I've only been doing PvP for a couple of months, and my two highest toons are 46 and 49 now, so I want to make sure I'm preparing myself adequately for victory (or at least acceptable, rather than humiliating, losses), so I have a few questions: 1) Expertise Below 50 -- does it count? I noticed that a few PVP Vendor weapons sell below 50 weapons with a small amount, and I was able to purchase the below 50 (Level 30ish) + Expertise Black-Green cyrstal during the Rakghoul event. Will this affect my 10-49 bracket matches at all, and if so, is it worth not using "regular" statted crystals/weapons? 2) Minimum realistic starting gear so that I look like I'm dressed to play -- now that I found out about farming Recruit Gear in Outlaw's Den, (got my helmet in my first trip), I don't see anything stopping me from having full Recruit Gear at a minimum (even if my 49 hits 50 and has to buy some, I'm assuming my 46 has enough time to just farm it all). 3) Since I started "late", my 49 is in the 20s for valor, so not likely to hit 40 valor before level 50 and start converting WZ to RWZ comms, so I'm focusing on being as close to 2000 WZ comms as possible. Can I really start buying BM with those when I hit 50? My understanding is that I have to buy BM (for a given slot) before I can upgrade that slot to WH. 4) My 46 is already Valor 29, so I'm thinking I might have a chance to hit Valor 40 in time to start converting WZ to RWZ even if I don't end up hitting both caps (2000 WZ, 3000 RWZ). If I have a choice, is it better to max my RWZs out before my WZs? 5) Finally, assuming I haven't made too many errors in planning above, what's the "best" path to get into wearing Oranges with WH so I don't have to look like a freaky pos reject from a bad fantasy movie? Sorry if this is long, I can break it up into separate posts if that's easier.

Does the zone end if it's 8:0?

I'm confused...your post is dated today (May of 2012) and you're griping about opinions that started being published in May 1999? I'm not sure about the *specific* review you are mentioning (since you didn't provide a link), but prequel-hating has been around since the initial release.

Well step up to a 32-bit machine, mate. I'm pretty sure 16-bit is below spec.

And from left field...what if BW calculates a "flirtable" variable, and the dialog only offers FLIRT for certain values....like most guys only flirting with girls with average "flirt" scores (too low and the guy isn't interested, too high the guy doesn't want to get shot down).? And I'm not just talking about base looks, I'm talking factoring in things like clothes -- Full Leia Slave Girl or other "sexy" sets might intimidate "average" guys. And current companion choice, appearance, and likely romance status could be a factor. And then I look up quests on Torhead and see option::male, option::female determining dialog choices. Well, it was a good dream while it lasted. [btw, yes I write male flirt with girl, but I thought it read better than flirter/flirtee]

To be honest, I *may* have spent more time surveying the female population, so I may be basing this off of just the male samples that...stood out.

The female's breasts aren't too large, their uniforms are probably just padded, and they have to do it to keep up with the ridiculous number of socks the male toons stuff down their pants.

There is no "point" to getting better gear now. If you can beat people using Gear X, what's the point of getting Gear X + Y? If you can't beat people who use Gear X, what's the point of fighting people using Gear X + Y? In math, it's the difference between a stable and an unstable equilibrium -- balance and no balance.

Not trolling. New to PvP. The goal would be to get the better out-of-combat rewards -- I believe a lot of people were upset when certain speeders requiring minimum valor had that minimum removed. The goal would be to enable newer (less skilled ?) PVPers (like me) to be able to put up a better challenge to the more experienced (better skilled ?). The goal would be to make it "more reasonable" to allow full 8-man premades to queue (which I see a lot of PVPers requesting). And it's not a new idea. I don't Golf, but higher "skill" there is usually expressed as a handicap. And higher "skill" usually means better recognition, better endorsement deals, more money, etc.

