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[StrawberryViking]

Sorry if this is in the wrong section, I intended to put it in the general discussion section, but this contains some major spoilers for both games, so I’m putting it here.

 It seems to defeat the point of the choice, to have the paragon always be the "right" option, and by "right", I don't mean morally, but it seems that Paragons always end up getting it better in the end. The game is supposed to have “hard decisions”, but that hardly seems to be the case when you know that picking an option in the upper portion
of the wheel will always turn out in your favor in the end.

If, you don't really catch what I mean, the most profound example is in ME1,when you have to make the decision on whether or not to save the council. I personally chose to "focus on Sovereign", because frankly, in my opinion, saving all organic life as we know it seems to be the more important issue at the moment, rather than saving the life a three politicians. Though leaving the council to die may not have been the morally sound choice, focusing
on Sovereign was the smartest choice at that moment, with that knowledge.

Yet, in the end, if you choose the "paragon" choice, then the galaxy still gets saved, somehow, with the council, and most of the citadel intact, albeit, with a lot of lost human lives. Though this sacrifice doesn't really carry any weight in the game because it doesn't affect the player directly, so it doesn't really matter to the player. It would have been a better decision to have those human lives be of people you knew personally, or even your crew.

But the Paragon choice, in the game it is a sure-fire way to be successful in the decision-making portion of the game, but in real-life, the"paragon", or just choice, may not actually be the right choice. In real-life, you can't save everyone by making the paragon decision. You have to learn that sometimes, sacrifice is required, and to think otherwise would be naive. The phrase, “bad things happen to good people” comes to mind.

Although this is a very "renegade" outlook, but if you think about it, many paragon decisions, which I can almost guarantee will end up helping somewhere, have the massive potential to be the most disastrous.

The Rachni Queen
The paragon choice is to let her go, but with the current knowledge you have at the moment of the decision, it seems pretty dumb to let the mother of the creatures who have spent the entire mission trying to kill you, and part of a species,who, for the entire duration that the galaxy has known them, have been only hostile. She may say that it wasn't their fault, and they aren't really like that, but I get the impression that she might say anything and everything to persuade you to let her live, since you are the one that controls her fate. 

Though killing her is technically genocide, they didn't seem to have a problem with it before. Besides, wasn’t killing the Thorian “technically” genocide too?

Collector Base
I personally chose to keep it, because it seems a tactical decision to use their own technology against them, after all, some of your ship upgrades were based in part on reaper technology, and it sure helped you when it counted, but now that T.I.M. is suggesting you use it for almost the same purpose , you now have something against it, your only reason seeming to be his human supremacy motivation, but really, that seems to not matter in the grand scheme of things,as you can deal with him after the galaxy is saved, or it won’t matter because everyone will be dead.

Really, that technology could end up saving you, but just because it compromises your morals, you suddenly decide that having a possible advantage over the reapers is not worth compromising your “moral integrity”

X57: Bring Down the Sky
I will admit that this was a tough decision to make, but I think the logical choice was to go after Balak. Though in the process, you get 2 people killed, if you release him, he will probably kill more than that, a lot more. 

Kasumi: Stolen Memory
The paragon will let her keep the greybox, while renegade and neutral will destroy it. Considering that Keiji himself advised her to destroy it, with the knowledge of how she would treasure the memories, he himself states that the information will harm her.

Illos
Not really a decision, but dialogue. When Vigil tells you how he shut down “non-essential” staff pods. The Paragon says “That’s monstrous!”, while the renegade “It was necessary”. This seems to further my assumptions that   paragon is naïve, as if Vigil had kept all the staff alive, those Prothean scientist might not have made it to the Citadel to tweak it, thus giving the rest of the future galaxy a fighting chance against the reapers. The renegade understands this, the paragon probably would have doomed the future galaxy had they been in charge.

Paragon seems to be a synonym for naïve, while renegade is simply a realist. You get renegade points simply for stating the truth (i.e. “we can’t help them now”). I just really bothers me morality seems to outweigh logic at some
points. Sometimes, being ruthless is the only way to get the job done, and I just really wish that at some point, choosing the "paragon" choice will end up screwing you over at some point. 

