Galactic Command Gearing Roadmap - Coming This Week

[MaximumOwnage]

Our goal at launch was 60 minutes per crate. Right now we are seeing times both below and above that goal with an average time per crate being little higher than our target, but not much. It is one of the data points we looked at to plan for our new target. Which if you are math savvy, our new goal is you will get crates twice as fast as before (or more).

 

For reference, people doing aggressive CXP farming are already doing so at a rate quite a bit faster than every 60 minutes. Our new targets are that someone will get a crate every 30 minutes, without a boost.

 

-eric

 

The "CXP" rate if I have this correct is going to be raised. Assuming you have your finger on the pulse of the player base I am guessing (and hoping) you are raising it considerably higher than it is now. I wish it was happening today because this hit players like me with 50 characters especially hard.

 

My concern for players like myself and many many others especially since DvsL who now have dozens of characters to play and gear is not the "CXP" per say. It is part of it because of the fact that we need command tokens given to us in the crates for purchasing gear. But my main concern is unassembled components. And I will try my best to explain why.

 

Since the gearing upgrade somewhere during 3.0, the gearing of alts was made possible. It was a very important step in the right direction because as you know SWTOR has in a way become very alt heavy mainly due to the age of the game and people wanting to explore every storyline in the game. It was the right decision at the right time. Which brings us to 2017.

 

Since the DvsL event, it is even more important than ever to follow in the pattern of the 3.0 gearing concept. And the concept was simple. Make gearing for all players easier and less grindy. This concept can be easily achieved with the "new" 5.0 gearing system (which I would argue is the best one since launch IMO) by one simple step. Make the return as quick if not even quicker than 3.0.

 

As this game gets older and more people play it the amount of alt toons only grows larger. The need for a quicker less grindy gearing system is more important now than ever.

 

In closing I am going to as humbly as I can make a suggestion. Return the unassembled component returns to the same rate as it was prior to 5.0. I don't know how to work out the math but I am sure your team does. I am a lot less concerned about the rate of boxes (other than the fact I need those command tokens) than I am the rate of unassembled components. However you figure out the combination so we are not bottle necked waiting for command tokens while our unassembled components pile up.

 

Please return the rate to what it was before 5.0 and in my opinion this gearing system will go down as the funnest and the best since launch. I and many others are hoping and looking forward to your team getting this right. Thanks for your time and I hope you read this.

[Lhancelot]

*dons asbestos underpants*

 

I like GC and think it can be salvaged.

 

IMHO the following needs to be done:

 

- Faster cxp levelling (apparently you are doing that now)

- Bad luck protection for set bonus items in crates

 

With these changes, I'd actually appreciate GC. Why? It makes a lot of content relevant again, which, in the absence of new content, is the next best thing. I do a lot of solo stuff and I still want to gear up properly. If only to do veteran and master mode chapters....

 

Edit: I don't understand all of this "game is dying" talk. I've not seen so many people online in a long time. I understand why everyone is frustrated with the 5.0 changes, and there's a lot of valid concerns. But this talk of everyone fleeing in droves is the opposite of what I see every day....

 

Do you mostly PVP?

 

I think the majority of the frustrated players are players that predominantly PVP, and who like gearing alts via PVP.

 

Also, your opinion is equally valid and important as anyone else's, but I would wager that it differs from the majority of players on the game atm.

 

I think judging from the forums and in the game talking to other players, the vast majority do not like the RNG aspect of this new gearing system and seeing that's the structure it's built on, it's a highly disliked system.

 

Fact of the matter is, as always BW/EA will not admit the system is built on a shoddy AWFUL structure of RNG which DOESN'T work as was proven prior to 3.3.

 

When patch 3.3 made gearing easier and allowed alts to be geared via PVP, the entire playerbase rejoiced in celebration of having so much freedom and flexibility in gearing mains and alts for PVP.

 

All of that freedom and happiness was eradicated with two quick patches called 5.0 and 5.1.

