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Augh Morrigan what the gently caress happened to your face 
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Sep 10, 2013 18:53
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Necroskowitz posted:Looks like Bioware is developing deep gameplay and story elements for Inquisition. Oh man, the only person in this picture with normal anatomy is the guy on the left, though that's probably just because his eyes are covered. Is this really official art? VVV EA has never had very good marketing. Internet Kraken fucked around with this message at 03:05 on Sep 11, 2013 |
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Sep 11, 2013 03:03
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Jackard posted:I like this one more. I just noticed captain mustache casually freaking out in the background. Is that guy a party member? Leelee posted:In DA:O, the "good" characters tend to get along well, meaning Alistair, Wynne, and Leliana. Morrigan just hates everyone. Dog, as appropriate, loves everyone. Morrigan doesn't hate Sten, and they can sometimes agree over their love of random violence. The best party member to bring with Morrigan is Ogrhen though because he drives her insane. Internet Kraken fucked around with this message at 12:55 on Sep 11, 2013 |
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Sep 11, 2013 12:48
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Origin is ridiculously unhelpful and poorly designed for a distribution platform run by a wealthy company. On top of just having a worse interface then Steam in general, if something goes wrong with Origin it is a nightmare to fix. Over years of using Steam I've never had technical problems with it. Once my account got hacked though and I lost a bunch of items, which Valve was under no obligation to replace, yet the support did anyways. It was a simple and smooth process as well. Meanwhile, I tried to download DLC for Sims Medieval once on Origin and despite paying for it, I couldn't install it. I tried consulting Origin help, but it was absolutely worthless. I sent emails to their support and they just kept asking me obvious questions and ignored what I was saying. Eventually I gave up on trying to get the drat thing to work since it wasn't worth the hassle. Basically, Origin has to compete with Steam which I have a great experience with, and it does a horrible job of it.
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Sep 11, 2013 16:10
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CottonWolf posted:I destroyed Andraste's Ashes. Do I get a secret 4th ending, where the Maker wins and we cut to the next time it comes around? No you didn't. There was actually another pile of ashes right behind the one you destroyed, so it all works out just fine.
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Sep 14, 2013 00:54
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Mordiceius posted:I always liked when the story behind the Golden/Black City was more vague. I liked in DA:O when you wonder if that story is real or just a fable. Too bad DA2 came along and said "NOPE! CHANTRY WAS RIGHT. MAGES SUCK" The most interesting thing about the Fade in Dragon Age:Origins was that you could see the Black City from any part of it. No matter where you are in the Fade, the Black City will be visible. Obviously this means it has huge importance, but does that mean the Chantry's story is correct? Could it just be that because so many people believe it that the Black City manifested itself in the Fade based on their dreams? It was neat since there was no clear answer. I haven't played that DLC in DA 2 that supposedly ruins all of this, but to just come out and say the Chantry's story is 100% correct seems...stupid. Really stupid. You come up with a really cool idea then you just stomp all over it. I think it's pretty obvious though that DA 3 will end with you going to the Black City and confronting The Maker/Andraste/Mega Pride Demon/Flemeth/Whatever.
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Sep 15, 2013 21:58
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I mentioned it earlier in the thread but there is a huge disconnect between what the lore says and what you actually see in the game. the world as described by the DA:O codex entries sounds way more interesting than what you actually see. I really like the lore but their descriptions are more interesting than the actual game.
