SWTOR Guide: The Galactic Starfighter Pike/Quell Battle Strategies

The Pike/Quell starfighter is designed to do maximum damage when you use missiles and torpedoes. The starfighter can be equipped with two types of missiles or secondary weapons that make it possible for you to use a variety of strategies when in battle. Most of the strategies used with the Pike/Quell are long-range combat oriented with some dogfighting capabilities. You can equip the Pike/Quell with loadouts that will make it difficult for your enemies to counter your attacks and there is a missile for all types of situations. Since it’s hard to get requisition, it’s a good idea to know what type of components you want for your Pike/Quell in advance. Knowing a little about the ship and what it has to offer will help you make the best decisions and that is what this guide has to offer. Pike/Quell Basic Weapons Strategies As you get accustomed to flying your…

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SWTOR Bounty Contract Week Is Back!

If you missed your chance last month to participate in the SWTOR Bounty Contract Event, it’s making a return! All classes level 15 and up will be able to participate in this event. You will get rewards and exclusive items for completing these contracts. You also get a certificate you can use at the Cartel Bazaar vendor. Here’s some info on how to get started in case you have not done it before. SWTOR.com has some tips: The Bounty Brokers Association needs you! The BBA have posted too many contracts for their regular membership to handle and are asking anyone Level 15 and above to answer the call of bounty hunting between December 10 – 17, 2013. Interested? We thought so! Here’s how to get started: 1.       First, travel to the Imperial or Republic Fleet, which is reachable by your ship’s galaxy map, transit shuttles, or the Emergency Fleet Pass….

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Scheduled Maintenance: December 10th, 2013 – Patch 2.5.0a

Just a heads up that BioWare will be taking down the servers tomorrow December 10th, to preform maintenance. During the downtime, BioWare will implement a small patch. Patch notes are not up yet, but be sure to check back, as we will post them as soon as they become available. Maintenance: December 10th, 2013 | 12.06.2013 , 03:38 PM On December 10th, all game servers will be unavailable as we perform maintenance. Patch 2.5a will be implemented during this downtime. Details are as follows: Date: Tuesday December 10th, 2013 Duration: 2 hours Time: 3AM PST (11AM GMT) – 5AM PST (1PM GMT) Thank you for your patience as we maintain service for Star Wars™: The Old Republic™. Time Zone Start Time Scheduled End Time UTC Offset HST Tue Dec 10, 2013 01:00 AM Tue Dec 10, 2013 03:00 AM -10 hours AKST Tue Dec 10, 2013 02:00 AM Tue Dec…

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Master SWTOR Galactic Starfighter: A Guide

Now that we have the new expansion Galactic Starfighter, SWTOR players old and new are looking for ways to survive in this fast-paced and hectic game environment. You want to succeed in your challenging battles and progress forward so you might need a few tips. You don’t want to end up as that pilot who dies all the time so here are some tips to help you master SWTOR Galactic Starfighter: Know your ship- this is first and foremost one of the most important things you will be able to do. Your ship is your tool, inside GSF. You need to know it inside and out. A lot of this will come with practice and just playing a lot. But you need to know the basics of the ships. So take time to examine your ship for abilities and components. You need to know everything you can about your ship’s…

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Star Wars Retro games: Rebel Assault

Since we try to cover all starwars gaming news here on SWTORStrateies, I thought it was about time I started a new column covering all the old classics. I don’t know how often I will make posts like this, but the point is I will play thought my old collection of Star Wars games and write about the experience. I will also post videos as often as it is possible. The first game I will play again is Star Wars: Rebel Assault.  This is a Sega CD review, so you probably know what to expect. Really good audio, shit video. And you’d be right. The majority of the footage in here consists of moving computer renders. These give you the important stuff, like your levels and environments. They are pixelated crap. The other small portion of screen time goes to animated characters, which hold up pretty well. Unfortunately, you don’t…

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Documentary: When Aliens Attack

To be honest, I’m not sure I will call this a documentary, but it fits nice in our weekend column on speculative space documentaries, and I have always liked this show.  So today I present you When Aliens Attack.  This was a television show that aired on the National Geographic Channel a few years back. I use to only see alien ET UFO type shows on the History Channel. Now, we have more documentaries based on truth and experiences that allow us to share in logic and inspiration for our imaginations. I enjoyed seeing the “What If” factor that the writers came up with and researched what was available to us on this planet as far as possible defense. We have military assimilations as what we call war games and this allows us to begin working models in scenarios with the various levels of our intelligence communities around the world….

