When it comes to expansions in an online game, SWTOR has had a fair amount of variance with the content it would offer in its own expansion patch-cycles. Some, like 2.0 and 5.0, would deliver the expansion's entire themed story in the very first update and then immediately (or at least quickly) segue into something new, and others, like 4.0 and 7.0, stick with the intended theme all the way through.
There are advantages and disadvantages to both methods.
For updates like 2.0 and 5.0, you run into a situation where you're logging in with the game's splash-art proudly telling you that you're off to put the Hutt Cartel down or wrestle with Vaylin for the Eternal Throne, when actually you're past all that and are now dealing with Czerka and whatever it is that's going down on Copero. However, especially as far as 2.0 is concerned, this breadth of content also helps the galaxy feel far bigger, as there's much more going on than just chasing down one man's plans or seeing how separate stories become entwined.
For updates like 4.0 and 7.0, the story should feel more streamlined as it's all part of one big story, but that presents another problem entirely; if the story doesn't work, and that's all you've got, it's going to leave one heck of a sour taste. 7.0's glacial story content release presents a further problem with this, that being that stringing people along for months if not years before things come to light can go wrong very, very easily if the payoff isn't deemed satisfactory.
I do prefer having more variety of stuff to do, but there's no denying that the 2.0 model in particular wouldn't work as well nowadays. Back then, we were just another player in the galaxy, with no power-base to speak of, and it was easier to slot us into some inconsequential stuff as a main story update. That's not to say that inconsequential stuff can't still happen now that we're the Commander of the Alliance and powerful higher-up within Task Force Nova and the Hand of the Empire, like with the Feast of Prosperity, but it's much more of a side thing than an actual story update.
It's funny in that regard to compare SWTOR to the occasional stuff that World of Warcraft does. WoW likes to do a lot of "cutesy" stuff, which can often be fun, but I really don't think that would translate across well to SWTOR.
"What do you mean the next story update involves helping a clutch of turtles survive on Rishi? I'm the Alliance Commander, slayer of Valkorion, ally of Mandalore herself, and the one who's going to kick Malgus's butt! I can't do something as meaningless as this!"
I mean, I'd definitely be up for helping turtles survive on Rishi if ever that does become a thing. I may never be able to make up for unintentionally killing Speedy, but if I can help some survive in their honour, I'll feel a little bit happier.
Anyway, the point of today's post is that I intend to look back over the various expansions - including the base-game - and talk about my favourite story updates that came with each one. This will not just involve my talking about the story content each patch delivers, but any extra things they added if I deem them important enough.
I am including 7.0 in this despite the fact that we're still partway through it, because I'm still intending to bring this blog to a close next month, so I'm not going to be able to comment on 7.0's grand finale. I might as well address my current favourite update in this expansion while I'm giving myself the opportunity!
On with the show!
~~~
Base Game: Patch 1.5 - HK-51 Activated
Foreword: I am discounting the actual 1.0 content itself, as not only do I feel launch content cannot be classifed as an "update", but I do not feel it fair to put all that content in the same category as subsequent updates within this or even really any era.
1.0 didn't have an awful lot by way of actual tangible story stuff between launch and 2.0, at least not as far as single-player content goes. Full credit to them, they doubled-down on producing a fair bit of group content, including two full operations (and the remaining four bosses of a third), a warzone, and group-heroics within two brand-new daily zones, but the story that came with them was piecemeal; the quests set things up and provided closure at the end, but that was about it.
That said, throughout all of this they established a plot-thread which would carry over into the next expansion; that of the Dread Masters' campaign to wage terror across the galaxy. First overtly hinted at with the Republic conclusion to Karagga's Palace, the Explosive Conflict operation openly confirmed for both factions that the Dread Masters were going to be the next big players on the scene.
But both of those were both to do with operation quests, something which at the time the average casual story player would not have been able to access as easily as they can nowadays. The only content relevant to this story thread which was designed for everyone to be able to access by themselves came with patch 1.5 and the brand-new daily area, Section X.
The Dread Masters themselves don't actually feature, but this was a decent continuation from the last time we saw their forces in Terror From Beyond. Their plan to seize the Aurora Cannon was never really expanded upon in any great detail, but it was still quite a fun heroic to do.
