No arguing that logic! 👍

I think, and I could be wrong, but, I do believe that because the characters are the creations of the studio/Lucasarts,they own the rights not only to the characters but to their likeness there of. That would include the voices of the characters. You have to remember, that the voice actors are playing a role and they themselves might not actually talk that way in real life. Sometimes you see interviews with actors and they don't talk anything like the characters they played did. So I don't think there would be any issues with the voices being the 'intellectual property' of the voice actors. Like I mentioned in an earlier post, during the Clone Wars series, Lucas said straight out he couldn't afford to pay the actors who played the characters in the movies to voice the characters in the Cartoon series he was doing. In fact he said something like "They make more during their coffee break than it would cost me to make a whole episode." And so he had to hire some voice actors who could do similar voices of the actors for his TV series. There was no legal issues there because he owned the likeness their of of all those characters, including the voices the characters used in the movies. He owned the copyrights to those characters, and he was able to use their likeness, that of the actors who played them, however he wished, because they were copyrighted. Naturally, I'm sure as part of their contracts, when he used their likeness he might have to pay them a small royalty fee, but that was based on the fact that they were big stars too so they could demand such things as part of their contracts. I doubt the voice actors have quite the same clout as major movie stars, so royalties to them for their likeness of their voices might not have even been in their contracts, and if they were, the royalties were probably extremely limited. My knowledge of the law is limited to Penal Law, I'm certainly no expert on businesses/copyright law, so I may be off on this.

It's a valid concern and your heart is in the right place, but unfortunately the all mighty dollar really is the ultimate consideration for businesses. If it makes it more workable for them to do AI's and the alternative is like text based which people do not like and really goes against the grain for this game, they're gonna go with the AIs. Computers have been taking jobs from people for years now, and automated technologies now often do the work that humans did prior. It's just the nature of the beast. If they can do things cheaper using computers instead of people, the money factor is always gonna win out when it comes to business concerns. I agree. It's just a matter of time. A few years from now, I think it's all gonna be voiced by AI's. Cheaper and you don't have to worry about people's schedules.

They do have a right to make a living but so do the people working on the video game. If this game can't afford to pay voice actors, than they should have the right to use AI voices. They do it in movies, the do it on TV, they do it in video games all the time. The game shouldn't be relegated to have to KOTOR-esque voice interaction because they can't afford to pay them. We've always had voiced content before, and if AI voices are the only option other than text based, I say go AI voices than. They're also allowed to use other people to voice that have similar voices. Was just like on The Clone Wars series. They couldn't afford to pay the actors to voice the characters they played in the movies on the Clone Wars series, so they hired voice actors with voices similar to those of the actors so the character's would at least sound similar. Liam Neelson agreed to voice for the series as Qui-Gon Jinn as he only had a brief few scenes anyways but he did it out of love for the character and worked for a rate they could afford and was a one shot session. Can't high jack characters simply because the voice actors can't be brought in for some reason. If they can't afford to pay them, than they can't afford to pay them. It's unfortunate, but, that's just the situation the game finds itself in resource wise.

Funny that you should mention that. I just started playing 'Enlisted'. It's a WW2 FPS multiplayer mmo for free. I'm big into the European Theater of WW2, really just started because I developed a morbid fascination with Na*i Germany and because my Grandfather was a WW2 Veteran. So I'm really into all the Call of Duty/Medal of Honor games, but you can't really play them anymore unless you still have like PS2 or of the like and I don't have that anymore, and I got this really kick ass new Alienware Gaming computer, but you can't play those games on the new computers really which totally sucks. Only one I can play still is Medal of Honor: Airborne. But I miss this old games, so I saw Enlisted and it looked really good, FPS and all. But unfortunately, it's one of those games, and I've been running into the same issue like you were describing with your friend who plays World of Tanks. Enlisted is really cool, look wise, play wise, I love it, but you just can't stay alive. You got all these other players and they buy all the advancements, better weapons and all. I gotta run around most of the time using a carbine (Not even an M1 Carbine) and have to reload every shot, and they're spraying their MG-42's and automatic assault rifles all over the place. It's really really frustrating because you get so little play time before you get waxed. These games, I get why they do it, it's great for making money, but, at the same time, I would personally rather pay a subscription fee and be able to have a fighting chance than play a free game with the options to buy better stuff with real life money, because it's too expensive. I think they might end up making a good profit if they did it via subscription, because a lot of people try these games for free but than they get so frustrated they stop playing. If you're a regular joe, just trying to make ends meat, you really can't afford to go full in on games like that. It must be fun for people who have the extra scratch to buy up the good stuff but at the same time, there can't really be much fulfillment out of it, because you know you're just owning a lot of the other people simply because you have the extra cash and they don't. It's not a skill thing, you're not really beating anyone, your just spending more money than they can. I wouldn't want it that way anyways.

