Be honest, you knew I'd pop up in this thread, didn't you?
Firstly, I'll say that I don't think there ae definite plans for SWTOR to go F2P. I think they have F2P scenarios in place, in case they need to push the button. I'd b suprised if it did so soon, but I guess stranger things have happened (The NGE springs to mind...).
As for your bad points below, I'll try and give you my feedback for each point. Be warned though, I'm a big fanboy of this game, and it can do no wrong as far as I'm concerned. I've enjoyed every aspect of the game thus far.
The Not So Good:
- Elite quests. I forget what they're called in SWTOR. I think Blizzard have it right here. They're aware people just skip them and are building something to compensate for that. They're a legacy of the pre-WoW MMO market and the audience has moved on from them.
The Heroic quests are a really fun part of the game for me. Sure, if you can't get groups for them, they become a royal pain in the ass, especially if your a completionist, like me. I've levelled my Sage to 46 so far without doing a Flashpoint or Heroic really, and that saddens me. It's not through choice, but through lack of server popuation to do it with. That said, you don't need to do a single FP, heroic or WZ to level up to cap. I know, I've done it.
1.3 is currently on the test server right now, and that brings the group finder, which includes options for finding groups for planetary content. This, combined with server transfers, will make finding groups so much easier. I've tried it, it works, its cool. Plus, no cross-server idiots to worry about.
- Coruscant and Nar Shadaa. Note that both are city planets. The design of both of these zones completely ticked me off and I didn't get past either. The Cataclysm underwater zone Vashj'ir is a bit of a trial too, but I've actually played it through several times and will probably do so again. Something is really wrong with SWTOR's city zone design for me.
Not really sure what your gripe is with Coruscant, as I've levelled through it at least 6 times so far, and have enjoyed it each time. Maybe it's not as 'open' as you anticipated, and this is what is putting you off? Dromund Kaas does my head in however, and it was a real chore pushing two imps through that.
- Chatty quest-givers. I never imagined this would be a bad thing, but it was surprisingly antisocial. Since the social aspect is a big reason that I play MMOs at all, let alone the ones I choose, chatty quest-givers and their funny gestures proved to be a negative.
Again, not something I've really noticed. After the first play through of most none class content stuff, I just hit spacebar anyway. Legacy perks in 1.3 might help you here. You can tailor a toon to get more XP from Class quests, Flashpoints and Warzones, as wel as Exploration, so it's entirey possible to skip most world conten.
- The storylines: a little too unstructured. WoW Cataclysm goes too far the other way, but it nevertheless provides some strong contrast. What do I think should have happened? My Sith inquisitor should have arrived on that third planet (whatever it was called), reported to the local Imperial commander and been routed back and forth to junior officer quest-givers. Pretend my inquisitor is attached to that officer's command on temporary assignment while working on the sneaky overall objective. Instead, as I recall, I didn't meet the local commander until about three quarters of the way through the zone. Narrative cohesion doesn't mean a linear quest structure.
Not an issue for me, but then I'm not a writer
- Stupid evil. On more than one occasion I found myself wondering how the hell the Empire functions at all if everyone sits around indulging their sadism. Quite screwing around folks and get on with conquering the galaxy. I know Star Wars is a straight-out good vs evil universe, but when I mass-murder rebels quickly for the sake of efficiency instead of slowly for chuckles I really don't think I should be earning light-side points.
I agree here, and get round it by playing Lightside. So far, I've had no urge whatsoever to play a Dark side character, with the only exception being when I get DS points for making a decision that I would in RL, and me thinking that theres no way I should have got DS points for it! I also play my Sith and BH as LS too.
Any feedback on my points? What did and didn't work for you? If you're still playing, how's it going? If you gave up on it, what would it take to entice you back?
As I said previously, I'm still playing it and loving it. We're doing Ops (when it ain't GW2 beta weekend) and PvP when we can, I'm sitting on two 50's with a third well on the way, and a plethora of alts in their mid-20's.
SWTOR for life babeh. Or something...