Well, it looks like we will be Ebon Hawk bound as well. How is the RP scene? Going to be a pain because most of our names are already taken which is going to destroy our characters and their carefully crafted stories...but I guess there isn't anything to be done about that. It is what it is...

Actually, Ebon Hawk is the largest US RP-PvE server based on sheer numbers. My guild is on Sanctum of the Exalted and we have a very active RP community. And don't listen to the nay-sayers. RP is what keeps you going between the content updates.

This is precisely the sort of content that SWTOR needs more of. Their hadn't been this much activity on the servers since launch. I hope that events like these will become more common place, as in at least once a month. Not only do these events provide additional content for players to participate in, but they help to advance the overall story of SWTOR. I have always felt that SWTOR presents a great opportunity for BW to create more of episodic element to MMOs, much like a TV show. The way I see it is that these events could be chained together to create "seasons" so to speak. Each season would be based on a self-contained plot that may (or may not) tie into other facets of SWTOR's story. So for instance, this "season" would be about the Rakghoul plague and depict how it spreads from planet to planet with each subsequent event being set on a new planet (or planets). As the "season" progresses, it is slowly revealed how the Rakghoul plague came about and how is responsible for spreading it. The final "episode" could be a flash point style encounter where players can confront the source/mastermind behind the plague (if there is one). Also, it would be interesting to add competitive elements. Some players will want to stop the plague while others might perhaps want to spread it for their own twisted reasons. It would be great if there was a way to introduce a metric that could track spread vs. containment game wide (server wide would be cool, but might make things too challenging) and then some sort of repercussion occrus based on this (like, during the final few days of the event a particular series of quests kick off). This could lead to some interesting situations where players might find that they are now at odds with other players from their own faction or maybe even their own guild. Now that would be some REALLY interesting drama. As for events in general, I think keeping an element of surprise is definitely the way to go. Maybe a little bit of "hint dropping" would be useful (like was done by pre-loading vendors with the vaccine), but I don't think there should be a need to always say "event x will begin on day y" as one of the factors that made this first event so much fun is that it was unexpected. Adding mystery to the game is always appreciated. So, to sum it up, I would like to see more of these sorts of events more frequently. To be honest, THIS is precisely the reason many of us got into MMOs to begin with. For us the promise of MMOs was that it would allow for a gaming experience where there was always something new and you never ran out of things to do. The whole point of us paying our $15 s month is to fund the continuous addition of new content and an ever-changing game world. But as we have seen time and time again, the vast majority of MMOs have fallen completely flat on this promise which causes us to get bored and just move on to the next one that will only hold our interest for a further 30-days. I am hoping that SWTOR can be an exception to this and give us the MMO experience that many of us want. If anything, the raw numbers from the shear amount of player activity that occurred during this event should be a clear indicator that this is a direction that BW needs to pursue.

Having some legacy unlocks be influenced by the relationship between characters

Loading times in TOR are not a function of the client having it load resources from the server. Those resources are already present on your HDD. The reason it takes so long to load certain planets is because they are very large. This is why there is no loading screens once you are on the planet (unless you jump from one end to the other via QT or holocom). Even transitioning into an instanced section of the game (the green "doors") does not cause any loading. This is also why loading up your ship or the station goes much faster. Less assets to have to load from the HDD. As for general graphical performance, it would seem that SWTOR is rather taxing on the GPU despite not having "high end" graphics. This could be due to the density of objects that are rendered on a screen at once... particularly other player models. Patch 1.2 proved that further optimization could improve TOR's overall performance, so perhaps there is still more tweaking to come.

In my opinion, the foundation has been set. BW accomplished what they wanted to do originally which was make a compelling leveling experience with a story (if you didn't like that, then the story probably wasn't for you...that's going to be a matter of personal preference). Now that the base has been established, they only need to build up on that. I think we can see they are going in the right direction. If they can do these world events like the Rakghoul plague every month or even every two weeks (that might be asking too much), this will be an amazing MMO. Something tells me that Tatooine is only the beginning and we will see Rakghouls spread far and wide across the galaxy. I have a feeling that this will be the "story" of TOR for the next sixth months to a year. And that right there is what WB needs to do...they did to be consistent with an overall "story" for the game that ties into events and chains off of content previously delivered. If they can do that, then they can maintain that "forth pillar" of the MMORPG genre that they are seeking to accomplish. The thing is, those of us who were here from day one will always be ahead of the content curve. We played the heck out of the game during the first few weeks it launch and we will do the same every time new content drops. This is true for the starting population of every MMO. Once an MMO matures, new players will come to it, and they will be at par with or behind the content curve. They are the lucky ones...

Don't know about TOR specifically, but video game sales in general have decreased significantly. It's party due to the general decline of the world economy and the continued diversification of entertainment. Many more people are spending their time on smartphones or just not playing video games at all...i.e. surfing the web and interacting on social networking sites. Sources: http://www.zacks.com/stock/news/73046/video-game-sales-plunge-in-march http://www.wired.com/gamelife/2012/04/arstechnica-wii-software-decline/ http://abcnews.go.com/Technology/wireStory/us-video-game-sales-drop-25-percent-march-16128349#.T4y-Je2y6mQ

The RP on Sanctum is heavily influenced by the guilds. More inter-guild and non-guild RP is developing. Some of the more RP oriented folks are starting to come out and play

Yeap. Sanctum has lots of guild oriented RP (becuase the largest pre-launch RP guilds got placed here), but the inter-guild and non-guild RP is starting to pick up. More and more people are coming to the point that they have more time to spend on RP then just "game stuff".

