Empire in Flames Announces Partnership with Sunrunner II

Empire in Flames Announces Partnership with Sunrunner II

Earlier today a new SWGEmu partnership was created by the Empire in Flames team and the Sunrunner II team! Lead Developer Halyn has added the amazingly talented team of Takhomasak and Lasko to the developers working on an Empire in Flames. Takh and Lasko will still maintain Sunrunner II which is not closing down, but they will be actively contributing to EiF.

Takhomasak is well know throughout the SWGEmu world as the creator of worlds. His server, Sunrunner II is a virtual playground of planets and moons in the Star Wars galaxy. EIF launched with one of his planets, Taanab, which has been a very popular world with the EiF community. Sunrunner II will continue to be a development environment and test server for Tak’s development. In his new partnership with EiF, he will have a thriving community to play in his creations in a live environment.

Lasko is known as the developer who is creating new instances for Sunrunner. He will be sharing his talents with the EiF community, who have been thirsty for content. Lasko is also the creator of the Mod the Galaxy TRE compilation and repository on which Sunrunner II and several other SWGEmu servers are based. When Takhomasak was asked about his partner, Lasko, he stated, “I have felt very lucky to have him helping me. He’s the most knowledgeable person I know about this game and environment. It was his early guides that steered me toward doing what I do.”

Halyn, the lead developer of an Empire in Flames, is known and respected in the SWGEmu community as a creator of unique content and tweaks that not only improves the Quality of Life for the community, but his approach to a more balanced profession system is something players often comment that they wish SWG Live had made these changes, rather than the NGE.

Some of the unique content in EiF includes over 35 playable races, an armor and weapon systems based upon cores allowing players to use any armor appearance they desire, and new animal mounts such as large cats. These are just a few of the features that make EiF a respected and exciting Star Wars Galaxies Emulation server.

If you have any questions, please contact Halyn, Takhomasak, or Lasko.

Sandarie, EIF Community Manager

 

Friday Feature 10/27/2017: EiF’s Combat!

EiF knew combat would not be fully balanced when we went live. Over the past months we’ve had a much larger player base using our system than the 5-10 players pre-launch on the test center. Our community’s feedback has been invaluable. I reviewed the Q & A with the Devs, to be sure this was the most accurate and up-to-date information. There are a few changes, such as with the armor. 

Below is the current state of EiF’s combat systems, as it relates to Professions and Skills.

