SWTOR Girlfriends

I've got a bunch of SWTOR characters that I'm running through. These are all newer than my seven remaining "OGs" from my first playthroughs. I've kept most of those because they are maxed out on the crafting skills and even have many alternate schematics, which I'd lose if I ditched them. That said, I don't just use them for crafting; I still use them for events, for seasons, for group flashpoints, and most of them are slowly but surely grinding through post-end credits material, of which there's a lot. Some of it was present almost from the get-go like Section X, the Black Hole, Ilum, etc. So they're still pretty active. Given the fact that I have 24 total characters, therefore 17 of them are "younger" than the OGs and need more attention, the OGs are probably too active, to be honest with you.

I'd actually like to talk about a very specific aspect of the characters today, which as the subject line gives away, are the "girlfriend" characters among the companions. With one exception, I play male characters—both because I am a guy myself, and because I think male action heroes is much more iconic and makes much more sense than the modern and bizarre and off-putting action-grrl stereotype that our modern, delusion-based, wishful thinking ideology has about men vs women. They're simply different both physically and psychologically, and I have to look askance and wonder what the heck is wrong with people who don't admit that those differences are, in fact, pretty darn obvious. So, yeah—for almost all of my characters—and I'm making one exception with a Sith Sorceress—my characters are men, and therefore will be scoping out the companion roster for potential girlfriends. 

In this post, I'm going to talk about the potential girlfriends for each character class, and what customizations are available (and in some cases desperately needed), and what I'm specifically planning on doing with each of my characters. None of my younger characters are really at a point where I've gone too far in to this particular aspect, even those that are pretty far along (and that's saying something; Hutran Thanatos is Level 69 already, and just landed on Hoth nearly at the end of Act II (of III.)

Jedi Knight Story: The Jedi Knight story really only has one romanceable character, Kira Carsen whom you meet way back on Tython, and pick up officially as a companion on Coruscant. She's your second addition to the roster, and you get her really early. She's also one of the best girlfriends in the game, to be honest with you, so I don't feel bad about romancing her. 

With Mark, my OG Jedi Knight, I didn't slap a customization on her until after the story was over and I'd already gone through all of the customizations anyway. She looks pretty good without a customization; in fact, I'd argue that it's possible that her customizations don't improve on her original look at all. Taul Kajak, my Mirialan Jedi that I'm no longer recording is also not using a customization, and Elemer Kell, my Zabrak Jedi that I am still recording, is using customization 8, which has the orange Sith eyes (kind of a spoiler alert. Then again, you can only pick it up on Ilum. That said, there's nothing to prevent you from flying your ship to Ilum as soon as you have a ship and buying it, which is what I did.)

Other possibilities that I could have considered are the blonde #4 and the braid at #10. In fact, I've used that one for a while with Mark, and while I tend to really like the braid customizations on my girlfriends a lot, the over-the-top facial scarring associated with that customization was too much for me after a while. That said, I do have it unlocked in my collections, so I could potentially pick it up again. I doubt that I'll play more than these two Jedi Knights again in the foreseeable future, however, so I probably won't get around to it. Maybe I'll go reapply it to Mark's Kira since he's done with the story part of cut scenes with her anyway.

Jedi Consular Story: I have started, although done very little with so far, a new Jedi Consular. Kind of as a joke, I named him Gandalf Grayhame (although I had to put some umlauts on the first a to get the name to take) and made him look like an old man, as close to the iconic image of Gandalf as you can get. He's only got one girlfriend option, Nadia Grell. Not only do you not even deal with her until very late in your story—having instead to run around with Lizardo the walking Anthropology Class as a companion for much of the first half of the game—but she's neither very attractive or likeable. I've not really given a lot of thought to customization for her, really, but I'll probably pick something just to be a little different. Maybe give her not-white hair, although then he'll look like a creepy old man with a younger than appropriate girlfriend. Although—all things considered, that's kind of funny too.

Sith Warrior Story: Let's stick with the force users for now. The Sith Warrior has a couple of romance alternatives, but none of them are great, to be honest. The "default" seems to be Vette, the sassy twi'lek girl who starts out as your slave. Phovos Maledict is going to romance her, just because I didn't last time. She's actually fairly cute and likable, but she's a weird alien who has two fat tentacles instead of hair, so I don't find her all that attractive.

The other option is your human Jedi Jaesa Wilsaam. Mathew, my OG Sith Warrior romance her light-side, but that isn't really a romance—at least not until Onslaught, deep in the expansions, where she finally admits that she's been in love with you for a long time. While that's a satisfying way to do it in some ways, it's also a lot of delayed gratification. Probably way too much, to be honest with you. I suspect it may have been added in in the expansions because of player complaints about the lack of real romance option with her lightside during your normal story.

