Star Wars: The Old Republic: Episode II

[Derfel Cadarn]

All AH suck. In Ultima online players placed houses in prime areas and placed vendors in them that players could buy stuff from. Other sellers would pay the house owner for the privelege of placing their own vendors in the house. It was fun, shopping around. Some houses were rune libraries, filled with runebooks containing runes marking locations all over Britannia. LFG channels? UO only had the equivelent of /say, until /party, /guild and /alliance. We did our communication over ICQ. And walked 10 miles to the dungeons uphill, barefoot in the pouring rain. And we loved it.

And when we died, we had to find another player or a npc wandering healer to rez, then run back to our body to get our stuff back. The number of times I had to use my recall book to get to a bank to retrieve a basic stash of reagents in order to nuke the ice fiend in Ice dungeon camping my corpse...

Auction houses? Looking for group channels? Damned noobs.

[Kosciuszko]

@Kosciusko

Perusing the first SWTOR thread here and saw that you play on Rubat Crystal - that's where I play! Small world. ^_^

Hah! Savi is the character name.

45 at the moment and it's not an issue if you can't solo heroics yet. I didn't really start until 41 or so; Undying Rage is really great for this as it gives 99% damage reduction for a few seconds for the cost of half health. And use Quinn over Vette.

Annihilation really gets rolling against elite mobs with strings of DoT crits for getting close to 1k a tic but against you have to use Pommel Hit/Savage Kick/Annihilate to just quickly kill them. The rotation is really weird, though, and it's all priority based and will change frequently. It takes a lot of paying attention to but I'm pretty sure most (all?) Marauder specs operate like this. I've been using

Deadly Saber>Rupture>Berserk (only at 3 stacks of DS)>Annihilate>Vicious Slash>Rage generation

It's probably not a bad thing to hit Annihilate prior to DS or Rupture if you've got Annihilator built up to a stack or so and want to build more wiggle-room for rage generation when necessary. At 3 stacks you shouldn't have a problem considering you'll have 7 seconds to hit Annihilate when it pops again- plenty of time to build five (really four considering an early talent in tree, but still takes 5 to trigger) rage.

[Shryke]

Anyway, I'm only L25, and for leveling purposes, I think not having a LFG system is better. I'm sure it is more annoying at L50, but even in WoW, it never was taht huge of a problem. It's only with the introduction of dailies and 30 minute dungeons where you want to grind for ph4t l3wts where the LFG system speeds up your grind. Before 50, the game shouldn't be that much of a grind (and in fact it shouldn't be post-50 as well). Some type of summoning feature is definitely needed. For quests it takes for fucking ever for newbies to come over to the spot, and pre-25, the fuckers have to walk which makes it even worse.

Huh? It was a huge problem in early WoW. Stopping leveling to get a group together and then hauling all their lazy asses out to the dungeon took tons of damn time. It was easier at max level because at least you and everyone else of that level was in the same city spamming the same chat. The pain of stopping leveling to do a dungeon was only mitigated if you were leveling with everyone else in the first wave. Summoning stones helped somewhat too.

TOR already fixes some of this with some (all?) of the flashpoints seeming to be accessible from the Fleet. And the dungeons seem to be placed in more ... distinct places in the leveling experience. Heroic quests though are old school annoying.

It's still up in the air, imo, whether it will still be as easy once the initial wave is done leveling.

[Max the Mostly Mediocre]

We can argue about who is right or who is wrong except...there is no actual right or wrong here

There is, and Blizzard was kind enough to prove it. Catering to the hardcore at the expense of the casual is a wonderful way to deflate your subscription numbers.

[Relic]

unless you have lightsabers.

[karaddin]

Overall, even with my slight struggles in progression (which again, are probably my own fault), the game has exceeded every expectation up to this point. I spent all afternoon Saturday lost in my Marauder's story, as I gained a new...companion through a thrilling, wholly unexpected (as I'd not spoiled myself prior), and thoroughly Star Wars-y series of events. Never had a single moment like that in 5 years of playing WoW.

I stayed up till 3am the last 2 nights getting to this point. I'm glad to say I did see it coming, perhaps because I've approached the toon with such an evil mindset and it seemed the natural cruel thing to do. I loved it!

