An open letter to our players

[JarenWelen]

Ben, if you read this, I want you to know that I appreciate what you've said and what you've done.

 

My problem with SWTOR -- and please take this to heart, because it's shared by a lot of people -- is that we don't know where this is all going. Not story wise... I don't want to know where the story's going, that's the fun in the ongoing chapters. But GAME wise... we don't have a clear direction:

 

* We don't know why we need to get our Alliance to level 20; it's just become a grind for the sake of grinding, and while I have gotten my Alliance to 20 on one character, the rewards were almost nonexistent (you can buy those mounts cheaply on the GTN).

 

* We don't really know why we need to get our companions to such a high level because at fair (20-30) levels they seem to do just fine. Sure it's great to have a level 50 companion, but what will we need it for? Especially since we end up losing these companions during story chapter progression anyway.

 

* We don't know what will be around to engage us later. I find myself redoing old content -- NOT KOTFE CONTENT, but leveling 1-50 again for the stories there -- because I end up not having much to do. Queueing for hard mode flashpoints is an exercise in futility; it almost never pops. Story mode group-finder operations are a crap shoot; invariably the tank leaves after the first wipe. There isn't any replayable content currently at high end game that's KOTFE specific except for the star fortresses which got old quickly (and don't really offer anything new to the mix). I know we're getting the Eternal Championship but you'll have to forgive your audience for thinking it's still vaporware because we haven't seen it yet.

 

* Finally, we don't see BioWare or your team as engaged as you do. Bugs go months, if not years, without being fixed. Legitimate grievances here aren't addresses, or if they are it's pretty flippant. The 'community managers' do not engage with the community. The only real discussion here is between people posting their legitimate concerns and the people who then attack them for posting them in the first place. The only time we see people like Eric Musco is in the video-based hypefests which seldom address anyone's actual concerns and merely regurgitate already known data.

 

You took the time to provide an open letter to your players, and I respect and appreciate that. Can I ask that you therefore return the favor in kind and allow open letters like mine and the voices of so many others -- some newer, some older, some like me who have been here since the beginning -- to fall upon YOUR ears?

 

We want to love your game. We want to enjoy it. But we want to know you're hearing what we have to say, too.

 

Excellently worded.

[Exly]

I'd love it if you could point out anything in the last couple of years that they failed to deliver on.

 

Well, the biggest thing that I can think of comes out of this note taken from Dulfy's web site (http://dulfy.net/2014/10/10/swtor-new-york-cantina-tour-flash-drive-files/) that reported on the 2014 NY cantina Q&A session:

 

Why so long between Operations?

Looking ahead at the project plan they knew this was going to be a problem. However they only had two options that they could realistically go with. The first was to release an operation before the expansion, but have it quickly become obsolete come 3.0, and only have one operation available with 3.0. Or they could wait and have two for 3.0 but have a really long time without anything. It was really crappy and high end PVErs got “f*****”. It is something that they don’t want to ever do again (have that much time between operations).

 

So, since as of today at the time I am writing this there have been no new operations introduced in game, and none have even been announced, it is clear that they failed in this case.

 

Then there is the matter of the Eternal Championship. It was announced to us that it would go live on February 11 along with Chapter 10 of KotFE. Failing to do that they then told us that it would launch with chapter 11 on March 8, and then they proceeded to fail to deliver it for a second time. Now maybe the third time is a charm, and it will be released on May 3, but even if it does launch with chapter 13, they will still have failed twice to launch it when they said they would.

 

I hope that you loved having this pointed out to you as much as you thought you would.

[SerraShar]

We are committed to doing better and I think Chapter XII: Visions in the Dark shows we are serious about listening to your concerns and making meaningful changes to address them - a high quality chapter, released on time that we hope has met the expectations of our players.

 

does that mean , next chapters we will have choices that matter and that we will see in futur chapters difference in class when they are in those chapter ^

[DarthScruffy]

Yes you don't feel cheated, other people might feel cheated, why do you guys act in such a sociopathic manner, the usual "*_____ you I got mine" attitude? Why is it forbidden for a person to show dissatisfaction with how things are going? Why do you feel personally insulted and feel the absolute need to tell me that you don't share my views? Have I claimed that every single person who play this game shares my opinion? Or is it simply the proclamation that more than one person might hold this opinion that offends you? Why can't you let me show my opinion without you trying to lump me with some group or another?

