Star Wars Galaxies to End December 15th

Tonberry

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Aug 30, 2010
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372
Wow, I'm gonna go ahead and not quote all that. xD

Anyway yeah.. Most people will agree that the Agent has the best story followed closely by Inquisitor and then Warrior. The rest either make no sense like you said about a lot of the Consular stuff or they just go way over the top with things. For me the Smuggler is the only enjoyable republic storyline mainly due to the humor. The rest are either stupid, boring or over the top (Knight). Despite the Consular story really annoying me I found Trooper the most work due to being bored by it almost constantly. If combat medic wasn't such an interesting spec I doubt I'd have got through most of it.

As for PVP, pretty much all of the warzones are really great. I don't know if you've been playing with friends or what, but I personally think everyone who plays SWTOR should experience rated huttbull with a great guild setup and vent. It is by far the most competitive thing I've ever seen in an MMO. When you win a match by literally 1 or 2 seconds it takes a while to get over it all. xD Proper competitive PVP in this game is the definite highlight for me. If you find a good guild who like to have a laugh or set one up yourself it really is game changing. Eventually some shit went down in my guild and everything fell apart and after that the game felt so dull. It was like going from the Pre-CU nostalgia to NGE.

I don't know if you tried Operations but its worth giving a go to those into pvp. Coming from a raiding background I personally found them to be a little bit to easy even on their "nightmare" option, but the traditional puzzle boss BW seem to be going for is always a fun fight regardless.

If you have a guild you really love then the only real issues with the game are as follows:

Balance - They just can't get this right. Pyrotechs and Marauders/Sentinels have been OP from day one and they have yet to address it. It can really turn the great PVP into nothing more than a zergfest and makes other classes less desirable for op groups.

Trade - Too many of the crew skills feel undervalued or useless, my main had Artifice which I was forced to drop because it's just not worth the effort.

Content - The content itself is in no way bad, but they take far too long to release things. If these future "more frequent updates" come through and aren't just the same old crap spread out across more patches, then this issue shouldn't be a problem much longer.

Lastly you mentioned the server merges. The problem here was they pulled an SOE. They said they weren't going to merge anything and were going to be doing things through transfers. Everyone knew this was utter bullshit but they didn't want to risk bad press I'm guessing. However there was talk of super servers, certainly not to the same degree as EVE because there's a lot more information being passed around by the server for SWTOR in comparison to EVE, but they have supposedly drastically increased the server capacity. Considering the amount of servers which have been suppressed down, the remaining few servers should essentially be able to support the peak amount of players the game has a had in the past at a push. This is nice even though I prefer smaller servers where the community is more tight knit, but it certainly fixes a lot of issues the game has had.

So in short the remaining few servers should be able to support a huge population and they should have room to raise the cap even higher if a sudden influx of players return for some reason. I miss the competitive atmosphere of guilds on my original server to be quite honest, but the merges ultimately worked out for the best, especially when it comes down to economy.

I hope Bioware release a big worthwhile patch once they've got their F2P option out there. Something good enough to pull all the vets back in.
 

Kayliaah

Relic
Joined
Aug 30, 2010
Messages
322
Well I played Flashpoints with random groups thanks to the Group Finder which is a great addition imo (something Guild Wars2 lacks terribly), even if it's nothing new, it's a good thing it's there, and I wanted to try Operations when I reached 50 with my Juggernaut but I ended up playing the Eternity Vault only, and it felt like a FP with a much larger group, but I don't know, it felt like everybody was just in it for themselves, I didn't see much teamwork, it was all about bashing everything until you reached the end boss, and then it was pure mayhem, I had a hard time following others because it was my first time, and even if my Juggernaut was fully upgraded and I felt awesome about it before entering, when I got swarmed like crazy I died a few times, it was really frustrating since the other guys in the group just kept going to reach the end, it felt like the Flashpoints after doing them so many times, people are just raiding the place and doing several runs every day so they can't be bothered with the rest of the group, it's all about the reward really.

Good thing the group was full of tanks, because when I was targeted by the end boss my health went down pretty quickly, I must've missed something because I was in full defense mode and I didn't feel like a Juggernaut anymore, so I was running around trying to understand what was going on lol. Before that phase 2 I saw everyone running towards the center and jumping on the platforms but I was stressed trying to keep up so I failed my jump and crashed on the ground because the freaking platform was moving and I jumped too late.
I didn't even try nightmare mode.

I got invited into a guild a couple days before the security key screw up, it's always fun to join guilds in MMO's because even if the game pisses you off sometimes you can still have fun with a group you know, I didn't play with friends I knew though, they were either on different servers or just not playing anymore.

I tried the tower defense thing in PVP, and I tried hard to play the game right by taking over the turrets but when I saw that most people didn't even bother and that they were just fighting each other in the center, I just joined them and got many kills from that, and I hate those Jedi Knights, they feel like super heroes and run into the mess hacking around them, I was satisfied when I killed some of them while wearing a bikini, their heavy armor didn't help them at all.

