144 réponses à ce sujet

[Akka le Vil]

KalosCast wrote...

Nobody outside of comic book villains and snarky high-schoolers honestly believe they are doing evil for the sake of evil

So, so true.

And it's too bad to see just how often this categorization of "evil" is the one in RPG.
Morrigan is "evil", she doesn't care about others and doesn't mind to use them if it benefits her.
It's not because she isn't going out of her way to gratuitously harm others that she isn't evil.

Not being "caricaturaly evil" doesn't mean you aren't evil.

Modifié par Akka le Vil, 26 novembre 2009 - 10:30 .

[Varenus Luckmann]

"Evil" is subjective.
But yes. Yes she is.

[Wildfire Darkstar]

red8x wrote...

Connor and his desire demon are responsible for Redcliffe.  Is the kid evil?  Potentially.  Because of his age I would just say he is just really stupid.

I'm not tackling the Morrigan question simply because I don't think we're ever privy to enough of her motivations to know for sure. But I don't think you can call Connor evil without taking such an extremely self-righteous view of morality that just about no one in Ferelden comes off clean

Connor's completely sheltered. He's a natural mage who's mother did everything she could to prevent him from getting the kind of education he would need to be prepared for the sort of problems that only a mage would face. Had he been handed over to the Circle of Magi (leaving aside the moral questions of that particular tradition), he would have no doubt received the standard warnings that all mages receive regarding dealing with demons. As it stands, the only magical training he received at all came from Jowan, who is a) a Blood Mage, and a bit of a flake. Desire demons traffic in deception, and Connor, through little fault of his own, was unusually easy to deceive.

If anything (and obviously other than the demon itself), the arlessa's actions are the closest there are to actual evil in that situation. Her selfish desire to keep Connor's magical talents hidden set up the problem in the first place, after all. Both Connor and Jowan were deceived to some extent into playing their roles, but the arlessa was always acting as her own agent.

Greigor requests the Rite of Annulment which is like calling  a tactical strike on a terrorist cell.  Evil in the sense that innocents would be caught up in it.

Not just Gregoire (who is arguably more enlightened in his views than many of his fellows), but Templars in general are evil insofar as they are inclined to view mages as an undifferentiated mass of potential apostates. Whether or not they'd come right out and say it, I suspect the standard Templar response to the potential death of innocent mages would be for them to dispute the idea that there are "innocent mages" in the first place.

Beyond the sort of inherent anti-mage-ism of the Templars, though, Gregoire's in an unenviable position. He obviously can't let the situation in the tower spread beyond the tower, and he doesn't have either the manpower or the imagination for anything other than a "scorched earth" approach. The fact that he's more than willing to let the Warden and company go in and attempt to resolve the situation proves that he's not malicious. If he's evil, I'd argue that its the sort of evil that comes with the job of being a military leader: having the deal with the uncomfortable concept of "acceptable losses."

[Wildfire Darkstar]

Sidney wrote...

Morrigan isn't evil....she's a borderline sociopath though.

Oh, I don't think there's anything "borderline" about it. Morrigan was raised in an isolated forest hut by a woman whose name is generally invoked only to frighten children. There's no way in hell Morrigan ever had a chance to be properly socialized.

In light of that, I don't know if I'd call her evil. But she's certainly no paragon of virtue.

[DocDoomII]

Good and Evil... such stupid concept.

It's more like 'morally acceptable' and 'morally unacceptable'. And morality changes with time, place and culture.



That's all a farfetched system created to live politely into society, and to protect ourself shielding our nature behind masks.



The truth is that life is just a huge number of choises, one after another, and is defined by what we choose when a choise is offered/imposed.

[Original182]

Axterix wrote...
Actually, both those things can be directly attributed to the repressive Circle system.

Conner's mother felt she had to get a private tutor to train him enough to hide his mage talents because she didn't want to lose her son.  That trainer turned out to be Jowan, who was not a full fledged mage, probably not the best qualified to teach, but was available, because the Circle system wouldn't let him have his love, causing him to feel the need to flee.

The whole mess inside the circle, meanwhile, happened on the scale it did because a large chunk of mages wanted out of the system.  And to do that, they believed they needed violent means, needed power, and so turned to blood magic.

The danger of becoming abominations is too great for the Circle not to take such drastic measures. My examples of Connor and the Circle are just to show how dangerous things can get if demons can successfully take over mages.
From the game's lore, we learn that mages are like beacons that attract demons. Seeing how horrifying things can become, that is why they must be carefully supervised and housed in a "cage" to prevent them from becoming abominations and causing havoc in the world. If they become abominations due to failing the Harrowing or making pacts with demons, then they can be "neutralized" quickly.
Even if it's repressive, imagine the alternatives like Connor.

