Confirmed: I just managed to post on your blog using the name/URL option. 🙂

I just tried posting again on your blog, using the name/URL option and then the anonymous option. Both times, 'an error occurred' ... 😞 I will keep trying. 🙂

Hello Shintar/Tiranea, congratulations on 12 years of SWTOR blogging! Like ThanderSnB, I have run into obstacles trying to post messages on your blog itself. Earlier today, I thought I might finally manage it (since there was an option to post using a name and URL, rather than having to log in to anything ... I didn't recall having seen that option before), but then the platform just returned an error whenever I tried to post. Oh well. If that had worked, I was going to start posting about the Shae Vizla (APAC) server, as I'm probably in the minority being an Australian who hasn't created a character there yet. I plan to do that eventually, but it isn't a priority right now. Considering SWTOR factors alone, the main reason I haven't left my current home server (Satele Shan) is because I'm in a great guild here (Elders of the Republic/Elders of the Sith). Anyway, congratulations again! 🙂 - DB

I've been completely avoiding using Quick Travel since it started costing what it now does. Why, when I easily have the in-game funds to cover it? Taxis cost tens to maybe a few hundred credits. Quick Travel costs hundreds to thousands of credits. Interstellar travel costs nil to a few thousand credits ... often far less than Quick Travel seems to cost, for far more significant benefits. To me, Quick Travel is disproportionately priced to the point where it feels jarring; something that's so clearly priced the way it is just to be an out-of-character mechanism, where the costs for other modes of travel haven't changed. Credits are virtual, but they do also represent time that I've put into the game; effort that I've spent. I'm not about to throw that away on something that has such poor return-on-investment (for my gameplay, anyway). It's the same reason I watch and wait when I want to buy something off the GTN; why spend more than I have to, when I can get things for less with a bit of patience? Using taxis and a bit of patience (i.e., running), I can get to the same destination as Quick Travel, but at far less financial cost. Now, if costs for Quick Travel were to consistently fall between taxis and hyperspace jumps, that would seem more reasonable to me. I would say that I get less done in the game than before, and I do put more thought into organising my travels than I used to, but I think that's about it. After a long time of not using taxis at all, I've become a regular taxi passenger again, taking in the scenery and (virtually) complaining about the increased traffic these days. 😀

Hello Shintar/Tiranea, I was pleasantly surprised to find this topic here on SWTOR's website just now! I think I first came across your SWTOR blog some years ago, when I started playing SWTOR and was looking for related information on-line, but I only started reading your blog in earnest this year. Over the past few months, I have gone through your entire list of blog posts, reading the (many) posts that interested me. Thank you for your perseverance in continuing to write about SWTOR, and my sincere compliments on the exceptionally high standard of recreational writing. I know this is reaching you late, but congratulations in relation to your post on 23 February 2019. 🙂 I hope you keep enjoying the game and writing about it for a long time to come. - DB, the Vanguard from the other side of the world (Australia)

