Star Wars The Old Republic: PvP
By Remko Molenaar (Proxzor) OnRPG Journalist
If you’re reading this today it likely means you’re stuck at work and counting down the minutes till you can go home and hop into Star Wars The Old Republic. So allow me to help pass the time and share my thoughts on the recent PvP and warzone updates brought into the game leading up to launch.
Warzones have been seen before in a lot of MMOs and are quite popular among the PvP fanbose. Bioware added its own magic touch to this game feature to create warzones unique to Star Wars. There are currently three warzones that have been seen and played during the last betas. These three warzones all had some uniquely made concept, and each had its own following of fans. I’ll be going over the pros and cons of all three but first a small tid bit of info. To make things fair every player that joins a warzone is matched to the highest level so that their stats are on par with each other. They however lack the skills of a higher level so they still have a little disadvantage so to speak.
Voidstar
In this warzone both sides have to fight their way through in a race against time. You will have to access the ship’s data core while the other side tries to defend the ship and prevent the other side from reaching the data core. The battle takes place on a lost ship which has supposedly some sort of schematics to a powerful weapon that both sides want. Now that the long lost ship has been rediscovered both sides are racing to the depths of space to take control of the vessel and access the secrets stored in its memory banks. The fight takes place in the ship and you will have to break in through different sections of the ship in order to steal the secret schematics of the powerful weapon. While you are doing this however, the defending side will try to prevent you from taking these schematics and thoughtful team play has to come from both sides in other to emerge victorious. I personally found this the least favorite warzone because of the intense pressure placed on each member of the team. Also if one team had higher level characters, it really created an imbalanced match-up, despite the game’s power balancing in PvP.
Huttball
Huttball is by far my favorite warzone in SWTOR as well as most of the forum community. The concept is simple capture-the-flag mechanics as seen in many MMOs. However, Bioware added a nice touch to it by changing the flag to a ball. In essence it’s American football.. in space! Two teams meet inside the deadly arena also known as The Pit. In the pit players will have to take control of the ball which appears in the center of the map. If you’re lucky enough to get your hands on the ball, you must survive the barrage of foes and try to get the ball into the enemy team’s goal. The goal line is very close to the opponents spawning area so it will be hard taking the ball to the other side without any team work. Team tactics are far more important in this mode than any of the others so be sure to communicate with your allies. Throughout the level there are traps scattered on the map that will help you push enemies away or damage them. You can also use objects and ramps as launching pads to dodge and juke your enemies. In essence, the uniquely designed map can become your best friend or worst nightmare. At the end of the game the team with the most points wins and is rewarded with a lot of coin and experience.
Alderaan
The Alderaan warzone has a concept which is also quite known in the MMO scene and is fairly simple to understand. This Warzone takes place on an iconic world and players have to take a troop transport to get to the battlefield. In this warzone you will have to take control of certain laser turrets that are spread across the battlefield. Once one team has captured all the laser turrets then the enemy’s transport is knocked out of the sky, ending the match. There are three turrets total and tough strategic decisions must be made through the match of who to use as defense and who to send on assault missions. This Warzone is one of the hardest in my opinion and often stretches out into some pretty intense battles. Once again communication is key to your success.
Outside of the warzones there is also World PVP that can keep you occupied in certain areas. It will however totally depend on what server you are playing. There are PvP servers and PvE servers so that every player gets their choice to either experience a realistic warring world, or pick flowers without getting disturbed. I personally am a big fan of PvP servers so I will roll my Dark Sith there.
Conclusion
It’s been a pleasure hyping this game over the past few months. I personally am a big fan of this game and a big fan of its various PvP modes. The Warzones shows us the caliber of Bioware’s studio, and I expect to see plenty more amazing warzones in the future. Look forward to further coverage of Star Wars from me as I intend to stick around with this game for quite some time.
