Random DA things

[zillah975]

I love this game like burning. After I'd been playing on the PS3 for several months, I bought a shiny new laptop for the sole purpose of having it for the PC and I'm now playing it on BOTH the PC and PS3, because it's JUST THAT AWESOME. *draws hearts* I have four working laptops now, because of the three I had before, none would run DA.

The following rantishness is from looking at the game from the POV of a character within it, not from the POV of a player who understands why things have to go a certain way in order to position the player character to proceed down a certain path and become the big hero.



There. Now.

Okay, have you noticed that Duncan is a manipulative, evil bastard? I was crushing on him so hard at first, but my human wardens and my newest City Elf warden just want to punch him in the face. Alistair may be all starry-eyed over him, but oh my god.

My human wardens. First, while her father lies dying at their feet, Duncan promises to get her and her mother to safety only if her father agrees that she'll become a Grey Warden. She doesn't get a say in this, and her DYING FATHER is being blackmailed into it on the lives of his wife and child!

That's a pretty big strike against poor old Duncan.

Second, it turns out that this thing that Duncan blackmailed her dying father into agreeing to will get her killed, either immediately upon joining, or within just a few decades -- when she will descend into the deep roads and fight monsters in the dark miles below ground until they kill her. RAWR.

Third, POOR SER JORY. OMFG. He's got a pregnant wife at home! but does Duncan even try to talk sense into him?! No! He's all, "oh, he pulled his sword, I HAD to kill him," but you notice that Jory looks about as threatening as a kitten up a tree until Duncan draws his sword and advances on him? Because I sure noticed that. Doesn't even once try to reason with him, or explain things to him further. No, he just tricks him into leaving his wife and child, then stabs him to death when Jory expresses some dismay at Daveth's gruesome and untimely death!

Also, creepiest group ever, the way Duncan, Alistair, Jory, and your Warden just back slowly away while Daveth chokes to death. Jeez, guys, maybe it wasn't even the blood, maybe he just swallowed wrong! Somebody could at least TRY to help him!

The human origin is definitely the worst (for Duncan's character, I mean) of the ways I've played through so far. But the City Elf is also kind of grim, as I realized when I played through the opening on the "I am a selfish asshole" setting and discovered that if things go a certain way, your pal gets carted off to prison to be executed and Duncan's all, "hey, I only need one warden. Too bad for him."




I feel sort of guilty for still crushing on Duncan, even knowing what a bastard he is.

Are there any "Duncan is a manipulative evil bastard" fics out there for a girl who both crushes on him and wants to punch him in the face?

Comments

[jamzsquared]

In response to your question, I think my take on Duncan depends on which origin story I play (like so much in DA). My f!surana was definitely put out, pissed, and angry when she was "recruited," mostly because she is such a goody two-shoes that she betrayed Jowan without a second though, did exactly what Irving told her to do, and ended up getting burned in the worst of ways (this, though, puts her on a serious trajectory for character development that I've been itching to write). Getting pawned off on the Wardens, leaving the Circle, and getting plunged in the midst of civil war and blight are not things that she feels grateful about.

On the other hand, my f!Cousland really, really, really wanted to be a warden, and so when she's forced to flee Highever, albeit under really horrible and traumatic experiences, she doesn't feel so much that Duncan exploited and manipulated the situation, but rather that he saved her from the Howes in the one way that was open to him. Still, I totally see how that 'power of conscription' business and the way that it gets used in the origin stories (in some ways, I think, sloppier than others, which I attribute to the usual spectre in all things Poorly Plotted by Bioware, which is the collaborative process of writing the story, blah blah).

Off-topic, I love the icon of your mage, Winterborn. Glad to see that I am not the only one who created a silver-haired, dark-skinned character. My first Cousland favored that look, complete with tattoos, and when I saw what her parents looked like the first time, I amused myself with trying to figure out where the hell Vanora came from. A changeling's child, quite clearly. ;)

Also off-topic, I glad to see that my contemplation of buying a new laptop in order to run DA, rather than on console, is notabsolutely effing crazy completely unusual. Am so jealous of all the fun mods and such that PC players can access...