Mods: This is *not* a specific suggestion to the developers, I am very new to *playing* PVP (but not paying attention to the issue threads), and I would like to discuss this with the PVP community. Please don't kill by moving to "Suggestions". PVP Community: I think that PVP equipment stats should *decrease* with increased Valor (under the assumption that Valor represents skill, not simply time served). This way, the higher yourTier, the more that your skill, team co-ordination (practice working with your team and your team's choice of members) that will determine victory. If this was the case, than full "premade" teams have a viable place in the random WZ queue, as they would presumably win more from the start, and thus level more quickly *into" weaker gear, which would mean that PUGs become more of a challenge. Of course, out-of-combat rewards/awards (special looks, titles, ship mods, mansions, whatever) should be based on higher Valor, because it takes more to win with less. Anyway, as I said, this isn't a specific suggestion, this idea in no way considers PVE/PVP balance, but all I've seen lately is a widening gap between entry-level and expert PVP, and a lot of "the losers should lose because they're losers" arguments. Winners deserve recognition for winning, but unless the Winners want BW to end up putting bots in the matches to replace the "losers" who see no reason to show up or stay in matches, there has to be "some" incentive for the "losers" to show up and stay. And if you're fighting bots in an arena, it's PVE, not PVP. (And maybe people might want to watch two top-Valor teams compete)

A: penalized for a few seconds (or as long as I want to wait) or sent back to a med center so I can try again. Q2U: What does the gold star mob get? Returned to full health, possibly down a few allies, and not allowed to do anything until I come back to fight it again. It surely doesn't get more money, XP, or other rewards (although if it got more money than I spent in repairs and consumables, I'd technically be better off taking a dive or two to boost my net income when I finally beat it).

How come in-game emails from quest completions disappear after a while with no way to save them? FYI, I'm not asking about GTN notices or the emails or the various system welcome messages with our Founders title, etc. Corollary: How come there isn't a "completed quests" log? I find it very immersion breaking to have to manually type my character's history on another PC as it happens.

Rolled my first Rep the other day, a trooper::commando, and am currently saving the galaxy with my companion, Aric Jorgan, also a commando (not that companions have true classes, but like my PC, has Aim primary and uses autocannon). On one night of missions, I picked up 1-2 pieces of Aim gear plus one Aim autocannon. I also got a complete set of smuggler's gear, two Cunning autocannons, and a sniper rifle. And another Cunning autocannon the next day. AFAIK, none of this is usable by any REP PC, but I thought I'd check possible companion usage (none of mine). Risha: Smuggler Companion Cunning Sniper Rifle (but probably 20 levels higher than the weapons I found). Sergeant Fideltin Rusk (Jedi Knight) -- can use autocannon, but needs Aim, not Cunning Zenith (Jedi Consular): Cunning Sniper Rifle So, I've picked up more versions of my main weapon than other versions, and there isn't anybody in the game that I can see that uses what I did acquire, so no GTN, it's just vendor trash found on green/boss drops. Anybody else having this problem?

OK, with Google mail, I'm using like 29 MB out of my 7.something GB, and I hardly ever prune that account. In SWTOR, I've had *way* less than 1 MB mail total, but BW keeps deleting the good stuff -- by which I mean NPC emails send in response to quest actions. I still have a few empty emails with my Founder title, etc., and I don't care about spam or Galactic Trade message deletion, but why (especially with the reported low server usage) do my PVE-RP messages get deleted after a while. That's part of my PC's history, and should take virtually no storage space (8 bytes per PC max, since they are canned messages), so why does BW auto delete them with no chance for me to save (even a "save" button that acted just like a print screen and dropped the message to a SWTOR subfolder like screen shots, which take up much more storage, would be better than just deleting them). In a similar vein, considering BW's CRPG background, why is there no quest log (missions completed or journal entries) section? Even UniPrint text storage is minimal in these days of terabyte drives. As it is, I have to break game immersion by using a secondary computer to free-style PC history into a TXT file. That's what we call "Hi-TEK". The sad part is, that this isn't likely a bug, it's by design (or, more likely, failure to design). If I'm going to keep toons around for a while, I'd really like a way to go back and review their history in-game. Unfortunately, this failure finally made me snap the one week the devs are skipping Q&A, and it's sad, as this (current implementation / design) is what they said they want to get asked about, not future features. So, why was such basic functionality omitted from the game? tl;dr -- Why can't we save messages from Galactic Mail? --player who actually used these features in BG/IWD

