4630 réponses à ce sujet

[Medhia_Nox]

That's not what I meant...

 

You bolded the portion of Xerrai's post that said, "He could have let the mark do you, let it consume you till you were torn up...but he didn't," and replied,

 

 

Which makes it seem like you didn't take the same meaning from the scene, which is that Solas does in fact save you in the Trespasser scene. Sure, all of his actions put you in danger in the first place, but he does save you in that one moment.

 

That is why I asked why you thought otherwise.

 

I see... I don't see it as "saving".  *shrugs* 

 

Which is why I wrote that I simply fail to appreciate his magnanimity.

 

EDIT:  @midnight tea:  Correction, I think you like an unfeeling monster.

 

Why, confounds me... but that's hardly relevant. What it says about you?  Nothing at all.  This is make believe... now, if you felt this way about someone who actually did these things in real life... I'd have an opinion.

[AlanC9]

If I poison you.. then give you the antidote.. is that "really" saving your life?

If I poisoned you by accident? Yes.

Or even if I did it deliberately and then changed my mind. That's just what the words mean.

[Sah291]

@Sah291:  Possible, though again I think they failed at that.  
 
Even "if" we were at fault... what would it matter?  On a meta-level "we" know we had no control.

To put you in the shoes of a wanted criminal. This makes more sense if you believe Hawke was once considered for protgainist, and that the game was picking up some of those storylines they didn't use in the DA2 expansion. But there are a lot of themes about justice and how criminals should be dealt with... Like, should the Inquisition go scorched earth for revenge, etc. The judgements, etc. Leliana's traitor.

They could have done it better. But that was the impression I got.

[Medhia_Nox]

@AlanC9:  That fact that you're a poisoner says tons about you (in this scenario).

 

"but change my mind"?!  

 

Seriously... if I tried to kill you, then decided to not kill you... you would just totally ignore that I tried in the first place? 

 

Again, this is why the game should have made you care about people at the Conclave and then had Solas kill them.

[midnight tea]

@midnight tea:  Correction, I think you like an unfeeling monster.

 

Why, confounds me... but that's hardly relevant. What it says about you?  Nothing at all.  This is make believe... now, if you felt this way about someone who actually did these things in real life... I'd have an opinion.

 

You have an opinion either way, because I see you sneering at people who don't adhere to your views on Solas here or outside of this thread.

 

And here's the thing - there's no such person like Solas in real life. There's no one who lived for millenia, changed the world and saw the collapse of his entire civilization and world as he knew caused by his actions and - driven by remorse and sense of duty - set to make things right again, even if it means drastic changes again and severe punishment for himself.

 

This is exactly what makes characters like Solas fascinating - he's an epitome of a saying "you either die a hero or see yourself turn into a villain", only in case of Solas it might be that his journey to villainhood may yet be disrupted. That you don't see a fascinating story or redeemable character here is something you're entitled to, but obviously there are people who see things differently than you, for variety of reasons, as exemplified by this thread.

[nightscrawl]

@AlanC9: That fact that you're a poisoner says tons about you (in this scenario).

"but change my mind"?!

Seriously... if I tried to kill you, then decided to not kill you... you would just totally ignore that I tried in the first place?

Again, this is why the game should have made you care about people at the Conclave and then had Solas kill them.

Referring to Solas's act in the final scene as "saving" you does not also mean that the person is ignoring that Solas is responsible for the need to be saved. But it is literally what "save" means -- to rescue from danger or possible harm. He saves your life in the scene. He prevents your death.
 
Sure, you can hate him for necessitating that saving in the first place, but it is what happens. If Solas had not removed the Anchor at that time the Inquisitor would have died.

[Medhia_Nox]

@midnight tea:  So, you think all these extenuating circumstances gives him the right to destroy the modern world? 

Because that's all it comes down to at the end of the day... he could be "The most interesting man on Thedas."  but he wants to kill everyone... 

 

I try to look at it from the perspective of a being who's life is in jeopardy... not someone who is looking at the lore of a fictional world.

 

I relate all fiction to the real world... otherwise, I don't bother.  

 

I've said over and over... I purposefully stay away from places like The Blanketfort... just because you're here on this thread not liking what I'm saying in this confined space about Solas... doesn't mean I have to stop.  

 

I know you think I have an opinon about "you" - but I don't.  You can either believe that... or not.  I actually don't care. Only you know "why" you like the character.