Learn something new everyday. I'll remember that. 👍

I'm not a big fan of the direction and vision Bioware has adopted in this game. I've expressed quite often that I am unhappy that Bioware doesn't respect Lucas's Vision and canon more. I've also said many times, I don't consider this real Star Wars, because quite honestly, it simply isn't. It goes against things Lucas established in his canon. 'Grey Jedi' stupidity. Jedi getting married, having families, using Force Lighting as Lightsiders. They purport 'Balance in the Force' to mean an equal balance of Light and Dark which it totally isn't. It goes against the movies and The Clone Wars series themselves. And these are just a few examples. There are many others. - Not everyone may care about that, and that's fine, people are entitled to their opinions, but that's how I feel about it. This is a major reason why I am happy about the prospect of the game going under new management. I will, however point out that you are forgetting that there are going to be people who already work for Broadsword who will also be working on the game, so it isn't just all the same people, it some of the old people from Bioware, and some of the new people who work at Broadsword and have never worked for Bioware. Also, there is a different management that will be overseeing the game and all those former Bioware employees will be answering and taking their orders from them. It will be Broadswords vision that the old Bioware employees will be taken their directives about the game from. So that's where some difference may be found. There is some truth to this. I personally don't feel that the end game is complete garbage, I more agree with you in the respect about the abilities and the engine. But, I have managed to have some fun anyway doing end game content over the years. But, that's your opinion on it, and there are no wrong opinions. If you feel end game is complete garbage, that's certainly your right. Class balance has been a bigger issue for me. I do consider story to be new content, but, I agree, it's transitory, you play it once and than that's it and there isn't much of it that they put out to begin with. You wait 6 months or longer for anything new, and in an maybe hour or so it's all over. I do think that they should put some more emphasis on realizing new content that's repeatable. Operations for example. People can spend weeks, maybe even months working on and playing new Operations and even once cleared, they're still replayable, can be enjoyed repeatedly (if you like them that is) and can still gain things from them for the time (gear potentially). But,you have to remember that a very large segment of the game population are story players, so that's where they get the bulk of their business, player base wise, so they have to, and they should not overlook their wants and needs. I generally agree with this. I do repeat some of them because I make a lot of in game credits selling decos, so I tend to Solo veteran FPS repeatably that drop a lot of them. Not sure you could consider them new, but they're not the older ones either. I kinda enjoy Nathema Conspiracy. But, not really group content because I solo them so I can get all the deco drops. I agree with this. It's just about the hamster wheel and it keeps people busy by giving them a carrot at the end of the stick to chase after because they're not putting out any where near enough new content to keep people busy. Raiders and PVPer are out an outspoken lot and may seem to make up a big presence on the forums, but compared to the overall player base, we make up a small minority, I think. A little before my my third and last Raid group ended I had started doing some PVP on the side just fill in the time between raid nights, and I had some fun with it, but when it ended, I was a little fed up with the raid scene and didn't want to start all over again with a new group and than I got really into PVP and I stopped raiding entirely. I do it everyone once in a while, but mostly just if a friend asks for some help. And I agree with you, they even ruined PVP. - Among other reasons, they turned that into a hamster wheel as well. Well, we're in agreement on wanting BS to be different. And quite honestly, like I said, I'm hopeful, but I am also keeping my expectations low. I'm a bit surprised (and that may be just by me having misinterpreted some of your message in some of the posts) and happy to hear at least you are hopeful as well.

