What secret areas have you found in the game?

[narkedoff]

found this human skeleton behind a waterfall .... really surprised me

http://img88.imageshack.us/img88/917/skele.jpg

Edited May 18, 2012 by narkedoff

[Bloodstealer]

The linearity of a story has nothing to do with exploration. Just because you have a quest to do something somewhere doesn't mean you aren't allowed to see other areas of the map.

 

It seems to me like you're one of the people whining for exploration, yet have never bothered to do it themselves. In fact, you don't even want exploration, rather just an additional thing to complain about.

 

There's plenty more exploration in this game than the other game where flying mounts basically removed all sense of wonder and unknown.

 

Well a game on rails with exhaustion zones all over it, hidden barriers to restrict where you can climb etc... kinda makes me think exploring was the last thing on there devlopment brainstormed list.... as for wonders and the unknown... a datacron and codex entries.. which reward next to nothing and the Codex 6months into the game is still borked with many of those wonders not achievable... hmmmm

When I think of exploring I think random encounters, random loot locations and challenging puzzles etc... show me where this exists... maps are on rails, mobs continually respwan in the same place, same type of mob, no up/down scaling based on level, meaningless loot, codex entries that are broken, planets never change not even day/night, cross faction openworld to keep you on your toes is all but non-existant even in designated areas on planets... need I go on as to where exploration seems to lack in SWTOR.. heck one of the major aspects tom Star Wars.. ie SPACE has nothing explorable only a few repetitive mini combat missions on rails, hich varies not one iota whenever you run them.... sorry I fail to get a sense of exploration, which is a shame becuase I see randomness and exploration as a major hook for any MMO that trys to implement it, but then again I guess that's just old school

 

Random locations for loot, mob spawns, achievement items etc could go a long way to opening up this game across both factions... no need to have separate instances these things have both factions aiming to find the same things on the same instanced map... then much more of an Open World begins to emerge... not PvP driven but exploration drivven... and after failing to secure that +4 datacron a few times cos of the Sith beating you too it.. and you as well in the process, you start to think grouping.....

 

The Rakghoul event could be a lesson learned to a lesser extent.. we were busy completing the dailies, avoiding mobs (peg in hole spawns unfortunately, but they were scaled in levels), but Imps were doing the same thing so you nhad either be careful or all out bloodraged . There were Ops groups (if you were lucky enought to have a server that has population for such things) forming to take out the 3 World Bosses, only to be met by a group of Imps trying to achieve the same thing... it made it a litle less stagnant, bring the random spawns in,

Then create random spawn points for world bosses, loot datacrons and it opens the game up so much more... then you will have my buy in to exploration.. until then its just meeeeh imo

Edited May 18, 2012 by Bloodstealer

[Wanchope]

I don't have any screen shots, but finding, and then taking down all the world bosses seems like something that should be in this thread.

[Owsley]

A lot of the mountains on Alderaan are climbable. Lots of fantastic views and a few shortcuts if you know where to go. I love drivng up and down the rivers.

 

Nar Shaddaa is full of hidden rooms and areas. Since it is faction shared and you can't drill down into elevators on the map, you find stuff all over the place. If you stumble upon the opposing faction's heroic areas you find lots of resource nodes and chests for the taking. There is also an area that appears to be class specific. The taxi is unreachable unless you have the mission that opens it up. It would be nice if they added gaming to the casinos. The slot machines and tables are already there.

Edited May 18, 2012 by Owsley

[Evgen]

Well a game on rails with exhaustion zones all over it, hidden barriers to restrict where you can climb etc... kinda makes me think exploring was the last thing on there devlopment brainstormed list....

I can't think of a game without walls. I'd rather play in a place that looks like it is huge than one that seems like a walled in city park.

 

as for wonders and the unknown... a datacron and codex entries.. which reward next to nothing and the Codex 6months into the game is still borked with many of those wonders not achievable... hmmmm

Which things aren't achievable? I know some are strange, a Coreliia datacron unlocking under Quesh or whatever it is, but unachievable I'm unaware of.

