Itemization in 7.0

[Jedi_riches]

 

Also, another change that would at least make me a little happier since they're doing away with the toggle is the option to finally pick what tier DS corruption we want visible on our characters. If they gave us something like that, that'd be nice too.

 

The latter is the easier choice otherwise the would have to go in and change every single ls/ds conversation choice in the game so that it matches the dvl alignment scale as killing a dozen people always was worth more than a kill conversation option.

[Jedi_riches]

Sooooo... How about story players? Will we get absolutely no rewards towards gearing doing stories? I mean, we were getting renown before at least, which gave us tech fragments and gear... So now we get nothing?

 

I'm so glad I'm done leveling alts because it sounds awful.

 

Sounds like the only option is the conquest route.

[Matimus]

Is it possible that everyone is reading this a bit wrong? If you look at what they said, I think that this is an important statement.

 

Running a random Featured Flashpoint via Group Finder each week will yield a guaranteed upgrade to the player’s lowest equipped slot, unless the player is already equipped with fully-upgraded gear. In this scenario, players will receive gear that can be disassembled into currency that can be used for future gear upgrades.

 

Then you get this.

if the base item rating of level 80 gear for 7.0 is 320, then Veteran Flashpoint players could upgrade their gear all the way up to item rating 324

 

I take this to mean that doing a Veteran Mode FP can upgrade your gear up to a point. IE it will upgrade your lowest irating item up to 320. However if you already have 320 gear or higher, you get currency for future upgrades. I can't look at the vendors on the PTS, but I do see that Conquest Vendor requires armor fragments. Can't see the upgrade path since I don't have anything to upgrade, but it would make sense that you could use those armor fragments to upgrade past 320. It gives a path for all players. If you want to skip VMFP's and go straight to HM ops you can get better gear faster. But if you want to grind out a million VMFP's and get the currency, that is cool too.

 

I am not sure one way or another, but I do think capping casual (story?) players isn't the right move. Having them on the gear treadmill will keep them playing too. Having the hardest content be the fastest way to get gear isn't wrong though.

 

I do think that there is a ton of negativity on this thread and I wish people would stuck to giving feedback rather than ranting at the changes.

 

As someone who plays every aspect of the game (PVP, NiM, story, FP's, etc), the gearing is fine. I do see why people are concerned. I also can see that the devs are trying to balance the gear treadmill around many different playstyles and I do think it is a case of trying to make everyone happy and I don't think there will ever be a gearing system that will do that.

[LordCamTheGreat]

7.0 feels like one step forward in some areas (shared tagging, weapon outfitter, two combat styles) and two large steps back in others (random pruning, itemization reverts, removing entire game systems).

 

I am extremely disappointed that we are reverting to a system where operations are the primary way to get the best gear. Onslaught's gearing system was the best that this game has had imo, play however you want, get tech frags, get your set bonus. Doesn't matter what content you played. I loved that. Forcing players to not play their own way goes completely against the philosophy that was outlined one expansion ago, now it's already being thrown out for yet another gearing system change. Do I need the best gear to do all the content? No. Do I want the best gear for all content because it will make me feel more powerful and give me something to play towards? Yes.

 

Yes, renown crate rng and galactic command crate rng was bad - to that extent I'm also glad amplifiers are being removed. No, forcing players to play content they don't want to play to get better gear won't fix it. The only way this new system will be acceptable for me is if every single person in a group gets a piece of gear / gear token when they kill a boss. Sure having 2 pieces of gear be tradeable in a group of 8 players lets you dump everything on one player, but you'll still have to run the same ops with the exact same group over and over and over to gear everyone. I really disliked that system and for the most part did not partake in end game gearing when it was a thing despite playing a lot of SWTOR.

 

I also loved the dark vs light system in that you could gain dark or light alignment points by doing practically anything. That was amazing. Removing the system and reverting to only conversation options (which a lot of times make no sense) is a straight downgrade imo. I remember before DvL was a thing, I would literally spam black talon to get light or dark 5 because it was the best way to do so.

 

This deal is getting worse all the time...

[TheVoyant]

I very rarely ever post on the forums. But this needs to be said.

