86 réponses à ce sujet

[Ieldra]

But will it destroy the soul of the baby? Or will it merge itself (kind of the way Justice does with Anders) so you can't tell where one begins and the other ends. I agree that Archdemons destroy the soul of the Warden when they try to possess them but Morrigan keeps on insisting Old God not Archdemon.

Morrigan says this will be a child with the soul of an Old God, not an Old God, and that it will be free of the darkspawn corruption. Also, I think the idea is that a just-conceived child hasn't got much of a soul, since that's shaped by memory and experience. Otherwise, it and the Old God's soul would destroy each other just as with the Warden.

 

Apart from that, I'll have to look the actual dialogue up in the game, but there may be a lore inconsistency somewhere in this. Specifically, I don't recall if the child is said to carry the Taint. The wiki says yes, but this would be rather odd since the transfer is said to free the archdemon of the darkspawn corruption, and that's basically identical to the Taint.

[Xilizhra]

I think the whole Warden deal sucks either way. Baby gets soul destroyed. Or Warden gets soul destroyed.

 

All sounds very unpleasant. Old Gods are a pain in the ass to get rid of it seems.

I'm fairly sure the fact that the souls don't cancel each other out is an indication that the fetus is as soulless as darkspawn.

[Wolfen09]

the soul does not retain memories, otherwise people would remember past lives....  basically, to me at least, the old god baby will just get whatever fancy schmancy powers an archdemon has and will be normal for the most part...  pending morrigan's parenting of course

[Ieldra]

basically, to me at least, the old god baby will just get whatever fancy schmancy powers an archdemon has and will be normal for the most part...  pending morrigan's parenting of course

Indeed, and I recall she says something to that effect when you ask her about it at Redcliffe.

[Clockwork_Wings]

Something I read said the Qunari wrote of the old gods, saying they were as to normal dragons as the old kings were to mortal men.  While the qunari are probably highly biased in this regard, it would suggest that they thought the old gods were just particularly awesome dragons.

[Gervaise]

She says that some things are worth saving and the old god is one of them (I paraphrase) but it implies a bit more than just acquiring a few old god powers.   That was one of the reason my Dalish warden was so against it, because it would mean saving the soul of an old Tevinter god that had been responsible for the destruction and enslavement of his people.

 

One of my other wardens justified doing the Dark Ritual on the ground that not only would it save her and Alistair (who were lovers) but also you opt for the course of action with the greatest chance of success.   If a grey warden was not needed on hand for the soul to jump to, then it seemed to follow that even if none of the wardens survived, so long as someone struck down the arch demon, the soul would jump to Morrigan's baby.   Basically she was abiding by the general grey warden approach of the ends justify the means.

 

Whether you think it evil or not to overwrite the baby's soul depends on whether or not you think a baby is just a lump of flesh until it emerges from the womb.   However, the very fact that it is described as having a soul suggest that is not the case.   I understood that it is because the soul has only just come into being that it is possible for the old god to take it over with no ill effects on the old god soul.   So the potential of the original soul has been sacrificed to save the soul of the old god.  At best it is a form of possession, in which case it may be that there is in fact some form of coexistence, as with Connor or Anders, although in both these cases the spirits had to be invited in by the host, whereas with Wynne it just stepped in automatically as she was in no position to object.

 

I think the distinction between Old God and Archdemon is one of rational thought.   The Old God is a demon/spirit but probably of a different type to the ones we generally encounter.   It can reason intelligently, communicate with others and generally comes across as a being with rational aims and objectives.  It may even have a benign relationship with its worshipers.     When it is afflicted with the taint, it essentially goes insane and thus its only aim is to lead the darkspawn to the surface in a orgy of destruction.   Thus it is no longer an Old God but simply an Archdemon.

[Ieldra]

Something I read said the Qunari wrote of the old gods, saying they were as to normal dragons as the old kings were to mortal men.  While the qunari are probably highly biased in this regard, it would suggest that they thought the old gods were just particularly awesome dragons.

Remember according to some sources, the old human kings were Dreamers. What would that make the Old Gods?

[Ieldra]

OK, I'm replaying the scene with the ritual. This is the relevant information:
 

(1) The child will bear the taint, so that the archdemon's essence will home in on it.

(2) "At this early stage, the child will be able to absorb the essence and not perish".

(3) It will not become a darkspawn, but a child with the soul of an Old God.

(4) "Ignoring that after one night it could barely be called a child, no, it will not be hurt, it will be changed."

(5) Morrigan seeks "the essence of the Old God, not the dark forces that corrupted it."

 

Anything more than this is something added by players. That the child's soul will be destroyed, that it will basically be a reincarnation of the Old God, that it's a demon. All that is speculation with no evidence in the scene itself. Also, the ritual itself is never called "dark". The phrase is "a ritual performed in the dark of night."

