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Star Wars Galaxies: Exp. Complaints Lead to the Dark Side
Stradden
Managing EditorMember CommonPosts: 6,696
Publish 22, which took place (according to the SWG official website) on August 16th, 2005 was announced, like any other patch, with a number of fixes and changes including one which reads under the heading of Experience Points: "Updated group experience point bonuses and group XP bonus rewards can now be easily identified in the XP feedback." After the patch was completed, players began to cry foul on Sonys forums. Players seemed to be complaining primarily about the discrepency between what they were being told by experience markers and the amount of experience that was actually being delivered to their character. Many players expressed feelings of anger and frustration, feeling as though their complaints had been ignored by SWG developers.
The Director of Community Relations for Star Wars Galaxies made the following post on Star Wars Galaxies Warcry apparently in response to the issue:
Experience is now divided among group members, rather than every group member receiving full credit for the kill. A larger group experience bonus was implemented, to ensure that grouping is still optimal: although experience earned per kill is less, a group of players is still able to earn experience over time at a much faster rate than a solo player. For example: * If you solo a creature then you get 6000 experience. * If I solo a creature then I get 6000 experience. * If we group and kill two creatures together, then we get 3000 experience per creature each (6000xp total), plus an additional bonus amount of experience because we are grouped (and two of us together can kill those two creatures more quickly than we could have solo'd one each). The display of experience was altered in order to minimize the notification of individual experience grants, and emphasize the notification of group experience bonus percentages. Since individual experience grants on a per-kill basis decline as group size increases, but the group bonus percentage increases as your group-size increases, we want to place the emphasis on the increasing bonus for grouping rather than on the decreasing individual experience awards. We hope that this clears up any confusion with the experience changes. Tiggs SWG - Director of Community Relations |
Visit the Sony Forums here, and check out SWG Warcry here for more details.
Cheers,
Jon Wood
Managing Editor
MMORPG.com
Comments
I understand it now at least. But the sad thing is, as Elnator pointed out, now people won't wanna group with anyone who isn't either the right class or very close to their level so that they aren't doing all the work.
This was one of the great things about SWG is you could group with someone way better than you but they didn't care because it wasn't like it mattered. Now it does matter, a lot. Blah why did they have to do this right when I started playing.
It won't affect groups of new players but it will affect the mid to high range players who have been around longest. I'm gonna keep playing but it sucks that SWG is gonna lose some of its best community members.
Surely they could have nerfed Jedi's somehow instead of group xp. Please tell me if I'm wrong.
The problem has been, and always will be (apparently), that grinding bol missions is not fun. This just makes it so you have to do more boring creature missions to get XP. Meanwhile, 75% of the content in the game either doesn't give experience to CL80s (or anyone in a group with a CL80, since it ups your effective level to that) or is so difficult that no one will do it (killing elite mobs with double or triple the hitpoints which still give the same amount of experience).
What gets me is that they've said that they had "content teams going through the game" adding new stuff to do and tweaking the spawns. Instead now we still have most content geared at CL25 to CL50, which is exactly what it was right when the CU launched.
SOE doesn't get it. They don't understand that people don't like running missions all day, and that's all SWG really offers. People are finally fed up with it, and I honestly think they're losing a lot of customers over this. I know that people always threaten, but this seems to be a "last straw" kind of thing. The way they handled it was just insult to injury.
The sad part is that they needed the XP nerf, as people were getting professions too quickly. However, without meaningful content besides the geocaves, corvette, kashyyyk, and the DWB, people aren't going to stay around.
The forum account banning and post deletions have begun after a 24 hour period with little to no activity from any official on the board. They went into full SOE bunker mode where they admit nothing.
Enjoy your favorite MMO with us!
crimsongamers.com
Hmm, always so quaint how the meat of the matter is not printed.
XP has been reduced by 1/8th across the board for grouping.
All you new players, no one will group with you because you only subtract from their XP gains.
