Changes to Gearing in 7.0 from PTS Feedback

[AlrikFassbauer]

Hi mentalmackem,

 

PTS will be brought down tomorrow afternoon, so there will not be another phase of testing. When changes are live, we absolutely will be observing feedback coming in from players. I'm working on ways to help streamline that for players who frequent the forums.

 

When I finally decided to go to the PTS, I couldn't use/play it, because of that dreadful Error 206.

And that, meanwhile my whole game patches as normal.

 

I thought of getting rid of the BitRaider component, but then I'd have to download almost the whole non-PTS-game again, which i feared would take far too long, considering my bandwith of only several hundred KB ( yes, this still exists ! ) and the game's current size of almost 100 GB ( ! ) .

 

The PTS itself is quite big, and I feared that I'd have to download that afterwards for hours, too.

 

Following the thumb rule of "never touch a running system", I decided therefore, not to participate with the PTS. I really didn't want a broken game amidst the Feast Of Prosperity ( which I like more and more ! ).

Edited January 29, 2022 by AlrikFassbauer

[Pricia]

I guarantee you that BioWare does know--the formulas are in the code, after all, and at least one of the devs is very familiar with theorycrafting.

 

I did mix and match while testing, and even with every piece available (mixed Force Lord and Targeters, and all left side Accuracy), and the max proficient stim, it wasn't enough for me to reach 110% without having to do an augment or two. And of course, using all that accuracy meant I had, what, 4 or 5 pieces left spread between alacrity and crit, so you can imagine how low those were at 318 and 320. Ugh. The thought of having to augment gear I'm going to throw away at the vendor for an upgrade is making me gnash my teeth in frustration. I can't even save it for an alt, for heaven's sake.

 

I didn't get a chance to see the very latest gear before the PTS went down. Maybe they made it a little better?

 

But that was before this change, right? I mean, in practice you can have every single piece of armor with accuracy now (except hands). That plus accessories should be fine, no? I guess it depends on weapon stats too...

[LordCamTheGreat]

Don’t count your cookies before you get them. It may never be available because they started this process back in the 5.0 era. You can go read how they were having trouble. Then they were going to do it in 6.0. Now they say they can’t do it in 7.0. So I would take what they are saying with a large grain of salt and scepticism if you think it will be ready for 7.1. That way you won’t be disappointed, again!

 

Oh don't worry I've been here every time they said they were thinking about it or had weapon outfitter on their list of features to make etc.

Guaranteed players are going to be upset because the weapons will be tied to outfits and you won't be able to mix and match the current outfitter and a separate weapon outfitter - at least that's how I am fully expecting it to work. Hijack the current system rather than allow for more customization.

 

Considering I was saying on the forums how the devs didn't have enough time and would likely delay the expansion back in June/July, I am taking everything they say with a big grain of salt and do not expect this expansion to be in a fully functional state for the remainder of the year - at least not in the way that the devs or players intended.

 

It sucks. The initial announcement stream was awesome. Practically everything since has killed my hype. At this point I just want the expansion to come and rip the bandaid off so I can get used to a far far worse gearing system / pruned abilities sooner.

[LordCamTheGreat]

But that was before this change, right? I mean, in practice you can have every single piece of armor with accuracy now (except hands). That plus accessories should be fine, no? I guess it depends on weapon stats too...

 

Well....maybe?

You could already mix and match all the sets on the PTS and couldn't hit accuracy cap with base gear. It's possible that the devs have rebalanced what parts are in each set to allow players to hit the 110% cap but we just won't know til launch.

Also don't even get me started on accessories. The devs haven't even addressed the fact that you can't change what stats the legendary implants give you afaik so gearing might end up being even more restrictive. All this for the sake of pleasing the 0.1% nightmare raid players! (Am I salty? Yes.)

[Sethenon]

It sucks. The initial announcement stream was awesome. Practically everything since has killed my hype. At this point I just want the expansion to come and rip the bandaid off so I can get used to a far far worse gearing system / pruned abilities sooner.

 

This is pretty much how I feel - I was so excited to hear about an expansion and it's been one let down after another. System after system has been gutted or removed, they haven't lived up to any of the things they bragged about in the stream. At this point, I'm looking forward to the story (which will most likely be finished within a few hours) and the load-outs. Gearing is a mess - under the best of descriptions with NIM raiders basically being given blatant favoritism. Many of the features have been pushed off to 7.1 or even 7.2 who knows when they will arrive. It truly feels like 1/4 of an expansion, this is my first one (and the way it looks it might be my last).

