55 réponses à ce sujet

[BiowarEA]

****ing bull****! I had a quest to investigate the mages who are sneaking off at night. Keep in mind I was totally in support of the mages at this point. But guess what happened when I stepped into their little meeting? 

"OMG THE CHAMP IS HERE, KILL HIM B4 HE INFORMS THE KNITE COMMANDAH!"

So I thought "Wtf, ok Maybe it's just stupid grunts...they don't know how to communicate."

We butchered 2 dozen mages whom we wanted to help and continue to follow the lead to a warehouse. AND IT ****ING HAPPENED AGAIN.

I TOLD U THE CHAMP IS FOLLOWING US! AHHHHHH. FIGHT HIM!!!

Again, I butchered 3 dozen of them . Only ONE actually bothered to surrender and talk to explain. "Erm, we thought you were on the Knight Commander's side....so we kidnapped your sister...to have a little bit insurance"

Being STILL a nice guy, I wanted to TALK to the leaders...so I spared this puny guy's life and proceed to where my sister is. 

That's where I stumbled upon the disgruntled templars allying with the mages. So I thought "OK, this is finally where this quest can be resolved without violence!" and I stepped to their camp, intent on shedding as little blood as possible.

The templar guy went "Oh, ****. Champ is here. We're sorry, man. We ...we were mistaken. You can have your sis back..."

So far, so good. But...the mage leader, WHOM I SPARED 3 ****ing years ago and helped to ESCAPE went "**** you ****! KILL THE HOSTAGE, KILL THE CHAMPION!"

What. The . ****? WHY? The Templar leader attempted to convince her to stop, but got killed by blood magic as the stupid **** apostate turned into a demon. And I pretty much was forced to kill ALL of these stupid ****s. NICE CHOICE N CONSEQUENCES THERE BIOWARE.

If you think to counter this example of classic Bioware railroaded bull**** quest chain by saying I did 3 tasks of hunting down dangerous apostates for the Knight Commander and THAT makes me anti-mages by impression YOU ARE WRONG. WHY DO YOU EVEN TRY TO LIE? 

Because:

1. I even spoke in support of mages iN PUBLIC. IN the presence of the Circle's First Enchanter.

2. I was totally keeping Anders, who are TOTALLY PRO MAGE ACTIVIST.

3. I HAD NO ****ING CHOICE TO SPARE THE TWO APOSTATES. The one that was fake, I did spare. BUT IT DOESNT. ****ING. MATTER.

4. IF you told me "Why did u do the apostate hunting quest if you are in support of mages in the first place ROFFFLES" Guess what, fanboy? IT WAS A MANDATORY QUEST. I ignored the letter from the Knight **** completely. I completed ALL SIDE TASK before realizing, after checking my quest journal that this ****'s quest IS MANDATORY.

5. Dragon Age 2 is a classic example of fake choices and consequences and is in no way of improvement over the original Dragon Age. At least in that game ENCOUNTERS DO END WITH NO BLOODSHED if diplomatic avenues are taken. In the sequel, there is no persuasive skills available, all you gotta do is kill kill kill talk, spare the remnants and kill some more. By the time the finale came, I couldn't care anymore and felt I was railroaded into this ****. Those two factions are retarded, and I wanted to walk away from the city. But Nope. No such option, because I was the CHAMPEEN of DICKWALL.

[KenKenpachi]

Hmm sounds like dealing with the mob really....not that I know anything about dealing with the mob << >>.

[MKDAWUSS]

The entire series has been built on rather meaningless choices that seem to cancel each other out. DA2 took that even further. The game felt completely linear.

[BiowarEA]

Yep! I guess meaningful choices is just another cumbersome RPG element that got streamlined out of DA2.

[_Dejanus]

One, I don't think anyone other than the odd radical appreciates the tone you just took, for the sake of us cooler heads please tone it down. As to your complaint, it has some ground, I think, through there were certainly plenty of situations where violence could be minimised if not avoided entirely. Killing the guards but not the boss, per say.

[rumination888]

What game isn't built around meaningless choices? "Choice" has been nothing more than a buzzword used by advertisers and politicians for the past decade or so to draw in the public. Its the same with the word "freedom". All meaningless. You can't fault DA2 for having the same meaningless choices as its predecessors.

[BiowarEA]

rumination888 wrote...

