#anti swtor hunter

[serenofroses]

edited: ... tumblr, stop eating the readmore. DX

starting Hoth on HandofJadus! Ania.

Hunter appears.

me and Ania (for story reason): 🖕

[anchanted-one]

Alliance Commander Ask Game

I saw this interesting post by @consularmain , and thought I'd do it too!

1. Who’s your Alliance Commander? What class are they? Alignment? Random other facts you wanna share?

That would be Vajra Devarath, Jedi Knight. He's mostly Light-Sided, but gets very attached to people. During his 'funeral' after he and the rest of Braga's strike team went MIA, my Consular thought he was a bad Jedi, but a really great person.

His story deviates greatly from the game, but I'll be referring to that rather than the game. I'm currently writing it on AO3, but I'm on Shadow of Revan, at the moment. I'm a long way from writing about his Commander days.

2. What’s a reason or two you like that this character is your Commander?

Vajra is decisive and clearheaded. He doesn't always know what's best, but on these occasions, he's very quick to ask Lana, Theron, Koth, Jorgan, Beywan, Scourge, Kira, or anyone else for their opinions. And choosing the one he things is the best one.

He has a good reputation in the galaxy. Most ordinary people see him as the ultimate white knight errant; honest (more than he actually is), self-sacrificing, and a winner. The Sith and both sides' High Command (including Acina) acknowledge his strength. The Jedi acknowledge his commitment to the galaxy, and perhaps even the Force. I should say, Vajra didn't ask for this, his legend just grew on its own thanks to him getting a lot of spotlight missions.

3. What’s a reason or two you don’t like about them being Commander?

Vajra was permanently affected by the carbonite. It's a source of chronic pain for him, to the point of knocking him out when he least expects it. He does cope somewhat after accepting both Sides of the Force thanks to Satele and Marr, but fifteen years after his return, he's got quite the litany of health problems.

He also has an old problem with mental health. He does deal with it on Rishi, thanks to Lana, but killing or losing allies can hit him hard.

4. Why did this character of all your OCs become Commander?

I've always been partial to the Knight-Errants, and the Jedi Knight felt like the natural anti-Emperor crusader. I thought that once they kill the Emperor in chapter 3, they're already the strongest boss in the galaxy, with few able to stand against them. In addition, Kotfe-et always felt like a Force-user storyline to me. It doesn't translate well for the others. I mean, Smuggler and Bounty Hunter are basically criminals, and Cipher Nine is a spy, not a poster model. And there are the fights against Arcann and Vaylin too...

5. Who did they side with? Did they stay loyal or go saboteur? Or maybe you headcanon they defect properly?

By the time of the Iokath conflict, my universe is far divorced from SWTOR storyline. In fact, the reverse happened. With the Fleet and the Gravestone under his command, Vajra attempts to put an end to fighting. He more or less strongarms both sides into going along with it. Acina and Chancellor Rans are the ones who have to choose, and they choose 'surrender.'

6. Are there any NPC’s from the class stories you’d like to see/HC join the Alliance? Ex: Master Timmns, Ardun Kothe, Watcher One, etc.

The following are part of my Alliance: Shara Jenn (remote worker), Watcher One (secretly), Praven, Bengel, and a bunch of others.

7. How’s your OC feeling about the current Malgus situation?

Doesn't happen. Vajra has the habit of decapitating enemies. Malgus was killed on Ilum, and there was nothing could be salvaged from the station's self-destruct.

On a meta level, I hate enemies that won't stay dead. It's lazy writing, and they already had Malora. They could've brought back Jadus, if they wanted nostalgia-bait, the community would've rejoiced. (You either die as a respected adversary, or live to become more nuisance than terror)

8. Are any of your other OC’s part of the Alliance? If yes what do they do for the Alliance? Do they get along with your Commander?

Most notably, Jasme Shan, Theron's twin sister. But she's not one of the starting classes. She's an Archivist first, combatant second. She's also Vajra's best friend.

Technically, Cipher Nine is a founding member, but only Vajra, Lana, Shara Jenn, and Watcher One know about it. Lana lets Theron and Jasme in on the secret at some point, but I don't know when.

Seraphim Abbot, who's a Jedi pilot and Kira's husband, also joins when she does (earlier, in my story).

Hekaten (Sith Inquisitor) joins the Alliance, in a way. They get along okay.

In addition, Roban Queens (Trooper) joins the Alliance early. But he's had a problem with Vajra for over a decade now.

Vajra encountered Commander Tavus on Taris, but didn't apprehend him, since Garza kept his defection secret. Roban hated him for it, somehow expecting the then-fifteen-year-old to somehow know how to tell a traitor. He picked a fight with Vajra, and lost. To add insult to injury, Vajra filed a formal complaint against him and Garza, which led to her losing trust, and getting a temporary demotion. He never forgave Vajra for that.

During the timeskip, Roban worked with Lana, and began to want her. But she wasn't interested, and he blamed Vajra for that (rarely admitting that he himself was the problem).

Oh, and um. Roban and his family are Zakuulan sleeper agents. He hates Arcann for killing them, but he's a Valkorionist through and through. So that's one more reason to hate Vajra.

