Subject line says it. I played last night with no issue. I've tried closing & reopening the launcher. I've tried letting it be for 90 minutes to see if it would get past whatever it was stuck on. I've rebooted by PC a couple times. I've redownloaded/reinstalled the launcher. All to no avail.

Selected Marauder and got package with offhand weapon but, cannot equip it. I've leveled past 10, trained Mara skills, etc. but, cannot equip the weapon. Says "Slot full". Please fix!

What's the budget? A laptop you consider for any type of even moderately serious gaming, even if only occasionally, needs to have a discrete graphics card. That alone tends to take you from the sub $600 side of the market and push you to the $850 or more level in most cases. Despite what some naysayers will allege, things like "Laptops are meant for gaming", generally the only trade off between a gaming laptop and a gaming PC is price and screen size. And the latter is a non-issue if you have a monitor to plug it into. While not exactly precise, expect to pay roughly 1/2 again as much for an equivalent laptop. That gap narrows a bit at the lower end and jumps a bit at the higher end. My favorite brand for my last two laptops that I can game on is Sager. They're not the cheapest but, also not overpriced like Alienware tends to be. My current one is a little over two years old and still does decent with most games though it's starting to show it's age a bit if I try to play the very latest titles. Current Sager at a decent price (imo) for $960: http://www.sagernotebook.com/index.php?page=product_customed&model_name=NP6652 2gb nVidia 750m graphics card 8gb ram 4th gen Intel Core i5 750gb hdd Full HD display Full keyboard with true number pad on right side (many 15" laptops skimp on this) You'll find similar pricing at sites like cyberpowerpc.com and ibuypower.com. You could also look to a local store like a Best Buy as they do carry some as well. Again, similar pricing: http://www.bestbuy.com/site/15-6-laptop-8gb-memory-750gb-memory/1709307.p?id=1219060817495&skuId=1709307&st=pcmcat287600050003_categoryid$abcat0502000&cp=1&lp=6 Now, you can probably play SW:TOR on an integrated graphics chipset laptop but, you would want to be sure it's the latest generation AND be sure of how much of the system memory you can allocate to it and make sure there's enough. On my 2+yo laptop (nVidia GTX 460m with 1.5gb of it's own memory) I can get 30+fps on medium settings in all but the highest congested areas. And here's a link to a site that's compiled a lot of benchmark results for mobile graphics cards and chipsets. The individual card descriptions at the bottom of them have listings of games with FPS at different settings. The list of games is not the same for each card BUT, should give you an idea of a particular card or chipsets capabilities. http://www.notebookcheck.net/Comparison-of-Laptop-Graphics-Cards.130.0.html Some games they approximate based on cards with similar stats and/or where other games measure up roughly the same. Such is the case with their listing of SW:TOR for the Intel HD 4400 integrated chipset. They approximate you might be able to get 30 at low settings with it. http://www.notebookcheck.net/Intel-HD-Graphics-4400.91979.0.html Good luck and happy shopping!

Considering Blizzard boasted around 12m subs for WoW at one point, to slide to 7.6m is roughly a 37% slippage. In April-June of 2013 they lost 600,000 subs. http://www.maximumpc.com/world_warcraft_subscribers_plummet_77_million_players_2013 If TOR lost that amount in three months it most likely would be closed. Your post seems to be targeted at the "haters" ie. not game industry analysts, not former developers or project leads, not insiders in the industry, just the common folk whose opinions vary as greatly as the types of fish in the ocean. Reading someone posting, "This game sucks and will die in 6 months" or "This is expansion is stupid and will kill this game in 3 months" yada yada yada is akin to reading a movie review in your local rag paper claiming, usually in overly pretentious tones, that the film is a waste of time while seemingly strangely enough, you go and have a wonderful time watching it. Or in short, the only thing your post amounts to is an "I told you" statement. So umm, you feeling better now that you got it out of your system?

