Update 7.5 .... completely disappointed!

[BelorfinSiana]

I for one hated the skill tree changes in 7.0.

[Thepyrethatburns]

Wait, we get to make pies?

That sounds awesome actually.

First, I made the galaxy tremble at my mastery of the Dark Side.  Now I shall bring them to their knees with my mastery of the Cinnamon Apple Strudel Pie!

Not too keen on Hutta's new look if only because the water looks TOO clean.  I mean, the place is supposed to look like a Superfund site.

Still hyped about the pies though.

[Stradlin]

2 minutes ago, Thepyrethatburns said:

Wait, we get to make pies?

That sounds awesome actually.

First, I made the galaxy tremble at my mastery of the Dark Side.  Now I shall bring them to their knees with my mastery of the Cinnamon Apple Strudel Pie!

Not too keen on Hutta's new look if only because the water looks TOO clean.  I mean, the place is supposed to look like a Superfund site.

Still hyped about the pies though.

If you  find that a..surprising career trajectory, think of all the former skill trainers. Hundreds of sith lords and jedi masters who used to teach new characters their abilities ended up as speeder piloting  trainers.  These are  pretty bitter people I imagine.

 

P.S.been seven years since GSF got any GSF exclusive content.. Seven...years. It took less time than that to take swtor from few concept art images to 1.0. 

[LittleEwina]

The power of the pies shall free us, and if you add a mystery ingredient you can actually truly be free hint hint. And now I'm imagining beating Malgus through the power of Quesh grown fruits.

[Guyverarmor]

On 5/1/2024 at 6:28 PM, LtGeneralGezlin said:

No, because there are more important things in my life to get mad about than the content in a video game. 🙄

While true it's just a game, it's still perfectly fine to be upset at the sub-basement direction this game has taken since...well, beyond 1.0.

Your indifference is the reason Games Devs believe they can just coast because they have an IP people love and do what they want knowing there will be people lapping it up. Games devs and companies should be held accountable for a sub-tier product they put out. Hell, I'm held accountable at my job if I put forth a sub-optimal core network design...it's why I do not do it.

[PianoMatt]

I don't normally weigh in on these sorts of discussions and I don't like spoilers.  With there being 0 story content  (with the exception of the Lane Vizla story culmination) I tried all of the content out on the PTS.  I did most of the dailies for the new event area (there were not enough pies to sample and complete one)

This update is a complete miss for me.  I go into most new things in my life with an open mind and a willingness to give it a chance. I'm usually on board with the general direction or flavor of a SWTOR update and almost always find something that makes me stop what I'm doing and just appreciate the work that went into it.  I did not find a single moment in this content update that did that for me on the PTS.  

If you did not like doing chores in Interpretor's Retreat, you will not like this update at all.  Everything and I mean EVERYTHING is a chore and they not only feels like chores but also leave you with a "was that it?...was that even worth my time?"  They all take too long, have an unecessary amount of forced timers or transitional periods, and/or are mind numbingly easy.  I don't know how you fail any of the events.  I tried to on purpose and was not successful.  The easter egg hunt is way too easy without competitors in the area so hopefully that will at least have some sort of pressure/excitement when it's live for a larger group of people.  The fishing is a claw game with very long windows to get your "fish" (which we never see outside of our inventory at the very end) and I am hoping there is a hidden mechanic or achievement in there for it because you give all of your "rare" fish back to end the mission.  The pie baking is a reskin of what the feast of prosperity has already has done.  The plant farming is exactly what you expect it to be only it's diminished because you want it to be better than it is or do something unexpected.  The same goes with the creature wrangling.  The weakest and most visually prominent mission: dance at the giant pole...I don't even want to talk about it.  

And you have to do it day after day after day and on alt after alt after alt.  The vendor has feast of prosperity prices so you will have to grind these out on multiple toons if you want to get everything.  I got 0 joy from the PTS spring event, hopefully that will change when the story missions are added.  You can see the unused set pieces in the zone that they will be attached to.

Just brace yourselves everyone.  

(The basilisk droid is a different story and is much more compelling.  The systems for this venture are not explained very well on the PTS through the in-game dialogue so make sure you use your achievement panel and hit the tab at the top to check out the way it works if you do log on to try it)

[Shayddow]

Quote

Happens with all newer flashpoint - Umbara, Copero, Nathema, Null, Shrine. When one of those is selected you can expect people to drop out.

They drop out because of the length of these flashpoints. Most people seem to want shorter FPs for weekly conquest, etc. You can explore the longer ones when you do them solo, but running them with other people you want something quick. Like "spammer" station.

[JakRoanin]

Ok, I'm no white Knight, I hated the Manaan update I hated it. Not the planet itself, that's gorgeous, but the story and the missions were a bummer. But, I am tired of being told I shouldn't like what I do like. I love the idea of pies, I like service quests, I like adding calmer moments in the saga. I loved Voss, this update sounds like something I will love.