Oh yeah and the crafting system, what the hell, it looked good at first, but what's the point in having several companions if they can only craft the same crap, you can only choose one true crafting profession and two material gathering ones, and when I saw I wasn't going anywhere with Armormech, Armstech etc, I just dropped it and went for Bioanalysis so I could make awesome stimpacks, after experimenting with reverse engineering I made some reusable buffs and it was kinda cool not having to bother making new stuff, also tried slicing and it was worth it just for the credits lol.


We'll see how they handle the F2P thing, it should bring some people back and make others interested, but I don't understand their Cartel Coins crap, okay it kinda makes sense for the F2P version as it will work like an item shop currency, but why use it for subscribers too? I mean why not just give subscribers aka supporters everything they paid for since the start? Why bother giving them cartel coins depending on their subs, it's pointless.


I should have taken more screenshots but I kept forgetting so all I got is two random ones from the beginning.


My first ever screenshot on my first red Twi'lek Inquisitor, I hit the Fraps screenshot button by error, that happens a lot.
Sadly I had to scrap that one because I wasn't sure where I was heading and ended up making terrible story choices and picking the wrong profession, Sorcerer, so I made another one who looked as close as I could make it, and went Assassin, then played Huttball with it, I loved the stealth.

http://img28.imageshack.us/img28/4999/screenshot2012081400361.jpg


Completely failed screenshot because I hit print screen by error, again, and the guy's face is hilarious.
Everybody was arguing whether or not we should kill him, it was from the Black Talon again, I was with my BH Vikkie, I think my biggest problem in SWTOR was trying to find good names, I always ended up picking crappy unstarwarsy ones.

http://img856.imageshack.us/img856/7831/swtor2012091107361746.png
 

Tonberry

Inactive Staff
Joined
Aug 30, 2010
Messages
372
When they first released the group finder it was utterly pointless based on the state the game was in at the time. It wasn't hard to find a group and by actually speaking in general, the community ended up a lot more tightly knit because you had to actually communicate to get a group. All of these ease of access features that WoW has also added have really taken a lot of the community feeling from these games. In addition the population was the problem with getting groups at the time, so the finder was utterly pointless until they did the merges anyway. Their first massive mistake was making that entire update focused on the group finder instead of actually addressing the population issues quicker and adding some additional content.

Operations used to feel more raidy than like bigger flashpoints around launch to GU2 but after that they nerfed a lot of stuff in them and fixed quite a bit too. Soa in Eternity Vault used to be insanely difficult because he was so buggy. Then they fixed the bugs and nerfed him as well so now even on nightmare mode you can 4 man him if your group knows how to play. But back in the day I can remember being up at 2AM with my guild trying to get him down, damn those bugs were fun and frustrating lol. I miss those days when my guild was at their peak, dominating warzones, leading the way in PvE and having a good laugh whilst we did it.

Same goes for Bonethrasher, he used to hit ridiculously hard in nightmare mode but now you have to be insanely unlucky to actually die on that fight. On my Guardian I tanked Soa nightmare mode in Tionese/Pre-50 gear, that's how bad that fight is now. I got almost full Rakata on that char in one night.

Out of curiosity what server are you on Kay?

I've got some pretty sweet screenshots, but most of them are on my laptop. I did just find these two on here though:



Those were the days...
 

Kayliaah

Relic
Joined
Aug 30, 2010
Messages
322
Sadly all I'm seeing in GW2 when it comes to communicating with other people to find groups for dungeons etc is massive spam in general chat, like, LFG AC EXPL PATH2 LVL80 MESMER.
And it repeats and repeats indefinitely, when you don't see people just chatting it's all you can see, and I saw that in SWTOR too even with the Group Finder, this is so very annoying.

But yeah the GF doesn't really work as it should work to make it more efficient, for example when you want to do runs of lower level Flashpoints to help newbies get through, well you just can't, because the GF won't allow you to join because your level is too high, so freaking stupid.
You can still join "manually" by standing in front of the airlock waiting for people to pick up the mission, but then what's the point of having a GF if it's restricted like this.

I was on Red Eclipse, I said it in my massive post so I understand if it got lost in there.
Saw that Red Eclipse was still there as one of the super servers now, and it's "Very Heavy", a shame I was there when it was empty.
 

Tonberry

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Aug 30, 2010
Messages
372
Well even with spam in general chat you're still putting some effort into finding a group and talking. In most games with group finders you sit there doing nothing for a few minutes and then a lot of the time the group you get wont say a word through the whole run, unless someone messes up and somebody else will feel the need to whine about it. Definitely not a fun experience imo.

I had a couple of alts on Red Eclipse which for some reason I was asked to rename, I don't quite understand that since they were on Red Eclipse before any of the merging happened. But none of them are even over level 20 so I couldn't care less.
 

