Ability Delay -- Character Responsiveness (This will make or break SW:TOR)

[sdream]

I don't think they based it much on MUDs, as far as I'm aware Blizzard mostly designed WoW with a bunch of ex-EQ players that wanted to make a much much better game then EQ and a whole bunch of people that used to work on Diablo which is an action game.

 

But I am pretty sure those EQ people also played MUDs back in the days and EQ is essentially MUD with 3D engine on top of it. I absolutely have no doubt that Diablo and Warcraft development process had huge influence on WoW in general i.e. network code.

[lenonk]

Take it back 1 step and you have the correct response.

 

EQ was designed by MUD players. Then WoW was designed by EQ players.

 

I used to be the head coder on a MUD. Good times I remember implementing a bard class in like, 26 hours. It was rife with bugs and miscalculations, but everyone loved it.

 

Peace

[Hawkules]

Hopefully they will be able to fix this issue, it's a core part of any MMO.

[Zironic]

Truthfully and perhaps a little off-topic, Trion did the best job... Turbine was held back by the whole LotRO Universe, they really had to stick to the rules and perhaps overlooked it for focus on other aspects. Mythic was simply a scam, they used an old horrible engine and the problems there lie in the incompetence of the entire Team as well as coding (more specifically).

 

Bioware, you may be right... all emphasis on Story/VO/"Cinematic Combat" absolutely "no" clue of the reality of MMO Gaming. Inexperience perhaps...

 

I think Bioware essentially designed Kotor 3, now with multi-player. However I think this is the first Multi-player game they've ever done so they probably didn't expect a lot of the issues that came up.

 

However you would have thought they would have -someone- on the team with experience making MMO's to tell them these things.

 

But I am pretty sure those EQ people also played MUDs back in the days and EQ is essentially MUD with 3D engine on top of it. I absolutely have no doubt that Diablo and Warcraft development process had huge influence on WoW in general i.e. network code.

 

Yeh, most likely.

Edited December 30, 2011 by Zironic

[Randkin]

Oh man, Xcore, I completely forgot to mention-- do you recall when people tried to go to WoW's AQ raid? Enjoy having your ship disappear entirely requiring you to remake the trip! Or have the entire boat wind up in the side of a freaking MOUNTAIN.

 

Yup.

[Zironic]

Oh man, Xcore, I completely forgot to mention-- do you recall when people tried to go to WoW's AQ raid? Enjoy having your ship disappear entirely requiring you to remake the trip! Or have the entire boat wind up in the side of a freaking MOUNTAIN.

 

Yup.

Well, this particular thread is about character responsiveness, not buggy behaviour in general.

[ajjw]

I've not got much more to add that I didn't in the previous 2 threads, so I'll just say that I still hope this is fixed / improved upon ASAP. Also, posting to rate.

[Mwave]

Bump Bump

The responsiveness and reception of spells is critical in MMORPG production, in my opinion it is the fundamental core of successful and smooth flowing combat, and i feel that the quality production of SWTOR is simply not up to scratch and for it to continue something must be done about it, or else my predictions is that it wont last past June and it will be another name to add to Pandora's box.

[Randkin]

Well, this particular thread is about character responsiveness, not buggy behaviour in general.

 

I know, I've followed it since the first posting. I was just bringing it up to him since he mentioned something similar and it made me laugh.

[Mwave]

Oh man, Xcore, I completely forgot to mention-- do you recall when people tried to go to WoW's AQ raid? Enjoy having your ship disappear entirely requiring you to remake the trip! Or have the entire boat wind up in the side of a freaking MOUNTAIN.

 

Yup.

 

 

You would not want to look at the WoW 7 years of now, but the WoW of today for that is the competition that it is facing.

[Amp_]

I don't notice the problem on my BH at all, which is my main.

 

However, when I go to play one of my melee classes (more so the SI than the SW) I get a lot of the instances where the animations will reset on me. It's very frustrating and definitely limits my enjoyment of playing those classes.

[Xcore]

I think Bioware essentially designed Kotor 3, now with multi-player. However I think this is the first Multi-player game they've ever done so they probably didn't expect a lot of the issues that came up.

 

However you would have thought they would have -someone- on the team with experience making MMO's to tell them these things.

 

 

 

Yeh, most likely.

 

And this is where I draw the line of idiocy. First step to making a successful MMO -- Hire someone who "knows" not necessarily how to make or code it but who knows MMOs period.

 

I don't believe they had any such person, as you point out.

 

And yes, Blizzard was made up of not "Casual" EQ Players but "HARDCORE EQ Players" -- They knew what an MMO really is, needs to be and how to accomplish it.

 

 

I am disappoint but my hope rests with Herr Zoeller.

[Randkin]

You would not want to look at the WoW 7 years of now, but the WoW of today for that is the competition that it is facing.

