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Big Tenting Party? It's kind of a dragon age pun. Maybe it won't translate.
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Apr 12, 2013 20:27
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Quinine's Angels
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Apr 12, 2013 22:45
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You can't go wrong with the Spacing Guild.
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Apr 12, 2013 22:49
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LP Superstars
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Apr 12, 2013 22:51
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Free Republic
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Apr 12, 2013 23:02
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Barf Wight posted:Free Republic This is the best name. Please take it.
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Apr 12, 2013 23:04
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Grand Old Pubbies. Or run the Space prefix into the ground: Space Appreciation Station. Or Space Guild, but that's probably taken. Or Space Napalm Company, but that's probably the other thread.
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Apr 12, 2013 23:08
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The Irish Republican Army?
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Apr 13, 2013 04:29
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Barf Wight posted:Free Republic I was going to second Log Cabin Republicans, but this is the best possible option by far.
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Apr 13, 2013 06:58
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Barf Wight posted:Free Republic This.
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Apr 13, 2013 09:27
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my dad posted:This. I'd never heard of Free Republic until today. I guess I'm not even surprised, it's just kind of sad. Will try and set it up in a couple of hours. I'll need four other players, I think.
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Apr 13, 2013 09:31
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Barf Wight posted:Free Republic If the Guild Leaders title is "Dale Reed" and the MOTD is "There is always more and it is always worse" then I am all for it.
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Apr 13, 2013 09:45
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Sadly, the guild leader's name will be Dumbledore McDreamy.
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Apr 13, 2013 09:50
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 CHAPTER 14: WHO WOULD CROSS THE HOLOCRON OF DEATH MUST ANSWER ME THESE QUESTIONS THREE Previously posted:The search for the NOETIKON OF SECRETS has brought JOLUNE MOL'NEUX to the power-hungry vigilante LARS BADDEG. Lars decieved Jolune with a fake Noetikon and has trapped her mind within an endless white wasteland...     : !!! : So sorry for startling you. I would offer you a drink- but I ran out millennia ago, by my record. But we could play a game instead. : Now, that is a good question, but a difficult one. I'm guessing you activated what looked like some sort of ancient device- a holocron, maybe- and something went wrong. You zigged where you should have zagged, and you ended up here. : Wrong to trust Lars Baddeg.: He seemed too miserable to be lying! How do I get out of here?: Well, I suppose I could let you go. But you'd have to play a game with me, first- a game of questions. Answer right, you're free. Answer wrong, and your strength becomes a permanent part of this place.: I don't like the sound of that... but I guess I have no choice.: Now you're beginning to understand!BONUS STAGE: HEY KIDS, LET'S PLAY ALONG AT HOME! CAN YOU ESCAPE THE HOLOCRON OF DEATH?  a) You seek instruction. b) You ask. c) I won't do this. : b) Ask. You lure it out with a question. : Too obvious I suppose. It's no fun when you get the answer right. a) Everything. b) The truth. c) Nothing. : c) Nothing. The wise person does not know, but seeks knowledge, always.: Another right answer! You are so dull. a) Let them come (Meditate). b) I need more information. c) I will defend myself. : b) I need more information. What are the enemies? What are their weaknesses? Where will they attack from?: No! I don't know the answers to these questions...  : *WHUM* : Ha! FLAWLESS VICTORY! Now for Lars...The penalty for failing to give the right answers is... absolutely nothing. You get electrocuted a few times and then dumped back into reality.    : Is not for you to kill Scorekeeper's Herald.: Come on, you tried to defeat me with an aphorism based trap. It's like trying to drown a Quarren, or overfeed a Hutt or poison a... a... Poisonian. : You think you're pretty clever, but the Noetikon's aren't enough to stop me or my master.: Who are you anyway? Why am I having this conversation? You and your master are irrelevant. I will cure Yuon Par.: It's too late for your Master. She crumbles as we speak. : You realise, even if you win this, they'll still kill you. : Yup.: Then why fight? Surrender, and you'll be treated fairly.: You're so smart- you figure out what happens to vigilantes who get sent to prison. I've got more of a chance with the Sith. Let's do this.  Lars brings nothing to the table except a lot of HP. Thanks to all the double XP weekends SWTOR's been having lately, I'm overleveled for this fight, so it finishes quickly.  : Ah, he dropped the Noetikon of Secrets. At least, I hope it's the real Noetikon. I'll be pretty steamed if we get sucked into another dimension again.     : This is the Noetikon of Secrets. We are the Masters who have seen the darkness and turned back to the light.: I'm looking for a cure for my Master. The other Noetikons said to ask here.The third and final Noetikon is inhabited by Master Jesper Altax, who is another Jedi invented by Bioware just for the Noetikons, Master Chamma, who featured in the Tales of the Jedi Companion (a sourcebook for the SW RPG) and Master Bastila Shan who featured in some old game no-one remembers called Knights of the Old Republic.   : We are neither doctors, nor healers. : Patience, Bastila. What she means, Jedi, is that for you to consult us, this illness must be remarkable indeed.: That isn't what I mean at all. What I meant was “Go away and leave us alone.”: Someone is talking to us for the first time in a century, and you want to get rid of them?!: Awww, is Chamma lonely? Awww.: Yes, actually! Honestly, sometimes I wish I'd stayed darkside. At least Sith holocrons get to corrupt hapless archaeologists occasionally. Instead I'm stuck on a shelf with you and Captain Charisma for all eternity.: Hey!: *cough*:  Yes, I'm sorry. Tell us what you know about this illness, and we will see what we can find.: Yuon keeps repeating the words “the darkness is coming”. YET ANOTHER BRIEF RECAP OF THE PLOT LATER...  : It's an illness the Jedi have seen before, one created by an ancient Sith named Terrak Morrhage. He used it to turn Jedi to the dark side by the hundreds and leech their strength from them. In this way, he waged war on the Jedi.: Is there any way to stop it? : One by one, the healer cut Morrhage off from his army, the source of his strength.: Each time he used the technique however, it cost him some of his own strength.: By the time the battle was won, the healer was weakened beyond the point of recovery. He sacrificed his life to save the Jedi Order.: … : The ritual is recorded in an ancient terminal in the Jedi Temple. Learning it will require the combined knowledge of all the Noetikons. If you are thinking of learning the technique, Jedi, I would caution you- powers such as these weigh heavily on those who wield them.: But it seems your Master doesn't have time for caution. : I will go there as soon as possible.: That's... what I said?: ...I'm slightly scared of you.: Join the club.: Hey!: We will do our best to help you learn the technique. Take all three Noetikons to the terminal in the temple and activate them. We will teach you what you must know.  : *mip mip *mip mip* Oh! It's Attros again.  : Yuon's illness has begun to affect her body. She's losing strength, fading fast. Are you any closer to finding the last Noetikon?: I've found it, and the Masters have told me how to find a cure. It's in the ruins of the Jedi Temple.: A cure! At last. : Great. Another adventure in Coruscant's sweaty bowels.: Be careful, but hurry- I don't know how long Yuon will last.: Well, let's go. Time's a-wasting.: ...Herald, Yuon not want you to sacrifice self for her.: I'm not planning on dying Qyzen. The Jedi in the story cured hundreds before the ritual killed them. I just need to cure one person.: Nothing ever that simple.A LONG, LONG ELEVATOR RIDE LATER...  : Huff... huff... seem to be fewer monsters around than before.: Maybe Gree fix things? : It's quiet... too quiet.: WHAT?: I said “It's quiet, too quiet”. You know, like people do in situations like this. : CAN'T HEAR YOU OVER PIPE NOISE.: I SAID “IT'S QUIET, TOO QU... oh, forget it.*  : U=DIE: Imperials!? Here!? : More.  : Jedi scum! : I hope that's all of them. What are Imperial troops doing here? I thought we had an army to stop this sort of thing from happening. : Hey, is someone out there? HELP! HELP! We're trapped in here!: Hmm?  : I'll just get this open, whoever you are.: Could be trap.: Locking yourself in a closet is a pretty lame way to entrap someone.  : Stupid move, trusting some prig Senator. Jedi Temple's abandoned he says. “No one to fight, only trouble's getting there”. What do we find? Battle droids, Imperial commandos, Sith... we're lucky all they did was take our haul and lock us in here to die.: Do you know what the Imperials are trying to do?: Besides attack mercs on a legit job? No idea. Senator Starsnow's after a journal that belonged to his dead kid. Some bigwig Jedi, fell during the Sacking, journal's all that's left of him. I feel for the Senator, and his credits, but those commandos have the journal now. They aren't going to spare us twice.: I can't let the Imperials have the journal of a fallen Jedi. : A dead Jedi might be your kin, but he's not mine. Senator Starsnow's waiting near the Senate tower. If you can get that journal back, he'll be expecting you.  : This elevator should take us to the Temple... what's left of it anyway. NEXT TIME: By your powers combined! BONUS CODEX CONTENT: Jedi Temple Ruins posted:Although the Jedi Temple was destroyed by the Empire during the Sacking of Coruscant, its ruins still speak of its former glory. After the temple was bombed in the initial attack, the upper floors were deliberately collapsed on Darth Malgus’s orders. The Jedi Temple’s tower, once a Coruscant landmark, broke free during the bombing and fell to the city’s lower levels. The old Jedi Council chamber is the only room left largely intact, but it is still considered dangerous and prone to collapse. The temple ruins have continued to see strife even after the Sacking of Coruscant. They were the site of a duel between Darth Malgus and the Jedi empath Aryn Leneer before Imperial forces were withdrawn from the planet. Exceptionally brave and lucky looters have also disturbed the ruins, hunting–and often finding–valuable Jedi artifacts. Inferior fucked around with this message at 21:55 on Jan 14, 2014 |
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Apr 13, 2013 18:27
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I've seen a lot of things try and mimic "What do you mean? An African or European swallow?" but that's ... among the lamest. However, you're totally spot on with the part where trying to capture a Jedi with aphorisms is hilarious, so nicely done regardless. That made me laugh.
