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[Ieldra]

You listen to the logs at Pragia?

 

The scientists there seemed to believe they were.

 

It was pretty methodical if crassly put by Bioware as usual, not the way I'd have written it, but I am not on their writing staff.

Did it seem plausible to you that those scientists believed that? Biotic children are rare, and they went through them by the score. What kind of test makes that level of mortality necessary, to say nothing of that kind of mortality in subjects that rare? Even the most ruthless scientist wouldn't do LT 50 tests on humans, that's just not rational.

 

Unless, well, those scientists were of the death camp variety where the power they got to wield was just as important, or even more so, than getting results. And in that case, it would be far beyond "necessary evil". Which proves my point.

[KaiAdamori]

I go away for a day (to play ME) come back and this thread has bloomed like a nuclear mushroom cloud over a countryside village! Love all the different takes and opinions coming out here!! Some really interesting stuff! hehe

 

The fact that they were reduced to mustache-twirling villains is unfortunate in itself.

 

Bioware likes to pretend sometimes like morality is black and white, without a place for pragmatism etc.

 

Making Cerberus into a puppy shooting Villainous Group of Villains, was just taking the easiest and most boring road to tackle those questions.

 

This, within the game, TIM could really have swayed me and had me wondering if Cerberus might just be on the right track but they, sadly, became the black hat villain society. Could've been handled in a manner that was more engaging.

 

I wonder if we can become like Cerberus in Andromeda? Our armour does appear more similar to a Cerberus operative than Alliance Military. Always preferred their armour in ME3.

 

This would be awesome! I would like to have a real divergence in how events play out based on the choices we make as opposed to "the same result" regardless of the means.

 

@Master Warder Z_:
The problem with Cerberus' presentation is that we never got the impression those atrocities were necessary. They were totally over-the-top, with a significant dose of drama over common sense. I mean any ruthless but sane scientist would try to limit the fallout of their experiments, even if only for reasons of economy and reputation. Cerberus was like they don't care at all about ethics, rather than "I regret what I have to do but it's necessary."

 

I think that we do get the sense that Cerb felt the end's justify the means, it's more a case that we can't agree. They are setup almost immediately as the "wrong" choice." That only compounds the issue of having us team up with them in 2. We get to play along with Cerb and their ends justify the means mentality but, no matter how renegade our shep might be, we can never really side with them, It just isn't an option. It's like we are being teased! lol

 

 

That the sort of stuff you wanted to hear? 

 

Yeah, totally. More divergence, more impact in regards to decision making. More moral ambiguity.

 

Yeah, sounds like a lot less of wishful thinking and make believe morality, and more using your head and encountering real dilemmas.

 

Also, replay-ability, a more mature outlook, it might not be perfect but the direction is valid and interesting.

 

^this"

[Ieldra]

I think that we do get the sense that Cerb felt the end's justify the means, it's more a case that we can't agree. They are setup almost immediately as the "wrong" choice." That only compounds the issue of having us team up with them in 2. We get to play along with Cerb and their ends justify the means mentality but, no matter how renegade our shep might be, we can never really side with them, It just isn't an option. It's like we are being teased! lol

Again: did it seem plausible to you that they believed that? It is rather ironic: we face extinction, and that means a lot of stuff can be justified that would otherwise be unacceptable, but Cerberus goes *way* beyond that, because the deaths at Pragia come with no discernible benefits that couldn't have been achieved in other, equally simple, and in fact much cheaper ways.

 

Then along comes Overlord and pushes this up to eleven. I say the presentation of Cerberus as an organization that embraces "necessary evil" was a complete and utter failure. The same applies to the Reapers after the Catalyst's revelations, btw.. They were designed, and acted, in order to offend all our moral and aesthetic sensibilities in the worst possible way, rather than as completely non-human agents of some weird kind of species preservation.   

[Shechinah]

Again: did it seem plausible to you that they believed that? It is rather ironic: we face extinction, and that means a lot of stuff can be justified that would otherwise be unacceptable, but Cerberus goes *way* beyond that, because the deaths at Pragia come with no discernible benefits that couldn't have been achieved in other, equally simple, and in fact much cheaper ways.  

 

That was to a degree part of what made Conatix Industries' handling of Jump Zero's BAaT program awful; after finding that they were making slow progress, they decided they needed experts; 

 

On one hand, you have the option of requesting assistance from the Citadel civilisations who would have an extensive knowledge about the subject and one of whom is noted to have biotic training as an integral part of their race's educational program meaning they'd likely able to dispatch instructors or share knowledge on how to handle biotic potential in a safe way. Additionally, this might even prove useful for diplomatic human-alien relations. 

