Game update 2.8 is close. The public test servers will be closing down on June 2. Here are the official word from Tait Watson: Hey all! Thank you for all your great feedback, reports, and helping us test out the Spoils of War game update. Just as a heads up, we will be taking the PTS down at 10AM CDT on Monday, June 2nd. Thank you again, and we look forward to having you back on the PTS next time! -Tait
Author: Soeren Kamper
Cartel Pack Sales from May 30 to June 1 (28% OFF)
Cartel Market will be having a sale from May 30 to June 1. When? Friday, May 30th at 8AM Central – Sunday, June 1st at 8AM Central What? The following Hypercrates: Hypercrate: Crime Lord’s Cartel Pack Hypercrate: Galactic Ace’s Starfighter Pack Hypercrate: Opportunist’s Bounty Pack Hypercrate: Hotshot’s Starfighter Pack Hypercrate: Blockade Runner’s Cartel Pack Hypercrate: Vice Commandant’s Contraband Pack Hypercrate: Space Jockey’s Starfighter Pack Hypercrate: Enforcer’s Contraband Pack Hypercrate: Dogfighter’s Starfighter Pack How Much? Each of these Hypercrates will be 28% off. I know what you’re thinking, 28%?! That’s a strange number. The reason that they are 28% is that at that discount they end up being exactly 5500 Cartel Coins, meaning they can be bought in a single purchase. You may also notice that some of these are embargoed packs so make sure to log in and get them while they’re around.
Sage Top 3 Answers
Eric Musco justed posted the answers to the top 3 Sage questions which were submitted earlier in the official forum. Questions 1 & 3 were a waste. More lightsaber attacks, really? The answer to #1 was interesting to me at least, confirming that developers share my belief that dps should just, well.. dps and not try to actively off heal even yourself. Leave healing to your healers. For #2, glad that they will be fixing pvp sage/sorc healing. It’s interesting that they are considering going back to how noble sacrifice/consumption worked in the early 1.x days when it didn’t cost any health to use. Read it all below: PvE – Survivability Are the developers satisfied with Sage/Sorcerer survivability, specifically in PvE operations? What is your philosophy towards the Sage class and its defenses? Are there any plans to improve the class’s current survival tools? For example, by perhaps providing a…
Live Streaming from the International space station
Here is a great window to Space! If this project remains open, it will allow the world witness our reality from another perpective. A beautiful one. And from time to time some wild phenomena out there, like the North Lights and meteors in Summer. I wonder if that is possible from that height. But I guess that going around the equator that must be beyond our reach…Still magnificent.! I wish they installed surround angle moving cameras and a few more. I hope this experiment succeeds and grows wider in budget and resources. The Ustream video from the station is available only when the complex is in contact with the ground through its high-speed communications antenna and NASA’s Tracking and Data Relay Satellite System. During “loss of signal” periods, you will see a blue screen. Since the station orbits the Earth once every 90 minutes, it sees a sunrise or a…
TOR TV: It’s Not Unusual To Be Feared By Everyone
Jedi Master Carlton Banks had has great influence over Dread Master Calphayus… There is not hope for the Empire! Jump on it! This video is made with the fresh Emote from the Space Jockey’s Starfighter Pack if anyone was wondering. The dancer is wearing: Crest Of The Dread Master (Head Piece) from Hateful Entity. Battlemaster Force-master Gear (only from GTN or crafter now) Using the Covert Waist Energy Armour for the belt (Cartel Item)
Scheduled Maintenance: May 20th, 2014 – Patch 2.7.2
