I don't do group content. So that will never happen. Unless we're talking flashpoints which, the last time I checked, have a solo mode.

And this is where all the difference lies. I enjoy the game more now when I'm more powerful. I love the fact that I can do heroics without having to constantly worry I might die, or that I won't have to rest for like two years between every fight. It breaks all immersion when I have to do that. I prefer some personal RP when I play. All the mechanics of having to constantly rest and not take on too many mobs ruins that for me. I prefer the ARPG approach of being able to take down many mobs at once. It creates an epic feeling, like a movie.

We can't have a movie feeling due to the fact that this game has a tab target combat system. If it was like Jedi Academy and the earlier games it would be more down to skill. Now it's down to stats. So I have to try and make the best of it, which is wanting powerful companions and also nerfed ordinary enemies.

Nope. Nothing in what I said have pointed to me not wanting no more interaction than clicking a single button.

No I meant strong enemies will give my tank companion a lot of trouble at later levels (like on Belsavis). In the beginning she has zero troubles tanking 2 or even 3 champions/elites at the same time. If I set her to healing we have less problems. But I don't want just a healing companion all the time. And I don't feel strong later on. In the beginning your companions and yourself do so much damage that enemies have very little chance. So SWTOR is the opposite; the higher level you are the longer fights against ordinary enemies take. This because your defensive and offensive abilities does not increase in power as fast as the damage enemies does and the health they have.

Move on if you're tired of hearing about experiences from casuals who play for the story and hate grinding/raids/pvp. With that out of the way, yes this is a thread from someone was have recently returned. I quit before the 4.0 arrived. I read all the threads that hated on the strong companions. Saw BW nerf the comps into the ground only to buff them back to, well not the same level as before but they are considerably stronger to someone like me who never experienced the 4.0 comps. I loved the double XP event. It enabled me to just enjoy the Star Wars experience. The strong companions: I love them. It allowed me to focus on the story instead of feeling like I'm playing Daggerfall for the first time and getting one-shotted by some imp (imp as in a small flying green annoying thing, not imperials) and rats/bats. I play a Star Wars game because I love the story, the characters and I love feeling powerful. I'm don't want to play some farmer that can't even handle lvl 1 rats. What some people seem to want is like putting Darth Sidious or Darth Vader into a story and a strong rebel and her 3 adds can almost take them both down. That's just ridiculous, imo. Now if you PvP I expect you want a challenge, or if you raid. But I do neither and I don't care if comps are "overpowered". They make the game more fun for me. The only complaint I have is that enemies that are at strong or higher get way too hard once you hit a lvl 30+ planets. Suddenly my comp that could tank 2-3 elites/champions in heroics on the first 2-3 planets can't handle 1 or 2 strong without loosing half her HP or more. That's a little silly. Sure I can set her to healing and I can do all the dps:ing. In other words; the HP and DPS curve on enemies on later planets after the first 2-3 is way to steep, imo. So no, I don't want a "challenge" all the time when I'm focusing on the story. I want to be entertained. The changes in 4.0+ have made this possible for me. Thank you, Bioware :3

It's to try and fool us casuals so we buy the game or spend money on it in some way, play a month or two and realize that it's just another game that only cares about pvp:ers, and/or raiders. Then the raiders and pvp:ers complain that people are leaving and the servers are empty... They should remove all pve content that is not raids and let people level up by pvp and raids only. At least this way both groups won't have to deal with casuals like myself and we won't have to deal with these groups.

If we had a lot of single players RPG's, which we don't. Unless you think going back and playing old ones (again and again) is the only course left. The only new SW game is also another online game.

Why push for faster leveling? Probably because they want everyone to leave the classic story and move on to the new content. With the new direction SWTOR have where the focus is a single player story. The less people still stuck on class quests the better. At least that's how I interpret the choices they have made. Personally I like the new direction. The more story and less group content the better. And it's not like there is any new SW single player game either so we SP peeps are stuck with a MMO.

Nope. I play SWTOR for the story, that's my main focus. B&S and BD's focus is pvp. So unless I want to pvp all day at end game I will not have anything to do. And I hate pvp. There is way too much obsession with pvp in online games, like we don't have fps games and mobas already...

I prefer the crafting right now. It's better and easier, imo. Of course with all the heroics being solo-able and the good rewards you get with them mods/enhancements and armor parts is now less useful. Oh well.

You're giving KOTOR 1 way too much credit. I found it a bit on the dull side the first time I played it. KOTOR 2 had a better story and was better with regard to the dark and light choices you made, ie, companions cared about you "falling" to the dark side. I loved that. KOTOR 1 felt more like playing today's DA:I: You gotta be the hero no matter what. Why I love the Sith Warrior story more than all DA games combined.

Would be even better if the combat changed into an action combat one, like Jedi Academy and the games before it. But that is never going to happen just like lightsabers reacting to being pushed against a wall most likely never will. The tab target combat is considered to be easier for causal play.

