What, if anything, went wrong with KotFE/ET and what should come in the future?

[Darkbloom]

I have some opinions about this, they are mine alone. Just wanted to make that clear.

 

I think the expansions were a success overall. They increased game visibility, brought in new players, and gave us some great storytelling. But, did they hold those new players, and what flaws existed that prevented the expansions from reaching their full potential?

 

 

I remember when KotFE was announced. I was so excited to re-subscribe. I really thought that KotFE was going to be a great expansion. I was obviously not alone.

 

When I heard that they were going to return to a focus on story, of course I thought of the original 8 class stories. I believe that's what most of the people who re-subscribed were imagining.

 

What we got was very different.

 

I was actually pretty happy (as long as I only played my force-using characters) until the Darth Marr/Satele chapter. That was when I realized that there was something deeply wrong with the story, no matter what "choices" you made. The way they turned Marr's ghost into a ridiculous hippy guru was disgusting. And by the end of chapter 16 I finally had to admit that I wasn't playing any of my character's stories. I was playing the Redemption of Arcann. Wow. Yet another spoiled, privileged kid's redemption story. I've seen that movie enough times now, thanks.

 

I was so angry when I finished chapter 16, and not in a good way. A good way would be that my character was angry. No, I was just angry at the writers.

 

It wasn't a game. It was a Netflix series. And it was a Netflix series that I didn't want to see.

 

Everything else that went wrong has already been nicely summarized by others.

[ekwalizer]

There are far more issues in the negative column, than in the positive column (for me).

 

1. Complete abandonment of end game MMO activity.

This was a total violation of a promise made by the staff to never again go 14 months without an operation. Next month will mark 36 months since the last complete operation.

 

2. Way too linear, even for this game.

There is absolutely no choice, throughout KOTFE that mattered. The difference between total light and total dark was a single cut-scene with the outcome remaining exactly the same. "Oh but <spoiler> might betray you!" B-O-O-H-O-O. We literally just met that person 5 hours earlier. No one cares about that companion.

 

3. Where are my dang companions? Two years later and I still don't have Mako back?

 

4. The "major" decision of ET leaves Republic toons unscathed. That isn't a major decision for them. But it was for anyone that mains a BH or SW (worse yet, people like me that main a BH and 2nd main a SW).

 

5. Far too single player focused. In the summer of 2015 the studio, in all their wisdom, decided to run 12x story XP for 5 months ... leaving Ops and PvP stagnant. Of course people were leveling ALTs most of the time. But they let those metrics sway their decision to change the course of the game to "story players".

 

6. Speaking of the stories for those two expansions, I found them about as enjoyable as a swift poke in the eye ... the first time through.

 

7. Which leads to my next point: Zero replayability. Once you've seen it and figured out that NO choice you make matters, there is no reason to play through it again.

 

8. This started with SoR but continued on with these expansions: gating dailies behind the story.

 

9. Also starting with SoR but continuing on with these expansions, forcing everyone to go through the entire "story" solo. That doesn't really lend itself to the title of multiplayer.

 

10. Too many companions. Seriously, stop with this. Give me back my original crew plus a few new ones. It doesn't feel like I am in command of a military force because everything I do is with one companion. Why give me 50 potentials if I can only take one with me? If the "way forward" really is solo play - then let me take 3-7 companions with me (that last bit is sarcasm if you can't tell).

[DanNV]

Below are my opinions, not speaking for anyone else. Some minor spoilers below, so if you haven't played KotFE/ET, please read at your own risk.

 

What went wrong with KotFE/ET? Everything.

 

I agree with everything you said.

 

There is a good deal of useful feedback in this thread. Maybe Keith and his EA masters will actually read it.

Edited November 18, 2017 by DanNV

[Rheshalea]

What I am hoping is that at some point the developers and writers will realize how bad the last two years have been and come out with a real expansion.

 

And it needs to start with our character coming out of the refresher as our LI wakes up, and say 'I just had the weirdest dream.'

 

I know that this will only be understood and laughed at by those who are as old as I am, and they will understand that when an entire season causes more pain than entertainment, sometimes you just have to write it off as a dream.