9. How does your OC feel about Odessen? (Bonus: how do you feel about it)

Vajra loves it. The scenery is perfect, and it's balanced in the Force. In my story, Lana starts developing it as mroe than just a military base. It has cities, farms, industries, and even markets. They build a home on Odessen, and raise their kids there.

Personally, I love it. Only world I love more is Alderaan.

10. How does your Commander feel about being the Commander?

He accepts it. You have to understand though; he takes it to a whole new level. If you've ever heard of the Shogunate in Japan, that's what he becomes. A benign military dictator. He's able to bring peace to the galaxy thanks to this, but he hates how he's going against his teachings to be a dictator. In addition, he would've liked to have retired from fighting and leading. To spend the bulk of his time as a good husband and father.

11. Favorite place in the Alliance base?

The cliffs overlooking the base and valley beyond.

12. Favorite mission in KotFE?

Chapter 3. The escape from Zakuul, and getting rescued by Lana. On a personal note, I like how this mission frames Vaylin as a force of nature. Like the Dahaka from Prince of Persia: Warrior Within. She was a better Vader, back in those days. Then she became a worse Kylo Ren...

13. Favorite mission in KotET?

The final one, though it's very different for Vajra. When he and Hekaten meet face-to-face for the first time, Valkorion realizes that the Sith has a super-strong pull on ghosts. He uses that to escape his 'cage' (Vajra) and transfer over to Hekaten. The final chapter, where you have to piece yourself together, takes place in Hekaten's mind rather than Vajra's. The Inquisitor escapes thanks to Vaylin's interference, and Vajra briefly resumes his role in containing Valkorion before destroying him for good using Tenebrae's original body.

14. Least favorite mission in either? Why?

From meta, the walker missions. In the game, Iokath. I hate everything about that world, but especially the conclusion. After everything SCORPIO did, having her arc resolved with a single choice like that is dumb. Personally, I resent SCORPIO blaming all organics for what only the Cabal did to her. And she's not fighting for droid rights; she has no problem treating HK-55 like a tool.

15. Is your Commander successful because they’re skilled? Or are they perhaps just really lucky?

Skill more than luck, but I can't stress on how important his friends/council are to his success.

16. From our OC’s point of view, SoR -> KotET wasn’t a fun experience, did they develop any fears as a result?

He was terribly upset by finding out that he lost five whole years. Especially because everyone he knew has changed and grown without him. Most importantly, Lana and Jasme. The latter lost the love of her life (Sith Warrior, Kairegane Rooks) and nearly gave up. He wished he'd been there for her, as she'd been for him.

He's also aware of just how hard his absence was for Lana, with whom he shares a powerful Force-Bond. It was almost dead for five years, which caused her no end of grief.

It doesn't help how he realizes that they've had five years of growth taken away from them, including the family they wished to start together.

And then there's Kira, who had a son while he was frozen.

As a result, he's very afraid of losing time. He's always in a hurry to get the work out of the way, so he can do what's really important to him--spending time with his loved ones. He's loath to let them out of his sight, like he's owrried they'll slip through some crack and vanish the moment he has his back turned. This also makes him very angry with Arcann, though he manages to put his feelings aside.

17. AU time! If your Commander wasn’t Commander, which of your other OCs would have likely taken their place?

Probably no one. Kairegane Rooks, the Wrath, was terminally ill. For her to survive, she'd have to not have a congenital disease. Hekaten is taken prisoner by the Eternal Empire, and Lana and Theron don't trust Roban due to his affiliation to Zakuul (in addition to his general creepy behavior). He proves them right by abandoning the Alliance when Valkorion takes over Hekaten. Smuggler and Bounty Hunter are far too removed from galactic politics to care. I suppose someone would've risen up, but it would've been a dark and bloody universe that ended up in an even worse place than where we are now.

18. Who’s someone your Commander hopes they never have to deal with again?

The Emperor, and Roban. That second guy especially. Creeped on his wife (Lana, whom he married way back during SOR), and joined Valkorion. He even had the temerity to pretend that Force Users have bad inner eyes, rather than accept that maybe Valkorion really was the Sith Emperor.

19. Does your Commander hold on to/still use any titles they earned before KotET?

He doesn't, but he finds them thrown his way very often. Some of the titles he has, which aren't in-game titles:

General, Jedi Marshal, and Crown Reaper (or just Reaper).

20. Share something, anything at all, you want about your Commander that you’ve not really gotten the chance to share before but really want to.

Honestly, I've either already written it, or will be writing when I get there in the story.

In the beginning, I intended for each of my OCs to correspond to a deadly sin:

Vajra: Pride (in his swordsmanship) Kairegane: Lust (thrill seeker) Roban: Envy Hekaten: Greed Mark Fordorn (Bounty Hunter): Wrath (He's an escaped Power Guard) Juun Stede (Smuggler): Gluttony Devel Nirol (Consular): Sloth.

But I did a poor job of keeping to it in most cases, so the 'sins' are a shadow of what they might have been, with the exception of Mark, who's still a very angry man.

[a-master-procrastinator]

Which of your SWTOR Companions are NOT with the Alliance?

