We’ve had a lot of people asking to check out the site, but up until now it’s been a very private alpha. Now we’re opening it up to our fans who know where to find us (Twitter, FB, and our Blog!)
There is one big rule!
If you are a member of the media (blogs / podcasts / Conan O’Brian), DO NOT post any reviews until the site launches (which will be sometime between Feb 25 and March 1). We don’t want people getting all excited and then not being able to find our site.
A few tips:
Do not try to log in or make an account, it isn’t hooked up.
Do not try to navigate around the site, that also isn’t hooked up.
We cache all of the data for your most recent character in the browser, so all of the work you do will be saved, for ONE character (per browser). If you make a second, it will wipe out the first. (Accounts will fix this, of course)
Item drop location isn’t finished yet, sorry about that!
The site may take a while to load the first time (we have it on a small server until we go live). It should load with a character builder wizard, if it doesn’t, hit refresh (because clicking on the ‘gear’ link isn’t hooked up yet)!
What did you think? Share your feedback, good and bad. What do you think you’ll use the tool for? What took you a while to figure out (what did you overlook)? What is your favorite feature that you don’t want us to change? Was anything confusing?
Leave a comment so we can get a dialog going with everyone!
Add veronica.tegen to Skype (mention SWTOR in the invite to connect) if you want to join us at 8pm PST Monday night, 2/20 at 8pm PST. We’ll be doing a big call to gather feedback.
*This tool is not yet released, this is a preview of what’s to come in a couple more weeks!*
SWTOR is fun, really fun! But it would be even better if I could show off my badass gear to my friends, amrite? We all got spoiled by World of Warcraft’s maturity… with our fully functional armory api, mods, simulators and amazing community. But SWTOR is a new game that has to be built upon; we don’t get an armory, we don’t have our fancy Deady-Boss-Mods, and the game is too young to have a reliable simulator.
Mr. Robot has adjusted his approach to SWTOR, since it’s a new game. Many of you will be expecting a gear optimizer, but he won’t have that for a while. Instead, his first SWTOR tool will act as an armory until the War Masters over at Bioware have time to release one (who have their hands full making more fun content that drops more badass gear). Phase 2 will build on the gear optimizer, of course!
Phase 1: Mr. Robot’s Character Builder
Many of you know Mr. Robot from WoW, for his gear optimization magic. But he can’t optimize gear if he doesn’t know what you’re wearing! Enter: Mr. Robot’s Character Builder, a tool that lets you recreate your character including:
Character name, guild, and server
Gear for you and your companions, and a separate wish-list tab
Skill tree
Crew skills
All the extras, like your Dark, Social and PVP levels
Here are some screenshots of our character walkthrough – the process you’ll go through when building a brand-new character.Mr. Robot also wants to help you discover cool items, so the second major goal of the Character Builder is to provide quality and accurate item data. Mr. Robot intends to have the most accurate item information, so we’ve spent weeks in-game looking up item lists from vendors, mapping random prefixes to sets of stats, and verifying end-game drops. He’s also built out some filters you won’t find on other sites, like browsing items by flashpoint/operation or special handling of crafted items.
Crafted items are tricky, since a lot of green items can turn into even more items. This can ‘junk’ up an item list, interrupting all of the fun you wanted to have perusing items. So we’ve condensed the crafting lists by grouping the related items. Below is the expanded view of a green crafted item, showing you what other items are discovered from RE’ing it. You can select any of those items to equip on your character.There’s also my favorite filter… the “Match Profile” button, which will remove items you can’t equip because the dark level is too high, for example.
Make an account!
Our WoW tool doesn’t require an account for most of the functionality – you can import any character from the armory at any time. But since there is no official armory for SWTOR you will want to save all of your hard work! Be sure to make an account and save your profiles! Mr. Robot doesn’t want anyone throwing their gaming rigs out the window in frustration of losing the hard work, so he’ll remember the latest thing you did (tied to your browser), but that’s about it.