 

There are a sum total of three changes I like with 7.0:

 

1) Being able to play a different class in an existing story.

2) Weapons being added to costume designer.

3) The tagging changes.

 

As someone with the Collector's Edition that's played since release, a long time subscriber, I absolutely HATE EVERYTHING else about 7.0. Literally everything! The more I read about it the more I dread it!

 

It is, in fact, SO BAD that what I'm going to do is the new bit of story on maybe 2-3 characters. Then I'm canceling my sub and logging off and I probably won't launch the game again until the next story update or some massive changes reverting the vast majority of this outrage.

 

You're literally adding some of the most universally hated changes WoW ever received, as if someone saw all of that hate and somehow decided "yeah that seems like a good idea, let's kill our game." I legitimately cannot fathom what in the heck the developers were thinking with any of this. It's just so sooooo bad.

 

Destroying pretty much every class is pretty much game killing, then on top of it you have devastating gear progression, removal of virtually any freedom - whether it be what we play or how we gear (both in acquisition and composition), and I don't know how anyone thought it was a good idea to go back to the original LS/DS system where we had to grind Diplomacy for hours and hours and do speed runs of Black Talon and even then it was a royal pain.

 

Pretty much everything about the new item system is horrible. How you acquire them, how they're not even moddable, how set bonuses are being changed to accessories (accessories that have locked stats and more likely than not isn't what we want/need but would be forced to use for a set bonus), not to mention how only the best gear can be acquired from Operations which probably comprise less than 1% of the playerbase - and are the only moddable new gear.

 

Forcing people to all do the same dailies, weeklies, and queues are just going ruin people's enjoyment of the game. Heck even if by some fluke it happens to be something someone doesn't mind even then it's dreadful when there are dozens of other players all trying to do the same thing.

 

Between ruining of classes, corralling of players and removing freedom of choice in how we play, or the utter destruction of the gearing system.... They're all so bad that I'm honestly not even sure which will be the most offensive and greatest cause of people getting fed up and quitting.

 

I came here to say some version of this. This is the voice of a large percentage of your players. It is a surefire failure.

 

7.0 = "I felt a great disturbance in the Force, as if millions of voices suddenly cried out in terror and were suddenly silenced."

[OlBuzzard]

I very rarely ever post on the forums. But this needs to be said.

 

There are a sum total of three changes I like with 7.0:

 

1) Being able to play a different class in an existing story.

2) Weapons being added to costume designer.

3) The tagging changes.

 

As someone with the Collector's Edition that's played since release, a long time subscriber, I absolutely HATE EVERYTHING else about 7.0. Literally everything! The more I read about it the more I dread it!

 

It is, in fact, SO BAD that what I'm going to do is the new bit of story on maybe 2-3 characters. Then I'm canceling my sub and logging off and I probably won't launch the game again until the next story update or some massive changes reverting the vast majority of this outrage.

 

You're literally adding some of the most universally hated changes WoW ever received, as if someone saw all of that hate and somehow decided "yeah that seems like a good idea, let's kill our game." I legitimately cannot fathom what in the heck the developers were thinking with any of this. It's just so sooooo bad.

 

Destroying pretty much every class is pretty much game killing, then on top of it you have devastating gear progression, removal of virtually any freedom - whether it be what we play or how we gear (both in acquisition and composition), and I don't know how anyone thought it was a good idea to go back to the original LS/DS system where we had to grind Diplomacy for hours and hours and do speed runs of Black Talon and even then it was a royal pain.

 

Pretty much everything about the new item system is horrible. How you acquire them, how they're not even moddable, how set bonuses are being changed to accessories (accessories that have locked stats and more likely than not isn't what we want/need but would be forced to use for a set bonus), not to mention how only the best gear can be acquired from Operations which probably comprise less than 1% of the playerbase - and are the only moddable new gear.

 

Forcing people to all do the same dailies, weeklies, and queues are just going ruin people's enjoyment of the game. Heck even if by some fluke it happens to be something someone doesn't mind even then it's dreadful when there are dozens of other players all trying to do the same thing.

 

Between ruining of classes, corralling of players and removing freedom of choice in how we play, or the utter destruction of the gearing system.... They're all so bad that I'm honestly not even sure which will be the most offensive and greatest cause of people getting fed up and quitting.