[Clockwork_Wings]

Remember according to some sources, the old human kings were Dreamers. What would that make the Old Gods?

Whatever it was I read, the wiki, probably, did not elaborate that far.  I'm still going with "really awesome dragons."  In-game lore around Haven suggests there's more to dragons that meet the eye in the first place.

[Wolfen09]

so its a transformer Dragon?

[Gervaise]

Still maintain that the Old Gods were worshipped by the Tevinter Magisters, who on the whole seem a pretty nasty bunch, and Corypheus praying to Dumat seems to confirm this.   Given the Magisters were pretty powerful themselves and were able to control ordinary dragons, I think the Old Gods must have been something considerably more than just powerful dragons in order to impress them.    As for denying the link with demons.   Well, why did the writers call them archdemons?   Why not tainted dragons or tainted gods.   It wasn't the taint that turned it into a demon.   In fact given we are told that even demons shun the Black City, it would seem to suggest that the recognise that it could in some way corrupt them.   This is what Morrigan is referring to when she talks about "dark forces that corrupted it."  

If the child is "changed" it is no longer the original child but as she states a child with the soul of an old god.   Whatever it receives from the soul, I pretty sure Morrigan wouldn't have thought it worth saving if it was benign and likely to make the child good and virtuous..  

[Uccio]

Old Gods are really gods whom have been somehow cut of Thedas. Those dragons of them were just avatars who went to sleep when their connection the their gods were severed. When awaken by darkspawn they become grazy because of the taint. They are more powerful than any other dragon but they still are just dragons since the divine connection is lost.

That is a theory of mine anyway.

[Nyeredzi]

They exist outside of creation (both the fade, and thedas)

[Dr. Doctor]

I'm going with the Old Gods being the Forgotten Ones from Dalish mythology. Fen'Harel apparently lured them into an "abyss" and sealed them off from our plane of existence. If that abyss was say, the Fade then luring the Magisters to the Black City might have been their first attempt to escape their prison.

[Lotion Soronarr]

Morrigan says this will be a child with the soul of an Old God, not an Old God, and that it will be free of the darkspawn corruption. Also, I think the idea is that a just-conceived child hasn't got much of a soul, since that's shaped by memory and experience. Otherwise, it and the Old God's soul would destroy each other just as with the Warden.

 

Morrigan sez a lot of s***.

 

We are talking about a woman that would gladly murder slaves and have heir own child use as a vessel for the soul of not-quite-satan, in a ritual she herself doesn't understand fully.

 

What normal woman would do that to her own child?

 

You can try to spin it any way you want, but the facts are that she is sacrificing her child and it's soul. Weather or not you think a soul has any real worth is beside the point. Soul = memory? No, memory is stored in the brain, not in a metaphysical concept of a soul.

 

Morrigan obviously thinks the soul of an Old God is worth perserving, but the soul of her child is not.
 

And this is all without taking into account that Morrigan can very well be wrong.

We already know that Flemeth was deliberately tricking her at least once (fake Grimmoire)

 

 

If mortals regularly reincarnated, you'd have a point in calling the ritual evil. Since they don't, your objections don't apply.

 

Wrong. The ritual is evil, period.

 

Morrigans word isn't worth anything. We already know her morals are frakked up, so when she sez the child will be changed, not hurt.. why the hell should anyone believe her?

Her definition of hurt is probably "crippled".

"Oy, you wont' be hurt, I'll just stab you with a knife. Trust me, you'll survive it, so no harm done!"

 

Not to mention, she is forcing such a dramatic change on a child, which in itself is wrong. Did anyone ask the child if it wants is soul to be messed with? No?

[Gervaise]

Ieldra, why does the ritual need to be performed in the dark of night if it is a perfectly okay ritual?   Why in fact does there need to be a ritual at all?   If it is simply about something the Warden transmits to their child why not simply say that you need to have sex together and conceive a child.   Is the ritual necessary to ensure conception (which is a possibility since Warden's generally have so much difficulty doing so) or is it to ensure that the Old God essence by passes all intervening vessels and homes in on the child?   I opt for the latter given that you can leave Morrigan at the city gates for safety and so it has to ignore the presence of two Grey Wardens and all the dark spawn on the ground in order to reach its desired destination.   I know the symbolism of dark aspect doesn't necessarily suggest evil deeds to some people but in the context of the game, I think it does.   If a ritual must be carried out in the dark of night (and she does extinguish the flame) that implies something not altogether wholesome is being undertaken.   I grant you if she is having sex with either Alistair or Loghain, then perhaps it is better for both parties that they can't see one another (I believe Loghain even says he'll think of his wife while doing the deed), but I don't think that is the reason for the need for dark.   Dark hides dark deeds.   Even if the child is born an innocent with the potential for either good or evil, do you really trust Morrigan to raise it the right way?

