One of my favourites is an offensive pull. Quite often, we'll have the ball and be near their endzone but our ball carrier will get nuked. When the ball passes to the enemy, I then pull them in to the nearest firetrap, killing them. The ball then passes to me and I'm only 20m from the goal line. Typically, most of their team will have already jumped in to the pit heading to the middle so its an easy score!

I think they need to give everyone a rating, i.e. 100% rated warzones. Then, match make based on that rating if possible. Thats the only fair way to do it. I sometimes run as a 4man premade in guild. When I run with my officer team (big pvpers) we generally kick butt and faceroll. When I run with new members / casuals we generally suck due to newness, gear, lack of coordination etc. If the simple fact of grouping up segregated us, then it would make things worse for when I run with newbies. We need a rating system for all players, and the current rated system / queues need to be used only for tournaments / guild vs guild stuff.

My guild is called Divine Retribution. We were forced to move from Frostclaw [EU PvE] to Nightmare Lands [EU PvE] but kept our name. Then, yesterday's move to The Red Eclipse [EU PvE] ended up with us being called Divine Retribution @ The Nightmare Lands. We searched around and found another active guild called Divine Retribution @ The Red Eclipse. Now, this seems to indicate that if there are duplicate guild names, no-one gets to keep the original! Both my guild and the other Divine Retribution were set up in TOR during pre-launch. Both are active. One of us got transfered, the other didn't, but we both lost our names. It was not possible for either of us to rename to just "Divine Retribution". So, we've both lost our guild names. It sucks. I know the other guild was only set up for TOR, whereas mine has been around for over 10 years, but its a big blow for both guilds. Part of what keeps people logging in each week is an attachment to both their characters and their guilds. If you change one or both of these things then the motivation to log back in diminishes. Ofc, there is no fair way for Bioware to deal with this. On paper, my guild has more "right" to the name: we've been around longer, we have more members, we have better raid progression etc, but real life doesn't work like that and we both have good claim to the name. I really hope my guild can get its name back but I doubt it will ever happen because Bioware would have to show favouratism to do so.

1) Why did you opt for vertical gear progression instead of horizontal gear progression, given that vertical gear progression segregates the community and invalidates old content too quickly? 2) What is your roadmap / future design philosophy regarding open world pvp? I don't need specifics, just general philosophies like how you plan to encourage it (rewards etc), balance it (npcs?), that sort of thing. I'm basically looking for reassurance that you have a plan and that it makes sense. I'm willing to wait for actual results, but if your plan is rubbish then I wont. 3) There seems to be a lot of evidence that SW:TOR doesn't support multi-core processors. This can be seen by running TOR and checking your core load: 1 core will typically be maxed out (or close to..) whilst the others are idling at 5-15%. Is there any plan to address this issue? 4) Do you have any plans to add support classes to the game, such as buffers / debuffers etc? 5) Do you have any plans to make the combat in this game more complicated regarding stats? For example, adding the ability to stack ranged / melee / force / tech defences individually, or adding the ability to stack bleed resistance / poison resistance etc. It seems that atm, the game is too simplistic regarding character development

