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Canonical Choices


EAFSAMWISE

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I know this thread will probably be met with backlash and that people will probably be making tons of "you decide how the story goes, it's up to you," comments, so I am acknowledging the reality of that beforehand. With this in mind, however, I had an exchange that recently got me thinking--I was playing on my Jedi Knight toon and got to the point in KOTFE where you start recruiting people for the Alliance. One of the more minor exchanges I had was with 2V-R8, the default service droid for ships that all Imp players in the game have. he mentions at one point how "cruel" his master was and how happy he was to be free from him. So in light of this I was wondering, since every class story involves you playing supposedly as a real character in galactic history, are certain possible choices more "canonical" than others in terms of what actually happens? I.e., should it be assumed that Republic characters mostly choose Light-Side options and that Imperial characters mostly choose Dark-side options? Thus should it be assumed that Jaesa Wilsaam's parents were really murdered in cold blood by her soon-to-be master, and that Vette remained a slave and was abused/tortured, for example? Please share your thoughts on this.
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Given that the dialogue in 2V-R8's reunion when playing an imperial does not change based on whether you're light or dark, I don't think he's meant to be seen as having the best judgement of whether his masters are cruel or kind.

 

Also, Jaesa cannot be recruited by anyone other than the Sith Warrior. And she never even appears for anyone else. Almost certainly in order to avoid establishing a canon. (A similar case occurs with Khem Val, who can potentially have be forced out of his body, leaving Zash as the sole owner.)

 

So no, there is no canon. And the devs are in fact actively going out of their way to avoid establishing a canon. They do have a "default" for people who skip straight to later stories, but not a strict canon.

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Given that the dialogue in 2V-R8's reunion when playing an imperial does not change based on whether you're light or dark, I don't think he's meant to be seen as having the best judgement of whether his masters are cruel or kind.

 

Also, Jaesa cannot be recruited by anyone other than the Sith Warrior. And she never even appears for anyone else. Almost certainly in order to avoid establishing a canon. (A similar case occurs with Khem Val, who can potentially have be forced out of his body, leaving Zash as the sole owner.)

 

So no, there is no canon. And the devs are in fact actively going out of their way to avoid establishing a canon. They do have a "default" for people who skip straight to later stories, but not a strict canon.

Pretty much this, also let's remember how 2V is telling a story about how he "stoop up" to his "evil master" or something in order to look cooler than he actually is, and by this means, I mean he was straight up lying.

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That's because yes, there is certainly a canon, though not discussed. Imperial characters are all assumed to make darkside choices and lightside characters assumed to make lightside choices. That's why it's the default for most choices save a few like with Theron where the default for both imps/pubs is keeping him. That's why even the wikis use these. Darth Nox for example is evil by default, and assumed to have treated his companions like a sith would same with Warrior hence why 2V acts that way. Darth Imperius is treated as the "gameplay alternative".

 

You can play as DS Jedi and LS sith, this game gives you that freedom, but the canon for these classes are always seen as falling inline with their roles. In all games with choices the lightside is considered the canon. It's pretty much the rule. They may say there is no canon, because the game is on-going and they don't want to take certain players out of it. But you better believe once this game wraps up, or they decide to go with another game a canon will be chosen as it was with the original kotors, and it will without a doubt have all the classes fall in-line with their roles and probably place the Knight's story as canon protag.

Edited by vallixas
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That's because yes, there is certainly a canon, though not discussed. Imperial characters are all assumed to make darkside choices and lightside characters assumed to make lightside choices. That's why it's the default for most choices save a few like with Theron where the default for both imps/pubs is keeping him. That's why even the wikis use these. Darth Nox for example is evil by default, and assumed to have treated his companions like a sith would same with Warrior hence why 2V acts that way. Darth Imperius is treated as the "gameplay alternative".

 

You can play as DS Jedi and LS sith, this game gives you that freedom, but the canon for these classes are always seen as falling inline with their roles. In all games with choices the lightside is considered the canon. It's pretty much the rule. They may say there is no canon, because the game is on-going and they don't want to take certain players out of it. But you better believe once this game wraps up, or they decide to go with another game a canon will be chosen as it was with the original kotors, and it will without a doubt have all the classes fall in-line with their roles and probably place the Knight's story as canon protag.

