I attended the NYCC Cantina Tour this year and last, and since I already had a Tauntaun Fawn code, I don't need the one I received at this year(s) con. Now, I can be a jerk and sell it on eBay, but I'd rather have a contest that is fun, and fair to win the code. I'm looking for suggestions on how best to do that. Posting this in "General" on both sides only resulted in the typical flame-fest and moronic responses, so I figured I'd get a few of those here, but hopefully not as many... So, Star Wars fans - what do you guys think would make a great 'contest' with the prize being one of these highly sought after codes. (Contest can work for both Empire/Republic players, as I have toons in both factions).

Guild: The Black Bha'lir (Primary) Guildmaster: Aarun Faction: Republic Purpose: Casual PvE, some PvP and RP Guild website: blackbhalir.swtornow.com Guild: Blue Maw Corsairs (Secondary) Guildmaster: S'efa Faction: Empire Purpose: Casual PvE, some PvP and RP Guild website: blackbhalir.swtornow.com/bluemawcorsairs

CZ-198 Application 1. Please tell us a little about yourself. Why do you want to be a part of the Czerka family? I'm K'altor Chengon, freelance pilot, and yes, when you do your background check on me, I'm the same K'altor Chengon that was once a Jedi. Since leaving the order, the only good way to make credits is helping the 'war effort' - and I've had my fill of war, and just want to make the credits. Since Czerka has credits, I have a ship, I'm willing to use what's mine, to help you guys part with what you have. 2. At Czerka, we pride ourselves on our accomplishments. Please name three of your accomplishments that you are most proud of. (Please do not include family milestones such as marriages or the birth of your children. I'm going to give you one, if this is not enough to show that I'm worthy of Czerka, I guess I'll find out of IA needs my skills... A holo-recording is attached: When played: {{Holo-recording begins] K'altor Chengon stood in his Jedi robes, the anger on his face was evident by all in the room. Senator Nal Kruma was the first to address the young man who's fists were clenched tightly. "Jedi Chengon, you seem to have demanded to speak with us, in spite of the Jedi Counsel informing you to report to the Jedi command ship. Your attack on the Republic soldiers in and of itself is an act of treason!" "If I truly attacked the guards, they would be dead." K'altor spat out in disgust. "I simply informed them that they were hungry and they needed to eat." Grand Master Satele Shan walked towards the young man and placed her hand on his shoulder "You are allowing your anger to to consume you. We understand your frustration, but now is not the time to..." "Don't provide lessons now, Master Shan!" K'altor gently pushed the Grand Master's hand off his shoulder "You were not on Alderaan, you were not on Coruscant! And it seems quite convenient that the bureaucrats are only out to save themselves over the citizens of the Republic by signing something that is more like an order of surrender than an actual peace!! There are still Sith on Alderaan for stanging sake!" "K'altor" Satele said softly "I was on Alderaan. You may have been too young to remember, but I was there. I do not mean to lecture you on the ways of the Order or the Force, but please, you are heading down a dark path. There is no place in the Jedi Order for more darkness." "You're right!" K'altor spat out as he removed his Jedi robes onto the floor and tossed his lightsaber on the pile of clothing "I was expected to be made Knight, like my brothers. But I can not be associated with an organization that refuses to open their eyes to the suffering of the citizens of the Republic! I am leaving the Jedi Order, and you'll have to kill me if you want to gartal stop me." "Guards!" an alien senator yelled "Arrest him!" As the other troopers within the hall moved forward, the Grand Master raised her hand and softly said "No. Belay that order." The guards stopped and looked at each-other, as Satele placed both hands on K'altor's shoulders this time and looked into the eyes of the near naked young man before her. "What will you do, K'altor? You are strong with the Force. What if the Empire captures you like they did your mother and sister? What if they turn you to the dark side and you become that which you currently hate?" K'altor looked up at the Grand Master and closed his eyes, she felt the calm within the man before her "I'm taking ownership of the Republic freighter, and I'll help the Republic as a freelance pilot. I will suppress my Force abilities and not use them unless I return to the Order. But, know this, Master. I will not do so unless the Republic and the Jedi Order can prove to me that they are willing to win this war, and not lay down like a Nerf to the whims of the stanging Empire! And as for being captured by the Empire and forced to turn to the dark side, it'll be quite difficult for them to turn a corpse to the dark side! Because unlike the Jedi Counsel, I have no fear in dying to protect the Republic." K'altor bowed to the Grand Master and walked out of the room. {End-Holo-Recording} 3. How did you go about achieving the accomplishments above. Would you say you would do "whatever it takes" for success? If you watched the attached holo-recording, you've seen I've given up everything to prove myself. 4. Would you say you have a strong moral compass? Do you think this could get in the way of your job, should you be asked to do something...questionable? I'm a former Jedi - not a Jedi any longer. But It all depends on the questionable something. Harming an innocent? No kraffing way! Take out some corrupt Hutt, Imperial, or a Sith? No problem. 5. You are about to enjoy our wide variety of complimentary cocktails and snacks, when you notice that your esteemed colleague's newest experiment is likely to break out of their confines while you are gone. How would you handle this situation? I guess it depends on how 'esteemed' I feel about this colleague, right?

