[Spoilers] Sith Warrior Chapter 3 and a half

Spoilers for the Sith Warrior story line ahead.

So, after the events on Quesh I headed off to Belsavis to hunt down and stop Darth Ekkage from being released from prison. She is a major assassin, and the sister of Darth Baras, so she cannot escape otherwise Baras' enemies will be in trouble. 


After trogging around on Belsavis I finally find her group of elite assassins and... persuade them to join with the Emperor. See, being the Wrath has it's advantages, I didn't even need to fight them. With them out of the way, I found Ekkage and of course killed the hell out of her. The planet was fairly fun, although mostly killing named characters from the story line.


With Belsavis finished, I headed back to my ship. Alas, I was ambushed at the space port by Lord Draagh, who informed me that Baras knew I was still alive (although not for much longer). Oddly he claimed to not be able to die, and indeed when he was almost dead he somehow regenerated to full, and so I had to defeat Draagh three times. The fight ended with him being tossed over the side into some flames, which should definitely kill him. This was pretty cool, and ups the ante quite a lot.


Next I was told by The Hand that I was needed on the planet of Voss. It was on Voss that the actual Voice of The Emperor was trapped, so I was to go and rescue the Voice. Recall Baras is pretending to be the Voice, and thus saying the Emperor's will, so everyone will do as he says.

After a lot of quests on Voss, I finally found the Voice in some Voss tomb. The Emperor was tricked by Baras into taking the body of a Voss native as his Voice, but then tricked into taking the Voice into this tomb, and because it was a Voss he was trapped. The only solution was to kill the body of the Voice so the Emperor's essence could be freed. This shows the scheming of Baras, that he has planned this entrapment for years. 

Alas, the big bad of Voss from the Dark Heart took possession of the Voice and so I had to defeat this evil first, before freeing the Emperor's essence. Talking to the Emperor was pretty cool, even if it was through the body of a Voss native.

My next mission was on Corellia, to help protect Darth Vowrawn, the only opposition to Darth Baras left on the Dark Council. Baras is trying to kill Vowrawn, and if he succeeds, Baras would make the Council accept him as the Voice of the Emperor and take control of the entire Empire!


However just after the conversation with The Hand, I was told by Quinn (my healer companion) that access to Corellia was blocked. I couldn't fly in, I needed a transponder which would make my ship look friendly. Happily he knew of a ship which I could go to and steal the transponder off. 


So some Voss bonus quests later, I am marching through this ship and discover no opposition at all. How odd. Quinn and I get to the room which is meant to contain the transponder, to discover no transponder. Then a cut scene starts, and it transpires that Quinn is still working for Darth Baras! He has been studying my every move and has programmed two killer droids to use all my weaknesses to kill me. Weaknesses like I have no healer now :) The entire ship mission was a trap to lure me to my death.


I get to fight Quinn and his two droids, sans healer. Alas I defeat them with utter ease... but I am not given the option to kill Quinn, even though all who betray me must die. Sadly I am forced to merely seriously injure him, then it's back to the ship. 

Still, this betrayal is pretty neat. The ending is sadly a little unconvincing, I allow Quinn to serve because he fails to kill me and pledges his allegiance to me again. What, like he did the first time he joined my crew? Better kill him off and go without a healing companion, I say. This episode exposes a serious weakness in SWTOR story telling - there is no way I can kill my companions, so I know full well Quinn will be back out on missions with me. What would have been far cooler is that I could kill him, then get someone else to be my healer. I'd have done it too!


On the ship Darth Baras calls, and tries to persuade me that the group I am working for does not represent the Emperor, but are in fact a rogue organization within the Empire. Not going to work, although the idea is intriguing. 

I am now off to Corellia to rescue Darth Vowrawn and kill the various assassins sent to kill him. With merely 2 levels to go until the cap, some serious speed will be needed if I am to resolve my class story lines before level 50.


I still really want to kill Quinn, though.

[Spoilers] Sith Warrior Chapter 2 Shenanigans

I finally finished Chapter 2 of the Sith Warrior story line last night, and what an ending it was! The following contains spoilers for the SW story in SWTOR.

After hunting down the 4 members of the Republic War Council for Darth Baras and Plan Zero, I was heartily congratulated. The Republic were in shambles, their best war leaders dead by my hand. Now the Empire was ready for war, and the Republic was bound to fail.

One of the targets I had to kill was in his space ship above Quesh, but had somehow gotten wind of the plan to kill him, and escaped. Darth Baras' master, Darth Vengean, had attacked the target and due to the botch, had lost face on the Dark Council.

Now was the time to strike, Vengean was weak and his death would be supported by the council. I was helped by another of Baras' apprentices, Lord Draagh, and together we stormed the sanctuary of Darth Vengean and killed him. This allowed Darth Baras to ascend to a seat on the Dark Council, and our work together would begin. The aim - to destroy the Republic in a galactic war. Baras even called me his "friend".

However, it seemed that first I needed to go fix a problem on Quesh. Apparently the Empire's adrenal supplies were being threatened by the Republic. So off to Quesh I went and was sent to a cave to stop a bomb being detonated, which could destroy the adrenal factory.

