Sooner or later there will come a time when you will find yourself needing a few Companion Gifts to raise the affection of your erstwhile compatriots towards the mythical 10,000 maximum. Now maybe you can accomplish this just by having them tag along. I did this once with Mako and surprised myself as I actually was not paying attention to companion affection at the time. But most of the time these guys need a little help. And if you're going to do it for five or six of your companions, you'll need a lot of help because they all can't be in all those conversations where they like what you say and award affection accordingly.

 

A very good guide on how to begin this process is here: http://www.swtor.com/community/showthread.php?t=573213&highlight=companion+affection The basic idea is to get a companion from 0 to 6,000 using the gift vendor on fleet. Those gifts cost either 200 or 600 credits each. If your companion has a moderate affection for some of those gifts in either tier, it's not that difficult to get them to 6,000 with very little expenditure. It doesn't work for ALL companions because some of them just don't like a lot of the gifts. Ashara working with a female toon, for example, is just about impossible to please and the method shown the link above simply won't work with her at all. But most of the time it will.

 

Companions like gifts at four different levels:

 

1. No like at all. Worthless.

2. Small, worth just a few points

3. Moderate, getting better

4. Large, the best there is.

 

The NUMBER of points actually depends on several factors. One is the current level of affection in increments of 2,000. A companion who likes a gift at a Moderate level when he/she is at affection level zero will like the very same gift at only a "Small" level above 2,000 and not at all above 4,000. And "Moderate" might mean 60 points, or it might mean 30 points. "Small" might mean 30 points, or it might mean 10. When you are investigating this you will have you buy one each of all the "small" gifts to see which one awards the most points. You can't tell ahead of time.

 

You can also get up to a 30% bonus in gift affection points if you buy the Unlock on your legacy. It's under Legacy -> Character Perks -> Companions. There are three increments of 10% each available for CCs or credits: 10K, 30K, 50K for each level respectively. The same sort of bonus us also available separately for conversations. That's one of the reasons it is difficult to predict exactly how many points a given gift will get you. The words "moderate" or "small" give you different points for different gifts, then you have to factor in these bonuses you have selected.

 

From 6,000 to 10,000 will likely require you to obtain Companion Gifts one way or another. They are available:

 

1. on the GTN

2. As part of Cartel Packs

3. or your companions can go get them.

 

They may show up once in awhile as a drop or a gift to you after finishing a quest, but that kind of procurement is not dependable. Gifts on the GTN can be horribly expensive and the market is very volatile. Gifts via Cartel Packs suffer the same problems as a drop. They're random and you only get one. At least on the GTN you know what you are getting.

 

But the research on the GTN is tedious. You must roll over each gift with your companion at your side to figure out which gifts offer Large or Moderate affection while comparing prices. You are looking for the cheapest gifts the award the highest affection which, of course, varies per companion. It's rare to find a cheap gift that awards Large affection, but it does happen. The only way to find out is to look at each one, which is probably over 200 pages worth. Write down which gifts are Moderate or Large; don't bother with Small gifts at this point. There are too many and not worth tracking.

 

The cheapest way to get gifts is via companion missions at level 49-50. These missions return the best gifts and there are no gifts available at all above 50. This means that if you otherwise don't need it, you can stop at level 450 with that skill. They, too, suffer from randomness as you can't predict which gifts they will return, but it's a lot cheaper than the GTN. Besides, you can sell the ones you don't need. The skills that can return Companion Gifts are:

 

1. Underworld Trading

2. Investigation

3. Diplomacy

4. Treasure Hunting

 

Underworld Trading is, IMO, the very best way to get gifts. The missions pop on a consistent basis, sometimes 4 or 5 at a time. At the highest level of 49-50, if your companion is already at max affection, the missions almost never fail. In fact, I can't remember when one did. Never say never, but it is very rare.

 

Investigation is a close second, but my feeling is that missions don't pop quite as readily and are also subject to a greater failure rate. If you are wanting to do five missions at a time you'll be doing the logout/login shuffle more than you want to get everyone properly deployed.

 

Diplomacy pops as well as Underworld Trading, but the issue here, at least for some, is that missions also reward you light/dark side points. If you are concerned about keeping the highest level of one or the other, multiple missions will bounce you back and forth since the ratio of light to dark is about half and half. If you don't care about that issue, then Diplomacy is as good as the first two with a failure rate like Underworld Trading.

