Planned Class Changes for 7.3

[Kazjan]

34 minutes ago, WayOfTheWarriorx said:

1 hour ago, Kazjan said:

The game been on the decline for years ever since they brought out KOTFE.  Of course it has had some spikes in population during some content update.

I don't think that anyone could deny with a straight face that the game's population has declined over the years. And yeah, KOTFE did quite a number on the population, a lot of people had issues with it. I was one of them, although I didn't leave the game over it, but was very open on the forums on my dislike of it.

My point was only about the "game is ded/dying". We've been hearing people say the game will be dead/gone in a year for the last ten years on the forums heh.

TBH the biggest drop in population was when they decided to get rid of Open world PVP to go to this Arena PVP System that has been the biggest headache since it was launch. I still don't understand why labeling a players Spec was a good idea.  Make absolutely no sense what so ever. 

Oh for those people who weren't around in those days "YES" we had OPEN World PVP System which was actually the best End game content IMO for PVP. Instead of fixing the stability and performance issue they decided to get rid of the whole system.  Oh don't worry they sold the game with Trailer after Trailer with Open world PVP at it focus.  This was a period where guild actually had fun and flourish. 

sorry got off topic 

  17 minutes ago, Faltun said:

  44 minutes ago, WayOfTheWarriorx said:

Yeah, they release game wide population counts in full, month by month, across all servers? Site your source please.

  1 hour ago, Faltun said:

mmo-population.com/r/swtor/stats

There are more, but google is your friend, i hope you know how to use it.

Expand  

I'm sorry that link does not support your debate you kind of of shot your own argument down.  Base off the link YOU provided  the game has increase it population month after month that is not a decline. The F2P model is working so we have to give them credit for that at least.  

However, You're correct 7.0 was not received very well with some of the player base myself included.  But that due to lack of quality that is expected from Star Wars Storytelling/ Lack of innovation when it come to FP/OPS/PVP/ Lack of Creativity with the Reskin of old armor set from the base game and calling them "NEW"

Again, said this in other post them getting rid of that story base FP and going back to old style was a great move they just need to revert to doing what brought them to the dance in the first place.  Now all they have to do is get rid of this KOTFE storytelling and go back to Individual Class Stories.  IMO.

Edited May 16 by Kazjan
double post

[WayOfTheWarriorx]

1 minute ago, Faltun said:

There are changes which cant avoid hurting PvE or PvP like you said, but this shouldnt be one because there are solutions to not to do so. Simply because you can incrase sustained(which incrase a bit of burst too) and reduce burst in he same time on burst ability like off gcd dmg ability... and since ap has the best burst it dosent hurt if its burst is reduced few % in exchagne for a better sustained.

I'm not necessarily against your idea in how to address the buff. But, at the same time, I'm not against the manner in which BW has chosen to address the buff. I get it has very good burst in PVP. But, and this is a but, that's because it has very fast burst windows, they're isn't much 'downtime' between them. But, in terms of individual hits,  they are not putting out the biggest burst numbers per attack, from what I see. Rage has higher burst attacks, Carnage has higher burst attacks and Engineering, well, I think everyone knows what kind of burst they can put out. AP can't reach a burst attack (generally speaking, obviously, sometimes the stars align, relics proc with adrenal, other buffs as well at same time) as high as some of the other burst specs can. 

The problem here is simply you can't have balancing for both and it work out well. I understand your point about how you could effect DPS for PVE with sustained changes, but, it is a burst spec and I think, just my opinion, that's why they are addressing the change in the way that they are. Rage, Carnage, Engineering, they can drop higher burst bombs, so I think they are trying to give AP/Tactics more comparable individual burst attacks.

And who knows, maybe you'll turn out the be right, and it will be too much. If history has shown us anything with regard to balance changes BW makes, they're not exactly known for gentle stokes, they tend to swing the buff/nerf bat hard. They're are some exceptions (arsenal comes to mind), but I said it very early on, it maybe they do have to make a change in 3 months if it turns out to be too much. The changes they made to the tacticals original form does seem reasonable to be me, it does seem like it may be okay. 

You never ever know, until it goes live.

16 minutes ago, Faltun said:

mmo-population.com/r/swtor/stats

There are more, but google is your friend, i hope you know how to use it.

So it to try and back your claim that the game is dying you site a source that shows a massive increase in population in the 6 months.

11/2022 - 107,682.

5/2023 - 223,339.

