Gearing Changes in Eternal Throne

[WayOfTheWarriorx]

I don't think u will have to worry bout that for long, raiders are expecting new raid content and if they wont announce it soon, they will be gone. whats the points of grinding same **** over and over again even if its in new gift wrap.

 

Raiders are gonna be gone even if they announce new Ops [which they won't be] because the gearing fiasco alone is going to cause too much resentment.

 

 

Consider this, given the RNG aspects of this total horsecrap of a gearing system someone at BW came up with when they were high on coke, drunk on Hennesy, and, in all likelihood, batshzt bellvue insane, someone who "gears" only doing heroics and FPs might, with some luck from RNJezzus get a full 6 peice set bonus that he absolutely does not need for the content a blind man could breeze thru doing heroics and FPs, while a hardcore progression raider standing right next to the other guy at the GTN hasn't been able to get the 6 piece set bonus because RNJezzus has a hardon for him. So the guy doing HM/NIM Operations who would actually get some real benefit from having the 6 piece set bonus has to stand in envy next to the heroic/FP guy with full 6 peice set bonus that he cant ever get the benefit from because he doesn't know how to proc with the proper rotation to gain a benefit from it in the first friggen place.

 

People who do not do Operations, do not need set bonus'. Raiders do, which is why up til now, the only friggen place you could get 6 piece set bonus gear is from Operations [and warzone coms for PVP gear set bonus you could only get inside warzones].

 

It will breed too much indignation.

 

If it was that anyone could get the bonus from gear, but than there was gear that had the same bonus's but also had 6 piece set bonus that could only be gotten from doing raids [or warzones], at least it would still be something to give incentive to do Operations and Warzones. It would be something that would mark raiders and PVPers as some sort of testament to skill/time that was required in order to get the gear with the set bonus's.

 

There won't be any new operations because there won't be any raiders left to do them a very short time from now if there are not major changes made to the gearing system that will speak to the concerns and feelings of raiders and PVPers.

 

The irony of this all is, this may be the first time that raiders and pvpers are coming together in solidarity.

 

The best gear in the game should be there only for those with enough determination, skill, and group cohesion to take it.

 

Carnage is life.

[tritonsquadjax]

So, with the 16+ level 65s i have, i now have to rank EACH to GC rank 70 to get end game gear. And i thought grinding KotFE was the worst thing possible.

 

GG bioware, you just killed off the last of your playerbase.

[Inexistt]

It's like they've been ordered to kill the game or something. This gearing revamp is a god-awful idea. Scrap it right now or you're going to lose so many subs, hardcore players, streamers like myself. Don't try to fix what isn't broken. The commendation system is good. Stop this foolishness.

[IanArgent]

I'm going to take this opportunity to remind people that there was (and still is) a Vendor in the old bonus series area of Pub Belsavis that sold the pre 4.x set bonus gear (and still sells the old set bonus chest piece) for commendations. As long I've been playing, you could obtain set bonus gear without stepping foot in an operation.

 

(I presume the equivalent vendor is there for the Imps of Belsavis as well)

[Kai-Del_Serromis]

You know what's sad? Eaware won't listen to a single bit of this. We're gonna get what they want, no matter what.

[LadyTremor]

Wow,

 

This is nuts and not in a good way. Why do you need to make changes to make the game less appealing to play for your dedicated players. One of the stupidest things I have ever heard of is taking away Expertise. The benefit of this stat was that committed Ranked players did not have to be concerned with being teamed with characters lacking gear and knowledge of how to PVP. It still allowed all players to hit Warzones but hardcore pvp players could enjoy end game with others with the same liking.

 

LadyTremor

[aeterno]

Playing the devils advocate for RNG...

 

Despite these latest changes I doubt leveling GC is going to end up a massive massive grind fest. It would go against every post launch and industry wide instinct to make the game(s) ever more casual friendly. If we are honest, even DvL event legendary isn't that brutal of a grind as people first cried about, not given how many xp boosts BW tossed into the game to facilitate the worst part of leveling everyting to 50.

 

Perhaps GC progression will also be so "user friendly" that having an RNG component is a necessary evil to not have a huge portion of the population when compared to now in BIS withing a couple months of the systems launch... I mean if I had to choose either the turd sandwich of what they're going to do or the giant douce of being assured of getting a full set of gear at the end of the GC grind but with the grind to ding a level substantially longer, I honestly don't know that I'd prefer the latter.

