BioWare released the first two videos of the Guild Summit panel today. Both the Operations and PvP videos were released, making these excellent views for any end game player who is wondering what they can expect from update 1.2 and beyond. BioWare will be releasing more of the videos next week. Keep an eye on swtor-life for the videos as soon as they are released.

BioWare had a nice full day of surprises in store for players yesterday, and this one may have been the most unexpected of them all. The Developers have decided to start their very own podcast, with developer interviews and news straight from BioWare.

The first episode launched yesterday and is focused around the combat changes players will be experiencing in 1.2. Combat designers Austin Peckenpaugh and Cameron Winston sat down with show hosts Eric Musco and Brooks Guthrie to talk class balance, the new Warzone Novare Coast, and even gave a little hint to a new Heroic World Boss we can expect to see on Voss, the Nightmare Pilgrim. One of the most interesting little tidbits of info out of the show was concerning forum posts, specifically what kind of posts get the most attention from the developers (here’s a hint: Whining about your individual assumptions and experience is less likely to get noticed. Instead offer expanations about the overall game experience that are affecting the community as a whole without making unproven assumptions.).

Head on over to the official site and check out the new podcast. This first episode clocks in at just under 20 minutes long, hopefully the shows length will be extended a bit in the future. in the mean time be sure to let us know what you think of the new show in our comments section below!

PvP is going to be changing in 1.2. Now this is no surprise for most players, BioWare has be very vocal about their desire to improve on PvP with the launch of their newest game update. But some players (myself included) may be wondering exactly what that means. Sure, some info has been made public through various sources, but there has not been a nice long post from a developer talking about all the changes we can expect to see.

Gabe Amatangelo made it his mission to change that.

Gabe went the distance and made a huge blog post about what players can expect to see on the PvP horizon. While he does emphasize that when the new update launches the ranked PvP will be considered in “Pre-Session”, with more improvements coming the the future,  he still does a fantastic job on outlining what we all can expect to see in our PvP future. Gabe talkes about Ranked Warzones, the new rewards system, the AFK Vote Kick option, and some new ststs players can expect to see at the end of the match. Even if you just dable in PvP now and again it is well worth a read, and guilds who plan on grouping up for some Ranked Warzone madness need to head over and give it a read asap!

You can find the full post over on the SWTOR site, and we welcome your thoughts on the issue in our comments section below!

This week’s Community Q&A was all about the developers bringing players the answers to some of the most burning 1.2 questions they have come across, and boy did they deliver. This week’s article is chock full of all kinds of 1.2 goodness, including what has been my favorite response to a question since the Q&A articles began:

Aymi: You guys are including a whole bunch of things to motivate us to reroll and unlock stuff through Legacy, but if I’m playing on one server because the community is great, I’ll be limited to eight characters. You said during the Guild Summit you were going to think about it at some point, any update on that?

Daniel Erickson: We are 100% committed to providing more character slots per server in the future but unfortunately we’re not ready to talk about how that will work.

This is great news for players like me who have already used up all 8 character slots but have no interest in switching servers. Outside of that little gem there is still a metric ton of great info in the article, including a huge answer from Georg Zoeller about how gear and reverse engineering is going to work in 1.2.

Head on over to the official SWTOR site and read the article at your earliest opportunity. You will not regret it. And as always feel free to share your thoughts on everything with us in the comments section below!

((The RP XP with MJ #32))

Jenla Ruf sat outside the Boarsch home and brooded under the hood of her cloak at the yellow rain coming down and splashing in the rust muddied puddles all over the village on Hutta. Inside, her Mandalorian lover worried over his sister’s existence.

“Why bother with these slugs?” the Imperial agent scowled as she wiped the slimy rain from the comlink on her arm, contemplating her next move. “Sister or not… this is a waste of our time.”

It had been weeks since they escaped the Sith surprise attack against the Jedi on Uradis. They’ve been in hiding long enough, but now there’s this, this “personal” wrinkle. Inside, Jenla heard the hushed voices of Margis and Boarsch. He was promising his dying sister assistance, no matter what.