On May 20th, all game servers, SWTOR.com, and the launcher will be unavailable while BioWare perform scheduled maintenance. Game Update 2.7.2 will be implemented during this downtime. Details are as follows: Date: Tuesday May 20th, 2014 Duration: 5 hours Time: 3AM PST (10AM GMT) – 8AM PST (3PM GMT) During maintenance, all updates and additional information will be posted on the official Twitter account. Below are the patch notes: 2.7.2 Patch Notes General Preferred players no longer have Chat restriction, as intended. Cartel Market Emotes and Moods can now be unlocked in Collections. Jori Daragon’s Loincloth no longer causes missing textures on the wearer’s legs. Flashpoints + Operations Corrected an issue which unintentionally granted Energy Spheres immunity to Challenging Call and Threatening Scream during the Dread Master Brontes encounter in Dread Fortress. Warzones The Lingering Sludge affect from the Toxic Sludge Pipes in the Quesh Huttball Pit is now applied to afflicted…
PTS Patch 2.8 Notes – 5/16/14
A new update has been applied to the PTS. You can find the new notes below, and they will be merged into the existing Patch Notes. Game Update 2.8: Spoils Of War PTS Update 2 Soovada (“Spoils of War” in Huttese) is an annual celebration of total extravagance in Hutt culture, originally celebrated in the summer season of Varl after successful military campaigns. Rival clans compete to prove their superior wealth, attempting to sponsor the most parties, pit fights, bounties, gambling, and every other public display of fortune and excess imaginable. Popularized among outside cultures during visits to Nar Shaddaa, this exuberant holiday is now celebrated on hundreds of worlds across the galaxy, where it’s simply known by its Huttese name; any connection to ancient wartime looting is largely ignored. Highlights New Event: Festival of Splendor! Players can try their hand at Smuggler’s Luck and Kingpin’s Bounty slot machines on Nar…
Win A Diablo 3 Reaper Of Souls CD Key!
Cheapdigitaldownload.com the top Digital Download Store and swtorstrategies.com the most dedicated SWTOR, Star Wars Battlefield and StarWars news site on the web today, brings you the biggest event for this month. Win a free Diablo 3 Reaper Of Souls CD key! Get it free! Swtorstrategies.com teams up with Cheapdigitaldownload.com Swtorstrategies.com partners with Cheapdigitaldownload.com. Cheapdigitaldownload, with its exceptional service, provides the most competitive prices in the market. They have tested, and frequently continue to anonymously check CD key vendors that they present, to offer you a great quality of service and allow you to buy your PC games, Gamecard and Xbox products (Xbox points, Xbox live and Xbox games) with extreme confidence. What’s CD key? It’s a multi-digit code that the store will send you via e-mail after your purchase. You will then use this code for official download platforms such as (Steam, Origin, Uplay or Battle.net) to activate and download your game…
Assassin / Shadow Top 3 Answers
Here are the top 3 Assassin / Shadow Answers: Madness in PvP The Madness Assassin has been grossly revamped from its original state pre-xpac, which in turn has caused many players to become repulsed by its current playstyle. Due to the changes, Madness also suffered a dramatic hit in PvP, losing access to its Insta-Whirlwind utility and the loss of Maul procs which also goes to hurt its burst potential. In addition, the spec suffers from being far too easy to kill (having no true stealth benefits) with no real execution power to actually down targets beyond fluff damage, therefore making it seemingly a useless fighter on the field in comparison to what other classes / specs can do. With no team utility, lack of kill power and absurdly low survivability, what exactly is the purpose of a Madness Assassin on the battlefield? Are there any plans to alter or…
PvP vs PvE Mounts Philosophy