 

On the other hand, they could hire a bunch  of mercenaries, one of whom had a deep-seeded grudge against humanity courtesey of First Contact and allow them to turn training into hell for the students.  

 

Naturally, the option Conatix Industries went with was the latter because they thought the first option would make humanity look weak. The aforementioned mercenary with a grudge proceeded to introduce brutal elements into the training including mistreatment and abuse which resulted in the deaths of some of the students and finally the death of the turian mercenary himself with the whole causing diplomatic issues.

 

While some of the techniques honed during the original program is still used in modern biotic training, there is the likelihood that the Citadel option would have resulted in the same, if not better, progress but with no deaths occuring as a direct result of the training program and the methods used.

 

I do believe it was necessary to train people with biotic potential to ensure their uncontrollable powers did not cause harm to themselves and their surroundings but if this could have been accomplished in a different manner that was avaliable as a plausible option at the time the decision was made then would mean it was unnecessary to go the manner that they did. 

[Shechinah]

I would like to note that while the Alliance's BAaT program was a horrible and inexcusable affair, I do not think it is comparable to what happened in Cerberus' Sanctuary project.

[Sylvius the Mad]

The fact that they were reduced to mustache-twirling villains is unfortunate in itself.

Bioware likes to pretend sometimes like morality is black and white, without a place for pragmatism etc.

Making Cerberus into a puppy shooting Villainous Group of Villains, was just taking the easiest and most boring road to tackle those questions.

Even if Cerberus is undeniably villainous (I don't think they are), we should still have been allowed to work with them to accomplish common goals, or at least acknowledge when they were right (as with TIM's Control idea at the start of ME3).

[Master Warder Z_]

I would like to note that as far as I could tell the Alliance's BAaT program at it's worst had nothing on Cerberus' Sanctuary project at it's best.

 

...Because having military instructors physically assaulting civilians is something you want in the press, I mean at best you could say they were drafted, but erm, they weren't.

 

Breaking limbs of people who aren't in your military to begin with tends to result in court martial and dishonorable discharges from my experience.

 

The fact they hired Turian mercenaries is another tsk tsk thing as well, So it isn't even Alliance military doing said assaulting, its something that would result in a diplomatic incident with the Council races and Humanity.

 

So got nothing? Heck no, if reported it would lead to all sorts of nastiness, which is why that crap is so far classified, they'd put a bullet in your head if you tried to talk about it.

[Shechinah]

...Because having military instructors physically assaulting civilians is something you want in the press, I mean at best you could say they were drafted, but erm, they weren't.

 

Breaking limbs of people who aren't in your military to begin with tends to result in court martial and dishonorable discharges from my experience.

 

The fact they hired Turian mercenaries is another tsk tsk thing as well, So it isn't even Alliance military doing said assaulting, its something that would result in a diplomatic incident with the Council races and Humanity.

 

So got nothing? Heck no, if reported it would lead to all sorts of nastiness, which is why that crap is so far classified, they'd put a bullet in your head if you tried to talk about it.

 

I should reformulate since I can see how my words might be understood; What happened in the BAaT program was horrible and should never have happened but to say it was on par with Sanctuary is something I disagree with.
 

[Laughing_Man]

I should reformulate since I can see how my words might be understood; What happened in the BAaT program was horrible and should never have happened but to say it was on par with Sanctuary is something I disagree with.
 

 

Yes, but this was all a case of the writers doing their best to be overly dramatic and hysteric about everything Cerberus did.

 

Realistically, they could have been just as effective if not more so, without acting like a chuckling Dr Evil.

The way they were portrayed, they simply embody the same idiotic!evil mastermind caricature from cartoons for kids.

 

Sanctuary was an extreme case, both because it happens after the Reapers actually invaded - which made everyone desperate,

and also because the majority of Cerberus were indoctrinated at this point.

[Commander Rpg]

An adult game doesn't base the character's behaviour on "sides" or "alignments", it makes you pay for every choice you take, whether it was a good or a bad action; and usually bad actions can have a bad outcome, to often pay in return, and good actions have a positive outcome, but people might not appreciate them or may consider you the "goody goody".

[Laughing_Man]

An adult game doesn't base the character's behaviour on "sides" or "alignments", it makes you pay for every choice you take, whether it was a good or a bad action; and usually bad actions can have a bad outcome, to often pay in return, and good actions have a positive outcome, but people might not appreciate them or may consider you the "goody goody".

