This week’s DevTracker highlights are all about bugs. Writer Charles Boyd helps a player who inadvertently woke up in bed next to Aric Jorgan. Writer Randy Begel explains how context-sensitive dialogue doesn’t always line up. Designer Austin Peckenpaugh helps a player test out his combat formulas. Senior Online Community Manager Stephen Reid assists James Ohlen collect ideas on what planet Star Wars: The Old Republic should visit next. Hit the jump to see all the highlights.
You’ll learn about expertise, armoring, and what the heck a techblade is in this week’s DevTracker highlights. Principle Lead Combat Designer Georg Zoeller illustrates the importance of expertise and why Recruit gear is so valuable for starting players. Associate Online Community Manager Joveth Gonzalez informs how Novare Coast is affecting the phasing out of Ilum daily and weekly quests. Systems Designer David Hunt explains why there are no level 50 techblades and techstaffs, and how armoring, barrels, and hilts work in relation to the item ratings. Senior Online Community Manager Stephen Reid wants to hear your thoughts on the Rakghoul Pandemic event. Hit the jump to see all the highlights.
Character transfers for Asia Pacific players who have until now been stuck on North American or European servers are underway. As a complication of the transfer process however, BioWare has decided to delay the release of the customer rewards Tauntaun Ram vanity pet, for transferring players only. The pet is still slated to be delivered via in-game mail to all eligible characters not being moved to an APAC realm tomorrow, April 25th 2012. Stephen Reid took a few minutes to spell out the reasons behind the decision to delay:
Stephen ReidHey everyone. This message only applies to those players who are transferring characters to the Asia-Pacific servers.
As you may know, by April 25, 2012, 11:59PM CDT / April 26, 2012, 4:59AM GMT, we are due to grant all active subscribers (as of April 12, 2012, 12:00PM CDT, 5:00PM GMT or April 22, 2012, 12:00PM CDT, 5:00PM GMT) the in-game Legacy Tauntaun Ram Pet via in-game mail.
As in-game mail items do not transfer as part of the current character transfer process it’s possible that some players would be transferred before they could receive their pet via in-game mail.
To ensure no-one misses out, we are briefly delaying delivery of the Tauntaun Ram Pet to those who are transferring their characters. Everyone who has transferred characters(s) to the Asia-Pacific servers should receive their Tauntaun Ram Pet via in-game mail early next week (starting April 30th). We’ll bring you more exact details closer to the time.
This does mean those of you who transferred characters will be Tauntaun-less for a few more days, but we'll ensure you all get your new best friend early next week. Thanks in advance for your patience and understanding.
For anyone not in line for an Asia Pacific transfer, you can rest easy tonight with dreams of your very own Tauntaun sleeping bag companion waiting for you tomorrow. Further details of what exactly APAC players can expect of the transfer process can be found after the jump.
The secrets of the galaxy are out there, but you’ll find hints of them in this week’s DevTracker highlights. Lead Designer Daniel Erickson talks about Warzone rewards and the motivations behind today’s patch 1.2.0c. Principle Lead Combat Designer Georg Zoeller teases bits of knowledge about the magenta crystal and the Tauntaun mini-pet. Associate Online Community Manager Joveth Gonzalez posts when the Rakghoul Pandemic event will end. Senior Online Community Manager Stephen Reid discusses the difference between the new Black-Green crystal and the Razer Black-Green crystal. Systems Designer David White discloses why certain Social items disappeared with patch 1.2. Hit the jump to see all the highlights.
After appearing on Twitter last week to ask the Star Wars: The Old Republic community what they wanted to see most in PvP, James Ohlen returns this week with a follow-up question.
James OhlenA lot of good feedback from last week’s question. Open world PVP was the most asked for feature.
Follow up. What kind of Open World PVP excited you most? Bounties, guild fights, open world objectives, rewards for player killing, etc.
Stephen Reid has made an accompanying post on the official forums, including a poll asking players which type of Open World PvP they prefer.
Stephen ReidHello everyone. James Ohlen, Game Director for Star Wars: The Old Republic, is asking for feedback once again - getting into more detail regarding PvP.
Once again, he's going to be taking feedback directly via his Twitter account, but if you're not on Twitter, we're going to reproduce his question here and would love to get your feedback here too. This week we also have a poll for you to vote in.
