SW:TOR

Exploring Cybertech Crafting #SWTOR

stargrace December 22, 2011 5Comments

There has been a lack of blog posts lately, I know. It’s that time of year when everyone is busy with their holiday cheer – and me? I’ve been playing SWTOR. In fact I’ve surprised myself with how much I enjoy the game. I didn’t follow it through development at all, I had no idea what any of the classes were, how crafting worked, or any other details. My Imperial Agent is now level 11, and I’m done with Hutta (but I’m still there at the moment, farming crafting supplies). I ended up choosing Cybertech and the two ‘harvesting’ skills that are suggested to go with it, scavenging and underworld trading. Guild mates have chosen a few of the other craft categories, and we are trying to round things out as much as possible. Crafting is.. weird. Your character doesn’t technically craft, your companion does. In fact even though you can train your crew skills at level 1, you can’t open the crafting window until you have a companion. Your companion goes away on these crafting missions (leaving you with a moment of peace, alone for once) and returns with supplies – or without. Crafting  missions cost a bit of coin, consider it a fuel cost. The more your companion likes you, the higher chance they’ll come back with something useful. So far my companion is not that fond of me. Our personalities don’t mesh at all and she frowns at a lot of the choices I make in conversations with NPC. I know you can gift them items to increase your standing with them, but that costs money and I don’t really see the need at this moment.

Cybertech creates items like droid armor, earpieces, grenades, armoring, and mods. So far I’ve made a few mods, and one of the final items I received before leaving Hutta was a new weapon with four mod slots. I quickly headed over to the machine used to mod pieces, and made use of the crafted items I had been making.

While I have technically been playing SWTOR as a ‘single player’ game, I do belong to a guild with a handful of friends and I fully believe that it is up to the players to decide whether they play the game single player or otherwise. I’ve grouped up for some of my more difficult quests, and I expect as I level up I’ll continue to do so. When I don’t want to play with others I have the option to remain solo, which I’ll admit, is quite refreshing.

I’m looking forward to starting my class quests, and moving on from Hutta. While the zone was good at introducing me to the world, it’s also very dismal and brown. I could use a change of scenery.

As always, happy gaming, no matter where you find yourself!

Two ‘Free’ Levels, for Bounty Hunter and Imperial Agent #SWTOR

stargrace December 19, 2011 2Comments

I’m not all about the race to end game (my highest character is currently level 8), but being a little higher than the quest area you’re in comes in handy for easier kills. I’ve been completing every quest I can find, and spending loads of time roaming around pointing my grenades at anything that moves. That being said, for the bounty hunter and imperial agents that start on Hutta, there is an easy way to gain two ‘free’ levels.

** Spoilers**

First you have to wander your way to the Jiguuna Spaceport. This is just to the right hand side of Nem’ro’s Palace. Take the first right, and follow the hallway down to the end. You’ll find yourself in an open space with some ships you can use for transport. Fly to the Imperial Fleet. Once you’re there you’ll see a quest just ahead of you that offers to teach you about crafting and about social points (which I still haven’t gotten into yet). The crafting quest requires you to speak to crafting trainers and you earn experience for every one you talk to. There are approximately 12 NPC to speak to in total. You don’t have to actually train with any of them, you just need to speak to them and rack up the experience points. Once you’re done and you have your levels you can fly back to Hutta and continue on your quests.

Velours, Imperial Agent #SWTOR

stargrace December 18, 2011 3Comments

I’ve been taking my time in SWTOR, especially since I know nothing about the world. After visiting with the guy pictured above a few times, I’ve come to the conclusion that I don’t especially like the Hutt. I suppose that’s not very surprising for a race that seems to thrive on greed and gluttony. My nick name in game is ‘the red blade’ and I think it’s fitting that my Cyborg has red hair to match. I played a Bounty Hunter for a bit yesterday but it didn’t appeal to me as much as the Imperial Agent, so I created a new one (the old one wasn’t on my account). Ah, that’s right, I’ve also got my own account already. It didn’t take long. Even if I only play for a month or two I’ll have gotten my money’s worth.

