7.0 Follow Up

[juliushorst]

About companion strength, we’re investigating why they are underperforming in level-synced content.

 

Thank you! I you would also investigate why our actual characters are underperforming (hint: capped alacrity) and why new gear is useless in level-synced areas it would be amazing.

 

With respect to modernizing our UI, we know this is an area where opinions are going to vary widely, and we don’t expect that to change. However, these updates are vital to the ongoing success of SWTOR as technology continues to improve far beyond where it was when the game shipped, such as monitor resolutions or GPUs being faster and having more memory. We know UI changes must be evolutionary and we need to ensure consistency, improved experience, and just better overall flow.

 

OK. I don't think there is any way to make me like the new UI better than the old one but (in my opinion) ugly UI is something I can live with as long as the game is fun.

[Damask_Rose]

 

With respect to modernizing our UI, we know this is an area where opinions are going to vary widely, and we don’t expect that to change. However, these updates are vital to the ongoing success of SWTOR as technology continues to improve far beyond where it was when the game shipped, such as monitor resolutions or GPUs being faster and having more memory. We know UI changes must be evolutionary and we need to ensure consistency, improved experience, and just better overall flow.

 

--Keith-

 

Dear Keith,

 

Lets discuss this some more.

 

I'm all for changes that will make the game play more smoothly on more systems , but clearly the vast majority of the changes made to the UI had nothing to do with performance. Performance is worse than before. Since the vast majority of the changes made are purely aesthetic, and widely hated by your player-base, are you going to put your money where your mouth is? What are you going to do to improve the player experience that has been eroded? What are you doing to improve flow? 'Cause I got to say, there is no flow at all right now.

 

Even when you fix the myriad of little bugs introduced with the UI change, using the new UI is jarring. Every. Single. Time. The palate change should be a little step in the right direction, time will tell. Are you also going to adjust the line spacing since the wider spacing is also causing players physical discomfort? Ditto the font? Any reason you can't decouple the inventory screen from the character sheet? It is super annoying having my inventory open when I don't need it to be. (None of the little bugs made it onto your earlier list. Dare I hope they are being addressed in 7.0.1?)

 

Any thought as to letting us change our avatar's stance and angle on the character sheet? That's what drives me bat **** crazy! The bouncing combat stance gives me anxiety, as does the weird top-down angle. Maybe it's an OCD thing? All I know is I want so badly to fix the angle and click off combat stance. I'd rather not see my avatar at all, than have to watch her constantly bouncing back and forth. You can't claim that change had anything to do with improving performance, improving the experience, or better flow.

 

A significant portion of your player-base is afraid of the future UI changes you are planning on making. Can you assure us that the changes won't double-down on what we hate about the ones we already got?

[juliushorst]

If Jackie cannot even share any first thoughts about 7.1, this means that the patch isn't even on the drawing board yet. You're optimistic regarding summertime. They will do the March patch. Then they will have one patch with more bugfixes and adjustments (in regards to what Mr. Schmidt wrote) which will come in May/June. Then there'll be the summer break, so we're speaking about September as the earliest release date for 7.1. Please, someone quote me when you find out that I was right. I won't be able to call it out myself anymore after tomorrow.

 

I believe parts of the operation (main part of 7.1) are already on PTS.

[Damask_Rose]

I believe parts of the operation (main part of 7.1) are already on PTS.

 

That's a matter of opinion In my circle of friends weapons in the outfit designer is far more important than an operation they will never do.

[juliushorst]

That's a matter of opinion In my circle of friends weapons in the outfit designer is far more important than an operation they will never do.

 

I'm in the same camp But I meant "meat \ main part" as "content" opposed to "bugfix" (outfid designer issue is, in my opinion, a bugfix).

Edited March 11, 2022 by juliushorst

[Gwena]

Some thoughts:

 

About companion strength, we’re investigating why they are underperforming in level-synced content.

