Quote:
[17:05] <Brannoc> Welcome to another great Stratics house of commons with the developers of Starwars Galaxies! We'd like to focus on Restuss tonight so try to keep your questions around this, however others may be taken.
[17:05] <Brannoc> Please send your questions to [QT]Sprite OR [QT]Bot by using /msg [QT]NICK My question here. Questions sent to myself or the developers will NOT be answered so please do not send them to us. You only need to send your question one time and only to one QT. Sending it multiple times will not increase the liklihood of it being answered.
[17:05] <Brannoc> We'll begin with a brief introduction from our guests and then proceed with the chat. Now would be a good time to send those questions to [QT]Sprite or [QT]Bot!
[17:05] <Rogue_5> Hi! My name is Grant "Rogue_5" McDaniel. I am the SOE Producer for Star Wars Galaxies.
[17:05] <Helios_SOE> Greetings. I'm the Dread Lord Helios, creative director for SWG. Thanks for stopping by.
[17:05] <temujin> Hello, I m Jason Minor. I m the Art Director on SWG.
[17:05] <Vapor> Hello everyone, my name is Dave Jones. I am an Associate Producer for SOE on SWG. My name on the boards is Dev-Vapor.
[17:06] <SpaceRancor> Hello everyone. I am Eli Holding, lead designer on the high end content team.
[17:06] <Neif> Hey all, this is Tim over at LucasArts. I'm the assistant producer for SWG
[17:06] <Shadowbrak> Good evening everyone. My name is Travis Shadowbrak Hicks, and I am one of the developers on the high end content team.
[17:06] <the_neri> Hi everyone, this is Jake at LucasArts, excited to be here chatting. Who is Excited about Restuss?
[17:07] <Brannoc> *MrD* Question on the new Player Character Appearance Improvements, Is the plan to add the missing races in Chapter 3? and will this allow for or include the ability for more customization in the future. E.G. Braid's/Dreadlock's for Wookiee's.
[17:12] <temujin> The Humans, Zabraks, and Twileks with chapter 2, beyond that we are still working on which race will go out with which chapter. The changes will not hamper any further customization, however none is currently planned.
[17:12] <Brannoc> *GeneralH* With publish 29 all bogus titles currently in game that people were using were removed. I am fine with this fix however those Jedi who unlocked pre-9 lost their titles as well. Many of us spent months to unlock and even longer to finish our Jedi only to have our titles we worked for taken from us. Is there any fix coming to restore the pre-9 titles to those Jedi and ONLY those Jedi who were pre publish 9 and earne
[17:13] <Helios_SOE> Unfortunately the data that would be required to restore those titles properly is lost and we will never be able to do that. :-/ We will continue to add new titles for future achievements, however.
[17:13] <Brannoc> *Gassygunslinger* Approximately how long do you expect the first phase to last? As an estimate?
[17:14] <SpaceRancor> *Gassygunslinger* Since this is the first time we have actually run an event like this for SWG it will be a learning process for both of us. We are estimating that Stage 1 in Restuss should take about 1 to 2 weeks to complete.
[17:14] <Brannoc> *bugzonlsd* Would you tell us more about a Jedis current role in combat and what direction its headed?
[17:16] <Helios_SOE> This Friday, we'll be posting the complete Jedi expertise tree. The expertise trees will redefine the roles of all the professions as they come online. Jedi is mostly a hybrid profession that can do a little bit of everything so how you choose to play is mostly up to you and the expertise build you choose. Be sure to check out the Comlink on Friday for details.
[17:16] <Brannoc> *ArkonisMaximus* Will jedi be able to wear the armor from the restuss quest, since its no trade?
[17:17] <Shadowbrak> *ArkonisMaximus* Jedi will not be able to wear the Restuss armor as the rewards will have the same armor restrictions as current armor sets.
[17:17] <Brannoc> *arilious-eclipse* my question is in regards to the new lightsaber that is supposed to be availible from the restuss event. would this be aquired thru commondation medals or is it an actual quest reward
[17:18] <Neif> The new lightsaber is actually one of the few items that is not tied to the commendation system. Instead it's a rare loot drop that you can only get in Restuss after the battle has taken place.
