Avian Gamers Network

Greetings...

I’m Blair, producer for Star Wars Galaxies and more specifically in charge of the Combat Upgrade (CU) project. I’ve been around for a while now, and many of you may recognize me from when I worked on the Live team.

In the upcoming weeks you will start to see what Combat Upgrade is all about. Next week, I’ll have a development diary set up, where you can see what happens on a daily basis. The diary will let you in on what changes we make, what feedback you give, and what the daily work on Combat Upgrade actually is.

What we’ve got today is the first round of public documentation which talks about the hard work the CU team is doing. Our plan is to review the feedback this weekend, and prepare a response of the most frequently cited issues next week.

Have a read. (It’s long!)

Combat Upgrade Update
We looked at the current combat system in SWG and iterated designs several times to be sure that it is on target with your input for the system and for our overall mission which is to make SWG more fun, more accessible (easy to understand, hard to master) and Star Wars-centric.
During this process we worked to make every system easier to understand, more engaging and more fun to play.
This vision document summarizes the exciting updates of the Combat Upgrade.

Statistics

• Star Wars characters will now have a single hit point bar, called "Health". When health reaches zero, the player is incapacitated.
• Offensive attacks are performed ultimately to damage your opponent’s health statistic in order to win in combat.
  Players continue to perform special actions in combat that they receive during their character’s advancement. These actions draw from two point pools "Action" and "Mind". You must have the required number of pool points to perform the action.
• There will be no more stat migration capability.
• Players no longer have the so-called "drain" stats: Strength, Quickness, and Focus. They will continue to have the recharge stats "Constitution", "Stamina", and "Willpower", however they will be called "health regeneration rate", "action regeneration rate", and "mind regeneration rate".
• Species differentiation will be defined by different regeneration stats, skill mods, and minor special abilities.
• The only wounds a player can receive are health wounds. All other wound types will be removed from the game.

Health, Action, Mind pools

• A character's maximum health will increase with the character's combat level up to 300%. New character health will be 1000, maxed character health will be 3000.
• Players will be able to reference their combat level.
• Short term buffs will modify this health value no more than 20%.
• Long term buffs will modify this health value no more than 10%.
• Species modifiers will affect no more than 10% of a base statistic.

Special Actions

• The following profession trees will be modified by adding and removing new special abilities to bring them in line with the new system: Marksmen, Medic, Brawler, Scout, Riflemen, Pistoleer, Carbineer, Bounty Hunter, Smuggler, Commando, Pikeman, Swordsman, Fencer, Jedi, TKA, Doctor, Combat Medic.
• All of the above professions will be re-balanced so that mastery requires a more equal number of skill points for each of the elite professions. No player will be able to master three elite combat professions.
• The profession trees for Entertainers, Musicians, Dancers and Image Designers will be affected by the Combat Upgrade, and will likely need some profession tweaking because of the changes with wounds, stat migration and buffs to the mind. We will make adjustments to entertainers by creating some long lasting, minor buffs for combat professions. The initial changes to these professions will be:
  
  Profession Dancer
  
  • Added new dance (Tumble) to Dancing Knowledge I
  • Added new dance (Tumble2) to Dancing Knowledge II
  • Added new dance (Breakdance) to Dancing Knowledge III
  • Added new dance (Breakdance2) to Dancing Knowledge IV
  • Removed the 15 second delay between stopping one song or dance and starting a new song or dance.
  • Removed chance of making a mistake while dancing.
  
  Profession Musician
  
  • Added new song (Starwars4) to Novice Musician skill box.
  • Added new song (Funk) to Music Knowledge II.
  • Removed the 15 second delay between stopping one song or dance and starting a new song or dance.
  
  Profession - Image Designer
  
  • Reduced Image Designer skill point costs by 16 by reducing each skill box between Novice Image Designer and Master Image Designer by one point.
  • Removed Image Designer action timers for Body and Cosmetic changes.