 

But... remember this, just because I disagree with you doesn't mean I don't "understand" the character...

 

@nightscrawl:  I'm a fairly obstinate person (if you couldn't tell ) - I actually would have preferred him to kill my character at the end of Tresspasser... my Inquistor is going to go to the ends of the world to stop him. 

 

And no... him not killing an enemy Inquisitor is not "compassion" - it's Bioware's bad writing.

[Fiskrens]

Again, this is why the game should have made you care about people at the Conclave and then had Solas kill them.

And again, I think that would have made an utterly boring beginning. It would have taken too long time to "get to know the people you care about" before the real events start, namely the explosion at the conclave. I like that the game starts with a mystery and a lot of questions.

But I digress: this thread isn't about the start, it's about people bashing each other's heads with circular arguments .

[midnight tea]

@midnight tea:  So, you think all these extenuating circumstances gives him the right to destroy the modern world? 

 

What's with you and thinking that if we, at the very least, understand his motivations we somehow agree with him on everything, or think that it gives him the right to destroy the world???

 

Show me a single person here who ever said anything of the sort. You won't find one, in fact you'll find people who tried to explain you before that understanding one's motivations doesn't means agreeing with his plans.

 

No, most people do is say they get where he's coming form or, at best, he's someone who may be worth redeeming, depending on what we're going to be presented with in DA4. Nobody here I can think of ever said anything that is even close to what you think people are saying when they say they like or understand Solas.

[dawnstone]

And again, I think that would have made an utterly boring beginning. It would have taken too long time to "get to know the people you care about" before the real events start, namely the explosion at the conclave. I like that the game starts with a mystery and a lot of questions.

But I digress: this thread isn't about the start, it's about people bashing each other's heads with circular arguments .

Weird, I thought the thread was about this:

 

[midnight tea]

I try to look at it from the perspective of a being who's life is in jeopardy... not someone who is looking at the lore of a fictional world.

 

You seem to be unable to accept that people may have or like different perspective on a story, since hey - it's a story, so we can have those perspectives.

 

And I myself, as an aspiring storyteller myself, like creating or reading stories in which characters are put in messed up situations, like necessity to destroy one world in order for others to live and similar scenarios; ones where there's no clear answer and where morals and characters are thoroughly tested in near-impossible situations that don't really let people get away from clean. Fortunately it seems that Bioware likes to tell such stories too, which explore moral quandaries and broken or flawed characters who still have to make extreme choices, hence it's no surprise I like where they're going with Solas (and where they may go with Inquisitor in the future game).

[Medhia_Nox]

@dawnstone:  It is about that.  It's about liking/loving Solas.

 

Someone can understand him and like him... and understand him and dislike him... I am the later and I happen to have some free time to waste today on this thread. 

 

@midnight tea: Understanding his motives and liking him are two different thing... so, do you "like" Solas?  And if so, do you often like people who's goal you can understand but otherwise find reprehensible.  Or, do you not find his goals reprehensible?

 

As an aspiring storyteller I'm unsure why you would not be curious what has caused my impassioned response about Solas.  But, there I go again...

[Xerrai]

What's with you and thinking that if we at the very least understand his motivations we somehow agree or think that it gives him the right to destroy the world???

 

Show me a single person here who ever said anything of the sort. You won't find one, in fact you'll find people who tried to explain you before that understanding one's motivations doesn't means agreeing with his plans.

 

No, most people do is say they get where he's coming form or, at best, he's someone who may be worth redeeming, depending on what we're going to be presented with in DA4. Nobody here I can think of ever said anything that is even close to what you think people are saying when they say they like or understand Solas.

Well I suppose Don_Quijotes (something like that) can be an example of a person who actually wants to support Solas's plans. He's popped up a few times. Usually as a troll, I assume.

But he's a distinct minority.

 

You are right in saying most Solamancers do not want Solas to succeed though. But there I will admit there are Solamancers that get a bit on the creepy side when they say things like "I want to go with him and stand by him". Most Solas romancers though accept that he has done horrible things, and plans to do horrible things, but still want to redeem him.

[myahele]

What does "redemption" even mean to someone like Solas? To simply make him stop his plans?

[Bayonet Hipshot]

Medhia is right in saying that there are many Solas fangirls who naively ignore all the victims of Solas' plans because the Inquisitor survived.

