Author Topic: Virtue goes up too much!  (Read 32978 times)

Venn

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Virtue goes up too much!
« on: June 11, 2004, 12:09:58 PM »
This is really turning into a problem. I like the idea of the mod, but... my virtue is up to 18 already, and it seems that anything that helps someone else increases it. Which is definitely bad, because almost all quests have you helpiing people. And I want to have Korgan and Edwin in my party, to do their quests, but once I get 19 virtue they won't join or will leave, right? I would lose some virtue but I can't, cause I'm playing an Inquisitor....
There is no way I can prevent getting 19 virtue, right?

Offline SimDing0™

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Re: Virtue goes up too much!
« Reply #1 on: June 11, 2004, 12:15:47 PM »
Virtue promotes roleplaying. This, among other things, means that if you want evil people in your party, you're going to have to satisfy them. Therefore, between evil NPCs or good actions, you're going to have to sarcifice one or the other here...

Venn

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Re: Virtue goes up too much!
« Reply #2 on: June 11, 2004, 12:27:30 PM »
I know... but I think virtue points are given a bit too freely in the game. Considering there's a maximum of 20, right? I'd think a Paladin gets to commit non-virtuous acts without losing his Paladin status... as that kind of struggle between good and evil within himself should be central to the whole Paladin idea. And especially if you consider that the PC is a Bhaalspawn. Though it's true I have yet to see an action that incurrs a Virtue penalty other than killing civilians. But, like I said before, you get too much virtue, really. Since a Paladin's supposed to be helping those in need, should he get virtue points for every slave he frees, and things like that?
What I mean is, I'm missing out on some quests cause they're evil, and I got no problem with that since it's not the first time I play the game... but still Virtue seems a bit unbalanced.
Sometimes I feel like I should get Virtue points if I do something to which the easy option would be the non-virtuous one... I mean, I kill a bunch of slavers, I talk to a slave child... of course I'll be freeing him, why be rewarded? And since buying stuff takes your reputation into account, it doesn't seem as though the virtue is a reward, rather than just an impediment to having evil characters in the party.

Venn

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Re: Virtue goes up too much!
« Reply #3 on: June 11, 2004, 12:28:27 PM »
Sorry if that didn't seem too clear.  :-\

Offline SimDing0™

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Re: Virtue goes up too much!
« Reply #4 on: June 11, 2004, 12:31:00 PM »
Since a Paladin's supposed to be helping those in need, should he get virtue points for every slave he frees, and things like that?
Whether or not it's expected from him doesn't have any bearing on whether it's a good action or not, though.

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What I mean is, I'm missing out on some quests cause they're evil, and I got no problem with that since it's not the first time I play the game... but still Virtue seems a bit unbalanced.
I think a lot of the unbalance comes from the tendency of Bioware to make the most beneficial quest solutions the "good" ones.

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I mean, I kill a bunch of slavers, I talk to a slave child... of course I'll be freeing him, why be rewarded?
Virtue isn't a reward. It's a measure.

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And since buying stuff takes your reputation into account, it doesn't seem as though the virtue is a reward, rather than just an impediment to having evil characters in the party.
At this point, it's worth noting that some time in the future, NPCs should take account of reputation changes rather than virtue changes if they are outside the party.

Offline Kish

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Re: Virtue goes up too much!
« Reply #5 on: June 11, 2004, 12:53:54 PM »
it doesn't seem as though the virtue is a reward,
It's not meant to be a reward.
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rather than just an impediment to having evil characters in the party.
A paladin will never knowingly associate with evil characters; a paladin who ever commits an act of evil Falls.  It sounds like you're objecting to having to roleplay with a mod whose entire purpose is to enhance roleplay.
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Venn

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Re: Virtue goes up too much!
« Reply #6 on: June 11, 2004, 01:01:12 PM »
Well, yeah I know that Virtue's not supposed to be a reward, regardless of what I said earlier.

About the "freeing children" thing... yeah, it's the right thing to do, but getting Virtue points for that, I think, is unwarranted, since there's not such a lot of points, anyway. If the max were 100, that would be okay, I guess...

And yes, Paladins wouldn't knowingly associate with evil characters, but... despite their alignments, Viconia and Korgan aren't evil. Korgan is more Chaotic Neutral actually, and Viconia never really gives you a reason to think she's evil other than her being a drow. She does get to change.

Offline Kish

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Re: Virtue goes up too much!
« Reply #7 on: June 11, 2004, 01:35:24 PM »
Viconia and Korgan aren't evil. Korgan is more Chaotic Neutral actually,
Let's see.  Korgan is a vicious beast who killed two members of his previous adventuring party for no real reason.  He pushes you to kill other groups of adventurers for their equipment.  Every time he's outdoors at night, he jokes about raping a woman.  He turns down a prostitute in the Bridge District because it's no fun for him if the woman's not fighting him.  He insults everyone around him constantly, but if you say much milder things to him in the Copper Coronet, he goes red-circled and tries to kill you.  All the time he's in your party, he drives home how much he loves slaughter.