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Things you wish you knew when starting out in SWTOR

This is just a helping hand for new players. It might also be usefull if you are a returning player, since most of this will be obvious. When doing group content tell people if it’s your first time. People will often expect you to know quite indirect paths to follow which avoids combat and will therefore run ahead. You’ll end up pulling, getting killed and (more often than not) wiping the group. Try to establish how quickly your group wants to do a flashpoint – people will start raging if you’re not pressing spacebar (to skip cutscenes) at the same rate as them. The default price you get when you put something on the GTN (auction house) is often ridiculous – I think the price it suggests for molecular stabilisers is 5% or less of the usual selling price. Similarly, the price you can get from selling to vendors is…

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PVP Enhancements Chart

As you now, we’re all about bringing you cool SWTOR to make things easier. We love it when players and fans create some really cool charts, graphs or tools to help us all enjoy the game a little better. We found a little something that is similar to this PvP enhancement chart we brought you a little while back, also made by a SWTOR player. If you’re looking for a great list of PVP enhancement and modification stats to help you figure it all out quickly and easily. The name of the PvP Enhancement is on the left, with columns for: Endurance Power Critical Surge Accuracy Absorb Defense Shield Alacrity Expertise If you’re tired of scrolling around so much trying to figure out which stats go with which enhancement, you can use this chart to help you find out quickly. You might want to bookmark or save it to your…

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MTSBWY: Bohemian Rhapsody: Star Wars Edition

Based on Bohemian Rhapsody by Queen and Star Wars created by George Lucas. The students and faculty of the Digital Video Program at the University of Advancing Technology in Tempe, Arizona released a great new Star Wars themed parody. They aren’t the best singers in the world, but they’ve put together a great video, filled with some pretty impressive cosplay. There is also some decent wordplay in this, though I’ve no idea why Satanic Spock is part of it. Not complaining about the Samurai Mandalorians, or random bikini women in masks. Remember to turn on the captions.

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How to play Galactic Starfighter with an Xbox 360 Controller

Galactic Starfighter… we never could have seen that one coming back in 2011 when SWTOR first launched. But we found a fun little nugget at darthhater.com that suggests that maybe they can use The Force. This post they made about using an old Xbox gamepad with the old style rails space game is pretty interesting now that we have Galactic Starfighter. Many SWTOR players have been complaining about how the GSF doesn’t have a joystick capability. But this little trick the Darth Hater crew found out about years ago should work. Note: You will need the JoyToKey software, our config file (right click/save as), an Xbox 360 Controller, an Xbox 360 Wireless Gaming Receiver, and Windows for this to work. They even have a video for us: Text Tutorial from DarthHater: Download JoyToKey. Extract it somewhere you want it to live on your hard drive. Download our cfg file. Place it in the same directory as JoyToKey…

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Galactic Starfighter Twitch Stream Friday, December 6th

BioWare will be streaming 3 hours of exciting SWTOR space PvP combat, tomorrow Friday December 6th. If you don’t have access to Galactic Starfighter yet, this is your chance to see the developers live making fools out of them self on the official SWTOR Twitch channel WHERE: twitch.tv/swtor WHEN: Friday, December 6th @ 2PM PDT / 10PM GMT WHAT: 3 hours of intense free flight dogfighting in space – now live for Subscribers in Galactic Starfighter If you can’t wait until tomorrow, you can go wathc drakedge2000 playing the expansion live right now

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Star Wars: Battlefront development has been temporarily put on hold

Apparently Electronic Arts have stopped all future projects by developer DICE, until they sort out all the issues with Battlefield 4. Apparently  there is an issue with BF4, which have been leading to numerous game crashes.  The developer’s decision to stop all other work to fix the problematic Battlefield 4 also extends to all future game development. Here is what IGN have on the story: “First, we want to thank the fans out there that are playing and supporting us with Battlefield 4,” they said. “We know we still have a ways to go with fixing the game — it is absolutely our No. 1 priority. “The team at DICE is working non-stop to update the game. Since Battlefield 4 China Rising expansion pack was already in the final stages of development by the time issues began with Battlefield 4, we decided to fulfill our promise to deliver it this week, but we’re…

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SWTOR Crafting Bonuses Chart

If you’re the kind of player who loves to learn with visuals, then you’re really going to like this Crafting Bonuses chart for SWTOR, made by HoHawl (Reddit name). This great chart lists each class on the left-hand side, along with ship droid and optional companions. Then across the top we have the crafting skills and you can see the crit and skill bonuses you can receive for each class. You can see the full image here and download or save to your computer, or even print it out so you can refer to it often.