 

Treasure Hunting works, but it really is the worst of the bunch. Not only do missions not pop at the rate they do with Underworld Trading, they also frequently return gift "fragments," even at the highest 49-50 level. There are three kinds of fragments:

 

1. Premium (green) requires 12 fragments per gift

2. Prototype (blue) requires 6 fragments per gift

3. Artifact (purple) requires 8 fragments per gift

 

You can see that this doesn't make a lot of sense, but further, the pop rate for green Premium fragments is very low. You'll hardly get any of those. Once you have a sufficient number of fragments they can be assembled by the "Curator" (Same desk as the gift vendor.) on fleet into whole gifts. Here you can choose which gift is created, but credit for credit, Treasure Hunting costs the same as any other mission skill, and returning fragments when every other skill returns whole gifts means Treasure Hunting is far more expensive.

 

Now, when you are leveling companion affection to 10,000 you don't simply want to procure enough "Large" affection gifts to get him there. That's only half the story. The other half is to get him on the Legacy "Board" (Legacy -> Global Unlocks -> Imperial/Republic Classes) by finishing all the conversations with that companion. That grants you a Presence Bonus among other things. Conversations award points, sometimes hundreds of them, so if you want to be cost-effective about this process you will proceed with careful increments, making sure the companion is both in a rest area like a Cantina, and ALSO on your ship. These two places invoke different conversations.

 

So you want conversations to award free points if you can make it happen. That means increasing affection 500-1000 points at a time in a Cantina, where conversations will pop with yellow triangles, then move the companion to your ship to see if there are some conversations to be had there, then back to a Cantina for rinse and repeat. This will save you quite a few companion gifts, especially as you get toward the maximum affection of 10,000.

 

Edit: As psandak stated below, you can "farm" points, but whether or not you actually "farm" you still need to do the above because those conversations are going to sit there until you have them and you cannot get to done in terms of Legacy until you do them. "Farming" would mean you keep re-starting the conversation trying to get maximum points. I'm not suggesting you do that. In my experience just being respectful to your companions and not starting arguments intentionally will get you sufficient points with them.

 

IMO raising companion affection is definitely worth it, even if it is to finish all conversations and learn their stories, which sometimes involves running small missions with them. They vary in quality. Kaliyo, being a psychopath, is pretty interesting compared to a random soldier boy who hangs with you only a short while. I've only got three more to go, having done 37 out of 40. It's been an enjoyable experience.

 

If you have any thoughts on this or if I have erred in any way, please let us know here and I will revise.

Edited June 14, 2015 by MSchuyler

Damn this is one huge post but yeah one of the main reasons you need companion affection is to speeden up your crew skill missions and i think it affects your success rates in crew skills as well Edited June 14, 2015 by NUTMANIAC

I have only one real issue with your guide: farming affection points through conversations. While what you are suggesting is 100% accurate, in my opinion, doing what you suggest takes away from the story. It will cost more credits in the long term - because you have to acquire more companion gifts - but farming conversation points leads to a schizophrenic character.

 

If you (the new player reading this guide) care about such things (and not all players do), then do not farm conversation points. Make conversation choices based on the character personality you have chosen and let the chips fall where they may. You will enjoy the stories a LOT more if you do.

I have only one real issue with your guide: farming affection points through conversations.

 

I never suggested that. I simply said you need to have those conversations. Nevertheless, I edited to make that point more clearly. I'm grateful that's all you found. :-)

IF you don't want to lose affection with your comps, just get Treek/HK, they are not programmed for general quests.

IF you don't want to lose affection with your comps, just get Treek/HK, they are not programmed for general quests.

 

I haven't met a companion yet that was extremely negative at a personal level. Some of the most extreme negative points I ever received were in quest conclusions where all your companions got a say and there was no way you could please all of them. Plus points for one caused negative points from another. But as I said, just being respectful and showing an interest in them usually results in at least mildly positive points.

 

Treek (I've never used HK) does have her own affection tree and set of conversations. It does count as an achievement, but I'm not sure what other benefits you get by getting her to 10K .She's very concerned about being remembered for her great exploits.

