First Round of Onslaught PTSWelcome to the first round of Public Test Server testing for the ‘Onslaught’ Expansion! Each round will be targeted to test something specific. For example, In this initial round we are going to be looking at changes to the Sorcerer, Assassin, Marauder, and Juggernaut Advanced Classes. These changes include new ‘Onslaught’ Set Bonuses, Tactical Items, an initial batch of Amplifiers, and the following new Abilities:Volt Rush (Sorcerers) - Deals energy damage to your target and energizes you for up to 5 seconds. The Energize effect can stack twice, with each stack increasing Volt Rush damage by 30%. The ability has 3 charges and a recharge timer of 10 seconds.Severing Slash (Assassins) - Strikes targets in a cone, dealing weapon damage and slowing their movement speed by 50% for 3 seconds. 12 second cooldown.Furious Focus (Marauder & Juggernaut) - Furious Focus has 4 ability charges and recharges every 30 seconds. Activating Furious Focus consumes all charges causing your next attacks to do 25% additional damage. Ex: If you consume 3 charges, your next 3 attacks do 25% increased damage.It’s important to note that the numbers displayed for these abilities are not yet final. With that in mind, be aware that most encounters may either seem too easy or too hard.FeedbackTo coincide with these targeted PTS rounds, we will be looking for specific feedback. This feedback will help the team not only build changes for these Advanced Classes, but help us better define the changes for the other Classes as well. What we’re looking for is:How do the Set Bonuses look and feel while playing?How do the Tactical Items look and feel while playing?How easy or hard is it to understand what certain Set Bonuses, Tactical Items, or Amplifiers do?Which Set Bonuses, Tactical Items, or Amplifiers seem underpowered or overpowered, and why?Feel free to start your theory-crafting early, as long as you keep in mind that any numbers you see are not final. Once all Classes are made available for testing, we’ll start asking for more focused balance feedback across all Classes! Head over to our PTS Forum. to share your thoughts.How To Get Started(Note that character copy will be disabled for this round of PTS)Create a new character and leave your starting phase to find a teleport terminal which will send you to Odessen.Click on the boost terminal on Odessen to jump your character to level 75 and grant you credits.Interact with the class-appropriate PTS Gear Vendor on Odessen to choose from a variety of Set Bonus gear and Tactical Items.Now test them out to your heart’s desire! Play any content you’d like to help get a feel for these changes and how they work. Whether it’s practicing on training dummies, random enemies in the wild, Warzones, or Flashpoints, the choice is yours! (Remember, most content has not been balanced for level 75 yet, so things will likely be far too easy or too hard.)RewardsBack by popular demand, we are happy to announce the return of PTS rewards! However, not every round of PTS will track progress towards these rewards, so keep your eyes peeled for more PTS blogs in the future. This first round of PTS will not have a reward associated with it. Once we start the second round however, there will be a new PTS-only Achievement that will require you to complete five in-game group activities. When we get into the third round, we will then have a similar PTS-only Achievement of completing 10 in-game group activities.Completing these Achievements will earn you the following rewards:One of the two Achievements - The Strike Team Specialist and Strike Team Commander character Titles.Both Achievements - A new and very unique mount that will be revealed in a future PTS article.*All rewards will be distributed with the launch of Onslaught.What To ExpectHere is what you can expect for PTS round one, and beyond:For this round, changes for the Sorcerer, Assassin, Marauder, and Juggernaut Advanced Classes will be available - with other Advanced Classes will be available in later PTS rounds.There will be multiple rounds of testing on PTS, expect that we may wipe characters in between rounds.Some rounds will allow for character copy, while others may not. Keep your eyes on each rounds’ PTS blog for details.The PTS may not be available at all times as it is a test server. Downtime with little or no warning is possible. Please watch the PTS Forum. for details.Everything shown on the PTS is subject to change.At the beginning of each round of PTS testing, expect to see a new blog like this one!The team is hard at work bringing a lot of changes to the PTS over the course of this summer, so please jump in and give us your feedback!Source

