It's weird how there are tons and tons of threads of this issue in customer service forum, dont you think? http://www.swtor.com/community/showthread.php?t=507316 This one has 19 pages and is only one of hundreds of threads with the same issue. Or all the recent threads concerning crappy/laggy FPS and stuttering on Makeb?

Before I say anything at all, I'm playing on a comp with i7 2600k cpu, Gefore 560ti (same clock as 570ti stock), 8gb ram. I run all the new games (BF3, skyrim, the witcher 2 etc etc) on max settings with fluid FPS. Before I started playing SWTOR again for the new expansion, I enjoyed theorycrafting etc with new talent builds, checking out new abilities and what's new. It looked really nice on paper, until I logged in and noticed how "choppy" and "laggy" everything still felt. It was actually WORSE than what I remember from the last time i played SWTOR. I can have 40-100 FPS, and I will still get spikes and it feels laggy, and suddenly drop down to 20-30 FPS a lot. Warzones where battle is going on is the worst. PVP is really no fun atm, when I get spikes and FPS drops when the game should play at 60+ FPS. The gameplay and pvp is simply "laggy" overall. Oh, and just to mention it: THE BOLSTER SYSTEM IS NICE ON PAPER, BUT YOU TURNED IT INTO THE LARGEST JOKE IN MMO HISTORY. The dev that is behind the bolster system should already be fired, it is so amateurly done that I lose faith in mankind. Now I'm expecting the EA defenders and SWTOR fanboys will flame me with "your comp is broken, you havent tried this and that blabla". I have tried different drivers, I have tried tweaking with nvidia inspector (which has helped sometimes, and what I learned from that is how **** the ingame AA is, and what a joke the graphic settings ingame really is), I have looked at the CPU/GPU % load and so on. It's the game that is poorly coded atm, and the game engine is really, really bad. I also base this on the fact that there are tons and tons of people with the same problems, with different graphic cards. Hell, even people with brand new cpu chips and nvidia 680 cards are getting low FPS and laggy gameplay. It's even more funny at the new planet Makeb is even worse than the old planets in terms of FPS and spikes. Bioware, START FIXING THE CORE MECHANICS OF THE GAME BEFORE YOU CONCENTRATE ON PUTTING NEW SPAM ON CARTEL MARKET. I want my money and time back please :/

To answer the OP's question: Well, I just cancelled my sub :/ The game is too dumbed down, bioware is overnerfing classes (they listen too much on the noobs, and not so much on the ones who got a clue). Game engine = fail. Ilum = fail. Open pvp = Huge fail. Warzones = sometimes fun, but its too easy to get gear, noobs get the same gear as the best ones, with no effort/rating involved etc. Rated pvp = the same crap as the old system, just with a new name. Noobs will still get the greatest gear in the game as the best ones fast, and again with no effort.. lazy noobs win! I had some faith in the game, but I've simply lost interest now. Now I actually think mists of pandaria will kill this game with its pokemon endgame material and all, as sadly as that sounds.

Actually, every single person in my guild gets those "lockups" and fps lags from quest updates (especially ilum), opening inventory or tabs while moving etc. The engine is NOT optimized properly.

lol, "let the true pvp begin". So you are saying something like "I get owned all the time now, but I'm sure its only because they wear BM gear, and I only wear champion. 1.2 will surely fix this, it will make me a better player for sure!" Sorry to tell you, but you will get owned just as much as before, but the difference is that there will be no goals or rewards in endgame worth playing for, or keep subscribing for. Champion gear to BM gear is still very little difference, but atleast its something. In 1.2, everyone will get the current "champion" gear, called war hero, and get bored to death fast and quit with nothing left to do.

If bioware remove the gear rewards in pvp, the game will die when people get bored quickly with no goals to do, caused by lack of rewards in high end pvp. Bioware wants all the lazyest people get everything easy. Now watch how bioware sinks their own ship with this stupid choice.

After the news on how bad rated warzones will be, lots of people have cancelled on my server, and our largest and best pvp guild who were going to focus on organized pvp disbanded yesterday :/ Bioware is truly killing their own game.