Yeah, that sounds exactly like "not evil, more Chaotic Neutral actually" to me.
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Offline Mongoose87

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Re: Virtue goes up too much!
« Reply #8 on: June 11, 2004, 03:56:23 PM »
Don't forget his tormenting of Arie

Venn

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Re: Virtue goes up too much!
« Reply #9 on: June 11, 2004, 04:07:22 PM »
Viconia and Korgan aren't evil. Korgan is more Chaotic Neutral actually,
Let's see.  Korgan is a vicious beast who killed two members of his previous adventuring party for no real reason.  He pushes you to kill other groups of adventurers for their equipment.  Every time he's outdoors at night, he jokes about raping a woman.  He turns down a prostitute in the Bridge District because it's no fun for him if the woman's not fighting him.  He insults everyone around him constantly, but if you say much milder things to him in the Copper Coronet, he goes red-circled and tries to kill you.  All the time he's in your party, he drives home how much he loves slaughter.

Yeah, that sounds exactly like "not evil, more Chaotic Neutral actually" to me.

I was thinking about that after I posted. I actually think he's Neutral Evil, not Chaotic Evil. Still makes him evil, though.

But, to be honest, Aerie DESERVES to be tormented, she's just SO annoying.

Offline jester

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Re: Virtue goes up too much!
« Reply #10 on: June 11, 2004, 05:05:24 PM »
Although slightly left to what was the original topic, I'd like to add that IWD2 handled the paladin situation quite well, when it comes to rewards. Most of the time they don't get any. :D At least no money. Same for monks IIRC. I liked that, but I know it is not within the scope of Virtue.

I must say that after a couple of months disabling alignment troubles, getting multiple strongholds, sleeping tight and zipping through cutscenes, I now enjoy the tradeoff situation and the fuss and the problems. :D Life is hard.

If you really need a berserker and don't want to play one yourself, try Anomen with the NPCkits from gibberlings3.
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Offline Kish

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Re: Virtue goes up too much!
« Reply #11 on: June 11, 2004, 05:35:20 PM »
But, to be honest, Aerie DESERVES to be tormented, she's just SO annoying.
Uh-huh.  Why are you trying to play a paladin, again?  Just play a nice CE berserker, and you'll find your potential companions much more to your taste.
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Venn

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Re: Virtue goes up too much!
« Reply #12 on: June 11, 2004, 09:18:33 PM »
But, to be honest, Aerie DESERVES to be tormented, she's just SO annoying.
Uh-huh.  Why are you trying to play a paladin, again?  Just play a nice CE berserker, and you'll find your potential companions much more to your taste.

That's not what I mean. I play an Inquisitor for two reasons: the class abilities, and to not play a fighter or bard since that's what I played before.
Not because I want to roleplay a Paladin, I mean, if you want to roleplay, surely a Bioware game is not your best bet.
I can definitely roleplay a Paladin, anyway, but I want to try and do all of the stuff in the game that there is to do.
My complaint is that it's just too easy to gain virtue points... and that it's a problem for me since I can't lose any. That was it.

Offline Kish

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Re: Virtue goes up too much!
« Reply #13 on: June 11, 2004, 09:40:19 PM »
I play an Inquisitor for two reasons: the class abilities, and to not play a fighter or bard since that's what I played before.
Not because I want to roleplay a Paladin, I mean, if you want to roleplay, surely a Bioware game is not your best bet.
So you installed a mod which is all about roleplaying why?  If you could do what you're trying to do, it would show that there's a flaw in the mod.
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Re: Virtue goes up too much!
« Reply #14 on: June 11, 2004, 10:50:06 PM »
I mean, if you want to roleplay, surely a Bioware game is not your best bet.

You've obviously never played KOTOR.

Offline Mongoose87

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Re: Virtue goes up too much!
« Reply #15 on: June 11, 2004, 11:16:06 PM »
Yeah, KOTOR has RPing up the yingyang.  Slightly uncomfortable, but nonetheless interesting.  Seriously, if you don't want to follow the rules of being a paly, it's the worst class possible to bend the rules with.

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Re: Virtue goes up too much!
« Reply #16 on: June 12, 2004, 01:23:58 AM »
Listen and Listen well I ran an evil character with virtue instailed from chapter one to the final battle of ToB. It wasn't that hard. I didn't have to go and kill a random commonor just to bring it down.

