375 réponses à ce sujet

[Addictress]

In point of fact most of the weak leads are handled on the war table.

Where the consequences have absolutely no bearing on the final battle that we can see.

OMG I came back to this thread.

*runs out again* fack

[Al Foley]

Where the consequences have absolutely no bearing on the final battle that we can see.

OMG I came back to this thread.

*runs out again* fack

...So?

[vbibbi]

Sorry, but when do exactly Inquisitor and their companions act as common scouts? Not only they move around areas that are rife with magical, demon-spouting portals only Inquisitor can close; most of the tasks are way more substantial than "investigating weak leads" or "getting rid of a handful of soldiers".

The examples of Hissing Wastes and the Oasis, as was mentioned above, are very weak leads. "The Venatori is up to something!" is not a strong military lead.

 

In point of fact most of the weak leads are handled on the war table. 

The war table has missions like: stopping an assassin after the ruler of Fereldan, finding the Venatori spy influencing the king of Nevarra, brokering a peace between Nevarra and Tevinter or Orlais and Fereldan, trying to gain influence with the Tevinter magisterium. Most of these are outside of the regions of the game so it makes sense that we can't do them personally (though it would have been nice to handle the Orlais-Fereldan treaty the Fereldan monarch assassination attempt) but they are examples of strong leads being used on the war table. The way the Hissing Wastes and Oasis are set up, they read like war table missions: we've identified Venatori agents searching through ruins, let's send some agents to disrupt operations and take the loot for ourselves.

[robertthebard]

How many of these times throughout history have these generals gone off personally to investigate these weak leads rather than sending underlings and abandoned their leadership role to act like a common soldier/scout?

 

Scout: "General, we have information that a small group of enemy soldiers might be hiding in the forest, we should send a detachment of soldiers to-"

General: "Cool, I'm gonna take my 3 buddies and we'll go wander around the forest and try to find them."

 

Not exactly sound strategy there.

When do we ever not send scouts in first?  How many of your underlings can close any rifts they may find?  I get it, let's ignore part of the story to justify "but I wanted to play the Sims instead of a DA game, where the protagonist actually has to be protagonistic", but hey, that's the nature of video games in general.  If I wanted to play a RTS game, I'd have bought one.

[In Exile]

How many of these times throughout history have these generals gone off personally to investigate these weak leads rather than sending underlings and abandoned their leadership role to act like a common soldier/scout?

 

Scout: "General, we have information that a small group of enemy soldiers might be hiding in the forest, we should send a detachment of soldiers to-"

General: "Cool, I'm gonna take my 3 buddies and we'll go wander around the forest and try to find them."

 

Not exactly sound strategy there.

 

You've just broken every single RPG, and illustrated the problem of every plot that doesn't revolve around, essentially, opportunistic grave robbers (i.e., adventurers). This is no less insane than the idea that the single two surviving Grey Wardens in Ferelden would 1) even remain there and 2) would risk something as valuable as the treaties demanding their assistance to go kill wolves in a forest for coin.

 

You either accept the basic premise of the RPG that the Protagonist is aware of his or her being an unkillable engine of death and taking insane and unjustified risks to do things personally at every instance, or you reject the basic premise of the setting. 

[malloc]

As someone who had much more fun with Origins then Inquisition, the answer to this will probably effect how I buy Bioware games in the future...

Doubt it.

 

-Their real time pause is being slowly integrated with a hack and slash. Which no problem with dual combat systems, just a problem when the combat system has not seen any innovation since the first game.

-Rigid class dependencies which limits customization.  Big issue for them, in game decisions are now limited to race and class rather then an actual representation of the abilities. I could put as much strength into my mage but I would never see a dialog option that helps me use my strength to solve a problem, unless it is class based.(This would be more than possible to do in shadowrun btw)

-They are heading for an psuedo-open world and spreading out fetch quests with no comparable urgency to the main story."Big baddy is trying to kill us all? Hold up fam let me catch these chickens first"

It's hard to have reactive choices when you are importing a whole bunch of content from previous games. Save import because more difficult with each series and you will most likely end up with very shallow consequences to your decisions or your decisions won't be addressed at all. Let us not forget, bringing decisions from previous generations of games with backwards compatibility is already a job in itself

[Al Foley]

I may get murdered for this....but I have long awaited the day when Lindsay Lohan would post on the BSN. 