 

But that also goes the other way as well. If someone feels that feature X is fine, they shouldn't be abused. With most games, for non-bug features, if someone wants "X", there is probably someone who wants "not x". They need to hear from everybody, true enough, but just because someone doesn't share the opinion of the most vocal, that doesn't mean that that person is "happy with a mediocre game".

 

This was really apparent with slot machines, pvp balance wars on the boards, level sync, ops vs. KOTFE content etc.

[Managuense]

I'd just like to say, I think it's telling how more positive a lot of the comments here are than on the thread over at the SWTOR Subreddit. Used to be this place was as bad as Mos Eisley, and the Subreddit was a lot more positive, now it's like I am living in an alternate Universe!

 

 

 

Then again...

 

Actually you should be thanking me, and all the others, who cancelled their accounts. It was us who forced this response.

[xkcurtisx]

Hi there!

 

My name is Ben Irving, Producer for Star Wars: The Old Republic. I don’t often make posts in the forums, in fact, this may be my first ever post. Despite that, our whole team, myself included try to digest all of the internet for SWTOR information – The forums, Reddit, Facebook, YouTube, etc. Recently there have been questions and concerns around the quality of our releases and the ongoing support for SWTOR and I wanted to stop by to address those concerns.

 

First off, I want to apologize for some of the issues you have experienced in the last couple of months. The monthly chapter release schedule is new and it has come with some unexpected bugs. It has caused problems for some of you and I want to say I am sorry. At our core, the SWTOR team are all gamers, just like you. We empathize with the excitement of wanting to play a great game only to be blocked by a problem. We spend all of our energy striving to make SWTOR the best game possible and when bugs and other issues get in the way of your player experience, we take it to heart. We are committed to doing better and I think Chapter XII: Visions in the Dark shows we are serious about listening to your concerns and making meaningful changes to address them - a high quality chapter, released on time that we hope has met the expectations of our players.

 

Onto the future. Is SWTOR going to receive ongoing support? The answer is absolutely yes.

 

It's worth starting with the things we have already announced, we talk about them on the monthly Producer Live Stream but I think they are still worth mentioning. We had the launch of Knights of the Fallen Empire – 9 incredible story driven chapters, 14 companion recruitment missions, Star Fortress, 5 new player levels, 30 flashpoints upgraded to be challenging again, 50 operation bosses upgraded to be challenging again, too many heroic quests to count, a revamp of the 1-60 levelling experience and a huge number of quality of life improvements. More recently we have kicked off our monthly chapter cadence and our third installment – Chapter XII: Visions in the Dark – was just released. That cadence will take us through most of the year ending with Chapter XVI, our story finale for Knights of the Fallen Empire. In addition to all the monthly chapters we have built great supporting content – Recruitment missions to explore the galaxy with some of your favorite companions, the Odessen Proving Grounds Warzone, the Rishi Cove Arena, the Eternal Championship and new levels for crafting. That’s actually more content following a major expansion than we have ever released and the team is really excited for all of you to play it.

 

The harder part to address, because you have to take my word for it, are all the features and content we are working on that we haven’t yet announced. If you follow Charles Boyd or Paul Marino on social media you may have seen some hints of this. The team recently visited our MoCap studio to create new animations. Charles Boyd spent a week at our VO studio recording more lines of dialogue for future story content. The two most exciting things to share are that our writers are deep into the plot summaries for the next season's worth of chapters and we have started the early design phase for new, non-chapter, content. You all know the drill here, I can’t talk about any of the specifics (yet) but what I can say is that we have some REALLY cool stuff to talk about later this year and the whole SWTOR team can’t wait to announce it. Soon. TM.

 

Knights of the Fallen Empire is the most successful expansion we have ever produced. It received critical acclaim from press and fan sites but most importantly, it has been successful because all of you have supported us through the expansion launch and the release of the monthly Chapters. In the eyes of all of our partners, SWTOR is a huge success. BioWare supports this game. EA supports this game. Lucasfilm supports this game. Disney supports this game. In fact, for a game that has been live for almost 5 years, we are receiving an incredible amount of support from all of our partners. It’s both amazing and humbling.

