Making two characters look like they’re actually interacting when I draw them has always been a challenge for me, so I’ve been practicing with reference images more lately. Featuring SWTOR characters, of course.
Koth was one of the few aspects of KotFE I actually liked, and I like him even more after playing the story through Seren, who is willing to make darker choices (as opposed to Avei, who is extremely Light Sided).
Seren is hella angry at Zakuul for the whole carboniting thing and as far as she’s concerned, this is war. She’s not going to go out of her way to harm civilians, but if they get in the way and get hurt? Too bad. And Koth calls her out on that! He says no, she should not be hurting innocent people, or she’s as bad as Arcann. He has the strength to stand up and tell her no. And then he GTFOs because he will not be complicit in the killing of innocent civilians.
(He didn’t take the Gravestone though and I thought he does? We’ll see, I haven’t started Chapter 10 yet.)
11. Canon divergence. Are there parts of their story that don’t line up with in-game information? Why? Where?
Definitely. My opinion of KotFE/KotET and their bland, boring, pissy villains and their meandering plot and their gotsdamned railroading is barely above my opinion of Kyle Ron and the 3D Clone Wars, and y’all know how much I don’t like those lmao.
*cracks knuckles* I’m just gonna do Avei and Illi and everyone else together since it’s easier. Let’s do this. Under a cut because I know no one but me cares this much lol. Another unnecessarily long post ahoy!
Skye Lir and her master, Derran Kanis, are asked to go on a joint Imp-Pub mission into Wild Space to hunt this ~mysterious threat ooooh~. Skye asks her pal Avei along since she’s handy in a fight and has plenty of experience navigating galactic-level threats. Avei is reluctant to leave her family, especially her three-year-old daughter, but agrees to just one more big-stakes mission. The Jedi Knight crew goes along; the smuggler crew is off elsewhere in space.
Chapter 1 happens like in canon. Derran, Skye, and Avei try to prevent the ship’s destruction but fail. Skye instructs her crew to escape and warn the others and they do so. Avei decides to buy time for the crew to escape, and they are all captured.
Right as the ship explodes, across the galaxy in Avei’s ship the whole smuggler crew is woken by Kiva screaming bloody murder. They all come running; Kiva cries repeatedly for her mommy. Corso finally gets out of her “Mommy’s ship blew up.” He tells her it was just a bad dream and gets her back to sleep.
Chapter 1 continues. Derran is the canon Outlander; Skye and Avei are treated as her accomplices. Derran refuses Valkorion’s power but he still possesses her when she “kills” him. Arcann has Derran, Skye, and Avei all carbonited.
Kiva is still upset and not herself the next day when the smuggler crew gets a call from Kira, who tells them what happened. They book it to the site of the wreckage to help the Republic forces Kira also called comb the desert wreckage for survivors. Kiva is distraught and keeps repeating that Mommy is gone.
At some point Kira and Corso talk and Kira mentions she can’t feel Skye or Derran in the Force anymore (I believe she mentions this in her letter to a romanced JK) and Corso mentions how weird Kiva was acting the night before they got the news. They put their heads together and Kira tells him more about Force abilities and a whole puzzle Corso didn’t realize he was putting together falls into place - all the times Kiva nabbed a toy or treat supposed to be out of reach, her strange knack for getting through doors he could’ve sworn were locked, her uncanny ability to know which room he and Avei were in, and now her strange dream - and Kira confirms Kiva is very likely Force-sensitive. She offers to bring Kiva to the Jedi Temple but Corso refuses; he’s lost enough family and he won’t send his daughter away.
The Republic and Empire go to war with the Eternal Empire, blah blah. I refuse to believe they were instantly crushed by sooper speshul Zakuul so this goes on for a while, at least a year.
Risha leads smuggling jobs but Corso isn’t really involved with that, as his hands are full with a preschool child dealing with the loss of her mother with separation anxiety from hell, and also the fact that her now-frequent tantrums make things move around the room.