 

I also believe that Medhia is asking from many Solas fangirls is how can you understand Solas and still like him ? I mean if you understand Solas you either will dislike him or will be very wary of him. You can't like someone who plans to commit mass genocide in order to return to and achieve utopia for himself and very small group (the Ancient Elves) - If you do, that's pretty messed up.

 

Solas does not view people in post-Veil Thedas as people, he views them as something worse than Tranquil. Given how morally ethical people are expected to treat the Tranquil fairly and not just kill them off because they are Tranquil, this renders Solas as someone who is morally unethical. His justification for wanting to carry out a mass genocide because people in Thedas right now are not people to him and he needs to commit this genocide to restore things to the way they were is an argument many reprehensible people responsible for genocides have used throughout history.

 

As a Southeast Asian, Solas' arguments to bring back things to the way they were before reminds me of Pol Pot who decided to kill hundreds of thousands of Cambodians in order to achieve the agrarian utopia that he and his Khmer Rouge wanted. Its not very different from Mao Zedong's or even Stalin's argument of mass killing to achieve their utopia.

 

Now some of you might talk about how Dorian and the Inquisitor reacted in the Dark Future and use that as a way to justify Solas' potential actions but this is false equivalency. Dorian and the Inquisitor did not want to destroy the Dark Future that they were in, they simply wished to leave it and return to their timeline. On the other hand, Solas wishes to do things that will result in the deaths of thousands of people to create the utopia he wants.

 

It only gets worse from here. Solas was willing to let a sworn enemy of his, a blighted Tevinter Magister to possess his magical orb and allow him to use it to kill a highly influential religious leader as well as a whole host of people in hopes that the said Tevinter magister might die and he could then recover the Orb and proceed to do that the Tevinter magister himself wanted to do in the first place.

 

This is further corroborated and reinforced by how Solas behaved towards the Inquisitor in the Dark Future. He clearly was regretting what had transpired and told the Inquisitor as well as Dorian that "this world must not come to pass". That world is a world where the Veil had been torn apart. Solas wishes to bring down the Veil. Now he may want people to have some final moments of peace but mass genocide is mass genocide,regardless of how nicely you treat those you plan to kill in order to execute your plan an achieve your utopian vision.

 

Last but not the least, I find it ridiculous that people find it perfectly okay for an Inquisitor to continue to remain friends with Solas. The Egghead lied to you throughout the game and yes a lie by omission is still a lie. True, he did warn the Inquisition of the potential Qunari invasion but that does not absolve him of what he has done and what he wants to do.

 

Finally, the world of the Elves that Solas talks about is the world of the Ancient Elves, not the world of the Modern Elves, not the world of the Dalish Elves and not the world of the City Elves. Its not very different that the Thalmor doctrine which says it wants to unmake the world so that Elves can return to their immortal ways but they conveniently forgot the fact that this can only apply to High Elves since Orc, Wood Elves and Dark Elves have been fundamentally altered on a biological level by Boethiah, Azura and Y'ffre which means they cannot really revert back like the High Elves can and they leave out how all the humans would die because of this.

[Medhia_Nox]

@myahele:  And how is that good enough (you're not saying it is - I'm just expanding on your thought)... he ALREADY killed everyone at the Conclave and caused Corypheus' war "by accident".

 

If he just says: "Okay, I won't kill everyone."  How is that "redemption."  

 

For me, the redemption story belongs in a tawdry romance novel.  

[dawnstone]

What does "redemption" even mean to someone like Solas? To simply make him stop his plans?

To him, or for the characters he's potentially harming? For him, redemption, or making up for what he believes he's already done wrong, probably would be what he is attempting to do already.

 

For the characters, a) he'd have to stop whatever the hell it is he's trying to do, or give a better reason for why it must be done (ie, what if the Veil is failing, and if we don't remove it properly the world will be destroyed, anyway), and b] direct his power and intellect towards non-apocalyptic solutions for existing problems (ie, the Blight, the Veil, elven oppression). 

[Medhia_Nox]

Are there a lot of people here who think you actually get to decide how you redeem yourself? 

[Abyss108]

I've always hated the word redemption... To me, it sounds like you think that if you do enough good, anything bad you did is magically wiped out and it isn't bad anymore...

[midnight tea]

@midnight tea: Understanding his motives and liking him are two different thing... so, do you "like" Solas?  And if so, do you often like people who's goal you can understand but otherwise find reprehensible.  Or, do you not find his goals reprehensible?

