A/V The Old Republic MMO: The New Official Thread

I don't remember posting these concept arts by Anna Inkyung Lee from the latest Nathema flashpoint.

Spoiler

The members of Sunrider/Da-Boda family survived to Legacy times, so there is always a chance that one day we will meet their descendants.

They can always explain what happened to Nomi or Vima before and after KotOR (I am still disappointed that Mandorla has not been released).

 

Where was this mentioned?

I remember the one in Dark Empire

 

Oh, you are correct. I have messed up Dark Empire with Legacy series.

 

Ossus confirmed! Khem, Nadia, Jaesa and Doc will return with 5.10 update.

Livestream Cantina Reward

• New in-game flair
  
• Available everyone - SWCANTINA2018
  
• Expires at end of 2018
  
• swtor.com/redeem-code

5.10 Jedi Under Siege

• Nightmare Mode/Master Mode Gods from the Machine
  
• Masterwork Armor
  
• Guild Improvements
  
• System Improvements
  
• Guild Management
  
• New Planet and Daily Area - Ossus is the new planet
  
• New storyline based on the rivalry between Sith and Jedi
  
• Companion Returns: Doc, Nadia, Jaesa, Khem Val

Gods from the Machine Master Mode

• Veteran Mode Changes
  
• Veteran Mode difficulty will be reduced from “hardmare”. It will be pulled more in line with other Veteran operations.
  
• PTS patch notes will have a detailed list of the changes
  
• Master Mode
  
• We weren’t going to do master mode but Keith wanted the master mode
  
• Future group content not affected by implementation of master mode, they are not as far away as you think.
  
• You won’t be able to predict all the mechanics on master mode and need to react on the fly.
  
• Master mode is balanced for 248 augments+. Tyth will be slightly easier than the other bosses. Rest of the bosses will need to have 252 gear.
• Master mode will be first thing on PTS, likely tomorrow or early next week. Each starter planet will have a terminal to get you to Odessen where there will be a Level Booster, entrance to Gods from the Machine and Numerous vendors for gear/augments.

Masterwork Armor (Tier 5)

• Level 252 Artifact Gear with set bonus
• Level 258 Legendary Gear with set bonus
• Same stat breakdown as previous tiers
• Crafters – Bind on Equip
• Acquire schematic from trainer
• Use materials from crew skills, Ossus, PvP, Conquests and Gods from the Machine Bosses
• Fastest way to get the gear this way
• Gameplay – Bind on Pickup
• Gear can be purchased from Reputation vendor with Masterwork Shards
• Masterwork Shards can be earned from a new “special” weekly mission( (i.e. weekly dailies, weekly flashpoint etc), Ossus Weekly, Unassembled Components (limited time per character per week and gets more expensive the more you do it), and Command Crates
• 252 gear can be acquired rarely from Command Crates at Rank 300 and from the Ossus World Boss Weekly.

Guild Improvements

• Guild Progression
• Guild now gain levels
• Guild XP earned based on Conquests
• Guild Perks
• Temporary Perks that are slotted via Guild Ship, perk likely changes each week
• Higher XP gain, more harvesting etc, more crafting conquest objectives were some of the example perks given
• They are purchased via a new Guild Currency and credits
• Guild Currency earned from Guild levels and Conquests
• Conquest Improvements
• More consistent Objectives across all conquests
• Less emphasis on Daily Repeatable Objectives
• Guild Landing Page
• New Interface to show info on your guild at a glance
• Guild Management
• Guild Inspect (you can right click on a player and inspect their guild, guilds can put a message that show up when a player get inspected)
• Logging – should be able to log Guild member conquest contribution ideally
• Guild Mail
• Ban by Legacy (ignore by legacy not in yet, won’t affect other players with the same legacy name)
• More Guild Ranks with more options on what rank each access to
• PvP Challenges (Arena, WZ, GSF)
• Minimum of 2v2, maximum dictated by game type
• Groups and Guilds can challenge each other
• Stat Tracking
• Guild changes will be on PTS (won’t be on the first iteration of PTS but will come in later)
• Guild Heraldry did not make it to Patch 5.10 but it is still happening
• Guild character cap not changed

Ossus

• Ancient center of Jedi activity, devastated by the Sith via chain of supernovas, wiped out pretty much all life and destroyed most of the structures.
• Two separate storylines for Sith and Republic, becomes a daily area after storyline completion
• 10+ daily missions for each faction
• New Reputation track
• New datacrons to discover (3 datacrons)
• Two world bosses
• Seeker Droid and Macrobinoculars (Seeker Droids will be improved)
• Tons of Stronghold Decorations to unlock

Returning Companions

• Doc – Serving as a doctor for the Jedi colony
• Khem Val – Only available if you sided with Khem Val during the Sith storyline
• Nadia – Part of the Jedi colony
• Jaesa – Both LS and DS. LS will be on Ossus, DS you will encounter in a separate mission not on Ossus. The version you will encounter depends on which one you had before.
• These companions are class specific.
• Same gender romance available for Jaesa and Nadia. LS Jaesa romance option will be added for the first time as well.

