They won’t have to work at all. They can buy a hypercrate sell it and buy the gear. You have to work to get me gear. I can use a credit card to get it.

Cool, but the devs are betting more people will go to the cash shop. Maybe your right and hundreds of players will become dedicated crafters, and build sustainable wealth plans. My guess is the hypercrate market will drop because the market will flood with them. Causing people to buy more and more CCs. We’ll see.

To say player toxicity is the main reason PvP failed in SWTOR is just wrong. But managing it now is the only way to save PvP. PvP failed in this game during development when the engine was chosen. Six months after launch they had to shut down Illum open world because the engine could not handle the amount of players. It was a slideshow. Structured PvP died when 8v8 ranked had a 2 year preseason, when they came to realize that cross server was not an option because of the engine. At the 1.2 guild summit they announced season 1 would start with cross server. They realized cross server would not be feasible so they had a never ending preseason. PvP died six months after the first server merge. I think that was around 2.0, but I’m not positive, PvP is a niche game system in a niche MMO. I still love it, but you have to think of it in a more casual way at this point. Getting pissed and toxic at this point is stupid. PvP will never thrive in SWTOR. At this point you just want to keep the pops poppin. This means getting the casual player in queue.

If we time travel let’s get history right. Open world PvP died because the engine could not handle the traffic on illum, and would become a slideshow. BW removed the content because it was not sustainable. Ranked 8v8 died because preseason lasted for 2 years, and was never supported. They also raised the level cap at the time, without balancing the game for 8v8. Most games were stalemates as players were now more mobile and tankier. Voidstsrs were never capped and novare coast would last every round. The PvP community as a whole died around that time because we were told that cross server was not possible on the game engine. This made matchmaking impossible because it was limited to those playing on a single server (at the time there were like 20 servers). They tried changing ranked PvP to arenas but the community was basically gone at that point. So if you are going to go down the history of PvP let’s get our facts straight,

In a large healthy mmo you are correct. But this game has a smaller population very set in the way they play. Most players have done all of the content and now play the game for the parts they like. Changing people play styles at this point will just drive more people away. BW is in a tough spot, this new gear will raise revenue on the CM, which will keep the lights on. This is something everyone here in the forums want. However, major changes in gearing systems will upset people. Look at command crates.

They will be fairly thin when they first hit. Therefore really expensive. How will many people get the credits to buy the rare and expensive gear?

Ok, endgame in SWTOR is subscription only. Therefore any changes to endgame gear only effect subscriptions. Subs will now be able to pay for BiS crafted gear with credits. It will be rare and expensive. To get the money to buy the items, people will be tempted to buy CM items and sell them on the GTN. That is a popular method used in F2P games. However, endgame SWTOR is made for subs. Therefore they are building in a system that will push subs to go to the CM for more then cosmetic items.

Sorrry mistake on that sentence. For those who cannot use context, if I get the gear first I have the advantage.

Ok I will call it play to win, you can call it play to catch up and we can continue arguing over the semantics. What am I going to do? Likely craft what I can and buy the rest. Because I still like this game. Just don’t like the new system.

What?

I think we had this argument like 5 pages back. If I can pay to buy gear with credits in the first week of new gear. And another player had to grind a month for it. Then they have an advantage in an arena. I get it, you have a lot of credits, it does not effect you, or players like you. However, many players who just PvP will not have a huge stash. They will be very tempted to buy a hypercrate in order to keep up. That is where the P2W comes into play. Crafted gear bought with credits encourages players to go to the CM. I have also said in the past, if there are no set bonuses on the gear this argument is moot. But they have never issued a new set of gear that does not have a set bonus attached. And they said in the stream that they know people would have a lot of opinions on the descion which makes me think they knew a P2W argument would pop up

Look, your entire argument is based on you wanting to claim your way of playing the game is superior to mine. Here is how I play: I play ranked a few times a week, use the mats to craft augments, and make a decent credit stash. Not huge but I can buy mostly anything I want. I am stating that because CM items are BoE, you can’t have craftable BiS gear. That is the link that creates a P2W mechanic. We will never have BoP CM items, so we should not have BiS craftable gear. You can’t have both.

As I stated in a previous post, I think the best gearing system would be to make everything craftable, as long as there is no way to make the credits to buy said gear with cash shop items. Since we are able to sell cash shops items in the GTN, and that will never change, craftable gear is not a good gearing system. It is a P2W mechanic.

