ETA on Advanced Class change?

your just trying to ruin it for everyone else with this class change nonesense

I have a feeling that old quote by Daniel Erickson will haunt this thread to the very end. I'll put a link here --> What the Dev's currently consider to be classes in the hope that you can understand where the division is between one games definition of 'class' and 'advanced class' lies.

But you are not allowing for the number of 'Bad Players' that could become 'Good Players' because they get to swap to an Advanced Class with mechanics they enjoy playing. Besides which 'X' and 'Y' are unknowable, for all we know 'X' could be fixed, and 'Y' could be lowered to <1% if you take the time to explain things to them.

PUGs tend to imply a certain amount of inconvenience. This doesn't increase nor decrease this inconvenience to any significant level. Although it is encouraging to see you think the demand for such an AC function is so high as to have such a dramatic impact.

It's nice to know we agree on some things, and I didn't directly quote it but thanks for sharing your play style and hours spent, pretty similar to my own

I am familiar with the holonet page. Those "classes" on that page are the story lines, the base classes. If you click on any of those bas classes, you will see the AC's available. There are even descriptions of the skill trees and the types of roles performed by that AC. That holonet page does not contradict the last statements by the devs that AC's are fundamentally different class designs and are different classes in their eyes. In fact, the holonet page now even includes more concise information pertaining to the different AC's. almost as if they wanted to make it clearer that they are different classes while still maintaining the story line distinctions. Was this their intent when they redesigned the holonet page? I do not know. I do know that the holonet page was redesigned, though.


Those "bad players" COULD become "good players" if they played the other class, true. The option already exists in game for them to do just that, though. They can level that other class.

Allowing those "bad players" to change their class will NOT instantly make them "good players". Leveling that other class will give those players time to learn the new class either solo, or while grouping with people of similar level who are likely learning their own class. Allowing class changes, especially at max level, would be to allow those players to possibly burden the players who are already familiar with their own class with a player who is "learning the ropes" of a new class.



I recognize that with over 500,000 players, if even 20% of those players change class the number of players changing class would be over 100,000, a significant number, even if 20% is a minority. We cannot know what the actual percentage of players who would change class would be, and I hope we never have to find out.

You're welcome.

Actually some of the Storylines assume you are an advanced class you are not. I remember one of the companions of my Operative refere to my ability to oneshot kill people... its a vivid memory because i picked the class especially because i liked the idea of knifing people.

And i remember parts of the consular story where my Shadow would constantly use the force to heal people. I suppose thats nice, but it always made me wonder why i couldn't just heal people regularily. If the class would have gotten 1 heal, no matter how ineffective it would be, it actually would make sense. (And year i realize you get one at level 50.. and arguebly the current version of combat technique and harnessed shadows include selfheals)

My Sorcerer was sometimes threated like an assassin.... so no i don't see the problem with changing Advanced classes. Its overdue.

Matter of fact i think it should be part of the regular respec. You go to the respec guy and he rests your class choice on top of it. I feel like it takes till like level 35ish until the advanced classes developed all their identity and i always disliked reaching that point, having spend to much time into that character, possibly worked on crewskills and all that... and then suddenly realizing that i am not happy with the role my char is playing.

I would be opposed to the idea of changing the class. But advanced spec? Why should that bother anyone? If anything you could even try out how you like a certain type of advanced class at high level, before you commit to it. Instead of having to spend weeks going through a painful grind, to get to 50 again, and finding out you actually liked it the other way around, more.

I am not the type of guy that likes going through the same content over and over again. And its painful enough to go through the same generic quests, aside from class story missions, i have gone through with 3 other characters already, with barely any change to it. Thats no fun for me.

And i would gladly pay in order not to have to go through that a 5th time, just to try out a different version of the char i already played.

And i would never go into a PUG with a freshly swapped AC, but rather go to a level appropriate content and kill some stuff for a while, until i understood the class i am playing.

You make it sound like there are no people 'learning the ropes' in the high level areas. Many people level to 50 without ever doing any flash points, or heroics. Many people don't even use interrupts or stuns. And i cannot imagine anyone that spends real money to change an AC, would jump right into content which effects anyone else but themselves, until they familiarized themselves with the class.

You can in this game reach max level by being 'pulled' through content by your high level friends. As soon as you have access to your ship, some level 55 friend of yours can farm you through red level heroics all day long, getting you insane exp, without you even having to lift a finger or know how to play the game.

These people will always exist, forcing people to 'roll an alt'.. is just stupid.

I would like to point out that in the time this thread alone has existed, almost everyone of those players desiring to change their class could have actually leveled the new class and could already be well into gearing that new character.

So, should we allow the player who doesn't want to level the new alt to just throw money at BW to be able to create a max level character, one with BIS gear and all companions at max affection and all companion unlocks?

There is no such thing as ADVANCED SPEC, so you cannot change advanced spec. It is your advanced CLASS, which according to the devs is a different class than the alternate advanced class. That would make changing AC's changing your CLASS.

Yes but look at the amount of information the Class is given Bounty Hunter compared to the two Advanced classes of Mercenary or Powertech.
It shows how the core experience is centred on the selection of the class (as it contains the story, companions and general feel) compared to a secondary stage of specialisation based on an arbitrary division of abilities and skills as covered by the Advanced Class.

I must admit it's been some time since I ventured near the Holonet, didn't the old version give the full spec trees?

I just thought about this and I would think that it could likely be even worse than that. If you change your class from a commando to a vanguard, you are no longer a commando and so lose access to all commando skills, in essence you forget them. When you become a vanguard, you must pay to learn all the new skills. If you switch back, you would forget the vanguard skills. I would expect that you would have to pay to learn the commando skills that you forgot when you changed to vanguard.


This would be in line with a mechanic already in game. If you change your crew skills, your level in the crew skill that you drop would be reset to 0, and you forget all recipes you had learned. If you ever change back to the original crew skill, you must level it again and relearn all those recipes you forgot.

It depends if the players spend time they could be playing SWTOR here instead. But I only frequent the forums when I can't play the game.

Why not? What's it to you? Jealous, because you didn't have the option? You rather have them waste their time in lowlevels, where they learn NOTHING about operations, instead of spending their time actually learning how their character works at max level?

And now please just go ahead and tell me that the use of your abilities and way you play your class isn't wastly different from level 10, 30 or 50... or 55.

Taking your level 55 and going to Makeb and beating some solo dailies until you are comfortable with your character is much more useful in learning that character, than leveling up, once more, through all the boring content, huge timesinks and the same boring quests, only to have your level couple abilities change things around anyway.

And i can tell you my Sorcerer, Shadow and Operative all play a lot different from the way they played before level 30.. or even 50. Getting Battlereadiness on level 50 changed the way i fought with my Shadow completely. Nothing could prepare me for that. And the importance of Interrupts doesn't even come into play before level 40ish, when strong and elites use more and more windup attacks. Something you don't really see before that point.

I don't believe you learn that much from leveling up your character, since you are constantly reaching milestones that completely change the way you approach things.

*roll eyes* Jawohl mein Herr, i sall promptly improve my terminology. It shall not happen again.