Gearing Changes in Eternal Throne

[IanArgent]

Are all crystals changing to the mastery stat, or only expertise ones? Why can't we chose for them to be another stat, other than mastery?

 

It's a little weird, actually. I would have set them to Alacrity to give a little bit of a decision as to whether to use that or Critical. As it is, nobody's going to bother with Mastery.

 

OTOH, they've been wanting to make the stats crystals give irrelevant for a while now. Wonder if they'll replace the current Crit crystals with Power and make them all effectively irrelevant

[Morrolan]

 

I can see why you guys waited till the last minute to break the news to us all. Now we just have to figure out a way to nicely disband all our guilds and stop paying for this garbage

 

Mass migrate to another game with your whole guild.

[Deewe]

Non-subs are excluded from it. Raiders will hate it. People in between will quickly become abjectly disgusted with RNG grindfest slot machines for their gearing.

 

I can promise though, getting a belt when I already have 3, and I need bracers, isn't fun. It's not incentive. It just sucks.

 

Well looks like pretty much the main issues from what we know so far.

 

So far not thrilled by the change, could be wrong though

[smithre]

Are you seriously creating another system that revolves around RNG for rewards? I hate RNG. I hated the RNG nature of the DVL packs (30 some crystals I'll never use because I already have them, yay!).

 

Can you least explain what will be guaranteed in the packs? For instance, will every pack drop an armor piece?

Edited October 18, 2016 by smithre

[FlavivsAetivs]

Are you seriously creating another system that revolves around RNG for rewards? I hate RNG. I hated the RNG nature of the DVL packs (30 some crystals I'll never use because I already have them, yay!).

 

Can you least explain what will be guaranteed in the packs? For instance, will every pack drop an armor piece?

 

It'll probably be platinum and you'll have to get 30 of them to have a shot at your HM chestpiece.

 

~ Eudoxia

[Jerba]

Had some time to think about it, and I'd say the changes are okay; I'll probably feel different about it when I'm farming crates for weeks to get the last armor piece, but this sounds a lot better than the KotFE gearing process. As always, my raid group will adapt as necessary.

 

• We are no longer forced to run Heroics but can play through pretty much anything we want.
  
• Casual players will no longer flock to EV/KP when it's Priority Ops to get BiS gear. I hope they'll still run ops because it gives more points than solo content but we'll see.
  
• You can no longer farm endless amounts of gear - this was my main issue with KotFE. Players would run all of their alts during an easy Priority Ops and then mail everything to one character. Gearing up is way too fast that way; Galactic Command sounds like it will be more controlled.
  

 

 

There are some issues, most of them have already been brought up:

• PvP should not be about gear, but now PvP players will take just as long to gear up as endgame PvE players. And half a year later when everyone is BiS, newcomers will get stomped by geared players.
  
• Even when removing Expertise, there's still a difference between PvE/PvP gear, especially regarding accuracy.
  
• Galactic Command is not alt-friendly. For example, there are players in my guild who play in multiple raid groups with different classes. Come 5.0, they'll need to put in more work to be geared up compared to players who play a single class, and the raid group can't help them with that. Even when moving mods/enhancements around, you'd need to level any advanced class you want to play to a high rank before you get the correct setbonus.
  

 

I do have a request:

Make it so when we inspect players, we can see their Command rank, just like we can see their Valor and Social rank right now.

This would help out progression groups so they can verify what ranks their members are at. I know you only care about casual players right now but can you please get this in?

There are ways around it (like requiring members to send in screenshots), but inspecting would be much easier.

Edited October 18, 2016 by Jerba

[IanArgent]

I think you are missing the problem here. I could care less if they mailed casual players a full set of gear. That's not the issue at all. It's about how we spend our time in game. We'd like endgame raiding not have an RNG-based gearing system. It's archaic. We should not have to spend our time grinding meaningless content because we can't seem to roll a helmet.

 

I wholeheartedly agree with Gabigool here. (How often has that happened?)