Which one let's me look like I'm using the Desert Eagle of Blaster Rifles instead of the Desert Eagle of Pringles Cans? BW should have just made AutoCannon an "Off-Hand" like vibroknife or shotgun, so we look normal using a blaster rifle for standard class moves (like Hammer Shot), and *then* bring out Fat Boy for the big stuff (with longer animations). My 2CR.

I think that Smugglers/Agents (male and female) should get the dialog option "How you doin?" or "No, How YOU doin?" for the first player response to *every* non-companion dialog. Make it option '4' so no other ones have to be removed. And provide a wide array of responses -- OG, SG.

Probably irrelevant to most people, but the Cylon Centurions in the original Battlestar Galactica carried some sort of bladed weapon as well as blaster rifles; I think it was even used in one scene. I thought it made them look bad-*ss. Anyway, the "problem" with Star Wars (the franchise as a whole, not just this game) is that George Lucas wants it kid friendly. So if we want to play Star Wars (and obviously we do), we play with GI Joe cartoon combats. If you want "realism", the first two things that need to go are "no friendly fire" and walking through people. Just my CR 0.02.

Close. Ugnaughts are craf*ting*. Jawas are craf*ty*. Jawas FTW. And to whomever said Kel Dor, may I please quote from the referenced article: "Kel Dor surnames, like Human surnames, were based on ancient family trades or jobs, or even a description of a particularly famous Kel Dor in the family. The Koon family name, for example, meant 'explorer'." I laughed. I felt bad about laughing. I cried. Then I laughed some more. Then, I started thinking...

#1: Flesh Raider (Darth Pekkerhed) #2: Mon Calamari (The Squidfather) #3: Duros (Because I couldn't quit singing "Rock Me, I'm A Duros" during Nar Shadda)

If the reason for removing the huge ugly speeders is because of the complaints about huge ugly speeders cruising fleet (and hogging up space at the GTN terminals), how about this: Instead of just "speeders allowed / not allowed" and forcibly dismounting several seconds after the "not allowed" warning, allow/disallow speeders by "class" -- huge landspeeders? not in cities/spaceports, but faster than anything else in the opens of [Tatooine, alderaan, etc.]. Caveat: All I own is the STAP from Digital Edition, and I'm not buying my Type II license for which I just qualified, since prices are going down. I'll probably never own any of the Escalade models, but I'm not sure I'm sad. [Or, like in the real world, try to sell small hybrids to rich PVPers as status symbols]

For those interested in such, I posted a long-ish alternate system in which crystal affected alignment instead of alignment dictating colors allowed. From what I've seen. more lore friendly, and doesn't *make* Sith/Jedi by "opposite" alignment to use. http://www.swtor.com/community/showthread.php?t=340342 (or if somebody could show me a better way to link to threads within the forum).

It's not just a cosmetic change. It's changing something that had meaning into cosmetics. Personally, I think the original system (have to be DS/LS whatever to use specific colors) was backwards, so I'm not too sad that that system is going away. I saw this as an opportunity to make the system match the Lore (as I know it), so instead of griping on the patch thread, I offered a suggestion on the...suggestions board. The class/alignment/story choices I've made so far haven't really put me at odds with the color code, so I'm not heavily invested currently, but as I plan to play all 4x2 stories, I try to invest in my future.

