AI versions of my characters

I asked ChatGPT to create an AI image of Phovos Maledict in one of my favorite Sithy outfits for him. Of course, they didn't give him the black core darksaber like they should have, but otherwise, it turned out quite well.

I wonder if I can get it to fix the saber color without screwing the rest of the image up? Let me try real quick...

Almost! They fixed the lightsaber color, but screwed up his visor color. Luckily, since nothing else changed, I could copy and paste the top part of the first image onto the second image and get exactly what I wanted.

I'd like to do more of these for more characters. They look pretty good. I deliberately asked for a cyberpunk background, but it makes it look like he's operating on Nar Shaddaa.

Space Walther's PPK

So... I said earlier that I wanted to have a "James Bond" scoundrel; an agent with a Walther's PPK lookalike (sorta) gun as his main weapon as a way to play more of the Scoundrel combat specs. I actually had planned to build Jado Vikunn, but I've got him "looking" like a D&D drow from the classic era, i.e., Driz'zt with a short, conservative haircut.

If I could have gotten that same color on a human, that would have been even better, because then I could use the white eyes (yes, I know Driz'zt has purple eyes. I'm not trying to actually make a cosplay Driz'zt) and I wouldn't have to have the chin tattoo... which, luckily, you can't really see anyway. Between his dark skin, the black color of the tattoo and the dark stubble, it's almost invisible.

This "drow James Bond" does indeed have a pistol, of sorts, that's not exactly the same as a Walther's PPK, but which is close enough that it gives a very similar look, the Cunning Admiral's Blaster Pistol. Which I just bought on the GTN, since it was a relatively modest 30M credits. (Waiting on my subscription monthly cartel coin grant, which should be any day now, to add it to collections.) The SIS Service Pistol might be even better. I've got them both in the works...

Now, I need to find out how I'm going to dress him to get that James Bond look. There's not exactly a "space tuxedo" option that I'm aware of.

Something like this works as a spec ops outfit, at least, but James Bond is more famous for wearing his tuxedo in social situations than anything like this... although he does wear stuff like this in most movies too.

End Jan and First Feb SWTOR Journal

I may not play quite as much this week. I have to do my taxes sometime this week (have to being "I set a goal to get them done now that January is over") and I will likely be running a new campaign of D&D on Saturday that I need to take some time to prepare for. I also really want to finish the Arkham Horror novel that I was reading at the end of last year which I've really only read a few pages of in January. Last year, I read one hundred and seven books. In January I read... zero. I'm obviously not going to do as well this year, but I don't want to completely fall of the wagon either. But, I also re-upped my subscription, so I have two more months. What do I want to do?

I actually spent much more time than I expected doing Seasonal stuff; thinking that I want to at least unlock the blaster rifle and blaster pistol before it ends. I got the first rifle, and the pistol is only ... well, sometime next week away. I won't get the "advanced" version, because I jumped in when the season was well underway, and it was never my goal to do any of it, honestly. But I started feeling a little FOMO, so I'm doing some of it. I like the blaster rifle and pistol, and if that's all I get, I'll be happy with them. 

I spent quite a bit of time with Phovos Maledict lately. He's completely finished the first half of the story, and is well on his way in the second part; I'm about to finish Taris in the next day or two, and then do the double flashpoint that you do, before going to Quesh and getting turned on by Baras. That's a bit moment in the Sith Warrior story, and I just need to get there and all is good. As I said already, I'm doing this one pretty light-side mostly and I'm romancing Vette. Jaesa is "good Jaesa" again, like she is with M'at Thew. With Goth Severax goes through the story later, he'll be a much meaner Sith Warrior, kill lots more people because he can, and turn Jaesa to the dark side just to see how that goes. I mean, I could watch someone's YouTube of it, but people make boneheaded decisions a lot and they don't look as cool as my characters, so, y'know.

I'm actually quite happy with the progress I've made with him this weekend. Vash Galaide also started on Nar Shaddaa. Saxon Hettar did the Black Talon, but I went back to the Fleet; I may grind it one or two more times just so I can feel empowered to skip faction stories and still stay way ahead on levels if I want to. And his "brother" Vant Galaide, the semi-retired mercenary bounty hunter just went back and retroactively did the Dread Masters faction story on Belsavis, including seeing to Section X while I was at it. I also sent him to Corellia to do the faction story there before doing The Black Hole. And then he'll have Ilum and CZ-198 to do before Rise of the Hutts and Makeb comes along. 

Vant Galaide and Mako in the hangar on Corellia.
I'm sure it's perfectly normal for Mako to run around the galaxy without any pants on, why do you ask?

