Y'all need to calm down a bit

[SirCaldric]

Just wanted to start off this post by saying I'm 100% understanding of the concerns regarding missing abilities right now. I am.

 

But this is turning into a mob mentality faster than quick. Please remember that this is very likely nowhere near how the actual systems will work (based on their "status" thread, and how everything is subject to radical change). It's a super early test for some Guardian paths between the disciplines.

 

I also want you to keep in mind that it seems this test was not thought out/planned properly/rushed through to the test server. There's plenty of evidence of this, such as the very primitive way of getting to the testing area/content, the many bugs present (companions with no stats and 30k HP, mounts being useless...) and overall confusion on what the heck is going on, despite having read the threads regarding the testing phase.

 

It's great to voice your concerns, but there have been some absolutely ridiculous posts on here from some people, ranging from "they're changing OUR classes!", "I will never play again if this happens", "YOU'RE DESTROYING YOUR OWN GAME IN A DISGRACE" - at this point you might as well ask to see the manager too.

 

The test itself was kind of a disaster, that much is true. But let's reserve our opinions until we get into the meat of things where we can finally say "Wow, they really did remove our abilities" or "Oh, there they are" because at this point, we truly don't know.

 

Let's calm down a little, shall we? And if down the line it turns out that they really did break everything, go nuts.

[Voroschuk]

"they're changing OUR classes!", "I will never play again if this happens", "YOU'RE DESTROYING YOUR OWN GAME IN A DISGRACE" - at this point you might as well ask to see the manager too.

The question is do we want to play with those drama queens? I can understand the frustration, but if some people can overreact this much to something that is wip and in very early stage, I can only imagine how they behave ingame lol. So I can't say i'm going to miss this type of people xD

[SirCaldric]

The question is do we want to play with those drama queens? I can understand the frustration, but if some people can overreact this much to something that is wip and in very early stage, I can only imagine how they behave ingame lol. So I can't say i'm going to miss this type of people xD

 

Right, it's hard to form an opinion on the Guardian as it is right now. I feel like they should've waited with this testing phase until August instead, because then they might've had something more for us to actually test, you know?

 

EDIT: I don't want to segregate this into "us vs them" because the only reason they are so worried is because they've experienced something terrible happening in another game before moving to this one, and this apparently shows hints of what made them leave it in the first one. So like you, I understand their frustration and concerns but it's just too early to go full ******* about it.

Edited July 11, 2021 by SirCaldric

[LeoAugustina]

Its coz many of us are coming from Word of Warcraft. Class felt amazing to play, then Blizzard did this exactly same thing "pruning", "class identity", "choices" and butchered the entire game.

And we know that if nothing has changed in early developpment the die has been cast

 

I played myself warrior during 8 years with World of Warcraft and I loved id, once they pruned it I run away for ever into SWTOR.

I dont want this to happen again.

Edited July 11, 2021 by LeoAugustina

[Voroschuk]

I play only mmorpgs since 2005 and saw more than 1 AAA game go down because of bad decisions, trying to oversimplify gameplay and not listening to the hardcore players. Vets are the core of this community, no matter what some people think - i see newbies come and go daily in my guild, very few of them stays..And for them there is no difference, 25 abilities or 35. But as you see, for vets its inportant. So BW wount live from casuals anyway, but loose a lot of long term platers.

 

Another fun fact - if a game is played by hundreds of thousands, some mild, constructicve feedback usually wount reach its target, because mmorpg genre devs knows very well, that there always will be 20% of players who will hate every change - and thats considered okey, devs will ride with that and continue to work on planned changes. But if they see pure hate flowing so hard, they might stop and reconsider. Believe me, thats the mmorpg thing and the only way to attract at least some attention. And Swtor devs know their audience pretty well - they will see and understand, that something is really reallt wrong. 6.0 ideas were great, thats why all criticisim was constructive and all went good as possible.

 

All right, you do your thing then)

Hope the devs will adjust to what we expect and give us some good stuff.

[Alssaran]

Its coz many of us are coming from Word of Warcraft. Class felt amazing to play, then Blizzard did this exactly same thing "pruning", "class identity", "choices" and butchered the entire game.

