This game is great

[Kelimbror]

until you play the Jedi Knight

Playing one now...definitely feels like the spiritual successor to KotOR. I definitely feel like a Jedi who should be a star in a movie because of my importance. Only level 33, but it's getting good.

[May90]

I never said an MMO couldn't use a different approach, but the genre has some conventions by way of needing to provide the same experience for all people at the same time in a much larger, living (for appearances sake) world, means it can't give you the same design as a single player RPG. Like you do realize that the reason why you have to kill multiple things and there are fields of mobs is because you are playing with multiple people at the same time right? Like you understand that fundamental difference between MMOs and a single player game? B/c that's the issue your having here.

I keep offering you to check out ESO if you'd like an MMO that bridges the gap between the two concepts as well as possible. It's utterly fantastic at what you seem to like the most. It's also criticized as being the most un-MMO mmo, which most people hate. So yeah...I don't really know where to go from here with you. You either have an instanced/isolated/single player experience which is more in line with a 1p RPG or you have an open world with lots of respawning mobs and quest design that understands and accepts that in order to funnel you through the leveling process and various stories.

Personally I think an MMO could do away with traditional questing and leveling and just provide the SWTOR story experience as an optional and additional piece of content beyond a means to an end. I don't expect that MMO will ever get made b/c it's likely expensive and way too risky to be accepted by players. GW2 almost had the guts, but couldn't pull the trigger and stuffed leveling in at the end which diminished what they accomplished with that game.

I understand that the design must be different from single-player games, but I disagree that quests themselves should be less unique. At least they should indeed be "quests", as they are in single-player games. Objectives should be not "go to area X and kill N bastards", but rather something like "find out who is responsible for recent attacks on Republican officers on Taris", where you actually do your own investigation by talking to different NPCs and exploring different areas instead of following marks on the minimap without even caring why you are doing it. It doesn't interfere with MMO spirit, in contrary, a group of people doing some really interesting quest with plot twists will have a lot of fun trying to predict what is going to happen.

As for ESO - like I said, I've never liked ES series. Among all MMOs I've tried, only Guild Wars 2 was somewhat diverse - still quite repetitive after a while, but, at least, grinding there is masked well enough to not care about it most of the time. In SWTOR, the moment I see something like "disable 5 terminals", I immediately feel down. Same in WoW, but WoW somewhat redeems it by some really funky quests and traditional Blizz humor. SWTOR tries to redeem it by cutscenes, but, when you spend only 0.1% of the time or so on the cutscenes, it does not really help.

Oh no, I mean when they placed you in it during a story mission. Noveria, prior to "Stand The Line", leading up to Liara with the lava those missions. Point A to Point B, Noveria had a stop to grab another 2 quests hardly compelling. And again don't get me wrong I LOVED the ME series and even the controversial ending >.>

OK, let's take that Therum quest. What objectives do you get there? "Locate Dr. T Soni". When this quest starts and you drop on the planet, you have absolutely no idea what's going to happen (I mean, in your 1st playthrough). You actually explore the area. You fight enemies you encounter because they are in your way, not because you have quest which tells you to kill 50 of them. Conversation with Liara is interesting, you get to learn something about the ruins you are in, about her mother, about the Geth, not just "Thanks for coming here, now release me and I will reward you with XP and money".

So, as you can see, in this particular quest the driving thing is story, gameplay just supports you on your way of exploration and investigation. In SWTOR, most quests are the opposite: the main thing you have to do is to kill N this or collect N that, and dialogues are there just for justification of those objectives. Again, it would be fine if side quests were like this but class quests were more interesting - but they are not! Some class quests and some side quests are actually different (like that quest on Ord Mantell where a woman asks you to recover her talisman and return it to her, and half way through you learn that she is a spy and the talisman is a spying device), but most of them are absolutely meaningless and repetitive.

It makes sense as a side quest to help a criminal woman in Mass Effect kill two criminal leaders, this actually meaningful achievement, you feel that you destroyed two dangerous gangs. But what do you achieve in SWTOR by "killing 20 Imperials"? There are millions more Imperials, what does killing 20 of them accomplish? Lore-wise and story-wise it makes no sense, it is just a gameplay filler. Without such fillers the game would last, maybe, one day /played, but MMO developers want people to spend more, so, instead of developing more meaningful content, they put those filler quests everywhere, and now what should have been 1 day /played becomes 10 days /played, 90% of which is boring grinding tasks. Why can't it be different?

I just think you picked the wrong class. All of the NPCs and companions you mentioned earlier were for the Trooper class. That story feels very "joblike," "jobby," or "jobish." It wasn't the most fun and encouraging way to spend my time. Personally, the Agent storyline is the best, but even it doesn't really pull you in until you deal with Watcher X on Nar Shadda. You're really not going to understand the arguments about the story pulling you along until you play the Jedi Knight and the Imperial Agent. If you have already played those classes, then this is not the game you're looking for. #jediwave

I am also trying to play my Sith Inquisitor. I like the story way better, but, again, the story itself (that is cutscenes, dialogues and unique quests) is a very tiny part of the game, compared to all these "kill N X" side quests.

