PVP can be saved but the Dev's refuse to do so

[SentinalMasterWW]

Controversial title, but I feel it speaks the truth, SWTOR's PVP is some of easiest but very enjoyable compared to other MMO's where you have to gear and spec into abilities specifically for PVP. I want to clarify I am not attacking the Dev's, nor do I encourage hate towards them, I merely state what I and others feel. There are numerous posts on this Forum stating the issues with PVP, Players legit begging the Dev's to come fix them, but the Dev's ignore it, and go do something else entirely, like buffing Medals, Okay that is more so a touch up thing than an actual fix which most players want. 

Since the Start of Season 3 of PVP, the Clear problems with PVP show themselves once more, 

• Premades Clogging up Q's, and just farming players. 
• Horrible Class Balancing 
• Modes that need better QOL improvements. 
• Insanely short TTK which leads to lack of skill based gameplay, and more so rapid burst play. 
• Lack of any form of Quality Competitiveness (I.E any form of Ranked) 
• Poor Reward Value, For completing the PVP track you only get 12 tokens, The rest are locked being achievements, doing this all gets you one Armor/Weapon Set, 1-2 Decos, a Title, or one mount. 

Going back to the first point, it has been asked for and reported since the removal of ranked, to get rid of Premades, especially the idea of an 8 Man premade. It has been begged for to get them removed, but the Dev's refuse. My theory? Since the Removal of ranked they need something to keep hardcore PVP'ers around, and their idea of doing that is letting them get together with their buddies and farm players with meta specs. 

These are the suggestions I have for the Dev's to solve these issues 

Premades 

Reduce the max number allowed to form in a group down to 2-3, Creating a whole separate mode is not needed, the only thing it would do is be dead and prove the point they only exist to have an advantage so they can farm players. By reducing the amount of players allowed, the Q pops much faster as it doesn't chug trying to match a premade a against another premade. 

Class Balancing 

I get its hard to balance for both PVP & PVE, but here are some suggestions I have without making specs garbo for PVE. 

Madness/Balance: 

-Remove the Reapply chance for Deathbrand/Shifted balance, there is no need for this to be on a range spec. 

-Nerf the Passive Self heals via Dots and Sorc Shield 

-Nerf the Healing done by Force Leach. 

-Reduce the Passive DR Reduction mod from 5% up to 3 times, down to 2% up to 3 times. Sorcs should not have the same amount of DR Reduction as a heavy armor spec. 

The DMG can stay the same on Sorc, its just nerfing their healing and DR Reduction. 

Deception/Infiltration: 

-Change Low Slash to an immobilize, The CC spam on this spec is annoying and with the Fast TTK, there is very little you can do, Deception is currently the most infamous IMO Spec that abuses CC's, If the dev's truly want to reduce the CC spam, change Low slash.

Lethality/Ruffian 

-Increase the Cooldown on their Roll making Bacta infusion activate instantly, I'd double the current cooldown. From my testing, the current cooldown is around 8 Secs, I'd double it to 16. 

I focused solely on what many consider to be the current Meta specs, other specs buffing/Nerfing is a different conversation. 

QOL Improvements 

By this I mean making PVP modes better, Huttball IMO is the worst one, it is not fun unless you are playing a spec with a lot of utility like tanks or stealthers. Speaking of Stealth, it is the most annoying thing to deal with in huttball. 95% of matches just come down to throwing the ball to the stealth player camping in the endzone, or having team members farm the endzone. Here are some QOL stuff they can do for huttball 

-Anti-Stealth Endzone, If you come to the other teams endzone in stealth you will be pop'd out, this encourages players to protect the ball carrier rather than throwing it to some stealther in the other teams spawn. 

-Endzone Protection, What I mean by this, is that the longer you stay in the other teams Endzone, you start getting a Debuff applied, this Debuff increases the DMG you take, and reduces the Amount you Deal. This helps with spawn camping, it means you cant just camp endzones as a tank with a pocket healer, if you do so, you are going to die VERY Quickly the longer you stay. 

