1927 réponses à ce sujet

[Anarcala]

TJPags wrote...

AshenEndemion wrote...

TJPags wrote...

AshenEndemion wrote...

By not approving of the Rite, the Rite is denied.  If the request is sent to Val Royeux, it must have been sent to Elthina prior.  If the request was not sent to Elthina, then Meredith strongly believed that the Grand Cleric would not approve, and felt the Divine would have a more approving response.

Nothing in what I saw indicates it was sent to Elfinna.  Meredith may have sent directly to the Divine, bypassing Elthinna.  Assuming its at all accurate.

Yes, nothing in the statement indicates it was.  Nothing indicates it wasn't.  I assume a request was sent to Elthina, because that is standard procedure.  Just like I assume there are children in the Kirkwall Circle, even though there is nothing to indicate that there are...

It never looks good, in military-like organizations, to go over the head of ones immediate superior without even informing them.  Usually the result is "Why did you come to me with this?  Go talk to them, then come to me."  Yes it is possible that she didn't even send the request to Elthina.  But I don't believe this is the case.

All fair points, and in general, I agree.  Here, however, I think we see in early Act 3 that Meredith is not exactly the biggest fan of Elthinna.  I can see her going right to the Divine with that.

I'll also add, given the number of blood mages we run into during the game - which only gets worse in Act 3 - was consideration of the Rite so "out there"?

Conjecture, but I imagine Meredith had a good little whine about Elthina when she sent for the Rite.  Probably trying to make her seem ineffectual as a leader...which actually isn't too far off the truth...

As for the blood mages - yes there are more, but the suggestion is that the increase is due to Mages being pushed to breaking point by Meredith.

[stobie]

Merrill's story is more understandable, given that she's been so much a loner. I guess, for me, it's the span of years involved. They're planning something, both of them, pretty crazy. In Anders's case, he has to know it won't end well. (Merrill could believe it will end very well, however, though I'm never sure what she expects to gain from a mirror that Morrigan put together so fast.) I also question why an Anders live-in lover wouldn't be pressuring him a bit more about opening up. I don't think I'd be *that* dense. (but I keep picking Fenris & restarting my supposed-to-love-Anders- rogue, so I haven't gotten into Act 3 much yet.)

[TJPags]

Anarcala wrote...

Conjecture, but I imagine Meredith had a good little whine about Elthina when she sent for the Rite.  Probably trying to make her seem ineffectual as a leader...which actually isn't too far off the truth...

As for the blood mages - yes there are more, but the suggestion is that the increase is due to Mages being pushed to breaking point by Meredith.

I agree on the first point.

On the second, I'm not sure.  My personal opinion is that the lockdown was ineffectual, again given the blood mage problem we see.  So the "being pushed" thing, I'm not sure I get.  I see her "pushing" as justified.

[BY-TOR STORMDRAGON]

It was nice to see Leliana again, but working for the Divine? That was odd...she kicked serious ass in Origins...

[tmp7704]

Conduit0 wrote...

And Loghain having a bad day wiped out an entire city's worth of people at Ostegar.

Loghain being mere mortal lacking any magic powers and optional demon posessing him ... would've been significantly easier to stop cold in his track though. Would take 1-2 determined people rather than couple squads of templars.

Plus, it did take quite a bit more specific circumstances than just "i happen to be in a city and i happen to have a bad day".

Modifié par tmp7704, 04 avril 2011 - 01:00 .

[AshenEndymion]

TJPags wrote...

All fair points, and in general, I agree.  Here, however, I think we see in early Act 3 that Meredith is not exactly the biggest fan of Elthinna.  I can see her going right to the Divine with that.

I'll also add, given the number of blood mages we run into during the game - which only gets worse in Act 3 - was consideration of the Rite so "out there"?

Meredith may not like Elthina, but she respects the office of Grand Cleric.  As evident by her restraint up until the final sequence.  My personal opinion is that it's an ultimate sign of disrespect by not even sending the request to the Grand Cleric first.  Since no response is a "no" she doesn't even have to wait more than a day before sending a request to the Divine (since they're all in Kirkwall.  It's not like she would have to send the request to another city).

And I don't think the request is "out there."  I actually agree with the request.  I've never been much of a fan of the mages.  Or I'm not when I'm not playing a mage.

[WhiteKnyght]

tmp7704 wrote...

