SWTOR: 2 months on, who's still playing

Blowfish · 24-02-2012 9:38am

Dustaz wrote: »

Basilisk Droid was a massively full server at launch and now on alliance side its a ghost town. I hope for the sake of people who do enjoy the game that therell be server merges soon.

Are you sure about that? Republic have actually started dominating Ilum in the evenings, it seems there's more Reps now then there's ever been.

Draupnir · 24-02-2012 11:48am

Got to level 34 last night, starting to dream of finally capping a character in an MMORPG for the first time since MUD in college. I think the highest I ever got in WoW was level 59 with a Draenei Paladin about 5 years after I started playing!

One thing that bugged me a bit last night was that, in spite of being spec'd as a Medic Commando, I could only down some pretty strong NPC's around my level on Balmorra if I played with my Medic companion and I did the tanking. Perhaps I've underpowered my tank companion though.

Still loving the main storyline for the Commando Trooper, didn't expect the story to be as engaging.

Shiminay · 24-02-2012 12:40pm

Dustaz wrote: »

If my guild had not have quit en masse (myself included) we would have everything clear on nightmare (all bar soa down in ev) by now and be left with nothing at all to do. For some reason in wow, that didnt happen untill at least a year into the cycle of each expansion.

Is it a case Dusty that Wow simply had more content or that the game took longer/was harder to get through or anything? It seems like that's the sort of thing they really should be able to get right when WoW has been around for so many years and with a heap of expansions etc.

Venom · 24-02-2012 1:34pm

Koded_AR_Rose wrote: »

in terms of graphics what game would be a good comparison i am a noob in pc gaming but have a decent enough laptop that runs fallout 3 fairly well and was wondering would it hold up for this game? ... sorry if this question is off topic

Warhammer Online would be the nearest graphics wise to SWTOR. But the game engine is crap so you need a pretty good system to run it at medium quality settings.

Holyhole · 24-02-2012 1:42pm

Dustaz wrote: »

One thing that noone seems to accept is that this 'type' of player exists in every game. The difference is that a game like wow can hold peoples attention for 5 years but swtor struggles to hold them for 5 weeks.
You play the game at your own pace, thats fine but literally the only thing swtor has going for it is the questing system. Once that finishes (or wears thin) there really isnt a whole lot else to it. Companions, most professions, the world at large are useless at max level. The raids are good, but really only 'good'. If my guild had not have quit en masse (myself included) we would have everything clear on nightmare (all bar soa down in ev) by now and be left with nothing at all to do. For some reason in wow, that didnt happen untill at least a year into the cycle of each expansion.

I dont agree with a lot of this tbh m8. about the end game not being there, yep thats true, its pretty faceroll, about the 'type' of player, yep, especially at the start of any MMO. never argued any of that. But Companions/professions/world at large not being there.. nope dont agree with that at all... companions are really good addition, really helpful, save me a whole heap of time gettin epic mats to make cashish, as well as providing some fun story quests. 'Most professions' is a bit vague, but i have found that the crafting is at least better then wow, definatly a fan of using slicing on one char to get the mission for Underworld trading on another char, to make epic bracers on another char, to make me 150K Credits, thats much more amusing than any crafting I ever did in WoW, maybe thats personal taste tho.. the world at large, well i play on a PvE server (FrostClaw), so if you mean world pvp then i wouldnt really know or care tbh.. but there are a few hours of dailys, several HM instances, a couple high end world bosses.
Could there be more? HELL yeah! cant wait to try it as it comes in..
You are correct tho that vast majority of this game right now is in the levelling, which is fine by me, looking forward to levelling one of every class.. 8 chars whould keep me busy for quite some time..

Dustaz wrote: »

Without sounding overly negative, Id guess that theres a faily hefty amount of that population is made up of naysayers. Basilisk Droid was a massively full server at launch and now on alliance side its a ghost town. I hope for the sake of people who do enjoy the game that therell be server merges soon.

Yer I hope the merges are done quite soon as well tbh m8. Although when you look at the info comming out of BW, the seem to be saying that they havent lost that many subs. This may be true, but activity is definatly falling, at least from what i can see. I do assume its from the 'more hardcore' players, and the 'more casual' players are now starting to get up to 50, so hopefully its going to work out in the long run. Certainly my guild population has gone very sharply in the last month from harder players to softer players.
Its worth saying that I actually feel kinda sorry for the more serious gamers who attacked this game with real gusto. I thought it was going to accommodate you guys. I suppose you will have to check out Tera and GW2, hopefully you will find what you are looking for there. Although, i think it is very reasonable to want a fresh and enjoyable (non WoW copy) MMO, SWTOR is not it, and when it does come out, everyone, myself included, will be heading over to it..

24-02-2012 4:54pm

I was on Atho City.

Didn't play hardcore - took til mid Jan to get to 50. At around 40 I just started to find the game boring and I think I pushed to 50 with the hope that it would improve.

