77 réponses à ce sujet

[krylo]

Steve236 wrote...

Let me ask you this, How many of you play RTS? If you do how many times have you let troops to die so you can save the majority of your force? If you have guess what your just as bad as loghain.

Absolutely.

I mean every time I leave a few units of orcs to die I start a massive smear campaign painting all orcs as traitors to the crown, and put a bounty on their head.  Then I hire assassins to kill any survivors.  Then, while I'm at it, I poison my political dissidents and start selling my peasants into slavery.

Yup.

Exactly the same situation.

[sylvanaerie]

If sparing Loghain in your game makes you satisfied/happy, then do so. There are reasons to spare him just as there reasons to give him a traitor's death. I like to think of each playthrough as just one reality in a multiverse and that one Warden affects a LOT of the world around him/her by how they perceive it and follow their own moral compass. I keep thinking of the talk with Wynne about power, using it and affecting everyone around you.



Ultimately it all boils down to what you have fun doing as the end result of the game is at the core to simply have fun. The thinking part is a perk the fun part is core.

[Reaverwind]

Steve236 wrote...

Let me ask you this, How many of you play RTS? If you do how many times have you let troops to die so you can save the majority of your force? If you have guess what your just as bad as loghain.

Yup, I sacrifice 2/3 of the military just so I'm in a mad scramble to replace the forces before getting swamped by the enemy. While I'm at it, I also don't plug that hole in my defenses, just so I can watch the enemy exploit it for grins and giggles. /sarcasm

[goofygoff]

CalJones wrote...

Killing him (in my first runthrough) was the only act that has made me feel really, really awful. (I haven't ever tried killing Connor, btw). I would rather lose Alistair than do that again.

The other thing that makes me feel awful is having him do the Dark Ritual.  He seems so much more reluctant than even a romanced Alistair.  And even if you don't tell him that it will produce a child, the way he says, "Please do not ask me to do this thing", almost always makes me back down.  And when you do let him off the hook, I have to admit feeling warm fuzzies when he thanks you and says it's a kindness he will not forget.

I always have that conversation with him, even if I have no intention on going through with it.  For some reason, I just love how when you ask him if you've become friends, he neither confirms nor denies it.  It's just so...him. 

[Sabriana]

Loghain does indeed look far more horrified than Alistair. I put it down to Loghain being a lot more experienced man that him. After all, my Wardens usually do the Alistair romance to its conclusion until someone else turns up, but he's more or less a semi-virgin at that point.

Although I must say, the comic-strip puts the ritual in a whole other light. Morrigan crying bitter tears - who knew.

[CalJones]

I must admit I've never made him go through with it in a playthrough (I did watch it on YouTube and he does indeed look horrified). In the games I've finished I've had the PC bang Morrigan twice (Loghain survives), the PC sacrifice herself, and Loghain sacrifice himself. He seems to think death is preferable to banging Morrigan, which makes me wonder if the comment about the contents of Morrigan's underwear being stinkier than Dog's rabbit carcass is actually true.

[Sarah1281]

If you leave the decision up to him and have a decent persuade then he'll agree to it and thank you for not forcing him to do it. This way Alistair can be king, you can live, and you don't have to spend the rest of your life recruitng for the Grey Wardens and not need to feel like you're neglecting your duty.

[Jewsapalewsa]

Greatsword to the FACE!



all the justification Loghain gets in my games.

[CalJones]

Yes he will do it if you have persuade - but he clearly doesn't want to. Since the effects of the taint are harsher the older you are, he's not going to be alive for a whole lot of time after the game ends (the epilogue, if you make the sacrifice and he lives, says he is around for "several" years which is very vague but I'd guess 5-10). I'd rather give him the big send-off to ensure he's remembered the right way.



Obviously I'm an unapologetic Loghain fangirl so, whereas I want the best possible outcome for him, others would rather just have his head on a pike. It's a good job the game caters for everyone.

[Apophis2412]

In the end what he has done is irrelevant.



The only question that should concern you is wether Loghain would be a liability or asset as a Grey Warden.

[CalJones]

Indeed, though it seems that many seem to derive some sort of visceral pleasure from killing him.



