At least this one isn't "I wants the Warden..."
Leliana is the only person with the resources to do the job of spymaster. You don't have to like it, but that is her job. Further, you might run the Inquisition, but it is Leliana, not the Inquisitor, who runs the spies.
@OP: At least you have one adviser who has similar views to your Inquisitor with Josephine.
Actually a spymaster isn't indispensable.
A network is what matters, not who runs it.
Leliana is merely who was selected to head it, that doesn't mean you couldn't behead her and find someone else
I guess it doesn't really matter, since kicking out an adviser would derail the game. You'd have a lot of back and forth between the Inquisitor and the other advisers, and you can't kick them all out if they're written to be more resistant, which Cassandra most certainly would be on the matter. I doubt she'd ever agree to giving one of her closest colleagues, one who also assisted her in putting this whole thing together in the first place, a kick out the door. To make her open to accepting this would totally gut her character. Then there's writing the new character, one who obviously would not be a candidate for the Divine, leaving Cassandra as the only option.
Leliana and Cass created Inquisition not you. They hired Cullen and Josie not you. They promoted you to be Inquisition. Even if you are CEO you can't still kick creators out. It's not like you are that higher than them.
But they did make me the Inquisitor didn't they? And they always wants my opinion and lets me decide for the most part what course of action we should take.
I believe they even express the inquisitor is the most important thing for the inquisition, and that he/she makes people believe in the cause.
So why can't I tell Leliana for example to stop her ruthless behaviour and tell her the Inquisition does not go around murdering people left and right?
A compassionate and forgiving inquisito does not fit into such an inquisition, and it seems odd to me you can't do anything about it (unless you soften her) but you should still be able to give her a piece of your mind and change her behaviour and the way she deals with things by giving orders not to ruthlessly murder everyone? There is no option to actually use your leadership role in many important decisions, which I think is a bit of a shame.
Even when she slit the throat of that chantry sister, I couldn't even express a reaction! Everytime someone is killed, I've always expressed sadness about it and have given people a piece of my mind when they've killed someone that I believe did not deserve it, but suddenly, Leliana slits the throat of someone, and my inquisitor does not even say a single word, let alone even react to it? She slit the throat of a defenceless woman and my inquisitor who has always been expressive about that, suddenly believes it is okay, because Leliana is so important to the inquisition? They could at least have given us an option to express our opinion or at least appear shocked!
But they did make me the Inquisitor didn't they? And they always wants my opinion and lets me decide for the most part what course of action we should take.
I believe they even express the inquisitor is the most important thing for the inquisition, and that he/she makes people believe in the cause.
So why can't I tell Leliana for example to stop her ruthless behaviour and tell her the Inquisition does not go around murdering people left and right?
A compassionate and forgiving inquisito does not fit into such an inquisition, and it seems odd to me you can't do anything about it (unless you soften her) but you should still be able to give her a piece of your mind and change her behaviour and the way she deals with things by giving orders not to ruthlessly murder everyone? There is no option to actually use your leadership role in many important decisions, which I think is a bit of a shame.
Even when she slit the throat of that chantry sister, I couldn't even express a reaction! Everytime someone is killed, I've always expressed sadness about it and have given people a piece of my mind when they've killed someone that I believe did not deserve it, but suddenly, Leliana slits the throat of someone, and my inquisitor does not even say a single word, let alone even react to it? She slit the throat of a defenceless woman and my inquisitor who has always been expressive about that, suddenly believes it is okay, because Leliana is so important to the inquisition? They could at least have given us an option to express our opinion or at least appear shocked!
For some reason whe can't control Inquisition much although we are it's public face and leader. If elf Inquisitor can't stop anyone in Inquisition calling her herald of Andraste I doubt compassionate Inquisitor can stop Leliana from murdering people.