 

With respect to modernizing our UI, we know this is an area where opinions are going to vary widely, and we don’t expect that to change. However, these updates are vital to the ongoing success of SWTOR as technology continues to improve far beyond where it was when the game shipped, such as monitor resolutions or GPUs being faster and having more memory. We know UI changes must be evolutionary and we need to ensure consistency, improved experience, and just better overall flow.

 

We are listening and will continue to make adjustments based on your feedback. We are hopeful as we release patches, we’ll find a balance between updated designs, making adjustments, and ensuring your play experience is enjoyable.

 

--Keith-

 

Thank you so much for your reply! I am very happy to hear that you are looking into the issue with Companions, that gives me hope.

 

As for the UI, my main concern is that it be easy on the eyes, as in, not hard to look at, with comfortable contrast and all that other stuff that is the UI equivalent of having good ergonomics so that it doesn't induce migraines or cause a lot of eye strain. Shiny new visuals can be really neat, provided they are designed with these things in mind. I'm glad to see in the PTS notes that the new UI is getting some adjustments in this regard, I just hope future improvements to the UI are designed more carefully to avoid things like the issue with the new inventory giving people headaches.

[iopseal]

All the old interface needed, was a new tab that offered ‘loadouts’ instead of the outfit designer. They could have gone wild, and added a third tab for character appearance too. They could have literally copy/pasted the project code, form layout, and connected the database to the new locations, had it done in a week. You have to wonder, who decided it was a priority to move the buttons for the inventory, disassembly tool, etc from the left side of the inventory window to a much less obvious space above the inventory blocks, in the same inventory window. They created a job number, and assigned dev hours, to move buttons from the upper left, to the left top. Uhh… Like, who ever sat around and said “gee those buttons off to the left, really must be moved, immediately’?

 

I just … don’t get their priorities, why they chose to ignore their own source material (KOTOR, KOTOR II, and SWTOR itself) in favor of (poorly) implementing features that other games that are not remotely related, have. Whomever asked for login awards? A ‘galactic season’? Again, why, and who was this for? That stuff didn’t move the story forward, nor did it help ‘reduce complexity’, which always seems to be the fallback answer for pruning stuff that makes SWTOR worth playing, that makes it unique. I just … don’t get it.

 

Completely agree with everything you said, the devs are look at this game like building planners who have never visited the site they're trying to develop, it's abstract reasoning ignoring the real reason why people enjoy this game.

[eabevella]

Some thoughts:

 

About companion strength, we’re investigating why they are underperforming in level-synced content.

 

With respect to modernizing our UI, we know this is an area where opinions are going to vary widely, and we don’t expect that to change. However, these updates are vital to the ongoing success of SWTOR as technology continues to improve far beyond where it was when the game shipped, such as monitor resolutions or GPUs being faster and having more memory. We know UI changes must be evolutionary and we need to ensure consistency, improved experience, and just better overall flow.

 

We are listening and will continue to make adjustments based on your feedback. We are hopeful as we release patches, we’ll find a balance between updated designs, making adjustments, and ensuring your play experience is enjoyable.

 

--Keith-

 

Again, you managed to shift and dodge. People almost universally hate the new UI because:

 

It hurts their eyes (Visual Design 101: DONT. HURT. PEOPLE'S. EYES.)

It isn't intuitive at all (judging by the 39730275th people asking "where is my mounts?!" on the fleet chat).

It blocks the whole screen (not everyone is using a 50" screen to play a PC game).

 

Those are not """opinions""". Those are amateurish mistakes.

Not to mention that even though "art" is subjective, but in many cases, ugly is ugly.

Oh, and it really doesn't bring significant improvement to performance or whatsoever.

Own it up, said you've made a mistake, and work to improve it (at least the UI contrast is going to be changed).

[iopseal]

Own it up, said you've made a mistake, and work to improve it (at least the UI contrast is going to be changed).

 

How long do we have to wait for that though?

[Muckbeast]

Some thoughts:

 

About companion strength, we’re investigating why they are underperforming in level-synced content.

 

That is encouraging but are you aware that level-sync is already obliterating player stats?

