**OFFICIAL** Star Wars: The Old Republic Thread

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BenSkywalker

Diamond Member
Oct 9, 1999
9,140
67
91
These people have NO clue about how to launch an MMO..

You have to get a good laugh when people get in a lather over someone's speculation taken as fact. Bioware has stated that they are doing a rolling launch, we will find out when we get in later this week based on the latest posts on the official forum. Any information that people have heard so far in terms of exacts isn't from Bioware according to them.

They have stated that they will not sell more games then their servers can handle(so those that try to buy it shortly after launch may not be able to get it). I think the large stress test gave them a good idea about what their servers were capable of in terms of a total population supported.

Yeah, I wonder if they're going to tell guilds the server name beforehand.

The impression I got was that we would be getting notification of what server we would be on at some point this week via email.
 

DrunkenSano

Diamond Member
Aug 8, 2008
3,892
490
126
Stress tests in beta have never given a popular game a good idea of what their servers are capable of. They always underestimate because they wish to keep cost as low as possible. There will still be problems at launch, rolling launch or no.
 

HumblePie

Lifer
Oct 30, 2000
14,665
440
126
Wow if that is true this will be total and EPIC fail..

if they stagger not only early access but LAUNCH? fuck them I will send them their 4 CE's back to ram up their ass..


Staggering early access is epic fail enough... but to even CONSIDER a stagger launch...

screw them..
Poeple are TAKING VACATION for this launch.. and people want to play with thier FRIENDS AND FAMILY this being an MMO and all..

this is total horseshit..

right now as it is only 1 of my 4 accounts will get in on the first day.. the rest were bought months later so the rest of my family including my GF will be getting in late.. meaning I will most likely have to start an ALT first or not play at all.. being that myself and my GF play as a team all the way to 50..

These people have NO clue about how to launch an MMO..


Hey, don't shoot the messenger. They are trying to be as fast as they can. Also pre-order does not guarantee 5 day early head-start. Never was that stated anywhere. It said UP TO 5 day access. As for launch day, they said they will try to let as many in as possible and bring up as many servers as can be done if needed. But if they run out of equipment and ability to handle untold millions of people trying to get in, they will have to start staggering the influx or else everything may go down and no one gets to play. They are hoping to have everything in place and setup so they don't have that problem, but there is nothing for sure in life. Which is why even the box will state that uptime is not guaranteed either. Just like your internet you purchase doesn't guarantee 24/7/365 uptime. Shit happens.
 

HumblePie

Lifer
Oct 30, 2000
14,665
440
126
You have to get a good laugh when people get in a lather over someone's speculation taken as fact. Bioware has stated that they are doing a rolling launch, we will find out when we get in later this week based on the latest posts on the official forum. Any information that people have heard so far in terms of exacts isn't from Bioware according to them.

They have stated that they will not sell more games then their servers can handle(so those that try to buy it shortly after launch may not be able to get it). I think the large stress test gave them a good idea about what their servers were capable of in terms of a total population supported.



The impression I got was that we would be getting notification of what server we would be on at some point this week via email.


Uh, actually what I typed was from Bioware :p
 

darkewaffle

Diamond Member
Oct 7, 2005
8,152
1
81
Wow if that is true this will be total and EPIC fail..

if they stagger not only early access but LAUNCH? fuck them I will send them their 4 CE's back to ram up their ass..


Staggering early access is epic fail enough... but to even CONSIDER a stagger launch...

screw them..
Poeple are TAKING VACATION for this launch.. and people want to play with thier FRIENDS AND FAMILY this being an MMO and all..

this is total horseshit..

right now as it is only 1 of my 4 accounts will get in on the first day.. the rest were bought months later so the rest of my family including my GF will be getting in late.. meaning I will most likely have to start an ALT first or not play at all.. being that myself and my GF play as a team all the way to 50..

These people have NO clue about how to launch an MMO..

I think you're nutters.
 

Axon

Platinum Member
Sep 25, 2003
2,541
1
76
Hey, don't shoot the messenger. They are trying to be as fast as they can. Also pre-order does not guarantee 5 day early head-start. Never was that stated anywhere. It said UP TO 5 day access. As for launch day, they said they will try to let as many in as possible and bring up as many servers as can be done if needed. But if they run out of equipment and ability to handle untold millions of people trying to get in, they will have to start staggering the influx or else everything may go down and no one gets to play. They are hoping to have everything in place and setup so they don't have that problem, but there is nothing for sure in life. Which is why even the box will state that uptime is not guaranteed either. Just like your internet you purchase doesn't guarantee 24/7/365 uptime. Shit happens.