[midnight tea]

Where the consequences have absolutely no bearing on the final battle that we can see.

 

They're not supposed to. I mean, why they even realistically should be? We don't just play to stop Corypheus, we play to secure power to do it and try and fix the broken world that allowed horrors like Corypheus rise in the first place. Unlike the Warden, who just gets ancient treaties and only has to focus on one or two obstacles that get in their way to securing alliances, there's actual, extensive work involved in running something as big as Inquisition and securing funds, allies, trade routes and assets in order to actually do stuff.

 

Of course, if the Inquisitor may just want to fully focus on Corypheus, guess what - they can actually do that. Although for the cost of many problems they could fix not being fixed and far more shaky reputation.

 

What was it that you mentioned before? Oh, right - "player agency". "Consequences"!

[AlanC9]

You either accept the basic premise of the RPG that the Protagonist is aware of his or her being an unkillable engine of death and taking insane and unjustified risks to do things personally at every instance, or you reject the basic premise of the setting.

Now I'm imagining a version of ME1 where they don't ever let Shepard off the ship because his imprint from the Beacon is irreplaceable.

[vbibbi]

You've just broken every single RPG, and illustrated the problem of every plot that doesn't revolve around, essentially, opportunistic grave robbers (i.e., adventurers). This is no less insane than the idea that the single two surviving Grey Wardens in Ferelden would 1) even remain there and 2) would risk something as valuable as the treaties demanding their assistance to go kill wolves in a forest for coin.

 

You either accept the basic premise of the RPG that the Protagonist is aware of his or her being an unkillable engine of death and taking insane and unjustified risks to do things personally at every instance, or you reject the basic premise of the setting. 

I agree inasmuch as we really do have to suspend disbelief that our PCs are able to accomplish all that we do with the help of Power Word: Reload. We can't take things too seriously, knowing that it's a tentative translation between a plausible story and how gameplay actually works.

 

My issue is more that there should be more of an issue dealing with the fact that only the PC can close these rifts, and that we still gladly face constant danger when losing means that the only person in Thedas who can close the Breach and all of the rifts dies and the world is screwed. It's part of the power fantasy that we are the only hope for the world, and that we're awesome enough that no one questions whether we should be escorted by dozens of troops to each rift we close, to make sure we're not overwhelmed and killed.

 

I'm veering off into waaaaay off topic, but I think it would be cool if DAI had the PC as a random Inquisition agent rather than the Herald. The Herald is a mysterious figure shielded from the public eye by Cassandra and the advisors. Once we rise far enough in the ranks to become part of the Inner Circle, we learn that the Herald really is just a figure head put there by the grace of the Anchor. Plot twist...the Herald is a dwarf/Dalish/Vashoth and not even Andrastean, and is a virtual prisoner of the Inquisition because they are the only person able to close the Breach. So we as an agent have the ability to take on an undercover leadership position in the Inquisition and follow a lot of the vanilla game's actions, just not as the Herald.

 

They're not supposed to. I mean, why they even realistically should be? We don't just play to stop Corypheus, we play to secure power to do it and try and fix the broken world that allowed horrors like Corypheus rise in the first place. Unlike the Warden, who just gets ancient treaties and only has to focus on one or two obstacles that get in their way to securing alliances, there's actual, extensive work involved in running something as big as Inquisition and securing funds, allies, trade routes and assets in order to actually do stuff.

 

Of course, if the Inquisitor may just want to fully focus on Corypheus, guess what - they can actually do that. Although for the cost of many problems they could fix not being fixed and far more shaky reputation.

 

What was it that you mentioned before? Oh, right - "player agency". "Consequences"!

Where are the consequences, though? The epilogue slides don't change if we didn't clear EdL from the red templars or if we didn't open the temple in the Oasis, or if we didn't close the rift in Crestwood. Yeah we can headcanon that an Inquisitor who does the bare minimum to reach Cory and kill him is less successful in restoring order than an Inquisitor who completes every quest, but that's not evident in game. Trespasser, two years after we stop Cory, doesn't have any difference in world state other than who is Divine and some of the companion quests. It doesn't even reflect whether we sided with mages or templars; templars aren't mentioned in the epilogue and mages reform the Circle and create the College regardless of our actions. Where are the consequences?