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Sep 18, 2013 01:41
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Blue Raider posted:The Elder Scrolls games do this, too. In Skyrim, Alduin flapped around and killed some random city guards, but in the next one, guaranteed, there will be books that talk about him leveling cities and razing the countryside and such. It doesn't bother me too much. Well, it doesn't bother me much in Elder Scrolls games because it feels like the lore there is mostly just flavor text. It's just there to entertain you. In DA:O the codex feels like it is supposed to give you more insight into the world like the ME codex those. There is such a huge disconnect between what the codex says and you actually see though it ends up annoying me. Plus in the Elder Scrolls, typically the lore you read about isn't what you are directly interacting with. In DA:O you read lore about the Darkspawn that makes them sound terrifying, then you fight them a minute later and they are just violent orc monsters. It leaves me disappointed since I was expecting something much more interesting, and the game set it up! EDIT: As an example, even sequences in DA:O I thought were well done the first time I played were lame in comparison to what the lore paints them as. I thought the broodmother part was good, but when you read the darkspawn lore you realize it should be so much creepier. You should be walking into complete darkness. Only the most limited amount of light can be found as you descend into tunnels filled with nothing but blight. Then you encounter a creature that is a living engine of decay, forever churning out monsters that poison the land itself. Something like that should overwhelm you with the corruption that seeps from the walls itself. But it's just a big fleshy monster in a tentacle chamber. Which yeah might be creepy, but the lore itself paints a much more interesting encounter. VVV Don't really agree with that. Most of the stuff I read in the ME codex felt in line with what I saw in the game. I can't think of any moments where I read something in the codex that the game didn't capture the feeling of. Internet Kraken fucked around with this message at 02:14 on Sep 18, 2013 |
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Sep 18, 2013 02:08
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losonti tokash posted:Almost everything the ME codex says about space combat is completely contradicted any time it's shown on screen. The biggest offenders of this are when Sovereign attacks the Citadel in 1 and the battle for Earth at the end of 3. The first one because the codex goes to great pains to talk about how missiles are obsolete and useless because everyone has super accurate lasers that instantly shoot them down, but in the cutscene there are missiles loving everywhere blowing everything right the hell up. Yeah you're definitely right about space combat being completely different from what is described in the codex. I guess I didn't remember it because it's not right at the start of the game. Also it's been years since I played Mass Effect, so maybe I'm misremembering and the codex was a piece of poo poo there aside from the top notch narration. Which reminds me, I was reading the Sonic Brotherhood LP and there's a loving codex in that as well. A codex in a Sonic game. Is this a thing now where if Bioware makes a game there has to be a codex in it? Has that always been a thing? CitrusFrog posted:Oh, ok. Yeah that's a pretty glaring inconsistency right there. "Hey, remember you decapitated her next to a magical pile of ashes! Who knows what sort of mysterious effects that could have..." -Bioware's response to people pointing out this huge plot hole.
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Sep 18, 2013 04:12
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I remember one thing I really hated about Anders is that his recruitment quest basically unambiguously said tranquils are always suffering. Not sure why they went through the effort to try and make something repulsive look morally gray, then later on just flat out say it's all bad. It just strikes me as bad writing. You make the audience try to feel split about something, then just tell them they should feel this way instead no questions asked.
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Sep 25, 2013 06:20
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It was always something that was portrayed in a bad light, and indeed you could always consider it to be disgusting, but it was pictued more as a grim necessity. What made it not completely horrible is that the Tranquils were content and productive. It's not like being lobotomized and turned into a mindless zombie, they could still do stuff and had some degree of individuality. Not much, but they didn't suffer in their state. Then DA:2 says yes they do suffer constantly and it's horrible. This isn't set up as a big reveal or anything either, it's just dropped in at the end of Ander's recruitment to make the situation more dramatic. necessary voodoo posted:Which was why the entire mage origin story was about you trying to save your friend from being made tranquil? Basically every comment on the tranquil in DA:O from party members is about how creepy they are. It was sort of presented as acceptable in theory, but in the actual game no one ever seems to be really okay with it. Yes, the same mage that was going to be made tranquil because the Templars thought he was unstable and dangerous. Which he was. Him being made tranquil would of prevented a lot of trouble. Everyone says tranquils are creepy but that's to be expected. The important thing is that in DA:O tranquility was presnted as the only viable alternative to straight up executing people that are too dangerous. When a single weak mage can cause complete chaos, they had to resort to such methods. It was awful, but was it worse than being dead? Not everyone feared tranquility either. There were tranquil that said they chose to take that path because they felt it was better than the alternative. But all that doesn't matter when DA:2 just says tranquility is actually eternal torment for no good reason. Internet Kraken fucked around with this message at 06:42 on Sep 25, 2013 |
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Sep 25, 2013 06:35
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Dragon Age: Origins dumped a ton of lovely loot on you as well though. When you ran through areas you got tons of useless equipment that was like 3 tiers below what you are using. You could round up all the peasants and turn them into your personal army with all the cheap gear you are getting. I actually found it really annoying since the inventory icons for most gear looks the same, so when you actually do get something worth using you might not notice at first because you're just glancing over everything at that point.
