Sabers, races and class roles ohhh my!

[Fro-zone]

Since SW:TOR was announced, Bioware has long been an advocate of letting players become controllers of their own destiny - mostly through the "fourth pillar" of story. Flexibility and players engaging in their own unique stories has been the mantra thus far however as the game comes closer to shipping this is slowly eroding away.

 

Most MMOs like WoW and many others have pigeon holed classes into specific roles (mage/dps, priest/heal, warrior/tank). Bioware stated that they were staying away from this feature that that is apart of the MMO genre. Recently at E3 (2010) they have retracted from this and stated that class roles are very much incorporated into the game. Both flexibility of roles and more structured style both have implications - the latter more design friendly. I am not arguing that this is good or bad (you guys can do that for me hehe) I'm merely raising the question if Bioware are moving away from the flexibility they promised in many aspects of the game into a more structured and controlled game especially class roles.

 

I think the biggest "that sucks" I have with the game currently is it seems that races are becoming class specific which I think is disappointing. Most races fit into all class types it just is a shame that the game has taken this direction and not opened up the playing field to all races for all classes. Character customization is a big thing and I'm hoping Bioware digress .

 

Now I will move onto the petty issues of light sabers... while I could make many arguments with how they are currently represented in game currently - over-sized hilts and cannon-logical issues to name a few I'll stick to player customization. If I was to become a force wielder I prefer the single-handed it just brings forth that nostalgia you see in the movies unlike these exotic double-bladed and dual-wielders (greedy much?).

 

Personally issues aside (lol) it seems the Consular and Inquisitor are getting shafted with double-bladed and the warrior and guardian dual-wield however there is some light at the end of the tunnel as guardians and warriors are being marketed with single-blades still. But I get the feeling in-game wielding these types of sabers will give higher damage output especially for the melee Jedi thus forcing me to go double later on if I was to choose this class. In Kotor itself dual wield and double bladed had penalties but late game the advantages outweighed these because of pure dps. I hope I'm wrong but the way the force wielders are being marketed as of now it seems to be the case.

 

Thoughts? (Sorry my grammar got lazy towards the end.)

[Kira_Tsukasa]

I have to agree that the double bladed lightsaber thing has gotten way out of hand. They saw Darth Maul had one and suddenly half the Sith and Jedi had to have one. Personally, I prefer the single blade, single hilt style. I didn't even like dual blasters in KotOR (like they were trying to pull a Matrix or something).

 

As for the classes, what perked my curiosity was the class role flexibility. Usually in an MMO I will be a lone wolf and join groups only occasionally, so this flexibility suited my play style. Losing that uniqueness may break the game for me, to be honest. It would also make the game stand out less from other MMOs besides the fact that it's Star Wars. Not to mention class specific roles in a party leads to a lot of drama and a lot of finger pointing and a lot of "why can't X class do their job" rants.

 

Races aren't really a big deal for me. It would be nice if each race has their own race-specific skills, such as a certain race is more resistant to Force effects, but I really don't mind if a Rodian and a Twi'lek wants to party together.

[Hallucination]

Most MMOs like WoW and many others have pigeon holed classes into specific roles (mage/dps, priest/heal, warrior/tank). Bioware stated that they were staying away from this feature that that is apart of the MMO genre. Recently at E3 (2010) they have retracted from this and stated that class roles are very much incorporated into the game. Both flexibility of roles and more structured style both have implications - the latter more design friendly. I am not arguing that this is good or bad (you guys can do that for me hehe) I'm merely raising the question if Bioware are moving away from the flexibility they promised in many aspects of the game into a more structured and controlled game especially class roles.

I don't remember Bioware saying that they would let everyone do every thing, and I'm glad that they aren't. The idea of Darth Vader performing surgery or Han Solo kick boxing a rancor seems a bit silly, doesn't it? I think that as long as everyone can choose tank or heal and DPS it should be okay, unlike in other games (ex: WoW) where some classes can do everything, others can do two things and some are stuck with three different ways to do the same thing.

