93 réponses à ce sujet

[Nykara]

I prefer how the Dragon Age dialogue works.

If only Bioware could take the best features from both ME and Dragon Age and put them together in one game it would be the most awesome game ever.

[MrFob]

This could be done with alternative systems to the P/R system.

1) Faction allegiances. Let's say you pick the mage side 4 or 5 times, then the Templars will not accept any deals from you. (In the ME universe, perhaps this might be Salarians vs Krogan. Other factions, of course could be added.)

 

2) NPC approval. If you constantly p!ss off some NPC then you won't be able to persuade them to do something. Maybe they even decide to betray you.

 

These two systems could also work in conjunction: each NPC belongs to a faction and doing something for or against that faction effects that NPC's approval.

 

I would actually make something like this highly specific to certain dialogues. Say, throughout the game, you talk to one character 6 times.

In the last conversation you want to convince the character of something. Now you have a couple of options to argue but if you chose a specific set of option in previous dialogue, you unlock success with a special extra option (which will otherwise fail), in which you can argue on the basis of your own reputation. (Doesn't have to be dialogue options with this character, could also be a mixture of dialogues, quest decisions, etc.)

 

They did try a similar thing with TIM's final persuasion in ME3 but only in very rudimentary terms (and worst, they greyed out the option rather then letting us fail with it). I'd like to see a system, similar to this improved upon.

 

It's a bit more to keep track of for developers but I wouldn't expect a lot of dialogues to have this. If it does pop up a few times though, it gives the impression that the other characters do remember you and can reference previous actions, which would be nice.

[wolfhowwl]

If they keep the system they need to work on thematic consistency.

[chris2365]

I agree that the dialogue/Paragon and Renegade systems need a rework. My major sticking points are the following:

 

1) Again, like many of you mentioned, it limits the opportunities for role play. For example, if I want to unlock dialogue options later in the game to increase my odds of having a more successful playthrough, then I have to stay consistently in character by picking Paragon or Renegade constantly. The problem with this is that after a certain point, I wouldn't even think much about my response. I would go straight to Paragon in order to max out my meter. Now, a few of you might mention ''Why not just switch it up every now and then and throw a neutral/renegade response into your session from time to time''. 

 

Which leads me to my second point

 

2) It just became too easy. It was obvious that picking Paragon and being a goody-too shoe all the time was the best way to play, since it maximized your EMS, saved more people, etc. I think there was ONE Renegade action in the entire trilogy that benefited in the long run (killing Rana Thanatopis), and that's not right. We should be forced to actually reflect on our choices, and get burned for choosing one or the other. In the trilogy, it basically came down too:

 

- Chose Paragon to be the best, the greatest, the nicest, etc.

- Chose Renegade to be the evilest, the jerk, the racist, etc.

 

When in reality, it should be more:

 

- Choose Paragon to be the idealist, the compromising, the one who might sacrifice objectives/missions for values/people

- Choose Renegade to be the realist, the uncompromising 'my way or the high way' guy, the practical one who choose to stick to the mission no matter what the cost

 

Now, this might resemble the idea the devs wanted to implement originally, but we all know it eventually reverted to what I described in my first set of points. And that's a problem, because sometimes, being practical and uncompromising should be the better option.

 

Here's a perfect example of what I think I Paragon should be forced to do in the Next Mass Effect, taken from one of my posts on another thread:

 

''Imagine this: On Virmire in ME1, you are given a special option (like a blue Paragon response) that you can use to convince Ashley and Kaidan that you can save both of them. You'll just split your squad. Shepard goes solo for one, 2 squadmates go for the other. Makes sense, right?

 

Only this option leads to the death of both Kaidan AND Ashley, since you and your squadmates get overwhelmed and have to pull back.

 

That's a good example of where being Paragon and trying to save and do it all can backfire, and we absolutely need more of this sort of situation in ME Next. Would a great amount of replayability, not to mention it would be a massive punch to the gut for the protaganist, and actually make you feel more accountable for every decision you make.

 

And it would make for intense moments like the best of the series, whether it's the Tuchunka decision, who you assign to what in the Suicide Mission, etc. Those were the best because you really had to think from an ethical/logical/practical/etc. perspective, instead of just padding your Paragon/Renegade meter.

[Mcfly616]

Morality is subjective. And for a lot of people, RPG is about creating a character, not playing a role. Creating a character that has elements of them into it (their own customized avatar). 

 and you're placed in the shoes/position/role of someone you will never be in everyday life. No matter what part of yourself you project on the character, you're playing a role. You're casting yourself as the part of the protagonist in a video game. You're only doing what you would do in those shoes.

