Thanks for your feed back Brian. It’s really tempting me into testing the waters. Wanted to let you know you weren’t talking to yourself. :)
Erm. Thanks, Jazar, I felt suddenly very selfconscious. :)
JtoL is about the only thing about SWG that sounds remotely interesting actually.
Yeah, I was tempted to pick them up based on Brian’s comments here. Then I realized I could just play vicariously through his posts and save myself a lot of time.
Quick note: Finally rigged up the Cougar HOTAS today and set in non-emulation mode just to see if I could get away with it. Upon launching I found that the rudders, throttle and stick worked without any effort on my part. The trigger fired guns, the secondary launched protons, the hat worked properly, and soforth. Couple downsides: The rudders control roll and the stick controls yaw - and that ain’t right. Also many of the buttons and controls don’t seem to automatically default to anything.
Inside the actual options there are some selections dealing with the joystick (whether the hat pans or snap views for example) but there’s nothing like an intricate interface for mapping controls that I could see. I may end up trying to sort out an emulation template with the stick software. But it is kinda disappointing. I seem to recall the old TIE and X-Wing games did have a complete keybinding system you could use. I know for a fact most flightsims do as well as classy old Terminus (for those few of us who ever played it).
Going to check the forums and see what I can find out. So good and bad but mostly good. And even the little that was functional plug-and-play it was enough, with the keyboard, to give me a very sweet taste of how much more fun I’m going to have with the HOTAS (and the more advanced fighter I just acquired). Alot of traditional ‘flight sim’ commands are available. You have a fully rendered cockpit, padlocking, several modes of target selection and as mentioned rudders, throttles and joysticks all work. Padlocking adds immensely to the sense of piloting a craft as your ‘head’ intuitively moves to follow the target and you feel more like you’re trying to swing the ship around to follow your line of sight rather than blindly chasing a directional arrow pointing to an offscreen target.
More on this as, or if, I sort out how to customize my stick. Also, brief plug for my old Intensor speaker chair. Some the craft have just great Star Warsy harmonic rumbles and whines as you pilot them or they zoom past. You really feel it in this chair. Adds hugely to immersion.
Now where did I put them virtual 3D glasses?
Edit: Evidently there’s a keymapping function that comes up in space. I’ll see if I can find it this time.
Edit: Worked out fine though it took me a while to get everything ‘just so’. Finding the right keys, toggles, buttons and hats for every command you think you might need and in spots that make intuitive sense can take a while. My response to /tells for about an hour was “I’m mapping keys right now. Aren’t I a fun guy to know?” But that’s mainly because I’m a finicky person when it comes to setting up the joystick. I usually do it once, get the muscle memory, and forget about it. A couple mistakes can mean regrets down the road but coding a joystick isn’t something I really want to do all the time so I get in there and do it right the first time with only a rare revisit.
So, do you need a joystick for SWG: JtL? I’d say the answer is it depends. Even a relatively cheap joystick from a good manufacturer can add to the feeling of flying a starfighter and it’s far more intuitive than scrolling a mouse around or, as in my case, furiously rolling a trackball in the direction you want to go. But in the early stages I did great with just that. It’s only as commands started piling up and combats began getting that much tougher I found myself really longing to have all the controls I needed at my fingertips. And I was fortunate enough to already have a Cougar HOTAS for my flight sims. This is pretty much as good as it gets and it’s expensive. A fine, more affordable alternative might be a Saitek stick for one hand and a Stategic Commander or Claw for the other to handle various targeting, ability-based and nav computer commands. It turns out that, in the joystick recommendation thread in the SWG forums, the Cougar made an early appearance and it seems there are several very hardcore guys with 'em already. Guess I ain’t so special after all.
I am even more seriously considering voice comms. While you can make macros that handle basic combat text communications very easily (along the lines of the EAW or Il-2 stuff) it doesn’t really offer enough nuance for me. I’d ask here but I’ll probably stick that question into the SWG forums just to see what the folks there are using and how it works if I can’t find a thread.
Forget all that, I can’t believe you admitted to having an Intensor chair.
