Throw Players a Bone, Don't Cap the Presence Stat (Companion Power)

[juliushorst]

I skip most mobs in heroics whenever I can - there is no Renown xp and bonus missions don't count for gear currency therefore there is nothing to make fighting worth my time. So I agree, crippling leveling process is one of many really bad changes.

[MotorCityMan]

I don't agree that companions need a buff. Companions were ridiculously OP to begin with, and players were just face rolling content. I admit, its a comfortable habit to get into.

[Cleev]

@Raansu just want to say a quick thanks for keeping up the resistance against making comps OP again

gameplay is much more enjoyable now

[DWho]

@Raansu just want to say a quick thanks for keeping up the resistance against making comps OP again

gameplay is much more enjoyable now

 

Yes for everyone with OP classes, top end gear, and playing in uncapped areas, the game is great. For everyone else, it is a major slog and very unfun.

[Rammboo]

If players thought comps were OP why not just not use them?

You can dismiss them.

[Raansu]

If players thought comps were OP why not just not use them?

You can dismiss them.

 

Because the game automatically resummons them....

[Jedi_riches]

Because the game automatically resummons them....

 

But you can keep them on just follow mode, they won't do anything at all to help.

[Spexius]

Because the game automatically resummons them....

As someone who is selfdeclared ubar a little bit of work can be expected from your side as well. Funny that all these elitists are effectively as lazy as everyone else, if not worse. SWTOR always offered you possibilities to make your life as miserable as it gets, but somehow I have not seen one of your ilk to step over their own shadow to actually do that. Read: Stop blaming others for your own shortcomings.

 

And I can tell you, all the changes of 7.0 in combination created a horrible mess. Recently I was in Section X, and ended up fighting some stupid outside mob group for like a minute or something, because each of these flappies is actually selfhealing. Healing as in "ohh I'm almost dead" -- "please wait!" -- "And back to full HP! wooo!". As a tank with the meager damage output that was painful, because it was not one mob, but all of them doing that and you have only a limited set of interrupts and stuns and the heroic moment could have been in timeout already because of similar garbage just before ...

 

That is just stupid, really. And don't tell me to use a DPS, because the game must be reasonably playable with all specs, tank, healer, and DPS.

[DWho]

If players thought comps were OP why not just not use them?

You can dismiss them.

 

That fix would require that the "game is too easy" folks actually wanted the game to be challenging for them and not what they really wanted which was for the game to be more frustrating for others. For years there have been multiple ways to wring more challenge out of the game if that was what you really wanted to do. To be fair, there were a few that were asking for specific fights to be more challenging.

 

I extensively tested 7.0 on the PTS and specifically set out to replicate the "new" player experience by playing with only the gear that dropped from the class missions, only leveling the companion through the story choices, playing with a "blank" legacy, and keeping on level with the planet. That created plenty of challenge and was very similar to what you had in the initial (1.0) version of the game as far as "challenge". Korriban and Dromund Kaas were pretty straight forward but neither of those was difficult in the initial game either. You started to notice the difficulty with Balmora and it increased with Tatooine (the Yonloch fight was tough on level with the gear I had at that point) and Alderaan. There were some really difficult fights on Hoth, Belsavis and Voss where you did have to pull out the medpacks and stims (just like you did in the 1.0 version of the game). Corellia was a mixed bag because it was becoming difficult to stay on level (I ended up being level 60 by the end of Corellia). That all said, it is possible to have a challenging experience (unless you want every trash mob fight to be a death match) by playing the game within the limits you would have had during the version 1.0 days.

 

All of these ways to increase the "challenge" have been posted over and over and the response has almost unanimously been "Its not my job to make the content challenging, It's Biowares". Making it very clear that challenge was not what they were really looking for.

 

Here's a suggestion they will hate because it keeps the difficulty for them and makes the game easier for others. Bioware should create an item, like the Rakghould vaccine "relic" that gives you a 100% boost to Presence for 1 hour that exceeds the cap. They should also create a Legendary Item or Tactical that does the same on a "permanent" basis. Then they could have their "challenging" game and everyone else could have the game the way they like it. But like I said above, most of the "game is too easy" crowd doesn't want challenge for themselves, they want frustration for other players.

[JojoKasei]

Its barely noticeable outside of heroics....The slow progression of skills is way worse than the scaling and I'd say that's the real problem people are experiencing. Most of your kit used to be given to you by level 20 with the rest being passive upgrades. Core kits now are coming at like level 50+

 

Read that before and it made me wonder why anyone would consider "how about denying them the fun abilities?" as a vaild idea.