I was inspired by this post by @swtorpadawan.

It's a good question, and it got me thinking (slowly, as always). For now, I've come up with fates of companions in Lette Legacy (Jett as the Outlander), and will work on others later.

Warning - Mentions of established character deaths below. And lots of spoilers for KotFE and everything after it.

In my headcanon the events of KotFE and onwards are different from in-game version, which impacts the fate of some companions. The most relevant differences are the fates of class characters (Bounty Hunter, Jedi Consular, Smuggler and Agent are in the Alliance; Jedi Knight, Sith Warrior, Sith Inquisitor and Trooper are not with the Alliance for different reasons) and the fact that the Alliance does not participate in the renewed war between the Republic and Sith Empire, choosing to stay neutral.

Also, the state of companions changes with time, so this is for the time around the events of 7.0 in SWTOR.

Jedi Knight crew:

Fideltin Rusk - continues his military service in the Republic.

Doc - after Ossus stays to help the Jedi in the renewed war.

Jedi Consular crew:

Zenith - continues anti-Imperial activities.

Tharan Cedrax - survives the Imperial attack on Meridian Complex and continues to work for the Republic.

Nadia Grell - after Ossus stays with the Jedi.

Trooper crew:

Elara Dorne - continues her military service in the Republic as a part of the Havoc Squad, takes Jorgan's place as second in command after he joined the Alliance.

M1-4X - stays with the Republic as part of the Havoc Squad.

Tanno Vik - does whatever he was doing in chapter 6.

Sith Warrior crew:

Malavai Quinn - stays with the Empire as one of Acina's officers.

Major Pierce - continues his military service in the Empire.

Jaesa Wilsaam - disappears after Emperor's Wrath's death, current whereabouts unknown.

Broonmark - killed while trying to assassinate a Wookiee senator on Alderaan.

Vette - killed by Vaylin on Odessen.

Sith Inquisitor crew:

Khem Val, Andronikos Revel, Talos Drellik and Xalek - all stay in the Sith Empire and work for Darth Nox.

Ashara Zavros - killed by apprentices of Darth Nox.

Bounty Hunter crew:

Skadge - just does his thing, if nobody shot him yet. (I don't even count him as companion, but since he is a companion in the game, I guess I had to add him). Jett never met him again after dropping him somewhere shortly after Belsavis.

Imperial Agent crew:

Vector Hyllus - continues his duties as Dawn Herald.

SCORPIO - merged with Iokath.

Kaliyo - dropped out of the Alliance after Vaylin is dealt with. I just don't think she would stick for much of what comes next.

So 22 out of 40 companions from class stories are not with the Alliance (obviously Kaliyo, SCORPIO and Vette were a part of the Alliance).

Honorable mention: Raina Temple - officially is not with the Alliance, but working with them to maintain communication between the Alliance and the Chiss Ascendancy.

[talesfantastic]

MAY THE FOURTH BE WITH YOU

Late to the party, but a reminder that I write Star Wars muses - in the Old Republic Era, with additional later-on verses for movies and shows. I'm redoing bios but right now I have KOTOR's Revan and HK-47 written up.

I have most of SWTOR's Theran Cedrax written up (a companion to the Jedi Consular) and will be adding his constant companion, Holiday.

Additionally, I'll be adding an old SWTOR muse, Seran-vin Kast, an Iridonian Zabrak bounty hunter who is very much anti-Sith, but also has an understandable beef with the Republic.

Under consideration are my Jedi Consular, Liana Raine Carmine as well as her cousin, Sith Inquisitor, Sarre-ha Carmine Kallig. Side eyeing KOTOR's Carth Onasi and Canderous Ordo, too... but that's further down the line. Sort of hoping I'll find those two out in the wilds of Tumblr's SWRPC.

TL;DR I love Star Wars and everyone should play Knights of the Old Republic, The Sith Lords, and Star Wars: The Old Republic asap.

[imperial-topaz2003]

My Reworked Legacy

Been working on this for a long time, but I've finally finished my rework of my SWTOR legacy. Decided it was best to list off my characters one by one with a brief introduction

First up is Artek Sefyr, my Jedi Knight and the Protagonist™ of this legacy. Basically, he's sort of like Clone Wars Anakin, a friendly, affable, and generally noble fellow, who does struggle with his emotions and the alure of the Dark Side. Also a Theron slut.

Next is my consular, Valri Monoya, my Jedi Consular. Definitely a wise, calm, and friendly type of Jedi. Approaches many situation with a "I have no enemies" mindset. Gonna eventually romance Nadia with her

This is my Smuggler Ixosecan, chaotic good pansexual fellow, saving the galaxy and looking good while doing so. Probably gonna go with Koth, I guess?

Baduenda returns! A 'take no shit' butch republic trooper who absolutely hates the empire. Gonna eventually romance Elara.

Gigachad Sith Tyrrnith is also back! This time in a fresh paint of Sith Pureblood Red. Pragmatic Dark side fellow, and romancing Malavai.

Brast'ore'illithyr, or Torei for short. Reformist Sith Inquisitor with a trollish streak. Also romancing Lana.