But is the circle the best way?  Is having mages hate themselves because they can do magic good?  Is taking 5 year old kids away from their parents good?  Is stripping someone of all emotions and magic because they might go bad good?

It's not the Chantry's fault that mages can potentially become abominations once demons overpower them . It's the nature of magic. The mages have to learn not to hate themselves on their own.
Taking 5 year olds away from their parents isn't good, but it is the safest way to ensure the child lives and not become abominations. Even grown adults fall to demons, imagine an innocent and trusting child.
I believe being a Tranquil is a personal choice. An apprentice can either attempt the Harrowing or be made a Tranquil. If it is forced on someone, the alternative is usually an abomination or death, so there's just no choice. Again, this is the way magic works. The Chantry isn't to blame for the lack of options.

The Circle isn't perfect, but it's the best we've got.

Without the main character, she wouldn't be in the tower.  And keep in mind that the templars are waiting to kill everyone inside the tower as well.  She wants to scour the tower to free future mages.  Templars want to do it to be sure they end the threat to the land.  Both are good from a certain point of view.  Both are also bad.

The whole circle thing is not set in stone, morally.

Yes there is the right way, saving the innocent mages and killing Uldred.
I don't remember Morrigan wanting to save the mages. In fact, she actually wants to let the Templars kill them all, but only because she thinks they're pathetic, and not to protect Ferelden from them.
It was Wynne who wants to save possible survivors.

I don't think she feels a need to state what is obvious.  Master + student pairings seem to work pretty well for the Dalish and Flemesh.  And there are people who can seak out and deal with mages who overstep their bounds, just like your party did when the Templars failed in their duty. 

Although, mostly, she's a barbarian.  She'd rather pull down the trapping of civilization and let nature takes its course and figure it out.  Imposing structure isn't her job.  But woe be to any who try to curtail her freedom.

The Dalish may be ok, but Flemeth is the prime example of how it doesn't work! It is because of Flemeth that Morrigan is like this. So even the Master-student pairing is not perfect if the Master is the evil one.

We may have side-tracked. If Morrigan is not evil and is either good or neutral, she would do what the main character does, try to compromise, lead by example and show that not all apostates are evil, etc. But due to her upbringing, she cannot do that. There is no justification for evil decisions.

Modifié par Original182, 26 novembre 2009 - 11:22 .

[Wildfire Darkstar]

Original182 wrote...

Yes Morrigan is evil even without realizing it, due to her upbringing. She either cannot tell the difference between right and wrong (willing to let the mages in the Mages Circle be sacrificed just because she disapproves of them being submissive to the Chantry), or she doesn't care.

The only reason why she doesn't wantonly kill people is because she may not survive the outcome.

I don't know if arguing from a position of moral absolutes gets us anywhere, honestly. Leaving aside the fact that Morrigan clearly has a bit of a personal bias regarding the Circle of Magi and the Chantry, I suspect she has a very clear idea of the difference between right and wrong. You just may not happen to agree with it, is all

But making the case that she has a very different, and almost certainly more brutal and unforgiving, moral code than most of the other NPCs and probably (hopefully?) most players, is miles apart from arguing that she'd "wantonly kill people" if she was capable of getting away with it. Morrigan doesn't seem particularly afraid of the Templars or their ilk, and she never comes across as particularly bloodthirsty. She clearly has a moral code, of sorts, based on her reactions to various scenes throughout the game. Those morals are certainly strongly influenced by a "survival of the fittest" view of the world, but it's too simplistic to say that she only cares for that which serves her own interests. I think. She reacts very negatively to anyone in the game who tries to leverage guilt or the idea of social responsibility to limit the freedom of anyone else, from the Chantry and the Templars down to the peasants fighting with the unscrupulous merchant in Lothering.

That's not to say that I agree with her moral code (I don't), or that her morals cannot be reasonably considered evil. But she's not truly psychotic, and she does have a clear sense of morality, even if it's an alien one that is a poor fit for the world outside of the Wilds.

[Original182]

Then the best hope for Morrigan would be that she is not evil, but is neutral or chaotic neutral.



It may be possible, because if she was left alone, it would be possible that she would not seek to do evil things to people.

She visited Lothering before joining the main character, just to see what they're all about, but not to enslave them or anything.



Maybe people miss a step by thinking if Morrigan is not evil, she is good, which is clearly not the case. So if she's not good, then she must be evil and nothing else.



But it seems Morrigan being Chaotic Neutral would be the best compromise.

