This week's Star Wars: The Old Republic Friday Update is the Battle for Alderaan Highlights Video. The video includes footage of a group of players taking on King Ulgo. Before this, a live stage demo from Gamespot featured the quest at E3 2011 along with many others. Up until now, the context of the event was muddy at best. However, we now have a greater understanding of Alderaan's story and more specifically, the self-proclaimed King Ulgo.
A working dissection of both of the videos is in the media gallery below. Make sure to check back for more. As with all of our dissections, items noted in prior dissections will not be mentioned here again unless otherwise important. Feel free to add your thoughts and items you noticed in the video. If we decide to use your find, we will credit you in the dissection.
The official DevTracker post and video embed follow the jump. Alternately, you can view the high-definition version of the video via our Youtube account.
Update: BioWare just moments ago released a new video from E3, this time highlighting commentary from the fans lucky enough to get a chance to play. Embed of the video is available after the jump.
Outside of the BioWare booth during E3 2011, we were able to capture some footage of some Sith Assassin gameplay. We cannot guarantee it is very exciting due to the tendencies of the players at E3 but we can at least say it is a bit of gameplay for those looking for new footage.
We did however manage to make a dissection of the video. The dissection includes information on an assortment of gear, new abilities, and more. As with all of our dissections, items noted in prior dissections will not be mentioned here again unless otherwise important. Feel free to add your thoughts and items you noticed in the video. If we decide to use your find, we will credit you in the dissection. See the Media Gallery below for the dissection.
Following the tradition of being on the lookout for new tidbits in the game, we now have PvP Information Learned. During the Fan Site Summit, we were able to pull out a few items of interest for fans of Star Wars: The Old Republic. Since this is the first time we could PvP at a hands-on event, many of the concepts and mechanics are new to us on the battlefield. Join us by hitting the jump to learn more on the PvP in The Old Republic.
As many of you know, Darth Hater was invited to join a special fan summit this week at BioWare's Austin campus. In addition to presentations and live Q&As, we were able to get more solid hands-on with Star Wars: The Old Republic. While sado was traipsing through Nal Hutta with his Bounty Hunter, I was finally able to get some serious time with a class Ive followed closely since November of 2009: the Imperial Agent. After spending many hours bringing an Agent from level one to Advanced Class and beyond, I finally feel like I can report on this enigmatic, elusive class.
The Bounty Hunter is one of those classes that went through much iteration of changes since first introduction almost two years ago. Although the look and core functionality remains the same, we saw the class have its resource mechanic change, it gained an additional role in one of its Advanced Classes, etc. Therefore, I looked forward to playing a Bounty Hunter at BioWare's Fan Site Summit to see how far the class has come. If you wish to not have the Bounty Hunter class story spoiled, do not hit the story pages.
For fans following Star Wars: The Old Republic, curiosity about the Jedi Consular extends back to learning about them at last year's press event. Thankfully, we were finally able to get our hands on this class at last month's Jedi Immersion Day in San Francisco. After several hours of play time and ten solid levels, we have a much clearer image of what it means to play the Republic's most mystical class.
LucasArts treated us last month to a full day of Star Wars: The Old Republic at their headquarters in San Francisco. Sado and Orionark leveled a Jedi Knight through Level 10. Read on for an in-depth account of our play session, including our impressions of the class' combat, storyline and companion mechanics.
Warning: We've separated the story section of this article into its own page as it contains spoilers for the entire Tython quest line, so skip it if you'd rather stay in the dark.
E3 revealed a great deal of exciting information on Star Wars: The Old Republic, from player ships to warzones. However, people couldn't help but hear the disappointment in my voice when I excitedly started to play the Sith Inquisitor, participated in the opening quest dialog, and proceeded to run smack into stationary Class Trainers. With this reveal in mind, I feel it is necessary to point out what we speculated in January as the ability gaining and leveling system for the classes -- with the exception of getting access to talent trees only after you selected your Advanced Class -- is
While at the Penny Arcade Expo, we had time to write down all of the abilities in the demo for our community here at DH. After the jump you will find the playable classes with abilities listed in order of level trained. Many of these will be familiar to people who have seen the abilities list from Gamescom, but a few of them have changed even since then. A full abilities list comparison will come later in the week but for now here are the abilities. Note: It is implied that these are only general class abilities and do not include advanced class abilities. The starting abilities that are missing from here were the same from Gamescom and were not changed so our staff in attendance did not write those down.
Our European friends at SWTOR-Station appear to have images of most of the abilities leading up to level 46 for a few of the classes. The abilities themselves have exciting possibilities but the fact that these abilities seem to stop at level 46 lends more credence to the argument that level 50 could possibly be the cap (see our interview with Arnie Jorgensen for more). The important thing to remember with these abilities being seen is that this is not a complete list, these appear to be only the class shared abilities, meaning non-advanced class or tree abilities. Beyond abilities, there are images of a few of the origin world maps and more. Note: Make sure to click the British/American flag for English.
We were able to have multiple members of the Darth Hater staff on hand to help compile the following ability stats at Gamescom. With the rushed nature of our hands on time, the consistency from one class to the next is understandably variable. Additionally, it should be noted that we were repeatedly reminded that all in-game text from character sheets to tooltips are considered "placeholder" and may be subject to change.
Note: We played Level 2 characters. Although we previously mentioned many abilities in prior dissections and other content, we included them to contrast and track changes between the various builds. Changes from one build to the next are highlighted in bold.
Our dissection of the Star Wars: The Old Republic content released during E3 is now online. As in our prior dissections, we will add new content in as we find it, so keep checking back. Feel free to let us know if you notice something we missed, and we will be happy to add it to our dissection with credit. Note: If something is mentioned in a prior dissection, then we do not reiterate it again here. Low bandwidth users should note there are numerous images contained in this article.