Edited October 18, 2016 by aeterno

[monster_cody]

hmm restricting gaer behind RNG packs behind a sub paywall regarding galactic command system

sounds like a wonderfull idea lmao

who came up with that one?

so all prefered players who paid for a month or 2 month subscription to get kotet are gonna be screwed over ?

as it is all passes from ops to warzones are now useless just as the artifact authorization ,since prefered players dont have acces to galactic command they cant even earn some goddamn gear

 

nice pay to win wall there

and yes its pay to win, hiding power behind a paywall is pay to win doesnt matter if there is no gear to be bought off the cm if its hidden behind a paywall regardless what kind of paywall it is, that is called pay to win.

 

now perfect solution would be that all prefered players who have KOTET expansion should be given acces to galactic command system with a restriction like that they can only earn 50% command exp points while subs get full 100% or that subs get 50% extra.

[DragonDai]

It's like they've been ordered to kill the game or something. This gearing revamp is a god-awful idea. Scrap it right now or you're going to lose so many subs, hardcore players, streamers like myself. Don't try to fix what isn't broken. The commendation system is good. Stop this foolishness.

 

This is actually my theory. Someone said "Hey guys, we're gana pull the plug on SWTOR in a year or two. How can we make the most money possible before we do?"

 

I know it SEEMS like this won't make the game money, but wait until they start offering CEXP boosts in the Cartel Store. Or single use items that allow you to increase your chances to get a piece of gear for your Discipline. **** like that.

 

Short term, the amount of monetization bull they can pull via the Cartel Market and this new system is through the roof. Long term? This game is d-e-d dead.

 

I know it's a totally crazy conspiracy theory (and if we're being 100% honest, even I'll admit it's likely not true), but man it sure seems like this is the only reason they could be pulling this kinda crap.

[IanArgent]

Playing the devils advocate for RNG...

 

Despite these latest changes I doubt leveling GC is going to end up a massive massive grind fest. It would go against every post launch and industry wide instinct to make the game(s) ever more casual friendly. If we are honest, even DvL event legendary isn't that brutal of a grind as people first cried about, not given how many xp boosts BW tossed into the game to facilitate the worst part of leveling everyting to 50.

 

Perhaps GC progression will also be so "user friendly" that having an RNG component is a necessary evil to not have a huge portion of the population when compared to now in BIS withing a couple months of the systems launch... I mean if I had to choose either the turd sandwich of what they're going to do or the giant douce of being assured of getting a full set of gear at the end of the GC grind but with the grind to ding a level substantially longer, I honestly don't know that I'd prefer the latter.

 

I hope you're right. It's possible, but I don't rate it likely

[Caely]

Okay, I've read through the thread and got the whole command crate thing (yes, drawbacks, but happy to see all that ridiculous ninja looting or bad rolls go away). However, loot dependent on advanced class versus specialization is problematic. I heal so DPS loot, advanced or not, is useless even with that deconstruct button.

 

My questions:

1) Will the amount of CXP from deconstructing useless gear result in enough points to get another "crate" right away?

2) Will crafters have the ability to learn schematics from reverse engineering items (i.e. implants, relics, etc) from crate drops? I believe it was mentioned that crafters would be able to craft useful gear.

 

New and challenging" four man content and two new planets were mentioned several time during the stream, but I have not heard anything about a new OPs. There is so much opportunity from the story line! I can only hope this is something the plan to talk about at a later time.

 

I really applaud developers for trying out new things, so the good thing is even though several in my OPs group are unhappy, we all are willing to see how things go and go into the new expansion hopeful.

[WayOfTheWarriorx]

I thought raiders allegedly did it for the 'challenge', not for carrots.

 

We do it for the carrots, and when we get all the carrots we do it so other people in the group can get the carrots. Getting all the carrots IS the challenge.

 

We also do it for all the laughs we get when we screw up along the way.

 

If there weren't any carrots, we wouldn't have had any reason to walk into the raid in the first place.

 

Definition of the word 'raid' -

"to quickly and illicitly take something from (a place)." - Something is the gear, the illicitly is through the use of force, the place is the Operation.

[sithlordschmidt]

RNG boxes? Seriously?!? I assume literally nobody on the development staff took basic undergrad psych courses. This won't work.

 

Actually, it is psychologically sound, as counter-intuitive as that sounds. There have been many studies showing that intermittent, random application of positive feedback (gambling box) is a more effective way of producing a given behavior than consistent, predictable feedback (guaranteed rewards). If you doubt me, do a google search for "psychology intermittent reinforcement".

 

For the record, I'm not speaking in favor of the randomized rewards (I tend to have pretty bad luck with RNG). I'm just explaining why BW, as well as many other gaming companies, have tended to make more and more things RNG. As backwards as it sounds, people are simply more likely to come back for more if they think they might get something cool at any moment than if they know exactly how much work will equate to exactly which reward. It's the same reason that lockboxes are always more profitable than selling items outright.

