So I was l looking the other day and trying to determine if we, as an MMORPG community, really need “balance.” I mean, does balance really fit into an RPG? WOW did it after all, so maybe I just don’t really understand RPGs. While I was contemplating this, I happened to be watching the SWTOR trailer entitled “Hope.” It wasn’t until it was over that I realized that in the whole battle, I did not notice one smuggler, and possibly, not one Jedi Counselor. What I saw were troopers and fighting Jedi. Oddly, in a war were combat prowess and firepower mattered, not one non-combat oriented profession was present in the fighting. So, then I went and watched the trailer “Return.” There is a smuggler in that trailer, but oddly, he doesn’t shout, “YOU JEDI RUN FOR FREEDOM!! I WILL DESTROY THIS SITH LORD!!” In fact, other than is minor heroic moment in the hallway, his main focus is to get out of the area ASAP. Having read a good bit of the Star Wars novels, and obviously seeing all the movies, as well as most of the video games, I have realized that in most instances, smugglers run. They don’t charge into the heat of battle, cursing at the higher powers about the fact that some sith keeps killing them and whining, “it’s just not fair”. A smuggler’s only real interest in combat was who would pay more for weapons. So then I began thinking about my days of pen and paper RPGs. You know, if I wanted to be a troll killer, I would roll a fighter, or later, a barbarian. If I decided to roll a thief or a mage, I didn’t do it thinking, “I can’t wait to see how this guy does in a sword fight.” All that to say this, balance has no real basis in RPGs. If you want combat balance, play first person shooters. Heck, even talk to bioware about making a Star Wars shooter. But don’t play an RPG, roll a non-combat class, and then complain that he doesn’t do so well on the battlefield. Please, leave the RPG in RPGs. They are different Roles for a reason.

...and thus it starts. "It's not fair that a double-lightsaber weilding Sith, who has studied combat and practiced Force use since he was a child, can kill my pistol weilding smuggler." "I can't get the objective because my Imperial Agent keeps getting owned by a seasoned, special forces trooper with a gigantic chain gun" "it needs to be fair!!!!" Well, it was fun while it lasted. Bio, you guys had a really good idea, and a good start. It was an enjoyable jaunt into one of my favorite universes. Best of luck in the future.

It seems as though people only post when they have issues or want to flame the game. I just wanted to take a few minutes to comment on the things that I have seen in the game and why I like them. 1. Class specific story-lines. There have been plenty of posts on this already, but it is just a really neat testament to the fact that a lot of creativity went into the game. I have played other games where my soft-skinned, midget, magic-user would have to go kill 15 broken battle axes from Monitor type creatures. The concept of doing for the experience is still the same, but it is much more enjoyable when the story fits the character you want to play. 2. Quests that aren’t black-and-white kill x number of [insert monster here]. Again, back to point one, it shows creativity while accomplishing the same thing. 3. I love the fact that it cost me 40k to get the speeder skill. It makes it an accomplishment. When I ride my speeder, I feel as though I earned it. Walking places, though time consuming, IS NOT BAD. You get to see more of the environment as well as earn some exp from killing stuff on the way. Also, gives you time to send your companions on crew skill missions. 4. Rail-shooter space combat. Ok, it does get repetitive at a point, but it is still fun none-the-less, as well as requiring more skill. You have a window in which to accomplish your goals. You miss that window and you fail. I like that. Though, I would like to see a sand-box type system, I can live (and will continue to pay) with the system the way it is, as long as BW adds some new ones from time to time. I am not sure, but I think it will be easier to release new runs quicker with a rail-system instead of a sand-box. 5. Voice-overs and cut scenes. Not really too much more to say about these. It takes an enjoyable mechanic from a single-player, platform game and puts it in a multi-player one. Plus having more than one person in the conversation adds some humor and intrigue to the conversation. 6. The lack of a LFG mechanic is perfect. People want a social game, the lack of LFG fosters that atmosphere. If you have played the other games that have this system, you soon find that you end up running the instances without even talking to the others in your group, unless they ninja-gank something from you. This is completely contrary to the building of a social environment. If you have to actively talk to players and search for healers, tanks, and DPS, you, by default, create a more social game. This also promotes guild groups. Your guild will start making schedules for instances and working together, instead of individual guildies just hanging out in LFG queues all day. After all, that was the point of guilds in the first place. 7. Software. Well, I am not much of a techie, but I run SWtoR on my laptop. I had to turn the graphics setting of my card all the way to ‘speed’ vs. ‘quality’ but the graphics and FPS are still awesome. I have read posts where individuals are complaining about computer crashes and blue screens of death, but I do not think that is a software issue as much as an individual driver issue on the user’s system. Have I experienced issues? Yes. The first was calling tech support. I won’t go into it, but I feel that as the game takes off and becomes popular, BW/EA will adjust this to better assist the gamer. I was in an instance, Hammer Station I think, and my character got knocked back against a wall. He got stuck in the ‘flying through the air’ animation and it took me a while to work my way out of it. It was funny and frustrating at the same time. Will I quit because of it? No. Will I shout ‘this game sux!’ No. Because it doesn’t. This game is awesome, and it will only get better. Good work. Keep going. Don’t listen to the whiners. You obviously have some creative staff, with wonderful ideas. Keep listening to them!! I am 42 years old. I have been in the military for the last 22 years. My wife bought me this game as a valentine’s day gift because she knows I love Star Wars. I was just going to play the free 30 days just to say I did it, but I have decided that I am definitely going to renew my subscription.