 

RNG is fine for cosmetics. Not for mechanics. There are a number of ways the system as-described can remove the RNG element for mechanical gearing. For the love of the Force, do it. Every 6 max-level galactic command crates should provide enough armor/hilt "set bonus" pieces to reach max stat set bonus, more or less guaranteed, and tuned to the character's role. The easiest way to do this is to make the armor plates/hilts generic, like literally every other crafted or purchased armor plate or hilt in the game.

[Poshible]

Wow, they really fed Eric to the wolves here.

 

Eric--is the gear moddable and can we put them into legacy gear if so? That makes this sting a lot if not.

[Iliac]

Bioware,

 

I know you have had a lot of employee turnover through the years. So, I would like to recommend for you to do a little research into what the results were the last time you tried to give PvP gear out through RNG boxes. ( hint: you had to switch back.) It wasn't pretty, and I don't expect it to be any better this time by including raiders in the mix.

[Sunyavadin]

I do have a request:

Make it so when we inspect players, we can see their Command rank, just like we can see their Valor and Social rank right now.

This would help out progression groups so they can verify what ranks their members are at.

 

Yep, then we can confirm that the ungeared healer looking to join up definitely worked their arse off for every last one of those 100 DPS belts that dropped for them along the way!

[RikuvonDrake]

I am a bit disappointed in the fact that there are fewer incentives to do Nightmare, having the best type of Command Crates drop from Nightmare as well would be a great change that would promote Nightmare raiding while still not disturbing the balance of gearing through Galactic Command as Nightmare requires a high level of gear to begin with.

[Soul_of_Flames]

QUESTIONS!

One thing that I haven't seen anyone bring up yet is what form the gear in the crates will take.

 

- Will gear drops in crates be specific gear pieces? Sets? Or will they be individual mods?

 

- If the gear drops are full gear pieces, IE a chest piece, will they be moddable? If so, I don't expect the pieces to be perfectly itemized, therefore giving theory crafters something to still work on.

 

- If the gear you get in crates does, indeed, contain BiS mods, then aside from the obvious setbonus advantage, what good does that do to crafters who currently make their money selling BiS mods, enhancements, relics, barrels, hilts, etc? You mentioned that crafters will still be able to craft "comparable" gear, but what does that mean? Same rating but less effective? That's not cool. Otherwise, do the mods/enhancements/etc have special bonuses (similar to setbonuses) that make them stand above crafted items?

 

- Will there be ways to work and progress towards a specific tangible piece of loot that isn't random? For example, if you are looking to get the earpiece as the last piece of gear you need, will there be something you can do to progress to that goal specifically? Or do you just have to try your luck by grinding crates over and over?

 

- If the answer to the previous question is "try your luck," then may I give a suggestion: Have specific boss encounters drop items that influence the probability of gear drops in these crates. And these items would be given to all present, not just a single winner. For example, a specific ops boss drops a consumeable item that increases the probability of your next crate dropping an earpiece by X%. Different difficulty modes would drop items granting higher percentages. I think this would quell the raider's concerns about this new gearing system.

 

Also, here are some random questions/points.

- What is the point to having a Command Rank cap? You seemed pretty enthusiastic about letting players 'show off' their rank, but if there is a cap, then that cap is just gonna be the status quo. Nothing special. Especially since you said you still earn CXP and crates at max rank, what exactly is the point to capping it? It seems arbitrary.

 

I mean, I understand that the rank influences the tier of rewards and that could invite problems down the line when people who farmed to rank 500 would be at an advantage, but to fix that, all you need to do is create a secondary rank that determines the crate's tier and stalls at the expansion's "cap." Basically, you could rank your Command Rank basically to infinity but the secondary "gear rank" (which could stay hidden for all we care) would determine the level of gear we get. This way, people with absurd command ranks can show off.

 

- Is allowing players to enter Ranked PvP as a means to grind gear really a good idea?

 

- What will boss encounters drop now, if not gear? You already mentioned their normal decos and mounts, but not all bosses dropped those things.

 

- What does this new gearing system mean when it comes to bolstered content?

