Holocron : Ah, the silence. :)

SunSword : Whoo.

Q-3PO : Hello everyone, sorry about that restart, didn't expect so many people tonight. Things should be stable now. Let me go over how the Dev Chat works. We've closed off the chat room, so that only the speakers will be able to post. Private message your questions to Q-3PO. We will read through the questions and send the most appropraite ones to Raph and Anthony. We won't be able to answer every question but we will try to get through as many as we can. Tonight's topic is on Game Systems with Creative Director Raph "Holocron" Koster and Lead Systems Designer Anthony "SunSword" Castoro. We'll answer questions on various SWG systems such as combat, crafting, economy, skills and professions. We are not going to answer questions on Jedi, the Space Expansion or Beta. We'll go a full hour.

Holocron : And we'll run over time to make up for the delay in starting...! OK, introductions... I'm the creative director for the project, I work over at Sony Online Entertainment, Austin office. Basically, I am in charge of the design for the game. : And I know many of you know that since I see a lot of familiar faces from the boards. :)

SunSword : Hey everyone, I'm the Lead Systems Designer on Sony Online Entertainment. I work in the same office with Holocron. My responsibility is to make sure the game systems support the vision that Holocron sets for the game. I'm in charge of things like the Skill System, combat, etc...

* Holocron : reminds everyone, send your questions to Q-3PO, not to SunSword or Holocron.

Q-3PO: *Jayces*: 1)Can you tell us a bit more about how resources work?

Holocron : Basically, resources fall into broad categories. We generate specific types of resources in those categories. Those specific resources have characteristics that they share in common with the other respurces of that general type (for example, all metals have roughly similar characteristics) Every resource has its own distribution pattern, so you have to find good mining spots for extraction. Resources can also be mined out, and when something is mined out from the entire galaxy, it goes away, like away away, for real. Then we generate a new resource fromt he same category. It may have similar characteristics or may not. We do this so that a) miners are always exploring b) items have turnover because you can't repair old materials anymore b) it gives a nicer market fluctuation to goods.

Q-3PO: *Blade*: Will XP be visible to the player?

SunSword : Yes, but only as a graphical bar. XP is meant to give you a rough idea of your progress towards your skill goals.

Q-3PO: *LilWookie* : How will you be supporting solo gamers, especially crafters?

Holocron : We've seen lots of debate on this on the boards. Basically, the answer is that we are trying to make sure that you are a part of a society online. So there IS interdependence required. But you can play without ever actually playing WITH other people. We have a lot of things in the game to allow you to trade and engage in business without needing to actually talk to those people. You can set up missions to have people deliver goods to your factory, for example, you can sell things without being online, etc.

Q-3PO: *Darth_Felix* Since there will be no one shot kills, will sniping still be a viable profession or will it just die out?

SunSword : Well, the answer in general yes. There are definite long-ranged targetting skills in the combat skill system. So if you describe sniping as the action of sitting back, taking careful aim, and placing shots in specific locations, then yes, sniping will be an extremely viable activity in combat. (sorry for the slow answers, I'm rusty)

Q-3PO: *WarJade* : Can we build houses in the water and in the underground?

Holocron : Not currently planned, no. It starts getting very complicated, when you consider that we do things like deform the terrain under houses, and that sort of thing. So right now, we're not letting you build too close to water, for example, to avoid graphical glitches caused by deforming the terrain around the water... Now, we may still have underwater structures in the game... but not player houses. :)

Q-3PO: *Wardenman* : How complex will player houses be, ie, number of rooms/floors. Also, will add-ons be limited to interior things like in UO, or can you add on a whole wing?

SunSword: We're still in the process of prototyping player housing, so I cannot tell you for sure, however I will give you an idea of what we are trying... We are certainly attempting to do multi-floor player houses, and as part of our attempt to prevent "urban blight" we'd rather go semi-verticle with construction rather than horizontal. I've communicated a few design philosophies having to do with houses, and they include things like "every house should have at least one public area and one private area." As for external add-ons, I don't expect we'll have that kind of feature when we lanuch the game, you'll have to be satisfied for now with choosing a house style you like, and decorating it inside.

