No. The Sith you describe is the fodder real Sith crush under their boots, and send into enemy ranks to die, or hopefully learn a thing or two. Idiots prone to random violence do not survive intrigue and Sith politics. Where you're getting the 'greater good' bit from I can't even begin to assume. I'm just talking about not being a complete tool.

I would agree with you if the alignment system had anything in common with either Dark or Light side. But it does not. In fact, a metric ton of story choices between "Light" and "Dark" choices are really choices between being an idiot or actually stopping to think - and that's on both sides. Most of the remaining choices are about pointless violence or ludicrous naivety. Try it. Play a Sith, think pragmatic, and don't kill just because you're bored. Actually think like a strategist unwilling to waste imperial resources. Chances are, you end up a lightsider in this system. The same applies to a Jedi who isn't a brainwashed idiot and dares to kiss Kira. That evil, evil darksider.

Or you could detach the idea completely from the horrid construct that is the alignment system in the first place. Just offer a choice between animation and ability sets for all classes, job done.

Oh, from an optional point of view, I'm all for it. I've always found it odd that they didn't offer alternate ability appearances / animation sets given the assets are already in game. It seemed such an obvious way to make free money if sold on the CM, especially. I'd be royally pissed if it was forced onto me simply due to their borked alignment ideas, though.

Feedback: I'm completely opposed to any mechanical advantages or disadvantages tied to alignment unless it is first disconnected from the Dark Side appearance changes and ingame story choices. I want my character to remain Dark I for appearance reasons, and I want to pick my story choices as I feel it, not shoehorned into specific mechanics or ugly appearance consequences because BioWare insists on forcing their often questionable alignment system onto me.

My primary concern with gear (now that it is apparently dependant on Discipline, not AC) is actually that I can't grab Juggernaught Tank gear on my Sorcerer or similar. It's not as bad among DPS characters, or even healers - it'll just be a nuisance if I want to equip that Tank twink I made to occasionally help out my guild. I think they'd be better off just rewarding people with Tokens instead. My other gearing concerns are completely dependant on the exact implementation. The general notion of acquiring gear no matter which part of the game I play, and of PvP/PvE sharing the same gear, actually appeals to me quite a bit.

Yes, yes and yes. My main is a DS1 Rattaki sorcerer. She looks awesome with the DS1 Sith eyes, horrible with DS2+, and far too cute without. I'm happy at DS1, and want to keep it that way. If this DvL mechanic really works as I read it right now, it will either mean a lot of hassle (back and forth, back and forth), destruction of my character's appearance (and corresponding annoyance on my part), or me simply ignoring the entire mechanic, assuming thats even possible. None of that is desireable.

Pure conjecture, and a rather rude one, too. Is that really necessary?

Knowing said player, I highly doubt lack of credits or willingness to pay is an issue here. Frankly, I couldn't tell you who our own guildmaster was at specific points in time, either. It changed several times, especially with lapsing and restarting subscriptions. We simply were never hierarchical enough to actually bother to switch it back. And while you might rightly call Qintas careless in this matter, I find it very suspicious that Bioware would have no record of such a transaction tied to a guild. O.o

So, recently, I logged into SWTOR to find that I somehow reverted to Preferred Status. Since I've been on a recurring 6 month subscription that came as quite the surprise, and after checking my account page, it appears that the transaction in question "Failed", without any reason given. Alright, fair enough. Technical problems happen. However, due to this, I'm effectively lacking 5 days of subscription. I wanted to find out if I'm still eligible for the HK Bonus chapter reward (and the reason for the failed transaction), so I sent a ticket ingame, and called my card company. The card company was unaware of any difficulties and confirmed me my card was in working order, and I've been able to use it both before and after the failed transaction - including resubscribing. Paypal was involved too, and unaware of problems. Bioware took a few days to answer... and redirected me to billing support. With a link that did not work. Listing phone numbers that were of little use to me since I live in Switzerland. After some searching, I found a list of international phone support numbers... Which failed with varying reasons from being apparently invalid, waiting for an hour in a queue, or the lady at the other end speaking no language appropriately aside French, and then hanging up on me. Since those international numbers are rather expensive and my patience is nearing it's end, I've just about given up on actually reaching any kind of support. So, this post. First of all, has anyone seen any sort of clarification on what your subscription status needs to be in order to qualify for the HK bonus chapter? I know they used the word 'continuous' in various sources, but PR announcements and technical implementation does not necessarily need to be the same, so I want to make sure it's not similar to the "first of every month" deal they use for the monthly reward - for which I qualified. And second... This is mostly feedback for Bioware, in the slim hope it is actually read: I've been a subscriber since launch. I like this game, and I like where it's going, despite some difficulties. I intend to remain a subscriber. And all in all, my experiences with support have been excellent... until today. I use a recurring subscription precisely so I don't have to worry about expiry dates and refreshing it. For an inexplicable reason, a single transaction failed, causing my subscription to stop immediately. A single automated Email notification about this would have easily avoided the entire situation since I was around, just preoccupied with other things aside playing, allowing for an uninterrupted subscription. I then attempted to reach support, and not only took it a completely needless amount of time... it was also wholly unsuccessful. Multiple support places, invalid links, no other option of getting contact aside international phone numbers (that I was able to find, at least) which then don't work at all or not very well... This is poor customer support from start to end. And lastly... the qualifiers for the bonus chapter. Assuming it is not implemented differently than stated, a single technical hickup completely beyond a subscriber's control... Now prevents a long standing subscriber from getting access to a subscriber reward. Please consider an alternate system here. Something akin to "after X days of subscription", not just specific time periods. All in all, it's a rather bitter experience with Bioware for me. I'll not pretend I'll just stop subscribing, let alone playing - but in all honesty, it might just make me reconsider staying subscribed for the days I'm not playing in between, which happens regularily, or spending much more money at the Cartel Market.

The line between a resistance movement and a terrorist organisation is pretty blurry, and their methods and justification are often very similar. Morally questionable? Oh yes. But it's not like the Resistance has the means to fight a proper "military against military" conflict right now.

No, it depends on their contracts. If any developer needs to make changes, chances are said developer has an office hours contract because his work simply does not need to be done during the night. The very idea of asking for night time development would be flat out refused by about any court in Europe unless the company in question can provide proof of the necessity, such as said development requiring hardware or other prerequisites only being available on certain time tables. It's why we sometimes do development testing until late at night at my place - because we need the same simulator we use in production throughout the day. But an MMO? Good luck getting that approved.

I wonder at times. I mean, I know american employee protection is relatively miserable compared to most european countries, but I'm fairly certain Bioware can't keep their office-hour-contracted employees for night shifts at will without some kind of actual emergency. Yes, it's frustrating. But yes, it's also understandable. If my company would ask me to work night shifts without truly critical issues, I'd point to the "No night work" article on my contract, and say 'No'. And they'd be very, very hard-pressed to convince me that 2 hours of server down during the start of EU prime (start, not middle, its 6pm) would classify as business critical.

To be fair, even though "being busy" is not the best excuse in the world... They really should inform you about subscription lapse, at least when it occurs with an auto-renewed subscription due to some payment processing error. I had the same happen some days ago and only noticed when I logged in after my vacation. If they're literal about the continuous subscription thing this'll throw me out of the HK Bonus Chapter simply because they didn't bother sending out an automated email.

I am honestly not certain that it would even begin to warrant the effort. I dare say the number of people who will still care in a few months aren't all that numerous.