If you are the PvP and MMO veteran you claim then you would know that when a game uses PvP as an alternative route for character progression it never winds up with a balanced PvP metagame because it's been designed around PvE principles from the outset. Character vs Character games are never as balanced as PvP games.

I'm happy to say thanks for the game too, I've definitely had my money's worth. I'm not sure how much longer I'm going to be playing it but I can't complain too much about what's been done. Love the graphics and the story lines, I wish that it wasn't so quick to gear up and feel 'complete' but apart from that it's an excellent game.

Sorry if I'm asking a silly question - but you are using the Imperial Zabrak option aren't you? There are two Zabrak choices, the imperial one is at the far right of the screen.

They probably just want an enjoyable run avoiding 'Go Guys' and other things LFG spammers are known for.

Agreed. Also don't forget LOTRO - whilst I dislike the way the player character and NPCs look the landscapes still stand out as some of the best I've ever seen in any online game.

Truth is I think that 'choice' went out the window in December and January. You have to hit the market whilst it's hot for you and back then there was NOTHING hotter than TOR for most players. The problem is by the end of January the hype machine had well and truly worn off and spun in a negative direction leaving EA/BW with the issue of having to regain momentum which is always vastly more difficult in a title post-release. I'm not saying it can't be done but the fact is the vast majority of people who actually wanted to play TOR will have already played it by now - those who enjoyed it are still playing and those who didn't would take an awful lot of convincing to return. Most people who haven't played the game already just aren't interested, either they are happy with their current MMO or the genre or IP doesn't appeal to them in the first place.

To be honest I don't think it has anything to do with WoW, the main reason TSW will struggle is because 'alternative Earth' theme is going to limit its appeal. I love much of the design of the game but just have no interest in playing a human in a game set on Earth - I like swords and sorcery or space science fiction and always play non-human species so the whole 'alternative Earth' theme just doesn't appeal regardless how good the game is.

True but the numbers speak for themselves and the OP has a point. For people whose play style is to maximize the progression of one character (which accounts for a whole lot of players) there really isn't much in terms of long-term goals to work towards. It's far too easy to feel like you have 'completed' the game if that is the kind of play style you usually enjoy in MMOs. I'm very similar to the OP in a way. I used to be what I'd call a hard core casual, hard core in the number of hours I'd play per week (25+) but casual in the fact that I wasn't a hard core raider (always in the second bracket of tiered content one step behind the best raiders). But you know, I didn't have a problem with that because I'd see them walking around all the time in better gear than me and it gave me something to aspire to in the game. These days I'm what I'd call a pure casual player, I play far less than 10 hours per week and it's difficult for me to login for more than a couple of hours at a time due to family commitments. However, the problem I have that even with limited game time and the knowledge that I'm not one of the best players around (at least in previous games) I still feel like I have no reason to login on my main character - he feels 'complete' which is a really odd feeling. Now let me be clear, I'm not saying I've cleared all the NM mode OPs but for some reason I just don't feel any motivation whatsoever to do that content. I'm 'satisfied' with where my character is right now, which is a feeling I don't think I've ever had before in any MMO I've played, I've always wanted to progress my character to the next levels. I'm not saying this isn't a good game, I've really enjoyed it and I do feel like I've had my money's worth. The problem for me is that feeling 'complete' is never a good thing for an MMO player to feel in any game and it tells me that something is fundamentally wrong. Perhaps the rewards are just too good for the lower tiered content or perhaps there is something else causing that feeling - I don't honestly don't know the answer.

Yeah I mean it would be horribly unbalanced if somebody could get something purely based on time spent playing which would give them an advantage in PvP over other players... you know... like PvP gear...

Agreed. These were the only two perks I really had any interest in so I was disappointed to see them removed/changed.

Well PvP in these games isn't actually designed for PvPers or it wouldn't reward gear in the first place. It's designed to give people who enjoy gearing up their characters (quintessentially PvE-minded players) an alternative way to progress outside of end-game PvE which is why it appeals to lots of people. The real PvPers (those who play for the challenge and would do so even if everybody had the same gear as them) are few and far between.

100 people in a PvP guild and you can't put together groups for PvP? If that's true you probably need to be asking yourself the question of whether you are actually in a PvP guild in the first place.

I'd pay up to $20 for a digital collectors edition key personally, not interested in any of the physical items or a box but access to the vendor is something I would be willing to part with some additional cash to obtain. I like what they've done in Rift by giving everybody the option to purchase a "Collector's Edition" account upgrade.

Some Operations take less time than some HM Flashpoints, having a life and family doesn't exclude you from end-game content in TOR because the Operations are actually really small. EV takes around 30m whilst KP takes between 45m and 1h - there are FPs which take longer. I have a life and a family and usually get less than 2h uninterrupted gaming per night at best and I've still been able to complete most Operations so I've never understood this argument. You talk like 90% of raiders are single, unemployed or college students but almost every raider I know works full time with a young family these days. Sure they were college students 6-8 years ago whey they played WoW but not anymore.

