Ahhhh! This made my weekend! Two of my favorite bioware men. I blame Alistair for getting me hooked on bioware games, so as punishment he's my slave boy. Muhahahhahaa!!

Agreed. I did a few head counts before, and when we had "heavy", that same number of people on a different server was their "light". This is an except from a different thread, counting population: The average LIGHT destination server has 649 concurrent logins (range is 224-1056) The average STANDARD destination server has 1,419 concurrent logins (range is 660-2756) The average HEAVY destination server has 2,198 concurrent logins (range is 930-3604) The average VERY HEAVY destination server has 2735 concurrent logins (range is 1526 - 3394) The average FULL destination server has 3,638 concurrent logins (range is 3,166-3810) The range is what is important here, BC creates the lows. So when we have 930 people, we are listed as "heavy", and someone else has "light". with those same 930 people.

That's some nice use of the new gear, right there! I've been off in GW2 land, too... I just came back to check on this thread! How do we find your tumblr blog, so we can keep up with any new gw2-ish skimps? (not that they need it as badly, but still...want!)

Oh, I wasn't saying I wanted them to make it human with Cathar face paint. I'd rather take the larger Cathar-type bone structure. But they're not going to do it -- it'll be the same human heads we have for all the races -- maybe they'll just mix up the order again.

I'm guessing the playable Cathar will have to look somewhat different than the Cathar in game, because the in game Cathar have larger heads. The helmets wouldn't fit correctly. In game, I have a headband on Aric, and it's more of a backband -- it disappears into his head at the temples.

Get off my lawn! And your little pet, too! /grump I actually wish there were more varieties of pets and that they did a little more in their animations. Miss the little black kitty that would fly with me on a broomstick! Ooops. I think my wow is showing.

I can't get enough of those jackets with no shirt. I really wish they were in game. They're just so.... rawrrrr! (been oogling this thread for a long time, finally had to jump in and say something, because, mmm mmm good!)

Ysabeau and Isobel thank you! I just love looking at numbers! The differences between factions and types of characters are really interesting. I always guessed there were a lot of 50 level sorcerers. I've found when /who-ing, they're the first level 50 to go over 100 people. I've actually had a little bit of a problem using /who on full servers. Usually when it gives you outlandish numbers, a few enters will give you the correct number. Today while trying to count on Drooga I finally had to give up. It would never give a number. Obviously there were a lot of people on, because it was giving me numbers like 1186 and 1783. Scrolling the list it *really* was giving me all those people from all over the galaxy and all different levels! Wasn't any good for my data purposes, but was interesting. And thanks for all the data crunching and spreadsheets, Paige. Great work!!

I believe this is probably true. We're at "standard" right now (just ran the numbers) and we have 411 reps and 437 imps, for a total of 848 at standard. From watching torstatus, we should be going into "heavy" soon, and I'll try and catch the break point. Edit: These seem to be the same as they were previously, at about 650 we'd bump up into "standard". So it's possible (not enough data yet!) that while some servers were increased, BC stayed the same as it was before the transfers. I did a few checks on non-destination servers, but at very off-peak times.... on Zaalbar there were only 9 people on at 1am, including both sides. Just for some anecdotal data.

I, too, just find it interesting. Plus, I find it nice to see the increase in population [in Begeren Colony]. I can do a /who of 1-15 now, and get over 100 people! Before (when I was just checking numbers, not entering on the form) I'd be able to do 3 searches ( 1-25, 26-49, 50 ) and get the total population on one side. I'll be interested to see if we continue to grow as more people transfer over, or if the rest are staying at their original server and we even out. p.s. Great work, Paige!!

Skipping over the if they should or should not be used argument, here's something that might work for adding them to your friend's list, or whispering them if you are not in the same vicinity (and therefore can't click on their portrait). It only works if they are online, however. You can use the /who command to find the person by searching for general information, if you don't know specifics. Like "/who 20-29" will return all the people within those level ranges, and then you can sort alphabetically to find your person. Or if you know more information, "/who 22-25 sage" will return any sages within the 22 to 25 levels. You could even type, "jedi taris" and have it return all the jedi (sage, sentinel, guardian, shadow) that are on Taris. If you really don't have any information on them, but you know at least three consecutive letters in their name, you can also try "/who abc" and it will return people who have those letters in their name (As long as the letters aren't interrupted by a ' or a - or another special character). This will find first names and guild names, but not legacy names. Once you have them on the list of people, you can click to add them to your friend's list, and never have to try to type a special character again!

