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extrapenguinAnd thus, the journey ends: both for the Bounty Hunter storyline and all the class storylines. I have now completed them all. This is not the end of my SWTOR posting, however – I think I'll make both a "quickstart guide" for getting started (nonspoilery pitches for the class stories, brief overview of combat styles, some quick tips on combat) and an actual spoilery story ranking/comparison, for one, and since I'm doing the MMO stuff and progression raiding, expect continued investment in SWTOR and its storylines.
Anyway! On to the actual topic of this post. And the screencap album.
Chapter 3's premise is that Jun Seros, the Jedi Master you pissed off by killing the Jedi at the end of ch1, spread false accusations to make you Public Enemy #1. In swoops Darth Tormen, a pretty generic ruthless evil Sith Lord who hires you to hunt down two of Jun Seros's biggest allies/backers/subordinates (I didn't really care tbh), Jun Seros himself, and Supreme Chancellor Janarus.
Belsavis has lackey #1, a smuggler dude who helped somehow during the previous war. After him giving us a bit of a runaround, we found him in the Tomb, trying to stop Imps from freeing captive imperial troops. Belsavis was pretty, as always, but the story here was a bit eh. This is also where the last companion joined in. Skadge is ... I fully understand why he is the certified least favorite companion in the entire game and I agree wholeheartedly.
Getting briefed on the situation.
Voss has lackey #2. There's some minor diplomacy here, as lackey #2 is a diplomat. Hunting her down involves a nice little bonding session with a Gormak warlord, who's pleased we don't fight with "magics" (the Force??) like the Voss. Then we go kill the lackey and her idea of the Voss and Gormak making peace. (Zahadd Dume cares not for politics, only for payday. And she thought witnesses might be a bad idea.)
Then there's Corellia, which involves capturing local resistance figures so that the Empire can force them to sign the treaty. (Corellia's bigwigs signed Corellia over to the Empire despite popular resistance.) This lures out Jun Seros, who sends people to kill Tormen while he fights us. Of course, this doesn't go well for either of his teams, as he and his people end up dead. From his personal effects we get access codes to the Supreme Chancellor's ship. He also moralized a bit about our entire lifestyle, and the fact we killed people who had no spare options, but given that the thing he's critiquing is the roleplaying choice of playing a bounty hunter in the first place: ehhh.
Threatening one of the aforementioned resistance figures.
Supreme Chancellor Janarus's ship is a nice little quest involving destroying the shuttle bay and sabotaging the escape pods so he can't run. Then we fight our way to him and he wants a chat. Turns out he's released the real details of what happened, including all of Jun Seros's fabrications, as a gesture of good faith, and would like us to reconsider our life choices a bit. This is the final moral choice – kill Janarus, capture Janarus alive, or agree to his suggestion of killing Tormen instead. Zahadd, of course, was full on "just business" and has a reputation to maintain, so she delivered Janarus to Tormen in carbonite. This is probably the worst ending for Janarus.
Now, reading that, you might've thought "But how does hunting more bounties and killing Jun Seros make the accusations go away?" And you're right. It doesn't. Chapter 3 only works plotwise if you're out for vengeance. Janarus tosses everything into the public domain when we confront him, but there's no prior indication this would happen, and even once it's in the public domain ... the original impressions would still be there for people. The general public doesn't give a fuck about retractions. So while working for the Empire is much more organic than the Smuggler working for the Republic, it's still complete bullshit. And even if the Supreme Chancellor was somewhat implicated, killing/capturing him would only make your case worse. So Ch3 only works if you're a darksider out for vengeance who decides to kill Darth Tormen instead at the end. I still think it's better than Smuggler, but I'll have to digest how it compares to the generic zzfest of Knight.
The final companion, Skadge, I mentioned above a bit. He is ... well. The most sexist pig ever. Also the one guy who threatens sexual violence to a female NPC, IIRC. And then he keeps getting worse from there. He's the vile, dumb brute, a caricature of the type of guy you might imagine working as an enforcer for organized crime. He also threatens his way onto your ship, and for fucks's sake, we should've been allowed to shoot him there and then. 0/10 do not appreciate.
