237 réponses à ce sujet

[batlin]

You do know that following your idea would basically force a player to play as evil right? Because at that point there would be no reasons to not to. Since it's a game you don't have to follow your morality as you would in real life, because this is a game. And last time i checked players don't like to be "forced" or at least "strongly encouraged" to play something over something else. In an game as DA, it's an important part of the game. Sorry, but your idea applied in this game would be an utter failure, at least if implemented as you would. Because you are saying "i want to play evil and be rewarded more for it".

I would bet anything that the majority of players would still play the good path even if the rewards for being evil were enormous. The point of giving the evil option more reward is to make being good actually mean something, as well as to provide an actual reason for someone to be evil. You agree that being good means selflessness and evil means selfishness, right? Well, where's the selflessness in doing a good act if you know that in the end, you're exactly as well-off as if you'd chosen to be mean? Go back and read my analogy to Kim Jong Un. If he could have the life he has now without starving his countrymen to death, he most likely would. The reason he doesn't is because the rewards for making people suffer are too great for him to give up. That's why he's evil. He has chosen wealth over virtue. And the true moral of a virtuous person is that being good is its own reward. If you are upset that picking the good path doesn't get you as much gold as the evil path, then are you really as good as you think you are? Do you care more that a game evenly distributes reward evenly for each morality than having actual moral dilemmas? Was pulling the paragon trigger ever a difficult choice? Do you even want a moment of hesitation before doing the right thing instead of mechanically picking the virtuous option only because you want the good ending?

 

I think making a player feel something when they choose to be good or bad is more important than balancing rewards, because in real life, the rewards aren't balanced. That's why it's not unfair in a meta sense; it's just being true to life. A high-ranking inquisitor would have the prerogative to be corrupt and malicious with little fear of reprisal! One that is considered a holy person to boot! The most powerful tool of dictators is religion, after all, and using your status in DA:I to do bad things is an enormous opportunity for writers to explore that, and it would be a real shame if they didn't.

 

And THAT'S why being good in spite of the ability to capitalize on your position should matter more than how a few scenes play out. You the player should make real sacrifice to do the right thing. Everyone would be a saint if there was never something to lose from doing the right thing. Being good should be a test of your virtue rather than as petty a choice as choosing what color shirt to wear.

 

Also, who says a player on the good path couldn't do a couple acts of evil here and there? You know, maybe threatening the farmer to give you a bigger reward, or stealing a helmet out of a shop. Of course at the end of the day, you still will fight for justice and save the world. Hey, who would know?

[Sylvius the Mad]

Going way OT, but how come that's your default?

I play the same character the first time through every game.  He's an old 2nd edition AD&D character of mine.

 

Sylvius was a pure showman CG Thief (Swashbuckler) whose alignment was switched to LE by a Deck of Many Things.  He promptly dual-classed to Necromancer but kept it a secret from the party (because dual-classing at level 9 makes you basically useless), and began acting crazy to cover his newfound ineffectiveness.  He couldn't use his Necromancy skills in front of the party without giving away the secret, and he couldn't use his Thief skills without losing XP.  His behaviour earned him the moniker Sylvius the Mad, and he was a lot of fun to play.  And since I've been playing him or over 20 years, I know him really well, so it makes it easier for me to experience game content if I'm not having to do a lot of ental gymnastics in order to figure out who my character is.

 

And because I know him well, and because he's LE, he's a great test of RPG systems.

[Sylvius the Mad]

I don't remember NWN well enough. I have mixed feelings about DAO when it comes to lawfulness. I don't think the issue really came up very often, and that decisions were limited on a good evil scale.

The only situation I can really think of where lawfulness came up was with respect to the anvil of the void.

The greedy merchant in Lothering is perhaps the best example.

[tmp7704]

Anyway, to sum up,
 
1. Being evil is more fun when the game doesn't tell you that being evil is an option

This is largely no-go in games like DA which make you choose your course of action through dialogues -- the 'evil' option has to be listed there along with the others, as otherwise it'd simply be inaccessible.

Though for what's worth DA:O had some of this 'freeform evil' in form of pickpocketing -- aside from couple specific quests you were never told to rob people iirc, you could simply do it if you chose to.

[Neon Rising Winter]

Any sense of right and wrong there is offset by pragmatism. Morrigan represents that view.. she emphasizes that we have more important things to do and shouldn't stop to save everyone. It's neglectful, but not necessarily immoral. She just holds to the bottom line.

I think most of the conflicts in DAO revolve around this. Idealism/Pragmatism. Not good/evil. It's up to you to read the good and evil angles into it.

And give me this approach any day, is there any reason to simplify a character's actions down to good and evil? Well apart from years of brainwashing from AD&D, that alignment system has a lot of silliness to answer for. Personally I just keep in mind a vague idea of my character's approach to problems and then run with the solutions that fit best whatever they may be.

