109 réponses à ce sujet

[rda]

I'd gone one further and say I don't think Varric or Bianca really love each other the way I would think of love. The haven't lived together and have only seen each other in snatches over the last 15 or 20 years.

I find it very possible they're in lust with each other, and possible in love with the idealized version of what they think the other person is, but real, enduring love? I dunno.

You can't really know a person unless you've lived with them on a day in, day out basis, and once the bloom has worn off the rose,and you've seen your lover or spouse at their absolute best and worst. And then you make a choice whether to continue loving that person and working at the relationship or not.

The "I can't help it, I'm so in love you," type feelings are more ones I'd associate with lust or infatuation. Just my two cents, of course.

[Former_Fiend]

I'm going to try and be brief because I've ranted about this quite a bit in the Varric thread;

 

The story needs some resolution. There needs to be a choice made; either Varric and Bianca get together or Varric moves on with his life. Ideally, that would be an option in the hands of the player, because, you know, agency, but Bioware picking one and going with it is fine, too. 

 

Personally, I would select the option that has Varric getting on with his life. I've personally been in a similar situation - there were fewer assassins involved - and I speak from experience when I say he needs to move on.

[rda]

I'm going to try and be brief because I've ranted about this quite a bit in the Varric thread;
 
The story needs some resolution. There needs to be a choice made; either Varric and Bianca get together or Varric moves on with his life. Ideally, that would be an option in the hands of the player, because, you know, agency, but Bioware picking one and going with it is fine, too. 
 
Personally, I would select the option that has Varric getting on with his life. I've personally been in a similar situation - there were fewer assassins involved - and I speak from experience when I say he needs to move on.

Yep, a friend of mine was in a similar type situation, and I just said to him, "Dude, you know this is messed up and you deserve better, right?" And he got pissed for a while, but then ended up agreeing. And I think the fact that I and some of his other friends said something gave him the courage he needed to end the relationship.

[MWImexico]

...

I mean, we could, in previous games, harden people's personality, make someone give up blood magic and so on. Which means, being able to persuade someone to get out of a parasitical relationship, even if it is all very feelsuh, should be an option.

...

 

I suppose it's possible to convince someone of a lot of things depending of the quality of the reasons (arguments? I'm not sure this is the right word in english), you employ. The thing here is that 1) we are talking about attraction and feelings and 2) I can't think of a valuable rational and strong reason why he should adamantly think that now, that's enough for him; I think he should decide himself. His relationship with her is unconventional but not toxic in my opinion.

It's sad because if Varric was a love interest, he would have been my number one choice.

[Han Shot First]

Being in an emotionally and psychologically unhealthy relationship just because the heart wants what he heart wants, even that which is worse for it, is foolish. Which is why I am an advocate for choice. The Inquisitor should have a choice in persuading Varric to move on. 

 

 

 

Choice goes both ways and doesn't apply only to the Inquisitor.

 

Even if the Inquisitor chooses to lecture Varric on all that is wrong with that relationship, Varric (if he were a real person) would also have the choice of ignoring that advice. And  given how Varric's feelings towards Bianca have been portrayed, I don't think it would be very realistic for him to just do what the Inquisitor says. People usually don't end serious relationships just because someone they barely even know tells them to.

 

I think giving the Inquisitor the option of guiding Varric into ending that relationship would have fallen deep into video game logic, where the protagonist too often gets to play Hand of God.

 

 

 

As for Varric being an option for Femdwarfquisitor, it would have added an interesting dynamic and an interesting reason to play as a Female Dwarf.

 

And with that I think I now I understand the real motivation for this thread. This is a 'Varric should have been a LI' thread isn't it?

[Bayonet Hipshot]

*snip*

 

That's the whole point of a fantasy video game. For you, the player, to have agency and effect changes in the world. Not for you to watch an interactive movie.

