Taugrim's MMO Blog

The patch notes for PTS 1.2 are up: http://www.swtor.com/test-center/patchnotes/313976

Simply put, the number and degree of class changes are significant.

I’m an advocate of the approach of tweaking fewer things, putting them on Live, and seeing how  balance is impacted. That has been the working mode of BioWare up through Patch 1.1.5. However, in 1.2 many classes are being changed in significant ways, and it’s hard to tell whether the changes will collectively bring classes into the desired balance.

After talking with my Maven guildees on Vent, below are our thoughts on the notable initial changes in 1.2. For brevity, I do not cover every single change.

Summary

• Overall
  • Sustained healing for 2 of 3 ACs nerfed
  • Instagib / burst DPS nerfed
• By AC
  • Guardian / Juggernaut significantly buffed
  • Sentinel / Marauder significantly buffed
  • Sage / Sorc healing took an arrow to the knee, for DPS no more proc to insta-cast AOE
  • Shadow / Assassin basically untouched
  • Commando / Mercenary sustained healing nerfed. Grav Round / Tracer Missile damage nerfed
  • Vanguard / Powertech can’t hybridize tank with right-hand DPS tree, and the RNG burst has been lowered for that tree
  • Gunslinger / Sniper buffed
  • Scoundrel / Operative healing buffed, DPS instagib nerfed

Sentinel (Marauder)

• The Focus / Rage cost for CC abilites is being removed. I think this is a fair change, because previously you’d have engage in combat before having the resources to use CCs.
• The “Execute” ability is usable at 30% HP instead of 20%
• The healing debuff can’t be cleansed
• Watchman tree
  • Can no longer talent the in-combat stealth to provide 100% damage mitigation. A nerf, since damage will break you back out of stealth
  • Cauterize can be talented to snare at 50%, so this removes the GCD contention with the “Hamstring” ability
  • Valor is now in Tier 1 of the tree, which is great as any spec can take it
• Combat tree
  • Fleetfooted now buffs the Transcendence buff. This change keeps the Combat tree consistent with being about mobility and anti-kiting
• Focus tree
  • Inner Focus causes Zen to provide up to 4 stacks of Singularity. This is consistent with the philosophy of being able to generate resources immediately (or not need them) to do something you want to do
  • Improved AOE damage via the Swelling Winds talent

Guardian (Juggernaut)

• The Focus / Rage cost for CC abilites is being removed. I think this is a fair change, because previously you’d have engage in combat before having the resources to use CCs.
• The “Execute” ability is usable at 30% HP instead of 20%
• Finally, Guardian gets a CC effect early: Charge stuns at level 10. However, some players are concerned about building Resolve on the target, whereas the existing root effect does not build Resolve
• Defense tree
  • Blade Barrier was moved down a tier. This fantastic ability will become reachable for Vigilance / Defense hybrids
• Vigilance tree
  • Single Saber Mastery damage buff no longer tied to stance. Everyone will likely take it
• Focus tree
  • Inner Focus causes Zen to provide up to 4 stacks of Singularity. This is consistent with the philosophy of being able to generate resources immediately (or not need them) to do something you want to do

Sage (Sorcerer)

• Seer tree
  • Conveyance buffs have been nerfed. The fast-cast, mana-inefficient flash heal is having the mana cost reduction replaced by increased Crit Chance. The greater heal is having the cast-time reduction replaced by reduction in mana cost. Both are bad changes for PVP
  • Resplendence no longer removes the HP cost from Noble Sacrifice. Per Ryndar, this change is crippling. Right now NS is the only way to regain mana, which regens slowly, and in 1.2 it will cost HP to use again
• Balance tree
  • Presence of Mind proc now only usable on spammable single-target spells. Significant nerf. No more insta-cast AOE

Shadow (Assassin)

• No noteworthy changes

Gunslinger (Sniper)

• Can finally enter Cover while rooted
• Healing debuff effect added to the armor debuff ability
• Sharpshooter tree
  • Burst Volley may be worth taking, as it will not only boost Alacrity but mana regen as well
• Dirty Fighting
  • Crit Chance talent nerfed from 6% to 3%

Scoundrel (Operative)

• The backstab ability’s cooldown increased from 9s to 12s
• The opener from stealth now has a 7.5s cooldown. This is probably being added to prevent instagibs (Shoot First -> vanish -> Shoot First). In practice most of the better Scoundrel / Op players I know don’t rely on the instagib technique, but it is funny
• Sawbones tree
  • Upper Hand limit increasable from 2 to 3
  • AOE heal amount increased and made more compact, cooldown increased from 12s to 15s
• Scrapper tree
  • Not sure why they’re making the changes
• Dirty Fighting
  • Crit Chance talent nerfed from 6% to 3%

Commando / Mercenary

• Channeled ground-target (DFA / MV) AOE diameter nerfed from 16m to 10m – probably a good change
• Full Auto attack animation timing fixed
• Base cost for cast-time nukes reduced
• Combat Medic tree
  • Crit Chance talent nerfed from 6% to 3%
  • Net-higher mana costs for healing
  • Healing buffs and damage mitigation buffs nerfed
• Gunnery tree
  • Grav Round damage nerfed 10%

