While I agree with everything else you posted, I'm not so sure about this one. If the dev team wasn't deaf, none of these changes the OP mentioned would have even made it onto the live servers. EAWare had players screaming in their ears for the entirety of 6.0 being on the PTS, and they did nothing. History, both long ago and recent, shows that they are very, very deaf.

Didn't read your whole post, but this caught my eye. Anyone with one arm and half their brain tied behind their back knows that this game is ONLY still here because of the Star Wars name. If you think for a second otherwise, I'd really like to read your reasons why because, as someone who's played this since closed beta and has dabbled in pretty much every other MMO in existence today, this game's systems are sub-par in almost every way from performance to mechanics. It only excels (somewhat) in story, but only from a 2011/2012 lense... Most more recent MMOs exceed it in that aspect too.

The current upheaval is rather tame by comparison because if you haven't noticed, the forums are about 75% (and I'm being generous) less active than they were during 4.0.

Sadly, it's the same thing that was hard for the SWG developers to keep their playerbase happy and ultimately the reason for SWG's progressive downfall - They think they know what we (the playerbase) want more than we know what we want. The most recent (but not the only) example of this is their total disregard of literally everyone's feedback on the PTS without even trying to make it LOOK like they were listening and adjusting accordingly. This is why I never even bothered to touch PTS or even read the PTS forums while testing was going on. I knew they were just going to just waste everyone's time by taking 0% of the feedback they were given, so I'm glad I never touched it. Since launch, this is the first time that I'm actually just going to let my subscription lapse because it's just not fun to play anymore, not only from a creative/story direction aspect but also from a technical/performance aspect... The game has bugs still that have existed since launch, we still have a 32-bit client like its 2005 on an outdated engine so heavily modded that it should have been called Frankenstein Engine instead of Hero Engine, and combat is so clunky (and unplayable for many in PvP regardless of their spec or settings) that it's like mentally swimming in peanut butter trying to wade through mobs or kill players. Had this game not been a Star Wars MMO, I would have been gone a loooong time ago, but I've stayed subscribed because I love Star Wars, and I've consistently waited for the game to get better, but it never has. It was mediocre at launch, and it's gotten progressively worse with progressively slower updates and with progressively worse support. If the resources devoted to the Cartel Market were devoted to content creation, we'd have a decent game to play, but that won't happen because that's not where the quick money is. Next month will basically be the first time since 2004 that I haven't been subscribed to a Star Wars MMO... Let's hope Fallen Order isn't a total dumpster fire that lasts 5 hours, but lolEA so I'm not holding my breath.

Your first problem is labeling this as an "expansion" to begin with... It's a very far cry away from being an expansion regardless of how many times EAWare call it as such. It's not even the size of an ESO DLC, and those are released constantly. That's just one example. I think it's safe to say that by the standards set by every other AAA MMO that 1) This game gets worse and worse at having a constant flow of content and 2) This game has objectively the worst and most inconsistent update history of every western MMO on the market, which is hilariously sad because as a Star Wars game, this SHOULD be at the top of the MMO charts. It has earned EA $1 billion, but it definitely has not seen that reflected in support, regular updates, and regular content added.

Good ol' 32-bit client on a Frankensteined outdated engine

It sucks, and was a totally unnecessary change IMO. It doesn't even sound like Star Wars. It's just noise. This whole time, the original music has been just fine, and actually encapsulates the essence of SWTOR, so I don't know why they felt the need to change it now. You would think they would have at least given us the option to pick what music we want, but ya know... It's EAWare, so what do you expect.

I've got about 52 million on my main, and I know that's very low compared to a lot of players because I didn't even work very hard to get that. All I know is, I'm not touching crafting or BiS gearing for now because of the costs. I have roughly 55k cartel coins saved up, so I might just buy a bunch of CM crap to sell if this is what the economy is now.

I'm 100% all for Vitiate (with Doug Bradley). IMO he wasn't in the base game nearly long enough after all the pre-launch speculation/stories/theories we got about him between KotOR and SWTOR. There was a lot of speculation at the time that he was Darth Andeddu, which I would have liked, but either way, Vitiate was probably the most interesting character to me in the base game by a long shot. Valkorion on the other hand, I hated. Pretty much anything pertaining to those 2 expansions, I disregard as never happening lol. Vitiate + Empire vs Republic actually makes me feel like I'm playing a Star Wars game. KotFE/KotET made me feel like I was playing some kind of generic space fantasy game. I applaud their efforts, but that story was a dumpster fire. If we got the level of detail and cinematics in the base game that we did in KotFE and KotET, that would have been great.

Honestly, I just wish the game would die already so someone else can give their shot at the next Star Wars MMO. We all know there will be a third one at some point, but the longer this crap keeps going, the longer we have to wait for someone to (hopefully) do it right this time. Only bad thing is EA will still have to be involved. This update (I won't call it an expansion because it isn't) after 3 years is a joke in every possible way.

I get to work in motion capture performance (with the company that has made the SWTOR trailers) quite a bit and those cinematics are NOT cheap by any stretch of the imagination, so I would be extremely surprised if we got one. I hope we don't though honestly. I'd rather money be put into the game itself (64-bit client please?).

I honestly don't know what to think or if I'm ready. I'm going in pretty much blind (haven't played in a while and didn't touch PTS or read about it), so I'm just hoping I'm pleasantly surprised and not disappointed like I have been with everything since KotFE.

You do realize everything you just said is extremely inaccurate right?

Soft relaunch? 6.0 is barely an "expansion" compared to other MMOs like ESO and FFXIV.

Hey guys, remember in 2011/2012 when the forums were actually full of articulate and relevant threads?

PvP specifically has always been a train wreck in terms of performance in this game since the very beginning regardless of having a high-end systems or not. Unfortunately, it's a byproduct of a horribly Frankensteined game engine along with having no 64-bit support.

Huttball is and has always been a train wreck. I don't see how 6.0 makes it any worse than it already is.

Honestly, I hope so at this point. The game in its entirety has fallen short from launch starting as a victim of overhype and has always remained behind in various ways. The sooner this game is done, the sooner someone else can take a crack at the third Star Wars MMO. Third time's the charm? I hope so because the schizophrenic direction this game keeps going is getting ridiculous. Oh and hopefully the next one won't be built using a potato engine. You have games like ESO that came out only a year or two after SWTOR and actually have hard-set detailed plans (with dates) regarding performance improvements to keep up with the times, and SWTOR is over here with its 32-bit client re-doing gearing for the 50th time... /facepalm

Can't tell if trolling or if just dumb.

I get why people post, and I never said people shouldn't post. The point was there's no need to make a new thread on the same topic over and over each week (in the wrong forum too, mind you) like it's some brand new brilliant idea when they can post in the already-existing hundreds of threads about new classes that have existed since the game launched.

The difference is that George Lucas and Mark Hamill both confirmed that a sequel trilogy was George's original plan so getting that by whatever means was always a possibility. BioWare has flat out said multiple times (especially in streams when the question has been asked in chat) that a new class isn't going to happen, so I don't know why we have to see a new thread about new classes literally every week on the main discussion forum. Like someone else said, post it in the suggestion forum. The most we'll ever get are new ways to customize and build the existing classes, which is exactly what they're doing with the tactical system (ESO trait system) in 6.0.

These threads are getting old.

Nah just being realistic and looking at the game, it's situation, and it's creators from an objective POV.

Hate to be the bearer of bad news, buuuut the devs work and have always worked for EA, and EA works for $$$$ alone, not us. At this point, I think we should remember that instead.

What are you even talking about?