Weekend update

As usual, I played a fair bit of SWTOR over the weekend. Vant Galaide finished Tatooine, including the bonus series. I didn't like the bonus series, exploration missions or planetary faction missions as much as I remember (I last played with with a Republic character) because they're too Imperial, frankly, and I don't imagine my characters as being super patriotic or loyal to the Empire; they have their own agendas and goals, and this is especially true of the bounty hunter, more than any other Imperial class in the game. But, it's done, and Vant is in the upper 50s for level and heading on towards Alderaan.

I played just a bit with Taul Kajak on Voss, thinking that I'd get him to level 80s. I still haven't managed that yet, but I was really disappointed in how laggy Voss was for me. Maybe I needed to reboot at the time I did it, but I think Alderaan and especially Voss have just become laggy in the course of the updates to the game, at least on my rig, which as I've said before, lacks a graphics card for dumb reasons. I'm tempted to work with my son-in-law to get an improved rig, but we'll see. Neither of those planets gave me much grief when I was playing nearly a year ago on this same computer, but they're consistently being rough on me now.

Curiously, the other major thing that I did was spend some time on Ruhnuk with Maark, doing the story and unlocking the daily area so I can get up to Legendary Reputation status and buy the really cool Mandalorian armor there. However, even Ruhnuk, which is much higher resolution and prettier graphically than Voss isn't giving me lag very much. I don't know what the deal with Voss is. It's just a tough planet for my computer. Alderaan too, to a lesser extent. The daily grind is kind of tedious, but I think it'll be worth it, because the armors are really pretty cool. Less important now that I've bought a few Boba Fett style armors, and more are available in the game than ever before. But I kind of like this one probably the best as Boba Fett-like. The coat from the Infamous Bounty Hunter, the first real Boba Fett or The Mandalorian looking look is probably the most generally useful, but the cool caped armor chestpiece of the Ruhnuk piece looks really good.

I like Ruhnuk graphically, but it's kind of a pain to play. The enemies have a lot of health, so it's tedious and time-consuming to fight against them, although not really more dangerous. It just takes longer. To fight... wild dewbacks? The scaling is clearly an artifact of the game, rather than something that makes any sense from a meta perspective.

I also really disliked the story on Ruhnuk. The story was more cutscene than gameplay. While this was kind of nice in the sense that it shows that the engine could be used with its existing assets to make a great animated show if we could have a good writer and a couple of animators, it wasn't the most fun to play at all, and the cutscenes weren't really all that likeable. Competently done, but paired with a crappy story.

Shae Viszla is a companion character who I send on errands to craft little things as part of my business. I also used her for several characters early on before I had actual story companions. Now, seeing them treat her like she's more important than the former Alliance Commander, and she can send me on those types of errands, is ridiculous. She's a terrible girlboss Karen, and nothing about seeing her is fun. Sadly, the whole story is about the interaction of terrible, unlikeable girlboss Karens; Shae, Heta, her Mandalorian rival, and the green Jedi girl all take on that role, while your character just sits around watching and being, as some of the Mandalorians say, Shae's lapdog. Ugh. Terrible story. But mercifully short. And frankly, I'm only doing it because I want the reputation stuff. I'm pretty ambivalent about the new story stuff for 7.x, or even older. I'm more interesting in replaying the original stories than I am in advancing into the expansions. Even Rise of the Hutt Cartel doesn't do that much for me. Even most of my original characters haven't done it yet, much less my newer ones.

Anyway, here's a few new screenshots.

I really like winter looks, and I now have enough options that almost every character could have a different one. Here's me experimenting with one on Johhn

I played the Showdown on Ruhnuk with Maark looking like this. I basically copied it from someone else, although they used a different mouthpiece that was bulkier than mine. I've got several options of my own, but this is my favorite.

A new update to Vant, using some pieces that I just unlocked from the Wastelander Tech armor, replacing the Triumphant Predator chestpiece and... I don't know, some other leg pieces which I can't remember now.