Vanguard / Powertech

• Interrupt costs no mana
• Shield tree
  • Some abilities moved off GCD
  • Mitigation tweaked (can’t tell whether it’s net-buff or net-nerf)
• Tactics tree
  • Melee DoT can be talented to snare 30% for 6s
• Assault Spec tree
  • The proc cooldown reset talent for High Impact Bolt now requires a specific stance to work. No more Carolina Parakeet (21/2/18) hybrids
  • The proc cooldown reset talent has a 45% / 60% change to proc but has an internal 6s cooldown – which is a net-nerf due to loss of RNG burst

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BioWare revealed many key features for Patch 1.2.

Here are some of the notable takeaways from the livestream. My comments in italics.

Quality of Life Improvements

• Sprint (out-of-combat movement buff) will be available at level 1. Thank. Freaking. Goodness.

UI Changes

• Customization
  • You can move / re-position elements
  • You can resize individual elements or the entire UI
  • You can export your UI settings (XML file format), so you can share them with other players. Unfortunately you can not export keybindings
• They are adding Target of Target as a UI element
• Companion bar will be separate instead of an overlay
• Mouseover targeting is not making it into 1.2
• No ETA on macros. What they are ruling out are macros that affect combat directly
• No ETA on API for addons
• No plan on adding a separate bar for Stealth, just as there is in Cover

General PVP

• Valor Rank will not be a gate / requirement for gear – it’s merely a measure of how long you have been PVP’ing. Unarmed Brawling combat will be unlocked at higher ranks. It appears it will be more for Prestige and for fun
• Stats on PVP gear are getting re-worked. My hope is that with the changes PVP gear will be the best option for PVP for each slot, which is not the case now. Right now the DR cap is too low for Expertise, which makes slotting all PVP gear a waste
  
• Tab targeting is being worked on. So many people have complained about this, so it’s good that BioWare is looking at it
• You can target players by clicking on their nameplate. BRB need to rename character to “Tau” and guild to “Mvn”

Rated Warzones

• You have two options for queueing for Rated Warzones
  • solo for 8v8. I think having solo queues for Rated Warzones will be hilariously fun. People in the chat over on GAMEBREAKER speculate that this will be a lot of Assassin/Shadow and Operative/Scoundrel, and I’d throw in Sentinel / Marauder as well. Those 3 classes are the strongest for soloing and most difficult to shutdown in terms of their DPS. Regardless, it will be an entertaining option while you are waited for guildees / friends
  • 8-person group for 8v8. Finally, we can run full 8-person groups! The catch of course for smaller guilds is having 8 players available and online that make for a functional comp. As Leiralei tweeted, it would also be great for smaller guilds if you could queue as a 4-person team, and get paired up with another same-size team.
• There will be a “pre-season” for Rated Warzones at the start of 1.2, and the the “regular” season will begin. What this means exactly is not clear, but some people are speculating that pre-season will be used to bracket people at the start of the regular season. TBD.
• Rating will be at the individual level, as opposed to the team level. Prior to this announcement, I was concerned that Rank warzone teams would have a fixed roster, a la WoW’s Arena. The issue here is that creating teams with fixed rosters can create schisms within guilds and you need the same team members online to be able to run. Having the rating at the individual level will allow for much more flexibility
• Best-in-Slot PVP gear will come from Rated Warzones. I have mixed feelings about this. IMO titles / bragging rights are sufficient reward for the cream of the crop. Giving them a gear advantage will make PVP even more faceroll, especially against lesser-ranked opponents in whatever context. When Blizzard largely removed the Arena Rating requirements for epic PVP gear in Cataclysm, it created a much more level playing field, where outcomes were determined based on skillful play and coordination (and composition)

Multi-Spec

• They are targeting Dual Spec shortly after 1.2
• You have to manually click gear to swap sets, i.e. no predefined gear sets

PVE Difficulty

• Normal Mode is being replaced by Story Mode
• Nightmare Mode Operations will drop different loot and have additional mechanics compared to Hard Mode Operations

Companions

• Regarding same-gender relationships
  • They don’t want to just take the existing storylines / voiceovers and re-work them – that isn’t storytelling
  • They did have some romance relationships that did not make the cut due to budget reasons
  • They will come out with same-gender relationships with the Story Updates later this year

Population / Distribution Numbers

• Overall population breakdown across all server types
  • 57% Empire
  • 43% Republic
• The population is more lopsided on PVP servers, but Georg did not say by how much
• Not surprisingly, Sith Inquisitor is the most popular class, with almost one-fifth of the entire game population

UPDATE (2012/03/07): Dulfy took in-depth notes from the livestream, so check out her post. She has a kick-ass blog, so make sure to follow her on Twitter.

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I’ve been reading through the comments posted on YouTube for my first TERA video, and Beta testers reported combat issues related to latency.

