What's going right/wrong with launch...

[UnSub]

The question is then: how do the devs want players to progress in-game? If it really is all about story, then only make progression possible through story quests and turn off XP through other means.

Or, it becomes a case of letting players out level the story content and accepting that, but still letting them play through the story as they go.

If you can play through story content you outlevel, it can take the difficulty out of that story content (which is fine if the story content really is that good). BioWare single player games scale the difficulty (in theory - in reality, shooting a geth at lvl 1 is the same as shooting a geth at lvl 60) which could have been another way of approaching it.

And on top of this is gear / crafting, which makes more sense to spend time on at max level than wasting time on output that will be outlevelled.

[Velorath]

I think there are a lot of people who literally can't help themselves and will skip over content that they'd enjoy because they feel pressured to level as quickly as possible, and I don't believe that's a healthy mentality for the devs to encourage if they want their game to be successful in the long run,

You're conflating "legitimate equal alternative" with "fastest possible route". For some reason that fallacy has proven very common in this thread. They are not equivalent.

Dungeons, PvP, etc, should be legit alternatives to questing, offering roughly the same speed, so players can progress however they want.

I'm pretty sure I said I'm ok with it as long as it isn't the optimal route, but when people say the want to use LFD so they can level alts and bypass most of the other content, I get the impression that they're essentially looking for a power level tool.  I haven't played WoW in ages, but is LFD not the fastest way to level and gear up?  I always felt like that better xp and loot were traditionally the motivations for going through dungeons in mmo's.

[sam, an eggplant]

If you play a tank LFD is probably faster, yeah. Otherwise probably not. WoW leveling to 80 is really, really quick now.

[Zetor]

But on the other hand I'm skipping over almost all heroic and flashpoint content because it's too much of a hassle and time waster to find a group to run them.  I'm 31 and have only run Esseles and Hammer, and I ran Hammer way late with a group of guys I know or I wouldn't of seen that yet.

To me, a server-wide LFG channel would make it sufficiently easy to put together groups while working on other stuff.

Like I posted earlier, a server-wide LFG just Does Not Work in practice. There's a server-wide LFG channel in lotro (glff) and it's gotten me precisely zero groups since I started playing the game in 2008... just because I happened to choose a low-medium pop server.

In SWTOR - like Thrawn - I have only run the esseles a few times and hammer station once. Whenever I hit up the fleet, all I see in /1 is 'lf tank / healer for <instancename>' -- when I return half an hour later, the same people will still be saying the same thing.

I personally love running dungeons with random people, even if it's the same dungeon over and over (not really; WOW has enough variance so you don't run the same dungeon more than 3-4 times). It's a very different experience every time unlike questing: once you'll get a bunch of newbies who don't really know what to do (and that's fine), other times you'll get a group that completely murders the place in about 15 minutes. The group composition is also random-ish, which will change how the group can can approach trash pulls and bosses. I also had less negative experiences in LFD-type groups (wow, rift) than standard pugs. For me a LFD system would be a godsend.

[Ingmar]

I also had less negative experiences in LFD-type groups (wow, rift) than standard pugs.

This is absolutely true for me as well, particularly in leveling content.

[Simond]

LFD: "If I quit/am terrible/act up enough to get booted, a replacement is only a click away"
Spamming /LFG: "It took an hour to put this group together and if they boot me it's going to take them just as long to find a replacement if the group doesn't just implode therefore they're going to have to put up with me".

Guess which one tends to make most people behave better?

[Cyrrex]

As a somewhat socially inept MMO player, and having never tried WoW's current iteration of LFD, I guess I would say that I wouldn't mind seeing it in SWTOR.  This is the rare game where I actually really want to see the content in the Heroics and Flashpoints (yeah, the content...don't give a shit about the xp and the loot)...but I don't really feel like I have the time to bother with finding a group to do it with.  Or put differently, if I only have an hour to spend in game, I will take the path of least resistance - regular questing - assuming it still scratches the itch.  As it is now, I am missing all that content.  I really want to change that, and I will have to go out of my way to do so...but I can plainly see the advantage of having an intelligent tool to make that process smoother and faster.

[eldaec]

While I do think they should do this (after implementing the much more important sidekicking), they need more flashpoints first.

