Having us kill civilians in Oriath Square is tasteless.

"

gibbousmoon wrote:

PvP has very little (if anything) to do with an in-game narrative, so I fail to grasp the relevance of your PvP kills in WoW.

I did specifically mention NPCs.

It comes with the esthetic of the game.
Its completely in line with the story, the recent events in it, it reminds you that this is Wraeclast and not Azeroth.
It would be a huge mistake to go down this slippery slope of conforming to peoples puny feelings. In fact i would say it is great design if it makes you feel gross killing them, that is exactly what was intended im sure.

"

DoubleU wrote:

"

gibbousmoon wrote:

PvP has very little (if anything) to do with an in-game narrative, so I fail to grasp the relevance of your PvP kills in WoW.

I did specifically mention NPCs.

Frightened citizens? Really?

Or anything analogous to that? Because if that were the case (I kind of doubt it), then I would levy the exact same criticism upon WoW.

There's nothing wrong (imo) with allowing players to kill civilians in a game. But making it a de facto requirement for progress in a campaign requires a pretty significant narrative justification, in any game.

PoE blatantly fails that proviso.

"

RedsDead wrote:

It comes with the esthetic of the game.
Its completely in line with the story, the recent events in it, it reminds you that this is Wraeclast and not Azeroth.
It would be a huge mistake to go down this slippery slope of conforming to peoples puny feelings. In fact i would say it is great design if it makes you feel gross killing them, that is exactly what was intended im sure.

If you were reasonably able to avoid killing them, then I would agree with your post 100%

"

gibbousmoon wrote:

"

DarkRanger4 wrote:

No, keep them as they are.
It is a war.
The wars have random casualties.
Especially when one of the sides has a magic weapon of mass destruction.

And Exiles are not heroes nor saints in any modern meaning.
You're going back in time killing architects for loot/treasure.
Sacrificing beasts to some elder gods.
Creating abominations from monsters to defeat them for loot.
Clearing thousands worlds on Atlas for power.

This is the first coherent defense of the status quo in this thread, but

It is not, but you're obviously cherry picking the arguments you can handle. As mentioned before some of the exiles have many personal reasons within the story to be slaying those citizens.

"

Bnethor wrote:

"

gibbousmoon wrote:

"

DarkRanger4 wrote:

No, keep them as they are.
It is a war.
The wars have random casualties.
Especially when one of the sides has a magic weapon of mass destruction.

And Exiles are not heroes nor saints in any modern meaning.
You're going back in time killing architects for loot/treasure.
Sacrificing beasts to some elder gods.
Creating abominations from monsters to defeat them for loot.
Clearing thousands worlds on Atlas for power.

This is the first coherent defense of the status quo in this thread, but

It is not, but you're obviously cherry picking the arguments you can handle.

Prove it, and quote those arguments you think I am cowering from.

"

As mentioned before some of the exiles have many personal reasons within the story to be slaying those citizens.

Indeed. But did you read the latest post in the thread before yours?

"

gibbousmoon wrote:

"

DoubleU wrote:

"

gibbousmoon wrote:

PvP has very little (if anything) to do with an in-game narrative, so I fail to grasp the relevance of your PvP kills in WoW.

I did specifically mention NPCs.

Frightened citizens? Really?

Or anything analogous to that? Because if that were the case (I kind of doubt it), then I would levy the exact same criticism upon WoW.

There's nothing wrong (imo) with allowing players to kill civilians in a game. But making it a de facto requirement for progress in a campaign requires a pretty significant narrative justification, in any game.

PoE blatantly fails that proviso.

"

RedsDead wrote:

It comes with the esthetic of the game.
Its completely in line with the story, the recent events in it, it reminds you that this is Wraeclast and not Azeroth.
It would be a huge mistake to go down this slippery slope of conforming to peoples puny feelings. In fact i would say it is great design if it makes you feel gross killing them, that is exactly what was intended im sure.