Removing Dark Side / Light Side restrictions is a pretty bold step towards mediocrity that doesn't seem to be pleasing to many, for many reasons. I don't like it because it's just one more step towards the only difference between the two factions and the two alignments being purely cosmetic. Others argue Lore -- expanded, film universe, and all combinations between. There's also the argument that only half of the classes are force users, so how to count blaster color in Lore arguments -- I'm ignoring this in this post because it's orthogonal to the other two issues, and can be dealt with separately. I thought about it for a while, and I've come up with an idea that (a) is consistent with removing alignment *restrictions* (as per Patch 1.1.5), (b) serves to differentiate factions / alignments instead of making them less distinguishable, and fits with the Lore (at least from what I've seen in these forums and elsewhere -- I'm not a Lore Trivia monster, so this is based on general observation). My idea is this: make color crystals *give* LS/DS points in one or more ways (since I don't know if people will be receptive to this idea, I haven't tried to work out detailed exploit-proof methods -- if the idea is liked, I'm sure there will be plenty of discussion on implementation). RP Background: Assume that the Republic controls all major Blue/Green crystal sources, so that the Empire is forced to create synthetic [Red]. Small clusters of any can be found on any planet, but is too difficult for mass production (hence, Treasure Hunters, rare drops, etc. can get them regardless of color or faction or alignment). Red Crystals -- These are all synthetic; they give [force] user darkside points, are cheaper, can easily and cheaply be bought from vendors (imp; rep may have a different economic model), generally provide higher CRIT, SURGE, ALACRITY, and Primary Stat Boosts. Most likely to have negatives, especially at lower levels (maybe to Presence, or some weird things, the idea isn't to gimp them, just show that synthetic crystals offer a quick and easy way to power, but at a cost). Green, Blue Crystals -- These are real crystals, albeit collected from large deposits. I'd say no LS or DS points for using them (that way Sith using them don't have to go LS, but Jedi using red do go DS). They usually lack (or have lower at equivalent level) CRIT, SURGE, ALACRITY, and Primary Stats, but have higher Endurance, Presence, DEFENSE, SHIELD, POWER, ACCURACY, maybe some other weirdness). Natural Red, Purple, Other Colors -- Only obtainable through "special" means -- that means, not the crystal, would determine any LS/DS gain. Since they are "rare", we presume they are "natural" (possible exception: White), but are not bound by the typical attributes of synthetic (red), or mass-mined from the same few sources (blue, green), and there are no expectations on there bonus/penalty makeup. Ideally, there wouldn't be one level 50 PVP build that *has* to be one way or the other, but rather that PCs would pick their color crystals the same way the Jedi and Sith did. Special color crystals wouldn't be required, and there should be no "SM has to use this crystal for maximum effect" so that getting left behind in Raids, Ops, other PVP, etc., for RP decisions doesn't happen. Sorry this was long, I just see this as the time to [begin] to add in this mechanic if BW is going to remove the old one.

Hey, I can imagine that in a commercial for an American car...right after the dad says that he power-fists the air a couple of times, has his wife grab him a *can* of beer from the fridge and lays his type-4 body back on his recliner to watch sports on tv while his dog licks his balls.

Having worked in development for a number years, here's my guess at what's going on: BioWare Developers/analysts are collecting server usage metrics and putting together a few viable options. Project Management / analysts are reviewing the options assembled by the developers (and maybe tossing in their own for the developers to go back and research), and attempting to determine like customer losses (based on perceived satisfaction with the method selected, and how long it is estimated that development will take to code & test ('cause existing players will sure be pissed if the transfer player method messes them up b/c they're basically innocent bystanders). Very few of the above people are probably high enough in management to be the people who actually have to make the call because they are or (answer to) a VP. Most development errors won't cause termination or salary loss, but giving the green light to the cause of the loss of enough customers could. I'm not trying to be overdramatic, here, I'm just saying the method of transferring characters from one server may *seem* easy to an outsider, but it may be complicated and risky enough to require more than just copying a few data files.