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Shezarrine: The Fate of Tamriel (Spoiler thread)


anbeegod

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Alright, I don't like critiquing the writing that goes into a mod especially in this case as I adore a lot of it. However, I just finished or rather endured a monologue of a conversation with Onmund That irritated the hell out of me, not only for what felt to me to be short sidedness but lack of options for the player.

 

The dialog in question is on the thalmar topic tree and you can ask why the thalmor despise the phijis. I found the flow of this conversation to be very one-sided and not thought threw. I choose two ways to approach this topic, the first time around I noted that magic indeed is something that should be treated with caution as to who has full access to it. Or rather the concept of everyone using magic as default I do not agree with and this was the closest choice to support that logic.Onmund's counter-arguments sounded very one dimensional or rather extremely bias to me.

 

Dismissing the dangers of magic and comparing it to swords and politics, which I found absurd. I then choose the next dialog available to counter that view which brought up two magic users that caused great destruction, and again it was met with this logic that sounded like "There will always be evil people and if magic was not the means of there violence something else would be." I find this type of stance to have a huge flaw in its argument. It's not about whether bad people will do bad things. It's about not ignoring threats and removing severe consequences and preventing mass loss of life.

 

Wars, you see coming, politics you see coming, swords you see coming, but magic can be hidden or invoked be on purpose or accidentally and can and HAS cause such chaos mass slaughter and destruction that can be hard fought let alone prepared for. Its impossible to stop every threat, but that doesn't mean add more numbers to the already poorly handled situation.

 

Making a potential killer or destructive accident a needle in a haystack is not a good ideal. Not to mention not everyone is blessed with the ability to use magic in the first place. So right out of the gate, there are people with a disadvantage in protecting themselves from would-be abusers. Prioritizing the right to use magic over the loss of life is not a logic I can support. Ignoring the already mass loss of life due to magic without any means to address or even lessen the chances of such things happening again..I can not support such a logic.

 

People need to know that there are consequences to mistreatment of magic, they need to know that there is a standard to what is ok and what is not.They need to know that they can be safe.They have that right to know those things and dismissing that is illogically and cold. I find Onmund's stance to bias and disregard the tragedies and catastrophic damages caused by those that abuse magic to be gross and ignorant. However, this surprises me not as he seems quite ok with the mass slaughter his sister does in their village, Putting their hate aside when his sister did what she did. The village labeled them demons from birth, considered them curses to the village and bringers of doom...

 

Thanks to his sister's action....They were right. You can't wish for magic to be accepted then turn around and commit an act that justifies its restrictions. Then be outrage when people hate you when you ignore mass slaughter. The hypocrisy of it all is beyond damning and you have to find a middle ground. I wanted to say all this to Onmund, to paint a different perspective then thalmor good phijis bad that he seems fixed on.Onmund only seems to understand things from a magic user perspective and bias.

 

This is ok to feel when it only applies to your life, but the moment your in a role that effects masses, you can't be biased like that.That's what creates tyrants, people that can't see things from another perspective aside from their own. I felt his dialog and my options in response to it did not provide room for a middle perspective and that annoyed me because that is where I stand. I want magic and magic users to be embraced, but not without consequences to those that abuse it, and certainly not ignore life already lose or prioritizing magic users over nonmagic users. Onmund says it's not black and white yet only offers a black and white answer.All or nothing is not the right answer...I can not agree.

 

There was a dialog to just blow it over and say whatever, but I do not wish to be flimsy in my morals when challenged but instead to stand firm. I hear Onmund's stance and I have a firm stance on it. At the very least I would rather agree to disagree.

 

Edit: I try and will continue to try and edit what I'm trying to say here, as I love this mod so far but wanted to challenge the logic behind some of the things Onmund says and what the player can say in term or what they can not. This comment is to provide a conversation and wish to apologize for entering real-life subject manner to the conversation as a reference. I do not wish to aggravate a political debate but more a critical thinking challenge due to my love for the dialog and deep meaning already displayed in the mod. So my apologies to any this may of offended.

 

I tried to create different arguments for the player, though sometimes it's sacrificed for the flow of the conversation.

