Moral traps and ambiguities

[BrettM]

I understand -- and fully appreciate -- that Skyrim is not some storybook fantasy, with beings of pure virtue facing down a threat of unmitigated evil. The Imperial/Stormclock controversy is a perfect example of that, where the best you can do is to review the evidence and try to pick the greater good (or lesser of two evils) while trying to mitigate what evils you may. I think this is wonderful! I also understand that this is a rough world, where a little street justice is usually the only kind of justice that can be had, and we are the ones who have to apply it.

 

Some of the moral ambiguities, though, are more disturbing, since you never get any confirmation as to whether your choice was right or not. Yet you are forced to make the choice anyway, despite having no rational basis for doing so, because there is never an option to just walk away. Once you are foolish enough to talk to someone and ask the wrong question, a quest pops up and you have no right of refusal.

 

Case in point: In My Time of Need (Discussion spoiler tagged for those who haven't done it.)

 

 

Both sides in this quest -- Saadia and the Alik'r mercenaries who are after her -- claim to be on the side of right, but there is no independant evidence to support either of them. If you help Saadia, are you helping a criminal escape deserved justice or a dissident escape undeserved persecution? Betraying Saadia's trust didn't feel good, but I did eventually go that way and was relieved that the Alik'r were true to their promise not to hurt her. And I can tell myself that Hammerfell is now free of the Thalmor, so it seems unlikely that they would have hired anyone to track down an anti-Thalmor dissident, meaning that Saadia was a traitor as the Alik'r claimed. But, we can never be sure, which is a little bothersome.

 

 

For those trying to chart a path for a "good" character. it seems too easy to fall into moral traps because of quests that offer no options or those that do not make the options clear. Usually you first know you're in trouble when the quest goal "kill <so-and-so>" pops up for someone you have no reason to kill or "steal <thus-and-such>" from someone you have no reason to rob, but by that time you're in too deep to change your course, or you seem to be.

 

Once you have fallen into one of these traps, there never seems to be a way out except to leave the unresolved quest in your log and vow to never follow up. This is beginning to irritate me.

 

Case in point of a quest with no options: House of Horrors.

 

 

From the minute you walk through the door of the Abandoned House, you are committed to two killings, regardless of your wishes. There is no warning that this will happen and no way out.

 

I can excuse the first one to some extent since the Vigilant actually attacked me first without giving me any way to reassure him that I had no desire to follow any commands of spooky voices. But I feel like I should have had the option to say "Hell, NO!" at that point, just as I didn't have to kill the museum twit for Mehrune Dagon.

 

After that, however, it seems that there was no response I could give at the altar that did not commit me to eventually killing Logrolf as the only way out of the quest. Either I would have to kill him as a helpless captive in the camp, or kill him at Molag Bal's order. Neither was acceptable to me, but there is no third option.

 

Is Tamriel a better place without people like Logrolf? No doubt. Was Logrolf a complete idiot for running off to confront Molag Bal, deserving anything that happened to him because of his actions? Definitely. But that was his problem and none of my business, really, as he had never done any provable harm to me or to anyone else I would consider myself bound to defend. I definitely resent being forced into service as Molag's instrument, with no way to tell the two of them to have joy of each other while walking out and locking the door behind me. Logrolf made his own bed and I should at least have had the option to just let him lie in it, if not to get him out of it.

 

 

Case in point of unstated options: With Friends Like These.

 

 

It would be nice if there were some way to bring the hag at the orphanage to the attention of the Jarl or whatever passes for a justice system in Riften, having her peacefully removed as unfit to be anywhere near children. It would be passable if you could at least intimidate her into fleeing off to the wilds where she'd probably be eaten by a cave bear. But, in the end, I managed to accept my actions as street justice and didn't lose too much sleep over whacking her.

 

However, the followup totally aggravates me. I did end up killing the self-confessed scum, but it galls me to kill anyone with a bag over his head. The quest log insisted that I had to "kill one of the captives" to get out of the shack and did not indicate any alternatives. If I had realized I could kill that tart who kidnapped me, I would have done so gladly, then gone on to clean up the Dark Brotherhood. But, now I'm stuck with no way to get back on track, so that quest is going to sit in my log until doomsday or beyond. Grrr.