 

When I think of exploring I think random encounters, random loot locations and challenging puzzles etc... show me where this exists... maps are on rails, mobs continually respwan in the same place, same type of mob,

Again I don't know any games with this. If by random you mean one of 3 different types of mobs at the same power level and function, then a little. I myself think the way virtually ALL MMORPS do mobs is trash and would like to see something new. Too bad the gaming community tends to punish originality and creativity. I don't think all games should be the same and offer the same features.

 

no up/down scaling based on level, meaningless loot, codex entries that are broken, planets never change not even day/night, cross faction openworld to keep you on your toes is all but non-existant even in designated areas on planets...

Scaling would be great, but I think loot is the best time sink they ever created, I don't expect to get phat loot from walking into a corner of the map.

 

need I go on as to where exploration seems to lack in SWTOR.. heck one of the major aspects tom Star Wars.. ie SPACE has nothing explorable only a few repetitive mini combat missions on rails, hich varies not one iota whenever you run them.... sorry I fail to get a sense of exploration, which is a shame becuase I see randomness and exploration as a major hook for any MMO that trys to implement it, but then again I guess that's just old school

Space, is big. Really big. You just won't believe how vastly, hugely, mindbogglingly big it is. I mean, you may think it's a long way down the road to the chemist's, but that's just peanuts to space. And it's mostly nothing. It's not a feature you just add on, space exploration is a game in itself. And I think it has nothing to do with Starwars. Space battles yes, would I like the current system improved, yes. Do I want them to spend tons of money to letting me go anywhere to see visual effects for planets and novas that haven't needed improving since the 1990s, no.

 

Random locations for loot, mob spawns, achievement items etc could go a long way to opening up this game across both factions... no need to have separate instances these things have both factions aiming to find the same things on the same instanced map... then much more of an Open World begins to emerge... not PvP driven but exploration drivven... and after failing to secure that +4 datacron a few times cos of the Sith beating you too it.. and you as well in the process, you start to think grouping.....

Or you start to think, why should I play a game that requires me to group just to walk across the bloody map without getting ganked to do my missions or pick up a lore object. I prefer to know where these things are, so once I've found them I can find them again, and not "explore" the same area for the 20th time.

 

Maybe that's the thing. Exploration is pretty much a one time deal.

 

I also think a good story doesn't have you wandering around aimlessly. I like that all the classes have to go to the same places at the same time in the planets quest chains. Great for grouping. I am always finding new stuff a little out of the way. Champions, interesting scenery.

 

In wow I spent 30 minutes walking around the back side of one of the continents, when mounts were from 40, and I was <40. Guess what I found?!?! Nothing. One small area with a shack, no npcs, and nothing else of note. I would have preferred an exhaustion zone 5 minutes in thank you very much.

Edited May 21, 2012 by Evgen

[Ashton]

Space, is big. Really big. You just won't believe how vastly, hugely, mindbogglingly big it is. I mean, you may think it's a long way down the road to the chemist's, but that's just peanuts to space. And it's mostly nothing. It's not a feature you just add on, space exploration is a game in itself. And I think it has nothing to do with Starwars. Space battles yes, would I like the current system improved, yes. Do I want them to spend tons of money to letting me go anywhere to see visual effects for planets and novas that haven't needed improving since the 1990s, no.

 

It's not as challenging as you imply here. SWG did it, and did it well. Now I'm not one of "those" SWG players who want this game to be SWG 2, but I do want a more robust space system than TOR currently has.

 

It is a separate game though. And like SWG, I'd like to see Bioware devote specific developers and support to a space system that allows for PvE and PvP, and of course, exploration. It needs to be a separate team, though - so that current issues with the game as/is continue to be pursued and fixed. Which means the rail system needs to go and a new system designed, developed and implemented.

[StarDaimyo]

Nice thread - I wil read in in detail later - replying to subscribe

[dazednconfuzed]

I can't think of a game without walls. I'd rather play in a place that looks like it is huge than one that seems like a walled in city park.

