Culture Shock

[Burtringo]

Okay, no trolling. I'm genuinely curious and would like to apologize ahead of time for the long post. I just want put some of my thoughts into words. I am a relatively new player to SWTOR, but a long time MMO gamer. Runescape, EQ1, DAoC, WoW, FF14, Neverwinter, etc. Even with nearly 30 years of MMO gaming experience, SWTOR still managed to give me a few culture shocks. There are bad apples everywhere, but it seems to be more prevalent with this game.

 

1. Are there no in-game GMs? The very first time that I arrived at fleet, the kind of topics that were discussed in general would have gotten players perma-banned in every other MMO that I've played. I know, there's a filter for profanity, but there are no filters racist remarks, which seems to be pretty rampant. Other players will jump all over anyone even insinuating anything sexual, but whenever anyone makes racist remarks over and over, most players will just stay silent. Maybe it's just me, but that seems odd.

 

2. Whatever happened to first come, first served? Over my short playing experience in SWTOR, I've learned to grab/trigger my objective first, before killing off the mobs around it. I've even learned to get the mobs to agro my companion first, so that I can loot/trigger my objective. There are times though that has mobs which can stun/knockback. Even coming up with different ways to get to my objective first, there are still Space Ninjas that will wait until I get stunned or knocked back then run in and loot/trigger the objective. I've had many times when I would let the person who was there first get the objective while I wait for the next respawn. While standing right there waiting for the objective to respawn, there's been many times when another player will just run in and try to trigger it as soon as it respawns... right in front of me. Is common courtesy totally dead? I'd hate to think that if a zombie apocalypse does happen, we'd end up killing each other before the zombies get to us. 

 

Again, really genuinely curious. Am I missing something? Has the game always been like this or is this a new development?

 

At first, I thought that maybe it's just the younger generation of gamers, but then I hear some of these players claiming to have been playing MMOs as long as I have. Yes, I know there's a blacklist, although I hate using it. I have only blacklisted one player in my whole MMO life, until I arrived in SWTOR. I think I have over a dozen on my list now. After my first 3 months, all the hate and discourtesy drove me away from the game. I stopped playing for half a year and just recently got back in with the resolve to just blacklist away and avoid everyone. It has made my playing experience slightly more tolerable, but it's really sad to have to play that way. 

 

[ThanderSnB]

1. I don't think there are any in-game GMs. It is based on players reporting. You have to right-click and report the player. The number of reports has to hit a certain threshold (they won't tell us the exact number) to automatically mute them for a certain length of time (they won't say how long). If the number of reports gets to a higher number, it will be seen by a moderator. They can get suspensions from the game, maybe bans too. They don't talk much about it because they fear players will abuse it if they have more details. At certain times of day, there may not be enough players to get enough reports. The majority of players just assume it's trolling and learn to ignore it. Or they turn off general chat so they never see it. In this game, the only time you need general chat is if you are looking to join a premade group for operations/world bosses or are watching for guild ads to join a guild.

2. For most players SWTOR is just a single player game, so they don't care about their in-game reputation. They can steal quest objectives and get a bad name, but it doesn't matter because it's not going to stop them from finishing their story. Most of those players don't care about endgame where a bad reputation might make things more difficult. Even if they do care about endgame, it's possible to get the best gear solo, no need to group, so a bad reputation doesn't matter much there either.

[denavin]

Chat can be turned off, right click on the offending party and you can block them from your chat.
I have found that a thick skin is needed in any MMO as people suck. If you let it bother you then it will always be a problem. It is up to YOU to ignore the jerks and simply play the game.
This is an ADULT game and language will always be rough. Nobody is going to tone it down just because it bothers you. It's more like if you complain about it then you WILL become the target of the abuse. So long as there are no treats on you life there is nothing that you can do about except ignore it and get on with your gaming.

You CAN report abusive player but don't expect to ever know what or if anything will be done to them.

Without sounding too unfeeling.... You just need to get over it. Sorry but that IS the way it is in life and the game.

Oh and this is not the only game with abusive players. I have played many MMO's that are MUCH worse. So as games go SWToR is mild. Don't expect it to change just because it bothers you.

[eabevella]

1. There is no in game DM so fleet chat is 70% time usa politics, 20% racist/sexist/homophobic slurs that may or may not related to usa politics, 10% ERP/kink/degenerate stuffs that aren't even funny. The only saving grace is that if you ask a genuine newbie question, most people are still helpful.

2. My personal policy is, if I see you already engaging, like killing the animals around the dead body during the shadow spawn heroic on DK, I will let you click first. But if I see you are still running toward an objective, I think it's fair game.

Personally, I think getting into a friendly guild or just remembering the few "good" names who start pug groups on fleet are helpful. Oh, and a very long ignore list.

[HypSpec]

11 hours ago, eabevella said:

2. My personal policy is, if I see you already engaging, like killing the animals around the dead body during the shadow spawn heroic on DK, I will let you click first. But if I see you are still running toward an objective, I think it's fair game.

I think this a reasonable standard that I would love to see more players adopt.

