That Was a Whole Month

Keep forgetting to get back here to write about some of my adventures. Had to laugh when I realized my last post was about trying the revamped F2P SW:TOR. I got another eMail about more Cartel Coins being thrown my way.

I still don't know what you can buy with them. The F2P details made my head swim so I wanted to just try it, get in there and see what it was like. Then I remembered I hadn't even finished the client download!

I had left it up for hours over-night but it wasn't able to finish. Couldn't afford the band-width during the day then I never went back to resume. *lol* Thinking that this is all a lost cause. Maybe it will finish today and I'll be able to log in tomorrow. See what the Christmas things are. Get annoyed at the F2P limitations. Then get my 30+gb of hard drive space when I uninstall it permanently...

That Bioware/Lucas Thing

So I got an eMail about the Cartel Coins I am due for being Digital Deluxe and having paid for however many months I did...

Not sure if 100 is a little or a lot since I haven't browsed what's in there. The folks at GamerBreakerTV found the shitty axe pretty humorous. Frankly I've rarely been tempted to spend money outside of box prices and monthly fees. Over the course of fourteen years of gaming I've spent an addition $10.

Anyway. Decided to see what their F2P model is like. Every description I've heard made it sound crippling and convoluted. I mean... only two hot bars available? Hilarious. I noticed the server list is a lot more brief:

Holy Shit!! *lol* That's the entire list of US server. Talk about a decline! Wonder how many other people will come back. Wonder how many will stay.

Such a massive client. Will give it some time on Thanksgiving but it it doesn't hold my interest, I'm going to get the 35gb of hard drive space back damn quick.

BioWare Swings the Axe at Employees

There is a forum announcement about some "restructuring on the SWTOR team." Always difficult to see but not surprising. As much as I enjoyed the game I haven't been able to get back into it. The few times I've logged in the last three weeks it's been pretty sparse. If I can't get interested I'll be cancelling my account at the end of the month. My guess is that I'm not the only one feeling like this.

Using Social Power and Influence for CS

Noticed this on my feed and had to laugh. Must be nice to have a recognizable name for the insta-responses. Decided to try loading up the client. Got all the way in and out with no problem. Tried logging back in with no issue. So whatever.

That's a Lot of Warm Bodies

Taugrim mentioned an article at Massively that went over SWTOR head counts:

Vogel and Dickinson also shared some mind-boggling numbers relating to SWTOR staffing, as the game's development cycle featured 30 producers, 40 platform engineers, 80 programmers, 75 designers, 140 artists, and 280 quality assurance positions. How does one approach a ginormous project management task of this magnitude? Mainly by sticking to a rigorous triage process and thinking outside of the box when it comes to internal conflicts and team-building procedures.

That's pretty insane.

You Under Estimate the Power of the Dark Side

Have eleven days remaining but doubt I'll bother. Should log in to check my mail and clean everything up… just no interest. Maybe in a few months.

The Next Couple of Months

Logged into Star Wars since WoW was doing weekly maintenance. Boredom. It's been just over a week since I ragequit and there was no draw. Checked mail, sent a few Slicing missions out, then logged off. I would like to finish some of the stories out. See if that happens before my first and last paid month runs out.

Why does WoW still have my attention after all this time? Not sure. Prolly the established comfort and familiarity. So until the world ends (Dialbo 3 is released) I'll be getting the rest of the alts into LFR. Shaman is almost done with the Paladin next. Also getting the horde DK ready for some RBGs.

Thankfully there's Ask Mr. Robot. No way I could keep up with the dynamics of each class.

Bioware Doing a Few Things

Today's patch notes finally show a few things happening. Being able to use the Pacify/Diversion ability on Operation bosses was imba so it's an appropriate nerf. Yet the Sentinel Watchman tree fixes were very interesting:

This validates one of my paranoid conspiracy theories about why we don't have a combat log. If the user community could see what was going on this set of bugs would have been found a long time ago. And been complained about long and hard. I'm sure there are plenty of other problems like this live yet no one can authoritatively say they exist. Saves their forums and image. Sigh.

Approaching Bug Critical Mass

Fuck. Really tired of this bug. Will fail with the quest tracked and un-tracked, so I'm not buying into any urban legends. It wouldn't be a big deal if Republic would win more matches on my server. Guess it's time for WoW. Try for the Valentines mount and farm guild rep with the red envelopes. *sigh*

'Someone' is Spending Money On My Shit

Looks like the GTN eMails no longer include who bought the item you posted. It was another source of names for gold sellers but seems a little paranoid. Actually… just noticed it no longer even includes the item that was sold. Silly.

Commando 24 and Four Compantions

M1-4X is hilarious! Usually prefer to quest with a healing companion for lower downtime yet I am going to try to use this guy.

Really surprised how Troopers get their companions so early. At twenty-four I now have ranged DPS, heals, and tank. This is probably going to be my next 50. Which is a shame since the Operative is now 33…

No More Face At 22

Commando is getting through Nar Shadda. Completing Nar Shaddaa Blood Sport rewarded her first full helm, so she's completely obscured now! Now to see about getting same-colored accents on all her pieces…

Not All Healers Are Equal... or Itemized

Was reviewing Elara's gear before the maintenance kick when I noticed her gun has Cunning mods. Aim is her primary stat so yeah. Guess those will have to be replaced. Not sure if I'll be using her to quest since Aric's DPS has been great.

Highly Visible Importance of Galactic Perfection

Doing the Commando Class Questline on Taris. During The Arrangement an unsuspecting Ensign is transformed into a rakghoul. Despite his internal organs exploding and resettling his ass came out looking great. Like pretty much every ass in SWTOR…

What's That Datacron Worth

There's the GM of one of the guilds I'm in selling an easy trip to the +10 Datacron in General Chat. Naturally it garners some snide trolling. Getting that buggy thing done is quite a damn hassle so maybe people will pay it. Seems like a bad guild rep thing though.

There Is No Light

Finally hit Dark V sometime this week. Leveling Diplomacy I would occasionally take high-yeild light side missions so there were almost 2000 stray light side points to overcome. Yet I noticed that now they're all gone…

Worth One Month... Then What?

Haven't changed my mind since Thursday so I got this little token in every in-game mailbox. It really is more fun than the gearing/alt'ness that I'd be doing in WoW. Yet it isn't more fun than the WoW endgame.

I'm going to need to see some things:
Combat Log with Export
DPS Meter
LFG Tool
Macros
Moveable, Extensible UI


Find it hilarious I still hear people making excuses, often in reference to WoW. About how WoW was horrible at launch and would have three-day downtimes. Whatever. This is 2012. Product feels late beta but has been released over a month.

Doubt I'll do a second month. Resub after there's more content in. Don't pvp at all since republic. Not feeling energized to resettle imperial.

Unlimited Power! What It's Like

Apparently being 300 years old makes being in two places at once easy. Lord Scourge needs to reveal some secrets!

Clever or Really Lazy...

Was doing The Last Defenders when I ran into a little annoyance. It is difficult to target the various corpses since they don't have nameplates. With no loot they disappear pretty fast so you have to be on the ball. When attempting to scan a robot that has already been scanned you get this error across the screen.

Now maybe they're trying to be clever but I don't think so. Instead of a more friendly "You have already scanned this robot's corpse" message, this 701 thing is thrown at you. There are worse ones that I will have to capture—definitely one on Nar Shaddaa. So many parts of SWTOR that have no polish. Sure they're little things but after a while it gets noticeable.

Prospering in Huttball Without 50s

PVP is very sad for Republic on the Kaas City server. Yet sometimes things really go our way. This was the second game I'd played with the Commando and her first Huttball. Whoa.