mllemaenad:tiz85:becausedragonage:meridok:Okay, Tumblr keeps mis-attributing my commentary so if you

mllemaenad:tiz85:becausedragonage:meridok:Okay, Tumblr keeps mis-attributing my commentary so if you want to read the previous (most excellent and please do go read it) stuff: follow this link.Not to mention that Origins literally opens up with Duncan telling us how that since the end of the Fourth Blight - 400 years before, like, equivalent to shit that happened in the 1600s for us - popular opinion has turned more and more towards “The Grey Wardens are relics, heroes of old tales”. Like, the way it’s all set up, until the Fifth Blight hit Ferelden (and ONLY Ferelden/the Wilds - remember this, this is important) the vast majority of humans in southern Thedas thought the darkspawn were literally not a threat and had been entirely defeated by Garahel at the end of the Fourth Blight.What about the Anderfels? You might say. That’s why I said “southern Thedas”. Your average Ander is definitely still very aware of the darkspawn and presumably western Vints are as well (and educated Vints), to a degree. But most of Thedas? Not your average Ander. Most of Thedas? Might never travel more than 20 miles from where they were born. Except at the highest, most educated and/or powerful levels, the world of Thedas is small in terms of how much awareness the average person would have. Dwarves and Orzammar are near mythical, as legendary as griffins, to many humans.And then, of course, the Fifth Blight happens. And sure, a Grey Warden saves the day. Stops the Blight so fast its the shortest Blight ever. Only one major nation is really affected. Popular tales of the Warden, etc, would presumably increase popularity, relevance, awareness of the Wardens and the darkspawn… for a time. And with very little immediacy outside of Ferelden or areas with large numbers of Fereldan refugees. In Nevarra? Antiva? Hell, much of Orlais? The Wardens are still relics of tales - and an organization that by ancient treaty can infringe on a kingdom’s sovereignty and override their laws. Kingdoms/rulers don’t usually like that.And of course, as has been said, the Grey Wardens - from the very start of the series - have been deliberately presented as “classic heroic order… that is fucked up and falling and failing and forgotten”. That’s kind of the point. (And the beauty. Ugh, I love the Wardens, lmao. They’re fighting what is pretty much the purest embodiment of evil in Thedas, they give their lives, and they are forgotten, shunned, ignored - and not superhuman, not Flawless.) What happens with the Wardens in Inquisition is realistic, and so very human, on many levels. And not at all out of keeping with the Wardens we’ve been presented.Also, not gonna lie, if you got “DAI is demonizing the Wardens” you are shit at understanding stories. DAI didn’t demonize the Wardens. DAI didn’t “treat the Wardens like shit”. The game showed how individuals with ungodly amounts of political and military power and sway can influence major aspects of society and history. And newer organizations? Can very easily have more popular legitimacy than older ones, and more raw military power (which is a vitally important calculation at macro-scale state politics), and - particularly in the case of religious organizations - more (immediate) political legitimacy.(Also, like, if you Adamant after the Winter Palace, the Inquisitor is literally propping up/holding the reins of power on the most powerful state/empire in Thedas. Like. Who is gonna come to the Wardens aid if the Inquisitor boots them out? The Anderfels?)Now, can the Inquisitor, as a character, within the story, treat the Wardens like shit? Sure. There’s a reason getting rid of the Wardens nets you buckets of disapproval from several companions. ‘Cause that’s probably a bad fucking decision tbh. But it’s a roleplaying game. It’s supposed to allow for those kind of choices!… This got significantly longer than I planned on. Woops. Yes!And one more thing on one quote from the pics above: “LITERALLY ALL THEY CARE ABOUT IS STOPPING THE BLIGHT.”YES and that’s the whole problem with them and WHY they ran into trouble in DA:I. Because there was no Blight, because they were duped and since they had that ‘at all costs’ mindset they had no moral checks in place to stop them, to make them question, to plant a bit of doubt when they really needed it. That’s the issue with the Wardens, that’s the issue with Loghain, that’s the issue with (to some degree) Meredith: heroes who think that they can sacrifice and compromise on fundamental matters of morality because they are right and their cause is just. The irony is that once they decide that anything goes then they’ve lost the means to measure the what is right and just. Then they start slaughtering mages, selling their people into slavery, slashing the throats of their own people. It’s not good enough to want to do the right thing, you have to do it in a right manner. And this may work… for half of what the OP said.The other half, however, is another story.The point is this: the Inquisition as a whole is not much better than Corypheus.Because on one side we have a singular very powerful person with an entourage of also powerful individual around who kills everybody who tries to stop them. And on the other side we have a singular very powerful person with an entourage of also powerful individual around who kills everybody who tries to stop them.Now I know that most people would get their pant in a twist but lets remember this: the Chantry (on which the Inquisition bases its legitimancy, literally, the Inquisition was the Chantry before it split into Templar Order/Chantry properly called. The Quizzy is called the motherfucking Herald of Andraste for goodness sake) is no better than Corypheus at all. Heck, prolly a bit worse, if nothing else because the Chantry had more time to kill and destroy at its leisure.Andrastianism hadn’t been done much more good to Thedas than whatever religion Corypheus wants to bring in. Remember the Dales? The treatment of elves? Remember the abuse of Mages? Remember the hundreds of innocent people killed in Rivain because they were Qunari? Oh and we have little reason to think that the very first Inquisition was a “nice” organization since all it did was kill heathens (the later First Inquisition seems to have mellowed a bit which is why it was promptly turned into the Templar Order/Chantry so they could go back at the business of being as nasty as possible).Really. Tell me any thing Corypheus did and I can tell you that the Chantry did it, too.Honestly, the difference between Andrastianism and Corypheus is that Andrastianism had already got ridden of most of the people who opposed it, while Corypheus is still in the “kill the heathens” stage.The Chantry