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Post by Iakus on Nov 14, 2018 22:55:21 GMT
To answer the OP question": Playing morally good shouldn't be an automatic "I win button" but at the same time, neither should being forced to indulge one's inner sociopath. There's certainly nothing wrong with trade-offs. And in fact it could be interesting to have different flavors of "good" and "bad" outcomes based on the morality of the character. Different rewards for different styles of play.
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Post by zipzap2000 on Nov 19, 2018 6:04:43 GMT
Is shooting a man to save a million the right thing to do? Yes. But it's still murder, demonstrating that your character knows when to be a bastard and when to hold the moral ground should determine who gets the best ending. You should be willing to sacrifice your beliefs for the greater good, and be forced to make ruthless decisions that ask you to sacrifice your morals.
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Post by alanc9 on Nov 19, 2018 8:03:02 GMT
Is that logically coherent? The same action can't simultaneously be immoral and the right thing to do, -- if it is, there's something wrong with the morality system you're using, because it's giving you bad advice.
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Post by copper on Nov 19, 2018 12:45:05 GMT
Is that logically coherent? The same action can't simultaneously be immoral and the right thing to do, -- if it is, there's something wrong with the morality system you're using, because it's giving you bad advice. I think in general this is true. But what about something like the Reaper War, where it's potentially the end of civilization if our protagonist fails? I could see some ruthless calculus being used, and accepted by other characters, in this scenario.
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Post by griffith82 on Nov 19, 2018 14:27:05 GMT
Is that logically coherent? The same action can't simultaneously be immoral and the right thing to do, -- if it is, there's something wrong with the morality system you're using, because it's giving you bad advice. I think in general this is true. But what about something like the Reaper War, where it's potentially the end of civilization if our protagonist fails? I could see some ruthless calculus being used, and accepted by other characters, in this scenario. Unfortunately yes that's what happens in war. I can see both sides of the coin here.
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Post by Hanako Ikezawa on Nov 19, 2018 16:12:09 GMT
I think in general this is true. But what about something like the Reaper War, where it's potentially the end of civilization if our protagonist fails? I could see some ruthless calculus being used, and accepted by other characters, in this scenario. Unfortunately yes that's what happens in war. I can see both sides of the coin here. Until it gets to killing civilians. There's no excuse, even war, for that.
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Post by SofaJockey on Nov 19, 2018 16:25:42 GMT
Unfortunately yes that's what happens in war. I can see both sides of the coin here. Until it gets to killing civilians. There's no excuse, even war, for that. 300,000 Batarians in the Bahak System died as collateral damage from stopping the Arrival of the Reapers. There's a perfect excuse.
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Post by Phantom on Nov 19, 2018 16:29:21 GMT
the question should be asked in full, "how far are you willing to go to stop the Reapers?" and "Is your honor worth the silence of ash of Trillion dead?"
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Post by Hanako Ikezawa on Nov 19, 2018 16:46:40 GMT
Until it gets to killing civilians. There's no excuse, even war, for that. 300,000 Batarians in the Bahak System died as collateral damage from stopping the Arrival of the Reapers. There's a perfect excuse. And I think Shepard should be tried as a war criminal because of it. the question should be asked in full, "how far are you willing to go to stop the Reapers?" and "Is your honor worth the silence of ash of Trillion dead?" Not stoop to their methods is my answer. Also Javik has some big talk about a method that was proved to not work.
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Post by themikefest on Nov 19, 2018 16:48:02 GMT
When it comes to the reapers, friendships and being nice go out the window. My Shepard doesn't get paid to be nice or friendly. She gets paid to destroy the reapers. Look at Mordin/Padok. Good characters, but I have no problem shooting them in the back to get more resources to deal with the reapers.
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Games: Mass Effect Trilogy, Dragon Age: Origins, Dragon Age 2, Dragon Age Inquisition, KOTOR, Baldur's Gate, Neverwinter Nights, Jade Empire, Mass Effect Andromeda, SWTOR, Mass Effect Legendary Edition
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Post by dmc1001 on Nov 19, 2018 16:49:13 GMT
Until it gets to killing civilians. There's no excuse, even war, for that. 300,000 Batarians in the Bahak System died as collateral damage from stopping the Arrival of the Reapers. There's a perfect excuse. Agreed. Shepard did try to warn them but communications were cut off and by then there was no way to stop it. Still, almost smacks of revenge for Terra Nova. (It's not, but can feel that way.)
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Post by themikefest on Nov 19, 2018 16:50:32 GMT
300,000 Batarians in the Bahak System died as collateral damage from stopping the Arrival of the Reapers. There's a perfect excuse. And I think Shepard should be tried as a war criminal because of it. And I think the asari should be tried as war criminals for witholding an artifact that could have saved many lives had it been revealed earlier.
