Category Archives: Star Wars Galaxies

Atheren’s Adventures The Year In Review 2018

World of Warcraft

The bulk of this year was spent playing World of Warcraft. Right after Blizzcon 2017, I started leveling characters so that they’d be at max level when Battle for Azeroth arrived. I found as I was doing this that I enjoyed the Class quests more than I would have guessed.

I stuck in my toe in some LFR’s, and they weren’t bad at all. I didn’t feel like there was much of a reward for participating in them, which I suppose is the point. You’re supposed to be in a Raid Guild that only let’s you go along if they’re desperate, and they sure aren’t going to let you have any gear drops, because those are for the real raiders. Pretty icky, in my opinion. At least if something is available as LFR you can just leap in there, and experience the content, since many story lines conclude in Raids, apparently. If that’s actually the case, you might want to tweak that so everyone can complete quest story lines start to finish on their own.

Only seven characters were ready when the expansion arrived, and I sent them through each area in kind of a little conga line. It was good, and then it became grindy, particularly in Stormsong Valley (which I’m still not over).

After taking a break in November/December I’ve gone back in with a new plan, an even better plan (Start the Revolution Without Me). I’m going to run characters to 120 one at a time, leading this time around with my Demon Hunter.

I didn’t realize how much I missed bouncing around on my characters on other servers, and creating new characters on new servers. Sometimes I like to drop back to simpler times in the game world. I killed off four characters I never play (still very hard to do). Whoo hoo! I now have six open character slots for creating new characters on realms unknown.

Once again I have to comment on the awful new character models. It would be more palatable if there were barbershop options to change eye size and color, and many more hairstyles and colors available.

Everquest 2

I was really enjoying Everquest 2 earlier this year, and subscribed for a time. Somehow I got caught up in trying to work on crafting for each character, and while it was interesting, it felt onerous after a bit, so I drifted away. I’m certain to return to this game in 2019 as I have some really enjoyable characters there, I like the world, I love the quests.

Blaugust

I participated for the first time. I was really pleased to reach my goal of posting every day, and I liked my content. What started off as a pretty convivial atmosphere among bloggers soon seemed rather clique-y to me. It also seemed to me that there was some unneeded competitiveness and bloggers taking shots at others. No need for that.

On the plus side, I looked at some games in my Steam Library, and really liked them, but need to go back and finish them.

As part of Blaugust, I dipped back into some games I hadn’t played in awhile, Lord of The Rings Online, Wildstar, and Rift and Secret World. I enjoyed my time in all of them, and was sad to see the announcement that Wildstar would close. I will try to make time for the remaining games again in 2019.

Elder Scrolls Online

I started playing this more regularly in September, logging in each day for the Reward. By October, I was playing longer sessions, had truly fallen for the game, and I subscribed. I hope to write about it more, it is so deep and rich.

Star Wars Galaxies (Emu) The other game I’ve played at almost Live Game Levels this year is Star Wars Galaxies, the Pre-Combat Upgrade version. The game remains the most absorbing, live your life in an alternate world experience ever. I’ve always hoped someone would make a game with all of it’s features, but there is still nothing like it.

Return of the The Last Chapter Blog as my Game Blog

It has been a good thing, moving back to my earlier blog. The blog was originally created to share World of Warcraft tips as I was learning them with my guild mates/family. They’re a rowdy bunch, though, and only my spouse always read it. I do like the Pages option at the top for linking to my favorite games and the sites that give guides for playing. That will need quite a bit of work.

I’ve found a bunch of new podcasts to try out, and will work on getting a updated list on the sidebar.

I miss my nice pictures to break up headings on the sidebar, so I’m going to get around that by sticking any picture I want to use on the sidebar in some selected post. Once you do that, it seems to become part of some nice picture archive you can always draw from. Work around solutions ftw.

The Conundrums of Guild Life

Guilds, guilds guilds.  If I analyze myself, I’m going to posit that I’m doomed to never be happy in guilds that aren’t like the first guild I was ever in, Galaxies Style.

It Offered:

Lively personalities, excellent guild chat.

Good Leadership (though this point varied/changed/proved the ultimate downfall of the guild along with the advent of World Of Warcraft entering the MMO scene)

A core group of about five players who were reliably on, always helpful, good at recruiting new members, always working to make a guild and ultimately a city that allowed the group to thrive and grow even more.

Regular events such as hunts or doing Rebel missions/base attacks to help people advance in the GCW (Galactic Civil War).

Anyone asking for help gets it from whoever can help.

Players who were generous with their time and crafts.

But what do I really want?

I’ve joined, often briefly, dozens of guilds from random invites.  The first things that gets me is silent guild chat in guilds with 500 members and only five ever on.

These have mostly been in Wow.   Early on, guilds that claimed they’d help you level would do nothing but direct you to Thotbott with any questions.   I want my lowbies to have someone help them with fights they have trouble with (doesn’t happen much anymore at any level, but there used to be sticking points in WOW’s terrain.) 

One of the best ways to level, and most fun for me is dungeons.  In any game, I’d like the guild to be willing to organize dungeon runs, just regular dungeons.  This not only provides, or should provide, leveling help, but it’s a great opportunity to train players in a non-harsh PUG environment how to play their classes well in a group. 

Did you see Eliot Lefebvre’s article http://massivelyop.com/2017/06/21/perfect-ten-mmo-grouping-advice-you-shouldnt-bother-giving/    
This, as they say.  None of these things are helpful to anyone in the entire dungeon group, certainly not to those trying to learn skills.   Ideally, the guilded player doesn’t need to PUG, and won’t hear these things, and they are a far better player for it.

