Are ops/raids outdated?

[Max_Killjoy]

So I take it you've never heard of Tactical Mode flashpoints and Story Mode operations?

[ekwalizer]

Experiences vary. Don't let a few bad experiences ruin the entire raiding aspect of this game for you. I was in an absolutely amazing raid group for over a year. We found each other right here on the forums. It was a mix of three or four small guilds. The entire group had a really awesome dynamic, everyone got along and there was no drama. The only reason I am not still raiding with them is I simply do not have the time.

 

tl;dr: There are still a lot of really great people out there that are probably in the same boat you are in. You just need to find each other.

[VegasTheLost]

It's quite simple now. Some people here think the OLD HM/NIM should still stay so hard to keep it from casuals, even though many of the elite raiders, the group that was targeted during its release, had either moved on or got bored and left due to it being very old content. They'd rather to let it die rather than make some use and fun to the majority, who wasn't able to taste it for years.

 

If you take a look at the FP, OPS, Heroic section of the forums, you can see that some guilds/raidgroups are progressing to NiM content. Guilds/raidgroups that didn't do them before 4.0 on the intended difficulty level. Why is this important? There is 'new blood'. You claim that the veteran/elite raiders left, maybe, however new ones are stepping up. Not that magnitude but they are stepping up. And it is a good thing.

 

Btw, how do you know that NiM in it's current format is not fun? Personally I think NiM has a certain appeal and can form a single group of people to high end raiders. Bringing others closer and build a group dynamic still holds a value despite KoTFE's every effort. That couldn't be bad.

[AbyKro]

The main problem is that you have to spend a lot of effort to gather people, find enough ppl for the trio combo and endure break/dc/drama, rather than focus on the game content.

 

Join a guild that is doing ops and you just have to sign up for operations easy as that:)) no need to find people,the raid leaders will do the teams and for the boring part of the operations this happens in almost every MMO,they can't realy release a new operation every month and tbh operations have become way more easyer then they used to be,i remember when HM/NIM ops where challenging

[Slowpokeking]

If you take a look at the FP, OPS, Heroic section of the forums, you can see that some guilds/raidgroups are progressing to NiM content. Guilds/raidgroups that didn't do them before 4.0 on the intended difficulty level. Why is this important? There is 'new blood'. You claim that the veteran/elite raiders left, maybe, however new ones are stepping up. Not that magnitude but they are stepping up. And it is a good thing.

 

Btw, how do you know that NiM in it's current format is not fun? Personally I think NiM has a certain appeal and can form a single group of people to high end raiders. Bringing others closer and build a group dynamic still holds a value despite KoTFE's every effort. That couldn't be bad.

 

Before 3.0 more more people were doing it. What do you mean intended level? It was designed for a certain elite group of people. When these intended group had left or moved on, why shouldn't they switch difficulty rather than let it die?

 

"New Blood"?

 

1) Few people come to SWTOR for raid challenge now due to ops is no longer a focus. Are there more raiders than the 2.0 3.0 cycle? Overall, the raiders' number is dwindling and will keep on since there is no new ops.

 

2) Even for those few raiders, these "New Blood" are going to move on or give up on raid due to no new content someday. Right now they are doing it because there is no new challenging content. Fewer and fewer people would be interested of ops due to no new content.

 

I think NIM is fun for high end raiders, but it would not be fun anymore after it's been run over for 2-3 years. Nobody is going to stay on the same PVE content forever. It's time to move on, simple.

Edited March 21, 2016 by Slowpokeking

[Max_Killjoy]

It's not for YOU to decide what is or is not fun for OTHER people.

[Slowpokeking]

It's not for YOU to decide what is or is not fun for OTHER people.

 

Then why did the raiders ask for new content and leave? Shouldn't they enjoy their fun on the same old NIM?

[VegasTheLost]

I think NIM is fun for high end raiders, but it would not be fun anymore after it's been run over for 2-3 years. Nobody is going to stay on the same PVE content forever. It's time to move on, simple.