 

You have a misunderstanding here default=/=canon, ME has default choices for characters and so does Dragon Age. Neither of those default states are the canon, I also highly doubt we'll see a canon version of events within the game after it closes. Its the last piece of Legends material being published and I don't see Lucasfilm bothering with chosing a canon version like they did with KOTOR unless they continue Legends, which is unlikely to ever happen. Also the wikis use it for the purposes of making it easier to write about those figures, and they're fan-wikis. Using fan wikis an argument is not how things work, they're not edited and approved by Bioware or Lucasfilm.

Edited by FlameYOL
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So no, there is no canon. And the devs are in fact actively going out of their way to avoid establishing a canon. They do have a "default" for people who skip straight to later stories, but not a strict canon.

I would argue that they have in fact established a canon choice: Sparing Broga the Hutt on Quesh in exchange for his servitute. You can kill or spare him, but he later appears as a Republic ally in the Republic Quesh story where Moff Dracen is killed or arrested and then shipped away from Quesh. The way I look at that is the only way for both stories to work is for Broga to betray the Empire and later help the Republic kill/arrest Dracen. It's the only way I imagine the Quesh story's continuity making sense.

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I would argue that they have in fact established a canon choice: Sparing Broga the Hutt on Quesh in exchange for his servitute. You can kill or spare him, but he later appears as a Republic ally in the Republic Quesh story where Moff Dracen is killed or arrested and then shipped away from Quesh. The way I look at that is the only way for both stories to work is for Broga to betray the Empire and later help the Republic kill/arrest Dracen. It's the only way I imagine the Quesh story's continuity making sense.

 

I don't like Quesh's story. I hate the idea of my choices being invalidated. (Fun fact: I originally thought the Imperial story took place after the Republic story since Broga can be killed. I forgot Dracen showed up in the Republic story and could be killed.)

 

I think it's meant to be a mutually exclusive case where whoever canonically wins on Quesh is determined by who the player plays as.

 

Though, I prefer to headcanon that Broga had the foresight to flee Quesh and place a body double before the Imps got a hold of him.

Edited by rashencyberspeed
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I don't like Quesh's story. I hate the idea of my choices being invalidated. (Fun fact: I originally thought the Imperial story took place after the Republic story since Broga can be killed. I forgot Dracen showed up in the Republic story and could be killed.)

 

I think it's meant to be a mutually exclusive case where whoever canonically wins on Quesh is determined by who the player plays as.

 

Though, I prefer to headcanon that Broga had the foresight to flee Quesh and place a body double before the Imps got a hold of him.

Fair enough. I think you can look at it as both happening, or it's like shared Flashpoints and Operations as well as the Warzones (Assuming those aren't just constant battles, either faction could have won on Novare and the Voidstar etc.)

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You have a misunderstanding here default=/=canon, ME has default choices for characters and so does Dragon Age. Neither of those default states are the canon, I also highly doubt we'll see a canon version of events within the game after it closes. Its the last piece of Legends material being published and I don't see Lucasfilm bothering with chosing a canon version like they did with KOTOR unless they continue Legends, which is unlikely to ever happen. Also the wikis use it for the purposes of making it easier to write about those figures, and they're fan-wikis. Using fan wikis an argument is not how things work, they're not edited and approved by Bioware or Lucasfilm.

 

Actually yes, many of the default choices in those games are canon. And the developer usually establishes the canon after the next title releases as to not invalidate people's choices during it's run. They have done so with Dragon Age, Origins has a canon warden who is the Dalish Elf, despite giving us the choice to chose our race. Alistair is the canonical king etc https://twitter.com/BioMarkDarrah/status/364864515717873665. The books and comics also follow this canon. We could also choose in the original Kotor games, but they still went with a canon in the end. This applies to not just Bioware games. In most games the default choice is considered the canon, most recently Assassins Creed. It is this way for continuity reasons. The Wikis, follow the general rule Lucas established himself; Lightside is always canon in any game with choices, and Bioware despite not outright saying it continues to follow this rule. The Knight is clearly the canonical Outlander as shown in all the trailers. Arcann and Senya are assumed to be saved as they are alongside the Knight in Echoes as well.