Irrespective of my own liking for the character, I already have in my party a murderer who wiped out an entire farmhold including children, an unapologetic assassin and an Orlesian spy. My own character, depending on the origin I chose, might well be a criminal as well. Why, then, would I not recruit a man who has been, previously, a great hero and peerless tactician? Riordan, the senior Grey Warden at that point, thinks it's a great idea. No doubt Duncan would have agreed. The Wardens take who they can and make use of them.



As for being an asset or a liability, Loghain, at that point, has begun to respect you. He has nothing to gain from betraying you - after all, he seeks only to serve (and save) Fereldan. He is a pragmatist, and doesn't let his emotion get in the way, like Alistair. He just gets on with it. In that respect he is a more suitable Grey Warden than Alistair.



Of course, the main problem is that we are forced to choose between Loghain (a character who has been portrayed as the main antagonist until that point in the game) and Alistair (your comrade, buddy and possibly lover). For a lot of people, that's a no-brainer - you have a history with Alistair and have obviously built him into the template you want. However, if you put yourself in the Warden's shoes, he or she doesn't know Alistair forces a choice until it actually happens. Given the choice between murdering a man in front of his daughter without even giving him the chance to explain himself, and bowing to a friend's huge and undignified hissy fit, I'm always going to side with Loghain. Alistair acts in an very un-Warden-like manner at this point. He may feel he has reason to, but he embarrasses himself and makes a mockery of the Wardens' own ethos. Much as I like Alistair, I cannot respect him after that.

[Apophis2412]

krylo wrote...

Just gonna throw this out there--but my HMN made sweet sweet love to the mother of an alienage elf.

Poor Sweet Iona.

But for seriously--you can't justify wrongs done just becuase of a time zone.  If everyone in the 1800s had thought "Oh hai, gais, it's the 1800s.  SLAVERY IS TOTALLY A-OK AND ALL!" well, we'd still have slaves, wouldn't we?

Tearing apart families, putting them on auction, and sending them off to work slave labor was wrong in the 1600s.  It was wrong in the 1800s, it's wrong today, and it's wrong in Ferelden.   [...]

Yes you can. There is a difference between truth and what is thought to be true. We can all agree that slavery is wrong regardless of place or time. However to the medieval mind there is nothing wrong with slavery. This doesn't mean that slavery is right in the middle ages, but just that medieval society's ideas about morality haven't evolved enough yet.

Or in more simple terms: The medieval man is ignorant and doesn't know any better.

In my mind there are two kinds of morality: absolute and subjective.

Absolute morality means that there are some universal rights and wrongs, regardless of timezone or place. Examples include rascism, theft and discrimination.

Subjective morality to me means that as our understanding about what is right and wrong has become better through the ages we come closer and closer to these universal values/ absolute morality.

However just as a child does amoral or stupid things because he is yet unable to comprehend the world around him, so does the medieval man have a 'infantile' or incorrect understanding of morality. However in both cases we don't punish these people for it. We merely hope they learn and evolve.

[Akka le Vil]

I'll always find it very funny how people can easily excuse anything as long they somehow like the guy, or how they can find all horrible and immoral to execute a guilty, and at the same time seems not to bother that much how he ruined the lives of ten of thousands innocents.



Draco in leather pants, nothing more

[Apophis2412]

CalJones wrote...

Indeed, though it seems that many seem to derive some sort of visceral pleasure from killing him.

Irrespective of my own liking for the character, I already have in my party a murderer who wiped out an entire farmhold including children, an unapologetic assassin and an Orlesian spy. My own character, depending on the origin I chose, might well be a criminal as well.

I agree with you. DAO is filled with criminal people who the player just forgives.

Let's make a list  of all the 'criminal' people in DAO shall we:

Companions:
Sten: Killed a family.
Leliana: Was a bard and killed many innocents.
Zevran: Assassin/ cold-blooded killer.

Npc's:
Duncan: Was a street thief.
Daveth: Was a pickpocktet and cutpurse. Would have been executed if not for him joining the Gray Wardens.

Player Origins:
City Elf: Murder.
Dwarven Commoner: Being a member of a criminal organisation. Disrupting an important religious event. Impersonating a member of a different caste.
Dwarven Noble: Killed his brother (possibly).
Mage: Helped a mage who wanted to become an apostate escape.

If Loghain can't become a Gray Warden because of his crimes and should be executed, than the same could be said of Duncan, Daveth and atleast four the the Player Characters.

