cflems Posted January 8, 2021 Posted January 8, 2021 Here are the things Bioware needs to do (or in some cases, un-do) to improve PvP and stop the slow bleed of players out of the game from that community: 1. Improve desync. I'm talking specifically about the phase walk bug that was introduced in 6.2, where phase walk now occasionally randomly teleports the player back to their original location, usually resulting in instant death. Great and reliable DCD, right? Nip this in the bud before it gets so buried in other code that it's unfixable like the majority of the desync issues. Working on those issues would be greatly appreciated as well, but at the very least... don't introduce MORE desync. 2. Restore the casual environment to regs. At the moment, people are feeling like regs rewards operate on a win-or-die system, and this translates directly into the way that people play regs. Win-only rewards and deserter lockouts have massively increased the number of objective premades, and premades in general in regs facing pure-pug teams, as people feel like they need to premade in order to affect the outcome of the matches, or else they get no rewards and they've wasted their time. At the same time, the pugs are effectively locked in the warzone with them by the deserter timer. It's a terrible combination. Literally just revert this system. Regs is a place for people to play casually, and for new players to learn how to PvP. It doesn't need the trappings of a competitive system like ranked does. 3. Fix Voidstar. This is particularly irritating because Voidstar is the first map in the rotation, but as soon as you spawn into a Voidstar you are immediately unable to change your tactical and utilities they way you are in every other warzone. You're also locked into playing the entire match with whatever random setup you were using on fleet due to the deserter timer. If you can't figure out how to make it so you can change before the game starts, just unlock gear and utility changes for the whole warzone. Tactical/gear swapping was really never an issue in 8v8s anyway. 4. Balance classes. It's been over half a year since the last attempt at class balancing, which addressed only the most egregious offenders (triple maul, double backstab, polarity shift every time you press the W key), as well as introducing some new ones. I'll make a quick tier list in case you have actually no idea how the meta is at the moment. Some of these might be slightly debatable, so I'll star the ones that some people might put a tier lower or higher. S tier (god tier): AP PT with Powerlode Jugg Tank with Grit Teeth (and optionally Force Bound) Forcebound Fury Mara* (EU players will tend to agree here, NA players will tend to disagree) A tier (very viable, good picks for ranked): Concealment Operative Lethality Operative Marksman Sniper Lightning Sorc Fury Mara with DPS Set Other Mara Specs with Forcebound Sorc/Merc Healer IO/Arsenal Merc B tier (decent, good players can excel easily): Vengeance Jugg with Grit Teeth Operative Healer Anni/Carnage Mara with DPS Set Deception Assassin PT Tank Pyro PT* Engineering Sniper C tier (weak/memey, generally avoided in ranked): Hatred Assassin Rage Jugg D tier (trash. overwhelming input requirement for average or below results): Virulence Sniper* Madness Sorc* Sin Tank Obviously perfect balance is never going to happen, but it would be nice if there were at least no S or D tier, and some work on the C tier classes would go a long way as well.
supertimtaf Posted January 8, 2021 Posted January 8, 2021 Good stuff. Would upvote if possible. Here are the things Bioware needs to do (or in some cases, un-do) to improve PvP and stop the slow bleed of players out of the game from that community: 1. Improve desync. [...] The issue with desync is usually related to server-side issues, with bad netcode that has been getting only worse and worse since they began adding mobility/slow skills for everybody. Teleport do not work as well, just like rapid dash (holotraverse, shadow stride...). They don't know how to resolve the issues but just slowing the animation by a tiny bit would help a lot in this case, instead of adding an akward 0.25sec GCD (which didn't solve the issue anyway...!). Remember when using your gap closer on PT/VG had 50% chance of triggering but not making you move at all ? That's the same issue. 2. Restore the casual environment to regs. [...] Add some easy to get cosmetic rewards for regs, maybe some that requires valor, or maybe pvp commenda-... Oh right, not allowed to talk about these anymore. Or increase the overall rewards you get in regs. Maybe cross-server queue for EU as well...? I mean, regs right now are only arenas on Leviathan because there's too few peoples to play bigger game modes. I miss hypergate. 