What game isn't built around meaningless choices? "Choice" has been nothing more than a buzzword used by advertisers and politicians for the past decade or so to draw in the public. Its the same with the word "freedom". All meaningless. You can't fault DA2 for having the same meaningless choices as its predecessors.

I agree...albeit to an extent. Although not "really" meaningful, but DA:O had some choices that made you feel bad about it or at least required you to consider the outcome without thinking of pure good and evil.

In the "Nature of the Beast" quest in DA:O you help the Dalish with a werewolf problem in their woods. The Dalish Keeper asks for your help because his people are being attacked by these mindless beasts, and for that you must slain Witherfang (the werewolf "leader") and bring him his heart. Once you embark on this quest you encounter some werewolves on your path until you find one that engages in dialog with you. He warns you to back away for his quarrel is with the Keeper Zathrian and his Dalish elves (this dialog is different if you're a Dalish Elf). You proceed and eventually find that werewolf again who you engage in combat until Witherfang intervenes. The werewolves, instead of attacking you, flee to their underground ruins.

As you keep venturing towards your goal you eventually find the werewolf den and Witherfang asks to speak to you. If you agree, you discover that Witherfang is the spirit of the forest, called the Lady of the Forest by the werewolves. She was bound into the body of a silver wolf by Zatharian and cursed to spread the curse of lycanthropy to whoever she bites.

Zatharian's motivation for doing this was that both his children were attacked by humans centuries ago. His son was murdered and his daughter raped. For revenge he bound the spirit to the wolf and forced her to infect all humans responsible for those crimes. But his revenge was never satisfied and instead of lifting the curse, he damned them into eternal suffering. As a side effect he was also bound to the lady of the forest (in a way) and he got to live for much longer than any other elf. 

Once you the Lady of the Forest tells you all of that, she asks you to convince Zathrian to lift the curse. If you do that, it will cost his life as well and you will set free all those humans that once murdered his children as well. The other option is to side with the werewolves and annihilate the Dalish.

So you're faced with three options, neither of which are really good and one apparently evil:
-- Help Zathrian and kill the werewolves, killing a benevolent spirit along with innocent humans and dalish that have been cursed with the werewolf curse;
-- Help the werewolves and the Lady of the Forest, killing all Dalish and Zathrian in the process as revenge for what "the elves did" to many innocents;
-- Convince Zathrian to lift the curse. He dies and the Lady is set free but the werewolves revert back to normal, and you set free a bunch of criminals in the process;

So as you can see, Bioware did make some things right in DA:O.

[ExiledMimic]

You can play Origins and pick who you romance, who you recruit, how your face the end of the Archdemon, who rules the land and how your party thinks of you. In the end the game ends the exact same way. The difference is you feel like you affected those things. In DA2 you don't feel like you changed anything no matter what you did. And that quest right there is one of 3 blatant examples of how you are pushed without question to a specific ending without so much as a flavor to your choices made.

I'd done the same as the OP. I'd spoken for mages, worked for them, striven for them, busted my butt time and again to get them just 1 more sliver of humanity and human well being. Because I killed an Abomination and a murderer I got lumped into Meredeth's camp, despite helping the third mage gain some sort of peace before taking him back without incident. It was a blatant shove into the direction they wanted and was obviously beneath the standards Bioware is capable of. I honestly think this game needed another 6 months to fix all of Act 3. If it weren't for these horrifying issues, the game would be great. Instead it's too linear to be a game involving choice to begin with. If what I do doesn't matter, then don't give me the choice and let me follow the story and enjoy cutscenes more.

[JJDrakken]

I agree. They pull the choice out of our hands, every chance we get & then stuff whatever they want back in it's place. Yay us.


JJ

[Taiyama]

Unfortunately, I'd have to agree. It really was completely absurd. My Hawke was a known apostate, a public sympathizer with mages... Completely stupid for them to flip their sh** when I arrived at the secret meetings.

[Cajeb]

Agreed. My Hawke was speaking out for peace and for templars and mages to be reasonable and work together. He was for getting rid of Meredith. He finds a meeting between mages and templars that have the same goals as him and what is he forced to do? Slaughter them. WTF

[MotoSkunkX]

That specific example is a rather bad one. That woman was obviously driven absolutely batty by her use of blood magic since you rescued her. She turns INTO AN ABOMINATION. Which means she could have already been possessed.

