Idea for future companion stories

[jdalfonso]

I wanted to get player opinions about an idea I have for future story missions. Assuming that Bioware keeps giving us new companions and companions that originally belonged to other classes, I was thinking that a great way to tie our alts into the story would be to set up chapter missions where we encounter and recruit the characters we have already played.

 

For Example: SPOILERS AHEAD!!!

 

Lets say your playing a Jedi Knight and have completed all of the KOTET chapters. At this point in the story the Jedi Knight is the Emperor dealing with uprisings. You then go on a mission where you here rumors of a Jedi Counselor who's been spotted with a Padawan (assuming you have a character that has completed the Jedi Counselor story line). The game then asks you to choose a Jedi Counselor from your alts. When you encounter this mysterious Jedi in game, its the character you chose with the names, titles and armor you have on your alt, and he is now your new companion, (with a matching SH decoration).

 

I think this would be an interesting idea for a couple reasons: 1) SWTOR is, like all Bioware games, is heavy on companions, interwoven story telling, and character customization. This would tie all of those elements together in a way that Bioware has never done before, but has always been a next logical step, (such as Dragon Age fans one day playing a character who recruits the warden, champion and inquisitor the player created from the previous games). 2) it would allow the stories of the 8 original characters to continue. 3) it fits into the story already and most of the back story for these new companions would be filling in what happened to them during the 5 years the outlander was in carbonite. 4) it creates easy story telling opportunities to give us some more of the original companions. In the case of the Counselor example I gave, the assumption was that Nadia was the Padawan, but you can insert whatever companion you want or which ever's story Bioware wants to expand on. 4) it makes all of the time we poured into our alts much more meaningful. By bringing into the player's central story (assuming you have some kind of emotional/ creative attachment to your main.)

 

It would also open doors for other interesting stories. If your counselor and Nadia are a couple, they could give us dialogue that represents that choice or a side quest. I also always wondered what the Counselor would think of Kira Carson. Her being a child of the emperor and the Counselor being famous for killing her pseudo-siblings. I just think it would be really fun, plus it gives us even more incentive to want to buy cartel packs to trick out our other toons.

 

Let me know what you guys think.

[Glikks]

I think the idea is cool but I don't think it would work in game. If this were to be implemented, we would NEED them to remain voiceless and completely devoid of character. Which then may ruin the entire point. I'm all for purely cosmetic alt companions where you can just choose to have them fight alongside you but with no real story or influence.

 

If BW were to do this, it would be near impossible to get that companion to completely represent that character. In order to keep the alt companion true to the character, they would need you to choose the dialogue for both characters if they talk and talking to yourself isn't fun. Not letting players choose what the alt says/does would anger them as they would hate that their character isn't responding in a way they envisioned. Also it would be impossible to decide what they like/dislike since you made all their choices. Should the game look at their V Dark alignment and just assume your alt should like evil choices?

 

I like the idea of having character stories go further and think it would be great to see my SW fighting alongside my SI but it would have to be a bland, emotionless, combat only companion, with no dialogue, to get any of it to work.