 

*giggles*

I'm as old as you are, and I've been saying the same from the start, after it started to sink in just how bad KotFE was.

Retconning two whole expansions is bad. Really, really bad, but what's even worse is to continue down the same road, with the same story that most players sincerely dislike.

Still, in this case, there's so many possibilities.

 

Let our character be rescued and woken up from carbonite by their main old companion, be it a husband/wife/closest friend, and have the first words from the PCs mouth be "I just had the weirdest dream."

Let Marr or Satele be there to help that companion fill in what's been going on during the five weeks (not five years, because our main companion/wife/husband would never wait five years to rescue us!!!) the PCs been incapacitated. Marr/Satele can present the new main plot, which has to be something plausible this time, please.

Lana and Theron can show up soon after, and present a squad of possible new assets (=companions) from which the PC can pick and choose - this because I'd be mightily peeved off if they took our new companions away again. My Sith sorc, for example, enjoys having Blizz tag along, and I know there are lots of players who have lots of (new) comps they like. Anyway, present the "new" comps to the PC along with a dossier/short convo and let people pick as many as they want, up to the number they had unlocked in the nightmare that was KotFEET.

 

Use the same planets - Zakuul and Odessen and Iokath and so on, but make it right this time, with explorable, open worlds and sidequests and daily areas and everything. This is a new (initially unplayabale) faction, let us work towards swaying/forcing it to join either the Republic or the Empire, and/or eventually let it become a proper third faction, maybe as a reflection of this gray side of the force one Marr and Satele were rambling about.

 

Anyway, making the new areas join the Republic/Empire could happen through gamewide happenings.

One thing that ticked me off with KotFEET was that nothing changed in the rest of the galaxy, except for the appearance of a handful of Star Fortresses that had absolutely no effect on the planets they threatened. Why couldn't lowbie characters help save Alderaan from the Star Fortress? Adding new sidequests/events/happenings that everyone can take part in would tie a new expansion and storyline into the original game properly and make the PCs involved in the new story see and experience the effects.

 

All this can easily (on a theoretic level) be tied in to everything in the game. Add new daily quests and rewards to old daily reputation grinds. Add new rewards and objectives to PvP (for example, in WZs, have items for players to pick up and hand in at their chosen faction's main base, and as reward for the WZs), add new mini-bosses to FPs that drop the hand-ins, and the same for Ops bosses.

 

Meh, in short, just focus on a proper story, not on new areas we don't get to explore. Save the time and effort and expense of creating new places, and instead add new and interesting things to do in the old ones, so players of all levels can feel like a part of it, even if it (the reason for doing the new quests) will look much different with the knowledge of the story the max-level characters have.

[Tsillah]

But it's still better than anything after it. (Personally, I speed through Hoth because I don't like it, but it too is better than anything after Corellia.)

That's something else though. You said Corellia was the best part of the game. I don't see it like that, that's all I'm saying.

[Bothan]

Loss of class companions. Specifically, Corso. I realize a lot of people don't like him, but to my male smuggler, he became a good and trusted ally and friend. At least there was an option to pull him from the companion console.

 

Nobody missed me. I only recall two companions ever saying they bothered looking for me: Torian, and Aric. This was depressing.

 

Betrayal. It grew tiresome to be betrayed over and over and over. This Theron plot line pissed me off so much that I only played it the one time. I'm not bothering with my other seven characters.

 

Cut scenes. Too damned many. After playing through once, I found myself spacing through most conversations and cut scenes just to get through it.

 

Auto-launching the next chapter. Let me decide when to begin! It drove me nuts to finish one, and immediately get thrown into the next. Ditto auto-launching upon stepping foot in my war room. I may have other reasons to be there.

 

Arcann fretting over Torian/Vette. "I do hope <so-and-so> is okay." Srsly? You don't know them. (Minor, yes, but I eye-rolled every time I heard it.)

 

Qyzen, Bowdarr, and Forex. I didn't bother. Their acquisition requirements were tedious.

Edited November 18, 2017 by Bothan

[grania]

I've just been re-rolling my characters that started kotfe. Someday, surely, we'll be able to skip over this dumpster fire entirely and pretend it didn't happen.