 

Personally, I would have preferred a system where the gear items were fixed but everything else in the box was random. For example, first rank lockbox might always drop a belt appropriate to your class/spec, as well as a few other totally random items. Second tier might give you bracers and other random items. Eventually once all the gear slots are filled, they start over at the next tier and so on. This would keep the "irresistible carrot" of random rewards there while also allowing people to plan their gear methodically.

[Lazaros_Chatzi]

Commendations are gone as from 5.0

I see, Thanks for the answer

[Lazaros_Chatzi]

Comms are going away, that was in the live stream.

There will be no more comms.

Thank you too for the answer

[Andryah]

So, with the 16+ level 65s i have, i now have to rank EACH to GC rank 70 to get end game gear.

 

Why? So you can regrind and replace a year later on all 16?

 

You can spend your time any way you like, but personally, I don't see the reason to put every character into end game gear if you are not running Mastery level content on them all.

 

Pick a main, maybe an alt or two and go for it. The rest, just put them in level 70 crafted gear and be done with it (that is assuming you even play them at level 70).

[Zez-Kai-Ell]

So, with the 16+ level 65s i have, i now have to rank EACH to GC rank 70 to get end game gear. And i thought grinding KotFE was the worst thing possible.

 

GG bioware, you just killed off the last of your playerbase.

and you think they even realize that?

[LadyTremor]

I Love Star Wars, and having this game and being a part of a MMO that set the Star Wars universe apart from all other MMOs was an outstanding idea. Now Bioware in classic Bioware style is destroying a once great game. I used to play City of Heroes/City of Villains, but, the devs there screwed up the game so bad that they finally shut it down for good a few years ago. Bioware should get ready to do the same to the SWTOR servers after this upcoming debacle. If George Lucas saw what you were doing to this game and the disappointment you are creating with die hard Star Wars fans he would have a coronary!

 

They should scrap 5.0 and go back to the drawing board. Their creative team sucks! Why do they care more about casual users than dedicated players?

 

I am just disgusted that they are about to flush 4-5 years of a great gaming experience down the toilet.

 

LadyTremor

[Okod]

So you've turned PvP into a pay to win grind fest? Don't want to sub? Crap gear for you. Don't have time to spend 40h per week grinding crates? Crap gear for you too.

 

I can't even begin to understand why you thought this was a good idea. I mean I think I can see what you were aiming for; make the best gear only available to subs, and make it takes ages to grind means - in theory - many many months of subs. Unfortunately I feel this is going to back-fire horribly. Certainly for me it means I have cancelled my sub (yes, yes, you can have my stuff) - unfortunately I forgot to change the 6 month subscription (yes, that's how much I enjoyed the game before) so I have 150 days left...but I hope the cancellation still shows up on your 'metrics'.

 

The best change in recent history, IMO of course, was the gear cost reduction. For a while now 95%, or more, of PvP people have been fully geared vastly decreasing the balance issues between teams, and making victories more based around skill, rather than on which team had better stats. And the fastest PvP way to get gear is in ranked matches? What should be the ultimate expression of skill vs skill in SWTOR is now a gear-check? ET seems like such a massive step back.

 

I don't PvE at a high enough level to really comment. Certainly the level I play at I've never found gear to be remotely an issue, so isn't something I'd grind for. For PvP I play so many alts, sometimes respeccing between roles depending on my mood, this is just going to be a nightmare grind for me that I'm simply not interested in.

 

Please reconsider. Yours, a long long time and previously 6-month subber.

[Nostroo]

I have only one question: why?

 

Could we please get a statement of the one, who thought that thi is a good idea? He or she doesn't even have to post it him/herself. I also don't want a name. Just why this person thought, that this is a good idea, because there was a similar system from 1.0 to 1.1 which got removed because it was bad. And there you got tokens, which you could at least change against the one with the right setbonus.

 

Items

 

PvP

• Battlemaster Gear Tokens have been converted into Battlemaster Commendations, which can be used to purchase any Battlemaster gear. This allows players to purchase any piece of gear instead of requiring them to purchase the piece indicated by the token.
  
• Battlemaster Bags now contain Battlemaster Commendations instead of Battlemaster Gear Tokens. They still also contain Champion Commendations.
  

[Icykill_]

Why? So you can regrind and replace a year later on all 16?

 

You can spend your time any way you like, but personally, I don't see the reason to put every character into end game gear if you are not running Mastery level content on them all.