— Alan
It’s just a chair. With speakers. And it does work really well with JtL’s sound effects. But if it helps, just forget I mentioned it.
And, ladies, did I mention I’m single?
Well at least he’s not one of those flightsim nerds (and I love flightsims) that have home built cockpits and walk around the house in a G-suit.
I’ve been playing space sims since the original X-Wing for IBM PC, so natrually I’ve been eagerly awaitng this expansion.
Best experience I’ve had so far was just the other day, running a Tier 3 mission for CorSec. I was ordered to interdict an arms shipment from the Black Sun. I found the shuttle, grabbed the cargo after disabling her, and ran to a waypoint in preparation for their counterattack. After taking out a wing of fighters I proceeded to rendavous with a CorSec Lancer to drop off the cargo, where he then gave me a beacon to deliver to another CorSec interceptor to through the Black Sun off his tail. Unfortunitally, the Black Sun fighters had already arrived by this point, and so I dashed towards the waypoint at full burner trying to outrun them. I docked as soon as I could, and watched my shields get eaten away while I was immobile. Luckly my armor and shields withstood two full passes, and once I undocked, I hit the emergency thrust button to get the heck out of there. Problem: The Reactor scrammed and shutdown. No engines, no shield recharge, and they’re coming around for another pass. It was exciting, but I had to eject.
The next day I brought a wingman with me, and he held them off long enough for me to complete the mission and return to the fight. We proceeded to the next assignment, to launch an assault on the Black Sun. After a rather uneventful escort of a CorSec Spec Ops transport, we engaged a full wing of Black Sun fighters. I downed the last one and turned about to fnd who was shooting at me since the blaster fire was pretty intense. I panned my Hat Switch around to find a gunboat tailing me, with three turrets! I had “only” level 5 equiptment, so I hit my burners after the last of my armor ran out, my wingman telling me to fall back as he was almost down to nil as well. He used up the last of his torpedos, so I told him to head to the Space Station for repairs while I lead the gunboat around. Sure enough the gunboat followed, and I kept him at a range of 1km, just outside his gun range, and lead him to Gorverna Space in Dantooine. My wingman met us at the hyperspace point, and quickly disabled his weapons with a volley of proton torps. By this time my shields had recharged so I turned around and drew his fire while my wingman took out the rest of his guns. The mission ended as a success, and we decided to take a break afterwards, and I returned to Corellia to patch up what was left of my ship. A close call, but very satisfying…=)
I really think this expansion has alot of potential. I’d like to see some mission terminals perhaps, for starfighter missions. This game is really shaping up to be like WC: Privateer, only the multiplayer aspect and free range of flight makes it so much better. (For those that remember Privateer, word to ya! =) The ability to board disabled ships woul rock, I think it would be awesome to drop a squad of commandos from a YT-1300 onto a corvette, or another player ship, though I’m not sure how this would work out. But overall, a great expansion, I’m liking it tremendously.
Here’s my story, I’m grinding for my Tier 4 boxes in Kessel. I am taking out a few rebel gunboats in my TIE Advance, and after my second kill I notice a rebel pilot nearby, I quickly target through everyone nearby and I realise that I am facing a full squadron of PC rebel players. I decide to grab the bull by the horns and switch my power to weapons, I come in low under the first target, a Y-wing and lay into him with my blasters, his shields flare, and collapse and I stay on his tail as he tries to turn with a second salvo his engines are gone and I see the pilot away. I target again and realize that the rebel A-wing, the only ship there that could out maneuver me is turning down, and only 200 meters away, I cut power and turn upwards firing into the belly of the A-wing before he can aim down, that’s two. Third target is an X-wing he knows I am here and is turning toward me I cut in low under the arc of his cannons (which could take me apart) and fire into his tail, his shields hold as he turns around trying to get me into his firing range, I cut power and turn to fire right into his cockpit, and empty two full salvos. Two left, first is another Y-wing, he fires a salvo at me but it glances off my back shields, I don’t want to chance a missile which could destroy me outright, or even another salvo of laser fire which would collapse my shields, (And since I have no armor probably end my flight) so I accelerate under his craft, and turn upwards as his bulky ship lazily tries to come in line. I have all the time in the world to dump my blasters into him. Finally there is another X-wing, being hassled by two NPC TIEs, I feel almost guilty as I line up with his side and take him out.