I have killed tons of BM players with both my lvl 50's when I only had centurion gear. And the difference between champion and BM is close to nothing. A champion geared guy who say "omg you are BM, not fair" when the BM player owns him, just needs to learn how to play. Sadly many clueless people think BM is superior :/

Now from being an athlete myself, and doing sports on high tournament levels (with sponsors), I can say that I like competition, and I think its fair that if you bring the effort, you should be rewarded likewise. So if you dont care in putting any effort at all, you should not be rewarded for being lazy. Bioware wants to reward lazy people like you, and I think its wrong.

You're example is as wrong as it gets. All RL sports = sponsors and price money on HIGH END level. I especially love how you mention "golf" as a sport where there are no rewards Imagine if Tiger Woods and the rest of the golfers were told "if you win a big tournament in this career, there is not any price or reward at all, you will end up broke", before they started winning and got rich as hell. You are probably a bad golfer, so you get nothing. A bad pvp'er should still get 96%, and I wish the skilled pvp'ers would be awarded with 100% for the work. It's only 4% I want, but its still something that can count as a "reward" for the effort.

It's all about not getting bored from the game too fast. It's more fun to keep playing if you know there is something slightly better as a reward, even if its just sligthly. If there is no reward at all = easy to become bored and quit.

Just wanted to inform bioware that tons of the members of several pvp guilds on my server are quitting after the news that rated warzones will be the new valor grind, except any requirements at all. One large pvp guild also disbanded yesterday. Now I wonder, who's idea was it that "rated" pvp, would not mean squat? All they are doing now is seperating normal warzones from rated warzones, even if they will basically be exactly the same, just that rated will give better free gear. I will cancel sub and prolly play my month out like 80% of my pvp guild already have, but pvp just gets boring when there is nothing worth "working" for by playing organized. High warzone rating = no rewards worth mentioning, A LOT more effort. Low warzone rating = the same rewards as high rating, a lot LESS effort. Endgame pvp gear worth working for = None. Chance of getting bored from lack of worthwile "goals" pvp wise: High. You failed with Ilum, and now you fail with this. Both had good potential. Clickers and backpeddalers that run around playing rambo in pvp with no tactics in their head should NOT be awarded 100% as much as those who put more effort in it and play organized. Just like hardmodes gives better rewards than story mode in pve.

Just wanted to inform bioware that tons of the members of several pvp guilds on my server are quitting after the news that rated warzones will be the new valor grind, except any requirements at all. One large pvp guild also disbanded yesterday. Now I wonder, who's idea was it that "rated" pvp, would not mean squat? All they are doing now is seperating normal warzones from rated warzones, even if they will basically be exactly the same, just that rated will give better free gear. I will cancel sub and prolly play my month out like 80% of my pvp guild already have, but pvp just gets boring when there is nothing worth "working" for by playing organized. High warzone rating = no rewards worth mentioning, A LOT more effort. Low warzone rating = the same rewards as high rating, a lot LESS effort. Endgame pvp gear worth working for = None. Chance of getting bored from lack of worthwile "goals" pvp wise: High. You failed with Ilum, and now you fail with this. Both had good potential. Clickers and backpeddalers that run around playing rambo in pvp with no tactics in their head should NOT be awarded 100% as much as those who put more effort in it and play organized. Just like hardmodes gives better rewards than story mode in pve.

Rated pvp with absolutely zero rewards that matters is going to fail, I promise you People will get bored quickly, and far less people will even care about the rating at all.

Our guild basically quit after the awful work they are doing with rated warzones, no reward system, and not even ability to queue as a full team in 1.2...