 

 

No matter how you slice it, you play a role in the setting and narrative of any rpg. Hence why it's called a "role-playing" game.

[goishen]

Well, Patrick Weekes has been quoted as saying something to the effect of you could write a doctoral thesis on those few words that represent what you're gonna say (sorry, I forget what it's called internally).  I'm not gonna argue with him, nor am I gonna support him.  Just tossing that out there.

 

Your ideas of having factions working against one another wouldn't be all that great though.  In other words, did you know that in the first iteration of ME2, there was supposed to be a confrontation between Mordin and Grunt?  Like the one between Jack/Miranda and Tali/Legion?  Some of you might say cool.  Others, I think wouldn't be so hot.   Mordin used biological warfare on them to commit a war crime.  That means that Grunt's assessment of Mordin (and not to mention Wrex and all the other krogan) would be pretty freakin' low.  Especially once they found out what he did.

[Googlesaurus]

Well, Patrick Weekes has been quoted as saying something to the effect of you could write a doctoral thesis on those few words that represent what you're gonna say (sorry, I forget what it's called internally).  I'm not gonna argue with him, nor am I gonna support him.  Just tossing that out there.

 

Your ideas of having factions working against one another wouldn't be all that great though.  In other words, did you know that in the first iteration of ME2, there was supposed to be a confrontation between Mordin and Grunt?  Like the one between Jack/Miranda and Tali/Legion?  Some of you might say cool.  Others, I think wouldn't be so hot.   Mordin used biological warfare on them to commit a war crime.  That means that Grunt's assessment of Mordin (and not to mention Wrex and all the other krogan) would be pretty freakin' low.  Especially once they found out what he did.

 

For factions to work they need to be split along political/sociocultural/economic lines, not exclusively races. They don't need to be exclusively hostile either. They can be cooperative, ambivalent, or hostile depending on goals and attitudes. 

[goishen]

For factions to work they need to be split along political/sociocultural/economic lines, not exclusively races.

 

 

Right, you want me to go down that list and point out ways that krogans hate salarians/turians?

 

The only way it could work is to have everybody not on your ship affected by it.   And then, it would seem kind'a hinkey.

[Mcfly616]

Your ideas of having factions working against one another wouldn't be all that great though.  In other words, did you know that in the first iteration of ME2, there was supposed to be a confrontation between Mordin and Grunt?  Like the one between Jack/Miranda and Tali/Legion?  Some of you might say cool.  Others, I think wouldn't be so hot.   Mordin used biological warfare on them to commit a war crime.  That means that Grunt's assessment of Mordin (and not to mention Wrex and all the other krogan) would be pretty freakin' low.  Especially once they found out what he did.

 Sounds good to me. The only negative I see is that it would've become predictable after the first couple instances that crewmembers started beefing. If that were the case, I would take a Mordin/Grunt confrontation instead of the Miranda/Jack one. Miranda/Jack is small time compared to what Mordin/Grunt could've been. 

 

Jack and Miranda beefed because Jack blames Cerberus for her childhood horrors, and Miranda counters with the fact that it was a rogue cell. Whatever. Mordin was directly involved with the Genophage alteration, and the Genophage was a key motivator in the creation of Grunt. For someone who is trying to understand why or what he is, Grunt could've picked his brain or simply could've had a bone to pick. Mordin could've added some speculative insight. Sounds like some deep drama could've been had between the two

[Googlesaurus]

Right, you want me to go down that list and point out ways that krogans hate salarians/turians?

 

The only way it could work is to have everybody not on your ship affected by it.   And then, it would seem kind'a hinkey.

 

And yet, different krogan despise them for different reasons. ME1 Wrex looked down on Garrus for the turian's involvement in spreading his genophage and his opinion that Garrus was so sheltered by standard turian culture he couldn't comprehend the way the galaxy actually was. Weyrloc Guld certainly hates salarians as a species, but he wanted to use the genophage cure politically to dominate the other clans (and let a salarian scientist freely work within his lair in the process). Some, like Okeer, are too self-absorbed to give their prejudices much thought. 

 

That's the only way it would work if incompetent writers created it. There already exist illustrative models of how to tackle a non-simplistic, dynamic reputation system e.g. Alpha Protocol. 