 

Not this again. This is coming from someone who is not playing WoW at the moment, has no intention to, and quite frankly has a lot of criticism about it: the new talent trees, which is the feature this new approach mostly resembles, is far from one of the bad points. In fact, the smoothness of gameplay is still one of the game's many strengths. People remember classes before they were "pruned" because they had so many buttons, and we all know "quantity means they were so great to play!"

 

Listen, you know how many interactions my warlock toolkit had before in the very old days? One. Affliction spells would proc an instant Shadow Bolt. You know what my optimal DPS rotation was? Shadow Bolt. No, I'm not leaving anything out here. I know it's a crazy list and really hard to follow, but someone had to write it down.

 

There were some classes that were great to play in MoP and lost some of that charm, but others gained from it since. MoP Demonology warlock was fun, but I wouldn't say the current warlock has any less flavour to it. Outlaw rogue is an interesting idea that they just can't seem to get right. There were some classes that had, frankly, a tad too much. And you still have classes with immensely important priority systems. Play Shadow Priest and do a mythic raid. I need a flowchart to make sense of that rotation.

 

My affliction warlock has a lot more interactions in his toolkit on a fight-to-fight basis than he had in the past. Also, my demonology warlock has more identity now with his horde of demons than in Classic - WotLK when all being a demo lock meant was "my pet deals a good amount of damage." Additionally, many of my guild mates who moaned about these changes for a few years and finally got their abilities back in Shadowlands forgot all about them. We've had a hunter who wanted Eye of the Beast back since Cataclysm because, and I quote, it was "integral to his fantasy of having a pet." He got it back in Shadowlands and has used it a grand total of...*checks notes*...zero times. He hasn't used it. He doesn't even have it bound to a keybind. I saw screenshots of his interface. When I asked him whether he used it, he said "not really."

 

I don't want to tell anyone that his reason for disliking current WoW is invalid or whether he has to (subjectively) enjoy a certain amount of abilities more.

 

But about everyone who does any form of competitive content will agree that classes right now are ten times more nuanced than they were under the old systems, the smooth combat is one of WoW's many strengths, and that it's classes have even more random interactions you need to watch out for than FFXIV. Whether class fantasy is the same as efficiency is another discussion.

Edited July 11, 2021 by Alssaran

[FumblesPhD]

Listen, you know how many interactions my warlock toolkit had before in the very old days? One. Affliction spells would proc an instant Shadow Bolt. You know what my optimal DPS rotation was? Shadow Bolt. No, I'm not leaving anything out here. I know it's a crazy list and really hard to follow, but someone had to write it down.

 

Ah, good ol' Shadow Bolt turrets. As you mentioned, as WoW grew so did the warlock toolkit, til it became too cluttered with niche curses and other active abilities. Then they pruned it, and made way for more and new abilities. Ebb and flow.

 

You're completely right, and if people do their due diligence with actually testing the feel of the presented paths on PTS throughout the coming months then I have high hopes that we will see class fantasy preserved while making the game more enjoyable as a whole.

 

I've said this before but not here, so for the record - this is not the end. This is the beginning of something new, and is obviously a sign of BioWare investing much more heavily into this (and future content) than even I had previously anticipated upon the initial announcement of LotS.

[LeoAugustina]

But about everyone who does any form of competitive content will agree that classes right now are ten times more nuanced than they were under the old systems, the smooth combat is one of WoW's many strengths, and that it's classes have even more random interactions you need to watch out for than FFXIV. Whether class fantasy is the same as efficiency is another discussion.

I rarely read something so much false.

Go and tell this to all arm warriors, chaman, rogue and demonoly with demon form was loved by many many warlock.

Edited July 11, 2021 by LeoAugustina

[FumblesPhD]

I rarely read something so much false.

Go and tell this to all arm warriors, chaman, rogue and demonoly with demon form was loved by many many warlock.

 

Blame demon form on Demon Hunters. That said, demonology got a whole new (and arguably more fitting) class fantasy, and the game as a whole got a new class (Demon Hunter).

 

But seriously, are you saying that you think you're going to lose 'class fantasy' in SWTOR because you don't have AoE Taunt as a dps guardian?

[LeoAugustina]

I dont want any skills minus.

[supercometl]

You're completely right, and if people do their due diligence with actually testing the feel of the presented paths on PTS throughout the coming months then I have high hopes that we will see class fantasy preserved while making the game more enjoyable as a whole.