[CalJones]

Ha! That reminds me, when I was growing up over here in the UK, there was a sci-fi drama called Blakes 7 (which was awesome, btw). Even at the tender age of 10, I was very taken by one of the villains, a rather irredeemable fellow called Commander Travis. He dressed in head to toe black leather and had an eyepatch and an artifical hand that shot lasers. I thought he was the coolest thing ever and was absolutely devastated when they killed him off after a couple of seasons.

I still have a sneaky liking for black leather pants...



But regarding your point, I always want to give a game character the chance of redemption if possible, be it Sarevok in ToB, Saren in ME (not that you can do much other than have him shoot himself), Sten, Loghain...I've even redeemed Irenicus via a ToB mod, though it takes a lot of work to get him round to your viewpoint.

Given the chance, I'd even try to redeem Howe, but he's totally unrepentant. He's a much more black and white villain that Loghain, and as such there's nothing you can do but put him out of his misery.

[krylo]

Apophis2412 wrote...

The only question that should concern you is wether Loghain would be a liability or asset as a Grey Warden.

Depends upon the character you're playing.  Are you a true 'ANYTHING TO END THE BLIGHT' Warden?  Or are you merely a begrudging hero forced into this position?  Or maybe you're merely a heroic individual who is standing up for what is right, and facing down a great evil?  

There is more than one way to play your character, believe it or not.

CalJones wrote...

Irrespective of my own liking for the character, I already have in my party a murderer who wiped out an entire farmhold including children, an unapologetic assassin and an Orlesian spy. My own character, depending on the origin I chose, might well be a criminal as well. Why, then, would I not recruit a man who has been, previously, a great hero and peerless tactician? Riordan, the senior Grey Warden at that point, thinks it's a great idea. No doubt Duncan would have agreed. The Wardens take who they can and make use of them.

As for being an asset or a liability, Loghain, at that point, has begun to respect you. He has nothing to gain from betraying you - after all, he seeks only to serve (and save) Fereldan. He is a pragmatist, and doesn't let his emotion get in the way, like Alistair. He just gets on with it. In that respect he is a more suitable Grey Warden than Alistair.

AGAIN, this depends on your character.

Does he respect you or is he merely saving face?  Are you a naive character who immediately believes that he trusts and respects you all of a sudden ONLY when the alternative is clearly death?  Or are you a bit harder, and are you doubtful?  If the latter do you see his expertise as a general worth the risk, or do you believe that the fact that he CAN'T be trusted at that point would invalidate any generalling he could potentially do?  Or perhaps you believe that the stories of his legendary tactics are greatly overstated and, not knowing about the ultimate sacrifice, you believe that he is of little use to you being a weaker warrior than you (as proven by your victory) and an incompetent general after what happened at Ostagar?  Or maybe your character is a human noble who believes that Loghain is implicit in Howe's murder of your family, if not completely than at LEAST in the fact that Howe was never tried for it.   Or maybe your character is a male City Elf who actually liked his betrothed and had looked forward to getting to know and maybe love her.  Maybe this City Elf, rightly, blames Loghain for the fact that she is, most likely, some Tevinter noble's play thing now--after you risked your life to save her from JUST THAT FATE--at best, and a blood mage's sacrifice at worst?  Maybe your character merely can't forgive Loghain for fingering him/her as a traitor.

There are a LOT of perfectly valid reasons for a character to execute Loghain.

Again, just because YOU play an extremely forgiving character who gets weak in the knees for guys with two black eyes and a misshapen head, that doesn't mean everyone does.  Indeed, maybe some people play that character one time, and then the next time they play a character who is willing to take a risk with Loghain and SEE if they can trust him, as he would be valuable IF they could--after all they did it with Zevran. And then the time after that they play a character whom is simply too in love with Alistair to leave the decision up to anyone else--after all Alistair lost the closest thing he had to a father to the man.  Or perhaps you are playing a character who brooks NO evil in their companions and left Sten to rot, kicked Leliana out once the truth came out about her, and murdered Zevran without speaking to him. Etc. etc.

Trying to suggest that there is only one right way to play your character as it pertains to Loghain without being some kind of morally repungnant hypocrite does neither of you any justice.

Apophis2412 wrote...