The real meat of this update came with the first brand-new companion: HK-51. Unlike the threat of the Aurora Cannon, an army of HK units is a much more impressive and serious threat which showed the resourcefulness of the Dread Master's forces and provided quite a tangible presentation of the sort of power the Dread Masters hoped to acquire.
The HK-51 questline is quite long and repetitive once the excavating begins, but I love it for two reasons. Firstly, the Theoretika portion remains to this day one of my favourite parts of any quest-chain. Secondly, I loved how it actively made you use your alt-characters to farm for select components. I'm learning more and more now I am involved with World of Warcraft just how ahead of its time SWTOR was with how much it leaned into alt-friendliness even in the early days - although it has come leaps and bounds since then - and this aspect of the questline, while still frustrating, was still nice to see.
Patch 1.5 was a nice way to highlight the threat the Dread Masters posed, as until this point we'd largely seen them imprisoned and using mercenary forces and mostly fellow Sith to progress their goals. With this update, we'd seen how extensive their regular army could be, and helped to deprive them of yet more forces by preventing them from securing the HK droids. It set the groundwork nicely for what was to come.
~
Rise of the Hutt Cartel: Patch 2.4 - The Dread War
I have to say that this was a close toss-up between 2.4, patch 2.7, the first patch to bring us Forged Alliances content, and patch 2.10, which concluded Forged Alliances. Patch 2.4 narrowly wins out because it provided a satisfactory conclusion to the Dread Masters arc.
Patch 2.4 brought us a new daily zone, complete with a reasonably extensive quest-chain, and not one but two operations released at the same time.
Until Oricon was released, daily zone story content (if there was any) was limited to just a wrapper quest introducing you to the zone. CZ-198's story, meanwhile, was not to do with the actual daily zone itself, but the flashpoints which accompanied it. Thus, Oricon set an early standard for several future daily zones. Sure, the story missions were ultimately just the dailies with some extra requirements, but at least it meant that by the time you had unlocked the daily missions you already knew most of what you had to do.
There was also a notable instance of optional group-content completion being acknowledged by the story, something which has never really been seen since. Completing Scum and Villainy in its entirety would yield an alternate line from Dread Master Raptus acknowledging your hand in the death of his fellow Dread Master, Styrak, on Darvannis. This honestly still stands out as a really good way of integrating relevant content while still providing a generic line for those players who never completed that operation.
Please excuse me while I resist slagging off patch 5.9 for failing to do the same when a seventh machine god is discovered if the player's character has killed all six others in Gods from the Machine.
However, Oricon did have one really quite major snag from a lot of players' perspectives. Until now, an operation was kept separate from the main story, being almost entirely standalone save for the thread running through all of them up to this point. With Oricon, completing the story of the planet opened up another story chain; one which involved completing both Dread Fortress and Dread Palace.
This may seem very hard to believe for players who joined in recent years, especially with how frequently both Dread Fortress and Dread Palace are being run each week, but back then this was a quite significant issue. Since operations were nowhere near as 'open' in the types of rewards casual players could get as they are now, there was quite a major pushback against being 'forced' to do operations just to complete the story.
Full credit to BioWare, they listened. While it was too late for both of these operations, subsequent operations with the exception of Gods from the Machine were treated as more standalone. Even Temple of Sacrifice, featuring an arguably more 'canon' confrontation with Revan than the alternative seen in the solo-friendly quest chain alternative, did not need to be completed to see the conclusion of the Shadow of Revan storyline.
I'm given to understand the operation path was bugged anyway at launch, so, erm... that's not great...
From my perspective, Dread Fortress and especially Dread Palace quickly became two of my favourite operations. I especially loved the theming of the Masters' private arenas where we do battle with them, and the climactic battle with the Dread Council still holds up really well. I also can't move on without specifically acknowledging the fight with Dread Master Calphayus. If anyone was wondering where I got my moniker "Calphy" from, this is where!
...although that is definitely getting awkward since people in my guild started referring to Calphayus himself as "Calphy". I might deserve a slap or two every once in a while, but hearing "kill Calphy" occasionally on TS does make me quite concerned...
