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[Kinyou]

Was a little annoyed by the 2 character limit. Then I realized that I can just make a second F2P account if I want to make more characters.

Kinyou 1 - EA 0

Went back yesterday after getting my first character (Jedi Consular) to 45 at launch.

Started a Jedi Knight Guardian, really enjoying it, got to level 10 but was a bit surprised to see they 'now you are level 10, you will receive less XP from mobs and quests' which kind of put me off a bit as it took a long time for me to get to 45 first time around.

Anyone have any idea how much less XP you get if you don't sub, i bought the game at launch so im a 'prefered' player or whatever it's called .

Not sure actually. I assumed that you don't get that "rested" bonus anymore. So you get just the "normal" amount of xp, not the boosted one.

I hope you're not right, because If you get less XP overall as a F2P player... that would suck big time.

 

[dimb]

Was a little annoyed by the 2 character limit. Then I realized that I can just make a second F2P account if I want to make more characters.

Kinyou 1 - EA 0

Alternatively: just switch servers.

All this Free to Play stuff is essentially a lie. Game is almost unplayable with the hotbar limit at higher levels, so this might as well just be a demo for early level characters.

 

[Kinyou]

Alternatively: just switch servers.

All this Free to Play stuff is essentially a lie. Game is almost unplayable with the hotbar limit at higher levels, so this might as well just be a demo for early level characters.

Well you can buy an extra quickbar for 250 cartel points. So you don't have to subscribe, but I guess buying at least something is inevitable.

But limiting the UI is really the most pathetic part of this F2P option

 

[Jomjom]

Anyone know what the PVE, Daily, and Black Hole commendation caps are for preferred players?

 

[firehawk12]

I'm still curious. If I want to spend the 5 bucks to get to preferred status, what is worth buying?

 

[notworksafe]

I'm still curious. If I want to spend the 5 bucks to get to preferred status, what is worth buying?

Quickbars and not showing your helmet.

The "not showing helm" might just be a personal preference though. I like to see my character's face during the dialogue stuff.

 

[HarryDemeanor]

Anyone have any idea how much less XP you get if you don't sub, i bought the game at launch so im a 'prefered' player or whatever it's called .

Basically they want you to do the Bonus Series missions when you're finished with a planet's storyline. If you were subbed by the time you were finished with a planet you would already be a couple levels into the next planet's level range. So by doing this they want you to play through an entire planet before you head into the next one.

 

[RPGCrazied]

I'm still curious. If I want to spend the 5 bucks to get to preferred status, what is worth buying?

Don't buy the packs. I bought 2 today and got crap. An imperial banner to place on the ground, some ball to throw at people and some crafting I'll never use. I did get the show titles and more inventory space though. I made a fast 5k on the craft materials.

 

[notworksafe]

Basically they want you to do the Bonus Series missions when you're finished with a planet's storyline. If you were subbed by the time you were finished with a planet you would already be a couple levels into the next planet's level range. So by doing this they want you to play through an entire planet before you head into the next one.

Do subs not get the bonus series quests or are they just not on every planet? I didn't get any for Quesh or Hoth.

Once I finish my BH story I might make a Jedi to hang out with GAF, assuming you don't mind someone just hanging out and leveling. My guild is pretty much dead.

 

[Apophis2036]

Basically they want you to do the Bonus Series missions when you're finished with a planet's storyline. If you were subbed by the time you were finished with a planet you would already be a couple levels into the next planet's level range. So by doing this they want you to play through an entire planet before you head into the next one.

Ah ok, the quest XP seems fine but the bonus quest XP seems really low, killed 40 extra mobs earlier and got 60XP for the bonus quest !, im sure when i played at launch you got almost as much as a proper quest for the bonus quests while you were in the area.

Fantastic game though and i genuinely feel sorry for the guys that lost their jobs when it wasn't as successful as EA wanted.

I essentially play it as a SP, Mass Effect style experience, the graphics, music, voice acting, cut scenes are fantastic quality and the MMO combat is the best outside of WoW imo.

Maybe they should just turn it into a SP game and release it for the next gen consoles, esp if they have tablet controllers, so much content that deserves to be played !.

 

[Cystm]

I'm still curious. If I want to spend the 5 bucks to get to preferred status, what is worth buying?

I'd get an additional quick bar and some minor experience boosts.

