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ermingardenSWTOR came out with a new story update on Wednesday! I have a few thoughts, both about the update itself and about how it fits with previous expansions.
(Okay, apparently I have a lot of thoughts.)
Spoilers below the cut, especially for "Echoes of Oblivion" and "Knights of the Eternal Throne."
[Full disclosure: I have only played Echoes of Oblivion on my Jedi Consular so far. I don't know what details might be different for other classes, though the broad strokes are the same.]
In short: Echoes of Oblivion seems to be a corrective effort by the writers in response to many players' dissatisfaction with the ending of Knights of the Eternal Throne. Tone-wise it's much more similar to KotFE/KotET than to Onslaught, but I don't think this represents a long-term shift going forward - I predict the return to Imperial/Republic conflict as the driver for story content is here to stay.
As I see it, the story content in SWTOR can be divided into two categories: faction-conflict and faction-unity. The class stories and almost all of the planetary storylines on the original planets fall into the faction-conflict category, driven primarily by the war between the Empire and the Republic; Rise of the Hutt Cartel is in this category as well, with a separate storyline for each faction. (Hutt Cartel is basically just an extra planet, with a planetary storyline but no class story element.) The faction storylines converge at a few points, namely the Tatooine and Alderaan planetary arcs, the False Emperor flashpoint on Ilum, and the Dread Masters storyline, but remain generally separate.
This changes with Shadow of Revan. SoR is the first big switch to a faction-unity storyline; barring small differences, mostly in the prelude, the entire story is the same for both factions. My guess is this was done mostly for financial reasons - naturally, it's cheaper to develop only one set of content rather than two. But not only is the storyline the same for both factions in SoR, the story actually focuses on interfaction cooperation, first on a small scale (Lana and Theron), but later more broadly (the Yavin Coalition). SoR, KotFE, and KotET focus on Imps and Pubs banding together in the face of a greater threat.
What's always rubbed me the wrong way about this is that there's a real dissonance between the portrayal of the Empire in the early content and in these faction-unity expansions. In the later content, the Empire and Republic are depicted as more or less moral equivalents. In the earlier faction-conflict content, though, although not every Imperial is evil, the Empire as a whole definitely is. The Pub-side storyline on Nar Shaddaa, for example, involves the Empire literally committing genocide against the Evocii (the native species of the Hutta system). Non-humans (except for the Sith species) are legally second-class citizens in Imperial society, and many Imperial worlds depend on slave labor. None of that is ever really addressed in the faction-unity content.
With the most recent major expansion, Onslaught, Bioware returned to a faction-conflict storyline in what I thought was a very clever way! The two faction stories mirror each other, so most of the playable content is actually the same, but the tone and plot is much more "classic SWTOR."
Echoes of Oblivion is a faction-unity storyline in the sense that it's the same for each faction and suggests a degree of moral parity between Jedi and Sith. But I think the faction-conflict storyline in Onslaught is going to be more typical of future story updates. At the end of Onslaught, you're presented with two breadcrumbs leading to future story arcs: (1) Kira and Scourge show up saying Satele Shan and her students have been infected by a mystical plague from a dark ritual carved into the Emperor's original body (yes, really - KotFE/KotET got a bit weird), and (2) there's a short scene implying that Darth Malgus, who disappeared at the end of Onslaught, has shown up on Dantooine for unknown reasons. EoO picks up the first breadcrumb and resolves it. At the end of EoO, you get another reference to Malgus' appearance on Dantooine, suggesting that the next story update will follow that thread and continue from Onslaught.
Story-wise, EoO didn't really do much for me. As I mentioned above, I think it was created to address particular issues a lot of fans had with the ending of KotET, and while there were things about KotFE/KotET I didn't like, they mostly weren't those things. At the end of KotET, you finish off Valkorion, born Tenebrae and formerly known as Vitiate/the Sith Emperor. As I understand it, a lot of folks, especially those who had played Knights of the Old Republic, were annoyed that (1) the SWTOR player character essentially supplanted Revan and (2) Vitiate/Tenebrae/Valkorion/the Sith Emperor met his final end as Valkorion, an identity he only had in KotFE/KotET. KotFE/KotET shifted a lot of the focus to Zakuul, and since Zakuul was literally only invented for those expansions, it was hard to get invested in. Honestly, KotFE/KotET doesn't always feel very much like Star Wars to me. (I have a pet theory that Zakuul is the same as Zigoola, the Sith planet that appears in Karen Miller's Wild Space, but that's a discussion for another day.) EoO is basically Killing the Emperor, Take 2. (Take 3, if you played the Jedi Knight class story.)