 

So first of all, what "testing" is there really to be done? This test is a VERY high level test, giving us a look at 2 of about 50-ish combinations. So in reality all the test is for is to make sure they didn't make any ability being option brick the class. As such players have pointed out a lot of the "choices" do brick the class. Saber throw is thrown around the most because it is a great example of a "utility first" ability. You are a melee class, so getting your one ranged filler removed takes away a lot of the class. Next is the state of DcDs being all part of one "choice". The thing is, between saber reflect and enure... one of these is clearly the better choice if you actually know when to use it.

 

So when they give extremely open ended testing questions, they probably won't look into the spec as much. Literally all you HAVE to do is read the pts post thoroughly, log in and read the descriptions of the two passives on the A and B track, and then wonder why they made enure have a passive choice, AND have to choose enure.

 

I am not even against a lot of the premise of this system. However people should be worried when the first example they give, in the post not in game, already is showing a reduction of key utility abilities and potential cooldowns by making you choose between said abilities.

 

Making me choose between passives and rotational abilities is good. Heck even making it so you can choose between 2 passives and 1 Defensive cooldown would work, operative already does this with blow-for-blow being a utility choice.

[FumblesPhD]

Sure, there is a limited amount to test now, but as I mentioned I was speaking towards due diligence over the coming months of PTS iterations and voicing our concerns and thoughts in logically structured and well-worded posts in the PTS forums. Similar to how you have done just now.

 

Cheers,

Xareledan

[VampRayLa]

It's great to voice your concerns,

 

That is what ppl are doing, and while i agree some are angrier than others, and, well, where im from we call that passion. They care that much to be that upset - it counts for something to me. (and I have done a lot of reading forums the last couple of days, and I could have missed it, but I didnt think I saw anything out of line. Just ppl very upset about something they care very deeply for.)

 

"they're changing OUR classes!"

 

While I agree the owner (bioware) of the story (swtor) is always to tell their story, and should not be swayed by the mob....The game may not exist without bioware, but the game also does not exist without its players. putting as much time ( 10 years!) and energy into learning these classes, customizing toons, choosing story options, its kinda hard to not feel some ownership.

 

They are gutting the effectiveness of my Jedi to be Jedi - I care about her, deeply. She was all powerful, fun, and versatile. And they want to limit her, put her in a box. I really dont see how Im NOT supposed to take that personal.

 

"I will never play again if this happens"

 

Yes, a knee jerk reaction, a rage quit, and one ive thought long and hard on. This isnt a class I play got nerfed, let me find the next meta. People left other games, that they loved, for this reason. And its happening to them again. I have tried other games that limit my abilities, make me choose - and I dont play them because of that. If i wanted to play a game with limited abilities, I would play that game, but I dont, I play swtor for its range, and now its being designed like the games I/we didnt like. Why would I stay playing swtor if I didnt play other games for the same reason?

 

This isnt something they did that I dont like and I cant ignore or opt out of. (Ppl get their favorite class nerfed, all the time. They are sad, but they get over it. Most changes are in some way superficial, and even if someone didnt like it, they could still play their class and have fun. Or they move to a new class until their class comes back around to be good.) This is the foundation to the game, the class. And its being gutted. All of them. The game will no longer be fun to play - so why play?

 

"YOU'RE DESTROYING YOUR OWN GAME IN A DISGRACE"

 

Again, this has happened to other games, and clearly people left. I dont know if swtor will survive this, i think it will, but other games that did this took a hit and are considered 'not the game it used to be'. I mean, wow classic exists for a reason, right? To such a reason blizzard is running it. Swtor is destroying its legacy in their (and my) eyes.

 

at this point you might as well ask to see the manager too.

 

I dont know, IS there a manager I can speak to?

[FumblesPhD]

They are gutting the effectiveness of my Jedi to be Jedi - I care about her, deeply. She was all powerful, fun, and versatile. And they want to limit her, put her in a box. I really dont see how Im NOT supposed to take that personal.

 

*facepalm*

QQ more

 

Edit to add:

What box are you being put in? How are you no longer powerful, fun, and versatile?

Have you even played the guardian on PTS?

