I can't even begin to understand how a company like Bioware could continue to give everyone the "call your ISP" nonsense as their bottom line response to error 9000. This goes back to late 2011, and if you search error 9000 on the swtor forums.....you can find thousands of people asking for help.....to which the same 8-9 troubleshooting step are provided. Once the person does them all without success......the typical, "Call your ISP....ur losing 1% packets". I guess they figure that losing subscribers to error 9000 attrition is better for the games future than either fixing the issue itself, or at the very least, admitting that it is in fact an issue that they have not resolved yet. If half the people knew that Bioware was actually self aware, I bet you that a lot of them would stick around....knowing that Bioware was actually admitting it was a problem on their end. In my personal case, I did not experience any remote latency based issue in this game until Tuesday. 8/21 when patch 1.3.6 was released. In Biowares eyes, it is no coincidence that all of my latency and error 9000 DC's started directly after downloading this patch. Even though I experience no latency issues with any other online game, or voice chat, etc., they continue to tell me that it an ISP issue. Oh....btw....I called my ISP and they said that there are no issues on my end. I get severe lag spikes where everyone around me is running in place, including me.....but I can still press abilities, which do not graphically show as being used. These spikes last anywhere from 5-10 seconds, with the longer ones resulting in error 9000 DC's back to server screen. I would estimate that I get the lag spikes alone 75% of the time, and happen once every 3-5 minutes. The error 9000 DC's happen only when the lag spike lasts 7-10 seconds, and happen roughly once every 15 minutes or so. Regardless though, the 5-10 second lag spikes alone make the game unplayable, as I just can't find the game playable when a 7 second lag spike usually results in me running in place until all of the game data catches up to me at once, with my character lying on the ground dead. It is too bad.....I like the game alot.....but for some weird reason....I just cant see the point in paying for a game that I literally am unable to play.

Are you saying that even though most Deception builds include 9% overall armor pen from Charge Mastery and 59% armor pen on Duplicity-procced Mauls? As far as some of the later other posts go.....I appreciate the feedback very much, although, I did specify that I was referring to a PVP environment only. I assume that each of you would feel the same way if you based your answer on it anyway, but if not, please share.

Is the thought that the +Power War Hero Relics are better than the damage on proc ones? I was curious if the damage on proc relics scaled with any of our stats, or if the relics had additional chances to proc for Deception Assassins on abilities that hit 2 and 3 times per use like Saber Strike or Voltaic Slash.... Obviously Power is very good and not always easy to come by, however it would seem like there might be a possibility for the damage on proc relic to be very good, assuming that it could have extra chances to proc.

In a PVP scenario, I was curious what is considered to be the best in slot War Hero Relics for Deception Assassins... Is the thought that the +Power War Hero Relics are better than the damage on proc ones? I was curious if the damage on proc relics scaled with any of our stats, or if the relics had additional chances to proc for Deception Assassins on abilities that hit 2 and 3 times per use like Saber Strike or Voltaic Slash.... Obviously Power is very good and not always easy to come by, however it would seem like there might be a possibility for the damage on proc relic to be very good, assuming that it could have extra chances to proc. Any help is appreciated.

As far as the OP's question goes, in a PVP scenario, is the thought that the +Power War Hero Relics are still considered better than the damage on proc ones? I was curious if the damage on proc relics scaled with any of our stats, or if the relics had additional chances to proc for Deception Assassins on abilities that hit 2 and 3 times per use like Saber Strike or Voltaic Slash.... Any help is appreciated.