For those that actually finish the FS grind, gaining a fully templated jedi will take grinding 4 hours a day for 5 years and NEVER getting killed. Yes, that's content in SWG.
So think well before you make that commitment. 5 years to get in template and there will still be no content in the game.
Hmm....SOE once again screws over its play base and everyone runs around and acts surprised by it?
Face it guys, its a dying game and each "patch" just pushes it closer to the edge. If I had the reins at SOE and LA, I'd pull the plug now, offer refunds to everyone and send the devs off to the unemployment queue to make way for some decent game coders and mechanics.
Development on SWG seems to be stuck in this rut of 1 step forward, 10 steps back. Every patch results in a further dillution of the player base as those that have stuck with the game get shafted and leave to play better games.
There are much better games out there than this polished turd, and much better companies than SOE.
Does anyone care to explain how this is supposed to be a nerf ? I don't see any difference between before and after, except what they announced they'd do : putting the highlight on the group bonus experience.
SoE has never been subtle in the management of situations where people cried for the wolf/nerf, granted. Let us not forget however that if EQ has become such a piece of rubbish over time it is because of the same exact crybabies that know only to whine, and whine, and whine all the damned time.
Nothing of what SoE can do, in better or worse, will change that.
You really need to read the article carefully before commenting... or did you completely skip over the first sentence??
<quote> "Experience is now divided among group members, rather than every group member receiving full credit for the kill. " <unquote> (Emphasis Mine)
Where every member of the group once got 6000 exp for killing a mob (plus a nice little xp bonus for grouping) you now get 6000 DIVIDED by X (where X is the number of players in the group), plus a nice little xp bonus..
Thus, if 20 people group to kill a mob (say a 10,000 exp Krayt for example), rather than everyone getting 10k exp, they get 500 exp (plus maybe another 10% [50exp] for being grouped).
THAT is what is angering so many people and bringing forth claims of a nerf.
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DJ Cavalier -- Gamer Radio Initiative
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Gamer Radio Initiative (www.gri-network.com) - Serious About Gaming
Apparently SOE is changing the XP system back to what it was before Publish 22 because of the overwhelmingly negative response of the community. It just hit TC and it's going to be on live soon.
http://forums.station.sony.com/swg/board/message?board.id=in_testing&message.id=79882#M79882
They also admit that there was some miscommunication regarding the changes making the patch notes. Here's a thread with some Q&A from Tiggs.
http://forums.station.sony.com/swg/board/message?board.id=in_live&message.id=79137#M79137
Just thought y'all would like to know before you got pitchforks out.
- m o n t h i g o s -
My opinions do not necessarily reflect the opinions of MMORPG.com
I find it interesting that Tiggs (the SOE Community Rep) stated:
<quote> "Test Center group experience calculations have just been reverted to pre-publish 22. We strongly encourage our players to create a character on Test Center and report any problems that may arise as soon as possible. The publish from Test Center will be pushed to our Live service later on tonight. This will not require a downtime however some players may need to log out to see the changes take affect." <unquote>
To me this reads: "please log on and test our old way was ok and let us know, but even if its not we're going to just ram it back on the servers again as soon as we can...." Now unless she means ANOTHER publish from the TC will be pushed Live tonight, and the group exp revert will remain in place on TC for at least a few days for testing... but somehow, I doubt it.
Call me cynical, but I've watched SOE bite its customer's in the ass for the last 6 years, from SWG, to Planetside and EQ2, all the way back to the original EQ (including time as Verant).
As for the other thread,
"Why were the publish notes not clear that this was a nerf to experience?
This was simply an oversight in the process. The details of the change were not raised to the community teams awareness."
Translation: "There is little to no feedback between teams within the company, and besides if we admitted we nerfed exp in the beginning, the uproar would have been even worse."
"Why was the system message taken away? Why not just simply add the group bonus to the system message like every other game out there
We think there's too much clutter on the screen, and would like for players to be able to see more of the game, and read less of it."
