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Chill and Teo are joined by Hyp and our new guest Chong to discuss the basics of PvP, and how to get into it. We also go over the developer blogs about the new operation, Terror From Beyond, and the class changes coming in Game Update 1.4.

1. Introduction

2. Question to the panel

3. Trivia question

Congratulations to this week’s winner, Mosq!

4. The Holofeed

• Patch 1.3.7 was deployed during a marathon 9 hour scheduled maintenance on Wednesday (delayed from Tuesday due to the Labor Day public holiday in the US).
• Jesse Sky, Lead Operations & Flashpoint Designer, tells us about the new operation coming in Game Update 1.4 via his Developer Update – Terror from Beyond blog post.
• Austin Peckenpaugh, the Senior Designer on SWTOR responsible for creating, maintaining and balancing class gameplay, gives us some insight into what we can soon expect in his Developer Update: Class Changes and Balance in Game Update 1.4 blog post. He went on to clarify the resolve changes with some examples, and to explain how the team balances the needs/constraints of PvP and PvE gameplay.
• There is a way for players on PvE servers to be flagged for PvP without their consent by other players. BioWare considers this a problem which they will subsequently fix. Chong mentioned that one such method is to attack a mob that a player has already tapped; the player’s companion will then attack the instigator, which will automatically flag the victim for PvP.
• While we will remain limited to sending out a maximum of 5 companions on missions or crafting tasks at level 50, our new HK-51 companion will have a small efficiency bonus to all mission skills, and a small critical bonus to all crafting skills.
• White colour crystals will eventually be available again, but even when they are, they will be difficult to attain.

5. Force Feedback

Thanks to @ForceChuckle, @Voyak and @Iamalana for the friend follows, and also thanks to @Voyak and @Dimbo56 for retweeting episode 42.

We discuss tweets from @VodoxSWTOR, @bytorsnowdog, @terencemyers, @Dimbo56, @YojeVawree and @Voyak, and an email from Saxe Gotha on the Ebon Hawk server.

6. Sarlacc Digest

Chong’s Champions

Chong is assembling a band of stalwart heroes to join him in an 8-man ranked warzone team. Their initial forays will be on the Republic side of The Harbinger server (west coast PvE), though they also hope to eventually create an Imperial counterpart.

They will start queuing at 8pm PDT on Saturdays, starting on 8 September 2012.

No previous experience is required (though is obviously preferred!). The only gear requirement is (at the least) a full set of recruit gear.

Chong’s PvP primer

• Expertise
  • If you plan to PvP your new major stat should be Expertise, followed by Endurance and your main primary stat (aim, cunning, willpower, strength).
    • This does not mean you should just stack Expertise; it does require your full attention to balance it with your primary stat and endurance.
    • Endurance and your primary stat priorities change depending on your class and spec.
  • Expertise does three important things: it increases the amount of bonus damage you do to players; it reduces the damage you take from attacking players; and it increases the bonus amount of healing to players.
    • A player’s companion counts as a player (only applicable in world PvP).
    • Expertise has a soft cap of around 20%, so stacking beyond that can be wasteful.
• Skills tree
  • I suggest that if you want to PvP, you should review your skill trees for the role you want to take.
  • All classes are good for PvP, even tanks.
    • Tanks are great for holding down a turret or marching to the goal in Huttball.
  • The skills you want to grab will be anything that will keep you in the fight or incapacitate others.
  • Also anything that will reduce cast times. (Mostly a DPS or healing thing.)
    • Alacrity is good for this and/or spec into talents that reduce pushback from damage.
• Gear
  • Recruit
    • When you first hit level 50, you can get a free set of Recruit gear from a terminal on the Fleet in the combat training area.
    • If you hit 50 and took the token to get credits, you can still get the Recruit gear from the Recruit PvP Gear vendor in the same area. It will cost you 320,000 credits to purchase the full set.
      • This is blue (i.e., not modded) PvP gear with a significant amount of Expertise to prevent you from being crushed (as you would be in straight PvE gear).
      • If you feel you don’t want to spend that much, you can queue without and farm Warzone Commendations to build up to Battlemaster gear. (It will be slow!)
      • You will not each the Expertise soft cap with Recruit gear.
  • Battlemaster
    • Battlemaster gear is purchased using strictly Warzone Commendations.
      • To get a full set, it should set you back 12,500 Warzone Commendations.
      • You cap your Warzone Commendations at 2000, so make sure you buy gear before you cap to prevent wasting the Warzone Commendations you gain.
      • A full set of Battlemaster gear should get you to the Expertise 20% soft cap.
      • Keep this gear for War Hero gear purchases.
  • War Hero
    • War Hero gear is purchased using Rated Warzone Commendations from the War Hero PvP Gear vendor in the Combat Training area.
      • You will also need your old Battlemaster gear to purchase the item.
      • You can gain Ranked Warzone Commendations from 3 places:
        • Daily and weekly PvP quests;
        • Purchasable from “Corr”, the PvP Item vendor, at an exchange of 1 ranked for 3 non-ranked at Valor rank 40 or more; and
          • Pro Tip: The vendor claims to sell them 10 for 30 but you can use the “split item” trick and choose a quantity of 1 to 99 and it will sell you 1 ranked for 3 non-ranked.
        • Doing Ranked Warzones.
  • Rated War Hero
    • Rated War Hero gear is also sold at the War Hero PvP vendor, but does require a particular rating to purchase it, plus more Rated Warzone Commendations and non-rated War Hero gear.

7. Outro

Thanks to Hyp (@Hypknotoad) and Chong (@empiredivider or email him via chong@ootinicast.com) for joining us this week.

You can email questions and comments about the show to ootinicast@gmail.com. Follow us on Twitter via @OotiniCast. Check out our website, ootinicast.com, which has links to our presence on Google+ and Facebook. We are a proud member of the TOR Syndicate! Subscribe to us on iTunes, and watch for us in your Bind on Equip feed.