Ashara - motivation for joining SI

[davanev]

Just collected Ashara on my SI and up to this point I have enjoyed the class but am struggling to maintain immersion in the story with her along for the ride. My SI is pretty dark - not out and out psycho but by no means a reformer. Everything he has done so far is to gain power for himself with no thought to the cost for others.

 

 

He met Ashara by setting assasins on her, he persuaded her to help him by electrocuting her until she agreed to help him. She betrayed him at the meeting with her master's - what else should I expect as I tortured her until she agreed to help, but then just stood there while I cut them into peices. Then she decides to join me.

 

1) Why ? I see zero motivation for this even if the Jedi don't want her she has better option than to go with me, I am

the man who just murdered the closest she has to a family.

2) Why should I take her with me - she is an expendable pawn I tortured into helping me - everyone else I have

used the same way ended up dead. My character would either kill her outright or leave her to rot.

 

Somehow she ends up as part of my crew and has now decided we are on some sort of crusade to convert the Sith Empire into a Republic clone - my character just wants power, wealth and fun, not necessarily in that order.

 

 

This is the single most awful piece of writing I have come across in an MMO - and I am including the Malavai Quinn debacle with the Sith warrior. That's two class storys ruined for me by fith rate work on the part of the writers/designers.

 

Is there any class in this game which force at least one monumentaly unsuitable companion down your throat ?

Edited July 30, 2012 by davanev

[Marick_von]

I don't use her. Basically ignore the fact that she is there and use her to craft. If she could at least be turned to the darkside that would at least give me a bone to chew on. As she is? Kind of useless. I will admit I am looking at this mostly from an rp stand point. She might be a good dps.

[Chikun]

Yeah, I hate her. I would have preffered to have Thana instead.

[Gabrandt]

Yeah, I hate her. I would have preffered to have Thana instead.

 

This.

 

And even then, I am light side.

[Chikun]

To me though, there also is just no tactical purpose of having her. Say I'm specced as a tank, ideally I'd opt for the healer companion. If I'm specced as a healer, I'd stick with Khem for his aggro holding awesomeness. If i spec DPS, I'd probably roll with the same two companions depending on if I'm ranged or melee. The only other purpose for having her or the pirate would be for possible world pvp but even still i might preffer the healer.

[boobaffet]

my big *****

[bright_ephemera]

 

1) Why ? I see zero motivation for this even if the Jedi don't want her she has better option than to go with me, I am

the man who just murdered the closest she has to a family.

2) Why should I take her with me - she is an expendable pawn I tortured into helping me - everyone else I have

used the same way ended up dead. My character would either kill her outright or leave her to rot.

 

Somehow she ends up as part of my crew and has now decided we are on some sort of crusade to convert the Sith Empire into a Republic clone - my character just wants power, wealth and fun, not necessarily in that order.

 

 

This is the single most awful piece of writing I have come across in an MMO - and I am including the Malavai Quinn debacle with the Sith warrior. That's two class storys ruined for me by fith rate work on the part of the writers/designers.

 

Is there any class in this game which force at least one monumentaly unsuitable companion down your throat ?

 

There is no reason I can interpret for Ashara to join you. I think she's the worst. Quinn comes close, but a single action opportunity would've fixed him just fine. Ashara is hopeless.

 

The Smuggler has Risha, who suits the class archetype, but whose recruitment is beyond bizarre if you spent fifteen levels hating her presence and telling her that at every opportunity.

 

The Trooper's Tanno Vik is supposed to challenge the good-soldier type, but at least he has a reason for joining you.

 

The Agent's Kaliyo is strained. A lot. I found her amusing, but any rational person would off her within weeks of meeting her. And SCORPIO's really iffy. It's a shame, because the Agent is otherwise superbly written.

 

The Knight's biggest archetype challenger is actually kind of cool and has a reason to force himself on your party.

 

Consular and BH I know nothing about.

 

I would call Ashara far and away the worst, then Kaliyo and SCORPIO, then a significant gap before the other forced recruitments.

[lokdron]

The women stays forever on the ship as a crafting mule until I can turn her to the dark side.

