Iokath, GotM Tyth and A&E

[worexx]

Hi Eric

 

What’s wrong with you and your team?

 

Now, the next boss is released and it seems that your dev team are misfocused. Iokath was announced as a great new planet for dailies which follows the storyline where your faction is not where you was born but what you chose. We got a mob filled planet where no one is online after finished the achievements. This was waste of dev time. The new daily concept where you get only 5 quest and need 5 quests to complete to daily mission failed, or not? The open PVP idea failed, or not? Farming resources failed, or not? How many players are online on Iokath and is this, what you expected?

 

The next thing it the new OP GotM. But first some comments to SWTOR. SWTOR is for casual gaming. Its great and makes fun, but its an outdated content where progress make no sense because too seldom a new content is published.

 

You invited the semi-progress gamer to PTS to test the new OP. You got feedback that this gamer wish more challenging contents. As a result, most of the players on the live server get 248 equipment from PVP or CXP farming (SM OPS, dailies, easy HM things) not from OP bosses like Tyth or the sisters or the NIM OPs. Is this, what you expected? The dev team spend a lot of time in boss mechanics and the results are nice. But does it make sense that only few groups defeat Tyth HM after weeks? Revan HM and Ravagers HM are still challenging because its feels like more NIM mode then HM. I don’t complain that the new OP is too hard but I complain that the difficulty between SM and HM is too different and most of the mechanics of HM are more for NIM. As I mentioned at the beginning, SWTOR is for causal gaming. If more 90% of player get the current 248 equipment from CXP Farming not from NIM Ops and GotM then its something wrong, or not? How many groups defeated on PTS the sisters? 50% or less? How many casual gamers defeated on PTS the sister? 5%? And how many are interested in GofM after they got the kill achievements? Do you see in your logs many groups who are playing 16mode NIM OPS every week or only once to get the achievement? Its Tyth HM is complicated? No, but contains too many RNG elements. How many groups defeat Tyth HM week by week first try? Are the sisters too complicated? No, but overloaded with mechanics. This fits better to a NIM mode. I thing, in general the concept doesn’t fit to the existing community. Yes, we need challenging content, but we need playable content for the majority either.

 

Do you really think, SWTOR gets more player with the new Iokath content as it is?

 

All SM content should be possible for nearly everyone, HM should feasible for 70-80% and NIM mode for 10-15%. All other make no sense for me for SWTOR. Many content fits to this eg. FPs (SM, HC, MM), many SM, HC, NIM Ops, Chapters (solo played), eternal championship (incl. time run). Please, do not use PTS results for calibration if the PTS is not open for everyone.

 

Based on what was delivered with Iokath, I expect for the next bosses jumping/balancing elements where player senseless die again and again in jumping or climbing phases. I’m sure your dev team is working on this. This would be a good time to closed my account.

 

cheers

Edited July 14, 2017 by worexx

[Jerba]

Totally agree with everything, especially:

But does it make sense that only few groups defeat Tyth HM after weeks? Revan HM and Ravagers HM are still challenging because its feels like more NIM mode then HM. I don’t complain that the new OP is too hard but I complain that the difficulty between SM and HM is too different and most of the mechanics of HM are more for NIM. As I mentioned at the beginning, SWTOR is for causal gaming. If more 90% of player get the current 248 equipment from CXP Farming not from NIM Ops and GotM then its something wrong, or not? [...]

All SM content should be possible for nearly everyone, HM should feasible for 70-80% and NIM mode for 10-15%. All other make no sense for me for SWTOR. Many content fits to this eg. FPs (SM, HC, MM), many SM, HC, NIM Ops, Chapters (solo played), eternal championship (incl. time run). Please, do not use PTS results for calibration if the PTS is not open for everyone.

Fortunately, A&E VM seems to be tuned slightly easier than Tyth VM, but since Tyth VM has not been nerfed, groups stuck on Tyth won't even get to see A&E.

 

In order for SWTOR's population to recover, the learning curve must be fixed, and this starts in the class story and chapter story. It shouldn't be possible to go AFK and let the companion do everything.

