Discussion Topic: Game Update 5.4 and the Next Roadmap

[docbenwayddo]

...

• Umbara Stronghold – This is the most unique stronghold yet, as you will be able to decorate your own moving train. You’ll need to complete the flashpoint a few times to gain access to the stronghold. Look for more details about the Stronghold in an upcoming post.
   
  

...

Details need to include whether "doing the flashpoint a few times" means having to be involved in the unfortunate, dispiriting KotFE/ET story. Locking things behind that horrid story won't make more people do/repeat the story, it'll make them decide to stop throwing good money after bad.

 

A real QOL addition would be content having nothing to do with that whole mess.

[Magira]

The stronghold behind PVE garbage to hide is another blow in the face of the PVP community.

[IoNonSoEVero]

I ask for the content that I'm interested in. I LOVE the STORY, I LOVE my COMPANIONS and I love the STRONGHOLDS and decorating and doing my crafting and dailies and doing my cxp stuff. I do just that, I play by myself and I'm happy to do it. There is a reason I don't group...and much of it is owing to people who get way too testy and mean and use coloured text and swear to make their points.

 

What I'm NOT INTERESTED in is OPS, or PVP or FP. If I can't solo it, I have no interest in it. But guess what the difference is between you and I. I don't make a nasty swear-y posts screaming that people like YOU should be tossed out on their ears because of what they like to do in the game.

 

To you, I am one of those 'crummy players' that the devs need to get rid of, because according to you, only true and wondrous people who play group content are the only ones worthy of playing the game.

 

Well, guess what, this lvl 50 legacy, lvl 300 cxp player with oodles of alts, who has been playing the game since before launch pays a sub and buys crap to keep the lights on.

 

Without people like me, you wouldn't have a game, so think about THAT.

 

Co-signing this. I'm here for the story, the companions, the romance storylines, the strongholds. There are plenty of games where one can go kill and blow up stuff. This is the only one with the storylines and characters that have been engaging for me.

 

And it's a very valid point that the 'pack players' who hurl insults and anger and aggressively bother other people in-game because not everyone plays like they do might do well to remember that their attitudes are one of the things that *deter* some players from wanting to interact more. I can't picture myself ever liking PvP or Ops, but I'd probably be willing to at least talk to other players in-game and keep my chat channels on if I hadn't run across so many who were horrible.

[masterceil]

As someone who switches between vigi and defense very regularly I would appreciate this too. Not sure I'd prefer it over them working on the stuff they say they are though. Switching isn't too terrible, just... time consuming I suppose.

 

I main Ruffian, but I often swap to Sawbones to heal (so I can continue the chase for 248s while using my main), and to Scrapper when I need that single-target burst. It only takes me about 5 seconds to re-set my utilities, about 5 seconds to fix my quickbars when I switch back to Ruffian from either Scrapper or Sawbones (literally swapping two abilities twice), and about 20 seconds to fix my quickbars when I switch to Sawbones (I click the arrow on QB1 to make it QB6 and put my healing abilities there - which I have to do every time -.-).

 

Not sure how big the change is between Vigi and Defense, but 30 seconds max isn't a deal-breaker for me. I agree it would be a wonderful QoL change, but there are many other changes/bugfixes I'd like to see first. Like stealth-rezing (consistently failing after 2.0 seconds), fixing reliability of Trick Move (sometimes works under ideal conditions, but it mostly serves at melee range to proc Upper Hand, because it's just not reliable as a gap closer), and letting me Preview some gorram armour every once in a while

[DukeLorien]

Well, if they do, then why are Germans complaining that they don't get news in German?

 

Norwegian, Swedish, Hungarian, Danish, Finnish, Russian, Polish, Dutch, Czech, Slovak, Romanian, Italian, Spanish, etc. etc. players do not get it in their language and they make it work somehow.

 

In the end I'm just trying to figure out what makes the Germans and French so special that they need forums in their language.

 

Do you know?

 

Considering the larger picture, I just don't see a real basis for this concern.

