Recommended Level: 48-50Faction: Republic & EmpireBosses: 6 (3 mini-bosses) Directive 7 is the name given to a group of renegade droids who have joined together as one identity with one mission, which is to go through the galaxy exterminating all biological life forms. Both the Republic and the Empire have suffered at the hands of these renegade droids so both factions have a common interest in taking down Directive 7. Fortunately, for both factions, one of the Directives disagrees with the exterminating of all other life forms and offers them valuable information that will help put an end to this rebellion. Your mission is to travel with your squad of level 50 players to the small moon called Zadd, where you’ll go up against these 6 bosses in addition to one bonus boss. Here’s a vid of the Flashpoint in action: Detector Detector is the first mini boss you’ll encounter when you arrive…
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
Flashpoint Guide: Taral V
If you’re looking to do the Flashpoint Taral V, it helps to know just what you’re getting into before you get started. It begins when you and your team travel to the Imperial held planet of Taral V and steal the star charts that will lead you to the space station. The recommended level for this Flashpoint is 33 and there are 6 bosses plus a bonus boss (optional). Many of the trash mobs can be skipped if you are looking to do a quick run but killing them for the extra experience and chance of loot is great if you have the time. Now let’s take a look at those bosses: Handler Gattan As his name suggests, the handler has pets- two Vinecats that you will have to fight during this battle. Gattan’s cats will attack random party members and they are immune to crowd control. The technique is…
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.
SWTOR Imperial Agent Sniper 1.5 Leveling PVE Build
This post will give you a decent leveling build for the Agent in SWTOR and we are covering the Sniper advanced class. The build is optimized for patch 1.5 and we will give you step by step point allocation as well as some rotations that you can use while leveling. SWTOR Imperial Agent Sniper 1.5 Leveling PVE Build 10 – 11: Energy Tanks 2/2 12 – 14: Gearhead 3/3 15 – 17: Explosive Engineering 3/3 18 – 19: Engineer’s Tool Belt 2/2 20: Interrogation Probe 1/1 21 – 22: Efficient Engineering 2/2 23 – 24: Cluster Bombs 2/2 25: Imperial Methodology 1/1 26 – 27: Experimental Explosives 2/2 28 – 29: Calculated Pursuit 2/2 30: EMP Discharge 1/1 31 – 32: Energy Overrides 2/2 33 – 34: Augmented Shields 2/2 35 – 37: Electrified Railgun 3/3 38 – 39: Deployed Shields 2/2 40: Plasma Probe 1/1 41 – 43: Lethality…
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…
Ben Cousins Paying to Win Talks about F2P Game Model
In November 2009, EA hit the headlines when the BATTLEFIELD HEROES team made sweeping changes to their in-game economy and virtual item catalogue that many felt would completely destroy the game, as Ben Cousins explains in his “Paying to Win” talk that covers the free to play gaming model and if and how it works. While consumer press, forum users and players claimed that the new game model ruined BATTLEFIELD HEROES, economic statistics would show EA otherwise. Despite the predictions of destruction, over a year on, BATTLEFIELD HEROES continues to be a powerhouse in the free-to-play space, with nearly 7 million registered users, no declining trend in active users, and it long-term future assured. So, what happened? In this talk, Ben Cousins, General Manager of Easy (the EA studio behind BATTLEFIELD HEROES) takes us through the story of this controversy. Through the development of BATTLEFIELD HEROES and the early performance…
SWTOR World Boss Guides
World bosses are a big part of any MMO and Star Wars: The Old Republic is no exception. You’ll need a full raid party to beat these bosses so be prepared to work together as a team. Throughout the galaxy, you’ll encounter several planets with these raid level bosses and they do yield some nice loot and a codex entry. After taking down a boss the reset timer usually last around two to three hours for each. All of the bosses in SWTOR have what is called a “Terrifying buff” that will yield any companions incapacitate as soon as you initiate the fight. For the most part the bosses will be stronger as you move up in levels. For this reason, if you’re having trouble with the lower level ones, you may need to build up more before tackling the higher-level raid bosses. Here are the planets in STWOR where…
SWTOR Sith Inquisitor Sorcerer Leveling Build For 1.5
In this post we are going to give you a leveling build for the Sith Inquisitor and the advanced class of Sorcerer for the new 1.5 patch. We will give you the build and then we will give you some rotations that you can use with the build as well: SWTOR Sith Inquisitor Sorcerer Leveling Build For 1.5: 10 – 11: Reserves 2/2 12 – 14: Electric Induction 3/3 15 – 16: Subversion 2/2 17 – 19: Convection 3/3 20: Chain Lightning 1/1 21 – 22: Lightning Barrage 2/2 23 – 24: Exsanguinate 2/2 25: Lightning Storm 1/1 26 – 27: Lightning Effusion 2/2 28: Lightning Spire 1/1 29: Lightning Barrier 1/2 30 – 32: Forked Lightning 3/3 33: Conduction 1/1 34: Polarity Shift 1/1 35 – 39: Reverberating Force 5/5 40: Thundering Blast 1/1 41 – 43: Seeping Darkness 3/3 44 – 45: Will of the Sith 2/2 46 –…
