Okay, first, drop the condescending tone. You clearly didn't understand what I wrote. A video game is not a recurring service when there's no new content being added. Buy any other game for whatever console or PC you want, it'll cost you $50-60, and you'll be done with it and play as you like. For SWTOR, you end up paying $180 to be subbed for a year. I understand how people like playing old OPS or FP's or such and will stay subbed for them, but at some point, you've more than paid for them, don't you think?

You could say that for any online game, yet I never had to pay a recurring fee for CoD 4 and such. Only MMO's do that as far as I know, and they're not the only one who have to pay for servers.

Way to criticize my post without bothering to read/understand it. No, I'm not dictating how you spend your money, I'm merely expressing an opinion. And no, I'm not a "Category D" player, because like I stated, I'm still playing class stories (BH and Smuggler, to be specific), FP's and OPS I have never played before. So I happily pay my $15 per month for the game, which I enjoy, making me a category A player. HOWEVER What I meant was that once I'll be done with all of this, I don't see what justifies BW taking money from me every month. I don't think any game that isn't an MMO is charging a recurring fee to play. That is because once you buy the game, no additionnal content is provided. So, why does an MMO that doesn't provide new content still requires a subscription fee? What I don't understand is why you all seem to think it's ok to pay over and over and over again to play the same dailies, OPS and Heroics. Don't you think that once it has been purchased, you shouldn't have to pay for it every month like that? So yeah, once I'm done with the original content, OPS and all, I will probably fail to see a reason to subscribe and become a category B player. And please, stop trying to insult me without even reading my posts. That's pretty much what I'm saying, indeed. MMO's are the only games I know of (I'm not a gaming know-it-all, granted) that charge a recurring fee, but that's because it's the only game that regularly updates and provides new content. If it stops doing that, I don't see how it is still legitimate for them to take money from customers for content they paid for over and over and over again.

OP here. Ok, for all you smart***** going "I'm paying $15 a month for the game, KotFE is a bonus they add for free, OP sucks at math hurr durr." (or any variation of that argument), please answer this: What justifies BW charging your credit card $15 monthly? While I agree with you that it DOES seem few and represents only a small amount of my credit bill each month, guess what: It does add up over time. I am myself a (relatively) new player, having been playing for about 10 months and subbed for more or less 6 of those. That means, for the short time I have been a sub, I have paid $90 for SWTOR. For a lot of you, which have been subs for much longer and may also buy from the CM (which I don't), you may have paid over $200, $300, or even more for this game. Let's approximate the price of a good non-MMO game to $60. Seems fair? Well guess what? $60 is the amount you paid for SWTOR during the 4-months complete drought of content between chapters 9 and 10. How do you justify that? Personally, being a new-ish player, I'm not yet done with all the class stories, I'm only new to raiding, PvP and all that stuff. But for all of you endgame players (if there's any of those left after the treatment they've received from BW), how do you justify paying that kind of money when the 15-minute chapter is literally the only content released? No new OPS. No new FP's. No new WZ's. GSF having been all but abandonned. So yes, you paid $15 for this chapter only. I know you're allowed to disagree with me, but how can you dispute the claim that you're paying $15 only for this chapter, when said chapter is the only content released every month? Saying you're paying for the game as a whole means you're okay with paying over and over for the same OPS/class stories/PvP without anything being given back to you every month. Don't you wanna know what your money is used for?

BW should be running out of excuses by now. I've always been one to defend them but it's getting ridiculous. I loved 4.0's initial 9-chapter release, even if I thought it was a little short for what was advertised. But then we had the SF and alerts to (kinda) keep us waiting. After 3-4 months of nothing, I had big expectations for chapter 10. Needless to say the 30-minutes long chapter filled with unavoidable trash mobs that attack from 70 meters (And only one VA-less alliance alert) was a big letdown, but I decided I'd wait for at least another chapter to judge of the quality of single-chapter releases. Now it's 15 minutes and no alerts. What. The. Hell. How can BW even justify treating paying customers like that? I am not paying for this game to turn my characters into HK-55. I'm looking forward to the 5-minutes cutscene they'll call "Chapter 12" coming up next month.

I think every class has at least some vocal cues when they take damage. With that said, it's true that I hear my Vanguard tank shout all the time (personally I love it) but most of my other toons are silent (sniper, sage, sentinel) and I would love to hear more of my Sage's voice.

Awesome idea. If that ever becomes a thing, I would definitely buy my main, at the very least. Then I'd buy a certain number of my other characters (according to price) in importance order, up to 8 if they aren't too expensive (main of each class).

Feldraeth's post is perfect. The only non-Force-sensitive class that stands a chance against a Jedi or a Sith is the sniper.

Same issue. Completed chapter X on my Sage and Juggernaut pre-4.1b, without problem. Now I just "finished" it with my Sniper post-4.1b and the mission acts like it's not completed. Like other people mentionned, I have access to the chapter XI description, can't summon most story-related companions, and can't recruit Blizz. It definitely looks like an Agent-related issue. This is so annoying because patch 4.1 took almost triple the time (11 hours instead of the planned 4). Now 4.1b was supposed to fix only 2-3 things, including this specific issue, so really not a "big" patch like 4.0 or 4.1 were, and it couldn't even get that right. You'd think a game that charges $15 a month would have better patching. Without falling to all the pointless BW hate, I feel like we deserve better service.