None of which are, strictly speaking, necessary, since most are daily areas and I've already got max reputation on them. Still, I think the HK quest is fun, even though for a laugh, I should have had him equipped as my companion as I was doing it. Maybe if I do this with Anstal Tane that's exactly what I'll do. 

Still, I feel like a lot of this isn't real "progress" since Vant is in semi-retirement and is already max level. He's not really doing anything that helps him in any way, I'm just doing it to do it. But levels are kind of a structural crock anyway; stories that you read or watch don't have anything like them. Characters just do stuff because the doing is the point, not the "gaining XP or loot" for doing them. I need to let it go. That said, I'm just kind of ambivalent about everything after the main story is over. I don't want to quit, exactly, but I go through the rest of the stuff at a crawl, and only enjoy some of it here and there. Sometime before I end this run of playing, I'll send M'at Thew through the KotFE and KotET expansions, at least, and end up with a base on Odessen. But whether I actually end up doing that with anyone else at all remains to be seen. Quite possibly not. Although maybe having at least one character who doesn't have a "better" girlfriend option can romance Lana and keep her in place of the girlfriend that I got instead. Don't know who if anyone that would be at this point, though.

Sith Warriors

I have three Sith Warrior characters, although only one of them is in "semi-retired" state; in fact, he's the next character to go into "post retirement" once I activate him. Another one is almost level 60 and almost halfway through the story, wrapping up Tatooine in the next day or two. The third is still on Korriban and hasn't even started his story yet, but I'm waiting until I get Phovos Maledict into semi-retirement before I start him. He'll be at least level 20 when he starts, maybe even closer to level 25. My "just started" characters, who actually haven't yet started, are all hovering at around 20. Some are closer to 25. None of them are about to start yet, but they still do their starting planet heroics most weeks, so they still get a level or two every week when I'm actively playing.

Before I show my three Sith, I didn't do what I expected again today. I did a lot of my "business" stuff, and am over 300M now in credits. I got some more seasons stuff done. I played a bit of Beorn on Dromund Kaas, although certainly I didn't do the whole planet yet. I finished Saxon on Hutta. He should have been at the "just started" stage, but because they had recently redone the Hutta graphics, I wanted to see them, so I kicked him off early. He's now on the fleet and ready to go to Dromund Kaas. I'll show it later, but agents are a little odd. He, like many of my characters, has an outfit for each of the main twelve planets, but agents don't really have a Hutta outfit; they wear their Dromund Kaas outfit for a little while until they go undercover as "the Red Blade" and then they wear a Red Blade disguise the entire rest of the time that they're on Hutta. I'll show—in another post—both my Red Blade disguise, and my normal agent in uniform outfit, which is really for Dromund Kaas mostly.

And, of course, I played a lot of Phovos on Tatooine. Playing even just a little bit with my son-in-law while he was doing the Sith Warrior story made me want to get back into the warrior moreso than some of the other characters.

Mat Thew is the original Sith Warrior, and was played as a marauder (fury). He has one of the stupidest names of any character that I still have, but... y'know. It's too much money to change it, so it stays. In my "translation" of him into Capes & Rayguns, his "real" name is now Castant Grene. 

Most of Castant's outfits are armored and have a face-covering mask. This "privateer" Sith outfit is one of the few that shows his face.

Castant is a reformer, so I played him as a powerful and overbearing guy who's more or less OK and doesn't do the ridiculous mustache-twirling evil Nazi Sith parody vibe that the game wants to push on you. But he's also not "straight up" light side because that's nearly as stupid in most cases. He did not casually murder people just because he could, he did not corrupt Jaesa, etc. 

In fact, he's one of the characters that I actually really do want to get through the post-retirement story and get Jaesa back. I did the "light side" romance of Jaesa with him, and that doesn't actually get to its denouement until into the expansions.

Phovos Maledict is arguably a bit less serious. He has Elvis hair, for one thing, and often dresses in a space disco suit with bell-bottoms, and open-shirted jacket, a pair of sunglasses, etc. that's all white. I looks more like John Travolta from Stayin' Alive with a goatee than what you'd expect from a Sith Lord. I'm playing him similarly except that for Castant I didn't romance Vette, because he's a good-looking, aristocratic, powerful Sith lord and romancing a mouthy teenaged blue alien with tentacles instead of hair was stupid. So Phovos will, in fact, romance Vette, so I can see what that's like. He's a Juggernaut (vengeance).

A newly designed Phovos Maledict outfit that's more or less playing it straight. It replaces one that I created in the beginning that I liked less and less the more I looked at it. 