Can I propose a new solution: E: Purchase with credits I would rather grind for rank and just purchase gear once I reach those ranks, rather than grind for comms to purchase gear. This worked well in WAR after they made this change, you could just buy all the gear you wanted as you ranked up (up to RR70) after which it became RNG again. There are obviously a few problems with purchasing for cash based on rank: 1) If someone didn't pvp at all whilst leveling, they'll have a massive wait for good gear at 50. 2) On level cap rises, high ranked players could just buy best gear immediately. To solve 1) you need either more sets of armour so that you can offer lower ranked people more stuff, or you remove rank requirements on some of the gear (but not the top gear). To solve 2) you need to split valor in to multiple tiers. So, you'd have a scale for "overall valor rank" which would be the sum of all valor earnt ever. Then, you'd have valor tiers for each expansion. So, at the moment you'd have "Overall Valor" plus "Initial Release Valor" or something. You tie gear in to the initial release valor ranks, and fluff to the overall valor. So, when a new expansion / level cap comes along, you create a new valor scale for that expansion and all valor earnt after expansion is released only contributes to the overall valor and the new scale. example using lotro (max rank=15): Overall Rank: 13 Shadows of Angmar Rank: 5 Mines of Moria Rank: 8 Mirkwood Rank: 10 Rise of Isengaurd Rank: 0 Riders of Rohan Rank: 9 So, what this is basically saying is that overall, I've done a lot of pvp and have a high rank. However, during initial release (SoA) I only achieved rank 5 as I didn't pvp much. During mines of moria, I started pvping a lot and would have achieved rank 8, giving me access to most of teh gear. During Mirkwood, I pvped a lot and achieved rank 10, however, I quit the game during the Isenguard expansion and this earned no ranks at all. Then I returned to the game for Riders of Rohan and started PvPing and achieved rank 9, givign me access again to the best pvp gear. Imo, this is the best ranking system you can have. It is better than simply adding on new ranks each expansion. It gives veterans an overall rank they can show off and be proud of, but also resets the field each expansion so that new members / pvpers aren't penalised too much.

I definitely agree with the OPs friends: this is not Star Wars as the general public knows it. Is it Star Wars? Of course it is. It fits with the extended universe, has most of the hallmarks of the star wars universe (sabers, blasters, space, aliens etc) and kind of looks the part too. However, if you are a Star Wars fan who has only really seen the movies and played some computer games, then this game simply does not fit with your expectations of the Star Wars universe. In fact, its downright rubbish, for the following reasons: 1) Art style. The original movies (4-6) were gritty and felt more realistic. It wasn't a future full of squeeky clean corridors and smart uniforms (star trek....). There was a real sense of being on the frontier, so whilst there was some awesome tech, there was also a basic lifestyle. The art style of TOR completely distances itself from that original feeling to the universe. 2) Locations. Again, much of the original movies, and even the newer movies, were set on massive planets and you got a real feeling for the sheer scale of where you were and a good feel for the wilderness. Again, that is almost completely lacking in TOR. Most planets feel linear and too many of them are set on cities. It does not feel like I'm in the same universe. 3) Epic Battles. The original films were full of epic battles on an epic scale. Even within those battles, the outcome wasn't often decided by one singular person, but more often there was a feeling of a community coming together to overcome an obstacle, fighting for the common cause. There is none of that in TOR. In TOR, we are our own miniature army. There are no fights with epic scales, only epic creatures. 4) Player journeys. Every single star wars movie is ultimately about character growth. Granted, Lucas was rubbish with dialogue but never the less he portrayed the growth of most of his characters. Most people were and remained ordinary people, but were part of something larger. Luke went on his journey from iritating teen to wise jedi master. Solo went of his journey from self-centred smuggler to cheeky nice-guy following a cause. Leia went from spoiled brat to someone calmer and wiser. That does not happen in TOR in my experience. There doesn't seem to be any character growth once you've left your starter planet. Anyways, your view may vary and its all just opinions, but personally I only watched the movies (recorded off tv on tape, then vhs, then dvd, then blu-ray....) and played most SW games and I don't feel like I'm living my Star Wars experience. In fact, there are precisely 2 moments in the entirity of the game where I've felt like I'm playing Star Wars: 1) Acquiring my lightsaber on Tython and the following fight 2) Warlord Kephess when you kill a bomber and have to use the bomb on the warstrider. Thats it. The rest has been too generic to feel star warsy.

SW:TOR is far from the best, but I believe it is surviving because it is the middle ground. For example: * LOTRO has far superior combat mechanics for PvE. Each class is vastly differenct to all the other classes compared to here where they all play exactly the same. There is a much greater focus on teamplay (buffs, buffs) and tanking actually takes skill. * WoW has a much more fleshed out endgame. Admittedly, I don't play WoW but from everything I've heard, there is simply much more to do at endgame * WAR had far superior pvp mechanics: player collision, much greater team cohesion, much more enjoyable and worthwhile world pvp, greater choice for warzones. * Eve / SWG have/had far greater crafting systems and economies * LOTRO has a far better story than TOR. If you actually read the quests in LOTRO, they are vastly superior to here. The epic questlines in particular have much better story telling that in TOR. HOWEVER, TOR fills the middle ground. Whilst LOTRO may have better pve combat mechanics, they suck for pvp and the pvp in lotro is seriously stale and unbalanced. WAR had excellent PvP mechanics and much better pvp in general, but the solo and pve side was basically missing. Eve/SWG were great but both are/were soooo time consuming and complicated that most people couldn't be bothered. WoW may have great endgame, but its generic cartoony fantasy, not sci-fi. TOR has a bit of everything going for it, even though every single feature in this game has been done better by someone else.

