This video was recorded on 17th December at 2:00am GMT. When the guild “Binary Sunset” battled Kephess. I guess your just lucky some times 🙂 Binary Sunset is named after the iconic scene from Star Wars IV – A New Hope, and we’re based on the Progenitor (EU), an RP-PVE server. they are a multi-national European Guild; the raid in question including players from England, Iceland, Portugal, Turkey, Germany, Belgium and Spain. This was their 13th try that evening, on a boss they hadn’t attempted before, and at 2:00am GMT. Given their timezone differences everyone was getting a little tired, but they couldn’t just call it – they are a mature Guild of working age, and likely to be spread far and wide for Christmas with families. This week was the last chance to get an attempt in on completing Terror from Beyond in 2012. As a Guild they had ups and downs, their previous GM disbanded…
Author: Soeren Kamper
First Digital Expansion Announced for SWTOR: Rise of the Hutt Cartel
BioWare updated their webise this morning with a new addition to the swtor.com/buy page. It’s now possible to pre-order the first ever expansion for Star Wars: The old republic, named Rise of the Hutt Cartel. The sales page also reveals new details regarding price, content and of course, how to pre-order. The drop date listed is Spring 2013. Here is the run down: Continue your Star Wars™ saga with a new level cap of 55. Experience new epic story content with fully-voiced cinematic conversations. New Planet: Makeb – Explore a vibrant alien landscape. Subscribers save 50% off the Regular Price – Only £5.99 (£11.99 Regular Price). Receive five (5) days of Early Access* if you Pre-Order by January 7, 2013 11:59PM CT // 5:59AM GMT! The page also includes a new FAQ about the new expansion. In it, there is a pretty lengthy description of what players can expect with the release of Rise of the…
Patch Notes 1.6.1 – 12/18/2013
BioWare have finished this week’s scheduled maintenance and the servers are now back up and running. Apart form a few bug fixes to Speeder Piloting and versus test bugs, this patch sees some new additions to the Cartel Market. Jedis and Warriors should be happy about this, as they get new armor: Below are the complete patch notes: Cartel Market New Items The Valiant Jedi and Sith Raider armor sets are now available for 1,440 Cartel Coins each. Discounts 10% discount on Black Market Cartel Packs. Cost: 162 Cartel Coins. 10% discount on Crime Lord Cartel Packs. Cost: 324 Cartel Coins. 10% discount on all Weekly Passes. Cost: 216 Cartel Coins per Weekly Pass. 50% discount on the Rancor Holo-Replica. Cost: 90 Cartel Coins. Bugfixes The Improved Speeder Piloting I item included with the LD-1 Celebrator speeder now correctly reflects that the unlock is player-only and not account-wide. Some item…
Reminder: Scheduled Maintenance tomorrow
Just a heads up to remind you that this week’s scheduled maintenance will take place tomorrow on Tuesday and will last from 2AM to 6AM CST. In this case, Star Wars: The Old Republic will receive a patch update. Hello everyone, we wanted to let you know that we will be performing scheduled maintenance for four hours on Tuesday, December 18th, 2012 from 2AM CST (12AM PST/3AM EST/8AM GMT/9AM CET/7PM AEDT) until 6AM CST (4AM PST/7AM EST/12PM GMT/1PM CET/11PM AEDT). All game servers and SWTOR.com will be offline during this period. This maintenance is expected to take no more than four hours, but could be extended. We will have the patch notes available in full asap. Check out the original announcement over at the official forum thread.
