I generally use escape when the précis of the line and line as voiced don't match up. For example, choosing something that sounds like it should be in a sarcastic or joking tone from the dialogue wheel, and it turns out it's said in all seriousness/anger and therefore not what I was expecting. (Usually accompanied by me squawking "But my character wouldn't say that!") So not really min-maxing to get the best result, more like streamlining my character's responses so they FIT the character as I imagined them. (And this does, indeed, sometimes result in my character losing large amounts of affection with certain companions.)

http://www.swtor.com/user/ce/5zy01

Cytharat, that's the Sith lord whose name escaped you. And Lemda Avesta, the bisexual female LI from the Republic side of RotHC, whom you completely forgot. As another poster also replying to you said, we're hopeful that these won't be the only ones forever. (I'm not hopeful that any of the existing companions will be opened up to SGRs, but they do have an opportunity to introduce new companions who are.)

At the moment, we don't actually have evidence either way about Lana and Theron - they might both be genuine bisexual NPCs. I mean, there has already been an exclusively gay character in the game - Cytharat. I don't think you could flirt with him if you were female. (Lemda was like Theron and Lana, no evidence that she's bisexual beyond her responding to PCs of both genders, but she may well have been. Given that she appeared in the same expansion as Cytharat, I'm inclined to think that the writers intended her to be bisexual.) Anyway, here's a question - how do you establish an NPC is bisexual (rather than herosexual) without hitting players over the head with compulsory a "I had same sex and other sex lovers in the past" dialogue carried exposition to definitely mark them as such? If it were me, maybe a mention of past lovers of both genders in a codex entry, but even that's pretty anvilicious. Really? Ugh. (None of my characters have declined flirting with her.)

I do like Darth Marr...

But didn't you know? Herosexual is the lazy path! One frustrating thing about the romances on Makeb was the sheer lack of content. Both Cytharat and Lemda Avesta had very few lines, and although Cytharat sends you a message (via Katha Niar) after he's had to be sent away for medical attention, Lemda doesn't even bother sending you a personal note - she lets her Uncle do that. Theron and Lana (both what we could call "herosexual") had more content, but now we come to the single most annoying thing of all... All of these romances are, to a certain extent, segregated by faction. Gay female Imp on Makeb? SOL. Gay male Rep on Makeb? SOL. Gay female Rep in SoR? Shorted on content. Gay male Imp in SoR? Shorted on content. They had better NOT do that again. If we're having faction segregated romances, there better be LIs for both genders on both factions.

That thought makes me giggle too. Though, I'd really only want to do it Because that'd be extra giggle-worthy imho.

Elara Dorne with my fem!Trooper, and Nadia Grell with my fem!Consular. Kira with my fem!Knight. I think people see where I'm going with this.

I haven't read the novel they're talking about, yet, but I did read Lords of the Sith... The imperial characters didn't seem to have a problem with Delian Mors, except for one unlikeable fellow who didn't like her because she was (paraphrasing here) "hedonistic, lazy, and soft" (and because he was ambitious and wanted her job). When we actually get to see her point of view, we get a much more nuanced look. She's probably my favourite of the minor characters in that book. So, despite the implications of the article, I don't think the Imps have a problem with non-heterosexual sexualities. I guess I'll have to read Aftermath and find out if I'm right here.

Recently I've found myself able to play male characters, something I hadn't been able to do for many years... So I have a couple... One for each faction, the Sith Marauder is currently in the middle of Cytharat's romance, while the Republic guy has finished Yavin, but has yet to move on to Ziost with Theron. (So yes, Cytharat is a male only romance.) I was disappointed by how things ended with Lemda. You get a kiss in one of the very last interactions, and... you can complement her when speaking with the Chancellor? And her reaction is "Fine, you win. Here's my holofrequency, call it often". Then you get mail from her uncle... Who basically implies that Lemda misses you, without actually writing the words? And you never hear from her again. It's... ugh. Like it's missing half the story, half the context. It's awkwardly done. Which is why I'd like to see her make a reappearance in the game somehow.

I would definitely not object to either Cytharat or Lemda Avesta returning, and having their romances expanded to match others in the game. Both interesting characters who were not given enough time in the game. I sort of felt I only got half the story with Lemda... Though I haven't finished the Cytharat romance enough to comment on his. (Only problem is, all of my ladies then went on to romance Lana... *sigh*)

I think that, regardless of the romance situation, Theron probably thinks the PC is the most important out of the three of them (Theron, Lana, PC), and did what he did to protect the PC. But I don't know... Just how antagonistic can the relationship with Theron get? I haven't really set out to antagonise either of them deliberately, so... *shrugs*

I think she's supposed to be a powertech bounty hunter - she's got the armour and some of the moves. But I'm curious about this... what makes a character a tank? What is it about Kaliyo that makes you think she's not one? ETA: Isn't Vector melee dps? I'm pretty sure SCORPIO is the Agent's melee tank.