Sorry for the wall of text, but I’ve been thinking about this a lot. If there was anything I missed, or anything that is inaccurate,I would love to know. If you don't agree with what I have posted, I would love to hear why.

Modifié par StrawberryViking, 26 mai 2010 - 03:37 .

[Lemonwizard]

If you consider that a wall of text I would suggest you take some more architecture classes.


EDIT: never mind, you fixed the wierd formatting.


Btw, I like your name.

Modifié par Lemonwizard, 26 mai 2010 - 02:53 .

[Onyx Jaguar]

I don't see Paragon as Naive and Renegade as realist, IMO that thinking is trying to justify your actions to yourself.



Neither are the wrong direction, one strengthens humanity for itself, the others strengthens it for a community (in regards to the big decisions).



Paragon represents more cooperation, while Renegade represents more action



Talking you way through situations or intimidating your way through

[StrawberryViking]

Lemonwizard wrote...

If you consider that a wall of text I would suggest you take some more architecture classes.

Ha, with the size font I was typing with, it seemed like it. (Darn my bad eyesight!)

[Zulu_DFA]

The Paragon is always wrong.



Because



The Paragon fails



To



Shoot first, ask questions later,



To



Kill'em all and let God sort'em out,



Because



Better safe, than sorry.

[Tlazolteotl]

Paragon is made of fail in mass effect.

Mainly because the devs try too hard to steer away from "rewarding" players for being the bad guy.

Consequently, there's rarely a downside to paragon ... which is, frankly, lame.

[StrawberryViking]

Onyx Jaguar wrote...

I don't see Paragon as Naive and Renegade as realist, IMO that thinking is trying to justify your actions to yourself.

Neither are the wrong direction, one strengthens humanity for itself, the others strengthens it for a community (in regards to the big decisions).

Paragon represents more cooperation, while Renegade represents more action

Talking you way through situations or intimidating your way through

I will admit that I did get a bit off-topic with that little rant, but my main gripe was with the decision with the council. The first time I played, I "focused on Sovreign", because I didn't have the knowledge that I'd survive either way. I thought that the lives of the council don't matter next to the fate of the entire galaxy, and it made more sense to me at the time to focus on the immediate threat.

[SpiderFan1217]

Paragon is wrong if you let that one merc go free. Renegade has it right. Blown that Bleach away.

[Zulu_DFA]

SpiderFan1217 wrote...

Paragon is wrong if you let that one merc go free. Renegade has it right. Blown that Bleach away.

Ha, this strory about the little Eclipse sister resembles all too well the story with the Rachni queen...

[Lemonwizard]

The problem with the morality system is it's not even really a choice. You solve exactly the same problems and there's no situation where one works and the other does not. It would be much more interesting if there were actually problems that could be solved only by violence or problems that could be solved only by cooperation, but as it stands you win either way and thus it's not a choice of how far you're willing to go to get the job done (as it should be), but with what kind of style would you like to press your "I win no matter what" button.

[StrawberryViking]

Tlazolteotl wrote...

Paragon is made of fail in mass effect.
Mainly because the devs try too hard to steer away from "rewarding" players for being the bad guy.
Consequently, there's rarely a downside to paragon ... which is, frankly, lame.

Holy crap... that really explains a lot... I feel foolish for not realizing it earlier...

But yeah, that is totally lame

[Bookman230]

ACTUALLY, that destroy Mordin's data because of lives lost being a Paragon choice is wrong. It was one line of dialouge. The Paragon choices are to explicitly push Mordin to use the data to cure the Krogan or to keep it just in case.

[StrawberryViking]

Lemonwizard wrote...

If you consider that a wall of text I would suggest you take some more architecture classes.


EDIT: never mind, you fixed the wierd formatting.


Btw, I like your name.

Took a while for me to notice your update, but it took a while before I realized that my post looked like some sort of poem, but I guess that's what I get for typing it in Word. Oh, and thanks, but so this post isn't completely off topic...

Lemonwizard wrote...