 

What is the point of gaining levels or getting gear if it makes you weaker?

 

Level 80 Experiment. Fleet vs. Tatooine.

 

https://imgur.com/ZbgPjPf.jpg

 

Stats in Fleet:

Acc: 110.06%

Crit: 36.59%

Alac: 7.42%

 

Stats in Tatooine:

Acc: 115.65%

Crit: 27.97%

Alac: 2.35%

 

Change:

Acc: Gain 5.59% (why?!?!?! useless)

Crit: Lose 8.62%

Alac: Lose 5.07%

 

Level 75 Experiment. Fleet vs. Taris.

 

https://imgur.com/2VsRVXT.jpg

 

Stats in Fleet:

Acc: 110.62%

Crit: 45.89%

Alac: 7.56%

 

Stats in Taris:

Acc: 103.7%

Crit: 24.2%

Alac: 1.38%

 

(Had to mouse over alacrity stat to see the actual alacrity %.)

 

Change:

Acc: Lose 6.92%

Crit: Lose 21.69% <=== ?!?!?!?! BRUTAL!

Alac: Lose 6.18% <=== rip GCDs

 

This makes solo, story, conquest content a lot less fun as it makes your gear and levels feel worthless or even a bad thing.

 

How did this make it to live without someone at least teleporting down to a planet ONCE to see what happened to their stats?

[Muckbeast]

As a returning player as of a few weeks ago, this game is in a very very very bad state for new players. I jumped in with an old level 65 character from years ago and experienced endless bugs with the storyline, including several quests that were overtuned and nearly impossible. The gear scaling and allocation of items based on class/spec pre-75 is terrible and feels not rewarding, as I'm willing to bet it hasn't been looked at in years.

 

Scaling is an absolute progression ruining disaster right now.

 

Level 80 Experiment. Fleet vs. Tatooine.

 

https://imgur.com/ZbgPjPf.jpg

 

Stats in Fleet:

Acc: 110.06%

Crit: 36.59%

Alac: 7.42%

 

Stats in Tatooine:

Acc: 115.65%

Crit: 27.97%

Alac: 2.35%

 

Change:

Acc: Gain 5.59% (why?!?!?! useless)

Crit: Lose 8.62%

Alac: Lose 5.07%

 

Level 75 Experiment. Fleet vs. Taris.

 

https://imgur.com/2VsRVXT.jpg

 

Stats in Fleet:

Acc: 110.62%

Crit: 45.89%

Alac: 7.56%

 

Stats in Taris:

Acc: 103.7%

Crit: 24.2%

Alac: 1.38%

 

(Had to mouse over alacrity stat to see the actual alacrity %.)

 

Change:

Acc: Lose 6.92%

Crit: Lose 21.69% <=== ?!?!?!?! BRUTAL!

Alac: Lose 6.18% <=== rip GCDs

 

This makes solo, story, conquest content a lot less fun as it makes your gear and levels feel worthless or even a bad thing.

 

How did this make it to live without someone at least teleporting down to a planet ONCE to see what happened to their stats?

[Muckbeast]

The thing is these mission were supposed for 2 people. Now you are not overpowered anymore and everything feels a little bit more difficult and takes more time if you do it alone. Team Up for harder h2 missions or just run dailies/solo content

 

Yeah, and guess what: your companion counts as one of those 2. So says Bioware:

 

Absolutely! It certainly may be a bit more challenging than before but you can complete them. The intent is that you can complete any [Heroic 2] with your Companion counting as one of the two. If you find this isn't true for any Heroics tomorrow, let us know.

 

-eric

 

 

https://www.swtor.com/community/showthread.php?p=8622573#post8622573

[Muckbeast]

In my experience, grinding content is usually designed for solo play and socialization is predominantly done at hubs.

 

This is absolutely true and in the game development world we have a term for this:

 

PLAYING ALONE TOGETHER.

