BellaStrega

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  1. It's not possible to have a true utopia any more than it's truly possible to have absolute good or absolute evil.
  2. I can't speak for the devs, but I am amazed that anyone else would try to do so.

    I'd love to see an increase in the number of possible slots per server, as well as a stack of slots to be placed wherever we want or simply adding 2-4 slots to every server. I'm not picky. I think, given that a lot of people have slots filled on their favorite servers that it would only be a good thing to give us more slots to play the new powersets and the new 1-20 content.

    I ain't gonna argue with anyone about this 'cause the devs have said nothing.
  3. For Morac Ex Machina's sensibilities:

    Quote:
    Originally Posted by Deadedge View Post
    How many died in Israel, how many in Lebanon?

    If all human lives are equal, then math is the answer.
    That sounds like utilitarianism, which sometimes seems to dismiss human concerns while trying to place a certain cost or value on crimes against humans.

    Quote:
    Originally Posted by Mr. NoPants View Post
    The lives of your people are always worth more then the lives of other people when those other people are causing direct harm. In a fight buildings such as churches, schools, and hospitals are only protected targets as long as they aren't being used as offensive platforms.
    This is something many people believe, but if it leads to spilling blood simply because of proximity, is it really desirable?

    Quote:
    Originally Posted by Morac_Ex_Machina View Post
    Really? I know a number of people that would disagree.

    Oh wait, they say I'm crazy. That's different.
    You're evil because you chided me last night! It is not possible for you to be good in other contexts because cognitive dissonance will not allow me to find you likable. Sorry!

    Quote:
    Originally Posted by The_Killbot_5000 View Post
    How dreadfully nationalistic and xenophobic. As far as I'm concerned if it's human and on this planet, it's my people.
    Yeah, I agree with this. There is something to be said for putting a stop to lethal attacks, but at the same time, if the only response you produce simply kills more innocent people in the crossfire, I don't think that's desirable.

    Quote:
    Originally Posted by The_Killbot_5000 View Post
    That's why this is a thought-exercise. It's a clear cut what-if scenario, the bare bones of the ethical dilemma and nothing more, no awkward national loyalties to get in the way and bias us all. You're not meant to look for a real-world scenario and work with that, you're just meant to go with the question as asked. Tricky that way isn't it?
    Unfortunately, it - and the "is torture okay with a ticking time bomb" scenarios - tend to weight things toward "the best answer is the expedient one, even if it costs human lives." Being a hypothetical scenario doesn't excuse it from also being a false dilemma.
  4. Quote:
    Originally Posted by Twisted Toon View Post
    I can think of a few.

    Seems the media bashed Israel a couple of years ago because They fired back at people lobbing missiles at them from Lebanon. Unfortunately, those people lobbing missiles were hiding among the "innocent" citizens and near schools. It became a choice between two evils. Which was worse, allowing people to continue to lob missiles across the border killing Israelis, or take out the ones firing the missiles, and possibly innocent civilians in the process (called collateral damage).
    I suspect that this will bring La Cólera del Ocho down upon this thread.
  5. Quote:
    Originally Posted by Samuel_Tow View Post
    Crap! I knew I was forgetting something! Thank, Morac!

    P.S. I'm completely serious.
    I actually did try using it once, but I ended up with consecutive posts anyway.

    Now I just sort of wave at the tide and move on (and yeah, that's the second time this week I referred to that metaphor).
  6. Quote:
    Originally Posted by Morac_Ex_Machina View Post
    I'm pretty sure that comes close to the record for most consecutive posts.

    There is a multi-quote feature. Please use it. (Button in the bottom right of the post, next to the quick-reply and regular quote buttons).
    I use it sometimes, but not always. The consecutive posts aren't hurting you, nor do they violate forum guidelines, TOS, rules, etc.

    My posts have actual content, please address them or don't respond.
  7. Quote:
    Originally Posted by Captain_Photon View Post
    (shrug) So you say; I happen to think that over-intellectualism is worse, and I've seen a helluva lot of it in this thread.
    To an anti-intellectual, any degree of intellectual discourse is probably over-intellectualization. That's what anti- means.

