I was recently given the opportunity to play the Bounty Hunter class in an origin world experience at the first ever Bioware Fan Site Summit. It was a fun time indeed and I am thankful for the opportunity. It has answered a lot of questions for me personally about more than just the class, but on a broader level of having to do with my views on the game.
Floodgates have opened and it is now widely known in the SWTOR community that there will be an event held this weekend at Bioware’s offices in Austin, Texas. The participants – fan site representatives. Fifteen fan sites will be attending. This seems to be an extension of events that were organized for regular press members at the recent UK event and for PC Gamer (they said in their article that they too were flown to Austin for two day SWTOR bonanza). Click here to read my full mission statement about the upcoming event
One of the big items of news that came from the UK player event SWTORGB, that I especially liked was the information we got on the mysterious “Datacrons”. Credited by Daniel Erickson as the first known person in a community play event to discover one, “Kandycane” brings us this tidbit on the discovery and it’s use from his game play impressions…..
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Going through all the blog posts and tweets and everything else has left me exhausted. The amount of information given in this last Friday Update is staggering if you think about it, as it is something actual about our classes we are playing at launch. In the bigger picture, if you look at it like I do, it really breaks down class roles, and that leads to the reality of how close we actually are to finally playing this game. With all of this, I am going to try to dissect some of this information in relation to the Bounty Hunter.
Diving straight in, I am going to start with this quote below:
Choosing an Advanced Class is very important in The Old Republic, as within your Advanced Class, your character will reach their full potential. Your Advanced Class choice dramatically alters the gameplay experience of your base class by providing access to two exclusive skill trees per Advanced Class, with a third being shared between both Advanced Classes.
So how I take this is that this plays out like any other MMO so far, even the venerable Warcraft and how their Talent trees used to be when it wasn’t so restricted. This basically say “Hey, pick the AC you want, you still get the base class abilities of the class itself, thus this being the Bounty Hunter. You can even place some points in the other AC. So, just like WOW, we get 3 talent tress to mess with to fine tune the type of player we want to be and how we play.
Now, as much as I hate “cookie-cutter” builds on classes, I don’t see a way Bioware can stop this. Some abilities are going to be better than others and there will be those that will probably force those upon you depending on the role you pick. With this in mind, I hope that Bioware gives us the “Dual Spec” option so that we can have 2 builds based on what we are doing (Soloing/Group).
Something else I picked up on is this:
As you level up, your character will gain abilities from three sources:
- Through trainers, from their base class (e.g. Sith Warrior)
- Through trainers, from their advanced class (e.g. Marauder)
- Through skill points spent in the skill trees of their Advanced Class
So no longer is it the run to one trainer and you’re done. We now have to hit up the Base Class (Bounty Hunter) but we also have to fine the AC trainer that we are playing, in my case which will be the Mercenary. This is interesting as unless these are always grouped up, you have to make sure to remember where each are to make sure all of your abilities are up to par.
Now the fine folks over at Bioware even gave us the break-down on the roles for the Bounty Hunters:
Bounty Hunter Advanced Classes
Mercenary (Roles: Mid – Long Range Damage Dealing, Healing)
PowerTech (Roles: Close – Mid Range Damage Dealing, Tanking)
- As previously announced, the Bounty Hunter’s Mercenary Advanced Class now features the ‘Bodyguard’ skill tree, allowing this iconic class to fill the role of a medic if desired.
- The ‘Advanced Prototype’ skill tree, shared between both Bounty Hunter ACs, now features an upgrade to the base class flamethrower, which allows the player to rotate while using the ability.
We now see how the Bounty Hunter breaks down. Mercenary breaks down into a DPS/Healer role and the Powertech breaks down into a DPS/Tank role. Now for all you WOW’ers out there, Bounty Hunters look to have the possibility of being Paladins of Swtor.
Those that are going the Tank Bounty Hunter will also have that DPS chance of speeding up their leveling without sacrificing the Tank aspect of it. It also plays
I, like many, think this last update was a great one. it really moves use one step closer to that fateful date where we all get to jump in game and put all this information we have been hoarding for so long to the test. In regards to the Bounty Hunter, playing a main healer and knowing I have DPS choices to help in the leveling process make me very happy as well.