Later I am in Kessel on my Master Mission, (Destroy the Corvette) and me and 4 or 5 guildmates are tearing through the escorts and picking the guns off the Vette, when one of us goes down, over my mic I hear him yell, “Rebels, player rebels, behind us.” There is some frantic dogfighting and we lose two more of our group, but I pick off one rebel X-wing, and a B-wing. Suddenly I hear one of our pilots yell, “It’s all down, Dookay, just take out the bridge.” I turn to fire on the head of the Corvette when I hear my missile lock engaged, Boom, my ship is toasted by a Player X-wing, frantically we regroup at the outpost and prepare, and as we hyper in I hear profanity, and I enter into a scene of chaos. The rebels are waiting at the entrance, I dodge some fire and manage to take out a Y-wing but not before his missile took me apart. Frantically I am trying to hyper back in before the Corvette bails as our pilots and the Rebels engage in furious dogfighting just inside the Kessel region. I hyper back in and take out a player X-wing then myself and a guildmate, who managed to kill virtually the entire ambush single handed, limp to the Corvette, and dump our payloads into the bridge. As the ship went down I felt good about the whole conflict.
http://forums.station.sony.com/swg/board/message?board.id=lightspeed&message.id=141199
Given the title of the thread “Enough whining…let’s hear your best JtL experience so far” it’s not all rosey out there in the world of opinion.
Some folks really can’t wrap their heads around dangerous PvP combat ala flightsims. They want to make it much harder to kill craft, more like ground combat where a battle between buffed players with support can go on for a hideous amount of time. This also tends to reward grind over skill. He who can afford the best buffs, weapons and armor always wins. One of the good things about SWG’s character design is that “level” isn’t really relevant. It’s not extraordinarily hard to master a profession or two with a modicum of dedication. Grinding takes other forms instead. You end up with very unstarwarsy, acting and appearing, characters locked in combat that doesn’t resemble the source material either. JtL feels much more like the real thing, at least to me, so far and in no little measure because the mechanic does require skill as much as kewl loot if not more so.
Another, more reasonable, complaint is that the last required mission to master piloting (and qualify for the much desired multiplayer combat-capable starships) takes place in PvP only space. Anecdotally, and very likely, this seems to have lead to large gangs of expert pilot gankers running around and killing players who’re not even interested in PvP. This should certainly be reconsidered. I understand the devs probably think PvP is the best use of JtL, and I suspect it is myself, but really the decision to get involved should be left in the player’s hands.
See, that’s actually interesting to me. I might get SWG just for the JtL expansion, because it does sound rather cool, with the ship building and the combat and the large Privateeresque world to play around in.
However, I will wait a bit to make sure that the reflexless whiners don’t get their way.
Damn, you’re tempting me.
Wonder how it would be from nz with 200ms-odd pings to the US.
Anyway, say I buy it. What do I experience once I first log in and for the first week?
I played SWG… but just got bored of the grind.
Peter
I’d say your experience would be alot like what I’ve been talking about with the difference that you’d have two additional races to chose from when creating your character (Sullustan and Ithorian) and you’d still have a bit of grind to build up any ground-game traits. There’s a modicum of grinding in space but missions from pilot-trainers keep you busy and there’s some variety in the ‘gatekeeper’ missions when you qualify for a new skill box. I certainly didn’t feel bored once I got into the swing of things. Early on when you’re in a simple, slow, ship taking on simple, slow, foes it can feel a bit more grindish but you’re not there long.