[vbibbi]

Now I'm imagining a version of ME1 where they don't ever let Shepard off the ship because his imprint from the Beacon is irreplaceable.

Realistically, the Alliance or the Council should have had an asari learn the beacon's information from Shepard, just like Shiala was able to partially do.

[Realmzmaster]

How many of these times throughout history have these generals gone off personally to investigate these weak leads rather than sending underlings and abandoned their leadership role to act like a common soldier/scout?

 

Scout: "General, we have information that a small group of enemy soldiers might be hiding in the forest, we should send a detachment of soldiers to-"

General: "Cool, I'm gonna take my 3 buddies and we'll go wander around the forest and try to find them."

 

Not exactly sound strategy there.

 

Many times, Hannibal after briefing his commanders would don simple warrior gear to help inspire his troops and fight in the front lines. Alexander the Great, Ramses II, Richard I of England, Erwin Rommel, George S. Patton and many generals in the Israeli army. These men lead by example from the front.

[AlanC9]

Realistically, the Alliance or the Council should have had an asari learn the beacon's information from Shepard, just like Shiala was able to partially do.

Of course, that would mean having the Reapers exposed right at the beginning. Probably a better outcome than having the Council be idiots all the way to ME3.

[kimgoold]

What Poodle said.
As much as a love DA:I, it really doesn't feel like it's even part of the DA world to me. So much so, that I don't even consider it as part of the same franchise.
Face it folks.....the good old days of Origins are long gone. Sadly

And I may cry. If they don't return to the better format of DAO and keep trying to reinvent the wheel I may stop playing altogether, I liked DAI but I LOVED DAO they barely could be called the same franchise now. I actually dread what they will unveil as their next Improvement. 

[AlanC9]

In your position, you should actually want Bio to keep trying stuff.

[Nefla]

Sorry, but when do exactly Inquisitor and their companions act as common scouts? Not only they move around areas that are rife with magical, demon-spouting portals only Inquisitor can close; most of the tasks are way more substantial than "investigating weak leads" or "getting rid of a handful of soldiers".

For one, the rifts shouldn't have been so plentiful. Making them so common was one thing that made them seem more like a nuisance than a threat. The fact that nearby NPCs are unaffected by them and don't react to them in any way is the other. You could completely ignore all of them aside from the ones you're forced to close in the self-contained story areas and it affects nothing in the game or the epilogue. Anyway, the whole "Venatori might be doing something three weeks journey from here" is an example of a weak lead that should be followed up by regular soldiers/scouts.  

 

You've just broken every single RPG, and illustrated the problem of every plot that doesn't revolve around, essentially, opportunistic grave robbers (i.e., adventurers). This is no less insane than the idea that the single two surviving Grey Wardens in Ferelden would 1) even remain there and 2) would risk something as valuable as the treaties demanding their assistance to go kill wolves in a forest for coin.

 

You either accept the basic premise of the RPG that the Protagonist is aware of his or her being an unkillable engine of death and taking insane and unjustified risks to do things personally at every instance, or you reject the basic premise of the setting. 

I would have been fine with the inquisitor had been killing wolves or following weak leads or whatever if they were already in that area for the main story (which I assume would give us a compelling reason for being there but then again there WAS that whole "randomly talk to Stroud/Loghain/Alistair in a cave in Crestwood rather than at Skyhold" so...). I'm not complaining that the hero is powerful or even that they shouldn't be risking themselves, I'm complaining that a leader is off doing menial tasks instead of leading. We're told the inquisitor leads the inquisition but the only leader-distinct decisions he can ever make are on the war table (which is optional, completely separate from the game, and affects nothing in-game 99% of the time) and the judgements and IMO it would have been better if instead of judgements we'd had the ability to decide someone's fate on the spot rather than have them appear at Skyhold later. It would have injected some more life and interaction into some of those quests. The "advisors" were in charge of everything and took care of everything and all we did was go where they told us and do what they told us.

 

As a leader it makes no sense that we'd wander off alone for weeks at a time on what might be a wild goose chase or not important enough to bother with. If we'd simply been an elite soldier for the inquisition then it would have made more sense.

 

I agree inasmuch as we really do have to suspend disbelief that our PCs are able to accomplish all that we do with the help of Power Word: Reload. We can't take things too seriously, knowing that it's a tentative translation between a plausible story and how gameplay actually works.