It was still games with a linear story, despite different endings. You had the illusion of a choice, nothing else. And choices does not mean better, like some people seem to think. Baldur's Gate I and II are considered to be vastly superior to (in the story department) to just about anything BW worked on after those games. You had zero choices in those two games. And when I mentioned that it had nothing really to do with the Sith or the Republic, it was the feeling both games gave me. In comparison to SWTOR where playing any class you're constantly reminded of the war between the two factions. I did not care about that when I play KOTOR I or II, I cared about the personal story, about the people I met.

So in other words, you don't want a story like KOTOR I and II? Because the story in both was linear, had nothing really to do with the Sith or the Republic and any light or dark choice you made did not really change anything. It was those two games BW obviously (to me at least) looked at when they made the story for the new exp. Edit: I should've added, looked at again. As well as ME. Many players wanted what we had in KOTOR so BW went back to that. I remember when I played KOTOR that I missed the conflict the original trilogy had brought up, between two big factions. But later when KOTOR II arrived I enjoyed playing a dark side character so much that I did not care.

No thank you. I want a single player game sure, but not based on SWTOR dying. I want both. And I want BW to update the visuals in SWTOR, or preferably change engine (because let's face it, they can't do much more with this engine, they are stuck) but that would be too costly and take way too long. Playing DA:I and Fallout 4 and coming back to play SWTOR, it feels like switching between a Playstation 1 and 4. So much grain on those textures and low poly meshes. Oi..

The 100% XP bonus ends in a few days so if you want in on on the extremely fast leveling train you gonna have to play right now. I prefer if they keep it another few weeks, it's easy to get spoiled. I liked the fact that at the end of Korriban i reached lvl 23 on my Sith Warrior. A few hours later and I'm lvl 30 and still have a bunch of quest left on Dromund Kaas. I don't know how anyone can hit lvl 65 in a couple of days, it takes a lot longer than that if you do all quest and not just skip everything npc's say. And not using any kind of extra XP boost.

Darth Baras, at least a couple of years (well probably more than that) ago when I went up against him. He was ridiculously strong. Took 16 tries, with a healer comp.

I hear ya. I'm an "old" player and I'm still amazed by the amount of negativity on the forums. And the idea that my thought = everyone think like this. Like when some people started multiple thread about the strong companions and that all players hate that, what? Me and other casuals loved it. Thank goodness BW listened to the rest of us and tuned them again. Anyway, that just an example when a small vocal minority think they speak for everyone when they criticize something with SWTOR. Of course, the amount of negativity is common in the gaming community. Just look at WoW's forum, or DIII, or Tera, Vindictus, GW2, most games on steam and their respective forum. Etc. Just yesterday I finally picked up Pillars of Eternity and I saw the large amount of positive reviews it got, but on the forum it was the complete opposite - just hate. Oh well.

99% of the story content is ranging from easy to normal. But then we have that 1% like Darth Baras, who seem to be set up to make the player fail about 600 times. There is no fight in SWTOR that I hated as much as that one. It's very much down to luck in those fights. Today however you can just over-level and thus crush those extremely hard story bosses. And sparing yourself of the frustration. After the exp you'll just have to try or skip the fight and start with the expansion instead. Also you could take a certain little furry companion with you that can tank and heal at the same time. This will most likely be another thing of the past once the exp is out. All those cartel coins spend on Treek, that will balanced down to the same weak level as the other companions...

Since the only thing you replied to was about heroics, I guess you realize it's more than just about PVP? If you agree with OP, that is.

Immersion (stomping on low lvl enemies can sometimes be fun), being on mount as high lvl in lov lvl area, farm stuff, etc. And no you won't be able to do heroics as easy as before. And some maybe not at all, you'll have to group.

You mean you have ignored all the other points people have been making against level syncing? Are you aware that there are PVE servers? I don't care about PVP, my reasons have all to do with PVE.

Exactly. People have to subscribe longer. It's just another business decision. Not one to make it better for players, in general.

Well it depends on what kind of player you are. If you love group content, don't like the idea of over-leveling anything and want everything to be a challenge - you'll love it. But if you are a soloer, you want to actually feel powerful when you play your Sith or Jedi fighting against those lvl 10 random enemies, while you're at say lvl 15 - though luck. Not to mention we will have to deal with annoying mobs gunning us down from our mounts, that before could hardy put a dent in our armor. All in all it's a bad decision and a good one, depending on your play style. I personally hate it. I always solo, and now I can most likely forget about being able to solo early level heroics because BW want to force me to change who I am as a player. Which just means I'll leave, sooner or later. One step back, from that step forward they did when they added solo flashpoints and said they want to focus more on story content because so many of us solo and play for the story. Sigh, this is why I prefer single player games. No forced grouping and "IT'S A MMO YOU ARE SUPPOSED TO ALWAYS GROUP WITH PEOPLE AND SOCIALIZE!" - opinions from random group-lovers. We don't force people to socialize IRL, and should not in a MMORPG.