[Dean_the_Young]

And that's something people like Lotion are in all-out support of when it's all about the templars.... do I see hypocrisy?

 

Probably not.

 

Lotion views the Mage-Templar delimma as one of a sanctioned faction acting in response to a clear and public threat on a basis of common good. Imperfect, but legitimized on multiple levels.

 

Morrigan's stance in regards to the OGB is nowhere near as clear. For one, there is no clear and public threat that she is addressing- her goals isn't to end the blight, since she abandons the fight if she doesn't get her way, and she provides no security rational for why we should do as she asks. She doesn't represent a faction sanctioned or legitimized by outside authorities and public support. She is a lone actor who follows her wn whims for her own reasons, and quite frequently over the course of the game isn't interested in helping others for collectivist sentiment like the public good.

 

So, in so much as hypocrisy is a matter of reasoning and exceptions rather than outputs, you'd need far more than what you've raised so far.

[azarhal]

I'm going with the Old Gods being the Forgotten Ones from Dalish mythology. Fen'Harel apparently lured them into an "abyss" and sealed them off from our plane of existence. If that abyss was say, the Fade then luring the Magisters to the Black City might have been their first attempt to escape their prison.

 

The Elves believes the Creators were trapped in the Golden/Eternal City, not the Forgotten Ones...

 

I personally think that the Forbidden Ones (Formeless One, Gaxhkang, Xenebec and Imsheal), the Forgotten Ones, the Old Gods, Fen'Harel and the Creators are all the same type of entity.  I will even throw in "Flemeth" and the elves who entered Unatera (sp) as mentioned in Masked Empire. The thing is that there might be overlap here, because the legends come from different cultures. I'm starting to think that Flemeth is in reality Mythal (get "rezzed on Mythal's altar", want to protected the world through protecting the dragons according to Yavana, etc) for example. Or that Fen'Harel could be the Formless One.

 

At the start, all of them would have been Dreamers that less or more ruled Arlathan and gained vast knowledge and "immortality". Considering the place was apparently very much a backstabbing heaven, it's not hard to think they were a "civil war" and two group appeared: what the Dalish calls the Creators (stayed with Arlathan) and the Forgotten Ones (created Tevinter). Fen'Harel then tricked both side to become the sole winner and continued to "rule" through Tevinter. Although, he actually failed at getting ride of all of them, hence Andraste destroying Tevinter.

 

Thedas might just be the playground of entities that are pretty much close to gods and all humans are just pawns to them in their struggle for power...

[Ieldra]

Ieldra, why does the ritual need to be performed in the dark of night if it is a perfectly okay ritual?   Why in fact does there need to be a ritual at all?   If it is simply about something the Warden transmits to their child why not simply say that you need to have sex together and conceive a child.   Is the ritual necessary to ensure conception (which is a possibility since Warden's generally have so much difficulty doing so) or is it to ensure that the Old God essence by passes all intervening vessels and homes in on the child?   I opt for the latter given that you can leave Morrigan at the city gates for safety and so it has to ignore the presence of two Grey Wardens and all the dark spawn on the ground in order to reach its desired destination.   I know the symbolism of dark aspect doesn't necessarily suggest evil deeds to some people but in the context of the game, I think it does.   If a ritual must be carried out in the dark of night (and she does extinguish the flame) that implies something not altogether wholesome is being undertaken.   I grant you if she is having sex with either Alistair or Loghain, then perhaps it is better for both parties that they can't see one another (I believe Loghain even says he'll think of his wife while doing the deed), but I don't think that is the reason for the need for dark.   Dark hides dark deeds.   Even if the child is born an innocent with the potential for either good or evil, do you really trust Morrigan to raise it the right way?

I don't see any evil, not even symbolic evil. What the term "dark" suggests depends on context. I don't think it suggests "evil" here rather than "mysterious", hinting that these are things you don't (yet) fully understand. To some people, this appears to be synonymous with "evil", but that's an association stories often make which I truly detest and don't feel I need to take into account when making the decision. Furthermore, later, when Morrigan uses the term "dark" to imply evil herself, it's something she rejects, so clearly, it should suggest something different when she speaks about "the dark of night".

 

Furthermore, there is no victim. I fully agree with Morrigan when she says that "after one night, it could hardly be called a child". 

 

I think that most people who reject the ritual do so not because of any clear-cut evil they're seeing, but because it appears vaguely unwholesome to them. That, however, is not enough to throw away my life to avoid, even would I not agree with Morrigan that this is something worth attempting in order to bring some of the Old Gods' mysterious powers into the hands of mortals. Not all my Wardens follow the same philosophy, but had my main Warden had her knowledge, he would probably have suggested the ritual himself.