The game's population has increased by 115, 657 players in the last 6 months. Which means It's more than doubled in population in the last 6 months.

I have to ask, do you know how to use google? Look at your own source.

Subscriber count - 

2023-05

11,754,678

 

Active players -  446,678

....

2018-06

4,153,861

Active Players - 157,847

...

Both of those numbers have done nothing but steadily increase over those last 5 years and they give numbers for every single month, during those last 5 years. It has never dipped down.

Which is interesting considering this seems to totally contradict the original graph chart of population counts over the last 5 years first presented.

It also ends with the following note - 

NOTE

We have only been collecting player information on MMO Populations since 2015. The above data represents our knowledge about estimated player counts, subscribers and popularity for Star Wars: The Old Republic (aka swtor).

"our knowledge about estimated player counts"

Also, this isn't even from Bioware.

 

Please let me know if I'm missing something here, because this makes no sense at all. heh

Given these 2 facts, I'm not inclined to give this much credence. 

37 minutes ago, Faltun said:

Also im traveling quite a lot, have a cool IT job

Lucky bastard. =p

[WayOfTheWarriorx]

38 minutes ago, Kazjan said:

TBH the biggest drop in population was when they decided to get rid of Open world PVP

Please don't remind me. I miss open world PVP.  I loved it. I was flagged 24/7. Was some really cool achievements from it too with cool titles like "Legend in the making."

 

39 minutes ago, Kazjan said:

I'm sorry that link does not support your debate you kind of of shot your own argument down.  Base off the link YOU provided  the game has increase it population month after month that is not a decline. The F2P model is working so we have to give them credit for that at least.  

Okay good, I thought maybe I was missing something when I saw this heh.

 

40 minutes ago, Kazjan said:

Now all they have to do is get rid of this KOTFE storytelling and go back to Individual Class Stories.  IMO.

I knew there was a reason I liked you. 

[WayOfTheWarriorx]

Just now, Faltun said:

dont you see that is a constantly incrasing number and show all subscriber ever subscribed, and not the current subscriber count lol, i think its obvious SWTOR dont have 10 million active subscriber.... You want to look at active players, thats the data we re looking for. And yeah probaly it incrased in the last few months, but is dead compared to 6.0 era and i mean the game is dead since 7.0.

If you look at my previous response I did include the active players. When I saw the subscriber counts, I knew something wasn't right, it's listing 11 million subscribers.

Well the population chart at the top over the last 6 months has increased dramatically. It's more than doubled.

But where they list the numbers, under the chart, that doesn't jive with the chart up top. That lists the active players as steadily increasing month by month over the last 5 years without exception. So I really don't know what to make of it, it's literally self contradicting between the chart and the numbers listed below.

But like I said, this isn't even from bioware and its stated that its just an estimation anyways. I wouldn't put too much to this.

I do agree with you though, there have been population loses at times, when 7.0 first dropped, but I think it has increased in recent months.

It's hard for me to say objectively because I play on Star Forge and Star Forge is great, it doesn't have any population issues.

I do know, at least from what I see said on the forums, at any rate, that the other servers aren't as in good of shape as Star Forge. Star Forge was made from combining 5 old servers, but all the other ones were made from combining 3 old servers, so it stands to reason why it has a more healthy population.

I won't speak for the other 4 servers, I've never been on any of them.

[WayOfTheWarriorx]

5 minutes ago, Faltun said:

On fleet its hard to find grps, removed ranked, On gtn and trade chat hard to find stuff, pop times are long. I think its pretty clear for everyone SWTOR has some serious population problems and yeah once its not worth for them, they re gonna shut down the servers forever.

None of that is the case on Star Forge. Star Forge does not have any of those problems. Again, I won't speak for any of the other 4 servers. I don't play on any of them, I only play on Star Forge. All I can say is that I don't ever see anyone on Star Forge expressing those opinions.

Just out of interest, what server/s do you play on?

Edited May 16 by WayOfTheWarriorx

[Kazjan]

26 minutes ago, Faltun said:

Okay so please read again my post and pls try to think. I wrote these in my posts:

 

"Are we wondering why SWTOR is here in the verge of collapse with 7.0 changes? 