 

SWG did this. you went off one side of aplanetary map, you came back on the other side, kind of like as though the planets were round.

 

Which things aren't achievable? I know some are strange, a Coreliia datacron unlocking under Quesh or whatever it is, but unachievable I'm unaware of.

 

One of the Knight lore entries, at least, plus a pile of stuff that shows on one planet but unlocks on another.

 

Again I don't know any games with this. If by random you mean one of 3 different types of mobs at the same power level and function, then a little. I myself think the way virtually ALL MMORPS do mobs is trash and would like to see something new. Too bad the gaming community tends to punish originality and creativity. I don't think all games should be the same and offer the same features.

 

Random encounters, and dragons appearing on the world map in Skyrim.

 

Space, is big. Really big. You just won't believe how vastly, hugely, mindbogglingly big it is. I mean, you may think it's a long way down the road to the chemist's, but that's just peanuts to space. And it's mostly nothing. It's not a feature you just add on, space exploration is a game in itself. And I think it has nothing to do with Starwars. Space battles yes, would I like the current system improved, yes. Do I want them to spend tons of money to letting me go anywhere to see visual effects for planets and novas that haven't needed improving since the 1990s, no.

 

I don't know how you can say space has nothing to do with Star Wars. The final battles in two of the original movies centred around 2 space battles. And if you have looked at any of the space combat threads, the ideas people are posting mostly revolve around instanced hotspots, like what we have at the moment, but without the rails.

 

Or you start to think, why should I play a game that requires me to group just to walk across the bloody map without getting ganked to do my missions or pick up a lore object. I prefer to know where these things are, so once I've found them I can find them again, and not "explore" the same area for the 20th time.

 

Maybe that's the thing. Exploration is pretty much a one time deal.

 

That's the point about exploration in MMOs, it isn't necessary. Maybe you need to travel somewhere first, for it to show up on the map, but that isn't really exploration. Exploration is picking a direction and heading that way to see what is out there.

 

I also think a good story doesn't have you wandering around aimlessly. I like that all the classes have to go to the same places at the same time in the planets quest chains. Great for grouping. I am always finding new stuff a little out of the way. Champions, interesting scenery.

 

The story doesn't, true, but an MMO where story is about the only thing going for it will get boring quickly, as evidenced by the number of subscriptions TOR has already lost. And great for grouping? Sure, if you can find someone out there actually willing to talk.

 

In wow I spent 30 minutes walking around the back side of one of the continents, when mounts were from 40, and I was <40. Guess what I found?!?! Nothing. One small area with a shack, no npcs, and nothing else of note. I would have preferred an exhaustion zone 5 minutes in thank you very much.

 

Maybe you would have preferred that, but not everyone would. Some of us aren't bothered that there isn't anything there apart from scenery. That's the point of exploration, there doesn't have to be something special in every place you go and look at. It makes finding that something special even more worthwhile.

[Fenshire]

I have found two 'secret' locations in the game.

 

One is an empty droid factory on Nar Shaddaa. Huge area not on the map, no mobs at all in the area.

 

The other is a large cave system on Voss. This one does have a map, but the entrance is not marked on the world map. Again, there are no mobs inside at all.

 

Both are just big, empty spaces, however they are fully detailed environments.

 

I kind of laugh when people say there isn't any place to explore in this game... then I bring up these two locations and without fail, they've no idea where they are or how to get to them.

[Evgen]

SWG did this. you went off one side of aplanetary map, you came back on the other side, kind of like as though the planets were round.

That's an interesting way to do it. I personally like the way it is now.

I went to Tatooine and felt like I was in a huge vast desert. I go to Coruscant and it feels like a huge city.

I just googled for some screen shots of "SWG scenery" and all I saw was walls and mountains that appeared pretty close, but greyed out.

I know if the devs had to make all that area explorable nothing else in the game would be finished yet.

I think they will add more areas, and I also felt a lot of the areas were vast and not over populated with quests areas.

 

One of the Knight lore entries, at least, plus a pile of stuff that shows on one planet but unlocks on another.