 

 

At the end of the day, this problem is making me more and more reluctant to talk to NPCs of any sort, lest I be forced into one of these traps. This takes a lot of the fun out of exploring, since any conversational option other than "go away" may well dump me into something I'd rather avoid. Curiousity is discouraged, cutting you off from a lot of information. Instead of just playing and experiencing everything first-hand, you end up stopping and checking the wiki for everything if you prefer story spoilers to spoiling your character's role play. This is a disappointing aspect of a great game.

[sajuukkhar9000]

So what you are saying is because the game doesn't hold your hand by telling you specifically before-hand who is right or not, in cases like "In My Time of Need", or by telling you painfully obvious choices, like the ability to kill Astrid during the DB joining quest the game "traps" you? Not sure if serious.

 

Also there is a third option in House of Horrors, its called dont finish the quest, no one is MAKING you do it.

 

Morally ambiguous quests like skyrim has now are FAR better then "DUR HUR HUR HERE TIZ BE A GOOD AND EVIL PATH DUR HUR HUR" that most other games have.

Edited February 20, 2012 by sajuukkhar9000

[sheepskin]

OP, I find the moral ambiguity present throughout the game adds to realism and immersion. Just my opinion though. I can see what you're saying. It threw me off at first too. I kinda connected the dots though, what the vision was for the game. And the story line-choices tend to echo real-life dichotomies; neither side being right nor wrong, you're skewn between two opposing forces. A lot of times without your consent.

 

 

I can relate.

[sukeban]

So what you are saying is because the game doesn't hold your hand by telling you specifically before-hand who is right or not, in cases like "In My Time of Need", or by telling you painfully obvious choices, like the ability to kill Astrid during the DB joining quest the game "traps" you? Not sure if serious.

 

Also there is a third option in House of Horrors, its called dont finish the quest, no one is MAKING you do it.

 

Morally ambiguous quests like skyrim has now are FAR better then "DUR HUR HUR HERE TIZ BE A GOOD AND EVIL PATH DUR HUR HUR" that most other games have.

 

This seems like an unnecessarily patronizing answer that really skips over much of what the OP was talking about. Certainly nobody would argue the desirability of prepackaged quest outcomes of "good" and "evil," but the lack of being able to drop or refuse quests really does strike me as a feature that is sorely lacking in Skyrim. Sure, if you are playing a nonsensical "do it all" character that is leader of the Thieves, DB, Companions, Mage etc., you may or may not mind the constant barrage of random and morally dubious quests whenever you enter a new city or meet new NPCs; but for a character attempting to actually roleplay, there is a certain terror in exploration that seriously does detract from the game.

 

Case in point:

 

That danged DB intro quest. All you have to do is be within earshot of a guard in Windhelm to hear, "I heard the Aretino boy is attempting to contact the DB" and your quest immediately updates. Or, you know, you could ask for any "rumor" at any inn throughout Skyrim and get the same update. It is annoying. This quest is one of the worst offenders because you don't even have to engage in conversation with anybody to initiate it, thus leaving you completely powerless to avoid it. Unless, of course, you want to avoid Windhelm forever or sneak around the city in an attempt to remain twenty feet away from any guard for fear or triggering the dialog. What this then means: No Civil War quests, no completing the Thieves Guild, a bunch of impossible other named and radiant quests, as well as the thoroughly anti-immersion WTF of avoiding one of the major cities in Skyrim, you know, forever. Why did Beth not just make this quest something that you have to seek out? I mean, it is a TES game, of course the DB is going to be in it. The more correct question that you should is, "Why are they holding our hand and forcing us into joining/destroying the DB?"

 

Moral ambiguity is a fine thing and is quite enjoyable in many quests. "In My Time of Need" was, actually, one of my favorites. But I do agree with the OP and believe that it is rather trash that we cannot refuse or drop a quest after we have heard about it. Curiously, these options seem to exist for mundane radiant quests, so why not with named ones? Why am I given the option to refuse to collect 20 nirnroot samples, but not the option to refuse to kill somebody I do not know in cold blood? How much sense does that make? Why no option to hear someone out and then say, "GTFO, you are psychotic!"

 

It seems this is so because Beth has taken a rather anti-roleplaying tack and has opted instead to force-feed you as many guild and quest-lines as possible, exposing you to as much of their content as possible on a single playthrough. This both diminishes replayability as well as adds irritation. A simple method of refusal would have solved all of this. It boggles the mind why this was not included as a default.

