[quote]KnightofPhoenix wrote...
You can't, because we know that no one knows what Hawke's position is in regards to the entire issue in Act 3. He has to declare it then. So what did he do? He couldn't have even failed, because it would still have exposed his position.
So was he trying to play secret agent all this time and doing obscure things that are of no consequence that if he fails, no one notices? [/quote]
Well, no. I agree with you: it's unreasonable to think Hawke was taking action. But I think that it's unreasonable to think the Warden initiated or developed the plan to defeat the Archdemon. That was all Flemeth & Alistair, and later Eamon and Riordan.
The best analogy I can give for the Warden is this: the Warden was a choice algorithm. The options were laid out bare, and the Warden picked A or B (and sometimes C) . But with almost no exception (the werewolves are one) the Warden didn't actually come up with these options. They were presented.
[quote]And how was Hawke convinced that sitting on his ass for 3 years is a good idea?
At least DA:O tried to show us why we are fighting the blight, albeit poorly. [/quote]
Laziness? Greed? Disinterest?
In DA:O, you were kidnapped into the Wardens (potentially). You could quite literally have been dragged kicking and screaming every step of the way (go with Duncan or die, partake in the Joining or Duncan murders you). When you get to Flemeth's hut, as a reluctant figure, you don't have an option to say no.
You can meekly protest and then you're told to go on your way.
It's the same as in DA2. It's just that you're forced to care about different things.
[quote]No, he suggests, the character agrees. [/quote]
No, Flemeth orders it. She outright says, it can't be anyone but you.
And my character didn't agree. And if you say my character had to agree.. well, my Hawke had to agree not to do anything for the game to go on too.
It's the same design.
[quote]Chancellor and Prince(ss) consort are also things you suggest on yor own. Suggesting to Irving that he goes to Orzammar is also something you come up with. Same with the boons regarding the Circle, Orzammar, of elves. you are the one who comes up with it. [/quote]
Yes, you're right. I fired up DA:O. But these are no different than the minor betrayals Hawke can pull off. The scope of DA:O is different, but the execution is the same.
[quote]Heck even sparing Loghain. Some people beg you for it. But no one really tells you. He doens't even expect it. You just do it. And before saying Riordan, you can accept his surrender before he speaks. It's his idea to make him a Warden. [/quote]
Anora comes up with it first.
[quote]His mining business is proving to be a disaster since Act 2, with the Orlesian selling his part because of that. Gamlen is not as important as something that threatened to destroy the entire city. And the Tal Vasoth are no where near the same scale of threat.
So essentially Hawke is out there dealing with small fish while the entire city is collapsing under his feet and he's not noticing, until Orsino disturbs his meal with the speech 3 years later. [/quote]
Yes. In the same way that I could be a mage who was forced by Irving into betraying a fellow mage, kidnapped by Duncan, threatend with immediate execution if I didn't drink concentrated magical poison, and then told in clear terms by an ancient abomination and a whinny templar to go and save Ferelden. I could never have wanted to be a Warden (in fact, the Origins give you an excellent reason to never want to be a Warden) but the game tells you to stuff it.
It's the same thing in DA2. The game forces these choices on you, and it's up to you to invent a reason.
[quote]Then saving mages.
And since Gregoir is uncertain at the end (and doesn't trust Cullen), you can be the one to tell him to emprison them all.
But it's reactive and not proactive. Did DA:O had a lot of pro-active choices? Of course not. But they were there, I listed several above. [/quote]
If you say those choices are reactive, then most of the choices of the Warden are reactive. The mages & templars one is absolutely reactive - you go to get mage allies in your treaty, and then you react to the situation.
[quote]It's not that different, I know. Which again, that's why I am syaing "in game". I agreed with you from the very beginning that the overall design is mostly the same. [/quote]
But it's not different ''in the game'' because ''in the game'' the ideas are not yours. They're every other characters but the Warden's. It's actually worse if you look at it that way, because looking at it at level of design you can hand-wave some of the pasivity as being a result of the lack of VO and the cinematic design.
[quote]The examples I provided are different. First, to the amount of ways you can play the thing prior and during the Landsmeet.
Also, for some level of pro-activity. No one tells you to lie to Anora, and then backstab her. No one tells you to backstab Eamon. No one tells you to persuade Anora to be Prince Consort. No one tells you to make Anora and Alitair marry (you suggest it). No one tells you to marry Alistair. And no one tells you to impose yourself as chancellor. [/quote]
These are all minor quests. I agree with you here. But none of these are the main quest of the game, which is what you're objecting to. Act III's plot isn't the unique human noble or female character epilogue.
These aren't comparable, because they're nothing more than Hawke's pro-active role in shaping the companions. No one tells Hawke to support Merril (or to dissuade her), to encourage or argue with Anders and Fenris in their quests...
Hawke is perfectly pro-active and a busy-body in the lives of the companions.
But both you and I can agree that Hawke is passive because the main conflict of Act III has Hawke sitting on his hands. Well, that's just how DA:O handles it with the Warden. Absolutely nothing that you do, defeating the archdemon wise, is your own idea beside the Werewolves.
[quote]Alistair solo (Eamon chancellor). Anora solo. Anora + Alistar. Chancellor with either.
Then there is the question of the Ternir of Gwaren at the very end, which you could potentiall get. And no one suggests that to you, you can just ask it. [/quote]
That's getting into the level of picking LI's and looking at friendship rivalry scores and saying the endgame of Act III has lots of different choices because your companions can betray you.
[quote]And this is not change to the status quo at all. Not only because the outcome is the same in some instances.