[17:20] <Brannoc> *JediJakL* SPACE QUESTION: Are there any plans for a Space upgrade or *DREAM* a Death Star add on?
[17:21] <the_neri> Hey JediJakl I think its safe to say that all of us on SWG team share the Death Star dream although nothing flushed out yet, stay tuned...
[17:22] <Brannoc> *finalasylum* Areu guys planning on improving the trader professions on the game?
[17:22] <Vapor> We have plans to make significant improvements to the trader professions in a future chapter. Look for more information to be put out as we draw closer to the release.
[17:22] <Brannoc> *[FarStar]ViggoVickers* What is the "com" cap for a server to shift to the next phase...?
[17:23] <Shadowbrak> *[FarStar]ViggoVickers* The elements of the faction bases advancement is based off of quest completion, not commendations. The number of required quests is lots
[17:23] <Brannoc> *[swgemu]artemis* what is jedi going to be able to spend the medal points on from the restuss quests?
[17:24] <SpaceRancor> *Artemis* The rewards offered through the commendations of the Restuss event are not well suited towards Jedi. They do have the lightsaber hilt to be gained through the rare spawn inside of the city. But we have decided to open things up and make commendations tradable with the next hotfix which will allow them to at least trade or sell them to others.
[17:25] <Brannoc> *finalasylum* Have you guys thought about adding new color crystals for jedi; like silver black or veridian?
[17:25] <Helios_SOE> Yes, we're looking at giving out more colors in the future. We do want to make sure that the rewards are meaningful when we do hand them out, so we're making sure we don't just toss them out there without putting some good content behind them.
[17:25] <Brannoc> *Tarquinas* Could you explain the Jedi expertise system?
[17:26] <Helios_SOE> The full Jedi expertise design in all it's gory details will be posted on our boards this Friday as part of the weekly com-link feature.
[17:26] <Brannoc> *KetuSringa* will Creature Handling skills be showing up in the new skill lists?
[17:26] <Helios_SOE> There are no plans to add creature handler expertise trees at this time.
[17:28] <Brannoc> *bugzonlsd* What is going to be done about the commendation costs for the rewards, I have already noticed groups using the "flea quest method" in order to gain xp,faction or commendations.
[17:30] <the_neri> we are aware of people cheating to gain xp ( therefore setting themselves up for a karmic tour of hades postlife) and this is being fixed although commendation costs will not change
[17:30] <Brannoc> *Lowca-Fote* Will we be told in advanced when Phase 2 will start?
[17:31] <Shadowbrak> *Lowca-Fote* Phase two will become available on each server at different times in response to quest completion. Additional heralds will appear in major cities around the world when both faction bases are completed and the stage two battles should commence during the next server prime time.
[17:31] <Brannoc> *Corndog* Is decay going to come back into the game?
[17:31] <Helios_SOE> We will reconsider decay when we do the trader publish. Until then, no.
[17:31] <Brannoc> *MrD* Swede has Kindly jumped in on the forum confirming some details on the new base building mission introduced with Chapter 1.1 But I'd also like to ask why the mission are such low level? I know you need to accommodate lower level players but could there not have been one CL80+ for us vets that maybe counted as 2 of the lower missions. I have to admit that killing 40 NPC over and over can get a bit repetitive
[17:33] <SpaceRancor> *MrD* We wanted to keep the first part of the event open enough to give everyone a chance to participate. There are later stages that increase in difficulty. And even later there is the added aspect of the missions that can take you up against the toughest mob of all...other players.
[17:33] <Brannoc> *[FarStar]ViggoVickers* In the later phases, will the "com" rewards increase?
[17:33] <Shadowbrak> *[FarStar]ViggoVickers* The stage three quests give higher commendation rewards than the stage one quests.
[17:34] <Brannoc> *ArkonisMaximus* What is being done to better the combat/targeting system?
[17:36] <Helios_SOE> Auto-aiming is making a comeback to SWG. You'll have a choice between manual aiming (the way it is now) and auto-aiming (classic MMO targeting).
[17:36] <Brannoc> *Sicc* Hello, can Jedi get new robes with the restuss event part 3? Will we see any new robes soon? Thank you.