 

Let me make this clear-- Xcore mentioned the looting bug (kneeling for an hour), so I mentioned what I did. I am not making comparisons of SWToR of now versus WoW of 7 years ago. COMPLETELY different thing. Please don't take this out of context.

Edited December 30, 2011 by Randkin

[brevous]

I installed TOR a couple days ago. I have a relatively high end PC, and was able to turn everything on max, and have almost no problems with FPS or this 'delay' you speak of. I was playing on a 'medium/standard' population server as a Smuggler.

 

But wait, what's this, some friends I find on FB already have a group going on another server, and they are Empire? So, I reroll as an Agent (same class, different name, abilities are same but animations are different).

 

As the Smuggler, I had no problems with the ability delay, but with the Agent it is very apparent with a lot of the abilities. Granted, I only made it to lvl 9 on each character, but it was a world of difference. My "Snipe" ability would finish the animation and deal the damage a full half second or so after the cast timer finished. Everything was very cumbersome and much more awkward to deal with.

 

I don't know if this is because I am playing on a more heavily populated server or something? Is it the difference between smuggler/agent? I did not make any changes whatsoever to my graphics settings or anything. I don't know.

 

Anyone played both smuggler and agent and noticed a difference?

 

Thanks guys,

I really do like the game and will keep playing

[Xcore]

Let me make this clear-- Xcore mentioned the looting bug (kneeling for an hour), so I mentioned what I did. I am not making comparisons of SWToR of now versus WoW of 7 years ago. COMPLETELY different thing. Please don't take this out of context.

 

I know what you're saying -- its just a misunderstanding, don't take it personal

[Sinigual]

I absolutely LOVE this game... the stories, the lore, the environments, etc... and plan to continue to play for a while still.

 

But this is a 100% legitimate issue that needs serious attention. WoW kept millions of people, myself included, hooked for several years because it is the smoothest, most responsive MMO out there. There was a real sense of "timing" and "reaction" in the gameplay... and if Bioware can emulate that part of the game, as they have with so many other things, I believe that this would be the MMO choice for many, many, many people... myself included

 

 

I won't pretend to know what is involved in having such smooth results in character response, but I trust Bioware is the company to get it done.

 

Long reply short: Make it happen, Bioware!! <3

[origosis]

See, I believe it is due to different design approach. They started development when memory of text only MUDs was fresh. In MUD, you type in a command or press a macro button, and you get action instantly, so in WoW you have the same design philosophy, when any sort of animation is secondary to what you get in combat log. So you may get actions registered in text before an animation finishes off.

 

BioWare just like number of other developers chose a different approach. They basically made their "choreographed" combat a priority, where animation comes first and everything is secondary (I guess that statement about what they found during early development cycle was bunch of PR fluff). I believe this is one of the main reasons why they don't even have a combat log.

 

The things you mention are what I am referring to. When I play PVP I understand that certain things may not go off right away.. But it kinda gets lost in the noise for me.

 

I may already be stunned, that skill may be on cool down already, I may be out of mana, My unstun may still be on cool down.

 

There are so many situations that already stop an ability from working right away or at all, that I just live with it.

 

I want it to be fixed, but until then it really doe snot affect me that much. I know going into a fight it's not, 1, 2, 3, .... 4. It's 1.., 2.., 3.., .......4 and really it can mean lifer and death if I had been able to squeeze in 1-2 more skills into my rotation. But most battles are not that close, even in PVP.

 

I know this is my personal experience. And I do not apply it to you. But I am posting this for the devs to see. a tiny portion of the community (Just me?) Finds this to be almost a non-issue.

[lenonk]

I installed TOR a couple days ago. I have a relatively high end PC, and was able to turn everything on max, and have almost no problems with FPS or this 'delay' you speak of. I was playing on a 'medium/standard' population server as a Smuggler.

 

But wait, what's this, some friends I find on FB already have a group going on another server, and they are Empire? So, I reroll as an Agent (same class, different name, abilities are same but animations are different).

 

As the Smuggler, I had no problems with the ability delay, but with the Agent it is very apparent with a lot of the abilities. Granted, I only made it to lvl 9 on each character, but it was a world of difference. My "Snipe" ability would finish the animation and deal the damage a full half second or so after the cast timer finished. Everything was very cumbersome and much more awkward to deal with.

 

I don't know if this is because I am playing on a more heavily populated server or something? Is it the difference between smuggler/agent? I did not make any changes whatsoever to my graphics settings or anything. I don't know.

 

Anyone played both smuggler and agent and noticed a difference?

 

Thanks guys,

I really do like the game and will keep playing

 

 

No, I've played them both and they're both similarly clunky to me. Could be related to the server population, we really don't know. We do know it affects some people much worse than others.

[Xcore]

I installed TOR a couple days ago. I have a relatively high end PC, and was able to turn everything on max, and have almost no problems with FPS or this 'delay' you speak of. I was playing on a 'medium/standard' population server as a Smuggler.