Goth Severax is my darker Sith warrior. I plan on romancing "dark Jaesa" with him, and keeping Vette as a slave for as long as the game lets me do so. He still won't be cartoonish evil, because that's stupid, but he'll certainly be darker and meaner than either of the other two. Like my other wave V character, he's a repeat in mechanics, so he's the same mechanically as Mat Thew.

I've been fascinated since learning about them with my Western Hunter-Gatherer ancestors who had darkish skin and hair, but blue eyes. Goth is that kind, but of course, the dark side has turned his eyes yellow. Phovos has the "bright blue eyes" customization that was meant, I'm sure, to be Dune-esque. Although you can't see them super well through his shades above, you might see it in the other image of him from yesterday.

This doesn't show off Goth's serious 'stache, but it certainly has the darker, meaner Sith vibe going for it.

Also, I've been too caught up in Dynamics achievements so I can get all of those three speeders, as well as doing more Seasonal objectives than I expected. I'd like to unlock the blaster rifle and pistol before the season ends, although I won't get to the end of the string. I started with less time than needed, and I haven't been very focused on it. 

I do have the speeders for Ord Mantell, Hutta and Korriban unlocked, though. 

Sigh. Most of the rest of the planets are considerably more complicated. But I kill two birds with one stone by working on Tatooine this week.

UPDATE: My wife has a friend coming over for a Wicked marathon tonight, so I've got the evening mostly to myself. Plans for the night? A bit more Phovos Maledict on Tatooine. Maybe a bit more Mirabeau Tane on his next destination, which after a transition, should be Balmorra. I'd like to play through his transition, at least, and land him on Balmorra. And bring Gändalf Greyhame back from the Fleet to Tython, where he can run Dynamics for a while, although probably not tonight. But I'll place him where he needs to be.

Oh, and Mirabeau did two thirds of the GSI last night. I need to go to Hoth and finish that. Which is awkward, because he's high enough level at level 70, but hasn't been to Hoth yet in the story, so it's his first time there. Let's actually do that first, then do some Phovos.

Legacy of the Sith

Not that I'd ever completely abandoned it, but I was shuttering towards "I've done enough SWTOR for a long while" before Legacy of the Sith came out a few years ago and decoupled the Advanced Class (which is now just your class anyway) from your story. When I first started playing, the game was quite new, and your class was your story. Partway through, you could pick an advanced class. So, for instance, my trial Smuggler later picked up Gunslinger before I decided that I didn't want to pay for a subscription and the 20-level demo wasn't worth playing.

When I joined for real after reading about how Game update 4.x had made the game considerably more solo player friendly; although I think I was early in game update 6.x at this point, so Onslaught, you no longer picked a class and then after a few levels graduated into an advanced class. You now picked a class and immediately at character creation picked an "advanced" class. So, if you wanted to play as a smuggler, before you did anything else, you had to decide if you were a gunslinger or a scoundrel rather than playing for a few levels or so as a "generic" smuggler. But Legacy of the Sith, in game update 8.x, or maybe even 8.0; the first part of it (I don't remember anymore) decoupled your story and your mechanics. Your "advanced class" became your mechanics and your actual class became your "origin story" so now if you picked smuggler, you could pick any of the tech advanced class options to run your character through. If you wanted to be a commando and carry a giant Jesse Ventura cannon while running around as a swashbuckling gunfighter, that was kind of ridiculous, but the game allowed you to do it. As minor a change as this was, I nearly doubled the number of characters that I have after it launched, because of all of the mix and match options that I wanted to try. All of whom are still "in play" status; I haven't maxed level or finished the class story (yet) with any of them, although some of them are relatively close to max level and at least halfway through the story. (Once they max level, they can do the story much more quickly, because I can focus on only doing the class story missions.)

These were my Wave III characters, and my to-be-built planned Wave V characters. My Wave IV characters, on the other hand, are two characters that are recreating specs from my original Wave I, so they are not mixed/matched characters, but are playing class mechanics that match the original class story as they did for the first seven versions of the game. 

