What SWTOR needs

…in my opinion, of course. It’s quite a silent week for me, this one, at least in regards to writing here. The reason being that the nursery school teachers in germany are on strike indefinitely, which means at least this week, possibly going into next week. So our son is home and i stay with him- which in turn means that the time i usually write something is blocked. In terms of playing, his being sick at the moment doesn’t help. It’s nothing too bad, bad his sleep is uncalm. So, well, not much of a gaming week here.

That is a bummer, because you know these times when you can’t wait to log into a game? I’m in one of these phases. Doesn’t matter if it were FF14, SWTOR or ESO- my current trinity- i’m really enjoying my time in those games i play- although it has been SWTOR, exclusively, in the last week.

While i like the game very much and am surprised at how good its design fits both my preferences and my available time to play, there are some things i miss in SWTOR. So here are a few pointers.

Planetary storylines should be their own thing

I do realize that this is what later on happens anyway, after the class stories are finished. But i wished quests in SWTOR came three-fold: class quests, planetary quests and sidequests. With 12XP currently going on a seperation like this would help a lot in making use of the experience bonus in place while still following the main theme of the individual planets. If there is a way to tell the planetary story apart- or experience/read it ingame without doing every quest there is on a planet, let me know. I’m unaware of an option like this.

Is that…a gate? Also, while we’re at it: please add a keybind for hiding/displaying nameplates!

If planetary quests were highlighted in some way, i guess my approach to quicker levelling in SWTOR while still experiencing more of the story would be to finish the planetary questlines first and the class stories after.

Mentoring

Ok, i don’t know anyone in game (yet – made contact with Shintar, though), so this wouldn’t be of much use for me except maybe in flashpoints, but every MMORPG, in my opinion, needs to provide the option to experience content together in a ‘challenging’ and ‘worthwhile’ way for friends to play together. It would certainly help social guilds in planning and executing social events that make use of available content.

A little help for the srubs

If there was the ability to set your own level, it would also help with the 12XP issue of “levelling too fast” since you could do both- level quickly and experience the stories you’d want to experience.

Usable decor

Shortly after the FC meeting in FF14, i went out of our guild house (or whatever they’re called), saw a fountain and clicked on it. To my surprise, something happened. That, of course, was after we sat on couches while discussing FC-related stuff in our house. In SWTOR, as far as i can tell, usable objects are in the majority. Sure, you can read mail, store items, gather resources and probably do other things i don’t know about. But sitting on a couch is done by jumping on the seat and using the /sit command- success varies. It might be an engine thing, but it’s a bummer that housing is mostly limited to “looking nice”.

Account or legacy wide friendlist

This is a stealth-edit. When i tried to contact Shintar, i added her to my friendlist. For a while afterwards, i kept wondering why i didn’t see her online anymore. Then i realized that i was on a different character, so i’ll have to add her 6 or 7 republic chars to each and every friendlist of my characters- if she’d want to do the same for me, it would involve even more work. I appreciate the ability to sometimes play with a “secret” character if you don’t want to meet anyone (especially useful for guildleaders), but it would still be a great help if there was at least a faction-wide friendlist for accounts/legacies.

That’s all?

I’m pretty sure there’s more. I could join the chorus and wish for more open planets. I had a disappointing experience the last time i played Soofoo on Tatooine. I saw a gate-like structure on the edge of the spaceport/first town and, of course, went there to explore. I was out of the gate for a few meters/yards when i got the warning: “exhaustion zone. Turn back”.

See, open space! But don’t go there….it’s exhausting.

But i’ve made my peace with the zone design, realizing that maybe it isn’t really about the planets. When all those important people in the movies land on a planet, they don’t go hiking, after all. They are on these planets for a mission- so are we, the players. So i changed my stance and just view them as setpieces/backdrops where the action takes place. Still, i hope for more open maps sooner or later, and as far as i know, they’re there.

I’m still hugely enjoying my time in both FF14 and SWTOR, hope to be able to join the next fc meeting in FF14 as well as a guild in SWTOR soon.

Got my chocobo!

So i finally got my chicken to ride on. As said, it involved a few days/sessions of questing, gathering and crafting, which is ok, i guess, since i gained a few levels in everything. I’ve made it a policy that when i need, say, 10 items of something, i’ll go and collect 1 stack (99) +10 of it. This way, i’m levelling up continuously. Today i got my Botanist up to level 20, which is now quite close to the level of my highest adventuring class.

And here’s what i have got as reward.

My Chocobo

Well, at least i’m lucky enough to already have spent lots of money for FF14 despite being utterly low-level, so i also have the Behemoth to mount.

My Behemoth

Now that’s something totally different, isn’t it? Honestly, i don’t like either one of them. One is too cute, the other too badass, but i do like how comfortable my character looks on the Behemoth, so i guess i’ll go with that for now. One thing FF14 does really right: your character just looks great in almost every position and occasion.

Talking about looks

I also finished the barber questline, which took simply travelling to the capitals and talking to some of the crafter guild leaders. Once you unlock the barber, you can summon him by using your bell in your inn room.

Deidra before

This way, you’ll be able to gain access to new hairstyles and -colors which have been added to the portfolio or made usable by all races. I did a quick do-over and when i was ready, Deidra looked like this.

Deidra after

Going on

See, there was something i totally forgot: there are the hunting logs, as well. Hunting logs, to simplify, are lists of different kind of mobs you’ll have to go and fight (it’s not the same as the hunting jobs where you hunt named mobs). They exist for every adventuring class and do give considerable XP.

Also, as i mentioned, i hit level 20 with my Botanist, so there’ll be a new class quest waiting for me in Old Gridania.

Right now, my to-do list in FFXIV looks like this:

• get and finish the Botanist class quest
• continue the main storyline until it reaches the same level as my Arcanist is (yeah, still not there)
• level up the Weaver, so that i can craft stuff that’s level-appropriate for the Arcanist
• craft some gathering and crafting equipment- i feel my Botanist is underequipped at the moment
• gain access to Halatali, which is a dungeon, and i learned that you’ll have to do a quest to gain access
• finish the hunting log for the Arcanist
• see what other classes have open/available class quest
• get the quest for putting magic stuff into items (needs level 19 crafting profession)

…and that’s just to continue to “play the game”, it isn’t actually doing something, it’s getting the stars lined up so i can continue to play the game. This game is crazy, but i like it. In fact, the longer i play, the more i like it and the more i want to be somewhat “finished”, as in max-level in one profession and finished with the storyline. I like to play the game somewhat “focussed”, but it just offers such a breadth of activities, already in this early game, that i get distracted and try to progress in many areas at once.

There is so much endgame in sight for me it’s dazzling: crafting, gathering, playing the market, adventuring, getting other classes levelled, exploring dungeons and so on. I really feel “behind the curve” on this one- and it’s not only the level, but it’s also that i can’t seem to even grasp everything that’s in there- in that veign, it is quite similar to Everquest 2 (even more than it resembles WoW, i think).