Jump to content

EntaroAdun

Members
  • Posts

    14
  • Joined

Reputation

10 Good
  1. Not exactly, a Shadow, per se, but Corran Horn does a fair amount of sneaking around and investigating in I, Jedi. Though I guess he would probably fit the old model of Jedi Investigator better than Shadow...
  2. Worth giving some thought to the very idea of "quality of life" as a useful metric for measuring a society. Historically, this metric only emerged relatively late in the 20th century as a real measure of societal success. See, for example, Melvyn Leffler's For the Soul of Mankind, which discusses the evolution of US-Soviet rivalry in the second half of the 20th century. For the first half of the 20th century, metrics like military power, steel output, or scientific achievement were generally considered to be the mark of a successful society. It was only with the emergence of contemporary consumer culture from the 1950s onwards that "standard of living" in terms of material welfare became a metric for societal success, first in the United States and increasingly throughout the rest of the world. So, while we might consider the quality of life in the Empire from a real-world perspective, it might also be worth considering whether "quality of life" is really a metric that is used in-universe. Certainly at the time of the Prequel Trilogy people in the Republic don't really seem to care very much about the "quality of life" of many Republic citizens living throughout the galaxy. Perhaps quality of life is not a particularly meaningful concept for the denizens of the GFFA.
  3. The Mantis actually reminds me a bit of Serenity from the show Firefly, except with a third engine pod sticking off the bottom. I really like the Defender class - I think it does a good job drawing on the various diplomatic vessels from the movies. The Imp Agent ship is also perfect - it's what James Bond would fly, if he were in this game.
  4. The Jedi believe that the Force is created and sustained by the natural process of life. For them, the Force and nature are inextricably intermixed. As a result, the Jedi tend to shy away from mixing the Force with technological artifacts. This is not to say that the Jedi don't want to know more about the Force; after all, Knowledge is a major precept of the Jedi Code. But the Jedi want to know more about the Force as it is, not as they want it to be. Attempts to bend the Force to one's will through artifice is ultimately a path to the Dark Side. So, for the Jedi, there is a reason that the Force is only manifest to certain individuals, and not to others - that's just the nature of the Force. The role of a Jedi is to accept that nature, not try to change it. By comparison, the Sith are all about taking what they want - no limits. As a result, Sith tend to be more willing to try to manipulate the Force through artifice. If a Sith, for some reason, decided that he wanted to share Force sensitivity with others, that would be consistent. However, it's not clear why a Sith would want that, since Sith tend to be about maximizing power, not sharing it.
  5. I agree that the structure of an MMO makes killing off the player's companions a bad idea, even though it could make for an epic story. That said, I do hope they continue the companion stories... the convo with Kira about how the Jedi should rule the Republic makes me think there's some very interesting story material there.
  6. Political scientists often differentiate between "authority" and "influence" within any political setting. Authority is generally derived from the official positions of state, usually in some form of formal hierarchy. Influence is an abstract measurement of other means of power - personal affiliations, private wealth, or, in the case of the Sith Empire, strength in the Force. In any system of government, an individual's influence may be very different than their titular authority. In general, authoritarian governments often have (perhaps ironically) very unclear structures of authority, often with entirely parallel systems of government existing simultaneously. Competing lines of authority actually help to secure the power of the national leadership, since competing bureaucracies are unable to adjudicate disputes amongst themselves, and must continuously turn to the national leader to make decisions. One might expect that the Sith Empire, with its 12 quasi-independent Spheres, is designed to operate along these lines, securing the Emperor's place as the ultimate arbiter. On the question of Sith philosophy, it actually makes a lot of sense that Sith government would be organized along lines of influence rather than along lines of formal authority, since Sith believe that the powerful should rule and the weak should perish. Formal authority rests on a series of rules and customs that (in the Sith opinion) serve to restrain the truly strong from seizing power. In a system of pure influence, however, those with the greatest influence rule the society, regardless of titular positions of authority. Thus it's not surprising that an influential individual like Kilran or Malgus would behave peremptorily towards others, even if his actual position of authority were not particularly strong.
  7. I made a similar switch from Focus to Def-Vig Hybrid, though less motivated by the Focus nerf than a desire to try something new (I ran pure Def for a while before switching to Focus). My build looks something like this: http://www.torhead.com/skill-calc#500rrMzzZcGMMrhdzMMZ0M.1 It's a little more offense-oriented than yours - I opted for the auto-crit Bladestorm/Dispatch and the Sundering Throw to help set up my Overhead Slash/Master Strike damage, rather than the Blade Barrier and Stasis Mastery. Still, it has great durability - I'd forgotten (after using Focus for a couple months) how durable you are when you spend most of your time in Soresu Form. I haven't had much of a chance to play it yet, but it seemed to do pretty well against healers. The added damage - especially the yellow damage from auto-crit Bladestorm and boosted Sweep - might give it an edge in burning them down, though I'm geared primarily for crit/surge at the moment, which might also help. That Sorc you fought must have had crazy resource management to fight you for three minutes - a lot of the Sages I fought last night were having difficulty keeping their resource bar high (perhaps the 1.2 nerf?).
