Tuesday 31 January 2012

How to fix Scoundrels / Ops – The one trick pony doesn’t belong here


The nerf to Scoundrels (Operatives) caused a lot of discussions at the official forums. Not only was it a heavy blow against an already underplayed class, but it was the first real PVP nerf since launch. The truth is people really have it hard dealing with frontloaded burst classes in PVP situations when they are the target. It is not fun getting knocked out relative fast while feeling completely out of control. What people fails to notice is the fact that these bursts classes often gets killed just as fast if things goes wrong for them. So we get to a situation where the outcome of the fight is decided before it begins. And each time a scoundrel/operative/rogue/thief/whatever successfully executes one of these stealth attack, there’s a high chance of spawning another forum warrior. Which results in a nerf and often the burst class gets left behind the rest.

The game designers have to make an important choice. Either accept that such class doesn’t belong to the game or step up and tell the community that that’s the terms for that class. If they choose the former option they have to give their stealthy class some other tools so they are still viable without the burst and if they choose the latter it requires some delicate balancing and create a pvp environment that allows such a strong 1v1 class. The problem is, however, that most game designers get stuck between those 2 options and it’s easy to see the results. The 2nd option is rarely the solution for an MMO game. It’s only in EVE online where I have seen it viable. However in SWTOR, and WOW and RIFT for that matter, we have to face it that a stealthclass with frontloaded burst doesn’t belong to these games, which means that the Scoundrel/Operative class and especially the Scrapper(Concealment) tree have to find a new role. This doesn’t mean that our class shouldn’t be able to pop out of stealth and take out a vulnerable target. It just means that we should do it in a slightly longer fight rather than a few seconds of burst.

Saturday 28 January 2012

New Blog under construction


So this is where it all begins. Currently I have no idea about what to write, but I suppose that’s gonna change. This is my first blog so it is a new area for me. I will blog about the MMO I am gaming and for now that’s going to be SWTOR.

There’s lots of stuff to blog about in SWTOR, but I will primarily focus on PVP and the classes I play (which for now is smuggler). I’ll be discussing mechanics and tactics, both for general PVP and class specific. Once in a while I might be ranting about the game design and telling stories as well. However this blog is more an informative one and hopefully be helpful for my readers (all 3 of you).

But first let’s have some story time. I was introduced to the MMO genre when a friend of mine told me about wow and I even got beta access. Being about 12 years old back then I was just another wow kid running around not understanding anything, but everything was just huge and amazing, and I had some great time in wow. Now I consider myself as an experienced MMO gamer where I have been through WOW, RIFT, EVE and a countless of smaller MMOs. Well that’s the short version of my MMO story maybe I’ll write the long version later.

Hmm, still, my very first Blog post. I’m looking forward getting into the blogging community. Wish me good luck. I need it!