Smuggler Archive

Last month we saw Publish 8: Droids Rebuilt reach its fruition, with a
ton of new utility droids being added to the mix. We also saw two
mini-publishes. Mini 8.1 focused on Image Designer enhancements and included
some radical new looks for characters as well as a secure transaction interface
that will extend to numerous other areas of the game. Mini 8.2 saw the opening
of the Death Watch Bunker, where there are some very tough hombres that are none
too happy. There are rumors of awesome loot from this starting to trickle out
into Live, including Mandalorian armor and Jetpacks!

This year's E3 allowed us to demo Jump to Lightspeed, which was an
amazing experience! This was the first time we had shown it to the public and we
fully realized just how much fun it already is!! There were countless occasions
where we would find ourselves plinking at Hutt Fighters from the turret of a
YT-1300, or chasing a Tie Fighter through an asteroid field, and have to tear
ourselves away to realize that we were indeed in the middle of a demo. I assure
you, this is going to completely transform SWG while tying in seamlessly with
the ground game. It is simply incredible!!!

We will be doing a closed-invite Beta for JTL sometime between August and
September. We really want to get a wide variety of players in the cockpit, so we
are currently devising the numbers and groups for populating the beta. More on
this from Bo'shek (Rich Vogel) in the near future...

Back on the ground, we are in the thick of Jedi Testing for Publish 9:
Secrets of the Force. We are going to want to take an extra week or so to
fully bake it in, so it may be a bit more than two weeks from our last
mini-publish (the Death Watch Bunker). We will keep you apprised at the
progress, but we are currently targetting 6/22/04.

To test this massive system, we made a duplicate of the existing Test Server.
We call it, originally enough, Test Center 2! We needed to create a large and
robust test population, so we put together two groups and made them specific
ranks.

- Existing Test Center players that were active within a certain period
became Padawans.

- Existing Live Jedi that created characters on Test Center within a
certain period became Jedi Knights.

Over the weekend there were in excess of a thousand simultaneous players on
TC2! Much thanks to those of you logged in and helped us with testing. I would
encourage you to continue doing so during the next couple of weeks, because we
will be giving away starter packs, running some crazy tournaments and really
trying to stress the system to its limits! Since Test Server 2 will be wiped at
the end of the testing phase, it is really a free-for-all over there. Crazy. We
may even try to set a bunch of Live Bounty Hunters loose at some time
>:-)

One of the more controversial changes that is occurring with Publish 9 is
that characters who unlock their slots Between Publish 9 and Publish 10 will not
be able to immediately convert to a Padawan. There are a number of reasons why
we feel the need to do this, but foremost is a transition period between Force
Sensitive and Padawan that will not be done until Publish 10: The Jedi
Trials. If you do unlock you will be notified, but not able to convert until
P10. If you do not unlock but are along the way, partial credit will be given.
This has been discussed in the past few Friday Features.

Looking forward, the three main systems that we are enhancing before Space
are: Jedi, Combat Balance, and the Galactic Civil War (GCW). They are turning
out to be extremely extensive (and extremely cool!). Accordingly, we want to
focus as many resources as we can on them. This is challenging when doing
parallel development of JTL, which in some ways is a completely new game. We
have made some adjustments to the Live schedule, based on our desire to fully
realize each system.

Before I reveal our schedule, I want to shoot very straight with you. When I
say things can and will change, I mean it. If we feel that we need to
focus more on a particular system, we are going to adjust the schedule to allow
it. My job as Senior Producer is to ensure that the overall project is
successful, no matter what. This means trying to focus our resources on where
they are most needed while keeping them healthy and happy. This also means
adjusting the schedule and moving things out when other things are in
jeopardy.

We could take 4 different approaches in our communications with you:

- Not tell you anything

- Give you the party line

- Try to get everything done and not do them well

- Do things right and tell you the truth

I want to tell you the truth. I want you to know what our priorities are, and
what we are working on, and why things change. I guarantee some folks are going
to scan this entire schedule, find the one line in it that refers to them, and
go off about it. The truth is that we want to polish our game as much as we can,
and we don't want to put out half-baked publishes. Part of the pain of hearing
the truth is that it changes.

Without further ado, I present you with our current schedule:

Publish #9: Secrets of the Force

Complete overhaul of the Jedi system

Force Sensitive Specializations

New Lightsaber Construction

Padawan

Jedi Knight

Jedi Council - Force Ranking System

Badge Display system

Loot enhancements

Hermit Quest fixes

Revised Master Image Designer Timers and ID XP gain

Additionally our Character Transfer System will be available to move
characters between servers and accounts (for a small fee).

Mini Publish 9.1

Wookiee Armor 2

Additional Chat Channels

Mini Publish 9.2

Crafting/ Entertainer Quests

Publish #10: The Jedi Trials

Complete overhaul of the Path to Jedi system

Initial Leader Boards PvP Kills

Improved Commodities Market

Mini Publish 10.1

Massive Emote Package (75+)

Mini Publish 10.2

Wookiee armor 3

CS/ QA/ Correspondent Issues

Publish #11: Combat Balance/ Galactic Civil War - Phase 1

First Phase of Galactic Civil War revamp (ground base).