 

I guess I did not really explain the difference between companion conversations in-game that come about as a result of them being your chosen companion during normal quest conversations with NPCs versus conversations initiated by the companion. You can, of course, manipulate who is with you during the former conversations. I've never chosen to do that and just take my lumps as they come, but you absolutely MUST have those companion-initiated conversations in rest areas and/or your ship. If you want to get them to max you cannot avoid them. Just buying them gifts to get them to 10K isn't enough.

See Dulfy's post on companions for a lot of the detail and a little bit of the math of affection. But I actually prefer this site for determining companion gifts. Bear in mind some sites call the middle and highest affection gifts "Favorite" and "Love" respectively, while other sites reverse the terminology.

 

It might seem complex at first, but it becomes second nature.

As a person with 19 alts who's just gotten another eight chars(which means 48 companions, including Treek) to 10000, I'd like to share a few tips:

 

- Always buy the Character perk for companion gifts - extra affection(you don't really need one for companion conversations). That would save you money in the long run - getting 229 affection instead of 176 matters.

 

- Always bulk-purchase blue Grade 5 gifts on the first days after a new Cartel Pack comes out. Gifts have no bind timers, people are selling them immediately, prices drop. Don't forget to check purple gifts, too - some poor soul would always sell a Rakata Grenade for 10k.

 

- Weapon gifts(and to the lesser extent, cultural gifts) are always expensive, no matter what you do. So I would recommend you give the companion the second most important gift. For example, Nadia needs cultural artifacts, which are crazy expensive(13k++), but you can pacify her with Republic gifts, which cost 2-3k each.

 

- You've got Treek unlocked in your legacy? Get her affection to 6000 via cheap gifts and don't talk to her until max level(55+). Then talk - she'll give you 360-840 affection for each conversation, you'll get her to 10000 in no time, and there'd be no need to waste those expensive Grade 5 technology gifts.

 

- Do not do any of these things if you're not planning to run a character as your crafter or as your regular mission runner(i.e. you're going to log on him/her every day to do crafting/mat/mission work). If you want to see the companions' stories and conversations for the class, 8800-9300 affection is usually enough to finish it.

I don't know if this is just me but I find that it is pointless getting the 600 gifts on the fleet, whenever I have tried this it only gives me just over double the affection the 200 gifts grant, while it is quicker the 3x the cost for only double the affection is not worth it.

 

Please correct me if I am wrong, I had tried this a few months ago but I am sure they were my results.

I don't know if this is just me but I find that it is pointless getting the 600 gifts on the fleet, whenever I have tried this it only gives me just over double the affection the 200 gifts grant, while it is quicker the 3x the cost for only double the affection is not worth it.

 

Grade 1 gifts for 200 credits used until the affection hits 6000 are cheaper, that's true - you'll spend less. But using Grade 2 gifts for 600(used from 4000 affection) is faster.

 

Theoretically you can keep using Grade 1 gifts until 6000, and then Grade 2 gifts until 8000. But that requires so many clicks that I find it easier and faster to use blue Grade 5 gifts from 6000 on.

I don't know if this is just me but I find that it is pointless getting the 600 gifts on the fleet, whenever I have tried this it only gives me just over double the affection the 200 gifts grant, while it is quicker the 3x the cost for only double the affection is not worth it.

 

Please correct me if I am wrong, I had tried this a few months ago but I am sure they were my results.

 

One of the problems with the gift vendor approach (detailed in depth in the link I provided above) is that it does not work well for all companions. Some of them "resist" the approach because they like nothing in that list at a Moderate level, whether it is the 200 range or the 600 range. When it works well you will spend less than 40K from zero to 6000 affection using the 200 level from 1 to 4000 and the 600 level from 4000 to 6000. The 2000-4000 level will double because the gifts fall from Moderate to Small, so if you're getting 60 points for a gift from 1-2000 it will fall to 30 points from 2000 to 4000. Still, since they cost 200 vice 600 it's cost-effective to do this.

 

But if you have Ashara as a companion and you are a female toon, none of this works because she doesn't like anything or the stuff she does like is worth like 12 points--hardly worth the effort. She is the worst of several toons that don't fit the original pattern. (And as a Sith I personally don't like her Jedi attitude anyway.)

 

So you may have hit a companion where the approach doesn't work well. Try it again with another one.

I hadn't noticed that about Ashara (haven't done SI). She appears to be about the worst for gift affection! At least for non-romancing.

