Genuine group content/solo content question

[DoctorBeckett]

With people yelling about "no group content", why is it that a majority of people I talk to in game, say they prefer the solo RPG experience? I'm finding it difficult to recruit for my guilds because of the "no group content." People just want the entitled XP boosts and GB stuff associated with it. Am I missing something wanting to build my guilds so we can do ops/PvP/FPs,etc (Ops, which I've never done in the 5 years I've been playing, btw!!)?

~Hawke~

[Bobs_YourUncle]

Probably because a lot of the group content players left.

[JOrifice]

With people yelling about "no group content", why is it that a majority of people I talk to in game, say they prefer the solo RPG experience? I'm finding it difficult to recruit for my guilds because of the "no group content." People just want the entitled XP boosts and GB stuff associated with it. Am I missing something wanting to build my guilds so we can do ops/PvP/FPs,etc (Ops, which I've never done in the 5 years I've been playing, btw!!)?

~Hawke~

 

Honestly?

Gaming is no longer a teenage, middle class, males' hobby.

Now there is a much wider demographic and the age has seriously increased.

It used to be that anyone who was online had the time and resources to spare and were willing to spend serious amounts of both. Now, not so much. People are older, have more responsibilities (jobs, families, etc.) and have much more varied interests. For a lot of people MMO's have become "social" games, rather than multiplayer games.

[Chiltonium]

With people yelling about "no group content", why is it that a majority of people I talk to in game, say they prefer the solo RPG experience? I'm finding it difficult to recruit for my guilds because of the "no group content." People just want the entitled XP boosts and GB stuff associated with it. Am I missing something wanting to build my guilds so we can do ops/PvP/FPs,etc (Ops, which I've never done in the 5 years I've been playing, btw!!)?

~Hawke~

 

because their player count dropped from the millions to 400k at best. All the people that wanted an MMO left, all the people that wanted a single player RPG stayed.

[americanaussie]

Because I'm scared people will go off on me for not knowing my class as well as I should. People have short tempers and internet anonymity makes people bad. Panic/frantically hit throw ball in the 2 seconds that you have the huttball while being slaughtered/stunned by 8 opposing team members and you'll be cursed out by your team for being a dumbbutt. Even if in the last game you made 4 goals and were MVP. I do group content with people I know or if a guildie needs something, but I love the ability to go at my own pace in a solo if my friends aren't around. I get all nervous now queuing for pvp. There are new pvp games since I last played and the last time I couldn't figure out what the heck we needed to do or the layout and everyone expects you to be a pro from the start. I'd probably queue for an op that I already knew about and was certain my armor was enough but I really really don't want to even attempt pvp any more. There's no learning curve.

[AllisonLightning]

Because I'm scared people will go off on me for not knowing my class as well as I should. People have short tempers and internet anonymity makes people bad. Panic/frantically hit throw ball in the 2 seconds that you have the huttball while being slaughtered/stunned by 8 opposing team members and you'll be cursed out by your team for being a dumbbutt. Even if in the last game you made 4 goals and were MVP. I do group content with people I know or if a guildie needs something, but I love the ability to go at my own pace in a solo if my friends aren't around. I get all nervous now queuing for pvp. There are new pvp games since I last played and the last time I couldn't figure out what the heck we needed to do or the layout and everyone expects you to be a pro from the start. I'd probably queue for an op that I already knew about and was certain my armor was enough but I really really don't want to even attempt pvp any more. There's no learning curve.

 

I'm actually half decent at PvP, a lot of the times when I'm bad, I'm getting absolutely murdered by lag where characters are literally re-appearing and moving so fast compared to me, I'm struggling just to land blows before their ability comes into it. I can't touch ranked for that reason and get steamed when people act like complete jerks, if you're really all that, go queue ranked- everyone who is so good queued rank, they wouldn't be complaining that no one ever queues on chat.

[Costello]

Probably because a lot of the group content players left.