I dont know enough about Erickson to have a proper opinion on the matter. I'm aware that the features that did make it in to this game are well designed and executed (the game is relatively stable and bug free). However, I'm also aware the the features in this game are very bare and bland with virtuall no innovation involved at all. So, if it is Erickson's fault that we are missing sooooo much stuff in this game, or that some of the features are just plain stupid (vertical gear scaling = worst decision ever) then good ridance, kick him out. However, if that isn't Erickson's fault and Erickson is simply the guy who did the best he could with what he was allowed, then he should stay. Personally, I'm more concerned about Jeff Hickman getting a more prominent role in the game. His history in WAR was pretty aweful tbh (he was one of the major reasons for its downfall) and he makes very basic mistakes during interviews which do not inspire confidence.

Not that I disagree with you, but if you actually want bioware to listen to you then you'll need to explain rationally why each of the things you listed will save the game. For example, I'd love to see much more pvp development, but without doing extensive market research I can't say whether that will save the game or not, only that it will help retain the existing pvpers. If the MMO pvp market is genuinely small then it wont save the game, however if there is a sufficient gap in the market for a AAA MMO with awesome world pvp then maybe it would save the game.

Any chance you can share the source for the lowered cost of war hero weapons? So far I've not seen anything to suggest that the cost is dropping but if it is that is great news. I've not bothered with my WH weapon yet so was gonna grind it out before the patch, but if it's gonna be cheaper post-patch then I'll just save my comms.

Min and Max damage are determined by the rating of your hilt or barrel. So, a 150 rating hilt will have higher min-max damage than a 140 hilt, even if the stat weighting is better on the 140.

Hi, When I say I tend to top out at 1400dps in a boss fight, that means sustained damage for the entirety of the fight. My highest hits are obviously a lot higher (around the 6k mark) but I average 1400 damage per second, every second for the duration of the fight. In my opinion, infiltration is just as good in ops as balance. Balance has a higher damage output but that is mostly down to AoE. However, inf (in my experience) is less squishy due to kinetic field. -30% AoE damage is far superior to the minor self healing of balance spec in operations because 99% of the damage you will take in ops is AoE. Definitely looking forwards to the 1.4 changes.

If I remember rightly, this game is single-threaded, meaning all processing for this game will run through a single core on your processor. That is the bottle-neck for most people. It is also the reason why most people don't see a correlation between specs/age of their PC and their performance. Due to single-threaded nature of the game, you will see the best performance if you have a CPU from the end of a previous generation. This is because by the end of a generation, the clock speed per core is quite high. When the next generation comes out with more cores, each core tends to have a lower clock speed. Thats why people with CPU's with only 2 cores but a clock speed of 4 GHz are running the game better than people with 6 cores but a clock speed of only 2.5GHz. To test this, run a CPU monitor whilst playing the game. My and my guildies have done this, and typically one core will reach 70-90% capacity whilst our other cores idle in the 5-15% range.

Server population means nothing. I play on a PvE server because I dont like open world griefing, I want my PvP to be consensual. There are many who feel the same. As to counting the number of flashpoints etc, I have actually done this. On server reset days, flashpoints and operations outnumber warzones. As the week drags on, the numbers shift the other way until you end up with warzones outnumbering pve group content on sunday's and mondays, quite often thursdays as well. But you are missing the point. I never said PvP was the most popular activity, I just said it was a hugely popular one, which is true. I also don't want this game made in to a pure pvp game as I am aware that it would effectively kill it. First and foremost I'm a raider. Secondly, I'm a PvPer. After that, I prefer flashpoints, after that its all the same. If they made this game 100% PvE, myself and most of my guildies would quit. If they made this game 100% PvP, myself and most of my guildies would quit. I, like most MMO gamers, enjoy a variety of activities when I log on and I'd like to see development in all of them. Developing a functional endgame PvP system is one of the most effective ways to retain your playerbase, equally as important as churning out new raids and flashpoints, creating new races, developing new classes, creating new planets etc.