 

Is this normal for so many changes that negatively impact players? Is it expected that the good stuff comes 2 patches down the road?

[Pricia]

Well....maybe?

You could already mix and match all the sets on the PTS and couldn't hit accuracy cap with base gear. It's possible that the devs have rebalanced what parts are in each set to allow players to hit the 110% cap but we just won't know til launch.

Also don't even get me started on accessories. The devs haven't even addressed the fact that you can't change what stats the legendary implants give you afaik so gearing might end up being even more restrictive. All this for the sake of pleasing the 0.1% nightmare raid players! (Am I salty? Yes.)

 

I sure hope we get a good surprise when it comes to legendaries and accuracy. I mean... a bunch of people mentioned it.

[TrixxieTriss]

 

Is this normal for so many changes that negatively impact players? Is it expected that the good stuff comes 2 patches down the road?

 

No, it’s not normal. The last time they made changes that were so reviled by the players (because BioWare ignored player feedback), we lost a lot of players within weeks of the expansion launching. A few months later the producer and designers were moved to Anthem. There’s no coincidence as to why Anthem failed too and why the producer had to resign. It sure feels like Keith, Charles and ChrisS (who was a designer on Anthem btw) are really rolling the dice this time. Sadly, I think you will see another mass exodus of players and some people at BioWare may end up being shuffled off to other projects. The billion dollar question is what will EA do this time. Remember Anthem had more players than swtor currently does and they shut it down because it wasn’t making enough money. What happens if we lose 10-20% of the subscriber base over these changes? Will that be enough for EA to pull all future funding or even shutter the game.

Edited January 29, 2022 by TrixxieTriss

[Pricia]

No, it’s not normal. The last time they made changes that were so reviled by the players (because BioWare ignored player feedback), we lost a lot of players within weeks of the expansion launching. A few months later the producer and designers were moved to Anthem. There’s no coincidence as to why Anthem failed too and why the producer had to resign. It sure feels like Keith, Charles and ChrisS (who was a designer on Anthem btw) are really rolling the dice this time. Sadly, I think you will see another mass exodus of players and some people at BioWare may end up being shuffled off to other projects. The billion dollar question is what will EA do this time. Remember Anthem had more players than swtor currently does and they shut it down because it wasn’t making enough money. What happens if we lose 10-20% of the subscriber base over these changes? Will that be enough for EA to pull all future funding or even shutter the game.

 

Would be interesting to see the numbers but number of players doesn't really mean much anymore. Someone spending $100 on CC every month is worth 6 subscribers. I never played anthem but how were micro-transactions?

[Sethenon]

No, it’s not normal. The last time they made changes that were so reviled by the players (because BioWare ignored player feedback), we lost a lot of players within weeks of the expansion launching. A few months later the producer and designers were moved to Anthem. There’s no coincidence as to why Anthem failed too and why the producer had to resign. It sure feels like Keith, Charles and ChrisS (who was a designer on Anthem btw) are really rolling the dice this time. Sadly, I think you will see another mass exodus of players and some people at BioWare may end up being shuffled off to other projects. The billion dollar question is what will EA do this time. Remember Anthem had more players than swtor currently does and they shut it down because it wasn’t making enough money. What happens if we lose 10-20% of the subscriber base over these changes? Will that be enough for EA to pull all future funding or even shutter the game.

 

Thanks for the quick history lesson, it does explain much. I'm sure there's more to the story that we players will never get to see but in the lack of any such information, I'll go with what you have stated. It does seem like a shame though, you'd think people would learn from their mistakes.

[LordCamTheGreat]

No, it’s not normal. The last time they made changes that were so reviled by the players (because BioWare ignored player feedback), we lost a lot of players within weeks of the expansion launching.

 

As a first hand example of how ignoring player feedback affects the playerbase, my entire guild quit the game when Galactic Command launched.

I took a break for a while and I'm the only one consistently still playing the game at this point.

 

There needs to be much better communication between the players and the developers.

 

It's good that the devs are setting milestones for feature releases (such as the pvp update coming later) because it theoretically means that they can focus on getting one thing right at a time rather than releasing everything at once in an extremely buggy and unfinished state.

