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[Stephenc13]

 I picked the Mages the first time I played through, and Templars the second time.
I feel that the Mages were overall the wrong side after both playthroughs.

When I picked the mages, I was thinking "They can't be killed off for no reason, most of them are probably innocent!"
and a few seconds into the killing and I see a mage turn into an abomination, I was thinking "uhhhh... maybe I picked the wrong side"
A little more into the playthrough, and I realized that the mages were definitely the wrong side.

The Templars were most likely formed because they witnessed many mages letting demons into their bodies.
So the Mages brought the Templars onto themselves, and they complain about how oppressive the Templars are when many of their fellow mages keep turning to blood magic and demons.
The mages rebelling against the Circle give the Templars more reason to tighten their grip on mages.

Reasons why Templars and the Circles are important.

The Demons are like ants,
The Circle is like a basket,
The Templars are containers and ziplock bags
The Mages are fruits and foods.

1. It's impossible to rid of all the ants because there are countless amounts of ants as there are demons in the Dragon Age world.
2. It's possible to rid of the basket but everything will be disorganized and harder to maintain, everything will be on the picnic blanket. Without the Circles, Templars could not do their job well if every mage was scattered thoughout the world.
3. If foods weren't in containers or ziplock bags, if they were in the basket or not, ants would still be seeking out the food and eventually finding a way into the basket to get to the food. If there were no Templars, but the Circles contained unsupervised mages, Demons still would find a way to invade the Mage bodies.
4. If there were no fruits and foods, there wouldn't be as much of an ant problem. If there were no mages, there wouldn't be much of a demon problem. Ants may still crawl around the picnic area, but there wouldn't be a specific thing to feed on.

Ants may still get into the containers, but the containers keep the ants from feeding on all the other foods.

[Torax]

I wouldn't say they doomed themselves if they didn't ask for it. But that is more a mindset that only some share in Thedas.

[Bratinov]

This is why the harrowing exists. If a mage passes the harrowing he/she should be free imo.
Why would any mage willingly go to the Demons if not out of desperation? Sure there are power-hungry lunatics but those can be found in any group.

[The Sum of all Evil]

Stephenc13 wrote...

 The Templars are containers and ziplock bags
The Mages are fruits and foods.
[...]
3. If foods weren't in containers or ziplock bags, [...]

As a mage, I never wanted to even think of being inside Meredith, thank you very much!

[Darth Krytie]

I might be forgetting an instance or two, but those mages who transformed into abominations? Weren't out in High Town shopping for pears. In every case that I can recall, the mage's life was threatened before they turned.

Modifié par Darth Krytie, 09 avril 2011 - 10:21 .

[IanPolaris]

Darth Krytie wrote...

I might be forgetting an instant or two, but those mages who transformed into abominations? Weren't out in High Town shopping for pears. In every case that I can recall, the mage's life was threatened before they turned.

There are only two cases (in seven years) where a mage spontaneously and (apparently unwillingly) turns into an abomination.  In both cases the mage was either untrained or barely trained and in direct fear of their lives.  They were Thrask's daughter who was about to have her hands cut off (and then likely raped and killed) by slavers....and she literally had no place to run,and the other is an apprentice (tell by the robes) who was backed into a corner by a death squad of templars who were going to gut her then and there and refused to listen to her pleas.

-Polaris

[Plaintiff]

The templars are not to blame for creating an environment that would either cause mages to rebel or become distressed (and thus vulenrable)?

[AlexMBrennan]

I think you should distinguish between mages turning into abominations and mages turning to blood magic.

The former is just an occupational hazard for mages, and something Meredith should have seen coming - what did you expect would happen if you back mages into a corner and tell them that you are going to kill them, their families, their loved ones and their dog? Especially since the mages might not want to resist possession all that much if they know that they might be able to kill a few more templars if they don't.