Q-3PO: *Derek58* : Can armor be worn under a cloak or baggy clothing?

Holocron : You can wear some kind sof armor under some kinds of clothing, yes. It really does depend on the armor and the clothing. Basically, it boils down to what it would in real life--does it fit? If you have hugely spiky armor, then likely nothing will fit on top of it. But if it's slim, then stuff might fit on top of it. We do have a hard limit of no more than three layers deep, though. We're trying to keep the graphical bar high, and we don't want to see clothing polygons interpenetrating other clothing polygons. Or body parts. ;)

Q-3PO: *megaduce* : How will the Bounty Hunting profession be handled?

SunSword : Good question! Guess, what? I'm going to answer it! Bounty Hunting hasn't been implemented yet, but here's the current design philosophy: We want to avoid abuse of the bounty system. We want the bounty hunting system to feel like Star Wars. There are really two kinds of bounty hunting, and in this answer, I'm going to talk about player bounty hunting. To become a bounty hunter, the player must first meet some prerequisites in the combat system to demonstrate that they are a skilled warrior. They must also obtain some low level investigation skills so that they will have some mechanism for finding the hunted. Having met these prerequisites, they can move up in the bounty hunter ranks, starting out by taking NPC Bounties. After they have advanced they can take Player Bounties. Player bounties are normally generated when someone has violated or failed a player mission. So how does someone earn a bounty? First, a player (the mission giver) posts a mission, and one of the requirements is a "BOND." This bond is credit amount that they require the mission taker to put in escrow for the duration of the mission. If the mission taker fails the mission, the mission giver can choose to place a bounty on the mission taker's head. Part of the money from the bond goes to the bounty. The rest is LOST and cannot be recovered. This generates a mission on the bounty board. It's important to note that the bounty hunter cannot browse all of the missions, they are randomly selected to prevent bounty hunters and mission takers from getting together to swindle mission givers.

Q-3PO: *Thunderwulf* : Thanks for the chat guys. What im wondering is, Will a character who chooses a crafting profession be able to advance in his craft without having to rely on the "kill/loot" method thats common with most MMORPG's?

Holocron : The answer is most definitely that a crafter does not need to fire a shot at all to get better at being a crafter. However, merely crafting lots of stuff is not enough either. That's because we do not want people to just make stuff that nobody wants in order to earn meaningless XP and get on a macroing levelling treadmill. Basically, crafters have to be significant to the marketplace. They advance by having people use the stuff they make. The profession is more economically driven than in other MMORPGs because of that. The rap against that is that it does mean that crafters are dependent on others for their advancement. Then again, that's true in some ways of practically everything. Adventurers depend on people giving missions, to an extent. Anyone int he econmic system at all depends on other people in one way or another. We see this advancement mechanic as being one that helps support the economy rather than destroy it, and one that is conducive to a good level of interdependence at the community level...

Q-3PO: *CaptainPage* : Explain to us more about item decay and how to maintain items. (What exactly is to be done?)

SunSword : Okay, crafted items decay through use and damage. Right now, we don't have a general "over time decay" planned because we have finite storage. Items are composed of two categories of things: Resources, and Components. Components are other crafted items. Someone with repair skill can repair an item essentially by replacing it's components. However, they cannot repair the "base item resources" so over time, all items will need to be replaced if they are used.

Q-3PO: *Leprechaune* : Will all the planets be equally endowed with resources?

Holocron : In the general sense, yes, they are equally seeded with resources by and large. But keep in mind there's a lot of variables to worry about. Some resources might be extraoridinarily scarce and hard to find. So they might be absent on a given planet. Some planets might never get some kinds of resources (water on Tatooine is a good example of a rare resource/planet combo.) Also, resources get used up and new ones generated, and the distribution pattern changes each new resource, of course,so over time, some planets might be in a "dry spell."

Q-3PO: *Darth_Felix* : Will there be a limit on the # of NPC guards, pets, vehicles, or houses that you can own?