If they implemented auto-matchmaking now, lots of idiots would just play the flashpoints over and over, then quit when they find the game too repetitive.

[apocrypha]

LFD: "If I quit/am terrible/act up enough to get booted, a replacement is only a click away"
Spamming /LFG: "It took an hour to put this group together and if they boot me it's going to take them just as long to find a replacement if the group doesn't just implode therefore they're going to have to put up with me".

Guess which one tends to make most people behave better?

As always there's another side to that.

Spamming LFG: the person putting the group together inspects every whisperer and excludes anyone without optimal gear/spec/role. Playing a non-FOTM class or one considered sub-par? Yeah, playing a class without CC during Burning Crusade rocked. You got LOTS of groups.  

[Numtini]

Guess which one tends to make most people behave better?

I don't have to guess, I've lived with both systems and putting the group together by hand results in far better behavior.

You do have people who claim there is no difference you have an equally large group of people who claim that instant anonymous results in a huge degradation in behavior. But I've never once heard someone claim that an instant anonymous LFD tool makes community better. I suspect that both groups are being honest, but have different expectations of a group and the LFD matches one of those, but not the other.

It also doesn't take a hour. FFS we put together a mid-level pickup raid with 12 people in about 30 minutes the other night and that was in a game with no grouping tools at all.

[kildorn]

I also had less negative experiences in LFD-type groups (wow, rift) than standard pugs.

This is absolutely true for me as well, particularly in leveling content.

Since both sides are anecdoting it up, I've had pretty much similar experiences with hand made and LFD groups in WoW. The decline in the community seems more linked to the popularity of the game than the addition of LFD. I preferred LFD because holy shit, I could run BFD on-level! Even better when they started fixing some of the old instances to be wings instead of 3 hour long slogs that no sane person wanted to run.

[eldaec]

I once joined a PUG and we all got unicorns, but then someone said a bad word and sky fell on us.

This is pretty conclusive.

[ajax34i]

IMO, Tanks (and to an extent healers) probably prefer to create their groups manually; they're already doing all the cat-herding, what's another half an hour putting a good group together, especially if it's going to make the cat-herding easier during the run?  DPS'ers probably prefer the LFD system because it auto-gets them tanks and healers, and it's a queue which they're used to anyway.  Once guilds form and all the tanks and healers start hiding inside them, manually befriending a few tanks and healers will probably have better results for a DPS'er than trying the anonymous LFD system.

[kildorn]

IMO, Tanks (and to an extent healers) probably prefer to create their groups manually; they're already doing all the cat-herding, what's another half an hour putting a good group together, especially if it's going to make the cat-herding easier during the run?  DPS'ers probably prefer the LFD system because it auto-gets them tanks and healers, and it's a queue which they're used to anyway.  Once guilds form and all the tanks and healers start hiding inside them, manually befriending a few tanks and healers will probably have better results for a DPS'er than trying the anonymous LFD system.

I've found the other way, personally. DPS usually makes groups in chat channels, because it's the way to guarantee yourself a spot. Tanks and Healers just want to get the damned run going, and LFD rewards their rarity by randomly selecting the three filler spots. My healer would rather deal with three bad DPS than spend 30 minutes in /general trying to find people. Good DPS is awesome, but random bad dps will do.

Guild only healers and tanks won't play in /general any more than they'll play in LFD, imo.

[Lantyssa]

Guild only healers and tanks won't play in /general any more than they'll play in LFD, imo.

As a tank-lover, this describes me.

[Numtini]

Like I posted earlier, a server-wide LFG just Does Not Work in practice. There's a server-wide LFG channel in lotro (glff) and it's gotten me precisely zero groups since I started playing the game in 2008... just because I happened to choose a low-medium pop server.

I just saw this, but GLFF is a player created channel, not an official one. And it competes currently with a LFF tool that's impossible to comprehend and a regional only official LFF channel.

There's a brand new instant anonymous tool that is simple, but tends to create groups that aren't capable of completing the content and is largely unused. That's another aspect of the anonymous grouping tools, you need to dumb your content down so it's trivial to complete.

[Ingmar]

Non-anonymous PUGs suck just as much at working together as anonymous ones. You only see an improvement when you're working with the same people regularly.