While I understand shit does happen, I expect more from a company like Bioware. At this point, less than 30 days from 2012 and years after WoW's relatively bumpy launch, I would think they've figured it out.

Still, stress test beta weekend was just fine and that was FREE, so I would think all of this language is just CYA stuff.
 

maniacalpha1-1

Diamond Member
Feb 7, 2010
3,562
14
81
Wow if that is true this will be total and EPIC fail..

if they stagger not only early access but LAUNCH? fuck them I will send them their 4 CE's back to ram up their ass..


Staggering early access is epic fail enough... but to even CONSIDER a stagger launch...

screw them..
Poeple are TAKING VACATION for this launch.. and people want to play with thier FRIENDS AND FAMILY this being an MMO and all..

this is total horseshit..

right now as it is only 1 of my 4 accounts will get in on the first day.. the rest were bought months later so the rest of my family including my GF will be getting in late.. meaning I will most likely have to start an ALT first or not play at all.. being that myself and my GF play as a team all the way to 50..

These people have NO clue about how to launch an MMO..
This reminds me...does the game support powerleveling? Are there damage shield spells a high level can cast on lows (just for example)
 

HumblePie

Lifer
Oct 30, 2000
14,665
440
126
This reminds me...does the game support powerleveling? Are there damage shield spells a high level can cast on lows (just for example)

No. There are no damage shields in game that I am aware of. At least not castable upon others. Every class has a buff they can cast on others based on their base class.
 

maniacalpha1-1

Diamond Member
Feb 7, 2010
3,562
14
81
No. There are no damage shields in game that I am aware of. At least not castable upon others. Every class has a buff they can cast on others based on their base class.

Well, that was just an example. There are lots of ways to powerlevel in Everquest besides damage shields. A high level could snare a big train of monsters, beat them down to 10% health and then exit the zone and let the lower level player finish the whole group of mobs; or if the powerleveling player is a feign death class, they can feign death, thus losing aggro, and achieving the same effect.

And there are still more ways than that. The rule is, majority damage gets the exp, so the high level can just do as close to 50% damage as possible and let the lower level finish them off. It's not as fast, but faster than normal leveling.
 

HumblePie

Lifer
Oct 30, 2000
14,665
440
126
While I understand shit does happen, I expect more from a company like Bioware. At this point, less than 30 days from 2012 and years after WoW's relatively bumpy launch, I would think they've figured it out.

Still, stress test beta weekend was just fine and that was FREE, so I would think all of this language is just CYA stuff.

Sort of. They are hoping they CAN accommodate without having to do a rolling/staggered launch. They are just trying to make sure their equipment can handle it and that they have enough equipment to handle the demand. I think they are being very professional about it personally. They KNOW they have MILLIONS of people already waiting to get in on day one. They have over a million preorders right now well. They just aren't 100% certain they have the capacity to deal with that much demand. Trust me, I would rather have a rolling launch where servers are up all the time and the majority of people that want to play can do so. That opposed to the opposite where so many players at once all trying to access the game at the same time seriously crashes everything and no one gets to play as they are constantly trying to bring servers back up to have them crash again due to basically a DDOS attack (of a sorts) by anxious gamers trying to get in to play.

They will be closely monitoring everything during the launch cycle to make sure everything is as smooth and accommodating the majority of the player base as possible.
 

HumblePie

Lifer
Oct 30, 2000
14,665
440
126
Well, that was just an example. There are lots of ways to powerlevel in Everquest besides damage shields. A high level could snare a big train of monsters, beat them down to 10% health and then exit the zone and let the lower level player finish the whole group of mobs; or if the powerleveling player is a feign death class, they can feign death, thus losing aggro, and achieving the same effect.

And there are still more ways than that. The rule is, majority damage gets the exp, so the high level can just do as close to 50% damage as possible and let the lower level finish them off. It's not as fast, but faster than normal leveling.

No. No power leveling. First person to tag a monster gets it "locked" on to them. If a player is too high a level and does the majority of damage or heals someone for too much while they are fighting then the monster grants no exps. There is NO power leveling in this game period.
 

maniacalpha1-1

Diamond Member
Feb 7, 2010
3,562
14
81
No. No power leveling. First person to tag a monster gets it "locked" on to them. If a player is too high a level and does the majority of damage or heals someone for too much while they are fighting then the monster grants no exps. There is NO power leveling in this game period.