Sharing of resources:    I know Guild Bank Management can be a pain, and people toss in all sorts of stuff, trying to contribute to the group.  Most often, they have no idea what is useful and what is not.  The frustrated GB manager can often be heard threatening people for putting in useless stuff which they’re going to toss or sell soon.   This can shake newbies to the core and make them feel like fools.  How does this contribute a  sense of welcome and camaraderie?

It’s called Guild Chat for a reason!  I have hardly ever run into a player who was a motor mouth and they never were silent.  I personally don’t appreciate or take part in conversations about the real world, I’m here to leave that behind  zzzzzzzz.   I do think that players in guilds, particularly the Officers, should be in there talking to people about the game, seeing if anyone needs help, has questions.  There should be some spark of life in the place.   One of the things a guild might recruit for is personality.  Look for it, find it, encourage it.

Make newbies feel welcome.   The people recruiting should be aware of the person’s class and profession, and should help to introduce the player to the others.  Let them know who is good at a particular class and profession so the player can have some idea of who can mentor them.  Having players who will be new member mentors is guild role that can be key to a guild’s health and survival.

My Own Efforts

I don’t find these things often, and so in the past I’ve created my own guilds.  Because we have had enough family members to keep things interesting, it hasn’t gone beyond that.  Early on I encouraged everyone to go ahead and invite other players to join, but aren’t we all such introverts that we never did it.  As the leader, I polled people and it turns out they didn’t actually want strangers in the guild, making them be social and putting their mitts in the guild bank.  Rofl, rofl, rofl.

Undaunted, I really wanted to be the super duper guild leader I desired to find myself.

I created a guild blog that had tips I’d learned from voracious reading about the game, and interesting articles.  How I wanted to share!   Nobody but my beloved spouse, who generously reads all my blogs, ever looked at the blog.

I had my crafters leveling as quickly as I could and I provided potions, scrolls, armor, weapons, every single thing I could make so people could grab and go.

I put money in the bank as I could. My formula was that any of my characters who had over 50 gold would drop the “excess” in the guild bank.   Guild repair money, training money, mount money.

We did a few battlegrounds as a group.  I was awful, but I went in.  These didn’t last too long.

Guild dungeon runs started out not too bad. 

Three of us liked dungeons and enjoyed running through them whether guild or pug.  The others, not so much, but they’d do it.    For the weekly guild runs, which I loved because doh, I actually knew the people, I went into overdrive.  I created character sheets for the dungeoneers and ahead of the weekly run, checked the WOW Armory to see what they had armor wise and sent them new pieces if I could make better.  I sent scrolls, potions and jewelry for their class and level.

One person (who doesn’t read this blog) had a Paladin and Warrior for the runs but only liked cloth armor and they wouldn’t wear anything else.  This person ultimately felt I wouldn’t let them play their class as they liked because I sent things with stats that they actually needed.  On the plus side, I learned a lot about the games classes.

Only one person would tank regularly, and was that dread thing, a Draggy Tank.   Here’s where the big disadvantage comes in to a family group–nobody would ask him to slow down or talk to him in any way about the difficulty of keeping up.  Instead they complained to me.  When I mentioned this to Draggy Man, he blew it off and those who were unhappy claimed they loved loved loved his tanking and wouldn’t change a thing.  So depressing.

That whole problem eventually ended our dungeon runs.  We actually made it much farther than I imagined we ever would, up to Wrath of the Lich King dungeons.   Then kablooie.

Now hardly anyone is playing, and all on different servers most days.  I think sometimes of opening up one of the guilds to Real People (ha!) but then I have to play more, be there, find a solid core of officers.  As you can tell I’m scattered across several servers myself in World of Warcraft, and I play ten other games at any given time so I can’t the do the job right, and thus I won’t do it at all, unless something changes.

The Point Of All This

My new guild, which was fun at first, has had guild chat fall mostly silent.  Oddly if you say hi, you get a ton of responses, but if you ask a question, you’re now getting zippo.  Sad face.

It seems to now be mostly becoming a Raiding guild, and nothing else is worthy of consideration.

Guild Dungeon Runs have only ever been for Mythic and Heroic and I’m bummed because I hoped to have this guild be one where people ran dungeons together to level up.  I don’t know if I can think of a diplomatic way to see if regular runs, maybe even just once a week, could be set up for normal dungeoneering.    Why why why am I still Pugging in a group like this?

The guild bank is on major Lockdown, I don’t know what happened there, because I’m not around all the time, but every tab is Deposit Only or Locked.  Lazy dog, I hoped when I started my first character here that I could just be a gatherer and toss stuff in the bank and some sweet crafter would provide basic bags and potions I needed.

I now have my alt army in place there with all the crafts covered, but you have to level those characters too in order to get anything useful for the other alts.   There are only so many hours in a day, or night, as that’s usually when I play.

This is kind of the point at which I usually silently leave a guild all disappointed, but I think I have to hang in there, and try to talk more in guild chat myself, try to work out some of these things, because there are many many nice people in this group, they’re just chasing other goals than I have myself.

See? I do have some deep thots in my head.

On A Rainy Evening

No sun, no problem.

Star Wars Galaxies

I made a factory run of Walls with my Architect, promptly using them up on Cities and Guild Halls.