Loose 3/4 of our matches? You should party up with your fellow TCL members more often.

There are lots of great Sith guilds on SotE. If you haven't joined our server FB group yet, I suggest that you do so ( https://www.facebook.com/groups/359245180777088/ )

Yeah, another Sanctum player here. My guild organizes RP-PvP events, such as our recent "Operation: Glass-Maker" (here is a video: ). We are always looking for ways to incorporate RP into both the PvE and PvP aspects of the game.

Yeah...if you are on an RP server, you should never feel afraid to just strike up an "IC" conversation with another player. By this point, many of the griefer/trolls have given up and left. Also, many of us have very active communities that create regular events for all players.

The thing is, the definition of "Hardcore Gamer" means different things to different people. For some, it means being completionists. To others, it means playing games on the most difficult settings. And in some cases, it means that you spend a significant amount of hours per week playing video/computer games. I happen to fall into the later category, and because of this, I am termed "hardcore" even though I rarely complete games (which includes reaching end level in MMOs) or play them on the hardest setting. But I do spend the vast majority of my time per week playing video/computer games, so I am considered "hardcore". To be honest, MMOs need to appeal to the widest audience possible if they are to remain "massive". Catering to only a certain segment of the market while alienating others is not good business sense when it comes to MMOs.

As was said at the Guild Summit, the LFD tool is coming, probably in 1.3 and it will NOT be cross server.

Well, there must be a ton of people who want this as it was briefly available for sale on their site last night but sold out again in minutes. Either that or they are only releasing a handful at a time. GameStop now shows a 5/1/12 release date and Amazon removed the release date from their listing altogether. I wonder if the production quality is not up to snuff and they are getting a lot of rejects. Sounds like the OLED Keyboard fiasco of a few years ago all over again.

I won't deny that there is some "fishy" math going around. This is a complex game, so certain formulas might not be showing the expected results. In fact, some of these errors have been discovered and are being corrected. Guess what I am really trying to say is that people are acting like there is no way that this is going to be changed. I will admit that there is a good possibility that these changes will go live with out being re-adjusted, but if the outcry intensifies and the actual metrics from gameplay bear witness to a problem, it will be corrected. But seeing as how the PTS testing window has been extended, I think that BW is trying to collect as much data as possible and see if perhaps the changes they made did go too far. We have no idea what BW's "target numbers" are. No developer releases that sort of hard data because it only leads to more player confusion and anger. I respect what RuQu is doing. He is checking out the facts and not making extreme accusations. Of course, he is also not one of BW's QA testers, so he only knows as much as we know about the underlying mechanics of the game. But people saying they have quit the game purely based on patch notes for an unpublished patch is a bit extreme. If these changes had already been made to the live servers, then they would have a leg to stand on.

You mean the same Q&A response where GZ said: But I guess no one wants to believe that developers actually listen to their customers...

BW has not blindsided us with nerfs. They haven't even gone into effect yet and probably won't in their current form. Patch 1.2 has only been deployed to the PTS where it is undergoing testing prior to deployment to the live servers. If it looks like a majority of the players are going to be unhappy with the changes, then they will be adjusted before 1.2 goes live. Many people here are acting like this is a done deal and that the 1.2 patch has already been rolled out to all the live servers and that every player is already being effected by class changes. This is simply not the case.

Ha, I got a response from GZ even though I wasn't really expecting one. I was at the Guild Summit and one of the issues brought up by many guilds, particularly PvE guilds, was that clearing end-game content was too easy. This is certainly not the case for my guild, so making the game "more challenging" was not something we were asking for. But, I do recall reading endless forum posts here about how "easy" the game was which was making it boring (again, an assessment I don't agree with). The changes to classes in 1.2 were already implemented before the Guild Summit, so the guilds that were complaining there were just confirming BW's assessment. But the thing is, BW tracks every aspect of the game in very minute detail. Their changes to the classes were based on data trends derived from an accumulated aggregate of play sessions. If this data was showing that certain classes were over-performing, then the logical conclusion is that said classes need to be "brought down" so that they stay within expected parameters. Computer games, particularly RPGs, really are nothing but "simple" math and sometimes you need to re-adjust your equations so that you get the results you were expecting. Now, did the changes go too far? Maybe. But again, BW will be analyzing the metrics from the PTS (they pushed back the 1.2 release date in order to extend testing) and if it looks like the classes are now under-performing, further adjustments will be made. As not very many people play characters on the PTS, the full consequences of the changes will probably not be realized until 1.2 is deployed to live servers. And again, should it be determined that most players are struggling then more changes will be implemented. What I am trying to say is that these class changes were made based on BWs own analysis of player data. And if this data shows them some classes are over-performing, then it will also show them if they are now under-performing. What BW hath taketh away, BW can give back.

Out of curiosity, isn't the reason most of these changes are being implemented is to make the game more challenging? It would seem that ever since launch the "majority" of players have been screaming that the game is WAY too easy. Given that assumption, shouldn't it be much harder now for a top-end guild with BiS gear to clear a NM Ops unless they change their method of approach?

I will be there representing The Corellian League.

I was told by one of the devs at the summit that the 500 number is due to a limitation with the chat system. Of course, a 500 account limit instead of character limit would go a long way as well. That being said, I was told that, as with everything else, caps are likely to change over time.

True, doing them is not necessary, but many of them are really well done and have quite interesting stories written for them.

I wholeheartedly agree that they need to backfil all the planets with end-game content. I am sure it will come over time. They put too much work into all the planets to let them go to waste.