 

No. Just no.

 

In realistic situations many times it means that stopping to do a good deed will result in you giving your enemies time to escape / destroy data, etc.

Pragmatism Vs. Idealism are about whether you should do a good deed even when it harms your "Greater good" or overall bottom line.

 

Sure, sometimes you may reap an unexpected benefit do to a good deed, but with how Bioware likes to portray this, you (almost) ALWAYS get rewarded more for good deeds. (I do wonder why we have so many crooks and criminals in the world if this is the case)

[Master Warder Z_]

No. Just no.

 

In realistic situations many times it means that stopping to do a good deed will result in you giving your enemies time to escape / destroy data, etc.

Pragmatism Vs. Idealism are about whether you should do a good deed even when it harms your "Greater good" or overall bottom line.

 

Sure, sometimes you may reap an unexpected benefit do to a good deed, but with how Bioware likes to portray this, you (almost) ALWAYS get rewarded more for good deeds. (I do wonder why we have so many crooks and criminals in the world if this is the case)

 

Selling arms to insurgents is a profitable way to make a living.

[Commander Rpg]

No. Just no.

 

In realistic situations many times it means that stopping to do a good deed will result in you giving your enemies time to escape / destroy data, etc.

Pragmatism Vs. Idealism are about whether you should do a good deed even when it harms your "Greater good" or overall bottom line.

 

Sure, sometimes you may reap an unexpected benefit do to a good deed, but with how Bioware likes to portray this, you (almost) ALWAYS get rewarded more for good deeds. (I do wonder why we have so many crooks and criminals in the world if this is the case)

You haven't read well enough what I said.

 

Simplifying: doing evil deeds is usually creating an immediate harm to someone and is giving an immediate advantage to you, in the long run instead many evil deeds don't have a clear outcome but they do have a negative outcome in their very peaks; also the evil deed is often risky because if there isn't a force of good to fight you, you will fight with others like you, and again there will be immediate harms for losers and advantages for winners, plus a very bad result in actions for everyone (since evil deeds don't produce real benefits for the quality of the living ones). On the other hand, doing a series of good deeds may or may not give you a good reputation or even a bad reputation, they frequently have an immediate beneficial effect to someone and zero or some benefit for you, in the long run they have a huge impact in two cases: in the first case, if people around you welcomes them, society (whatever it is, aliens, humans...) broadens and becomes a small oasis of peace among many menaces; in the second case, people don't accept you because they're too blind and they will block you, or they will be "half and a half" and some will come and some will go, which means you will still have to watch your back to pursue a good ideal.

 

In conclusion, the good doers live a troubled life with their responsibilities but in the end (whatever the end is) they can't blame what they've done, while the evil doers live mostly a quiet life with fights and attempts to their life, they don't care about the rest. They might live until the end of their course, but what they do gives an X amount of things (wealth, power, sex etc.) that is counterbalanced by the chaos they produce; even if they don't want to be responsible of their actions, that responsibility will come to them.

 

This is what I meant.

 

If a person does want to choose a good or an evil action, she must considers the immediate and remote implications, both material and moral.

[Laughing_Man]

In conclusion, the good doers live a troubled life with their responsibilities but in the end (whatever the end is) they can't blame what they've done, while the evil doers live mostly a quiet life with fights and attempts to their life, they don't care about the rest. They might live until the end of their course, but what they do gives an X amount of things (wealth, power, sex etc.) that is counterbalanced by the chaos they produce; even if they don't want to be responsible of their actions, that responsibility will come to them.

 

That sounds remarkably like concepts of religious faith or karma.

 

Life is sometimes like that, other times it isn't.

 

The randomness and chaos of life offers those that believe in spirituality enough anecdotes to grasp as an example to the truth of their beliefs,

while ignoring all the other cases where things didn't really work out according to those rules.

 

Correlation does not imply causation, not necessarily anyway.

 

And as for society striking back against offenders, well, again, that's not always true, and in any case the morality we are discussing here is not about

personal gain, rather the survival and success of a species or the entire Milky Way group.

 

And when it comes to this level of relationship between states or different species, everyone uses cloak and dagger tactics to some degree anyway,

you can't really afford to be naive at this level if you want to preserve your independence and guarantee (as far as possible) your survival.

 

This does not exclude dealing in good faith, only that you always keep one hand armed even while offering the other,

you should always have a plan B and and even F, because as a responsible leader you don't have the luxury of completely trusting your gut feeling

without preparing for the worst as well.

[fhs33721]

No. Just no.