[danielweberdlc]

Zenith for the JC has no reason to be on board, plus he has a job on Balmora I'm pretty sure he's supposed to be there for. On top of that, light side JC's will probably hate him. Theran pretty much just barges his way on board, as well, with no really good reason for you to let him come with you.

 

Never played BH, but I hear Skadge is awful.

 

At least those characters are consistent in which faction they support, however. Ashara has zero reason to be willing to kill Jedi or fight the Republic, and she never even seems to be aware of the fact that, technically and practically, she's a traitor. She acts like the Jedi council ordered her to be on board in some kind of padawan/apprentice swap program and she's just earnestly trying to make it work.

 

Her story would make sense if the SI (or she) had originally been written for a neutral third faction, which is the only way I can make any sense out of her story.

[Chikun]

It seemed like they made the character but forgot that she basically had to defect. That coupled with no option to corrupt her just makes her a troll companion BioWare made to piss SI's off.

[Rotoroot]

This is the single most awful piece of writing I have come across in an MMO - and I am including the Malavai Quinn debacle with the Sith warrior. That's two class storys ruined for me by fith rate work on the part of the writers/designers.

 

Agreed. I find the writing and voice acting in this game to be terrible.

 

The stories are worse then the comic books that come with the kids meal at mcdonalds.

The writing is worse then any show you will find on WB or CW.

The voice acting is lifeless and "feels forced".

 

Seriously, Bioware you are awful at story writing. Maybe take a college class?

 

You make other MMO devs who suck at writing stories look like Robert Frost.

[islander]

Yeah, I hate her. I would have preffered to have Thana instead.

 

Yep, Bioware pooped the bed on this one.

[Ekemeister]

I don't really see how ashara ruins the SI storyline. If you prefer, you never actually have to "see" or hear from her. Personally until recently, I always sent ashara on crew skills missions and otherwise left her in her corner.

If you want companion storyline, Khem Val, Andronikos, and Talos are a great choices; I additionally enjoy watching Xalek grow as a Sith.

 

In Ashara's defense however, It's easy to farm affection with her via Belsalvis dailies. The blunt manner which the SI argues with her is entertaining. Lastly, I have it on good account that depite a lack of a long term relationship with her, you can still have "bedrock" moments in the back room with your companion.

 

Edit: Thana was too weak for me to accept as a companion. I would of fed her to Khem instead.

Edited August 6, 2012 by Ekemeister

[stuffystuffs]

Ashara's joining actually makes sense to me.

 

First, she's curious about the Sith/Empire and believes she can learn more about them by following the SI around. She desires to use this better understanding of the Sith to possibly bring about peace between the two force using orders (Sith/Jedi) someday.

 

Second, she's prideful and possibly doesn't want to go back and face the Jedi where they will tell her how badly she's dun wrong and all that.

 

What doesn't make sense is why some SI's would allow her on the ship, but unfortunately you can't turn any companions away.

[Maaruin]

This is the single most awful piece of writing I have come across in an MMO - and I am including the Malavai Quinn debacle with the Sith warrior. That's two class storys ruined for me by fith rate work on the part of the writers/designers.

 

I disagree. As a character I find her a lot more interesting than Jaesa DS Fanservice or Jaesa LS Stereotype.

 

For the path you chose (there are others*):

 

She joins you because she is afraid of you. I mean, you shocked her into submission and killed her masters and you wrote that normally you would just kill her at that point. So she can't go back to the Jedi because you won't allow it.

 

Now she's stuck with you and somehow has the idea: "Hey, I could reform the Empire from my position. I'm sure I can influence him in reforming the Sith."

 

If you want her to become better fitting, start lying to her. Tell her you really want to change the Empire. She will believe you, even if your only goal is power. And then she will use even her Jedi contacts to support you in rising to power. She will start questioning the Jedi rules and at the end of her companion story she is halfway to the dark side.

 

She even admits that "Peace is a lie - at least when you are talking about more than personal peace."

 

 

I wished she was fully corruptable, but since that's not the case, try to enjoy as much as you can get.