A cold shiver rose in Jenla’s spine. She knew what that meant. Though Boarsch had joked about it at times in the past, this time she felt uneasy. Margis was dying and their options were limited. The agent turned and moved to the doorway. She pressed her ear to the grimy metal.

“I’ll reach out to the Republic,” she heard Boarsch say.

And that was the moment Jenla Ruf realized the mistake she made, a mistake she vowed to correct.

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Today William Wallace, Senior Game Designer for SWTOR, posted a nice long Developer Blog talking all about the Legacy System. Players who have been following the development of the Legacy System and all the news since the Guild Summit may find a lot of the info presented here to be a re-hash of what they have heard before, but there are a few new gems of information placed in there to make it worth a read for even the most dedicated TOR player.

Along with going over some of the new features we can expect Mr. Wallace also talks about the design philosophy behind some of the choice BioWare has made about the features they want to make available to players. Are you curious as to why Smugglers may be Force Choking their way to victory during their quests? Maybe you want to know how an Inquisitor can be calling down Orbital Strikes from the Imperial Fleet? Well all this is touched on by Mr. Wallace.

Check after the jump for the full article, and let us know what you think in the comments below! Continue Reading »

Today a new post popped up on the forums from Stephen Reid that relayed a question from Game Director James Ohlen. What Ohlen wants to know is this, what kind of Open World PvP do players like the most and what kind of Open World PvP do players want to see in SWTOR?

Now it is no secret that players have be hoping for a more interesting Open World PvP ever since the release of SWTOR. Well no everyone has a chance to weigh in and share their opinions with the big man himself. Here is the official post on the subject.

What kind of Open World PVP excites you most?

You can vote in the attached poll. Here are some more details on each type of objective:

‘Raw’ Open World – faction vs faction, with no faction population restriction mechanics AKA ‘true’ Open World PvP. Factions claim objectives.

PvPvE balanced – bolstering the underdog faction through NPCs, turrets, etc. Factions claim objectives.

Faction population capped – strict balancing in place between faction populations in objective areas. Factions claim objectives.

Guild based – everyone is your enemy except players in your guild. Guilds claim objectives.

Remember, you can follow James on Twitter @JamesOhlen; you can follow our main account @SWTOR.

You can head over to the forums and vote in the official poll here. The poll will only be open until April 4th, so be sure to get over and weigh in if this is a subject near and dear to your heart. Feel free to let us know what you think in the comments below as well!

During the Guild Summit it was announced that Game Update 1.2 will include, among many other things, that players can expect to see some in-game events starting up. Now the details as to what these events will be and what players can expect to see from them is scarce, but recently SWTOR’s Community Manager, Mr. Stephen Reid, has offered up some more tidbits of data to give players some idea of what they can expect. Continue Reading »

It’s the time of the week for you regularly scheduled server maintenance, but with a nice twist this week.

The servers will not be going down at all so no need to stop your play session for some updates! Just keep on swinging those lightsabers and fireing those blaster folks, because the fun just will not stop this week.

It’s time again for one of my favorite features on the SWTOR official site, Community Q&A. This week we learn a little about why Commandos and Mercenaries don’t get an interrupt ability, if there is going to be a longer period of time before hitting the “enrage timer” on certain operation bosses, if we are ever going to see an finished “Timeline” section on the forums, and whether guilds will ever be able to openly communicate with their alt guild if they have one on the opposite faction. There is also a nice long answer discussing the reasoning behind the upcoming healer nerfs  that will be taking place across all classes that is a must read for all healers.

Next week there will still be a Community Q&A but there will not be a thread opened for players to pose their questions. This is because the development team will be looking for some of the most asked questions concerning game update 1.2 and devoting next week’s Q&A to answer them. They will also be focusing future Q&A sessions on answering questions concerning game mechanics and updates that have already been released to the live servers, focusing less on questions like “Will we ever see this?” or “When is this coming?” The whole point here is to respond to fewer questions where the answer will just be “maybe” or “soon.” If you want to pose a question in future Community Q&A threads you will have a much better chance of getting a response if you stick to questions about the current game state, not on stuff that may come in the future.

For the full list of questions and answers from this week’s thread check after the jump, and be sure to let us know what you think in the comments below!

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