening to what your players want for a change?! You know, the people actually paying for this game! *rabble-rabble-rabble*"

 

BW: "We've seen that the majority of players prefer this, so we're going to focus on it."

Player B: "Rawr! Why is it always metrics, metrics, metrics with you guys?! EAWare is nothing but souless corporate drones! *rabble-rabble-rabble*"

 

If anything KOTFE and its near-exclusive focus on solo Story seems like it is the product of vision. "We're BioWare, dammit, our passion is story so we're going to rededicate ourselves to that. We'll include new group content and PVP periodically, and we'll make existing Ops relevant at max-level, in order to give something to those players, but our focus and commitment is going to be to crafting a compelling ongoing story."

Edited March 15, 2016 by DarthDymond

[TX_Angel]

If anything KOTFE and its near-exclusive focus on solo Story seems like it is the product of vision. "We're BioWare, dammit, our passion is story so we're going to rededicate ourselves to that. We'll include new group content and PVP periodically, and we'll make existing Ops relevant at max-level, in order to give something to those players, but our focus and commitment is going to be to crafting a compelling ongoing story."

 

All fair points, except KotFE isn't NEARLY enough story for the cost, and it isn't even that great of a story.

 

I've read fan-fic more interesting than KotFE. It isn't all that.

[Max_Killjoy]

All fair points, except KotFE isn't NEARLY enough story for the cost, and it isn't even that great of a story.

 

I've read fan-fic more interesting than KotFE. It isn't all that.

 

KotFE comes across as Vitiate fan-fic, at least from the spoilers I'm reading.

[DarthDymond]

All fair points, except KotFE isn't NEARLY enough story for the cost, and it isn't even that great of a story.

 

I've read fan-fic more interesting than KotFE. It isn't all that.

Perfectly reasonable position to have on that front - story quality is a subjective thing, one person's "oh my gawd, that was the most amazing thing!" is another person's "ugh, that was flat-out awful" and a third person's "...meh".

 

I'm enjoying it, and I'm finding my continued sub worth the expense, but I completely understand how someone else could look at it and say "this just isn't giving me the quantity / quality / type of content I'm looking for in a game to justify the cost."

[IanArgent]

KotFE comes across as Vitiate fan-fic, at least from the spoilers I'm reading.

 

 

It's not impossible for it to be, as you describe, Vitiate fan-fic. It's also not the only option the writers have left themselves - there's broad hints that what Darth Marr and the Jedi Knight believe to be the case is not true, or at least not completely true. (I haven't run a Warrior through to know what the canonical Warrior says when he encounters Valkorian). I would personally find it very hard to believe that Valkorian is the same Vitiate that devastated Ziost - Valkorian holds quite evident pride in and concern for the citizens of the Eternal Empire; whereas he is derogatory towards Arcann's Chaotic Evil tendencies and rule. He also shows very little evident Dark Side corruption, unlike almost every other serious dark-side-aligned force user (and Vitiate is canonically the Darkest of Darkside users in this time). Another point: the Knights are not darksiders. There are parallels between Valkorian and Vitiate: Valkorian is an immensely powerful dark side force user, who is the "immortal" emperor of a underdog empire that nonetheless is a power in galactic events. But, if the SI can "eat" force ghosts, why can't someone else? I will be extremely disappointed if Valkorian turns out to be the Vitiate that has been the Big Bad of the vanilla story. I will be more disappointed if Revan turns out to be a major player "somehow." What I won't be is surprised if either of those turn out to be the case - the writers have shown they can be amazingly lazy some days.

 

 

I halfway want to figure out a way to give you a start-at-60 token to use as a "throwaway" character to do KotFE on; so you can judge it for yourself. OTOH, it's a merely adequate story even if my speculations under the spoiler tag are true, and the writers have plenty of time left to disappoint.

[Max_Killjoy]

It's not impossible for it to be, as you describe, Vitiate fan-fic. It's also not the only option the writers have left themselves - there's broad hints that what Darth Marr and the Jedi Knight believe to be the case is not true, or at least not completely true. (I haven't run a Warrior through to know what the canonical Warrior says when he encounters Valkorian). I would personally find it very hard to believe that Valkorian is the same Vitiate that devastated Ziost - Valkorian holds quite evident pride in and concern for the citizens of the Eternal Empire; whereas he is derogatory towards Arcann's Chaotic Evil tendencies and rule. He also shows very little evident Dark Side corruption, unlike almost every other serious dark-side-aligned force user (and Vitiate is canonically the Darkest of Darkside users in this time). Another point: the Knights are not darksiders. There are parallels between Valkorian and Vitiate: Valkorian is an immensely powerful dark side force user, who is the "immortal" emperor of a underdog empire that nonetheless is a power in galactic events. But, if the SI can "eat" force ghosts, why can't someone else? I will be extremely disappointed if Valkorian turns out to be the Vitiate that has been the Big Bad of the vanilla story. I will be more disappointed if Revan turns out to be a major player "somehow." What I won't be is surprised if either of those turn out to be the case - the writers have shown they can be amazingly lazy some days.

 

 

I halfway want to figure out a way to give you a start-at-60 token to use as a "throwaway" character to do KotFE on; so you can judge it for yourself. OTOH, it's a merely adequate story even if my speculations under the spoiler tag are true, and the writers have plenty of time left to disappoint.