Also, to the OP: Not a great concession here, but overall you'll see less of what you call out here on pubside.

[Grendel_Echo]

On 9/20/2024 at 6:21 AM, eabevella said:

2. My personal policy is, if I see you already engaging, like killing the animals around the dead body during the shadow spawn heroic on DK, I will let you click first. But if I see you are still running toward an objective, I think it's fair game.

You literally showed my today gameplay. I reached to apprentice dead body, could not loot it since the animal mobs walked on it. I was alone and attacked, moved away a bit to have space to click on body, mobs followed, but before I managed to click, another player arrived and did it first without joining the fight. Before they left I reacted with smthing like "damn you" on chat, and got in response "it's a short respawn". 
Well its true,  respawn is short, several seconds, no big deal, but it wasn't polite. Sadly what else we can do, than to shrug arms and play.
In similar situations I usually join the fight, but whewn its over I step aside awaiting for player to click first.

I feel that approaching a clickable item in an mmo game, when we aren't grouped we form a kind of queue, and should watch to each other avoiding accidentally steal from others.

[eabevella]

44 minutes ago, Grendel_Echo said:

You literally showed my today gameplay. I reached to apprentice dead body, could not loot it since the animal mobs walked on it. I was alone and attacked, moved away a bit to have space to click on body, mobs followed, but before I managed to click, another player arrived and did it first without joining the fight. Before they left I reacted with smthing like "damn you" on chat, and got in response "it's a short respawn". 
Well its true,  respawn is short, several seconds, no big deal, but it wasn't polite. Sadly what else we can do, than to shrug arms and play.
In similar situations I usually join the fight, but whewn its over I step aside awaiting for player to click first.

I feel that approaching a clickable item in an mmo game, when we aren't grouped we form a kind of queue, and should watch to each other avoiding accidentally steal from others.

I know the feelings, happened to me a lot of times, so if I see people attacking those, I'll let them click first since they are doing the heavy lifting (well, it's not really difficult but you get what I meant), it's only fair that they go first. Plus, they'll be likely clearing the other mobs ahead of me while I wait so it's a win-win to me.

[ADarklore]

I was also shocked with what I've read in SWTOR chat.  I've played a couple different MMOs including FFXIV, DCUO and ESO and especially in ESO, this doesn't happen there because ZOS is very heavy-handed and has even resorted to AI monitoring your private chat messages, albeit they stated that people getting banned because of it was, 'accidental'.  So coming here from ESO, I have been shocked by what I've read in chat here, and is pretty clear SWTOR has a very 'hands-off' approach.  I simply keep the chat completely closed and never bother with it since I play pretty much solo- like I do most MMOs; I even created a 'silence' chat tab so that everything except private chats are visible.

I was also shocked to find SO MANY new players (or new characters) in every zone I've played.  For a game this old, and from some comments, I thought for sure the game zones would be dead- and was thankful the game had a very heavy solo playability.  Only to find out, the game is highly populated, and yes, I've had to contend with people stealing quest objectives, which is annoying, because some actually do have a LONG respawn.  There's a quest on the Jedi Knight/Consular side in Coruscant where you have to open SEVEN chests to get computer chips and they are spread out over a very large area... but when you have four or more other players running the same quest and respawn is about five minutes per chest- it took forever to finish.  Perhaps reducing the number of objectives would be a huge help, but given the age of the game, that's not going to happen.  What I ended up doing was PARKING on a single chest and collected it multiple times instead of trying to race other players from chest to chest.  So in a way, I can see WHY some players would be like that- waiting for someone in combat so you can rush in and collect the objective, in all honesty I've done it myself because of the frustration factor and just wanting to get the objective complete so I can move on.  If I know an objective has a quick respawn or if there multiple objectives close-by, I will let someone else get it and I'll move on to another.  I've had the same thing in other MMOs, including ESO, but it's much worse in the 'starter' zones which is more heavily populated- or especially in 'event' zones.  So it's nothing new, just not what I expected from a game I kept hearing was "dying".

To the OP I'd say higher level zones you'll have less of this happening, as I also noticed the higher level zones I went, the more spread out players tended to be, but still populated. 

[Samcuu]

Yes people stealing objectives is an issue. I always send a group invite to other players in the same area as me when doing these types of missions. If they don't accept then I don't feel bad at all taking objectives. Of course mmo etiquette is not to snipe someone's objective if they've already killed the mobs or are in the process of doing so. However I come across this far less often simply by just going into the pvp instance, you'll hardly ever see anyone there. 

[Setta]

On 9/19/2024 at 6:23 PM, Burtringo said:

1. Are there no in-game GMs? The very first time that I arrived at fleet, the kind of topics that were discussed in general would have gotten players perma-banned in every other MMO that I've played. I know, there's a filter for profanity, but there are no filters racist remarks, which seems to be pretty rampant. Other players will jump all over anyone even insinuating anything sexual, but whenever anyone makes racist remarks over and over, most players will just stay silent. Maybe it's just me, but that seems odd.

