Pre-release thread discussion

[eldaec]

Matchmaking seems sensible, but in a game lacking sidekicking, UI configuration, dualspecing, PQs, appearance tab, etc etc... I'd be happy enough with a simple lfg tool so they can get on with all the other basic shit missing from the game.

[Merusk]

Hm.. I can't decide if I want a Female BH or a Male BH for the voice acting.  Decisions like this used to be so cosmetic.

[Lantyssa]

Dungeon finders detach dungeons from a sense of location in the world. Its no longer the fabled dungeon in area XYZ under the mountain surrounded by citizens with stories of its legend, its a drop down option.

As opposed to airline terminal 1-6?

[Amaron]

But then it's what i meant -- your gameplay is to focus on the UI cue(s). A mod which changes the UI doesn't change that, it can at best either change what exact sort of cue you're waiting for which doesn't really change how you play the game,

It can definitely change how I play the game.   If the UI cue is in the middle of the screen then I'm playing the game instead of the UI.

[Simond]

Put my down for not wanting combat log, threat meters, or any of that other shit. This is coming from both a tank and a raid leader. It's just not needed and makes the game less fun when everyone starts spreadsheeting.

You act like people aren't going to spreadsheet the game anyway and the game isn't going to be designed around that spreadsheeting. Looking at the raid content spoilers so far outside of like one "lootship" fight it's pretty standard DIKU stuff; threat management, LOS, add control, burn/healing phases, etc. Now you get to do that with a UI that offers very little help.

Not everyone will spreadsheet. Some will, but they will be making educated guesses.

Or they'll rip the raw data out of the guts of the game and put it up on spoiler sites before the game launches. (click "Effect Details")
You know, either or.


e: whoops, fixed.

[caladein]

That's not something you need a mod to fix, that can be done in the vanilla GUI. However your example does give you an advantage if you have that mod, and others do not. Same with heal bars, and Effect timers.

That's fine!  Either make a good interface, or let us make a suite of them for you.  The problem with the SWTOR interface is that it's neither good/useful nor customizable.

[kildorn]

Put my down for not wanting combat log, threat meters, or any of that other shit. This is coming from both a tank and a raid leader. It's just not needed and makes the game less fun when everyone starts spreadsheeting.

You act like people aren't going to spreadsheet the game anyway and the game isn't going to be designed around that spreadsheeting. Looking at the raid content spoilers so far outside of like one "lootship" fight it's pretty standard DIKU stuff; threat management, LOS, add control, burn/healing phases, etc. Now you get to do that with a UI that offers very little help.

Not everyone will spreadsheet. Some will, but they will be making educated guesses.

Or they'll rip the raw data out of the guts of the game and put it up on spoiler sites before the game launches. (click "Effect Details")
You know, either or.

I don't think you linked what you meant to link ;)

[Sobelius]

I thought there was a mistake when it said there were 398 guilds registered for my server. 398!! Many of the guilds were listed as over 200 people. So I thought, maybe that's for the whole game, but not just one server.

Then I did a "refine your search" and got this result:

>> There are 6764 guilds matching: Republic Allegiance, PvE Type, English Language, US East (EST) Timezone.

I'm assuming an AND relationship between that criteria, since the choices are supposed to narrow the results.
 

[Fordel]

SWTOR may fare a bit better than WoW did without LFD, at least for a little while because as far as I know all the Flashpoints are started from the fleet rather than some random-ass dungeon entrance squirreled away in a corner of a zone no one goes to like most of Vanilla WoW's 5-mans.

I'd love heroic instance concepts rolled into SWTOR, actually. The idea of "play this instance again at level cap", just because it annoys me where there is an awesome dungeon in the leveling path that you will never see again. And once the game gets some age on it, nobody will ever see beyond someone having their level capped friend run their alt through it..

LFD didn't change my life much at level cap (though it made it so I didn't have to hang out in the hell that was trade chat), but it made leveling dungeons actually get done.

As far as I know "heroic" modes will be available for all flashpoints. I dunno how dramatically different they are however in difficulty or if they have extra bosses/etc.

My concern would be that if you wanted to quest in between dungeon runs. There's quite a few folks that queue for LFR while solo questing. It's fine once people hit 50 and they are all AFK in the capital waiting anyways.

[Amaron]

Not everyone will spreadsheet. Some will, but they will be making educated guesses.

Or they'll rip the raw data out of the guts of the game and put it up on spoiler sites before the game launches. (click "Effect Details")
You know, either or.

With a game this big they'll take it even further and build an entire program to simulate combat.   

[Paelos]

Not everyone will spreadsheet. Some will, but they will be making educated guesses.

Or they'll rip the raw data out of the guts of the game and put it up on spoiler sites before the game launches. (click "Effect Details")
You know, either or.

