Ethical choices I've wanted to make but couldn't

Can't help but think of this when I think of Praetoria... A lot of what the Resistance wants is just what happened in that video. Take out the ruler and those who support him to create a new regime. Maybe not a -good- regime. But a new one.

Plus... Y'know. Tetris FTW!

-Rachel-

If people say that there needs to be more independence in the writing, that INCLUDES universe building. Any argument that you can't rebel because the universe as written doesn't support it is just redundant.

From ClawsandEffect:

"Saying "But I don't WANT to do that." is the same thing as an actor declining a role because he disagrees with the character's morals"

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I can understand your point very well. The other day I watched an episode of Law and Order LA where one of the Baldwin brothers was playing a bad guy. I happen to know that that brother is a born again Christian who lectures on ethics on TV all around the country. He didn't let his personal beliefs stand in the way of his role on TV, and you should not either, as a role player. In face to face games, I play a lot of roles, as a GM I might play a crazed murderer or a deranged world defeating madman (I run superhero rpg's). As a player I might play a gung ho patriotic captain america clone or a gay healer or a Wiccan defender of the Earth Mother. None of those roles are me. I have played essentially myself before, mind you, but very seldom. After all, I role play to escape from my life, not to relive it.

Your character need not have the same goals, morals, or phylosophy as yourself. In fact, it shows great role playing mastery to play out of your comfort zone.

Of course, in MMORPG's you are limited by what the devs envision as possible roles and choices within the game. As stated elsewhere, I personally would love a Neutral Path in the game, one that consisted of a series of arcs dedicated to just improving your character or finding wrongs and righting them reguardless of whether Longbow or Arachnos cares one way or the other. Or Emporer Cole, for that matter.

In the case of Arachnos, mayhap you are an Equal Op crasher of parties, just as likely to kick Arachnos butt as Longbow butt, and bedamned the consequences, or maybe you never attack the good guys or Arachnos, but always go after the other bad guys...

In Pretoria maybe you fight both the resistance and the loyalists, only going after the truly bad ones, or whatever. There should be a way to make a few contacts who can set up missions like this without being part of the entrenched powers that be... and also not entrenching themselves! LOL.

I really think you misunderstood what I meant. I don't dislike the choices themselves, or feel my characters couldn't make them. However, I prefer to stick to my character as I designed it, rather than how the game tries to tell it despite my wishes. Call me biassed, in that I "grew up" with City of Heroes' old days where the story was basically "You're a hero, you do good. I don't care WHY." Pick any of the Launch story arcs and you'll notice the same recurring theme - people tell you what must be done in order to do good, and you do it. Never at any point is motivation even mentioned. Well, outside of entry pop-ups.

I don't play this game like an actor plays a role. I play this game like a writer writes a story. Because that's what I do when I'm not playing games. I write. Not necessarily very well (though I like to think so), but it's what I do. And the more they add to City of Heroes, the harder it gets to write for my characters.

Here's an example I considered making a thread about, but thought better of it: I want to make a basic elemental. An elemental is a force of nature. It is neither good not bad, because it has no concept of morals. It can cause great harm, just like a wild fire can, but it can also do much good, just like backburning to prevent a wildfire can. Right now, I have no place to put such a character.

I can't make such a character a hero, because heroes, especially as of I18, are defined as good people motivated to do good, which an elemental wouldn't be. I can't go Vigilante, because vigilantes are motivated to punish the guilty, which an elemental wouldn't care about. Villains are described as having dreams of greatness, which an elemental wouldn't as it isn't interested in such things, and rogues are out of the question, as they're in it for the money, when an elemental would be beyond any currency. I wish I could plop that elemental down in a "middle ground" world where it could do what it does without regard for good and evil, right and wrong, order and freedom, cake and pie, etc.

I wish I could put an elemental in Praetoria, but that's twice as out of the question as both Paragon City and the Rogue Isles combined. Not only do people in Praetoria need to be always motivated, but they also have to be politically minded, and when I have a creature who cares very little for anything but doing what it does... Well, politics and slogans are just inappropriate.

I don't dislike Praetoria for what it is. I dislike Praetoria for what it ISN'T, and what it isn't is an expansion of the morality system. There is almost nothing in Praetoria that cannot be achieved by morality and alignment missions in a better technical way. It is indeed a flawed utopia with no good guys, but it still forces you to choose sides, leaving still no ground for those who don't take sides.

In D&D terminology, I speak about Neutral characters, those who are just as likely to do good as they are to do bad, and rarely do either for reasons of ethics or morality, but instead subscribe to a completely independent philosophy. Yes, those can be bastardised into heroes or villains if one REALLY wants to, but... I don't really want to. I don't have a choice, obviously, but that still doesn't mean I want to.

I don't really have a problem with "belonging" as a concept. It works for some characters just fine. I just want more options, and I don't feel Praetoria gives me more options that I didn't have before. We've had enough arguments about how Longbow are really evil and the Circle of Thorns are really pretty good to know that there's enough room for moral ambiguity within the existing world. Why make a brand new one when you'll just enact more faction on faction struggle, but you'll just rename the factions? I admit, I like the CONCEPT of Praetoria, but I don't think it adds as much moral ambiguity as people think. It just adds more politics.

To my eyes, moral ambiguity is God of War's Kratos. Moral ambiguity is Devil May Cry's Dante. Moral ambiguity is Hellsing's Alucard. Moral ambiguity is Soul Reaver's Raziel. In a sense, Emperor Cole himself does a fine job of walking that line, a much finer job than Calvin Scott, purely person to person. But our characters don't and can't, because they're always following someone else's banner and someone else's ideology. You're always siding with someone, and this is what bugs me the most.