SunSword : Yes there will be limits on all of those things. Unfortunately, we have to restrict the number of things players can have in general. For things like pets, you will only be able to control so many at a time, and you will only be able to store so many at a time. For houses, we have a "lot-based" system. Every player will be given a finite number of lots which they can use for building. Once those lots are consumed, a player cannot place more structures, until they make room by removing another one.

Q-3PO: *Enix* : What sorts of things are the Developers putting in the game to promote roleplaying, even amongst players who might not otherwise do it?

Holocron : Well, as the old saying goes, you can lead a horse to water, but you can't make him roleplay... Among the things that I consider as conducive to encouraging roleplaying: Moods (where you can say something angrily), Say alternates (where you can mutter or grumble or sigh something rather than "say"), Prose chat mode (where you can get the full effect of those things), Lots and lots of animated motion captured emotes, Freeform emote (like /me in IRC or pose/emote in muds/moos), Game systems that encourage you to actually live the role you are pursuing as a profession (for example, crafters having to actually have a market), Player languages (and NPC ones) so you can learn languages, might need translators or protocol droids, etc., Diverse array of character customization, clothing, and lots of flexibility... A tough name filter. You get the idea. Now, none of those things in themselves will make someone roleplay who doesn't want to. We can't force someone to be a good roleplayer. All we can do is offer as many tools as we can. There's more than those in there (and the game systems on in particular covers a LOT of ground) but this is a long enough answer already. :)

Q-3PO: *LilWookie* : Is it possible that you will have multiple BH per target?

SunSword : Interesting question. This is up for debate at the moment. I've seen it discussed on the forums, and it is an interesting idea. It does raise some problems though. First it increases the possibility that a bounty hunter/bountied player can game the system because bounty hunters will see more missions. It also raises some other questions such as, "Are two bounty hunters on the same mission automatically enemies of one another?" I'd like to see more discussion on the boards about this, as it is not officially part of the design at the moment.

Q-3PO: *Moggerog* : Do you guys have a working contract system yet? How flexible/complicated can dealings be using the system and what sort of player actions/activities can the system keep track of?

Holocron : We don't consider it a contract system, we call it the mission system. It's not all up and running yet, only some of it. It touches a lot of other systems (in particualr, the big other thing it touches is the need to be able to manipulate "object tokens" which are referents to objects that you keep in your datapad.) We're starting small with missions because it's a complex system. There will only few a few types of transactions it recognizes at first. I imagine that many of the moe complex things you guys want to do will not be supported. Think small for now: deliveries, exterminations, acting as guides, flocating specific items, etc. For now, the missions are one-leg only. However, the system keeps track of all sorts of things for you. You can set time limits, filters, post the missions publicly or give them privately to someone... We hope that if the missions stuff pans out, it woul dbecome one of the prime areas for future expansion.

Q-3PO: *SWGuy* : Will Brawling be in the game?

SunSword : Well, if by "brawling" you mean melee combat, the answer is yes. However, you should remember that it's a bad idea to bring your barefists to a blaster fight (unless you're Vader). There are skill trees and professions related to melee combat, both armed and unarmed, and they center around three styles: Power, Speed, and Technique. As a matter of fact, one of the tentative profession titles is "Brawler," referring to someone with lots of unarmed power skills.

Q-3PO: *GrAsShOpPa* : Will there be Ubber items in SWG?

Holocron : Not in the EQ sense. You don't camp some megamob to get an uber item that only it drops, every fourteen and a half days. The collest items are hopefully going to be made by players. There WILL be cool things that you can only get from mobs. But many of those things will be components, not finished uber goods.

Q-3PO: *LordIblis* : Will the Hutt-faction have a disadvantage regarding the other factions because of military issues?

SunSword : Well yes. And no. You could argue that the Rebels are also at a significant disadvantage to the Empire, being much smaller both in military size and pure numbers. The strenght of the Hutt faction is that they tend to operate in backwater areas and because they are a criminal faction, get access to things they shouldn't... If the question is intended to mean, "Will Empire players kick Hutt players' butts with AT-ATs?" the answer is, that depends on how resourceful the Hutt faction is at gaining access to Imperial hardware.