Do subs not get the bonus series quests or are they just not on every planet? I didn't get any for Quesh or Hoth.

Once I finish my BH story I might make a Jedi to hang out with GAF, assuming you don't mind someone just hanging out and leveling. My guild is pretty much dead.

You are absolutely welcome to join, duder.

 

[notworksafe]

You are absolutely welcome to join, duder.

Cool, will do! Hopefully I should be able to finish up my BH soon and I'll join you guys.

 

[Kinyou]

Looked at the XP thing again. Apparently you do indeed get less than a normal player. Because when I hover over the xp bar it first tells me that I'm getting less than someone who subbed and then also that I'm not getting the "rested" bonus.

So far I haven't run into that many problems (actually got once above the recommended level for my class quest) but it still really irks me. I'll probably pick up the game for 10€ to get the 30 days sub.

I assume I'll just be able to turn my f2p account into a sub one, right?

 

[VandalD]

Played for quite a bit and enjoyed myself, but the thought of having to pay for more buttons just completely turns me off. It makes me not want to play because I know eventually I'm going to need them. The trooper I raised during my free month about a year ago already has two action bars maxed out, and that's at level 25.

So, yeah, I want to play - I nearly subbed, but paying for action bars just crosses the line for me. I don't want to support that.

 

[Kinyou]

Some update on the XP stuff.
Apparently doesn't no one really know (here's a thread from the official forum) how much less someone with f2p gets. Everyone seems pretty confident though that you wont have to grind since there are always plenty of quests available.

 

[DiscoJer]

Honestly, once a game starting having more than 2 bars of skills, I stop playing, or stop using any new skills.

 

[HarryDemeanor]

Do subs not get the bonus series quests or are they just not on every planet? I didn't get any for Quesh or Hoth.

Once I finish my BH story I might make a Jedi to hang out with GAF, assuming you don't mind someone just hanging out and leveling. My guild is pretty much dead.

Editing this because I totally misread it. I know some bonus series don't show up until a couple more levels like the Nar Shadda ones. Quesh might not have any.

 

[bluemax]

Man some of the F2P stuff is really oppressive. I wanted to trade with another player last night. Can't do that.

Was gonna mail him the item instead. Can't do that.

Wanted to get into crafting, oh wait you can only have one crew skill at a time and if you unlearn it then it goes back to 1. So crafting is pointless.

I mean I get a lot of the F2P restrictions, but there are other times where it makes me really frustrated.

Anyone know what the PVE, Daily, and Black Hole commendation caps are for preferred players?

20 for planetary commendations.

 

[Jomjom]

20 for planetary commendations.

What about tionese, etc. ?

 

[Silly.Mikey]

I forgot what my security password thing is, and now i have to call them just to be able to disable it and play. Really don't feel like going through all that.

 

[calder]

I forgot what my security password thing is, and now i have to call them just to be able to disable it and play. Really don't feel like going through all that.

Ugh, don't remind me. Asking me one of the 4-5 security questions every time I log in is agony, mainly because their security questions are TERRIBLE. I don't have a bloody favourite actor, I'm not 12 years old, and most of the questions I could select are annoying to use because my hometown was long and had special characters in it, so every time I freeze and wonder how I spelled it. Took me forever to remember one answer so I could log into the website and check the other questions.

 

[Ezalc]

So my friends and I are kind of looking for a free MMO to play that isn't completely terrible. We like star wars, is this game actually fun? I heard some people say it wasn't that good but they didn't give reasons for it. I wanted to try out Vindictus instead but apparently you can't play it from Brazil.

 

[Cystm]

So my friends and I are kind of looking for a free MMO to play that isn't completely terrible. We like star wars, is this game actually fun? I heard some people say it wasn't that good but they didn't give reasons for it. I wanted to try out Vindictus instead but apparently you can't play it from Brazil.

Check out the |OT|.

TL;DR

Yes.

 

[dimb]

So my friends and I are kind of looking for a free MMO to play that isn't completely terrible. We like star wars, is this game actually fun? I heard some people say it wasn't that good but they didn't give reasons for it. I wanted to try out Vindictus instead but apparently you can't play it from Brazil.