 

https://massivelyop.com/2017/10/29/this-is-why-playing-alone-together-still-makes-you-feel-connected-but-is-it-helping/

 

Yes, come content is actively played together, but part of the virtual world aspect of MMOs is that you can do activities solo, duo, or in a group - your choice. There should be equally valid and progression-friendly content for all styles of play.

[JianSarys]

Some thoughts:

 

About companion strength, we’re investigating why they are underperforming in level-synced content.

 

With respect to modernizing our UI, we know this is an area where opinions are going to vary widely, and we don’t expect that to change. However, these updates are vital to the ongoing success of SWTOR as technology continues to improve far beyond where it was when the game shipped, such as monitor resolutions or GPUs being faster and having more memory. We know UI changes must be evolutionary and we need to ensure consistency, improved experience, and just better overall flow.

 

We are listening and will continue to make adjustments based on your feedback. We are hopeful as we release patches, we’ll find a balance between updated designs, making adjustments, and ensuring your play experience is enjoyable.

 

--Keith-

 

It looks horrible, so I'm not sure how that's evolutionary. You change stuff to make it better, not worse, and if it's working perfectly to begin with, you don't change it at all. I know now every was lucky enough to be raised with a father, but there must have been some male figure in your life to tell you "If ain't broke, don't fix it!" smh

If you really want to improve on the game then fix stuff you have been ignoring for years such as, camera suddenly pointing to the ceiling, cutscenes where your cape goes through your body, falling through a floor, and if you must add a feature, a turn off companion voice while we give them 1000 gifts would be nice.

[Falensawino]

 

With respect to modernizing our UI, we know this is an area where opinions are going to vary widely, and we don’t expect that to change. However, these updates are vital to the ongoing success of SWTOR as technology continues to improve far beyond where it was when the game shipped, such as monitor resolutions or GPUs being faster and having more memory. We know UI changes must be evolutionary and we need to ensure consistency, improved experience, and just better overall flow.

 

We are listening and will continue to make adjustments based on your feedback. We are hopeful as we release patches, we’ll find a balance between updated designs, making adjustments, and ensuring your play experience is enjoyable.

 

--Keith-

can we address why the deconstruction rewards text is so darn dark? I can't read this without putting my face up to my monitor

 

https://i.imgur.com/nigzU0P.png

Edited March 11, 2022 by Falensawino

[GuerillaTech]

I agree about wanting to have it already fixed, but I also know we haven't stopped trying to replicate it so we can get it resolved. We have tons of data, but if there's any additional clues you can send us, or possibly a video of your particular encounter, that will help. I am truly sorry it's taking so long to get this and many other changes released. Thank you for your and everyone's help on our Public Test Server.

 

 

Hey Keith. Here's a video of Relentless Assault killing my character. Playing as an operative and getting into close range at the start of the encounter made this easily reproducible.

[LordPaulusCobris]

Some thoughts:

 

About companion strength, we’re investigating why they are underperforming in level-synced content.

 

With respect to modernizing our UI, we know this is an area where opinions are going to vary widely, and we don’t expect that to change. However, these updates are vital to the ongoing success of SWTOR as technology continues to improve far beyond where it was when the game shipped, such as monitor resolutions or GPUs being faster and having more memory. We know UI changes must be evolutionary and we need to ensure consistency, improved experience, and just better overall flow.

 

We are listening and will continue to make adjustments based on your feedback. We are hopeful as we release patches, we’ll find a balance between updated designs, making adjustments, and ensuring your play experience is enjoyable.

 

--Keith-

 

How hipocrit of you to say that to us...

Don´t you know... don´t fix what is not broken? The scaling on the template does work well even in 4k!

 

So don´t give us some random BS about tech... that is laughfable when you are using alpha code of an ancient hero engine...

 

How about complete revamp to later versions of the hero engine? Sorry... you dev team simply don´t have the skills to pull it off...

 

I have worked with the Hero Engine and Hero Engine 2 for many years and i know the need to have skilled personel to update and keep all functions working was it should...

Messing around will break many sub functions and debugging then will be a pain in the ***...