He does this regardless of whether or not you've been flirting with him or not. (The looking back at you thing.) But, I have to say, though, having taken a Theronmancer to the end now (finally!)... It takes on a slightly different shade. His actions are identical, but the romance gives it another level. I'm pretty sure we're supposed to assume he threw the shield down behind him because he was about to do something... which he doesn't get to do because the Emperor grabs him.

Having played a sniper, trust me... she's definitely a tank. Not a great tank, but a tank. I used her up until I spent the 300k to buy Treek. Treek >>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>> every other companion at this point.

Ashara allowing herself to be romanced by a Dark V Inquisitor is the definition of playersexual in action. 1) If you take her with you as a Dark SI, and make dark choices in front of her - her affection goes down. 2) Low affection means that the romance won't be triggered, because her conversations won't be triggered And then there's the part where the player can make her like them... 3) So you buy her gifts which raise her affection, and leave her on the ship so she doesn't witness the vast majority of the conversations. Which results in... 4) Profit! She ignores your DS tendencies, even if you're full Dark V and visually darkside corrupted, and gets into a relationship with you. Who did that? Not Ashara. The player did that.

The romances in this game are already in your cop out territory. Do you think it's really realistic that Ashara "I'm still a Jedi!" Zavros would stay with a Dark V Sith Inquisitor, let alone romance him? Well, she stays, and she's a LI and she will romance somemale who gets her affection high enough. Cop. Out. Because the pool is going to be too small, there will not be enough of them to do it properly... And we'll end up with some people's PCs ending up SOL. So either you're going to have to be content with some of the NPCs being bisexual (which people will call playersexual just because people seem to have problems acknowledging bisexuals as even existing), or you're going to have to find some soothing words for those of us who are annoyed/angered when we found ourselves SOL. Again.

It's not a cop out, at least not for this game it wouldn't be. It's a very real solution to limited resources. It'd sure be nice if every single LI-able NPC had their own sexualities and sexual histories that come up in conversation sometimes - but they just don't have the 0s and 1s and $ to do it justice... Especially not with two factions and two alignments which have to be taken into account in romances as well. Also, bear in mind that "defined sexualities" would limit the number of gay/lesbian/bisexual NPCs. We've got (stab in the dark for KotFE) like 6 companions available to us - they'd probably make at least one male and one female available for SGR in KotFE, and faction doesn't seem to be a big factor for this expansion, but then you're facing alignment... Would they be LS or DS? Would one be one and the other be the other? Would LS females be SOL? LS male? DS female? DS male? Because some of those combinations would be left out (unless they decided to make both SGLIs at least alignment neutral - which they won't because Lana got announced as a companion, and assuming she continues as a bisexual LI, she's DS). This has happened already in the game. Imperial males got one male love interest in RotHC, and Republic females got one female love interest in RotHC. If you were an Imperial female or Republic male? Too bad, you were SOL. Also to a certain extent in SoR with Lana's romance cutting off abruptly for Republic PCs, and Theron's cutting off for Imperials. Giving us a shared pool of companions goes some way to address the Imperial/Republic divide, but it doesn't address LS/DS issues... Unless they gave us at least two SGLI options per gender, and do we honestly think that's likely to happen when all evidence to this point suggests that they won't? I can't remember who mentioned her, but Lemda Avesta is not a good example of a bisexual love interest. The only reason people say she's bisexual is because Cytharat on the Imperial side is gay (in that his flirts only come up for male PCs), neither of them have any indications of their sexualities outside of who their flirts are available to. She's also emotionally removed, distracted, and never really seems to warm up to the PC. She doesn't even send you a follow up mail, leaving it up to her uncle to convey her "I'm busy" message that we're supposed to interpret as "I miss you". In short, there's a whole lot of context missing from that romance arc. All that said, I really do like her and hope she comes back in some form - my female scoundrel would definitely appreciate that, especially if the attraction between them could be explored... I'd like some indication that my character's affections are returned. Hmm... maybe I should write some fan fiction... That may well be the only way I'll get any satisfaction...

As of last night, my uber-LS gay Sith Marauder forgave Quinn. It's just sad that he's not able to romance the guy. Put me in the Quinn likers club? I think he did the best he could in a poor situation - he probably thought he was dead either way, and thought that Baras, being older and more experienced, probably gave him the higher probability of surviving.

