The SWG 'end-game' was the best kind.... NONE! There was no 'end-game' in SWG. The idea of 'end-game' is emblematic of a theme-park, on-rails game like WoW and ToR. Don't take that to mean I don't like ToR or wow, because I do. They are fine for what they are. They aren't a sandbox. SWG was a sandbox. A sandbox doesn't really have an 'end-game'. There were no "levels" in SWG. You picked 3 professions to play (out of 32 possibilities), leveled independently of each other, in any order or sequence. You could Master 2 of them, and dabble in a third. Or dabble in several of them if you wanted. At any time you could drop any of your professions and take a totally different one. No levels mean there was no "end of the road" for your "class". No rails=freedom to play they game the way you want. WoW appealed to the gamers who like methodical, guided and repetitive play, and there are a LOT of them. SWG/Eve/ATitD etc appeal to an additional kind of gamer. The patient, thoughtful kind who enjoy variety, puzzles, complicated mechanics, and social flair. There are a lot FEWER of these type of gamers. SOE simply got greedy and wanted to attract more of the on-rail players at the expense of the free-form players. It failed because of this change. If it had stayed the course and fixed the sandbox, it would have continued to be profitable for years to come (how many old sandbox-ish games are STILL online and profitable?). But trying to lay rail on top of a sandbox is doomed to failure.

WHat about things tied to your class quest, like your companions and ship? Do you still get them if you go all pvp?

I get closer and closer to joining one of the swgEMU servers. I would take SWG pre-CURB over ToR any day of the week. Or over any other 'mmo' right now. Ideally though, they would take the ToR polish, combat, pvp, and engine and wrap it up in the original SWG. Give us 32 professions (no "levels") and the option to play without ever pulling a trigger or waving a sword around. ToR will be a success as a themepark, but's thats all it will be. It will always be overshadowed by wow, and never rise above any of the other themepark mmo's out there and on the horizon. It's single distinguishing feature will be it's voice acting. That's the first thing people will talk about. Now, 3 years from now, who knows. Maybe with new planets will come player housing, a totally new, totally different (and therefore interesting) crafting system, a more open space game..... None of the mmo's mentioned in this thread are any better. Yeah, they migth have different polish, or different features, or different engines. But they are all themeparks! The korean one could be a hit, but it suffers from elfdwarfitis. We want a freaking sci-fi mmo Devs!!

How much is it? That may be useful to know. Other than that, it's actually over-powered for ToR. But I always tell people to get as much power as they can afford. You could play BF3 on high on that machine with no problem. If you want to shave some $$, get the i5 2500 CPU. Won't really need 800 watts either, unless you plan on putting 2 graphic cards in there. You should be fine with a *good* 600 watt psu. Technically you could drop your graphics to the 560 TI if you wanted (I use it) and be fine. But if you got the dough, get the more expensive one! It will serve you longer.

There are those like like to solo. There are those who prefer mostly solo activities, but like to be around other people, and occasionally do stuff with them. Then there are people who can't seem to do anything unless they are in a group. ToR is geared toward the first group. ToR has minimal support for the second group. ToR is hostile to the third group. ToR is only an MMO by the letter of the law, not the "spirit". Even the great granddaddy of themepark games, WoW, is more group friendly than ToR. Give it a year or so to get it' feet under it and the Dev's an opportunity to start making a game for the players instead of the investors.

...and the Elevator Boss crit's the forums for 5 Stupendous Damage!! AoE effects hit for 2 Mega damage per post! Dispel!! Dispel!!

Yeah, it's way too late for ToR to get a decent crafting game. You can't make things *more* complicated, only less. Entropy rules here as in everything else in life. I suppose there would be ways they can implement an interestign and useful system, but it would require an awful lot of effort (read:money) to put it in place, and they would have to put up with a LOT of screaming and gnashing of teeth by the combatards. Just enjoy ToR for what it is, and keep an eye out in case there is ever another game where crafters get treated with as much respect as fighters.

