Would You Like Legacy Influence And Legacy Alliance Ranks? Y/N Explanation

[Velgar]

Well, all the alliance and companion influence grind did was encourage me to play less. I parked all but one toon, I am not going to grind endless H2s for crates on all 8 classes. Did it for one toon on the alliances and got up to all of influence 33 on highest influence companion. As a result I have not even done KOTFE on the other 7 due to the grind on the alliances and influence.

 

So their goal of sucking people into playing a lot more to grind all that out on their alts backfired in my case, now I do not play the alts at all.

 

So yes, legacy wide would get me to play the story on my alts and I would actually play more with less grind. So I vote for legacy wide on both alliances and influence.

[pooks]

I ran 1 character through it all and got the 4 npc to 20 influence and refuse to do it again.

If you make this legacy-wide then yes I vote for that.

Second best would be to reduce the cost of the supplies.

[Neglience]

No and i don't care.

 

The crafting market is already flooded with cheap mats, with legacy influence it will get worse.

[SootyTX]

How would you handle the situation where one of my characters kills a potential companion whereas another does not? How would you handle the situation where Koth finally carries through on his threat to leave forever because I'm a bug meanie whereas another one of my characters is all sweetness and light?

 

This. Most of my toons hate Koth and have as little as possible to do with him. Others I have either killed, imprisoned or just left doing whatever they were doing. What sense would it be that a companion I killed on one toon, imprisoned with another and accepted on another somehow has the same influence with all of them? It's ridiculous.

 

I'm a hopeless altaholic but I have no issue with the current set-up. I have 7 or 8 KotFE charcaters each with multiple companions in the 20s or 30s, I don't see the problem in the slightest. We haven't even gotten to chapter 10 yet, we have months of new story coming out and lots of stuff coming along, I really don't understand this 'need' for people to max out companion influence within a couple of weeks.

[Sotof]

This. Most of my toons hate Koth and have as little as possible to do with him. Others I have either killed, imprisoned or just left doing whatever they were doing. What sense would it be that a companion I killed on one toon, imprisoned with another and accepted on another somehow has the same influence with all of them? It's ridiculous.

 

No it's not. Influence has no bearing on the story. What you do to that character will be reflected by your choices, not by your gift spam.

[devincor]

It depends on where Bioware has the companion endgame thing going. There are a few questions still to answer.

 

1) When this story is over, are we keeping all these companions or going back down to a handful? I figure a few will not make it to the end based on Marr's statement.

 

2) If we don't keep them all, which ones are we going to keep? Does this depend on faction? Will Influence make a difference if they live or die? I don't see the Republic and Empire going buddy-buddy after this story. So what happens to romances across faction?

 

The only companions I figure are safe are Treek and possibly HK-51. You had to purchase one and quest the other.

 

I have put a hold on handing out gifts even though I still grind heroics. I know I would probably be upset if i busted butt to get a companion to influence 50 then have them die or leave. That's why I am only taking one of my characters forward through the story, once I have a better idea of where this all is going I can make some better "choices".

[EnkiduNineEight]

This. Most of my toons hate Koth and have as little as possible to do with him. Others I have either killed, imprisoned or just left doing whatever they were doing. What sense would it be that a companion I killed on one toon, imprisoned with another and accepted on another somehow has the same influence with all of them? It's ridiculous.

 

I'm a hopeless altaholic but I have no issue with the current set-up. I have 7 or 8 KotFE charcaters each with multiple companions in the 20s or 30s, I don't see the problem in the slightest. We haven't even gotten to chapter 10 yet, we have months of new story coming out and lots of stuff coming along, I really don't understand this 'need' for people to max out companion influence within a couple of weeks.

 

So, since this breaks your immersion so badly, let me ask you.. How do you reconcile that when you do your alliance dailys/weeklys and you go back and perform heroic quests on prior planets you are inhabiting (and if grouping, grouping with) people from the past. EG.. Players who are level appropriate to a world or whoa re seeing it the first time, are in YOUR past, if you are there for Alliance reasons?

 

How are you managing to wrap your head around that the actions performed in your quest for your alliance Heroic 2's fit the planetary storyline from YOUR PAST, not your present? Etc?

 

You use Immersion breaking like its some magic argument, but all the Alliance Quests are immersion breaking in and of themselves. You travelinto the past to get influence for people in your present/future? really?

 

So what,ou hate Koth, but he has a high influence on your alts because one of your characters got high influence with him.. How does this break anything that isn't already broken when the whole method to get influence is to time travel?

[DreadtechSavant]

A big NO from me.

 

It is not a grind at all, It is no different to doing the dailies before 4.0 for credits. This is why I do them as KotFE has lost interest for me any case.

 

The same players who have said yes are the same players who will be the first to complain that there character have nothing to do if this becomes legacywide.

Edited January 23, 2016 by DreadtechSavant

[SootyTX]

So, since this breaks your immersion so badly, let me ask you.. How do you reconcile that when you do your alliance dailys/weeklys and you go back and perform heroic quests on prior planets you are inhabiting (and if grouping, grouping with) people from the past. EG.. Players who are level appropriate to a world or whoa re seeing it the first time, are in YOUR past, if you are there for Alliance reasons?

