I mean in WOW (Pre WOTLK)  there was a point to it all, you had loads of wold pvp going on, you could attack the enemy cities and towns, they would attack yours.  You had good crafting so going out gathering mats was risky as you were sure to end up in a fight as everyone else was also out gathering.  Then there was the dueling outside the capital city and wintergrasp.

But in SWTOR there is nothing at all to do with your nice top of the range gear, you simply do not need it as there is no large scale pvp going on anywhere, even the warzones are only 8 v 8, there is literally no point in having it.  You can't attack enemy cities as the guards even at lowbie zones are champion elites with 200k HP.  It just seems like a game without purpose.

This is a good point.

Usually a gear grind makes you more competitive and makes you able to move to teh next tier in the game.

Okay, is that good or bad? Depends.

Problem in SWTOR -

PVP - I will echo what you have stated and add that the "more competitive" aspect of the gear still exists but is thwarted by what you have said. It's like being the tallest little person. That gives you little to celebrate. (I am not anti-little person. I am jsut saying that a tall or short little person deals with pretty much the same problems and holds pretty much the same esteem).

PVE - If the Operations are sloppy and pointless and can or can't be done with litle regard to gearing or the gear is very fast to achieve and move to the next level, then that content better come out really fast to keep up. In SWTOR, the Operations in the first couple months were full of bugs. The bugs caused the challenge, not the mechanics or the raw power of them (the 2 Bouny Hunters in KP being a notable exception - and they died on the like 10th attempt on Nightmare Mode).  I am not saying that the fire resitance push of vanilla WoW is needed. Where you basically invest tons of resources in items you cannot use in the rest of the game to merely be able to survive the specific damage put up as a progression choke and checkpoint on the way through the endgame, but having pushover and/or bugged content takes away the draw. In SWTOR it wasn't really a "YES!" moment except for the 2 Bounty Hunters in KP and again that came too quickly. Same night, a coupe handfuls of attempts. It was usually more like have a sick feeling in your stomach wondering if the floor would disappear, the boss would become immune, ability X would do 3x it's intended damage or that once you did kill the guy he wouldn't be lootabe, the loot would go to the wrong class, or only those people still standing at the end would be eligibel for the loot. Yeah - not an enjoyable experience.

For me -

I am really much more interested in a gameplay structure more like Ping Pong where you get rewarded for being better and get better by spending time doing it and being challenged. That is good for the fighting, FPS and platformers. As much of that that can be brought in will be great for MMOs. But there is the attachment to the progress of gear that was hard earned and allowed you to take on the next level of bosses that may be part of what keeps people subscribed. We will see with TERA and moreso with GW2. The problem with both of those examples is that TERA does have stats on gear that improve and GW2 doesn't have a sub. Whatever. All I know is that SWTOR didn't do it for me.

EDIT - Added in missing "l" in several words. This keyboard sucks.

Bioware built what i like to call, a movie set game. From the outside it looks like a total built city, town or house. As you walk up to it and peak around the corner, you realize it's just an appearance, a empty shell.

This is the best way i can desdribe TOR. It is a game that has these systems like other games, but there's really no need for them, since the game lacks depth and a true mmorpg foundation.

Gear grind is pointless in any game and have served same purpose in any EQ/WoW clone.

Next.

Yeah what was the point of seperating imps and reps?  WoW launch had no PvP gear but skirmishes and ganking were rampant because the factions crossed paths so often and later the TM/SS zerg.  Alliance out numbered horde by a lot at release so faction imbalance doesn't matter as much when you can attack anywhere as opposed to something like ilum where we had 20 republic and well over 100 imps in the zone.

The only thing I could find that was semi fun is I play a shadow so I can kill imps all over the main base because most guards are weak so when they zone into ilum, trying to fly away, picking up dailies, or organizing for the flashpoints.  but meh.

I think they countered the poeple that grinded gear, I had a battlmaster set before 1.2 and it seems that grind is being made worthless.  BW is good at single player games, SWTOR is like 8 single player games and that is the extent of it.

My server is dead, they gave me a free month due to my original 3 month sub and I log  in and do the daily WZ and everyday is the same exact few players in those warzones.

Is a good game but not so much a good MMO.

Originally posted by tares

Yeah what was the point of seperating imps and reps?  WoW launch had no PvP gear but skirmishes and ganking were rampant because the factions crossed paths so often and later the TM/SS zerg.  Alliance out numbered horde by a lot at release so faction imbalance doesn't matter as much when you can attack anywhere as opposed to something like ilum where we had 20 republic and well over 100 imps in the zone.

The only thing I could find that was semi fun is I play a shadow so I can kill imps all over the main base because most guards are weak so when they zone into ilum, trying to fly away, picking up dailies, or organizing for the flashpoints.  but meh.