At 50, PvP became a hateful mess, the entire game ran poorly on my machine which is massively above the system requirements and the content was extremely generic.

I guess I'm not speaking for everyone - but I think the game is promising with some interesting ideas but the execution has been poor and I don't think the playerbase out there has the patience for things like this anymore.

I think WoW really burned a lot of people out when it came to grinding out gear and I think MMO's in general need to offer something more now. What that is I don't know.

In anycase - back on topic, most of my guild on ATHO have quit and the server is extremely quit. My sub ran out around a week ago but I hadn't played since late January.

I know I won't be back, I rarely un-install games but I completely removed SWTOR because I know I'm done with it.

Not trashing it, it's worth a try if you are new to MMO's or are into star wars. It's a good experience for a while but ultimately it left me with no desire whatsoever to log in and play. Even the thought of logging in would be a chore now.

Venom · 25-02-2012 1:47am

Holyhole wrote: »

I dont agree with a lot of this tbh m8. about the end game not being there, yep thats true, its pretty faceroll, about the 'type' of player, yep, especially at the start of any MMO. never argued any of that. But Companions/professions/world at large not being there.. nope dont agree with that at all... companions are really good addition, really helpful, save me a whole heap of time gettin epic mats to make cashish, as well as providing some fun story quests. 'Most professions' is a bit vague, but i have found that the crafting is at least better then wow, definatly a fan of using slicing on one char to get the mission for Underworld trading on another char, to make epic bracers on another char, to make me 150K Credits, thats much more amusing than any crafting I ever did in WoW, maybe thats personal taste tho.. the world at large, well i play on a PvE server (FrostClaw), so if you mean world pvp then i wouldnt really know or care tbh.. but there are a few hours of dailys, several HM instances, a couple high end world bosses.
Could there be more? HELL yeah! cant wait to try it as it comes in..
You are correct tho that vast majority of this game right now is in the levelling, which is fine by me, looking forward to levelling one of every class.. 8 chars whould keep me busy for quite some time..

Unless there has been a radical change in crafting the best way to make lots of credits in SWTOR is by not wasting credits leveling up crafting. Apart from the fact you can get equal if not better upgrades via commendation vendors on every planet not to mention once you hit 50 the amount of credits you get from the daily missions is way more profitable that crafting.

Kirby · 25-02-2012 3:31pm

Alot of people who complained about lack of end game content.....didn't do any of it. They got to 50 and just quit. How many of you actually did the set of hardmodes at 50? Even once? Black Talon, Boarding Party, The Foundry, Directive 7, Battle of Ilum, False emperor, Kaos under siege. Most of them are on the fleet. You don't even have to travel anywhere. They all drop tionese and Columi gear and all take an hour or so with the exception of BT. FE and Foundry have good stories too where you fight Revan and Malgus. There was plenty to do and it took me over a month to farm my columi set doing them every day.

Then you have EV and Karagga normal and hard modes which are 8 and 16 man raids. You have Ilum open pvp. You have Ilum and Belsavis dailies if thats your thing. And you have battleground pvp with three maps.

Tbh I can't think of any MMO that has had more engame content on release and I've played all the recent ones save rift.

Regarding professions, I found Underworld trading an excellent moneymaker. Mandalorian Iron sells for 7k a bar. I've made several million credits without too much effort from it.

Then there is the fun of farming sets at 50. People don't realise you can take any low level armor you want and like the look of, farm the set, and put the mods from the best armor in the game in it. The next patch is adding removal of armor mods and the tier weapons and armour sets......so if you don't like the look of the tier sets, take the mods out and stick it in your favourite set. Great feature.

November One · 26-02-2012 6:00pm

Kirby wrote: »

FE and Foundry have good stories too where you fight Revan and Malgus.

Dude spoilers.

Otherwise I think you made a good point.

Dustaz · 27-02-2012 2:13pm

Shiminay wrote: »

Is it a case Dusty that Wow simply had more content or that the game took longer/was harder to get through or anything? It seems like that's the sort of thing they really should be able to get right when WoW has been around for so many years and with a heap of expansions etc.

I really don't know. For starters the endgame content was harder and there was probably just a little more of it. There were pve zones you hadnt touched whilst levelling, which isnt the case in swtor. There was rep farming and quests, professions took a little more work to relevel and in every expansion since vanilla there was a lot more in the way of dungeons and raids at max level. I think the fact that its such a single player game has a detrimental effect also. I don't think i added 1 person to my friends list while levelling my main, so outside of the guild i knew noone on the server. At 50, I didnt group with randoms, just ran dungeons and raids with the guild partly because Ive been gaming with them for so long but also because we really didnt know anyone else. That certainly wasnt the case in wow. Whatever it is, it means that i was jumping around the republic fleet aimlessly in far quicker time than i was jumping around ironforge.