 

You are acting fully on emotion and not at all on logic. Once the changes are in effect I fully expect to see things like on-the-fly changes between certain choices of one ability set or another. Furthermore, loadouts will allow you to swap gear/ability bars/disciplines/all that good stuff at the click of a button - BREAKING you out of any 'box' you're imagining.

Edited July 11, 2021 by FumblesPhD

[JCDenton]

this is very likely nowhere near how the actual systems will work

 

Makes for a piss poor, uninformative test then, doesn't it?

[HamadKyron]

The test itself was kind of a disaster, that much is true. But let's reserve our opinions until we get into the meat of things where we can finally say "Wow, they really did remove our abilities" or "Oh, there they are" because at this point, we truly don't know.

nuts.

 

But the issue here is, they didn't ask us to give feedback on their system 3 months from now, they asked us to give feedback on the current PTS iteration, and currently, the PTS completely guts a lot of peoples' favorite class. That isn't okay, so people are going to complain. Yes, it might get better, but people don't have to ignore what's right in front of them because it MIGHT get better

Edited July 11, 2021 by HamadKyron

[captainbladejk]

Just wanted to start off this post by saying I'm 100% understanding of the concerns regarding missing abilities right now. I am.

 

But this is turning into a mob mentality faster than quick. Please remember that this is very likely nowhere near how the actual systems will work (based on their "status" thread, and how everything is subject to radical change). It's a super early test for some Guardian paths between the disciplines.

 

I also want you to keep in mind that it seems this test was not thought out/planned properly/rushed through to the test server. There's plenty of evidence of this, such as the very primitive way of getting to the testing area/content, the many bugs present (companions with no stats and 30k HP, mounts being useless...) and overall confusion on what the heck is going on, despite having read the threads regarding the testing phase.

 

It's great to voice your concerns, but there have been some absolutely ridiculous posts on here from some people, ranging from "they're changing OUR classes!", "I will never play again if this happens", "YOU'RE DESTROYING YOUR OWN GAME IN A DISGRACE" - at this point you might as well ask to see the manager too.

 

The test itself was kind of a disaster, that much is true. But let's reserve our opinions until we get into the meat of things where we can finally say "Wow, they really did remove our abilities" or "Oh, there they are" because at this point, we truly don't know.

 

Let's calm down a little, shall we? And if down the line it turns out that they really did break everything, go nuts.

 

As much as I hate to say it, you truly don't understand as much as you think you do if you honestly believe this is a good idea. It's not about people being "drama queens" or similar. Quite frankly it's condescending stuff like your statement that cement people into the position this is a bad idea. You call it "overreacting" I call it being rightly angry at a subpar product when they can do better.

 

I'm a founder in this game that's been here since closed beta, and I have played every spec in this game. I also am a modder for older games and have created quite a few levels and mods for other games. Some of my levels used to be EA recommended for weeks at the time for Timesplitters Future Perfect as one example. I have also started creating mods and content for newer games. While I may not be a AAA studio dev, I know what it takes to create content. Generally I would agree that people overreact, but this is one of those times where they deserve every bit of flack they're being given, because this is absolutely lazy and subpar game design. The fact that certain baseline abilities are now part of different discipline paths you have to pick from proves that they have stolen abilities from us.

 

I was also there in WoW when they tried this exact same thing in the name of "pruning useless abilities". WoW went overboard to the point that you had maybe 1/8th of the toolkit you did before to the point they may as well have called it Diablo: World of Warcraft Edition. Stealing more than half your toolkit, then giving 2-3 of those abilities back to you and calling it a "choice" is not a choice, but an insult. When WoW did this same thing, they lost so many subs, they were forced to start bringing back abilities they had removed and even dubbed one of their devs the "unpruner". In the case of Arcane Mages, they only had 2 abilities as part of their rotation. Spam ability one until ability 2 lights up, hit ability 2 until it's no longer lit up, rinse and repeat. There was no depth to the spec, no uniqueness about it at all. You can't have depth to a toon and a class if they all do the same thing, and there is no variety in the toolkit.

