The Reflections of the Cold Moon mission is a mobile game tactic designed to get players to unlock the companion account wide

[remylion]

First, meditating is a waste of 2 minutes staring at your screen while your character does nothing. This is not fun or engaging.

Second, you add a 10 minute cooldown on "meditation". The only reason this exists is to try and get people to unlock Amity account wide so other characters can meditate skipping the 10 minute cooldown. And you have to mediate 4 times?

SWTOR is now using mobile game tactics to keep players "engaged" and spending CC to bypass the 10 minute cooldown.

What other mobile game tactics have you woven into Galactic Season 4?

Edited March 29, 2023 by remylion

[Estelindis]

I was stunned to see that this cooldown persists over logout.  Why shouldn't we be able to avoid the wait by logging out and returning the next day?

[arunav]

I just played the game, and finished 7 weeklies that were worth more season points. The meditation objective is only worth 8. There are several that are worth 12. Do 1 or more of those instead, as it finishes the track quicker. 

I do think that the unlock cost for the season companion is too high. It should be 10 CCs. Better yet, 1 CC. Why does it cost 60 CCs, when it's impossible, as far as I can tell, to recruit on more than 1 character via regular gameplay? 

[ShadowyKai]

... Is THAT what the "Reflections of the Cold Moon" objective is?

I haven't been in the game since the update yesterday, because I am one of the unlucky people who cannot get the launcher to work, despite downloading the DirectX 9 files, turning off compatibility modes, and adding the SW:TOR Launcher to firewall permissions.

I had been wondering what this objective was. I didn't know what "Earn Meditation Points across the Galaxy with Amity as your companion" meant. I figured maybe it was like the "Syndicate Infighting" objective in Galactic Season 2, when you had to get a disguise from a crate and then click on consoles or defeat Syndicate mobs while disguised.

But seriously, all you do is sit and wait for two minutes while somebody meditates? And the cooldown on it doesn't even continue while you're logged out?

Wow, that's lame even for Bioware.

[Stradlin]

6 hours ago, remylion said:

First, meditating is a waste of 2 minutes staring at your screen while your character does nothing. This is not fun or engaging.

Second, you add a 10 minute cooldown on "meditation". The only reason this exists is to try and get people to unlock Amity account wide so other characters can meditate skipping the 10 minute cooldown. And you have to mediate 4 times?

 

The meditation thing is unironically among my  personal favorites when it comes to  "little things BW has recently  added". It is, again  unironically, about the friends you make along the way. 10 or so people gathered on same screen, all tied to same menial task, with nothing much else to do besides check eachother out and talk to one another. The whole thing, the whole point  is about making this happen.  Omg  I've already provided so much stupid trollish self help  new age spirit guide drivel to anyone who has had the massive  misfortune to meditate with me."D 

It is BW flirting with pretty standard  sandboxish aspects of mmo game design, which is somethibg they should do much more often. It makes perfect sense and it is perfectly sad people don't recognize it for what it is. Gamers aren't wired for that stuff anymore.

 

Edited March 29, 2023 by Stradlin

[GeneralGyro]

they want you to do something else while you wait , hopefully quick travel to a heroic or something. shave off those 100 credits.

[commanderwar]

I think we need more season objectives like the meditation one

 

However I think the cooldown is stupid and that it persist over log out is just absolutely terrible

[Ardrossan]

Glad y'all are playtesting this. It's a pattern for BW to introduce something very inconvenient and then a few weeks or months later add a QOL fix that doesn't quite fix the problem but at least makes it slightly more tolerable. I'd prefer to wait until that happens and eat the lost GS points. 

[Amodin]

I'm frankly surprised no one has brought up or mentioned the fact that after all this BS talk of reducing credits in the game economy, the only way this Galactic Season to advance in levels besides weekly missions - is to pay with ONLY Cartel Coins now.

The previous three seasons, we could advance with either coins or credits.  Credits aren't even an option this season.  Really?

[ceryxp]

55 minutes ago, GeneralGyro said:

they want you to do something else while you wait , hopefully quick travel to a heroic or something. shave off those 100 credits.

