Since I have a few spare minutes before my research group meeting, I figured I would address a comment sent to me about the Sola mod. Since the comments were originally sent by email, I'll leave the sender anonymous. I'm replying to the comments publicly both because this is an issue on which I and a non-trivial fraction of mod users disagree (and thus it might be informative or at least diverting to a general audience to see what I was thinking), and also because someone once mentioned that I only seem to put up positive comments. In truth, it would seem that (most?) people who don't like the mod don't bother to tell me about it. That's quite fair -- I don't email a manifesto of flaws to the author of every shareware game I reject. At any rate, the class of complaint shown below (which ranks an easy second after "Sola is gay" on the frequency chart) has come up only about five times directly.
I'd like to start by thanking our anonymous reviewer for taking the time to share some thoughts. I will go on to address most of the points in some detail, with an eye toward explaining my thoughts at the time of Sola's creation. This may end up sounding like an excuse or an apology; that is not my goal.
When I saw that you had a Solaufein Mod, my expectations were really high, but when I got him into my party, I was... well... disappointed.
It's not that he's a bad character. On the contrary, he's exceedingly powerful,
Actually, I don't consider "powerful" to be the opposite of "a bad character". I might say that "having a powerful personality" is a good way to avoid not being "a bad character", but that's not what you're talking about.
I'll admit that Sola is quite powerful -- if you know what you're doing. If you understand the BG2 combat and spell rules and you can use Sola's spells to compensate and augment his fighter side, he's probably more powerful than anyone save a full-grown Valen or Kelsey.
When Sola first came out I got quite a bit of mail claiming that he was, in fact, too weak. Admittedly, when Sola first came out the Revenge Spiders were considered impossibly dastardly opponents that required serious cunning to defeat. Still, while the common grasp of BG2 tactics has improved dramatically since then, I still get complaints that Sola is difficult to keep alive (Hi, Gwen!) or that he flounders in certain parts of the game. As a concrete example, when ToB first came out there was a hue and cry about the weakness of Tsuki no Ken in that high-level setting, followed by requests that I have it grow over time. Thus the Tsuki "upgrade".
On a personal opinion note, when Sola came out there weren't any NPC fighter-mages available. That's one of the reasons that I decided to interpret his feats of magic in vanilla BG2 (dimension dooring, calling the illithid out of the astral plane, duplicating the eggs) as well as his stated backstory (the fighter's guild) as making him a fighter-mage. However, at the experience levels found in BG2 that class ends up being one of the most powerful ... because of the way the game rules work and because of the emphasis on tactical combat.
* Anyway, the take-home message from this point is that I agree that Sola is powerful if you know what you are doing, but that there was initially a large segment of the target audience that found him too weak and thus not worth the effort. We'll return to that theme later.
As an aside, the "legacy" or "evolution" aspect of the Sola mod should not be overlooked. As you might imagine for something with around one hundred releases, things change over time and you often get "stuck" with certain decisions.
his banter is interesting and well written (I especially love the dialogue he has with Imoen),
That particular part of Sola was written by Jason Compton. I highly recommend that you check out his Kelsey mod -- I think you'll enjoy it, for all of the reasons that you cite here.
and making him a poetry lover was inspired, because dark poetry does seem like something Solaufein would enjoy. However, his power is a large part of the problem.
Frankly, he's TOO powerful, and people are too interested in him. If your mod was a fanfic, then Solaufein would be a Marty Stu--a character created by a fanfic writer who is basically perfect and dominates over the plot, even though they are NOT the main character.
If the Sola mod were a fanfic (say, a retelling of the original but with Sola instead of Anomen) with "vanilla" BG2 as the canon (say, that hideous "novel" in which Abdel takes Minsc, Jaheira and Imoen against Irenicus) then yes, Solaufein would be a candidate Mary Sue.
For example (tongue in cheek), using the test at
http://www.subreality.com/marysue/realpeople.htm yields a score of 17 (including three points for saving the day and two for fitting a stereotype) -- "borderline". The test at
http://www.springhole.net/library/marysue.htm yields ... (including using Kelsey as a "canon" character that becomes jealous and points for remaining "sexy" after a battle and giving him points for being impervious to a normal drow weakness (sunlight), rule-bending, being unusually rebellious, powers to take out cities, being given a weapon by a magical being that is Japanese even though you are not, saving the life of a character, ...) 73, "definitely a mary sue". Wow, that was fun.