3. Fix Voidstar. [...] This one I don't know, because well... I haven't seen a single voidstar since I'm back. 4. Balance classes. [...] We're at a point where we're not asking for perfect class balance, since Bioware will obviously not remove abilities that were too powerfull since their introduction. However, much more frequent class balancing can be definitely needed, at least to vary group compositions in ranked or just make regs not be a total steamroll if you're using meme-tier class. We don't want to have the same issue with previous infamous pvp seasons where some class just dominated for a whole year and a half because no balance was made to change things up. I can't speak for seasons past 8, but there shouldn't be a situation where not even 4 players on a class can obtain gold rewards while some other class get more than 100 gold tiered players. Vary things up, even if it's broken players will not care because it already is unbalanced. Oh and maybe add some set bonuses to specs that needs it, or bring back some old ones. Sin Tank is currently stuck using dps set bonuses because it got nothing better to use. Just sayin'
-Bob- Posted January 8, 2021 Posted January 8, 2021 4. Balance classes. It's been over half a year since the last attempt at class balancing, which addressed only the most egregious offenders (triple maul, double backstab, polarity shift every time you press the W key), as well as introducing some new ones. I'll make a quick tier list in case you have actually no idea how the meta is at the moment. Some of these might be slightly debatable, so I'll star the ones that some people might put a tier lower or higher. S tier (god tier): AP PT with Powerlode Jugg Tank with Grit Teeth (and optionally Force Bound) Forcebound Fury Mara* (EU players will tend to agree here, NA players will tend to disagree) A tier (very viable, good picks for ranked): Concealment Operative Lethality Operative Marksman Sniper Lightning Sorc Fury Mara with DPS Set Other Mara Specs with Forcebound Sorc/Merc Healer IO/Arsenal Merc B tier (decent, good players can excel easily): Vengeance Jugg with Grit Teeth Operative Healer Anni/Carnage Mara with DPS Set Deception Assassin PT Tank Pyro PT* Engineering Sniper C tier (weak/memey, generally avoided in ranked): Hatred Assassin Rage Jugg D tier (trash. overwhelming input requirement for average or below results): Virulence Sniper* Madness Sorc* Sin Tank Obviously perfect balance is never going to happen, but it would be nice if there were at least no S or D tier, and some work on the C tier classes would go a long way as well. How would you want classes balanced, around regs or ranked? Are you speaking directly to number farming or the ability of these classes to play objectives? I don't play ranked anymore so i don't have an opinion on that platform but In regs i can perform just fine on madness or virulence and I'm not talking about numbers farming, i'm talking about objectives. I can hold off a cap to call for help just as well as any other player. In unranked objective based WZ's i would argue that balance has more to do with the player than the class and in some cases possibly the gear gap, which i dont believe should exist in pvp.
TrixxieTriss Posted January 8, 2021 Posted January 8, 2021 Don’t forget making low and mid bracket viable again.
supertimtaf Posted January 8, 2021 Posted January 8, 2021 I don't play ranked anymore so i don't have an opinion on that platform but In regs i can perform just fine on madness or virulence and I'm not talking about numbers farming, i'm talking about objectives. I can hold off a cap to call for help just as well as any other player. In unranked objective based WZ's i would argue that balance has more to do with the player than the class and in some cases possibly the gear gap, which i dont believe should exist in pvp. Gear gap aside (which shouldn't exist we all agree), there is still a clear difference between some specs and class when it comes to PvP. In voidstar as an example, you could very well set two equally skilled player in defense from both side, one being a vanguard and the other being a commando. I can assure you than one will have a clearly much easier time defending a door than the other when somebody comes knocking, let alone if there's two players. The same can apply to Civil War or Novarre when you need long cap times. The same also applies to ranked, where as soon as you see that one team has a sin tank and the other has a different tank, you know in advance that somebody will definitely struggle way, way more than the other. To put it simpler : Skill difference is okay. However, there shouldn't be a case where a player will lose against somebody equally skilled purely because his opponent just have "better stats", be it in the form of better gear or just better abilities. Or if this is the way that Bioware chooses to balance things, then make sure that it's never always the same class that stays OP for too long. An entire season is too much if you ask me, and they already proved that they can be quick about balancing stuff (Deception Sin set bonuses being too strong got nerfed quite rapidly if I remember).