 

So we agree that we need more new operations! Goode.

[Slowpokeking]

So we agree that we need more new operations! Goode.

 

Yeah, and when new ones have come out, the few raiders left or returned raiders will switch to these content rather than the old ones.

 

THIS, is why a content shouldn't always stay on its difficulty because people will switch their focus.

Edited March 21, 2016 by Slowpokeking

[VegasTheLost]

Yeah, and when new ones have come out, the few raiders left or returned raiders will switch to these content rather than the old ones.

 

THIS, is why a content shouldn't always stay on its difficulty because people will switch their focus.

 

What I see nowadays is that new people doing these old raids. For what reason is each of there own. But they doing it. You know I have all NiM achievements for EC. But it was a level 50 OP and I was level 60. Overleveled, overgeared, caried through. But this doesn't mean I wont do it again. Slowly but I'm getting there with my crew. And some day we will do it, even if there would be new raids at that time. You can say that this is just me, but you cannot say that we will be the only ones doing that.

With the operations scaling there are means to go back and do them again. Need an example? Here you go:

.

[Slowpokeking]

What I see nowadays is that new people doing these old raids. For what reason is each of there own. But they doing it. You know I have all NiM achievements for EC. But it was a level 50 OP and I was level 60. Overleveled, overgeared, caried through. But this doesn't mean I wont do it again. Slowly but I'm getting there with my crew. And some day we will do it, even if there would be new raids at that time. You can say that this is just me, but you cannot say that we will be the only ones doing that.

With the operations scaling there are means to go back and do them again. Need an example? Here you go:

.

 

It doesn't matter, in 3.0 there were more pugs doing EC NIM, pugs asking for NIM TFB/SNV/DF. Do we still see them now? NO. Fewer people are doing these now and it would only get worse. My guild used to do EC NIM for drop/achievement, which they don't do it anymore. Most of the pugs only do SM and EV/KP HM.

 

Once new ops comes out, people will focus on it, it's not farming, a brand new challenging content require the guild's full focus if you want to do it well. And how about the rest of them? NIM TFB SNV DF DP? Are you gonna run all of them over when new content comes out?

Edited March 21, 2016 by Slowpokeking

[VegasTheLost]

It doesn't matter, in 3.0 there were more pugs doing EC NIM, pugs asking for NIM TFB/SNV/DF. Do we still see them now? NO. Fewer people are doing these now and it would only get worse. My guild used to do EC NIM for drop/achievement, which they don't do it anymore. Most of the pugs only do SM and EV/KP HM.

 

Once new ops comes out, people will focus on it, it's not farming, a brand new challenging content require the guild's full focus if you want to do it well. And how about the rest of them? NIM TFB SNV DF DP? Are you gonna run all of them over when new content comes out?

 

You say that you don't see anymore NiM ops forming. That doesn't mean noone is doing them. The reason you saw NiM ops forming before 4.0 is because most of them didn't required much attention to do it. Overleveled and over geared, like I said. It made it easy. However you didn't see HM ToS and Rav forming do you? With your logic than noone ran them. Those when they came out required good groups. It was aimed for those good groups not for PUGs. With the ops scaling HM and NiM raids require good groups again. Groups that can work together. Some of them maybe left. But there are new players interested in raiding and they are progressing. AND THIS IS A GOOD THING.

When new raid comes out you bet I will do the old ones as well with my crew. Why? Because we find our fun doing raids. Raids are the thing keeps us together in this game. Raids are that we can do together and have fun doing it. The more raids we'll have the more choice we'll get to play together.

[Slowpokeking]

You say that you don't see anymore NiM ops forming. That doesn't mean noone is doing them. The reason you saw NiM ops forming before 4.0 is because most of them didn't required much attention to do it. Overleveled and over geared, like I said. It made it easy. However you didn't see HM ToS and Rav forming do you? With your logic than noone ran them. Those when they came out required good groups. It was aimed for those good groups not for PUGs. With the ops scaling HM and NiM raids require good groups again. Groups that can work together. Some of them maybe left. But there are new players interested in raiding and they are progressing. AND THIS IS A GOOD THING.