Q-3P0 : There are 15 more minutes for our chat, but we'll extend the chat an additional 15 minutes to make up for the technical problems at the beginning. So, we'll go for another half hour from now.

Q-3PO: *Bald-Wookie*: How will loot be handled for creatures, I know people don't want to open a Rancor and find Credits on them?

Holocron : There won't be magical credit pouches on rancors, no. :) If you shoot a rancor, it's going to be because you're a) working on getting better at shooting b) maybe have a market for rancor teeth c) are on a mission given you by the game or another player to take out a rancor lair. Basically, we want the act of attcking a rancor to be in context, if you know what I mean. You do it for a reason. (Mere survival is a valid reason of course. ;) )

Q-3PO: *GeminiJedi* : How will you handle macroing leveling?

SunSword : Well our advancement system isn't usage based, so macroing in the traditional sense won't work. Frequently, to get to the next skill, you only have to use the related skill enough to demonstrate knowledge. Frequently, you'll have to complete a mission or do some other non-usage activity to qualify for the next skill. Our game isn't about getting the next skill, it's about using the skill to do something fun. With that in mind, we've tried to design a system that encourages actual game activities, not just mindless use of the skill.

Q-3PO: *KirKethlik* : Will crafted items require other crafted items in order to craft the item?

Holocron : Absolutely.

SunSword : Lots of them.

Q-3PO: *tifightbst* : What can a mayor do besides forgive outcasts?

SunSword : Wooo!

Holocron : Don't give it all away, SunSword ;)

SunSword : We're still working on the mayoral powers, but in general, the Mayor can set the tax levels (to pay maintenance fees on structures) place structures, and perhaps change some other rules for the city.

* Holocron : gags SunSword and drags him behind the Dumpster...

* SunSword : must restrain...self.......

SunSword : ack. gah.

Q-3PO: *Masurao* : If you don't own a store, how will we be able to set up shop to sell items?

Holocron : There's two ways. One, you find someone who does own a store, and sell your items to them. In other words, you're a wholesaler, not a retailer. The second means is, you use the commodities market, and that's all I'll say about that feature. ;) Oh--I guess you could run a vendor in another player's shop too...

Q-3PO: *MikeTheNose* : Does number of lots include how many you can put on one planet or the whole universe?

* SunSword : pokes Raph.

SunSword : There are two limits. Each player has a limit for the total number of lots they can have in the whole galaxy. Each planet has a total number of lots that may be built upon as well. We've calculated this based on the number of players, number of lots, and surface areas. There should be plenty of room.

Q-3PO: *Mistfreshie* : Will there be a system that allows me to rent stuff from other players?

Holocron : Nothing like that currently planned, but I guess you could give something to someone, and then create a mission for that specific player at the same time that was for delivering that same item back by a certain date. Then if they don't give it back, you can send a bounty hunter after them. :)

Q-3PO: *Sasco* : Will the ability to disarm an opponent be an option as an alternative to fighting?

* SunSword : nods.

SunSword : Yes.

Q-3PO: *Alzeya* : Will the ability to disarm an opponent be an option as an alternative to fighting?

SunSword : We aren't done implementing the combat system yet, but a disarm skill is planned, although it's really just an action you take in combat, it's not really an alternative to fighting, it's a tactic.

Q-3PO: *Bajeezus* : Will player governments be allowed to choose a type of government, republic, democracy, monarchy oligarchy, etc?

Holocron : At launch, democracy only.

Q-3PO: *RedNbacca* : * Is the skill tree finished? When will we get to see it?

Holocron : No, it's not finished.

* SunSword : nods.

Holocron : And you won't get to see it until the game is in your hands, most likely. Certainly not all of it.

* SunSword : nods some more.

Q-3PO: *B0XMAN* : What types of regulations will there be to moderate what we manufacture?