Additional Updates to PTS Patch 1.5Hey everyone!PTS will be going live shortly with the next build. As noted, Bounty Hunter has been added along with the 4pc bonuses being added to the other class sets. The other thing that is now available for testing is that the level sync we previously discussed has now been added across all group content, not just EV and KP:All OperationsAll FlashpointsAlso, look for new balance on planets that had level sync applied to them for solo contentPlease feel free to play any of the above and let us know your thoughts. Is it too hard, or too easy? Please be specific and let us know what you were playing in your feedback. As a reminder, the PTS Achievements (which track rewards) do not matter yet in this phase. We will really push you towards group finder content when Phase 2 begins.-ericSource

PTS Phase 1.5 Patch NotesHey folks,Here are some of the changes from PTS Phase 1. This is not a comprehensive list of all changes:Severing Slash’s damage has been increased by 25%Dark Return’s damage has been increased by 60%.Tempest of Rho’s proc chance from Force Lightning has been increased from 10% to 20%Crystals are now available on the PTS Mod VendorModdable Main-hand and Off-hand weapons are now available on the PTS Weapons & Accessory Vendor.Agents are available for testingAgent Set bonus gear and Tacticals are now available on PTS vendorsTaxi’s on the fleet have had their speed increased.Hutta now has a teleporter to Odessen so that Agents can join in the fun.Reminder that Bounty Hunters are not yet ready for testing; they won’t have any gear vendors on Odessen just yetVendors will no longer hide their item list if you have a discipline selected.We’re testing out a new adaptive level sync for Story and Veteran difficulty group content to determine whether we want to use it for certain older content in 6.0. Check out Karagga’s Palace or Eternity Vault at level 75 and give us feedback on how the scaling feels if you’re interested!Note: None of the other Operations are using this sync yet, so you can bounce between them to check out the differences if you’d like.Fixed a bug with cooldowns not appearing properly on some abilitiesThis may not be completely fixed, please bug/post if you see more of these with very specific infoUsing the boost terminal will now let you unlock your legacy properly.Aggro radius of enemies have been fixedFixed a bug where conal AOEs weren’t working rightUnstable Acceleration and Anomalous Entropy now behave as their tooltip suggests they should in Master mode.Nahut’s electrified ring is now actually electrified.Teleporter/boost terminal on Hutta and Korriban will now grant all companions.The new key art is now on the loading screenTraining Dummy Health Modulators have been updated to 6.0 values:Basic Modulator: 0.5 Mil -> 1.0 MilStandard Modulator: 1.5 Mil -> 2.5 MilAdvanced Modulator: 2.5 Mil -> 4.0 MilExpert Modulator: 4.0 Mil -> 6.0 MilFixed healing crit chance on the lucky tactical (since it was 100% crit chance)-ericSource

Ending of PTS Phase 1.5Hey folks,We are going to be bringing PTS down shortly which will mark the end of phase 1.5. The next time we bring PTS up (next week), will be the kick-off of phase 2. There is a LOT coming in that phase so look for a breakdown next week of what you can expect to see.As always, we cannot thank you enough for taking the time to test on PTS and give us your feedback. It continues to be invaluable.-ericSource

More PTS 1.5 UpdatesWe brought PTS down this morning to deploy another patch. This patch is meant to address the group finder issues we were seeing. As a note you will notice that a few things are happening:Players will notice they may now earn Renown crates, these crates are currently bugged, the contents are not intended. Don't worry about giving us feedback on these crates for now as they are not fully implemented.Any existing gear that you have will show their amplifiers as "null". Purchasing new versions of that gear will fix the problem.The final boss of Hammer Station is dropping a large amount of loot (more than intended). Also that boss is despawning very quickly so loot em' quick if you kill them.We will be bringing PTS back up early this afternoon Austin time. Thanks all.-ericSource