 

What ? You can be the representative of a mythical God, can walk unharmed in the Fade, can decide the fate of nations, can decide the fate of a war, can decide the fate of a powerful organization....But we cannot have a hand in deciding how our followers can evolve and grow ? What kind of mad logic is that ? 

 

Varric is a character, not a real person. Even if he was a real person, he would at first be upset, then do some introspection and then change his opinion. You know, like how you hardened Leliana and Alistair in Dragon Age Origins. You say something blunt yet realistic straight to their faces, they spend time thinking about it and then they eventually change their mind. Its called character development.

 

Varric in this game only had character exposure in that we see more of Varric but we never really see Varric develop as a character. We get his character explained to us more but we never see him evolve. Moving on from an unhealthy long distance faux-relationship with a woman who has, on multiple occasions screwed him over, would have been a good character development.

 

This isn't "Varric should be an LI thread". This is about "Bianca should be been recruited or judged" & "Varric should move on" thread. Him being a possible romance option is a side effect. 

[Korva]

I find it impossible to not heavily side-eye any supposed concern for a character's (or real person's) well-being when it goes hand in hand with "they should break up so I can stake a claim on her/him instead". Even if the relationship in question is unhealthy and even if the concern is genuine, that's still blatantly selfish and just lays the foundations for another unhealthy relationship.

 

That said, I was entirely unimpressed by Bianca and definitely thought she was kind of a north-bound ogre's flatulent south end. She'd fall into "I'll tolerate her presence for your sake if you ask me to, but only as long as she behaves better than last time" territory for me. You don't have to be besties with every friend of a friend, but you don't have to suffer their BS either.

 

The quest itself was definitely way too short and too isolated. Pretty much all of the companion quests need more content, more consequences, more impact.

[Han Shot First]

That's the whole point of a fantasy video game. For you, the player, to have agency and effect changes in the world. Not for you to watch an interactive movie.

 

 

Good thing I never called for the game to be turned into an interactive movie. Let me repost what I said on the previous page:

 

 

 

While it can be interesting to sometimes have the protagonist influence the personalities or direction of companion characters, you have to be careful not to overdue it. And I think the Inquisitor playing Hand of God and ending Varric's relationship with Bianca would have been overdoing it.

 

I'm all for choice and consequence. What I'm not in favor of is having characters do things that are out of character, just for the sake of fanservice or giving the player character a chance to go on a power trip.

 

The problem for me is that It is out of character for Varric to discard Bianca, regardless of what the Inquisitor says.

 

Could the Inquisitor judging Bianca have been interesting? Sure, if it could lead to Varric rage quitting. With choices must come consequences after all. And those consequences must be believable. Varric wanting to date the Inquisitor after Bianca is thrown in the dungeon or executed...not so much.

[Reaver102]

I don't believe there is anyway for us to hold Bianca accountable due to the merchants guild.  The Inquisition, and for that matter the surface, is to dependent on lyrium.  Fighting a shadow war with the merchants guild would sunder the Inquisition's alliances.  

[Willowhugger]

To be fair, Bianca's mistake isn't even a mistake.

She consults with the Grey Wardens.

People who, people on this FORUM, would say are the last people on Earth to want the Blight to spread.

Why would you assume Thedas SATAN has infiltrated them.

It's kind of an out of context problem.

[tmp7704]

True, Varric is a grown man but the Inquisitor is a grown man or grown woman who can pity their best friend and persuade him to move on.

This is actually something that's touched upon elsewhere in DAI (with Cassandra, iirc) It goes along the lines of, "Only you can decide when it's time for you to move on."

Additionally whether you consider yourself their best friend doesn't mean they have to agree. As far as what we're shown in the game goes Varric's actual best friend is/was named Hawke.

[Willowhugger]

Varric is very clear he doesn't consider you a friend-friend.

He considers you his boss he admires, respects, and is kind of intimidated by.

Mostly because he considers you to be Jesus.

[LolaLei]

Varric is very clear he doesn't consider you a friend-friend.

He considers you his boss he admires, respects, and is kind of intimidated by.