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Post by Hanako Ikezawa on Nov 19, 2018 16:51:37 GMT
And I think Shepard should be tried as a war criminal because of it. And I think the asari should be tried as war criminals for witholding an artifact that could have saved many lives had it been revealed earlier. The Matriarchs who knew and didn't share, sure.
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Post by Deleted on Nov 19, 2018 19:12:38 GMT
Until it gets to killing civilians. There's no excuse, even war, for that. 300,000 Batarians in the Bahak System died as collateral damage from stopping the Arrival of the Reapers. There's a perfect excuse. I think those 300,000 Batarians would argue that it was not a perfect excuse. There's a reason why, in game, we were not actually given that choice to make. The story made the choice for us and all we could do was decide whether or not we would attempt to warn them or just radio Normady to save ourselves. In that case, of course, warning them became the "morallly better" choice... and neither choice resulted in a "good ending."
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Post by griffith82 on Nov 19, 2018 23:41:08 GMT
Until it gets to killing civilians. There's no excuse, even war, for that. 300,000 Batarians in the Bahak System died as collateral damage from stopping the Arrival of the Reapers. There's a perfect excuse. It was a hard choice but it had to be done
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Post by griffith82 on Nov 19, 2018 23:52:46 GMT
Unfortunately yes that's what happens in war. I can see both sides of the coin here. Until it gets to killing civilians. There's no excuse, even war, for that. What choice did we have?
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Post by Deleted on Nov 20, 2018 0:40:32 GMT
300,000 Batarians in the Bahak System died as collateral damage from stopping the Arrival of the Reapers. There's a perfect excuse. It was a hard choice but it had to be done What choice? The game gave us no chance to choose not to destroy the relay at all. The devs chose for us to destroy that relay. THe only choice we were given was whether or not Shepard would try to warn the Batarians or call in the ship to be sure to save himself/herself. I'd venture a guess that, for most players, that was a fairly easy choice... also knowing that the devs would never kill off Shepard within a DLC no matter what was chosen in that regard.
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Post by Hanako Ikezawa on Nov 20, 2018 0:53:13 GMT
Until it gets to killing civilians. There's no excuse, even war, for that. What choice did we have? Bringing the squad with us in the first place so we wouldn't be drugged for two days comes to mind for starters. Yeah Hackett said go into the prison alone but there was no reason we wouldn't have had some on the shuttle that dropped us off or rendezvous on the station afterwards or called in reinforcements while we were there and so on and so forth.
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Post by Deleted on Nov 20, 2018 1:31:18 GMT
Until it gets to killing civilians. There's no excuse, even war, for that. What choice did we have? In this case, the playing public is simply parroting the morality being "taught" by the game. The devs decided for us that this was a scenario where one could possibly justify sacrificing a large number of innocent civilians; but the actually "goodness" of that morality is still debatable. Shepard doesn't really know that the Alpha Relay is the only opening the Reapers have into the galaxy. He/she has no actual way of knowing that destroying that relay will buy them any significant amount of time... all he has on any of that is Kenson's word. The artifact's proof is that the Reapers were planning to come through that Relay, being a Reaper controlled artificat, it is not logically that it would reveal that destroying that one Relay would completely derail the Reaper's plans for months. Shepard is literally throwing away the lives of 300,000 Batarians on the sole word of a totally indoctrinated individual.
Shepard fumbled the ball when they failed to set up a plan for reinforcements the moment Shepard confirmed Kenson was free of the prison. Instead of going to the base alone with Kenson to get proof, Shepard should have been conferring with Hackett while in the shuttle with her. It was not Shepard's decision to make at any point in time. Heck, Shepard wasn't even part of the Alliance. It certainly wasn't Kenson's decision either. She obviously wasn't acting under orders from the Alliance. She's a rogue operative taking matters into her own hands. Hackett is also complicit... letting his friendship with Kenson get in the way of his doing his job.
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Post by ahglock on Nov 20, 2018 2:32:19 GMT
300,000 Batarians in the Bahak System died as collateral damage from stopping the Arrival of the Reapers. There's a perfect excuse. I think those 300,000 Batarians would argue that it was not a perfect excuse. There's a reason why, in game, we were not actually given that choice to make. The story made the choice for us and all we could do was decide whether or not we would attempt to warn them or just radio Normady to save ourselves. In that case, of course, warning them became the "morallly better" choice... and neither choice resulted in a "good ending." This gets played out in hostage situations. Gunman uses Bob as a shield, Gunman points gun at crowd of people. Police shoot through bob to kill gunman. Yeah it sucks Bob is dead, but its considered worse to stand by and let gunman kill 5 people. Maybe the gunman is out of ammo, maybe he misses etc but you normally don't take those chances. I don't think I'd call it the moral choice, it might be the most logical choice that when playing the odds saves the most lives. But I don't think I'd call t murder either.