 

My issue is more that there should be more of an issue dealing with the fact that only the PC can close these rifts, and that we still gladly face constant danger when losing means that the only person in Thedas who can close the Breach and all of the rifts dies and the world is screwed. It's part of the power fantasy that we are the only hope for the world, and that we're awesome enough that no one questions whether we should be escorted by dozens of troops to each rift we close, to make sure we're not overwhelmed and killed.

 

I'm veering off into waaaaay off topic, but I think it would be cool if DAI had the PC as a random Inquisition agent rather than the Herald. The Herald is a mysterious figure shielded from the public eye by Cassandra and the advisors. Once we rise far enough in the ranks to become part of the Inner Circle, we learn that the Herald really is just a figure head put there by the grace of the Anchor. Plot twist...the Herald is a dwarf/Dalish/Vashoth and not even Andrastean, and is a virtual prisoner of the Inquisition because they are the only person able to close the Breach. So we as an agent have the ability to take on an undercover leadership position in the Inquisition and follow a lot of the vanilla game's actions, just not as the Herald.

 

Where are the consequences, though? The epilogue slides don't change if we didn't clear EdL from the red templars or if we didn't open the temple in the Oasis, or if we didn't close the rift in Crestwood. Yeah we can headcanon that an Inquisitor who does the bare minimum to reach Cory and kill him is less successful in restoring order than an Inquisitor who completes every quest, but that's not evident in game. Trespasser, two years after we stop Cory, doesn't have any difference in world state other than who is Divine and some of the companion quests. It doesn't even reflect whether we sided with mages or templars; templars aren't mentioned in the epilogue and mages reform the Circle and create the College regardless of our actions. Where are the consequences?

I agree that I wish the PC had been an agent rather than a figurehead.

 

Many times, Hannibal after briefing his commanders would don simple warrior gear to help inspire his troops and fight in the front lines. Alexander the Great, Ramses II, Richard I of England, Erwin Rommel, George S. Patton and many generals in the Israeli army. These men lead by example from the front.

I'm not talking about leading from the front, I'm talking about buggering off alone on a time consuming side trip over a rumor or a hunch (something a scout or group of grunts should do, not the leader).

[BansheeOwnage]

The examples of Hissing Wastes and the Oasis, as was mentioned above, are very weak leads. "The Venatori is up to something!" is not a strong military lead.

 

The war table has missions like: stopping an assassin after the ruler of Fereldan, finding the Venatori spy influencing the king of Nevarra, brokering a peace between Nevarra and Tevinter or Orlais and Fereldan, trying to gain influence with the Tevinter magisterium. Most of these are outside of the regions of the game so it makes sense that we can't do them personally (though it would have been nice to handle the Orlais-Fereldan treaty the Fereldan monarch assassination attempt) but they are examples of strong leads being used on the war table. The way the Hissing Wastes and Oasis are set up, they read like war table missions: we've identified Venatori agents searching through ruins, let's send some agents to disrupt operations and take the loot for ourselves.

About the bolded: Not necessarily. We get to visit places like Valence, the Shrine of Dumat, the area in VR where Josephine's quest took place, Vivienne's party, etc. Just because the War Table ops aren't in the maps we actually travel through doesn't mean we could never do them ourselves.

[Nefla]

About the bolded: Not necessarily. We get to visit places like Valence, the Shrine of Dumat, the area in VR where Josephine's quest took place, Vivienne's party, etc. Just because the War Table ops aren't in the maps we actually travel through doesn't mean we could never do them ourselves.

Very true, certain quests could have been in self contained areas.

[midnight tea]

Where are the consequences, though? The epilogue slides don't change if we didn't clear EdL from the red templars or if we didn't open the temple in the Oasis, or if we didn't close the rift in Crestwood. Yeah we can headcanon that an Inquisitor who does the bare minimum to reach Cory and kill him is less successful in restoring order than an Inquisitor who completes every quest, but that's not evident in game. Trespasser, two years after we stop Cory, doesn't have any difference in world state other than who is Divine and some of the companion quests. It doesn't even reflect whether we sided with mages or templars; templars aren't mentioned in the epilogue and mages reform the Circle and create the College regardless of our actions. Where are the consequences?

 

The consequences are obviously where you aren't looking, either intentionally or not. Realmzmaster has already explained that the DAI is less linear than DAO, hence the consequences don't necessarily impact the game in a linear fashion, which was my point.