 

Pretty much this.

 

From a limited sample of the people i used to raid with it was felt that WoW offered the levels of group content they were after so they went there.

 

Now BW have no reason to produce group content as it will only appeal to a small percentage of the player base, as if your playing this game for group content you must like repeating the same operations where you know the mechanics backwards. And if two year old ops don't appeal then your not hear for the group content and the introduction of new ops will be competing against Legion (or other MMO's that have more frequent updates) and I'm fairly certain even BW know that is a fight they would lose with the speed at which they introduce new content.

[JLazarillo]

The real problem is that grouping is a chore in this game. Most of it requires specifically balanced teams and a significant time investment. You can't just grab a couple friends and do whatever for 30 minutes or however long everyone's on. The only things that would be exceptions to this would be Heroic runs, which are still more efficiently done solo unless you want the teaming bonus rewards, and Tactical FPs, which also mostly just give booby-prizes (not to mention even some Tacticals, really can't just be done by "anyone" anyway).

 

The way the game's designed, most people just see more bang for their buck in the solo content, and personally, I don't necessarily think that's a bad thing. It might be fun if grouping were simpler/more rewarding, but honestly not if it comes at the cost of ruining the pretty good solo experience this game already has going.

[americanaussie]

I'm actually half decent at PvP, a lot of the times when I'm bad, I'm getting absolutely murdered by lag where characters are literally re-appearing and moving so fast compared to me, I'm struggling just to land blows before their ability comes into it. I can't touch ranked for that reason and get steamed when people act like complete jerks, if you're really all that, go queue ranked- everyone who is so good queued rank, they wouldn't be complaining that no one ever queues on chat.

 

 

True. I'm in australia so my latency is 186ms at the best of times. It's not great. It might improve when we get the national broadband network but that's not for some months yet.

[jasoneth]

True. I'm in australia so my latency is 186ms at the best of times. It's not great. It might improve when we get the national broadband network but that's not for some months yet.

Unfortunately the NBN won't help when it gets to you. I moved to a house with fiber-to-the-premises (100 MB/s down, 40 MB/s up); infinitely better than my previous ADSL. My in-game latency in SWTOR didn't change at all.

 

That's because SWTOR, like most (if not all) MMOs actually sends very little data between your client and the server. All the heavy-weight stuff (textures, images, etc) are stored on your harddrive, not sent from BioWare's servers. Switching to the NBN gives you a vastly wider pipe, so you can receive more data at once, BUT the length of the pipe is what defines our latency, and that is unchanged. (Technically, it's not the physical distance between us in Australia and the US-based servers, but the number of hops--routers and switches--that slow things down.)

 

As to Hawke's question in the OP, I agree with what others have said: those who wanted an MMO have moved onto greener pastures; thus most of those remaining want what SWTOR has become, multi-player KOTOR, a single-player RPG in a shared world.

[Halinalle]

Many players wanted KotOR3 instead and they really thought SWTOR would be KotOR3 but it wasn't. So they have been complaining about it since launch.

[LyraineAlei]

Honestly?

Gaming is no longer a teenage, middle class, males' hobby.

Now there is a much wider demographic and the age has seriously increased.

It used to be that anyone who was online had the time and resources to spare and were willing to spend serious amounts of both. Now, not so much. People are older, have more responsibilities (jobs, families, etc.) and have much more varied interests. For a lot of people MMO's have become "social" games, rather than multiplayer games.

 

^ People grow up, still love to game, but don't always have the time.

 

Because I'm scared people will go off on me for not knowing my class as well as I should. People have short tempers and internet anonymity makes people bad.[... ]I do group content with people I know or if a guildie needs something, but I love the ability to go at my own pace in a solo if my friends aren't around.

 

^ Subtract the guildie part since I don't even guild due to a lack of a consistent schedule. I do PvP, but it can be crudshoot on if I get into a group that wants to measure epens or whatever or people running the daily/weekly who know that regardless of win/loss, the quest will be done.

