Pre-ordering SW:TOR from outside the launch regions
Speaking as someone also in the Oceanic region...you have four options here:-
1. Order a digital retail code from Origin anyway, damn the region lock - If you can connect to a VPN in the United States or something, this will work. You will still require an American credit card, but some folks report that putting in their real street address with a false US state worked. Others say you really do need an US card, no matter what. Still other folks report that they have been able to order from the Russian Origin store. Note that most folks from outside the launch regions haven't taken option 1. So...
2. Order a physical boxed copy and get it shipped to you - This is what you're looking at, but it will be prohibitively expensive in shipping and it will take a while to arrive. The collector's edition in particular is a heavy box, so that may ramp up your costs in that respect. May not be worth it. Please note that most Australians and other folks in the region seem to be making their box purchases from US Amazon rather than the UK. I dunno if there's a particular reason for this
3. Get someone you know in the US or EU to order a code from Origin for you - This is what I did; OpMegs and Unicorna sorted it out for me, and I paid them.
4. Pay a third party company to order a code from Origin for you - G2play.net is doing this - you pay them, they make the purchase, they send you the codes. Though they are not promising to send you pre-order/early access codes any more. Several folks from our region say that this site is trustworthy, and has not cheated them on past codes before. Use your own judgement here on whether you think this is a good idea. Obviously you'll end up paying a little more than if a friend does it for you, because they'll take a cut.
Playing SW:TOR for the MMO-shy
SW:TOR is explicitly designed to be friendly for non-MMO players. It's a very solo-friendly or duo-friendly game - in fact you'll find that the class quests are largely designed with the assumption that people will be soloing them - any other players along for the ride are in 'spectator mode' and do not have any conversation options during dialogue sequences. You certainly can team up for those, of course. Bearing in mind also that a full team in SW:TOR is four players, two people plus their two NPC companions can complete quite a lot of stuff designed for a full team, though perhaps with greater difficulty. You can, for instance, run some Flashpoints that way, though it might be a greater challenge.
Every class gains access to a different group of companions, but your companions will always be able to fulfil whatever role you need - you'll have ones that can ranged tank, melee tank, heal, ranged DPS, or melee DPS.
As noted, Flashpoints and Operations are largely what you'll have issues with playing solo or as a duo. Flashpoints are similar to CoH Task Forces, of the modern short variety rather than the lengthy painful ones. Again, this is apparently possible even without a full team, just harder. Operations are raids, so that's clearly out of the question if you're avoiding the...full MMO experience. But that's about all you'd be gated from.
Oceanic Community
If you and your sister do play the game, the Oceanic community - mostly Australians and New Zealanders, also English-speaking Asians like myself - are mostly rolling on US West Coast servers. This may or may not affect your server choice. I'm not too antsy about this, but I at least like to keep an eye on where most folks in my timezone are heading.
The Harbinger and The Jekk'Jekk Tarr (US West PvE) are currently being targeted by Aussies and regional folks getting their early access, but it remains to be seen whether this will pan out as more servers are added. Reports say The Harbinger is getting a particular heavy load.
The Swiftsure (US West PvP) is the server being targeted by the Oceanic pee-vee-pee community, but I don't believe either of you are interested in this.
Begeren Colony (US West RP-PvE) has been chosen as the unofficial Oceanic RP server, according to some websites. But there isn't as massive a consensus on this - I'm only getting the data from one source, as opposed to the clear 'everyone roll on Harbinger or Jekk'Jekk or Swiftsure that is coming out from other folks', so I can't make any promises. At present there are only two US West RP-PvE servers anyway; most of the RP servers are located in other zones.
This situation may change as more servers are added as we approach launch and beyond.
-- Acyl
Speaking as someone also in the Oceanic region...you have four options here:-
1. Order a digital retail code from Origin anyway, damn the region lock - If you can connect to a VPN in the United States or something, this will work. You will still require an American credit card, but some folks report that putting in their real street address with a false US state worked. Others say you really do need an US card, no matter what. Still other folks report that they have been able to order from the Russian Origin store. Note that most folks from outside the launch regions haven't taken option 1. So...
2. Order a physical boxed copy and get it shipped to you - This is what you're looking at, but it will be prohibitively expensive in shipping and it will take a while to arrive. The collector's edition in particular is a heavy box, so that may ramp up your costs in that respect. May not be worth it. Please note that most Australians and other folks in the region seem to be making their box purchases from US Amazon rather than the UK. I dunno if there's a particular reason for this
3. Get someone you know in the US or EU to order a code from Origin for you - This is what I did; OpMegs and Unicorna sorted it out for me, and I paid them.
4. Pay a third party company to order a code from Origin for you - G2play.net is doing this - you pay them, they make the purchase, they send you the codes. Though they are not promising to send you pre-order/early access codes any more. Several folks from our region say that this site is trustworthy, and has not cheated them on past codes before. Use your own judgement here on whether you think this is a good idea. Obviously you'll end up paying a little more than if a friend does it for you, because they'll take a cut.
Playing SW:TOR for the MMO-shy
SW:TOR is explicitly designed to be friendly for non-MMO players. It's a very solo-friendly or duo-friendly game - in fact you'll find that the class quests are largely designed with the assumption that people will be soloing them - any other players along for the ride are in 'spectator mode' and do not have any conversation options during dialogue sequences. You certainly can team up for those, of course. Bearing in mind also that a full team in SW:TOR is four players, two people plus their two NPC companions can complete quite a lot of stuff designed for a full team, though perhaps with greater difficulty. You can, for instance, run some Flashpoints that way, though it might be a greater challenge.
Every class gains access to a different group of companions, but your companions will always be able to fulfil whatever role you need - you'll have ones that can ranged tank, melee tank, heal, ranged DPS, or melee DPS.
As noted, Flashpoints and Operations are largely what you'll have issues with playing solo or as a duo. Flashpoints are similar to CoH Task Forces, of the modern short variety rather than the lengthy painful ones. Again, this is apparently possible even without a full team, just harder. Operations are raids, so that's clearly out of the question if you're avoiding the...full MMO experience. But that's about all you'd be gated from.
Oceanic Community
If you and your sister do play the game, the Oceanic community - mostly Australians and New Zealanders, also English-speaking Asians like myself - are mostly rolling on US West Coast servers. This may or may not affect your server choice. I'm not too antsy about this, but I at least like to keep an eye on where most folks in my timezone are heading.
The Harbinger and The Jekk'Jekk Tarr (US West PvE) are currently being targeted by Aussies and regional folks getting their early access, but it remains to be seen whether this will pan out as more servers are added. Reports say The Harbinger is getting a particular heavy load.
The Swiftsure (US West PvP) is the server being targeted by the Oceanic pee-vee-pee community, but I don't believe either of you are interested in this.
Begeren Colony (US West RP-PvE) has been chosen as the unofficial Oceanic RP server, according to some websites. But there isn't as massive a consensus on this - I'm only getting the data from one source, as opposed to the clear 'everyone roll on Harbinger or Jekk'Jekk or Swiftsure that is coming out from other folks', so I can't make any promises. At present there are only two US West RP-PvE servers anyway; most of the RP servers are located in other zones.
This situation may change as more servers are added as we approach launch and beyond.
-- Acyl