When SWTOR first came out, the devs took great care to tune the content and the leveling curve, but with KotFE chapter 1 they just put the abilities on your hotbar one by one, and it goes too fast. There are 9 (now 16 chapters), more than enough content to teach your rotation and basic boss mechanics, instead the devs resolved to nerfing the content to the lowest common denominator.

Instead of improving the KotFE tutorial, they nerfed SM ops but strangely enough, they buffed most HM ops with every content now being on-level. On the one hand, I agree HM should be nerfed, on the other hand the SM content (solo content and SM ops) must be buffed so that players will learn mechanics.

Sadly, I don't expect either of this to happen with the current dev team's budget, no matter how well their intentions.

Edited July 14, 2017 by Jerba

[DarthCognusSion]

The next thing it the new OP GotM. But first some comments to SWTOR. SWTOR is for casual gaming. Its great and makes fun, but its an outdated content where progress make no sense because too seldom a new content is published.

 

You invited the semi-progress gamer to PTS to test the new OP. You got feedback that this gamer wish more challenging contents. As a result, most of the players on the live server get 248 equipment from PVP or CXP farming (SM OPS, dailies, easy HM things) not from OP bosses like Tyth or the sisters or the NIM OPs. Is this, what you expected? The dev team spend a lot of time in boss mechanics and the results are nice. But does it make sense that only few groups defeat Tyth HM after weeks? Revan HM and Ravagers HM are still challenging because its feels like more NIM mode then HM. I don’t complain that the new OP is too hard but I complain that the difficulty between SM and HM is too different and most of the mechanics of HM are more for NIM. As I mentioned at the beginning, SWTOR is for causal gaming. If more 90% of player get the current 248 equipment from CXP Farming not from NIM Ops and GotM then its something wrong, or not? How many groups defeated on PTS the sisters? 50% or less? How many casual gamers defeated on PTS the sister? 5%? And how many are interested in GofM after they got the kill achievements? Do you see in your logs many groups who are playing 16mode NIM OPS every week or only once to get the achievement? Its Tyth HM is complicated? No, but contains too many RNG elements. How many groups defeat Tyth HM week by week first try? Are the sisters too complicated? No, but overloaded with mechanics. This fits better to a NIM mode. I thing, in general the concept doesn’t fit to the existing community. Yes, we need challenging content, but we need playable content for the majority either.

 

All SM content should

be possible for nearly everyone, HM should feasible for 70-80% and NIM mode for 10-15%. All other make no sense for me for SWTOR. Many content fits to this eg. FPs (SM, HC, MM), many SM, HC, NIM Ops, Chapters (solo played), eternal championship (incl. time run). Please, do not use PTS results for calibration if the PTS is not open for everyone.

 

SWTOR is only for casual gaming is your opinion and not fact. Especially with the release of new Ops content this game is finally breaking away from the disaster that was the KotFE and KoTET era. And just because the story may have been well received cannot change the fact that people were just not logging in to the game. Fleets were consistently quiet.

 

Having 248 gear doesn't mean anything. Gear is not a substitute for skill. Ideally bosses shouldn't be killed in the first week in anything but SM. The fun part of progression is learning the fight. If that isn't for you, that's fine, but don't raid HM/NiM and expect bosses to be faceroll easy. That isn't the case and it shouldn't be. A&E is not overly complicated nor does it have too many mechanics. The fight is insanely fun. It hasn't even been out a full week yet. What do you expect?

 

I agree that SM should be able to be completed by anyone who has a basic understanding of the game, but there has to be something that makes it possible to fail. You can't expect to just stand there and win. Also this boss was already killed by a 3 person group so clearly it isn't that hard. HM should not be lowered to the level of 90% being able to kill it. It should probably be around 50-60%, maybe a little bit lower. Everyone complains that we don't have any challenging content and then when they release some people complain about it being too hard. Here is a thought. Spend time learning the fight and getting better at it. Not everyone can be the best, and not everyone can or should clear this in HM in the first week.

