Star Wars™: The Old Republic™ - Road Map 2017

[Ragglemuffin]

Hey Keith.......got a question for you.

 

You know patch 5.3.....its not long now until July rears its beautiful head and shouts "HEY YOU GUYS!! READY FOR DIS AWESOME PATCH?!". Now we know patch 5.3 is going to include a sprinkling of class changes and i was wondering if, well, you know, the combat team maybe have some more information to share on the other classes aside from Shadow/Assassin?

 

Looking forward to reading your response, amigo

[Forren-Midosea]

That is not in our plans for this year. It may be something we can consider in the future, so I'll add it to our growing list of ideas.

 

-Keith--

 

So you have list of ideas? How about making something that would make this game great again in terms of PVE (PVE gsf! ME LIKE, but thats not it)

 

Dont know if you have plans for another xpansion but this game is tired of force based expansions. How about you will roll out an xpansion with something wierd and funny, something old but new again. For example everyone of us knows that Czerka company is full of wierd people, why not making it a main theme of new expansion and totally redesigning a PVE system. Making lots of instanses across galaxy on old planets with few bosses (2-3), adding some old school flash points with their story behind it and maybe it would be great if you will create a new class (afterall this game had lots of opportunities for this (dred guard with oricon, revanite with sor, zakuulan knight and outlander with kotfe) and bring back the story chapters once again.

 

Your predecessor had neat idea about making prototype and legendary gear feel like its something so you could do that too, all its needed is just a few tweaks for PVE. Making veteran mode mode dependent on tactics not gear.

 

[Jrbabar]

Hey Keith.......got a question for you.

 

You know patch 5.3.....its not long now until July rears its beautiful head and shouts "HEY YOU GUYS!! READY FOR DIS AWESOME PATCH?!". Now we know patch 5.3 is going to include a sprinkling of class changes and i was wondering if, well, you know, the combat team maybe have some more information to share on the other classes aside from Shadow/Assassin?

 

Looking forward to reading your response, amigo

 

This ^ please!! idk why it's so hush hush, i honestly thought all the changes were gonna be in the long awaited roadmap. :"(

[LordAppius]

To be bluntly honest, and you probably have read this by the thousands. but if you really want us to be hooked into the game give us missions that are more entertaining and complex than the usual kill x imp/rep/zakuul/revanite/hut cartel mercenaries. This is what ppl are tired of. I think there is a lack of motivation and imagination when it comes to creating missions. I can't recall a mission that i would like to repeat, because they are almost all the same are 100 % boring. We, or i should say, I, would like to see a mission where we start tracking our companions. Where Theron or Lana say

 

"Commander a recent scouting party has reported that your previous companion, Ashara Zavros, has been sighted on planet X!. We sent immediately a party to follow her and know a little bit more of her whereabouts. In the meantime we should departaruee right away for that planet at start pursuit and searching for her!"

 

Not all missions have to be like this, but please gives us a better reply than what Elara told the tropper, "yeah you know we married, but job comes first...." Even Quinn was away more loyal and ended up in jail. If you want ppl to actually start enjoying your game a little bit more give us missions where we actually feel we are accomplishing something. BUT FOR THE SAKE OF GOD, if you do take this in consideration, DO NOT MAKE THE QUESTS BORING AND DIVIDE THEM IN PERIODS OF MONTHS. This is what made a lot of players leave, the inability to provide steady content.

 

Providing 1 fs since iokath is not a good tactic. And the problem is that fp will be something we will steam roll in 20 minutes, where those 20 minutes will be killing trash or just stealthing away and killing bosses that have no impact on us or the story and don't provide information about nothing. Please look back at vanilla, try to pick up the good parts and improve from there. Giving us missions that are complex, interesting and that provide a sense of accomplsihment is what we want, not a mission to murder 200 x new enemies. If that is the purpose we should just make HK 51 and 55 go and kill stuff instead of us.

[EzioMessi]

To be bluntly honest, and you probably have read this by the thousands. but if you really want us to be hooked into the game give us missions that are more entertaining and complex than the usual kill x imp/rep/zakuul/revanite/hut cartel mercenaries. This is what ppl are tired of. I think there is a lack of motivation and imagination when it comes to creating missions. I can't recall a mission that i would like to repeat, because they are almost all the same are 100 % boring. We, or i should say, I, would like to see a mission where we start tracking our companions. Where Theron or Lana say

 

"Commander a recent scouting party has reported that your previous companion, Ashara Zavros, has been sighted on planet X!. We sent immediately a party to follow her and know a little bit more of her whereabouts. In the meantime we should departaruee right away for that planet at start pursuit and searching for her!"