 

*There is another path where the inquisitor is manipulating her much more with words. No shocks, but she still kills the assassin and she starts her way down to the dark side without really noticing. (most logical way, even if it has some weak points. But other companions have them too. If you don't care about spoilers, then look at these videos.)

 

And then of course there is the light side way, but that's not what you want.

[danielweberdlc]

No one is saying Ashara is boring - what we're saying is that her motivations for joining you make no sense. i think she's an agreeable companion and has interesting observations, but I just can't get over the fact she has no reason to be with me, and lots of reasons to leave, not the least of which is the fact I keep killing Jedi right in front of her, which she blindly ignores, despite the fact it says right in her codex entry she doesn't like that. Heck, I don't even lose affection.

 

Jaissa may be more 'boring', I personally disagree, but at least she's consistent and her motivations are clear, especially DS.

 

I can't believe Ashara would join you because of 'curiosity', especially after you kill her foster parents, enslave or kill everyone she knows on the planet and then pretty much make the entire place uninhabitable.. That would certainly satisfy my curiosity about what Sith are like.

 

And there is nothing in our story, not even the smallest glimpse of any attempt to make the Sith nicer - she completely makes it up on her own, despite overwhelming proof to the contrary.

 

As far as being afraid of you, well, she certainly understands you can kill her, but I wouldn't really call her afraid. If she was afraid of dying, she certainly wouldn't throw herself into combat like she does. And she has literally tons of chances to escape - a couple of her companion missions even have her going into Republic space all alone, and a lot of the crafting missions are to at least neutral locations. She could easily escape and there's no reason the Jedi wouldn't take her back - heck they have a former dark council member as a Jedi, a fact I'd be stunned she wasn't aware of.

 

You could make some kind of Stockholm Syndrome argument, i guess, but you'd have to make a lot of the scenes up yourself - they certainly aren't in the game. She does end up apologizing a lot.

 

But there's really no explanation why the SI doesn't even attempt to turn her to the dark side and make her a real apprentice, or why you put up with all her Jedi nonsense.

[Maaruin]

I think her inconsistency is not that bad. It is part of her character. And I think for most parts it's not that badly written, even if there are some weak points.

(Checked earlier posts. I interpreted some as "ashara is the worst written companion" instead of "how she joins is the worst written part of the game", that's why I came up with Jaesa. It's also little of a personal grudge with her DS version )

 

Imagine her like this: She has been trained by her masters to fight against the Sith and the Empire. Her training took place in a warzone.

Now, suddenly, she meets a Sith who is different. She thinks so, because in fact you are the first Sith she ever met outside a fight. And you even helped her against the Assassins. (Assuming you take the non-violent, manipulative answers.) In her eyes you are a friendly Sith that needs her help. So she agrees.

 

But then she changes her mind. (Ashara changes her mind a lot.) She tells it to her masters. But she doesn't want them to kill you. But they want. So against what she intended to do she has infilicted a mortal confrontation between her masters and you, the "friendliest Sith she ever met" (because you are the only one). So no matter who kills who, she would feel guilty about it.

 

After that she could either try to flee or go with you, as you want. And now imagine having to explain everything to the Jedi. She thinks she is responsible for her masters deaths. In this situation she makes a very stupid decision. She realizes it later on, that's why in her first conversation she says "no, this is not right". At this point she wishes she had been gone back to the Jedi.

 

But then you tell her that you are not like other Sith and that you want to change the Empire. And she belives you, even if you are lying. And step by step she grows attached to you. (There are some small talk conversations about cardgames and flying the ship.)

 

That's the story intended for the game. Now they had to add a light side path and a more brutal dark side path. But without changing too much. So these paths have a lot more inconsistencies.

 

I tried to explain the brutal dark side path with that she is afraid of you. Of course, later on, she changes her mind and trusts you much more. Depending on your conversation choices this might not make sense. You have the option to give her almost no reason to think you want to change the Empire, but the game acts like you did.

 

 

Of course some parts of the story could be improved. A more suitable brutal dark side way, in which you drag her away captive and torture her until she submits. And a more light side way without killing the masters.

