Let's talk SWtOR!

[Twani]

I don't think Quinn is a robot. He has a definite personality; it's just not a very attractive one. (In other words, boy is extremely passive aggressive, bitter about his status, incredibly controlling about anything he can grasp to be controlling about, and of course loyal to the wrong person.) Honestly, though, the romance dialog in SWTOR is generally... well.. horrible (the v word is used; also, mostly a dragon age comic and both spoilery and offensive, so beware archive binging). I mean, personally, I adore the Vector romance, but your character sounds like an absolute creep during it. They sound like a creep in most romances.

 

(Not to mention male BH->Mako, which is like the ultimate in creepiness in that you sound like a 37 year old guy chasing after a 16 year old girl who just wants to keep things professional and you KEEP DOING IT. Brr.)

 

 

I don't like the gameplay of ME1 (boring!), bug I find ME2/3 very fun, if I turn up the difficulty. (Though I've been known to run through it on story and just play for the game.) As for Dragon Age, I definitely like it more then KOTOR (which as 'NWN in SW!' to me- seriously, what's the difference been Aribeth and Bastila besides Bas having a cooler voice?) and Bloodlines (which I had such hope for, and still hang out in the modding community for, but it turned in to a such a generic 'kill everything' game at the end- the first area was the best area). Dragon Age was also a much more tactical game then the others, too (though, I mean: the Fade, seriously, I've done that twice and now everytime use my beloved Skip the Fade mod, because that place sucks). DAII isn't as tactical, unfortunately, though I found the companions decent enough to look past that.

 

(Honestly, I didn't like the NWN2 OC (mainly because I didn't like any of the companions!- I ended up basically going 'okay, which of you jerks is the least offensive to me', besides adoring crazy Ammon Jarro)- though I really liked Mask of the Betrayer.)

 

 

(As for where I'm at, I'm doing Novel writing for NaNoWriMo this month. Next month, probably going to either choke down on Altan or try IWD NPCs. Hm.)

[SapphireIce101]

So far, there are only two romances that I like, and those are...Kira and Kaliyo.

 

As for KOTOR, I didn't get very far in that game. I didn't really like it much. Now, Jade Empire was more entertaining than KOTOR, and it kept me wanting to play it. It's definitely one of Bioware's gems. The one thing that I don't like about Jade Empire is that it reuses KOTOR's alignment system just by renaming Dark Side and Light side with Closed Palm and Open Palm.

 

When it comes to ME, I like all of them, but sadly, 3's ending just kills the whole idea of trying to play through the whole trilogy again. Also, I'm one of the few people that believe that the Director's cut did NOT help at all.

 

Dragon Age, I love Dragon Age. I started a new Origins playthrough as a Female City Elf. I...really don't like the city elf origin due to the fact that the city elf's cousin basically gets raped. Not cool Bioware. This in turn, has turned me off from playing a Male Hawke because Male Hawke and Vaughn, have the same voice actor, as well as using the same voice. Dragon Age 2, I finally got finished with that playthrough, and I'm still baffled at Orsino using Blood Magic when we're WINNING. Its just like "Why?! WE'RE WINNING YOU DAMNED BUFFOON!". I've also got a nickname for Dragon Age 2 its "The game that always proves Fenris right."

 

NWN2, I really only like Daeghun, Duncan, Sand, and Neeshka. Okay, and Khelgar too. Mask of the Betrayer is really the only good thing about NWN2, well, except for user-generated content, but even then, I think MotB is the best thing about NWN2.

 

As for NaNoWriMo, I don't think I'm going to write a novel, though, I was planning on writing something, but I'm not sure. Maybe I'll try making my IWD NPC too, already got her named, too.

 

Edit: Forgot to mention that Kulyok might be considering writing a romance for her Coran mod. Imo, that would be so awesome.

[Domi]

Good luck with the novel and the romance, ladies!

 

I am speed-leveling (well, for me), so I will be playing IA after BH event is done - she is paired up with Eric's sniper to get Tattoine Kingpin's second Achievement. So, I hopefully made it to Vector soonish.

 

Right now I am working on M!Sorc and just about finished my F!Warrior (holding her back, actually, to do more PvP dailies in under 55 bracket to save comms for new PvP relics).

