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Idiots, Slander, and Patch Notes
Idiots are everywhere. Politics (both sides), grocery stores, toll-booths, police cars (sometimes in the front, sometimes in the back), movie theaters, and at the Rockettes Christmas Special in the seat right next to me whistling with the music (whistling? REALLY?!?). The last place I want to see idiots is in a group with me when I am in a Warzone.
Unfortunately, I like to play for the Republic.
You see, on the Imperial side, I think there are people that really love PvP. They spend a good amount of time there, they focus, and they use strategy. They learn the playing field. I think I’ve seen more Imps go straight for a health pickup than I have Lightsiders. They use teamwork and determination to excel at whatever Warzone they are in.
More on point, last night Chipchops and I were playing with our smugglers in an Alderaan Civil War. We haven’t played together before, but we are both pretty experienced in PvP. When we started off, we had a fairly decent plan: take left and right turrets and hold them. Simple, easy to remember. The middle turret is too difficult to take and hold, due to its proximity to the respawn areas. Chipchops and I go secure the left turret, and where is everyone else? In the middle, getting their butts handed to them by the sorcerers. When asked why they weren’t going for the right side, they responded with some interesting quotes.
- Me: “If we get our act together, we can still win, but we only need two at the left turret. Everyone should be taking right side at this moment.”
- Some guy in response, let’s call him LazyGuy: “I’m just here for the XP, I don’t really care if we win or lost. [sic]”
- Me: “I would like to win, and we can, if everyone heads right. Mid is too hard to hold.”
- Another person, lets call them Stereotyper: “We should just have fun. That is a Wowist attitude. This is just a game, no need to be mean.”
So let me get this straight. I played WoW for about 3 months about 8 years ago. And because I want to win…at PvP…I’m a WoW player…
I think they MIGHT just have been trying to insult me.
So LazyGuy starts emoting at people at the left turret, and I get fed up with holding it, like a good sniper should. I decide to go get my piece of the action because the Imps are comfy just killing the one or two stragglers that aren’t at the left turret. I died several times, but I still got up to the turret and was in the process of using it when I got mobbed. A little backup and we probably could’ve taken it. But it was too late anyway.
Some more choice quotes:
- LazyGuy: “Party at left!”
- LazyGuy: “Bring the cards, we’ll play Texas Hold ‘Em.”
- LazyGuy: “7k xp for a loss is enough for me.”
One, I would clean their clocks at Texas Hold ‘Em.
Two, I feel that by queuing up for a Warzone, you are signing a contract saying “I will fight for the Republic.” By doing nothing, you are making it impossible to win for those that want to win. Yeah, it is just a game, but a Warzone has an inherent competitive factor to it. You want XP? Go level. Don’t PvP.
I don’t think it is unreasonable to expect my teammates to try to win in a competitive game. I come from LOTRO; we play nice there, but we still expect people to pull their weight in a group. If you don’t want to play by the rules, why are you playing?
The solution: today’s patch
There was a patch released today that had the following in it:
- Rewards for winning Warzones have been increased.
- Warzone completion rewards have been decreased.
Maybe this will solve the “I don’t have to try to get good rewards” syndrome with which we on the Republic side seem to be plagued. One can only hope.
PvP Strategy: Gunslinger’s Dampers Defense
I recently put up a post about a PvP build that I had theorycrafted. Having gotten the chance to try it up to level 25, I thought I would post on what I had found.
First off, as a recap, this build is based on getting in and out of cover effectively. Just because you have a stationary mechanic, doesn’t mean that you need to remain still. Success in PvP is about movement, and this still holds true even with cover.
Typically, the ideal situation is one where you remain mostly ignored, much to the enemy’s detriment. You are allowed to remain in cover and keep blasting away. But that is more of what happens in PvE. PvP often places you at odds against the one guy who decides that you have been headshotting quite enough.
If you are versus a powerful enemy, such as a Sith Marauder or the Imperial Sniper, you will have to use your skills fully, (especially with the latter, as they have a lot of the same tools). On that note, this guide also works for Snipers, just in the Marksman build vs. the Sharpshooter build.