Begeren Colony has been lower in population the last day or so, but for the past couple months it's been higher. I've been tracking populations on both of them (since I have characters on both). Begeren has been higher on torstatus by just a few points (so very small margin). Plus, every Friday and Saturday I've been running /who at 8pm to get a total number of players online, and in the last two months Begeren has always been higher, though sometimes not by much. Given, I don't have data from before April, and it's only a small amount of data I do have (twice a week @ 8pm), but I'm guessing from Bioware's choice Begeren must have been the highest of the three RP-PVE servers, west coast.

I've been trying to check today on the "light" vs "standard" for our server, and I can definitely say (at least as of today) that when the population goes above 599 we become categorized as "standard". There seems to be a little fluctuation in the 500-599 range, most likely due to people logging in and out and the server status changing back and forth before I can get a true headcount. As far as my data collecting shows, Paige's population numbers for light and standard are correct. A fleet population snapshot: Just a little bit ago (roughly 9pm Pacific on a west coast server), we had about 325 (+/- 10) people on each side (for a rough estimate of 650) and about 43 (+/- 5) on each fleet. We're on RP server, so we might have more people hanging around fleet than 10%. Also, I haven't been doing any fleet/population studies, so this has the potential to vary greatly!!

I have been /who-ing my server (Bergeren Colony) which is light most of the time, with maybe a few forays into standard. Still, we make it into the top 20 US. At low tide ( the wee hours of the morning, say 4am or so), we have less than 100 people playing. Last night's count: 63 Republic side and 38 Imperial side. At high tide just last week it was about 750 +/-, and that took it to standard. The past day it hasn't reached standard, but we have been the first server listed after the standards. The highest number of people I've /who-ed (given 50 people could come on right after I sign off!) has been 596 (total, rep/imps) Just now we are still at 'light', and right below the last 'standard'. I'm not sure ordering the servers like this actually works, but it *appears* to. I've been ordering it by population and then randomly testing the populations to see if the were indeed in order. They seem to be. Anyway, with Light at 1:40pm on a Sunday holiday weekend (west coast server & time) we have 170 (1-49's) and 69 (50's) Republic side, along with 169 (1-49's) and 41 (50's) Imperial side. I haven't had the chance to hard test the theory, but I think had we gone over into 600+ people, we would've changed to "standard". I've started to enter my /who counts in the server population chart --- I think that was a wonderful idea!! To the OP -- great thread and wonderful work on your math! I'm another person that loves data. It's interesting!! (And on a totally bias server plug -- Begeren Colony is great! RP-PVE west coast server, where the Republic pop is slightly heavier than the Imperial pop and the people are nice! I hope people re-roll there!)

Yummy. I'm doing this next time. It gets hot in that room, working so hard... it's only fair to let him take his shirt off. I'd be doing the guy a favor. And Risha too. Oh, she'd complain -- all while watching out of the corner of her eye.

Signed!

Same! I didn't know anything about companions before rolling my smuggler, too. I had read about the different classes, and knew I wanted to be a smuggler or consular. Not for healing, but for ranged dps, which is what I love. (At that time trooper didn't appeal to me, although I love it now especially because of fem!Shep's voice) I was sooo surprised at my reaction, and before I even got him as an official companion I was d'awwwing him and his gift of a blaster to go shoot 'em up. I've made a second smuggler to try the other AC.... and to get more Corso time As far as skipping everything except for class quests -- I want to do that sometimes, but then I'm afraid of missing out on some good orange gear quest rewards. I need to start making a list of what quests give things I'm really interested in, and what just gives commendations or some such.

Just be glad we can't insert pictures the same way we could back on some other boards (*cough*DragonAge*cough*Alistair*). Or instead of just simple lines of loving text, you'd have a million multiple images of him smiling up at you from all his various customizations!

I don't know if that was on purpose or not, but it was funny!

Rule 2 of the internet: All men are jackholes until they prove otherwise.

My closing statement of "don't ask, don't tell" was not meant to trivialize the very important and very real problem people are facing, and I'm sorry to anyone who felt it did so. I do find it funny that at the same time you are berating me for using that term, you are also saying I should keep quiet about my gender. Men/boys don't usually go around announcing they are guys because pretty much everyone assumes everyone else is a guy. I'm all for weeding out the homophobes, but I'd like to weed out the chauvinists and creeps, too. I didn't say guys shouldn't act differently, that's normal. I said, "don't freak out and be weird", which is an altogether different thing. This is actually why I'm a proponent of women feeling free to correct those who assume they are men. If it's considered as an attempt to grab attention, then those of us who don't want attention aren't ever going to feel comfortable doing so. It makes it into a Big Thing, when it should just be normal. In my last guild we had an overwhelming number of women. No one felt awkward correcting the "he" to "she" in guild chat, it wasn't a big thing at all. The only comment we ever really got was from a new recruit who just said he was going to assume everyone was a women in the guild until they corrected him... and yes, that got several guys piping up and saying, 'hey, I'm not a girl!' All types of people make plays for attention in this game, you mostly see them in general, or typing in all caps, using excessive leet speak, etc. A simple correction in a party or guild chat like, "He said he'd be right back." with a "she, actually, and I'm back" shouldn't all of a sudden turn someone you thought was a nice, good player into an attention seeking *****. I actually think the tide is turning on that, and I'd like to see it stay that way.