 

 

I came here to say some version of this. This is the voice of a large percentage of your players. It is a surefire failure.

 

7.0 = "I felt a great disturbance in the Force, as if millions of voices suddenly cried out in terror and were suddenly silenced."

 

So much of this is true.

 

Perhaps the most unfortunate part of all of this is the missed opportunity (or perhaps opportunities ).

 

There WERE so many possibilities ... GOOD ones at that. BUT the path that has been chosen seems to be so far removed from fun and excitement. Instead what we have is what was I quoted.

 

It should be noted that I'm not talking about the development of the story lines. Heck ... I even like KotFE / ET. I AM talking about the game mechanics and everything else (so to speak).

 

This makes it VERY difficult to be supportive of SWTOR (at best).

 

Truly :

 

 

Remember:

 

 

Once you start down the dark path ... forever will it dominate your destiny.

 

 

I can't convince the team to reconsider the path they have chosen. IMO it's too late for that. There is no time to undo what had been done. I'm quite certain of that. It just simply does not make sense to follow this path.

[afwhoefuwov]

BW seems to emphasize on getting good gears. But, is that the only thing players can do? Gearing? Or are we just gonna stuck with doing the same old contents, which get rotated every week, to grind for gears. Once you're done grinding, there better be lots of new FP, new OP, new stories....etc. Our last story update is only a few minutes long....

[casirabit]

Matimus;9977072]Is it possible that everyone is reading this a bit wrong? If you look at what they said

 

It depends on whether you actually trust what they say but a lot of us have heard this song and dance before. This is not the first time they have pulled this and so a lot of these individuals have been here during all this and they just about reach the limit with them doing this.

[Exly]

It would be nice to know what other changes the devs have planned. We have not heard everything yet, and while I am not hopeful that as we learn more, that what they have already announced will make sense. I still would rather know everything before reacting to strongly to what they have announced so far.

[Darth_Sidewinder]

I have been an active subscriber basically without break since the release. I mostly play with a small group of friends and fairly casually (ie, not competitively, no operations, no hard modes). My main concern is having enough of PvE stuff to do without having to repeat the same thing for fiftieth time. As far as itemization goes, I am okay as long as I am able to gear up enough to be able to do an occasional flashpoint without getting slaughtered.

 

The greatest gift would be making sure that we can play all Flashpoints and ideally even Operations in some story mode - meaning playable even without some über top level gear, just for the story. (I am looking at you, Dread Fortress finale of actual planetary storyline, never finished because, well, it's an Operation).

 

That would be "play your way": no content locked out if you somehow don't want to or can't click yourself to death in some hyper fray.

(Remark however, having the extra healing support droid in solo flashpoints was almost an overkill bc they are fairly easy to begin with, but at the same time it would be super handy to have an option to summon that in ANY activity if you are eg in a group of two very casual players doing a normal veteran flashpoint. Introduce also "solo" version for those and leave it up to you whether you want to make it easy for yourself by summoning the droid or keep it as a challenge. Maybe exactly do something like you do it alone or with the droid - only basic reward, versus you do it without the droid - bonus reward that can get you some more competitive gear.)

 

But I digress. Anyway: I think it is important for the devs to sort things out "on the upper end", balance everything top-tier players care about. But also keep in mind that there is probably a fairly large chunk of players who play not big scale ops, but also not just "single player", but who play for the lore and world and who want to experience as much of the game content as possible. And to be able to access ideally all the content with just the humble gear they have. If they then want a challenge, they can play some hard modes. But if I got my gear by doing the planetary quest on Nar Shaddaa, I want to be able to do my Hammer Station. That's the bottom line.

 

As for Light vs Dark, I am personally okay with the alignment being "faithful" to my characters' behaviour, it worked like that before, HOWEVER, I am saying this as a person who managed to get their characters to Light V and Dark V already and I am fully aware that it may be difficult for some to achieve this without the alignment toggle. For that reason, I'd think it may be the best solution to have the toggle switchable either on or off. That would be play your way, again.

