“Introduction to Galactic Strongholds” Breakdown

SWTOR has finally released more information about player housing as well as shown how the placement system works! Read more to view a breakdown of the gifs and a key points list as well as an explanation about some of the features. Featured picture is the Nar Shaddaa floating Sky palace. You can view a lot more pictures of it here.

Stronghold Introduction Key Points

• Strongholds start at level 15 after wrapping up your missions on your capital planet (Coruscant for Republic or Dromun Kaas for Empire). Likely after your planet’s class story quest.
• You pick up the intro quest on the fleet.
• You can browse other player’s strongholds and your own from a terminal on fleet.
• Strongholds have a purchase price, a reactivate price, an occupancy and upgrades.
• Strongholds can be purchased with cartel coins or credits (similar to other unlocks)
• Strongholds have 8-10 room slots, including “living spaces, small rooms, a garage, a balcony”. You get the first room free. You unlock more rooms one by one.
• You get basic decorations including some NPCs. “simple chairs, tables, and a pair of Republic or Imperial Guards”
• Decorations come from: Reputation, PvP, Crew Skills, Crafting, loot drops from Flahspoints and Operations, Cartel Coins
• Once unlocked, a decoration is unlocked across your legacy
• “Decorations also have an unlock count – so for example, if you want to place 4 chairs of the same type, you must have unlocked that chair 4 times.”
• Decorations are not free-place, but you do have a lot of customization with where they go.
• You will be able to list your Stronghold as private, completely public, give temporary invites or permanent invites (keys).
• Public Strongholds will be sorted by prestige. Prestige is gained by unique and duplicate decorations, unlocking rooms, and placing decorations.
• Legacy banks are unlocked by purchasing a stronghold. We still don’t know exactly how it works.

This is likely the area of the fleet where you can purchase a stronghold or browse others. The terminals show Nar Shaddaa, Coruscant and Tatooine. The Aurebesh says “STRONGHOLDS”.

• Directory:
  • Purchase
  • Public Listings
• Strongholds:
  • Personal
  • Guild
  • Keyring
• Decorations:
  • Personal (prestige score counter)
  • Guild (prestige score counter)

Coruscant Apartment Occupancy: 10 Upgrades: 9 This luxurious penthouse apartment is located in the prestigious Senate District of Coruscant. Such prime real estate is reserved for powerful and well-connected individuals. It features state-of-the-art architecture, a magnificent view, and a high-grade security system to ward off unwanted solicitors. Stronghold Purchase Options: Guild Purchase Purchase Cost: (in the six digits) Reactivate Cost: (??? what is this?) Serving as both personal residence and seat of power, Galactic Strongholds are purchasable homes available on many civilized worlds. Each stronghold is designed for maximum customization and expansion, allowing the owner to decorate every room with their choice of furniture, personal items, trophies and a tremendous variety of… [cut off] Legacy Purchase Purchase Cost: 0 credits Reactivate Cost: 0 credits You have already purchased this Stronghold in the past, which means the cost of reactivating it will be zero credits.

Stronghold Decorations

Decorations also have an unlock count – so for example, if you want to place 4 chairs of the same type, you must have unlocked that chair 4 times.

Although this seems frustrating if you want a lot of stool or lighting, it does allow both crafters and the Cartel Market to not become redundant after a player buys everything once. This GIF shows the same room decorated in three different ways. Decoration Style #1: Terminal on left, three glowing datacrons on stands (pink, yellow red), 2 functional comfy chair, a table with purple tablecloth, a lamp with a blue shade, a bar stand with drinks on top and four small stools, a really large hutt-shaped couch, four tables with small plant-like decorations on them, a red banner between two blue banners, a large blue floor rug, two holotrees and three Isotope-5 containers from Makeb/Toborro’s Courtyard (that seems unsafe…) Decoration Style #2: Two large ancient statues, two large urn statues, two green bush tress, five small brown trees, two pretty floor fountains. Decoration Style #3: A very large blue crystal, a blue finned ceiling lamp, two rounded black couches, three standard red couches, two coffee tables with drinks, two small side tables, a red floor rug, a large row of small spaceport seating, two green bushes, a large rounded bar with 7 stools and a pouring apparatus, and a Republic banner.

Placing Decorations and Wall Hooks

This GIF shows the floor hooks, which is how you place decorations down. It’s a little too fast! First it shows an empty floor. The hooks are not visible when turned off. The player activates the hooks using “Show Hook” button in the middle of the screen. The player selects an area of the room. They can then choose from a series of hook-area-spaces-formats.  The GIF shows the formats: nine small squares, quarter medium square, awakward cross with four small squares (which is what the player chooses). Once he choose an area shape, he choose a hook spot and goes into decorations and choose a large purple crystals to put there. He can then slide the crystal around inside the hook – neat! This prevents decoration clipping but allows some movement. Same deal, but for the wall. The text on the menus is too small to decipher.

Jessy Sky, Lead Designer

Jessy Sky, the staff member who wrote this post, has been around in SWTOr for quite a while. Here’s some wise tips he’s got about breaking into design from an interview a while back!

Don’t wait until you have a job in game development to make games. Start making them now, with whatever tools you have at your disposal. Play games in literally every genre and have long conversations with dedicated players of each of them. Don’t dismiss any genre, discipline, or hobby because you can find surprising lessons in design just about everywhere you look. Learn a scripting language and have a working knowledge of the hardware for whatever platform you want to develop on. Most of all, be open-minded and easy to work with – everything else can be picked up as you go.