E3: General Information Learned

We are back from over an hour and a half playing 6 of the 8 classes in Star Wars: The Old Republic, not including Jedi Knight and Jedi Consular. All official videos are posted on our YouTube channel. Although we will have more specific information about the classes shortly, we first wanted to give you a heads-up on some of our findings after the jump.

Updated: June 30 @ 5:40 PM EST

  • When you die, you resurrect outside a small med center building in proximity to your bind station. You spawn with all equipment in hand -- no corpse run necessary.

  • Blaine Christine specifically mentioned PvP acquired armor sets in his presentation.

  • The group size limit in our demo was four players.

  • You acquire new skills through class trainers in the main quest hubs.

  • Class trainers are labeled "Elite."

  • Side quests did not seem to be class restricted.

  • You cannot initiate quest dialog if a nearby party member is in combat.

  • Certain quest givers may be contacted via HoloCom, which works the same as a normal cutscene.

  • A trade command and Lobby chat channel are available, but upon activating them we received a message that said "This function is not yet implemented."

  • Chiss and Human characters both had a /dance action available, and the dance was identical for both males and females.

  • Multiplayer dialog system allows each player to choose their own response, and an automatic dice roll decides the winning choice.

  • If you are in a group and initiate a quest dialog, the other members in your group have two minutes to reach the conversation point. If they don't make it, you have the option to start the conversation without your groupmates.

  • For non-instanced quest givers, the NPC doesn't move around much. Instanced quest givers tended to have elaborate cut scenes where they interact with the environment.

  • Mobs have a leash radius, and some did manage to evade us.

  • If you right click on an inventory item with a vendor trade window open, the item is sold. Values are in single credits with no fractional amounts.

  • Auto-run is available and in the usual places of Mouse 3/Numlock.

  • The taxi system was similar to World of Warcraft's gryphons. You pay a small fee and are transported from Station A to Station B.

  • The character creation screen was very similar to Dragon Age: Origins

  • The aggro indicator is blue when there is no aggro, yellow they are aware of you (mouseover status says "ALERTED") but not engaged, and red indicates in combat. The ranges for this varied depending on the type of mob.

  • For completing quests, you sometimes received items, money, alignment points, and experience points, or any combination therein.

  • For completing quests in a group, you received "Social Points." We don't know their purpose.

  • If a quest is instanced you enter a green portal. If you aren't eligible for the quest, the entrance is red.

  • All classes have a "Revive" ability, a 5s cast time, 10m range, no cooldown ability which can be used on a player or companion. The tooltip did not indicate if the ability is restricted to out of combat use.

  • You can inspect the gear of other players in your group from any distance, even if they're on a different planet.

  • You can inspect the gear of all other players in visual proximity. We don't know the maximum range of this.

  • In our groups the loot rules were "Round Robin" without a dice-rolling mechanic, and the credits looted were split equally among players in the group that were in proximity.

  • Loot was appropriate for what the mob would carry, such as a droid carrying a gun drops a gun (and often seemingly useless spare parts).

  • Personal Ships are described as a "base of operations" for the classes, groups, and companions.

  • Companions are seen in the "hanger," similar to the way that they are in the Mass Effect and KoTOR series.

  • A Dashade Companion and Human (looks like one of the lightly armored trooper concept art images) are seen in the background during the presentation.

  • Flytext seen during the gameplay hands on, works like scrolling combat text but more in the way of Borderlands where damage numbers pop out in different directions around the enemy as you damage them as well as yourself.

  • Preferences allowed for the customization of Flytext in similar ways of Scrolling Combat Text.

  • Preferences allowed for the adding of action bars, similar to the way they are added in the World of Warcraft default UI.

  • Bottom right hand corner bar graph is mentioned as "Game Server Delay"

  • WASD is default in-game



Character Statistics (4 tabs in all)

Base
Damage (Primary)
Bonus Damage
Critical Chance
PVP
Bonus Damage
Trauma Ignore
Critical Damage Reduction
Critical Chance Reduction
Damage Reduction
Tech
Bonus Damage
Bonus Healing
Critical Chance
Energy Regen Rating (in seconds)
Accuracy
Defense
Damage Reduction
Defense chance (percentage)
Glance chance (percentage)
Glance Absorption
Resistance




Map of Ord Mantell, minus the landmarks and features.


