260 réponses à ce sujet

[Vhalkyrie]

I think it was a flaw with the new combat design. Desire/pride demons used to be pretty darn scary in DAO. I got my tail beat by the high dragon in DAO - I meant to go back and try again but never did. But Hawke is slapping around dragons, and desire/pride demons were ridiculously easy to shut down. The high dragon fight was more annoying than tough with the "stop time and summon mini dragons out of nowhere".

So...poor job in setting up the danger via game mechanics.

Modifié par Vhalkyrie, 30 mars 2011 - 03:29 .

[Camenae]

"Hawke is wrong too" =/= "Merrill is right."

[Maria Caliban]

tmp7704 wrote...

Killjoy Cutter wrote...

If the game always shows pride demons being slapped around, then pride demons are no big deal.

The game shows everything slapped around. Going by this logic nothing is big deal, including the Archdemons.

An Archdemon itself isn't the problem, it's the Blight it commands. DA:O shows an army of darkspawn taking down the king's army. Lothering gets sacked. The Bannorn in a panic because of the darkspawn rampaging across their land. The endless swarm of darkspawn the Archdemon commands.

The Archdemon itself is about as powerful as a High Dragon. It's dangerous because of what it controls, and that's why the player is told to fear it.

A pride demon, by itself, is never shown to be dangerous to Hawke or the Warden. A pride demon that's bonded with a powerful mage and has managed to take over a Circle full of other mages, which it then turns into an army of abominations is shown to be a danger, but that's not the case with Audacity.

Audacity is at no time built up in the player's mind as an entity to be feared.

The mirror is spooky, but the fear it generates makes no sense. Pol runs from Merrill in terror and is killed by the Strider - his reaction to Merrill is one of terror. That's not the actions of a rational agent. As a player, I can only see Pol as the product of the type of society that would burn old women as a witch because a bunch of calves were stillborn that season.

In a story where the hero encounters and overcomes one horrific danger after another, I need a reason why this specific danger is different from the others. A codex entry that tells me pride demons are super powerful doesn't help when I've already shut down several of them. Hawke is apparently super powerful and could probably also wipe out a village.

[Corker]

Killjoy Cutter wrote...

Exactly. 

Despite all the talk and accusations and fan-anger about what Merrill was doing, everything that went wrong was because of someone else's fear.  Merrill was never possessed, never sacrificed anyone, never unleashed any demons on the world, never did any harm to any innocent with her blood magic. 

Every single death surrounding Merrill's "evil blood magic" was caused by someone else's irrationality, fear, and hate.

Of course, we never get to see what would have happened if Merrill had repaired the eluvian. 

It *could* have been a mechanically simple, winnable fight with just the loss of Merrill as a consequence.  Or it could have gone to cutscene land, with a glowing Merrill rampaging through the Alienage* while Hawke stands dramatically in the door of her house, frozen in horror for as long as it takes for the animators to rack up a sufficiently impressive body count.

We won't really know if the others' fears were rational or irrational, in other words.

*Assuming Audacity taught her to repair the eluvian and she did so in her home.

[Vhalkyrie]

I wish they would have let us have the option to let Merrill finish it so there wouldn't be these crazy debates. It one of the things that makes DA2 so much more linear than DAO. For a series that's supposed to be about choices and consequences, limiting the obvious branching option here is frustrating.

I suppose there's still a chance to redeem it in a DLC or sequel, if she kept it on friendship path.

Modifié par Vhalkyrie, 30 mars 2011 - 04:07 .

[Killjoy Cutter]

Maria Caliban wrote...

tmp7704 wrote...

Killjoy Cutter wrote...

If the game always shows pride demons being slapped around, then pride demons are no big deal.

The game shows everything slapped around. Going by this logic nothing is big deal, including the Archdemons.

An Archdemon itself isn't the problem, it's the Blight it commands. DA:O shows an army of darkspawn taking down the king's army. Lothering gets sacked. The Bannorn in a panic because of the darkspawn rampaging across their land. The endless swarm of darkspawn the Archdemon commands.

The Archdemon itself is about as powerful as a High Dragon. It's dangerous because of what it controls, and that's why the player is told to fear it.

A pride demon, by itself, is never shown to be dangerous to Hawke or the Warden. A pride demon that's bonded with a powerful mage and has managed to take over a Circle full of other mages, which it then turns into an army of abominations is shown to be a danger, but that's not the case with Audacity.

Audacity is at no time built up in the player's mind as an entity to be feared.

