Let me start this by saying I've never played UO, so some of my examples use what I was told.
Originally posted by Elnator
Please explain to me, then, why UO's PVP system was more balanced than anything else I've ever played? Hmm? So you do admit it wasn't perfect. Which is my point about impossible. Whether it really is or not, I don't know, what I do know, is no matter WHAT people will complain about balance. The perception will be, that it is not balanced. Bottom line: In a totally open skill system the SKILLS you choose determine how well you do in PVP, or Not. There were several different methods of being very deadly in PVP combat. Some became tamers, some were top tier archers, some were tank-mages, some were melee specialists without peer who could take half (or more) of your life with 1 swat of their hammer or sword. But in UO PVP was BALANCED, if only because you could change your template however you wished whenever you wished and weren't tied to any specific skills unless YOU chose to be. EDIT: SWG was balanced for the same reasons then right? Of course not, because people that didn't want to be FotM, wanted to be just as tough as the FotM, and it's the same thing in AO (which I've proven by going to stratics). Your profession was simply a title given to you based upon your highest skill. I've heard that it isn't totally skill based, that there are actually classes that can specialize in skills. Don't know how true that is, but that's what I was told. UO PVP was among the most balanced PVP systems ever. And it was a 100% completely OPEN PVP system and a 100% completely OPEN skill system. I was never a huge fan of corpse looting in UO but the PVP was top notch. Right, and how long has AO been out now? Even you admit nothing is perfect. Yet people wanted SWG's balanced in an hour. Now, how many people play AO? Do the same type of people play AO that play say WoW? The reason these questions are important is that balance, and the whole reason why it's an impossibility, is a matter of perception. You see what is unbalanced today, may be usless tomorrow even though the devs don't do a thing to change it. Players just learn how to deal, and develop new tactics. Now just because YOU say it's balanced I decided to take a trip to Stratics forums: http://boards.stratics.com/php-bin/uo/showflat.php?Cat=&Number=6352986&page=&view=&sb=5&o=&fpart=1&vc=1&what2=showflat&selv=&vwhich= http://boards.stratics.com/php-bin/uo/showflat.php?Cat=&Board=uouhall&Number=6354900&Forum=c1&Words=Balance&Searchpage=0&Limit=25&Main=6354840&Search=true&where=bodysub&Name=&daterange=1&newerval=1&newertype=y&olderval=&oldertype=&bodyprev=#Post6354900 http://boards.stratics.com/php-bin/uo/showflat.php?Cat=&Number=6352688&page=&view=&sb=5&o=&fpart=1&vc=1&what2=showflat&selv=&vwhich= All recent posts stating how unbalanced PvP is. So I'd say my statement still stands. Whether you want to believe it or not (I would have thought it a foregone conclusion before) the more complex the system, the harder it is to manage. It is simple logic.
Originally posted by Morat20 And you'd be wrong. It's more difficult to balance -- especially if you strive for the "same powers, different skins" approach some MMORPG's take -- Which is really my point, it is more difficult, yet people refuse to believe that. but by no means impossible. Players had the relative imbalances pinpointed within two months of launch. The designers did NOT anticipate them, but should have.
Then please tell me which game has achieved this mystical balance to prove that it isn't impossible? I don't believe it will EVER happen. Like I said, balance is a matter of perspective. There will ALWAYS be people saying a game isn't balanced, whether it has PvP or not. I mean look at CoH, before there was PvP, people were complaining that Blasters could kill faster than Scrappers. The difficulty -- as always -- lies in balancing PvP versus PvE content. PvE players don't really care about "balance" as long as they're able to do what they want to do with the template they've chosen. PvP players, on the other hand, bitch to the ends of the freaking earth if they think Template A has a .0005% damage edge on template B, and act like God himself owes it to them to fix it.
Again look at CoH, no PvP to speak of (at the time) and yet still complaints about balance. Plus, it's been my experience that the loudest PvP whiners are unable to comprehend anything more complex than "His rock is bigger!". I've seen them whine over a paper/rock/scissors system (Class A has an edge v Class B, but Class B can whip Class C, and Class C can beat Class A -- balanced, but you should hear the whining when Class B loses to Class A). Balancing the skills system in Galaxies wasn't the chore you want to believe. Hell, the original CU docs did it -- however, those were scrapped four months before delivery in order to mimic WoW. (Did you know that? What a waste -- several months worth of design and early work scrapped for a last minute MAJOR overhaul, because someone had a bug up their ass). I agree. The CU balanced A LOT of the problems and I loved it. This was my favorite time in the game, but even you agreed that balancing a class based system is easier, and that is really my point. I'd have preferred to avoid capping skills, although implementing hard caps or -- a better, if still poor choice -- diminishing returns would have ended the worst of the unbalances between templates. Armor, looted DoTs and doctor's buffs still needed to be addressed, however. Only programmers pressed for time -- as SOE's were, when the original CU design was scrapped -- would have "balanced" the game by adding in a level-based damage multiplyer and mitigator. That little gem of stupidity sandbagged the entire CU.
I would like to say that armor pre-cu was not all that expensive. I could get full suits of 30-36% stun base 66-70% armor to be sliced to 80-90% armor from around 200-300k per full suit if it took me 3 full suits to get the slice I needed it was odd.
Given that in 1-2 buff sessions on dantooine you could generate 1 million credits I don't really see how armor cost was prohibitive.
Not that I thought it was balanced, but it was not expensive or hard to get that level armor on every server. If you ground Combat Medic/Doc and TKA rifleman or fencer you could lay a beat down on anyone.
People generally didn't understand pre-cu combat and equipment and it required a max'd template but it was not hard. I could grind any profession in a matter of days and setup macros to grind most boring features.
I could move server to server and in days have a character able to generate a few million credits at a whim.
The buffs where absurd and everything was soloable except 2 locations but it was not hard to get good in that game. /tumbletostanding on alt/friend/guildie /heal /pause 5 /macro masterdoc
Make sure you got stims and check in periodically to train. Buff action/health of tumbler for quicker grind.
Mastering a ranged or melee profession was equally as easy and could be macroed.
The problem was nothing in game to do. Not that they changed that yet.
Wow, Jodokai -- I don't think I'd ever seen ANYONE miss the point as badly as you did. I'm especially fond of your "I love the balance the CU achieved" comment.
You seemed to have failed to grasp two key points there -- first, the original CU design docs were trashed (those were the ones I was referring to). Second -- and this is the funny part, given your response -- that the CU achieved "balance" through the hack of modifying damage by level.
In short, they made NO attempt to balance "classes" -- they balanced levels. It's one reason I quit. My nine year old found level-based damage mitigation and mutliplication to be an offense to simple gameplay.
That you loved it and consider it "balanced" says quite a bit about what you like in games. You want to compare two numbers, and have the higher number win. You think "Skill" resides in low-ping and decent hand-eye coordination, and think "strategy" means "having the biggest gun".
The pre-CU gameplay wasn't that badly unbalanced. In terms of PvE, what caused it to be "unbalanced" was overpowered doctor buffs (based on the Devs failing to properly min/max crafting) coupled with broken professions. Pistoleer was "unbalanced" by virtue of half their skills simply not working.
The original CU design was a simplification of the pre-CU combat system -- given the high dev turnover, having to "dumb down" the design was a cost-cutting measure. With the success of WoW, however, the original CU design (already a simplification) was scrapped in favor of a system where "balance" was achieved by playing "Whose level is higher". Hardly fun combat.
Galaxies failed because it was pushed live half a year too early. Too much was scrapped at the last minute, and developers spent the first six months trying to fix bugs and rapidly turn on necessary content that was unfinished, rather than -- as is normal -- using the first six months to finish tweaking the game engine.
World of Warcraft is about 2/3rds of the way through a revamp of their Talent trees, based on large-scale user data. They would not have even been able to begin that, had they launched in as pitiful a state as Galaxies. (Having your launch be marred by "not having enough servers" is so much better than "Marketing made us launch 6 months too early, with incomplete functionality and insufficient beta testing).
Balancing the Galaxies skill system didn't take much -- min-maxers did it after game launch, but any Dev could have (and SHOULD have!) sat down and written a simple program to min-max the template and look for imbalances in the numbers -- dodges above design spec, resistances to multiple effects too high, etc.
In the original design docs, there should have been maximum possible values for those things -- as well as the spreadsheets identifying how they'd act in combat.
You cannot "balance" combat when you have classes, skills, and templates that don't work as intended -- I'm not talking bugs, but flat broken. At no point between launch and NOW has Galaxies ever had all their skills and classes working correctly. Achieving "balance" in that environment is a fool's game, and ultimately they half-assed it by using your "level" as the end-all and be-all of combat -- rather than the skills, modifiers, and defenses your template gave you.
Oh -- one final note. The Devolpers BIGGEST mistake was allowing recursive macros. There will always be people who use third-party software to do that, but having it embedded in the game was a mistake.
Allowing macros, yes. But certain skills (center of being, for instance) should have been toggled, rather than triggered -- and recursive macros should have been removed.
Lengthy enough macros would still allow the flexibility desired, but get rid of things like AFK entertainers and farming of meatlumps.
Originally posted by Morat20 Wow, Jodokai -- I don't think I'd ever seen ANYONE miss the point as badly as you did. I'm especially fond of your "I love the balance the CU achieved" comment.
I'm not going to bother responding to the rest, but come on man, don't misquote me and then slam me because of your misquote. Here is what I actually said:
The CU balanced a lot of the problems and I loved it.
Nowhere did I say the CU was balanced. That would have been a really silly thing for me to say, considering I think balance is impossible.
Then look: I said A LOT of the problems. Those problems being buffs and armor.
So if you're going to slam me, slam me on what I actually say, don't turn my words around so it comes out with a different meaning.
The CU didn't balance anything as far as classes and skills. All it did was make your CL the biggest factor in anything. It didn't account for specials and healing and skills, just CL=ALL.