Kanux Shosam, my bounty hunter. Probably not gonna be a mandalorian, but we'll see. Gonna be romancing Torian with him.

Lastly, we have our Imperial Agent, Audian Vanterius. Basically, he's pro-Empire, anti-sith. Romancing Vector. Would love to tell you guys more, but I gotta go to work because capitalism. I hope to post more about them in the future!

[rainofaugustsith]

SWTOR: The Shadow of Revan class missions

The Shadow of Revan expac and Prelude have some dialogue changes for each class. Each class gets a unique cut scene at the beginning of the expac, and there are little references here and there. Each class also gets their own unique side mission while they are on Rishi. 

After going through each mission, and many several times, I have...opinions. Here’s what I think of the SoR class story side missions. 

SPOILERS FOR THE CLASS STORIES, AS WELL AS EACH CLASS’S MISSION ON RISHI. 

Best: 

Trooper - The trooper must resolve General Garza's latest mess, which involved lifting that scary tech from Manaan and trying to make a squad of elite cyborg soldiers. The soldiers are not in a peaceful state, and the trooper is sent to put them down. Why is Garza on Rishi, how does she know about the Revanites and Manaan? We never do find out. There's no option to even try to save Eclipse Squad, and that's a heartbreak because it quickly becomes clear that they were vulnerable people who were terribly exploited.

What is extremely satisfying is that you finally get the option to call Garza out on her war crimes, and even say that you will testify against her. My trooper had wanted to tell Garza that she was a terrible person since Coruscant, so this was really nice. Exceptionally nice. I think it's the only time, Republic-side, that a character gets to give an open "fuck you" to their superiors, and in Garza's case it's very well deserved. 

Sith Warrior - Darth Vowrawn tracks down the Wrath to inform them that the Servants are tracking them all the time with stealth droids. Even better, Vowrawn has procured the Gree tech needed to take them out - which he gives to the warrior with no strings attached.

I really like this quest for two reasons. First, someone does something for the Wrath without expecting anything in return. It's implied that it took Vowrawn quite a bit of effort to procure the tech to destroy the droids, but he did it. It also gives the Wrath the chance to break, literally and figuratively, with the Emperor and his servants. 

There’s also a moment when Vowrawn asks the Wrath what they want for themselves, and I don’t think that’s a question they’re asked very often. Again, it’s someone who seems to have an interest in the Wrath’s personal well-being, or at least an interest in prompting them to think about that. 

Imperial Agent - The agent teams up with the old Keeper, now in exile, to rescue Shara Jenn and send her off to be de-programmed. This felt like such a good bit of resolution for Watcher Two. She's the agent's support for much of the class story. She's there when the agent is faced with the terrible choices posed by Darth Jadus. And she gets thrown into a coma. Rescuing her, sending her off to a life without Imperial Intelligence, helping her get deprogrammed - for once the story does right by a character and lets you actually help them. 

here’s some turnabout for Keeper here. He’s the one responsible for the Agent’s Castellan restraints, but now he’s risking his life to help another Imperial Intelligence colleague remove her mental conditioning and brainwashing. Keeper’s response to the agent also depends on the way the agent handled the end of the class story; if they chose to work with the Sith, Keeper doesn’t trust them. If they chose to keep the Black Codex and become a ghost, Keeper is far more amiable. 

Overall I felt as though this mission, even in its brevity, really helped heal a major wound from the agent’s class story, find closure for several characters, and let the agent walk away feeling better about things.  Meh:

Consular - There's nothing really objectionable overall to this quest, which sends the Consular on a mission to prepare a holocron of herself. You get to visit one of Rishi's beautiful waterfalls. It just felt like a continuation of the Consular class story and nothing more. They take and take and take from the JC for the entire story, without any regard as to how it affects her, and this is more of the same. They’ll send her all over Rishi on their errands. There's really no personal closure or growth for the Consular; just an expectation that she's going to continue to jump whenever the Council asks. This time they're literally asking the Consular to make sure they can keep using her even after she's dead. I really wish there had been an option to ask the Council "you never stop taking, do you?" 

Worst: 

Jedi Knight - I suppose how much you like Orgus influences how you feel about this quest. I don't, and my Jedi Knight was very angry to see him. He sends you off on little humanitarian missions as a way of reconnecting you with being a Jedi, but...that's never what the Jedi Knight does at any point in the story. You never really see most Jedi doing that, In fact at the beginning of the Knight's class story, if you ask to help the refugees on Tython that are being completely ignored by the Jedi Order, Orgus blows it off. Humanitarian aid? It's not the Jedi Knight's fault they weren't doing that before, Orgus.

There's also an offer to remove the Jedi Knight's trauma to "make them whole again," which, as a trauma survivor...yeah, that didn't particularly sit well. At least the Knight was able to counter that with “it’s all a part of me” instead of just accepting that. 

Bounty Hunter - Remember Crysta Markon from the Bounty Hunter story? Your tireless supporter and mentor for the Great Hunt, who honestly seemed thrilled to see you do so well? Yeah. They wrote her out unceremoniously and now you have to avenge her death by killing her murderers. Oh, and Crysta's daughter will be sketchy. The emails you get from Crysta beforehand, and her daughter after, are tear-jerkers. They're really well written.