Actually, yes. Your whole post smacks of sexism, no matter what gender you actually are. Who is talking about knowing how to use a computer? Might've well said and you know how to drive. While I don't agree with the OP's statement about people only playing characters of their own sex, all she was asking was if there are other women out there to game with. It's not unusual for people to want to group with people similar to themselves. It's not a cry for attention, its a desire to find others she can relate to. You are correct in that there is nothing special about girls playing this game -- but you have missed the point several of us have been trying to make. No one is complaining about announcing their gender in general chat and getting comments there. Most of us are talking about correcting/admitting that we are women to the people we are in a group party with, or even our guild. We are not saying, look at us, we're women, we're special, we can use a computer -- we are saying don't freak out and be weird because we are women who are gaming. We shouldn't have to be in a Don't Ask, Don't Tell environment.

39 and a woman here, too. I saw the first movie with my parents at a drive-in, and they say not only did I stay awake the whole time, but I sat in the front seat with them and shushed them when they tried to talk. Both my parents are into science fiction, and I started sneaking their Heinlein books to read at about 9. I have two younger sisters and we all played video games, watched sci-fi, and discussed Star Trek over dinner. Later, my go to movies when babysitting were always the Star Wars movies, and it kept both boys and girls entertained -- girls even more so, actually. When my sister was 7, she actually insisted on dressing up as Darth Vader, she didn't want to be a princess! As far as gaming goes, I mostly play fem characters, but I'll usually roll one or two male characters also. And having a male lead doesn't stop me from loving games like The Witcher, either. I don't usually announce or correct people in groups if they use a wrong pronoun, or call me dude or bro. Most of the time it's a pick up group, and I won't be playing with them again. If it happens to come up in the conversation, or if they're actually good, nice players that I friend, I'd be more likely to correct the pronoun use. I don't actively try to hide it or lie -- but if it's just a quick group, I don't want to have to go through the whole "pictures or it didn't happen" or "there are no girls" or "men are men, women are men and children are FBI agents". I know sometimes they're trying to be funny, but it gets so exhausting to hear it every single time. If I'm not going to be playing with them again, why bother? And I really hate when guys say people only say they're girls in order to get things. I don't know one women who's "taken" something from some random guy (unless it was her husband!). As far as roles & alignment go -- I'm always dps and my alignment is all over the place, depending on the character. I take great glee in killing; ranged, melee, whathaveyou. I plan to try a healer out for the first time in swtor, just because I can play a BH or smuggler and still do some healing. tl;dr. Girls exist in gaming, enjoy Star Wars and don't just play healers. I'm one.

Before I played and had only read/seen pictures of Corso (pre-weekend beta test), I was excited to get the face mods and hoped there would be a good one for me to change him into. As soon as I *started* playing, I quickly changed my mind. After the first few conversations on old Ord Mantel, I was hooked! He's just so gosh darned cute. On the good/bad thing-- I appreciate a good guy and like that he stays true to what he values. Yes, he has a soft spot for women which is both frustrating and endearing. But while he's good (and good guys are hard to find) he's not Good. He will ding you for not stealing sometimes, and when I did steal from the republic for our own profit, he gave me a +120. I don't recall shooting very many women in cold blood, but I know I've done it to a few men and he gave me a lot more approval for that rather than the "turn them over" type of option. All the companions have different ideas of what you should do and shouldn't, though I don't think we get any really "darkside" companions.

Wouldn't it be fangirl romance, not fanboi? You can't kill off any companions in this game, so how can you blame a character for not leaving when that's how the mechanics work? Even if he was super testosterone laden alpha male, he wouldn't leave no matter how you treated him. I would liken Corso's character to Alistair's in DAO. There were large camps on each side that either hated or loved him. However, the mechanics of the game let you kill or drive Alistair away. Some people took great pleasure in doing so... and then complained that he was weak because you *could* do so. I have a feeling if you could do the same to Corso, the ones who dislike him still wouldn't be happy. They would then blame him for the ability to kill or drive him away. The romance arc with Corso is just about as opposite from Twilight as you can get, so I don't understand the leap between the two. Liking Corso does NOT equal liking Twilight. It makes no logical sense. If there was a twilight story anywhere here, it would be told from Vette's perspective while in love with someone who has life and death control over her. tl;dr You can't kill him. If you could, more power to you. But you can't, so don't blame the character for game mechanics.