Comlink – July 7, 2006

As many know, we're in the process of completing implementation on the Jedi and Bounty Hunter trees in the Profession Expertise system for Chapter 2. The designers responsible for these new trees are Hanse for the Jedi trees and Tunso for the Bounty Hunter trees.

In last week's Comlink, I briefly outlined the Expertise system and discussed its impact on the Jedi. This week I am including the brief overview for those of you who missed last week, and I am also discussing the Bounty Hunters' Expertise trees.

Before I get into the specific trees, I want to explain the goals of the Expertise system and how it works. The overall goal of the system is to offer new and exciting choices for players to make about the development of their characters. These choices offer players the chance to further customize their character creating more diversity between characters of the same profession and give the player an additional goal when leveling.

At level 10, a player earns five Expertise points and then earns 1 point every two levels up to a maximum of forty-five points at level 90. Beginning with Chapter 2, only Jedi and Bounty Hunter characters will be able to interact with the system and allocate these points or even see the Expertise interface. We will introduce the expertise system to two professions per Chapter moving forward.

Once a player reaches level 10, they can activate the Expertise interface (it will appear on the Main Menu) and begin allocating their points over the two trees available to their profession. Eventually, a third tree will be introduced that specifically offers choices regarding the Galactic Civil War and Player-versus-Player specific enhancements, but that will not be available after the basic Expertise system is available to all nine professions.

Allocating Expertise points will do one of two things for a character. They will either modify an existing ability, such as increasing damage done, or they will unlock new abilities or series of abilities.

Players can allocate the points they have earned and even experiment with different choices through the interface without permanently committing to the changes. Once they're satisfied with their allocation, they can choose to “accept” those choices by clicking the “Accept” button. Once accepted these choices can only be undone for a fee through a re-spec (re-specialization option) from the appropriate NPC.

Tree Key/Legend

Notes :

• The Expertise tree graphics below are concept pieces used to construct the trees and not representative of actual in-game art.
• Specific numbers mentioned in the tree summaries are apt to change as we iterate and test the data over the weeks leading up to the scheduled update.

The Bounty Hunter Expertise Trees

The two trees below reflect improvements or brand new abilities for the Bounty Hunter. We are not going to auto-allocate any Expertise points on release for the Bounty Hunter since all expertise choices are additive to the currently existing special abilities.

The two Bounty Hunter trees are Bounty Hunting and Bounty Specializations. The Bounty Hunting tree focuses on allowing the Bounty Hunter to enhance or focus on specific areas of actually hunting targets by offering new abilities and improvements to existing trap and ambush abilities. The Bounty Specializations tree emphasizes benefits to the Bounty Hunter wearing assault armor and using carbines and/or rifles as weapons of choice.

The Future

Many players expressed concerns after the last Comlink post about the integration of existing abilities into the Expertise trees. I specifically stated in replies to those concerns, on the previous Comlink, that the Jedi profession was the exception in this system in terms of existing abilities being rolled into Expertise trees. My hope is that this Comlink will put to rest those concerns. Again, your feedback is welcome and I appreciate your interest in the system!

Please have a good weekend! EJDev SOE Senior Designer, Star Wars Galaxies