That is what I am doing.  Did Taris to get level one, claimed Amity and did the intro mission.  Then picked up Coruscant heroics weekly.  Went first to the shrine, then did two heroics, cooldown done, back to the shrine, completed heroics, back to the shrine.  Got it done three times without having to stand around.

[ShadowyKai]

7 minutes ago, Amodin said:

I'm frankly surprised no one has brought up or mentioned the fact that after all this BS talk of reducing credits in the game economy, the only way this Galactic Season to advance in levels besides weekly missions - is to pay with ONLY Cartel Coins now.

The previous three seasons, we could advance with either coins or credits.  Credits aren't even an option this season.  Really?

Purchasing Galactic Seasons levels with Credits is an option that becomes available later in the Season, not at the beginning. In Galactic Season 3, the Credits option first became available about a month after the Season started.

[LD_Little_Dragon]

6 minutes ago, Amodin said:

I'm frankly surprised no one has brought up or mentioned the fact that after all this BS talk of reducing credits in the game economy, the only way this Galactic Season to advance in levels besides weekly missions - is to pay with ONLY Cartel Coins now.

The previous three seasons, we could advance with either coins or credits.  Credits aren't even an option this season.  Really?

It's too early.  The credits are a 'catch up' method.  There's nothing to catch up to right now. 

Previous seasons you had wait about a month before the credit unlock options showed up.

 

RE: the mediation objective.

If it's that bad/boring then don't do it.  Bioware keeps adding more mobile type elements to the game because THEY WORK.  Stop making it work for bioware.

[eabevella]

It's not that bad. I just clicked meditate and went watching The Mandalorian. Just had to remember to go back every 15min or so.

[remylion]

10 minutes ago, eabevella said:

It's not that bad. I just clicked meditate and went watching The Mandalorian. Just had to remember to go back every 15min or so.

if I sit down to play SWTOR I shouldn't have a back up form of entertainment to wait out a mission timer of 10 minutes when I have to do 4 of these "meditation" sessions (or more if you are the only one doing this).

[eabevella]

12 minutes ago, remylion said:

if I sit down to play SWTOR I shouldn't have a back up form of entertainment to wait out a mission timer of 10 minutes when I have to do 4 of these "meditation" sessions (or more if you are the only one doing this).

I always have back up entertainment when I'm crafting, waiting for a q to pop, or waiting for whatever pug ops to show up *shrug*

[Amodin]

21 hours ago, LD_Little_Dragon said:

It's too early.  The credits are a 'catch up' method.  There's nothing to catch up to right now. 

Previous seasons you had wait about a month before the credit unlock options showed up.

 

RE: the mediation objective.

If it's that bad/boring then don't do it.  Bioware keeps adding more mobile type elements to the game because THEY WORK.  Stop making it work for bioware.

 

21 hours ago, ShadowyKai said:

Purchasing Galactic Seasons levels with Credits is an option that becomes available later in the Season, not at the beginning. In Galactic Season 3, the Credits option first became available about a month after the Season started.

Ah well for some reason, I have NO memory of that, maybe I just wasn't paying any attention to this, lol.

Still, I do kind of have a valid point about this - why wait the month when they are wanting to adjust economy?  Just allow the Richie Rich people to start purchasing levels.  It's not like it would be an advantage over anyone else...

Oh wait, yeah, we are in an MMO that has to drag our repetitive content.  My bad.

[Darcmoon]

7 hours ago, Amodin said:

 

Ah well for some reason, I have NO memory of that, maybe I just wasn't paying any attention to this, lol.

Still, I do kind of have a valid point about this - why wait the month when they are wanting to adjust economy?  Just allow the Richie Rich people to start purchasing levels.  It's not like it would be an advantage over anyone else...

Oh wait, yeah, we are in an MMO that has to drag our repetitive content.  My bad.

Nah.  They make us wait so that anyone who has to have it NOW, has to buy cartel coins.  They would prefer those get bought than the chance enough people would drop credits to do the unlock.