The crappiest part of all this is that developer studio's look at wow, and they see a monthly income in excess of 100 million freaking dollars. PER MONTH!!! Are you kidding me?! So the suits are thinking... "Man, how do I get me some if that!? I know, I will make a wow-clone! Those saps will shovel money into my pocket to play wow with a sci-fi skin!" And they are right! But the thing they are missing is that warcraft is a phenomenon, and an exception. IT very well may be the last MMO to ever have those kind of numbers. Heck, the game is only running off momentum as it is. Monumental momentum, but still. Games like Ultima Online and SWG were able to build a real sense of community due to players being "invested" in their characters. People mocked SWG's single-character-per-server model, but it was actually almost a requirement. With a game that offers more than one career path, the player has to start making choices about how they will spend their time. In pre-NGE SWG, you could pvp or pve, build and run a city, participate in one of the EIGHT unique crafting professions (each a class), run a merchant shop, be a space pilot, be a resource miner, run in-game player-driven events, entertain/socialize professionally (there were 2 classes for that), or offer character appearance services. One person would literally spend their entire real-life life trying to do more than 3 or 4 of those things. You were able to hold 2 full professions plus a few boxes in a third. Therefore you really didn't NEED more than one character. Not to mention the ability at any time to just "drop" any of your professions (know as classes nowadays) and train up a totally different one. My point is that this kind of depth and breadth in an MMO leads to a real commitment and longevity to the game based on CONTENT, not on new raids or shinies. Player commitment=long time financial gain for the company. Wow really was the first working themepark-style MMO, and therefore got pretty much everyone to play at some point. I doubt seriously this will ever be the case again. I just don't see people settling for another wow-clone. This includes ToR.

I think I finally understand where many of the anti-fun-crafting or the crafting-should-be-weak crowd are coming from. Anyone who is in that camp, I am about to blow your mind. Ready? Crafters don't want to make the best gear to USE. THEY WANT TO MAKE IT FOR YOU! Warcraft is NOT crafting, okay? True crafting is about a set of players providing gear for the community. True crafting IS NOT about making ourselves the best gear in game. Yes, it is possible that we *could* make gear for ourselves, if we could wear it. But what an interesting, deep, flexible, and complex crafting system is for... it's PURPOSE in a game, is to provide a fun (for them) way to PLAY a game by running a merchant service. What I and others in this thread want is to make stuff for the community. Our goal isn't to walk up to you wearing a full set of BiS gear after 22 minutes of clicking. We want you to work WITH us to provide YOU with a full set of BiS gear that you have spent hours preparing to wear. It's not a crafter-in-BiS versus a raider-in-BiS competition.

Theres as much point to end-game raiding as there is for an interesting crafting system. It's all about options. And it can never be said too may times: These are not mutually exclusive options. There is a fair and equitable way to allow crafters to make the best item in game while still allowing end-game raiders/pvp to sport the best gear.

The day when some cheetos-munching button-mashing nerd living in mom's basement is able to get gear better than that provided by people with the brains and commitment to work a great crafting system is the day when MMO's will become some themepark grindfest with rotations and cookie-cutter specs. Oh, wait.....

That's true, but what is so frustrating to me is that there are solutions to meet the needs of both players. There have been more than a couple suggested in this thread already. Over the course of the years since Ultima Online, there have probably been TENS OF THOUSANDS of suggestions by people on various forums on how to put an interesting player crafting system in, make the existing one better, fix the interesting one they had... whatever. Honestly, if pre-NGE Galaxies was still running, I would still be playing. That game had all kinds of bugs and problems up to the day is closed down, and yet it was damn near the ideal player crafting system. Better than Eve, ATitD (google it), or any other mainstream or niche game I have ever heard of. I have long maintained that if we could somehow merge SWG's entire crafting system and social game, WoW's polish and progression, Battlefield's combat style, and Eve's space.... in a sci-Fi skin? Holy crap. It would dominate the earth.

Game developers don't make games for US, silly. They make games to make money. They have learned, thanks to wow, that there are a lot more idiots who just want to mash buttons and drool over shiny lewt while stroking their epeen than there are people who enjoy playing a more intellectual game with a deep and USEFUL crafting complemented by a USEFUL means to sell to the community. SWG was the best, last attempt by any large game developer to provide the players with a wide variety of playstyles. This lasted a few years, till wow blew up and SOE started catering to the mouth-breathers. I don't play ToR for the crafting, because there isn't really any in game. What we actually have is a private NPC source for gear. Each player is able to toss a few credits to an NPC in exchange for some materials, and then give those materials to an NPC to make stuff. Some players have access to different sources for this private gear based on RNG, but it's pretty easy for any player in game to get access to all the same identical NPC-provided gear. If we had real Crafting, we would be able to provide something to the community that is not readily available. Something that actually holds it own among the sea of mediocre looted gear. Since looted gear sit's at the top of the pile, crafting has no real use, except as a way drain credits out of the game via NPC missions.

I miss SWG's crafting as well. Heck, I miss the social part as well. If BW could have put an adjusted SWG crafting system in with ToR combat, it could have been sweet. Sadly, few games seem to want to provide the broader attraction of a crafting/social mini-game. There just aren't enough people with the brains/attention to play that style game to convince the Dev's to put content in for them.

I've died once, but it was an experiment. I had just travelled the VIP elevator adn noticed how it seemed to be dropping pretty fast, so I thought "I wonder if this is dropping faster than I fall?". And I tried. And died, lol.