21/11/2016

Wading into IntPiPoMo #2: Favourite Pets and Companions

Time for another #IntPiPoMo 2016 post. Taking the spotlight today are some of my favourite Companions and pets which can currently be accrued in the game.

You can basically tell which my favourites are if they get given a creative spot in my Tatooine Stronghold. For Companions, I typically try and include those who have a room dedicated to their Class 'origin' within that room as matter of principle (whilst also adhering to the current overall game story so that anyone who has yet to return or been kicked out by the current Main is left out), but there are those who are just sort-of 'there' with no creativity involved whatsoever.

Then there are those who, regardless of where they are in my favourites list, become the subject of my rare moments of inspiration with nice little vignettes dedicated to their person.

Pets, being different to Companions, have no proper 'origin' and are more often than not given their own dedicated areas as a compromise. There are some exceptions, as you'll see, but let's get cracking.

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Starting off with a one-of-a-kind pet, the Plaguehorn Reek! This little fella, who goes by the name "Argyll", is currently the only Reek pet in the entire game, and can only be acquired from the Rakghoul-plague infected Reek World Boss during the Event on Tatooine. He's currently only owned by Calph, and is quite possibly my absolute favourite of the land-based pets due to his current uniqueness.

Seriously, no Cartel Reek of any sort has yet been released, not even a mount! Are they slacking or something on this front?


The moment I knew that a Krayt Dragon Skull was going to be a Decoration, an idea formed in my head. What if you could get a group of Kell Drakes - possibly the derpiest pets ever - and make it look like they're worshipping the skull? To my delight, this was indeed a possibility, and the Cult Drakes have been a part of the Stronghold for as long as I can remember.

There's still a fifth Kell Drake which has yet to materialise according to the Decorations list. This is a black 'Nightmare' Kell Drake, and it may yet appear in 5.0 if pets and the like are added to the Command Crates. Time shall tell.


No vignette for this, but then it supplements the café I've got on the top floor nicely enough as it is. This is the Drink Server Probe you can buy from the BBA Reputation Vendors, and it's utterly adorable. I particularly love the cloth draped over its arm. A similar pet - entirely gold and named "G07-DY" - was made available during the Nightlife Event, and instead of the glass with the little umbrella, this droid carries a plate of continuously-spilling coins.


Gault and Vette form perhaps my favourite partnership yet imagined of Companions, and I hope that future expansions come up with something similar with some of the remaining ones. I had to give them a section of my spaceport, complete with crates of gold (and the Binary Load Lifter) to mull over.


It's nearly always been customary to have an HK Unit be one of my balcony's throne guards. For the longest while, it was HK-51, and then HK-55 took over the responsibility once a certain pet was made available from the Eternal Championship. As much as that scene lasted far too long, I couldn't resist making a reference to it here.

In case you're wondering, the second throne guard position is currently occupied by Z0-0M, because doing the same thing as HK is exactly the sort of thing she'd try and do. Prior to Calph's taking-back-over of Main position, my Sniper Pip's main 4.0 Companion Xalek took this guard spot.


Another of my favourite long-established vignettes, the Jawa camp has seen some decent modifications with recent Decorations from 4.0, and of course Blizz has to be a part of it somehow. I tried to use some of the most unappealing junk to bolster the Jawa's stock, most notably the Emergency Response Droid, which looks very much like an Astromech with a faulty motivator. I'm forever peeved that there isn't a broken gold Protocol Droid NPC Decoration.

C2 doesn't deserve to be a part of this.


Currently the only Companion left in the Agent room since SCORPIO's disappearance and Kaliyo's never-going-to-not-be-kicked-out-of-the-Alliance development in Fallen Empire, Lokin is left to ponder his Rakghoul experiments in peace.

Hey, at least nobody can complain about the smell.


If anyone knows exactly what this droid is, they might have just reflexively shuddered. This is an MCR-100 Miniprobe, and can only be acquired by scanning all possible MCR-99 Droids on one character. This is a nightmare since if you pick it up on a character who hasn't done scanning for a while you don't know which ones you have until you fail to scan them.

So of course when Calph did it recently (the only other character of mine to own the Droid is Pippera the Sniper), she got caught at the final hurdle since there was only one Droid left, and it was the one which she theoretically should already have scanned on Coruscant as part of the questline!


This is the other side of the café, and of course Nico has to be the one deliberating over which drinks are worth downing.


Bonus intrusion by a mount! This little 'nursery' of aquatic creatures - also containing the only Sleen pet, the Plaguetooth Sleen from the Rakghoul Plague infected Narvaxx on Corellia - is probably the most bizarre scene I've created, but eh, it sorta works, I guess.


Finally, and rounding off with my two favourite airborne pets, here are my darling Arctic and Coastal Thrantas floating serenely next to a Red Thranta decoration. The two pets used to just be by themselves above the nursery, but it works so much better now they've got a bigger friend.

Image Count: 29 (+10)

2 comments:

  1. I didn't even know that you could have not just one but three Thrantas for your stronghold. Shows you how well I keep up with the decoration releases.

    Have you posted that Krayt Dragon setup before? Because I'm totally getting déjà vu from it.

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    1. I keep a serious eye on the Decoration potential. Indeed, when checking out new Cartel Items for GTN Purchase, it's nearly always the Decorations which I go to first. :P

      I have indeed posted the Krayt Dragons before; the first iteration of the cult (back when there were only three of the adorable blighters) was pictured in my Tatooine Stronghold post. Since the cult has been updated since that time, and it is a collection of some of my favourite pets, I felt justified in posting it again.

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