Edited July 14, 2017 by DarthCognusSion

[Exocor]

So, after one week (and two days of main raid) we cleared A&E HM and I have to say, that it is a pretty cool boss fight with some very nice mechanics. Compared to Tyth, it is a bit more difficult on the first view, but it is mostly about learning the mechanics. From that point of view, it is a very easy encounter, where you not have to deal with rng-components. From its difficulty, I would compare it with Operator IX @Asation in NiM. The first time, you enter the encounter, it will be chaos. When you have downed it several times, it will become a no-brainer. No dps-checks, no heal-checks, just a bit of tank&spank and some other stuff, where the tanks have to work.

 

From the 2 new bosses, I definitely prefer A&E. Tyth is just cancer with adds spawning and deciding wether to move or not randomly. However, 16m will be very challenging. Compared to Tyth, you can't take someone just standing around and dpsing. Everyone has to do it's job. However, I'm looking forward to try it with my group. Only the performance can stop us.

[worexx]

Hi DarthCognusSion

SWTOR is only for casual gaming is your opinion and not fact. Especially with the release of new Ops content this game is finally breaking away ...

 

Let me clarify this. Progress means you spend all available time & resoruces and more to get a progress. In the old WOW times this means 6days a week 5-7h raid and the 7th day for farming. But there is no content left for this type of progress in SWTOR. BW published two bosses in 2 months-not more, and the guild with PTS access already cleared ths new content on the live server.

 

Having 248 gear doesn't mean anything. Gear is not a substitute for skill. Ideally bosses shouldn't be killed in the first week in anything but SM. The fun part of progression is learning the fight.

fully agrre

 

A&E is not overly complicated nor does it have too many mechanics. The fight is insanely fun. It hasn't even been out a full week yet. What do you expect?

Let me ask in another way. what do you expect for NIM? I expected a casual content where players with a lot of skill are focused in NIM.

Its like the chapter in solo mode. I had a lot of fun with it playing all chapters solo on master mode or made the sprint champion achievement. But as mentioned above, the balance between SM, vet and master mode is wrong. And this is what I'm complaining. GofM is nice, with nice mechanics (and to much rng at Tyth) but the balancing between sm and hc is wrong.

 

Cheers

[olagatonjedi]

Hi DarthCognusSion

 

 

Let me clarify this. Progress means you spend all available time & resoruces and more to get a progress. In the old WOW times this means 6days a week 5-7h raid and the 7th day for farming. But there is no content left for this type of progress in SWTOR. BW published two bosses in 2 months-not more, and the guild with PTS access already cleared ths new content on the live server. [/Quote]

Long gone are the days of 6 day a week, 5-7h days of progression raiding. Are there still guilds/players out there? Sure, but they are the minority in MMO's as a whole. Life, and games following suit, have become a worl of immediate satisfaction, which caters more to casual gamers, who log in and dont have that much time to dedicate to the game, at least not all at once. Bioware has recognized this, and are trying to make necessary changes to adapt to this demand. Will the first few changes be perfect? Obviously not, but as anyone can see with the last few updates kotfe, kotet, iokath, they are trying to find what will work long term, because what the game started with obviously failed as they lost consumers gradually as demands changed.

 

I think a lot of peoples expectations from these games are misplaced and lack an overall viewpoint, understandably because everyone is trying to find a game that prioritizes all of their interests.

Edited July 17, 2017 by olagatonjedi

[nicholascool]

Im playing on my Jedi Sage but I chose to ally with Acina and have really hard time finding ppl for the OP. Does anyone here wanna team up ?

[Exocor]

Im playing on my Jedi Sage but I chose to ally with Acina and have really hard time finding ppl for the OP. Does anyone here wanna team up ?

 

Go to the terminal in the base, not far from where you spawn, when entering Iokath. Switch on pupside (you can easiley switch back on imp later).

 

Another workaround is, to got to Iokath, right in front of the op-entrance and then relogg.

 

Other players must be able to invite you after choosing one of the options. The first way is more reliable then the second one.

Edited July 18, 2017 by Exocor

[worexx]

Hi

 

I think a lot of peoples expectations from these games are misplaced and lack an overall viewpoint, understandably because everyone is trying to find a game that prioritizes all of their interests.

 

I like to bring this discussion back to my original compaint. The Ops are not too hard, but misbalanced betwenn SM, Vet (for GotM and many other) and often for NIM either.