Gotcha, that should be fixed, can't understand why they haven't fixed some small things, but did go through the trouble to make some datacrons harder to get, how that got to be a priority I would REALLY like to know.

 

Random encounters, and dragons appearing on the world map in Skyrim.

Random as in you can meet anything anywhere? Or random as in one of 3 different mobs in the area?

Most areas in TOR random wouldn't make sense. One of 3 different mobs, sure, I would like to see a little more variety, but that wouldn't have stopped anyone from unsubbing.

 

I don't know how you can say space has nothing to do with Star Wars. The final battles in two of the original movies centred around 2 space battles. And if you have looked at any of the space combat threads, the ideas people are posting mostly revolve around instanced hotspots, like what we have at the moment, but without the rails.

Seriously? Reread my post again. I said space exploration, not Star Wars, space combat yes, make it better.

 

That's the point about exploration in MMOs, it isn't necessary. Maybe you need to travel somewhere first, for it to show up on the map, but that isn't really exploration. Exploration is picking a direction and heading that way to see what is out there.

I do that all the time in TOR, not sure how long you expect to travel for. There are a lot of areas that you would never go to unless you have played all classes on both factions, even then there are some areas that area there for exploration. I can understand how you could want more. I think it would be cool too, I just think it's no where near non-existant.

 

The story doesn't, true, but an MMO where story is about the only thing going for it will get boring quickly, as evidenced by the number of subscriptions TOR has already lost. And great for grouping? Sure, if you can find someone out there actually willing to talk.

I don't think that is one of the reasons people are unsubbing. Diablo , yes, general disappointment due to unreasonable expectations, yes, real life not allowing for an MMO, yes. This game is right up my alley. I prefer it to wow, have no interest in Guildwars, or any other fantasy MMORPG, I like fantasy, but I played AD&D a lot, and 95% of MMORPGS seem to be fantasy.

 

Maybe you would have preferred that, but not everyone would. Some of us aren't bothered that there isn't anything there apart from scenery. That's the point of exploration, there doesn't have to be something special in every place you go and look at. It makes finding that something special even more worthwhile.

I don't think you get what I'm saying, 30 minutes, 1 shack. It takes about 10 seconds to walk by the shack. The rest was bland featureless terrain. Go in to the water a second or 2 and exhaustion zone. Nothing across the water.

 

I expect they will expand the current worlds and add more. I think extra exploration would come at some cost, increased system spec requirements, and lots of dev time for sure. I'd rather have more story, more consequences for my actions, and more companions.

 

Back on subject, I also found an entirely empty area on Nar Shadaar, entrance not marked on the map.

One of the lower floors there and it can only show you the world map!

Edited May 22, 2012 by Evgen

[dazednconfuzed]

That's an interesting way to do it. I personally like the way it is now.

I went to Tatooine and felt like I was in a huge vast desert. I go to Coruscant and it feels like a huge city.

I just googled for some screen shots of "SWG scenery" and all I saw was walls and mountains that appeared pretty close, but greyed out.

I know if the devs had to make all that area explorable nothing else in the game would be finished yet.

I think they will add more areas, and I also felt a lot of the areas were vast and not over populated with quests areas.

 

Oh, no, any mountains you saw were climbable in SWG. It might take you quite some time to reach the top of them, but damn, the views were awesome. I'll admit, there are one of two planets in TOR that feel vast - Tatooine, Hoth, for example, and I kind of agree with you about Coruscant. I think it gives the impression of a big city, but not a city world.

 

Gotcha, that should be fixed, can't understand why they haven't fixed some small things, but did go through the trouble to make some datacrons harder to get, how that got to be a priority I would REALLY like to know.

 

Agreed. This is a bug that has been in since day 1 too. I don't personally know of any other buggy lore entries, since I've not really bothered with them since finding out about the Knight one.

 

Random as in you can meet anything anywhere? Or random as in one of 3 different mobs in the area?

Most areas in TOR random wouldn't make sense. One of 3 different mobs, sure, I would like to see a little more variety, but that wouldn't have stopped anyone from unsubbing.