 

Not all missions have to be like this, but please gives us a better reply than what Elara told the tropper, "yeah you know we married, but job comes first...." Even Quinn was away more loyal and ended up in jail. If you want ppl to actually start enjoying your game a little bit more give us missions where we actually feel we are accomplishing something. BUT FOR THE SAKE OF GOD, if you do take this in consideration, DO NOT MAKE THE QUESTS BORING AND DIVIDE THEM IN PERIODS OF MONTHS. This is what made a lot of players leave, the inability to provide steady content.

 

Providing 1 fs since iokath is not a good tactic. And the problem is that fp will be something we will steam roll in 20 minutes, where those 20 minutes will be killing trash or just stealthing away and killing bosses that have no impact on us or the story and don't provide information about nothing. Please look back at vanilla, try to pick up the good parts and improve from there. Giving us missions that are complex, interesting and that provide a sense of accomplsihment is what we want, not a mission to murder 200 x new enemies. If that is the purpose we should just make HK 51 and 55 go and kill stuff instead of us.

 

So I've never been much for PvE (especially not solo PvE) so I skipped them, but I've heard the macrobinocular and seeker droid missions are lauded for being a really good case of "And now, for something completely different!"

 

I wonder if they could make more missions along those lines? I can tell the intention with the walker and mouse droid missions was to make something that's different than "spam your usual rotation at different bosses" but it becomes old fast. Maybe they could improve along those lines, and make walker vs walker combat less about health bars and more like GSF, I do t know. But you're right, the solo missions do need something different after 5 years of fetch/kill quests.

[chaharbagh]

What are the species that Grennk and Sellexith belong to?

[KeithKanneg]

Hi Keith, is there any update on what this week's weekly discussion post will be? I think the class changes discussion and the combined server merger threads have been the past two discussions. I'm crusio to see which of the players' concerns are currently high enough on the priority list to make it into the weekly discussions.

 

(I hope this week's discussion isn't Ranked rewards, because that sounds less like a discussion and more like you telling us what's already happening.)

There's obviously lots to choose from, so we'll decide the topic tomorrow. We haven't established a priority list, yet, and that'll make it seem a bit random for a while.

 

Keith---

[KeithKanneg]

Thank you for replying! I messaged you here on SWTOR.

Ok, feeling a bit like a newb, but after you stated that, I realized you meant you sent me a Private Message. Uhoh, I've never checked that before and just now looked...SO, I sincerely apologize to everyone who has sent me a PM over the past couple months.

 

I wasn't being rude, I simply didn't know I had another inbox to check. I'm not sure I'll be able to answer every question, but will do my best to get back to you. I guarantee it's going to take some time! to get through all the messages. Thanks for being patient!

 

---Keith

[stoopicus]

Ok, feeling a bit like a newb, but after you stated that, I realized you meant you sent me a Private Message. Uhoh, I've never checked that before and just now looked...SO, I sincerely apologize to everyone who has sent me a PM over the past couple months.

 

I wasn't being rude, I simply didn't know I had another inbox to check. I'm not sure I'll be able to answer every question, but will do my best to get back to you. I guarantee it's going to take some time! to get through all the messages. Thanks for being patient!

 

---Keith

 

No worries! It's actually kind of hidden and has non-obvious notification of unread messages. I think most of us have done that

[Biomild]

Will the Manaan SH add an other 25% to the conquest bonus?

[Swedguy]

Ok, feeling a bit like a newb, but after you stated that, I realized you meant you sent me a Private Message. Uhoh, I've never checked that before and just now looked...SO, I sincerely apologize to everyone who has sent me a PM over the past couple months.

 

I wasn't being rude, I simply didn't know I had another inbox to check. I'm not sure I'll be able to answer every question, but will do my best to get back to you. I guarantee it's going to take some time! to get through all the messages. Thanks for being patient!

 

---Keith

No problem! As Stoopicus said, they're a bit hidden. To make things easier, here's what I was wondering: Since Companions seem pretty important, can we expect the KOTFE Chapter 9 Bug to be fixed at some point? Maybe by lettting us toggle Companion Romances manually or by letting us alter previous KOTFE decisions by replaying Chapters 1 to 9? Might be the wrong place to ask, but it seemed relevant since in the Road Map, you mention how companions are pretty important to BioWare.

Edited June 14, 2017 by Swedguy

[Blacklynx]

Thanks for the roadmap Keith, i must say i haven't read all posts so i'm sorry if these suggestions are repeated.