Here at Darth Hater, we are known for our painfully thorough dissections of the nuts and bolts that make up Star Wars: The Old Republic. During our hands on time this Tuesday, we furiously scrambled to record as many facts as possible. Our own personal impressions will be coming shortly, but first we wanted to make sure the theorycrafters could get some real facts to sink their teeth into. Here are some of the key facts we discovered with our hands on time with the Imperial Agent, Trooper, Smuggler, Sith Warrior, Sith Inquisitor, and Bounty Hunter.
As BioWare's Sean Dahlberg said about Star Wars: The Old Republic activities for E3:
If you mean our updates, yes. We'll be updating the website each day with something new from E3. The daily updates (meaning a new update each day) won't be starting until June 14th (in the afternoon). In fact, if you watch the count-down banner on the homepage, you'll know exactly when we'll first update the news article.
...the Darth Hater team will have coverage from on-site at E3, and in-depth looks at the official updates every day.
Monday, June 21 at 6p PST / 9p EST - Live Q&A with the Darth Hater team on our Vent server to answer all of your questions. Set your Ventrilo client to vent.darthhater.com with port 26166 in order to participate.
No true Hater would be without proper attire, so we decided to make available for purchase to the general public four of the eight shirt designs the team is wearing at E3. Click on your favorite Star Wars: The Old Republic MMORPG pillar to purchase.
Last week, LucasArts & BioWare extended an invitation to Darth Hater for another round of Star Wars: The Old Republic hands-on game play at the beautiful Presidio campus in San Francisco. Eager to take another look, Meg and I left GDC and made our way to Lucasfilm where we were treated to playing Level 6 Troopers on Ord Mantell, and also spoke in depth with Jake Neri of LucasArts and Daniel Erickson of BioWare.
The final class announced for the Sith Empire is the Sith Inquisitor. This force user is based off of Count Dooku and Emperor Palpatine, and excels at the use of electricity to dispose of anything standing in its way. Unlike the Consular, who seems to prefer a more tactical approach to combat, the Inquisitor doesn't mind quickly getting into the thick of things. This powerful class is skilled at using lightning to leave charred destruction in its wake.
Darth Hater was recently invited out to LucasArts' home base in San Francisco to get a look at the newest class in Star Wars: The Old Republic, the Imperial Agent. During our time at the studio we got to ask Jake Neri a few questions and we also saw a live demo focusing on some of the combat abilities utilized by this Sith sniper. Throughout the event we hastily scribbled notes, attempting to get a real understanding of how the Imperial Agent works, and we came away with some interesting discoveries.
I must preface this article with the fact that this is only my opinion based on what information is currently available and should be taken with little impact on the final product. After doing the latest dissection I decided to go back through our prior dissections to take an in-depth look at the skills and abilities in The Old Republic. In doing so I started to notice one recurring theme in many of the abilities - Crowd Control. For those that are unfamiliar with the term crowd control:
In a massive multiplayer online role-playing game (MMORPG), crowd control (also called CC) is the ability of one character to influence or prevent the abilities or actions of another character(s). Crowd control can be extremely powerful because possible future action trees can be completely eliminated. Thus, the crowd control user (crowd controller or CCer) can control possible outcomes, forcing or controlling the opponent to use an even fewer set of available abilities/actions. Used properly, CC often renders an opponent nearly useless, allowing the CCer to use abilities/actions against an opponent without fear of retaliation or response. Source
I counted twelve abilities that have some sort of Crowd Control function. These abilities come from what is currently known from the Sith Warrior, Bounty Hunter, Smuggler, and Trooper:
Flash Grenade (AOE, Stun, All nearby targets) - Smuggler
Smash (AOE, Stun, Up to 3 nearby targets) - Sith Warrior
Force Choke (Channeled hold, single target) - Sith Warrior
With how many of the abilities currently seen having some CC function you have to wonder how that will impact healing in the game. There are also abilities that require enemies to be stunned to be used, like the headshot ability of the Smuggler. To me it seems to imply that healing in the game will be much less of a main feature of the game unlike many other MMORPGS. This seems to be to be a point of contention. How will end game PVE (Player vs Environment) raiding work out in this model? I am sure that they will work out some way of having bosses immune to CC but it is still up in the air whether trash and the new lieutenant rank mobs will be the same in the end game. PVP (player vs player) is much less of a concern for me as I am sure they will have some way of curtailing the benefits of stuns and snares.
To me this discussion raises more questions than it answers but it is at least food for though for some discussion on the forum and in our comments section. What do you think?
Update: Sleeper discussed this a couple weeks back adding his own perspective on the crowd control abilities.
Just when I thought there was no way for BioWare to possibly design a class that will be more fun to play than a laser-sword wielding ninja-monk they release game play footage of the Republic Trooper. When BioWare stated each class would represent an iconic character from the movies they were not mistaken, however, the Trooper is not from either George Lucas trilogy. No, this guy is straight up Rambo
Sean posted a reply to toke, one of the users on the forum, explaining how the different saberwielding styles will have their own advantages and weaknesses like in Kotor:
Originally Posted by toke Awesome... quick question.. does the Sith always have to dual wield a weapon or can he use a single light-saber and second question if you dual wield a weapon do you lose your privilege of the force? Obviously if he always dual wields the force will still be an option. Just wondering.
Thanks for the update though While we are not to a point where we can give out specific information (because it is not done yet), there will be bonuses and weaknesses when either dual wielding or using a single lightsaber.
It's a small but important reveal nonetheless at this early date. It can be presumed that the same could apply to multi-blaster use as a smuggler.
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