[sajuukkhar9000]

Do you understand what a journal is?

 

A journal is something you write it, you take notes about things that have happened or you have heard about, you don't just go back and erase part of a journal just because you didn't decide to pan out a previous thing you hear about to its fullest extent.

 

Like if I had a journal and wrote in it something like "ohh some people I know are going on a trip and invited me" and then I decide not to go I'm not gonna go back and erase all mention of the trip from the journal.

 

It isn't anti-roleplay that you cant remove things from your journal, it's actually logical and fits in the context of what a journal actually is and how they are used, it would be more anti-roleplay to have you erasing things in your journal just because you don't plan to go through with everything, because that's not how people use journals.

 

 

 

I swear its like people don't even try to make coherent or thought out arguments anymore. They just spew this contradictory garbage out in order to insult games in whatever way they can, that or they seemingly dont understand the basic concepts of common things like journals or roleplaying.

 

Bethesda hasn't taken some anti-roleplaying tack it's just that you entire argument is based around ignoring what a journal is and how people use it.

 

And I'm sorry if that sounded rude but I'm sick and tired of hearing the same broken and completely un-thought-out arguments repeated time and time again in some desperate attempt to make the game to be worse then it actually is.

 

Its like the Bioware forums all over again, the game could s*** gold bricks and people would still *censored* about how the bricks aren't shiny enough.

Edited February 21, 2012 by sajuukkhar9000

[sukeban]

I swear its like people don't even try to make coherent or thought out arguments anymore. They just spew this contradictory garbage out in order to insult games in whatever way they can, that or they seemingly dont understand the basic concepts of common things like journals or roleplaying.

 

Bethesda hasn't taken some anti-roleplaying tack it's just that you entire argument is based around ignoring what a journal is and how people use it.

 

And I'm sorry if that sounded rude but I'm sick and tired of hearing the same broken and completely un-thought-out arguments repeated time and time again in some desperate attempt to make the game to be worse then it actually is.

 

Hold yer horses there, friend.

 

Don't misunderstand me: in general, I think that Skyrim is a fantastic game. I've no interest in freezing game development Han-Solo-style in nostalgia for Morrowind or Oblivion or whatever "insert things were always better back in the day" argument one might try to make. Any criticism that I make of the game is in the spirit of trying to be constructive, to illustrate ways in which--IMO--the game could have been better, not just to tear it down or make specious arguments because I am bored or angry or frustrated or just trying to engorge my own personal e-peen. So please respect the sentiment of my post, and don't jump to characterize me like you know me.

 

Anyway, that said, I will try to avoid undue criticism and nostalgia when I say that the Skyrim quest interface is neither better nor worse, IMO, than its predecessors, it is merely different. However, it certainly isn't much resembling an actual journal any longer, and is now little more than a glorified tool-tip for organizing your agenda. Yes, of course, in past TES games, that is what the journal was for as well, but there was at least the added embellishment of comments and/or use of an actual book that has now been stripped out. When I hit "J" it brings up essentially a list of commands that the game is telling me I should do, which, IMO, is fine. However, given that in many circumstances I have no control over how these things end up in my "journal," I am now being told to do many things that I have no desire whatsoever to do, like to kill my follower for the glorification of Boethiah. Or to kill Grelod the Kind simply because it was my first playthrough and I didn't yet know to avoid the Aretino boy. Is it really so much of a unreasonable request to be able to just say, "Oh hell, no" to Aretino and to tell him to kill Grelod himself? No, instead it stays stuck in my quest log--as a command--to go and kill an old woman that I have never personally ever met. If the interface were truly a "journal" it would read something like, "Demented Aretino kid wanted me to kill some little old lady; I am not sure if I am very comfortable with this." Instead, it says, "Kill Grelod the Kind," and I am stuck with this, even as the most noble of paladins--forever (assuming I don't actually want to kill her). Why, as a paladin, would I have ever written "Kill Grelod the Kind" in my journal to begin with? The fact that this is just foisted on you, the character, without your consent, is what my quarrel is with the way these things are implemented. On my first character, I had like fifteen different "Kill/rob/beat up random NPC" entries in my quest log that I could not get rid of. Whilst that might not be anti-roleplay, it is rather confusing (why would my noble character have made these entries?) and cumbersome (scrolling down two pages of forever-idled quests to see other ones). In other words--It could have been handled better.