 

This story is about a gearing system that worked GREAT and was never complained about but was "fixed" when in fact it was one of the only facets of the game that was solid and not one bit broken.

 

Instead of working on replayable content I guess they decided to try to create a new grind to make old content new, but this is impossible as you can't turn something old into something new anyway.

 

Lots of dev work from the past that was well designed and well made was trashed and thrown away when the old gearing system was destroyed and this new abomination was implemented.

 

To say I hate the new gearing system and changes would be an understatement.

[Talon_strikes]

*dons asbestos underpants*

 

I like GC and think it can be salvaged.

 

IMHO the following needs to be done:

 

- Faster cxp levelling (apparently you are doing that now)

- Bad luck protection for set bonus items in crates

 

With these changes, I'd actually appreciate GC. Why? It makes a lot of content relevant again, which, in the absence of new content, is the next best thing. I do a lot of solo stuff and I still want to gear up properly. If only to do veteran and master mode chapters....

 

Edit: I don't understand all of this "game is dying" talk. I've not seen so many people online in a long time. I understand why everyone is frustrated with the 5.0 changes, and there's a lot of valid concerns. But this talk of everyone fleeing in droves is the opposite of what I see every day....

Except we don't need to make elder content relevant again. The devs have been doing that for the past 2 years with 12xp leveling, DvL event, etc. We need new group content for this game.

[Sargrith]

Do people really want to go back to 4.0 and replay old operations (some 5 years old) to gear up?

 

Seriously if BW went back and said, sure we made a mistake now every week one HM op will drop 240 gear the other 236 knock yourselves out. People would want to do that content?

 

People that want that style of gearing haven't moved on by now? Should they bring it back the option to possibly get one piece of 240 gear a week playing old operations would make gearing great? Cause I don't see it. I think if they went back to 4.0 gearing method the forums would be in uproar that there are no new ops and people are bored of the old ones and everyone is quitting.

 

Do people think that all the people that have quit would return to replay old operations. You can play them now and get unassembled components, so its only really a speed thing and if its fun whats the rush cause 5 year old ops are fun right.

 

If they had released 5.0 with the old gearing and not this sham things would never have turned so badly for them. People who were playing were obviously ok with the system or at least ok enough. What they did was drive people off with their broken RNG system. Will they come back with a change back? I can't say. But at this point changing back is the only reasonable thing to do. Making RNG more convoluted or faster still leaves the mess that is.

 

And there is a new op coming. Yes its been too long in coming but it is coming. So people do want to gear up for it, and yes making the system something people are ok with will make that more likely.

[DanNV]

Tweaking and supplementing the GC system is great, but whatever you do, please don't remove it the way some hardliners are calling for.

 

Letting all playstyles advance along a unified track towards the BiS gear is a positive change for the game, and if the trade-off for having that unified track is that progress along it needs to be throttled, then on balance that's still worth it.

 

Yeah, it's such a loved system that subs are leaving in huge numbers, populations are way down year over year, etc. If they keep it as is, they won't be able to keep the lights on. Good idea.

[RswanBing]

I don't understand all of this "game is dying" talk. I've not seen so many people online in a long time. I understand why everyone is frustrated with the 5.0 changes, and there's a lot of valid concerns. But this talk of everyone fleeing in droves is the opposite of what I see every day....

 

You've not seen so many people online in a long time, I don't doubt you word, but I've experience the opposite.

 

Then I transfer to end my sub in good conditions, and sure my new server is populated. Since players who transfers choose one of the few populated server, these servers see population increase but in the same time other servers go worse for the same reason. The population isn't growing up, it's just concentrating.

[DarkSaberMaster]

What a joke.

 

Go back to the old system. Why do you insist on putting in a system that is clearly hated by the players? Admit you made a mistake, restore the old system and move on. Really it's not that hard to do.