Lol, way to give a well balanced, constructive response I think you will find that 90% of players came to this game because they like Star Wars, and the rest came because their friends did. Beyond that, you can't make any assumptions. Some will have come because it is bioware. Some will come because of the advertised voice acting and story focus. Some, like me, came because the developers advertised pvp as being equal to pve in this game and that is what I've wanted from an MMO since I started playing them. Additionally, you can't make any assumptions about those leaving. In my guild, the first group of people to quit en-masse were the solo-casuals. They leveled to 50, experienced the story and then quit. They said that the crafting system, the story itself, the character customisation and the fluff were all extremely lacking in this game so after leveling to 50 once, they got bored and quit. The second group to quit en-masse were the pvpers. When Ilum imploded, they got bored of warzones and just left. The third group of people to quit en-masse were the raiders. EV and KP were too easy, so once we had both cleared and on farm, they left (so, about 3 months in). The only people left in my guild are the alt-o-holics and people like me who enjoy multiple aspects of the game, rather than fixating on just one. If they removed PvP, for example, then me and everyone like me would quit and our guild would simply end. The only fact we know at the moment is people are leaving the game. Thats it. As people leave, the experience for those that remain lessens and thus everyone is trying to come up with "suggestions" for how to fix the game. Even those who are violently defending the game in all these threads will have suggestions on what they'd like improved. Perhaps the best way to fix the game (i.e. attract more players) would be to massively develop PvP so the game can attract all those "PvPtards" as you call them. Many people love to PvP so if Bioware did it right, this game would flourish. It's up to us to guess what would work best, hopefully Bioware have teams of market analysts who can say with a bit more certainty what will work.

Everyone has their own views and ideas on what is the best MMO and what features it would include, so no matter what there will always be arguements. It basically comes down to what sort of gamer you are as to what features are most important to you, personally. From Bioware's point of view, the important features are a combination of what they want to achieve, combined with what they think their target market is. Unfortunately for many of us on the forums, most developers have correctly identified the casual market as a relatively new, untapped market that will likely generate more money than the traditional gamer market. That is why more and more developers are making games aimed at casual gamers. Bioware has done the same. The casual gamer market, traditionally, cannot cope with complex ideas or large timesinks, its all about instant gratification and engaging mechanics. SW:TOR provides this by the bucketload which is why SW:TOR will be a massive success once it goes free-to-play, a pricing model which appeals to the casual crowd. That, sadly, leaves us core gamers missing out on features that appeal to us. Core gamers have more time to spend in game than casuals. We have more dedication. We want something more involving. We can afford the time to learn complex game mechanics. Generally, this means a combination of sandbox features and traditional endgame themepark features. Such an MMO does not currently exist in the AAA market, and is honestly unlikely to ever exist. The core gamer market for MMOs is not big enough to justify the sort of development budget needed to make an MMO that would please us. Its also a huge risk. Given the time and experience most core gamers have, any flaws in an MMO are quickly exposed and many core gamers simply leave to continue their quest for the perfect game. As the perfect game does not exist, we have to settle for second best and pray for improved features. My only hope for the "perfect" core gamer AAA MMO is in a post-WoW era. Unfortunately, WoW has the unique combination of large endgame content and large community which together serve to attract and retain many core gamers. Once WoW ends, I firmly believe that the core gamer market will suddenly seem much larger, hopefully large enough to encourage the development of a AAA sandbox/themepark hybrid for the core gamers. By that point, the casual mmo market will also be saturated so there will be less desire to continue development for that market.

