395 réponses à ce sujet

[JamieCOTC]

I wish there were more moments like this in the game. Instead of having choices that matter from game to game, which has been, quite frankly, a bit of let down, here we have an early choice that is reflected later in the game. There is another part in the game like this where you meet a girl who wants to join the Grey Wardens. This small choice really does matter. It's a far cry from the choices for Crestwood in the E3 preview, which was cut for whatever reason, but it did answer the call of tough choices. With the outcry about the Leliana incident, this begs the question, do people really want consequences to their actions in a game or do they just want to win?

[Illegitimus]

 

Again, it comes down to telling Leliana how to do her job. If she thinks that the proper course of action is to assassinate this person, then one would assume she knows best. The decision to do so isn't morally reprehensible. That's a modern sensibility.

 

But if one is going to assume she knows best, then one might as well assume that she knows what she's doing when she kills the nun.  There's an argument to made in favour of ruthless Lelianna after all.  

[robertthebard]

I wish there were more moments like this in the game. Instead of having choices that matter from game to game, which has been, quite frankly, a bit of let down, here we have an early choice that is reflected later in the game. There is another part in the game like this where you meet a girl who wants to join the Grey Wardens. This small choice really does matter. It's a far cry from the choices for Crestwood in the E3 preview, which was cut for whatever reason, but it did answer the call of tough choices. With the outcry about the Leliana incident, this begs the question, do people really want consequences to their actions in a game or do they just want to win?

Mostly it comes down to they only want the choices they think should matter to matter. As is pointed out in this post however, if one's going to assume she knows what she's doing in Haven, why would one assume that she doesn't later? If she's disobeying your wishes, it's because she knows best.

[thewatcheruatu]

But if one is going to assume she knows best, then one might as well assume that she knows what she's doing when she kills the nun.  There's an argument to made in favour of ruthless Lelianna after all.  

 

Not really.

• Your Inquisitor is there for the assassination of the Sister.
• Your Inquisitor is better apprised of the situation as opposed to merely accidentally eavesdropping on an in-progress conversation.
• Your Inquisitor knows Leliana a lot better at that point in the story and maybe has a good sense of her internal struggle.
• You Inquisitor knows herself a lot better at that point in the story (and the player knows his/her Inquisitor better). 
• Your Inquisitor can clearly see that Leliana is possessed of nothing but vengeance in that moment--she isn't calmly reflecting at the stronghold in order to calculate the best move.
• The sister (to my knowledge, anyway) hasn't specifically killed anybody, nor has she ever been a member of the Inquisition--she's not a double-agent, traitor, etc. Merely somebody loyal to a Grand Cleric who objects to the Inquisition. 
• Your Inquisitor is the declared leader of the Inquisition who by now has been tasked with making every difficult decision it's possible to make. She is clearly the correct authority to pass judgment on the Sister, as this isn't strictly a matter of the administration of the spy network.

 

Then on top of everything else, Leliana disobeys a direct order.

 

I'm not saying Leliana is right or wrong in either case. But these situations aren't comparable.

[robertthebard]

Not really.

• Your Inquisitor is there for the assassination of the Sister.
• Your Inquisitor is better apprised of the situation as opposed to merely accidentally eavesdropping on an in-progress conversation.
• Your Inquisitor knows Leliana a lot better at that point in the story and maybe has a good sense of her internal struggle.
• You Inquisitor knows herself a lot better at that point in the story (and the player knows his/her Inquisitor better). 
• Your Inquisitor can clearly see that Leliana is possessed of nothing but vengeance in that moment--she isn't calmly reflecting at the stronghold in order to calculate the best move.
• Your Inquisitor is the declared leader of the Inquisition who by now has been tasked with making every difficult decision it's possible to make.
• The sister (to my knowledge, anyway) hasn't specifically killed anybody, nor has she ever been a member of the Inquisition--she's not a double-agent, traitor, etc. Merely somebody loyal to a Grand Cleric who objects to the Inquisition. 

Then on top of everything else, Leliana disobeys a direct order.
 
I'm not saying Leliana is right or wrong in either case. But these situations aren't comparable.

