Honestly? That´s quite entitled thinking. Why should a gaming company that has hundreds of employees working on content (talking wow) give an expansion out for free? It´s nice that you get it in SWTOR, true. It would be totally fine for BW to charge for expansions, IF they come close to the content the average WoW expansion provides, which they don´t. Also once you paid for for the expansion you get regular content upgrades until the next expansion for free. Or to put it even more simply: Things cost money, money needs to be paid so that other things can be made. F2P doesn´t pay anything.

Well F2P is nothing but a ruse. Still you can play for free. F2P never defined as "you can play for free without restrictions". I oppose the F2P idea in general, because it´s a lie, there is only subscription, subscription pays development, development brings content, through content my dull free time will be broken. Still - i think F2P should allow a sustainable gameplay, with a longer duration to reach rewards. And i am totally fine with a company ripping off the F2P crowd through micro-transactions, as long as there are no downsides for players who actually pay for the game. Yes F2P that spent money for a game pay in a way too. But they could sub to get rid of the disadvantages.

HELL NO! WoD was the worst expansion ever. ESPECIALLY the time travel crap and how they unraveled it. Not to mention that it was all for nothing, because it changed nothing. (Okay, there are almost 0 MMOs where player action actually changes things permanently in any way).

Please. Play Archeage a bit. Aim for Epic grade gear. Then tell us RNG is any good. I know it´s not SWTOR. But RNG Boxes from the Cash Shop, i am okay with as long as they don´t give game relevant stuff. RNG Boxes for gear? (or any improvement on that) Not so much. I am aware that boss drops are RNG as well, but that´s normally a different story. Devs only use RNG when they want to artificially prolong the life of a game or content because there isn´t really much elso to it than shattering on the #RNGGate.

I disagree, because Archeage Veteran. Changes nothing about the fact that F2P is a gaming cancer that has spread slowly, but steadily into almost every major release and is corrupting the whole concept that a developer actually has to create content continously that ppl deem worthy to sub for. The most serious problem with F2P is that ppl think that could actually work. A high quality MMO like SWTOR for zilch. Just free. Never to spend a dime. Nobody ever has to. And then feel entitled to even more "content" or features because the game is advertised as F2P so they have the right to get it all. Agreed. But F2P isn´t the solution to that. I doubt that they couldn´t get that data, but it wasn´t the best suggestion, i agree. Agreed, that´s a good one - even 25% would work. Problem with preferred is - you can get it for 5 bucks. Once! And never spend more on it. Maybe the truth is totally different and most preferred players pay at least the same as the usual subscription gamer does - on average, but then... why not sub upfront.

You obviously never played Archeage - if you want an a..f... experience with RNG try it.

It´s just that - any dev that thinks a gamer want´s to be f... by RNG needs his head checked. And yes - i am aware of the fact that RNG, to a point, has been always an issue. I have been a long term raider in WoW and long before that also. Sometimes your piece wouldn´t drop from a boss for a long time. You still had the satisfaction of working your progress. RNG Boxes on the other hand... what sane person with a trifle of common sense would even think that up?

Dreadnought is also quite cool atm - if they are not carried away by some RNG boxes in the future. Okay it´s more like a short term thing like Overwatch, but i am looking towards RO too. Sadly rumor is it´s becoming F2P, which is always a bad sign for any game. Problem is devs are getting lazy, content stretched out by impossible RNG odds. Sad this has arrived at western devs too.

Agreed - RNG is a piece of sh.... i even boasted aroudn the Archeage forums how SWTOR was better than it because of almost no RNG (that matters). It´s quite amazing how stupid game designers can become, when attached to EA.

hmmmmmm.... i should not have fast forwarded through the live stream recording.... Is this becoming the infamous rip-off archage cash shop box thriving crap all over again with GalCom? Guess it´s time to cancel sub again.... damn it was so nice to return after 2012. Edit: Btw. Bioware. I love DA and ME - but if you do stuff like this in SWTOR i won´t even bother buying a single player game from you anymore. You should really do the Walking Dead Season 6 Finale on some EA CEO.