 

The next point you need to understand, simply because you personally don't use a particular power that often does NOT automatically make it a bad power that should be removed. Every power that I have on my Guardians I use, and the abomination that's on PTS is not a Guardian at all. What's on the PTS is the equivalent of Uncle Owen having stolen Anakin's lightsaber, then trying to take on Darth Sidious himself, he's going to get stomped every time. As far as choosing powers goes, choosing passives is one thing that we've done since the launch of this game and is nothing new. Stealing abilities I've had since launch, then offering to give one of them back through a "choice" is lazy game development and is an insult to long time players and new alike. This is the equivalent to stealing my wallet with $100 and my social security card in it, then offering to give me back either $10 or my social security card, then pretending you've done me a favor. Either I'm out $90 along with my wallet and social security card, or I'm out $100 and my wallet. In the case of this game it's an unnecessary nerf for the sake of a nerf.

 

When you are developing a map for a game, a mob, an item, or anything at all, you as the developer have to give people a legitimate reason to want to interact with said thing. If it's a map you must give people a reason for wanting to go there. If it's a mob you must give the people a reason for wanting to interact with that mob or avoid them. If it's an ability you must give people a reason to want to use that ability. If you as the developer can't do that, then you can't expect players to do that. When I created levels for Timesplitters I would entice people to the center of the map to leave their base by putting health kits, armor, and more powerful weapons in the center of the map. I would give those people enough bits of cover to grab the items, but leave it exposed enough that they wouldn't be able to stay there very long, and it worked. You have to entice people to do things, you can't force them to do things they don't want to do. All that's going to do is make them quit. Not all aspects of a game are going to attract everyone. I despise PVP, but more power to those who like it. I may not use an ability that often because I don't PVP, but it may be their bread and butter, or vice versa.

 

Folks also need to understand, you can lower the difficulty to the floor of the basement level of hell itself, and there would STILL be people who can't do it because they refuse to learn and get better. In today's day and age there is bountiful information to help people learn what they're doing if they legitimately want to know. There are tons of guides, videos, and the like for this game. People can also read the tooltips of their abilities to discover what they do. If need be there are folks like myself who do not mind helping new people out. I've spent many an hour helping people learn this game. Likewise I can put all the info out there in the world, as could Bioware themselves, but it means absolutely nothing if people don't listen, read, or learn. Folks can learn this game if they want to do so, the question is if they legitimately want to do so.

 

Getting into abilities themselves I will reference my Guardian Tank. Warding Strike, Guardian Slash, Blade Barrage, Saber Reflect, Challenging Call, Taunt, Force Kick, Strike, Slash, Force Sweep, Force Leap, Force Stasis, Guardian Leap, Riposte, Awe, Cyclone Slash, Blade Storm, Blade Blitz, Hilt Bash, Saber Ward, Freezing Force, Warding call, Resolute, Combat Focus, Enure, Force Push, Focused Defense, Saber Throw, and Dispatch, all get used at some point or another. Every single one of those abilities are abilities that provide value to the toolkit of my tank and are part of what he is. The only ability I did not name there is Force Clarity which came to us in 6.0. While I do in fact use Force Clarity, it didn't give us anything that wasn't already present. All of those abilities could be removed and nothing much would be lost. However one power is not the same as half of the toolkit. However I would rather see abilities like Force Clarity given some actual value beyond what they have now.

 

As one example of how they can change things up, take the ability Consuming Darkness for Sorcs and the lightside version of it. This restores force to Sorcs on use, but debuffs their force regen for a time. Let's suppose they wanted to improve force regen for Sorcs and Sages and give them an alternative way to keep their force up. Give them 3 passives to choose from. Passive A, a flat cost reduction to certain force powers. Passive B, caps the force regen debuff at 3 stacks instead of 4. Passive C, grants a small refund of force power each time the DoT from Affliction and Crushing Darkness tick. If done right, all 3 are viable abilities. If they want to give us new abilities and try to give us different ways to play, they're going about it the wrong way. Again the fact that certain baseline abilities are now part of different discipline paths prove they have stolen abilities from us, and it's not just folks freaking out. It's not "old players simply not wanting to relearn rotations", it's that they've legitimately stolen abilities from us, and are trying to give them back to us a " choice", then pretending they've done us a favor.

[Alssaran]

That is what ppl are doing, and while i agree some are angrier than others, and, well, where im from we call that passion. They care that much to be that upset - it counts for something to me. (and I have done a lot of reading forums the last couple of days, and I could have missed it, but I didnt think I saw anything out of line. Just ppl very upset about something they care very deeply for.)

