Factions - In the end it's all about the beginning... But it shouldn't be!

[Trefilio]

Could any admin please move this to Suggestions Forum? Opened the thread on the wrong forum and can't delete it.

 

Maybe someone has talked about this already, maybe it's something old in the community, maybe even I have posted something similar on the early days of the SW:TOR community and forums, but ever since launch I've been wondering whether it wouldn't be better to have a RP/PvE feature to change factions at given points in the game throughout Side Quest Series at each new chapter ending/beginning, for instance. And maybe a repeatable but demanding endgame quest series that at a certain point would lead to a changing path dialog. I'd really like to see mirrored classes playing on either sides based on player's personal choices throughout the game, and not simply the same old "born this way" character creation.

 

I believe every MMO out there would have a lot to profit from such an approach to faction selection, but that is totally a main canonical part of SWish storytelling, from movies, to novels, to games, to comics. There has always been the duality of Light and Dark in the Star Wars universe (as in any other story ever told, or almost), but still there has always been the defecting on both sides, not only due to "alignment" choices but due to philosophical and political takes as well. Just because one was born and raised as an imperial that doesn't mean he'd be stuck to that forever.

 

My favorite example is Kyle Katarn, whom I know is not canon (or not anymore, at least, as pretty much everything from the SW:EU) but yet he is one of the characters that clearly has proven how "crossing the lines" is plot defining for Star Wars. Not to mention, Exar Kun, Ulic Qel-Droma, Malak, Revan (Jedi of the Republic, then Sith, then Jedi, then prisoner, then outcast, then crazy as f*ck, then

one-with-the-force

), Mara Jade and pretty much everyone on the Skywalker household (aside from Leia, I suppose), Lando Calrissian, Galen Marek (Starkiller), Juno Eclipse, Dooku, Ajunta Pall, Kreya, Meetra Surik (The Exile), and I could go on for as long as there are stories being told/written about SW.

 

If you do the math, aside from very few relevant-to-the-plot characters (Marka Ragnos, Yoda-ish characters) changing sides for whatever reason is THE core feature of Star Wars, being such a major part in its rich lore that I really wish wish we could have that in-game somehow.

 

...Yet, not going to happen, I know, just needed to share my frustration with this fossilized faction mechanic we have on MMOs since forever, even though it's clearly one of the greatest cause of community balance issues. It's a fact, most people only select a given faction because of its Race/Class options, it has nothing to do with the RP path they'd like to follow. I do believe that, had we these options during the gameplay, faction's population would be a little bit more even, but a lot richer on their diversities.

 

Exceptions I remember:

* Matrix Online, your faction used to be fully based on the quests you'd take

* Star Wars Galaxies, I might be wrong on this one for I had played it only for 6 months, but I don't recall my options being either black or white, I'd quest for whomever I wanted.

Curiously both games were from SOE, that has already announced lots of paradigm breaking features for Everquest Next. More studios should take such risks instead of doing hundreds of more of the same games, just on a different setting.

Edited April 19, 2015 by Trefilio
Opened thread on the wrong forum.