Still, I rate this quest low because of the way it needlessly killed off a very likable character. Can you imagine what it would have been like to have Crysta in the Alliance? She might have worked well with Hylo as co-leader of the Underworld department. But no, she gets killed offscreen.

Also, I dislike this for the fact that the bounty hunter can't even express real fondness for Crysta; the closest you get is a "Crysta and I weren't friends but I guess she was okay." WTF. I felt like there should have been an option to say "yeah, I really liked Crysta a lot" and have the bounty hunter genuinely angry and upset on a personal level about her murder. 

Smuggler - The smuggler meets up with Beryl Thorne and embarks on a questionable scheme. At the end, there's a chance to tell Beryl "you know you could always walk the straight and narrow and work for the Republic!" Sure, my pirate queen smuggler who was totally exploited by corrupt senators is obviously going to say just that. While it was fun to see an old familiar face, this felt 'meh' to me because the LS/DS choices at the end seemed really heavy-handed. On the other hand, nobody killed off Beryl, so she's one of the only characters from the Smuggler's story who actually still has the potential to return at some point. 

Sith Inquisitor - So there are these ancient devices just hanging out in the middle of the Rishi jungle, and they add years of life and...yeah, I don't know either. We never hear about them again.  I liked that this quest allowed Talos to participate in one of the Inquisitor's quests for relics and ancient knowledge but it seemed kind of muddled and underdeveloped overall. 

[ayrennaranaaldmeri]

This man is the nastiest skank bitch I’ve ever met. DO NOT TRUST HIM. He is a fugly slut

[vespertine-legacy]

My swtor idiots had a very busy day!

First, @miss-spooky-eyes and I finished the Bounty Hunter class story on Indy and Coda! Coda got to have a minor existential crisis on Corellia, but I think she’s all good now. And! now the murderwives are free to do fun things together like Cause Problems On Purpose do heroics and flashpoints and uprisings, oh my!

I also healed HM Explosive Conflict on Zeke, and actually got to finish the entire thing (and I think the Kephess fight was actually the smoothest part?), which was nice.

After a break, the Panty Raid group did a run through 16-man Dread Fortress on impside with 12 people that went way faster than expected, so when we were finished, we sat around for a minute trying to decide what to do. One person had to leave, and then we decided to fling ourselves at Colossal Monolith a few times to see what happened. What happened is that the Monolith stomped us into the ground extremely hard. It actually wasn’t the worst thing, and it’s kind of a fun boss, there’s just quite a lot going on. I don’t think I blinked at all during the first pull, and @astrifer-bound pointed out to the group that they had looked up at one point to see tears streaming down my face and thought that I was crying, but no, it was just that I wasn’t blinking because I was focusing too hard to trying to keep people from dying. So on the subsequent three pulls, every time Shelly (another healer) called out “watch your feet!” to get people to move out of the danger circles, one of the lovely dps called out “november, blink!” We ended up doing four total pulls, and I think on our best one we got him down to maybe the mid-30%s, but couldn’t do enough dps to match the damage he was putting out. But I think we were getting the hang of it, and discussed giving it another go next week if we can actually fill all 16 spots instead of just having 11.

[awryen-nyx]

UGH. I wish we’d been able to off Skadge right before the game forced him into your employ.

And it takes YEARS to finally kill him. UGH.

Well, it’s a fic I have yet to post on AO3, but I took care of Skadge VERY early. Cause seroiusly. FUCK that dick bag.

[sirotras]

just... just imagine mirai there instead of skadge and it’d be perfect

[dealersdencantina]

The Rescue Hylo Conversation

I REALLY wish there’d been more push from the BH to stop Gault. And then, when he does it, I wish there’d been more, “What the hell did you expect? Kisses?” You barely get that.

Needless to say, in the parts I have yet to post on AO3, I use SOME of the dialogue from that convo, but most of it’s cut cause it was a pensive moment and Gault finally is moving on and he and Mry’da have a small moment that gets fleshed out more later.

(i am still of the opinion that they handled the whole thing between gault and hylo so wrong. i never would have forgiven him, feelings regardless. i’d have been trying to hunt him down and have a confrontation that either he makes a deal with her and pays her off and they part ways or she gets killed. the sudden “I’ll take you back!” thing just…ugh, i hated it, especially so soon after being woken up from a stasis chamber where the wounds were still fresh.)

[sunderedazem]

I think my favorite SWTOR OCs (so far, lol) are my Bounty Hunter, Astayr, and my central OC Jedi Knight, Corrain Gealai. They're both human OCs and my HC is that Astayr is just about 5 cm taller than Corrain. He's smol, she's tol, they are Frends :)

Astayr went full Mandalorian and generally just leans really hard into a lot of badass bitch tropes, except she knows that also means soft is not weak. So she's soft as well, especially on Torian and her crew, even after fuckups (Skadge excepted. Gault gets maybe a punch in the nose at worst, but Skadge would get shot). Her journey ends up making her extremely critical of people who act without a code of ethics, and extremely contemptuous of anyone who's a hypocrite - being pinned as the scapegoat for half the Republic's crimes and then being forced into working with the Sith has left her pretty anti-establishment, too. She genuinely gives a fuck about folks who can't protect themselves - in the sense that she'll help them train until they can - and while she's incredibly resistant to the idea of intentionally botching a job and betraying her employer, she'd also reject a bounty in a heartbeat if it turned out the job itself wasn't an honorable one. Live captures suit her better too, unless she knows she's turning someone over to extreme torment, or it goes against their honor.