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Sep 25, 2013 20:56
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Strict Picnic posted:Justice only looks like that in Awakening because he was possessing a corpse. I'm guessing they planned to use this if Anders died in your Awakening play through and was possessed post-mortem, but ran out of time. Well abominations look like lumpy messes of torn flesh for the most part so I think it's safe to assume that anyone possessed by a demon is going to have their body start falling apart at some point.
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Sep 27, 2013 23:31
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The lore says that the difference between spirits and demons it that demons actively hunger for mortal thoughts. That's why they are constantly trying to get into the physical realm; mortals provide them with their sustenance, and they get a lot more of it by hunting them down in the real world than feeding on what passes over into the Fade. Spirits don't feed on mortals so they don't care about them. I like that they didn't explicitly state that this means spirits are friendly, just that they don't care. Being distilled representations of emotion, they have the potential to be just as nasty as demons when taken to the extreme. That's pretty much what happened to Justice. Pick posted:I don't know, but it's a bummer, because I would have absolutely loved this. Merril dies from food poisoning before Act 2 because she bought rotten meat from some shifty vendor near her house. How could she not buy it when he told him it was good?  It still baffles me that the character dealing with demons on a regular basis is somehow the most naive and helpless.
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Sep 28, 2013 01:06
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I wish Bioware would make a game based in one of their settings that wasn't about saving the world and instead just about saving your friends and family. People care a lot more about characters they know than a million faceless NPCs mentioned only in text. People always say Bioware's best writing is the party member interactions. A game where there could be a bigger focus on those kind of relationships could be really interesting. Given the irdiculous amount of crime in their games you wouldn't be short on fights either.
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Sep 28, 2013 13:29
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Ravenfood posted:Well, they kind of tried that with DA2... There's a reason people say DA 2 is a mountain of wasted potential. Bioware doesn't stick with that anyways though. The whole game builds up to the big mage templar conflict with massive repercusssions and blah blah blah. Bioware seems incapable of keeping the focus of the game small. Geostomp posted:So DAII, but if Hawke were actually able to meaningfully impact anyone's fate? Yes, and characters you actually care about. Your family in DA 2 is pretty lovely aside from your sister, and everyone other than Varric and Aveline is a colossal idiot. VVVV DA 2 has so many problems you could write an entire essay about them. The game did barely anything right and so much wrong. Internet Kraken fucked around with this message at 16:47 on Sep 28, 2013 |
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Sep 28, 2013 16:32
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Raygereio posted:Merril was exasperating, but I actually kinda liked that aspect of her characterisation. Merril could of been an interesting character if she didn't come off as being dangerously incompetent in every single way. Her interactions with with the player and the party members suggests she is incapable of looking after herself. Given how dangerous dealing with demons is, she should be a lot more independent. Obviously nobody is helping her deal in blood magic so what has kept her from being tricked by a demon the second she started messing around with it? She could of been turned into an abomination by a demon saying it was going to be really really really nice if she just let it out of the fade for a bit. A character that had spent so much time dealing with otherworldly spirits that her social skills degraded could be interesting. Someone that knew how to deal with demons and bend them to her will, but had spent her entire life living with a clan in the forest that shunned her so she had no clue how to function properly in a city. I guess that would be like Morrigan though, only a blood mage and also not pissed off at everything all the time. Merril isn't just incompetent socially though, she can't do anything on her own without loving it up. That makes no sense considering how dangerous demons are. Also Merril's character is kind of creepy when you remember that some of the DA II writers consider her shortcomings to be adorably quirky rather than depressing. Pick posted:Varric pays for protection, it's in one of the dialogues. You can't pay to protect someone from getting their brain eaten by a demon.
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Sep 28, 2013 21:23
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I still think "I guess this tranquil solution wasn't the holocaust you imagined" is the worst piece of writing I've ever seen from Bioware. Maybe I was just hallucinating and that line isn't real since I can't believe they could put something so loving stupid in their game.