Special Actions (continued)

• Players that have skill boxes in one of these affected professions will be allowed a skill re-spec for their character. This does not include the force sensitive skills. (A re-spec is short for "respecify". It is the chance to choose new skills for your character).
• Special actions will follow a more traditional "3 phase" execution: Wind-up, Execution, and Cool-down. Certain actions don’t have a windup and will execute instantly.
• The wind-up phase is the time from when the player begins a special move to when the move takes effect. During this time, there will be a UI element, visible particle effects (or animation), and sound effects to indicate the player has initiated an action. The length of the wind-up time is determined by the ability used, the character's advancement level and associated buffs on the character.
• Some abilities can be interrupted in the wind-up phase by attacks from opponents.
• Moving during the wind-up phase cancels the action. By extension, actions which have no wind-up time will not be cancelled by moving. (Many special actions will not have a wind-up. Wind-ups will be used for specials such as "Aim" where the player would be stopping to aim a weapon).
• The execution phase is the time the special action uses to perform the action. It is determined by the weapon the character has equipped and any associated buffs on the character. During this time, no other actions can be performed.
• The execution time is indicated on-screen by disabling all other special action icons, by animations and particle effects associated with the action, and by sound effects.
• The cool-down phase is the time after the action is performed when that action cannot be executed again. The length of the cool-down time is determined by the ability used, the character’s advancement level, and any associated buffs. All actions belong to a "cool-down group".
• Actions which share the same cool-down group cannot be executed until the cool-down timer expires.
  Cool-down is visualized by disabling all icons in the same cool-down group. No sound effect or animation is associated with cool-down since the player will be doing other things during the potentially long cool-down phase.
• While an action or group is cooling down, the player may begin actions that are in other cool-down groups.
• Toolbar text will be updated to better describe each ability.
• The icons for each ability will be redone in full color. They will visually indicate which abilities draw from mind, which draw from action, and which draw from both.

Weapons and Armor

• All weapons will do a base damage of type of two possible types: "Kinetic" or "Energy". Several weapons will do additional elemental damage of one of the following types: "Heat", "Cold", "Acid", "Electrical".
• Armor will resist a percentage of the base damage. Some armor will have additional resistances to the elemental damage types.
• Armor layer crafting allows you to add protection against the special damage types. Raising protection against any element will lower protection against the opposing element.
• Recon Armor receives a nominal bonus to energy protection and a nominal penalty to kinetic damage protection. This can be conceptualized as a free energy layer.
• Battle Armor has even protection against all damage types – no modifiers at all.
• Assault Armor receives a nominal bonus to kinetic protection and a nominal penalty to energy damage protection. This can be conceptualized as a free kinetic layer.
• Armor layer crafting allows you to add protection against the special damage types. Raising protection against any element will lower protection against the opposing element.
• Wearing advanced armor will apply de-buffs to your character such as slower movement, accuracy penalties, etc. Armor with basic cores will not apply de-buffs.
• As your character progresses through the skill tree, (s)he will learn certifications for certain weapons and armor types. Until your character has that certification, you cannot equip weapons or armor of that type.
• Particle effects for the “hits” and the “muzzle flashes", and the color of the bolts will be determined by the damage type of the weapon. The color for energy weapons will be red. The color for kinetic weapons will be blue.
• We will convert all existing weapons, armor, factory crates, and schematics to use the new combat data wherever possible.

Buffs

• The group UI will be re-worked so that you can see the buffs and de-buffs applied to other group members.

Healing/Doctor/CM Changes

• Medical crafting will be handled by the crafting line in Medic as well as Bio-Engineers.
• Doctors will have enhanced abilities that are enhanced with the use of consumables called enhancers.
• Enhancers are on a 1000 point scale - the higher the number the better.
• The quality of Enhancer charges will vary per ability. We are aiming for an average of ~20%.
• We are adding craftable stimulant packs (stims) that can be used by anyone. Stims are one shot consumables that require no skill boxes to use.
• The use of the different stims will be determined by the player’s combat level. (i.e., novice players will be able to use the lower level stims while the elite players will be able to use the higher level stims)
• Players will use stims by double clicking them. Each use will consume one charge. Each use has an associated cool-down time.
• Stims can modify your health ~10%. You can’t use your stims to heal someone else.

Combat Range

• The maximum range for basic combat attacks will be 64 meters.
• Melee will be effective at a maximum distance of 6 meters. This will tighten the look and feel of combat making it more "up close and personal".

