Feb 11, 2012

Posted by in News | 15 Comments

Friday Q&A #1 – Dual-Spec Incoming, Cross-Server Warzone Queuing & More

BioWare has a whole new kind of Friday Update in store for players of Star Wars: The Old Republic, and they kicked it off yesterday with a bang!

Each Tuesday, BioWare will open an official Q&A thread on the forums, and 10 questions will be answered and posted on Friday. This week we got a bonus, as there were 15 questions answered, and some of them hit on some hot topics.

One of the biggest was arguably about dual spec:

Aurozia: Will there be a dual specialization system in the future? Will there be a possibility of changing advance classes as well?

Daniel Erickson: We have no plans for switching advanced classes – which we see as fundamentally different class designs- but dual spec is in the works and coming soon.

Glad to hear they aren’t even considering advanced class switching, but dual spec is certainly even a departure from previous design stances.

Another one started out with Warzones, but ended up being about cross-server queueing:

Simoon: Will you be adding the option to choose what Warzone you enter a queue for?

Gabe Amatangelo: Not until we introduce cross server queuing. If we were to allow players to choose their Warzone before they could queue across servers, then it would negatively affect how often every player would see a Warzone – and for every player that loves a certain Warzone there is another player that hates it. The population would end up divided by their Warzone choice, negatively affecting the time it would take for a specific Warzone to become available for anyone. With cross server queuing we will still have a preference to match players of the same server, but those players who choose specific preferences such as these will likely end up in a match with players in the larger Wargroup.

What do you guys think about these changes? Good or bad? As someone who has been following the game since before day one of the announcement well over 3 years ago, things like dual spec and cross-server play were dismissed for one reason or another, at one time or another. I am curious as to the change in philosophy that would prompt these.

There are a few other notable questions in there, so you should pop over and have a read. And don’t forget to check the forums Tuesday when the new thread is opened, and you have a chance to ask your own!


  1. I personally dont want cross server WZ queing. If you are a avid pvp player you being to recognize those in the battles with you. You end up making friends and rivals on the opposite faction. I believe that it will just ruin the server’s community. If there is cross server queing it will just result in a bunch of random people who dont talk to each other and will never see each other again.

    • I might be terribly wrong, but I seemed to me that I often fight Siths… and I’m a Sith.
      I even happened to randomly fight my guildies…

      So I don’t think factions have anything to do here. Still, the rest of your point is valid, through I do not agree.
      I don’t want to read the perpetual taunts you can read on /1 when idling in Orgrimmar.

    • Actually if you learned to read, cross server warzones pair your server first b4 taking in others from other servers. So your whole statement is worthless.

  2. Lord Paladin says:

    NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO /vader

    Cross Server queuing is a terribad idea!!! Please no!

  3. You know, I’m gonna have to disagree with you guys. All I have to go on is anecdotal evidence, and your servers might be perfectly balanced, but I’m not seeing it, and apparently a lot of folks on other servers aren’t seeing it, either. Cross-Sever queueing gives BW a shot at pairing from larger pools, which should help the match-making process.

  4. cross-server queuing… /facepalm

  5. Lady Republic says:

    Daniel Erickson: The new and vastly improved ‘Hue to Chest’ system launches with Game Update 1.2 and there are more customization and quality of life improvements along those lines hot on its heels.

    – Huzzah! No more clown Trooper for me, thankyouverymuch.

    • The “clown Trooper” idea really gets to me. I have a Commando to 45 and I haven’t looked bad since about level 20. I started running flashpoints and got some CUSTOM gear that was all white/orange and like the look I have. I’m not against “match to chest”, but I don’t see it as big of a problem as others do.

  6. x-server +
    dual spec +

  7. Huttball24_7 says:

    Coming from an Empire heavy server, we get about 90% huttball, 5% voidstar/Alderaan ending early cause not enough pubs, and 5% full Empire vs Republic games. My server desperately needs xrealm pvp. We get tired of killing ourselves in huttball all the time.

  8. Dual spec was a no brainer, should ahve launched with it.

    • NO it should never be in this game if it is within the advance class you choose i’ll be fine about but if i can choose a different advance class for the second spec then hell no.

  9. Why no changing advanced class?! Obviously not for lvl 50, but like a regret option up to lvl 15-20. You can’t tell the difference before you have tried it, and playing through the origin world twice because you chose wrong is just stupid.

  10. Cross-server for pvp’ing reasons? I have no problems with this. Especially since I mainly play late at night due to my work schedule. I don’t think there will be any degradation of community with it being just PvP. Now, if it was PvE I could see how concerns would be warranted.

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