Explain to me why do we need a MBA to understand gearing up now?

[FerkWork]

Except you could have got ultimate comm ( whatever those crystals were called ) gear much faster than getting to tier 130 and set bonus aside ultimate comm gear would be better than what you have gotten from getting to level 130 I'm sure.

 

Also SM is bolstered so you could have geared up set pieces from just doing operations and they become more forgiving as you do them ( oh and you learn the content ).

 

Nothing is going to be worse than someone in T2 gear that somehow thinks "yay I can do operations easily now" having not really done them before and proceeds to wipe the group. People should be gearing by doing appropriate content if they intend on doing that content - the previous path was perfect for this reason as you learned whilst gearing. Now you can run 1000 exploited fractured runs and be "geared for operations".

 

You misspelled throwing snowballs at companions and be ready for Ops :3

[Sargrith]

Worse then I thought they would do, not very helpful. As long as the crates remain the primary gearing source it wont work. Please get someone new in charge that can see past rng and replace it.

[americanaussie]

You don't. At least most normal minded people should grasp it. You need to determine if you're going for ops or PvP or both

They do it differently.

 

PvP entails 3 things to buy the gear.

1- the lower tier gear piece if going for tier 2 or 3.

2- some command tokens

3 an insane number of unassembled gear pieces. Blah.

Edited January 23, 2017 by americanaussie

[RagnarAugustus]

It is getting quite convoluted. I don't understand why they're so afraid of letting Ops just drop actual gear instead of all this token mess. I don't think it would undermine the GC system at all, just supplement it - the hardest content dropping little cherries on top. Why does it have to be so complicated?

 

Exactly! As per Bioware's own words Galactic Command was implemented to allow solo PVE players to obtain Best in Slot raid gear without earning it in a raid. They never said anything about interrupting or slowing raiders from gearing yet 5.0 all but destroyed raiding to the point where group finder on Harbinger rarely pops. If Bioware kept GC for the solo players and reimplemented 4.0's operations loot system almost everybody would be happy. I'd have BW buff CXP rates too in order to alleviate the grind for solo players.

[jimmorrisson]

As long as the crates remain the primary gearing source it wont work.

 

I have gotten the impression that either purchasing crafted gear or outright crafting gear yourself is the other primary source.

 

Which in itself requires grinding for refined isotopes and void matter catalysts to sell or use, grinding heroics for credits, purchasing cartel store products with real cash to resell on the trade network for credits, or purchasing credits outright from a credit spammer.

Edited January 23, 2017 by jimmorrisson

[Christie_Swift]

They mentioned the drop rates in OPs will be different. However, what about PvPs? If someone does not want to do OPS would we be able to still get the high end gear just with just PvPs?

 

It seems to me that OPs will still have an advantage over drops in PvPs. So are we back to square one and have to do OPS even if some dont want to? I know there is still the RNG gear drops but just seems more confusing and still not solving much of the problem IMO.

[Quraswren]

Have you ever tried to explain MMO gearing to someone with no experience what-so-ever, like your GF/Family Member?

 

4.7

 

I did do that it it was a whole lot simpler than what you claim:

Play the game, get crystals and buy the gear you need from your class vendor. Oh and if you want me to help you out in gearing. Just come to an ops with us on a DPS toon and we can help you get any gear you want for your main. Alt friendly.

 

Want to PVP. Just play PVP and get valor. Buy what you can afford.

 

Oh you want to level your companion? Easy, just buy rank 1 and 2 gifts and you will get them as high as you'll ever need for what a new player will do. Since you'll be doing heroics anyway, you'll get crystals as well as higher rank influence tokens should you want to level them higher than you really need to.

 

5.1

 

Q: "How do I get cool stuff?"

A: Oh you can play any content for gear but it's like a casino slot machine. If you want to get gear you can come to OPS with us but the drops there are RNG as well so you'll lose way more than you win just like the RNG crates even with the last boss being a 100% drop, its not enough to undo the garbage the rest of 5.0 and 5.1 has brought. AND oh BTW. I cannot help you in any way get gear for the most past like in 4.0. I can only help you get another pull of the slot machine faster since there is still so much RNG to rely on.

 

Also, not alt friendly at all because making GC legacy would somehow ruin and already screwed up design, so I hope you like one and one toon only.

 

Want to PVP? Oh well you can but that does nothing but drive the slot machine game as well as you need pieces to combine to get a unasssembled which you then need to combine with a token which you then need to go to a vendor to get your gear? You might was to read it yourself because it's really screwed up trying to explain it.