She either knows what she's doing, or she doesn't. The only difference here is that she actually gets the blood on her hands, and you have to see it. If you're going to condone one murder, either actively or passively, she's absolutely right to call you on it if it comes up later, which she will if you question her on it back at Skyhold. She'll even call you a hypocrite, and she's not wrong. If it's ok to murder spies, it's ok to murder spies; just because your standing right there doesn't change the basic premise, "it's ok to murder a spy".

[Wulfram]

A presumption that someone knows what they're doing is always open to challenge in the face of evidence.

The two situations are vastly different.

1. Is a traitor, has caused the death of one of your allies, has information that could endanger further and is still on the loose

2. Is only being loyal to the Chantry and is working for someone who is not shown to have engaged in any hostile actions, has not done any harm, has shown no indications of being a threat and in any case can't be considered a threat because she is already captured and at your mercy.

[In Exile]

I heavily disliked the entire arc. The very last thing clowns like Leliana need is some sycophant whimpering to them to pretty please open your heart and believe in the goodness of people. But that's what BioWare wrote, so that's the dialogue the protagonist gets.

It's an apt example of how effeminate the morals and themes of DA often are, to the series' significant detriment.

I don't know and can't possibly understand what brought on this nonsense - and ignoring the absurd (and entirely gibberish) in it ("effeminate" morals is sexist nonsense) - but there's no connection between it and what we seen in-game.

We have three incidents. The first is whether Leliana will assasinate an alleged traitor. This has two resolutions: she OKs the assassination (wasting the tremendous resources required to pull this off to somehow "send a message") or she finds some other means to punish the traitor. To say this is "believing in the goodness of people" is total nonsense. As the dialogue options themselves suggest, it's perfectly pragmatic.

The second is Leliana asking whether it was right for her to withdraw her scouts after losses. Again, there is a perfectly pragmatic justification: against an unknown foe who so far went undetected, keeping her scouts out there might have yielded no further information but cost the Inquisition valuable assets.

And finally we have the church scene, which is between cold blooded revenge murder (pointless, if satisfying) or flipping an enemy asset to your side (you know, Leliana's whole JOB as a spy master).

I don't know what copy of DAI you received, but in the one the rest of us got the scenario you describe doesn't exist.

[In Exile]

A presumption that someone knows what they're doing is always open to challenge in the face of evidence.

The two situations are vastly different.

1. Is a traitor, has caused the death of one of your allies, has information that could endanger further and is still on the loose

2. Is only being loyal to the Chantry and is working for someone who is not shown to have engaged in any hostile actions, has not done any harm, has shown no indications of being a threat and in any case can't be considered a threat because she is already captured and at your mercy.

This is true, but as I say above, the fact of the treason and the need for punishment is never in doubt. The sole question is the MEANS of punishment, and Leliana gives an erratic and nonsensical justification for it when pushed.

[In Exile]

But the options you, as the player, are presented with are to either stop the death of the murderous traitor or to allow it. The choice comes before the investigates.

 

That's poor paraphrasing, because that's not the line the Inquisitor actually offers here. We're debating whether the Inquisitor should have become involved; we should do that based on how the Inquisitor actually comes to be involved. Which is, as I recall, to first question Leliana on what she's doing (in a bit of a forceful way).

 

You seem to think I mean "moral" in the "it's morally wrong sense to execute". But I don't, and never did. I mean moral in the general sense of the world (i.e., it's against your moral code to allow a killing in these circumstances). "I think traitors should be flayed alive, not swiftly killed" is a moral position. I apologize for the confusion.

 

Whim? He's a traitor who has caused the death of one of your allies and is a threat to others. His execution may not meet modern standards, but it's definitely one of the more justifiable deaths out there.

 

 

It's an absolute whim. He's a spy (I thought it was a she?). That death was, presumably, caused by taking advantage of the relationship of trust that existed in virtue of being an agent of the Inquisition. That cover is now blown. The question is then what to do about it, and on an apparent whim, Leliana decides that the thing to do is to invest the incredible resources required to assasinate someone. We're not talking about taking a captured prisoner and putting their neck on the chopping block.

 

Interestingly, I wasn't questioning the morality of executing a proven traitor - I actually think that's fine. What I was questioning was the extra-legal nature of it (spymaster, on a whim, decides to assasinate).