Llacertus Posted January 8, 2021 Posted January 8, 2021 (edited) Gear gap aside (which shouldn't exist we all agree) Not sure I agree with your gear gap point. Getting top gear doesn't really take that long to reach. The main components that you really need are 10k power, 1213 alacrity, and a max of 3300 crit. For a new player, I'd say that would take a week to a month to reach depending on what activities that player does. That doesn't seem like a very difficult grind to reach. I like the idea of there being a power increase separating s a highly experienced player from a new player based on more than just skill alone. Its actually very rewarding when you grind for a short while to hit a higher power/crit, and you start noticing higher damage. I worry that if bioware meddles with stat boosting, it will be harder to create varying stat builds. Gear right now should probably be the least of the dev's concerns. Edited January 8, 2021 by Llacertus
supertimtaf Posted January 8, 2021 Posted January 8, 2021 *snip* While I do agree with your statement, I don't think that stats by themselve are responsible for the gear gap. Set bonuses grind can be an issue as well, and most of the time you get steamrolled if you don't have the right one (if your spec even has one that is optimal). But that may be my opinion speaking there, as a returning veteran with no credits left on my characters when I got back. Gear grind took a bit longer than intended due to this, which imo is the issue (while the devs sure like to artificially add grinding steps). And I'm a nostalgic of the good old days, where you could farm gear much more easily without money and rng, all thanks to pvp commendations that you could earn while leveling up. I do agree however that gear is much less an issue now than in the first few weeks of 5.X. But still, makes me wonder why such high credits cost for new bonus sets when the old ones were working wonders and are better than some current ones.
Voroschuk Posted January 9, 2021 Posted January 9, 2021 B tier (decent, good players can excel easily): Vengeance Jugg with Grit Teeth Operative Healer Anni/Carnage Mara with DPS Set Deception Assassin PT Tank Pyro PT* Engineering Sniper Well, from my experience PT tanks are not wanted in ranked, and even if you're really good at this class you still won't excel easily, go ask if you'll find one. Just look at how often people tank on something other then Juggs, that will say it all, PT and Sin tanks are dead in PVP because Juggs are simply better at almost everything.
Llacertus Posted January 9, 2021 Posted January 9, 2021 I don't think that stats by themselve are responsible for the gear gap. Set bonuses grind can be an issue as well, and most of the time you get steamrolled if you don't have the right one (if your spec even has one that is optimal). I completely agree. There are alot of classes that need better set bonuses or more options for set bonuses.
Decalin Posted January 9, 2021 Posted January 9, 2021 2. Restore the casual environment to regs. I would also add changing the scoreboard view at the end of reg matches, personally I would just remove them altogether, but most would probably like to see their own stats still. At this point, thought I know this would be unpopular with the guys who like things the way they are, I would just make regs solo queue only and ranked group queue only, let premade's fight premade's.
supertimtaf Posted January 9, 2021 Posted January 9, 2021 At this point, thought I know this would be unpopular with the guys who like things the way they are, I would just make regs solo queue only and ranked group queue only, let premade's fight premade's. Ranked Group Queue doesn't proc at all except on some rare occasions, so I'd wager that this would be a bad idea. And even removing the ability to queue in group for regs would be a bad idea as well. I mean, while a 4+man group can hurt, a duo cannot change the tide of a battle, except on some rare servers where pvp is dead anyway. I'd be more honest and say that the issue is that more often than not, peoples who q in group are more experienced and better than the average player. Which is a completely different issue regarding the game's design and how it teaches players to be decent (which it doesn't anymore since 4.X let's be honest). All in all, this would not solve the issues of regs PvP.
Xienive Posted January 9, 2021 Posted January 9, 2021 When I made a new character recently I was so amused by the fact that you can't even complete the "Intro to warzones" quest unless you win the warzone. If you pick that quest up as soon as you get to the fleet you're probably around level 11-15 or so. You have no ear, implant, or relics slotted. So not only do you have almost no skills or abilities, you also aren't going to get a full bolster either because you have missing slots. The intro quest gives you those pieces, but you can't just participate in a warzone to complete the quest. Imagine you're a new player who just wants to try a warzone, you get put into a badly matchmade arena, stomped in about 10 seconds, twice, and you have to keep doing that until you get a team that can carry you to a win so you can complete an intro quest. That's really going to convince new players to get into PVP. The matchmaking system isn't nearly good enough to justify the required win for dailies. It's especially bad in low and mid level brackets. I'm sure we've all had the experience at some point, maybe frequently, where no matter how many WZs we que for we continuously get put on "that team", that just can't win no matter what, over and over, making the daily take ages.