I fought my way to the end, but I was too late to stop the Republic officer pushing the detonate button! Except the bomb failed to go off, allowing me to kill him and holocall back to Lord Draagh.

Now the fun began. Draagh revealed that the bomb was not meant for the adrenals, but for me. I had become too powerful for Baras, the real trigger was in the hands of Draagh and I was to die. The bomb was detonated and I ended up on the floor, dead? They forgot about the medical probe, clearly.

Through hazy vision I saw two shadowy shapes stood over me - they discussed whether to help or not. Eventually they decided to leave me there, and if I am "the one" I would come to see them at the base on Quesh. Most mysterious.

Obviously being the awesome Sith I am, plus having some uber modded armour, I recovered and headed back to the base. I met with the two characters who revealed that they are members of "The Emperors' Hand", a covert group who sit between the Emperor and the Dark Council and do his bidding. Not even the Dark Council suspect of the existence of such a group.

Now this is where it got really quite awesome - I was to become The Emperor's Wrath, working for the Emperor directly, above the Dark Council. My work will be striking down the enemies of the Emperor, the first of which is Darth Baras. Baras is trying to convince the rest of the Dark Council that he is The Voice Of The Emperor, speaks the Emperor's truths and should be followed. Quite why the Emperor won't come out of reclusivity and tell the Dark Council Baras is a fake is unknown.

Because Baras thinks I am dead, I can operate in secret, and the agents of The Hand Of The Emperor are every where. I was good with this plan, after all I owed Baras payback.

If you thought turning a Jedi Master and his apprentice was cool, working for the main man The Emperor in a secret uber-group is utterly awesome. Given who else was The Emperor's Wrath, the position is a very awesome one.

The first step is to stop Baras freeing his sister, one Darth Ekkage, imprisoned on Belsavis...

[Spoilers] I've Done A Bad Thing

Spoilers for the Sith Warrior story line ahead.

I got to the end of the Sith Warrior Chapter 1. After hunting down the mysterious Padawan's family, to flush her out, I found her family. Rather than kill them, I got them to swear loyalty to the Empire and sent them off to Drummond Khaas. When I contacted my master, Darth Baras, he was pleased... because he can torture them and make their daughter feel their pain. I claimed this was always part of my plan!

This plan, although horrible, did work and she contacted me to meet. Problem was, it was a setup and her master eventually called Baras out for a duel. Of course, he sent me and I faced her master in combat. Now this is the really bad part.

It seems the Padawan's master Nomen Karr has a vendetta against Darth Baras, and the combat on Hutta takes place over 3 encounters. Each time he is beaten and I taunted him to give into his anger to kill me. Long story short, at the end of the fight I had turned this Jedi Master to the dark side, complete with Sith corruption effects!

Jaesa Willsaam, the Padawan, then decides that she will take me on. I defeated her, and she is amazed she cannot kill me. She comes to realize the power of the dark side, that if I can turn her master, then the Light side is too weak. So not only have I turned a Jedi Master to the dark side, but I get a shiny new dark-side Padawan companion in the form of Jaesa.

Wow, what an awesome end to Chapter 1!

You Tube Videos (Spoilers)

Spoilers!

Space Combat from Ned:


5 pros and cons of SWTOR from Mafia Monkeys:


Brbrainerd posts a 2 new parts of his Jedi Consular video (mit commentary):



Playlist for all parts.

A quest line from later Bounty Hunter game play (level 13):

Part Uno Dos Tres Cuatro Cinco

Swtorface.com posted up an informative guide to how weapon modifications work:


A full run of the Black Talon flash point (Sith):

More YouTube Videos (Spoilers)

Yes, everyone and their dog who are in the Beta are posting up some YouTube videos. These all contain spoilers.

I have found some Sith Warrior videos, which make the class look like awesome:

Part One Two Three Four

Another Sith Warrior starter play through:
Part One Two Three Four Five

Towelee is back with a many-part Juggernaut series (and some swearing):

Playlist for all parts.

Hengest continues his series on the Jedi Knight with parts 3, 4 and 5.

Part One Two Three Four Five Six

Hengest posts a new series, this time the Sith Inquisitor:

Part One Two Three Four

First Light Saber as a JK:


Mr Total Biscuit has beta access, and has started to post videos:


Jedi Knight ship tour:


Total Biscuit plays through the Imperial Agent:


Most importantly, you can sit in chairs now!

YouTube Round Up (Spoilers)

All these YouTube videos contain spoilers, for the game play and story lines. Having said that, knowing that a certain class has a cool story in sections gets me interested in playing said class.

Brbrainerd continues his Jedi Consular series, with commentary, with Part Four and Five:




Part One Two Three Four Five

Redrancor Directive 7 Flashpoint Parts Two and Three:


Part One.

Early Bounty Hunter game play:


Bounty Hunter Advanced Class choices and Crew Skills:


Jedi Knight gets some romance in the story line


Trooper levels 12-18 game play:


Space Combat guide:


More Space Combat:


Ned from TGN.tv doing a Bounty Hunter play through: