First, excuse my English if you find it hard to read. It is after all, my second language

Thoughts: about the game as a whole

First of all, let me just say that I feel a lot of features of this game are great, but also counter-productive--or at least, they are not cost-effective, and I don't see them making sense.

Let's talk about the game itself. I still think that Bioware would be better off making Kotor 3. There are 8 different stories in this game, and I don't think the majority of players will create 8 alts to experience them all. I would create a few alts, but 8 is way too many at least for now. Story is, of course, an awesome part of this game; however, it's sad that most people can only experience less than a fourth, or even less than an eighth of this greatest feature of the game.

There was so much investment, both money and time, into the storyline and voice acting. However, most people--if not all--can only experience a fraction of this feature. Isn't this sad? Is it cost effective?

It's my opinion; the game is out, the money and time is sunk cost. However, there is surely a lot to think before pouring this kind of investment into an MMO, or any game.

Let's just imagine a Kotor 3 game following SWTOR's Jedi Knight storyline.

First it would cost less;

The story could be more polished, and will be more dynamic because it's no longer MMO (option to kill companion will definitely be back at least);

There could be fewer bugs; even if bugged, it would be less of an issue because the player can load the game;

The several "versions" of the JK: Guardian, sentinel and consular, could be more fun to play because Bioware no longer has to worry about balancing: like mass effect 2's six classes, they are not balanced but all of them are a lot of fun;

They could add physical effects--even simple effects like in Dragon Age 2 will add something to the game;

Also we could probably play a better polished Dragon Age 2 instead of Bioware trying to redeem it with Legacy and MotA, etc etc.

Of course, SWTOR allows us to experience the old republic era from 8 different angles. For that, I thank you. However, whether it's worth it is still up to debate. I myself would definitely enjoy a polished Kotor 3 more, especially if it has a new combat engine and good physical system.

Thoughts: story as a 'sip test'

First, on T-Nation, Chris Shugart has a great article on sip test, and I think SWTOR is currently suffering from this sip test problem.

The article is here: http://velocity.t-nation.com/free_online_forum/diet_blog_hammer_velocity_shugart/beware_the_sip_test

While the great experience from level 1-49 is surely a sip that tastes quite good, this part can only net you $60 (or $70/150 depending on the edition) per player. Some more if the said players level up slowly, or are willing to experience a few alts.

The thing that builds up a MMO king like WoW, is certainly the whole can of coke: endgame. Surely, Bioware knows its stuff and the sip has been great. But what about the can? Lucasarts, Bioware and EA invested so much into the sip, knowing that the can is going to be average at best: after all, Bioware is an MMO rookie, and Mythic made some very bad decision in its MMOs before. This doesn't make any sense to me.

The bad experience of the can will affect another sip, another can, and another drink. If a Jedi Knight has bad endgame experience, chances are that he's going to quit instead of playing another story, which could be great. Again, this is not cost effective...

This is a sensitive time for Bioware. Dragon Age Origin's DLCs are rushed, Dragon Age 2 has been a let down, if SWTOR becomes a laughing stock, Mass Effect 3 and Dragon Age 3 are going to suffer. If they are awesome games they could restore Bioware's reputation, but c'mon, using Bioware's trump cards to restore reputation? It is, again, not cost effective for either EA or Bioware.

Anyways, the 1-49 part is great. However, in order for the game's investment to make sense, Bioware must keep the endgame high-quality, and this is currently not the case.

This brings back the first point: Bioware is better off making Kotor 3.

This also brings up my first suggestion:

Suggestion: Let's enjoy the sip some more, shall we?

Here's the thing. This is a story driven MMO. So why is there no story in the endgame?

Why is so much investment, so much story and voice acting dumped into the sip, while we can get none of this better part of the game in endgame?

Why can't we experience the class story again as a level 50 character? We can do that in both mass effect games. In many single player games, we can continue to play most features after beating the game. In pokemon games, in TES series, in diablo and many other games.

