When you have to start explaining to the "clever" raiding community that mmo doesn't mean "you have to group" or that being a soloer doesn't mean that you "don't need" engame gear, this discussion has no sense. I'm a soloer. While I'm playing, I dont have to deal with stupid kids, their mothers calling them for dinner, their jealous girlfriends, their jobs, pseudo leaders, elitists, min maxers, walkthrough junkies, scheduled raiding activities or whatever. I like freedom, I just sit in front of the computer and I play my way till death. All day or all night if I'm pleased. Do this mean that I'm a bad or less skilled player? Of course not, I've seen PvPers and Soloers more skilled than any raider. And like other user wrote above, this is not rocket science.

No thanks. Basically you propose to add another grinding factor to the game so subcribers should buy CC or grind to death for again: another limited amount per week or month. There no pont giving 500, 200 ,300 or whatever lower amount of CC if the cartel market managers set the prices to 600 for ONE thing that should be included in the subscription UNLIMITED access. Oh I already won ~200cc with the legacy system, nice I'm gonna take those and buy ONE dye. I'm so happy. /sarcasm

I usually don't pay attention to who say what. But in this case the OP quote is very clear, Anyways, quote or not quote, if this game were really f2p plus subcription model, subscribers should have unlimited access to every game feature as part of their subscription. All the cartel market stuff should be "Bind on Pickup" world drops , rare but available, and subscribers have a CC stipend. The stipend, that subscribers get now, can't even pay one full customization per month. Also, the current design encourage subscribers to pay unlocks in CC because it is very expensive using credits. We all know how these "tricks" work. One day the droprates are reduced or the prices are increased then people have to spend extra in boosts and other stuff.

It not about the fluff (that it is important in mmos), it is because when the people think that something is not right, they don't want to be part of it. Probably many are not affected by 2.1 changes, for example my characters are just perfect and I dont want to change anything, maybe just a small detail and that won't be very expensive. But I started to loose confidence and I ask myself "what's next?" Even the defenders have a limit, it just matter of time.

I'm sorry, I missed your "constructive" contribution to this forum between the whining for your lost exclusivity and your requests for more exclusive dyes.

The only sets I got complete are the organa statesman, organa loyalist and genteel clothing (which unlocking prices are 360, 90, 90 respectively) because I prefer to combine pieces to find better looks. 360cc to unlock a barely common set and 90 for something that can be bought for llike 2k credits... 60cc for an emote that cost 100credits. I mean, is these new feature supposed to be used by normal people or just stupid ones with more cash than brain? It is a good feature, but those prices turn me off. I already unlocked 3 cheap toys that I use frequently but nothing more so the "collection" wont be completed ever. Btw some items are not being added to the collection upon login, to be sure that everything is added put your bound items in the cargo bay and place them gain in your inventory.

Well Said!. Give CE and security key owners the ability to sell their items and get some credits. Make benefits of the money they paid before like CC buyers do now. The pettiness is strong in this one.

Yep same here, the "substantial discount" doesnt apply if they charge double prices. Don't worry, this game is still playable and it could be worst, the degradation process will continue as scheduled, yesterday Lotro added an ingame slot machine called "hobbit presents", figure it. I believe all these people go to the same club and share the same stupid ideas.

where have you been all these years, Soviet Union camp or something?

Probably some users think the best way to support a game (not only here) is going this way, but certainly it doesn't. It creates a false feedback perception that everything is fine when it isn't. At least, not for everyone. There's nothing wrong with people asking for more benefits and the less if they are paying a subscription. What the next update is telling us?, the answer is: Look, you may subscribe, you may buy xpacks, but that is not enough. We need you, at some point, buying cartel coins. So lets resume, I'm a subscriber but if I want to use the new features I will be limited, discounts and free CC included in the equaiton. How long when a "new" feature will replace an old one to become a new CC sink, resurrection, quick travel for example?. I'm speculating of course.