Hardly a fix.
Shayde - SWG (dead) Proud member of the Cabal.
It sounds great, so great in fact, I pitty those who canceled - Some deluded SWG fanboi who pities me. I don't like it when you say things. - A Vanguard fan who does too. 09f911029d74e35bd84156c5635688c0
We are kinda getting off topic here guys.... lol... can we try to keep it to listing some great ideas and fixes for SWG2? I have been enjoying reading new ideas etc...
The one thing that I would love but am honestly puzzled how to solve is player housing. I loved my castle like Naboo style home that was full of war and hunting trophies. To be honest, it accounted for many of my adventures in the old game. Problem was that it caused massive lag and made a mess out of landscapes that were once picture perfect...let us not even mention what it did for certain quest spawns (ala pirate leader).
A load on demand format still gets terribly taxing when you hit a populated player city so what would be the best answer? Preexisting housing that you can purchase? A pseudo instanced area like AO or Ryzom...not too fond of that one I might add as it makes things seem artificial.
Just something I ponder as to me SWG still had the best player housing in any MMORPG and it was one of the features that endeared me to it.
Originally posted by Morat20 Jodakai: The CU achieved "balance" in exactly the same way a doctor cures your headache by knocking your unconcious with a hammer. That you consider it a good thing is kind of sad. I'm surprised you don't have higher standards.
I think everyone has just forgotten how jacked up everything was prior to the CU. The grass is always greener and all that.
What a lot of you have forgotten about all the complaints and comments that "The only way they can make it challenging is add HAM". I read this thousands of time. Maybe this wasn't the best way to do it, but no one else seems to be able to either. My main toon was a full time crafter and I didn't have much of a problem with it. I liked the CU, say what you want about me.
All of that however isn't really my point. My points are these: 1. Skill based systems like SWG used to be are harder to manange and balance than class based. 2. People refuse to believe #1 is true. 3. People will ALWAYS complain. If you don't change something, people will complain no one is listening, if you change something people will complain that it's different.
I don't refute that it is easier to manage a paltry 9 classes than a great skill based system.
I DO refute that there was actually a lot to "manage", especially when there were like 12 combat classes. The only balance whining came from PVPers. BFD. If you wanted to bring up the power of one class, or fix the bugs in another class.. great.
With the "largest dev team in the business", you would have thought they could handle it. Other teams might just do it right.
Shayde - SWG (dead) Proud member of the Cabal.
It sounds great, so great in fact, I pitty those who canceled - Some deluded SWG fanboi who pities me. I don't like it when you say things. - A Vanguard fan who does too. 09f911029d74e35bd84156c5635688c0
I wonder... Does anyone know the size of the dev team at Blizzard that is running WoW? It's pretty much undeniable that WoW is almost bug free and smooth. I wonder how large is the team that it took to achieve that state. I just saw WoW's latest CONTENT patch notes and they put to shame anything that SWG has ever done. Take a look!
World of Warcraft Client Patch 1.9.0 (2006-1-3)
The Gates of Ahn'Qiraj
The Gates of Ahn'Qiraj will house two massive, unique dungeons -- the Ruins of Ahn'Qiraj, a 20-man raid dungeon, and the Temple of Ahn'Qiraj, a 40-man raid dungeon. As players delve deeper into the mysteries of Ahn'Qiraj, they will discover revelations of the Silithid infestation and their shadowy masters, the Qiraji. Players will have to complete a world event of massive proportions before they can open the Gates of Ahn'Qiraj on their realm. ***During the public test of Ahn'Qiraj, the world event to open the gates will be accelerated to allow testing of the dungeon content.***
Linked Auction Houses
Players will now be able to buy and sell goods with greater effectiveness using the Linked Auction House system. Auction Houses in Orgrimmar, Undercity, and Thunder Bluff will now share the same pool of Horde player-created auctions, and Alliance players will find the same to be true when visiting Ironforge, Stormwind City, and Darnassus Auction Houses. This system has been expanded to support the neutral Auction Houses as well. Tanaris, Everlook, and Booty Bay will all be linked for players of both factions to access. In addition, the "Looking for Group" and "Trade" channels have been unified among the corresponding cities, meaning, for example, that you can trade your goods or look for groups in Ironforge while in Stormwind.
Multiple Battlegrounds Queues
Players will be able to enter multiple battleground queues. No longer must you make the hard decision of which queue to join -- when queued for all three, you can join the first one available or hold out for that particular battleground which you've really got your heart set on. Should a queue open while you are already in a battleground, you may switch to the new battle or remain in the current on.
Soul Shard Bags
Tailors now can make soul bags to hold soul shards. The smallest is a 20-slot bag, the recipe for which can be purchased in Gadgetzan. The recipe for a larger bag can be found in Scholomance, and one for an even larger bag can be found in Molten Core. In the main UI, these soul bags will display how many shards they contain. So long as the soul bags have room, any soul shards a warlock creates will automatically go into the bag.
Raid Calendar System
The raid-lockout system has undergone a significant change. The new system will have all instances reset at a certain server time, regardless of when you were actually saved to the instance. The reset schedule is as follows: Molten Core: Every 7 Days, resetting during weekly maintenance. Blackwing Lair: Every 7 Days, resetting during weekly maintenance Onyxia: Every 5 Days Zul'Gurub: Every 3 Days Temple of Ahn'Qiraj (40-man): Every 7 Days, resetting during weekly maintenance Ruins of Ahn'Qiraj (20-man): Every 3 Days All resets will occur during off-hours, when the least amount of raids are active.
Important Note for Mac OS X Users
The minimum supported Mac OS X revision for WoW will be changed in a post-1.9.0 patch, from 10.3.5 to 10.3.9. If you are running 10.3.5 - 10.3.8 and need to get the free update, you can use Software Update or you can click here for the direct download. This change will make it easier for us to release future updates to the game, for example to support upcoming Mac models based on Intel processors.
General
All Disorient effects have been renamed Incapacitate effects. This includes Gouge, Sap, etc.
All Confusion effects have been renamed Disorient effects. This includes Blind, Scatter Shot, etc.
Food and Drink are now in separate categories, so you can only have one food effect and one drink effect on you at a time. The only effect should be that foods that used to stack with each other (you could have two food effects on you at once) no longer will stack.
On-next-swing abilities will no longer cause multiple weapon procs on a single swing.
It is now possible to change the game's priority and processor affinity through Task Manager.
PvP & Battlegrounds
The Defiler's Talisman and Talisman of Arathor are now available at Friendly reputation.
Level 48, 38, and 28 versions of the Defiler's Talisman and Talisman of Arathor have been added.
Two new rewards have been added for reaching Friendly reputation level with the Silverwing Sentinel and Warsong Outrider factions.
New caster ring reward added for reaching Exalted status with the Stormpike or Frostwolf factions.
When a player leaves a battleground before it concludes, they will be unable to re-enter any battleground queue for 15 minutes.
Several civilian NPCs, who previously would assist non-civilians, will no longer do so.
A bug has been fixed with the Warsong Gulch reward vendors that were allowing items achieved at reaching Friendly reputation to be purchased at lower reputation levels.
Reputation rewards for the PvP Battlegrounds have been adjusted:
Superior Health Draughts, Superior Mana Draughts, and Battleground-specific bandages are now available uniformly at Friendly reputation.
Major Health Draughts and Major Mana Draughts are now available uniformly at Honored reputation.
Warsong Gulch and Arathi Basin now offer Battleground-specific rations at Friendly reputation.
Druids
Bear and Dire Bear form - Effects that lower armor will now lower armor by a percentage of the druid's full armor, rather than just base (caster form) armor. However, Enrage will still only remove 75% of base armor.
Omen of Clarity - Special attacks will no longer consume their own clearcasting state. All melee attacks will now be able to trigger the clearcasting state.
Nature's Grasp - This spell can now trigger from special melee attacks. It will no longer be possible to cast Entangling Roots at no mana cost immediately after Nature's Grasp procs.
Nature's Grace - The Nature's Grace buff will now appear on the player upon completion of casting, before the travel time of the spell. So, Wrath crits will now benefit the casting time of the next spell cast.
Insect Swarm - New icon.
Improved Starfire - The stun effect's duration no longer diminishes or is diminished by controlled stun abilities and spells (e.g. Cheap Shot, Hammer of Justice, Charge etc.).
Omen of Clarity - This spell now works correctly with Bash, Rip, Ferocious Bite, and Demoralizing Roar, granting a decrease in the cost of the ability. Ferocious Bite will still use the entire energy bar to generate additional damage.
Cat Form - Feline Swiftness will now regain its speed increase when moving from indoors to outdoors.
Cure Poison - Mana cost now based on a percentage of base mana.
Remove Curse - Mana cost now based on a percentage of base mana.
Abolish Poison - Mana cost now based on a percentage of base mana.
Hunters
Arcane Shot - Will no longer trigger two Judgement of Wisdom effects with one shot.
Aspect of the Pack and Aspect of the Cheetah - Periodic damage will no longer trigger the Dazed effect.
Aspect of the Wild - Radius increased. Tooltip updated to display radius.
Improved Concussive Shot - The stun effect's duration no longer diminishes or is diminished by controlled stun abilities and spells (e.g. Cheap Shot, Hammer of Justice, Charge etc.).
Tame Beast - The hunter will now turn to face the target during the taming process.
Bestial Wrath - Damage bonus reduced, duration increased. In addition, while enraged, the beast will be immune to Disorient effects (e.g. Scatter Shot, Blind, etc.)
Unleashed Fury - Damage bonus increased.
Pet Changes
Base pet speed is now standardized for all pets, including legacy pets. Pet speed can still be modified through the talent Bestial Swiftness and pet abilities such as Charge, Dash, etc.
All hunter pets will now always deal Physical damage for their base attack.
Turtles can now eat raw and cooked fish.
