Progression updated: Terror From Beyond: Asation : 4/5 Hardmode Scum and Villainy : Darvannis : 4/7 Hardmode More updates soon This line intentionally left blank

It's worse than you think. The best solution for companion affection is to do the following :- Don't have any private conversations with your companion. Buy 21x Grade 1 gifts from the vendor @96 rep per gift = 2016 affection. Buy 42x Grade 1 gifts from the vendor @48 rep per gift = 2016 affection (for 4032 total). Buy 104x Grade 1 gifts from the vendor @19 rep per gift = 1976 affection (for 6008 total). Buy 105x Grade 2 gifts from the vendor @19 rep per gift = 1995 affection (for 8003 total). Then head to your ship and have all your personal conversations with your companion. If you choose your conversation answers carefully, most companions will be well over 9,000 affection by the time you finish. Some may even be max'ed out. The 167x Grade 1 gifts will cost you 33,400 credits. (@200cr each) The 105x Grade 2 gifts will cost you 63,000 credits. (@600cr each). Total credits .... 96,400. If you happen to have any companion gifts in your inventory you can use instead of buying them, so much the better. Just remember to use the correct grade gift for maximum reward. 0-1999 = Grade 1 2000-3999 = Grade 2 4000-5999 = Grade 3 6000-7999 = Grade 4 8000-10000 = Grade 5 ofc, just because "we" know it's possible to max out each companion for under 100k - doesn't mean everyone else does. There's still going to be a market for Grade 5 gifts. And Grade 1 to 4 gifts for those people who don't realise why buying Grade 1 gifts from 4000 to 5999 affection is so cost effective. This line intentionally left blank

Shameless /bump ... plus ... If you're a PvE player looking for an endgame raiding guild and you read through our recruitment post, maybe even visited our website and then decided not to apply... could you throw me a whisper on "wodawick" or my current active alt "barclays" and let me know why not. I realise a lot of people on the forums are already guilded and tend to be the more NiM contect focused people. But the swtor community can't be getting so small yet that nobody is looking, surely? (and yeah, I know... don't call you Shirley) This line intentionally left blank

Current Recruitment Requirements: CD are no longer recruiting. We've decided to call it a day after 2 years of trying to keep an 8man team going with a constant trickle of people leaving the game. We need: Sadly, nobody. We came, we saw, we gave up. Quick link to our website.... http://bit.ly/cdguild Last updated: 30th September 2013. About us... Any guild that doesn't attract like minded people tend not to last very long (CD has existed for nearly 10 years, from our days in Everyquest and beyond). SWTOR has been a challenge to us and we've needed to reinvent ourselves a couple of times along the way. But at our core, we want to create a community with a sense of fairness and responsibility that people enjoy logging in for. We are an easy going, friendly guild of English speaking players from across Europe who raid 8man content 3 nights per week (Tues, Weds, Sun) - starting at 7:30pm (GMT) and ending at 10pm. Once we fill the roster, we hope to add a 4th raiding night too. We're okay with shift patterns and family commitments and other variations on that sort of theme. That said, right now we need people who are going to raid at least 2 to 3 nights per week on average. Which generally means we're looking for people who WANT to to raid 3 to 4 nights, knowing there are going to be occasions where they can't. One of our recruits said raiding with us was like slipping back into an old comfy pair of slippers. That's us... old and comfy. We want to have fun raiding and progress as far as we can with the raid team we have. We have a varied mix of people and skills and an attitude that says that's okay. We take raiding seriously enough to want to start on time, make constant progression and kill bosses with the best of them. But not so seriously that we're min/max'ing gear and referring to combat logs all the time. We think story mode OPs are for pugs and hard mode OPs are for guilds. We're probably not going to clear Scum and Villainy on Nightmare mode... and we're fine with that. (We hope to try anyway). Our progress has been slow and we've been had setbacks where people losing faith with the game. With the right people though, we can keep pushing forward. Which is why we need YOU! We are NOT a levelling guild. We are NOT a PvP oriented guild. We try to dedicate one night per week to less progression oriented raiding. A "gearing run" if you like for members who haven't geared up as quickly as everyone else. As a guild we're recruiting you, not your gear. We can help you fix pretty much anything except your personality. Interested in joining us? Too late. Where were you when we needed you? And finally.... Small 8man guilds... I'd suggest speaking to a couple of similar guilds and getting maybe 3 8man teams together using 4 guilds as a pool. Sadly the game engine doesn't do well with 16man raiding, especially if a few people have low(ish) spec computers and debatable broadband. Guilds are about community... turns out, that's really hard to pull off with just 8-12 people. So go find 40 to 50 and have a ball. We thought about it... but after 2 years of an ever changing roster - rebuilding the guild for the 5th or 6th time was just too much to contemplate when you know you'll only have to do it all again in a couple of months. This line intentionally left blank