Conduit0 wrote...

And Loghain having a bad day wiped out an entire city's worth of people at Ostegar.

Loghain being mere mortal lacking any magic powers and optional demon posessing him ... would've been significantly easier to stop cold in his track though. Would take 1-2 determined people rather than couple squads of templars.

Plus, it did take quite a bit more specific circumstances than just "i happen to be in a city and i happen to have a bad day".

Templars are weak and incompetent. The player, with a party of four or less clears out an entire tower of demons and abominations that sent the Templars running with their tails between their legs.

Also Cullen's statements are blatant exagerattion. I've seen what demons and abominations can do, and they are not as all powerful and frightening as the Chantry likes to make people believe. They make a mountain out of a molehill.

Modifié par The Grey Nayr, 04 avril 2011 - 01:05 .

[Lewie]

Anarcala wrote...

By not approving of the Rite, the Rite is denied. If the request is sent to Val Royeux, it must have been sent to Elthina prior. If the request was not sent to Elthina, then Meredith strongly believed that the Grand Cleric would not approve, and felt the Divine would have a more approving response.

Okay so the key issue here is whether or not Elthina was ever given the chance to view the request, and if she had what was her response. We're not gonna get answers I guess.

I was refering to Justice's lack of empathy in this particular installment. And Justice, in the end, won within Anders, in my opinion. His action at the chantry WAS devoid of societal morals also, whether "Just" or not. Justice had only "principle" morals, at any cost to maintain the principle of justice as a concept. Concepts are not always as neat in RL though. And, thanks to Anders influence, they masked those tendencies with an outside ability to appear somewhat "normal". I still think that fits with current Anders/Justice by the *end* of DA2 ( he originally maintained some guilt when aware of his actions, though, he also claimed to have blackouts and done things he was not aware of also....a whole other problem!) I don't think much of Anders was left by the end. I thought so MORE in my mage-sided playthrough, much less in my moderate templar-sided, then both.

This is just my opinion of course. To my eye, by the end, Anders had descended into madness. He was little more than a husk.

I agree, there are intrinsic problems with trying to apply an absolute to any given situation. And essentially Anders was saying 'either Mages get Justice, or they don't' by blowing up the Chantry.

However, it is made plain that Anders does understand that his actions are extreme. He feels guilt for them. As to whether or not he is insane...I'm not sure he is in any kind of psychopathic or sociopathic way at least. Certainly he's depressed, paranoid and possibly schizophrenic, but he seems (for the most part) in control of his actions. As for Justice taking over, or Vengence, Anders himself says that they are all one now.

Honestly, he seems to me like any terrorist/freedom fighter - regardless of the spirit inside.

The lore tells us that vengenance is a manevolent spirit, so if anders was for justice, why make a decision that ends with everyone dead. I also remember how justice loved lyrium, it sang. I think anders should not have made himself a host, period. Yet he does that, and runs about condemning others. Kirkwall seemed to me to be a meeting ground of all demons, so anders answer is blow up the chantry, kill the grand cleric, anyone within or nearby. That fixes only what anders believes is right, even if justice was a good spirit, they can't be controlled good or bad. That strangely is what the ripple effect would do when people know a mage killed the grand cleric. I always saw elthina take the stance she should, that was her position. 

[Mnemnosyne]

ddv.rsa wrote...

The thing is, it doesn't need to happen often. Like Cullen says, one mage having a bad day could destroy an entire city. It's happened in DA's past that lone abominations have destroyed entire towns before being stopped. Even if destruction on this scale only happens a few times in a century, spread across the world, do you genuinely think that people would be prepared to live with that constant risk in the real world?

A few things to keep in mind here.  As a medieval world, 'city' and 'town' refer to much, much smaller concentrations of people than they do for us in the modern world.  I don't know if any actual numbers have been given, but I seriously doubt that even Denerim, largest city in Ferelden, has more than half a million people in it, and I doubt it would be that many.  A town is a few hundred people, at most, and a village probably doesn't make it above 100, tops.