She ends up respecting Corrain for the man he becomes (they meet in KOTET/KOTFE) and for the fact that he's willing to walk away from pretty much everything he's ever known for his ideals, but she doesn't necessarily believe in his ideals herself. She's my most lightsided character.

Corrain, on the other hand, starts out as a nervous, eager bean looking to Do Some Good in the world and live up to the expectations people have of him. He's not really fully cognizant of his own abilities at first either, mostly because he's a dork-ass perfectionist, but he's very much a Good Little Jedi while Orgus is around.

Then the trauma and disillusionment with the Republic hit him HARD. He becomes terrified of his own abilities, and absolutely turns to vengeance on the Emperor and Darth Angral because he actually blames himself but is consciously trying NOT to. (Spoilers: lying to yourself doesn't really work) But since he's up to his ears in expectations of Being the Best Jedi both from himself and other people, he masks all the Bad Feelings and starts making very Questionable decisions, and then hides all of this from his fellow Jedi, so they end up trying to help him in all the wrong ways. (Also they need him so they kinda can't just sideline him even though they really should have)

He eventually comes back from the Traumas still trying to do the right thing, except now he's cynical, very anti-authority, and is basically a little firecracker on a short fuse - high-energy, high-impact. He goes Grey in all practical senses fairly early on, it just takes him a long time to come to terms with it.

(Basically Corrain's is the classic tale of an idealistic perfectionist getting slapped REALLY hard in the face and hiding it because they still need to be perfect, while also losing faith in the government, and then having to undock themselves later)

[forceway]

Star Wars for the fandom ask!

blorbo (favorite character, character I think about the most) Definitely Cad Bane. He's such a fuck, but a charming fuck in his amoral asshole ways

scrunkly (my “baby”, character that gives me cuteness aggression, character that is So Shaped) Uuuuh, I'll say Plo-koon. He's a good creature. Maul a little, mostly I just don't know enough about him as in all the evil shit he's done and all the dumb shit he's gotten himself into. Also Shriv. Another blue man.

scrimblo bimblo (underrated/underappreciated fave) I guess from what I saw, I gotta say Jar Jar. He is actually kinda funny in Clone wars series

glup shitto (obscure fave, character that can appear in the background for 0.2 seconds and I won’t shut up about it for a week) General Grievous. He's just neat.

poor little meow meow (“problematic”/unpopular/controversial/otherwise pathetic fave) I shall be controversial indeed and say Sith warrior from Swtor. The whole story line, honestly. My sith warrior is such an idiot who has no idea what he lets out of his mouth most of the time (I blame the conversation wheel.)

horse plinko (character I would torment for fun, for whatever reason) Probably Anakin and Obi-wan. And Palpatine of course. Look, I like my stupid blue bounty hunter, but it doesn't mean I like utterly unforgivably evil or overly goody two shoe stuff. I have a strong inner anti-jedi sentiment.

eeby deeby (character I would send to superhell) Palpatine for sure, because he's ugly as sin and starts a nazzi emprire. I think everyone else deserve at least one poke too, minus Ahsoka.

[depizan]

I was thinking about the post I reblogged about the loss of the Alliance in SWTOR, and some of my other disappointments with how faction is handled in the game, and how faction based MMOs in general tend to get stuck in this kind of "eternal conflict" mode. (Not that factionless MMOs don't get stuck in their own kind of weird "eternal conflict" mode, too. Look at Guild Wars 2 and the growing list of things that have tried to destroy Tyria.)

But there are stories that lend themselves to a faction model, and SWTOR does have - or does begin with - one of those. It's just that with no prospect of whatever conflict divides the factions ever being resolved, you have a weird permanent stalemate situation, kind of. The Sith Empire will never win, because that would make Republic players unhappy. The Galactic Republic will never win, because that would make Empire players unhappy. No actual solution to the conflict can ever be found because then it would be game over. (Also, no real faction shifting because how would you code that?)

Except... maybe none of that is true. There are games that have faction shifting of a kind coded in. Think of all the minor factions in World of Warcraft, some opposed to one another, some just independent. Sure, those faction shifts are mostly achieved with some kind of grind, but it does prove that mutable factions are codeable.

This might even solve the problem of the Smuggler and the Bounty Hunter being tied to specific factions when that leads to some very odd story stuff, particularly outside of each class story. It suggests a way to handle factional grouping and third faction classes without making those factions "better" because all flashpoints are available to them.

Here is Mac's theoretical redesign of SWTOR with a different handling of factions and playing into the story focus that is the game's best quality.

Republic and Empire each get three classes, Smuggler and Bounty Hunter are Underworld (a third, neutral to the others faction). Since the galaxy is supposed to be under a peace treaty - the Treaty of Coruscant - you design the game with flexible faction tagging and lean in hard to the Cold War set up.