[Traceguy]

3 hours ago, Shayddow said:

They drop out because of the length of these flashpoints

Shrine of Silence is a short one. It's shorter than some original ones, like False Emperor. 

[acklag]

The dark side might serve apple pie but they serve it cold, the light side includes ice cream with it

[JakRoanin]

I'm a raspberry pie girl myself. 

[Thepyrethatburns]

2 hours ago, acklag said:

The dark side might serve apple pie but they serve it cold, the light side includes ice cream with it

Feeble Jedi propaganda.

Ours is served piping hot like our fiery rage.  Also, where the Jedi pie tastes store-bought due to their philosophy of "There is no taste.  There is only the Force", we have the perfect blend of sugars and spices (mimicking the sweetness of finding victory through the Force as well as the spice of the sensations that we allow ourselves to feel) to bring all who taste our pies to their knees.

Yes, we could place the vanilla ice cream on in the same way that the Jedi do to mask their substandard pies.  However,  the flavor of our pies is able to stand alone, dominating all those whose lips cross the path of our pies!

[Setta]

On 5/4/2024 at 2:41 AM, Stradlin said:

If you  find that a..surprising career trajectory, think of all the former skill trainers. Hundreds of sith lords and jedi masters who used to teach new characters their abilities ended up as speeder piloting  trainers.  These are  pretty bitter people I imagine.

One thing that always kinda struck me odd is how the devs utterly failed to capitalize on this.  I'll explain. 

Long ago, when WoW was the at the top of it's form in WotLK, they introduced a new crafting skill called Inscription.  Inscriptions had glyphs.  Most were trash, but sometimes offered something like 1% extra damage for instance, or some other minor changes to a skill. Doesn't sound like much but again most were trash so extra dmg is extra dmg.  However one thing they also did was change how an ability can look.  Instead of the mage sheep spell making you look like a sheep, you were now a rabbit, or a turtle or w/e.

Now for a game that goes so heavily into cosmetics all of our weapons, armors, dyes, flairs, color crystals, weapons tuning, mounts etc (did I miss anything) to make us look a certain way.  It always amazed me that they could not give abilities a different pallet.  An example (or a few I suppose)

In the extended universe Luke Skywalker had what they called electric judgement, aka emerald lightning.  A light side force lightning ability.   The devs could easily (ok not with the skeleton crew they have) make it so that we change the looks of our abilities through them.  They (the trainers) would keep a collection of our unlocked ability looks, and we would change what they look like through their tabs. Other examples instead of a sage throwing a giant rock, now you're tossing a tree at them or maybe instead of the rock coming from the side, it comes down on the person squishing them.  Hell the devs could even allow these abilities to be dyed, or have it like some mounts where it's colors are effected by your color crystal.  There could be lots of different saber animations for JK & SW combat styles, etc.  I know a lot of people for w/e reason don't like the trooper's ion canon look, and would love a new animation there.  The possibilities are endless really. 

Not only could they put them in the cartel market and profit, but they could also put them as rewards GS or PvP tracks, to up their subscriber numbers.  Or just put a few in old parts of the game to get people to play / grind more, after all they will need some free to play ones too.  Idk the idea that they never did anything with this, when the game is like 90% about customizing your toon is wild to me, and I think this would fix trainers as well, as all the abilities are already there.  You just select the ones you want to customize and it'll give you options for how you want to customize said abilities. 

There is only one giant downside I see to this.  Said abilities could then never be removed, so they should be a staple of the class, so that they're not pruned later down the line.  As that would be the worst decision the devs could make, but that aside I think it would be a great source of easy revenue for them.

[eabevella]

17 hours ago, PianoMatt said:

I don't normally weigh in on these sorts of discussions and I don't like spoilers.  With there being 0 story content  (with the exception of the Lane Vizla story culmination) I tried all of the content out on the PTS.  I did most of the dailies for the new event area (there were not enough pies to sample and complete one)

This update is a complete miss for me.  I go into most new things in my life with an open mind and a willingness to give it a chance. I'm usually on board with the general direction or flavor of a SWTOR update and almost always find something that makes me stop what I'm doing and just appreciate the work that went into it.  I did not find a single moment in this content update that did that for me on the PTS.  

If you did not like doing chores in Interpretor's Retreat, you will not like this update at all.  Everything and I mean EVERYTHING is a chore and they not only feels like chores but also leave you with a "was that it?...was that even worth my time?"  They all take too long, have an unecessary amount of forced timers or transitional periods, and/or are mind numbingly easy.  I don't know how you fail any of the events.  I tried to on purpose and was not successful.  The easter egg hunt is way too easy without competitors in the area so hopefully that will at least have some sort of pressure/excitement when it's live for a larger group of people.  The fishing is a claw game with very long windows to get your "fish" (which we never see outside of our inventory at the very end) and I am hoping there is a hidden mechanic or achievement in there for it because you give all of your "rare" fish back to end the mission.  The pie baking is a reskin of what the feast of prosperity has already has done.  The plant farming is exactly what you expect it to be only it's diminished because you want it to be better than it is or do something unexpected.  The same goes with the creature wrangling.  The weakest and most visually prominent mission: dance at the giant pole...I don't even want to talk about it.  

