SWTOR

[jakonovski]

Yeah, I just removed this from my buy list last week.  I'm sure I'll check it out at some point, but Rift showed me exactly how tired of WoW I was.  In turn, it showed me how tired I am all together with the MMO genre lately.  It doesn't help that I went back to school recently, too.  I can't imagine trying to do a 30hr/wk MMO along with 13 credit hours at school.  I'd go crazy.

So true. I have Rift on my second month now, and whenever I login I'm impressed by how cool it all seems. All the same, I can't bring myself to play more than one or two hours at a time, and I have to take days off in between sessions. None of that with the grindfest that is AoEo, I play it obsessively, so it's all about the diku gameplay being sooooo worn out.

[Hawkbit]

Why is 5 people your line in the sand?  Why not 6 or 4?

Because MMOs were the original sorities that Eubulides had in mind.

[Paelos]

Why is 5 people your line in the sand?  Why not 6 or 4?

Logistics. Online social people usually have around five close friends so you can put together things easily based on that. Also, you can rotate in and out of roles well for a DIKU. Tank, Healer, DPS, DPS, DPS is the standard WoW set that I think serves well in it's ease.

[Nebu]

Why is 5 people your line in the sand?  Why not 6 or 4?

You need to step outside your bubble and pug a while.  Go and run some T2's with 4 randoms.  Run GSB or RoS with a bunch or randoms.  After doing that for a couple of weeks, tell me how much fun you're having compared to your tight-knit crew.  I think it would be an eye-opener.  

Most people can find 3-4 others to play with.  If I find 3, then I just need one random to make a 5 man.  If we make sure that our group has the key components (healer and tank) then we're left pugging dps.  Most of the time, that's manageable.  There's just no reason for groups to be larger than 4 in the standard diku model.  Healer, tank, dps, utility.  

[Surlyboi]

Why is 5 people your line in the sand?  Why not 6 or 4?

Because four is RIGHT OUT!

[Sjofn]

Depending on how many people from Slap in the Face move on over to Slap in the Force, 8 would be doable without TOO big a headache.There were definitely times where we'd only have 8 show for a 10 man raid, so ... Of course, that probably just means we'd only have 6 show up for an 8 man. 

I somehow missed that the group size is 4, that's ... small. It feels small. I don't know why four feels small and five feels normal, but it does!

[Nebu]

I like 4.  It has a tactical feel.  With 5, someone can slack off and you can usually still do fine.  With 4, it gives the illusion that everyone has to pull their weight. 

[Crumbs]

I'm curious what Blizzard will do to fight it.

Orcball 

[Lantyssa]

Depending on how many people from Slap in the Face move on over to Slap in the Force, 8 would be doable without TOO big a headache.There were definitely times where we'd only have 8 show for a 10 man raid, so ... Of course, that probably just means we'd only have 6 show up for an 8 man. 

Slap is pretty tight-knit.  Even if the five friends bits holds, putting any three of us together means a few more friends from each that the others are all comfortable with.  Plus I'd wager higher than average competency.

[Nevermore]

Do you think getting 8 people together is going to be difficult to do?

Yes.  It was difficult enough to find 8 good players in DAoC.  My guild couldn't keep 8 people together in Rift, which ultimately resulted in my quitting the game.    Finding 8 adults that I can tolerate for hours in a vent channel is hard.  Especially adults with families and a life. 

The difficulty was the rigid role requirements that had to be filled.  A Taskforce in CoX, which is also 8 players, is extremely easy to fill because the roles are all so flexible.

[Sky]

Depending on how many people from Slap in the Face move on over to Slap in the Force, 8 would be doable without TOO big a headache.

When guild phase 2 starts, we have to set up alignment between SLAP and BC. I hope there is some in-game support, like an alliance chat channel and window. If we could ally the various splinter groups, we might be able to actually hit operations fairly regularly.

And hey, I think Drae is saying we're all welcome at FoH raids from now on.