 

In realistic situations many times it means that stopping to do a good deed will result in you giving your enemies time to escape / destroy data, etc.

Pragmatism Vs. Idealism are about whether you should do a good deed even when it harms your "Greater good" or overall bottom line.

 

Sure, sometimes you may reap an unexpected benefit do to a good deed, but with how Bioware likes to portray this, you (almost) ALWAYS get rewarded more for good deeds. (I do wonder why we have so many crooks and criminals in the world if this is the case)

On the flipside in Bioware games you also get away with ridiciously evil/over the top jerkish actions without any negative consequences whatsoever.

Kill an entire village full of colonists -> Well that's kind of tragic, I'll be forced to passive agressively complain about your behavior and then send you of to the next mission without doing anything else.

Execute a captured enemy, that peacefully surrendered and even gave you vital information on Sarens plans, just because-> Nobody cares and nobody declares you unfit for Spectre duty as you probably should be.

Be a xenophobic jerk that constantly belittles his alien squadmates and screams at them for not being able to sleep-> They still love you.

Shoot hostage in the face to make the kidnapper surrender-> Police officier shrugs it off and doesn't arrest your homicidal butt even if you aren't a Spectre anymore.

[Laughing_Man]

On the flipside in Bioware games you also get away with ridiciously evil/over the top jerkish actions without any negative consequences whatsoever.

Kill an entire village full of colonists -> Well that's kind of tragic, I'll be forced to passive agressively complain about your behavior and then send you of to the next mission without doing anything else.

Execute a captured enemy, that peacefully surrendered and even gave you vital information on Sarens plans, just because-> Nobody cares and nobody declares you unfit for Spectre duty as you probably should be.

Be a xenophobic jerk that constantly belittles his alien squadmates and screams at them for not being able to sleep-> They still love you.

Shoot hostage in the face to make the kidnapper surrender-> Police officier shrugs it off and doesn't arrest your homicidal butt even if you aren't a Spectre anymore.

 

Most of those things seems to be very much in character for the hard-ass type Spectre, and even if not encouraged are covered by the Spectre mandate.

(those colonists, were mind controlled by the Thorian, and killing a merc or someone under indoctrination is hardly a big deal for a Spectre)

 

But yeah, by all means, you should reap the consequences of being an idiotic jerk as well, especially if you antagonize your squadies and still expect them to follow you.

[Commander Rpg]

That sounds remarkably like concepts of religious faith or karma.

Life is this. You're not usually rewarded for the good things you do, but you are mostly despised and hated by someone that doesn't approve your attitude towards goodness. Just look at history: Joan of Arc was a humble peasant, without any education, and she decided to go into a war for the sake of her country, despite of the kings' machinations; in the end she did good for France, however she was subject to a plot against her life and finally was murdered through a pyre.

 

If you think she had a quiet life and did get many honors or stuff, you have certainly been beguiled.

[Laughing_Man]

Life is this. You're not usually rewarded for the good things you do, but you are mostly despised and hated by someone that doesn't approve your attitude towards goodness. Just look at history: Joan of Arc was a humble peasant, without any education, and she decided to go into a war for the sake of her country, despite of the kings' machinations; in the end she did do good for France, however she was subject to a plot against her life and finally was murdered through a pyre.

 

If you think she had a quiet life and did get many honors or stuff, you have certainly been beguiled.

 

I don't disagree, what I am saying is that usually being a "renegade" is more effective at least in the short term. In the long term it's anyone's guess.

[Ieldra]

I don't disagree, what I am saying is that usually being a "renegade" is more effective at least in the short term. In the long term it's anyone's guess.

I don't think you can generalize that, because "renegade" actions include too many different things. If you're talking about doing something illegal, then it's more of a high-risk/high-gain modus operandi: if you get away with it, the rewards are usually significantly higher than for the legal path, but if it backfires, it'll backfire badly. To a lesser degree, that applies to other actions which would meet with public or governmental disapproval if they became known.

 

Then there are things like sabotaging the genophage cure: there would be a public outcry, but secretly many people would be relieved that someone did the dirty work for them.

 

So with plausible consequences, what I've always argued against is a consistent pattern of renegade-type actions being punished by circumstance, because that's not at all plausible. If reality were like that, nobody would choose such actions, since their only anticipated advantage is that the outcome can be better than if you stick to the other path - case in question: you get the krogan to fight without having to cure the genophage. A plausible pattern of consequences would include outcomes significantly better than the paragon alternative gives you, but also a risk of getting something significantly worse than you'd get if the paragon action failed.