Certainly nothing like that in WoW, but the experience is much closer to ME than WoW as someone said above, I'm not sure how I'm going to feel at max level as I'm not really bothering with groups so far, relentlessly pursuing the class story through the game.

[Solmyr]

Field report 2: Went out and was late for the raid on Eternity Vault so I decided to do the impossible - run all hard mode flashpoints in 1 night with no wipes...

... and almost succeeded. Oddly enough we 1-shotted even bugged Raven. Normally he is the one to 1-shot your group with his 54k/sec lightning, but this time we got him first try. And then we actually wiped on 5% on Mentor in D7. It was uncanny, as he's basically the same boss as normal, just slightly more hp and dmg. I guess we were too tired after 5 hours of hard modes.

Got 3/5 set items, only gloves haven't dropped yet, but that's understandable as they drop from BP last boss chest, which never opens if you wipe a single time on the boss. Only opened it once and was warrior token. Head doesn't drop anywhere ... I still haven't done enough Battle for Ilum runs to be certain, but 2/2 it dropped offhand weapon token. Asked guildies, they said they never saw head token either.

Tyrellius, the russian guy who tanks our hard modes said that in beta when you dropped a profession, the end-BoP items had a text "requires 1 ...". I am still inclined to think he may be wrong, especially for cybertech, because cybertech has always been advertised (on website and in the game codex) as a profession that makes explosives usable by anyone. But then again, if it works for the grenades, then it may work for the flasks, and then I will just lvl all professions to 400, craft the epic stuff and drop them and be insanely overpowered.

Catering to the hardcore at the expense of the casual is a wonderful way to deflate your subscription numbers.

Ah, but you see, hardcore games are satisfied by a few months of hardcore-ness(ity?). After that we're content to let the game "die" and become a sanctuary for casuals, carebears and people who never bother to read quests or chat. SWTOR will eventually be fashioned to tend to the needs of the masses and Bioware will definitely come ahead on the net profits chart. But for now, let the hardcore players have their due, we seldom get such chances. Between the lack of addons and statistical feedback, the bugged boss mechanics and imbalanced classes and the tinge of interface lag, area lag and bugged abilities/use items, the game is a heaven for anyone who wants to push the boundaries of impossible.

P.S. Let me tell you one reason why the "teleport to group" system is not a good idea. WoW tried it for a while and gave it up, instead putting a dungeon finder. What's wrong with this system is that it doesn't treat everyone in the group equally fairly. People know they can slack until the last moment and teleport to instance. Often it makes for the paradox of everyone carrying on with what they are doing and delaying the start even further. Other times one or more people would slack at the expense of those who get there first and have to wait for the rest to teleport to them. So the ones doing the travelling also do the waiting, while their fellow group members can quest, trade, chat, wank, you name it. Is this fair?

In a system where everyone has to travel on equal footing, there can be no slacking - everyone knows he has to get there on his own and does it. Besides, compared to pre-dungeon finder WoW, getting to the instance takes significantly less. All flashpoints are either on Imperial Fleet or on Ilum's landing site. Even without a speeder, the longest I've ever had to travel is 5-10mins. Usually it's less, instant travel, get on ship, Imperial fleet: 2 loading screens and ~2mins of running.

[Galactus]

That's cuz the Galactic Market blows horribly. I imagine they will change it (copy Wow's AH) asap.

I was talking about a Dungeon Finder, actually, sorry if I was unclear.

[Kosciuszko]

What would you advise doing to get some gear going before tackling hard-mode stuff at level 50? Any particular flashpoints or planets that you felt you got decent enough gear for, or perhaps gear just isn't that important at this point yet and it's still mainly ability of player to handle stuff? And arrgh, sounds like I need to build a coalitition of people that know what they're doing for now, or find one already formed.

[Ferrum Aeternum]

@Kosciuszko

Hah! Savi is the character name.

Awesome, I will add you tonight. My Marauder (now 35) is Abyssah.