SunSword : Well this is an interesting question. There are two phases to crafting. The first phase is the "design phase." This is where most crafters will do their work. They will use a draft "schematic" that they get from the skill system to design a final item. The types of schematics you will have access to will be based on your current progression through the skill system. At low levels, crafters will be able to design components that will be used all the way up through the construction of complex items. As players move up, they lose the ability to craft components and gain the ability to craft intermediate items, and so on. This is a very general answer and will ellicit a lot of discussion, I know. The second phase is manufacturing, where players take the finished schematic and use it as a blueprint to make items using the appropriate ingredients. At this point, there are no restrictions on manufacturing at this point in the process.

Q-3PO: *Reng_Kole* : Is there a type of "offline" xp skill gain for every profession, (as in the example of characters eating a bakers pastries while he is offline)?

Holocron : No, not every profession can gain while offline. There's no way for someone who is a marksman to gain while offline, for example. The XP earning for professions which rely on objects being used can be earned offline that covers stuff like crafting, mining, factories, sales, etc. But stuff that is more adventuring centered, more based on people using something directly on someone, those call for you to be there actually using the blaster on a target.

Q-3P0 : We've got 5 minutes left, so just a few more questions . . .

Q-3PO: *Cpl_Steel* : If two characters are fighting one another, and they have equall skills and equall equipment, What will decide the winner (please don't say luck)?

SunSword : The decisions they make. As we have outlined before, the combat system lets players place "actions" in a queue. The choice of actions will be the critical path for success on an even (or uneven) playing field.

Q-3PO: *Mabo* : How is the GUI coming along?

Holocron : Big topic! :) Well, we have a functional HUD including chat box, radar, toolbar, and some combat UI like your combat queue and targets; we have a contextual reticle now, you can switch between mouselook and mouse mode, all windows movable and resizable... We do NOT have final art on anything, which is why we haven't shown any UI in screenshots. We want to refine the UI and iterate it as much as possible, of course. Oh, we also have inventory screens, character creation, that sort of thing. Lately I've been revising the skills interface, and recently did the mission system interfaces. Our poor UI programmer is quite overworked. ;)

Q-3PO: *Caella* : Is 48 hours the length of all temp enemy flags still?

SunSword : Yes, for the moment. Keep in mind that any number we through out is usually a starting point, and will be tweaked as we examine the systems further, especially in beta testing.

Q-3P0 : Killjoy-X Outcasts are needed for one of the primary political functions. How do you cut the balance between making Outcasting strong and not making it so rare that players are terrified of going down that road?

Holocron : I wouldn't say they are *needed*. If there aren't any, it isn't like the government will collapse. :) I would be quite happy if it turned out that Outcasting was an effective deterrent to PKing, because it's a better foundation for us to explore more dynamic player governments and other such features than a PK switch is. If Outcasting worked well enough that we didn't need safe areas, that woul dbe neat. :) But I'm not counting on it, we know that it's an experiment in many ways. The reason it is in the game is to try to empower players. We wan tto find ways to let players havetheir space which they can shape, and control over the degree of aw (or lawlessness) is an important part of that.

Q-3P0 : That was the last question. Anthony and Raph, do you have any last comments before we end the chat tonight?

Holocron : I just want to say that i HAVE been reading the various crime threads, and we've been discussing them at the office. : It's a thorny issue, though, and I'll be candid and say that we do not have any easy answers fo ryou tonight. But we're going to continue looking at your concerns and we hope to be able to address it on the boards soon.

SunSword : I'd just like to say that I'll be interested to see further discussion on all of these topics on the boards, especially crafting and bounty hunting.

Holocron : Oh, and sorry again about the rocky start to the chat :P

Q-3P0 : Thanks for coming everyone! Sorry about the technical problems at the beginning, but we hope the extra time made up for it. We will post the transcript tomorrow and we'll send all the remaining questions to the developers to see if they want to answer them on the boards. Thanks Raph, Anthony, and Mark (our technical guru)! Have a great night everyone! Kevin, Marie, and Travis (your hosts)