[limenutpen]

The more we get closer to launch 7.0 is looking worse by the day. Not only we did not get the much desired performance upgrade. We actually are getting nothing of sorts.

I thought 4.0 and 5.0 was bad when they removed PvP gear...

 

7.0 is giving me nothing I want and making it all impossible to get what I like, taking one of the good changes in 6.0, that was gearing. May be its time to say bye bye Swtor after nearly ten / nine years of paid sub.

 

If you want to play a good MMO this is not the one, and possibly it shows that 7.0 is the killer of all patches, the one that finally puts a nail in the coffin to a game and a development team which really do not know what they are doing.

[Revenaught]

What the actual F… BioWare?!? I was looking forward to this expansion. Weapons in outfitter, ability to pick two fighting styles, load out storage, shared kill credit, ability to save alliance crate armor styles to collections! Man I tell ya I was droolin over the goodies and eagerly awaiting the release. Then I got this kick in the gut.

 

The only change needed in the gearing system, in my opinion, was the removal of the RNG element of it. And while you did remove the RNG, you did so by burning down an otherwise good system and put an open sewage line in its place. Gone are the days of playing my way and having it all be benificial. Now if I step out of my normal play style of solo or 2 to 3 man groups doing conquest related activities mostly it will be useless as I will not be doing the other content enough to be able to upgrade any gear I may get from it. So looks like I’m stuck with only conquest for my gear gain purposes.

 

Next while you left augments in game you have rather effectively barred me from using them. I have no where near the amount of credits needed to continually buy new augments, augment kits, and install said kits every time you decide to up the max gear level. Also with the removal of mods until gear level 334 I can’t even make use of my currently augmented moddable gear. So it looks like only the nicely well off will be bothering with and enjoying the benefits of augments.

 

And lastly the best gear in game is now solely reserved for the high end operations players and everyone else will just have to be happy with whatever scraps we are so graciously allowed. The same holds true for being able to fine tune our gear as we see fit. Only the OPs elite will have access to moddable gear at max level. All other peons need not apply.

 

All in all BioWare, right now despite the initial excitement I’m feeling pretty unwelcome at the 7.0 SWTOR table.

[JakRoanin]

I was looking forward to this expansion. Weapons in outfitter, ability to pick two fighting styles, load out storage, shared kill credit, ability to save alliance crate armor styles to collections! Man I tell ya I was droolin over the goodies and eagerly awaiting the release. Then I got this kick in the gut.

 

The only change needed in the gearing system, in my opinion, was the removal of the RNG element of it. And while you did remove the RNG, you did so by burning down an otherwise good system and put an open sewage line in its place. Gone are the days of playing my way and having it all be benificial. Now if I step out of my normal play style of solo or 2 to 3 man groups doing conquest related activities mostly it will be useless as I will not be doing the other content enough to be able to upgrade any gear I may get from it. So looks like I’m stuck with only conquest for my gear gain purposes.

 

Next while you left augments in game you have rather effectively barred me from using them. I have no where near the amount of credits needed to continually buy new augments, augment kits, and install said kits every time you decide to up the max gear level. Also with the removal of mods until gear level 334 I can’t even make use of my currently augmented moddable gear. So it looks like only the nicely well off will be bothering with and enjoying the benefits of augments.

 

And lastly the best gear in game is now solely reserved for the high end operations players and everyone else will just have to be happy with whatever scraps we are so graciously allowed. The same holds true for being able to fine tune our gear as we see fit. Only the OPs elite will have access to moddable gear at max level. All other peons need not apply.

 

All in all BioWare, right now despite the initial excitement I’m feeling pretty unwelcome at the 7.0 SWTOR table.

 

What they said.

[Pigglesworth]

Great information! Thanks.

 

What about how we go about getting gear from these methods for multiple combat styles. Right now, in our advanced classes, such as Juggernaut, we can choose the loot preference for Tank or DPS. It appears that we are going to be allowed 2 combat styles per character in 7.0 So, if we choose Sorc & Juggernaut as our 2 combat styles, will we have the option of choose DPS, Heal, or Tank gear as rewards or upgrades? Or, how do declare which type of pieces we want?

 

Also, will there still be capped and uncapped content? We will still need to gear separately for each?