[17:36] <Helios_SOE> There are no new robes given out as part of the Restuss event.
[17:37] <Brannoc> *Florus[SWG-DE]* Will we see any more changes with Restuss? I mean more quests and so on.
[17:38] <Neif> Definitely -- Restuss is an ongoing event, so as you build up your bases and trigger this battle you'll unlock some new quests that take place inside Restuss. These will be higher risk, higher-reward quests.
[17:39] <Brannoc> *[Sunrunner]Topeiv* When will pub 30 be released, and what info would you give us on the expertise system for jedi and bounty hunter?
[17:40] <the_neri> Chapter 2/Pub 30 is coming this summer and check out the comlinks the next couple of fridays to get details on Jedi and Bounty Hunter specifics. Expect Jedi and Bounty Hunter stuff on the Test Center mid to late July
[17:43] <Brannoc> *SirRafaelBH* What is the theme of the next expansion? Any juicy details are appreciated.
[17:44] <Rogue_5> Right now we are concentrating solely on game updates for the live game. We won't be ready to discuss any expansion details until sometime next year.
[17:44] <Brannoc> *[Bria]Arass[DtR]* About space: The Rebel "Freedom" Station in Deep Space is still not destroyable, is there any plan in changing that in the near future?
[17:44] <Helios_SOE> Yes, we have it on the list of bug fixes for the next Chapter.
[17:46] <Brannoc> *[Chim]LeskiL* It was mentioned some time ago that there maybe would come 4 expertise systems for 4 profession per chapter. Still planned like that?
[17:47] <Helios_SOE> It was considered for a short period in time, but it was decided that the game is better served by focusing on two professions at a time instead of four. We want to make sure that this stuff is right the first time.
[17:51] <Brannoc> *[Chim]LeskiL* So what can we expect the restuss is gonna give to the game? Is it something that will change the galaxy for ever, or forgotten in a few months?
[17:52] <the_neri> Restuss is a large scale server wide event that will bring new high quality content to the game so I would say that yes it will change the Galaxy forever
[17:52] <Brannoc> *[Chim]LeskiL* Is it gonna be easy for everyone to get all the new rewards from restuss event, or is gonna be special to have it. special like mandalorian armor now, or?
[17:53] <Shadowbrak> *[Chim]LeskiL* The only restriction on the rewards is commendation acquisition.
[17:55] <Brannoc> *[Intrepid]Maha* When will their be some sort of function enabled to send account cancellation/condmend homes to the owners datapad?
[17:56] <Neif> Packing up these condemned houses to player's datapads is a technology we're investigating, as this is something we'd definitely like to do to cut down on unused space.
[17:56] <Brannoc> *[Intrepid]Maha* Are there any plans to improve missions aboard POB's? Currently the mission holder has to be the pilot of the POB, are there any plans to make it so the mission waypoints show up for the pilot so long as the mission holder is aboard the POB, regardless of them being the mission holder or not?
[17:57] <Shadowbrak> *[Intrepid]Maha* The mission holder must be the pilot, this restriction is not being removed.
[17:57] <Brannoc> *Argyle-Chilastra* With the Restuss Space Mining quest currently bugged, We cannot progress to phase 2. Do the Devs have any estimations as to when we're going to see the hotfix?
[17:58] <Rogue_5> The progression to phase 2 will not be gated by this mission. Regardless, we have people actively investigating the problem right now and hope to have a fix later this week.
[17:58] <Brannoc> That's it for this one folks! Thanks for joining us here on Stratics IRC, the logs will be up on http://swg.stratics.com shortly. Be sure to come by next time!
[17:59] <Helios_SOE> Thanks for stopping in. See you guys on the forums.
[17:59] <Vapor> I hope you enjoyed the chat, take care everyone
[17:59] <temujin> Thanks and take care
[17:59] <Rogue_5> Thanks for joining us tonight! Have a great night!
[17:59] <SpaceRancor> Later everyone. Thanks for coming.
[17:59] <the_neri> thanks all for your time folks, remember cheaters never win, enjoy Restuss and keep rocking!