 

I don't mind relationships in the male Trooper story, the Elara/Jaxo thing. Zenith still stands out for me as my real flame in this game. Since I am 12xXP'ing, I took hubby to Makeb so I have fun playing with him again. And since they share a legacy suit with Quinn, the stripping galore, lol.

 

The creepiest romance idea for me by far is M!Consular + Nadia. Seriously? Hello, ye traumatized overprotected teen, who was a freak of her people her whole life. I am your kindly Jedi Master... So you mourn ye father who was horribly tortured and expired afore your very eyes? Come to my bed, child... What was BioWARE thinking?! Sort of unthinkable for any decent man, let alone a Jedi....

 

Thing is, I like Quinn as a character. Well written, good concept and a well-voiced. But the romance is absurd and abusive. I am writing a sexual harassment complaint... I've been loyal to that other guy all along.... I've build two droids to help me destroy you. Will you marry me? WHA---? Quinn, go buy yourself a slave-girl, and make her dress up as a Sith Lord, then play a dominatrix, that's what you really need. Why would any Sith Warrior ever want to humiliate herself? Why don't we get someone grand? A Sith? A Jedi?

[Twani]

Oh, yeah, I forgot Nadia. That's probably even more creepier then Mako.

 

(Honestly, though, I'm against Romancing Your Padawan in general. Kira, I might give a pass as girl knows how to stand up for herself and is promoted from your padawan relatively earlier, but Nadia, Ashara, and crazy!Jaesa? (And, yeah, the male!light!Warrior being able to convince Jaesa to sleep with him so they can have babies!! also doesn't sit well with me.) No thank you. I mean, I know I'm going to do the Ashara romance eventually, because I do like her, but watching videos of it... brr. Especially if you're playing utterly dark side and just manipulating her. But Nadia... yeah, Nadia is definitely creepy.)

 

The thing about Quinn that is most hilarious that it's like 'I WILL COME AT YOU WITH TWO RANDOM AVERAGE DROIDS." I mean come on, o'great tactical mind of our era. You couldn't even get elites? Puh-lease.

 

On the other hand, I am sort of impressed that they put some such dysfunctional and crazy romances in the game, because I like trainwreck romances at times (ah, Anders). But they should never be the 'only' option.

 

 

I can't/don't play the city elf origins anymore, much as I think your cousins are relatively cool people. I'm about to start a dwarf noble romancing Alistair (yeah, yeah). I have a crazy Dalish male who made random decisions, a relatively good Cousland who still made some bad ones (Connor...) and then a crazy bitch Mage who made the most horrible decisions possible always. Might as well make a character who did all the right 'noble stuff' (though the H vs B choice in dwarfland is still a hard one... no easy answer there). And maybe I'll even make a Hawke playthrough where Bethany gets to live!

 

(...Naaaaah.)

 

(The problem is I can't make a dwarf noble my 'own' anymore: I've been too influenced by DeviantArt artist's Aimo's lovely and adorable dwarf noble, so mine will end up looking exactly like hers, probably. ;; )

 

 

For NWN, I... okay, I'm horrible. Khelger? Played a genasi the first time, a drow the second time, got annoyed by his racism and generally don't really like the boisterous bruiser archtype. Neeshka? To me, another Imoen/Mission (though she had a bit more sass) who I never liked, and I had the rogue stuff taken care of anyway. Elenne? Would have freaked me out totally had I played male; as a female, she still was sort of creepy (how long have you been spying on me again?), but she didn't really offend me. Qara? Amused me at first, rapidly got more and more annoying as time went by. Sand? Liked him until the trial and I saw how useless he was, though I still tended to drag him around because MAGIC. Grobnor? If I have to have someone little and annoying and singy following me around, I'll take Deekin. Again. (And Deekin was really, really annoying. (But the doom song was cute.)) Casavir? Boring as dishwater, and sadly, not even B's romance writing could save him for me (though I think I romanced him both times, I just didn't really care). Bishop? Almost interesting, but the general misogyny and the amount of time he spends cooing over Magnificent Shandra turned me off. Shandra? Blarrrggghhh. Zh... ja... Generic Githzerai Cleric? Got points for being a githzerai and having stories about Dak'kon, so I usually dragged her around, but not that interesting. Construct? Yeah.

