For all those who argue the current system is fine and realistic, and should stay for the realism such a tedious time sink adds, I have but one question: When was the last time you toggled your toon down to a walk? If you want realism in travelling, that's the ticket! Sprinting continuously makes no sense! Nor does running forever. So why is that ok while you wait to get your speeder? Meanwhile, for the rest of us: I don't agree with racing to get to the next content--but damn there is no point to the way these spaceship/space station interactions work. Those hangar rooms? Worthless. Utterly worthless. Just removing the hangars and letting you click something and be on board your ship would be an improvement. Hell, lets take a middle ground and have every ship type on the ground like the shuttles are in the shuttles in the giant hangar on the second world. You still get to walk up to your ship and click on a glowy door, you just get to skip the loading screen from the elevator ride.

First reply misses point--as expected--then proceeds to presume tell me what I need or don't need based on the change having no effect on them? Let me know when they change something you notice having an effect on you so I can come by and lol it up. It isn't about the XP. My purpose in mentioning that angle was to explain what I expected was the reason for the change, and why that change was needless. If you actually read the OP you would see that I proposed another solution that would have put that spit drop of XP back out of reach, while still allowing a starting character the ability to travel between starting zones. Its about choosing 'fixes' that clamp down on options rather than cleaning up the options so that they perform well. I know of no other MMO that actually locks you into the starting zone--even EQII gave you the option of skipping theirs. Some more interesting info--have already run across people who popped back to the first planet post patch who can't take the shuttle off. Fortunately, most toons in that position will probably have a fleet pass or a ship so can head up to the Orbital--but not all. Fortunately, it will prove to be a small edge case in the long run.

Yesterday, one could make a character, send 'em up to the space station and complete the 'Talking to Crew Skills Trainer' quest. This netted a fairly hefty bump of XP and made the first half of an already cakewalk starting zone just a smidge easier a smidge earlier for a tiny bit of time. After this week's patch, you can't go to the space station right off the bat. I don't know yet when you can, but I suspect it won't be until you are given a quest to go to the second planet. Now, someone who didn't know any better might call it an exploit. It isn't. You will end up leaving the starting zone at pretty much the same level you would have anyway, and it will take about the same amount of time. The main difference is the speed with which you get to level 5 and start using your primary shot rotation. The XP bump is not only not an exploit, but the fix is destructive. Now, if you want to run with your friends, starting from zero, you may well have to finish 4 hours of play before you can meet up, depending on your class choices. Previously it was about a 10 minute walk at worst. As if waiting 4+ hours to pick your real class weren't bad enough. A far better solution to the "problem" would have been raising the minimum level requirement to even see the quest. Probably would have been less work too. Note: don't bother looking for this "fix" in the patch notes. It isn't there--unless I'm supposed to believe that having access to the space station immediately resulted in client instability.