I would counter by saying that unless they're trying to show a loss for some other obscure reason, these large publishers aren't going out of there way to drive a game into the dirt as they would rather keep squeezing out profits from something that is developed rather than invest in new development and risk people not jumping on board. However, you are correct that to a company like EA, it is most certainly about profits. Then again, unless your a charitable organization, you are in business to make a profit. They care about you only so far as they hope you keep paying into their bottom line. And aside from data mining the demographics to see where their current market is as well as what markets may be opportunities for growth, they don't care whether you're male or female, college educated or a high school drop out, making $100,000/yr or $10,000/yr, if you're physically or mentally handicapped in some fashion or otherwise healthy, married or single, etc etc etc. Again, they only care so far as what your contributing data point depicts on existing and future sales. And you may think it's cold, uncaring, or whatever other adjective you like but, they're in the business of publishing games and making money from that. Period. End of list. I would wager it won't be the exact moment there's a negative but, a relatively short term of losing funds. Patching an MMO with some new content or features is still cheaper than developing a new game from scratch. So I would expect a relatively short term of 3-6mo of desperation attempts when the crap really hits the fan to see if they can turn it around. But, if they can't then yes, the plug will get pulled. As it should. They're not the government. And as entitled as you may want to think you are, you're not deserving of any handouts from them. So many good games? Hmmm, let's get back to you on that in the next 1-2 years. The crowd funding phenomenon is fairly short lived so far. Granted there are several good ideas that are seeing substantial funding and moving forward with development whether it's a MMO like Star Citizen or other type of game like Carmageddon: Reincarnation. But to say these are "good" games before they launch is like saying Age of Conan is going to be a great game 3 months before it launched. Yeah ... ummm ... not so much. So a few good games that were crowd sourced may have come out but, any game developed is going to be subject to the same rule that always has existed for games ... does the product live up to the hype enough to make it a popular title, or will it tank because of it.

While one could debate how niche a market flight sims are in regards to all entertainment titles sold on the PC, they are still a genre that's been around for quite sometime a routinely see new titles released. And pretty much every single one of them, if they wish to be treated as a serious entry in that genre, allow at least use of a joystick if not outright additional flight controllers (ie. separate throttle, pedals, etc.) And they're usually not cheap, at least many of the well regarded ones. http://www.bhphotovideo.com/bnh/controller/home?O=&sku=899675&is=REG&A=details&Q=

Umm, why does/should EVERY other single player have to play by YOUR definition of fair loot rules. Regardless of what I, you or anyone else on these forums or in-game feels about what is fair for rolling on loot, YOU do not get to make the law for every other person playing this game. Seriously, just get over yourself (or yourselves for anyone agreeing with that stance.) People, it's really simple. Somewhere in your UI is a thing called a chat window. In that window you can, oh I don't know ... that thing that people do while swerving all over the road ... oh yeah, type text to one another. You know ... C O M M U N I C A T E. At the beginning of the run, if nobody in the group asks or states what the intended loot rules are then it is on YOU for assuming everyone else is in agreement with your definition of fair. And if that proves false then when you want to start pointing that finger of blame, start by looking in the mirror. You had the opportunity to raise the question or make the assertion that XYZ is how the group should roll on loot. If everyone is in agreement and somebody makes a mistake warn them. If it appears blatant, kick them or drop group and move on. There is no 100% agreement on what is fair with regards to rolling Need or Greed. If you honestly think there is then you haven't read enough loot threads across the multitudes of MMOs. This discussion is nothing new and has been going on for a decade or more. SSDG (Same **** Different Game) And somebody rolling Need throughout an entire run is no more breaking the rules of the game, as defined by the developers and software, than it is to roll Greed or Pass the whole way through a run. Anything beyond what the developers have designed via the software is your own arbitrary set of rules. And if you're unwilling to communicate them to those you are grouped with then when you throw yourself that pity party because someone rolled need and won for their companion on something that you could have equipped yourself, realize the only one who gives a dang about it is you.

Depends on the design of the game. But, you're right to a point in that in SW:TOR, your ship is essentially your "house". I'm not a fan of developers putting in housing to simply way "we have player housing!". But, if they give it a bit more meaning then a way to play SIMs in whatever IP the MMO is based on, then I'm good with it. It was one of the few things (IMO) that SOE got right with SWG. The things you could decorate your home with were mostly craftable so it helped drive the player economy. It also provided means for increased storage for players. You also could train in Merchant skill which in turn would allow you to setup a vendor droid in your house turning it into your "shop" which you didn't have to personally man. The player cities also provided convenience of amenities. So there was a fair amount of design choices that made it something quite a bit more than an instanced apartment that nobody else would see. The current planet design in SW:TOR really doesn't cater to that idea unless they were simply going to add housing zones outside of the quest areas. So that leaves the far more likely idea of instanced apartments in major cities like Coruscant, Nar Shadda, etc. Not sure what purposes beyond what you can currently do within your ship they will provide though. *shrug*

Not really. Do what Blizzard did AND take it the step further of closing off combat data from access in the API provided for the modders to use. It seems a great many people have the misconception that a game allowing for addons means EVERYTHING will be allowed. With the right implementation that simply isn't the case. As I previously posted, Blizzard got the concept right. Whether you're a fan or a hater of what is capable with their addons has only to do with what Blizzard continually chooses to expose as available data, and not how their addon system itself works.

