That is ridiculous. I've said before look at Dark Age of Camelot. They banned over 10,000 accounts in one swing back in 2003 before Mythic sold to EA. People were using a radar program in the PvP area that showed where all players were in the PvP zone. It was a HUGE deal because in that game there were Keeps to take and relics and towers. It was VERY easy to defend something if you can see where everybody is going before they get there. EA finally shut down their DAoC servers last year. It lasted another 10 years after they did that mass banning. And it wasnt as popular as SWTOR. I think SWTOR will survive and wont be sunk. You can actually still play DAOK, somebody opened up some servers somewhere. You still ave to sub for it tho. I dont recall where. But that game is still kicking.

Its only been one week...... I'm assuming with how people were saying that "everybody is doing it" that there are a lot more than Eric let on in the O.P. of this thread. I'm assuming that theres a solid ton of data they are parsing through and probably wont swing the hammer until the list is fully compiled and reviewed to make sure 100% that there is no possible way for somebody to claim that they didnt do it, when in fact they did.

As of February 22nd 2012 this is no longer possible. Patch 1.1.4 released 2/22/2012 http://www.swtor.com/patchnotes/1.1.4/2222012 I invite ANYBODY and EVERYBODY who claims otherwise to meet me in any non PvP area of your choosing, flag yourself as PvP and run around inside my AoE until you manage to flag me for PvP. If you DO NOT manage to flag me for PvP then you agree to pay me 1 million credits after you finally decide to give up and finally see that indeed that you have no idea what you are talking about. Anybody at all. In fact assuming you already put in a bug report and the report is closed, I will PAY you 1 million credits SHOULD you get me to flag for PvP by you running around in my AoE. The ONLY way you can get somebody to flag for PvP is if THEY TARGET YOU while they are AoEing. The ONLY WAY somebody can get you to flag for PvP is if YOU target THEM WHILE YOU ARE AoEing.. It has been whined about since close beta. They fixed it 2 months after launch. It hasnt been done for almost THREE YEARS NOW. Anybody whining about it is one of 2 things. Has no idea what they are talking about, or has a bugged account.

I dont think they have a spam filter tbh. I;ve seen lots of websites listed in chat. Not all from gold farmers, but still. Every single time I load into fleet I have 3-5 new peopel I have to put on ignore. I laod in and IMMEDIATELY my chat window is filled up with spammers. Litterally within seconds of getting there I have at least 3 new people to put on ignore and report. And the in game personal mails has been getting worse and worse. I'm not getting 2-3 every day when I log in. Why cant we just have an auto ignore feature? Allow us to make our own filter as to what we automatically ignore so a) we dont ever have to see it, 2) we dont eveer have to deal with it and 3) they automatically get reported. In theory how its supposed to work is if theres enough reports of a spammer in a short enough time period then that spammer receives a 24 hour suspension for their first offense, a 14 day suspension for their second and a permanent ban for their third offense. I know that this isnt true because not only of how many people say they report the same person as I did, but whenever I create a new character I see the same names as I did 2 years ago when I put them on ignore on my other toon(s). And they are spamming every 2 minutes or less. You can see the time stamps that those accounts are being macro'd to spam. So they are breaking many RoC and ToS agreements. Yet, there they stay.

To each his own and all that, but me personally I just dont get this. To me, the point of an Ops isnt to farm it, its to play if and have fun with it. Even the easy old school Ops can be made fun. To me its about playing the game and having fun with friends. I dont care if I'm the last one in my raid team to get geared out (which I usually am because the RNG LOATHES me when it comes to gear but is my best friend when it comes to decorations or mats). If my raid team starts to feel the burn out, then we'll do an old ops. If its too easy, we'll change it up. make it a drinking game. Like have the DPS parsing and make it a DPS race. They highest DPS to NOT pull aggro wins and the rest take a shot. Or make it so the heals and tanks have to DPS in their heal and tank stances and gear and the DPS have to heal and tank. Makes things a bit tricky and everybody usually ends up laughing at each other and having fun. Watching a sniper try to tank is kinda funny. I'm just saying, farming is boring as crap to me. Just play for fun, the comms will come if thats what you want. To me the point isnt to get fully geared out, because...then what? You have all the highest level everything and can farm the latest mode of the latest ops...then what? To me its about playing and having fun, not racing to see who gets "done" the fastest. But again, to each his own. I just dont get it.