-Leaping/Holotraversing/Rolling is prohibited while carrying the ball, This one may be controversial, but these abilites are broken in hutball, Roll especially causes so much D-sync, that they'll appear in one place, and the next minute their across the entire map. Holotraverse is also basically hacking, in the sense that if you have a stealther in the endzone, you can teleport to them while they are in stealth, so it legit looks like they are teleporting to no one. Again, this puts more emphasis on actually protecting the ball carrier to the endzone rather than abusing broken abilities. 

Short TTK 

Some people may like the Short TTK, but after a long time of playing, it kind of takes the skill away of properly popping defensives and smart plays, it more so rewards very fast TTK specs, like Tactics or Deception. I think they should increase the TTK, maybe not to 6.0, but a good sweet spot in-between the current one and 6.0. 

No Ranked 

Again Controversial to some, but the Dev's need to implement some form of Ranked back into PVP, Ranked gave players purpose in trying to get better at PVP, and actually made the old Ranked rewards cool because you had to work hard to get them, nowadays I see players with the Furious sets and their not the greatest at PVP having only gotten it via Seasons. Not saying Ranked Arena's need to come back, but there are multiple suggestions people have posted like tracking Win % among other things and rewarding the players at the end of a season. It would even be an excuse to send out PVP flair's again, I know a lot of people who would want the PVP flairs but didn't feel they were good enough to play in ranked. These flairs would say something like S4 (S being Season and the # being whichever PVP season it is) with the flair being bronze, silver, gold, etc denoting how well that player performed in a season and to differentiate it from the old ranked flair. Again may not seem like much, but it gives better incentive on trying to improve in PVP and having that mountain to climb. 

Poor Rewards 

The amount of tokens in a PVP seasons is not worth it, also considering the inflated prices, like you spend 8-12 Tokens for ONE Deco. If you 100% everything in a season you get a max of 20 tokens, that is one mount or a weapon/Armor set. Keep in mind that is every 3 months or so, if you do everything, you can get ONE thing. They either need to reduce the prices Drastically, or have the option for more tokens in a season. 

 

In short there is a lot that can be done to fix PVP, but I'm not holding out hope TBH. Even with the Switch to the new studio, I think SWTOR is just going to be maintaining the current status Quo; lack of good content/Fixes, and just trying to make a Season out of everything to try and milk content. It's easier to make a Season and put two armor sets with one being glowy, and try and advertise it as content than actually fixing the core issues.

 

[TrixxieTriss]

4 minutes ago, SentinalMasterWW said:

The DMG can stay the same on Sorc, its just nerfing their healing and DR Reduction. 

The problem with this approach is it also affects Lightning & healing spec Sorcs too & not just Madness Sorcs.

Because a lot of those changes are whole of class abilities & not madness specific. Nerfing Sorc healing & survivability would dramatically change the feel & how they play.

If Madness is over performing, then it needs a DPS reduction because Lightning is currently underperforming compared to Madness & other classes. 

[SentinalMasterWW]

44 minutes ago, TrixxieTriss said:

The problem with this approach is it also affects Lightning & healing spec Sorcs too & not just Madness Sorcs.

Because a lot of those changes are whole of class abilities & not madness specific. Nerfing Sorc healing & survivability would dramatically change the feel & how they play.

If Madness is over performing, then it needs a DPS reduction because Lightning is currently underperforming compared to Madness & other classes. 

True, Sorc healers are not that great and lightning is okay, I'm mainly referencing madnesses heals from Dots and static barrier alongside Force leach and deathbrand.  To my knowledge whenever deathbrand reapplies itsepf the sorc is healed for it. The DR reduction still imo is just too much, 15% seems like a lot for a class that is supposed to be wearing robes and not heavy armor

[Beyrahl]

Madness self-healing mostly % heals from the static barrier and leach. It's not actually casting dark heal all the time. 
Madness can hit the same DR a sin tank has with only having to upkeep resurgence. It definitely needs to either be harder to maintain or not as powerful, lot of Madness players just face tank, not to mention how bad of a slow death brand is; it just does the job for you. 

[TrixxieTriss]

1 hour ago, SentinalMasterWW said:

True, Sorc healers are not that great and lightning is okay, I'm mainly referencing madnesses heals from Dots and static barrier alongside Force leach and deathbrand.  To my knowledge whenever deathbrand reapplies itsepf the sorc is healed for it. The DR reduction still imo is just too much, 15% seems like a lot for a class that is supposed to be wearing robes and not heavy armor

As long as it’s not an ability or passive that is shared between the 3 builds. 
Then it’s a trade off for Madness wether you nerf DPS or Survival. 