I don't think that Bioware should have given us option to kick out essential people or demote them especially if they have been in Inquisition longer than you, but I agree with that reaction thing. There was lot of scenes where I would have want to disapprove what people did and show them that I don't support their actions. One was when Morrigan stabbed Abelas and my Inquisitor couldn't even get mad. Same with people calling my dalish Inquisitor herald of Andraste no matter how many times she has said that she believes in Elven gods, doesn't even like chantry and Andraste and has asked people to stop it.
So I do agree with reaction part, it could be even as far as threaten people you disaprove like that was last time when you went against my wishes or sth like that. But not kicking them out, since Inquisitor still isn't that much above everyone and game wouldn't work.
There should at least've been the option to kick out Vivi after her childish little furniture game.
I guess it doesn't really matter, since kicking out an adviser would derail the game. You'd have a lot of back and forth between the Inquisitor and the other advisers, and you can't kick them all out if they're written to be more resistant, which Cassandra most certainly would be on the matter. I doubt she'd ever agree to giving one of her closest colleagues, one who also assisted her in putting this whole thing together in the first place, a kick out the door. To make her open to accepting this would totally gut her character. Then there's writing the new character, one who obviously would not be a candidate for the Divine, leaving Cassandra as the only option.
Given the circumstances, I don't think it would be out of character for Cassandra to support the Inquisitor over Leliana. Rather the opposite. Following orders and not being a crazy murderer are things she can get behind, and someone who cares about Leliana should care about saving her soul, too.
Now, there are strong out of character reasons why firing Leliana would be difficult to accommodate, but if Bioware wasn't prepared to put in the resources, they shouldn't have written a situation that destroys the Inquisitor's working relationship with her. If they'd just had her reluctantly obey orders while remaining the same ruthless person who wants to kill Natalie and anyone else vaguely threatening, at least that would have left some room to work together until Corypheus was done with. But that's not what they decided to do, and that pretty much breaks my character.
Well said and I agree. It seems odd to me that nobody responds to Leliana's sudden ruthless behaviour, and I imagene Cassandra would surely have something to say about that.
I believe Josephine comments on Leliana after the quest where she slits the throat of the chantry sister, and she was definitely worried. And the orders she gives to one of her spies after the quest is definitely worrying and it seems off that you can't express your inquisitors opinion on such a huge change to a character.
I don't remember him doing that, when does he do this? I want to like Cullen and believe he's a better person now, but maybe I've been reading too many Cullen-hate tags in Tumblr cause that's where my uneasiness comes from, so if there is proof I'd like to hear it.
Hmmmm.
“Acknowledges” was a poor word choice, “understands” would have been more fitting.
Here’s the thing:
Cullen is not a mage apologist.
If you are looking for a bit of dialogue that says, “Mages are all wonderful people, they would never turn to blood magic and demon summoning if it weren’t for evil Templars” then as far as I know there isn’t one. He doesn’t believe that and more importantly, it’s objectively wrong.
Uldred and friends, the ones responsible for his PTSD, weren’t poor abused little things only fighting back against the evil of evil Templars. Tarohne, the blood mage from the mission where we first meet Cullen in DA2 isn’t some trod upon underdog desperate to protect herself. She is a nasty woman implanting demons into young Templar recruits because she’s a power-hungry nutjob. For every tale of a poor circle mage abused there is one of a maleficar who acts entirely out of ambition, selfishness or quite frankly, the crazies.
Now, that said, just because he doesn’t go out of his way to excuse the actions of Kirkwall’s more undesirables, does not mean he doesn’t recognize that the Templar Order committed many injustices against the mages in Kirkwall. And that those injustices created the situation Kirkwall, and the rest of Thedas is still suffering from.
He does.
He knows Meredith was in the wrong. He knows he was in the wrong for following her as long as he did. He blames himself for it. And even if the Inquisitor tries to excuse him, he’ll tell her she’s wrong. There is a conversation at Skyhold sometime after Perserverance where you ask him about his regrets and he makes all that clear.