Touche', Good point. 👍👍 (Hope I spelled that right, Steve.)

What the hell is wrong with that??!?!? I'm an American and I'm a big fan of Asian massage parlors. (And the non-Asian ones too.)

Yeah, that's total BS. I think that's wrong too. Totally. Who the hell would want to buy BIS gear for real life money rather than earn by playing the game? That makes no sense to my POV. But, one thing about people, people do tend to like to take the road of least resistance, and for those players who feel they don't have the necessary skills to do the content necessary to earn the BIS gear, to them that might seem like the only option available to them to get it. I'm surprised too. I played STO for like 2 or 3 years, and it wasn't like that. There were of course RNG boxes (which admittedly I bought quite a few of because I really wanted the Jem Hadar Attack ship for my Federation Klingon Tactical officer. Which I never got!!) Sometimes I consider going back to play STO a bit, because I did kinda like it, but that's definitely a strike against that idea. I had alot of fun even doing ground combat because I got to use a Bat'leth. I own one in real life. https://img1.cgtrader.com/items/2018952/feb27f3a50/large/klingon-bat-leth-the-sword-of-kahless-3d-model-obj-mtl-fbx-blend.jpg Heghlu’meH QaQ jajvam!!! (Today is a good day to die)

Fair point, Trixxie-Baby. The only reason I think it might still be different is because than they weren't making an entire continent only have one single server, and the second you make only one server for the North American content, which like I said, they would almost certainly than have to do with the EU servers, it kinda puts the writing on the wall. IMO, and that's all it is, just my opinion, I feel that would sign the death warrant of the game. Let's everyone know they're on a sinking ship, and that's when people start trying to get off that ship. Another reason why I don't think that's in the works or even being considered is the consideration they are giving to adding a APAC server and the fact that they actually tested a new APAC server. Those would kinda be contradictory moves. Plus with the move to Broadsword and that they are saying they have new content reaching into 2025 and new improvements being worked on and with 64 bit, moving to mega servers doesn't really seem likely to me. I could be wrong of course, that's just my take on it.

Yes, that makes perfect sense and I don't disagree. No one can be sure what's going to happen in the future under Broadsword. I personally don't have a stance on what's going to happen persay, I can only work with what they are telling us and whether that is true or not remains to be seen. What I will say with a bit more confidence, I don't think the game is going into maintenance mode, but you don't appear to be suggesting that anyways. I see the potential for improvement or change, that's a possibility because it's new management, they might take a different view on things. A small ass company like Broadsword, getting their hands on one, if not the, biggest IP out there, which is a gold mine, might see a massive opportunity here to build and grow. Keyword there is might, than again, they might not. I also agree with you that, even if they do make some changes and increase content, I'm not expecting any of that to be apparent before 6 months to a year. But, I'm not expecting any massive changes, I just have hope for that.

Keith also said plans for new content include 2025, which would be well after 7.4., which at that point the game will almost certainly have already been under Broadsword for quite sometime so there may be some content plan interaction between the two companies on that already. Also, and I'm sure this is just an oversight on your part, but, we're already in 7.3. Keith was speaking about 7.4 and beyond. - I say "there may be some content plan interaction between the two companies on that already." because the devs already have Broadsword listed under their names, not Bioware. Broadsword Author Dev Post Posted June 7 Whoa whoa everyone... I was hoping me telling you about the upcoming releases would help you understand this is a new beginning, not the end. We have more stories, modernizations, and MMO content already being planned out beyond 7.4. While details are being discussed and finalized behind the scenes, let's not spin this into incorrect theories. I am asking you to hang tight and we'll follow up later with more details when we can. -Keith

I kinda think if a server merge was in the plans, the last thing they would do is offer free transfers, for 2 reasons. 1 - Like you said, it would be a dead give away for an upcoming server merge which they know would meet with a lot of player discontent, and would lose them players. 2 - Because they'd know that a server merger would lose them some players they'd probably want to make as much money on server transfers as possible while they still could. If they are merging SS with SF than for certain the EU servers would also need a merger because they have far less populations than the North American servers (S.F. in particular, but from what people say on the forums, that seems to also apply to SS, if to a lesser degree) so essentially what they would be facing would be a total lose of sales for server transfers from that point onward.