Large Scale PvP support

Squad Leader Revamp

A Special note on the Combat Balance: This has been pushed again to Publish
11. It has been fully designed, and we have gotten our secure server up. This
is an extremely comprehensive change, including:

• Weapon Rebalance
  
  
  
  • Speed Formulas
    
  • Weapon Certifications
    
  • Weapon Statistics
  
  
• Ham Revamp
  
  
  
  • Drain and Regen
    
  • Specials Drain and Regen
    
  • Damage Regen
    
  • Weapon HAM Cost
    
  • Special Attack HAM cost
  
  
• Profession Rebalance
  
  
  
  • Skill Mod Balance
    
  • Special Ability Balance
    
  • Existing Specials
    
  • New Specials
    
  • Player Difficulties
  
  
• Additional Balances
  
  
  
  • Armor Balance
    
  • Buff Balance
    
  • DoT Balance

Again, we would very much like to get this out earlier. The simple
truth is that it is massive, and needs the proper amount of time for us to
develop and test it.

The following have moved post-Jump to Lightspeed:

Hutt Casino We are REALLY excited about this social adventure, but we are
running into art and design restrictions. Space is looking amazing... and we
want it to be even more so! We are very strapped for Art resources at this
time and can't create everything we want for this adventure until after
Space.

Hutt Asteroid Base For similar reasons, and we really want this to be
something you reach by flying through space.

Smuggler revamp We want to do this right too... and proper smuggling is
very much augmented by space flight!

I know there will be some disappointment regarding the schedule shifts.
Please remember that we want to open our schedules up to you as much as possible
so you know what to expect. Live Service is an inexact science (to say the
least!!) and will always include some shifts. Things have changed. They will
continue to do so. We are giving you our best approximations. All along the way,
smaller but vital enhancements are constantly being fixed and come out before
and after these main publishes.

We are fully focused in making SWG the best MMOG there is out there. The game
is very strong due to you, the players. The next few months have some
revolutionary changes occurring, and I hope you are as psyched as I am!!

Finally, some of the team is gearing up to head out to Anaheim this week for
the Fan Fest! I can't tell you how excited we are to hook up with the players,
and see you folks meeting with each other. There are some great things planned,
including several panels where you can grill us on all sorts of topics. Please
be gentle ;-)

Best,

- Gary Gattis
SOE Senior Producer, Star Wars Galaxies

PS Things can and will change!

Post Release Archives
href="http://starwarsgalaxies.station.sony.com/team_comments.jsp?id=61051&page=Team Comments" target=_blank>J.
Allen Brack's Letter to the Community
href="http://starwarsgalaxies.station.sony.com/team_comments.jsp?id=60070&page=Team Comments" target=_blank>Haden
Blackman's Letter to the Community
href="http://starwarsgalaxies.station.sony.com/team_comments.jsp?id=62241&page=Team Comments" target=_blank>Kurt
Stangl's Letter to the Community
href="http://starwarsgalaxies.station.sony.com/team_comments.jsp?id=60800&page=Team Comments" target=_blank>Rich
Vogel's Letter to the Community
href="http://starwarsgalaxies.station.sony.com/team_comments.jsp?id=59306&page=Team Comments" target=_blank>Gary
Gattis's Letter to the Community
href="http://starwarsgalaxies.station.sony.com/team_comments.jsp?id=57064&page=Team Comments" target=_blank>A
Welcome Letter from the Executive Producer
href="http://starwarsgalaxies.station.sony.com/team_comments.jsp?id=60442&page=Team Comments" target=_blank>Kirk
Black's Letter to the Community
href="http://starwarsgalaxies.station.sony.com/team_comments.jsp?id=61458&page=Team Comments" target=_blank>Chris
Mayer's Letter to the Community
href="http://starwarsgalaxies.station.sony.com/team_comments.jsp?id=61261&page=Team Comments" target=_blank>Jake
Rodgers' Letter to the Community
href="http://starwarsgalaxies.station.sony.com/team_comments.jsp?id=62352&page=Team Comments" target=_blank>State
of the Game
href="http://starwarsgalaxies.station.sony.com/team_comments.jsp?id=61526&page=Team Comments" target=_blank>Gary
Gattis's State of the Game Letter
href="http://starwarsgalaxies.station.sony.com/team_comments.jsp?id=61953&page=Team Comments" target=_blank>Gary
Gattis's State of the Game Letter
href="http://starwarsgalaxies.station.sony.com/team_comments.jsp?id=61771&page=Team Comments" target=_blank>Kevin
"Q-3P0" O'Hara's Letter to the Community

href="http://starwarsgalaxies.station.sony.com/team_comments_old.jsp?page=Team Comments" target=_blank>Pre
Release
Archives

I think thats the best thing some of us can do if your unsatisfied or bored right now with the game. Will make you feel less gyped by not paying SOEfor the time you are away.

SOE garantees they wont wipe your character in 3 months time. But, they also say they have not wiped any characters even after the 3 month time, so there may be a very high chance your toon is intact if you decide to come back many months after you cancel.

Just put allot of money in your houses and cancel. I did this to one of my two accounts. Feels a whole lot better now.