Since the overall gathering was somewhat 'informal' (they focused on community and "fun" and not a 'you're here on our dime, so you'll do what we say and hear our sales pitch'). Questions were asked; many could not be answered because they don't want to promise something that COULD not make it into the game for whatever reason. They told us about 1.5 hitting the Public Test Server (PTS); Keeping in mind that many of us were at the Con all day and had no idea, and they answered questions about themselves, the creative process, Star Wars in general; even what they would want to see in game via agreeing with questions/suggestions by us (Mos Eisley, greater customization control over hair, armor, and other colors/appearances, etc.). But, the overall tone of the evening was: "Thank you for being our fans, let's have fun and chat while you chat with others!"

The people (Both the BioWare employees and the fans) made the night! It was just a fun time. The BioWare staff made it even more fun by just being cool guys, and a lot of fun (even if they could not give us the deep dark secrets of the game - we tried).

A Super Special thanks to BioWare and Community Relations Manager Joveth Gonzalez (JovethGonzalez), and writer Charles Boyd (Trooper Story, Directive 7 and Esseles Flashpoints) for an amazing evening of food, drinks, conversations, and awesome give-a-ways at the NYCC Cantina Tour! We met some incredible fellow players and even recruited; hopefully, some new guildmates! Just a wonderful evening that surprised me in every good way! I hope this becomes a yearly thing for BioWare (being at NYCC, since SOE never bothered to connect to the East Coast fanbase in my 8-years there!) to do during NYCC. It was wonderful to meet and hang out with such cool people!. Again, a tip of my new SW:TOR hat to you all! Robert G.

I should not bother, because you're obviously a child. But, I was not talking at all about "Game Balance" - The rewards are a SITH THRONE and a SITH MASK. Where is the Jedi Master's chair? Where are the robes that look like they belong in Star Wars? This is not about "Sith rule", this is about a company that hired an art department from the Warhammer MMO to create Republic armor that had no clue what a Jedi should look like. Yet, the Empire art department had a good number of Star Wars fans on their team. So, unless you can comprehend what is being said in a given post, please do not reply.

My only problem is BioWare once again showing it's "Empire Bias" by making all the rewards "Sith" rewards... Where is the Jedi Master's chair? Where are robes that make us look like Jedi and not homeless Egyptian hobo's?? :/