 

Want to level up a companion? Do the same thing from 4.0 if you don't want to spend millions.

 

Don't for a second make out like 5.0 or 5.1 is some how easier to understand or better for new or old gamers. It's a convoluted Piece of poorly designed game development.

Edited January 24, 2017 by Quraswren

[Deewe]

Have you ever tried to explain MMO gearing to someone with no experience what-so-ever, like your GF/Family Member?

 

Q: "How do I get cool stuff?"

A: "So you play the game and you get command crates, those will have the gear you need."

I guess it's what the devs wanted to do, still the implementation is far from that simple.

[realleaftea]

remeber how this gearing system was supposed to be" less complicated" than the last one?

This is the perfect example of how good intentions might turn out to be disastrous....

 

... It all started with all kinds of commendation crystals.

... BioWare then simplified the commendation system (green, blue, purple)

... they tagged the already existing blended storylines under the label alliance

... they introduced 4 fractions as an alternative to class-specific vendors

... these fractions could be leveled separately to lvl 20 => 80 levels in total

... in order to level a fraction, you needed four different types of components

... players could obtain components either through repeatable ingame activities or through commendation vendors

... players were rewarded in form of crates containing gear specifically designed for the class depicted by a fraction

... The gear did not contain best-in-stock modification (nor any set bonuses)

... BioWare also started a special Dark-vs-Light event, rewarding players for trying out every possible ingame-activiity

... the DvL event was well received, but achievement-driven => it couldn't be repeated

... the reward came in form of special DvL crates containing gear, mounts, decorations, mods, XP boosts, etc.

 

So far the 4.x state of the game. BioWare then came up with the idea of a Command Rank system. This system ought to combine the different forms of crates, simplifiy the 'fractions' and remove existing inconveniences which wasn't a bad idea per se.

 

... no more 4 different fractions, only a single measurement unit => your command rank

... no more 'external' ranks or levels, instead something similar to a class level

... the original plan was to introduce 100 command levels (compared to 4x 20 fraction levels)

... leveling your command rank (the only 'fraction' left) would reward you with similar command crates

... these command crates would contain the same or similar things as the DvL or fraction crates

... to makes these crates more attractive, they would include best-in-stock gear (including set bonuses)

... no more fraction components; no more commendation crystals => only CXP

... instead of spending commendation crystals to get high-end gear, the crates will contain these items directly

... since you get CXP for any ingame activity, it's ensured that everything you do will be 'rewarding'

... in order to unify things even more, PvP and operations will use the same system as well

 

And this was the shiny new world, BioWare had imagined. And I bet ANY manager who isn't really involved in this matter, would have given his approval to this idea.

 

But it soon turned into a mess:

 

... crates would have to contain gear that matches your adv. class

... it turned out that the gear ought to be even specific to your class spec

... play testers achieved command level 100 way too soon for the system to stay attractive over the next year

... due to this and in order to support multiple tiers of gear, the max. level would have to be increased to 300

... due to the increased max. command rank, a single level up turned out to be unsatisfying and insignificant

... command crates would contain random items, increasing the chance for an depressing reward experience

... the possibility to aim for a specific gear piece was lost

... the lack of relevant loot (although common for most parts already) turned out to be a najor issue in operations

... the different types of end game content turned out to be hard to balance (win/lose in PvP, failing in OPs, etc.)

... XP and the derived form CXP didn't turn out to be a good & simple balance mechanism (see 'golden mobs', etc.)

... the nature of this unified system caused players to favor only the most rewarding content

... the lack of gear & upward level sync limited the amount of appropriate game content

... the lack of appropriate content and the dicrepancies in CXP rewards caused a highly repetitive gameplay

... 'gear via crates' made it hard to adjust inbalances without punishing those who have opened them already

...

... and so on

 

So in theory, their 'idea' or 'intentions' might have been understandable or maybe even honorable. And maybe, the system would have really simplified things, if BioWare would have done this correctly. And then, it might have turned out to be the next big step after the class design changes in 3.0 and the level sync in 4.0....

 

... but that will stay 'in theory' forever.

 

So maybe, just maybe... if BioWare would have introduced a harsh weekly limit for the CXP system; would have given a lower reward for monsters, but a higher reward for weekly quests; would have started out with a single tier of gear and a significantly higher chance to get the gear you want out of command crates; and wouldn't have increased the level sync right away, there might have been a glimpse of hope that this system would have been accepted by players

Edited January 27, 2017 by realleaftea