Story Problem: 'Kill' or 'Kill'? (Spoilers)

I agree.

If you agree, then you should let the ambush kill you in the previous mission and delete that toon. You did the greater good for the resistance.

edit: you also forgot to add freedom fighter that happens to try to blow up hospitals.

Best thing would have been never to join Cole's dogs in the first place. But since you did, no need to compound the mistake. Better to forgive Cleo and give the Resistance two warriors in the fight to destroy Cole.

Killing the oppressor's sheep in the cause of freedom is no vice.

My characters are not a hive mind, they don't know what other characters have seen or heard. Just because one contact says one thing, if my character doesn't talk to them, they don't know it.

Um... thats good?

What has that got to do with what i said?

Ignorance is strength, citizen - strength to do what must be done - for the greater good.

To borrow from The Prisoner (a show I think about a lot in general and while playing in Praetoria in particular):

I don't, huh? So when you said:

I'm not right to call ********? Going Rogue was supposed to offer a third option that was neither a hero nor a villain. It completely failed to do this, because it's always a binary choice even in Praetoria. People spent years talking about City of Greys or City of Spies or City of Mercenaries. We didn't get that. What we got was City of Heroes and Villains.

This isn't a bad thing in itself, mind you - that's how it should have been from the get go. But it's not what people were expecting from Going Rogue. You can insult my intelligence all you want, this doesn't change the fact that Praetoria wasn't as advertised. It's not about walking the line in the slightest. Walking the line would assume making your own choices. In fact, you very much don't. You never even pick your own morality. You pick between factions, where all factions are wrong.

I don't know why the game has been so focused on "beloning" ever since CoV, but I don't like it, because this compromises one's morality at its core. You belong to a faction, so you HAVE to share THEIR morality. You can switch to another faction, but then you have to share THEIR morality, instead. None of the choices that matter have to do with a grey morality. They have to do with faction warfare. At no point do any of the important choices actually let me pick MY morality. Why can't I play a Loyalist who will sometimes compromise the greater good for the good of a single person, but overall keep my alignment? I can't, because of the "political atmosphere." Or why can't I play a Resistance sympathiser who doesn't like wanton and petty rebellion? I can't, because of the "political atmosphere."

We turned morality into politics, and politics is not a "grey and grey morality." Again, the little consequence-less choices we make in-mission are far more interesting than the big morality swaps, because I can follow my chosen path AND make my own choices, rather than having my choices dictated to me by the path I've chosen.

We are given two "morality packs" - one resistance and one loyalist - and we can only ever swap between them wholesale. I never feel like the choices are my own, because the choices are always pragmatic - do you want to be Loyalists or Resistance? I can never say "I, as a loyalist, choose to spare this woman because the greater good of the people should not come at the price of lawlessness and cold-blooded murder." I can't, because of politics. So White will try to get Cleo out. Let him. Let the system work. Let the laws do their job. Isn't that what being truly loyal to the system means? Or why can't I be a resistance member who chooses to not kill innocent people by making them suck on sewage? Why can't I feel that the best way to save people is not by destroying their one source of fresh water? The truth is out, the struggle is going well. We don't need pointless sacrifices. Isn't that exactly what we're fighting against? Needless oppression and wanton murder? I guess not, because if that's what I choose, I become a Loyalist.

As far as I'm concerned, the game would have been far superior if we never "belonged" to any one faction at all and were simply allowed to pick and choose missions as they come. That way, we could take a little of both faction's morality without belonging to either one. That's what in-mission choices let me do. I can be a loyalist and still let DeVore go without becoming any less of a loyalist. If I can let DeVore go, why can't I let Cleo go? It's basically the same choice, only one time it's my choice while the other time it's a faction swap.

Originally Posted by Arcanaville Samuel_Tow is the only poster that makes me want to punch him in the head more often when I'm agreeing with him than when I'm disagreeing with him.

It's not the same choice. The cirumstances are very different. The difference is that when you confront DeVore you're on your own. When you confront Cleo you're with Washington, who will not be talked around into letting her go.

Besides, why would she 'go' anywhere? Cleo is in tight with Praetor White. That's a pretty good place for a Resistance spy to be. Hypothetically, if you were the only one who knew that and you were alone when you went to see her and you gave her the choice to run she'd probably kill you to protect her cover. She's already tried to kill you once. Why wouldn't she do so again?

Or maybe you fight her, defeat her and spare her on the condition that she flees to the Underground. Yeah, right. 5 seconds after you walk out of that office she's on the phone to Praetor White telling him that you are a resistance agent who just attacked her. Who's he going to believe?

Considering it's so patently obvious how events are just so arranged that it isn't the same, yeah, it isn't the same. But that's my point - why couldn't it be?

Maybe she will. Or maybe she won't. Maybe Cleo is one of the actual good guys in the resistance, maybe Cleo has a bit of honour and dignity left in her. Maybe she'll just cut her losses and flee. Or maybe she'll attack me and force me to kill her. That's fine. It's still the same effect, but I still get to CHOOSE different.

Or maybe she'll prove to be the dirty Crusader that Washington thinks she is, run to her boyfriend and try to rat me out. Then I'll get jumped by the PPD and forced to find evidence to clear my name, eventually exposing her and either killing her or arresting her.

As I said countless times before in relation to City of Villain - I'm fine with facing consequences as long as I'm allowed to make the choice which causes them. I want to flip Arbiter Daos the birdie and help Ghost Widow defile the Red Widow. There are other ways to retain status quo and keep her a ghost. And I'm fine with being tossed into an Arachnos brig for it and having to break out. Several times, if need be. But, of course, the cop-out excuse is "they can just turn off the reclimators," which thankfully CoV seems to discount, if you believe Dr. Steffard.