That twitch to shoot something brought out my halfway there Pistoleer.  She would also like to be a Bounty Hunter, but I’m missing just a single box to complete Marksman, Rifles 4.  Oh how painful to try to get that last box.  Using an SG-82 rifle which looks like a bent pipe.  zzzzzz

I sent my TK out briefly for some easy peasy Bol hunting on Dantooine, but her second mission had her chased by a Huurton who had been chomping my bols.  There were also two groups of Grauls right nearby.  It was never going to end well.

Lord of The Rings Online

More progress in Lothlorien.  Bizarrely a quest sent me back into Moria to help Bosi.  No one can resist a dwarf.   My Yellow Vision is improving.  Things didn’t look so bad tonight.

Wildstar

I downloaded Wildstar and will be playing my Medic.  It took me a few minutes to get reoriented to the game, but I’m glad to be back, giving it another try.  Such a great looking, dare I say, happy game.

Secret World

It’s official Secret World Day so into the Innsmouth Academy instance I went.   I immediately hit the wrong icon on the door because I was positioned oddly when I selected it.  All downhill from there.   It has been a while since I played and I know I didn’t get the codes right in earlier puzzles right off.  They must have let me re-start somehow.  This door isn’t.  I tried looking up how to re-set door puzzles in a variety of different ways.  Nada. 

Tried going out of the instance and back in.  Out of the game and back in.  Plink!  Somehow I’m getting in there.

SWGEmu Publish 8 on 6/4/16

Publish 8 is now on the SWG Emu  http://www.swgemu.com/forums/content.php  

While the Village is still not available, they seem to be getting closer.  Lots of other updates to the game, including Cries of Alderan Part 2.  


Publish 8: A Galaxy Divided


System

  • Improved server stability
  • Made some performance optimizations
  • Made some adjustments to reduce server memory usage
  • Fixed some memory leaks
  • Fixed some more causes of database bloat
Spawns/World
  • Improved and optimized how random world spawning works. A player no longer needs to be moving for things to spawn nearby
  • All planets now have a chance to dynamically spawn various spawns that are not unique to the planet (faction spawns, thugs, dark jedi, etc.)
  • Added/changed several static spawns, especially within non-player cities
  • Added some spawns to the Talus Imperial vs. Rebel Battle POI
  • Added spawns to the Tatooine Imperial Oasis
  • Added spawns to the Rori Black Sun Bunker
  • Added many public starship crafting stations
  • Added the Naboo kidnapped royalty and associated heralds
  • Many Jabba’s Palace mobs now have animations or patrol about the palace
  • There have been some non-existent buildings showing up on some planet’s planetary maps. These have been removed.
  • Increased the diameter of the the village “fog” area
  • When trying to place a structure, the ground around a dynamic spawn is now yellow
Creatures/NPCs/AI
  • Fixed stats and/or other details on many mobs
  • Mobs now regen HAM at a percentage of the max per tick
  • Mobs should no longer aggro through locked doors
  • Mobs no longer instantly stand after a posture change
  • The use of certain emotes on imperial npcs will now cause them to knock the player down, in addition to them being fined
  • Npcs will no longer use intimidate or force intimidate
  • Npcs that give a quest will now have the appropriate overhead icon. Please report any non-JTL ones that are still missing.
Events/Dungeons/Theme Parks/Quests
  • Much work has been done on the village, force sensitive, and jedi but it is incomplete and not ready for mass testing. They will therefore remain disabled for this publish
  • Added the theater manager quest series
  • Added Act 2 of the Cries of Alderaan story line (Requires the badge from Act 1 in order to start)
  • Added Kima Nazith quest line
  • Added Melios Purl quest line
  • Added Pooja Naberrie quest line
  • Added Shaki Hamachil quest line
  • Added Shibb Nisshil quest line
  • The item rewards from Thrawn’s final mission in the Imperial theme park should now always be a matching helm and suit
  • Escort mission targets no longer take on the player’s faction when the player is on leave. This prevents them from being attacked by mobs that the player cannot attack.
  • Fixed a few theme park spawns that would attack each other when they shouldn’t
  • Fixed Cries of Alderaan message not appearing in inventory if the fragments were combined with a full inventory
  • Newly acquired warren evidence can now be deleted from a player’s datapad
  • Turning in the warren evidence will now properly grant a faction point award
  • The life day quests can now be repeated each year
Player
  • The new player tutorial has been completely rewritten and re-enabled
  • New players are now sent the new-player starting email
  • The new player creation lockout timer is now 1 hour (down from 24 hours)
  • Changed HAM regeneration rates to be more in line with live
  • Fixed several full inventory checks that didn’t take into account the items within containers
  • Surrendering a skill will no longer remove abilities that are also granted by another skill that the player has
  • Getting an item from a factory crate will now always place the item into the player’s inventory
  • Triple incaps should more reliably cause death and the span that they must be within is now 10 minutes (down from 15)
  • Added 6-month expiration to in-game mail. Because of the large number of old mails on Basilisk, we’re throttling the expiration. This means that not all old mails will be deleted right away. There is no predictable order that the deletions will take place in. Any mail over 6-months old is at risk and might be deleted at any time.