Please limit your feedback to the question James wants discussed. Feel free to link to other threads and please keep your feedback constructive and on-topic!
Here is James' question for this week. As Open World PvP was the most asked-for feature last week:
What kind of Open World PVP excites you most?
The full post includes descriptions of each of the options available in the poll and can be found after the jump. Be sure to visit the poll on the official site and have your voice heard.
We’re back from the Guild Summit and BioWare is ready to follow-up with a few clarifications and answers in this week’s DevTracker highlights. Senior Online Community Manager Stephen Reid covers the possibility of eight-man groups in ranked Warzones, and the value of Ilum after patch 1.2. Principal Lead Combat Designer Georg Zoeller talks about balance changes, reusable items, reverse engineering, legacy unlocks, new additions in patch 1.2, and much more. Hit the jump to see all the highlights.
We caught up with a very tired Senior Online Community Manager Stephen Reid soon after the Guild Summit wrapped up to dicuss community plans and feedback collection. Regardless of his state, Reid was more than happy to answer the questions and prods of the community on the final day. For the interview in full, hit the jump.
It’s been a quiet few weeks, but this week’s DevTracker Highlights dives into upcoming features for patch 1.2 and next week’s Guild Summit in Austin. Principal Lead Combat Designer Georg Zoeller details open world PvP activity, Cover mechanics, Crew Skills, the Collector’s Edition vendor, and topics to be discussed at next week’s Guild Summit. Senior Online Community Manager Stephen Reid adds to the Guild Summit topics and explains why Asian Pacific server transfers won’t be available until late April. Hit the jump to see all the highlights.
Grab your lightsaber as this week’s DevTracker Highlights is all about PvP. Associate Online Community Manager Joveth Gonzalez hints at future updates to game’s launcher. Senior Online Community Manager Stephen Reid addresses concerns about stifling the community’s voice during server maintenance and patching. Senior Community Coordinator David Bass assures players that discussions at the Guild Summit will be in-depth, unlike those at conventions. Principal Lead Combat Designer Georg Zoeller talks PvP bags and the rate at which players acquire PvP gear. Lead PvP, Operations & Flashpoints Designer Gabe Amatangelo follows up and attests that players will see a less sporadic rate at which gear is acquired. Hit the jump to dig in and see all the highlights.
Many Star Wars: The Old Republic players had their weekend play time interrupted when an unexpected maintenance period brought servers down for several hours. Stephen Reid has responded on the official forums with some explanation behind the decision.
Stephen ReidOur Live team took the decision to roll out today's 1.1.0c patch during Friday night/Saturday morning with the knowledge that it would affect a higher than usual number of players. Unfortunately, we had to make changes that required server downtime. The Live team felt those changes were urgently required and that was why the maintenance was scheduled. Generally speaking, we try and ensure all required maintenance happens during our weekly maintenance period, but this was one situation where we had to move forward quickly; to not do so could have led to severe performance issues across the service as a whole.
The full post can be found after the jump.
Over the last few weeks, Adelbert and few other inquisitive official forum posters made their case involving issues with the high-quality texture options in Star Wars: The Old Republic. After investigating the issue, Senior Online Community Manager Stephen Reid responded to the problem raised by users.
Stephen ReidHey everyone, thanks for bearing with us as we investigated the concerns raised here.
After investigation, it seems that the confusion here is a combination of a UI issue that's been resolved and a feature that's working as intended, but the reason why it's 'working as intended' needs explanation.
First, the UI issue. The preferences menu as it is seen on the Public Test Server for version 1.1 of the game is correct - there are only supposed to be two texture choices, 'Low' and 'High'. This replaces the original three-choice preference of Low/Medium/High because in reality, there was never supposed to be a 'Medium' choice - that was a bug.
To view the quite lengthy response in full, hit the jump.
BioWare is hard at work addressing issues and gathering feedback in this week’s DevTracker Highlights. Principal Lead Combat Designer Georg Zoeller covers tactics for higher-level combat, character responsiveness issues, character level progress, how moddable items work, vehicle damage ceilings, and the illusive magenta crystal. Assistant Designer Chris Schmidt asks for feedback concerning the final class mission for the Jedi Knight. Senior Online Community Manager Stephen Reid breaks down the procedure for addressing bug fixes and game issues. Associate Online Community Manager Joveth Gonzalez clarifies the rumor entailing players being banned for not taking advantage of special dance zones. Hit the jump to dig in and see all the highlights.