  8. I decided to try out a Vig-Def Hybrid for 1.2, and I have to second everyone about what a good idea it was to move Sundering Throw to from Focus to Vig. I ran a Focus build before the patch, and Sundering Throw just seemed so out of place in a tree that focused so much on yellow damage. It makes much more sense where it is now.
  9. I took advantage of the skill refund to switch from Focus to Vig/Def hybrid after the patch, but I'm curious: how is the new "Combat Focus gives Singularity charges" ability? Is it useful? In any event, it seems like Focus will still be the most mobile of the Jedi Guardian variants (extra leap, extra slow) even if it lost a bit of damage.
  10. I think the general consensus is that a tank-specc'ed Guardian will probably be unable to actually kill a moderately-competent healer. Even DPS-spec will likely struggle against a healer who knows what he's doing. That said, unless you only want to get kills (in which case I'd consider looking into a Focus Guardian for burst DPS), I think a tank Guardian can be pretty effective in WZs against healers. Here are some thoughts (none of which, I am sure, are terribly original): 1) Remember that just doing damage to a healer can be enough to give your team a big edge, even if you can't kill the healer outright. Healers are valuable in WZs because they can spend their healing spells to keep the rest of their team alive. If you're doing enough damage to the healer that he has to spend most of his time healing himself rather than his teammates, then you've effectively neutralized the healer, even if you haven't killed him. This is doubly true if the healer isn't on top of his energy management (many Sage/Sorc are struggling with this after the 1.2 nerf) - Guardians' focus ability gives better sustainability in longer fights than most other casting resources. With all of those heals going to the healer rather than his teammates, your teammates should be in a much better position. Even a tank Guardian should be able to put out enough damage to keep a healer on his toes. 2) Even if you're not doing a ton of damage, at tank Guardian can be a real pain if he can get near a few of the healer/ranged DPS types. Tank Guardians have great utility when it comes to taunts, stuns, and interrupts, all of which can really screw with opposing DPS/healing rotations. This is especially true on maps like Voidstar, where you'll often see clumps of Snipers/Sorcerers/Mercenaries hanging back together. This kind of disruption is most effective when there are a group of enemies huddled together, and you can try to disrupt several casters at the same time (it quickly becomes a difficult but very interesting multi-tasking challenge). 3) Defense Guardians have a lot of stuns and interrupts as well as great durability and a renewable resource, which can make them an excellent anti-caster asset if played well. Maximizing the utility of your stuns and interrupts takes practice and maybe a bit of research - for example, you'll probably want to prioritize interrupting a Sorcerer's Resurgence and Innervate rather than Dark Infusion or Dark Heal. Interrupting key abilities - like a Bounty Hunter's "Death from Above" or a Sorcerer's "Revivification" - can make a big difference in a team fight, but smart opponents will try to bait out your interrupts with less important spells once they realize you're on them. Make sure you have some idea about what you want to interrupt, and what you're willing to let go. 4) Defense Guardians are naturally team players. The most obvious way you can contribute to your team is by hanging back and guarding key team assets, like your own healers. If you really want to go after enemy healers, though, consider teaming up with an allied DPS character to make an anti-healer tag-team. With your excellent interrupts, durability, and guard and the DPS's own interrupts and burn, enemy healers go down *really* fast. For maximum pwnage, try to coordinate your interrupts with those of your DPS friend - even a simple "you interrupt, then i interrupt, then you interrupt" can really help to completely lock out an enemy healer. P.S. - I, too, like your spec. For PvP, I'd consider dropping the two points in Shield Specialization for Solidifying Force. Shielding isn't that great in PvP, and your stuns, interrupts, and slows are one of your biggest assets. By lowering the focus cost on those two abilities, you can gain better resource sustainability in longer fights against healers.
  11. So, I'm not sure if anyone mentioned this before, but I have a theory on where the odd backpack came from. Here's a piece of original Ralph McQuarrie concept art for the original Star Wars: http://afartherroom.files.wordpress.com/2012/03/mcquarrie-2.jpg (As a side note: if you're not familiar with McQuarrie's work, take a moment to check it out: he was one of the great science fiction artists of the 20th century, and played an important role in developing the Star Wars esthetic that we know and love). Obviously, the "look" for Jedi evolved between this piece and the completion of the movie. Except for the goggles/breather apparatus, though, the armor in this piece looks to me a lot like the Knight PvP gear. Of course, in the context of the breather gear, the backpack makes a bit more sense - it looks like his face mask hooks into it. Still, I like the idea that the Knight PvP gear might have drawn some inspiration from McQuarrie
  12. X-Wing: Alliance was one of my favorite Star Wars games ever. Great stuff. Also, a TIE Defender: )-ǒ-( Sort of...
  13. Loved your channel! Great to see some nice commentary PvP videos.
×
×
  • Create New...