My thoughts exactly. They'll never switch it back. The only thing we can hope for now is an optional difficulty slider or some kind of boost that self limits XP and or power. A good start though would be to have legacy benefits be toggle-able. That would reduce mastery, presence and endurance values back to something normal for a video game. I really want to play, but I can't stay awake as the action part of the action adventure is so mind numbingly boring. It makes me wonder if the team forgot that Star Wars has a proud, nerdy, intellectual culture; the kind of culture that generally wants mental stimulation.

I support this idea.

I'm with the OP, except that I don't think excessive XP gains are the problem. All XP does is grant access to content further along the chain of the story or stories. Access simply means the freedom to advance through whatever content the player wants at his or her pace. I myself like to do everything. I'm an explorer and I enjoy exploring while uncovering the map, locating codex items and completing achievements. I like challenging myself against champion class enemies to gain a greater understanding of the mechanics of a class. When I heard a level sync system was being implemented, I fell down on my knees and worshiped at the alter of Bioware. And the idea of legacy datacrons, meant that I'd have to option to skip the jumping puzzles if I wanted to while still gaining those benefits as I advanced through each planet; the same way they had always been balanced except without the need to go to them. I was thrilled to the point that I subbed for the six month rate rather than the one month rate I normally used. Finally, I could play all the stories I had been saving for four years because the game wouldn't consist of killing gray mobs. Well mission accomplished, sort of. It's utterly fantastic for players who want to fly through the planets and get to endgame. But for people who want a steady evenly presented series of obstacles, it flat sucks. The problem is that level sync and legacy benefits have been horribly implemented for gamers like myself. The only mildly challenging solo content that I've found since 4.0 went live are the 2+ Heroic missions, which ironically are designed for 2 players. But even then, the missions on the starting three or four planets are a walkthrough. Level sync should be designed to sync players to the general level of the zone not the entire planet. And where players enter an instanced encounter, the sync should be to the original level of the mission. Secondly, I think players have the right to turn off legacy benefits if they want to. The legacy they have built is their own, why should they have to force that level of overpowering on starting characters if they don't want it? The way things are now, if I want to have a character that is semi balanced to the content, I have to start a new character on a new server where no companion conversations have unlocked bonus presence, abilities and buffs. Likewise, having the full benefit of the entire datacron catalog on a level one character is grossly out of balance and remains so until about four planets into the experience. And this has been made particularly bad since all the primary stats were merged into a single stat; mastery. Look, I'm not interested in taking anything away from other players or gating their experience to serve mine. I just want a few sensible options to make the experience I'm paying for at least semi enjoyable. The OPTION to make my experience more difficult, even tedious, in no way takes away from anything that KotFE hopes to achieve. What I'm asking for is that the game be designed with STORY as it's primary purpose. When combat is easy to the point that it creates no tension, then there is no drama. Without drama the STORY BECOMES FLAT AND BORING which makes the entire experience flat and boring. Can you imagine Luke Skywalker in the trench run of the Death Star being at all epic if there was not even a flicker of a chance for failure? Besides I'm never going to learn my class if every enemy dies before I even have a chance to target them.

I may have the exact same bug/glitch. I have the blank quests you described but didn't notice if I could abandon them or not. They're squished together so tight it's hard to even see how many, but it looks like five; the same number as my companion count. I'll log in after this post and see if they can be abandoned and possibly provide a work around until the code gets sorted out. I imagine the glitch was caused when companion dialogue progression was altered for 4.0. For the sake of providing context, I'm playing a Trooper and completed chapter 3 just prior to noticing the issue. What was out of the ordinary for me is that I finished the class story on Voss and went directly to Corellia; skipping the built up available companion conversations. Completing my class story may have been the catalyst. Hopefully I can abandon the blank quests too. Regardless, thanks very much for providing a possible workaround. [uPDATE] So I tried abandoning the blank quests and it worked like a champ. My companion quests lit right up and I was able to finish them out. I never had to abandon the blank quests more than once, but I was on the last conversation option for all of the companions except Jorgan. His quest however took me to a planet and was actually entered into my mission log as those types of quests generally do. Anyway I was able to finish Jorgan's chain as well. Thanks again for this work around.

The amount of presence given at starting levels is obscene due to the legacy benefits of unlocking all of the companion conversations. Until this is addressed, companions are going to remain borked at low levels. I'd like to be able to turn those benefits off if the system isn't going to be balanced. My feeling is that regardless of what is done to companions, the game is going to feel imbalanced at starting levels as long as the legacy datacron system remains unchanged. My hope is that there will be an option to turn it off or that it will be adjusted to scale according to how the benefits naturally accumulated in the old system as a character would conquer each new world in the leveling process.