  • Fixed the sender format of in-game mails
  • LD duration is now 3 minutes
  • /logout will now properly remove a player from the world if they are in a safe location, rather than setting them LD
  • Logging in while still LD will no longer make your player invulnerable while loading
  • A player’s action queue is now cleared when they are set LD
  • A player will no longer auto-attack while LD
  • Speak language commands no longer appear in the command browser
  • The various language commands (/basic, /dosh, etc.) now cause the player to speak in the appropriate language for the given message
  • A decay report is now presented to a player upon cloning
Combat
  • The /assist command is now functional
  • It is no longer possible to attack mobs behind locked doors
  • Auto attacks are no longer sent to the client to queue but instead just executed server side. This will prevent them from sometimes getting queued after another attack is queued due to latency.
  • Auto attacks will now fire at an interval closer to a player’s attack speed
  • The attack command will no longer queue with higher priority than other commands
  • Using /peace will now clear the combat queue
  • All attacks that hit a single pool will now also do a small percentage of the damage to the other two pools as well
  • Attacks that blind, dizzy, intimidate, or stun will now refresh the duration of those states if they are already present on the target
  • Defense vs. Intimidate is no longer functional
  • The intimidation state applied from multiple sources will no longer stacks it’s effect
  • Warcry, and similar delays, will now delay more types of actions including posture changes, squad leader commands, and species’ innate abilities
  • Increased the range at which combat spam will appear from 70m to 85m
  • Fire dots should no longer be reduced by armor
  • Fire and Disease DoTs can now incapacitate their target
  • Creature special attacks with a DoT component will now apply the DoT to pool that was hit with the attack instead of always applying to health
  • DoT timers are properly reset when a DoT is cured so that dots applied later do not tick at incorrect intervals.
  • Dots should now tick more reliably at the proper intervals
  • The amount of battle fatigue applied by a fire DoT will now be static for each tick instead of possibly increasing with each tick if the target has high BF already.
  • Weapon fire dots no longer cause excessive amounts of wounds
  • Fixed many issues with combat animations
  • Combat commands that include a posture change now properly animate
  • Attacks that incapacitate or kill a target will now animate properly
  • Area of Effect attacks should now animate towards the proper target
  • Default attacks should now play a much larger variety of animations
  • Many attacks now have multiple animations that are used under the appropriate conditions instead of always using the same one
  • The use of consumable heavy weapons should now animate properly
  • Using the last grenade or heavy weapon in a stack should now show the correct animation
  • Added combat flytext that denotes hit location
GCW
  • Fixed the layout of several different faction base types (newly placed bases only)
  • A faction base can no longer be placed where there are already 3 faction bases within 600m
  • All faction bases now have stronger defenders more in line with live
  • Faction bases should no longer bug out and prevent entry after the turrets are destroyed
  • A single defense can now be donated to a PvP faction base during each vulnerability
  • PvE faction bases can no longer have any defenses donated or removed via the HQ terminal
  • Faction Base terminals should now have functionality that is closer to live
  • A player must now remain at a faction base’s HQ terminal for 60s in order to shutdown a base destruction sequence
  • Added many missing system messages related to faction bases
  • Players of the appropriate faction rank can now view the vulnerability status of a faction base
  • Only Special Forces faction bases will now register on the planetary map
  • Doctors/Dancers/Musicians can now register within SF faction bases of the appropriate type
  • Added faction perks for players registered within SF faction Bases
  • Turrets now attack faster
  • Each turret type now has a different damage type
  • Fixed the armor rating and resists of some turret types
  • Turrets can now attack non-player targets
  • Auto-fire turrets will no longer focus fire a single target but will instead change targets periodically
  • Turrets are no longer aggressive towards non-faction targets
  • Faction mobs should no longer ever attack their own faction’s turrets
  • All GCW stronghold cities should now have mobs of the appropriate faction spawning within them
  • GCW planetary control is now checked and adjusted periodically rather than changing on the fly
  • Added factional spawns to non-stronghold, non-player cities on Corellia, Naboo, and Tatooine. The controlling faction is checked when spawning and re-spawning to determine which side’s mob to spawn.
  • Faction recruiters now have conversation options to check the status of the GCW on their planet
  • /gcwstatus now directs players to visit a faction recruiter or a newsnet terminal to check the status of the GCW
  • Added field faction status change
  • The pvp rating system (and /showpvprating) are now functional
  • Attacking an opposing player’s vehicle will now cause a tef
  • Triple incapping someone during a duel will no longer give a tef to their opponent
Professions

