#kite: trying so so hard but everything's a habit so the big things? easy 'cause he's got to think about them but there's just

[fooltofancy]

the problem with bg3 that isn't actually a problem with bg3 but more a problem with me is that i just want a party of my own stupid little guys so that i can smush them together like dolls. u know.

[synoxshots]

The Master KOTET Adventure

Well at last, my journey is complete. This was some of the most frustrating, and at times hilariously so, content I’ve ever done - but at the same time there were some parts that felt really rewarding and, dare I say it, even enjoyable. 

So as with my Master KOTFE adventure, I’ve written it all up in case you should ever find yourself wanting a go. As with before, I play a Rage Jugg, 306 gear, Descent of the Fearless set, fully augmented but not min-maxed. Here’s how it went, and warning, it gets long:

Chapter I

I was hopeful about this chapter as it's the only one I'd completed on veteran,  and I was already much more prepared. On master though, it still caused me problems. The first death was an unexpected attack from a Knight that dealt like 140,000 damage, which, ouch... The first boss was the main cause of difficulty in this chapter for me, which was the PA-717 droid. The best tactic was basically just stay as close as possible to it, stay out of its blue conal and hope you don't get shoved into mines, and just hit it as hard as you can. Took a few attempts and the successful one was itself a close call, with Lana dying with probably around 15% health left (didn't get to check exactly because, you know, fighting for my life). After that there's quite a few mobs already engaged in battles with Mandos, I just ran through them, also ignored the bonus objectives which I don't think made any difference.

You have a cutscene where you catch up with Theron and then face swarms of Skytroopers in a building. It is probably beneficial to have range here as there are kolto stations which I didn't manage to use a lot because I was always chasing after the droids. It does give you a checkpoint before the Knights come along, and even if you die then the battle carries on around you (and I had to file a bug report as my heroic moment wasn't working properly, so actually kind of cheesed the boss a bit by letting others deal with it ha). Once revived though, it wasn't so bad.

The walker is everyone's nightmare in this chapter. I follow this guide every time now and it does save a lot of hassle. The final walker fight actually went the best it's ever gone for me, I found the mobs a lot harder than the Big Droid at the end which didn't really touch me that much. No real difficulties after that.

Chapter II

This is the one I'd been fearing from the start, as it's regarded as one of the most difficult things to do in the game solo. I remember trying it on vet mode with my PT and not even being able to get past the jungle creatures, i.e. the very first mob. The only slice of hope was that I've heard the difference between vet mode and master mode isn't massive, but. It was still horrible. Died once on the jungle creatures but it wasn't a big problem really, and that was a fight that didn't reset progress so I got it on the second attempt. Not easy, but manageable. The first big challenge is the Genoharadan Scout camp, and honestly several attempts with a few different tactics didn't seem to get me anywhere (though on one I did get reasonably close) - so I called in a friend and we got through it quickly. No problems from then onwards until we got to the last boss, the Genoharadan Leader plus two hunters. And that was a Time.

As 2 dps with 2 healing companions, we went for targeting the hunters first, and generally we managed to get both of them down, but our companions would either be dead or very close to it. I'm not great at micromanaging companions anyway, and that was something that was definitely needed with Acina to pull her out of the fire and on the ground and all that. So we called in a tank to join us, and we made progress but still struggled. We did discover that with the people you call in, if they die it's alright to go to the med centre and then run back to the room and rejoin the fight without it resetting - but for the phase owner if they die, they can't leave the room (leaving the room will exit the battle, and on this fight it does reset progress). So we decided the best course of action was to get a Real Person Healer to join us rather than Acina, who will stand in everything. Funnily enough, having an actual person proved much more effective and we got it first time! It's a very chaotic fight overall, you get chucked around a lot, there's lots of ridiculously high damage abilities, lots of things to stand in and die, and so on. I definitely wouldn't recommend going alone. Acina will stay with you, doesn't seem to matter what the group size is - she stayed with us when we had a group of four - her influence level is also at the start of the chapter though I raised it to 50 (she's another who likes delicacy gifts which is always good). It was brutal, but it's done.

Chapter III

A nice breather, no deaths at all. I even managed the mouse droid on the first attempt! Stealth squads of troopers bring health down a bit but nothing to worry about, was always in control. Vaylin fight doesn't matter so much as it cuts out early. No real boss fight.