Yeah, that stuff is terrible. And you're totally right, it just prey's on human weakness. Gambling can destroy peoples lives when it gets out of hand and it can be hard for the individual to realize when they've actually hit that state. "One more hand and I can make back all my loses." Than they say it again, and again, and again. All these hypercrates, it preys on the same weakness, if less damaging. But, I'm sure a lot of people have spent a lot more money on them than they should have. I mean, you can spend days doing gathering missions, crafting things and selling them and deco-hunting for sales and the time that's needed to invest in it, or you can buy a few hypecrates and making 10x the amount in 10 minutes you would make from the aforementioned activities. Or, you can just spend 5 or 10 bucks and buy a few billion from credit sellers. You can reason that in your mind as a big time saver and I guess that's why a lot of people do it. These video games that have P2W and all the RNG packs, they all feed into the same idea and that's preying on human weakness in the name of money. Ultimately though, it's the responsibility of each individual to try and muster the will to not give into it. Some people might wanna blame the companies that engage in that sort of marketing, but we can't rule out the responsibility of the individuals to engage themselves in those sorts of schemes either.

I think that might be a bit premature. They're probably just being a bit cautious and want make sure everything is order before they start making any definitive statements. It might also being part of the deal that Bioware wants to be seen a sole authority on the game while it is still in their possession and they don't want to have any conflicting communications. That's just speculation on my part however. I must admit, I myself am anxious to hear from Broadsword myself, and I think a lot of us are. Hopefully that will be forthcoming before too long.

Yeah ,well, you know me, Old man, I was just trying to be a gentleman. =p 😉

Fair enough. Admittedly, that was just a little poke at you. I know you know there's no dungeons in this game. I'm gonna have to take your word for that, which I'm fine with, I have virtually no experience in WoW. I couldn't even get out of the starter area with how god awful the graphics were. And, again, I'm fully aware of and acknowledge that "purchasing" of cheevos is a thing, and it does happen. I just don't agree with the degree to which you are framing it to be. Other than that, our only disagreement is on the 'ethics' involved. (I use that term loosely, I'm sure you gather my meaning.) And even on that, it's disagreement of opinion. The 'right or wrong' of it, perhaps is abit subjective. At this point we've both made our positions on that clear and I think you'll probably agree that neither of us are likely to change the other's mind. Okay, Gotcha. I gather your meaning now and that's fine. That's how you see it and that's how you operate. Personal preference. Understood. And I agree, you can dress that up however you want, you could make it part of Galactic Seasons or some such other event, still the same old content. Not all raiders take that view, so, that's just a matter of personal views and preference. The groups that I played in weren't like that. We switched around when we got bored of something, or we were hitting a wall with something and we just wanted to take a break before we went back at it and sometimes we re-visted some of the content we had already covered. Just a different modus operandi. That's your experience, that's fine. And again, I don't disagree that that stuff goes on, it always has, it always will. I get why some people are tempted by it. Wings of the Architect do look pretty friggen bad ass. Plus the whole playing Space Barbie thing, like you mentioned, is very popular and people have different styles and things they want to accentuate and rare and hard to get items are great way to do that. We have some different views on things here, but, just for the record, I don't think that kinda thing makes someone a 'bad person' or anything like that, I just think it's unsportsmanlike. You have your views on it and I have mine, and we can just agree to disagree because all this is doing at this point is derailing what was being discussed initially and it just sort of went off on a tangent when tempers started to frey.