I do think EoO works much better for the Jedi Knight than for the other classes. (I'll freely confess that I'm going off secondhand knowledge of the Knight storyline - it's the one Republic class I haven't finished yet.) You defeat the Emperor as (1) Vitiate, (2) Valkorion, and now (3) in his original form as Tenebrae - there's a pleasing symmetry there.
Ultimately, though, I actually prefer the ending of the fight with the Emperor in KotET to the one in EoO, even if the heavy focus on Zakuul is annoying. In KotET, it's not a question of your player character being strong enough to overpower him. Instead, the Emperor's overconfidence is his downfall. He tries to possess you and fights you in your own mind, but as you realize in the end, it doesn't matter how powerful he is: He's fighting on your home turf, and my mind, my rules. The end of EoO also takes place inside a mind the Emperor (or rather, the echo of the Emperor) is trying to possess - Satele's, this time - but that doesn't really come into play.
(Speaking of echoes, we do get an appearance from the now-iconic line: I am one with the Force, and the Force is with me.)
It was interesting to see that the spirits of Master Syo Bakarn (from the consular class story) and Master Surro (from Ziost) were both present for the final showdown with the Emperor, suggesting that they're both dead at this point, even if Syo survived at the end of the consular storyline.
Mechanics-wise, the big fight at the end of EoO is honestly a grind. It's very similar to the battle with Revan in SoR in that you're joined by about 137983724 NPCs and it takes approximately forever.
Anyway, I thought EoO was okay, but not great. I'll be glad to get back to more Onslaught-esque content now that the "fighting the Immortal Emperor" story arc is wrapped up - hopefully for good this time.
(And dear Force, please someone give Satele a hug. And send her to therapy. She's had a rough few years.)
(Okay, apparently I have a lot of thoughts.)
Spoilers below the cut, especially for "Echoes of Oblivion" and "Knights of the Eternal Throne."
[Full disclosure: I have only played Echoes of Oblivion on my Jedi Consular so far. I don't know what details might be different for other classes, though the broad strokes are the same.]
In short: Echoes of Oblivion seems to be a corrective effort by the writers in response to many players' dissatisfaction with the ending of Knights of the Eternal Throne. Tone-wise it's much more similar to KotFE/KotET than to Onslaught, but I don't think this represents a long-term shift going forward - I predict the return to Imperial/Republic conflict as the driver for story content is here to stay.
As I see it, the story content in SWTOR can be divided into two categories: faction-conflict and faction-unity. The class stories and almost all of the planetary storylines on the original planets fall into the faction-conflict category, driven primarily by the war between the Empire and the Republic; Rise of the Hutt Cartel is in this category as well, with a separate storyline for each faction. (Hutt Cartel is basically just an extra planet, with a planetary storyline but no class story element.) The faction storylines converge at a few points, namely the Tatooine and Alderaan planetary arcs, the False Emperor flashpoint on Ilum, and the Dread Masters storyline, but remain generally separate.
This changes with Shadow of Revan. SoR is the first big switch to a faction-unity storyline; barring small differences, mostly in the prelude, the entire story is the same for both factions. My guess is this was done mostly for financial reasons - naturally, it's cheaper to develop only one set of content rather than two. But not only is the storyline the same for both factions in SoR, the story actually focuses on interfaction cooperation, first on a small scale (Lana and Theron), but later more broadly (the Yavin Coalition). SoR, KotFE, and KotET focus on Imps and Pubs banding together in the face of a greater threat.
