314 réponses à ce sujet

[Cainhurst Crow]

So I'm playing Inquisition again after a long hiatus, and I have to say, it doesn't make much sense to me to even bother with the mages when it comes to forging alliances.

 

For one, the entire crux of the Mage/Templar war is that mages don't want to go back to the circle system and feel the templars are out of control, and the templars feeling that the mages have too much freedom and need to be put under more restrictions.

 

Siding with the mages doesn't accomplish anything in this initial breakdown, because the templars are still the lawful authority of the land who need to be persuaded against extremist actions and draconian restrictions, at least from the mages point of view. The templars are additionally the ones who are serving as the aggressors in this war, by that I mean the majority of the conflicts are templars going in to enforce the law, and mages responding with force. It doesn't seem likely that there are bands of marauding mages going around attacking templar encampments and such.

 

Bringing the templars under the power of the Inquisition not only allows the inquisition to have a nice bargining chip with the Mages, it also allows reforms to take place much quickly, thus resolving what the mages were rebelling about in the first place and removing one of the main reasons for their rebellion.

 

That's the practical side of things, story structure wise, here's why it's better.

 

Corypheus wants to bring tevinter into a new golden age, and make what is essentially a mage run paradise on thedas with him as god. Him going to the mages to turn them into his ideal form of mage makes sense, since he's such an ******* about mages being better then people. The entire plot unfolding with the Templars as well, from the intervention of Cole to the saving the order from self imploding to the characters involved, are all extremely well writen as well. Even the Envy demon is an extremely interesting boss battle as well as character.

 

Now let's compare that to the mage angle, which required time travel to explain away half of its plot points, and revolves around a character who does nothing but get in the way, and not even because of bad intentions, just because they suck at their jobs. Maybe its just me, but I don't think a plot should require time travel shinnanigans to hold its main storyline together, IE stopping the venatori from being dicks with time machines.

 

Additionally, I would argue that Calpernia makes a much more interesting villian than nothing templar Samson. A new character from tevinter who breaks the caste system and turns against her master, VS a jobber from the previous game who just did what he did for the lolz and the edge.

 

Overall, I think the story writers had 1 path they really wanted the story to go. And that was the inquisition saving the templar order, and as many mages as it can. Not the other way around.

[Toasted Llama]

The main argument for the mages is indeed "time travel", but because of how overpowered it is, many people see it as a 'good' argument for saving the mages. It's unfortunate how many people discard the templar option based on that. Additionally, I don't think many people realize how much freedom you can give mages by taking control of the order that abused them, even I did not think about that until you pointed it out. Great arguments!

[thesuperdarkone2]

You can feel that way but the game quite blatantly makes going to the mages a priority. Let's start off with why:

 

 

When you first get to Val Royeaux, the templars essentially tell you that you can go to hell and that they are their own power. Heck, Lucius straight up calls the templars who joined the Inquisition TRAITORS, so it's made blatantly clear the Templars want nothing to do with you. On the other hand, Fiona politely comes to you at great risk to herself and invites you to discuss a potential alliance. If you aren't a rampant mage-hater, there is literally no reason not to at least go to Redcliffe and hear the mages out.

 

Afterwards, you find out about the time rifts. After that, you find out that a bunch of Tevinters for some reason came all the way to Redcliffe to get the mages. Fiona not knowing about you should raise some concern. Not going to the church afterwards is the only way to justifiably consider going to the templars. If you do go, you learn about the Venatori, a group who is obsessed with you and is probably the closest thing you've got so far to discovering just who exactly caused the Breach, not to mention Dorian's warning how the time rifts are going to continue to expand and go farther. That is pretty much an immediate reason to deal with the mages.

 

Now, you've basically got a hostile enemy occupying territory practically next door to you with time magic that is starting to expand and are the primary suspects in finding the culprits who started the Breach. Before you suggest "lets get the Templars", your advisors straight up tell you that won't work as the Venatori are mobilizing for war and by the time you get the Templars, the mages will be long gone, plus your advisors straight up telling you actually assaulting Redcliffe Castle even with Templars would be seen as an act of war with Ferelden so that's out of the picture. So now you've got a hostile foreign power mobilizing for war who potentially caused the Breach that is right next door and will take the mages away from you if you try to get the Templars. That alone should be reason enough for why you should deal with the mages ASAP.

 

Furthermore, literally nothing indicates you'll lose the Templars if you help out the mages first, plus the plan to get the Templars involves essentially threatening them to help you. Something tells me the Templars wouldn't be too happy to help you when you threaten them into helping you.

