SW: The Old Republic Part 5

[rjshae]

Never had a desire to play in MMO games; the thought of playing with a mob of needy 14-year olds isn't appealing. I'll stick to the single-player experience.

[Gorth]

It's a trade-off. Yes, the MMO parts suck (not unique to SWTOR, I just don't like them). The lack of consequences in the world (rather obvious, since it would affect other players experience) and the real time combat (cool downs etc.) is not my thing.

 

What it does have though, is a heck of a lot of money thrown at it and it shows, at least on the origin worlds. Large open levels, decent to good level of details in the landscape. Probably the only place where you'll find environments with that number of man-hours invested. I almost dropped my jaw first time I tried the speeder and noticed that everything was modeled, not just cardboard ground planes.

 

As for the Cartel store, I think I got robbed. I wanted unlock a bit of inventory space and bought a few cartel coins. However, the first time (using the "apply to all characters for this account" option), it only deducted the coins from my account, it didn't actually give me more slots. Only when doing it the second time did it. Not only that, but one of my two characters had already spent 5000 ingame credits to expand it a bit, so sure, that one got an extra row and the next one would still be 20k credits. However my other character hadn't expanded it before purchasing it and now also has to pay 20k for the next set of slots. Seriously, WTF?

 

Anyway, the stories are interesting enough so far to keep me interested (grind and everything included). That's what really matters

[melkathi]

I played a Sith Warrior at launch, quit around level 32. didn't want to play with people either but kept missing out on flashpoints and such, which IMO were the fun part. I really wish it had been a single player game. The gameplay by that point had gotten boring, and I wanted to bring more than one companion.

 

At least the low to mid level flashpoints you can return at a higher level and solo.

I had to solo Cademimu because I never found a team. Which wasn't too bad as it meant I could play it at my own pace

[NOK222]

I have yet to pass Lost Island Hard Mode

[Hurlshort]

Not all MMOers are 14 year old needy kids.  I've actually had quite a few good friendships develop in different MMO's, many of them lasting for years.  

 

For some reason TOR just doesn't inspire the same socialization in me though.  I've never really grouped with someone and been like, hey, we should play together again sometime.  Maybe I'm just getting older and more crotchety.

[Gorth]

Well, when you run into players called 'NeedMorePussy', you know you are amongst a crowd you don't really want to associate with

 

I think I'm going to file a ticket with support, regarding the "double charge" (almost 800 cartel coins) for a single inventory expansion.

[melkathi]

Meh, even with headstart, Pancake was taken as a character name on every server I tried. So no running around as a Padawan Pancake :/

Ruined the whole Jedi thing for me

[alanschu]

Well, when you run into players called 'NeedMorePussy', you know you are amongst a crowd you don't really want to associate with

 

I think I'm going to file a ticket with support, regarding the "double charge" (almost 800 cartel coins) for a single inventory expansion.

 

Let me know if you struggle with traction on that.

 

 

And yeah, in my experience simply because people act like 14 year olds, doesn't mean that they are. 

[Gorth]

 

 

Well, when you run into players called 'NeedMorePussy', you know you are amongst a crowd you don't really want to associate with

 

I think I'm going to file a ticket with support, regarding the "double charge" (almost 800 cartel coins) for a single inventory expansion.

 

Let me know if you struggle with traction on that.

 

 

And yeah, in my experience simply because people act like 14 year olds, doesn't mean that they are.

 

 

Thanks, but if they can't help, no big deal, it was just peanuts (less than a cup of mochachino). The damage was done when a bit of trust in the store software went out the window. I'll just let the people who get paid for dealing with it deal with it (I know from our own support department how much it sucks when you get a real jerk customer, I'll put effort into not being one)

 

Yeah, maybe it's something in the internets groundwater? People often act like they are drunk on the internet, turning normally "mature" individuals into cranky 14 year olds when interacting online. Point in case: Usenet, muds, mmos, forums, etc.

 

Completely unrelated, since I've now got a couple of (ship) droid companions too besides the starting companion, are compaion skills "fixed", as in only the same 3 regardless of who you pick as companion when going somewhere? If so, I might rethink my current selection to fit my tastes and to some degree ignore what benefits the initial companion may have contributed.

 

On a slightly related note to companion skills, are they going to end up with something earth shattering or is it "nice to have" (and then sell it for credits) stuff when investing heavily in a skill?

 

Yes, n00b questions, I know

[Humanoid]

Yeah, despite the name, "Crew Skills" are really your skills, except you delegate their execution, you've got just the three.

 

As for the rewards of crafting, I found that while levelling how much utility you get out of the skills is, naturally for an MMO, dependent on how much you want to grind it out. You learn to make basic "green" equipment which is equivalent to basic solo quest reward stuff. If you "reverse engineer", i.e. destroy the stuff you created for a partial component refund, you have a chance of learning an advanced "blue" version of that item which is superior to what you'd otherwise be wearing when solo questing. (And for a second tier, repeat the above replacing green with blue and blue with purple, but that's not worth the time and material investment at lower levels).