Yeah, I was gonna say I personally only know of 8 or 10 people (out of our 150+ individual accounts in our guild alone) that have ever used any exploit. Only about 3 or 4 that used the Ravagers one.

You misunderstand. The "good little care bears", "witch hunters", "torch and pitchfork mob" and etc people arent looking to see WHO got punished. Merely THAT somebody was punished. Its easy to say, "We'll handled effected accounts accordingly" and then do nothing at all. Companies lose face and customers lose faith when that happens. And it happens quite often specially with EA. Many people already lost faith in this company and this little event is making them perk their ears and they are watching for any kind of notification that action has actually been taken so they can restore some of their faith in the company. Its not about WHO, its about IF. People dont want to play with scammers and cheaters. Plain and simple. They make the game not fun. If the game isnt fun, whats the point in playing it? We want to see that people have been punished for making the game not fun. We want to see that this company will not tolerate abuse. We want to see that this company has integrity. I personally think its dumb but many people (my friends included) wont ever play any EA related game ever. No matter how fun it actually is because they've been burnt by EA time and time again. Some people are watching and waiting to see if they get burnt again. I dont give 2 craps who did it. But I do care that they actually punish people for rampantly breaking the rules. If they dont, then why have any rules in the first place? All I care about is integrity. Do they actually care about their own product enough to deal with situations like this.

Thats kinda my problem tho. A few days max. Which means most people wont even know they are banned at all. They'll probably just find out one day reading their email that at some point they were banned while they were at work. pfft. so what. Thats not even a slap on the wrist. If I could rob a bank and then find out later in an email that I served a suspended jail time while I was on vacation using up all that stolen money, I'd probably do it in a hearty beat (ok no I wouldnt, but the point is there). I think the punishments should be something like those that used it twice get a warning. There should be a 2 week minimum suspension for those that used the exploit 3 times. 4 times then a 4 week suspension. 5 times then a 8 week suspension. 6 times or more banned. The entire point of a suspension or ban is as a punishment. And of course a punishment is something to teach a lesson and to deter that action from being taken again. What good is a punishment if its so short or mild you dont even know you received it?

You had a pretty big difference in WoW than I had. I remember all kinds of bugs that lasted months and months. Many times the queues were broken so I;d sit there 30th in line to log in but my gf right next to me logged in just fine after I got into queue. They had tons of bugs that lasted very long times. But I only played it for 6 years before I stopped so maybe they got everything fixed after I left. I didnt say you dont have a right to complain, all I said was you need to be realistic. I;ve only played a few MMOs and only been playing MMOs since 2001. But in Dark Age of Camelot, World of Warcraft, Warhammer Online, Aion Online, Eve Online and World War II Online, this game has been abo****rely no different. I;ve been in this game since closed beta and when people ask me about the game if its any different and my answer is no. Its an MMO. There are DPS classes, tank classes and healing classes. There are ranged classes and meleee classes. There are casters and there are sword users. There are bugs and the community is chalk full of people who constantly make threats about unsubbing and it being the worst game they ever played, yet still log in for 6 hours a day 7 days a week. This game is absolutely no different than any other MMO that I've ever played. The only difference is graphics, fluff (armor designs, houses, mounts, etc) and storylines. And that this is a more interactive game when it comes to missions. But its still and MMO, just like any other. They arent reinventing the wheel, just making it look different, just like any other MMO after whatever the very first MMO ever was. Why do I play SWTOR instead of any other MMO? Because of my friends in game here, I like the storylines and I just cant get back into having to read my missions. I like them being played for me in cut scenes. I tried to go back to WoW for free with a resurrection scroll an old friend gave me, but I just cant get into the quests. Too much reading (he says after typing a long response for people to read).