FYI, various incarnations of this thread have existed since before launch in 2011. This discussion is still going on because we still have no same-gender romance-able companions. Makeb has two temporary LIs, one for Republic (a bisexual female, Dr Lemda Avesta) and one for Empire (a gay male, Cytharat). SoR has two temporary LIs, one from the Republic and one from the Empire. One, Lana, has been announced as a companion for KotFE, but who knows if we'll be able to continue a romance with her (particularly if you're LS Republic). We have seen no signs of Theron returning in KotFE as yet, though I'm putting money that he'll return in some form or another, though again, who knows if we'll be able to continue a romance with him either. Bioware has been very hamfisted in the way they have handled same gender flirtations/romances in this game. There're no options, still... after 3, almost 4 years basically - despite promises they've made along the way. That is why this thread is still going.

Do remember that what we've seen is Chapter 3. There should be some kind of explanation in Chapters 1 and 2.

Re: Gender Disparity This is the single biggest reason why "individual sexualities" wouldn't work in this game (as it is right now). Not unless they vastly improved the number of female companions. Because either some classes wouldn't get an F/F option at all, or almost all the female companions would be bisexual. (If it were the latter, I probably wouldn't mind, as the majority of my characters are lesbians... though it would be a problem when it came to my favourite classes because the two LIs I'm not that interested in (Akaavi and Kaliyo) would likely be the bisexual ladies on the crew - because we can't deny men the chance to boink them, of course, so we won't make them gay - I'd much prefer Risha and Temple.) Oddly enough, Agents get three female companions, though one is a droid. It means the crew is majority female, the only such crew in the game. I am not sure what this says. Sure, you can headcanon your character as gay all you like, but that's all it is. There's nothing anywhere ever to indicate that your character is gay before level 50 (if you're male and Imperial, or female and Republic, otherwise you gotta wait til 55+). Because the NPCs never initiate flirts, you can't even say "sorry, you're not my type" to anyone. It means nothing. It is not representation when the player themself has to imagine their character is gay because the game doesn't let you express that in any way shape or form before a certain point.

You do. You must not have been looking too hard, the flirt is in the very first conversation you have in person with your team on Makeb. However, I do know of at least one person who selected it thinking it was to flirt with Katha Niar and then was like "ewww I flirted with a guy!!" in general. It was quite amusing and disturbing at the same time to watch his reaction. I'm still a little sore I didn't get to flirt with Katha Niar... *sigh* Stupid segregated same gender romances... A lesson Bioware obviously didn't learn - since they've effectively repeated the mistake in SoR. You don't get any closure/ending with your LI if you're the opposite faction. I don't know about Imp/Theron yet, but LS Rep/Lana get nothing but a broken heart. (How else are you supposed to interpret acrimonious words and then nothing?) (My guess for Imp/Theron is they get nada too, but at least their last words with Theron aren't antagonistic, unless they chose the DS option for the Jedi... I know he'd be upset by that.) Sorry, sorry... Still trying to get over this. I disagree. It can be done right. The reason it never seems to be done right is a combination of the writers ability (or lack of), budgetary restraints ("how many lines of dialogue/what animations/how many hours for the VA" and "how much money"), and time limits/deadlines. Any writer worth their salt is familiar with handling "what ifs". Sometimes characters are developed without a clear idea of their sexuality. Sometimes characters surprise us down the track by making a choice we never would have imagined for them in the beginning. Because being a writer means being open to all possibilities. Because, of course, it means it'll mostly be same gender PCs who are left with the weeping.[/sarcasm] In case you hadn't noticed, even the heterosexual LIs are playersexual to a point. If they were going to include rejected flirts as dialogue, they'd have to make the LIs a heck of a lot more picky.

I'd like to think so... However - what follows are spoilers for Lana's romance with a LS Republic character. I am now rather depressed about Lana. I really don't think Bioware is going to give us a chance to redeem her... So unless they offer us other options, some of us lady loving ladies (particularly Lightsiders) are going to be out of luck in KotFE. Oh and one other thing I wanted to talk about now I've done both romances... There's a mite bit of double standards going on... Next on my agenda is to finish Imp side with my male character (a very gay lightside Sith Marauder).

Except he's a droid, and it is possible to program a droid with other parameters. Besides which, I can see how a Hunter Killer would be an effective bodyguard... Track down potential threats to your meatbag body and kill them before they become actual threats. Sorry, just had to... So, uh, Theron. They neeeeeeeeeeeeed to bring him back.