Well, maybe you have spoken to some people who said that's the reason. I'm not gonna say "No, that didn't happen." I wasn't there. But even if that was the case, than that applies to those people, and only those people, not everyone else. And, IMO, I don't think that's the case for most people who have a problem with that practice. I don't know many people who are jealous of people cheating. Again, I don't doubt for a minute your an excellent player. But, if that's something you have engaged in and still think is okay, than you're just someone who's okay with people cheating. I'm not your mother, your ethical standards are yours to hold as you see fit. Speaking only for myself, my problems with it are not based on jealousy. I have nothing to be jealous of in that regard. You're certainly entitled to that opinion, it is simply one I don't share. Quite honestly, I'm not losing any sleep over it myself. I disagree with the practice, I consider it cheating, but it's not exactly a global epidemic either. And I don't consider it 'evil' in any way, shape or form. It's just poor sportsmanship from my POV. Well, perhaps that wasn't the best way of wording it on my part. People who do sale runs are excellent players, their skill is beyond reproach. I consider them people who tarnish the reputation of raiders at large. I can acknowledge their skills and still think what they are doing is unsportsmanlike conduct.

As have I. I'm not going to speak for other games, as I haven't played a ton of other mmorpgs, off the top of my head, STO, DDO, LOTRO, EVE Online, and Elite Dangerous. I've never been into progression raiding in any other game other than SWTOR and DDO. But I also didn't play those other games nearly as long as SWTOR. I'm also not interested in what goes on in other games as even if that was true of every other mmorpgs in existence, that would still not mandate it to be so in SWTOR. Which it isn't. I'm not sure I'd go quite that far, but there is some truth to the limited nature of high end gaming. Also, there are no dungeons in this game. The age of the Operation is meaningless. For those that haven't done them before, they are effectively brand new. So if you are a progression raider now, and this is your first go at that stuff, the age of it is irrelevant information. I don't have a clue what most guilds are doing because I haven't been in a guild in over 3 years and neither I, nor you, or anyone else knows what the majority of guilds on all servers, at all times, 24/7 are doing. It's a ridiculous statement to make to speak for what the majority of all guilds are doing. That's certainly possible, and I'm happy to take your word for it, some are definitely guilty of such practices. All I will say regarding that is, whatever guild that was, those engaging in such practices were lame as hell IMO, skilled as they may be. I'm sure it wasn't a big deal, because people in that guild were doing it, so clearly it wasn't a big deal for them. But if you think a majority of raiders outside that guild necessarily shared opinion that such practices were 'no big deal' or that 'it happens all the time' overall in the game at large, I'd beg to differ. Well, I think it's fair to say, and I think you might actually agree me on this, that's certainly not the case in this game, because at the rate this game turns out new content, and even more so with regard to raids, nothing is time sensitive because it's going to be years in between the release of new operation and a subsequent operation after that. If you were referring to other games, which I think is likely, once again, we're not talking about other games, we're talking about this game. And there is no time sensitive in the operations scene in this game. I'm most certainly not going to say that, those that do that certainly didn't earn those achievements but I would venture to say many of those"trash can guildies' that earned them that way probably aren't going around making any big claims of their legitimacy because their skills are so poor no one would ever believe them anyways. They might straight up say "Yeah, my guildies helped me out with that." Because there's no shame in that. But there is some shame in saying "Yeah, I paid some people to get me thru that content." and that's why you don't often see people admitting that publicly. People lie about it. If you can't see the difference between helping someone and pimping, I don't know what to tell you than. Wings of the architect sort of lose their luster when you paid to get them and didn't earn them. Furthermore, they might not even realize that happened. Their guildies might have said, "just come with us, don't worry about it, it won't be a problem.", knowing they could carry them. I wouldn't much blame anyone for a carry if there were sexual favors involved. Sexual favors are pretty high up on the list of priorities for most men. What I'm going to tell you is, no it's not 'bad', it's just lame as hell. And it's got nothing to do with me. I'm not the one cheating. I fail to see how other people cheating is applicable to me 'getting over myself.' I didn't realize that cheating had become a virtuous thing.