I agree to your baseline. Though i have never been an F2P type because i play mmos from the beginning - literally. When there was no F2P. And while F2P may have done SWTOR something good in terms of numbers, F2P is a gaming cancer that sadly grows with every release. I wonder if it´s just happened because there weren´t enough subscribers around anymore (even WoW offers some kind of F2P meanwhile). Or if it just was companies realizing how to get even more money from their customers. To be fair - the subscription in SWTOR is one of the best and most generous around. In some F2P based titles you won´t even get extended char slots for subbing and have to cash shop in on every "convenience labeled" stuff extra. Bioware/EA is quite decent here. Now how to get the preferred players in? Maybe a consecutive or additive sum of 3-6 month of subscription will give the benefits of GalCom. But ppl also really need to learn that F2P can´t work - on it´s own. Somebody has to pay for the staff, servers, new content development. A game cannot be F2P! There are bills to be paid and investments to be made. At least (and that´s the worst case scenario) those guys with big wallets have to pay for all the F2P gamers and get called P2W by the F2P crowd in return. It´s total BS, really.

Das ist Jack aus Mass Effect als Kind. ^^

That requires you to land a hit, something that kinetic energy can provide if the defense stroke/hold is too weak. So while force users may be able to hit harder, applying the missing kinetic energy by utilizing the force it´s still totally viable for non-force users to win a duel or use those weapons effectively, especially if you know that you can´t beat a force user by sheer brunt attacks. ( a shot in the back of the head will also do ^^)

That´s also said about modern warfare. Since often combat is a push of a button (drones, missiles) it´s a surreal situation where you never reach that kind of personal experience. Conscience might do it´s trick, but still not the same. Take GoT´s Battle of the Bastards for example, that pictures quite well how gory and messy medival times warfare was. There little personal about the kills there and little time to hestitate or contemplate. In a duel the Jedi awareness may justify this (as well as a Sith´s intend to inflict fear and agony), in a fully fledged large scale war like spear-heading an clone trooper assault, even Jedi should have a hard time to account for every kill they make in the fray. Maybe some "meditation" afterwards will bring that personal caring back, but right in the fray, it just has to be done.

It has some practical use - compared to a standard SW Sword/Melee weapon it´s rather small, portable and has some serious cutting power (doors, armor). It´s quite concealable as long as it´s not drawn because then it´s quite a big attention catcher. Also due to it´s weight (hilt only) it´s easier to wield than a melee weapon of other kinds. But it´s inferior in pure kinetic impact to you standard blade (no weight coming to bear). Makes you wonder if the "strong" slashes of a saber wielder rely on the Force to apply kinetic power to the blow. And we don´t need to argue that there has never been a more iconic weapon in movie/gaming history. Even with all the additional tries to make it even more special looking (Kylo), it´s the basic lightsaber that is still the elegant weapon Obi-Wan describes. It can be a powerful tool to any melee fighter, but even the Assasins/Shadows used normal knives over a double-bladed saber for kills for a reason. They don´t make such a fuss when you draw them/using them.

Will do better on starship combat. Really i loved KotFE cutscenes, they seem alive and vivid, most of the time not having you awkwardly ask yourself ; How´s that supposed to work. But the starship battles.... really the Gravestone should have been trash at least 3 times before the final battle. Considering the efficiency of the Eternal Fleet (and the numbers) it´d been easy to close in and kill with obscene firepower. There need to be better "explanations" how a small frigate could survive an all out battle with such a fleet, even a fraction of it. Sure, at Odessen it was SCORPIO interfering and maybe some plans to capture it before that, but... Since the order to "just disable the Gravestone at any cost" is never given it totally kills immersion, when you´re on a time critical mission, enemy fleet in orbit and fireing range and..... nothing happens. Also when the Gravestone took off Asylum it´d been easy to destroy the ship since enough enemy caps were close enough and the Gravestone isn´t actually dodging fire (nor it seems has the capability to do so, because it moves... well like a Gravestone. It´s basically a mini-death star for the eternal fleet, but we see damage when ever it gets hit, so concentrated fire would have ended it long ago. I know it may be too late for the coming expansion but please consider it in the future. KotFE has great cinematic cutscenes, but a good portion fail to transport the immediate threat and danger and time critical factor/drama. Sure it´s an MMO and that´s kinda slower like Mass Effect, Shooter-like action, but even in the great Mass Effect Bioware often failed to transport the In-Action seriousness and intensity of a fight because of some "clumpsy" looking actions where you´d think: "Jeez, if someone did it that way, everybody dies."