Question: Where is the High Level End Content that you (SOE) have been promising players will see since SWG release.. or even since JTL release... or even since RotW release?? Are there any plans to EVER release that High End Content, or is it all just another lure to keep long-term players stuck paying the monthly fee in the vain hope that the game eventually gives them something to do other than "kill A_random_mob_01, rinse, and repeat"??
"Will we be raising the experience at all?
We are monitoring the experience rates on the Live service and once we have enough data we will be tweaking the experience rates."
Which is precisely what you CLAIMED you had been doing BEFORE introducing this nerf (and now back-pedalling away from it faster than Lance Armstrong in the Tour de France)... Why prescisely should anyone playing this game, or those planning on buying it, even believe a word of what you are saying??
I can say that I met Tiggs at E3 this year, along with Brenlo, and attempted to have a conversation about SWG, player concerns, and a range of other matters. I found Tiggs to be extremely rude, obnoxious,... she would not even make an attempt to engage in any discussion on any of the matters regarding SWG, as though talking to the gaming community was beneath her. Brenlo, at least, made an attempt to explain the reasoning behind the CU and other changes... but could only come up with the reason as being: "We wanted to move the game away from its current core Star Wars fanbase..."
I think that really sums it all up.
-===- -===-
DJ Cavalier -- Gamer Radio Initiative
-==-
Gamer Radio Initiative (www.gri-network.com) - Serious About Gaming
I find it interesting that Tiggs (the SOC COmmunity Rep) stated:
<quote> "Test Center group experience calculations have just been reverted to pre-publish 22. We strongly encourage our players to create a character on Test Center and report any problems that may arise as soon as possible. The publish from Test Center will be pushed to our Live service later on tonight. This will not require a downtime however some players may need to log out to see the changes take affect." <unquote>
To me this reads: "please log on and test our old way was ok and let us know, but even if its not we're going to just ram it back on the servers again as soon as we can...." Now unless he means ANOTHER publish from the TC will be pushed Live tonight, and the group exp revert will remain in place on TC for at least a few days for testing... but somehow, I doubt it.
Call me cynical, but I've watched SOE bite its customer's in the ass for the last 6 years, from SWG, to EQ2, all the way back to the original EQ (inlcuding time as Verant).
As for the other thread,
"Why were the publish notes not clear that this was a nerf to experience?
This was simply an oversight in the process. The details of the change were not raised to the community teams awareness."
Translation: "There is little to no feedback between teams within the company, and besides if we admitted we nerfed exp in the beginning, the uproar would have been even worse."
"Why was the system message taken away? Why not just simply add the group bonus to the system message like every other game out there
We think there's too much clutter on the screen, and would like for players to be able to see more of the game, and read less of it."
Question: Where is the High Level End Content that you (SOE) have been promising players since SWG release.. or even since JTL release... or even since RotW release?? Are there any plans to EVER release that High End COntent, or is it all just another lure to keep long-term players stuck paying the monthly fee in the vain hope that the game eventually gives them something to do other than "kill A_random_mob_01, rinse, and repeat"??
We are monitoring the experience rates on the Live service and once we have enough data we will be tweaking the experience rates."
Which is precisely what you CLAIMED you had been doing BEFORE introducing this nerf (and now back-pedalling away from it faster than Lance Armstrong in the Tour de France)... Why prescisely should anyone playing this game, or those planning on buying it, even believe a word of what you are saying??
I can say that I met Tiggs at E3 this year, along with Brenlo, and attempted to have a conversation about SWG, player concerns, and a range of other matters. I found Tiggs to be extremely rude, obnoxious,... she would not even make an attempt to engage in any discussion on any of the matters regarding SWG, as though talking to the gaming community was beneath her. Brenlo, at least, made an attempt to explain the reasoning behind the CU and other changes... but could only come up with the reason as being: "We wanted to move the game away from its current core Star Wars fanbase..."
I think that really sums it all up.
You're cynical. And also Lance Armstrong doesn't backpedal, only forward.