You have degrees of faction, just like those minor factions in WoW. I'm going to borrow the middle part of WoW's faction set up for this. Theirs runs Hated - Hostile - Unfriendly - Neutral - Friendly - Honored - Revered - Exalted. We just need the middle chunk, from Hostile to Friendly. Hostile is typical enemy mob: bar is red, it will attack you on sight. Unfriendly is an orange bar, but will not fight you unless you attack. Neutral is a yellow bar, again, will not fight you unless you attack. Friendly is typical allied mob: bar is green, etc.

Imperial players can go to Coruscant, and Republic players to Dromund Kaas, but everything is Unfriendly to them, they can't buy anything (except maybe at the spaceport?), and there are no quests available to them. Underworld players start out one tick up at Neutral and have a few merchants and quests available. Ones that it makes sense would be available to random people. (This is to balance out Underworld space starting at Neutral to Pubs and Imps.) And, obviously, Pub space starts out Friendly to Pubs and Imps space Friendly to Imps. (Though I would be slightly tempted to have Korriban be neutral to the Agent class because, as a non-Force-Sensitive you don't really belong there.)

(As you can see, we're basically using a game mechanic to underline the state of galaxy. We can also set things so that people can't go fuck things up for their fellow players by coding it so that if you just go attack people on the opposite faction capitol, you get blipped to hostile and squashed like a bug.)

Now, we write the game like there is actually a Cold War happening. This means missions for Imps and Pubs that send people into "enemy" space (not, to start with the capital or Force User planets, though) where they have to accomplish their missions without attracting the attention of the other faction. We can take advantage of instancing to allow for diplomatic incidents, like thinking "well, they can't report I'm here if they're dead," without triggering the anti-trolling splat mobs. This is also where we introduce some side quests that give people the opportunity to work on becoming to Neutral with the opposite faction.

Smugglers and Bounty Hunters are off doing Underworld stuff, with some options to take quests that benefit the Republic or the Empire. (Giving them the chance to work on becoming Friendly with one or both factions.)

All class stories get written so that there are several potential outcomes. We're going to use the Agent story as a model here, and basically set it up so that everyone has a story line that ends with them still loyal to the faction they began with, now Underworld/Unallied, or loyal to the opposite faction. This gets paired with the ability for characters to keep doing things to make the other faction like them better and you're setting up defections or the decision to go neutral with mechanics and story.

You use the Cold War setting to ramp up general tension. Have more missions like that one on Republic Hoth where you can work with some Imperials. Or the times where a Sith Warrior can use Republic soldiers to their advantage. So the whole base game has this good overlay of people wanting peace and people wanting to go back to war (on all sides!). This lets you really flesh out the factions, and the good and bad people in them. Have a more positive sort of Gray Morality going on.

As far as Flashpoints go, you re-write The Black Talon/Esseles for proper Cold War subtlety. I think we want to use the intro flashpoints to give people a better idea of the kind of proxy conflict stuff, where you might be fighting what appear to be a third party (like pirates), but you get info (of the non provable kind) that they're working for the Empire/Republic. And maybe come up with some kind of mechanic where party members can get special communications based on faction. Like, the main (everybody) cut scenes for the Esseles talk about it being pirates that are attacking them, but the Jedi/Trooper characters get a quick comm call that the pirates are probably working for the Empire and after a particular person.

For all the shared flashpoints, you tweak them so they are truly shared. One queue for everyone, we still need to work out exactly how we're getting the different factions their special flavor bits, but there's more of that here. And maybe a kind of saboteur mechanic for things like what to do with the missiles on Cademimu, so that they can still be launched at a fleet for a DS option, but it's not in-character obvious that someone did it.

We can still have some Empire and Republic specific flashpoints, which we might allow Underworld characters who are Friendly with the right faction to do. (Or maybe not if we're keeping the ones we have. They've got a bit of a secret mission vibe. Maybe we add a fun treasure hunt flashpoint for the Underworld folks.)

The end of the base game becomes the Cold War going hot because of Revan (and let's say it's not the Republic at large backing him, but a smaller group within the Republic that's okay with his plan). Now we get proper fall out from someone wanting to commit mass murder, we get a good climax, and we can shift from writing eight class stories to three-ish main stories with class and faction related flavor bits. You'd have those fighting for the Republic (ex-Empire characters could get good flavor bits about fighting their old allies and some suspicion from their new ones - a suspicion ex-Underworld characters would also get), for the Empire (again, joined members get some good flavor bits), or who are with the Underworld now.

First expansion is the war, maybe with some of what we used to have in Chapter Three going on. I'm also kind of tempted to weave in some actual foreshadowing for Zakuul here. I'm not keen on Space Voldemort or the time skip, but other parts of those expansions seem worth trying to save. But maybe we have the player characters working with Lana and Theron like in the Revan expansion, but it's about hints that there's something bad coming instead.