However to the medieval mind there is nothing wrong with slavery.

False, in the context of Ferelden.

Slavery has been abolished in Ferelden and is looked down upon quite harshly by the people of Ferelden, despite the continued racism against the elves.

However just as a child does amoral or stupid things because he is yet unable to comprehend the world around him, so does the medieval man have a 'infantile' or incorrect understanding of morality. However in both cases we don't punish these people for it. We merely hope they learn and evolve.

...Yes we do.  We totally do.

We send them to the corner, we take away their toys, we ground them to their room, we tell them they aren't allowed friends over, etc. etc.

We do not merely hope that they learn and evolve, because that doesn't always happen naturally.  We apply pressures to the individuals.  We MAY hope that societies learn and evolve, but, again, not individuals.  We don't just take back what a thief steals and then let them run on their merry way.  We punish them.

The society of Ferelden has already evolved beyond slavery, though for how many years we can not be sure.  Loghain was a racist and a slaver in a society, in so far as race relations are concerned, is not so very different than our own.

This means, that, yes, he should be punished by the morals and ethics of that society--as well as by any external morality and ethics the player may compound onto the game, or which the player character may hold themselves that are seperate from those commonly held by the people of Ferelden.

Apophis2412 wrote...

Npc's:
Duncan: Was a street thief.
Daveth: Was a pickpocktet and cutpurse. Would have been executed if not for him joining the Gray Wardens.

Player Origins:
City Elf: Murder.
Dwarven
Commoner: Being a member of a criminal organisation. Disrupting an
important religious event. Impersonating a member of a different caste.
Dwarven Noble: Killed his brother (possibly).
Mage: Helped a mage who wanted to become an apostate escape.

If Loghain can't become a Gray Warden because of his crimes and should be executed, than the same could be said of Duncan, Daveth and atleast four the the Player Characters.

Seriously?

You are, honest to god, going to compare petty thievery, murdering a rapist/murdering a rapist in self defense (depending upon gender), being born into a ghetto and being strong armed with the life of your sister into crime, or helping a friend avoid the equivalent of being killed in cold blood (and I should point out you can talk to Irving about Jowan's plot) with treason against the crown, false accusations leading to an entire subsect of society being branded as traitors, poisoning political dissidents, siezing control of a country in a coup, torturing other political dissidents, freeing and working with a known malificarum (your PC mage didn't know Jowan knew blood magic, Loghain did), imprisoning and torturing (through lyrium withdrawl) an innocent templar, and slavery?

You are actually going to equate any ONE of the first set of things to the ENTIRE LIST of Loghain's crimes?

Really?

That is where your moral compass lies?

Murdering a rapist in self defense is equal to torturing multiple people, and selling others into slavery?  Not even touching upon his other crimes?

Welp.

I think we're done here.

Modifié par krylo, 06 mars 2010 - 11:14 .

[CalJones]

*sigh* If you are going to resort to insults, at least have the decency to spell them correctly. Whelp contains an h.



Of course there are different ways to play your Warden, else it wouldn't be a *role-playing* game. And yes I have tried the different options - in my first playthrough my HN did execute him. I felt like a heel for doing it, but I did it nonetheless (my second HN spared him). My Dalish had Alistair kill him. That didn't sit right with me either, but that character took a dim view of slave trading and didn't like shem in general. So yes, there are multiple ways you can handle it and I'm not saying one is more valid than an other - I am just saying what feels right to me, personally.

As far as crimes go, my feeling is that Howe is responsible for the majority of the worst crimes - certainly the tortured prisoners, and definitely the Highever coup (if you speak to Loghain at camp as a noble he says something to the effect of expecting your father's troops, which implies that he knows nothing of what's gone on).

It's also likely, as the new Arl of Denerim, that Howe is responsible for much of what's going on in the Alienage. Loghain's real failing here is turning a blind eye to it and letting Howe get away with murder (quite literally). He's obviously preoccupied and, juding by the cutscenes, pretty depressed. He's certainly not rubbing his hands together in glee and cackling at the plight of the elves. More likely Howe shoves a bit of paper under his nose and says sign this, it'll help replenish our war chest, and Loghain sighs heavily and does so, much in the same way as he agrees to hire Zevran. My own interpretation, of course, but this is how it feels to me after several playthroughs. As Anora puts it, her father is capable of remarkable blindness. Whether you think that is worthy of death is up to you.