Edit to add, quarantines are a similar thing. Group A has small pox or whatever, they get quarantined. They have done nothing wrong, but you are kidnapping them and throwing them in a box. Sure most would willingly quarantine themselves, but those that don't, your other option is let them roam free and potentially infect millions no matter what safeguards you set up. Is it immoral to quarantine them against their will?
There are plenty of philosophies that wold say yes it is, so I'm not saying its wrong but it isn't a universal morally wrong act.
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Post by gothpunkboy89 on Nov 20, 2018 2:42:21 GMT
Shepard doesn't really know that the Alpha Relay is the only opening the Reapers have into the galaxy. And yet they go out of the way to introduce and Alpha Relay that when tuned right will connect directly to the Citadel Relay. Information Shepard is explicitly told. Also explicitly told is that this is a unique one of a kind Relay because it functions as both short and long range Relay.
The entire basis of the Mass Relay system is that the space between worlds is so long that it would be the equivalent of sailing from England to North America in the 1400's.
Which are valid words given she is a respected scientists and the Alliance wouldn't be chasing ghosts in the ass end of no were unless there was valid proof. While Anderson and Hackett have been willing to give Shepard the benefit of the doubt they are not the sum total of the Alliance command and it wasn't either of them that sent Kenson to the system nor started to provide them with the resources needed to build the base.
Why did the artifact reveal any of that? It has been a while since I played the DLC but I do not remember the artifact telling Shepard that destruction of the Relay would derail the Reaper's plans for months? The only one I remember mentioning anything about delaying the Reaper invasion is Shepard because it would force the Reapers to have to reach the next Relay before they could start invading which would by some time.
It is based on the data she gathered before indoctrination and the fact the artifact and the entire base of indoctrinated individuals tried to stop him from blowing up the Relay. The very same indoctrinated people who behaved perfectly normally and supported Shepard right up until he tried to do something that would negatively effect the Reapers. If blowing up the Relay would have done nothing to Reaper's invasion then there would have been no reason for the indoctrinated staff to lash out at Shepard. It would have been far more useful to help him blow it up then be pulled back into the Alliance to infiltrate key strategic areas and then betrayed them during the Reaper invasion to help cripple the Alliance against the Reapers.
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Post by Deleted on Nov 20, 2018 2:50:52 GMT
I think those 300,000 Batarians would argue that it was not a perfect excuse. There's a reason why, in game, we were not actually given that choice to make. The story made the choice for us and all we could do was decide whether or not we would attempt to warn them or just radio Normady to save ourselves. In that case, of course, warning them became the "morallly better" choice... and neither choice resulted in a "good ending." This gets played out in hostage situations. Gunman uses Bob as a shield, Gunman points gun at crowd of people. Police shoot through bob to kill gunman. Yeah it sucks Bob is dead, but its considered worse to stand by and let gunman kill 5 people. Maybe the gunman is out of ammo, maybe he misses etc but you normally don't take those chances. I don't think I'd call it the moral choice, it might be the most logical choice that when playing the odds saves the most lives. But I don't think I'd call t murder either.
Edit to add, quarantines are a similar thing. Group A has small pox or whatever, they get quarantined. They have done nothing wrong, but you are kidnapping them and throwing them in a box. Sure most would willingly quarantine themselves, but those that don't, your other option is let them roam free and potentially infect millions no matter what safeguards you set up. Is it immoral to quarantine them against their will?
There are plenty of philosophies that wold say yes it is, so I'm not saying its wrong but it isn't a universal morally wrong act.
I never said it was "universally" anything. In fact, that's my point... that the Batarians would argue the morality of the decision from their POV. Your gunman scenario isn't the same thing at all. In deciding to follow through with Kenson's plan, Shepard is trusting the word of Kenson... someone who, after revealing the plan, was also revealed to be under Reaper control. The "proof" of a Reaper attack is also coming from a Reaper source; yet it never occurs to Shepard that it all could be a set-up... on blind faith, he/she kills 300,000 people.
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Post by Deleted on Nov 20, 2018 2:53:57 GMT
Shepard doesn't really know that the Alpha Relay is the only opening the Reapers have into the galaxy. And yet they go out of the way to introduce and Alpha Relay that when tuned right will connect directly to the Citadel Relay. Information Shepard is explicitly told. Also explicitly told is that this is a unique one of a kind Relay because it functions as both short and long range Relay.