I posted this on an external site a while ago. But I'm having a nostalgia moment, where I'm thinking that posting to the suggestion forum isn't a complete waste of time (it's been a while since I thought this way, no doubt my cynicism will return shortly)... but anyway... My thoughts about freeing up "good" names, previously held by players who no longer play the game.... Pick a date, preferable after 1.2 went live, but before 1.4. Mail everyone who has a character that hasn’t been played after that date telling them they may soon lose the character names they currently have. If someone logs in with that character (even as preferred) and play it for more than 1 hour, they get to keep that name. They get 1 month to do it. 1 month later, rename all the inactive characters in a similar way to the server merger naming convention “Simon” -> “Simon_0F2A”. If records about names before each of the server mergers happened still exist that can be tied back to an account, perhaps mail people who lost a given name letting them know that their name has once again become available. First come, first served. For extra kudos, build a system that holds “freed” names for 2 weeks for people who previously lost that identical name in a server merge. Do the same every 2 months, advancing the “cut off date” by only 1 month. Until such time as the gap between the current date and the cut off date is either 18 months or 2 years. After that, have a rolling 1 month purge. My reasoning are based on these: I assume most of the “good” names were reserved by early adopters. People who played pre-1.2. I also assume that is the biggest proportion of people who left and don’t intend to return. I wouldn’t want someone who’s taken a short to medium term break from the game to lose their names. It’s disheartening for those who do return that they lost a cherished name. But whilst my definition of “medium term” right now might be 6-8 months, once the game has been active longer, my definition of medium term would lengthen. For example, if the game had been active for 5 years, I don’t think it would be unreasonable for people to lose names after 2 inactive years. But right now, 2 years would be too much. Equally (in my opinion) in 5 years, 1 year would be too short. So start at 1 and gradually build to 2. By restricting “keeping your name” to players who play for a minimum of 1 hour after being warned they may lose their name, you both get to avoid those people who peevishly log in for 30 seconds to keep a name they STILL don’t intend to use and at the same time, give that player 1 hour of playing again. Maybe that hour reignites a spark and they return to the game. Personally I doubt a list of “lost” names exist from the server merges, but if you don’t ask, you don’t get. btw, my choice of 1 year or 2 years rather than say, 30 or even 60 days is a reaction to the current limits applied to guild leaders. I still hold GL title on our duplicate guild that resulted from two server mergers. It’s not unknown for an ex-member who’s not played in a very long time to log in and suddenly find they’ve become the guild leader. The only way I can avoid it is to remember to log into that character every 29 days or so. It’s too frequent for an inactive guild. I can see the logic for shorter times, but let’s do our best to try to make returning to the game a fun experience rather than a series of frustrations and disappointments. Because taking a short break (<4 months) and returning to the game only to find out you've lost your character name would probably make me just walk away again straight away, even if I'd read the emails reminding me to log in. This line intentionally left blank