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Apr 13, 2013 18:37
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Oh cool, they brought back one of the better bits of kotor. Then made it easier and non-game-ending.  Would have loved it if getting it wrong eliminated your profile or at least booted you back to the character select menu.
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Apr 13, 2013 18:39
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Brainamp posted:Would have loved it if getting it wrong eliminated your profile or at least booted you back to the character select menu. Meaningful consequences? In TOR? Whatever drugs you're taking, take less.
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Apr 13, 2013 18:44
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Hah, so WoW back in Cataclysm had a quest in Hyjal where you had to infiltrate the Twilight's Hammer cult. At one point you're given a little ball and are told to answer it's questions truthfully as an exercise. It then hijacks your bar and gives you a yes and no button basically, and asks you a bunch of questions, some of which did I think have potentially dick wording to require you to actually read them. You had limited time to answer and since it did rather a lot of damage every time you got something wrong or didn't answer it was very possible to get killed either by not realizing what was going on (like say not noticing your bar got hijacked) or just being a derp.
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Apr 13, 2013 18:47
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Coq au Nandos posted:I'd never heard of Free Republic until today. I guess I'm not even surprised, it's just kind of sad. Got that guild set-up yet Nandos? If not, I'll probably be online for the next hour-and-half or so (it's roughly 2.20pm AEST, so probably until about 4.00pm) if you need an additional name/signature. [Edit to Add:} be a good idea if I put my character name in the post, eh? Name is Brah'gon OzCavalier fucked around with this message at 05:25 on Apr 14, 2013 |
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Apr 14, 2013 05:23
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I wasn't able to get online last night (we're in the same time zone). Hoping to try tonight, say in about six hours.
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Apr 14, 2013 05:39
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About 6 hours? Right-o. I'll see you then.... and anyone else that's along to make the guild.
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Apr 14, 2013 06:18
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I'll be happy to join in, but I'm still abroad and won't be able to until tomorrow at the earliest. Still, a guild sounds fun, so I'll be happy to jump aboard once I'm available.
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Apr 14, 2013 08:09
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The folks have to be online, right? I got three Pubbies but alts don't help much. And that's 2AM my time so I *might* be smart enough to be asleep by then.
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Apr 14, 2013 08:15
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I'll be online in a few hours, so I can help with Guild stuff if you need me.
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Apr 14, 2013 09:21
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Dolash posted:I'll be happy to join in, but I'm still abroad and won't be able to until tomorrow at the earliest. Still, a guild sounds fun, so I'll be happy to jump aboard once I'm available. Oh ffs, tonight's a bust as well. Oz, if you can get the numbers tonight, hit it. This inability to play at regular hours may be part of why I wasn't able to do the BH LP.
