I guess it’s Shintar’s fault but I decided to try SWTOR again (and sorry, I didn’t notice the referral code until after).  Yes, yes, I know.  I have a sub to WoW and FF14 active at the moment.  WoW is about farming pets at the moment, given the content lull before WoD, and that’s like 30 minutes a day.  I did level 3 more characters to 90, so that’s something.  FF14 I’m on the bubble for.  At 43, I’m in no-man’s-land.  Not enough for end game, too high for the mass of folk.  Dungeons are my best bet but my schedule these past days has made sitting down for even 30 minutes to concentrate hard.  I play a healer, so it’s not like I can AFK in a fight.

SWTOR’s next expansion is in a month.  It’s $20, which I think is the right price point for any expansion.  I guess there’s a Blizzard premium, just like Apple.  Think Turbine could learn a bit about this…

Anyways, if you pre-order (done) and subscribe (done) you get 12x the experience on class quests, which is ~5 quests per planet.  It stacks with generic experience boosts which you can buy in the store or get as a reward.  I logged on my Imperial Agent and the quest log was at 8K experience per quest.  The class quest though, that was over 100k.  1 quest practically gave me a level in itself.  Tried the Bounty Hunter who was 50 (my Sorc is 55 from previous subscription) and Makeb (the 50 to 55 zone) has all the quests impacted by the boost.  That’s…a level of insane.  30 minutes and I had 2 levels.

I played SWTOR during beta and for the first 3 months.  I considered it still in beta when I left as some core design was missing, in particular around the social tools.  Went back for Makeb for a few months, then real life got in the way and I stepped away from the PC for some time.  Funny story, I left Rift because I went away for 3 weeks in the summer, came back and the guild had server transferred.  SWTOR has always interested me for the story and the cannon.  Let’s be honest, KOTOR is the reason that people today even bother with games related to Star Wars, and SWTOR is more or less KOTOR3 multiplayer.

The 12x experience bump though, that’s an odd one.  When the core of the game is the story and this bypasses 90% of it, it makes you wonder.  Even a new played in WoW/WoD skipping til 90 would have no understanding of their timeline.  SWTOR is different in that there’s a personal hero story and the zones themselves are deeply tied to that story.  In WoW, you’re a faceless hero, in SWTOR you are the face of your game.  The good news is that it only applies to your class quest, which is the only unique part of the adventure upon replay.  Well, sort of.  The “normal” zone quests provide you with a fair chunk of SW lore.  Plus they give you the chance to pick light/dark side.  Skipping all of those means you really haven’t picked a side.

You’re also giving up the loot.  As a subscriber, training costs are 0, which is good, but you’re woefully underequipped for the content ~level 20.  There’s a climb in difficulty due to poor stats up until you reach 47 and can head to Makeb.  Makeb has a zone buff that normalizes your gear.  You could be in level 1 items and do fine.  I’d say that the loss of credits was an issue but you get next to nothing until level 40 anyways.  A set of dailies gives about 100k at 55, so it’s not like people are going to be struggling.  It’s a massive split from WoW’s instant 90 though, where you’re fully geared in epics, have super flight, all skills, some runes and a bit of cash.

What it does give you is an ~8 hour quest, from 1-55, detailing your class from start to end.  There are 8 unique versions of this (4 per faction), so about 60 hours of content.  For $35 (sub+pre-order), that’s a decent deal.