 

I did write him to be biased. He's biased towards magic, Thalmor, Thindrel, as you can observe. However, Onmund is okay with the village's slaughter not because he's okay with genocide, but because every villager abused, tortured him and his sister when they were only small children, made their childhood (when their minds and views were developing) living hell. Unless one is a saint, they would want retribution. The quest is named "An Eye For An Eye", not only because it revolves around the Eye of Magnus, but also because it's where Onmund's sister has her revenge - delivering the "fitting punishment" as she demanded.

 

Onmund's childhood is also why he is so heavily biased towards the Thalmor, because Alinor is where he and Ingvi found companionship and a home for the first time. But unlike Onmund, Ingvi believes she can be even better than the Thalmor.

 

As for Onmund's logic, he thinks the cause of tragedies is evil-doers instead of magic itself. To prevent disasters, one needs to first filter out potential trouble makers based on their merits, but one cannot observe a person's merits simply from the look. In Onmund's mind, extensive use of magic is what increased the Dominion's quality of life and level of civilization. In this case, magic is not unlike technology - everyone can learn coding, engineering, computer science in reality, and that's what led to the creation of numerous technological inventions which made our society superior to what we had one century ago. It's true that technology led to the creation of mass destruction weapons, just as magic includes destruction and conjuration spells - limiting the learning of technology might prevent disasters, but at the cost of an advanced civilization. In Onmund's view, it's not worth the price.

 

As a sidenote, I think everyone in TES universe can use magic as long as one has learned it. It's unlike Dragon Age universe where only people connected to the Fade (or in TES's case, Aetherius) can use magic. I did read from somewhere that khajiits need much more effort than humans or elves to achieve the same level of magic though.

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Thanks to his sister's action....They were right. You can't wish for magic to be accepted then turn around and commit an act that justifies its restrictions. Then be outrage when people hate you when you ignore mass slaughter. The hypocrisy of it all is beyond damning and you have to find a middle ground. I wanted to say all this to Onmund, to paint a different perspective then thalmor good phijis bad that he seems fixed on.Onmund only seems to understand things from a magic user perspective and bias.

 

Well I can only agree with you , but the fact is Thalmor are dangerous and their logic should be like Onmund's : they think they are right , that they must use magic to dominate the world , then they can force a world peace , and , as the nazis or other murderous organisations like the USA , they think they are the good guys . Onmund is obviously brainwashed/truly convinced that the Thalmor are the answer , and his sister a murderous sociopath but , as the mod author told me when I complained about her, characters in this mod are grey , not white nor black , not good nor bad , they are ... humans (you see what i mean)
One funny point : when Onmund said "There will always be evil people and if magic was not the means of there violence something else would be." , he was f*cking right . Just look at our world , without magic , we've got weapons , assault rifles , nukes and whatever, America act 1000x worse than the Thalmor if you look all the mass murderers and bombs on innocent civil population ... Japan didn't deserved it , Viet-Nam did'nt deserved it , Middle-East do not deserves it either (terrorists does , but children and women are the one who dies while terrorists hides) Well , I got off-topic I guess , sorry , but this mod proves that there is no "good guy" nor "bad guys" , only politics , lies , and the "greater good" they claim to aim ...
Thi mod still allows you to make your own choices and make them count (For instance , Ingvi can be punished and killed for what she did , it's not one of those "deal with it" situation like the vanilla ending of CoW questline)

 

EDIT : Since anbeegod answered too ,you can delete this post if it's useless .

Edited by ibrawane
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Just a theory rant.....

 

This is where I get lost if you use Caesia mod she confesses she loves you if your nice to here then she tells you her story but in this mod she shows up after the College and is completely different. So I assume she is but is not the same person. Some where you changed the story to fit this mod. Or her and her brother are two of the best liars around and love to play with peoples minds and emotions. which I guess fits Thalmor spies only to help the their empire . Also some of there values seem twisted which fits the Thalmor. As a student of History mainly military this is very Fascist such as in Nazi or Stalinist type of brainwashing for the state. Where children turn in there parents for disagreeing with the party line. Or anything for the party all others are wrong. What I see is a mentally disturbed Caesiea tooting the party line and going out of control of the party. Sounds like they may take her out at sometime. Onmund also fits the brainwashed idea with his I believe and we should have power to remove you freedom of choice as a living person be that choice right or wrong. And don't get me started on the Gods who would maybe choose to step in when the people start to change.