I play this game because it is a Star Wars MMO - Not because I'm a MMO Player or because I love to PvE, PvP, RP, etc. I play this game because it is the ONLY Star Wars MMO right now. But I did come over from the first Star Wars MMO: Star Wars: Galaxies The one thing that BioWars/EA/LucasArts needs to do is learn from the errors that SOE/LucasArts made with Galaxies - the advantage BioWare has is there is a history with the majority of us within the Star Wars fan base that play this game. And that is an unquestionable statement; LISTEN TO THE CUSTOMERS OR THEY WILL DROP YOU! SOE was initially arrogant and unwilling to compromise with the subscribers - every 'protest' was ignored or led to bans of subscribers, and most suggestions were ignored, but even those that were publicly aknowledged were never implemented in-game; until the end. Now, if that was a LucasArts decision (the only common denominator between Galaxies and ToR) I have no idea what to say at that point - I'm not an expert on License Agreements/Law. But, when your subscribers (or, as many of you like to call them "The Vocal Minority") tell you something is wrong, it is best to listen... And do it quickly. A year after SOE released the NGE version of Galaxies, the game was quite good and fun, but there was no population because that "Vocal Minority" did a bang up job at winning the online/media campaign against SWG. I played SWG for the full 8-years, I'll play SWToR until the next Star Wars MMO is released - but, please... There is an undeniable history within the Star Wars community that they will happily pay if they are happy - but their needs, demands, and concerns should not be placated, but acknowledged and implemented or given a reason why they can not be. 1.2 has some good stuff, but it was NOT ready to be released. Bugs that I reported the first day of the PTS (background sounds from WZ's or other planets carry over onto the fleet and other worlds after reloading/Quick Travel or Revival) are still present. With all due respect to the art department, concerns about the poor looking Republic armor has yet to be addressed since pre-launch! (I recall many threads commenting on how ridiculous Consular headgear looked. And the new armor is no better!) It is almost as if the artists on the Empire team were die-hard Star Wars fans, and the artists on the Republic team were watching too much Anime or playing too much Warhammer (take your pick on which edition). Credit sinks for the sake of credit sinks without any viable means to make credits is frustratingly annoying and it has been said ad nauseum many times over that there needs to be other ways to make credits in the game or the prices of specific things needs to be reduced significantly. also ignored. The entire Legacy system is a credit sink. And an absurd one for some things at that. I'm not 'raging' or threatening to quit; Because to do so would not be me or truthful - I have zero plans to quit the only Star Wars MMO. But I also don't want to be the only member of my guild active. I don't want to "walk around" the server and not see another player due to those casual MMO players leaving the game. Learn from the errors of the past... Because NO GAME WAS BETTER (IMHO) than the last 4-months of Star Wars Galaxies - yet, there were few players to appreciate the changes that were added into the game due to un-hearing ears of the "Powers That Be" from the past. I want SWToR to succeed, but it starts with the voices of the subscribers being heard and taken seriously. Outside focus groups and internal polling will never tell you what your players want. Especially if those players are PAYING $15 a month! I lost 3-guild members yesterday and others are saying they will quit because of the PvP changes or 'nerfs' to their class. Something needs to be done sooner than later, guys. Please. Please keep replies respectful and on-topic.

/QFE! I could not have said it better myself! (except about winning more than losing, which is why I removed that part of the post)

Coyotecalls, As a Republic Player on a Sith Named Server, I can feel your pain!!!! For the very-few Star Wars Galaxies players that are here that know me - they recall I almost never participated in PvP on SWG - Mainly due to the fact that my system was not 'state of the art' at that time, and 'he with the fastest connection wins' in that game... Here, I had a guild-mate get me into PvP a lot more - and at first (pre-launch and a few weeks into launch) PvP was fun; I actually LOVED it... Win or Lose (which, to be honest, we lost about 40% of the time. That percentage is now about 80-90% of the time. To make it worse - I play a Sage (Seer line) and I've noticed my heals are crap now, as well as I'm being interrupted much more now than prior to 1.2 release. Now, I had one guy tell me "(I'm) pissed that (I) cant spam my heals like I used to and use (an exploit) like before." I only have my guild as witness to what I'm about to say, but I found out about the (combo/exploit) last Sunday! So as a player that used my class "correctly" I've noticed a significant change - and had I known this was going to be the case, I would have demanded not a 'refund' of my Skill Points, but the ability to completely RESPEC to a Shadow since healing is useless... I'm not a PvP player per se - but there is a serious disparity in this game when it comes to PvP that needs to be addressed for example: CC's should not be able to be chained... I find myself CC'd to death - even if I break it once, that just let's me cast a Force Armor or do a quick heal before I'm CC'd until dead. There should be an immunity to CC's once a CC is applied TWICE... Applied, broken, Applied, done - no more for x-minutes. The players that are flaming those of us that are "at the bottom" are the ones who obviously are reaping the rewards of the system - but after awhile, people are going to get mad enough to either quit or just stop with PvP altogether because there is no point - especially once you reach L50.