 

I'm the kind of player that prefers creating alts to play the vanilla story, so gc has been pretty much tertiary for me, also the reason why i still have my lvl 70 token unused. Would there be a way to create a character with the lvl 70 token but starting to play in the vanilla story? iIt's not like the level you are means that much nowdays.

 

As a suggestion for the gc menu, when i want to do the heroics/uprisings/pvp, why can't i choose wich ones i want to play in from a drop down menu? Like decided to do heroics so i choose from a drop down menu the planet i'm interested, instead clicking the heroics and cancel ad nauseum untill i get where i want to go.

 

There were claims when the tunings appeared that there would be different ways to get them other than boxes, any news on what's planned? (thanks for adding them to collections, even if it's expensive)

 

Any chances on revisiting the macrobinoculars/seeker droid end missions so they can be done solo?

 

This one might annoy some ppl but any chances of doing an ops solo story mode for those like me that want to see the story but can't be bothered/no time/no skill to do a complete ops. No need for achivements or even loot, just want to see the story (mainly the oricon story and now the Iokath one)

[OneHit]

Keith,

 

Can you add Cursor Size to the UI. Since I started playing this game 5 years ago my screen resolution has doubled, my screen size has doubled, and Ive been through 3 sets of glasses. The Cursor is too small and crisp that I often lose it during boss fights and PvP. Thanx

[omaan]

I don't know if the Dev's are still monitoring this discussion, but there is a question I HAVE to ask.

 

To make myself clear, I dislike and completely avoid PVP in games. Why? Lets just say I have had bad experiences with the PvP playerbase in every game that included it, so I will NOT participate in it ever again.

 

Now to my question, will you ever allow me to enjoy Galactic Star fighter (other than the limited tutorial) without having to PvP? I know there are many in t he PvE community like myself that completely avoid GSF because of the PvP. WIll you eventually open it up so ALL of your playerbase can enjoy it, or with you continue to keep it closed off to a small niche community?

 

If any of the Devs can answer this, I would greatly appreciate it.

 

Are you joking? Gsf is apriori pvp, it can't be pve lol. Pvp community is already in big minus in this game, since world pvp is dead, no new warzones for a long time. Pve community has ops,uprisings,fps and now you also want gsf? Lol too much, sorry

[omaan]

Use this thread to discuss the 2017 road map from Keith, which can be found here.

 

-eric

 

My feedback concerns bad state of pvp in this game. Are you planning to give us cross-server warzone queues? With buffing rewards from pve (each boss has a guarantee drops) many players are paying attention to pve rather than pvp, and i always see the same people queuing warzones which is booring because fighting the same players you know and fight every day makes these fights look the same lol. Numbers lf Pvp community is shrinking:world pvp is dead in swtor even on Iokath,ranked is dead on almost all servers except for tre and harb but even on these two it procs rarely, not many people paying attention to warzones because of bad class balance, no new warzones.

One of the possible solutions is cross-server queues! It's needed ASAP especially if you are not planning server merges. So, can we have it? Are you planning to make cross-servers queues and support pvp in this game?

[OneHit]

This one might annoy some ppl but any chances of doing an ops solo story mode for those like me that want to see the story but can't be bothered/no time/no skill to do a complete ops. No need for achievements or even loot, just want to see the story (mainly the oricon story and now the Iokath one)

 

This doesn't bother me at all. In fact I think if taken a step further this will solve a lot of the Story vs Endgame drama. I suggest abandon all chapters immediately. Make all Story content from this point on be a progress from Missions<Dailies<FPS<OPS. Just add a solo mode.

 

Hold on. This is where things start to make sense.

 

And in the Solo Mode let us fill groups with a few of the 50 companions we have. Maybe not a full 8m group for ops. Maybe so. Idc. Dumb down the damage so low that you will only lose a couple companions due to AOE, or make them immune to AOE. W/e. Story mode peeps don't mind an easy win. **** let them get the weekly done with it. This actually makes them somewhat familiar with the fights and maybe they might dip their toe in ops again an see if they enjoy it better now. That way you can pretty much satisfy Half the community there. Freeing up the rest of the cartel market team to work on PvP and GSF. Which means adding new war zones/games.

 

Keep the events Fresh like you just did with the Nightlife event. Making it fresh every year is a better schedule. But you def get PROPS for listening to the community and making last years Jackpots available via vendor.

 

Introduce a new SH once a year. New tweaks to the customization so RP/Dress up communities are happy.

 

Down the road I'd also like to see In game meters and comms. I know that opens a new can of worms an fixes but it would help the more experienced players help the lesser experienced players. Sometimes they want help but aren't tech savvy enough to setup VOIP. That way you can explain why their numbers are so off on the meter. Every one does "good" dps till they get a meter.

