DA2: Orsino question/observation

[zute]

Totally missed the significance of this on my first play through, probably because we haven't really heard much about him, but there's a message signed by "O" about the cool, crazy experiments that Quentin is doing (i.e. trying to recreate his dead wife by killing a bunch of other women). I'm reasonably certain that is probably Orsino... I remember he said something about so-and-so using blood magic but he had stayed away from him, during the final battle.

So all this time I kind of sympathized with Orsino and thought he was one of the down trodden mages but now... I'm not so sure. He seems like a pretty creepy guy now.

Comments

[twist_shimmy]

Yeah, it was Orsino. He redeems himself slightly by saying "I thought Quentin's magic was too dangerous and told him to stop, but they've left me with no choice."

I will never stop D:-ing about Orsino because of this. WE TRUSTED YOU! Why must Hawke be the only sane mage in Kirkwall? :(

[zute]

I sure as heck hope he didn't know he was kidnapping and killing women... grrrr!

[twist_shimmy]

I would like to think not. Because if he did, my Hawkes will snap even more. DX

[sakuratea]

Seriously. Here we are, winning, and the guy is like, "hey, things are scary. Why not be a monster?"

[sleepyowlet]

Bad writing.

Would I allow any content of DA2 into my head-canon, this wouldn't be part of it, because it just makes no sense.
I'm keeping that door firmly shut, though.

[darkrose]

That was a huge "WTF??" moment for me.

My Hawke--the apostate Champion--has just sided with the Circle mages and proceeded to nuke multiple groups of templars into piles of fine ash. And then Orsino goes and does that shit?

Meanwhile, Hawke's looking at his boyfriend and thinking, "I'm going to be hearing 'I told you so' for the next year, right?"

I assume the idea was to make both sides morally equivalent. It came across like yet another example of characters acting with "I'm crazy!" as their only motivation.

[christmasinjuly]

>I assume the idea was to make both sides morally equivalent. It came across like yet another example of characters acting with "I'm crazy!" as their only motivation.

This. I frankly thought, with all those deranged maleficarum AND vicious Templars traipsing about, that both sides already HAD enough pros and cons to be getting on with. Reducing it to a choice between tweedle-crazy and tweedle-crazier just made me want to ask Anders if he needed me to distract the Maker while he blew up Kirkwall and put it out of my misery.

The Enigma of Kirkwall codex entries elysium_fic pointed out are helpful in understanding the peculiar torture of being a Marcher mage, but godDAMN, narratively it was so UNSATISFYING for all the tension and build-up to come down to SLAY IT ALL, ALL IS MAD.

[solitae]

but godDAMN, narratively it was so UNSATISFYING for all the tension and build-up to come down to SLAY IT ALL, ALL IS MAD.

Indeed. I really wanted an all-out Mages vs. Templars battle at the end rather than 'Oh look, both sides are NUTS. KILL THEM!'

[christmasinjuly]

It would have been awesome! Both sides had fair points! Anders going all V for Vengeance pushes everything to the max! Slaughter in the streets! The side the Champion chooses shall carry the day! ...just kidding, it only matters inasmuch as you prefer armor or robes for company as you run to the Gallows...

[darkrose]

Reducing it to a choice between tweedle-crazy and tweedle-crazier just made me want to ask Anders if he needed me to distract the Maker while he blew up Kirkwall and put it out of my misery.

Honestly, would anyone really have missed it?

The Enigma of Kirkwall codex entries elysium_fic pointed out are helpful in understanding the peculiar torture of being a Marcher mage, but godDAMN, narratively it was so UNSATISFYING for all the tension and build-up to come down to SLAY IT ALL, ALL IS MAD.

Especially since, if you missed the codex entries, then there's nothing in game to suggest that there's a reason Kirkwall is the standing home of the Thedosian Blood Mages & Abominations annual convention.

(And now I'm imagining a bunch of templars and abominations lining up to do the Time Warp.)

[christmasinjuly]

> Honestly, would anyone really have missed it?

Probably not, considering six years of gallivanting about Kirkwall did fuck-all to change the visible environs, and it's not like you could decide "oh, I'd like to improve Darktown" and maybe that would mean you couldn't help, say, the alienage and maybe making decisions like that would make sense in a narrative that's supposed to be driven by the political intrigues of one particular city and maybe choices like that would have aligned with the vision of the game's overall themes and WHY COULDN'T I APPOINT MYSELF VISCOUNT AND HOLY LORD asldkgh;wleit;alsdg; /head-explodey

> Especially since, if you missed the codex entries, then there's nothing in game to suggest that there's a reason Kirkwall is the standing home of the Thedosian Blood Mages & Abominations annual convention.

Or if you're an idiot and got all the codex entries, read them, even got the Achievement specifically pointing them out as worthwhile and so read them again and STILL managed to miss what the sodding point of them was until you read a comment on a discussion thread that sent the lightbulb above your head pinging dimly on... not, of course, that this happened to me or anything...

> (And now I'm imagining a bunch of templars and abominations lining up to do the Time Warp.)

L M A O. Followed immediately by the Electric Slide and the YMCA. (The Macarena is left only for the most daring of maleficarum and that one Pride demon who thinks he can do ANYTHING and make it look cool, ugh. Hybris, you don't even go here!)