We finally have repeatable story!

[Khevar]

I've been playing MMORPGs for over ten years and I have never been an "alt-a-holic." In SWG I had my main character and my crafter (there were only two character slots for non-elder jedi accounts). In SWTOR, I really just have one main character. I made many others just to see the BioWare class stories, but really I'm a one character player.

As with the other conversations we've had, your particular opinion is strange and unusual to me.

 

For someone who appreciates Bioware storytelling in SWTOR, and finds everything else uninteresting, you have such a casual dismissal of the 8 class stories. They offer something unique to game storytelling, which is 8 different viewpoints on a singular, overarching story. While none of them are Shakespeare by any means, I do feel that they are good "video game stories"

 

And taken collectively, they tell an even more grand story. You can see where they cross over and impact one another, and each has a different viewpoint towards the conflict leading up to the official restart of the war. Even the oft-maligned planetary stories have crossover points and help flesh out the overarching narrative.

IMMOs are time consuming as it is and fully optimizing one character is more than enough effort.

What optimization would be required to run solo story? You're handed gear left and right. The encounters aren't difficult even for a poorly geared character. You also have access to plenty of legacy sets.

So for a person like myself, who really only cares about one character, being able to repeat the story content with the same character is great. Story is what separates this MMO apart from every other MMO on the market and it makes sense to have this option. Having alts to go through the story is not the same thing as that's a different character and likely a different class with different companions.

You're telling me that you'd rather re-run KotFE multiple times on the exact same character, rather than bring any of the other classes through to see how the writers may have them react to situations? Or meeting their long-lost companions?

 

I mean, I'll accept it -- you basically just said exactly that. But I certainly don't understand it. I cannot get inside your head-space to understand your viewpoint. At all.

Edited October 17, 2016 by Khevar

[xordevoreaux]

It'll be interesting how many hours it'll take after the repeatable content is avaiable before people log into the forums to complain they're burned out on the repeatable content.

[Tsetso]

It'll be interesting how many hours it'll take after the repeatable content is avaiable before people log into the forums to complain they're burned out on the repeatable content.

 

That depends on the content. If it's a mindless reputation grind - probably not more than a week or 2.

[Quraswren]

That depends on the content. If it's a mindless reputation grind - probably not more than a week or 2.

 

I'd think less than that if you look at repeating the story if all the difficulty levels do is raise hps and damage thus doing nothing but increase the time to complete them. Not actually adding any real repeat value for that extra time.

 

I'd give that particular complaint a week or less.

[Tsetso]

I'd think less than that if you look at repeating the story if all the difficulty levels do is raise hps and damage thus doing nothing but increase the time to complete them. Not actually adding any real repeat value for that extra time.

 

I'd give that particular complaint a week or less.

 

Well, i was talking about what i expect, based on unconfirmed info on the internet.

[xordevoreaux]

Well, i was talking about what i expect, based on unconfirmed info on the internet.

 

I specifically mentioned "hours"

 

The content will be available to play around noon to 1pm on a Tuesday. By 3 pm that day, I expect the forums to light up with complaints about it once people finish something, swearing they'll never repeat it because it's boring, no reason to repeat it for the same reward, just another time sink to keep us busy, etc.

 

The usual whine.

[Tsetso]

I specifically mentioned "hours"

 

The content will be available to play around noon to 1pm on a Tuesday. By 3 pm that day, I expect the forums to light up with complaints about it once people finish something, swearing they'll never repeat it because it's boring, no reason to repeat it for the same reward, just another time sink to keep us busy, etc.

 

The usual whine.

 

No, that's too early. Since uprisings are going to be part of it and there are quite a few of them, just clearing all of them on all 3 modes would take a lot more than 2 hours.

[IanArgent]

No, that's too early. Since uprisings are going to be part of it and there are quite a few of them, just clearing all of them on all 3 modes would take a lot more than 2 hours.