His write-up in WoT2 also explains his headspace during his time in Kirkwall pretty well. There’s a line in there about how he started to notice that things weren’t as okay as he thought in the Circle because the mages there had a fear in their eyes that matched his own and that worried him because they were the people he was responsible for protecting. (Please excuse me while I go have some Cullen feels)
WoT2 also makes it clear that the other Templars didn’t really like or trust him. This is likely why people like Thrask didn’t go to him with their concerns about the abuses in the Circle. So his ignorance about the severity of the situation was a combination of his own fear of mages keeping him from getting close to them (as he did before Uldred) and the better Templars not thinking they could approach him.
Nice friendly guy who cares about mages gets traumatized, takes a hardline approach to controlling mages, causing him to miss how terribly the mages are treated in Kirkwall until it’s too late, spends years fixing the aftermath before joining the Inquisition to atone for his mistakes and try to make the world a better place for everyone.
That’s pretty much his entire character arc in a nutshell. So… yes. Cullen understands that many of the problems in the Circle were because of the way the mages were treated. When he tells the Inquisitor he wants to atone, what do people think he means?
Oh Maker, not another Cullen thread ...
All threads should be Cullen threads. 
Actually a spymaster isn't indispensable.
A network is what matters, not who runs it.
Leliana is merely who was selected to head it, that doesn't mean you couldn't behead her and find someone else
And who would you choose? Why would any of the spies come to you over her? Particularly if you killed her for a petty reason.
Hmmmm.
“Acknowledges” was a poor word choice, “understands” would have been more fitting.
Here’s the thing:
Cullen is not a mage apologist.
If you are looking for a bit of dialogue that says, “Mages are all wonderful people, they would never turn to blood magic and demon summoning if it weren’t for evil Templars” then as far as I know there isn’t one. He doesn’t believe that and more importantly, it’s objectively wrong.
Uldred and friends, the ones responsible for his PTSD, weren’t poor abused little things only fighting back against the evil of evil Templars. Tarohne, the blood mage from the mission where we first meet Cullen in DA2 isn’t some trod upon underdog desperate to protect herself. She is a nasty woman implanting demons into young Templar recruits because she’s a power-hungry nutjob. For every tale of a poor circle mage abused there is one of a maleficar who acts entirely out of ambition, selfishness or quite frankly, the crazies.
Now, that said, just because he doesn’t go out of his way to excuse the actions of Kirkwall’s more undesirables, does not mean he doesn’t recognize that the Templar Order committed many injustices against the mages in Kirkwall. And that those injustices created the situation Kirkwall, and the rest of Thedas is still suffering from.
He does.
He knows Meredith was in the wrong. He knows he was in the wrong for following her as long as he did. He blames himself for it. And even if the Inquisitor tries to excuse him, he’ll tell her she’s wrong. There is a conversation at Skyhold sometime after Perserverance where you ask him about his regrets and he makes all that clear.
His write-up in WoT2 also explains his headspace during his time in Kirkwall pretty well. There’s a line in there about how he started to notice that things weren’t as okay as he thought in the Circle because the mages there had a fear in their eyes that matched his own and that worried him because they were the people he was responsible for protecting. (Please excuse me while I go have some Cullen feels)
WoT2 also makes it clear that the other Templars didn’t really like or trust him. This is likely why people like Thrask didn’t go to him with their concerns about the abuses in the Circle. So his ignorance about the severity of the situation was a combination of his own fear of mages keeping him from getting close to them (as he did before Uldred) and the better Templars not thinking they could approach him.
Nice friendly guy who cares about mages gets traumatized, takes a hardline approach to controlling mages, causing him to miss how terribly the mages are treated in Kirkwall until it’s too late, spends years fixing the aftermath before joining the Inquisition to atone for his mistakes and try to make the world a better place for everyone.
That’s pretty much his entire character arc in a nutshell. So… yes. Cullen understands that many of the problems in the Circle were because of the way the mages were treated. When he tells the Inquisitor he wants to atone, what do people think he means?
Thanks for the write up, this is a good explanation. But that part about Cullen coming to the realization that Meredith was wrong raises a question mark in my mind when he says in Inquisition "Meredith's methods were harsh, but they kept the people safe" because, to me, her methods weren't keeping Mages safe and were making the situation in Kirkwall worse.