 

If there is anything I would like people reading this to take away it’s this: SWTOR is absolutely being supported into the future. We have a lot of content coming over the next few months and even more exciting things to talk about later this year. All of us here at BioWare appreciate your ongoing support and we are committed to providing the best experience possible.

 

It’s because of you, our players, that this game continues to thrive. Thank you for playing Star Wars: The Old Republic.

 

Ben Irving

 

most of this is kappa

[LtGeneralGezlin]

Actually you should be thanking me, and all the others, who cancelled their accounts. It was us who forced this response.

 

Hahahaha. Yeah, no. IF you cancelled your account, you wouldn't be here. Unless you have nothing better to do with your time than complain about a video game?

 

Also, why would I thank anyone who left and stopped supporting the game?

[Falor]

30 flashpoints upgraded to be challenging again, 50 operation bosses upgraded

 

Go look at your own Operations numbers... This decision (with no new op) actually KILLED the entire SWTOR Operations player base.... I can't even FIND players to Ops with, they all left the game.

 

Don't take those "upgrades" as a success, they were lazy. It was a design decision that was "supposed" to satiate the MOST LOYAL subscriber base, and all it did is run us all off. I did EC for like 6 months, TFB for a year, DF/DP for a year too... Hell, YOUR TEAM PROMISED that ops would never take longer than a year, again, and they not only dropped that statement on the floor, they beat it with a stick.

 

Oh, and don't talk like adding ONE warzone every 3 years is some kind of gift to your player base... It was a day late and a dollar short.

 

Get your damn praise out of that post and actually apologize for making crap end-game content (again) for KoFE...

 

~Annoyed Reddit Mod

[Managuense]

Hahahaha. Yeah, no. IF you cancelled your account, you wouldn't be here. Unless you have nothing better to do with your time than complain about a video game?

 

Also, why would I thank anyone who left and stopped supporting the game?

 

Because accounts are not pro-rated. Unfortunately I'm paid up in advance, and double so, I've paid for time when services I have purchased were not delivered.

 

It's my right to complain, even though I haven't complained as of yet.

Edited April 19, 2016 by Managuense

[Kaos_KidSWTOR]

While I love the sentiment behind this letter. It addresses none of the REAL issues behind the game.

 

Issue 1: The FRAMERATE... Oh my god, I could not find a more abysmal released game on the optimization side. SW:TOR runs at a smooth 100 FPS when i'm not in combat with anything, even on Fleet with 100+ people in the same screen. But, every time I enter into a Warzone, my FPS tanks like a rock! Operations aren't as bad, I can at least get 30 - 60 FPS, which is tolerable. But, Sub 20's with Warzones, even Arenas? Hell no that's not tolerable! Especially with my specifications being LIGHTYEARS faster than the game's recommended specs! I have an i5-6600k clocked at 4.1 Ghz, with a GTX 970, and 16 GB of RAM, with the game installed on an SSD for faster loading times.I find it appalling that I can't get at MINIMUM 60 FPS in a Warzone while i'm in combat.

 

Issue 2: Class Balance. Ok, I'm getting sick and tired of Healing Sorcerers and Hatred Assassins. I play an Annihilation Marauder, and I feel i'm pretty good at it. I don't die in 2.5s like most other Marauder players do, but I don't have anywhere near the damage and survivability combo of a Hatred Sin or a DPS Sorcerer. And, I refuse to play either of the classes, because I've put so much time into my Marauder already getting him to full 208 Augmented PvP Gear. And now i'm also working on my Operative and my Juggernaut getting them fully 208 geared! I shouldn't have to play one specific class to deal the best damage. All of the classes should have roughly equal damage between them. With Melee's initial damage being higher to compensate for the lack of Range.

 

Issue 3: Lack of Operations Content. I'm really bored of running HM's and either Facerolling them, or being curbstomped (EC HM...) Give us something fresh! Give us an Op/Solo thing like you did with Shadow Of Revan in one of the chapters! Make the end fight be Vaylin or Arcaan himself! But, we want SOMETHING...