That being said, there are already major hurdles that the devs seem to be refusing to acknowledge for whatever reason and the gearing and pruning changes still feel unfinished.

[LordCamTheGreat]

Thanks for the quick history lesson, it does explain much. I'm sure there's more to the story that we players will never get to see but in the lack of any such information, I'll go with what you have stated. It does seem like a shame though, you'd think people would learn from their mistakes.

 

As long as the mistakes still make them money, they don't really count as mistakes to Bioware/EA so why bother learning!? /sigh

[TrixxieTriss]

Thanks for the quick history lesson, it does explain much. I'm sure there's more to the story that we players will never get to see but in the lack of any such information, I'll go with what you have stated. It does seem like a shame though, you'd think people would learn from their mistakes.

 

That is something BioWare seem incapable of doing. You only need to look at the development history of this game to see how many “own goals” BioWare have scored (repeatedly). If there was an industry award for shooting yourself in the foot, BioWare would be world leaders in synthetic feet.

Edited January 29, 2022 by TrixxieTriss

[JaeOnasi]

But that was before this change, right? I mean, in practice you can have every single piece of armor with accuracy now (except hands). That plus accessories should be fine, no? I guess it depends on weapon stats too...

It's not fine at all. I already had done just that on PTS because I took every accuracy piece in Force Lord and every accuracy piece in Targeters that Force Lord didn't have, along with all left side accuracy pieces--which was everything except hands/saber/focus. Those plus max proficient (accuracy) stim still gave me an accuracy rating below the 110% threshold at 218 and 220. Of course, that meant I had only hands, saber, and focus left for crit and alacrity, so those stats were complete crap, and it showed in parses: 17k dps vs my current normal 21k on an Ops dummy.

 

The devs know exactly what numbers are required to meet the accuracy and alacrity thresholds, and they could simply have added more to the tertiary stats of what's at the vendors so that the game is semi-playable in 318/320/322 gear _without needing augments_ and without needing to use two different gear sets instead of this craziness we're going to get at the start of 7.0.

 

You might say, "But Jae! 17k is great! That's more than enough to take down bosses!" And yes, 17k is pretty good by objective standards, even though I find it unacceptable for myself. But I play my main at the very top tier for that class. I'm not THE top, by any means--there are people who play infiltration shadow/deception assassin even better. The point is, most players don't play that class at that top level, and also my DPS is dropping by 4,000 points. I parsed a full 24+% less at 320 than I do on live currently. Doing 25% less DPS on vet mod Ops bosses who'll have substantially more health in 7.0 will be frustrating at the least.

 

Now, imagine the casual player who doesn't know what an optimal rotation is, doesn't min-max armor, won't know that s/he needs to buy pieces from two different gear sets to get to 110% accuracy, doesn't even know what utilities to use to maximize DPS, and who, on top of that, will likely keep that cool cartel market lightsaber equipped rather than the fugly generic 318 one because the weapon outfitter doesn't work. That player might pull 5k now for DPS in full 306 gear. Drop that by 25% in 7.0, and he or she will suddenly be unable to take down certain bosses overland, in flashpoints, and in some Ops. That's going to be a huge problem for a lot of casual players.

 

How do you think that will play out for casual players in group finders for MM FPs and harder SMOPs if they get into a group that's partly filled by elitists doing speed runs to gear up? Getting kicked midway through an activity for insufficient gear/ability is always a problem in any MMO, but it will be magnified in 7.0.

Edited January 29, 2022 by JaeOnasi

[pyrietboletje]

PvP Weekly Missions

[WEEKLY] Conspicuous Valor

[WEEKLY] The Spoils of War

[WEEKLY] Go Berserk!

[WEEKLY] Time for Pain!

[WEEKLY] Galactic Starfighter

 

 

Am I seeing this right that LOW level pvp weekly matches (The War Front) cannot be repeated 3x?

[Desplain]

It would seem after all of that feedback you guys still didn’t listen to the most important part about gearing. The part that is going to make people unsubscribe from the game in disgust.

 

DO NOT REMOVE MODDABLE GEAR AND ONLY MAKE IT AVAILABLE FOR OPERATIONS PLAYERS IN 7.1.