Thanks for setting up the Shae Vizla test server. I've played on that server daily from 4-9 April 2023, creating a new Republic Trooper and a new Sith Inquisitor, and going through the starter planets until I reached the faction fleets. In addition to answering the questions posed, I've included more comments below. Compared to an existing server, how is the performance? Gameplay itself was slightly better overall, but logging in, connecting, and loading performance seemed the same. (I'm normally on the Satele Shan server. I'm aware that SWTOR had many more servers in the past, including one in or near Australia.) Any specific areas or planets where you feel the performance has lessened? No. Everything was the same or better. What region/country do you reside in? Australia (west coast). Provide a comparison of ping from existing servers to Shae Vizla. Satele Shan usually has a 280-360 ms latency for me, though it can vary from 260-480 ms, sometimes with serious lag spikes. Shae Vizla has typically been around 60 ms latency for me, though varying from 55-70 ms, and has been very stable and consistent. I have noticed a few lag spikes, but nowhere near as bad as with the Satele Shan server. Is grouped content working properly? Not tested. I'm primarily a solo PVE player. How quickly can you get into a match or Flashpoint you’ve accepted? Not tested. I'm not a PVPer, and I only complete flashpoints rarely due to the amount of time commitment that they take. Is travel to any location (planet, Stronghold, Fleet, etc…) hindered? No. Everything was the same or better. Are there any issues with the UI such as missing assets or loss of functionality? I don't know if this is related to the test server or not, but all of my characters (on both servers) seem to have had their map filters reset. I may have missed some announcement, but otherwise I'm guessing there was some system change (whether intentional or inadvertent) made at the same time as the test server opened up. Apart from that, everything has seemed the same (on both servers). Are there any issues with visuals or sounds with the cinematics? No. Additional comments: On starting the two new characters on the test server, I immediately noticed that the Republic character was running at normal speed, but the Imperial character seemed to be running at a slower speed. (Still running, but perceptibly slower than the Republic character.) I asked if other players had experienced the same thing, and it looked like some had and some hadn't. To check on this, I created several more Imperial characters on the test server, and they all seemed to run at normal speed. There were basically three groups of people on the test server, that I noticed: (1) Australian and other Asia-Pacific players swooning over the vastly improved responsiveness of the game when played on the test server, and hoping that an Asia-Pacific server would be reinstated permanently; (2) non-Asia-Pacific players who had terrible responsiveness from the test server and mostly seemed appalled at the level of performance; and (3) non-Asia-Pacific players who, surprisingly (to me), were experiencing reasonable responsiveness from the test server. Even reading through all the feedback here, it seems clear that, overall, Australian players connecting to USA servers generally experience poorer responsiveness than USA players connecting to the Australian test server. I guess there must be some technical issue from the Australian side. If I were starting SWTOR as a brand new Australian player today, and if Shae Vizla were a permanent server, there's no doubt I would be choosing that server. Is the improved performance enough to make me switch if Shae Vizla became a permanent server? No. I'm very happily in a great Satele Shan guild and the times that I've joined in group content with my guild, it's been feasible, though not ideal (due to the lag). If I were an avid PVPer, on the other hand, that might have made a difference. Thanks again for the work that's gone into the Shae Vizla test server and all of the community engagement involved. I never thought I would live to see the day SWTOR was available (again) on an Australian server, even if it is just a test server for a limited time.

First, thanks for maintaining this game and putting effort into communicating with the playerbase. Please, whatever you do, don't jeopardise the new player experience and don't annoy the playerbase. Be fair; if you're going to charge for something you weren't charging for before, there needs to be something reasonable given in return (even if the charge may make in-character sense). Better still, as many have said, introduce things that players will want to pay credits for. Speaking for myself, and just off the top of my head: 1. Make dyes reusable rather than one-off, and introduce a credit cost for each reuse. (Simultaneously, cut down on the number of dyes given out as rewards.) Maybe the reuse cost could scale with the original cost of the dye, so reusing a Cartel Market black-black dye would be really expensive, but reusing a low-level crafted dye would be really cheap. 2. Make Daily Resource Matrices purchasable using credits. This is the number 1 'bottleneck' currency I've been facing, and I'm guessing others are in a similar situation. This idea could also apply to other end-game currencies, too, of course. 3. Allow more cargo bay slots than currently allowed (across all categories: character, legacy, guild), with accompanying credit or CC costs. 4. Allow players to buy specific crafting schematics (rather than having to rely on random drops and the GTN), with cost scaling according to crafting level. To extend this idea a bit, think about other things that involve randomness (e.g., types of armour dropped from Alliance Crates) and make it possible for players to choose what they get, at a cost. 5. Allow some items to be stacked (that currently can't be stacked; e.g., various certificates/grants/tokens), with a credit cost for stacking and unstacking those items. On a different note, I didn't realise there is a limit to how many reactions you can add per day in this forum. I didn't even get past page 1 of this thread, and already ran out. Would it be possible to increase that number? Thanks.

When I got back to Lieutenant Randa, I played through the mission-giving series of cutscenes again (without resetting), and the game gave me a new mission to speak to Master Halykus, but did not do anything to my mission to return to speak to Lieutenant Randa. The icon over Lieutenant Randa changed to indicate the (correct) mission-ending status. I spoke to Lieutenant Randa again, and the mission-ending cutscenes played (and I received the mission reward). I then abandoned the new (repeated) mission to speak to Master Halykus. This seemed to work for me, although it was clunky. Hope this helps anyone else trying to finish this mission series in the future.