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[ipgd]

ElleMullineux wrote...

Then you and I are in disagreement, because friendmanced, and with support I think he is.

Friend!Anders is a pretty good example of how much he isn't able to control Justice, given that he basically allows himself to be cannibalized and assimilated by Justice :innocent:

He's saner, but Justice has more power over him there than ever.

[KnightofPhoenix]

ipgd wrote...

KnightofPhoenix wrote...

Indeed, but I am not sure Vengeance falls into the "traditional" demon categories.

Yeah, but are those "traditional" demon categories substantial, or are they arbitrary divisions made by mortals who don't really understand the nature of spirits and the Fade? It's a question that's raised in the games but never definitively answered.

From what we have seen so far, I think they are substantial. There is a clear difference between rage, desire, sloth and pride demons. Question is, are they the only ones?

The hierarchy is also loose as we have seen a Sloth demon having two desire demons under him (DA:O)

ElleMullineux wrote...

KnightofPhoenix wrote...
@ Elle
Yes, and I do nto think Anders is nearly strong enough to control him.

Then you and I are in disagreement, because friendmanced, and with support I think he is. ../../../images/forum/emoticons/grin.png

Friendmanced ends with precisely Justice taking over and Anders not being able to resist.

If there is hope for Anders to take control, it's in a rivalmance, especially if he can be persuaded to slaughter mages (I still find it farfetched).

Modifié par KnightofPhoenix, 08 juin 2011 - 03:44 .

[Rinji the Bearded]

ipgd wrote...

ElleMullineux wrote...

Then you and I are in disagreement, because friendmanced, and with support I think he is.

Friend!Anders is a pretty good example of how much he isn't able to control Justice, given that he basically allows himself to be cannibalized and assimilated by Justice :innocent:

He's saner, but Justice has more power over him there than ever.

Pretty much.  With the friendship path, he gives into Justice and perfects the merge, which is overall peaceful (for him).  In the rival path, he's fighting tooth and nail against Justice, which allows him to realize what Justice/Vengeance has become.

[KnightofPhoenix]

Queen-Of-Stuff wrote...
I don't think Justice is a demon. Not yet, anyway. For me, it seems like a huge difference between a spirit and a demon is that a spirit above all wishes to fulfill its function, while a demon above all desires life. But I don't know. Justice appears to be even more hellbent on doing his thing now than he was back in Awakenings.

Demons also want to experience mortal desires. in Anders' case, it's anger and revenge. Which Justice ends up embracing.

[KnightofPhoenix]

ElleMullineux wrote...
Haha, I don't see it that way. It's more like Justice has given him the drive and determination to do what he really wants to do - to me it looks like they're both pulling towards the same goal. If anything it's Anders who has assimilated Justice and bent him to his own cause. There are a lot of things Justice could be upset about, but it's the one thing that Anders finds injust that he directs all his energies towards.
If Justice were in control I imagine he'd be flipping out over a lot of other things as well.

The game says this is not the case. We have the codex saying that Anders pretty much lost control.

Justice focusing on the state of mages does not mean Anders bent him to his cause. It mostly likely means that Justice was corrupted by Anders' anger, transformed, and then took over. Anders' anger and hatred corrupting Justice does not mean that he is controlling him.

[KnightofPhoenix]

Queen-Of-Stuff wrote...

KnightofPhoenix wrote...



Demons also want to experience mortal desires. in Anders' case, it's anger and revenge. Which Justice ends up embracing.

I won't argue that Justice is a corrupted and thus more demon-like spirit, but I won't go so as far as calling him a demon still. He was always rather pissy, even before he merged with Anders. Perhaps his corruption started as early as the deal with the Baroness, where he watched and seethed at the injustice the villagers suffered under her rule.

It might have been possible that he felt the anger and hatred of the peasants in the fade. But I think it definitely started when he was trapped in Kristoff's body. 

I personally am also on the side that Justice is in the process of becoming a demon.
But whatever he is now, he is clearly unhealthy and imo, Anders is too weak to control him.

Modifié par KnightofPhoenix, 08 juin 2011 - 03:54 .

[ipgd]

I don't really think Anders would have done anything he did if he were really the one in primary control. That the rival path lays out that Justice planted the bomb on his own suggests to me that it's Anders who has changed [more] to be in concordance with Justice/Vengeance, and that he has come into agreement with ideas that primarily originate from Justice.

KnightofPhoenix wrote...

Friendmanced ends with precisely Justice taking over and Anders not being able to resist.

If there is hope for Anders to take control, it's in a rivalmance, especially if he can be persuaded to slaughter mages (I still find it farfetched).