The mirror is spooky, but the fear it generates makes no sense. Pol runs from Merrill in terror and is killed by the Strider - his reaction to Merrill is one of terror. That's not the actions of a rational agent. As a player, I can only see Pol as the product of the type of society that would burn old women as a witch because a bunch of calves were stillborn that season.

In a story where the hero encounters and overcomes one horrific danger after another, I need a reason why this specific danger is different from the others. A codex entry that tells me pride demons are super powerful doesn't help when I've already shut down several of them. Hawke is apparently super powerful and could probably also wipe out a village.

(I think we do see both the Warden and Hawke wipe out the equivalent of small well-armed villages on many occasions...  )

What you said about Pol there does make sense -- the Dalish seem to have lost so much that they've become exactly that kind of society, at least in certain clans.   There's so many half-truths, so many holes to fill in, that they've become supersticious and distrustful. 

[Maria Caliban]

Camenae wrote...

"Hawke is wrong too" =/= "Merrill is right."

Did someone say Hawke was wrong?

[Killjoy Cutter]

Corker wrote...

Killjoy Cutter wrote...

Exactly. 

Despite all the talk and accusations and fan-anger about what Merrill was doing, everything that went wrong was because of someone else's fear.  Merrill was never possessed, never sacrificed anyone, never unleashed any demons on the world, never did any harm to any innocent with her blood magic. 

Every single death surrounding Merrill's "evil blood magic" was caused by someone else's irrationality, fear, and hate.

Of course, we never get to see what would have happened if Merrill had repaired the eluvian. 

It *could* have been a mechanically simple, winnable fight with just the loss of Merrill as a consequence.  Or it could have gone to cutscene land, with a glowing Merrill rampaging through the Alienage* while Hawke stands dramatically in the door of her house, frozen in horror for as long as it takes for the animators to rack up a sufficiently impressive body count.

We won't really know if the others' fears were rational or irrational, in other words.

*Assuming Audacity taught her to repair the eluvian and she did so in her home.

Everything we see in the game leads to the conclusion that their fears were irrational.  Not only do the Warden and Hawke both defeat multiple pride demons, both have an instance in which they enter the fade and save someone from demonic control. 

[Killjoy Cutter]

Vhalkyrie wrote...

I wish they would have let us have the option to let Merrill finish it so there wouldn't be these crazy debates. It one of the things that makes DA2 so much more linear than DAO. For a series that's supposed to be about choices and consequences, limiting the obvious branching option here is frustrating.

I suppose there's still a chance to redeem it in a DLC or sequel, if she kept it on friendship path.

The big letdown for me with DA2 isn't any of the gameplay alteration, it's that it feels so much more like I'm along for the ride, when compared to DA:O, when I felt like I was actually determining the course of events.  (To anyone who is going to make arguments to the contrary, note that I said "FELT" before you start trying to nitpick.)

[tmp7704]

Maria Caliban wrote...

An Archdemon itself isn't the problem, it's the Blight it commands. DA:O shows an army of darkspawn taking down the king's army. Lothering gets sacked. The Bannorn in a panic because of the darkspawn rampaging across their land. The endless swarm of darkspawn the Archdemon commands.

The Archdemon itself is about as powerful as a High Dragon. It's dangerous because of what it controls, and that's why the player is told to fear it.

DAO also shows that the endless swarm of darkspawn actually translates to roughly 30 mobs which die in one hit each.

The lore and the gameplay unfortunately operate on entirely different levels, and taking the gameplay as accurate portrayal of power leads to conclusion there's nothing in Thedas that four people can't take care of. Or one person, either on lower difficulty or with enough DLC cheese.

Incidentally, is the bit about the Archdemon being as powerful as a High Dragon said somewhere by the devs, or is that based on their in-game performance? If the former it'd be... disappointing, i was under impression the Archdemons were supposed to be something more than that even on their own.

A pride demon, by itself, is never shown to be dangerous to Hawke or the Warden.

Yes, and it's also a disappointment. If there's nothing in the world to be really wary of, the experience along with the game world becomes akin to:

[Vhalkyrie]

Quite honestly, if the other option was let Merrill finish the Eluvian and all would be perfect, my character would still have chosen to destroy it. Because that's what my Hawke believes. Such is the way with our choices. Merrill was strong in her conviction she was doing the right thing, and my Hawke is strong in her conviction that she is wrong.

One example is if you allowed Avernus to continue his research, then in DA2 you get a potion where you can get some attribute bonuses. My Warden is content with her choice in killing Avernus, and knowing that you get a goodie later wouldn't stop me from making the same choice to do it again.

