Cartel Market is KILLING THE GAME

Evaluation:
1. the CM is not in and of itself the issue: it's when it becomes the primary focus and delivery point for game winning (or end game) products that becomes a problem.
2. Many feel as though something has been taken away from the game itself when a person can simply open up their wallet and "buy their way" through the game.
3. Game content is beginning to suffer as a result of too much focus on the CM ? ( I personally don't see this... but for now it could be a point of discussion).
4. Some feel as though gear used in end game should only come from drops that are found in difficult areas to complete.

My own thoughts on end gear is that all too often you do not gain what is needed until it is almost too late .. Or after the fact when too much emphasis is place on pieces being found in instances that require multi-player raid groups to acquire. There really does need to be a balance on this matter.
I personally would not mind if some of the better gear came from drops ... though not necessarily exclusively.
Rare equipment and gear sources have always been an interesting point of discussion, even in the best of MMO's.

There is one thing that I do see personally: aside from the story line, why do we play the game ? I'm not trying to be sarcastic or to incite an argument. Seriously: if there the rewards are weak for the hours of invested game time then people will (and have in MANY games, not just SWTOR) get bored and leave. It's not so much that you can "buy your way" through the game as it is why do this in the first place?
IF there are some "fun things to do" as well as something of interest to be able to discover or a DROP that's REALLY nice.. or EVEN if there were mods to go into the equipment we are using found, earned or dropped that would make things more worth while.
The one thing that some might be trouble about would be if end game material was found exclusively in areas that were difficult to complete or impossible unless in a raiding party.
Again: I'm not taking any particular side on pointing out the matters of both sides to be considered.

From what I've seen thus far it is VERY rare that any drop I get is actually applicable to the character I'm using at the time when I pick up a drop. 90% or BETTER of everything I find or loot is useless. I put it on the GTN or (if it's GREEN) I sell it to a droid, vendor of some sort while in game to prevent taking up unnecessary storage space.

I personally buy mod able gear/weapons (99% of the time on the GTN ... ). Then I begin to grind looking for pieces that have mods that I can remove and place inside of the gear that I have.
I do have a particular look that I prefer for each of my characters... soooo I tend to keep that look through out the story as much as possible (it's mostly about the immersion thing to enjoy the story better for me )
The new KotFE has actually provided a better way to do that. I can grind the assorted weekly heroics (even solo) ... earn the better glowing and radiant data crystals ... buy components for the head, chest legs ... etc, etc, etc .. The strip the mods out and place them into the mod able gear that I prefer to use. I seldom buy mod items on the GTN any more since KotFE has a better system or rewarding for grinding the weekly missions. Besides what some folks charge for purpled mod items level 65 is insane !
It takes a lot of time.. and a few extra in game credits to make it happen. But it's well worth it!

THE CM ?? I guess it just depends on how the individual uses (or for missuses) the system.

You appear to have absolutely zero practical understanding of how MMO development takes place, or any internet based development for that matter.

For the record.. the part of the studio working on CM content =/= the part of the studio working on patch content updates. They (the studio) have stated this many times, and it makes complete and logical sense, so there is no reason to doubt the studio on this.

Yet people like you fluff over it and double down on your "we must stop supporting this game in order to force them to change" nonsense. Again.. the CM is not the boogey man here, nor is it killing the game in any way. In fact it has helped keep the game open and running.

Now.. issues some people have with claiming there is no content added to the game except for CM is complete hyperbole.. and you know it. I get if some people are upset that the game is not getting enough of their favorite pet content segment.... and for them.. it's a valid issue. But to circulate the issue in the context of the CM being evil and destroying the game is complete fantasy.

Like so many people these days, you want to shoot the dog because the cat has been bad to you.

Sincere question... since you hate the direction the studio is taking the game, and you believe that we as players must stop funding them until they change... WHY are you still a subscriber and playing this game??????????

IMO, you throw hand grenades at the studio, yet deflect any personal accountability for your feelings about the game being incongruent with your insistence that we all stop giving them $$. Walk your talk man. If you don't enjoy the game, then don't pay and don't play. Why play something you detest so much?

Contrary to popular opinion CM isn't killing the game though the way it's handled is making people unhappy.

The main issue being the money gamble. The CM tokens used to mitigate the issue. Guess they have been removed because the stats proved people are buying more crates to get the items they want that way.
=> Mitigate or remove some of the randomness/very low drop rates and you see people complaining much less.