First off - killing someone is neither more honorable with a light-saber than it is with a gun. It´s close and personal, but only psychopaths want to see the life fade away from their victims close up. Melee gives you a more personal kill, but it´s also easier to show mercy to a yielding enemy than it would be from a sniper scope. But close-combat is, as has been said, gory, sweaty, dirty - not this elegant fighting we see normally in movies, not only Star Wars specific. That justifies why both Sith and Jedi use them. Aside from the obvious it´s cool and tradition stuff, there is no real reason why a force-wielder couldn´t perform the same feats with a gun as with a light saber. It´s quite an effective weapon and sometimes pictured as a force focus (Mace Windu surely didn´t block Palps lightning with a plasma cutter alone). It also has no definitive disadvantage against a blaster since any force user seems to be able to brick the distances quite fast. So why use them? Bringing a knife to a gunfight alone commands respect or fear. And you have to give it that, it´s quite elegant. There is no reason a force-user could/shouln´t wield both - one hand light saber, the other blaster, now that´d be cool. Blasters could be modified with cortosis plating or even vibroblade technology to withstand saber strikes and used in parrying, but a blaster wielding force user is nothing that´s out of the question. It´s tradition, they are taught practically from birth that all other weapons are inferior and "uncivilized" (there is no civilized kill). You could go as far that´s pretty brainwashing. On both sides.

Yeah well you can hurt yourself with a lightsaber type weapon. You can do some serious damage to yourself with a sharp melee weapon also. Any trained melee fighter would be able to wield a lightsaber weapon with serious effectiveness, aside from the obvious force-sensitive feats like the above mentioned blaster reflection. The reason that you can´t grab a sabers blade, like a longsword user would to penetrate armor, doesn´t count - it´s an almost weightless weapon that doesn´t need the extra physical push to penetrate "plate". Even without the force it could be totally possible, if you take the numerous random movies where characters deflect at least arrows with a blade. Aragorn actor, Viggo Mortensen, even deflected a stunt dagger that was wrongly thrown directly at him out of the moment (fighting scene in the woods where the companionship breaks and the leader Urukai throws at him). It stayed in the movie ofc, because obvious reasons. One might argue that a force user simply has the ability to keep up the concentration necessary for extended defenses. This is a handy excuse why force-users are so easily shot down in the movies, because concentration elsewhere (Order 66 for example). If, let´s say 20 Soldiers, would fire assault cannons at a force-user from different directions, there´s really nothing he could do about it, except evade by jumping out, deflection impossible and death quite normal. It´s a common misconception that force-users are invincible (Sith brabble about it all the time ^^) That doesn´t rule out non-force users as deadly lightsaber type weapon wielders, even without the example of Pre Visla. The main reason why this will not become a thing is that it´s not really canon and game specific players surely feel "special" because they can wear a lightsaber - imagine the **** storm if every bounter hunter and their mother would wield one. Lastly, light sabers may be rare in the Skywalker timeline, but in KOTOR and SWTOR every one shot Sith/Jedi runs around with and drops one on death, not as loot, but they sure have those on them. Even if you disregard the cannon fodder NPCs, that era has full fledged wars between armies of force users so light-saber weapons are available in abundance. From a technological standpoint, there is no reason why a skilled technician, scientist wouldn´t be able to build or at least reverse engineer and modify a lightsaber type weapon. (I am pretty sure that´s how it works in Zakuul). So sorry - it´s just a melee weapon, a specialized one, but still.