No, it didn't happen all the time in raiding, it was not common place in any way, shape, or form. And I play on Star Forge, and even now I don't ever see people talking about sales runs, either asking or offering. And that's not because people are never doing it, they are, but, even the people that do it know how most people feel about that practice. That it's frowned upon. So, the claims you are making, that's just you saying some stupid crap that you can't back up. "This happens all the time in raiding." You're on every server, in every raid? You're on 24 hours a day, 7 days a week for the last 11 years? You know every raid team that's ever existed in the game? You know every raider? You've asked around about how raiders feel about this? People who do do sales runs to get achievements, they don't going around telling people that they got those achievements because they paid for sales runs to get them, they lie about how they got them. Wanna take a guess why they lie about that? I would go one step further and hazard as guess if you did take a poll, 85% of raiders would say that's lame as hell. Because it is lame as hell. Now listen, you wanna do that, go for it. But stop trying to paint it as some common place thing that every raider engages in some form, or that it's a respectable practice. If it was, you wouldn't have so many people disagreeing with you. It's cheating, plain and simple, and that's what you're trying to defend. Cheating. It's the win-trading of PVE. But, I agree with you, it's not some troubling or horrific thing. It's a friggen video game. It's just lame.

That's not Jealously, that's calling out cheating and lame ass people. You saying that all NiM operations are easy is just you bragging. They're not all easy. I'm sure your a very good player, I don't doubt that for a minute. But many people have done NiM operations, RM HM, and for it's time, TOS HM/Ranagers HM, referred to back than as 'Hardmare', and they don't all think it's easy, so I'm really not all that interested in that sort of smack. You wanna say everyone else is bad, go for it. You wanna try and defend that practice of Sales runs, that really tells me all I need to know. I don't have any respect for anyone that does it, advocates it, or defends it. And if you ask me, and this is just my opinion, no real raider would defend that lame ass horse crap. You think that's okay? That's a you problem, not a me problem. I stand by everything I said.

Hell no. If peeps over on SS are unhappy with their experience there, they always have the option to transfer to another server.

I was HM/NiM a Progression raider in this game for years and was in 3 raid groups over those years. If by 'part of this game' you mean that it happens sometimes, than yes, I'd agree. But to say it 'always happens', or that all progression raid groups sell carries, or that they're all cool with the idea, I'm gonna have to disagree with that. My groups never did that because that's as lame as lame gets. You can call it self righteous all you want. That's some shameful crap IMO, tarnishes the name of raiders and demeans raiders who spend years honing their skills, working the raids, setting scheduled time out of their daily lives to work with their raid pals on Operations and is frowned upon by many progression raiders. I don't know what servers you played on, maybe that was more frequent on the servers you played on, but you're making statements that are far too blanket. I have seen it happen, I know it does happen, I'm not denying that in any way, but the light your casting on it isn't something you, or anyone else is in a position to do. That might be in your experience, or what you think, but not everything you are saying are objective facts. Carries for credits/items.packs, real life money, is akin to poor sportsmanship for those that engage in it. Most of the raiders I've had relations with frowned on that practice, didn't advocate it, and never did it. It's sort of like athletes who use steroids to gain an unfair advantage, that's something like (but not exactly) the sort of reputation sales runners have to a segment of the raider population, at least until sometime in 6.0 when I was no longer in any raid groups. Additionally, I've been in 15 guilds over the years and not one of them ever engaged in sales runs. Now, if you're okay with that practice, that's fine, you're entitled to your opinion. But, in my opinion, sales runs are lame as hell. It's like win-trading. The reasons why it happens is irrelevant. It makes having achievements pointless because they're open to suspicion than. There's also a difference between sales runs and helping a friend out. There were certainly times when people I was friendly with in the game, who knew I was a progression raider, and they weren't, and they would ask me to join their group because they had low DPS and they were having some trouble clearing something and I would help them out. But that was outside of my raid group and I didn't gain anything for it, it was just about giving some people a hand. In my personal experience, and that may be different than yours, sales runs were never common place (although they certainly happen) and they were certainly looked down upon by many raiders. Lastly, I agree with Balameb, sales runs have never been a 'fundamental' part of this game.

That's exactly correct. It's speculation based on what they have said. Maybe they're lying, maybe their not. It's all just speculation at this point, on everyone's part.. But I wouldn't use the term "pump out". That implies they'll be doing a lot of new content at a fast rate. Even if they're not lying and they will be putting out new content, I'm not expecting it to be all that different than the amount that Bioware has been putting out.