Phase 1.1: Sharing ‘The Armory’ with 3rd party tools
Mr. Robot plans to develop an API for other tools to import your character data. No reason for everyone to enter their gear multiple times into every cool tool on the internetz! And eventually, Bioware will have an official armory, which we’ll LOVE because users won’t have to manually pick all of their gear anymore. When that happens, 3rd party tools will be able to import our BiS lists and whatever else we have to offer, as well as the character information if they don’t use the Bioware armory directly.
If you’re making a tool that would benefit from our API, let us know! We want to chat with a few of you to find out the best method of getting you the data you want. Leave a comment or email vee (at;} askmrrobot (d0t] com.
Will you be mine? Mr. Robot invites all SWTOR bloggers and podcasters to his Press Tour d’Love from Feb 20 – 24. RSVP to secure your interview spot and ask him anything you want!
Mr. Robot just wants to be loved. Many of you know he tried out for a spot in Transformers, and that he wanted to be the lead in Wall-E because he had a crush on the lead actress, Eve… and he wanted to be one of the main Droids in the SWTOR game, but they didn’t pick him… they said he wasn’t evil enough.
So he’s returning to what he knows best, optimizing games for humans. He’s about to launch his SWTOR tool and wants YOU to write about it. It’s his version of being on late night talk shows or on the cover of Rolling Stone. So what do you say, will you join the Tour d’Love?
When: Interviews will be scheduled between February 20 to February 24. The articles and podcasts cannot go live until our site launches, toward the end of February.
RSVP: Fill out the form below
Have Fun: Mr. Robot really wants his personality to shine through these interviews. If you have a fun angle you’d like to take, let us know when you fill out the form.
XOXO: Mr. Robot also has a few surprises in store for everyone who joins his press tour, as well as his favorite blog and favorite podcast interview. Don’t worry about kissing his @$$, he’s just looking to see his robot personality come through… he wants this to be FUN! Think Conan O’Brien, not CNN.
PS: The image in this post is from a great photographer, and you can buy his cards and calendars here.
Who doesn’t love being right, honestly?! Mr. Robot takes a lot of pride in his work and he knows that providing tools with data errors will confuse his human friends. Or worse, it might frustrate them enough to cause a revolt, and Mr. Robot really doesn’t want to DIAF!
Mr. Robot has gotten a lot of love mail begging to release the tool asap. He apologizes for launching slower than expected, but it’s because he had to get the item data himself (and the help of a few trustworthy humans). The current databases have a lot of wrong information, missing items and things are just categorized wrong: some items show up as craftable when they aren’t, others supposedly drop form 1,000 different vendors… ORLY??
We originally intended to rely on these databases like we did for WoW, but since the data is not up to Mr. Robot’s standards, he has spent hours and hours (more like days and days) in game going from vendor to vendor to gather item location information. He’s been verifying which items have removable enhancements, and which ones don’t. He’s cracked the code on craftable items. He’s still working out some theories on random items. And he got a LOT of help from Dulfy on Flahspoint and Operation items.
All of this work, btw, has slowed his leveling. Poor Mr. Robot is only level 35… sure he could hack in and make himself 50, but the class quests are SO MUCH FUN!
Anyway, Mr. Robot will have another version of the alpha coming out soon. He’d like some help from detail-oriented and trustworthy humans to verify his item information. If you’re up for the gig, leave a comment, and let us know your class, level, faction, and if you do a lot of PVE or PVP content.
Mr. Robot just released his closed, private alpha today. This is very early-stage, not everything is hooked up or complete. But the basic character builder is functioning. He’s agreed to let one lucky fan get access to this private alpha, which only 10 other people are checking out!
We’ll be adding more and more people with each update. Be sure to sign up for the beta, where we’ll invite up to 1,000 people to check it out, just a couple weeks away.
Have you seen a big, ugly, scary monster running around with a Sith? That would be Khem Val, my new BFF. I’m a chick, so I can say that about my SWTOR companion, get over it! He quests with me, kills things for me, laughs at my jokes, and cheers me on when I tell quest givers, “I will kill them all!”