The latter - blood magic - on the other hand requires the mages to have acquired the presumably restricted knowledge of blood magic and to have had some experience using it. Whether that is inherently evil is debatable (I don't consider using someone's blood to kill them any more evil than shock freezing them and blowing them up with a fireball) but is certainly stupid given that using blood magic is a capital offence.

[Augustei]

Stephenc13 wrote...

 I picked the Mages the first time I played through, and Templars the second time.
I feel that the Mages were overall the wrong side after both playthroughs.

When I picked the mages, I was thinking "They can't be killed off for no reason, most of them are probably innocent!"
and a few seconds into the killing and I see a mage turn into an abomination, I was thinking "uhhhh... maybe I picked the wrong side"
A little more into the playthrough, and I realized that the mages were definitely the wrong side.

The Templars were most likely formed because they witnessed many mages letting demons into their bodies.
So the Mages brought the Templars onto themselves, and they complain about how oppressive the Templars are when many of their fellow mages keep turning to blood magic and demons.
The mages rebelling against the Circle give the Templars more reason to tighten their grip on mages.

Reasons why Templars and the Circles are important.

The Demons are like ants,
The Circle is like a basket,
The Templars are containers and ziplock bags
The Mages are fruits and foods.

1. It's impossible to rid of all the ants because there are countless amounts of ants as there are demons in the Dragon Age world.
2. It's possible to rid of the basket but everything will be disorganized and harder to maintain, everything will be on the picnic blanket. Without the Circles, Templars could not do their job well if every mage was scattered thoughout the world.
3. If foods weren't in containers or ziplock bags, if they were in the basket or not, ants would still be seeking out the food and eventually finding a way into the basket to get to the food. If there were no Templars, but the Circles contained unsupervised mages, Demons still would find a way to invade the Mage bodies.
4. If there were no fruits and foods, there wouldn't be as much of an ant problem. If there were no mages, there wouldn't be much of a demon problem. Ants may still crawl around the picnic area, but there wouldn't be a specific thing to feed on.

Ants may still get into the containers, but the containers keep the ants from feeding on all the other foods.

The idiocy and crimes of the few should not mean one can condemn an entire people.. Otherwise your taking the first steps on the road to genocide. Besides, those mages were driven to breaking point fighting for their very lives after being unjustly condemned to death.

The mages that begun this whole problem was 1/7 fraternaties.. Which when you look at that globally is really very little. The situation in the Kirkwall circle was different anyway since 1) Meredith was insane 2) Orsino was stupid and 3) The Veil was thin as a result of the imperiums experiments.

If you were in prison and your jailers had decided to kill all the prisoners including you, and you got your hands on a gun Would you not use it? Just sayin'

Modifié par XxDeonxX, 09 avril 2011 - 11:04 .

[neubourn]

they mentioned this in the story...how good mages can and will turn to blood magic if they are backed into a corner, so in that regard...who WOULDNT do that if faced in the same situation? Thats the crux of the story...how far must a group of people be persecuted before they say enough is enough? Even Orsino was willing to throw in the towel...have the mages locked up, just to keep them from being killed, but even that was not enough for Meredith and the Templars.

People have been ragging on the story, but i believe it is well written...the fact that someone like the OP can come out deciding that the mages were flat out wrong, while somebody else can see the justification in their actions...that just goes to show how well the story was written imo. It presents us with a situation, and we use our own pre-conceived notions of morality to decide who is right, and who is wrong...and each side is able to justify their opinion. There is no right or wrong answer, and is also why it has torn apart Thedas.

[Rifneno]

Yay, more justification for genocide.

Most mage-related crimes we see can be at least partially blamed on the Chantry's heavy-handed measures.  Including Connor and Quentin.  Who knows, maybe even Anders could've been seperated from Justice thus preventing the whole Chantry gravity bomb.  As he says, Tevinters are the only ones who have even bothered to try to cure a possession rather than just scream "kill it with fire!"  Who's to say there was no way to fix him?  Back when the black plague was ravaging mankind they often killed live plague victims for fear of them spreading the disease.  But the plague is a bacteria, and today we can outright cure it.

