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Star Wars Galaxies Users Restless Over Rebalancing
Zonk writes "Last Thursday 'Thunderheart', the Community Manager on PC MMO Star Wars Galaxies' forums, dropped a bomb: the long awaited patch rebalancing combat within the game has been pushed off until after the Jump to Lightspeed expansion [which just announced 13 of its 15 spaceships] launches. Given that the JtL expansion is not due until this fall, this puts the combat rebalance somewhere around the beginning of next year. The playerbase has... not taken this well. The original thread on the official forums was locked at 64 pages - it was then picked up again in a thread already surpassing 50 pages. The players are rightly outraged, and the reaction has prompted a response from the Sony Online chain of command. It will be interesting to see how this turns out." Update: 07/21 15:52 GMT by S : There's an interview with producer Haden Blackman over at Game Informer which discusses the issue in more detail.
I have altered the deal, pray I don't alter it any further.
The number one reason SWG fans are pissed is that SOE is charging them 15$ a month telling them that it is going into the maintaining of servers and creation of new free content. but instead SOE has taken that money to develop and expansion that they will then charge full price to their current base.
I guess people might be strictly 'imperial' or 'rebel' but how about this.
Which ever side sucks, give them a 60-40 / 70-30 majority. This can be done ala counterstrike balancing, initiated by all those people on the forums.
Just put a flag up saying save the *insert side that sucks* and people will rally.
Generally, two sides with equal numbers, one side who is better will always win. Unbalance the numbers to reflect the skills involved, and the games are more interesting.
In the star wars universe, there were more potential 'rebels' that imperials, however, the imperial army was larger (I am guessing)
IANASWF.
#hostfile 0.0.0.0 primidi.com 0.0.0.0 www.primidi.com 0.0.0.0 radio.weblogs.com
I grabbed the Fileplanet 14 day free trial and it was enough to convince me to purchase the game (only $29.99 these days). I'm about halfway through my 30 day free trial and the game is running a bit thin content-wise, although I have 'powered' my way through a lot of it. I would like to give the GCW/PvP a try, but as it currently stands, it pretty much consists of jedi/guild gank squads. Funny, I thought Lucas et al. were anal about continuity in the Star Wars universe... guess not! You've got fully declared (overt) Rebel Jedi walking the streets of Imperial controlled towns such as Theed and Bestine, showing off their sabers and force powers, with no opposition at all. This game is supposed to take place between Ep 4 and 5, btw.
I started my character June 29, and as of right now I've mastered a combat profession (TKA) and have around 2 million credits in the bank. Due to the combat inbalance, you can pull in around 500k-1mil credits every three hours doing "solo group" missions (that is to say, a bunch of people max out a group in order to gain access to ~35k reward destroy missions and go solo the missions for the full payout). I don't know anyone (aside from guilds) that currently group for the actual purpose of cooperative gameplay.
I played the beta, and for the buggy POS that it was, at LEAST there was some sense of community. People would form hunting parties and such on the high level planets. Now it's all about getting buffed by a master doctor for 3 hours and soloing (whether for credits or xp). The whole routine is wearing a bit thin, and I'm not sure I'll renew until JTL and/or they fix the combat balance problem.
I don't play Galaxies, although I do play another MMORPG (FFXI) and take an interest in the genre. As such, my rant here isn't going to be specifically about Galaxies, so feel free to stop reading and/or mod me off-topic now.
This is the perfect example of how so many developers shoot themselves in the foot and harm both their own chances of success and the reputation of the industry. This is particularly true of the PC gaming industry, which has seen its credibility battered by behaviour like this over the last few years. I'm talking about this habit that developers have of whipping up interest in a product, claiming it's going to be here "very soon" and then not delivering.
The most spectacular example of this recently has been Half-Life 2. I forget when exactly Valve went public with what they'd been doing on Half-Life 2... I think it was some time around March 2003. When they unveiled it, there was a predictable and deserved *thud* sound as jaws hit the floor. More impressively still, at a time when Doom 3 was still stuck in the mystic lands of "when it's done", Valve announced that Half-Life 2 would be appearing in September that year... just a few months away. I remember speaking to some friends about this at the time; the consensus was that Valve had just compltely undermined ID, that ID were going to be a laughing stock and that Doom 3 wouldn't be looking so special by the time of its release, as Valve would have comprehensively stolen their thunder.