What is this…. Life Day thing
Many people who haven’t played Star Wars: Galaxies, or are not much into the whole Star Wars lore, might have a hard time understanding what this whole Life Day business is all about. People who played Star Wars: Galaxies already knows all about this, but if you haven’t played SWG, I can tell you that Life Day was an ingame event. It was the SWG version of Christmas. Every year 2 gifts were given out by the Developers to everybody in-game. One gift is for people to open themselves, and the other gift is for you to trade with a friend. Before Star Wars: Galaxies, Wookiee Life Day made its first appearance in The Star Wars Holiday Special. Unlike most aspects of the normally well-crafted Star Wars universe, Life Day is utterly expedient, inserted into the show to provide a very basic goal for the heroes, and lend a bit of topical…
BioWare on Grade 7 Ship parts costs
With Game update 1.6 new Heroic Space Missions saw the light of the day, and with that also new tier 7 ship parts. These are of course supposed to help players complete these new challenging missions. To get these new upgrades you need to spend hundreds of Daily and Fleet Commendations or just purchase them on the Cartel Market. This have off course sparked a huge debate with players crying “Pay 2 win”. Today Community Manager Joveth Gonzalez made a forum post with feedback from Lead Systems Designer Damion Schubert indicating that BioWare is looking for solutions to reduce the gap between the two paths: Hi everyone, I’ve spoken to the design team about the issue of Grade 7 ship upgrades and the cost in game (resources and time) versus the cost on the Cartel Market, since this concern was raised by a number of people on our forums. Our Lead Designer for the game, Damion Schubert, has this to say: Unfortunately, there…
The big list of free SWTOR guides
Sine the launch of Star Wars: The old republic almost one year ago, we have steadily updated our website with new game guides. Now one year later, it has become increasingly hard to find the the guide you might be looking for. There for are we creating this list for a better overview. This will be a work in progress and we will do our best to keep the list updates. If there is something you feel you need a guide on, let us know in the comments below, and we will see if we can help out. Raiding/Flashpoints Guides: The False Emperor The Esseles The Streets of Cademimu The Colicoid War Game Directive 7 Taral V Mandalorian Raiders Athiss Boarding Party Dorin’s Sky Maelstrom Prison Hammer Station The Foundry The Black Talon The Lost Island Flashpoint Guide Battle of Ilum Kaon Under Siege Scum and Villainy SWTOR World Boss Guides…
TOR TV: Jedi Samurai
Nowadays, Samurai-dom is less about kicking butt with a giant Katana and more about honor and justice, in other words, bushido without a giant knife at your side. This kind of sucks really, so some dude from France created his own “samudi” code in Star Wars: The old republic. This new way of life combines the way of the jedi, with the way of the Samurai. Sounds hard to understand? Worry not; the creator of this noble way of life also made an instructional video about it. Check it out:
Corellian Run Radio Interviews Rob Hinkle
The good people over at Corellian Run Radio had the chance to interview Senior Systems Designer, Rob Hinkle. In the interview Mr. Hinkle answers questions regarding upcoming and current mechanics in PVP. What struck me the most about his answers to the questions, regarding gear. He personally felt gear had mattered too much up to this point. He spoke of having progression without having such a large gear gap, i.e. tightening up the gear gap. This seems like a good way to go. Here is a snip: Question 4: Are there any plans to ever change from the vertical progression of PvP gear to horizontal, especially with free-to-play? (i.e. will gear in the future still be a large factor in performance?) Rob: As we move forward, we want to tighten up the minimal gear level and maximum gear level power gap while inside PvP. ToR is an MMORPG, so we feel that players need some…
Game Update 1.6: “Ancient Hypergate” Launch Trailer
With the launch of Star Wars: The Old Republic’s Game Update 1.6: Ancient Hypergate, BioWare posted a promotion trailer. This video is showing off the new content in the usually BioWare way we know from the other updates. The video itself do not reveal anything big to the fans following the game here on swtorstrategies, but it’s still a damn nice watch. Check it out below:
Game Update 1.6: Ancient Hypergate – Patch notes