Unfortunately, I do not view the Sola mod as a fanfic. I also don't view "vanilla" BG2 as the "canon". Instead, I liken BG2 to a tabletop roleplaying game. The computer plays the role of the game master, telling you what your characters perceive. You play the role of CHARNAME, directing the actions of that character. Unfortunately, the other five characters are not so clear. Do you play the role of Jaheira, or does the computer? In general, you can make her "do" what you want. However, you cannot control what she says. And every once in a while she will "do" what she wants (sadly, these times are usually ill-thought-out, like nominally-TN Jaheira leaving you over the svirfneblin). One reason for this is, unfortunately, legacy concerns. Human players tend not to like it when "their" NPCs are not under their direct control. Fallout tried that approach, and although everyone loves Fallout, everyone hated not being able to control the NPCs.
My mental model for BG2 is tabletop roleplaying where you are playing CHARNAME and your five friends are playing the five NPCs. Unfortunately, your five friends are bad at tactics and don't really understand the AD&D rules, so whenever a fight comes up they ask you, out-of-character, whether they should cast magic missile or shoot the crossbow. In general they are also willing to let you lead the group around (but not always: Korgan and Nalia are both lovely counter-examples). But this should not be confused with the story being "about you" (as opposed to about the group or your adventures together). You can get a stronger handle on this by playing a multiplayer BG2 game in which different human players control the other party members. If I play a multiplayer game of BG2 with my friend Scott, even if I happen to be controlling Player1 it is not clear that the game should be "all about me" and that Scott's characters should not get significant moments. Similarly, in the Dragonlance setting (which you will go on to reference), even if Tanis (or was that Raistlin?) is nominally the main character, the others make indepdent suggestions and steal quite a bit of the limelight.
For example, if we imagine (thought experiment now!) that the "canon" is "BG without Imoen at all" and that some mysterious "Imoen Mod" introduces all of the Imoen content with which we are familiar, Imoen would rate an 82 on the second Mary Sue test above -- worse than Solaufein for worming her way into the plot and our hearts and minds. The same holds for Jaheira (chased down by harpers, chats with Elminster, special gifts, the love of a canon character helps her overcome grief, etc.). The same would happen if we imagine Dragons of Autumn Twilight without Raistlin and some "Raistlin Mod" that introduces him. Do we traditionally view Imoen, Raist and Jaheira as Mary Sues? Not at all! Some people would say that they were "present in the original" and is thus somehow disqualified from Mary Sue-dom. In my view, once you fix your set of mods, that becomes "the original" for the purposes of that run through BG2. Imoen, Solaufein, Raist and Jaheira are not Mary Sues in this view -- they are main characters who have a relevance to the plot.
(*) The take-home message here is that I agree that "Sola" could be a Mary Sue against the "game without Sola as canon", but that the same holds for the other major characters. I do not view BG2 mods as fan fiction (see
http://www.weidu.org/fandom.html if you want Solaufein fanfic).
Of course, Solaufein doesn't do this EXACTLY, but there are occasions when he--a secondary character--is made to be more like the main character.
I agree with the spirit of what you are saying. However, I don't agree that there really is a "main character" in BG2. I realize that this is a non-standard stance, however. There are also occasions when Irenicus, Bodhi, Imoen, Jaheira, Sarevok and Solaufein all look like the "main character". To steal your example from below, I view BG2 as much more like Dragonlance than like Die Hard. There is a team, and while some have greater roles than others and some leave earlier, there is not a single "main character", despite dramatic appearances.
For example, there's Bodhi; when I spoke to her and she started saying how she would take away Solaufein, I thought to myself, "What does she care about some drow? She doesn't have the same conversation with Viconia."
There are a number of interesting points here. One is that, again, Bodhi is more concerned with some characters than others (e.g., she is more concerned with Imoen and her soul than anyone else, Sola or no). Another is that I don't believe that mod authors should be limited by what failed to take place in the original game. Given a larger production budget, I think BG2 should have included conversations between Bodhi and all of her kidnapees. Unfortunately, that didn't happen. If making all of her kidnaps seem "equal" is viewed as a requirement, the mod-author is left with either not including special dialogue there or beefing up the dialogue for everyone else as well. I don't view it as the Sola mod's responsibility (or the Kelsey mod's responsibility!) to beef up Viconia's dialogue like that.
[ For a more in-game response, it doesn't seem unreasonable to me that a dark, elven vampire would be interested in making a dark elven vampire. As you mention above, Sola is quite powerful. Bodhi is quite smart -- a priestess like Vic isn't going to be able to call down favors from Shar once she enters undeath. Vic will be limited to growling and punching with her claws. A fighter and mage like Sola will still be able to use non-divine magics and brawn to aid himself in his undeath, and after the battle (remember that Bodhi thinks she will win) he will be more useful to have around. Bodhi has shown an interest in similar things in the past: see Tanova. Plus all of the reasons explicitly mentioned in the dialogue. ]
When I read it, it really stood out as a fan's idea rather than something "integrated seemlessly" into the game.