Question: Is there any chance that you guys would consider altering the specific requirements for individual pieces of War Hero gear? Obviously, the War Hero gear will always require X amount of rated/non-rated warzone commendations, and I'll even say that also requiring a piece of Battlemaster gear is completely fine too. However, would you please consider letting War Hero gear to be purchased by allowing the traded-in Battlemaster piece to be from any of the 3-4 sets that your class PVP vendor sells? (Example - Battlemaster Force-Master's Boot's could be traded in for Battlemaster Force-Mystic/Force-Master/Stalker/Survivor Boots) The problem with the current implementation is strictly due to the requirement of the identical Battlemaster piece to traded in for the War Hero piece. If your going to require people to obtain almost every piece of Battlemaster gear before War Hero gear, the least we should be able to do is optimize our sets properly. This is not possible in it's current implementation because of the secondary stat difference between an identical Battlemaster and War Hero piece of gear. If we optimize Battlemaster gear, we can not properly optimize War Hero gear, and vice versa. Example of Secondary Stats: Battlemaster Force-Master's Boots: +74 Critical Rating & +51 Alacrity Rating War Hero Force-Master's Boots: +61 Power & +53 Surge As you can see, the secondary stats on these two identical BM/WH pieces are completely different. Because the goal is typically to obtain full War Hero gear, we are currently required to look ahead and purchase our Battlemaster gear so that it will allow us to purchase whatever War Hero piece we want. The result is that we are forced into Battlemaster pieces that might not be itemized as well as others and end up wearing this poorly optimized gear for quite some time. This can also happen in the reverse, where your Battlemaster gear is the way you like it, but because you can only purchase that same War Hero piece, you have no choice but to wear it, regardless of the huge stat differential. There are also scenarios where people already had their full Battlemaster sets before patch 1.2 when the gear requirement/trade-in was implemented with the War Hero gear. Essentially, these people purchased their BM gear with the stats that they wanted, but then had no choice but to purchase the exact same War Hero piece, except that War Hero piece has completely different stats on it. Lastly, what happens if someone was originally a DPS and obtained their Battlemaster set accordingly......but then as they were ready to start obtaining War Hero gear, they decided that for the benefit of their team, they were going to play a different spec and be a healer? In order for someone to be able to do this and obtain their proper War Hero healing gear, they would technically have to go back and re-buy another full set of healer Battlemaster gear.

A - We already know that this game will never be balanced around skill levels, nor will changes ever be implemented to specifically increase the skill cap B - It doesn't matter whether melee or ranged "need" interrupts, as interrupts in this game are a complete joke C - If raising the skill cap is what is desired, do something as simple as making interrupts have an actual impact on gameplay Sure, anyone can land an interrupt and stop X from being used, so I guess it technically is serving its purpose as just that, and interrupt. However, I can assure you that casters, whether dps or healers, do not currently need to factor interrupts into their decision making due to the lack on consequence when interrupted. Player A, the healer, is spamming his 2-3 heal buttons on himself.......Player B, the attacker, is going to town on Player A, but isn't making much progress. Player B uses his cognitive thought process and decides he needs to do something different because he can't keep up with the healing. Normal decision making would typically be to do something that prevents the healing from going out, in some fashion. Hypothetically, lets assume Player B has no stuns off cooldown, which in this game is quite frequent due to the majority of players affinity to slam their faces on their keyboards every time their stun is usable.....and just hope for the best.....but that's a topic for another day.......Anyway, the point is that Player B would likely then "utilize" their interrupt to stop the healing, however when he lands the interrupt on Player A's next heal, the result or benefit from doing so is essentially nothing, as Player A will