 

The dragons can turn up anywhere, once you've advanced the main storyline to the point where they can turn up. Other mobs seem to be fairly random, but are probably following a pre-set route... traders travelling from one city to another, for example.

 

Seriously? Reread my post again. I said space exploration, not Star Wars, space combat yes, make it better.

 

Oops, sorry. My bad. Yes, make space combat into something decent, and while I personally think space exploration would be great, I don't think it is really necessary.

 

I do that all the time in TOR, not sure how long you expect to travel for. There are a lot of areas that you would never go to unless you have played all classes on both factions, even then there are some areas that area there for exploration. I can understand how you could want more. I think it would be cool too, I just think it's no where near non-existant.

 

You say it yourself, you don't visit all areas unless you play all the class stories. But beyond that, there is no reason to go off the beaten path, and more often than not, if you do go for a wander, you run into something you cannot get past.

 

I don't think that is one of the reasons people are unsubbing. Diablo , yes, general disappointment due to unreasonable expectations, yes, real life not allowing for an MMO, yes. This game is right up my alley. I prefer it to wow, have no interest in Guildwars, or any other fantasy MMORPG, I like fantasy, but I played AD&D a lot, and 95% of MMORPGS seem to be fantasy.

 

How many threads do you see on these forums from people saying 'Thanks, but I'm out'? Or people complaining that their once huge guild is not all but deserted? I play D&D too. I'm a DM though, so rarely get to play myself

 

I don't think you get what I'm saying, 30 minutes, 1 shack. It takes about 10 seconds to walk by the shack. The rest was bland featureless terrain. Go in to the water a second or 2 and exhaustion zone. Nothing across the water.

 

I expect they will expand the current worlds and add more. I think extra exploration would come at some cost, increased system spec requirements, and lots of dev time for sure. I'd rather have more story, more consequences for my actions, and more companions.

 

Back on subject, I also found an entirely empty area on Nar Shadaar, entrance not marked on the map.

One of the lower floors there and it can only show you the world map!

 

I understood you, but what I was saying is that to some of us, it doesn't matter. I can understand how some would find it annoying to travel for ages and see nothing of interest, but for others, the point of travelling for ages isn't to go and find interesting things (although I'll admit that is always a bonus), but just to see what is there. If nothing is there, then so be it. It is still half an hour or whatever of exploring.

 

I do hope they expand the worlds to give them a more open feel, and give us more to do besides questing and hanging around on the fleet, but I don't knowhow they'll implement it.

[Trevelyan]

SWG did this. you went off one side of aplanetary map, you came back on the other side, kind of like as though the planets were round.

 

 

SWG did not do this. There were invisible walls in SWG. Once you got to the edge of the map you stopped but could see terrain past the invisible wall. I remember this because it caused issues with Bounty Hunter missions. Many of the missions would spawn off the map becoming unreachable. You had to drop the BH mission and pick up a new one. As large as the SWG maps were, they still had boundaries.

[Arkerus]

If you want miles of empty terrain on each planet...

What would you do with it? Its pointless to design hundreds of miles of terrain that is nothing more than a wasteland (literally and figuratively).

 

This game is not ONE planet, like WoW. They had to create several planets and each planet got enough space and time to flow the story at that location.

 

If you want a pure open world this game isn't for you. Stop trying to mold it to your own desires.

[Skaol-dirtyd]

SWG did this. you went off one side of aplanetary map, you came back on the other side, kind of like as though the planets were round.

 

 

You must have played a different version of SWG than I did for 7+ yrs.... The SWG game I played had walls once you hit the edge of the map. You never came out on the other side.

 

Cool Idea though.

[Helistin]

Empire's fleet must the a secret area on my server considering i can the only one there even during peak times.

[dazednconfuzed]

SWG did not do this. There were invisible walls in SWG. Once you got to the edge of the map you stopped but could see terrain past the invisible wall. I remember this because it caused issues with Bounty Hunter missions. Many of the missions would spawn off the map becoming unreachable. You had to drop the BH mission and pick up a new one. As large as the SWG maps were, they still had boundaries.

