xxStrahdxx Posted December 31, 2023 Share Posted December 31, 2023 I love GSF and I think it could be better. So here are some suggestions I would recommend. 1st: Take grouping back down to 4 man teams instead of ops groups. Allow ops groups against other ops groups of the same size. This will encourage more 8-man teams to fly against each other and give newer players and older players who fly alone to enjoy their time playing this game mode. 8-man tournaments would be so awesome. Maybe set it up like an arena fight for rankings? 2nd: When switching weapons such as Lasers add a charge timer say 3 seconds or so before the weapons have the power to fire. In the case of Missles add a load timer of the same three seconds. This will eliminate the switching between lasers to keep 100% accuracy. Along with help against constant missle locks. Because at this point all you have to do is switch missiles and bingo you can start locking again and bypass the loading times of missiles. 3rd take out the power-ups and put heal beacons in the game during death matches. 4th, give us something to do with fleet and ship requisition points once we have maxed out our ships. Even if it's expensive, maybe 200k ship points or fleet req points to unlock other patterns or colors for the ships, and it's lasers and thrusters? I know people who have millions of points just sitting there with nothing to use them on. Ok, so these are some things friends and I discussed over the past couple of months while waiting for ques. Feel free to add more. Please keep negative comments out of this we all know GSF needs some reworking try to be positive and help get some changes in this great game mode so that everyone has more fun. 2 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
DakhathKilrathi Posted December 31, 2023 Share Posted December 31, 2023 (edited) 2 hours ago, xxStrahdxx said: 1st: Take grouping back down to 4 man teams instead of ops groups. Yeah, this is reasonable. It used to always work this way and that was fine. +1 2 hours ago, xxStrahdxx said: Allow ops groups against other ops groups of the same size. This will encourage more 8-man teams to fly against each other and give newer players and older players who fly alone to enjoy their time playing this game mode. 8-man tournaments would be so awesome. Maybe set it up like an arena fight for rankings? The only way this happens is if players organize it. Which we can already do via challenges, but you'll find that there is very little interest in this, and not enough players at a level to make it interesting. Not a good use of dev time imo. 2 hours ago, xxStrahdxx said: take out the power-ups Powerups are secondary objectives, offering an incentive to control the map. They add an element of skill and experience and a way to counter some things you'll see if you know what powerup helps with what. Deathmatch is far less interesting without them, but it's not going to stop players from dominating like you think it will. 2 hours ago, xxStrahdxx said: put heal beacons in the game during death matches This is already a thing. This is what the Warcarrier/Legion and Clarion/Imperium are for. And Spearpoint/Bloodmark I guess but don't do that to yourself unless you know what you're getting into on that one. Yes, someone has to play healer but like... that's good, actually? It allows for players who might not be good at left clicking to still contribute, and the bomber in particular has a way to also defend the healing drone, which is good if you're running from someone. This should remain player controlled imo. 2 hours ago, xxStrahdxx said: give us something to do with fleet and ship requisition points once we have maxed out our ships. Even if it's expensive, maybe 200k ship points or fleet req points to unlock other patterns or colors for the ships, and it's lasers and thrusters? I know people who have millions of points just sitting there with nothing to use them on. Yes please! +1000 on this one alone. It just accumulates forever and you can't do anything at all with it, so it's pointless to even keep earning it once your ships are maxed. I have some fully unlocked (that is, every possible component unlocked and maxed out) and still have hundreds of thousands of requisition points or more. Edited December 31, 2023 by DakhathKilrathi 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
xxStrahdxx Posted December 31, 2023 Author Share Posted December 31, 2023 3 hours ago, DakhathKilrathi said: This is already a thing. This is what the Warcarrier/Legion and Clarion/Imperium are for. And Spearpoint/Bloodmark I guess but don't do that to yourself unless you know what you're getting into on that one. Yes, someone has to play healer but like... that's good, actually? It allows for players who might not be good at left clicking to still contribute, and the bomber in particular has a way to also defend the healing drone, which is good if you're running from someone. This should remain player controlled imo. I know that they help but there is not always a Warcarrier or Legion playing, also many of them get hunted in death matches so people stop bringing them in leaving us with zero heals. I also know a good scout can make a bomber's life terrible and teams do not always cover them like they should. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
