Dariuas - Greetings Imperials and Rebels alike! (Oh, and you non-faction people too) Welcome to the Star Wars Galaxies: An Empire Divided House of Commons! I am Dariuas, I will be your host this evening. In order to ask a question to the developers, you must /msg or /query one of the following people [Qt]Snake, [Qt]Merloth, [Qt]Chux and, [Qt]Ryu . Dariuas - Please do not message the developers or myself. Only send your question to 1 QTaker, and please do not spam them with the same question over and over. Dariuas - With that said, please welcome the SWG team, Haden Blackman Producer LucasArts, J. Allen Brack, Producer SOE, Brandon Reinhart Designer, Raph Koster Creative Director, Kevin O'Hara Community Manager SOE, Ronda Scott Internet Community Relations Specialist We will begin the HoC once they have introduced themselves! ronda_lucasarts - Hello everyone, thanks for joining us! :-) Q-3PO - Hey everybody. Glad you could make it Blair - Greetings all. GreenMarine - Hola. I'm Brandon ^_^ Holocron - Hello everyone!
Dariuas - *[TMPST]Werzoth* Does the buildings for the city (cantina, hospital, player garage, theater, parks, fountains, etc.) take any lots? Maintenance? Could you explain how the process works with the interaction of politician and urban planner and placing those inside the city? GreenMarine - I'll take this one. GreenMarine - Structures owned by the city like cloning facilities and shuttleports don't take up lots. Cantinas and hospitals are owned by players and do take up lots. GreenMarine - For city structures, maintenance is paid by the city as a lump sum. GreenMarine - Cities can charge various taxes to help pay for the maintenance. GreenMarine - Initially, politician will be focused on running the city. They gain various abilities to enhance the city, etc. GreenMarine - Urban Planner...I'm still not sure how this profession will happen. It may be that we go with putting the new schematics into architect instead. It's still being discussed. GreenMarine - done :)
Dariuas - *[TMPST]Werzoth* Could you tell us a bit more about the 5 ranks a city can have? (requirements to go up/down (citizens, structures?), radius granted at each rank, rewards, etc.). GreenMarine - The five ranks scale from outpost to metropolis. A city earns rank as players join the city as citizens. GreenMarine - In order to be a citizen, you have to own a declared residence within the city. GreenMarine - Ranks enable city abilities. A rank 4 "city," for example, can have a shuttleport. An outpost (rank 1) can't. GreenMarine - The idea is that as you work to build your city, you are rewarded for the effort by unlocking new structures. GreenMarine - done.
Dariuas - *Ichiir* What is the minimum distance a player city has to be from an existing static city? GreenMarine - The radius of the city can't overlap an existing static city. Ideally, you want to build your city away from no build regions so that you get the most out of your radius. GreenMarine - The max radius of two player placed cities cannot overlap. GreenMarine - So even though your city might start small, the max potential city size can't interfere with the max potential city size of another city.
Dariuas - *ikoo* i was wondering how milita will work in game ... how many milita will be allowed, etc. GreenMarine - Currently, the city mayor, as a politician, earns a skill to manage the militia. Any city citizen can be a militia member. GreenMarine - Militia members earn three new commands: /cityban, /citypardon, and /citywarn GreenMarine - but you CAN still enter the city radius and access your own structures GreenMarine - the /citypardon command removes a ban GreenMarine - The /citywarn command is a bit more complex...
* Q-3PO wonders if we should have titled this the GreenMarine chat ;) * GreenMarine - When a player is WARNED they become vulnerable to attack by the militia for 5 minutes as long as they are in the city radius. GreenMarine - Its a way for the militia to protect their territory by force of arms. GreenMarine - If you are warned and you leave the city, the TEF is removed. GreenMarine - City militia combat is layered on top of the normal PvP system. If you are warned, your buddies can't help you, regardless of faction etc GreenMarine - However GreenMarine - There are some exceptions GreenMarine - heh this is where things get a little complex GreenMarine - if the militia is rebel and you are imperial, you can fight normally GreenMarine - Just think of it as an extra pvp layer for city protection on top of existing pvp rules. GreenMarine - I hope that makes sense. If not, ask more.
Dariuas - *Thalia* Will the mayor be able to remove factories and houses that we don't want part of our town and rearrange the buildings in our city? GreenMarine - We aren't sure. Some players are asking for this, but its potentially highly griefable. How would you feel if someoen moved your house to place their cloning facility? We are still debating this. Most likely this feature won't be in the initial set of player city rules because it is fairly problematic.
Dariuas - *Kluz[Mos_Tera]* Does the radius grow every time a citizen joins? and if not, could you explain how that works? GreenMarine - There are fixed points at which the rank and radius increases. There is an advancement window open to all players in the city that shows how much is needed to get a new rank. GreenMarine - So you might need 10 citizens to get rank 2, etc. GreenMarine - Those numbers aren't final right now and probably won't be until this hits TC.