is beyond that. The heathens have already been killed.And this is what the Inquisition power is based upon. This is WHAT THE INQUISITION IS FIGHTING FOR.Now, individual Quizzes may disagree. Especially not-Andrastian idividual Quizzes. But the reason the Inquisition gets to have so much power and so soon, and why nobody questions them very much is the one above: you are fighting for Andraste and for the Chantry.Congratulation! You are the poster child of a thousand years of oppression! Meridok notes that the Wardens “are still relics of tales - and an organization that by ancient treaty can infringe on a kingdom’s sovereignty and override their laws. Kingdoms/rulers don’t usually like that.”And what is the Inquisition doing for basically all the game but THAT, and even without even having treaties to justify it? You run around sticking flag in the ground to call dibs on stuff, and if anyody opposes to you you kill him.The problem “The Inquisition played with a ball and everyone listened” is real. The fact that the Inquisition had 0 right to do basically everything they did is also real. And that is particularly clear in both the Winter Palace and the fact that the fate of the Wardens is left in the Inquisition’s hand.Now, you can say “Well but they HAD TO defeat Corypheus!”. Setting aside that for me it is an even choice between Cory and the Inquisition, I’ll cite becausedragonage:The irony is that once they decide that anything goes then they’ve lost the means to measure the what is right and just. Yep.It doesn’t work for the Wardens alone.It also works for the Inquisition. Which HAS TO defeat Corypheus at all cost, even if the cost is the creation of a monster of an organization which has far too much power for its own good… and the good of everyone around.Even because there are still two Old Gods to be awakened. Two Blights to happen, and who knows what then?But Corypheus is destroyed.The Wardens still have a sense, the Inquisition doesn’t anymore. With the defeat of Corypheus and the closing of the Breach, what should the Inquisition do?Tl;dr: The Inquisition is the poster-child of the Chantry and Andrastianism, and the reason everybody listen to them is because they are believed to have been sent by the Maker. Which means that the Inquisition is the poster child of a thousand years of oppression and genocide and which are frankly little better than Corypheus himself. The Inquisition has 0 “secular” reason to do what it does in regard of politic (no treaties, nothing), its existence is based uniquely on religion reasons and in the need of the status quo to keep going on. Reasons that stop existing the moment Corypheus is defeated and the Breach closed.There is a reason why many people believe the Inquisitor will die soon, and why there was a fan-dlc which speculated on the need for Hawke to kill the Inquisitor.And this is, my friend, the true masterpiece of “grey morality” of the game:Corypheus is a monster who fight for a corrupt and likely false religion.But so are you.PS: my Hawke, btw, told all of this to the Inquisition. And only reason he helped them was because Varric asked and he has a soft spot a mile wide for Varricmllemaenad :DThe slide for the Inquisition in the epilogue is terrifying. You get a different one depending on which of your advisors you preferred, but there’s no way to get one that doesn’t scream of tyranny.I think the difference between what you get in Origins and what you get in Inquisition is interesting. Both the Warden and the Inquisitor make hugely important political decisions – that’s just how the quests play out. In Origins you get these massively detailed slides, discussing the fate of everyone you’ve ever met. Sometimes things a Warden did with the best intentions will end badly. Sometimes a thing you barely noticed will make a profound difference. In Inquisition, you get political overviews – few groups resist the will of the Inquisition, and the inference is that it’s unlikely to end well for those that do.The Warden is a character who, by chance and fate, for a very brief moment becomes the most important person in the world. Their treaties give them negotiating power, and the desperation of the various groups they’re trying to recruit gives them leverage. You can be a kingmaker more than once, you can break curses and save or murder countless people.But once it’s done? Well, you’re Commander of the Grey and de facto Arl(essa) of Amaranthine. It’s not that you’ve no power whatsoever. But you’re back to being one player amongst many. You can’t go back to Anora, Alistair, Bhelen or Harrowmont and say you don’t think they’re working out as a ruler so you’d like them replaced. Those slides tell you all sorts of things about the people you put in power, and the people who have to live under them. Those personalities matter, because they’re going to determine what happens next.In Inquisition, what happens next depends almost entirely on the power of the Inquisition and their relationship with the new Divine. You don’t need long breakdowns of who does what where, because that’s not the point. The point is that the Inquisition has re-established the authority of the Chantry, and is using it to shape the world according to its desires. Whatever you’ve done with Celene, Briala and Gaspard – you might go back in and do something else later.Thus, many believe that when the tide again turns, Celene will stand alone.That’s what it says if Celene rules and is not on good terms with the Inquisition. Not that Orlais might not have the best leadership, that the Inquisition failed or that it might be in trouble, but that Celene herself better watch out.That the Wardens do some screwed up things in all the games is a given. I mean, they start their careers by poisoning themselves, so it’s all downhill from there. But … Wardens do have a check on them. They have the right to do whatever is necessary to stop the Blight, but that’s it. They’re supposed to remain politically neutral otherwise. Obviously (as Origins demonstrates) that’s harder than it looks, but nations will come down them if they get out of line. They got themselves kicked out of Ferelden once for meddling, and one of the points Anora will raise in her favour as a potential ruler is that putting a Warden on the throne is going to look dodgy.The Inquisition has no such check. Power and more power is really their only endgame. And with the Herald of Andraste as their leader, they have the implicit approval of a goddess for everything they do.I’d be surprised if people came out of either Origins or Inquisition especially scared of the Wardens. But I know I’m bloody terrified of the Inquisition. Those ending slides are damning in a way that Origins’ weren’t. -- source link
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