[Maniccc]

The renegade paragon meter was definitely not a morality system.  It was a white knight vs jerk system more often than not, with occasional moral moments thrown in.

 

I understand it as a game mechanic, but it was just poorly implemented.  ME3 got it closer to right, but frankly, they should just toss it.

[Gothfather]

Can't say i agree with the OP at all.

 

Moral choices in a game should NOT be tied to a meter that is used to open up dialogue options EVER. It creates a situation where people make choices based on "gaming" the system, it forces all or nothing polarization which separates the player's actions from the character. You no longer are making decisions based on what is presented but rather what the "reward" is, in this case paragon/renegade points. And because the mechanic of the dialogue system are tied to this mechanic you can be "punished" for not playing the min/max game.

 

One of the best ambiguously moral choices of the series was the Legion loyalty quest in ME2 and the paragon/Renegade reward for the choice cheapened the whole experience of that quest. What made the choice so great was that there was no clear morally correct answer, do you remove free will from a group of intelligent being or do you kill them? Yet when you boil it down to the reward its clear, do I pick X that gives me A reward or do i pick y that gives me B reward. Why the hell would anyone want moral choices boiled down to such a primitive and clunky system? 

 

The Paragon/Renegade system mechanic punishes the player for not going all in on one side or the other. Why would anyone want a system that punishes you for not picking an extreme?

 

i like the idea of interrupts but why must they be tied to a morality system? Why must our moral choices be part of a morality system at all? people should react to our action specifically not to some abstracted gauge.

 

I hope that Bioware does not include various mechanics to ME4 just for the "sake of  the brand." 

[Gothfather]

Rpg is about playing a role. If you **** all over people the entire game, the ability to be a stand-up good guy and shining example of morality shouldn't even be available to the player past a certain point. 

Pffftt... yeah because that just eliminated two entire tropes of literature, the fall of a hero and the redemption of the villain. This idea that switching your moral perspective is not staying in character is utter crap. Hell Greek plays often have the rise, fall, and redemption of a character all in one play, the story of  Hercules is just such a story, but according to you that shouldn't be allowed.

 

A role is not limited to what moral compass you set your character by, some of the best stories told are those that CROSS moral divides.

[Mcfly616]

Pffftt... yeah because that just eliminated two entire tropes of literature, the fall of a hero and the redemption of the villain. This idea that switching your moral perspective is not staying in character is utter crap. Hell Greek plays often have the rise, fall, and redemption of a character all in one play, the story of  Hercules is just such a story, but according to you that shouldn't be allowed.

 

 PFFFFFFFFT....you're comparing Greek literature to Mass Effect. Too bad in literature there is a natural and cohesive progression to the fall and/or redemption of the character that never happens in Mass Effect. Instead Shepard comes off as a schizophrenic/bipolar whack job going from one extreme to the other. 

 

Nice try though.

[SNascimento]

Pffftt... yeah because that just eliminated two entire tropes of literature, the fall of a hero and the redemption of the villain. This idea that switching your moral perspective is not staying in character is utter crap. Hell Greek plays often have the rise, fall, and redemption of a character all in one play, the story of  Hercules is just such a story, but according to you that shouldn't be allowed.

 

A role is not limited to what moral compass you set your character by, some of the best stories told are those that CROSS moral divides.

Except the P/R system doesn't stop that. You can be an anti-alien extremist all across ME1 and still be able to save the council if you have a change of heart in the end. Same thing in ME2, you can be pro Cerberus all the way and in the end destroy the Collector Base. 

The choices that you won't be able to make generally involve social interactions. And it makes sense. If you're anti alien in a game for example, you shouldn't be able to convince someone in a major decision by saying you love aliens. 

[God]

 and you're placed in the shoes/position/role of someone you will never be in everyday life. No matter what part of yourself you project on the character, you're playing a role. You're casting yourself as the part of the protagonist in a video game. You're only doing what you would do in those shoes.

 

 

No matter how you slice it, you play a role in the setting and narrative of any rpg. Hence why it's called a "role-playing" game.

 

And that role is something you're creating yourself. We're talking past each other here. I'm talking about how the scale of the morality system shouldn't have to be external, universal, or affective of the narrative as a whole beyond physical constraints. You're defining an RPG to me. Which is redundant. I know what it is, and I agree with you. But that's not the point I was getting at.

[God]

Except the P/R system doesn't stop that. You can be an anti-alien extremist all across ME1 and still be able to save the council if you have a change of heart in the end. Same thing in ME2, you can be pro Cerberus all the way and in the end destroy the Collector Base. 