Watching a gamescom interview, no LFD, just a flag in the LFG pane. No role advertisement, either. LFG finder is server-only, no cross-server LFD. Why is this so hard for games to get right? Even Rift's very rudimentary system mostly worked, all but one dungeon group I was in (post-release) was through the LFD. Blah.

And the gear quality for the 8 and 16 man raids is equal, you just get more drops for the 16. Quality based on difficulty mode, which is a switch flipped before the instance. But you can use crew skills to ease the pain, archeology would let you maybe find a secret door or slicing will let you power up a friendly battle droid.

[PalmTrees]

Do you think getting 8 people together is going to be difficult to do?

Yes.  It was difficult enough to find 8 good players in DAoC.  My guild couldn't keep 8 people together in Rift, which ultimately resulted in my quitting the game.    Finding 8 adults that I can tolerate for hours in a vent channel is hard.  Especially adults with families and a life. 

The difficulty was the rigid role requirements that had to be filled.  A Taskforce in CoX, which is also 8 players, is extremely easy to fill because the roles are all so flexible.

Yeah, flexible roles make filling out taskforces (1 group) and raids pretty easy in CoX. Max group size is 8 and the Praetorian raids go from 2-4 groups. Only if you're doing master badge challenges like defeat the raid boss w/o using the mission-specific debuff do you need to worry about roles and power selection.

[Sky]

I think that's one downside of TOR going with more or less straight classes, and they really need to rethink that imo. If I'm going to run my BH solo, I'm going to want a different setup than if I'm grouped or doing pvp. Some games have put in minor measures to alleviate this, but Rift has really set the standard there. Way too late in TOR development, but the least they can do is allow very easy respecs and three role presets so you can switch on the fly.

[Kirth]

Its hardly raiding when it's either 8 or 16 people.

I'd call anything over 6 people a raid.  So would Rift and WoW.

It comes down to group sizes.  SWTOR has max group of four people.  The definition of a Raid, I guess, is multi group content.  Rift that's 10 and 20 man (2 and 4 group) and WOW is 10 and 25 man (2 and 5 group).  In SWTOR it appears that they will have 4 man groups, 8 and 16 man raids (2 and 4 group).

The question is, if you continue to shrink group size, does the small raid size really become a raid?  In SWTOR you have 8 people.  That's not much at all, that's only 3 extra people that in your normal WOW/RAID single group dungeon.  I would think the largest complaint about raids is the organization of so many people.  That's the stigma anyway.

Do you think getting 8 people together is going to be difficult to do?

Let's take it a step further and say groups are 3 people.  The raids consist of 2 and 4 group content.  Thats 6 and 12 people.  Would you consider 6 people a raid at that point?

What is the threshold for when something is considered a raid in some abstract definition?

I think it is easier to think of it as how content designers approach these things. I'd imagine they define the boxes like so; solo, less then a full group, a full group, 2 groups and 4 groups then pick a pigeon hole and go from there. But as I've said before whoever cracks the dynamic scaling difficulty on group size may have a winner on their hands.

[sam, an eggplant]

I think that's one downside of TOR going with more or less straight classes, and they really need to rethink that imo. If I'm going to run my BH solo, I'm going to want a different setup than if I'm grouped or doing pvp. Some games have put in minor measures to alleviate this, but Rift has really set the standard there. Way too late in TOR development, but the least they can do is allow very easy respecs and three role presets so you can switch on the fly.

Again, if it's in WoW, you can be fairly certain it's going to be in SWTOR. If not at release, then soon thereafter.

[Arrrgh]

I think that's one downside of TOR going with more or less straight classes, and they really need to rethink that imo. If I'm going to run my BH solo, I'm going to want a different setup than if I'm grouped or doing pvp. Some games have put in minor measures to alleviate this, but Rift has really set the standard there. Way too late in TOR development, but the least they can do is allow very easy respecs and three role presets so you can switch on the fly.

Again, if it's in WoW, you can be fairly certain it's going to be in SWTOR. If not at release, then soon thereafter.

Once the tank/healer shortage screaming begins they'll add dual specs.

