Rogue_5’s Comlink – April 7th, 2006

[Issele]

Greetings everyone. Rogue5 is out traveling for the summits today so he won’t be able to send out his usual com-link. As such, you’ll have the distinct pleasure of my company in his stead today.

For those of you that don’t know me, I’m known as Helios around these parts. While I've been a systems designer for a fair whlie, I’ve also recently taken up the Lead Design role on Galaxies and wanted to share with you what the vision for SWG is, going forward.

The number one focus of the design team is to refine the game that the NGE has brought us by aggressively hammering out bugs and improving existing game mechanics. A close second objective is to emphasize the Galactic Civil War conflict in interesting and engaging ways. The timeline as it exists in SWG provides us with a prime opportunity to capitalize on the great fiction surrounding the GCW. While this certainly implies PvP combat, I want to assure you that non combat player competition will certainly also be a factor in this conflict. Expect to see much more GCW flavored game experience in the coming publishes.

Specifically, today, I want to touch on the features of publish 29 which will help pave the road for the vision we have for SWG:

Waypoint/Interior work

* The waypoint system will be refined to work seamlessly both indoors and out. This will allow easier navigation to points of interest or mission objectives.


Lair Modifications:

* Various improvements to the creature lairs are being implemented. These improvements will allow us to set up things like attack “waves”, rare spawns and boss creature spawns with more precisions and consistency.


Targeting Enhancements

* We’re going to review the targeting system for both combat and non-combat situations. Specifically we’re shooting for targeting assist mechanisms similar to what we have in space. This upgrade to the targeting system will also make it easier to target things for situations like house decorating.


Tool Tips

* You’ll start seeing improvements to the character sheet in this publish starting with tool-tips that give a better idea of what various character attributes do for you. This is the first step in reintroducing meaningful character stats to SWG. With the changes to the combat system (see below), player stats will become more important as we de-emphasize player level as an explicit input into any given attack. The expertise system will add more stats for players to tinker around with.


Weapons & Combat System Changes

* We’re going to alter the combat engine to place primary importance on player equipment instead of player level. This means that acquiring better equipment will be of great importance.
* Existing weapons will automatically have their damage/speed values changed if necessary.
* Various other combat mechanisms are being investigated in support of the Expertise system that’s also being developed in this publish. Things like glancing blows (misses) and critical hits are all being looked at.

Expertise System


* For this publish we’re going to develop the framework for the expertise system. The portion being developed for this publish will not be visible to players when the publish goes live. This initiative is strictly to build the supporting framework for the Expertise system.
* With this system, players will gain new stats and abilities based on how they spend their Expertise points, which are earned as they progress in level. The first professions to have their Expertise trees deployed will be Bounty Hunter and Jedi. This will happen in publish 30. We’re targeting 2 professions every publish after that.

High End Content

* The Galacitc Civil War erupts in a major conflict that will cause drastic upheaval on one of the planets in the Galaxy. This spectacular event will be showcased at this year’s E3 and will make its debut on a galaxy near you with publish 29. Players will choose a side to fight for and will join this massive battle amidst Imperial troopers & Rebel commandos.


Quest Content

* Publish 29 will bring all new quest content that will take your character from level 37 to level 41. The planets on which these adventures will take place include Corellia and Talus.

Bug Fixes

* In our continued bid to drastically improve the game experience, we will continue to aggressively address current bugs and live issues during publish 29 development. You can look forward to a wide variety of issues being fixed from all facets of the game.

[Daiho]

Targeting Enhancements

* We’re going to review the targeting system for both combat and non-combat situations. Specifically we’re shooting for targeting assist mechanisms similar to what we have in space. This upgrade to the targeting system will also make it easier to target things for situations like house decorating.

Back pre-NGE ??? For now, most some fixes bring us back to pre-CU and pre-NGE... maybe I'm wrong

[matron]

will the expertise tree be retroactive? like will lvl 90's get to distribute points?

[Leviathen]

I disagree that it will bring us back to pre-nge. I think what he means is that you will have a crossair on the screen that indicates where it would be best to aim in order to hit your target... at least that is how i inturpreted it.

I like the changes.. though I woul dlike to see the expertise system implimented sooner. But it is better well done that full of bugs

[Szul]

Targeting Enhancements

* We’re going to review the targeting system for both combat and non-combat situations. Specifically we’re shooting for targeting assist mechanisms similar to what we have in space. This upgrade to the targeting system will also make it easier to target things for situations like house decorating.

Back pre-NGE ??? For now, most some fixes bring us back to pre-CU and pre-NGE... maybe I'm wrong

No, like the JTL client. Its what I've been suggesting to them since November, so about time they got a clue and listened to people.

They've already said that target lock will never return, this is more of active target identfication assistance like you have in Space.