 

Skyrim is an amazing game (I am more a fanboy than a critic, truth be told...) and I would recommend it to anyone. But I, like many (though obviously not all) others, favor playing in a roleplaying style. I absolutely do not want random, nonsensical "Kill X" entries cluttering up my quest log. The more strange aspect of all of this is that this functionality (to accept a quest or to reject it) is already employed for _many_ of the quests already in the game. You glossed over my example of the Nirnroot quest. Why am I given the option to turn this, or any, quest down, whilst others are forced upon me? Why, after I leave the farm, do I not have a journal entry telling me to collect a heck of a lot of Nirnroot? By the logic you used before, I "heard" about her needing Nirnroot and would thus have entered it into my journal, even if I hated Nirnroot and never ever wanted to handle the blasted things. It is a double-standard. Weirder still, any character can collect Nirnroot; it has no logical bearing on a character's morality or sense of honor--yet I am given the option to refuse, as if the choice were morally consequential (rather than just a waste of time...). This courtesy is then _not_ extended to me in the case of wanton murder, something that fundamentally affects the sort of morality our character is guided by. It doesn't make sense. An option to simply "ignore" information that we think is totally, irredeemably sketch would be logical as well as a nod to the player that they are free to pursue only the quests that they are interested in. An option to "drop" a quest would have been harder to implement, of course, but would have been nice in those situations wherein we listen to that demented Aretino and then decided we'd rather report him to the Jarl than to commit murder only to be rewarded with a junky silver plate.

 

So, I would say:

 

1. Give the player the opportunity to ignore things they don't want to hear. Those Windhelm guards aren't going anywhere if I suddenly become possessed by Molag Bal and just want to kill, kill, kill.

2. Extend your reasoning all the way to its conclusion and never ask the player for permission to take a quest, ever. Assume that he wants to do them all, and create journal entries accordingly. It may not be pretty, but it will be internally consistent.

 

(NOTE: having just re-read this post, I'll add that I'm not trying to be rude either. I think your position in general is good, as I too intensely dislike bashing good games or when people are haters or flame for no logical reason except to try and feel cool. And--for sure--those types of people are out there. I'm definitely not one of them though, and for sure neither are you. Therefore, I would say we're more allies than anything else :) .)

[chanchan05]

I'm for the more "journal-like" journal as well. Or even a simple interface which asks you if you want to write down what you heard on the journal. Heck I keep my own Skyrim Journal now on Springpad instead of using the inbuilt Journal. Although I am making my current role play more immersive than usual (I actually removed the compass thing and crosshairs).

[BrettM]

@sajuukkhar9000: It was not my intention to bash Skyrim, which I am greatly enjoying. But no game is perfect, and I don't see anything wrong with discussing how certain aspects of the quest system impact role playing.

 

If you would care to reread my post, I began it by praising the game for not being morally simplistic. I don't know how you got from that very clear statement to the impression that I would prefer "DUR HUR HUR" gameplay and am some kind of mindless hater who can't assemble a rational argument.

 

I'm not asking that the game always tell me beforehand who is right, or even that there always be a side that is incontrovertibly right. But choices always have consequences, and it feels a little lacking when a quest leaves the player completely in the dark both before and after. "In My Time of Need" clearly did have a side that was more right than the other -- either the woman was a traitor or she was not -- but you are left not ever knowing which side that was and you never experience any consequences. You are asked to make an arbitrary decision based on no evidence other than the he-said/she-said statements of the parties involved. What judge wouldn't dismiss the case for lack of evidence? But you don't get that option, and you never find out whether you chose for more good than ill. Your choice makes no difference, rendering it pointless in terms of character development. I did rather like the quest, but I think it needs a few tweaks before I would join sukeban in calling it one of my favorites. As it stands it is sort of a black hole that absorbs your input and gives nothing back.

 

If the quest log were a journal, I would have the option of writing "I decided not to go on the trip with my friends" and then turning the page, closing it out. Where is that option here? Anything I decide not to pursue stays in the active section of my to-do list. The journal analogy just doesn't seem to be working here, as sukeban pointed out so well. If I don't want to kill one of my followers for Boethiah, why do I have to face constant reminders that I need to do so, mixed in with the things that I am going to do? Do you keep sticky notes on your fridge reminding you to do things you aren't going to do, or do you remove them to keep the clutter down? That quest is history for me, so give me a way to close it out even if it gets marked "failed".