The thing that sort of annoys me is that people try to compare swtor to vanilla wow. Thats a pretty dumb comparison since as you pointed out, everyone, including bioware, have been watching and playing wow since it came out so expectations need to match the current state of wow, not where it was 7 years ago.

Holyhole wrote: »

But Companions/professions/world at large not being there.. nope dont agree with that at all... companions are really good addition, really helpful, save me a whole heap of time gettin epic mats to make cashish, as well as providing some fun story quests.

Companions are an awesome idea. In the levelling game they work really well. at 50 they are useless. You can't say that they are handy for professions. Thats how professions work. The gathering window might as well be a 5 buttons that say "Get this item" or "craft this". You dont actually see them or use them in any meaningful way (apart from using the crit capable ones on appropriate missions).

In pvp and pve you cant actually use them, ever. So whats the point? Theres an entire stat in the game (presence) thats rendered useless the second you hit 50. Like a lot of things about star wars, really great idea that they just didnt think through and implemented badly.

'Most professions' is a bit vague, but i have found that the crafting is at least better then wow, definatly a fan of using slicing on one char to get the mission for Underworld trading on another char, to make epic bracers on another char, to make me 150K Credits, thats much more amusing than any crafting I ever did in WoW, maybe thats personal taste tho..

Biochem is useful and its pretty much like every other alchemy profession in any game, so lets ignore that.

synthweaving and armoromech are also fairly standard with the exception that theres no reason to have them as nothing you can make is better than stuff that drops from hm's and raids. So pretty useless thus far (i assume theyll eventually get the message and implement some bis for these)

Armstech and Artifice. For gods sake, why do these professions exist? Merge them all into cybertech and be done with it. Or give them a whole SHEDLOAD more stuff. Armstech in particular is lacking badly. Both of these can make 1 modification that isnt exactly in massive demand and guns and offhands that arent really that usefull. Again, better is dropped in hm's and raids

Cybertech. Again, brilliant idea, badly implemented. Mods and Armorings on the whole are such a good idea but to make them secondary to drops from raids and hard modes nullifies the entire idea. Enchanting and Jewelcrafting still play a part in wow endgame, why does cybertech, armstech and artifice become useless after level 49? Bioware will learn and fix it but its such an obvious gaping flaw that you wonder how it wasnt spotted 2 years ago.

I liked the difference in gathering skills and missions skills.

Tbh I can't think of any MMO that has had more engame content on release and I've played all the recent ones save rift.

swtor had 1 raid with 6 bosses and 1 raid with 1 boss and 2 or 3 max level dungeons. Thats almost exactly what wow had at launch 8 years ago and they got an awful hard time for not having enough. If you count the hard modes, a feature directly lifted from wow, then you need to compare it to the wow expansions that had hard modes and wow still had more. Remember theres still only 5 (?) hard modes available.

, and put the mods from the best armor in the game in it.

No, because you cant make the BIS mods and at the moment you cant remove them from the BIS items (i know thats coming in the next patch but god, how could they not have looked at this and seen how it SHOULD work)

November One wrote: »

Dude spoilers.

The game has been out almost 3 months, i think its a bit late for spoilers:)

Blowfish · 27-02-2012 2:33pm

Dustaz wrote: »

No, because you cant make the BIS mods and at the moment you cant remove them from the BIS items (i know thats coming in the next patch but god, how could they not have looked at this and seen how it SHOULD work)

Actually, the level 58 armoring mods drop in Ops as BoE's, so you can regularly find them on the GTN. The other mods can be pulled from the Rakata etc. gear. You'll be missing the set bonus, but as mentioned that'll be changing in 1.2.

Artifice is able to craft BiS relics and has moneymakers in the Magenta Crystal etc. Synthweaving has it in the heavy armor orange belt and wrist so are at least somewhat useful. Armormech can create BiS wrist and belt.

Armsmech definitely needs a lot of work though, and the rest bar Biochem could do with a little more usefulness. Thankfully it is one of the things changing in 1.2 too.

Raphael · 27-02-2012 3:35pm

The one thing to be said for armormech/cybertech is that they're very useful while levelling. Armormech kept me and my companions very well geared all the way through. Dropped it for Biochem in the high 40s though.

Kirby · 28-02-2012 4:48pm

Dustaz wrote: »

swtor had 1 raid with 6 bosses and 1 raid with 1 boss and 2 or 3 max level dungeons. Thats almost exactly what wow had at launch 8 years ago and they got an awful hard time for not having enough. If you count the hard modes, a feature directly lifted from wow, then you need to compare it to the wow expansions that had hard modes and wow still had more. Remember theres still only 5 (?) hard modes available.

Mate, all the information is on the previous page. I don't know how you could have missed it. why do a "5?" when you can clearly see them listed on the previous page. There are seven end game instances available for 4 man groups. You know this because you read and quoted my post. You clearly saw this so by ignoring it you are just being obtuse for the sake of your argument.