wow someone ask for more stuff for his money and the only thing he/she gets is a whole horde of fanboys attacking. The reason of why people still paying subs is because there are critical features that cannot be bought with credits or cartel coins. Those missing features could make the game very frustrating and EA/BW is taking advantage of it. So answering the OP question, the point of your $15 are these "little" stuff like the credit cap, the teleports, the probes, ingame discounts and the stuff that work as "consumables" from the cartel market like passes. So the people really interested in the game (loyal customers) should subscribe and, instead of use the stipend to buy CM items, use it to pay the new features. (and if you want those CM then buy CC, - briliant!). You like it or not, subscribers money is also being used to develop the game. Unless you prove that all that money go to a separate account just to maintain the servers and pay the original investment. False advertising and bad advice. There are subscriber features that don't exist in the CM, plus it's a way more expensive for a "normal" person. If the advice is good intended (which I doubt so) it should say the OP to go preferred and buy unlocks from the GTN with credits.

To be honest I'd like a cheaper subscription price of course , but as others have said, the price is similar as others mmos. Which I'd like is more advantages or freebies for VIPS (not necessarily detrimental for f2p) regarding the upcoming stuff that it has been designed for cartel coins use. It has been said, the "barber shop" for example.

On the bright side, if we have thundercats now later they can add transformers and power rangers. Btw, there was a cartoon with pandas too

Always check the GTN, there are several adaptative lvl 1 sets from cartel packs usually very well looking and cheap. No need to waste your CC yet.

Yep the game feels healthy in every place you are. Bringing more potential customers is not enough, there a lot of things that could be improved and I hope EA/BW won't go the disposable-customer model.

A nice feature but I don't expect too much about it. The cartel market is already overpriced compared with the little stipend that subscribers receive. Unless the prices are way less than 100 per piece my CC will stay where they are. It's clearly a CC sink and another way to suck more money from subscribers.

Yep I experience everything you say, the game has many graphical inconsistencies. Flickering textures, fps drops, and performance degradation over time. The performance is not constant in the same areas under the almost same conditions (which are the people online of course), so one day you get 70fps and the next 30fps in the same area. Some days ago I noticed my fps drop dramatically to 25-30 in the Saleucami Fleet Action space mission. After that, the low fps continued everywhere until I restarted the client. I've gotten this "effect" several times. The pictures below show how even setting everything to "very low" I got less fps than at "very high" after I restarted the client. http://img7.imageshack.us/img7/1739/swtorlow.jpg http://img844.imageshack.us/img844/303/swtorlowhigh.jpg PhenomII 955 clocked at 3800 (stock is 3200) load temps <55Cº watercooled HD7950 stock clocks 950/1250, load temps <70Cº 12GB RAM and the game is installed on a 1 year old SSD W7x64 Ultimate I haven't experience any memory leaks btw. I'm monitoring everything, my temps are fine, my drivers are always up to date, no bottlenecks, no bloatware running in the background. In summary, my system is more clean than any newbie fanboy computer and I have a quite experience with it, so I can feel any force disturbance.

I see some people have some misconceptions. 1. As other have stated, there are no free stuff, always someone has to pay. However, it is possible that people play this game without paying a cent. 2. Subscribers don't get "free CC", they pay for them as part of the subscription. 3. F2P players, if they spend real money or not, they still are contributing to the game, making it more populated, in other words: alive. One of the reasons, if not the main one, several aspects of this game such as crafting, constant demand of items and grouping at lower levels, is because there are lots of new people joining everyday. Now, do subscribers get enough for their money?, I doubt it. I don't really care about WZ and FP but if you want to consider them, fine. - Space combat. No reason to play space combat more than one time per week. As we know, SC has been totally nerfed. - Inventory Unlocks A fast look at the GTN proves that is cheaper to buy account wide inventory and cargo bay unlocks (from players who apparently have a lot of real money to spend in CC) than use the "exlusive subscriber unlocking feature" paying 4-10 times more credits for "a per character" unlock. The "subscribers way" is not even optional. - Character customization. The same as above for other unlocks such as autorizations and character customizations. The last week, I've bought a complete set of very cheap unlocks, 150k for an artifact autorization - account gives you an idea of what I'm talking. While those depend on the ingame CC/credits conversion (those lots of cheap CM items is really suspicious) they still are a reason to not subscribe. With all the economy (in credits and cartel coins) already messed up, I don't think Mr Musco is capable of make these subscriber discounts, worth the money. In my opinion, the new character customization should be part of the features that subscribers get "for free" (I know the fanbase like to say it that way) they also shouldn't be taken as a credit sink.