 

I wish I could roll back my elderly toons though, they sure didn't deserve what happened to them.

[LordArtemis]

I agree with everything you said.

 

There is a good deal of useful feedback in this thread. Maybe Keith and his EA masters will actually read it.

 

I agree, lots of great opinions. Would love to read more.

[Deewe]

Guess by now the devs know pretty well what went wrong, a bit chunk of the issue was a lack of a proper budget to have class based story line.

 

Now, I'd say the other issue was all the money wasted in changing the classes and the talent tress. The game needed more balance and way less drastic changes.

 

The issue with VO story, FP and OP is there is very few replayability in them. Does not mean you should not do it because they do bring players back in.

 

Until they have proper funding, they should get back to extending the class story with the initial companions.

The trick is : one at a time.

 

Ideally they would deliver one Imperial and one Republic class at a time but even if they only do one but do it very well, players will start to notice and will come back.

[wistarie]

I am afraid you should accept that there will be no "proper funding" anymore in SWTOR.

[Nmyownworld]

I am afraid you should accept that there will be no "proper funding" anymore in SWTOR.

The pragmatist part of me isn't looking for "proper funding" in the immediate future. My viewpoint is one of how the available funding for the game is applied for the future. One way is to learn from past decisions. That's how I think of this thread. Admittedly, the input in this thread is from a minute percentage of players (criteria: subbed + responding to the thread = not that many players). However, that doesn't negate the validity of the feedback in this thread.

 

My hope is that the game's funding, regardless of the amount, does not create more "once and done" KotFE/ET-ish type content (YMMV). Instead, proceeds in building up content with high replayability for solo and group content players. I think KotFE/ET showed that more is needed beyond enticing players to try SWTOR. Retention of players is very important.

Edited November 18, 2017 by Nmyownworld

[LordArtemis]

Well, I think they likely bet the farm on KotFE/ET and it likely didn't provide a positive cost to retention benefit.

 

IMO it is possible to turn things around if they have taken a turn for the bleak with respect to player numbers, but they would have to do a few things...and they do not have much time if things are trending negative currently.

 

1) Make a move to find some way that players can replay their class stories, even if it doesn't change anything with their current status in the game.

 

2) Create server invasions on PVE and PVP states, where folks can participate in defense of certainly planets...could make it factional, or just have the alliance slant. Either way, it would create some interesting scenarios IMO...always did in other games I have played.

 

3) Fix the bugs with Iokath and Kuat and remove the credits requirement from Iokath dailies.

 

4) Boost CXP for the first 100 levels of GC in a massive way.

 

5) Bring back Gree, Nightlife and DvL as well as implement 3X XP and CXP for a quadruple whammy and spread the word.

 

They could also offer a better package for sale for the holidays....60 days of sub, all expansions, 2400 coins....35 bucks.

 

Wouldn't hurt, IMO, if they added a new tier to access....premium....500 bucks...removes most of the annoyances of F2P and preferred, but GC remains sub only.

Edited November 18, 2017 by LordArtemis

[LrdScorpio]

You don't have to have 10 million paying subs to be able to put out content. This game has enough paying players to be able to do better than it has done. The issue is with game direction and the internal messes that seem to envelop all EA studios

[CloudCastle]

I have a lot of complaints I'm afraid, but I hope Bw considers these things when designing future content.

 

1) BW should never have abandoned the traditional expansion model. Instead of a nice, complete package that I looked forward to doing multiple times, we were given this bizarre TV serial model with no clear end in sight, and no way to know if our decisions were going to screw us over later (and hence all alts had to held back from participating.)

 

2) Giving us a legion of empty, clone companions was a terrible idea. Companions didn't need to be stripped of their abilities (goodbye Assassinate), mechanics (goodbye moving mouths, planetary commentary), and even their looks (goodbye working customizations in cut scenes.) I don't need to have every companion from every class available to me! Stripping companions and making them samey-samey with minimal functionality was NOT a fair trade-off. I would much rather have seen the companions left as class specific and kept the way they were.