[IanArgent]

OTOH, since I'm still feeling like a Devil's Advocate:

 

Eric stated (I forget whether it was in the livestream or in one of these posts), that crafters will be able to craft equipment with endgame stats, lacking only the "set bonus." It's been implied that "set bonus" will be changing again.

 

If you can gear to BiS statistically from crafted gear, and only need to draw the appropriate armor.hilt from a Galactic Command pack, how much does that change your view?

 

I won't speak to this, because of my own oft-stated views about "set bonus" availability; and because I don't know how much of a benefit set bonus is at the highest end of content.

[Rolodome]

OTOH, since I'm still feeling like a Devil's Advocate:

 

Eric stated (I forget whether it was in the livestream or in one of these posts), that crafters will be able to craft equipment with endgame stats, lacking only the "set bonus." It's been implied that "set bonus" will be changing again.

 

If you can gear to BiS statistically from crafted gear, and only need to draw the appropriate armor.hilt from a Galactic Command pack, how much does that change your view?

 

I won't speak to this, because of my own oft-stated views about "set bonus" availability; and because I don't know how much of a benefit set bonus is at the highest end of content.

Could depend somewhat on just how costly it is to craft the gear.

[Sunyavadin]

Wow, they really fed Eric to the wolves here.

 

Eric--is the gear moddable and can we put them into legacy gear if so? That makes this sting a lot if not.

 

Yeah, they sent Eric on a suicide mission here. Did they draw straws for who got to notify the commmunity of these changes?

 

And it still stings a helluva lot, since the gear that drops is still based on your advanced class, so even if we can, for most of us that's one alt on the other side that we'd be able to gear via legacy stuff.

[FlavivsAetivs]

I won't speak to this, because of my own oft-stated views about "set bonus" availability; and because I don't know how much of a benefit set bonus is at the highest end of content.

 

Set Bonuses make a massive difference. The 6-piece Set Bonus is basically required to have anywhere close to viable DPS on Infiltration Shadow.

 

~ Eudoxia

[WayOfTheWarriorx]

And this is the final nail in the coffin for raiding in SWTOR.

 

^ Signed

[foldyjedi]

I think i actually like these changes.

What i was missing all the time, was a REASON to grind something in the game for. Maybe it will be like in Phantasy Star Universe where you where grinding mission, and once in a while you receive that shiny piece of gear everyone wants. In case it wasn't useful to you, you could sell it for really good money.

I hope it will be something like this. Grinding the old operations (and hopefuly new ones) for the chance of a super drop ( in a crate) will be nice.

Imagine you had the chance to get let's say this arbiters lightsaber.

[LordTurin]

OTOH, since I'm still feeling like a Devil's Advocate:

 

Eric stated (I forget whether it was in the livestream or in one of these posts), that crafters will be able to craft equipment with endgame stats, lacking only the "set bonus." It's been implied that "set bonus" will be changing again.

 

If you can gear to BiS statistically from crafted gear, and only need to draw the appropriate armor.hilt from a Galactic Command pack, how much does that change your view?

 

I won't speak to this, because of my own oft-stated views about "set bonus" availability; and because I don't know how much of a benefit set bonus is at the highest end of content.

 

Varies a lot. Really helpful on tanks (allows tanks to have 3 taunts in the first 18 seconds of the fight, so much easier to keep aggro), increases dps overall by maybe 3-5%ish, and healing can vary a fair amount (can't remember the set bonuses off the top of my head).

 

So not huge, and could be worked around except the highest level crafting takes an absurd amount of mats. So right now, a 220 BiS armoring would take I believe 2 dark matter catalysts, something like 20 exotic isotopes, and 40 total of the level 9 green mats. So going by current mat drops, after an entire run through both EV and KP you could make exactly 5 armorings (and mods and enhancements all require the same amount of mats).

 

From my experience, crafting the high level gear works for implants/earpieces/relics, and sometimes the MH. It is just not worth it for anything else, and unless the nerf the mat requirements vs 4.0, it will probably continue that way.

[Sunyavadin]

- Is allowing players to enter Ranked PvP as a means to grind gear really a good idea?