 

So... Ammon Jerro was really the only character I liked (and I was all 'Yeah, Shandra sucked, woo!'). Oops. Then I took along Generic Githzerai Cleric, whoever annoyed me least from Sand and Qara at that moment, and generally Bishop when I had that extra spot. Not a very fighting ready group, but eh, that's what summons are for.

 

(On the other hand, I liked all the Mask of the Betrayer companions, and think the evil ending where you devour everything with loyal One of Many at your side (unless he eats Safiya) is one of the best evil endings of video games ever.)

 

 

A Coran romance would be nice... but for me, Coran is forever in my mind CN and in some sort of destructive mad horrible 'love' thing with my just as CN characters, which seemed to be the only way I got through the BG1 romance. (I imagine my character probably killed him to keep him with her forever and ever and ever and carries his ashes around and coos to him.) Maybe I should try the CG baby way one day. Hm. >.>

[SapphireIce101]

I made a Dalish that really hated Shemlen. The only human he became friends with was Morrigan. Otherwise, He killed Leliana, he killed Wynne, he killed Loghain, he ordered Alistair to his death because he wanted Anora as queen. He would have killed Nathaniel, but he decided that Nathaniel was extremely useful. I mean, the man did knock out about four Grey Wardens before he was caught.

 

When it comes to the Hawke siblings, I find that Carver is the more realistic sibling. Bethany, on the other hand, is just Merrill without blood magic, imo. Speaking of Merrill, I like her romance, well, her friendmance anyway.

 

I do like Aimo's dwarf noble, but I'm not really a fan of...Alistair's romance some of the time. Hah.

 

Yeah, a lot of the companions in NWN2 are...not good. I predominantly like Sand though, and the companions from MotB.

 

Ah, CN Coran, I like you so much, but at the same time...I really like CG Coran. If a BG2 Romance were to happen, I wouldn't mind if it were bittersweet. I'm a fan of "Its better to have loved and lost, than to never love at all.". That, and I rarely use Safana and Coran together, so to me, Safana and Coran suddenly hooking up kind of makes no sense to me, and my head-canon I guess.

[Thimblerig]

I've been playing DA a little when I can scrounge time on my friend's computer. Am playing a City Elf because I wanted to play a pint-size scrapper - she has red hair in pigtails, faux-Dalish tattoos, and an awesomely broken nose from brawling in a gang as a rowdy youth, says I. (Had to play portions of the Origin with the sound off.)

 

Morrigan is utterly adorable, Alistair is annoying, haven't seen enough of Leliana and Sten to have an opinion yet.

 

Loghain is... the general who took time out of a busy day to give the scrappy new kid a pep talk. Don't let anyone tell you you don't belong. The first Warden that Maric let back in the country was a woman. She was magnificent. I like Loghain! Seeing him as the antagonist is going to be... interesting. Also, there's a lot of implied history in just a couple of lines there.

 

So far, this game is great.

[Domi]

The thing about Quinn that is most hilarious that it's like 'I WILL COME AT YOU WITH TWO RANDOM AVERAGE DROIDS." I mean come on, o'great tactical mind of our era. You couldn't even get elites? Puh-lease.

 

OMG, I laughed, and laughed, and laughed. I just imagined my SW tell that to him in her in-game voice. Would have been awesome!

 

Honestly, why did he even try to best a Sith in combat in close quarters? He is a group's medic. None of this droid drama was necessary, he could have quietly put the Lord down, and none would be the wiser. And what was his planned escape route, should he have succeeded? Ask Pierce nicely to fly to Korriban?

 

Yeah, I tend to block Nadia out too.

 

Okay, I gotta go back to worrying about how 3.0 will impact my dear, dear, dear Vanguard.

[Twani]

If Quinn was actually smart, he'd do generic medical checkups on them regularly, and then inject Jaesa with something to put her down (got to get that emotion sensing out of the way), wait a bit, then kill the SIth Lord while they were out on the field somewhere (because face it, every Sith Warrior drags Quinn along for something at some point of time) (OH I'M SORRY I FORGOT THAT I COULD HEAL LOL). Then he could kill Vette and Pierce in his own time because he seems to feel this desperate need to, and then he can run off with Boonmark because for some reason he didn't want to kill him. I'm not sure why. It's a Talz, man. I personally want to kill all Talz.