 

Issue 4: No Incentive to do Flashpoints. I don't think i've EVER run a Flashpoint since 4.0 launched, hell even late into 3.0 I didn't do Flashpoints. There's faster ways to make Credits, Commendations, and Crafting Mats than Flashpoints, and i've seen the story to them like a kajillion times. Maybe you should Re-Work flashpoints to where they give a slightly less powerful Set Bonus 4 set that can be used as a stepping stone to Operations content? But, give us SOMETHING to do in them. They aren't even that great for leveling with...

[Foxpthree]

Please new raids. Announce new raids!

[BrianDavion]

You talk about new content but yet you still haven't fixed the massive amounts of bugs that are already existing.

 

Please, for the love of god, fix the broken things first.

 

I'd rather they ya know.. did both

[TX_Angel]

First off, I want to apologize for some of the issues you have experienced in the last couple of months. The monthly chapter release schedule is new and it has come with some unexpected bugs. It has caused problems for some of you and I want to say I am sorry.

 

The apology doesn't mean much without fixes.

 

Had you said "we are very sorry for the problems, we have secured additional funding from EA to hire 50 more staff to improve the pace of development", then it would mean something.

 

As it stands, the words are hollow without a plan of action to change course.

 

Onto the future. Is SWTOR going to receive ongoing support? The answer is absolutely yes.

 

A statement that sounds great, but says nothing. SWG received ongoing support after "Rise of Obi-Wan" in 2005, but lets be honest, nothing new worth talking about happened after that up until 2011 when the game shut down.

 

It's worth starting with the things we have already announced, we talk about them on the monthly Producer Live Stream but I think they are still worth mentioning. We had the launch of Knights of the Fallen Empire – 9 incredible story driven chapters, 14 companion recruitment missions, Star Fortress, 5 new player levels, 30 flashpoints upgraded to be challenging again, 50 operation bosses upgraded to be challenging again, too many heroic quests to count, a revamp of the 1-60 levelling experience and a huge number of quality of life improvements.

 

Those aren't things you've announced, those are past things you've already done. As it stands, it appears that you have nothing planned for the future beyond KotFE.

 

Most of that list above is just rehashing existing content. Almost nothing new, beyond a short single player story, has been released since 2014.

 

More recently we have kicked off our monthly chapter cadence and our third installment – Chapter XII: Visions in the Dark – was just released. That cadence will take us through most of the year ending with Chapter XVI, our story finale for Knights of the Fallen Empire.

 

Translation, we're asking you nicely to pay us $180 a year to play a now single player game that has old MMOish stuff in it.

 

That’s actually more content following a major expansion than we have ever released and the team is really excited for all of you to play it.

 

That is one of the saddest statements I've ever read. It does not speak well of your development team or your plans.

 

You are riding the coattails of Star Wars, because if this game were not "Star Wars", you would be long out of business.

 

The two most exciting things to share are that our writers are deep into the plot summaries for the next season's worth of chapters and we have started the early design phase for new, non-chapter, content.

 

Translation: We want you to pay $180 NEXT year for a single player game as well.

 

Knights of the Fallen Empire is the most successful expansion we have ever produced. It received critical acclaim from press and fan sites but most importantly, it has been successful because all of you have supported us through the expansion launch and the release of the monthly Chapters. In the eyes of all of our partners, SWTOR is a huge success. BioWare supports this game. EA supports this game. Lucasfilm supports this game. Disney supports this game. In fact, for a game that has been live for almost 5 years, we are receiving an incredible amount of support from all of our partners. It’s both amazing and humbling.

 

If you actually believe that, then you've drunk all the kool-aid and you have no idea what it looks like from outside.

 

If there is anything I would like people reading this to take away it’s this: SWTOR is absolutely being supported into the future. We have a lot of content coming over the next few months and even more exciting things to talk about later this year. All of us here at BioWare appreciate your ongoing support and we are committed to providing the best experience possible.

 

It’s because of you, our players, that this game continues to thrive. Thank you for playing Star Wars: The Old Republic.

 

Ben Irving

 

Translation: It is time to unsub...

[christianchalx]

Thanks for the post, really apreciated. And please do this more often, we like to hear what is going on, it really helps.