 

No. Just no. I'm done pretending that loud, irrational, "the sky is falling!!" criticism that always happens when even minor system changes are announced has anything to do with any positive kind of passion. The same kind of way that dude who has been spamming he wants his old tracer missile animation back for over a decade doesn't do that out of "passion" for an animation either.

 

While I agree the owner (bioware) of the story (swtor) is always to tell their story, and should not be swayed by the mob....The game may not exist without bioware, but the game also does not exist without its players. putting as much time ( 10 years!) and energy into learning these classes, customizing toons, choosing story options, its kinda hard to not feel some ownership.

 

Stop appealing to emotion. I hate it. It makes it sound as if everyone who doesn't go crazy about these changes after one day of a six month PTS cycle doesn't "care" for the game or their class. I've clocked in over two-thousand play hours on my Guardians, and even I'm not jumping through the roof. Some things are bad (e.g Enure has to be baseline). Other things are good (e.g thank god Challenging Call is gone for DPS). Nobody in here can tell me with a straight face that having to press that every so often to lower your threat was "defining to the fantasy of a Jedi Guardian" when just re-working aggro management would do the trick.

 

They are gutting the effectiveness of my Jedi to be Jedi - I care about her, deeply. She was all powerful, fun, and versatile. And they want to limit her, put her in a box. I really dont see how Im NOT supposed to take that personal.

 

Because she's a toon in an ever-changing MMORPG. There is absolutely nothing here to take personal, and this isn't an opinion. The developers suggesting some ability adjustments and to increase class identity has nothing to do with being about you. And just to be clear: I'm not saying you shouldn't be giving input. You should definitely do that. But if you are "taking this personal", you're doing something wrong. You don't take things personal in a testing environment. I didn't take things personal when Blizzard changed my toons and I tested them either. I was invited to a closed alpha. I looked at what was being presented. I gave my pros and cons about what I thought.

 

I don't understand this community at all. Maybe it's NGE PTSD. The SWTOR community is by far the loudest community when it comes to every change. You could literally remove one ability that nobody ever uses, and you could provide data that they don't, and suddenly people would be like: "but this is an important ability! I use it for (incredibly niche situation that happens once a year here). You can't take this away! It defines my Jedi!"

 

It's like my guild mate who desperately wanted Eye of the Beast in WoW back and made a fuss about it for years. And since he has gotten it back, he has used it... *checks notes*...zero times. Oh well, we sure are glad they wasted that dev time on your request, huh?

 

The simple matter of fact is, we have 5% of a system currently to go on. Everyone who now throws their hand up and says: "this is unsalvagable, scrap all the work you've been doing so far and start over!" while claiming to know how content is made...well, they don't. It's that simple.

[ceryxp]

After reviewing a side-by-side comparison of live vs PTS Guardian that was posted to Reddit my level of concern has greatly diminished. That is not to say that I am not still anxious to see the full details, but I am less concerned that they are gutting the classes as others have hyperbolically claimed.

 

 

Upon review it looks like my Vigilance Guardian will only lose a handful of rarely used abilities. Some of which actually are not being removed just changed into a passive form that is triggered by something else, such as Freezing Force becoming Blade Burst and being added to Blade Storm if you pick the right passive.

 

Will the new Combat Styles change how we play? Absolutely. But so have every expansion. Every expansion brings new metas, new rotations, etc., and this one is no different.

 

Remember, everyone, that this is typical of BW. They drop something on a Friday, let the forumites rage over the weekend, and then they come back the following week to reveal more information. Their entire MO is to get people to rage so they can bring out information later that should have been there in the first place.

[Wolvel]

AOE taunt and intercede (not to mention the complete BS that is the removal of 2 dcds) completely removes any identity jugg had. The only thing dps jugg has over mara right now is guard and single taunt, what a joke.

[FumblesPhD]

AOE taunt and intercede (not to mention the complete BS that is the removal of 2 dcds) completely removes any identity jugg had. The only thing dps jugg has over mara right now is guard and single taunt, what a joke.

 

I hypothesize that the intended purpose is to have Guardian (Juggernaut) be more of a 'single lightsaber wielder', still with its three combat styles, and have Sentinel (Marauder) be something similar, yet with two lightsabers, and still its own three combat styles. Similar, yes, but no more similar than they are right now especially considering that the Marauder is not even on PTS yet so we have no real idea of what one 'class' vs another 'class' is going to look like. We can only make inferences from what is provided, and I have no doubt that they are not going to diminish juggernaut identity without ultimately addressing it in some other way that we have yet to see.