Of course, we all know how the story developed. The September 30th release date for HL2 came and went, with no release in sight. Sure, Valve got unlucky (or stupid, depending on how you see it) over the source-code leak, but from what I've heard (I've not seen the leaked source-code, nor do I particularly want to), the game wasn't even close to being ready for release last September. Indeed, there's a growing feeling that the revised release date of *this* September is now looking unlikely. The result? Valve lost a lot of credibility. Their main rivals, ID, gained a lot of ground back, because people felt that while "when it's done" release dates are a bad idea, ID had at least been consistent about it and, of course, it's now gone gold. Much of Half-Life 2's thunder was stolen by Far Cry, which delivered much of what HL2 promised, with far less hype. The overall loser? The PC gaming industry in general, which has further cemented its reputation with its customers as unprofessional, unfocussed and unable to deliver.
The Galaxies fiasco doesn't sound as though it's on quite the same scale. At least the game is out in this case, although it's hardly had the best of press during its first year. However, with a MMORPG, customer trust is an absolutely vital issue. With a standalone game, it helps but it's not vital, as you can generally persuade the punters to "take a chance" on an unknown title, if it looks tempting enough. But the MMORPG model requires both getting customers and keeping them; if you lose their trust, your business is going to decline pretty quickly.
I believe (although I don't PVP, so I could be wrong) that the problem is with the profession combination Rifleman and Combat Medic. With these two professions it's possible for a player to cause their opponent to become dizzy (if you do pretty much anything while dizzy you fall over) using a Rifleman technique (IIRC) then they inflict damage over time using the combat medic skills. And if you cause them damage, they can just heal themselves. If anyone wants to correct me then please do, I'm just a crafter and don't really know much about combat :)
My take on SWG is that SOE have more or less accepted that JtL will be kill or cure and so want to concentrate on that before they do anything else.
Seems like they failed to pull off the MMORPG cleanly and had to push it out the door to get some sort of return on their costs. Having spent a year trying to get that playable, it's getting to the stage where the Star Wars brand is no longer a sufficient selling point in the absence of good gameplay.
By delaying their combat rebalance, SOE admittedly piss off subscribers but many of those were pretty pissed off already and have still stuck with SWG. Why? Basically they hope things will improve. If SOE push out the combat rebalance now and it's no good, they will disappoint again. If they wait, those subscribers are likely to hang on long enough to see what the improvements are like. They squeeze a few more months' worth of subs out of people and buy themselves time.
I expect JtL to be indifferent to good and the combat rebalance to be indifferent to poor. I expect JtL will *far* overshadow the RPG combat rebalance. I don't think combat is a priority for SOE in the RPG and from the pre-launch forums I don't think it ever was. They'd rather have a more peaceful, manageable MMORPG world - essentially backstory to JtL. This way moisture farmers pay their subs to live quietly and those who want excitement will have to look for it in JtL.
Everyone(or a favourable majority) needs to band together and cancel their accounts for a period of one month. Then if the actions on SOE's part are still not satisfactory after this period, extend it to two months and so on.
If SOE counters by threatining the future of the game, then so what; it's just a game. Move on. The players need to be in control, after all it is your money.
If you simply roll-over and wait, nothing will change. Remember your sub is your vote, not some online petition or forum whine. Use it.
Combat Medics are a huge problem, but it goes a lot deeper than that. Combat Medics are a problem because, while every other combat class has 75% chopped off their damage in PvP, CMs do not. They also inflict this unmitigated damage to an unhealable pool using area attacks. They can essentially end a battle before it starts.
The combat balance is essentially a gigantic nerf to all combat. In SWG, combat has become (aside from the CMs) all about spamming special attacks and who gets knocked down first. SOE's plan is to limit the number of special attacks that can be used, lower damage output, and slash resistances on armour.
Interesting approach (more a boycott than a strike really). I wonder though who will really be prepared to do it if it means that when (if) they come back, they will have to start from scratch.
I agree that SOE seems to be somewhat contemptous of their subscribers and particularly of views expressed in the forums. I suspect the forums are kept on mainly as a means to allow players to let off steam rather than anything else. Are they still closed to outsiders? That always seemed a particularly cynical move by SOE. This way subscribers bitch behind closed doors and keep paying. Smart move if you know your product falls short of its hype.