 

I have the free 60 still, I haven't used it because you just get all the defaults on all the story decisions from the class and planetary arcs.

[IanArgent]

I have the free 60 still, I haven't used it because you just get all the defaults on all the story decisions from the class and planetary arcs.

 

Hence the desire to get you a option for character you don't have to care about, other than the time invested in playing.

[Max_Killjoy]

Hence the desire to get you a option for character you don't have to care about, other than the time invested in playing.

 

Not caring about it is a pretty good way to get me to not play it. Hard to care about jumping into what amounts to someone else's character at level 60, especially when I'm not even allowed to tweak the "backstory" from all the Bioware defaults.

 

Because I received it as a gift, I played ME2 before ME1, and I felt like I was playing a cardboard cutout, or filling in for another player at an RPG player. The had to download a "savegame creator" and read up on ME1 to set up a character with some actual history, before I could really enjoy ME2 (and it was even better once I was able to download a copy of ME1 and play through it).

Edited March 15, 2016 by Max_Killjoy

[IanArgent]

Not caring about it is a pretty good way to get me to not play it. Hard to care about jumping into what amounts to someone else's character at level 60, especially when I'm not even allowed to tweak the "backstory" from all the Bioware defaults.

 

Because I received it as a gift, I played ME2 before ME1, and I felt like I was playing a cardboard cutout, or filling in for another player at an RPG player. The had to download a "savegame creator" and read up on ME1 to set up a character with some actual history, before I could really enjoy ME2 (and it was even better once I was able to download a copy of ME1 and play through it).

 

OK, I can accept that (and more than accept it; it's a pretty good viewpoint). And I would agree with the notion that it would have been nice for KotFE's start-at-60 option to have had the ability to choose at least "important" branch points (LS/DS "viewpoint," which romance flags were set, and important class decisions); though doing it in-interface rather than by being able to set up a "save game" would be tricky.

[gabigool]

Really? So people in full 192 gear in TBC standing in the laser knew what they were doing 2 years ago? What's hard to take seriously is the "But it's on the internet, it must be true" mentality required to believe that people didn't complain about noobs in HMs/Ops under the old system, and how everything was butterflies and rainbows in the Progression scene. Of course, it's either denial, or ignoring all the threads to the contrary, so that one can blame those "filthy casuals" for the any and everything.

 

You do understand that the existence of poor players years ago does not in any way invalidate my point. Nor would the presence of high-caliber players today. I am not painting the picture back in ~1.2->2.0 as butterflies and rainbows. So.... I think you aren't actually arguing my point. You're arguing with the fact that I disagreed with you.

 

The level of ability of the average new Operations player today is far below the level of ability in the past. Anyone who spends a decent amount of time doing Operations content in this game - and who has been since Denova came out - cannot possibly disagree with this statement. I'm not sure if I've ever seen anyone aside from you argue this.

 

The game simply does not prepare players for this content. If anything, it encourages new players to learn poor play. I do not blame "casuals", I blame the developers.

[Slowpokeking]

You do understand that the existence of poor players years ago does not in any way invalidate my point. Nor would the presence of high-caliber players today. I am not painting the picture back in ~1.2->2.0 as butterflies and rainbows. So.... I think you aren't actually arguing my point. You're arguing with the fact that I disagreed with you.

 

The level of ability of the average new Operations player today is far below the level of ability in the past. Anyone who spends a decent amount of time doing Operations content in this game - and who has been since Denova came out - cannot possibly disagree with this statement. I'm not sure if I've ever seen anyone aside from you argue this.

 

The game simply does not prepare players for this content. If anything, it encourages new players to learn poor play. I do not blame "casuals", I blame the developers.

 

So why still keep them and rescale them?

[Khevar]

So why still keep them and rescale them?

Why are you asking gagibool? The developers are the ones that did it.

[Slowpokeking]

Why are you asking gagibool? The developers are the ones that did it.

 

I just think it's dumb. They should make new ops if they really care about it.

[Khevar]

I just think it's dumb. They should make new ops if they really care about it.

Your posts in this thread are all over the place.

 

Sometimes you want "tactical ops". Sometimes you want old ops to be rescaled down to be faceroll easy. Sometimes you want new ops.

 

Formulate a clear though as to what you want, go to the suggestion forums, and ask for it.

[Slowpokeking]

Your posts in this thread are all over the place.

 

Sometimes you want "tactical ops". Sometimes you want old ops to be rescaled down to be faceroll easy. Sometimes you want new ops.

 

Formulate a clear though as to what you want, go to the suggestion forums, and ask for it.

 

I just think they shouldn't use these old ops to keep the challenge and make people spend so much effort on it and endure personal drama. Just let them be as easy as possible for people to enjoy. Even Revan is long gone, no point to rescale them up as zombies anyway.

Edited March 15, 2016 by Slowpokeking

[CaraExas]

maybe the next operation will have nothing but insta kill mechanics.

 

 

KAPPA

[DarthDymond]

So why still keep them and rescale them?

BW wanted to raise the level cap to 65.

BW wanted to have Raid content at par level for this new cap.

BW did not want to spend a significant amount of resources to provide this Raid content at par level for the new cap.

 

Raising the level of existing Ops allowed BW to say that there are nine max-level Ops available, without them having to expend more resources than they were willing to devote to it.