 

But Jedi_riches general point is true: vendor rank 2 green gift costs 3x the rank 1 gift. For a comp in the 0-1999 range, it gives 1.1x affection, for 2000-3999 it gives 2x affection, for 4000-5999 it gives 2.5x affection. So it never is cost-effective compared to the 200 credit rank 1 gift. Just takes less time. Except ...

It does give affection for 6000-7999 (20% of what it did on-rank). Whereas the rank 1 gift now gives nothing.

 

All in that Dulfy post.

 

Me: I take first toon to 4000. You have plenty of time, and can farm the first FP for whopping affection.

4000 for second comp if of similar alignment to me, or my planned romance option

6000 if a later stage comp (including romance) and/or they are opposite-aligned

 

Then I let companion and normal quest dialogue affection do their thing. And for the tough cases, a few rank 4/5 gifts to get them over the top. Rarely takes much (HK51 is about the worst).

IF you don't want to lose affection with your comps, just get Treek/HK, they are not programmed for general quests.

Unless you do missions on Oricon that was the only place I got it with Treek for some reason..

Old player recently returned. I have been doing class stories I have never done and noticed the influence for those companions goes up pretty nicely.

 

For my old BH though having Mako at just 10 influence at level 55 is painful. For a test, I just ran Black Talon solo and got 4560 influence in about 20 mins. The bad side is a picked two light side convo choices (+200) which did not match my BH because I wanted to see the max influence.

 

Not sure if there is weekly lockout on that, but will run again without choosing light on those two and see how much influence I get.

No lockout. Yes, running Esseles/BT gives HUGE affection for your first companion. It always gave a lot (400 or so), now since they changed it to Influence and cranked up the reward rate, it is in the thousands. I got 7000+ with Vette. Edited November 23, 2015 by DocDAM

The companions gifts tables got updated on 17th Nov, so that there are now no companions that do not have at least 1 item they love

 

http://dulfy.net/2015/10/21/swtor-fallen-empire-companion-influences-guide/ has been updated to reflect this.

Edited November 23, 2015 by GythralSWTOR

No lockout. Yes, running Esseles/BT gives HUGE affection for your first companion. It always gave a lot (400 or so), now since they changed it to Influence and cranked up the reward rate, it is in the thousands. I got 7000+ with Vette.

 

You are right - just did it again and got over 5k influence even picking dark choices she disapproved of.

There's a big change now. Go to fleet companion gift vendor, buy the rank 1 (200 credits) gift that give moderate affection for that companion. One of them will give 128 affection each.

 

Companion rank 1 to 5 give 128 affection

Companion rank 6 to 10 give 102 affection

Thereafter 77 affection

 

You need 113 rank 1 gifts or 22.6k credits, to get a new companion from rank 1 to 10.

No point using rank 2 (600 credits) gift. e.g. from companion rank 6 onwards, rank 1 gift give 102 affection, rank 2 gift give 128 affection at 3 times the cost.

Thereafter 77 affection

[...]

No point using rank 2 (600 credits) gift. e.g. from companion rank 6 onwards, rank 1 gift give 102 affection, rank 2 gift give 128 affection at 3 times the cost.

Well, "thereafter" = till L15. Then it drops again, then again at 20.... See the updated Dulfy table and spreadsheet someone linked a few posts above.

 

But yeah, it was always more cost-effective to use the lower rank gift, just takes more time. With the new, more forgiving, diminishing returns table, it makes even more sense to stick with the lower rank gift. But if you are going for super-high Influence (say >25), you'll find yourself starting to buy the rank 5 and 6 gifts to avoid clicking for 10 hours

Confused newbie here, trying to figure this all out. I've been getting quite a few companion gifts as random drops while out questing, and I've just been sticking them in my cargo hold for now because I'm not sure what to do with them. Should I give them to my companion right away? Or save them for later, and see how high I can get them via conversations only, before using them? I've been to this dulfy site and looked at the charts but it's making my brain hurt. I don't get it.

Confused newbie here, trying to figure this all out. I've been getting quite a few companion gifts as random drops while out questing, and I've just been sticking them in my cargo hold for now because I'm not sure what to do with them. Should I give them to my companion right away? Or save them for later, and see how high I can get them via conversations only, before using them? I've been to this dulfy site and looked at the charts but it's making my brain hurt. I don't get it.