The problem with the morality system
is it's not even really a choice. You solve exactly the same problems
and there's no situation where one works and the other does not. It
would be much more interesting if there were actually problems that
could be solved only by violence or problems that could be solved only
by cooperation, but as it stands you win either way and thus it's not a
choice of how far you're willing to go to get the job done (as it
should be), but with what kind of style would you like to press your "I
win no matter what" button.

quoted for truth.

[StrawberryViking]

Bookman230 wrote...

ACTUALLY, that destroy Mordin's data because of lives lost being a Paragon choice is wrong. It was one line of dialouge. The Paragon choices are to explicitly push Mordin to use the data to cure the Krogan or to keep it just in case.

Just looked into, and realized you are right, I just saw "his research was sick", and steered away from that option, opting for "might be useful". I checked the wiki and read the options, and realized I was wrong...but thanks for the heads up, I'll edit it.

[Markinator_123]

Paragon choices should defintely bite you in the *** more. For instance, realistically speaking, Zaeed would never be loyal to you if you didn't let him kill Vido. It is obvious that they threw paragons a bone there (I save the innocents by the way). I really hope rewriting the heretics bites people in the ***. It would make the story interesting and I agree sometimes paragon is naive and idiotic.

[Pacifien]

Think the decision on whether or not to save the Council is the only that has shown any consequences. Paragon decisions haven't been rewarded by much other than cameo appearances in ME2. Renegade decisions haven't been punished either. I mean, the decision to let the Rachni Queen go hasn't resulted in the epic of all wins against the Reapers, nor has it led to the downfall of civilization.

So going by the one big decision where we see the outcome, you get a very cold response by the aliens on the Citadel because you wouldn't take any measures to save their Council members. Even if the decision had affected how the battle played out in ME1, I don't see the aliens changing their tune in ME2. The fact they could have died isn't as palpable as seeing the sudden rise of humans. It doesn't matter if you ignored the Destiny Ascension to concentrate on the real threat or purposely left them to die, all the aliens see is that they simply died. So I'd be disappointed if the outcome of the neutral option had more in common to the outcome of the paragon option than the renegade one.

[StrawberryViking]

Markinator_123 wrote...

Paragon choices should defintely bite you in the *** more. For instance, realistically speaking, Zaeed would never be loyal to you if you didn't let him kill Vido. It is obvious that they threw paragons a bone there (I save the innocents by the way). I really hope rewriting the heretics bites people in the ***. It would make the story interesting and I agree sometimes paragon is naive and idiotic.

The first time I did  Zaeed's loyalty mission, I went after Vido, since in my canon playthrough, I give everyone 1 free revenge card, but I felt so horrible, since as you go through the factory after Vido, you can hear the workers screaming.... But seriously, I thought Zaeed was going to kill me on my Paragon playthrough when I let him go...he was furious...I wouldn't trust him to keep me alive, much less be loyal to me

But this.

I was really hoping that the rachni would stab you in the back, but it really seems that we're just gonna end up with a rachni army against the reapers...

[MrNose]

Paragon isn't always "right," not by a long shot.  Sor far the game always moves forward, but there are definitely differences, and some paragon ones aren't the best.  Taking a renegade action against the Eclipse Merc who tries to surrender or to the Merc building the Gunship at Garrus' recruitment mission is the right thing to do, for example.

I understand your frustration at not saving the council.  Its a grey decision to be sure.  I ultimately decided that since I was killing Sovereign anyway, there was no point in not saving them, but I could easily have chosen to go a different way.

Honestly, the bulk of your examples (Collector Ship, Kasumi, Mordin, etc.) seem to have more to do with you opinions than anything else.  Rachni Queen and the council are really the only two instances where being paragon results in a ticker-tape parade, and there are few realy consequences to not being a renegade. 

As you said with Kasumi, destroying the greybox is probably the right decision, paragon or not.  Its never presented as the wrong decision either..

Lemonwizard wrote...

