1.) This is a suggestion forum. Who are you to decide which suggestion is valid or not? 2.) Learn to read please. The GM told him to post it here.

Definitely BH. Becos BH gives you flexibility in terms of playing light side or dark side. Trooper storyline makes more sense if you play light side, IMO. Also, BH *feels* powerful, even though both are mirror class. Finally, BH evokes the image of Jedi Killer while Trooper evoked the image of cannon fodder.

Actually, some players are not even sure why they want AC-respec beyond the fact that they don't want to re-roll. Which is a valid claim. After all, a player should play the game which he finds fun and not be forced to do something he does not find it fun. Because if he doesn't find it fun, you have one less subscriber and I don't have to tell you what low population can do to an MMO. The real reason, I believe, that many people probably know at a sub-conscious level, of why they want AC-respec, is because the concept, the design and the implementation of advanced class is deeply flawed. Firstly, SWTOR is heavily designed based on WOW, some say specifically Burning Crusade-era WoW. However, WoW does not have any advanced class design at all. Many players gave suggestions, e.g. mages becoming archmage and some other stuff, but nothing concrete came out. In the end, what they got was Death Knight. Which is more of a prestige class than advance class. Hence, SWTOR designers have to design from scratch and this explained the deep flaw. They have no one to copy from! Why is the AC design flawed? Firstly, you can see that the AC class design came VERY late in the design process. Probably even after some class implementation. How do we know? From some of the early release news, the story elements and the class companions. If I am not wrong (and early beta players can confirm or refute this), the classes are originally designed to be as follows (with no AC concept) Bounter Hunter/Trooper : Tank or DPS Sith Warrior/Jedi Knight : Tank or DPS Smuggler/Agent : Healer or DPS Consular/Inquisitor : Healer or DPS This is reflected in the earlier game footage and news and is currently evident by the companion given, specifically the first few companions given. For example, the sith warrior's first companion is dps, complementing the warrior's tank role. Consular/Inquisitor/Smuggler/Agent all got a tank as first companion, indicating they are meant to be healers. Hunter gets a healer companion, which is best for a tank. Trooper gets a dps companion, which is OK for a tank as well. Jedi Knight is the only odd-man-out, for a class that was originally designed to be a tank to get also a tank companion. It could be T7 was re-tooled to be a tank, when originally he was a healer or dps. Another sign that the class originally was not meant to have AC is class storyline and transition to AC. And the only flaw I found is on the consular. The consular's starting planet storyline revolves around the first lightsaber and great efforts went into showing how you acquire the saber story-wise. So once you craft the saber, what happens? Well, if you are a healer, everything flows smoothly, as it was originally meant to be. But if you chose a shadow AC, you vendor that important saber away IMMEDIATELY after that because you get a free double-bladed saber which is a signature for your AC. The saber that was so important for the last 8-10 hours of game-play, got thrown away. From here, you can see the AC is just a tagged-on idea and poorly implemented (at least for the consular class). In fact, the entire chapter 1 story of the consular is about HEALING people. There is even a sub-story where your consular can use HEALING powers, despite being a shadow with no healing powers. Finally, the AC specialization process. No quests, little VOs. You talk to someone and he ask you to talk to the specs. You review two trees which you have no idea what they are for, how they are played and you make a decision that can affect you for the next 100 hours of game-play just by playing for 8-10 hours. The word "advanced" means it is something that occurs at a stage where one is quite an expert. You get your advanced education in the university, not after studying 5 years in elementary or primary school. Hence, why is advanced class chosen at level 10 and not, say, at level 40? This again revealed the flawed design of the AC concept. If they are all along designed to be different classes, then why not have them chosen at level 1 and have different and APPROPRIATE companions to boot? (e.g. A Jedi Shadow / Sith Assassin will have a healer or dps companion, for example) And why are these ACs not having unique CLASS story that reflects their uniqueness? An operative/shadow/assassin/scoundrel will have plenty of stealth-based class story for example, instead of going around healing people for the consular (as shadow built) All these point to the poor design of the advance class concept. That is why subconsciously, players felt it but some can't just put words into the feeling that their advance class felt WRONG and hence want to change their advance class without going through the last 30-40 hours of the same class quest again (which cannot be skipped, if you want to progress, unlike the other 80% world quest) The class designers had better talked to the quest/mission designers (if they are not already the same people) and come up with fixes for this flawed design and implementation. At the end of the day, whether you want to grant AC respec or not. In short : AC concept is new, has no precedent (at least compared to WoW), is poorly thought out, implemented as a tagged on, contributing to poor player choice and enjoyment, thus having a state where players want to re-spec and do not wish to re-level through the same unskippable content. Designers have to either grant AC respec as a quick fix or thoroughly revamp the AC concept again.