Okay, I admit, that's just theorizing on my part, but what's not theorizing is that the reason Connor wasn't properly educated on his powers is because his mother didn't want to lose him to the Circle.  You can blame Lady Isolde for a lot of things, but you can't blame a mother for trying to give her son the only chance he has at a good life or for not wanting to give him up and never see him again.  You can't blame any parent for that, and if you can then you don't understand basic parental instincts.  So she got the best help she could and even in her position of power that meant a moron I wouldn't trust to feed my fish.  I often compare the demon luring him in with him climbing into a rusty van that has a "FREE CANDY!" sign on it.  Any properly taught child knows not to do that, but Connor wasn't properly taught because of the Chantry's heavy-handed methods.  Period.

Quentin knew Orsino.  Orsino was First Enchanter.  The Kirkwall Circle is very tightly controlled, to the point where even the First Enchanter fears he'll be accused of blood magic for merely leaving the compound at the same time as some other mages.  We don't know how you get to be First Enchanter, but it's a safe bet that this isn't something that happens in a year and a half.  It's almost certainly given to people that spent their lives in the Circle and excell at their craft with a clean record.  What's my point?  The conclusion I'm seeing is that it's very likely Quentin was a part of the Kirkwall Circle and escaped at some point.  It's pretty unlikely Orsino just happened to meet apostates while having drinks at the Hanged Man and they bonded over drinks and jokes about the smell of rotting sacrifices.  So if he was part of the Circle, chances are pretty good that he's one of the many that the templars took from various parts of the Free Marches and stuck in demon central to slowly go co-co for Cocoa Puffs.  Even if not, Orsino claims at one point that the reason he didn't turn Quentin in was because he thought (and rightfully so I might add) that Meredith would use Quentin as an excuse to further subjugate the innocent mages if not outright try to Annul the Circle.  Which leaves me with not one, but two trains fo thought that both end in "would mommy Hawke be alive if not for the templars?"

Mages definitely need to be policed.  But the templars do far more harm than good.  The templars need to come crashing down and if the Chantry won't accept that, the Chantry needs to come down too.

[Andre Ramses]

Stephenc13 wrote...

 I picked the Mages the first time I played through, and Templars the second time.
I feel that the Mages were overall the wrong side after both playthroughs.

When I picked the mages, I was thinking "They can't be killed off for no reason, most of them are probably innocent!"
and a few seconds into the killing and I see a mage turn into an abomination, I was thinking "uhhhh... maybe I picked the wrong side"
A little more into the playthrough, and I realized that the mages were definitely the wrong side.

The Templars were most likely formed because they witnessed many mages letting demons into their bodies.
So the Mages brought the Templars onto themselves, and they complain about how oppressive the Templars are when many of their fellow mages keep turning to blood magic and demons.
The mages rebelling against the Circle give the Templars more reason to tighten their grip on mages.

Reasons why Templars and the Circles are important.

The Demons are like ants,
The Circle is like a basket,
The Templars are containers and ziplock bags
The Mages are fruits and foods.

1. It's impossible to rid of all the ants because there are countless amounts of ants as there are demons in the Dragon Age world.
2. It's possible to rid of the basket but everything will be disorganized and harder to maintain, everything will be on the picnic blanket. Without the Circles, Templars could not do their job well if every mage was scattered thoughout the world.
3. If foods weren't in containers or ziplock bags, if they were in the basket or not, ants would still be seeking out the food and eventually finding a way into the basket to get to the food. If there were no Templars, but the Circles contained unsupervised mages, Demons still would find a way to invade the Mage bodies.
4. If there were no fruits and foods, there wouldn't be as much of an ant problem. If there were no mages, there wouldn't be much of a demon problem. Ants may still crawl around the picnic area, but there wouldn't be a specific thing to feed on.