[Akka le Vil]

Original182 wrote...

It may be possible, because if she was left alone, it would be possible that she would not seek to do evil things to people.

She visited Lothering before joining the main character, just to
see what they're all about, but not to enslave them or anything.

As said before, "evil" is not "stupidly and gratuitously evil". It's not because someone doesn't go out of his way to harm others that he isn't evil.
Someone realistically evil (not "comic books evil") can be pleasant and polite and doesn't need to eat children just because he's evil.
But if he starts to harm people because he benefits from it and the harm is disproportionate, then he's clearly evil.

[Wildfire Darkstar]

Original182 wrote...

The danger of becoming abominations is too great for the Circle not to take such drastic measures. My examples of Connor and the Circle are just to show how dangerous things can get if demons can successfully take over mages.

Hmm. Personally, I think that "the ends justifies the means" is one of the most overtly evil rationales for any course of action that it's possible to adopt. And, it's worth pointing out that the ends did not, in fact, justify the means in the case of the Circle, since the Chantry and the Templars weren't actually capable of controlling the situation in any case.

From the game's lore, we learn that mages are like beacons that attract demons. Seeing how horrifying things can become, that is why they must be carefully supervised and housed in a "cage" to prevent them from becoming abominations and causing havoc in the world. If they become abominations due to failing the Harrowing or making pacts with demons, then they can be "neutralized" quickly.
Even if it's repressive, imagine the alternatives like Connor.

Quite clearly, a mage needs training and teaching to avoid the variety of dangers that a non-mage would never even have to think about. And there's undoubtedly a value in having a group like the Templars trained in dealing with rogue magi, abominations, and other dangers associated with magic. But it's quite a leap from there to a system where magic-capable children are essentially arrested, taught to despise themselves, and forced to live in what is ultimately a prison. It's not very different from the way in which elves are treated, honestly.

And the system isn't even effective in fulfilling its stated purposes: many of the blood mages and abominations we see in the game were pushed down their paths out of resentment towards the status quo. Enough that one can't help but wonder if the heavy-handed approach isn't creating as many or more problems than it's solving.

[MartinJHolm]

I hate D&D 4'th edition but they made a good change to alignment.

If people don't know there is now only 4 alignments

This is how it used to be

Lawful good - good - chaotic good
Lawful neutral - true neutral - chaotic neutral
Lawful evil - evil - chaotic evil

now it's

Lawful good - good - good
unaligned - unaligned- unaligned
evil - evil - chaotic evil

It's way more logical than the old one that was really too detailed because some of the definitions were far-fetched.

Btw. I think Morrigan is unaligned.

[Rugaru]

To the "evil" stuff, good and evil are not real they are concepts imposed by society, things viewed from one society can be evil while from another society be upstanding and good.



As far as Morrigan being "evil" in any regards no she isn't any more evil than a wolf is. She was raised by someone of questionable morals and raised in a very survivalist way.



Too the chantry and mages thing- I think the only reason it is such a danger for mages to become abominations for one is that the chantry is meddling in things they don't have a clue about. All mage training is supervised by people that are clueless about the subject. I think the danger of abomintations are a danger created by the chantry themselves, if mages were left more to their own devices I think they would be able to "solve" the demon problem a bit more effectively. As is they have their hands tied and are stuck with just passing information from one generation to the next.

[Bluemax151]

MassEffect762 wrote...

Bah, take away her looks and most of you wouldn't even bother with this girl.

You know I know it, if you met her equivalent in real life most of you would steer clear.

Actually her model looks really deformed in the revealing robes.  Her face isn't too bad but I'd still love to drag her to the washroom and give it a good scrub.

It's the fabulous voice acting and inter party bante where she really shines. If I met a real life Morrigan (and I have to a degree) I would find her company rather entertaining/welcome but her cristicsm of friends and family would be unbearable. I'm a masochist to a degree so my opinion is probably a bit schewed.

I don't really see how she's evil. She is certainly RESENTFUL and she lacks the ability (and even states she's given up on trying) to understand the outside world. She shows disgust at Flemeth's use of men in dialogue, she shows empathy at Sten's and Jowain's plight. Certainly she's vocal about how such and such of an activity is an inconvenience for her. Rightly so, she never wanted to go into the civilized world and Flemeth forced it upon her through your quest to combat the blight. She has wrapped this hard/cruel/cold/manipultive b*tch around her to protect herself from the world at large. Remember Flemeth has "taught" her about the "real" outside world and all it's faults and cruelties. Even broke her heart when she broke that mirror.