Then realize that the 'destroy an entire city' is wild exaggeration.  There's no evidence that a single mage has ever even come close to destroying a city at any time in the history of Thedas.  I know of no such references in any codex or dialogue.  A mage may destroy a village, but even a town is unlikely.  The incident that caused the Rite of Annulment to be created?  An abomination killed about 70 people.  That's it, 70!  And not all at once, either, it was over the entire period of time it took to bring down.  In the real world, any person with some training, strategy, and 'luck' in the execution of their plan could easily kill 70 people or more, and that's with our highly advanced methods of capturing such dangerous individuals.  In Thedas, a single man with a sword can probably kill several hundred people if he's smart enough.  It's not as though they have forensics and advanced detective science to track down murderers.  And in reality, there are people who have killed well over a hundred, even with modern forensic science to help track them down.

Then consider how beneficial mages are to society.  Healing of wounds that would otherwise be fatal is the most obvious and immediate benefit to everyone, and there are many, many more things that mages would be beneficial.  In the real world we accept risks in exchange for benefits to our society much smaller than what mages would provide.  How many plane crashes have we ever had, in about a century of air travel, and how many people have died because of them?  Probably more people than would die to mage accidents.  And yet people haven't rejected air travel because of this risk, because the benefits are too great.  And yet the benefit to society from widespread mage availability would be even greater.  How many people has Anders himself helped over seven years in Kirkwall?  How many would have died without him or some other similar mage being available?  How many more would be helped if all the mages in the Gallows were free to practice magic wherever they wanted?  Probably far more people than would die in mage-related attacks/accidents.

As long as the risks are not constantly exaggerated, as they have been by the chantry for a thousand years, people would have no problems with them, I think.  Especially if proper precautions were taken.  For example, if the training templars get to cancel magic were publically available so that all city guardsmen could recieve similar training.  Remember that Alistair specifically notes that the lyrium is not necessary for templar talents to function, so if the Chantry didn't intentionally keep that training a secret, anyone who wanted could learn to counteract mages.

[stobie]

BY-TOR STORMDRAGON wrote...

It was nice to see Leliana again, but working for the Divine? That was odd...she kicked serious ass in Origins...

Isn't the current Divine the same woman from Orlais that saves Leliana in her DLC? Dorothea?  

[Anarcala]

TJPags wrote...

Anarcala wrote...

Conjecture, but I imagine Meredith had a good little whine about Elthina when she sent for the Rite.  Probably trying to make her seem ineffectual as a leader...which actually isn't too far off the truth...

As for the blood mages - yes there are more, but the suggestion is that the increase is due to Mages being pushed to breaking point by Meredith.

I agree on the first point.

On the second, I'm not sure.  My personal opinion is that the lockdown was ineffectual, again given the blood mage problem we see.  So the "being pushed" thing, I'm not sure I get.  I see her "pushing" as justified.

The blood mage problem has to be taken in context.  It gets progressively worse through the Acts, yes?  In Act I, hardly any BM's present bar Grace and her lot.  This is a very small number when you consider how big the Circle in Kirkwall must be (one of the biggest Free Marches cities, with a dedicated building for the Circle) and how many Templars there are.  By Act II, there are more and the problem is getting worse, however we also know that Meredith gains the idol and begins to squeeze on Mage freedom.  By Act III it's all out wrist cutting action with rumours that Meredith is nuttier than a bag of KP lightly salted.

As for who did the pushing - well that depends on what Meredith thinks 'pushing' is.  Karl certainly didn't need to be made Tranquil for writing letters to an apostate...

Modifié par Anarcala, 04 avril 2011 - 01:07 .

[stobie]

tmp7704 wrote...

Conduit0 wrote...

And Loghain having a bad day wiped out an entire city's worth of people at Ostegar.

Loghain being mere mortal lacking any magic powers and optional demon posessing him ... would've been significantly easier to stop cold in his track though. Would take 1-2 determined people rather than couple squads of templars.

Plus, it did take quite a bit more specific circumstances than just "i happen to be in a city and i happen to have a bad day".

Then you could compare Uldred to Loghain, who commands an army, and I have to say, I found Loghain a lot harder to defeat. 

[tmp7704]

The Grey Nayr wrote...

Templars are weak and incompetent. The player, with a party of four or less clears out an entire tower of demons and abominations that sent the Templars running with their tails between their legs.

The protagonist of a RPG is more powerful than anyone else in the world and the only competent person to boot. Colour me surprised

[tmp7704]

stobie wrote...

Then you could compare Uldred to Loghain, who commands an army, and I have to say, I found Loghain a lot harder to defeat. 

Loghain falls pretty quick in combat. Considerably quicker than say, Arishok.