One more thing I’ve discovered. The higher level, Tier 3 on, missions start getting so tough it’s a crapshoot as to whether you get one that’s soloable or not. Good idea to try and join a PA or make friends and help each other with missions. Helping friends with the tough gatekeeper missions is more fun than just hunting random pirates and you get all the experience for your kills, and assists, in the group. It also ensures there are folks around to help you on your own tough gatekeeper missions. Admittedly, I’ve got some friends after being in-game for a while so that’s easy for me to say but I’d probably not mind the difficulty being toned down so I could solo higher tier missions. The problem I tend to encounter, personally, is that any given friends on at a particular time tend to be much higher or lower in experience than I am. So either I end up as a sort of spectator along for the ride or with a friend I spend as much effort protecting as he does helping me out.
This might be less of a problem in a large PA as they many tend to be very organized and almost professional operations. Me, I’m not much of a joiner. I make friends and leave it at that. After getting tangled up in the rank and responsibility scheme in Asheron’s Call I kinda swore off any voluntary involvement in a virtual night job.
Frustrated by mission difficulty or not I’m damned well going to get my hands on a YT-1300. I just hope it doesn’t mean having to finally break down and join a PA.
If I don’t have to sit on the planets grinding… damn… i think I’m in. This is what I wanted EVE to be.
Ok, I’m in NZ, where do I get this bloody thing! :D
Peter
Damn it, amazon won’t ship to NZ … ggRRrrRR!
Peter
I really don’t know who does not having much experience getting things shipped abroad. Doubtless somebody can help you.
One more consideration for a new player might be getting the cash to buy new ships. I’d built up a relatively modest million credits to spare before the game came out. I’ve spent about half getting halfway through the skill tree buying new hulls and the odd manufactured or retroengineered weapon. Most of my gear is scavenged. And I’m lucky enough to have a shipwright friend that wants to be crew on my YT-1300 when I get it. It’s good to be a good roleplayer. She helps me out with freebies from time to time. You might be able to work a deal with a shipwright for the occasional free hull or bit of gear in return for an exclusive contract supplying them with salvaged parts. Or you could make additional money selling parts. Not sure how lucrative that is as I haven’t tried it. The cash rewards alone from space missions don’t appear to be entirely self-sustaining. You can cover repairs and tipping (for the inevitable healing up at a medical center and cantina after a wreck) but you ain’t gonna get rich. Rich is going to be very helpful especially in getting higher tier hulls. These aren’t required, even the lowest tier hulls have their minor advantages, but they’re a really really good idea. I tend to doubt you’d get very far in a starting Scyk, TIE or Z-95, even an incredibly well engineered one with top of the line parts, in the skill grinding missions. They just can’t hold enough mass for the better weapons and shields not to mention all the other gear needed to support advanced combat. They do, however, retain the best maneuvering and dogfighting parameters. You’re just unlikely to do enough damage, to enough foes, rapidly enough to survive any serious furballs.
For making money, in my experience, there are two routes for the non-dedicated crafter/artisan and both involve some ground-grinding.
The most efficient is also the most demanding. High level terminal missions or just pick-up hunting groups against creatures that also drop useful materials (hide, bone, meat and the odd ‘rare’ item). This tends to require folks willing to hunt with you, good buffs and gear, as well as a mastery of one or more forms of ground combat. Some folks can solo like this, rangers and creature handlers have some built in advantages here, but it takes considerably longer as you need more downtime to heal up and rest between encounters. A buffed up PA zerg can mow down lots of otherwise intimidating beasties with barely a pause.
Less demanding in terms of dedication but with fairly good returns is earning up some skill as a surveyor (basic artisan tree). This is the worst, most boring, grind ever invented. You survey for a material and sit there hand sampling until your skill improves. And you really must grind it. Surveying is much more effective at higher levels - the range of territory you can search for needed material goes up. Once you have tier 3 or 4 in the skill you should be set and life goes from onerous to very easy. Just go to a website that tracks where the resources are and what quality they are, identify a market in need (talusian water for doctors for example, high quality steel for shipwrights, or just energy sources for other surveyors and to cut your own operating costs), get a slew of medium or heavy harvesters, and you’re in business. Compare prices on the bazaar before you sell or, better, establish some regular customers who’d rather not travel. Just ask them what they need and how much before you go off surveying. Downsides are threefold: spending money on expensive harvesters, spending time maintaining harvesters and surveying for resources and having to grind the skill in the first place. The upsides are definites especially for players with limited time to mess with making money: harvesters harvest whether you are on or offline. So plant 'em and forget about 'em. They’re grinding credits for you while you have a life. Also one column of skill boxes in artisan isn’t remotely the investment in time or effort that going out and becoming a master combatant, ranger or creature handler is. Two last notes: resources can and do run out so you’ll periodically be pulling up harvesters and relocating them. Mining in the wild, for a noncombatant, can be dangerous. Don’t get off your landspeeder until you know it’s safe. Don’t try to clear dangerous critters from an extraction site unless you can fight. You might try to hire nearby players (search functionality by skill or title) to help you or, possibly, consider building up some basic combat skills yourself.