 

Of course, Darth B is going to inevitably kill him because then Quinn knows where the bodies are burried and Darth B doesn't like that, but, eh, that's Quinn's decision.

 

(If I ever do get around to writing my fic, I think I'll do the betrayal that way, actually, as Quinn is *supposed* to be smart, at least from what the game spends the rest of the time telling me. And the fact that I can't demote him from my number two after what happens is dumb. Dumb!)

 

 

I liked the Alistair romance the first time I played it (in which I was lucky to have him choose to go Warden and thus didn't run in to complications... er, until I said 'Nope, Morgy, not giving you crazy power, sorry gal' and... yes), but the more often I play, the more he grates. (Oddly, in my male Dalish playthrough, where he was teasing Leianna about passing love notes and grumpy doing 'how can he like Morrigan' while Morrigan teased him about being my Warden's BFF anyway made me appreciate him more- I think I might like Alistair as a snarky best friend, but not as a romance interest). Still, I have a Zev game, a Morg game (actually, that character romanced all three characters and danced around triggers to never get jealousy conversations (leading to amusing DA2, where Lei and Zev were all like 'YES THE WARDEN IS THE LOVE OF MY LIFE' when he ran off on them)), but he ended up with her), and a Lei game (my Cousland flirted with Alistair, but it didn't go anywhere, despite that whole 'My love' deal in Awakenings), so I figure I should made an Alistair game. And if my dwarf noble can't have Gorim (<3), then I'll take Alistair, I guess.

 

(The key is going to be DA2. Did Fenris, Merill, and Anders. Obviously, that means I should hang with Isa or Seb, but the idea of setting up a 'break poor dear Anders's mind rivalry' is tempting.)

 

Loghain is an interesting character. I like him a lot, but after reading the books and reflecting on his actions in game... he really was horrible at tactics, despite all the 'OH LOGHAN IS SO GREAT AT TACTICS' (just like Quinn!). He fought with Grey Wardens before and (spoiler, kind of) if not for you (and Alistair), he would have doomed Ferelden (Blackwall even says it, in the World of Thedes books). So it's like 'Okay, Loghain, you're interesting, but you are a MORON'. But a very interesting moron! I just find it difficult to take him seriously.

 

 

 

I ended up not being able to write today because my friend wanted me to beta her extremely kinky and rather disturbing FFVIII fanfiction. I have a standing offer with my friends to beta anything they throw at me, but that was almost too much. (Told her that, too, so I'm not like, gossiping behind her back. >.>)

[SapphireIce101]

To be honest, I don't think Bioware was prepared for Dragon Age to be as successful as it became. I mean, there's some plot, and character issues here and there.

 

Like, Loghain being an awesome tactician, yet for some freaking reason he's horrible at tactics.

 

Then, there's Fiona, the giant Mary-sue character. I don't like her, I'll never like her, and I don't like how she made Maric promise to never tell Alistair about the fact that she's actually his mom, that's right, Alistair is elf-blooded. This just makes me feel bad for Alistair, as well as Goldanna.

 

I'd go into more, but it would seem like a lot of nitpicking, and angry ranting.

 

Err, you have fun beta-ing that FF8 fanfic. Ah, FF8, how I like you sometimes. . . . I really don't like RInoa. Ugh. I'll just leave it at that.

[Jab]

Well I like the NWN 2 OC more than MotB. And I really liked Sand, Bishop, Neeshka (I dont think, that she fits the Imoen personality - she is more chaotic and childish certainly, well she is very different) and I liked Shandra as well. True, MotB characters are certainly more developed in the end. But I missed the sarcasm of Sand and Bishop. And the story of the OC was ok as well. It wasnt really good for the first half of the game (just a classic story of a hero), but I really liked the explanation of the fall of the empire (and the hero of the empire). And the battle for your fort was satisfying. The game should have really end there. My personal problem with MotB was, that your character usually does not fit in (http://nwn2db.com/build/?153641 - he was a great match for the OC story with the ford defending etc.). Well and the whole storyline does not fit to the setting. I mean why making a planescape like game in Forgotten realms, when you can use actual Planescape? Still, MotB was very good.