Not that it will help.

[Sjofn]

Depending on how many people from Slap in the Face move on over to Slap in the Force, 8 would be doable without TOO big a headache.

When guild phase 2 starts, we have to set up alignment between SLAP and BC. I hope there is some in-game support, like an alliance chat channel and window. If we could ally the various splinter groups, we might be able to actually hit operations fairly regularly.

SitF is gonna be Republic (SJOFN DEMAND SMUGGLER and FORDEL DEMAND TROOPER), which would actually make me prefer we not be aligned, just because I have this DISEASE where I cannot play the Other Faction on the same server as my "real" characters. I blame DAoC. Also depends on how many character slots we get per server (do we know that yet?). I would be totally sad if I couldn't make one of everything because I want a person in BC or whatever.

It's not ACTUALLY up to me, of course, just a thought. I DO plan on having at least one BC character (up to four, depending on how engrossing the game is, I do love to level, and I do play the shit out of Bioware games!) however it shakes out, though, 'cause. Well. Why wouldn't I? 

[Abelian75]

just because I have this DISEASE where I cannot play the Other Faction on the same server as my "real" characters. I blame DAoC.

Hey, I totally have that disease too.  Though I have absolutely nothing to blame for it other than my own bizarreness.  It makes me feel... creepy, somehow.  Like I'm peeking in somebody's windows at night.

[Sjofn]

Like you're tresspassing at the very least!

[Lantyssa]

Weird.  I prefer playing all factions on the same server.

[Mrbloodworth]

Noooo!

You are supposed to hates them! What else are official forums for?

[Draegan]

Why is 5 people your line in the sand?  Why not 6 or 4?

You need to step outside your bubble and pug a while.  Go and run some T2's with 4 randoms.  Run GSB or RoS with a bunch or randoms.  After doing that for a couple of weeks, tell me how much fun you're having compared to your tight-knit crew.  I think it would be an eye-opener.  

Most people can find 3-4 others to play with.  If I find 3, then I just need one random to make a 5 man.  If we make sure that our group has the key components (healer and tank) then we're left pugging dps.  Most of the time, that's manageable.  There's just no reason for groups to be larger than 4 in the standard diku model.  Healer, tank, dps, utility.  

Trust me, I'm well aware of the pug scene in any game.  When I played WOW in TBC and WOTLK it was all in a family style guild or without one.  So I was exclusively pugging.  It's only recent with RIFT that I stepped back into the hardcore raiding/guild scene.

That being said, I don't see much of a difference between 5 and 8 people as long as the fights are not super tuned.

[Mrbloodworth]

That's 8 chances of a bio-break rather than 5 in a boss fight. That's whats different.

[Sky]

SitF is gonna be Republic (SJOFN DEMAND SMUGGLER and FORDEL DEMAND TROOPER)

That's cool. I really want to roll a Jedi Knight at some point. I'll submit my application with my raid availability and achievements in other raiding games as well as my current dkp in wow. "I raid so good, make you wanna slap yo mama!"

Though I do also prefer all my characters on one server for the day they finally crumble and allow cross-faction mail or bank (yay EQ2!).

[Ingmar]

Do we know how many characters are allowed per server yet?

[Merusk]

Why is 5 people your line in the sand?  Why not 6 or 4?

You need to step outside your bubble and pug a while.  Go and run some T2's with 4 randoms.  Run GSB or RoS with a bunch or randoms.  After doing that for a couple of weeks, tell me how much fun you're having compared to your tight-knit crew.  I think it would be an eye-opener.  

Most people can find 3-4 others to play with.  If I find 3, then I just need one random to make a 5 man.  If we make sure that our group has the key components (healer and tank) then we're left pugging dps.  Most of the time, that's manageable.  There's just no reason for groups to be larger than 4 in the standard diku model.  Healer, tank, dps, utility.  

Trust me, I'm well aware of the pug scene in any game.  When I played WOW in TBC and WOTLK it was all in a family style guild or without one.  So I was exclusively pugging.  It's only recent with RIFT that I stepped back into the hardcore raiding/guild scene.