The whole betraying the king thing just doesn't sit right with me either. When you wake up at Flemeth's, Alistair immediately blames Loghain which is, frankly, odd, given Loghain's history (you would think that most people would ask why before they started pointing fingers). You know Loghain and the King have been arguing, but you are also standing right there when Loghain tells him not to ride with the Wardens but stay back where it's safer. You also know for a fact that you missed the signal for the beacon. You never see the battle, so you really don't know whether Loghain could have got the king out safely or not. (If you interpret the cutscenes literally, then there was hardly any time between the beacon being lit and the king getting crushed by the ogre, so Loghain's men wouldn't have got to him in time anyway. However, the timing of the cutscenes can't be proven, so this is conjecture). When you wake up at Flemmeth's, all you have as evidence is the word of a couple of witches who Alistair doesn't even trust. He is making assumption based on tenuous evidence either because he is over emotional from the grief of losing his comrades, or because he's an idiot. Take your pick.

The coup was done out of necessity. At this point, Loghain has no vested interest in killing off Cailan. Cailan is married to Anora, and his death weakens her claim to the throne because she is not of noble blood, despite the fact that she has been doing a fabulous job (according to the Codex). Declaring himself regent presents a bigger obstacle to the likes of Arl Eamon, who we know has been encouraging Cailan to find a new wife and is hardly a saint himself. It's very telling that Eamon, who was very quick to cast Alistair out when his new bit of Orlesian totty stamped her little feet, suddenly promotes him as a successor the second his nephew is dead. He wants to have influence at court, and Alistair represents that. Note that he has absolutely no reaction if you side with Anora and either exile or execute Alistair. You'd think he would, if he genuininely cared - but no, he still invites the lot of you (Loghain included if you recruited him) to stay at his castle in Redcliffe. Hmm.

If you opt to execute Loghain, he even tells Anora that he was trying to protect her.

The real coup is being staged by Arl Eamon, who is trying to replace a capable queen with his pet bastard. In my mind, his actions are far more damaging to Fereldan than anything Loghain has done.

[Akka le Vil]

As far as crimes go, my feeling is that Howe is responsible for the majority of the worst crimes - certainly the tortured prisoners, and definitely the Highever coup (if you speak to Loghain at camp as a noble he says something to the effect of expecting your father's troops, which implies that he knows nothing of what's gone on).

So you consider that selling your own citizen to a life of servitude, betraying your soldiers and letting thousands of people getting carried underground and eaten alive by darkspawns, is not that a big deal ?

I'll always love how people completely disconnect their reasoning when it's convenient

As Anora puts it, her father is capable of remarkable blindness. Whether
you think that is worthy of death is up to you.

Letting something happens under your responsability when you're fully aware of it and passively endorse it, while pretending looking the other way, is just as guilty as doing it yourself. And cowardly on top of that. Your call if it deserve to be forgiven. You may ask the victims first though - they are always the ones being forgotten, funnily.

The real coup is being staged by Arl Eamon, who is trying to replace a
capable queen with his pet bastard. In my mind, his actions are far more
damaging to Fereldan than anything Loghain has done.

This is...
Well, it's so laughable I can't even answer seriously ^^
It shows just so much, well, Loghain-grade willfull blindness that I guess it proves my point above : people who WANTS to find reasons to forgive a bad guy that looks cool, will always find them, regardless of facts

Modifié par Akka le Vil, 06 mars 2010 - 01:01 .

[krylo]

[quote]CalJones wrote...

*sigh* If you are going to resort to insults, at least have the decency to spell them correctly. Whelp contains an h.[/quote]Whelp/Welp was being used as an onomotopeia, not calling him a child.

It's a sound, and so long as it is phonetic it is correct.  This is like correcting someone's spelling of Bamf.

This is actually why I chose that spelling.

[quote]Of course there are different ways to play your Warden, else it wouldn't be a *role-playing* game.[/quote]And YET you both present your views on Loghain's life as though they are the only choices that a morally upstanding Warden could possibly make.


