Favorite Bioware Characters?

[Violet]

Oops, didn't mean to repost.

Hahahaha, why do you have to post this while I was writing the first response?

Vaeolet Lilly Blossom-

I never thought Avaline was stuck-up. She dislikes criminals, and I think that most of us would agree with her on that. Of course, if her friendship is maxed and your Hawke chooses to overthrow the Chantry (as mine did), she sticks with you, despite a bloody mage revolution conflicting with what you call conservative values. (I would imagine conservatives would side with the Chantry over apostate mages.)

The very first thing she does after I've been in Kirkwall for a while, is tell me that I'm horrible, wrong, that she's been stalking me, and that she won't give me a job. After all I've done for her: consorted with a dragon, saved her life, fought endless waves of darkspawn alongside her!

And then regardless of if I dare to flirt with her... Mr. Dickus the Darkhorse swoops in out of nowhere and woos her with nothing but stupidity, conservatism, long locks of dark hair, and his 'ever so manly' guard uniform.

I bet he even has sex in his armor... it's the only 'decent' outfit he has.

Either way, her opinions are very clearly on the templar side of things, which is why your friendship has to be maxed with her to get her to join you in the first place! Because she is an archetypical conservative bitch.

As for Morrigan. . .yeah, she's a bit of a bitch. She's also highly intelligent, and I never once saw her do something evil that didn't have solid, coldly logical justification.
As for her sleeping with you and leaving, with the Witchunt dlc, you can go with her through her conjured Eluvian.

Don't care about the DLC, since it's just that: DLC. A way to gouge more money from me when the character involved didn't interest me in the first place! Flemeth? Interesting character. Yet another one of Flemeth's 'daughters'? Boring, archetypical, and a general bitch.

When did she prove her intelligence? When? I never saw it, I honestly want to know. She's proven she knows some magic, like at least half the mages in the fucking game, most of which are complete idiots (and die in the tower, go team!).

Solid, coldly logical explanation? You mean paranoia, self-importance, and a complete misunderstanding of 'survival of the fittest' (that being the most lucky survive, fitness increasing but your chances)?

Come one, come all, judge for yourselves if this is pedophilia. (It's not.)

My girlfriend seems to think so

Come on, Vaeolet. How can you not like Merrill?

Easily... for all of the reasons posted before and more (example: the bullshit regarding the eluvian, we saw what that shit did to the Dalish warden, no thank you, and she was there too, so you'd think she'd remember that part!).

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Vaeolet-

I argue that intelligence has everything to do with possession, and Arch Mage Orsino was only possessed when he became so desparate that he could not think clearly. All of your conversations with demons in the game deal with outsmarting them in some way.

Desperate? Hah... the mages had a well fortified position, your assistance as foot soldiers, and his normal magic was plenty enough to do massive waves of damage.

What he did endangered (and infact killed) many of his mage friends, and turned on you instead of the templar hordes he should have attacked.

My blood mage never had a single problem with demons. I was never faced with any pacts that I had not agreed to, and in particular I was pissed off that all of my party members except Anders fucked up the one time that we entered the Fade. Oh I was pissed, it's like they were all intentionally written stupid for that scene.

"I like big boats and I cannot lie"... really Isabella? See: I even knock on characters I do like most of the time.

Also, notice I did post defenses for Avaline and Morrigan, though when I said "one at a time", I more of meant I would defend Merrill against your individual points.

I notice that, albeit I didn't get to see them until the Merrill one was under way. I have a practice of not clicking 'post reply' until I have fully responded... and it generally works for me.

But why expressly defend Merrill? Hell, I'll brutalize Anders and Fenris, and I'll mock Varric after he stops making fun of himself, Isabella is a greedy and traitorous slut who will try to screw you over in at least every Act... but I can find something redeemable in all of them.

I cannot find that in Merrill.

You seem heavily biased against Merril simply because she is awkward around people. I don't think you actually gave her a chance, but was instead intent on hating her the entire time simply because DA II let you down. You even insulted what she was wearing- clearly a factual, unbiased argument.