If only I could've left him on Belsavis.
Zahadd Dume & crew, off into the horizon.
Anyway! On to the actual topic of this post. And the screencap album.
Chapter 3's premise is that Jun Seros, the Jedi Master you pissed off by killing the Jedi at the end of ch1, spread false accusations to make you Public Enemy #1. In swoops Darth Tormen, a pretty generic ruthless evil Sith Lord who hires you to hunt down two of Jun Seros's biggest allies/backers/subordinates (I didn't really care tbh), Jun Seros himself, and Supreme Chancellor Janarus.
Belsavis has lackey #1, a smuggler dude who helped somehow during the previous war. After him giving us a bit of a runaround, we found him in the Tomb, trying to stop Imps from freeing captive imperial troops. Belsavis was pretty, as always, but the story here was a bit eh. This is also where the last companion joined in. Skadge is ... I fully understand why he is the certified least favorite companion in the entire game and I agree wholeheartedly.
Getting briefed on the situation.
Voss has lackey #2. There's some minor diplomacy here, as lackey #2 is a diplomat. Hunting her down involves a nice little bonding session with a Gormak warlord, who's pleased we don't fight with "magics" (the Force??) like the Voss. Then we go kill the lackey and her idea of the Voss and Gormak making peace. (Zahadd Dume cares not for politics, only for payday. And she thought witnesses might be a bad idea.)
Then there's Corellia, which involves capturing local resistance figures so that the Empire can force them to sign the treaty. (Corellia's bigwigs signed Corellia over to the Empire despite popular resistance.) This lures out Jun Seros, who sends people to kill Tormen while he fights us. Of course, this doesn't go well for either of his teams, as he and his people end up dead. From his personal effects we get access codes to the Supreme Chancellor's ship. He also moralized a bit about our entire lifestyle, and the fact we killed people who had no spare options, but given that the thing he's critiquing is the roleplaying choice of playing a bounty hunter in the first place: ehhh.
Threatening one of the aforementioned resistance figures.
Supreme Chancellor Janarus's ship is a nice little quest involving destroying the shuttle bay and sabotaging the escape pods so he can't run. Then we fight our way to him and he wants a chat. Turns out he's released the real details of what happened, including all of Jun Seros's fabrications, as a gesture of good faith, and would like us to reconsider our life choices a bit. This is the final moral choice – kill Janarus, capture Janarus alive, or agree to his suggestion of killing Tormen instead. Zahadd, of course, was full on "just business" and has a reputation to maintain, so she delivered Janarus to Tormen in carbonite. This is probably the worst ending for Janarus.
Now, reading that, you might've thought "But how does hunting more bounties and killing Jun Seros make the accusations go away?" And you're right. It doesn't. Chapter 3 only works plotwise if you're out for vengeance. Janarus tosses everything into the public domain when we confront him, but there's no prior indication this would happen, and even once it's in the public domain ... the original impressions would still be there for people. The general public doesn't give a fuck about retractions. So while working for the Empire is much more organic than the Smuggler working for the Republic, it's still complete bullshit. And even if the Supreme Chancellor was somewhat implicated, killing/capturing him would only make your case worse. So Ch3 only works if you're a darksider out for vengeance who decides to kill Darth Tormen instead at the end. I still think it's better than Smuggler, but I'll have to digest how it compares to the generic zzfest of Knight.
The final companion, Skadge, I mentioned above a bit. He is ... well. The most sexist pig ever. Also the one guy who threatens sexual violence to a female NPC, IIRC. And then he keeps getting worse from there. He's the vile, dumb brute, a caricature of the type of guy you might imagine working as an enforcer for organized crime. He also threatens his way onto your ship, and for fucks's sake, we should've been allowed to shoot him there and then. 0/10 do not appreciate.
If only I could've left him on Belsavis.
Zahadd Dume & crew, off into the horizon.