The issue is Bioware have always been lazy when nerfing survival. Too often they just picked an ability or passive that affects the whole class & not just specific builds.

This has led to them ruining certain builds multiple times over the years & it takes them years to fix them. It’s why I get nervous when ever someone says nerf Sorc Survival because it nearly always negatively affects the other builds too. 

If Broadsword decided to only focus on the Madness build & didnt impinge on the other builds, I’d have no issue. But it’s basically the same BioWare team as before, so I have zero confidence they’ll change their approach 😞

Edited July 20, 2023 by TrixxieTriss

[krackcommando]

9 hours ago, Beyrahl said:

Madness self-healing mostly % heals from the static barrier and leach. It's not actually casting dark heal all the time. 
Madness can hit the same DR a sin tank has with only having to upkeep resurgence. It definitely needs to either be harder to maintain or not as powerful, lot of Madness players just face tank, not to mention how bad of a slow death brand is; it just does the job for you. 

their mobility is quite absurd given how tanky they are. it really is the best of both worlds. I suppose maybe a sniper who picks every possible mobility option could out run them if they wanted to do zero dmg. but yeah. prolly fair to call a broken spec (still). fwiw, I still experience lethality bleeds in WZ respawn zones. can't remember if I had it with deathbrand though.

[Beyrahl]

If everyone had the same survival I wouldn't complain. 

[Balameb]

15 hours ago, SentinalMasterWW said:

QOL Improvements 

By this I mean making PVP modes better, Huttball IMO is the worst one, it is not fun unless you are playing a spec with a lot of utility like tanks or stealthers. Speaking of Stealth, it is the most annoying thing to deal with in huttball. 95% of matches just come down to throwing the ball to the stealth player camping in the endzone, or having team members farm the endzone. Here are some QOL stuff they can do for huttball 

-Anti-Stealth Endzone, If you come to the other teams endzone in stealth you will be pop'd out, this encourages players to protect the ball carrier rather than throwing it to some stealther in the other teams spawn. 

-Endzone Protection, What I mean by this, is that the longer you stay in the other teams Endzone, you start getting a Debuff applied, this Debuff increases the DMG you take, and reduces the Amount you Deal. This helps with spawn camping, it means you cant just camp endzones as a tank with a pocket healer, if you do so, you are going to die VERY Quickly the longer you stay. 

-Leaping/Holotraversing/Rolling is prohibited while carrying the ball, This one may be controversial, but these abilites are broken in hutball, Roll especially causes so much D-sync, that they'll appear in one place, and the next minute their across the entire map. Holotraverse is also basically hacking, in the sense that if you have a stealther in the endzone, you can teleport to them while they are in stealth, so it legit looks like they are teleporting to no one. Again, this puts more emphasis on actually protecting the ball carrier to the endzone rather than abusing broken abilities. 

I 100% like this.

For the 'endoze debuf' thing i would add that all the map could be divided in zones/areas and staying too long in one zone should also start a debuf (something like adding stacks, moving zone start lowering stacks but not auto removing them at once). Whith this it would prevent mid area number crunchers and make people move more.

[meddani]

14 hours ago, Beyrahl said:

Madness self-healing mostly % heals from the static barrier and leach. It's not actually casting dark heal all the time. 
Madness can hit the same DR a sin tank has with only having to upkeep resurgence. It definitely needs to either be harder to maintain or not as powerful, lot of Madness players just face tank, not to mention how bad of a slow death brand is; it just does the job for you. 

best to ignore him, guy has a personal vendetta against madness/balance, i'm surprised there are no "buff merc/mandos" suggestions in his post lol

[Prapcaster]

2 hours ago, meddani said:

best to ignore him, guy has a personal vendetta against madness/balance, i'm surprised there are no "buff merc/mandos" suggestions in his post lol

To be fair everyone who doesn't play madness has a personal vendetta against madness. 

[meddani]

13 hours ago, Prapcaster said:

To be fair everyone who doesn't play madness has a personal vendetta against madness. 