General

  • EiF is about player choice and counter play in our balance.
  • Professions vs Skills
    • The New Profession System and Skill Trees: One of the core ideas of EiF was to separate “What you do” from “How you do it”. “What you do” are your Professions – Bounty Hunter, Commando, Doctor, Entertainer, Merchant, Ranger, Smuggler, and Squad Leader. Any person can pick any profession; they cost 0 skill points, but a person can only have one of those professions at a time. Professions grant non-combat abilities and some combat specials, but no combat modifiers – for example, picking Smuggler doesn’t give you extra pistol speed/accuracy/etc.
    • Skills are the “How you do it”, and it’s almost everything else from the original skill trees. Pistoleer, Carbineer, Rifleman, TKA, Fencer, etc, plus your crafting skills and dancer/musician/image designer. Those do require skill points, so you mix-and-match to your heart’s content, up to 250 points worth. The trees are recalculated so that you can basically take two and a half skill trees; I suspect most players will have a line or two of Medic in their builds, but some of our testers already surprised me on that point by forgoing it for more defensive modifiers.
  • No Legendaries
    • Weapons or Armor
  • Core Based Crafting System
    • Separates the appearance from the performance
    • Crafting revamped -Damage is substantially higher and resists cap much lower than 90%
    • Weapons
      • All stats have been revamped to actually matter on a weapon. Assuming similar crafting, pistols will be faster than carbines which are faster than rifles. Rifles have higher damage than carbines which have more damage than pistols.
      • Accuracy calculations come into play; a melee character on top of a rifleman will absolutely destroy him, but at 64 meters the rifleman will shred a melee character.
      • Additional weapons, including some from the NGE will be added as EiF progresses
      • A recent tease from Halyn was an A280-CFE which is a convertible weapon. With the proper certifications (details coming soon(™)) it can be switched between a pistol, carbine, or rifle.
      • Armor piercing/armor level have been removed from calculations, as it pushed players to AP3-only weapons (or stun!)
    • Armor
      • Not all about Composite anymore, appearance is separated from performance
      • Armor is capped at 60% resists
      • Suits of factional armor will come in with the GCW patch. The Imperial and Rebel variants of Mandalorian armor will be part of the Mandalore patch
    • All armor and weapons decay
      • An armorsmith can best repair armor
      • A weaponsmith can best repair weapons
      • Any player can use a repair kit, but the master AS and WS have better chance of not breaking the piece and getting a better repair
      • Crafting stations improve chances of a good repair
  • HAM
    • The HAM/buff system has been inverted. Pre-CU features low base HAM and extremely strong buffs; EiF flipped that, so players start with high HAM and buffs add around 10% total.
    • Starting HAM is closer to 5000
    • No longer incapped by depletion of:
      • Mind
      • Action
      • PvP
        • Action and mind bars can still be targeted by other players, even if they can’t force an incap. During, say, a 4v4, a valid tactic may be for one or two players on each side to focus on keeping the enemy healer’s mind bar locked down to prevent them from throwing heals.
      • Players only incap on the health bar.
    • Action and Mind regenerates faster
      • 3-4 sec from empty to full
      • Action and mind regen very fast, but specials actually /use/ action and mind – firing a pistol special, for example, might take 30% of your action bar, but a few seconds later you’ll be back at full action.
      • Health is regenned faster by sitting
    • No species starting differentiation for HAM
  • Speed
    • Not capped at 1 atk/sec, but 75% reduction of weapon speed
    • With a focus on speed all the way down (speed crafted, speed sliced, speed PuPed) pistols can fire well faster than once per second…but given HAM costs for specials, it’s not real practical.
    • Speed is calculated differently. HAM costs and encumbrance matter. AP is no longer factored into damage calcs. High HAM and low buffs. Lower armor protections.
  • Dizzy
    • Dizzy/KD doesn’t work the same way here.
    • Dizzy is only a 15% chance to K/D you on posture change, not 85% that is is traditionally
    • Dizzy however affects you offensively, reduces your accuracy
    • Stacks with Blind
    • Reduces your primary defenses by 20%
  • Primary Defense – caps at 125
    • Melee/Range
    • SL bonus pushes the cap above 125
    • Pikatta Pie – pushes the cap about 125 too
  • Secondary Defenses – caps at 125
    • Dodge – Pistols/ 1H mele
    • Counter attack – Carbines/2H Melee
    • Block – Rifles/Pikeman
    • Defensive Acuity – Unarmed
    • In the future we’ve talked about adding in schematics that drop with different combinations, such as a dodging polearm.
    • SEAs help to reach Cap, but not push above the cap. Still keeps the cap of +25 to one stat from all your attachments.
  • Buffs
    • Doc buffs
    • Moved status from doc buffs into base stats, so now unbuffed you are close to what a doc buffed character was. Doc buffs only increase stats by about an additional 5% ( as was intended in Raph Koster’s initial design )
    • No longer required for play, intended to be at same power as other buffs such as food and drinks
    • No Doc Bots
    • Buffs are weak on EiF
    • Ent Buffs are reduced from Live
    • The classic SWG model is “low HAM, high buffs” – we’ve swapped that around, so you natively have high HAM with buffs providing far less of an increase. Playing without buffs is perfectly feasible; in PvP, buffs give an edge.
    • Further tweaking to ensure Doc buffs are viable is planned, but not outside the scope of current design. Atm they’re a bit underpowered.
  • Professions – Profession skills require the ‘mind’ pool to activate.
  • Racial Bonuses – Some bonuses do affect combat.

Thank you, Anishor, for helping me to put this together!

-Sandarie, Community Manager

Clearly Not Combat Princess!