Edit: A couple things occur to me. As I mentioned, selling salvage might obviate the need to mess around with the ground game entirely. I don’t do it as I’ve been giving away anything I don’t use to my shipwright. Maybe someone else has a better idea of what kinds of profits there are to be made? Surveying in my experience, once you’re good at it, isn’t a bad way to spend some time in-game. While you can get general information about resources from various crafters websites actual waypoints to rich deposits aren’t advertised and you’re largely left to discover them on your own or from contacts. This can lend itself to a sense of exploration and, occasionally, you’ll find new deposits of valuable resources before the website’s unofficial surveyors do. Also you’ll tend to stumble over points of interest and unusual sites out in the wilds.
Lastly, it looks like there are hooks in the game for asteroid mining. It’s not in yet but when it does arrive it’ll definitely cut down on the need leave space for those who’d just rather not.
Yes I’ve played some of the ground game and can get a few credits organised I am sure. I have mates I could bludge off as well… maybe.
We’ll see, not even sure I can get the damn thing delivered to me!
Peter
Ok you bugger, i’ve ordered it!
What server do Qt3’ers play on?
I’ve got some friends on the euro servers… but there’s no point in joining them when I am in NZ.
P
Well, don’t know how many are still playing. SWG wasn’t what alot of people were expecting or used to on a number of levels. Some intentional, some not. I’m on Starsider.
Hmm I think my mates might be there as well. Could end up handy.
Yes, SWG wasn’t what I wanted… but boy JTL sounds great.
I’ll cry if I’ve miss-read you :D
Peter
The simplest way to put it is that it’s ultimately a, mostly, mission-based space sim with some loot and the ability to customize ship loadouts. The potential for PvP looks incredible but I haven’t gotten to the point I’m ready to get into it yet. Graphics and sound are awesome.
What isn’t there that I’d like to see would be an economic and/or piratical game of some kind along the lines of a Privateer. As it is goods and resources don’t have any mass in the game so there’s really no need for ships to haul goods which makes the notion of spacegoing traders quaint at best. Which isn’t to say there can’t be piracy. Along with the ‘hooks’ for asteroid mining I’ve seen some comments in the forums that you can disable and board merchant vessels. They’ll give you a message that you’ve looted some resources or items but these things (many of which I’ve never heard of before) never show up in inventory or have any known function or value. This may be something coming up in a future update or some functionality that’ll be explored in the Hutt expansion (at least I think that’s the next one - was some time ago or so I recall).
So the question becomes, after you complete all your faction missions - then what? PvP seems to be the answer. But if it’s as aimless and pointless as groundbased PvP - why? At least with JtL I’ve got an answer. It’s fun. Why do people play X-Wing vs. TIE Fighter multiplayer? And one has to assume that the promise of a better realized Galactic Civil War means there’ll be more of a point to it eventually.
Another answer to ‘what next?’ is to abandon your career and start over on a new path. You get experience at double the rate on your second go around, treble on the third and so forth. In theory you could play through both Rebel, Imperial and all three neutral career paths with their unique gatekeeper missions. And these missions do have some variety and story elements, along the lines of most singleplayer flight sims, to keep you interested. Especially when you get to Tier 3 and 4.
But I definitely miss the possibility of being a spacegoing freetrader. If anyone’s backpocket is just as effective as your, nonexistant, cargo hold there’s really never going to be much of a future in it.