In pokemon, the main focus after beating the game is either to breed pokemon for wifi battles or to collect all pokemons--yet we can still fight the Elite 4 whenever we like it.

In Diablo 2, after beating the game the main focus is gear, but that doesn't mean we can't enjoy a good thrashing with Baal. Why is it that after leveling up to level 50 and beating the final story boss, we can only chill out in the fleet?

This is actually the main reason why I left WoW. The only thing to do after hitting max level is to chill out in Stormwind waiting for whatever queue to pop or waiting for the guild master to add me to the raid.

My suggestion: add an option to obtain the class story quests again as a level 50 character. All 'instanced' mobs should be scaled to level 50. Quests could allow different choices from the original play through. Quest could offer tokens for PvE gears, consumables, materials or etc. Finishing the whole class quest line for a second time could offer an epic main hand weapon, like vanilla wow's Rhok'delar or Benediction.

Even better: the epic weapon's model should be customizable. We should be able to customize the lightsaber's hilt, its color, what the gun looks like and etc. Though this might be wishful thinking on my part.

We could also have a hard mode of the class quests or let them become dalies, or weeklies. At least it's going to be better than Ilum dailies. At least for me, this will be gold for at least ten times:

Jedi Knight's Taris arc is just as good.

Thoughts: Companion system

I understand that using companions in endgame PvE and PvP could cause trouble because AI is not that smart. However, again, endgame is the major part of an MMO, and if companions is completely useless in endgame, then it's again a sip test issue.

More reason to add lvl50 storyline, apparently.

Another problem is the affection system. Companion quests unlock at certain affection levels, but getting affection is difficult, and there is no incentives for players to buy gifts for unused companions to unlock their story. This is, again, not cost effective. Bioware designed companion story for every companion, but how much is unlocked? Maybe LIs only for most people.

Suggestion: make gaining affection for unused companions easier, or add incentives for players to buy gifts, gain affection and unlock companion story.

For example: make it so that you can always ask if your companion is willing to share more of his or her story. If you don't have enough affection, inform the player "Affection: failure" and let the companion say that he/she does not wish to share more; or if you have to advance into the next act, inform the player "you have to advance in your story further".

Thoughts and Suggestion: World PvP

Why do we need the Ilum PvP zone is beyond me. There are great examples of world PvP before. I heard DAOC has great world PvP, but unfortunately I haven't played it, so I cannot really talk about it. In my eyes, great world PvP is vanilla WoW's Tarren Mill vs Southshore, it's Blackrock mountain, Felwood, Silithus, Sorrow Hill and Tyr's Hand.

Are they dedicated PvP zones? Apparently not. I believe flying mounts killed WoW's world PvP, as well as class balance issues because blizzard had to balance PvP around the arena. Also LFD system is another world-pvp-killer. SWTOR has neither issues. It has the potential to create another Tarren Mill vs Southshore, another Blackrock mountain or Sorrow Hill. However, it did not live up to this potential.

All we need is several places, reasons for people to get together and fight. Token reward is all that's needed. Let's say, 20 valor and 3 merc commendation per kill (on average. Solo kill could offer more, while group kill should spread the reward between players. This is also an issue with Ilum. If 100 imps roflstomp 1 rep, each get (20+180)/100=2 valor, it will not be that disastrous, and people are at least more encouraged to roll the underdog faction). Instead of farming valor, people should PvP for fun and for pride.

Suggestion:

Why people gather at Blackrock mountain? Because it's the entrance to five instances, two of them are raids--WotLK and Cata's LFD system was certainly bad for world PvP, but so is TOR, where every flashpoint's entrance is on the fleet;

Why Tyr's Hand? Because it's a good source of gold, and gold is both scarce and useful in WoW--compare to SWTOR, where players have 300k credit and don't know where to spend;

Why people gather at Felwood? Because it offers consumables essential to endgame, both PvE and PvP;

Why Silithus? Because the repeatable quests there either give good gear or are prerequisites to good gear--compare to Cataclysm and SWTOR, where 'welfare' gear is too easy to get, dailies are boring and overlooked;

Why Sorrow Hill? Because plaguelands have good resources, and collectable resources are scarce, essential, often contains extra rewards, and must be gathered--compared to TOR's crew skill system, which, while having its own merits, doesn't lead to resource conflict and world PvP; plus two instance entrances.