Eric Musco was really engaged in the community yesterday. Besides the Faction change post we wrote about earlier, he also updated the community about the PvP vs PvE Mounts Philosophy: Hey everyone, I know there has been a bit of frustration from our PvP community regarding a Rancor mount going into the Cartel Market. Although I had mentioned at the time that there would be Rancor mounts coming to both the CM and Operations, I thought it would be good to explain our philosophy on mounts. Especially around their exclusivity. For PvP mounts, such as Season rewards, what you are going to tend to find is that they are exclusive variations of a mount and not necessarily a completely exclusive model (not to say we would never do an exclusive model, that is always possible). For example, you will not find a Rancor that looks anything like Giradda’s Rancor, but…
Confirmed: Faction Change “very, very unlikely” to be Added
There have been a discussion regarding faction change on the official forums, and yesterday Eric Musco had an answer on this matter. Faction changes is “very, very unlikely” to be Added. Personally I I never thought the ability to change factions was something that was in the realm of realistic possibility. I can understand people wanting to change faction but as Eric pretty much states it’s likely never going to happen as the story options tied to each toon makes it impossible. Hey folks, This is a good question! We have been asked this a few times at some of our Cantina Tours as well but I wanted to make sure we had the answer here in the forums for folks to be able to find it. I am remiss to ever say the word never, but I can say that it is very, very unlikely that we would ever…
Star Wars Battlefront Confirmed For E3 2014
Electronic Arts plans to showcase Star Wars: Battlefront, at this years E3. EA CEO Andrew Wilson broke the news during an investor call last week. In response to a request for an update on EA’s slate of Star Wars titles, Wilson said it expects to reveal more about the new Battlefront “and other new projects in development” at the annual game expo. EA announced the new Frostbite-powered Star Wars: Battlefront at last year’s E3, in the form a brief teaser trailer seemingly set on Hoth. The company expects to release the game, one of the first in its exclusive publishing agreement with Disney, next year. Other Star Wars titles are in development at EA-owned studios Visceral Games and BioWare. Star Wars: Battlefront will most likely come out around the same time the Star Wars movies start to come out, probably in the last quarter of 2015, just around the same…
Swtor-mined: 2.8 PTS Patch #2 | 5/8/2014
News from swtor_miner. This time he came up some more information on the new Narshadda Nightlife/Festival of Splendor Event. He found the chances of winning while playing the new slot machines. Kingpin’s Bounty Slot Machine Costs 1x Kingpin’s Casino Chip to play Chances for reward: Jackpot 1 (.07% chance) Kingpin’s Rancor Jackpot 2 (.23% chance) 1x Vectron Opus Win (4% chance) 1x Golden Certificate: A certificate which can be exchanged for special goods from a Nar Shaddaa casino prize vendor. Free Play (50% chance) Lose 1 (22.83% chance) Lose 2 (22.85% chance) – Outcome removed by Feeling Lucky buff. Machine Explodes (.02% chance) The Feeling Lucky buff removes one of the possible lose outcomes while playing the High Roller Slot Machine, but the relative outcome weights remain the same for the other outcomes. You keep the buff for 2 minutes or until you win or hit the Jackpot. The new probability of winning…
Star Wars: The Old Republic Insider Video — May 2014
Watch the latest SWTOR Insider Video, now live, as Producer Jack Wood and Community Manager Eric Musco offer an inside look at the latest exciting news for Galactic Strongholds Digital Expansion, Season 2 of Ranked PvP, Cartel Market and more! Darth_Wicked from Reddit discover something interesting. At around 00m36sYou can listen Jack Wood talking about the new Homestead on Tatooine and you get to see a couple of new Sandcrawlers that are not currently in the game. Starting to wonder if the above is related to the planetary Guild conquest thing or if our homestead on Tatooine will be an actual Sandcrawler What do you guys think that’s all about?