Pretty sure it's a huge reason they've managed to kill off just about every major Sith/Imp character but Satele still walks around with the biggest plot armor in the game.

Hell the entire KOTFE expansion is most fitting for Knight, and seems out of place for all other parties involved. It's not like we should be surprised by any of this. We already know the Empire loses for one. We already know a world state where the empire has killed or enslaved everyone is not happening lol

Edited by vallixas
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Actually yes, many of the default choices in those games are canon.

No. It's only a default for characters that didn't play through the other content, not a definitive statement of what "really" happens. That's what "canon" really means, mind, a definitive statement of what happens, and the defaults aren't that.

 

They have to be *something* (i.e. if your character doesn't play through the class stories or KotFE or whatever, there has to be *something* for what the character did during those stories), but that doesn't make that "something" any sort of definitive version.

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Actually yes, many of the default choices in those games are canon. And the developer usually establishes the canon after the next title releases as to not invalidate people's choices during it's run. They have done so with Dragon Age, Origins has a canon warden who is the Dalish Elf, despite giving us the choice to chose our race. Alistair is the canonical king etc https://twitter.com/BioMarkDarrah/status/364864515717873665. The books and comics also follow this canon. We could also choose in the original Kotor games, but they still went with a canon in the end. This applies to not just Bioware games. In most games the default choice is considered the canon, most recently Assassins Creed. It is this way for continuity reasons. The Wikis, follow the general rule Lucas established himself; Lightside is always canon in any game with choices, and Bioware despite not outright saying it continues to follow this rule. The Knight is clearly the canonical Outlander as shown in all the trailers. Arcann and Senya are assumed to be saved as they are alongside the Knight in Echoes as well.

Pretty sure it's a huge reason they've managed to kill off just about every major Sith/Imp character but Satele still walks around with the biggest plot armor in the game.

Hell the entire KOTFE expansion is most fitting for Knight, and seems out of place for all other parties involved. It's not like we should be surprised by any of this. We already know the Empire loses for one. We already know a world state where the empire has killed or enslaved everyone is not happening lol

Dragon Age has no canon, a default world state does not constitute a canon and I cannot stress that enough. As far as the comics are concerned, they use their own world state. Developers have said the events still happen in different world states, just not in the way they happened in the comics, like Alistair meeting his father regardless of whether or not he is a King or if he remained as a Grey Warden.

 

KOTOR had a canon because of it being in Star Wars, neither of Bioware original IPs have a canon Shepard/Ryder or a canon Warden/Hawke/Inquisitor, again. A default world state does not mean its canon! Asssassin's Creed is another deal entirely, that is a saga that didn't even began as an RPG and as I understand they had promised not to invalidate people's choice. A promise that was broken, and they were rightfully criticized for it. As far as this game again, the developers have gone out of their way to not establish a canon, marketing material does not constitute continuity. Once again, using fan wikis is not an argument so I'm not even going to address that. And the Empire doesn't have to win even if you play as Imperial, the Empire could still fall apart despite your best efforts.

Edited by FlameYOL
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Dragon Age has no canon, a default world state does not constitute a canon and I cannot stress that enough. As far as the comics are concerned, they use their own world state. Developers have said the events still happen in different world states, just not in the way they happened in the comics, like Alistair meeting his father regardless of whether or not he is a King or if he remained as a Grey Warden.

 

KOTOR had a canon because of it being in Star Wars, neither of Bioware original IPs have a canon Shepard/Ryder or a canon Warden/Hawke/Inquisitor, again. A default world state does not mean its canon! Asssassin's Creed is another deal entirely, that is a saga that didn't even began as an RPG and as I understand they had promised not to invalidate people's choice. A promise that was broken, and they were rightfully criticized for it. As far as this game again, the developers have gone out of their way to not establish a canon, marketing material does not constitute continuity. Once again, using fan wikis is not an argument so I'm not even going to address that. And the Empire doesn't have to win even if you play as Imperial, the Empire could still fall apart despite your best efforts.