Chapter IV

This one caused me more problems than I thought it would, as though there's no real boss fight there is a swarm near the end and after many attempts on my own, trying to raise Vette's influence further to see if it would help (it did, but not enough), I had to call in a friend. Still took a few attempts with the two of us. Initially we went for having both comps on heals, then we found it was better to have one healing and one dps to nuke it a bit, and eventually we got through it - though I only had 6% health left. It was another of those fights where it resets completely on dying, though your friend can go to medcenter and jump back into the fight. Jugg just wasn't the ideal class for that one I think. After that there were no problems, beforehand it was just the odd Compactor Droid causing me issues, though as long as I used my defensives efficiently it was fine as they lose health quickly too.

Chapter V

This one wasn't too bad. Quite a lot of waves of droid mobs again, they do take your health down quite a bit, but by this stage I'm used to that! It's just a chapter where staying out of red things is key really. When you face the giant droid you don't get hit too much, just watch out when it's the time the repair droids come along because being caught in the big attacks will hurt. The droid does lose health at a good pace though. When you go in the droid it's a pretty simple fight, just have to make sure you regen your health regularly (one time I did not and guess what happened?).

I didn't die on the fight against ARIES. From what I'd read, the key seemed to be staying out of melee range...not ideal for a Jugg. So I decided on keeping mobile and utilising my attacks that did have a bit of range as much as possible. (ARIES also tells you to stand still if you want to die, a good reminder if you still needed one!). It was a bit grindy but my health was never really a concern, I ran around a lot and stayed out of the red and all was well.

Chapter VI

So this one was another Experience. Half of it is a puzzle which is a nice change of pace, and no different from story. I would recommend at this stage doing the Bergola bonus mission - I'd never actually done it before, but it does mean you don't need to fight the extra pups when the beast pit starts, and instead have them on your side. Which is definitely a help of sorts, but that fight in the beast pit is definitely something. The best tactic seemed to be getting as many stuns in as possible, as he can be stunned and interrupted - I put Theron onto damage as well to use his stun, used heroic moments for the extra stuns as well. The beast casts a big circle around itself that takes out nearly all of your health, and he has a habit of hitting you as soon as you get out of it and killing you as well, in short it wasn't fun on melee and involved lots of screaming and running away. The other thing is kite him away from Indo Zal, just take him the opposite direction to keep him alive.

And then the very interesting thing. Because it was Hell I invited a friend to come along. HOWEVER, they were stuck in the Zakuulan Knight armour that you wear at the start of the chapter and couldn't do any abilities apart from a bit of companion micromanagement and a lot of emotional support. They also put their companion onto attack for the extra stun, then heal later in the chapter to try and throw some heals at me during the Arcann fight.

That Arcann fight...I chose the light side options in chapter II so I had him on my side, but that didn't make the chapter easier. You're not able to heal Arcann so I just tried to taunt things off him if his health was getting low. I focused on the Captain and tried to ignore the adds as much as possible, used Arcann's reflect to take them out, starting the fight with his taunt and then praying I hit the guard break in time so I could do damage...I had Theron on damage here as well as the plan was basically burn as quickly as possible. It may be better on a character that has some ability to heal Arcann as companions won't...or it may be better to take the dark side option earlier in the story so you're fighting against him rather than with him (though that's a trade-off with the final chapter fights).

This chapter was certainly a trial but we got there in the end. It's best to keep a level head and not panic, skills that I did not pick up from my class trainer and instead ran around in fear and at times forgot how to swtor.

Chapter VII

This is an interesting chapter without masses of fighting, there's 3 boss fights but not masses of trash in-between. First up is the Horizon Guard, which took three or four attempts but really the best strategy for me was nuke him with a heroic moment, stuns, and interrupts. The main challenge I had on this chapter was the two Twisted Experiments. They cast corrosive goo, which you see as a green circle. It can be interrupted, they can be stunned, so it was just a matter of managing that. It was difficult with the two of them there - with a Jugg I used intimidating roar to give me some time to blast just one, it may help to use a stealth class that can stun better, or a sorc/sage that can whirlwind. The good thing is that it was finally a fight in KotET that doesn't reset your progress, so if you take one down you don't have to restart the whole thing. It does bug when you die though - you end up behind a locked door and have to leave and re-enter the phase. That was only the case on the first death though. Or else I would have done it a lot.

Last up is the Corrupted Vault Guardian. Didn't die on this fight, though I did on the two elites before - mostly because I lost Lana early and couldn't use a heroic moment. I ran around the room, stunning/slowing and interrupting as I could, nearly got through without dying anyway and again it's not a fight that resets. The Guardian boss covers the floor in red stuff called morass, it doesn't go away, so manoeuvre him well or blast him fast. Or don't, like me. I just kind of kited him round the room, he doesn't move fast. Lost Lana at the end because she couldn't avoid the morass but I could, and by then he was nearly dead. Because I didn't die on this I didn't really read up on the mechanics, because on reading my go-to guide it looks like there's more - so er, that's probably a good thing to do if you have trouble! Overall though, this was a chapter with challenges but I found it had a better balance between being challenging and enjoyable.