People keep asking for it because the AC system is POORLY DESIGNED and IMPLEMENTED. And many players felt why should they re-roll and repeat the same thing for something that is essentially the fault of the class designers? And then now the class designers have the cheeks to say "working as intended".

I agree that the poor LFG tool is one contributing factor to people leaving. But I think the other reasons are : 1.) Too easy to level, causing many players to super-level to 50. 2.) Little or no end-game content (the poor LFG tool contribute to that, because people cannot find others to group with for flashpoints) 3.) The inability to switch AC. Players who do not want to re-roll quit because they are stuck with a class they didn't care for.

Guess what? I also went with the whole shebang. And I still support AC changing. Players should be given the options to play how they want and have fun as they want. Players who have fun = longer subcription = more player base = more fun for everyone. If Bioware persist in their flawed design of no AC change, then one day a big portion of frustrated players will quit and then all that is left are just those who screamed ACs are different class, no respec for you!

I played all 8 classes, 2 of them twice. Although I have not even completed any of the chapter ones yet I have completed all of them till the end of the capital planet. Here are my impressions. Imperial Sith Warrior : Korriban was interesting with a mini finale but the capital is forgetful and no mini-finale. Main antagonist is not clear at this time. I played the warrior as a pure light side which is quite interesting to say the least. Sith Inquisitor : Korriban was similar to sith warrior but with a twist. Of all the force users, the lightsaber quest is a non-event. Capital planet ends with a mini-finale and a sort of mini-twist and some intrigue. Main antagonist is not clear at this time. Agent : Hutta was quite boring. I guess many people likes it because Agents came with twists and turns. At least one twist each for Hutta and capital. Main antagonist is somewhat clear at this point in time. Bounty Hunter : The twist came early in Hutta but also lacks emotional impact. Hutta itself is also average. The capital planet quests are however, very interesting. Ends with TWO mini-finale. Main antagonist is clear at level 3... Republic Jedi Consular : Tython is mainly forgettable but the lightsaber construction is a major portion and serves as a mini-finale. A small twist at the end of Tython. Capital planet quests revolves around solving the twist. And then after that more of the same which is why many people feel it is boring. Only interesting if you are the self-sacrificing, scholarly type. Main antagonist is slowly revealed after capital planet, making it an mystery. Jedi Knight : Tython is similar to JC. You have a early antagonist and finale with light saber crafting. Depending on your light side/dark side choice, the outcome may be a bit different in terms of later set up. This is the only class I have not played the capital planet yet. Smuggler : This has got to be the most funny class to play (at least as a male, jerk *** roguish type). I have chuckled at some of the dialogue choices I made myself. Story is very personal, with mini finale at the end of Ord Mantell and a sort of significant moment finale at the end of the capital planet with a surprise at the end. The surprise will then lead to a bit of boring storylines (but funny conversation). Good for players who don't want to care much of the conflict and who likes to role play the Malcolm Reynolds, pre-ANH Han Solo type. Main antagonist is revealed early, around level 1 or 2... Trooper : The class with the closest link to the republic storyline. A big twist at the end of Ord Mantell with the reveal of what I think as the main antagonist. Capital planet quests are a follow up of the manure that hits the rotating blades. Best played as a heroic soldier. Note : As mentioned, most classes are played till we get the starship. So the "main antagonists" I mentioned may not actually be the main ones if there are twists. So please don't spoil us.