 

3) Removing companions from the story was a terrible idea. It made my character's own lack of individuality in the story all the more painful. Companions should have been returned immediately, through a series of interesting quests that allowed players to build their crews back up the way they wanted. THEN, they could have joined them for the Zakuul story arc, even if all they did was stand behind us and add commentary like they used to. At least my boon companions would have still been a part of my adventures. As it was, my character was left lonely and bereft, forced to use companions she barely knew and sometimes cared little about.

 

4) Removing the open world in favor of instances was bad. When I enter Fallen Empire, I feel like Alice stepping through the looking glass into a strange and lonely prison, where I can't escape and no other players are there. What happened to all the other quests we used to get that helped us explore and get to know a new planet? The reputations tracks that allowed us to grow? I missed these things terribly.

 

5) Fallen Empire was too long and too linear, with no alternative leveling path allowed. You are trapped inside, stuck on a long and tedious quest chain involving choices you didn't make while being forced to recruit companions you didn't want. There's no way to skip things, or to design your own leveling path like we could in the previous iterations of the game.

 

6) Cut scenes should enhance my character's story, not be a passive TV show about NPC's I have no control over. There were too many cut scenes where my character wasn't present at all, which yanked me out of my character's head, disrupting immersion and believeability. Was my character supposed to know these things even if they weren't there? Was I supposed to make decisions based on what I the player knew, rather than what my character knew? Why was the story about these other characters more important than my character's own?

[GalacticKegger]

What went wrong

• Removing the game's zone leveling and content difficulty progression system, and replacing it with forced level sync that gives us virtually no 1 - 60 leveling progression other than story and Jesus-droid faceroll solo FPs.
  
• Removing group leveling story from the last two expansions and making them solo-only, making it impossible for a player and their friend to level up through them together.
  
• Not releasing any new (and real) open world planets to explore; instead forcing level sync down our throats for every zone on every planet that came before KotFE so as to recycle them all then pass them all off as new expansion content.
  
• Convoluting the crafting mini-game
  
• Removing all group play Flashpoints, HMs, Ops and their loot tables from the leveling game, forcing bolster on them and permanently recycling them all to level cap so group players not only can't experience them as part of their planet level progression, but they can't even go back and farm them for customs or tradable and REable loot.
  
• KotFE killed off 4 years of time and effort we put into our companions. Not only was our ability to custom gear them for combat removed, but we either have to skip the 4.0 expansion story altogether or recall them from an Odessen terminal after completing the first 9 chapters to get them back.
  
• Removing loot tables from the game and replacing them with F2P RNG loot boxes.
  
• Calling what used to be elder game the new and improved end game.
  
• Removing end game content difficulty progression and replacing it with a mobile-gaming solo RPG ladder advancement system.
  

 

What went right

• The Cartel Collections interface and search feature
  
• The Eternal Championship operations-equivalent to solo play end game
  

 

What should come in the future

• Bring back veteran aspects of the pre-4.0 game as options to bring back veteran players:
  
  • provide non-level sync'd instances on each planet and in each daily zone - including the original H2s and H4s. Players who prefer level sync can simply not join the non-level syn'd instances and vice versa.
    
  • bring back unbolstered leveling planet flashpoints, HMs and Operations as a non-level sync'd game play option. Can even keep them out of GF ... just allow them to be walked into.
    
  • bring the old loot tables back for the non-level sync'd and non-bolstered content.
    
  • bring back an option for companion combat customization.
    

  [*]Provide an option that allows players to physically play through KotFE's and KotET's story chapters together.

  [*]Produce full open world expansions from here on out, similar at least to RotHC and SoR in content quality and quantity ... including the ability to play through all story content in a group.

  [*]Add a parallel solo track end game similar to the Eternal Championship.

  [*]If Galactic Command must be retained then limit it to being exclusive to elder game, and only as an accessory that embellishes elder game gearing (in preparation for end game like it used to be) - not replaces it. [*]Leave end game operations loot tables, gear and content difficulty progression alone.

 

And finally ... this game isn't F2P - it's a F2P hybrid or there wouldn't be a subscription model associated with it. I think it would then be fair to presume that anyone willing to pay $150.00 a year in subscription fees (plus whatever they spend in the Cartel Market) would also be willing to pay an additional $30.00 to $50.00 a year for real and robust expansions.