 

Plus, finding out Cory's plans makes a lot more sense if you sided with the mages because they already happened but meanwhile the only reason you know about Cory's plans with  the templars is by finding papers the Envy demon left lying about and Envy gloating about the demon army. Sorry, but the mage method makes a lot more sense.

 

Furthermore, having to recruit Cole TWICE is just plain ridiculous. It makes sense having to recruit him if you sided with the mages but zero if you already recruited him after siding with the templars. It makes sense everyone is suspicious if he first came during the attack on Haven but little if he's already been around for a while after siding with the Templars. Plus, the interactions with the dying Roderick make more sense if Cole is the one with him rather than Dorian. 

 

Now lets talk about the Red Templars: 

 

If you sided with the templars, HOW IS THERE AN ARMY OF RED TEMPLARS STILL AROUND? It makes sense that the Venatori are still around if you sided with the mages because a majority of them are from Tevinter but it makes zero sense for the Red Templars to have a large presence if you helped the Red Templars. For starters, you prevented them from bolstering their army with the entire Templar order which should drastically reduce their numbers. Furthermore, you killed a lot of red templars while recruiting the mages so there should be even less. That brings up the question of how are the red templars still a fighting force if you sided with the templars? They are apparently large enough to stand up to the Orlesian army during WPHW despite that making no sense if you sided with the templars yet makes complete sense if you sided with the mages.

 

Furthermore, the Templars stop being relevant if Barris dies or you conscript them. There is no redemption arc in that case. Plus, the Templars get absolutely no mention in Trespasser apart from their rebellion against Divine Vivienne.

 

 

All things considered, the game blatantly wants you to go towards the mages. 

[thesuperdarkone2]

Edit:double post

[Dai Grepher]

True story OP.

 

The templars are also better because they are the stronger ally to have. Mages are weak against templars, which is why they needed to hire sellswords to help them.

 

Templars are also more respected by the people.

 

The Chantry also needs the templars for their own protection.

 

And yes, getting the templars under control should put the rebel mages at ease. So it makes sense to go after them. Getting the mages under control means nothing to the templars, because how do they know you really have them properly restrained?

 

If you look at it with hind sight, templars are still better because all the bad ones turned on you, and you killed all but one of them. And even Denam you can judge in various ways. So you only get loyal templars. The mages on the other hand were infiltrated with Venatori. So when you save the mages from Alexius at Redcliffe and recruit them, you're actually getting a lot of Venatori spies along with them.

 

And Calpernia is WAY better. She'll be in DA4 as a companion for sure.

[thesuperdarkone2]

True story OP.

 

The templars are also better because they are the stronger ally to have. Mages are weak against templars, which is why they needed to hire sellswords to help them.

 

Templars are also more respected by the people.

 

The Chantry also needs the templars for their own protection.

 

And yes, getting the templars under control should put the rebel mages at ease. So it makes sense to go after them. Getting the mages under control means nothing to the templars, because how do they know you really have them properly restrained?

 

If you look at it with hind sight, templars are still better because all the bad ones turned on you, and you killed all but one of them. And even Denam you can judge in various ways. So you only get loyal templars. The mages on the other hand were infiltrated with Venatori. So when you save the mages from Alexius at Redcliffe and recruit them, you're actually getting a lot of Venatori spies along with them.

 

And Calpernia is WAY better. She'll be in DA4 as a companion for sure.

The templar complaining that you aren't hunting mages if you recruit them and their whole rebellion against Divine Viv because she's a mage kind of confirm that no, you didn't kill every bad templar and mage-hate is still rampant.

[Cainhurst Crow]

-snip-

 

Two points.

 

1. It makes more sense to go for the Templars after Val Rouyeax precisely because they are hostile. The mages have pretty much assured you that they aren't going to be a proactive threat, unlike the templars. So, does it make more sense to get the support of a practically confirmed ally, or to neutralize a current threat who also happens to be the main cause of your allies other woes. Even if you can't get them on your side, you'd at least be able to do intel gathering.

 

2. There are red templars for the same reason there are red templars when you do the templar mission. Red lyrium was being given to the templars by Imposter Lucien. It makes sense that in the field or in some of the farther off bases, you would have small pockets of red templar fighters. In the same way you run into rogue mages who joined up with the Venatori out in the Forbidden Oasis.