 

Cheers

Edited July 18, 2017 by worexx

[merovejec]

Hi Eric.....

 

I'm not Eric, but....

 

What did you expect? Its the way it goes in other MMOs too. You get a new area, you play it the first few weeks and then you are done and move on! The problem of swtor never was the type of content but the LACK of content or the speed at which it is being added.

 

Sure, me being an achievement hunter, I done what was needed to be done and never came back to Iokath, but still, there are not only players like me! Others RP there, new players can do Iokath for the first time in a year from now, thats how it works in MMOs. Section X or Black Hole had the same issues back then, its really normal and im fine with that.

 

As for the new ops, well, 16M has always been a pain for the most players. Many people still have performance issues (even though the game is 5 years old) at 16man mode and once they do it once, they dont see a point in doing it again, unless you were in a 16M raiding guild like NGE. There is no real benefit in doing 16M and never was one, just for the achievements. The difficulty is fine too. Tyth finnaly offered some proggresion nights for guilds after over 2 years. Sisters seem to be easier, but there is still Tyth beforehand and its not a one-shot for every guild, mainly due to class nerfs now.

 

I think they will introduce NiM mode and they should, there should be something even the 3-4 NiM guilds still in game with have problems with.

Edited July 31, 2017 by merovejec

[RikuvonDrake]

I think the new bosses are very well balanced, the DPS and HPS requirements are in reality quite low compared to other content, however, the requirement of mechanic execution is a bit higher than comparable bosses. Sadly, due to no new difficult multiplayer content for quite a while before these bosses, the majority of the player has had a declining in terms of player skill due to how much companions have carried them through content. As such, the new bosses feels much more complicated than the past, despite in reality it's just that the old operations are familiar to players and the mechanics are executed almost while sleeping.

[worexx]

I think the new bosses are very well balanced, the DPS and HPS requirements are in reality quite low compared to other content, however, the requirement of mechanic execution is a bit higher than comparable bosses. .

 

I'm fine with this but this is not my compaint. The new OP is nice but as many other misbalanced between the modes. Would be great if a very hard NIM is coming. But the HM is too far away from SM like in many other parts of the content.

Do you belive that this Iokath content (planet & Op) brings new player or keep more player?

[merovejec]

Do you belive that this Iokath content (planet & Op) brings new player or keep more player?

 

This question is completely irrelevant now. That train left a looooong time ago and its about saving the game overall! People wont be coming back in thousands cause of this new operation, maybe at the end of the year when the whole thing is out and they will surprise us with a NiM mode too for those that played the whole year to have something to do.

 

Iokath wasnt meant to be a salvation, its just a simple continuing of the story, but it came too late to keep the people from leaving in vast numbers. The main problem of Bioware was that they lost the trust of the people and they wont regain that easily, if at all. The game is now setup for new players to come, its not well for veterans those are only frustrated with game. Bioware probably hopes they will pick up new players and then keep those later on. They are not exactly striving to please the veterans at the moment.

[olagatonjedi]

This question is completely irrelevant now. That train left a looooong time ago and its about saving the game overall! People wont be coming back in thousands cause of this new operation, maybe at the end of the year when the whole thing is out and they will surprise us with a NiM mode too for those that played the whole year to have something to do.

 

Iokath wasnt meant to be a salvation, its just a simple continuing of the story, but it came too late to keep the people from leaving in vast numbers. The main problem of Bioware was that they lost the trust of the people and they wont regain that easily, if at all. The game is now setup for new players to come, its not well for veterans those are only frustrated with game. Bioware probably hopes they will pick up new players and then keep those later on. They are not exactly striving to please the veterans at the moment.

No game will give every player everything they want, and veteran players have already had an opportunity to help form the game they want. If they are not satisfied with the changes they helped form, the MMO company isn't going to change their mind if they start making threats about leaving or unsubbing. New players come in with an open mind regarding the current evolution of the game, and are more willing to accept things as they currently are.

[merovejec]

If they are not satisfied with the changes they helped form, the MMO company isn't going to change their mind if they start making threats about leaving or unsubbing.