Dariuas - *[EPIC]Scraps* What timeframe are we looking at for a Player Cities Testserver rollout? Blair - We have something called a monthly update that we work on, well, every month. Blair - These are our big major updates that come out. Blair - We have a major updated hitting testcenter today. Blair - Player cities is not in this update. Blair - Our target is to have player cities in the next monthly update.
Dariuas - *ArtyD* Will player citys prevent anyone from collecting resources within it like static citys? GreenMarine - That statement isn't quite accurate, you can sample in static cities. That aside, nothing prevents you from harvesting in a dynamic city. GreenMarine - In fact, charging property tax on harvester owners will be one way cities make money.
Dariuas - *Loafman* What happens if a town is formed around my existing structure, and I do not wish to join the town? How will this affect the "police" squads and taxes and whatnot? GreenMarine - In order for cities to truly function, they have to have some influence on the surrounding structures and populace. If you dont' want to join, don't declare that house a residence, then you won't be a citizen. You will still be subject to property tax and if you don't like it you'll have to move. GreenMarine - The point is though... GreenMarine - That the city, ideally, should bring you something. A nearby cloning facility, a shuttleport, a bank, etc. GreenMarine - If the city owner is a punk, he could sic his militia on you. If he does that to everyone, though, he won't be able to build a very effective city.
Dariuas - *RedEye* Are politicians basic/elite/elite-elite classes? If Elite, are they a single branch evolution, or full tree? GreenMarine - Politician is a novice profession. Anyone can buy the novice politician skill and run for office in a city. You advance by earning votes in elections. Politician is focused around player cities right now, but other types of government and elections can be introduced in the future (far future, lets not talk about that right now) GreenMarine - Its a full tree. GreenMarine - Its not a starting profession thoug. GreenMarine - though Q-3PO - Let's give them a hint on how to become one Dariuas - a jedi?
* Dariuas drools *
* Dariuas smacks himself * Q-3PO - No not a Jedi, sheesh. GreenMarine - What we are currently planning is that you get that first politician box with some apprentice xp. GreenMarine - Its novice in that it has no other skill requirements. Q-3PO - So you can start working on that if you want to be among the first politicians....
Dariuas - *Patient_Zero* will we be able to make starports similar to theed's? where people can leave whenever they wish GreenMarine - Not like Theeds. You can place shuttleports, the shuttle has to be there for you to leave. GreenMarine - The city can place a surcharge on ticket sales. GreenMarine - To make some extra cash.
Dariuas - *Creidsinn* will the money from taxes be going to a special bank account for city use only or will the money be lying int he mayor's bank account? GreenMarine - The money goes into the city treasury. I'm still working out a good way to make the treasury secure, so the mayor can't cut and run. Possibly by putting transactions up for a vote. It isn't certain at this point.
Dariuas - *Odeloth* Greetings! In all honesty, do you think the players will welcome the cities as a new, stimulating mean of roleplaying, or just another big storage "facility"? The "Friday Feature" document outlines them nicely, let's hope we can use them mainly as a complex roleplaying environment. Holocron - Well, I think some players will certainly welcome it as a roleplaying feature. Others won't. More than anything, I think we're providing a tool with this system. Holocron - There will certainly be some players who use it for RP, but I also hope some use it for pvP with the militia, and others use it as an economic subgame. Holocron - I guess we can't really stop people who just want it for storage though. ;) GreenMarine - Hey, the master musicians and dancers will be able to run their own cantinas. GreenMarine - There's a lot of opportunity for RPing there. GreenMarine - Same for doctors and hospitals. GreenMarine - combat medics, etc. Holocron - That's true. :) I am looking forward to mayors trying to balance their budgets, that's for sure. Q-3PO - I'm going to vote for Arnold as my mayor. Is he running? [QT]Chux - lol Wolfgang - lol
Dariuas - Question: What dype of defensive structures can we get for our cities other than turrets? Will we be able to build walls or guard towers? GreenMarine - Turrets will not be in the initial release of player cities...I think. Besides the Militia, there will be some defensive options, but they aren't fully fleshed out so I dont' want to talk about them too much.
Dariuas - *GD* What other structures will be part of cities that hasn't been released yet? Any hopes in building walls, bridges, and other beautification add-ons? GreenMarine - I'm not sure about walls...after all it would not be cool if you walled in your enemies. But there is a pretty extensive list of beautification objects. Domes, gardens, statues, foutains. Lots of room for customization.