Some people might think that's good, but it certainly takes away a social aspect. I'm going to guess that there's no twinking either, are all gear and weapons no trade or something, or at least all GOOD gear, which would also kill a player economy?
 

CVSiN

Diamond Member
Jul 19, 2004
9,289
0
0
Some people might think that's good, but it certainly takes away a social aspect. I'm going to guess that there's no twinking either, are all gear and weapons no trade or something, or at least all GOOD gear, which would also kill a player economy?

Why would that kill an economy?
There is plenty of stuff for low levels to buy to make their chars better..

and this has been standard practice for ALL modern MMOs for the last 10 years.

WoW started it and everyone else used the same system.
 

maniacalpha1-1

Diamond Member
Feb 7, 2010
3,562
14
81
Why would that kill an economy?
There is plenty of stuff for low levels to buy to make their chars better..

and this has been standard practice for ALL modern MMOs for the last 10 years.

WoW started it and everyone else used the same system.

Just because WoW did it doesn't mean it's good. What about high levels? If everything's no drop how do you trade your mega super ultra robe for a mega super ultra weapon of some kind? Don't tell me that a full suit of armor and best raid weapon drops for everyone when you kill a raid mob.
 

CVSiN

Diamond Member
Jul 19, 2004
9,289
0
0
Hey, don't shoot the messenger. They are trying to be as fast as they can. Also pre-order does not guarantee 5 day early head-start. Never was that stated anywhere. It said UP TO 5 day access. As for launch day, they said they will try to let as many in as possible and bring up as many servers as can be done if needed. But if they run out of equipment and ability to handle untold millions of people trying to get in, they will have to start staggering the influx or else everything may go down and no one gets to play. They are hoping to have everything in place and setup so they don't have that problem, but there is nothing for sure in life. Which is why even the box will state that uptime is not guaranteed either. Just like your internet you purchase doesn't guarantee 24/7/365 uptime. Shit happens.

Again fucking nothing but bullshit..

NO OTHER MMO IN HISTORY has had to do this.. the staggering is done by who picks up their game and patches faster than the others.. which is what makes Midnight MMO launches so popular..
If I get my ass up and go stand in line to get my copies and play that night.. that is my staggering..

to have people get up get their copies and get home and then tell people sorry we cannot play till next Wednesday but this other guy can play today is total and utter horseshit..

This does nothing but piss people off.. people want to be FIRST and people want to group with their guilds from the first day..

No other MMo in history has staggered their early access.. it takes people days to download so that builds in a a staggered affect as those with high speed get in first.. and those that take days to get it are the late bloomers..

in a game that we have proven that power gamers can reach L50 in under 5 days ( not played btw 5 days...) this is a game killer..

The greta thing about MMO launches is everyone starts at 0 ALL TOGETHER.. then it is off to the races.. to stagger that and give people a head start over others that paid the same money is flat fuckign retarded. I know it was in the terms.. I I bitched about it then too.. as most of the power gamers did..

but now to hear that if my friend Bob doesn't have a PO and decides he wants to get a copy on launch day that even he may be further staggered? shows me BW has no business running an MMO.

they are already instancing TOO much in the game as it is.. it's a royal pain in the ass to have INSTANCED Cities.. let alone instanced play areas... to have guild members spread through 4 different zone instances is ridiculous..
 

CVSiN

Diamond Member
Jul 19, 2004
9,289
0
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Just because WoW did it doesn't mean it's good. What about high levels? If everything's no drop how do you trade your mega super ultra robe for a mega super ultra weapon of some kind? Don't tell me that a full suit of armor and best raid weapon drops for everyone when you kill a raid mob.

You dont..

you go raid or earn it for what you want.. same as it's always been.
please stop comparing EQ which was a second gen MMO vs the latest and greatest.
EQ was great back then but things have evolved to prevent alot of the mistakes they made.

BTW raid mobs may drop 1 piece... you will have to raid for months and months to get a complete epic set..

this is how they keep people playing..
 

maniacalpha1-1

Diamond Member
Feb 7, 2010
3,562
14
81
You dont..

you go raid or earn it for what you want.. same as it's always been.
please stop comparing EQ which was a second gen MMO vs the latest and greatest.
EQ was great back then but things have evolved to prevent alot of the mistakes they made.