[JMCA]

Go look at your own Operations numbers... This decision (with no new op) actually KILLED the entire SWTOR Operations player base.... I can't even FIND players to Ops with, they all left the game.

 

Don't take those "upgrades" as a success, they were lazy. It was a design decision that was "supposed" to satiate the MOST LOYAL subscriber base, and all it did is run us all off. I did EC for like 6 months, TFB for a year, DF/DP for a year too... Hell, YOUR TEAM PROMISED that ops would never take longer than a year, again, and they not only dropped that statement on the floor, they beat it with a stick.

 

Oh, and don't talk like adding ONE warzone every 3 years is some kind of gift to your player base... It was a day late and a dollar short.

 

Get your damn praise out of that post and actually apologize for making crap end-game content (again) for KoFE...

 

~Annoyed Reddit Mod

 

If you people are that selfish as to think that your needs for something brand new overshadow the single most inclusive change to the endgame this game has ever seen you are COMPLETELY DELUSIONAL.

 

You, sir, do not belong on ANY authority position related to this game.

 

Step down as a mod of Reddit. Get out of the community.

 

We don't want you here anymore.

[mikebevo]

Why does this remind me of a general manager giving a vote of confidence to the head coach 3 days before they fire him?

 

All the doom and gloom threads in the forum about game dying and this is the one that makes me believe it is.

[Lil_Fusion]

Mate if you looked for information via google, reddit, fansites, your own gosh darn forums you'd see people don't give a crap about KOTFE they want new RAIDS new group content they can enjoy with their friends not 10-30 minutes of story content you call golden because let's face it, it's really not.. put this story crap on the back burner and get to the crap people want.. Release raids then release story crap in subsequent patches. You don't just outright ignore your PvE and PvP communities respectively for years while you make up these crappy predictable stories. Edited April 19, 2016 by Lil_Fusion

[Warrgames]

Sorry I'm not going to be nice and thank you for your load of crap post Ben. Your apologize doesn't mean ****, till you at least try and fix the issues you are apologizing for. Lets be honest things aren't getting better; the are getting worse. There is zero commutation about anything going on with the game on the forums. I'm not going to create Twitter, Facebook or any other social media account just to find out what going on with the SWTOR. Maybe you should try and make some changes than apologize too us. As it stand right now, SWTOR is barely worth $15 a month.

[JigaarCo]

An actively developed game is one that receives new content regularly, an that is not a 2 hour solo content once a month, please tell me how that is an mmo? we need regular supply of PVE and PVP materials, operation, warzones etc. getting a new wz map once every 3 years or a new operations once every two years is by no means in any book an active development in any mmo... please don't fool yourselves

[xDanekx]

What about new raids? ^_^

[Mornyr]

A lot has already been said here and I don't want to be too redundant, but I'm compelled to at least add my two cents about this.

 

This open letter is appreciated, but as far as I'm concerned, with any game, I'll believe it when I see (and play) it. Don't tell me that the changes you've made are awesome or that the content you have planned is amazing. It means literally nothing. I form my opinion on the game by playing it, not by reading about it or hearing about it in livestreams. And that evidently needs to be said, because you really screwed the pooch on endgame PvE with this expansion, so don't try and tell me it's been incredible. You meant to lower the barrier for entry, but instead you removed it completely. With the bolster on SM and all of them being available at level 50, the whole concept of gearing up for ops is moot. Heck, the only reason I even play Ilum anymore is because I can't abandon that damn quest, I'm usually level 60+ by the time I get there anyway. I've seen so many new players who don't even know that they have no idea what they're doing, because there isn't even an iota of challenge to the leveling and early-endgame process. Having ops like EV and KP drop the same tier of gear as Rav and ToS is ludicrous. By bringing all the ops to the same level in terms of drops, or gear and level requirement, you've only made the more mechanically challenging ops nearly irrelevant, because you can get that same gear much more easily, so why bother? There's nothing to work up to. With the priority HM ops it becomes a sort of race, once one of the easier ones is on priority, to do as many runs with as many alts as possible, until I'm sick of it, but that's the only ops that any groups are forming for. Running flashpoints has become entirely pointless, even if you can get a group the rewards are garbage. Even the Star Fortresses got very old very quickly. At least before you could fall back on some solo story content on an alt or something, but with SoR and KotFE everything plays out exactly the same for every class, give or take the ability to skip a tedious quest (*cough*Qyzen*cough*). I don't know, you may yet live up to the promise of "meaningful choices that matter", but all I can think of is a certain choice made outside the Gravestone that appeared to be very conflicting, but ended up playing out the same either way. The story of KotFE is fine, I'm enjoying it, but it did not blow me away at all. At least for me it ends up being nothing more than an hour or two on my main every month, and I'm no longer sure that that's enough to keep me subscribed. The branching story and the unique class experiences are what set this game apart, and it's not there anymore.