Of course maybe it's all just some huge manipulation and Claudia Black just makes it all sound so sincere. Why would she bother though? Obviously from the use of the dark ritual you know Morrigan practices blood magic. She could just control you to get what she wants anyway.

I'm glad someone mentioned the Kate Mulgrew  interview already...

[Akka le Vil]

Couldar wrote...

As far as Morrigan being "evil" in any regards no she isn't any more evil than a wolf is. She was raised by someone of questionable morals and raised in a very survivalist way.

Of course she is. She's an intelligent being able to use her brain to understand consequences and hence make different decisions, unlike a wolf.
She's just completely irresponsible and without empathy.

[Mobisto]

For someone raised by a humanized demon, I think she turned out quite fine!

[Rugaru]

Akka le Vil wrote...

Couldar wrote...

As far as Morrigan being "evil" in any regards no she isn't any more evil than a wolf is. She was raised by someone of questionable morals and raised in a very survivalist way.

Of course she is. She's an intelligent being able to use her brain to understand consequences and hence make different decisions, unlike a wolf.
She's just completely irresponsible and without empathy.

If you are told everyday that red is black, red is black, red is black. If you go out and tell someone else that a red apple is black are you wrong? No. It is what is true to you. To Morrigan everything she has learned has led her to her decisions she isn't "wrong" nor is she "evil". To her it is right and true. For her it is as much as a wolf getting food, the wolf has to kill something to eat, a wolf will protect itself and those it cares about. It thinks and reasons enough at least to not just kill and eat everything. Morrigan does not go out of her way to be malicious or hateful, yes she has her own ideas and agenda which may not mesh with yours, but a difference of opinion or point of veiw is not evil/

[tp_81]

Rhys Cordelle wrote...

Whether or not she's evil depends on what her intentions are for the god child

I assumed right away that Morrigan had learned from Flemeths grimore how to transfer her soul and wanted a powerful, potentionally immortal daughter for herself to take over at later time.

Yeah I agreed of course... Obviously the old warden would get killed before reaching the demon, I had went to such trouble to set Alistair up with the queen and certainly didnt want to die myself :innocent:

She may be evil but she is not crazy-maniac-evil and thats good enough for me.

[Count Viceroy]

tp_81 wrote...


I assumed right away that Morrigan had learned from Flemeths grimore how to transfer her soul and wanted a powerful, potentionally immortal daughter for herself to take over at later time.

She tells the truth when she says she knew about it all along. It happens even if you don't give her the tomes.

Modifié par Count Viceroy, 26 novembre 2009 - 02:41 .

[Rugaru]

I thought all she said was that it was Flemeth's plan all along, not that she knew about the ritual all along. However I haven't done one where I didn't give her the grimoire.

[Count Viceroy]

Yes, well that's what I meant. It was flemeths plan all along, but by extension Morrigan must have known about it. As the tomes have no impact on wether the ritual is offered or not. 

Modifié par Count Viceroy, 26 novembre 2009 - 02:48 .

[Allattar1]

She isnt necessarily eveil, but she has a purpose, a mission to fulfill.

If you start romancing her it makes sence, especially with the this is not right speech. She has never been allowed to be close. She fights the human nature of wanting, and love and if played right you can make her feel downright miserable by showing that love isnt a weaknesses.



I played nice, mostly, and gave her what she wanted in the end. Then the last revealed a sorrowful side about what could have been in another time. However she does have one duty, to the god child she will bear. Whether this God child will be a force of malovence or benevolence will have to be seen.



There was a purpose their for Morrigan, and she respects strength and harshness becuase that is what she was always shown.

You can bring her round though. Had great fun doing that.

[Drake Sigar]

Depends on your definition of evil. She grew up with the harsh teachings of Flemeth, has been hunted by a religious group since childhood, and became more bitter and pessimistic each year. Despite that, her inner child is still buried in there somewhere, and it's possible to show her concepts like love are not confined to fictional fairytales. I'd say she's not evil so much a damaged human being.

[Count Viceroy]

She's not evil in my opinion. She's a selfish **** however. For obvious reasons due to her upbringing.

[RunCDFirst]

Count Viceroy wrote...

She's not evil in my opinion. She's a selfish **** however. For obvious reasons due to her upbringing.

She screws the PC over in the end. Ergo, she's evil. Anyone that isn't working for you is against you.

[Count Viceroy]

RunCDFirst wrote...

Count Viceroy wrote...

She's not evil in my opinion. She's a selfish **** however. For obvious reasons due to her upbringing.

She screws the PC over in the end. Ergo, she's evil. Anyone that isn't working for you is against you.

That doesn't make her evil. That makes her selfish.