Of course, you can also romance dark side Jaesa, which is a whole 'nother kettle of fish. This option is kind of popular because its funny in a psychotic and toxic kind of way. I'll probably eventually do it, but I'm not terribly excited about it, to be honest with you.

While I'm on record as not really loving blue, green or red hairless alien girls or finding them all that attractive, I do think a few of the customizations are marginally better than the standard. Mathew's Vette has the lighter blue #3 and Phovos' Vette has the green #9. Jaesa's got different customizations and appearance depending on which side of the Force you push her in to: light or dark. She's actually not terribly unattractive as a default if you don't mind dark-looking Spaniard or Sicilian girls. I also briefly used the red-head and freckled #3 on Mathew's before settling on the blond #4. I will point out that blonde #4 Jaesa looks almost exactly like the default Elara Dorn, however. I don't like any of her dark side customizations all that much; she looks really good as default dark side, in my opinion.

Sith Inquisitor Story: I didn't keep my old Sith Inquisitor (and I don't even remember what I named him anymore either), but this poor class only has one romance option and it's like Vette only even worse. Not only is she an even more weird-looking alien girl, but she lacks Vette's charming personality. In any case, it's a moot point. I'm playing my current Sith Sorceress as, as the word sorceress implies, a woman, so she won't have a girlfriend option in the story. I think there's only one boyfriend option, but I'll see when I get there. I'm not thrilled by it either way.

Smuggler Story: Moving in to the tech classes, I've got a lot more options. The smuggler has one-off flings on almost every main story planet, but his real romance options boil down to Risha and Akaavi. Both have problems; Risha is an NPC on your ship, but not your companion for the entire first act, and doesn't actually join your crew officially as a companion until Alderaan, halfway through. This means, of course, that you can't customize her. She's also got a dark Sicilian who spends all of her time in a tanning salon or at the beach look to her which isn't terrible, but she's also got a lot of even prettier options. Luke used the very attractive platinum blonde long braid option #9, although I also have some others that I'm playing around with now that I'm all done with the romance arc anyway. #1 is a pale skin but very dark hair option; quite attractive, although she looks a lot like Sergeant Jaxo from the Trooper story. #3 is blonde but kind of generic and forgettable. #6 is about as dark as the default, but with prettier auburn hair in side buns not terribly unlike Princess Leia, and #8 is pale skin but also some kind of side bun action. And as I said, #9 is the best one. But because I've already used it, and because I have three smugglers in play, I wan to get some variety. Anstal Tane is the furthest along and the soonest to pick up Risha as customizable. I think I'll likely go #1 with him. Haul Romund is a platinum blond dude himself, so I'll probably re-use #9 with him. They'll look good together in the cut scenes where they're kissing and stuff. And Gael Heckett, my cyborg sunglasses at night guy will take either #6 or #8.

Akaavi Spar is also an option for the smuggler to romance. Frankly, though, I have no idea why. She's bigger than the default body type 2 smuggler, she's completely unfeminine, and not very likeable. She's also a bald weird alien with horns on her head, like she's a Crying Game cross-dresser Darth Maul pretending to be a gun-toting girl and fooling absolutely nobody.  I will never consider romancing her. Plus, you get her even later; almost the latest companion you get as part of the smuggler story, so even if she were attractive, your romance arc would, by necessity, be too short.

Agent Story: The agent story has two romanceable options, and there's a major problem with both. The default that they expect you to do, I think, is Kaliyo, who you pick up on Hutta and who is your first companion. She's literally the worst potential girlfriend in the game. Not only is she completely psycho and unlikeable, but she's a weird gray-skinned bald alien chick. I've never romanced her and never will. Although so far I've only had two characters who've had the opportunity to spurn her; John my OG sniper and Hutran Thanatos my Operative. Vash Galaide and Saxon Hettar will both have the opportunity to tell her to go space herself soon, though. As far as customizations go, there aren't any that improve on her look, so I go for humiliating her even further; sticking the rakghoul infected zombie-looking customization on her sorry butt and then dressing her in something ridiculous to make her even uglier. And I almost never run missions with her if I can help it anyway. Luckily, I've got a lot of alternate companions that I've picked up from various sources, so even at the very beginning of the game I can run with HK-51, or Darth Hexid, or Nico Occar, or Shae Viszla, or PH4-L4NX or Fen Zeil, etc. As I've said many times before, the rest of the official agent's cast of companions isn't great either; you can run stuff with creepy bug-man Vector, although he's a creepy bug man. Doctor Lokin as an older and creepier Bruce Banner is an option.