supertimtaf Posted January 9, 2021 Posted January 9, 2021 The matchmaking system isn't nearly good enough to justify the required win for dailies. It's especially bad in low and mid level brackets. I'm sure we've all had the experience at some point, maybe frequently, where no matter how many WZs we que for we continuously get put on "that team", that just can't win no matter what, over and over, making the daily take ages. To be honest, is there even a point to implement matchmaking system in unranked. Because yes, the game will not put players in two random team each time, it will try to do the same as it does in ranked but on a lesser scale. Put the two highest player/group against each other, and fill the rest with "bad" or medium-tiered players. Except that doesn't solve the issue anyway, because in the end if the skill gap between the two best players is too big, one team will still stomp the other anyway. The same goes for ranked Solo-Q when there's only two tanks in queue. The better one will always farm the other one, thus farming the other team. You know in advance if you've won or lost this way, just by looking which tank you're paired with. But it's ranked, so that's the point. With regs however, I'm not sure.
JediMasterAlex Posted January 9, 2021 Posted January 9, 2021 The same goes for ranked Solo-Q when there's only two tanks in queue. The better one will always farm the other one, thus farming the other team. You know in advance if you've won or lost this way, just by looking which tank you're paired with. But it's ranked, so that's the point. With regs however, I'm not sure. For ranked, it depends on the skill gap and the elo gap. If one tank is terrible and the other is good, then yes, the good tank will almost always win. But if one tank is good and has high elo, and the other tank is average with average elo, the average tank will get better dps on his team and can often win against the good tank, because that's how matchmaking is supposed to work. For regs, some attempt at matchmaking is probably better than none at all, but we really don't know enough about how it works.
supertimtaf Posted January 9, 2021 Posted January 9, 2021 For ranked, it depends on the skill gap and the elo gap. If one tank is terrible and the other is good, then yes, the good tank will almost always win. But if one tank is good and has high elo, and the other tank is average with average elo, the average tank will get better dps on his team and can often win against the good tank, because that's how matchmaking is supposed to work. For regs, some attempt at matchmaking is probably better than none at all, but we really don't know enough about how it works. Yeah, I went and asked around and it seems that I forgot about a thing or two. Thanks for the update/reminder.
TrixxieTriss Posted January 10, 2021 Posted January 10, 2021 I completely agree. There are alot of classes that need better set bonuses or more options for set bonuses. It would also help if BiS gear used for pvp wasn’t locked behind pve content or random RNG at Kai. I’m still trying to get the rest of my Merc Apex Predator set after 4 months I’ve 4 pieces. Every one has come from Kai selling them direct. I’ve tried spending 10’s tech frags and millions of credits to roll Kai’s RNG item and had zero success in getting any Apex gear. There needs to be the same path to BiS gear for pvpers in pvp as there is for Pve players in Operations.
TrixxieTriss Posted January 10, 2021 Posted January 10, 2021 For regs, some attempt at matchmaking is probably better than none at all, but we really don't know enough about how it works. If only they would properly explain it so we could “actually test it”
TrixxieTriss Posted January 10, 2021 Posted January 10, 2021 When I made a new character recently I was so amused by the fact that you can't even complete the "Intro to warzones" quest unless you win the warzone. If you pick that quest up as soon as you get to the fleet you're probably around level 11-15 or so. You have no ear, implant, or relics slotted. So not only do you have almost no skills or abilities, you also aren't going to get a full bolster either because you have missing slots. The intro quest gives you those pieces, but you can't just participate in a warzone to complete the quest. Imagine you're a new player who just wants to try a warzone, you get put into a badly matchmade arena, stomped in about 10 seconds, twice, and you have to keep doing that until you get a team that can carry you to a win so you can complete an intro quest. That's really going to convince new players to get into PVP. The matchmaking system isn't nearly good enough to justify the required win for dailies. It's especially bad in low and mid level brackets. I'm sure we've all had the experience at some point, maybe frequently, where no matter how many WZs we que for we continuously get put on "that team", that just can't win no matter what, over and over, making the daily take ages. Totally agree.