 

Yes iterate... yes evolve... but on things that are really in need of change... and the UI was not one of them...

 

So if you are listening... where is the Expansion? Im still waiting for the "epic" and Bioware Story that i was promissed a long long time ago...

 

Its seems Bioware Magic , is not working very well for this title...

To EA i say... New leadership on this project and in Bioware Austin is needed...

 

The lack of vision is evident for these last years...

Change is needed and FAST, before this game is unrecoverable...

 

LPC

[fushnchips]

How hipocrit of you to say that to us...

Don´t you know... don´t fix what is not broken? The scaling on the template does work well even in 4k!

 

So don´t give us some random BS about tech... that is laughfable when you are using alpha code of an ancient hero engine...

 

How about complete revamp to later versions of the hero engine? Sorry... you dev team simply don´t have the skills to pull it off...

 

I have worked with the Hero Engine and Hero Engine 2 for many years and i know the need to have skilled personel to update and keep all functions working was it should...

Messing around will break many sub functions and debugging then will be a pain in the ***...

 

Yes iterate... yes evolve... but on things that are really in need of change... and the UI was not one of them...

 

So if you are listening... where is the Expansion? Im still waiting for the "epic" and Bioware Story that i was promissed a long long time ago...

 

Its seems Bioware Magic , is not working very well for this title...

To EA i say... New leadership on this project and in Bioware Austin is needed...

 

The lack of vision is evident for these last years...

Change is needed and FAST, before this game is unrecoverable...

 

LPC

 

100% all of the SWTOR teams need to be accountable for this it's a disgrace and wasn't an expansion at all so I'm still waiting for an expansion.

[Carba]

"opinions vary widely" ????

not among customers

[Nee-Elder]

"opinions vary widely" ????

not among customers

 

Yeah i mean, sure there are some more measured (less raged) $ubscribers like me who are still enjoying SWTOR while still i'm pleading with the Devs to answer important (and "critical" ) type questions.

 

And sure, there's a significant group of players who barely even read the Launcher much less these Forums.

 

But otherwise, i think it's pretty clear the majority of customers are essentially unhappy or let's say perplexed with 7.0 (at least, until 7.0.1 arrives and/or 7.1 arrives later ) .

 

p.s. Keith, if you're still reading this thread, please see my very legitimate question to you on page 2. Thanks.

[DarthEccen]

Hello SWTOR Community,

The biggest offender of this issue is when Malgus is pulling or pushing the player. This creates one of two possibilities: something in the game is causing the player to take a substantial, unintended spike of damage which kills them, or the movement of their character is causing them to hit something we call a “death volume”. This is a space built into all environments that if a player enters, kills them instantly. In this case, this area is used as a mechanism to ensure players don’t ever get stuck in the environment. We have done explorations of the death volumes, combat triggers, the ballistics on Malgus’s attacks, and none of these appears to be the culprit. The bug remains so our hunt for a fix continues.

 

This bug also occurs (although much more rarely) on the first boss fight, and during the cutscene after you interact with Malgus (assuming this horrendous bug doesn't stop you from beating him). The latter occurs 100% of the time. I literally hear my character cry out in agony as it falls through the terrain, in spite of the cutscene continuing unabated. On one occasion, a Shadow Stride caused me to fall through the map for about 60 seconds before I actually died. And pushes of any kind initiated by the player seem to be able to do this to trash mobs.

 

I don't want to upend your investigation/troubleshooting process, or anything, but it really seems like the problem isn't with the attacks that are occurring. It's with the terrain. Or at least, that's the bottom denominator.

Edited March 11, 2022 by DarthEccen

[iopseal]

Yeah i mean, sure there are some more measured (less raged) $ubscribers like me who are still enjoying SWTOR while still i'm pleading with the Devs to answer important (and "critical" ) type questions.

 

And sure, there's a significant group of players who barely even read the Launcher much less these Forums.