Yep, usually I play with ~170ms and today I have around 400ms with peaks of 8000ms in Shadowlands. The same for other east coast servers. Westcoast servers are giving me 200ms as usual. Not necessarily the servers are the cause, btw. /edit Some minutes after I wrote this post and while I was tracing, the ping problem was gone.

Also if the floor has an irregularity, it is interrupted. I really like the remote controlled starship, I have one in each character

I usually like to manage my currencies at will (my will). A cap of 100 is an improvement, but not the awesomeness. 1 or 2 days of normal questing plus the heroics missions were enough to reach the 50 cap, which "forced" the player to interrupt their questing and spend the commendations in non wanted stuff (because the equipment level restriction). A cap of 100 is more reasonable, it gives the time to reach the level required which is usually when the planet is "completed", it also gives more room so the players can save some commendations for the next planets. Btw, your statement is false, since you can carry a big amount of other currencies from lvl 1 to lvl 55.

I agree with your diagnosis but not your suggestions, maybe 3 and 4. The ingame economy is not equal to the RL, however there are similiar factors. I don't want to enter in many details because it may take the whole night and my english skills are not that good. As RL, people with business skills will make more credits than others, others may just grind, others will use rl money to buy from the store and then selling the items in the GTN, etc. Money sinks don't distinguish rich or poorers. Now how this ~30k per piece fits into the big picture? Very bad of course. As you described, it disincentives the use of the CM equipment. I don't need to explain that some players probably will never see millions of credits in their wallets. This game is not only played by these mmo experts, very interested in money sinks btw. We have to take into considerations casuals, mmo newbies and other people who their primary goal is not to be the richest guy of the server. Also, those players so worried about inflationary pressures may take into consideration that the item drops supply here is infinite and its cost is barely nothing, while the demand is finite and there will never be a shortage. Also, I doubt that EA/BW is really worried about inflationary pressures, if so, then the CM items should be bound on acquire and not be an incentive for credit grinders (and other plagues I wont specify here). However, I agree that credit sinks are needed. How to implement them then? 1. Instead of people rarely using a feature because the expensive cost, lowering the cost may incentivate them to use it more often. 2. More micro sinks. For example, we know that people using their mounts on places like the GTN kiosks is annoying. An idea that include a credit sink is charging for mount use: 1 credit/second (It could be 0.5c/sec, no need to flame here.). It may be increased to 2c/sec for speeder II and 3c/Sec for speeder III. The people will use the mount when it's needed instead of all the time.

Playing the game is optional too. Use your overused flaming attemp with someone else.

It's a disincentive to buy new looks on the store. Also, big money sinks in the end help to impoverish the poorest. This equipment modding feature is a stronger part of SWTOR, it is supposed to be used and enjoyable, however, with this rates it could be a dead one. I don't see myself using it very much at higher levels. Ingame service prices can't be so expensive, they have to be symbolic but without falling into triviality. Repair price, is a good example, it has to be low enough to not be a pain and at the same time to make players care about their characters. That doesn't mean they cannot be lowered more. People used to believe that the earth was flat and here we are.

I have a 7950 and I also expected a better performance compared with my old 5770. I'm using the 13.2 beta drivers, I have better results disabling shadows (because the "low" shadows are nearly the same as "off") , AA ingame and forcing AA and AF. The MSAA 4xEQ method with a standard filter works the best with jagged edges but the movies play only with sound for me. Otherwise use AA 12xEQ with the edge detect filter but it's not as effective as MSAA, specially with some lines and borders when you rotate the camera. Even that, the performance is not the same everyday (in the same areas) it depends how crowded is the area. I got 110 FPS indoors and a very smooth gameplay. Some open areas and close to big buildings may drop to 30, but most times around 40-80. The fleet is another story .