Mostly because he considers you to be Jesus.

 

I liked how he considered Hawke to be his best friend, though I was sad that he was too intimidated by the Inquisitor to ever really become proper friends... always figured he'd be a little more open minded than that, lol.

[dragonflight288]

I liked one bit of dialogue. 

 

Bianca: My family isn't going to kill you.

Varric: So you say, and each time they send assassins. 

[dragonflight288]

I liked how he considered Hawke to be his best friend, though I was sad that he was too intimidated by the Inquisitor to ever really become proper friends... always figured he'd be a little more open minded than that, lol.

 

He invited me to play a good game of Wicked Grace where Cullen had to take the walk of shame. That was fun. 

[frylock23]

Let's be honest, it's a little hard to truly judge Bianca here. We don't ever get to see her at her best only while she's trying hard to fix up something that went horribly south on her despite what she thought were reasonable precautions as has been mentioned.

 

It's a little unfair to decide that she's always this unimpressive of a person based on just the one mission. As far as we know, Varric is most upset with her because she gave up a family secret and took steps to get the red lyrium studied without asking him, not because it turned out to be such a catastrophic mistake. After all, who could know how disastrous it would turn out to be? Basically, he's mad she didn't trust him more than anything else and it looks bad to find out that her lack of trust indirectly led to the breach.

[SpiritMuse]

Bianca discovered that Lyrium is sentient,

No, she discovered that lyrium is possibly alive, that's not the same thing. Bacteria are also alive, but hardly sentient.



I was really kind of liking Bianca, she was badass with a wicked sense of humor. Sure she made a big mistake but she did try to set it right best as she knew how and I even defended her to Varric. And then she told me she'd feed me my own eyeballs and I just went "What the fu-! What in the world did I do to deserve that?!"

Now I can only think of her as a selfish, possessive b*tch and I want nothing more than to tell Varric to get the hell away from that harpy. :/

[errantknight]

If Varric was unaware of what an effed up relationship he has with Bianca, or was pining in some way, I might have felt like my inquisitor should be able to say something, but he isn't unaware and he isn't pining. He's made a choice and while my inquisitor was totally giving him the hairy eyeball, it's his business. And while my inquisitor thought she messed up royally, he could see how such an unfortuate chain of events could happen. He found her gullible but not criminal. Besides, he's going to imprison the love of Varric's life? I don't think so, lol. Not even if he though she was kind of a ******.

[rda]

I'm calling shenanigans here. Varric told Bianca about the red lyrium. She knew what she was dealing with. And she went out and made a deal with some magister she didn't know (!!) who ended up working for Corypheus.

This isn't some, "Gee, that was an unfortunate chain of events that could've happened to anybody." That was epically criminal stupidity.

Her supply of red lyrium probably corrupted a number of Templars who ended up killing people.

This isn't a "whoops, my bad!" This is her negligence ended up killing people, or easily could have.

Sure, she doesn't deserve death, but she deserves a lot more punishment than walking free and saying, "Smell ya later!"

[Asakti]

There are two issues here, so I'll split them up:

 

Bianca and Fault:

To be honest, it is quite a bit failing that we can't decide to bring Bianca in.  Sure - we can judge the mayor of Crestwood for something he did a decade ago that isn't really related to the Inquisition.  But no, we can't judge Bianca for a thing she did that is tied directly to the plot.  How does that work?  I'm surprised it isn't in-game, because that would be relevant to the plot and also be a huge issue for Varric's character and his relationship to the Inquisitor/Inquisition.

 

Whether or not she is at fault, and whether or not she should pay a price could be up to the player, and obviously, be a point to debate for years to come.