Kiva is three so her mindset is “Mommy left and didn’t come back, so if Daddy leaves he won’t come back either.” Also one of her best skills with the Force is sensing emotions, so not only is she dealing with her own grief, she’s being bombarded by everyone else’s through the Force, and hasn’t learned to regulate any of her Force abilities yet. (I majored in Early Childhood Education so the idea of how a Force-sensitive child would operate, so to speak, is endlessly fascinating to me.)
Corso reads everything he can on the Holonet about using the Force, and between him and Guss’s memories of his training, they are able to slowly teach Kiva how to at least not lose control during tantrums.
Over in the Empire Illivrin is having the time of her life. Illi hates the Empire and her two goals as a Dark Council member were 1. self-preservation and 2. running the Empire into the ground. She’s doing great at the second but not so much at the first, because her top subordinate Sali’ra is busy gathering every scrap of info she can to overthrow Illivrin before she gets them all killed. Sali’ra is coordinating her efforts with her uncle, Av’en, and her cousin, Furi’sa, both who want Illivrin gone for the good of the Empire. (My headcanon is that literally everyone else in the Empire looks at Illivrin as one of those crazy power-mad Sith who always die in a week from their own schemes, except she keeps not dying somehow.)
Vae’ra and Torian get married! Yay! It’s a Mandalorian ceremony. Vae’ra bridesmaids or equivalent were Sali’ra, Mako, and Blizz. Gault got ordained on the Holonet for the make-it-Empire-official part of the ceremony.
After the better part of a year Sali’ra has turned enough of Illivrin’s forces onto her side (and attending Dark Council meetings while Illi is off pointing the Silencer at everything she can, and showing the Council what a better option she would be) and is ready to make her move. Furi’sa comes to the latest Dark Council meeting and accuses Illivrin of being an enemy of the Empire and not having the Empire’s interests in mind, etc. When the Council backs Furi’sa, Illivrin - cornered, desperate, and dangerous - attacks Furi’sa. Khem and Xalek back her while Sali’ra and Furi’sa’s father, Av’en, are on her team. Team Illi vs Team Furi is brutal and vicious and very cinematic in my head. Illivrin finally strikes Av’en a mortal blow with her lightning. Enraged, Furi’sa beheads Xalek and tosses his head at Illivrin’s feet. The two fight fiercely but they’re burned out after the fight already. Illivrin tries to kill Furi’sa with lightning but is too tired to make it a death blow; Khem barely saves her from Furi’sa’s killing strike. Khem tells his master to run; Illivrin doesn’t want to leave him but ultimately decides on self-preservation and runs while Khem mows down the Sith guards that swarm him. Khem is finally subdued and while Furi’sa almost kills him, she instead has him imprisoned back in the tomb of Naga Sadow. Sali‘ra takes Illivrin’s Council seat as Darth Colubra. Furi’sa mourns her father and swears she will have revenge on Illivrin.
Illivrin successfully escapes Korriban and flees into exile in the Outer Rim. For the next decade-ish she’s gonna wear rags and eat whatever she kills with her bare hands in some desolate Outer Rim jungle. She snatched Xalek’s mask before she ran and keeps it close, swearing she will avenge her murder son and her murder bro.
Vae’ra alerts Corso that Furi’sa and Illivrin are loose and on the warpath. Wanting to hide his Force-sensitive daughter from the Sith and also give her a stable, normal childhood, he takes the ship and moves out to Dantooine, where they will be anonymous and fairly hidden, and takes a job on a farm. Kiva gets to go to school like a normal kid. Corso forbids her from doing any Force stuff in public (she has better control nowadays) but she’s always curious and there’s a convenient abandoned Jedi Temple not too far away, so he occasionally goes and raids the databanks for anything that will help her learn, and lets her practice her Force abilities in the privacy of Avei’s ship.
The rest of the crew sticks with Risha, who works on reclaiming Dubrillion. By the time the five years are up, she is Queen like she should’ve been. Guss also gets some Jedi training.
Vae’ra and Torian adopt an orphaned Chiss girl, Iseli, and a Zabrak boy, Jerro.