There is no buy in, so I don't think it hurts to just try it, but I don't think TOR is particularly good as an MMORPG, and it has even more problems as a free to play game. The game suffers from terrible skill bloat, poorly balanced and designed classes, environments that are often vacant, and most detrimentally a repetitive quest structure that does not offer much in terms of variety. Instead The Old Republic relies on its story beats and conversations to break up the leveling experience, but these vary quite wildly in quality, and at times can feel few and far between.

The game is a grind in every sense, and this is only more noticeable and frustrating as with the lower experience returns you have as a free player. While the game is currently billing itself as free to play, expect to be treaty with hostility by the game for not being a subscriber. Instead of enabling or rewarding paying users the game constricts and harangues free players, depriving them of essentials to make the game a more cumbersome and grueling experience.

 

[Apophis2036]

Some update on the XP stuff.
Apparently doesn't no one really know (here's a thread from the official forum) how much less someone with f2p gets. Everyone seems pretty confident though that you wont have to grind since there are always plenty of quests available.

Cheers.

I actually noticed i got over 2k for completing a lvl 12 bonus quest last night, i prob read the '60 XP' wrong yesterday lol.

It seems fine, im lvl 14 in about 7 hours and i watch all the cut scenes and have done the first flash point.

Fantastic games considering its free, although i do have two action bars as i bought the game at launch.

If anyone is playing it and enjoying it i would pay the $5 to get sprint at lvl 1 and an extra action bar, makes all the difference.

If i get to max lvl i will just re sub to get the extra bars and be able to do unlimited flash points, no big deal for $15 imo.

The second best MMO ever made after WoW imo, a shame it tanked so fast , although i was surprised it still sold 2.5 million copies so they made at least $150 million back.

 

[Cystm]

There is no buy in, so I don't think it hurts to just try it, but I don't think TOR is particularly good as an MMORPG, and it has even more problems as a free to play game. The game suffers from terrible skill bloat, poorly balanced and designed classes, environments that are often vacant, and most detrimentally a repetitive quest structure that does not offer much in terms of variety. Instead The Old Republic relies on its story beats and conversations to break up the leveling experience, but these vary quite wildly in quality, and at times can feel few and far between.

The game is a grind in every sense, and this is only more noticeable and frustrating as with the lower experience returns you have as a free player. While the game is currently billing itself as free to play, expect to be treaty with hostility by the game for not being a subscriber. Instead of enabling or rewarding paying users the game constricts and harangues free players, depriving them of essentials to make the game a more cumbersome and grueling experience.

The classes are balanced better than any other MMO. Skill bloat? Sorry, it's not League of Legends with ultra hard to remember 4 abilities or GW2 with it's face roll ability swapping.

The environments haven't been vacant since they merged servers months ago.

As for it being a grind? Sure, it is to some extent, but it's a far better experience than any other MMO. You're not making choices based on the purely mechanical benefit to your character in TOR. You are actually investing yourself in the situations and making decisions based on my character's outlook. The sum total of those decisions creates a character biography that transcends the skills and equipment you've gained along the way(Which is exactly all WoW or GW2 has going for it's character progression.)

You are playing for free - and while the fact that they decided to throw action bars behind a pay wall was a bad decision, it's not this oppressive punishing factor that you are making it out to be. If you get to a point to where you need the extra space for abilities (around level 30) you can simply buy another bar for 5 bucks. You still aren't paying a monthly fee and can continue to level up in a way that is specific to your preference.

 

[epmode]

Wait, they actually lock a quickbar away from free players? Awful.

 

[Osiris]

OK, so for the week before F2P I was playing on a free trial and enjoying it quite a bit, now the game has gone F2P and between the restrictions (esp. the quick bars), the nagging, the reduced XP, reduced loot etc. my final decision is not to put another minute or to put a single purchase for coins and uninstall.

The fact is that even a preferred player is going to be seriously gimped compared to a subbed player, and some of that gimping cannot be undone by Cartel Coin purchases.

It's not so much a F2P as an extended trial meant to push people towards subs, I'm never subbing so therefore any time investment is a waste, so thanks, but cya SWTOR.

Coming from something like Aions F2P model, which was awesome, or even STO's fairly acceptable F2P model, the SWTOR F2P experience is poor and will always be second rate.

My final score for SWTOR F2P?