[17:59] <Shadowbrak> Thanks for coming out, good night all.
[17:05] <Brannoc> Please send your questions to [QT]Sprite OR [QT]Bot by using /msg [QT]NICK My question here. Questions sent to myself or the developers will NOT be answered so please do not send them to us. You only need to send your question one time and only to one QT. Sending it multiple times will not increase the liklihood of it being answered.
[17:05] <Brannoc> We'll begin with a brief introduction from our guests and then proceed with the chat. Now would be a good time to send those questions to [QT]Sprite or [QT]Bot!
[17:05] <Rogue_5> Hi! My name is Grant "Rogue_5" McDaniel. I am the SOE Producer for Star Wars Galaxies.
[17:05] <Helios_SOE> Greetings. I'm the Dread Lord Helios, creative director for SWG. Thanks for stopping by.
[17:05] <temujin> Hello, I m Jason Minor. I m the Art Director on SWG.
[17:05] <Vapor> Hello everyone, my name is Dave Jones. I am an Associate Producer for SOE on SWG. My name on the boards is Dev-Vapor.
[17:06] <SpaceRancor> Hello everyone. I am Eli Holding, lead designer on the high end content team.
[17:06] <Neif> Hey all, this is Tim over at LucasArts. I'm the assistant producer for SWG
[17:06] <Shadowbrak> Good evening everyone. My name is Travis Shadowbrak Hicks, and I am one of the developers on the high end content team.
[17:06] <the_neri> Hi everyone, this is Jake at LucasArts, excited to be here chatting. Who is Excited about Restuss?
[17:07] <Brannoc> *MrD* Question on the new Player Character Appearance Improvements, Is the plan to add the missing races in Chapter 3? and will this allow for or include the ability for more customization in the future. E.G. Braid's/Dreadlock's for Wookiee's.
[17:12] <temujin> The Humans, Zabraks, and Twileks with chapter 2, beyond that we are still working on which race will go out with which chapter. The changes will not hamper any further customization, however none is currently planned.
[17:12] <Brannoc> *GeneralH* With publish 29 all bogus titles currently in game that people were using were removed. I am fine with this fix however those Jedi who unlocked pre-9 lost their titles as well. Many of us spent months to unlock and even longer to finish our Jedi only to have our titles we worked for taken from us. Is there any fix coming to restore the pre-9 titles to those Jedi and ONLY those Jedi who were pre publish 9 and earne
[17:13] <Helios_SOE> Unfortunately the data that would be required to restore those titles properly is lost and we will never be able to do that. :-/ We will continue to add new titles for future achievements, however.
[17:13] <Brannoc> *Gassygunslinger* Approximately how long do you expect the first phase to last? As an estimate?
[17:14] <SpaceRancor> *Gassygunslinger* Since this is the first time we have actually run an event like this for SWG it will be a learning process for both of us. We are estimating that Stage 1 in Restuss should take about 1 to 2 weeks to complete.
[17:14] <Brannoc> *bugzonlsd* Would you tell us more about a Jedis current role in combat and what direction its headed?
[17:16] <Helios_SOE> This Friday, we'll be posting the complete Jedi expertise tree. The expertise trees will redefine the roles of all the professions as they come online. Jedi is mostly a hybrid profession that can do a little bit of everything so how you choose to play is mostly up to you and the expertise build you choose. Be sure to check out the Comlink on Friday for details.
[17:16] <Brannoc> *ArkonisMaximus* Will jedi be able to wear the armor from the restuss quest, since its no trade?
[17:17] <Shadowbrak> *ArkonisMaximus* Jedi will not be able to wear the Restuss armor as the rewards will have the same armor restrictions as current armor sets.
[17:17] <Brannoc> *arilious-eclipse* my question is in regards to the new lightsaber that is supposed to be availible from the restuss event. would this be aquired thru commondation medals or is it an actual quest reward
[17:18] <Neif> The new lightsaber is actually one of the few items that is not tied to the commendation system. Instead it's a rare loot drop that you can only get in Restuss after the battle has taken place.
[17:20] <Brannoc> *JediJakL* SPACE QUESTION: Are there any plans for a Space upgrade or *DREAM* a Death Star add on?