[batlin]

This is largely no-go in games like DA which make you choose your course of action through dialogues -- the 'evil' option has to be listed there along with the others, as otherwise it'd simply be inaccessible.

Though for what's worth DA:O had some of this 'freeform evil' in form of pickpocketing -- aside from couple specific quests you were never told to rob people iirc, you could simply do it if you chose to.

Of course I'm aware that there's limitations. The point is that if you can be evil without being given the game's blessing, it will work better.

 

I think it could work better in this game than the last DA games though through to the war map. I don't know exactly how it works, but from what I gather, you can gain perks by deciding on different courses of action the Inquisition can take in order to solve various problems.

 

So, off the top of my head, let's say there's one issue where a small town has a lot of useful resources that the Inquisition really needs, but obviously they won't just hand it all over to you. Your options to handle it include bartering with the townfolk for the resources, allying militarily with the town, or raiding and pillaging the town.

 

Let's say you choose to make an alliance with the town and get a bit of help from their soldiers. Now your army is bolstered and you have more power to do other things.

 

But the other options on how to deal with the town won't go away. A particularly conniving Inquisitor might ally with the town to get extra soldiers, and after you no longer need their help, then you choose to raid the town of its resources. It's vile, but you get the best of both worlds!

[Super Drone]

Whiiiiich is why an evil person should put on a facade of being good. Did you even read my post?

 

 

Did you read anyone else's. I just think you're wrong.

 

You want a system  that rewards you for being evil so that being good is more meaningful. you want to hand-waive away the downsides of being evil, namely the part where people stop helping you because you are evil. Where your badass crew that keeps you from dying (you ever tried to run a DA game solo? You are significantly less cool) realizes who you really are and bails on you. 

 

I get most people on BSN always assume the world in Bioware games is full of mindless thralls who will do whatever you want them to, but that's never acutally been true outside of bad fanfiction.

[Sylvius the Mad]

Any sense of right and wrong there is offset by pragmatism. Morrigan represents that view.. she emphasizes that we have more important things to do and shouldn't stop to save everyone. It's neglectful, but not necessarily immoral. She just holds to the bottom line.

I think most of the conflicts in DAO revolve around this. Idealism/Pragmatism. Not good/evil. It's up to you to read the good and evil angles into it.

I think it's entirely possible to defend the greedy merchant on moral grounds. If you support individual liberty and private property, the merchant is the victim in thay scenario.

There's also a moral argument to be made that the Warden shouldn't save Redcliffe - that doing so unnecessarily puts all of Ferelden at risk.

But the Lawful Evil angle in Lothering is clear: you defend the merchant on the basis of fair commerce, but you do so because it benefits you to do so.

[In Exile]

I think it's entirely possible to defend the greedy merchant on moral grounds. If you support individual liberty and private property, the merchant is the victim in thay scenario.

 

Not really. Even if try to do it you just run into basic problems with unconscionable bargains. Any principled approach to contracts has to account for circumstances which vitiate the precondition to a true bargain. It's precisely why what the merchant does wouldn't be (in principle) legally enforceable. 

 

But the Lawful Evil angle in Lothering is clear: you defend the merchant on the basis of fair commerce, but you do so because it benefits you to do so.

 

Wouldn't the LE angle be that a rule whereby the powerful can exploit the weak in bargains is a very good rule rather than fair commerce (because it's not actually fair commerce, per above)? 

[BioWareM0d13]

 

Lastly, being evil should be easier and have rewards greater than being good. If the rewards for being a good person are equal (or better) than being a bad person, why be bad? After all, isn't the reason people do bad things in life to get ahead? If Kim Jong Un could have a decadent life of fame and (forced) love without subjugating his citizens to starvation, he probably would. But he can't, which is why he (and the old guard who really run the country) allow bad things to continue happening in North Korea.

 

 

3. Being evil should yeild greater material reward than being good

 

 

 

While I agree with much of what you wrote, I have to disagree on these points. From a gameplay perspective having every evil choice be the correct one would be just as flawed as having every morally good option reap greater rewards. It would be better in my opinion to vary it by scenario, with both morally good and evil decisions having their fair share of successes and failures. Players should have to think about their decisions rather just spamming a single morality choice to gain the biggest rewards

 

Also while in the real world there are examples of people reaping benefits from ruthlessness, there are just as many examples of failure. For every iron-fisted dictator who manages to keep his population cowed there is another using the same playbook who ends up deposed and/or murdered by his own people. 

[BioWareM0d13]

Edit - double post 

[batlin]

Did you read anyone else's. I just think you're wrong.