This morning I watched the last set of duels that I streamed on Saturday, and from the footage it looks like latency (or lag) impacts the quality of PVP combat.

Check out the following TwitchTV video for duels between Razer (level 5 Female Elin Slayer) and Kennedy (level 5 Female Elin Archer):
http://www.twitch.tv/taugrim/b/308466267

At several points in their duels, what Kennedy and I saw was the same: Razer was able to hit Kennedy even though it looked like Razer was clearly out of melee range. This prevented Kennedy from knowing where his opponent was, and therefore how to target and how to counter. Given that I saw the same thing that Kennedy was experiencing, we wondered whether the issue was Razer’s Internet connection. He checked and his ping time to our Vent server was low.

Keep in mind the latency occurred in 1v1 combat with very few players nearby. That said, the issue really isn’t whether the Beta server was tuned, how many people were nearby, etc – rather the issue is that given the importance of positioning in combat, TERA is by design more sensitive to latency (lag) compared to your typical non-action MMORPG. Games typically have higher “lag” as the number of combatants increases, so there is the risk that the quality of combat in TERA may drop in mass PVP.

Aside from the latency issue, in TERA the hitbox is based on character race, gender, and size. The benefits of being small (“it’s harder to hit me”) outweigh the downsides (“it’s harder to heal me”). I’d rather take less damage than be easier to heal, because that would mean there is less reason to heal me in the first place. In general, I believe that character race, gender, and size should not have any meaningful impact on game combat, to allow players the flexibility of creating a character that suits their personal preferences not game mechanics.

UPDATE (2012/02/13 noon PST): before you pull the “OMG NOOB TERA IS IN BETA” card, keep in mind TERA went live in Korea on January 25, 2011 – over a year ago. What is in Closed Beta is the version of the game that is being managed and operated by game publisher En Masse for NA.

Developers tend to localize games for new markets with via language (text and voiceovers), tweaks to XP, and content availability, not via changing core game mechanics. I observed this with Aion, which was live in Korea before going live in NA in 2009 and with Allods Online, which was live in Russia before going live in NA in 2010.

So what we can reasonably expect are fixes per Beta testing related to the localization process and changes to En Masse’s server environment and infrastructure, but probably not to the core game code itself.

UPDATE (2012/02/15): some folks are claiming that FPS games have lag too, and that it isn’t a big deal.

Let me frame a critical distinction between FPS combat and TERA combat.

In FPS games, you can run and gun – the action of firing a weapon does not cause you to move in a predefined path. Weapons in FPS games have a “reload” timer but they do not in themselves restrict mobility, unless the player chooses to do something like aim their weapon by using a scope.

However, in TERA, when you use an attack ability, you move in a fixed path for that ability. Keep in mind one’s ability to attack and defend are heavily dependent on positioning.

Therefore I expect lag in TERA to be more detrimental than lag in an FPS.

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In this video, I discuss how combat works in the MMORPG TERA, including:

1. how to attack and land blows on targets based on the animation for each attack
2. the secondary effects of successfully landing blows on targets, including stun and knockdown effects
3. how the animation for an attack impacts the player’s ability to move the character and fire off subsequent attacks
4. how the “hitbox” for each target influences collision detection and how easy it is to hit the target

As discussed in the video, combat in TERA is more similar to console games such as Tekken and Street Fighter than traditional MMORPGs such as World of Warcraft.

TERA entered Closed Beta for NA in February 2012 but keep in mind this game went live in Korea back in January 2011, so the game was over a year old at the time this video was made.

For more information on the classes, races / racial abilities, and hitbox considerations, check out the following excellent guide:
http://www.terapvp.com/threads/a-guide-to-choosing-your-class-and-race-in-tera.3964/

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This video covers the 4/6/31 “all-out” DPS PVP spec for the Bounty Hunter Powertech and Trooper Vanguard advanced classes in Star Wars: The Old Republic (SWTOR). Vanguard and Powertech are mirrors so this video is applicable to players of both classes.

Here is the spec used in the video:

• Powertech: http://www.torhead.com/skill-calc#301bMZMsZfhMbdGGMs.1
• Vanguard: http://www.torhead.com/skill-calc#801bMZMsZfhMbdGGMs.1

This spec synergizes around the strong offensive capabilities of the Pyrotech (Assault Specialist) tree, in particular the mechanics for Rail Shot (High Impact Bolt) and Elemental damage.

I queued solo for the Alderaan match in the video as a 52 Valor Rank Vanguard with 8 pieces of Champion gear.

For more information about Powertech / Vanguard PVP, please refer to my free in-depth Guide.

To see me PVP’ing live, check out my TwitchTV channel. My stream features real-time commentary – and to the extent possible interaction with the Chat Room.

Follow Me

Twitter: @taugrim
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YouTube: http://youtube.com/taugrimtaugrim
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GAMEBREAKER Host for “The Republic” SWTOR show: http://www.gamebreaker.tv/category/the-republic/