Ossus Storyline

• New storyline based on the rivalry between Sith and Jedi
• Be careful to not get the story spoiled by datamining
• You can autocomplete previous story to access Ossus as long you are Level 70
• There will be alliance alerts
• Saboteur and Loyalist – If you sided with the opposite faction during the previous storyline, you will have the opportunity to become a double agent/saboteur and work for the enemy or just stay loyal to your previous faction.
• Planet is very remote and very unpleasant place. A group of Jedi that survived Zakuul have traveled here and built a base.They started a farm etc to make the planet more hospitable.
• Sith is not very happy about this Jedi development. The first shot of the war between Sith and Jedi will be ignited here.

New & Returning Ossus Characters

None will the characters will be companions currently but might be possible companions later on if players wants it.

Republic (Right to Left)

• Tau Idair– Head of Security for the Jedi Colony, she has a tattoo on her head that is the ancient symbol of the light side
• General Daeruun – Jedi General, new alien species
• Master Gnost-Dural

Empire (Left to right)

• Darth Malora – Minor character from back in Korriban as a side mission. Risen from a minor character to a major position on the Dark Council.
• Major Anri Empire Special Ops Commander
• Unrevealed sixth character

 

I like it.

I see Gnost dural.

So what is the middle guy on the Jedi side?

And the Alien Sith girl?

 

Looks good, wish I still had my laptop to play it, don’t suppose any of you do let’s plays of the story stuff?

 

Sounds pretty good, maybe I'll resub if I have time to catch up on things. Nice to hear about more companions coming back, though some big names are still missing.

Glad to hear Ossus and Gnost-Dural will appear. Well, as long as they don't kill him off, he's one of the few major Jedi characters left in the SWTOR era.

I just hope the launch doesn't go too badly, sometimes when they released a big content update in December, they don't bother to fix anything until January.

 

This sounds all well and good, but I hardly have the time, nor motivation to play anymore, let alone resub. I will play for a bit, then get bored and stop, then play again.

 

Going to resub for it. Looks great


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

 

Some Ossus screenshots and concept art:

Spoiler

You mean Sith throne? I guess that nothing changed and Acina is the Empress if she is alive or Vowrawn if she is dead.

The middle guy on the Jedi side is General Daeruun (new alien species - "Krek") and the Sith girl is Darth Malora from Korriban side quest.

Ossus (dailies) will be on PTS soon, so hopefuly this will be covered by testers.

After 5.10 only Tharan, Zenith, Kira and Scourge will be missing.

 

So Darth Malora is now head of Sith Bio-tech, cool. Also explains the new look.

I wonder who the thrid Empire person will be, looks like a generic trooper, hope they are interesting under the mask.

Also interesting to see a 'jedi-general'

 

BIG SPOILERS (VERY BIG) for Ossus from dialogues with Nadia, Doc and Jaesa.

Spoiler

• Malgus is alive.
• In the end of the Imperial storyline you kill or capture Gnost-Dural.
• Republic players will be able to kill or capture Malora.
• Empress Acina or Emperor Vowrawn return. The same goes for Jonas Balkar and Moff Pyron.
• Doc confirms that Kira and Scourge went after something related to the Sith Emperor.
• It seems that the original voice actor for Gnost-Dural is back.

EDIT: Jedipedia has posted full OSSUS dilogues - BIG SPOILERS

 

Interesting

Can't wait till December so I can play it.

