Ratajack doesn't get it. He's one of those guys that feels personally threatened whenever there's any challenge to the status quo. I don't really understand it - it's weird for someone's personal worth to be so wrapped up in the status quo of a video game, but it is what it is. He doesn't have any viable arguments. His entire argument boils down to "This is the way it's always been, so this is the way it has to be." It's circular logic.

It's a game, genius. It's not "entitled" to want to eliminate some tedium so that you can focus on the fun. Especially when you've already played through that tedium before, likely multiple times. Some of you really have no perspective.

Yeah, not sure why you'd want to skip these. Easy XP.

You're debating for the sake of debate at this point. The benefits of 12XP on customer retention outweigh the potential negatives. A few whiners will whine - typically the same whiners that whine about any change that's outside of their personal preferences. This is a loud group, but generally quite small - a 15 page thread with tons of crying will typically reveal the same 2-3 guys whining over and over again on every page. Other people will avoid the 12XP, so no net effect there. And then there's the group that want it. Sure, there's certainly some that would stick around either way. But there's definitely a non-insignificant contingent of players that would have left or already have left, but will choose to subscribe thanks to the perks enabled by 12XP. In the end, it's a net gain for SWTOR. It's more money in their pockets. And that's without even factoring in the direct money they'll earn via people purchasing the actual perk.

This assumes they would play through the story at the standard pace in the absence of 12XP. That's a faulty assumption. People that are adverse to leveling alts typically will just not do it at all - e.g., they unsub. At this point, I've leveled all the alts that I intend to level (I have a main 60, and I have an alt 60). I might dink around a bit more on a couple, but the chances of me leveling another one up to 60 at the standard XP rate is extremely slim. So if I get bored of my two 60's, it's a near certainty that I'll unsubscribe. I believe this is a typical experience for many people. Most people have an "alt tolerance" - i.e., they can only tolerate leveling so many alts. For some people that tolerance is 0 - they refuse to level any alts. For others, it may be nearly limitless. Based on 10+ years of MMO play, my tolerance is 1-2. I'll level a main, and then I'll level 1-2 alts. If I get bored of my characters at that point, I'm done with the game. I'm not going to endure the leveling process again. I believe this is pretty close to the norm for the majority of players. However, if I could quickly level an alt at an expedited rate, my alt tolerance would increase and I'd spend more time playing the game - and by extension, subscribing to the game. I'd be likely to experience the game as every Advanced Class before I contemplated unsubbing. Ergo, they'd keep me as a subscribe for longer. For me, leveling is just an extended introduction. End-game is what the game is actually about. So when I'm bored of playing my current character, the only fresh potential for me is to play another character at end-game. Unfortunately, the standard MMORPG model has decided that you need to endure the leveling process all over again. I have the patience to do that once or twice more, but that's it. So once I get bored of my current characters at end-game, I'm done. Giving me the potential to quickly advance a new class to end-game would guarantee additional months of my subscription.

This is asinine. A person will not unsubscribe from the game any more quickly simply because they leveled faster. If anything, it will cause people to retain their subscription longer. Burned out on playing your Sorcerer? Currently, you might be just inclined to quit, since the tedium of spending the next couple months leveling up another 60 doesn't sound fun. But no worries. 12xp an Operative up to 60 in a week or so Interest renewed and subscription maintained! Honestly, anyone that wants 12XP isn't subbing because of the leveling process - they probably play MMOs in spite of it. So the potential of losing subs because of 12XP is virtually nil. I enjoy leveling in MMORPGs...the first time. After that, it's a tedious exercise in frustration. So if I get bored of my main, I'm likely to unsubscribe because I don't want to spend 50 hours leveling up another character. 12XP would only serve to retain my subscription; there's no scenario where 12XP would expedite my cancellation.

Only other game I've played in the last few months is Titanfall. I play it on High and it's smooth as butter. I actually upgraded the video card a few months ago. But honestly, even before that, I can't remember the last time I played a game that gave me any performance issues. It's pretty much exclusive to SWTOR.

I've tinkered. I've turned everything to very low. But SWTOR still runs poorly. Moving my camera, UI interactions, etc., will all cause periodic sputters, etc. Intense WZ battles...ugh. So help me out. Where is my system failing? I know it's not cutting edge, but come on - can't even get reliably good performance on very low graphics?!? It can't be that bad. Gigabyte Z68X-UD3H-B3 mobo Intel i5-2500K @ 3.3 GHz (4 CPUs), ~3.6 GHz 8 GB DDR3 @ 1333 MHz EVGA GeForce GTX 750 Ti FTW Samsung SSD 830 Series (128 GB) [Windows is installed on this drive] WD 500 GB 7200 RPM [sWTOR is installed on this drive] Windows 7 - 64 bit Halp.