Extra static gear to choose from isn’t a fix for not having moddable gear.

 

Also what happens with weapons and you’re recent announcement that weapons won’t be in outfitter for in 7.0?? (And maybe not even in 7.1 if you can’t get it to work). By removing moddable gear, you are basically removing our ability to use our cartel market weapons.

 

It's completly clear now that you guys of Bioware got insane!!!!!!!!:mad::mad::mad:

 

Yes I dare to attack you!!!!:mad::mad:

 

You took my money since 2012 and now your taking away my ability to gear propperly.

 

I've invested large amounts of f...ing Euros to buy weapons which look like real Star Wars ones and now you're telling me I won't be able to use them anymore?:mad::mad:

 

As I said in my thread about the drop rate in the latest FP : "Your behaving like f.... politicans, taking our money and do nothing for it.:mad::mad:

 

My guild members and I will cancel our sub, because we're sick and tired of this nonsens.

[Lady_Myajha]

So I think I want to get this straight in my head here after reading the post.

 

1: Goal is to make gearing easier for the newb to understand. End result: We make gearing even more complicated then it is now.

 

2: Goal is to allow players to play the game how they want to play it. End result: We'll allow you to do it, but you only get the rewards if you play it how we tell you to play it.

 

3: You decide that allowing players to have control over how they want their gear to be to fit their playstyle isn't right, so you decide to give everything to RNGesus and hope that they can get that piece of gear that they've been searching for months for. Didn't that go out the window with Warcraft raiding when they realized it wasn't fun to do raids for months to get that shoulder piece you were looking for.

 

4. You're going to release non-moddable gear before you have a system in place to allow people to play with cartel weapons that they paid good money for. Way to **** over your paying player base.

 

I swear it's like the devs watched an episode of "who loved the year 2004" and decided that you devs loved the way that WoW launched and reverted this game to 20 years in the past in game development. Massive RNG. Incomplete systems. Fixed systems that take control away from your customers.

 

And what's even funnier is when pretty much your entire player base tells you "this isn't the right direction to go" you chose to totally ignore your player base because you are so arrogant that you know how they should be playing your game better then they do and chose to ignore your player base all together.

 

It's like you are trying to destroy this game.

[Xenaul]

I

You might say, "But Jae! 17k is great! That's more than enough to take down bosses!" And yes, 17k is pretty good by objective standards, even though I find it unacceptable for myself. But I play my main at the very top tier for that class. I'm not THE top, by any means--there are people who play infiltration shadow/deception assassin even better. The point is, most players don't play that class at that top level, and also my DPS is dropping by 4,000 points. I parsed a full 24+% less at 320 than I do on live currently. Doing 25% less DPS on vet mod Ops bosses who'll have substantially more health in 7.0 will be frustrating at the least..

 

So based on this it doesn't sound your test accurately reflect how normal people play the game. If changes brought down rotation of an OP min/maxing player down, it doesn't mean that dps of average player will go down, as a matter of fact it might go up where the gap between haves and have nots is decreasing with average DPS being higher over all in a group. Makes sense especially since not FPs and OPS will not have downscaling anymore.

[Pandoras_Jar]

Hello Bryant & Jackie,

 

I'm continuing to refine and update my 7.0 Gearing Guide so that it's ready/up-to-date for launch (or as close as ready as possible) and I have a couple of questions.

 

- Is the tertiary stat distribution remaining the same for PvP gear (or how it was on the PTS) or is it changing to line up with the PvE gear changes?

 

- There are currently not many sources of Requisition Caches (these crates guarantee a gear upgrade FYI for players not familiar with 7.0 PTS) and these sources heavily favour PvE (at least on the PTS we saw). Are there plans to add Requisition Caches at the very least to the GSF and Ranked PvP Weeklies? (Requisition Caches on the PTS we saw could only be found on Priority SM Operation Weeklies, Vet & MM Flashpoint Weeklies and the Unranked PvP Weekly).

 

- Upgrading Set Bonus Implants (on the PTS we experienced) was a very strange and finicky process... Can we get confirmation that it was bugged (at least hopefully it was bugged) and perhaps some clarification on exactly how it is intended we upgrade our Set Bonus Implants? Is it supposed to be how we upgrade other gear pieces? ie. just currency and gear piece turn in to upgrade?