Yes, check the population charts, it reduced drasticly with 7.0 game is on life support and they dont even have resources to put out contents properly. On fleet its hard to find grps, removed ranked, On gtn and trade chat hard to find stuff, pop times are long. I think its pretty clear for everyone SWTOR has some serious population problems and yeah once its not worth for them, they re gonna shut down the servers forever.Yes, check the population charts, it reduced drasticly with 7.0 game is on life support and they dont even have resources to put out contents properly. On fleet its hard to find grps, removed ranked, On gtn and trade chat hard to find stuff, pop times are long. I think its pretty clear for everyone SWTOR has some serious population problems and yeah once its not worth for them, they re gonna shut down the servers forever."

Clearly 100% sure i was writing that the game is dying since 7.0. 

Please now tell me how this chart fail to show that and how my argument fail.....

When you can check 2022-02 when 7.0 realesed and the chart go down.

6.0 lowest is around 150-200k and highest around 450-500k

7.0 lowest is around 100k and highest is around 220k

Game is on life support since 7.0 i said that and the chart proves that but im waiting for you to prove me wrong.... The fact it incrased in the last few months dosnet mean that its not dead compared to what it was in 6.0 era....

 

Let's end this insanity, You are missing one major fact... and that is this game is 12 Years old and for a game that is 12 Years old and to have almost 500k Active Players is amazing. No one is saying that 7.0 wasn't received well we all know it wasn't. But the game is not on the collapse.  

Also, You're going to see decline all the time due to how the development cycle is and that goes for a lot of game. The whole purpose is for player to comeback and try what ever new and once they're done they go back to playing something else. 

Now if we were seeing those numbers for major expansions then that would be something to worry about. 

SWTOR is following the same Development style as FFXIV. Where they release small story update every number patch the only difference is that FFXIV provide Hours on Hours of content where SWTOR provide maybe 3 hours of content and that all. 

 

[sithBracer]

On 5/16/2023 at 11:52 AM, Kazjan said:

Let's end this insanity, You are missing one major fact... and that is this game is 12 Years old and for a game that is 12 Years old and to have almost 500k Active Players is amazing. No one is saying that 7.0 wasn't received well we all know it wasn't. But the game is not on the collapse.  

Also, You're going to see decline all the time due to how the development cycle is and that goes for a lot of game. The whole purpose is for player to comeback and try what ever new and once they're done they go back to playing something else. 

I'm surprised no one realized that a lot of the spikes in 6.X coincided with the mandalorian seasons releases/announcements.

I personally never watched it, but I heard that in season 2 luke skywalker came back, it drove the internet insane and it is most likely responsible for the biggest spike in 6.X. 

 

On 5/16/2023 at 11:05 AM, Faltun said:

dont you see that is a constantly incrasing number and show all subscriber ever subscribed, and not the current subscriber count lol, i think its obvious SWTOR dont have 10 million active subscriber.... You want to look at active players, thats the data we re looking for. And yeah probaly it incrased in the last few months, but is dead compared to 6.0 era and i mean the game is dead since 7.0.

What exactly is your point? The game has been on the decline since they completely screwed up in 5.0. Ben irving magically disappeared and keith was brought in to mitigate the damage as much as possible. They were never able to get back to the population they had before it, a few spikes from the success of the first 2 seasons of the mandalorian did nothing to change that overall. We all know the game is not where it used to be, but you are offering no solutions except begging for class you play to be buffed while others to be nerfed.

Edited May 18 by sithBracer

[sithBracer]

1 hour ago, Faltun said:

i just pointed out that, 7.0 and removing abilities and making the game even dumber and easier clearly hurt the population with 7.0 while 6.0 incrassed the population compared to 5.0. because 6.0 gave more layers and complexity to the combat system.(they added new abilities and tacticals and a ton of mods to customise your gear). Clearly that is the way to go, i mean add things to the game instead remove them.

You have absolutely no evidence to back this up. The release of 7.0 was a disaster with or without ability pruning. There were thousands of bugs, abilities weren't working, phantom GCDs, actual content breaking (esp in the new fp), very little new content, a very unintuitive gearing system which drove people crazy (I was fine with it though), FPs being so hard the average pug couldn't do them (I personally had to get 20k heals on the second boss of the new MM fp just to barely keep up, and this was before we got better gear, unaugmented as well), and this is just the tip of the ice berg. Putting all the problems on "reeeeee muh merc can't stun, muh sniper can't heal roll" or whatever it is you are complaining about this week, is just nonsense.