[German Soldier]

My issue with most morality systems is, like you mention, that they're too black and white. Morality is not a binary system but games so frequently want to portray them as one.

 

If I'm being honest I prefer the way that Dragon Age does things. There is no "this is how good/evil you are" meter, but rather each individual companion likes or dislikes you more based on your choices. The main failing that Origins had was that you could just gift spam to bribe anybody into loving you, but the later games did a better job.

 

 

There are some criminal choices to be made in DAO like murder knife people for no reason at Ostagar which are most universally disliked by the companions(aside from one which is undoubtedly insane) which to me qualify a warden as evil which simply mean that the player is allowed to make these type of person in that game.

[Secret Rare]

Life is this. You're not usually rewarded for the good things you do, but you are mostly despised and hated by someone that doesn't approve your attitude towards goodness. Just look at history: Joan of Arc was a humble peasant, without any education, and she decided to go into a war for the sake of her country, despite of the kings' machinations; in the end she did good for France, however she was subject to a plot against her life and finally was murdered through a pyre.

 

If you think she had a quiet life and did get many honors or stuff, you have certainly been beguiled.

Quite presumptuous to assume that one perspective based upon a meekly passive sense of impotence is the reality of life.

Failing to perceive the limits of your own reasoning is what it define the critical flaw of your post in which the meaning of life was reduced to be nothing more but your own obscurantism of it.

There are  infinite  ways in which i can perceive the Johan arch history other than  your view of it.

[fhs33721]

Most of those things seems to be very much in character for the hard-ass type Spectre.

Only if you consider hard-ass Spectre to be the same as cold-blooded homicidal maniac with superiority complexes.

[Commander Rpg]

 

Quite presumptuous to assume that one perspective based upon a meekly passive sense of impotence is the reality of life.

Failing to perceive the limits of your own reasoning is what it define the critical flaw of your post in which the meaning of life was reduced to be nothing more but your own obscurantism of it.

There are  infinite  ways in which i can perceive the Johan arch history other than  your view of it.

 

I've never talked about impotence nor about the sense of impotence, this is your impression about it and it's wrong, mainly because you have probably taken the concepts that more than others interested you - like focusing on tragedies and forgetting the past posts where I said that the good deeds have a reach more far than the immediate results, etc. etc. - and forgot about the speech's core. My reasoning is "limited" by common sense, the good reasoning, the mind's sanity, in which falls every freedom in thinking; moreover you haven't named the flaws that would be undermining my reasoning, you're just telling me I'm proposing a dark version of reality, when reality, if you think about human life, can turn quite terrible already as it is.

St. Joan of Arc was an example of how the life of a heroine can be, devoting herself to the good cause lead her to sacrifice something in return, so the question is: was it worth to sacrifice things, even her life, to live as she chose to live, or was it better to go another way, turn back to the duties she took responsibility for, and choose something else? You have to choose it, if you play a roleplaying game, if your character has to go for the path of "glory for the greater good etc." or the path of "selfishness, greed etc." he will have to deal with what can happen to him, to his team, to the people he cares for or not. And if he chooses to stay in the middle, he has to face what can happen. A role-playing game that fails in stimulating a human judgement in what the player is doing, is failing in letting you role play a character. It is nothing more than a game with some rpg elements, stats and stuff.

[Laughing_Man]

Only if you consider hard-ass Spectre to be the same as cold-blooded homicidal maniac with superiority complexes.

 

Everything is relative. But I am not trying to assign hard-ass points, I use existing spectres that we had an opportunity to meet:

Saren (before indoctrination), Nihlus, Tela Vasir, Jondum Bau, they all seem like they would do all of the above under the right circumstances

(some of them have done so in fact), and the council are aware of this and sees no problem with it.

 

What you see as a superiority complex is actually part of their mandate, the same "superiority complex" many judges have.

 

The spectres serve a very specific purpose, the "license to kill" is one of their tools of trade.

[Medhia_Nox]

Each NPC should be given its own morality system - and then sure, give groups a morality system with which to judge the player. 

 

ExoGeni:  Supports

BinaryHelix: Condemns

 

Just get rid of "good" "evil" or "paragon" "renegade". 

 

I don't mind if they tie "some" conversation options to whether a group "Supports" or "Condemns" you - but I also want something like DA:I where if I have "Corporation Contacts" as a perk... then I'll also get more conversations regardless.  

 

What is the value of a system that measures your morality... if your morality is not tied to something and is simply a personal experience. 

 

Let the NPCs react to your actions in whatever way Bioware deems fitting without regard to what the player perceives that as.