 

Personally I just used the materials I had on hand without buying any extras from trade, and the result is that every so often I'd luck out into getting something decent - but as I levelled it became a rarer occurrence since I steadily fell behind the tradeskill levelling curve (i.e. I'd be making decent level 25 gear at level 30). So unless things have changed, if you want your profession to remain useful for the entire levelling curve, expect to have to supplement your crafting materials from the trade network on a regular basis.

 

No idea how useful crafting is once you hit max level, but at a guess based on traditional MMO patterns is that you get to make stuff better than any flashpoint gear but inferior to any operations gear.

Edited April 9, 2013 by Humanoid

[Hassat Hunter]

3 overall for all companions.

They're not really necessary. I got artifice for saber parts, but I rarely (if ever) use it.

 

Slicing is nice though. Can't say no to free money

[Nepenthe]

People are really touchy in the endgame. I was with two other guys doing a flash point to get one of the HK parts, I'm not a healer, but I did the spec for one for that mission. A tank came in, not part of group, and began being a bitch at how much we were sucking. Me, being the **** that I was, responded in kind. My first ignore list. We had to wait for another tank to show up.

 

 

My worst experience is still from Colicoid War Games, but yeah, I've ran into some seriously fubar people in the end game.

 

 

I have yet to pass Lost Island Hard Mode

 

I managed to do it once, have failed it twice since then. Kind of annoying, since I didn't have any of the relevant stuff active at the time. Was with the guild. That first boss really is a check, if you can kill it, you can breeze through the rest - even if people claim otherwise.

[Hassat Hunter]

It can be good, it can be bad. Had some really good HM FP games. Also really REALLY bad ones. Hit and miss.

 

As for LI HM you mean the big bug outside or the massively "holy ****" droid fight? Since that's the second boss . First went down easy but oh my that droid did us in good each and every time.

 

EDIT

About 20m to see chances of 2.0.

Logged in to see what some of the differences are... got a METRIC ton of achievements. And about 100 cartel coins (you get them for finishing class stories apparently).

Edited April 9, 2013 by Hassat Hunter

[Nepenthe]

It can be good, it can be bad. Had some really good HM FP games. Also really REALLY bad ones. Hit and miss.

 

As for LI HM you mean the big bug outside or the massively "holy ****" droid fight? Since that's the second boss . First went down easy but oh my that droid did us in good each and every time.

 

EDIT

About 20m to see chances of 2.0.

Logged in to see what some of the differences are... got a METRIC ton of achievements. And about 100 cartel coins (you get them for finishing class stories apparently).

 

The droid, the bug at the door is so easy it doesn't qualify as an actual boss. I don't think it drops anything of value, either, but I haven't played my 50 since last year, so I could be forgetting.

[NOK222]

 

 

It can be good, it can be bad. Had some really good HM FP games. Also really REALLY bad ones. Hit and miss.

 

As for LI HM you mean the big bug outside or the massively "holy ****" droid fight? Since that's the second boss . First went down easy but oh my that droid did us in good each and every time.

 

EDIT

About 20m to see chances of 2.0.

Logged in to see what some of the differences are... got a METRIC ton of achievements. And about 100 cartel coins (you get them for finishing class stories apparently).

 

The droid, the bug at the door is so easy it doesn't qualify as an actual boss. I don't think it drops anything of value, either, but I haven't played my 50 since last year, so I could be forgetting.

 

 

What bug?

 

Yes that's the boss that always gave me problems. I passed it once with a good group, but we got wiped five times on that huge guy at the lava place. We almost beat him, we had the strategy down. Then people quit...sigh.

[Nepenthe]

The one that's at the door to the main compound.

[Hassat Hunter]

It dropped Tionese and dailies, like all bosses do.

Of course, don't know with 2.0 yet, making LI HM easier and HM FPs more rewarding...

[NOK222]

I got HK-51, it took me a painstaking day, thankfully I had a partner.

[Gfted1]

You can get him as a companion or something now?

[Humanoid]

Apparently yes, in a manner so complex as to lead to the creation of walkthroughs specifically for it. Didn't read it so it may be mostly self-evident, but still, that's a lot of images.

[Gfted1]

Thanks. Cool cinematic at the end.

[melkathi]

You can get him as a companion or something now?

 

They added him in an update for subscribers around the time it went F2P I think. (though it was known he would be added since before release)

I hear the missions to get him are rather tedious.

[Guest Slinky]

 

 

You can get him as a companion or something now?

 

They added him in an update for subscribers around the time it went F2P I think. (though it was known he would be added since before release)

I hear the missions to get him are rather tedious.

 

 

You have to scan fairly large areas with a crappy scanner to find hk parts. If you have a bunch of friends to help you it's not too bad. If you are alone it might murder your soul and destroy your mind. Depends on your luck.

 

Having lots of alcohol with you is highly recommended.

[Hassat Hunter]

Well, the missions themselves aren't.

The space station infact is AWESOME... it's got a definite Peragus/System Shock feel to it.

 

The tediousness starts after that, when you get the scanner and have to find the parts...

[Spider]

Yeah, the scavenging hunt was very tedious, but the derelict spaceship was fantastic. Finding the parts was fine when the quest came out, since everyone was doing it. But once the original surge died down, it's become very boring I can imagine.