Oh really? So I wait and get the color I want for what? 10 million in game credits that can only be used ONCE. One single lousy time on one piece of armor. Then I have to shell over more for another of the "popular" colors. If you don't understand this by now I am not going to try and convince you any more why this is a piss poor system.

 

But yeah just go ahead and keep on defending this nonsense.

The funny thing is... this is actually a good system in that it allows for credits to move around in the economy. There's not really any major credit sinks in the game and in most games, you need to have credit sinks. Despite what people think, credit sinks are necessary, and therefore consumables are necessary.

Dyes are simply a new credit sink and is actually one of the friendlier ones since you control if and when you spend your money on it... Whereas repair bills, flight points, medpacs, one-time use stims and adrenals are all heavily on the non-friendly side. Those you pretty much have to pony up if you do content that needs it. Dyes... are a choice.

Look at it this way. You buy paint, you paint your room. That paint is used up. Can you really scrape it off and bring it to a new place and reapply it? No... conceptually dyes are the same way. I'm sure this won't make you feel better, nor convince you otherwise, but it's the nature of the beast. Give it a week or two and the dye costs will come down and won't cost 10 million credits. And if you're willing to pay 10 million credits on a dye pack that you KNOW is a consumable.. then you chose poorly.

Yes how dare we compare to OTHER games who have infinitely better systems such as the dye system. How dare we demand something equal or better than what is out there already. We should just be so damn grateful when we are milked like cows.

 

Why do I get the feeling you either work for them or gain something from them and that is why you defend all this nonsense.

Oh, they definitely could do better by copying some things from other games. During game test and shortly after release, I was a vocal proponent of group finder. IMO they're idiots for not copying the right features from good games.

However, there's a difference between what I THINK they should do and what they DO do.

They've started to communicate a bit better now and they've established a pattern of action that enables me to easily predict what they will do, which I use to set my own expectations.

Maybe I work for them, maybe I don't. I clearly stick it to the developers, the game, and the community management when I feel they deserve it.

In this case, though, they don't deserve a bit of the ire they're getting. They haven't acted contrary to the words they used to set expectations and they haven't acted contrary to their past actions. They are perfectly in line with the expectations they've set since f2p.

I agree that subscribers should NEVER EVER have to pay extra for basic content. Since Cathar are now a playable species that constitutes content in my view. I don't mind paying extra for cosmetic items, like armor, mounts, etc., but to charge subscribers to access new content is OBSCENE, cynical and greedy.

I plan to IGNORE patch 2.1 altogether. I will not spend a single cartel coin, not even the ones I get for free, on any of it. If BW comes to its senses and makes this content available to subscribers free of additional charge, then and only then will I bother.

As it is, I shall be watching future patches. If there are ANY further patches like 2.1, I will cancel my subscription. Why should I pay $15 a month essentially for: additional action bars, access to operations and 500 free cartel coins each month, when spending $15 on cartel coins will buy me access to content currently not available to me, despite my monthly fee.

Bioware you really shat all over subcribers with this one. Don't repeat it or you will see subscriptions disappear. Maybe you can support SWTOR without the 500k subscribers or so, but I doubt it.

I plan to IGNORE patch 2.1 altogether. I will not spend a single cartel coin, not even the ones I get for free, on any of it. If BW comes to its senses and makes this content available to subscribers free of additional charge, then and only then will I bother.

Then welcome to the land of Never Bother.

Remember that BW will have medics/data that we don't and I'd be willing to bet that most subscribers are hoarding their CCs, hence the use of them in the appearance changer (I'd imagine).

It's also worth pointing out that appearance change in WoW is around £10 (or it was when I played it) for subscribers.

Yes but why the hell can't they just put the hairstyles in? Is it too much to ask? I'm not a designer or anything of the sort but I'd bet on the fact that implementing hairstyles into the game isn't much of a task. There's no need to charge us with cartel coins. Just put it in!

I don't know if someone already commented on this, but your statement that you think implementing 3d models in a video game isn't much of a task would be incorrect. To make a 3D object, and add it to many forms and make it fit those forms without too much clipping is not really a simple task. To make all the hair textures for new hairstyles for instance, and have some 30 texture maps that fit the hair, isn't a simple hue change. To model the vertices and make them work for fat or thin characters isn't the same either. They need a new texture for black hair, and then another for black hair for body type 2, and another for body type 3, and then another for type 4.

Many games shortcut these things by stretching textures, or shifting hues and calling that a day. These shortcuts look horrible. The textures are pixelated or distorted, or single hued without having dimension. To fix that, you Need the different textures per model.

You also need texture sets per resolution change. If a game has three detail levels, there are three textures per color etc. So just for one hair model, with three resolutions, 15 haircolors (without the color pack), and 4 body types, you'd end up with 180 texture options. To do that, is incredibly time consuming, and that's just one hairstyle. How many hairstyles were released in that one human hairstyle pack? 2 Female, 1 Male, and one unisex. So, that is 360 textures for Female, 180 for Male, and 360 for female (twice as many as it would be, due to the different shaped heads for male and female.)

For that cheap pack (240 CC), you get 900 textures. And 5 different (if slighlty) shaped hair pieces. Are they making money on this hair? Yes, it does have a steep profit. Was it easy and cheap for them to do? No.

This is just for the new hairstyles, it did not include the new hair colors. That one is complicated too.

If they put something new in the market, it was complicated, but it will always make them money. That is what the system is for. They aren't doing it to make us any happier than we need to be. They don't want us overjoyed, as that would cut into their future profits. They want us satisfied. They calculate their prices very very carefully, with test groups. *shrug* We're their money bag.

Not that I have any objection to being their money bag. I am a happy subscriber. I just know how the world turns and how economics work. I am also an artist who works with 3D models fairly regularly. I know the work they put into it. It does frustrate me how often people look at my work and consider it "easy". If my job was completely easy, they wouldn't pay most artists as much as they do.

Subs are no longer the benchmark for success when a game goes to a hybrid model. Profit margin is of much higher importance now.

I imagine profit was always of paramount importance.

I agree with the OP.

Content is suffering because of CM focused devs. and execs.

The little content since Mekeb has either; a CC gate (Treek, various armor models, mounts) or extremely vanilla and underwhelming....though free.(czerka daily area and czerka flashpoints)