This is not at all like the "big" choices the Warden can make to set or help set other changes in motion.
And if you want to consider these as a sign of Hawke being so active, DA:O has much much more choices than that, big and small. [/quote]
I don't consider them cases of Hawke being active at all. I'm saying you have to consider them as examples of being active if you think DA:O had an active protagonist. And then you're forced into saying that the Warden was more active than Hawke, but you can't say that Hawke was passive anymore.
[quote]But you can excersize some command in Denerim. Not enough to convey the feeling that you are a real commander and yea, Awakening did it much better (which incidently, on its own, I like it much more than DA2).
For instance, you get to decide who commands the rear guard. [/quote]
But you can't point out how incredibly stupid that plan is, and how much better it would be to take your entire party (Riordan included) with you to fight the archdemon. You can't point out that using fireballs would be a better plan than death by launching Riordan from the tower to defeat the archdemon.
Hell, you can't point out how stupid it is to actually go try and save Denerim.
[quote]It may not have a big impact, except if you decide to have the other Warden there (not sure why anyone would do this without metagaming). You get to decide which army types get to assist you and while they do not hugely alter the battlefield, they are still different. From potentially ranged units, to just melee, to defensive units, to potentially feral werewolves, to potentially AoE mages to counter mage specialists. You get to decide which type is appropriate for the situation. They alter your playstyle a bit. [/quote]
That's just nitpicking. You don't set up the plan. You don't decide where to attack Denerim from. You can't come up with the anti-archdemon strategy. You don't actually asign the troops to do any other task than play bodyguard.
[quote]
The character is assumed to care. And there are reasons.
A Dwarf for instance would have to be pretty blind to think that the blight, once it takes over Ferelden, is going to leave Orzammar alone. [/quote]
But a dwarf doesn't have to care. You get kidnapped. In fact, you can tell Duncan to go to hell until he conscripts you and then threatens to murder you if you don't offcially join the Wardens.
[quote]So there is a difference between you and the character. [/quote]
Not at all. Like I said: this is like me countering with Hawke not having to care about the mage\\templar conflcit - it's just a cop-out.
[quote]And before saying what's the difference between Hawke and the Warden. Even if we assume that the design is the same when it comes to activity or passivity. At the end of the day, we still have a Warden who is more active (not always on a superficial level), and can be proactive in some instances. While Hawke is mostly superficially active, and I do not remember a single instance of him being pro-active, at least on a large scale which he is supposdely capable of doing. [/quote]
The Warden was never pro-active on a scale that you say Hawke should have been.
And in the instances that the Warden was pro-active, you can point out equivalent instances for Hawke (i.e. friendship/rivalry with each companion).
That's how Bioware designs their game. It was the same way in KoTOR. The only pro-active hero Bioware's ever designed is Shepard, and they decided to give that up in ME2 by making Shepard a lackey of the Illusive Man.
[quote]No, there are several. If you're a female, being mistress to Alistair as well. You can also become Teyrn of Gwaren, which is no small thing, regardless of origin. And you can be chancellor to Anora as well, but it doesn't provide the same amount of power as Alistair. You become paragon if Dwarf. You can be enchanter for mages iirc. The City Elf can also become something else. [/quote]
There is nothing I have more unspeakable loathing for than the appeal to an epilogue as justification of "choice". It's not choice if it comes after the end of the game and all you get for it is a dialogue choice and an epilogue screen. It's the epitome of cop-out design.
If, after Act III, you had an extra DLC scene where Hawke can pick one of 16 different paths (help mages, betray mages to templars, flee to Ferelden, betray templars, become Viscount, try to rally the marches against the chantry, etc.) and then an epilogue screen, would you suddenly say that Hawke became an active protagonist?
I don't mean to sound aggressive, but I just dislike designs that are essentially smoke-and-mirrors.
[quote]So no, there are several options available. And you don't always just decide at the last minute (you can confirm it at the last minute), except the boon.
Does DA:O restrict you? Yes, but not as much as DA2. [/quote]
It restricts you just as much as DA2, with the major exception being the opportunity to pick a few endgame outcomes a little differently. Like I said; do you think Bioware could fix the lack of choice in DA2 by creating a DLC where Hawke picks a particular future and then Varric narrates it?
[quote]I know it doesn't do it that differently, except that it gives more options. What are we arguing about again? [/quote]
That Bioware can't design active protagonists; that you can't really dislike Hawke for being passive without doing the same for the Warden.
[quote]Not something I disagree with. Indeed, that's what I usually say when people claim that DA2 was so different and "innovative". It wasn't, and imo DA:O did it better.
But I personally want something beyond DA:O, and DA2 was a step backwards for me. [/quote]
We're on the same page here.
[quote]When I say I want a pro-active protagonist, I most certainly do not point at DA:O and say "This is what I want". Of course DA:O did not have PC that was that pro-active and this is a criticism I've always brought up against it (as well as the post Landsmeet part). I do think however that, while they are not that different, DA:O did it better than DA2 in that regard. At least DA:O gave me the illusion of some pro-activity better.
But ideally, I do want Bioware to get out of this shell. And all RPGs. Even TW2 is still mostly stuck in the same paradigm in that regards (it just make choices actually matter which is not generally done before). [/quote]
I suppose where I disagree with you is that DA:O gave a better illusion. For all of its faults, and there are lots, I actually think DA2 did a much better job of creating an illusion of a pro-active PC.
But, then again, I've never designed the vigiliant hero that you're thinking of, and no game accomodated a disinterested but talented and generally moral hero better than Dragon Age 2, even though it did a lot of things badly.
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