I have several characters who would probably change factions, but not a single one of them would be a spy and sabotage their former faction from the inside, they arent deceptive types.

It's definitely done poorly.

 

In my opinion, if you choose the faction at character creation. You should be locked to it forever. Story wise, game play wise. Only time I'd think it would work is if they added the tokens to switch factions like in WoW.

 

They took this game's story and absolutely tarnished it, all thanks to everyone's "favorite" KOTFE and KOTET. (2 detrimental mistakes for this game, story wise.)

I am not liking it either. I also have characters who would switch sides outright and not engage in spy games. I also have characters who have so consistently supported the other side that nobody in their right mind SHOULD believe they still support their old faction or trust them. The saboteur story makes no sense for them.

 

I feel like they shouldn't have dangled the shiny of openly switching sides with Iokath if they were going to push everyone into being secret agents.

I would have like to not have to choose either and be a third faction. The other way they could do it would be to completely switch factions. Which would make complete sense for my ultra Dark Jedi or for my ultra light Merc.

I have several characters who would probably change factions, but not a single one of them would be a spy and sabotage their former faction from the inside, they arent deceptive types.

*Porbably* the transition isn't finished yet. Have patience, and let's see what 6.0 / Onslaught offers.

I have several characters who would probably change factions, but not a single one of them would be a spy and sabotage their former faction from the inside, they arent deceptive types.

 

Yeah, it's bs, i hate it. But they never learn do they. I also, just wanted to be an Alliance faction.

Edited June 24, 2019 by MandFlurry

In my opinion, if you choose the faction at character creation. You should be locked to it forever. Story wise, game play wise. Only time I'd think it would work is if they added the tokens to switch factions like in WoW.

In the case of SWTOR I agree, but only because the games story was not designed with faction switching in mind.

In general it can be a interesting way to contruct a story, but obviously with the world construction of a MMO in the background this is hard to pull off.

In the case of SWTOR I agree, but only because the games story was not designed with faction switching in mind.

In general it can be a interesting way to contruct a story, but obviously with the world construction of a MMO in the background this is hard to pull off.

 

Obviously you guys haven't been doing the stories, as our characters from Each faction in the story lines can make decisions where we talk to other companions about Wanting to change our faction for the better, if not totally leave it. WTH, do you or any one else have a right to say you have to be locked in a faction, i'd tell any one to go to hell for that. Even in SWG MMO, we could change faction from Empire to Rebellion, but it was a hell of a lot faster.

choosing faction is something that cant change is GOOD

choosing class is that something that cant change is BAD (and dont say make another char coz speeders, companions, pets,armors cant all be moving and need way to huge time and effort to reobtain)

Edited June 24, 2019 by Kissakias

I suspect they're trying to buy time with the saboteur thing, with the plan being to eventually allow you to switch, if they can fit it into development time and story. The hangup likely being an enormous amount of technical work that the game was never built to support, to truly allow you to switch factions without breaking a thousand different variables.

 

And there are all sorts of scenarios that may be impossible or at least very annoying to account for, which makes me wonder if they even have much of a plan beyond Onslaught or if they're painting themselves into a corner (I mean, they could continue the saboteur thing for some time, but at a certain point, it'd be weird if you don't ever truly switch over... someone's gotta suspect eventually). An example of scenario that may be impossible or annoying to account for, say you have an old planetary quest for faction A and you switch to faction B. Do you just lose the quest and can now do faction B's planetary quest? Does it stay in your log but you can't complete it because you can't reach your old faction's area now? Do you hit some cutoff in the story where all old quests are considered completed and you can never go back and do them? What about other players you know on a particular faction side? Can you even play with them anymore? (I don't remember how this works normally with faction split as it is, tbh)

In my opinion, if you choose the faction at character creation.

 

Not necessarily, EQ2 had a nice traitor questline that allowed you to switch sides, but simply be given the dialogue options to 1) Pub 2) Imp is as lame as it gets.