[Dabrikishaw]

I don't know how many times this needs to be said, but I'll say it as many times as I need to: There is no wrong way to go between mages or Templars. Both paths are viable and make sense depending on player biases and roleplaying,

[thesuperdarkone2]

Two points.

 

1. It makes more sense to go for the Templars after Val Rouyeax precisely because they are hostile. The mages have pretty much assured you that they aren't going to be a proactive threat, unlike the templars. So, does it make more sense to get the support of a practically confirmed ally, or to neutralize a current threat who also happens to be the main cause of your allies other woes. Even if you can't get them on your side, you'd at least be able to do intel gathering.

 

2. There are red templars for the same reason there are red templars when you do the templar mission. Red lyrium was being given to the templars by Imposter Lucien. It makes sense that in the field or in some of the farther off bases, you would have small pockets of red templar fighters. In the same way you run into rogue mages who joined up with the Venatori out in the Forbidden Oasis.

1. Except the whole point of getting the aid of either faction is the you know, stop that whole GIANT DEMON RAINING HOLE IN THE SKY. I'd rather get the help of the people who were nice to me and are much closer than deal with the people who told to go to hell and are much farther away. You also seem to ignore the fact that your advisors straight up tell you the mages will be gone and doomed to slavery and blood sacrifice if you go to the templars. That should be a good reason to NOT go to the templars first if you actually care about mages.

 

2. While there would be small numbers of red templars still around, there shouldn't be enough for an army that could handle the Orlesian army during WPHW. Seriously, how are the red templars managing to even field that many if you sided with the templars? Also, what proof do you have that the mages in the Forbidden Oasis are just rogue mages that joined the Venatori? I'm pretty sure they always were Venatori mages.

[Cainhurst Crow]

1. Except the whole point of getting the aid of either faction is the you know, stop that whole GIANT DEMON RAINING HOLE IN THE SKY. I'd rather get the help of the people who were nice to me and are much closer than deal with the people who told to go to hell and are much farther away. You also seem to ignore the fact that your advisors straight up tell you the mages will be gone and doomed to slavery and blood sacrifice if you go to the templars. That should be a good reason to NOT go to the templars first if you actually care about mages.

 

2. While there would be small numbers of red templars still around, there shouldn't be enough for an army that could handle the Orlesian army during WPHW. Seriously, how are the red templars managing to even field that many if you sided with the templars? Also, what proof do you have that the mages in the Forbidden Oasis are just rogue mages that joined the Venatori? I'm pretty sure they always were Venatori mages.

 

You find journal entires from the venatori stating that the new mages from fereldan who joined up are crazy, that they don't give a **** about politics and just want to blow **** up/ kill people with magic for sport. And resort to blood magic even faster then some of the more trigger happy magisters they know.

[greenbrownblue]

So I'm playing Inquisition again after a long hiatus, and I have to say, it doesn't make much sense to me to even bother with the mages when it comes to forging alliances.

 

For one, the entire crux of the Mage/Templar war is that mages don't want to go back to the circle system and feel the templars are out of control, and the templars feeling that the mages have too much freedom and need to be put under more restrictions.

 

Siding with the mages doesn't accomplish anything in this initial breakdown, because the templars are still the lawful authority of the land who need to be persuaded against extremist actions and draconian restrictions, at least from the mages point of view. The templars are additionally the ones who are serving as the aggressors in this war, by that I mean the majority of the conflicts are templars going in to enforce the law, and mages responding with force. It doesn't seem likely that there are bands of marauding mages going around attacking templar encampments and such.

 

Bringing the templars under the power of the Inquisition not only allows the inquisition to have a nice bargining chip with the Mages, it also allows reforms to take place much quickly, thus resolving what the mages were rebelling about in the first place and removing one of the main reasons for their rebellion.

 

That's the practical side of things, story structure wise, here's why it's better.

 

Corypheus wants to bring tevinter into a new golden age, and make what is essentially a mage run paradise on thedas with him as god. Him going to the mages to turn them into his ideal form of mage makes sense, since he's such an ******* about mages being better then people. The entire plot unfolding with the Templars as well, from the intervention of Cole to the saving the order from self imploding to the characters involved, are all extremely well writen as well. Even the Envy demon is an extremely interesting boss battle as well as character.

 

Now let's compare that to the mage angle, which required time travel to explain away half of its plot points, and revolves around a character who does nothing but get in the way, and not even because of bad intentions, just because they suck at their jobs. Maybe its just me, but I don't think a plot should require time travel shinnanigans to hold its main storyline together, IE stopping the venatori from being dicks with time machines.

