It is truely a sad time when I see how some non-raiders think that this system works. Clearly it doesn't work and let me give you a view on how my Comand rank leveling has gone. I am on 3 of my guilds raid teams and fill in when needed for others since I am the GM. I am at Command rank 214 with 2 pieces of gear from tier 2, Now well into tier 3 I have 1 piece. The drop rate has been approx. every 54 to 60 Command ranks for gear pieces. The crates drop more useless jawa scrap, empty gear shells that should be in the cartel market and not crates, pets and useless crap. At this rate of drop I will have to be well into command rank 1000 to even be close to a full set of gear. As for January's bandaid fix that will only guarantee gear piece tokens at last boss that need to be combined with command rank tokens it's use is minimal at best. This means that raid teams will have little wiggle room for fill ins unless the guild as a whole has progressed far enough in command rank to have those tokens. The ability of being able to find fill ins for a particular role has suffered since it will take years to get all our alts to a command rank high enough for those command tokens or gear. The story is cute and lots of people have enjoyed it but the story doesn't change, once you did it on one toon it will be the same on another. The ball has been severely dropped on the content of this game and needs to be fixed asap before it is too late. They want us to believe the changes take time yet in the blink of an eye they shut the servers down immediately when their cartel market is affected. Let's face it money talks!!! If we hit them where it hurts in their wallet or bank account then fixes will happen and happen fast. We all need to ban together to demand a fix before its too late and this game we all have grown to love dies................

We represent a 750+ member guild on the Jedi Covenant server. The guild runs 9 weekly raid teams and Friday and Saturday night open guild raids. Its members are also active in pvp and other SWTOR activities. Prior to 5.0, raid team members were dedicated to progression as well as fun*and easy operation runs. People were committed to gearing their toons, honing their skills and tackling and completing the hardest content in the game. If one team member had bad rng on rolls for gear, the team could help them get the gear they were missing to help the team advance. With the advent of 5.0, all that has changed. 5.0 brought some good changes, such as the class changes which provided interesting new abilities to many classes. However, 5.0 also brought perhaps the most criticized, frustrating and hostile game change ever to be introduced to an active MMO. In many people's perception, SWTOR can now*be likened to a gambling casino which feeds on people's propensity to seek the chance reward, provided there is intermittent reinforcement to keep them going. Put the money in the slot, pull the handle and see if you get the gear. If not, buy another command boost to feed the hungry SWTOR beast, grind some more and try again. Some people have said that they*consider SWTOR*to be*an unregulated online gambling site and wonder if federal regulators are investigating this aspect of the gaming community. Rather than people gathering to focus on progression raiding, people feel compelled to focus on the grind to potentially get a gear drop that will help them with the harder content. Some people with good rng get multiple drops, while others endure the frustration of not getting a decent drop for perhaps 70 or 80 command ranks. Casual players are often more geared than hard core raiders. A team cannot support its undergeared members because the gear is all rng. Players are also forced to focus on lower level content which they have cleared for years until they can acquire the gear to continue with their progression teams. Some players simply do not have the time to grind the command ranks and will not be able to access the gear they need to continue on their progression teams. For others, the tedium and boredom of the grind is extreme. People who have submitted tickets complaining about the system have reported that they get a generic response that demonstrates no real concern about the situation. Calls to customer service have been met with the recommendation to post a complaint on reddit or other forums to get the attention of SWTOR executives since there is nothing customer service can do to address the situation. 5.0, in many people's view, is a system which is frustrating, demeaning to long time raiders, and yet addictive to those with the slightest gambling tendency. Perhaps there should be a SWTOR Anonymous site for those who cannot break away from the grind long enough to tend to personal affairs. The whole system is a travesty to a game that people have played for years and immensely enjoyed because it provided challenging and enjoyable content. The changes announced for January go a small way to address the current level of frustration many players are experiencing. However, the changes are minimal and will not truly fix a system that has been horribly broken. Players are leaving the game and others are contemplating leaving if a big fix is not coming. While casual players may like the new changes because they do not have to do operations to get gear, the reality is that casual players do not need the new gear. In our view, it is imperative that SWTOR substantially address the broken gearing system before there is a mass exodus from the game. Raiders have endured no new operation content for over two plus years. To now strip them of their gear, force them to grind and provide such a small chance of gear is disrespectful and a slap in the face to a community that has paid for and supported this game since inception. Simple fixes could include such things as upping the rate and quality of drops in the command crates, lowering the tier level requirements, and providing guaranteed gear drops on each boss rather than a random drop on some bosses with only one guaranteed drop. Such changes would still provide SWTOR with the financial gain from command boosts, but also provide gear to those players who actually need it to continue with progression raiding. We strongly recommend that SWTOR consult with the GM's of leading guilds on all servers to come up with a*satisfactory and substantive fix to this*situation before people leave the game and it dies.