Turtles can now learn Shell Shield, allowing them to reduce all damage taken by 50% for 10 sec.
Hunters can now tame Sons of Hakkar. Sons of Hakkar are in the Wind Serpent family and will know Lightning Breath (Rank 6).
Boars can now learn Charge, an ability that allows them to charge to an enemy, immobilize that enemy for 1 second, and add a large amount of Attack Power to the boar's next attack.
Gorillas can now learn Thunderstomp, an ability that causes high threat area Nature damage.
Mages
Impact - The stun effect's duration no longer diminishes or is diminished by controlled stun abilities and spells (e.g. Cheap Shot, Hammer of Justice, Charge etc.).
Netherwind Regalia - The 8-piece set bonus will now proc immediately upon completion of casting the spell, before travel time on the spell. This will allow the proc to affect the next spell cast as intended.
Arcane Concentration - Blizzard will now be able to gain a Clearcasting state from this talent.
Arcane Missles - Will now be able to trigger procs based on dealing damage.
Remove Lesser Curse - Mana cost now based on a percentage of base mana.
Blast Wave - Will now show spell data in the talent page.
Conjure Water (Rank 7) � Will now create ten waters instead of four.
Pyroblast � Damage bonus from + spell damage items increased.
Paladins
Due to significant talent changes, all Paladins' talent points will be refunded and can be respent. Training costs for all talent spell/ability replacements have been significantly reduced.
Paladins can now learn Greater Blessings for the following spells:
Blessing of Might
Blessing of Wisdom
Blessing of Kings
Blessing of Sanctuary
Blessing of Salvation
Greater Blessings will cast the associated blessing on all raid members that share the same class as the target. For example, if you cast Greater Blessing of Might on a warrior in your raid, all warriors in the raid party will receive Blessing of Might from you. Additionally, Greater Blessings have an increased duration of 15 minutes. These blessings require twice as much mana as the single target version, as well as a reagent. Paladins can purchase these new Greater Blessing spells from their class trainers.
Seals and Judgements - Added or increased damage per level so that these spells keep pace between replacements.
Judgements - Judgements that place a debuff on their victim will now all have their duration refreshed when the judging paladin strikes the victim with his or her melee swings. All these debuffs have had their duration decreased to 10 seconds. In addition, Judgements that place debuffs can no longer be resisted.
Seal of Righteousness - Now does holy damage on every swing. It can now proc correctly as well. The Judgement effect has been renamed "Judgement of Righteousness" to differentiate it from the Seal damage in the combat log.
Judgement of the Crusader - The holy damage bonus has been decreased as part of rebalancing paladin damage (which is still increased overall).
Seal of Command - The proc will occur more often, but will only do 70% of weapon-swing damage.
Judgement of Command - Instead of placing a debuff on the victim, this spell now does immediate damage. If the victim is not stunned, they only take 50% of the total damage. The damage on this Judgement was increased significantly.
Judgement of Wisdom - Arcane Shot will no longer cause this to proc twice on one shot. Channeling spells can now trigger this proc as well.
Vengeance - Special ability critical hits can now trigger Vengeance.
Judgement of Righteousness - The damage of this judgement was increased significantly. This judgement can now trigger procs. The bonus from spell damage items has been increased slightly.
Holy Shock - Now heals friendly targets and damages enemy targets. Mana cost reduced. Bonus from spell damage and healing items increased.
All Seals and Judgements have had their bonus coefficient from plus spell damage re-evaluated. Some holy damage effects had no coefficient before and now have a coefficient.
Vengeance - Clarified the tooltip to indicate procs will not trigger Vengeance.
Summon Warhorse - Mana cost reduced.
Summon Charger - Mana cost reduced.
Consecration - No longer displays a debuff icon on targets in the area of effect.
Updated Aura tooltips to be more clear (include radius, fix grammatical errors etc...).
Judgement - Range increased, cooldown decreased, mana cost decreased. Using Judgement will now initiate melee combat.
Exorcism - Now usable on Demon targets in addition to Undead targets.
Holy Wrath - Now usable on Demon targets in addition to Undead targets.
Seal of Justice - Mana cost slightly increased. The stun effect's duration no longer diminishes or is diminished by controlled stun abilities and spells (e.g. Cheap Shot, Hammer of Justice, Charge etc...).
Seal of Righteousness - The damage bonus from +Holy damage has been reevaluated on this seal. Since the damage is delivered on every swing, the bonus has been reduced. However, paladins attacking with faster weapons should see an overall increase in the bonus from + spell damage gear. Mana Cost slightly increased.
Seal of Command - Damage bonus from +Holy damage items slightly increased.
Seal of the Crusader - Mana cost slightly increased.
Seal of Fury - The seal and judgement have been removed and replaced with a new self-buff, Righteous Fury, which will increase threat from holy damage.
Seal of Light - Mana cost slightly increased.
Seal of Wisdom - Mana cost slightly increased.
Seal of Command - Mana cost slightly increased.
Hammer of Wrath - Missile speed of the flying hammer increased.
Divine Protection, Divine Shield and Blessing of Protection - Targets of these spells will now receive the "Forbearance" effect, preventing another of these three spells from being applied to that target for one minute.
New Spell: Righteous Fury (level 16) - Increases the threat generated by the Paladin's Holy attacks by 60%. Lasts 30 minutes.
Blessing of Sanctuary - Now causes Holy damage to the attacker when the blessed target blocks an attack in addition to the current effect.
Hammer of Justice - Is now a Protection spell.
Repentance - Is now considered an Incapacitate effect.
Blessing of Wisdom - Mana regeneration over time will no longer generate threat.
Purify - Mana cost now based on a percentage of base mana.
Cleanse - Mana cost now based on a percentage of base mana.
Priests
Martyrdom - This talent will now trigger on melee special abilities as well as on melee swings. The tooltip has been clarified to indicate this ability only works on melee strikes.
Dispel Magic - Mana cost now based on a percentage of base mana.
Cure Disease - Mana cost now based on a percentage of base mana.
Abolish Disease - Mana cost now based on a percentage of base mana.
Mind Blast - Threat raised on ranks 7, 8, and 9. Incorrect data had been entered in those spells, resulting in less threat generated than designed.
Blackout - The stun effect's duration no longer diminishes or is diminished by controlled stun abilities and spells (e.g. Cheap Shot, Hammer of Justice, Charge etc...).
Rogues
Sword Specialization - Special attacks such as Sinister Strike, and Mortal Strike now properly trigger the chance to gain an extra attack.
Mace Specialization - The stun effect's duration no longer diminishes or is diminished by controlled stun abilities and spells (e.g. Cheap Shot, Hammer of Justice, Charge etc...).
Slice and Dice - This finisher can now trigger the Ruthlessness talent.
Shaman
Lightning Shield - This spell will now proc when the shaman is struck by elemental attacks.
Stormstrike - Earthbind and Stoneclaw totems will no longer use up charges of Stormstrike.
New Spell - Tranquil Air Totem. Creates a totem that reduces the threat caused by nearby party members by 20%.
Grounding Totem - This totem will no longer absorb the spell from Crippling Poison or Deadly Poison.
Purge - Mana cost now based on a percentage of base mana.
Cure Poison - Mana cost now based on a percentage of base mana.
Cure Disease - Mana cost now based on a percentage of base mana.
Poison Cleansing Totem - Mana cost now based on a percentage of base mana.
Disease Cleansing Totem - Mana cost now based on a percentage of base mana.
Warlocks
Searing Pain - Reduced mana cost by 10%.
Infernal and Doomguard - Increased armor 10% and damage 30% on both pets.
Soul Link - This spell can no longer be partially dispelled off the warlock. In addition, Soul Link can no longer be used on non-demon pets.
Hellfire - Victims of Hellfire are now able to resist properly. Warlocks continue (as designed) to be unable to resist their own damage.
Curse of Shadow and Curse of the Elements - These curses can no longer cause resistance to become negative. To compensate, both curses now increases the damage taken from the appropriate schools by a percentage.
Summon Felsteed - Mana cost reduced.
Summon Dreadsteed - Mana cost reduced.
Pyroclasm - The stun effect's duration no longer diminishes or is diminished by controlled stun abilities and spells (e.g. Cheap Shot, Hammer of Justice, Charge etc...).
Warriors
Execute - Improved Execute and other discounts to the Execute ability will now correctly convert the resulting extra rage into damage.
Retaliation - This ability will no longer lose charges when the attacker is behind the warrior.
Sword Specialization - Special attacks such as Sinister Strike, and Mortal Strike now properly trigger the chance to gain an extra attack.
Sweeping Strikes - Whirlwind and Retaliation will now correctly consume the charges from Sweeping Strikes.
Bloodthirst - The damage component has been increased to 45% of attack power.
Enrage - The talent will now grant 5/10/15/20/25% extra damage when enraged, instead of 8/16/24/33/40%.
Mace Specialization - The stun effect's duration no longer diminishes or is diminished by controlled stun abilities and spells (e.g. Cheap Shot, Hammer of Justice, Charge etc...).
Improved Revenge - The stun effect's duration no longer diminishes or is diminished by controlled stun abilities and spells (e.g. Cheap Shot, Hammer of Justice, Charge etc...).
Unbridled Wrath - Only normal melee swings will trigger the rage generation from this ability.
Racial Traits
Troll Racial Abilities Troll Berserking
New functionality: Berserking is now an activated ability that increases your melee, ranged, and casting speed by 10% to 30%. The value scales upwards towards 30% depending how low your health is when you activate the ability.
Now lasts 10 seconds.
Now requires a small amount of mana, rage, or energy (depending on your class) to activate.
No longer requires being struck by a critical to activate.
Now has a three minute cooldown, up from two minutes.
No longer has a global cooldown.
Throwing Mastery
Trolls now also receive a bonus to Bow weapons in addition to Throwing weapons.