With the rumors circulating about BioWare banning people for visiting Ilum below the recommended level, many on Reddit and the official forums wondered if it was actually true. Now we have official confirmation from Senior Online Community Manager Stephen Reid that yes, they are banning people, but not for what the rumors might make you think.
Stephen ReidFirst, action was taken against a number of accounts for what's commonly known as 'gold farming' - or in our case, credit farming. These accounts were found to be exploiting the game in a variety of ways to maximize their credits in order to sell them to other players. Our Terms of Service team took action against these accounts and removed them permanently from the game.
Second, a smaller number of accounts were warned or temporarily suspended for exploiting loot containers on Ilum. To be completely clear, while players may choose to travel to Ilum earlier than the recommended level (40+) and may loot containers if they can get to them, in the cases of those customers that were warned or temporarily suspended, they were systematically and repeatedly looting containers in very high numbers resulting in the game economy becoming unbalanced.
None of these accounts were banned for their actions and no accounts have been banned for travelling to Ilum while still relatively low level. By comparison, the number of accounts that were warned or temporarily suspended was considerably lower than the number of accounts banned for 'credit farming'.
Hit the jump for the post in full.
Senior Online Community Manager Stephen Reid took to Reddit yesterday to answer anything he could about Star Wars: The Old Republic, his role at BioWare, and his experience with the game's launch. After the jump are highlights of a shortened recap of the Q&A, thanks to Reddit user Chossi_lah. If you would like to see the discussion in full, visit the AMA post on Reddit.
On Wednesday, December 28 at 2PM CST, Reddit will hold an AMA (Ask Me Anything event) with Senior Online Community Manager Stephen Reid where the community registered on Reddit will be able to receive answers to their most provocative questions about Star Wars: The Old Republic. It’s a long running event on Reddit and if past AMAs are any gauge on how this one will go, it should be rather fruitful. If you have any questions for him that have remained unanswered, go there on Wednesday and look for the post made by Stephen Reid (StephenReid on Reddit) for an opportunity to have your question answered.
As you may have heard already, BioWare is in fray of launch day and as we approach what is Prime Time, users can expect to see ever-increasing queue times on the servers. BioWare is aware of this and cautioned players from creating characters on high population servers. In Senior Online Community Manager Stephen Reid’s post on the official forum, he recommends players avoiding a certain list of servers unless they are prepared and willing to wait long queue times. Reid also noted that BioWare is in the process of employing population caps to dissuade people away from creating characters on those servers but will ease up on the cap over time. For players that might end up on an overpopulated server and are frustrated, Reid also mentioned they are in the process of developing a character transfer system however, there is no ETA on when we will see it yet.
For Stephen Reid’s post in full, hit the jump.
This week’s DevTracker Highlights covers everything you need to know for the less-than-a-week-away Early Game Access and launch. Senior Online Community Manager Stephen Reid reminds players that MMOs change, gives the status of a Walmart system error, and reveals details about Early Game Access. Senior Community Coordinator David Bass illustrates the kind of achievements that will be available in Star Wars: The Old Republic. Community Coordinator Allison Berryman details upcoming forum changes for launch and how to determine if you have the right game client for when the game goes live. Principal Lead Combat Designer Georg Zoeller covers the challenges around balancing for one on one and group combat. Hit the jump to dig in and see all the highlights.
Stephen Reid confirmed via Twitter that the Star Wars: The Old Republic testers from the Thanksgiving Beta Weekend will be able to be patch their game client for Early Game Access and Release. As such, players should keep their game installation in tact on their computers. For players who tested the game prior to November 25th, however, Mr. Reid recommends a clean installation of the game client.
Read on for the direct quotes from Stephen Reid.
BioWare introduced Joveth Gonzalez as a new Associate Online Community Manager for the Star Wars: The Old Republic community team. Stephen Reid mentioned him on Twitter amid the Thanksgiving Beta Weekend madness, saying the following:
Stephen ReidA sneaky @joveth appears - say hi: http://t.co/vnEiABVt
Read on for more information about BioWare's newest community team member.
Stephen Reid
We're letting in a LOT of people; it may take a while for your launcher button to go active. Patience please. :) It's a Beta test after all!
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