Then again, I would fit under your description of a Mage Apologist. Although for me it'd be more like "Mages are people and should have the same freedoms, trust, and respect as any person without Magic. We shouldn't automatically treat them as dangerous as that attitude, more often than not, leads to the dehumanization of Mages and a self-fulfilling prophecy of possession and destruction (like the saying, tell a man they are a monster enough times and they start to believe it). But this does't give them free reign to do whatever they want, just as we wouldn't allow a person without Magic to unapologetically rob or kill someone. And many cases of Blood Magic and Demon Summoning are the result of victims of abuse (whether it be physical, psychological, or spiritual) lashing out at the toxic, and arguably abusive, elements, teachings, and practices that are prevalent in the Chantry, Circles, and Templar Order. Though not all of them may be that way; they may also be the result of Mages who want to hurt or enslave others, even Mages, out of a desire for power and should be stopped."
Now this is starting to look like an except from Anders' manifesto so I'll stop cause I don't don't want to derail this with Mage Rights, Templars v Mages, etc.
He says that yes. . .
"You still regret the man you became after leaving Ferelden?"
"After the Fereldan Circle, I thought all mages were like the ones there. Knight-Commander Meredith's methods were harsh, but they kept people safe."
"You've said Meredith was unstable"
"She was my Knight-Commander. I had no reason to distrust her. She wasn't wrong about the blood mages in Kirkwall. Meredith encouraged my anger towards the mages. But there was only so far I would go, and she knew that too. I was her second in command, but she kept decisions from me-- those i would question. I believed she was serving the city. I never thought to question her. Not until it was too late."
"You can't control everything. You stood up to her in the end."
"If I hadn't, would i be like her now? I wanted mages locked away as much as she did. I trusted they were treated reasonably well, but I should have done more. I should have looked into it. It is not yet enough. The Inquisition is my chance to atone. I will see it through."
. . . and everything he says after that makes it clear he was wrong and he knows it. So I don't understand why that one line is the one that is focused on.
Fair enough, thanks. I feel better about Cullen now.
And who would you choose? Why would any of the spies come to you over her? Particularly if you killed her for a petty reason.
I like Cullen, when he's in cutscenes and in dialogue he strikes me as a compassionate and nice guy, but it's some of his war table missions that bother me. His opinions on how to deal with things on some of his war table missions are disturbing, so I don't use him often anymore. It seems to me that his personality is different on the war table than outside.
in support of cullen, you need to keep in mind that he was/is a templar. templars are warriors and as such train in strategy and war and the first thing he would have been taught to put aside was person feelings and beliefs for what was best for the situation. to look at it objectively and say we could do this and that might happen, which would cause us problems later or we could do that and solve the problem entirely. it doesn't always work but he tries. the main problem with this kind of thinking is the human condition. the first part of the human condition is the compassion you were speaking of if you give everyone a second chance you end up with more problems then not (think jack the ripper having a second chance) the second is that humans do not act logically or with instinct. best example. the tsunami that wipes out that place in Asia, wave appears, the tide drops like 150m all animals run for the hills away from the sea and people run towards it. on average people are stupid and need to be told what to do even if they don't like it.
I the messiah?
Ah, you're another one of those "The Inquisitor can do anything types..."
Tell me, what skill does the Inquisitor have in running spies? (none are displayed in game). What information does the Inquisitor have to manage the spies? Where does the Inquisitor know where to send them? What groundwork has the Inqusitor laid?
The answer is: None of these. The Inquisitor has no skill in running spies, that's not the Inquisitor's job. Leliana has the network, the contacts, and the framework needed to run this. Those spies do not follow you: You do not give orders to any spies: You give the orders to Leliana, and she ensures it gets done.
Unless you can prove (through actual game presentation, not headcanon) that the Inquisitor can do the job better, I'm just chalking this up to a tantrum.
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