 

It was Bioware who chose to focus story and made the Veterans leave! Its very hard to discuss this when you or I dont know the facts and numbers.

 

How I see it is that the game had 10% raiders, 10% PVPers and rest (80%) casuals concentraded on things like RP, SH decoration and mainly leveling alts chosing different choices and doing story, dress up.... The 20% were the most vocal on forums etc, the 80% was quiet and fine with the game. Bioware realized this, they realize they dont need to invest 500k into new operations, but 50k into new story and new stuff for CM. Thats what I think happened with 4.0 we got KOTFE and people left. Already after 3.0 people were annoyed about level difference in operations (soloed or 2manned EC NiM), easy to get timed runs and mounts from DF/DP NiMs, no NiM for Revan or Ravagers.... The Veterans wanted to go the way as it was with Oricon, buffed NiM modes and fluent adding of new operations, difficulties etc. Thats what the raiders wanted, but there were only the 10%. PVPers wanted new maps, balancing, season rewards, they were getting it but less and less, just like the raiders, cause they were only the other 10%.

The only part of the population that helped form this game was the 80% causuals, not the raiders or PVPers.

 

 

New players come in with an open mind regarding the current evolution of the game, and are more willing to accept things as they currently are.

 

This is the focus of Bioware now, for new players there is lots to do and its easy, i mean it is easy but due to level sync its all "current content" so takes some time to do. A new player has 8 class stories and then the story is the same, but still it makes the ppl do it on at least both factions, maybe 4 times (male/female) etc. So new people are fine and Bioware is building on this.

The fact that we again got an operation is just a longshot into the dark since they admitted OK, we did enough of story now a bit of ops, since Uprisings must be terrible in terms of metrics. It still shows how limited the manpower is at Bioware when it takes a year to make an ops and give us 1 boss every 2-3 moths. That is a clear sign of the decreasing funding due to declining revenue, but that is another discussion.

[olagatonjedi]

It was Bioware who chose to focus story and made the Veterans leave! Its very hard to discuss this when you or I dont know the facts and numbers. [/Quote]

Content will typically cater to the masses, whether they post on the forums or not. They can simply look at participation numbers and formulate a plan regarding what content is going to retain the masses. Whether or not the content is good or not is another issue entirely. You see this with kotet, kotfe, level sync and cxp.

 

When it comes to class balance changes, that is when forum posters play a huge part, for good or bad. Most of the "quit or stay" deals with class balance. PvP viability - class balnce. Ops viability - class balance. Roles and role substitution - class balance. Since the community powers the evolution of classes and balance, we inevitably see imbalance which hurts the rest of the game because it flows directly into the content that is created. Why are some classes chosen over others to run Nim content?, because the evolution of skills of a class based on player suggestions. Now we are at a place where there is so much imbalance between classes that BW has to fix what the community screwed up, and adjust things to the active, and upcoming content. But this change doesn't happen in 1 patch or 2 patches. Its an ongoing process, but most people arent patient enough to see it through.

[Pietrastor]

Totally agree with everything, especially:

 

Fortunately, A&E VM seems to be tuned slightly easier than Tyth VM, but since Tyth VM has not been nerfed, groups stuck on Tyth won't even get to see A&E.

 

In order for SWTOR's population to recover, the learning curve must be fixed, and this starts in the class story and chapter story. It shouldn't be possible to go AFK and let the companion do everything.

When SWTOR first came out, the devs took great care to tune the content and the leveling curve, but with KotFE chapter 1 they just put the abilities on your hotbar one by one, and it goes too fast. There are 9 (now 16 chapters), more than enough content to teach your rotation and basic boss mechanics, instead the devs resolved to nerfing the content to the lowest common denominator.

Instead of improving the KotFE tutorial, they nerfed SM ops but strangely enough, they buffed most HM ops with every content now being on-level. On the one hand, I agree HM should be nerfed, on the other hand the SM content (solo content and SM ops) must be buffed so that players will learn mechanics.

Sadly, I don't expect either of this to happen with the current dev team's budget, no matter how well their intentions.