Internet Kraken fucked around with this message at 03:12 on Sep 29, 2013 |
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Sep 29, 2013 02:17
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The entire thing is awful but the fact that they top it off with a character dropping a holocaust "joke" that is completely out of place is shockingly stupid on so many levels. Usually with bad writing I can at least tell what the intention was, but there I'm honestly baffled. I have no idea how anybody could read that line and not immediately go "what the gently caress?". VVV I only said joke because I have no loving clue what to call something like that. Other than stupid. Stupid stupid stupid. Internet Kraken fucked around with this message at 03:35 on Sep 29, 2013 |
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Sep 29, 2013 03:26
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I guess you can enjoy any game if you are very liberal with your interpretation of the writing. I'll just say that Bioware is not nearly as clever as they think they are, and you should generally read all their stuff at face value. Which is why I can't enjoy their games when the bad writing comes up; I know exactly how they want you to read it and it's incredibly stupid. I suppose to varied responses can give you the illusion of depth since it feels like you can supply your own response to these events, but that doesn't really work for me. I mean you could read Merril as a deconstruction of the fragile fantasy waifu trope, but that seems silly when Bioware fully embraced that trope when writing her. Plus if they really wanted to do that they could of gone about it in a far better way. With Dragon Age: Origins and Mass Effect it didn't feel like I had to stretch the writing so far just to enjoy the characters.
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Sep 29, 2013 05:58
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Pick posted:Why should I interpret things their way? I paid for the game and I'll consume it my way. Well more power to you. Like I said when I read stories (at least ones written by skilled writers, which Bioware would have us believe they are) things like author intent stick out in my mind unless I get truly immersed. It's hard for me to get immersed when the characters are all blithering idiots. When that happens my first thought isn't to ponder what story reason they have to be so stupid, it's to think about why the writer has done such a lovely job with these characters. To use Merril as an example yet again, she does nothing to endear herself to the player. Right off the bat she is shown to be scatterbrained, awkward, and sensitive. Then she just summons a demon for the task of getting rid of a wall, and brushes it off as saying no it's just cool. So not only does she portray herself as incompetent, she also shows incredibly dangerous powers with poor justification for using them. At no point does she demonstrate sufficient control over dealing with demons, we're just supposed to take her word on it. Even when she actively doubts herself on multiple occasions. There is zero reason for you to trust Merril with anything. So if she is supposed to be a deconstruction of the fantasy waifu, right off the bat she fails since I have no reason to like her. You are going to expect bad stuff to happen with Merril from the start. Then it happens because surprise Merril is an idiot. Whether you encourage or criticize her is ultimately irrelevant since the outcome is the same. It's not a deconstruction of the trope when it plays exactly to your expectations. Some different dialogue lines at the end of her quest aren't enough to fully explore that concept. If they really were picking that trope apart then Merril would of changed drastically over the course of the game depending on how you interacted with her. And if I were playing the game, I'd be pissed off since I knew this idiot was going to cause problems from the start yet I am unable to do anything about it. Characters being incredibly stupid draws me straight out of the game. Internet Kraken fucked around with this message at 06:21 on Sep 29, 2013 |
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Sep 29, 2013 06:18
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Pick posted:I like that your characters have lives independent of you and don't necessarily take your word as gospel. Merrill is your companion, but you don't own her; you shouldn't be able to casually deter her from a dream she literally gave everything to chase. And see, that would be perfectly fine if Merril wasn't established as being completely incompetent. She is not confident in herself. Trying to live on her own is basically impossible for her. Yet she insists on still dealing with demons, despite it repeatedly proving to be a really loving bad idea. Merril is not an independent person, she is aware of this, yet she still clings to the idea that blood magic is not a problem. It doesn't mesh with the rest of her personality at all. The only reason she ignores you is because she is stupid, and that is not a character you can expect most people to enjoy. Like if Merril was actually competent at dealing with demons it would be another story, but like HenessyHero said she gets tricked by a demon that literally says "I'll help you with (impossible) thing!". It just asked her to betray are friends and she agreed to it. If you can fall for the easiest trick in the book, you shouldn't be allowed to cast a spell let alone deal with demons of horrifying power. VVV No not really, because comparing the plight of a mage to someone moving to Chicago is a terrible comparison in the first place so I didn't address. Yes people do stupid poo poo in real life. Most people don't do stupid poo poo that threatens entire populations. Also when someone moves to Chicago they are basing their decision based on others success. Demon bartering in the DA setting has no success story, it's said to be a horrible idea everywhere. So justifying Merril stupidity as a character doesn't work that way. Internet Kraken fucked around with this message at 13:17 on Sep 29, 2013 |
