Use the free L60 and play through KotFE with it; you keep all companions AND get to see as much of the new game as you like. Do not start with any existing L60s if you dislike losing your companions, even for a short while. With the free L60, you can have your cake and eat it, too.

...are available to Bioware. If they wanted our opinion on any given topic(s), they would afford us an opportunity to speak. There is no need for them to guess about anything.

Take name of player character, turn in exploit report.

Exactly; I did all the new content (at least as far as I was willing to go, which was thru Chapter 8, and part-way into Chapter 9) on the free L60 and am back to casual grinding all of my original L60s up to L65 on Yavin whenever the mood hits. That way, I kept all of my "original" companions, such as they now are in their generic, boring, and sad form. I discovered that the story of KotFE was actually quite good. I really liked it for the most part. But that is as far as the play-value of combat upgrade goes; everything else in the new game experience is a vast, grey, dull wasteland, just like Ziost. No reputation grind (aka the Alliance series), no PvP (aka M1-4X grind), and no Qyzen forced-grouping (aka juggernuts (sp) points-for-doughnuts) for me. I am sooo glad I did not touch my original characters!! I augmented all of my companion gear sets when I prepped for the coming of KotFE, and so far, the new 208s are a wash when it comes to upgrade value, because all of my characters, including the new L65, do just fine with those old, augmented sets. Thank goodness for the appearance tabs!! My subscriptions lapse in mid-November; I will easily have everyone up to L65 by then. Then I will just wait until Bioware runs a new 'renewal' promotion, and see what is available for 'returning' subscribers. Until then, I can save my subscription allowance. I never thought I'd be back on Yavin so soon.

Qft ^^

Have you used the NO token?

Well, you can always quest without them; you'll soon see that they have some usefulness.

First, do the whole RotFE with the free level 60; do not do it with any of your original characters. This will prevent you from losing any companions on your original characters. Second, play that quest line out until your chosen end. I actually enjoyed the new story through Chapter 8, which was well worth the price I paid for it. Second, I did all of the starter quests for the Alliance reputation grind and left it at that. It is clear that these quests are why level syncing was created. You are probably going to spend a lot of time on the lower-level planets if you want to get that Alliance going. I did not do the PvP quest line for M1-4X on my new Sage, because I am not fond of Bioware's attempt to force me to do things I clearly don't like to do. Nor am I going to chase Qyzen's many tasks, because I am not fond of Bioware's attempt to force me to do things I do not want to do. I now have a L65 Sage, with several new companions (one companion is all you really need). I've got a bunch of new Legacy gear, some new mounts and three new trade professions at L500, and two pieces of level 208 gear. All of my original L60s have all of their companions and combat skills that remain in each class. I'll level the rest of them to 65 while my subscription lasts, and Yavin 4 is good for about a 60-to-61 level ding if you do the weekly along with the 8 regular dailies. I think the regular 8 dailies will get you about 3/4 of the way thru a level with level boosts. Do go back to your spaceship and finish out your companion story quest lines; it is worth a level in xp if you use an xp boost. Plus, it will remind you of what you've lost in your characters' personalities. Painless and pleasant, except for the companion quest lines.

He's busted for my Sage.

Okay, but my question is much simpler; for every PvP victory I achieve, I get some sort of tally or count toward a total number which gives me something as a reward, like you said, depending on the context. Is that correct?

When I achieve a PvP victory over another player, do i get, like, a kill achievement or something? Do the number of PvP victories result in an award of something?

...the list of which 500-level professions go with what free level 60 class. I am sorry if I missed the link; could someone direct me to it? I'd rather not roll a new character blindly.

What they said...