 

How are you managing to wrap your head around that the actions performed in your quest for your alliance Heroic 2's fit the planetary storyline from YOUR PAST, not your present? Etc?

 

You use Immersion breaking like its some magic argument, but all the Alliance Quests are immersion breaking in and of themselves. You travelinto the past to get influence for people in your present/future? really?

 

So what,ou hate Koth, but he has a high influence on your alts because one of your characters got high influence with him.. How does this break anything that isn't already broken when the whole method to get influence is to time travel?

 

I'll ask you a question first - how can my Jedi Knight have high influence with a certain Sith Warrior companion when she killed him?

 

Immersion is relative - some things bend a little. The planetary heroics are one of those. Even after 5 years these same issues will be ongoing, the KotFE story explicitly states that Empire and Republic are still fighting each other across the galaxy despite the threat of the EE. Plus most of the heroics are against other factions anyway - mercenaries, other races.

 

Same applies with other players - how are they from 'the past'? I don't assume meta knowledge when in game. i don't look at a level 15 trooper about to head in to clear out the Face Merchants on Coruscant and think to myself "well, that's silly, I destroyed that lab 5 years ago, what's he doing here?". I see another Republic hero that would make a great ally as I go in to pull apart another nest of butchers that has set-up shop in the depths of Coruscant. Applying the tiniest amount of imagination makes all your so-called immersion issues non-existent. That doesn't apply to a companion that can be alive, dead and imprisoned simultaneously. if you don't understand the difference, then you don't understand the difference between a character and a toon, and nothing I say will change that.

[Sotof]

I'll ask you a question first - how can my Jedi Knight have high influence with a certain Sith Warrior companion when she killed him?

Because influence is nothing but a game mechanic. You get influence for pissing characters off even. Why is that if it's an indicator of anything? All it's an indicator of is how much you've thrown gifts at a character and how much you've interacted with it. Nothing more.

[BSVeritas]

How about this? The more toons you have unlocked an alliance member with, the easier it is for you to unlock them with another toon? Say a reduced number of turn ins for each toon the alliance member is unlocked on.

 

Along the same lines, the more toons you have maxed influence with on an alliance member, the more influence you get with that member on other toons for each conversation/gift.

[Jesira]

YES.

 

My problem is the Star Fortresses as they are miserably boring, take forever, and I have done them several times already on different characters and there is nobody to run them with anymore, and yes, it is really annoying having to level up all of the Alliance Specialists. It takes too long, and when you're running a character through each chapter quickly, you don't even remotely have the time to do that.

 

All in all, I think the Alliance system should be legacy-wide. I really shouldn't have to go through all of this with every single one of my characters and it honestly is a MASSIVE deterrent of doing alts.

[devincor]

Again, nice 5 month necro.

 

Just curious about those struggling with Alliance Specialist influence. Why? Between companion affection and Alliance Specialist the Alliance is much easier to level. You get a box to turn in for every heroic you do. Then you get a companion gift after that. How are you struggling to get the Alliance up but not your companions?

 

While I don't have every one of my alts Alliance complete, I do have 3 that are finished with the rest sitting anywhere between 12-18 ranks. I tend to put the crates in the legacy bank and work out who I want to max or boost up next.

 

Side note:

 

I do wish BW would of recognized those of us that had the achievement for maxed out affection with all our companions before 4.0 dropped and given us a head start in the new levels (jumped them up to around rank 25 with original companions). I recently started a new commando and just barely into Act 2 my companions are all between rank 20-27. My mains at 65 doesn't even have 2 that high, think I have one on each main that is between 22-30.

[LyraineAlei]

Legacy Influence concerning companions? Meh, I don't mind the grind, I personally still haven't used my Free Level 60 token because I prefer the 1-60 story and find my original companions up to influence level 10+ early on with a little bit of extra gift tossing from my Treasure Hunter/Diplomatic characters storing their extra gifts in teh legacy bank. The recruitment missions requiring item turn-ins rank those companions up to at least influence level 10 (originally, haven't actually gotten aorund to playing chapter X since my Agent had it bug on her out of punishment for not romancing anyone or being male, still unsure why but the whole thing was reset on her). My Pub characters plan on running Esseles with the starter comps for Pub classes, Imp mirrors doing the same, to "grind" that rep faster. Then the Revan 1-50 Flashpoint sets for most of the rest so I can gather up the kill count achievements, earn some credits on the side, see who all has changed in combat. Anyone left will be running Directive 7/Kaon with me for the same reasons.

 

And gifts, of course.

 

Legacy ranks? I like that Alliance crates are legacy-bound, but maybe once one character has gotten an Alliance Faction/Person (Say, Hylo) up to 20, the crate requirements for future characters of that legacy is cut down by a quarter. So if 100 crates are needed the first time, 75 would be needed for the rest. Still the grind, but not as much of one. And then a single character gets all four to 20, the req drop from that 100 original to 60 for the rest of characters. Then it's alt friendlier, but not fully immersion breaking and your character is still running around gathering resources.