I am starting to think your whole argument is based on you wanting to claim you play the game in a superior way to me. Look I play ranked PvP, craft augments and am self sufficient in my credits. My argument has nothing to do with my personal ability to buy gear with credits. I likely would not be able to pay tons of credits to gear alts but I am fine. The argument is that with the way the economy now works it leads to a predetory business model. IMO the best gearing system would be that everything is done by crafters, as long as there is no way to inflate the economy by selling cash shops items in game.

Sure, or keep the current gear system. Ideally they take gear out of PvP all together and just bolster everyone to 250.

Agreed P.S nerf Mercs

If I have the credits or not has nothing to do with the argument. It is a predetory game system targeting subs.

Your proving our point......players who have not made a diligent wealth plan, and followed it through for years can get the same gear rewards as you by paying real life money. That is P2W.

The gear you craft now is not BiS. As of now there is no P2W mechanic in the game. That changes when top tier gear is craftable.

Paying the subscription should exclude all P2W mechanics from endgame. Until crafted top tier gear was announced there was no P2W mechanic in endgame, now there is.

So.. you admit to using available horded CCs from your ongoing monthly sub.. and hence spend no real money... yet insist this new tier of gear is forced P2W? Cute switch up there. Now.. I can understand your misperception here.. being credit poor and having no consistent plan for accumulating in game wealth. But the fact is.. players like myself simply devote a few minutes each day to their wealth plan and reap the results each morning when they log in. Other players spend time differently.... but it is their time to spend and they go that route instead of your route. Regardless.. they are not spending real money to get the gear in question. Spending CCs to get credits IS inefficient.. even though it works and is allowed by the studio. I spend no CCs or real money to have items to sell on the GTN.. yet I routinely log in and collect 10-20 M in profits every morning... and have billions on hand from simply following my daily plan. You on the other hand spend CCs to convert to credits via GTN... which is fine... but it's not an efficient use of CCs. CCs are most efficiently used for things you simply cannot purchase from another player off the GTN. You are certainly free to use your CCs inefficiently... but eventually you will tap out and then be forced to spend real money for more of them under your method. Well,I did pay real money on a sub I did not use. Stupid of me, yes, but still spent real money which I converted into in game cash. Those CC were “gifted” to me because I paid $15 a month. You need to stop thinking of just you and me in this argument. Think on a more macro level. Crafted gear, traded on the GTN will drive many players to the CM. It is a cash grab. It is P2W.

I absolutely have an advantage over a player if I can get credits quickly using the CM while it takes other players time to get that gear through grinding. If I have top tier gear the first week, and it takes others a month to get the credits, I have an advantage. If everyone has to grind OR RELY ON THE GRIND THEY DONE, then you have no P2W in the system. Say it takes 100m to buy a full set. That would take about a month or so to grind.. Or it would take 20 minutes buy and resell a hypercrate. Because I can use money to get gear faster then gearing in game, it is P2W. I get it you are rich. Since I came back I make about 10-15m a week playing ranked PvP and selling the augments from mat drops. I am not having this argument because I don’t know, or don’t have credits. I am having this argument because, like every other EA multiplayer game they are trying to nickel and dime their customer base. They are putting f2p mmo mechanics directly into the sub portion of the game. Being able to craft top tier gear was a descion made to drive CM sales.

I’m dug in. I am not using P2W wrong. There will now be an avenue to pay real money to achieve BiS gear. That is P2W. In a sub based game (which endgame is), there should be no way to pay real money and have an advantage over any other player. Your only argument is that I will not have an advantage over you, because you have lots of credits. Now, I agree it is not hard making credits in this game. But it still takes x amount of hours. By paying real money I can wipe out all that time. I can make every hour you spent making your fortune obsolete by spending real money. Btw there is no way you can say using the CM is inefficient. I forgot my sub was running while I was away and had a ton of CCs, bought a hypercrate, sold it on the GTN and made a ton of credits.

Maybe I am a fanatic. I really hate how game business has become predetory. Look at games like NBA 2k, or battlefront where you have to pay an large amounts of additional money after buying the game just to be competitive. Here I pay a subscription, this practice encourages subs to pay real money in the CM to keep up with others who will do the same (or have grinder more in the past then I have). If you have grinded more your advantage is well earned, but if I can wipe out that advantage with $50 then your getting into a shady territory.

Agreed