 

Thank you,

 

- Xam

 

EDIT: Sorry, I forgot a question...

 

- Are we going to get Warzone Crates for completing PvP (& GSF) matches? And if so, are they going to have a chance of dropping Thyrsian (PvP) gear? On the PTS, we were getting crates from completing matches but the premium crates just dropped tech fragments...

Edited January 31, 2022 by Pandoras_Jar

[Delphis]

Horrifically confusing. Gear sets are an absolute mess.

[JaeOnasi]

So based on this it doesn't sound your test accurately reflect how normal people play the game. If changes brought down rotation of an OP min/maxing player down, it doesn't mean that dps of average player will go down, as a matter of fact it might go up where the gap between haves and have nots is decreasing with average DPS being higher over all in a group. Makes sense especially since not FPs and OPS will not have downscaling anymore.

Actually, your conclusion that casual players’ average DPS will go up makes no sense whatsoever. It does not square with testing, and it certainly does not square with the math of tertiary stats. I suspect you didn’t look at the gear on the PTS. You honestly think that decreasing accuracy percentages and poorly optimizing all tertiary stats will IMPROVE a casual player’s performance?

 

Here’s what’s most likely to happen. A casual player will not know that they need to buy pieces from multiple vendors to achieve anywhere close to 110% accuracy. I’m not even sure if you can get 100% accuracy with a single set.

 

Many of us told BioWare that there was not nearly enough accuracy even mixing sets on 318/320 gear. I and others suggested increasing the amount of tertiary stats on the current sets to bring stats more in line with what’s needed.

 

BioWare’s answer? Don’t change the stats, create more sets so that we can mix and match, even though I and others had—you guessed it—mixed and matched during testing.

 

Let me explain better why casual players will have even less DPS than raiders and min-maxxers since I suspect this might be a point of confusion. If you do not have enough accuracy (110% for bosses) you miss hits. Every single miss is an absolute DPS loss. Alacrity and crit have no bearing whatsoever on a missed hit. In fact, if you have a high alacrity and low accuracy, you just miss faster.

 

I know how to get accuracy up so I miss as close to 0 hits as possible. The casual player doesn’t know this. When that newer Consular dps player selects all Force Lord armor as the game suggests s/he should do at the vendor (because NOWHERE does BioWare suggest mixing sets to maximize accuracy), that player will experience an absolute dps loss. The percentage loss of accuracy will be even greater for a casual player than it will be for someone who understands the basics of theorycrafting. I’ll be missing 2% of my hits with unaugmented gear. The casual player will be missing closer to 10%, possibly more if they don’t take any left side accuracy pieces or use a proficient stim.

 

So, casual players’ DPS will be overall lower, arguably even quite a few percentage points lower, and definitely not higher as you suggested. On top of that, bosses have more health. Now, you should understand why I think—based on PTS testing and data—that casual players will have a dps loss, perhaps even more percentage-wise than those who do understand the tertiary stats.

Edited February 1, 2022 by JaeOnasi

[TrixxieTriss]

Actually, your conclusion that casual players’ average DPS will go up makes no sense whatsoever. It does not square with testing, and it certainly does not square with the math of tertiary stats. I suspect you didn’t look at the gear on the PTS. You honestly think that decreasing accuracy percentages and poorly optimizing all tertiary stats will IMPROVE a casual player’s performance?

 

Here’s what’s most likely to happen. A casual player will not know that they need to buy pieces from multiple vendors to achieve anywhere close to 110% accuracy. I’m not even sure if you can get 100% accuracy with a single set.

 

Many of us told BioWare that there was not nearly enough accuracy even mixing sets on 318/320 gear. I and others suggested increasing the amount of tertiary stats on the current sets to bring stats more in line with what’s needed.

 

BioWare’s answer? Don’t change the stats, create more sets so that we can mix and match, even though I and others had—you guessed it—mixed and matched during testing.

 

Let me explain better why casual players will have even less DPS than raiders and min-maxxers since I suspect this might be a point of confusion. If you do not have enough accuracy (110% for bosses) you miss hits. Every single miss is an absolute DPS loss. Alacrity and crit have no bearing whatsoever on a missed hit. In fact, if you have a high alacrity and low accuracy, you just miss faster.