What more can a girl want? Well, I’ll tell you what I want. I want to know what gear is an upgrade for my in-game buddies. I’m clueless in flashpoints when loot drops… how am I supposed to know if it’s an upgrade for one of my many companions? And I think my companions are losing patience with me, as I summon them, look at their outfit, then send them off again. They must think I care more about fashion than killing people, and that’s just not true! I’m a dark Sith and love shooting enemies in the face with lightning. But gearing my companions in-game, is such a clusterf***, I don’t know what else to do…
The good news is that Mr. Robot’s SWTOR character builder will let me equip gear on my own character as well as my companions. Then I can look up Khem Val’s gear at any time in my search to find him the best gear in the universe.
Mr. Robot said he’ll have a private beta ready around Valentine’s day. So be sure to sign up for the beta newsletter if you want to be the first ones to check it out. And check back on our blog, we’ll be posting updates and discussion points leading up to the beta.
Get notified the minute we launch with SWTOR, sign up for Mr. Robot’s email
So Mr. Robot has put us hard to work, gathering flashpoint information for his soon-to-be-released SWTOR character builder. However, even the simplest thing, like getting a boss list for each flashpoint, is proving difficult. The information is all over the place!
Torhead doesn’t let me filter by flashpoint
Darth Hater doesn’t have a boss list for half of the flashpoints they list, and their list of flashpoints is incomplete
Tor-loot has nicely organized lists, but they are incomplete as well
The 3 swtor wikis that I’ve referenced are also all over the place and incomplete
The best resources I’ve found: Sith Warrior, Dulfy’s Guides and from Laura H on ForceJunkies. By the way, we love Sith Warrior! They are definitely the theorycrafting leaders, creating character spreadsheets to analyze abilities, explaining game mechanics, and they even started a thread to provide construction feedback and analysis to Bioware for each end-game class.
Flashpoint Tidbits: Did you know…
Completing bonus missions can unlock bonus bosses. For example, completing the bonus mission in The Foundry unlocks the Burrower Matriarch.
You can get a daily flashpoint quest, so be sure to pick it up before running one! You can find it from a mission box in the supply quadrant of your fleet.
You can do Hardmodes of most flashpoints when you hit level 50. The bosses drop pieces from the first tier of your set, and you also get commendations to buy more of the set pieces.
Having trouble with the new site? Can’t find your favorite feature and secretly think Mr. Robot removed it to torment you? No need to worry, Mr. Robot is a FRIENDLY robot, and is here to help. First, here’s a site tour if you are not finding the features you want:
Q: I owned the old version of the mobile app, what’s up with this new stuff?
A: Let me redirect you to the mobile FAQ.
Q: I can’t login
A: Try quitting your browser and restarting it. This should fix the problem (make sure you completely quit the entire thing). You shouldn’t have to do that more than once (it’s a one-time thing with the cookie)
Q: The site seems slow, but you said the new design would be faster, is it opposite day?
A: Nope, not opposite day! We just have to wait until the caches are all rebuilt (millions of BiS lists get cached on our server and we had to wipe them with the new launch). If it’s slow for any other reason, we’ll be fixing it asap! Update, on 12/22 1:20 am PST, we launched an update that should make it faster, and our caches are getting nice and built up. 12/23: the site should be very snappy, if it isn’t, post on our forums and let us know.
Q: The page looks broken, I have text overlapping and all sorts of baddies. Why do you do this to me?
A: If you are using IE8, we no longer support that browser If you are using a different browser, please let us know so we can look into it. Is Mr. Robot now evil and hates IE8 users? No, he really likes all of you, but he already supports a lot of browsers, smartphones and tablet devices.
–Also, make sure you aren’t zoomed in or out, in your browser, and that you aren’t forcing larger fonts.
–It could also be a font issue with your browser. Read this thread, there are several things to try. Note, if you have noscript, you might be blocking custom web fonts.
–Update, as of 12/22 1:20 am, we now put in LIMITED support for IE8. It should function, but it isn’t pretty and doesn’t have tool tips. At some point in the future we might make it a bit nicer, but we won’t officially be supporting IE8.
Q: How do I create a link to my character now?
A: Once you save your character (requires a free account), we save the character and give you a URL that is shareable. We will be adding the feature back in that changes the URL for your character without having to save a profile.
Q: I can’t find the gear list, did you take it away?
