Here’s an interesting site TORStatus.  I play on Sith Meditation Sphere.

The numbers are basically a scale of 1-5 based on BioWare’s description of server population – Light to Full.  My server is usually Standard with a few spots of Light.  When I started it was full a lot of time time and heavy the rest.  I’m not sure if BW changed the numbers behind the words, perhaps that’s it.  The metrics show that there’s a 5-10% drop in clients since last week and I think that number will increase next week due to subs coming up.

Anyhow, I was on last night in prime time and there were less than 130 people on the Fleet.  It took me a half hour to get a group and it wasn’t a hard mode.  Then it took me 10 minutes to get to the dungeon.  I was on the fleet so I had to Leave Fleet -> Enter Ship Zone -> Enter Ship & Fly to Ilum -> Zone into dock -> Zone into Orbital Station -> Zone into Ilum & run to instance -> Zone into instance.  Each arrow is a loading screen.  Let’s compare to WoW.  I want to group, I press the LFG group and I’m ported to the dungeon.  One loading screen.  In Rift, I press the tool, I’m ported to the dungeon.  In either of them if I didn’t use the tool I would fly (mount or flighpoint) to the dungeon and zone in.

All in, it took nearly an hour from the time I logged on til the time I killed the first bad guy in the zone.  That’s a tad too much.

The Old Republic is out and naturally, I’ve been able to get some time in.  Two guides are up too.  The Sith Sorcerer Guide and the General Strat Guide.  They pay for the game and the monthly sub, which is nice.

I’m playing on the Imperial side, on Sith Meditation Sphere.  Called Asmiroth, naturally.I’m quite ahead of the leveling curve as the planets indicate how many people are playing with you.  Lower planets have 150-200 players while the ones I’m on have 10 or so.  I’ve unlocked my Legacy as well, which gives all your characters the same last name.  You unlock it after Chapter 1, which is around level 32.

The game has improved by leaps and bound from the beta stage.  It’s actually quite surprising how much they improved gameplay in a short period of time.  I was really worried about crafting and mods and they pulled an 11th hour switcheroo which works out pretty well.  From level 10 on up, you can get orange colored gear, which is 100% modifiable.  If you like the look, you can mod it all the way to level 50 and keep the same look.  I’ve had the same helmet for 20 levels now.  This works for all armor but does not work for weapons.  Weapons have a DPS component that is separate from the mods and even for an Inquisitor/Sage, where DPS doesn’t matter, it has Force Power which doesn’t come from mods.  So while you can upgrade your weapon with mods for 5 or so levels, you will eventually be replacing it.

Heroic quests, for 2 or 4 people, are interesting but not required to level.  Getting 2 people together is simple enough, on a populated planet.  Getting 4, especially after level 25 or so where roles are important, is next to impossible.  No one purposefully levels as a healer, so when you need one, it stinks.  Plus, everyone has piles of area effect attacks, making it a pain for a tank to do their job properly, especially if they are geared for DPS instead.

Also, it’s clear that level 35+ content wasn’t tested enough.  There are less things to do and way more bugs.  Sort of like Age of Conan.  Balance is off as well, where some enemy placements are next to impossible to get through unless you get lucky.   Here’s an example.  At level 35 there was a Heroic-2 quest I tried to solo.  Stuns and shields and planning and I was able to complete it without dying.  A level 40, with the same companion and talents, couldn’t get past the first group.  Things are balanced around the harder difficulty by that point.  I do know that Hard Flashpoints were largely broken as were all operations at the last beta.  We’ll see how that goes when I get there.

Leveling pace is decent.  If you skip all the story (spacebar) you can rush to 50 in about 80 hours.  Otherwise, it’s about 1.5-2 hours per level, after level 20 and fairly steady from that point.  There are still some balancing issues to work out (Heroics are not worth the time/experience) but it feels a good pace.

The story aspect is pretty strong.  It really plays like a single player BioWare game.  I won’t spoil anything but the story is quite a bit more solid than anything Lucas has written and you do feel invested in your character.  My questions revolve around what happens after you crush the Republic on a planet.  If you return, are they still there, story-wise?

Fun game, should last a couple months for me.

More info from the beta.

Last weekend was the last massive stress test for beta.  There were about 50 servers, filled to the brim.  Many disconnects, corrupt characters, failed connections.  Exactly what a beta is supposed to find but still concerning at this point in the game.  A high level server was supposed to be launched on the 16th, it finally did on the 25th with no notice.  90% of the people can’t access it.  The game is getting another big patch today, what I expect to be the final one since early access starts in 2 weeks.

I’ll put more thoughts up later but for now a quick rundown of the various systems.

Crafting

A tad more complicated than what we see in other games due to the ability to deconstruct items and learn better version.  You have collection skills and mission skills which also collect items but for the rarer recipes.  And one crafting skill per player.  As simple as the system is, it’s inherently broken in that none of the items are currently upgrades to anyone playing the game up until the mid 30s and then stop being useful at final levels.  One particular skill, Slicing, allows you to pull cash out of boxes in the wild – with zero other use.  It’s essentially an ATM skill – so a requirement if you want to be rich.

Combat

If not for the fact that they send 3-4 enemies against you at once, this would be the same as any other game.  The downside to this is that there are only 2 types of enemies throughout the entire game – humanoids and droids.  They look the same at level 1 as they do at level 50, so it’s insanely boring after you’ve killed a few thousand (by level 15, easily).   The feel is the same as all other games, click a button, watch something happen, click another button.  Also, there is a fair amount of skill bloat, where by level 30 you’ll have 2 bars (at least) full of abilities.  That’s crazy.

