Ah Firday, day of my most favorite thing ever on the SWTOR forums: the Community Q&A. Questions answered this week have actually been gathered from two weeks ago, but they are no less relevant on the current game state. I always love it when I see a game company opening up direct communication with their fans, so kudos to BioWare for taking the time out even during busy weeks like this one must be in order to reach out to the community.
The servers were down for an unscheduled maintenance last night in order to get in a couples fixes players have been experiencing since the launch of 1.2. This is not the first time the servers have gone down unexpectedly since 1.2, but it’s important to realize that this is not unusual. Whenever a big update like we saw with 1.2 gets deployed there will inevitably be a few bugs that seek through that need some TLC. While there is always the hope that these unscheduled maintenance periods are a rare occurrence, it is at least good to know that the development team is hard at work keeping SWTOR up and working for us. Here are the patch notes from last night’s maintenance:
1.2.0c Patch Notes
4/19/2012
General
Corrected an audio issue that could cause a loud, perpetual “jet engine” sound that is most noticeable on the Republic and Imperial Fleets.
Corrected a rare issue that could cause players to be unable to access their guild.
Classes and Combat
Bounty Hunter
Mercenary
Heatseeker Missile: This ability will now only gain extra damage from your additional stacks of Heat Signatures and will not incorrectly detect debuffs from other players.
Trooper
Commando
Demolition Round: This ability will now only gain extra damage from your additional stacks of Gravity Vortex and will not incorrectly detect debuffs from other players.
World Event
Jeelvic the Jawa will no longer take more DNA samples than intended for purchases.
Players who were not properly granted final event codex entry and title for defeating Infected Trapjaw, Zama Brak, and Urtagh will be granted both the title and codex entry.
PvP
Increased rewards for players on the losing side of Warzone matches.
Players will now receive rewards for Warzones if they have earned at least one medal.
Servers will be going down tonight at 2AM CDT (12AM PDT/3AM EDT/8AM BST/9AM CEST/5PM AEST) until 6AM CDT (4AM PDT/7AM EDT/12PM BST/1PM CEST/9PM AEST) while BioWare deploys a patch. While the serves are expected to be down for 4 hours the maintenance time could be extended as necessary. Players will be required to download a copy of the patch upon launching the game after the servers go back online.
That’s right folks, the Republic Containment Officers are working hard an expect to have the Rakghoul infestation to be contained by the 24th, specifically on the 24th by 2AM CDT (12AM PDT/3AM EDT/8AM BST/9AM CEST/5PM AEST). Make sure to avoid Tatooinee (or the fleet) at all costs until then to help prevent the spread of these horrible monstrosities around the universe!
Unless you are the brave sort, then you will have until the 24th to gather all the Rakghoul DNA they can in order to buy any of the special event items being offered, and to gather the special Republic Containment Officer gear. It seems like new dailies are available each day for those who are participating, so make sure to complete them all each day in order to unlock new ones for the next day!
Both the servers and the website went down this week for the weekly maintenance. The servers were nothing special, oh we got a couple of patch notes but there was not real big changes included in them.
1.2.0b Patch Notes
4/17/2012
General
An issue that prevented players from receiving the final Codex entry for the event has been corrected. Players that previously defeated Urtagh but did not receive the Codex entry and associated title will need to defeat the boss again in order to obtain it.
Items
Tionese and Centurion gear have had their stats corrected to pre-update 1.2 values.
No, the big news with this update was the fantastic new design for the official SWTOR site.
The new site design is much sleeker and, dare I say, sexier than the old design. After looking at the same design for years it is nice to see it get a little love, and there are a bunch of little touches that make it look really nice. The inclusion of the in-game icons next to the available categories was ingenious, and it really was a great upgrade.
What do you think of the new site? Let us know in the comments section below!
This week’s scheduled maintenance will be taking place on Tuesday, April 17th from 2AM CDT (12AM PDT/3AM EDT/8AM BST/9AM CEST/5PM AEST) until 7AM CDT (5AM PDT/8AM EDT/1PM BST/2PM CEST/10PM AEST). All game servers will be offline during this period. This maintenance is expected to take no more than five hours, but could be extended.