[CarpeSangrea]

Fortunately for me I didn't even make it a full minute into this quest before noping the hell out.  The "voice" is so aggravating I'm only doing the quest once so I can get the rep and then throwing them out an airlock.

[Shayddow]

It is a Human who was brought up by Selonians so it speaks Selonian. Which again speaks gobbledygook instead of Basic.

One issue is that the unlock for the quest is "recommended" for over level 24.  Then one of the quests takes you to Ilum. (level 50). There is some fighting involved, so someone lower than say 47th level is going to be in deep batha poodoo.

So far I've only done this with max level (80) characters, I won't be doing the quest with lower level characters.

[ThanderSnB]

You can sort of get around the cooldown by using alts, but I noticed the Exhausted debuff does not expire while the character is logged off. You need to be logged in for it to count down. I was going to have 4 alts just sit there with the companion, login once each to finish it, and repeat each time the objective comes around, but because the cooldown doesn't expire offline, I would have to sit there logged in for 10 minutes on all of them. Next time, I will just alternate between Meditating and doing another season objective. By the time I finish the other objective, 10 minutes will pass, so I can Meditate again. It is still tedious going back and forth like that, but at least I won't be waiting 10 minutes.

By the way, having more players around doesn't really do anything. You get the 10 minute cooldown after getting 50-51 points. Whether you get those 50-51 points slow (solo) or fast (other players around), you still have to wait 10 minutes to get the next 50-51. Your channeling time might go from 4 minutes (solo) to 1 minute (other players around), but it's pretty insignificant compared to the 10 minute cooldown.

[Advocatis]

I’m so very glad I participated and read through the post GS3 critique so BW could ignore every single suggestion made to improve the Galactic Seasons Experience.

[Dekibra]

apart from the 10 minute cooldown which is inconvenient and annoying to say the least, I don't get your point at all because:

1. it is 1 out of 10 possible objectives, if you don't like it, don't do it, simple
2. unlocking Amity accountwide has nothing to do with that objective (I for one do it because of the reputation track, which is easy CQ points for all my chars and I play on all servers, so having Amity right away is convenient)
3. and because of 1. and 2. I don't get the mobile game reference at all (maybe I don't play enough of those, so please someone enlighten me)

[tattoohero]

Wow, the whining about this cracks me up because the objective is a weekly not a daily.  No one said you had to do it in one day.   Do it when you first log on, either at the capital of the side you're on or Voss then move on to something else.  Why whine you have to stand.

No, you don't have to stand around for 10 minutes.  You are making that choice.  Nothing stopping you from doing something else, like heroics, go work on something else, to go the other planet you can meditate at:?  

[TahliahCOH]

On 3/29/2023 at 12:36 PM, remylion said:

if I sit down to play SWTOR I shouldn't have a back up form of entertainment to wait out a mission timer of 10 minutes when I have to do 4 of these "meditation" sessions (or more if you are the only one doing this).

You don't actually have to do that, though. It's one of the options, but there are others you can select instead to get the 7 for the week.

I did it just to try it, but I won't be doing it again. It was fun to see everyone standing around (or meditating around), but four times for two minutes with a ten minute cooldown in between each? Naw. Not my thing. I ended up switching to a toon that hadn't picked up the macrobinoculars or seeker droid quests yet, and while I was waiting the ten mins, got those, popped into the Senate tower to do the talks, and by then, it was close enough to ten mins that I went back to the shrine. Still boring as can be, though, so not something I'll be doing ever again.

[remylion]

8 hours ago, TahliahCOH said:

You don't actually have to do that, though. It's one of the options, but there are others you can select instead to get the 7 for the week.

I did it just to try it, but I won't be doing it again. It was fun to see everyone standing around (or meditating around), but four times for two minutes with a ten minute cooldown in between each? Naw. Not my thing. I ended up switching to a toon that hadn't picked up the macrobinoculars or seeker droid quests yet, and while I was waiting the ten mins, got those, popped into the Senate tower to do the talks, and by then, it was close enough to ten mins that I went back to the shrine. Still boring as can be, though, so not something I'll be doing ever again.

I tried this late at night and did it alone on one server and it was super boring.