Seems to me that overall, these balance changes are providing much more positives than negatives. The negatives pertain purely to CC skills. Mostly, a few skills got a range reduction WHICH HAS NO EFFECT ON PVE. The big one was changing force wave from an 8meter 360 knockback to a 15meter cone instant knockback. This is a sidegrade. In PvE, the only time this will affect anything is when you're leveling solo and screw up a trash pull and have 15 npcs on you. It won't affect operations or flashpoints at all. However, being 15m and instant, that will actually help in the majority of cases where players need to use this skill. So, imo, its a sidegrade, not a nerf. But then we have the buffs! As a shadow, I'm extremely happy! Infiltration shadows are getting a massive buff which might finally put us level to other DPS specs in PvE. Commando's are getting a buff to healing AND an interupt. Sages get their new free self-heal. There are far more buffs than nerfs in this patch, virtually none of the nerfs affect PvE, but they will have a minor positive effect on PvP. Also, PvP is a hugely popular feature in this game so to all of you screaming about pvp, screw you and your self-entitled opinions! Stop being so selfish and see the bigger picture. A game with both pve and pvp will have a larger, healthier population as many, many players enjoy both activities.

Lol, thats higher than my PvE max damage and I'm in nearly full black hole! Good effort!

I mostly tank these days, but I was a hardcore infiltration fan before the switch. The reason I switched was simply that we lacked a second high quality tank in guild and we had too many melee DPS. Anyways, on topic, my highest DPS as infiltration spec in an actual raid was just shy of 1400 dps. However, I know on perfect runs that my sentinel and gunslinger friends have gotten 1600+. Karagga's Palace Nightmare Infiltration Spec - Please note I've upgraded my gear since then, this run was done in mostly rakata gear. As balance spec, the highest I've gotten in an actual raid is 1490dps which was on Jarg and Sorno. Now, admittedly, i dont often use balance so my DPS could be higher with more familiarity. However, as much as I've asked for them, this community so far hasn't been able to produce balance DPS logs from actual fights where the balance shadow got over 1500dps. I'm sure they do exist, I've just never seen them! Karagga's Palace Balance Spec - Please note gear was slightly better than previous inf parse, but only by 2-3 BH pieces. So, with that in mind, infiltration shadows as well as balance shadows can already reach the DPS figures needed to complete all current content without needing to be carried. Secondly, difference between balance and infiltration currently isn't that much and basically comes down to whether you can AoE or not, or whether you have to spend certain amount of time at range. With the new changes, infiltration will benefits more than balance because shadow strike makes up a higher proportion of damage, therefore you get more benefit from the change. In addition, the change to blackout only affects infiltration, giving us more force and thus more DPS. So, in my opinion, shadow was already viable for endgame content, but these changes should help close the small gap between infiltration and balance whilst boosting both a bit higher in comparison to other classes. I will definitely NOT bring us close to the top end of sentinels or gunslingers. EDIT: Forgot to address the pvp side of things! Infiltration was always good at pumping out actual DPS. Our burst was high, but primarily reliant on project/breach combos making us easy to shut down. With the changes, shadow strike will now hit 30% harder, so we'll be less reliant on project/breach. Additionally, our buff from clairvoyant strike (+30% damage) will now never drop off, so hopefully your rotation doesn't need to be so predictable. The main difference though is in defensive capabilities. We are gaining: Force Speed down to 15s from 30s Blackout reduces incoming damage by 25% Fade now usable every 1m30s instead of every 2mins Kinetic field now reduces damage by up to 6% This is what could make the biggest difference for shadows. Sentinels still seem to have better defensive cooldowns, but our increased defenses will definitely help a lot. The main downside to these changes for shadows regarding PvP is the CC changes. The change to force wave will negatively affect our ability to defend the walkways in huttball but as it is not 15m and instant, hopefully positively affect us elsewhere. the big nerf is force stun. Reducing the range from 30m to 10m is gonna suck as force stun was the only 30m skill that inf shadows had.