myrrhbear Posted January 1 Share Posted January 1 I appreciate the intent with this thread. GSF is one of my favorite things to do in SWTOR, and has been for years. I have 100% GSF achievements, maxed ships on like 30 characters, have written GSF guides, and very much enjoyed running a GSF class weekly in my guild. I really enjoy it. I also would like to see it improved, and I 100% agree that it obviously needs improvement. However, I think the thread about removing premades from solo queues https://forums.swtor.com/topic/932302-just-end-premades-for-solo-queing/page/2/#comment-9793053 is a more practical approach to improving GSF at this time. I may totally be wrong. How would I know. My impression though is that SWTOR now has less money to invest in development than previously, and even at it's peak SWTOR really didn't seem to see value in budgeting to improve GSF. It is widely hated - deeply hated even, lol. Many people in SWTOR avoid it like the plague. A bunch of people started doing GSF when it was added to weekly seasonal tasks because it was quick progress but since they were only playing to get the conquest or whatever, but it was still MISERABLE to play GSF a lot of the time due to absurd degrees of imbalance, we started getting a lot more people AFK. I wish they wouldn't do that. It's a disregard of the other people on their team, but I DO understand why they do it. GSF needs fixing, but I think it's a correct assumption that because it has relatively little activity and isn't a core factor in retaining subscriptions, it is very low on the ranking of what the devs will think it's worth investing money and time into. I hope I'm wrong and there's a budget to actually change GSF in ways that are needed, but I don't imagine there is. SO... I think it makes better sense to request a change that takes very little money, very little time, and goes to the core of the problem. After hundreds and hundreds of hours in GSF it seems to me this is simply removing the GROUP QUEUE button. That shouldn't cost much money at all or time. Yes, I think it would be hypothetically better to add in a separate GROUP QUEUE that only matches players against others in GROUP QUEUE. At least this way the people who only enjoy GSF as a group still have the option, but I don't know if this is as easy and as low cost as simply removing the GROUP QUEUE button. If it's just as quick and inexpensive, then by all means simply separate the SOLO QUEUE from the GROUP QUEUE, and keep both of them. If that's a hassle though, just delete the GROUP QUEUE button. That change alone, though obviously far from perfect, should result in more often have more fair matches. The matchmaker program is far from perfect, but it's okay, and it attempts to divide the strongest players evenly across the two teams. If we remove the GROUP QUEUE button, I think we will find that after a number of months the data shows the average balance of matches is improved, and along with that the average number of people queing will slowly begin to improve. I would also think the number of people going afk will decrease once GSF starts to feel somewhat more fair and accessible to newer players to learn. The removal of the premade groups should also heavily reduce the hostility associated with GSF, which is better for everyone and for SWTOR as a whole. I would also add that a 4 person premade is still going to be absolutely miserable against people queing solo. I know for a fact as someone who is very proficient with GSF that I can heavily sway a match on my own. The people who bully and troll the community with their premades often use this as an argument in favor of defending their premades. It's a poor argument because it basically implies disregards that SOME improvement is better than NONE. Yes, 1 very strong player can sway a match, but 2 very strong players split by the matchmaker, 1 on each team, is often a fun and fairly balanced match. Whereas 2 very strong players on the same team, especially if on comms together but even without that, is a landslide. If I queued with even 2 other strong players it would be miserably imbalanced. It's just a fact. GSF has a VERY steep learning curve, and the total beginner gets tossed in against the most expert players. It's not a good design, but assuming there's very little incentive as developers to invest in improving GSF, that's why I'd say we focus on asking for something that can tangibly help, but which cost almost nothing in money or time - just delete the GROUP QUEUE button. Try that and lets see how it pans out over a number of months. If you want to do anything else that's simple and adds a lot of incentive for players to queue up for GSF, it would to make GSF matches count towards PvP progress! 2 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
DakhathKilrathi Posted January 1 Share Posted January 1 11 hours ago, xxStrahdxx said: I know that they help but there is not always a Warcarrier or Legion playing, also many of them get hunted in death matches so people stop bringing them in leaving us with zero heals. I also know a good scout can make a bomber's life terrible and teams do not always cover them like they should. I mean... the solution to your bomber being hunted is to cover your bomber better. It's a team game; you're meant to help your team. If they're still having trouble, their positioning might be a problem. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
DakhathKilrathi Posted January 1 Share Posted January 1 Also here's an example of requisition that's just sitting around. I have every component on this ship. Almost a million fleet requisition, too. It's a pointless number at this point because it's not like I can transfer it. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