Onslaught PTS: Round TwoThe second round of testing for the ‘Onslaught’ Expansion on the Public Test Server is now live! With this round, a bunch of new things have been added to the PTS. We’ve added the loot acquisition from Spoils of War, Crafting progression, and the Dxun Operation for testing!Spoils of War AcquisitionAs we’ve previously discussed at cantinas, on livestreams, forum posts, and our Reddit AMAA, there are a lot of aspects to the “Spoils of War” changes for gearing. Increased loot drops across the board, Amplifiers, deconstruction, a slot-targeting vendor, and Galactic Renown changes are all now live on the PTS! Are some of these changes news to you? If so, here’s a quick breakdown:In general, a lot more loot will be dropping at a faster rate. Amplifiers can now be found on all newly acquired pieces of gear that are eligible. For example, for an Amplifier to appear on a Shell piece, the Shell must be Premium quality or above. Amplifiers have a lot of different effects, but if you don’t like which effect you rolled, you can re-roll them for credits. Rerolling will give you a selection of three different Amplifiers to choose from. If you prefer your current Amplifier over the new options, you can simply stick with what you already have. The cost for rerolling an amp increases each time you reroll in succession on the same item, so it may be more effective to go find some more gear in the world rather than burning all your credits on a single item!With the increase in loot drops it’s a safe bet that players will find themselves with loot they don’t need. Thanks to our new deconstruction system, players will now be able to break down items into either crafting components or Jawa Junk depending on the item type. If a broken-down item was crafted, and you have the required Crewskill to reverse engineer that item, crafting materials will be gained. If the item is either a world-drop or you don’t have the needed Crewskill, Jawa Junk will be granted instead. Jawa Junk can be turned into a special vendor, granting either crafting materials or randomized gear for a specific slot. You can throw as much Jawa Junk at the vendor until you get a piece that meets your needs, allowing you to really hone-in on what item you’re trying to get.Lastly, the Galactic Command system will be reset and rebranded to Galactic Renown. Renown will essentially function the same way as Galactic Command, by earning Renown Experience through completing various tasks (killing certain enemies, completing activities etc.) The main difference is, this won’t be the main way for players to attain gear. This will be a supplemental system that rewards players as they complete group activities, PvP, and more!Crafting ProgressionWith this testing round there will be a lot of changes coming to the Crafting system. Crafting and Crew Skill specific materials, such as Armormech’s “Armormech Combined Component”, have been expanded to have three quality types - Premium, Prototype, Artifact. Let’s say you’re an Armormech and want to craft the highest quality Armormech Combined Component. You can take your lower quality materials, such as premium, and with a handful of other materials, create an Artifact quality one. Additionally, Crafting materials needed for upper tier crafting can also be obtained via Flashpoints, Operations, or PvP. These aren’t limited to specific activities, but instead can be obtained from any of them. Conquests will also offer a Crafting material of their own. You can currently acquire all crafting materials from a variety of different content modes. Coinciding with this, a new Profession-wide Legendary Component can be attainable from either broken down Legendary items or Wealthy Yield Profession Missions.Dxun OperationThe upcoming Dxun Operation is now available for testing! If you would like to see what dangers await you in Dxun's jungles, head to Odessen. There, your adventure will begin with an ominous bridge leading into the sky.Story mode will be available for testing. This may not be quite balanced yet, so some encounters may be challenging, while others may be easy. Ideally, the team is looking for Story Mode to be significantly easier than the Gods from the Machine Operation. We strongly encourage players to try a variety of Set Bonus and Tactical combinations to really push the boundaries of these encounters! We will encourage Veteran Mode testing and feedback as we get closer to PTS Round Three.FeedbackTo coincide with these targeted PTS rounds, we will be looking for specific feedback. This feedback will help the team not only make changes for the classes, but help us balance them against other classes as well. What we’re looking for is:How do the Set Bonuses look and feel while playing?How do the Tactical Items look and feel while playing?How easy or hard is it to understand what certain Set Bonuses, Tactical Items, or Amplifiers do?Which Set Bonuses, Tactical Items, or Amplifiers seem underpowered or overpowered, and why?What are your thoughts on the Amplifier system and how to reroll them?How do the gear drops feel? Are they rewarding, is there too little gear, or too much etc.?How do Flashpoints and Operations (especially Karagga’s Palace/Eternity Vault) feel? What needs adjustment in these areas?How does Dxun feel? Is it too easy or too hard? Do certain aspects need further balancing?Feel free to start your theory-crafting early, as long as you keep in mind that any numbers you see are not final. Once all Classes are made available for testing, we’ll start asking for more focused balance feedback across all Classes! Head over to our PTS forum to share your thoughts.How to Get StartedCreate a new character and leave your starting phase to find a teleport terminal which will send you to Odessen, boost your character to 75, and grant you credits.Click on the boost terminal on Odessen to jump your character to level 75 and grant you credits.Interact with the class-appropriate PTS Gear Vendor on Odessen to choose from a variety of Set Bonus gear and Tactical Items.Now test them out to your heart’s desire! Play any content you’d like to help get a feel for these changes and how they work. Whether it’s practicing on training dummies, random enemies in the wild, Warzones, or Flashpoints, the choice is yours! (Remember, most content has not been balanced for level 75 yet, so things will likely be far too easy or too hard.)Would you prefer to copy one of your own characters? If so, you can follow these easy instructions below!Log into www.swtor.com.Click on your account name in the top right hand corner of the site.Click “My Account.”In the left column, scroll down and click the link entitled “PTS Character Copy.”Select the server and then the character that you wish to copy from.Click the “Copy Character” button.The site will display the current status of your character copy at the top of the page. Additionally, you can click the “View your character transfer history” link to see if the copy has completed.RewardsAs mentioned in the previous PTS article, during this round there will be the first of two PTS-exclusive Achievements, which will require you to complete five in-game group activities. Earning both Achievements will grant exclusive rewards when 6.0 releases!Completing these Achievements will earn you the following rewards*:Complete the first PTS achievement - The Strike Team Specialist and Strike Team Commander Character Titles.Complete the second PTS achievement (available in a future PTS update) - The new Kai Zykken MK-85 Test Log Mount. Warning - Mount may move at the speed of an actual log.What to ExpectThere will be multiple rounds of testing on PTS, expect that we may wipe characters in between rounds.Some rounds will allow for character copy, while others may not. Keep your eyes on each round’s PTS blog for details.The PTS may not be available at all times as it is a test server. Downtime with little or no warning is possible. Please watch the PTS forum for details.Everything shown on the PTS is subject to change.At the beginning of each round of PTS testing, expect to see a new blog like this one!The team is hard at work bringing a lot of changes to the PTS over the course of this summer, so please jump in and give us your feedback!Source