Mostly loving the changes and really looking forwards to playing some more infiltration spec after the update! I only hope that we can find another worthy tank in guild so that I can ditch tanking. Anyways, my summary: Damage buffs: Shadow Strike will do 30% more base damage with proc Blackout / Fade can be used more often for increased force regen Defensive buffs: Force Speed cooldown halved (30s -> 15s with my spec) Fade usable more often (2mins -> 1m30s with my spec) Blackout provides -25% incoming damage buff for its duration Kinetic field can now provide up to 6% reduced incoming damage Nerfs: Force wave now cone, not 360 Force Stun now 10m range, not 30m Additional Good Stuff: I will no longer have to spec in to kinetic field, thus freeing up 2 talent points So, looking back at some past logs of mine, shadow strike makes up roughly 15-20% of my overall, so a 30% increase in base damage for this skill (ofc, I only use with proc) should equate to 4.5% - 6% DPS increase straight away. The change to fade / blackout is less easy to measure but overall I may be looking at roughly 7%-10% DPS increase for infiltration in PvE. I tend to top out at 1400dps on perfect fights, so an extra 10% will put me at 1540dps which is getting close to gunslingers and sentinels, so can't really complain! On the PvP side, I think we'll notice some bigger crits from shadow strike but main difference is gonna come from the improved defensive cooldowns: blackout (-25% inc damage) and fade (stealth). These two should help us stay in the fight a bit longer. However, the nerf to our CC is quite bad. Force stun is the infiltrations only 30m instant skill, so with the nerf we won't be able to interupt caps as often as we can now. Force Wave is also gonna make it much harder for us to defend walkways in huttball. I suppose that balances out with our improved force speed but meh, I think I'd prefer force wave!

There is no such thing as an MMO that is 100% themepark or 100% sandbox. Most MMO's lean one way or the other, but all MMOs have both elements in them. For example, SWG had endgame raids (Corvette, Death Watch Bunker), linear quest lines (Rebel and Empire Questlines). SW:TOR already has sandbox elements: open world pvp is a sandbox mechanic! So, saying that because SW:TOR is mostly themepark it should never, ever use any sandbox elements is silly. It doesn't fit ANY current development model and it also doesn't fit with common sense. At the end of the day, the developers of any MMO simply want their subscribers to stay playing, and therefore paying, for the game. Themepark elements are easier to develop and easier to understand for the mass market, but they are also very short lived as players complete the content and get bored. Sandbox elements are much harder to develop and generally harder to understand, but ultimately have a much longer lifespan. By focusing mostly on themepark elements, you place the burden of player retention purely on the developers ability to churn out content. For the developers to be able to do this, they need lots of developers and thus lots of money to fund it, so they basically need a lot of subscribers. As soon as sub numbers drop, that model is screwed. By focusing on sandbox elements, you need some seriously intelligent developers at the start to get it right, but after launch the burden of player retention no longer lies with the developer, but with the community. The developers therefore have longer to develop content and thus lower running costs. This is why the themepark subscription based model for MMOs is currently failing and more and more themeparks are going F2P. The market is saturated with very similar MMOs and thus none of them can build a player base high enough to fund continued development of content. Sandbox elements alleviate this problem: assuming they get the sandbox right (hard to do, admittedly), the community stays happier with the product for longer and so the burden on the devs is less. Player retention remains higher. Win Win

WHY? This is your imagination limiting your vision. There is room for a blend on everything. For example, leave class stories as they are, leave main planetary quest line in tact, but make all other quests dynamic i.e random/scaling based on when you pick them up. Right there, in two lines, I've described exactly how you can blend excellent storytelling and quest lines with a sandbox questing system. Expand your imagination dude. Seriously Persistant housing CAN BE INSTANCED. It doesn't have to be out in the real world. Let us buy appartments on coruscant. Let us rent rooms in Organa Palace. Whatever. It can be instanced, persistant and yet not affect the rest of the leveling experience. Its fecking easy. For real MMO example, check out LOTRO. It has persistant housing that is instanced away in neighbourhoods. I do PvE and PvP, mostly PvE, and can honestly say the vast majority of updates to classes in this game are a result of PvE balancing and have had a negative effect on PvP, not the other way around. In my opinion, PvP has gotten worse since release as a direct result of balancing for PvE. The changes I've listed would not radically change the game. Questing, leveling, classes, combat etc would all be exactly the same as it is now. The core experience of SW:TOR would remain 100% identical to the themepark on rails ride we have now. The difference would be primarily at endgame where players would no longer be required to repeat the gear treadmill ad nausium but would instead would have alternative ways to play the game, namely proper pvp, dynamic questing and worth while crafting. However, I am aware that bioware do not have the balls to alter the direction of their game. They've chosen their model, chosen their design strategy and are sticking to it. It failed miserably with the core gamer crowd but with the change to free-2-play they will attract many more casual players to this game, and it is casual players who will enjoy what this game already offers. This game will become a slow success story after free-to-play, but it will never be the game that core gamers want and so will remain a failure in the eyes of most core gamers. Thats fine, I accept that, but I can't help but try to offer suggestions on how to make the game a better place for the core gamer crowd. After all, I love Star Wars, I want a Star Wars MMO and I'm a core gamer, so its only natural