Well, I can't argue with the notion that the Solaufein mod is "one fan's idea". Actually, I guess I can, since many people contributed and I wouldn't want to marginalize them.
Again, I see this as a notion of perspective. I am not taking the view that some "earlier" conception of BG2 is the "canon". I take the game as it is when you start to play through it as the world.
Here's a fun example. Most players probably find the plot in which Imoen is captured by Irenicus and subsequently rejoins the party "completely natural" or "seamlessly integrated" into the game. You may well be surprised to learn that it was not at all the original intention of the designers but was instead a council of despair added at the last minute because of other constraints. When I view "vanilla", "out of the box" BG2 I don't look at all of the ways (some visible in the game and some visible only to modders) in which Imoen's return was handled poorly, especially compared to the designer's original intentions. Instead I take the game as presented as the starting point. The ToB ending and Gaider's Ascencion mod are another (controversial) example of this.
For other examples of why "out of the box" BG2 should not be regarded as definitive, take a look at what has gone into the Oversight Mod and the Baldurdash Fixpack. Most players are willing to take "BG2 + Baldurdash" as "the start of the world". I take it a bit further and accept "BG2 + your current mods" as "the start of the world".
Another thing is Solaufein himself--his stats and his skills. Maybe I just like canon too much, but it doesn't make sense that he has such a low consitution--seriously, if he was so weak as a child, he would never have become a fighter, he would just be a mage.
I'm not sure which "canon" you're referring to here, but there's nothing in AD&D or the FRCS that requires more than a 10 CON for a fighter (or, in fact, any amount of CON at all!). There is a strength requirement, and he certainly makes that. Sola actually has slightly above average health for a drow (the average from 3d6-1 would be 9.5). If his training in the Sorciere (sp, see Salvatore) and his fighter training happen simultaneously or if his mage training happened first he would have no trouble using magical defenses like shield, mage armor, blur, mirror image, ghost armor, spirit armor and stoneskin to "make up for" his "slightly above average" constitution.
That said, there's a strong notion of "powergaming" in the suggestion that a "low" constitution of 10 would preclude his training as a fighter. If we were to actually invoke power-gaming, then his stats would appear quite optimized. A 2E AD&D F/M gains a total of 10+18 = 28 hit points (the difference between 65 and 93 at level 9/10). Compared to the -4 AC bonus from the 18 DEX, that's peanuts, especially given the various spell protections.
In a strong sense, the arguments that "Sola is too powerful" and "Sola is a weak fighter" cannot both be true. The fact that he ends up being a very strong fighter means that his CON isn't holding him back. "In game", People like Sola or his fighter trainers, well familiar with the local "laws of physics" (= canon AD&D rules), would have no trouble seeing such things in advance.
However, in my opinion and experience any debate about the stats of an AD&D character ends up being a red herring. Check out rec.games.frp.dnd via google for concrete examples. Essentially, AD&D doesn't give enough meaning to the statistics, so much like horoscopes they are interpreted based on the context of the reader.
In case you've ever read the Dragonlance series, it's just like with Caramon and Raistlin: Raistlin is a mage because he has a pathetic constiution, and Caramon is a fighter because he is strong and tough.
Actually, a look at interviews with the original Dragonlance players ...
http://www.3rdedition.org/articles/viewer.asp?ID=28http://www.crescentblues.com/5_6issue/int_weis.shtml... suggests that most of these are strong retcons or things that were emphasized as the series evolved. Raistlin has a weak voice because his original player, Terry Williams, acted him that way.
Anyway, if you give credence to such arguments than it is worth pointing out that Tanis and Tika had "in-game" CONs of 12, which neither sit that much higher than Sola's 10 nor give any in-game advantage in AD&D. To put it another way, Solaufein is just as healthy as Tanis Half-Elven.
Finally, "in-game" (if memory serves from the "Look Raist, Bunnies!" series), Raistlin became a mage because of his strong brain, not because of his weak body.
I'm not saying crank up his constitution to 18; I'm saying maybe lower his intelligence and dexterity a little and bring it up to 15 or 16.
Yes, I agree that Sola's stats could be tweaked around to make some subset of the players happy at the expense of others. :-) However, I hold that the stats are a red herring. For example, Sola's STR could be 9 and his WIS and CHA could both be 1 and he would be, tactically, just as powerful. He would be just as strong at beating up bad guys in BG2. With a STR of 9 it would take two castings of the very-long-lasting Strength spell to get him to 18/00. With his "given" STR of 18/21, it takes two castings of the Strength spell to get him to 18/00. Compared to his class (F/M), his stats have very little effect on his overall prowess. Stat-boosting items are also quite common in BG2.