 

SWG did this. you went off one side of aplanetary map, you came back on the other side, kind of like as though the planets were round.

 

You must have played a different version of SWG than I did for 7+ yrs.... The SWG game I played had walls once you hit the edge of the map. You never came out on the other side.

 

Cool Idea though.

 

Hmm, it seems they changed the mechanics then, or else my memory is worse than I think it is. Either is possible, lol.

 

i was referring to very early SWG, back when it first came out. I am positive you could go off one side of the map and back on to the other.

[Trevelyan]

Hmm, it seems they changed the mechanics then, or else my memory is worse than I think it is. Either is possible, lol.

 

i was referring to very early SWG, back when it first came out. I am positive you could go off one side of the map and back on to the other.

 

Same here. I played since its launch and always remember hitting a glass wall. Unless they had the option in Beta and then removed it prior to launch.

[dazednconfuzed]

Hmmm, strange...

 

Well... they should have made it so you went off one side of the map and re-entered the other side.

[Evgen]

Hmmm, strange...

 

Well... they should have made it so you went off one side of the map and re-entered the other side.

I like the way champions did it best, if you got close to the edge of the map everything got gray, so you knew you were getting close before you hit the invisible wall.

 

I myself wondered why there had to be exhaustion zones on Tatooine for the 50 meters or so between some zones . . .

[Najam]

In wow I spent 30 minutes walking around the back side of one of the continents, when mounts were from 40, and I was <40. Guess what I found?!?! Nothing. One small area with a shack, no npcs, and nothing else of note. I would have preferred an exhaustion zone 5 minutes in thank you very much.

 

This was hilarious!

 

On topic, have found a lot of the things mentioned on this thread. I found in my early days of playing my main that just hoping on my speeder and going around planets was a lot of fun.

Edited May 24, 2012 by Najam

[sarbonn]

I know this is a pretty old thread, but it was one I created, so the reason for the necro is because I'm curious how much new stuff people have found in the new expansions, which weren't really a possibility when this question was first asked.

 

One thing I wanted to point out is that very first story I mentioned (where the chest was found in that out of the way place): It appears that Bioware has actually taken out the chest, which means that the secret area is still there, but it has absolutely no purpose now, which really sucks now. It was one of those great little finds, and for some reason hey felt the need to remove it. Why?

[WorldSmasher]

On Yavin 4, I found two data pads, one written by a Jedi, Arlo Grennen, and another was anonymous. However, they were hidden in instances. I wonder if they lead to anything? These were the non-repeatable instances where I found them. It makes me wonder if there are other instances in SoR that might have datapads hidden in them like this?

[Holocron]

Same here. I played since its launch and always remember hitting a glass wall. Unless they had the option in Beta and then removed it prior to launch.

 

No, it was in with launch, but changed later on. I use to explore the worlds, and travel a lot in swg, and coming out on the other side of the map is something I would do as a short cut to my location if was closer to the opposing border. This was of course was back before vehicles, when you had to walk everywhere.

[MaximusRex]

I know this is a pretty old thread, but it was one I created, so the reason for the necro is because I'm curious how much new stuff people have found in the new expansions, which weren't really a possibility when this question was first asked.

 

One thing I wanted to point out is that very first story I mentioned (where the chest was found in that out of the way place): It appears that Bioware has actually taken out the chest, which means that the secret area is still there, but it has absolutely no purpose now, which really sucks now. It was one of those great little finds, and for some reason hey felt the need to remove it. Why?

 

There were credit chests in many of the early flashpoints, and people were using bots to farm them.

[Monumenta]

eggs and crystals you can mine on alderaan, killable venders in outlaws den, water on tatooine that you can freeze on hoth and fight a ghost on ilum with, crazed rep trooper playing golf on oricon, the chamber above the gtn in outlaws den that used to contain the ancient tome...

 

its too bad the datacrons on rishi is bugged open because thats a great unmarked mission