Forum Discussion

RealymanLP

7 years ago

Onslaught PTS News

First Round of Onslaught PTS

Welcome to the first round of Public Test Server testing for the ‘Onslaught’ Expansion! Each round will be targeted to test something specific. For example, In this initial round we are going to be looking at changes to the Sorcerer, Assassin, Marauder, and Juggernaut Advanced Classes. These changes include new ‘Onslaught’ Set Bonuses, Tactical Items, an initial batch of Amplifiers, and the following new Abilities:

Volt Rush (Sorcerers) - Deals energy damage to your target and energizes you for up to 5 seconds. The Energize effect can stack twice, with each stack increasing Volt Rush damage by 30%. The ability has 3 charges and a recharge timer of 10 seconds.

Severing Slash (Assassins) - Strikes targets in a cone, dealing weapon damage and slowing their movement speed by 50% for 3 seconds. 12 second cooldown.

Furious Focus (Marauder & Juggernaut) - Furious Focus has 4 ability charges and recharges every 30 seconds. Activating Furious Focus consumes all charges causing your next attacks to do 25% additional damage. Ex: If you consume 3 charges, your next 3 attacks do 25% increased damage.

It’s important to note that the numbers displayed for these abilities are not yet final. With that in mind, be aware that most encounters may either seem too easy or too hard.

