This game badly needs mods and macros.

I sorely underestimated just how poor the UI would turn out. It is so uncustomizable it isn't funny. Health bars, buffs, debuffs, and the power bar are all WAY too small. You can't move or resize anything, I HATE having the chat box up the top.

Not having a damage meter or even a freaking combat log is ridiculous. Why shouldn't we even know how much damage we're doing? I want to know what the best rotation is for my character and I have absolutely no way of working that out.

Macros are a staple in every MMO, how can you just not have them? There's a nice focus target but it's practically useless without focus macros.

These should be top priority for the next patch.

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Can the title of the thread be changed to something other than "badly needs mods and macros"? The discussion is more about wanting it than needing it.

mouseover function yes ..
Since equels key binding anyway .

say or yell or raid warning functions yes .

Macro that automates game play , making 4 button click in 1 second NO
It doesn´t equel the playground with those who are not gifted in macro functions.
Sorry you want people to play a game , then all should learn to play .

Not some freaks who have beter scripting skills then the rest .
But can´t even be bothered to learn the game properly .

I never realized there was so much hate for macros there was. I think people misunderstand what you can actually do with them.

I've been healing 8-man operations lately and will estimate that I switch targets about once every 4 seconds (a lot more during combat, a lot less out of combat). This amounts to over 2500 unnecessary clicks in a 3-hour raid.

I've been healing in MMOs for years and now that I'm getting a little older, my fingers actually hurt after one of these sessions. I have to click a mouse for my job and notice the next day if I do a lot of swtor healing the night before.

I try not to worry or think about the effect all my MMO playing might have on the long-term health of my fingers, but cutting out 2500+ clicks a night can only help.

Addons: Not really needed. We're getting a combat log and the ability to change up our UI, that's all we really need honestly.

Macros: On the fence. We would need to severely limit what they can do. A savvy macro user can do many things with just a few lines of code. While I know many players can't or won't do such things, it still doesn't detract what a knowledgeable person is capable of. Some people claim macros don't play the game for you, but I'd wager they haven't seen what macros enable those who know what they're doing.
(I hate using it as a reference, but many/most of us know how the system works there) WoW has a very sloppy macro system that does indeed allow people, who know how to write macros at a much higher level than most players, almost bot the game for them. The only thing these players are actually doing, is making sure they target the right mobs and right players, almost everything else is done by using a macro.

It's disgraceful at the level of UI customization in this game. Addons should be added to the game, but more importantly, macros need to be added to the game. Even a simplistic game like SWG had macro support.

/signed and double signed for UI modification. Learn a lesson from Rift (the one thing they absolutely did right). There you can mod your UI like a boss without the need for an external mod.

This is not quite right. The jobs macros can do have been severly cut back over the years and the biggest problems that still remain is the combination of macros and some special HARDWARE that can line up macros or that you can program macrolike to do ingame stuff (which, btw, works with SWTOR, too...). As long as you can't do a rotation by hitting a single button, as it is possible in Rift, we are most likely fine.
My main use for macros is to set up one key with 3 different skills that I can activate by holding shift or ctrl before pressing the key. This way I can have 24 skills on 8 buttons which really puts less strain on my hands and makes playing more comfortable. Another use for me is @Focus and @Mouseover, which i mainly use for interrupting the right target without switching to it first and healing.
As long i could use these functions in SWTOR, I'd be very happy.

One of the things I liked most about WoW was that there was the endless ability to edit your HUD due to user generated content. This actually helped the Devs out in the long run, as they could see over time how people liked their HUD setup, and what people really needed. This greatly assisted the games ability to expand, as people did not feel locked into one way of doing things (Healbot anyone).

I know that generating an add-on framework at this stage of development is a daunting task, however I feel as tho it will greatly help the lure of this game. I for one crave customization of my gaming interface, and I know that there are a great many people who do. I acknowledge that work is being done, however the ability to have UI scaling as well as interface object placement, is just the tip of the iceberg. In order to make many of the people who play this game, many of them coming from WoW. the ability to create custom interface elements is vital.