Orc Racial Abilities Blood Fury
Now applies a healing effectiveness debuff on the user instead of the attack power penalty. The healing debuff is applied immediately upon using the ability.
Hardiness
Resistance is now applied to just Stun mechanics.
Gnome Racial Abilities Escape Artist
Casting time lowered.
Dwarven Racial Abilities Stoneform
No longer snares the user.
Armor bonus increased.
Duration lowered.
Items
All of the Tier 2 Class Armor sets have been updated with new art.
The following weapons and shields have been updated with new art : Perdition's Blade, Obsidian Edged Blade, Gutgore Ripper, Core Hound Tooth, Aurastone Hammer, Drillborer Disk, Staff of Dominance.
Many of the pieces from the Tier 2 Armor sets have received updated statistics. The armor sets with the most extensive changes include the Netherwind, Nemesis, and Judgement sets. Other sets received fewer revisions, or none at all.
Slimes have been latching on to more valuable items and they will now be dropping better loot than they used to, including coin drops and special bags.
Drop rates of Darkmoon Cards 2-8 (Portals 2-8, etc..) have been reduced. Ace drop rates have been increased.
The drop rate of Shadowcat Hides has been increased.
The Lifestealing enchantment now does shadow damage rather than fire damage.
Manna Biscuits now have two separate spell effects so they stack correctly with other food and water.
Well Fed buffs from special foods will no longer stack with each other.
The enchanter-made wands are now correctly flagged as Bind on Equip.
Silithus air elementals have a slightly increased chance of dropping essence of air
Stormshroud Shoulders have been fixed to be a superior item and have had the stamina on them slightly increased as well.
Whistle of the Black War Raptor was changed to Bind on Acquire.
The Runed Stygian Belt is no longer Unique.
Bandages will now appears as "Consumable" in the auction house.
Jaedenar humanoids and demons in Felwood and Winterfall Furbolgs in Winterspring can now drop Runecloth.
Winterfall Furbolgs will not drop Winterfall Firewater as often.
The Seal of Wrynn, Nogg's Gold Ring, and Talvash's Gold Ring have been improved to be superior items.
All Giants in Azshara now drop cash and items appropriate for an elite creature.
The attack speed slowing effect from Thunderfury has been reduced to 20%, and no longer stacks with other such effects such as Thunderclap. The rate at which the weapon procs has also been lowered.
The Reckless Charge ability of the Goblin Rocket Helmet and Horned Viking Helmet is now considered an incapacitating effect instead of a sleep effect.
Flamewaker Legplates and Sash of Whispered Secrets improved to have the proper stats of an epic item.
Broken Silithid Chitin is now marked as a poor item.
Albino Crocscale Boots now has the appropriate geometry attached.
Darkshore Grouper now has an appropriate sound when moved in your inventory.
The effect of the Freezing Band is now considered a Freeze effect.
The Force Reactive Disk's and Cloak of Fire's effects will no longer gain a benefit from effects that increase spell damage.
The Insightful Hood and Southsea Head Bucket will now cover hair properly.
The proc ability of the Halberd of Smiting can no longer cause another proc.
The Glimmering Mithril Insignia will no longer make a player immune to Death Coil.
The Goblin Mortar's stun effect now has a description.
Six Demon Bag tooltip changed to note that the target must be in front of the caster.
The Fiery War Axe is now in fact, Fiery.
The Abyssal Plate Gauntlets are now Bind on Equip.
Items with the Frost Blast ability will now deal the correct damage listed.
Gauntlets of Shining Light is now spelled correctly.
The Pure Elementium Band now has a sell price.
The Mendicant's Slippers now have the proper amount of stamina for the level of the item.
Arcanist's Bindings had more resistances than proper for the item, and these were removed.
Alcor's Sunrazor is now Bind on Equip.
Transforming Thunderstrike and Shadowstrike will no longer consume additional copies of the item that might be in the inventory.
Added a note to the tooltip for the Healing and Mana Draughts available in Alterac Valley that informs the player they are only usable in Alterac Valley.
Incorrect amounts of abilities such as Attack Power, Increased Fire Damage, or Increased Healing Damage were being applied to all random item property world drops. Two handed weapons such as Staves had much lower amounts of these abilities, while ranged and one handed weapons had too much. All further drops of these items will have the correct amounts, but previously dropped items will not be affected by this change.
The Shardtooth Meat quest item can no longer be fed to a Hunter pet.
Blue Dragon Card - This trinket will no longer proc from non-combat abilities.
Shield Spikes - Shield Spike damage will no longer occur on ranged blocks.
The Gnomish Death Ray's backfire will now affect players even if they have an immunity effect, such as Divine Shield.
The Zandalarian shoulder enchantments now properly display their effects on the item enchanted.
Professions
An Alchemy recipe to Transmute Heart of Fire into three Elemental Fires has been added at the Friendly level of the Thorium Brotherhood.
Epic items that are level 51 and above will now disenchant into a Nexus Crystal. Also items that normally disenchant into Large Brilliant Shards have a very small chance of disenchanting into a Nexus Crystal. New more powerful enchanting recipes that require these Crystals can be found in the new Ahn'Qiraj content.
Enchanters can now turn some of their dusts and shards into magical oils. These oils when applied to weapons add a temporary bonus to magical damage or mana regeneration that stacks with permanent enchantments. The lower levels of these recipes are found on normal enchanting vendors. The higher level versions are found on special vendors and are rewards for high Zandalar faction.
The Enchanting Trainer in Cenarion Hold in Silithus sells some of both new types of enchanting formulae.
Schools of fish have appeared around the world that can be fished from a few times before being fished out. These schools tend to contain valuable fish types such as Oily Blackmouth or Firefin Snapper. In some places, wreckage can be fished from for even better rewards.
The cooking trainers around the world sell the recipe for Sagefish and Greater Sagefish. These two fish types can be found in schools in inland areas and provide health and mana regeneration as well as additional mana regeneration for 15 minutes after eating.
Engineers with skill 250 or greater, who have completed Umi Rumplesnicker's 'Are We There Yeti?' quest line, should seek her out again in Everlook.
Quests & Reputation
The Timbermaw Furbolgs have received a faction revamp!
The Timbermaw Furbolg faction is now named "Timbermaw Hold."
Certain named Deadwood and Winterfall Furbolgs are now giving more positive Timbermaw Hold faction when killed.
Old quests have been revised, and several new quests involving the Timbermaw Furbolgs have been added.
Reputation caps for killing monsters now happen at the end of a level, rather than in the middle of it. For example: if reputation gains for killing a monster were previously capped at the middle of the range for Friendly on a monster, then they are now capped at the end of Friendly.
Reputation is now its own category in the chat window; you can change the color of reputation gains and losses as reported in chat without it affecting other miscellaneous information.
All Alliance versions of the quest "Heeding the Call" now give uniform reputation increases.
Warlock quests that teach imp summoning now all uniformly award reputation increases for respective racial factions.
Spells now may have a casting requirement of current reputation with a faction.
All versions of the quests "A Donation of Wool," "A Donation of Silk," and "A Donation of Mageweave" have had the level of the quest raised so that higher level characters performing them will be able to receive the full reputation gain. The minimum level requirement for the quests have not changed, though the amount of XP gained when completing any of these quests will be different than from before. Mageweave will continue to give more XP than Silk, and Silk more XP than Wool.
The quests "Morrowgrain to Darnassus" and "Morrowgrain to Thunder Bluff" now give increased reputation per turn-in to be in line with the amount given with "Morrowgrain to Feathermoon Stronghold."
The Alliance version of the quest "Centaur Bounty" now gives Stormwind faction for completion.
The Horde version of the quest "Centaur Bounty" now gives the same amount of XP as the Alliance version (which means it was increased).
The quest "Zaeldarr the Outcast" now gives an Argent Dawn reputation increase upon completion.
A bug with the reputation system has been fixed that was preventing some awards to Horde and Alliance factions from being shared properly amongst all member factions of the team.
The quest "Ledger from Tanaris" now gives a reputation reward for Gadgetzan upon completion.
The quest "Supplies for Nethergarde" now has an additional reward of increased Stormwind reputation.
Fixed typos in both quest versions of "All Along the Watchtower".
Fixed typos in both quest versions of "Lessons Anew".
A kobold has been moved away from Piznik so that it won't keep evading in the quest "Gerenzo's Orders".
Fixed typos in the quest "Signets of the Zandalar".
Fixed typos in the quest "Rotten Eggs".
The cleansed plants of Felwood have been modified:
There is no longer a gossip option to interact with them; simply right click on the plant to receive your buff or fruits.
The amount of items you get from plants has been adjusted.
A corrupted whipper root plant was bugged to require one fewer plant salves than intended to be cleansed; it's now fixed to require the salves just like the other whipper roots.
Fixed two bugs where Pratt McGrubben in Feathermoon Stronghold was not offering to re-teach Wild Leather Shoulders and where he was not properly teaching Wild Leather Leggings.
Fixed typos in both quest versions of "Power over Poison".
The level of the quest "Piercing the Veil" has been increased from 3 to 4, bringing it in line with similar quests.
Sayge's Dark Fortune of Damage buff now only increases damage from a randomly determined range of 1-10%.
A coin reward has been added to the quest "Worth Its Weight in Gold".
Vahlarriel in the second part of the quest series "Vahlarriel's Search" now has something to say when returning with the pendant.
The level for the quest "Parts for Kravel" has been raised to bring it in line with the other quests of the Kravel series.
You now need fewer Scorpashi Venoms to complete the second quest of the "Reagents for Reclaimers Inc." quest series.
Baron Revilgaz now should be a little more vociferous.
Fixed a bug with the Horde Hallow's End quest "Ruined Kegs" that allowed the Alliance to interact with the keg.
Hallow's End Pumpkin Treats should no longer be on the same timer as combat-oriented potions. Really.
Xabraxxis' Demon Bag will now last slightly longer in the world once he is killed (3 minutes, up from 2).
