In our latest interview with BioWare, we spoke with Design Producer Shawn Ketcherside to talk about everything Star Wars: The Old Republic.

ZAM: Looking at the structure of the Ilum's open-world PvP map, it looks like it would be fun with small-scale skirmishes and guerilla warfare. These days, however, with the way people just want to get their dailies done, Ilum has transformed into this giant game of siege warfare, where one side will be camping the enemy base for kills and valor, while others just rotate around the middle snagging armaments. Was there a specific vision with Ilum that you had hoped would play out?

Shawn: That's a hard question! We had some thoughts, but we're being careful with what we're doing. We don't want to just make changes for the sake of making changes. Anything we do, we want to make sure we're making it better and more improved for the player.

ZAM: Visualizing an MMORPG is nearly impossible, given the wildly creative interpretive power of players, so we can move on from this for now. Getting back to the updates, I know with 1.1 the focus was on expanding endgame with Karagga's Palace and Kaon Under Siege; is 1.2's big theme all about reacting to player feedback and expanding the general breadth of SWTOR? I know there's big expansion on the Legacy system, a new Warzone, and the conclusion to the Kaon Under Siege arc.

Shawn: Yeah, we have some in-game focuses for sure. We want to make sure we're keeping as many people as possible engaged, but we have way more than that in mind. You mentioned the Legacy system, and that's one of the huge things we really want to hit because I think it's an exciting feature for players who really aren't into raiding and are more interested in going through all the different storylines, which is a huge part of the game. So the Legacy updates will offer those players quite a bit. The other big thing we're focusing on is implementing some guild features; the guild bank is going to be a huge thing. Guilds are the social spine of our game, and we want to make sure we're giving them things to make them happy and we're making their guild experience better, so that's one of the things we're really focused on.

ZAM: Back to the Legacy system here; any more hints you can give on that? This is me being sneaky, but we've already heard things like new powers and items, and there's speculation that some cross-faction races might be unlocked. Anything a little more concrete?

Shawn: I don't want to spoil the surprise, sorry!

ZAM: Very well! I'll end this off on a general note then. This is something I've been curious about for some time now: How do you currently see natural progression for endgame content in Star Wars: The Old Republic? For a player who just hits 50, what are you hoping will be the "best" way for that player to experience endgame content, going from "casual" playing to "medium" progression, all the way to "hardcore" nightmare mode operations? How are you hoping for that progression to play out?

Shawn: We're actually focusing on that and how to integrate that into game updates going forward. One of the things that's really important to us is because of the way our game is and how important story is, we want to make sure that more casual players can see the content of the operations and the flashpoints, but at a difficulty level where they can enjoy the content, even if the rewards they're getting aren't at the level of the more progression-based nightmare mode guilds. We just want to make sure we can get everyone as involved as possible.

ZAM: This is me guessing, and you don't have to answer this but... do you think we might see easier versions of operations in the works so that less progression-focused players can experience those instances without the endgame "commitment?" I really enjoyed both Eternity Vault and Karagga's Palace; they're a lot of fun to tackle with friends! Any... comments on that?

Shawn: I can tease a little bit here. Those are some things that we're looking at and there may be some things coming up to make sure that the more casual players can enjoy all the rest of that content.

ZAM: I will... leave that up for interpretation. That's perfect, thanks! That also pretty much wraps up my questions for now!

Shawn: I wish I had some better information on the PvP stuff, but it's really in flux right now and we're keeping our eye on this.

ZAM: Maybe we'll speak again when things finally settle down. Thanks for the chat!

Shawn: Thank you!

Christopher "Pwyff" Tom, Editor-in-Chief.