You talk about expansions but I wonder why? You may want to compare a game with 3 seperate expansions 7 years worth of content to a 2 month old game. But its foolish. My point stands, there is more endgame content in this than any other MMO I've seen on release. And there is only going to be more added.

And the inference that "Hard modes don't count as engame content because there are easier versions" is just ridiculous. If you don't like the game, fine. But stating there are only 2 or 3 max level dungeons is just lying. There is no other way to put it.

There are plenty of legitimate issues with the game.

You can talk about the fact that it isn't optomized well and its a resource hog. You can talk about too many fetch quests. You can talk about The default UI not being customizable. You can talk about too many hobsons choices and the early beta idea of being able to kill companions being dropped. Certain professions seem useless. Button lag for the first month and a half. Buggy datacrons take take an hour to do and then fall through the world. Over instancing leading to empty servers. etc etc.

Lots of issues that plague the game. Endgame content really, really isn't one of them.

Nody · 28-02-2012 5:30pm

Kirby wrote: »

Lots of issues that plague the game. Endgame content really, really isn't one of them.

But if people are consistently (and between this thread and the others it appears to be) get to max level, get bored and quit that does point out a lack of high level content. It does not mean content don't exist but rather that people don't care/are interested enough i doing it (which they by definition should be because now they don't need to grind levels any more) and hence it is lacking.

Dustaz · 28-02-2012 5:30pm

Kirby wrote: »

Mate, all the information is on the previous page. I don't know how you could have missed it. why do a "5?" when you can clearly see them listed on the previous page. There are seven end game instances available for 4 man groups. You know this because you read and quoted my post. You clearly saw this so by ignoring it you are just being obtuse for the sake of your argument.

Oh im sorry mate, i didnt notice you being deliberately obtuse by including one that was patched in 2 months after release. You know, the really really badly designed one that took a year to make apparently.

Ive given up trying to remember, but there was 6 wasnt there? BT, Taral, D7, False Emp and Battle of Ilum and the repubclic equivalent of the foundry, which the name escapes me.

My point and its one that noone seems willing to address is that Hard modes are DIRECTLY lifted from wow. As Are battlegrounds. As is the idea that you MUST have lots of end game stuff for people to do once they level to cap. So stop comparing a game that has taken ideas and concepts from wow's entire lifespan to wow at launch. Yes, there is end game content, I've done it all. Putting in a hard mode into low level dungeons isnt exactly the most original or creatively taxing process in the world and is hardly worthy of praise.

It also doesnt address quality. There might be stuff there, but it doesnt guarentee that the stuff is actually any good. I actually quite liked the raids, but the dungeons were piss poor.

You talk about expansions but I wonder why? You may want to compare a game with 3 seperate expansions 7 years worth of content to a 2 month old game. But its foolish.

As i said above, If you take wow, copy most of the good bits (but leave out some of the really good bits for god knows what reason), skin it in a space theme and put it out there for the mmo market that wow created, then you are going to be compared to world of warcraft.

Not world of warcraft 7 years ago. world of warcraft NOW. That is what the game is competing with. and its the reason so many people quit so quickly.

Shiminay · 28-02-2012 5:51pm

Dustaz wrote: »

Not world of warcraft 7 years ago. world of warcraft NOW. That is what the game is competing with. and its the reason so many people quit so quickly.

On this one point - could one make the argument that there is simply no economically viable means to touch WoW's vast quantity of end game content simply because it's had to long to produce so much?

MMOs are coming out all the time, if they're not going to have some serious hooks other than "it's set in this universe" and is essentially the same game mechanically as WoW (and I think for the sake of argument, we can say that generally speaking, WoW and SWTOR are mechanically the same game), then surly no one can dethrone WoW as they'll just keep adding more and more to it.

Nody · 28-02-2012 6:04pm

Shiminay wrote: »

On this one point - could one make the argument that there is simply no economically viable means to touch WoW's vast quantity of end game content simply because it's had to long to produce so much?

That would be Everquest which released one expansion a year with multiple raid zones (with multiple bosses in each raid zone usually) every year for gosh, 15 or so years now?

If content was king then EQ would be the master of the block yet when WoW came out it rocked EQ's socks with EQ having 7 odd expansions by the time. WoW did not have more content but WoW was a better game.

This is what MMO developers keep on missing; you can't beat WoW by doing WoW with a new skin and some altered abilities as WoW clone in a new skin. It has to much content and was to many people's first MMO for that. If they want to beat WoW the game simply needs to be better, smoother, and more fun while running well on low end machines. Rift was a good stab on the different part with the combine three soul idea but failed badly in other areas. WHO's public group idea and the way they had PvP feeling a natural part of the game was also a good plan but it failed in other areas.

The problem with the above is you need someone to cross all the boxes and polish it long enough to get there. And the polishing team needs to listen to the right type of players (i.e. not only one segment of the hard core, story drive etc.) to get it right. Do I think anyone will pull that off though? Honestly, no, I think the MMO market will keep on splitting up into more and more games all getting <500k subscribers and staying there with in 6 months as people keep on going from game to game not finding the "it" factor they expect.