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Apr 14, 2013 11:47
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if we can get a few more people online we can form the guild right now. Jolune and I are online so we only need a few more on the Republic Fleet ASAP. Just need one more goon. Ferrosol fucked around with this message at 13:07 on Apr 14, 2013 |
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Apr 14, 2013 12:51
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Gimme a sec to log back in (game logged me out while I was AFK down picking up the missus from work).. [Edit to Add:] Need just one more person online now (10.05pm AEST, 8.05am US EST) OzCavalier fucked around with this message at 13:08 on Apr 14, 2013 |
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Apr 14, 2013 13:02
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 ##Begin Log## Captain's log: #013 Stardate: Back on Skavak's six.  Me and Corso were stumbling out of the Silent Sun when we suddenly realized we'd stumbled into the heart of Black Sun territory. I was expecting some gang muscle to fall on top of us, but it must be our lucky day, because we tripped over a sad-eyed beauty instead.  quote:Agent Folaris: I'm Folaris. I think you and I should have a private chat. Misread that one. Those drinks at Silent Sun must've thrown me off my game.  quote:Agent Folaris: There's a list of these unfortunate individuals sitting on their computers. I need those names.  The girl had guts getting this deep into gang territory on her own, not to mention there was a good chance Dooce's man Lobacc was on that hitlist. I'm never one to say no to giving a bunch of thugs like the Black Sun a bad day. quote:Quinine: I won't blow this – trust me.  We closed in on the Black Suns' hideout using the information Darmas gave us. On the way we found some Black Sun goons setting up their sick little game. We got the jump on them and Corso stood back while I disarmed the bombs.  Their jury-rigged trash was nothing compared to the bombs at the Nightmare of Duros. Still enough to turn somebody into an unlucky smear on the pavement, though.  While we were at it we tagged some stolen freight agent Yorksin told us about. I kept hoping Rogun's blasters would turn up, but no dice. Skavak wanted the Black Sun for something else, but then what did he do with my cargo?  Getting into Black Sun headquarters was still no walk in the park, but me and Corso's luck was holding steady. The place looked even more wrecked than normal for a gang hideout – somebody must've hit it hard already.  We took a minute out to do Folaris a favour and knock out their computers. Their techies were in panic-mode when we burst in, so I guess she made the right call asking for help.  Stealing the Black Sun's holorecords proved a lot tougher. The heavies guarding them were lifelong gangbangers, which on Coruscant's lower levels means they've probably seen as much fighting as real soldiers.  I'm still here now, so I guess I've seen more.  Security at their holo-projector was pretty thin, since hey – it's just a holoprojector, not the Senate Tower. We reeled in our spliced-together gangster home movie and got comfortable. It was about time we found out what Skavak was up to on Coruscant. Recommended for tracking the jackal of the stars. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZAtHc4jbHjQ  quote:Skavak: Urbax, buddy, you're such a cynical guy. Can't I just be paying an old friend a visit?  Now that was a nice surprise. It was good to hear someone else was giving Skavak grief – and a lawman at that? It's almost enough to go legitimate. quote:Skavak: Whatever it takes. I'm in a rush to wrap up other business here. Besides, finding work for my friends makes me feel good.   quote:Corso: Let's go bust up that party at the spaceport, Captain. That's the plan, we find Skavak's troublemaker before Urbax can turn him into a chew-toy. Unfortunately we don't know which dock he's in, so while we make our way back to the upper levels Corso's been comming Darmas asking him to listen in for trouble at the spaceport. Urbax doesn't look like the subtle type – once Darmas hears shots fired, we'll be on him. We came back across agent Folaris on our return trip to make sure the Black Sun hadn't tracked her down, but things weren't as simple as I'd hoped.  quote:Quinine: The equipment is history. Seems like a job well done, right? Well, then things get awkward.  quote:Quinine: So you had an ulterior motive all along. “It's nothing like that, except it's exactly that.” I knew I should've checked her credentials. Even if it wasn't already a low-down, scummy thing to do, I'd already had a drink with Lobacc, and I'm not one to leave a guy out to dry like that.  quote:Agent Folaris: You just don't give in, do you? Ah, you're right. I shouldn't be looking for a quick profit. SIS agents don't have badge numbers or tags, one of the things I don't like about 'em – running around with no accountability's supposed to be my thing. Still, I shot an anonymous tip to the SIS's hotline that if any of their Black Sun informers start turning up dead, they might want to check if an agent Folaris's bought any beach-homes on Manaan recently. Here's hoping the next officer of law and order I meet's a little more upstanding, though if Urbax gets to him first I'd settle for just standing. ##End Log## Dolash fucked around with this message at 15:24 on Apr 15, 2013 |
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Apr 15, 2013 14:32
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OzCavalier posted:Gimme a sec to log back in (game logged me out while I was AFK down picking up the missus from work).. It's been a couple of hours since then (stupid time zones) but I'm going to log in with my trooper Verner and just be semi-AFK while doing chores (and maybe some actual playing) for the next five hours or more. I'll also join a custom chat channel of "/cjoin Goons" so that we can coordinate without knowing each character's name.