Game Update 2.8: Spoils Of War PTS Update – 5/8/2014
The public test servers for Star Wars: The old Republic have updated with a new build. Some of the highlights are: Group Finder Operations have been redesigned! Story Mode Operations are now more accessible to endgame players (levels 50 – 55). The Operations section in the Group Finder window will list available Operations on a predetermined schedule, rotating in different Operations every few days. Players who meet the level requirement of the Operation will be Bolstered, removing the requirement for endgame gear. Rewards have also been improved, making this a great opportunity for players to earn Ultimate Commendations and experience new content! Below are the changes made to the existing note: Classes + Combat Jedi Consular Sage Balance (Sage) Mind Warp has been reverted to its live functionality, and now increases the duration of Mind Crush by 1/2 seconds. Shadow General Mass Mind Control will now taunt NPC’s while Combat Technique is…
Summer of SWTOR Update
Bruce MacleanFor just posted an updated Roadmap of what to expect in Star Wars: The old Republic this summer. The new release schedule, now that 2.8 (the end of the last roadmap) is approaching and looking very different than what was said in the last roadmap. Interesting they’re doing double fleet req/warzone comms but not valor. Not sure how I feel about this operation overhaul for 55 Operations, but if it gets more groups going to the end instead of stopping at the weeklies, more power to them. Unfortunately their decision to push back strongholds leaves us with a gap in terms of new content releases. Guess the name of the game now is patience. Check out the full forum post here, or our copy paste below: Hi again everyone! I’m here to provide an updated look at the upcoming Summer of SWTOR in light of our recent Galactic Strongholds…
Swtor-mined: 2.8 PTS
While we have been celebrating Star Wars day, swtor_miner have been busy datamining the newest patch on the public test servers. Before you read on, I have to warn you that this post includes spoilers. Just below are the raw changes and below that comes the interesting stuff. New/Changed/Removed Abilities New/Changed/Removed Achievements – New/Changed/Removed CodexEntries New/Changed/Removed Collections New/Changed/Removed Companions New/Changed/Removed Conversations New/Changed/Removed GOM_Items New/Changed/Removed Items New/Changed/Removed MtxStoreFronts New/Changed/Removed NPCs New/Changed/Removed Quests New/Changed/Removed Ships New/Changed/Removed StringTables New/Changed/Removed Talents New Event: Festival of Splendor? Soovada (“Splendorous Summer” in Huttese) is an annual celebration of total extravagance in Hutt culture. Rival clans compete to prove their superior wealth, attempting to sponsor the most parties, pit fights, bounties, gambling, and every other public display of fortune and excess imaginable. Popularized on Nar Shaddaa, this exuberant holiday is now celebrated on hundreds of worlds across the galaxy, where it is more commonly known as the Festival of Splendor. Cartel…
Concealment / Scrapper Proposed Survivability Changes
The below 2 posts are posts by a developer, not suggestions by players.: Hey Folks, This is the list I’m looking at to put in, mostly based on the feedback y’all have given here (using Imperial names because that’s what I have in my notes, don’t hate!) Add an Interrupt to Jarring Strikes 50%/100% chance to activate (So you can interupt an active cast with Hidden Strike) Add 10%/20% DMG Reduction to Revitalizers to the duration of Stim Boost (this is IN ADDITION to the healing) Add 15%/30% AOE Damage Reduction to Shadow Op Elite Hit me with your feedback based on this list! Original Dev Post: Hey Gang, So something we want to do in 2.8 is see if we can’t add a bit of survivabilty into the Concealment/Scrapper trees, with possibly a focus on events happening as you exit stealth. We’ve got a couple ideas, but nothing concrete…
2.8 Patch Notes from PTS
The first patch notes for Game update 2.8 is online. These notes are only indicative of the current patch to the PTS, and will be expanded upon as we get farther into the testing process. Star Wars™: The Old Republic™ PTS Game Update 2.8 Last Updated: May 1st, 2014 All content and features on the Public Test Server are not final and are subject to change. Highlights Nightmare Mode Dread Palace is now available! Return to Oricon to face off against Dread Masters Bestia, Tyrans, Calphayrus, and Raptus, who are now more powerful than ever before! General Added a high resolution shadow map option for high-end machines. This enables more detailed shadow rendering over a longer distance. Classes + Combat General Fixed an issue that would occasionally allow abilities to affects targets, even if those targets had a 100% or greater chance to defend against attacks. Jedi Knight Sentinel Watchman Merciless Slash now deals more damage…
Patch 2.8 on the PTS tomorrow
Public test servers will be back up online tomorrow, and now it is time to start beta testing game update 2.8. Below is the announcement from Tait Watson: Hi all! We have wiped the characters from the 2.7 Public Test Server release and you can now safely copy your characters over in anticipation of 2.8 testing. I know the first question to this is going to be “When is that going to be, Tait, you valiant Knight of Information and Glory?” so I’ll go ahead and tell you that we are aiming to put it up on the PTS this Thursday, May 1st (2014, if you’re reading this way in the future). While I don’t have an exact time yet, I’ll let you know when I do. And this, of course, is subject to change and I will update you all when I find stuff out! For instructions on PTS Character…
Celebrate May the Fourth with a new Astromech Droid™ and Double XP!