I don't care about the number - I care about the results. When my FPS drops, I notice it and it affects my gameplay. Things are not seamless and smooth as they should be. I want everything to be silky smooth when I look around pr perform actions. Hang-ups, stutters, ripples,tearing, etc., drive me nuts.

This is why I always have, and probably always will, prefer TDM style multiplayer in a "pick-up" environment (e.g., your teammates and opponents are random). It allows you to have terrible teammates, but still have a successful result in the end - either collectively or individually. Objective-based game play with pick-up groups always frustrates me. Unfortunately, the entire MMORPG developer community has decided to use objective-based PvP almost exclusively. SWTOR has slightly broken the mold with the PUG 4v4s, but unfortunately you're still at the mercy of Bioware's bizarre PvP queuing system where you can't actually pick the WZs you want. Even if we couldn't queue for one specific WZ, it'd be nice if they at least gave us the option to toggle/untoggle certain WZs, like we can with FPs in the FP queue.

I leveled up as a Madness Sorc. When I got to 60, I changed to Lightning for PvP. I basically had to completely re-learn my character. The playstyle was completely different, and virtually every ability in my primary 'rotation' was new to me. I had to learn about an entirely new set of passive buffs and how they interacted with these new abilities. For all intents and purposes, I was playing a brand new character with zero prior experience. I was starting from the ground up and had no clue what I was doing at first. Fast-forward an hour or two later, and I pretty much had it figured out. It's not that complicated. So this notion that people will have no idea how to play their class if the leveling process is shortened is just completely asinine and pure fiction. If you change disciplines at 60, you're basically playing a brand new character anyway. And the leveling process in no way trains or prepares you were HMs or PvP. At best, it just lets you learn your half dozen or so most-used abilities. You don't really get a great deal of practical application in challenging environment. And as mentioned, if you change disciplines, you're basically going to have a whole new set of abilities to learn anyway. In other words - internet Chick Littles gonna chicken little.. At least it makes it easy for the rest of us to figure out who to ignore.

Legacy 50 seems a bit ridiculous. I've got one 60, a 50 (I played at release, quit, and then only returned a couple months ago), and then a half dozen alts ranging from 20-40 -- I'm still only Legacy 21. Probably because the Legacy system didn't exist for the first few months of release which is when I did most of my playing. Also, I'd like to play my alts more, but good grief, it's boring as CRAP doing those same side quests over again. I literally spacebar through every single one of them now. Now I basically just log onto the alts, do a few dailies (warzone, flashpoint, etc.), and advance my class chain another mission or two before I tap out from the boredom of needing to go kill the same 10 Droids or collect the same 10 Data Cards that I've already done a half dozen times before, with absolutely no threat, challenge or originality involved. There's also the fact that I'm very involved in my Imperial guild. I'd love to see the Republic stories, since I've actually only leveled a Smuggler Pub-side. But that means I have to be disconnect from my Imp guild. That kinda sucks. Sure, I can be on voice coms, but it's a bummer being detached from gchat, etc. 12xp would be nice, since I could power through the Republic class stories and minimize the time away from my guild. I would gladly pay cash money to be able to have 12x class story XP. And if people are worried about low level flashpoints being deserted, then just figure out some way to tie the boost into that. Perhaps periodically you need some item from the end-boss in a flashpoint in order to keep your buff active. Voila. I dunno. Something. Point is, I want 12x XP. I just hope there's not some ridiculously huge entry barrier like Legacy 50. Good grief.

So do you hate rest XP too and always make sure to park your character in a non-rest area? I presume you also never use the XP boosts and don't pick up daily quests either?

I don't know why the separation of PvP gear and PvE gear is considered a good thing. I didn't like it when WoW decided to do this, and I still don't like it now. I don't see what the big deal is with PvE'ers being able to use their gear in PvP, and vice versa. Who cares. Everyone is always so overly concerned about how everyone else gets their gear. When it comes to PvP, don't we want it to be about the player skill anyway? This has always been my biggest gripe about MMO PvP - it's so gear-dependent. That's counter-intuitive to the entire concept of PvP, for me at least. Just my opinion, obviously. I understand most will probably disagree.

This. I'd love to see all the Republic class stories (I play Imp), but I don't want to be detached from my guild for that long. Or if they let our characters jump factions. That would work too. I've long felt that class/faction restrictions are an out-dated model. Hell, factions in general may just be an outdated model.