With a game this big they'll take it even further and build an entire program to simulate combat.   

You act like that matters. There's a huge difference to me with a bunch of people cranking numbers outside the game and allowing parsers into the game so people can stare at their constantly updated statistics.

[Ginaz]

Other guilds on Shien:

http://www.swtor.com/guilds/search?shardName%5B%5D=he1067

Looks like Bat Country is on the same server as the PC Gamer guild.

http://www.swtor.com/guilds/36325/pc-gamer-mint-imperials

[Nevermore]

Other guilds on Shien:

http://www.swtor.com/guilds/search?shardName%5B%5D=he1067

Looks like Bat Country is on the same server as the PC Gamer guild.

http://www.swtor.com/guilds/36325/pc-gamer-mint-imperials

Uh, no?

Server: Nightmare Lands

[Ginaz]

Other guilds on Shien:

http://www.swtor.com/guilds/search?shardName%5B%5D=he1067

Looks like Bat Country is on the same server as the PC Gamer guild.

http://www.swtor.com/guilds/36325/pc-gamer-mint-imperials

Uh, no?

Server: Nightmare Lands

Sorry, was following the link and assumed it was for other guilds on Shien.

[Amaron]

You act like that matters. There's a huge difference to me with a bunch of people cranking numbers outside the game and allowing parsers into the game so people can stare at their constantly updated statistics.

In a game this popular people will get those stats no matter what.   If they're willing to write a combat simulator they'll certainly be willing to jack the combat info right out of the client's memory.   What you want is impossible so why torpedo a good UI in the mistaken hope that it will happen?

[Lantyssa]

Hah.  Queens of the Clone Age.

And a SWG reference... Servants of the Shrub []

[Sky]

I like a nice neat shrub, but I do avoid topiary.

[Paelos]

You act like that matters. There's a huge difference to me with a bunch of people cranking numbers outside the game and allowing parsers into the game so people can stare at their constantly updated statistics.

In a game this popular people will get those stats no matter what.   If they're willing to write a combat simulator they'll certainly be willing to jack the combat info right out of the client's memory.   What you want is impossible so why torpedo a good UI in the mistaken hope that it will happen?

Not have a combat log is not "torpedoing" a good UI. There are certain people who will hook electrodes to their genitals if they can get more dps. That doesn't mean it will become the norm. The crazies will be crazy, but my problem is when the crazy becomes mainstream because it's just so easy to download a meter and watch the numbers fly!

[kildorn]

Yeah man. RPM meters are the same thing. A few douchebags want some data and the next thing you know all cars have them. What the hell! :P

I really do consider in a mechanics heavy game that you show me some mechanics, just because without it data becomes folklore and mythology. "Man, X stat is better for you, you fucking noob!" *has no math to confirm nor deny this statement*

Really, a combat log is just historical retention of what's already on the screen. It's not like SWTOR hides it's damage numbers. A combat log just assigns a timestamp and historical retention to it.

[Sjofn]

Quickness improves runspeed, Kild!

[Fordel]

I still want to know how that guy became a TeamLead.

[Sjofn]

I don't know, but given he wasn't my TL, I'm totally glad he was!

[kildorn]

Quickness improves runspeed, Kild!

I really think he was just an idiot, but he's a good example!

The man had EVIDENCE. He ran TESTS. They were all completely wrong and his methodology was shit, but still. I'm going to sit and snicker that I was a FORMIDABLE MELEE FIGHTER as well, even though that was out of game documentation.

[Ingmar]

Yeah that's the perfect example of the sort of bullshit that is totally untrue, but can become accepted "fact" when there's no documentation or the documentation is bad.

[Fordel]

What's probably worse, is how Mythic thought Friars used Str for their staff attacks. Mythic was real special 

[trias_e]

Quickness improves runspeed, Kild!

A class lead seriously thought this?  That's hilarious.  And disturbing.  And makes way too much sense.

What's probably worse, is how Mythic thought Friars used Str for their staff attacks. Mythic was real special  

I was a Friar.  Boy did I facepalm when Mythic realized their error (since we had our our str raise as we level), and then bandaided it by giving Friars a dex/qui self-buff that didn't stack with other buffs.  Thanks for fixing this fundamental mistake...by not actually fixing anything at all unless we were soloing.  Awesome.

[Fordel]

Mythic didn't figure out shit, a bunch of players went 'look retards, here is my character sheet with/without +str/+dex and here is my damage log'. In fact if it wasn't for the combat log, friars would still be trying to convince Mythic their staves used dex to this fucking day I imagine.



The Paladin TL was named Los_Ortiz or something like that? He lasted like a week, mostly because he went (or always was) insane. He went full retard and fought the entire internet that Quickness effected run speed.