Value is in the mind of the player. Personally, subbing is far more a convenient model for me and I judge the value of it against the time spent in game a month. Even if I only averaged a half-hour a day it would come down to a dollar an hour ... not a lot cheaper entertainment out there than that. And I tend to play more along the lines of 15hrs/week rather than 15 in an entire month. As for getting anything decent ... I've unlocked extra char slots, a yellow endurance crystal, 2nd cargo hold, extra inventory row, and the mailbox and vendor on my ship, account wide. Aside from maybe getting the GTN kiosk on my ship, that's largely the extent of what I'll be getting off from the Cartel Market. Because to me, all the fluff items, armor, speeders/mounts, etc. don't do anything for my gaming experience. I understand for some that the vanity items are things they crave. To each their own. But to say there's nothing decent unless you save up months of coins is pure opinion on your behalf.

Yes and no. Blizzard has the right concept but far from a perfect implementation, at least in my opinion. By concept I mean the idea that what the creators of the addons have access to is essentially an API that Blizzard strictly controls what data elements are usable. This is what enables Blizzard to "break" addons by making slight tweaks to the API if they determine any addon goes beyond the scope of what they intended. Where they screwed up, again in my opinion, is making so much combat data accessible. Again, keep in mind that they control what data points are accessible. So all those boss timers, damage meters, healbots, etc. are all doable because Blizzard chooses to allow it to be. So, if Bioware were to take the same conceptual idea and severely limit, or outright omit, access to combat data, what would be left would be data elements usable for QoL addons. That scenario, to me, would be a good thing. That would allow more rapid additions of things the players would find useful while at the same time, eliminate all the "if you want to raid with us then you need to have X,Y & Z installed" BS. Personally I would LOVE to see a SW:TOR version of the addon, Altoholic. Being able to see with a couple clicks what any of your other characters have equipped, in their inventory, bank, guild bank, skills, quest log, crafting recipes/schematics, etc etc. is quite useful ... if you're an altoholic. The one feature I would add to it, that would be specific to SW:TOR, would be to allow us to send other alts' companions out on their crafting missions.

Wildstar, TESO and Star Citizen. And I typically am a 1 MMO at a time player so hopefully the release dates for those three are staggered at least 6mo apart. I'm also not a "roots" person in so much that I don't feel so embedded in any one MMO that I can't simply pick up and move on to another. Some people look at the hundreds of hours they have invested in a character or characters in one MMO and can't themselves walking away to start new in a different game. Me, I simply view those hours through the perspective of if I had fun while doing it then the time wasn't wasted, regardless if the game closes down or I voluntarily move on to something new. The biggest thing I like about SW:TOR is the character and companion story lines coupled with the questing. And so when i do go off to play something else, should I see notices that Bioware has expanded on the stories, I may come back to check them out.

They will because ... ??? That's a rather large sense of puffed up self importance you have going on there. You really think your words carry that much weight around here? Please refer to my previous statement then. Why would he directly respond to you? You, that has shown no sense of understanding what goes on under the hood of these games and to believe it is fact that a group of interns could easily port this game to a new engine. Your a single person among 10s of thousands who recently has done more simply to attack EA then to offer any amount of true constructive criticism. That's pretty funny. You provide these target-rich posts/rants and then expect people not to call you on it? Especially when your posts overflow with self serving arrogance? Interesting choice of words. Does the buck stopping actually mean you're dumping your sub or dumping the EA stock you own? You've shown a strong lack of conviction and willpower in previous threads with regards to doing that. Given the nature of your previous threads and how much you rail against Bioware/EA were I them, I send that letter out to be tested prior to opening it. So your mind is limited BECAUSE of the names people on these forums have called you? That's pretty much an admission to being weak minded. As for your resolve, that's highly suspect given how contradictory you are between railing so hard against the company while at the same time funding them and/or owning their stock. But, I'm sure your final letter will be an interesting read filled with all sorts of facts (ie. your personal opinions), baseless allegations and presumptions of how easy/simple some things are to do.