likely not even realize that he was interrupted because he is mashing 2-3 buttons, and once his heal is interrupted, he just continues to cast his next healing spell without pause, as if nothing ever happened. Bottom Line - Raising the skill cap could be done by doing something as simple as making interrupts matter. Personally, I'd like to see something in between TOR, which is no lockout at all, and WoW, which is typically a 4 second lockout, anytime your cast gets interrupted. I understand that TOR is mechanically different due to the lack of schools for each spell, and there would obviously need to be additional balancing of interrupts and their cds, however it can still be done. If your casting a heal and get interrupted, your locked out of your "healing spells" for X seconds. If a caster dps gets their casted force spell interrupted, they get locked out of their "casted force attacks" for X seconds, not just that one spell, etc. Something like this would require people to be mindful of when they decide to use their "big" heal or spell, and conversely does the same to the interrupter, as they would also want to be mindful of when they use their interrupt and not waste it on a garbage heal or spell. Skill cap is immediately raised, albeit by a small amount. The real raise in skill cap comes from the changes in peoples play, in order to continue to be mindful of what was just stated above. Now, all of a sudden, people might actually start to develop some new play styles. Just think, now instead of rolling their entire bodies over their keyboards, people just might start to perform some basic, pvp-oriented, oldest tricks in the book, thought requiring actions like FAKE CASTING!!!!!????? Oh my god.....quite a complex and advanced concept in PVP. As sarcastic as I am being right now, the sad thing is that with the current state of TOR pvp, having to even think about possibly fake casting to bait an interrupt on a.....force attack, so that you can freely heal for another X amount of seconds.....actually would be quite a leap forward as far as skill cap goes. Currently, nobody has to waste any remote part of their brain power worrying about interrupts.....and this topic as a whole, is just one of very many basic pvp maneuvers that could be added and would exponentially raise the current skill cap, or lackthereof. Forgive me if any old WoW pvpers are thinking that what I am saying is nothing new.......as I completely agree. However, when coming from a game like WoW, its easy to say or think that. Just think about TOR pvp, and then ask yourself what part of the gameplay actually requires skill? Is there any way to really be able to tell when someone does something amazing in a WZ? Is there any way to really tell the difference between someone who is a skilled player, or someone who is ok, but has BIS cuz they can simply queue more often? Take away the meters, and what way can you assess anyone's skill level?

People need to stop using the total damage done at the end of a warzone comparison because it is irrelevant. Sure, a madness spec Sorceror can do 500K damage in a warzone all day long, however when it comes to all of the short fighting segments in the warzone, they are not going to kill anyone. PvP is and always has been a game of burst and cooldowns. Classes that can consistently hit for 3-6K, without having to set it up, are far more valuable than that of a dot based, slow rolling damage type of class like a madness Sorceror. The only other scenario, or class that can be viable without the burst, is one that has a multitude of damage reduction cooldowns, or other "get out of jail free" abilities such as the disappearing acts or full, or near full damage and ability resistance cooldowns that classes have. If you dont have the burst, or any of what is listed above, you fall further down the totem pole depending on how little of each you have. Whether or not something was actually changed with Marauders or not really doesnt matter. What does matter is that we do know PVP changed when 1.2 came out, and the result has been classes without damage reduction cooldowns and/or any other out, have become much less viable. Getting hit for 1/3 of your HP in a single hit is not balanced. Plain and simple, and you can save all the BS about ramp up time because I have a Marauder and an Assassin, and its a complete joke how easy it is to drop several classes. Even if the stars align and I actually get low, I always have my trusty ability to disappear into thin air, or resist every ability cast on me.