 

It's a whim because it appears that the decision to assasinate involved no further consideration of anything beyond whatever Leliana took to be confirmation of treason. Decisions made in a split-second, with absolutely no regard as to their feasibility, are made on an apparent whim.

 

I mean, you just came back from slaughtering a whole bunch of mages for no particular crime beyond hanging about in the hinterlands. You're soon going to go out to kill a whole bunch of people later. You'll likely soon recruit Sera after she orchestrates your slaughter of a whole bunch of other people who have committed no apparent crime except defending themselves from the assault of your heavily armed cronies. But no, it's this traitor guy who is special and need saving, apparently.

 

He doesn't get saved. The argument is not about failing to punish traitors. It's about how traitors should be punished, including being executed extra-judicially and, again, on a whim.

 

But there's no particular reason why this occasion should require you to speak up, unless your beliefs are frankly incompatible with playing the role of Inquisitor throughout the game

 

That's just silly. Objecting to someone - without much apparent thought - deciding to just commit to assasinate someone is quite different from, for example, deciding whether (and what) to sacrifice to advance the goals of an organization. It's not even necessarily inconsistent with being ruthless (since a far more ruthless option, for example, would be to capture the traitor alive so that he might be visibly mutilated and tortured - say flayed alive - and left out to die as an example).

[Wulfram]

This is true, but as I say above, the fact of the treason and the need for punishment is never in doubt. The sole question is the MEANS of punishment, and Leliana gives an erratic and nonsensical justification for it when pushed.

That's not really clear from the choice the player is offered, though.

We're not offered "Kill the bad guy" and "Capture the bad guy", we're offered "Kill the bad guy" and "Don't kill the bad guy", and Bioware games do quite often have "not kill" mean "let go". The fact that capture is on the table does help in a "spoiled" playthrough, but its very much not evident when you first encounter it.


A thought has occurred to me just now: A big thing which hurts this dialogue is the addition of the explanations. The paraphrase is IIRC something along the lines of "Do we really need to kill him?" or something of that ilk, which is a fair question to ask. But then with that paraphrase goes the explanation that this guy will not be killed, which turns a reasonable enough question into an order. I'm half wondering if they tacked on the explanation later - maybe people got annoyed because after asking the question they couldn't then have the guy killed - because I think that explanation is actually a lot of why this choice is so much of a trap.

[In Exile]

 

I just can't agree. We're talking about this scene as if it were taking place in a modern context. And even if we were, executing somebody for treason wouldn't be outrageous except in very recent history.

 

Regardless of what my Inquisitor might or might not do in the same situation or if asked for an opinion after being provided the whole story, the point remains that in the context of a world setting like Ferelden and given the protagonist's position relative to the Inquisition's leadership, there is no way any character except the most obnoxious and extreme goody two-shoes would be speaking up there. Anybody playing a character who is accustomed to life in Thedas and is still trying to make sense of his/her place within this organization should remain quiet.

 

We're not talking about silenting standing idle while Leliana orders the execution of an entire village of innocents, including women and children. This is one person who is a real security risk, has already caused major damage, and should by almost all reasoning be stopped by whatever means the leader of the spy network sees fit.

 

Anyway, we disagree. I'm not going to change your mind, and you're not going to change mine. So I'll just stop there.

 

 

First off, these "historical morality" arguments don't have much value in respect of DA, since - as a setting - the characters do recognize (and some actively share) modern values and morals. Beyond that, these moral positions did appear to exist for far more and far longer than people give credit. And, as I said above, that you object on moral grounds doesn't necessarily mean "I think killing and executing is immoral". Beyond even that, I made a point to say that you might also be objecting on pragmatic grounds (because you think the assassination would be a total waste of resources).

 

Second, "in the context of a world like Ferelden", you're totally misunderstood the situation. You're literally proclaimed to be a divine figure. When the Inquisition is called, you're standing apart from the crowd, with the other leaders of the Inquisition. You're invited and actively participating in all of the strategic meetings. The last conversation you have with Leliana - which is mandatory - is her asking you to interpret for her the will of her god. Anybody who is accustomed to any kind of life - and keep in mind that the montage makes it clear that quite a great deal of time passed between Wrath of Heaven and the "present" - would feel as if he or she were, if not an equal, then certainly very much within the same strata as Leliana, and entirely entitled to converse with her about the subject matter. You're on the same level - if not arguably a greater one - that Cassandra herself, who you'll recall has no actual leadership role in the Inquisition at all besides having been part of it longer (technically, if we count her role recruiting for it).