I think the biggest "that sucks" I have with the game currently is it seems that races are becoming class specific which I think is disappointing. Most races fit into all class types it just is a shame that the game has taken this direction and not opened up the playing field to all races for all classes. Character customization is a big thing and I'm hoping Bioware digress .

I'm disappointed that there will be class/race restrictions, but with any luck they will fairly liberal.

Now I will move onto the petty issues of light sabers... while I could make many arguments with how they are currently represented in game currently - over-sized hilts and cannon-logical issues to name a few I'll stick to player customization. If I was to become a force wielder I prefer the single-handed it just brings forth that nostalgia you see in the movies unlike these exotic double-bladed and dual-wielders (greedy much?).

The hilt sizes seemed to be reasonable at E3 to me. As for the styles, I know that Knights/Warriors will get to dual-wield for their DPS subclasses, and single wield for their tanking subclasses, which seems to make sense to me. I could swear I remember hearing that the Consulars/Inquisitors would single wield in a subclass, but don't quote me on that.

 

Personally issues aside (lol) it seems the Consular and Inquisitor are getting shafted with double-bladed and the warrior and guardian dual-wield however there is some light at the end of the tunnel as guardians and warriors are being marketed with single-blades still. But I get the feeling in-game wielding these types of sabers will give higher damage output especially for the melee Jedi thus forcing me to go double later on if I was to choose this class. In Kotor itself dual wield and double bladed had penalties but late game the advantages outweighed these because of pure dps. I hope I'm wrong but the way the force wielders are being marketed as of now it seems to be the case.

Well, for the Knights/Warriors wouldn't it make more sense for the tanks to use a lower damage setup than the DPS?

 

And as for the Consulars/Inquisitors, it would suck with they were stuck with double-bladed sabres.

 

Thoughts? (Sorry my grammar got lazy towards the end.)

There are no thoughts on the internet.

[SithLordDrew]

Taking practicality aside, and looking at it from a pure game mechanic, Bioware has approached the problem of class balance and came up with a very good solution.

 

If your Sith Warrior wants to DPS as the main focus, you are locked out of the Tanking tree completely. An ability that is very cool and powerful can be given to the DPS tree pretty early and the developers have no worry of Tanks picking up the talent because it’s over powered.

 

The down side is you still have to focus on a theme for each talent tree. In this case, DPS Sith Warriors will most likely be dual wielding as most of their talents focus on having a light saber in each hand. Jedi Consular’s will be seen with staffs… errr… I mean double-bladed light sabers.

 

The only way to have a complete open ended class/race/armor/weapon combo is to go back to the pen and paper RPG game. I believe that only with a dungeon master can you truly come up with any character you wish.

 

 

~Sith Lord Drew

[Kira_Tsukasa]

Taking practicality aside, and looking at it from a pure game mechanic, Bioware has approached the problem of class balance and came up with a very good solution.

 

If your Sith Warrior wants to DPS as the main focus, you are locked out of the Tanking tree completely. An ability that is very cool and powerful can be given to the DPS tree pretty early and the developers have no worry of Tanks picking up the talent because it’s over powered.

 

The down side is you still have to focus on a theme for each talent tree. In this case, DPS Sith Warriors will most likely be dual wielding as most of their talents focus on having a light saber in each hand. Jedi Consular’s will be seen with staffs… errr… I mean double-bladed light sabers.

 

The only way to have a complete open ended class/race/armor/weapon combo is to go back to the pen and paper RPG game. I believe that only with a dungeon master can you truly come up with any character you wish.

 

 

~Sith Lord Drew

 

If that's what they did, then it's nothing new. There's an MMO called Fiesta and their Warrior class can either be a DD or a Tank. If you choose DD, then you don't have the stats to be any good at Tanking. If you choose a Tank, then you don't have the stats to do a decent amount of damage. You could do half and half, but you'd be a mediocre Tank and a mediocre DD and generally unwanted in a group.

[dswtor]

well i think it will keep balance so not everyone is the coolest looking race like in wow with the blood elves.