I don"t even think it's that bad, the only thing about sorcerer sright now that's annoying is the root on the knockback 

[Prapcaster]

1 hour ago, meddani said:

I don"t even think it's that bad, the only thing about sorcerer sright now that's annoying is the root on the knockback 

idk I think death brand is pretty broken. Remove the stupid refresh and slow it has and nerf leech and I think it would probably be fine.

[Beyrahl]

4 hours ago, Prapcaster said:

idk I think death brand is pretty broken. Remove the stupid refresh and slow it has and nerf leech and I think it would probably be fine.

You give up AoE to take it, I think it should be the survival option and I think that's fine. Currently, it's the survival and free kiting sim option, most classes it's most abusive on are already not doing well. It should be less of a slow or simply not slow at all, if the slow is to remain its reapplication should not slow 100%. 

[Prapcaster]

1 hour ago, Beyrahl said:

You give up AoE to take it, I think it should be the survival option and I think that's fine. Currently, it's the survival and free kiting sim option, most classes it's most abusive on are already not doing well. It should be less of a slow or simply not slow at all, if the slow is to remain its reapplication should not slow 100%. 

the refresh is just silly imo. One time it refreshed 14 times on me. The match was completely unplayable because of it.

[omeru]

Dont be harsh on them they dont refuse to fix it they are just not good enought to save it. Sadly swtor dev team is like the last guy who picked in a game, they have negative effect when they try to do something because they are not good enough for this. 

[SentinalMasterWW]

 

1 hour ago, Prapcaster said:

the refresh is just silly imo. One time it refreshed 14 times on me. The match was completely unplayable because of it.

I get why they gave Death brand the slow, DB is supposed to be the single target option, but the Reapply chance is completely obnoxious to deal with, 7.0 already made PVP more annoying with the amount of roots/Slows every ability has now. 

Honestly for me, some people may agree or Disagree, I'd be fine with the DMG and healing done, if Madness played more akin to hatred, A very strong DPS but Glass Cannon, in that if you get focused you die REALLY fast, more so relying on Life steal to stay alive. 

 

8 hours ago, meddani said:

I don"t even think it's that bad, the only thing about sorcerer sright now that's annoying is the root on the knockback 

The current state of Madness is too broken, It can Face tank anything with its 15% DR Reduction, combine that with its life steal and off-Healing abilities, it can be a massive pain to deal with. It's not like Madness is some high tier skill spec, any monkey with two neurons can do well with this spec. 

The other issue is that for people who play a spec like sniper/slinger don't have much of a chance against madness, Any DMG Done, all madness has to do is pop force speed and force leach and heal for like 20-30K back again. I've had matches as Engi sniper where I unload everything into a madness sorc, and they will still be able to face tank a majority of it, not to mention all they have to do is pop bubble, wait for it to go through, than pop deathbrand and Force leach, and they are already back at 40-60% already.

Ideally, me personally, I'd want Deathbrand removed entirely from Sorc, and given to Hatred instead, a spec that needs a good single target ability for more healing in PVP. I'd give sorc the passive that gives two charges on Deathfield instead of deathbrand. 

It would also make sense for hatred to have that snare, given they are a melee based spec, not to mention hatred lacks any off healing abilities and basically has like 1-2 defensives to keep it going. 

[krackcommando]

2 hours ago, SentinalMasterWW said:

It would also make sense for hatred to have that snare, given they are a melee based spec, not to mention hatred lacks any off healing abilities and basically has like 1-2 defensives to keep it going. 

I would pump the brakes on this. there's a difference between having a high skill floor and needing an incredibly powerful buff. when played right, hatred hits crazy hard. they should sacrifice mitigation/healing for that. they're sins. they have two cloaks. they are very very far from helpless. giving classes with such powerful escapes relatively mindless heals leads to the current situation with lethality. hatred is just a higher skill floor. leave it there for higher skilled players.

Edited July 21, 2023 by krackcommando

[Beyrahl]

4 hours ago, krackcommando said:

I would pump the brakes on this. there's a difference between having a high skill floor and needing an incredibly powerful buff. when played right, hatred hits crazy hard. they should sacrifice mitigation/healing for that. they're sins. they have two cloaks. they are very very far from helpless. giving classes with such powerful escapes relatively mindless heals leads to the current situation with lethality. hatred is just a higher skill floor. leave it there for higher skilled players.