It's not much of a stretch if you consider how much of a mentally unstable wreck he is on the rival path. He also makes it pretty explicit he intends to kill himself, and the fact Varric's "except for X" line does not fire for him in a romance seems to support that.

I don't think there's much hope in him being able to win out over Justice on any path, really.

Modifié par ipgd, 08 juin 2011 - 03:56 .

[KnightofPhoenix]

ipgd wrote...

KnightofPhoenix wrote...

Friendmanced ends with precisely Justice taking over and Anders not being able to resist.

If there is hope for Anders to take control, it's in a rivalmance, especially if he can be persuaded to slaughter mages (I still find it farfetched).

It's not much of a stretch if you consider how much of a mentally unstable wreck he is on the rival path. He also makes it pretty explicit he intends to kill himself, and the fact Varric's "except for X" line does not fire for him in a romance seems to support that.

I don't think there's much hope in him being able to win out over Justice on any path, really.

Yea exactly. I meant it's farfetched that Anders soberly and consciously chooses this course of action. I can see him doing it as a mentally broken shell of a man. Which kind of looks like Hawke manipulating him into doing it.

But yea, good posts

Modifié par KnightofPhoenix, 08 juin 2011 - 04:11 .

[Sialater]

This is the part where I don't like that if you Rival Anders because of Justice, and then spare the mages, Hawke can't tell him that she's upset with him, or doesn't agree with the way he accomplished his goals, or even that he's sleeping in a separate tent for a while. If you don't break up with him, it's assumed you're quite all right with everything he did.

But, that just goes back to the NO COMPROMISE theme of DA2.

[KnightofPhoenix]

ElleMullineux wrote...
I don't think what he did was bad, I think it was necessary and a brilliantly calculated move.

...yea I am not going into this debate again. I saw what he did as the act of an insane reckless short-sighted fool that has nothing brilliant about it.

I can see what you're saying about the corruption, but personally I do not find that a satisfactory answer. That J-Anders doesn't seemingly care about any other injustice seems so strange to me, he becomes Justice-for-Mages which is the cause Anders cares about... rather than Justice (or Vengence) for anything else. I just can't reconcile it any other way.

Because Anders never seemed to care about the other injustices, so Justice was corrupted by his anger and narrowmindedness on that one issue, thus focused on that. Hence why he became Vengeance and is no longer Justice (which in contrast is supposed to be impartial).

If Anders was as angry and concerned about all the injustices in the world as much as the situation with mages, then we would have had a J-Anders with Justice for all kind of mentality.

Both Anders and Justice lost control and yes they did merge. But I believe it's Vengeance that is controlling this new entity, not Anders.

Modifié par KnightofPhoenix, 08 juin 2011 - 04:06 .

[ipgd]

ElleMullineux wrote...

By saying I don't think Justice is in control - doesn't mean I think Anders has total control either, they've instead merged to become something else - something more than they were individually and something, imo, better.
I can see what you're saying about the corruption, but personally I do not find that a satisfactory answer. That J-Anders doesn't seemingly care about any other injustice seems so strange to me, he becomes Justice-for-Mages which is the cause Anders cares about... rather than Justice (or Vengence) for anything else. I just can't reconcile it any other way.

They're definitely merged, but it's made pretty clear that Justice is the one wearing the pants in their relationship.

KnightofPhoenix wrote...

...yea I am not going into this debate again. I saw what he did as the act of an insane reckless short-sighted fool that has nothing brilliant about it.

Insane, sure, but short-sighted, not so much. Whether or not what he did was morally palatable, he did accomplish exactly what he set out to do

[KnightofPhoenix]

ipgd wrote...

KnightofPhoenix wrote...
...yea I am not going into this debate again. I saw what he did as the act of an insane reckless short-sighted fool that has nothing brilliant about it.

Insane, sure, but short-sighted, not so much. Whether or not what he did was morally palatable, he did accomplish exactly what he set out to do

Short-sighted in the sense he did not think about the comign war and how mages are supposed to win it. And he most likely succeeded in alienating the people, who were crucial in helping the mage underground.

Yes, his goal is to start a war and he succeeded. Wanting to start a war and not knowing or planning how to win it, and alienating all kinds of potential allies, is short sighted.

[KnightofPhoenix]

Queen-Of-Stuff wrote...
And what was Anders thinking? Agreeing to let another being share his mind and having equal if not more autonomy over his body in the most impossibly intimate and irreversible process imaginable? Has he no sense of personal borders and privacy? It's not like he and Justice were best friends. I would never.

Anders was very imprudent and irresponsable.

I thought he was wiser than he sounded in Awakening, but turns out I was wrong. And come to think of it (as SF pointed out), the signs were there.