[quote]As far as crimes go, my feeling is that Howe is responsible for the majority of the worst crimes[/quote]And yet it was Loghain himself that spoke to Jowan and convinced him to poison Eamon.   The Templar, then, in Howe's prison must be there under order of Loghain, as it was from that Templar's custody that Jowan was taken.  You are giving Loghain entirely too much leeway in assuming he had no idea/no hand in the things that Howe did.

Just because Howe was the one who had the prisoners in his prison doesn't change the fact that they were there for 'crimes' they committed against LOGHAIN'S conspiracy, and it is naive at best to assume that he had no hand in it.

[quote]It's also likely, as the new Arl of Denerim, that Howe is responsible for much of what's going on in the Alienage.[/quote]Sure, if you ignore the papers with Loghain's name that the slavers hand over, or the fact that they repeatedly mention that Loghain gave them permission OR the fact that he takes responsibility for selling slaves when questioned about it in the landsmeet.

Yeah, other than all that evidence I guess we can assume it was Howe.

The only thing Loghain MAY have been innocent of is the riots, but no one accused him of that.

[quote]More likely Howe shoves a bit of paper under his nose and says sign this, it'll help replenish our war chest, and Loghain sighs heavily and does so, much in the same way as he agrees to hire Zevran. [/quote]And yet his agreements with those decisions and the knowledge of them are full.

Whether it was Howe's idea, in no way, absolves him from responsibility.  If I hand you a gun and say "Hey, that guy over there has got like 200 dollars on him, shoot him," and you do it--YOU are the murderer.   In the absolute BEST case scenario that's what happened with Loghain.  Howe handed him a gun, and LOGHAIN decided to pull the trigger.

In the worst case scenario, Howe didn't even need to hand him the gun.

[quote]Whether you think that is worthy of death is up to you.[/quote]

And YET, again, you and Apophis present your decision (up until this point) as though it is the only morally justifiable decision.

Go reread those posts, and pretend we were talking about Branka instead of Loghain and tell me how it feels to you.


[quote]The whole betraying the king thing just doesn't sit right with me either. When you wake up at Flemeth's, Alistair immediately blames Loghain which is, frankly, odd, given Loghain's history (you would think that most people would ask why before they started pointing fingers). You know Loghain and the King have been arguing, but you are also standing right there when Loghain tells him not to ride with the Wardens but stay back where it's safer. You also know for a fact that you missed the signal for the beacon. You never see the battle, so you really don't know whether Loghain could have got the king out safely or not. (If you interpret the cutscenes literally, then there was hardly any time between the beacon being lit and the king getting crushed by the ogre, so Loghain's men wouldn't have got to him in time anyway. However, the timing of the cutscenes can't be proven, so this is conjecture). When you wake up at Flemmeth's, all you have as evidence is the word of a couple of witches who Alistair doesn't even trust. He is making assumption based on tenuous evidence either because he is over emotional from the grief of losing his comrades, or because he's an idiot. Take your pick.[/quote]

And yet David Gaider himself has said that Loghain was planning a 'confrontation' with Cailin eventually.  It is why Eamon was poisoned BEFORE Ostagar.  Loghain knew a confrontation was coming, and he removed Eamon from the picture beforehand. Was Loghain originally planning to kill him?  No.  He was not.  Treason and betrayal were in the cards before he ever saw a darkspawn, however.


[quote]The coup was done out of necessity.[/quote]

No it wasn't.  See earlier posts.  He would have had a much stronger base of power to fight the blight and/or hold off the orlesians had he called a landsmeet.  Anora would have most likely won the right to rule anyway, but Loghain wouldn't have been seen by an usurper by half the bannorn driving the country into civil war.

Ferelden had back up laws for succession if the king was killed/his bloodline destroyed.  Instead of using them, Loghain declared himself Anora's regent and usurped the power from the landsmeet.

As I said in previous posts, he had reasons for doing so, but it was NOT necessity.

  [quote]Declaring himself regent presents a bigger obstacle to the likes of Arl Eamon, who we know has been encouraging Cailan to find a new wife and is hardly a saint himself.[/quote]AND whom is unconscious with Poison that Loghain himself hired a maleficarum to use upon him.