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Sep 29, 2013 13:02
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Pick posted:No, man, pretty sure you really did miss the point. You say I'm missing the point yet you completely ignore that I already explained how you can't equate someone's poor decisions in the real world to Merril's situation. It's unique to the DA setting given the natures of mages. Regardless, I guess I'll just explain why by comparing it to every situation you described. -Your friend marrying a bad person isn't equatable to conversing with otherworldly demons that could fry her brain. I don't know what your friend saw in that person, and obviously they had negative qualities, but no human is going to turn you into a horrible monster that can slaughter hundreds. -Your friend had no talent but I'm going to guess believed they could learn. After all, their are tons of resources to consult for learning about art. When consorting with demons Merril has only her own experience to draw on and maybe some incredibly outdated elven lore. Also, loving up a painting won't get you killed. -Working in the restaurant industry is not equatable to demonology. Let me make this clear; what Merril is doing is a universally despised practice. Nearly every modern culture in the setting objects to blood magic. There are no success stories. There is nobody for Merril to learn from, or anyone to support her. The only resource she has to consult are echoes of the long ruined elven golden age, which are not going to tell her everything she needs to know. This is a practice that has you constantly dancing with death, and it's not just your life on the line but also the lives of anyone else that happens to be nearby if you gently caress up. This is how demon summoning is portrayed in the lore. It's how Bioware wants you to view it. So for someone to willingly practice demonology despite literally everybody telling them not to, they would have to be extremely confident in themselves. They would have to be so sure of their abilities that they can risk their life and those of others every day. At the same time they'd also have to be so arrogant that they will put others at risk just because they trust in themselves. Merril has none of these qualities. She's not confident and she doesn't try to be selfish. She is not portrayed as someone that would put others at risk for her own sake. She does not come off of being sure of herself and doubts her abilities on multiple occasions. It makes 0 sense for someone with her personality to practice demonology. Someone ignoring their family and friends in real life is not comparable to a mage endangering entire cities with their stupidity. Pick posted:They're not, really, because in the context of the game you know it doesn't matter because ultimately you can defeat whatever happens. It's just scaling it to real life. This is ridiculously silly. You can't say your comparison works just because of protagonist power, because the people in the game are not aware that Hawke is the player character and thus capable of defeating anything. EDIT: Also I might be okay with one party member being a colossal idiot, but I think when at least two of your other companions do things just as stupid as Merril does it indicates a serious writing problem. Internet Kraken fucked around with this message at 16:00 on Sep 29, 2013 |
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Sep 29, 2013 15:56
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Pick posted:You're spending a lot of words refusing to answer the question, which is: what do you, personally, do when one of your friends is on a bad track but can't be dissuaded? Why? I'm not answering that question because it is not relevant. Merril's situation is NOT comparable to your friend working at a loving restaurant and I just wrote a wall of words explaining why. You are ignoring how I made it clear that the stakes in all of the situations you described are not anywhere close to what Merril is dealing with. You're also ignoring that unlike those situations, Merril has been told from birth not to do this poo poo. Your friend wasn't told from birth not to paint were they, and that if they did gently caress up painting it would get everyone they know killed? And again, if you justify someone unleashing an apocalyptic situation as fine just because Hawke can resolve it with magical protagonist powers, you're just crazy. You're not supposed to think you can magically fix everything when you play the game. And this doesn't even work because you can't fix everything anyways. VVV I'm getting "riled up" (really? It's a forum discussion, nobody should be getting upset over it) because it feels like you're intentionally being obtuse. You're ignoring that your comparison is terrible and doesn't work at all, so why should I address the question you posed through it? Maybe you don't understand what my point is since I've spewed so many words at this point. Let me state it; Merril's character makes no sense as her actions do not line up with her personality at all. The clash between the two is so strong that it sucks me straight out of the game since I see it as incredibly poor writing, which it is. If you want to fight that, then explain how Merril's character makes sense in any way. Internet Kraken fucked around with this message at 16:19 on Sep 29, 2013 |
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Sep 29, 2013 16:14
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". Pfft, like demons are a threat to Hawke! She kills one of the three great known demons of the world like it's nothing (Xebenkeck). Tearing down dozens of demons on a loving walk. An abomination is usually as dangerous as a cat.