Ants may still get into the containers, but the containers keep the ants from feeding on all the other foods.

I just played once, supporting the mages, but i agree the game kind of force a "bad image" for them. Almost every time i stood by them, somehow they do crazy ****, use blood magic and become abominations or demons. That part with Orsino was the tip of the iceberg! Come on, he more than anybody else, should now the consequences! He really tought he could save the other mages in that "state? And worse he even gives ME, who stood by him, the problem to kill that thing. The way you think, and the analogy you use, is very interesting and logical, it fits really well in the universe.

For me, and that what i believed during the game, and what justify the decisions i made, i dont necesserally think magic, or even blood magic is something bad or evil. Its like a gun, you cant say a gun is good or evil, but the way PEOPLE use them, can make the consequence good or evil. Also i think that to live the way they live must be a pain, being constantly controlled by templars, leaving your family when a kid, etc. What the templars did during Origins also didnt contribute to them.

I think it is kind of a problem of the game... as if they want to put the mages in a "bad" light. I dont know everybody, but i condemn Ander's attitude, i trusted him, and he commited murder to a character that was presented in a "good" way trough the game (and he "should" have know, as he was in my party).... he was a mage. Even Marryl, who tried everything to fix the mirror, but at the end, have to kill the Keeper and all the dalish. Also a mage.

The writers presented the mages like magic = evil, or at least magic = bad consequences.

Modifié par Andre Ramses, 09 avril 2011 - 12:36 .

[Rifneno]

Andre Ramses wrote...

he commited murder to a character that was presented in a "good" way trough the game

Please tell me you don't mean Elthina.  The guy cleaning the chamberpots or something, right?

[Andre Ramses]

Rifneno wrote...

Andre Ramses wrote...

he commited murder to a character that was presented in a "good" way trough the game

Please tell me you don't mean Elthina.  The guy cleaning the chamberpots or something, right?

Yes, i mean her At least for me she was a good person, trying to achieve peace trough conciliation, even tough she dont step clearly to what is wrong or bad... why do you think she was evil / bad / or something else?

But even if i dont mean her, i think what Anders did could still be condemned, since he problably killed a lot of innocents inside the Chantry... or anybody thinks that he evacuated everybody there before the explosion?? 

[Torax]

Leave Connor out of the debate. Connor was just a case of the Mother not wanting to have her son leave. Also to have the blood line she was preserving being branded a Mage. Meaning he could no longer be the heir to Eamon at least as the Arl is concerned. Connor also while poisoned by an apostate. Connor turned the Demon on his own. A Desire demon that gave him what he wanted. To not have his father die from the sickness he had. The Demon prolonged his life as what appeared to be agreed upon between her and the child.

But Connor's case has nothing to do with the Circle. It had to do with a Mother who wasn't afraid of the Circle. She was afraid of losing her son. Also what that would mean in regards to her husband being the Arl as well as her giving him a mage child and not a "normal" child. While I know the use of "normal" may ruffle many feathers as if I am a mage hater. I am not a hater of mages. Just pointing out that not all npc's will agree with me. Also speculation on your part if you think being outside of the circle is a better life. The Circles are as much to protect the people from the mages as well as product the mages from the people. The games just offer us the extremes since a nice and happy place would be highly boring.

Lastly the Templars and the Mages do more harm the good. The extremists on both sides fan the fire that erupts. Neither side is innocent. Leliana in DA2 even mentions an offshoot of the Fraternity of Enchanters was in Kirkwall working against the Chantry and the Templars. So it's not like one side was just sitting passive. There are innocents on both sides. Templars and Mages all meaning well while some extremists including JAnders pushing to war.

[Sabotin]

I'm glad that they tried to challenge the modern perceptions of people. Bad things can happen with good intentions. Nowadays freedom is regarded as one of the highest ideals, so they had to put an overwhelmingly bad image on the mages just so that there would be any people who would actually pick the templar side.