Next expansion, Zakuul attacks, things go super to shit, Lana, Theron, some people from Zakuul and the player character(s) form the Alliance. Oooh, wait, lets go ahead and keep the Vitiate/Valkorian thing, and have killing the Emperor be the end of the first expansion (because he wants to eat the galaxy - he's gone mad, but the Empire as a whole won't acknowlege it and are following him off a cliff, the Republic isn't seeing him and the Empire as separate, even evil characters live in the galaxy, etc). Now, Zakuul invades because when you kill Vitiate, Valkorian keels over. Whoops.

(Zakuul is the backup plan. If he can't destroy the galaxy as Vitiate, here comes the uber-Empire! You just managed to off him, but the uber-Empire gets fired at the known galaxy anyway.)

Now we have one story going, with different flavors depending on the characters relation to the three old factions. Kind of like we do in the existing game. And we avoid bumping the player character up to a ridiculous level of authority by making them part of the leadership of the Alliance instead of the leader. Keep them more in line with the base game power level.

Not quite sure where we go from here, but basically you have this kind of flowing faction thing going through the game that meshes well with the story.

I don't know. Mostly I wanted to work out how you could do something more interesting with faction.

[lesbiannova]

Thoughts on the following SWTOR characters: Sgt. Jaxo, Aric Jorgan, M1-4X, Syreena, Beryl Thorne, Zenith, Yuun, Bowdaar, Guss Tano, Gault, Blizz, and Jonas Balkar?

Sorry for the late reply. I’ve been busy lately, and it took me time to carefully consider my opinions on fictional characters.

Jaxo: Jaxo is one of those characters that reminds me of why I prefer playing as women in video games in general if given the choice, for reasons beyond just me being a woman myself. When you’re playing as a female Trooper, not only you could have those little moments of bonding with Jaxo, Jaxo is also shown to have other women friends herself. Those moments make the decision to save her or the POWs after Belsavis difficult.

Aric: Both as a character and companion, he is a great addition to the Trooper story. I like that he remains loyal to the Republic and knows that the Empire is still evil despite being scapegoated for Tavus’ treason, and that he disapproves of you following Garza’s most morally questionable orders.

M1-4X: I like his enthusiasm in his support of the Republic and opposition to the Empire. I enjoy hearing his stories of fighting the Empire throughout his companion conversation arc.

Syreena: I always feel sorry for her because of how she gets manipulated by Skavak. All the women who are used by Skavak deserve better. I despise Skavak even as a villain (since he is not remotely interesting even as a character) and I hate how the narrative frames his “girlfriends“ as stupid and gullible.

Beryl: She is definitely one of those NPCs I wish my women OCs could flirt with. I like her for being a Smuggler with a strong moral code, who values more things than just profit, and is trying to help the people on Taris.

Zenith: I like him as a character and I find him an excellent foil for a LS Consular. Of all the 8 class story arcs on Balmorra, the Consular one is my favouriteand Zenith is one of the reasons I like it. Personally I have no interest in romancing him even if he is an option, but I can definitely see that he would be more comptible with a DS Consular (who is still anti-Empire).

Yuun: His personality is very likeable and the concept of a Gand Findsman companion is interesting, though unfortunately like most of the other companions who join the player characters last in the class stories, Yuun also suffers from lack of character content in general.

Bowdaar: He’s clearly meant to be the Chewbacca of SWTOR, though I find him a good addition to the Smuggler story. It’s hard for me to play a Smuggler who doesn’t befriend Bowdaar.

Guss: I like him. He might be a slippery, lying conman, but he’s not much worse person than the Smuggler. He doesn’t fit in the Jedi Order, but he is no fan of the Sith either, and he outright refuses to become a Sith.

Gault: I don’t mind him as a character, and I can see that if he is romanceable, he would be a better option for Dark Side Bounty Hunters, but I definitely wish his recruitment plotline in vanilla could have done better. Even when playing as a light side BH, and I don’t think my BH would kill him even if the option exists, it still feels railroading because he was supposed to be one of your targets. Also, I prefer Risha taking Gault’s role in KotFE’s Chapter 13, since it’s a missed opportunity that we never see Risha and Vette reunite and team up in the game.

Blizz: A good bean and absolutely adorable. I like his optimistic and curious personality. There’s hardly anything bad you can say about him. It’s hard for me to play a Bounty Hunter who is rude to him.

Jonas: I don’t ship him with my Trooper, though I like that he is competent and a good ally to the Trooper. I also like his interactions with an Imperial saboteur in Jedi Under Siege and Onslaught.

[rainofaugustsith]

There is one companion standing between me and the achievement for getting 1000 kills with each Imperial companion.  I’m trying to decide just how much I want it, or it it’s worth suffering through 1000 kills with Skadge in tow. There are a few other companions I don’t care for and I put heavy armor on them and pretended they were random troops to get through the achievement, and I can’t even do that with Skadge. I’m completely ignoring him on my ship this time and not even doing the conversations.  I’m not getting BH to 100% ever because I will never allow Skadge into the Alliance, and the same is true for the Agent, Inquisitor and Knight because there are KOTFE achievements I just don’t want to do for them.  I’m also never going to get the Republic side to the 1000 kills for all achievement because there’s one companion I never take out ever, and I rejected him when he came back anyway.  Imperial side, though, it seems sucky to let Skadge ruin the achievement.