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…
BioWare LiveStream Q&A November 29th
BioWare hosted their second LiveStream Q&A November 29 at 3PM CST as we told you about yesterday. They took questions about the upcoming game update 1.6 and it lasted around a half hour. Those who were able to get their questions in early possibly saw them answered live at the event. They have Community Manager Joveth Gonzalez hosting with Damion Schubert (Lead Designer) and Jeff Hickman (Producer) available to answer questions that came in from Twitter, Facebook, the forums and more. Erik Muska was also available offscreen to take live questions during the event. Some very good questions were asked including how the transition to the new free to play model is going as well as what new things we can expect to see in 1.6. When asked how the numbers look for F2P, Schubert says “Almost every conceivable metric is better. The numbers have blown away our expectations, which means…
Companions 101: Vette
BioWare just posted the third installment of “Companions 101″”. This time Community Production Specialist, Courtney Woods, wrote an article focusing on the Sith Warrior companion – Vette. Beloow is a snippet, but if you are into Twi’lek’s, you should also check out our own article about this Exotic race Vette is all about the extremes. When she likes something, she expresses it immediately. If she is angry at someone, she will flare and snap at them. She will always let the Warrior know how she feels about a decision or the situation, which can be a delight or a pain. If you want to gain Vette’s trust and respect, keep in mind that her three biggest dislikes are needless cruelty, suppressing the weak, and anti-alien sentiment. Since the Empire is known for committing all three of these, it is no surprise that she has little love for the Sith and Imperials. So what are her motivations to help a…
Massively: Interview Hall Hood
Massively’s Larry Everett had the chance to to an interview with Lead Writer of Star Wars: The old Republic – Hall Hood. This guy is approaching politician levels of question dodging, and answering questions regarding the upcoming planet Makeb, Hall Hood don’t really sheds light on anything new. It seems to me that going forward, at least for the foreseable future, the concept of 8 distinct class stories is gone, even if we may have different cutscenes for the same main story depending on our class. No word about “Rise of the Hutt Cartel” story, that was datamined a few weeks ago either. When Makeb was first announced, we were told that it was not a continuation of the class story. Yet in a recent interview, Jeff Hickman said that Makeb is the continuation of your story. I think there might be a bit of confusion in semantics. Can you clarify and perhaps expound on what…
Developer Update: Heroic Space Missions
BioWare posted a new Developer Update yesterday. This time by Lead Designer Michael Backus, focusing on the new Heroic Space Missions coming with game update 1.6. For those people following this blog and Star Wars: The Old Republic closely, there won’t be much new info. Still it’s worth a read if you are interested in understanding what thoughts that have gone into the development. Many spacers enjoy the serenity of the stars, the peace of floating through the Unknown Regions, wondering if they’re seeing events and phenomena never before witnessed by intelligent life. But for others, space is just another battleground in the Great War. It can be used as a place to hide from enemies, but more often it’s where the greatest warriors of the stars prove their skill… and their loyalty. Our primary focus for the Space Missions in Star Wars™: The Old Republic has always been to make the player…
Sith Talk Episode 40
Sith Talk is live with their podcast Episode 40. This week Sudo returns. Bru’tis is still on his break. But we have a great patch for the F2P and the news of 1.6 on the way. Plus our impressions of the Cartel Market and the F2P patch. We also ask our viewers to help with a name for our spin off show. You can listen to it via youtube below, or listen to it or download it at podomatic.com Remember to follow the guys over at their facebook page here
BioWare LiveStream Q&A Event on Tomorrow
BioWare will be holding their second LiveStream Q&A tomorrow November 29 at 3PM CST. Here they will be taking questions about the upcoming Game Update 1.6. It looks like the event will be on for about 30 minutes, so make sure to ask your questions soon if you want the to have a chance to answer. Check out the details below: 11.27.2012 LiveStream Event #2 BioWare and LucasArts are excited to announce the next LiveStream Q&A Event. Below is all the information you need in order to watch and participate in the LiveStream Event. Star Wars™: The Old Republic™ – LiveStream 11/29/2012 3:00pm to 3:30pm CST The second LiveStream Event will discuss Game Update 1.6: The Ancient Hypergate and the recently launched Free-to-Play option. Game Update 1.6 brings an exciting player-versus-player Warzone and new Heroic Space Missions. If you’d like to participate in this LiveStream Q&A Event, you can ask questions on the LiveStream Channel during…