 

They'll do one in one difficulty mod, maybe two, and pronounce it unbearably tedious

[Quraswren]

No, that's too early. Since uprisings are going to be part of it and there are quite a few of them, just clearing all of them on all 3 modes would take a lot more than 2 hours.

 

Thats why I give it a week or a little less.

 

Gives gamers time to see the story and to see if difficulty levels for story is really worth the extra time it takes to clear the story you already know.

 

They you add in Uprisings. If an increase in difficulty level doesn't come with newer mechanics and a worthy reward for the time to redo them. I don't see many putting in the time to complete them all over and over on different difficulty levels. Just wont be worth the time. Clearl them on solo and get out.

 

I fully expect that within a week. Gamers will have cleared the 9 chapters, hit every new Uprising on at least one difficulity level and looked into seeing if there worth doing again on a higher one. Then looking at the galactic command levels and seeing if it's worth that new grind system.

 

If it isn't up to par. Then I'd expect complaints within the first week. Hours seems to fast but I would go as low as 24. Someone could easily see all that in a complete days play at launch.

[DewyMossEmpire]

I would absolutely love to see this implemented for the rest of the content. Going back to all of the class stories & expansions, especially things like Makeb, on higher difficulty modes & playable with your lvl 65 characters would be spectacular. I don't always want to roll new chars just to replay stories, but I ~always thought it would be fun to simply replay the stories with the chars I have.

[TUXs]

I have no desire to do KOTFE on any additional toons...but I'm glad they're making some of the story repeatable finally...I just wish it wasn't KOTFE...

[XiamaraSimi]

I have no desire to do KOTFE on any additional toons...but I'm glad they're making some of the story repeatable finally...I just wish it wasn't KOTFE...

Getting ME3 PTSD flashbacks.

 

Its all about their imagined "artistic vision"

 

In their own minds they think they know what we want, and will steamroll forwad with it, no matter how many people go "Um, wait, this isnt what i was asking for..."

 

Remember "SPECULATIONS!" ?

Edited October 17, 2016 by XiamaraSimi

[Aowin]

...

 

It's only "strange and unusual" to you because you are an alt-a-holic more than likely. Oddly enough, in old school MMOs you generally only had one character slot. It wasn't until theme park MMOs and WoW, which came much later, that MMOs started having this mentality of encouraging multiple characters.

 

When did I find everything "uninteresting"? I find operations uninteresting because it's mediocre raid content compared to other MMOs I have played. I'm an avid PvPer and always have been. It's what I primarily do. I just so happen to love BioWare storytelling as I've been playing BioWare games for 13 years since KotOR 1.

 

Just because I love BioWare storytelling doesn't mean I'll love every class story. In fact, I found half of them to be disappointing. I was really only interested in the Jedi Knight story because that is actually the KotOR 3 story line if you read the Revan book.

 

I've ran KOTFE on other characters. For one, KOTFE doesn't make sense for any class other than the Jedi Knight. Secondly, there isn't enough variety to make playing on other characters worth the time and effort. I simply do not care to play those expansions on more than one character and I would repeat them on my main.

 

While I know you assume that your opinion and perspective reflects that of the "majority," it's probably time for you to reconsider that stance. As I said, feel free to check out the suggestion forum and see just how many threads were made wanting KOTFE and class stories to be repeatable. I'm not the only one.

[Aowin]

I would absolutely love to see this implemented for the rest of the content. Going back to all of the class stories & expansions, especially things like Makeb, on higher difficulty modes & playable with your lvl 65 characters would be spectacular. I don't always want to roll new chars just to replay stories, but I ~always thought it would be fun to simply replay the stories with the chars I have.

 

I agree 100%. I'm not interesting in rolling new characters to see story I've already completed. I'd rather do it on the character I already have. I don't care for ROTHC, but I'd love to revisit the class stories.

[Aowin]

...

 

Lets not go on a tangent about ME3's ending. I know you believe it was universally hated, but after the extended cut many are content with how it concluded. I did a Highest EMS Destroy run and got the perfect ending. DLC like Leviathan should have been in the base game, but oh well.