 

You people are like the morons that did New Coke, the main thing different between you and them is they didn't insist the customers were wrong and refuse to restore the old Coke. They quickly learned and reverted the changes they made. How in the world can you people be this dense?

 

They can't. It's too easy for them to do. So they won't. They love doing **** the hard way.

[RiVaN_]

These are pretty gosh darn valid concerns .

If someone really wants to wait for changes to take affect before playing, that's ok! However, I think there is other fun to be had without just gearing their 70 (level an alt to 70 in prep for the changes, finish up legendary status, etc).

 

-eric

 

I read the above quoted post, specifically the part that I have left in my quoted section and I ask; for a player like me, (and there are many like me out there) other than gearing what else is left to do? I mean, other than move on to a different game until you get things sorted out? Your statement practically says, "for those who have been around since launch there really isn't much for you until the Op is complete and we fix the gearing issues." Seriously, you might as well suggest what game we should be playing in the meantime.

 

Allow me to explain a little:

 

To be fair to the community this game encouraged us to level 8 characters to at least level 50 (via the 8 original, chapter based stories) before the DvL Event with the "Legendary Player" achievements. Then we were encouraged to speed level 8 more during DvL this summer.

 

So I, for example, have a total of 28 characters on my main server. I have seen all of the class stories multiple times, I have at least one of each character type (multiples of others) and I have played through all of the story content that you have provided on many occasions. Players similar to me have progressed every Operation, every flash point and even the new uprisings to the point that it is all muscle memory now.

The one thing that we had to look forward to in 5.0, 5.1 and so on, was chasing that next level of gear through Operations and checking out this new Galactic Command progression system . But, as it turns out, Galactic Command isn't much fun.

 

Yes most MMO's are implementing some sort of endgame progression system that keeps players interested and keeps them playing long past the provided content, but those progression systems are based on Character progression and the improvement of your characters stats and attributes. SWTOR has made a progression system focused solely on gearing. The problem that I fear that you have created is that there is nowhere to go from here. No real reason to ever up the level cap or the command ranks. With Level Sync there is no reason to retool Operations to be more difficult or challenging and with bolster there is no reason to make many more changes to PvP.

However, many of these systems aren't working well together. At this point SO MUCH about the game is broken that, for many of us that have been playing since launch there is FAR MORE frustration than there is fun in SWTOR.

 

What I would like to know from you Eric is what reason do players like myself have to continue to pay a subscription to Bioware to play SWTOR? What reason do those of us who have been here since the beginning of things have to stick it out? Your statement above indicates that for long term players who are simply hanging out and waiting for new content we might as well move on...

[GalacticKegger]

Do people really want to go back to 4.0 and replay old operations (some 5 years old) to gear up?

Actually, that would be pre-4.0, not 4.0. Basically, we just want to go back to the old system. That we'd have to go back to the old operations to gear up is simply the result of not having any newer operations to play since before 4.0.

 

Seriously if BW went back and said, sure we made a mistake now every week one HM op will drop 240 gear the other 236 knock yourselves out. People would want to do that content?

Again, please don't confuse the system with content. The system is not content.

 

People that want that style of gearing haven't moved on by now?

Why? This was their game for 4 years ... considerably more than that for many if you go back to beta. Were they supposed to leave?

 

Should they bring it back the option to possibly get one piece of 240 gear a week playing old operations would make gearing great? Cause I don't see it.

We would see at least one piece of gear a week for every boss in every operation. Would every player be able to use them all? Of course not. But the notion of the pre-4.0 system limiting players to possibly getting one piece of 240 gear a week is absurd.

 

I think if they went back to 4.0 gearing method the forums would be in uproar that there are no new ops and people are bored of the old ones and everyone is quitting.