 

I would also like to see the game go to the once a year $60 expansion bulk content drop. Followed by either the $15 a month Sub fee which we currently have. Or which I suggest DLC's like DLC's every 3 months for say $45. This will avoid the current cart blanch system we have now. Also giving you some capital to work on the upcoming content. But you gotta find a way to release content if you want player to come back to this game. Which i Think we all want. That will solve the issues with server pops/que times.

[VladThePada]

Ok, feeling a bit like a newb, but after you stated that, I realized you meant you sent me a Private Message. Uhoh, I've never checked that before and just now looked...SO, I sincerely apologize to everyone who has sent me a PM over the past couple months.

 

I wasn't being rude, I simply didn't know I had another inbox to check. I'm not sure I'll be able to answer every question, but will do my best to get back to you. I guarantee it's going to take some time! to get through all the messages. Thanks for being patient!

 

---Keith

 

You should notice the PMs for bringing back the old season rewards as a choice for the new players to enjoy the best rewards from the past seasons like furious, gladiatorial and rest. Actually lots of people want that really badly ^^ including me.

[EzioMessi]

Out of curiosity, during the upcoming balance patches, would the Devs consider lowering the amount of CC in the game? PvP can be downright unplayable for melee sometimes, between the extreme burst and defensives from Snipers and Mercs, and the large amount of CC everyone in the game tosses around.

 

Any changes implemented through the resolve system won't affect PvErs at all, and any changes to the abilities' durations themselves could be separated into a PvE effect and PvP effect like they've been since launch, so it wouldn't affect them much.

 

My suggestion would be to either increase the duration of resolve, or give most melee classes a longer duration CC-immunity than we currently do. Maybe fill up resolve in just a single stun instead of two (the burst is currently high enough that you could conceivably die within a single stun anyways).

[dr_mike]

Ok, feeling a bit like a newb, but after you stated that, I realized you meant you sent me a Private Message. Uhoh, I've never checked that before and just now looked...SO, I sincerely apologize to everyone who has sent me a PM over the past couple months.

 

I wasn't being rude, I simply didn't know I had another inbox to check. I'm not sure I'll be able to answer every question, but will do my best to get back to you. I guarantee it's going to take some time! to get through all the messages. Thanks for being patient!

 

---Keith

 

First Arbitration filed November 2014. Two more followed that. Still waiting.

 

edit: Are we ever going to get the issues with the forums fixed? Six+ year old software. Broken theme pictures and icons. Subforums on the front page so folks can figure out where they need to be. Could have sworn that vBulletin supports a spam filter which could be set to disallow referral links in spam content also. etc.

Edited June 14, 2017 by dr_mike

[chaharbagh]

Anyone have any idea what species Grenkk and Sellexith belong to? I've checked the file names, but i doubt that those are the correct names of the species. Edited June 14, 2017 by chaharbagh

[HuNtOziO]

Can you please tell us when you'll be posting more class balance changes? This is by far my most anticipated change in the next patch and would love to know the balance change plans

[Andryah]

Ok, feeling a bit like a newb, but after you stated that, I realized you meant you sent me a Private Message. Uhoh, I've never checked that before and just now looked...SO, I sincerely apologize to everyone who has sent me a PM over the past couple months.

 

I wasn't being rude, I simply didn't know I had another inbox to check. I'm not sure I'll be able to answer every question, but will do my best to get back to you. I guarantee it's going to take some time! to get through all the messages. Thanks for being patient!

 

---Keith

 

I find it surprising that the studio does not have the forum configured such that any PMs to customer facing staff get forwarded to an email address you and other staff actually regularly check. We all as players can and do get a copy of any PM sent to our email of record.

 

You should fix this.. because it's a long running complaint in the forums about PMs to customer facing staff appearing to be ignored.

Edited June 14, 2017 by Andryah

[chaharbagh]

Anyone have any idea what species Grenkk and Sellexith belong to? I've checked the file names, but i doubt that those are the correct names of the species.

 

I trust that you have the answers, Keith?

Edited June 14, 2017 by chaharbagh

[chaharbagh]

Managed to PM Keith and Eric regarding the respective species that Grenkk and Sellexith belong to.

[DarthDymond]

Anyone have any idea what species Grenkk and Sellexith belong to? I've checked the file names, but i doubt that those are the correct names of the species.

If they're not a new species, I'd guess they're a variation on the Vurk (the species of the Jedi that Jango kills in front of Dooku in Ep II).