Proposed Ranked Season Timing and Reward Changes

[Pizza_boy]

Eric,

 

Shorter seasons? Yes, everyone wants that. You’ve made a similar post in the past that never materialized so we’ll see if the devs execute on their intention this time.

 

One currency? Yes, easy QoL improvement, and the credit conversion rate is so meager that unused tokens are essentially worthless right now.

 

Releasing old rewards? I am strongly opposed to this. You’ll get support from newer players who weren’t around 5 years ago to earn the rewards, that’s obvious and predictable. I’ll give you a different perspective.

 

Ranked rewards are a time stamp on a players accomplishments at a specific period in the history of the game. Someone who has Girrada’s rancor, furious gear, or any of the early season top 3 titles earned them during the golden period of competition for Swtor ranked, particularly in regards to solo ranked.

 

No amount of a premium on token cost preserves the rightful exclusivity of these rewards. A player receiving s-1-4 rewards in season 10+ is an anachronism. You’ll take the rewards out of context, out of their time period of competition while ironically making them near- worthless. When everyone has a Ferrari, no one cares that you have a Ferrari.

 

Well said

[AlanTheGoat]

Love the ideas being brought to the table.. I also appreciate the older rewards being released as long as the prices balance it out and keep it only to those who earn it. Edited July 2, 2018 by AlanTheGoat

[septru]

Eric,

 

Shorter seasons? Yes, everyone wants that. You’ve made a similar post in the past that never materialized so we’ll see if the devs execute on their intention this time.

 

One currency? Yes, easy QoL improvement, and the credit conversion rate is so meager that unused tokens are essentially worthless right now.

 

Releasing old rewards? I am strongly opposed to this. You’ll get support from newer players who weren’t around 5 years ago to earn the rewards, that’s obvious and predictable. I’ll give you a different perspective.

 

Ranked rewards are a time stamp on a players accomplishments at a specific period in the history of the game. Someone who has Girrada’s rancor, furious gear, or any of the early season top 3 titles earned them during the golden period of competition for Swtor ranked, particularly in regards to solo ranked.

 

No amount of a premium on token cost preserves the rightful exclusivity of these rewards. A player receiving s-1-4 rewards in season 10+ is an anachronism. You’ll take the rewards out of context, out of their time period of competition while ironically making them near- worthless. When everyone has a Ferrari, no one cares that you have a Ferrari.

 

You haven’t been clear on whether top 3 titles will be re-released. I may disagree with rereleasing mounts, armor, etc. but I can understand from a business perspective why you are doing it. Shorter seasons with unique, chaseworthy rewards require more resources, resources you’ve prioritized to other aspects of the game. I get it. You can’t use the same reasoning for Titles. They take next to no time to create, and rereleasing them would be nothing short of laziness and an affront to veteran ranked players.

 

I have every top 3 sniper and/or gunslinger title in the game, every ranked reward including Warzone Annihlator titles from 8v8 ranked. The title most special to me is All-Galaxy. I got that title on two characters when ranked was highly competitive and it’s a title most acknowledge as the best of the bunch. All-Galaxy means that I’ve been around competitive ranked for half a decade, I was competitive at a time when it was far more difficult to do so, and I fought with/against a specific set of talented players during a vastly different meta. None of those are true if you rerelease the title in a season so far removed from its history.

 

People often forget that aside from having the best top 3 title, season 2 had by far the worst rewards. A stronghold deco, some color crystals, and a helmet that looks like a squid is attached to your face. The dev team is going to feel pressure to acknowledge season 2 rewards by themselves aren’t something to chase. They’ll look at what these they could offer, and remember that All-Galaxy is S-2 and it could be a great reward to increase activity while removing the reason people lust after it in the first place. I hope they resist that detrimental compulsion.

 

I'm a relatively newer ranked player. Played for 3 ish seasons now. No where near Caprica, but even I agree. Rewards from a different season are a time stamp of a player's accomplishments during that time period.

 

This has nothing to do with the argument that players back then were better than players now.... or QOL and competition back then was better than it is now.... this is the fact that "Ranked rewards are a time stamp on a players accomplishments at a specific period in the history of the game. "

[JattaGin]

Bringing back previous rewards might even make me queue again for ranked. I suppose in season 12, for example.

 

This will also allow us over time to build an extensive list of goods on the vendor (...)

 

In the tradition of the collectors edition vendor in the VIP area of the fleet?

 

Couldn't resist.

[Ld-Siris]

I do like the idea of shortened seasons but I like running around with my furious sabers. I don't wanna see every Jack and Jill running around with them.

[LeglessChair]

As much as I want the season 1 rancor, I'm not cool with re-releasing past rewards, it takes away from the original accomplishment imo. A 6 month season is not "short". All other games I play/played have 3 month seasons. Consider 3-4 month seasons followed by a 1 month pre-season to give people a chance to play arenas without everything that comes along with ranked. Edited July 2, 2018 by LeglessChair

[Metthew]

Nice thing you guys are looking into the season timings. Six months is kind of long though, 3 or maybe 4 months would be nice. It would also be really nice if season end dates were announced at or near start of the season.