Don't be nice. Be mean be cruel. You don't geting anything special for

Virture is suposed to show this. You can be an evil bastard but well loved.
As long as no one knows you did it your rep shouldn't change. But if you kill somebody because they looked at you funny thats a sign of evil.

A Paladin is suposed to fall if they commit an evil act.
Infact bioware is lose in that a paladin isn't allowed to be in the same party as evil characters. Unless there is no other chance. An example would be a demon army is about to be unleshed upon the world and only by working with the evil warrior can the paladin hope to win. If bioware was as strict as the rule then a paladin couldn't be in the same party as an evil character for most of the game.
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Venn

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Re: Virtue goes up too much!
« Reply #17 on: June 12, 2004, 08:31:01 PM »
Yeah, KOTOR has RPing up the yingyang.  Slightly uncomfortable, but nonetheless interesting.  Seriously, if you don't want to follow the rules of being a paly, it's the worst class possible to bend the rules with.

Yeah, I played it. It was nice that you could be consistently evil throughout the game, but it still got very tedious... all dialogue was essentially the same, going over the same topics... there was a lot of dialogue, which is nice, but Bioware's writing is quite lame, really.

Venn

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Re: Virtue goes up too much!
« Reply #18 on: June 12, 2004, 08:34:01 PM »
Listen and Listen well I ran an evil character with virtue instailed from chapter one to the final battle of ToB. It wasn't that hard. I didn't have to go and kill a random commonor just to bring it down.

Don't be nice. Be mean be cruel. You don't geting anything special for

Virture is suposed to show this. You can be an evil bastard but well loved.
As long as no one knows you did it your rep shouldn't change. But if you kill somebody because they looked at you funny thats a sign of evil.

A Paladin is suposed to fall if they commit an evil act.
Infact bioware is lose in that a paladin isn't allowed to be in the same party as evil characters. Unless there is no other chance. An example would be a demon army is about to be unleshed upon the world and only by working with the evil warrior can the paladin hope to win. If bioware was as strict as the rule then a paladin couldn't be in the same party as an evil character for most of the game.

I just think that maybe, just maybe and it's just an opinion, Virtue points should be awarded in instances where you have a choice to make, a good vs evil choice, and there's a compromise in choosing the good option. You might be forfeiting a monetary reward, for the good of others, for example.

And I don't want to get into the debate of what the Paladin is and isn't and how they're supposed to act.
There's many conflicting sources out there, so everyone's right.

Offline jester

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Re: Virtue goes up too much!
« Reply #19 on: June 12, 2004, 08:48:47 PM »
The funny thing about alignments is that it is more a matrix than a ranking. I always thought that a lawful character would like a chaotic character just as much as a good an evil one. So a LG and LE would be a better combination than a LG and a CG.
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Offline Kish

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Re: Virtue goes up too much!
« Reply #20 on: June 12, 2004, 09:38:43 PM »
And I don't want to get into the debate of what the Paladin is and isn't and how they're supposed to act.
There's many conflicting sources out there, so everyone's right.
Conflicting sources about what a D&D paladin can and cannot do without Falling?  No, there really aren't.
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Venn

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Re: Virtue goes up too much!
« Reply #21 on: June 13, 2004, 07:18:12 PM »
And I don't want to get into the debate of what the Paladin is and isn't and how they're supposed to act.
There's many conflicting sources out there, so everyone's right.
Conflicting sources about what a D&D paladin can and cannot do without Falling?  No, there really aren't.

Yes there are. It really depends on which God the Paladin represents, and IF they represent a God or not.

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Re: Virtue goes up too much!
« Reply #22 on: June 13, 2004, 07:20:05 PM »
The funny thing about alignments is that it is more a matrix than a ranking. I always thought that a lawful character would like a chaotic character just as much as a good an evil one. So a LG and LE would be a better combination than a LG and a CG.

And there's not really a conflict between a Paladin and Evil-aligned characters... Evil can mean a lot of things, FFS an egotistical person would be considered Evil...

Offline Kish

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Re: Virtue goes up too much!
« Reply #23 on: June 13, 2004, 07:21:36 PM »
And I don't want to get into the debate of what the Paladin is and isn't and how they're supposed to act.
There's many conflicting sources out there, so everyone's right.
Conflicting sources about what a D&D paladin can and cannot do without Falling?  No, there really aren't.

Yes there are. It really depends on which God the Paladin represents, and IF they represent a God or not.
Have you ever actually read the (A)D&D Player's Hanbook?
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Offline neriana

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Re: Virtue goes up too much!
« Reply #24 on: June 13, 2004, 09:41:35 PM »
And there's not really a conflict between a Paladin and Evil-aligned characters... Evil can mean a lot of things, FFS an egotistical person would be considered Evil...

No. A person who commits evil acts is evil. An egotistical person is merely annoying.
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