Servers are back up after today’s game update. Below are the patch notes. Personally I’m not really overjoyed to see the Life Day/New Year stuff being just a purchase from Cartel Market (meaning no xmas/new year event, most likely), but hey, much better than nothing. I guess the best we can really do (assuming you aren’t interested in putting in any more money than the $15 you already do) is wait for your sub + security CCs to kick in and get stuff then. At least until the initial GTN rush calms down and prices settle down once again. Highlights Ancient Hypergate, a new Warzone, is available for play! Travel to an ancient ruin built around a Gree Hypergate and battle to control the precious technology for your faction. New incredibly challenging Weekly [HEROIC] Space Combat Missions are now available! All-new Grade 7 Artifact Quality Starship Upgrades are now available from the…
1.6 will launch December 11th
Bioware delivering next patch earlier than i expected. Happy Holidays for us. You still have time to test out the patch on the Public Test Server, but only for the next few days. BioWare will launch the update during the Scheduled Maintenance window on Tuesday, December 11, so time to speed up my fleet commendations and WZ commendations grind! Check out the announcement below: Scheduled Maintenance for Game Update 1.6: December 11th, 2012 Hello everyone, we wanted to let you know that we will be performing scheduled maintenance for six hours on Tuesday, December 11th, 2012 from 2AM CST (12AM PST/3AM EST/8AM GMT/9AM CET/7PM AEDT) until 8AM CST (6AM PST/9AM EST/2PM GMT/3PM CET/1AM AEDT). All game servers will be offline during this period. This maintenance is expected to take no more than six hours, but could be extended. Game Update 1.6 introduces a new Warzone, Ancient Hypergate, where you can team up with other players to…
Valve fixes Steam overlay to work with SWTOR
Steam overlay (shift+tab) will now work with swtor without workarounds. If you’re not familiar with Steam overlay, it allows you to use an “overlay” within games (they don’t need to be games bought in Steam either) so that you can use a browser, chat with friends, take screenshots, and more. This is very handy especially for people without multiple monitors. So when you’re in a game which you “linked” with steam, you can press shift+tab to bring up the overlay, which renders “over” the game. This is oftentimes a quicker alternative to straight up alt+tabbing (if what you want to do is possible within the overlay). As far as I know, steam overlay wouldn’t work with swtor before without workarounds. One would add it to their steam library (as a non-steam game), then when they started it Steam would “lose track of it,” such that Steam overlay (Shift+Tab) wouldn’t work….
TOR TV: Jedi on the Fly
This SWTOR Machinima was created by youtube user Metaworlds. The video shows a lone Jedi travelling around Coruscant accompanied by the sweet chillout music by Rael Wissdorf. The video really shows the beautiful scenery of the planet and how great the graphic in the game really is. If, like me, you enjoy a little chill out music while you’re grinding alone, this is definitely worth bookmarking.
1.5.2a Patch Notes 12/6/2012
BioWare closed down the servers for an unscheduled maintenance window to apply a new patch. This patch is a fix for the subscriber artifact item equipping bug. Servers are back up now, so go play. Below are the patch notes: Items Corrected an issue that prevented players from equipping some crafted Artifact (purple) quality gear.
Sith Talk Episode 41: Prochain patch Français et allemand font depuis que nous espérons
Sith talk is back with a new episode of theire fault mouth ( just kidding guys 😉 ) podcast. This week they cover their week and cover the feedback from YouTube views. Sudo come by with the next chapter in hes series. They also cover some new and future changes to F2P and Preferred player statuses. as well as the new patch notes 1.5.2, and much more. Cant make out the title no worries use Google translator after hearing the news and enjoy the joke. See you in the PIT !!!! Remember to follow the guys over at their facebook page here
Jonathan Crow Answers forum Questions
Last week, Gameplay Analyst Jonathan Crow received the spotlight stared in a meet the developers column over at the official website. Following up on this, he took questions form the community that is now up on the official forums. His answers includes interesting statistics regarding player behavior and performance, some of which you diden’t see comming… Check out the full Q&A below or the real forum thread over at the official forums. Q: Has the boss vs. player death ratio in EC changed much since 1.5 was released? Jonathan: It has changed a little bit since 1.5. In general it seems to have worsened a little, but that’s mainly because most level 50 players are busy playing around in Sector X and doing the HK-51 missions, which makes getting a full group harder. We all know that PUGs tend to not perform as well in Operations when compared to well-organized groups who have been farming the…
The Importance of Player Feedback with the New Free-to-Play Option