I dont check this everyday so sorry for the 30+ page late response. What you said there is completely false in every way. I have seen MANY MMOs ban thousands upon thousands of accounts in one big swing and those games lasted almost 20 years. One in memory specifically is Dark Age of Camelot. There was a program people were using in the PvP area to see where everybody else in the zone was. I believe it was called radar. It ran rampant. People thought that since it was so wide spread that that Mythic might as well just adapt it and put it into the game. Instead they swung their ban hammer over the course of 3 weeks and 10s of thousands of accounts got banned. That was in 2002 or 2003, the game just finally closed down its servers in 2013. They lasted another 10 years after banning almost half their subscriber base. So this entire so many did it so the game will **** down if we punish them debate completely false and has been proven to the contrary. They stuck with their integrity and said they didnt want their game to be controlled by the exploiters and cheaters. That they would control their game (they sold to EA and EA ruined the game by catering to the whiners and cheaters many years later). They did it and it worked. WoW also went through a massive banning period. I do not recall why, but I remember a big to do about a lot of bans being handed out at once. I believe Aion did also. Banning the cheaters will only help improve the game, not hurt it. They make their statement to those of us with integrity that they will continue to put their best effort in providing a service to us that will not be compromised nor controlled by people who abuse and cheat the system. I'm fairly certain with as many instances as I see on some planets that they have more than enough of a player base that they too can ban a huge number of people and barely even notice it on their bottom line. Most of their money is made from Cartel Coins anyway and I would wager that the people who exploit, are probably not the ones that spend as much money in the cartel market as the people who do not exploit. Because if they could just exploit to get what they wanted, they wouldnt pay money for it. As for your argument that it effects no one. How can you be so completely naive? It didnt effect the crafters who didnt use the exploit and didnt have to raid all the time to get the tokens to turn in to get the gear to reverse engineer to learn the schematics? I bet there are A TON of crafters whos economy was crushed by exploiters getting all the free gear they want to learn the schematic. How about those people who PUG that now cant get into Ops because the exploiters who are now fully geared get in ahead of them because of the gearing alone? They arent effected? You're "NO ONE" has just turned into 10s of thousands of players. So I guarantee you that not only do I keep my job, but I also get a kudos for making the company look better. You may call it idealism, but I call it integrity and reality. The reality of it is those people accepted an agreement and signed their name to follow the rules of that agreement. They broke the rules so the agreement is null and void and they should no longer get the privilege of using this service. Every compnay has the right to refuse service, specially when people violate their terms. Go to a restraunt and start bench pressing the tables and chairs. See if they decide to change it up so that thats what they do. Or do you think you'd get kicked out? Integrity is not only about following the rules, specially the rules that you agreed to follow, but also about making decisions that dont effect others negatively.. And yes, see my points above as to how this effected many people. I see it on fleet every day people spamming LFM for "X" ops here, best geared responder gets spot. Now the people that didnt exploit lose a chance to run because somebody has no integrity and didnt care how it effected others. You may not think your speeding or passing multiple cars in a single lane road will effect anybody else, until you cause an accident. People never think their actions effect anybody else because all they care about is what they get out of what their actions are. Theres a lot more people to have been negatively effected by this exploit than most know.

I say this to everybody that complains about bugs and them being "game breaking but not fixed for months on end". NOBODY is holding a gun to your head forcing you to pay your hard earned money to play this game. This game you can even play for free. But if you still dont like it SO much, I invite you to go play ANY OTHER MMO EVER. Best of luck finding one with no bugs or one where bugs get fixed within hours. In other words, if you dont like it I'd suggest you stop gaming and go outside and find something productive to do. Because what you want in an MMO and what is available arent going to match up....ever.

What on earth are you guys dong to NOT get a response from CS? I have had many emails back and forth with CS on a few different situations. In all of last year tho I only have 6 tickets. 4 are from gold sellers spamming me with their in game mail sales pitches. 1 was about the Ravagers bug where whats her name would go to the escape pod and shoot it instead of actually leaving and the other was about the GF bug where we didnt get our 30 Ultimate coms. Since they dont talk about bugs that you report (unless they need more information) I only have the 1 report that merits an actual response. Guess what? They responded. If I didnt delete my emails as soon as the issues were fixed I;d have a bunch to show, but unfortunately all I have is this one. I got an actual response from an actual CS who did actual work and actually reviewed the issue and actually resolved the issue and actually gave me what I was missing. And not only that, but got it within 2 days. http://i270.photobucket.com/albums/jj89/deez11010/SWTORCSResponse_zpsafcf7df9.jpg