Chapter VIII

One of the easiest chapters of the bunch. There's lots of trash, and quite a bit of it skippable - either as it is already in combat, or my manoeuvring around it. The walker is a pain but was never at risk of dying. Some interesting bits though. You face a guy called Tyrall Jerikko where the Gravestone is dry-docked, he has two droids with him so I yeeted one off - it disappeared but didn't die, I got through the fight...Tyrall and the droids then respawned so I had to do it again. Hmm. I still yeeted the droid again though, it also didn't die but the fight mostly worked properly at least, I lost Lana (not sure why) but I was never in much danger. The other minor issue I had was in the fight with the Knight just before rescuing Vette, not entirely sure what happened, the adds just seemed to overwhelm me. Used a heroic moment and the cannon you're given on my second go and it took a matter of seconds.

Vaylin is actually an easy fight, though it took 3 attempts - the first I didn't plan for her adds properly, the second I was yeeted. Having Arcann with me meant I got his abilities from chapter 6 again - the taunt and reflect - which took the adds out. Heroic moment also does the trick, though I didn't have it on my successful run. Stay at melee range - in her purple circle she keeps close and you're fine. If you're wiser than me, look for when she's about to do the explosion with the knockback and get yourself against a wall so you don't get thrown off. Or be like me, and don't.

Chapter IX

So the final chapter. It's in two halves basically - with the first there's no boss, buy there is a lot of trash. I had Arcann and Senya has my companions, which meant I had Arcann's abilities again which are brilliant for dealing with trash, and I was getting better at managing them as well. Use his taunt and reflect, it speeds things up. There's two major waves that end with two Knights coming along and it was on those where I had the trouble - it just got a bit too much at the end and with things on cooldown. But the fights don't reset, I put heroic moment on just in case, the Knights were blasted in seconds. It may be more tricky if you have Lana and Theron, but I think these are fights more of annoyance rather than being impossible.

The second half, then. First you fight Vaylin, it's the same mechanics from the previous chapter and not too difficult to deal with. I had Dramath with me so I had the healing, it may be a bit more difficult if you take the light sided decision in chapter 7. He's auto-boosted up to level 45. Again, watch out for the knockbacks.

If you saved Arcann, he's your companion in the final fight. After a quick death I ran to fleet and gave him a compendium so he went up to level 50 influence. Fighting Valkorion is very challenging, and involves lots of running around to get out of line of sight of his attacks - things like Project and Force Storm that will take two thirds or so of your health and leave you desperate to find a memory of healing, at which point you'll inevitably get slowed down by his Dark Ritual and not make it and die (this can be interrupted, but I was rarely within range to do so because...kiting).

The basic idea on this one is when he shifts to the light/dark, you follow suit - it seems to be random as to which one he goes to. When you're shifting make sure you hide behind rocks or something (under the stairs is the best bet I found) - so none of those nasty abilities wipe chunks of your health again. It became a bit of a game of hide and seek from there. The light side abilities seem to have faster cast times than the dark, where often he'd get me with a dark ritual whilst I was trying to hit him. You need to survive one of these phases, switch back to normal, use the holocron ability again, and on the second light/dark phase is when he dies. This took many attempts, though it doesn't seem to affect your repair bills too badly which is a plus.

Some final notes:

Going Commando once again proved a valuable resource, with plenty of tips and general experiences of doing it. My experience didn't always match up to theirs, in part due to the classes we used, but there's a wealth of information there.

I think experiences will vary depending on your choice with Arcann in the first chapter. He was a pain to use in chapter 6, but his abilities were very useful in chapters 8 and 9.

On average I'd say it's more difficult than KotFE - the hardest chapters are very hard, and I brought a friend along three times (well, two and a half, given the chapter 6 experience) because I was just not making progress - whereas I only had help once in KotFE.

As with KotFE, different classes are probably better suited to different chapters, and if you’re just seeking the achievement and have the options available - you might want to try different things accordingly. I think Jugg/Guardian is a decent all-round bet though, plus I made myself a Grit Teeth which gives me even more survivability. 

I think this has made me a better player! That may be up for debate, and I’m still prone to wild panic a lot of the time, but there were also lots of times I really found myself better at studying mechanics and finding the best strategies for me to beat them. 

Completing a master chapter completes the achievement for veteran (and story) as well, so it’s a great way to rack up cheevos - and now my KotET completion is at 100% which is incredibly satisfying. But it doesn’t grant a title, sadly.

Another shoutout to @sparkles-and-rust​ as my go to when I needed a helping hand or just some emotional support!