Again ... PRE-4.0 mate ... PRE-4.0. While I can't speak for everyone I do know that bringing the pre-4.0 end game system back in preparation for a cadence of Ops releases would reconstitute our Harbinger guilds. That's 90+ legacy accounts with 100% cooperation. Realistically, at least half that would return. The only people I see who would be in an uproar are solo players who don't want to see new group content for fear of actually having to group up to play it. But I believe BW is curing that by having both a solo ops track and a group ops track. So even that won't be an issue any longer.

 

Do people think that all the people that have quit would return to replay old operations.

At least we are in agreement that there is nothing for large group end game but 2 year old old content to play. Though I'm not sure why the fixation on old operations. A return to the pre-4.0 system would would bring veteran players back to play ANY operations ... especially the newly announced ones.

 

You can play them now and get unassembled components, so its only really a speed thing and if its fun whats the rush cause 5 year old ops are fun right.

It's not a speed thing. It's a concept and progression flow thing. Under the pre-4.0 system it would take a full time raider a couple of months to gear a character for BiS at each level (SM, HM, NiM). Unusable gear was RE'd and the mats rolled for so alternate gear could be crafted, and Legacy comms were used to fill in the blanks (for both main and alts) otherwise gearing for the next progression level would taken an eternity.

 

Putting together a "finished" tank, dps or healer for each faction took 6 months, and by that time a new heroic zone with new story missions, new flashpoints and HMs and a new operation had already been released to keep the process going.

 

Galactic Command is designed for a single player tablet RPG. SWTOR is not a single player tablet RPG. If it is then Bioware needs to come right out and formally announce it. Until then the game remains subject to MMO expectations from its MMO community.

Edited February 2, 2017 by GalacticKegger

[Ottoattack]

These are pretty gosh darn valid concerns .

 

It is fair to say that if someone solely cares about gearing their character, they would consider waiting for these changes to go in place before playing. That is why we had a few goals in making my post yesterday:

1. We are being open that changes are coming.
   
2. We are going to provide details on what is changing, and when, so that you know what to expect.
   
3. We want to start rolling these changes out ASAP. I said the changes will start in the next few weeks, but the goal is the first changes will happen very soon (likely next week).
   

If someone really wants to wait for changes to take affect before playing, that's ok! However, I think there is other fun to be had without just gearing their 70 (level an alt to 70 in prep for the changes, finish up legendary status, etc).

 

-eric

 

Since you mention the devs are open for chat:

 

GC, RNG, CXP gain and rewards are not the main issues. GC being the PRIMARY source for gearing is the main issue.

 

My suggestion is to make ops and PvP become the primary source for end game gearing and GC stays the same as a supporting mechanism. You can get "lucky" but you do not massive grind and luck to gear.

 

One more, you want Tier 1 sets to be easy to obtain. Currently they are extremely time consuming to obtain unless RNJesus loves you.

 

For PvP:

• Reduce tier 1 UC costs by a factor of 4.
  
• Reduce tier 2 UC costs by a factor of 2.
  
• Reduce tier 3 UC by 25%.
  
• Increase the loss gain from 2 to 3 UC.
  
• Make arenas provide same UCs as WZs.
  

 

Ops:

• Every SM boss drops tier 1 piece(s).
  
• Every HM boss drops tier 2 piece(s).
  
• Every NiM boss drops tier 3 piece(s).
  

 

Do this by next week, gearing problem solved and you do not have to mess with GC at all.

Edited January 31, 2017 by Ottoattack

[teclado]

I must say, I really appreciate the increased interaction from you, Eric.

 

I understand the intent of getting rid of expertise from pvp...but I still think it was a mistake. The reason is because now we have two things, two very different things, tied together with the same gearing system. PvP gear should be quick and easy to get, but not as good in PvE as the best gear attained from operations. Gear progression makes more sense for PvE. As I'm sure you are well aware of the reasoning behind game update 3.3 (and I'm sure you've seen Lhancelot's post that dug up the 3.3 changes explanation), PvP gearing should be quick and easy, making PvP about skill and fun competing against other players, not an epic long grind.