Also why everyone thinks the mages "should have been good"? Just because they're being opressed and fighting for freedom? It's a no win situation. I think they went the right way with such a situation, I just wish they'd explore it a bit more, like the consequences (I guess in DLC/DA3).
While a lot of people will view it as limiting and forced (and I can say for myself that to me it also didn't feel too natural, specially at the end) you can see it as somethnig refreshing also, instead of always having the good+ option that takes the best of both sides.

Modifié par Sabotin, 09 avril 2011 - 12:49 .

[LobselVith8]

Stephenc13 wrote...

I picked the Mages the first time I played through, and Templars the second time.
I feel that the Mages were overall the wrong side after both playthroughs.

The Circle mages are being condemned to genocide for an act that Anders committed, how are they on the wrong side?

Stephenc13 wrote...

When I picked the mages, I was thinking "They can't be killed off for no reason, most of them are probably innocent!"

Of course they're innocent - Anders committed the crime. And given how, when Hawke sides with the mages, Varric specifically mentions there were "many survivors," and the templar ending specifically doesn't mention this, I don't see how the mass execution of men, women, and children who had nothing to do with Anders attack on the Chantry can ever be justified.

Stephenc13 wrote...

and a few seconds into the killing and I see a mage turn into an abomination, I was thinking "uhhhh... maybe I picked the wrong side"
A little more into the playthrough, and I realized that the mages were definitely the wrong side.

So the actions of a few should condemn them all? Should the templars who rape, torture, illegally force Harrowed mages into tranquility, and murder condemn every member of the Order of Templars?

Stephenc13 wrote...

The Templars were most likely formed because they witnessed many mages letting demons into their bodies.
So the Mages brought the Templars onto themselves, and they complain about how oppressive the Templars are when many of their fellow mages keep turning to blood magic and demons.

Mages were placed into prisons because, centuries ago, they held a nonviolent protest against their lack of rights in Andrastian society, and Divine Ambrosia II wanted to declare an Exalted March on her own cathedral in response (History of the Circle codex).

Stephenc13 wrote...

The mages rebelling against the Circle give the Templars more reason to tighten their grip on mages.

Or it gives the mages a chance to live a life without being under Chantry and templar subjugation, since mages are people and deserve basic rights and freedoms, they are not ants.

[Rifneno]

Andre Ramses wrote...

Yes, i mean her At least for me she was a good person, trying to achieve peace trough conciliation, even tough she dont step clearly to what is wrong or bad... why do you think she was evil / bad / or something else?

But even if i dont mean her, i think what Anders did could still be condemned, since he problably killed a lot of innocents inside the Chantry... or anybody thinks that he evacuated everybody there before the explosion?? 

I'm not excusing Anders, I'm saying Elthina is a horrible excuse of a human being and the only crime against her isn't that she was blown up, it's that she wasn't mentally, physically, and sexually abused to the point of taking her own life just like so many mages under the abuses she let happen.  Almost everyone who did something wrong in the mage-templar conflict had some mitigating factor, whether it be trauma from a previous event, demons pouring crazy into their brains, or lyrium crazyblades.  Elthina was in complete control of her senses and she refused to do anything.  May she rot in hell.

Torax wrote...

Leave Connor out of the debate. Connor was just a case of the Mother not wanting to have her son leave. Also to have the blood line she was preserving being branded a Mage. Meaning he could no longer be the heir to Eamon at least as the Arl is concerned. Connor also while poisoned by an apostate. Connor turned the Demon on his own. A Desire demon that gave him what he wanted. To not have his father die from the sickness he had. The Demon prolonged his life as what appeared to be agreed upon between her and the child.

That makes less than no sense.  My entire point is that Connor wasn't properly taught how to deal with demons BECAUSE the Chantry made it impossible to do so without his parents losing him.  How exactly do you translate that into the Chantry not having an effect?!

[Torax]

Rifneno wrote...

Torax wrote...