Also the dialogue in the enclave could be more elaborate to show better what is going on inside her. And last but not least you should come up with the plan to corrupt her, not Lord Forgothisname who looks like a soldier.

Edited August 8, 2012 by Maaruin

[danielweberdlc]

The problem is not her consistency, it's her motivation for killing Jedi and working for the destruction of the Republic. It's the fact that she becomes a traitor to all she knows and believes in without so much as even acknowledging that fact.

 

What really bugs me is that there was a really simple way to solve this problem - simply allow you the option of sparing Masters Ryan and Ocera in return for her oath of service. Then at least there is a plausible reason for her to join you and the opportunity for you to gain her trust in a convincing manner. It would also explain her loyalty, as she would believe she is being loyal to her oath and not necessarily to you.

 

Combine that with reasonable affection losses for fighting the republic and she becomes a -much- more believable companion.

 

Dark side SI should just be able to kill her, or to corrupt her - it wouldn't add that much to her story to make her much darker, struggling with the dark side.

[JLazarillo]

The problem is not her consistency, it's her motivation for killing Jedi and working for the destruction of the Republic. It's the fact that she becomes a traitor to all she knows and believes in without so much as even acknowledging that fact.

 

It seemed pretty clear to me that her motivation in doing it as being more or less regrettable collateral damage. Ashara's motivations generally stem from making the whole galaxy shut the hell up be nice to each other, whether they want to or not. She doesn't want to hurt people if she can help it, but meeting the SI makes her feel empowered (as opposed to the Jedi, who always taught her to hold herself back), and so she's not going to let anyone hold her back from that any longer.

[Maaruin]

The problem is not her consistency, it's her motivation for killing Jedi and working for the destruction of the Republic. It's the fact that she becomes a traitor to all she knows and believes in without so much as even acknowledging that fact.

 

Well, in your class story you don't fight against the Republic, you fight against Thanaton. Ashara would have no problem with that, I guess.

 

What really bugs me is that there was a really simple way to solve this problem - simply allow you the option of sparing Masters Ryan and Ocera in return for her oath of service. Then at least there is a plausible reason for her to join you and the opportunity for you to gain her trust in a convincing manner. It would also explain her loyalty, as she would believe she is being loyal to her oath and not necessarily to you.

 

That's a good idea too.

 

Combine that with reasonable affection losses for fighting the republic and she becomes a -much- more believable companion.

 

Well, the game mechanics don't allow this outside from conversation, and if I remember correctly, fighting Republic and Jedi in cutscenes gives some losses.

 

Dark side SI should just be able to kill her, or to corrupt her - it wouldn't add that much to her story to make her much darker, struggling with the dark side.

 

Yeah, but pleaso not a dark side snap like Jaesa. Let her slowly go more and more towards the dark side. I mean, you can play her current story like this, but she doesn't really notice that she makes small steps towards the dark side.

[Nydus]

It seemed like they made the character but forgot that she basically had to defect. That coupled with no option to corrupt her just makes her a troll companion BioWare made to piss SI's off.

 

I have to say I'm a little taken a-back by the amount of dislike of this character. I actually don't mind her and she fits into my story line perfectly; i.e. my character thinks of himself as a reformer but has progressively sunk through the DS ranks as his motivations become more about getting revenge and giving people their comeuppance.

 

Ashara fits perfectly within the above; her confrontations about Sith atrocities, etc. She is almost a reminder to my character of his initial plans for the Empire.

 

And I don't know about this "not being able to turn her" stuff, because by the end of her story line she was fairly accepting of my direction for the Empire. And as I said, I'm not light-side at all and she was even approving of some of my dark side positions by the end. Even got the "Darth Nox" title.

 

- Arcada

[Nydus]

Oh! And regarding her motivation, I agree with the post quoted in the post above .

 

Ashara really had nowhere to go after you decimated ... completely humiliated ... her masters.

 

Her sitting by and watching fit into the way I was treating her (I had just saved her life, after all). Not sure it fits into some of the scenarios described in this threat (shocking her, etc.).

 

I can really only comment on my experience though.

