Master Difficulty. Because mobs can only hit harder right?

[Bonzenaattori]

Dear Bioware,

 

Quick question.

Will there ever be a difficulty that involves the need for a player to think outside of the box or are you going to just make champion mobs hit harder than 40k with their basic attack function?

Just wondering.

 

But in all seriousness what were you thinking?

Did you think at some point while coding this difficulty parameter that a player would actually waste their time doing this after they've gone through the horrible gearing pandemic that you've thrown us?

Or was this difficulty setting actually designed to consider the current gear of the previous patch in mind? No?

So what can we expect with Master Difficulty? Please enlighten me... dying to know right now.

 

Will you make mobs be able to attack you through walls because line of sight is pretty much the only reasonable strategy for a melee where 30% of the crap in this storyline you have to do without a companion or an adequate one, and I couldn't help but notice your companions reaction speed has drastically fallen since 5.0's release...

Gosh so many questions.

 

I suppose you were waiting for some pain addict who was patient enough to gear up to the highest tier of gear til you released Master difficulty right?

[Swtorevolution]

You want players to think outside the box when all players do is read guides on Dulfy.

[Nothing_Shines]

I know a thread has merit when a certain sockpuppet runs in to undermine it. I don't even need to read the OP to know I agree with him 100%, now.

 

And I love the new tracer missile animation. I hope they never bring back the old one. Just sayin'.

Edited December 5, 2016 by Nothing_Shines

[Swtorevolution]

I know a thread has merit when a certain sockpuppet runs in to undermine it. I don't even need to read the OP to know I agree with him 100%, now.

 

And I love the new tracer missile animation. I hope they never bring back the old one. Just sayin'.

 

That's thinking outside the box for you.

[Rolodome]

Hate to say it, but you pretty much captured my thoughts about the difficulty settings in a nutshell. They are a gear/influence wall, nothing more. No skill needed or required because there are no new mechanics... just level up gear and influence to the point where you're roughly at the same point of survivability and power you were before.

 

I could already create that kind of challenge for myself by using a low influence companion, or wearing lower gear than is expected for the content, or putting a companion on DPS when heals are expected... all these difficulty settings are, are the stuff I could already do to make things more challenging for myself, but done for me. And since they are done for me, there is no way to tweak or adapt them to find a sweet spot where things are challenging but not stupidly beyond gear and/or influence level.

 

Pretty pointless if you ask me. I kinda knew it the moment they described it on the livestream, but I've seen it in action since the expansion hit and it's every bit as disappointing as I thought it would be. I just don't get what is supposed to be challenging about mobs who hit harder and have more HP. The general expectation for challenge in MMOs is mechanics... in solo form, this would be Eternal Championship.

 

But rather than take the time to add mechanics to a few chapters and do more later (since they obviously don't have the resources to do it all at once), they went the "fluff" route and used a calculator on a few numbers. It's just a waste of development time to me. If some people enjoy it, then more power to em, but if it was targeted at guys like me who look for a challenge, it missed the mark by a mile.

[americanaussie]

Master difficulty is supposed to be group content.

[Exly]

Master difficulty is supposed to be group content.

 

Chapters are solo content, not group content even in the upcoming master mode.

 

Now if they made the Master mode chapters something that you could group for and still get full credit for everyone in the group, then they might have some replay value I guess, but as solo content I just don't know.

[americanaussie]

The press release I read said they were large scale battles in a group. But they aren't releasing any more info until January.

[Halinalle]

After watching Vulkk's stream yesterday I think Master difficulty is very much needed for Uprisings. I mean, if someone can effortlessly heal Veteran as scoundrel in 220/224... Mid-tier gear needed?

 

Tank was in 228s, one dps was 220/224 and second dps in "middle of upgrading" (89k hp or something which is lower end for level 70). Again, mid-tier gear needed?

Edited December 5, 2016 by Halinalle

[Tsillah]

Master difficulty is supposed to be group content.

 

I doubt it. I haven't bothered yet cause I don't care to do it anymore but I have guildies who have completed the veteran mode of all story chapters in 224 gear mostly (I think for one chapter he added a crafted 234 hilt or something).

 

Now if Veteran Mode can be done with sub par gear, they're really going to have to go full out to make Mastery Mode need grouping.

 

Of course, there are people who will need better gear or help because they get angry with their rank 5 healer companion not keeping them alive while they stand in every circle they can find, but I don't think Mastery Mode is going to be something that people will have to group up for if they have a clue about how to play their classes.

[ConradLionhart]

Does Master difficulty open up after you complete Veteran mode? Because all I see now are story and veteran.

 

If Master was as difficult as people claim, I don't mind reasonable difficulty, I hope the CXP matches it.

[majopucik]

lol yeah, I was doing the Veteran chapters for achievements (most of the achievos are bugged) and it was quite funny to see the lowest class of the mob hit so hard, its ridiculous.

 

I mean everything works on these mobs, sticky grenade causes the stun, Blazing bolts stuns them too, its silly that its all "standard mobs" and they hit like trucks.

[Bonzenaattori]

all the abilities do the same damage as story mode. Its only the basic attack function that has increased damage. and its pretty silly

[Khevar]

For what it's worth, I actually enjoy the Veteran mode of the new chapters.

 

With the exception of Chapter 2, I've been running it with dps + dps. I like the fact that the mobs hit really hard and my companion is squishy. I can't remember the last time I had to use defensive cooldowns or mez an enemy in solo content.

 

I wish the entire vanilla class / planetary quests had an option whereby they could be played in "veteran mode"

 

So far, it's the only part about 5.0 I've enjoyed.

[DarthFletcher]

The companion bork is really annoying, just ran Hoth heroics and during one of the missions I noticed a mob targetting Vette and looking down, spinning the camera angle around I couldnt see her either so I focus on her and I am looking down, Vette as magically fallen through the floor and is pretty much doing nothing but make the mobs look down.

 

This with the fact that companion seem to be lagging miles behind than in previous patches, it is almost like your putting your character life in their hands whether or not they show up in time to heal or do anything. I can't see how by adding an expansion they managed to screw up the companion coding.

[Tsillah]

The other thing that annoys me is that you need to level your companions to at least 20 to do well in veteran mode, so even higher in mastery mode I suspect.

 

That would be fine normally except...

 

 

You don't get to choose your companions or keep the ones you get. For example you only get Darth Acina as companion in chapter two. After that, she's gone again. So they expect me to level her up just so I can do that one chapter in veteran or mastery mode. I don't think so.