All in all, patch 2.4 delivered a satisfactory end for the Dread Masters. Considering that they were the game's first recurring big-bad, I'm pleased that while they did have several operations themed around them that they didn't feel too overwhelming. That they were killed off in a mid-expansion patch honestly still surprises me, but I'm pleased that they weren't kept around to be the 3.0 bosses. Ending them when they did felt just right to me.
Away from the actual story content, patch 2.4 also brought in 4v4 arenas in PvP, replacing 8v8 in the ranked PvP format. Unlike normal warzones, which had elements of objective play alongside the opportunity to play deathmatch, the arenas are purely about deathmatch. It's hard to say years later whether their introduction was truly a success, as I know a lot of people really disliked the removal of 8v8 ranked and the arena format being so small made it very easy to single out "weaklings", but at the same time a really good arena match (by which I do not mean "just stomping your opponents into dust") could still be enjoyable.
Since ranked PvP has now been abolished altogether, arguably with PvP seasons we have seen the return of 8v8 ranked in some form. That it took 8 years for arenas and warzones to share the limelight in their entirety, and largely only because of combat styles making it much harder to manage ranking scoreboards effectively, suggests that despite all the initial misgivings a lot of it still did work?
~
Shadow of Revan: Patch 3.2 - Rise of the Emperor
I mean, 3.0 had only so many patches. 3.0 was a horrifically buggy mess which couldn't be completed for many people until a month later, 3.1 gave us master mode Blood Hunt and Battle of Rishi, and patch 3.3 just gave us a new playable species and a new stronghold.
All in all, I feel patch 3.2 kinda claims this spot by default!
Real talk about the 3.0 patch itself for a second here. Horrific bugs aside, I really didn't mind it all that much as an expansion patch. It improved upon 2.0 by not being as wildly inconsistent between certain areas in terms of mob difficulty as Makeb was, and it being set across two planets provided a bunch of variety. At the same time, the shift away from animated cutscenes for side-missions to voiced mission pop-ups felt like such an unexpected curveball as that's just not what SWTOR did!
Despite the rough first impressions, I can't hate it. It gave us some wonderful missions like the class story snippets that still really hold up.
Anyway.
Patch 3.2, Rise of the Emperor, took us to Ziost to pursue the spectre of Vitiate as he continued to enact plans unknown. Vitiate's got nothing on Malgus, is all I'll say. We reunited with Lana and Theron, for what I sincerely hoped would be the final time, and put our minds to wresting Ziost from the clutches of the mad Sith Lord.
Honestly, a lot of this Sith Emperor business really feels confusing looking back. We know now that Vitiate, as Tenebrae, used ZILDROG to drain the life from everything on Nathema rather than using his own power, so how did he do the same to Ziost? Was that just residual power from the machine god, or something else? However, at the time it was certainly an impressive feat and the cutscene showing Ziost's death is still really quite down-heartening.
In terms of other stuff this patch brought us, it finally brought us the Outfit Designer, as well as a new daily zone and associated instanced boss. Ziost's daily zone quickly became one of my all-time favourites, and is still a zone I visit quite frequently.
The Colossal Monolith, meanwhile, started out as a quite infamous boss. Firstly, it dropped an exclusive 204-rating mainhand weapon, which was greater than the highest rating dropped in 3.0's other raiding content, Revanite, which was 198-rating. Secondly, it launched bugged so that it was easier to complete than intended. Thirdly, because BioWare locked the daily zone of Ziost away for six days when 3.2 first launched, they ended up having to ban several players who found a way to boundary-break their way across and access the boss.
I mean, it's certainly inventive, and at least required more effort than the Ravagers exploit that lasted for weeks, but I certainly don't blame BioWare for acting as they did.
...yeah, there really isn't a lot one can say about anything about 3.0's story updates. I mean, 3.0 itself gave us Disciplines, hooray, but as with anything first impressions are very important. By the time 3.2 came out, the oddities that started with 3.0 were just kinda ingrained, and thus it didn't feel as odd to get into the first time through.
Bit of a rough justification for picking this update, but then 3.0 was a rough expansion!
~
Knights of the Eternal Throne: Patch 4.6 - The GEMINI Deception
Much with with how patch 2.4 was close to being beaten by patch 2.7 or patch 2.10, patch 4.6 has its own close competitor; patch 4.4, Profit and Plunder.