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Pick posted:And there's no suggestion Merrill's going to bring about an "apocalyptic scenario" The lore for the game directly states that even a single abomination can cause massive destruction. An abomination that combines a powerful mage with a powerful demon is supposed to be incredibly strong. This is how the game wants you to view these things, you can't deny that. Now you might not just because the disconnect between the lore and the gameplay is so huge at times, but this is how it is supposed to be viewed. This is how the characters in the game are supposed to view things. If you are truly immersed in the game you'll be looking at things from their perspective, so even if you as the player can cut through a dozen abominations no issue, you should be aware that any one of them has the potential to cause huge amounts of destruction. You're literally ignoring all the lore that is supposed to be an important part of the setting.
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Sep 29, 2013 16:24
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. She'd just turn into an abomination like all the other abominations you've encountered. It's something that happens to Hawke all the time; the biggest threat is to Merrill, not to anyone else. You can't give any in-game explanation for why we should be especially afraid of abomination-Merrill. Heck, we can let a dreamer-abomination roam the streets if we want to, which is supposed to be the worst conceivable kind, and ultimately the damage is does is minimal.
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Geostomp posted:I'm just hoping and praying that it isn't used like a crutch in DAI like it was in this stupid game. The writers were just so lazy to toss blood magic and demons/possession around instead of bothering to write actual character for evil mages (or any mage other mage, really). If anything, it showed that Kirkwall's Templars were wildly incompetent if they couldn't manage to ferret out blood magic that was this common in their stronghold city even after basically taking over. What I've learned from this thread is that nearly everyone in Dragon Age II is an idiot. When you examine the game from different perspectives, you just find more and more ways in which they are stupid. Layers upon layers of idiocy. To talk more about the new game, has Bioware said what the general motivation of the Red Templars (I think that is what they are called) is? Are they just blindly following the old chantry, are they a specific group of templars gone crazy on lyrium, or something else?
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Sep 29, 2013 19:28
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Blood magic isn't inherently evil, it is just another form of magic after all, but off the top of my head there are 3 main reasons it is almost universally despised; -It causes a great deal of harm, either to yourself or others. Usually others. -It can be used to directly control the minds of others. This is what Templars usually point to for it being evil, since other sources of magic might kill you but nothing else can poison the minds of others (ignore all those entropy spells that do I guess). -It is heavily tied to demons. When a demon is directly summoned, it's usually through blood magic. Also, blood magic is really hard to learn, so most of the time a mage has to contact a demon to learn about it in the first place. I don't think demonology is directly tied to blood magic though. The two are heavily mixed because demons usually seduce mages by offering to teach them blood magic, but demons can be summoned through methods other than blood magic. That seems to be equally frowned upon, if not more so. I can't recall anyone in the games actively studying demons but not blood magic though. VVV If Alistair shows up in my game he better only be some random drunk on the street. Internet Kraken fucked around with this message at 19:48 on Sep 29, 2013 |
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Sep 29, 2013 19:43
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Pick posted:^^^ I wonder if Harry Potter did have to deal with people failing to understand how analogies work? I even bolded the question, in case people wanted to bypass the ABC version, but alas! I can type out "when do you support people with dangerous or problematic dreams?" until my fingerprints rub off and I apparently won't get an answer. You won't get an answer because your comparison is terrible and ignores details crucial to the situation. Thus, the answer to the question is irrelevant since it doesn't apply. Multiple people have pointed this out. Don't pretend people are ignoring what you're saying when that is exactly what you're doing.