 

As for older rewards, I'm opposed to making them available. Titles should definitely be out of question, and I'd rather new items be present and let the old stuff remain exclusive (or be slightly modified to set it apart from the real stuff).

 

New rewards placed on vendor on a rolling basis sounds great, however.

[DerSchneider]

I'm a relatively newer ranked player. Played for 3 ish seasons now. No where near Caprica, but even I agree. Rewards from a different season are a time stamp of a player's accomplishments during that time period.

 

This has nothing to do with the argument that players back then were better than players now.... or QOL and competition back then was better than it is now.... this is the fact that "Ranked rewards are a time stamp on a players accomplishments at a specific period in the history of the game. "

 

Braindead smash players from s3 deserve furious even less than modern merc players imo.

[Simplette]

Is that what you expect, Bioware? Its totally ridiculous that releasing old content would make people happy! But it'd make old season rewards worthless. Its also funny that people been requesting armor set for season 9 and what you do is you announce that you gonna give away old armors. If I haven't got S3 armor, for example, it only means that I wasn't good enough at period when it was available. And its fine! Everyone gets what he deserves. That's life. But, please, keep old rewards exclusive. But I don't mind making silver tier rewards available. Old crystals and weapons aren't real top notch, its all about gold tier mounts and armors which are no longer available.

 

About shorter seasons - that's cool tho. 4 Months long season means 3 per year. And that's much better than 10 months long seasons!

 

P.S. waiting for Top-3 class titles from vendor for 1,000,000 Ranked Warzone Commendations

[sifudies]

Making the seasons shorter is a good idea and definitely needed, but please don't bring back old rewards. You'll just make having those rewards meaningless to everyone. All of those players including myself who earned those rewards in their appropriate seasons don't want all of these new people running around with them, especially with the amount of cheating the last few seasons have had. Rather than giving everybody old rewards how about spending more than 5 minutes coming up with rewards for new season. The past 3 seasons rewards have been awful and lazy in comparison to previous seasons. If you put even a quarter of the effort you put into making all these new cartel items into ranked rewards you might actually have good rewards that players really want.

[Raansu]

3 months is still too long imo and 6 months is just brutal. I think ya'll should follow overwatch's model for competitive seasons.

[frennky]

• All Seasons will now use the same type of currency
  

 

-eric

 

Are those tokens/currency also going to be Legacy-wide like command tokens?

[Dacri]

Eric,

 

I dont think you guys should actually give the new people access to old ranked gear and rewards. The old players put "hard" work into it, to see randoms who didn´t even play the game or didn´t have the skill to achieve certain elo using/wearing that stuff.

 

Its not fair at all for me to skip a couple of seasons, then when my class is OP FOTM not even put effort into it to get the top tier rewards for the multiple seasons I didn´t play, you get the example?

[Costello]

Bring back old rewards is like reissuing exclusive rewards as subscriber perks because its easier than offering new rewards.

 

Sure it caters to new players but it brings nothing to long term players. But hell it doesn't matter what anyone wants its going to happen; if you can make people repeat old content for old rewards and call it exciting new stuff and have people think its great all power to you.

[alexsamma]

Braindead smash players from s3 deserve furious even less than modern merc players imo.

 

Smash mara was nerfed before season 3, smash was not a meta spec in season 3.

[EricMusco]

Hey folks,

 

Definitely keep the feedback coming! The team is reading through the thread to get an idea of everyone's thoughts.

 

A few points of clarification:

• The prior rewards we are talking about are cosmetic rewards (mounts, weapons, armor) not things like Top 96 titles.
  
• These older items on the vendors would be very expensive to purchase with seasonal tokens. We absolutely want to avoid "everyone" having our older top-end rewards. The intention would be for them to be accessible but still very rare.
  

-eric

[EnzoForMe]

Hey folks,

 

Definitely keep the feedback coming! The team is reading through the thread to get an idea of everyone's thoughts.

 

A few points of clarification:

• The prior rewards we are talking about are cosmetic rewards (mounts, weapons, armor) not things like Top 96 titles.
  
• These older items on the vendors would be very expensive to purchase with seasonal tokens. We absolutely want to avoid "everyone" having our older top-end rewards. The intention would be for them to be accessible but still very rare.
  

-eric

 

Thank you for the quick clarification on Top 96 Titles, I appreciate it and am glad we are aligned there.

 

I still push back on any inclusion of prior season rewards for the reasons I stated, but the titles were my main concern.

Edited July 2, 2018 by EnzoForMe

[LeglessChair]

3 months is still too long imo and 6 months is just brutal. I think ya'll should follow overwatch's model for competitive seasons.

 

I looked up a few games and 3 months seems to be the standard, even for overwatch. IDK why it's 3 months tho and the reasoning for the 3 months might not apply to swtor.

Edited July 2, 2018 by LeglessChair

[omaan]

Hey folks,

 

Starting with Season 10 we are considering some changes to the frequency of Ranked PvP Seasons and how we structure rewards. Let’s talk about what our goals are for these changes and what we intend to change.

