just can't do evil

Remove all ads!

I had a problem with being evil as well at first. But after a few tries when I finally got angry enough to get an evil campaign on the way (note this was back when I was (/could) still roleplaying the game emotionally). The money has nothing to do with it for as stated, there's more than enough of money in BG2 anyway. Only problem is the dialogue options really. Evil does not appear in this game the way it should. Instead of being a calculating self-centered evil, you're forced to be more of a raging dumb sort.

Still, after forcing myself to play an evil game, I found myself enjoying it very much indeed. Reminded me of Fallout really. With the exception that in BG2 you still couldn't slaughter that one common idiot who dared speak offensively of you without letting the entire town know about it, and switch to the famous suicide-mode against your immortal self.

 

@ Manus

OK, the money arguement doesn't really hold, but I still say that the only reason evil isn't as popular is it's replayability. I don't buy into that whole conscience thing. I have a conscience. I consider myself to be a good person, who does the right thing 99% of the time. However, I am able to distinguish between a game and real life, something you seem to have difficulty doing. I don't play evil for some cathartic fantasy. Hell, that's not even the definition of fantasy. A fantasy game is something that takes place in a fantastical world, meaning different from earth. It doesn't mean something you fantasize about. By that rational, fantasy football would be fantasizing about football players, which would make me - well, let's be politically correct here - and just say a man of different tastes. The point is fantasy in the context of a fantasy RPG does not mean to fantasize about anything. It's a fantastical world where fantastical creatures, fantastical magic, fantastical villans and fantastical heros exist. It's not a wet dream.

Heck to go even further, if you think people who play evil are fantasizing about evil, you even miss the point of role-playing! You don't role-play yourself. The entire concept of role-playing yourself is counter-intuitive. The hero in SoA and ToB is NOT you. It's someone who you are playing the part of. By definition, when you role-play, you are playing the part of someone else. Anyone of sufficient intellect is able to role-play both good and evil. You say, "If I was this character, what would I do?" You wouldn't say, "If this character was me, what would he/she do?" I try to get as much out of the game as possible, and to do so, I take full advantage of both types of role-playing opportunities.

And you're still all softies.

@ Shura - it's Aldeth - not Aldazar - Aldazar opined in favor of good. Also, I have to say I admire you Shura - half the evil stuff I now do in the game came from your ideas. You have playing evil down to an art form.

[ November 05, 2003, 22:24: Message edited by: Aldeth the Foppish Idiot ]

 

But sometimes people roleplay their (option number 1) own characters, as opposed to (option number 2) creating a character that is not them (ie- a Half-Orc, unless you really see yourself as a Half-Orc).

Me, I play myself as a character. My real name is Neeraj, and I named my PC Neeraj, and I also made myself the class that I would best see myself in, (and then once I finish as a paladin I'll do another class/kit).

And because of that, I choose to do what I would really do as if really in that situation. Because many people do this when creating a PC, conscience does come in to play.

Whereas if creating a character that you totally do not see a mirror image of yourself, then conscience of course would be hardpressed to come in to play.

So its all a matter of perception. If you percieve yourself really in the game, conscience will come in to play (unless you do certain things just for the humor in it as someone earlier stated).

Anyone ever played NBA Live? I put myself in that game too! I make myself a 6'10 center for the Toronto Raptors! And when I played it, I used to fantasize about being a center in the NBA! That will never happen because I'm a mere 5'11

And nobody cares if we're softies.

[ November 05, 2003, 22:38: Message edited by: Neeraj the Freak Paladin ]

 

I don't think people are softies if they can't play evil, they may well be anyway though . I just don't understand how you can find it so difficult. If you are deeply into your character and role-play then it shouldn't be a problem.

However good is easier to play, more rewards and cheaper stuff. BG2 hasn't really allowed for truly evil characters.

Neeraj - is it me or do you keep changing your name?

 

@ Neeraj - Your real name is Neeraj? I always thought it was Freak!

Actually, you make a good point. Are you roleplaying yourself, placed in a fantasy setting, or are you roleplaying somebody else? I guess sub-consciously, I roleplay myself, and that's why I can't play evil very well. It's also probably why I'll often select a smart-ass dialogue choice.

 

Like Splunge (and many others who probably haven't said as much) I roleplay myself and while I regularly have fleeting evil thoughts, such as wondering what it would feel like to simply stand up and punch someone in the face or stab someone etc, I wouldnever be able to act on those thoughts. I'm simply unable as yet, maybe it's just that no-one has quite pushed me far enough to snap.

 

@ 8People.