 

Additionally, I would argue that Calpernia makes a much more interesting villian than nothing templar Samson. A new character from tevinter who breaks the caste system and turns against her master, VS a jobber from the previous game who just did what he did for the lolz and the edge.

 

Overall, I think the story writers had 1 path they really wanted the story to go. And that was the inquisition saving the templar order, and as many mages as it can. Not the other way around.

Hmmm, I have a feeling that templars will become servants of the Titans in DA4 (or later) due to their lyrium addiction, I always side with mages because I feel pity for them. On the other hand, I understand the fear of Mages. Especially if one knows that a quasi-god mage (Fen'Harel) was responsible for ruining an entire civilization, because if he did not then other mages would destroy the entire world. Well, but looking at our real life history you do not need magic to destroy masses of people: Stalin (Russia), Mao (China), Hitler(Germany), Pol Pot (Cambodia). As always in Bioware games - morally difficult choices are never perfect solutions.

[AresKeith]

I don't know how many times this needs to be said, but I'll say it as many times as I need to: There is no wrong way to go between mages or Templars. Both paths are viable and make sense depending on player biases and roleplaying,

 

What is this logic doing here

[greenbrownblue]

I don't know how many times this needs to be said, but I'll say it as many times as I need to: There is no wrong way to go between mages or Templars. Both paths are viable and make sense depending on player biases and roleplaying,

EXACTLY!

[Fiery Phoenix]

What is this logic doing here

Intruding logic!

[thesuperdarkone2]

You find journal entires from the venatori stating that the new mages from fereldan who joined up are crazy, that they don't give a **** about politics and just want to blow **** up/ kill people with magic for sport. And resort to blood magic even faster then some of the more trigger happy magisters they know.

Example of one of these journals?

 

Also, funny how you ignored my other point. Maybe because it has facts?

[Cainhurst Crow]

Example of one of these journals?

 

Also, funny how you ignored my other point. Maybe because it has facts?

 

No, because your other point was your opinion. ". I'd rather get the help of the people who were nice to me and are much closer than deal with the people who told to go to hell and are much farther away." I'm not here to tell you that your logic in approaching the situation is wrong. Merely that I feel the story works a lot better from a lot of points, theme wise, narrative wise, and character motivation wise, in picking the templars and dealing with the consequences therein.

 

Anyway, one such entry from "Blood Spotted Venatori-Journal"

 

"Does the Elder One take power from demons? I've learned much about their summoning and binding. I was surprised to find so many I recognized from the Circle among the Venatori, but they talk freely of rites and rituals forbidden in the Imperium."

[Lazarillo]

I don't know how many times this needs to be said, but I'll say it as many times as I need to: There is no wrong way to go between mages or Templars. Both paths are viable and make sense depending on player biases and roleplaying,

 

There is one wrong way. Unfortunately, that way is making them mutually exclusive, which the game did.

That said, there are ultimately reasons to support or refuse either group; I agree that both groups are equally viable choices, depending on player/player character preferences.

[Cainhurst Crow]

I don't know how many times this needs to be said, but I'll say it as many times as I need to: There is no wrong way to go between mages or Templars. Both paths are viable and make sense depending on player biases and roleplaying,

 

Sure, Sure. In the same way that Erased and Sword Art Online are both animes that are fine depending on your interpretation. I just happen to be a fan of a well written redemption story and struggle against the old guard trope, and a huge anti-fan of time travel as a main point of a plot.

[MileyChicken]

So I'm playing Inquisition again after a long hiatus, and I have to say, it doesn't make much sense to me to even bother with the mages when it comes to forging alliances.

 

For one, the entire crux of the Mage/Templar war is that mages don't want to go back to the circle system and feel the templars are out of control, and the templars feeling that the mages have too much freedom and need to be put under more restrictions.

 

Siding with the mages doesn't accomplish anything in this initial breakdown, because the templars are still the lawful authority of the land who need to be persuaded against extremist actions and draconian restrictions, at least from the mages point of view. The templars are additionally the ones who are serving as the aggressors in this war, by that I mean the majority of the conflicts are templars going in to enforce the law, and mages responding with force. It doesn't seem likely that there are bands of marauding mages going around attacking templar encampments and such.

 

Bringing the templars under the power of the Inquisition not only allows the inquisition to have a nice bargining chip with the Mages, it also allows reforms to take place much quickly, thus resolving what the mages were rebelling about in the first place and removing one of the main reasons for their rebellion.