If you intend on subbing, a nice extended trial, 8/10

If you don't? - don't waste your time, nor your cash, find something worthwhile for your time, 2/10

 

[Cystm]

If you spend your whole time comparing and contrasting what conveniences subscribers are getting and you are not (as someone that is spending no money and hasn't any intention of spending any money) then no, I don't expect you to have too much fun.

I understand the hang up with the action bar paywall idiocy, but everything else is pretty damn logical.

The model allows you to pay to enjoy the game in a way that is specific to your preference and at a pace that allows you to avoid feeling any of the "pressures" that comes with paying a monthly subscription.

I give your post a 3 out of 79 marshmellows and one and a half bilbo baggins doing a crip walk.

 

[Kinyou]

Just to get that one thing clear. When I buy the game in the store, the package contains a code for a 30 day sub, right? Because I'm afraid that I pay the ten bucks and end up with some code that you can only use when you're setting up a new account or something like that.

 

[Shining Sunshine]

Wait, hotbar limit? How many buttons can you have?

 

[Cystm]

Just to get that one thing clear. When I buy the game, the package contains a code for a 30 day sub, right? Because I'm afraid that I pay the ten bucks and end up with some code that you can only use when you're setting up a new account or something like that.

If you purchase a physical key fob, you get a months worth of subscription with it.

Wait, hotbar limit? How many buttons can you have?

You get 2 action bars with 25 buttons. Extra action bars cost 250 cc or about 2 bucks.

 

[Kinyou]

Wait, hotbar limit? How many buttons can you have?

You get two quickbars, those can hold 12 abilities each.

Adding another one costs about 250 cartel points, though that quickbar is then limited to that specific character. If you want to unlock it for your whole account and all characters on it, you have to pay ca. 560 cartel points.

edit: beaten

If you purchase a physical key fob, you get a months worth of subscription with it.

ok, nice

 

[DTKT]

You get two quickbars, those can hold 12 abilities each.

Adding another one costs about 250 cartel points, though that quickbar is then limited to that specific character. If you want to unlock it for your whole account and all characters on it, you have to pay ca. 560 cartel points.

It's per character? What the fuck

 

[Alex]

Haven't kept up with the F2P structure here, but If you're limited on bars, then theres no choice than to buy some. SWTOR, like WoW, has fucking MASSIVE skill bloat. It's a huge detriment to those games, IMO, and one of the main things I'd like to never have to see again in an online RPG of any type.

 

[Cystm]

It's per character? What the fuck

Right. About two bucks for a single character if that's all you need or about 5 bucks for all characters. It's a one time purchase.

SWTOR, like WoW, has fucking MASSIVE skill bloat. It's a huge detriment to those games, IMO, and one of the main things I'd like to never have to see again in an online RPG of any type.

I don't get this. Is it too hard to play?

 

[Milly79]

Finding it comical that people are saying skill bloat. Oh god, we have to look up what skills are useful! You can play about every class aside from Knight/Warrior with 2 bars pretty damn comfortably. Does it make it right they locked it behind a pay wall? No, it doesn't. It's still unacceptable, but do some research and look for the skills that are useful.

 

[Yasae]

OK, so for the week before F2P I was playing on a free trial and enjoying it quite a bit, now the game has gone F2P and between the restrictions (esp. the quick bars), the nagging, the reduced XP, reduced loot etc. my final decision is not to put another minute or to put a single purchase for coins and uninstall.

The fact is that even a preferred player is going to be seriously gimped compared to a subbed player, and some of that gimping cannot be undone by Cartel Coin purchases.

It's not so much a F2P as an extended trial meant to push people towards subs, I'm never subbing so therefore any time investment is a waste, so thanks, but cya SWTOR.

Coming from something like Aions F2P model, which was awesome, or even STO's fairly acceptable F2P model, the SWTOR F2P experience is poor and will always be second rate.

My final score for SWTOR F2P?

If you intend on subbing, a nice extended trial, 8/10

If you don't? - don't waste your time, nor your cash, find something worthwhile for your time, 2/10

So what were Aion's restrictions? What did it do wrong and what did it do right?

 

[Osiris]

So what were Aion's restrictions? What did it do wrong and what did it do right?