Now we have to agree on the time spent on CM isn't spend elsewhere.
First I seriously doubt selling existing assets (decos, mounts, pets...) takes that much development effort. Then slightly editing alpha channels on textures or eventually tweaking textures or even meshes isn't that much of an effort either.
So in the end the time spent on new content, QoL or bug fixes vs CM would be very marginal.

Top to that that the ROI on the CM is most certainly the highest they have in SWTOR. Mix that with the fact you don't need huge resources to add stuff to the CM and you have a good picture of the situation.

So as a producer, you can either keep having a small team working on the CM with a small budget and having players spending hundreds of thousands $ a month or marginally improve the game instead in the hope you'll bring more subs.

Consider that each time a player buys a supercrate he's almost paying another subscription on opt of his. Now some players are buying much more than one Hypercrate a month, ie: like they are subbing for many others characters.

In short you want to encourage the CM and the crates, although I would advise to make it less seen as a cash grab and a casino game. Which BTW is illegal in my country

A break from the game is generally good when you start becoming too embittered towards it. It gets me that people seem to forget that they have the choice available at all times.

While it's true no one knows the operational budget for the company (and they certainly would never want players to know), there are ways to get an idea of how much money they rake in from the CM. Just get to know a few of the CM "whales", followed by a good guess as to how many whales are in the game. That's not counting the money from subs throughout the year or direct CM CC purchases.

If you refuse to consider anything to be a valid critique without a figure from Bioware, then I guess none of us will know anything for sure, and you'll be stuck with only Bioware's version of any narrative.

If that's the way you wanna roll, fine, but your assertion that they're setting operational goals based on a reasonable budget/profit margin is no less an assumption the other way.

Exactly. Playing SWTOR is completely voluntary on the part of the player.

It is a lot healthier to step back for a bit and take a break when frustrated or upset instead of doubling down on one's frustrations and anger.

But some people simply want their pound of flesh when upset and will take it anyway they can. And of course misery loves company.. hence threads like this are ripe for a pile-on by the self-disaffected.

I never said stop funding SWToR as a whole, if I did then unsubscribing would make sense. I specifically said stop supporting the CM...Which would mean still paying for a Sub, which I do (Month to Month).

If I feel like playing some Star Wars I sub.....

Would I like to see the game improve, gain depth in its systems and see those systems interact with each other meaningfully....Yes I would!

Since I clearly care about this game enough to argue for it's future (regardless if I'm on or off base) why would I pull all support?

Do I think the CM has it's place...sure.

Do I think the CM should be the primary focus of every update and Bioware conversation I see or read...Nope.

Do I believe that Bioware has placed an equal amount of staff and resources to each aspect of the game..Raid, PvP, Single player, Crafting and the CM just because they have said they do? Not at all, I dont see results that indicate that is accurate.

I started my SWToR account in March of 2009.....I was in all phases of the beta and sat up until 1am the first night of early start to tag the names I wanted on the server Rakata Mind Prison, which was a roll over from beta... Trust me when I say I care what happens to this game.

SWToR has potential to be so much more than it is and I'm disappointed the Bioware team has done so little to improve game systems.

If I think the CM is getting in the way of this game becoming what it could be, you bet I'm going to attack it.

You do know that the chart you posted doesn't say a thing about lost subs to WoW. It just stated the amount of time people are playing the game. Time dropped from playing a game might not have anything at all to do with subs. I don't play SWToR everday.

Heck I have taken months off but kept my sub running. Does that mean SWToR lost my sub because I was not playing? No it just means less hours played. Which is what your link says in the artical.

If your going to use statistical facts please use the right ones.

just my two cents

tbh i would prefer to do some kind of daily to get some form of tokens to buy cartel items as i dont like the idea of real money for ingame items never here and never will

CM sucks because all the cool cosmetic stuff is from there. Some of it you can purchase straight up, but the really awesome stuff is an extremely rare drop from a pack. BW's way of making it obtainable in game is spending in game credits that gets transferred to another player, which doesn't even help the IG economy. My entire guild quit after we geared out mains in 224's. There is literally nothing else to do besides craft and run FP's and ops we have done 1000 times. I wish BW would come out with some awesome looking sets for each advanced class that would take a while to earn with tokens and massive credit sinks. I sit on a fully geared 224 character, a veteran player, with nothing to do.