 

We're talking about the person who Leliana literally believes is chosen by her god as a savior. You've got as much moral authority - and actual authority, really - to tell her what to do as Cassandra would have, who's not even a "leader" in the Inquisition (unlike Josephine, Cullen and Leliana herself).

 

I'm happy to drop the subject, but you're very much wrong in your grasp of the situation.

[In Exile]

That's not really clear from the choice the player is offered, though.

We're not offered "Kill the bad guy" and "Capture the bad guy", we're offered "Kill the bad guy" and "Don't kill the bad guy", and Bioware games do quite often have "not kill" mean "let go". The fact that capture is on the table does help in a "spoiled" playthrough, but its very much not evident when you first encounter it.

A thought has occurred to me just now: A big thing which hurts this dialogue is the addition of the explanations. The paraphrase is IIRC something along the lines of "Do we really need to kill him?" or something of that ilk, which is a fair question to ask. But then with that paraphrase goes the explanation that this guy will not be killed, which turns a reasonable enough question into an order. I'm half wondering if they tacked on the explanation later - maybe people got annoyed because after asking the question they couldn't then have the guy killed - because I think that explanation is actually a lot of why this choice is so much of a trap.

 

The explanations are meant to explain the consequence of the choice - guy dies, or guy doesn't die. People I suppose took that to mean, I suppose, that the Inquisitior was going to say "don't kill him", which I guess is very fair. I'm not trying to defend how Bioware wrote the scene - I think it's really confusing, and I couldn't "soften" Leliana in my first PT because my PC straight up didn't care whether or not she killed this person, which was apparently a pivotal choice to her. But I really liked that this nonchalant attitude led to an unexpected (and ultimately, undesired) consequence, so I saw the whole affair as a "+" that made the game replayable.

 

So I don't mean to be taken as defending the execution. I just think it's entirely justifiable for the Inquisitor to speak up.

[BabyPuncher]

I don't know and can't possibly understand what brought on this nonsense - and ignoring the absurd (and entirely gibberish) in it ("effeminate" morals is sexist nonsense) - but there's no connection between it and what we seen in-game.

We have three incidents. The first is whether Leliana will assasinate an alleged traitor. This has two resolutions: she OKs the assassination (wasting the tremendous resources required to pull this off to somehow "send a message") or she finds some other means to punish the traitor. To say this is "believing in the goodness of people" is total nonsense. As the dialogue options themselves suggest, it's perfectly pragmatic.

 

Oh, the 'tremendous' resources. The 'tremendous resources' required to stab someone. Wherever shall Leliana find such 'tremendous' resources to 'waste'? They're just so tremendous. And of course, the unknown alternative 'means' that we don't anything about except they're much less tremendous than the tremendous resources which are tremendous.

 

Please. As I said earlier, I'm fairly sure the Inquisitor's words were "Now is precisely the time for ideals." That's not an appeal to goodness to you?

 

You are correct on one point. Is it indeed perfectly pragmatic. Pity that BioWare failed to grasp the correct reason why.

 

Let us speculate on a slightly alternative scenario, a scenario where killing the nasty traitorous spy is in fact the 'easiest' option. (Which is what I hold to be the case anyway....) Does this line of morality therefore collapse? Should the protagonist now submit to Leliana? He should not, because the moral dilemma was never about the easiest course of action to begin with. 

 

So in summery, it sure sounds like an appeal to goodness to me, and even if wasn't and was a appeal to supposed 'pragmatism' (it's not really pragmatic), it would still be the wrong argument.

 

By the way, have you considered that even if everything you said was true, it merely turns Leliana from a narrative-coddled brat into a moron? Which is still pretty bad writing, considering this is our supposed expert spymaster who embarks on a course of action both, as you just said, very un-pragmatic in addition to being immoral?