Map of Hutta ala Paint


UI & Game Options

Control Options:
Auto-Loot on Right Click, Auto Self-Targeting, Camera Max Distance (set to 7), Camera Rotation Speed, Deselect Target Upon Clicking on Terrain, Inverse Mouse Horizontal, Inverse Mouse Vertical, Mouse Sensitivity (set to 1)

FlyText Options:
Fly Text Enabled, Fly Text Ability Damage From Self, Fly Text Ability Damage From Companion, Fly Text Ability Damage on Self, Fly Text Combat Misc From Companion, Fly Text Combat Miss From Other, Fly Text Combat Miss From Self, Fly Text Heal From Companion, Fly Text Damage From Self, Damage On Companion, Damage on Self, Miscellaneous, Effect Gain Negative, Effect Gain Positive, Effect Loss Negative, Effect Loss Positive, Ability Damage From Companion, Heal From Companion, Heal From Other, Heal From Party, Heal From Self, Low Health Companion, Low Health Self, Mitigation Companion, Mitigation Other, Mitigation Self, Screen Space, Experience.

Rendering Options:
Standard Texture Quality Ones, Refresh Rate, Resolution Size.

Nameplate Options:
Nameplate on Enemy NPCs, Nameplate on Enemy Players, Nameplate on Enemy Player Companions, Nameplate on Friendly NPCs, Nameplate on Friendly Players, Nameplate on Friendly Player Companions, Nameplate on My Companion, Nameplate on Self

Social Options:
Automatically Ignore Group Invites, Automatically Ignore Guild Invites, Automatically Ignore Trade Invites, Profanity Filter, Conversation Mode (mouseover: Is the player playing multiplayer, solo, or as conversation mode?). Set to Conversation Mode.

Social Window:
18 people online displayed at time; tells you name and planet they are on, and can filter the list. Friends List function also present.

Equipment / Loot

Sith Training Blade
Bound
Main Hand
17-24 Kinetic Damage
Durability 100/100
Requires Training Saber

Neophyte Robe
Chest
2 Armor
Durability 75/75
Requires Light Armor
Requires Sith Inquisitor

Neophyte Trousers
Legs
2 Armor
Durability 75/75
Requires Light Armor
Requires Sith Inquisitor

Neophyte Ankle Wraps
Feet
1 Armor
Durability 75/75
Requires Light Armor
Requires Sith Inquisitor

Sith Duel Leathers
Bound
Chest
Armor 23
3 Agility

Sith Practice Blade
Bound
Main Hand
17-24 Kenetic Damage
Durability 100/100

Acolyte Robe
Chest
2 Armor
Durability 75/75
Requires Light Armor
Requires Sith Warrior

Acolyte Trousers
Legs
2 Armor
Durability 75/75
Requires Light Armor
Requires Sith Warrior

War Blade - Quest Item/Reward
Bound
Main Hand
Durability 100/100

Dantooinian Light Target rifle
17-29 Energy Damage
+1 to Presence
Durability 100/00

Courier's Pistol
Bind on Pickup
Main Hand, Off Hand
15-27 Energy Damage
+1 Presence
Req. Blaster Pistol

Burnished Blaster Pistol (purchased for 208 credits from vendor)
18-33 Energy Damage
+2 Cunning
Req. Level 3

Basic Medpack
Restores 150 to 170 health.
Cooldown: 30s

Grey Item Drops

Dud grenade

Ruined Wookie Disguise
Dropped by the elite mob "Agent ___" on Hutta
No stats.

Quest XP/Turn in Notes

Based on a Level 2 Trooper
1680 EXP Required to Level Up

Clearing the Air (Quest)
10 Credits
102 Experience

Exp gained per kill 25-120
25-30 each for each person in a three person group.
110-120 for the bigger solo enemies.

Comments

  • #135
    Nice nice nice, even a little map!

    I was wondering with Hutta, we know its a starter place for Agent and the Bounty hunter where they get to progress to a certain level - Do you think we'll have zones for planets? Because I'm pretty sure I read/heard a some time ago, a dev mentioning that your character will be able to return to their "home planet" at a higher level. If it is for instancing, leveling, more story for your class or acquiring new equipment. Basically a higher level zone at the same planet.

    D'you think we will see this? can you back me up? - because I might be wrong. Im just speculating.