EDIT: Also Monthigos, edit your post and put a space after your links so that they work. I would have let it slide but ummm you're a staff writer!
I think he succeeds...the game is away from the core Star Wars fanbase...
- "If I understand you well, you are telling me until next time. " - Ren
The thing that Tiggs neglects to mention about the new exp thing is that NO ONE CAN SOLO ANYTHING ANYMORE.....Remember? YOU geniuses nerfed that with the sooooooo well received combat update (yea the one that lost you like 1/3 of subscribers in April).
So not only is group exp nerfed but solo grinding is too? In a game that relys heavily on grinding...what the hell is there to do now?
Jesus would it kill the devs to listen to subscribers?
Only cynical where SOE is concerned.. I've got nothing but praise for the openness of other developers in talking with the gaming media (and thus, community) about their products.. Mythic, Blizzard, Funcom, NCSoft... nothing but love for those guys and the openness they have toward letting the community know whats happening...
SOE, on the other hand, is as frustrating as trying to get blood from a stone, with response times that rival the glory of watching paint dry, or grass grow..
And yes, Lance does only pedal forward... It was perhaps not a good analogy to use, but it was the only thing that sprang immediately to mind.
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DJ Cavalier -- Gamer Radio Initiative
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Gamer Radio Initiative (www.gri-network.com) - Serious About Gaming
anyone that complains about blizzard probably never played an soe game.. this is typical of soe to do this type of update and it just doesn't appear in their notes.
so...
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There are 10 kind of programmers. Those who understand binary code and those who don't.
The problem is SOE isnt that big. Sony is huge. But SOE is nothing compared to others. How many subscribers does SOE have to all its games? Maybe 1 million. Blizzard can easily double that with WoW alone. NC Soft can put both of them to shame with well over 5 million thanks to L, L2, CoH, GW, and more.
I think this is the big problem with SOE. They get their checks from Sony. Someone said a starting graphics designer gets $50-60K per year starting? That is one paid fething employee.So they have a quota to make with SPE. Haev to bring in a certain amount of money each quarter.
Now they dont want to make too much or it will become expected. So they keep the games at certain levels. With a certain number of subscribers. And trust me here. Corporations are very good at this. They are number crunchers better then any gamer could ever wiish to be.
So you end up with the higher corporate (SPE and Sony) content but not thrilled. And SOE staff still gets paid. As long as they keep giving the same numbers or around the same then they keep getting that cash. And us, the gamer, left in MMO limbo.
SWG was one of the greatest of universes to be put into an MMO. It practically sells itself. How many Star Wars fans are there around the globe? Literally tens of millions I am willing to bet. And how many would want to play in the SW universe? Maybe millions. Yet how many SWG subscribers are there? One chart site says 250k. I believe its lower since SOE loves to lie but lets say its 250k. That is probably 1% of what they could have. How is that possible??? Simple. SOE doesnt want more subscribers. They are getting paid either way.
Just a theory I have developed the past few days.
So how do you hurt them? Make SPE and Sony aware of the fact that SOE could do better. Could kill all other MMOs. Could have several million subscribers. How do we do that? I dont know. One guy wrote an open letter to the president of SPE so maybe that will work. I know the last time someone playing SWG contacted SPE the fit hit the shan at SOE and developers were running scared. So it might be the way.
Kai
Man, when will SOE's customers learn?
/walks away shaking his head and laughing hysterically at everyone still subscribing to Sony products
Wow, really looks like the shin is hitting the fat on this one.
I've never seen SWG do a U-turn so quickly.
Must have been something that got there attention... lots of subscription cancellations?
My name is...