cflems Posted January 10, 2021 Author Posted January 10, 2021 Seems this has attracted a lot of attention so I'll just make a giant quote wall and respond to what I think is relevant. Good stuff. Would upvote if possible. snip We're at a point where we're not asking for perfect class balance, since Bioware will obviously not remove abilities that were too powerfull since their introduction. However, much more frequent class balancing can be definitely needed, at least to vary group compositions in ranked or just make regs not be a total steamroll if you're using meme-tier class. We don't want to have the same issue with previous infamous pvp seasons where some class just dominated for a whole year and a half because no balance was made to change things up. I can't speak for seasons past 8, but there shouldn't be a situation where not even 4 players on a class can obtain gold rewards while some other class get more than 100 gold tiered players. Vary things up, even if it's broken players will not care because it already is unbalanced. Oh and maybe add some set bonuses to specs that needs it, or bring back some old ones. Sin Tank is currently stuck using dps set bonuses because it got nothing better to use. Just sayin' Thanks, glad my read on the situation has been accurate. No one is expecting the removal of certain abilities as I'm certain this is far out of BW's comfort zone, but they've demonstrated before that they can balance if they make it a priority (*cough* 5.8). It's just that at the moment I think they value the novelty/variety of their tacticals and set bonuses over the balance of their game which is... unfortunate. I can't tell you how frustrating it is to try and play madness in any competitive environment. And not for lack of player ability either. Caecus (the #5 sorc this season, sitting at 1608 on lightning) has a toon he only plays madness on and it's hardstuck in 1200s. I myself am sitting at #8 and haven't fared any better with the spec. Caprica (#1 and #2 sniper) has had similar experiences with playing exclusively virulence although I think he fared slightly better, maybe made it into 1300s. I honestly think lifting up the specs that have been tossed by the wayside is way MORE important than fixing super OP **** like powerlode and force bound and crossguard. You should never automatically lose most of your games due to the spec you play, that's just outrageous. How would you want classes balanced, around regs or ranked? Are you speaking directly to number farming or the ability of these classes to play objectives? I don't play ranked anymore so i don't have an opinion on that platform but In regs i can perform just fine on madness or virulence and I'm not talking about numbers farming, i'm talking about objectives. I can hold off a cap to call for help just as well as any other player. In unranked objective based WZ's i would argue that balance has more to do with the player than the class and in some cases possibly the gear gap, which i dont believe should exist in pvp. I would want classes balanced around their ability to perform in combat, as has traditionally been done, I just think a patch to do so is long overdue. To say the double AP forcebound meta is stale at this point is quite an understatement. If we start trying to balance around ability to stall nodes or cap we venture into dangerous territory such as needed to remove stealth/sapping, which is obviously far out of the acceptable range of changes to be made for balance's sake. I also tend to believe that ranked, and in particular higher elo brackets, is the place where combat is showcased in a way that reflects the balance of classes, as most if not all players are approaching the skill ceiling of their class, and using all their abilities to their maximum effectiveness. Obviously this is not perfect, but I think it provides a better measuring stick than regs, where most fights are not even in number, nor remotely close in skill, which is a different issue. TL;DR: ranked, because pewpew go brrr. Don’t forget making low and mid bracket viable again. I support this tremendously, but we've been dying on this hill for years now and I don't think it's happening. The only way to do so is pretty obvious: increase that lowbies and mids award by like 10X or 20X. But I honestly think BW quite enjoys the money they get off PVPers buying datacrons for their alts so I'm chalking that one up as wishful thinking. To put it simpler : Skill difference is okay. However, there shouldn't be a case where a player will lose against somebody equally skilled purely because his opponent just have "better stats", be it in the form of better gear or just better abilities. Or if this is the way that Bioware chooses to balance things, then make sure that it's never always the same class that stays OP for too long. An entire season is too much if you ask me, and they already proved that they can be quick about balancing stuff (Deception Sin set bonuses being too strong got nerfed quite rapidly if I remember). I agree wholeheartedly with the first half, and disagree wholeheartedly with the second. Before 6.0 I would have agreed that just a change to the meta at all would be refreshing but after all the ludicrous **** we've seen in this expansion... just balance your game, bioware. (Read: 98% HP openers from stealth from 1 person, AOEs doing 