DAII let me down horribly... the story is bland, expectable, repetitive, with zero flow to it, choppy, and the only thing that saves it is that Varric is telling the story under pressure. I can find nothing respectable in the story of Dragon Age 2... which considering it's background in the original DA: is appalling. The only stories in the game worth telling were the micro-stories.

I am biased against Merrill, it's true... but not simply because she is awkward (around people? Fuck, she's awkward everywhere, even with the mice in her house!). That doesn't help her case... but it is not the sole reason I despise her.

I despise Al from Full Metal Alchemist (Brotherhood too) for many of the same reasons I despise Merrill, and these are the same reasons I hate all 'kid heros':

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8ybODUYYSRM

Regarding what she was wearing: THIS IS A VIDEO GAME. It is an aesthetic experience, and part of that experience is what someone's wearing. I AM A COSTUME-MAKER: aesthetic things mean a lot to me. To you, it's an affectionate aside... to me, it is a mood-killingly bad style choice.

Like coming to bed with an intention of sex while wearing this:

Anyway, how am I a pedophile when you say you had sex with her just for the achievement? If Im a pedophile, doesn't that make you a prostitute pedophile?

I'm a slut, and I know it I cannot think of one person who'd tell you differently that isn't named 'Mom', 'Dad', or 'Grandma'.

And no, to be a pedophile I'd have to be attracted to the kid. Quite the opposite, she revolted me from shortly after the start with her terrible (read: shoddy) defense of blood-magic.

So the truth is that I'm plenty often willing to do something simply because I get a medal for it. If only I got a medal for growing C-cup breasts as soon as humanly possible, I'd be there in a flash

I'm joking, of course. I don't want to turn this hostile, as I already promised not to hit you with a stick.

* Violet struggles to care, she's not hostile, simply opinionated. And more than a little willing to defend her opinions. Not that she won't back down if she's wrong... it's just that you'll have to show her first. That is not necessarily easy.

[Aegrus]

Passionatefool-

Anders is definitely a good choice. He would have ranked in my list, but he pretty much blew up the Chantry when I would have preferred a diplomatic solution. Plus, he makes disparaging remarks against Merrill, even going so far as to directly blame her for everything bad that's happened to the Dalish, despite most of it being the fault of outside forces or Keeper Marethari.

He (and the spirit of jusctice) is awesome when you bring him into the fade- he pretty well stops demons from tricking you in to doing anything. Plus, as with Mordin, he runs a free clinic.

I'm sure Vaeolet is going to have something to say about the Merrill point.

[thebigfudge]

Wrex from mass effect for me, Or HK-47

[leo-rcc]

Like coming to bed with an intention of sex while wearing this:

Hawt.

[Jaysyn]

Probably showing my age, but Edwin & Minsc are still my favorites.

[Aegrus]

Vaeolet-

You want to know when Morrigan shows her intelligence- did you notice my profile signature? It's a Morrigan quote.

Now, as for Merrill. . .

I'm defending her by far the most both because you seem to hate her more than my other choices, and because she ranks first as my favorite character.