[quote]It's very telling that Eamon, who was very quick to cast Alistair out when his new bit of Orlesian totty stamped her little feet, suddenly promotes him as a successor the second his nephew is dead. He wants to have influence at court, and Alistair represents that. Note that he has absolutely no reaction if you side with Anora and either exile or execute Alistair. You'd think he would, if he genuininely cared - but no, he still invites the lot of you (Loghain included if you recruited him) to stay at his castle in Redcliffe. Hmm.[/quote]And you'd think if Loghain were as innocent as you were painting him he wouldn't have had Eamon poisoned before Ostagar. 

Neither one of them is clean, but Eamon wasn't attempting a coup.  Not until Loghain already pulled his, anyway.

[quote]The real coup is being staged by Arl Eamon, who is trying to replace a capable queen with his pet bastard. In my mind, his actions are far more damaging to Fereldan than anything Loghain has done.[/quote]Yet had Loghain not followed the course he had taken Eamon would have had no grounds to attempt to put Alistair on the throne.  The Queen's place would have been decided, and the Grey Wardens wouldn't have needed to build an army on their own--and once doing so they wouldn't have been forced to depose Loghain to be able to use it against the blight as they wouldn't have been labelled traitors for no good reason.

Modifié par krylo, 06 mars 2010 - 01:20 .

[Apophis2412]

My reaction to certain things:

I play the game mostly with one question in my mind: What would Duncan and/or Riordan do? To me, both these men were diehard Gray Wardens who would do anything to stop a Blight.
No one is denying that Loghain did some terrible things. However to a Gray Warden that should be irrelevant. The only question that matters is if Loghain is a liability or asset to the order. To me the Gray Wardens are not an order of noble knights like the Round Table of Camelot.
I agree however that in DAO the PC is only a few days in the order before the disaster at Ostagar and so is unfamiliar with the workings of the order. Therefore one can justify playing a valiant morally-right hero.

On Eamon: Since when did this guy want to stage a coup? It is true that at first he is trying to replace Anora with Alistair. He does this for two reasons:
1.     Anora could be working with Loghain. She therefore cannot be trusted.
2.     She is a commoner and only a person of Royal blood should sit on the throne.
This does not mean however that Alistair is no more than a tool to Eamon. The first evidence that points to this is the fact that he repaired and kept Alistair’s mother’s amulet all these years. The second evidence is the fact that he tells the player that he will see where Alistair went after the player has put Anora on the throne and kept Loghain alive.
Eamon’s reasons for wanting to despose Anora are acceptable. Firstly Anora is much like her father. Secondly she is not the true heir to the throne, Alistair is.
And before anyone is going to point out the new facts that ‘Return to Ostagar’ brought:
Eamon suspects, as does the general populace, that Anora is barren because she hasn’t produced an heir yet. Producing an heir has always been the primary duty of queens. If Eamon is correct Cailan divorcing and/or cheating on Anora is neccesary, no matter how morally wrong it might be.
And I know that Cailan was trying to improve relations with Orlais and he even might have been a close friend of Empress Celene. There is however no direct evidence that he was intending to marry her.


On another note: I was thinking about Revan. His crimes are far greater than those of Loghain, yet we all accept that he can redeemed. Shouldn’t Revan be executed for his crimes after the events of Kotor?

Modifié par Apophis2412, 06 mars 2010 - 02:19 .

[krylo]

Apophis2412 wrote...

On another note: I was thinking about Revan. His crimes are far greater than those of Loghain, yet we all accept that he can redeemed. Shouldn’t Revan be executed for his crimes after the events of Kotor?

It would have been nicer than what the Jedi Council actually did.

[Apophis2412]

krylo wrote...

Apophis2412 wrote...

On another note: I was thinking about Revan. His crimes are far greater than those of Loghain, yet we all accept that he can redeemed. Shouldn’t Revan be executed for his crimes after the events of Kotor?

It would have been nicer than what the Jedi Council actually did.

Canon states that he regained his memories just before the battle of the starforge. There should he not be executed after the events of Kotor?

[CybAnt1]

C
As for being an asset or a liability, Loghain, at that point, has begun to respect you. He has nothing to gain from betraying you - after all, he seeks only to serve (and save) Fereldan.

Decided, for the first time, to take Loghain into my party last night on an "alterna-save", because I was curious. I wanted to take him back to RtO but alas in that savepath I had already gone there earlier and the game won't let you return a second time to RtO -- too bad I wanted that dialogue. 