 

The real problem is that grouping is a chore in this game. Most of it requires specifically balanced teams and a significant time investment. You can't just grab a couple friends and do whatever for 30 minutes or however long everyone's on. The only things that would be exceptions to this would be Heroic runs, which are still more efficiently done solo unless you want the teaming bonus rewards, and Tactical FPs, which also mostly just give booby-prizes (not to mention even some Tacticals, really can't just be done by "anyone" anyway).

 

The way the game's designed, most people just see more bang for their buck in the solo content, and personally, I don't necessarily think that's a bad thing. It might be fun if grouping were simpler/more rewarding, but honestly not if it comes at the cost of ruining the pretty good solo experience this game already has going.

 

^ It's a chore when I can read the LFGs for HMs, SM Ops, HM Ops, so forth from the same people for over an hour, and suspect that if I were to look into those, that would be my fate as well. And then there's the content that could be very long or very short (Hoth Class Quest versus Quesh Class Quest, for example. Or Eseless versus Taral V) in terms of time spent on them.

 

/that's all I have to add, really.

[DarthCDiv]

because their player count dropped from the millions to 400k at best. All the people that wanted an MMO left, all the people that wanted a single player RPG stayed.

 

I play this game about as much as any other game and I treat it as a single player rpg. That's where it's strengths are, for me. I have convinced a friend to try it out with me soon, though.

[Chiltonium]

I play this game about as much as any other game and I treat it as a single player rpg. That's where it's strengths are, for me. I have convinced a friend to try it out with me soon, though.

 

Lucky

 

When the game came out I was still in the Navy, I invited about 200 people from my ship, 64 or so signed up, and 5 other friends I've been playing MMOs with since EQ1 in 99.

 

0 of them still play The last of them left 1 year ago after no new ops or group stuff had come out. I only come back once every 6-8 months to play the new stuff, pvp a bit, and wait another 6-8.

[peter_plankskull]

I play this game about as much as any other game and I treat it as a single player rpg. That's where it's strengths are, for me. I have convinced a friend to try it out with me soon, though.

 

It wants to be a RPG, but besides the story quality, which is debatable, it holds NOTHING even having the remote positives of a RPG.

 

Multiple endings? No.

Different difficulties? No

Multiple playthroughs? No

Disconnect from previous story? Yes

 

Theirs what's above... and the general qualify of it generally just feels... lower... than other games. Companion interaction compared to the ME series looks... lacking... morality choices are... boring... and don't have any real outcomes. Blowing up the spire in chapter X literally does nothing good, at all, the Eternal Empire isn't weakened, a companion isn't prevented from death, if anything, it's a complete negative and you lose the grave stone.

 

Blowing up the Spire should have actual positives, AND negatives, as should not blowing it up, each decision should be measured carefully in a role playing manner, and a tactical manner. Would you be willing to potentially hurt your alliance to prevent the death of your favorite love interest, or maybe stay true to your goal in defeating the Eternal Empire? Maybe your lust for revenge outweighs the love of your companion, and you let anger take over. So far, none of any morality choices have been anything remotely as mentioned above, and is incredibly skewed to a light side perspective, and this is coming from someone who has NEVER made a DS character.

[HuaRya]

It's a shame that a game that seemed to have operations as it's centerpiece up until 2014. The skills and attributes of each class are quite brilliant. All it would really take is 1-3 new operations to bring that demographic back to the game. Give them a unique mount and the highest tiered gear that looks cool and they will be content.

 

As far as the Solo Player

 

It would be massively fun if we could do flash points using multiple companions. We have so many companions now it would be fun to assign tank/healer/dps in different combinations and tackle flash points. I say this because the real raiders never much cared for FP's and getting groups together is tedious. I know my healer companion won't rage quit if we wipe forcing us to wait in the queue for an hour.

