Adventures on the Onslaught PTS: Phase 1.5

With Onslaught due to launch next month (!), BioWare have been providing us with a steady flow of details regarding Classes, their new Abilities, and their various Tacticals and Set Bonus pieces. Last week they opened up the PTS, allowing people to test out the changes for Inquisitors and Warriors, before bringing it down within that same week to prepare for the inclusion of Agents. The PTS is currently open in "phase 1.5" of testing, although it will probably be brought down again next week to prepare for Hunters and phase 2.

I missed the initial batch of testing due to being on holiday, much to my disappointment. I was able to keep up with what people were saying on the testing forums, but both their reports and the official word of BioWare was not enough to really sate my interest. Notably, we knew what the ultimate tiers of the various Set Bonus items were going to be but the lower tiers were still a mystery - BioWare had highlighted that they would mainly be stat boosts and left it at that. Additionally, we didn't know how many of these sets would or wouldn't have six pieces.

Speaking of Set Bonus and Tactical items, the only ones that had been listed were specific to Classes; we'd already been told that there would be several items which everyone could use, but we weren't informed about any of these. Granted, considering the sheer potential of 'generic' items, this is likely because all the options aren't yet finished, but it would still have been interesting to receive official word on those which were ready to go. 

Then what about the Companions? BioWare had been hinting that they'd like to give Companion re-balancing another go, given how lackluster or powerful certain characters are, but there had been no indication of whether or not they'd even started this. 

So, when the PTS came back up on Wednesday, I happily launched myself into it. I'm in the fortunate situation whereby the Classes 'ready' for testing are those which I have the most experience with (sorry, Hunters) so when it came time for BioWare to list all the sets and Tacticals, I already had a good idea in my head of which items I was going to try out.

In this overview, I will also be listing just extremely generic findings as well as Class-specific ones. If you want to know what these are but have no interest in reading about Classes, you need merely look for the screenshots of the Imperial Fleet as that will be the cutoff point for Class details.

Incursions on a very remote planet

Hello there!

It has been a while since I've last posted here. This is due to various reasons, ranging from real-life making it difficult to blog consistently (February, for example, was devoted entirely to work-experience) to not really knowing exactly what to devote a post to next. I have quite a few drafts which I've started, at least. 

Today, BioWare have announced details of the next-but-one patch, 5.10.3. At long last, after several years of it being requested by the KotOR crowd, the planet Dantooine is making its SWtOR debut. 

This is not the only glad tidings, however, as Dantooine will bring with it the first in-game event since the Rakghouls resurged in January 2014. That's well over five years since a new event! That said, there's actually a fair amount of familiarity to this event; the main villains of the piece are the Nova Blades from Rishi, this time sponsored by the Imperials to attack Republic settlements.

Of course, because this event needs to cater to everyone, the Nova Blades just attack anyone that happens to get in their way. Pirates; who can trust them?

Since this event is going to be the first one which has any real significance to the story, this implies that there will be a very small story update to go with it; I'm guessing this will continue the rather superficial loyalist and traitor choice from Ossus rather than expand on it or allow a faction-switching mechanic like Iokath did. It's a very safe option for them at this juncture, as then they can save the expansion itself for any bigger developments on that part. 

In the meanwhile people who actually want to defect will likely need to put up with more forced-pretending, which I can't imagine to be very fun for them. 

While I am of course ecstatic to see both a new event and one of the final two missing planets from the original KotOR at last, I have to admit I'm somewhat saddened by the implication that Dantooine will only ever be an event planet. Since it is an actual planet at least that should at least mean that we won't be restricted from travelling to it at any point like the Rakghoul tunnels. 

I would have definitely loved it to have been more significant that it is seemingly going to be, but it's not the end of the world. They may yet create more separate areas on various planets, akin to Black Hole and Section X, which I would absolutely love to see for many planets across SWtOR. 

April is going to be something of a month of information for SWtOR; we'll hopefully be getting info pertaining to 6.0 next weekend from Celebration in Chicago but we definitely know that they intend to give us more information for 5.10.3 later this month, presumably when 5.10.2 has launched. 

I genuinely can't wait to hear what BioWare has to say.

5.0: Another Year Later

So here we are. The 5.0 patch cycle has now started its third and hopefully final year of life. This is the only expansion in SWtOR's nigh-seven-year history to have completed two full years, and it's certainly been an interesting ride.

As some of you may recall exactly one year ago I published an article looking over 5.0's then-present history. As I described, the first year of 5.0 resulted in nearly every single game activity or function receiving something new. Has the second year managed to accomplish a similar feat or does it feel severely lacking in comparison?

Let's find out!

The 5.10 Stream: Thoughts and Hype Trains [Some spoilers]

Yesterday evening, Eric and the rest of the team ran a stream divulging more direct information about the Jedi Under Siege update coming to us later in the year.

In case you need a recap if you haven’t been following this elsewhere this update will include a new storyline and Daily Area, Guild updates, a new tier of endgame gear, and Master Mode Gods from the Machine.