[CulturalGeekGirl]

I think that Justice is more demonic on the Rivalry path, and more spirit-like on the friend path. If there's one thing that made Justice angry and prone to violence, it was being called a demon. On the Rivalry path you've gotten Anders to call him a demon pretty much 24-7 for years now. On the friendship path he still refers to him as a spirit.

I still think that Justice is being corrupted in either path, but I don't think he's ever a full-on demon. Also, if spirits can become demons, it begs the question... can the reverse happen? Could a demon be saved and returned to its original spirit form? Is there a hybrid form in the middle - mortals are essentially creatures of warring principles and desires, so wouldn't a spirit halfway through the transition be downright... human?

Is there any way for Anders to control Justice? I'd say "sort of." I think that Anders needs to work on getting rid of his own anger and hatred in order to get Justice to be more like Justice and less like Vengeance. After the Chantry boom may be the best time to do this, because I think Justice is going to be a little confused... for Justice, Hawke killing Anders was supposed to "complete the circle of Justice" for them, and now that it has not been done, Justice is forced to live with the idea that he was unjust and not punished for it. I think this may give Anders the "grip" needed to have a "conversation" with Justice about moderation, peace, and mercy.

Anders will never be "normal" Awakening Anders again, not even if there were some spell to seperate him and Justice. Too much has gone down, and everything we've heard or read indicates that his soul would likely be so damaged by now that he couldn't survive (that may not be true, but I'd say it's safe to assume he would be very, very damaged). The best hope for Anders is to become a true hybrid creature... still always driven by justice, but also ruled over by his own merciful nature, and his own ability for deflection and self-control.

This is another case where the fact that we can't have infinite options in a video game RPG (rather than a Pen and Paper RPG) comes back to get us. A middle path of merging with Justice but moderating his extremism and control over him would have been the best... but your only choices are essentially asking Anders to do the "impossible" (as far as we know) and wrangle a demon inside of him, or fully supporting his anger and his spirit's agenda.

He says himself "I had too much anger." Well, skippy, I'm glad you realized that. Now how about working on that? 

Modifié par CulturalGeekGirl, 08 juin 2011 - 04:21 .

[LobselVith8]

ipgd wrote...

KnightofPhoenix wrote...

Friendmanced ends with precisely Justice taking over and Anders not being able to resist.

If there is hope for Anders to take control, it's in a rivalmance, especially if he can be persuaded to slaughter mages (I still find it farfetched).

It's not much of a stretch if you consider how much of a mentally unstable wreck he is on the rival path.

I find it far fetched that Anders would think murdering mages for an act he alone committed would make sense, regardless of his state of mind. He's been pro-mage for seven years now, I don't see him coming around to the line of thought that the mages should be killed when they're innocent of his actions.

ipgd wrote...

I don't think there's much hope in him being able to win out over Justice on any path, really.

Couldn't there be answers for Anders' symbiosis with Justice in Tevinter, or the kingdom of Rivain where the seers are said to merge with spirits?

[upsettingshorts]

There's a difference between knowing and planning for the reaction - because the act is ideological in nature - versus knowing and planning for the strategic realities of the new status quo in order to advance the cause of victory.

Anders considered the former, that it was better to fight and die for "justice" than it was to continue to live under the status quo. He did not consider the latter, how to win such a fight, and that is of course one of the issues with his action that ties in to a couple of others with it - as it can be argued that starting a war with no hope of victory, or at best no plan for it, is inherently - on some level - unjust.

That being said, he clearly put enough thought into the current political situation to understand what his actions would do and what events they would trigger.  How to live in the new world order he created?  Not so much.  He doesn't plan to experience it.

Modifié par Upsettingshorts, 08 juin 2011 - 04:25 .

[KnightofPhoenix]

CulturalGeekGirl wrote...
Is there any way for Anders to control Justice? I'd say "sort of." I think that Anders needs to work on getting rid of his own anger and hatred in order to get Justice to be more like Justice and less like Vengeance. After the Chantry boom may be the best time to do this, because I think Justice is going to be a little confused... for Justice, Hawke killing Anders was supposed to "complete the circle of Justice" for them, and now that it has not been done, Justice is forced to live with the idea that he was unjust and not punished for it. I think this may give Anders the "grip" needed to have a "conversation" with Justice about moderation, peace, and mercy.

I actually think this is the worst time.

Mages are more susceptible to losing control to demons (and I assume demon like entities) when under stress. A war now started and it's going to be gruesome, with probably a lot of bloodshed. In this kind of context, I expect Anders to lose it completely.

In fact, I expect a large number of mages who were never trained to fight a war (or handle the mental strain), to lose it.