In addition to the regular maintenance there will also be a new design for the official SWTOR website which will require it to be offline from 1AM CDT (April 17th, 11PM PDT/2AM EDT/7AM BST/8AM CEST/4PM AEST) until 11AM CDT (9AM PDT/12PM EDT/5PM BST/6PM CEST/April 18th,2AM AEST). Once the site comes back up, the new redesign will be unveiled.
As soon as we found out there is a special event on Tattoine I wanted to find out and experience as much of it as I can. I spent all day yesterday on Tatooine uncovering the secrets of the event and Bioware really worked hard to give us some new things to uncover. The thing I like the most about the event is the fact it is enveloped in good old Bioware story. There are announcers at the fleet warning travelers not to travel to Tatooine (of course we all went there right away). Once you get to Tatooine you can watch a TV right outside the starport giving you the latest about the outbreak (and starting a special event/quest that rewards you with a mini Rakghoul pet). Once you get to the source of the contagion you are faced with area quests that further explain what happened and even our old World Boss friend Trapjaw is changed and transformed into an Infected Trapjaw.
Rakghoul Pandemic News Report
I have compiled a guide describing all the most important portions of the events on our sister site SWTOR Spy. You can read the full guide to the Rakghoul Pandemic event including information on:
New Heroic Bosses and their location
Tracking the Origin Quest that rewards the mini-pet
Area Daily quests and Codex entries you can earn
I have video of the two Event World Boss kills we had yesterday with a PUG on Tatooine. I would like to thank the good people of Dune Bantha server that remained vigilant and got organized so we could down these bosses.
Anyone visiting the fleet today should hear a little message about how there is a planetary alert on Tatooine. Rakghouls have been spotted on the planet and citizens are recommended to stay away for the time being, but what is the fun in that?
The announcement is to inform players of the first ever in-game event of SWTOR, occurring on Tatooine. A ship carrying the Rakghoul plague has crashed on Tatooine, releasing a large amount of these monsters north-east of Outpost Therazan. Players will be able to tackle some new dailies there that reward “Rakghould DNA”, which can then be turned in to vendors in the same area for some event related items. These include black-green color crystals, and infected companion kit that will let you tun a companion into a Rakghoul, and even a Rakghoul mini-pet. There are also some new infected world bosses for player to take down as well. If the fleet announcement is to be believed then there should be new planets added to this event as time goes on.
No word yet on how long this event will be taking place, but keep you eyes on swtor-life.com as we bring you all the info as the event progresses.
Edit: Some new info I have discovered since posting this. The world bosses on Tatooine are located at the Sarlacc Pit, in Outlaws Den, and the other is an infected version of Trapjaw which can be found in his same location out in the Dune Sea.
As part of our coverage of the newly released Legacy Patch 1.2 we have compiled two high quality guides that are a must read for any Star Wars: The Old republic player. The first guide covers the new flashpoint “Lost Island” with its 7 bosses. We cover tactics for each of the bosses with screenshots and tips on how to defeat them. As most of you know, Bioware decided to increase the difficulty of encounters in newly released flashpoints and operations and we believe a guide like this will help you defeat the bosses without needing to experiment too much. Also, it beats watching pointless videos on youtube with no explanations.
The second guide is about a super cool mini-pet that is not easily obtainable. Bioware decided to introduce another very cool thing that you can obtain by going to several planets, doing unexpected thing. We had the Magenta Crystal before, and now it is the Orokeet mini-pet. You will need to visit both Alderaan and Tatooine to get this little guy and we have compiled a guide with 27 screenshots to help you add this cute fellow to your pet collection. Visit our sister site SWTOR Spy for a full walkthrough to getting the Orokeet mini pet.
My lightsaber could be the most badass and expensive nightlight of all time.
I think everyone has had this problem. You want a life size Darth Malgus statue in your house, you don’t have $6,000 on hand to put him in your house. Well that problem is going to disappear for one lucky person.
Sideshow Collectibles, the company who makes this and other epic life sized statues, is holding a contest where they will be giving away one of these statues to one lucky player of SWTOR. All you need to do is to head over to the contest page on their website and sign-up. You will have until May 11th to register, but why wait when you can head there right now and secure your chance to win.
As this is a contest exclusively for players of SWTOR you must be sure to enter the e-mail address you use for the game when you are signing up, and there is a limit of one entry per household/IP address. You must also agree to pay for taxes that may be assessed on the shipping cost or value of the statue, but it’s hard to say no to that when you are getting a $6000 statue free of charge.