Feedback

To coincide with these targeted PTS rounds, we will be looking for specific feedback. This feedback will help the team not only build changes for these Advanced Classes, but help us better define the changes for the other Classes as well. What we’re looking for is:

How do the Set Bonuses look and feel while playing?
How do the Tactical Items look and feel while playing?
How easy or hard is it to understand what certain Set Bonuses, Tactical Items, or Amplifiers do?
Which Set Bonuses, Tactical Items, or Amplifiers seem underpowered or overpowered, and why?

Feel free to start your theory-crafting early, as long as you keep in mind that any numbers you see are not final. Once all Classes are made available for testing, we’ll start asking for more focused balance feedback across all Classes! Head over to our PTS Forum. to share your thoughts.

How To Get Started
(Note that character copy will be disabled for this round of PTS)

Create a new character and leave your starting phase to find a teleport terminal which will send you to Odessen.
Click on the boost terminal on Odessen to jump your character to level 75 and grant you credits.
Interact with the class-appropriate PTS Gear Vendor on Odessen to choose from a variety of Set Bonus gear and Tactical Items.
Now test them out to your heart’s desire! Play any content you’d like to help get a feel for these changes and how they work. Whether it’s practicing on training dummies, random enemies in the wild, Warzones, or Flashpoints, the choice is yours! (Remember, most content has not been balanced for level 75 yet, so things will likely be far too easy or too hard.)

Rewards

Back by popular demand, we are happy to announce the return of PTS rewards! However, not every round of PTS will track progress towards these rewards, so keep your eyes peeled for more PTS blogs in the future. This first round of PTS will not have a reward associated with it. Once we start the second round however, there will be a new PTS-only Achievement that will require you to complete five in-game group activities. When we get into the third round, we will then have a similar PTS-only Achievement of completing 10 in-game group activities.

Completing these Achievements will earn you the following rewards:

One of the two Achievements - The Strike Team Specialist and Strike Team Commander character Titles.
Both Achievements - A new and very unique mount that will be revealed in a future PTS article.

*All rewards will be distributed with the launch of Onslaught.

What To Expect

Here is what you can expect for PTS round one, and beyond:

For this round, changes for the Sorcerer, Assassin, Marauder, and Juggernaut Advanced Classes will be available - with other Advanced Classes will be available in later PTS rounds.
There will be multiple rounds of testing on PTS, expect that we may wipe characters in between rounds.
Some rounds will allow for character copy, while others may not. Keep your eyes on each rounds’ PTS blog for details.
The PTS may not be available at all times as it is a test server. Downtime with little or no warning is possible. Please watch the PTS Forum. for details.
Everything shown on the PTS is subject to change.
At the beginning of each round of PTS testing, expect to see a new blog like this one!

The team is hard at work bringing a lot of changes to the PTS over the course of this summer, so please jump in and give us your feedback!

Source

12 Replies

ExiledRival
Seasoned Ace
7 years ago
First PTS Phase 3 Update

Hey folks,

Welcome to the final Phase of Onslaught PTS! The main focus is the phase is specifically around balance testing. The biggest thing we want to understand is the impact of mixing and matching sets and tacticals. To help in that, here is how you can acquire gear:
The "boost" terminals which are present on Odessen now also grant tech fragments.
We have added those terminals next to fragment vendors on both fleets (to save some walking).

Here is where we will want you to do balance testing:
Warzones (ranked and unranked)
Operations (any difficulty)
World content (missions, heroics, chapters)
Do not focus on Flashpoints at this time, we are working on making large balance updates to them which will come in with the next PTS build. These changes are based on feedback from the current state of PTS. Head to Operations for a preview of some of the changes (scaling to 70 instead of very low levels, etc).

There will be separate threads for each content type to give feedback, so please head to them. Additionally we will setup specified playtimes for group content over the weekend to ensure numbers in group finder.

PTS Rewards
You can now earn progress towards the second PTS Achievement. Reminder that completing both the Phase 2 and 3 achievements is required for the Kai Zykken Log Mount. If you did not complete the Phase 2 Achievement, we will count progress towards that now in Phase 3 as well. The current intention is that Phase 3 of PTS will run until the end of next week so make sure to get your achievements completed by then!