And I already wrote this, but most of the highest spikes in 6.X coincided with the releases of the mandalorian seasons. They were temporary and dropped right after they appeared, so your "evidence" that 6.X was just omg omg omg amazing is also nonsense.

 

1 hour ago, Faltun said:

you just hate me for some reason, maybe even you dont know why, poor frustrated boy... but you dont put any facts on the table, just saying random things with some tough exaggeration without any proof at all.

 Wow, big head much? I don't know you, I don't care about you. If you became a billionaire, married the love of your life and lived happily ever after I wouldn't care. If you died the most painful horrible death imaginable, I wouldn't care either. I think you are a bad player based on all the nonsense and whining I saw on the forums, but I have absolutely no ill will toward you. Live your best life and find happiness.

[AdjeYo]

1 hour ago, Faltun said:

All i said was that if they incrase PT's sustained dmg which is totally ok, because they need it for pve, that will also incrase its burst in PvP, which is already on top, so they could balance that with few % lower shoulder cannon dmg, so generally they will incrase sustained for pve, but the burst in pvp kinda stay the same. Also i said to reduce the burst dmg on engi. 

With the current tactical I doubt burst will be noticably different. The tactical only buffs Retractable Blade and Magnetic Blast, hardly heavy hitters. I see no need to tune down AP's burst. Yeah they have very high burst, but they're supposed to.

[toomanyluigis]

Wasn't this a class balance feedback discussion? When did this topic suddenly dive into how many subscribers swtor has now or just bickering between each other?

Can we just discuss class changes?

Arsenal needs a dmg buff, we are parsing too low to be considered for NiM raids and are kicked from groups due to our poor damage. Restoring the +10% dmg to barrage like it used to would go a long way. Also 3 stacks on the new tactical wont change much. After the bug we had this week that caused it to give 6 stacks my dps jumped to 28k. A much better output and not OP compared to other burst classes.

[SentinalMasterWW]

Getting back on Track, I'm surprised no one has brought this spec up for PVP, but I think Hatred/Serenity need some PVP buffs. 

Let me be clear, Their DMG is top tier, So that area is fine. 

Their problem is survivability. 

If I were to offer some PVP choices for Combat styles here are some ways 

-Give this spec Deathrband/Shifted Balance, I know it sounds weird given my hate towards Madness/Balance but Hatred/Serenity makes sense to have this ability as a snare given that they are a melee. Deathbrand is obnoxious because its on a ranged spec which really does not need a snare. 

For Serenity Strike/Leaching strike here are some options 

-Give this ability its root back, Serenity really does not have a strong immobilize ability for getting kills, Force slow works okayish but having a straight immobilize on its core ability would help. 

-Change leaching strike/Serenity strike to always hit, One problem that can get annoying is that this ability often misses. Compare that to force leach which always hits. 

-Buff the DMG/self healing done by at least 5-6K, This spec has no off healing capabilities compared to madness/Balance, This spec literally lives via its health stealing abilities. 

When it comes to other stuff 

-Double Cleaving cuts DMG and its life steal, No one is going to pick cleaving cut, its really pathetic the amount of Health you get. If it did around 12-15K DMG with 100% life steal, than it might be worth picking up for PVP and maybe PVE. 

-Buff Battle Mediation/Overload saber for any of the sins specs, BM is so terrible, the health recovery would be nice but the 15% is not enough, I'd make it 30%.  

-For hatred/Serenity I'd look at making saber reflect, give some health regen when hit moreso akin to Mara's, where it only regens like 1% every sec or so. 

 

 

[afwhoefuwov]

For Immortal/Defense, I would recommend bringing back the Lord of Pain's Threatening Scream.  If you AOE taunt, your DR increases by 2.5% for each enemy it hits.  Perhaps, make this an Implant, or better, make it a passive so players can choose this or the taunted damage. 

[Nee-Elder]

33 minutes ago, Faltun said:

 but forced to leave veterans who couldnt stand the simple and dumb gameplay that lost all of its layers and complexity.

Sure, but that ^ happened a lonnnnnggg time ago in an Update far far away. (  either 3.0 or 4.0 , whichever one removed the original 'skill trees' system )

[WayOfTheWarriorx]

1 hour ago, Faltun said:

Well, well.... i hope you checked the news. Guess who was right about the game is being on life support! Here we re.... SWTOR is going on maintenance mode soon and will be stuck in one of the most horrible expansions til they shut down the servers forever which is clearly not so far after an mmorpg step into this stage of its lifespan....
 