    EDIT: Btw, just noticed on the map, that you couldn't determine if you could zoom out, so I might have a point here...
  • #141
    Put it to you this way: at GDC, I saw about 1/4 of the Ord Mantell map that is drawn above, and I couldn't zoom out either. I just saw connecting lines.
  • #140
    Couldnt tell from our gameplay, for now it is all speculation. Have fun thinking of what people at Bioware might be thinking of.
  • #143
    Yeah, Bioware is really promising. I guess at least every starter planet will have different zones, they can always expand further if they feel like y'know.

    Cheers for responding.
  • #134
    Awesome recap DH! keep it up.

    "Blaine Christine specifically mentioned PvP acquired armor sets in his presentation."

    What do you think this means? Looting PVP armor sets off of dead players that are generated by the game & in fact are not from the dead players or gaining renown like in WAR & turning those in to acquire these PVP armor sets?
  • #142


    Top row is two groups of the same outfits with different coloring.
  • #133
    Ya'll weren't kiddin when you said you recorded everything, amazing.
    Is one of you a savant like Rainman?

    P.S. That must be the best MS Paint job I've seen yet (the green map)
  • #139
    I'm definitely not Rainman. Definitely. Because I dont wear underpants from Kmart.
    We just drew maps into our notebooks and then did what we were able to do to get them on computers.

    Glad you love my paint skills, because that is about the extent of my computer imaging skills.
  • #131
    You can tell these are def. starter zones.
  • #132
    That has also been confirmed.
  • #123
    "If you are in a group and initiate a quest dialog, the other members in your group have two minutes to reach the conversation point. If they don't make it, you have the option to start the conversation without your groupmates."

    So, if a PUG of players A, B & C are in a group - say they have just finished an instance and Player A is sorting bag space at a vendor, B is going to a class person to hand in a personal quest (that was finished in the Flashpoint), and C has found a new quest person all to together...

    What happens:

    1) if B & C start the process of a cutscene at the same time? Or B is in a cutscene when C starts the new found quest chain?

    2) if C starts a new quest, and A & B see you have 2 mins to reach the quest circle, can C straight away SKIP the timer of 2 mins before A & B have even responded? If so, won't it perhaps piss some people off who are on route if they want to see the story/dialogue but an impatient person/group starts without them? Personally, I'd leave any PUG or group that started stuff and didn't even give me a chance to see it play out by skipping...
  • #124
    1. In a case like that, B will be in his cutscene while C has the option to wait on B. If the 2 min is not long enough he can just walk away from the quest giver if he wants to accept it at the same time as B. Or B can push esc to get out of the conversation NOW and can pick up the conversation later.

    2. C can go ahead and do everything on his own. A and B can both come along and pick up the same quest later. (unless it is class specific) They can also just skip waiting right at the start if they know nobody can make it. It is also a way to make sure your dialog is the only option chosen, but it gets rid of some of the group dynamics. Just plan ahead to make sure you are ready to get your group's quests.
  • #129
    Many thanks Z. So for point 2, C gets the quests to kill, say 10 deserters, and as nobody else makes it to the circle (as he just clicked SKIP) the rest of the group don't have that quest? Dialogue scene plays through and C talks alone. But if A & B then go to the circle they could pick up the quest and have the dialogue together and C is just not part of it right? All then have quest and each kill counts towards the group tally?

    Yeah, plan ahead indeed. If you are part of a PUG that's skipping lots and not waiting for the whole group then it seems you should just leave and take note who's impatient :-)
  • #138
    You are correct.
  • #144
    1) quick question Zoidberg. What do you mean by "unless it is class specific"? do you mean, say it is a trooper quest, and then the jedi knight runs ahead and does the dialogue, does that mean the Trooper misses out? because that would be especially stupid if it was the Trooper's class quest. Please elaborate.

    2) are you saying that if C goes and does the cutscene/dialogue in a flashpoint, the others are left out? or does player A and B still have the ability to enter the conversation afterwards, and just those two would be in it, and it would be just player A and B in convo? It would be upsetting if C could skip, and A and B would not get to see what the cutscene is like, or EVER participate in it...
    Please tell me A and B will still experience it, but not at the same time as C is all... EVEN in flashpoints...

    Thank you. I read your comments between you and Heybarn, and i just wanted to make sure that i was correct in interpreting it as, "All will experience that cutscene/convo (even if it is flashpoint), but if C does it ahead of them it ONLY means he is in it by himself, and others will STILL be able to experience it."
    Am I right? elaborate please and thank you. that question alone prompted me to make an account.
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