What's always rubbed me the wrong way about this is that there's a real dissonance between the portrayal of the Empire in the early content and in these faction-unity expansions. In the later content, the Empire and Republic are depicted as more or less moral equivalents. In the earlier faction-conflict content, though, although not every Imperial is evil, the Empire as a whole definitely is. The Pub-side storyline on Nar Shaddaa, for example, involves the Empire literally committing genocide against the Evocii (the native species of the Hutta system). Non-humans (except for the Sith species) are legally second-class citizens in Imperial society, and many Imperial worlds depend on slave labor. None of that is ever really addressed in the faction-unity content.
With the most recent major expansion, Onslaught, Bioware returned to a faction-conflict storyline in what I thought was a very clever way! The two faction stories mirror each other, so most of the playable content is actually the same, but the tone and plot is much more "classic SWTOR."
Echoes of Oblivion is a faction-unity storyline in the sense that it's the same for each faction and suggests a degree of moral parity between Jedi and Sith. But I think the faction-conflict storyline in Onslaught is going to be more typical of future story updates. At the end of Onslaught, you're presented with two breadcrumbs leading to future story arcs: (1) Kira and Scourge show up saying Satele Shan and her students have been infected by a mystical plague from a dark ritual carved into the Emperor's original body (yes, really - KotFE/KotET got a bit weird), and (2) there's a short scene implying that Darth Malgus, who disappeared at the end of Onslaught, has shown up on Dantooine for unknown reasons. EoO picks up the first breadcrumb and resolves it. At the end of EoO, you get another reference to Malgus' appearance on Dantooine, suggesting that the next story update will follow that thread and continue from Onslaught.
Story-wise, EoO didn't really do much for me. As I mentioned above, I think it was created to address particular issues a lot of fans had with the ending of KotET, and while there were things about KotFE/KotET I didn't like, they mostly weren't those things. At the end of KotET, you finish off Valkorion, born Tenebrae and formerly known as Vitiate/the Sith Emperor. As I understand it, a lot of folks, especially those who had played Knights of the Old Republic, were annoyed that (1) the SWTOR player character essentially supplanted Revan and (2) Vitiate/Tenebrae/Valkorion/the Sith Emperor met his final end as Valkorion, an identity he only had in KotFE/KotET. KotFE/KotET shifted a lot of the focus to Zakuul, and since Zakuul was literally only invented for those expansions, it was hard to get invested in. Honestly, KotFE/KotET doesn't always feel very much like Star Wars to me. (I have a pet theory that Zakuul is the same as Zigoola, the Sith planet that appears in Karen Miller's Wild Space, but that's a discussion for another day.) EoO is basically Killing the Emperor, Take 2. (Take 3, if you played the Jedi Knight class story.)
I do think EoO works much better for the Jedi Knight than for the other classes. (I'll freely confess that I'm going off secondhand knowledge of the Knight storyline - it's the one Republic class I haven't finished yet.) You defeat the Emperor as (1) Vitiate, (2) Valkorion, and now (3) in his original form as Tenebrae - there's a pleasing symmetry there.
Ultimately, though, I actually prefer the ending of the fight with the Emperor in KotET to the one in EoO, even if the heavy focus on Zakuul is annoying. In KotET, it's not a question of your player character being strong enough to overpower him. Instead, the Emperor's overconfidence is his downfall. He tries to possess you and fights you in your own mind, but as you realize in the end, it doesn't matter how powerful he is: He's fighting on your home turf, and my mind, my rules. The end of EoO also takes place inside a mind the Emperor (or rather, the echo of the Emperor) is trying to possess - Satele's, this time - but that doesn't really come into play.
(Speaking of echoes, we do get an appearance from the now-iconic line: I am one with the Force, and the Force is with me.)
It was interesting to see that the spirits of Master Syo Bakarn (from the consular class story) and Master Surro (from Ziost) were both present for the final showdown with the Emperor, suggesting that they're both dead at this point, even if Syo survived at the end of the consular storyline.
Mechanics-wise, the big fight at the end of EoO is honestly a grind. It's very similar to the battle with Revan in SoR in that you're joined by about 137983724 NPCs and it takes approximately forever.
Anyway, I thought EoO was okay, but not great. I'll be glad to get back to more Onslaught-esque content now that the "fighting the Immortal Emperor" story arc is wrapped up - hopefully for good this time.
(And dear Force, please someone give Satele a hug. And send her to therapy. She's had a rough few years.)