 

You're better off using the low level gifts sooner rather than later. If you give a low level gift to a companion with high influence you will gain a lower amount of influence (sometimes very low/negligible/zero).

 

For example:

 

If you look at the "LOVE" table on Dulfy - if your companion is influence level 1 and "loves" the gift type, giving them a level 1 green gift will gain you 128 Influence. If your companion is influence level 40-50 and "loves" the gift type, giving them a level 1 green gift will gain you 0 influence.

 

Hope that helps a bit

Edited November 23, 2015 by Ceinwyn
minor edit

Confused newbie here, trying to figure this all out. I've been getting quite a few companion gifts as random drops while out questing, and I've just been sticking them in my cargo hold for now because I'm not sure what to do with them. Should I give them to my companion right away? Or save them for later, and see how high I can get them via conversations only, before using them? I've been to this dulfy site and looked at the charts but it's making my brain hurt. I don't get it.

 

The Dulfy guide mentioned above can be found here: "Classic companion guide" for class companions

 

Once you start KOTFE: http://dulfy.net/2015/10/21/swtor-alliance-specialists-and-companion-recruitment-guide/

 

And finally the post 4.0 guide, complete with all new companions and even the new cartel market companions available from the GTN. : http://dulfy.net/2015/10/21/swtor-fallen-empire-companion-influences-guide/

 

Hope that's not too much to take in. The last guide is likely your best bet. There were some adjustments to what certain class companions like, which you'll find in that one.

The Dulfy guide mentioned above can be found here: "Classic companion guide" for class companions

 

Once you start KOTFE: http://dulfy.net/2015/10/21/swtor-alliance-specialists-and-companion-recruitment-guide/

 

And finally the post 4.0 guide, complete with all new companions and even the new cartel market companions available from the GTN. : http://dulfy.net/2015/10/21/swtor-fallen-empire-companion-influences-guide/

 

Hope that's not too much to take in. The last guide is likely your best bet. There were some adjustments to what certain class companions like, which you'll find in that one.

 

Possible error in chart -

 

Jaesa (dark) - weapon only gives me moderate influence gain with her.

Possible error in chart -

 

Jaesa (dark) - weapon only gives me moderate influence gain with her.

Short answer: the chart is correct.

 

Long answer:

 

What is her influence rank, what rank and quality of gift are you giving her, and what is the actual number of points you are getting?

 

The tooltip note saying "small" "moderate" or "large" gain when you hover over a gift only tells you roughly the number of points you will get. It's not an indicator of how well the companion likes that type of gift. And it doesn't adjust in any way for influence rank, or the gift rank or quality.

 

So regardless of the companion's "attitude" toward that type of gift, or anything else, if they will get (estimating here) 60 to 140 points from that specific gift, the tooltip will say "moderate" gain. And if they get over 140 points from it, , the tooltip will say "large" affection gain.

 

If it's their "love" type gift, but too low rank/quality relative to their influence rank, they will get zero points, and the tooltip will say "no gain". If it's a type they only "like" but it's a Rank 6 Purple gift, and you haven't gained any influence with them yet, the tooltip will says "large" gain, because you'll gain several hundred points of influence if you give them that gift.

 

Example:

I just happen to have a character with dark Jaesa at influence rank 12 (no romance). She gets "moderate" gain from the rank 1 "green" weapon gifts from the gift vendor on fleet. But she gets "small" or no gain from every other rank 1 gift type. For the rank 2 "green" gifts from the vendor, the tooltip says "moderate" gain for the weapon, but also "moderate" from luxury and trophy gifts, with small or no gain for the others.

 

The actual points gained from the gifts (i have full legacy boost unlocked) are:

Rank 1 weapon (moderate), 100

Rank 1 luxury (small), 56

Rank 1 military gear (small), 25

Rank 2 weapon (moderate), 133

Rank 2 luxury (moderate), 75

Rank 2 military gear (small), 33

 

This is exactly what she should get for those gifts if the weapon is "love" that gift and luxury/trophy are "favorite" gifts, etc., based on the charts at Dulfy. For a "love" rank 1 gift at influence rank 10 to 15, it's 77 points, plus 30% is 100 points, and so on. (Yes, I logged in my character, and bought and gave her those gifts, just to get the numbers for them).

Edited January 7, 2016 by Adric_the_Red