 

About VtM: Bloodlines... The game has many quirks. But it has so many great places and quests... The Ocean Hotel or Downtown Hospital. Searching for the plague origin in Downtown. The quest to get together the old killer twins in Chinatown. And I could really go on and on. And when you play for a Malkavian, it gets even better. Btw I had so much fun with the TV. And the radio adverts about the senator elections - oh that was funny. Personally I thing, that the game is better when you use guns and rifles though. Melee fighting seems like fun at first, but it gets boring after a while. And there are very bad locations as well - catacombs were horrible, just four or so levels of fighting.

[Domi]

Funny, Quinn complains about Vette, and Pierce, but never about Jaesa. Hmm.

 

Anyway, I finished the Warrior, my 3rd story/L55, yay! And started grinding Inquisitor. Fun to play, but the story is boooring so far. However, I met Andronikus, and I think I am going to like his romance on my female char. Still have Alderaan and Taris to go till the boy's hot Togruta comes on board

[Twani]

Heh. I think (in general) people who played female characters with interest in the guys didn't like Shandra usually. Your two kinda love interests spend a lot of time sighing about how wonderful she is, and when you go back 'home', everyone is like WHO IS THIS WONDERFUL WOMAN YOU HAVE BROUGHT TO US rather then 'Hay, FemProtagonist, you're awesome!' That's what causes me to resent her- there's a bit of Mary Sueishness to her, I think, in that people drop from randomness to praise her wonderfulness, and then of course she dies tragically and beautifully to save you forever (as the original Mary Sue once did) and then, if you take the right dialog, will cause my dear Jarro to completely rewrite his life, because oh, the decendent he didn't even know about was the Bestest Person Ever!

 

Her personality itself actually wasn't bad- she was snarky, dismissive of Bishop's misoyngy, had your back during the trial (if you weren't an ass), became competent rather quickly, and overall wasn't offensive. It was just that the people around her seemed to thinks she was the bestest thing ever and... that was kind of annoying.

 

As for MotB, I don't think it would have been considered a Planescape story so much if it hadn't been, well, the same story Obsidian has been writing for years (and started back in Black Isle as Planescape). I hate to admit it, but I think I've read basically every Forgotten Realms book that came out before 2010 or so, and there are so many stories in the Forgotten Realm. I don't think Mask of the Betrayer, with all it's spiritual elements and ties to the gods, was any more of Planescape stories then say, the War of the Spider Queen/Lady Penitent saga was, oh, a Ravenloft story (I mean, the bad guys won! Totally! Ravenloft!). Forgotten Realm is so hodge-podge that almost any story fits in it, including more philosophical works. In fact, I'd say Mask of the Betrayer would NOT have worked as a Planescape story- mainly because of the direct influence of Myrkul and Kelmjerkface. Planescape is very specific about keeping the gods (and even to a degree, their influence) away from the game table. (Notice the difference- Forgotten Realms is very direct on what sort of thing happens if one, say, becomes a Chosen of Mystra, what powers you'd get, and while is sort of like 'the player will probably only get these powers under very special circumstances', doesn't discourage one from playing a Chosen- while in Planescape, what powers a proxy would get is vague and the book is basically like 'yeah, player should never be a proxy', even though being a Chosen and Proxy is relatively the same thing.)

 

 

As for Bloodlines... the game just became too combat based at the end. I think the first half, or even three fourths, was brilliant, but the last part was horrible. As you said, the catacombs, or even just the end game crawl to La Crox... you could play the first part of the game killing no one (and in fact, the game often rewarded you with extra XP for stealthing through missions). Then all of a sudden the game turned in to a dungeon crawler (if lacking dungeons). The first part had the autmosphere of Masquerade (which I adored and played much more then D&D... and I played a lot of D&D) down pat; the second part seemed like I was playing one of those horrible Hunter video games. Ugh!

 

Though, at least, unlike KOTOR 2, it had an ending. >.>

 

 

Yeah, I don't like Fiona. She's apparently in DA:I, though, being... well, her usual self? (Though there's a screenshot of her collapsed in a dungeon surrounded by bad stuff, so maybe she dies, but then Alistair would really never know his mom, which sucks.) As for Gold, I think she was just completely lied to by Arl Eamon, who really seems slimy in some ways. I don't like him. Also, I think his wife and Teagan are totally having an affair. (WHO IS THIS WOMAN TEAGAAAANNN)

 

 

On the interesting side, The Last Court (a text based browser game by Failbetter Games, who made Fallen London, which is my favorite browser game in the world) came out. A lot of people on the forum dislike it, I think not being used to this method of browser game. Basically, you start it up in your browser, and every twenty minutes/hour/six hours (whatever) you flip over to it, do an action, read the lore, then go back to what you're doing (writing and goofing off, for me). As I work at home, this sort of browser game is perfect for me, but it's not like 'sit down, play game' like a lot of people were expecting.