 

But otherwise, i think it's pretty clear the majority of customers are essentially unhappy or let's say perplexed with 7.0 (at least, until 7.0.1 arrives and/or 7.1 arrives later ) .

 

p.s. Keith, if you're still reading this thread, please see my very legitimate question to you on page 2. Thanks.

 

I don't think they're going to see them backing down and admitting to their mistake anytime soon, its too tied into their "vison" and so they don't want to be seen as to admit defeat. So they're gonna try to placate us with promises of fixes while hoping it will distract us from the short comings of their "vision".

[Totemdancer]

I don't think they're going to see them backing down and admitting to their mistake anytime soon, its too tied into their "vison" and so they don't want to be seen as to admit defeat. So they're gonna try to placate us with promises of fixes while hoping it will distract us from the short comings of their "vision".

 

That will only happen if more players leave and the only way to stop bleeding players is to humble themselves. We’ll have to wait and see what happens to player numbers over the next 5-8 weeks

If 7.0.1 doesn’t stop the bleed, EA or BioWare upper management might make some leadership changes like they did when Ben Irving tried to kill the game with 5.0. If I remember correctly they did that around April / May last time.

[Tressith]

Keith,

 

I want to be encouraged by what you've been posting but you're not making it easy! The communication coming out of the trenches right now is, honestly, very bad! There are multiple confirmed game-breaking bugs (group phases violently desyncing and tutorials coming up blank among them) and for some reason, your team has decided to stop updating the Known Issues thread. Why? I can't even have confidence you're actually working on fixes in this strangely overdue patch if you won't acknowledge you have bugs. And that's putting aside the fact that many of these bugs were noticed and reported in the PTS. I think people who put money in this game deserve to know what happened that allowed these reported issues make it into a live environment. It suggests serious managerial disfunction behind the scenes.

 

And those are just the communication problems prior to your follow up post. Which seems to even double down on some of the problems players have identified since 7.0 has gone live. The UI issues people are reporting aren't a simply a difference of vision. It's true that they violate basic design principles, and it's true that they are causing a portion of the player population terrible eyestrain and headaches. Besides which, it's capable of less than the old UI was, and that's not a matter of staggered rollout. And it's not streamlined - a streamlined character window wouldn't take up my entire monitor and wouldn't have this much dead space. I can't tell what your vision is based on the deliberate changes we've seen in 7.0. If you feel like players dislike the changes because they can't see the big picture... That's a communication problem! The best hint you give about what that vision includes is:

 

"Not only does the launch of Legacy of the Sith begin the journey into updating the game, but this update also opens the doors to new players who have never experienced SWTOR before."

 

Which... If 7.0 was intended to make SWTOR more approachable, it's categorically failed, and not only because of bugs like the missing cinematic text after character creation or blank tutorials! The simple ability pruning and spreading out of ability acquisition is, frankly, new player hostile. I don't think any class gets a full attack rotation before leaving their capital planet; some have to wait until level 50, which is usually when they're finishing up their class story. Some people may not even get their class-defining ability before they're done with their class story. Snipers can actually just miss their orbital bombardment entirely, because of how the new ability tree system works! Combine that with the ballooning time to kill on basic mobs because of the newly introduced stat scaling, and the general state of PvE balance, I struggle to think of a worse time to be a new player. Launch, perhaps, back when I started. Frankly, when I've been talking to potential players, I've been warning them away. It sucks to be put in that position!

 

I really want to be optimistic about the future of this game but you're making it very hard to be. Your posts don't even read like someone who's trying to meet players where they are - they read much more like a tired parent chiding their children about eating vegetables. And that really, really worries me.

[americanaussie]

Hey Keith. Here's a video of Relentless Assault killing my character. Playing as an operative and getting into close range at the start of the encounter made this easily reproducible.

 

I also have a video of it too. I noticed once that Malgus goes invisible with just his saber visible right before it happens.

Recommend removing the ability if you cannot get to the bottom of it. That was annoying. It's been like a month. It's not very fun letting my companions fight the battle for me which is what I did to avoid the bug.