[17:21] <the_neri> Hey JediJakl I think its safe to say that all of us on SWG team share the Death Star dream although nothing flushed out yet, stay tuned...
[17:22] <Brannoc> *finalasylum* Areu guys planning on improving the trader professions on the game?
[17:22] <Vapor> We have plans to make significant improvements to the trader professions in a future chapter. Look for more information to be put out as we draw closer to the release.
[17:22] <Brannoc> *[FarStar]ViggoVickers* What is the "com" cap for a server to shift to the next phase...?
[17:23] <Shadowbrak> *[FarStar]ViggoVickers* The elements of the faction bases advancement is based off of quest completion, not commendations. The number of required quests is lots
[17:23] <Brannoc> *[swgemu]artemis* what is jedi going to be able to spend the medal points on from the restuss quests?
[17:24] <SpaceRancor> *Artemis* The rewards offered through the commendations of the Restuss event are not well suited towards Jedi. They do have the lightsaber hilt to be gained through the rare spawn inside of the city. But we have decided to open things up and make commendations tradable with the next hotfix which will allow them to at least trade or sell them to others.
[17:25] <Brannoc> *finalasylum* Have you guys thought about adding new color crystals for jedi; like silver black or veridian?
[17:25] <Helios_SOE> Yes, we're looking at giving out more colors in the future. We do want to make sure that the rewards are meaningful when we do hand them out, so we're making sure we don't just toss them out there without putting some good content behind them.
[17:25] <Brannoc> *Tarquinas* Could you explain the Jedi expertise system?
[17:26] <Helios_SOE> The full Jedi expertise design in all it's gory details will be posted on our boards this Friday as part of the weekly com-link feature.
[17:26] <Brannoc> *KetuSringa* will Creature Handling skills be showing up in the new skill lists?
[17:26] <Helios_SOE> There are no plans to add creature handler expertise trees at this time.
[17:28] <Brannoc> *bugzonlsd* What is going to be done about the commendation costs for the rewards, I have already noticed groups using the "flea quest method" in order to gain xp,faction or commendations.
[17:30] <the_neri> we are aware of people cheating to gain xp ( therefore setting themselves up for a karmic tour of hades postlife) and this is being fixed although commendation costs will not change
[17:30] <Brannoc> *Lowca-Fote* Will we be told in advanced when Phase 2 will start?
[17:31] <Shadowbrak> *Lowca-Fote* Phase two will become available on each server at different times in response to quest completion. Additional heralds will appear in major cities around the world when both faction bases are completed and the stage two battles should commence during the next server prime time.
[17:31] <Brannoc> *Corndog* Is decay going to come back into the game?
[17:31] <Helios_SOE> We will reconsider decay when we do the trader publish. Until then, no.
[17:31] <Brannoc> *MrD* Swede has Kindly jumped in on the forum confirming some details on the new base building mission introduced with Chapter 1.1 But I'd also like to ask why the mission are such low level? I know you need to accommodate lower level players but could there not have been one CL80+ for us vets that maybe counted as 2 of the lower missions. I have to admit that killing 40 NPC over and over can get a bit repetitive
[17:33] <SpaceRancor> *MrD* We wanted to keep the first part of the event open enough to give everyone a chance to participate. There are later stages that increase in difficulty. And even later there is the added aspect of the missions that can take you up against the toughest mob of all...other players.
[17:33] <Brannoc> *[FarStar]ViggoVickers* In the later phases, will the "com" rewards increase?
[17:33] <Shadowbrak> *[FarStar]ViggoVickers* The stage three quests give higher commendation rewards than the stage one quests.
[17:34] <Brannoc> *ArkonisMaximus* What is being done to better the combat/targeting system?
[17:36] <Helios_SOE> Auto-aiming is making a comeback to SWG. You'll have a choice between manual aiming (the way it is now) and auto-aiming (classic MMO targeting).
[17:36] <Brannoc> *Sicc* Hello, can Jedi get new robes with the restuss event part 3? Will we see any new robes soon? Thank you.
[17:36] <Helios_SOE> There are no new robes given out as part of the Restuss event.