I may have doomed the Quarian's when I spared the Geth in ME2, but if that's the consequence, then I'll deal with it in ME3.  Similar with the mirror.  I rivaled Merrill and she destroyed the mirror.  What happens next is a consequence of Hawke pushing Merrill down the path to keep, or destroy it.  Marethari making the sacrifice for Merrill was inevitability, as deemed by the game designers.

Modifié par Vhalkyrie, 30 mars 2011 - 04:57 .

[Corker]

Killjoy Cutter wrote...

Everything we see in the game leads to the conclusion that their fears were irrational.  Not only do the Warden and Hawke both defeat multiple pride demons, both have an instance in which they enter the fade and save someone from demonic control. 

I don't actually disagree.  And yet, when NPCs who ostensibly have experience and wisdom on such matters (Marethari, Flemeth) indicate that they are dangerous, I have to wonder why our risk assessments are so different.  I could chalk it up to, "Everyone is an idiot except for me and Merrill," but my life experience tells me that's not generally the case.  When your subject matter experts are going pale and stammering, it's usually a good idea to listen.

The trouble is, they're talking lore, and gameplay provides an entirely different data set. You won't know if you're going to end up in a lore-influenced scene or a gameplay-influenced scene until Merrill actually fixes the mirror.

[Maria Caliban]

tmp7704 wrote...

Maria Caliban wrote...

An Archdemon itself isn't the problem, it's the Blight it commands. DA:O shows an army of darkspawn taking down the king's army. Lothering gets sacked. The Bannorn in a panic because of the darkspawn rampaging across their land. The endless swarm of darkspawn the Archdemon commands.

The Archdemon itself is about as powerful as a High Dragon. It's dangerous because of what it controls, and that's why the player is told to fear it.

DAO also shows that the endless swarm of darkspawn actually translates to roughly 30 mobs which die in one hit each.

Which is story and gameplay separation.

The lore and the gameplay unfortunately operate on entirely different levels...

But we're not talking about the gameplay.

The *story* says that Hawke defeated the Arishok, a High Dragon, Hybris, and Xebenkeck. Even if your specific Hawke didn't, that's because he or she never tried.

The *story* of DA:O says that the Warden can defeat an archdemon and can defeat lots of darkspawn, but not the entire army. We cannot save Lothering. We see thousands of darkspawn we can't fight. We have to assemble not one, but three armies to defeat the Blight and we have those three armies backing us at Denerium when we fight the horde and the Archdemon.

Alternatively, what in the *story* of Dragon Age 2 tell or shows us that a single pride demon is an enemy to be feared? A single codex entry (and we know codex entries are written by people in the setting) and a very long health bar aren't sufficient build up if the intention is to make us believe this is a threat Hawke couldn't handle.

But I don't think that was the intent. I see nothing to indicate that the player was supposed to be worrying about a pride demon getting lose and destroying parts of the Free Marches.

[Killjoy Cutter]

tmp7704 wrote...

Maria Caliban wrote...

An Archdemon itself isn't the problem, it's the Blight it commands. DA:O shows an army of darkspawn taking down the king's army. Lothering gets sacked. The Bannorn in a panic because of the darkspawn rampaging across their land. The endless swarm of darkspawn the Archdemon commands.

The Archdemon itself is about as powerful as a High Dragon. It's dangerous because of what it controls, and that's why the player is told to fear it.

DAO also shows that the endless swarm of darkspawn actually translates to roughly 30 mobs which die in one hit each.

The lore and the gameplay unfortunately operate on entirely different levels, and taking the gameplay as accurate portrayal of power leads to conclusion there's nothing in Thedas that four people can't take care of. Or one person, either on lower difficulty or with enough DLC cheese.

Let's not excuse these issues and flaws by falling back on bad tropes.  "Gameplay / Story Segregation" isn't a valid design style or the natual course of things, it's a halfass excuse for poor writing and development.

Modifié par Killjoy Cutter, 30 mars 2011 - 05:10 .

[Torax]

It's basically going no where to attempt to compare the stories and plot of Origins and DA2. DA2 is more mashed together to just build up the danger that is extremist mages + demons vs. A lunatic of a Knight Commander who has blind followers until it's too late. The Arishok is a cool character but he almost just facilitates a means to an end of turning you into the Champion. So then we're crammed with yet more demons & abominations all to justify how bad mages could be. While perfectly killable, we have to find them as a threat I guess. It allows players to maybe side with Meredith beyond for an Achievement. Meredith basically demands mage genocide. Orsino just asks for her to step down.