I dont think there is one specific class that needs work, but rather there needs to be a deep look into the sheer amount of abilities that cause players to have so little control of their characters. There is a place for cc's, stuns, and knockbacks, but the pvp game right now is just constant bombardment of annoying, pointless abilities that cause you to have so little control of your character. With that said, the easiest fix would be for Bioware to actually make the "resolve" system have a purpose. I wont even attempt to describe examples of where the resolve system does not work, mainly because there is no consistency in it. I have personally witnessed countless scenarios where either myself or my target are cc'd/stunned with full resolve. My opinion is that the resolve system was a creative attempt to come up with a new way of controlling cc's, stuns, etc. I think that it has been given enough time and the result has not been positive. Thus, it really is important for Bioware to take action and either scrap the resolve system completely, or change it so that it actually works. Again just my opinion, but the resolve bar could still actually be a nice visual tool for players to have. However, that would require a new cc/stun DR system where the resolve bar reflected the persons current DR state, i.e., allowed targeting players to visually see and recognize whether their cc/stun was worth casting. Some of you will say that the current resolve system does just that, and while it is supposed to in theory, there are just too many problems with it's mechanics to actually serve the targeting players with any helpful information. Its a complete crapshoot whether or not your stun/cc is going to land or not, resulting in a resolve bar that can essentially be counterproductive due to its false reflection of the persons DR state. I personally feel like using the resolve bar to reflect the current DR state of a target is a good idea, but I think that pvp DR should operate differently. Currently, you can be stunned/cc'd 3 times in a row, sometimes more if the resolve system decides to not work at that moment. I think that Bioware can continue to allow 3 ccs/stuns to be cast on a player, however there is no way that each of those cc/stuns should all be full duration. Proposed DR system would work as follows: ( Yes, I know that this is very similar to that other game) Full DR, or ones immunity to CC/Stuns starts after receiving any combination of 3 stuns or crowd control within a 15 second window. Each stun/cc cast has less of an impact than the one cast before it, i.e. doesn't last as long, but proportionate to its own duration. If a player is stunned for a full duration, X second time period, their DR state will reset back to zero after the 15 second window has elapsed. During that 15 seconds, if they are stunned or cc'd a 2nd time, it will be for 50% of the normal duration of the ability. If they are stunned or cc'd a 3rd time in that 15 second window, it will only last 25% of the normal duration. The 15 second window begins the moment the person is cc'd or stunned, as opposed to the current way of starting when the cc ends. This type of DR system would discourage the current, mindless application of stuns and cc's that takes place in every warzone. With no consistency in the current resolve system, people typically just roll the dice, as opposed to using their brains. Random example using easily divisible numbers: 1st - 8 second cc goes out on the target, and it lasts full duration. (Resolve bar shows as 1/3 full) 2nd - 6 second stun goes out on the target, only lasts for half duration, 3 seconds.(Resolve bar shows as 2/3 full) 3rd - 4 second stun goes out on target, only lasts for 1 second (Resolve bar shows as 3/3 full) The resolve bar would be reworked to display a bar with 3 segments or blocks inside it. When one block is full, you know the player has been cc'd once in the last 15 second window, and will have to evaluate the current situation and decide whether or not you think using your 8 second cc is worth it, knowing it will only last for 4 seconds. If the bar has 2 of 3 blocks filled, you know your 8 second cc is going to last 2 seconds. If the bar has 3 of 3 blocks full and you still decide to cast your stun or cc....well then thats your own fault for wasting your cooldown on an immune player. This would get rid of the guessing game, it would emphasize the need for players to pay attention to the bar instead of rolling their faces over their keyboard and mindlessly running around stunning, cc'ing or even knocking back anything that moves. If for no other reason, it would provide a clear, concise pvp DR mechanic, visible to everyone and would get rid of the currently terrible system that allows someone to be stunned 3-4 times in a row, all for full duration, only to reach full resolve and immunity with 20% HP. What good does immunity to CC really provide if your going to die in the next 3 seconds anyway? You then get to rez with no resolve again, run out, re-engage, only to have the same thing happen 10 more times over the course of the warzone. Also, there is no argument possible for allowing someones resolve bar to reach 100% during a 8 second cc, and to then start draining before the CC has actually ended. Again, the the DR 15 second window, or whatever system hopefully gets implemented, HAS TO START when the actual CC/STUN is applied. On a separate note, please, for the love of god, make interrupts actually mean something. Landing an interrupt on someone is completely useless right now, especially on a healer. Healers have absolutely nothing to worry about right now, and can focus all their time on mashing 2-3 buttons over and over while making sure they are always near their trusty columns or structure to LOS. Bioware did a good job at making sure classes had several schools of magic or spells, i.e., kinetic, energy, etc. This is conducive to allowing interrupts to actually interrupt players chain casting abilities. If I am casting an energy damage based spell, and I get interrupted, I should absolutely not be able to cast another energy spell instantly. Interrupts should lock the target out of whatever school of damage that they were casting, for X amount of seconds, which in my