I would now like to show you an effective method for playing defensively and still getting the DPS that comes with being a Gunslinger. I’m going to call this method the Dampers Defense. You only need the first few tiers of the Sharpshooter to be able to start using this to its full effectiveness. Here is the absolute minimum build on DarthHater. Read more…
Expect Excellence
I have played many games in my lifetime. There have been many dungeon-crawls, many grind-fests, and many hours spent wondering why I was doing what I was doing.
It has all come to an end.
SWTOR has single-handedly given me what I’ve always wanted in an MMO. It has story, zest, interesting systems, and a gun-totin’, wise-crackin’ space cowboy who has a flair for getting in guns blazing and getting out with a smile on his face and bad-guys in smoking piles behind him.
The first thing you need to remember is I like playing characters that remind me of certain parts of me. In other words, I can see myself in that character. My Hunter in LOTRO was a single-minded, goal-oriented killer, just like me (except of course for the “killer” part). My Captain in LOTRO was a lot like me (really more like me) in that he was fond of justice, dignity, and tradition, and he is fiercely loyal to his friends.
My smuggler is fantastic with the ladies, is a great shot, has a hot-rod starship, and is snarky and sarcastic. Just like…wait a minute! That’s not at all like me! I am literally none of those things. I have never shot a gun (though I live in Texas), my car is a boring, practical sedan, I am typically very polite and non-confrontational, and I was completely in the dark about how my wife liked me for a year before I finally asked her out on a date! Read more…
PvP Talent Build: On-The-Run Hybrid Gunslinger – 29/5/7
LAST UPDATE: Update 1.1.5
This is a PvP build for the Gunslinger. This will mainly utilize the Sharpshooter specialization, but also has some balance involved.
This build is mainly conjecture from the perspective of what worked in Beta in PvP. This build will more than likely change, and I will put up more builds as I experiment more. This is just a taste of what is to come.
Note: This build was created with the Darth Hater Talent Calculator. The link to view this build is here. Numbers have been left out of my discussion, as values may change in patches before launch. The idea of each ability is usually more important than the qualitative numbers associated with it.
Class: Gunslinger
Primary Focus: Sharpshooter
Secondary Focus: Balanced between Dirty Fighting and Saboteur
Purpose: PvP
Goal: This build is about getting in cover, making people mad because they keep dying, then when they actually finally come after you, getting the heck out of Dodge to continue your sniping.
LAST UPDATE: Update 1.1.5
All points allocated are the maximum allowed for each ability, unless otherwise noted. Read more…
A SWTOR Beta Top 4: Things To Know About PvP
There are so many wonderful features of Star Wars: The Old Republic. I got the immense pleasure of playing the Beta this last weekend, and I want to share some screenshots and opinions. I will be putting out a series of posts with the Top 4s of the many things I got to try, including the classes, the PvP, the systems, and the experience in general.
I played three Warzones that were available to me at level 15ish: Alderaan, Huttball, and Voidstar.
Alderaan was a really interesting Warzone, where tactics and battlefield knowledge will definitely come in handy. You have to control turrets that are constantly firing at either the Republic ship or the Imperial ship. The amount of time you control the objectives will directly influence whether you win.
Huttball is a blast, especially if you like football. It is either incredibly difficult to score or we had a bad group that just wanted to shoot each other, because only one team scored when I played, and only once. You are given a skill to pass the ball which is automatically put on your skillbar. It also remains there even outside of the Warzone, which I thought was interesting, so you can place it on a little-used bar and keybind it.
Voidstar was my favorite. The match lasts a little over 10 minutes, and you play either attacking or defending, switching off immediately after the match ends. You have 5 minutes to access a datacore by breaching two sets of doors. The bombs that you place take a few seconds to do so, and the defenders can disarm them as well. Whoever gets the farthest or completes it in the fastest time wins.
Here are the top 4 things to know about PvP in SWTOR!
Rhekk
Geldarion
Torvox
The Fanatical Swordsman 