Don't think there are any in game GMs.  I disagree that chat here is worse than in other games, exception being FF14.  I've seen some doozys in other game chats before, so while chat is not politically correct, it's not the only chat like that.  That said the ignore function is there for a reason.  Lean to use it, makes the game a lot better.  Once you weed out some trolls everything becomes alright. 

On 9/19/2024 at 6:23 PM, Burtringo said:

2. Whatever happened to first come, first served? Over my short playing experience in SWTOR, I've learned to grab/trigger my objective first, before killing off the mobs around it. I've even learned to get the mobs to agro my companion first, so that I can loot/trigger my objective. There are times though that has mobs which can stun/knockback

Sorry but this is also a problem everywhere else.   Every game I've played and there's a lot, ninjas are everywhere.  That said, unlike some other games you do not stop channeling the objective or node if you're hit.  Unless that hit is a stun or knockback.  If you're really worried about it, learn to send your companion in first to attract the mobs, run in and get the node / objective.  Problem solved. 

2 hours ago, ADarklore said:

I was also shocked with what I've read in SWTOR chat.  I've played a couple different MMOs including FFXIV, DCUO and ESO and especially in ESO, this doesn't happen there because ZOS is very heavy-handed and has even resorted to AI monitoring your private chat messages, albeit they stated that people getting banned because of it was, 'accidental

Maybe things have changed more recently for some games, but honestly this is nothing new across the genre.  And while I don't agree with the things said in chat by these people, I don't believe in policing everyone either.  Ignoring a person ignores their whole legacy, so all of their toons.  They don't get to make alts and bother you again.  Do it enough times, and the problem is easily solved, without having to resort to policing the game.  Which with the skeleton crew that they have working on it, well they'll get around to it, by 2030 if the game is still around then.   

 

[denavin]

6 hours ago, Grendel_Echo said:

You literally showed my today gameplay. I reached to apprentice dead body, could not loot it since the animal mobs walked on it. I was alone and attacked, moved away a bit to have space to click on body, mobs followed, but before I managed to click, another player arrived and did it first without joining the fight. Before they left I reacted with smthing like "damn you" on chat, and got in response "it's a short respawn". 
Well its true,  respawn is short, several seconds, no big deal, but it wasn't polite. Sadly what else we can do, than to shrug arms and play.
In similar situations I usually join the fight, but whewn its over I step aside awaiting for player to click first.

I feel that approaching a clickable item in an mmo game, when we aren't grouped we form a kind of queue, and should watch to each other avoiding accidentally steal from others.

The way to foil these people is simple. Set your companion to Tank. Send them in to attack and they will put aggro. Then you do and click on the objective before you attack. That way it will not lock you out from being in combat. I've been doing this for years.
 

[Toraak]

On 9/19/2024 at 6:23 PM, Burtringo said:

 

2. Whatever happened to first come, first served? Over my short playing experience in SWTOR, I've learned to grab/trigger my objective first, before killing off the mobs around it. I've even learned to get the mobs to agro my companion first, so that I can loot/trigger my objective. There are times though that has mobs which can stun/knockback. Even coming up with different ways to get to my objective first, there are still Space Ninjas that will wait until I get stunned or knocked back then run in and loot/trigger the objective. I've had many times when I would let the person who was there first get the objective while I wait for the next respawn. While standing right there waiting for the objective to respawn, there's been many times when another player will just run in and try to trigger it as soon as it respawns... right in front of me. Is common courtesy totally dead? I'd hate to think that if a zombie apocalypse does happen, we'd end up killing each other before the zombies get to us. 

 

This has been normal for every MMO I've ever played. Always grab the item 1st before worrying about the mobs around it. 

[GalaxyWeasel]

To be perfectly honest, if I put on the ignore list everyone who said something in the general chat that I found offensive I'd probably have a very silent chat. My list is thus completely empty.

I think what helped keep me in the game is early on I found you could close the chat window (as other people have already stated that you can do), and then you miss all of those jerks' comments. The majority of what I did for most of the game prior to discovering group-finder was to keep the chat window closed, unless I wanted to read what a non-Basic speaking companion/character had said, and then I would close it again.

Now that I do group activities more often, and am more used to dealing with the general chat, I can handle seeing this rubbish and generally just ignore it. It's my personal goal to never have anyone on my ignore list- if the chat gets too obnoxious or vulgar, I just close it until I get queued into a group activity like flashpoints or Player-Vs.-Player, which does happen often. Like someone else said, it seems a lot worse on the Sith Empire side, especially on the fleet.

May I note, that the filters seem to be a bit... in need of improvements. For some reason, I've had perfectly clean and appropriate words, like the name of the day after Friday and before Sunday, or the name of the mammals with big teeth that like to chew wood, censored. Also, it seems quite a lot of other words that are inappropriate manage to slip by them. Maybe the developers could do something about that at some point, but in the meantime just try some of the described methods of dealing with these rude people. On behalf of all of the actually decent people on here (which there are plenty of) sorry about the jerks- like life, you've just got to learn to not pay any attention to them.

(And glad to see someone else who played Runescape- I used to play that years and years and years ago. Fun, but nowhere near as major as this game is!!!)