I disagree that petitions aren't worth a shot. Particularly if they are backed up by arguments and a proposal for action. Maybe the best approach is a pair of petitions: one for people who are pissed off and threatening to leave, one for those pissed off but staying. Set SOE a deadline and let them watch the names rack up. Of course there will be people who sign as intending to leave but SOE won't know exactly how many. Hopefully it should help focus their minds on the issue.
Petition online is a great free service for hosting petitions like this. It doesn't seem to have a SWG petition active yet.
#1) It's our game, you just play here
#2) Technical support is the responsibility of the user
#3) Forums may be used to discuss the game at large, unless posts include serious issues with the game or make SOE look bad
#4) The game you purchased out of the box may need to be patched, and then patched some more, and then there will be a requisite gameplay change, and then a mandatory expansion, and then another gameplay tweak, and probably all that over again. Thank you for beta testing with SOE, your monthly fee will be deducted from your credit card.
#5) Game stability, server performance and non-crash level bugs (like spawning as a wall) are second priority to releasing new material which will cost you more money.
the long awaited patch rebalancing combat within the game has been pushed off until after the Jump to Lightspeed expansion [which just announced 13 of its 15 spaceships] launches.
The combat rebalance is probably the most important patch they could do. Even more important than the Jedi revamp they did a month or two ago because combat effects everyone Sure the old Jedi system led to crappy hologrinding, but there were plenty of people who weren't caught up in the hologrind who just wanted to play. What good is it for the Jedi now anyway when a good fencer template can still beat most of them? Combat has been borked from day one, and kostner never cared because he is so anti-PvP. Now they are going to rush out a FPS add on before fixing the game for their playerbase? They are going to tank the jump to lightspeed too. They might have attracted FPS players, if they didn't make space combat only optional. That is right folks, it's going to be like playing quake with spaceships, but you have to ASK people first if you can shoot them. DOESN'T that sounds like FUN!!!!
I really wanted SWG to be fun, I played the first few months and quit, I started playing again last april, and quit again because the Jedi Revamp looked like a clusterfuck. I was right. It just keeps getting worse. How could an idea that seemed so good (a SWG MMORPG) turn out so wrong? They've turned Star Wars into the Sims in space. Bleh.
Star Wars was seen as the license that couldn't fail to bring in 1 million players, and they are probably down to the low 200k or even high 100+K players now. After a year of playing, becoming leader of a major guild, going to the Fanfest to meet with the Devs, I can safely say that SWG is apparently a hugely understaffed, poorly managed MMORPG. The response time from the Devs for serious gameplay issues is astounding and there are numerous bugs that date from launch that are still making life crappy for everyone. The absolute inability for SOE to hire enough coders to do the job that they have obligated themselves to do by releasing a MMORPG this complex is shocking. There seems to be a total disconnect between their perceptions of how the game should work and how it is currently working. At fanfest, one of the Devs would repeatedly tell players who felt that there was an imbalance in the game mechanics that favoured/disfavoured one profession over another "You are not playing right" or "You have a role to fill, that's what you do." He seemed totally agog that players might not do exactly as the Devs intended them to do. A very naive statement, if you ask me. Many, many of us are simply waiting for WOW at this point. Hopefully future MMO developers can learn from SOE's mistake.
Looks like SOE or someone deleted that board post as well. Interesting tactic.....
...who still play SWG. I quit in disgust about 6 months into it, when I noted that the game had, by and large, not really changed at all since it started. The clincher for me at the time was the latest "monthly" patch, which had been pushed back for the third straight month in a row. It became pretty clear at that point that SOE had no intention of ever making SWG any better.
Combat was seriously hosed since day 1 of that game -- that's the other part of why I quit. It's quite vindicating to see that not only is the game in the EXACT SAME STATE as it was when I quit half a year ago, but that SOE is still moving at the same glacial pace, promising the world and delivering it... tomorrow.
-E-
I've been playing SWG for a while now. I play an entertainer, and it's been fun from the first day. It continues to be fun. No, I'm not rich. No, I'm not powerful. But I do have fun. And my character has a wide enough range of talents that if it ever does get boring, I can do something else and it will still be fun.