Jeff Hickman posted a news update yesterday regarding Free to Play restrictions. Looking at the Feedback BioWare got from the community with the New Free-to-Play Option, BioWare are making changes starting yesterday: Starting today, Preferred Status Players will see an increase to their default Quickbars from two (2) to four (4). If you’ve already purchased additional Quickbars, don’t worry: we will be refunding your Cartel Coins for any Quickbar-related purchase. Additionally, in an upcoming patch (no exact date yet, but players won’t have to wait long), Preferred Status Players will be given four (4) additional character slots, which means that they will have a total of six character slots. As always, Free-to-Play Players can reach Preferred Status simply by purchasing anything from our online store or purchasing a physical copy of the game. Last but not least, I wanted to share the news that the 50 character limit on Global Active Characters for Subscribers will be…
TOR TV: Hate-Me Rises: The Alpha Subject
Hate-Me Rises: The Alpha Subject is a SWTOR Machinima by HateMeGaming. Guild Hate Me travel to the Post-Apocalyptic Swamps of Taris. Sent by their Masters to face a deadly foe and to advance to the next stage of their training. The Video includes the take down of World Boss, Subject Alpha. This is the first of a Six Part Series by GraveWurm & Spyke
Free Fireworks to celebrate 1 year
To celebrate SWTOR’s first birthday anniversary, all players will get 25 complementary of faction specific fireworks over the game’s in-game mail system. This will happen on December 11 for valid accounts as of December 10. December 20th marks the 1st Anniversary of the official launch of Star Wars™: The Old Republic™! To thank our community for their continued support throughout this memorable first year, we’re happy to announce that all players with a valid Star Wars: The Old Republic account as of December 10th, 11:59PM CST will receive 25 complimentary stacks of faction-based fireworks! Fireworks will be delivered via in-game mail on December 11, 2012 to all qualifying players. Wow! Hard to believe it’s only been a year. One year, four end game Ops, four warzones and tons of fun.
1.5.2 Patch Notes 12/4/2012
Lot’s of fixes this time including 4 quickbar slots for preferred players! Bioware don’t get much love when this game is concerned, but looking at these patch notes, you can tell they are listening and reacting to community feedback. Cartel Market New Additions The Covert Pilot Suit has been added to the Cartel Market! This adaptive armor can be worn by any class at level 1. General A confirmation dialogue is now displayed for Cartel Coin purchases made outside of the Cartel Market. It shares the same “never show again” option as the confirmation for purchases made directly from the Cartel Market. Attempting to purchase an item or unlock your character already owns or cannot use now displays a more appropriate warning dialogue. An issue that prevented some Cartel Market purchases from being delivered correctly has been addressed. Several errors in the French and German Cartel Market tutorials have been corrected. Items…
Scheduled Maintenance, December 4th
Just a friendly remember that there will be scheduled maintenance on Tuesday, December 4th. Hopefully BioWare will adress the Reverse Engineering Schematics Bug and the HK-51 bug. Hello everyone, we wanted to let you know that we will be performing scheduled maintenance for four hours on Tuesday, December 4th, 2012 from 2AM CST (12AM PST/3AM EST/8AM GMT/9AM CET/7PM AEDT) until 6AM CST (4AM PST/7AM EST/12PM GMT/1PM CET/11PM AEDT). All game servers will be offline during this period. This maintenance is expected to take no more than four hours, but could be extended. This weekly maintenance is done in order to make general improvements and to check performance of the game so that we can continue to provide a consistent, quality experience. Quite often (but not always) after a maintenance period there will be a patch to download. After the maintenance, please login via the launcher to download the latest patch. If your…
TOR TV: SWTOR Wedding : Hoth Ski Patrol
When a hardcore pvp guild trying to organize something RP related…. what can go wrong? 2 couples in the guild Hoth Ski Patrol got married recently and decided to hold a ceremony in their honor. I’ve never been more proud to be Empire.
Meet the Developers: Jonathan Crow
Cool interview with Jonathan Crow, with some insight into what they keep tabs on. Quite an enjoyable read. Man would love to see the queries he runs on all that sweet sweet data he has access too. What does a typical day look like for you? Most days I work on two activities: 1. Monitoring the health of the game via a series of dashboards that we developed to track some of the important key performance indicators for the game (keeping track of daily logins, game economy, engagement in Operations and Warzones, etc). 2. Working on deeper-dive analyses associated with specific areas of play (such as comparing player deaths to boss kill rates between Operations) to help the development team assess whether a certain feature or piece of content needs to be modified to maximize the engagement and enjoyment of the player base. Can you share some interesting statistics with…