100k+, infinite spam of explosive fuel and polarity shift, spammable 60k+ hits that ignore all DR *still a thing*, uncleansable 90% aoe accuracy debuffs that take effect AFTER a mezz *still a thing*. There's plenty more to list but this is exhausting.) gear gap discussion Were it up to me you'd be able to select your set bonus, tactical, and amps from a dropdown in each warzone, but that'd be taking the grind out of the MMO, so too much to hope for. Also the way I'd do bolster is have it turn each armoring/mod/enhancement into the BiS version of itself, so a lethal superior mod 60R-17 becomes a lethal superior mod 80R-17, etc. This has actually been done before in 5.10, and claims have been made that it was extended to 306 in 6.0, but having played an undergeared sorc when I first started playing on DM, this is either strictly false or just broken, either way it doesn't work as it should. Well, from my experience PT tanks are not wanted in ranked, and even if you're really good at this class you still won't excel easily, go ask if you'll find one. Just look at how often people tank on something other then Juggs, that will say it all, PT and Sin tanks are dead in PVP because Juggs are simply better at almost everything. Part of the reason it's hard to classify support roles is they're always matched 1:1 vs another player of that role, and usually a FOTM one. It's not that PT tanks aren't B tier, it's that jugg tanks are S tier, and the queue is full of them. How often do you see a vengeance jugg win 1v1 vs a concealment operative? Literally never. Same idea. You may be right that PT tank is a little below B tier but not quite to C, but this is pretty close. With better teammates a PT tank is likely to win. Otherwise rip, because jugg tank is objectively way better. Meanwhile PT tank oppresses a sin tank in the same way. On another note, "wanted in ranked" is not a good metric. Anything that isn't an AP PT, or a class with an accuracy debuff to give the enemy AP PT(s), isn't wanted in ranked right now. I would also add changing the scoreboard view at the end of reg matches, personally I would just remove them altogether, but most would probably like to see their own stats still. At this point, thought I know this would be unpopular with the guys who like things the way they are, I would just make regs solo queue only and ranked group queue only, let premade's fight premade's. Certainly don't make ranked group only, the group ranked meta is horrible and the mode itself is so dead you have to queue by appointment. This is not an exaggeration, if you sit in queue for 24 hours with a group of 4 players, you will get zero (0) group ranked pops unless you contact another team and ask them to queue against you. I could see group regs being a thing in the same way that group ranked is, where if you queue for regs in a premade it puts you in a different queue to be matched against other premades. I would actually be super excited for that if group regs were to be an arena mode too, I think that would be tremendous fun. As to the scoreboard though, I don't think changing it would be much of a help. I rarely run into deathmatchers anymore, only 4 stealth premades who never actually unstealth except to cap doors. It's terribly unfun to be teamed with these players, as your 4 randoms get slaughtered constantly by twice as many players, and when you "win" it's the most hollow victory ever because you spent the whole time getting massacred. Doesn't feel like winning, and frequently makes me stop playing regs. It's no fun to play against these players either, as an 8v4 is not remotely competitive or interesting, and then you get no rewards after. Either way regs is starting to feel like wasted time. At least deathmatchers played the game. To be honest, is there even a point to implement matchmaking system in unranked. Because yes, the game will not put players in two random team each time, it will try to do the same as it does in ranked but on a lesser scale. Put the two highest player/group against each other, and fill the rest with "bad" or medium-tiered players. I think role balancing the way ranked does it in regs would go a long way, especially to keep players who only play regs from coming onto the forums talking about how arena is a stupid format because they faced a team of 2 healers and 2 skank tanks in a reg arena. In terms of using a "regs ELO" for matchmaking or whatever, no I think that's a completely useless metric and teams should just be random. Even ranked ELO is often inaccurate and people generally give 80-100% effort to win ranked matches, vs like 40% in regs. It would also help if BiS gear used for pvp wasn’t locked behind pve content or random RNG at Kai. I’m still trying to get the rest of my Merc Apex Predator set after 4 months I’ve 4 pieces. Every one has come from Kai selling them direct. I’ve tried spending 10’s tech frags and millions of credits to roll Kai’s RNG item and had zero success in getting any Apex gear. There needs to be the same path to BiS gear for pvpers in pvp as there is for Pve players in Operations. Again, if it were up to me, you'd literally select them like specs/utilities. But I do think we have to be realistic here. And as a final note, +1 to everyone saying revert the win-only reward system and remove the deserter lockout. I didn't want to quote all of these individually.