Well if this (1-hour long chapter, including time wasted on unavoidable mobs that attack from 80 meters and stack slows, with only 1 companion back from alerts) is the result of 4 months' work, what are we gonna get for chapters done in 1 month? Running around for 20 minutes and no alert for companions? This chapter was announced for January when 4.0 hit, and when it was pushed back to February I thought it was because they wanted to improve it some more and make it really special to make up for the months-long content drought. That is NOT what we were delivered with 4.1.

Let's not forget that this chapter was announced for January after the realease of chapters I-IX, and later pushed back to February, and they STILL pushed back some of its content to chapter XI. Now that I see how few content this patch brought, it's hard not to be dissapointed. I'll be waiting a lot less eagerly for the chapters to come.

You summed up my original post in 50% less words. Thank you.

I'm just gonna say I expected more. Don't get me wrong. The chapter was good enough, if a little predictable. Kudos to the writer. But this is the only new content we've had in 4 months. It's an hour long, and that's including the awful fights with unavoidable trash mobs that do nothing but stack slows on you. They won't even be avoided with stealth (what's the point of playing a stealther, really?). Am I the only one that feels like this is an attempt to make the chapter look like it's longer than it really is? I don't want to bash BW like this whole forum probably will two days from now. Like I said, I liked the chapter. But BW had 4 months to get it right, and it looks like they've become lazy. Aside from having the same objective repeated 3 times and the annoying trash mobs in-between, the chapter was probably 20 minutes long. Meanwhile, we didn't get any new FP's, new OPS, new WZ, new events (even the ones that we've grown tired of because they're always the same were bugged and had to be re-scheduled) or new stuff for GSF. What have they been doing since October/November? Even the patch felt botched, the maintenance time nearly tripled (11 hours instead of 4), people in Europe lost half the early access they paid for and probably won't get any compensation. tl;dr The chapter is nice, but short and repetitive. Since we aren't getting any other content for raids or PvP, I think an hour-long chapter and a single alliance alert (two for subs) really isn't enough for all the time we've been waiting. Anyone feel this way as well?

Thanks, that's really helpful. The main reason it didn't work in my head was because of the Imp-side speech by Decimus. Is it stated somewhere that it was only for the Imperial-friendly community? Maybe I just don't remember it. The thing with those is that it's not quite the same. On all three of those planets, while you do have to "decide" which of your toons did it, the objective is the same and the result is the same. On Tatooine, both factions destroy the Rakata tech. On Alderaan, both factions kill the Ulgo king. On Voss, both reveal/hide the truth from the Voss, which remain neutral either way. So basically, as long as both factions are doing the same thing, there is a small problem as you have to decide who does what (same for the FP's, like the Battle of Ilum and the False Emperor). But on Corellia, the problem is different as both factions are not doing the same thing at all, and the consequences would definitely not be the same if either faction prevailed like on Alderaan or Voss.

Ok, so here's the deal. We all know that all the class stories are happening at the same time (more or less), and same goes for the planet arc stories. One reason that is obvious is that some of those events, especially at higher levels, are mentionned by other NPC's for every character. One obvious example is in the Jedi Knight story: when he every character learns about it in RotHC, and it sets the stage for further story (in SoR and KotFE). That means on most planets, the story arcs for every faction are not incompatible. Take Belsavis: The Republic does its best to contain riots while the Empire helps the rioters. Then, when the Esh-Ka are released, both struggle to hold them and imprison them again. Finally, the Republic goes to the deep prison to deal with the World Razer while the Empire goes to liberate the Dread Masters. Once again, we know that "really happens" because it sets the stage for the whole Oricon arc and Dread Masters ops. The only time the arcs seem incompatible is Taris/Balmorra, but that is easily solved because both factions don't turn their attention to the planets at the same time. When the Republic is greatly improving its position and rebuilding efforts on Taris, the Empire is crushing Republic troops and resistance fighters on Balmorra. Then, the Republic goes to liberate Balmorra with success while the Empire goes to f**k s**t up on Taris for good. But now, what about Corellia? This is the only planet I know where both arcs should happen at the same time, yet they seem really incompatible to me. It's mostly about the ending. In the Empire arc, Darth Decimus outright declares Corellia a member of the Empire, while in the Republic, he is slain minutes before he could make that speech. Also, in later content, like RotHC and the Black Hole introduction, both sides claim to have won on Corellia without much room for interpretation (They say something like "Our victory on Corellia was very costly"). Normally I would understand some kind of stalemate/mixed results, like if the Empire took the planet but lost way too many of its few remaining soldiers along with 3 Dark Council members, as a "victory" for both sides, but that's not what is shown in either story arc. tl;dr Who won on Corellia? Both sides speak of the battle as a victory. Did Darth Decimus make his speech or not? Thanks and sorry for the long post!