 

But wait, what's this, some friends I find on FB already have a group going on another server, and they are Empire? So, I reroll as an Agent (same class, different name, abilities are same but animations are different).

 

As the Smuggler, I had no problems with the ability delay, but with the Agent it is very apparent with a lot of the abilities. Granted, I only made it to lvl 9 on each character, but it was a world of difference. My "Snipe" ability would finish the animation and deal the damage a full half second or so after the cast timer finished. Everything was very cumbersome and much more awkward to deal with.

 

I don't know if this is because I am playing on a more heavily populated server or something? Is it the difference between smuggler/agent? I did not make any changes whatsoever to my graphics settings or anything. I don't know.

 

Anyone played both smuggler and agent and noticed a difference?

 

Thanks guys,

I really do like the game and will keep playing

 

Its the same, issue still persists -- Please view the Smuggler Video in the OP for just one example of the overall issue. Also, as a Gunslinger myself at lvl32, Aimed Shot is one of the main culprits... so is the knockback ability... etc etc.

[Khoranth]

I installed TOR a couple days ago. I have a relatively high end PC, and was able to turn everything on max, and have almost no problems with FPS or this 'delay' you speak of. I was playing on a 'medium/standard' population server as a Smuggler.

 

But wait, what's this, some friends I find on FB already have a group going on another server, and they are Empire? So, I reroll as an Agent (same class, different name, abilities are same but animations are different).

 

As the Smuggler, I had no problems with the ability delay, but with the Agent it is very apparent with a lot of the abilities. Granted, I only made it to lvl 9 on each character, but it was a world of difference. My "Snipe" ability would finish the animation and deal the damage a full half second or so after the cast timer finished. Everything was very cumbersome and much more awkward to deal with.

 

I don't know if this is because I am playing on a more heavily populated server or something? Is it the difference between smuggler/agent? I did not make any changes whatsoever to my graphics settings or anything. I don't know.

 

Anyone played both smuggler and agent and noticed a difference?

 

Thanks guys,

I really do like the game and will keep playing

 

So you are suggesting There is not enough "power" for each server to run correctly when heavy populated?

 

How about warzones? how did warzones feel on the lower popualted server?

[Randkin]

I know what you're saying -- its just a misunderstanding, don't take it personal

 

I'm not, mate. It just tickles sometimes how a funny offhand comment can become THIS ISN'T WHAT WE'RE TALKING ABOUT GNASHGNASHGNASH.

 

Though, to be fair, some probably havent seen the participation of the previous threads like we have, also. I'm just as guilty of needing to keep things in perspective.

[Babyfood]

the title of the thread says its all. This is going to make or break the game. EA/BW needs to be focusing 100% of their resources to fixing this at once and when they are done they need to focus on making the UI a lot better. Not being able to customize the UI is unforgivable. You cant even scale it let alone customize anything.

 

Having said that, the game has potential but it feels very "under construction" and without addressing these basic playability issues the game will fail. Please fix this game because I really want to keep playing it.

[Nadeya]

WOW I dont know what to say, you ppls saying often that Bioware wanted to make great animations over fluidness ? *** ? I dont see good animations in this game, they are really nearly all stiff and boring.

 

My sniper has ok animations but for my inquisitor, its totally terrible. Good animations are something like in Aion where the combat is more like an action combat game.

 

Make a video of an inquisitor heal and tell me these are good animations, *** ? They are totally stiff and that is just one example, most are while casting something. Hell even while your char is running looks akward.

[godslayerz]

The delay from when I hit a button to when my character does something is TERRIBLE!

[Xcore]

The things you mention are what I am referring to. When I play PVP I understand that certain things may not go off right away.. But it kinda gets lost in the noise for me.

 

I may already be stunned, that skill may be on cool down already, I may be out of mana, My unstun may still be on cool down.

 

There are so many situations that already stop an ability from working right away or at all, that I just live with it.

 

I want it to be fixed, but until then it really doe snot affect me that much. I know going into a fight it's not, 1, 2, 3, .... 4. It's 1.., 2.., 3.., .......4 and really it can mean lifer and death if I had been able to squeeze in 1-2 more skills into my rotation. But most battles are not that close, even in PVP.

 

I know this is my personal experience. And I do not apply it to you. But I am posting this for the devs to see. a tiny portion of the community (Just me?) Finds this to be almost a non-issue.

 

I am not sarcastic when I say that I'm happy you can live with it. However, I would like you to read my overview of the entire issue/thread (link in OP) because to you I'd address: Even if you "can live with it", DON'T! Because the only way to make the Genre as a whole, developers and even players understand this constant issue (across so many MMOs) is to "raise" your demand of quality.

 

Also, I should mention that the problem itself is exasperated the higher end you get in both PvE and PvP. To a casual player, it may not even be noticeable -- To a Professional Gamer with a .4-5 reaction time average, well its unplayable completely.