I decided to put together a list of my 5 favorite things from the Jesus Patch notes as well as my 5 least favorite things.
Favorites
1) Players can now remove Armoring modifications from items with set bonuses and transfer those set bonuses to Custom (orange) items. These modifications can only be transferred to an item that is equipped in the same slot.
THANK YOU! Ultimately,this isn't a change that I'd care all that much about if the force user tier gear didn't look absolutely terrible. The fact that I can not only get rid of the hideous Sorcerer healing Tier gear, but turn right around and put it in my amazing purple Tron-looking crafted gear is really exciting to me. Especially considering....
2) On critical successes, crafted Custom (orange) gear now receives an Augment slot.
This a weird change in a way because it actually would encourage people to not wear the tier gear that they have because it can't be augmented while the crafted gear can. SO, min-maxers wouldn't be caught dead wearing the actual tier gear when they can get +28 to their primary stat in 3 slots with crafted gear. Seems an odd choice from a design standpoint, but one that I like nontheless.
3) "Rest" abilities, such as Meditation and Recharge and Reload, are no longer interrupted by taking damage if the player is not currently in combat.
Words cannot describe how annoying it is to start Seething to regenerate some force only to have someone charge in to a regular mob and interrupt the process. I can only hope this also applies to Scavenging and Bioanalysis as well.
4) C2-N2 and 2V-R8 have been reprimanded and now vocalize less frequently on personal starships.
Outstanding! If you need an explanation on why this is amazing then you must not be playing with sound on. Some people think that this is the single best change in 1.2. Maker knows I do.
5) The Battle of Ilum daily and weekly missions have been removed from the game.
Oh Happy Day! No more stupid, arbitrary, nonsensical free PvP epics awarded for progress in a war due to winning a football game with your friends!
REALLY?!?
1) Healing Nerfs
Healing was overpowered. No question about it. Especially for Sorcerers. I knew a nerf was coming. I expected a nerf to come. I even said multiple times that I think a nerf should come. That said, I think they over did it. Bounty Hunters and Sorcerers both got hit with the nerf bat pretty hard and if it goes live I think BioWare will realize it was a bit too much and end up changing it again which just adds to the time it takes for the class to get settled. I don't have a problem with not having infinite Force anymore. That was silly. However, Sorcs still have very expensive heals comparative to other classes and we regenerate our force more slowly. We do have consumption (Life Tap) which allows to get a portion back for a portion of our health which means this isn't the end of the world for Sorcs, it just changes the play style fairly significantly. I'd have liked to see some sort of passive regen buff added with Force Bending or give us something similar to Vent Heat with a longer cooldown so we'd have some sort of a "free" mana regen for moments in the fight where it isn't ideal to take health away.
That said I do feel bad even complaining about Sorcerer nerfs while Bounty Hunters are still recovering from their nerfs similarly to the way a character recovered from a sneak attack at the end of an episode of OZ.
2) Combat Logging
Don't get me wrong. Combat logging is absolutely necessary for serious raiding. Getting killed by something and having no way to know what killed you and for how much isn't acceptable. That aspect of things will improve and that's a good thing. However, I think it's a band aid. I want to see real time (or at least close to it) performance logs so adjustments can be made on the fly. I'm sure that someone much smarter than me will develop some sort of program where everyone in the raid can upload the results of their personal log to compile a "raid report" but I feel like something less obtrusive and more intelligent is needed. I'm putting this in my cons because I worry that Bioware sees this as a fix rather than a start.
3) PTS
Only select guilds were eligible to import copies of their characters over to the PTS. This means that the majority of the people who want to view these changes before it goes live have to level a character from scratch. In turn, I think that means that a large number of things that happen at max level will not be tested and that could lead to more bugs. Bioware had a very long Beta period prior to the launch of this game and it still launched with numerous buggy issues. Some of which were addressed and some of which are still in the game. Hopefully they learned from their mistakes and they have some way to avoid repeating them because the first 3 months people were very forgiving. If Bioware releases a huge content patch with a ton of bugs with the "Jesus Patch" I think they're going to get crucified by a large number of their subscribers. (See what I did there?) I know I won't be thrilled at another period of feeling like a Beta Tester who pays to test.
4) The preference for "Show Sith Corruption" is now labeled "Show Dark Side Corruption."
It always annoyed me that non-force users could get Sith Corruption. I thought it needed to be removed from the game. Instead they just fixed it so people who wanted to shoot guns won't get pissy at not being able to look like a dirty faced zombie. The fact that it makes no sense is apparently irrelevant. Obviously suspension of disbelief is a factor when playing a Fantasy Sci/Fi game, but this simply doesn't make sense. If you're a Bounty Hunter who is a bad ass, then throw on some Black gear and talk with some bass in your voice. If you want red eyes and to have your character slowly swap from looking like Leonardo DiCaprio to Clint Eastwood as you level then you should roll something that holds a light saber.
5) Numerous spelling and grammatical errors in text throughout the game have been corrected.
I'm glad that they are fixing this, but a little angry at myself for paying $15 a month to play a game where this survived a near 12 month Beta, 3 months and game and is just now getting fixed in the first major content patch after many smaller updates.
Let's hear yours!