The voice acting and stories continue to suck me in. I can’t stress enough how refreshing it is to have choices that not only affect my character but affect the responses from NPC. This morning I received mail from a father who was grateful to me for allowing him to escape the planet with his son. See, when I first did the quest I killed the father in front of the kid, and I felt so bad after watching this kid burst into tears that I really wished there was some sort of rewind button. While I’ve been doing these quests I haven’t paid any attention to the little symbol that shows up indicating whether the response will give you points in light or dark. I’ve just been responding with whatever my gut told me was the ‘right’ answer for my character. In all of the quests I’ve done so far that was the only answer that I regretted giving, and wished I could have done differently. This time around I made sure not to kill the boys father. Of course it meant lying to his wife but she didn’t seem that nice anyhow.

Why would a member of the Empire care about being ‘nice?” Well. I’ve been thinking about that. It’s exactly as the introduction movie indicates. Revenge. Revenge fuels my character, Velours. She was told by her grandmother (I haven’t decided if it’s true or not) at a young age that her parents were killed by Jedi. Sure, that’s like saying a monk wiped out an entire town, but hey why would her grandmother lie to her. So Velours doesn’t see the Empire as being evil at all, and she doesn’t feel the need to be unnecessarily cruel  to those around her. It doesn’t matter if someone is ‘good’ or ‘evil’ there is always the potential for one or the other. Anyhow. Yeah. I’ve been working on a back story for her. It’s difficult but fun to create.

I’ve inched my way to level 8, and killed a bunch of thugs who were trying to figure out what I was doing in town. Always pleasant to walk into your own room and find a few undesirables rummaging around in your personal belongings. Needless to say, they didn’t stick around.

I hope everyone has been having a wonderful weekend, no matter where you have found yourself. As always, happy gaming!

So About That Game I Wasn’t Going To Play… #SWTOR

stargrace December 17, 2011 1Comment

I didn’t mean to. My finger slipped! Some how I found myself typing in the user name and password to my other half’s account, and before I knew what had happened, I had created a Chiss Imperial Agent. Before today I didn’t even know what a Chiss was. In fact before today there were many things I didn’t know. Like the fact that Anakin is Darth Vader. Or that the Empire is the bad guys (technically) and the Republic is the good guys. I’ve only seen one Star Wars movie, and apparently it was “the wrong one” to watch (I think it was episode one, and the one that’s labeled episode one, not the REAL episode one). I’m working on fixing that as we speak.

All of my posts involving SWTOR (and I don’t know how many there will be, I don’t have my own account and I’m leery of purchasing a copy of the game for myself) will no doubt have many errors and come from the perspective of someone who is still learning so please have a little patience.

Anyhow.

I created a Chiss. Character creation followed the path of every other MMO out there, and I found the options a bit limiting. It felt odd to go back to a race / class restriction after going without in many games, but I assume that this is due to the ‘laws’ of Star Wars. After browsing through the class options (which I knew absolutely nothing about) I decided to just go with an Imperial Agent, which is a sniper type class (so far at least). I get to use rifles, and I throw bombs and for the first 7 levels at least I’ve taken great delight in hiding behind every little object on the ground while I pick off mobs one at a time.

The story so far is fantastic. I love having options in my responses and I love that they influence my character. I also love the voice acting. I may not know anything at all about Star Wars, but I do know about MMOs, and I know what I like and don’t like. So far, I like this.

As always, happy gaming, no matter where you find yourself!

So Very Excited About A Game I Won’t Be Playing #SWTOR

stargrace December 13, 2011 9Comments

I have to admit, I’m feeling pretty left out. See, a lot of my good gaming friends are playing SW:TOR as we speak, reserving their character names and making their claim to servers and guilds while I sit here writing this blog post, looking at my usual ‘GoC’ (game of choice) wondering “Why didn’t I pre-order?!” and then remembering that I really just don’t enjoy science fiction, and I don’t know anything at all about Star Wars (or Star Trek). It has taken ALL of my willpower not to give in and blow $60 on a game that I know from the get-go doesn’t interest me, because guess what, my friends are fantastic at sharing their excitement for all things shiny and new. I think the fact that they’re making me so excited about a game that I know doesn’t actually interest me at its core is amazing.

So as I browse through my twitter stream, my RSS, and my G+ feed, I hope you all have an amazing time and keep that excitement spilling over to us non-players! I really hope the game has an incredibly long life span, and I hope the guilds that I see forming up last longer than the ones that I saw in Rift (no offense to Rift, great game, but didn’t have the staying power we all wished was there). I’m looking forward to reading numerous blog posts about the early access, and I hope the official launch on the 20th goes as smooth as everyone wants it to. Just because I’m not playing it, doesn’t mean I want it to fail! Keep the excitement coming, folks!

As always, happy gaming no matter where you find yourself!