 

I feel like the 5.0 changes removing expertise really painted us in a corner. I mean, you could just instantly bring back pvp gear with expertise and re-tweak bolster accordingly. But then a bunch of PvP only players might be a little miffed that they spent so much time grinding for PVE gear, which would instantly become non-optimal in pvp. But if the pvp gear is cheap enough, like it was from 3.3 to 5.0, I don't think we would be too upset.

 

The TL;DR is that I would love to see PvP gear with expertise come back (with two tier sets....something along the lines of...I don't know...220 and 224 rating). Keep Galactic Command if you must. Then just improve operations drops a little, and viola! You have a good system IMO.

 

EDIT: Maybe the reason for the drastic shift from 3.3 to 5.0 gearing philosophies is due to something I've heard you guys talk about before: there has to be a carrot to work for, otherwise players lose interest and stop playing? Perhaps that's what happened in 4.0? You guys have the data, obviously. I have no clue. For me, personally, I enjoyed getting full 208 pvp gear on multiple characters. Maybe you could increase the grind a little bit from what 3.3 offered, but I think it definitely needs to be much shorter than what we have right now. Perhaps some kind of cosmetic rewards could be the carrot. Offer mounts, weapons, gear appearance sets, color crystals, dyes, etc. as purchasable rewards. You could make them cost Command Tokens so that people could do whatever they want and work towards the rewards. I don't think the carrot should entirely be gear (for PvP at least).

Edited January 31, 2017 by teclado

[MaximumOwnage]

Since you mention the devs are open for chat:

 

GC, RNG, CXP gain and rewards are not the main issues. GC being the PRIMARY source for gearing is the main issue.

 

My suggestion is to make ops and PvP become the primary source for end game gearing and GC stays the same as a supporting mechanism. You can get "lucky" but you do not massive grind and luck to gear.

 

One more, you want Tier 1 sets to be easy to obtain. Currently they are extremely time consuming to obtain unless RNJesus loves you.

 

For PvP:

• Reduce tier 1 UC costs by a factor of 4.
  
• Reduce tier 2 UC costs by a factor of 2.
  
• Reduce tier 3 UC by 25%.
  
• Increase the loss gain from 2 to 3 UC.
  
• Make arenas provide same UCs as WZs.
  

 

Ops:

• Every SM boss drops tier 1 piece(s).
  
• Every HM boss drops tier 2 piece(s).
  
• Every NiM boss drops tier 3 piece(s).
  

 

Do this by next week, gearing problem solved and you do not have to mess with GC at all.

 

I agree with this. I really am not concerned about how fast I get to 300 or the drop luck IF they return the unassembled component rate to the same speed as it was before 5.0. I am not sure what your "factor" rate means exactly but if it equates to a speed of return as fast if not faster than before 5.0 I am in total agreement with you.

 

It is nice to see people like you reasonably trying to get this system working in a way that is enjoyable.

 

It is such an easy fix it is painful to watch them not correcting it. But it sounds like they hear us and are going to fix this once and for all.

 

My only fear right now is that they are bashful on the return rate and rather than get it to where it needs to be, they just tweak it and make this entire game more toxic than it is now.

 

Its really simple. The quicker the gear grind goes, that happier the player base will be. I am not saying make it no grind, but the rate of return prior to 5.0 would be fair enough. And I am including the weekly and daily PVP missions and all the ways we received the old gearing comms. It needs to return to that rate.

 

the bigger the swing the development team takes towards making this grind quicker, the happier the player base will be. How happy do you want us? Well we will see. Because it is super easy right now to fix this. I just wish it was 4 weeks ago because my entire guild has left the game . I am confident this will get them back to playing again if they do this fix right.

[MaximumOwnage]

The TL;DR is that I would love to see PvP gear with expertise come back (with two tier sets....something along the lines of...I don't know...220 and 224 rating). Keep Galactic Command if you must. Then just improve operations drops a little, and viola! You have a good system IMO.

