Light or Dark?

[enthrop]

I always ponder this question when I make a new class.. and I'm doing it now for IA.

 

From a slight RP perspective (I don't really RP, but sometimes I like to have reasons for actions), I've created a cyborg named Vallerii (from Sharon 'Boomer' Valeri from Battlestar Galactica). It felt appropriate that she was an Imperial Agent too. For anyone who knows BSG, it might make sense to you why I was thinking of making her light sided, sort of like fighting her "people" (which in this case are Imperial, and while I know factions don't have a default alignment, Imperial = Dark in my mind!)

 

From an actual gameplay and companion perspective, I'm wondering if one is "easier" than the other, or lends itself to more interesting dialogue. For example, BH light is significantly easier in that almost all your companions prefer light choices. SW on the other hand enjoys dark more so. I also like that SW's companion is effected by your dark/light option. Similarly, one of BH's title is effected by several of our dark/light choices.

 

What's the impact of dark/light for IA?

[CaptainApop]

Neither will adversely affect your story. The class is well built to accommodate both. In fact your actual alignment has very little to do with the direction you take. You generally have 3 pillars to work with. Sith-loyal, "My country, right or wrong" or pan-galactic batman out to save everybody.

You can mix in and out of these as you wish out your ending more relies on who's alive by the stories end and who you kill is really more of a mauve and grey morality zone than anything overt.

 

A spoilered example.

 

The end of act I pits you against Jadus. Your choices are.

Join him, become his "hand" and help set him up to kill the emperor. He's not a good guy by any means but it could very well be a better leader than emperor "wants to eat the universe".

Kill him, which will result in the deaths of the few hundred prisoners he has on-board.

Win an epic dick measuring contet with him and have him run off into deep space to lick his wounds. He's still a threat but you saved the prisoners.

I wouldn't call either choice ambigously light or dark honestly. First and third get you DS/LS points repsectively though

 

 

Companion wise Kaliyo generally prefers the DS choices as she's the anarchistic rebel, Vector just likes you talking your way through dialogue mostly and the Doctor doesn't care what you do as long as you gather all the facts first. Scorpio you're unlikely to gather much dialogue with since you get her on belsavis but she's completely self serving and temple is a LS imperial loyalist.

To my knowledge none of our titles are affected by choices.

Edited May 11, 2012 by CaptainApop

[NicWester]

With this class more than any other, it's all about what you want versus what the story wants.

 

You'll understand what I mean once you've played with it a bit, but it feels like we're intended to go Light I or II or Dark I or II. Or neutral, but there's no reason to ever do that The choices you make are largely pragmatism versus idealism, doing what's right compared with what's expediant. And while your decisions DO affect the storyline in major ways (largely your decisions at the end of acts), neither are you gimping yourself by making different decisions. As in, if you generally pick light side stuff and then pick a dark side option, it's not all "WHAT THE HELL, MAN?!" or anything of the sort.

[bright_ephemera]

I found that neither Light nor Dark seemed easier (I leveled neutral shading towards light alongside my husband's dark agent). Even the wit seemed fairly evenly distributed; Light didn't mean Trooper Vanilla "Yes, sir" and Dark didn't get a monopoly on wicked humor.

 

And the beautiful thing is, the Agent isn't a Light/Dark track. As others have said. It's People Of the Empire/Sith Authority/Higher Good with sub-struggles among self-determination (for yourself and others), Republic interests, individual visionaries' crusades...okay, there's a clear flaming evil track, but making a good-aligned agent is a lot more nuanced than mashing the blue star. Quest resolutions and further quest paths are different but not substantially better/worse/optimal for light, dark, and ambiguous choices.

 

There's a good variety of companions and companion preferences; you have to do almost all of Act 1 with a chaotic evil maniac, but if you're at least snarky sometimes she'll tolerate you.

[Ravenwhyte]

I don't think light or dark choices makes a difference in difficulty but it makes a huge difference in the storyline. I just finished the class story as a light side IA. I was level V light in the mid 40's and my class story ending was completely different than any others I have read or heard about.

 

Choices you make in chapters 1 & 2, especially when it comes to life or death decisions, will have a major impact on the class story and how it unfolds. Companion approval varies but dark is usually preferred with a few surprises.

 

Intense & incredibly interesting story line for IA's. Highly recommended.

Edited May 11, 2012 by Ravenwhyte

[bright_ephemera]

I don't think light or dark choices makes a difference in difficulty.

 

Derp! I forgot...LS/DS splits will sometimes circumvent fights entirely, making some individual scenes easier but also altering your entire future. I do not think that either Light or Dark has a bigger number of such fight-avoidance chances overall.

[stuffystuffs]

When I roleplay Agents, I don't really think about Light/Dark but just pick the option that suits them.

 

The current Agent I'm playing is more on the Light side of the bar...not b/c I want her to be "a lightside character" but mainly b/c I wanted to roleplay her as being more diplomatic and compassionate.

 

She's got DS points though especially when

she spared Watcher X. First off, she felt bad for the guy but secondly, she was interested in the dirt he had on the Imperial Intelligence (being Chiss, she doesn't fully trust them)

 

[BubbleDncr]

For the Agent storyline, I really think its best to not play just light side or dark side. I would say you can decide whether or not you want to start out on a certain side, but if you force yourself to stick to a side, it'll be a lot less interesting.

[Mirthadrond]

I role played my IA as a Loyalist / Logical long term strategic thinker. Sometimes people died. (betrayal or too dangerous). Sometimes I let them live when it served the empire better.

At around lvl 38, I was pretty much 'Neutral" in my alignment.

 

Having played this toon (above) and a DS IA... yes, the decisions you make definitely affect the story / outcome. I'll leave it to you to discover these differences.

 

The PROBLEM - with role playing my agent this way was I could NEVER EVER EVER.. get upgraded relics. Be they light or dark........ which is a problem if you aren't BIOCHEM. (I wasn't)

Extra power / crit chance make some boss fights a heck of a lot easier.

[Darksaberexile]

The PROBLEM - with role playing my agent this way was I could NEVER EVER EVER.. get upgraded relics. Be they light or dark........ which is a problem if you aren't BIOCHEM. (I wasn't)

Extra power / crit chance make some boss fights a heck of a lot easier.

 

I ran into this problem too, and hated that I couldn't get any relics before level 50 (other than a matrix cube). With the way I played my sniper, I ended the story with neutral alignment (slightly more light than dark), and then with Ilum's planet story ended up at equal light and dark scores. They need to add neutral relics badly.

[Mutive]

Derp! I forgot...LS/DS splits will sometimes circumvent fights entirely, making some individual scenes easier but also altering your entire future. I do not think that either Light or Dark has a bigger number of such fight-avoidance chances overall.

 

 

Yeah, for Jaedus in particular, going the hard dark or light route makes the encounter so much easier. (As taking down a dark lord of the Sith is pretty brutal from what I've heard.) With that said, in general, LS vs. DS doesn't really matter much as far as difficulty goes. (And probably most agents are going to run fairly neutral if they're trying to RP at all.)

 

[Mutive]

I don't think light or dark choices makes a difference in difficulty but it makes a huge difference in the storyline. I just finished the class story as a light side IA. I was level V light in the mid 40's and my class story ending was completely different than any others I have read or heard about.

.

 

Okay, I'm curious now. What was your ending? I've only heard of three so far.

Defect to the Republic (which you can do being pretty damned evil despite that it's supposedly LS), Batman (which you can also be pretty evil for despite that it's also supposedly LS - although the dialogue is pretty wacky here for the hard core darksiders), and head of Sith lead intelligence (which you can be fairly good for despite that it's supposedly DS).