Every, and I mean EVERY MMORPG is exactly the same. You spend a lot of time doing quests on your own, unless you are social and make friends/join a guild. The only difference is that SWtoR uses animaiton and voive over. This TAKES the best parts of a single-player platform game. It does not MAKE it a single-player game any more than you make it while playing. If someone is not getting the social experience out of the game while playing, it is more their lack of effort than BW's lack of programming. And to echo the comments above, group finders do not make the game more social. You just end up getting in an instance, and not chatting with the others in your group. It is still a single-player experience, you just have more firepower to do it with.

Yea, I was playing SWToR and some chick snuck up on me and scared the crap out of me. I said, "WHO THE HECK ARE YOU?!?!" and she said, "uhmm. your wife!"

/agree /support /whatever works. I would like to see this. Yes there are other things that need to be added or done, but that doesn't make this a bad suggestion. I would like to see this or other things that will promote guild grouping for quests, flashpoint, etc. before we see PvP 'fixes' that just end up messing up the game for people who realize that there is more to an MMO-->RPG<-- than just fighting other players.

Which means that it will get little visibility and fade into the message nether. I guess we should say how much SWtoR isn't like WoW so these suggestions can get some attention.

The only issue I would see is you were in a group with two Jedi, one who helped someone and one who chose not to. How whould you resolve that encounter in the questline? It would have to be a very limited questline in one of the "one Jedi character only' phases. Anything to extravegant and it would affect group quests.

Actually, no, I think what is being said is that you end up with a bunch of people who are more worried about how much DPS the guy next to him is doing, instead of just doing your part. If a level 10 guys wonders into a level 40 group, well there are a lot of problems there before the instance is even started. No one here is saying that guy should be able to handle his own. If this is your group make up, the people who invited him deserve the wipe, or really need to step up their game so that they don't. The reality is that the 10 level guy will spend most of the run dead and be a burden on the others. Their fault. I like the fact that you go in and fight the instance. I did one earlier this week where someone was not pulling their weight, so we had to adjust how we fought, controlling aggro, and 'spell' rotations. It was hard, it was aggrevating at times, but in the end, it was a blast. It wasn't tank-tank, dps-dps, and heal-heal, just keep spamming the same buttons until we are through. It was 'Oh no, wait let me this. WOOT it worked. Oh no now he is targeting me. Oh wait, did you see what the BH jsut did, cool." You had to think through it. So, no, don't add a damage meter so someone can gripe and complain about others that they CHOSE to PUG with. Play the game, beat the bosses by sometimes unorthadox means, and HAVE FUN!!!! And before you respond, "says the guy who obviously doesn't pull the damage" I do my share, and sometimes I don't. oh well.

I actually like your idea of the group quest thing. Maybe make it some kind of guild payoff. Have your tech repairing damage. Have someone working the weapons systems to make missile reloads quicker, or maybe even facilitating a full reload after you run out. The ship's owner would pilot, of course. You really could have a lot of things added to it, without having to redo the rail system. And the payoff would be some kind of guild rewards, plus individual rewards. Or maybe some higher-grade ship upgrades that everyone who participated would get. I don't know, but I think there is so much that would be fun a profitable.

I played the OTHER MMO and when I went 3D it completely changed the game experience. It jsut seemed so much more expansive. I tried SWtoR but for my system, perspective was really off. It tried to put the toon right in front of my face so I almost had to look cross-eyed to see it. I adjusted the slider bar on the Nvidia control panel all the way down, but that only helped a little, but everything looked like flat cardboard cutouts on a 3D environ. Maybe I just need new drivers. but yea, 3D is UBERKEWL.

That is odd. I read the WoW forums and see just as many posts there on how bad thier support is and how they don't listen to their player base. In fact, alot of the complaints you see here are echoed on the WoW forums. I will say, however, when you call WoW customer support, the person on the other end generally understands what you are saying, and you can understand them. When I called SW:ToR customer support, English was a little hard for the support agent, and eventually resulted in both of us deciding that the conversation could advance no further.

/agree I play on a laptop, and I am old. It is hard to read alot of the times. I actually didn't put any talent points in to one box on my tree because I didn't think I had the spell. Later, when I wondered why it would even be there if I didn't have it, I got close with my glasses and realized that I did. So maybe I am looking at this from a handicapped perspective, but I agree none-the-less.

What you have said is well thought out and articulated. Point 1. As an RPGer I agree with this 100%!! Point 2. I actually like the way it is. A sandbox would be cool, but this is ok and enjoyable. I look forward to where they may go. Point 3. Agreed, but I don't hink dailies are the way to go. Maybe because I HATED rep grinds. I think adding one or two well thought out quests a month that offered a variety of USEFUL gear suited for your class or vanity items. If you could only do the quest once, then everyone would then move away from looking/stating the same but have useful variants. Point 4. I don't agree with ANY suggestions to start to try and 'balance' the classes for PvP. As both of us are former, apparently long-time WoW players, I think you can understand. If you keep getting knocked off the rafter, quit trying to attack him and get your ranged team mate to shoot him down....it is a GROUP sport Point 5. Again, I like it. At low levels you can craft useful gear for PvE and it saves you some money in that you don't have to go buy it. And since the leveling system hasn't been condensed to support qq'ers, the gear is useful for a while (in game terms) I don't know much about PvP at lower levels. I do agree that crafting needs to be and remain relevant. Crafters need to be able to craft items at all levels that are just as good, if not better, than drops/valor purchased. If not, then crafting in SWtoR will go the way of crafting in WoW, as in 'why bother?' Lastly, to echo your sentiment, this is an amazing game with a lot of potential.

6. Please don't listen to the 1,000 disgruntled players that want you to make this WoW in space. Out of your 1.7 million player base they are the minority. Self explanitory without constructive points, but I wanted to say it anyway. original post: http://www.swtor.com/community/showthread.php?t=318117