Pure joy on their faces
As we reported earlier today, there is a hands-on event being held in London today where lucky people that applied for a pass at the official forums are now enjoying all SWTOR has to offer. They all get to visit the Origin worlds and here are the first impressions from the gamers.
deanogee @ official forums said:
I thought the (Jedi Knight) gameplay was pretty smooth and the story progressed nicely as your were immersed straight away into a “heroes” role. Despite playing for an hour It felt like I was only a small percentage of the way through the sub plot upon the orgin world Typhon, progressing only 2-3 levels in the process. Nevertheless with the whole game being bigger than every single previous BioWare project put together I see this story lasting a very long time and loads of tiny sub-plots along the way.
p.s Titles are confimed (i.e Darth’s, Lord’s etc) and you apparently hit the advanced classes around lv 10.
I also found the two Jedi Knight buffs at the start allowed either you to buff yourself so you did more damage, or/and buff players around you.
Plus in pretty much every fight you are in – an enemy drops something which you can pick up.
Darth-Reaver @ official forums said:
Ok so i just want to say it was great to meet and chat to Daniel Erickson and Stephen Reid
So i played the Sith Warrior for half my time and the other half i played a Bounty
Hunter, the game runs nice and smooth quest system was easy to follow.Combat is very similar to WOW both mele and ranged, i did find vendors, trainers and a taxi system on my short travels.
the games is looking very good, however i did notice some very minor bugs while i was playing.
But very fun to play.
We had a small Q&A after with Daniel Erickson and Stephen Reid and as others have said Darth Titles are confirmed I asked if there was still going to be an open Beta before release and i was told “No Comment”
We got a cool poster that i got signed and choice of T-Shirt, i got the Sith one
Ilmarian @ Twitter said:
Had an awesome evening at #SWTORGB Big thanks to everyone at Bioware for making this happen. I think #SWTOR is the first true mmoRPG!
qmyn @ Twitter said:
#swtorgb was totally surreal. The BioWare guys are truly inspiring. Amazing game coming to a galaxy near you soon.
aartanaway @ Twitter said:
- Play time is nearly over, having fun but there is just not enough time!!!
- Smuggler – fun play quite a lot of ducking/diving, fun ranged stuff. Game isnt too buggy but there are a few annoying things.
- Jedi guardian – much more fun opening area IMHO, some beautiful graphics. Combat feels great with the test sabre 🙂
You can find more impressions as they come in on the official forum thread or on Twitter.
Update with more impressions and pics:
Dariel at the official forums said:
Played a Sith Inquisitor tonight at the event.
Only got to level 4 but I absolutely loved the voice over. Even the random NPCs standing around which don’t have much of a purpose are talking to each other and they have voice over too whilst they chat, continuously found my self stopping and listening to what they had to gossip about.
The phased story areas were pretty awesome definitely felt very cinematic and heroic every time you went into one. I had one scenario where I was interrogating a guy and had the options to reason with him, talk trash or just straight up electrocute him . There were some traditional kill x and collect y but nothing in terms of having to grind mobs as you were usually leading yourself to the next part of a story or phased area.
At level 4 i had 4 attack abilities and 1 buff, i only learned from the trainer twice and peeked at what i could expect, i can truly say i was always excited to level in that respect. I had learned force lightning at level 3 and overload which was a AOE knockback at 4.
Combat did feel a little button smashy at first until i did get overload which sort of put me into a bit of a rotation but can’t comment much past that with only being so few levels in.
Questions were answered in the last 15 minutes, highlights of that were : No companions in Warzones, there will be titles e.g Darth / Lord etc Daniel Erickson briefly explained they were ranks you gain but nothing else on that, no more planet announcements, flashpoints can have companions but only filling the main 4 group spots.
At the end of the event we all got decieved posters (choice of malgus or the jedi) which Daniel Erickson, Stephen Reid and Gabe Amatangelo signed and a choice of Empire and Republic Shirts.
matteh at the official forums said:
I played the trooper, had a great time playing grouped with another 2 troopers
One thing mentioned is that we were playing off the NA servers and there are no European servers currently (I could stand corrected on how far along they are) but could show how far/close are from release or open beta.