Patch Notes – 10/21/17

On the morning of 10/21/17, the server will be coming down for a patch. Make sure you shut down completely and relaunch the launcher to get the latest patch.

  • Backend reorganization.
  • Added new items that are not yet player acquirable.
  • Added new structures that are not yet player acquirable.
  • Added two new planets that are not yet player reachable. (Chandrila and Coruscant)
  • Added new backpacks that are not yet player acquirable.
  • Added new weapons that are not yet player acquirable.
  • Added new armor that is not yet player acquirable.
  • Sensing a pattern yet?

Friday Feature 10/20/2017: A Chat with Kelta!

Woo hoo! Another chat with one of the Empire in Flames Staff! Enjoy getting to know Kelta!

EiF: Which versions of SWG did you play? pre-CU, CU, NGE?

Kelta: I only played NGE. Unfortunately, I was a late comer to the game.

EiF: Which server did you play on?

Kelta: I played on Starsider!

Kelta: I played a LS Jedi and a Commando/BM. I tried to do Jedi/BM, but when they put my tanking heal at the bottom of the tree, I had to give up my narglatch.  I also had–at various times–a tailor, dancer/image designer, and a medic/BM.

My jedi was my favorite because I really enjoy tanking, but my commando was a close second. Who doesn’t love to set things on fire? Plus, my commando had pets!

EiF: How many accounts did you own/manage?

Kelta: I had two accounts. They both started out as my then-boyfriend’s  and then became mine.

(He paid for them though, so I guess that made them technically his!)

EiF: What type of gameplay style do you most enjoy?

Kelta: I was and am mainly an RPer. Tanking during instances was a close second, and gunning during space events was third. I also enjoyed just playing the game. I loved exploring the planets, following the quest lines, and fighting with my various pets.

EiF: What’s a typical gaming session for you, what activities?

Kelta: My gaming sessions vary. I have a tailor that I horribly neglect–when I get the crafting or decorating bug, I play her and start some wild scheme like creating a swimwear line! Mostly I hang out on my rangers and play with my pets. I spend a lot of my time hunting, taming babies, or running missions with my friends. I’m slowly getting into the RP scene. I have lots of ideas and not so much with the time right now.

EiF: What do you most enjoy about SWG?

Kelta: I love the pets!  I usually run with a pack of cats, but the variety of species I can tame is awesome!  I enjoy ferreting out the new tamables that have been added and searching for the super rares. I’m very excited that now I don’t have to be a bio-engineer or have a ton of money if I want specific pets; all I have to do is go find them and tame them! Taming is probably my favorite change from the NGE.

EiF: What do you enjoy most about Empire in Flames?
Kelta: Cat mounts! xD
It’s having all my friends gathered back together in one place and getting to see familiar names popping back up both in-game and on Discord, honestly. When Galaxies shut down, we tried to find another game that we could all make a home and nothing ever clicked. Now I have my closest friends back creating a game together, while other friends come back to check out and enjoy what is being created. And I’m gaining new friends as well!

EiF: When you are not ingame, what do you enjoy doing?

Kelta: Sleeping mostly. 🙂 But I also enjoy cooking, baking, gardening, reading, writing, gaming, and spending time with my family.

EiF: What do you do outside of EiF / do for a living?

Kelta: I’m a high school English teacher. ( 1) No, you won’t hear me correcting your grammar. I only do that if I’m teaching, you’re a student, or you ask me to. 2)You probably have an urge to check for grammatical errors now. Go ahead. It’s okay!)

EiF: What is your role with EiF? What does that entail?

Kelta: I’m the wife of the owner and I have no programming skills whatsoever. Pretty much, I offer suggestions when asked, serve as a sounding board as needed, enjoy playing the game, and point out bugs as I find them. Occasionally I make wild suggestions that are either shot down or considered.  I also yell “Shuttle” whenever I miss them–which is frequently–and try to help the actual programmers remember to enjoy the game too.

Oh, and I enjoy being a helper when I’m in-game!