 

Just combed through the dialogue. Some observations:

Spoiler

• I just spent some time comparing the dialogue of Gnost-Dural to Lance Henriksen's timeline videos, and I'm pretty sure it isn't Henriksen voicing him this time around, unfortunately. Whoever is voicing him, though, is an excellent impersonator and clearly did his research on how Henriksen speaks. I've heard this actor in BioWare games before, so I'll see if I can find out who it is. They had to replace Jeff Bennett with Spencer Garrett for Revan, so this doesn't surprise me.
• Some voice actors I am very happy to hear return are Jamie Glover for Malgus and Christopher Godwin for Vowrawn. Also, whoever voices NR-O2 is back and he's the best ever.
• Gnost-Dural mentions that he knows of a forgotten Jedi world deep in the Unknown Regions that the Jedi should escape to. That sounds awesome to me. Any guesses on which world it could be? I don't know of any Unknown Regions Jedi worlds in Legends, so it could be a new one... or they decide to port Ahch-To over to the game.
• Something peculiar is that Gnost-Dural seems to be imprisoned or killed at the end of the Imperial storyline but saved and recovered by the Jedi in the Republic storyline. Am I missing something or is this the first deviation of continuity between the Republic and Imperial stories?
• We knew this from the Cantina Livestream, but I want to say again I love that Imperial and Republic exclusive stories are returning. I appreciated the generalized stories of the previous few expansions, but to return to the core of the game is so exciting to me.

Also, having now heard the final speeches made by Malgus and Daeruun (who makes a nice allusion to the Zhell and Taung conflict), I am almost positive this is the final war between the Galactic Republic and this incarnation of the Sith Empire--and also, in my opinion, the beginning stages of a long, potentially years-long storyline that will lead us to the end of the game's story.

Just some ramblings on why I say that and what I hope to see: the end of The Old Republic isn't just the ending for the story set out by the game. It isn't just the ending for the Knights of the Old Republic series. It is also the ending for the entire Old Republic era that began with the Tales of the Jedi comics, the end of millennia of endless warfare between the ancient Jedi and Sith that started long before this game and continues to takes it toll long after. It will also effectively be the final installment in Legends. Given that, I hope wherever the game goes now will aim to show why the audience needs to see what happens in this war, and then close out this chapter of Star Wars history by reflecting on the Jedi versus Sith conflict as a whole.

I don't say that the game will end because the game isn't doing well or anything, and in fact this final phase of the story could last for some years to come, but with most of the major players from the first two wars dead or otherwise missing from the conflict due to Player Choice Purgatory, I honestly believe the story would be best served if BioWare decided on a definitive stopping point and worked its way towards that. I don't want the game to close down, but I do want to the game's story to conclude with meaning instead of being drawn on until they have to stop.

The meaning of all stories is determined by their endings, and thus far The Old Republic has been a whole lot of fighting but without a central theme or message to tie it all together beyond the quintessential "good versus evil" dynamic at the core of all Star Wars. With that in mind, I hope Charles Boyd and the other BioWare writers really take the time to ask questions as we approach another, and potentially final, phase of warfare between the Empire and Republic. What should the audience take away from this endless fight between Jedi and Sith when all is said and done? Is there a way to end this cycle from repeating over and over again? When do we become the same as our enemy and lose track of why we are fighting in the first place, only setting out to fight because of loyalty to our own party? I'd like to see our protagonists reckon with that--at this point, they have been fighting for thirteen years (if you include the five in carbon freeze). The Agent storyline began to tackle some of these questions, but I want to see what the broader themes and messages are for the game as a whole.

I also think it makes for a very interesting ending if the player gets time to react to the fact that all of the heroes, mentors, and allies from their days have now faded away, leaving the player as the relic of a previous generation.

 

Spoiler

Whoa, I didn't realize! I adore that. If The Old Republic wants to go with the "greatest hits" of both canon and Legends, I'll take it in a heartbeat.

 

I worry that they've sort of painted themselves into a corner with the ending of KOTET and some of the class stories.

Spoiler

Less so with Republic characters, as the majority of those are played pretty straight, as people who believe in democracy, follow Jedi rules of being unambitious, etc.

On the Imperial side though? They need to come up with some convincing reason why Sith characters—despite being Sith with all that likely entails—for some reason decide to allow Acina to sit on a throne they could easily seize, or pissants like Malora to be on the Dark Council. These are characters who killed their way up to the position of Wrath or a seat on the Dark Council in an incredibly short time period, before the Zakuul invasion slaughtered or scattered everyone like Marr to the point that Acina could declare herself Empress largely uncontested by virtue of the fact that she surrendered and everyone else was dead. It made at least some sense in KOTFE/KOTET because the PC was a popsicle when it all went down, and by the time they reemerged the Eternal Throne was a much bigger prize to chase than the Sith one. But now? I'm not sure how they'll justify an ambitious dark side Sith not trying to take throne for themselves.