Leave Connor out of the debate. Connor was just a case of the Mother not wanting to have her son leave. Also to have the blood line she was preserving being branded a Mage. Meaning he could no longer be the heir to Eamon at least as the Arl is concerned. Connor also while poisoned by an apostate. Connor turned the Demon on his own. A Desire demon that gave him what he wanted. To not have his father die from the sickness he had. The Demon prolonged his life as what appeared to be agreed upon between her and the child.

That makes less than no sense.  My entire point is that Connor wasn't properly taught how to deal with demons BECAUSE the Chantry made it impossible to do so without his parents losing him.  How exactly do you translate that into the Chantry not having an effect?!

My point is the Chantry was never in the decision and I think it actually had more to do with Eamon losing his heir than any fear of the chantry of it'self. Why it has no place in the topic.

[Rifneno]

Torax wrote...

Rifneno wrote...

Torax wrote...

Leave Connor out of the debate. Connor was just a case of the Mother not wanting to have her son leave. Also to have the blood line she was preserving being branded a Mage. Meaning he could no longer be the heir to Eamon at least as the Arl is concerned. Connor also while poisoned by an apostate. Connor turned the Demon on his own. A Desire demon that gave him what he wanted. To not have his father die from the sickness he had. The Demon prolonged his life as what appeared to be agreed upon between her and the child.

That makes less than no sense.  My entire point is that Connor wasn't properly taught how to deal with demons BECAUSE the Chantry made it impossible to do so without his parents losing him.  How exactly do you translate that into the Chantry not having an effect?!

My point is the Chantry was never in the decision and I think it actually had more to do with Eamon losing his heir than any fear of the chantry of it'self. Why it has no place in the topic.

The Chantry founded and runs the templars.  They even keep them addicted to drugs that they control the import of to keep them compliant.  Also, you have no basis for the theory that Isolde keeping Connor was because she wanted to keep the heir.  She's a mother and she cares about her son.  The fact that she doesn't hesitate to offer her very life to save his clearly indicates that.  What does a corpse care for politics?  She just wanted the best for her child, as any even remotely good parent would.

[TJPags]

Bratinov wrote...

This is why the harrowing exists. If a mage passes the harrowing he/she should be free imo.
Why would any mage willingly go to the Demons if not out of desperation? Sure there are power-hungry lunatics but those can be found in any group.

But this answers your own question - some will be power hungry idiots.  And they may well attract other power hungry idiots.  And how much more dangerous would they be without Templars?

[Dean_the_Young]

Bratinov wrote...

This is why the harrowing exists. If a mage passes the harrowing he/she should be free imo.
Why would any mage willingly go to the Demons if not out of desperation? Sure there are power-hungry lunatics but those can be found in any group.

Power-hungry lunatics in other groups don't become WMD's. The scale of difference is between that of a rifle and a nuke.

Why would any mage willingly go to Demons or Spirits other than personal desperation? Well, we can ask Merrill, Anders, Connor, the Black Marsh ****, or even Uldred. They never approached or made deals with fade beings because they were being threatened at the moment.

Love, greed, self-sacrifice, ambition, indignation. Plenty of things that have nothing to do with the Templar's system.

The Harrowing isn't even proof that mages are immune to Demons on their own under all conditions, only a test that they're trusted enough to live in the Tower.

Modifié par Dean_the_Young, 09 avril 2011 - 02:26 .

[Dean_the_Young]

Rifneno wrote...


The Chantry founded and runs the templars.  They even keep them addicted to drugs that they control the import of to keep them compliant.  Also, you have no basis for the theory that Isolde keeping Connor was because she wanted to keep the heir.  She's a mother and she cares about her son.  The fact that she doesn't hesitate to offer her very life to save his clearly indicates that.  What does a corpse care for politics?  She just wanted the best for her child, as any even remotely good parent would.

Isolde crying that her son wouldn't be enable to inherit doesn't count?