Edited November 19, 2017 by GalacticKegger

[grania]

"Lonely and bereft", that's a good way to describe the experience. It never really got better either, it just scabbed over a little.

 

The best part of kotfe and kotet was the trooper's reunion with Jorgan. It's literally the only thing about it that I'm fond of, and it should have been a side mission just for troopers. Because now I'm stuck with this (awesome) but unwanted companion on all my other characters who couldn't care less if Jorgan lived or died. It's a sad state of affairs.

[LordFell]

Under no sane metric could KOTET/KOTFE be considered successful.

You wanna talk about subs, you wanna talk about retention... I don't care. What I see when I look at my Pub Guild and my Imp guild, is that the vast majority of "old time" guildmates haven't logged in for about 180 to 360 days. And when I say vast majority, I mean... there's like... 3 of us "originals" left on my Imp guild and about the same on my Pub guild.

...and given the Server Merges, I'm pretty damn sure this is a phenomenon that's widespread.

 

People hated the Eternal Expansions, and the evidence is all around you in game and on the forums.

 

The Writing was really not good.

The story does not feel right, good, or appropriate unless you're a Force User. This is an incontrovertible fact. Anyone who tells you they liked playing Eternal whatever on their Bounty Hunter or Smuggler is clearly trying to signal you in some way. Call the police...if you were playing Eternal Blah on your Force using character, odds are you still hated it, or just didn't really care for it. We're talking about an unredeemable F or at best a grudging and generous C+.

 

People have mentioned things like lack of choice... or how linear the expansion was. I think the best example of how the writing failed is how badly the Fall & Redemption of Arcann went. I really never get a solid sense that... yeah. Arcann has Fallen, he's a slave to the Dark Side now. He is a victim. Instead, I am left with the feeling that he is... no more or less mistreated by his parents than I am by mine (and no, that's not a great relationship). And... ultimately, I don't see him as being any less responsible for his actions than, say... any other politician who's started a questionable war, or enacted oppressive policies (only, Arcann killed anywhere from 50 billion to 20 Trillion people, depending on how you figure the math). I just don't see him as Dark Side... just... immoral and ambitious. Even a little red, dark side energy flowing around would have helped... but I wasn't feeling this at all.

 

When Sidious turned Vader, it was a years long campaign of very careful manipulation.

If Valkorian even turned Arcann, it was by being indifferent to him throughout his childhood.

The two things don't equate.

 

The Railroading is Real

When you finish one chapter, they auto-load another. If you want to look away from the trainwreck, you need to hammer your escape button right about now... and that's not a bad idea, because although they have rolled out near continuous action in your Chapter progression, there's still Alliance Alerts you ought to deal with. It doesn't entirely make sense that your characters can ascend to the Eternal Throne... while the Star Fortress over Tattooine is still intact... and if you want to go and do that flashpoint... sure. I mean, the enemies in that Star Fortress are still loyal to Arcann, even if you bring him as your companion to do the Star Fortress (because.. of course they are).

 

And of course... the worlds aren't Open. One way or another, my brave characters who have dragged themselves all the way through this mess are apparently the Sovereign or Emperor of Zakuul.... I haven't been back to that planet since I claimed the throne. There is nothing to the planet; no open content, no quests. I rule the damn planet... but I don't have any sense that I should care, or have any reason to go there.

 

The debacle that is Companions...

And forced companions. You MUST do THIS chapter with THIS companion.

...but I don't want to.

You MUST do THIS chapter with THIS companion.

...can't I just take the companion I want, and if you must bother me with your pointless drivel, I've got a holocommunicator for that?

 

Lana = Mary Sue. Someone on Bioware has a major "thing" for her, and I'm not on board. She has a squinchy face, funny eyes, and a generic Imperial voice. I'm not interested in Lana as a companion at all... or Theron for that matter... but I get to spend most of my chapters with one or both of them.

You get to spend lots and lots of time with Lana and Theron!!!

...but I don't want to.

You get to spend lots and lots of time with Lana and Theron!!!

*sigh*

 

Not to mention the still missing or poorly reintroduced old companions.