[17:37] <Brannoc> *Florus[SWG-DE]* Will we see any more changes with Restuss? I mean more quests and so on.
[17:38] <Neif> Definitely -- Restuss is an ongoing event, so as you build up your bases and trigger this battle you'll unlock some new quests that take place inside Restuss. These will be higher risk, higher-reward quests.
[17:39] <Brannoc> *[Sunrunner]Topeiv* When will pub 30 be released, and what info would you give us on the expertise system for jedi and bounty hunter?
[17:40] <the_neri> Chapter 2/Pub 30 is coming this summer and check out the comlinks the next couple of fridays to get details on Jedi and Bounty Hunter specifics. Expect Jedi and Bounty Hunter stuff on the Test Center mid to late July
[17:43] <Brannoc> *SirRafaelBH* What is the theme of the next expansion? Any juicy details are appreciated.
[17:44] <Rogue_5> Right now we are concentrating solely on game updates for the live game. We won't be ready to discuss any expansion details until sometime next year.
[17:44] <Brannoc> *[Bria]Arass[DtR]* About space: The Rebel "Freedom" Station in Deep Space is still not destroyable, is there any plan in changing that in the near future?
[17:44] <Helios_SOE> Yes, we have it on the list of bug fixes for the next Chapter.
[17:46] <Brannoc> *[Chim]LeskiL* It was mentioned some time ago that there maybe would come 4 expertise systems for 4 profession per chapter. Still planned like that?
[17:47] <Helios_SOE> It was considered for a short period in time, but it was decided that the game is better served by focusing on two professions at a time instead of four. We want to make sure that this stuff is right the first time.
[17:51] <Brannoc> *[Chim]LeskiL* So what can we expect the restuss is gonna give to the game? Is it something that will change the galaxy for ever, or forgotten in a few months?
[17:52] <the_neri> Restuss is a large scale server wide event that will bring new high quality content to the game so I would say that yes it will change the Galaxy forever
[17:52] <Brannoc> *[Chim]LeskiL* Is it gonna be easy for everyone to get all the new rewards from restuss event, or is gonna be special to have it. special like mandalorian armor now, or?
[17:53] <Shadowbrak> *[Chim]LeskiL* The only restriction on the rewards is commendation acquisition.
[17:55] <Brannoc> *[Intrepid]Maha* When will their be some sort of function enabled to send account cancellation/condmend homes to the owners datapad?
[17:56] <Neif> Packing up these condemned houses to player's datapads is a technology we're investigating, as this is something we'd definitely like to do to cut down on unused space.
[17:56] <Brannoc> *[Intrepid]Maha* Are there any plans to improve missions aboard POB's? Currently the mission holder has to be the pilot of the POB, are there any plans to make it so the mission waypoints show up for the pilot so long as the mission holder is aboard the POB, regardless of them being the mission holder or not?
[17:57] <Shadowbrak> *[Intrepid]Maha* The mission holder must be the pilot, this restriction is not being removed.
[17:57] <Brannoc> *Argyle-Chilastra* With the Restuss Space Mining quest currently bugged, We cannot progress to phase 2. Do the Devs have any estimations as to when we're going to see the hotfix?
[17:58] <Rogue_5> The progression to phase 2 will not be gated by this mission. Regardless, we have people actively investigating the problem right now and hope to have a fix later this week.
[17:58] <Brannoc> That's it for this one folks! Thanks for joining us here on Stratics IRC, the logs will be up on http://swg.stratics.com shortly. Be sure to come by next time!
[17:59] <Helios_SOE> Thanks for stopping in. See you guys on the forums.
[17:59] <Vapor> I hope you enjoyed the chat, take care everyone
[17:59] <temujin> Thanks and take care
[17:59] <Rogue_5> Thanks for joining us tonight! Have a great night!
[17:59] <SpaceRancor> Later everyone. Thanks for coming.
[17:59] <the_neri> thanks all for your time folks, remember cheaters never win, enjoy Restuss and keep rocking!
[17:59] <Shadowbrak> Thanks for coming out, good night all.
i bolded a few points a found interesting.
Edited, Jun 27th 2006 at 9:26pm EDT by MasterOfWar