GUI - I'll restate how horrible this is, it _still_ doesn't remember where you left each window and whats worse is there are some new bugs to deal with (such as the one where closing an item description on a vendor/bazaar closes the whole vendor/bazaar window!)
Vet rewards - It would appear that Traders and Entertainers don't get the 'Elder' titles that everyone else gets, just more reason to believe the devs really don't give a damn about these elements of the community (while I'm on the subject of Entertainers how come my one has a CL of 2 but my Trader only has a CL of 1?!).
On a similar subject it would appear that, due to SOE's wonderful [lack of] QA on this patch, no one who logged in [and therefore respec'd] an existing character in yesterday (i.e. me, both accounts, all characters) got any of the items they would have got during levelling up (it's now like EQ2 where you get given items at certain 'levels' or skill boxes in SWG). Rather than issue these items out retrospectively they expect players to use 2 of the 10 respecs to move to a different profession and then back to the original one to gain the items (this I could accept if they increased the respec's by 2 to compensate) once a hotfix goes live (it still hasn't and due to even more [lack of] communications from SOE people have already used 2 respecs trying to get these items.
While I'm talking about respecs, I was thinking today that actually 10 respecs (one for each new profession and a final one to chose that you want to stay as) isn't enough to try all the new professions because it would only enable you to try 1 of the Trader varients (there are 4), see my earlier comments about devs and their [lack of] concern for the non-combat players.
I posted on the official SWG forums a few times before this abortion went live that everyone would be Jedi now (usually to be met with replies of 'and how is that different to what we have now?!') well unsurprisingly I was right. Everywhere I go all I see is Elder and respec Jedi either dueling or arguing about who 'earned' it. I know there were alot of Jedi pre-NGE but the situation is far worse now (mainly because they are everywhere and not just on the high end planets like they used to be)
What was interesting though was the notable decline in players online tonight compared to last night, obviously it's a little early to judge if this is a trend but the signs don't look good for masses of returning players (it looks like they came, they saw, they [still] didn't like and they left again, and took a bunch of previously happy players with them)
What is also noticible is the lag! Last night I put it down to the fact that loads of people were online (Eisley was always laggy on release but there were lots more people back then and I had a lower spec PC). Tonight however there were many less people and I still had a second or 2 delay doing stuff in my PA hall with no one else around! I'm no expert on this kind of thing but my guess is either the servers aren't happy about the additional load this patch probably brought or the client isn't (or a combination of the 2).
Again it's too early to say for sure but it would appear that the crafting community has either largely quit, is refusing to craft in protest or is busy being other classes (either on trial or for good). I don't remember the last time I saw the bazaar this empty and it's having a knock on effect because combat players are having trouble locating equipment they can now use (the most common request being either weapons or resources to construct lightsabers). Obviously the aforementioned lack of items for the respec'd professions hasn't helped here.
At least they got the in-game knowledgebase back on line so players can, once again, submit in game support tickets - I put mine in with my requests for this that and the other, in my mind the request is totally reasonable, experience tells me I'll get some brush off reply from a CSR. Depending on how I feel at the time I might kick up about it, not that this has done me any good in the past. To date I have only ever found 1 member of SOE support staff who could do his job properly and that is Joel (is that Joe L or Joel?) from Planetside then subsequently MXO - let me qualify that, with 10 years experience in the IT support arena I think I have a reasonably good idea about this! All I can say is that SOE support QA is as non-existant as their coding QA!
Now I never thought I'd say this but I find myself wanting SWG to fail, it's quite possible that I'm being selfish in that, if it's no longer a game I want to play, then I'd be happiest if it went under so all the people that it's now supposed to cater to can't play it either. I guess an element of this is the fact that, in every MMORPG bar none I have played the devs cater to the combat players first, foremost and almost exclusively (and that SWG used to be the only one that didn't) but I'm guessing a large part is that the SWG team at SOE has screwed us over so much and so often they don't deserve to have the title to work on (which I suppose ultimately means I'd like them all to lose their jobs). Unfortunately I'd imagine the ones actually responsible for this mess are some high up suits in either Lucas or SOE and wouldn't catch much if any fall out from SWG's failure and the poor grunts at the bottom of the ladder would be the ones looking for a new job.
Sound a bit harsh? Probably but then the CU and NGE were harsh on the player, karma is a bitch and all the cries of 'it's just a game' won't change the fact that we feel cheated, betrayed and had 2.5 years labour of love flushed down the bog! Not that I want SOE to go under (unlikely anyway unless Lucas has some big penalty clause or something) because I'm happily playing EQ2 and Planetside still.
I guess this is why I find myself strangely drawn to any negative cover of the NGE (which isn't particularly hard to find). The realist in me however thinks that SWG will limp along, at least until the PS3 comes out (which appears to be the underlying goal of the NGE) at which point SWG will probably become just like EQOA is now..........deserted.
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