The reward for the quest "An Audience with the King" "Seal of Wrynn - has been improved.
The reward for the quest "Gnome Improvement" "Talvash's Gold Ring " has been improved. XP and reputation rewards for the quest have also been increased.
The reward for the quest "Nogg's Ring Redo;" "Nogg's Gold Ring" has been improved. XP and reputation rewards for the quest have also been increased.
The Horde Quest "Material Assistance" should no longer auto-launch an incorrect (deprecated) quest.
The quest "Galen's Escape" now gives an additional coin reward upon completion, as well as an increase of reputation amongst the player's factional team.
Raids & Dungeons
Noxxion in Maraudon now has the correct immunities.
Noxxion is now social and will bring friends if pulled past other creatures.
Abyssal Templars are no longer marked as Humanoid.
Twilight Stonecallers in Silithus should now aggro properly.
Gordok Reavers and Warlocks now have a slightly larger radius for detection and "call for help."
Drop rate of Dark Runes in Scholomance has been reduced.
The Altar of the Deeps in Blackfathom Deeps will now give players the Blessing of the Deeps.
The abomination event in Stratholme was been reworked with new technology to insure there are no more premature resets.
User Interface
The Guild UI has been significantly improved. Now when you click on a guild member, it will open up a side panel with all the information about that member including their note and officer's note.
There is now a Guild Info panel for each guild. That panel allows a guild to enter long term information and messages about the guild that is too long for the message of the day. The guildmaster can use the guild control panel to determine who has access to change the text in this panel.
Options have been added that allow raiders to not display their base party UI when the Raid UI is up. Also, you can choose to only display effects on players that you can dispel or ones you can cast. This is all in the interface options pane.
A "tip of the day" feature has been added to loading screens within the game.
Under Video Options there is now a slider to control the detail of spell effects. Lower settings can help to improve performance.
Auction buyers/sellers will now receive a detailed invoice of the transaction.
The casting bar has been brightened back up, it was appearing darker than intended due to a bug.
A new option has been added to Interface options, "Sticky Targeting". When this is turned on, you will not deselect your current target when you click on empty space.
A new interface option, "Detailed Loot Information" has been added that defaults to 'on.' If you turn it off you will only see the roll and Need/Greed option of the player who won the item rather than information for every player.
Open bags that are in your bank will now have a bluish background to them to allow easy differentiation between inventory bags and bank bags.
The Friends List and Guild UI will now display when a person is AFK.
It is now possible to use the dressing room UI to model items that are being rolled for in the Group Lood/Need Before Greed Popup window.
Add-ons, Macros and Keybindings can now be saved on a per character basis, so you can have different characters load different add-ons/macros/keybindings.
The Ignore command will now ignore emotes.
The Interface Options Pane has been split up into a normal panel and an advanced panel.
In the initial loading screen there will be a tip displayed. This can be turned off from the interface options menu.
Any time an item is distributed using the "Master Looter" system and the item is quality epic or above there will be a confirmation dialogue to confirm that the item is going to the correct person.
Key bindings can now be saved either globally or on a per character basis.
Add-ons can now be saved either globally or on a per character basis.
In addition to the set of macros shared by all characters, each character gets an additional 18 macros available to them.
Added the ability to link enchanting recipes in chat.
Optimized UI event handling in raid situations.
Optimized UI layout engine to improve loading times.
The game will no longer accidentally load UI files that are dropped loose into the top level installation directory.
The EquipCursorItem() script function uses slot numbers consistent with the rest of the inventory functions. Any macros which use this function should be updated by adding one to the slot number used currently.
New TOC entry for dynamically loadable add-ons: ## LoadWith: Addon1, Addon2, etc. - Indicates that your add-on should be automatically loaded after ANY of the add-ons specified on the LoadWith line are loaded.
The 8th return value from GetItemInfo() is no longer be localized, instead is one of a number of INVTYPE_* tokens.
A new 9th return value from GetItemInfo() is the inventory icon for the item.
debugprofilestop() will now return sub-milisecond (floating point) values.
Added Texture:GetTexture() which returns the filename (without extension) of the file for the texture.
Added FontString:SetNonSpaceWrap(true|false)
Added Frame:GetFrameType() which returns the type of a frame.
Added Frame:IsFrameType("typeName") which returns true if the frame is of type typeName, or a subtype of typeName.
New 8-param form of Texture:SetTexCoord(ULx, ULy, LLx, LLy, URx, URy, LRx, LRy)
Parent frame scales are cumulative instead of overrides.
Textures and FontStrings now have IsVisible() and IsShown() functions with the same semantics as the frame functions of the same name.
Added Button:SetFont(), which works like the equivalent FontString function.
Added ScrollingMessageFrame:SetFont(), which works like the equivalent FontString function.
Special honor awards show up in the combat log.
Druids can preview different weapons in the dressing room while in moonkin form.
Emotes show up in the chat log file.
Combat messages no longer show up in the chat log file.
Resurrection spells will return pets to life with the appropriate amount of health and mana.
Talent improvements to buffs will persist across instance boundaries and logging out.
World Environment
Elven NPCs in Scholomance will now animate properly.
Players should no longer be able to walk on steep terrain.
Players should no longer be able to move slowly through some locked doors and gates.
Nida Winterhoof in Thunder Bluff now sells Flowers for the sensitive Horde player.
The Short John Mithril's chest in Stranglethorn Arena will now display an effect when it is being opened so its harder to open the chest unnoticed.
Night Elf food vendors have changed their supplies slightly.
Chests in Maraudon have been disabled for good.
In Wetlands, Bluegill Murlocs will now be more plentiful and several other Bluegill camps have been thinned.
All mount sounds, when standing and jumping, are now in place.
Tauren males now use their off-hand attack animation.
The Zeppelin's propeller from Under City should now animate properly.
Jesper and Spoops should no longer be lingering around once the Hallow�s End holiday period is over.
The Moonglade Wardens have received an increase in hit points and damage dealt, bringing them in line with their Steamwheedle Cartel bruiser counterparts.
Flight Paths
New flight paths added between Ironforge and Chillwind Point. Also, between Chillwind Point and Light's Hope Chapel.
Fixed a problem with the flight paths between The Crossroads in The Barrens and Zoram'gar Outpost in Ashenvale.
Fixed the flight over Yojamba Isle from Booty Bay in Stranglethorn to Sentinel Hill in Westfall.
Bug Fixes
Fixed a bug that caused Crimson Templar to be doing much more damage with it's fireball attack than intended.
Fixed a bug that could cause Guard Slip'kik to move while trapped in ice.
Fixed a bug that caused Azure Templar, Earthen Templar, and Hoary Templar to be resistant to Fire.
Fixed a bug that would cause Time Lapse to cause hate reduction even if the target resisted the effect.
Fixed a bug that allowed pets to be targeted by "Wild Polymorph" during the Nefarian encounter.
SOE knows what you like... You don't! And don't forget... I am forcing you to read this!
Originally posted by kefkah The one thing that I would love but am honestly puzzled how to solve is player housing. I loved my castle like Naboo style home that was full of war and hunting trophies. To be honest, it accounted for many of my adventures in the old game. Problem was that it caused massive lag and made a mess out of landscapes that were once picture perfect...let us not even mention what it did for certain quest spawns (ala pirate leader). A load on demand format still gets terribly taxing when you hit a populated player city so what would be the best answer? Preexisting housing that you can purchase? A pseudo instanced area like AO or Ryzom...not too fond of that one I might add as it makes things seem artificial. Just something I ponder as to me SWG still had the best player housing in any MMORPG and it was one of the features that endeared me to it.
Personally, I liked the instanced approach to housing in AO and Neocron. I think it works well in sci-fi settings. I would have been happy if SWG had implemented something similar - I really liked the huge empty landscapes and crowded real (i.e. NPC) cities at launch. Most players enjoy having the ability to make their mark on the landscape, but I think that SWG style cities/housing can detract too much from the authenticty of the setting especially when quality standards are not applied. If a sequel is made, I'd prefer the ability to use a ship as my home or rent rooms in cities/space stations EQ2-style, perhaps with garrison buildings (or even Star Destroyers) offering accomodation and other facilities for faction-aligned characters. What I would want to avoid would be a repeat of the annoying and "un-Star Warsy" (meh!) experience where my pc stutters and chokes as a sprawling city suddenly pops into view and I get an on-screen message welcoming me to "Stalingrad", "Detroit" or "New New York". The other benefit of instanced housing in npc cities is that high populations are maintained in central locations so that new players aren't deterred by the sight of ghost-towns when they first arrive.
Originally posted by Shayde I DO refute that there was actually a lot to "manage", especially when there were like 12 combat classes. The only balance whining came from PVPers. BFD. If you wanted to bring up the power of one class, or fix the bugs in another class.. great. Wow, you either only visited the the combat classes, or have a really short memory. EVERY CLASS was "whining" about something: Entertainers were whining about getting more dances/music and AFK'ers. Image Designers where whining because they wanted to add tattoos. Architcets were whining because they wanted to be able to color their furniture, Weaponsmiths where whining because they wanted more storage, Armorsmiths were whining because they wanted more loot drops, and less organic components. Bio-Engineers where whining because they couldn't tell how their pets were going to come out and had the possibility of wasting TONS of hard earned resources by having a pet no one can call. Droid Engineers were whining about not having decay, and their product was pretty much just a novelty. Polititions were whining because when players left their houses were taking up space. Chefs were whining because some of their buffs weren't working right Merchants were whining because they felt their professions was pretty much worthless. Cost in skill points did not equal benefits of class. Tailors where complaining about some of thier bio components not working. Artisans where complaining because they couldn't make any money with the things they sell. Now I don't know how you're only getting 12 combat professions as the only non-combat profession I haven't mentioned is Doc, but I'll assume you aren't including Ranger, Smuggler, Squad Leader, Combat Medic or Creature Handler, so I'll include their problems too.