Amazing, I can't believe they just went up and increase the actujal grind like that. The Combat Upgrade pretty much did away with soloing but even then grouping wasn't so bad. When I started playing again getting a group at combat level 10 was easy. It allowed me to travel and get up in level that way I could explore and quest more. You could use just about any class since you just needed to do damage to the mobs, maybe some healing. Now with spliting the experience it means more grinding, maybe even people not doing full groups to lessen the experience split(where a full group was always ideal before no matter the class). Which leads to wanting certain classes and levels all around. Meaning that if you are a lower combat level you are fiighting monsters that will give even less experience. Add that to the split experience setup and you are in for a extremely long grind it seems.
I'm glad I stopped playing when I did. Cause this right here would have made me stop since I was doing Jedi Village Quest at the time and that grind before was a bitch, it's going to be killing people now with the split since they'll have to grind even more.
SWG was great since it wasn't different from other MMORPGs I felt. You wanted to group. At least I loved it when I played against after the combat upgrade. It was actually fun compared to other games. It's like they want to turn this into another generic MMORPG and take away what made SWG unique compared to other MMORPGs out there.
Just sad.
I knew SOE was finally going crazy or just not caring anymore(or taken the not caring to a new level) when they actually increase the monthly price for Everquest Online Adventures(nothing at all justifies that price increase, NOTHING. The game is basicly ignored by SOE and has been since Frontiers came out) but to do this. Canceling accounts and turning people away from the game to stop new peopel from coming in is the only way SOE will pay attention and listen. I hate bashing a game but if that is what it will take for SOE to listen and to stop doing things like this then so be it.
double post.
Even peace may be purchased at too high a price, and the only time you are completely safe is when you lie in the grave.
If 1 player kills mob_001, you can expect two players to kill it significantly faster if they complete each other well in a team. What is ludicrous in stating that, in average, for two reasonably skilled players, whose skills complement each other, they kill any mob twice as fast as if they had been alone ?
1 player kills mob_001 for in 6 minutes for 6000 xp
2 players kill mob_001 in 3 minutes for 3000 xp each + Group bonus
-> 2 players kill 2 mob_001 in 6 minutes for 6000 xp each + 2 x Group bonus
One can argue about it happening in average, for any number of people in a group, since skills will never complement perfectly, but the above are simple maths. I would like anyone to prove me wrong on this please, or else will it not remain what you said : crybabies claiming it to be a nerf ?
If 1 player kills mob_001, you can expect two players to kill it significantly faster if they complete each other well in a team. What is ludicrous in stating that, in average, for two reasonably skilled players, whose skills complement each other, they kill any mob twice as fast as if they had been alone ?
1 player kills mob_001 for in 6 minutes for 6000 xp
2 players kill mob_001 in 3 minutes for 3000 xp each + Group bonus
-> 2 players kill 2 mob_001 in 6 minutes for 6000 xp each + 2 x Group bonus
One can argue about it happening in average, for any number of people in a group, since skills will never complement perfectly, but the above are simple maths. I would like anyone to prove me wrong on this please, or else will it not remain what you said : crybabies claiming it to be a nerf ?
I dont know about after CU but pre cu I can see why this wouldnt work, splitting the xp among the group.
I could log in, get buffed, grab my gear, then head to dathomir and run out to the Rancor Hills area. In one buff session of 3 hours I could clear 10 random rancor spawns. That is just an average. Sometimes less and sometimes more since it can be a ghost town out there some days and others you cant walk 5 feet in front of your face.
Now with my guild, who are quite organized in hunting, can get buffed up and head out to the same area and get the same amount of nests. Why? distractions... time to talk.... time to have a smoke.... etc.
Nothing you can do will make grouping more efficient if you split the xp up evenly. Even with a minor bonus. Plus 20 person groups arent that common. The usual number is 10. For each person above the first person you have to add more downtime in.
Soloing will always win out. I mean if I can take down mobs alone for 1k xp a pop in 3 minutes time each, why on earth would I want to join a group killing higher mobs for 5k xp split 10 ways (500xp) a pop in 3 minutes each also?
Get it? That was your nerf. They made it far more efficient to hunt alone gain compared to hunting in groups. And while I love to solo I also enjoy group hunting.
Kai