 

I still love this game, and I still recommend it to people, if only for the amazing 1-50 experience and for the chance to play it with friends. But the feeling I'm getting is that the dev team is simply too small to give this game what it needs. I bet you're sick and tired of this comparison, but I just renewed my WoW sub. There is a LOT of stuff I don't like at all about WoW, but at least it keeps giving me stuff to do. SWTOR doesn't, not any more.

[DisIzMe]

Please new raids. Announce new raids!

 

"....and we have started the early design phase for new, non-chapter, content. You all know the drill here, I can’t talk about any of the specifics (yet) but what I can say is that we have some REALLY cool stuff to talk about later this year and the whole SWTOR team can’t wait to announce it. Soon. TM."

 

Thats the only thing in the (much welcomed,please do this more often, guys,please) announcement that may be hinting to new operations. The thing is, IF it is indeed mentioning traditional operations and not some eternal arena coop it means that new one will most probably not be coming out this year anyway. Early design phase and such.

[DisIzMe]

 

You, sir, do not belong on ANY authority position related to this game.

 

Step down as a mod of Reddit. Get out of the community.

 

We don't want you here anymore.

 

We,as in Trolls United? Or as an individual that feels entitled to speak for others without any reason to do so.

[gabigool]

Hi there!

 

My name is Ben Irving, Producer for Star Wars: The Old Republic. I don’t often make posts in the forums, in fact, this may be my first ever post. Despite that, our whole team, myself included try to digest all of the internet for SWTOR information – The forums, Reddit, Facebook, YouTube, etc. Recently there have been questions and concerns around the quality of our releases and the ongoing support for SWTOR and I wanted to stop by to address those concerns.

 

First off, I want to apologize for some of the issues you have experienced in the last couple of months. The monthly chapter release schedule is new and it has come with some unexpected bugs. It has caused problems for some of you and I want to say I am sorry. At our core, the SWTOR team are all gamers, just like you. We empathize with the excitement of wanting to play a great game only to be blocked by a problem. We spend all of our energy striving to make SWTOR the best game possible and when bugs and other issues get in the way of your player experience, we take it to heart. We are committed to doing better and I think Chapter XII: Visions in the Dark shows we are serious about listening to your concerns and making meaningful changes to address them - a high quality chapter, released on time that we hope has met the expectations of our players.

 

Onto the future. Is SWTOR going to receive ongoing support? The answer is absolutely yes.

 

It's worth starting with the things we have already announced, we talk about them on the monthly Producer Live Stream but I think they are still worth mentioning. We had the launch of Knights of the Fallen Empire – 9 incredible story driven chapters, 14 companion recruitment missions, Star Fortress, 5 new player levels, 30 flashpoints upgraded to be challenging again, 50 operation bosses upgraded to be challenging again, too many heroic quests to count, a revamp of the 1-60 levelling experience and a huge number of quality of life improvements. More recently we have kicked off our monthly chapter cadence and our third installment – Chapter XII: Visions in the Dark – was just released. That cadence will take us through most of the year ending with Chapter XVI, our story finale for Knights of the Fallen Empire. In addition to all the monthly chapters we have built great supporting content – Recruitment missions to explore the galaxy with some of your favorite companions, the Odessen Proving Grounds Warzone, the Rishi Cove Arena, the Eternal Championship and new levels for crafting. That’s actually more content following a major expansion than we have ever released and the team is really excited for all of you to play it.

