Tag Archives: patch 1.3

Doling Out the Legacy Character Perks

10 Tuesday Jul 2012

Posted by in alts, legacy system

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I have been a little reluctant about splashing out on legacy character perks for several reasons. Firstly, the server I am spending all my post Patch 1.3 time on is the server upon which I have the least amount of credits (due to it being my newest/least amount of time spent upon it server.) And secondly, I’m just not sure which of my characters I will be leveling next. But it would seem foolish to take even 1 more step towards an alt level without thinking about purchasing at least a couple of the experience related character perks.

Because of my legacy unlocks on 3 servers, I am also pretty far behind on building a legacy, so I am not able to maximize any of the perks. But every little bit helps, yes? If you’d like to see the full tables for the perks, check out Dulfy’s excellent Legacy Character Perks guide.

    • Improved Warzone Experience
Rank Credits Legacy level Required to Purchase Cumulative
XP Boost
1 20k 5 2
2 30k 10 4
Total 50 k 6%
  • Improved Class Mission  Experience
Rank Credits Legacy level Required to Purchase Cumulative
XP Boost
1 20k 5 2
2 30k 10 4
Total 50 k 6%
  • Improved Exploration Experience
Rank Credits Legacy level Required to Purchase Cumulative
XP Boost
1 10k 5 2
2 20k 10 4
Total 30k 6%

So, that would mean spending 130k credits to gain 6% extra XP from three of my regular activities. That seems totally worth it for my next alt or two, since it would mean not feeling obligated to do every bonus quest in an area. Or to stay on certain planets until my eyes bleed. You know what I’m talking about.

Also of interest, given that on my Smuggler I am leveling Armormech from scratch, is thinking about upping my ability to quickly improve her companion affection levels, to hopefully result in better crafting results.

  • Legacy of Altruism
    Increases amount of affection earned from companion gifts.
Rank Credits Legacy level Required to Purchase Cumulative Affection Gain
1 10k 5 10%
2 20k 15 10%
Total 30k 20%
  • Legacy of Persuasion
    Increases amount of affection earned from conversations with your companions.
Rank Credits Legacy level Required to Purchase Cumulative Affection Gain
1 10k 5 10%
2 20k 10 10%
Total 30k 20%

Despite my love for crafting, and knowing I will definitely be taking my Armormech to 400, it’s a little harder to justify spending 60k credits to improve my companion affection gains. It’s definitely not something worth purchasing for my Jedi Knight, who already has her Biochem at 400. But it is still a solid consideration for my smuggler. I may wait until she’s made enough cash herself from selling Armormech items to purchase it for her.

What about you? Which character perks have you splashed out on, and how did you decide which character got which perks?

Patch 1.3 Allies Patch Notes

26 Tuesday Jun 2012

Posted by in patch notes

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Well, it’s finally here– Patch 1.3 has been deployed on live servers! For recaps of some of the changes I’m most excited about, check out:

Full final patch notes after the jump!

Continue reading →

On Being a SWTOR Crafting Enthusiast in an Environment Where Everyone Wants Everything to be Free

10 Sunday Jun 2012

Posted by in crew skills, PTR, synthweaving

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I’ve been checking out Patch 1.3 on the public test server (PTS), focusing my time on the crew skills changes to synthweaving. And I will get to a post on that topic later in the week. But first, I wanted to share some of my recent experiences regarding interacting with PTS folks around crafting.

My Time is Worthless, Your Money is Precious

So far, I think I’ve crafted about 30 augmentation kits on the PTS for folks to try out. To do so, I’ve stood around on the fleet, chatting with players about the patch, for several hours as I’ve made crafted pieces to reverse engineer, then made augmentation kits. I am keeping 4 of my companions busy on making the crafted items, and sending the 5th out on Underworld Trading missions in the hopes of scoring some of the new synthweaving patterns added to the game.

I logged in to the PTS this time around to find that I had 20k in credits and not very many crafting materials, due to the huge number of custom pieces I made and sold on the cheap during the last patch’s testing phase. Thus, to have enough cash to list anything of value in the GTN, I had to make and sell some custom gear. I was nearing the end of my possible Kit creation when I got a tell from a reader of this blog who gallantly gifted me with 5 stacks each of the crystals and the artifact fragments. And thus, I was able to crank out a ton more augments which I put up on the GTN for 250k a pop, selling them as fast as I could list them.

And at some point, the grumbling started in General chat, along the lines of “You’re a jerk for selling those kits for 250k. You should be selling them for 100k max. You are greedy.” One of my fellow crafters jumped in and noted that we have to spend 4+ minutes crafting each of our 10 items that we have to RE in order to make each kit. And that further, the materials for making those crafted items sell for 1-3k a piece on live servers, making your base cost for materials anywhere from 40-120k depending upon your server economy. To which our heckler replied “Go farm the mats.”