Happy to report that I took two of the suggestions in this thread and had much better results last night. First, I switched specs from Carnage to Annihilation and noticed an immediate difference in both solo and group play. Got into a group that ran 3 of the Taris heroics and was very pleased with my damage output. Bleeding everything up and watching DoTs crit made a lot of intuitive sense and produced great results as we just burnt through everything. Plus tons of added utility and rage generation with the improvements to Force Charge. Once I get fully accustomed to the talented ability having no minimum distance requirement (which is fantastic) I can see my Marauder being a true killing machine.

Soloing was much more satisfying as well, because I tricked out Quinn in the best stuff I could find for him and brought him along for the 5-6 solo quests I ran once our group was finished. Rarely dropped below 50% health and didn't miss Vette's or (Companion 3's) added DPS a bit with the new spec. The challenge is still there, minus all the downtime from having to self heal every minute or so. I love it!

Annihilation really gets rolling against elite mobs with strings of DoT crits for getting close to 1k a tic but against you have to use Pommel Hit/Savage Kick/Annihilate to just quickly kill them. The rotation is really weird, though, and it's all priority based and will change frequently. It takes a lot of paying attention to but I'm pretty sure most (all?) Marauder specs operate like this. I've been using

I actually prefer a priority based rotation over a robotic, standard operating procedure type deal that never varies. It's the reason I used to enjoy DPSing with warriors in WoW. Keeps me more engaged.

Deadly Saber>Rupture>Berserk (only at 3 stacks of DS)>Annihilate>Vicious Slash>Rage generation

Good, very similar to what I was using last night (minus Annihilation of course, since I'm not there yet).

It's probably not a bad thing to hit Annihilate prior to DS or Rupture if you've got Annihilator built up to a stack or so and want to build more wiggle-room for rage generation when necessary. At 3 stacks you shouldn't have a problem considering you'll have 7 seconds to hit Annihilate when it pops again- plenty of time to build five (really four considering an early talent in tree, but still takes 5 to trigger) rage.

Cool, thanks again for the tips. I'm excited to get this character rolling again.

@karaddin:

I stayed up till 3am the last 2 nights getting to this point. I'm glad to say I did see it coming, perhaps because I've approached the toon with such an evil mindset and it seemed the natural cruel thing to do. I loved it!

I was genuinely fist-pumping by the resolution of that questline. There were some hints toward the end of what might be in store, but the end result was no less satisfying. Possibly the best part was the, um, transformation undergone by the boss character at the end. I freely admit I was cackling evilly by the time his third incarnation rolled around. :D

Certainly nothing like that in WoW, but the experience is much closer to ME than WoW as someone said above, I'm not sure how I'm going to feel at max level as I'm not really bothering with groups so far, relentlessly pursuing the class story through the game.

Yep, it does have a very similar feel to a multiplayer version of ME (which, if you think about it, is a pretty damned awesome concept in itself). There are just a ridiculous number of reasons for someone like me (huge SW fan, huge Bioware fan, WoW veteran) to love this game, bugs, imbalances and other slight foibles notwithstanding.

[Kosciuszko]

I admit I loved the end of chapter 1. And the companion that you get from it is actually useful; very high melee DPS and I occasionally used her on Alderaan and following planets. Its just that Quinn is too damned good.

And it does make you cackle while doing it.

ETA: Also, sitting on -9600 Dark Points at the moment. Wonder if I get a new title at -10000.

[Ferrum Aeternum]

Also, sitting on -9600 Dark Points at the moment. Wonder if I get a new title at -10000.

is that the Dark V threshold? I bet you do. Mine is at ~ 5,000 atm. I've occasionally taken Light side choices when I thought it made more sense in plot terms. Still sitting at Dark III which will be good enough to net me vendor gear at lvl 36.

[Kosciuszko]

I'm not gonna lie. I have yet to take one light side choice. I've skipped some dark side options when doing it would be stupid and not just evil, but when confronted with one or the other I've gone dark.

[Ferrum Aeternum]

I'm not gonna lie. I have yet to take one light side choice. I've skipped some dark side options when doing it would be stupid and not just evil, but when confronted with one or the other I've gone dark.

