There have been from great points here from both sides. While I'm not a fan of Vivi I still see her as a well written character that is very human.
One of the main reasons I'm not a fan of Vivienne is she acts like she above all the Mages. However, to me its who she is connected to, not her magic that got her that position. In some ways shes like a more self centered Wynne.
Just my opinion though.
Vivienne was one of the youngest full mages in Circle history. And that was in Ostwick, before she ever met Bastien and got involved in The Game. Her magic absolutely is that good.
Well if they are the norm, then we should be able to make the same claim about the Circles of Magi. Every Circle we encountered in the games was overrun by demons and annulled, so clearly the Circle system can't be working as intended.
Some Circles
weren't working as intended. Which is why I said, "it works well when it's working as intended." Put italics on the
as intended and everything.
Precisely and I would argue that the fact that the Circle system has never been without contention and ultimately failed as opposed to the several societies with free Mages that existed since before the Chantry and Templars, that the Circle was an ill conceived and useless institution that contributed to the problems it had been put in place to fix and prevent.
The Circle Tower system has never worked well nor how it was intended. Before Kirkwall, the Rite of Annulment was performed 13 times. And as Inquisitor Ameridan, a free Mage and leader of the Seekers, stated: The Rite of Tranquility was never meant to be a punishment. Cassandra's revelations concerning the Seekers also reveal ruined intentions.
The Circles existed for roughly 820 years. They've 'never worked well' is a pretty bold statement considering we're only familiar with the last 10. There were actually 17 annulments before Kirkwall, not 13. About 1 every 40 years, And in the last 10 years there are potentially 3. Perhaps that might be an indication of how very
different the previous 800 years were. At the very least, we should give them credit for the first 160 or so years before the Right of Anulment was created.
Yes, Tevinter devours its own. So does Ferelden and Orlais. As a player of The Game, Vivienne is one of the devourers. You cannot ignore the fact that the Dalish, Avvar and Chasind among others have free and perfectly integrated Mages in their societies with no ill consequences since before the Chantry and Templars. As we learned more about the Avvar it was clear that their Free Mages offered a robust benefit to their society, Mages and mundane alike.
Tevinter society is structered in a way that puts weak and inexperienced mages under the thumbs of Magisters as surely as they are under the Chantry's thumb in Southern Society. Possibly even moreso, in the case of mage slaves. If you want the majority of mages to answer to the whims of a Tevinter Magister rather than a First Enchanter, then yes, by all means. Let's have them emulate Tevinter.
The Dalish, the Chasind and the Avvar have completely different social structures. You can NOT impose their methods of integrating mages onto Southern Thedas and expect it to work. It won't. They are all examples of small insuler communities with a heavy focus on martial training among all of it's members, that are built entirely around answering to their mages and looking to them for guidance.
Templar abuses and suchlike are used as propaganda by the mage side just as abominations are used as propaganda by the templar side. All very predictable. However, at its heart. the war is a war of independence. One faction says "We want autonomy", the other says "We won't let you have it." Which means that the default position, as far as I'm concernced, should be pro-mage. As a rule, I consider the "We won't leave you alone and will force you into servitude" position a bully's position, and I detest and despise it to the end of the universe. Any justification to deny someone autonomy must be very, very compelling, and I am not seeing that it is.
This is, btw., independent from the question whether or not autonomy is a good idea from the perspective of those who demand it. Sometimes, it may not be, because an autonomous faction's strength may actually be weaker than its influence within a larger structure would've been. Nonetheless, I consider "I want to walk away" (akin to "I want to leave my country") a basic right that should not be denied without an extremely compelling justification. There's a reason why this is considered a human right.
This is, basically, why the "mage question" has always been loaded in the favor of mages, and why Bioware's attempts to create a less pro-mage narrative have largely failed until DAI. Because even assuming that all the positive pictures of the Circles were accurate and "good circles" dominated the scene, I'd consider "We want to walk away" a legitimate demand for the mages, and "We won't let you" evil by default.
As for the danger of possession, it is in the interest of any mage faction to contain that, regardless of where they stand ideologically, even if it's "only" to protect one's reputation. For instance, an independent mage school where people get possessed would soon be out of business. Take Tevinter, from where we don't hear of any cases. They should plausibly be as ruthless in containing abominations as any templar could demand. That's why this is not a compelling reason to deny mages independence.
As an addendum to my post on the previous page, two things:
(1) DAI was successful in creating a less pro-mage (or rather pro-rebellion) narrative exactly not by justifying the templars' cause (which would be doomed to fail like it did in DA2), but by presenting us with several mages who liked their lives in the Circles and didn't want the rebellion. Thus, the moral high ground still lies with "people have the right to live how they want to live", rather than "enforcement of servitude for the good of all".
(2) It is, of course, perfectly understandable that the Chantry doesn't want the mages to leave. That will, after all, weaken it considerably. Autonomy movements in the real world are resisted for the same reason. However, even where autonomy movements are terrorist and/or based on a racist ideology (some of the mages qualify, unfortunately), it is usually recognized by anyone but autocratic regimes that the demand for autonomy as such deserves consideration.
