In Star Wars The Old Republic your companions are a major part of the game, they follow you around, tank for you, heal you or at a pinch they can rip out the entrails of your enemies. This guide details the SWTOR companion gifts, shows you which gifts are best to give to each companion and how the changes in companion affection are calculated.
Firstly, gifts can be acquired in several ways. You can buy them from the auction house or from the companion gift vendors, you can be given them as quest rewards or as loot drops, or you can send a companion out to gather them via one of the mission crafting skills.
In short give your companion a gift they like and they will like you more. Yes, it seems that everybody does have their price. However, you can’t just go around giving any gift you find to any of your companions. Well, actually I suppose you could do that but you really shouldn’t. Knowing which gifts will be appreciated by which companion is the secret to maximising your affection gains.
For example, look at the following chart.
Along the side are the various playable classes of Star Wars: The Old Republic and along the top are the various categories of gift item. If you cross-reference and see a symbol then you will gain some affection points from the gift.
The symbols on the chart show you how much the companion enjoys that type of gift.
= this is their primary or favourite gift type. Gifts of this type give the companion +96 affection.
= they love these types of gift and their affection is raised by +54. (does not indicate romance between characters)
= they only like this gift so for these you get the smallest level of affection gain, +24.
If the square is blank then you will always get 0 and the gift will be wasted.
So there you have it, now you know which gift you should give to which companion. There is one other thing that you should consider. Gifts come in a variety of rarities, green gifts are common, blue gifts are uncommon and purple gifts are rare. The rarer the gift the more bonus affection the companion receives from it
- Common gifts don’t add anything to the affection.
- Uncommon gifts add +50%
- Rare gifts add even more, I can’t find the figures now but I’d guess at between 75-100% extra affection.
Let’s look at a couple of examples.
Let’s assume your Jedi Knight has two gifts in his inventory (A common ‘underworld luxury’ and a piece of uncommon ‘Republic memorabilia’) and you want to know which companion would get the greatest benefit (Doc or Sergeant Rusk?)
Underworld Goods (Common adds nothing to the affection rating)
- Doc likes the gift so will gain +24 affection from it.
- Sergeant Rusk has no feelings towards it so will gain nothing (+0)
Republic Memorabilia (Uncommon adds 50% extra affection)
- Doc has no feelings towards it so will gain nothing (+0)
- It’s one of Sergeant Rusk’s favourite items so he gains +96 for the item an extra 50% for its rarity. A total of 96+48 = +144 affection.
Romancing a Character
Give certain companions enough gifts and flirt with them when you can and you will unlock them as romantic options. This will often increase the number of gift types you can give that companion or the effect, a ‘like’ may become a love or even a favourite. I believe that this change occurs around the 5000 affection rating mark, but please let me know if this is not the case.
Gift Affection Diminishes
You will also need to watch out for the rank of the gift. Giving the right ranking gift to the right companion is also important. Using gifts of too low a rank will result in less affection rating. Giving gifts of too high a rank will not increase the amount of affection past their basic levels, so you would be almost wasting the gift.
Gifts drop to 50% effectiveness at the first mark and then by a further 50% drop at 4000. In short each rank of gift is only 100% affective for the following ranges.
- Rank 1 = 0 – 2,000
- Rank 2 = 2,001 – 4,000
- Rank 3 = 4,001 – 6,000
- Rank 4 = 6,001 – 8,000
- Rank 5 = 8,001 – 10,000
i.e Giving a rank 5 gift to a companion with an affection rating of zero could only at best result in a 96pt gain. That same 96pt gift could benefit a higher level companion who is no longer able to use the lower ranked gifts.
Without knowing the above it’s easy to waste a rare gift on someone who cares nothing for it.
Since I started using this chart my companions like me a lot more for it.
I will try to keep the above grid updated to make sure it’s correct but if you do see something that’s wrong, let me know.
A huge thanks to Latos and Snidgetwidgeon for all their help with keeping this accurate.
First I’d like to thank you for posting this article on companion gifts. It is a very good reference.
My comment is based on the light/dark versions of the romancable companions in the chart. My main is a light side sorc and I have maxed out Ashara. When I first got her I had experimented with the gift types and they lined up with what you listed for her “light” version. Before maxing her, I gave her some more gifts and I was surprised that she was actually enthusiastic about getting them. So, I tried giving her a courting gift which she didn’t previously like. It turned out that she really liked it (lining up with the “dark” version on the chart). So, my guess is that the “dark” version of the chart is an expanded set of gifts that the companion likes once you have entered a romance with that companion.
Thanks for the update. That seems to fit in with what I was finding too.
I’ll make those changes as soon as I can.
Cheers.