Why am I always using someone else's reclimators, anyway? Why can't I dig myself a hole in the sewers where no-one knows about, steal myself a reclimator, buy myself a cold fusion generator and have my own hovel where I don't have to worry about spawning in a PPD cell or a Resistance brig? If this is about grey and grey morality, why can't I be allowed to make mistakes and suffer the consequnces? Why must I kowtow to this faction or that faction or that faction over there.

In fact, you know what I'd have liked to see? Option 1: Kill Cleo. Option 2: Kill Washington. Option 3: Kill 'em both and claim that's how you found 'em. But I can't, can I? Because which faction would that put me with? "Me?" Such a faction doesn't exist. And it should. I've been saying that for five years, and even the "City of Ambivalence" expansion STILL doesn't let me work for myself without being somebody's dog of war.

Originally Posted by Arcanaville Samuel_Tow is the only poster that makes me want to punch him in the head more often when I'm agreeing with him than when I'm disagreeing with him.

Optimally yes. But you have to wake them from their stupor first.

Agreed Sam, but what you need to realize is that "working for yourself" IS NOT AN OPTION in Praetoria. You are either resistance, or loyalist. You could be neither . . . but then you better not play any arcs.

I NEVER expected working for yourself to be an option in a universe/city that is basically in a state of open and clandestine war. Just saying.

Errr on the chance of being flagged by Mod12 about political speak, all I'll say is blowing folks up usually don't wake them from their stupor, it actually makes them demand that those who control them do something about those that blew them up.

There are better ways to wake them from their stupor . . . such as getting rid of the water that's helping put them in that stupor.

Well... I kind of wish we could. I mean, why can't I play the Dr. Vhaz or Nemesis of that world and just have my own hideout hidden from BOTH factions? All I'm saying is that they did indeed replace a black and white morality with a yellow and blue morality. They replaced ethics with faction politics, and while it's less cartoony and cliche, it is no less restricting.

I honestly don't know what I was expecting from Praetoria, but I kind of hoped that this would be the land where we would finally be bale to make OUR decisions. You know, not be pawns of the establishment in the way City of Villains portrays us, but what I got was even MORE servitude and faction politics than when I swooned after Arachnos. At least in the Isles, I can work for the mob, work for the Circle, work for the Freakshow and, yes, even work for myself via Dean McArthur and Leonard. It was all railroading, but at least I felt I had a choice, because ultimately, it didn't matter who I worked for.

By making choices in Praetoria matter so much more, they've actually made the choices LESS enticing, and at the same time boiled those choices down to only two - Resistance or Loyalists. Hell, I can't even work for the Syndicate. And why not? They seem to be the major third player in the game. Why can't I work for them? Why can't I work to overthrow Marcus Cole, only not in the name of anarchy for the masses, but with the aim of replacing his overt fascism with a puppet democracy secretly governed by Syndicate leaders? Seriously, does that not strike anyone else as a viable and meaningful third option? I mean, yeah, it's still serving someone else, but it still makes for a more than "yes or no" conundrum.

Here, I have an idea: Help Washington kill Cleo in the name of order, help Cleo kill Washington in the name of freedom, or call up Wu Yin to send in some muscle to help you kill them both so that you weaken Cole's regime by undermining White, weaken the PPD by removing a high-ranking Interrogator and open the door for infiltration by the syndicate in filling the power vacuum. Yeah, it's still a "kill" option, but hey, it's one more option. And an actual grey option, to boot.

Originally Posted by Arcanaville Samuel_Tow is the only poster that makes me want to punch him in the head more often when I'm agreeing with him than when I'm disagreeing with him.

Funny, I think so, too. That's why I had no second thoughts when I arrested Doctor Steffard. He may think his Doctor Mengele act was doing the right thing, but I for my part don't think that the right way to free Seers from the network is by splitting their skull open and leaving them to die.

Not after I already disconnected a whole bunch of seers from the network. There's a point where acceptable losses cross over to irredeemable actions, and as far as I'm concerned, Doctor Steffard aka Cutter Cain crossed that line.

But what really sealed the deal to me? When I saw how he dealt with losing a Seer, and how he almost immediately shifted all the blame elsewhere, that killed my opinion of him. If he won't take resonsibility for his actions, then the Responsibility branch will.

Without getting into RL politics too much there are very recent examples of violent acts against a government being blamed on the government and not on the folks doing the violence. Particularly if their cause is considered just.

Agreed and I most enjoyed blowing up the Enriche plant.

I almost decided against that because I cannot stand Calvin Scott just that much. For as much as I worked for the Resistance and agreed to their cause, Calvin Scott seemed almost as bad as Emperor Cole, at least in his willingness to kill innocents and spread suffering around just to enforce his vision of the word.

It's certainly hard being a Resistance member when it seems that your allies care less about bringing truth to the people and behave more like Destroyers in neon-light armor.

I thought this was very good writing on the devs part. Scott is no angel, but then no angel would defeat Cole. Like revolutionaries throughout history, he's an extreme man, devoted to the cause, but human. He's hard and cruel because his enemy is.

Yes, wake them - not blow them up

You did read the background info and various dev interviews and Q&A panels since GR was first announced, didn't you?

I enjoyed telling him that I'd been working undercover the whole time for the Loyalists, and in reply to his 'You aren't the first to betray me':

"I'll be the last though."

*ASSASSIN'S STRIKE*

Mission complete.

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SUPPORT - IT'S NOT JUST A GROUPING OF ATs
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More Than a Game
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No you're not. You're awfully, horribly, terribly wrong to do so. You hyped up the content as something that it wasn't, created a character under that mindset, then got uppity when it turned out things weren't consistent. Half a dozen ranty paragraphs changes nothing in that regard.