 

But this is false as has been stated by the dev himself, as has been followed by the comics itself, there is a confirmed Dragon Age canon. We have the books we have the default state we have the official word of the dev. Not sure what's left for you to argue.

 

As for Assassins Creed the default Eivor when you choose to randomize the selection, is always female Eivor, likewise the devs confirmed she is the canon Eivor. And Male Eivor is but a glorified skin of a dead being reincarnated as female Eivor LOL (they even confirm this in-game which actually was sort of bizarre because they pretty much tell players male Eivor doesn't really exist and the player is just wearing an alternate skin). Reinforced further by the fact certain characters in-game will refer to Male Eivor as "she" and "her" instead of him, multiple times.

 

Back on the subject of the Empire, they would never make the majority of the choices on the Empire side canon. Not ever. Empire players are always assumed to make darkside choices. Playing as a LS sith/DS jedi is but flavor for us. All of these roles are assumed to play their proper roles. They would never use an Empire state because that would destroy any continuity. Being that you can pretty much kill off most important characters.

 

That's why they made the right choice with choosing LS canon for SWTOR to build on from the original Kotors. There was really no other way. This game might be the last in Legends, and this discussion might not ultimately matter in the long run (unless someone decides to produce books or comics later on). But if it were to continue in another product you better believe the following:

 

"In side-choosing games such as the Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic series and Dark Forces saga where the player has the choice between light side and dark side, as of yet, the light side ending has been verified as canonical by Lucasfilm in all games."

 

Would hold as it did for Kotor and every other choiced based Star Wars game. There's no doubt in my mind regardless of our choices, regardless of our romances if they were to produce another game

 

 

Male Knight x Lana would be the canon, and I say this as a Theron, Kira and Vette lover

 

Edited by vallixas
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This game has no established canon. That said, I think the SW would mostly make DS choices but there is a quest early on where an instructor praises him/her for a light side choice. Never waste a resource.
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Or, to be clear, there is no canon in-game except what the devs have established themselves. The Hero of Tython defeats Vitiate on Dromund Kaas and the Warrior receives a message about it shortly after he defeats Darth Baras. There is no option to spare Darth Thanaton at the end of the Inquisitor storyline. There is no option for the SW to kill a certain companion for his betrayal. And Tyresius wasn’t killed by the bounty hunter on Tatooine (however much I wish that was an option).

 

Those things decided by players are mostly a matter of personal taste.

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Those things decided by players are mostly a matter of personal taste.

It actually doesn't matter *how* the players make those choices (personal taste, preplanned path even though the player wouldn't choose that option, dice(1), whatever). All that matters is that the *players* make the choices.

 

So the definitive version of what happens in the Dark Council chamber at the end of the Inquisitor story is that:

 

The Inquisitor and Darth Thanaton fight, and although the Inquisitor wins the fight, Darth Thanaton survives it and is killed by Darth Mortis. The Inquisitor is then raised to be a member of the Dark Council in Thanaton's place, and Darth Marr bestows the rank of Darth and a Darth-name title on the Inqusitor.

 

The Darth-name title itself is not definitive, of course, since the player (and only the player) has control over which of the three titles is granted.(2)

 

(1) If you have a three-sided coin, feel free to use that instead of dice.

 

(2) Yes, even now, all three are available. https://i.imgur.com/6afPhCd.jpg was taken on a character that I began *after* 5.0 added the alignment toggle knob thing.

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  • 2 weeks later...
Actually yes, many of the default choices in those games are canon. And the developer usually establishes the canon after the next title releases as to not invalidate people's choices during it's run. They have done so with Dragon Age, Origins has a canon warden who is the Dalish Elf, despite giving us the choice to chose our race. Alistair is the canonical king etc https://twitter.com/BioMarkDarrah/status/364864515717873665. The books and comics also follow this canon. We could also choose in the original Kotor games, but they still went with a canon in the end. This applies to not just Bioware games. In most games the default choice is considered the canon, most recently Assassins Creed. It is this way for continuity reasons. The Wikis, follow the general rule Lucas established himself; Lightside is always canon in any game with choices, and Bioware despite not outright saying it continues to follow this rule. The Knight is clearly the canonical Outlander as shown in all the trailers. Arcann and Senya are assumed to be saved as they are alongside the Knight in Echoes as well.