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Sep 29, 2013 20:23
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Pick posted:Then set aside the examples and answer the question like I've asked: When your friends are going to do something harmful to themselves and potentially others and cannot be dissuaded, do you continue to support them, why or why not? No, I'm not going to ignore all the context in the game to answer a question that doesn't matter. My original point was that Merril's character makes no sense, as her personality is heavily at odds with her actions and goals. All the lore surrounding mages and demons is the reason, so I'm not going to ignore it and answer that question because it had nothing to do with my point. I really don't get how you can honestly think this stuff isn't significant to Merril's character when nearly everything she does involves it. You can't ignore the lore when it comes to mages because the lore determines how they live their lives. Come on, didn't I already explain how in the wall of words on the last page? VVVV Yeah how silly of me to focus on the lore when the entire plot line revolves around it! Internet Kraken fucked around with this message at 20:41 on Sep 29, 2013 |
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Sep 29, 2013 20:31
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Lotish posted:Except the question isn't really about Merrill specifically, it's about what you do when your friends are pursuing obviously (if only to you) destructive goals. Why is that so hard to answer? It's not hard to answer, it ignored my point about Merril's character being flawed so I didn't bother. But if you really want an answer, fine. I'd try to appeal to my friend with logic and hope I can convince them to look at their situation from an objective perspective. Obviously they have reasons to believe what they are doing is right, so I'd address those individually. If my friend is giving up everything and saying they are going to live off painting, I'd ask them what their plan was. How were they going to make money off this? How are they going to learn about it fast enough to make a living? Do they know if they even have the talent to handle this? It's a big risk, and hopefully I could convince them to reconsider. It's hard to deal with a friend that can't see why they are making a mistake though. Usually there is a lot of emotion involved. It's a pretty general question and hard to answer outside of a specific context. I can say this though; in no way is pursuing a career in painting comparable to summoning eldritich horrors to do your bidding. Here's the only way I can think of the put it on the level of what Merril does; All your life you've been taught to draw with pencils in a specific style. Somewhere, you here about painting instead, and you think it could really make you successful. However, the art of painting is incredibly dangerous, and if you make one mistake you could not only kill yourself but also unleash a terrible canvas monster that goes on a destructive rampage. Your friends and family tell you to forget about painting, just focus on drawing, there is nothing to gain from risking your life and others to be a painter. ...This is stupid as hell and I'm sick of talking about this elf. But you see how it's really dumb to make that compairson in the first place? Don't tell me I'm being to literal either, because all that stuff about hurting yourself and others is important to Merril's actions, as is the fact that it should of been taught to her since she was young. EDIT: You know what? Maybe I am being to literal, because I can just answer the question in a better way; if my friend is going to do something that they have been told since their childhood is incredibly stupid and incredibly dangerous, I'm not going to be their friend. They are clearly deeply troubled and should probably get mental help if they are so unreceptive to what others say. If what they are doing is dangerous to others, I'm going to tell the authorities rather than let them just go on with it. EDIT 2: I've probably put more thought into this than Bioware did. gently caress 
Internet Kraken fucked around with this message at 21:00 on Sep 29, 2013 |
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Sep 29, 2013 20:50
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KittyEmpress posted:But you are (or your family is) an apostate. Your sister was an apostate, your dad was an apostate, you had apostate cousins, it was apostates all the way down. Carver even makes comments about the whole family hiding from templar due to Bethany (and you). Two out of three reactions to Avelines husband are 'great, a loving templar' and the last is 'we don't have time for this let's go god drat it' the hawke family does not like Templars, which is why Carver becoming one is another in a series of douche moves. Being an apostate and being a blood mage that consorts with demons on a regular basis are not the same thing. If anything, living with or being a mage only makes you more aware of the great danger posed by someone that does do those things. Unless you are roleplaying as someone who is unreasonably sympathetic towards all mages or is interested in blood magic themself, you have 0 reason to trust Merril right from the start. The same applies to Anders of course who is LITERALLY AN ABOMINATION  Pick posted:And if that's not enough, I'm sure someone has made copycats of them in the Sims. Maybe I've spent too much time in this thread today if I'm laughing at this but Carver's expression perfectly captures his character. Internet Kraken fucked around with this message at 21:50 on Sep 29, 2013 |
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Sep 29, 2013 21:47
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Crabtree posted:Has there been any talk on how the Fade spilling out into the real world can take effect? Is this simply abominations roaming around the countryside ala Oblivion or can the land actually shift to whatever stimuli local monsters, citizens or what-have-you wish or bargain through the tear for? Like say spirits or demons make once desolate farm land fertile again but with predictably disastrous results on the flora and fauna -- or a peasant wishing to create their own kingdom regardless of how many sacrifices they make to fulfill that dream. It could go either way. All Bioware has said so far is that it's causing demons and abominations to pour into the real world, which is obvious and says pretty much nothing significant. It could be INCREDIBLY interesting and the fade sequences could be bizarre and trippy. Or they could be really dull and just another dungeon crawl with some floating bookcases and a brown filter to remind yourself that this is a dream woooooooo how creative. If you recall the fade was like that in the first two games, so I'm not getting my hopes up.
