Picked the same options here and no Xalek This was on my Sorc as well so looking like a class bug as a Mara guildy got him no problem today.

Because an MMO only gets one shot to attract and keep subscribers and SWTOR has done a pretty bad job of doing that going by these forums and other 3rd party ones. Dreadful system performance on high end PC's No high res graphic options (an MMO first) due to Hero engine not being able to handle it Pointless crafting Boring PvP Laggy and very basic combat Dull and uninspired missions. Broken high end raids Yeah SWTOR has had a great launch.

Funny thing is the Age of Conan, Warhammer online, Star Trek online and Champions online fanboi's said the exact same thing

He used those others games as examples of rushed games with bad launches not working out very well in the long run.

+1 Very boring missions to be done over and over and over again.

+1 While no MMO will ever launch bug free due to how complex the MMO's are and due to the various types of hardware a PC can have, I have never seen an MMO launch where the high graphics option was missing due to the game engine being utter rubbish. Even the worst of the MMO's launched over the last 10 years such as Age of Conan, Warhammer, Star Trek online and Champions online were are to be run with max settings turned on as seen in all the games promo videos. Yet the latest entry to the market, the most expensive to make, the most hyped and from one of the biggest developers in the business can't be run on max settings the way the games has and continues to be advertised due to the game engine not being up to the job! WFT Bioware!

100% agree with the OP.

The ability to pick a companions skills would be awesome that way players could experience all the companions they get not just the healers ones.

Not only is ingame voice not needed due to much better offerings like teamspeak, mumble and ventrillo being out there but any game that does has ingame voice options always seems to be much more laggy after the feature is added.

You can solo flashpoints with great ease once they turn grey to you. Just saying.

I found myself in a similar situation on my first character. I did every mission, bonus mission and a good deal of the heroic missions and alot of space missions tho not many flashpoints or PvP. When I had to move to Voss I was 2 level below the mission content and had to grind out PvP XP due to how hard the mobs were being two levels higher.

Very well thought out survey Sorrow, 11 out of 10 for your work It's just a pity Bioware hasn't bothered with a poll such as this I would just like to address something that certain posters are saying in regards to not many SWTOR players using these forums. In this day and age where net access and use of social media sites is now in the realm of the everyday user and the web can now be accessed from mobile phones, TVs and tablets never mind computers, I don't think its a case anymore of a games official forums just being the purview of the minority.

My guess is the issue is something major. This issue is bad PR and is being commented on by other website and in user reviews of the game. To be fair to Bioware they have been quick to roll out bug fixes so unless they have the biggest fool on the planet deciding on the order of things to be fixed, I can't see how a small code change to let players pick the real high res graphics option (with a warning or whatever about loss of framerate) just to make this thread and the bad press go away unless there was a really serious issue going on.

My guess is the issue is something major. This issue is bad PR and is being commented on by other websites and in user reviews of the game. To be fair to Bioware they have been quick to roll out bug fixes so unless they have the biggest fool on the planet deciding on the order of things to be fixed, I can't see how a small code change to let players pick the real high res graphics option (with a warning or whatever about loss of framerate) just to make this thread and the bad press go away unless there was a really serious issue going on.

Its nothing to do with the servers for sure but I do think the Hero engine can't handle having all the bells and whistles turned on. Even using the medium settings that are currently the best we have at the moment there is a very noticeable drop in frame rate when you hit the fleet no mater how few people are around. There is also the issue with shadows that in one spot look ok if a little basic and in another spot a few meters away turn into pure junk and look like they are made from lego bricks. Considering even with the games real high res textures turn on (beta, holo trick, screenshots) while nice but nothing really next gen or cutting edge yet according to Bioware, cause a huge awful performance hit to high spec PC's kinda shows the engine in a total pile of trash.

I'll bet it is only TOR. I run a 5870 myself in 1920x1080 with everything maxed and have had zero issues running the game apart from ability lag in warzones. Iv run Crysis2, Skyrim, MW3 and Saints Row at max settings perfectly and the same for MMO's like WoW, Rift, LOTRO, STO, DC Universe with no issues at all. In TOR I range from 70-100fps outdoors and 40-60ish in the fleet so people with the same card having such low framerate'e probley have altered their INI files or have some setting in ATI control panel set to max. The true problem is with Bioware's coding of the Hero Engine or just the Hero engine itself hence no one, no matter what GPU they have, get to play with the high res textures settings.

You can also see high res textures if you preview items. If you CRTL+ right click on a piece of armor the preview window opens up. Now under your characters preview the item is low to medium res but if you click on the companion preview window you will get to see the armor piece in full high res.

Even with just the one avatar on an empty low detail flat area it stutters so badly It would be funny if it wasn't the engine this game uses

But Bioware did and continues to do so

In Nov 2007 the best graphics card on the market seems to be 8800 Ultra which was a DX10 card. http://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/graphics-card,1718-4.html Bioware picking the Hero engine for SWTOR was also around 2007 which might be the reason SWTOR is not able to run DX11 level graphics and why the current ingame graphics look like something from a 2007 game.

Those look exactly like the shadows I get on Tatooine using an ATI 5870. As other have stated the quality of shadows seems to change dramatically depending if you're indoors, on the fleet or outdoors. Such a huge variation in shadow quality has to mean the Hero engine is either not up to the job, not optimized correctly, Bioware coders suck or maybe all 3. If as some folks in this thread as seem to think that the Hero engine is using the CPU over the GPU it could explain why player with high spec but perhaps dual core systems are suffering horrid framerate issues even with the medium graphics settings this game uses.

I sure as hell aint paying money to be lied to and misled I'll tell you that. Promo pictures and videos to this very day using a graphics option Im first told not is open to me due to a UI bug and yesterday told its just the way the game is.

That is the game were looking for

From the Heroengine website http://www.heroengine.com/2011/11/heroengine-meets-starwars/ All the details about how Bioware decided on using this less than impressive game engine that can't handle high res textures

Yeah I was thinking the same thing. Considering the outrage over the issue and the bad press it gaining on other websites you would think adding the high res option back in would be a priority and not require months to add in a setting that was taken out. My money is on the Hero engine being the main cause of the problem and nothing at all to do with the players hardware. Hell even the high res textures while nice and not even remotely cutting edge graphics with many other non instanced MMOs having much better and more detailed graphics.