 

I don't know and can't possibly understand what brought on this nonsense - and ignoring the absurd (and entirely gibberish) in it ("effeminate" morals is sexist nonsense) - but there's no connection between it and what we seen in-game.

 

Is it? Well, if you'd like to suggest more fitting language for the tendency of 'soft' being equated to 'good' and such that I tend to see in DA...

[BabyPuncher]

Also, I find the whole question of "Should the Inquisitor have spoken up?" to be a trivial non-issue. Silly, even. It's completely standard procedure for protagonists in these sorts of stories to charge head first into bandits and monsters and all sorts of suicidal situations. Even though BioWare did an obscenely poor job of showing it, this is supposed to be a person so incredibly extraordinary they literally built an empire from nothing. And yet they should be afraid to speak up?

 

If anything, there should have been far more scenes of the Inquisitor taking authority in such situations. (Although he didn't really 'take authority' at all...) Maybe that would have convinced me a little that this is a person even remotely capable startling and leading an empire.

[JamieCOTC]

Mostly it comes down to they only want the choices they think should matter to matter. As is pointed out in this post however, if one's going to assume she knows what she's doing in Haven, why would one assume that she doesn't later? If she's disobeying your wishes, it's because she knows best.

Fair point and if you want to play it like that, great. However, there could be much more at stake than a Spymaster doing her job. If you play with a Leliana/Warden romance world state, the Inquisitor gets a letter asking that s/he tries to steer Leliana back to who she was. It mirrors the soft vs. hardened Leliana in DA:O though on a world scale.

 

Spoiler

I was not there for the death of Divine Justinia, but I know it will have hurt her terribly. While her wits and her skill are amazing, Leliana’s greatest strength lies in her faith, and to have Justinia die strikes at her very core. I beg you, if she is faltering, help her find her way back into the light.

 

In the beginning of DA:I Leliana is very different from the Chantry sister from Lothering, but after she is steered back from a harder edge (which both the Warden and the Divine seem to want) you get a glimpse of the Leliana from the first game. That's the great thing about RPGs. You can play them in so many varied ways.

[Illegitimus]

 

Is it? Well, if you'd like to suggest more fitting language for the tendency of 'soft' being equated to 'good' and such that I tend to see in DA...

 

Other way around.  "Good" is equated to "soft".  The thing is, in Dragon Age you can't count on the good thing being the right thing. There is one epilogue where soft Leliana manages to thread her way through her problems with a minimum of bloodshed and make some nicely liberal reforms.  But there's also one where where her wimpish ways lead to the disintegration of the Chantry, and what will likely be centuries of bloody religious warfare between her Chantry and spin-offs that will likely be more oppressive than the Chantry was before her reforms.   No result with hardened Leliana is that bad as I recall.  

[thewatcheruatu]

Also, I find the whole question of "Should the Inquisitor have spoken up?" to be a trivial non-issue. Silly, even. It's completely standard procedure for protagonists in these sorts of stories to charge head first into bandits and monsters and all sorts of suicidal situations. Even though BioWare did an obscenely poor job of showing it, this is supposed to be a person so incredibly extraordinary they literally built an empire from nothing. And yet they should be afraid to speak up?

 

If anything, there should have been far more scenes of the Inquisitor taking authority in such situations. (Although he didn't really 'take authority' at all...) Maybe that would have convinced me a little that this is a person even remotely capable startling and leading an empire.

 

You and I have completely different reads on this scene. It's not about being "afraid" to speak up. It's about being smart enough not to make an ass out of yourself in front of your spymaster. It's about knowing how to play politics. About observing and learning before you take charge. Otherwise you're just a big brash idiot, albeit, perhaps, with noble intentions.

 

The way the choice is written, it doesn't say, "Killing him is not a wise idea when he can still be useful." It read to me more like, "Ewww. Do we have to kill him? Blood is icky." 

 

Apparently, the resulting dialogue from choosing that option characterized your Inquisitor's sentiments differently, but I didn't even guess that choice was going to lead to a more pragmatic alternative to assassination. I just assumed this was the standard, "Well, can't kill him. So just turn him loose and hope he never does anything bad ever again," BioWare non-solution.

 

On at least one thing we can agree, though--the scene was confusing.