opinion would be 4 seconds. I recognize this is not as simple for locking out healers due my understanding of only one school of healing existing. Even then though, if Bioware did not want to create 2-3 types of healing schools per class to allow them to cast their other school of healing when locked out of another, healers should still have to be cognizant of more than just who doesn't have a full red bar. Even if the majority felt that a 4 second full school lockout was too long, at the very least make interrupts reset the persons GCD. Currently, when I interrupt a healer spam healing 2-3 abilities, they don't even notice they got interrupted, and just continue to spam whatever their next heal was in their "rotation", without a break or pause in between. This causes interrupts to have zero impact on the game. I see a healer casting a critical heal on my low health target, and I quickly switch to the healer (assuming I can't use focus target modifier) and land the "key" interrupt. This actually is a bad decision in most cases, due to the healer not being punished in any way, and continuing to spam heals on the low target, but more so because I instead could have just continued to mash my buttons as well, and probably would have had a better chance at dropping the target by getting an extra 2 casts off in the same time in took for me to swap targets, interrupt, swap back, and start casting again, all while the healer never actually stopped healing, even though they were technically "interrupted". I can empathize with those of you that will say that this is not WoW arena, and that there are just too many people in a warzone that can interrupt a healer and that it would result in healers always being locked out of their heals. However, there is a simple resolution to this fact, which would be to allow DR to also effect lockouts. Very simple, and wouldn't even need a "resolve bar" type of visual system, as interrupts have much shorter cooldowns and can't really be wasted on a DR'd interrupt. If a person is interrupted 3 times in an X second window, each lockout is cut in half, etc., until they are immune to interrupts for however long. This would raise the skill cap of SWTOR PVP by quite a bit and could even allow new (to SWTOR) play styles to develop, such as fake casting, or bait casting a non essential school's ability. I do think that this would ultimately have balance implications, and would likely make most of the melee classes with tons of stuns, grips, charges, knockbacks, etc., coupled with their ridiculous mobility, control, and damage, even stronger, however I think that these are separate issues that both need to be addressed anyway. Just because something is broken or wrong doesn't mean that you should refrain from fixing something else that is broken. Bioware really just needs to fix the major issues, by either implementing new mechanics or updating broken ones, but also by making very simple class balance tweaks more often. Rant Over.

All of you who keep crying about how addons will end up making people be "mean" to you because your dps isn't up to par, the bottom line is that your just bad at the game. The fact that you do not want raid leaders to have the ability to analyze data from their raids just shows how elementary your way of thinking actually is. I spent the majority of my WoW career in US guilds that were competing with the Euro guilds for the #1 spot, so I can admit that my perspective on things is not going to align with 99% of the player base. However, the fact still remains that anyone who is using an argument that they like SWTOR because there is no way to analyze data from raids, just shows that you care less about the progress of your guild and more about whether or not you can be held accountable for crap play. Nobody is forcing you to use addons and if you don't want to be in a guild that holds people accountable, don't join one. Just remember....the guilds who use "Recount" to determine raid spots or anything else are the guilds that your used to playing in. Any guild that has an ounce of intellect will use mods that extract data from the game and can be analyzed at a later time to determine far far more than Recount. The only purpose that Recount serves is for personal accountability, as well as finding out why your tank died. Yes, maybe after that the raid leader will ask the healers why he only got x amount of heals over x amount of time, but understand that is an integral part of raiding. It allows on the fly iteration and helps guilds fix small problems and progress. Instead, you would prefer that you just keep wiping on the same mechanic over and over until you just get lucky enough to get to the next stage? Inexperienced nubs are the only people who will actually argue against addons, but it is because of their inexperience that they do not see the real value, and I guess because of that, can they really be blamed? The debate on macros and addons has become way too black and white, and that is just not the case. Those like myself who argue for addons/macros are doing so because we want the ability to analyze our play and make improvements. Yes, there is a very small percentage of people who would attempt to use them to exploit, and make them play the game for them, but the majority of people just want more options, more customization, and more interesting play. A lot of you argue that something like a boss mod plays the game for you, but you fail to see the real value in a boss mod. Think about playing with no mods and try to envision how little you are able to track, see, and react to. Its just a dumbed down way of playing. Sure, you don't get raid warnings for who has a debuff, or when a certain attack is coming, etc. However without the ability to see every detail, you lose the ability to react to every detail. So, for all the arguments about addons making the game too easy, there are just as many about how the lack of addons makes the game too easy. Instead of having a much more dynamic gameplay, the lack of addons ultimately just allows people to coast through the game, oblivious to all of the little nuances that are actually going on around you. In it's current state, SWTOR does not allow you the ability to really figure out it's mechanics.