You don't have him for a very long time before the endgame - but you can, if you try, get his approval to 100 (well, even without the console). Once you have him as a companion (finally tried it last night), he'll accept gifts, and there are conversation options to raise his approval. Unfortunately, all of them require you forgiving what he's done and claiming you see his POV - which I just can't do - so I couldn't do it. I kept trying convos with him, but they kept dropping his approval. I mean, what was I going to say? That trying to murder me was OK? I told him I brought him into the party to sacrifice him -- got a 15 pt approval drop for my honesty. (And I was true to my word.)

I will give him one thing: when we had the convo right before going to the Archdemon, he volunteered to sacrifice himself before I had to ask him. He said he should do it to redeem himself. 

I still say he's evil, but that one act makes me accept that Anora built him a monument; though I don't think that cancels out other actions.

 

[CalJones]

krylo wrote...

And YET you both present your views on Loghain's life as though they are the only choices that a morally upstanding Warden could possibly make.

Morally upstanding, no. Practical, yes. Would Riordan recruit him? Yes. Would Duncan recruit him? Yes. A reluctant conscript or a raw recruit who had little understanding of the Wardens' ethos might choose to do otherwise. I'm not disputing that.

...Yeah, other than all that evidence I guess we can assume it was Howe.
The only thing Loghain MAY have been innocent of is the riots, but no one accused him of that.

I'm assuming the riots kicked off due to the events that happen in the City Elf origin, so no, even Howe wasn't involved in those.
The rest - prisoners, slavers etc - are obviously not good things to do. That's a no brainer. The reason I mention Howe is because the Wiki states, "He serves Loghain, with some believing he is behind the worst of Loghain's crimes." This is speculated rather than stated, but given what Howe did to the Couslands, it seems very likely to me.

And YET, again, you and Apophis present your decision (up until this point) as though it is the only morally justifiable decision.

Go reread those posts, and pretend we were talking about Branka instead of Loghain and tell me how it feels to you.

Funnily enough Branka gets to live in quite a few of my games. Sometimes my Warden makes her see the error of her ways. Sometimes I just need the golems.

And yet David Gaider himself has said that Loghain was planning a 'confrontation' with Cailin eventually.  It is why Eamon was poisoned BEFORE Ostagar.  Loghain knew a confrontation was coming, and he removed Eamon from the picture beforehand. Was Loghain originally planning to kill him?  No.  He was not.  Treason and betrayal were in the cards before he ever saw a darkspawn, however.

Yes, I'm aware of this - a confrontation is not the same thing as treason and betrayal, however. What he actually would have done had Ostagar not happened isn't known, so that's a bit of a tricky point.

No it wasn't.  See earlier posts.  He would have had a much stronger base of power to fight the blight and/or hold off the orlesians had he called a landsmeet.  Anora would have most likely won the right to rule anyway, but Loghain wouldn't have been seen by an usurper by half the bannorn driving the country into civil war.

Ferelden had back up laws for succession if the king was killed/his bloodline destroyed.  Instead of using them, Loghain declared himself Anora's regent and usurped the power from the landsmeet.

As I said in previous posts, he had reasons for doing so, but it was NOT necessity.

Point conceded. I must admit I haven't read the books (yet) nor have I delved deeply enough into the Codex to know what those laws are.

Neither one of them is clean, but Eamon wasn't attempting a coup.  Not until Loghain already pulled his, anyway.

Maybe so, but Eamon is still taking a huge risk promoting Alistair when there's an archdemon on the loose. For starters, Alistair doesn't want to be king, and second, he's one of only two Wardens known to be in Fereldan at that point so what the hell is Eamon doing trying to make him king? Eamon might be right to feel agrieved for being poisoned, but he's still a dick with a lousy sense of timing.

[sylvanaerie]

I've actually left Anora on the throne a couple of playthroughs. And even had Alistair and Anora married in a couple as well. I can't justify in my mind leaving Loghain alive. I tried it once, and it felt completely wrong. Went back and redid the Landsmeet and killed him.
Its all perspective really. As Flemeth says "We believe what we want to believe." I have posted my reasons for why I believe and Krylo makes good points too. CalJones I can appreciate your viewpoint but just have to "agree to disagree" with you.

And it has nothing to do with age, I'm 48 and I still don't like the guy.

Modifié par sylvanaerie, 06 mars 2010 - 04:40 .