The choices that you won't be able to make generally involve social interactions. And it makes sense. If you're anti alien in a game for example, you shouldn't be able to convince someone in a major decision by saying you love aliens. 

 

I disagree with this. I think it should come down to what traits you put into your character, not have some arbitrary universal measurement of your alignment that somehow affects the setting. A more charismatic and cunning character for example can be silver-tongued to persuade anyone of just about anything. That's how I view it. Your character can be as anti-alien as Hitler was anti-Semitic, but if your character has a strong enough personality, he can convince anyone that he loves them and that the new, thinly veiled anti-alien law actually benefits aliens.

[God]

I agree with the idea of how you can cross moral divides successfully. I don't think you should have to be limited to staying within the constraints of one form of morality over another.

[Maniccc]

The problem with all this talk about redemption and falls, assigning motivations such as being sneaky, or pretending to be a friend to someone, etc. is that the game does not take these things into consideration.  Your Shep's motivations exist only in your, the player's, mind.  As such, there may come a time when you hit a point in a decision tree where you are forced to make one of two choices, neither of which conform to the motivations you've ascribed to your Shep.  What do you do then, when the choice you want to make, based on your head RP, is not available because the game developers did not put it in?

 

There is a difference between writing a story and playing through a pre-written one.  In truth, you are only able to play the character(s) the writers write for you.  This was a big point of contention in the ending of ME3, where people felt that the Shep they were controlling was somehow their Shep, and not one of a couple of pre-written versions they picked.  If ME was a story about redemption, or falls from grace, then we would get those sorts of choices in the story.  

 

But ME had nothing to do with that.  It is a typical "the demons are coming" story, and the Sheps they created are based on two models, one that is ruthless, one that is "heroic", if you will.  Hence, the only questions that have any validity regarding Shep's character or behavior, are the ones that fit into this paradigm.  So the question can only be these:  was this system well implemented?  what was right or wrong about the implementation of it in the various games?  should we even have such a system?

 

The complaint that pursuing renegade/paragon points affected your choices is a bit off the mark.  That was the point of the system, to push the player into one of the two Sheps the writers created for us to play.  This complaint, therefore, is either a misunderstanding of the game and the writing, or it's a complaint about Shep not being written so openly that players can shape him into anything desired.  Either way, both make the same mistake: thinking that it is possible to have a story driven game with a deep PC, while simultaneously allowing this PC to be anything created by the players.  It is just not possible to create 10 or more different Sheps, with different reactions, choices, dialogues, and so on, each of which fits a particular type of Shep.  The more shallow and blank your PC, the more open he will be to player choices.  The more depth and flavor the PC, the less freedom the player will have.

 

Take for instance, Mount and Blade.  Your character is a complete blank, and you can do most anything you want.  Betray your king, side with an exile king, become your own king, be loyal to one king, and so on.  You can have a fall or redemption in that game, if you want.  But this is only possible because there is no narrative; you are in a sandbox and create the narrative yourself.  In ME, however, you are in a linear story based game, where you are offered choices based on pre-written stories and outcomes, using one of two pre-written characters.  The paragon/renegade system was an attempt to encourage players to play as one of those two Sheps.  

 

Now, by the time ME3 rolled around, the system was changed enough so that you could go from playing one Shep to the other because players complained about the system as it was.  In other words, players wanted the blank character.  If you want a blank character, then you will get a shallow character, and the depth of him will not be in the writing, but only in the player's head.  And this is why I said in my earlier post, that there is no point in having any system like this at all.  They should just do what Mount and Blade did with the PC's followers in that game.  They like you or they don't based on your choices in the game, and that will be the personal consequence for the player's actions.

[SNascimento]

I disagree with this. I think it should come down to what traits you put into your character, not have some arbitrary universal measurement of your alignment that somehow affects the setting. A more charismatic and cunning character for example can be silver-tongued to persuade anyone of just about anything. That's how I view it. Your character can be as anti-alien as Hitler was anti-Semitic, but if your character has a strong enough personality, he can convince anyone that he loves them and that the new, thinly veiled anti-alien law actually benefits aliens.

But again, you can do that. While leveling up you can make your shepard more or less charismatic. And the P/R is less about being able to do something and more about how you do it. So in your example you can have a Shepard that would be able to convince people of something, but it will be in the way that fits his personality, or in gameplay terms, only the Paragon or the Renegade option would be available. The result would be the same in either one. 