Why Tarren Mill vs Southshore? First, faction pride; secondly, they are very close together. In TOR, opposite factions rarely quest in the same place, some maps are way too big: Tatooine and Hoth, opposite faction towns are far away from each other, and since you can create alts of both factions on the same server even if it's a PvP server, killing faction pride.

Fixing Ilum up and down is NOT going to fix world PvP, because it's NOT world PvP. Forget about Ilum, how about ... getting something above?

To be continued...

Suggestion: server economy

A good server economy is a must have. There are several problems here:

1) Players earn credits too easily and don't have enough ways to spend credits.

Players don't really spend credits at GTN; it's just credits from one player to another. We need the system to recycle credit; otherwise there will just be inflation even if we have a healthy GTN auction system. Also, a good place to earn credits is a good place for world PvP.

2) Crafting system needs some work. I don't think the current system that allows only one crafting skill is a good system, because it discourages the auction market. There should be the flow of raw materials to keep the market healthy. Also, some good mats should need raw materials from other crew skills.

Suggestions:

Players should be able to spend more credits. Some examples: space combat could offer some more rewards, but players would need to repair the ship and continue to upgrade ship items; add a credit cost to crafting; vanity items that cost credits and etc.

Suggestion: on expertise and gear progression

The whole idea is confusing.

In PvE, we want there to be active gear progression, we want gear checks, and we don't want undergeared people to pass through content; we want certain bosses to be impossible without a certain level of gear. We want the gear progression curve to be flat, or even concave up.

In PvP it's different. Losing with no chance of winning is frustrating, roflstomping is boring. 10-49 PvP is much more fun because gear has less impact. Same in WoW, I had the most fun doing Alterac Valley between level 70-74, because everyone is in Season 4 PvP gear. So we want the gear progression curve to be preferably concave down, flat at most. Surely we still want people to progress to better gear, but better gear should only be marginally better, and gear progression should mostly be for vanity.

Yet at the same time, we want the PvP gear to be about 10% better than the same tier PvE gear.

Current expertise system doesn't promote that.

Maybe what we actually need is a 'PvE stat' that increases PvE items' usefulness in operations.

The game and the story are good, Id even go as far as saying great. End game is still lacking and PvP well... its kinda a joke !

Im on one of the most populated PvP servers (Bloodworth) and trust me once you hit 50 forget it. Illum is dead, all the other faction wants to do is flip for objectives, or.. there are no other faction and you spend hours just waiting around.

Huttball is so disturbing now, we've had guildies leave and swap servers because they are getting the same WZ time after time.

I can honestly say I havent played Alderaan in 3 days now ! (thats taking the p*** in my book) We should be able to choose any WZ we want. I know players (many) myself included who would happily wait 10, 15.. 20 mins if they knew they could play a certain WZ.

This games was in production now for what... over half a decade ? Thigs like this should have been noticed and acted on before it even came close to release !

I like you, wanna make out?

Seriously though, great post. These are exactly the reason world PvP was so prosperous in WoW. Especially how it used to be where we would all run to the instances. Blizzard has spoiled the MMO community by giving them insta queue everything. Nobody wants to look for groups anymore, let alone run to the flashpoint. I'll probably be trolled for bringing up such rediculous ideas, but hey.. It's the truth! I'm not sure that with what Blizzard has done, the community is motivated to do things the old fashioned way? That and this ADD infested generation with 2 second attention spans.

That being said, I feel like world PvP wont be an option unless they come up with something great. Which is highly disappointing. I did however, see my first imperial the other night, on Hoth! He just ran away into his instanced class area... Such disappointment.

Edit: if we get flying mounts in this game, me and my guildies are quitting.

reserved.

(Also, shamelessly, bump)

but I promise to write something after dinner!