The other mage/templar were both quite reasonable. She was a paranoid psychopath and she forced the confrontation. It's the other two examples you listed before that one that didn't make any sense.

[Xrissie]

U mad, brah?

[YamiSnuffles]

This quest drove me insane. At first I thought it was some sort of bug. How could anyone think that I was siding with Meredith when I was constantly (and publicly) siding with the mages? I mean, I could understand the lead mage being against me since she had gone insane but everyone else? You'd figure with Meredith around everyone would be used to recognizing crazy when they saw it and just tuning out.

[rumination888]

BiowarEA wrote...

So you're faced with three options, neither of which are really good and one apparently evil:
-- Help Zathrian and kill the werewolves, killing a benevolent spirit along with innocent humans and dalish that have been cursed with the werewolf curse;
-- Help the werewolves and the Lady of the Forest, killing all Dalish and Zathrian in the process as revenge for what "the elves did" to many innocents;
-- Convince Zathrian to lift the curse. He dies and the Lady is set free but the werewolves revert back to normal, and you set free a bunch of criminals in the process;

So as you can see, Bioware did make some things right in DA:O.

And you're faced with two options when dealing with the apostate mage:
-- Kill her.
-- Let her go

You chose to let her go. The ramifications of that action 7 years later was something out of your control. And so you, like many people in this thread, confuse choice with control.

Modifié par rumination888, 13 mars 2011 - 01:21 .

[elferin91]

the most confusing thing about it were the templars, so an apostate mage kills the leader templar of the group AND turns into an abomination and the templars just attack you, and there is no way to turn other mages to your side
i understand why she was angry but the whole conflict is ridiculous

[TJPags]

I have to agree - this quest made no sense to me.

I walk into a meeting Orsino told me about, and everyone assumes I'm working for Meredith? No talk, just attack?

Then it happens again? Although the one Templar who I saved earlier refuses to attack, everyone else loses their minds again. And yes, after Trask is ready to let Beth go and talk to me, crazy insane blood mage kills him, raises demons, and everyone attacks me?? (well, I suppose people will say that was blood magic mind control - whatever). Well, again, excep the one mage I'd helped earlier - and yes, HE uses blood magic too!!!

So basically, Orsino asks me to look into a bunch of Templars who want to treat mages better meeting with a bunch of mages looking to make things better, and I end up slaughtering all of them - except 2. When I'd much rather have actually helped them, and simply removed Meredith and put Cullen in her place, than have to deal with a huge fiasco at the end.

Oh well.

[Pyrate_d]

Agreed, I just made a thread about it because I didn't notice this one.

The game had tons of stuff like this. You can almost always ask for a peaceful resolution, but you NEVER get it. This quest is just the most blatant example.

Origins had a million times more choices than DA2. DA2's only real choices led to the same outcome--you even have to fight Orsino if you side with the mages. Really disappointing.

By the way, what happens in this quest if you don't spare the blood mage in the cave? Does this allow you to resolve things peacefully?

Modifié par Pyrate_d, 13 mars 2011 - 03:44 .

[Everwarden]

BiowarEA wrote...

Yep! I guess meaningful choices is just another cumbersome RPG element that got streamlined out of DA2.

That is exactly how I felt at the end of the game. Up until the third act I thought that I'd been making choices and that they were going to shape the end. 

Nope. I was wrong. You don't get any real choices in this game, just the illusion of them. It's ridiculous, and a crying shame. I hope they fix this in Dragon Age 3. I don't expect it, but it would be nice. 

I was an inch away from making my own post about just this, too. But you posted exactly what I was thinking before I could. Way to steal my thunder!!! Though I'm glad I'm not alone. 

Modifié par Everwarden, 13 mars 2011 - 03:51 .

[Nelzeben]

I agree. While I really don't think the whole "choice" thing is as bad as people here make it out to be, that part really annoyed me as well. Why would they attack a known apostate that publicly spoke out against Meredith?

My rage... isn't quite as impressive as yours apparently is, but I did think that was badly done. I don't see any reason for it, either, unless they didn't have the time to create an appropriate quest for mage-supporters. (Assuming the quest is similar if you've been supporting the templars before.)

[AbsolutGrndZer0]

Face it, Kirkwall is rampant with blood mages and abominations. Even if you do side with the mages. Now, in the mages defense, they were opressed MUCH worse than in Ferelden, and they felt they had no choice but to resort to blood magic to survive.