Who would've thought that after they removed abilities and dumbed down the game systematically to the ground step by step... hoping that will bring new players to the game, clearly these horrible changes didnt bring in any players(the new players didnt come or stay because the game was simpler) but forced to leave veterans who couldnt stand the simple and dumb gameplay that lost all of its layers and complexity. 

Ain't over yet.

The other MMOS under Broadsword have been going on for years after they were moved over there.

7.3 aint even out yet, and 7.4 won't be for a good long while yet.

No where in that news was it even intimated that the game will be shutting down.

Game was already on life-support with the drips and drabs of new story content.

I'm a veteran, I'm still here.

I think you've confused me with some fanboy. This game isn't, nor has it ever been real Star Wars.

Edited June 7 by WayOfTheWarriorx

[Nee-Elder]

On 5/23/2023 at 5:00 PM, SentinalMasterWW said:

Getting back on Track,

Looks like the feedback was received ( somewhat ) and decisions were made for tomorrow: https://www.swtor.com/patchnotes/06132023/game-update-7.3-old-wounds

[SentinalMasterWW]

So with 7.3 being out for a bit, I wanted to leave feedback regarding some of the Class Changes and what else Bioware needs to do. 

Sniper/Slingers 

The Return of Vital Regulators is appreciated, It definatly helps in PVP having some Recovery rather than any DMG Dealt is permanent until you exit combat and heal up or just die. If there is more Class changes to come soon, I would like to see Roll Heal possibly be added back into the Vital Regulators passive, However I would like to have it on the PTS to see if its to OP. 

Regarding Possible Changes, I'd Like to see Ionic Tactical get Reworked since Neural Trigger got reworked as well. The 50% DMG bonus should be removed, Engi/Sab already have a lot of Crit built into their Spec. Ionic is basically the Neural Trigger tactical for Snipers/Slingers, Everyone runs it because it gets easy 140K Hits. 

Class balancing wise, Marksman/Sharpshooter need some attention, they are still bottom of the barrel for both PVE & PVP. 

Mercenary/Commando 

The Redone Stealth probes are okay, Personally I'd like to see the Accuracy Debuff on Mercs/Commandos instead of VG/PT's as their tanks already have an Accuracy Debuff ability. 

The Redone Package is also decent, I don't really notice to much of a difference compared to the old random charge package. 

I do wish though for them to Redo the Target Elimiators Package, It is a really bad package, The 2% DMG increase is pathetic alongside the long wait time.

I'd also like in the Future for the old Apex Predator set to return as a legendary Implant, This one would mainly be meant for Gunnery/Arsenal but it would help in their DMG Department, and perhaps pull them out of the muck. Concentrated Fire is nice, but Apex would greatly benefit those who play Arsenal/Gunnery. 

Ignoring these two and just doing plain Class Buffs, Arsenal/Gunnery need them, A lot of player left feedback saying that these specs need them as they are bottom of the barrel in PVE, okay in PVP. 

Sorcs/Sages

The nerf to Madness was a Start with Deathbrand, but I do think their self heals should be lowered a bit. DMG can be fine, but the Self healing should be tweaked down a bit. 

The buff to Lightning is eh, Its alright. Even with the nerfs Lightning/TK got a while back, the spec is still okay. 

I do think Sorc/Sage healers should get some buffs, they are still kind of bottom of the Barrel when it comes to healing.

Assasin/Shadow 

Honestly the spec still feels the same to me, The changes to Deception/Infiltration are okay, I don't this spec needs DMG buffs, its already obnoxious enough in PVP. 

The changes to Serenity/Hatred are eh, I would like to see some PVP utilities added to their tree for better survivability. 

Marauder/Sentinel 

Still feels the same to me, Class changes were really nothing major at least to me. 

Vanguards/Powertech 

From what I've tested and what I've seen the new tactical offers better sustained DMG, It is decent, I think it will give Tactics/AP better sustained DMG for both PVE & PVP. It doesn't boost their big openers so it doesn't nuke players in PVP. 

As stated Earlier, the Redesigned stealth probes Accuracy debuff should be given to Mercs/Commandos, VG/PT tanks already have Riot Gass/Oil slick, I don't see them needing more Accuracy Debuff abilities. 

 

Overall some decent changes, The Return of Vital Regulators was the big one for me that really stood out to me.

 

 

 

Edited June 16 by SentinalMasterWW
Fixing stuff