Modifié par KnightofPhoenix, 08 juin 2011 - 04:26 .

[Sarielle]

ElleMullineux wrote...

Sarielle wrote...

I'm not saying that my character was accurate; more about how I played her, heh. She could not imagine her friend doing that of his own accord. She also really did think he needed to pay for it, would pay for it, and that she could at least ensure it was done kindly.

He DOES seem at peace with what he's done, which is what made her even more sure that he could not be allowed to run around potentially doing something of that magnitude again. She killed blood mages that had gone over the edge; she couldn't play the hypocrite.

IMO you need to look at Anders actions in a wider context, rather than just the local ones. (Although as Surely said some pages back that Justice will probably rear his head over other things, but at least with the mage war he'll hopefully be occupied for a while).
Chantry Jenga was a single action required to start the war, and now that action has been completed successfully he can fight for mage justice alongside other people that have been drawn into the fight. As his lover my Hawke couldn't kill him - even if that might have been better for the cause (as Anders tries to say) - so instead he gets to carry on the good fight, and he seems to be empowered by it, and also gets to see the immediate results which I think is fitting. 

I'm sure there will be many more horrific things done by both sides during the ensuing fighting but it seems a lot fairer once it's open warfare, rather than a terrorist attack. So I don't see him doing "something of that magnitude" again - at the very least I hope he trusts Hawke enough now to bloody well TELL her/him what he's planning.

Lol, you're arguing with Jubilee, not me. I've been trying to make it obvious the two are quite separate in how they think/ While the real me thinks what he did was horrific, I also think it would have taken something radical to shake up the system in Thedas. For what Anders wanted to happen, I think it was a valid action. And, because this inevitably comes up:

***Disclaimer, I am not advocating real life terrorism

EDIT: Though from what I've played of rivaling Anders so far (and I do still have a lot to go), he seems less happy being challenged, but I think ultimately all of us, even if we aren't sharing a body with a corrupted spirit of justice, need a wake-up call now and then, a dissenting voice to say "Hey, you're going to far. You're ignoring these facts. Etc. Etc." It may not be better for his frame of mind, but I agree with the poster above who says Anders, as Anders, seems stronger in the rivalry path vs. assimilating happily with Justice on the friend path.

Modifié par Sarielle, 08 juin 2011 - 04:31 .

[Reflection Muse]

CulturalGeekGirl wrote...

I think that Justice is more demonic on the Rivalry path, and more spirit-like on the friend path. If there's one thing that made Justice angry and prone to violence, it was being called a demon. On the Rivalry path you've gotten Anders to call him a demon pretty much 24-7 for years now. On the friendship path he still refers to him as a spirit.

I still think that Justice is being corrupted in either path, but I don't think he's ever a full-on demon. Also, if spirits can become demons, it begs the question... can the reverse happen? Could a demon be saved and returned to its original spirit form? Is there a hybrid form in the middle - mortals are essentially creatures of warring principles and desires, so wouldn't a spirit halfway through the transition be downright... human?

Is there any way for Anders to control Justice? I'd say "sort of." I think that Anders needs to work on getting rid of his own anger and hatred in order to get Justice to be more like Justice and less like Vengeance. After the Chantry boom may be the best time to do this, because I think Justice is going to be a little confused... for Justice, Hawke killing Anders was supposed to "complete the circle of Justice" for them, and now that it has not been done, Justice is forced to live with the idea that he was unjust and not punished for it. I think this may give Anders the "grip" needed to have a "conversation" with Justice about moderation, peace, and mercy.

Anders will never be "normal" Awakening Anders again, not even if there were some spell to seperate him and Justice. Too much has gone down, and everything we've heard or read indicates that his soul would likely be so damaged by now that he couldn't survive (that may not be true, but I'd say it's safe to assume he would be very, very damaged). The best hope for Anders is to become a true hybrid creature... still always driven by justice, but also ruled over by his own merciful nature, and his own ability for deflection and self-control.

This is another case where the fact that we can't have infinite options in a video game RPG (rather than a Pen and Paper RPG) comes back to get us. A middle path of merging with Justice but moderating his extremism and control over him would have been the best... but your only choices are essentially asking Anders to do the "impossible" (as far as we know) and wrangle a demon inside of him, or fully supporting his anger and his spirit's agenda.

He says himself "I had too much anger." Well, skippy, I'm glad you realized that. Now how about working on that? 

This is pretty spot on word-for-word how I see it as well.  What Justice and Anders did is, and he even mentions this at one point, not a common occurance. I think it's reasonable to consider that something new (or hybrid as you so well put it) could be born of the joining. What that is, exactly...well, that's part of the fun of speculation.