Armorsmith:

  • The imperial PSG schematic now has the proper effectiveness ranges and now utilizes the proper resource attributes for base effectiveness
Artisan:
  • Adjusted mind/action drain amounts for surveying and sampling
  • Dismounting is no longer required prior to sampling (it will automatically dismount you)
  • Fixed a bug with experimentation success calculations which caused experimentation results to always be better than they should be
  • Survey tools now only have pre-cu range options
  • Newly crafted Dustcrepe should now be functional
Bio-Engineer:
  • Adjusting a bio-engineered pet’s stats will now properly recalculate based on the adult level instead of on the current level
  • Fixed stun resist not being passed on to pets during crafting
  • Adjusted damage and resists formula for crafted pets
  • Being attacked as a result of a failed dna sample attempt will now remove mask scent
Bounty Hunter:
  • Increased the damage and wounds caused by torso shot’s fire dot
  • Fast blast now hits all 3 pools and has a high accuracy bonus
  • Npc bounty mission success/failure is now determined by who gets loot rights rather than by who gets the killing blow
  • Fast Blast and Spray Shot now have their proper weapon type restrictions
Brawler:
  • Fixed the animation of 1h and 2h lunge2 attacks
Creature Handler:
  • Changed the taming process to be more like live
  • Creature Handling xp is now awarded separately for each pet instead of in one lump
  • Changed the creature training success formula to be more forgiving to lower skilled creature handlers
  • The Creature Taming Bonus skill mod on SEAs is no longer disabled
Droid Engineer:
  • Players can now download the waypoint from a droid with a merchant barker module installed
Entertainer:
  • Adjusted action drain amounts for entertaining and flourishing
  • It is now possible to listen and watch at the same time regardless of which action you perform first.
  • Fixed the bug that caused buffs to not be given reliably
  • /bandflourish now only gives xp to the one who uses the command and not to the entire band
  • It is now possible to drop an instrument to play when a different one is already dropped
  • The sing emote is now properly entertainer only
Image Designer:
  • We think we fixed the issue where players could end up bald after an image design session. Please report if it still happens.
  • Ending up with a hair object in inventory after an image design should no longer happen
Marksman:
  • The point blank area 1 skill is now an area of effect rather than a cone effect
Medic/Doctor/Combat Medic:
  • /healdamage will no longer sometimes not work if a player with no Combat Medic skills is carrying some ranged stimpacks
  • /quickheal can now be used in combat
  • All medical commands with a mind cost should now have the cost adjusted based on the player’s focus
  • Area heals now properly check all potential targets for validity before healing them
  • Revived players will now have a 60s grogginess debuff
  • /healstate and /healenhance can now be used without arguments
  • /healstate now plays the proper client effect
Merchant:
  • Removed the female Bith vendor option
  • Newly created vendors now have the vendor search option enabled by default
  • Vendors that run out of maintenance are now unregistered and have vendor search disabled
  • Vendor Ad-barking is now functional
  • It is once again possible to transfer a structure containing a vendor
  • More bazaar/vendor pages can be filtered by category
  • Fixed pagination on various bazaar/vendor screens
Pistoleer:
  • Removed the knockdown effect from disarming shot 2
  • Added a knockdown effect to pistol melee defense 2
Politician:
  • Fixed an issue that could sometimes cause a mayor to lose citizenship in their own city
  • Civic structures can no longer be transferred
Ranger/Scout:
  • It should no longer be possible to get scouting xp via mask scent more than one time per creature
  • Mobs no longer continuously check against mask scent/camo. If a player succeeds once, the mob won’t notice them as long as they stay within range
  • Area track results will no longer include transport shuttles
  • The resource concentration thresholds for each harvest adjustment (skinny, fat, etc.) have been changed. All steps above skinny should now be more prevalent.
  • Added the flytext for snare/root traps
Smuggler:
  • Adjusted the amount of xp granted from most types of slices
  • Slicing armor with negative encumbrance will no longer increase the encumbrance
  • The feign death skill is now functional
Tailor:
  • Newly crafted Crafting Aprons can now be worn by Wookiees and Ithorians
  • Crafting apron schematics that take a crafting tool as an ingredient can now be crafted with individual (non factory crate) tools
Items/Loot
  • Newly crafted or looted personal shield generators now have lightsaber resistance
  • looted janta and donkuwah knives now always have their static dot
  • Fixed the values on static janta knife dots
  • Looted Bounty Hunter Armor now always has its default color scheme
  • Added bubble tank schematic to loot
  • Fixed the range check on the /loot command
  • Vehicles will now decay over time as long as they are called. The decay rate is dependent on the type of vehicle.
  • Removed the Nightsister armguard from loot and added it and the Rebel Endor Helmet as options to the Veteran Rewards System
  • Powerups now have a yellow name
  • Fixed the position of many housing signs
  • With publish 7 we made the chance for exceptional and legendary item loot be modified by the level of the mob. That modifier’s effect has been reduced.
  • Fixed some helms that appeared as armor to appear as clothing (newly acquired ones only)
  • Fixed several item types that would not properly update their charges left when going from 2 to 1 charge
Pets
  • Added guard command functionality
  • Added ranged attack command functionality
  • Added befriend command functionality
  • Pets should now properly disengage when their owner ends a duel with their target
  • Pets are no longer immune to being attacked while their master is dead
  • Pet’s max HAM is now reduced as their vitality drops
  • Newly tamed humbabas and savage humbabas can now be trained as a mount
  • Pets are now considered valid targets for AI threat evaluations. This should allow pets to tank if they are not out damaged
  • Droid medical bonuses are now removed from the owner if the droid dies, is incapacitated, runs out of power, or is out of range
  • Items can now be placed in a droid’s item storage compartment while in a full house
  • The gallop cooldown is now tied to the mount and not the rider
  • Pets can no longer be told to follow or attack a target behind a locked door
Group/Guild
  • Changed the group level formula. Each individual member now has a more significant impact on the final level instead of 90%+ of it being decided by the highest level member
  • A Group’s level should now properly be recalculated any time one of it’s members’ level changes (changing weapons, learning/dropping a skill, etc.)
  • Added the lottery and random group loot rules
  • looted credits are now split among nearby group members
  • Group loot messages should now always display the player and item names properly
  • Out of range group members will now properly display their planet or a directional arrow pointing in their direction
  • A guild leader can now claim ownership of a guild hall owned by an inactive member (one that hasn’t logged in for more than 28 days)
  • All guild prompts should now properly include names
  • A guild will now cleanup their sponsored players list during it’s weekly update
  • Added guild elections. These can be manually enabled by a guild leader and will also trigger automatically during a guild’s weekly update if it has an inactive leader (30 days since last being online) or no leader
  • /guildstatus no longer requires the one using the command to be in a guild
  • A guild leader can now leave the guild. Elections will begin automatically.
Missions
  • Fixed some mission details changing after logging off and back on again
  • Mission descriptions are now displayed on examine, and the mission waypoint title are now correct
  • Entertainer mission terminals can now send player’s to player cities to perform
  • Hunting missions now only target creatures
  • Significantly increased hunting mission payouts
  • Deliver missions can now be taken on the adventure planets at any of their outposts
  • Deliver/crafting missions should now actually send you to the start and end locations that they advertise instead of a random one near the advertised positions
  • Adjusted the deliver/crafting mission reward formula to not only consider the distance between the start and end npcs, but also the distance to the start npc
  • Doubled the xp reward for completion of a bounty mission
  • Bounty hunter mission terminals can no longer be sliced
  • Adjusted which mobs are attached to some destroy missions (especially npc ones) so that the range of levels of the mobs are not as wide.
  • Standardized the span of levels that destroy missions will be available at. This should make it easier to find certain missions that had a short span before and make missions that had a long span less prevalent.
  • When looking for destroy missions in a group there is a threshold where a higher group level will not increase the minimum level of missions shown. This is to prevent high level groups from having no missions show up when none on the planet are high enough (and has been this way for several publishes). That threshold is now set on a per planet basis. Planets with higher level missions have a higher threshold.
  • Changed the formula for calculating the credit rewards of destroy missions. Being in a group no longer gives a significant boost, but the new baseline is higher than what payouts were while in a group before. A player’s/group’s level now has a small impact on the max potential payout (higher level groups can see higher paying missions).
  • Fixed grouped mission payouts to function as they did at 14.1. The payout is divided by the number of total players instead of only by the number of players in range. A player must be in range to receive their portion.
Misc
  • Redesigned the random name generator for players, npcs, and resources with different rules based on species or resource class. Random names should be more similar to how they were on live
  • Added the following decoration type player event perks: AT-AT, AT-ST, bantha, fruit stand, gravestone, meat rack
  • Added all venue type player event perks
  • Added the following game type player event perks: jukebox, capture-the-flag, lottery droid, scavenger hunt chests, shuttle beacon
  • Added the following personnel type player event perks: recruiters, honor guards
  • The self powered harvester veteran reward is now functional and available
  • Fixed a few potential causes of client crashes
  • Added the ability to create and moderate custom chat rooms
  • The auto-joined ‘General’ chat room no longer exists. Players can opt to join the main ‘Chat’ room via the channel browser for a public, galaxy-wide chat room
  • When chatting in a chat room, “Core3” is no longer appended before the player name on each message
  • Added and/or improved many abilities for staff