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Sep 29, 2013 22:02
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Revenant Threshold posted:I'm like 99% certain there's a dialogue line after Marethari fucks up where Merrill says that she didn't ask her to look out for her. In a way that suggests she isn't interested at all in people attempting to cover for her. .....loving Anders says this? I hate him so much, god drat.
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Sep 29, 2013 22:49
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Kibayasu posted:I had brought Fenris along to the end of Merril's quest as well as Anders. Merril got quite the brutal talking to from those two, it was hilarious. Man I hate Merril but even I wouldn't bring those fuckers along during that quest. I really don't like her at all but I still feel horrible for her when all this bad poo poo happens. It's like beating up a retarded person.
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Sep 29, 2013 23:42
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The Crotch posted:Hey, can we talk about Gamlen for a minute? I mean, sure, he gambled away your mom's house, but holy poo poo is your family ever terrible to him. The Hawkes spend over a year living in his giant-rear end house, never once cleaning it, never once paying rent, never once paying for their own food. Yeah, I mean he's not a wonderful guy but he doesn't deserve all the poo poo you can give him. Your family literally shows up randomly one year after being gone for ages and he manages to get you into the city and gives you a place to stay. The whole time your Mom just bitches at him over everything. When he asks her to help pay for the rent, a perfectly reasonable request when you're all able bodied and have been living in house for a year, she actually gets pissed off at him. That's ridiculous. Your mom is such a horrible character. You're supposed to feel bad for her after she's gone through so much, but she's just vile. She whines endlessly while doing basically nothing to remedy her situation. Internet Kraken fucked around with this message at 01:17 on Sep 30, 2013 |
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Sep 30, 2013 01:15
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Captain Oblivious posted:Woah back up a moment. Whatever else is being said, lets not delude ourselves about blood magic. What I meant was that using blood magic didn't automatically make you completely evil, not that it wasn't a horrible magic to use. I did phrase it poorly though.
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Sep 30, 2013 01:36
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The world as a whole would benefit if Hawke's family doesn't reproduce anyways. In fact, nobody from Kirkwall should. Just pretend that place never existed. We can call it the Kirkwall solution.
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Sep 30, 2013 01:56
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Well, she does get thrown off her high horse eventually. Just not in the way you'd expect 
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Sep 30, 2013 03:25
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MildShow posted:If we're going to have a Grey Warden companion, I'd rather have Nathaniel or the Hawke sibling over the rumored Stroud. I know that he's pretty much the only guaranteed Grey Warden depending on choices, but he was such a minor, irrelevant character in DA2, that I can't see why they'd bring him back. Hey remember, Merril was a minor irrelevant character in DA:O, and making her a party member turned out great! Right?
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Oct 1, 2013 00:14
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Do you actually need a healer though? I mean in DA:O you can just get by chugging poultices every time you wind up in a fight that can't be resolved before someone is going to bite it.
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Oct 4, 2013 03:24
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