Thanks all.

-eric

Source
RealymanLP
7 years ago
Onslaught PTS: Round Three
Welcome to the final round of testing for Onslaught on PTS! While the previous installments centered on adding content and systems, our focus for this round balancing. Let’s look at everything available for you to experiment with.
What’s available for testing
Since a lot has been added between the various PTS updates, here’s a quick breakdown of everything available for testing.
The full process of loot acquisition has been implemented across the entire game. This includes an overall increase of loot gained, Discipline/Rating targeting for gear drops, Set Bonuses, Tacticals, Amplifiers, the gear deconstruction system, and several gear vendors.
The upcoming Dxun Operation open for testing! If you would like to see what dangers await you in Dxun's jungles, head to Odessen. There, your adventure will begin with an ominous bridge leading into the sky. Dxun is accessible on Story Mode and Veteran difficulty.
Onderon is open for you to explore! The storyline isn’t playable, but the Daily Missions are.
Feedback Requested
How is the balancing between Set Bonuses, Tacticals, Amplifiers, stats, and overall builds? Is anything too strong or too weak?
Have you played through Dxun? Are there parts that are too easy or too hard? If so, where and how?
How does PvE balance feel? In what ways would you adjust it? Do Story/Veteran/Master Modes reflect the proper difficulty in both new and old content?
What about the balancing for PvP? Are there any abilities that should be adjusted? Should Amplifiers be enabled for Ranked PvP?
Have you completed any of the Onderon Daily Missions? Are any of them too easy or too challenging?
What about the Mek-Sha Heroics? With the proper amount of people, are any of them too easy or too challenging?
Rewards
In addition to the Achievement to complete five group activities added in Phase 2, we’ve added a new Achievement to complete ten group activities in this round of testing. If you haven’t earned the first Achievement, you still have time! Even though it was brought in with Phase 2 of PTS, you can still gain credit for it and the new Achievement by completing ten group activities.
Completing both of these Achievements will earn you the following rewards*:
Complete the first PTS achievement - The Strike Team Specialist and Strike Team Commander Character Titles.
Complete the second PTS achievement - The new Kai Zykken MK-85 Test Log Mount. Warning - Mount may move at the speed of an actual log.
These PTS rewards will be awaiting you when Onslaught launches on October 22nd!
How to Get Started
Create a new character and leave your starting phase to find a teleport terminal which will send you to Odessen.
Click on the boost terminal on Odessen to boost your character to level 75 and grant you credits.
Interact with the class-appropriate PTS Gear Vendor on Odessen to choose from a variety of Set Bonus gear and Tactical Items.
Now test them out to your heart’s desire! Play any content you’d like to get a feel for these changes and how they work. Whether it’s practicing on training dummies, random enemies in the wild, Warzones, or Flashpoints, the choice is yours! (Remember, most content has not been balanced for level 75 yet, so things will likely be far too easy or too hard.)
Would you prefer to copy one of your own characters? If so, you can follow these easy instructions below!
Log into www.swtor.com.
Click on your account name in the top right-hand corner of the site.
Click “My Account.”
In the left column, scroll down and click the link entitled “PTS Character Copy.”
Select the server and then the character that you wish to copy from.
Click the “Copy Character” button.
The site will display the current status of your character copy at the top of the page. Additionally, you can click the “View your character transfer history” link to see if the copy has completed.
What to Expect
There will be multiple rounds of testing on PTS, so expect characters to possibly be wiped in between rounds.
Some rounds will allow for character copy, while others may not. Keep your eyes on each round’s PTS blog for details.
The PTS may not be available at all times, as it is a test server. Downtime with little or no warning is possible. Please watch the PTS forum for details.
Everything shown on the PTS is subject to change.
At the beginning of each round of PTS testing, expect to see a new blog like this one!
The team is hard at work bringing a lot of changes to the PTS, so please jump in and give us your feedback!
Source