Venom · 28-02-2012 6:11pm

Kirby wrote: »

Mate, all the information is on the previous page. I don't know how you could have missed it. why do a "5?" when you can clearly see them listed on the previous page. There are seven end game instances available for 4 man groups. You know this because you read and quoted my post. You clearly saw this so by ignoring it you are just being obtuse for the sake of your argument.

You talk about expansions but I wonder why? You may want to compare a game with 3 seperate expansions 7 years worth of content to a 2 month old game. But its foolish. My point stands, there is more endgame content in this than any other MMO I've seen on release. And there is only going to be more added.

And the inference that "Hard modes don't count as engame content because there are easier versions" is just ridiculous. If you don't like the game, fine. But stating there are only 2 or 3 max level dungeons is just lying. There is no other way to put it.

There are plenty of legitimate issues with the game.

You can talk about the fact that it isn't optomized well and its a resource hog. You can talk about too many fetch quests. You can talk about The default UI not being customizable. You can talk about too many hobsons choices and the early beta idea of being able to kill companions being dropped. Certain professions seem useless. Button lag for the first month and a half. Buggy datacrons take take an hour to do and then fall through the world. Over instancing leading to empty servers. etc etc.

Lots of issues that plague the game. Endgame content really, really isn't one of them.

Dude endgame content at release was a bugged and broken mess. Chests couldn't be looted and the only real difference between normal and hard modes were retarded enrage timers on the boss mobs and if a player died it could screw up the whole dungeon.

Add in no LFG tools so players had to hang around the Fleet spamming chat just like the bad old days of EQ1 over 10 years ago! This is not even taking into account major gameplay issues like ability lag, server lag and how crap the game runs with more than a few players on screen at once and you have just one of the many reasons players are leaving SWTOR in droves.

You can bury you're head in the sand all you want but endgame content in SWTOR is really, really a major problem.

Venom · 28-02-2012 6:20pm

Nody wrote: »

That would be Everquest which released one expansion a year with multiple raid zones (with multiple bosses in each raid zone usually) every year for gosh, 15 or so years now?

If content was king then EQ would be the master of the block yet when WoW came out it rocked EQ's socks with EQ having 7 odd expansions by the time. WoW did not have more content but WoW was a better game.

This is what MMO developers keep on missing; you can't beat WoW by doing WoW with a new skin and some altered abilities as WoW clone in a new skin. It has to much content and was to many people's first MMO for that. If they want to beat WoW the game simply needs to be better, smoother, and more fun while running well on low end machines. Rift was a good stab on the different part with the combine three soul idea but failed badly in other areas. WHO's public group idea and the way they had PvP feeling a natural part of the game was also a good plan but it failed in other areas.

The problem with the above is you need someone to cross all the boxes and polish it long enough to get there. And the polishing team needs to listen to the right type of players (i.e. not only one segment of the hard core, story drive etc.) to get it right. Do I think anyone will pull that off though? Honestly, no, I think the MMO market will keep on splitting up into more and more games all getting <500k subscribers and staying there with in 6 months as people keep on going from game to game not finding the "it" factor they expect.

+1

You would think after the failures of...

Vanguard
The Matrix Online
Age of Conan
Warhammer Online
Champions Online
Star Trek Online
DCU Online

that Bioware/EA would of done things right with SWTOR and considering the budget and development time they had its kinda shocking how much of a failure they made of things :eek: Trying to serve up the same crap as player had over a decade ago or making a bad WoW clone is just not going to cut it anymore and thankfully the GW2 dev team seems to relies this.

Kirby · 28-02-2012 9:26pm

Dustaz wrote: »

Oh im sorry mate, i didnt notice you being deliberately obtuse by including one that was patched in 2 months after release. You know, the really really badly designed one that took a year to make apparently.

Game release was December 20th. KuS was released on January 17th. Less than one month after release. Not even close to two months. But you can choose to ignore facts if it suits your argument.

Koded_AR_Rose · 29-02-2012 2:40am

Venom wrote: »

Warhammer Online would be the nearest graphics wise to SWTOR. But the game engine is crap so you need a pretty good system to run it at medium quality settings.

I have ran that on the ooh its shiny and it rarely lags only mildy when entering a highly player populated area and this is playing while it is still downloading ....
Do you think it would be worth a try with swtor?

also thanks for the reply

Dohnny Jepp · 29-02-2012 2:58pm

I played it for a month and enjoyed it. It was just too similar to everythin else out there. I'm happy to play mmo's that are similar that are also f2p.

Venom · 29-02-2012 3:25pm

Koded_AR_Rose wrote: »

I have ran that on the ooh its shiny and it rarely lags only mildy when entering a highly player populated area and this is playing while it is still downloading ....
Do you think it would be worth a try with swtor?

also thanks for the reply

I honestly couldn't say. I'v a pretty high spec PC so most of my time playing was fine but going to the fleet, PvPing or running group missions did cause the game to to drag alot.