It's not about what generation a game was. It's about specific game mechanics that are good vs mechanics that are not. Tradeable equipment is a good mechanic whether 1999 or 2011, nontradeable equipment is a bad mechanic. And just to reinforce my point that it's not about generations or evolution, let's look at it from your point of view. Assuming you agree with no-trade equipment, then you should consider no trade equipment as the better way to do it whether it's 1999 or 2011 as well.

And, I'm still wondering whether you at least have work at your gear. Do raid mobs drop full suits of highest level gear for each player or do you have to keep killing it til everyone gets one? Edit- nm, I see your edit.

Is there a 5 minute lockout on high level raid instances, or more like 3 days?

Everquest uses no drop like everyone else but they do have a server people can choose to play on where everything is tradeable. And guess what? It's not any easier to get gear there than it is on a normal server. Gear that's actually worth anything people sell for exorbitant amounts of platinum, so at best you can buy something every few months.
 
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CVSiN

Diamond Member
Jul 19, 2004
9,289
0
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It's not about what generation a game was. It's about specific game mechanics that are good vs mechanics that are not. Tradeable equipment is a good mechanic whether 1999 or 2011, nontradeable equipment is a bad mechanic. And just to reinforce my point that it's not about generations or evolution, let's look at it from your point of view. Assuming you agree with no-trade equipment, then you should consider no trade equipment as the better way to do it whether it's 1999 or 2011 as well.

And, I'm still wondering whether you at least have work at your gear. Do raid mobs drop full suits of highest level gear for each player or do you have to keep killing it til everyone gets one? Edit- nm, I see your edit.

Is there a 5 minute lockout on high level raid instances, or more like 3 days?

Everquest uses no drop like everyone else but they do have a server people can choose to play on where everything is tradeable. And guess what? It's not any easier to get gear there than it is on a normal server. Gear that's actually worth anything people sell for exorbitant amounts of platinum, so at best you can buy something every few months.

which all that does is encourage goldfarmers.. again we dont want that.

I already answered your question..
raid lockouts are 1 week long.

Mobs MAY or MAY NOT drop a piece of gear for you.. and if it does it is either a guild DKP system or if its free rolls you roll need for it..

most of the time it will be a guild merit system unless you are in a PUG.

so you earn it..

It will literally take months and months to complete a set.

There are other tradable items in the game until its been USED..

all items once worn are bound to that character no matter the quality level.

Crafted Items can be sold unless they have been worn.
as can world drops.. unless you bind them.
 

nanobreath

Senior member
May 14, 2008
978
0
0
Again fucking nothing but bullshit..

NO OTHER MMO IN HISTORY has had to do this..

No other MMO has had near the level of interest that this game has right now. So duh, no other MMO in history has HAD to do this. The next closest to this in level of popularity would be the WoW launch, and even it didn't have this level of pre-order. Oh and by the way, WoW had uber server problems when it started. They even stopped selling copies of the game for a short time because they couldn't handle the increased load. Servers were taken down daily to fix problems. Blizzard was grossly under-prepared.

Bioware on the other hand is trying to prepare for the worst case. They are putting plans in place to handle an extremely large server load and they have announced these plans to the community so that they will understand what is going on, and why. If everything goes smoothly, you won't have to worry, but if there is a problem it is way better to be prepared than to have shit hit the fan and have the game servers go down for everybody.
 

CVSiN

Diamond Member
Jul 19, 2004
9,289
0
0
No other MMO has had near the level of interest that this game has right now. So duh, no other MMO in history has HAD to do this. The next closest to this in level of popularity would be the WoW launch, and even it didn't have this level of pre-order. Oh and by the way, WoW had uber server problems when it started. They even stopped selling copies of the game for a short time because they couldn't handle the increased load. Servers were taken down daily to fix problems. Blizzard was grossly under-prepared.

Bioware on the other hand is trying to prepare for the worst case. They are putting plans in place to handle an extremely large server load and they have announced these plans to the community so that they will understand what is going on, and why. If everything goes smoothly, you won't have to worry, but if there is a problem it is way better to be prepared than to have shit hit the fan and have the game servers go down for everybody.

I was there for WoW launch and Alpha..