Took me about an hour and a half to get to level 5.5 skipping a few conversations to get a bit further. Also there is a queue group/solo button for joining warzones don’t know if its been mentioned before. I ejoyed the mini map and the whole transparent part of it. The questing as a group was well put together. Any of other questions about the trooper or the gameplay I’ll be happy to answer
Nighthaunterz at the official forums had a very long post that you can read in its entirety here. Here are the most important things to know:
There is no swimming in the game.
There is a maximum of 4 characters in a flashpoint, this limit includes companions.
There is auto facing, it is odd.
NPCs could shoot through solid objects, maybe a bug.
There will be no other major planets announced (planets whith 10+ hours gameplay).
Staying alive is pretty easy, you can handle 5+ mobs at once.
There were class specific areas in certain buildings.
There was a clear indication of when you were choosing a light side or dark side answer prior to getting points.
You can refuse quests through conversations.
The voice acting is very good.
There is an ear equipment slot…
I didn’t notice any weather.
 Entrance |
 Entrance to gaming area |
 Computer setup |
It is a special day for all the fans of the Old Republic in the United Kingdom because they will get a chance to play the game in London tonight from 7pm GMT. The event was announced on the forums a few days ago by Stephen Reid and forum members that applied were given invites on first-come, first-serve basis (follow this link for the complete announcement). Above images show the space where the gameplay demo will be held and I must say it looks awesome and futuristic. Members of the press are also playing the game as I write this article and we expect their reactions all throughout the day. Gameplay demo includes only the Origin worlds and each person will be given a whole hour to play. We’ll be monitoring how things go and what people’s reactions are and we’ll keep you posted on any news that might come out from this event. You may also follow #SWTORGB on Twitter, because that is the “official tag” for the event. If you are attending the event we would love to hear from you and what you thought of the game. Feel free to contact us if you want to share your experience.
Something I have been wondering about for quite some time is the level of item one can expect to craft after a “crafting crit” takes place during item creation. Will the created item be on par with raid loot drops, PVP drops, or other drops or rewards from missions?
Read on!
Visitors of Penny Arcade Expo have been busy recording various gameplay sessions all throughout day 1 of the convention and we have gathered all the relevant videos in this one post. There is some more footage of Taral V flashpoint as well as some starting planets gameplay. We also have Daniel Erickson giving a few more presentation of various planets and I suspect we will be seeing all of these videos as downloadable content from the official site. Until then enjoy.
Video shows full in-game cinematic for the instance telling us the background story of why are we fighting this hard fight. Flashpoint footage is from the first third of the instance and the person playing is a clicker (you have been warned). Quality is Full HD and the video is worth your bandwidth.
Video shows the last third of Taral V instance including the fight (and wipe) with the last boss. *spoiler alert* Last boss seems to have an add so it requires some coordination and unfortunately the Trooper died and Jedi Knight was not able to take aggro from the healers quickly enough (not his fault). The person playing seems to be a veteran MMO player and you can see just how smooth the gameplay is when played by a knowledgeable player. The video is HD and gets 5 stars from me.
Jungle part of Taral V from the Jedi Sage perspective. Video is HD with detailed shot of the UI in the end
We see the starting zone for Bounty Hunter with some great cutscenes and a chubby BH as our protagonist. HD quality is available and I recommend watching it this way because it brings out the best out of the game footage.
We see some areas of Hoth with surprising volcanic activity and future questing grounds set inside ice caves and ship graveyards. Available in HD quality as well. Thanks to Engrey for the footage.
Official trailer showing in-game footage of Tatooine vistas.
The video shows all cutscenes and footage from questing inside a cave on Korriban. This is footage similar to the one we’ve see at Gamescom last year, but nice to see it again.
Darth Hater just released a video they shot at the SWTOR booth at Pax East where a demonstration of the Space Combat feature was held live. Presentation was hosted by Daniel Erickson and Stephen Reid and the footage is amazing in all of its Full HD glory. The video shows awesome footage of the space map and then shows us space combat inside an asteroid field. Darth Hater is working on one of their famous dissections of the video and you can find it here.
Ask A Jedi just released a 15 minute video of gameplay from PAX East. The video shows flashpoint Taral V. The footage is extremely high quality and shows Jedi Knight gameplay. In my opinion this is the best in-game footage we have seen so far. The game looks EPIC. Please visit Ask a Jedi website for more coverage from PAX and interviews with the developers. We’ll start our dissection of the video in a minute.