If you dont know about it, dont worry about it imo. I never care to know what bugs or exploits there are. If I encounter one I put in the ticket and leave it at that. If I;m in a raid and I see somebody about to accidentally (or purposefully) do the activity that causes the bug or exploit, I tell them "dont do that or it bugs out" and leave it at that. I honestly hope all abusers of this exploit get banned. I really do. Which is unfortunate because I would lose a couple friends from my raid team and many of my guild mates. But plain and simple, it was in both the Terms of Service and Rules of Conduct that we agreed to when we first subscribed to the game. Unknowingly doing it once I have no problems with. Heck, I dont even have a problem if somebody did it a second time either 1) not realizing what they did or 2) trying to duplicate it for a better idea of what to put down in the bug report. The second one I have a little reservation for but I can at least see the logic of trying to help with as much information as possible to help fix it faster. I dont care if somebody gets fully geared out. I do care about crafters learning the schematics but only because it can really ruin the economy for those pieces and many people sell credits for real cash so they're breaking multiple rules. But what I care about the most about this exploit is integrity. People dont care how their actions effect others. To some, this does effect them because now they have less chances to get into raid groups because they didnt cheat and get fully geared so theres fewer spots open because of all the people that are looking for somebody to fill their last raid spot wants the fully geared person. It effect PUGs tremendously. But thats why I feel the exploiters should receive a lengthy suspension to a permanent ban. Because they dont care how their actions effect others. They dont care that they are wasting other peoples time and money so long as they get what they want. Thats where my issue is. People are all about getting what they want and dong give a crap about anybody else. They ahve no integrity. These people need to be taught a lesson. Whether or not they learn from it is a different story. Any parent can tell you, it doesnt mater how many times you tell your child or punish your child, if they REALLY want to do something, they're going to do it. And this stupid, "if I get banned, I'm never coming back" threat is the DUMBEST thing I've ever heard. Guess what? Being banned means you arent allowed back, so yeah...you wont be coming back if you get banned. They need to be taught the lesson that other people matter. If they choose not to listen, thats on them and tells you exactly what type of person they are. And if they are that type of person, maybe you're better off without them.

This is the dumbest thing I've ever read and you FULLY have no idea of what you are talking about. People get pulled over all the time even though there are other cars going as fast or faster. How many times have you seen on COPS or another show like that where theres somebody getting pulled over and them saying "What about that other guy who passed me?" or "what about the other 5 thousand people driving the same speed as I was?'. Just because everybody else is doing it does NOT make it ok to do. Also theres safety factors when talking about speeding or impeding traffic. Rules in a video game are not safety issues so they should be followed 100% of the time because theres no "gray" area. About these... Do you never exceed the speed limit? No, never. Always come to a full stop at a stop sign? Yes always. Never change lanes without signalling. No, not ever. Never jaywalk? No. Some of those I did do when I was younger (mainly speeding) but as I got older (past the age of 24) I realized that going 65 in a 55 doesnt actually get me to my destination any faster due to traffic, traffic signals and signs. I always have to laugh when I see somebody blow by me and then 5 minutes later I see them again waiting in traffic or at a stop light. If it saves any time at all, we're talking less than 5 minutes total. And seriously, are you going to get fired over 5 minutes? No. Will your Dr kick you out and not see you because of 5 minutes? No. The ONLY time when 5 minutes actually matters is in life and death situations and then it is acceptable to break many laws to try and save a life (though usually its best if you can leave that to emergency personnel who are trained for it). Or do you break those rules sometimes because you figure you won't be punished for it? Thats NOT why p[people break ANY of the rules you used as your examples. People speed because they think it will get them someplace faster, even though it wont. People dont come to a complete stop at a stop sign because either they are in a hurry or because the cross traffic is clear. People dont use their signals because either its broken, they're driving with one hand a with the other occupied, or simply forget. People jaywalk because they are in a hurry, or are too lazy to walk to the corner. NOBODY breaks the law simply because they think they wont get caught. Not even shop lifters. They break the law because they want something. Nobody does it for the sole purpose of thinking they wont get caught. They may think they wont get caught, but they're breaking the law for a different reason. There are NO arguments that can be made to break any rules that you completely agree to before you take part in the activity the rules are in regards to. You agreed to it, you follow it. Laws are different because you may not agree with them. You dont sign your name and say "I agree to these terms and conditions" with laws like you did when you subbed for this game.