A: Nope, it’s still there, but better! Now, just click on the item name and the list shows up. No more trying to click the “…” button, which btw, was a pain in the ass on a tablet device!
Q: I used to look at the talent build sources on the old site, but I can’t find it now.
A: We’ll put those back up after the holidays. We didn’t have time to get them in the new update.
Q: Where did the export to Reforgerade option go?
A: We didn’t have time to add it into the update, but it will be brought back very soon FIXED on 12/22 at 1:20 am.
Q: Some of the filters I use are gone, like exclude archaeology items.
A: We eliminated some of the less-used filters and added in a few that people really wanted. We didn’t keep them all in because we don’t want to overload the user with options. Instead, you can now exclude any item from the gear list (open the gear list, and uncheck the box on the left). We hope that satisfies all users
Q: I get an error when selecting blacksmithing or a BS related item, does Mr. Robot hate plate wearers?
A: He loves plate wearers, considering he’s made out of metal. There’s a bug that we’re working on fixing asap. Sorry about that!
Q: The shopping list is awesome, but are the enchantment mats wrong?
A: Yes, they are wrong. Sorry about that. We’re working on a fix Mr. Robot really doesn’t want your friends to make fun of you when you open the trade window and have the wrong mats FIXED 12/22 1:20 am PST.
CLASS SPECIFIC INFO:
Q: Shaman: My Shaman spirit hard cap is gone! OMG HELP!
A: Yeah, we missed that, it will be in an update later today. Until then, you can manually add in your own spirit caps. Fixed: 12/23, 5am PST.
Q: Shaman: are the stat weights right for Enhancement?
A: Yes the stat weights are right, but the ‘more info’ tip is wrong. We have to update it. However, Mr. Robot will optimize correctly Fixed on 12/22, 1:20 am PST
Q: Is the expertise cap broken?
A: Yes, we are fixing it asap! Fixed on 12/22, 1:20 am PST
Q: Tanks: Did you change how avoidance and CTC are handled?
A: We did change some of the stat weights for tanks, but we are going to add in more stat weight presets to cover more choices The CTC should be working, but if you think it isn’t, please give us your character realm, name, and what you think isn’t working. Preferably on our forums.NOTE: on 12/22 at 1:20 am we added a new option for CTC users, you can exclude the food/elixir mastery buffs when using CTC.
Q: Tanks: Is the optimizer right for tanks? A: Actually, it’s a bit off. We’re tweaking the algorithm over the next couple of days. Until then, apply some human brain waves to it, while the Robot optimizes his code. This should be fixed now, if you’re still having trouble, be sure to let us know. (12/23, 5am PST)
Q: Hunters: Mr. Robot is recommending the gnomish x ray scope over flintlocke’s woodchucker, is that right?
A: No, it’s not right, and we’ll fix it right away. Fixed 12/22 at 1:20 am PST.
Q: Healers: Why is Mr. Robot suggesting Rathrak, the Poisonous Mind?
A: Because the damage proc wasn’t categorized as damage only. We’re fixing tthat!
Q: Why is Mr. Robot equipping 2 cogwheels, I thought they were unique equipped?
A: They are, and that’s an error. We’ll fix that soon! Fixed on 12/22 at 1:20 am.
Q: Resto Shaman: Why is Mr. Robot sometimes recommending pieces of the elemental shaman set?
A: If you put a cap on spirit that is easy enough to achieve, Mr. Robot thinks the spirit on the healer set bonus isn’t very good, since it’s so easy to achieve. Which leads him to recommending the elemental pieces. You can raise the spirit cap to adjust his behavior, but we’re wondering… maybe this is the RIGHT way? Read our thread here.
First, let’s start off with this factoid: The mobile app has not changed, it has just moved.Also, you DO NOT NEED to buy anything else! Once you complete the transition process by following instruction on your phone, you will get to access the app and RoboCouncil, just as before!
FAQ:
Q: I don’t like the address bar taking up real estate!
A: Neither do we, here’s a tutorial on how to remove the address bar for iPhones.
Q: Do I have to pay more money to get the app?
A: No. A BIG BEEFY ABSOLUTELY NOT NO! Once you complete the transition process, you own the app and RoboCouncil. YAY! Sorry for any confusion. Now, read the next question, it’s related.