 

Edit to add:

We are also in the gearing up stages for the transition to combat styles and the ability to switch between them, so again when it comes to identity of a particular [class|discipline|combat style|etc] we have to remember that the lines are going to be drawn a little differently than they were previously.

Edited July 11, 2021 by FumblesPhD

[ceryxp]

AOE taunt and intercede (not to mention the complete BS that is the removal of 2 dcds) completely removes any identity jugg had. The only thing dps jugg has over mara right now is guard and single taunt, what a joke.

 

AOE taunt, you mean Challenging Call, which is still there. It was moved to the Defence tree. Challenging Call only works as an AOE taunt if in Soresu Form, of which only tanks get. If not in Soresu Form Challenging Call acts as a moderate threat dump. It also causes affected players to deal 30% less damage when attacking anyone other than you.

 

Likewise, Guardian Leap was not removed. It too was moved to the Defence tree.

 

Removal of 2 dcds? Do you mean Resolute and Force Kick, the CC break and interrupt abilities, respectively? As they said in their announcement, this is a super high level preview. It is not a deep dive. Speculation is that the CC break and interrupt abilities are being moved to a general list of abilities that everyone has so that one's CC break and interrupt do not change as they change from Combat Style to Combat Style.

 

As the OP said, y'all need to calm down a bit. Or, not. Cry havoc, let slip those dogs of war, grab the pitchforks and torches, twists those pants into knots, but not just any knot, a Gordian knot.

[captainbladejk]

AOE taunt, you mean Challenging Call, which is still there. It was moved to the Defence tree. Challenging Call only works as an AOE taunt if in Soresu Form, of which only tanks get. If not in Soresu Form Challenging Call acts as a moderate threat dump. It also causes affected players to deal 30% less damage when attacking anyone other than you.

 

Likewise, Guardian Leap was not removed. It too was moved to the Defence tree.

 

Removal of 2 dcds? Do you mean Resolute and Force Kick, the CC break and interrupt abilities, respectively? As they said in their announcement, this is a super high level preview. It is not a deep dive. Speculation is that the CC break and interrupt abilities are being moved to a general list of abilities that everyone has so that one's CC break and interrupt do not change as they change from Combat Style to Combat Style.

 

As the OP said, y'all need to calm down a bit. Or, not. Cry havoc, let slip those dogs of war, grab the pitchforks and torches, twists those pants into knots, but not just any knot, a Gordian knot.

 

You can try to frame it however you want, but it's still a nerf. Removing abilities from people and making them choose between that ability and other items, or giving them nothing back in return is a straight up nerf for no valid reason.

[SirCaldric]

As much as I hate to say it, you truly don't understand as much as you think you do if you honestly believe this is a good idea. It's not about people being "drama queens" or similar. Quite frankly it's condescending stuff like your statement that cement people into the position this is a bad idea. You call it "overreacting" I call it being rightly angry at a subpar product when they can do better.

 

-snip-

 

I didn't say it was a good idea, I said it was too early to tell if it's a good idea or not. It IS overreacting because you literally do not know if this is a subpar change or not yet. I would also like to clarify that I did not call anybody a drama queen, that was another poster. And I did not agree with that part because there's no need to create an environment where we're making fun of each other for having different opinions. I am not making fun of you or anyone else when I say that you are overreacting. I'm telling you to calm down.

 

There's a lot of "you need to understand" in your reply, but I think you need to understand that you're overanalyzing and thinking way too hard about something that ultimately we don't know about. Whatever happened in World of Warcraft sucks, whatever the heck this test phase was supposed to be also sucks, that much is true. We can talk game design and production all day but no matter what, right now we simply do not have enough material to draw a definite conclusion on what exactly is changing.

 

Your outrage is warranted if this keeps going down the path you ultimately believe it will, but right now it serves no purpose other than to vent about what has happened in the past.

 

Makes for a piss poor, uninformative test then, doesn't it?

 

Absolutely. As I mentioned earlier, it is a disaster.