 

Hi,

Germany is one of the largest markets for gaming. Don't know about france but i think its important too. I think if you wanna do business in another/other country/countries you should provide basic informations in there language. It shows respect to the customer and is polite. When i am in another country i try to adjust as best as i can.

 

There must have been a reason why bw has a french and german forum. So they should do something with it.

 

And altough a lot of germans are able to communicate in english, not everybody can or just can on a basic level. One of my guildmates cant read or speak english. I find it weird but ok. So I translate all the info she wants (operation-guides; patchnotes; classguides...)

 

MfG

Aariy

[Thruine]

• There is no simple way to see if my friends are online. if I have happened to friend the character they are on, and I am on the character that happened to do that, then fine. This does not happen often!

 

This seems a huge barrier to easy group organisation within a successful MMO. (By way of comparison: The game I fled to was ESO. There I can see when a player is on no matter what character they are on; and getting the guild together for good content is oh-so-easy.).

 

I don't mind if they add this as long as we can disable it. Sorry but I find it slightly annoying to want to play one character and be asked to bring my tank, or healer... no one ever asks for dps... That's the one thing (among thousands) I disliked about ESO. I hope that doesn't sound too terrible but there is a difference between having friends and wanting to spend time with them all of the time.

 

About things others have mentioned, I think group content is great but no, not solely a focus on it. I like all aspects of games. I want the cosmetics and strongholds along with the group stuff. I like PvP and raiding (not done that yet). It just needs to be a full course meal and sure, if one's been neglected then it needs more attention at present. But hopefully we get all aspects at all levels. A Bioware game is different than other games. Story is what they were built on and iit simply has to be there. And expectations have to be measured. We all know people will plow through content like locust. Its one reason WoW measures theirs out instead of everything at expansion drop. People would just plow through then spend the rest of the two years bored. They may be bored more often but not as deep since even a millions subscriber game can't keep up with player appetites. I'd adopt that for SWTOR which I would say they seem to have.

 

Also, the separation of PvE and PvP. This is another thing ESO is screwing up currently. These really are two different games in almost every aspect. As mush as it probably will hurt resource wise, for players and developers, these are going to have to be treated as two different games or PvP is just going to have to suffer. PvP is really a side aspect of these type games. I've never known a successful PvP only game (I'm sure there are somewhere but I've never played one). At no time should PvE suffer for PvP. Much as we might wish it, its a disaster for all if that happens since PvP can't even sustain WoW with its millions of forced subscriptions. I think a simple solution for dps checks is if content can be done with all of one class with average players then its okay. If not, it needs boost. If too easy, then a reduction. If that messes with PvP, then so be it. Or fix the content.

[casirabit]

Hello Keith Kanneg!

 

 

 

QoL suggestion: Provide a means for us to stay in touch with our in-game friends no matter what (unknown) character they are on, or what faction they happen to be on right now!

 

More feedback:

 

• There is no simple way to see if my friends are online. if I have happened to friend the character they are on, and I am on the character that happened to do that, then fine. This does not happen often!

 

This seems a huge barrier to easy group organisation within a successful MMO. (By way of comparison: The game I fled to was ESO. There I can see when a player is on no matter what character they are on; and getting the guild together for good content is oh-so-easy.)

 

• Despite a huge number of areas when characters of different players can now co-exist, there remains no way to communicate with a player privately (or via guild) if they happen to be on a character of the opposite faction. A fellow guildie might be online and about to turn up, but if they are on the opposite faction and running late, we've no way of knowing that.

 

Of course there's clumsy third-party workarounds. Discord, forums, chat programs, voice and all the rest. However the lack of an in-game unified method to communicate with 'our' players easily within the game (no matter where they are in the game) is a deal-breaker for good fun grouping and MMO-goodness.

 

(In truth I remain dumbfounded at just how hostile the SW:TOR game remains to easy expected means of staying in touch with in-game friends).

 

So with the obligatory (tongue in cheek!) bit about having been a subscriber for years, and only being back for two months to help a friend out, the above is a significant irk that helped drive myself and my fellow friends away from the game.