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Apr 15, 2013 15:27
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Black eyeshadow is the first warning sign. Evil loves kohl in Star Wars.Dolash posted:Still, I shot an anonymous tip to the SIS's hotline that if any of their Black Sun informers start turning up dead, they might want to check if an agent Folaris's bought any beach-homes on Manaan recently.
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Apr 15, 2013 22:47
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Inferior posted:"Think your neighbour's a Sith? Tell us on 515-SCRT, and the SIS promise to hire a random adventurer to deal with problem sometime in the next 2 to 3 years." Anybody can call in the SIS, you just need to know the right number is all. 
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Apr 15, 2013 23:31
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Inferior posted:Black eyeshadow is the first warning sign. Evil loves kohl in Star Wars.  : It's called war paint, thank you very much.
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Apr 16, 2013 20:06
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##Begin Log## Captain's log: #014 Stardate: When the heat's up at dock seven. Let's wrap up my stay in Black Sun territory. We still had a lot of it to sneak out of, but until Darmas told us about trouble at the spaceport we could take our time. We didn't have to go far before bumping into Captain Theraguin again.  quote:Quinine: I think I found them all. Let's hope Black Sun doesn't get any more. I wasn't about to take money from a guy trying to single-handedly police gangland, especially not for defusing a few bombs.  quote:Captain Theraguin: Rare to find someone not out to make a profit. Theraguin reminds me of the Captain back in the Cavalry. Big heart, really willing to go that extra mile, and probably just as likely to get blown up by an IED. They better send him some more men, and soon – once you start retreating from Coruscant where's there left to retreat to? We finally got out of the Black Sun sector, and luck willing I'll never go back in unless it's to admire the Army's work burning them out. Not to mention the drinks were mostly water and spit. Dooce was waiting for us. Assuming we hadn't already killed everyone Lobacc had fingered, I figure his testimony should take care of the rest of them.  quote:Dooce Everton: Perfect. Perfect. I already talked to the Senate about getting you paid.  Then it was back to the speeder port to jump a cab back to the Senate. Better we were close to the starport when Darmas made the call, besides, we had one more job to get paid for. At this rate, I might just make my interest payments this month!  quote:Quinine: I got what you wanted. The agent coughed up a service fee for my work. If I wasn't so hard up for credits I might've done it for free, gunning down shipjackers puts me in a good mood these days. We were just in time, too. Corso got a beep from Darmas with the docking bay. Number seven – must be my lucky day. Coruscant security was reporting blaster fire and trying to cordon it off, and we had to beat feet. Recommended for a brief career in law-enforcement https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EJvRUS-F6aI   A Sullustan constable wasn't what I was expecting. The Sullustese have a reputation for determination but not toughness. quote:Urbax: I can't figure out if this Sullustan's deaf, or just stupid. Miel's got guts, that's for sure. Lucky for him I was planning to save his hide anyway – I don't think he realized even Coruscant Security was letting him get waxed. quote:Quinine: I'm sure if we ask them real nice, they'll just leave.  quote:Urbax: You really are as dumb as you look, aren't you?  Thus began my career as an official Sullustese deputy.  Short, but eventful. Urbax lived up to his scrapper reputation. He put a few bolts through my coat, but I've been shot so many times by now it was like being pawed at by a kitten. A big, mean, anger-issues having kitten. Miel had the good sense to shoot to kill.  It wouldn't be long until Coruscant Security got up the guts to storm in, so me and Corso had to wrap things up with our new Sullustan friend quick.  quote:Quinine: Sticking up for the little guy is what I do best. That's Sullustans for you. Nice enough guys if you love explaining your jokes.  quote:Quinine: I'm just a simple starship Captain trying to earn a living. Sounds like Skavak to me. Still, most cops give up once you jump to hyperspace. I have to give Miel points for determination, even if he's in over his 1.6 meter-high head.  quote:Miel Muwn: Ah! I suspected your timely intervention here was not coincidence, upstanding citizen. This is good news.  Now he's speaking my language. I just hope I can talk justice into being a load of scattershot to the face instead of a long stay in a Sullust jail cell. quote:Miel Muwn: Your help with these lawbreakers was invaluable. I will contact the local security forces and file an appropriate report with them.  quote:Corso: Maybe we should go see if Darmas knows anything about Skavak? Might as well. After Kixi dragged Skavak's identity record through the mud I was sure we'd be hearing from him sooner. Maybe he's laying low, waiting for the heat to die down before he slithers out of whatever hole he's hiding in. No such luck, Skavak. There's going to be so many people on your tail by the time I'm through that the only thing I'll be worried about is not getting to shoot you first. ##End Log##
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Apr 17, 2013 22:13
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I love Miel Muwn. He'd be fun to have as a party member, if not for the whole "paladin in a thieves' guild" problem.