Obviously you guys haven't been doing the stories, as our characters from Each faction in the story lines can make decisions where we talk to other companions about Wanting to change our faction for the better, if not totally leave it. WTH, do you or any one else have a right to say you have to be locked in a faction, i'd tell any one to go to hell for that. Even in SWG MMO, we could change faction from Empire to Rebellion, but it was a hell of a lot faster.

 

Lighten up, Francis. He's talking about game design where switching factions would change classes, skills, animations and companions.

Empire >>> Republic could work for me, but I can't think of any reason why one of my rep chars (and there are quite some lowlifes among them) would ever switch to the empire, where troublemakers are executed on the spot instead of getting a more or less firm slap on the wrist. A dark side Jedi has true freedom, why join the Sith who just crave it?

 

Doing the very same saboteur jobs for the Exchange or the Hutts would fit perfectly to most of my renegade chars. Heck, we could still have the same voice for the contact, it would just require alternative versions of the dialog lines where the empire/republic is explicitly mentioned.

Edited June 24, 2019 by Mubrak

I like it. I have an imperial agent who actually gets to be a real double agent. (And I dark jedi who enjoys taking stabs at the weak Republic)

While I am disappointed Ossus didn't allowed us to switch to the opposite faction like Iokath did I'll wait and see how the saboteur path proceeds, some of my characters would definitely switch over but they understand they can create more damage through deceit and treachery which is what they've been doing so I say let's wait to see how the story-line progresses. However if they pull us under the rug and force us to side with our original faction anyway then I'll be not only disappointed, but also very angry.

I think the issue with saying "you picked your faction at character creation" is that the story specifically has already created scenarios in which your character can choose to do things suggesting they want to switch sides, and that's been true since the game began. In the case of the Agent, BH and Smuggler it can even be argued that they have the option to be 'third faction' since they can choose to go off the grid (IA), become Mandalorian (BH) or establish their own underworld power base (smuggler). It's also built into the IA story that they can officially switch sides. The JK can tell Scourge they are interested in being a Sith. They took it farther with KOTFE by placing your character outside their faction and giving them chances to officially align with the other side.

 

So IMHO it's not as simple as saying 'return to the faction whence you came.' The story arcs many PCs have taken puts them in situations where that just doesn't make sense. But being a saboteur and pretending to support their old faction doesn't work plausibly for some characters either. Best case scenario for most of my own characters would have been to stay on Team Alliance and not work for either faction.

Empire >>> Republic could work for me, but I can't think of any reason why one of my rep chars (and there are quite some lowlifes among them) would ever switch to the empire, where troublemakers are executed on the spot instead of getting a more or less firm slap on the wrist. A dark side Jedi has true freedom, why join the Sith who just crave it?

Have you tried LS Trooper class story? Republic screw up original Havoc Squad with Tavus. And Dagger Wing. And lets general Rakton go for stupid politics reasons.

Post-class story, Republic waits it out while Empire offers help and Acina offers alliance. Republic also opens hostilities on Iokath and there's also that thing with Saresh trying to assasinate you and taking over Alliance. And then Republic has the gall to officially condemn you for not rolling over and dying for Saresh.

I mean, if you're roleplaying trooper with Forex-levels of hardwired loyalty that's fine, but with Senators being douchebags to Havoc at every opportunity, there's enough reasons to officially switch sides.

Edited June 24, 2019 by madarsrikards

I have a dark jedi V that wants to defect to the Empire and become Sith. I love the idea of defection, but I hate that I still feel like I'm doing good-goody quests for the Republic. Also, someone of our character's statures wouldn't be fighting fires and protecting tomatoes. I'd like to think we'd be working on more important things, protecting or destroying more important things. Who cares about lettuce? The hungry I suppose, and I see the logic in depriving the enemy of a food source, but that doesn't make it exciting to play. There was no lettuce in The Hunger Games lol.

 

I'm wondering if it's possible to make saboteurs' daily quests be the ones for the Empire instead of the Republic. The quests could stay the same, we'd just be playing the quests for the side we want to join...