I never pass up an opportunity to execute some puny groveler or advance my own standing. But occasionally it feels as if some of the Dark choices might hamstring my character's path in some way. Also, I've chosen to spare certain lives when it seemed it would benefit the Empire to do so. Trust me, my character is still plenty evil, heh.

[Shryke]

Ah, but you see, hardcore games are satisfied by a few months of hardcore-ness(ity?). After that we're content to let the game "die" and become a sanctuary for casuals, carebears and people who never bother to read quests or chat. SWTOR will eventually be fashioned to tend to the needs of the masses and Bioware will definitely come ahead on the net profits chart. But for now, let the hardcore players have their due, we seldom get such chances. Between the lack of addons and statistical feedback, the bugged boss mechanics and imbalanced classes and the tinge of interface lag, area lag and bugged abilities/use items, the game is a heaven for anyone who wants to push the boundaries of impossible.

What the hell does that even mean?

Also, the hardcore are the people who play all the time. Big source of revenue. The other big group you wanna grab is the casual but constant player. They like to not have their time wasted though. (a big improvement WoW brought to the genre that games that came after it, including TOR, have is the ability to get shit done in small increments.) The hardcore are actually the ones most likely to put up with time wasting.

Also, the whole Star Wars thing is very likely drawing in tons of non-MMOers who aren't always willing to put up so much with the "time honoured" conventions of the genre.

P.S. Let me tell you one reason why the "teleport to group" system is not a good idea. WoW tried it for a while and gave it up, instead putting a dungeon finder. What's wrong with this system is that it doesn't treat everyone in the group equally fairly. People know they can slack until the last moment and teleport to instance. Often it makes for the paradox of everyone carrying on with what they are doing and delaying the start even further. Other times one or more people would slack at the expense of those who get there first and have to wait for the rest to teleport to them. So the ones doing the travelling also do the waiting, while their fellow group members can quest, trade, chat, wank, you name it. Is this fair?

In a system where everyone has to travel on equal footing, there can be no slacking - everyone knows he has to get there on his own and does it. Besides, compared to pre-dungeon finder WoW, getting to the instance takes significantly less. All flashpoints are either on Imperial Fleet or on Ilum's landing site. Even without a speeder, the longest I've ever had to travel is 5-10mins. Usually it's less, instant travel, get on ship, Imperial fleet: 2 loading screens and ~2mins of running.

You seem confused about what people are asking for. The summoning stones were bad cause they made someone do all the work of running out to the dungeon while everyone else slacked off. But no one is asking for those.

What people are asking for, afaik, is a way to, at the very least, instantly move your whole group to the dungeon in question from wherever they all are at the time.

This would be really helpful for Heroic quests, which tend to be far less accessible.

[Tyrellius]

Interesting, most of you Marauders here seem to dig Anni so much I ay give it a bash. I'm not saying I know how to play carnage properly, but using Gore for the 100% armour penetration increase is a big part of my dps, timing to use massacre to increase my extra attack chance, then gore, then blowing all my cds asap to fit inside the 6 second window and the numbers to wrack up loads, bonus points for trying to get ravage to fit into that window

It may be an animation bug, but button spamming seems to fuck with my attacks, causing them to misfire or not attack at all. Seems methodical, calm dpsing is the way to go. No maniacal button spamming.

I was working a lot over the Xmas break so have quite a bit of time off coming up soon. I plan to hit SW hard :D

ATI's new 7900 series is also coming out in the next 5 days or so, very interested to see if I can pick up a pair or reduced 6970 or 6990s! Hell, with all the xmas overtime if the price is right I may check out the 7900s themselves, however all the benchmarks I've seen on them seem to be on par with the 590gtx, which for a next gen card is a bit disappointing.