The Black Bha'lir (Lord Adraas) will do our best to attend; either myself, of my co-guild-leaders.

The fact is, if you're fighting 1:1, and no other help for either yourself of your enemy, the trick is to not lose FORCE, heal yourself, and prey your DoT for Mind Crush sticks (and that you can get it off, and use Mind Snap as a last resort. Do not use your glowing stick at all because the lightsaber is the weakest weapon in the TOR universe!

The Republic loses WZs because Empire players outnumber Republic players, and they are better equipped. Also, in WZs I find I'm being chopped to pieces more by Operatives and Inquisitors and the never-ending CC effects that are spammed; an area where there should be a limit to how often a PC can be CCd during PvP; because resolve ain't workin'. In one encounter, my resolve was full, I tried to break free of whichever CC I was in, and bam! CCd again... Granted, I'm not much for PvP to begin with; This is the first game I've ever had FUN in PvP with my guildmates... But it's still not my thing, overall... The solution is simple, but will never work because no one can "b teh ubrz, i pwn u noob".. EVERYONE going into a WZ; no matter what level they are, or what level/quality their equipment is, can only punch/kick/shoot/stab causing a maxium of 1 damage per attack, no CCs, no armor bonus', and 100 health for everyone. (I'm being sarcastic, people)

Wow! My full-healing (Seer) line in Sage is more powerful compared to other classes? For true? Wow... I should tell the 5 level 50 Imps that tear me apart in every WZ that I'm more powerful than they are, and that they should DIE when I walk up to them... Then again, I do not have full-purple-level 50 armor with maxed out mods because the Republic can't win a WZ on our server due to being under-equipped compared to the Empire side... But, now that I know I'm much more powerful, I should clean house SOLO in War Zones! /sarcasm off.

I would! Do you have any idea what the properity taxes in New York/New Jersey is on a $250k house! Almost $8k per year! And, a $250k home in NY/NJ would be somewhere I would be too close to an area where I would not feel safe for myself or my family - or, is in the middle of nowhere without electricity, sewage or anything else 'civilized'. (Yes, I'm over-exaggerating)