The problem with the morality system is it's not even really a choice. You solve exactly the same problems and there's no situation where one works and the other does not. It would be much more interesting if there were actually problems that could be solved only by violence or problems that could be solved only by cooperation, but as it stands you win either way and thus it's not a choice of how far you're willing to go to get the job done (as it should be), but with what kind of style would you like to press your "I win no matter what" button.

You're confusing "choices" and "problems".  In video games, choices rarely have an ideal outcome, or they heavily obscure it if they do.  The ideal outcome is generally based on user preference.  Problems do have an ideal outcome.  Mass Effect has many choices, but few problems in the story.  The one area where they perfectly manage to join problems with choices is during the suicide mission, but in general doing things this way is quite difficult. 

The game which best handles "choices" is Heavy Rain, IMO.

video games and choice: 

[Markinator_123]

Zaeed is no better than Santiago. One time I saved the hostages and then left him to burn in that refinery.

[StrawberryViking]

Pacifien wrote...

Think the decision on whether or not to save the Council is the only that has shown any consequences. Paragon decisions haven't been rewarded by much other than cameo appearances in ME2. Renegade decisions haven't been punished either. I mean, the decision to let the Rachni Queen go hasn't resulted in the epic of all wins against the Reapers, nor has it led to the downfall of civilization.
So going by the one big decision where we see the outcome, you get a very cold response by the aliens on the Citadel because you wouldn't take any measures to save their Council members. Even if the decision had affected how the battle played out in ME1, I don't see the aliens changing their tune in ME2. The fact they could have died isn't as palpable as seeing the sudden rise of humans. It doesn't matter if you ignored the Destiny Ascension to concentrate on the real threat or purposely left them to die, all the aliens see is that they simply died. So I'd be disappointed if the outcome of the neutral option had more in common to the outcome of the paragon option than the renegade one.

But the real gripe for me about it was that the paragon decision, though it did have it's consequences, (the loss of human lives), the consequence doens't carry any weight because it doesn't affect Shepard directly. In ME2 you hear about how the Alliance's numbers being down, but all it is is words, because it's not like you gain or loose anything due to the decision, at least, not yet. Also, if you decide to let Nirali Bhatia's body to be released, there is a news-thing-o  about the public loosing faith in the Alliance because of their failure to counter geth technology, which I assume means less people enlisting.

I would like to think that this might result in the loss of a good chunk of the citadel fleet in ME3, as they are not the force they used to be without the support of what the Alliance used to be. Alternatively, council-killers (for lack of a better name), might loose more human lives as a consequence of the aliens not trusting the humans, and as a result, less aliens defending with the humans.

[scorptatious]

Markinator_123 wrote...

Paragon choices should defintely bite you in the *** more. For instance, realistically speaking, Zaeed would never be loyal to you if you didn't let him kill Vido. It is obvious that they threw paragons a bone there (I save the innocents by the way). I really hope rewriting the heretics bites people in the ***. It would make the story interesting and I agree sometimes paragon is naive and idiotic.

By rewriting the Geth, the former heretics than join the rest of the geth on the Quarian homeworld. Which means that if the quarians attempt to take back the homeworld, you'll have blood on your hands.

[Strike]

Specifically toward the choice of the Collector Base, it depends more on your trust of Cerberus then anything. Do you think Cerberus can handle this technology? Will they be able to harness the abilities of the technology without running into complications?
 
I don't think keeping or destroying it is a renegade or paragon action, if you have concrete definitions for them.

For me:

Paragon: Ultimately looking to save the most lives as possible in the current mission. No matter who or what. This method requires a person who has empathy and a belief in second chances.

Renegade: Ultimately looking toward the future to save lives.This method requires a person with excellent precognition and good judgment; who to kill or not to kill.

If you judge the Collector Base (destroy/save), you actually don't know what will happen. Destroying the base could be determined as a way to save lives in the future (Renegade) if you don't trust Cerberus.
On the flipside, saving the Collector Base could be determined as a way to save as many lives possible (Paragon) if you trust Cerberus.

[Onyx Jaguar]

Quite honestly being ruthless isn't the only way to get the job done as you can get the job done both ways, its just a matter of difference in philosophy.