 

Excellent point! Or what they also could do is a reverse bolster for PVP. Let me explain.

 

I totally agree that not only should the two not have to mix, but that the gear requirements for nightmare mode should be achieved by rewards attained from that very difficult work not simply PVP. You can accomplish this by NOT adding expertise. Here is how I propose to do it:

 

#1. Come out with a gear set ONLY obtainable thru the PVE system (OPS, nightmare or whatever) and make that gear supreme since it is the most difficult way to obtain it.

 

#2. Introduce a reverse bolster. Anyone who has this gear equipped while entering a WZ will be bolstered DOWN to the highest obtainable PVP gear in any WZ.

 

#3. Keep expertise out of the game and achieve both giving PVP players the enticement to advance to PVE HMs or NM modes because his top gear will allow him the instructory level of PVE gear. Something us PVP players lacked with expertise gear.

 

#4. Have a less toxic environment between the "PVP" crowd and the "PVE" crowd because now they are both viable players using their current gear in either instance of game play.

 

I think it would be a win win to introduce reversed bolster to this game and introduce an entire new gear set for NM modes or HMs of PVE.

 

Just my thoughts on this. Thank you.

[wainot-keel]

He's probably not. He's speaking for a vast majority of the posters in this thread, which are the same people that have been complaining non stop since December.

 

He probably is.

On fleet gen chat , not once , not even for trolling purposes I've seen people defending this GC garbage.

 

Everybody in my entire guild, who never post on these forums, think this is a garbage gearing system....

[Ottoattack]

I must say, I really appreciate the increased interaction from you, Eric.

 

I understand the intent of getting rid of expertise from pvp...but I still think it was a mistake. The reason is because now we have two things, two very different things, tied together with the same gearing system. PvP gear should be quick and easy to get, but not as good in PvE as the best gear attained from operations. Gear progression makes more sense for PvE. As I'm sure you are well aware of the reasoning behind game update 3.3 (and I'm sure you've seen Lhancelot's post that dug up the 3.3 changes explanation), PvP gearing should be quick and easy, making PvP about skill and fun competing against other players, not an epic long grind.

 

I feel like the 5.0 changes removing expertise really painted us in a corner. I mean, you could just instantly bring back pvp gear with expertise and re-tweak bolster accordingly. But then a bunch of PvP only players might be a little miffed that they spent so much time grinding for PVE gear, which would instantly become non-optimal in pvp. But if the pvp gear is cheap enough, like it was from 3.3 to 5.0, I don't think we would be too upset.

 

The TL;DR is that I would love to see PvP gear with expertise come back (with two tier sets....something along the lines of...I don't know...220 and 224 rating). Keep Galactic Command if you must. Then just improve operations drops a little, and viola! You have a good system IMO.

 

EDIT: Maybe the reason for the drastic shift from 3.3 to 5.0 gearing philosophies is due to something I've heard you guys talk about before: there has to be a carrot to work for, otherwise players lose interest and stop playing? Perhaps that's what happened in 4.0? You guys have the data, obviously. I have no clue. For me, personally, I enjoyed getting full 208 pvp gear on multiple characters. Maybe you could increase the grind a little bit from what 3.3 offered, but I think it definitely needs to be much shorter than what we have right now. Perhaps some kind of cosmetic rewards could be the carrot. Offer mounts, weapons, gear appearance sets, color crystals, dyes, etc. as purchasable rewards. You could make them cost Command Tokens so that people could do whatever they want and work towards the rewards. I don't think the carrot should entirely be gear (for PvP at least).

 

As someone who almost exclusively PvPs I am happy that expertise is gone and I do not want it to ever come back. I would rather have bolster set at 242, where regardless of what gear you are wearing you get max stats, to even out the play field. Though this is the discussion for another thread.