This is pretty much where I'm at. I'm running a corruption sorcerer with mostly 208 gear, the exceptions being 190 crafted implants and a 220 earpiece. My comp was influence level 15 at the time and in the damage role. Basically I do damage in a healing spec and use the companion damage as a supplement. Then I heal as needed. It's a little chaotic, but a lot more expedient than running the comp as a tank or healer for my build. First I ran the starter planet heroics; total walk through as usual (which sucks to be frank, especially for players starting new characters on an existing legacy). Then I ran some Taris and Voss heroics. The difficulty increased as the level of the heroic increased, which is how it was before the 4.0.2. One encounter got really hairy when facing 3 golds and 2 silvers. 2 golds spawned as part of the encounter and the one I had cc'd was broken by the companion. We both had about 10% health when it was over. The heroics were still very much doable, but instead I had to do basic strategy like CC and directing the companion at who to attack and when. That wasn't the case before the patch. I could have the comp attack and watch the encounter. All in all, I think it was an improvement for sure. I'm still pretty disappointed with the under level 21 content; which I believe is mostly due to a legacy datacron benefit imbalance. I think scaling those benefits with level sync would improve that; as would an option to turn those benefits off. The poorly executed level sync (especially for those planets) doesn't help. On a side note, the day before the patch, I tried to solo the Hoth star fortress heroic with an influence level 24 companion. It was my first time running the place so I was a little bewildered by the encounters. I got to the third reactor stabilizer array before I gave up. There were just too many elements to handle by myself on a first run at it. Also, in hindsight I realized I probably should have been running my comp in tank mode or heal mode. Overall it was pretty easy to manage until the reactor stabilizer series of events, and I think a lot of that has to do with me really not knowing what I was doing. The heroic star fortress mobs are much more difficult to beat than planetary heroic mission mobs, despite both activities being classified as Heroic 2+.

Personally speaking, I just assume have all 18 characters on one page. The way the list is now with all the redundant PLAY buttons and over sized insignias, there is more than enough room to do so if some of the fat is trimmed off. But considering all this stuff takes time and money, I'd be happy with the option to organize the list and an option to turn off moving the recently logged in character to the top of the list.

does it save memory or reduce lag by removing quests? I only ask because maybe it was done for technical reasons. Also, is it possible these were moved to locations more relevant to what they're about? is the section X one on Belsavis now perhaps? The devs have stated that streamlining the experience was part of the goal so maybe they just moved the quests givers to different locations.

Great idea

Maybe a nice compromise would be a boost item like those used to increase XP gains by 25%, except this would increase difficulty by 25% and/or reduce XP gains by 25%. They could be created and sold on the cartel market which would pay for the coding needed to create the optional increased difficulty mode. Those who want an increase in challenge win because they have access to what they want. Those who want the game difficulty left alone win because they don't have to participate. Those who develop the game win because they get paid directly for the new option.

I love the sheer dedication of compiling a list like this. I tip my hat to you 1) A level sync system based on the zone the player is in, not the planet as a whole. Additionally, syncing players to the original level of instanced content, rather than syncing instanced content to whichever planet the instance is accessed. 2) a gated influence system that limits companion influence ranks according to character level and relative to character level sync, while at the same time placing no restriction on influence gains and allowing pooled influence and ranks to be beneficial once the appropriate character level and character level sync has been achieved. 3) Toggle off button for legacy benefits that affect combat

The point of the leveling experience in an MMO is to learn your class. This way you aren't a burden when participating in endgame cooperative team play activities. Having a training period (leveling up) not only makes the adventure relevant to endgame, but gives purpose to exploring the many mechanics and systems the basic MMO offers. In the case of TOR, If leveling only requires hitting the attack button on the companion action bar, then it sort of defeats the point of the leveling game in the first place; which is to learn how to play, respect the game mechanics and learn how to work as a team. The good news is, that players who don't want to experience the leveling game in it's entirety; regardless how they feel about it; can simply use the level 60 character creation tool, or a buy a token. Additionally, MMO's evolve over time. So it's never doom and gloom as long as technicians are still working at improving the game. I started an inquisitor after 4.0 launched. I literally one shot all the simple mobs and two shot the silver elites. The gold elites played like the silver elites used to at start up. By level seven or eight I soloed both heroics without a companion. When I got my companion, it was game over. Now to put it into context, I had the legacy benefit of all datacrons except those on Rishi and have the presence bonus of completed companion dialogue for two classes, in addition to all four class type buffs. I then started an inquisitor on a different server, outside of my legacy and it felt pretty balanced for the short time I tested it out. My personal feeling is that the systems in place in general work. That being said I would like to see some tweaking to the combat mechanics so that players don't have to intentionally sabotage the many tools in the game that were designed to progress their characters in order to explore their class and the game world in general. I understand that story is the focus of the game and I'm all for that which is why it's so important to have a minimum standard for difficulty. There is no tension in a drama if no uncertainty exists. I think that a nice middle ground would be to offer a heroic mode in addition to the current story mode of the leveling game.