As for “freeing up” names reserved by people who will probably never use them again, I would go with this as a solution… Pick a date, preferable after 1.2 went live, but before 1.4. Mail everyone who has a character that hasn’t been played after that date telling them they may soon lose the character names they currently have. If someone logs in with that character (even as preferred) and play it for more than 1 hour, they get to keep that name. They get 1 month to do it. 1 month later, rename all the inactive characters in a similar way to the server merger naming convention “Simon” -> “Simon_0F2A”. If records about names before each of the server mergers happened still exist that can be tied back to an account, perhaps mail people who lost a given name letting them know that their name has once again become available. First come, first served. For extra kudos, build a system that holds “freed” names for 2 weeks for people who previously lost that identical name in a server merge. Do the same every 2 months, advancing the “cut off date” by only 1 month. Until such time as the gap between the current date and the cut off date is either 18 months or 2 years. After that, have a rolling 1 month purge. My reasoning are based on these: I assume most of the “good” names were reserved by early adopters. People who played pre-1.2. I also assume that is the biggest proportion of people who left and don’t intend to return. I wouldn’t want someone who’s taken a short to medium term break from the game to lose their names. It’s disheartening for those who do return that they lost a cherished name. But whilst my definition of “medium term” right now might be 6-8 months, once the game has been active longer, my definition of medium term would lengthen. For example, if the game had been active for 5 years, I don’t think it would be unreasonable for people to lose names after 2 inactive years. But right now, 2 years would be too much. Equally (in my opinion) in 5 years, 1 year would be too short. So start at 1 and gradually build to 2. By restricting “keeping your name” to players who play for a minimum of 1 hour after being warned they may lose their name, you both get to avoid those people who peevishly log in for 30 seconds to keep a name they STILL don’t intend to use and at the same time, give that player 1 hour of playing again. Maybe that hour reignites a spark and they return to the game. Personally I doubt a list of “lost” names exist from the server merges, but if you don’t ask, you don’t get. btw, my choice of 1 year or 2 years rather than say, 30 or even 60 days is a reaction to the current limits applied to guild leaders. I still hold GL title on our duplicate guild that resulted from two server mergers. It’s not unknown for an ex-member who’s not played in a very long time to log in and suddenly find they’ve become the guild leader. The only way I can avoid it is to remember to log into that character every 29 days or so. It’s too frequent for an inactive guild. I can see the logic for shorter times, but let’s do our best to try to make returning to the game a fun experience rather than a series of frustrations and disappointments. Because taking a short break (<4 months) and returning to the game only to find out you've lost your character name would probably make me just walk away again straight away, even if I'd read the emails reminding me to log in. This line intentionally left blank

Hmm... I don't see is a huge demand for EU <-> US transfers. Therefore I don't see why you would want to restrict the choice. It would be interesting to hear your reasoning. Don't get me wrong... I'm sure there will BE demand, especially from the sort of people who hang around on the forums. But the generic player? Not so much. I can imagine two things that you might be worried about... Something financial. Something related to server population imbalance. Something financial. 1800 ccoins is 1800 ccoins everywhere surely. I know the price (relative to USD / EUR / GBP exchange rates) isn't quite the same everywhere... But surely to abuse the difference between the exchange rates... wouldn't someone actually have to PAY to get onto the "other" region to take advantage? ofc, the exception could be the APAC customers unhappy with their initial free transfer. Maybe a concern they'll choose an initial free transfer to one region with the expectation of a cheaper paid transfer somewhere else later? There's a huge opportunity here win over the hearts and minds of players verses looking like penny pinching misers. Short term thinking tends to hurt long term goals. ofc, if any of that is a factor. Maybe something to do with legacy unlocks? Transfering a level 1 character cross server to unlock a lot of legacy stuff that would normally cost more than 1800 ccoins? But surely that's also true for inter-region transfers? Something related to server population imbalance. Firstly, I would point out that only the US region still has the option for players to transfer to the same playstyle & same language servers. There are a total of 9 servers in Europe, one for each combination of RP/PVE/PVP and English/French/German. Therefore anyone in the EU wanting to pay to transfer is either going to be changing in order to swap from PVP <-> PVE -> RP or to swap language. I am therefore assuming there will be limited movement to move to a "bigger population" or away from a shrinking population, since doing so would mean swapping to a server style or language (I presume) that player wouldn't initially WANT to play on. ofc, there is going to lots of scope for players who want more PvP to move to the known PvP strongholds. US players retain the option to transfer from PvE to PvE for example, purely to find a bigger community. Especially where friends have ended up on the "wrong" server as a result of the various server mergers along the way. And this is the only large market of paid transfers I'm expecting. But if a potential consolidation of people onto an couple US servers isn't restricted, why worry about a potential EU <-> US move? The only thing I can think of is that Bioware are concerned about falling server populations again either in Europe or in the USA and that when people notice their server population dropping, they'll pay for a cross region transfer and so make the situation worse. Resulting in a short term boost to finances, but ultimately a long term loss of subscriptions. But wouldn't that also be a danger with purely US <-> US transfers? The thing I would say is that such behaviour would be a symptom, not a cause of concern. Restricting cross region transfers might delay the flood - but you need to focus on the underlying issues, not the server transfers. Server transfers might put a spotlight on any potential problems, but removing the spotlight doesn't actually fix anything. And ofc, it could be something else entirely. But since you've ruled out technically restrictions... I'm at a loss to figure out what else it might be. Overall. I would say add paid cross region transfers. Because... Why not? As an aside, I would add my name to the group of people who think 1800 ccoins is too much. Yes, it's cheaper than other MMO's - but just because other MMO's overcharge for the service - doesn't mean BW have to too. Plus BW's approach to game design meant a push towards alts too. Players shouldn't be financially penalised for embracing that philosophy. tbh, given the small scope for potential transfers (and therefore I presume a limited amount of income), I think BW could have earned huge brownie points for relatively little lost revenue by making all transfers free. But then, I try to think what's best for the customer first and what's good for the accountants last. I've always assumed exceeding players expectations rather than chipping away at their patience will be rewarded long term, financially. This line intentionally left blank