[juliushorst]

Here's a suggestion they will hate because it keeps the difficulty for them and makes the game easier for others. Bioware should create an item, like the Rakghould vaccine "relic" that gives you a 100% boost to Presence for 1 hour that exceeds the cap. They should also create a Legendary Item or Tactical that does the same on a "permanent" basis. Then they could have their "challenging" game and everyone else could have the game the way they like it. But like I said above, most of the "game is too easy" crowd doesn't want challenge for themselves, they want frustration for other players.

 

Or even better, add veteran stacks back but only for green solo gear. This should solve two problems at once: make this insultingly bad gear that should be open world drops actually desirable for many players and justify grinding ARMs for it and it would solve problems people have with difficulty. If they want to pretend open world pvp is still a thing in the game they can even make the stacks not work in pvp instances.

I know this would motivate me to grind this gear for all my characters.

[Rooksx]

They may have gone a little too far in the other direction, but what exactly was fun about facerolling through Heroic mobs before? Stomping everything in your path may be fun for five minutes but it very quickly becomes incredibly boring, particularly as hotkey combat is intrinsically dull. Ask yourself: what is the point of combat if it's almost impossible to die? You might as well remove enemies altogether if they're going to offer no challenge whatsoever. Overly easy content can be just as tedious as overly difficult.

[juliushorst]

They may have gone a little too far in the other direction, but what exactly was fun about facerolling through Heroic mobs before? Stomping everything in your path may be fun for five minutes but it very quickly becomes incredibly boring, particularly as hotkey combat is intrinsically dull. Ask yourself: what is the point of combat if it's almost impossible to die? You might as well remove enemies altogether if they're going to offer no challenge whatsoever. Overly easy content can be just as tedious as overly difficult.

 

We did them so many times already they simply can't be fun. So they can at least be fast. Ask yourself: what is the fun in attacking the same group for a minute before they die and you can move to another group?

[Jedi_riches]

They may have gone a little too far in the other direction, but what exactly was fun about facerolling through Heroic mobs before? Stomping everything in your path may be fun for five minutes but it very quickly becomes incredibly boring, particularly as hotkey combat is intrinsically dull. Ask yourself: what is the point of combat if it's almost impossible to die? You might as well remove enemies altogether if they're going to offer no challenge whatsoever. Overly easy content can be just as tedious as overly difficult.

 

But also don't mistake difficulty with plain tedious.

[DWho]

They may have gone a little too far in the other direction, but what exactly was fun about facerolling through Heroic mobs before? Stomping everything in your path may be fun for five minutes but it very quickly becomes incredibly boring, particularly as hotkey combat is intrinsically dull. Ask yourself: what is the point of combat if it's almost impossible to die? You might as well remove enemies altogether if they're going to offer no challenge whatsoever. Overly easy content can be just as tedious as overly difficult.

 

Well, what is the reward of grinding through that heroic (and almost dying repeatedly for arguments sake). 3 Aquatic resource matrices (of which you need at least 60 to upgrade your gear) and 10 tech fragments (that you need thousands of to upgrade anything). That is per piece of substandard gear. No reward should equal no risk. A death match in every battle may be exciting for a bit but it quickly becomes boring/tedious when done hundreds of times a day.

[Raansu]

That fix would require that the "game is too easy" folks actually wanted the game to be challenging for them and not what they really wanted which was for the game to be more frustrating for others. For years there have been multiple ways to wring more challenge out of the game if that was what you really wanted to do. To be fair, there were a few that were asking for specific fights to be more challenging.

 

 

Maybe use your head a little?

 

Its called balance. No one is asking for the game to be uber difficult, people just don't want it to be stupid levels of boring. The companions have been OP for years now and had outright trivialized content. The fact that my companions could solo a champion level mob was absolutely ridiculous and should never have been a possibility.

[Raansu]

Well, what is the reward of grinding through that heroic (and almost dying repeatedly for arguments sake). 3 Aquatic resource matrices (of which you need at least 60 to upgrade your gear) and 10 tech fragments (that you need thousands of to upgrade anything). That is per piece of substandard gear. No reward should equal no risk. A death match in every battle may be exciting for a bit but it quickly becomes boring/tedious when done hundreds of times a day.

 

There's better ways to get those resources than spamming heroics. Oh wait that would require you to do something not solo.....heaven forbid you do anything but solo content in a MMO.