I'm mostly just checking out class/companion stories now. I played TOR since beta for almost a year then took a break from any MMOs for a bit. Played through some single player stuff that had been collecting virtual dust in my Steam library and now I'm back as a subscriber to finish story lines I didn't complete while I wait for three games to come out, Elder Scrolls: Online, Wildstar and Star Citizen. Will be waiting several months for any of the three so I'll have time to wrap some stories up and play around with the space stuff when it drops.

Everyone eh? Doubtful unless there's an actual game play need to do so. Plenty of people who play mmorpgs have zero desire to play games like SIMs or Second Life. So unless the housing is well integrated into other game mechanics, it would not get used by everyone.

For me to want housing in a game it has to have purpose beyond simply playing "SIMS" in whatever IP the game is based in. If I wanted to play house, I would be playing the SIMS, not a mmorpg. With that said, there are ways that devs can incorporate housing into other systems of the game to truly give it a purpose. SWG managed it with both player cities as well as being able to make your house your own vendor shop. And house furnishings were part of crafting. And they served for additional storage, etc. Meaning it wasn't a static place what you could simply put a couple things on the wall and invite people in to chat privately. Housing done with pretty much that as its sole purpose to me is a waste of dev time. Other ideas would be to have housing somehow figure into PvP if the player desired (obviously not everyone would.) But, instead of building your friendly neighborhood domicile to kick your feet up in after a long day of questing you instead build a forward base site that you and your allies need to defend. Unfortunately for those really wanting housing, the direction the game has taken makes it far more difficult for the devs to put it in with any amount of meaning with regards to other aspects of the game. It will be instanced for one. And there will be limited interaction with anything else meaningful in the game. Sure, they'll probably add the ability to put a mailbox, GTN station, vendor, etc. in your house and they will be Cartel Coin options for sure. But, i can already do that on my ship. Instead of housing they might as well give us a wider assortment of player ships with the ability to decorate them and invite other players on board and simply leave it at that.

Only advice I can offer to the OP, or anyone guild hunting for that matter, is: 1. Be honest with yourself in what you're looking for out of the guild. Are you looking to simply play the game with some cool people that if you met in RL you'd like become fast friends with or are you merely looking for a collection of other avatars that play the game well and can help you achieve your in-game goals? Or a mix of both? 2. You should recruit the guild as much or more so than they recruit you. Meaning you should do what you can to make sure it'll be a good fit. Group with some of their folks if you can prior to joining and ask them questions about what day-to-day in-game life is like in the guild. Finding people you had a good experience with questing or clearing a heroic can be a good starting step. They should be able to give you ideas of how active the guild's chat/voice server is, how laid back or uptight they are about things, if they're a heavy PvP, OPs, etc. type of guild, etc etc 3. Not really a necessity but, many stable guilds have their own site in some format. Take the time to get familiar with it and you might get an indication if they're a group of serious players only (ie. most/all threads are about game play, how to optimally play your class, how best to gear it, etc etc.) or if they are more casual and laid back with a good chunk of off-topic discussions and humor. Not saying either is better or worse, just one or the other may be a better fit for what you're looking for. 4. Last, in the end most guilds will value if you conduct yourself with honor and integrity and do more to defuse drama rather than cause it.

So we went from the legality of gambling, to the definition of gambling, to allegations of corporate greed, to morality and now to ethics. Oh, and the illumination of your lack of conviction with regards to your feelings about EA/Bioware's alleged lack of morals and ethics while furthering their culture of corporate greed. It's one thing to try and drum up interest in your cause when the system you're a part of has compulsory membership. It's another when that membership is voluntary. You made this mountain of grandiose claims out of a mole-hill of a simple request of: "Dear Bioware: Can you educate us please on the percentages for rare drops in the Cartel Packs?" Dozens of pages later we have what amounts to pretty much pure comedy ... Much Ado About Nothing When are we expected to get to the part about 6-toed mauve unicorns and quarks? I want to know when to tune back in.