[Velorath]

Yeah that's the perfect example of the sort of bullshit that is totally untrue, but can become accepted "fact" when there's no documentation or the documentation is bad.

That's more like an example of the kind of bullshit that happens when developers don't understand how their own game works.

[caladein]

Which is surprisingly (hopefully not so much around these parts) common in this genre!

[Velorath]

Which is surprisingly (hopefully not so much around these parts) common in this genre!

I think if that were true people wouldn't be pulling out examples from 10 years ago to prove why we need combat logs today.

[Amaron]

Not have a combat log is not "torpedoing" a good UI.

Would you be ok with the log if it was delayed?  Like you could only get the info out of combat?  Or maybe if you could tell the server to not send combat log info on YOU to others?  I ask because the actual complaint seems to be "damn those people for looking at numbers" but I doubt that's the problem.

[Sjofn]

Which is surprisingly (hopefully not so much around these parts) common in this genre!

I think if that were true people wouldn't be pulling out examples from 10 years ago to prove why we need combat logs today.

DAoC just happened to have the most hilarious example, I seem to recall a lot of handwave-y faith-based voodoo in CoX as well (before they realized the world won't end if they give players enough information to actually know wtf was going on in their game). I can't think of an example since then, because hiding everything from your players is no longer common because doing so is pointless and stupid.

Seriously, did I fall through a wormhole into Crazytown, with the added bonus of it being 10 years ago?

[Surlyboi]

Hah.  Queens of the Clone Age.

And a SWG reference... Servants of the Shrub []

Aww, I miss the shrub.

[Wolf]

Which is surprisingly (hopefully not so much around these parts) common in this genre!

I think if that were true people wouldn't be pulling out examples from 10 years ago to prove why we need combat logs today.

DAoC just happened to have the most hilarious example, I seem to recall a lot of handwave-y faith-based voodoo in CoX as well (before they realized the world won't end if they give players enough information to actually know wtf was going on in their game). I can't think of an example since then, because hiding everything from your players is no longer common because doing so is pointless and stupid.

Except how loot tables work in raids in WoW. There's plenty of voodoo around that, and people are pretty certain it's not straight RNG - Too many horror stories :)

[Lucas]

"What is next" post on the official forums:

http://www.swtor.com/community/showthread.php?t=274

Welcome to Star Wars™: The Old Republic™. It’s been many years in the making and the team is very proud of what we’ve achieved. Since we’re an online game we are going to continue building on the game for years to come. You can count on us to diligently expand the game and service to surprise and delight you. We’re going to not only respond to your feedback, but also hopefully exceed your expectations on how Star Wars: The Old Republic will evolve over time.

Many of you helped make the game what it is today by participating in our testing programs. You’ve watched the game grow over the past year and have been very vocal about things you’d like to see in the game in the future.

A team is never finished building a massively multiplayer game, so we’d like to take this opportunity to reveal a little information on what the team is working on for patches coming in the near future. Our priorities have been, and will continue to be, based off of the feedback we receive from our players.

• New Content – We will be adding new content to the galaxy on an ongoing basis. These worlds will include Operations, Flashpoints and solo content.

• Guild Functionality – Guilds are important to the long term health of any MMORPG. We have a huge list of guild centric features. This will be an ongoing effort that will probably never end. Guild banks are the first thing we’ll be delivering in our plans for increased guild functionality. Eventually we even want to deliver on the promise of the long hinted at “Guild Capital Ships”.

• UI customization – You like choice. We hear you! SWTOR is all about choice. Being able to choose how you interact with an online game is something we feel is very important. We are going to be giving more control over the UI as an ongoing effort. This is a very big priority for us.

• PvP – We have an entire team dedicated to adding content and features to player vs. player. We have some of the most experienced PvP developers in the world on this team. So far very few people have seen, or know much about the stunning Open World PVP on Ilum; when you get to the high levels prepare to be blown away! In addition to that high level PVP content, expect new Warzones and new PvP features on a regular basis.

• Space Combat – We will continue to add missions to the space game. We also have a special project going on right now that will expand space gameplay in a significant way... for now the details will have to remain under wraps.

• Legacy System – The ability to select a surname for your character is just the start of something much bigger. Soon, the Legacy experience and levels you earn will grant your characters access to powers, objects and other cool benefits.

• And more – We have an entire team of developers working on future content. Right now we are focused on nothing else but Star Wars: The Old Republic, so expect new and cool things.

It is fair to say that we’re just as excited as you are about the launch of Star Wars: The Old Republic. Not only are we launching one of the largest and most impressive games ever created, but we’re also excited about the prospect of continuing to work on the game so that you, the fans, will always have something heroic and amazing to enjoy. Thanks for playing.


James Ohlen

Game Director

Hmm....We also have a special project going on right now that will expand space gameplay in a significant way..."