Also... new companions are just shells. Nothing inside.

 

A lot of really aggravating mechanics.

I remember there was one fight, with a pair of named Knights of Zakuul while you're still escaping. And I vividly remember coming to the forums to absolutely rage about that fight... because I literally (and I'm not exaggerating) spent 70% of that fight being knocked back, knocked down, or stunned. I get CC'd into uselessness, and Lana wins the fight while I flop around like a fish. Sure, I have a Break for CC, but since it's continuous, I get to use it once out of the 30 times I get knocked down.

 

That... and the refusal to let stealth mechanics work. Hey, I don't FEEL LIKE fighting every single mob on the landing pad, and that's why I'm rolling a Stealth character. Nope. Even from Stealth, I just aggro'd mobs so far away I can't even see them on my mini map. Here comes the... well... heck. Everything. Everyone is now attacking my Hidden in Stealth character. Hurray.

....that's a lame cheat. If you WANT us to have to fight, for some reason... you put down some stealth sweeping droids.

Edited November 23, 2017 by LordFell

[LunaticFringer]

To be honest I think the problem started way back at square one with SWTOR. One they got a little egotistical with their vision where the game would go versus wanting to separate themselves from the pack (while still heavily borrowing from things like WoW) and not listening to built in gamers they had coming from, yes I'm going to say it, places like SWG.

 

*The Engine was ultimately a bad idea

*They thought they were going to keep tons of servers open and didn't think cross-server queues were a good idea

*They banked everything on Players not eating up story quickly

 

Now we could say there have been milestones since launch where the game could've gone another way but didn't... but I'd actually name one thing that went very wrong with KotFE/ET.

 

*They spent way too much money on fluff (the trailers) and not enough on the actual game content

 

I honestly think it boils down to that. Had the money for those flashy trailers went into game development, staff, etc... we might've been on better ground now. Albeit I think we still would've had problems had things like DvL and the now infamous Command Crate grind went forward anyway as well.

 

They can still learn from it. And I'm still trying to give Keith a chance to implement some things from The Roadmap... but I'm already upset about numerous things. Forced Legacy name changes with apparent surprise Naming Policy additions so you can't even have a simple Legacy name like Storm anymore when one had it for several years on The Ebon Hawk with no complaints? Things just don't look well from this player's perspective.

 

Honestly? If EA/Bioware's only option is to keep this mmorpg going till their contract is cancelled or renewed before a new Star Wars mmorpg can even be considered? I almost think they should just shut it down for a year and do a legit overhaul like Final Fantasy did. The coming patch not withstanding... this game needs some serious thought put into it at this point if they want it to appeal to a wider fan base again and live up to even a fraction of the vision it originally had. Ultimately, listen to all the feedback... and also use some common sense before implementing stuff. It'd go a long way to making people happier in my humble opinion.

 

~my 2 credits for what it's worth

Edited November 19, 2017 by LunaticFringer

[Lunafox]

My two cents:

 

The Good:

 

-Being able to solo flashpoints. Until that was made possible, people like me (soloers for whatever reasons) missed out on a lot of story content. Allowing soloers to go through it and experience it, made the game fun again. I loved the GodBot that allowed me see what I was missing. People who still want/like to group can and should get better rewards, but as a soler, I'm content just getting to see and experience the story.

 

-I loved the cutscenes, lovely quality, though I wish there had been less emphasis on the Valkorions and more on us and our interactions with our companions.

 

-Chapters in a timely fashion. I enjoyed getting a new chapter every month, it gave me something to look forward to. I knew that if they catered to the 'give it all to me now crowd' they'd burn through it in no time and then there would be nothing for anyone to do for a long time.

 

The Bad:

 

-The story only works for Force users and because of this allows for little replayability. The story should have 'class flavor' much like it had in SoR. This made it much nicer to replay...also the little side quests helped. SoR to me was probably the best and most exciting expansion. I loved it.

 

-The story should have had at least two versions, shooters and lightsaber users. Ideally 4 versions...imp shooters and force users and pub shooters and force users. And slight alterations to the shooter story because no one in their right mind would believe that the Emperor a powerful force user would be gung ho to leap in and take over a Force Blind.