As for choices, you choose Mages or Templars and that makes a difference in the story. Either way, the sheer number of blood mages is NOT your choice, nor should it be. What other characters do is not your choice. Your choice is to support the mages despite knowing damn well they are evil to the core in Kirkwall (and have to fight them too, since the demons want chaos, not peaceful coexistance), or else support the Templars and wipe out the evil mages for the good of Thedas.

[Gamejudge]

AbsolutGrndZer0 wrote...

Face it, Kirkwall is rampant with blood mages and abominations. Even if you do side with the mages. Now, in the mages defense, they were opressed MUCH worse than in Ferelden, and they felt they had no choice but to resort to blood magic to survive.

As for choices, you choose Mages or Templars and that makes a difference in the story. Either way, the sheer number of blood mages is NOT your choice, nor should it be. What other characters do is not your choice. Your choice is to support the mages despite knowing damn well they are evil to the core in Kirkwall (and have to fight them too, since the demons want chaos, not peaceful coexistance), or else support the Templars and wipe out the evil mages for the good of Thedas.

But the thing I distinctly remember from lore in origins is that blood magic is NOT common by any stretch of the imagination. It is not simply cutting your wrist and using magic. It's a complicated process that takes time and often years to learn, so how everyone knows blood magic is completely beyond me.

[Tleining]

@ BiowarEA
so your point is that you can't solve quests peacefully, and you back that up with one Quest? What about Merrils final Quest? You have three Options, two lead to you fighting her Clan, the third will allow you to leave peacefully.

@ AbsolutGrndZer0
and the Templars are better? Meredith sees Blood Mages everywhere and basically tries to gain complete control of Kirkwall, Cullen is still scarred from the Abominations and left in charge of other Templars, and best of all, the Tranquil Solution. With people like that in charge, you can either allow yourself to be made Tranquil or fight back.

[whitless256]

This quest frustrated me too, however I think a lot of people are missing some of the more subtle aspects. Look at the mage leading this. Grace. The lover of an insane blood mage who raised the dead and became an abomination. She told us she was not a blood mage but it becomes obvious later that it was a lie.

In Act 2 you find Grace and Alain in the Gallows and if you click on Grace it's quite clear she blames YOU for her being captured. Because you let her go with no food, no help, and hardly a head start. How's that for gratitude?

So here is a woman who has spent roughly six YEARS nursing her bitterness and hatred for the Champion. What do you think she's going to tell her followers when it comes to you? Especially now that she's either insane or posessed. Quite obviously she's been speaking against you. She HATES you. She wants to kill your sibling. The first two instances of the conspirators attacking you is perfectly justified if you think of how long Grace has been turning them against you, mages and Templars alike.

They don't think you're working for Meredith because you hunted down three apostates for her. They think so because their insane abomination of a leader has been poisoning them against you. The only thing that doesn't make sense is the Templars attacking you after Grace reveals herself to be an abomination and in the end that's a minor detail.

Edit to add:  And honestly, by that point in the game what have you done for the mages?  You live in a fancy hightown estate.  You get leniency to live as an apostate (if you're a mage) because you saved the city.  You're hardly suffering like the mages are.  Sure you've let a few of them go, spoken a few words in their defense, but what HAVE you done for them at that point?  Not a whole hell of a lot.  Grace does have just cause to feel bitterly about you.

Modifié par whitless256, 13 mars 2011 - 05:26 .

[BiowarEA]

Gamejudge wrote...

But the thing I distinctly remember from lore in origins is that blood magic is NOT common by any stretch of the imagination. It is not simply cutting your wrist and using magic. It's a complicated process that takes time and often years to learn, so how everyone knows blood magic is completely beyond me. 

Exactly! In DA:O Blood Magic was supposed to be this secret, hard-to-obtain lore. You had to go bargain with daemons to even get a glimpse at it, and most mages were horrified at the concept. In DA2, blood magic happens whenever a mage - any mage - gets slightly upset. They can then decide to stab themselves, and turn into abominations while spirits and corpses rise out of the ground (even if you're indoors and there are no buried corpses within miles). By the time you reach the second half of the game, random blood mages are running around the streets at night, attacking the PC like common thugs. And don't get me started about the quest NPCs. The second you see a mage in a quest, there's at least 85% propability he'll turn out to be a blood mage before the quest is over.