[Uproot]

OK, let's take that Therum quest. What objectives do you get there? "Locate Dr. T Soni". When this quest starts and you drop on the planet, you have absolutely no idea what's going to happen (I mean, in your 1st playthrough). You actually explore the area. You fight enemies you encounter because they are in your way, not because you have quest which tells you to kill 50 of them. Conversation with Liara is interesting, you get to learn something about the ruins you are in, about her mother, about the Geth, not just "Thanks for coming here, now release me and I will reward you with XP and money".

So, as you can see, in this particular quest the driving thing is story, gameplay just supports you on your way of exploration and investigation. In SWTOR, most quests are the opposite: the main thing you have to do is to kill N this or collect N that, and dialogues are there just for justification of those objectives. Again, it would be fine if side quests were like this but class quests were more interesting - but they are not! Some class quests and some side quests are actually different (like that quest on Ord Mantell where a woman asks you to recover her talisman and return it to her, and half way through you learn that she is a spy and the talisman is a spying device), but most of them are absolutely meaningless and repetitive.

It makes sense as a side quest to help a criminal woman in Mass Effect kill two criminal leaders, this actually meaningful achievement, you feel that you destroyed two dangerous gangs. But what do you achieve in SWTOR by "killing 20 Imperials"? There are millions more Imperials, what does killing 20 of them accomplish? Lore-wise and story-wise it makes no sense, it is just a gameplay filler. Without such fillers the game would last, maybe, one day /played, but MMO developers want people to spend more, so, instead of developing more meaningful content, they put those filler quests everywhere, and now what should have been 1 day /played becomes 10 days /played, 90% of which is boring grinding tasks. Why can't it be different?

First, Those vehicle missions were VERY linear there was NO exploration, it might have twisted and turned abit but it was a linear course to the eventual "inside" goal. You didn't have to get out of your vehicle and if you did you were lucky to open a couple crates worth of junk you'd omni-gel anyway.

If I follow the rest of it you just need a game that has a dynamic world for you, so when you kill those 20 imps in the base they are gone for good, or helping that woman find her lost cat or w/e has a lasting effect on her and the world because of it. SWTOR isn't that game and trying to complain that it isn't doesn't make much sense.

[May90]

First, Those vehicle missions were VERY linear there was NO exploration, it might have twisted and turned abit but it was a linear course to the eventual "inside" goal. You didn't have to get out of your vehicle and if you did you were lucky to open a couple crates worth of junk you'd omni-gel anyway.

Linearity does not make it less "explorable". The thing is, the first time I did those missions, I had no idea what I might encounter on the way. I didn't know who Liara T'Soni was, I didn't know where and when I am going to encounter her, I didn't know whether she was going to help me or fight me... In SWTOR, this element of surprise is gone. I am not even talking about "kill 50 enemies in the area shown on your minimap", those are a joke, they do not even have right to be called "quests". But, take most class missions: they are mostly "go there and do that". There might be some small surprise on the way, such as a character betraying you, or some prisoner you encounter and can free - but the general structure is known in advance, thanks to those "convenient" features they put in modern MMOs, such as minimap signs and quest descriptions that look more like technical documentation.

If I follow the rest of it you just need a game that has a dynamic world for you, so when you kill those 20 imps in the base they are gone for good, or helping that woman find her lost cat or w/e has a lasting effect on her and the world because of it. SWTOR isn't that game and trying to complain that it isn't doesn't make much sense.

No, I don't necessarily need a dynamic world, I just have no idea how it can fully be implemented in an MMO. But I want quests or task to be meaningful, to feel important. "Find (yes, find, not go to a minimap location where he stands) and confront the Sith Master who killed your lover", or "Save senator's daughter who knows where the Hutt secret base with illegal lightsaber production is located" - these are meaningful, you really do something important for the Galaxy and get to experience something from the lore. "Kill 50 Imperials" or "collect 10 metal boxes" - now these are more suited for mail deliverers and gardeners, they do not make sense on the global scale. In real war, a squad never gets task: "Assault that position and kill 30 marines". It gets task: "Draw the enemy back from that position, take that position and use it to snipe those guys in the bushes". It makes sense, it is logical. "Kill 40 Imperials" is illogical, it doesn't make sense from any point of view, unless you are some kind of psycho and count in your logbook how many people you've killed.

[Kelimbror]

*snip*

I know you say you don't like the ES series, which is sorta mind boggling given your preference of games, but ESO has things like this. I don't like paying for leveling, which is why I am not renewing my sub, but that game utterly nails the amazing and unique quests.

[Parrin]

Playing one now...definitely feels like the spiritual successor to KotOR. I definitely feel like a Jedi who should be a star in a movie because of my importance. Only level 33, but it's getting good.

There are some surprisingly powerful moments in this game if you played the KoTOR titles. And they get WAY more powerful when you're playing the Knight story. I mean, when I hit Taris on my trooper and reached the Endar Spire, that KoTOR music came in and I geeked out a little. But when I reached the same point on my Knight, I actually stopped before heading in to finish the quest and just let the moment settle in.