[CosmoChakra]

The Renegade/Paragon system was a bit of an enigma to me. I would often wonder whether the blue and red coloured options meant altruistic and pragmatic choices or whether they represent compassionate and aggressive behaviour. It even conflated the two sometimes.

 

For the next game, they should consider keeping the wheel from ME3, but with a change. The red and blue coloured options should remain choices, while they players use additional buttons to implement the behaviour to complement the choice. 

 

Like for example,

 

Blue: Save Salarian

Red : Fight Krogan

 

Assuming the Left trigger provides compassionate reaction and the Right trigger provides an aggressive reaction. If I took the Red Option with the Left Trigger, it would show a compassionate dialogue about the choice while still taking a renegade choice.

 

This would be a neat feature to implement.

[Deebo305]

I don't like or dislike the system but I like how it helps shaped the PC personality and how other saw him. This is very similar to Hawke's 3 persona choices

Whereas in Inquisition, the Inquisitor will always sound so Neutral umtil an actual choice is made, makes them sound relatively boring during any ambient dialogue spoken by party members whereas in ME or DA2, peoole knew Shepard was a ruthless jerk; people knew Hawke was a sarcastic jokesters so if he tried to be intimidating they wouldn't take him seriously

I prefer if it stays rather than goes honestly

[Display Name Owner]

I wonder if it would help simply if it weren't so obvious which option was paragon and which was renegade. When I first played ME it took me (for some reason) a while to even realise that upper right was 'nice' and bottom right was 'mean', I was just picking whatever option felt right at the time. After I clocked on I wanted to keep doing that but I couldn't help being drawn to paragon to play a niceguy Shepard. But before that it was a bit more organic I guess.

[Gothfather]

Except the P/R system doesn't stop that. You can be an anti-alien extremist all across ME1 and still be able to save the council if you have a change of heart in the end. Same thing in ME2, you can be pro Cerberus all the way and in the end destroy the Collector Base. 

The choices that you won't be able to make generally involve social interactions. And it makes sense. If you're anti alien in a game for example, you shouldn't be able to convince someone in a major decision by saying you love aliens. 

The P/R system does not allow for this. You don't have to be anti-alien to be full renegade. Not all renegade responses are tied to being anti-alien, so a renegade Shepard doesn't preclude him from being pro alien. This is the problem with the P/R system it doesn't have any nuance. Its ham handed and adds little to the game. It promotes playing for the reward to open up dialogue options so you are no longer playing to the actual events of a given situation. Any system that promotes this is a bad system and shouldn't be incorporated into ME4, as ME4 is a perfect point to move to a more nuance system or better yet no morality system at all. Let our choices be our moral compass.

[Gothfather]

 PFFFFFFFFT....you're comparing Greek literature to Mass Effect. Too bad in literature there is a natural and cohesive progression to the fall and/or redemption of the character that never happens in Mass Effect. Instead Shepard comes off as a schizophrenic/bipolar whack job going from one extreme to the other. 

 

Nice try though.

 

Are you familiar with the story of Hercules? That guy is as "schizophrenic/bipolar as they come using your metrics. He goes from saving people from monsters to murdering his wife and children to being redeemed and obtaining godhood. Those a pretty huge extremes and having a system that allows for this, is a better role-playing tool than one that tries to straight jacket you into one position or another.

 

I never understood why some role-players get their panties in a ball over how someone else plays their character in a single player game. They take some huge cosmic offence to just knowing that someone isn't role-playing or worse yet isn't role-playing how their self appointed arbitrary rule set says they should be role-playing.

 

Let people play how they like. i am against the P/R system because it encourages and frankly punishes you for not playing "all in" to a given "side." yet people are not all good and all bad they are far more nuanced than the current system allows without massive penalties. It makes huge assumptions that a charismatic persuasive person must be "good," which completely eliminates the possibility to be the manipulative and charming bad guy. And it conversely equates being gruff and intimidating with being the "bad" guy. Which eliminates almost 1/2 of the characters from buddy cop movies, which are gruff and intimidating but are not renegades or bad guys. They are simply people who are not charming and use fear/intimidation to get people to do the right thing.

 

I really don't think a moral system should hamstring players, I see no need for one period. Let our individual choices be the yard stick of the universes' reaction to us. let skills like charm and intimidation be independent of the any morality system so that more nuanced character can be made and for the love of god let players stop getting their panties in a bunch trying to force other players to role-play by their own self appointed system of what they feel is appropriate RP.