I played SWG for the full 8-years, so I can say that I have a good idea of what SWG is, was, and what TOR could have been. But, I will say that comparing these games is like complaining your apple does not taste like an orange! ITEM: Highest subscription numbers: 300.000 SOE never released subscription information, even to this day. So these numbers are irrelevant, and completely pulled out of the air by who knows who. It is only guestimated what their high/low was... ITEM: Not having met all the requirements of the fanbase, 2 years after release, the game was completely overhauled, the process took nearly 2 years. The result was NOT welcomed by the community. INCORRECT! The problem was SOE saw how much money WoW was making, and tried to make World of Star Wars, rather listening to the community, SOE and LucasArts hired an outside firm and conducted "Focus Groups" of MMO players that LucasArts admitted: A. Did not want to read so much, which is what SWG had a lot of. B. Did not want to figure out the profession/skill system because it was too confusing. C. Could not be a Jedi out of the box. So, they created the NGE... A system that when it was being tested - the ENTIRE COMMUNITY screamed to kill the project! That was ignored by SOE/LucasArts and the game suffered for it. ITEM: Planets: More than 10 planets... Big in size and free in travel. The big and free places were used to build houses and create [cities]. Not at launch. And although players could create housing, etc. The first cities did not start springing up until weeks after. Kashyyyk was added in "Rage of the Wookiees", Mustafar was added in "The Trials Of Obi-Wan" - And, it was not as fun as you would think running from the Nym's Starport on Lok, to our city in the lower western part of the map - but I loved that I could do it without seeing a stupid "Exhaustion Zone" and having no clue where the zone begins/ends! ITEM: Races: Bothans, Human, Rodians, Zabrak, Trandoshan, Mon Calamari, Twi´lek, Wookies,... The starting races: Bothan, Human, Mon Calamari, Rodian, Trandoshan, Twi'lek, Wookiee, Zabrak Added in "Jump to Lightspeed" Ithorian, Sullustan I will agree that the race selections are limited in TOR, but they are not that bad - however Wookiee, Bothan, and Ithorian should have been choices! ITEM(S): Single- and multi-passenger ground vehicles and starships Player-run virtual economy (99%) An extensive set of emotes, moods, and associated animations The ability for players to place bounties on opponents that participate in PVP Dynamic resource spawns on planets needed for complex crafting Using creatures as mounts This was said already, but most of the above was not in-game at launch, many of them were just prior to the NGE. But, again, I will agree that this game could have been served better with adding some, if not all of these features - but, I will defend BioWare and say that the game is new - I'll give them time to add more of the above... HOWEVER, the crafting system in TOR, although a pain in the butt at times, I feel is more balanced! Random resources caused massive problems and quality control issues for crafters; structures traders that created homes did not suffer from those flaws, but armor, weapons, medical and food (when it was worth playing those classes), and droid crafters suffered greatly on some servers. Sadly, I like knowing that my ENHANCEMENTS are the same as the next guy's, only my prices are better. ITEM: Timeline: No clue, whats that supposed to do with Star Wars 1-6 Nothing at all! We are 3,000+ before the events of the Rebellion Era. Again, reading is an amazing thing. Please take the time to read KNIGHTS OF THE OLD REPUBLIC or THE OLD REPUBLIC comics, or the books REVAN, or DECEIVED. I'm not trying to be insulting there, but if you are unaware of this games timeline, then taking the time to read about it would serve you well. ITEM: While TOR is called SW:TOR, it has nothing to do with Star Wars the way most (not all) know it. You are in the minority, here. This feels like Star Wars to me - and the ONLY reason I am playing this game is because it is STAR WARS! To keep this post constructive I will leave it now....

Before I get to the above question, I'd like to comment on your initial point. I do agree that the CE vendor is pathetic. It was originally touted as having unique items available for sale only to CE customers. But, I did not purchase the CE because of that - I purchased it because I purchased the CE edition for Star Wars Galaxies, and every-other Star Wars collectors edition item I could afford (The CE edition of "THE JEDI PATH" book is one of my favorite things - the way the vault opens - too cool!). But, again - I will completely agree that more needs to be added to that vendor - including level progression of those items! The yellow/black crystal should be available up to level 47 at least! - - - But, onto the above question. Role-Play is what you make of it. My character is my own, although I do not like some of the choices (they go against what I would do if I was playing the character in an RPG), I work my way around the stupidity and repeated dialog. Another example is my secondary character, although people in-game see her as "Kira Carsen), I address her as "Tysie Fallon" in my guild stories. So, yes, I can see the frustration in playing someone else character with my characters name - but I can get over that, too. With my main hitting 50, and my dislike for PVP overall (and in this game, it's worse with the Republic being outnumbered so badly on our (and most likely every) server) the Role-Play options are restricted to the fleet or cantina's, since doing the same end-game weak PvE (or nearly impossible Hard Mode flashpoints; look, I'm a FULL-HEALING Sage, I draw agro when healing, I'm dead in seconds until I find SOME WAY to get better gear without PvPing my life away; if I could do that, since the last 5 matches I was in where we won 2 of them, we were not given credit!). Anywise, my point is - Role-Play is what you make of it. And I can RP my characters on these rails... I may not like the choices at times, but they are not game breaking to me.