Ranger Felt the were a totally useless class. Skill points did not equal reward of class Smuggler Were whining about not being able to Smuggle and Slices being random. Squad Leaders were whining about having a useless class. Specials would take all their Action and still fail. Combat Medics some where whining saying they were too powerful, somewhere whining about Nerfs. Creature Handlers were whining about the creature nerf that was in preperation for the CU that came a year later, and were complaining about not being a true combat profession. Now all that is 19 professions (I've combined Musician and Dancer into Entertainer) plus your 12 makes 30, so I assume you didn't include Marksman or Brawler either, yet they both had the same problem: Was no point in mastering them. Now that was just off the top of my head. If you want to know about ANY of these professions specifically, please let me know, I'd be happy to get more indepth. There were a heck of a lot more problems than just some PvP'ers whining about balance in 12 professsions.
That WoW patch changed the game immensely. Now cities are active again and Oggrimar is tolerable because everyone is spread out. The AH thing was a good addition to say the least as was the trade channel being planetwide. Great patch.
However, it did have its bugs. Cant keep items on craft menu, Dc'ing in BG flags you so you can't come in for 15 minutes but that may be as intended and the mail is a royal pain at the moment though I do like where they headed with it.
Yeah, the garrison or Star Destroyer housing sounds like a wicked idea. Gives the military faction that much more realism. One thing I never liked is that the war and its factions never felt like a war - more like a part time job you came in and did occassionally. Putting your living quarters right in ground zero would literally bring the war to your doorstep.
Originally posted by Shayde I DO refute that there was actually a lot to "manage", especially when there were like 12 combat classes. The only balance whining came from PVPers. BFD. If you wanted to bring up the power of one class, or fix the bugs in another class.. great. Wow, you either only visited the the combat classes, or have a really short memory. EVERY CLASS was "whining" about something: Entertainers were whining about getting more dances/music and AFK'ers. Image Designers where whining because they wanted to add tattoos. Architcets were whining because they wanted to be able to color their furniture, Weaponsmiths where whining because they wanted more storage, Armorsmiths were whining because they wanted more loot drops, and less organic components. Bio-Engineers where whining because they couldn't tell how their pets were going to come out and had the possibility of wasting TONS of hard earned resources by having a pet no one can call. Droid Engineers were whining about not having decay, and their product was pretty much just a novelty. Polititions were whining because when players left their houses were taking up space. Chefs were whining because some of their buffs weren't working right Merchants were whining because they felt their professions was pretty much worthless. Cost in skill points did not equal benefits of class. Tailors where complaining about some of thier bio components not working. Artisans where complaining because they couldn't make any money with the things they sell. Now I don't know how you're only getting 12 combat professions as the only non-combat profession I haven't mentioned is Doc, but I'll assume you aren't including Ranger, Smuggler, Squad Leader, Combat Medic or Creature Handler, so I'll include their problems too.
Ranger Felt the were a totally useless class. Skill points did not equal reward of class Smuggler Were whining about not being able to Smuggle and Slices being random. Squad Leaders were whining about having a useless class. Specials would take all their Action and still fail. Combat Medics some where whining saying they were too powerful, somewhere whining about Nerfs. Creature Handlers were whining about the creature nerf that was in preperation for the CU that came a year later, and were complaining about not being a true combat profession. Now all that is 19 professions (I've combined Musician and Dancer into Entertainer) plus your 12 makes 30, so I assume you didn't include Marksman or Brawler either, yet they both had the same problem: Was no point in mastering them. Now that was just off the top of my head. If you want to know about ANY of these professions specifically, please let me know, I'd be happy to get more indepth. There were a heck of a lot more problems than just some PvP'ers whining about balance in 12 professsions.
Even if you were right, which I think you're not. You mean to tell me that all these request were not possible with a 70 people development team and 2.5 years?
Look at the WoW patch notes that I copied on the previous page, Mr. Smedley himself said that he has the biggest development team in the industry (70). Which means that Blizzard can do SOOOOOOOO much more than SOE with less people. It's inexcusable!
SOE knows what you like... You don't! And don't forget... I am forcing you to read this!
I loved SWG when it started out...loved it up until the CU really...was always a challenge or something to do....at all levels of the game.
If they were to sign the license to a new company (which I hope they do) I would have to say the largest factor in me wanting to play a sequel MMO...would be a true sense of being imperial or rebel. In the current game...it was nothing more than a symbol over your head...didn't change where you could go, who you could work with etc.
The sides need to be divided...it is a star WARS....should be treated as such. Not saying that it has to be all out PvP....but being a rebel should feel like being a rebel.....same as imperial.
Originally posted by duncan_922 Even if you were right, which I think you're not. You mean to tell me that all these request were not possible with a 70 people development team and 2.5 years? Please tell me which part you don't believe. I can show proof for every one of those points. Look at the WoW patch notes that I copied on the previous page, Mr. Smedley himself said that he has the biggest development team in the industry (70). Which means that Blizzard can do SOOOOOOOO much more than SOE with less people. It's inexcusable! And again you miss the point. WoW has a class based system. It is MUCH easier to balance and fix than a skill based. And thank you for proving my point, people refuse to accept that a complex system is harder to mange than a simpler system.
Yeah, I do believe that there should have been a harder line to seperate Imperial from the Rebels. WoW makes an ultra effort to keep the two sidess seperate and the animosity between them is quite evident. Though I think Star Wars factions would be a bit more complicated and needed to be treated as such. I mean there are double agents, sympathizers, go betweens and in some places - both sides stand side by side albeit not happily.
Again, it comes back to the point of making Star Wars based on the Galactic Civil War and going from there. Yes, there needs to be a good portion of the game devouted to other things like resource gatherers but still even they would be affected by the war. Sell to rebels and imperials snub you and so on.
A war themed and based mmorpg with Star Wars as the setting would be much more enjoyable.
Originally posted by duncan_922 Even if you were right, which I think you're not. You mean to tell me that all these request were not possible with a 70 people development team and 2.5 years? Please tell me which part you don't believe. I can show proof for every one of those points. Look at the WoW patch notes that I copied on the previous page, Mr. Smedley himself said that he has the biggest development team in the industry (70). Which means that Blizzard can do SOOOOOOOO much more than SOE with less people. It's inexcusable! And again you miss the point. WoW has a class based system. It is MUCH easier to balance and fix than a skill based. And thank you for proving my point, people refuse to accept that a complex system is harder to mange than a simpler system.
First of all Jodokai, take it easy....
On your first point, I just gave my opinion that you are wrong, but I stated that it was besides the point, which you avoided. Do you really mean to tell me that fullfilling those request was not possible with a 70 people development team and 2.5 years????
On your second point, you actually miss the point. Are you by any chance a programmer or developer to know if a class system is easier than a skill system? Didn't SWG stop beign a skill system since the CU? What has happened since? Shouldn't the game have gotten SOOOOO much better, since they have now an easier system? Also, if you look at WoWs patch, it's mostly content. SWG could make 5 consecutive expansions (mind you they would have to be paid) and they couldn't get that much content in! They only time they've gotten close was with JTL.
No matter how you look at it. Dumbing down the game to 9 proffesions to "make it easier on them" (devs) is inexcusable at this stage!
SOE knows what you like... You don't! And don't forget... I am forcing you to read this!
I tell you one thing , id drag the whole dev team out to the wood shed and give em a good whipping for driving that game into the ground,lol. The game had huge potential , lots to do, lots of fun......but unbalanced classes and too many bugs started the downfall early. They refused to fix things before they pushed out content content content and it bit them in the butt. Not balancing classes for over 2 years is disgusting.
Im not sure how the game is now, I havent played since I quit for a 2nd time in JTL. But hopefully its more balanced that it was. Also anyone who does still enjoy it, dont take any of it as a slam...i still tell people they would probabaly get there moneys worth. Not a bad game.....just could have been way better.
Originally posted by duncan_922 First of all Jodokai, take it easy.... I am pretty relaxed. On your first point, I just gave my opinion that you are wrong, but I stated that it was besides the point, which you avoided. You stated that you didn't believe me, I asked you which part you didn't believe so I could prove it you. If you don't believe me, I will show you proof that all of those complaints were real. Do you really mean to tell me that fullfilling those request was not possible with a 70 people development team and 2.5 years???? Sure it was. IF THOSE WERE THE ONLY PROBLEMS, but they weren't, and some of these complaints SHOULDN'T have been fixed. Again people seem to have short memories. Anyone remember how bad Bio-Engineers were when the game was released? Anyone remember how borked Architects were when it was released, what about Droid Engineers, Bounty Hunter's Investigation line anyone? Credit duping? Harvester exploits, etc. etc. etc. There were thousands of problems that needed to be fixed, and I understood that since the "leveling" system was so complex and there was SO MUCH to the game that fixes would take time. On your second point, you actually miss the point. Are you by any chance a programmer or developer to know if a class system is easier than a skill system? No, I can use simple logic. I can think for myself. With a skill based system you have to account FOR EVERY POSSIBLE COMBINATION OF SKILLS that a player could possibly choose. When a toon reaches level 80 you have no idea what combination of skills the player may have choosen. Did he find a combination that makes him more powerful than intended? In a class based system all you have to do is look: Is the smuggler's level 10 attack just as powerful as the Spy's level 10 attack? You know EXACTLY what skills and how powerful a level 80 Spy will have. You can't see how much easier one would be over the other? If you really can't see this, not only have you proven my point, but I don't think I can discuss this with you anymore, because simple logic isn't setting in. Didn't SWG stop beign a skill system since the CU? No it didn't. It was still a skill based system. There were no classes. Every possible combination of skills and professions still had to be accounted for. What has happened since? Shouldn't the game have gotten SOOOOO much better, since they have now an easier system? Also, if you look at WoWs patch, it's mostly content. SWG could make 5 consecutive expansions (mind you they would have to be paid) and they couldn't get that much content in! They only time they've gotten close was with JTL. WoW has been out for a year, NGE a couple of months. If you look at the patches Blizzard put out the first couple of months after release was ALL bug fixes. I whole heartedly believe that the bugs wil be fixed much more quickly now, and content will be added a lot faster now.