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BioWare calls for your screenshots!

BioWare is celebrating the second anniversary for Star Wars: The Old Republic and ask players to send in screenshots that make the game unique for them. These screenshots can be from your fondest memories to your best moments in the game and include your favorite places and characters. Check out the announcement below: SEND US YOUR “My SWTOR Saga” SCREENSHOTS! Between now and December 15th, 11:59PM PST / December 16th, 7:59AM GMT, send us your screenshots for a chance to be featured on our official Facebook page! It’s easy to participate: Screenshots should not be retouched or enhanced Screenshots must solely utilize in-game environments and objects Screenshots must be at least 800×600 We recommend turning off your User Interface All submissions are subject to the Electronic Arts Terms of Service. EMAIL YOUR SCREENSHOTS ALONG WITH YOUR CHARACTER NAME AND SERVER TO SUBMISSIONS_EN@SWTOR.COMBEFORE DECEMBER 15TH, 11:59PM PST / DECEMBER 16TH 7:59AM GMT.

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Companion affection explained

For people that have been in the game since day one, this might not be interesting read. But for newer people, or people WHO haven’t really thought much into companions, this might be interesting. I present to you, my guide to Companion affection. Conversation The most common way to gain (or lose!) affection with companions is to have them with you during cut scenes, or speak with them directly when they offer you missions in cantinas or your ship. The base affection gain for a dialogue option they approve of is +15, and the base loss for one they disapprove of is -1. Those values are modified by a multiplier that reflects how late in the storyline the companion joined up with you. Less commonly, there will be choices they strongly approve of, which have a base +40 gain, or strongly disapprove of, for a base loss of -30. In very…

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Known In-Game Issues: Updated December 4th, 2013

Only 1 of these GS bugs is seriously affecting gameplay on a mechanical level. The rest are tooltips or cosmetic. Galactic Starfighter General When in Galactic Starfighter all audio can completely turn off, the issue is resolved as soon as you leave Galactic Starfighter. Attempting to change graphic settings while dead may prevent players from being able to queue for respawn successfully. The Cinematics button on the Character Selection screen does not function at this time. All Sensor Dampening upgrades are currently limited to 15k meters. Ship Mastery icons do not explicitly state the amount of Requisition bonus gained by their use. (10%) Chat Players of the same faction may occasionally see chat messages from other Battles. Cosmetics/Cartel Market After unlocking any “Gas Canister” or “Chemical Reactant”, the player can no longer re-select the standard (e.g. “None”) cosmetic options. Some cosmetics options, when previewed for purchase, will display a different…

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Developer Blog: Welcome to Galactic Starfighter Subscriber Early Access

Early access to Star Wars: The old Republic – Galactic Starfighter is on, and the space battle have begun. With the new patch, comes a new developer blog post, and a short Starfighter Customization Trailer.   The blog post is made by Senior Producer Blaine Christine and is pretty much just a welcome message.  Below is a copy/paste of the blog post for you who can’t acces swtor.com from work. Also remember to check out the video in the bottom of  this post: Welcome to Galactic Starfighter Subscriber Early Access 12.03.2013 Hello, Starfighters! It is with great pleasure that we swing open the doors to our second Digital Expansion of 2013. This one has been a long time coming and we are incredibly proud of the experience we have in store for you. What is it? Galactic Starfighter is a 12v12 PvP free flight space shooter. At its core, it is all…

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Patch Notes – Game Update 2.5: Galactic Starfighter Early Access

Patch notes for Galactic Starfighter is up! No nerfs, buffs or balance changes at all to any of the GSF ships. So all stats that were on the PTS last weekend are moving forward with launch. I like this because I felt GSF was pretty balanced. I can’t wait to climb into my cockpit again! Also: The Black Market and Crime Lord’s Cartel Packs are back in the Cartel Market for only two weeks, they will be once again embargoed on December 17th. Time to get my Revan Mask! See you all in space! Galactic Starfighter Early Access Game Update 2.5: Galactic Starfighter Early Access Highlights Galactic Starfighter Subscriber Early Access is here! Starting today, all subscribers have early access to 12 vs 12, free flight, player vs player dogfighting. Players from level 1-55 will be able to pilot their very own starship and customize it to match their playstyle. With…

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TOR TV: Team Poison (8 Lethality Agents)

