Just replaying Iokath and he’s one enjoyable aspect of it for me, besides the crappy story he’s in. I know he dies incredibly stupidly on Impside, but hey, Acina dies on Pubside and she still gets good amounts of screen time for Imp characters if she survives Iokath, I don’t remember ever seeing Jace again on Pubside? They really badly misused him having him available to die on Iokath at all imo.. the guy was one of the main promotional characters from the original release cinematic trailers with a cool backstory and has a really good voice actor for god sakes!

It’s criminal how they wasted him on such a silly death for a pointless 15 minute story beat we all wish we could retcon.. Now they probably can’t justify paying out for Principal Lewis from American Dad to come do a voice that half the playthroughs won’t hear.. But still. I’ll say I want it. For sure. They could even resurrect a “dead” Jace and give him a decent story update without much issue really too. It’s not like we called in medics to check his body. Theron checked him. And since we were against Jace at the time, and Theron generally likes the republic and obviously won’t want his father murdered by us, he lied about him being dead. Or he simply got it wrong. And Jace was recovered by Elara who ran off to get reinforcements instead of just running off like an idiot. There’s a lot they could do. And should do imo. It’s not like they haven’t gotten around a character dying before. Over and over and over and over again….

Sadly, I think they changed it; It used to be that if you bothered to go through the main story on Makeb, then you talked a LOT with Jace Malcolm for the lead-in / original run of the Makeb bonus missions. Want to say I tried it earlier this year, and they were fully terminal-obtained.

But aye - once characters are dead, they should really stay dead.

Dead characters should stay dead (unless it's a powerful force user like Valkorion, etc). If Malcolm was brought back from the dead then they would have to do the same with Acina. I liked Malcolm as a character but I guess the reason why they haven't brought him back is because of his relationship with Satele and Theron. Would he even want to work with the person who left his son to die and tried to kill his baby mama twice (optional)?

Look, in theory, I agree. Dead is dead and I mostly prefer people to stay that way. But not here. Not when they’ve criminally wasted a character on such a terrible story beat like that. Plus its not like he got a lightsaber ran through him. I wouldn’t see it as impossible for him to have survived Iokath. I mean, I’ve seen a lot of non valkorion characters survive worse. Didn’t we get stabbed by Arcann and just shrug it off? And just because one side gets resurrected doesn’t mean you’d HAVE to do it with Acina too. She’s clearly not as big of a character. I mean was she in the cinematic trailers for the game? I never even heard her name until KOTFE. And what would Jace not wanting to work with you have to do with it? You could have him as an enemy for those who killed Theron 🤷🏻 He doesn’t have to appear as a friendly face for every class and character. And besides, he doesn’t get to decide who he wants to work with… he’s a soldier. If the Republic tells him to do something, he does it. I’m sure he wasn’t too thrilled to be asking a Sith Lord who has murdered thousands of his fellow soldiers or the Bounty Hunter who slaughtered the Chancellor for help on Iokath either, but his superiors forced it.

I think Jace being in the Cinematic Trailers might be part of why they killed him on Iokath; to make the events there and after more impactful.

I think Jace being in the Cinematic Trailers might be part of why they killed him on Iokath; to make the events there and after more impactful.

Think about it; as people keep pointing out, estranged or not, this is Theron's father. The events on Iokath leading to Jace's death were arranged by the traitor, the same traitor that turns out to be Theron himself. Theron, whether he intended it or not, caused his father's death. Even if they don't/can't show how that affects Theron, that thought will hit some players hard when Theron's revealed on Umbara...

 

 

 

Personal grumbling: Maybe if 'Knights' had been allowed to run its course naturally without "Moar IMP vs PUB Plz!" causing it to be cut short, they might have had a chance to explore the full repercussions of Jace or Acina's death on Iokath rather than just a few throwaway background comments on Copero and suddenly having Vowrawn as Emperor and Daeruun as our Republic military contact....

Knights not running the full course was a failure on BioWare's part assuming that piecemealed content of a story that felt so disconnected to what came prior was going to sustain a playerbase (or meet whatever metrics they were aiming for). What's the excuse for Nathema being as bad as it was then relating to story characters? The fact that you're blaming the players that wanted a traditional Star Wars storyline rather than the mess we received says more about your shortsightedness than anything else.

Those storylines were interesting at first, even with their faults. Afterward? Could put you to sleep. Little mattered, Valkorion became insufferable, it was written for half the classes at best, player characters should have never been presented with an eternal throne, etc.

Sadly, I think they changed it; It used to be that if you bothered to go through the main story on Makeb, then you talked a LOT with Jace Malcolm for the lead-in / original run of the Makeb bonus missions. Want to say I tried it earlier this year, and they were fully terminal-obtained.

There used to be cutscenes for these missions rather than just terminals? I really wish they wouldn't remove things like that.

I think Jace being in the Cinematic Trailers might be part of why they killed him on Iokath; to make the events there and after more impactful.

Think about it; as people keep pointing out, estranged or not, this is Theron's father. The events on Iokath leading to Jace's death were arranged by the traitor, the same traitor that turns out to be Theron himself. Theron, whether he intended it or not, caused his father's death. Even if they don't/can't show how that affects Theron, that thought will hit some players hard when Theron's revealed on Umbara...

 

 

 

Personal grumbling: Maybe if 'Knights' had been allowed to run its course naturally without "Moar IMP vs PUB Plz!" causing it to be cut short, they might have had a chance to explore the full repercussions of Jace or Acina's death on Iokath rather than just a few throwaway background comments on Copero and suddenly having Vowrawn as Emperor and Daeruun as our Republic military contact....