 

I would prefer before they do something like that, they add in the ability before you can add a "friend" they have to approve it. There have been numerous of times that I went to help someone and then suddenly I was put on their friend's list and I didn't even know about it until I received a tell about it.

 

I don't mind helping people but I don't claim to be friends with everyone I help. Some of them got quite annoying saying I need to come help them again and that is when I switch to a character they didn't know, so I am not sure this is a good idea.

 

All my boyfriend's and friends characters I know and have them on my friend's list because they tell me their characters and I tell them mine. If someone doesn't tell you their other character's names maybe they don't want you to know about them. I would not want bioware adding something that gives people the name of all my characters without a way for me to refuse them to know all my characters.

 

As far a guild member, you can check the guild list and you can tell which guild members are on.

Edited July 24, 2017 by casirabit

[Quraswren]

And this is a stellar example of what people are complaining about with regards to communication. The executive summary of this would be "We do what we believe best, for those who are unsubscribing don't let the door hit you on the way out, the rest shut up already and buy more packs". You are not talking TO us, you are talking AT us. And the condescension in that post is thick enough to cut with a knife.

 

No. I for one am not taking advantage of the oh so generous Double CXP event. I haven't even played for more than a week, because since you chose to nerf classes indiscriminately, the characters I play on are useless for group content (Corruption sorcs) and there is no reason whatsoever to resume the grind on something else I don't enjoy playing.

 

But, please, feel free to continue to ignore all negative feedback and go on full-speed towards the cliff. I'm sure there will be some around to defend your reasoning and actions and contionue to kiss your boots right up to the moment the servers are turned off. Which I assume isn't that far in the future, if you continue to treat your subs like a cheap, renewable resource.

 

Well said. I'm glad I'm not the only one that read that and saw keith falling back on his old PR, customer service days and wrote a bunch of fluff to placate the masses.

[Going]

Thanks for all the feedback. I'll take up a number of the points you raised with the team, including the 242 for Master Mode on Umbara. You also asked about Legacy Currencies, additional class balancing, Strongholds, and more, so I'll update the Roadmap to include many of those items, along with any additional insight, where possible.

 

There's a lot of criticism in this thread, a lot of good ideas, some confusion, a bunch of frustration. and a ton of passion about SWTOR. I've also read that we don't play the game, have no understanding of MMOs, and most of decisions are the opposite of smart. I get it and I think most of you know realize we're not going to please everyone, and no matter how many changes we make, someone is going to be unhappy and call us out.

 

I know we'll continue to improve the game, we'll continue to refine every area, we'll add new content regularly for a wide variety of different play styles - some will get strongholds, some will get PvP, GSF, Operation Bosses, New Flashpoints, Story, and more. I also know we'll make mistakes along the way, and you'll be able to help us course correct, yet I still want the Dev Team to take chances, to push themselves and strive to be better and provide a lot of fun for all of us who play this game.

 

I've also read some of you are tossing in the towel and are leaving us. That obviously saddens me as the game is better when everyone works together. I have valued your input, have tried to understand your frustration while working with the team to get your concerns addressed. Not everything is as it seems, but I respect your decision and look to earn your business again in the near future.

 

Hope everyone is taking full advantage of the bonus CXP week. Have a great weekend.

 

Keith---

 

Founder player here, and i have been through all the ups and downs.

 

Keith, i am truly happy with what you have brought to the game so far, in the sense of attitude and transparency. I have always understood that not everyone will be happy with what is given or the direction the game goes. Have i been one of those people who didn't get what i wanted....of course. Honestly i think you have a lot of passion for this game, and i hope you continue to. Keep up the hard work!

[Ottoattack]

There is much that is going on here. I will try to be constructive.

 

Thanks for all the feedback. I'll take up a number of the points you raised with the team, including the 242 for Master Mode on Umbara. You also asked about Legacy Currencies, additional class balancing, Strongholds, and more, so I'll update the Roadmap to include many of those items, along with any additional insight, where possible.

Sounds cool.