Artificial Intelligence

• AI will receive a general upgrade.
• A hate system will be introduced to improve gameplay and make agro control more interesting and engaging.
• AI will be changed so that NPCs and creatures make use of Action and Mind pools. This will give players tactical AI choices that can prevent AI special attacks. They will also use the wind-up/cool-down system.
• AI will use special attacks including: healing, buffing, de-buffing, interrupting, and crowd control against players.
• AI will use both range attacks and melee attacks to challenge and engage the players with the new combat system.

Miscellaneous Changes

• Moving, getting discovered by an enemy by performing too many actions will bring a rifleman out of cover.
• Several UI components will be changed to reflect the new system including: the character sheet, the stat migration page, the toolbar system, and the group interface.
• Food, spices, and medications will be altered to conform to the new rules.
• All schematics will be updated to ensure newly created weapons and armor conform to the new rules.
• All creature data will be modified to re-adjust their hit points. Creatures will also have their attacks and armor modified to conform to the new rule set.
• We will implement a host of new sounds in the combat game to make the system more exciting and immersive.
• Line-of-sight will be turned on for terrain. Players will be unable to fire if they don’t have line-of-sight to the target.

Profession Pre-requisites
We are revamping the skill point costs of elite combat professions to be more even across the board, though they will not be 100% identical.

OLD Profession Prerequisites:

• Rifleman = Marksman, Rifles Tree (4 boxes)
• Carbineer = Marksman, Carbine Specialization Tree (4 boxes)
• Pistoleer = Marksman, Pistol Specialization Tree (4 boxes)
• Pikeman = Brawler, Polearm Specialization Tree (4 boxes)
• Swordsman = Brawler, 2H Sword Specialization Tree (4 boxes)
• Fencer = Brawler, 1H Sword Specialization Tree (4 boxes)
• Teras Kasi Artist = Brawler, Unarmed Specialization Tree (4 boxes)
• Bounty Hunter = Master Marksman (Full Novice Profession), Scout Exploration Tree (4 boxes)
• Commando = Master Marksman (Full Novice Profession), Brawler Unarmed Specialization Tree (4 boxes)
• Squad Leader = Marksman Ranged Support Tree (4 boxes), Scout Survival Tree (4 boxes), Scout Exploration Tree (4 boxes)

NEW Profession Prerequisites:

• Rifleman = Marksman, Rifles Tree (4 boxes), Marksman Ranged Support Tree (4 boxes)
• Carbineer = Marksman, Carbine Specialization Tree (4 boxes), Marksman Ranged Support Tree (4 boxes)
• Pistoleer = Marksman, Pistol Specialization Tree (4 boxes), Marksman Ranged Support Tree (4 boxes)
• Pikeman = Brawler, Polearm Specialization Tree (4 boxes), Brawler Unarmed Specialization Tree (4 boxes)
• Swordsman = Brawler, 1H Sword Specialization Tree (4 boxes), Brawler, 2H Sword Specialization Tree (4 boxes)
• Fencer = Brawler, 1H Sword Specialization Tree (4 boxes), Brawler, Unarmed Specialization Tree (4 boxes)
• TKA= Brawler, Unarmed Specialization Tree (4 boxes), Brawler, 2H Sword Specialization Tree (4 boxes)
• Bounty Hunter = Marksman Ranged Support Tree (4 boxes), Scout Exploration Tree (4 boxes)
• Commando = Brawler, Unarmed Specialization Tree (4 boxes), Marksman Ranged Support Tree (4 boxes)
• Squad Leader = Marksman Ranged Support Tree (4 boxes), Scout Survival Tree (4 boxes)

Be ready to engage in the new, faster-paced Star Wars Galaxies combat system.

As we finalize the various systems, we will continue to bring you updates and ask for your input. Please remember to keep your discussions constructive, we appreciate your feedback.

Looking forward to your comments!



Blair
Producer

I guess it's because they want it to go with the Slicing changes, which is a blatant ripoff of the EQ2 crafting system.

Well if it's the same people doing both games, why not use the same system. After all, how many different games have used the Quake 3 engine?

Quite honestly, ANYTHING that works is better than the current system. I can't wait to be able to actually go and kill stuff without having to worry about buffs.