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Wild Space: Graphics, Flashpoints, And Companions

It’s a big galaxy our there, and Wild Space can be a dangerous place. Worry not, explorer – each week we’ll navigate you safely through the lost hyperspace routes of the Deep Core and track down the great articles and entertainment from around the SW:TOR fan community, all in less than 12 parsecs, of course!

Over on TORWars, they discussed a topic this week that is very near and dear to my heart: graphics! I’m a bit of a hardware junkie and manged to scrape enough cash together in order to rebuild my computer to prepare for the TOR release. As expected, my computer runs the game quite well with nary a drop in frame rates in sight. However, I have missed the ability to enable anti-aliasing, which smooths out the edges of the graphics in game.

Attempting to force the option on via the client_settings file can cause some instability in the game client, including causing it to crash. Obviously, since anti-aliasing is not supported by BioWare yet this behavior is to be expected. Also, to be fair, anti-aliasing is not really that high of a priority to get fixed, what with other problems that the development team is working on. But…it still bothers me and I would love for the option to be available. The TORWars article asks the question does the game need the anti-aliasing settings? I ask the same to you now, is this a necessary feature or is it a low-priority frivolity?

For those who have only played single-player BioWare games in the past, the concept of grouped flashpoints might seem a bit daunting. After all, you have to round up some other people, who you may not personally know, and then work together to overcome some challenging obstacle. Fortunately, SWTOR Face has some tips for how to make your flashpoint experience as enjoyable as possible. Some of the highlights are:

Try to be understanding of new players and be as helpful as possible.  These encounters are not the standard “dungeons” that most WoW players are used to and the roles required by each player can change during a Flashpoint. Sometimes a player will be needed to off-tank or interrupt special abilities; other times they might just need to do as much dps as possible.

Don’t be scared to ask questions on how to better play your character in an encounter. Some people will no doubt not expect this and may act rude or unaccommodating but the majority of people will see this as an opportunity to try and work together.

Remember flashpoints are supposed to be one of the more social aspects of the game, so treating your fellow players with respect and being willing to help will make everyone’s experience so much more enjoyable. Be sure to check out the full article over on SWTOR Face for all of their helpful tips.

As it has been mentioned before, the five companions that you get as your progress through the game all have different abilities and strengths. To help clarify what companions your character is going to get and what role that companion can fill (DPS, tank, or healer), Yufmelt has compiled a list of all the available companions for each class and their roles. For ease of use sake, they have compiled the list into a handy PDF that you can quickly refer to. Check it out!

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Wild Space: Security, Crew Skills, And Datacrons

It’s a big galaxy our there, and Wild Space can be a dangerous place. Worry not, explorer – each week we’ll navigate you safely through the lost hyperspace routes of the Deep Core and track down the great articles and entertainment from around the SW:TOR fan community, all in less than 12 parsecs, of course!

In this shortened holiday edition of Wild Space, I would like to join with Darth Hater for a public service announcement about account security. Security breeches are a real problem for online games nowadays so it is advisable that  you take advantage of as many extra security features as you can to secure your account.

BioWare has already instituted policies to secure your account, including having every user create five security questions and has offered a security authentication token for two-factor authentication into your account. This means that to log into the game or website (and access your account information) you would need to use your password as well as the security key to access it. This makes your account more protected from the possibility of someone getting unauthorized access to your account.

To order a physical security key from BioWare ($4.00 + shipping) or download the mobile security key to your iOS or Android device, visit this website.

One of the innovative features of TOR is the Crew Skills system that allows your companions to craft and gather materials while you are out “playing the game”. For those of us (like me) who have never been able to get into crafting because of the time investment, or just didn’t find it interesting in other games, the Crew Skills system offers a fresh take on an MMO favorite.

If you are looking for ways to maximize all of your Crew Skills effectiveness, then this video by SWTORFace is for you. Also be sure to check out their diagram for which Crew Skill best supports another.

Are you a big explorer? Want to uncloak every map and view every mountain top? Well, if you are the Magellan type, then I would encourage you to read this write-up about the Datacron system from Corellian Run Radio. They will convince you why you will enjoy figuring out the puzzles required to get every Datacron.

If you would rather just get on with it and find all of those Datacrons because of the stat bonus that they provide, check out this article from SWTOR-Spy that lists all of the locations for every Datacron in the game as well as walk-throughs on how to get them all. (Warning! Spoilers on Datacon locations are contained within).

 

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Wild Space: Combat (In Space!), Damage Meters, And Levels 1-10 Review

It’s a big galaxy our there, and Wild Space can be a dangerous place. Worry not, explorer – each week we’ll navigate you safely through the lost hyperspace routes of the Deep Core and track down the great articles and entertainment from around the SW:TOR fan community, all in less than 12 parsecs, of course!

I was one of the lucky few to get in on day one of early game access. It certainly helped that I pre-ordered about 7 hours after pre-orders were announced back on July 21. Since Tuesday, I have been really enjoying playing my Sith Warrior and have been trying in-game to highlight all of his awfulness as a person. One of the things I wasn’t sold on going into the game was space combat. I had tried it in the beta but didn’t find it to be very enjoyable. However, once I got into the real game, I began to really enjoy the space combat.