Ahhh, so now you're trying to reverse a well known truth that's 500+ years old ... "A fool and his money are soon parted" It's called marketing. Make something appealing to the public in hopes that they buy it. EA/Bioware has properly marketed the Cartel Packs if they have a decent enough % of the playerbase spending at least some RL $ on them to support their game play. There's nothing shady about it. It is simply understood that you only have a chance at getting the specific item you want from the packs. Stupid people and fools are simply that, stupid people and fools. If they want to spend their hard earned money on virtual crap, who am I to disagree? Life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. You cannot define that for another person any more than I can. But, I'm not going to interfere in another's life and obstruct their liberty to pursue their happiness. Live and let live.

Oh, you mean GAMING ADDICTION then. For a minute (okay ... 40+ pages) I thought you were talking about gambling. Instead, what you actually have is a developer creating a game environment that contains elements which can be purchased for RL cash. A player's sense of how important these virtual elements are to them is going to vary wildly from the apathetic to cosmetic items to the obsessive-compulsive game addict. Now then, if you want to have a study conducted by a legitimate research facility to show that the same areas of the brain and the same chemical reactions occur when someone wins at black jack and someone gets whatever rare item from a Cartel pack, power to you. There actually may very well be a link. But the common link you're looking at is addiction in of itself, not the activity. At which point, whether you want to pursue litigation because you emptied your bank account buying Cartel packs or because after spending 100hrs of week for the last 2yrs sitting on your but and you've now gained 150# and have type 2 diabetes as a result, essentially amounts to the same thing. That being one's addiction to a game has resulted in unhealthy/unwise choices.

Ahem, them making money is one of the right things they need to do for their customers because if they are unable to make money, this whole thing gets shutdown. Take your eyes off that square inch of bark on that one tree in front of your nose (ie. the RNG on that one item you're upset that you haven't got yet from buying Cartel packs) and try to see the forest around it for a change.

I think you should go right ahead and do just that, or at least try. Heck, I'll even suggest an attorney for you that has intimate knowledge of the gaming industry, Jack Thompson. I understand he's currently for a new legal avenue to attack the gaming industry for. But, don't attempt to file your case in FL as I don't think he has a license to practice there anymore. But by all means, regardless of the attorney you eventually convince to take on your case, PLEASE be sure to keep us up to date on the proceedings and your impending success in proving illegal gambling and/or racketeering against EA/Bioware. Now excuse me while I go buy stock in Orville Redenbacher as the amount of popcorn people will be buying while we anxiously await news of your success is going to push that stock to new heights.

I think the only thing that people in this thread are "fanboys" of, with relation to this thread, is pointing out the fallacies in the OP's logic. But you're right, there is at least one person in this thread being a "tool". I'm not naming names but, they share a similar status in another thread about "porting" to a different game engine.

Does that mean OCD people who get distraught when they don't get exactly 28 blue M&Ms in a bag can sue M&M Mars for not putting the average percentages of colors on the wrapper? I mean, if they're expecting 28 blue M&Ms and the bag states nothing of the average percentages of colors to found within the bag, then they are gambling whether or not they will get 28 M&Ms, at least by YOUR definition. Makes you wonder if companies like Upper Deck and Topps disclose on their packaging your chances of getting specific players' rookie cards in each pack. Sorry but, gambling refers to games of chance, not a purchase.If you wish to engage in semantics trying to argue that buying a Cartel pack is akin to playing black jack or roulette than sorry but, you are simply wrong.

What's sad is you seem to be the only person, or one of a VERY small few (I cannot claim to have read all 550 pages) in 50 pages holding on to the delusion that not only this easily possible (with time being the only factor) but, a viable, cost effective solution to the problems of the game. Some have been illustrating their greater amount of experience in the industry, programming, or simply IT, than the degree you have and fall back on as the feather in your cap of proof that you know of that which you speak. Others have used simple logic to make points that you either ignore, choose not to answer or make poor attempts to talk your way around. Regardless, you seem to have a death grip on the certainty of how viable it is. If you truly believe that to be true than it shouldn't be at all difficult to go out and secure venture capital to take any one of a number of aging but, well revered MMO titles, and bring them up to graphical snuff by porting them to CryEngine3. I mean there should be plenty of people in the industry, ones with FAR more experience than your degree in how things actually work in the game development world, that would be lining up to get on the chance to make bank by bringing much loved games back into the forefront by giving them what amounts to a face lift. So why don't you go on out there and prove us wrong and make it happen.