LMAO@your feeble appeal to authority...especially when this 'authority' happens to be the weasel words of EAs PR department. SWTOR has lost 400k subscriptions, representing nearly a quarter of it's subscription base. Within 5 months of the game's release. EA has admitted that this figure includes trial accounts and promotional gametime, including the month's free gametime that by SHEER COINCIDENCE was handed out immediately prior to the quarterly report. Meanwhile, Activision only includes paid WoW accounts active within the last 30 days. These are the facts.

What a LOAD OF CRAP. The quarterly report not only demonstrated a huge slump in active subscriptions (less than 5 months after release), it also revealed that EA have been cynically inflating this figure by including trial accounts and promotions; in particular the month's free gametime which by SHEER COINCIDENCE was handed out immediately prior to the report. It must be wonderful to live in your fantasy world.

BWHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHHAHAHAHAHAHAHHA!!!! WoW has over 10m subscribers, has been going strong since 2004 and Activision ONLY counts paid subscriptions that have been active in the last 30 days. SWTOR has dropped to an alleged 1.3m subscribers, is 5 months old and EA are cynically including trial accounts and free gametime promotions as 'active subscriptions', including the free month they gave away (by SHEER COINCIDENCE) immediately prior to the quarterly report. LOL!

BWHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!!!!!!!!! Now you're REALLY grasping for straws. The people who (unwisely) bought the six month's gametime represent a tiny minority of the subscriber base. The number who bought the six months and still play are an even smaller minority. The month's free gametime brought a huge number of players back into the game in time for the quarterly report, some of whom had cancelled VERY early on.

False. The free gametime was the only thing that brought a LOT of people back into the game, some of whom cancelled in January.

Everyone was already aware of this particular example, but the DiabloIII pass only represents 1.2m of WoW's 10.2m subscribers and is STILL a paid account. Where is the evidence of Activision 'padding' their subscription figures with non-paying accounts, like EA?

Care to elaborate, or are you just blindly grasping for straws after being proved wrong?

Exact quote from EA: "as of the end of April we now have 1.3 million, with a substantial portion of the decrease due to casual and trial players cycling out of the subscriber base, driving up the overall percentage of paying subscribers" They are counting trial accounts and free promotional gametime as 'active subscriptions'. Deal with it.

LMFAO!!!! So according to you, there are currently no trial accounts active, because they 'all left'???? BWHAHAHAHHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!!!!!!!!!!! Oh boy.

Except that a large number of the 1.3m figure are trial accounts or free gametime promotions who AREN'T paying for the game. EA are (by their own admission) including trial accounts and free promotional gametime as part of their 'active subscription' figure. Activision ONLY includes paying accounts that have been active within the last 30 days and SPECIFICALLY excludes trial accounts and free promotions. What part of this can you possibly not understand?

Activision's definition of 'active subscribers' when assessing the number of active WoW subscriptions: "World of Warcraft subscribers are defined to include: (1) individuals who have paid a subscription fee or have an active prepaid card to play World of Warcraft , (2) those who have purchased the game and are within their free month of access, and (3) Internet Game Room players who have accessed the game over the last thirty days. The definition of subscribers does not include any players under free promotional subscriptions, expired or cancelled subscriptions, or expired prepaid cards." HERP-A-DERP-DERP

Uhhhhhh....what? Activision SPECIFICALLY excludes trial accounts and promotional gametime from their 'active subscriptions' figure, while EA cynically includes them to inflate the numbers. How is that a 'level playing field'?

No, normal people are smart enough to realise that it's panic stations at EA as SWTOR slowly slides into the toilet and that the quarterly report was very disingenuous, to the point of being intellectually dishonest. -The number of 'active subscribers' cynically includes trial accounts and the large number of people currently playing on the month's free gametime, that by SHEER COINCIDENCE was introduced immediately prior to the quarterly report. Meanwhile, WoW has stringent guidelines whereby only paying accounts active within the last 30 days are counted as 'active subscriptions'. -The number of subscriptions also includes the people who reactivated their account for the massively-hyped Jesus Patch in April and are already looking at cancelling. Basically, this is the beginning of the end for SWTOR and once the big-name MMOs hit later this year, the game will be lucky to turn a profit, no matter how much EA fudge the statistics.