 

That's the practical side of things, story structure wise, here's why it's better.

 

Corypheus wants to bring tevinter into a new golden age, and make what is essentially a mage run paradise on thedas with him as god. Him going to the mages to turn them into his ideal form of mage makes sense, since he's such an ******* about mages being better then people. The entire plot unfolding with the Templars as well, from the intervention of Cole to the saving the order from self imploding to the characters involved, are all extremely well writen as well. Even the Envy demon is an extremely interesting boss battle as well as character.

 

Now let's compare that to the mage angle, which required time travel to explain away half of its plot points, and revolves around a character who does nothing but get in the way, and not even because of bad intentions, just because they suck at their jobs. Maybe its just me, but I don't think a plot should require time travel shinnanigans to hold its main storyline together, IE stopping the venatori from being dicks with time machines.

 

Additionally, I would argue that Calpernia makes a much more interesting villian than nothing templar Samson. A new character from tevinter who breaks the caste system and turns against her master, VS a jobber from the previous game who just did what he did for the lolz and the edge.

 

Overall, I think the story writers had 1 path they really wanted the story to go. And that was the inquisition saving the templar order, and as many mages as it can. Not the other way around.

 

Good post. Never really thought of it that way, but always had a preference to the Templar arc.

[robertthebard]

True story OP.

 

The templars are also better because they are the stronger ally to have. Mages are weak against templars, which is why they needed to hire sellswords to help them.

 

Templars are also more respected by the people.

 

The Chantry also needs the templars for their own protection.

 

And yes, getting the templars under control should put the rebel mages at ease. So it makes sense to go after them. Getting the mages under control means nothing to the templars, because how do they know you really have them properly restrained?

 

If you look at it with hind sight, templars are still better because all the bad ones turned on you, and you killed all but one of them. And even Denam you can judge in various ways. So you only get loyal templars. The mages on the other hand were infiltrated with Venatori. So when you save the mages from Alexius at Redcliffe and recruit them, you're actually getting a lot of Venatori spies along with them.

 

And Calpernia is WAY better. She'll be in DA4 as a companion for sure.

I was in Val Royeaux, while fearing them can be considered a form of respect, it's not the respect you're looking for.  This, like all other "may as well toss a coin" choices in the game has no right or wrong answer.  Either can be chosen with impunity for the aftermath, the only real difference it makes is who you fight at the ballista just before Cory does his reveal.

[Dabrikishaw]

There is one wrong way. Unfortunately, that way is making them mutually exclusive, which the game did.

That said, there are ultimately reasons to support or refuse either group; I agree that both groups are equally viable choices, depending on player/player character preferences.

Oh I agree that both should been recruitable. I even made a thread detailing why.

[thesuperdarkone2]

Sure, Sure. In the same way that Erased and Sword Art Online are both animes that are fine depending on your interpretation. I just happen to be a fan of a well written redemption story and struggle against the old guard trope, and a huge anti-fan of time travel as a main point of a plot.

Redemption? How are the Templars redeemed if you conscript them? Heck, the game pretty much confirms that mage hate still exists in the templars if you side with them. No, redemption doesn't occur

[thesuperdarkone2]

No, because your other point was your opinion. ". I'd rather get the help of the people who were nice to me and are much closer than deal with the people who told to go to hell and are much farther away." I'm not here to tell you that your logic in approaching the situation is wrong. Merely that I feel the story works a lot better from a lot of points, theme wise, narrative wise, and character motivation wise, in picking the templars and dealing with the consequences therein.

Funny considering this whole thread as literally your opinion. It's fine if you prefer the templars, but it's a whole different thing when you say and act as though the templar side is literally better in every single way and that the devs want you to side with the templars given how blatant they want you to actually go with the mages.

 

 

You also haven't refuted literally any of my other points. How is wanting to stop the Breach with the faction that is both closer and more friendly an opinion? Seems like you don't want to accept that there are holes in your faulty opinion

[Toasted Llama]

but it's a whole different thing when you say and act as though the templar side is literally better in every single way and that the devs want you to side with the templars given how blatant they want you to actually go with the mages.

 

Something with pot meets kettle? Are you being intentionally hypocritical? Either side being considered 'intended' by the developers is an opinion; for both sides.

[thesuperdarkone2]

Something with pot meets kettle? Are you being intentionally hypocritical? Either side being considered 'intended' by the developers is an opinion; for both sides.

Yet you appear totally fine when someone makes posts saying the templars are the devs preferred option. Hypocrite much?