No matter how you look at it. Dumbing down the game to 9 proffesions to "make it easier on them" (devs) is inexcusable at this stage!
I never said it wasn't. I HATE the NGE. I loved the old system bugs and all, but what is also "inexcusable" is all the players that whined and complained and refused to see the simple logic that a complex system like SWG used to have, takes time to fix.
Originally posted by Jodokai Originally posted by Shayde I DO refute that there was actually a lot to "manage", especially when there were like 12 combat classes. The only balance whining came from PVPers. BFD. If you wanted to bring up the power of one class, or fix the bugs in another class.. great. Wow, you either only visited the the combat classes, or have a really short memory. EVERY CLASS was "whining" about something: Entertainers were whining about getting more dances/music and AFK'ers.Image Designers where whining because they wanted to add tattoos.Architcets were whining because they wanted to be able to color their furniture, Weaponsmiths where whining because they wanted more storage, Armorsmiths were whining because they wanted more loot drops, and less organic components.Bio-Engineers where whining because they couldn't tell how their pets were going to come out and had the possibility of wasting TONS of hard earned resources by having a pet no one can call. Droid Engineers were whining about not having decay, and their product was pretty much just a novelty.Polititions were whining because when players left their houses were taking up space.Chefs were whining because some of their buffs weren't working rightMerchants were whining because they felt their professions was pretty much worthless. Cost in skill points did not equal benefits of class.Tailors where complaining about some of thier bio components not working.Artisans where complaining because they couldn't make any money with the things they sell. Now I don't know how you're only getting 12 combat professions as the only non-combat profession I haven't mentioned is Doc, but I'll assume you aren't including Ranger, Smuggler, Squad Leader, Combat Medic or Creature Handler, so I'll include their problems too.Ranger Felt the were a totally useless class. Skill points did not equal reward of classSmuggler Were whining about not being able to Smuggle and Slices being random.Squad Leaders were whining about having a useless class. Specials would take all their Action and still fail.Combat Medics some where whining saying they were too powerful, somewhere whining about Nerfs.Creature Handlers were whining about the creature nerf that was in preperation for the CU that came a year later, and were complaining about not being a true combat profession. Now all that is 19 professions (I've combined Musician and Dancer into Entertainer) plus your 12 makes 30, so I assume you didn't include Marksman or Brawler either, yet they both had the same problem: Was no point in mastering them. Now that was just off the top of my head. If you want to know about ANY of these professions specifically, please let me know, I'd be happy to get more indepth. There were a heck of a lot more problems than just some PvP'ers whining about balance in 12 professsions.
Of course NONE of your yellow post had ANYTHING to do about the almighty "Balance". Musicians getting a new song has NOTHING to do with "balance".
Sure, there were game improvements or fixing some lacking classes, but BALANCE only pertains to combat. That was the CRUX of the CU, and a great deal of the nge. This "balance" problem was ALL from the pvp camp.
There were about 12 main combat classes, and no I am not counting brawler & marksman. That was all they needed to "balance". Could have been done, if they just put half the effort they did with the CU in it.
But no.. they halfassed the cu, they halfassed the nge and now there's just a halfassed game.
Shayde - SWG (dead) Proud member of the Cabal.
It sounds great, so great in fact, I pitty those who canceled - Some deluded SWG fanboi who pities me. I don't like it when you say things. - A Vanguard fan who does too. 09f911029d74e35bd84156c5635688c0
Comments
I would like to say that armor pre-cu was not all that expensive. I could get full suits of 30-36% stun base 66-70% armor to be sliced to 80-90% armor from around 200-300k per full suit if it took me 3 full suits to get the slice I needed it was odd.
Given that in 1-2 buff sessions on dantooine you could generate 1 million credits I don't really see how armor cost was prohibitive.
Not that I thought it was balanced, but it was not expensive or hard to get that level armor on every server. If you ground Combat Medic/Doc and TKA rifleman or fencer you could lay a beat down on anyone.
People generally didn't understand pre-cu combat and equipment and it required a max'd template but it was not hard. I could grind any profession in a matter of days and setup macros to grind most boring features.
I could move server to server and in days have a character able to generate a few million credits at a whim.
The buffs where absurd and everything was soloable except 2 locations but it was not hard to get good in that game. /tumbletostanding on alt/friend/guildie /heal /pause 5 /macro masterdoc
Make sure you got stims and check in periodically to train. Buff action/health of tumbler for quicker grind.
Mastering a ranged or melee profession was equally as easy and could be macroed.
The problem was nothing in game to do. Not that they changed that yet.
Wow, Jodokai -- I don't think I'd ever seen ANYONE miss the point as badly as you did. I'm especially fond of your "I love the balance the CU achieved" comment.
You seemed to have failed to grasp two key points there -- first, the original CU design docs were trashed (those were the ones I was referring to). Second -- and this is the funny part, given your response -- that the CU achieved "balance" through the hack of modifying damage by level.
In short, they made NO attempt to balance "classes" -- they balanced levels. It's one reason I quit. My nine year old found level-based damage mitigation and mutliplication to be an offense to simple gameplay.
That you loved it and consider it "balanced" says quite a bit about what you like in games. You want to compare two numbers, and have the higher number win. You think "Skill" resides in low-ping and decent hand-eye coordination, and think "strategy" means "having the biggest gun".
The pre-CU gameplay wasn't that badly unbalanced. In terms of PvE, what caused it to be "unbalanced" was overpowered doctor buffs (based on the Devs failing to properly min/max crafting) coupled with broken professions. Pistoleer was "unbalanced" by virtue of half their skills simply not working.
The original CU design was a simplification of the pre-CU combat system -- given the high dev turnover, having to "dumb down" the design was a cost-cutting measure. With the success of WoW, however, the original CU design (already a simplification) was scrapped in favor of a system where "balance" was achieved by playing "Whose level is higher". Hardly fun combat.
Galaxies failed because it was pushed live half a year too early. Too much was scrapped at the last minute, and developers spent the first six months trying to fix bugs and rapidly turn on necessary content that was unfinished, rather than -- as is normal -- using the first six months to finish tweaking the game engine.
World of Warcraft is about 2/3rds of the way through a revamp of their Talent trees, based on large-scale user data. They would not have even been able to begin that, had they launched in as pitiful a state as Galaxies. (Having your launch be marred by "not having enough servers" is so much better than "Marketing made us launch 6 months too early, with incomplete functionality and insufficient beta testing).
Balancing the Galaxies skill system didn't take much -- min-maxers did it after game launch, but any Dev could have (and SHOULD have!) sat down and written a simple program to min-max the template and look for imbalances in the numbers -- dodges above design spec, resistances to multiple effects too high, etc.
In the original design docs, there should have been maximum possible values for those things -- as well as the spreadsheets identifying how they'd act in combat.
You cannot "balance" combat when you have classes, skills, and templates that don't work as intended -- I'm not talking bugs, but flat broken. At no point between launch and NOW has Galaxies ever had all their skills and classes working correctly. Achieving "balance" in that environment is a fool's game, and ultimately they half-assed it by using your "level" as the end-all and be-all of combat -- rather than the skills, modifiers, and defenses your template gave you.
Oh -- one final note. The Devolpers BIGGEST mistake was allowing recursive macros. There will always be people who use third-party software to do that, but having it embedded in the game was a mistake.
Allowing macros, yes. But certain skills (center of being, for instance) should have been toggled, rather than triggered -- and recursive macros should have been removed.
Lengthy enough macros would still allow the flexibility desired, but get rid of things like AFK entertainers and farming of meatlumps.
I'm not going to bother responding to the rest, but come on man, don't misquote me and then slam me because of your misquote. Here is what I actually said:
The CU balanced a lot of the problems and I loved it.
Nowhere did I say the CU was balanced. That would have been a really silly thing for me to say, considering I think balance is impossible.
Then look: I said A LOT of the problems. Those problems being buffs and armor.
So if you're going to slam me, slam me on what I actually say, don't turn my words around so it comes out with a different meaning.
The CU didn't balance anything as far as classes and skills. All it did was make your CL the biggest factor in anything. It didn't account for specials and healing and skills, just CL=ALL.
Hardly a fix.
Shayde - SWG (dead)
Proud member of the Cabal.
It sounds great, so great in fact, I pitty those who canceled
I don't like it when you say things. - A Vanguard fan who does too.
09f911029d74e35bd84156c5635688c0
Jodakai: The CU achieved "balance" in exactly the same way a doctor cures your headache by knocking your unconcious with a hammer.
That you consider it a good thing is kind of sad. I'm surprised you don't have higher standards.
The one thing that I would love but am honestly puzzled how to solve is player housing. I loved my castle like Naboo style home that was full of war and hunting trophies. To be honest, it accounted for many of my adventures in the old game. Problem was that it caused massive lag and made a mess out of landscapes that were once picture perfect...let us not even mention what it did for certain quest spawns (ala pirate leader).
A load on demand format still gets terribly taxing when you hit a populated player city so what would be the best answer? Preexisting housing that you can purchase? A pseudo instanced area like AO or Ryzom...not too fond of that one I might add as it makes things seem artificial.
Just something I ponder as to me SWG still had the best player housing in any MMORPG and it was one of the features that endeared me to it.
I think everyone has just forgotten how jacked up everything was prior to the CU. The grass is always greener and all that.
What a lot of you have forgotten about all the complaints and comments that "The only way they can make it challenging is add HAM". I read this thousands of time. Maybe this wasn't the best way to do it, but no one else seems to be able to either. My main toon was a full time crafter and I didn't have much of a problem with it. I liked the CU, say what you want about me.