 

Oasis gives us more resistant Inquisitor, and Crestwood gets us a slew of quests, influence and war table missions, including judging the mayor of Crestwood quest and ones that eventually lead to strengthening of merchant routs all across Thedas. And if you clear Emprise du Lion out of Templars and collect evidence leading to Samson, you get to visit Shrine of Dumat and get Dagna to make a rune - that is a full quest: with multiple cinematics and new locations. If you don't, you get to miss that and fight stronger Samson.

 

If these aren't consequences I don't know what is.

 

Add to that the fact that we don't know which consequences will be relevant in DA4 - we don't know what the consequence is there of drinking or not from the Well, do we? Yet they are in the Keep - same way, coincidentally, both whether we picked or conscripted mages or templars, as well as many main objectives in the zones, including the Oasis temple, closing rift in Crestwood, helping people in Emerald Graves or killing Imshael.

[midnight tea]

For one, the rifts shouldn't have been so plentiful. Making them so common was one thing that made them seem more like a nuisance than a threat. The fact that nearby NPCs are unaffected by them and don't react to them in any way is the other. 

 

Unaffected? Barring few exceptions there's nobody really close to rifts. And if a rift happens to open near a settlement, usually it's either abandoned or destroyed. And if there's a rift in the neighborhood what are poor sods supposed to do, other than leave them alone? It's established in the story that so long as the rift doesn't grow the demons stay near it.

 

As it stands most people are barred behind fortifications, or huddled together and guarded in places like Crossroads or Fairbanks' camp. And if you get to a point where you can have patrols dispatched, like in Exalted Plains or Emerald Graves, if the soldiers are close to the rifts, they will fight the demons.

 

 

 

You could completely ignore all of them aside from the ones you're forced to close in the self-contained story areas and it affects nothing in the game or the epilogue. Anyway, the whole "Venatori might be doing something three weeks journey from here" is an example of a weak lead that should be followed up by regular soldiers/scouts.  

 

Where exactly "Venatori might be doing something three weeks journey from here"? Hissing Wastes is not that far away from Western Approach, and scouring and securing the area where we have the Keep, as well as close to a place in which they've tried to summon the army of demons together with the Wardens, plus making sure that they don't get their hands on any potential ancient artifact (given that Cory is wielding one as well as it's interested with more) strikes me as pretty high on priority list.

[Nefla]

Unaffected? Barring few exceptions there's nobody really close to rifts. And if a rift happens to open near a settlement, usually it's either abandoned or destroyed. And if there's a rift in the neighborhood what are poor sods supposed to do, other than leave them alone? It's established in the story that so long as the rift doesn't grow the demons stay near it.

 

As it stands most people are barred behind fortifications, or huddled together and guarded in places like Crossroads or Fairbanks' camp. And if you get to a point where you can have patrols dispatched, like in Exalted Plains or Emerald Graves, if the soldiers are close to the rifts, they will fight the demons.

There's a rift right there on the horsemaster's farm and everyone just goes about their business like it's nothing. Nobody is farther than the equivalent of a few city blocks away from one and even those "huddled together" aren't really equipped to fight the demons (just look at the exalted plains) but they didn't even attempt to have the people react to or care about them. The only rift that affects anyone is the one in Crestwood under the lake but that's only because it raises the dead. Other than that people don't even complain about them or express fear that there are demons wandering around nearby. There's really no point in the plentiful small rifts aside from yet another menial task to grind power on. They certainly have no affect on the story and whether you close none of them or all of them has zero impact.

 

 

 

Where exactly "Venatori might be doing something three weeks journey from here"? Hissing Wastes is not that far away from Western Approach, and scouring and securing the area where we have the Keep, as well as close to a place in which they've tried to summon the army of demons together with the Wardens, plus making sure that they don't get their hands on any potential ancient artifact (given that Cory is wielding one as well as it's interested with more) strikes me as pretty high on priority list.

Sure, scouring and securing the area is a good idea...for squads of regular soldiers. Seriously, why would the leader be doing that especially if it turns out to be nothing? Why even have an army if we only have it in name? Why have mages and templars supposedly working for us when all they do is help power your mark or suppress the breach while you close it and then nothing? Why not just have them leave after doing that?