 

If you're leveling from 1-65, and doing Heroics on the side of leveling and using those freebie EXP boosts, I can be level 65 by the of Act One or so, and then collecting crates throughout the rest of the playtime. I have over twenty crates in the inventory of my RT who hit 65 on Hoth (she was started pre-KotFE), and the same number on my JK who is on Quesh at 65. Collecting the boxes isn't as big of a deal if you're still playing the base stories since I can use the stories to break up the monotony. But if alts could have the requirements for reaching Alliance Ranks dropped by a bit after they'd been reached by one character already, it would be mroe convenient.

[demotivator]

I'll ask you a question first - how can my Jedi Knight have high influence with a certain Sith Warrior companion when she killed him?

 

Because influence is not affection. The evidence of this is that even when a companion disagrees with your decisions you still gain influence.

 

Prior to KOTFE when discussing with your companions you wanted to pick the options that they would like and for those who didn't care about RP restarting a convo when they would dislike something because the point was gaining affection, in KOTFE whether they like or dislike your decisions doesn't matter anymore... it's better to have your companion disagree than having no reaction at all.

Edited June 22, 2016 by demotivator

[Rolodome]

Regarding legacy influence: My first thought was, "This will give me less to do with new alts" (a bad thing).

 

But then I thought... now wait a minute. One of my issues with alts and leveling characters in general, is that I tend to pander to my companions, if for no other reason than knowing that they'll get a little bit stronger and if I want to craft on that toon or gather stuff, it'll be easier.

 

If it was legacy wide, and thus a lot easier to do over a long period of time with multiple characters... I would be able to immerse myself more fully in the character itself and stop pandering to my companions for gameplay bonuses. Each playthrough would feel more unique and less restricted.

 

But perhaps this speaks to the (still lingering) problem with companion influence, that pandering to them is the way to go if you want the gameplay bonuses and there exists no clear alternative gameplay option to pandering, short of screwing yourself over. There is no "don't pander and still get the bonuses" kind of path. You either pander or you make it harder for yourself.

[Vodamin]

No and no.

[Jesira]

Again, nice 5 month necro.

 

Just curious about those struggling with Alliance Specialist influence. Why? Between companion affection and Alliance Specialist the Alliance is much easier to level. You get a box to turn in for every heroic you do. Then you get a companion gift after that. How are you struggling to get the Alliance up but not your companions?

 

While I don't have every one of my alts Alliance complete, I do have 3 that are finished with the rest sitting anywhere between 12-18 ranks. I tend to put the crates in the legacy bank and work out who I want to max or boost up next.

 

Side note:

 

I do wish BW would of recognized those of us that had the achievement for maxed out affection with all our companions before 4.0 dropped and given us a head start in the new levels (jumped them up to around rank 25 with original companions). I recently started a new commando and just barely into Act 2 my companions are all between rank 20-27. My mains at 65 doesn't even have 2 that high, think I have one on each main that is between 22-30.

 

Well it was the thread that came up when I searched for a similar topic, and has a lot of pages of discussion on the issue. To answer your question, it isn't so much that I have *trouble* with anything (other than Star Fortresses) I can't stress enough how utterly mind numbing it is doing this for the 3rd, 4th, 5th, etc time on an alt. I've already maxed out on two characters and am working on 3 others still. When new characters get to this expansion and have all the chapters to run through, they haven't really had the time to max that stuff out, get all the companions from Star Forge missions, etc so you have to consciously stop progressing through the story to work on those things which isn't something I imagine most players who weren't around for the actual release of the new chapters would know to do, and there's no real indication to do the Star Fortresses unless you notice the NPC in the war room area with her little side quest icon.

 

On the topic of Star Forges, I am just lucky that I have my boyfriend to log on and help me run through each of the heroic ones on alts, because when you LFG 9 out of 10 times nobody is interested in doing them, which isn't a problem I just experience myself, but before I got to my alts I was seeing people have the same issue every day lol. On top of that, the Star Fortress Heroic 2+ dungeon is too long to have to do to acquire so many companions. When I came back to the game to work on my alts, I was literally dreading the Star Fortress Heroic 2+ dungeons because I remembered how long and how much of a pain they can be. I honestly don't feel like doing it anymore, at all...But I want to get these alts through it, and god forbid I ever start a new character one day...bleh...

Edited June 22, 2016 by Jesira

[Savej]

Getting companions up to 50 influence is just about the biggest and silliest grinds I've seen in a western mmo. It's easy to work around it but I'm pretty sure doing so is a rules violation and that still sets you back millions of cc per companion. The alliance crates give a fraction of what you'll need for any one companion. It sure seems a lot like the companions were moving towards "legacy based" instead of individual character based (dissociating gear from companion effectiveness, dissociating companion affection with whether they like you and conversation tree access, etc), but BW decided against it halfway into KotFE development. And so now we have OCD hell for people with many alts.

[PetFish]

My Answer Is No And No

[Jeweledleah]

agreed with idea of legacywide boost, in the same vein as presence.

 

grinding alliance ranks over and over is just.. not fun, but if after first character each subsequent character gets lets say.. 4 times as much influence form the same turn ins? there is still a choice to put in the effort involve,d but it doesn't require nearly as much grinding, making it more feasible.