When new raid comes out you bet I will do the old ones as well with my crew. Why? Because we find our fun doing raids. Raids are the thing keeps us together in this game. Raids are that we can do together and have fun doing it. The more raids we'll have the more choice we'll get to play together.

I'm not saying nobody is doing it. But there were even fewer people doing it compare to 3.0 and even 2.0 and it will only get worse with/without new content.

 

Oh really? Have you really done NIM on 3.0? Other than EC, TFB, SNV, DF and DP is extremely hard for pugs while it was easier than it once was.

 

ToS and Rav are NEW OPS at that time, it was supposed to be elite guild run, I remember Bioware said too few people are doing ToS and Rav HM. It requires good groups, but good groups aren't gonna stay at the VERY OLD ops when there are new ones coming out. This is why raiders have left. You are saying new people, tell me how many elite raiders would come to this game, which got no new content and the ops is no longer a focus? It's keep dwindling.

 

Yes it's a good thing, so the raiders have left rather than "enjoy" these GOOD OPS again. So the casuals still stay away and all we got is some "New Blood" who came to a game for the hardcore ops when ops is no longer its focus.

 

So are you going to 24/7 running NIM EC, TFB, DF, DP, HM Rav, TOS plus the new content? How many people are going to do that? Yeah raid is fun, so why do you stay for a game which has no new raid content rather than those are keep offering new content? Which one would most of the raiders pick?

Edited March 21, 2016 by Slowpokeking

[VegasTheLost]

Oh really? Have you really done NIM on 3.0? Other than EC, TFB, SNV, DF and DP is extremely hard for pugs while it was easier than it once was.

 

Sorry, what?

 

ToS and Rav are NEW OPS at that time, it was supposed to be elite guild run, I remember Bioware said too few people are doing ToS and Rav HM. It requires good groups, but good groups aren't gonna stay at the VERY OLD ops when there are new ones coming out. This is why raiders have left. You are saying new people, tell me how many elite raiders would come to this game, which got no new content and the ops is no longer a focus? It's keep dwindling.

 

First off: yes we need new raids. Second: elite raiders doesn't just come in. They have to grow and now I see that some are on the path of growing. Without new raids how could someone become an elite raider? Running an easy content overleveled, overgeared and learning nothing?

 

Yes it's a good thing, so the raiders have left rather than "enjoy" these GOOD OPS again. So the casuals still stay away and all we got is some "New Blood" who came to a game for the hardcore ops when ops is no longer its focus.

 

#thankdis4KotFE

 

So are you going to 24/7 running NIM EC, TFB, DF, DP, HM Rav, TOS plus the new content? How many people are going to do that? Yeah raid is fun, so why do you stay for a game which has no new raid content rather than those are keep offering new content? Which one would most of the raiders pick?

 

Only in our game time. Yes we will do it. We will do it until we clear each and every one. I already told you why we are playing. Why is it so bad for you that we can find fun in the scaled old ops?

[IanArgent]

One thing I've noticed in a lot of anit-BW threads is that the possibility that new players might be playing the game is utterly unconsidered; or hand-waved away. OFten with an attitude that is dismissive that new players should be anything other than grateful that The Veterans are around to show the new players The Ropes. ("See the rigging over there? Those are the ropes. Old sailing joke"), and bemoaning that the new players "need to be carried."

[Slowpokeking]

Sorry, what?

How many ops will going to run at the same time?

 

 

First off: yes we need new raids. Second: elite raiders doesn't just come in. They have to grow and now I see that some are on the path of growing. Without new raids how could someone become an elite raider? Running an easy content overleveled, overgeared and learning nothing?

Without new raids, overall people who interested raid will just switch to another game, fair and simple. There is no other way

 

#thankdis4KotFE

 

What does KotFE have to do with new raids?