Kayliaah

Relic
Joined
Aug 30, 2010
Messages
322
Lol tell me about it, I know silent groups from SWTOR doing FP's with people who just wanted it over with because they were here just for the loot, skipping cutscenes (which I can understand when you see the same thing a dozen times) and complaining or even insulting others when they don't skip the cutscenes in time, and then going back to silent mode until the end.

I had this occur once in GW2 when trying to do one of the lower level dungeons (Caudecus' Manor) with a random group that I joined while waiting in front of the entrance, and what a mess it was, I basically talked to myself through the whole thing, most of them were silent and when they weren't they were telling you what to do, when somebody was in trouble nobody bothered to revive them, they would just tell you to respawn not giving a damn about how much it would cost you after several respawns to repair your gear with the anvil... the group was so shitty that one person left for dinner (why would you join a dungeon party if you're going to go eat in a few minutes..), and we all stood there for 5 minutes wondering what to do because we couldn't finish the dungeon without the whole group as we needed 5 characters to get through a door, so we just left, worst experience I had in GW2 lol and I'm sure it's nothing and surely not the last.

It's in cases like these that I would've loved to have a Group Finder, in SWTOR when one group member left I think or didn't join the party in time, the GF would put you at the top of the list to find you a replacement so you didn't need to disband and do it all from the start, it's just easier and not as frustrating.


Anyways, it's all fun in the end, you live and you learn.

And I saw that the merge in SWTOR made many people unhappy with all their characters' names being taken so they had to rename them, Anet killed the problem at its source with Guild Wars 2, making every name unique worldwide, there can't be two same names on two different servers, so you can tranfer your characters as much as you want, no bid deal.
Okay it was pretty annoying to find names for my characters since they were all taken, every single one of them, I ended up mixing names together, changing letters... and I only have ONE character, I have no idea how I'll name my Charr, but I know he'll be a big badass.
 

Tonberry

Inactive Staff
Joined
Aug 30, 2010
Messages
372
I had to do the same in regard to names. I feel like they could've worked around making names unique through all servers because even on the morning of early access (I woke up at like 5AM to get in asap) I still didn't get any of my preferred names and even then it took ages to get a variation of them which wasn't taken. They pretty much force you to have a surname which I don't like.

In any case regarding groups I'd prefer as much communication as possible in GW2 even if that makes finding them a pain. I feel like communication is a must mainly because the dungeons in GW2 are so poorly designed. It's still my only criticism of the game.
 

Kayliaah

Relic
Joined
Aug 30, 2010
Messages
322
I didn't mind the "easiness" that the group finder brought to SWTOR, or the lack of communication because of it, I mean 90% of the time when I joined a random group I would end up chatting with them, so communication was still there, it was just quicker. And I had fun.

Otherwise most of the communication you see is what I posted before, LFG blablabla, if you think that it's better than nothing at all then you're right, but it's still freaking annoying.

But yeah, in GW2, the lack of communication will totally lead to failing the dungeons, not because all of them are poorly designed, but because the dungeons need a 5 player party for a reason, there is no way to make it on your own, unless you're the best juggernaut type in the game or a Necromancer using crowd control all over the place, damn them overpowered classes!

Otherwise yeah, the corridors filled with evil stuff, the waypoints being WAY TOO FAR from where you actually want to be, getting stuck on rocks etc, I guess it's half the fun if you can bear it lol.
 

Tonberry

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Aug 30, 2010
Messages
372
Of course a full party should be needed but dungeons are still very poorly designed, especially the earlier ones.

It was the only criticism I and countless others had during the beta. I was hoping they'd make some serious changes to them by release but they made very few.
 

Kayliaah

Relic
Joined
Aug 30, 2010
Messages
322
I don't know the dungeons seem fine for most people otherwise they wouldn't be doing a dozen runs every day, but "very poorly designed" is extremely vague since I don't even know what you didn't like about them.

The last dungeon added with the Lost Shores, Fractals of the Mists, is probably the best dungeon in the game, best looking one too, at least they're learning.
 

Tonberry

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Aug 30, 2010
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372
A lot of the dungeons just felt like a spam fest, especially AC. Everyone commented on that during the beta, just spamming then respawning and running back before the fight resets isn't my idea of what dungeons are about. I know that pretty much only goes for AC but still, a lot of the mechanics in the others were pretty bad. I also found the sylvari themed one (forgot the name) had a few bosses which just seemed overall glitchy. I remember the one with Zojja, Ein etc being a particular bitch and completely negating the "everything is something to be kited" attitude that Anet kept putting out in interviews. If they expected us to kite things they should have stopped Zojja and Ein wallhacking, otherwise you basically died as soon as you ran out of endurance, then spam run back and slowly burn them that way. I'm guessing that had some bugs around the time I did it lol.

Perhaps they've fixed a lot of that now, I don't know. Some of them were alright, but the ones which actually had some challenge seemed to be mainly down to bad mechanics or some form of annoying glitch. I decided to just stick with PVP since that is the highlight of GW.
 
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