Through the week Press2reset will be publishing reviews of the major aspects of BioWare’s Star Wars: The Old Republic. Keep checking back as we’ll be updating daily with Story, PvE, PvP, and Economy. On Friday, we’ll publish our wrap-up article to bring it all together. So, stay tuned!
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Just one more kill, if I can just get one more kill…
The adrenaline courses through my veins as I mash the buttons on my keyboard. I can feel sweat bead on my forehead as my eyes have ceased to blink due to concentration. One wrong move could cost me. Will I taste the sweet, gratifying nectar of victory or be humiliated by my loss?
BioWare’s Star Wars: The Old Republic definitely caters to those players interested in besting their peers in combat. First off, there are servers that are specialized as PvP servers. You can still find some player versus player action on the PvE servers, it’s just not a priority. From there the PvP is broken down into two playing fields: Warzones and open-world.
The Warzones are a compilation of three mini-games: Huttball, Alderaan, and Voidstar. Each game, which is randomly chosen, pits up to ten players against a similar number of opposing players in a fight for triumph.
Huttball; they add fire and acid because players aren't killing each other fast enough
Huttball is a capture the flag game disguised as the most radical sport on this side of the Smuggler’s Moon sponsored by Giradda the Hutt. Players must take the ball from the center of the playing field to the opposing side’s area. The first team to score six goals wins the match. Should time run out before six goals are scored, the team with the most goals is pronounced winner.
Alderaan is an epic battle between Imperials and the Republic to gain control of three turrets. Once a side has a turret under control, they fire mercilessly on the enemy’s dropship. Maintaining control of turrets until the opposing team’s shields are down is key to winning this Warzone.
Lastly, Voidstar takes place on an abandoned battle cruiser. It’s a race to see which side can download the schematics for a powerful weapon. Voidstar is the most confusing of the three, with two parts to the game. One team will be the attackers who set up bombs and try to reach the central computer, while the other team attempts to prevent the attackers from planting bombs and reaching the main database. After a round, the teams switch roles and the match is played again.
Win or lose in the Warzones, all players still receive experience points, credits, commendations (which can be traded in for better PvP gear), and Valor points (which unlock PvP titles and the ability to use certain gear).
Strategizing over which turret to take requires careful thought.. and people who listen
While the Warzones are extremely addicting and fun to play, it took me a few times to get completely absorbed by them. The first matches I played, I was completely lost! I had no idea what was happening. Lasers zipped by my head, someone was getting force-chocked, another met their demise engulfed by flames, and I’m pretty sure Marc, our editor-in-chief, threw a giant rock in my face.
In the beginning of every Warzone, a voice-over describes what is about to take place. Upon hearing it, I thought “seems simple enough”. Next thing, I was shoved into my first match and it ended in a complete disaster! SWTOR could have done a better job in explaining how the Warzones work; first-timers will no doubt be confused. Needless to say, after a few matches, the flow of the games became natural and I just could not stop playing them.
After hours of playing in the Warzones, I began to notice a balancing issue. It’s a complete mishmash of different people, meaning level 10 characters can fight alongside level 49 characters. SWTOR does its best to balance things out, players have about the same amount of hit points and base stats are relatively equal. Everyone still keeps their abilities, however, level 40+ abilities dominate level 10 abilities. I moan every time I am paired up with level 15s and I groan when I see a level 49 enemy. Despite BioWare’s attempts at fairness, it fails. It’s not so much about skill as it is hoping the SWTOR gods deem me lucky enough to have a few high level characters on my side.
Since the recent release of the 1.1 patch, level 50s can only play in Warzones with other level 50s. It’s still hard to tell if things are completely balanced, since it was just released. This bracketing of the level 50s presents a stop to the advantages’ players have in pimped out battle gear. That’s a great start, but the difference from 10 to 49 is still incredibly deep.
No one will stand between me and that door!
Open-world player versus player is exactly what it sounds like. There are certain planets that both Republic and Imperial can visit. For example, both sides have quests on Tatooine and as an Imperial, I can stumble across a group or a lone Republic player completing their own missions. Or, on the other side, if I know the Republic has a base somewhere close I can then go hunting for my prey. This type of PvP adds every bit of excitement to the repetitive act of experience gathering through quests. Sometimes I ferociously slaughter my enemy, and sometimes I get rofflestomped by a Republic group out on a ganking spree.
My one huge problem with open-world PvP is there are no bonuses for striking a kill, except on Ilum. No experience, no Valor, nothing. This makes the penalty for dying just another trip to the shopkeep for repairs. It kills the competitive nature while taking the threat and scariness away from player versus player. We want players to fear the names of Mel’issa, Peachy, and N’than. When I happened to get slain, it was nothing off my back. I just continued on like nothing ever happened. I want to feel a connection to the open-world PvP, and in SWTOR it’s just not as exciting as it could be.
Ilum is the end-game ice planet that focuses on PvP. The Imperial and Republic each have their own base, and their camps are spread over the land. Each place has two turrets; those fighting against a faction are set on destroying them and those fighting for them help repair it. If all bases are controlled by one faction, that side gains a certain buff that increases Valor points received. Although this seems like an ideal setup for some incredible player versus player action, there is very little PvP actually happening.
This is probably as peaceful as you'll ever see Ilum
The Ilum missions do not feel much different from other quests on other planets, they just have the guise of PvP. Also, there are reported cases of both sides working together to grind through the missions to gain commendations and gear. BioWare has promised us in future updates the focus will return to PvP by having quests with objectives that force players to combat with other players.
Regardless of the flaws that currently plague Star Wars: The Old Republic’s PvP, it is still an insane amount of fun. I have plugged in more hours playing Warzones than I have completing missions. The promise of winning and my drive for competition sucks me back in time and time again. Alongside BioWare’s commitment to improve SWTOR’s player versus player interactions, I feel it can only get better. I look forward to the day I slay you on the battlefield.
Happy hunting!
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