 

Some Nights…

 World of Warcraft

I’m trying to get my Rogue leveled to Draenor.  She’s slogging through Hyjal, in what seems like my 20th time through the area.  Things are going well, she wins fights pretty quickly and onward.

Tonight a Horde Personage was working the same area and had to run in and kill anything I was going for.  I don’t understand at all why Horde and Alliance can’t talk.  It is crazy that I can’t tell the guy some indelicate bit.

One step ahead of me for every quest.  Get to the cave where you have to drag the little turtle around and kill the big turtle. The guys appears out of nowhere, whack whack.

I’ll just go away and come back later.

Swg Emu-ski

Ok, I have several things to do in SWG so I’ll just pop in there.

Frozen at character load screen…

zzzzzzzz……

Lord of the Rings Online

Hmmm they’re going to start the transfer process again Monday the 14th.  It occurs to me my Meneldor characters might get split up and some low level characters might be holding items for higher level ones. 

I should check their pockets while there is time.  Sure enough the Warden has wood and a boatload of recipes for my Minstrel.  Her inventory and bank are full of stuff for the other character.  Poor thing.

Log in Minstrel, see what craft level she’s at, have Warden send her wood.

For some bizarre reason, My level 43 Minstrel is in the Shire, near Needlehole.   Her map thingie would take her to Angmar, but I’d like her to catch up on crafts so she can clear inventory space.

I could just ride, but I decide to use the Stable horses.  Needlehole to Hobbiton. Hobbiton to West Bree.

Except.  Suddenly my horse freezes.  Can’t dismount.   Try logging out to log back in but Disconnected from Server.

I’d like to play something for a bit longer tonight but I guess I don’t dare.

A Trandoshan, A Wookiee And A Rodian Walk Into A Cantina: "Neverending Content"

Tobold has an interesting post on “neverending content” based on a quote from former World of Warcraft developer Ghostcrawler:

 “Neverending content leads to making things so difficult you can’t progress or asking you to run the same content 100 times.”.

First, I have to say “neverending content” is exactly what Galaxies provides.  Resources, skills, creatures, the entire world dynamically changes all of the time.  There are only a few scripted events in the game that will present the same challenges every time you go through them.  Jabbas Palace, The Corellian Corvette, The Warren.  These are the kinds of places most like other games where the variance of the experience depends on your character, class, weapons, and armor.

 

As I’ve said in the past, I wish, and do not understand technically why it isn’t possible for dungeons to be scalable according to group members and their skill sets.  It should look at your weapons, armor, level, class and provide loot that will be useful to and mobs that will challenge the party members. 

I’m also very tired of people running through dungeons they’ve been through a million times, “bored of this”.  In addition to the other dynamically generated features of a dungeon, I want to see the maps change and be randomly generated.   You will never know exactly where to go, what to do, what loot you may get. How hard can it be to make that work?

I’m not a programmer or anything at all but a player, but if the game can check your level and armor item level before sending you into a dungeon, it can sure check for the other things.

The randomly generated maps, mobs, loot…seems like just another set of variables to include to me.

Poof! Somebody should make it so.

Galaxies Tuesday: Doctor’s Hunting List…

Apologies to my loyal Galaxies Tuesday readers for no Galaxies at all last week. 😦  Busy, busy with Draenor.  You know how that goes.