Firstly, you guys should take it easy. I am sure Bioware will allow anyone who wants to transfer to the new APAC servers to do so. I don't think they can or wants to restrict by IP address. They allow you guys to play in US servers, isn't it? Secondly, the new APAC servers will be located in Australia. You better check the ping from your country to Australia. For example, the players from S'pore are not exactly jumping for joy because the ping to US West servers are actually shorter than compared to Australia. You can do a simple ping test in any of the online speed test websites. At the end of the day, having APAC servers may not be a good thing to everyone (except maybe for the Australians and the NZers)

BTW, I am responding to your statement that people will not have alts if they have AC. I am proof that this is not true. Why do I have 8 alts? Storyline. I want to experience all 8 storylines. That is why I have 8 alts. How about the other 2 alts. 1 reason is becos no AC, so no choice, I have to level 2 additional classes due to a wrong choice I made earlier. (I had a smuggler who went gunslinger and an agent that went sniper which I later realised was exact mirrors and I haven't "experienced" the scoundrel/operative healer type. So I chose to level yet another smuggler in order to be a scoundrel. If AC respec is allowed, I would have just changed either my gunslinger to scoundrel or my sniper to operative. So having AC respec will not prevent players like me from leveling alts because we have heavy "alt-ism". At most it will prevent me from having 16 alts instead of 8 only (or in my case, 8 instead of 10). I already have to plan some of my alts to skip the 80% common missions (do PvP, grind or just spacebar through the conversations) but there is no way I can skip the class missions. How many times do I have to say the same thing to Bowdaar or Corso anyway or hear Skavak gloating? For those who are anti-AC respec. I strongly recommend you to play your class AGAIN and go through every mission AGAIN. Then repeat it for every class. Then come back here and tell me if you think AC respec is needed or not. As for being a good tank or healer. Guess what? I have both a powertech and a mercenary. I must say bounty hunter is one class I don't mind leveling twice because a) I like the storyline and you can go both ways b) I can have both a male and female characters and their voice actors are superb. But if you ask me to level the Jedi Consular storyline again, I'd rather tear my eyeballs out.

I won't be a "mediocre" healer because I would have leveled as a healer given that I have 10 alts. And as someone suggested earlier, I did level a different AC on a different faction (in a different server) E.g. I have a Jedi Shadow (tank) and a Sith Sorceror (healer) So if AC re spec is allowed, if someone in the republic side needs a Jedi Sage healer (or any healer for that matter), I could re spec to a Jedi Sage (which will play EXACTLY like a Sith Sorceror healer) and everyone is happy. (Of course, I would have to maintain two sets of gear but that is no different from the current plan to do dual-skill-tree. And please don't use hyperbole. What we're asking for is something that is reasonable and has precedent. We're not asking for instant level to 50 or worse, a complete experience for different AC. Because if Bioware insist on saying that the ACs are different classes, then we can also demand that these two "different" classes have different : * primary stat * storyline * crew * starship * gear design * etc... You can't have something that share 90% of every game mechanic and then tell us they are fundamentally two different classes. BTW, while leveling my Jedi Shadow, in the storyline, she happen to magically heal an NPC. So tell me, where is her healing skills coming from if she is a SHADOW? Hmm? Now, if you add AC respec, at least I can say, yeah, it makes sense that she can heal the NPC. So is this a case of the story/mission designer not talking to the class designer?

Funny you say this. I have TEN alts and have intention to level every single one of them to 50. Yet, I still support AC respec. Why? Becos it will be fun for me and I won't feel like : Oh, I am stuck in this role and this group just need a healer which my AC cannot spec. If you then ask "Why not bring the other alt I have which is the role that the group wants?" My answer is the 10 alts are all spread between two servers and two factions and are of VARYING levels. So let's say if someone wants a healer in cademimu and my healer currently is level 10 but my level 30 char, which can be a healer if AC respec is possible, cannot run because he is not a healer at the moment.