 

-The story had way too many missed opportunities for story for important companions like Scourge. He could have had many interactions based on all the business with the Emperor and his people. I'm sure others like Kira too, could have played a more important role, given that she was a Child of the Emperor.

 

-The story focuses too much on the Valkorion family. None of them were very engaging for me, I didn't like any of them, except Valkorion himself. I think the class stories were better because they focussed on the player and their journey more so than the enemy. We are the stars of the game, not Valkorion's obnoxious spawn.

 

-Killing Darth Marr. That was heinous and unforgivable. Worse still, if you're going to kill him...there needs to be balance to the Force. Kill Satele too.

 

-Too much betrayal as a story driver/trope. Everyone betrays everyone, even over lunch. It's so common it's no longer edgy or fun, or even capable of eliciting much emotion, except anger and the 'you've got to be kidding me' feeling.

 

-Companions, in particular, Romanced ones needed to be returned in a timely and meaningful fashion.

 

-Companion bias on the dev's part. Some were returned more meaningfully than others. Why do Kaliyo and Jorgan merit a full chapter with them constantly by our side on a mission, but Quinn doesn't? Why do many comps get commemorative statues and someone like Quinn doesn't? (I know there are others, but Quinn is the one that is foremost on my mind.)

 

-Companion customizations don't work in cut scenes. Again this was a problem with Quinn's return--many got default Quinn and not their version.

 

-Not enough romantic cutscenes/story.

 

-RNG is not exciting. RNG makes me want to dash my skull against my keyboard. I never get anything good.

 

-Iokath is dull and there are no rewards that make me want to run those dailies, it's like slow torture.

 

-Too many trash mobs...everywhere.

 

-Too many steps in crafting now. It was fine before, why add more steps?

 

-Too many steps in gearing now. Why not award us coins and let us get the stuff we need off the vendor like before. Having to muck around with NPCS full of pieces only to run 'next door' and swap it out for a good piece we can use, is 'make work.' It adds nothing to the game experience.

 

-Strongholds, why not let us have something relevant to the story--Zakuul apartment or Odessen house. If you really want to rock my socks, give me Cloud City.

 

-A need for new events (please don't make us have to throw snowballs at people again this year. I beg of you.) And replay older events that were fun, like Chevin and the Rakghoul scavenger hunt.

 

 

As for the bitter beginning of this game, in my thinking, the biggest mistake made was giving too much xp which in turn allowed people to burn through the content too quickly. As someone who was raised up and accustomed to 'Korean grinders', where it took months if not years to attain max level, the speed at which max level was achieved here was staggering and took away from any feeling of accomplishment. It could have been decreased a bit without being mind-numbing.

 

 

And I think that about sums up my two credits worth.

Edited November 19, 2017 by Lunafox

[LordArtemis]

I would like to add to my original comment, as some folks have brought up some good points...some I agree with, others not so much.

 

I think some folks absolutely refuse to see any good in the expansions, and that is fine, but I do not think that in any way represents the majority.

 

That said, here are a few more mistakes I think they made, and perhaps some expansions of my original points.

 

Companions

 

I think the biggest mistake here was not the homogenization of all companions as much as it was the forced removal of current comps. Yes, making them all the same removed some of the uniqueness of some of the comps, including some great special attacks and animations. But overall I find the new setup acceptable.

 

What I continue to dislike is the comp removal, forced, which I think was a really bad move. I have characters that have not engaged in the expansions specifically for that reason. I put quite a bit of effort into the "influence" levels for some of these companions and do not want to lose them for gameplay or crafting reasons.

 

They should simply remove the forced removal of companions, and instead make it an option. They can, after all, continue to restrict access to comps during play if they wish.

 

Choices that REALLY MATTER

 

Of course our choices really didn't matter in the long run. They had a few notable effects, like perhaps how some companions react to you, which ones die, the disposition of the gravestone (though it doesn't matter if you keep it or not), what style "throne room" you will have on Odessen, etc. But there were a few notable points where it seems the choices should have been more meaningful. Especially with respect to the choice to either embrace Valkorian or reject him.