Pretty sure it's a huge reason they've managed to kill off just about every major Sith/Imp character but Satele still walks around with the biggest plot armor in the game.

Hell the entire KOTFE expansion is most fitting for Knight, and seems out of place for all other parties involved. It's not like we should be surprised by any of this. We already know the Empire loses for one. We already know a world state where the empire has killed or enslaved everyone is not happening lol

 

Wait so which is it? Is light-side the "canon" for everyone or is it just "canon" for pub-side and the dark side is canon for imp side? Also I agree with the Knight being the "canonical" storyline, especially with how the emperor is consistently the chief antagonist throughout that story and in the expacs and how despite being more personal and specific in their relationships with the Knight, Kira and Scourge become universally available and show up to everyone regardless. It just doesn't fit well in that part if you're not playing as a knight, especially since any other comps for other classes who played roles similar to those played by Kira and Scourge (romance in Kira's case, and Scourge joins the knight to begin with bc he specifically had a vision that the knight would be the one to destroy the emperor, not to mention he's the only class companion in the whole game to have had a connection to Revan), would be exclusive to those classes (I.e.Jaesa, Nadia Grell, Sahara Zavros, Khem Val, etc). The Jedi Knight seems in the best position to be connected to the overall plot of the game as a whole.

Edited by EAFSAMWISE
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Wait so which is it? Is light-side the "canon" for everyone or is it just "canon" for pub-side and the dark side is canon for imp side? Also I agree with the Knight being the "canonical" storyline, especially with how the emperor is consistently the chief antagonist throughout that story

If by putting quotes around canon, you mean so-called canon, I'd accept it. Some people have called it so, therefore it is, indeed, so-called canon.

 

That doesn't suffice to make it actually canon, i.e. *definitive*, though, and it's not the sort of thing that BioWare should busy itself with establishing. The reason given for the preview trailers for KotFE/ET/after using that particular character is really simple: the character they chose looks the same in all the trailers, and doesn't look like any of the principal NPCs, so he's easy to recognise. That it's a JK is simply that it must be *something*, and JK is what they chose.

 

Concluding from that choice that JK is in any way *definitive* presupposes that BioWare wanted to define one particular class / sex / species combination as *definitive* in some way. And clearly BioWare are wrong, because Tikreva'tarsil is the One True Outlander Jedi Knight. :rak_03:

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Wait so which is it? Is light-side the "canon" for everyone or is it just "canon" for pub-side and the dark side is canon for imp side? Also I agree with the Knight being the "canonical" storyline, especially with how the emperor is consistently the chief antagonist throughout that story and in the expacs and how despite being more personal and specific in their relationships with the Knight, Kira and Scourge become universally available and show up to everyone regardless. It just doesn't fit well in that part if you're not playing as a knight, especially since any other comps for other classes who played roles similar to those played by Kira and Scourge (romance in Kira's case, and Scourge joins the knight to begin with bc he specifically had a vision that the knight would be the one to destroy the emperor, not to mention he's the only class companion in the whole game to have had a connection to Revan), would be exclusive to those classes (I.e.Jaesa, Nadia Grell, Sahara Zavros, Khem Val, etc). The Jedi Knight seems in the best position to be connected to the overall plot of the game as a whole.

 

Valixas doesn't understand canon as well as they think they do. (I'm 100% sure the relationship of BioWare's novels in relation to the games is "canon to the extent that player choice is not contradicted".)

 

Plain and simple, there isn't any canonical choices to this game. Light side or dark side, Jedi Knight outlander or not, that's up to YOU. Nobody else.