 

I am not in the majority, but I do think GC is really good supporting all players, especially the ones who do not do end game. It just cannot be the primary source of gearing. It is always okay to get "lucky" or be a bit ahead if you like grinding, but luck and grinding should never be the main progression path in any game.

[Lhancelot]

EDIT: Maybe the reason for the drastic shift from 3.3 to 5.0 gearing philosophies is due to something I've heard you guys talk about before: there has to be a carrot to work for, otherwise players lose interest and stop playing? Perhaps that's what happened in 4.0? You guys have the data, obviously.

 

They had the data when 3.3 was patched in, and it showed that people didn't want to grind for PVP gears, and the data also showed that the majority of players couldn't even get the top tier gear set anyway... 2% had a full Dark Reaver set, according to their own metrics!

 

PVP should not be a gear grinding progression unless an entry level gear set is easily obtained and there should not be a great disparity of power between the entry set and top tier set in PVP.

 

Gear grind and gear progression is best suited for PVE where raids are set up in a progression built system.

 

Sure, a "carrot" system works in PVE, because the point is to build up strength over time and conquer raid content in a level climbing type manner. In PVE you defeat one level, gain gears from it, and eventually move up to the next harder level that then gives better gears.

 

Applying a slow, grinding gear progression for PVP is not reasonable, and even worse making entry level gears ultra hard to get is even more counter-productive, hurting anyone that is starting a new character in PVP.

 

Carrots in PVP should be cosmetic, and fluff stuff imo.

 

PVPers generally enjoy having rare items they can show-off and wear on their characters, or having toys they can click and play with that others do not have.

 

PVPers usually do not care about having better gear stats than everyone else, in fact there's a certain pride knowing you have the same gear yet dominate everyone else.

[Vember]

He probably is.

On fleet gen chat , not once , not even for trolling purposes I've seen people defending this GC garbage.

 

Everybody in my entire guild, who never post on these forums, think this is a garbage gearing system....

 

I've seen the opposite...the amount of white knights in game is enormous compared to what you see on the forums.

 

Also funny that everyone in my guild is happy to get gear for doing whatever they want, and have made several comments to that effect.

 

Funny how that works.

Edited January 31, 2017 by Vember

[Lhancelot]

I've seen the opposite...the amount of white knights in game is enormous compared to what you see on the forums.

 

Also funny that everyone in my guild is happy to get gear for doing whatever they want, and have made several comments to that effect.

 

Funny how that works.

 

Interesting because even people that say it's not as bad as some say, admit it's a worse gearing system than 4.0 and earlier.

 

I also have not heard one person defend GC, not one on fleet or anywhere else in the game.

 

RNG has been called every dirty word in the book in the game and on the forums.

 

I would love to know what alternative swtor universe/server you are in or on so I can bask in the positive vibes of such a great community that loves RNG.

 

Personally I haven't witnessed one ray of sunshine regarding this system or it's RNG platform it is built on. Every comment that tries to point out something positive with it always adds a caveat or the word "BUT" and a lengthy explanation of what needs to be added.

 

All I got to do is think about the old gearing system. I know for a fact I never seen one forum post or fleet chat discussion about how the 3.3 and later was bad regarding gearing.

 

We all found the gearing system to be one of the only stable and decent things about the game prior to 5.0 and 5.1.

 

Sometimes change is not a good thing. In this case it definitely was a bad thing.

 

The minor pros of the 5.0 and 5.1 gearing system are so heavily outweighed by the cons that any sensible dev group would either revert back to the old system or implement vast changes and quickly before more customers grew angry and left.

[TUXs]

I've seen the opposite...the amount of white knights in game is enormous compared to what you see on the forums.

 

Also funny that everyone in my guild is happy to get gear for doing whatever they want, and have made several comments to that effect.

 

Funny how that works.

It is funny, especially when that is a gross mischaracterization of how the current system works.