In no particular order, except that my spreadsheet ordered Wave III as such, these characters are:

• Saxon Hettar - A sith species bounty hunter using the smuggler gunslinger advanced class and dirty fighting spec. Fairly new started character. Still on Hutta.
• Vash Galaide - A human Imperial agent using the bounty hunter powertech advanced class with the advanced prototype spec. Mid-level character, on Balmorra.
• Gändalf Greyhame - a human Jedi consular using the Sith inquisitor sorcerer advanced class with the lightning spec. Fairly new character who just finished Tython and is on the fleet waiting to travel on the Esseles as soon as I get back to him.
• Beorn Hengest - a Republic zabrak bounty hunter using the Imperial agent sniper advanced class and the virulance combat spec.
• Wulf Hengest - a human bounty hunter using the trooper vanguard advanced class and the virulence combat spec.
• Haul Romund - another human (my favorite, obviously) smuggler using the bounty hunter mercenary advanced class and the innovative ordnance combat spec.
• Gael Heckett - a cyborg (so mostly human) smuggler using the bounty hunter powertech advanced class and the pyrotech combat spec.
• Mirabeau Tane - another cyborg trooper using the smuggler gunslinger advanced class and the saboteur combat spec. (Which is one of my favorites at the moment.)
• Codon Veile - a chiss trooper using the Imperial agent sniper advanced class with the engineering combat spec.

Waves I, II and IV are all non-mixed/matched characters, but for Wave V I wanted to fill in a few holes where I didn't have characters doing certain combat specs that I wanted to do. Wave V might grow because I have more holes than I currently have plans to fill. That said, none of these characters have yet been built in the game, so among other things, I'm still messing around and tweaking their names. Given how unhappy I've been with some of the names that I've been stuck with, I'm happy to have the opportunity to play around with them before committing to them in the game itself. 

And what the heck. Because I haven't built any of these, I can go ahead and plan for all of the Force user and other holes that I'm missing; more commandos, more Jedi and Sith, etc. I'll make an inventory of what advanced class and specs I still don't have, and then make a character plan who's point is to main that combat spec. When—or even if—I getting around to making all of these planned characters is a separate issue. So far, I haven't made any of them. I'll add more "plans" in the next few days.

• Jado Vikunn - I want to try a lot of the new Mirialan colors, so some very dark color (don't know which one yet) will go here. He'll play the agent story, but be a smuggler scoundrel advanced class with the ruffian combat spec.
• Kenth Odon - another Mirialan who'll be specifically designed to look kind of like Yondu from Guardians of the Galaxy; blue skin and red mohawk. He'll play the trooper story, but be an Imperial agent operative advanced class with the concealment spec.
• Gaul Pavanik - another Mirialan new color; this time a red one, like a Sith. I might, if I don't love it, actually make him a sith species character, however. He'll play the bounty hunter story and be a smuggler gunslinger with the saboteur combat spec. I already have a gunslinger saboteur, but I thought it was "important" to have a bounty hunter playing a gunslinger, so I needed another one. I've got all three specs, so his spec will be repeated. That's OK. I'm biased towards this spec and the powertech, obviously. 
• Donnall Sunn - One last new Mirialan color; this time, I want to make a pale character. What I'd like like is a rattataki that didn't need tattoos and who had hair, but I'm going to try and get as close as I can to that idea with him, I think. Because I haven't done much with the force characters, relatively speaking, this one will play the Sith inquisitor story but will use the Sith marauder advanced class (two lightsabers) with the annihilation combat spec. This will actually also round out my Sith marauder specs; I'll have one character of all three specs.
• Tycho Javand - I'll finally revisit the Jedi consular story again. TBD race, but he'll be a Jedi guardian with the cigilance combat spec.

Combat specs that are missing: 

• Jedi Sentinel - concentration
• Jedi Guardian - defense
• Jedi Shadow - kinetic combat, infiltration, serenity
• Jedi Sage - seer, telekinetics, balance

• Sith Juggernaut - immortal, rage
• Sith Assassin - darkness, deception, hatred
• Sith Sorcerer - corruption, madness

• Vanguard - shield specialist
• Commando - combat medic, gunnery
• Scoundrel - sawbones
• Mercenary - bodyguard, arsenal
• Operative - medicine

This is kind of ridiculous, though. It would nearly double my number of characters again. The changes that I'll actually make a character for all of those specs is very low. The characters I've already identified as Wave V are the ones that I see as priority.

In a pinch, I can make do with Jedi Shadows, Sith Assassins and even the last scoundrel and operative specs as my backup second combat spec on existing characters.

A few more menu shots...

...just for archive. When I want to use them on posts, I want to have them handy.