    And that's what you're doing.
  8. Quote:
    Originally Posted by Golden Girl View Post
    I don't think colonialism and imperialism counts as promoting freedom or justice
    Well, I don't think so either, but your argument sort of parallels the justifications for colonialism. Heck, so does arguing for freedom or justice - in a previous post you argued that "Freedom and justice" justifies a military invasion of a sovereign nation.
  9. Quote:
    Originally Posted by Golden Girl View Post
    Arachnos is oppressing the people of the Rogue Isles - so we're justified in looking for a little bit of regime change
    So standard military adventurism? Or perhaps manifest destiny?
  10. Quote:
    Originally Posted by Golden Girl View Post
    Actually, I think Malta would be totally terrified of a Praetorian invasion - it'd be like their worst nightmare - a world ruled by meta-humans who've grouped together, and are totally ruthless.
    And the best way to get them to invade is to ______?
  11. Quote:
    Originally Posted by Catwhoorg View Post
    Its not so very long ago in Human History, that a 'good man' was someone who treated his slaves well.

    1772 in England, 1777 in Vermont (first part of what became the US) was the recognition that slavery was illegal.

    The idea that 'owning' another person was wrong, and dare I say evil, was completely alien to many people before the abolitionist movements.

    Of course it took a lot longer (a century or more) before the owning of slaves was abolished and the cessation of treating women as 'property' (of their fathers, or then their husbands) occurred in the West.

    Were these people Evil ? Or just a product of the morals and over-riding opinions of their times.
    I want to point out that while you make an excellent point about morality at the time, that explanation of morality doesn't account for how the enslaved human beings felt about being slaves - rather, it sort of establishes them as objects to be acted upon rather than subjects with their own lives, thoughts, and beliefs.
  12. Quote:
    Originally Posted by Marcian Tobay View Post
    A more recent example would be the way American society treats the LGBT community. One side feels that denying people rights is evil. The other side feels that advocating or forgiving an immoral lifestyle is evil. Both would think they're right.*
    This is actually a bit superficial, because first you have to decide that who someone is is a lifestyle and then assign a moral value to a state of being while saying that it is a state of acting. So it's not as simple as being against an "immoral lifestyle" but declaring people immoral just because of who they are.
  13. Quote:
    Originally Posted by Morac_Ex_Machina View Post
    Question: can killing for fun be considered moral if the person really deserved it?

    (Disclaimer: This is not a question stemming from my own beliefs, it is designed to get people talking).
    Who decides that the person deserved it? Is there an end to this particular rabbit hole?
  14. Quote:
    Originally Posted by Marcian Tobay View Post
    Just to clarify, I'm with Captain Photon on that one. I just tend to RP horrible, terrible people. Whether there's a "right answer" to this, villainy would tend to side with the "G'bye hundreds of thousands" mentality.
    Yeah, the "You have to let this many people die or kill an order of magnitude fewer people to prevent those deaths" seems like a false dilemma. It's hard to visualize a situation quite so binary.
  15. Quote:
    Originally Posted by Autonomous Prime View Post
    Indeed. A comic book universe should be a world to escape TO, not FROM.
    Escapism for who, though? Do you enjoy it as much if you find that you or people like you excluded from the side of good? What if the idealism and moral absolutism justifies historical or modern excesses that you find ethically unsound?
  16. Quote:
    Originally Posted by Captain_Photon View Post
    That does please me, to be honest, though I'm sorry it makes you sad. I just don't think all that postmodern oh-morality-is-such-a-continuum-of-greys business belongs in a superhero comic universe. In the real world, sure, but I'm here to get away from the real world, not duplicate it with the volume turned up.
    It absolutely belongs in a superhero comic universe. It just doesn't belong in every comic universe.

    Disdaining it tends to justify a lot of excesses in the name of personal definitions of good, too.

    Also, I've found a lot more concern for the well-being of human beings in general and analysis of how humanity fails at this in postmodern writing than I've ever heard from "good is good and evil is evil" people.
  17. Quote:
    Originally Posted by Captain_Photon View Post
    Well, yes, obviously. What Golden Girl is trying to point out is that they're wrong.

    Look, this is a game based on superhero comics. For all that GR is supposed to be about moral ambiguity, moral ambiguity is not a theme that plays particularly well in superhero comics. It loads them up with a lot of philosophical claptrap that frankly belongs in some other genre. As such, I for one hope that GR's writing goes really light on it.

    A superhero comic is about punching bad guys in the face, and in such comics, iron-fisted hyper-authoritarians are bad guys regardless of in which precise way they wave their hands around while explaining to you why they do it while waiting for the deathtrap you're caught in to finish warming up. Anything else is just overintellectualizing a genre whose chief charm is its refreshing lack of intellectual crap.
    Comic book superheroes cover a wide array of genres, from relatively black and white golden age to the very ambiguous Watchmen (that did it better than pretty much the entire following iron age). Good stories don't strictly stay within a set of limits, especially a set of limits imposed by an outside body (the comics code authority).