I would be happy with overcharge or leaching strike being aoe.
but yes buff my bby hatred. Also, would love to see talent reordering, having to give up shroud out for 15s force speed as basic mobility is bull. 

[krackcommando]

2 hours ago, Beyrahl said:

I would be happy with overcharge or leaching strike being aoe.
but yes buff my bby hatred. Also, would love to see talent reordering, having to give up shroud out for 15s force speed as basic mobility is bull. 

😄 BW pruning at its best.

what's the most iconic ability of a class? ok. let's make them choose between that and something they can't play without!

best. xpac. evarrrr.

[Beyrahl]

1 minute ago, krackcommando said:

😄 BW pruning at its best.

what's the most iconic ability of a class? ok. let's make them choose between that and something they can't play without!

best. xpac. evarrrr.

guarded by the devs, oh.. 
f mara/sent

[StrikePrice]

I truly don't understand people's obsession with madness. I think people who complain about madness don't play madness. 

[SentinalMasterWW]

7 hours ago, StrikePrice said:

I truly don't understand people's obsession with madness. I think people who complain about madness don't play madness. 

I've played Madness, It is not a hard spec to play at all. If you are confused on why People dislike Madness here are some of the common complaints. 

-Madness is a Ranged spec which already gives them an advantage, Their attacks are about on the range between Mercs and snipers.

-Deathbrand slows the target and it has a 30% Reapply chance, this means whenever that DB gets reapplied, the user to my knowledge is healed for that, add on the fact that the slow is also reapplied, before the current patch DB was bugged where it would even reapply after Defeat, and was even more obnoxious with a 50% reapply chance. 

-Force Leach is absolutely broken, I've had it heal me for up to 40K Healing, that can beat out some dedicated healer specs. 

-A Majority of Madness Attacks are DOT based, they completely ignore armor and just shred your healthbar. 

-Madness also has off healing sorc abilites, combnined with passive healing from static barrier and life steal from its dots. 

-Madness and sorcs have a 15% DMG Reduction passive, which is completely stupid for a spec that is supposed to be wearing robes, somehow has the mitigation of a heavy armor spec.

[Beyrahl]

14 hours ago, StrikePrice said:

I truly don't understand people's obsession with madness. I think people who complain about madness don't play madness. 

I've played Madness off and on since 2.0, I only PvP. 
While what you say is usually true, I don't think it's so this time, when there's a lot of people commenting on it it's pretty easy to tell somethings wrong. 
As the saying - "While players can't tell you how to fix the problem, they'll definitely let you know when there is one." 
Never has it been in a state where it face tank, skey, and not be trolling or playing terribly even though it totally is bad play to do so, you can do it and find success more often than not.
Death brands slow is incredible and I would assume you haven't played any melees into someone permanently applying it to you. 
Along with that, the self-heals are pretty good (not the actual resurgence or dark heal), I think either losing how rapid the % HP heal is on static barrier or a slight % DR nerf per stack would do just fine to make it less oppressive against everything else. 
Here's an example for curiosity's sake while it's not good at showcasing its durability, here's another one where I take generally a bit more damage though that varies per game basis.

To really get into it, Madness is reaching Lethality's level of tankiness minus the obvious passive buff of 30% DoT DR it has. The difference being ones actually a melee and doesn't have as high of uptime on its DR, while lethality may be able to briefly surpass madness in DR it cannot maintain it. It also can't maintain the same amount of DR that madness can pretty much permanently upkeep. Paired with good self-healing it's quite the force, part of why lethality was so good in 6.0 and still is very relevant today, with viral elements being fixed and stim boost duration nerf via talent it's not as strong as it was when 7.0 launch but still very much so leagues above its peers in durability. Of course the exception of madness. 
I am completely okay with classes having some real durability in a meta where the TTK is so fast, however, if it was slower this amount of durability would be way more apparent and feel unbearable to deal with. This is why I think something should happen, while I want everything to be brought up to at least be more competitive against each other it's much easier to just hammer the outliers. 
Not that really any of this matters, as we're just players and I don't think developers consider our thoughts much when it comes to balance let alone if any balance topics are thought of. 
While I think they do great work in other areas, PvP balance is not one of them but they have done well in the past so I have hope. 

