Major Robert Dump
04-04-2006, 04:21
http://www.pureswg.com/
Even the developers and producers of SWG admit it, they ruined SWG one update at a time. Now someone is going to make a FREE server, that uses the software on the CDs we payed for, that will emulate everyone back to prior to the first major SWG upgrade which effectively becamse the beginning of the end (the "combat revamp" came much later than the CU)
Prior to the CU:
-Shuttles and Starports had ships that ran in 5-10 minute intervals. While it angered the "i dont pay a $15 dollars a month to wait" crowd, it had its benefits. First, it was more realistic. Second, it made PVP require more organization and scouting because if you attacked soemones base or town you could safely assume you had 5-10 minutes before reinforcments came. Third, it added an important social aspect because you got large groups of people in major areas waiting, which encouraged trade, entertainers, fighting and interaction
-TEFs. Temporaty enemy flags. If you attacked a member of the oppsoing faction -- be it npc or player -- you were now attackable by all members of the opposing faction who are also TEFd or in a declared overt state. Of course, you could always run around declared and be attackable by others as well. TEFs were great for pvp, and its a little ridiculous to think that an imperial can go to a rebel base and kill NPCs all day and rebel players cant do a thing to intervene, even if the rebel is declared (do you follow me? the imp is covert but killing without any sort of recourse by people who had the balls to go actually declare) The CU took out covert/overt/TEF and made it where you were on leave, on duty (can attack npcs without recourse from players) and special forces (you are a target for all enemies)
-Group BH vs Jedi fights. Again, sort of like TEFs, if a jedi is grouped with his friends and a bounty hunter attack him, the jedis friends can help, just like the bounty hunters group can help him. the idea of having to stand and watch an ally get ganked is absurd, and the CU made jedi vs BH exclusive combat, which was gay
-Crafting will come back, as will the purpose of dancers and musicians. Prior to CU, each toon had mind, action and health bars, if any of which got to zero you were incapacitiated. There were "buffs" you could get for health and action from doctors for a price (often this went on either in busy starports where a line formed around a doc -- another reason to slow shuttle times -- or it was a guildmate who did it for his guildies as a service.) Mind buffs were given by dancers and musicians in taverns and bases. Certain stat bars were targetable by sertain attacks and weapons, so going into battle unbuffed was a risk, especially if you were wearing cumbersome armor.
-decay will be back. This means less uberness. Got nice armor and weapons? better insure it so when you get killed it doesnt decay as much, and after enough times getting killed it would be useless. Decay was the backbone of an active crafter economy, which requires traders to survey and harvest, and scouts to find and kill animals, and fighters to go after loot and component drops. Also, in SWG resource stats and locations changed every few weeks, so some uber hide that certain animals on tatooine dropped would be available for maybe 12 days then poof. This sort of randomness requires people to get out there and hunt and survey.
-Jedi will be next to impossible and highly random to obtain, which is good otherwise 80% of people in PVP will be jedi, and the other 20% will be doctors or combat medics with poisons and DOTS
-No more levels. Level based MMORPGS make it harder for people to team up and experience content, and make it impossible for lowers to be involved in combat with highers. pre-cu SWG was based on skills, which required skill points, which you gopt 250 of. Lower level skills cost more points, and higher level ones less, which meant you could dabble in several combat/trade/crafting professions. IT also meant that a lower level ranged or melee guy -- or a crafter for that matter -- could still at least pick up a blaster and fight alongside friends, even more so if he/she had good equipment. Should a dancer/pistoleer template get rocked by a rifleman/pistoleer/master marksman template? Yes, and you would get rocked, but it wasn't the one hit one kill crap that you get from having a level 60 fighting a level 67. This also works in the benefit of PVE, as well as PVP where NPCs are involved. Also, it was damn near impossible to determine peoples skill levels and progressions because, aside from badges in your bio, there was no label or level number attached to you (unless you chose one, like when you master pikes you can use the label master pikeman, which most people didnt use a label because its kind of stupid, and if they did use on it was to mislead people. For example, my jedi used the label Novice Smuggler because for a long while he had the pistol skill tree in smuggler)
theres all sorts of other crap on that server, and I'm sure space will be limited. theres also talk of making smugglers attackable by bounty hunters, and making scouts more of a stealth based class, and making player bases harder to crack -- all things that were in development at SOE at one point, but postponed time after time. Heh, in the end (combat revamp), a player base could be killed by one player.....you needed 5 skills from 5 classes to blow a base terminal, all of which you could get from your 250 points with a few to spare, you get a good gun and some good armor and go kill the nerfed NPCs, use fiegn death if you got in trouble, and since theres no TEF players cant do a thing to stop you. then boom, there goes a massive base players put a lot of time into -- killed by one player, hahahaha
Also, theres no ETA so I'm not holding my breath, and if this company actually pulls this off expect Sony to follow suit and start making pay-to-play pre-CU servers again (a rollback would be nice, but I really dont mind starting from scratch again) Of course, with the server being free, credit farming may be less likely and hopefully they only allow macros for entertainers and crafters, not for combat or doctors