Please tell me what is the difference between a guardian dps and a sentinel dps since both are melee dps? Hmm? The fact that you use wow as an example shows your very poor understanding of SWTOR design. There is simply no wow equivalent. Let me put another poser. If the ACs are so different, why share the same skill tree? Why share 80% of the same abilities? The problem is Bioware is hald-arse about their design. They arbitrarily decided different skill trees are "same" (hence allow re spec and even dual-spec) but somehow AC are not the same, even though some ACs plays the same way. Really, the ONLY ACs that are VERY different are the consular/inquistor classes. Even then, despite having different roles (melee dps vs range dps), some of the same abilities are still being used regardless of which AC you go for.

You are assuming every player can and will want to be tank,healer and dps. Some players will always be dps only. Some healers only and yet others tank only. Only a select group of players will have the skill and the versatility to be tank, healer or dps. You also forgot with starships, companions, class story, gear, there are legitimate reasons (i.e.having fun) to play with the so called two-role classes.

If there is a FotM, having AC respec is the last of the problem. The game has a fundamental problem that has to be addressed.

Pro : Player get to choose to play the advance class they want and have fun without need to go through the same tedious process again. Con : None.

The reason for no AC respec is nonsense. There already is a fundamental difference between a tank and dps or a dps and healer in terms of playstyle. Yet they are giving dual-spec a consideration. ACs share same class story (THAT CANNOT BE SKIPPED, unlike 80% of common quests), same companion, same starship and 80% of same common skills, same stats, same gear etc... So I don't see why they are two different classes.