When and if morality becomes more about ethics and less about politics, I'll be open to changing my mind.

Quote:

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.

I'll very much agree with the OPs feeling that the sides in Pretoria are indeed black and off-black. Both sides are doing terrible things, with a the-end-justify-the-means attitude. I certainly got the impression that the choices were never about ethics, good or bad, heroic or vile - I got the impression it was all about being loyal or disloyal, and little more.

As this didn't fit my character the first time around, I saw the missions and "sides" merely as a way to get badges and levels while enjoying some stories unrelated to my character. Very little of it would ever be incorporated into my character. In fact, the sides as they are haven't fit any of the characters I have gone through Pretoria with. It usually feels like being stuck between a rock and a hard place.

While the stories and missions are very well written and enjoyable - I feel strangely comfortable and relaxed hitting level 20 and leaving Praetoria, "so I can start RPing my character." A bit harsh perhaps, but... there it is.

Mac


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I know exactly what you mean Samuel, and it's why I rather like coming back to "the old world". I'm kind of blessed in that I came to the game recently, just after i18 actually, and I didn't even know there had been a major issue released 2 days before I joined.

I have taken to the Rogues myself, and the reason is simple:
* Villains should all aspire to replace Lord Recluse, that no-good hack!
* Heroes should all aspire to crush Lord Recluse, and bring freedom to all(tm) and wave the american flag!
* Vigilantes should all aspire to smite the wicked, like a self-proclaimed angel of death.
* Rogues are in it for THEMSELVES.

Ok, if you read carefully, rogues are all about money, but I've chosen to skip that part many times. My characters are in it for themselves. They are rogues for independence. They are rogues for money. They are rogues because they hate politics. They are rogues so they can develop their powers. Rogues don't care about WHY. They don't care about the narrow game-view of right and wrong, good and evil. Most of my rogues are actually inherently GOOD people - which I guess is a bit ironic.

Mac

When it came to walking the fine line between right and wrong, I simply sat down and watched other people walk past.

I don't think anyone really approaches this from the standpoint of an actor playing a role. I've known players who approached method acting in their role playing, however, they are few and far between, and really, for good reason. Method Acting in an RPG puts a lot of pressure on the more casual players and gm's and makes their job a lot harder, LOL. While the great thespian is busy having his histrionics, the rest of the group is sitting around toying with the dice... or ignoring him while beating the heck out of the arch villian....

The fact of the matter is, the story you create behind your hero is only important to you. 99.9999% of the other players in the game will never know or care what it is. Heck, most players don't even read the minibio that you can write, and a whole heck of a lot of players don't bother with doing one in the first place. (I usually do, and I try to make it interesting if anyone does want to read it... usually either classically superheroic or humorous.. I do a lot of humorous characters... Fluffy Seigebot, Animala, Jack Frostinstein...)

I disagree with some people's assumption that you can't do an amoral character in this game. I have a L50 character who, until L40, was basically amoral. He didn't say anything, really, except "plop-fizz-glurp-slop-squlorch", walked through missions with teams (I tried not to solo him if at all possible), any team communications that were necessary were done in (parentetic comments), and I spent a lot of time using third person in other communications... "Plazmus seems to be in pain" and "Plazmus screams in rage as he is struck". Players enjoyed Plazmus, and I spent a lot of time figuring out creative ways to imply he didn't have much in the way of smarts... Around L40 I changed his origin to reflect the fact that I needed to be more communicative on more complex missions and gave him a brain... I never regretted doing that, and I still do a lot of the old plop plop fizz fizz stuff, just for fun, after all, he's supposed to be a big bag of chemical ooze sort of like Chemo.

I also did a character who was very amoralish, again, I tended to speak in the third person a lot, this time Animala... She was supposed to be an innoscent, with no real sence of good or evil, an animal like character with near human intellegence. She spoke of "doing the dance of hurting and slashing" and "doing the dance of dodging and jumping" and did a lot of very theatrical moves around the battle, aided by being a claw scrapper. I maxed out fitness and spent a lot of time just jumping and hopping round while doing the aoe claw move in order to simulate dancing.

Again, Animala was fairly popular with other players in that once they got used to the idea of my speaking in third person, "Animala doesn't understand why we are doing what we are doing, but she'll do whatever you say, because you smell nice" as an example, and that I was always jumping and hopping round. After they got into the spirit of things, I got a lot of comments directed my way about dance techniques, animal noises ( Animala growled a lot), and nature children. Very much fun. Even the sarcastic players were clever. I still play Animala as a nature child, although a somewhat more refined one... she's over L40, after all, approaching L50, there has to be some growth of character.

My point is, if you are a role player, you'll find a way. Though the new Pretorian zones are challenging. It's a lot easier to choose to be Gung Ho for Cole or Viva la Revolution, Cast Down the Oppressors than it is to be your own person. I'm working on finding a way, however.

I got an evil dastard who always attacks protestors... he's Gung Ho For Cole. I got an evil dastard who took relish in feeding cops to the ghouls... he hero worships Hatchet. I got another one who always stood up for the little guys (responsibility loyalist) and another who didn't particularly like several of the resistance guys, but felt that as bad as the resistance was, the cops were worse (protective resistance). There does not seem to be much room for middle ground, but I'm still thinking about the problem.


A little help from the Devs with some less black and white choices would be nice.