Origins had a story arch. Arch Demon and it's army horde vs. all of Fereldon. You end up having the knights of redcliffe, dwarven army (optionally with golems, also optional legion of the dead), Either the Mages or the Templars, Lastly the Dalish Hunters or the Werewolves. This army is what is used to help you fight to the Arch Demon. Once killed the organized Horde crumbles and immediately flees back under ground because the the song is gone.

In DA2 there is no war until after the game is over. The over reaching threat is basically an argument that you have no say in the matter of besides which side you fight on. There is barely anything you can change in the overall story. You can decide if your entire family dies or not. You can decide a little bit about your companions but outside of that, the main plot is out of your hands.

Killing or letting the prime suspect go has no effect. You come to the exact same spot. There is no way to talk down the Arishok. There is no way to stop Sister/Mother Petrice. There is nothing you can do about Grace or Thrask because they are scripted to show up again in Act 3. No way to talk down Anders. No way to convince Merrill to stop with the Mirror before A New Path. The closest thing to a decision is things like if Isabela leaves permanently or not.

Origins had 1 crucial outcome. The Arch Demon had to die. You still needed the army to fight them so it was a lot of good guys and bad guy solutions all leading to the Arch Demons death. DA2 had too many required crucial outcomes and not enough freedom outside of that. Maybe Thrask likes you. Maybe Meredith does or maybe Orsino. The Arishok may respect you or not. But for the story? You have no choice. Worst part is the full list of Crucial Outcomes from DA2 don't even really seem that dangerous beyond for Kirkwall. Not all of Thedas. Not until Anders goes all boom boom on the chantry. Even then it's 1 mage in front of me. Not some Dark Spawn Army all consuming the World...

Modifié par Torax, 30 mars 2011 - 05:31 .

[tmp7704]

Maria Caliban wrote...

Which is story and gameplay separation.

Which is why i'm not a fan of the "X isn't big threat because i easily beat it in the game (and every NPC who doesn't think the same is a dumb worrywart)" line of reasoning.

But we're not talking about the gameplay.

We're talking of what's the result of gameplay -- and which is how supposedly highly threatening enemies actually not pose much if any threat to the player. Which in turn causes the player to look down on these enemies and treat them nothing to worry about, and apply this reasoning to the story.

The *story* says that Hawke defeated the Arishok, a High Dragon, Hybris, and Xebenkeck. Even if your specific Hawke didn't, that's because he or she never tried.

There's a subtle catch here -- it's in using these instances as undeniable proof that Hawke could perform such feats repeatedly and without fail. Which is based entirely on the gameplay, and which involves factors like all enemies of given type having identical stats, or ignoring botched attempts which end in reloads.

In reality it's far from being this simple, and situations which may tax a person to the limits can be much harder if not impossible to repeat. And rarely guaranteed.

Alternatively, what in the *story* of Dragon Age 2 tell or shows us that a single pride demon is an enemy to be feared? A single codex entry (and we know codex entries are written by people in the setting) and a very long health bar aren't sufficient build up if the intention is to make us believe this is a threat Hawke couldn't handle.

This is very much a red herring, because what would it take for the game to make the player think that single pride demon is an enemy to be feared? Or any enemy, for this matter?

[tmp7704]

Killjoy Cutter wrote...

Let's not excuse these issues and flaws by falling back on bad tropes.  "Gameplay / Story Segregation" isn't a valid design style or the natual course of things, it's a halfass excuse for poor writing and development.

I'm not excusing nor segregating anything here. To the contrary, i'm applying your own way of reasoning used for pride demons to demonstrate that the threat of the Blight in DAO in fact wasn't a threat at all. And the conclusion the fear of it was irrational.

Modifié par tmp7704, 30 mars 2011 - 05:46 .

[sphinxess]

tmp7704 wrote...

Maria Caliban wrote...

Which is story and gameplay separation.

Which is why i'm not a fan of the "X isn't big threat because i easily beat it in the game (and every NPC who doesn't think the same is a dumb worrywart)" line of reasoning.

But we're not talking about the gameplay.

We're talking of what's the result of gameplay -- and which is how supposedly highly threatening enemies actually not pose much if any threat to the player. Which in turn causes the player to look down on these enemies and treat them nothing to worry about, and apply this reasoning to the story.

The *story* says that Hawke defeated the Arishok, a High Dragon, Hybris, and Xebenkeck. Even if your specific Hawke didn't, that's because he or she never tried.

There's a subtle catch here -- it's in using these instances as undeniable proof that Hawke could perform such feats repeatedly and without fail. Which is based entirely on the gameplay, and which involves factors like all enemies of given type having identical stats, or ignoring botched attempts which end in reloads.

In reality it's far from being this simple, and situations which may tax a person to the limits can be much harder if not impossible to repeat. And rarely guaranteed.