Merrill never struck me as a ditz, however. Let's review this-

She's a blood mage who wants to help the Dalish, even though they hate her because of Marethari's lies and Merrill's blood magic. Given that you said you're a blood mage, Vaeolet, I wouldn't think you'd hate her for that. You can say it's stupid to help people who don't want help, and I agree. But I also regard it as noble. Besides, she's not exactly weak for shouldering the burdens not only of her own life, but also for all the other Dalish, who strike me as useless ingrates.
To help the Dalish, she tries to repair the Eluvian, successfully recruiting the help of demons without getting herself possessed. She also knows how to repair it, which would take considerable intelligence.
Throughout the game, Merrill has some ditzy comments- for example, she gets lost easily, and she doesn't seem to understand the danger associated with muggings. Or she was just trolling Hawke with that comment. I'm not sure. To me, a lot of what she said seemed to be intentionally humorous rather than stupid.
However, much of what appears to be empty-headedness, I argue is a result of her moving from one culture into an entirely different one, with zero time to adjust or learn the new mores. As I said, by act three, she stops making fish-out-of-water comments, and starts saying more serious things.
Merrill betrays you for a demon, but notice that she isn't possessed by it, she has a good reason for betraying you (to help the Dalish, again- she says that the Champion isn't as important as an entire civilization, which I agree with), and she apologizes profusely afterwards, after she comes to her senses. You can't expect her to just immediately give up on all of her family and friends, no matter how bigoted they might be.
During her later companion quests, Marethari tries to save Merrill from a demon- however, Marethari stupidly keeps knowledge of the trap to herself, gets herself possessed in the process, and Merrill is forced to bravely kill her own mother-figure to save the party and the rest of the Dalish.
Afterwards, the Dalish, who were brainwashed by Marethari for six+ years to hate Merrill for no reason at all (Marethari claims Merrill was corrupted by the Eluvian, when instead Merrill knew enough to have a demon cleanse it before working on it)- confront Merrill, and blame her for Marethari's mistakes. However, with the Champions help, she can leave without killing anyone. It's not that hard to do, either- there are only 3 dialogue branches to choose from, and it's hardly a random guess which one will calm the Dalish down.
After all of this happens, Merrill is very grateful to the Champion, and realizes that she has to move on from the Eluvian and begin living life for herself rather than the Dalish clans.
You call her romance scene pedophilia, I say that she's over eighteen for reasons listed before, and depending on what complexion you choose for Hawke, he can be roughly equivalent to her in age (and thus life experience, because I know you don't care about the magical 18 year old line). As for the claim that Hawke took advantage of her, I have no idea where you even got that notion from. She doesn't seem to be lacking life experience by act III, which is when the scene takes place. I'll admit that her lingerie, if you can call it that, looks bad. However, that's hardly a serious offense to me, though as a costume-maker, I suppose it might be more important to you.
In the end game, Merrill does, in my opinion, the completely correct thing in wanting a peaceful resolution, but choosing without argument to fight the Templars and defend the mages when it is clear there can be no peaceful resolution. She's hardly a ditz in claiming that she'll stand by Hawke to the end.

Merrill may be awkward throughout the game, but so am I, and so are a lot of people, and I suppose I just identified with that. For a social outcast, Merrill's voice acting and characterization were spot on.

I hate kid heroes, but so far all you've provided are assertions without proof, plus one video to display how ugly her undergarments are. There's nothing wrong with the scene itself. Merrill claims to love the Champion, overcomes cultural bias by saying that she doesn't care that he's a human (which is admirable, consdiering how racist most of the Dalish are), and correctly identifies the societal implications of an elf being involved romatically with a human. She also overcomes her usual timidity by saying "if you're not afraid, then neither am I." Anyway, she pulled Hawke to the bed, not the other way around, so you can hardly claim she was coerced into sex.

Also, you claim that she has no experience with friends or lovers, so legal sex for her is pedophilia- by that argument, if someone is a virgin by their early twenties, sex with them is rape forever. It doesn't make any sense. I already explained how she accumulates more life experience than she first had in Act I. She has a lot of character growth, but i think you mostly overlooked it and focused on anything negative you could possibly exaggerate to seem meaningful. It's kind of interesting, actually- Merrill seems to have mademany of the same choices as you in the game (blood magic, kill the Templars, etc.), yet you're fixated on only the negative for her, and somehow overcome Isabella's obvious flaws. (Such as stealing the relic, thus killing thousands of people in Kirkwall, just to save her own skin.)

Btw, I lol'ed at the picture of the guy in the chicken costume.

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Wrex from mass effect for me, Or HK-47

Oh yes, Hk-47. Fond memories. I especially like how he calls everyone "meat bag."

[leo-rcc]

Oh yes, Hk-47. Fond memories. I especially like how he calls everyone "meat bag."

It's an accurate description at least.

[Aegrus]

Oh yes, Hk-47. Fond memories. I especially like how he calls everyone "meat bag."

It's an accurate description at least.

I actually kept him in my party all the time, as soon as I could get him.