Bear in mind that in this overview I will be going into a fair amount of depth about everything they covered and in the same order, so if you don’t want to read information about the new story update you’d need to stop reading everything after the Guild updates.

4.0 Impressions: Universal System Changes

So 4.0 has finally hit and whilst not everyone has access to the story, which I shall cover next week, or Level 65, everyone has access to the changed systems such as Companions and Level-Sync. This is just to look over what has changed and what my feelings are on the matter.

Accompanying Personnel: Companions I'd choose to keep

So Knights of the Fallen Empire has had a lot of questions being asked about it, particularly focusing on how Companions will be handled. Transpires that our own personal roster of Companions shall be permanently affected in some form or another; not only do we need to forage for various Companions but the implication seems to be that we can choose to not recruit a certain character; indeed, a further indication is that we can recruit or even kill a Companion belonging to another Class.

I'm reserving judgement on this last point, because I for one enjoy the diversity of the Class Companions. Whilst some are extremely difficult to work with - just try getting Ashara to like a Dark-Side Inquisitor - and some are just unpleasant - a certain Houk comes to mind - I enjoy having to spend time analysing their characters and what they like/dislike in the long run and having to adapt accordingly. I can understand the appeal for picking-and-choosing, however.

In spite of my attitude towards the matter, the question definitely rears its head; if you could choose which Companions could accompany you into the future, who would you choose? For this, I will be approaching it from the perspective of the original classes and not from the perspective of a future "potential owner", if you will.

The Companions listed, I must point out beforehand, are those which I would hold on as tightly as possible to rather than a complete list of those I could "bear to keep around". You'll notice that not a single Agent Companion makes this list, for example.

Cascaded Imperial Chivalry

Knights of the Fallen Empire has received a great deal of much-deserved attention from virtually all quarters.

Indeed, it's safe to say that it has received much better attention and to some extent publicity than Shadow of Revan, which was pitched as "the" big thing for SWTOR. This completely free update has received a fully-animated CGI Trailer rather than using the in-game engine to render cutscenes for trailers as what happened with Rise of the Hutt Cartel and Shadow of Revan. A full-CG animation hasn't been done for this game since the brief HK-51 Reveal back in 2012, which even then was under a minute and just a teaser, and it's excellent to see another CG trailer even if it's still strange knowing that a free update received one whilst the two paid full expansions did not.

Some information was, as many know by now, leaked accidentally on Saturday but I decided to hold off on presenting my thoughts until the announcement was officially broadcast.

The full trailer can be viewed here, you can read the press release yourself here, and a Developer Blog update detailing more about the update, including the new Level Cap of 65, here.

One week to go until 3.0!

So 3.0 launches in just over one week. Soon most of us will be able to see just what BioWare are so proud of, make use of the Discipline System, and get into a new sense of vigour with actually "fresh" PvE content that isn't just Dread Fortress and Dread Palace.

Indeed, it's been the preparations for 3.0 that have, ashamedly, kept me from finding worthwhile things to actually report about here; I've done absolutely nothing in-game save for farming the Oricon and Ilum missions, day-after-day for the past 6 weeks (!), for their Commendations across the two characters that I feel I'll be using most come 3.0. This is in order to get the most from the as-of-yet-unannounced conversion rates for Basic Commendations. Even if all I'll be using them for is replacing Dread Forged mods, barrels, and enhancements with the Dread Master equivalents*, at least it will still be something to write home about.

I do promise to be more active following the launch of 3.0. I've yet to do a blog post showing off my Tatooine Stronghold.

Now that's a thought...

Anyway.

Shadow of Revan

[caption id="attachment_95" align="aligncenter" width="300" class=" "] "War is coming. Conflict on a scale we've never seen."[/caption]

So BioWare have officially announced some details on the upcoming 3.0, officially confirming its title as "Shadow of Revan". One can also pre-order the entire expansion for $19.99, or £11.99 if like me you happen to be British. This is of course more than the Rise of the Hutt Cartel by $10 or £6, but for what you get I honestly believe that this price differential is worth it.

Oh, please make sure to watch the trailer. Even if you don't 'agree' with one of the scenes - you'll know which when you see it - it is so beautiful and showcases just how brilliant SWTOR's cutscene animations are compared to when the game first came out.

2.9: Galactic Strongholds

Pip's beloved computer station was confiscated upon entry to Manaan by the paranoid Selkath

So today 2.9 went live and has brought with it a whole host of brilliant things. As you can gather from the picture above, a new planet - Manaan - can now be visited although it is nothing more than a hub for codex entries, a flashpoint entrance, and a vendor. Part 2 of "Forged Alliances" has also been released to go with this.

Finally, the Galactic Strongholds and Guild Ships have finally made their way to us. A lot of people will be thrilled to finally deck out their own house while others are more interested in the Conquest that tides us over until 3.0 brings in its inevitable raid.