We forgot all about this story yesterday, but May 4 is rapidly approaching and that means it’s almost time to celebrate Star Wars Day. It’s only appropriate that BioWare get in on the fun, too, so the studio is planning a Star Wars Day celebration for Star Wars: The Old Republic with a double XP weekend and a free droid mini-pet. SWTOR is offering double XP from 11:00AM PDT May 2 through 12:00AM PDT May 5. If you have no need for XP there’s a more concrete reward on offer. Here is the details: We’re excited to announce that in honor of Star Wars™ Day and as a thank you to you, our players, we’re giving away the new MT-4T Astromech Droid™ Mini-Pet to the entire Star Wars™: The Old Republic™ community!* Your adventurous Astromech Droid is ready to courageously follow you as you join with friends to fight for…
Patch Notes – 4/29/2014 – 2.7.1 Patch Notes
Patch notes for tomorrows maintenance is up. BioWare is pushing a pretty solid set of fixes, some longstanding issues have finally been resolved. I am curious for additional detail on the shadows fix. I have noticed a lot of jaggy shadows when I am running everything near max. Check it out below: Highlights Ranked Warzone Season 2 has started! Season Two has opened for combatants! Giradda the Hutt summons you to join the Ranked Warzone Arena queue and compete for glorious rewards (to be announced later). Ratings have been reset for this occasion and, in the mighty words of Baron Deathmark, “Get in there and go berserk!” Season 2 Leaderboards Now Live! The Ranked Warzone Arena Leaderboards have been updated for Season Two! Season One has been archived and is still able to be viewed. Ranked Warzone Missions! Ranked Warzone Arena Daily and Weekly Missions are now available from the PvP Mission Terminal….
Guardian Top 3 Questions – Answered
Eric Musco Posted a new Top 3 Questions post on the official forums today. This one regards the Guardian. Here is the TL;DR version Can you up our PVP DPS Defense? Answer: No you greedy little fuck. Actually Nerf incoming. Happy? My AOE spec isn’t hitting really hard via single target. Buff please? Answer: You are seriously fucking stupid. There is a middle tree for exactly what you are asking. But hey, why not. Imma nerf you sustained damage tho. Cool? There are now too many options in the Middle tree. I’m incapable of reading and choosing things. Can we just standardize the tree so I just click everything and win? Answer: I guess we can do that. We wouldn’t want you accidently choosing a talent that doesn’t directly benefit the exact thing you are doing this instant. You can read the full post here, or our copy paste below:…
Scheduled Maintenance – 4/29/14 – Patch 2.7.1
On April 29th, all game servers, SWTOR.com, and the launcher will be unavailable while we perform scheduled maintenance. Game Update 2.7.1 will be implemented during this downtime. Details are as follows: Date: Tuesday April 29th, 2014 Duration: 5 hours Time: 1AM PDT (8AM GMT) – 6AM PDT (1PM GMT) During maintenance, all updates and additional information will be posted on the official Twitter account. Time Zone Start Time Scheduled End Time UTC Offset HST Mon Apr 28, 2014 10:00 PM Tue Apr 29, 2014 03:00 AM -10 hours AKDT Tue Apr 29, 2014 12:00 AM Tue Apr 29, 2014 05:00 AM -8 hours PDT Tue Apr 29, 2014 01:00 AM Tue Apr 29, 2014 06:00 AM -7 hours MDT Tue Apr 29, 2014 02:00 AM Tue Apr 29, 2014 07:00 AM -6 hours CDT Tue Apr 29, 2014 03:00 AM Tue Apr 29, 2014 08:00 AM -5 hours EDT Tue…