[sam, an eggplant]

That's not strictly true. Your reputation really mattered back in the early EQ days. If you acted like a dickhole, trained, ninja'd, etc, you could be ostracized and effectively forced out of the game. Server populations were low and static-- you knew who people were. These days, with much larger server populations, drastically faster leveling, solo leveling, character transfers, name/faction changes, etc, server rep is basically a non-issue.

[Ingmar]

That's anti-social behavior, which is not at all what I'm talking about; I'm talking about just basic coordination, which tends to be terrible in PUGs regardless.

[Amaron]

LFD made WoW buckets of cash.  At the very least that tells us /1 LFG is the wrong solution.  Few companies have actually tried to have a logical LFG alternative.   If you're looking for a group then by nature the LFG window should list groups and their requirements.   Instead it just lists other people looking for group as well.   At a bare minimum SWTOR needs to have some window where the groups are automatically suggested.   As a social tool it makes a great ice breaker which actually increases community.    For old content eventually cross server will become required.

All this is moot point though.   LFD without dual spec would be retarded.   They need to get that in fast fast fast.

[Azuredream]

If they don't want to put in LFD they at the very least need to improve the craptastic system they have in place currently.

[ajax34i]

Coordination is an issue during raids, which is where you typically have stuff like lava hounds, tanking multiple bosses, and various dancing-around mechanics that require it.  I wouldn't PUG raids, ever.  PUG groups for heroics/questing suck because of anti-social behavior - the small team gameplay is simple enough that coordination isn't really an issue.

[Ingmar]

Not in my experience. Groups that fail because they were unable to execute are FAR more common than groups that fail because someone decided to be a griefer.

[caladein]

There's a brand new instant anonymous tool that is simple, but tends to create groups that aren't capable of completing the content and is largely unused. That's another aspect of the anonymous grouping tools, you need to dumb your content down so it's trivial to complete.

It's not so much needing trivially difficult content as not having blindingly complicated utility needs for a group.  CC in TBC-era WoW was the same story.  Neither game is/was designed around "Pick any N from X bin." style of group composition like Rift, SWTOR, and Wrath/Cataclysm-era WoW are for the most part.

As an example, interrupting in LotRO was a relatively common need in groups, but what characters could actually do it was a bit of minefield.  As a Burglar I needed to have X spent in a particular legendary to make it useful for bosses and everyone still just wanted Champions.  In SWTOR, it's straight forward (all have 4s lockout):

- Sith Warrior and Powertech: melee range (4m), 8s CD
- Operative and Sith Assassin: short range (10m), 12s CD
- Sniper and Sith Sorcerer: long range (40m/30m), 12s CD

[Paelos]

LFD made WoW buckets of cash.

I disagree with your basic assertion. In fact, MMORPG revenues were already starting to decline in 2010 right after LFD was released for ATVI. If anything, I could make the argument that it started to cost them money compared to previous years.

[sam, an eggplant]

Correlation does not imply causation. All we know is that LFD was and is immensely popular. We don't know how it impacted retention one way or the other.

[Paelos]

Correlation does not imply causation. All we know is that LFD was and is immensely popular. We don't know how it impacted retention one way or the other.

We don't even know that LFD was immensely popular.

[kildorn]

Not in my experience. Groups that fail because they were unable to execute are FAR more common than groups that fail because someone decided to be a griefer.

This. It was rarely someone being a tool, and usually someone who would just tab-dot when we were CCing, and generally seemed to be playing with one hand while performing complex surgery with the rest of their concentration.

I don't think I've ever been griefed in LFD beyond once, which was less greifing and more dicks being dicks, when I got kicked at the last boss so the four guildies could put their guild healer in since he apparently needed a drop off that one mob. Personally, I would have told the guild healer no if they were just too lazy to do the rest of the instance, but whatever.

Most of my LFD failures have been either people scamming the system (flagging tank/healer, then promptly putting all the DPS gear on and declaring that we would kick a DPS and flag for a new tank), or people who simply could not move out of fucking fire.

[sam, an eggplant]

We don't even know that LFD was immensely popular.

Blizzard said it was, and reactions on the forums and in-game show that everybody's using it. You don't see anyone asking for groups in tradechat. It's overwhelmingly popular.