Mirabeau Tane without blinking

Vant Galaide in the same chestpiece (different color)

Iakar Kodo in his winter coat

A fancy Luukke outfit. He's made a lot of money by now, of course

Hutran Thanatos in a gas-protected suit

Luukke in a thuggish outfit

Vant Galaide's Mandalorian armor is unique

Luukke again, in a Han Solo esque outfit. With traveling neck pillow

Mirabeau in a similar outfit to Iakar below

Iakar's tactical suit

SWTOR Journal 1/26/2026

I changed my plan just a bit. For one thing, I didn't play quite as much as I anticipated. I watched a lot of TV with my wife, for instance, which normally I can't do super well, but I was in the mood to sit and get many, many hours of it and not complain about being restless. So, finished Stranger Things once and for all, and watched most of an entire season of Big Bang Theory. Of course, I did a few minor things with my "business" in SWTOR, but not much. I haven't been motivated to craft and sell, and my pistols haven't budged, even though they're the only copies for sale on the GTN right now. I guess I got lucky with my earlier sale, and there isn't demand for them at that price. Sigh. When they expire, I'll probably try again at $4M instead of $5M and see how it goes.

I also got more invested in Seasonal stuff than I expected, and ran around doing the Yavin IV dailies, which took a bit of time. I hadn't done those in quite a while, and I'd never done them with Johhn, so he didn't have a Yavin IV map uncovered at all. I also had a few characters on Ilum; another Season objective was 15 dynamic missions on Ilum. That took an hour or two as well. It was all reasonably fun.

But on to story progress. I took Vant Galaide, who just finished his class story, to the fleet and pick up the Ilum mission, after doing the Ilum dailies with some other guys and feeling motivated. I didn't really think about it until I got there, but I also picked up the Black Hole and Section X missions, because they're right there too. However... I skipped the faction stories on Belsavis and Corellia, so in theory, that character has no context. In reality, I've skipped the faction stories on those planets most times that I've played through the game, so I thought it might be nice to go back and actually do them. Vant went to Belsavis and picked up both the faction story string and the bonus series string and is working through them. I'm even doing a lot of the exploration missions (although not Heroics) with him there. Once I do that, I feel like I can skip several more Imperial characters on that and not feel bad. I'll also do Corellia with him before I do The Black Hole. I need to also run someone through the Voss stuff, since it's been a long time since I've done those. But probably not Vant. This was both surprisingly satisfying and unsatisfying at the same time. Satisfying in the sense that I feel no pressure to really accomplish anything quickly. I'm max level, semi-retired, and I'm just doing this because it's open and I haven't done it in the long time. Unsatisfying, because... well, it doesn't feel like making real progress. I am, of course. It's story material. But it's also side quest story material. The Belsavis stuff at least will lead to Oricon, but the Corellia stuff is completely unnecessary, and if you skip it, it has no impact on the expansion story stuff that comes next.

Vant's Mandalorian style custom suit

Then I played Phovos Maledict a bit. Finished Nar Shaddaa, except for the bonus series, which I'll go ahead and do before leaving the planet. But he's also way over-leveled at level 53, and he's on his way to Tatooine, which is one of my favorite planets. I may also grind some heroics and the Black Talon with him again to get him another level or two. (Or three.) Although he's unlocked enough abilities to feel pretty complete, I want to add the Vandinite Asylum helmet to one of his outfits that I've had from the beginning, but I can't equip it until he's level 61. Plus, I'll "relax" a little when he hits max level. That's still a ways away, but I want to get closer with him. It'd be great to be far enough ahead that I can skip some more of the faction stories coming up if I feel like I don't want to do them. And maybe he's the Imperial character who should do the Voss stuff. I don't have a new picture of Phovos, but I also played a fair bit of Mirabeau Tane, who's now level 68, and who finished both his class and the faction story on Alderaan. Which wasn't as tedious as I recall it being, although it'll be nice to not necessarily have to do it with everyone going forward because I just did on one recent Republic faction. (Although the Imperial side is almost the same anyway.) I'll stay on the planet with him long enough to do the Bonus Series. Then tomorrow, I can do Heroics on Ord Mantell and Coruscant again with him, get him up over level 70 and finish up the Act I story missions that we have between the planets before going to Balmorra. 

I know Imperial and Republic Balmorra aren't exactly the same, but because I have so many Imperial characters on or just finished with Balmorra, I'll probably let Mirabeau "rest" before doing it. I'll get burned out on that planet if literally almost everyone who's not retired is doing it all at once. 

Mirabeau in spec ops fatigues. I dislike troopers in heavy armor. That doesn't seem appropriate for the more spec ops stuff that they actually do in the story.
I'm kind of amused that I caught him mid-blink, but I'm leaving it for now.

So, I didn't get as far with Phovos as I kind of hoped/thought, I didn't play with my son-in-law at all, I didn't do anything with Beorn like I thought I might on Dromund Kaas, I didn't finished up Vash on Balmorra or even open him at all to double check that I'm remembering exactly where he is, and I didn't do anything with Gael Heckett either. Vant on Belsavis and Johhn on Yavin IV kind of took the place of what could have been quite a bit of that, though.