Edited November 3, 2021 by Pigglesworth

[casirabit]

I know I may get hassled for this, but I know of at least one dev who was in a elitist discord who communicated a lot. Would joke and interact with them......and the toxicity that came along with it. That is actually why I left the discord, because an ACTUAL DEV who works at BioWare was listening to the elitist jerks and agreeing with their collective mindset.

 

So actually.....some of these gatekeeping changes, make complete sense with the devs mindset is being influenced by gatekeeping toxic selfish elitists.

 

(And no, I will not name names. That is against the ToS.)

 

If this is true, (don't mistake me saying it isn't) then that is another reason I will be leaving. I left Wow because of the toxic behavior and the way the devs actually encouraged it (encourage means you don't do anything to stop it, especially if you are in a discord and allowing it to continue) then I am glad that they are no longer the only ones that can make a Star Wars game. I will watch for another one provided it is never done by BW/EA again and it is sad that they are pushing people to quit because they don't care but of course they may want that to happen anyways.

 

 

Edited November 3, 2021 by casirabit

[Krooll]

First ever forum post. Have always been a one character player going back to original game launch, taking long breaks and coming back for new story content. 2020 was the most fun I ever had playing swtor, and by far the most time investment. This was primarily due to the amazing Spoils of War gearing system which encouraged me to create alts and try out new classes/specs. Now I have 5 characters at 306 that were a ton of fun and simple to gear up. I understand the desire to be rid of the “Spammer Station” path. However, with the changes that have been announced I am unlikely to play anything other than my main when 7.0 launches. BioWare please reconsider.

[Darthanimus]

Itemization in 7.0

For the time being, the existing Augments and Augmentation Kits will still be usable on 7.0 gear.

Please don't say that to get the existing gold augs for 7.0 we would still need to participate in that damned awful grind for OEM and RPM materials? Getting the materials and grinding out those gold 77 augments were for me the very worst and definitely the lowest point of onslaught. Way below amplifiers, way below RNG, honestly just the pits.

[Exly]

So it appears that the devs need more time to work on HM and NiM versions of the new operation, and that is why they are trying to slow the progress on gearing.

 

"Second, we’re staggering the release of the Operation and the release of the expansion. As noted in the linked articles above, there are a number of gearing changes coming in 7.0, and we want to make sure players have ample time to gear up their characters, settle into Combat Styles, and get their groups ready for the next great threat to the Galaxy. But players won’t have to wait long for the Operation; with Legacy of the Sith coming Holiday 2021, we’re targeting January 2022 to release the R-4 Anomaly Operation."

 

People wouldn't need extra or "ample" time to gear, if all three modes were ready at launch.

[WHTJunior]

I'm not too thrilled about the removal of the DvL system, it was handy for earning points and useful if you wanted to play a Neutral character without making them bipolar when it came to choices. I guess I'll have to pick up Diplomacy on my neutral Inquisitor so he can stay that way, something the toggle made easy when I was playing him.

 

This is what I want to know as well. I had recommended that they add a gray option, to help center my neutral characters, but I guess those will either become bipolar lunatics, or they will all end up with Diplomacy.

 

For some insight, I have 32 characters on Star Forge, 32 characters on Satele Shan, and now 8 on Darth Malgus (working on my 4th Legendary Legacy, but you wouldn't know that since my original DvL server got merged into SF). I create characters in sets of 8, one for each class. My current breakdown across all three servers is, 3 DS, 3 LS, and 3 Neutral of each class. I know I will figure it out, but this is quite a wrench in my plan. I'm in a holding pattern, wait-and-see mode right now, for this.

[Meiran]

I must admit I'm a bit anxious about this change.

 

I only play solo. I only do story mode. I only do flashpoints if they are part of the story - I hate them. I absolutely NEVER group or do Ops or GSF or PvP or any of that other stuff. Because I solo, I'm not fussed about losing social points as I didn't get them any way. But I am concerned that, while I don't min/max my gear, I do like to improve it to the best I can get it to within my limitations. My main has an iR of 282 (no augments, no amplifiers, nothing like that), and that seems to be plenty good enough for her.