Isolde wants to have her cake and eat it. She wants whats best for her son, but also what she wants, which is why she did what she did in the first place. Being willing to offer herself later has nothing to do with mixed motivations prior.

[Rifneno]

Dean_the_Young wrote...

Bratinov wrote...

This is why the harrowing exists. If a mage passes the harrowing he/she should be free imo.
Why would any mage willingly go to the Demons if not out of desperation? Sure there are power-hungry lunatics but those can be found in any group.

Power-hungry lunatics in other groups don't become WMD's. The scale of difference is between that of a rifle and a nuke.

No.  NO.  So sick of seeing these over-the-top exaggerations involving modern-day WMD!  What exactly qualifies as a "weapon of mass destruction" is in dispute but I've yet to see one that doesn't make a pride abomination look like a toddler with a plastic butterknife.  Almost any WMD can decimate a metropolis.  The nuclear attack on Hiroshima instantly killed 67,000 people, compared to Meredith's abomination sob story of 70 people dying.  Now consider that the Hiroshima bomb was built quickly as soon as the technology was available and is barely a sparkler by the standards of modern nukes.  In 1961 the Russians tested a 50 megaton bomb, compared to Hiroshima's 15 kiloton.  That's 3,333 times more powerful.  But wait, maybe that's just nuclear?  No, it's not.  How about biological weapons, what are they capable of?  Familiar with the bubonic plague?  It killed an estimated 75,000,000 people in the 14th century.  And that was a natural disease, not one made in a lab where people purposefully modified it to be more virulent and deadly.

So yeah...  how about we stop comparing a canoe to the Titanic?  Mages don't hold even a fraction of the destructive power of a WMD.

/sigh.  I don't mean to lash out at you specifically, just needed to be said because too many people are using a completely false analogy.

Why would any mage willingly go to Demons or Spirits other than personal desperation? Well, we can ask Merrill, Anders, Connor, the Black Marsh ****, or even Uldred. They never approached or made deals with fade beings because they were being threatened at the moment.

Merrill:  As naive as she is, she understands there's danger and that they can't be trusted.  She'll only go on her Act III quest if Hawke is willing to go along and slay her should she become an abomination.  I don't believe she's as big a danger as many think she is.
Anders:  There was no reason to think it would turn out as it did.  What happened with Anders and Justice is without precedent.  It has still yet to be explained really.
Connor:  Didn't know any better, because the Chantry's heavy-handed methods cost him an education he desperately needed.
The Baroness:  She was actually a reference to a real person by the name of Elizabeth Bathory.  As close to an example of pure evil as I've ever seen in this world.  Don't check into her crimes if you're bothered by horror, trust me.  She inspired quite a few video game foes, which is why many people mistakenly believe she's a reference to another game.
Uldred:  Yeah, I'll agree with you there.  We don't know exactly how the situation with Uldred went down, but you're probably right in that he was completely at fault and not in any immediate danger.

The Harrowing isn't even proof that mages are immune to Demons on their own under all conditions, only a test that they're trusted enough to live in the Tower.

What it proves to me is that mages aren't tempted by demons nearly as often as people think.  People act like mages have to talk to 3 demons before they can get to their morning coffee, but if it's so common they why is it a big deal for them to "prove they can resist a demon" at... what did the youngest PC look like, about 20ish?  It seems to suggest it's pretty unlikely to encounter a demon naturally in at least that long.

[Iosev]

Ultimately, if you treat magi like dangerous criminals from the moment they're born, don't be surprised when many grow up and become the very thing you fear. Yes, the fear is understandable, but it is also creating an environment that fosters mental instability in magi.

Honestly, I don't think that there is an easy answer for this situation. Magi are living weapons; they have the potential for tremendous destruction, but at the same time, they're also living beings, with emotions, that can be nurtured or traumatized. Both of these aspects need to be considered; just as you can't think of magi as normal people, you also can't think of magi only as weapons.

Modifié par arcelonious, 09 avril 2011 - 03:50 .