That being said, I don't see much of a difference between 5 and 8 people as long as the fights are not super tuned.

If there's no difference between 5 and 8, then how is there one between 8 and 10 - which has proven quite viable as a raid-size for WoW.  2 groups.  See, you're looking at it the wrong way.   It's the # of groups, not the # of people in questions.  The difference in the products is 1 group, 2 group, 4 group.  vs 1 group, 2 group, 5 group raids.   

In th eend I think SWTOR encounters will actually be tougher to balance, given smaller group size and larger variety of class roles.  In WOW all tanks are Melee, so their problems are predictable.  All healers are ranged and DPS is either-or.  Meanwhile with SWTOR we're seeing ranged tanks added in to the mix.  Problems in WOW that were only the DPS' concern are now the tanks.  (Oh hey, need to avoid that random aoe effect in addition to the boss.)   Are there melee healers as well, that will have to worry about standing in flames/ positioning the way WOW melee dps do?

[Nevermore]

Do we know how many characters are allowed per server yet?

One? 

[Draegan]

If there's no difference between 5 and 8, then how is there one between 8 and 10 - which has proven quite viable as a raid-size for WoW.  2 groups.  See, you're looking at it the wrong way.   It's the # of groups, not the # of people in questions.  The difference in the products is 1 group, 2 group, 4 group.  vs 1 group, 2 group, 5 group raids.   

In th eend I think SWTOR encounters will actually be tougher to balance, given smaller group size and larger variety of class roles.  In WOW all tanks are Melee, so their problems are predictable.  All healers are ranged and DPS is either-or.  Meanwhile with SWTOR we're seeing ranged tanks added in to the mix.  Problems in WOW that were only the DPS' concern are now the tanks.  (Oh hey, need to avoid that random aoe effect in addition to the boss.)   Are there melee healers as well, that will have to worry about standing in flames/ positioning the way WOW melee dps do?

It's all based on your point of view. A group of 8 isn't large at all from my perspective.  Most people are coming from WOW or Rift and a typical group is 5 people, so 8 is 1.5 groups.  I think people can easily manage that in any PUG environment.

[Evildrider]

Do we know how many characters are allowed per server yet?

It's 8, and a dev mentioned, in an offhand remark, that there may be a reason you would want two characters of different factions on the same server.

[Sjofn]

Do we know how many characters are allowed per server yet?

One?  

I know you're joking but I would seriously fucking cut a bitch. It was a major factor in me not trying SWG (another major factor was everyone I knew saying it was buggy as fuck).

Do we know how many characters are allowed per server yet?

It's 8, and a dev mentioned, in an offhand remark, that there may be a reason you would want two characters of different factions on the same server.

But my SICKNESS. 

Oh well, if that's the case, more reason to have Slap and Bat Country be ADVERSARIES GRR. I guess. Man I get all  just thinking about it. I am broken!

[Soln]

But what about MOLES?

[Mattemeo]

I've never rolled off-faction on the same server, either. It would be... weird. I suppose with WoW, there's 10 classes and 10 slots per server so if you want to fill out a roster for one faction you've got a neat number of slots allocated. Seeing as there's only 4 classes in SWtOR that suddenly leaves a few slots to ponder over. And no, I'm not counting alt-specializations. I don't in WoW.

[Evildrider]

But what about MOLES?

They aren't a playable race.   

[koro]

I've never rolled off-faction on the same server, either. It would be... weird. I suppose with WoW, there's 10 classes and 10 slots per server so if you want to fill out a roster for one faction you've got a neat number of slots allocated. Seeing as there's only 4 classes in SWtOR that suddenly leaves a few slots to ponder over. And no, I'm not counting alt-specializations. I don't in WoW.

There's 4 classes, and each class has two advanced classes. In practice, it's eight classes per side, so it still fills out neatly if you make your opposite faction analogue the advanced class you didn't pick.

[Sky]

That was my plan.