 

I also don't do weeklies or dailies. I play for the story, and for fun, not for a grind or a second job. The highest I got to for the galactic seasons thing was level 24.

 

Does this new system mean that I will never be able to upgrade my gear through the story line? How will this work for a 'hardcore casual' like me?

 

Thing is, this is basically just going back to how it used to be. Playing solo used to get you nowhere.

 

Edit: One thing I haven't seen mentioned....Ranked. Toxic cesspool that it is, to do well in ranked you'll now need to be a top-tier NiM player as well as being good in PvP. You might be a PvP god, but you'll never have as good gear as those NiM PvErs.

Edited November 3, 2021 by Meiran

[DarthKurt]

I have worked VERY HARD and spent COUNTLESS MILLIONS to buy all the tactical pieces and all the sets to earn the achievement points. I see NO REASON why those achievement points should be stripped away from me. THIS WILL MAKE ME VERY UPSET.

[Lakemine]

I have worked VERY HARD and spent COUNTLESS MILLIONS to buy all the tactical pieces and all the sets to earn the achievement points. I see NO REASON why those achievement points should be stripped away from me. THIS WILL MAKE ME VERY UPSET.

 

It seems like tech frags are still on the PTS to buy tacticals and the gold aug mats. And tacticals and those mats are staying. So it looks like just the set bonus achievements are being deleted. Still wrong, dumb and stupid though.

[Lakemine]

If this is true, (don't mistake me saying it isn't) then that is another reason I will be leaving. I left Wow because of the toxic behavior and the way the devs actually encouraged it (encourage means you don't do anything to stop it, especially if you are in a discord and allowing it to continue) then I am glad that they are no longer the only ones that can make a Star Wars game. I will watch for another one provided it is never done by BW/EA again and it is sad that they are pushing people to quit because they don't care but of course they may want that to happen anyways.

 

 

 

Yep......it is very sad indeed.

 

I love Star Wars, and The Old Republic is my favorite era. SWTOR is my most played game at 25k+ hours, its helped with depression and irl deaths. To have the game die.........its very hard atm. It sucks that anniversaries are supposed to be fun and exciting........and its doubly worse and hurtful to see people excited and happy for these changes and death.........

 

Heres hoping that because other companies are making Star Wars games now, they can learn this lesson and not repeat it.

[Lakemine]

What the actual F… BioWare?!? I was looking forward to this expansion. Weapons in outfitter, ability to pick two fighting styles, load out storage, shared kill credit, ability to save alliance crate armor styles to collections! Man I tell ya I was droolin over the goodies and eagerly awaiting the release. Then I got this kick in the gut.

 

The only change needed in the gearing system, in my opinion, was the removal of the RNG element of it. And while you did remove the RNG, you did so by burning down an otherwise good system and put an open sewage line in its place. Gone are the days of playing my way and having it all be benificial. Now if I step out of my normal play style of solo or 2 to 3 man groups doing conquest related activities mostly it will be useless as I will not be doing the other content enough to be able to upgrade any gear I may get from it. So looks like I’m stuck with only conquest for my gear gain purposes.

 

Next while you left augments in game you have rather effectively barred me from using them. I have no where near the amount of credits needed to continually buy new augments, augment kits, and install said kits every time you decide to up the max gear level. Also with the removal of mods until gear level 334 I can’t even make use of my currently augmented moddable gear. So it looks like only the nicely well off will be bothering with and enjoying the benefits of augments.

 

And lastly the best gear in game is now solely reserved for the high end operations players and everyone else will just have to be happy with whatever scraps we are so graciously allowed. The same holds true for being able to fine tune our gear as we see fit. Only the OPs elite will have access to moddable gear at max level. All other peons need not apply.

 

All in all BioWare, right now despite the initial excitement I’m feeling pretty unwelcome at the 7.0 SWTOR table.

 

Ditto what is said here.

 

I was excited for those things as well, and just like a narcissistic relationship, the sucker punch hits hard and is painful and not fun. Games are supposed to be fun.

[KookieMaster]

7.0 = "I felt a great disturbance in the Force, as if millions of voices suddenly cried out in terror and were suddenly silenced."

That's implying that they were listening in the first place.