My only gripe with level sync is that it's not based on individual zones, but by planets as a whole. Instanced content should sync players to the original level of the content, not to the level of the planet. Keeping the experience on an equal footing throughout the journey would mean players could explore every last detail of the game and all of it's mechanics and systems or race to max level with as few steps as possible, and still face the same basic challenge all the way there. Additionally, I feel that the benefits of legacy datacrons and legacy companion bonus presence gained from completing their dialogue sessions, should sync down as well. However, I'd be satisfied with the option to turn off those legacy benefits.

I have to agree with the OP. XP is gained way too fast. And despite the best efforts by the developers to create systems to compliment that; systems I'm still totally excited about; it just doesn't work in a way that offers any kind of challenging game play for the level up experience, which is exactly what the systems in 4.0 potentially offered. Here's what needs to change. 1) Create a TRUE level sync system that syncs players to the current zone they're in, not the entire planet's max level cap. Level 15 players can easily handle level 15 enemies in the current system. 2) Scale the legacy presence benefit gained through completion of companion conversation arcs to 1/50th the sum per level earned up to level 50 and apply that ratio according to level synced. 3) limit legacy datacron benefits to those planets the current character has completed class and planetary story arcs for; or as an alternative to those who enjoy visiting them, limit the benefits to the datacrons the character has opened. This gives players the option to skip over story arcs as they see fit and still potentially benefit from their legacy. Or grant each planet's datacron benefits once the character has reached the max level for that planet. Or apply the planetary benefit once any of these three conditions have been met. Or just scale the benefit to 1/50th the sum per level earned up to level 50 and apply that ratio according to level synced. 4) Reduce the mastery benefits from datacrons proportionally to what was gained through the removal of wisdom, strength, aim and cunning. Essentially reducing the benefit to 25% its' current value. These alterations will bring out the true greatness that 4.0 potentially offered and restore a fun, engaging and challenging adventure. In pencil and paper RPG's, The point of gaining XP isn't about gaining levels; it's about gaining access to new adventures and challenges. By creating a true level sync system, and a balanced legacy, it will allow players who want to explore every aspect of the game; class quests, world story arcs, warzones, flashpoints, world bosses, crew skills and space combat; the exact same awe, thrill and inspiration as a player who chooses to rise to the top as efficiently and expediently as possible. The current XP mechanics will work in harmony with the rest of the game and allow players of both extremes and every shade in between a fun ride.

I started a new character and have experienced a very watered down extremely easy series of challenges. So I started considering that at such a low level the raw benefit of legacy datacrons; of which I have all but those on Rishi; simply makes my character unbeatable. I would like the option to turn this benefit off so I can experience the game with some if not all of the nail biting tension and excitement it once employed. An even better option; though likely much more difficult to code; would be to have the benefits of planetary datacrons kick in once you've completed the class and world stories of the zone those datacrons are in: sort of like a check point system. But for the sake of keeping it simple for you guys, an on/off toggle button would be more than sufficient to make me very happy. I haven't gotten my companion yet, but I can only imagine the super godlike power I'll inherit and turning that legacy benefit of presence off would be welcome as well. I don't ask this lightly, since I realize that it takes money to change things, but I think having some tools in place to allow players to enjoy a much more difficult challenge will promote a healthy game and won't in any way be counter productive toward the new direction 4.0 is taking The Old Republic.

With influence numbers maxing out at 250,000 the ability to see at a glance who has progressed further on the Crew Skill window is a bit taxing for my old man eyes; even with glasses LOL I think it would be helpful if the old affection progress bar was replaced with the brand new influence rank insignia. It's much more intuitive and falls in line with the new direction the game is going. Additionally, is there anyway we could have an adjustable Crew Skills, Crafting, Companions and Contacts window or a full screen mode? It would improve quality of life when crafting and monitoring the progress bars. Perhaps an even easier option would be to just move the whole function of crafting into the Companions and Contacts window or integrate the Crew Skills window into an all new crafting and mission interface. If missions, crafting and crew Skills were combined into a single window interface, it would make the whole process more engaging. I believe that with all the added companions now and in the future, something like this would be a welcome addition going forward.