repost myself from CS forum (put it in the wrong spot, my bad) http://www.swtor.com/community/showthread.php?p=7892033#post7892033 Ok, so we followed Dulfy and whatnot. Was our first time in the Op. When we very first got to the Coratanni/Pearl encounter there was no door for 7 of us. We simply went into the room and walked down the ramp. We only knew there was a door because the one person actually had a door to click on and to see the cut scene. When we started the fight we used the tactic to burn Pearl down to 10% health and then burn Coratanni down to make her leave. According to Dulfy, Coratanni is supposed to leave at 18-19%. She stayed there until 5-6%. Then she jumped to the escape pod and turned immune. But there she just stood shooting up the escape pod. Burning down Pearl made an immune Coratanni enrage and she would stop shooting the escape pod and then turn and basically wipe us out, all the while being immune. The cannons never even spawned. The second time we went in the door finally spawned for the rest of the raid, but we still had the same issues over and over. The turrets wouldnt spawn until Coratanni was at 6% and she wouldnt head to the escape pod until 6% every time. But every single time she would just stand there and shoot the pod. We tried it several different ways. We tried not killing Pearl and giving Coratanni more time at the pod, but Pearl just enrages and then starts to wipe us. Tried burning them at the same time but what happened then was they both enraged at 6% health. Basically once Coratanni goes immune, the encounter is over. We cant get her to go into the pod and leave. She just shoots it until she enrages and then turns on us.

Well, your rebuttal was that we could go to those places and donate already. So naturally I assumed you missed my point of not having to go to those places. Otherwise you would have no rebuttal nor reason to not allow such a feature. A simple, "I dont like it just because" would have sufficed in your case. You said why not, and I said why. Welcome to the suggestions forum where if you give a reason against, somebody else will give a reason for and vice versa.

I think the problem is people dont understand what the actual meaning of "fair" is. To them, it doesnt matter who is in group nor their reason why they want an item. Its simply, "I need this more so I should win it" attitude that people for some reason think is what "fair" means. Equal chance at winning an item that dropped from a fight they took part in. Thats fair. Just because in your eyes you need it more, doesnt mean that its not fair. I dont care if they are fully geared with 10 bajillion credits and you just dinged 55 with 10 credits. They took part in the fight. They have an equal right to get the gear. If you disagree, then only group with people with the same gearing and credits that you have.

I dont do this myself, but why is it not OK for somebody to need it to sell it? Maybe they need credits badly so they can pay a crafter for their enhancement or barrel or hilt? I simply dont understand how anybody could think that a RNG is unfair in anyway. Everybody has the same exact chance to win an item. There is no more fair way than that. Thats the ultimate fair wat to do loot. Everybody has equal chance to win it for whatever reason they want it. They were there too, why do they not have a right to it? Simply because they may play the game differently that others? Again,t he system is fine. I greed on things I dont really care about and would just sell. If somebody is desperate for credits, I dont care if they need on it to sell it for credits. I dont really need the credits. But maybe they do. Maybe they cant raid to get gear. Maybe they dont have time to farm dailies. Maybe selling on the gtn is the only way they can gear up and earn credits. It is impossible for the system to be more fair that everybody in group has an equal chance to win. Let it be imo. We start screwing with things that are fair just to make it unfair so people can feel better about themselves winning items or losing items, the the game will get ruined in a hurry. Look at Diablo III. They tried that, crashed the AH system and ruined it completely.