 

Only in our game time. Yes we will do it. We will do it until we clear each and every one. I already told you why we are playing. Why is it so bad for you that we can find fun in the scaled old ops?

 

Do you even have the time to do it? New challenging ops pretty much requires full attention of a guild to clear. How many HM/NIM ops are you doing right now?

Edited March 21, 2016 by Slowpokeking

[Slowpokeking]

One thing I've noticed in a lot of anit-BW threads is that the possibility that new players might be playing the game is utterly unconsidered; or hand-waved away. OFten with an attitude that is dismissive that new players should be anything other than grateful that The Veterans are around to show the new players The Ropes. ("See the rigging over there? Those are the ropes. Old sailing joke"), and bemoaning that the new players "need to be carried."

 

I'm not anti-BW. I just think most of the new players won't come to a game for raid when it's no longer producing new raid content.

[IanArgent]

I'm not anti-BW. I just think most of the new players won't come to a game for raid when it's no longer producing new raid content.

 

You're begging the question that there are enough players who want to come to a game "for raid." Plenty of people have posted (with sources of varying quality) that raiders have never been a large fraction of the MMO population; and given that the history of MMOs shows that raids have becomes smaller and less "Central" to the MMOs as they evolve, it's not just BW/EA that are de-emphasizing them.

 

Teh odl raids are available, at "launch difficulty" for anyone who does want to play them. BW is not (currently) working on new raids; but they've updated the current ones so they continue to be at end-game difficulty, the exact opposite of the situation prior to 4.0, where many ops were "outdated" because they were so far below the level cap as to be faintly silly.

[Slowpokeking]

You're begging the question that there are enough players who want to come to a game "for raid." Plenty of people have posted (with sources of varying quality) that raiders have never been a large fraction of the MMO population; and given that the history of MMOs shows that raids have becomes smaller and less "Central" to the MMOs as they evolve, it's not just BW/EA that are de-emphasizing them.

 

Teh odl raids are available, at "launch difficulty" for anyone who does want to play them. BW is not (currently) working on new raids; but they've updated the current ones so they continue to be at end-game difficulty, the exact opposite of the situation prior to 4.0, where many ops were "outdated" because they were so far below the level cap as to be faintly silly.

 

So with KotFE's focus, there were even less raiders now. A lot of them are bored of the same old ops, too.

 

So here is the question: WHY do you still keep these content for such a small and still dwindling group? It's not silly for them to be below the level cap. It's very silly to still rely on them to keep the difficulty. Prior to 4.0 there were more ppl running NIM.

Edited March 21, 2016 by Slowpokeking

[IanArgent]

So with KotFE's focus, there were even less raiders now. A lot of them are bored of the same old ops, too.

 

So here is the question: WHY do you still keep these content for such a small and still dwindling group? It's not silly for them to be below the level cap. It's very silly to still rely on them to keep the difficulty. Prior to 4.0 there were more ppl running NIM.

 

I thought the initial dev team made a mistake when they didn't allow for the possibility that the level cap would be raised when they initially set the mechanics up; IE, that raids(flashpoint, what have you - any and all -level-based mechanics) whose difficulty was calibrated at anything less than endgame level was a bad idea.

[Slowpokeking]

I thought the initial dev team made a mistake when they didn't allow for the possibility that the level cap would be raised when they initially set the mechanics up; IE, that raids(flashpoint, what have you - any and all -level-based mechanics) whose difficulty was calibrated at anything less than endgame level was a bad idea.

 

Because a MMO has to move on to new content, once people have moved on to new content or get bored by the old one, they aren't gonna stay on that one. So the content needs to be calibrated by level or mech when its original target had moved on.

[IanArgent]

Because a MMO has to move on to new content, once people have moved on to new content or get bored by the old one, they aren't gonna stay on that one. So the content needs to be calibrated by level or mech when its original target had moved on.

 

Again with the assumption that there are no new players; to whom the old content at the new level cap will be fresh and challenging. Raiding is an end-game activity, it should have end-game difficulty and end-game rewards.

