[massively] Analysts "concerned" about swtor, EA's stock falls

[AznAnarchy99]

Heh, just the usual fallout for a game that has a big name. Some people like it, some people don't and they let everybody know about it repeatedly. Same thing happened to BF3... now the only people left in the BF3 thread are the people that actually play the game. No big deal.

I stopped playing BF3 because the people I met and played with stopped and its boring by myself. I like SWTOR and the class stories. Im really engaged in them, but to advance through them, I have to go through the BS of the planet side quests and the horrible design of the planets.

 

[DaveSimmons]

I agree when I'm walking across a spaceport (especially before sprint), but zooming around the countryside on a speeder usually doesn't bother me. Especially if I stop now and then to gather some free crafting materials

I'm not in a race to reach level 50, I'm here to enjoy the content all the way there including the scenery.

(I do wish the first speeder wasn't a nitroglycerin-filled floating bomb.)

 

[stuup1dmofo]

(I do wish the first speeder wasn't a nitroglycerin-filled floating bomb.)

Probably made in Iran.

 

[Wreckem]

WoW was pretty good at launch if you played on a server that wasn't Illidan or Archimonde (or any of the couple of other ultra-high pop servers). I played on Azgalor (would just barely have queues at peak times) and barely had issues. Compared to just about any other online game it had an amazing launch and they had way more users than they could have possible imagined having to deal with at the time (millions instead of hundreds of thousands)...

WoW did NOT have millions of subscribers at launch. It didn't even have a million. WoW didn't hit 1million until several months after launch. WoW built its subscriber base slowly and steadily.

And it wasn't that smooth. They had servers dropping regularly until they opened more a few days later.

 

[AznAnarchy99]

I agree when I'm walking across a spaceport (especially before sprint), but zooming around the countryside on a speeder usually doesn't bother me. Especially if I stop now and then to gather some free crafting materials

I'm not in a race to reach level 50, I'm here to enjoy the content all the way there including the scenery.

(I do wish the first speeder wasn't a nitroglycerin-filled floating bomb.)

The problem is that there is no scenery. I remember walking through Ashenvale on my first toon in WoW being awestruck by the scenery. In TOR there there's nothing to see unless you flip your camera completely to the sky.

 

[stuup1dmofo]

The problem is that there is no scenery. I remember walking through Ashenvale on my first toon in WoW being awestruck by the scenery. In TOR there there's nothing to see unless you flip your camera completely to the sky.

Alderaan, Taris, Belsavis, the entrance to the Coruscant Senate Tower.

Hoth and Tatooine's desolate landscapes are beautiful in a way as well.

 

[AyashiKaibutsu]

WoW did NOT have millions of subscribers at launch. It didn't even have a million. WoW didn't hit 1million until several months after launch. WoW built its subscriber base slowly and steadily.

And it wasn't that smooth. They had servers dropping regularly until they opened more a few days later.

They had some servers dropping. As I said, as long as you didn't play on the ultra-high population servers the launch was a much smoother experience than what people imply these days.

 

[Chiropteran]

I have a theory. Original WoW (minus the bugs) was more fun than current WoW. It is what hooked the players from the started, and made WoW as popular as it is. However, a couple factors caused blizzard to change things around in the more recent expansions. For one, players have no clue what they actually want. They will whine and complain on the forums for a change, and occasionally get it and then realize it sucks after a few days of playing with it. For another, even the greatest games get boring eventually. Long time players are getting tired of the game and quitting, so blizzard takes some desperate actions and tries to change things that don't really need to be changes just to keep these players. Some come back, temporarily, because though the new Wow is inferior it is at least something different and new.

Anyway, the point is is that SWTOR is copying new WoW too much, when it should be copying old WoW, if it wants to copy WoW at all.

That said, it's still a fine single player game, I don't regret the purchase at all, it's been 20+ hours of fun already and even if I never engage in endgame content it's of a decent entertainment level for the cost.

 

[Arkadrel]

the point is is that SWTOR is copying new WoW too much

look at some games that didnt copy wow very much:

Age of Conan, Vanguard Saga of heros,..

they are not doing better.... their doing worse than WoW copies are.

Age of Conan = fun skill system (this worked for AoC, but wouldnt for what I want).
Vanguard Saga of Heros = deplomacy possible (awesum)

For one, players have no clue what they actually want.

Here is what I want in a game:

I want:

1) skill system (reguardless of mage or melee) that relies on lots of stats.

2) possible to gear swap, via macros to optimise gear builds for differnt skills.

3) a TP (tactical points) system alla FFXI, where you can do skill chains and mages can Magic burst (timed magic spell fiting the skill chain elemental propteries).

4) Dual class system, where you can swap between classes, from towns, so if your missing a key arch type, each player can possibly take that roll, if they have that class leveled high enough.

5) I want the holy trinity....the arch types: tank,dps,healer,.. buffer/debuffer ect.