 

I know how to get accuracy up so I miss as close to 0 hits as possible. The casual player doesn’t know this. When that newer Consular dps player selects all Force Lord armor as the game suggests s/he should do at the vendor (because NOWHERE does BioWare suggest mixing sets to maximize accuracy), that player will experience an absolute dps loss. The percentage loss of accuracy will be even greater for a casual player than it will be for someone who understands the basics of theorycrafting. I’ll be missing 2% of my hits with unaugmented gear. The casual player will be missing closer to 10%, possibly more if they don’t take any left side accuracy pieces or use a proficient stim.

 

So, casual players’ DPS will be overall lower, arguably even quite a few percentage points lower, and definitely not higher as you suggested. On top of that, bosses have more health. Now, you should understand why I think—based on PTS testing and data—that casual players will have a dps loss, perhaps even more percentage-wise than those who do understand the tertiary stats.

 

All of this is 100% correct. I can’t for the life of me understand Biowares reasoning for doing this. Plus they fail miserably with their communication to explain things. So the poor casual or new players are going to find every fight takes longer or is harder than it needs to be. Gearing will be as confusing as it is now for them. But at least now, they have the opportunity to get 110% accuracy fairly easy. The new system will make that much tougher. I can see many casuals or newbies quitting because who wants to spend 10 mins killing a boss that currently takes 2 mins. It will become super grindy and boring for them.

[Lady_Myajha]

All of this is 100% correct. I can’t for the life of me understand Biowares reasoning for doing this..

 

It's been a complaint since patch 1.0 that the devs of this game don't know how to play the game. They know their code, but generally their get their information from spreadsheets. Whenever this argument raises it's ugly head, the devs will magically start showing up in PvP games and the like to prove that they play the game, until it's realized that they aren't very good at what they are doing, and leave the game and go back deving.

 

It's all based on spreadsheets mostly. They get enough feedback from players that something needs to change (as in this case that gearing is confusing and not very newb friendly) and they sit down with their spreadsheets and come up with a "good idea". The problem is, that this good idea is never very good, because they don't understand the game.

 

Point in fact, that the entire point of accuracy being key, is lost on the devs. It's why we got gear that didn't even have accuracy on it, because they don't understand it's importance because they don't understand at the player level, what their game entails.

 

It's why Sorcerer got nerfed into oblivion. They don't understand their game well enough to understand balance. The spreadsheets are saying something, and they fix the spreadsheet, not the game.

 

Oh they know the code, and they know the spreadsheets, but what it takes to be a top player in this game, they have no idea.

Edited February 1, 2022 by Lady_Myajha

[Pricia]

Actually, your conclusion that casual players’ average DPS will go up makes no sense whatsoever. It does not square with testing, and it certainly does not square with the math of tertiary stats. I suspect you didn’t look at the gear on the PTS. You honestly think that decreasing accuracy percentages and poorly optimizing all tertiary stats will IMPROVE a casual player’s performance?

 

Here’s what’s most likely to happen. A casual player will not know that they need to buy pieces from multiple vendors to achieve anywhere close to 110% accuracy. I’m not even sure if you can get 100% accuracy with a single set.

 

Many of us told BioWare that there was not nearly enough accuracy even mixing sets on 318/320 gear. I and others suggested increasing the amount of tertiary stats on the current sets to bring stats more in line with what’s needed.

 

BioWare’s answer? Don’t change the stats, create more sets so that we can mix and match, even though I and others had—you guessed it—mixed and matched during testing.

 

Let me explain better why casual players will have even less DPS than raiders and min-maxxers since I suspect this might be a point of confusion. If you do not have enough accuracy (110% for bosses) you miss hits. Every single miss is an absolute DPS loss. Alacrity and crit have no bearing whatsoever on a missed hit. In fact, if you have a high alacrity and low accuracy, you just miss faster.

 

I know how to get accuracy up so I miss as close to 0 hits as possible. The casual player doesn’t know this. When that newer Consular dps player selects all Force Lord armor as the game suggests s/he should do at the vendor (because NOWHERE does BioWare suggest mixing sets to maximize accuracy), that player will experience an absolute dps loss. The percentage loss of accuracy will be even greater for a casual player than it will be for someone who understands the basics of theorycrafting. I’ll be missing 2% of my hits with unaugmented gear. The casual player will be missing closer to 10%, possibly more if they don’t take any left side accuracy pieces or use a proficient stim.