 

I'm neutral on whether there should be new raids or not - I personally don't care one way or the other, and recognize that BW:A has limited resources. But I don't see anything inherently WrongFun about raiding; and rather wish they did have the resources to put in more raids (as long as they don't gate story content behind it - the Oricon Quest Chain still peeves me).

[Eldren]

Sorry I once enjoyed most of the ops, but right now it just feels quite boring to gather 8 ppl to do these old ones. Especially when you need to wait for certain classes(tank mostly) and stop when some others took a break/left it. Modern gamers prefer quicker content that doesn't require much time to gather a group. Sure Bioware didn't release new ops, but I think current ops style also require some work. Like removing the tank-dps-heal trio from all the ops or make all classes be able to do all three roles and reduce the size of ops group.

 

In general, any part of an MMO that requires a particular party makeup is going to have problems if some roles aren't as plentiful as others. You either wind up going the route of lower-difficulty cross-realm group finders, or you consider stepping away from the "holy trinity" of MMOs (Tank/Healer/Damage Dealer).

 

SWTOR was built on that trinity because they'd have been foolish at the time of implementation (when WoW was still around 12 million subscribers) to not take what they thought was working from WoW, and try to fix what wasn't.

 

They did. WoW lacked cohesive, involving story. They gave us that. It lacked (at the time) AOE looting. They gave us that. It lacked last names. They gave us that. It lacked personal space/"player housing", which we got in the form of our own ships. It lacked voiced-over questgivers. We got that in SPADES.

 

The first semi-successful MMO to really "get it right" by stepping outside the "holy trinity" was Wildstar. I'm still honestly not sure why the game didn't do better than it did: it's fun, good mix of storytelling and humor, its combat is active and involved (get out of that red or you're going to get hurt), and it's a graphically fun game to look at. I think they went insane with the player housing at launch (I honestly was overwhelmed with options, and with the grind to acquire some things), but otherwise, it was (and remains) a fun game. I think people were (and maybe are) just burned out on "Triple A" MMOs. Maybe people are just looking for the kind of single player experiences with optional grouping that some "offline" games provide now.

[Slowpokeking]

Again with the assumption that there are no new players; to whom the old content at the new level cap will be fresh and challenging. Raiding is an end-game activity, it should have end-game difficulty and end-game rewards.

 

I'm neutral on whether there should be new raids or not - I personally don't care one way or the other, and recognize that BW:A has limited resources. But I don't see anything inherently WrongFun about raiding; and rather wish they did have the resources to put in more raids (as long as they don't gate story content behind it - the Oricon Quest Chain still peeves me).

 

Why would new players choose to do the old ones over the new content? They aren't gonna follow up the old route, they are going to climb up directly to not fall too far behind from the new stuff. If a game is not making new raid, why would people get attracted by its raid and join the game? Even at 2.0, there were only a small percentage were doing the NIM, but compare to them the current "new players" who were trying NIM is even less. In 3.0, the NIM were more popular than now.

 

Yes, there should be end-game difficulty raid, but not every raid content should stay at end level or it will be messed up. I tried a EV HM today and got my 224 MH from it. Why would I even think about running NIM DF/DP when EV HM could give me top tier MH? If you let those extremely hard old ops stay at top level, then it's nearly impossible to put it into a "right place". I'm not totally against raid, I just think OLD raid should be pugs' fun and it's silly to keep the HM/NIM's difficulty when the raiders had moved on.

Edited March 21, 2016 by Slowpokeking

[Max_Killjoy]

Why would new players choose to do the old ones over the new content?

 

Because it's new to them?

 

You're the one obsessed with new new new content -- to a new player, all content is new.

 

~~~~

 

What is it with the obsessive posting we're seeing lately on certain topics by a handful of posters?

 

http://www.dictionary.com/browse/hobbyhorse

http://www.dictionary.com/browse/bugbear

http://www.dictionary.com/browse/compulsion

http://www.dictionary.com/browse/obsession

Edited March 21, 2016 by Max_Killjoy