Orbital Bombardment is my weekly* look at all things Sniper related. After spending many years getting hit in the face, healing people who are getting hit in the face, or ...
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Five simple rules for maximising your Flashpoint experience
With early access now less than a week away, now seems like good time to throw out some tips for how to get along in Flashpoints.
I think a lot of us have become used to the throw-away nature of groups. WoW, Rift and now LoTRO all have their own version of autogrouping mechanics. SWTOR does not. This is a good thing. An MMO where you’re not forced to interact with people properly is not an MMO.
So in this strange new world where you’ll have to talk in order to form groups, and are maybe even forced into making some new friends along the way, what tips would you give people for getting by? Here are a few of mine…
Friday Poll: Which game version did you order?
I was a little bit slack and might have not got around to posting a poll last Friday, my apologies!
This week I am wondering which version of the game you have ordered. There has been a little bit of a ruckus on the forums recently in regards to the VIP lounge access being granted to Digital Deluxe owners, and even purchasable in game for a ridiculous amount of credits by anyone.
It’s worth noting, that just because you can get into the VIP lounge, doesn’t mean you can buy from the Collectors Edition only vendor.
So which version did you buy? Personally I went for the Digital Deluxe version, I couldn’t quite justify the Collectors Edition this time, but I couldn’t just have the normal version…
Loading ...Do you think addons are mission critical to operations?
There’s been a lot of talk about addons on the official forums and on Twitter… Love them or loath them, they’ll probably make an appearance in SWTOR eventually.
It does beg the question though, just how useful are the addons that people claim making raiding possible. I’ve read more than a few posts that say it will be impossible to raid without certain features – the most hilarious of which is a Recount-esque meter. All the addons discussed below were generally considered must-haves for WoW raiding, which seems a current and reasonable benchmark to compare against.
Read on for my evaluation of two of the bigger addons being argued about.
Imperial Agent Levels 1-5 – Part Two
Orbital Bombardment is my weekly* look at all things Sniper related. After spending many years getting hit in the face, healing people who are getting hit in the face, or stabbing things – I decided it was time to see things from afar, through a scope.
This post was written during beta, and as such may not be accurate of anything that makes it into live. That being said, I am talking in detail about various mechanics, abilities and story arcs for Imperial Agent - CAUTION: THERE ARE SPOILERS AHEAD.
Imperial Agent Levels 1-5 – Part One
Orbital Bombardment is my weekly* look at all things Sniper related. After spending many years getting hit in the face, healing people who are getting hit in the face, or stabbing things – I decided it was time to see things from afar, through a scope.
This post was written during beta, and as such may not be accurate of anything that makes it into live. That being said, I am talking in detail about various mechanics, abilities and story arcs for Imperial Agent – CAUTION: THERE ARE SPOILERS AHEAD.
Friday Poll: Light or Dark decisions?
Another Friday, another Friday update to wait for. Stephen Reid did say this weeks was going to be “interesting”, but I’m pretty sure he’s paid to say such things. On the plus side, only 4 Friday updates to go after this one!
This week I’m interested in hearing how you intend to play your first character through SWTOR. Choosing Light or Dark side decisions during conversations awards points, and as you progress down either path you gain access to various pieces of gear, and potentially other rewards. There was also talk of having rewards for remaining Grey – which involves balancing your Light and Dark responses in order to stay as neutral as possible, however I can neither confirm nor deny this. Blasted NDA.
The question is – how will you choose to play? I imagine a lot of people will make decisions based upon what kind of character they’re playing, or if they’re into RP, what their character would decide to do in a given situation. There are those of us who won’t think about the Light and Dark consequences and go with whatever they feel like at the time… I’m not giving you an option for that! You’ll invariably swing either way.
I personally will be remaining Grey as an Imperial Agent. My character has an innate dislike for the Sith, and is just as much against the corruption within the Empire as against the Republic, and her decisions will reflect that I should imagine… We’ll have to see how that works out come live.
Which way are you swinging?
Loading ...Why have BioWare not dropped the NDA?
When pondering what to post about this week, we ran into one question that stumped us a little bit. Just why is the NDA still active?
The past weekend saw more people than ever invited in to Beta test and give the servers some serious stress testing, and with the press embargo recently lifted the ongoing presence of the NDA is becoming a little bit of a sham. Now, as someone who is on the better side of the NDA, it doesn’t bother me too much – but I would love to start posting some of the juicy things we want to share.
Testing Weekends – All Welcome
As part of today’s Friday update, BioWare announced that they’re massively expanding their Testing Weekends. These weekends are not, strictly, a new thing – more and more people have been invited to test the game for the duration of a weekend over the past few months, typically to focus on one specific thing that BioWare wants to test. This announcement is significant, though, because they’ve promised that everyone who has applied to test the game will definitely be granted access for a whole weekend before the game launches; previously it was never a certainty, and more luck of the draw as to whether you’d be selected or not.
I think this is great news, personally. It’s a proper stress-test for BioWare, and hopefully they’ll get enough people online that they’ll experience and subsequently hammer out all of the issues that would have otherwise happened on launch day. Plus, a whole weekend where everyone can play together and not spend close to 24 hours making sure your character looks absolutely perfect (oh, is that just me?) means lots of random fun shall be had.
Sadly, I shan’t be able to partake in the fun since I’m away on business for the next month. However, we’ll pop up a thread on our forums so that you can hook up with Dan and a multitude of other Supercool Cantina guild members should you so wish (and, hey, maybe our loveliness will make you want to join us in game, too…).
Just so you’re aware, guaranteed access to the testing weekends only applies to people that signed up to test the game on or before November 11th (ie today). If you’ve not registered to test and you want access, do so now. Otherwise, various fan sites such as Curse will be offering the chance to obtain a key.
Full announcement from BioWare after the jump.
Friday Poll: What will your focus be in SWTOR?
It’s Friday afternoon… We’re all waiting with baited breath to see what the Friday update will bring on the official website. Why not take a minute to think about what your main aim is going to be in SWTOR?
I know personally I’m going to be aiming towards Operations – I can’t wait to start tackling some bosses with the guild. I’m sure I’ll get around to levelling alts eventually… Though I’ll try my best not to get distracted too soon. It is a slippery slope for us altaholics.
Feel free to let us know in the comments what you’re looking forward to doing, especially if you select “Other…”
Loading ...Guild Rank Names
For our SWTOR guild, the Officers and I have been talking recently about guild ranks and what we should name them. You see, we’re tired of boring and terribly uninspired rank names such as Member and Officer. Bleh. We figure that the Star Wars universe gives us great artistic license to have interesting rank names… the problem, it turns out, is that we stink at coming up with names.
We’ve tried scouring Wookieepedia, found obscure Sith factions that have ranks based on Roman Legion ranks (Sun Guard), tried naming our ranks after types of droids, looked at as much Star Warsy stuff as we could find, and nothing really seems to fit. So, we’re wondering:
If you run a Star Wars: The Old Republic guild, what kind of rank structure do you use, and what names do you attach to them? Let us know in the comments!
The only one we’ve stuck with so far is that we’ve called our Inactive rank ‘Nerf Herder’. You’re welcome.
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