Here are some of my somewhat random improvement ideas and suggestions. * Preference : Character on auto-follow should have an option in preference menu to have a auto-camera turn ON or OFF * Preference : Auto-camera turn for characters on auto-run should have an option in preference menu to turn ON or OFF * Preference : Click to location (add into preference option) and if clicking on a target that is too far from character, character will move forward until distance to engage the target (chat, loot, etc...). Make this an option to be turned on and off as well. * Companion : Command companion to loot or activate an object, especially if object is far away (i.e. same as gathering) * Dual targetting : one for enemy and one for friendly * Crew Skills : Allow queuing of up to 10 items for crafting items and up to 5 crew skill missions. * Crew skills : mission completion should deposit the items onto the inventory instead of poping up a panel to be confirmed, similar to completion of crafting items. * Travel : Please link the taxi points between the north taxi and the entrance of Kass City. Please re-look similar tax point pairs (e.g. Balmorra * Travel : In Hutta, move the taxi point and bind point from the entrance east to market area to INSIDE the Evocii Workcamp. Add a bind point inside the cantina inside Nemro's palace. * Quick travel : Allow quick travel and speeder mounting the MOMENT we exit from our starship (at the space port of all major planets/fleet). Or better still, allow quick travel from within a starship after it has landed. * Starship : When entering the starship, the starship should not be launching. Only AFTER we chose a destination should the starship launch, fly out of the planet, hyperspace to new destination and land in that destination. * Starship : Introduce a take-off and land button for those who wants to just launch to space and wait (e.g. to do space missions) * Companions : Allow companions to be click through (right click) when outside rest area. Very irritating to always get their comments when interacting with objects/loots and they like to get in the way, got right clicked and make snide comments. * Character : Please don't make the character turn more than 90 degrees. It's creepy. * Companion : Please don't make the companions look at us constantly and twisting their waist doing that. It's also creepy. * Crew Skills : Have more orange items craftable by armormech, synthweaving and armstech. Preferably set items with item bonuses (for armor makers). Most of the greens are quite useless for the above crew skills. * UI : Improve the LFG tool. Allow players to specify flashpoint, heroic missions, operations, world boss and what kind of players they are looking for (tank, healer, dps) * UI : Introduce a tutorial or mission for players to USE the LFG tool. Introduce social points for usage of LFG tool. * Dressing room : please allow zoom in onto the face (especially needed for companion customisations) * Dressing room : allow preview of weapons * Speeder : introduce faster speed at higher levels : 150% at level 40, 200% at level 50. * Speeder : introduce flying speeders (or flying upgrades to current speeders) * Advance class : allow AC changing. It is not fair to ask player to make an important decision at level 10 and not allow players to change it after playing for another 10 levels or 20... Advance class should have been introduced in...advanced level...say at level 40 instead. * Main map : the filter options should be in the form of CHECK BOXES instead of button options, similar to the mini-map filter. The visibility of all static objects, including missions should be map wide as long as map is revealed. * Main map and mini map : difficult colours for different icons. E.g. red for mail boxes, blue for storage etc... * Customisation : Race, appearance, gender, name changes in-game. Hope we don't have to pay extra fees for such things. (OK, maybe not gender unless it is an in-game series of missions or something) * Preference : Chat bubbles (and options to turn them ON or OFF) * Chat panel : Split player chats + NPC comments and action logs to different tabs. Add another tab for conversation logs. * Starship : Have a bind point, mail box, GTN and vendor inside the starship. The vendor could be someone who tagged along for a ride (a la Dragon Age Origins). Player should be able to quick travel from anywhere on the planet/fleet into the starship. * Starship : crews should be randomised or better still move around in the starship. * Starship : more labels on the starship map e.g. crew quarters, med bay, engine room etc.. * Starship : have some "actions" within the starship, e.g. ship being boarded by hostile parties. (think about one scene in dragon age origins where the camp is invaded by hostiles) * UI : Allow us to view other player's skills (spec) * Mailbox : Please place mailboxes outside/inside every cantina or rest places. E.g. cantina in Kass City, Nar Shaddaa etc... * GTN : Have GTN in every major planet hub. There is a reason it is called a GALACTIC trade network. No? If the planet is neutral or controlled by Hutts, then make it a Hutt-based GTN. * GTN : Should not require to specify categories and sub-categories in order to do searching. * GTN : remove the global limit of 50 items. Instead add a limit of 10 items of the same type a player can sell. So e.g. a player can sell up to only 10 stacks of desh (stack size is up to player) but can potentially sell any number of items as long as they are different. * GTN : allow selling of more than 2 days. 5, 7, 14 and 30 are good numbers. Increase the deposit fees if need to. * GTN : split "armor" category into the following categories : heavy (aim), heavy (str), medium (cun), medium (str), light. Sub-category instead would be the body location : head, wrist, hand etc... * GTN : if someone bought your item, it should be available immediately. Else, please do not send the mail "someone has bought your item and the money will be sent to you in one hours time" It is very spammy. * Mailbox : allow the following options : enable friends, enable guilds and enable everyone. Each option will allow only those enabled to send you mail. This will cut down on spamming e-mail to ZERO. * Alts : please allow adding of alts to your own friend list. Or better still, have a common "account bank" where alts can access the same bank vault. * Alts : Put the GTN (of imperial/republic and hutts) on the starting planet and allow access to bank. This allows players to create mules without the need to run all the way to the fleet or capital since you don't allow that (but still can do so from level 7, which does not solve the issue of mules and just make players more pissed off) * Grouping : Allow players to go to the OTHER starting planets. Why can't my Jedi friends join me in Ord Mantell, for example? I don't mind traveling between the planets to do my class quest and access class trainers. Just have ONE more options when clicking the shuttle " Travel to [other starter planet's name]" * Preference : toggle hood ON or OFF * Character : Allow hoods for Twi'lek. (Hint : just cut two holds behind, like the elves) * Flashpoint : allow player to fly to the flashpoint from starship using the navigation galactic map. * Companion : When riding "car-type" taxis, companions should be riding next to my character. When riding "bike-type" taxis, companions should ride in tandem to my character. * Flashpoints : Space-based flaspoints using our starships. * GTN : A "request to purchase" system. Buyer select the item they want to purchase and credits they are willing to pay, seller fulfill the request by posting on the item requested and take the credits. * Class : Give powertech bounty hunter the ability to use rifles or carbines. * Item : Energy packs : to increase force/rage/energy/ammo etc... * Map : Better main map navigation. Allow choosing of different planets. Then "zoom" in on portions of planets that can be zoomed in (e.g. Dromund Kass, Kass City, Space port, Temple approach etc...) * Map : Allow annotation of main map, possible viewable by group members. * Preference : Same equipment preference for companion. i.e. if character can hide helm or do hood up and down, another option for companion as well. * Keybinding : Add keybinding options for each of the targeting icons. * UI : Add the following targetting icons : numberical 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9. This way, it is easy to call out the kill orders with numbers. If you want to be creative, you can replace numbers with dots or something similar as long as people understood it represents numbers. * Companions : when sending companions for crew skill missions, they should not be waiting in the starship. They should be out doing missions!