Uh, excuse me? I need to go and farm materials to make items so they can be cheaper for you mister general chat big mouth? Because my play time is worth less than your precious bank balance? Are you serious? You might think that I was being trolled. But I wasn’t. Because this isn’t the only time that I have had folks consider my time, which I’ve spent crafting or improving patterns or spending tons of credits on missions to obtain schematics to be worthless. (NOTE: see also this same issue, years ago, in WoW.)

Why did I “need to make that much cash anyway”, as one person asked with a side of snark? Because almost nothing on the PTS is free in case you hadn’t noticed. In my case specifically, I want to try out the new custom patterns. Which has meant spending over 50k on executing missions so far (plus another 250k on buying mission discoveries). And buying a schematic on the PTS for 50k. And buying a ton of companion gifts to improve my affection to increase the chance of crits. (The copy of me from pre 1.2 didn’t have her toons very far along in that area, unlike current me.) And so on. And so far? I have exactly two of the new crafted schematics to show for all my efforts. T-W-O.

The great thing about MMOs is they provide a variety of things for each player to do that meets their individual definitions of fun. I love to discover and collect new patterns, and feel a sense of accomplishment when a ton of peeps are running around my servers wearing gear with the made by Anexxia label. And I like that I can support my characters through crafting instead of doing dailies because repeating quests for multiple days is not my preferred way to make cash. Not even if a vanity pet is on offer.

Now, I can understand it is annoying to see people buying my augment kits and reselling them for 750k or even 1.25 mil credits on the GTN. But if you make it a practice to harass players such as myself, who are there making items for you to try out and who genuinely love seeing all the new crafting changes on offer on the PTS so we can plan accordingly, then don’t come crying to me when crafters stop selling the items they make– or worse yet– stop even putting in the time on the PTS crafting items for you to try out. You’re welcome.

/end rant.

More Details on the SWTOR Server Transfers…Which Are Starting Next Week!

06 Wednesday Jun 2012

Posted by in official announcements

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SWTOR players have been rattling the sabers in the pursuit of more details about the upcoming character transfers to address the server population issues, and today, they got a screenful of information via a community blog post on the topic. All of the details have not yet been disclosed, which is making some folks a little nervous about what will be happening with their guild once the transfers hit. The post opens by noting that this will not be a free-for-all server transfer, rather, it will be a targeted and phased approach:

…we made the decision to strictly limit the initial phase of the Character Transfer Service to only allow transfers from selected groups of origin servers (where you’re moving a character from) to selected individual destination servers (where you choose to move a character to) based on the player populations of the origin and destination servers. In some cases, a large number of origin servers will be eligible to move to a single destination server. In others, very few origin servers will be transferring to existing high population destination servers. Remember, the goal here is to push almost every destination server to an active population that’s higher.

This should help assuage some of the fears that had been raised about the LFG tool being launched to barren servers. A few more facts we now have about the process:

  • Server transfers start on June 12, 2012
  • Not everyone will be eligible to transfer on day 1; the transfers will be staggered to reflect reasonable workload on the part of the dev team
  • Once your transfer starts it’s estimated to complete in a few hours
  • You won’t be transferring your characters off a PvP server to a PvE server
  •  Your Legacy and associated unlocks will be transferred to your new server
  • If you have already unlocked your Legacy on your destination server, the higher level Legacy will take precedence.
  • Guilds will not be able to transfer to a new server; instead, guildmasters will need to transfer and reform it. And guld members will have to individually transfer over.
  • If you have a guild bank, it will be re-granted to your new guild on your destination server by Customer Service
  •  If your transferred character’s name conflicts with an existing name on a destination server, you will be asked to rename your character.
  • Unless you have unlocked your Legacy on your destination server, you will need to rename your Legacy upon transfer (which conversely says that if you have unlocked a Legacy name on a server you are transferring to, that name stays put)

…because the process will be gradual, we cannot provide that information in advance. Depending on the number of characters transferred, the destination and origin servers eligible for transfer may be altered during the process. We don’t want to promise a destination in case it may change. Listings will become available as servers become eligible for transfer.

What We Don’t Know

  •  Is there a minimum level of character eligible for transfer?
  •  Is there a cap to how many bank slots / how many credits you can move on a particular character? And if so, does the character’s level impact those maximums?
  •  If I move my highest level character off a server, do the remaining characters on that server retain the legacy levels and perks they had as part of that server’s legacy?
  • If I don’t move immediately, will I have an opportunity to do so later? Or is it a limited time offer?
We’ll have to wait for the forthcoming FAQs to get to the bottom of these details. What are some of the questions you have? Leave them in the comments and I’ll add to the above list.