The chapters introduced with these patches, after which the respective updates are named, still hold up really well as the strongest of the initial sixteen chapters. Sure, Profit and Plunder was ultimately just a side thing, but it was a fun side-thing, and Gault and Vette had superb chemistry throughout the entire thing. The GEMINI Deception arguably had the biggest "what the f**k" moment in the entirety of Fallen Empire, but in a fantastic way, and those cutscenes still hold up really well.
Honestly, what makes patch 4.6 win out is largely the fact that it introduced some nice quality-of-life character perks. This was the update which saw the arrival of summonable personal and legacy cargo bays, something which is incredibly useful if in a raid and needing to grab something like an extra bunch of stims or - in an alarmingly high number of cases as far as one of my guildies is concerned - gear.
So, yes, starting with the chapter.
The GEMINI Deception follows on from the mandalorian chapter about Denova Darvannis, where we retrieve the GEMINI Prime unit and intend to use her to take control of an Eternal Fleet ship. We're accompanied by the totally-not-up-to-something SCORPIO, making me wonder where the flip T7-O1 had been all this while, and hijinks ensue. We're also reunited with Tai Cordan and Admiral Zasha Ranken, two reasonably popular characters from prior storylines, which was nice to see.
Ultimately, the biggest twist of this chapter came with the reveal of SCORPIO's grand plan. What is it with characters and having grand plans? Next we'll discover that our own characters have a grand plan that's being kept secret from us! Anyway. I won't spoil what SCORPIO's grand plan as shown here was, but I will say that with how things evolved in Knights of the Eternal Throne that things really went odd quickly.
Then again, 5.0 was another one of SWTOR's rough expansions so I can forgive them a little bit here. The transition doesn't feel well telegraphed, but then they weren't expecting to be rushed the way they were when they wrote this chapter.
Patch 4.6 sadly didn't contain an Alliance Alert. I think this was meant to be the patch where Zenith returned and would have had us destroy the Nar Shaddaa Star Fortress (...again?), and ultimately I am pleased this Alert never came to pass as it was originally intended. There are only so many times one can tolerate doing a Star Fortress.
Never again.
By far the biggest thing about patch 4.6, however, was the event that started to mark the countdown to SWTOR's 5-year anniversary; Dark vs. Light. This was a biiiiiiig checklist of activities to complete with brand-new characters, including completing all flashpoints, all chapters of Fallen Empire, infecting players with the rakghoul virus, and so on. It was basically one big celebration of everything and anything that had been released at that time, and it was reasonably decent fun.
For those who never had the opportunity to take part in it, this event was so named because it actually did pit the forces of the light against the forces of the dark. They tracked the progress of characters of both alignments, and used the resulting metrics to provide a determinant reward. If the light side won, players who reached a specific reward tier would receive chiss Jedi master Dazh Ranos as a companion. If the dark side won, those same players would receive zabrak Sith Lord Darth Hexid as a companion. Almost predictably, given how enticing the reward of a chiss companion was compared to a zabrak who players already had access to in some form with Akaavi Spar, the light side won.
Since then, Hexid and Ranos have been made available to players who weren't able to participate anyway, but I'm fine with that.
I wouldn't mind seeing this event return in some form, as unlike with Galactic Seasons which is constantly shifting each and every single week, with Dark vs. Light at least you could spread things out over the course of its duration and do things in any order you pleased.
Patch 4.6 felt like quite a refreshing update to get during the 4.0 era. Its chapter was decent, it provided some very welcome QoL features, and it also gave players something reasonably fun to do for quite a while afterward. Very few complaints from me about this!
~
Knights of the Eternal Throne: Patch 5.10 - Jedi Under Siege
As mentioned above, 5.0 was another one of SWTOR's rough expansions. Having clocked that people mostly really didn't like the direction the story was going or how it was being delivered seemingly at the cost of actual new group content, BioWare quickly binned the intended outline for both subsequent expansions, which would have followed 4.0's pattern almost to the letter), and delivered a quick nine-chapter-only storyline which wrapped up the remainder of the story started with Fallen Empire in short order.