If you were reasonably able to avoid killing them, then I would agree with your post 100%

1) There is no quest in the game that tells you to kill them. You get no rewards of any kind from killing them. They immediately run away upon entering the screen. Killing them is not a de facto requirement as it is utterly 100% pointless.

2) Most of the character classes in the game have good reason to murder them to begin with, or were people in professions where it was their job to dispose of them for corrupt nobles.

The Marauder was yet another one of the Karui slaves that those citizens buy, abuse, and sell off, treated as little more then savage muscle to do work for the "civilized" masters.

The Witch saw her sisters burned at the stake as entertainment.

The Shadow was a convenient tool for disposal that kills as easily as breathing till he stopped being useful thanks to one mistake.

The Ranger was seen not as a human but an animal to be hunted, shackled, and either put to use or put down.

Only the Templar, Duelist, and Scion realistically would be at least a little bit hesitant to kill the civilians. Though that is only a guess, after all character dialog for the player characters stops at Act 4.

Though it would not be a surprise is the Templar passes it off as being merciful in killing those citizens so that they would not suffer at the hands of the slaves. Especially with what happened later. "By my slaying of them their souls were saved from Kitava's Madness and Jaws."

3) In WoW NPC deaths are far more obstructive, in fact they are regularly targeted and killed for that exact purpose as part of the faction conflict by players. Dead quest givers block player progression and are natural gathering points for prey.

4) You can reasonably avoid killing them, as there are very few of them on the map and they generally cluster on the edges of where the main group of mobs charge from so that they can run off the screen ASAP. You actually have to chase them down if you want to seriously kill them.

"

TankHunter678 wrote:

Only the Templar, Duelist, and Scion realistically would be at least a little bit hesitant to kill the civilians. Though that is only a guess, after all character dialog for the player characters stops at Act 4.

I think only the Duelist.
Because killing the civilians isn't fair fight, and he's all about fighting strong opponents in fair fight.

Scion is connected with nightmare, she's kind of insane.

And Templar... Well, technically he should be against killing the civilians, but he killing his own God (Innocence) and starting to serve the entity who is basically satan of templar religion (Sin), so who knows. He already betrayed Templars and Oriath at this point.

"

Shagsbeard wrote:

They're. Not. Real. People.

Explain to me then. Why are people so uptight about virtual boobies?

"

gibbousmoon wrote:

"

Bnethor wrote:

It is not, but you're obviously cherry picking the arguments you can handle.

Prove it, and quote those arguments you think I am cowering from.

"

As mentioned before some of the exiles have many personal reasons within the story to be slaying those citizens.

Indeed. But did you read the latest post in the thread before yours?

For the arguments there has been talk of the oriathans treating our characters badly and the actual innocence of the citizens. They are slavers after all as de99ial pointed out. I also spoke of the psychological effects of killing hundreds of people:

"

Bnethor wrote:

I like that they're giving us the option to choose whether your character has become bitter enough to avenge their treatment upon the poor citizens. Maybe your character simply doesn't care that much about "human shields" that are in the way of dispatching your actual enemies.

Once your character gets to that point in the story they've already killed thousands of beings, some of them human. Either they've become numb to the killing or they're enjoying it. There's no way you're stopping to think if that guy deserved it when you're butchering hordes of people left and right. The exiles are practically demigods at that point and it's hard to see how taking a humans life would feel any different to them than squishing a bug.

In that sense I feel it's correct for the townsfolk to be killable. If the player wants to feel noble about it they'll have to take the extra care to make sure they don't hurt anyone who didn't deserve it in their opinion.

For the diverse characters themselves I think TankHunter678 just provided a great summary of the different characters' motivations.

I did read the latest post, but the closing argument about being reasonably able to avoid them just doesn't stand imo. So it becomes a difference of opinion. However I'd still say especially reflecting my earlier post that it's not supposed to be easy to avoid killing them due to the reasons stated above.

But then their enslaved children's souls I use to power my map device won't be at peak despair!