Where My head’s At

Well, at first blush, I’m bummed. You see, my original character is marooned on a PvP server with all my credits. And I’ve determined that I don’t actually really dig PvP servers though I am glad I tried one out. So I am crossing my fingers that she will, in the future, have the opportunity to move elsewhere to join the rest of my characters on a PvE or RP server.

Sigh. So basically, the initial wave of character transfers will not affect my playtime for the better. For now, I’ll have to keep aligned with my other servers to make sure I am in the loop on where folks are moving to. It will be nice to move with them to a server that has more opportunities for end game content completion, but I am bummed I will not be able to reclaim Anexxia at this point. And I have to again say publicly that I am more than happy to pay to move her in the future!

What about you? How are you feeling about the server transfers thus far from what we know now?

More info on Patch 1.3, Server Transfers Incoming!

21 Monday May 2012

Posted by in official announcements, poll

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Today is our lucky day!

We started off with Dulfy posting a compilation of all the details we know so far about SWTOR’s upcoming Patch 1.3, then IGN released their official 1.3 interview with Bioware lead game designer Daniel Erickson!

The interview has a wide range of information about upcoming quality of life improvements, including a note that the Looking for Group functionality will be server-specific and not cross-realm. I am a HUGE fan of keeping LFG server-based, having had numerous not fun cross-server LFG experiences. Now, before you start hitting the comment button to complain that your server is so low pop that this doesn’t solve anything for you, the interview also notes that there will be server transfers coming soon (presumably at or before Patch 1.3) to help alleviate the low population server issues.

So, for those of you on low population servers with the opportunity of server transfers on the horizon, what are you planning to do? Take the poll and leave your thoughts in the comments!

Friday 5: Five Things I’m Looking Forward to in SWTOR Patch 1.3

18 Friday May 2012

Posted by in friday five

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SWTOR Patch 1.3 has been on my mind a ton this week, as evidenced by the Patch 1.3 Crew Skills Q&A I put together earlier in the week which has sparked so much conversation. Some of it even on the topic of crafting…

😉

In reading through the comments, it became clear to me that folks don’t all seem to be 100% aware of the great stuff Patch 1.3 has in store for them. And thus, I bring you today’s Friday Five, the 5 Things I’m Looking Forward to in Patch 1.3:

  1. Craftable Augment Kits. I love the idea that everyone will be able to wear whatever outfit they like, and by adding an augment slot, ensure that it is comparable to the best quality end game gear they could earn. I love the diversity of clothing options available in game, and think this will add even more such diversity.
  2. Mod Extraction Costs Decreased. A lot of folks missed that little tidbit at the end of the Q&A. This is an awesome quality of life and flushness of pocketbook change that will benefit players who are active in Operations. I know folks who have spent upwards of 150,000 credits to yank out mods and put them into their gear, often more than once per week. when the loot gods have smiled upon them. Now they will be able to spend fewer credits to do so.
  3. Group Finder Launches. That’s right, as stated in the SWTOR inaugural podcast, the big focus for patch 1.3 is bringing a group finder to the game. It will allow you to choose Operations, Flashpoints, and even area quests (such as heroics and dailies) that you would like to group up for. Best of all, in my opinion, it will be limited to your server. I know many folks love cross-server LFG. But having played World of Warcraft since vanilla WoW, I can say with certainty that I much prefer getting to know players from my own server and grouping with them versus being lumped in with someone I’ll never see again from another server. I’ve found same server groups to overall have a more pleasant vibe, fewer incidents of reprehensible behavior, and have led to a number of new in game friends. I am sure I will try it out so I can see some of the Flashpoints I haven’t yet completed. But mostly, I’m just glad I won’t have to hear folks complain about not having a group finder. Just kidding. …Or am I? 😉
  4. Scale-able Armor Types for Social Gear. That’s right, if you are a heavy armor wearer, social gear will scale to reflect your armor proficiency. This means even more options for being a fashionable Sith Lord or Jedi.
  5. More Legacy Perks. Although we don’t know for sure what will make it in game for patch 1.3, you can see that whole list of shiny coming soon perks, and we know that a number of them will definitely be making their way into the game for Patch 1.3. So keep up the alting and building that companion affection! And the group finder should help us all climb the social levels ladder, thus unlocking even more perks.

Which of these changes are you most looking forward to in Patch 1.3?