[AshenEndymion]

Koyasha wrote...

*snip*The incident that caused the Rite of Annulment to be created? An abomination killed about 70 people. That's it, 70! And not all at once, either, it was over the entire period of time it took to bring down.*snip*

No. The Rite was created because of the incidents that led up that event. A several mages attacked templars, and the Circle protected the mages. Then a demon was summoned, killing mages and templars within the circle, possessed someone becoming an abomination, then escaped to kill 70 people.

If the mages within the Circle had given up the conspirators who attacked the templars in the first place, the situation may have been resolved without an abomination going out to the countryside and killing 70 innocents. The entire Circle proved itself corrupted.  That is why the Rite of Annulment was created...

Modifié par AshenEndemion, 04 avril 2011 - 01:13 .

[stobie]

The Arishok was mean - and I liked him so much, too! However, the 'stab through body' scene was really, really silly. I laughed, and I shouldn't be laughing then. I have a huge sword through my entire body, my little feet are kicking, & then I hop away & attack again, unscathed.

I had the worst time on my mage, against him - I had the Isabella friendship bug, & I couldn't figure out why I couldn't cast in time. He's a lot harder when you have Isabella and that fiend, Sebastian, hampering you!

[Lewie]

tmp7704 wrote...

stobie wrote...

Then you could compare Uldred to Loghain, who commands an army, and I have to say, I found Loghain a lot harder to defeat. 

Loghain falls pretty quick in combat. Considerably quicker than say, Arishok.

I enjoyed killing Loghain, i did not like killing the Arishok. Colour me confused.

[stobie]

I wanted to install the Arishok as Viscount, with Petrice's head as a wall decoration!

[tmp7704]

stobie wrote...

The Arishok was mean - and I liked him so much, too! However, the 'stab through body' scene was really, really silly. I laughed, and I shouldn't be laughing then. I have a huge sword through my entire body, my little feet are kicking, & then I hop away & attack again, unscathed.

I was playing a mage so as funny as the being impaled looked, i was way too concerned whether i manage to get a heal off after he throws me on the floor and before he stabs me again, to laugh... i mean, the failure meant having to repeat 15+ minutes of the circle sidestep dance yet. another. time

[stobie]

Oh, well - I probably laughed, then promptly died, but it was still silly.

[KnightofPhoenix]

tmp7704 wrote...

stobie wrote...

The Arishok was mean - and I liked him so much, too! However, the 'stab through body' scene was really, really silly. I laughed, and I shouldn't be laughing then. I have a huge sword through my entire body, my little feet are kicking, & then I hop away & attack again, unscathed.

I was playing a mage so as funny as the being impaled looked, i was way too concerned whether i manage to get a heal off after he throws me on the floor and before he stabs me again, to laugh... i mean, the failure meant having to repeat 15+ minutes of the circle sidestep dance yet. another. time

That was actually a "wtf *faceplam* moment for me.
Reminded me too much of Dynasty Warriors. A franchise I would want DA to stay away from as much as possible.

[stobie]

I also spent a lot of time pausing & running between pillars. I wanted to be able to shout, "But I thought we were FRIENDS! You liked my boyfriend!"



Like Mortal Kombat? I remember silly things in that.  That's not exactly Medieval Fantasy realistic, true. 

Modifié par stobie, 04 avril 2011 - 01:25 .

[KnightofPhoenix]

stobie wrote...
Like Mortal Kombat? I remember silly things in that.  That's not exactly Medieval Fantasy realistic, true. 

And like Soul Calibur.

[LadyJaneGrey]

stobie wrote...

I also spent a lot of time pausing & running between pillars. I wanted to be able to shout, "But I thought we were FRIENDS! You liked my boyfriend!"

I was nearly finished with the battle when the game bugged out and my poor Hawke died.  My yelling at the computer screen woke hubby up down the hall. 

More on topic: I'm sure some future historians will see Anders as justified.  The families of the victims, however, probably have a different opinion.

[EmperorSahlertz]

stobie wrote...

BY-TOR STORMDRAGON wrote...

It was nice to see Leliana again, but working for the Divine? That was odd...she kicked serious ass in Origins...

Isn't the current Divine the same woman from Orlais that saves Leliana in her DLC? Dorothea?  

The current Divine and the Revered Mother (or whatever rank she had) certainly shares the same name. Can't say wether or not they are the same person.