Zombie Pirate Ninja Monkey

Star Wars galaxies: my old nemesis. Or my ex-mistress. Or something.

Leaving an MMORPG is like dumping a girlfriend.  Both probably come after spending scores, perhaps even hundreds of hours with the now-unwanted companion, knowing it was over but unable to bring yourself to make the break.  There is a sense of sadness, but also of tremendous relief; of potential.

And, of course, you keep a vague eye out, just in case they've lost a few pounds, changed their attitude, learned some new tricks and are dangerously low on self-esteem.

Erm, forget the last bit.  But the point is that I keep a vague eye out to see if Star Wars Galaxies has learned from the constant player haemorrhaging and fixed their game.  There were things I liked about it: you could solo - useful when I detest a great many MMO players - even if this was only despite Raph's normal modus operandi and because of the broken combat system that let me Teras Kasi my way through Fort Tuskan on my lonesome.  It was a grind, but you could macro almost everything in the game except bounty hunting (my last, incomplete profession and the straw that shattered the camel's backbone into tiny jagged shards).

The uber macroing abilities, by the way, may or may not have been planned, but I do remember either Vogel or Koster saying something like: look at what aspects of your game your players macro, and those will be the broken bits.  Wise words.

Aaaanyway.  The developers of SWG have been promising the "combat balance" for at least two years.  Basically, combat in SWG is broken.  It's a horrible system, and so transparent that I hear tell of isolated groups of West African pygmies who have managed to munchkin it.  For all but the most mundane shots, weapons like carbines hurt their users more than their targets (no, seriously: the user would be better off just punching himself in the head).  Certain races could be insta-killed with one shot to the foot.  Eugh, it was more horrible than you could ever know.

As N3rfed pointed out, the first real meat on the new subject is available in pictures and text, and deals with the armour situation.  Well, it needed doing.  But does it have to be quite so paper-rock-scissors?  I mean, three weapon types, three armour types, and each good, vulnerable or neutral against each of the others.  Did it have to be so obviously 3? With a similar treatment of damage types (acid, stun, kinetic etc).

And the line that actively annoyed me was "We wanted to ensure people do not try and beat the system by mixing and matching high and low hindrance items".  Why not?  Does player knowledge have to count for nothing?  Can't one balance risks if one wishes to take less protective, lighter armour in rarely-hit locations?  This is the ultimate in paper-rock-scissors design: it's mandatory.

Except that one group will probably be able to beat it: those who - like me - can macro.  So in PvP you'd see me in one armour, choose the right weapon to defeat it, fire, then see my entire armour instantly change as I macro a complete new set on in a fraction of a second with a quick keystroke.  Wax on, wax off.  Oh, and in-character knowledge out, out-of-character player knowledge in.