 

Whether Morrigan will raise the child according to standards you would agree with is an unrelated problem. If I was convinced she would make an unstoppable abomination of it who crushes anyone she points to with no consideration for anything, I wouldn't do the ritual, but in fact Morrigan's motivations never came across as petty to me. Maybe there's a risk in doing this thing, I but I don't think it's big enough to die for to avoid. It will bring something new into the world, something that could change a few magical and political equations, and that has its own attraction in a world that could do with some change.

[Wolfen09]

this series is so open morally, i pretty much see everything you can do in these games as both evil and good....  I mean we could kill the dalish, kill the werewolves, or save both in origins, yet if we did the morally right thing in save both, it shows up later in origins if you go back to brecilican forest and in da2 the dalish are still hunting the former werewolves.... just for one example... but it still makes it look bad, i mean u kill the dalish... you just slaughtered an entire village, you kill the wolves you killed people who had no choice in their fate, and then you save them and the whole hatred still goes on between them.... yeah on the surface you did good, but in reality you never truly did the right thing in terms of the outcome

[azarhal]

this series is so open morally

 

This is why I believe that none of the "gods" are good or evils in the setting, even the spirits (demons/spirit) aren't really good or evil*. Sure some have questionable methods to achieve their goals or even questionable goals, but everything could seem justified form a certain point-of-view.

 

Take Loghain's betrayal for example, he was right about Orlais wanting to take back Ferelden, he was just totally wrong on when and how.

[Ieldra]

this series is so open morally, i pretty much see everything you can do in these games as both evil and good....  I mean we could kill the dalish, kill the werewolves, or save both in origins, yet if we did the morally right thing in save both, it shows up later in origins if you go back to brecilican forest and in da2 the dalish are still hunting the former werewolves.... just for one example... but it still makes it look bad, i mean u kill the dalish... you just slaughtered an entire village, you kill the wolves you killed people who had no choice in their fate, and then you save them and the whole hatred still goes on between them.... yeah on the surface you did good, but in reality you never truly did the right thing in terms of the outcome

Yes,that's one thing I like about DA. Few things are clear-cut, and many depend on interpretation. That has the potential to let you take ownership of the story in some way. Even where hidden things are eventually revealed as they must be, things remain complex and open to interpretation.

 

Also, I find it very important that I can often decide what I consider the best outcome without the story contradicting me. I hope things stay that way with regard to Morrigan's ritual.

 

@azarhal:

Have you played Return to Ostagar? I think it's quite possible that Loghain knew of Celene's plans to marry into Ferelden and claim it that way (the documents hint at the possibility) and that he betrayed Cailan because he seemed amenable to the plan.

[Clockwork_Wings]

 

 

@azarhal:

Have you played Return to Ostagar? I think it's quite possible that Loghain knew of Celene's plans to marry into Ferelden and claim it that way (the documents hint at the possibility) and that he betrayed Cailan because he seemed amenable to the plan.

There's a lot of reasons tossed about for why he did it.  One I read (tv tropes?  The wiki?) suggests that he thought that the wardens were staging a coup and lying about a blight to get attention and weaken the government.  The brilliance is, none of this occurs to anyone unless they recruit him.  One could spend the whole game thinking he's a one-note villain.  Brilliance.

[azarhal]

 

Have you played Return to Ostagar? I think it's quite possible that Loghain knew of Celene's plans to marry into Ferelden and claim it that way (the documents hint at the possibility) and that he betrayed Cailan because he seemed amenable to the plan.

 

I have, but I do not remember there being any mention of Loghain being aware of Cailan's actual plan. It was just some small little hints that he wasn't wrong in his paranoia. The 2nd novel and DAO suggest he saw the Wardens has the Orlesian's vanguards/spies.

[CENIC]

I... don't necessarily believe the Archdemons and the Old Gods are one and the same.

 

The Old Gods whispered in the dreams of Tevinter Magisters. A demon/spirit in the Fade can take the appearance of anything it wants. A disembodied voice could lie about being a god. I could tell you, reading this post right now, that I am a flying purple people-eater. Can you prove that is untrue?

 

In one of the comics, we learn that Calahad gained the power to unite the Ferelden tribes by drinking the blood of an ancient dragon that was sleeping deep underground. The Blight corrupts everything living that it touches. Plant life dies, animals like bears and wolves are corrupted into bereskarn and dire wolves. If the darkspawn were to find an ancient dragon, it would be corrupted as well. Voila, an Archdemon is born. The Archdemons were probably named after the Old Gods because of cultural beliefs and superstitions. There could be more (or less) than seven corrupted ancient dragons.

 

What I can't explain is the "singing," the Archdemon's ability to command the darkspawn hordes, or the "entity" that is present in the Archdemon and must be contained in another living creature. Dragons are important, and the Witches of the Wilds seem dedicated to preserving them, so I suppose the "soul" Morrigan wanted to capture with the Dark Ritual could just be the soul of a very old dragon...