    Saying "They're the bad guys, they're irredeemably evil, and that's that" is just about the least interesting possible way to present characters, and there's a reason that the so many of the most popular villains have more substance to them than that.

    Also, anti-intellectualism is unflattering on anyone, without exception.
  18. Quote:
    Originally Posted by Golden Girl View Post
    No, we're not

    We have a better idea of freedom, justice and what's right than Tyrant and his thugs - you'll see that once GR comes out
    What does "better" mean? Do you have an objective measurement? You know, that same argument was used to justify colonialism and imperialism.
  19. Quote:
    Originally Posted by Golden Girl View Post
    But it is evil to normal people - so the Praetorians are the evil ones
    What are "normal" people?
  20. Quote:
    Originally Posted by Captain_Photon View Post
    They do rather let the side down by calling him "Tyrant", though. I mean, a man who adopts that as a stage name is either indulging in more irony than an emo-goth Partridge Family cover band or quite comfortably in touch with his inner evil.
    Perhaps Emperor Cole considers himself a benevolent despot or tyrant.
  21. Quote:
    Originally Posted by Golden Girl View Post
    Exploring new dimensions isn't aggressive - it's not our fault if we get attacked there and have to take action
    Exploration is frequently aggressive.
  22. Quote:
    Originally Posted by Golden Girl View Post
    So the Praetorian disinformation has already started, has it?
    Statesman did lead an invasion into a sovereign nation, and several superheroes continue to support paramilitary incursions into that nation. The legality of these actions is highly debatable.

    Also, same nation engages in military incursions into the US, so.
  23. Quote:
    Originally Posted by Dr_Mechano View Post
    For a while there's certainly going to be a clash between legacy content and Going Rogue content.

    Since a Hero's hero arc makes Praetoria out to be the dimension of the 'evil goatee' variety but the GR content will make it out to be the 'oppressive ruling elite with superpowers doing it for the good of humanity' variety.

    I still find the idea intriuging that potentially Primal Earth could screw up Praetoria more than just suddenly having an influx of good/evil super powered beings. Stuff tends to follow us through portals, Nemesis will see a dimension without him and ego wouldn't let that stand, after all, every dimension deserved the right to a real benevolent ruler. The Freakshow (and almost every other level 40-50 foe) have broken into Portal Corp before and muscled their way to a new universe, what's to stop them now?

    Malta are NOT going to like the idea of Praetoria, since it's their worst fear realised, so I can imagine detachments of Malta being snuck in to set up new cells there and take out any super powered being they can.

    Basically we're bring a whole heap of trouble with us through the portal and possibly making Praetoria a battleground for more than just the Resistance and Tyrant...
    I can see Nemesis getting involved, but it seems more likely to me that the Malta Group is focused on primal Earth, and not likely to bother with Praetorian Earth until they have the utopia they want.
  24. Quote:
    Originally Posted by Captain_Photon View Post
    That sounds like it would take... a while. And I can't agree with anything that involves taking the old "Boo! Are you scared?" stance, on basic principle.
    That animation is used in a lot of powers in CoH still.

    Heck, I think I've seen it in CO.
  25. Quote:
    Originally Posted by Ultra_Violence View Post
    Every once in a while I hear someone complain about that mission and I just don't get it. It is very easy to beat, solo or on a team. I don't think I've ever failed it in about 10-15 tries. I like how different it plays. It does require you to be in the right place and have either an AoE attack or means of immobilizing/aggroing multiple foes. If you go in Solo with nothing but single target melee attacks you are in for a rough fight. Probably still possible but you will need a vacation afterward.

    You just go to the "goal" area and wipe out everything there. Then there are 2 passages to that point. Stand in front of in the on on the right and attack anything coming toward you. Be sure to attack ALL mobs in the group and maintain their aggro or they will forget about you and start running again. In between kills you can usually have time to range out and kill 1 spawn you can see and return before the next mad pumkin rush. Just keep repeating and wait them out. Rarely mobs will go down the left path but you can clear out mobs on that side in breaks to prevent this.
    I've completed this mission solo with single-target melee attacks.

    However, what the OP is describing does not sound much at all like what happened when I did it. It doesn't sound like it's working properly.