EiF: If you could have ANYTHING instantly in EiF, what would it be?

Kelta: Everything finished to the point where the team could play a bit more and my husband could RP with me!

EiF: What gives you Developer’s Crack?

Kelta: Ummm…Bringing one more person over the “Dark Side” and watching them join the CH fold! Or visiting the awesome player cities and observing the way they mold this virtual world into their own(which always gives me more ideas for decorating!) Or rping!

 

Friday Feature 10/13/2017 – A Chat with Abi/Gail!

Continuing the Empire in Flames staff interviews. This week we get peek into the life of Gail! Enjoy.

EiF: Which versions of SWG did you play? pre-CU, CU, NGE?

Abi/Gail: All, but I preferred the CU.

EiF: If you played in the pre-CU live, approximately how long did you play in the pre-CU?

Abi/GailI played from June 25th 2003 until the bitter end. There were a number of times where I wasn’t in game for long stretches due to real life, but mostly during the NGE because it wasn’t as interesting to me.

EiF: Which server did you play on?

Abi/Gail: Starsider. For life.

EiF: Which classes and which was your favorite?

Abi/Gail: 

PreCU – Doc/TKM (Dizzy & Knockdown!)

CU – Bounty Hunter/Pistoleer/Combat Medic

NGE – Spy

EiF: How many accounts did you own/manage?

Abi/Gail: I had one that was my primary, but at the peak of the CU I had three.

EiF: What type of gameplay style do you most enjoy?

Abi/GailPvP, difficult PvE, and Space PvP

EiF: What is a typical gaming session for you, what activities?

Abi/Gail: There isn’t really a typical – Sometimes I’m in EiF crafting or running missions with friends, sometimes I’m being dragged into an RP – sometimes I’m playing another game like Battlefront or Skyrim. My gaming time has decreased a lot since having a kid. Now I can only squeeze in a little time after about 1930 when my daughter goes to bed.

EiF: What do you most enjoy about SWG?

Abi/Gail: Being able to do things with my friends – secondary to that is the ability to do what I want how I want. I also like that you are not forced to play one specific class in one specific way. You can be or do almost anything you want in a way that you enjoy.

EiF: When you are not in-game, what do you enjoy doing?

Abi/Gail: Spending time with my little girl and making costumes. I’ve been a member of the 501st for 12 years now and I’ve been making costumes ranging from Star Wars, to Star Trek to Firefly and many more.

My goal is to make it as movie or screen accurate as possible – to that effect, I own two screen used costumes (Starship Troopers and Stargate) and one screen used prop (The Dark Knight).

Time with my daughter involves going to the park, playing in the yard, coloring and watching either Star Wars, My Little Pony, Pokemon or Tangled.

EiF: What do you do outside of EiF / do for a living?

Abi/GailI am a systems administrator for NASA. I also run a small decal business on Etsy.

EiF: What is your role with EiF? What does that entail?

Abi/Gail: The best description of my role is ‘Gap Filler’ – I do a little with textures, a little with code and as a sounding board for ideas from Halyn and Anishor. Occasionally I help Sandi with the community, but not very often since I think everyone would prefer I not interact with the community as much – I’m a grumpy guy.

EiF: If you could have ANYTHING instantly in EiF, what would it be?

Abi/Gail: CU Combat Medic – but just for me.

EiF: What gives you Developer’s Crack?

Abi/Gail: I am not a professional developer or programmer, so it’s a learning opportunity for me. Working on EiF is a chance to experience something that I don’t normally do day in and day out at work. That being said, I’ll keep my day job. Coding wasn’t for me in college and it still isn’t something I’d want to do to pay the bills.

EiF: Feel free to add anything else?

Abi/Gail: It is interesting to go all the way back to Pre-CU SWG. I really did the most in the CU, so to have the system be the older version is like going back to when I very first got in to the game with my friends. It reminds me of the person I was back then and how I’ve changed.

Also, I’m looking forward to having a TRE file full of stuff I’ve done to be added to the game and for players to start finding them. Don’t expect it this week, but the first things are on the horizon.