So Tauntauns had this really stupid idea to run 8 lethality agents and this is the result. I don’t think I’ve ever laughed as hard about SWTOR as I did when I watched this – the DoT’s and the 8-person Orbital Strikes were epic In total there were up to 16 dots on one person at any point. The 8 simultaneous orbital strikes… Holy shit. I wanna see 8 smashers next. I would also love to see the team go up against a 8 man team of shadows! It would be epic! Team Poison: Psikhotic Double’O (Flexy) Nekrona (Nekron) Galdor (Jayblaze) Catspit (Vullesh) Luigii Nezlok Markeen Music- 1. Toxic by Britany Spears 2. Poison by Bell Biv Devoe 3. Poison by Alice Cooper

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My WoW experience and how it makes me appreciate SWTOR more

I started playing WoW back in 2005. I played an enhancement shaman almost the entire time until I stopped playing about a year ago. I’ve seen what started as a really terrible, unfocused class spec dramatically improve, get tweaked, and finish off into mediocrity. Coming from that experience I’ve been very pleased with SWTOR ‘s handling of classes, specs, and especially PVP. This is a brain First, my WoW experience. Back in classic WoW, enhancement shaman had two active abilities. I would use one, use the other, then wait for the cooldown to end. In a group my job was to cast a buff or two and keep it up. Our spec was shit. All shaman had to be healers if you were in a serious raid. There was no gear itemized for my class and my class sets were useless. Of course I didn’t know any better and I…

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Star Wars Episode 7 Rumor Roundup December 1

It’s that time again… time to bring you another rumor roundup of Star Wars Episode 7. We’re getting even closer to the release of the first of the new films and we still don’t know a lot about them. But new facts are being released or confirmed every so often. As always, take these rumors with a grain of salt because we don’t know if there is any true to them. But here are some interesting new tidbits going around. Jedi Master SQL of Jedi News has some speculation about Episode VII: –          Lucasfilm has a great deal of news about Ep 7 that they could release at any time they choose –          On returning actors, he has only seen evidence of one of the “Big 3” possibly returning –          Dark Horse is likely to keep the comic license and “you can expect to see their logo on a lot…

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Documentary: Passport To Pluto

I was so hangover after our company xmas party last week, that I didn’t get a round to post a new space documentary. I really wanted to post a story on the ” New Horizons” mission NASA is doing.  The space agency launched the $700 million New Horizons robotic spacecraft from Pad 41 at Cape Canaveral Air Force Station in January 2006 on a flyby mission to study Pluto and its moons. Reaching Pluto required New Horizons to achieve a speed of more than 36,000 mph in an earth and solar escape trajectory, which is the greatest launch speed ever recorded for a man-made object to date. In April 2006, New Horizons flew past Mars, then by Jupiter in February 2007 and Saturn in June 2008. By March 2011, New Horizons passed Uranus and is expected to arrive at Pluto around July 2015. Being the god of the underworld might not be…

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EA Allegedly Working on New Open World Star Wars Game

If we can believe the newest rumors going around, EA is working on a new open world Star Wars game. Kotaku broke the news, which was spotted in a job listing: “EA Canada is looking for an experienced Animation director to help define and deliver on the vision for a major new next gen open world action game.” The game will probably be the second or third AAA title released after the deal from EA with Disney and Lucasfilms. As we reported recently, this gives EA 10 years of exclusivity with Star Wars video games. This means we can expect to see a little bit of everything coming soon. There will be games for the PC, for consoles and maybe even mobile or Facebook games. While these games will be Star Wars based, we can expect to feel a touch of EA on each of them as well. The first…

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Amazon will have 2400 Cartel Coins on sale from Thanksgiving until Dec 2nd (25% off).

Amazon is having a black Friday deal. Black Friday is the Friday following Thanksgiving Day in the United States, often regarded as the beginning of the Christmas shopping season. In recent years, most major retailers have opened extremely early and offered promotional sales to kick off the holiday shopping season, similar to Boxing Day sales in many Commonwealth Nations. Black Friday is not a federal holiday.. bla bla bla… .YO! 25% off cartle coins from Amazon! Just go buy them: http://www.amazon.com/Star-Wars-Old-Republic-Exclusive/dp/B00DIIZ15A You can use the code outside the US also. This is tested. You can also buy the code by simply putting a US address as you billing address. Here is some math: 2400 coins from market – 120coins per $1 5500 coins from market – 137coins per $1 2400 coins (Amazon w/25%) – 160coins per $1 So its worth it, and you get pet as bonus.

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