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Apr 17, 2013 23:08
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Bruceski posted:He'd be fun to have as a party member, if not for the whole "paladin in a thieves' guild" problem. Corso says hi. And also the two barbarians scheduled to join the thieves' guild in question.
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Apr 17, 2013 23:19
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Cythereal posted:Corso says hi. And also the two barbarians scheduled to join the thieves' guild in question. Corso's a goody-two-shoes by smuggler standards but he was also a guerrilla fighter and gun-runner. Miel's a by-the-book cop.
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Apr 17, 2013 23:23
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Bruceski posted:Corso's a goody-two-shoes by smuggler standards but he was also a guerrilla fighter and gun-runner. Miel's a by-the-book cop. He's also willing to murder people just because of who they associate with. So long as they aren't women at least.
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Apr 18, 2013 04:20
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caleramaen posted:He's also willing to murder people just because of who they associate with. So long as they aren't women at least. So exactly like a paladin? Enjoying the LP thus far guys, mainly because in terms of alignment people seem to be doing the opposite of my alts. Nice to see the difference.
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Apr 18, 2013 11:51
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Bahumat posted:So exactly like a paladin? Oh man! Tell me about it! Since we're in Biowaresville atm, and we keep talking about morality in this and the other thread re: the lightside/darkside choices, it's interesting to reflect on the trends in virtualized morality. To recap, in this version of the Bioware CHOICE engine, lightside/darkside morality is binary, and they cancel each other out. So, if you choose to kill and steal capriciously (100DS), and then magnanimously spare some lives (100LS), you will be at 0 in terms of credit toward an alignment rank. The game sort of recognizes 3 states; being morally neutral, and then a spectrum of LS to DS ranks. Darkside offers a texture change for your face and eyes, while light side offers no changes. Some equipment is restricted to a minimum light side or darkside ranking. In general, dark side stuff has dangerous knives and spikes, and light side stuff has more chrome. Though, how you can tell the difference on a light saber hilt from 10 feet away while a character is swinging it around, I'll never know. Everyone, whether force sensitive or not gets tracked on this scale, and can get the physical corruption. Which is interesting in itself, right? Because you can discharge lightning all day long until force choke, but you'll never suffer darkside wear and tear, so long as you spare enough lives to make up for the darkside choices. So this has me reflecting (what with the paladin comment) on pen and paper RPG morality, and how it's changed, and how much video games inform it and visa versa. The Paladin comment is clearly somewhat controversial (in as much as there is ever genuine controversy between two people's imaginations when it comes to an imaginary thing). Caleramaen seems to think that the paladin would have, for lack of a better term, 'Frontier Honor', where they recognize that you don't necessarily bear the sins of those whom you might have stopped. Bahumat seems to take the slightly more cynical approach that a paladin is so inflexible that they can easily justify killing otherwise 'good' people. For those who don't know, DnD is probably the seminal RPG ruleset, and it contained a rubric of morality that players would associate themselves with, either as a guide or as a reflection of their behavior. It was a judgment-free association with law or chaos. When the basic set was released, an additional axis as added: Lawful to Chaos (with neutral) and Good to Evil (with neutral). Any combination of traits could form the morality of a character. A character could justify a lot under their moral alignment, but the intention was, if they did not act in accordance with their alignment, then their alignment would change. So the alignment wasn't a restriction, it was a reflection of who they were as moral agents. In the original DnD, there were 3 broad types of character; a fighter, magic user, and cleric. These characters had no set moral requirements, though they did have various behavioral restrictions. This was an interesting first premise, in part because an amoral 'holy man' was, itself a somewhat novel perspective that has influenced morality in games every since. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cleric_(Dungeons_%26_Dragons)#Dungeons_.26_Dragons_.281974-1976.29 The Cleric had restrictions on weapons, and was based on the idea of a vampire hunter. The blunt weapon idea was cribbed from a flawed character from english history; http://www.britannica.com/EBchecked/topic/425178/Odo-of-Bayeux who ended up organizing Crusades. The vampire hunter mythos, itself, is wrapped up in a radically fundamentalist backlash movement in Europe preceding the age of colonization. The vampire hunters, as a myth, originated in the Balkans, and were figures set against the (also mythological) vampires. The story as a social construct, probably originated around the concept of tyrants (e.g. Vlad III--alleged basis of the character Dracula) being usurped by their sons. The instruments of punishment, particularly burning, were also a central feature of the treatment of witches during the later witch hunter