Seren has been in contact with Theron. Together they try to piece together what happened and track down Skye’s sister. With Lana and Koth they start setting down the foundations of the Alliance.
Eternal Empire conquers a lot of stuff. Illivrin stays hidden. Furi’sa hunts her and any other threat to the Empire. Corso and Kiva stay on Dantooine.
Picking up with our unfortunate carbonite blocks, Derran is the one forced to chat with the Lamest Villain. Affected by his presence, Skye has dark visions of the Republic’s fall, while Avei has terrible dreams of her crew and family dead.
KotFE picks up from there. Lana and Koth rescue the trio. They are suffering from carbonite poison but Avei most of all, because she couldn’t use the Force to enter a meditative, preserving state and also because she was bashed over the head to get her in the carbonite mold and she had an open, bleeding wound when frozen.
Blah blah KotFE continues. (I was much more interested in the implications of the five year skip, can you tell?) They flee, they meet Senya, find the Gravestone, etc. Avei hits it off with Koth and suffers increasing symptoms from her carbonite poisoning and does not give a shit about anything but locating her family. Nobody likes or trusts Lana. Skye and Derran don’t like Senya much but Avei understands her Mom Vibes and gets along with her okay. They make it to Asylum. Skye recognizes that psycho murderbot her sister picked up. Arcann and his Kyle Ron Knockoff Sister show up. Derran gets stabbity stabbed and Avei finally succumbs to her carbonite poisoning. I can’t be assed to remember all that stuff, it was mostly boring. HK-55 doesn’t die because I love him, and remains Derran’s loyal bodyguard and friend, although he has a rivalry with her other HK droid, HK-51. (Derran loves HK droids. The Jedi politely look away as long as she keeps them under control.)
They make it to Odessen, where Seren and Theron have been overseeing the start of a base. Seren is overjoyed to see her baby sister; Skye cannot handle this level of emotion and is awkward but glad Seren cares this much somewhere deep inside. Avei is dragged to the medcenter, still very sick, and refuses to get in a kolto tank until Skye swears she will call Avei’s family now that they have secured communications and it is safe to do so. Derran is named Alliance Commander. She probably develops a drinking problem.
Skye calls Avei’s ship and finds Corso and a (now eight-year-old) Kiva and tells them Avei’s not dead. Corso immediately flies the ship straight to Odessen. (I refuse to believe that Corso, whose chief character trait is loyalty, waited a whole nother year to be reunited with his wife. I REFUSE.) Avei is out of the kolto tank and doing much better by the time he arrives and SHE FINALLY GETS TO SEE HER FAMILY AGAIN AND THEY ALL HUG AND IT’S ADORABLE.
Then Kiva says “HEY MOM WATCH THIS” and throws a rock with her mind and that’s how Avei finds out her daughter is Force-sensitive.
Skye gives Kiva some formal training but is mostly busy with helping her former Master run the Alliance.
Avei sticks around the Alliance for a month but decides screw you all, my family is more important, and leaves. She continues to suffer lasting sickness from the carbonite poison, and it takes at least a year for her to truly recover.
I haven’t decided for sure how to manage it but basically KotFE and KoTET are condensed into one without all the nonsense like Iokath or whatever. (Also, obviously they can’t recruit say, Torian because he’s off with his wife. Or Vette, because she’s off with Furi’sa. etc.) Skye sticks with Derran; Seren is also a major player in the Alliance. Arcann and Vaylin are both killed and no one misses them.
Derran finally kills Valkorion in her head (without any part of being Valkorion, because screw you for making me play your pretentious crappy villain sue oc) but the mental toll of having a pretentious college philosophy major in her head makes her decide to use her Jedi Exile Retirement plan, and she peaces out to a nice beach planet with her HK droid pals. She hangs out there until years later, Kiva comes to pester her for training.
Seren takes over as Alliance commander. The Iokath stuff probably doesn’t even happen because I didn’t like it. The Theron’s-a-traitor arc does, but I haven’t played it all yet so I haven’t decided how much I want to tweak. All I know is Seren is pregnant but doesn’t know it til after Umbara, because I enjoy maximizing angst with basic tropes. She and Theron do stay together and name their daughter Caeles, after Theron’s ancestor Revan/Caele.