 

Regardless of all of the hate, KOTFE was largely an amazing experience. I enjoyed the first nine chapters and most of the other seven except for filler chapters. Player agency could have been better, but I'm expecting KOTET to improve upon that.

 

At the very least, this makes it easier for us to truly revisit the story and see just how much it changes without the need of running it on multiple characters.

Edited October 17, 2016 by Aowin

[xordevoreaux]

Without naming names or giving away spoilers, what happens if you replay part of KOFTE that you previously made a choice that caused companion so-and-so to leave? Does that companion magically come back if you play it again another way?

[IanArgent]

Without naming names or giving away spoilers, what happens if you replay part of KOFTE that you previously made a choice that caused companion so-and-so to leave? Does that companion magically come back if you play it again another way?

 

For that matter, can we replay Alliance Alerts, and will changed options result in changed results?

[DewyMossEmpire]

I agree 100%. I'm not interesting in rolling new characters to see story I've already completed. I'd rather do it on the character I already have. I don't care for ROTHC, but I'd love to revisit the class stories.

 

Makeb has always been one of my favorites. There's a lot of nostalgia there for me, with the music, sounds, voices. Especially with vanilla SWTOR. Going back to see the stories again would be pure fun, & with new options, a proper challenge! As is the purpose of video games. Especially to see them with different choices, I think it would be appropriate to keep the first play through of a story as the final story for your decisions, so that replaying it does not cause problems.

Edited October 17, 2016 by DewyMossEmpire

[TheRomanRuler]

Problem is, that before we had 8 class stories. And for each class you may want 1 lightside and 1 dark side character. And then there are advanced classes, you may want 1 advanced class lightside, 1 advanced class dark side, and 1 another advanced class dark side, 1 another advanced class light side and so forth. So you propably want to play trough story at least twice.

But for KOTFE, you need to play it trough 8 times, one play trough for each class. Or 16 for 1 play with light side and dark side, or 32...

 

I propose that at KOTFE (if possible anymore at this point) our characters all join together into Legacy alliance, so your alts would become your playable only companions. So you could at any point switch between them and story would continue just like when you switch between companions on the fly. For KOTFE it hardly makes sense story wise... But for new expansion it would be awesome. You only need to play trough story once and other play troughs are optional.

Spoiler for what happens in chapter 1 of KOTFE:

 

Vitiate has shown that he can "be" multiple people at the same time, so it would be fine if he would be "inside" all of our characters at the same time.

 

 

Sure it is not perfect solution. But i think it would be good one since it seems certain it simply is not possible to get more class stories quickly. System could be heavily improved and made good over the years. Thanks to Empire and Republic having common enemy, it would not even matter that Empire hating Republic characters and Republic hating Sith would work together in same legacy alliance. We already have loyal companions that may be completely opposite of you and do completely opposite things than you. I have bigger problem with some companions who clearly don`t like what i do sticking around with me than my Sith Inquisitor and Jedi knight working on the same team.

 

We could even have system like in Dragon Age Inquisition where you have multiple companions present at the same time and can take control of them. We can`t have everyone at the same time, but maybe team of 2 player characters and 2 companions would work.

 

Also you can already unlock HK 51 for Empire even though you collected parts and everything only for Republic. But that does not bother most people.

 

They could make entire expansion only about that or some other good solution. It would have to be free expansion, but i would have been ready to buy it.

 

Pretty sure "legacy story" would be best solution in current situation. More class stories is what we all want, but sadly it is not possible, and won´t be possible possibly ever. Since we must have 1 overall story, we also should only have to play it trough once and focus on having more companion dialogue during conversations. I would love to roll my Imperial Agent and have my Trooper approving my decisions (my Agent is light side and quite similar to my trooper), saying it is shame i was not born in Republic.