However, they weren't done there. While on the surface it can easily be believed that the traitor arc that started in patch 5.2 and concluded over a year later in patch 5.9 was its own beast in its entirety, it's also quite apparent that the awkward nature of its delivery was because BioWare intended to tell this storyline more naturally through the chapters. With the removal of the more detailed delivery method and a shift to telling it through flashpoints instead, this would explain a lot of the general clunkiness of story content for the majority of 5.0.
I'm still classifying this storyline as separate from Eternal Throne, however. While it was almost certainly going to be told as part of the wider Zakuul storyline in its original iteration, we'll never know how that would have panned out and what order things would have gone in. With how things ended up, the storyline is ultimately detached from the storyline that 5.0 opened with.
Effectively, once patch 5.9 had come and gone, BioWare were almost entirely freed from the shackles of what they had wanted to do and had to clumsily repurpose. With patch 5.10, they had a golden opportunity to show off what they could do when they were really getting going with something fresh.
Enter Jedi Under Siege. Honestly, patch 5.10 is so different in feel from pretty much everything that had come before it for the past two years during the 5.0 patch-cycle (5.0 itself lasted almost three years!) that it felt more like a mini-expansion than it did a part of the stumbling 5.0 patch-cycle. It was glorious.
This patch took us to Ossus, where a Jedi colony had been operating in secret throughout the war with Zakuul. An Imperial strike team has discovered the colony, however, and so for the first time since the 2.0 patch-cycle both factions had their own distinct roles to play in the storyline. Republic players would defend the colony, while Imperial players would attempt to dismantle it.
Along the way, new and returning characters would play a part. Jedi Master Gnost-Dural made his appearance in-game to much applause from yours truly, and companions Archiban "Doc" Kimble, Jaesa Willsaam, Jaesa Willsaam (yes, the second mention of her is intentional), Khem Val, and Nadia Grell made their returns as well. Doc, Khem, Nadia, and one of the Jaesas even had appearances in the Ossus story proper (although Khem and light-Jaesa only appeared for their respective player-characters) rather than just featuring in an Alliance alert!
Then there were the new characters. Jedi Knight Tau Idair received a rather lukewarm reception when compared to the Imperial Major Anri, but I was quite happy with both characters. It was quite fun to see Major Anri's attitude contrasted with her original boss, Darth Malora, and the chemistry with her soldiers was well-showcased. They all pale in comparison to General Daeruun, though!
Of course, it can't be ignored that this is the patch which returned Darth Malgus to the game's storyline. It's strange to think that, especially with how things are evolving in the current game's story, every single big story update (in other words, an x.1 or x.2 patch) since 5.10 besides patch 6.2 has involved him or his plans somehow. Even patch 7.2, which was otherwise about the mandalorians, hearkens back to his machinations and getting a previously independent storyline tied up in his story.
This doesn't in any way harm patch 5.10 in my eyes. 5.10 still stands tall as hands-down my favourite update released in recent years, simply because it started something new and gave characters from both factions something distinct to do without treading as heavily into the personal-timeline guff that some other faction-differentiating stories have done. It was, in some regards, a reminder of what the game was like when you could accurately place where each of your characters was while another character was off doing stuff, as they weren't clashing with one another as they would now.
Ossus as a daily zone is also really quite good fun. I don't rate it as highly as Oricon or Ziost, but I still really enjoy it. Oh, and it also had the first datacrons since patch 3.0! How cool is that?!
This update also included master mode Gods from the Machine, after a period of uncertainty whether it would actually come or not, and released the first gear set which had only the slightest of ties to the tedious Galactic Command system. I'm still baffled how they thought crafting via doing master Gods was the fastest way to earn 258-rating gear, given that I know several guildies who earned it in a month or so just via Ossus...
The biggest thing by far that this update included was the updated guild system. Guilds could now unlock the maximum levelling, reputation, and now command bonuses irrespective of member count by levelling up, and various powerful perks could be slotted into the guild ship such as boosting endurance in all but master mode operations or improving critical chance for crafting. The guild ship could now even have a set bonus!
All in all, patch 5.10 was just wonderful. Excellent storyline, very good location, wonderful characters, fun daily missions... even with some quite annoying bugs, very few of which fortunately prevented the game's story from being completed, the whole is just too good for me to pass up on, especially compared to what came before...