Over on SWTORFace, they have a couple of terrific guides about space combat that they created during the beta.  I found these guides to be entertaining and informative so please check them out if you want to know more about the space combat in TOR.

Our buddies over on TORWars have written up an article titled “Open TOR Policy: The DPS Meter Made Me Do It” where they discuss the pros and cons to including damage meters in TOR. If you don’t know what damage meters are, the article does a good job of giving a basic overview of the concept and then goes into it’s analysis of why it might be good or might be bad to include damage meters in TOR. On the pro side, it’s a good way to monitor your own performance and improve your DPS if you find that you are doing something wrong. On the con side, it encourages elitism by constantly comparing yourself against everyone else. Check out the full article and participate to become a part of this not-soon-to-be-over debate.

Yufmelt has one of the first reviews I have seen for the game to date and I thought it would be worthwhile for those of you who are still on the fence about purchasing the game. It’s a review of the first 10 levels and includes opinions on the story, combat, and the first flashpoint that you experience in the game. Be sure to check it out!

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Wild Space: Legacy Families, Preference Tips, And Crowd Control

It’s a big galaxy our there, and Wild Space can be a dangerous place. Worry not, explorer – each week we’ll navigate you safely through the lost hyperspace routes of the Deep Core and track down the great articles and entertainment from around the SW:TOR fan community, all in less than 12 parsecs, of course!

Republic Trooper

Details on the Legacy System are pretty limited. We know once you complete Act 1 of your class story, the Legacy System opens up to you and you can create a surname for your current character and every other character that you create.

But what happens when one of your alts is human and the other is a zabrak? Roleplaying wise, is it possible for a human and zabrak to be related by blood? Probably, but we don’t know for sure. Republic Trooper wrote up a really good Legacy System article that seeks to answer this question. To quote them:

“It’s not impossible to believe that there would be interspecies marriages in the Star Wars universe but I don’t believe there is a heavy genre history of that occurring…My point is if I want to roll a Twi’lek Jedi Warrior and then a Mirialan Smuggler, after my initial Human Republic Trooper of course, they would all share the same last name and Legacy…It’ll be interesting to see how the interspecies Legacy Families are handled once the game goes live and future content patches begin to flesh out the Legacy framework.”

Indeed it will be interesting to see. Check out the full article over on Republic Trooper.

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Wild Space: Choice, Item Mods, And Gameplay

It’s a big galaxy our there, and Wild Space can be a dangerous place. Worry not, explorer – each week we’ll navigate you safely through the lost hyperspace routes of the Deep Core and track down the great articles and entertainment from around the SW:TOR fan community, all in less than 12 parsecs, of course!

TORWars

Our good buddies over on TORWars turned me on to the fansite SWTORFace.com, where the crew has been churning out several great video guides for how to do different things in TOR. The most recent video describes how the item modification system works.

BioWare has stated that you could use your first lightsaber from when you get it, all the way up to level 50 just by swapping out item modifications to improve it’s stats. Check out this helpful video that explains how this process works from SWTORFace, as well as their many other guide videos on their YouTube page.

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Wild Space: Weather, History, and Quick Tips

It’s a big galaxy our there, and Wild Space can be a dangerous place. Worry not, explorer – each week we’ll navigate you safely through the lost hyperspace routes of the Deep Core and track down the great articles and entertainment from around the SW:TOR fan community, all in less than 12 parsecs, of course!

If you have been following SW:TOR for a while, you know that there are no random weather effects in the game. Sure, there are localized weather effects depending on your location on a planet that are constantly active, but nothing that occurs randomly. Only scripted weather in SW:TOR.

An article by our friends on TORWars tries to convince BioWare to turn on some more weather effects. Author Anthony Sproson argues that the literary device “pathetic fallacy” could be utilized much more by BioWare to enhance the SW:TOR story via the weather. For example, when something sad happens BioWare could cue some rain or storms; when something good happens, BioWare could stop the rain, throw up some sunshine, and add a rainbow.

By having the weather mirror your character’s emotions, BioWare could really augment the story and make it even more immersive. It’s a really interesting concept for a video game (it has been used in books and movies forever) and I would recommend that you all check out the full article over on TORWars.

History in general is very interesting to me and I have always been excited to learn more about the history of video games ever since I read “Masters of Doom” way back when. Darth Hater released an editorial this week which gave a brief history of the MMORPG genre.

Starting from MUDs (multi-user dungeons), progressing through the 2D (Ultima) and 3D (Everquest) MMORPGs of the recent past, and ending up with the World of Warcrafts and Rifts of today, author Raiden goes to great lengths to explain where MMORPG video games came from. It’s not entirely about SW:TOR, but it’s really cool to learn about where the genre came from and where it is going. Definitely check out the full article over on Darth Hater.

Georg Zoeller pointed this next fan creation out on Google+ and I think that it’s worth reposting here. YouTube channel TOR Hangout has (so far) posted two Quick Tip videos to show you how to manipulate the SW:TOR user interface.

The first was about using the focus target feature in to cast healing spells or buffs on a single target that you “focus” on. For those unfamiliar with focus target, you designate a player and they get their own special unit frame and key modifier that you can use to cast spells on them. The second video was about enabling and configuring healing frames for when you are in a Flashpoint or Operation.

Both videos are really well done so I would encourage you all to check them out. Lets hope we get more tips like this in the near future!

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