This was on SWTOR's high setting (really medium) with all the bells and whistles turned on and even then it looked very dated. You're best bet would be to wait for a trial tbh.

Dustaz · 01-03-2012 6:56pm

Kirby wrote: »

Game release was December 20th. KuS was released on January 17th. Less than one month after release. Not even close to two months. But you can choose to ignore facts if it suits your argument.

Well if your pulling me up on pedantics then ill point out that 2 months after launch isnt 'at launch'.

What about the myriad of other points relating to this that you have chose to ignore?

Sephiroth_dude · 05-03-2012 11:25pm

I have 46 days left and tbh I'm a bit lost,feel very overwhelmed by the game :-/

allanb49 · 06-03-2012 11:28am

Had a 2 week break back now at the weekend and flying through it now again with my jedi

RichieD · 06-03-2012 2:48pm

Im still playing on Basilisk droid republic, doing HM/NM ops at the moment.

The one biggest change id like to see is merging of servers.

Whats the point in having space ships and gigantic plants when there is only 100 people in the world.

Second to that id like to see 8 man pre-mades for pvp. Too many times I've gone into a wz and done 700k healing and still we get thrashed if 4 people in the group arent capable of watching a door.

luisspellcast · 11-03-2012 9:52am

maybe a bit late but i would like to share what i think:

i'm still playing and enjoying the game to it's full !

brought a couple old friends (and made new ones) on the role-playing server-- we would be the "hardcore" type that joined an RP guild, which seem very organized at the time, with intentions to get our own team going inside that structure and focus on end-game content without having to worry too much about logistics

it didn't work out and i decided to leave-- registered my own guild and we've build up numbers to our desired guild size (21 members) with hand-picked people from all classes--

the game has millions of flaws, be it bugs, bad loot distribution, shabby class design, boring instancing travel, missing obvious treats, limited functionality (both in-game and interface) but, in the end, i happen to see past all that for those 3 hours of absolute fun every evening with the people in the team, 2 of them happen to be gaming friends for the past 15 years

one of them friends gave me a 6 month sub as a christmas present and i subbed the other 6 months and i don't regret it a single bit

as for leveling i have plenty of time on my hands and leveled a juggernaut to 50 in 6 days (when you don't have much of a social life and it's too cold outside to go biking, it's doable) and capped a mercenary yesterday (which cleared vault and palace in normal-mode with level 40 pvp gear.) back on main, we managed to down Soa hard-mode with only 5 of us alive at the bottom with lady luck clearly not playing on our side and no one moaned, no one blamed rng, and everybody just giving 100% like expected-- we repaired for 60k and everybody will be logging again to go for more... next week is nightmare mode and we can't wait...

as for costumer service, i wonder how people have been writing their tickets: every time i /bug an issue (that is not super-common) i either get an email with specific steps to send a specific log or i get a chat-request (which sometimes can be in the middle of a war zone or instance-- bah)

people complain too much... people expect too much... people always want more than what they're bargaining for... i've no problem with that, but when i have to complain, anticipate or moan about something while others are enjoying, then i just deem it as my problem and walk away... it's not them, it's me...

i hope swtor become 10 times better than what it is now but, so far, i'm loving it and i'll be playing it for quite a while...

note: 700k healing in a warzone-- picture or it didn't happen

*edits for grammar and misspelling

Mr. K · 13-03-2012 12:20am

I'm still playing, on and off. I really just wanna experience all the story stuff, but I keep getting distracted by other games! I'm enjoying it whenever I play though.

excaliburhc · 13-03-2012 10:08am

still playing but it has gotten to the stage where it is log in do dailies / weeklys and thats it.

waiting on 1.2 ,if i didnt have mass effect to play then would have unsubbed till release.

Calhoun · 13-03-2012 3:57pm

Still playing it and enjoying it, im big into RPG elements of the game. I find that although the leveling experience with each class is the same the story keeps it very interesting and fresh.

If you think about it you effectively have 4 storylines per side at the moment to play through.

My only problem is balancing my mass effect playthrough with swtor time

.

RichieD · 15-03-2012 1:09pm

I've been one of SWTOR's biggest supporters and have been playing since early access.

However even im starting to get bored at this stage, I literally just log on at 7pm for operations and log out when we disband.

IF they fix scoundrels in 1.2 then i'll be re-movitated. It would also help if they made cybertech remotely useful compared to the other professions.

I have to say im extremely suspicious that they didnt release the details of 1.2 yet and only gave us a flashy video with no substance.

Vicxas · 15-03-2012 8:50pm

Im still playing, rolling a sith inquisitor on the Progenitor, Add me

Name: Borca

Welease · 16-03-2012 2:01pm

I cancelled this morning.. open world pvp doesn't seem to be a focus at present, and ilum has been empty for the last couple of weeks. There was very little point in continuing to log on and sit there waiting for people to fight.