The entire basis of the Mass Relay system is that the space between worlds is so long that it would be the equivalent of sailing from England to North America in the 1400's.
Which are valid words given she is a respected scientists and the Alliance wouldn't be chasing ghosts in the ass end of no were unless there was valid proof. While Anderson and Hackett have been willing to give Shepard the benefit of the doubt they are not the sum total of the Alliance command and it wasn't either of them that sent Kenson to the system nor started to provide them with the resources needed to build the base.
Why did the artifact reveal any of that? It has been a while since I played the DLC but I do not remember the artifact telling Shepard that destruction of the Relay would derail the Reaper's plans for months? The only one I remember mentioning anything about delaying the Reaper invasion is Shepard because it would force the Reapers to have to reach the next Relay before they could start invading which would by some time.
It is based on the data she gathered before indoctrination and the fact the artifact and the entire base of indoctrinated individuals tried to stop him from blowing up the Relay. The very same indoctrinated people who behaved perfectly normally and supported Shepard right up until he tried to do something that would negatively effect the Reapers. If blowing up the Relay would have done nothing to Reaper's invasion then there would have been no reason for the indoctrinated staff to lash out at Shepard. It would have been far more useful to help him blow it up then be pulled back into the Alliance to infiltrate key strategic areas and then betrayed them during the Reaper invasion to help cripple the Alliance against the Reapers.
My point was exactly that the artifact did not likely reveal that destroying the Relay would derail the Reaper plans. Only Kenson's word supports this theory... and she's clearly crazy (indoctrinated). Even before indoctrination, Kenson is off the reservation... taking the decision to destroy the relay into her own hands and it's not her call to make. She's the leader of a rogue group, looking to destroy a star system. In many circles, they'd be labeled as terrorists.
At any rate, regardless, it's not a decision that was ours to make in the game. It's a decision imposed on us. I find it unusual that people who will complain about the endings imposing a "genocidal" decision on the player have nothing to say about this one... which is clearly imposed on us. In the end, they're games and fictional stories... not a means to "teach" morality.
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Post by griffith82 on Nov 20, 2018 3:01:02 GMT
Bringing the squad with us in the first place so we wouldn't be drugged for two days comes to mind for starters. Yeah Hackett said go into the prison alone but there was no reason we wouldn't have had some on the shuttle that dropped us off or rendezvous on the station afterwards or called in reinforcements while we were there and so on and so forth. That's a design choice albeit a frustrating one it doesn't affect the plot.
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Post by griffith82 on Nov 20, 2018 3:03:13 GMT
And yet they go out of the way to introduce and Alpha Relay that when tuned right will connect directly to the Citadel Relay. Information Shepard is explicitly told. Also explicitly told is that this is a unique one of a kind Relay because it functions as both short and long range Relay.
The entire basis of the Mass Relay system is that the space between worlds is so long that it would be the equivalent of sailing from England to North America in the 1400's.
Which are valid words given she is a respected scientists and the Alliance wouldn't be chasing ghosts in the ass end of no were unless there was valid proof. While Anderson and Hackett have been willing to give Shepard the benefit of the doubt they are not the sum total of the Alliance command and it wasn't either of them that sent Kenson to the system nor started to provide them with the resources needed to build the base.
Why did the artifact reveal any of that? It has been a while since I played the DLC but I do not remember the artifact telling Shepard that destruction of the Relay would derail the Reaper's plans for months? The only one I remember mentioning anything about delaying the Reaper invasion is Shepard because it would force the Reapers to have to reach the next Relay before they could start invading which would by some time.
It is based on the data she gathered before indoctrination and the fact the artifact and the entire base of indoctrinated individuals tried to stop him from blowing up the Relay. The very same indoctrinated people who behaved perfectly normally and supported Shepard right up until he tried to do something that would negatively effect the Reapers. If blowing up the Relay would have done nothing to Reaper's invasion then there would have been no reason for the indoctrinated staff to lash out at Shepard. It would have been far more useful to help him blow it up then be pulled back into the Alliance to infiltrate key strategic areas and then betrayed them during the Reaper invasion to help cripple the Alliance against the Reapers.
My point was exactly that the artifact did not likely reveal that destroying the Relay would derail the Reaper plans. Only Kenson's word supports this theory... and she's clearly crazy (indoctrinated). Even before indoctrination, Kenson is off the reservation... taking the decision to destroy the relay into her own hands and it's not her call to make. She's the leader of a rogue group, looking to destroy a star system. In many circles, they'd be labeled as terrorists. I don't agree. Its logically told how the device is interacting and she was a respected scientist. She was not a terrorist she had a very difficult choice. Yes the dlcs is fixed story wise as a bridge. But imo the story works.
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