And you have to do it day after day after day and on alt after alt after alt.  The vendor has feast of prosperity prices so you will have to grind these out on multiple toons if you want to get everything.  I got 0 joy from the PTS spring event, hopefully that will change when the story missions are added.  You can see the unused set pieces in the zone that they will be attached to.

Just brace yourselves everyone.  

(The basilisk droid is a different story and is much more compelling.  The systems for this venture are not explained very well on the PTS through the in-game dialogue so make sure you use your achievement panel and hit the tab at the top to check out the way it works if you do log on to try it)

I'm too lazy to go to PTS but are there at least some good decorations to buy?

Also, the Empire probably makes better pies because "THIS PIE IS SO TASTELESS EVEN A JEDI WOULD CALL IT BLAND" *FORCE LIGHTNING THE CHEF INTO A WELL DONE STEAK*

[andisim]

PTS?, been there done that, not again with no outcome whatsoever...

waiting for the update, Bessi looks nice, rest? we'll see

[DuchessKristania]

On 5/1/2024 at 3:30 PM, denajii said:

Starting to feel like I'm the only one whose excited for the new things coming

Nah, I'm looking forward to much of what they announced. It doesn't matter what a patch has though, different players want different things and people are far more likely to be vocal with complaints. I hate the race and rakghoul events, but love Feast of Prosperity and the Pirate events. This new one seems more along those lines and that delights me. I also really like Dantooine and I'm excited for more to do there.

[Samcuu]

If they are updating the game I'll never be mad at them. They are probably doing about as much as they can with their dev skeleton crew. What we need is just better communication. 

[JakRoanin]

If they did an update with nothing but pvp and ops I'd cheer and never touch them, so why can't others do the same.

[Guyverarmor]

52 minutes ago, JakRoanin said:

If they did an update with nothing but pvp and ops I'd cheer and never touch them, so why can't others do the same.

Cause the people who do those gameplay areas have been treated like Bantha Poodoo for a very long time.

Majority of any updates are now for casuals to extreme casual players and single player customers. I'd honestly respect the dev team if they just flat out said "Look, we have zero care for people who do PvP and Engame activities like Raids/Ops." If they legit came out and said this, I wouldn't be upset cause them being silent on it has been apparent that they don't...but they at least acknowledge it. 

Edit: Just remove it being called an MMORPG because it's not that type of game anymore. It hasn't been since 1.0 or 2.0

Edited May 7 by Guyverarmor
Last thought on the matter

[JakRoanin]

But why were people ever expecting a traditional MMO 13 years ago, it has never been that. Never. They went out of their way to make sure people knew that. That confuses me.

[Guyverarmor]

5 minutes ago, JakRoanin said:

But why were people ever expecting a traditional MMO 13 years ago, it has never been that. Never. They went out of their way to make sure people knew that. That confuses me.

They constantly billed it as the "WoW Killer" multiple times. There have even been extremely early dev interviews stating such. That's why they pretty much copied WoW from tab target-type combat to skill trees, etc. 

They hoped to make a Star Wars version of WoW and have it kill the game it copied a lot from. And it failed miserably. They even admitted they thought MMO players would replay the story lines, which would give em time to make endgame content. That's why there wasn't any at launch. That tells me they wanted it to be an MMO like WoW and they failed at it.

[JakRoanin]

Having never played WoW I can't compare. But I have played STO and TOR is nothing like that. If anything STO is more grindy because it's story, cinematics, and VA isn't nearly as immersive and frankly amazing as TOR. It's customization however blows TOR to smithereens. 

[PianoMatt]

19 hours ago, eabevella said:

I'm too lazy to go to PTS but are there at least some good decorations to buy?

Also, the Empire probably makes better pies because "THIS PIE IS SO TASTELESS EVEN A JEDI WOULD CALL IT BLAND" *FORCE LIGHTNING THE CHEF INTO A WELL DONE STEAK*

Yes, I don't know if they want all that stuff being shared or not with screenshots, but there are some decent ones.  Lots of new tables with stuff on them (very similar to the small arrangement decos from Feast of Prosperity but with pies and plants), a pillar that must be tied to the story because it seemed out of place and off theme with the rest, but the real star will be the large BBQ Pit arrangement.

[eabevella]

12 minutes ago, PianoMatt said:

Yes, I don't know if they want all that stuff being shared or not with screenshots, but there are some decent ones.  Lots of new tables with stuff on them (very similar to the small arrangement decos from Feast of Prosperity but with pies and plants), a pillar that must be tied to the story because it seemed out of place and off theme with the rest, but the real star will be the large BBQ Pit arrangement.

Ohhhhh nice. More food is good too.

[JakRoanin]

Woo hoo!