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The basic premise of the game is canon. The broad strokes of the game’s story is canon. The PCs exist in the game’s world even if you’re not playing them but not much can be known about them definitively. What choices you make in the game cannot be known definitively but the fact your PC made a choice at a given moment is canon. Edited by Atajji
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The basic premise of the game is canon. The broad strokes of the game’s story is canon. The PCs exist in the game’s world even if you’re not playing them but not much can be known about them definitively. What choices you make in the game cannot be known definitively but the fact your PC made a choice at a given moment is canon.

Not necessarily. In KotFE/ET, there are some choices that occur later in the sequence that are only available for you if you make ==> that choice back there.

 

Spoilerish example:

 

If you blow the Spire in Chapter X of KotFE, and don't lie about it, Koth will leave and take the Gravestone with him. He comes back and goes away again in KotET Chapter I, and again in Chapter III. How he goes away in the Chapter III case is up to you, but in broad strokes either you murder him or you can forgive him, but he goes away.

 

But, that choice isn't offered if you talked Kaliyo out of blowing the Spire. What is the "canon" (i.e. definitive) state of affairs in that chapter? Koth has no definitive fate (maybe he's alive and still with you, maybe he's alive and gone away, maybe he's dead), and even the *existence* of the choice to murder or forgive him is non-definitive.

 

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True enough in that specific case but the Eternal Empire still invades and the Eternal Alliance is formed by the Alliance Commander with the help of Theron Shan and Lana Beniko to combat against it.

And eventually Arcann is defeated and Vaylin takes his place.

Edited by Atajji
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Not necessarily. In KotFE/ET, there are some choices that occur later in the sequence that are only available for you if you make ==> that choice back there.

 

Spoilerish example:

 

If you blow the Spire in Chapter X of KotFE, and don't lie about it, Koth will leave and take the Gravestone with him. He comes back and goes away again in KotET Chapter I, and again in Chapter III. How he goes away in the Chapter III case is up to you, but in broad strokes either you murder him or you can forgive him, but he goes away.

 

But, that choice isn't offered if you talked Kaliyo out of blowing the Spire. What is the "canon" (i.e. definitive) state of affairs in that chapter? Koth has no definitive fate (maybe he's alive and still with you, maybe he's alive and gone away, maybe he's dead), and even the *existence* of the choice to murder or forgive him is non-definitive.

 

The issue with Koth is ambiguous in a lot of cases. Most ppl know I'm a fan of lore/codex completion and so I know there's a codex entry for KOTET titled "Hylo Visz & the Gravestone" where if Koth left it details how Hylo Visz became the new Gravestone captain. This is a bit off-topic but it shows just how fluid and male able the actual plot is since Koth still appears fairly frequently and has substantial dialogue if you keep him. Same w/ Arcann & Senya. It also in many ways negates the idea that characters who have kill options for them can't come back in the future for ppl who didn't kill them.

Edited by EAFSAMWISE
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True enough in that specific case but the Eternal Empire still invades and the Eternal Alliance is formed by the Alliance Commander with the help of Theron Shan and Lana Beniko to combat against it.

And eventually Arcann is defeated and Vaylin takes his place.

Yes, agreed, the broad-strokes version is definitive(1). Your assertion was that the fact that you *make* a choice is canon. Not the result of the choice, mind, but the fact that it happened, and the Koth thing shows that even *that* isn't true. If you choose <<== this in the earlier chapter, ==> that choice never happened.

 

(1) It's definitive, but essentially devoid of meaningful information. "Someone emerged from the part of the galaxy known to the Galactic Republic and the Sith Empire. This person defeated first Valkorion, then Arcann, then Vaylin, bringing about the fall of the Eternal Empire."

 

The *interesting* part is missing. Who was it? Republic? Empire? Force User? Gun user? Male, female? What species? How did this person choose to deal with X, Y, Z, and W? That stuff. None of it is definitive.

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Darth Baras was defeated by his former apprentice. Darth Thanaton fought against a former slave who became a Sith and who was a descendant of Lord Kallig. General Rakton was defeated in battle by Havoc Squad. A Jedi whom Satele Shan had named the Hero of Tython fought against the Emperor’s True Voice on Dromund Kaas. A bounty hunter either assassinated Chancellor Janarus or didn’t (either way, Janarus is said to have died and is replaced by Saresh).

Edited by Atajji
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