This is not completely correct; the game can auto-target a flagged player, even if you are fighting with an NPC, and you are flagged as a result. For instance, a flagged player can enter the zone of your AoE attack, and wait until the NPCs are dead. The game will auto-target it and "poof", you are flagged if your AoE cast isn't finished as soon as the NPCs die. Same result, just not willful on your part. Thanks to that clever "game enhancement", it took me two days, and over six hours in Catina, to clear the flag. Yeah, the PvP system works great on PvE servers. Oh, I know, just turn off the auto-target...that's helpful. I just love having to take so many precautions not to become another tally-mark on someone's PvP score-sheet, just because I want to play PvE. I know my chance of winning that contest is nil because I am not PvP equipped. This is something that Bioware has complete control over. And the fix is INCREDIBLY easy. But there is no way Bioware will implement it. Just more Bioware POS programming. "Bioware doesn't care"

My Agent had three wives: Kaliyo, Temple and Yana-Ton; no conflicts.

Excellent!

^^ Very nice spinoff! ^^

this is it, in a nutshell.

http://www.swtor.com/user/ce/8qvsq PAX http://www.swtor.com/user/ce/8qvsr NYCC

Where are we going with the new xPac? Well, I'm going to tell you in this brief exposé. I wrote an earlier post, trying to explain why I thought the changes in the companion's roles with the player character were going to so fundamentally shift the way the game plays. I gave some examples from other MMOs which have made similar, late life alterations, which resulted in either the collapse of the game altogether, or a severe drop in subscriber roles. I mean, that's all I can do, right, to draw parallels with similar gaming systems, like WoW and SWG, to try to make sense of where these upcoming alterations to the SWTOR game seem to be similar to its predecessors, in an effort to predict what results make occur in our beloved SWTOR, because of the similarities. Right? Of course that's so. I believe that the game will be better in some significant ways. The new story line, the one that involves having the player be held prisoner for so long that the companions simply drift away and have to be found and recruited back into the team that the player character heads up, that's novel, right? As if they would give you the time of day after five years; I mean come-on, who would? They wrote you off as dead, collected their inheritances; the last thing they want to do is give back all that junk they vendored off a long time ago. This is a very interesting spin, well, sort-of, better than some to follow, and one I think is a true return to the Bioware story-telling formula that they do so well, in this and other games that they have written. I am looking forward to it, with the reservation that there don't seem to be any significant variations in this story, with the main threads being divided along the classic Star Wars universe of Republic versus Empire. It appears from comments that I have read from the various developer threads that it will emerge a lot like the slight differences between these faction stories as they played out in the Rishi-Ziost-Yavin expansion that we know as the Shadow of Revan. Those stories grew old and stale as I worked to get my twelve characters all up to level sixty (yes, really, I actually leveled twelve characters to sixty; boring drudge, I know, just don't say so, don't hurt my feeling publicly, okay?) for the new expansion. I mean, if I never do another solo Manaan Flash Point, I won't be disappointed. But it was a real hoot seeing those levels fly by so fast! Yep, I have twelve level sixties, just chafing to be unfrozen and set after whomever the new bad guy (or gal, don't want to seem impolitic here {note I said 'seem'}). By the way, that was an excellent spin, too: I really enjoy being able to run through those Flash Points without a group; it was an easy way to get my characters a whole lot of XP without any more effort than to resist the sheer, unadulterated boredom of seeing the Flash Point over and over and over {repeat four times, to get twelve} again. It was, however, a veritable fount of leveling experience points, particularly when combined with a cheap, Cartel Market experience boost for a buff. I was shocked, too, see the huge numbers to be obtained as experience to complete one; the levels just flew by! If you don't believe me, then meet me between seven and seven thirty, nighttime, next Thursday, Austin time, under the rainbow on Yavin. You know where that is, am I right? Of course I am. You can do this, just squeeze your little brow tightly and think, Poo Bear, think! Maybe the Return of the Fallen Empire will have similar experience boosts, because we all know, that is what we are in this for: leveling just for the sheer joy of grinding out another level! I am excited to think what they may have in mind for us; it boggles the