My guess is you mssed the point where I said I dont want to HAVE to travel to those places. Sure its just a click away.....and a long loading time....then a click away......and a long loading time for me to get back to playing the game. And as I've said several times, if you dont want to then you dont have to. Hence the word "voluntary". You dont have to change the %'s. If you want to leave it alone, leave it alone. If you want to change it, change it. and to all those assuming guild will "force" this voluntary tax and it will ruin the game, how do you think the game is now? Those guilds that would force people to use this voluntary tax, are the same guilds that already force their members to donate, or to pvp, or to raid 4 times a week, etc. This isnt going to change all the other guilds who have no requirement to all of a sudden say, "yeah, lets make that a requirement now!" if they dont currently require you to donate, then this will effect guild ownership in no way. Simply dont add a feature to see who is donating. Its not that hard to NOT do something. Same with if you dont like it. Simply, dont do it and your problem is solved. I honestly dont understand why people will think all of a sudden this will make guilds go crazy and force people to run naked through the woods with rabid wolves on their tail. I simply just dont get it. All this does is add an element to allow me to donate, without me being force to load somewhere to, click the bank, click the dontate, enter the amount and then load somewhere else (yes its not difficult to click, I was simply showing how many actions there are every single time you want to donate, vs the initial 2-3 actions required to set the auto donate. You set this once, and you're done. You dont have to do it once a week like you would now. Or once a day, or once a month. Its one time only, and you;re done. You dont have to load somewhere and then load somewhere else. How many people in game complain about loading times? About 90%. This would illimante 2 of their loading times per time they want to donate. And, the nifty part, we also can still go to the ship, fleet, SH and donate there too. If you want to do a lump some, there ya go. If you want it to do it automatically on a %'s base, there ya go. I honestly dont understand the negativity towards this. The worry about GMs exploiting their members shouldnt be there because those that have the desire to exploit their members, already do since people can already donate to the guild. This simply eliminates the loading and lets me not worry about if I donated this month to help out or not (as pointed out, going through 400 accounts to see hwo donated is time consuming). And again, is voluntary.

Elitist guilds will be the same no matter the tools at their exposal. Currently some guilds require you to have a certain level of gear. Require you to log in so many days a week to raid. Require you to PvP so many times a week. Some guilds already force you to donate just to be in their guild. Those guilds are already there without this feature and most guilds who not not do those things, also wouldnt force this feature. Like I said, I understand why there isnt one for a guild to set for its members. But I honestly feel that if people want to donate, that they can have a tool to do that without having to go to fleet, or guild ship or house or personal ship to do it. Personally I;d rather it goes to the guild on its own while I simply play the game without forcing me to go somewhere to do it. I dont see how having this tool would change it for those guilds who do not already have a requirement to be in their guild. Those guilds that do have the requirement, well. thats on those people who want to be in those guilds and are ok with those requirements anyway.

How about you read what I said instead of blindly disagreeing. The word VOLUNTARY is the first word in the title. And said repeatedly in my post. And said that this isnt guild controlled, but you control it for your players that you want yourself.

Which is why I said you can set it for whatever % you want. And can change it. You want to do more this week, set it high. You want to do less, set it lower. You dont want to at all, turn it off. This is per character and player controlled, not guild controlled. I dont get why people come on these forums and start arguing against something without actually reading the post.

So, neither of you actually read what I said. Its even in the title. VOLUNTARY guild tax I set it myself on the characters I want to donate with. If you dont want to, then dont set it to do it.

So yeah. Once again, who's illiterate? I've already said how I do my looting. Which, if you had any reading comprehension at all could understand that what you just posted is basically just either trolling, or trying to do some type of defamation of character (although if you were to actually re -read this thread you would realize that you look like an idiot and a whiner). I suggest you go back and re-read this entire thread. Each post in its fullest. And not just re-read it. But try to understand the replies. Try to comprehend whats being said. Try reading it without bias and whining. Try to read it with an open mind that....you arent the only person who plays this game and your way of playing isnt the only one and that other like myself use the loot rules how they are designed. I almost never need on anything at all. I cant even remember the last time I needed on gear. I'll need on mats or other items that I can use and dont have. Which is HOW IT WAS DESIGNED. But no, lets make it so only uyou can win what you want and other people cannot play how they want. I mean, you pay for their subs right? Which means they HAVE to play the way you do right? I know, better yet. Lets just take all loot out of the game. That way, NOBODY can win anything right? Get real. Grow up. Use the loot rules how its supposed to be, or start forming your own groups and master loot it and take everything since clearly thats the only way its fair in your mind.

Oh, so those people who play the game to sell everything they win cant play that way? Whos self righteous here? For the 10th time, everybody plays the game differently than you. Simply because you dont feel they need it, does not mean that they dont need it. Why dont you try to read instead of preach.