Q: Did I pay for nothing? Does everyone else get the mobile app for free?
A: The mobile app is not free for anyone. Previous mobile users got their accounts transitioned. Anyone else who wants it still has to pay.
Q: If I already own the app and RoboCouncil, why would I upgrade to a premium account?
A: After you complete the mobile transition, you own the app and RoboCouncil and don’t have to make any more purchases. But, we have some cool features coming out that will cost additional cash, like the Gear Planner (slated for early 2012!), probably a cool MoP feature, and support for other games (SWTOR first, then LoL). If you want all of those, a premium account totally makes sense, plus, we remove all ads for premium account owners. Since you already owned the app, you get 50% off the premium account if you choose to upgrade.
Q: Is the mobile app just a mini website now? I am seeing the website like I see it from my computer, I don’t see a mobile form-factor anymore.
A: That might mean we aren’t detecting your phone. Try this: open the Mr. Robot on your mobile browser. At the top of the screen, do you see a big ‘switch to mobile’ link? If not, we are definitely not detecting your phone. Email us or post in our forums with the phone you own, and we’ll add it to the list for detection! feedback@(oursite).com
Q: The pick a character bar shows up in the middle of my screen (or some other weird layout).
A: It happens on some iPhones (see picture here), but we’re not sure why, and it isn’t consistent. While we track down the cause, you can fix it my rotating your phone to landscape mode, then back again.
Q: Why are you moving it?
A: For a lot of good reasons, the we elaborate on here.
Q: Why do I have to create an account and login?
A: Since the app is sold on the web, and not the app stores, we have to verify that the person owns the app.
Q: I am having trouble logging in via the app, what’s up?
A: There’s a few things you can try, preferably in this order.
1. Make sure you have ‘private browsing turned OFF’ – go to settings > safari > privacy.
2. Force quit your browser, then open it up. Type in http://www.askmrrobot.com. If you aren’t presented with the mobile screen, look for the big ‘switch to mobile’ option at the top of the navigation.
3. Try uninstalling the app (you don’t need to reinstall it anymore). Restart the phone.
4. Since the app is tied to your account now, and not your phone, try logging in on someone else’s phone, if that works, it points to a setting on your phone not cooperating, and we can help troubleshoot it some more.
5. If you manage to create an account but can’t get the mobile transition process to play nice, email us at feedback@(oursite.com) with your user name. We can help.
Q: I created an account but it doesn’t think I own the app, help?
A: Email us, feedback@(oursite).com with your user name and we’ll help. Until we get your account set up, please start the free trial of the app to tide you over
Q: I paid for an app, not a mobile website, can I get a refund?
A: The app is still an app, it’s just accessed differently. You use a web browser instead of an app launch icon, but the product is still the same. If the app doesn’t work on your phone and we can’t fix it, we can process a refund. However, this will lock out access for the mobile app, RoboCouncil’s mobile app, and RoboCouncil on the web (new!).
Q: The new mobile app is slow, I don’t like it!
A: We are working through it and it will be fixed! It’s very likely it has to do with the BiS cache. You see, we cache millions of BiS sets on our servers to make sure the site loads nice and fast. With this update, we had to blow away that cache, and so now those millions of sets are being re-cached. Hang in there, it’s a top priority.
Q: I’ve tried everything and the app transition just won’t work, what do I do?
A: Sorry about that. We can manually set up your account. We need a few things from you first.
1. Open the app and look for the email link we provide for reporting problems.
2. Click that link to send an email. Be sure to include the user name you used when you registered on our site (not the forums, that’s different). That email will automatically send us your app code, which we need to manually set up your account.
3. It might take us 48 hours to manually set up your account. So in the meantime, please start a free trial of the app to tide you over. Once your account is setup, you’ll have the app and RoboCouncil assign to your account
Welcome to Mr. Robot’s redesigned site, chalked full of features that users have been asking for.
User Accounts: Now you can save settings for each character, and use them on any computer and any device. There are a few other nifty things user accounts lets us build in for you, like removing characters from your recent list.
The Mobile App will is moving to the web. If you already own the mobile app, you should really read this.