Perhaps some of the information in Amber Green's sticky post should be condensed into a shorter form and included on the "Customer Service Help Request... Create Ticket" window? Clearly someone decided this was something important enough that it deserved a Gold sticky on the forums. Except, as far as I'm aware only a small fraction of active players come anywhere near the forums. Although I can imagine the sort of people who visit the forums have a large correlation crossover to the people who submit /bug reports. So wouldn't it make more sense that if people are sending tickets to the "wrong" place - that they be made aware of the differences BEFORE then hit the [send] / [Create] button? I could also make a case of splitting normal tickets and bug reports into separate UI elements to make the distinction clearer. Or since there is a single point of entry, all tickets should go to a single department for classification rather than relying on the customer understanding the difference. Next... ONLY a "/bug" command? How about a /help, /cs and/or /ticket commands? Surely a couple of extra aliases wouldn't cause the whole thing to collapse under the weight of the extra program code? And finally.... a bug I reported back in September last year (Ticket #6445306 for anyone who's interested)... using the /bug command adds an extra carriage return to the beginning on the Description window... meaning unless the user removes it... the first line of all bug reports are always blank (meaning the summary on the primary list of tickets is also blank). The /bug command has a bug... how poetic is that?

The OP's original concerns are still valid though. A lot of what we're currently playing was the work of the Daniel Erickson era people. As the OP points out, a lot of the content that has been rolled out in drips and drabs since then was originally to be delivered as a much larger single patch or patches, including the Rakata Prime planet and the ongoing battle with the Dread Lords in another operation. As far as I can tell, Explosive Conflict was originally intended to be in the game at launch. I suspect Makeb was intended to be level 50 content. Without the +5 level cap increase. But none of that happened and the team was stripped back to much smaller numbers. So the question becomes how much have they actually managed to DO with what must be very limited resources since then? Assuming the server mergers, LFG, SSSP and the F2P transition (including the cartel market) were huge timesinks, and the ongoing work to flesh out the Rakata Prime content is ongoing... what comes after that? More importantly, can we realistically expect anything beyond the most lightweight content until some serious recruitment takes place? This line intentionally left blank.

Please don't take the negativity as a sign that improved communication is bad. We're disappointed with the contents of the message, that's all. Personally, I think you've shot yourselves in the foot by letting us know that there is nothing of significance coming until at least August. But even so, that's better than trying to hide the reality behind smoke, mirrors and silence. Rock and a hard place. I'd say you've made the right choice and if you can continue to follow up on it, may even earn back some of the customer's respect and eventually our money. Maybe you (as a company) have turned a corner. I hope so. Shame you didn't have any good news. And no, I don't regard NiM content as new. Any more than I would the difference between SM and HM as being in anyway significant. TFB went live on the 26th of September last year... and we'll finally getting a 3rd opportunity to play through the same content we'll have already been playing for 9 months and 14 days on the 9th of July. Woohoo. New Flashpoints? [cynicmode] Hardmode Colicoid Wargame Hardmode The Red Reaper [/cynicmode] Jeez, I hope you're putting more effort than that. This line intentionally left blank