imagination! And some other stuff gets jostled around, too, but that is only slightly less important. I know that Bioware has some residual talent left, because some of their ideas seem to be okay, even though the large mass of them are simply dull, unimaginative rehashes of old stuff, wrapped in a somewhat tattered, grease-stained wrapper of "something new!", just like the cheap way they did the "performance enhancement" thing by taking features out of the graphical environment that actually made the game fun to play (like actually being able to see NPCs before you literally stumbled upon them), since we all know that reducing draw distance is a great way to "enhance performance". Lots of Laughter (LOL![tm]) for all around as funny, shocking, massacre after massacre, unleashed by invisible NPCs, unfolded without any regard to repair costs or fun! I think they also increased aggro distances, too, because nothing spells fun like getting tagged by a huge group of distant NPCs just as you are about to grab that last coffer away from the gold farmer! I'll be there with my friend Guss. You will enjoy this game if you had him for a friend, too. Now there is another way to draw the player in, literally! Watch the coffer disappear as the mobs descend upon you...almost as much fun as watching your companion make deliberate, wide swings into equally distant clusters of hostile creatures as you send them off to gather something for you, something that is found in a straight, unimpeded line directly away from your character. There is never a dull moment watching Bioware disruptive programming at its best. I mean, have you ever really watched your companion set off to get something for you? I mean, do they take their own sweet time, looking left and right before crossing the road, pausing at every doughnut shop along the way, just to make sure that they do not get the loot but do get the aggro? Then you have to go wrest their near-dead selves free from those bad guys, or do like I do: run away and let them fend for themselves. They deserve it, and I tell them so, loudly, and with a firm vigor that is undeniable. I can usually get far enough away to escape, however, before the now-bloodthirsty herd descends upon me, by quickly reaching their cute little 'evade' range. The cost of repairs just makes it more fun, since I have all the trash to sell to pay for it. But that is what this is all about, p(l)aying for trash. And do I love the moon-walking, blitz-transporting, "performance enhanced" NPCs! Now the matter of Level-Syncing, or, as I call it, the solution to a problem that didn't exist beforehand, but now does. I never cease to marvel. No, really, I don't. Sometimes, I even marvel at my own ability to unceasingly marvel, without stopping, I mean. This is an example of Bioware creating a game impediment just for the sheer, unadulterated pleasure of jerking the player base around some more, all for no reason at all. Just look at all the pandemonium it has already created, even before implementation. These guys, they do have a sense of humor, right? Right? Well, maybe not, since this game is obviously coded by a committee that never has one of those fun, we'll-work-through-lunch sessions, where some low-dollar cold-cut place caters the lunch by bringing lots of soggy, one-taste-suits-all so-called sandwiches, just like our soon-to-be companions, where they plan how best to make the game confusing and unpleasant for all. They avoid that age-old committee dilemma by a simple plan: just don't talk to each other, saving that difficult effort of coordinating their work to make a seamless, enjoyable game experience for their player base. Bring your humor. Bring your pride. More importantly, be the first to bring a balanced combatant's pauldrons, a mark ten augment kit and a mark ten power augment. Nope, it is helter-skelter all the way, kits and augments notwithstanding, as mass confusion and changes-for-the-sake-of-changes unrolls, just so everyone can contribute their quota of one million lines of code by Thursday. And that is next Thursday, coders and readers alike. Bioware wouldn't want these drudges to get any, you know, sleep or rest or anything, because clarity of thought would just mess thing up completely. Back to Level Syncing. Now there is a non-issue in search of a non-solution if ever I heard of one, because in all the time I've wasted reading the vitriol that passes for forum discussions on the Bioware website (the one you are so graciously perusing even as you read through this endless drivel of mine) have I ever heard anyone, ever, complain about those mean upper-level bad guys ruining the poor, lower-level retreads’ funs and games. However, if you think about it, and I have, saving you the trouble, what better way to satisfy that coding quota problem? Here is the solution: think of a clever title, like Level Syncing, or better still, the infamous No Child Left Behind, and run with it. In that way, you really