A pity, but hopefully 1.2 will keep the more pve focussed players happy.. best of luck.

jeawan · 16-03-2012 4:19pm

Welease wrote: »

I cancelled this morning.. open world pvp doesn't seem to be a focus at present, and ilum has been empty for the last couple of weeks. There was very little point in continuing to log on and sit there waiting for people to fight.

A pity, but hopefully 1.2 will keep the more pve focussed players happy.. best of luck.

Ilum was **** for open pvp anyway the past part pretty much killed it completely n one will go there now bar to do the PVE Dailys shame as open world pvp is allot of fun more so then BG's they need to find a way to get people back into ilum again fighting

VinLieger · 16-03-2012 7:49pm

Cancelled it last night, 3 days left and just wasnt bothered. The other 4-5 guys i played with also are gone

luisspellcast · 18-03-2012 10:02am

Karaga's Palace 5/5 NiM

only Soa to go !

loving it...

Shiminay · 26-03-2012 10:55am

I logged in for the first time in about 2 months yesterday and went through a couple of missions on Alderaan with my Knight. I've had so many other games to play at the moment, I didn't have time for this and truth be told, I found the other games far more engaging.

But it was fun, I won't be leaving it so long in future

Calhoun · 26-03-2012 12:03pm

Was playing over the weekend but not as much as i would like due to Mass Effect, i have to say the server population is very discouraging and if i was EA i would merge because on population alone i am wondering if the game can survive.

I have looked online and there are similar concerns which are not good because it brings up doubt in peoples mind if its worth investing in their chars.

Anyone else noticing the decline on their server?

Nody · 26-03-2012 12:37pm

Calhoun wrote: »

Was playing over the weekend but not as much as i would like due to Mass Effect, i have to say the server population is very discouraging and if i was EA i would merge because on population alone i am wondering if the game can survive.

I have looked online and there are similar concerns which are not good because it brings up doubt in peoples mind if its worth investing in their chars.

Anyone else noticing the decline on their server?

From my MMO experience merges are ALWAYS later then the should (in some cases by years; more common to start up free or paid server transfers instead). I can only guess to why as I've not been given access to their thinking but a few reason stand out:

Merges signify that the game is shrinking - never a message you want to send out
They want to wait and see if it is not only a temporary dip in numbers (making more leave due to lack of population)
Servers are in general bought and paid for - unused servers still cost money and raise ankward questions
Self denial - they really think the numbers look ok/are above what they consider minimum for merge numbers

Calhoun · 26-03-2012 2:41pm

Nody wrote: »

From my MMO experience merges are ALWAYS later then the should (in some cases by years; more common to start up free or paid server transfers instead). I can only guess to why as I've not been given access to their thinking but a few reason stand out:
Merges signify that the game is shrinking - never a message you want to send out

They want to wait and see if it is not only a temporary dip in numbers (making more leave due to lack of population)

Servers are in general bought and paid for - unused servers still cost money and raise ankward questions

Self denial - they really think the numbers look ok/are above what they consider minimum for merge numbers

I read online that they put a cap of 1500 people per server and that is probably why they are in the situation they are now, they spread their numbers over a larger server base but messed up the launch so numbers are in decline and those playing are also declining as the place is dead .

Vicxas · 27-03-2012 7:40am

Calhoun wrote: »

I read online that they put a cap of 1500 people per server and that is probably why they are in the situation they are now, they spread their numbers over a larger server base but messed up the launch so numbers are in decline and those playing are also declining as the place is dead .

The 1500 cap was to test the server load with all the influx of new customers. Now im not so sure but hopefully with the content addond of 1.2 the numbers will flow back in.

Dubhthamlacht · 27-03-2012 9:04am

The game itself is still a lot of fun but the drop off in numbers is certainly a pain. I've noticed more so in the past week. I couldn't finish any of the group heroics on Balmorra due to lack of people and when I finished the quests on Quesh, often I was the only one on the planet from Republic side.

I hope 1.2 brings the population backup.

allanb49 · 27-03-2012 9:08am

I've dropped off for about a month,

logged in for once this month,

Mass Effect 3 roped me in and then i got football manager and the addiction started again,

Don't know what it is about that game,

Really need more time gaming and less working

Vicxas · 28-03-2012 7:50am

Dubhthamlacht wrote: »

The game itself is still a lot of fun but the drop off in numbers is certainly a pain. I've noticed more so in the past week. I couldn't finish any of the group heroics on Balmorra due to lack of people and when I finished the quests on Quesh, often I was the only one on the planet from Republic side.

I hope 1.2 brings the population backup.

Both sides of Balmorra are like this. It was like pulling teeth trying to complete the heroics, even the 2+ ones were a pain to fill.

I hope 1.2 will revive this game somewhat. Id hate to see it go the way of Star Trek Online.