There is a difference between "we are adding it sometime in the future" and "we are adding it in 1.2 together with rated warzones" So far I've only heard them say "future sometime". Please learn to read or link me a dev saying "8 man queue coming in 1.2"

------------EDIT :------------------- I AM NOT SAYING HIGH RATERS SHOULD BE SUPERIOR, I am simply saying that there should be a slight upgrade that makes the goal of reaching high rated more fun and compelling, and actually worth something at all. If you know your class right, then you shouldnt have any issues at all killing a full BM player if you are full champion atm, its only 136 vs 140. Hell, lots of champion items are even BETTER stat wise over BM atm. Now imagine that rated warzone gear was lvl 150, while HIGH rated wz gear was 153-154 and take longer to get. It wouldnt really matter much, and skill > gear still, but it would be a reward for the work you've put into organized pvp, just like hard modes/nightmare modes rewards you in PVE. Now if you can't see how this is fair, then it's VERY obvious that you don't believe you are any good in pvp, or have any intentions to try play better in the future, and just want everything for free with zero effort involved. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------ Now from being an athlete myself, and doing sports on high tournament levels (with sponsors), I can say that I like competition, and I think its fair that if you bring the effort, you should be rewarded likewise. If I win a tournament, I also win a money price (or a car etc). Bringing effort rewards you. So if you dont care in putting any effort at all, you should not be rewarded for being lazy. Bioware wants to reward the lazy people, and I think its wrong. Once the news about rated warzones in swtor is not being taken seriously at all, that rating will mean nothing except for green color instead of blue on the same armor, a mount or a pet, 80% of my pvp guild cancelled sub and most of them are now back playing wow. The guild went from active to dead very fast. This happened during just a few days after the horrid news about the changes bioware is taking. I've also heard similar stories, of especially pvp guilds, who are losing tons active members after the news. Now the problem is that I honestly feel the same way myself, the second I heard where bioware is going with "high end" pvp, with no rewards that really matter, or most would care for, I also lost every last bit of interest in the game too. Right now, lvl 60 valor gives ability to wear BM. You see tons of people grinding for rank 60, because it "gives impact on your character", even if its just a small gear buff over champion. It's simply the fact that it makes your char SLIGHTLY stronger as a reward. Now, how many do you see grind or work for the "war hero", or hell, even "warlord" title, and just for the title alone? Close to absolutely zero. Most of the people grinding it, did it in the past when they thought it would give awards that mattered in the future. They were wrong. In 1.2, it will be the same with rated WZ, there will simply not be much point in actually organizing teams for it. The rewards for the work doesnt mean anything at all. Thing is, with a rated system where the skilled players who achieve a set rating from playing organized and working for it, and gives you awards that actually upgrade you (even just slightly) it gives you a longtherm goal to keep playing for. If you hand out the best pvp gear to everyone, and call it "rated warzones", even if its just a completely new random warzone valor grind with a new name, except any reqs AT ALL this time, then people will become very bored quickly, because there is no rewards good enough to make people put all the extra work into achieveing as good rating as possible through organizing teams. Even the people crying "we want free loot for clickers too!". You will get bored as well, once you realise rated warzones will just be a new valor grind with ZERO skill involved, and that there is no reason to keep playing after you got the gear, because very few cares about rating if it gives you zero rewards worth mentioning. WoW atleast awarded the players with 2.2k+ rating with a better weapon (a whole good tier up), even if armor only changed in color. This meant that A LOT of people wanted to WORK for that weapon upgrade, because it mattered. Nobody would really care as much if you didnt get that wep. The goal needs to be achievable by not only the 5% of the top players, but it still needs to be hard enough that you cant pug your way to those rewards that matter. We want a gear grind that is also awarded by work and skill, not just 100% grind with zero skill involved. If you really think scrapping gear upgrades from the "harder to get" list, you WILL fail on keeping players happy and not bored to death with no reason to play your game. So again, I'm NOT saying high rated people should be completely superior, I am saying they should be awarded stat wise slightly, enough for it to be worth the work, but not so much that a "tier below" player cant kill you. Similar to champion level 136 and BM 140 now. If they made "story mode" pve gear drops be just as good as "hard mode" gear, do you honestly think as many guilds would bother with anything other than story mode then? no, only a very very few % would really care. They would get bored and quit in the end. PVE REWARDS THOSE WHO PLAY ORGANIZED AND BEAT HARDMODES/NIGHTMARE, SAME THING SHOULD BE SET FOR RATED PVP.