New Features: We think you’ll really like the new stuff we’ve added.
Lock any gem / enchant / reforge! You asked for it, we listened. Now you can lock in that expensive enchant you’re sick of Mr. Robot changing. Or that 150 gold reforge swap that only moved around 10 int and 10 hit to get your closer to the hit cap. No worries, just lock in what you want and Mr. Robot will optimize around it. You can also select new gems (etc) and put lock them in as well. You will see a gray dotted line around anything you locked.
Shopping list: Look for the shopping icon on the menu bar to pull up the shopping list. Mr. Robot tallies all of the gems and enchants you need (and associated materials) to go fishing on the Auction House or beg your friends.
Exclude any item: everyone wants different filters, and if we add them all the tool would become bloated and confusing. Instead, we give users the option to exclude any item(s) from the optimizer, so that Mr. Robot never suggests them for BiS.
Remove characters from your recent list: that’s right, now there is a big X next to everyone on the recent list, so you can get rid of the ones you never use.
Optimal bar: we added a snazzy colored bar to show how optimal your are, based on your settings. The width of the bar (in any view) is the BiS score for your settings. If you’re on the armory tab, it will show you how optimal your actual gear is, and show a little arrow indicating where you could be if you optimized with Mr. Robot. When you’re on the optimized tab, the bar shows your optimized score, and the little arrow indicates where you were with your last optimization. That way, if you change settings and re-optimize, you can quickly see if it’s better or worse.
Updated filters: we did a little house-cleaning on the filters, removing the ones that weren’t very important (like exalted rep) and adding in more relevant ones (like include/exclude molten front rewards).
Epic gem rules: we added in an option to control when Mr. Robot will suggest epic gems for your gear. You can tell him to only put epic gems in T13 heroic gear, or if you’re rich you can just tell Mr. Robot to put epic gems in all of your gear.
Stat weight updates: we have a new UI for editing stat weights, we hope you like it. We also added in the option to automatically change the stat weights between raids and 5mans (since the caps are the only thing that changes).
Miscellaneous Little Stuff:
Healer filters: we updated the healer preferences to show what it changes, instead of being a black box.
Gem sockets: the gems now have a colored border around them to indicate the socket color. Enjoy!
Generic characters: we still let you load generic characters, we just moved the option to the load menu.
Automatic optimization: there is no more optimization button, we hope that’s ok. You will just be optimized all the time, whenever you change something. That’s actually how it worked on the old site, we just ‘hid’ the changes until you pushed the button… Robots know humans like pushing buttons. But he removed it now, to make sure the UI wasn’t cluttered.
Faster load times: we optimized a lot of the code to make your characters load faster. We’ve grown from 10,000 users in January to over 4 million 11 months later! It was time to refactor the code for scalability.
4.3 Bugs: there have a been a few bugs on the site after the 4.3 update, like valor items not categorized under the right filters. Those have ALL been fixed with this launch.
Mr. Robot’s Premium Features: For those of you who love the advanced tools, or just love our favorite metallic friend, you might want to upgrade to a premium account. Every premium account comes with every feature, for every game, we ever make. Just $12 / year (that’s $1 a month for those of you who leave math up to the robots).
No Ads! (he might put his own smiling face in the ad spots instead, if you ask nicely)
The Mobile App
RoboCouncil, on the web and mobile
Protection during the Robot Apocalypse (a smart move, human)
Coming in early 2012: The Gear Planner ($5 when bought separately)
Coming in early 2012: SWTOR tools! Woohoo!
You can get a free trial of any of those products. In fact, Mr. Robot insists you start a free trial for the mobile app, just to make sure it works on your phone before you spend the money. Each premium feature can also be bought separately, and if you later want to upgrade to a full premium account, Mr. Robot will put your original purchase toward the price of the premium account (he doesn’t want you to waste your money).
If you are using a different browser, please let us know so we can look into it. Is Mr. Robot now evil and hates IE8 users? No, he really likes all of you, but he already supports a lot of browsers, smartphones and tablet devices.
FIXED on 12/22 at 1:20 am.
FIXED 12/22 1:20 am PST.