~
Onslaught: Patch 6.2: Echoes of Oblivion (and Spirit of Vengeance)
Much like the 3.0 patch cycle, the 6.0 patch-cycle doesn't have a lot to talk about when it comes to 'big' patches. Granted, this was the expansion where BioWare sat down and revised how patches would be numerated; if it contained a story update, it would only have one decimal point, like patch 6.2. If it was a minor update, but still contained stuff like a new event, it would have two decimal points, like patch 6.1.4.
Thus, there were only four 'big' patches in 6.0's lifespan: 6.0 itself, 6.1, 6.2, and 6.3. The COVID-19 pandemic interrupted things a fair bit, but it is likely that if it weren't for this change in numeration, patch 6.1.4 which contained the Feast of Prosperity might itself have received a 6.2 denomination. We'll never know, but regardless from this point forth this is why it takes months for a 'big' patch to be released, where previously a CZ-198 scale update was itself denoted as such a patch.
Were 2.0 or 5.0 to be released with this philosophy I don't doubt they'd both be a fair bit shorter in terms of 'big' updates.
Patch 6.2 was originally only meant to include the Echoes of Oblivion storyline, which entailed us finally putting an end to the biggest bad of SWTOR, but due to the delay because of COVID BioWare combined it with what would have been 6.3; the first part of a new storyline focusing on the mandalorians and their place in the galaxy.
I mean, I can totally get why some mandalorians are unhappy with Shae. She can't even remember which planet she was on during Chapter XIV of Fallen Empire! She's unreliable!
In general, it feels like with 6.0 BioWare took the opportunity to rid themselves of every last element of Fallen Empire era content that they could. The Alliance was formally removed as a major player, either being absorbed into the Empire or the Republic or becoming just allied with them while still its own thing. Kira Carsen, Lord Scourge, Tharan Cedrax, and Zenith, the last four companions to still be returned outside of Tanno Vik (RIP) and Lord-Zash-Khem-Val, came back throughout the course of the entire expansion.
6.2, meanwhile, touched on the biggest outstanding element of the Fallen Empire story; the body of Tenebrae. We'd killed Valkorion in Eternal Throne, and that still holds true even with his return in this update. It transpires that Tenebrae carved a plague into his flesh which would take hold of any who tried to destroy it, creating a replica of who he was at that time within their mind until he was strong enough to consume the host and be reborn. This is where Satele Shan has been since patch 5.9, as she found Kira and Scourge who were in the thrall of this plague; they subsequently passed it onto her and her students, and our job is to make sure Tenebrae doesn't kill them.
Even though we reconvene with his more familiar visages of Valkorion and Vitiate, the emperor we meet in Echoes of Oblivion is very much his own character. We also meet back up with certain other long-gone characters, such as Vaylin, who is given a new lease of life by somehow being able to take control of one of Satele's dead students, Darth Marr, Meetra Surik, and Revan, and together with Valkorion's remaining family and the spectres of those whose lives he ruined, we put an end to Tenebrae once and for all.
Spirit of Vengeance, meanwhile, introduces us to Field Marshal Heta Kol, who has marshalled together a bunch of mandalorian clans and led them in open revolt against Shae's leadership. We've only just seen the second part of this story in patch 7.2, with the implication that patch 7.4 might be part three. Y'know, discounting little cutscenes in other story patches that further the plot but don't really.
Unlike Echoes of Oblivion, which is a chapter-style solo instance, Spirit of Vengeance is a flashpoint. It's... alright. It's hardly one of my favourites, but it's also quite some way from being one of my least favourites.
Honestly, there's still so much we don't really know about the mandalorians and Heta Kol, and while this flashpoint is an alright introduction to them, we're only introduced to one of Heta's lieutenants personally - Bask Sunn. Durn Wynnward and Tyrus Brokenblade appear only in three cutscenes with Heta, and have only had speaking lines in one!
Oh, and Heta herself has changed both armour colours and voice. She was revealed in concept art with red-and-gold armour, then came to the game with green-and-red armour, and now is back to red-and-gold as she should always have been, and we have no idea why her voice actress changed. Fortunately it happened only after one instance of her appearing, so while it was noticeable she also wasn't established enough that recasting her shouldn't have been too difficult.
Shae may be unreliable, but at least she's consistent!