But you finally get someone likable when you pick up Raina Temple on Hoth, very late in the game. Although the voice actress is a blonde Aussie, for some reason her default character is a strange flat-faced black girl with boy hair. I usually customize her as quickly as I can. #2 and #3 aren't terrible, although nothing special. #4 makes her look like Elara Dorn. #7 makes her look like Jaesa Wilsaam. Both are fine, but the fact that they look almost exactly like one of the other girlfriends from one of the other characters is a bit strange, in my opinion. #9 is really the only one that I think is really all that great. John has used #9 since he first got her. I've got three more characters to go through, however; I doubt I'll use it on all four versions of Raina. I don't yet know what I'll do for that, although Hutran Thanatos is close to picking up his Raina, so I'll need to decide soon. I'll probably give him a #2. One of the other two, who are both pretty far away from picking her up anyway, will do #3 and #9 respectively.

Trooper Story: Elara Dorn is the only girlfriend option for the trooper, and while she is deliberately kind of irritating (in a way that isn't obnoxious; it's actually kind of cute. I'm surprised the writers were able to pull it off, frankly.) She is also pretty attractive in her default look. There are a few other customizations that have something to recommend them, though, although only one of them is a rival to the default look in terms of attractiveness, and that's the one you can get at the Nightlife event. 

Phillipion used the default Elara. I've got two up and coming troopers, although I'm only recording one of them now after screwing up the audio on the entirety of Ord Mantell with one. That said, my playthrough is nearly as important to me as my recording. One of them will use customization #10, and I'm trying to decide still what the other will do. One of the other customizations just for variety, or back to the default because I actually like it? #3 isn't bad. #5 isn't terrible, but it looks off because its a white girl with obvious black facial structure. I even kind of like the odd sunglasses at night cyborg eyes #9, even though not seeing the eyes is usually a turnoff. 

But #10 is the most attractive, followed by the default as a close second. Mirabeau Tane and Codon Veile are both at almost the exact same place in the story, about to go to Taris where you pick up Elara, so I'll need to decide which one I'll play first, and that one will probably get #10. I'm kind of leaning towards #9 for the second one just for the heck of it. Maybe I should do #9 with Mirabeau because he's a cyborg too (although he has normal human eyes, just some tech grafts around his eye socket on one side.)

Bounty Hunter Story: Finally we get to the bounty hunter and Mako, one of the cuter girlfriends in the game and one of the better romance side stories with a companion. I've had a lot of bounty hunters, although one of them was literally created by accident and one of them I almost deleted before deciding what the heck; I'll play it as a non-recording option. So, my use of them is a little over-stated. That said, Mako has some good looks. Her default is actually quite nice, and both Graggory and Galation used it all through their original playthrough (although both now are playing around with different looks, now that the cut scenes are over anyway.)

The only problem is that because Mako is with you from the very beginning, unless you take one of her original offering customizations, you have to wait until you've done two planets with her before you can go buy a customization. (I wish they sold all of them on the fleet. Scratch that; I wish you could apply them when you start the game so that even before she's your companion you can get the customization on the character that you want.) So, besides my two OG bounty hunters, what else am I doing with Makos?

Vant Galaide flew to Balmorra as soon as he could and picked up the dirty blonde customization #6. Wulf Hengist is still sitting on the original Mako, but he literally just got his star ship and is heading to Balmorra, so I'm considering picking up freckled redhead #5 for him. Or maybe I'll just leave her as is. Not sure yet. It's not his turn in the rotation for a little while, but I'll decide before I get to it. Embric Stane isn't recording, but he's got the darker redhead #3 option that they offer you on Hutta. I like this one a lot too, and I might use it on one of my recorded guys too... which I guess would just be Beorn Hengist. I'm also considering the nightlife customization. Although the hair color obviously isn't natural, it's still cute, and it's a unique hairstyle that you can't otherwise get on very many companions. 

If I had the collector's edition, I'd consider the cyborg eyes #7. The cyborg eyes #8 is weird because of the hairstyle (and the cyborg sunglasses, which are very narrow and strange) but I think it's fun to use it on Graggory's Mako after the story just for the heckuvit. I don't really care for black girl customizations, but it's worth noting that two of the three black Mako's have cyborg sunglasses too. All four of the cyborg sunglasses looks are different. #9 are the John Lennons, and #4 is full-on robot eyes.