6) I want PVE to be oriented around group play, so you force people together. To many mmo's are almost single player for 90% of the game, until raids = bad. People never learn to play together.

7) A auction house with a working economy... this means you need money sinks in the game so things dont inflate. It means there has to be stuff that isnt NPC sold, so people that gather/craft can make money off it. It might also mean some class skills comsum items, you need to gather and craft for to use (like arrows, poisons, food's, drinks, ect ect).

8) story based gameplay, for a main questline. Like the one in FFXI, where each expansion builds on it. This doesnt mean, you level though it, its ment to be challegeing experiance for a group of adventures, that want to unlock new area's ect. So theres a sense of accomplishment for doing so.

9) Some non combat quests, that isnt crafting or gathering. The diplomacy thingy from Vanguard was very well done. It leaves me wondering why others dont do this.

10) game balanced for PVE group play, against monsters in area and raid bosses.
(not a pvp focused game, they can have pvp and try to balance that out with pvp gears, just dont let it ruin the pve aspect of the game).

11) I want badass people (skill wise, not gear)
to be able to do near impossbile feats, solo.

That means if some mage is badass at dot+kiteing and able to avoid attacks by perfect timeing on buffs(canceling them, reappling them), running out of range of a boss's aoe/attacks at just the right time(stunning some attacks ect), and he' s able to do that for 3-4 hours straigt, hes able to do what normally takes a intire group of people 30-40mins to do.




*** Im seeing the world through rose coloured glasses, because I played FFXI....
I liked alot of what it has/had... I want a new version of it.

FFXIV changed everything good about FFXI, to more WoW'ish type and it just fell flat on its face.

Basically I want Squiresoft to throw FFXIV into the dumpster, and start anew, and make a game thats more or less a direct copy of FFXI, but with newer graphics, a fresh story, music ect, classes and whatnot.

 

[Chiropteran]

Here is what I want in a game:

4) Dual class system, where you can swap between classes, from towns, so if your missing a key arch type, each player can possibly take that roll, if they have that class leveled high enough.

5) I want the holy trinity....the arch types: tank,dps,healer,.. buffer/debuffer ect.

This is exactly what I am talking about when I say players don't know what they want.

Those 2 requests are diametrically opposed. The term "holy trinity" goes back to when you had to have a warrior tank, a cleric healer, and a mage dps or you couldn't do the hardest content in the game. There might be another tank class, another healer class, or another DPS class, but you needed the best for the hardest stuff. It goes completely against the idea of a multi-spec or class system where one player can fill more than one roll. You either have jack of all trades players who are just as good as the pure classes, or you force people to play the pure classes if they want to be in demand.

 

[TheUnk]

This is exactly what I am talking about when I say players don't know what they want.

Those 2 requests are diametrically opposed. The term "holy trinity" goes back to when you had to have a warrior tank, a cleric healer, and a mage dps or you couldn't do the hardest content in the game. There might be another tank class, another healer class, or another DPS class, but you needed the best for the hardest stuff. It goes completely against the idea of a multi-spec or class system where one player can fill more than one roll. You either have jack of all trades players who are just as good as the pure classes, or you force people to play the pure classes if they want to be in demand.

I think he's saying he wants 2 classes on 1 character, not 2 classes combined into 1 class.

Which btw is something swtor has to a degree, you just have to pay some credits each time you switch.

 

[Arkadrel]

Chiropteran

see FFXI.

you had a character, and this character had a main class level of 75, and a sub class level of 37 cap.

You could pick any class combos you wanted.

Paladin/ninja with duel wielding swords, or off hand shield, that "blink" tanked (via shadow clones (utsusemi buff = 3-5 shadows)). This way /ninja allowed the paladin to avoid "big" one shot type damage from bosses, but things that attacked fast would eat though shadows so fast it barely helped at all.

paladin/warrior : defense traits, abilities that lower offense give more def, a "provoke" ability to supliment the paladin so he held aggro better.

^ both are "tanks" dispite haveing differnt sub classes.




Also this "character" joined a party, where there is another tank already in it.
What does he do? he accepts the party doesnt need another tank, and either gears more offensivly + picks a sub class that allows him to dish out more damage.

OR

He changes to main class to another one, like a Ranger, Monk, Dragoon, samurai ect.
(assumeing he has more than one main class leveled)


He just needs to visit town, go pick up some gears for the class and swap his paladin out for say.... Dragoon.

Takes 2mins, and the party now doesnt have 2 arch type tanks in the same group (because its not needed, and it lowers exp/hour rates).

 

[BudAshes]

Once this game doesn't cost so much to buy in the first place I bet they will add lots of people. I don't want to spend 65 bucks on a game that i have to pay per month to play.

 

[KaOTiK]

They had some servers dropping. As I said, as long as you didn't play on the ultra-high population servers the launch was a much smoother experience than what people imply these days.