Patch 6.2 also introduced the login rewards calendar. Compared to how other games do it, I really like how SWTOR's version operates; it is not possible to miss rewards, as the calendar is not tied to any given day, week, or month, but rather how often you yourself log in. If you take a break partway through week three of your third calendar, you'll still find yourself logging back in at that exact same point whenever you come back.
The most annoying aspect of it is the seemingly random nature of the calendars appearing. I think I must have had almost fifteen versions of the Strength in Allies calendar by now, having completed my tenth last year, but I'm still only on my seventh Aggressive Negotiations calendar, despite not having seen that for at least three months!
Ah, well.
All in all, while I have misgivings about the mandalorian story, I feel patch 6.2 was reasonably solid. Echoes of Oblivion was decent fun, although the last fight can be very tedious for specific classes.
~
Legacy of the Sith: Patch 7.3 - Old Wounds
This should come as little surprise given how much I gushed about it in a previous post.
Compared to prior story updates, which focused almost exclusively on the longer aspects of SWTOR's current story chain, 7.3 only touched on them very briefly before sending us off to Voss to make nice with the Shrine Restoration Initiative to learn more about a prophecy made by The Three.
And honestly, it's just a really nice update. It's nice to see a follow-up to the Voss storylines we've seen over the years and to actually get more of the voss-gormak alliance that was ever-so-briefly seen in 5.0's first chapter, and the missions they give you are quite nice as well. I really quite liked the cantina quest and the tour-guide quest in particular.
While Malgus and his frustrating unknown plans feature in this update as well, I have to give major props to Jamie Glover for his phenomenal acting in this update. You can read multiple different things into Malgus's sudden change of behaviour, whether it's genuine regret or acting to bait us into supporting him, but regardless Glover's acting was flawless in that moment.
The other thing which was really nice about this update was the flashpoint Shrine of Silence. I really enjoyed having a flashpoint which was actually just another thing to do rather than an integral part of the story, and I look forward to seeing more done like this.
In general, I really wouldn't mind getting more small-scale story updates done in this manner. Send us to Alderaan, please!
There's not a lot else to say about this update, to be honest. It was short but sweet, and in the current seemingly-endless guff about Malgus and the mandalorians I'll take short but sweet gladly.
~~~
And there we have it. My picks for favourite big story-based updates from each expansion.
I find it noteworthy that a number of them are associated with repeatable content that I really like, whether it be an operation, flashpoint, daily zone, or combination thereof. Quite honestly, that's what I really like about what a lot of SWTOR does and did throughout the years in terms of having distinct activities. For example, compared to MMOs like ESO and WoW, most of its daily zones being a series of repeatable missions that do not change, rather than a bunch of alternating daily quests of varying kind and difficulty, really helps certain updates stand out compared to others.
That's not to say that I can't appreciate content which is more limited. My love of 7.3 is more because it just feels so refreshing compared to 7.1 and 7.2 that it's hard not to appreciate it, even if 7.2 objectively delivered more actual content. First impressions are also very important for a game update, something which still really harms 3.0, 7.2 itself, and the early patches of 5.0 while BioWare were still trying to make Galactic Command work.
So... yeah. I try to be fair when looking across all of these, but I still have a very sour taste in my mouth when thinking about how certain updates were when they launched or how much I dislike certain daily zones. I should point out in the interest of fairness that Section X is one of my least favourite daily zones, but I still chose patch 1.5 as my favourite big story update from that era as I feel the concepts behind the daily zone were just enough to pull it to the fore.
Plus, let's be honest, 1.0's post-launch content was not exactly meaningful a lot of the time. It was early days, but it still tried its damnedest to do what it could.
Of all of these updates I've specifically highlighted, my favourite would actually still be 2.4. 5.10 is excellent, and is my favourite in recent years, but I have to give credit to patch 2.4 for delivering a daily zone and two new operations in one go, something which we've only seen done once since in patch 3.0. For what was merely a middle-of-the-expansion game update, 2.4 provided a strong conclusion to a long-running story and laid the groundwork for future daily zones in terms of associated story delivery. That's not bad going.
Not to mention the introduction of arenas and reformatting of Ranked, something which BioWare were ultimately able to stick to their guns with all the way up to patch 7.2. That's some good longevity right there.
No comments:
Post a Comment