 

So, casual players’ DPS will be overall lower, arguably even quite a few percentage points lower, and definitely not higher as you suggested. On top of that, bosses have more health. Now, you should understand why I think—based on PTS testing and data—that casual players will have a dps loss, perhaps even more percentage-wise than those who do understand the tertiary stats.

 

The annoying thing is that they'd just have to increase accuracy/alacrity/crit on each piece for it to be viable.

 

But there is NO EXCUSE for a full set not to give 110% accuracy at level 80. None. Let people add amps for crit or alacrity if they want to min/max but 110% is really the bare minimum there (and 1213 alacrity as well, frankly. Even for casuals).

[TrixxieTriss]

It's been a complaint since patch 1.0 that the devs of this game don't know how to play the game. They know their code, but generally their get their information from spreadsheets. Whenever this argument raises it's ugly head, the devs will magically start showing up in PvP games and the like to prove that they play the game, until it's realized that they aren't very good at what they are doing, and leave the game and go back deving.

 

It's all based on spreadsheets mostly. They get enough feedback from players that something needs to change (as in this case that gearing is confusing and not very newb friendly) and they sit down with their spreadsheets and come up with a "good idea". The problem is, that this good idea is never very good, because they don't understand the game.

 

Point in fact, that the entire point of accuracy being key, is lost on the devs. It's why we got gear that didn't even have accuracy on it, because they don't understand it's importance because they don't understand at the player level, what their game entails.

 

It's why Sorcerer got nerfed into oblivion. They don't understand their game well enough to understand balance. The spreadsheets are saying something, and they fix the spreadsheet, not the game.

 

Oh they know the code, and they know the spreadsheets, but what it takes to be a top player in this game, they have no idea.

 

What is most annoying about this is there is a whole community of swtor Theory Crafters that have done all the hard work and maths already for BioWare.

ChrisS is a frequent participant (or was) on that Theory Crafters Discord and had/has full access to the spread sheets that community members have made.

This information is freely available for BioWare to use or peruse. And the community would gladly answer any and all questions if they had any.

Not only that, but I’m sure if asked, the community would be more than willing to do some early heaving lifting on PTS builds to help out with gearing equations etc.

BioWare are fond of their spreadsheets, but they ignore the ones that actually have vital information that would make their own jobs easier and make the gearing system work properly.

That’s what blows me away with BioWare. They ignore the actual experts and mathematicians who play the game in favour of their own guess work and flawed spreadsheets.

Is it arrogance or hubris or just institutional bias against the people playing the game who might understand it better than those coding it and not playing it.

[Lady_Myajha]

Is it arrogance or hubris or just institutional bias against the people playing the game who might understand it better than those coding it and not playing it.

 

I don't think it's an either/or thing. It could be all of the above and more.

 

Obviously you want people to play the game, so you need to balance ease of access and challenge.

 

People playing the game bring in money, which since this is Electronic Arts we're talking about is more important than anything else, including player enjoyment. They want just enough enjoyment to keep players playing, and gouge them for everything they can. Electronic Arts has never, and probably will never, been accused of caring about their player base and what their player base wants.

 

This can be seen extending over to Bioware. Look at Mass Effect: Andromeda. Look at Anthem. Just enough effort, and more importantly cash, to make the game somewhat work, and bail on it. Andromeda is the perfect example of a Bioware game that was butchered into oblivion because EA mismanaged the entire affair.

 

SWOTR isn't far from that line either. They need to keep their EA overlords happy... minimum effort... maximum cash grab.

 

There's so much in this gearing system that follows that example. Massive grind and RNG to dig the hooks into players and keep them playing trying to get that last piece of armor. Never mind that players are frustrated with this playstyle... grind is the key. The bigger the grind, the more they play.

 

Now add in hubris and ego, that they are the devs, and they know what their game should play like and be like. Never mind what the players want, it doesn't support their vision, so damn the players... full speed ahead.

 

In the end what is cheaper. To fix an entire game so that accuracy isn't as important. Or simply make a relatively cheaper change to the gearing system. People want a challenge? Well we're simply lower the amount of accuracy they can have. The devs want certain tertiary traits to play a bigger role. Simply tack them onto gear, and ignore the fact that no one wants these traits. By our EA overlords, they are going to damn well use that tertiary trait.