There is an "alt code" that seems to work (at least for me). While typing a message in the chat window, press and hold the <alt> key on your keyboard, then key the following numbers on your numeric keypad on the right hand side of your keyboard.... 0-1-1-8-8. Then release the <alt> key. That's <alt+0+1+1+8+8> It'll give you a ¤ in any other editor. But in chat, it'll give you the credit symbol. Hope that helps. Edit: Bahh. You were asking about the Cartel Coin symbol, not the credit symbol. My bad. Seems Amber gave you the "actual" answer. Scroll down 1 message. This line intentionally left blank

Depending on what you are looking for in a guild, CD might suit you. We're a friendly bunch and we've taken "trainee" tanks into the guild before now. We're a hardmode content guild, but hardly cutting edge. We'll get there, but we won't be breaking any records doing it. Mainly we're looking for someone who wants to raid 3 maybe even 4 nights per week, but is okay with occasional real life distractions. On the downside, I doubt we're ever going to put much effort into "older" content. We might, for giggles occasionally - but at level 55, we'll be focused on level 55 content. Sure, Vent, TS3, Mumble.... BUT... got RaidCall too? (We use mumble) This line intentionally left blank

There seems to be a bit of confusion in the thread. It's not that I AM darkside... It's the Jaessa is. Certain quest choices with her chooses HER path. And as far as I know once you've done those specific quests... it's set in stone, she's locked to that alignment. So there's no point me swapping from Dark V to Light V for example and it's (I think) impossible to get her to be BOTH Lightside and Darkside by making further choices. This line intentionally left blank

Has anyone else noticed that the meta achievement for warrior companions "Loyalty to the Sith Warrior" requires : The Beast The Commando The Officer The Padawan The Treasure Hunter Each of which is to get each companion to 10k affection. But I levelled my Jaesa as Dark Side, so instead of [The Padawan], I got [The Corrupted Padawan] instead. So I can't complete my meta achievement without a LS Jaesa? Finger's crossed it's on someone's bug list already. (and yes, I've submitted an in-game /bug report, just in case) The line intentionally left blank

Edited original post. We're currently looking for a tank to join us for 2.0 hardmode and possibly nightmare content. Quick link to our website.... http://bit.ly/cdguild This line intentionally left blank

I can understand that people in the last have asked for the ability to buy "older" cartel market items and that the new reputation tokens provide a mechanism for that. And therefore BW have chosen to pitch those items at the people who likely missed out in the first place... those people who actually buy Cartel Market packs. Plus it adds more money to the coffers, which I guess is the real point. If I've understood things correctly, the Resell Corp Reputation tokens can't be sold onwards directly, but the pack they are part of can - currently they are the only way to earn Rep. I'm explaining, just in case I'm mistaken. However, I've a very specific question - that I hope won't get lost amongst the many other comments in this thread. Q. Do the current plans include other ways to earn reputation with the Contraband Resale Corp via another route other than the cartel market purchased packs? I appreciate things might change based on feedback here. I appreciate that maybe we haven't seen everything yet. I'm just wondering if perhaps Makeb might feature quests that give certificates too? Or something other alternative that hasn't occurred to me. But right now, is THIS the plan? Or is there more to it? This line intentionally left blank