If that was the plan, it failed spectacularly imo. I mean, even if it would have gotten more exploration in other scenarios if the story had gone differently, Iokath itself still would have been an altogether terribly written and executed part of the story and wasn't even a main expansion.

I don't see why they ever wanted to waste a character of that stature there rather than have him as a bigwig part of an actual expansion you know? Kill him in THAT. Give the man his due. He easily could have been a Malgus level character. Not in terms of power etc but in terms of story impact. It's a character, like Malgus, that 90% of the playerbase knows and has some fond cinematic memories of. They are always good to keep around. Jace gets wasted in like 3 cutscenes... And he deserved a lot more exploration. He's the least explored out of himself, Satele and Malgus. The three I remember most from promotional material. Even in previous story you see very little of him

Look, in theory, I agree. Dead is dead and I mostly prefer people to stay that way. But not here. Not when they’ve criminally wasted a character on such a terrible story beat like that. Plus its not like he got a lightsaber ran through him. I wouldn’t see it as impossible for him to have survived Iokath. I mean, I’ve seen a lot of non valkorion characters survive worse. Didn’t we get stabbed by Arcann and just shrug it off? And just because one side gets resurrected doesn’t mean you’d HAVE to do it with Acina too. She’s clearly not as big of a character. I mean was she in the cinematic trailers for the game? I never even heard her name until KOTFE. And what would Jace not wanting to work with you have to do with it? You could have him as an enemy for those who killed Theron 🤷🏻 He doesn’t have to appear as a friendly face for every class and character. And besides, he doesn’t get to decide who he wants to work with… he’s a soldier. If the Republic tells him to do something, he does it. I’m sure he wasn’t too thrilled to be asking a Sith Lord who has murdered thousands of his fellow soldiers or the Bounty Hunter who slaughtered the Chancellor for help on Iokath either, but his superiors forced it.

The Outlander only survived that killing blow because of Valkorion. Also, I would argue that despite Malcolm appearing in comics and trailers Acina is actually a bigger character than he is in the game itself. And you don't bring back a character if half of your players are not even going to encounter him - that would be just a waste of resources. And if they brought him back as an enemy then that would mean we would just have to kill him again. Again, what's the point? Bringing him back would be too complicated because of his ties to Theron (who is also dead for many players) and Satele. Not to mention he's already been replaced with General Daeruun.

The Outlander only survived that killing blow because of Valkorion. Also, I would argue that despite Malcolm appearing in comics and trailers Acina is actually a bigger character than he is in the game itself. And you don't bring back a character if half of your players are not even going to encounter him - that would be just a waste of resources. And if they brought him back as an enemy then that would mean we would just have to kill him again. Again, what's the point? Bringing him back would be too complicated because of his ties to Theron (who is also dead for many players) and Satele. Not to mention he's already been replaced with General Daeruun.

Seriously? Your asking what the point of bringing a dead character back to kill him again is.... in a Star Wars thing...? Ahem. Revan. Vitiate. Malgus. Palpatine. Maul. This is very old hat here. The point is to get more story... And yeah "force sensitive ohhhhh", who cares? Because again, Malcom got shocked by a chair.... is it REALLY truly so hard for you to believe he could have survived that? Cos it feels like you just wanna find reasons to not include him to me. If they can bring one character back a thousand damn times, I think Malcom could survive a chair shocking without me recoiling in utter shock horror disbelief and not be able find this space opera story about magic samurai "believable" anymore lol.

And I never argued Acina wasn't a bigger character IN THE GAME itself. She's got a lot of screentime. And for some reason, she gets to keep having screen time AFTER Iokath no matter what, while Malcom does not, he's replaced by weird general lizard man no matter what. The point is Malcom is still a well known character who got very little exploration in the story. And it's a crying shame. I could have lived perfectly well without ever knowing squat about Acina. She was basically nobody for the first 5 years of this game.. I always wanted to learn more about Malcom ever since those old trailers..

There used to be cutscenes for these missions rather than just terminals? I really wish they wouldn't remove things like that.

Yeah. Almost all Heroics on every planet used to have cutscenes and dialogue choices for the pick-up and turn it. It was very upsetting when they removed them. They should've added a toggle for people who just wanted the terminal versions and leave the dialogued versions in the game.

They did this around the same time they removed 80% of the interesting Bonus Mission chains.

BioWare giving out kill options like candy during that period was one of their biggest mistakes IMO. Apparently they can't handle the scenarios they've created where a character is dead for one player and alive for another so most of the characters given a death option just disappeared from the story entirely for everyone with a few of them appearing here and there but being conspicuously absent or silent most of the time. I'm definitely sad that Jace (and Acina, I liked her) was given one of these chump deaths and we'll probably never hear from him again. The most we can hope for is a silent background cameo. The fact that we also got zero dialogue with him about our potential romance with his son (especially if we're imperial characters) is such a missed opportunity. We don't even get a letter about it.

At least we do still see Acina though, quite often to be honest, on toons who let her live. My Imp diehard Sorcerer sees her regularly. I guess Malcoms VA is harder to book maybe.

Nah thanks, he is a dumb stereotypical soldier dude, even as republic i would always choose the empire on Iokath just to get rid of Malcolm because I dont want such people in positions of power, especially when I am almost always joining the republic in onslaught unless I am a sith force user.

You don't want the qualified veteran soldier in charge...? Ok, give the job to Jar Jar. Also.... isn't almost everyone a stereotype here? What isn't these days. Nothing is original anymore. All the Pubside leaders seem like classic caricature good guys to me all the time... Removing Malcom doesn't change that.