 

There's a lot of criticism in this thread, a lot of good ideas, some confusion, a bunch of frustration. and a ton of passion about SWTOR. I've also read that we don't play the game, have no understanding of MMOs, and most of decisions are the opposite of smart. I get it and I think most of you know realize we're not going to please everyone, and no matter how many changes we make, someone is going to be unhappy and call us out.

As far as understanding MMOs, I am sure you guys do. This is not the issue. The issue is clearly you do very limited monitoring evident by majority of changes that have been implemented so far. In addition you are too slow to addressing bugs and issues. And yes, you cannot please everyone, though you can anger the majority when do not provide content steadily and you do not address issues. This is surely the case.

 

I know we'll continue to improve the game, we'll continue to refine every area, we'll add new content regularly for a wide variety of different play styles - some will get strongholds, some will get PvP, GSF, Operation Bosses, New Flashpoints, Story, and more. I also know we'll make mistakes along the way, and you'll be able to help us course correct, yet I still want the Dev Team to take chances, to push themselves and strive to be better and provide a lot of fun for all of us who play this game.

 

This is part of my frustration. Where is the content? So far this year we got 2 ops bosses and 1 low quality daily area. Yes, you did some bug fixes and life quality improvements here and there, but the core of the game is mostly 3-4 years old content. For a game that wants to charge the equivalent of a brand new title every 4 month, you surely do not deliver. I understand there is some management transition and you might be stuck with GC. Regardless, the new content level is close to being non-existent, and we have been through this for a while now.

I've also read some of you are tossing in the towel and are leaving us. That obviously saddens me as the game is better when everyone works together. I have valued your input, have tried to understand your frustration while working with the team to get your concerns addressed. Not everything is as it seems, but I respect your decision and look to earn your business again in the near future.

 

Well, I have unsubbed since the end of May and the only reason I can post is cuz I got 1 free week from referral. This may sound rude, but I am a customer and you are a service provider. I pay for high quality service. If you do not deliver I wont pay. There is not much more into it than that.

 

I will talk about my personal experience (surely does not represent everyone). I primarily PvP, but I run FPs, dailies and every once in a while an ops. My main is PT. First off PT as a class has major issues in every discipline. You guys did not do any class balance changes since 5.0 release till 5.3, nearly 8 month later, that addressed only 1 discipline and did not even make it viable in any game mode.

 

Then PvP, sorc healers were extremely broken for again 8 month till you finally addressed that 8 month later. Though there are many highly broken things in PvP that are still not addressed. I can sit here and provide examples, but I would advise you to go to group ranked, pull the top 5,000 records of each class and look at the presentation of each discipline, win ratio and presentation in the top 500 of the class. Clearly that did not happen. You guys had 8 month and the best you can come with is 8 disciplines and only addressing target dps on dummies...

 

Then PvP gearing.. I am surely one of the supporters of the removal of expertise, however, considering that GC is unreliable and that UCs rate is extremely slow. Running dailies for a week nets about 250 UC. The cost of obtaining and upgrading one piece is between 2-3 weeks per piece per toon. How is this even remotely reasonable?! "Why do not you run ops?" Why should I? I do not like them and should not need to do them to gear for PvP..

 

Then ques.. I am on TSL and it is nearly a ghost town. I would say it is busy day when I see more than 50 people at prime time on the fleet. PvP ques are too slow, and nearly dead outside of prime time. Forget lowbies. What is the action to address que times on you end so far.

 

As for responding to feedback, to be fair, you guys have been doing significantly better since Keith came around, but it is mostly targeted towards easy fixes. I really appreciate for example removing the maul positioning for sins (which was a player suggestion) and adding more hair styles. This is though easy stuff. Harder questions are usually left blank.

 

Again, class balance.. when you are 8 month late you do not spread the work over six month. This is unacceptable.

 

I love the game and more than happy to sub, but there needs to be a steady stream of content and support from BW. You guys are performing poorly on both ends.

[Costello]

There are a large number of issues that need to be dealt with.

 

Combat. - Its slow, awkward and suffers from serious bloat with classes having a large number of attacks and defensive cool downs that are the kept in check by lengthy cool downs. Resulting in a situation where instead of fast paced star wars combat we have a strategy game of managing cool downs.