supertimtaf Posted January 10, 2021 Posted January 10, 2021 Ahah, big snip incoming. No one is expecting the removal of certain abilities as I'm certain this is far out of BW's comfort zone, but they've demonstrated before that they can balance if they make it a priority (*cough* 5.8). I think that while removing abilities can be hard to do while keeping a spec as it is, a complete rework on some specs could and would do wonders for them and would be far better as to remove any or too much underlying issues with the spec. Hatred Sin as an example could use some work, imo. Just like dot operative. If a spec rework is too much, then change core mechanics, or even some abilities. It's just that at the moment I think they value the novelty/variety of their tacticals and set bonuses over the balance of their game which is... unfortunate. Bioware always has been a fancy "look at what we did" company, even if it meant that their game suffers a lot by this kind of "novelty showcase". This isn't good for both developper mentality and financial stability, especially if you ignore feedback after this. I honestly think lifting up the specs that have been tossed by the wayside is way MORE important than fixing super OP **** like powerlode and force bound and crossguard. We've seen how that worked with 6.0 Deception Sin. Peoples complained so much that it got immediately nerfed. I'm more for a tuning down of the whole game rather than a lift up for now. As you cannot lift up and buff everything indefinitely (At least, that's what I got taught at the time when I was still attending game-design class ). It's cool to see that they understood that with stats (how before with half of the crit we have now you could get to 45% crit and 15% alacrity at the same time lul) but it needs to happen with abilities and class balance. You should never automatically lose most of your games due to the spec you play, that's just outrageous. Indeed, this is a big issue, which affects PvE as well right now, as some specs are as meme-worthy in a PvE environment. And keep in mind that this cannot be solved by mere values tweaking like they tried to do in 5.X (lmao, 0.15% nerf to ball lightning). I would want classes balanced around their ability to perform in combat, as has traditionally been done, I just think a patch to do so is long overdue. An interesting thing that I noted about Bioware's class development is that we have a ton, and like a huuuuuge ton of defensive buffs to ourselves and others, and almost no offensive buff for your group. This is a big long term issue, as offensive buffs are way easier to balance around, and defensive buffs are the ones often really strong that you shouldn't use unless it's absolutely necessary. Right now we have so much defensive tools at our dispositions that it completely messed how anything can be balanced correctly. If you replaced half of the dcds of dps class by offensive buffs for them and their party, and gave the defensive abilities to tanks and tanks only, you would have a much, much more interesting and dynamic teamplay. All of this to say that I think the ability to perform in combat is a... Wide term, to say the least. And damage isn't the only thing to take into consideration right now, since everything including time to kill is inflated or nerfed to the ground. I also tend to believe that ranked, and in particular higher elo brackets, is the place where combat is showcased in a way that reflects the balance of classes, as most if not all players are approaching the skill ceiling of their class, and using all their abilities to their maximum effectiveness. True that, just like you should balance PvE abilities around NiM operations (Master Mode now I believe ?) as it's the hardest content which requires players to perform the closest to their class' skill ceiling. I support this tremendously, but we've been dying on this hill for years now and I don't think it's happening. The only way to do so is pretty obvious: increase that lowbies and mids award by like 10X or 20X. But I honestly think BW quite enjoys the money they get off PVPers buying datacrons for their alts so I'm chalking that one up as wishful thinking. A reward other than exp would be simply currency to buy older gear, and I'm not talking about credits. But if you could gear yourself with like... Lvl 50 non-modifiable gear with set bonuses for PvP, , then lvl 55 non-modifiable, then lvl 60 non-modifiable. It would make low-level pvp at least more enjoyable. Or just go back like in the past, and allow us to earn high-end currency at a lower rate while playing low-bracket pvp. I agree wholeheartedly with the first half, and disagree wholeheartedly with the second. Before 6.0 I would have agreed that just a change to the meta at all would be refreshing but after all the ludicrous **** we've seen in this expansion... just balance your game, bioware. The balance in this game sadly requires a lot of work in order to achieve perfect state. But it is definitely possible. Funny stuff btw, when class balance is near perfect, forums are often filled with much, much more minor complaints, like animations they don't like, or a whole class rework idea, new class ideas... This kind of stuff. Peoples tend to get creative when there's nothing to argue about. Were it up to me you'd be able to select your set bonus, tactical, and amps from a dropdown in each warzone, but that'd be taking the grind out of the MMO, so too much to hope for. Also the way I'd do bolster is have it turn each armoring/mod/enhancement into the BiS version of itself, so a lethal superior mod 60R-17 becomes a lethal superior mod 80R-17, etc. Final Fantasy 14 did something neat about it, in the way that if you wanna get geared, you have two different currency, one weekly capped and the other isn't,and you get both by playing any kind of activity at max level. The one weekly