Updated: We're currently looking for a tank to join us for 2.0 hardmode and possibly nightmare content. Current Recruitment Requirements: Mainly we're looking for "our sort of people". People with a conscience, a bit laid back but with enough drive to want to clear hardmode OPs at least. Who are looking for guild for the next couple of years, not the next couple of months. We need: 1x Tank 1x Healer (maybe) One of our tanks has recently decided he's not intending to play after 2.0. So rather than wait till everyone hits 55, we're starting to think about recruiting a tank now. We also *might* need a healer once everyone reaches 55, but that is rather tentative at this stage. We're an 8man endgame PvE guild with real lives to live too. Which means we need at least 3 healers, 6 DPS and 3 tanks in total so we can raid on our chosen 4 nights per week. Right now, we're waiting for Rise of the Hutt Cartel to be released, at which point we'll be pushing into S&V HM as quickly as we dare. Ideally we're looking for people who are ready for hardmode content, but people's attitude matter more than your gear... so if we have to gear you up a bit... we'll help you do that. Quick link to our website.... http://bit.ly/cdguild Last updated: 5th April 2013. About us... Any guild that doesn't attract like minded people tend not to last very long (CD has existed for nearly 10 years, from our days in Everyquest and beyond). SWTOR has been a challenge to us and we've needed to reinvent ourselves a couple of times along the way. But at our core, we aim for a sense of fairness and responsibility. We are an easy going, friendly guild of English speaking players from across Europe who raid 8man content 4 nights per week (Tues, Weds, Sun and one other day, TBD) - starting at 7:30pm (GMT) and ending at 10pm. We're okay with shift patterns and family commitments and other variations on that sort of theme. That said, right now we need people who are going to raid at least 2 to 3 nights per week on average. Which generally means we're looking for people who WANT to to raid 3 to 4 nights, knowing there are going to be occasions where they can't. One of our recruits said raiding with us was like slipping back into an old comfy pair of slippers. That's us... old and comfy. We want to have fun raiding and progress as far as we can with the raid team we have. We have a varied mix of people and skills and an attitude that says that's okay. We take raiding seriously enough to want to start on time, make constant progression and kill bosses with the best of them. But not so seriously that we're min/max'ing gear and referring to combat logs all the time. We think story mode OPs are for pugs and hard mode OPs are for guilds. We're probably not going to clear Terror From Beyond: Asation on Nightmare mode... and we're fine with that. (We hope to try anyway). Our progress has been slow and we've been had setbacks where people losing faith with the game. With the right people though, we can keep pushing forward. Which is why we need YOU! We are NOT a levelling guild. We are NOT a PvP oriented guild. We don't spend a lot of time in flashpoints except for new content either. We try to dedicate one night per week to less progression oriented raiding. A "gearing run" if you like for members who haven't geared up as quickly as everyone else. As a guild we're recruiting you, not your gear. We can help you fix pretty much anything except your personality. Interested in joining us? Visit our website at : http://bit.ly/cdguild and post an application within the recruitment forum (or private mail the application to one of the raid leaders). Pretty much everything we do is organised through our website so we need you to setup an account, especially for raid signups. And finally.... We're also looking for an 8man raiding guild with a similar attitude to our own to collaborate for a few night's of 16man raiding. It's something we've been talking about almost since launch. But "trying" 16man is kinda hard without the assistant of a friendly guild. We can raid lead, or you can. We'd probably choose one of our "Gearing Runs" nights, but are open to other ideas. If this sounds like something you'd like to try with us, please contact Wodawick... alts: Doe or Barclays or post something here on the official forums and I'll get in touch with you. This line intentionally left blank