[AllisonLightning]

It would be massively fun if we could do flash points using multiple companions. We have so many companions now it would be fun to assign tank/healer/dps in different combinations and tackle flash points. I say this because the real raiders never much cared for FP's and getting groups together is tedious. I know my healer companion won't rage quit if we wipe forcing us to wait in the queue for an hour.

 

Maybe a) immediately summon your healer companion were they so perfect and b) although I don't do this, maybe I don't know, don't look to dump the wipe on the healer. It irritates me to no end when I've gotten groups through final bosses in spite of their best efforts to die and make it as hard as possible for me to heal them, constantly charging into mobs and forgetting to heal themselves between groups.

 

I've only rage quit as a healer once- when a low level kick-voted the max level DPS and didn't consult the group and acted like they were all three roles.

[DoctorBeckett]

Honestly, I've always been a solo player. I enjoyed it. I never cared about Ops or PvP or anything that couldn't be solo'd. but now I want to experience the MMO side of things in the game. I will not leave the game, no matter how much people complain or put the game down. (It's Star Wars a KOTOR sequel, man!! I look at it as it is, but that's an argument for another time!!)

 

I was reading that Bioware got rid of (or the person left) their lead Raid designer awhile ago. It never really hit me until recently. Why don't they bring someone in? I'm sure that that would satisfy people screaming for raids.

 

In the mean time, what do I do about my guilds for the long term? Are guilds dying because of the "no group content"? Or is it as some have said here, that tastes change and real life has interfered with gameplay?

~Hawke~

[gabigool]

Contrary to many of the replies, I assume it's simply because you don't interact with anyone that does group content. If you did, you would hear the exact opposite. I've been playing this game for 5 years and I don't think I have ever spoken to a single player - ever - that implied they preferred soloing to group play.

 

Neither of us has a perspective that gives us a clue as to what the majority of players want.

 

What I do know, is that most group players also do solo content when they are not grouping, however not vice versa.

 

It stands to reason the solo numbers should naturally be higher. But none of us has the metrics except BW, and I suspect their analysis of those numbers does not factor in that group players are not here for the solo content.

[ImmortalLowlife]

Because I wanted Kotor 3. Instead they (EA) wanted to jump on the WoW train & make an mmo.

 

Thankfully.... they've now made SWTOR more "solo friendly" so I don't have to group with other players if I don't want to. 98.9% of the time... I DON'T want to. I wanna enjoy playing MY way without someone telling me to "spacebarrrrrr!" Through the cut scenes I've seen 100 times. I wanna stop and gather mats when I see them. I wanna step afk to listen to my 5yr old daughters sing the song they learned at school today. I wanna stop in the middle of a flashpoint and watch some video my wife wants me to see....

 

Now don't get me wrong, if YOU want to group for everything... Then by all means you should have something you enjoy doing.

 

But as for me... It's a single player RPG and I'm loving it. I enjoy it so much I'm willing to pay a monthly fee to play it.

 

*drops mic and plays through KotFE with character #38

Edited September 10, 2016 by ImmortalLowlife

[Tsillah]

I could've been ok with the solo player approach and just play the game socially, but then the solo player content has to be diverse and interesting enough. They've failed to do that with KotFE which is rather ironic, since the focus was on the solo player, but they haven't delivered even on that.

 

I would like more and better group content, but if the focus remains on story could you at least do that well BW? In fact whatever you're going to do, do it well this time. It's been a while.

[IanArgent]

The class storylines weren't that much better (and I think a couple were overall worse) than the KotFE storyline. They have the exact same amount of replayability IMO as the KotFE story (different convo choices leading to the same story "chokepoints"). And it's better than most of the planetary story arcs.

 

I've chosen to replay two classes I've already done (and choose different convo options, in the main) because I happened to want to do the "other" AC for those two classes (I've done a Commando and an Assassin, now I'm in the middle of a Vanguard and will shortly be doing a Sorcerer). So I've got a relatively fresh view of the original storyline; and, quite frankly, I'm looking forward to KotFE, where I'm at least nominally in control of my own destiny (in-story) instead of being Theron and Lana's pawn in SoR, or Gen Garza's pawn in whatever game she's playing in the Trooper storyline; or being an utter idiot in the Inq storyline...