All of that however isn't really my point. My points are these:
1. Skill based systems like SWG used to be are harder to manange and balance than class based.
2. People refuse to believe #1 is true.
3. People will ALWAYS complain. If you don't change something, people will complain no one is listening, if you change something people will complain that it's different.
I don't refute that it is easier to manage a paltry 9 classes than a great skill based system.
I DO refute that there was actually a lot to "manage", especially when there were like 12 combat classes. The only balance whining came from PVPers. BFD. If you wanted to bring up the power of one class, or fix the bugs in another class.. great.
With the "largest dev team in the business", you would have thought they could handle it. Other teams might just do it right.
Shayde - SWG (dead)
Proud member of the Cabal.
It sounds great, so great in fact, I pitty those who canceled
I don't like it when you say things. - A Vanguard fan who does too.
09f911029d74e35bd84156c5635688c0
I wonder... Does anyone know the size of the dev team at Blizzard that is running WoW? It's pretty much undeniable that WoW is almost bug free and smooth. I wonder how large is the team that it took to achieve that state. I just saw WoW's latest CONTENT patch notes and they put to shame anything that SWG has ever done. Take a look!
World of Warcraft Client Patch 1.9.0 (2006-1-3)
The Gates of Ahn'Qiraj
The Gates of Ahn'Qiraj will house two massive, unique dungeons -- the Ruins of Ahn'Qiraj, a 20-man raid dungeon, and the Temple of Ahn'Qiraj, a 40-man raid dungeon. As players delve deeper into the mysteries of Ahn'Qiraj, they will discover revelations of the Silithid infestation and their shadowy masters, the Qiraji. Players will have to complete a world event of massive proportions before they can open the Gates of Ahn'Qiraj on their realm. ***During the public test of Ahn'Qiraj, the world event to open the gates will be accelerated to allow testing of the dungeon content.***
Linked Auction Houses
Players will now be able to buy and sell goods with greater effectiveness using the Linked Auction House system. Auction Houses in Orgrimmar, Undercity, and Thunder Bluff will now share the same pool of Horde player-created auctions, and Alliance players will find the same to be true when visiting Ironforge, Stormwind City, and Darnassus Auction Houses. This system has been expanded to support the neutral Auction Houses as well. Tanaris, Everlook, and Booty Bay will all be linked for players of both factions to access. In addition, the "Looking for Group" and "Trade" channels have been unified among the corresponding cities, meaning, for example, that you can trade your goods or look for groups in Ironforge while in Stormwind.
Multiple Battlegrounds Queues
Players will be able to enter multiple battleground queues. No longer must you make the hard decision of which queue to join -- when queued for all three, you can join the first one available or hold out for that particular battleground which you've really got your heart set on. Should a queue open while you are already in a battleground, you may switch to the new battle or remain in the current on.
Soul Shard Bags
Tailors now can make soul bags to hold soul shards. The smallest is a 20-slot bag, the recipe for which can be purchased in Gadgetzan. The recipe for a larger bag can be found in Scholomance, and one for an even larger bag can be found in Molten Core. In the main UI, these soul bags will display how many shards they contain. So long as the soul bags have room, any soul shards a warlock creates will automatically go into the bag.
Raid Calendar System
The raid-lockout system has undergone a significant change. The new system will have all instances reset at a certain server time, regardless of when you were actually saved to the instance. The reset schedule is as follows: Molten Core: Every 7 Days, resetting during weekly maintenance. Blackwing Lair: Every 7 Days, resetting during weekly maintenance Onyxia: Every 5 Days Zul'Gurub: Every 3 Days Temple of Ahn'Qiraj (40-man): Every 7 Days, resetting during weekly maintenance Ruins of Ahn'Qiraj (20-man): Every 3 Days All resets will occur during off-hours, when the least amount of raids are active.
Important Note for Mac OS X Users
The minimum supported Mac OS X revision for WoW will be changed in a post-1.9.0 patch, from 10.3.5 to 10.3.9. If you are running 10.3.5 - 10.3.8 and need to get the free update, you can use Software Update or you can click here for the direct download. This change will make it easier for us to release future updates to the game, for example to support upcoming Mac models based on Intel processors.
General
PvP & Battlegrounds
Druids
Hunters
Mages
Paladins
- Blessing of Might
- Blessing of Wisdom
- Blessing of Kings
- Blessing of Sanctuary
- Blessing of Salvation
Greater Blessings will cast the associated blessing on all raid members that share the same class as the target. For example, if you cast Greater Blessing of Might on a warrior in your raid, all warriors in the raid party will receive Blessing of Might from you. Additionally, Greater Blessings have an increased duration of 15 minutes. These blessings require twice as much mana as the single target version, as well as a reagent. Paladins can purchase these new Greater Blessing spells from their class trainers.Priests
Rogues
Shaman
Warlocks
Warriors
Racial Traits
Troll Berserking
- New functionality: Berserking is now an activated ability that increases your melee, ranged, and casting speed by 10% to 30%. The value scales upwards towards 30% depending how low your health is when you activate the ability.
- Now lasts 10 seconds.
- Now requires a small amount of mana, rage, or energy (depending on your class) to activate.
- No longer requires being struck by a critical to activate.
- Now has a three minute cooldown, up from two minutes.
- No longer has a global cooldown.
Throwing MasteryBlood Fury
- Now applies a healing effectiveness debuff on the user instead of the attack power penalty. The healing debuff is applied immediately upon using the ability.
HardinessEscape Artist
Stoneform
Items
Professions
Quests & Reputation
Raids & Dungeons
User Interface
World Environment
Bug Fixes
SOE knows what you like... You don't!
And don't forget... I am forcing you to read this!
That WoW patch changed the game immensely. Now cities are active again and Oggrimar is tolerable because everyone is spread out. The AH thing was a good addition to say the least as was the trade channel being planetwide. Great patch.
However, it did have its bugs. Cant keep items on craft menu, Dc'ing in BG flags you so you can't come in for 15 minutes but that may be as intended and the mail is a royal pain at the moment though I do like where they headed with it.
Even if you were right, which I think you're not. You mean to tell me that all these request were not possible with a 70 people development team and 2.5 years?
Look at the WoW patch notes that I copied on the previous page, Mr. Smedley himself said that he has the biggest development team in the industry (70). Which means that Blizzard can do SOOOOOOOO much more than SOE with less people. It's inexcusable!
SOE knows what you like... You don't!
And don't forget... I am forcing you to read this!
I loved SWG when it started out...loved it up until the CU really...was always a challenge or something to do....at all levels of the game.
If they were to sign the license to a new company (which I hope they do) I would have to say the largest factor in me wanting to play a sequel MMO...would be a true sense of being imperial or rebel. In the current game...it was nothing more than a symbol over your head...didn't change where you could go, who you could work with etc.
The sides need to be divided...it is a star WARS....should be treated as such. Not saying that it has to be all out PvP....but being a rebel should feel like being a rebel.....same as imperial.
Yeah, I do believe that there should have been a harder line to seperate Imperial from the Rebels. WoW makes an ultra effort to keep the two sidess seperate and the animosity between them is quite evident. Though I think Star Wars factions would be a bit more complicated and needed to be treated as such. I mean there are double agents, sympathizers, go betweens and in some places - both sides stand side by side albeit not happily.
Again, it comes back to the point of making Star Wars based on the Galactic Civil War and going from there. Yes, there needs to be a good portion of the game devouted to other things like resource gatherers but still even they would be affected by the war. Sell to rebels and imperials snub you and so on.
A war themed and based mmorpg with Star Wars as the setting would be much more enjoyable.
First of all Jodokai, take it easy....
On your first point, I just gave my opinion that you are wrong, but I stated that it was besides the point, which you avoided. Do you really mean to tell me that fullfilling those request was not possible with a 70 people development team and 2.5 years????
On your second point, you actually miss the point. Are you by any chance a programmer or developer to know if a class system is easier than a skill system? Didn't SWG stop beign a skill system since the CU? What has happened since? Shouldn't the game have gotten SOOOOO much better, since they have now an easier system? Also, if you look at WoWs patch, it's mostly content. SWG could make 5 consecutive expansions (mind you they would have to be paid) and they couldn't get that much content in! They only time they've gotten close was with JTL.
No matter how you look at it. Dumbing down the game to 9 proffesions to "make it easier on them" (devs) is inexcusable at this stage!
SOE knows what you like... You don't!
And don't forget... I am forcing you to read this!
I tell you one thing , id drag the whole dev team out to the wood shed and give em a good whipping for driving that game into the ground,lol. The game had huge potential , lots to do, lots of fun......but unbalanced classes and too many bugs started the downfall early. They refused to fix things before they pushed out content content content and it bit them in the butt. Not balancing classes for over 2 years is disgusting.
Im not sure how the game is now, I havent played since I quit for a 2nd time in JTL. But hopefully its more balanced that it was. Also anyone who does still enjoy it, dont take any of it as a slam...i still tell people they would probabaly get there moneys worth. Not a bad game.....just could have been way better.
So does anyone enjoy the new system, how is it?
Of course NONE of your yellow post had ANYTHING to do about the almighty "Balance". Musicians getting a new song has NOTHING to do with "balance".
Sure, there were game improvements or fixing some lacking classes, but BALANCE only pertains to combat. That was the CRUX of the CU, and a great deal of the nge. This "balance" problem was ALL from the pvp camp.
There were about 12 main combat classes, and no I am not counting brawler & marksman. That was all they needed to "balance". Could have been done, if they just put half the effort they did with the CU in it.
But no.. they halfassed the cu, they halfassed the nge and now there's just a halfassed game.
Shayde - SWG (dead)
Proud member of the Cabal.
It sounds great, so great in fact, I pitty those who canceled
I don't like it when you say things. - A Vanguard fan who does too.
09f911029d74e35bd84156c5635688c0