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Pretty good list. I would add the following only because he was sheer awesome;

Minsc - A berserker ranger with a pet hamster Boo, whom he believes is a minature giant space hamster.
"Fool me once, shame on you; fool me twice, watch it! I'm huge. "
"Make way evil! I'm armed to the teeth and packing a hamster!"
"Yes Boo, I agree. This group could do with a swift kick in the morals."
"I trust those who prey on children no farther than they can be thrown, even if I manage to throw them pretty far!"
"Boo and I will say we knew the hero . And people will of course not believe us. And, maybe, they will look at us more strangely than they do now. Or Maybe not. "

It just never got old. But your list is better, I just thought an honourable mention

Minsc sounds awesome. What game is that from? Is it Baldur's gate or something? I've heard of Minsc and the hamster from somewhere, I just can't quite recall. . .

[Napoléon]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Vg1gTas7OAA

[Violet]

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Vaeolet-

You want to know when Morrigan shows her intelligence- did you notice my profile signature? It's a Morrigan quote.

Now, as for Merrill. . .

I'm defending her by far the most both because you seem to hate her more than my other choices, and because she ranks first as my favorite character.

Merrill never struck me as a ditz, however. Let's review this-

She's a blood mage who wants to help the Dalish, even though they hate her because of Marethari's lies and Merrill's blood magic. Given that you said you're a blood mage, Vaeolet, I wouldn't think you'd hate her for that. You can say it's stupid to help people who don't want help, and I agree. But I also regard it as noble. Besides, she's not exactly weak for shouldering the burdens not only of her own life, but also for all the other Dalish, who strike me as useless ingrates.
To help the Dalish, she tries to repair the Eluvian, successfully recruiting the help of demons without getting herself possessed. She also knows how to repair it, which would take considerable intelligence.
Throughout the game, Merrill has some ditzy comments- for example, she gets lost easily, and she doesn't seem to understand the danger associated with muggings. Or she was just trolling Hawke with that comment. I'm not sure. To me, a lot of what she said seemed to be intentionally humorous rather than stupid.
However, much of what appears to be empty-headedness, I argue is a result of her moving from one culture into an entirely different one, with zero time to adjust or learn the new mores. As I said, by act three, she stops making fish-out-of-water comments, and starts saying more serious things.
Merrill betrays you for a demon, but notice that she isn't possessed by it, she has a good reason for betraying you (to help the Dalish, again- she says that the Champion isn't as important as an entire civilization, which I agree with), and she apologizes profusely afterwards, after she comes to her senses. You can't expect her to just immediately give up on all of her family and friends, no matter how bigoted they might be.
During her later companion quests, Marethari tries to save Merrill from a demon- however, Marethari stupidly keeps knowledge of the trap to herself, gets herself possessed in the process, and Merrill is forced to bravely kill her own mother-figure to save the party and the rest of the Dalish.
Afterwards, the Dalish, who were brainwashed by Marethari for six+ years to hate Merrill for no reason at all (Marethari claims Merrill was corrupted by the Eluvian, when instead Merrill knew enough to have a demon cleanse it before working on it)- confront Merrill, and blame her for Marethari's mistakes. However, with the Champions help, she can leave without killing anyone. It's not that hard to do, either- there are only 3 dialogue branches to choose from, and it's hardly a random guess which one will calm the Dalish down.
After all of this happens, Merrill is very grateful to the Champion, and realizes that she has to move on from the Eluvian and begin living life for herself rather than the Dalish clans.
You call her romance scene pedophilia, I say that she's over eighteen for reasons listed before, and depending on what complexion you choose for Hawke, he can be roughly equivalent to her in age (and thus life experience, because I know you don't care about the magical 18 year old line). As for the claim that Hawke took advantage of her, I have no idea where you even got that notion from. She doesn't seem to be lacking life experience by act III, which is when the scene takes place. I'll admit that her lingerie, if you can call it that, looks bad. However, that's hardly a serious offense to me, though as a costume-maker, I suppose it might be more important to you.
In the end game, Merrill does, in my opinion, the completely correct thing in wanting a peaceful resolution, but choosing without argument to fight the Templars and defend the mages when it is clear there can be no peaceful resolution. She's hardly a ditz in claiming that she'll stand by Hawke to the end.