You do remember that buffed SM Temple of Sacrifice resulted in playerbase abandoning the operation right? Devs admitted it themselves lol. So yeah

[CarlGustaf]

You do remember that buffed SM Temple of Sacrifice resulted in playerbase abandoning the operation right? Devs admitted it themselves lol. So yeah

 

which buffed SM Temple of Sacrifice. Yes Lurker was tough with random groups. But as long as everyone did know what to do it went down!

Theire was a time when most SM operations were challenging to some point. But now? ignore every single Mechanik and move on. And still there are groups with bads who manage to do less damage than a healer with their dps. Result enraged Titan 6 with a full group (didnt find the video).

[Jerba]

You do remember that buffed SM Temple of Sacrifice resulted in playerbase abandoning the operation right? Devs admitted it themselves lol. So yeah

I'm not talking about the nerfs to ToS, they were needed, especially on second and third boss. And if I remember correctly, those nerfs happened before 4.0 already.

 

I'm talking about nerfs to bosses like Kephess TFB or Calphayus that had all their mechanics taken out. Meanwhile, the dps check on bosses like Styrak VM is way too high.

Edited July 30, 2017 by Jerba

[Pietrastor]

which buffed SM Temple of Sacrifice. Yes Lurker was tough with random groups. But as long as everyone did know what to do it went down!

It went down so well in general among the playerbase they had to cancel timed Operation event because quote:

Only a fraction of the players who are in Ops at 60 are in ToS

 

Obviously the reason why only a fraction bothered with TOS wasn't because people didn't like Yavin's shade of green.

 

I'm not talking about the nerfs to ToS, they were needed, especially on second and third boss. And if I remember correctly, those nerfs happened before 4.0 already.

Yes on Walkers, barely on Underlurker and it took forever. In the end, TOS was literally content that got wasted and Underlurker is still overtuned and biggest SM wiper out there, particularly in PUGs.

 

I'm talking about nerfs to bosses like Kephess TFB or Calphayus that had all their mechanics taken out. Meanwhile, the dps check on bosses like Styrak VM is way too high.

Some of these points I agree with. What's the purpouse of dumbing down Kephess TFB which was not a very complex fight to begin with when Operator IX right before was left untouched with full 100 pages of mechanics necessary to explain even on SM runs.

 

Class stories though - these never trained for anything Ops-related, especially Hard or NiM modes. There never was any tutorial or bootcamp that would keep teaching the players during solo leveling period about CC orders, DPS orders, all trinity roles, circles etc. TOR has nothing to 'go back to' in that regard, KOTFE/KOTET certinately didn't do anything radically different when it comes to (lack of) preparation of the playerbase for Operations. What you're tlaking about would be more like inventing gameplay scenarios from scratch.

Edited July 31, 2017 by Pietrastor

[merovejec]

For those that want a list in this thread Nerf ToS and Ravagers I made a list from patch notes about what they nerfed on SoR opses, seems Ravagers were nerfed more than ToS.

[Jerba]

Class stories though - these never trained for anything Ops-related, especially Hard or NiM modes. There never was any tutorial or bootcamp that would keep teaching the players during solo leveling period about CC orders, DPS orders, all trinity roles, circles etc. TOR has nothing to 'go back to' in that regard, KOTFE/KOTET certinately didn't do anything radically different when it comes to (lack of) preparation of the playerbase for Operations. What you're tlaking about would be more like inventing gameplay scenarios from scratch.

I disagree. The final boss fights in the class stories were very challenging; your companion could not heal away all the damage so you had to interrupt some abilities.

Yes, there was never a good in-game tutorial to explain you these things.

 

For example, when I leveled my first character, I was a noob, the only reason I managed to progress was by overleveling until all enemies were grey. My gear had the wrong stats and I used the wrong abilities.

Of course, I read all tutorials and tooltips but those didn't help me. From playing KotOR and Warcraft 3, I had some knowledge of game mechanics, like I knew the difference between AoE and single-target damage. But I did not know what a stun is, what damage-over-time means, what an interrupt is or what the trinity system is. The tooltips were full of terms I did not understand.

Eventually, I did of course find a guild and learned these things, but you're right, the game did a poor job of explaining it. However, I do think that anyone leveling their character pre-4.0 has a better knowledge of their class than someone leveling post-4.0, or worse, using a instant-60 character. Companions are so strong now that they negate any player mistakes.