Alternatively, what in the *story* of Dragon Age 2 tell or shows us that a single pride demon is an enemy to be feared? A single codex entry (and we know codex entries are written by people in the setting) and a very long health bar aren't sufficient build up if the intention is to make us believe this is a threat Hawke couldn't handle.

This is very much a red herring, because what would it take for the game to make the player think that single pride demon is an enemy to be feared? Or any enemy, for this matter?

Are there any entrys that say that a entire city or nation actually fell to a pride demon in the past?

Just like with blights - the archdemon was killed many times in early blights - the problem was it kept returning until they discovered the secret for destryoing its soul.

[hoorayforicecream]

sphinxess wrote...

Are there any entrys that say that a entire city or nation actually fell to a pride demon in the past?

Just like with blights - the archdemon was killed many times in early blights - the problem was it kept returning until they discovered the secret for destryoing its soul.

Meredith did specifically mention that her sister (a weak mage who never would have passed the harrowing) got possessed by a demon and killed 70 innocents before being taken down. The strength of abominations as given in the gameplay certainly doesn't match with what we're told about how strong abominations are.

On a side note, there have been 5 different archdemons (one for each blight), and each has been killed. I always thought the main reason they are so hard to exterminate is that there's usually a lot of time between each one, so the methods by which they are killed tend to get distorted (there was something like 500 years between the 4th and 5th blights). Sort of like having to reinvent the wheel each time.

[tmp7704]

sphinxess wrote...

Are there any entrys that say that a entire city or nation actually fell to a pride demon in the past?

Nothing on the record; but it's worth to keep on mind there's very little "on the record" in general. For example there's very few recorded wars in Thedas history known to us. I'm not sure if we can conclude from this that world is an utopia with few armed conflicts.

[Torax]

The Fifth Blight was actually lucky apparently. They caught it early and only needed forces from Fereldon. The last one before that required a uniting of about all of Thedas led by Garahel. A Blight tends to take years and takes out entire nations before they can take them down. Not just the Kocari Wilds through to some of the Bannorns and finally Denerim. So at least from the player perspective we don't don't even really see the full danger that blight can present because it ended to early. That or the Architect's actions made this last Arch Demon act more hastely than one normally would be.

[Vhalkyrie]

The Warden and Hawke are superhero outliers in the world of Thedas. Normal people cannot do what the Warden and Hawke can do. While Hawke may have plot armor and cannot die, pride demons are no big deal, everything else is a red shirt the can be plunked off by an ogre or a really angry alley cat at any given moment.

Meow.

Modifié par Vhalkyrie, 30 mars 2011 - 06:18 .

[Torax]

Vhalkyrie wrote...

The Warden and Hawke are superhero outliers in the world of Thedas. Normal people cannot do what the Warden and Hawke can do. While Hawke may have plot armor and cannot die, pride demons are no big deal, everything else is a red shirt the can be plunked off by an ogre or a really angry alley cat at any given moment.

Meow.

Cullen actually says as much to the player in the Circle Tower when he's in his prison in Origins. It's been mentioned again by npcs. Basically it's that sure the Hero or Champion can fell what is before them. But what is going to protect the regular non Plot Armor protected charactes? At least for the most the companions might be safe unless a crisis point hits. But the rest of the towns people and villages? Well lets just say Oriana and Oren Cousland didn't get any Plot Armor.

[tmp7704]

Vhalkyrie wrote...

The Warden and Hawke are superhero outliers in the world of Thedas. Normal people cannot do what the Warden and Hawke can do. While Hawke may have plot armor and cannot die, pride demons are no big deal, everything else is a red shirt the can be plunked off by an ogre or a really angry alley cat at any given moment.

Meow.

Calls for obligatory http://www.giantitp....s/oots0780.html

[Dan-mac RI]

tmp7704 wrote...

sphinxess wrote...

Are there any entrys that say that a entire city or nation actually fell to a pride demon in the past?

Nothing on the record; but it's worth to keep on mind there's very little "on the record" in general. For example there's very few recorded wars in Thedas history known to us. I'm not sure if we can conclude from this that world is an utopia with few armed conflicts.

There are tons of recorded wars: many many Exalted Marches, rebellions(Ferelden), Slave revolts(Kirkwall and Andraste), wars between Elves and humans(Fall of Arlathan and the Dales), and blights. Though to be honest I would love to see a time line of Thedas so we know when all these things happened.

Edit: I forgot the never-ending war between the Imperium and the Qunari.

Modifié par Dan-mac RI, 30 mars 2011 - 06:37 .