Aion's "Truly Free" F2P model makes the whole game unrestricted and free to play, there is no subs/f2p divide between players as they did away with subs altogether, the company relies entirely on purchases from the ingame store, the majority of which are either cosmetic or quality-of-play items such as mounts, 10%+ good loot chance boosts, XP boosts, etc, there is no pay-to-win items. (Although some may consider the failure-chance reduction boosts to Aions equivalent of enchanting an unfair advantage)

I didn't expect this kind of F2P from SWTOR staight away, but neither did I expect the gulf that exists between the two models.

One is designed to profit from going to F2P, the other is designed to get more subs. (and won't, really, if we're honest)

 

[Shining Sunshine]

You get two quickbars, those can hold 12 abilities each.

Adding another one costs about 250 cartel points, though that quickbar is then limited to that specific character. If you want to unlock it for your whole account and all characters on it, you have to pay ca. 560 cartel points.

edit: beaten


ok, nice

Holy crap that's unplayable. I was using like 60 action buttons at the end.

 

[Kinyou]

btw. apparently are people trading stuff like quickbars over the games auction house. So if you have a character sitting around with a lot of credits you could buy your quickbars/hide headslots etc. that way.

http://www.swtor.com/community/showthread.php?t=559023

 

[Mandoric]

I don't get this. Is it too hard to play?

It's not "too hard", it's just unbalanced design that focuses way too much on "remember which bar you put this skill on five levels ago? You'd better hope you do within three seconds!".

There's nothing wrong with a lot of skills, it just shows poor thought when they're ALL hypothetically useful in a given encounter but only need to be touched once a level or two. Something like FFXI has easily three or five times the skills for a caster class, but only needs half as many quickbarred and has a slow enough "combat round" time where you can feasibly fish the others out of your character sheet. (It also has a game structure where revamping your quickbar will hold for the next 4-8 hours rather than be useless next encounter when you run into droids, or not-droids, or guys who just don't hold the right formation for your AoE.)

 

[Cystm]

It's not "too hard", it's just unbalanced design that focuses way too much on "remember which bar you put this skill on five levels ago? You'd better hope you do within three seconds!".

There's nothing wrong with a lot of skills, it just shows poor thought when they're ALL hypothetically useful in a given encounter but only need to be touched once a level or two. Something like FFXI has easily three or five times the skills for a caster class, but only needs half as many quickbarred and has a slow enough "combat round" time where you can feasibly fish the others out of your character sheet. (It also has a game structure where revamping your quickbar will hold for the next 4-8 hours rather than be useless next encounter when you run into droids, or not-droids, or guys who just don't hold the right formation for your AoE.)

So... It's too hard to remember where you placed your own abilities, so therefor it's unbalanced.

I am sorry, but none of that is really valid, right?. I mean, you cannot remember where buttons are or fully understand how to use them situationally and it's the games fault?

 

[Yasae]

btw. apparently are people trading stuff like quickbars over the games auction house. So if you have a character sitting around with a lot of credits you could buy your quickbars/hide headslots etc. that way.

http://www.swtor.com/community/showthread.php?t=559023

[IMGhttp://www.abload.de/img/cheapstuffddr2w.jpg[/IMG]

Was only a matter of time.

Aion's "Truly Free" F2P model makes the whole game unrestricted and free to play, there is no subs/f2p divide between players as they did away with subs altogether, the company relies entirely on purchases from the ingame store, the majority of which are either cosmetic or quality-of-play items such as mounts, 10%+ good loot chance boosts, XP boosts, etc, there is no pay-to-win items. (Although some may consider the failure-chance reduction boosts to Aions equivalent of enchanting an unfair advantage)

I didn't expect this kind of F2P from SWTOR staight away, but neither did I expect the gulf that exists between the two models.

One is designed to profit from going to F2P, the other is designed to get more subs. (and won't, really, if we're honest)

Interesting. So basically the Valve/Riot model with Aion... I'd love to see that with TOR.

It seems their initial subscriber numbers were good (750k about a month after going f2p), however NCSoft also posted a $6M loss in Q2 of this year:

Aion was also blamed for the company's financial woes, as revenues in that title sharply decreased due to fewer microtransaction sales.

I'd expect early reports to be rocky, as the microtransaction route can be very lucrative. It's a hard call to make, though, and NCsoft is yet another developer with a subsidizing force behind it (namely Lineage).

 

[Westlo]

The second best MMO ever made after WoW imo, a shame it tanked so fast , although i was surprised it still sold 2.5 million copies so they made at least $150 million back.

