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During our recent Dev Chat, we hinted at the fact that Mandalorian Armor will be added to the game via a new dungeon we're working on now. This caused some confusion among some players who thought that Mandalorian Armor was already in the game... Let me clear that up.
Short Answer: Mandalorian Armor has existed since launch, but we haven't given you a way to find it/make it/buy it...
The Long Answer: We've had the Mandalorian Armor assets for some time (since well before launch), but we've always struggled to find a good way to integrate the armor into the game. Like Jedi, we didn't want Mandalorian Armor to become commonplace - it's supposed to be rare armor worn by an elite crew of mercenaries (who, by this point in the timeline, have been all but wiped out). We knew that bounty hunters would covet a suit of "Boba Fett's armor," and would feel "cheated" if just anyone could make, buy, or recover Mandalorian armor. So, there was some back and forth before launch about how to best implement the armor, and the best choice seemed to be by folding it into some kind of dungeon or quest progression. As many of you also know, however, we're sensitive to cutting crafters out of the economy - we didn't want there to be an over-abundance of "uber-loot" items that remove the combat professions' dependency on crafters (as the game has evolved, we've become more open-minded about the types of loot we can drop, but we're still cognizant of the crafters' needs). During the race towards launch and in the weeks that followed, we just didn't have time to devise a dungeon or series of quests that could provide Mandalorian armor in a compelling manner (with a good backstory, which is really important to me, especially in this case) *and* remain true to our design goals regarding crafters.
A few months ago, a LucasArts employee who plays the game religiously started a grass-roots crusade to get Mandalorian armor into the game. I was sympathetic, but we had so much on our plates already. Fortunately, during a review of the dungeon assets in development, we discovered a rundown mine that nobody was sure how to populate. To me, it seemed like the perfect hideout for a gang of mercenaries - and thus, we decided that it would become the lair of the Death Watch, an offshoot of the Mandalorians. I'm not going to give away too many details, but I'm really excited about the direction for the dungeon and I think it's going to make both powerful combat characters and skilled crafters happy...
Stayed tuned in the coming weeks. Before you know it, you'll be battling your way through Death Watch assassins and soldiers in search of one of the most iconic outfits in the Star Wars lore. Just make sure you know a good Armorsmith...
Haden Blackman
LucasArts Producer
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which in that case would spoil the whole point of having mando armour in the game.