Yes, but looking at how they already screwed up guardians and said they were "fine", I'm afraid they wont make them viable :/ Self-healing is the absolute way to go to help fix guardians atm.

I'm talking PvP. Playing guardian at the moment feels like playing something that is gimped, gimped, gimped. The survival of guardians is a joke, even playing as a tankspec feels like a joke. It's like playing a class where you feel its only 50% done if you know what I mean. I think if bioware gave guardians some sort of selfheal ability, that either scaled with total health, or scaled well (read well, and not awful like the blade barrier ability) it would go a long way to improve the guardian survival at the moment. Because right now it feels like a glasscannon without a cannon, and you sit left with just glass and "out of range, out of range, dead." It's the joke class in swtor atm, and everyone knows it. This could also make the Enure CD a BIT more useful, so you dont have to die 100% of the time once the 10 sec is up. You might have a chance to actually stay alive after..yay Playing guardian without having a pocket healing on you 24/7, feels like you are about to die soon no matter what. You simply cant get your health slowly back up without leaving combat, it only decreases. What if you gave all guardians a passive 3% of max health self-heal on every crit they make (but does not work on dots)? Including up to 3 AoE crits (so for example if you AoE crit 5 out of 5 at one time, you heal for 3x3 = 9% health total) They would still not heal like sentinels do, but they would atleast have some sort of self-heal, and it would work well with force sweep, which is used a lot, and already has a cooldown so it wouldnt be OP. I also think guardians need a buff on Enure (but not op), so its not a complete waste after the 30% health is gone. Say, it increases health by 30%, and after 10 secs, 15% of the health is gone (so its a 15% health heal in the end).

Did Gabe actually say for 1.2 patch? I heard that this was NOT for 1.2 patch, but "in the future". So if they dont launch this in 1.2, it will be a lot of complaints coming......and a lot of sub cancels too....a lot of people are waiting for rated wz's, and who would play as 4-man team + 4 randoms in rated pvp...? It would suck.

So basically, bioware wants to launch rated warzones with the current crappy queue system. Bioware, what the hell are you thinking adding rated warzones without being able to queue as a full team? If you dont let people queue as full teams in 1.2 together with rated warzones, this will only spread to a huge amount of complaints, because honestly, its god damn stupid. NOBODY WANTS TO PLAY RATED WARZONES IN PREMADE 4-MAN, AND THEN END UP WITH 4 OTHER RANDOMS THAT DOESNT CARE ABOUT TACTICS. IT'S A HUGE HUGE FAIL.

Sound like win-win. Gearscore mixed with people who watched TOO much on recount, ruined a lot of wow. It became an elitist community, and everything became "need 5k GS or more" etc, even if the bosses were easy and could be killed with a bunch of people in greens. I think this is the right way to go from a server community perspective. The game gets ruined when you get too much of "need x amount of this, and x amount of that to get invite" mentality among people who doesnt know what they are doing in the first place. In short: when noobs starts acting like elitists who think they know everything, when they actually DON'T, it goes very wrong, and that's what happened in WoW with too much focus on gearscore and recount across the board This lets the people with brains do their job, and it also lets the community have less of the "elitist" wannabes spamming chat with random values needed.

Fun fact: TERA looks 10x as good as SWtor, and also runs 3x as good I hope they fixed a lot in 1.2, so it can atleast run as good as TERA, even if it still looks **** compared to it.

Edit: Thank god for above post Edit2: Looks like bioware failed, and its not for 1.2....

That's why I wrote "might", in case you're reading comphrehension isn't good enough to understand that word, or my sentence. I wrote it only based on the 1.2 video that BW launched, and it was only something I wanted to mention IN CASE they were actually thinking of bringing it to pvp as well. I usually don't read every updated article on ign.com 2 minutes before I post here. The real question I want an answer on, is if it will be possible to queue as a full team/ops for rated warzones, like it should be. and not a 4 man limit.