myrrhbear Posted January 1 Share Posted January 1 The other problem with trying to introduce separate queues for grouped vs solo is that GSF already struggles for much of the day with queue times, and dividing those who like GSF into separate queues would make that even worse. So yeah, the easiest, least expensive, quickest fix for GSF that is also pragmatic would be (at least in the short term be) just deleting the GROUP queue button, and have everyone queue together in SOLO and also only have 8v8 during off-peak hours. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Anhkriva Posted January 1 Share Posted January 1 The waiting time for a match, especially outside rush hours, is already way too long, so any idea that would make the wait even longer is simply bad. To shorten this waiting time, I would support a solution similar to that used in FPS games - beyond a certain waiting time, the game fills the empty spaces with bots and starts the match. It wouldn't be pure pvp anymore, but at least there wouldn't be a situation like yesterday - one match for 3 hours of waiting. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
xxStrahdxx Posted January 3 Author Share Posted January 3 On 1/1/2024 at 2:49 AM, Anhkriva said: The waiting time for a match, especially outside rush hours, is already way too long, so any idea that would make the wait even longer is simply bad. To shorten this waiting time, I would support a solution similar to that used in FPS games - beyond a certain waiting time, the game fills the empty spaces with bots and starts the match. It wouldn't be pure pvp anymore, but at least there wouldn't be a situation like yesterday - one match for 3 hours of waiting. I will say that I recently went over to the Satele Shan server and could not believe how long the queues were. Star Forge server may not be perfect, but the queues here are manageable with 1 to 2 groups going between 10 am and midnight Indiana time and sometimes longer depending on whether it is a weekend. The most I wait is 5-10 minutes and once I get set to the match sink it goes rather quickly in comparison. We have a lot of good players here and I will say some frustrations in fighting them but it is still fun and we enjoy it. Come join us if you want a more active GSF. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
sharpenedstick Posted January 4 Share Posted January 4 (edited) The damage boost is mostly a noob stomper. I refuse to use it. Regarding groups, premades should just be removed from solo queue. Queueing with one other person should be allowed, and also it should be allowed to queue for premade and solo at the same time (just like how you used to be able to queue for ranked and standard pvp way back in the day). We all know premade queue will never pop because premades are just looking for easy wins and have virtually zero interest in facing other premades, but the option would be there. They really need to add some rewards to the GSF vendor, including some rewards that take 10k fleet comms to unlock. This way it will take a considerable amount of games to get them all. Edited January 4 by sharpenedstick Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
cjmarsh Posted January 5 Share Posted January 5 GSF is awesome, tons of fun pew pewing all over. It would be nice if the matchups were a little more balanced. I really like that the weeklies give good rewards and that there are incentives for people to play the game mode. Even more would be great, I'd love to see the queue pop in off hours too although that's not really a problem exclusive to GSF. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
DakhathKilrathi Posted January 5 Share Posted January 5 1 hour ago, cjmarsh said: Even more would be great, Agreed, though incentives need to incentivize participation, not just being in the game. Unless the devs intend to solve the problem of leeches and self destructors, anyway, and after several years I think we can safely assume no one cares to solve that problem. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
sharpenedstick Posted January 5 Share Posted January 5 (edited) One of GSF's persistent issues is the new player experience isn't great. I frequently hear things like "oh, I tried it once and had no idea what was going on." The frequently poor quality of games doesn't help in this regard, but the difficulty in the onboarding process is its own issue. And it's one that, in light of GSF and PVP's general neglect from Biosword, is unlikely to ever be addressed. Out of curiosity, does anyone know when the last time it was that a dev actually posted in this subforum? Edited January 5 by sharpenedstick Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Nee-Elder Posted January 5 Share Posted January 5 (edited) 19 minutes ago, sharpenedstick said: Out of curiosity, does anyone know when the last time it was that a dev actually posted in this subforum? Sadly, i believe it was wayyyyy back in 2018 --> https://forums.swtor.com/topic/867169-gsf-changes-in-592/ Actually , i had forgotten about this BLIP anomoly in 2022--> https://forums.swtor.com/topic/926403-ui-problems-after-72/?do=findComment&comment=9733282 But otherwise, yeah 2018 . Edited January 5 by Nee-Elder Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
DakhathKilrathi Posted January 5 Share Posted January 5 (edited) 30 minutes ago, sharpenedstick said: One of GSF's persistent issues is the new player experience isn't great. I frequently hear things like "oh, I tried it once and had no idea what was going on." The frequently poor quality of games doesn't help in this regard, but the difficulty in the onboarding process is its own issue. And it's one that, in light of GSF and PVP's general neglect from Biosword, is unlikely to ever be addressed. No, it won't ever be addressed by them I'm afraid. That's why a lot of us have created resources for people to use. Despon's GSF School remains the most accessible imo. Edited January 5 by DakhathKilrathi 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Darkestmonty Posted January 28 Share Posted January 28 I buy ship requisition with fleet comms and give then to my alts so I don't have to level new gsf characters Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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