I'm a cynic. I've played since early beta. I played early access and have been a subscriber since launch. I still actively play but I haven't pre-ordered the DLC because the idea of paying money for an unspecified amount of content to be made available at an unspecified date doesn't sit well with me. I just wanted to explain my background before asking my question. ** This post contains spoilers to potential future content ** Where possible, I've tried to put links to the official posts I'm basing my assumptions on. So. What information we have on Makeb so far is that it's 5 extra levels. A new planet estimated to be roughly the size of say Corellia and Voss combined, although I'm assuming a lot of that space won't be on the surface and the extra area will be the caverns and other spaces mentioned by the CSRs. Maybe it won't be quite that big. But until it's released... who knows. There will be 2 story arcs, one focused on the republic side and one focused on the imperial side. I'm assuming a large degree of cross-over, plus the inevitable side quests. There is also an intent to make sure current gear isn't made obsolete while levelling. Although it's unclear if you'd still be wearing Dread Guard type gear when you reach 55. In addition, there will be new skill tree options to invest into and a new active ability for each advanced class. And we won't be able to buy the DLC using Cartel Coins. Other information will be made available SOON™. Now I'll move on to speculation... There seems to be a feeling that there won't be a whole lot of content other than the story arc quests. The most worrying aspect to me is that there might not be any significant new OPs or FPs. Taking that thought a stage further, that might mean that current content is normalised to be playable at level 55 too. Personally I disliked that content was reused in the form of story-hard-nightmare, but I've been playing MMO's long enough to see how that happened. But I think that "reuse old content" could happen, in part due to the State of the Game #2 interview with Jeff Hickman contained the quote I appreciate that's completely out of context and other than my mind jumping to conclusions, nothing to say it relates to FPs/OPs. But it strikes me as a quick fix to a lack of "elder game content" immediately after the release of the DLC. So here's my question... If we're likely to be wearing the same gear we are now, doing the same Operations that we're doing now. Why raise the level cap to 55? I'm sure other Operations and other Flashpoints are in the road map. Not least due to the datamined information during the early part of last year that detailed Lost Island, HK-51 and Terror From Beyond. Plus other stuff we haven't seen yet, including the planet Varl (which might have become Makeb), a new daily quest area, a new operation called Scum and Villainy involving the Hutts on the planet Darvannis. Then even further in the future, onwards to Rakatta Prime, a new Flashpoint and a new Operation to take on the Dread Masters head on. I can imagine the daily quest area being part of the Makeb DLC. I'm just not convinced that the Flashpoint and the Operation will be. And even if they are, that's only ONE flashpoint and ONE operation. I doubt that is enough to keep people busy, without rehashing old/existing content. So are people expecting to be doing the same raids wearing the same gear @55 (at least for a short while)? Or do people think that Dread Guard level gear will be useful initially on Makeb but replaced by level 55? And would one FP and one OP (assuming they *might* be part of the DLC) be enough to keep people busy / interested? This line intentionally left blank

You probably don't want to do this. The Jealous Male goes into a frenzy whenever he it within a certain distance of the boss. In effect, his damage increases. You should keep the Jealous away from the boss at all times. Though taking him near the red pools is a good idea (as long as the red pool isn't near the boss's current or "next" position). This line intentionally left blank

Yup. Me too. Although my list extends to 3 pages. I think it's a great idea in theory. In practice however, (in my opinion) it makes quickly logging into another character a moving target. I first noticed the downsides when I logged into two semi-infrequently used bank characters today. After returning to the character selection screen I realised that it whilst previously I would have almost absolute certainty where I could find a character quickly... there were going to be occasions where it would be less than obvious. I'd be interested if you're still a fan of the change in a couple of days when you've had to check the character list multiple times looking for the character you wanted. Maybe it's just me, I like the intent of the change - I just want to make finding a character more predictable. Likewise. I too had characters like that (not reserved for Cathar though). And there are characters that could spend 99% of the their time on page 2... except I don't have characters I never use, so sometimes they won't be. And it's that "sometimes they will, sometimes they won't" that makes me think this could do with a little more dev time. This line intentionally left blank

Up till yesterday, that was how it worked, yes. You pretty much always knew that characters beginning with "A" were near the top of the list and characters beginning with "W" probably we at the bottom (or on the 2nd page... or something). Except where they we're the last character logged in. Sadly, as of today. That's no longer true. Finding a character you recently logged out of is relatively easy if you just logged out. However, swapping between 3 or 4 character reasonably quickly or logging in after a few hours/days break makes it a bit of a treasure hunt. I applaud the effort, just not the current implementation of it. This line intentionally left blank

It seems to have been changed to be based on "last active date/time". Yet it's an undocumented change in the patch notes. I'd only just about got used to the old order. Is there any chance we could get a configurable option for "Sort by: " Last Active/Name A-Z Or better still, a "lock character selection list" option that would let us log into each of our characters in reverse order to set their positions within the list, then lock them permanently in that order. Overall, it's a step in the right direction that probably works better if you have 8 characters or less. As someone with more than 8, it's added a slight frustration factor to finding characters that didn't previous occur. It feels like a somewhat well intentioned but ultimately clunky solution. Edit: Nope. I can't imagine it being any easier with 8 or less characters. Just logging in one or two rarely used bank characters makes logging in to a frequently used character clunky. Previously I always knew where characters were.... now I appreciate it's not random... but it feels like it is. This line intentionally left blank