[BansheeOwnage]

 

Oasis gives us more resistant Inquisitor, and Crestwood gets us a slew of quests, influence and war table missions, including judging the mayor of Crestwood quest and ones that eventually lead to strengthening of merchant routs all across Thedas. And if you clear Emprise du Lion out of Templars and collect evidence leading to Samson, you get to visit Shrine of Dumat and get Dagna to make a rune - that is a full quest: with multiple cinematics and new locations. If you don't, you get to miss that and fight stronger Samson.

 

If these aren't consequences I don't know what is.

I personally wouldn't count a gameplay reward as a choice-consequence. Anyway, as far as the whole "Rifts don't affect anyone" thing goes, I agree. I think Nefla wants them to actively influence the area, to give you a real reason to deal with them. Like dragons attacking towns in Skyrim, or raiders attacking your settlements in Fallout. Ignore that, or handle it poorly, and bad things will happen. But the rifts pose no danger in DA:I, and conveniently only pop-out demons if you go close to them.

 

There is even one inside the fort the Andrastian cult occupies, and oddly, they don't get a lesson in common sense by having the object of their worship attack them.

[Realmzmaster]

For one, the rifts shouldn't have been so plentiful. Making them so common was one thing that made them seem more like a nuisance than a threat. The fact that nearby NPCs are unaffected by them and don't react to them in any way is the other. You could completely ignore all of them aside from the ones you're forced to close in the self-contained story areas and it affects nothing in the game or the epilogue. Anyway, the whole "Venatori might be doing something three weeks journey from here" is an example of a weak lead that should be followed up by regular soldiers/scouts.  

 

I would have been fine with the inquisitor had been killing wolves or following weak leads or whatever if they were already in that area for the main story (which I assume would give us a compelling reason for being there but then again there WAS that whole "randomly talk to Stroud/Loghain/Alistair in a cave in Crestwood rather than at Skyhold" so...). I'm not complaining that the hero is powerful or even that they shouldn't be risking themselves, I'm complaining that a leader is off doing menial tasks instead of leading. We're told the inquisitor leads the inquisition but the only leader-distinct decisions he can ever make are on the war table (which is optional, completely separate from the game, and affects nothing in-game 99% of the time) and the judgements and IMO it would have been better if instead of judgements we'd had the ability to decide someone's fate on the spot rather than have them appear at Skyhold later. It would have injected some more life and interaction into some of those quests. The "advisors" were in charge of everything and took care of everything and all we did was go where they told us and do what they told us.

 

As a leader it makes no sense that we'd wander off alone for weeks at a time on what might be a wild goose chase or not important enough to bother with. If we'd simply been an elite soldier for the inquisition then it would have made more sense.

 

I agree that I wish the PC had been an agent rather than a figurehead.

 

I'm not talking about leading from the front, I'm talking about buggering off alone on a time consuming side trip over a rumor or a hunch (something a scout or group of grunts should do, not the leader).

 

Rommel, Patton and many of the leaders I mentioned would do their own reconnaissance. So would many of the Israeli generals. In fact the Israeli generals would lead the raids and follow up leads themselves. Hannibal was known to lead scouts on missions to check out the enemy and leads that were brought back. It was not until the Civil War that generals and other leaders (colonels etc)  routinely started leading from the rear. In fact Mosby's Raiders lead by Colonel John S. Mosby who lead the raids and followed up leads on Union intrusions (no matter how weak they may seem).

[vbibbi]

Of course, that would mean having the Reapers exposed right at the beginning. Probably a better outcome than having the Council be idiots all the way to ME3.

Or at least Shep should have left his/her V. Secret Diary behind that contained all the doodles of Prothean civilization when they left for Ilos. Just in case.

[AlanC9]

Rommel, Patton and many of the leaders I mentioned would do their own reconnaissance. So would many of the Israeli generals. In fact the Israeli generals would lead the raids and follow up leads themselves. Hannibal was known to lead scouts on missions to check out the enemy and leads that were brought back. It was not until the Civil War that generals and other leaders (colonels etc)  routinely started leading from the rear. In fact Mosby's Raiders lead by Colonel John S. Mosby who lead the raids and followed up leads on Union intrusions (no matter how weak they may seem).

And IIRC Mosby got shot several times doing so. Once rifles came along this sort of conduct wasn't prudent in a commanding general.