SWGOH Game Update - 4/19/2016 Guilds, Raids, Updates, Name Changing and Rey!?!

We got a few updates from CG_JohnSalera and EA_Jesse early Tuesday Morning.  We will have a lot to discuss in the Live Stream and in Discord!

Their posts are below:

Hello all –
First, I wanted to thank you all for your continued feedback! The passion and commitment you’re demonstrating for this game we all love is truly humbling.

As you have seen, we’ve posted updates Friday and again on Saturday to address some of the concerns players have raised after the update last Thursday.

Tomorrow, we plan to release two more quick fixes:
We are reworking the allocation of hit points to the health bar segments. This should give a better indication as to which characters have greater or fewer hit points.

On Friday we increased the speed of manual combat for all modes to match Galactic War (currently the fastest mode). We will now also increase the speed of Auto to match Galactic War.

We have other changes in the works, but I wanted to set expectations that we may or may not be able to get other changes out this week. Reason being that we are putting the final touches and final testing on the next major update which brings Guilds, Raids, and Guild Chat to the game. See Jesse’s Raids Preview.

We have to carefully air traffic control the various pieces of that release along with any updates we’d want to get out to you guys.

Key areas we’re also looking at:
Addressing concerns that Galactic War is taking longer than it used to for players
Investigating bugs and tuning issues reported for various characters
Making the fully random drop rate experience more predictable, an oxymoron that’s harder than it seems
And more

As we get more certainty as to exactly what and exactly when we’ll be able to get those changes in, Jesse and/or I will update you guys.

Thanks again for all your feedback. We are reading it actively and addressing it as quickly as we can.
Thanks!

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Greetings Heroes,

Not much longer to wait for Guilds and Raids - our biggest update yet!

The update will be arriving THIS SUNDAY NIGHT (4/24/16, PST). If you want to start playing with the update as soon as it's available, you will need to manually update your game from either the Google Play or the App Store once the update is ready to go. If you do not update your game Sunday night, it will become a mandatory update on Monday.

Here is some information about Raids to help you better prepare. Raids are intended to be epic, difficult, and exciting tests of you and your guildmates’ collections of heroes.

Summoning Raids
Raids can be summoned only by the Guild Leader
A Guild must have the earned the necessary Guild Funds in order to summon a Raid. This is done by completing Guild Contributions through Guild Daily Activities and other actions.
Once summoned the Raid is available for a set amount of time, or until the boss is defeated

Tiers of Raids
There are 7 difficulty tiers for Raids.
Tier 1 – No requirement, Intended for level 30 and Gear Lvl III
Tier 2 – Requires characters to have 2 Stars & above. Intended for level 40 & Gear lvl IV
Tier 3 – Requires characters to have 3 Stars & above, Intended for level 50 & Gear lvl V
Tier 4 – Requires characters to have 4 Stars & above, Intended for level 60 & Gear lvl VI
Tier 5 – Requires characters to have 5 Stars & above, Intended for level 70 & Gear lvl VII
Tier 6 – Requires characters to have 6 Stars & above, Intended for level 80 & Gear lvl VIII
Heroic Tier – Requires characters to have 7 Stars, Intended for level 80 and Gear lvl IX
The highest difficulty tier also has a time limit, so only the most elite guilds, working together with their mightiest squads will be able to best it!

Raid Rewards
Players who participate in and complete the Raid will earn special rewards, such as credits, Merit Tokens and Gear Prize Boxes. Merit Tokens are used to make purchases in the Guild Store, while Gear Prize Boxes contain highly sought after gear, and possibly even a fully crafted piece of Gear that can immediately be used by your characters. This includes new gear pieces which were recently introduced as components in the Level 80 update.

The Gamorreans
These pig-like brutes must be defeated before your Guild is able to take on the Rancor. They are no pushovers and will require smart tactics to defeat them to move onward towards the inner sanctum of The Pit.

Gamorrean Guard Abilities
Hack and Slash - Deal Physical damage to target enemy and inflict two Damage Over Time effects for 3 turns.

Muscle In - Gamorrean Guard Taunts and gains Retribution for 2 turns.

Punch Through - Deal Physical damage to target enemy and Expose them for 2 turns.

Gamorrean Brute Abilities
Heavy Chop - Deal Physical damage to target enemy and inflict Heal Immunity for 2 turns.

Head Splitter - Deal Physical damage to target enemy and inflict Buff Immunity and Ability Block for 2 turns.

Impede - Gamorrean Brute Taunts, gains Defense Up for 2 turns, and gains 70% Turn Meter.

Gamorrean Captain Abilities
Mighty Thrust - Deal Physical damage to target enemy, plus bonus damage equal to 20% of their Max Health. If the target had 50% Health or more, also call an ally to Assist. This attack can't be Evaded.

Rally the Guards - Call all Gamorrean allies to Assist, then summon up to two Gamorrean allies to the battle. This ability is on cooldown when the battle begins.

Bestial Roar - All allies gain 30% Turn Meter and Offense Up for 3 turns, and other allies recover 30% of their Max Health.

The Rancor
The first Raid available in Star Wars: Galaxy of Heroes is The Pit, where players will face off against the Rancor. This mighty foe smashes its enemies and will even devour them after so many rounds in the fight.

Rancor Abilities
Crushing Claw - Deal Physical damage to target enemy with a 50% chance to inflict Healing Immunity for 2 turns and a 50% chance to Stun for 1 turn. This Stun chance is doubled if the target has less than 50% Health. This ability deals 30% less damage to Taunting targets.

Rancor Slam - Deal Physical damage to all enemies with a 35% chance to inflict Health Down for 2 turns. Then, Devour's cooldown is reduced by 1 for each enemy that is below 50% Health. This ability deals 30% less damage to Taunting targets.

Bellow - The Rancor roars, Dispelling all positive status effects from all enemies, and removing 75% Turn Meter from each enemy that did not have a positive status effect.

Devour - Instantly defeat target enemy. This ability can't be Evaded, and the defeated target can't be Revived. This ability is on cooldown when the battle begins.

Guild Store
The Guild Store offers Gear for sale, as well as character shards for the all new characters Gamorrean Guard and Jawa Engineer. In addition to this, you may see shards in the store for other characters you are powering up, such as Rey!

Guild Activities
Guilds must work together to complete daily activities, such as completing a set number of light side battles. This is the best way to earn Guild Funds which are the currency used to activate Raids.

Name Change
While it’s not really part of Raids, we wanted to let you all know that in this update you will be able to change your name. This is done by opening your player profile by tapping on your Player Level progress bar in the upper left of the Cantina screen and then tapping the small pencil icon next to your current name. The first time this is done it is completely free, but subsequent name changes will cost 200 Crystals.