It wasnt a bad as SOME people made it out to be.. yes there was a server cluster crash.. I was on Archimonde and was forced to move elsewhere..

just being 3 days behind the rest of the PVP guilds was a HUGE deal.. it meant that they were going to be at least 10-15 levels higher than us when we got to the opena reas..
which means gank city..
On gorefiend at WoW launch we were able to play with no issues and after the crash.

or from a PVE aspect.. this gives crafters time to corner the market.

this cannot happen.. everyone deserves that same blank slate to make their mark or get ahead..


And also technology and internet speeds and server performance have made HUGE leaps in technology since 2004.. so this should not be an issue. as along with the amount of people the technology has grown as well.

there are no excuses when it comes to staggering and instancing.. it's a bad business practice all the way around for an MMO player. it separates and segregates players and gives those that get in first an unfair advantage over others that dont.

when there are L50s at launch from those that preordered first and those poeple are waiting in the L20 zones on PVP servers to make your lives a living hell.. then you will understand..

and mark my words it will happen.. there will be entire guilds L50 in under 8 days. especially on PVP servers.
 

Axon

Platinum Member
Sep 25, 2003
2,541
1
76
Sort of. They are hoping they CAN accommodate without having to do a rolling/staggered launch. They are just trying to make sure their equipment can handle it and that they have enough equipment to handle the demand. I think they are being very professional about it personally. They KNOW they have MILLIONS of people already waiting to get in on day one. They have over a million preorders right now well. They just aren't 100% certain they have the capacity to deal with that much demand. Trust me, I would rather have a rolling launch where servers are up all the time and the majority of people that want to play can do so. That opposed to the opposite where so many players at once all trying to access the game at the same time seriously crashes everything and no one gets to play as they are constantly trying to bring servers back up to have them crash again due to basically a DDOS attack (of a sorts) by anxious gamers trying to get in to play.

They will be closely monitoring everything during the launch cycle to make sure everything is as smooth and accommodating the majority of the player base as possible.

Perhaps I'm just more demanding given the cost of the product, but I feel like they could do both. Nonetheless, we'll see how it goes. I doubt the launch will be more populated than WoW at launch. I'm going to play Jedi just because I know Sith will be absolutely insanely overcrowded.
 

oddyager

Diamond Member
May 21, 2005
3,398
0
76
Sort of. They are hoping they CAN accommodate without having to do a rolling/staggered launch. They are just trying to make sure their equipment can handle it and that they have enough equipment to handle the demand. I think they are being very professional about it personally. They KNOW they have MILLIONS of people already waiting to get in on day one. They have over a million preorders right now well. They just aren't 100% certain they have the capacity to deal with that much demand. Trust me, I would rather have a rolling launch where servers are up all the time and the majority of people that want to play can do so. That opposed to the opposite where so many players at once all trying to access the game at the same time seriously crashes everything and no one gets to play as they are constantly trying to bring servers back up to have them crash again due to basically a DDOS attack (of a sorts) by anxious gamers trying to get in to play.

They will be closely monitoring everything during the launch cycle to make sure everything is as smooth and accommodating the majority of the player base as possible.


I doubt servers (both hardware and or software) are going to crash. Network infrastructure nowadays have a myriad of different ways to rate limit the amount of traffic coming into their environment to prevent that type of issue especially with a company that has Bioware/EA resources.

What I do expect is something along the lines of the Rift launch where players are stuck in forever queues due to the limited number of available servers. I'm guessing they saw what an absolute clusterfuck that was (I was there for preorder access) and want to avoid that.
 

DrunkenSano

Diamond Member
Aug 8, 2008
3,892
490
126
It will either be server crashes or server queues, one or the other is guaranteed to happen. It's a given, to expect anything else is wishful and unrealistic thinking.
 

Anomaly1964

Platinum Member
Nov 21, 2010
2,460
4
81
It will either be server crashes or server queues, one or the other is guaranteed to happen. It's a given, to expect anything else is wishful and unrealistic thinking.

Bioware released yesterday that TWO MILLION people did beta, I don't expect sever ques or crashes based on my beta experience...
 

JamesV

Platinum Member
Jul 9, 2011
2,002
2
76
Where is everyone buying the game?

I've just recently decided to get it, but I'm not a big fan of Origin; but being able to play it early is a definate plus. Then there is the post here where people are getting banned from the forums and can't even play their games on Origin.

So where are you buying it? Are there any good pre-order deals outside of the downloadable version's virtual items?