What drives people to pay/subscribe to a game? Content. Why does BW not seem to get that? They're not dumb. They know that for sure, it's not rocket science. So why don't they do anything about it? I can't speak for everyone, but I wouldn't subscribe to a game I don't like simply because of the "Get a HK-55 companion!" kind of rewards. A lack of such rewards wouldn't make me unsub if I liked the game, either. A lot of people subbed back when 4.0 hit (with numbers never seen since launch on certain servers, or so I've heard), but from what I've seen, the amount of subscriptions already began to fall (barely a month after 4.0!) once people realized that KotFE could be played through in more or less 3-4 days per toon. It's not hard to understand: No more content = no more reason to subscribe. So can anyone tell me why has Bioware apparently switched to "austerity" mode? They seem to want to release the least possible content while still retaining players. The best exemple is the SF flashpoints: It takes an eternity to grind through if you have many alts, but for BW, it's only one Flashpoint to develop. There's barely any VA, thanks to the use of KOTOR dialogues and all 6 companions not speaking basic. The best way to make money for BW would be to, you know, stop being greedy, hire people and release more content. Why not other class stories? Everyone now knows the Sith Warrior story, but what if they released another one, where you could play a Warrior that doesn't become apprentice to Baras and who lives all different adventures? New planets? New class companions which actually speak from times to times? I know that would keep ME subbed, at least (I'm not done yet with all class stories, and I don't see what will keep me when I am), and I'm definitely not alone in this. BW is also blessed with the return of the Star Wars movies after many years. No doubt that will draw thousands of casual Star Wars fans back to the franchise, which could definitely be used by SWTOR to gain more subscribers. I'm no marketing expert, but I'm sure a lot of the people who will be seeing SW 7 could be potential subscribers. Why does BW do nothing about it? tl;dr Bioware would make lots of money if they released actual content, especially with the return of the Star Wars franchise, to draw a lot of new subscribers. Why did they switch to milking mode instead, barely releasing anything and limiting their expenses to the maximum?

Right now, with those unlocked, I'd say: Jedi Knight: T7 (Any other answer is wrong). Jedi Consular: Qyzen, Talos, Yuun. Smugger: For now, nobody really fits IMO. Maybe T7, he'd be handy. Trooper: Forex, Yuun, Theron. Sith Warrior: Pierce, Lana, Xalek. Sith Inquisitor: Talos, Xalek, Lana. Imperial Agent: HK-51, SCORPIO, Theron, Lokin. Bounty Hunter: I got nothing. Then again, it depends a lot on the choices you made, since you'd likely use a romanced NPC (be it Koth, Lana or Theron) before the ones I listed. It also depends on your advanced class, for exemple HK-51 looks awesome with a sniper, but is a lot less special with an operative. Also, your alignment is important, a DS Consular would have no problem running with Xalek while a LS wouldn't do that.

Here's your cookie.

So from what I'm getting so far, people are only complaining about the companion nerf, but their issue is more with level scaling. Is that right? Basically people want to overlevel content and then roflstomp through it; when level scaling hit, they didn't notice they couldn't do that anymore, because the OP companions allowed it. Now that the companions are nerfed, the real issue shows.

So you're basically saying that this playstyle was never welcome for the 5+ years that this game has been around, until the companions were buffed a few days ago?

That's not an argument. Rank 22/50 is also far from "BiS".

Agreed, thanks for your helpful reply.

I can easily understand un-subscribing if you subbed back only for the improved companions, but I can't believe that this represents the majority of the people whining on the forums or in general chat. Most of the comments I've seen go "I'VE BEEN SUBBED FOR 5 YEARS BUT THIS NERF IS THE WORST THING EVER I'M GONNA UNSUB FU BIOWARE" and such. I just can't see why subscribers of multiple years would unsub over this.

I understand why many people are unhappy with the companion nerf, but why is this such a big issue? Countless threads are being moved to off-topic because they're just whining and threatening to un-sub. People are writing their hearts out (Often using poor grammar) about how this nerf is the worse thing to happen since beta, ruined the game completely, and so on and so forth. I won't comment on that nerf (and I won't pretend the community cares about MY opinion and make a thread called "My thoughts on the companion nerf"), but I just wanna understand. The comps were buffed for what? 2 weeks? 3? Maybe a month? And then, when they are nerfed a little (but still better than they were pre-4.0), suddenly it means the death of this game? I don't get it. At most, this is limiting a change which was generally well-liked (companion improvement) instead of going all-out with it out of the gate (BW stated that was not their goal). It will probably be adjusted again in the near future, depending on the community's feedback. 0.25*1 does not equal -1, the same way limiting a positive change does not make it a negative change. Overall, companions were still improved in 4.0., and people are reacting like BW announced the removal of voice-acting altogether. tl;dr: Why is everyone acting like the companion nerf means the end of the world when they spent years with useless companions, days with god-like companions, and now have not-OP-but-still-better-than-before companions?

It's because you're frozen in carbonite. You have to wait five years.