 

What it is, though, is an interesting little game where you play the ruler of some small town in Orlais known for it's glass making that's haunted by the fact that the ruler is descendend from an Abomination. The Divine is coming to visit in seven days, and it's up to you to desperately gather 'stuff' (in my choice, trophies: boar hunts everyday!) to please her, while managing standard bad stuff (bandits on the roads), your peasants getting angry (rebellion!) and mysterious circumstances (called 'twilight'). While goofing off, you can appoint a bodyguard, councilor, acomp... um... I can't spell this word, a sneaky type who helps you out, and a lover who will help you in varying ways. You also try to increase your stats (Rulership seems very important, making me wonder if I should start over and pick the male character (he's better at ruling while the gal is a better fighter), but... eh), desperately attempt to earn money, and oh, yes, prevent your town from: A) becoming completely broke, B) being completely shackled with rules and executions (I, er, let my Freedom fall and had that problem) and C) losing all sense of self-worth and becoming a sty. If two of those traits hit 0 at the same time, it's game over. I assume if you lose all your health, it's game over, too. Tricky!

 

Also, Carver and Morrigan are both hanging around in my town. You can't get much better then that.

 

 

As for my friend, she hates Riona. Back in the day, she even had a rabid Riona hating fanpage back on geocites. (Ah, geocites.) (Personally, I'm relatively indifferent to her, but if you had me a Squall/Riona story, I'm not likely to read it- pair him up with almost any other character, and I'm interested.) So I was expecting slash, and, hey, I don't mind slash. (I wrote Anders/Fenris fics. I'm not ashamed. >.>) But the father/son incest is a bit squicky to me, even if all characters are adults. Ehgh.

 

 

(Oh, and as for Quinn- someone put up all the conversations if you take each one of your companions to the confrontation with him. He tells Vette straight up he wants her dead for being annoying, and tells Pierce he told Baras Pierce sucks and won't be of any use and he's positively gleeful about getting to kill him, but invites Jaesa and Stupid Talz to join up with him. (They basically laugh in his face- I think dark Jaesa actually does.) Jaesa reveals something, though- apparently, emotion-wise, Quinn is perfectly serious and determined. Like, crazy boy really thinks he's going to win. Oh, Quinn. Quinn.)

[SapphireIce101]

If I'm going to ship Squall with someone in FF8, I'm shipping him with an OC, or Irvine. Ahh, Irvine, I wish you were the protagonist. Apparently, Irvine was hotter than Squall at one point, so Square tried to "uglify" Irvine. I don't think it really worked. I love Irvine a lot more than Squall. I've been tempted to write a Irvine X OC fic, but I haven't played FF8 enough for that.

 

I totally believe that Squall may have died at the end of disc one, and the rest of what happened is totally his "Final Fantasy". I don't think Square has confirmed or denied this fan theory, unlike with the Rinoa = Ultimecia fan theory. Where, apparently in some Ultimania or w/e its called, they denied that R=U is true. However, in the fighting game, Dissidia, Ultimecia has Rinoa's weapons.

 

Also, I've been watching some anime too, like Sword Art Online II, and Cross Ange. I don't think people want to be spoiled on that front, so I'll be quiet on that.

 

Yeah, what Eamon did was quite scummy. Isolde does that "Who is this womaaaaaaaan Teagan!" in DA2 during MotA. I wouldn't be surprised if Connor was actually Isolde and Teagan's love child.

 

If there's an option to kill Fiona, I would so take it.

[Jab]

Well as I said. I played for a paladin of The Red Knight. So NWN2 OC was a good match. You get a title and place among the Neverwinter Nine and then a big battle for a key fort. I could not ask for more.