 

I also opened new thread about this

http://www.swtor.com/community/showthread.php?p=9081121#post9081121

Edited October 17, 2016 by TheRomanRuler

[Aowin]

So we have confirmation that there will, indeed, be incentives for doing the harder difficulty settings for repeatable story. It's all connected to Galactic Command, the new progression system that streamlines all endgame content into one place. You can watch the Galactic Command stream on the SWTOR Twitch page:

 

https://www.twitch.tv/swtor

 

Galactic Command will not only give incentives for repeating the KOTFE and KOTET story chapters, but all endgame content. This includes warzones, operations, flashpoints, uprisings, GSF, and dailies/heroics.

 

The rewards will be access to Galactic Crates that will provide better rewards the higher your rank is, even endgame gear.

[Aowin]

Without naming names or giving away spoilers, what happens if you replay part of KOFTE that you previously made a choice that caused companion so-and-so to leave? Does that companion magically come back if you play it again another way?

 

You'll be able to repeat the content as if you didn't already make those choices. What we won't know until the story chapter stream is whether our first choices are locked permanently or if everything resets. You'll have to wait for an answer on that.

[Khevar]

It's only "strange and unusual" to you because you are an alt-a-holic more than likely.

I suppose. Although you should know that this has only happened in this game. I've only ever had a single character in the other MMOs I've played.

 

This was unique specifically because of the 8 class stories. I don't have one main character. I have 8. I brought each of those 8 through the expansions because I find them interesting. They're my own personal "head canon" characters that were responsible for the events of TOR's cold war.

Just because I love BioWare storytelling doesn't mean I'll love every class story. In fact, I found half of them to be disappointing. I was really only interested in the Jedi Knight story because that is actually the KotOR 3 story line if you read the Revan book.

 

I've ran KOTFE on other characters. For one, KOTFE doesn't make sense for any class other than the Jedi Knight. Secondly, there isn't enough variety to make playing on other characters worth the time and effort. I simply do not care to play those expansions on more than one character and I would repeat them on my main.

Fair enough. I too, have read the Revan book. I also read the original Old Republic comics (Tales of the Jedi) and the post-KOTOR ones (Zayne Carrick's story).

 

It seems to me there are more interesting stories in the Star Wars setting than just "Jedi".

 

I will say that I agree with your criticism of KotFE as feeling mostly appropriate for the Knight, however.

While I know you assume that your opinion and perspective reflects that of the "majority," it's probably time for you to reconsider that stance.

I am perfectly aware that my opinions do not remotely reflect the majority. And have not claimed otherwise.

 

You're welcome to peruse the 4+ years of my forum history here in search of times when I stated the majority agrees with me -- but it will be a long and fruitless search.

 

You have a really interesting level of arrogance. At many times during discourse with others, you speak as though you have a direct line to absolute truth, and act as if you had intimate knowledge of what the majority wants. Then you try and accuse me of the same?

 

Edited October 17, 2016 by Khevar

[Aowin]

...

 

My point is you were making my opinion to be somehow "unusual" and you were failing to understand my perspective, as if I am somehow an anomaly in the community. Whether you believe your opinion to truly represent the majority was more so a joke because of comments you made about my opinion.

 

Clearly I offended you and I apologize for making you defensive. I've never suggested my opinion represents everybody, however I would be surprised if a portion of the community does not agree with my sentiments.

 

I love BioWare. I love Star Wars. I love MMORPGs. I've been gaming in all three for a very long time and I just want BioWare to make the best Star Wars MMO they possibly can. It's the only one we have.

[gabigool]

I've never suggested my opinion represents everybody

 

I literally just spit out my seltzer.

 

I was drinking this new flavor my wife bought, Cranberry Cider. It wasn't that good but it did smell nice, which is handy as it's all over my keyboard.

[Aowin]

I literally just spit out my seltzer.

 

I was drinking this new flavor my wife bought, Cranberry Cider. It wasn't that good but it did smell nice, which is handy as it's all over my keyboard.

 

Everyone is entitled to their opinion. I just do not like when certain members of the community suggest their ideals are valued more than others. Some of us enjoy story. Some of us are happy part of the story is repeatable. It is a first step in providing more options in playing the game. There is nothing wrong with that.