craze which came on the tail end of a reinterpretation of the devil from an annoying trickster (to be outwitted) to the more familiar demonic monster (to be feared and purged). Here's a book: http://www.amazon.com/History-Devil-Gerald-Messadi%C3%A9/dp/156836198X So the cleric as an archetype began as a character that took on certain superstitions and features for the sake of gameplay, but had no moral compass built in. In the GreyHawk campaign, the paladin was introduced as a *type* of fighter with some prerequisites. The character didn't necessarily have to be virtuous in behavior, but virtuous in randomness, as the basic requirements to even be one were to be extremely powerful, wise, intelligent, resilient. It was kind of an Elite heroic character similar to the kind of poo poo fed to kids in cartoons and comics--righteousness justified by strength justified by righteousness in an ouroborous of smugly mandated social preeminence. The theif also came into existence, but was interestingly another neutral character cribbed from the Hobbit. Later, a kind of kind of anti-paladin 'assassin' subclass of the thief was offered which, interestingly, despite having incentives to 'assassinate' wasn't required to be evil. 2nd edition firmed up the idea of minimum performance requirements to be particular classes, adding Ranger and Druid (patterned after more Tolkien characters), but retained the flexibility in description of morality. Though, interestingly, in the 2nd edition player handbook, a 'guide' of sort was written for what various combinations of morality typically meant, and they were already showing a lack of understanding by the authors of what they had actually come up with. The most prominent example (long an insider's joke of sorts) was the concept of 'Chaotic Neutral'. At a literal level, what this meant was that the character had no preference for good or evil, provided there was no overarching law imposed by an external authority of some kind. The description, due to the biases of the people involved, was that such a person was basically 'crazy' and unpredictable. Rather than being in favor of laissez faire society and tolerant of moral differences, they were scions of chaos, looking to sew randomness with bizarre actions. When even a small amount of thought could put this kind of character in a different context--for example, a truly dedicated free market capitalist might consider chaotic neutral to be relevant. A child on a playground who must get along with 'good' and 'evil' children (due in part to an incomplete formation of those concepts) might prefer to avoid teacher intervention as a basic principle, if for no other reason than the interference feels like it impinges on their autonomy. Various small social groups fall naturally into this formation. A group of friends who share a public locale have to accommodate different moral standards and behaviors while trying to avoid the imposition of some external code to preserve their commons. There are no doubt people who you would consider evil at the beach, but ideally the police do not need to be called to allow everyone to use the beach without issue. By this I mean, there may be a man and his wife there, and the man may beat her, but while everyone is at the beach, nobody makes it their job to investigate this person's moral status and do something about it, until and unless he does something to upset the commons. By 3rd edition, the requirement that paladins be lawful good, and that assassins (when they were later reintroduced as kind of career for a thief to branch into) be some kind of evil alignment were put in the books. By 4th edition, the spectrum of moral alignments was dramatically reduced. Rather than 2 axes, there was only 1. At on extreme 'lawful good' gradually giving way to 'just' good, then an expanse of 'unaligned' into evil, and finally 'chaotic evil'. In the course of the change, a number of very strange adaptations were made to the larger world to push it into this binary viewpoint. A pantheon of gods long provided a set of 'suggestions' about what a type of morality might mean. There were gods of art and science who espoused order and chaos without moral judgment, and gods of people or vocations that espoused moral judgments without preference for order or chaos. They often had evil exploitive counterparts which were their nemesis; a good and evil god of the elves, for example. But, interestingly, when the moral continuum collapsed into a single axis, many of the positive gods were turned into 'unaligned' gods, while their nemeses were pushed into the 'evil' end of the spectrum. Paradoxically, these gods retained their inborn emnity--so that unaligned followers of-now-ethically meaningless religions would still have deeply seated animosity toward 'evil' if that evil happened to be the nemesis of their own god. Morality became simultaneously personal and subjective (in the case of adherents of various gods) and preconfigured (in the sense of the rules as written by the biased authors of the material). DnD 3rd edition was about 2000, and dnd 4th ed was 2008. So as far as 13 years ago, things were beginning to shift. Classes were restricted to certain alignments, whereas before, the use of alignment in games was really up to the players. If in 2nd, edition, a lawful good paladin committed evil acts, they would become a lawful evil paladin. The paladin was essentially a knight. Good knights and evil knights were fair game. In 3rd edition, if the paladin committed evil acts, they wouldn't be a paladin anymore. Though there were 'antipaladins' introduced at some point. Morality defined class. 