 

Story - This should be the easiest thing in the world to get right on a budget as there has to be dialogue and a plot arc, make it an interesting on. However we seem to get keeping up with the Valkorians and then everybody hates *insert character name* and wants to betray them. Play the Witcher series for an idea how even simple quests can be given weight by having a mature personal touch. Sure I'm hunting a ghost but through the quest I find out that this poor girl was though a witch and terrible things were done to her. Suddenly I'm not so sure the ghost deserves to die and all that from a very minor side quest.

 

Choices - So far they have been said to matter but it seems no one can find any real consequence other than possibly have 40 or 42 companions from those decisions other than that everything plays out the same.

 

Strongholds - What is happening here, we have 2 strongholds back to back. Not to say there isn't some appeal to decorating an instanced structure but really you could take the strong hold aspect out, have it as a mini game and it would have aside from conquest percentatge bonus no effect on the game. If your going to have a stronghold then make it so it serves some purpose *cough cough* Garison *cough cough* Class Hall.

 

End Game - The previous plan for gearing through CXP was because there was such limited end game content. Surely you couldn't expect people to replay SOR or any of the 5 year old operations to gear up again. So what do you do you try to change it so thats exactly what is required. With 2 new Operation bosses the only new content thrown into the mix. While doing little for the PvP community and then designing it so more instanced PvP is the way to regear up cause people hadn't done enough of that previous. You need to have an end game grind that works towards something decent and progress isn't tied to rng boxes or simply to get the next tier of gear that come the next expanion will require replaying SOR all over again.

 

Feedback and communication - It has really improved but then its often to start a new topic or to brush over the community feedback. A post on how Valkorian totally made sense then ignored on the feedback, posts on server mergers well we aren't ready to talk about that, posts on PvP then ignored, GSF then totally ignored, class balance then totally ignored. Seriously the class balance team seem myopic in that they just look at dps against a dummy and not how this actually plays or other options. DPS fine but if I can off heal to full when Im forced to hide behind a rock in a PvE encounter or waiting on the next wave of attack in PvP I'm damn sight better off than a pure dps who just stands there on 10% health hoping someone will heal them.

[MuskyBoy]

Keith,

If you nerf classes to the point players can no longer clear content they used to be able to clear, do not be surprised that players do not want to re-progress. When one player leaves a group another player is required to replace that person, this can take time in both finding the replacement and in some cases to gear them up. Then having to redo the old content again with less success then before due to nerfs and guess what happens? Group dies due to stagnation and players quit because they no longer have a raid team. This is a classic example of what the nerfs have done to many groups (I'm in 2 myself where this has happened) throw in the fact players have spent months grinding for 248 gear only to have their class seriously gimped leads to a lot of frustration. Some people will always argue that the answer is simply get better, but people do not necessarily have the time to invest in rerolling (in both levelling and skill)

to a class they can clear content with. Understand that nerfing classes won't just artificially make MM ops more challenging but it will flow down to groups still working through content.

[MingusPho]

 

The average item rating value itself is a great idea. It will save a lot of time on gear checks when pugging harder content.

 

I felt the same on this new feature. It's something we've needed for a long time now, for groupfinder's sake.

[leonlotus]

Bring back JAESA WILLSAAM

[Eshvara]

Bring back JAESA WILLSAAM

 

Yush! I'd like a real Sith lady by my side.

[trabble]

steps to revive swtor:

 

PUT ALL AVAILABLE SOURCES INTO THE COMBAT TEAM AND INTO THE OPS TEAM !!

 

I

- put all available ressources into the combat team to work on class balance again and put the target dps to 10.000. all classes must be able to reach this target dps. verify it in real combats, maybe open pts again. make the rotation public so everyone can try to reach the target dps. difference from best performing class to worst performing class should be around 5%. Not 30 like it is currently. It is not the answer to nerf averything and destroy the last idea of fun in the game. Because it sucks very much that you cant even beat some 4 year old ops because raid damage is to low now. That is crazy.