Class Balance

Melee classes are insanely gimped.  Since there are always 3 enemies to fight, you need to move between them while the ranged folk just stand there.  Really bad for melee tanks.  So out of 8 possible advanced classes, 3 are an a huge disadvantage. Since TOR is keeping the holy trinity (tank, healer, dps) and keeping group sizes at 4, there is a massive lack of healers in the game.  Theoretically, there should be enough but healers don’t level as fast as tanks, let alone DPS, so good luck finding one.  Classes that fill roles are fairly well balanced between themselves but time will tell which are better, especially in longer lasting fights where Force users are at a disadvantage.

Story

This part is well done.  There are a lot of options, though rarely do they have any impact other than light or dark side points.  Still, it’s fun to see what your actions have as consequences.  Light/Dark side only impact appearance, which is unfortunate.  From 1-20 you’ll have a lot of fun with your class quests.  Past that point, those quests are rare as heck.  If you play another character on the same faction, expect to replay a good 95% of the content and story.

Companions

At first they were horribly broken, now it’s only a little broken.  Tanks no longer have armor so lose their value in the 30s and healers pick up the pace.  Having to equip no only yourself but your companion means that you can’t easily swap companions – they will be heavily undergeared.  It’s a very odd thought. You can give them gifts to get small quests but all of them that I’ve see so far as just clicking text boxes.

Interface

Looks and feels Star Wars.  Clean too.  You can’t modify anything, which is VERY odd and some of the basic UI items such as macros, assists, target of target and mouseovers do not exist.  This currently makes healing about 10x as hard as it should be since DPS can’t help the tank and you need to manually click people to heal – so no moving while healing.   No looking for group feature or dual spec either – the latter of which is again making finding healers a pain.

Overall

If you’ve played a themepark MMO before (WoW, Rift, LOTRO, DDO, EQ, etc..) and are happy with what’s there, stay there.  If the story is old, then moving over could work.  If you dislike the mechanics of your themepark, you will be even more disappointed here.  If you’re looking for depth or polish, come back in 6 months.  Many of the systems that have been refined in the past have been reverted to horrible states or are simply broken.  With next to no developer input on the forums, it doesn’t help.

If you’re somewhat casual or new to the MMO sphere, then there’s stuff to see here and you should have fun for a while.

The game will sell piles of boxes and have a subscriber drop of 50% or more after 6 months.  I do expect it to be profitable but nowhere near what EA and BioWare are hoping for.

So the NDA lifted last week and I said I’d put up my thoughts on the game, here we are.

First impressions are simple enough, it’s a themepark.  If you’ve played WoW or Rift, then the game will be intimately familiar.  If you like either of those, there really isn’t a valid reason to swap over.  If you’re tired of the setting but not the mechanics, then a swap makes sense.

From a core mechanics perspective – combat, equipment, groups – the game is as you expect.  Decently balanced with variety across all classes.  There is a significant hindrance to all melee characters (of which 3 of the 8 advanced classes belong) since the majority of the game is played at a distance and against multiple enemies.  Each character, due to the good story and diverse skill set, plays somewhat uniquely and as you would expect from Star Wars canon.  Sith Sorcerers shoot lightning, Troopers use big guns, Smugglers dual wield blasters.  Each advanced class (except 2) offer dual roles.  They all DPS but some can tank or heal.  This makes it a lot easier to play through the game without having to create a new character.  The single role characters are a thing of the past and I expect those 2 other classes to swap to something else in short order – especially the pure DPS melee one.

The planets and visuals are spot on.  You feel like you’re in a Star Wars setting.  Enemies are cool looking but there are about 10 types total through the game and 95% of your combat is against humans or droids.  That does dull it up somewhat.  Groups work well together and there are a lot of group quests.  You can also get into dungeons, of which there should be 15 at launch and all of them available again at 50 at an expert difficulty.  Some of the more basic group UI elements are missing though, such as Target of Target, Focus, Mouseover (for heals) and an Assist option.  This isn’t such an issue at first but on harder difficulty, where control is important, it begins to show.  Still no Looking for Group tool, which is a bummer.  All but 2 of the dungeons are accessible from the same location – away from the planets – making it for an odd choice to actually find a group to do them.  Your only option now is to sit in that zone, twiddle your thumbs and hopefully find a group.

Crafting, as the system currently stands, is for lack of a better term, broken.  Nearly nothing you create has any practical use since your quest rewards will always be better.  One particular skill, Slicing, it essentially an ATM skill providing money out of thin air.  All characters will be using this to supplement their income.  Speaking of which, money means next to nothing aside from paying for skill upgrades and a mount.  Unless you’re giving it away by the bucketfull, you’ll reach max level with close to a million credits and nothing to do with it.  I’m sure that will change with time.

Finally, the story.  A  lot has been said about this aspect and Bioware does it well – better than Dragon Age 2, that’s for sure.  Every mission has a voice over and some options, though some of those options aren’t clear cut.  Personal missions (for your class) provide a unique backdrop to your progress and make you develop an interest in what’s going on around you.  You can replay as a different class and see different class quests but the zone quests (per planet) will always remain the same.  And those account for 80% of all quests, so replayability is questionable unless you play the opposing faction.  Still, better than other games out there.

Overall, the game is simple and fun and will keep people playing to see through the entire story at least once, so perhaps 2 months total of play.  There are some serious questions about advanced systems and mechanics but those don’t begin to apply until you’re at level 50 and there has been a total of 1 week of testing at that level – lots of missing details.  Since this is the first MMO for Bioware, and the experience thusfar as been mixed, I won’t hold my breath that launch + 2 months will be smooth.  I do expect the game to be a flash in the pan with spiked sales and under 1 million subs for the long run.  Still, if you can play with some friends, it’s not a bad way to spend 2 months.