[robertthebard]

Fair point and if you want to play it like that, great. However, there could be much more at stake than a Spymaster doing her job. If you play with a Leliana/Warden romance world state, the Inquisitor gets a letter asking that s/he tries to steer Leliana back to who she was. It mirrors the soft vs. hardened Leliana in DA:O though on a world scale.
 

Spoiler

I was not there for the death of Divine Justinia, but I know it will have hurt her terribly. While her wits and her skill are amazing, Leliana’s greatest strength lies in her faith, and to have Justinia die strikes at her very core. I beg you, if she is faltering, help her find her way back into the light.

 
In the beginning of DA:I Leliana is very different from the Chantry sister from Lothering, but after she is steered back from a harder edge (which both the Warden and the Divine seem to want) you get a glimpse of the Leliana from the first game. That's the great thing about RPGs. You can play them in so many varied ways.

Now you're starting to get to what I'm talking about: You're actively trying to soften Leliana, if you don't want her to be batshit crazy. This means that you must take every opportunity you're presented to do so. I'm not sure it even matters most of the time, but if I'm running for a "soft" Leliana, I don't even send her on the War Table missions where she's going to have someone killed outright. Contrary to what some have put forward in this thread, we're not out randomly killing everyone we meet. It's not like the apostates or rogue Templars are going to sit down to tea if we don't attack them first, they will, in fact, attack us, no matter what we do or try to say; see Cassandra and Solas trying to appease groups when we go to the Crossroads the first time. It's not like Butler isn't doomed to die anyway; if Leliana brings him in, there's never a trial, and I know I never went down to the cells under the Chantry to get him/her out.

It's no different from the Hardening process in Origins, if you miss a step, you don't get it. The same principle applies here, only initially, we're not talking about how Leliana is, we're talking about how the Inquisition is viewed; do you want to be viewed as ruthless or compassionate. The fact that the game provides you with a choice on that means that it matters in some way. It's up to you to seize it or not. If you don't, however, then you're going to miss out on an opportunity, and that's the way it should be; if you don't take advantage of an opportunity to do something, you shouldn't be able to do it.

[Vicious1915]

Since this was my first Dragon Age game, and I stopped shortly in to go back and play the first two, I'm waaaay late to this thread; however, I have to say it somewhere: Leliana blaming me for letting her be who she is really irritated me. My Inquisitor didn't know any of these people and certainly was not prepared to take on this burden. I let them do as they felt best, as I've done with all my party. They are who they are and it's not up to me to force them into being who they're not (from a role playing perspective). This manifested in struggles between myself and Solas, for instance, but never once did he act as though his decisions were not his own...

 

So after she berated me for attempting to talk her into letting her duty as the Left Hand go, apparently based on "all I've said and made her do", I'm over her. She was never particularly easy to get on with in any instance, despite my best efforts. Still makes me sad not to get on well with someone on my team, but I've had to learn in this series you can't please everyone.

[9TailsFox]

You and I have completely different reads on this scene. It's not about being "afraid" to speak up. It's about being smart enough not to make an ass out of yourself in front of your spymaster. It's about knowing how to play politics. About observing and learning before you take charge. Otherwise you're just a big brash idiot, albeit, perhaps, with noble intentions.

 

The way the choice is written, it doesn't say, "Killing him is not a wise idea when he can still be useful." It read to me more like, "Ewww. Do we have to kill him? Blood is icky." 

 

Apparently, the resulting dialogue from choosing that option characterized your Inquisitor's sentiments differently, but I didn't even guess that choice was going to lead to a more pragmatic alternative to assassination. I just assumed this was the standard, "Well, can't kill him. So just turn him loose and hope he never does anything bad ever again," BioWare non-solution.

 

On at least one thing we can agree, though--the scene was confusing.

Yes this decision was executed bad, and at the bad time. My Inquisitor was killing is not punishment everyone can be useful even enemy, especially enemy. But first we are nobody and even we was leader of Inquisition why I even doubt my spymaster she gave me no reason to, and I don have all information Leliana have it.

[AnimalBoy]

I like seeing Leliana slitting throats and being cold and ruthless so i had no problem choosing to harden her. Let the blood flow in the chantry!