 

You do NOT get gear doing whatever you want...you simply get a chance at gear doing ONLY activities Bioware wants you to gain CXP from. Crafters get no CXP. Decorators get no CXP. Collectors get no CXP. RPers get no CXP. Explorers get no CXP. Only certain things award CXP...and CXP is no guarantee, as many can attest to, of getting the gear you need.

[ctprock]

They'll probably screw this up just as bad as the 5.1 rework and will require a rework after this one, but don't worry guys we got an announcement for a rework of a rework for a system nobody wanted but Ben "Thrill of the Hunt™" Irving and Charles "Who is Lord Scourge?" Boyd lmfao

[MaximumOwnage]

It is funny, especially when that is a gross mischaracterization of how the current system works.

 

You do NOT get gear doing whatever you want...you simply get a chance at gear doing ONLY activities Bioware wants you to gain CXP from. Crafters get no CXP. Decorators get no CXP. Collectors get no CXP. RPers get no CXP. Explorers get no CXP. Only certain things award CXP...and CXP is no guarantee, as many can attest to, of getting the gear you need.

 

Hey TUX, what do you think of my reverse bolster idea? I always respect your opinion and was wondering your thoughts on this.

 

http://www.swtor.com/community/showpost.php?p=9228771&postcount=213

[benmas]

pleeeeese put a weapon box in the Season 8 rewards pleeeeeeeese

 

Also please put the brackets back to who they in season 3to6

so:

Bronze players get tokens to buy: crystals, unique title (1000-1349)

Silver players get tokens to buy: weapons crystal unique title (1350-159)

Gold players get tokens to buy: weapons crystals unique title mount(1600+)

Platinum get: basically everything + unique title (top players)

Edited January 31, 2017 by benmas

[curulz]

Hey folks,

 

In one of my previous posts I highlighted that beyond the changes we made in Game Update 5.1 that there are more coming. By Friday of this week I am going to make a forum post highlighting a roadmap of changes you can expect to address the feedback you have raised around gearing in Galactic Command. These changes will be starting in the next few weeks and will go through to Game Update 5.2. They are intended to address the following:

• Greatly increase the rate at which you earn Command Crates. Our goal is that you earn one Crate every 30 minutes, or less (on average).
  
• Looking at improvements we can make to Unassembled Components and Unassembled Pieces.
  
• Make gearing more alt-friendly.
  

That isn't a comprehensive list, but it gives you an idea of some of the things we are looking to address based on your feedback. Just in case I was quiet about Galactic Command for a few days I want you to know that we are listening and more changes are coming. Look for my post later this week!

 

Thanks everyone.

 

-eric

 

Glad you are trying to take some steps in the right direction. I hope you are also planning RNG mitigation. I'm ok with the GC system (with some upward tweaks in gains and balancing) but RNG is still a biggie. Getting a crate twice as fast is good, but not if that crate has little to no value, or worse a duplicate piece.

[TUXs]

Hey TUX, what do you think of my reverse bolster idea? I always respect your opinion and was wondering your thoughts on this.

 

http://www.swtor.com/community/showpost.php?p=9228771&postcount=213

Very nice! see below

Edited January 31, 2017 by TUXs

[GalacticKegger]

Hey TUX, what do you think of my reverse bolster idea? I always respect your opinion ...

Agreed. It's been a year away from the forums for me and TUXs has always been a straight shooter.

 

BW's use of the word Operations in a cohesive sentence got our attention and brought me back in, so I am trying everything within reason to get our Harbinger guilds reconstituted. But GC for anything other than a solo achievement system will continue to be a deal breaker. Frankly, they should have released KotFE as a separate single player KOTOR 3 and left SWTOR alone. But that's just us.

 

At least BWA is trying to bridge that gap by having simultaneous solo & group operations tracks. The problem is they are blindly adamant about using CXP for both and the audience they are trying to placate by announcing the return of Operations want nothing to do with it.

 

Anyway, it is good to hear his voice of reason again.

Edited January 31, 2017 by GalacticKegger