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mogan

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Edited By mogan  Moderator

"It wasn't a dramatic change of pace ..."

Unfortunately, that's kinda what SWTOR needs right now. SWTOR's combat was never great; copying WoW kind of dated it before it even came out, but 4.0 really stripped away almost all the fun it had. And with gear no longer having much meaning, the two primary pillars of MMO gameplay (killing mobs and making the numbers go up) have lost all flavor.

SWTOR is pushing single player story really hard, and there hasn't been much new content in the past two years that wasn't solo friendly or revolved around their new story line. Unfortunately, they've removed ALL challenge from that area of the game. Tougher enemies die in less than a full rotation, almost nothing can do any meaningful damage to the player, and combat has become a repetitive series of button presses which guarantee victory with little variation and no need for timing, strategy, or synergy between powers. If you put your companion on heal, they can literally beat most of the game for you; you don't even need to be wearing gear.

Even if BioWare rebalanced the combat back to where it was prior to the 4.0 update last year though, it wouldn't fix the underlying problem that SWTOR's core gameplay is largely copied from a game that launched over a decade ago, and has been emulated and iterated on dozens, if not hundreds of times since. I really like Star Wars, and I still really like the idea and setting of SWTOR ... but god damn if Bioware hasn't made it a chore to play.

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neo-rtsd

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neo-rtsd

@Mogan: While I agree, it doesn't bother me at all. All I really wanted from SWTOR was story, and it delivered. I hated being underpowered and having to do raids and stuff to be viable, so I'm glad they cut that necessity out. Now I can just jump in with my companion with absolutely no micro managing and experience the wonderful stories. I'm 33 years old with a family with 2 small children, I don't have the time for all of the MMO hoop jumping anymore, I just want to appreciate the story.

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mogan

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mogan  Moderator

@neo-rtsd: You have never, ever, in the history of SWTOR needed to run any raids, flashpoints, heroics, or other group content to experience the game's story. The only part of the game you've ever needed to grind gear for is the end game group or PvP content.

Maybe the saddest part of BioWare dumbing down the combat in the story portions of the game is that the combat there was already fairly easy to begin with. They smartly reduced the amount of quests you needed to run to level, and the critical path missions boil the story content down to the important bits ... but none of this stuff was ever something players had to bang their heads against at all. SWTOR has been very solo friendly since day one. All they did was strip the fun out of the combat and character progression.

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neo-rtsd

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neo-rtsd

@Mogan: Well that's not entirely true. Now I can play through parts of the game that were previously intended for groups only. Those can be a big part of the story and it's awesome that I can experience them without having to invest time that I don't have into finding a group. You're right though that nobody was forced to do it in order to progress through the MAIN story, but that being said, there was still plenty of really awesome story content that I couldn't enjoy without being in a group. Plus a lot of story missions were made much easier with high-end gear that you can't get unless you group and/or raid. Now people like me don't have to sit by and watch other people with more free time enjoy those things.

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mogan

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mogan  Moderator

@neo-rtsd: That's true, nerfing heroics so they can be played alone, and adding Solo Mode to a few of the more important Flashpoints do let you see parts of the game that ... well, that you really could have seen before without too much trouble, frankly. But now you don't have to deal with other people at all, so I guess that makes it easier. Though I think solo flashpoints are pretty flavorless because it's practically impossible to die and the drops aren't any good, and Heroics are 100% a gear/XP grind now.

But those changes could have been made without stripping all meaning from the already solo oriented story quests, and that's the part of the game I was talking about. Story quests are SWTOR's focus and make up the bulk of both old and new content, but beyond the actual story, they've got no appeal. Gear/Character progression and mechanics of combat are all meaningless because there's no consequences to playing well or poorly. The bulk of SWTOR isn't so much a game as it is a menial, repetitive task that must be completed to see the next cutscene.

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timthegem

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timthegem

@Mogan: Having played this game since beta, I can say that it is infinitely better in most aspects except for gear and crafting (which have been rendered almost pointless now). Yes, it's really a solo-player game now but people have been begging for another KoToR game for years. Here it is.

Early on, some missions were almost impossible to complete without the best gear and there was no way in hell that Flashpoints could have been done solo unless you were several levels above the standard range. Mob difficulty was jacked up even on basic missions. Sometimes silvers were tougher to beat than gold bosses.

Then there was the ridiculous cooldown on items to be collected during gathering missions. Ten players running around trying to click on items that took three minutes to respawn, and you had to collect ten of them. It was more frustrating than the early WoW Hogger days.

The stories are great overall and they make you feel like you're having a real impact now that the grind is gone and the game flows along smoothly. My only complaint is that you can't really make companions hate you, even if you upset them horribly.

Hopefully Bioware will incorporate an adjustable difficulty slider to the game in order to please players who want a challenge. Even City of Heroes had it for "door missions" over ten years ago. It should be a simple solution...certainly easier than a combat overhaul. Is combat dated? Sure, but it's still a hell of a lot better than the ol' hack n' block button mashing in games like Elder Scrolls Online.

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neo-rtsd

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neo-rtsd

@Mogan: I certainly agree with you in some regards. The gameplay was never revolutionary, that was a problem from the start, but a lot of us learned to look past it for better or worse. I personally treat it as a lack-luster spiritual successor to the old TOR games, especially story wise. The combat is reminiscent although not turn based, and the story is pretty much a continuation of all of the old story lines, so that's enough for my appetite to be sated for now, although I would really love a really revolutionary Star Wars MMO and a real sequel to the TOR games.

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t-16

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Edited By t-16

@Mogan: I actually agree with that, I love swtor and star wars.

But with 4.0 they made the game insanely boring massively overpowered companions and level sync/boosting on everything just makes the game a total breeze.

I can't really be bothered with the raids anymore or even HM FPs because I've done them all so many times over the years. Hopefully with the introduction of veteran solo content and etc it will bring some of the challenge back to the game.

I would like to see them go back to the old companion model as well, letting them be any role is fine gives you more choice but don't boost their stats so high, make it so you have to gear them like you did before.

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s9743469

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Edited By s9743469

@Mogan: Totally agree. 4.0 really removed all the fun. I stopped playing soon after. I may go back to check out the latest changes.

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mogan

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mogan  Moderator

@s9743469: I hear they're adding difficulty levels to KotFE and KotET, so maybe that'll help. I still think what SWTOR really needs is a full on combat/gameplay overhaul, and a console port with cross platform play ... but I doubt that'll actually happen.

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