 

Pick a main, maybe an alt or two and go for it. The rest, just put them in level 70 crafted gear and be done with it (that is assuming you even play them at level 70).

 

At least it's only 16 characters... try doing it with 35... 28 of which are currently lvl 65 and which all have ranked gear that I pvp with.

[DragonDai]

I have only one question: why?

 

Could we please get a statement of the one, who thought that thi is a good idea? He or she doesn't even have to post it him/herself. I also don't want a name. Just why this person thought, that this is a good idea, because there was a similar system from 1.0 to 1.1 which got removed because it was bad. And there you got tokens, which you could at least change against the one with the right setbonus.

 

This is the big question. It's really the only one that matters at this point, because I honestly don't see them changing their minds on any of this. And if this launches as detailed here, it's really all I want to know. Why? Why would you do this? Why oh why oh why?

[auroroavalor]

I'll take a crack at these!

• Yup. Having an item rating advantage would mean that you have higher stats. In Warzones especially there would be other factors at play such as any stat optimization and of course individual player skill.
  
• There will certainly be some gear that has Accuracy, but the current intention is that the armor sets will be moddable so you could always change the mods to add or remove a stat, such as Accuracy.
  

 

I have a few questions regarding these comments.

 

Firstly, is the intention here for Nightmare Raiders and Ranked PVP'ers to be running only one set of gear per class?

 

Does the combat team have access to a list of BiS stats for both endgame PVE and PVP for any given DPS spec? If so how varied are the stats for for BiS PVP and BiS PVE because they are currently quite varied.

 

For instance Concealment Operative

 

PVP Stats

 

Mastery 4612

Power 3400

Crit 1370

Alacrity 0

Accuracy 0

 

PVE Stats

 

Mastery 5164

Power 2850

Critical 1465

Alacrity 1015

Accuracy 700

 

To just remove my accuracy from PVE gear I would need to change 2x Enhancements, 2x Augments and a Stim, to return to PVP gear I would have to replace 14 augments with Overkill augments (Power).

 

This would be a continual annoyance for someone participating in both types of content until they got enough gear to run two sets of gear for the same Discipline. Is this the intended design decision?

 

 

Can you please further clarify

I'll take a crack at these!

• the current intention is that the armor sets will be moddable so you could always change the mods to add or remove a stat.
  

 

This should not be up for discussion, if you are considering removing modifiable gear at the same time as removing the option to choose the item of gear you want (token hand ins) you might as well remove gear and only have datacrons and make classes have BiS or fixed stats as a base level 70 feature.

[Daniel_Caparros]

What are you gonna do with Eternal Championship? The current gear are being scaled? And the tokens, are you gonna keep it?

[Primarch_PWnD]

Why? So you can regrind and replace a year later on all 16?

 

You can spend your time any way you like, but personally, I don't see the reason to put every character into end game gear if you are not running Mastery level content on them all.

 

Pick a main, maybe an alt or two and go for it. The rest, just put them in level 70 crafted gear and be done with it (that is assuming you even play them at level 70).

 

Personally, I do. I play ranked PvP with 9 different toons, and play regs with those plus 2 more.

 

Just because you don't have fun playing with your alts doesn't mean that we don't.

 

I'm a "PvPer". When I say that, I mean that I log into the game in order that I can play warzones and ranked. I find that fun. I don't have as much fun playing raids, or running through heroics, or dailies, or anything else.

 

I also like the variety of being able to play a whole bunch of different classes. I can choose which one I want to play depending on my mood. Sometimes it's tanking, sometimes it's healing, sometimes it's ranged dps, and sometimes it's melee dps.

 

I also like being able to help get solo ranked popping by being able to switch to whatever role we need to fill the queue and get a pop.

 

If I'm playing regs, and our faction is queueing with 3 healers, I can switch off my own healer to a different role. If I'm queueing and there are no healers, I can switch to my healer and fill that role for us.

 

Do I have to go on with the advantages of easily gearing multiple toons for PvP?

 

It's not just as simple as "pick a toon, stick with it, and be happy about it ".

 

Then there's the subject of how to do this on multiple servers. I have 2 toons on Harb, and the rest on Pot5. I'm going to have to go through the grind on multiple servers now too?

 

The system wasn't broken, there was no need to fix it. In fact, they've made tremendous improvements to pvp gearing over the past few years that have been majorly beneficial to reducing the barrier to entry to pvp. (I also made a post in the pvp forums about expertise, and the role it plays in keeping a level playing field in regards to gear discrepancy if anyone is interested).

Edited October 18, 2016 by Primarch_PWnD