Star Wars: The Old Republic Preview

MMORPG.com has conjured up their hands-on preview of Star Wars: The Old Republic based on the game’s showing at last weekend’s PAX East, though this particular is a bit short compared to the others we’ve seen.

I was playing a Jedi Guardian and the class had a lot to offer in terms of combat and control. My role in the fights was really an off-tank to the Trooper who was leading our team as the main tank. The Trooper could take a lot of punishment so he was handling the big jungle monsters and imperial heavies. The Guardian allowed me to make quick melee work of the other groups we fought. More relying on the light saber than the Force to accomplish goals, the Guardian still had a lot of options. With some great attacks and power ups the Guardian can control agro and finish enemies quickly. Again I want to point out the speed of the game which has improved drastically since the last build we saw. The light saber fighting flowed much faster and felt more like an action RPG.

In the Flashpoint we fought our way through the jungle to get to the Imperial base. We had a Vanguard Trooper, the Jedi Guardian, and a Scoundrel Smuggler. I could not tell what the Jedi Consular specialization was. From what I saw the Scoundrel was really a support class. The Smuggler stayed away from direct combat and kept us all alive with med drones which translated into what many MMO players would interpret as regular healing. The Vanguard Trooper was a straight up shooting tank. The class took a ton of punishment and was able to drop foes as we approached them with rapid fire. Being a support tank with the Jedi Guardian I unfortunately did not get to see much from the Consular player in our group. Overall the team I was with worked very well and the classes definitely had to support each other to get to the base. No one was bored by any means.