I am not denying the desirability of a specialized force capable of effectively containing magic and demons. I'm saying this should be run by the mage factions themselves. Especially, it should not be run by a religious organization ideologically opposed to magic. Templar-like skills aren't limited to the Templars after all. Like in any human community, things work out with the least amount of resentment if people feel that they're policed by their own. And of course, if it's actually a police force and their role isn't better described as "glorified goalers".
No Circle mage is in
servitude.
Not by the definition most people use. Which is
slavery.
They are not required to serve the Chantry in any way. Any money they make for work they choose to do either goes to the mage himself or to the Circle. If they are involved in any conflicts or wars it is at the discretion of the Circle's First Enchanter. Not by Chantry orders. There are multiple references to this. It's implicit in the purpose of the Lucrosian Fraternity. WoT2 references the Circles' wealth. There's also David Gaidar's own words.
Prisoners?
Yes.
Slaves?
Absolutely not.
I always find it a bit disturbing how easily people dismiss the dangers of possession.
Redcliffe is described as one of the largest, most prosperous towns in Ferelden. Without the PCs assistance, It is entirely wiped out by a single child abomination. It is possible that more innocents died in Redcliffe than there are mages in the average Circle.
That's
One untrained mage child.
Meredith's sister Amelia, an emotionally fragile girl, turned abomination and killed over seventy innocent people, including her own family. And that was with templars nearby to fight her and mitigate damage she could cause.
"Oh, but Dez, that's because their mommy's didn't want to send them to the Circle. Because the Chantry is evil! Bad examples!"
No.
That is what can happen in
any worldstate where young mages are not legally obligated to be turned over to the Circle, and even when parents choose to give their children up it has become prohibitively difficult to send their children away.
Completely autonomous Circles will
not have the numbers or the infrastructure to work. Mages are a tiny minority, few enough to fit into just 15 Circles across all of southern Thedas, most of which are just apprentices, and many of which won't be qualifed to teach or fight abominations or travel aound recruiting. They need the Templars and the Chantry to provide safe transportation and accessible ways for the common folk to seek help.
It takes weeks to travel across country, messengers are unreliable (and likewise take time), the average person has a very limited amount of funds, limited means of protection from the dangers of travel, no method of easy transportation and will not have the luxury of paid vacation time. Crops need to be planted and harvested, livestock need to be tended, goods need to be crafted and sold, or your family
starves to death.
With Circles under the Chantry's umbrella, qualified help was always as close as the nearest village, and the logistics were handled by them.
Without them...?
Even if they had sufficient numbers to police their own, you are making the assumption that when mages are free to do anything they choose, they will choose to serve the community, rather than seek personal power and glory, wealth, or a quiet family life. That belief is incredibly naive. To say the least.
If you want them to hire out, well . . . Tevinter has templars with no anti-magic powers that serve the mages interests. We've seen how well that works for them.
Tevinter society in general is not the place to be looking for any answers to "the mage question".
Tevinter mages exist in a highly stratified society where the weak and incompetent are either slaves to their betters, or killed by their rivals. And they do still run into trouble with out of control mages and abominations. Fenris had this to say during DA2's ending: "I hope you're prepared for what we are about to face. Desperation will drive these mages to terrible acts. I have seen it before. It will not be pretty. The Imperium has it's own templars, and they too must act when mages cross the line. The line is in a different place, but the end result is the same. We will see abominations born of terror and wrath, men you never believed capable of depravity embracing it gladly."
Even Dorian, who approves of the decision to ally with mages doesn't believe it's necessarily an entirely good thing: "You'd be a fool not to see where this could lead. Thing is the Imperium was once just like the south. Templars, proper Circles, all that rot. Then it changed. By inches. Not that this is a reason to oppress us. Still, my homeland should be a cautionary tale, not a source of inspiration."
The existence of mages who wanted to stay with the circle is not new to Inquisition. Even in Origins there were characters that liked Circle life, and even in Origins the benefits of living in the Circle were mentioned. There was an entire fraternity dedicated to that school of thought, arguably two if you consider Wynne's position typical of the Aequitarians. What
is new is that those characters are no longer living within the Circles and people have a harder time dismissing them as victims of Stockholm syndrome.
Wynne, like Vivienne was called privileged. Like Vivienne, it was said that she had no idea how 'real' Circle mages lived. Like Vivienne, it was ignored that she worked her way up to the point where she could simply ask the First Enchanter to leave and started out just like every other mage in the Circle.
So...
tl;dr Version: At it's heart, I'd say the argument is about security for the majority vs. freedom for a small minority. You can try to color the argument as one that is purely about independence and mage rights being trampled over. But that requires you completely ignore both the proven dangers and authorial intent. In short, it's an argument made from willfull ignorance rather than an objective examination of the facts.
If my neighbor had a child who could burn down the neighborhood because he had a nightmare, turn into a virtually unstoppable killing machine because someone offered him candy in a dream, or could accidentally fry my own children with lightning when they had an argument about toys-- I would not want him living there.
Perhaps you sincerely feel differently. But I suspect that if most people were honest about the realities of the situation instead of arguing from principle they would agree.
Principles are nice when you're talking about pixel people and it isn't actually you, your friends, or your family in danger.
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