Did noone play RIFT? I mean sure it was pretty derivative of WoW but not like TOR wasn't either.. but RIFT improved by leaps and bounds after launch and is one of the few MMOs these days to actually pump out a lot of content. New xpac looks really damn solid as well, if I wasn't happy with WoW I would be back in RIFT for sure.

As for it being a grind? Sure, it is to some extent, but it's a far better experience than any other MMO. You're not making choices based on the purely mechanical benefit to your character in TOR. You are actually investing yourself in the situations and making decisions based on my character's outlook. The sum total of those decisions creates a character biography that transcends the skills and equipment you've gained along the way(Which is exactly all WoW or GW2 has going for it's character progression.)

The game is way too grindy, sure the story quests were fun but all the other quests were mostly MMO 101, and they were by far the larger share. And than for F2P they make the XP even more for those players? lol good luck.

 

[Won]

I remember struggling getting all my stuff on even 4 bars at launch with my Scoundrel. Good times!

 

[Mandoric]

So... It's too hard to remember where you placed your own abilities, so therefor it's unbalanced.

I am sorry, but none of that is really valid, right?. I mean, you cannot remember where buttons are or fully understand how to use them situationally and it's the games fault?

It's just inconvenient design for the sake of being inconvenient/filling bars. There's little to no reason to have a 1000-damage skill and a 1000-damage skill for stunned enemies when you can just have a 1000-damage skill that resets c/d on a successful stun, and absolutely none not to steal Aion/Tera/pretty much everything Korean this decade's contextual "spacebar to follow up" feature. ToR's skills (at least for Juggernaut, BH, Sniper, and Sage, so I'm covering all four base classes there!) have less to do with situational awareness and more to do with a kind of rare-proc Simon Says, which I find far less enjoyable than WoW's branching/spec-based patterns, Aion's spacebar timing, or FFXI's advance loadout-planning and synchronization with party members.

 

[Cystm]

It's just inconvenient design for the sake of being inconvenient/filling bars. There's little to no reason to have a 1000-damage skill and a 1000-damage skill for stunned enemies when you can just have a 1000-damage skill that resets c/d on a successful stun, and absolutely none not to steal Aion/Tera/pretty much everything Korean this decade's contextual "spacebar to follow up" feature. ToR's skills (at least for Juggernaut, BH, Sniper, and Sage, so I'm covering all four base classes there!) have less to do with situational awareness and more to do with a kind of rare-proc Simon Says, which I find far less enjoyable than WoW's branching/spec-based patterns, Aion's spacebar timing, or FFXI's advance loadout-planning and synchronization with party members.

You just described two abilities per class. Abilities that are useful on taking down Strong+ mobs. "Rare-proc simon says" You stun the Strong+ mob, you deal bonus damage to said stunned mob.

They are useful abilities that you should be using on the regular while leveling.

 

[Alex]

Right. About two bucks for a single character if that's all you need or about 5 bucks for all characters. It's a one time purchase.



I don't get this. Is it too hard to play?

No, but it is an obnoxious, bloated mess to play and organize when you have your game design dictating 30-40 required but still hyper marginalized keybinds. There's no reason they can't roll this shit into a more effective and interesting package that could actually result in more real depth and usability and less clutter. When you have people buying mice with several rows of buttons on the side just to bind niche, but necessary, pap in a single sub-genre, you have a fundamental design issue.

I think, throughout the years, I spent almost as much time time on my WoW UI, macros and keybinds as I did WoW. SWtoR, in my experience, is even worse on the base level of ability interaction and clutter.

 

[Mandoric]

You just described two abilities per class. Abilities that are useful on taking down Strong+ mobs. "Rare-proc simon says" You stun the Strong+ mob, you deal bonus damage to said stunned mob.

They are useful abilities that you should be using on the regular while leveling.

There's also a whole bunch of other shit like the BH delayed big proc that's only useful solo/pulling. Or the BH DoT that's only useful pulling/kiting. Or shit, I haven't played this iffy game in months and it's 2am, I don't really feel like going and pulling up the laundry list of why I thought I needed to have 4 bars back when they were open to everyone playing free of charge--compared to the 2 short bars of FF, the 2 bars I kept in Aion, or the 1+macros I kept in WoW.