 

Also, heroics are "tedious" solo because its almost like that "2" means you're supposed to *gasp* group up with another player because heroics were designed for *gasp* 2-4 player groups.

Edited March 1, 2022 by Raansu

[MishaCantu]

But also don't mistake difficulty with plain tedious.

 

^^This. The thing is these are dailies. Repetitive activities should be fast. Even in real life daily chores are more efficient and rewarding when made easier. Dishwashers, washing machines, vacuum cleaners, all daily stuff we want to get done fast.

 

This is no different. Yes, OPS should be difficult, flashpoints and uprisings also. But something to be repeated daily shouldn't be a slog. Get in, get it done, get out. It shouldn't be gated behind lousy drop rates or artificial difficulty.

[DWho]

Maybe use your head a little?

 

Its called balance. No one is asking for the game to be uber difficult, people just don't want it to be stupid levels of boring. The companions have been OP for years now and had outright trivialized content. The fact that my companions could solo a champion level mob was absolutely ridiculous and should never have been a possibility.

 

Maybe have some empathy for the people who are struggling instead of worrying about what other people find to be fun. Now its balance, I thought it was "challenge". Well as far as balance goes, the game is out of balance. With the companion nerf there are major differences in the performance of certain classes in the same content with the same gear that weren't there before.

[DWho]

There's better ways to get those resources than spamming heroics. Oh wait that would require you to do something not solo.....heaven forbid you do anything but solo content in a MMO.

 

Also, heroics are "tedious" solo because its almost like that "2" means you're supposed to *gasp* group up with another player because heroics were designed for *gasp* 2-4 player groups.

 

Heroics 2s haven't required two characters for over 5 years and that was a change Bioware made specifically to give solo players something to do with conquest. One wonders if you even play the game if you don't know that.

[juliushorst]

Also, heroics are "tedious" solo because its almost like that "2" means you're supposed to *gasp* group up with another player because heroics were designed for *gasp* 2-4 player groups.

 

It doesn't. It was explained around 4.0 that it now means "player with companion".

[Raansu]

Maybe have some empathy for the people who are struggling instead of worrying about what other people find to be fun. Now its balance, I thought it was "challenge". Well as far as balance goes, the game is out of balance. With the companion nerf there are major differences in the performance of certain classes in the same content with the same gear that weren't there before.

 

Empathy isn't real. Its the projection of self involvement and the ultimate form of narcissism.

 

If you're struggling to clear heroics then that is a you problem and you need to learn how to play the game.

[juliushorst]

If you're struggling to clear heroics then that is a you problem and you need to learn how to play the game.

 

Product being made unenjoyable for the customer is a company's problem and it's company's responsibility to fix it if they want to maintain their customer base. So, me not enjoying the game with the new scaling is not a me problem, it's a BW's problem. If their product brings me no joy why should I pay for it?

[DWho]

Product being made unenjoyable for the customer is a company's problem and it's company's responsibility to fix it if they want to maintain their customer base. So, me not enjoying the game with the new scaling is not a me problem, it's a BW's problem. If their product brings me no joy why should I pay for it?

 

Stop feeding the troll. He doesn't understand the content he is talking about. He thought H2s were group content and thinks that the game was more challenging back in the days of 1.0. Back in the day, the content was even more "trivialized" because all you had to do was outlevel your opponent by 5 or 6 levels and they couldn't even damage you (you didn't even need a companion for it). Back then you could solo H4s, Flashpoints, and World Bosses. If one wants to talk about trivialization of content, 1.0 was king. The powerful companions in 6.0 were no different than the outleveled content in 1.0. You maybe didn't get the xp for the outleveled content (and most people doing them now aren't getting xp because they are max level) but you still got the full rewards whether you did a level 20 heroic at level 20 or level 50.

 

The most concerning part of the companion nerf is that now influence you spent time and credits building has almost no impact on the strength of your companion. You saved the galaxy half a dozen times but an imperial grunt can kill you in a few shots, not very heroic feeling.

Edited March 1, 2022 by DWho

[TheRealKingCrazy]

Well, this thread went downhill quickly...I see gaming has a long way to go to address the elitism/ableism present in the community.

 

And yes, MMOs are meant to be social, but if you value social aspect with complete strangers that much, I know of at least 6 places in my town (to say nothing of the workplaces in other towns/cities) that would love to hire you and put you in front of guests/customers on Day 1.