 

In vanilla, by the time you got to 50, you would run the Black Hole heroic or Hard Mode flashpoints, and there you quickly learned about CCs/kill order and other game mechanics from your fellow players. So by the time you'd run a HM operation, you should have enough game knowledge to understand the mechanics there.

Now, hard mode flashpoints lost their relevance. New players will play through the flashpoints in solo mode and they don't learn about the mechanics. Then they complain why operations don't have a solo mode because they can do everything else in solo mode, even heroic quests. If they do dare to join a group for an operation, it is a horrifying experience because the learning curve is too steep, and there are too many mechanics they never heard of. So they will likely stay away from operations in the future.

 

All in all, I find it pretty easy to see the shift that came with 4.0, and the impact it had on endgame PvE, so I wonder why you think differently.

Edited July 31, 2017 by Jerba

[Exocor]

The problem with content difficulties and the opportunites to learn certain mechanics is not only dependent to the devs and the game itself. It is also depending on the willingness of the players to learn. Just an example: When I played the Jedi Knight Story and came to the last duel with the sith emperor, I already made some flashpoint experience - Vets (just called "Flashpoints" back in the good old times) where challenging for someone like me, leveling his first character. I learned the mechanics of interrupt, bad circles and other stuff. So, I enganged the emperor. After my first death due to force explosion (don't exactly know what it's called in the english version) I was like 'whooops? What was that?". Right before my second death I saw the channel and the third time, I got to that point, I simply interrupted it and the rest of the fight was easy going. Back in these old times, T7 wasn't able to heal me up. And even for a newb like me it was easy to beat that challenge.

Back in these old days, players, who weren't willing to learn from there faults, where just left behind and noone, except of guildies cared. These type of players are not the target group for operations or other endgame-content. Today, in 2017, I doubt, that anything in the emperor-fight is challenging or lethal. The type of players, who didn't came through this fight by running straight towards the same wall over and over again are one-shotting his highness.

 

What I wanted to point out: The game got to easy. Players, who didn't reach level 50 in the past due to "content to slow/to hard" are running around with full 248 and thinking they are good.

 

To keep players, there must be borders, that are not simple to cross. There shouldn't be just easy and hard content - there should be a large scope of content. Currently we just have Storymodes, that are easy as ****, some HM-stuff, that are as easy as Storymodes when I began with swtor and then, there is NiM, which is completely from another planet compared with some stuff, that's called "Hardmode".

[Pietrastor]

I disagree. The final boss fights in the class stories were very challenging; your companion could not heal away all the damage so you had to interrupt some abilities.

Yes, there was never a good in-game tutorial to explain you these things.

 

For example, when I leveled my first character, I was a noob, the only reason I managed to progress was by overleveling until all enemies were grey. My gear had the wrong stats and I used the wrong abilities.

Of course, I read all tutorials and tooltips but those didn't help me. From playing KotOR and Warcraft 3, I had some knowledge of game mechanics, like I knew the difference between AoE and single-target damage. But I did not know what a stun is, what damage-over-time means, what an interrupt is or what the trinity system is. The tooltips were full of terms I did not understand.

Eventually, I did of course find a guild and learned these things, but you're right, the game did a poor job of explaining it. However, I do think that anyone leveling their character pre-4.0 has a better knowledge of their class than someone leveling post-4.0, or worse, using a instant-60 character. Companions are so strong now that they negate any player mistakes.

 

In vanilla, by the time you got to 50, you would run the Black Hole heroic or Hard Mode flashpoints, and there you quickly learned about CCs/kill order and other game mechanics from your fellow players. So by the time you'd run a HM operation, you should have enough game knowledge to understand the mechanics there.

Now, hard mode flashpoints lost their relevance. New players will play through the flashpoints in solo mode and they don't learn about the mechanics. Then they complain why operations don't have a solo mode because they can do everything else in solo mode, even heroic quests. If they do dare to join a group for an operation, it is a horrifying experience because the learning curve is too steep, and there are too many mechanics they never heard of. So they will likely stay away from operations in the future.

