I think Bioware has advanced questing in MMO's. Personally I don't think people will accept quest texts and not thought put into questing anymore. I honestly think people will want a reason for questing rather than just doing it to level. Case and point is TERA. A new MMO coming out (well newish) and the number one complaint i've heard is that the questing is boring. I feel that TOR made questing fun. Again just my opinion.

TOROcast - Episode 141 - Everyone Moves In this weeks episode of the TOROcast. Samm, JJ, and Tom discuss the upcoming game patch 1.1.5 and game update 1.2. As well as discuss the community Q&A for this week.

TOROcast Hard Mode - Episode 2 - Belsavis Boss Join Dedmon, Dave, Nolcro and RJ in this weeks episode of the TOROcast Hard Mode. This week the guys give their thoughts on #SWTOR 's recent update game patch 1.1.4. Afterwards everyone gives their own strategies for taking down the bosses of Star Wars: The Old Republic's first operation, Eternity Vault and answer some of your questions from twitter.

TOROcast - Ep 140 - Train Wreck The TOROcast crew is joined by our Background contest winner Josh from South Africa. In this weeks episode we go over some of the new additions and changes in patch 1.1.3. We discuss the Community Q&A, and we also break down next week's patch, patch 1.1.4. Thanks to Josh for the cool screen shot of Voss. Which should be on the site shortly. A few announcements this week be sure to tune in to our newest addition to the TOROcast family TOROcast Hard Mode (@ToroHardMode) with hosts, Dedmon, Nolcro, Tonight, and Sinic.

Theme Park and Sandbox are kind of two sub genre's in the MMO genre space. I think the main appeal from a Theme Park MMO is guidance. It shows the player where to go, how to gain levels, where you can get loot and then lets them get too. Almost like instant gratification. Now thats not a bad thing. People knowing where to go, what to do and getting rewards for doing it is whats fun about games. Now Sandbox can be so much fun. It can be unbelievably fun and the rewards more tangible than a Theme Park BUT its a hell of a lot harder to get there. Many Sandboxes dump the player in a vast new world and tell them to get on with it. Very little direction. Its a up hill struggle from the get go. However, once you do a reward, say a house or say a business you feel accomplished. Probably even more so than getting that epic drop from a theme park mmo. There just two very different views on how a MMO should work. Theme Park's will never be as open as Sandboxes and Sandboxes never as accessible as theme parks. As mentioned in this thread earlier the next generation of MMO's will be a hybrid of the two. Letting people play the way they want and still get a satisfaction of a reward. However, such an mmo would require a large amount of money and development time. With publishers not wanting to take risks, doing a solid theme park mmo is just good business sense. I can't see this type of mmo coming out for a very, very long time.

We have had a few new ideas how they could implement this does anyone else have any more ideas?

Pretty much this.

Everything will stay the same. Same dark/light restrictions on colour only crystals. The Whilte crystal will still be very, very rare and difficult to get. But it just won't hold any stats. In Essence it will be a status symbol saying "Look at me and all the hard work I did to get this crystal." Similarly there will be a equal hard to get power crystal which holds the stats. Again I understand its not a must change idea and theres not really anything wrong with the current system in place. Its just I'd like see people with the colour they want rather than the colour they need to take.

I'm confused why you are constantly bringing up difficulty. In no way will this change any difficulty to the game. You will still get colour crystals in the same way as you get the crystals now. Either through an artifice, vendor or drop.

Some really good discussion here Also interesting to see the other side as well. Keep it coming

Again this is another nice suggestion. Will keep Artifice's in demand and add a nice flavour to the crew skill. Regarding Iskareot I'm afraid I'm not entirely sure what your saying there. You seem to think I want stats taken from colour crystals and removed from the game. Which is simply not true. I just suggested that colour and the stats that are now on the colour crystals be separate. So you still have the stats which for argument sake we will call the Power Crystal and then a completely separate colour crystal. Because at the moment practically everyone is running around with a purple or orange lightsaber because THAT is the best crystal you can get. People will not take that purple out and replace it with a blue one and take that hit in stats just because they like the colour blue. All I'm suggesting is give the player MORE options in the appearance of their weapon. Rare crystals will still be very rare and those who put the effort into find them will still be unique to everyone else. I'm not taking a single thing away from whats already in the game, if anything I'm actually suggestion to Bioware they add more into the game. Again I'm not entirely sure of your point your trying to make. If anyone can elaborate for me please feel free.