capped is to buy each week one or two gear pieces of the highest possible item level (in this case this would mean set bonuses as well), with your class weapons (the most important change to your overall damage) being earned after seven normal raid weekly clear. The other uncapped currency is there to buy gear "with set bonuses", but with 30 ilvl under BiS, so you can still achieve high performance in any content while not being at max efficiency. This system works wonder in the sense that players still have to play your game for a long time in order to get geared, but doesn't add frustration and unwanted rng that will simply make you unable to play in competitive environment, like swtor currently does. Part of the reason it's hard to classify support roles is they're always matched 1:1 vs another player of that role, and usually a FOTM one. I really think that Bioware would have a much better time balancing stuff if they focused less on giving defensive abilities on everybody. More offensive buffs on dps class is good, and any class that has support abilities (can cast rez or heal/shield others, or simply give others movement tools like predation) should deal lower overall damage. This works as well in PvE, when you make said support abilities worthwhile (if a dps sorc could off-heal or rez easily, this would still be a good asset to have in your team. But this would require a rework of the rez system, guard system, and could make a bigger difference if healers were dealing damage in PvE, which most of them don't know how to). Anyway, the issue of support/hybrid specs balancing is that this will also affect PvE as well. Most support/hybrid specs need a rework in their kit to be viable both in PvE and PvP content. Again, the goal is to make everybody viable everywhere. I could see group regs being a thing in the same way that group ranked is, where if you queue for regs in a premade it puts you in a different queue to be matched against other premades. I would actually be super excited for that if group regs were to be an arena mode too, I think that would be tremendous fun. On this, I think that this could be solved if there was a bigger playerbase playing regs. On Leviathan it's really hard once a premade starts to queue, because there is like... 8 players in the whole server playing PvP. But if you had a bigger pool of maybe 50 players in queue, then four players playing in premade would be considerably less noticed, as you'd have much less chances of encountering them. This issue should solve itself as soon as PvP becomes an enjoyable experience for everyone, imo. I think role balancing the way ranked does it in regs would go a long way, especially to keep players who only play regs from coming onto the forums talking about how arena is a stupid format because they faced a team of 2 healers and 2 skank tanks in a reg arena. In terms of using a "regs ELO" for matchmaking or whatever, no I think that's a completely useless metric and teams should just be random. Even ranked ELO is often inaccurate and people generally give 80-100% effort to win ranked matches, vs like 40% in regs. Role balancing could be good in regs, but only if every role is balanced correctly. Like we all said earlier, you could get a sin tank in one team and a jugg tank in the other, sure you have a tank in each team, but one will currently be way better at his job than the other. And as a final note, +1 to everyone saying revert the win-only reward system and remove the deserter lockout. I didn't want to quote all of these individually. I missed the post about deserter lockout, what's this about ? D: And yeah, win-only reward system isn't good for anybody too. Just give less reward if you lose, so peoples don't stop playing/improving because they lost two games in a row.
JediMasterAlex Posted January 10, 2021 Posted January 10, 2021 Caecus (the #5 sorc this season, sitting at 1608 on lightning) has a toon he only plays madness on and it's hardstuck in 1200s. Just a small point of correction, I did get to 1368 on my madness sorc but ultimately yes, I've spent the vast majority of the season in the 1200s. In the end, it's just so much harder to carry with it, because you can't really play aggressive like you can with lightning. It's squishier, has no burst, damage on the run is like 1/10 of lightning's, runs out of force more quickly, and it barely even cleaves better in ideal conditions, if at all. Hopefully some day they'll buff it. I agree wholeheartedly with the first half, and disagree wholeheartedly with the second. Before 6.0 I would have agreed that just a change to the meta at all would be refreshing but after all the ludicrous **** we've seen in this expansion... just balance your game, bioware. (Read: 98% HP openers from stealth from 1 person, AOEs doing 100k+, infinite spam of explosive fuel and polarity shift, spammable 60k+ hits that ignore all DR *still a thing*, uncleansable 90% aoe accuracy debuffs that take effect AFTER a mezz *still a thing*. There's plenty more to list but this is exhausting.) Yeah, some want frequent changes for meta shifts, but I too just want better balance. I don't think it would take a lot either. Nerf powerlode and force bound, buff hatred, madness and rage. Tank balance might be the hardest because pt and sin would need significant buffs. I think role balancing the way ranked does it in regs would go a long way, especially to keep players who only play regs from coming onto the forums talking about how arena is a stupid format because they faced a team of 2 healers and 2 skank tanks in a reg arena. I completely agree. I've speculated before that this was a big factor in regs players hating arenas. A few months ago I was leveling some toons and playing lowbies/midbies arenas for the first time in years and the amount of matches with mismatched roles was shockingly high.
Recommended Posts