 

Lol, if you actually read my comment more thoroughly you'd know I don't conflate liking and understanding, so there's no need to be patronizing for no reason. 

 

Also, ask yourself this - do we really know his goals? Do we really know what he wants to accomplish or how?

 

We know he's planning something drastic and something he himself doesn't seem to like one bit, but we don't really know how is he supposed to "save the elves" (given that he doesn't associate himself with modern elves and was in no hurry to save Sentinels in ToM by any means if Inquisitor decided to slaughter them), or how is the world supposed to be destroyed (by his own admission he "destroyed elves and their world" but he didn't destroy Thedas per se).

 

So how can I find his plan reprehensible, if I don't really know what the end goal really is? Even when Inky asked why do modern people have to die for the elves to return Solas almost yells "Spoilers!" at us, so there's obviously more to the story there.

 

What if his plans actually save the world again from inevitable endless Blight (he tells Varric that the Wardens "bought us some time" - and he counts himself into "us"), or restore most people's lost connection to the Fade and, despite some casualties, the world is better off that way?

Flemeth certainly believes the change is coming. So is Sandal. So is, in fact, Chant of Light. The entire DA franchise seems to be building to inevitable change in Thedas, and now it seems that that change may be directly connected to Solas's plans. So who is to say now that Solas plan is indeed so reprehensible as you think it is?

The question is probably whether the price of that change will be too high. Solas, at this point, appears to believe that the only way to realize his goals is through means he himself thinks to be terrible - but what if there's another way? And if there is another way, and you had a chance to make Thedas a better place and it'd be a better place for everyone, even if it means certain sacrifices, would you take that step???

[midnight tea]

What does "redemption" even mean to someone like Solas? To simply make him stop his plans?

 

According to description of redemption choice we are supposed to make him "change his plans".

[Bayonet Hipshot]

Are there a lot of people here who think you actually get to decide how you redeem yourself? 

 

Judging from the responses to this thread, they are quite a few people who think that. Which is weird, because the other character who can redeem himself is Blackwall and the choice of him seeking redemption is one that is decided by the Inquisitor once they learn of the truth about him.

 

IRL, a criminal's redemption is decided by the judge and jury, not by the said criminal. Since Solas is a criminal (he aided and abetted mass murder at the Temple of Sacred Ashes as well as property destruction by Corypheus, and as of this moment, he can also be charged with attempted mass murder), he has to stand trial like any criminal has to and only the judge and jury at that said trial can decide if he can choose to redeem himself or not. Solas cannot make that choice because to do so is to give the justice system a giant middle finger.

[dawnstone]

I've always hated the word redemption... To me, it sounds like you think that if you do enough good, anything bad you did is magically wiped out and it isn't bad anymore...

I don't know, you don't choose whether other people believe you have accomplished it, but you do make the choice to have a desire for it and to seek it out. Forgiveness on the other hand belongs entirely to the person who was harmed to give or not to give.

[Medhia_Nox]

I've always hated the word redemption... To me, it sounds like you think that if you do enough good, anything bad you did is magically wiped out and it isn't bad anymore...

 

Totally agreed... 

 

So, do you simply not care about the bad things you've already done? 

Or do you remember those things as reasons to become a better person?  

 

Seeking redemption "can" be a noble act... the goal of a person genuinely seeking redemption is not, however, to obtain it.

 

@Midnight tea:  if he said "I am going to kill one old woman so the elven empire can be reborn." how would you respond? 

[Sah291]

I also believe that Medhia is asking from many Solas fangirls is how can you understand Solas and still like him ? I mean if you understand Solas you either will dislike him or will be very wary of him. You can't like someone who plans to commit mass genocide in order to return to and achieve utopia for himself and very small group (the Ancient Elves) - If you do, that's pretty messed up.

Okay, well to answer that then, I like him as a character--as in he makes the story interesting and dramatic, etc. As for liking him as a person, it's more a mixture of like and hate, I suppose. It's hard for me to not think about it objectively as a story, because he's not real. Putting myself in the shoes of the Inquisitor who romanced him? I would imagine it's horrifying, and she would think he is a monster. But if attempting to redeem him, and convincing him to stop willingly, meant saving more lives, I would try. I don't think people are also thinking about the consequences of what stopping him at any cost means, and how many people that might harm in the process. He might even be counting on drawing you into a war in this way.