 

All in all, I find it pretty easy to see the shift that came with 4.0, and the impact it had on endgame PvE, so I wonder why you think differently.

 

1 boss is not enough. Best games constantly teach the players all the tools/mechanics/tactics needed throughout the course of the game and smartly disguise their 'tutorials'. Final TOR bosses were not that, it was a sudden "ohh ****, this is different, no clue why, ok somehow passed it or asked for help".

 

And Flashpoints/Heroics you're talking about is not solo (class) content anymore. CLASS stories versus KOTFE/KOTET gave the same result of lack of preparation for any Ops content. Acutally, KOTFE gave more with Eternal Championship.

[olagatonjedi]

The problem with content difficulties and the opportunites to learn certain mechanics is not only dependent to the devs and the game itself. It is also depending on the willingness of the players to learn. Just an example: When I played the Jedi Knight Story and came to the last duel with the sith emperor, I already made some flashpoint experience - Vets (just called "Flashpoints" back in the good old times) where challenging for someone like me, leveling his first character. I learned the mechanics of interrupt, bad circles and other stuff. So, I enganged the emperor. After my first death due to force explosion (don't exactly know what it's called in the english version) I was like 'whooops? What was that?". Right before my second death I saw the channel and the third time, I got to that point, I simply interrupted it and the rest of the fight was easy going. Back in these old times, T7 wasn't able to heal me up. And even for a newb like me it was easy to beat that challenge.

Back in these old days, players, who weren't willing to learn from there faults, where just left behind and noone, except of guildies cared. These type of players are not the target group for operations or other endgame-content. Today, in 2017, I doubt, that anything in the emperor-fight is challenging or lethal. The type of players, who didn't came through this fight by running straight towards the same wall over and over again are one-shotting his highness.

 

What I wanted to point out: The game got to easy. Players, who didn't reach level 50 in the past due to "content to slow/to hard" are running around with full 248 and thinking they are good.

 

To keep players, there must be borders, that are not simple to cross. There shouldn't be just easy and hard content - there should be a large scope of content. Currently we just have Storymodes, that are easy as ****, some HM-stuff, that are as easy as Storymodes when I began with swtor and then, there is NiM, which is completely from another planet compared with some stuff, that's called "Hardmode".

Interestingly enough, as I was reading your post, it occurred to me that veterans, as a whole, with myself included, contribute massively to this lack of education opportunities for new players.

 

I remember running flashpoints back in the day as well, and remember very vividly enforcing fight mechanics regularly to everyone in the group to interrupt this, and avoid that aoe, line of sight on this phase, etc. And if everyone didn't listen, the likelihood of a wipe increased significantly.

 

A few things have changed since then. At the early stages of the game, i'd gather that most people weren't stocking up on stats like accuracy, because stat mechanics were still being discovered and parsed even a few years into the game. During those years, it was imperative that everyone in the group (not just one person) try to interrupt certain attacks to ensure an interrupt happened. This forced everyone to learn the mechanics either by wiping, or by teaching so that the flashpoint/fights could be successfully completed. Nowadays, flashpoints are races to finish, so very few people are willing to cover the mechanics to educate, and would rather just do everything themselves so they finish quicker.

 

And now they are capable of doing so, due to improved knowledge of game mechanics, as well as increases in stat availability through gear. You can accidentally get 110% accuracy just by randomly collecting and equipping gear nowadays. And many people are min/maxing more appropriately due to knowledge and guides that help lead them in a specific direction for gearing. The chances of 1 person in the flashpoint group that knows the instance/fights and is geared appropriately is probably over 90% nowadays, too. This allows 1 person to basically do everything there is to do to prevent a "insta-death" skill from going off.

 

Granted these are not the only aspects that result in players not having to learn their class and/or mechanics, but it is something I have noticed just running instances myself (hell, I'm one of those players, if I'm being honest). If BW wants to increase the challenge and promote teaching of mechanics, they could add additional attacks into the game needing action by more than just 1 person in the group. They could make certain attacks, such as interrupts work less, so stuns have to be rotated properly.

 

Anyways, just something that popped in my head while reading your post.