Even with the Agent it's pretty rough. I doubt the 'Sith Intelligence' ending to the class story is the most popular one. So you have a bunch of Agents who most likely took the route of not giving the biggest trove of secrets in the galaxy to the Sith, using it instead to fight for Empire without Force-wielder oversight. Agents who would occasionally do freelance work for more respectable Sith like Marr, and gained more influence on the Empire's direction than any other non-Force user alive through doing so. And then, in KOTFE/ET, they took down the most powerful Force users alive and became either a big-stick peacemaker or what amounts to Galactic Emperor. I find it hard to believe that such a character would simply accept being a servant of the Sith again, subordinate to a Dark Council containing the likes of Malora.

Basically, I feel like they've made the player character too strong and important—at least on the Imperial end—for the story to make much sense moving forward, unless the game transforms into Crusader Kings in space or they come up with something convincing that won't alienate players.

 

Conversation with Doc about Kira and Scourge

Spoiler

Doc: I stuck with Kira and Scourge through the war, and even for a while after--until Scourge went on the hunt. He was obsessed... something to do with the Sith Emperor, but he wouldn't tell me more. Kira was spun up about it, too. We got separated on Begeren. When I couldn't hook back up with them, I circled back to Tython and then fell into Gnost-Dural's little project.

Player: Do you remember anything else? I can have people start searching for them right away.

Doc: Not really--sorry. I know Scourge had a secret contact, someone he knew from back when he was the Emperor's Wrath. I'll jot down everything I have for you.

I guess, that Kira/Scourge mission...

Spoiler

...might really be about Emperor's original body.

I can see it happening considering that Boyd has once said that he want to explore such story possibility and that it won't be a main focus of the future storyline.

Spoiler

Really? I could have sworn that it is the same actor. Very good impersonation indeed.

Spoiler

I would have said that it has already happened before with SOR, KotFE and KotET.

I hope they will continue but at the moment there is no new codex entry about it in files. The names for other entries are already there but they have "trollish" descriptions like "Blah Blah Force Sensative Blah!".

 

Spoiler

Yeah, it’s kind of a time-old Knights of the Old Republic tradition to wipe out most of the Jedi just as they are on the cusp of or have recently achieved a great victory. I love The Sith Lords to death, but it was pretty strange to see the Jedi numbering in the dozens so recently after obliterating Malak’s empire. Given that the Republic was so close to victory before Zakuul, I guess we can just say that Zakuul targeted them more than the Empire... or perhaps the Empire is still weak and they are saving face?

Also, it’s kind of funny that Gnost-Dural is leading the Jedi to reconnect with their roots on Ossus because, according to him, the Jedi were ostensibly supposed to do that when they were rebuilding their temple on Tython:

“The Jedi relocated to their ancient home world of Tython to rest, meditate, and seek guidance from the Force. Thus began the unprecedented stalemate, the Jedi reconnecting with their roots...” Second time around will be better!

Spoiler

Yes! It really shows that the war has taken its toll on the galaxy by this point. I also selfishly want farms to be an excuse to bring us back to Dantooine, but maybe that’s one too many farm-based plots.

Spoiler

I believe Charles Boyd said he would write another in the livestream, which is great news!

EDIT: I just realized you are referring to the codex entries in game. He mentioned he would write a story-based blog post called the ‘State of the Galaxy’ that I think he’s done in the past.

 

Spoiler

Ah! You’re absolutely right. The stories deviated quite a bit when they settled on telling one story for all classes.

I guess I meant from the perspective of how stories were done at launch and through the Rise of the Hutt Cartel. Back then, each Republic and Imperial story had player choices, but the general events of their stories still happened alongside each other (i.e. the Republic evacuates Makeb and the Empire begins mining Isotope-5, and while the player choices might change those a bit, those events still happened alongside each other). Gnost-Dural going with Empire/being killed in the Imperial story and being recovered by the Republic is a noticeably different approach.

However, I think you’re absolutely right—since the recent expansions, that old way of doing things has been outmoded. I also remembered that Quesh and Hoth both have their own versions of events that occur depending on what faction you’re playing that contradict each other, so there’s definitely a precedent.

Spoiler

Yeah, I think you’re right about that—it seems, at least so far, you’re still considered a close ally. They still call the player Commander and so on.

I’m really excited to see how they use Malgus. While I appreciated how BioWare used him at launch, he’s always been the face of the game’s storyline alongside Satele, and that’s especially true now that Revan and Vitiate are gone.

Seems like a good time for another playthrough!