My first character in Galaxies was a Doctor.  It actually took me six months to get Master Doctor because one of the lines of the skill tree was medicinal crafting and an ore that I needed did not spawn on my server for several months.  I was just stuck.  When it did spawn, it’s stats were absolute junk but I was so thrilled to even see it show up.

The resource shifts in Galaxies were part of the thrill of the Resource Hunt.  Something might not show up at all, or it would only spawn on Dathomir, or in some impossible to place anything but a small harvester spot.  In the case of creature resources, you would really need the help of a hunting group, particularly on the “adventure planets” in order to gather enough to use or sell.  Sometimes you could just get in a random group of people hunting the resource, but best if you could snare it all for yourself, muhahaha.

Doctors’ Hunting List – Medical Meat!!!
Complete as of 5 April 2004

All of this data is nicked from SWGCreatures.comunashamedly!  Great resource, but when I was hunting for either Herbivore or Avian meat, I found that I kept on having to go back the website, note down what I should be looking for on a given planet… and of course, by the time the next spawn of decent meat had shifted in for that planet, the original piece of paper was long gone.  So I offer this table instead. 

Please send updates to SWGCreatures.com, not me!

“Chall” is the creature’s challenge level as reported by SWGCreatures.com.  I’ve started trying to give an indication of how much of the relevant resource each creature drops… but this was very 11th hour, and I’ve only got 3 so far!  In any event, this entire column is very vague, as I’m not sure what the relationship is between harvesting skill and amount harvested.  To fill you in, I’ve got the third box in the scout tree, but I’ve rounded all these drops to the closest 5.

Planet

Herbivore

Avian
Creature
Chall
Drop
Creature
Chall
Drop

Naboo

Bolle Bol
27
50
Nuna
10
 
Chuba, Large
5
5
Flewt, Savage Queen
10
 
Falumpaset
19
 
Kaadu Trampler, Aggravated
17
 
Falumpaset, Rogue
18
 
Kaadu, Female
12
 
Gnort
4
 
Kaadu, Gungan
13
 
Gnort, Massive
4
 
Kaadu, Male
14
 
Gualama, Dappled
14
20
Kaadu, Motley
8
 
Pulveriser, Elder
?
 
Nuna, Carnivorous
13
 
 
 
 
Nuna, Diseased
6
 
 
 
 
Nuna, Dwarf
5
 
 
 
 
Peko Peko
14
 
 
 
 
Peko Peko, Albatross
155
 

Corellia

Bageraset
10
 
Kaadu
10
 
Bageraset Bruiser
12
 
Carrion Spat
10
 
Bageraset, Rogue
13
 
Carrion Spat Corpsereaver
13
 
Durni
7
 
Carrion Spat, Giant
18
 
Durni, Crazed
10
 
Gulginaw
13
 
Kahmurra, Berserk
19
 
Gulginaw, Devil
18
 
Krabhu
10
 
Gulginaw, Greater
21
 
Krabhu, Violent
13
 
Rasp, Agrilat
8
 
Murra
10
 
Rasp, Howling Plumed
4
 
Murra, Forest
12
 
Rasp, Majestic Plumed
8
 
Murra, Mountain
17
 
Rasp, Plumed
7
 
Paralope
6
 
 
 
 
Paralope, Wooded
7
 
 
 
 
Vynock
9
 
 
 
 

Tatooine

Bantha
15
 
Nuna, Dwarf
5
 
Bantha, Bonecracker
?
 
 
 
 
Bantha, Bull
20
 
 
 
 
Bantha, Dune
17
 
 
 
 
Bantha, Dwarf
11
 
 
 
 
Bantha, Feral
15
 
 
 
 
Bantha, Matriarch
25
 
 
 
 
Bantha, Rogue
15
 
 
 
 
Bantha, Tusken
25
 
 
 
 
Boar, Blight
12
 
 
 
 
Boar, Wild Dune
?
 
 
 
 
Boar, Zucca
10
 
 
 
 
Eopie
7
 
 
 
 
Eopie, Desert
16
 
 
 
 
Eopie, Dwarf
3
 
 
 
 
Eopie, Jundland
10
 
 
 
 
Gorg
6
 
 
 
 
Gorg, Glutton
7
 
 
 
 
Razorback, Desert
24
 
 
 
 
Ronto
18
 
 
 
 
Ronto, Bull
23
 
 
 
 
Tatooine Mynock
15
 
 
 
 

Dantooine

Bol
29
 
 
 
 
Bol, Lesser Plains
10
 
 
 
 
Bol, Pack Runner
26
 
 
 
 
Bol, Seething Crusher
44
 
 
 
 
Enraged Defender
?
 
 
 
 
Piket
30
 
 
 
 
Piket, Fierce Protector
45
 
 
 
 
Piket, Longhorn
37
 
 
 
 
Piket, Longhorn Female
30
 
 
 
 
Piket, Plains Walker
32
 
 
 
 
Thune
26
 
 
 
 
Thune, Grassland Guardian
40
 
 
 
 
Thune, Herd Leader
48
 
 
 
 
Thune, Hostile Mother
30
 
 
 
 

Dathomir

Kwi
10
 
Reptilian Flier
15
 
Kwi, Female
10
 
Reptilian Flier, Ancient
25
 
Kwi, Injured
8
 
Reptilian Flier, Enraged
27
 
Malkloc
22
 
Reptilian Flier, Mature
20
 
Malkloc, Bull
28
 
Reptilian Flier, Young
10
 
Malkloc, Massive
22
 
 
 
 
Malkloc, Massive
20
 
 
 
 
Malkloc, Plainswalker
84
 
 
 
 
Malkloc, Plainswalker Female
81
 
 
 
 
Malkloc, Plainswalker Young
55
 
 
 
 
Verne
17
 
 
 
 

Endor

Bolle Bol, Bark Biter
27
 
 
 
 
Bolle Bol, Calf
15
 
 
 
 
Bolle Bol, Colt
17
 
 
 
 
Bolle Bol, Female
32
 
 
 
 
Bolle Bol, Herd Leader
?
 