 

And then your pala becomes a soul eater, gets love of a red wizard and has a hagspawn, spirit bear and half-angel in one party. I mean just for the party, this really is not a Forgotten Realms game. And you get the talking circle again (you know when you have to talk to them after each important decision in the story - this wasnt present in the OC). I liked the dilemma I had playing for a LG character about the Wall of the Faithless. Of course in the end I attacked it. Its both evil and unjust. Though rules are rules...

 

P. S. And another Fed Cup trophy is there, congrats! Wow the last match was incredible.

[Twani]

Aww, Jab. Read more Forgotten Realms novels set outside of the Sword Coast/Heartlands/Neverwinter Nights era. There's a ton of good stuff in them, including odder characters and settings beyond the standard 'fantasy generic' (Ed Greenwood was very proud of how different Rashaman/Thay was, IIRC- I used to haunt the Candlekeep forums like it was my job). As it is, red wizard is Forgotten Realms only (Red Wizards in Ravenloft are... odd, and hate Everyone), spirit animals were really a Forgotten Realms only thing, and I believe Hagspawn were first introduced in the Forgotten Realms (though they ended up in Ravenloft and Planescape). Half-Angel is weird, though, I do agree. (As for One of Many... he'd be an oddball in any setting, I think.)

 

I don't remember what I played in my first game, but my second was a bard (with one level of rogue to unlock rogue skills) who ended up taking some Red Dragon Disciple to keep the party alive in MotB. She was a drow, so I did the worshiper of Elistree- cliche, but it worked. CG (like all drow rebels must be), she ended up trying to throw down the wall, as I think most CG characters were.

 

(I keep meaning to play through with a priest(ess, probably) of Kelemvor, who would probably keep the wall up (after all, Kelemvor himself tried to remove the wall and the gods basically made him put it back up, so...). I'd miss my dear Dove, though. I'm also sort of disappointed... originally, Gann and Safiya were both meant to be bi (there's still some hints, if you're high CHA male and first meet Gann- hes like 'WOW HOT'), but the publisher said no. Bah!)

 

 

As for FFVIII... I spent yesterday trolling Archive of Our Own. Lots of Riona/Squall (makes sense, main pairing of the game), lots of Seifer/Squall (makes sense- most obvious slash, and has that rival thing people like). Followed by Irvine/Selphie (as it's sort of implied they get together, makes sense, and they make for a more 'fun' couple for people to write), Quetis (I'm spelling her name wrong argghh)/Seifer (closest to that rivalry snark you can get in a het pairing), and then... Seifer/Zell. That last one, while I'll never denounce people for the pairings they prefer, is sort of weird to me: if you want the whole rivalry thing, pairing Seifer with Squall makes more sense, and if you want to involve Zell in a slash pairing... well, he spends the first half of the game calling Squall baby and trying to get close to him. Just sayin'. Other couples, including Irvine/Squall, are pretty rare.

 

(Back in my teenage years, I had a crush on Squall, because he was like me- in all the bad ways. Emotionally immature, pushing people away for no reason, childish fits and wimsy, telling people to talk to walls... ;; Yeah. It was bad. I suppose he (and basically all the characters of that game, if you like 'pretty'- everyone is pretty rather then handsome/beautiful/hot) was attractive, though.)

 

 

I started my dwarfette noble in Origins. Bhaelen is good at what he does. (Jerk.) If you've never played the dwarf noble/commoner, don't play them- until you've done Orzamarr (spelled wrong again!). Dwarf Noble in particular reveals a lot. (And I am so glad that if you don't play a dwarf noble, the second child is canonly a son. Phew.) It's one of those origins that makes you feel incredibly badass until it all comes to head, though. And I really do like Gorim- 'my heart', 'i will always love you, my lady'. Feh, I'd dump Ali and the elf and get back together with him if the game allowed it. In any case, my little dwarf just finished her joining. Now it's time to head with Alistair ("Are you a mage?"/"Are you a moron, I AM A DWARF.") to the tower, dun dun, main plot is almost here!

 

The Last Court is currently bugged for me so my next 'Market Day' (special events) isn't triggering. On the other hand, that's kind of good (after seven market days, the game ends), as it gives me more time to raise my stats for when the Divine comes to visit. I accidentally got my Rumors of Revolution up in to the 80's; I am guessing a rebellion will be on hand very soon. Oops?