Middle-aged male (preferably with military background) is Eve Online's demographic.

BLAST FROM THE PAST! "Both EA and LucasArts have confirmed to VG247 that the target for BioWare’s newly announced Star Wars: The Old Republic is to make an MMO with a larger userbase than World or Warcraft. “We have very high expectations for this,” said EA Games president Frank Gibeau, speaking this week at LucasArts’ HQ in San Francisco. “Just look at the base of Star Wars fans, plus what BioWare can do. Trust me: we want to win. EA’s reputation is for wanting to win. “This is going to be a powerful category and there’s lots of ways to compete in this category. [blizzard] created a much larger opportunity for everybody else, but that doesn’t mean it’s going to stay that way.” LucasArts online boss Tom Nichols concurred, saying that the firm is banking on The Old Republic’s storytelling component to bust through WoW’s 11 million subs record. “When World of Warcraft came out, everybody thought, ‘No, the market is only this big, because that’s as big as EverQuest was.’ Blizzard showed that it could be much larger,” he said. “Our goal is to show that by bringing storytelling to the genre that we can attract an even wider audience. Plus, we have the benefit of this huge brand, which has done very, very well for nearly 30 years.” When asked specifically if he believed the game will be bigger than World of Warcraft, Nichols said all the ingredients were in place. “I think this game has that potential, with a premiere developer behind it; with a clear differentiating feature being story and something that’s very compelling, and being a feature that’s true to BioWare’s expertise as well as the Star Wars brand; plus the power of the Star Wars brand, which is still doing very, very well 30 years after it started,” he said. “The opportunity is there for us to do that.”" http://www.vg247.com/2008/10/24/wow-is-the-target-with-the-old-republic-says-lucasarts-and-ea/ LOL!

In cover, Snipers can use Entrench, which makes you immune to CCs, roots and snares.

EA specifically and categorically stated that the 'active subscription' figure included trial accounts. It's in their best interest to misrepresent what could potentially be a catastrophic decline in paying subscribers, hence the month of free playtime immediately prior to the quarterly report.

Because EA apparently stated that 500k subscriptions would be viable and a million would be very profitable, the problem being that a large number of the so-called 'active subscriptions' listed in the quarterly report AREN'T paying subscribers.

Activision's definition of 'active subscribers' when assessing the number of active WoW subscriptions: "World of Warcraft subscribers are defined to include: (1) individuals who have paid a subscription fee or have an active prepaid card to play World of Warcraft , (2) those who have purchased the game and are within their free month of access, and (3) Internet Game Room players who have accessed the game over the last thirty days. The definition of subscribers does not include any players under free promotional subscriptions, expired or cancelled subscriptions, or expired prepaid cards." WHOOPS!

...except that you're not comparing apples with apples when EA state that the game would be 'very profitable' with over a million subscribers; when in fact the current number of 'active subscriptions' includes a large proportion of trial accounts and players using the month's free gametime (which by SHEER COINCIDENCE was handed out immediately prior to the quarterly report).

...except that EA are (by their own admission) fudging the numbers by including trial accounts and free gametime as 'active subscriptions', so the number of actual paying accounts is most likely well under a million.

Pretty much. I have long given up on believing anything Bioware/EA says and their quarterly report is full of ambiguity and shenanigans.

Except that they SPECIFICALLY stated it in the quarterly report: "Through the end of the quarter, approximately 2.4 million units have sold through. In our last call we indicated that we had 1.7 million active subscribers, and as of the end of April we now have 1.3 million, with a substantial portion of the decrease due to casual and trial players cycling out of the subscriber base, driving up the overall percentage of paying subscribers. We have already launched a number of initiatives designed to grow subscriptions." DERP.

In case anyone missed it, they're including TRIAL PLAYERS as 'active subscriptions'. What percentage of that 1.3m are accounts only 'active' through the free month of gametime cynically doled out by EA to coincide with the quarterly report?

I get stuck in combat on all my characters, occasionally even after I respawn. Not being able to stealth sucks, but being unable to OOC-heal can be nearly as bad.