 

- Arcada

[danielweberdlc]

She 100% has a place she can go after you kill her masters - she can remain with the Republic forces fighting to save Taris, her fellow padawans and all the people she's lived with and fought with for her entire life. Why would it even occur to her to leave with you? Why wouldn't she just run while you're dealing with the assassin, or the ghost? Or call for help?

 

Instead she abandons her fellow students to death or worse. She abandons all the people she's known and worked with over the years. She abandons all the work she's done to convert Taris from a horrific wasteland to a habitable planet . She abandons her dream to become a Jedi knight to go with and HELP the person most responsible for their destruction. Yeah, the person with a Jedi soul-eating assassin as a best friend.

 

Keep in mind this quest chain is not occurring in a vacuum - the Empire is invading her planet, Thana is slaughtering civilians left and right and as an alien and a Jedi, Ashara is first in line for execution, or worse. How does she know you aren't just taking her straight to Korriban? Or to an Imperial prison to be tortured? Because Sith are so trust-worthy? She trusted you once getting you into the enclave - how did that work out for her?

 

And why don't you? Why do you think she'll never try to escape, steal your secrets or try to kill you? Or meet another Sith who convinces her to betray you? How long would it take Thanaton to convince her to help him destroy the person who killed her foster parents and ravaged her home? You're a Sith - you deal in betrayal and Ashara has proven easy to corrupt. Why do you trust her? Didn't Kallig just warn you about trusting apprentices not 20 quests ago?

 

And let's not forget all the terrible thing's (from her perespective) you've done on the planet, if you've done any quests at all. You've killed the Jedi master training rack ghouls. You've killed a leader of the Republic on PLANET WIDE TV. My goodness, you've probably killed a personal friend of hers - why else would he have her comm frequency? And your world quest culminates in the death of the head Jedi on Taris, whom Ashara most certainly knows.

 

And we're supposed to believe Ashara ignores all of this and just runs off to help you do more horrible things across the galaxy?

 

Ok, you can make the argument she's a weak, easily manipulated person, maybe not very smart or afraid to die. But, if that's the case, then it should be trivial to turn her to the dark side, but it never happens. And worse, to DS SI, you never even get the chance to try.

 

You can't make the argument that you 'save her life'. You tell her exactly why you saved her life, and it wasn't because you like her or because you're a friend of the Republic or you hate the Sith - it's because she's the only one who can summon the ghost. After that, she's completely expendable.

 

Again - I don't dislike Ashara, what I dislike is the writers who did such a terrible job on her story. I think she's a great character with a really poorly written story.

 

Again, the only thing I can think of is that her character was written for a neutral faction, or at one point in game development it was possible to be a Sith fighting for the Republic - it's the only way her story makes -any- sense.

Edited August 10, 2012 by danielweberdlc

[Maaruin]

She 100% has a place she can go after you kill her masters - she can remain with the Republic forces fighting to save Taris, her fellow padawans and all the people she's lived with and fought with for her entire life. Why would it even occur to her to leave with you? Why wouldn't she just run while you're dealing with the assassin, or the ghost? Or call for help?

 

True. She comes with you because she kind of wants to. Of course, when you arrive at the ship she changes her mind. Well, she changes her mind a lot.

 

Instead she abandons her fellow students to death or worse. She abandons all the people she's known and worked with over the years. She abandons all the work she's done to convert Taris from a horrific wasteland to a habitable planet . She abandons her dream to become a Jedi knight to go with and HELP the person most responsible for their destruction. Yeah, the person with a Jedi soul-eating assassin as a best friend.

 

Because you managed to trick her into thinking you are a good, nice Sith. (If you choose the not-shock options.) She kind of likes you at the point you after the encounter and wants doesn't want to tell the masters. Then she changes her mind and tells the masters, but doesn't think they will attack you.

When they attack you, she think she is responible for their death. (And would have thought she is responsible for your death if the masters had killed you.)

 

Keep in mind this quest chain is not occurring in a vacuum - the Empire is invading her planet, Thana is slaughtering civilians left and right and as an alien and a Jedi, Ashara is first in line for execution, or worse. How does she know you aren't just taking her straight to Korriban? Or to an Imperial prison to be tortured? Because Sith are so trust-worthy? She trusted you once getting you into the enclave - how did that work out for her?

