I hate every Praetorian

I had a similar moment doing a mission for Jackhammer and then found out he wanted to take the Fixadine and use it to control the Destroyers. I had to say, "No, this has gone on far enough," and went Loyalist. Which then let me blackmail Praetor White...

The level of writing of GR is really exemplary. Dragon Age and Mass Effect have taught that allowing us a choice in the story line is really compelling and satisfying. It makes for a far superior game than the normal tripe seen elsewhere where one merely goes from one action to the other on a pre-defined rail with no real say in what happens.

I would say that if CoH had these kinds of storylines back when it started, it would be where WoW is now. But then, as a writer, I may be more geeky towards this subject then most.

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Originally Posted by Dark_Respite I've had an absolute field day playing through the Resistance>Warden arc with the Praetorian version of Andrea Blake. I can't say she's LIKED every Praetorian she's met, but she respects most of them. (Not all. The ones who want to blow up hospitals, she'd happily beat into the ground.) And everything she does is motivated by giving people a CHOICE. I've not had the chance yet to go through the others, but I'm curious if all the arc paths start 'small' and end up affecting things on a larger scale. That's why principles are such slippery things to hold on to... *spoilers follow* Force Paolo to leave or allow him to stay? I let him stay - forcing him to leave "for his own good and the good of others" smacked too much of what Cole and his regime are about. Free the Seers or not? This one was harder for me, but I did it anyway and freed them - because the burden of adhering to and enforcing moral and humane behaviour should be borne by each individual, not forced onto the shoulders of a select few, some of whom didn't want that burden to begin with. Blow up the Enriche plant? At that one, I balked - I couldn't do it... I sat at my computer and argued with myself for a good 10 minutes about whether I'd do it or not, and was almost set to blow it up... but six months of suffering and disease and death just so Vanguard could come in and 'save' them? No. Deliberately bringing the populace to the brink of disaster and then rescuing them sounded too much like what Cole had done, and look where that ended up. *end spoilers* It's this distinct lack of "black and white" that I'm really liking about GR... if heroism were easy, everyone would do it. And how many villains are just true anarchists? It's those subtle shades of grey that I think are making these some of the best arcs in the game. Now if we could get more like these in PC and the RI, this game really would take on a whole new dimension. Michelle aka Samuraiko/Dark_Respite

What arcs do they mention that in?

Like someone who posted earlier on, I've been looking at the Praetorian morality 'trees', and comparing them to our Primal Earth moralities. I agree that the Crusaders are villainous and that the Power Loyalists are rogueish. But I actually felt that the Warden's and Responsibility Loyalist's moralities were reversed. I think that wardens seem more heroic: while they may be operating outside the law, they're standing up for what's right with as few unnecessary casualties as possible. Responsibility loyalists seem a little faster to execute somebody for treason, which I think brings them down a bit to vigilante.

This may, of course, be biased by my own characters in each branch. I've only got partway through Imperial, though.

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Originally Posted by Golden Girl What arcs do they mention that in?

*CRUSADER ARC SPOILERS*








Actually, there is one arc in the Crusader storyline where you kidnap a PPD officer to interrogate him. When he doesn't sing, you kidnap his family. Once he's talked, he gets shot in the head, and you get to choose whether to blow his family up or not.

Charming, eh?








.

That's hardly in the same league as the state-wide systemized brutality Tyrant's stormtroopers enforce

Ive been loving the Praetorian missions so far - as people have said they are extremely well written and executed (if a little ambush heavy sometimes).

I always try and make my characters have some sort of back story/personality even if its in my head but Praetoria has actually really let me live it out.

My praetorian Thugs/Dark mutant mastermind resented that she was forced to join the power division so she went and joined the resistance crusaders to blow a few things up and cause a bit of damage. However she then got the oppurtunity to grab a load of power by blackmailing Paetor White and I thought "yeah, she would totally do that". So she then started doing the loyalist power missions but she kept on informing the resistance of whats going on and eventually joined the resistance again. Basicly it was like she was playing both sides against each other to get what she wanted and it was great fun!

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Originally Posted by Zwillinger Quote: 16. Has Paragon Studios redefined "player" to require your mouse to subscribe separately from your keyboard? If your mouse has greater processing power than your gfx card, the answer is yes.

As I only had Elizabeth Bathory (as second melee alt) walking around there I only have done the Loyalist - Power arcs.

I loved the fact that I could be massivly evil... murder and needless pain was common and I could actually pick those descisions myself. Finally (and this also counts for the tips) a villain can really be a villain.

Easy to say that both my Elizabeth versions end up very red.

One thing that's definitely surprised me from this thread is the depth of emotion it's stirred within the players.

That's a serious achivement from the Devs and should be applauded

"You got to dig it to dig it, you dig?"
Thelonious Monk

I've just started playing GR, and I find myself mainly wanting to go off and start my own society that ignores all these dilrods, but that's not an option so far.

So instead I'm going to shoot people and destroy stuff. Almost as good!

A decent person wouldn't have even considered doing that to his daughter in the first place.

My Praetorian is a sadistic, thoroughly evil, completely amoral character whose only goals are 1) ensure own survival and 2) cause as much suffering as possible. With any other character Praetoria would have been incredibly depressing, but with her, it's been a blast. At first she was a Loyalist, but has since switched to helping out the Crusaders with whatever absolutely necessary puppy-kicking they want to do today - occasionally sabotaging their plans with a quick call to Marchand, just for the lulz.

I'm loving the actual hard moral choices on some of these arcs. Played through once as a Responsibility Loyalist - agonized a bit after the hospital bombing mission (stayed loyal though - the investigator was a bro and would have saved the hospital if he'd known about it), got disgusted with Mother Mayhem missions, let DeVoe go and finally went Resistance at the very end with Kang when my character finally got fed up with the abuses of power. She just wanted to protect everyone!

Regarding the alignments, to borrow from TvTropes and D&D alignments, they actually had a pretty good spread:

Loyalist Responsibility characters are Lawful Good (laws are there to help and protect the most people possible) and Lawful Neutral (I follow orders, even if I don't like them).
Loyalist Power characters are Lawful Evil (Manipulate the laws to my own ends) and Neutral Evil (my own power above all else).
Resistance Warden characters are Neutral Good (help as many people as you can) or Chaotic Good (freedom brings out the best in others).
Resistance Crusader characters are Chaotic Neutral (personal freedom above all else) or Chaotic Evil (My power, my might, burn anything that gets in the way of either).