 

Goals

We have a few specific things we want to address:

• Seasons are going longer than we would like.
  
  • Although this gives us a lot of time to put together awesome rewards, it does mean you have to go many months within one season.
    

  [*]Having a new Currency to collect every Season can be clunky and adds extra complexity to earning and spending currency.

  [*]We have heard a continual desire to bring back prior Season rewards in a fair but accessible way.

 

The Proposed Changes

• Seasons will now run 3-6 months - Our goal is to be around 3 months, but timing will be determined by Game Updates.
  
• Due to shorter Seasons we would adjust our Seasonal rewards
  
  • Seasonal bracket rewards would be reduced overall. Ex: Each Tier might receive a Stronghold Deco, Title, and Flair
    
  • All Seasons will now use the same type of currency
    
  • We would implement a permanent Ranked Rewards Vendor which we would periodically add new items to, such as mounts, armor sets, weapon sets, etc.
    
  • Starting at the end of Season 10 we would add Season 1’s rewards to the vendor for purchase. These items would be priced at a premium. This would mean they are available for purchase but they will be quite pricey to be fair to those who earned them at the time of the Season completing.
    
  • As we complete future Seasons we will continue to add prior Season rewards. Ex: We add S2 rewards as we complete S11.
    

 

These changes will keep some exclusive rewards per season tied to your rank, while allowing us to continue releasing “bigger” rewards on roughly the same cadence we did previously. This will also allow us over time to build an extensive list of goods on the vendor which keeps a greater incentive for players to continue participating throughout the Season.

 

TLDR – Shorter Seasons, less tiered rewards with greater rewards on a permanent vendor, start rolling old seasonal rewards on the vendor for purchase at a premium.

 

Let us know your thoughts!

 

-eric

 

Can you provide more challenge for getting gold tier?? people must tryhard for it, and feel rewarded. Too many bad players can get gold tier pretty fast...

[MaximumOwnage]

Eric,

 

I dont think you guys should actually give the new people access to old ranked gear and rewards. The old players put "hard" work into it, to see randoms who didn´t even play the game or didn´t have the skill to achieve certain elo using/wearing that stuff.

 

Its not fair at all for me to skip a couple of seasons, then when my class is OP FOTM not even put effort into it to get the top tier rewards for the multiple seasons I didn´t play, you get the example?

 

I have played ranked since season 1. I have titles for every season since 1. I am and have always been active in ranked game play and I would love for SWTOR to implement this.

 

I like you have worked very hard towards all the rewards I have and have absolutely no problem with bioware re introducing these rewards back into the game.

 

Your position does not speak for me and I am a veteran to every season. Your entitled to your opinion, but my opinion differs from yours.

[micnevv]

Hey folks,

[*]These older items on the vendors would be very expensive to purchase with seasonal tokens. We absolutely want to avoid "everyone" having our older top-end rewards. The intention would be for them to be accessible but still very rare.

-eric

 

That's still bad. Those rewards were given out for playing at the time.They have a certain prestige element to them.

 

Please reconsider this. Do not add them.

[Lundorff]

You guys have to give them a viable alternative to old rewards then. You can not expect shorter seasons and a lot of new and unique rewards every 3 months. That much is obvious from their wording, and this ranked vendor is their compromise. So find something they can easily place on a vendor, that is also appealing to the PvP community and can be gated by ranked tokens.

 

(I don't think old stuff should available again, but this easy for me to say, as I don't care about it in the first place.)

[Dacri]

Hey folks,

 

Definitely keep the feedback coming! The team is reading through the thread to get an idea of everyone's thoughts.

 

A few points of clarification:

• The prior rewards we are talking about are cosmetic rewards (mounts, weapons, armor) not things like Top 96 titles.
  
• These older items on the vendors would be very expensive to purchase with seasonal tokens. We absolutely want to avoid "everyone" having our older top-end rewards. The intention would be for them to be accessible but still very rare.
  

-eric

 

 

That will for sure encourage bot players to play and play and play no matter the elo gain/loss, which would be the same as just spamming q 24/7, and if you get them its a 3v4 anyways.. I dont like this

[Adrenalinezs]

Hey folks,

 

Definitely keep the feedback coming! The team is reading through the thread to get an idea of everyone's thoughts.

 

A few points of clarification:

• The prior rewards we are talking about are cosmetic rewards (mounts, weapons, armor) not things like Top 96 titles.
  
• These older items on the vendors would be very expensive to purchase with seasonal tokens. We absolutely want to avoid "everyone" having our older top-end rewards. The intention would be for them to be accessible but still very rare.
  

-eric

 

Thanks for clarifying.

[MaximumOwnage]

That will for sure encourage bot players to play and play and play no matter the elo gain/loss, which would be the same as just spamming q 24/7, and if you get them its a 3v4 anyways.. I dont like this

 

Well if they fixed the queue system to try and keep same elo level players playing each other it would be fine. I think if they fix that and with the new cross faction update, the ques should be busy enough to group similar elo levels to play on your team.

 

You brought up a great point, but this issue is a whole entire discussion in and of itself.