100% agree. I love that choices matter in KotFE. It really is a fantastic direction the narrative is taking and would be so much more enhanced if some of the early and bold ideas for companions and story choices got brought back as well. One of the things I loved about Knights of the Old Republic is that you didn't have to keep all of your companions. And now with the new companion mechanics forming the new basis to build from, bringing that Knights of the Old Republic touch to The Old Republic would add greater depth to the leveling experience. I hope it happens.

I haven't had this much fun playing TOR in years. It's definitely not everything I wanted the expansion to be but overall, it's working for me personally.

I was a little bit apprehensive about this new system, but after using it quite a few times, it feels more like a mini game than a story element anyway, so it works for me. EDIT: and truth be told, the conversation has gotten a little stale after the number of times I've replayed through it. The voice part of it is almost annoying at this point and I've really only played with it for a couple days. I think if anything was to be changed for this, I'd suggest minimizing conversations to changes and progression in the story and create a drop-box for influence progression repeatable mechanics. All in all though, it's reasonably enjoyable.

Some things that could have happened that I feel would have improved companions without gutting them: 1) Give players dual spec so they can run various forms of content with optimal results. This would encourage multiple sets of equipment which helps keep the game going and the economy flowing. 2) Allow each companion to perform 2 of the 3 combat roles to offer some flexibility and variety while retaining some distinctiveness. A lot of companions had multiple combat stances that sort of emulated this. With duel spec this would more than ensure no player permanently gimps themselves. 3) Restore and retain the gearing requirements for companions to enhance the choices players would select from #2 above 4) Create an appearance tab for companions so we can gear them optimally and still retain whatever look we want for them in the same way we enjoy that functionality for ourselves 5) Offer a hard mode level sync option so that players who want a challenge with their companion can explore the game at their own pace and face yellow and orange enemies throughout the experience. 6) An alternative to simplify gearing could be to remove the skin associated with the concept and let us upgrade the character sheet directly with mods, enhancements, color crystals, weapon type specific barrels, weapon type specific hilts, and slot specific armoring. Basically separate the skins from the gearing process, allowing those skins to serve appearance purposes only.

Although I didn't dislike it as much as most of the others who didn't care for it, the classic Kotor style dialogue system in chapter 9 does feel a little disjointed from the rest of the game. I think they went with this route because of the nature of the quests, the number of variables used and the raw storage needed for the dialogue to be voiced. I think a better solution is to present it in a way that requires no player voice acting; such as within a library of some kind and viewing holo-recordings. Considering this style of interaction may very well become the bulk of the content for alliance based activities and army building as the chapters in KotFE progresses on, it's probably best to make the change sooner rather than later.

I would have thought that instanced content would not get synced unless your level was higher than the mission level. Since it's instanced, it serves no purpose to scale it to the planet. It must have been a lot cheaper to sync a whole planet and everything in it to a set level than to meticulously examine each zone and instance. The cheaper route isn't always the best route. Unfortunately corporations don't always see that. And maybe in this case they had no choice.

It's a little off topic but I can understand the developers stripping us of our classic companions for the sake of the story and whatnot, but it seems like it wouldn't have gotten in the way of their plans to let us have our classic companions back after the story ends in chapter nine and we get our ship back. The reason i bring this up is because I can understand having some characters not having customization options with regards to outfits, but if this is going to be the content strategy, then giving us our old companions back in addition to the new ones lets us still make use of the new companion system where gear has no statistical value and only serves a decorative purpose. I suppose there may be plans to bring back classic companions in future stories, and this may be limited by design or even by financial and or contractual constraints. But even within these constraints, bringing them back as simply combat tools without any new dialogue would have been nice. It wouldn't have changed anything as far as story goes.

I'd like to see an option to have the cover bar activate when using stealth instead. The code is already there. A new bar wouldn't need to be accounted for or kept track of. All it would be is a different activation device or key bind. Ideally this would be best on a character by character basis.

I picked up 'personal challenge' on Dromund Kaas and I was surprised to find myself synced to level 18 versus level 11 mobs. I thought the idea was to make the old worlds just under par with the player? I expected to be synced to like level 12 or 13 and then later to level 18 when in the zone for 'friends of old'. I understand that it's cheaper to level sync according to planet versus the zones within each planet, it's just very disappointing. What could have been a great feature has been implemented in a way that maintains a very boring experience. I imagine even completionist players leveling up will end up 7 or 8 levels above the planet for most of the planetary experience as well. I hope that feedback may lead to a more fine tuned level sync experience in the future.