 

The harder part to address, because you have to take my word for it, are all the features and content we are working on that we haven’t yet announced. If you follow Charles Boyd or Paul Marino on social media you may have seen some hints of this. The team recently visited our MoCap studio to create new animations. Charles Boyd spent a week at our VO studio recording more lines of dialogue for future story content. The two most exciting things to share are that our writers are deep into the plot summaries for the next season's worth of chapters and we have started the early design phase for new, non-chapter, content. You all know the drill here, I can’t talk about any of the specifics (yet) but what I can say is that we have some REALLY cool stuff to talk about later this year and the whole SWTOR team can’t wait to announce it. Soon. TM.

 

Knights of the Fallen Empire is the most successful expansion we have ever produced. It received critical acclaim from press and fan sites but most importantly, it has been successful because all of you have supported us through the expansion launch and the release of the monthly Chapters. In the eyes of all of our partners, SWTOR is a huge success. BioWare supports this game. EA supports this game. Lucasfilm supports this game. Disney supports this game. In fact, for a game that has been live for almost 5 years, we are receiving an incredible amount of support from all of our partners. It’s both amazing and humbling.

 

If there is anything I would like people reading this to take away it’s this: SWTOR is absolutely being supported into the future. We have a lot of content coming over the next few months and even more exciting things to talk about later this year. All of us here at BioWare appreciate your ongoing support and we are committed to providing the best experience possible.

 

It’s because of you, our players, that this game continues to thrive. Thank you for playing Star Wars: The Old Republic.

 

Ben Irving

 

 

Ben, You need to understand that this post basically reads as a pat on the back. For yourself.

 

We don't need to read how much you love the game. We need to address the elephant in the room which is that there has been absolute *********** silence about group content since George's post last, what, June? July? Ben - this is an MMO. This communication is meaningless.

 

You don't go 14 months - then have a BW employee flat out say there would never be that long of a wait again - then follow it up with a longer period of time and not even have the courtesy to mention it.

 

What have you just said? Stay tuned?

 

For what? More solo content? Wait - you're going to put in 7 new Star Fortresses? HK-inspired industrial cleaning solvent? Oh, I know. You're going to announce the release of the Eternal Championship. For the third time.

 

Operations. What's the deal. That's all we need to hear from you. there is literally nothing else of value you can add with a post like this. If you have new Operations in the works, let us know.

 

It's ok if you don't know when. It's ok if you don't know much else.

 

Are they coming. Someday. Ever.

 

That's all the info I am looking for, and it's become beyond a running joke with EVERY player I play with, on multiple servers and in multiple guilds.

 

Focus on story all you want. But this isn't focus. This is total abandonment of one of the core pillars this game was built upon. The fact that these streams are swarmed in chat asking for some info on Operations and you guys ignore the question is beyond frustrating for many of us that have been playing this game for the last 4+ years.

 

Soon is not what any of us want to hear. You're asking for trust - it's hard to give that freely when the decision making by your team over the last year WRT Operations content is looked at in totality.

 

You've removed any semblance of logical player development/growth by neutering the value of Flashpoints where players learned roles and the core group gameplay principles. Now, at level 50, I can queue into a SM Operation, get bolstered and have a complete set of raid gear before I can even equip it.

 

You've taken away the need for proportional risk/reward with the creation of the HHM system. What used to require a HM Revan kill is now obtainable from SoA.

 

SoA.

 

Look at the tuning of Torque. Master Blaster. Cora. Objectively - they make zero sense. I won't even discuss tacticals.

 

And there's that whole part where you guys won't even say the word Operation. It's so unimportant to you guys, no one there even thought to check a single instance when you guys released the update that broke telegraphs. In what universe does that bug make it to live unless you don't even have people check a single Operation to see what's broke.

 

I feel like Billy Crystal's wife in Princess Bride. I'm following you around yelling "Operations! Operations! Operations!" while you cover your ears, screaming "Stop saying that name!".

 

Ben, give us a crumb. Are new Operations part of the plan for the next 12 months of this game? We shouldn't have to wait until Soon for that answer. I think those of us that still choose to pay for this game despite your treatment of group content recently have waited plenty already.

[cyrusramsey]

This felt like one, sometimes two genuine sentences to start out each paragraph, followed by a stream of PR slogans. Except maybe the last paragraph. I'm tired of being told how great things will be.