appear to be a good guy (or gal, /sigh), with everyone’s' best interests at heart, when you, in fact don't have one. A heart, I mean. The first player who opens a trade window, with those three items in it, gets one mike mike credits. And that is a whole lot, much more than the paltry amount for the shopping list. Number two to correctly and completely open up, and you know what that means, you left-handed kinda person, gets three-quarters of the number one's take. That's still a lot, and mostly just for the fun of reading all this stupid drivel. Think of the satisfaction of puzzle solving with so very, very little in the way of clues to actually, like, go on? You will be so proud to play this out, I am sure it will be a testament to your sleuthing acumen. If you make up a great-sounding title, like Level Syncing or Puzzle Solving, well, you just have to be important and everything. So whatever cheesy idea you actually appendage to that awesome label, it's bound to be great. It really doesn't have to have any logical connection at all. After all whoever created the saying, 'black is white', knew what I'm talking about. Right? Of course I'm right, don't be silly. If I were wrong, I'd stop now and spare you further humorless content. Maybe Bioware is hiring? I mean, I seem to have their whole je ne sais quoi down pat. I bet I could do some real harm in creative. Put in a good word for me, please. Come on, some has to. This whole, dull cacophony is creative, am I right? Well, just look at it! Of course it is; of course I am. Please, Bioware, feel free to call; you have my number, literally and figuratively; I'll be "waiting until three" ; I love semi-colons (can you tell?). Brackets, too, are my thing of art. Now lettuce turn to the consideration of the change to the companion credentials, for lack of a better term. I think that is the right way to put it, since this idea, which is wholly unsupported by any socially redeeming values, is a totally unnecessary change to the game system, making nonsense of the very concept that Bioware is touting all along so loudly "Players’ Choice Matters!" , that is, if you think having total control over how your character is set-up, or rather put, specified in statistics, is less valuable than being able to choose from one of three cookie-cutter templates, then I guess you are all on-board with this insipid idea. I am not on-board with it. I am so not-on-board with it that I would, if I could, send it and the guy (or gal /sigh) that thought of it over board with it, so they could sit in the ever-so-shallow waters of any SWTOR world, seeping in the greatness of a really lousy idea. Don't spoil my rant by trying to make sense of it. If you spoil this really great, awesome opportunity by making a comment about it in the forums, the deal is off. You have been warned. But some people just don't listen, and they will subscribe anyway. They will spoil things for everyone. At least, Bioware hopes so. I hope not, though. I mean, who wouldn't want to have that deal? Or any other really good offer like it, for that matter. So enjoy your babies while they still bask in the greatness of your own, special, hand-picked copy of Bioware's companion 192 sets of gear, where "Players’ Choice Matters!" and you get to make them your very own by the all-important choice of which dye module you will waste on which 192 set; fortunately, I have a dye-module-maker, so that is easy for me: I can have anyone I want. Or any other one I care to buy on the infamous "Cartel Market" (for once, they chose a meaningful name for something!!) It hardly matters, though, since some of them are so incredibly ugly that I cannot imagine that anyone put any effort in to them at all (I'm looking at you {actually, trying to avoid looking if possible} Willpower set for the Horde [oops, I meant the Empire!] Silly, silly me!), much less waste a dye module on them, you know, the ones you cannot extract after inserting? That whole ‘bound’ thing sounds a little perverted to me. I also like brackets within brackets, just to make your head hurt trying to figure out just what goes with what. See? I told you have coder talent!! If you can sort this out, it will be very rewarding, I'm sure. Where was I? Oh, yes, where are we going with KotFE? Well, if my analysis, the sheer brilliance of which surely impresses you by now, is anywhere near to be right (and I sincerely doubt that it is), then I think we are headed for a success story that will rival the overall magnificence of Sony's NGE in both power to dissuade and ability to bring to tears even the most jaded SWTOR player. Plus, we still get to be Jedi, even if it is only window dressing. Our companions get to be Jedi, too. Wait. That wasn't one of the choices. I guess: Companion Choices Don't Matter!" should officially be attributed to me, now. I hereby trademark it, unless someone else beat me to it, or unless it is illegal in the jurisdiction where I may be found. Or not.