WoW's launch was riddled with server problems. I played on Shatteredhand at launch. I received nearly 2 weeks worth of comp time due to all the server problems, each comp was 1-2 days at a time for how much the server was down/crashing. WoW's launch was not good, there were no low/medium population servers till they started adding more a couple of days after launch.

 

[DaveSimmons]

2) possible to gear swap, via macros to optimise gear builds for differnt skills.
4) Dual class system, where you can swap between classes, from towns, so if your missing a key arch type, each player can possibly take that roll, if they have that class leveled high enough.

I'd like these too -- yes you can respec, in the fleet, but it costs more and more each time.

I'd like to be able to switch my JK Guardian from a pure tank skill point set and gear set to the DPS-oriented build and gear set as needed. Maybe with a 15-30 minute cooldown between swaps if that's needed for game balance.

I disagree strongly about the forced grouping idea. I don't have a regular enough schedule for playing TOR to be forced to always play with others. I want to mostly play solo then do some heroics and flashpoints when I want to.

 

[Iron Wolf]

"People" know exactly what they want from a game nowadays. What they want is obvious from merely watching players run around the world for a few minutes.

They want Diablo 3. All people care about is running around killing things. Nobody is crafting, or gathering even. Nobody is slowing down to read the Codex entries. People bitch about having to backtrack a few feet to turn in a quest. Very few people play IAs or Smugglers, and the ones I've seen haven't a clue how to play their class.

WoW doesn't have anything to worry about from SWTOR. From observation, I assume that vast majority of players didn't even know what an MMO was until they picked up this game, because they were Star Wars fans, or for whatever other reason. Total noobishness and antisocial behavior not even seen among the WoW 12 year olds is in evidence here, and that may be what causes this game to suffer an early death.

 

[DaveSimmons]

WoW doesn't have anything to worry about from SWTOR. From observation, I assume that vast majority of players didn't even know what an MMO was until they picked up this game, because they were Star Wars fans, or for whatever other reason. Total noobishness and antisocial behavior not even seen among the WoW 12 year olds is in evidence here, and that may be what causes this game to suffer an early death.

This must vary by server. I've had only decent to very good experiences in PUGs playing 1-40 (Guardian), 1-13 (Consular) and 1-11 (Marauder) on the Bergeren PVP-RP server starting in mid-December.

Besides PUGs, it's common for strangers to buff each other, to help out against mobs, and to wait their turn for the respawn of a quest objective. In a combined 64 levels I've only had a quest objective ninja'd away from me while I was fighting a couple of times.

 

[JoshGuru7]

6) I want PVE to be oriented around group play, so you force people together. To many mmo's are almost single player for 90% of the game, until raids = bad. People never learn to play together.

11) I want badass people (skill wise, not gear)
to be able to do near impossbile feats, solo.

I like most of your list, but #6 and #11 are unlikely.

For every one MMO player you see at endgame who is grouping, there are a dozen at level 20 who prefer to be soloing their way across things. The viability of soloing is a major draw to any MMO more so than it is a detraction, and even if a MMO announces forced grouping as a gimmick for a niche market I think it would struggle to be successful.

As far as #11 goes, the only game that truly fits that bill is DDO with the implementation of the manual targeting for magic abilities. You could do some pretty insane things there as a sorcerer if you buffed yourself (haste + jump) and then treated it like a first person shooter, kiting entire dungeons around while you picked them off with fire balls, scorching rays and fire walls. DDO badly needs a huge UI update though as most people drop it immediately after they see that the interface is a holdout from a first generation MMO.

All people care about is running around killing things. Nobody is crafting, or gathering even. Nobody is slowing down to read the Codex entries. People bitch about having to backtrack a few feet to turn in a quest. Very few people play IAs or Smugglers, and the ones I've seen haven't a clue how to play their class.

WoW doesn't have anything to worry about from SWTOR. From observation, I assume that vast majority of players didn't even know what an MMO was until they picked up this game, because they were Star Wars fans, or for whatever other reason. Total noobishness and antisocial behavior not even seen among the WoW 12 year olds is in evidence here, and that may be what causes this game to suffer an early death.

I think you have a grass is greener elsewhere bias. SWTOR has the exact same immaturity that every other MMO does in the low level general chat. There's less of a connection to other players and less incentives to behave well in a community when you are playing a level 11 character that you may not even keep permanently. However, because most of the key objectives are behind transition points you do not need to worry about the behavior of other people for the most part in regards to waiting for their turn to kill a boss. I can count on one hand in SWTOR how many times somebody has tagged a mob that I wanted to kill which resulted in me having to wait for a respawn.

Once you get to the higher level planets I have found behavior on my server to be perfectly reasonable. You can send a companion to collect a node while you fight a group of mobs, or vice versa, so there isn't much concern about node stealing although I have seen it happen maybe twice. Putting together a group may be difficult if you tell people that you are looking for one, but if you tell people that you are starting one it's usually pretty quick even on the higher level planets which are less populated at the moment. Obviously, it helps if you have the option to heal or tank.