Cina · 28-03-2012 3:07pm

Sadly I may have to give up now. In the space of 3 weeks since ME3 and holidays the population on my server has gone down massively and it's very dull now. Unless they do a big merge then I don't see the point anymore.

luisspellcast · 28-03-2012 10:23pm

we started to go 16 man -- we've downed Soa Hardmode and moving tomorrow to try karaga's palace -- we're at the complete opposite of bored with the game

i think i know where most of the people's problem lies-- feel free to skip my insight after 12 years of online-gaming -- it goes like this:

people expect too much all the time-- it's very easy to say "won't settle for second best" or that "my money is not being worth it" but the fact is people create this fantasies on their heads of what they think the game will be and end up disappointed when it isn't...

then, they go on detaching themselves from the general public and forget that some massive game was programmed to be appealing to a huge age range, different cultures, different interests and on and on and on... they just think the game has to please them, and expressions have to make sense in their english, and characters have to make sense in their culture... plain fail understanding their own culture is not the only one around in the world and it's plain selfish, if you ask me...

they go on joining the wrong group-- by that i mean people without the same interest or motivation, be it role-play with their level 5 character or power level while skipping the story to raid end-content-- because they're not surrounded by the same focused likeminded people they end up losing interest and you don't need a rocket scientist to prove that theory...

my point is, people keep finding external reasons to justify their lack of interest but they never consider that they might have been looking for the wrong thing in the wrong place-- because the problem is never oneself, right ?

if there isn't a goal then what's the point in fighting ? if you're not having fun taking the journey then don't travel at all... i just think you guys either set an unrealistic goal or no goal at all... bottom line is that's what's costing you guys the fun in the game...

Calhoun · 28-03-2012 11:49pm

Lol nice response but lets agree to disagree , the dogs on the streets know there are problems with this game.

I actually don't have problem with the game it is seriously lacking for a game of this generation so I understand why people quit. One of our guys actually quit because his game crashed every 20 mins and the problem was on their side.

However if I can't find like minded people because populations are going to **** then I do feel I have a right to question money I spend on a monthly basis.

luisspellcast · 29-03-2012 6:51am

I work with computers for far too long to believe in stories like that, apologise my scepticism-- I've worked in specialised gaming stores and laugh my ass off when people refused to put their "omg my gaming rig rox" into a decent case or supply it with proper energy or ventilation-- even more when we figure which malware was freking up the system

question(s): do you think your pinto would run fine with a Ferrari engine under the hood ? do you step into a gunfight with a knife ?

people start comparing games, because "this game was released yesterday and my rig runs it and this other game that was released 4 months ago doesn't" -- and that's how much they know about programming so excuse me for giggling

where most people get it wrong is when they think costumer service HAS to teach them how to use a computer-- plain fail, if you ask me

are you, also, going to blame costumer service for YOUR bad choice of server ? maybe disguise it with "I want char transfers RIGHT NOW"...

sorry guys but my opinion stands: you've set the bar too high and now your just disappointed they didn't reach it

Welease · 29-03-2012 9:36am

luisspellcast wrote: »

if there isn't a goal then what's the point in fighting ? if you're not having fun taking the journey then don't travel at all... i just think you guys either set an unrealistic goal or no goal at all... bottom line is that's what's costing you guys the fun in the game...

While there is an element of truth in what you are saying, it has to be remembered that it's impossible for a customer to know pre-release if the game meets their expectations.. They have to play to understand the scope and direction of the game, and if that expectation isn't met then they will quit.. It happens with each and every game, SWTOR is nothing new.

It's not solely for the reasons you listed (grouping with the wrong people, wrong expectations etc.). While you may have found a game that holds your attention it sounds as your primary focus is pve. That's great, but for pvp focussed players there is no real end game.. Something that pvp players can only determine after getting to end game and interacting with the environment and sufficient players.. It's not that fault of players or the people that they group with that the pvp zones are very poorly designed and have no objectives, nor is it the fault of pvp players that designers have decided to move open pvp daily quests into instanced warzones which further removed open pvp populations. They are design decisions that one assumes are made for specific reasons, but players cannot be expected to know in advance..
Many people do have realistic expectations and goals for games which are billed as pvp games, and have pvp servers.. However, at time (across various games) the game fails to live up to basic expectations. It's not fanboi or hater to make a decision based on enjoyment levels, for the majority it's just an indication of the fun they derive from interacting with the game.. neither right nor wrong whatever they choose to do.
Personally i think elements of SWTOR are very highly polished, I particularily like the class levelling quests and the FMV for each.. but end game pvp for me was non existant so I cancelled. I think it's great that for some section of MMO players (pver's) this game seems to deliver.. the more successful games in existance, then the more companies will spend to create new ones.. but for me, it's pointless to pay for a game where I sit in an empty Ilum zone with noone to fight.. It's doesnt make me bitter though

I cancel and try something else

SWTOR: 2 months on, who's still playing

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