 

"House of Horrors" did indeed MAKE me do part of the quest because there is absolutely no way to get out of the locked house unless you do exactly what the quest log tells you to do -- kill the Vigilant. Now I'm in a locked shack with a quest log telling me to kill one of the captives. How exactly is it "painfully obvious" that two quests that lock you in a location with a similar objective to get out actually operate differently? Some quests you must follow the log, others you can ignore the log, still others you can bug (or bug the followups) if you kill some NPC that you weren't meant to kill. Where the heck is the consistency? How is one supposed to know which is which if the log doesn't give you any indication? Would it really hurt anything to have the log say "kill one of the captives OR kill Astrid"? Other quests do it.

 

As I said, I'm not out to bash Skyrim. This is my first TES game and I have raved about it to others. Like sukeban, I would just like to see more consistency in the quest interface so that a first-time player has better control over the progression of his character and the contents of his "journal". I shouldn't have to wiki everything in advance for fear that agreeing to an innocent-sounding request is suddenly going to rip away my moral choices with no warning.

Edited February 21, 2012 by BrettM

[sajuukkhar9000]

If the quest log were a journal, I would have the option of writing "I decided not to go on the trip with my friends" and then turning the page, closing it out. Where is that option here? Anything I decide not to pursue stays in the active section of my to-do list. The journal analogy just doesn't seem to be working here, as sukeban pointed out so well. If I don't want to kill one of my followers for Boethiah, why do I have to face constant reminders that I need to do so, mixed in with the things that I am going to do? Do you keep sticky notes on your fridge reminding you to do things you aren't going to do, or do you remove them to keep the clutter down? That quest is history for me, so give me a way to close it out even if it gets marked "failed".

The difference here is that 90% of the things you write down are notes like "X person wants Y items from Z place", and in situation like those it isn't normal to just write down "NAAA FFFFFF them", you keep it in there as is in the off chance you decide later to go back and actually get it for them.

 

The system as it is now is logical and works as journals would be used.

 

The only reason why people complain is because they are obsessive completionists who NEED every journal entry to be moved to the finished section and what makes it terribly funny is that they claim it doesn't suit "roleplay" when their supposed "roleplay" methods don't fit with how an item is normally used.

 

"House of Horrors" did indeed MAKE me do part of the quest because there is absolutely no way to get out of the locked house unless you do exactly what the quest log tells you to do -- kill the Vigilant. Now I'm in a locked shack with a quest log telling me to kill one of the captives. How exactly is it "painfully obvious" that two quests that lock you in a location with a similar objective to get out actually operate differently? Some quests you must follow the log, others you can ignore the log, still others you can bug (or bug the followups) if you kill some NPC that you weren't meant to kill. Where the heck is the consistency? How is one supposed to know which is which if the log doesn't give you any indication? Would it really hurt anything to have the log say "kill one of the captives OR kill Astrid"? Other quests do it.

Except there is a HUGE difference between the two that I'm not sure if your purposefully ignoring or not.

 

In "House of Horrors" the thing telling you to do something is a disembodied voice of a Daedric Lord it makes sense you wouldn't be able to kill him while in "Friends like these" Astird is just a NORMAL PERSON, SITTING ON A BOOKSHELF, TOTALLY UNAWARE YOU MIGHT KILL HER.

 

"Unkillable Daedric Lord who isn't even there" =/= "a totally random and normal person sitting RIGHT THERE in the open and seemingly defenseless" in ANY WAY, there not even REMOTELY similar.

 

PLEASE MAKE AN ARGUMENT BASED ON REASON

Edited February 21, 2012 by sajuukkhar9000

[midtek]

it was annoying 'visit the boy who want to join Dark Brotherhood' appears in the Journal everytime that I'll never be on to. Then it got the lowest line after completing few quests. I am fine with new journal system. Easy to track while still possible making immersion by marker remover mods.

 

I'm contented with Daedra quests especially the house of horrors. You know, most quests in Skyrim are only make you feel hero-playing from delivering an engagement ring for a widow to saving the lands. Then you find Daedra are exceeding mortal life; playing with your own morality just for their enjoyment. That's what I exactly expected to Daedra.

Edited February 22, 2012 by midtek