The title says it all.... Why is it that I can delete some quests, but not others? My quest log still has quests in it from level 1-20 because I can not delete them. This is annoying mainly due to the fact that you can only have 25 quests at a time. Once you get to higher levels, it becomes nearly impossible to be able to accept every available quest in the area that you are questing in. Some people will say, "Just go do the quests if you want to get rid of them so bad." As dumb of a comment that is, Ill dignify it by saying that if the only way to delete, or get rid of old, reward-free quests is to return to the area and complete them, it will in turn have a very negative impact on the leveling process. Hence, this is why the overwhelming majority of players elect to just "deal" with the abundance of old, useless quests in their inventories. Just remember that most of these old, useless quests are either Heroic +4, or they are quests that are acquired at the end of a zone, typically when you are ready to proceed to the next area. The only real reason that people stay in a zone for a long time is to get enough of the zone's commendations so that they can purchase the purple artifact box.

I can agree with you that not all non-macro users are lazy. I can also agree with you that it is possible that there are some players out there who decide to not use any macros or addons so that they feel more challenged. The issue I have with your comment pertains to this small group of players who don't use macros and/or addons, specifically because they want to challenge themselves. The thing is, these types of players that your referring to, who look for ways to challenge themselves, are far less likely to give a dam about what the person next to them is using for addons/macros. Furthermore, they are also far less likely to come onto the forums and preach about how "unfair" it will be if they get put into the game. The overwhelming majority of the people who come on these forums to talk about why macros/addons are bad, are typically going to use the "unfair advantage" argument. If it's an unfair advantage, then why don't these people just use them? The factual answer is almost never going to be because they'd prefer to challenge themselves, and is instead going to be because they don't know how to, and for whatever reason, are also unwilling to learn or figure it out. This is not to say that it's brain surgery or anything, especially using macros, however, it does at first require some sort of effort to learn how to use them, no matter what amount of each you actually use. They will also try to claim that it makes the game too easy. Simple solution to that would be to not use them, however that isn't a good enough solution for these people. In their minds, if they don't want to use them, nobody else should be able to use them because then they would be at a disadvantage, which they do not like. Hence my point below on how it is literally impossible to claim that you don't like macros because the game becomes too easy, (this would also insinuate that these people would rather be challenged by not using macros/addons) and to also claim that macros provide an unfair advantage to macro/addon users. It is one or the other.....you either don't want addons/macros because you care more about personally challenging yourself or its because you feel that it is an unfair advantage for those that do use them. There is no way that you can actually believe, or make an educated argument based on the claim that you don't want macros because you want more of a challenge, and then in the next sentence say that you also don't want them because its an unfair advantage for people who do use them. It's basically an oxymoron. If you want a bigger challenge, you'd have to at least admit that the added challenge comes from playing without macros/addons while everyone else is using them. I mean, the word challenge itself relates to overcoming obstacles, or "disadvantages." I don't think I need to spell it out any more than this., but if you want a challenge in this scenario, you would need everyone else to be using macros/addons. That is what makes the challenge exist in the first place. Based on all of the above, the whole point that I am making is that the people who actually come on these forums and argue against addons and macros by using the "the game gets too easy" or the "the game just plays itself" excuses, are full of crap. In reality, these people do not want addons and macros because they know they are too stubborn, lazy, or incompetent to do any sort of research, downloading, installing, and customization of addons/macros. In their minds, its just easier and requires far less effort and thinking on their parts if macros and addons are not in the game. This way, they are never put in a situation where they may have to actually use their brains for something other than smashing it into the keyboard.