5 years ago, the morality became black, white, and gray meaning a paladin, rather than being a niche of extremism, was now the apex of moral behavior, and all failures to live up to that apex were a matter of sliding down a continuous field into, first, moral ambiguity, and then evil (and ultimately gleeful evil for its own sake--as chaotic evil came to be seen). In video games, for reference, Kotor (the coastal town in montenegro) was released in 2003 featuring a behavior spectrum that affected the kinds of companions you might have, and opportunities you might get, without consigning you to a life of random serial killing *or* law enforcement and puppy rescuing. Every choice up to the end was still yours to make, but ultimately, your 'score' in the moral spectrum pushed you to either be the hero or the new dark lord of the sith, meaning the ultimate choice was out of your hands. Contrast this to Jedi Academy (also 2003), where you could choose light or dark side powers as you went through the game, but ultimately decided for yourself whether to be the hero or In TOR, we see the sort of 'latest and greatest' of this dumbing down and miscegenation of moral considerations. Many moral considerations in the game have no repercussions whatsoever, though they affect your companion's opinion of you. Since it is an MMO (which is no fault of the morality system), there is no failure state for anything in terms of player choice. You can't be 'too evil to get the good ending' or 'too good to get access to the evil companion'. All choices are always available, and the game is mercenary to your time investment. But the actual moral choices are each completely isolated. No choice as presented forces you to act one way or another, however, conversations will present different options based on a characters perception of you as good or evil (and whether that matters to them or not). In some cases, the ability to get more Light side or dark side points is conditional on having already accumulated a certain amount. In addition, you can pick the Diplomacy skill and have your crew members, either, committing moral crimes, or stopping barfights and delivering medicine in order to build light or dark side points in the background--making it possible to play the entire game as evil, but be treated as good or visa versa. The choice effectively neuters the concept of good and evil in as much as good and evil can be applied to Star Wars magic--and replaces it with the fused concepts of moral goodness and lawfulness as being inseparable, though, in this case, weirdly, you are presented with a completely random association between law and chaos and good and evil. In some sense, the ultimate less is that chaos + Good is the best side of the spectrum while dogmatic adherence to law is the evil side, though the structure of what the writers present clearly is deeply conflicted as to whether *some* kinds of law are not universally good (such as the idea that police are 'good' because they are trying to 'protect', though the vigilante police who are not part of government in coruscant are 'bad' because they are not part of normal government). The continuum seems to revolve around self-restraint at your own expense versus satisfaction at your own expense (in some sense)--though there seem to be peripheral contact with other moral structures in order to establish those choices. The perception of what is 'right' for a particular archetype to do is now largely informed by engineering considerations in games such as this. Because players seek 'choice' and do not want to be told what to do, the game must offer something like a choice. But more choices present an n^2 (or worse) set of possibilities, in portions of a game which are difficult to systematize (e.g. story), concepts which are intricate (and, frankly, begging the question) must be condensed as much as possible into something that can fit through a binary gate. Of course in real life, distinct interactions *do* happen, and so the collapse of choice into distinct moments can be justified. The ambiguity of what your character really wants, vs what you intend, vs what other characters would think of those things all allow for enough wiggle room for a simple continuum to exist where, in reality, it does not. What is kind of promising is that in the form of the companions view of your actions, there is, clearly, a more sophisticated palette of ethical structures at work. Vette values humor and defiance, above and beyond whether you're hurting or helping people--after all, it's one thing to torture people, it's another thing to be a jerk to them. The monster rear end in a top hat Khem Val who hangs out with the Inquisitor is like a really obnoxiously mean dog who won't respect you unless you're always acting like an alpha male, and certainly is mean spirited, but often does not give a poo poo, or is even positively moved by kindness in as much as such largess is a display of power and confidence. So yeah. Paladins man. gently caress those lawful good assholes. Who can live around that poo poo, seriously. TheCosmicMuffet fucked around with this message at 00:18 on Apr 19, 2013 |
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Apr 18, 2013 23:57
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TheCosmicMuffet posted:shitton o' words about paladins So uh, Cosmic. Have you ever thought of trying, like, haikus or something? I only ask because I'm not putting as many words as that into the thread per post and I'm already overdoing it. Edit: I don't really want to come off as rude, just suggesting you can probably rein it in a bit. Dolash fucked around with this message at 00:43 on Apr 19, 2013 |
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Apr 19, 2013 00:39
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