Look out, Elroy's gonna blast ya! http://img.rp.vhd.me/4652546_l1.jpg

I rarely play the game anymore so forgive my likely ignorance, but isn't this the most obvious answer?

Guess I'm the only one who laughed that there is some "rare display bug" that conviniently happened to this dude, which conviniently lets Bioware off the hook for appearing nonresponsive. Is it possible? Sure. Just funny to think I've never seen this bug discussed in all my lurking of the forums since late beta. How convineint for Bioware to say "oh, we really did respond... really, we did, you just were the victim of that.. uh, that rare display bug, where you don't see our response, but we really did..." Maybe it has been discussed before, I could be wrong. This particular case was absolutely the fault of the OP, just still didn't score any points for Bioware in my book.

Yep. They hold all of the cards. They, and only they, know the content they want to release, when they want to release it, and how much work is left to release it, yet they somehow manage to make themselves look the fool. Not just once or twice, because everybody knows deadlines are missed sometimes, but constantly and consistently. Would be prudent after such a poor record of meeting expectations (that they themselves set by themselves) to maybe have tested the content and been completely confident it was ready to go before they even brought it up. Sit on it, we are already used to waiting for everything, and complaints about "taking too long" will always be there no matter how fast you release. Make sure it works, and sit on it if you have to, to make it look like you are a professional team of AAA programmers that can put together a quality update without issue. Rebuild the reputation. But that's just me. You already sucked me for some more money, so good on ya.

1. Figure out a PvP system that isn't borked 2. Server transfers. 3. See 1 and 2

Was that a carpet reference?

I feel exactly the same way you do. Any movie that I see "the rock" in, the movie instantly becomes about "the rock" in my head. Clearly the guy has star power, and it's not like he's a bad actor, but he's "the rock". It takes me out of whatever fictional setting the movie is trying to create. I think Sam Jackson has the same vibe going for him. Whatever movie he is in, he's Sam Jackson, not whatever character name they applied to him. I think Sam was a poor fit in the prequel trilogy and took me out of the film. "Anakin Skywalker, I'd like you to meet Jedi Master Sam Jackson..." I know that argument can be made for a great number of movie "stars", but people who have such an established... personallity and style, feel out of place in a fictional, fantasy universe.

I can recognize the argument about what would be a "fair" equavlent of time invested for PvE gear vs PvP gear (best stats being equal). As a gamer, my response would be "who cares" how quickly Joe-PvE got his gear compared to Bob-PvP. Everybody plays the game at their own pace, and the gear can only be obtained as fast as the limits of the game allow. I can see arguments for "hardcore" raiders complaing that Bob-PvP may have gear with sufficient stats to join a raid, but may not have the experience to complete it. My response as a gamer would be "who cares". I don't believe that it should be the responsibility of the developers to make sure every player is capable at performing to the standards of any other player. I can also see the arugment for completely normalizing the stats when you enter PvP, but that would also take away that carrot/stick, so I can see why that is often avoided. It just seems to me a like a lot of the arguments that being with "X player only did blah blah blah..." should be the responsiblity of the player to solve, and developers should not be radically changing game mechanics to cater to one group or the other strictly based on trying to balance "time investment". There will always be somebody who got something before you, regardless of how easy/hard it is.

Ok, I missed several months, but what I take away from that response is that everybody (meaning every player) was given for free, with no additional effort required, an entry-level set of gear. Now, through choices made by the player, some opted not to use the gear, while others opted to sell it. It was their choice to do so, and nobody forced them to sell or not use the gear. So because one group of players actively chose to not participate in PvP with the free, no effort required, gear, those players who choose to take PvP more seriously than PvE are penalized by faulty equations. My question is, at what point do you let the player live with his or her decisions?

I (more or less) only PvP, and I've never understood this argument. Please ellaborate. Why? Obviously gear was/has been/can be given for PvP activities. Why does that gear have to be any more or less powerful than the "best" available PvE gear? I know that is how it usually is, but why does it have to be that way?

Ok, after this initial responses I have a better idea of what happened. Here is a follow-up question, and one that may sound rather dumb, but can someone explain why there needed to be an "expertise" stat in the first place? I read people saying that otherwise PvE players would be able to play in their PvE raid gear and somehow stomp PvP players. Can somebody give me a scenario as to why that would happen, and why a PvP-based stat (like expertise) needs to exist? (Not necesaarily just in this game, but any game where there exists a PvP-stat) PS. I'm not really dumb, but I can't wrap my head around it.

Hello. I used to love to PvP in this game, but quit a few months after release as it was quite apparent the game wasn't going anywhere (in general). I have recently resubbed, and I am disheartened everyday by reading about this bolster mechanic, and how it's just not working. I was hoping somebody could help explan the history of this bolster mechanic. When was it implemented, and how long has BW been dicking around with it? Why did they change the brackets from 10-19, 20-29, etc. and now lump everybody into one big cluster F? What happened to the old PvP gear? I would really like to get back into PvP, but I have no desire to try to figure out how to "game" the system, which armor should I actively avoid becase it penalizes me; Which armor is actually good because it takes advantage of a broken mechanic, etc. I liked the idea of starting at gear-level X, and moving my way up to gear-level "Better-than-X". I had no issue with losing to people with higher gear than me, because we all started at the same place, and we all have the same opportunity to get to that level. So I appologize if this is a long winded question. I'm just curious what happened, and why so many radical changes were made that didn't really seem to solve anything. **Quick Edit** This thread isn't intended as cheap shot at the devs, or to start some sort of flame war. I just missed a lot of time and am curious as to how the (pvp) game got to where it is today.

Suuuuuure. Your "twin brother".... Took it, and good luck with his (your) studies.

I know you are just trying to clarify for the unelightened, but I don't care about the technicallities as that is their job to figure out. Not sure it is a customers place to make excuses for the company on why it may be "too hard" or "too much work" to make a quality product. As the end user, this system is overly complex and requires me to jump through too many hoops to acheive my (personal) desired level of satisfaction. Additionally, the Q&A clarifications lead me to believe that even after the hoop jumping (and potential real cash money spending) I still wouldn't be able to acheive my (personal) desired result. Thank you for trying, BW. Too little too late for me (personally), again. ***I am aware everybody has different taste, and many people may like this system. I am offering my (personal) opinion on this upcoming feature for Bioware's consideration and information as to why this does not contribute to my desire to continue to give them money. Let them take that as they will***

What does that say about the state of the game, if people can find merit in the thread after a year? I'm just a man asking questions...