- all classes need 1 oh **** button and 2 self heals. a big one and a small one over time.

 

II

- put all other available sources into the ops team and produce new and better MMO content.

 

And after that is done you can post another 90-Day Roadmap about stuff nobody cares like another stronghold or summon treek while walking .... ((

[Sargrith]

Yush! I'd like a real Sith lady by my side.

 

 

Yup time to bring back Kira....

[analyis]

Thanks for all the feedback. I'll take up a number of the points you raised with the team, including the 242 for Master Mode on Umbara. You also asked about Legacy Currencies, additional class balancing, Strongholds, and more, so I'll update the Roadmap to include many of those items, along with any additional insight, where possible.

 

There's a lot of criticism in this thread, a lot of good ideas, some confusion, a bunch of frustration. and a ton of passion about SWTOR. I've also read that we don't play the game, have no understanding of MMOs, and most of decisions are the opposite of smart. I get it and I think most of you know realize we're not going to please everyone, and no matter how many changes we make, someone is going to be unhappy and call us out.

 

I know we'll continue to improve the game, we'll continue to refine every area, we'll add new content regularly for a wide variety of different play styles - some will get strongholds, some will get PvP, GSF, Operation Bosses, New Flashpoints, Story, and more. I also know we'll make mistakes along the way, and you'll be able to help us course correct, yet I still want the Dev Team to take chances, to push themselves and strive to be better and provide a lot of fun for all of us who play this game.

 

I've also read some of you are tossing in the towel and are leaving us. That obviously saddens me as the game is better when everyone works together. I have valued your input, have tried to understand your frustration while working with the team to get your concerns addressed. Not everything is as it seems, but I respect your decision and look to earn your business again in the near future.

 

Hope everyone is taking full advantage of the bonus CXP week. Have a great weekend.

 

Keith---

 

More than "some" have thrown in the towel. The guild I run with has lost 98% of our hard core raiders. The heavy handed nerfs were viewed as a betrayal. What you need to realize is none of the people that left are casual players. Most have been with the game since beta. The reason they felt betrayed is, despite all the we will listen to your feedback comments coming from you and eric, they were not listened to. Also, I started playing this game in beta and must say the server population on the harbinger has tanked in the past month. I have never seen it this low. What I see coming down the pipe is an expansion of FTP to lure casuals into the game and hope to get previous long term players back. If you go the FTP route instead of rewarding us die hards that is when I'll join my former guildies on the mmo they fled to

[TUXs]

Thanks Keith!

 

My biggest issues right now are:

• balance and the heavy handed nerfs of 5.3

• slow rate of content - this has got to be sped up a bit

• gearing - we're still far too focused on RNG - you've got to help PvPers more

 

And PLEASE keep the CXP event going. I actually played an alt all last week and I enjoyed it again...that hasn't been the case once since 5.0.

[dscount]

PVP Changes? How about before you bump up those UC's awarded you balance match making first?

 

Match making in this game is complete CRAP for both PVP and GSF. Now it's going to be even worse with bigger rewards we will see even more nose picking / window lickers in both PVP and GSF. Several GSF matches this weekend would have actually been balanced (new players I assume) if we didn't have two nose pickers doing nothing (No they had not been bombers either). Score was like 400 damage. (Not even sure how that happened).

 

I'd request we NOT increase UC rewards in PVP nor GSF at this point. Bad enough folks that don't PVP have to join PVP to 248 BIS level gear that doesn't drop in NiM content like they used to do.

[dscount]

Thanks Keith!

 

My biggest issues right now are:

• balance and the heavy handed nerfs of 5.3

• slow rate of content - this has got to be sped up a bit

• gearing - we're still far too focused on RNG - you've got to help PvPers more

 

And PLEASE keep the CXP event going. I actually played an alt all last week and I enjoyed it again...that hasn't been the case once since 5.0.

100% Agree with TUX on these points.

- My Sorc Heals plays very gutted and now in MM content it's nearly impossible to keep people alive (doable, but very very painful and usually folks die more now). GG on following the progress and making NO change as expected (You published the change - took no feedback and now making no changes after you "Monitored" it.)