 
 
 
Bolle Bol, Male
30
 
 
 
 
Bolle Bol, Stomper
23
 
 
 
 
Bordock, Ancient
45
 
 
 
 
Bordock, Foal
25
 
 
 
 
Bordock, Herd Master
40
 
 
 
 
Bordock, Mare
32
 
 
 
 
Bordock, Roaming Stud
34
 
 
 
 
Jax, Blooming
27
 
 
 
 
Jax, Blushing
27
 
 
 
 
Jax, Bounding
16
 
 
 
 
Jax, Pouncing
13
 
 
 
 
Lantern Bird
21
 
 
 
 
Lantern Bird, Aged
27
 
 
 
 
Lantern Bird, Gleaming
34
 
 
 
 
Lantern Bird, Radiant
40
 
 
 
 
Lantern Bird, Shimmering
30
 
 
 
 
Squall, Elder
9
 
 
 
 
Squall, Rabid
9
 
 
 
 
Swirl Prong, Erratic
27
 
 
 
 

Lok

Gurk
30
 
Flit
6
 
Gurk, Crazed Destroyer
43
 
Flit, Bloodsucker
9
 
Gurk, Feral
34
 
Flit, Giant
19
 
Gurk, Gatherer
30
 
Flit, Harasser
10
 
Gurk, Shaggy Youth
30
 
Flit, Youth
6
 
Gurk, Tracker
30
 
Perleck, Scavenger
15
 
Gurk, Whelp
27
 
Perlek
14
 
Gurnaset
15
 
Perlek, Ravager
18
 
Gurnaset, Hatchling
5
 
Pharple
5
 
Mynock, Lowland Salt
26
 
Pharple, Giant
7
 
Mynock, Riverside Sulphur
33
 
Pharple, Runty
3
 
Mynock, Salt
23
 
 
 
 
Mynock, Sulphur Pool
30
 
 
 
 
Snorbal, Calf Female
19
 
 
 
 
Snorbal, Calf Male
22
 
 
 
 
Snorbal, Elder Female
34
 
 
 
 
Snorbal, Elder Male
37
 
 
 
 
Snorbal, Mature Female
31
 
 
 
 
Snorbal, Mature Male
32
 
 
 
 

Rori

Gualama, Dappled
14
 
Rasp, Crescent
7
 
Jax, Bearded
11
 
Rasp, Horned
6
 
Jax, Bearded Mammoth
18
 
Rasp, Sickle
8
 
Jax, Fuzzy
13
 
Vir vur
10
 
Nudfuh
13
 
Vir vur, Dashing
12
 
Nudfuh, Pudgy
9
 
Vir vur, Dusk
15
 
Squall, Deranged
15
 
Vir vur, Midnight
16
 
Squall, Female
10
 
Vir vur, Timid
8
 
Squall, Frail
6
 
Vir vur, Twilight
13
 
Squall, Leviasquall
19
 
 
 
 
Squall, Meek Avenging
6
 
 
 
 
Squall, Vicious
12
 
 
 
 

Talus

Huf dun
19
 
Fynock
12
 
Huf dun, Bull
22
 
Fynock, Clipped
9
 
Huf dun, Stunted
?
 
Fynock, Giant
42
 
Huf dun, Vicious
19
 
Fynock, Guardian Frenzied
12
 
Kahmurra
15
 
Fynock, Jungle
14
 
Kahmurra, Beserk
19
 
Fynock, Queen Glutted
14
 
Kahmurra, Docile
10
 
Fynock, Youth Feared
7
 
Kahmurra, Frenzied
33
 
Fynock, Youth Fearful
5
 
Kahmurra, Genetically Enhanced
30
 
Gulginaw, Devil
18
 
Kahmurra, Mutated
26
 
Rasp, Flite
8
 
Kahmurra, Rabid Mutant
?
 
Rasp, Giga Flite
11
 
Kima
18
 
Rasp, Horned
6
 
Kima, Feeble
11
 
Rasp, Percussive
12
 
Kima, Hilltop
22
 
Rasp, Song
10
 
Kima, Wolf
19
 
 
 
 
Kima, Woodland
18
 
 
 
 
Paralope
6
 
 
 
 
Vynock
9
 
 
 
 
Vynock, Foaming
14
 
 
 
 

Yavin IV

Skreeg, Gatherer
?
 
Choku
?
 
Skreeg, Hunter
22
 
Choku, Female
13
 
Skreeg, Scout
18
 
Choku, Frenzied
21
 
Skreeg, Warrior
28
 
Choku, Hunter
15
 
Skreeg, Warrior Elite
30
 
Choku, Male
18
 
Tybis, Female
22
 
Choku, Pup
8
 
Tybis, Male
23
 
Whisper Bird, Female
15
 
Tybis, Youth
18
 
Whisper Bird, Hatchling
7
 
 
 
 
Whisper Bird, Majestic
?
 
 
 
 
Whisper Bird, Male
16