Idk about the rest but the Alliance does disband and its resources go to strengthen the Republic, but while Seren stays a free agent because of all the issues the Agent storyline gave her, she’s basically Republic at this point. Skye is very proud.
Years later Illivrin shows back up and Furi’sa discovers Kiva is Force-sensitive and lures her into her van shuttle with candy the promise of Force training; Kiva escapes Furi’sa and goes to train with the Jedi.
Over the course of a lot of years the Valaris Legacy gradually teams up to finally kick Illivrin’s ass. Kiva is the only one strong enough in the Force to challenge her and seals Illivrin inside a tomb on Yavin 4, where she remains trapped for all time, eternally separated from Khem Val, the only being she ever cared about. (This is how you treat a villain, Rian Johnson, just saying.) (Also Furi’sa kills Khem Val and avenges her father, though she dies doing it.)
All the post-Theron-traitor stuff is all more loosely sketched out and also it’s midnight rn and I need to go to bed, so let’s leave it at that.
Have you played all the classes for SWTOR? If so, what're the names, races and alignments of your avatars?
You want to hear about all my characters? Really?! I am very happy to oblige!! I hope you like ungodly long posts
The short short version: Yes I’ve played all; finished all except Consular and Trooper (on Corellia and Voss rn, respectively). My absolute favorites were LS Smuggler (the TRUE Han Solo route) and DS Inquisitor (electrocute ALL THE THINGS).
Meet the Valaris Legacy! Here are all my bbys:
If you follow my blog you already know all about my fave girl.
Ilu murder bby <3
Whoops, that was less hard to read when I made this…anyway this is Vae’ra, She Who Punches People In The Face With Flaming Fist.
Furi’sa, the Empire’s most dutiful daughter. Her alignment is more “Started Light Side/Neutral, then everyone betrayed me and I did the Full Dark Side Sith Rage Thing” but it’s easier to just say Dark Side.
Seren is another tricky alignment thing, because I meant her to be full Dark Side but when you choose whether or not to kill Darth Jadus I/she realized she just couldn’t bring herself to end so many Imperial lives. So she started out Dark but now (just starting KotFE) she’s mostly Light Side (but still kinda mean sometimes).
Skye is Seren’s little sister. She was the first SWTOR character I made and she is only just now trolling around on Rishi. Can’t say JK is my favorite class/story…
Avei and Corso’s daughter. Requires some timeline wrangling since she isn’t born til after RotHC…
Vae’ra’s big sister, fashion plate who is ride or die with her color scheme.
A character I made to try out KotFE. And then left languishing while Avei 2.0 did it instead. Skye’s former master and based on the very first Star Wars OC I ever made, back when I was 12.
Tesh’s alignment would more accurately be described as “Lawful Selfish” or “I’m just a dick.” Fun fact: was childhood friends with Illivrin.
Vae’ra and Torian’s adopted daughter. Technically Iseli is “I do the Mando honor thing but I’m not as strict about it as mom and dad” but it’s easier to say Dark Side.
I made a SWTOR!Revan because I’ve fallen completely in love with KOTOR but miss SWTOR’s graphics. Also a fun character building exercise; since my Revan is largely Light Side it’s fun to try and play her as she would’ve been while she was Darth Revan.
These guys are the parents of Furi’sa and Avei; they’re fraternal twins separated as children when the slave ship they were on was attacked. (They have another sister, Sali’ra and Vae’ra’s mom - those characters are all cousins.)
I’m not gonna lie, I made her just because I wanted a pretty Twi’lek to play dress-up on. She even has a pretty pink lightsaber! She’s also the only character with an authentic Twi’leki name (Star Protector is the translation). Story-wise I’ll probably have her be the canon Consular for Ch 2-3, while Kiva gets Ch 1 and the Felix romance.
Hope this is enough info for you. :P Thanks for letting me blab about my characters!