I think for some people it would be better to "Just change". Between Lana and Theron (for those that didn't *Burn that bridge) we have every ability to contact whatever faction we want to join and simply Discuss it with Faction leader maybe a short (Because we cant have a substantial and complex $$) meeting at a designated location we otherwise couldn't travel to (eg. Drommand Kass, Korriban for Rep or Tython, Ord Mantel for Imp/ Sith) several Dialog choices concerning past incidents against and for this faction, our actions during the Zakuul story, How we think nowdays and based on those what the Other factions leader thinks, states their offer (may be good or not so much) we decide from there then go back to our Base notify the Alliance members, a few more leave as expected then receive our first Holocall from the new faction with the next mission. I have no plans to change factions myself but I also don't see why those that do should *Always have to blow up all their friends and possibly old original companions that refuse to change.

Switching factions in a way that goes beyond taking the role of a spy/saboteur would be tricky. Take Jedi and Sith for example. If you switch to the other side, you're not going to be allowed to be Jedi or Sith any longer. There are no Jedi among the Sith Empire(unless you include spies like Barel Ovair), and there are no Sith among the Jedi Order.

 

Effectively, players would be required to become whichever class they mirror on the opposite faction. (Jedi Guardian becomes a Sith Juggernaut, etc.) If not just for story reasons, then probably for technical reasons as well. For example, a lot of NPCs have specific lines of dialogue that are exclusive to the original 4 classes of one faction only. Would players have to leave their guilds to join one on the other faction, or would guilds be cross-faction now?

 

Additionally, after switching factions, your character would still have the same voice actor, but not the prerecorded lines of dialogue necessary to give appropriate responses during conversations in faction-exclusive content such as missions and flashpoints.

 

Maybe there's a way to make it work, but it would require a lot of adjustments and taking a lot of things into consideration. I do think the idea is interesting though.

This wont be easy or smooth and certainly wont wrap itself up in just one or two more updates adding to the already too long waits between updates and too small content amounts. What about L.I.'s? some are fanatically set in their original faction, do they Mindlessly follow us to their enemy's side or do they maintain their default principles and break off from the player? BW offered more then they could sustain with the Zakuul stories and complicated that with more Iokath options, each tangling the various player directions more then before, now not so much 2 story directions but 4, or 2 with uncomfortably edited dialog options to fit all and not specifically derived. A big Mess. Edited June 24, 2019 by MikeCobalt

I am also wondering how they plan to handle it with the LIs. All of the KOTFE ones are problematic to one or both factions. I can't see the Jedi Council reacting well if you show up and tell them you married a Sith. Or either faction being comfortable with Arcann. Among the vanilla companions I do think there are those who would walk if they discovered their LI was a saboteur. Elara Dorne, certainly. Probably Jorgan, too. Kira. Possibly Raina. Quinn's very loyal to the SW but I think even he would object and walk if the PC ended up blowing the Empire to bits. There's also the point that with the exception of Theron and Lana you can't even tell the LI you're a saboteur, so now you're lying to them too.

Lighten up, Francis. He's talking about game design where switching factions would change classes, skills, animations and companions.

 

I apologize for my stupidity then.

could just make a quest line to swap factions, absolutly no need to swap skills or anything, its just switching from one side to the other. the real issue lies in you couldnt do it before around lvl 60 or just do it when you start up kotfe stuff since all quests are the same from that point on. (story wise it would just be the same really for the class, sorc becomes sage and sage becomes sorc. so its just a matter of a switch in the railroad tracks ( i know its no small feat to pull this off, but for frag sake, this is star wars... this SHOULD be something that is in the game, as well as you killing of your master to become lord etc etc, failing to become jedi gets you exiled or even banished, i mean this is what this whole religion thing evolves about but in this game we cant even walk on to unhollow/hallowed ground even if we did the saboteur quest... )

personally i like it but i do wish we could go further and openly support our new faction, almost all of my characters would be switching sides. On the other hand i understand if its technically impossible but i wonder if there is a compromise, for sub lvl70 content that is already in the game you count towards your original faction, for new content you count towards whatever faction you chose, so you get access to both fleets, both home worlds and so on but you cant do the old planetary story arcs and side missions for your new faction