Be warned....this is a long one The Macro discussion is not as black and white as people are making it out to be. Look at an established game like WoW, where over time, the use of macros has evolved to a state where you can not make a macro that allows you to press 1 button and activate a set number of abilities in a specific or random order. When WoW was a younger game, so were macros, and the result of this was a game that did not have a clearly defined set of rules regarding macros and a number of other things. Bioware has already shown that they are not afraid to take good parts of different MMO's and implement them into SWTOR, and kudos to them for doing so. If your going to develop a new MMO, why would you want to go through an unnecessary evolution where you had to make the same mistakes that have already been made in other games, especially when you could do the complete opposite and actually learn from the mistakes that other MMO's have made. It was very smart of Bioware to put aside any egotistical mindset and utilize the the obvious facts so that they could avoid going through unnecessary "growing phases." Macro's are typically used by any player that likes to be thorough and put in the extra time or effort into their character and game play. As far as macros being bad for the game because it will give some players an advantage; that is completely true. However, it only gives an advantage over players who are too lazy to take the time to put in the effort. Obviously not every player who doesn't use macros is lazy, but the other people who do not use macros are usually too casual to care to begin with, or they are brand new to MMO's and don't understand what macros even are, or what benefits they provide. At one time, every single person was a new player, but over time the majority of people become interested in figuring out other ways to improve their play. Macros can, and have played a big part in that process. People who claim that this is making the game "too easy" or that macros "play the game for you" are either too inexperienced to understand the actual impact of macros, or they are just upset that their own personal ineptitude is going to start to have an even bigger impact on their success rate than it had previously. Macros do not make the game "too easy" .....in fact, its quite the opposite. Understanding how to fully utilize macros isn't a skill that you automatically learn when you play MMO's. With that said, its no secret that almost all of the people arguing against macros coincidentally do not have the slightest clue how to use them. Because they are either incompetent, or just too lazy to put any effort into understanding macros, as well as numerous other areas of the game, it immediately becomes innately easier for them to just stand up and start crying about how unfair it is that people who put in more effort into the game are naturally rewarded, and thus, "gain an advantage". -Typical thought process of macro/addon naysayers- "So I guess what your saying is that putting more effort into something will typically yield in a greater reward versus someone who puts in less effort?" Yes, that is what I am saying. "Um, ya...that sounds totally unfair...We need to make sure that nobody is ever allowed to put time and effort into anything that could potentially put us at a disadvantage, regardless if that disadvantage stems from our own complacency and stubbornness. The only way to do this is to act like a 4 year old and throw a never ending temper tantrum until we get our way. Sounds like a plan.." Learning the mechanics of macros requires actual effort and motivation. Additional effort and motivation are then needed to learn how to implement the right macros specific to your character, spec, and play style. This being the case, it would appear that macros are seldom used so that one could arrange for the game to play itself, and instead, they are most often used by individuals who care more about their ability to customize their own play style; while also allowing the game to become more dynamic. The important thing to remember about the macro discussion is that it all boils down to it's implementation. Sure, if Bioware somehow manages to allow macros that allow you to do ridiculous crap like holding down a single key, permanently, and chain casting a spell over and over, well then yes, it would be a bad thing. However, this highly highly unlikely, and even then, it would literally take a blunder of that magnitude to effectively make macros a bad idea for SWTOR. People on this thread are making comments like, "NO MACROS,... BUT BUT BUT I WANT TO BE ABLE TO MOUSEOVERS HEALS!" What they fail to comprehend is that macros are exactly what allows you to mouse over heal in the first place, assuming your not using add-ons like grid and/or clique. Other examples of why macros are essential would be