[Paelos]

We don't even know that LFD was immensely popular.

Blizzard said it was, and reactions on the forums and in-game show that everybody's using it. You don't see anyone asking for groups in tradechat. It's overwhelmingly popular.

Your argument is flawed. Blizzard is going to tell us the system is working no matter what. Forums are a terrible place to gauge reaction. And spurious reasoning on tradechat is hardly evidence.

I'm talking numbers. We have no evidence of before and after. We also have no numbers on how many people did LFD for achievements and quit.

[sam, an eggplant]

Nobody releases numbers. I'm going to back away from your circular pendantry now.

[Paelos]

My point is we're all assuming that LFD is a good thing, when in actuality it is debated.

Now from your personal experience you may love it and list the reasons how you think it can benefit a server. However, I believe there is an equally good reason not to have it in the game from the standpoint of a community. It's not just generally accepted that not having LFD in SWTOR is somehow a detriment to the game.

EDIT: Unlike, for example, their shittastic UI on the auction house which is generally agreed upon as horrid.

[sam, an eggplant]

There is no solid consensus, agreed. I personally strongly believe it is needed, though.

[Azuredream]

I was compelled to go back to the patch 3.3 thread in the WoW boards to pull some gems from it. Back when it first came out I don't remember anyone saying anything even close to "this is a bad feature" and were more concerned with bugs using the tool.

I just stopped by to say that I just tried the new LFG daily deal with the Emblems of Frost and the money, and the cross-server dude that appeared in our group of four instantaneously.  It's pretty fucking awesome.

I'm on a low pop alliance server and the new LFG really has saved my subscription.

Ran through a few more today.  Ran into a complete retard tank that quit before we could kick him.  Also ran into an instance where the people were very nice and had been very obviously carried to get the gear they had.  Still though over all I am loving this.

I'm really enjoying the cross server dungeon LFG.  Like many have said, it was the time it took to form a group that prevented me from doing heroics, and now I can queue up and go about my business.  The only aspect I don't enjoy is that you can't queue for battlegrounds and dungeons at the same time.  If Blizzard removed that and simply removed me from one queue whenever a dungeon or a battle ground launched, that would be awesome.

Echoing that the new LFG tool is pretty much the awesomest thing ever. If I want to do an instance, I just hit random heroic as tank/healer and 3 seconds later I'm already inside. Sure, if I'm playing dps it takes longer (~5-6 mins), but that way I can check auctions, maybe do a daily quest, do some mining/herbing, etc. and it's still way less downtime than it was pre-patch. Then I can buy phat lewts with the badges, woo!

My leveling guildies like it too, and have actually done some lowbie instances nobody ever does on alliance. (Me, I'm not leveling another character, not before cataclysm :p)

I'm absolutely loving the LFG tool, with the side note that I've had a ton of trouble using it to do specific instances. It's amazing for badge farming fun, and I'd imagine it makes lower level instances far more doable than just praying your own leveling range is online and in lfg.

But for 80s? I've had a lot of fun with it for the bit I've logged in. I've yet to see the new instances though :(

I love the tool; I just wish it'd stop killing my pet when zoning me in.  I think anytime your pet is tucked away (ie on a mount or during flight) it doesn't bother to re-summon.  I usually take this for granted and it's taken me a boss or more to notice (it's hard to notice the damn imp sometimes).

Also, any tailors notice that lightweave is just proccing for no apparent reason?  I'm just running around Dalaran getting lightweave procs while doing inscription research or the cooking daily.

And yah, major /facepalm moment for me: I didn't realize you could turn in triumph badges straight for tier 9.  I probably wasted at least thirty getting my tier 8 robe for the 2 piece bonus.  Well, at least I'll have that bonus while I my hour a night starts decking me out in tier 9.

[Amaron]

LFD made WoW buckets of cash.

I disagree with your basic assertion. In fact, MMORPG revenues were already starting to decline in 2010 right after LFD was released for ATVI.

Feel free to disagree all you want.   LFD brought back a lot of customers period.   Those numbers are listed as well.   The question is if it was the cross server nature or the automatic grouping.   WoW had a serious problem with off-peak hours and low server pops at that point.