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Applause!!!! Yay, this is the type of discussion I was hoping would happen in this thread and thank you so much for the very in-depth answers from the both you ibraw and you Anbee.Anbee I fully respect this approach to a character well done and figured that maybe the intent. For me, this mod is challenging the moral of both myself and my character as you can see.As well as the choices in answers and actions provided which I'm aware is hard to cover.I find myself trying to reason with Onmund or feeling the need to provide a third option that can be a compromise to the options he sees or neutralize the hate he has. For my character right now, my bond with him is strong and I don't want to damage it. However at the same time wish to stand firm in my beliefs while meeting his, my character wants to save him from his hate. And help him see things from the ones he demonizes. I understand all well why Onmund has the feelings he does as would many, the problem is once you commit such an act of revenge, it tends to loop infinitely.

 

I wouldn't compare magic in this game universe to technology or even how we handle it. Not to mention we do have a restriction on technology that does indeed work. Restriction on most weapons work, and well there's a reason people aren't dying from nukes and biothreats every day. Restrictions regulations do work, and while other forms of violence can take its place in other areas, but overall an attempt to stop the violence does work. Whereas in Tamriel where everyone and their grandmother has a weapon and or knows a spell. The justice isn't as well distributed in that universe, in fact, it very much a wild wild west in Tamriel. If the bandit attacks aren't an indication alone. I mean threw out the game your attack by everything and you witness every hold attack by everything, and well the attacks that do the most damage are vampire attacks, dragons, and if you lure a rogue mage near a hold. Lets not even talk about the damage the Dragonborn he/she can do on their own accord >.<.

 

Personally, I like the concept of magic and technology used together and mages embraced and using magic to better the world. I agree with Onmund's dream here in that sense however without any rules or consequences when people do wrong and people are killed because it's definitely a when not if. This just sounds like an ultimatum for those who already lost so much, and yeah I just wish I can say that to him or show threw actions where I stand without it seeming like one side or another. Because that does bother me that we have to fall on one side or the other, and not be an entirely new concept or something that's in the middle of both ideals. However, that may also be the point, that no matter what you do Onmund may only see it one or two ways.

 

Either way, I'm finding the mod to be morally challenging since my route is trying to keep Onmund at my side while also seeing more and more our views collide and I like that. For me I RP my character creating a universal peace for all of Tamriel eventually when becoming high king or ascending. Basically doing a tiber septom, but uniting everyone. Finding a peace among the different views or a compromise that's close enough and makes most of the people happy. So I find this mod to be a very realistic challenge to a Dragonborn that wishes to do this and I thank you for that.

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Just a theory rant.....

 

This is where I get lost if you use Caesia mod she confesses she loves you if your nice to here then she tells you her story but in this mod she shows up after the College and is completely different. So I assume she is but is not the same person. Some where you changed the story to fit this mod. Or her and her brother are two of the best liars around and love to play with peoples minds and emotions. which I guess fits Thalmor spies only to help the their empire . Also some of there values seem twisted which fits the Thalmor. As a student of History mainly military this is very Fascist such as in Nazi or Stalinist type of brainwashing for the state. Where children turn in there parents for disagreeing with the party line. Or anything for the party all others are wrong. What I see is a mentally disturbed Caesiea tooting the party line and going out of control of the party. Sounds like they may take her out at sometime. Onmund also fits the brainwashed idea with his I believe and we should have power to remove you freedom of choice as a living person be that choice right or wrong. And don't get me started on the Gods who would maybe choose to step in when the people start to change.

 

They're not the same person. Caesia may love you, but Ingvi has no feeling for you since she didn't know you before the quest.

 

I'd argue that they weren't turning in their parents for the state though, because it's Ingvi's personal revenge; Onmund doesn't want to remove anyone's freedom either, because if he really hates someone/something, he'd sooner take their life than their freedom. But on them being brainwashed by the state, that part is pretty accurate. The Dominion that I wrote is extremely statist, anything that goes against the state's interest is disgraceful and shunned upon.

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