 

You want a system  that rewards you for being evil so that being good is more meaningful. you want to hand-waive away the downsides of being evil, namely the part where people stop helping you because you are evil. Where your badass crew that keeps you from dying (you ever tried to run a DA game solo? You are significantly less cool) realizes who you really are and bails on you. 

 

I get most people on BSN always assume the world in Bioware games is full of mindless thralls who will do whatever you want them to, but that's never acutally been true outside of bad fanfiction.

I'm wrong that an evil person would keep his companions in the dark about his shady actions? You sure about that?

 

I'm not saying that evil should have no downside. I'm saying that at the end of the day, the evil path should net you greater reward than being good. I already explained why several times.

 

 

While I agree with much of what you wrote, I have to disagree on these points. From a gameplay perspective having every evil choice be the correct one would be just as flawed as having every morally good option reap greater rewards. It would be better in my opinion to vary it by scenario, with both morally good and evil decisions having their fair share of successes and failures. Players should have to think about their decisions rather just spamming a single morality choice to gain the biggest rewards

I didn't say " being evil should always be the correct choice". I said "being evil should yield greater material reward than being good"

 

Those two things aren't always the same.

 

Also while in the real world there are examples of people reaping benefits from ruthlessness, there are just as many examples of failure. For every iron-fisted dictator who manages to keep his population cowed there is another using the same playbook who ends up deposed and/or murdered by his own people. 

Yeah, usually after a multi-generation dynasty.

[In Exile]

I'm wrong that an evil person would keep his companions in the dark about his shady actions? You sure about that?

 

How do you do that? "No, the blood of these children had seemed into my clothes before I bought them."

 

Alistair and Leliana are right there when you, for example, side with the merchant over the impoverished masses in the Chantry. 

[batlin]

Not neccessarily. Pol Pot went down relatively quick, for example. 

 

Never quick enough. He still did massive dmg. Still though, he's no Mao or Stalin.

Ghengis Khan? Atilla the Hun? Vlad the Impaler? Queen Mary I? Nowadays with advanced military technology, ousting dictators is quick. Back in pre-enlightmenment times though, the era that Dragon Age and most other fantasy settings emulate, the bullies ruled the world.

[batlin]

How do you do that? "No, the blood of these children had seemed into my clothes before I bought them."

 

Alistair and Leliana are right there when you, for example, side with the merchant over the impoverished masses in the Chantry. 

Which ties in with my other point of how evil characters need to be able to keep their nefarious deeds secret and pretend to be good.

 

Also, if I planned on killing some kids, I'd take Morriga, Shale and the dog with me.

[In Exile]

Which ties in with my other point of how evil characters need to be able to keep their nefarious deeds secret and pretend to be good.

 

Also, if I planned on killing some kids, I'd take Morriga, Shale and the dog with me.

 

And what happens when Morrigan talks about how awesome it was to kill some children? Or shale talks about smushing the squishy organics? Swapping out parties only works when they actually keep their mouth shut.

 

And, again, how would evil characters keep things under wraps? You'd have to murder everyone who's a witness, and otherwise ensure that the only things you do are indisguishable from good, defeating the point of being evil.

[AlanC9]

While I agree with much of what you wrote, I have to disagree on these points. From a gameplay perspective having every evil choice be the correct one would be just as flawed as having every morally good option reap greater rewards. It would be better in my opinion to vary it by scenario, with both morally good and evil decisions having their fair share of successes and failures. Players should have to think about their decisions rather just spamming a single morality choice to gain the biggest rewards.

Agreed, but this doesn't have much to do with good and evil per se, does it? It's about how obvious and predictable the outcomes of decisions are. I presume such variability would be good even if all the choices were neutral.

[batlin]

Lots of Kings rose and fell then too. 

 

Khan and his followers is a remarkable and nightmarish story.. there's nothing like it.

Besides in countless fantasy epics?

 

 

And what happens when Morrigan talks about how awesome it was to kill some children? Or shale talks about smushing the squishy organics? Swapping out parties only works when they actually keep their mouth shut.

 

And, again, how would evil characters keep things under wraps? You'd have to murder everyone who's a witness, and otherwise ensure that the only things you do are indisguishable from good, defeating the point of being evil.

If you insist on being difficult, there's always the option to go solo.

 

I don't know why you're asking about the specifics in a hypothetical scenario. I'm sure the writers at Bioware are more than clever enough to figure out how your character can keep a few actions secret from his companions. I wouldn't worry about that, man.

[In Exile]

I don't know why you're asking about the specifics in a hypothetical scenario. I'm sure the writers at Bioware are more than clever enough to figure out how your character can keep a few actions secret from his companions. I wouldn't worry about that, man.

 

I'm asking for specifics to illustrate how unworkable your idea actually is in practice. The writers at Bioware are most certainly not clever enough to figure out how to do something impossible. And that's the point. Your idea collapses when you try to apply it.