[Tsillah]

The class storylines weren't that much better (and I think a couple were overall worse) than the KotFE storyline. They have the exact same amount of replayability IMO as the KotFE story (different convo choices leading to the same story "chokepoints"). And it's better than most of the planetary story arcs.

 

No, just no. From level 1-50 there are 8 stories. Now there is 1. If you do not see the difference between 1 and 8 I cannot help you.

The added bonus of having 8 stories is not only that there are 8 to choose from which gives leveling characters more replay value but also you can alternate between stories. That combination creates a lot of replay value.

Then there is a third benefit. The stories were individual to your class type and therefore could be tailored to your class.

 

Knights of the Failed Expansion does not deliver anything equal to that.

It has 1 story for all.

Choice doesn't really matter in the end because the same main events still happen.

The story doesn't really fit any class because it's a mash up of tech and force user stuff that fits with none but because of the main line dealing with a force entity playin in your head it still favours the force classes.

 

Then the KotFE story line is full of plot holes and honestly ridiculous plot twists. Now every story will have some of that, it's not high literature we're talking about here but KotFE goes above and beyond in this and I find it frankly disturbing because it makes my character, the outlander look like a fool instead of a hero. If you blissfully missed all of that I am happy for you.

 

I'm looking forward to KotFE, where I'm at least nominally in control of my own destiny (in-story) instead of being Theron and Lana's pawn in SoR, or Gen Garza's pawn in whatever game she's playing in the Trooper storyline; or being an utter idiot in the Inq storyline...

 

I suspect you mean KotET but guess what? In SoR (which was not the original story line either and also was a step down), you are the pawn of Lana and Theron but in KotFE you are the pawn of Koth and Senya. Frankly it baffles me that you missed that.

Koth gets to do whatever he wants and you don't. Senya fails to deal with her psychopath children on two occasions but you can't push her out because she's a major part of the story.

 

Same difference, same bull. And yes, you could argue such things existed in the original storyline but here's the thing. In the original story the npc's where part of the story, after the original story the continuing story is built ON the npc's.

 

And that's what screws it up. BW are too trigger happy to resurrect dead npcs or not allow you to have any effect on them (Arcann anyone?). At least with Garza you could convince her into retirement and all the main opponents in the core story you get to kill at the end of the story.

 

You tell me, who is the bad guy now? Is it...

 

Valkorion?

Arcann?

Vaylin?

Scorpio?

Koth? (First betrays me, then kills my ship because he knows better and I don't get to even try to stop him)

What about Senya?

Are they gonna resurrect Thexan now?

 

I mean, how many powerful enemies do we need to have before we get to actually finish one of them off?

 

Seriously, it makes no sense to have so many powerful enemies in one go. It's just getting out of hand and Valkorion for example barely gets any play time in the later chapters of KotFE.

 

All they are doing is throw big happenings at us and pulling all the bad *** characters out of any old closet they can just to distract you from the fact they don't have real ideas anymore and don't know how to write a proper story or so it seems.

Edited September 10, 2016 by Tsillah

[ImmortalLowlife]

And to those who seem to hate the story being told, I'm reminded of something John Campea likes to say "All film is subjective...".

 

So while the stories from SoR through KotFE are not "Game of the year" worthy, I find tremendous replay value in them personally.

[peter_plankskull]

And to those who seem to hate the story being told, I'm reminded of something John Campea likes to say "All film is subjective...".

 

So while the stories from SoR through KotFE are not "Game of the year" worthy, I find tremendous replay value in them personally.

 

I suppose a rock makes a great friend too... I suppose that, after all, it IS subjective, but unless you can state how or why it has replay value, then it doesn't have any to the general population.