Merrill may be awkward throughout the game, but so am I, and so are a lot of people, and I suppose I just identified with that. For a social outcast, Merrill's voice acting and characterization were spot on.

I hate kid heroes, but so far all you've provided are assertions without proof, plus one video to display how ugly her undergarments are. There's nothing wrong with the scene itself. Merrill claims to love the Champion, overcomes cultural bias by saying that she doesn't care that he's a human (which is admirable, consdiering how racist most of the Dalish are), and correctly identifies the societal implications of an elf being involved romatically with a human. She also overcomes her usual timidity by saying "if you're not afraid, then neither am I." Anyway, she pulled Hawke to the bed, not the other way around, so you can hardly claim she was coerced into sex.

Also, you claim that she has no experience with friends or lovers, so legal sex for her is pedophilia- by that argument, if someone is a virgin by their early twenties, sex with them is rape forever. It doesn't make any sense. I already explained how she accumulates more life experience than she first had in Act I. She has a lot of character growth, but i think you mostly overlooked it and focused on anything negative you could possibly exaggerate to seem meaningful. It's kind of interesting, actually- Merrill seems to have mademany of the same choices as you in the game (blood magic, kill the Templars, etc.), yet you're fixated on only the negative for her, and somehow overcome Isabella's obvious flaws. (Such as stealing the relic, thus killing thousands of people in Kirkwall, just to save her own skin.)

Btw, I lol'ed at the picture of the guy in the chicken costume.

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I no longer have the energy and desire to make another hour-long post detailing why I disagree (yet again).

Bleh, you like what you like.

Fun fact: I can like evil characters (read: Isabella), but only if they are interesting as a character. I can maul the traitorous bitch if I want, and she certainly is nowhere near as intriguing to me as Zevran... but out of the shit that DAII is, she happens to be one of the better characters. Don't make me rant about how much I hate all of the characters from DAII (excluding Varric and Sarcastic Hawke), and dislike several things about DA, most notably a few of the characters. In particular... Loghain as a party member. (I love that I ranted anyway, hahahahaha.)

But the difference between the two games... is that Morrigan, Alistair, Shale, Oghren, Wynne, Leilana, Zevran, and Sten... while all flawed in their own ways, have come together under a common banner roughly involving saving Ferelden from the Blight and the Civil war.

The decent story of DA acts as prop for many character flaws, and allows them to stand out and apart from each other where they would otherwise have been mostly uninteresting.

There is no macrostory in DAII... leaving no prop for boring characters. Had Fenris and Anders been in the first game: they would have been fascinating. Anders in awakening was an awesome character (then suddenly got a stick up his ass and became a whiney emo bitch in DAII).

Varric was cool in DAII, but in DA he would have been incredible. Hell, even Merrill would have been respectable in DA, her background was relevant then and the game could really have used a blood mage (or they could have given you your friend from the mage opening, heh).

Isabella is the only character better where she is... albeit I find her repeated traitorous acts aggravating, and she is honestly a very shallow character. It's easier for a shallow character to stand out in a shallow game... she'd have been a poor man's Zevran in DA.

Aveline would have been excellent in DA, Carver/Bethany would all have been better for it (instead of the utter shit they are), all the DLC characters for DAII would have done better... DAII's "story?" holds every one of these otherwise (perhaps) decent characters down. Had the game had a good story that presented the eventual theme from the beginning (the Templar/Circle conflict)... DAII would have been an excellent game. Instead we deal with taking from the Deep Roads, fighting Qunari stuck in a city, and massive multi-year jumps used as a plot device to put massive amounts of time where it shouldn't be. The singular time this was used well was the very beginning, when you've essentially been sold for a year... everywhere else it feels unreal, ridiculous, usually pointless (aftermath of the Qunari event and transition from the deep roads, hell I don't remember if there were others), and there is no clear indicator that time has passed where it matters most: your companions, who have exactly as much nothing to do as you do.

A story is the difference between Flemeth being an old hag who talks too much, and being an ancient and powerful witch and philosopher. DAII doesn't have it.