The Fanatical Swordsman

There are so many wonderful features of Star Wars: The Old Republic. I got the immense pleasure of playing the Beta this last weekend, and I want to share some screenshots and opinions. I will be putting out a series of posts with the Top 4s of the many things I got to try, including the classes, the PvP, the systems, and the experience in general.

I have to be honest. I have posted things I love about SWTOR, and I have illustrated that I am clearly looking forward to getting my hands on this game again. However, to be completely fair, I need to at least do one post on things I DON’T like about the game (vs. you know, the 9 posts I did on what I love).

Here are the top 4 things I don’t like in SWTOR.

1. Pretty poor cosmetic system
   I may just be spoiled by LOTRO’s and DCUO’s fantastic cosmetic systems, but SWTOR’s is sadly lacking. What I don’t like about it is that you cannot easily change what you are wearing when it comes to cosmetics. It is a long and drawn out process of finding something you like, finding a crafter to make a fully modable version of it if you don’t already have something like it, getting the good mods, and swapping them in. It is quite annoying, but it could improve with time. They also recently removed the ability to match the armor color to the chest piece. This was a great idea, since it alleviates the “clown on acid” look that often happens when mixing gear sets. I can now see why they did that, because the armor sets (previewed here on Darth Hater) look exactly the same for the different tiers. The only difference: color. Now here is the issue. I don’t want to be Jango Fett. I want to be Boba Fett. Jango Fett was killed (albeit by one of the greatest Jedi ever to live), Boba Fett faced Luke Skywalker and didn’t die. There are no green bounty hunter armor sets, at least not this time. I like green, dang it, not blue. I don’t want the tier of armor to pick my color, because frankly a blue Jedi would look ridiculous too, when Jedi usually dress in earth tones. Anyway, will I still play? Yes. Will I deal with it? Yes.
2. PvP rewards not directly related to effort
   Currently, as it stands as of Thanksgiving weekend, SWTOR has fantastic PvP. One thing I like is that if you have a guy who is AFK and is autorunning into a wall in a Warzone, your team can still win if they’re skilled. What I DON’T like, is that guy gets the same rewards as everyone else. This is not a smart idea. Also, the PvP gear comes from boxes that you buy with your commendations. These boxes have a random number generator attached to them, so you might not get what you want. This is also not a smart idea. Currently, the effort is not proportional to the reward.
3. People in chat are idiots sometimes
   This is always a problem, regardless of what game you are playing or how good your community is. But one thing that is really ticking me off is that people in chat keep saying “Blah, blah, blah, this is just like WoW in such-and-such way!” It really grinds on me because it doesn’t feel a thing like WoW. It feels like an MMO. WoW is just where these idiots came from, and so that is all they have to compare to. MMO’s that have skills and spec trees and mounts and travel exist in many different forms. WoW is simply the most famous. LOTRO used to be called a “WoW clone,” then it developed into an entirely separate product, with things that are uniquely LOTRO.  (Note: I don’t hate WoW players. I hate idiots. Some of my best friends were WoW players, and in fact, I at one point played WoW.) The simple fact is, MMO’s borrow from the industry standard, which is a good thing. It means that for veterans like myself, it is easier to transition into the game and be awesome faster.
   3.5
   People in WoW tend to be a bit on the immature side. This has caused many to think of WoW players to be little 14-year-old boys that need a girl in their life that didn’t give birth to them. I am coming from a very mature community in LOTRO, so I know that it will probably be a step down, but I really hope that SWTOR doesn’t become the new WoW. I don’t want the stupid chat that makes me have to /ignore every other player all the time. Even in the Beta, one of the first things I did was learn how to create a channel to filter out General, PvP, and Trade chat. It was much quieter, and I was much happier.
4. UI layout is stuck
   You can’t move the UI, at least not that I saw. I also asked around, and nobody knew of a way, and one person said that it wasn’t possible. I really hope that we can eventually move things, because I want to be able to see my left-hand quickslot bar when I am in a group, which is currently impossible. I will have to make it be my companion bar or something that I only use when solo or duo. It isn’t game-breaking as much as it is kinda annoying.

So that is the things I dislike about SWTOR. Overall, I am really impressed with the game, and I will definitely enjoy playing it. These things are more-or-less something I would like to see get fixed later, not really something that breaks the game for me. I got along just fine without cosmetics or UI-control, and I won’t really care, come time for me to play. I am too excited about the nine other posts’ stuff to be bummed about this.

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