I agree. When leveling the only time I'm on Fleet is when a quest sends me there or I want to check the GTN and if I'm there for that then I'm not going to respond to your LFG anyway because I'm there for another reason. I never spend more than 10m in Fleet whilst leveling and even if I am there then I'm not looking for groups, therefore trying to recruit me for a group for leveling content (at least in my case) will be a futile experience. I do however often respond to group requests when I'm questing on the planet itself.

1. Ewok 2. Jawa 3. Wookie

Of which only a few people posting actually make any sense. This thread is kind of like playing a random WZ where you have 1-2 sensible people calling objectives and correctly analyzing what needs to be done with a few others listening whilst the rest simply vent their frustration or spout abuse at those trying to lead.

Well Dune Bantha is already Standard population at the times I play which means the remaining 9 servers should bring it up to Heavy or Very Heavy but not to Full which is what The Red Eclipse will become very shortly.

They probably don't want to spend 3h doing dailies which take them 45m on their current server like me. I'm actually thinking of sticking with my empty server until the next tier of raiding is available since I have no reason to play my L50 right now other than to farm dailies to get 5k for my ship GTN (which would take 4x as long with more people fighting over the quest mobs). I don't need other people around when all I'm doing is leveling alts, especially since I'm leveling with a friend so can do all the Heroic quests and FPs along the way anyhow.

I agree. I'm hoping they open Dune Bantha as the next destination since my server is likely to become an origin this week (since it's the lowest population server left) and I really don't want to go to The Red Eclipse.

Your success is still governed by what gear you are in compared to what gear your components are in and what team you get dealt compared with the team your opponents get dealt. You give me two teams, list me which classes they have and what gear they have and 9/10 times I will be able to accurately predict the outcome. In real PvP games THAT is simply not possible which is why I disagree with you about PvP being surprising. The only surprise is when sometimes the better geared opposition is actually extremely stupid and therefore you can snatch a win, those unpredictable wins are the only fun part but they're few and far between. As the game stands currently there is no measurement of success or failure. Somebody who lost every single WZ will still be in better gear than somebody who won every single WZ if they started playing a few weeks earlier. I can understand PvPing when you are in RANKED matches on an even playing field against teams of players wearing the same gear statistically as your team has (and in fact once ranked WZs come in I might actually start PvPing in this game) but as it stands right now PvP is usually nothing but RNG group composition.

I disagree. Either the team with the best gear wins, or the team with the best group composition wins, or the team who actually listens to each other wins. Essentially you live or die by what the RNG gave you to work with on your team and not because of what you do during the match yourself quite a bit of the time. Also to be fair... a lot of the time humans in WZs are dumber than NPCs in FPs and therefore easier to kill. Isn't that the point though? There is really no measure of how good you are in this game - every player is unrated and you are never on an even playing field because it's always influenced by RNG group composition. A game HAS to be either ranked or pre-made vs pre-made in equivalent gear in order for skill to be the deciding factor. I actually LOVE PvP but it has to be on an even playing field which is why I never bother with PvP in gear based games unless there is some kind of ratings system to make sure that everybody you are fighting against is playing with you on an even playing field. I get no satisfaction from rolling over less-geared opponents or bad teams.

Because this is a PvE game? 95% of the content in this game is PvE whilst in PvP you have 4 Warzones and nothing else - after seeing each one of the Warzone maps a few times I'm already bored of them. PvP feels a lot like dailies, tacked on to give people who can't raid for whatever reason something else to do. To put it into perspective, you can easily tell a PvE focused game from a PvP focused game - PvP games (see GW) do not give rewards which provide players with statistical advantages, whilst games which are primarily focused on PvE (see WoW/TOR) design their PvP reward system around gear which in itself is a PvE player mindset. Also, I don't like being rewarded based on time spent whilst losing, I prefer to be rewarded for winning - and that is one of the main differences between PvE and PvP players in AAA MMOs, PvE players expect to get nothing but repair bills when they lose whilst PvPers usually whine they aren't getting rewarded fast enough for losing. Personally in WoW I considered Arena/RBGs to be decent PvP content but looked on BGs as nothing but daily quests with more obnoxious people (NPCs usually hide their nerd-rage ). Now consider the fact that in TOR we ONLY have non-ranked BGs and ask yourself - why do you PvP in this game?

Bacca's Blade is smaller than Dune Bantha and posting in purple like a special snowflake isn't going to make your point any more valid. Go to http://www.torstatus.net/shards/eu and sort by population if you don't believe me. There are around 10 or so PvE servers in the EU still waiting for a transfer destination therefore logic dictates they will make another destination server for PvE transfers. Since Dune Bantha is the 2nd biggest server in the EU (contrary to what you think) I'm suspecting it will be the most likely destination. You are right I don't know for sure, but it seems logical given the remaining server numbers. Of course, it wasn't logical to push some of these origin servers past breaking point in the first place so who's to say logic is going to have any say in the matter anyway. We'll see, but I sincerely hope you are wrong again.

You miss the point in the thread. The OP is asking "if I don't leave my server will I be thrown off anyway?" - the word 'optional' is simply an illusion if it's your only option is WHEN not IF.