 

Again, in her mind she betrayed you or the masters by bringing them there. She expected that you could get along with them. (Look up in videos what the first conversation option is: It's something like "I'm a good sith." and then they attack you. She doesn't have experience with Sith deception.)

 

And why don't you? Why do you think she'll never try to escape, steal your secrets or try to kill you? Or meet another Sith who convinces her to betray you? How long would it take Thanaton to convince her to help him destroy the person who killed her foster parents and ravaged her home? You're a Sith - you deal in betrayal and Ashara has proven easy to corrupt. Why do you trust her? Didn't Kallig just warn you about trusting apprentices not 20 quests ago?

 

Well, the Sith Inquisitor is a different story. He mostly does what he is told to do and never thinks on his own. /sarcasm

 

And let's not forget all the terrible thing's (from her perespective) you've done on the planet, if you've done any quests at all. You've killed the Jedi master training rack ghouls. You've killed a leader of the Republic on PLANET WIDE TV. My goodness, you've probably killed a personal friend of hers - why else would he have her comm frequency? And your world quest culminates in the death of the head Jedi on Taris, whom Ashara most certainly knows.

 

Canon wise you don't do the planet questline.

 

And we're supposed to believe Ashara ignores all of this and just runs off to help you do more horrible things across the galaxy?

 

As I said, she gets a very wrong impression about you.

 

Ok, you can make the argument she's a weak, easily manipulated person, maybe not very smart or afraid to die. But, if that's the case, then it should be trivial to turn her to the dark side, but it never happens. And worse, to DS SI, you never even get the chance to try.

 

You can. She actually ends up much darker then she starts. You carefully cut off the Jedi ideas and put some Sith ideas into her head.

 

You can't make the argument that you 'save her life'. You tell her exactly why you saved her life, and it wasn't because you like her or because you're a friend of the Republic or you hate the Sith - it's because she's the only one who can summon the ghost. After that, she's completely expendable.

 

She doesn't think in Sith ways at that point. She never spoke to a Sith before.

 

Again - I don't dislike Ashara, what I dislike is the writers who did such a terrible job on her story. I think she's a great character with a really poorly written story.

 

I think half of her story is actually quite good. The other half could have done better.

 

Again, the only thing I can think of is that her character was written for a neutral faction, or at one point in game development it was possible to be a Sith fighting for the Republic - it's the only way her story makes -any- sense.

 

No, she was written as the obligatory corruptable padawan. If you ignore world quests and go the manipulative route she is an idealistic Jedi who thinks you want to change the Empire. You are only in it for the power, but you don't tell her.

It's based on Anakin/Palpatine, but it involves a faction shift, which makes the Anakin/Palpatine story hard to apply.

[OrYcle]

I disagree. As a character I find her a lot more interesting than Jaesa DS Fanservice or Jaesa LS Stereotype.

 

For the path you chose (there are others*):

 

She joins you because she is afraid of you. I mean, you shocked her into submission and killed her masters and you wrote that normally you would just kill her at that point. So she can't go back to the Jedi because you won't allow it.

 

Now she's stuck with you and somehow has the idea: "Hey, I could reform the Empire from my position. I'm sure I can influence him in reforming the Sith."

 

If you want her to become better fitting, start lying to her. Tell her you really want to change the Empire. She will believe you, even if your only goal is power. And then she will use even her Jedi contacts to support you in rising to power. She will start questioning the Jedi rules and at the end of her companion story she is halfway to the dark side.

 

She even admits that "Peace is a lie - at least when you are talking about more than personal peace."

 

 

I wished she was fully corruptable, but since that's not the case, try to enjoy as much as you can get.

 

*There is another path where the inquisitor is manipulating her much more with words. No shocks, but she still kills the assassin and she starts her way down to the dark side without really noticing. (most logical way, even if it has some weak points. But other companions have them too. If you don't care about spoilers, then look at these videos.)

 

And then of course there is the light side way, but that's not what you want.

 

 

Completely agree with your assessment.