Thus the only benefit in changing the stats involves breaking the fourth wall: changing the stats makes the human player sitting behind the screen "feel more at home" or "feel more comfortable with him". For you (and presumably for others) Sola would "feel more natural" with a higher CON. For me Sola would feel more natural with a lower STR. So it goes. I agree that I wasn't able to work this out to my satisfaction, but I also think that it's an illusory goal.
After all, if he was a genius, he would've figured out that the PC is not drow the second the PC did not refer to the "devourers" as illithids.
Sadly, for the purposes of "plot" almost any sentence that starts with "if he were a genius" is doomed to failure in BG2. Irenicus, Bodhi, the Cowled Wizards, Firkraag, Sendai, ... almost every major foozle in BG2 has a genius-level intelligence. Despite this, they all make hideous tactical and strategic mistakes. I will certainly agree that no one in BG2 lives up to her full potential in that regard. In some sense, this is necessary: if Irenicus (or any of the others) were "paying attention", you'd never be able to survive.
[ That said, the bit with the devourers comes "before" the Sola mod. When I first made the mod I decided not to touch any of his behaviors while you're still involved in the Ust Natha quests. In game, however, there is no reason to suspect that Sola doesn't actually realize that "something is fishy": he eventually says ~You are not drow. I should have known sooner, I think... Who are you, then? Why have you masqueraded yourself as drow?~ ]
Also, I seriously don't understand the dual-weild.
Design decision: when I first made the Sola mod there were no dual-wielders and I wanted to give players a chance to experiment with that.
With these three points in mind, it is now possible to discuss a larger "meta-game" issue. The dual-wielding, the F/M class and the "power" were all in some sense responses to the realization that Sola would have to be "worth the effort" or no one would install him.
In the limit, this is clear: if the Sola mod cost $500 and only added one line where he swore at you before turning into a squirrel, no one use it. Even if Sola were "exactly as interesting" as an existing character (Korgan, say), people might use him just for variety. However, Sola has strikes against him here even before the game starts: aside from Sarevok (not available when Sola was created) every single NPC (even Imoen!) is easier to recruit. Players must plan out their party with a significant gap in it for much of the game (very few people reported being willing to drop someone after Ust Natha and pick up Sola), which many people loudly reported as a strong inconvenience.
Given that high barrier to entry, if Sola were merely "just as interesting as Korgan", for most people the novelty would not be sufficient in order to convince them to (a) play the game again and (b) put up with the trouble of Sola joining late.
Thus as a purely meta-game issue Sola often favors "the new" or "the previously untried" or "the uncommon in BG2", if only to give players something to keep them interested and to make playing with him worthwhile.
For heaven's sake, you SEE him weilding a two-handed sword in Ust Natha.
Yes, that lovely halberd or spear the special drow male avatar carries. If I could have kept the drow male avatar for him and it had worked correctly with the BG2 engine he would have had skills in that.
However, this is not without precedent. The drow you fight in the pit that is carrying the Blade of Searing also uses the same lance graphic but is revealed to be a sword fighter later. More jarringly, creatures like UDDROW28.CRE use that same spear graphic and are revealed to be carrying a flail +3 and a shield +3 (not visible). Thus if you view the original game as the canon, this visual trickery is already firmly entrenched as part of reality even before the Sola mod.
I don't view the original game as canon, so I'll apologize here: yes, that's annoying. I wish I could have done something better, but I felt hemmed in by game engine limitations.
What's wrong with just giving him a nice big sword?
Nothing. Dual-wielding was chosen for meta-game reasons. Minsc already had the "nice big sword" market covered.
He's not Drizzt, nor is he a ranger--he's a kick-butt fighter who would have to train extra to weild two weapons.
Train extra? Well, he could have put those prof points into something else, I agree.
I don't mean this to be a flame, and I apologize if I offended you.
Not at all. Thank you for taking the time to share your opinions.
Summary:
* I agree that Sola is a powerful character if you know what you are doing. This has much more to do with his class and the AD&D rules than his stats.
* If we consider the Sola mod a fanfic with respect to "the game without Sola" as the canon, Sola can easily look like a Mary Sue. However, the same is true (or truer) for Imoen, Raistlin, Jaheira, Sarevok, etc.
* I do not view mods as fanfic. My view of playing BG2 takes "this game with all of these mods I have installed" as the standard and is based more on tabletop roleplaying. I do not view "vanilla BG2" as canon.
* Due in some sense to the state of the BG2 community at the time, many of Sola's design decisions were made in order to make it more worthwhile for userse to try him out. In the mod-rich world of today, many of these decisions can look like unfortunate compromises.
Once again, thank you for sharing your thoughts on the Sola mod. I welcome followups, especially negative ones. We need more expressions of dissatisfaction here.
"Progress, far from consisting in change, depends on retentiveness. Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it." - George Santayana
Topic: Solaufein as Mary Sue (Read 8831 times)