something like a "stop cast" macro. Being able to instantly stop your current cast so that you can use another ability as quickly as possible can be key. You could also create a simple macro that activates specific on use items, in a specific order, at specific times in your rotation. This will allow you to maximize your damage, while also freeing up more real estate on your bars for more important and more frequently used abilities. The most forgotten benefit from allowing things like macros, addons, etc., is the effect that it has on the games community. Allowing this open source style of customization will directly impact the rate at which the community, and thus popularity of the game expands. Right now, the SWTOR community is a hot mess, compiled of BS websites that do nothing more than tell you basic crap that you knew the moment you started playing. Furthermore, a whole lot of these sites actually think that we should pay them for their amazing advice. In the event that you have the actual patience required to sift through 20 pages of links and find a decent community site, the bottom line is that there really isn't much to discuss right now. Even if a conversation or thread gets popular, ultimately it is nothing more than conjecture due to the fact that there is very little that can actually be proven right now. Theorycrafting and the community go hand and hand, and one can not exist without the other. With that said, neither of them can truly exist without the ability to extract and analyze real game data. Yes, if Bioware allows in-game, non-mod customization of the UI, as well as adding some form of a combat log, it would technically be possible to extract and analyze data, however allowing macros, and for this specific scenario, addons, it would make it much easier, and thus much more likely that the community would begin to collaborate with one another. People who play this game who also have great math skills, or have real life jobs in analytics, etc., are usually great contributors to the community. Before long, people will begin to have real data and results and will share it with the community. In order for that to be possible, new community based websites will take form. Supported data, specific to each class, spec, and build will become much more accessible and this will then begin to fuel the communities desire to theorycraft. New, creative ways of playing each class will be tested and argued about. Different trends, and ideologies will resonate with different types of players, and ultimately will create a much more diverse player base. Slight changes to the game will have a rippling effect across the community, sparking newly, more interested players to take part in discussions around topics that they may have never cared about before. In the end, the undeniable impact that things like macros and addons have on the social aspect of the game will cause it to grow at a much faster pace. Once the game's community has an actual reason to interact with one another, as well as a platform to do so on, the result is a never ending circle of theorycraft and discussion and will ultimately give the game and its player base an identity. While it is completely understandable that Bioware did not allow these things at release, do not allow your complacency, or your current comfort level to fool you into actually believing that the game is better off, period. While you may feel your reasons for having this mind set are just, do your self a favor and think about the entire gaming community. What would games be like today if everyone shared in this same thought process as you do and believed that the less effort required in a game, the better of it is? I think we all know the answer to that question. When your giving your opinion on a specific mechanic of a game, try and base your evaluation and opinion around how it will impact everyone, not just yourself. It is very easy to say "X is bad......I don't think it should be in the game because it effects me in this way", but that is also a very selfish, narrow minded, and elementary way of assessing something. I wish that just one time, no matter how unlikely it is, all of the people who are always so quick to give their simple, non-educated, selfish opinion, would just use 1/100th of their actual brain power to come up with an opinion that is based on an actual insightful and thorough, big picture, thought process. Bottom line here is that both addons and macros are part of most MMO's for a reason. They add more customization and control to your game play. If you are one of the people who refuse to learn more about them, just remember that it is your decision, but in the end you are effectively handicapping yourself due to your unwillingness to conform and adapt to the play style that has become prevalent in every popular MMO. Insert joke(s) about length of post here ->