 

The fight with Valkorian is a good example. Here, if you chose to embrace Valkorian, it would have been better to have you battle different enemies from your class story instead, ones you dispatched like in the dream sequence. To make the fights the same, though obviously only a small bit of alternate dialog would have been required seems a silly choice to me.

 

Also, your choice to embrace Valkorian OR reject him SHOULD have provided you with a small control, like the control you get during the Valkorian fight sequence on Odessen, that would provide some rudimentary force powers. The powers you get if you reject him could have come from either Satele Shan or Darth Marr. THEN the context of the story would have made more sense to non-force users.

 

Everything behind a phase wall

 

This was a big negative as well. Especially considering the money that must have gone into making some of the locations. Sure, plenty of FPs have locations that you can not visit on a regular basis, but the expanions are not FPs. They should have not have designed that way.

[Paulsutherland]

Killing off Darth Marr was a big no no for me.

 

However the one thing that annoyed me the most was the decision to save Torian or Vette. In every other game when a decision was made there's always been another element preventing you from saving both. (I.E. In Mass Effect when your forced to save Ashley or Kaiden, the Normandy only has time to pick up one before Sovereign arrives and the bomb goes off.)

 

Yes we baited Vaylin down, but we have three people in our X or Y decision, we just saw Senya and Arcann / Lana and Theron in a prior cut scene before this decision, I'm sure they would have been able to rescue X member while holding out long enough for help to arrive.

 

I wish we could have sent one of our party members to go help the other person while the other comes wit us. (and if we send the 'weaker' of the two party members, they screw it up resulting in the death of Torian/Vette.)

[LordArtemis]

Killing off Darth Marr was a big no no for me.

 

However the one thing that annoyed me the most was the decision to save Torian or Vette. In every other game when a decision was made there's always been another element preventing you from saving both. (I.E. In Mass Effect when your forced to save Ashley or Kaiden, the Normandy only has time to pick up one before Sovereign arrives and the bomb goes off.)

 

Yes we baited Vaylin down, but we have three people in our X or Y decision, we just saw Senya and Arcann / Lana and Theron in a prior cut scene before this decision, I'm sure they would have been able to rescue X member while holding out long enough for help to arrive.

 

I wish we could have sent one of our party members to go help the other person while the other comes wit us. (and if we send the 'weaker' of the two party members, they screw it up resulting in the death of Torian/Vette.)

 

I would have been ok with the death if.....

 

1) Torian took his death better. He is a mando after all.

2) Companions were not forcibly removed by the expansions in the first place.

[Paulsutherland]

I would have been ok with the death if.....

 

1) Torian took his death better. He is a mando after all.

2) Companions were not forcibly removed by the expansions in the first place.

 

The entire thing could have been avoided if we just had an option to tell Senya or Lana to go save one while we save the other.

[Rheshalea]

Killing off Darth Marr was a big no no for me.

 

However the one thing that annoyed me the most was the decision to save Torian or Vette. In every other game when a decision was made there's always been another element preventing you from saving both. (I.E. In Mass Effect when your forced to save Ashley or Kaiden, the Normandy only has time to pick up one before Sovereign arrives and the bomb goes off.)

 

Yes we baited Vaylin down, but we have three people in our X or Y decision, we just saw Senya and Arcann / Lana and Theron in a prior cut scene before this decision, I'm sure they would have been able to rescue X member while holding out long enough for help to arrive.

 

I wish we could have sent one of our party members to go help the other person while the other comes wit us. (and if we send the 'weaker' of the two party members, they screw it up resulting in the death of Torian/Vette.)

 

The Torian/Vette thing honestly feels mostly like a "Look! We TOLD you your choices matter!"-thing than anything else. ...while also, as you said, making absolutely certain we know just how incompetent we, as Commanders, are.

I haven't played KotET through on more than two chars. Both times, the first thing I did after that horrible chapter was to get the "sacrificed" companion back, because the whole situation felt so stupid and unfair.

[tummiswtor]

No matter if You

save Vette or Torian

one of them going to be brainless companion anyway.

I've recruit Qyzen back and after that. I never seen him in cutscenes or never used him to the end of KotET.

He has not even small role in victory

Edited November 19, 2017 by tummiswtor