Here's an idea: instead of seeing how many mobs you can beat up, or how many Rebels you can kill, why not do something different with your playing time? Go to a cantina and actually interact with the entertainers rather than wiping off your battle fatigue and mind wounds in silence and then stalking away. Go to an image designer and change your look rather than sit in stony silence for ten minutes while your stats migrate. Go collect badges. There's a ton of stuff to do and see. Combat is not the be-all and end-all.
And if absolutely none of that sounds fun, then why are you bothering? I mean, it's your LEISURE time. You shouldn't spend your own time on something that makes you so angry that you're not enjoying it anymore.
The pvp combat and to a lesser extent the pve combat is unbalanced. PvP is most notable with many classes just not able to take part as their is always some uber-kiddie with every exploit and the one power macro who just can't be stopped.
But the more serious problem is that the game just isn't fun. Whatever made half-life so much greater the quake makes SWG so much less then and this is really nasty, any game out there.
I have played it for a few months and I slowly come to the realisation that there are no unbalances bugs or lack of content. The entire game from beginning to end is just wrong. It seems like every decission they took they took the one that was the least fun. I think that if you really sat down with the game, noted every irritant and then build a game with those you would have the perfect MMORPG. There is something there but sony is unable to bring it out, they tried for two years and honestly it is only getting worse.
Of course those who still play it will defend it, they are like smokers who say they like smoking, SWG has one thing, like EQ it is addicting, the addicition is you searching for the little bit of fun that Sony has missed. You think that just around the next skill box, the next job there is gonna be fun. There isn't.
Perhaps MMORPG's themselves are flawed.
MMO Quests are like orgasms:
You may solo them, I prefer them in a group.
I think this shows that fundamentally Star Wars Galaxies design is flawed. If a year of bug fixes doesn't make the game more fun, the bugs weren't the main problem. Just look at the core design decisions that have messed up how the game can be played.
1. Setting - Galactic Civil war during the middle of the OT.
This basically means that you have to limit Jedi, can't have any quests, mob kills, or loot that have far reaching consequences because it would interefere with the continuity. The devs just painted themselves into a corner where the power of the players had to be artificially kept low
Contrast this with the popular KOTOR which the devs had pretty much free reign. Want hundreds of Jedi running around? sure. Want a homicidal assassin droid? okay. Want to kill the dark lord of the sith? It's Cool.
2. Economy - Pure player driven
Players are by their nature greedy, People want new, useful, shiney things, just look at the successful camp-n-loot gameplay of EQ. Well the pure player economy means that adventurers have to focus on cash missions rather than exploration. What incentive do you have to explore if you don't get a reward, and infact you are penalized, since those who are just running baz nitch money missions are driving up prices. Finally the devs understood and included more useful loot drops. I think they are slowly getting to balancing loot-vs-player.
3. Character Development - pure skill based
Major balancing headaches. A pure class driven structure makes balancing so much easier, since you can have very specific roles. We are still looking at balancing issues a year later in SWG. It used to be the uber creature handlers walking around with 3 rancors within a day. Then it was the pistoleers able to waste people with ultra fast guns, then there were 1 shot kill rifle men, and then there have always been the pvp medics. What makes it so hard is there are so many combinations, and you can't make 1 combination significantly worse/better than another.
4. Size of the Universe - HUGE
I remember the devs bragged that the universe would be several times the size of EQ and RoK expansion together. Of course, they forgot to mention it would have half the content. They basically decreased the density of "interesting" stuff. So instead of 5 minutes between an interesting dungeon, or camp like in EQ, it was a 20 minute boring run where you would see nothing. Vehicles have definately helped, since you get the sense of size along with being able to get from point A to point B quickly. But all the content still feels diffuse.
5. Combat - Typcial RPG Style
It just breaks down the "feel" of Star Wars. I don't remember a Stormtrooper running up 2 feet from Luke and both of them standing there for a few minutes taking shots at each other (including several hits). In the movies they had long gun battles, it was just because people were dodging, running around, taking cover not because they had huge amount of hitpoints. I had hoped SWG would have created an innovative way capturing the feel of battling with blasters, but they didn't.
Like I said, to me the game design is inherently flawed. I think that is why they are focusing on the JtL expansion. Because it will be their way of breaking away from the contraints of their original decisions. If it works out I think we will see a focus on the space aspects of SWG, probably to the detriment of the land based RPG game that is being played now.
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