Firstly, if you are focusing on the gear to the point where you think it might not be worth playing until the DLC is released... you really need to sit down and think why you play. Gear comes and goes. Bosses still take about 6 minutes to kill, regardless of difficulty and level. Loot drops are what help you progress, not the other way around. The journey is what is supposed to be the fun part, not the end. But back to your concerns about greens replacing purples... As someone else has said, the CRS's have already directly addressed this - by saying that your endgame gear will still be viable when you reach 55. Keep in mind that the quests from 50 to 51 have to be possible by someone who's just dinged 50. That's roughly pre-tionese level gear. Personally, my best guess is that :- Quests @51 will drop Tionese level gear Quests @52 will drop Columi level gear Quests @53 will drop Rakatta level gear Quests @54 will drop Black Hole level gear Quests @55 will drop a mix of Campaign Level and Dread Guard level gear So yes, your Dread Guard level gear will still be usable at level 55. But everyone else will be wearing something similar anyway. After that, you start going out to earn the rating 154, 158, 162, 166 levels of gear. This line intentionally left blank

"Better" is subjective. But imo, yes. It's even possible with 1x mDPS and 3x rDPS. As long as the Jealous Male dies before the next one spawns. This line intentionally left blank

The strat I laid out is only for the initial pull and then the first Jealous Male. After that, just revert back to doing whatever it is you are doing now. The "2 on boss, 2 on adds" isn't really what I was getting at though. Not least because I can't know what your raid composition is. Mainly it's a "mDPS on the boss/jealous male, rDPS on the small adds as soon as they arrive at the red circle". I only mentioned 2+ ranged DPS on the adds - just in case your raid group was largely melee. *Someone* needs to attack the small adds, but if you have ranged people - it usually only needs 2 (in an 8man group) to AoE the small adds down. The sequence of events would be something like this :- Tank-A pull the Boss. When Tank-A gets 2x stacks of incubation, Tank-B takes the boss. This is very early in the fight. Tank-A moves towards the ranged DPS and when the 2x incubations stacks spawn 2x add - the ranged DPS kill them and return to the boss. mDPS could help, but then why bother? After a while, a Jealous Male and a red circle will spawn. Ranged DPS kill the Jealous. The red circle is ignored. When Tank-B reaches 9 stacks of the incubation debuff. Do a tank swap. Almost immediately afterwards, the 2nd Jealous Male and associated circle spawn. Tank-B picks up the Jealous. Your mDPS swap onto the Jealous too. rDPS can stay on the boss. That's up to you**. Someone goes to stand near the red circle and wait for the 9x stacks of incubation on Tank-B to trigger. At which point the person next to the red circle goes and stands in it - attracting the adds that spawned. When the small adds reach the circle, the rDPS stop attacking the boss and AoE down the small adds. After this, everything continues as normal. Tank swaps happen each time a new Jealous Male spawns. ** -- We split our rDPS and mDPS according to target. With mDPS focusing on the 2nd, 3rd and potentially 4th Jealous Males. rDPS killing the 1st Jealous Male only and all small adds when they reach the red circles. If you have lots of mDPS or lots of rDPS, then my description is only a guide, not an absolute. Just because we do it that way doesn't mean you have to. If you want mDPS to attack the small adds in the circle - fine. If you want rDPS to attack the Jealous - also fine. We do it this way so that people are switching targets less and mDPS aren't spending more time than necessary running around. Reducing time lost target switching and moving are both ways to increase overall DPS. As someone else points out, this only helps with this boss and only if you're consistently struggling with the enrage. There will come a point where you no longer need to do the boss this way and you can go back to doing "normal" tank swaps whenever a Jealous Male spawns. Not least, because this way is clunky and you'll need a higher level of DPS to kill the other bosses in TFB HM anyway. I'm intrigued by the 1800+ DPS mentioned. That's not unreasonable given the amount of AoE involved. However, just in case it's linked to why you are hitting the enrage timer... I'll point out that you should only ever be getting the small adds to AoE down while a red circle is present. If you are getting adds to AoE more often, then it's likely you are doing tank swaps (or the tank is losing aggro/dying) too often. Hope that clears up my advice and why it might work for you. This line intentionally left blank