^ What he said, please ^

This happens frequently on Yavin when someone else starts the "download data" daily quest and my character happens to be close to their start point; Bioware's programming error allows their dialogue to "bleed-over."

.....

First, a short prequel: the new SWTOR expansion, Knights of the Fallen Empire, is as substantial and sweeping in character as the New Game Experience of SWTOR's predecessor in the Star Wars universe's MMO, the now-defunct Star Wars Galaxies. That is not to say that KotFE will meet the same fate as did the NGE of SWG, but in quality and scope, the paradigm shift is just as sweeping. That said, the changes are so fundamental that only now, after many leaks and comments here and there by Bioware, are players beginning to grasp the scope of this new game system. It isn't just more class content story to be told; the whole center point of the former SWTOR revolved around character interaction with companions and the class stories that evolved as the various character classes progressed. Everything else was just side-quest padding to make the leveling happen, as we can now see, in the approximate ratio of 11 non-class quests to each class quest, hence the 12 times XP acceleration that was offered. SWTOR is changing so fundamentally that now it might be a good time to reflect on what is about to leave versus what is coming, because if players enjoy certain aspects of the game, then now is the time to do them, for as sure as the release of KotFE is coming, these activities are leaving. Companions are about to be homogenized in a way not heretofore seen. Each companion's idiosyncratic behavior, as an actor in-game, is about to be slotted into the three-way mix of tank-dps-healer choices that will be offered to us, eliminating player impact or input on how those individualistic traits play-out in game. First, however, I must interject an example of where this has already happened to another MMO. Consider some of WoW's more famous (for a while, anyway) pet predecessors for the Hunter class, a couple of tame-able NPCs called "The Rake" and old "Broken Tooth", feral cats whose tamed characteristics were much prized by observant Hunter-class players, especially those who loved PvP, for these cats, when tamed, still retained some of the characteristics of their wild cousins, namely an attack speed that was so rapid (striking more frequently than once-per-second) that PvP player opponents, like Mages who relied on casting spells, could never get them released, so fast did these player-tamed pets strike and interrupt them. It was not an exploit; it was simply player ingenuity that discovered and utilized these pets to do more than the average tamed pet could do. However, Blizzard, in its wisdom, homogenized pet characteristics, and the value of old "Broken Tooth" and "The Rake" disappeared completely, along with the fun of finding and taming them. So what does that have to do with KotFE? It can be spoken of freely now, since the little secret is probably going to be of no further importance once the KotFE changes hit the game system. The ship's droid is not like any other SWTOR companion. It is as close to its famous cousins in WoW, in present SWTOR, as companions in SWTOR can be. For those of you who play the ship's droid as a healer will know, it has amazing resiliency and strong tanking aggro engagement, all the while being the best-in-class of all healer companions, Treek included. A well-equipped ship's droid loses so little health in combat that it is almost a non-issue. I have only seen the little droid die twice, and that occurred when, in my haste to employ it, that I forgot to give it any equipment at all. Keep it pistol-free and be amazed as the little war machine runs up to an NPC, punching away with its unarmed attacks, holding aggro, all the while a stream of luscious green healing goodness keeps the player's health bar full to brimming. Give him a pistol, and it just gets hilarious, watching him grab aggro on NPCs away from established tank players, and killing the aggroed NPC with pistol shots. Before KotFE was announced, I equipped him with the defensive set of droid gear from Yavin, bulked it up with power augments, and let the chatty little droid do its thing. Wonderful stuff. You can also turn-off the healer aspect, equip it with aggressive droid gear, augmented, also from Yavin, and have a fighting companion who also manages to keep you very healthy, thank you very much! Don't believe me? Then you haven't played the little machine. And you have very little time left to do so, for I doubt very much that he will survive the Great Leveling of companions that Bioware is about to foist off on the game. Of course, I would love to be wrong, and I hope I am, but I doubt it. As Janis Joplin sang, "Get it while you can..."! I am hoping-against-hope that Bioware gets it right. Either way, win or lose, I really am going to miss my secret weapon.