Even the developers and producers of SWG admit it, they ruined SWG one update at a time. Now someone is going to make a FREE server, that uses the software on the CDs we payed for, that will emulate everyone back to prior to the first major SWG upgrade which effectively becamse the beginning of the end (the "combat revamp" came much later than the CU)
Prior to the CU:
-Shuttles and Starports had ships that ran in 5-10 minute intervals. While it angered the "i dont pay a $15 dollars a month to wait" crowd, it had its benefits. First, it was more realistic. Second, it made PVP require more organization and scouting because if you attacked soemones base or town you could safely assume you had 5-10 minutes before reinforcments came. Third, it added an important social aspect because you got large groups of people in major areas waiting, which encouraged trade, entertainers, fighting and interaction
-TEFs. Temporaty enemy flags. If you attacked a member of the oppsoing faction -- be it npc or player -- you were now attackable by all members of the opposing faction who are also TEFd or in a declared overt state. Of course, you could always run around declared and be attackable by others as well. TEFs were great for pvp, and its a little ridiculous to think that an imperial can go to a rebel base and kill NPCs all day and rebel players cant do a thing to intervene, even if the rebel is declared (do you follow me? the imp is covert but killing without any sort of recourse by people who had the balls to go actually declare) The CU took out covert/overt/TEF and made it where you were on leave, on duty (can attack npcs without recourse from players) and special forces (you are a target for all enemies)
-Group BH vs Jedi fights. Again, sort of like TEFs, if a jedi is grouped with his friends and a bounty hunter attack him, the jedis friends can help, just like the bounty hunters group can help him. the idea of having to stand and watch an ally get ganked is absurd, and the CU made jedi vs BH exclusive combat, which was gay
-Crafting will come back, as will the purpose of dancers and musicians. Prior to CU, each toon had mind, action and health bars, if any of which got to zero you were incapacitiated. There were "buffs" you could get for health and action from doctors for a price (often this went on either in busy starports where a line formed around a doc -- another reason to slow shuttle times -- or it was a guildmate who did it for his guildies as a service.) Mind buffs were given by dancers and musicians in taverns and bases. Certain stat bars were targetable by sertain attacks and weapons, so going into battle unbuffed was a risk, especially if you were wearing cumbersome armor.
-decay will be back. This means less uberness. Got nice armor and weapons? better insure it so when you get killed it doesnt decay as much, and after enough times getting killed it would be useless. Decay was the backbone of an active crafter economy, which requires traders to survey and harvest, and scouts to find and kill animals, and fighters to go after loot and component drops. Also, in SWG resource stats and locations changed every few weeks, so some uber hide that certain animals on tatooine dropped would be available for maybe 12 days then poof. This sort of randomness requires people to get out there and hunt and survey.
-Jedi will be next to impossible and highly random to obtain, which is good otherwise 80% of people in PVP will be jedi, and the other 20% will be doctors or combat medics with poisons and DOTS
-No more levels. Level based MMORPGS make it harder for people to team up and experience content, and make it impossible for lowers to be involved in combat with highers. pre-cu SWG was based on skills, which required skill points, which you gopt 250 of. Lower level skills cost more points, and higher level ones less, which meant you could dabble in several combat/trade/crafting professions. IT also meant that a lower level ranged or melee guy -- or a crafter for that matter -- could still at least pick up a blaster and fight alongside friends, even more so if he/she had good equipment. Should a dancer/pistoleer template get rocked by a rifleman/pistoleer/master marksman template? Yes, and you would get rocked, but it wasn't the one hit one kill crap that you get from having a level 60 fighting a level 67. This also works in the benefit of PVE, as well as PVP where NPCs are involved. Also, it was damn near impossible to determine peoples skill levels and progressions because, aside from badges in your bio, there was no label or level number attached to you (unless you chose one, like when you master pikes you can use the label master pikeman, which most people didnt use a label because its kind of stupid, and if they did use on it was to mislead people. For example, my jedi used the label Novice Smuggler because for a long while he had the pistol skill tree in smuggler)
theres all sorts of other crap on that server, and I'm sure space will be limited. theres also talk of making smugglers attackable by bounty hunters, and making scouts more of a stealth based class, and making player bases harder to crack -- all things that were in development at SOE at one point, but postponed time after time. Heh, in the end (combat revamp), a player base could be killed by one player.....you needed 5 skills from 5 classes to blow a base terminal, all of which you could get from your 250 points with a few to spare, you get a good gun and some good armor and go kill the nerfed NPCs, use fiegn death if you got in trouble, and since theres no TEF players cant do a thing to stop you. then boom, there goes a massive base players put a lot of time into -- killed by one player, hahahaha
Also, theres no ETA so I'm not holding my breath, and if this company actually pulls this off expect Sony to follow suit and start making pay-to-play pre-CU servers again (a rollback would be nice, but I really dont mind starting from scratch again) Of course, with the server being free, credit farming may be less likely and hopefully they only allow macros for entertainers and crafters, not for combat or doctors