I have something else to add. Since I finished leveling my sorc, I’ve started working on my Bounty Hunter. He has not entered into a romance with Mako yet. I noticed that you only have 1 line for Mako and the gifts that she likes differs slightly from it, so the line you have there is probably her “romance” list of gifts. Here is what she likes before entering a romance:
Weapon: Like 24
Military: Nothing 0
Courting: Nothing 0
Luxury: Like 24
Technology: Favorite 96
Republic: Nothing 0
Imperial: Nothing 0
Cultural: Like 24
Trophy: Like 24
Underworld: Love 54
All of these were tested using level 2 uncommon gifts purchased from the companion gift vendor.
Brilliant! Thank you so much for the info. It will soon be on the grid.
Keep ’em coming. 🙂
Here is one more tidbit that I learned while playing my BH. The level of the gift not only determines how much affection it will give the companion, it also determines at what affection levels the gift gives less/no affection. I was giving level 1 technology gifts to Mako which are 48 affection. I was able to continue giving these gifts to her until she reached the 4000/10000 affection level. After this point it changed to 19 affection per technology gift. Eventually lower level gifts will give nothing to a companion (I tried some level 1 gifts that Ashara loved, but they did nothing when she was around 9900/10000, so I do not know the affection level they stop working at yet).
Now, what this means is you should save higher level gifts for when your companion reaches higher levels of affection. If you have an extra 16k credits laying around (which should be no problem for someone who has at least 1 level 50), you can go to the fleet’s companion gift vendor and purchase the level 1 favorite gifts for a new companion in bulk to raise the affection level to 4000 before getting affection from conversations. If you compare the price of level 1 gifts to the higher gifts, the level 1 gifts will give more affection overall for the same price up to that 4000 mark (It just takes about 80 gifts).
Wonderful cheers. Worth quoting this in the main post I think.
Thanks again.
Umm, I like the chart… but just from a quick glance I can see its inaccurate in a lot of places.
Yeah, I’ve been spotting errors myself as I’ve been playing. If you know of any changes I need to make, I’m happy to hear them and make the changes.
Thanks
I love your, chart. It makes things so much easier while playing! That’s why I want to help make it better too. I tried giving a courting gift to Aric Jorgan on my Trooper but he was having none of it. I think the star there needs to be removed.
…and it’s been removed.
Thanks for your help.
Hello again Jim,
I was reading the patch notes for update 1.2 and it mentions fixing something between the romance option for a female trooper and Aric Jorgan. This has led me to realize that the star previously removed for courting is most likely valid, but needs an Aric Jorgan (Romance) slot. I did think it was odd that the female trooper had no (Romance) option, but now we know it is with Jorgan.
~Snidgetwidgeon
oh ok, good call. I’ll see if I can get the rest of the courting stats for Jorgan.
Thanks
Here is an updated list for Gault for the Bounty Hunter:
Weapon: Like 24
Military: Nothing 0
Courting: Nothing 0
Luxury: Favorite 96
Technology: Like 24
Republic: Nothing 0
Imperial: Nothing 0
Cultural: Like 24
Trophy: Nothing 0
Underworld: Love 54
This was once again tested using level 1 gifts.
One more note, it looks like the cut off point for level 1 gifts is at 2k affection for their full effect. The 96 gifts turn to 48 at that point.
Here is an updated list for Torian Cadera for the Bounty Hunter:
Weapon: Love 54
Military: Love 54
Courting: Nothing 0
Luxury: Nothing 0
Technology: Like 24
Republic: Nothing 0
Imperial: Nothing 0
Cultural: Like 24
Trophy: Favorite 96
Underworld: Like 24
It looks like you mixed up the stars and the hearts for him on your graph, so the romance is probably mixed up too )can’t test that one with this character though).
Also, it looks like the point where gifts begin to give less than their full effect is at gift level * 2000. So max level for each gift to have full effect is:
lvl 1: 2000
lvl 2: 4000
lvl 3: 6000
lvl 4: 8000
lvl 5: 10000
Again, thanks for this. 🙂 I haven’t had much chance to play recently, so you’re a big help in keeping this accurate thanks.
I’ve updated to include your latest info.
Here is an update for Vette (non romance) for the Sith Warrior:
Weapon: Like 24
Military: Nothing 0
Courting: Like 24
Luxury: Like 24
Technology: Like 24
Republic: Like 24
Imperial: Like 24
Cultural: Love 54
Trophy: Nothing 0
Underworld: Favorite 96
Again, it looks like it was just the love and favorite that were wrong in the chart. I’m guessing you swapped them for most of the chart by mistake when you made it.
In all cases but one, being in a romance shows Courting gifts to be more desireable. Jaesa Willsaam (Sith Warrior) is the exception. I think there’s an error with her data.
In addition, there are other sources that show Jaesa Willsaam (dark) and Jaesa Willsaam (light) with different preferences. Does this mean she should have 4 rows?
Thank you. I’ll look into the Sith Warrior line.
As far as dark / light options go. I didn’t think the companions gift choices changed in relation to light/dark choices.
My belief is that you have one line for standard and one if you are courting them.
If this is not the case, i can look into updating.
Thanks