Devs Admit Players were Right on Warzone Scoring and Rewards

Lisa Clark bioware, SWTOR

Players have been complaining since the launch of 1.2 that some things just didn’t seem right in PvP. At first, BioWare denied any problem but now, the devs have come forward to address the issue after more investigation. BioWare says they are aware of some of the problems with warzones and that they appreciate the feedback. As usual, they said they are working on a solution to complaints.

But is there proposed solution going to be the kind of fix most players are looking for?

Lead Game Designer Daniel Erickson had this to say on the forums:

Hey folks,

Some follow up news from observations of play and feedback over the weekend. In the next couple of days we will be deploying a small patch that will address the following issues:

As discussed, minimum medals to gain rewards will go from 3 to 1 to better reward those who are backfilled.

Warzones will once again be shutting down when population imbalance is detected. This was an unfortunate bug where a feature of Ranked Warzones (in full team play it is not desirable to let one team end the game prematurely by quitting out) was incorrectly implemented globally.

Completion of Warzones will gain a large increase in the percentage of rewards it represents, so while scoring is still the primary driver, you will cease to see games that give no rewards if players have a minimum of 1 medal earned.

We are extending the time we wait for a full team of eight to better make sure Warzones pop with complete teams.


A huge thank you to everyone who played this weekend and provided valuable feedback and analysis.

Daniel Erickson
Lead Game Designer

When it comes to PvP, there is always something to complain about. Determining which complaints are valid and the proper course of action to correct them cannot be easy for BioWare. However, one complaint with warzones I have to agree with: punishing an individual player when their team sucks.

Yes, it is a team activity and playing with a successful team typically means you will win. However, what if you queue for warzones alone or with a friend? 2 players alone do not a warzone win, especially if the other team is working together. So rewarding commendations based on the overall team success rather than individual activity towards objectives is slightly flawed. How can you keep it fair for everyone and encourage people to actually play to win?

It’s seems like BioWare is trying to work out the bugs but is it enough?

Lisa Clark

Lisa has been an avid gamer since she was old enough to hold her first controller and a game writer for more than a decade. A child of the Nintendo generation, she believes they just don’t make games like they used to but sometimes, they make them even better! While consoles will always be her first love, Lisa spends most of her gaming time on the PC these days- on MMOs and first-person shooters in particular.