Dariuas - *Rem|Lowca* will players be able to form "private" cities in which new citizens must first either 1) get permission from the urban planner to place a structrue within the existing city limits? or 2) get approved by the mayor prior to becoming a citizen? GreenMarine - No private cities in the first release. Maybe in the future. We want city building to be a public effort.
Dariuas - *Sien* one of the biggest problems when building is terrain, ive tried creating streets but the terrain is not letting me build where I want, will it be possible to flatten the terrain within a city area? GreenMarine - You won't be able to flatten terrain. That's a significant technical design issue that we won't be addressing in the near future. However, most of the new structures are being set up with a more reasonable terrain tolerance. That being said, you are going to have the most success if you place your city in a flat region. GreenMarine - I like the swampy area in south Naboo :) GreenMarine - I have two test cities. Mos Testy and Mos Swampy.
Dariuas - *[EH]Compton* I have a question for the Devs: When the new Professions are introduced, are we going to get more Skill Points so we don't have to destroy our existing characters to explore them? Holocron - We're not planning on raising the skill point cap for the player cities update. Holocron - We use a math formula to determine how many skill points players get--it's based on how much it woul cost to get all the skills in the game. Holocron - For initial launch, we actually gave you a bit of extra buffer room. Holocron - However, I will say that as we add more professions in the future (we see profession additions as a cool way to add to the game, so we expect to do that a lot) that we will up the cap eventually.
Dariuas - *Vanye* Will there be some sort of Marketplace for crafters to put Vendor's rather than going from house to house to go shopping? GreenMarine - So, this isn't related to player cities and might show up afterward or at the same time, but we do have a set of open tent structures for Merchants only that will be going in. You can place your vendors in the tent and people will hear the vendor bark as they walk by. You can also place a few decorations in the tent to customize it. I don't have any ETA on that. It's half implemented on my machine :)
Dariuas - *Dariuas* Has anyone become a jedi yet?
* [QT]Snake perks up at the J word... * GreenMarine - lol Haden - Other than me? Q-3PO - I have too, but not legitimately. Ah internal QA servers. :) Blair - We have a way to look at "who has met the jedi requirements". Blair - No one has met the requirements. Blair - People are getting closer though.
Dariuas - *morecontentplease* Are we going to get more intricate static NPC quests in the future? Multi-legged quests that feature more than just running Haden - Yes! Q-3PO - Yes yes yes Haden - We're working on this right now, putting a ton of effort into getting more static quests into the game for you. Haden - IN fact, right now, we have Nym's Stronghold on Test Center. Haden - That "theme park" has three separate quests that are pretty intricate and tell a connected story. Haden - They each take you to a fairly large dungeon as well.
Dariuas - *new_nicknam6* Will creature mounts need to be a creature handler to use them? Haden - The Warren, which is also on Test Center, has it's own storyline. Haden - And is also quite involved. Haden - We're trying to tie as much of the new quests into the Star Wars continuity and ongoing saga as possible. Blair - Will you have to be a creature handler to have a mount. Blair - NO!
Dariuas - *SensSmaq* When can architects expect to have their broken schematics fixed (lamps that don't light, items that are identical, couches that dont work) and when will our broken Construction skill tree be adressed? GreenMarine - Very soon, we are reintroducing our company "Bug Day" where everyone focuses on bugs only for one day of the week. GreenMarine - things like broken schematics are very easy to fix, they just take some time (the crafting data can be hairy). Bug Day will help us address issues like this much more quickly.
Dariuas - *BlindTyldak* How much faster can a mount move than a PC avatar? Are there some that can run constantly at BR speed or faster? Blair - There are differences in many of the creatures. Blair - But in general, mounts will move about as fast as a player who is using burst run. Blair - The idea is for mounts to be a cool feature, as well as reduce travel times. Blair - I think you will enjoy it. Blair - But we don't want to tell you what creatures we are releasing quite yet. Blair - It's a secret!
Dariuas - Thank you all for attending the Star Wars Galaxies House of Commons chat! Special thanks to all the developers who put up with us! Watch your favorite Stratics site for a log of this HoC! But before we go, we'd like to ask our Dev's to say something spiffy! ronda_lucasarts - Thanks so much for coming. ronda_lucasarts - We'll be back next month with more updates for you! [QT]Snake - Thanks to everyone for coming out! :D Q-3PO - Wish we had more time, there are lots of great questions. We'll definitely start doing more of these. GreenMarine - My fingers hurt. Q-3PO - Thanks Stratics for putting it together Dariuas - ROFL Blair - Thanks for coming folks. Blair - Have a good evening. Holocron - Night, all! Haden - We hope you all continue to enjoy the game. Thanks for playing (and thanks Stratics!). Q-3PO - Later gators GreenMarine - Later guys. Thanks for coming out. Blair - Hasta.