- While the Sisters fight was cool - it's still hard to get a group (GF) that has ANY clue.

- Gearing is very RNG still and you have not addressed NiM (MM) token issue in the hardest content. Still a complete waste that people have to run HM to get 242 and then force themselves to do PVP/GSF to gear up when NiM/MM content should be dropping tokens like every other Tier of OPS in the game since day one.

- RNG LOOT crates still very unreliable way to gear and we should have QoL feature that says "Next time I get RNG I want XYZ item to drop". Like not a 4th clone of crap relic or helm again.

 

CXP Boost - Was very awesome and I think should be permanent. I played catch up on a couple ALTS, but burned the last of my boosters. This would decrease the complete hostile audience of players if you can keep it online forever. Or increase RNG crate drops dramatically.

Edited July 24, 2017 by dscount

[casirabit]

Thanks Keith!

 

My biggest issues right now are:

• balance and the heavy handed nerfs of 5.3

• slow rate of content - this has got to be sped up a bit

• gearing - we're still far too focused on RNG - you've got to help PvPers more

 

And PLEASE keep the CXP event going. I actually played an alt all last week and I enjoyed it again...that hasn't been the case once since 5.0.

 

I have seen more people doing even the dailies last week than normal.

[Alssaran]

I felt the same on this new feature. It's something we've needed for a long time now, for groupfinder's sake.

 

This feature only makes sense when the average gear rating is actually a realistic value of when someone can clear the content. 242 gear for master mode flashpoints completely misses the point. There is simply no need to have an average of upper HM/early NiM progression gear to clear a master mode flashpoint.

 

As many people have pointed out: Everything after 230 gear goes pretty smoothly. If this feature is anywhere close to requiring 242 for even the average master mode flashpoints later on, it restricts an empty queue even further. And that will lead to the queue simply dying out. I might as well not queue at all.

 

I am saying this as someone who has the gear on his main, and who has the means to equip a tank/dps character to an average of 240 in a few days: A 240-242 gear requirement for content such as most master mode flashpoints is devoid of any realism, and the idea it should be there stems from the "average gear rating means that you can definitely clear the content there while being brain-AFK" crowd that has infested WoW for years. When it says 830 gear to enter a dungeon and 840 average to clear it, these people ask for 865-870.

 

Saying "entering master mode flashpoints requires an average of 230 or 224" would make sense, seeing that attempting it on anything below 228 can be a bit tricky. However, I did run MM flashpoints during early 5.0 with 228 crafted modifications and did just fine. Everything that is above 230 is completely unnecessary for that kind of content.

[Isaee]

From the thread and the last roadmap i understand that BW wants to drag down the dps from classes to the target dps ... okay .... in my opinion i think its more important to bring the classes classes up that are below the target dps / dtps .... . As example :

 

Sorg Sage Telekinese / Lightning : As far as i understand all the threats so far , it is that the dps is under the target dps ... to make this class compareable with other classes should be priority ... i mean other classes has the dps ... maybe to much ... but this class dont has the dps ( when you dont use the bug ). All i want to say is bring back the telekinsese / lightning spec .

How to bring the class to the desired dps ... since their is one skill that is ALWAYS up ( weaken mind ). I think it should do the trick by pushing the dmg of this skill by 20 %. The dps gain should be around 150 dps.

[Christie_Swift]

Besides balancing DPS and classes why not grow a spine and really balance this game among Casual, PvP, OPs players in terms of gearing. Ever since the creation of the so called Galactic command gearing grinding really has split this game even further. Everyone wants it easier for their groupies. The vocal majority who have easy access to OPS are ruling this game while the PvPers and casual players are left like the red head stepchild.

 

Please make the gearing system easier to obtain. I could care less for OPS being a PvPer/casual player and the original system was not great but better than what is being done now. This is an incessant orgy feast of grinding and some more grinding to obtain anything of value. This is a BROKEN system and someone should develop a new workflow to revisit the gearing system. The loudest children get want they want but this system needs more real BALANCING and nobody actually thought of it well.