No it wouldn't. If someone wanted that ultra rare colour crystal to stand out from the rest they still can. They still need to find/craft that colour crystal but it just doesn't hold any stats.

Indeed. Again thank you guys for keeping the discussion alive. I don't like just bumping threads for no reason. You guys rock. Lets keep the discussion going. Give perhaps new ideas on how to do this, we've heard some fantastic ideas already. Also much love from everyone who got here from the podcast.

Thanks guys

I'm glad so many people like this idea. But I have to be honest and say it wasn't my idea. A Co-Host of mine when we were recording a podcast suggested it. At the time I didn't even think of the idea. The two solutions I suggest are my own thinking but the general idea goes to my mate and of course the many other people who have probably thought of it before.

<3 <3 <3

Indeed this isn't something they could do over night. And lets be honest it isn't an important feature needed. But again it is something that would be nice to see.

TOROcast - Episode 139 - To the Knee In this weeks episode of the TOROcast we discuss the community Q&A held on the official forums discussing the future of Star Wars: The Old Republic. We also started a thread on the official forums to try to convince BioWare to separate the color crystals from the power crystals. I mean no that anyone wanted to use the yellow and black crystal from the collectors edition but lets face it, the green and black core crystal from the Razer gear looks damn awesome. To help us move this thread along go here and post whether or not you would like to see it in game. LINK to thread mentioned in show.

There is a white crystal in the game but you can't get it. The only person who did get it, got it by an exploit. So really its in the game data but unobtainable at the moment.

Indeed. But people will always choose the colour crystal with the highest stats. So for example if there is a blue crystal with 42 endurance and a yellow one for 45. They will always choose the 45 one because it is better. Meaning that everyone will have a yellow crystal. I'm just suggesting that we put the stats we already get from the colour crystals seperate from the colour meaning we can choose whatever colour we want but still keep that 45 endurance.

What we are saying though is to remove the stats from the colour crystal altogether and allow us to put whatever colour we want in. Or additionally let us change the colour to what we want.

No sorry you misunderstand. I don't want anything done with the actual stats. The problem TOR has is that there is a best crystal for everyone. People will always choose the crystal with the highest stat. However, that means everyone will have the same lightsaber colour. What I'm suggesting is to just let people choose what colour they want, without having to reduce your stats. Just to you know make people more unique and the Fleets more colourful

Heya folks. There was an idea that a few people have brought up about the Power Crystal's in your weapons. As of now the colour and stats are the same. With most people selecting the stat over the colour end game is a cluster of oranges and purples glowing in the abyss of space. Everyone seems to have the same colour lightsaber or blaster and I don't feel special or unique. A simple solution. Seperate the stat and colour of the power crystal. You can do this a number of ways. Heres just an idea. 1) Add an additional customization slot in your weapons which includes the colour. You get to keep the same stats but choose the colour you want. 2) Stick with just one crystal but when you put that in your lightsaber it lets you choose the colour you want from a selection of unlocked colours. So you still need to buy colour crystals to unlock them but once you have got it, you can use it whenever you want on any weapon. I personally prefer option 1 but these are just some quick ideas. I'm sure you guys can come up with a better idea. Anyway just a suggestion to Bioware. Make no mistake its not a BIG problem, but I think it will be a fun little option. What do you guys think?

KPants' "State of the Game" Review So, quite recently I received an email from Bioware asking my opinion of the game and how they’re doing so far…and so I got bored one night, and provided them as much detail as I could to tell them just those things. Of course, being me, I had to add a little extra in there as well. At any rate, I described everything to them verbatim to what’s below in a list-like format, so enjoy the read and please do describe your own thoughts in the comments section!

TOROcast - Episode 138 - Dolphin This week JJ, Tom and Kyle lead off the show while Samm is on a phone call to get things rolling. The majority of the show we do a lot of speculation of what we'd like to see from a Guild leveling system or the legacy system. A new contest has been announced at the end of the show so be sure to listen in and get the down low on the contest.