 

But the issue here is, they didn't ask us to give feedback on their system 3 months from now, they asked us to give feedback on the current PTS iteration, and currently, the PTS completely guts a lot of peoples' favorite class. That isn't okay, so people are going to complain. Yes, it might get better, but people don't have to ignore what's right in front of them because it MIGHT get better

 

You're not wrong about the first part, and that's why this is what I consider a flawed test. This is not ready for testing, it seems extremely rushed and not particularly well thought through or executed. The problem is that these complaints are made with the assumption that this is by definition 100% how the final product will end up like - and while that is not just very unlikely, it is an extreme stance to take due to the limited nature of the test.

 

So, as I've said many times now - the testing phase right now sucks, but there's no need to expect the absolute worst case scenario from this.

Edited July 11, 2021 by SirCaldric
Addressed another quote as not to double post

[VampRayLa]

There are too many of you to reply to all, but:

 

If you dont want the abilities, you dont need to play with them. This change is telling the rest of us who use them, we cant have them (at the same time.)

 

The box that I spoke of, though I thought is obvious, is the fact that will have to choose from a handful of abilities that I once just had. The fun of versatile is removed...because I dont have all of my abilities...im left in a box. I dont disagree that some abilities could have a rework, I never said otherwise. Ive lost abilities in the past, it happens. (droid cc) example: I cant say chilling scream is something, even in pvp, I felt really helped me - maybe a handful of times. But just because I dont use it often may not be something someone else uses better than I. (And to the dude about Challenging call, I guess you dont pvp? Not calling you out, just saying.) Which is kind of exactly my point. Just because you do not use the ability does not make it bloat or useless.

 

Lets take Challenging Call since it specifically was mentioned - its not pvp only:

PVP: should always be up, 30% less damage to attacks not on you.

PVE: good tank, ideal situation - dont need it, youre right. And what if its a new tank, you dont want to cut them some slack? Be a bro and help them out?

PVE: not a good tank - well, if your good, you better start using it or youre the tank now

PVE: not ideal situation - tank dies, you tank boss until tank rez, then drop threat so tank reestablishes tanking. Also useful if tank does not die, but needs to do anything else - stealth rez, control of another boss, adds, dc, bio, etc. Also useful as TDPS.

Starfighter: completely useless, just like all the others. We should just get rid of them all then.

EDIT: Forgot the DR, my bad.

 

And, sorry, I feel like those niche situations is the game. Yes, I think most of the community plays rotations, the same ten abilities over and over and over. That is not the whole community. The ppl who are concerned are those that use the niche play. I believe I was even clear that I dont think this is a game killer, most will stay (at least I was on some post), but the people that like the versatility, and the complexity are the ones that are upset. And, AGAIN, that is the point. (And they are the ones that cannot be accommodated by the choosing of abilities vs those that dont want them can just not use them.)

 

The PTS and its state is a shock, I get that. And they did it on a Friday with no one to answer any questions and three days to stew. I also get that. And further research will show what is on the PTS is limited, even for the changes. I really hate even talking about 'you get blade blitz or endure or saber reflect' as example because I also expect those may change. But the foundation of the choosing/pruning of abilities is not - at this time.

 

And, dont say its ok to give feedback, but..., for when you dont like the feedback you complain. (This is directed to the community, not swtor devs - honestly, Ive rolled with every change for many years, this is the first I dont like it from the start. Swtor devs have tweaked everything that didnt work well out the gate into something playable or removed. I have stood with the swtor devs on every change - maybe not agreed or liked it, but believed they would make it better and in most cases they do. They have a hard job, I get that - I also work in software - but, this was not something I cannot not speak up on. This is hard to come back from.) And yes, some ppl do complain even if you change a shade of blue, but sorry, this is not that - these are not some randoms screaming "GAME ENGINE!". Really read the posts and see what is being said in most cases. There is almost no balance on 'this is a good idea'. Some of these ppl (self proclaimed) never post - like me. I never come to forums, but felt so strongly about this change I felt I had to do something. Being mad is their emotion, but that does not make them wrong - they are right about the change - It is a bad idea.

 

If you want to call all of that emotional, I dont care. But I have laid out real game scenarios, and I can lay out more but I should not need to - I have proven my point on a single random ability that was mentioned, not chosen by me.

 

Its clear the type of player that is ok with these changes and the type of player who is not.

Edited July 12, 2021 by VampRayLa