I think they countered the poeple that grinded gear, I had a battlmaster set before 1.2 and it seems that grind is being made worthless.  BW is good at single player games, SWTOR is like 8 single player games and that is the extent of it.

My server is dead, they gave me a free month due to my original 3 month sub and I log  in and do the daily WZ and everyday is the same exact few players in those warzones.

Is a good game but not so much a good MMO.

Well said.... Ea had too much of a lofty expectations and with each passing month and budget growing they decided to release it and pacth it later.. Which might work for them if players have patience but with the rise of quality games going F2P and more MMO releasing over the next 2 years.. Ea is probably trying to come up with a good plan B at the moment..

You grind so you can RP walk through the stations in your brand new, amazing looking, super hero gear. 

Originally posted by musicmann

Bioware built what i like to call, a movie set game. From the outside it looks like a total built city, town or house. As you walk up to it and peak around the corner, you realize it's just an appearance, a empty shell.

This is the best way i can desdribe TOR. It is a game that has these systems like other games, but there's really no need for them, since the game lacks depth and a true mmorpg foundation.

Perfectly desbribed it. As it was released it was just bare minimum + story; now it's a bit better but I would still call it subpar.

I guess if you NEED an MMO and have played everything else or are big star wars fan it's alright. 

To line their pockets with monthly fees.

Originally posted by Mackeh

I mean in WOW (Pre WOTLK)  there was a point to it all, you had loads of wold pvp going on, you could attack the enemy cities and towns, they would attack yours.  You had good crafting so going out gathering mats was risky as you were sure to end up in a fight as everyone else was also out gathering.  Then there was the dueling outside the capital city and wintergrasp.

But in SWTOR there is nothing at all to do with your nice top of the range gear, you simply do not need it as there is no large scale pvp going on anywhere, even the warzones are only 8 v 8, there is literally no point in having it.  You can't attack enemy cities as the guards even at lowbie zones are champion elites with 200k HP.  It just seems like a game without purpose.

And ultimately, this is why I stopped playing after only 2 characters to lvl 30.  I just didn't feel like I was "going anywhere."  I really enjoyed the game up to that point though, but that "without a purpose" feeling just kept gnawing at me.  Seeing that the lore is moving forward in some exciting way is pretty important to me.  It gives the game that feeling of "purpose."  To be honest, I had an issue with the amount of copy/paste buildings and floorplans and graphics too.  Every single spaceport was identical, it was nuts.  And I had no desire to level to 50 to grind gear.  Yuck.

Originally posted by Mackeh

I mean in WOW (Pre WOTLK)  there was a point to it all, you had loads of wold pvp going on, you could attack the enemy cities and towns, they would attack yours.  You had good crafting so going out gathering mats was risky as you were sure to end up in a fight as everyone else was also out gathering.  Then there was the dueling outside the capital city and wintergrasp.

But in SWTOR there is nothing at all to do with your nice top of the range gear, you simply do not need it as there is no large scale pvp going on anywhere, even the warzones are only 8 v 8, there is literally no point in having it.  You can't attack enemy cities as the guards even at lowbie zones are champion elites with 200k HP.  It just seems like a game without purpose.

I never played WoW, but I asked myself that same question pre-1.2...haven't played since--haven't even updated the client for 1.2. That was about a month ago, and I noticed I was just charged my monthly...I don't see that happening a month from now.

I gave it an honest effort. I did a knee-jerk cancellation before the first month was up because I was bored with the story/mission grind, but decided to take my character to "end-game"...I did, then i discovered this thing you guys call the "gear grind". I participated to full Champion while trying to learn to PvP effectively--that challenge kept me occupied for a while, but eventually boredom returned. For this genre, this game might be as good as it gets for all I know--and so I don't want to bash the game because I'm sure there are people that very much enjoy this game-type...I most sincerely did not.

Originally posted by Mackeh

I mean in WOW (Pre WOTLK)  there was a point to it all, you had loads of wold pvp going on, you could attack the enemy cities and towns, they would attack yours.  You had good crafting so going out gathering mats was risky as you were sure to end up in a fight as everyone else was also out gathering.  Then there was the dueling outside the capital city and wintergrasp.

But in SWTOR there is nothing at all to do with your nice top of the range gear, you simply do not need it as there is no large scale pvp going on anywhere, even the warzones are only 8 v 8, there is literally no point in having it.  You can't attack enemy cities as the guards even at lowbie zones are champion elites with 200k HP.  It just seems like a game without purpose.

hmm .. pvp is NOT the only reason to get good gear. Just look at WOW now. People craves PvE gear when they don't even pvp.

The point is that you kill faster, and you last longer in a fight. People want to feel the power. And there are plenty of things to do .. like going back to old raid dungeons for mounts. And you want to be gear so that you can solo (or under-man) those dungeons, and also do it fast.