SWTOR: The Woes and Joys of 12x Experience

Star Wars The Old Republic introduced the 12 times bonus experience for class missions before the launch of Shadow of Revan. A player can literally only do class missions and it took them all the way to 55.  Now, 12x experience is coming it back on May 4th.

12x experience is both the bane and joy in the life of a Star Wars The Old Republic character.  You basically get a level for each class mission you complete.  Then once you hit 47 you can go to Makeb and it gets even faster.

Players get to blow through the story of each character and as we all know SWTOR is all about the story.  Casual players don’t have to go through the grind to experience them.

But 12x can have some drawbacks that might just make some struggle.

You Out Level Your Gear

A lot of people say all you need to do is wear the basic armor (greens) you get from quest rewards, but you still end up out leveling your gear.  You might struggle with certain class missions if you don’t work on your armor. 

Speed leveling gives the player hotbars full of abilities they don’t know how or when to use.  They usually skip heroics and flashpoints avoiding the group dynamic that endgame focuses on, which gives them a disadvantage when working in a group.

Buying armor as you go will just make you broke and the basic commendations you receive from quest rewards are just not enough to buy what you need.  If you think about it, you want to save those commendations for when you hit 60 and can buy your set of level 60 armor.

A few tips:

• Mix in Heroics and Flashpoints to work with a group.  Look for those announcements in general chat for people looking for a group and join in.
• Join a guild for the benefit of an extra 10% bonus to experience. There is also a good opportunity to group with the people you will most likely be doing endgame with.
• Plan on upgrading your gear every 10 to 15 levels.  If you don’t craft yourself get to know others who do.  Your guild is a good place to start.  Most won’t mind making you gear with either a low fee or no fee at all.
• 3 Words: TREEK IS AWESOME.  If you can afford to get her you should. This companion is a tank AND a healer. It will make leveling much easier.

The Amount of Travel is Horrendous

Doing all the side missions as you do the class story guides you to the next taxi.  When you are just doing class missions you miss taxis and you need to travel great distances to get to the next class mission.

When you need to go back for later missions like for conquest or for certain events you would need to travel more just to get to where you’re going.

With the new content coming at the end of April, this won’t be as much of a problem with the automatic taxi unlocks.

At 60 You Will Not Know Your Class And Will Be Undergeared

This is mainly for new players who come into the game because of 12x.  Too many times you go into a PUG and you get a group with undergeared players who seem to not know their class.  In Hard Mode Flashpoints and Operations it is important that each person know what they are doing. When someone doesn’t, you don’t go very far. 

With that in mind, SAVE your basic commendations you get from quest rewards.  You will need about 1300 commendations for a full set of 60 gear and grinding to get that much at 60 is boring.  Only spend them when you get near the 1000 commendation cap just to give some breathing room. Then, and only then, buy mods for your level.

Ideas On Keeping 12x Around

12x brings new players into the game who can experience it without all the boring grind.  Casual players who just want the single player experience like the had in Knights of the Old Republic 1 and 2 can experience it all over again. 

Now, it might be more of a benefit to the game if it was offered differently. It can still be given for a week or so before new content, but after that it should have some cost to it.  Limiting who receives the 12x boost above just subscribers might be a good idea.

Think about if it was part of the legacy system, when you have leveled 2 to 3 classes normally you can received the bonus account wide.  This would force people to know the game before speeding through.  This is not the intended purpose of 12x, but something without value is really nothing at all. When it is earned people would respect the game more.

12x may be a permanent fixture in the future and how that would affect the game I can’t answer.  In the meantime, I enjoy leveling classes because the stories are actually great to see.  When you see all 8 stories if gives you a better picture of the game world.