Hook us up with some dual spec.

This.

Seems to me anyone who doesn't want dual spec are against simply because WoW has them. Get over yourself TOR plays practically the same as WoW.

Actually, we don't want it because we enjoy having a community that is expected to play the game. Not one that is expecting to have everything handed to them on a silver platter because they cry.

Dual Spec is needed.

Have you ever played an MMO at endgame with no dual spec? It's a mess that has nothing to do with gameplay or immersion.

Why?

- Most players play dps. It's just a fact of life. Tanks and healers are fewer and farther between for the simple fact that they have the most crucial roles and most people do not want to deal with the stress that brings.

- At endgame, that natural bias towards DPS leads to very limited opportunities to experience endgame content for most of the player base. WoW, EQ and a zillion other MMOs have proven time and again that if you structure less flexibility into the spec'ing system, you get a raiding population of around 1% - 10% at most.

- PVP vs. PVE. If you have a talent tree structure that puts PVE talents into competition with PVP talents, it hurts both ends of the game. Nobody wants to go into PVP spec'd as PVE and get owned because they had the wrong talent choices. Nobody wants to (or will be allowed to) hold their PVE raid team back because they are doing less output in their PVP spec. (Note that you could solve this by combining those talents together so there is no choice between PVE and PVP, but then why have talent trees at all? Frankly I'm among the "why have talent trees at all" crowd - they just lead to cookie cutter specs - and like where Blizzard has decided to go for Mists of Pandaria)

- Once people have a "main" they are often attached to that character's story. This is likely to be particularly pronounced in SWTOR because it's a next generation story based MMO. Rather than reroll, many players will simply hold onto their main until they get frustrated enough to quit. Those that do hold onto their main often become bitter little pills that spread that bitterness in their guild and server. It's not pretty.

I fully recommend allowing 4 specs - two in each AC. These should be purchasable for a large amount of credits. For those who don't like it, I strongly recommend a RP server.

Pros: Healers and tanks are no longer burdened to use less ideal specs while leveling.

Everyone will have an easier time finding groups, since it will increase the amount of available healers and tanks.

Players can now have a PvP friendly spec, and a PvE friendly spec, increasing the likelyhood players will PvP, reducing queue times.


Cons:
Ruins the community because... WoW did it, and... players no longer have to make friends with every decent healer/tank they meet in order to party... and guilds won't necessarily have to keep terrible healers and tanks anymore, because more decent players will be able to switch roles based on what is currently needed.


Did I miss anything?

They've already stated Dual spec is coming OP, the thread is unnecessary.

Expect it a month or two after launch. They wanted it in at launch, but didn't have the time.

"Seems to me"? I didn't play wow more than 3 months at launch and my opinion had nothing to do with wow. Quit justifying what YOU want by creating strawmen.

Yeah, you did... a valid point.

"WoW did it" is not a cause for ruining the community. Secondly, you still can and should friend every decent tank/healer you meet, because they will still be rare with Dual spec. Dual spec doesn't change that. The only thing it does is allow those tanks and healers to level faster or PvP more often.

And why should guilds keep terrible healers and tanks? They're only terrible if they refuse to learn... and if they refuse to learn, then they are a BANE to the community, not a BOON.

I'm not sure if you were being sarcastic here, but I strongly disagree with this statement. WoW had a wonderful community. What destroyed that community was crosserver grouping in LFD. It took a good long while for standards to erode, but fast forward nearly 3 years later and they have. People now routinely do things in LFD groups that would have gotten you blacklisted on a server prior to 3.2 (when LFD launched). The lack of accountability and lack of need to group up on a server has led to this, not dual spec. Add in a swing back to harder instances in Cata after Wrath's easier instances, and it was an absolute disaster.

Dual spec was a godsend and allowed more people into endgame content.

LFD was the chocolate covered poison pill that killed WoW's community.

Bioware doesn't need to copy dual spec but should do something about the annoyance of respeccing for hybrid classes. I'd love to see something entirely different.

Why not just let players modify spec whenever they are out of combat. Or maybe link spec with companions so I can switch specs depending on who I have summoned. I dunno what would work best but there's got to be a better way.