I'm almost Light Side IV. One of the most enjoyable parts of my class story is showing how hypocritical the Jedi are as a whole, forcing them to attack me while I offer them alternatives. I've wracked up about 750 Darkside points, but that is mostly for punishing severe stupidity or disloyalty. Besides those minor slayings, I'm the poster child of Imperial Propaganda

[Ferrum Aeternum]

Interesting, most of you Marauders here seem to dig Anni so much I ay give it a bash. I'm not saying I know how to play carnage properly, but using Gore for the 100% armour penetration increase is a big part of my dps, timing to use massacre to increase my extra attack chance, then gore, then blowing all my cds asap to fit inside the 6 second window and the numbers to wrack up loads, bonus points for trying to get ravage to fit into that window

Massacre is the top tier talent, right? I still get some of the ability names mixed up and can't access Torhead from work. Perhaps if I'd waited all the way until I got Massacre I'd have a different opinion of the tree. Gore certainly helped, but for whatever reason it seemed to miss a lot so the target wouldn't get the debuff. Deadly Saber on the other hand is a buff that applies to all attacks during the buff window so you can't "miss" with it. Plus, several other talents in the Anni tree cause a direct benefit the additional bleed damage in a number of ways.

It may be an animation bug, but button spamming seems to fuck with my attacks, causing them to misfire or not attack at all. Seems methodical, calm dpsing is the way to go. No maniacal button spamming.

Actually, I have this happen fairly often whether I'm spamming buttons or not. In particular Force Scream will often "double clutch," i.e. my character's model will start and stop the animation, then fully animate and unleash the scream, causing a delay of about half a second. Sometimes I get caught in Ravage's animation as well, even after the mob has moved out of range or been defeated. I've chalked both these up as bugs.

I'm almost Light Side IV. One of the most enjoyable parts of my class story is showing how hypocritical the Jedi are as a whole, forcing them to attack me while I offer them alternatives. I've wracked up about 750 Darkside points, but that is mostly for punishing severe stupidity or disloyalty. Besides those minor slayings, I'm the poster child of Imperial Propaganda

Heh, neat. Similarly I'm working on a Consular (lvl 14) who favors the Dark Side. Go behind the backs of your gullible, naive Jedi peers & superiors = hilariity ensues.

[Tyrellius]

In Carnage the form to use is the Ataru Form: Enters an acrobatic lightsaber form, increasing accuracy by 3%. In addition, your successful melee attacks have a 20% chance to trigger a second strike that deals 229 energy damage. This effect cannot occur more than once every 1.5 seconds.

Massacre is the top tier talent in Carnage: Strikes the target with both weapons for 247 - 378 weapon damage and automatically triggers an Ataru Form strike. For 6 seconds after using Massacre, your Ataru Form has an extra 30% chance to be triggered. Requires two lightsabers. Massacre is on no cooldown, just requires 4 rage to activate.

I also take Narrowed Hatred: Increases melee and Force accuracy by [1 / 2 / 3]%.Combined with Ataru forms 3% my attacks and debuff very rarely miss. At 50 I imagine I'll have to enhance to reach 110%.

Looking foward to playing more!

[Ferrum Aeternum]

In Carnage the form to use is the Ataru Form: Enters an acrobatic lightsaber form, increasing accuracy by 3%. In addition, your successful melee attacks have a 20% chance to trigger a second strike that deals 229 energy damage. This effect cannot occur more than once every 1.5 seconds.

Massacre is the top tier talent in Carnage: Strikes the target with both weapons for 247 - 378 weapon damage and automatically triggers an Ataru Form strike. For 6 seconds after using Massacre, your Ataru Form has an extra 30% chance to be triggered. Requires two lightsabers. Massacre is on no cooldown, just requires 4 rage to activate.

I also take Narrowed Hatred: Increases melee and Force accuracy by [1 / 2 / 3]%.Combined with Ataru forms 3% my attacks and debuff very rarely miss. At 50 I imagine I'll have to enhance to reach 110%.

Looking foward to playing more!

I was definitely using Ataru Form in my Carnage spec. Obviously the accuracy would seem to be a great boon but still, Gore seemed to miss a lot. Maybe it was just my perception. WTB combat log parsing!

Regardless, given the great success I had last night I'm gonna stick with Anni for now.

[Galactus]

Fuck Nar Shadaa. I spent a shitload of time there and then "WAAAH! BONUS MISSIONS!" ARGH.

I left in disgust when I finished the Bonus series and saw three new missions pop up. Graagh. And I left the 30+ heroics too. Damn them.