And it does not have to be an absolute single world galaxy. It can still be single-world split along the following lines. 1.) West Coast 2.) East Coast 3.) English (Europe) 4.) German (Europe) 5.) French (Europe) and these 5 should have the following variant each : 1.) PvE 2.) PvP 3.) RP-PvE 4.) RP-PvP So total 5 x 4 = 20 varients of "single-world" galaxies.

Why would eve-style single world fail? Unless again there is a technical limitation. There would be no cross-server arguments, no worries about "ghost town" and definitely no worries about open world pvp and flashpoint grouping. You also don't have to worry about over-population because currently, each open world can be instanced. So if Hutta cannot take more than 100 players at a time, now it can already split to Hutta 1, Hutta 2 etc... question is how many instance can it split to? 5? 500? 50,000?

If the real world can have many John Smiths, I don't see why not the Starwars world cannot have many Bails or Antilles. First, have a first name and last name. Secondly, introduce unique ID. So when I mouse over Bail Antilles (number 264), I can also see a unique ID like a passport number or identity card number. We should look to real world for references. These are actually minor issues that can be solved easily.

If they cluster the physical servers and introduce redundancies, then they can take out one or two physical servers without the need to down the entire galaxy. Also, it depends again how they map the virtual worlds to the server clusters. If each cluster of servers supports an open world instance, e.g. cluster A runs Coruscant 1, cluster B runs Coruscant 2, cluster C runs Tython 1 etc... then one cluster down will only affect that instance and not the entire galaxy. (again this is conjecture on my part, we really do not know the underlying technology and whether it is feasible in the first place) Maybe Bioware can just come out and say :"It's not feasible technically" or something. FYI, to date, there has been no individual realms/shards shutting down. Only the entire playerbase shutting down for maintenance.

Why did Bioware split SWTOR into so many servers/realms? Why not have EVE-style single server (or more accurately, multiple real-life servers but clustered into one single virtual world) If you say a single open world cannot have more than, say 100 simultaneous players at the same time, they already have the technology to "instantised" open world. During the opening weeks, the starting area and capital planets were split into a few instances and you can even switch instances to group with your friends or guildmates. Why have to deal with "cross-server" whatever, transfer of characters etc.. when you have already the technology to have all players in one virtual world. What is the point of an MMO if you split the community up into different "shards"? At the very least, there is need to split, you just need to split along, say, language lines (one giant virtual world for English-speaking players, one fore German-speaking players etc...) and that should be enough? Perhaps there are some other technical challenges that Bioware engineers could not overcome?

there needs to be a (better) LFG tool but not dungeon finder because i know where the flashpoints are...

PvE = wanting to solve a puzzle PvP = wanting to play a sport different strokes for different folks.

I have thought about this design problem and in an MMO, unlike Single player game, you cannot do scaling. The answer lies in what is now "end-game". How can a freshly level max level char co-exist in the same zone as a max-tiered raid max level char? By having a small difference in terms of power but not so large that they cannot quest together. So if a decked out max level char has, say 150% more power than then freshie max level, then they can quest (and even pvp, just that the freshie has a lower chance of defeating the veteran) BTW, all these are already happening in pvp warzones. As a level 10 char, I could kill a level 50 under certain circumstances. At the end of the day, it really depends on whether a designer is willing to risk designs not from the mainstream.