For reference for those unaware, Madness has access to % healing on the bubble, around 4k every second bubble is up. If bubbles are not broken they will heal or overheal for 120k, while that's not terrible because it can be broken they gain life steal-from abilities, they also do have access to actual healing abilities that haven't really been shown love in nearly 3 expansions now. With its 15% DR passive resurgence also gives an additional 3% DR it hits very near tank levels of damage reduction if it was slightly less or at least had more chances of falling off sooner or simply applied in different ways like Lightning's DR I think no one would really complain. 

[StrikePrice]

7 hours ago, Beyrahl said:

I've played Madness off and on since 2.0, I only PvP. 
While what you say is usually true, I don't think it's so this time, when there's a lot of people commenting on it it's pretty easy to tell somethings wrong. 
As the saying - "While players can't tell you how to fix the problem, they'll definitely let you know when there is one." 
Never has it been in a state where it face tank, skey, and not be trolling or playing terribly even though it totally is bad play to do so, you can do it and find success more often than not.
Death brands slow is incredible and I would assume you haven't played any melees into someone permanently applying it to you. 
Along with that, the self-heals are pretty good (not the actual resurgence or dark heal), I think either losing how rapid the % HP heal is on static barrier or a slight % DR nerf per stack would do just fine to make it less oppressive against everything else. 
Here's an example for curiosity's sake while it's not good at showcasing its durability, here's another one where I take generally a bit more damage though that varies per game basis.

To really get into it, Madness is reaching Lethality's level of tankiness minus the obvious passive buff of 30% DoT DR it has. The difference being ones actually a melee and doesn't have as high of uptime on its DR, while lethality may be able to briefly surpass madness in DR it cannot maintain it. It also can't maintain the same amount of DR that madness can pretty much permanently upkeep. Paired with good self-healing it's quite the force, part of why lethality was so good in 6.0 and still is very relevant today, with viral elements being fixed and stim boost duration nerf via talent it's not as strong as it was when 7.0 launch but still very much so leagues above its peers in durability. Of course the exception of madness. 
I am completely okay with classes having some real durability in a meta where the TTK is so fast, however, if it was slower this amount of durability would be way more apparent and feel unbearable to deal with. This is why I think something should happen, while I want everything to be brought up to at least be more competitive against each other it's much easier to just hammer the outliers. 
Not that really any of this matters, as we're just players and I don't think developers consider our thoughts much when it comes to balance let alone if any balance topics are thought of. 
While I think they do great work in other areas, PvP balance is not one of them but they have done well in the past so I have hope. 

For reference for those unaware, Madness has access to % healing on the bubble, around 4k every second bubble is up. If bubbles are not broken they will heal or overheal for 120k, while that's not terrible because it can be broken they gain life steal-from abilities, they also do have access to actual healing abilities that haven't really been shown love in nearly 3 expansions now. With its 15% DR passive resurgence also gives an additional 3% DR it hits very near tank levels of damage reduction if it was slightly less or at least had more chances of falling off sooner or simply applied in different ways like Lightning's DR I think no one would really complain. 

If you are melee and you're struggling with slows, you have absolutely failed to adapt to the current meta and it's your fault. I pvp with every class and spec, but my mains are Inf Shadow, Rage Jugg and Combat Sent. All three have many, many ways to mitigate CC and I have no trouble getting next to sorcs. Now, they are slippery and they have lots of ways to stay alive. But, most of the time either I kill them or they flee the combat. Further, AR Mercs and Eng Snipers are much, much better than sorcs at shutting melee down.

It's bad players that can't adapt to the meta that are complaining about sorcs.

[Beyrahl]

5 hours ago, StrikePrice said:

It's bad players that can't adapt to the meta that are complaining about sorcs.

Very close-minded, there's no other slow as impactful, let alone no other class outside of lethality that can obtain its durability. (At least DPS wise)
I have made my point though, commenting on players' skills when everyone's skill level is subjective is quite trivial and missing the point. 
 

Edited July 25, 2023 by Beyrahl