The concept here is not crafting versus raiding, but choice. In SW:TOR, my only method of acquiring top tier gear is to grind endgame instances, basically, grind EC HM. That is the developers forcing me down a particular route and making me repeat it. In SWG, top tier gear was player crafted. That meant to get top tier gear I had to buy it with credits. Thats where the choice came in. I could grind quests for credits. I could farm rare mats and sell them for credits. I could craft myself and sell my wares for credits. Point being, if I wanted to be the best geared in the game, I could choose my method to get there, I wasn't forced down any one path. In SWG, I was particularly fond of farming rancor missions for example, so thats how I made my money. My mate who I played with preferred farming krayt dragon pearls instead. I'm happy for endgame gear to not be crafted as long as there are multiple viable ways to endgame loot so that the player, not the dev, decides how to acheive their goal. Player driven PvP does not mean those with the most time are the best. That is what gear-driven pvp is. Player driven pvp = pvp where players are actively encouraged to seek out and fight the opposition and the players have the ability to engineer fights. Basically, player driven pvp means giving players the tools to create their own pvp events that are meaningful and fun for all. In SWG specifically, this was achieved through pvp bases in player cities. By dynamic, all I'm aiming to achieve is that leveling up on multiple toons is different. This could be done using SWG's quest system (quests scale to your gear and group size and are randomly generated), Rift's rift system (random world events that scale to group size), WAR's PQ system (public quests that only advance once you've got a group together), or some future system that Bioware can develop. The concept is keeping things fresh for the player when leveling new characters. You're right, focus is the wrong word. Perhaps simply just having the ability to explore *more than we currently have* is a better way to say it. I'm not an explorer personally, but i know plenty who are. Good point, freedom is very personal. I suppose what I mean is equality of playstyle and the freedom to choose your route to success. For example, I love tattooine and hate hoth. In SWG, I could choose to level up on tattooine and avoid hoth. In SW:TOR I'm forced to do both. The goal / success criteria is the same, but one method of getting there is my choice, the other is the developers choice. The more the player feels in control of their experience, the happier they will be.

Thats the ultimate point of this thread really. SWG had some really terrible implementation and was overly complex, meaning many casual gamers just couldn't get in to it. However, the game was built on amazing concepts, concepts that captured the gaming minds of many MMORPG players and have left us wanting more ever since the CU/NGE. SW:TOR, on the other hand, has excellent implementation values but the game is built upon completely unoriginal, lackluster concepts that inspire no-one and are not long-lasting. If the development team at Bioware were to take the core concepts from SWG and implement them in SW:TOR with the sort of professionalism they have shown so far, then SW:TOR would be a much, MUCH better game and have some serious longevity. So, whether you liked SWG or not, most people will agree that the core concepts of that game are a great foundation for any modern MMO: Crafted Endgame Loot Player Driven PvP Player Driven Endgame Content Player Driven Economy Dynamic PvE Questing Quests Scaling To Group Size Lots of Roleplaying Features Focus on Exploration Player Freedom The main point, if you didn't spot it already, is that the game focused on the players and what the players wanted to do, not on the developers and what they can churn out.

SWG had nearly two years of doing well after launch with a stable player base of ~300k until the CU.