 

Of course! It's a MARVELLOUS idea! no more waiting ages for a WZ to pop, you'll always be able to get into a match instantly thanks to all the bots!

[FlavivsAetivs]

I would be willing to grind it for Bastila Shan's lightsaber. But nope. You can't get that since 1.7 and it's not in the crates, nor is anything else we actually want. (Again, can't discuss details due to source rules.)

 

~ Eudoxia

Edited October 18, 2016 by FlavivsAetivs

[Darkbloom]

OTOH, since I'm still feeling like a Devil's Advocate:

 

Eric stated (I forget whether it was in the livestream or in one of these posts), that crafters will be able to craft equipment with endgame stats, lacking only the "set bonus." It's been implied that "set bonus" will be changing again.

 

If you can gear to BiS statistically from crafted gear, and only need to draw the appropriate armor.hilt from a Galactic Command pack, how much does that change your view?

 

I won't speak to this, because of my own oft-stated views about "set bonus" availability; and because I don't know how much of a benefit set bonus is at the highest end of content.

 

It's definitely smart that they made craftable gear usable to fill in for gear that you don't get from RNG.

 

But, this doesn't fix what I call the "anger" problem. If you have a really dedicated pvper or raider, and over and over again they just can't get that last piece of gear they need to fill out their last set bonus, they are going to be very angry. And they will be angry whether or not the set bonus is absolutely necessary.

 

I really hope they include some sort of a token system so that, no matter how bad your luck is, after a certain (known before-hand) number of crates, you are guaranteed to be able to finish your set.

[Kremsau]

Just got caught up. Man this sounds awesome!!!!

 

Can't WAIT, great decision BW!

[Kaze-Yama]

It's definitely smart that they made craftable gear usable to fill in for gear that you don't get from RNG.

 

But, this doesn't fix what I call the "anger" problem. If you have a really dedicated pvper or raider, and over and over again they just can't get that last piece of gear they need to fill out their last set bonus, they are going to be very angry. And they will be angry whether or not the set bonus is absolutely necessary.

 

I really hope they include some sort of a token system so that, no matter how bad your luck is, after a certain (known before-hand) number of crates, you are guaranteed to be able to finish your set.

 

Add a certain number of tokens per crate. Like how every cartel crate or whatever comes with some jawa junk make every command crate come with galactic junk. You can use that junk to buy the gear you need but the gear vendors require a certain rank so you can't just save up junk to buy your tier 3 mainhand straight away.

 

I've posted and seen dozens of solutions to what is currently a very flawed system in the way bioware has described it. I really hope they actually listen to the players like they say they do and make some changes before or immediately after launch.

[IanArgent]

Set Bonuses make a massive difference. The 6-piece Set Bonus is basically required to have anywhere close to viable DPS on Infiltration Shadow.

 

~ Eudoxia

 

I had gotten the impression that the necessity for set bonus varied between classes, ACs, and roles. In my limited experience with set bonus via PvP armor that had been confirmed. If so, then I'd hope they address this with class changes in 5.0 (just as they did somewhat in 4.0 - one thing I recall specifically was moving the minimum range for saber throw from the set bonus only for guardians).

 

At any rate, there are currently 9 potential "set bonus" gear slots in the game, and you only need to fill 6 of them to get max "set bonus."

 

Worst case, you have 5 "set bonus" items, and need one more to complete a set. If my memories of prob&stat are correct, and only the MH/OH/Armor is relevant (you can craft the mods/enahncements you need, or buy one from a crafter), it doesn't matter whether you have or need armor vs mh vs oh - the odds of you drawing a slot item you can use to complete the set are the same. (If you have 5x armor, then you can use one of the other two armor slots, or the mh, or the oh).

 

If the odds are even of drawing any particular slot from the 9 set-bonus slotted items - 5/9 of the time you draw and discard, 4/9 of the time you draw and keep to complete your set.

 

I think I'm going to have to break out a spreadsheet to do the odds fully, but the odds aren't as bad as I thought. They're not great; I would still ike to see a more definite system of obtaining gear, but they're not impossible.