 

Varric and Bianca - and the lack of resolution:

I love Bianca as a character.  She's clearly flawed, even if the Inquisitor doesn't get a chance to call her on it (Developers fault).  But I hate and loathe Bianca/Varric.  I've ranted about it on the Varric thread a few times.  The fact that we can't resolve the Bianca/Varric issue is also a huge flaw in the game.  A few people above have said we shouldn't be able to.  Really?  We can basically decide if Bull becomes Tal-Vashoth, but not whether Varric moves on from a crush/obsession/unhealthy relationship he's been in for 15 years.  Really?

 

Whether or not you think of Varric, Bianca and her reasons for standing him up at the altar and whatever, the relationship isn't healthy.  I don't find it sweet - and I really wish you had the chance of being the character we are at every other point in the game.  The player character is meant to involve her/himself into everyone's business and it is a really large gap that we can't in this situation.

[tmp7704]

And she went out and made a deal with some magister she didn't know (!!) who ended up working for Corypheus.

A Grey Warden mage, not magister. Considering it's the Grey Wardens who spent last thousand years or so keeping Corypheus from getting out it wasn't exactly the dumbest thing she could've done. Not to mention I think around the time she did it everyone who'd even knew about Corypheus still thought the guy was dead?

[tmp7704]

A few people above have said we shouldn't be able to.  Really?  We can basically decide if Bull becomes Tal-Vashoth, but not whether Varric moves on from a crush/obsession/unhealthy relationship he's been in for 15 years.  Really?

Yes, really. The player also can't make other characters fall in love and have relationship just because he/she wishes to. Why should Varric be the one exception to this?

You can ruin Iron Bull's reputation with the Qunari (something he already damaged a lot himself, and you can do it pretty much because he's already willing to do it) but you can't affect how he feels about his squad of mercenaries. These are two different things.

Besides how do you imagine this to work? "Oh Varric, you should really stop seeing Bianca, this is bad for you" "OK boss, since you say so." The heart doesn't work like that. Would you want to kill her to get her out of his life? Yeah, that's going to work well, too.

[errantknight]

I'm calling shenanigans here. Varric told Bianca about the red lyrium. She knew what she was dealing with. And she went out and made a deal with some magister she didn't know (!!) who ended up working for Corypheus.

This isn't some, "Gee, that was an unfortunate chain of events that could've happened to anybody." That was epically criminal stupidity.

Her supply of red lyrium probably corrupted a number of Templars who ended up killing people.

This isn't a "whoops, my bad!" This is her negligence ended up killing people, or easily could have.

Sure, she doesn't deserve death, but she deserves a lot more punishment than walking free and saying, "Smell ya later!"

I have issues with Bianca, but how the heck was she supposed to predict that the mage she recruited for research was in league with an ancient tevinter darkspawn? Just because the guy was tevinter, he wouldn't necessarily be evil. The results were more epic bad luck than anything else. A grey warden mage would be a good choice practically speaking, but the wardens don't exactly play nice with others. Even if she found one who was willing, the odds of them being allowed to do it would be slim.

[Mikka-chan]

Bianca didn't contact a Vint, did she?

 

From what I understand, she went straight to the Grey Wardens.  She talked to Larius or Janeka (neither who were Magisters).  Now, admittedly, Larius was basically a ghoul unless possession by Corphy cleaned him up real nice, but Janeka would seem a perfectly normal (if ambitious) Grey Warden Mage if Corphy was playing her to type as he did at the end of the Legacy DLC.

 

Yeah, the fact that it ended up getting the information to Corphy is horrible, but I don't think 'There was this blight infected thing so I went to the Grey Wardens' is something to be punished over.  It isn't possible for her to know 'Grey Warden is possessed by ancient darkspawn magister'.

[Korva]

Yeah, I don't think it's reasonable to act as if she recklessly sold out to Corypheus. He played her like he played many others. Whether it was a good idea to study the red lyrium as she did is up for debate, but going to a Grey Warden mage for help was the logical best choice in these circumstances. What made me dislike her is her deceptive and dismissive attitude followed up by that threat. It was like she refused to fully face up to the fact that she'd made a huge mistake that cannot be fixed simply by putting a pathetic little door on it.