I changed my moniker like once a week it seems when I first came on the sight in September. But I've stuck with Freak Paladin for about a month, and I beleive I will keep it as I was told by the administrators that it isn't recommended to keep changing the name.

@ Splunge! Freaky stylin!

@ Manus

Yeah David Robinson is for real! He even used $5 million (american) of his own money to make a good school for inner-city kids in San Antonio, Texas

 

Aldeth, I think you've confused my post with someone else, I never said anything about fantasizing. This said, I agree with many others that I do tend to place myself in the shoes of the other person, this is easily ahieved due to my shifting, undefined, malleable, nature- but I still hold my sense of morality intact. I have had experience with acting, and it is a very unpleasant feeling to become a character whose thoughts are, for want of a better word, highly disagreeable. You can feel the change, and I don't like it.

If you are seperate from the character sure, and most games are like this, (most characters too really) but in a role-play this is not (for me at least, and it seems many others), not the case.

Well, each to their own, if you do not feel your conscience come into play with your actions- or rather, the thoughts and beliefs, the motives behind the action, which are in my opinion the more important, especially when we are talking about the self- then that is perfectly ok, and I have nothing wrong with that (or being a softy) but you could understand that this is not the same for everyone, I am sure.

 

I find it hard to believe you can do any good roleplaying by remaining a logical machine with no emotional attachments at all. Of course the complete opposite of this isn't good either. But whenever I'm required to roleplay, or act for that matter, I draw emotions from my real life and use them to guide my reactions.

That means that if I started the game as a good character, I would create bonds to some of the NPC's and reflect those bonds on my real-life friends and family in order to make them appear more important. The next time I play the game though, these NPC's have come to remain in my mind as past friends. So understandably it feels like a part of me, not just the other character, was betraying them by becoming evil. At this point I must separate myself from the game and adjust anew.

Some people may claim that this is a case where a person can't tell the difference between a game and a reality. But I think differently. It's a gift. Not all games succeed in doing this to me either, only the selected few of the good games. That's why I like the Japanese games more, since usually PC games don't have the same atmosphere, plot, music and guided events to allow for such incredible immersion. Maybe it's a tad bit childish to be able to take a game world so seriously but I wonder, who's enjoying more: The one playing the game, or the one living through it?

I guess it ultimately comes down to what you're looking for in a game. Some might be looking for intellectual challenge. Others for motorical challenge. Some might be just looking to beat boredom. And then some are looking for an escape from reality. While I fit each of the cathegories above, the last one undoubtedly fits me best.

I roleplay because I want to escape from the reality up to a certain point. More importantly, I roleplay, because that's the only way I can live multiple lives in stead of one. In a way, I've been to every one of the worlds where the best games and books I've read have happened. And that's a richness, not a curse.

 

@Aldeth: You are so right! Let's not forget this is still a game! You guys must know to cross the line between a game and the real world.
OK, I must admit... I like to play good too. But for different reasons. The game itself is made to be played this way. There are fewer posibilities to be evil than good. If the game would have been made to kill everything on sight and make target practice on every poor little commoner, I would do exactly this! Yes I know, I can do it. But I think that the Cowled Wizards are there to descourage acts like this (at least to newbies). To me sounds like: "You are free to do what you want, but we recommand not to."
Oh, and here are some other arguments: NPCs. Watch this:

Korgan vs. Minsc
Seravok vs. Keldorn
Edwin vs. Imoen/Aerie
Viconia vs. Anomen/Aerie
Jan vs. Nalia
...and so on.

See my point? The best NPCs are evil aligned. And about the romance with Viconia... I find it the most challenging of them all. Is very easy to make Aerie fall in love with $charname$ than with Viconia.
So... I can't play evil neither. It is so very rewarding playing goodie-goodie-two-shoes. But I will never part with Korgan, Edwin and Viconia. They are the must-have trio!

 

@ Manus

No, it was you. I just checked. You commented right after my first post that, "Aldeth, it's called a conscience." Implying that I lacked one. I was simply stating that if you have played the game as many times as I have, you can't imagine yourself as every character you play without becoming schizophrenic. In fact, I do not imagine myself as any character I play. As long as all of you out there who do this understand you are NOT really a paladin, or NOT really a wild mage, or whatever it is you're playing, I guess no harm done.

That having been said, perhaps I'm being too logical. I may not think of myself as an adventurer, because I could never actually be one (even if I lived on Faerun). Remember, adventuring is for the elite few, kind of like becoming a professional athlete today. So 99% of the population wouldn't be able to do it. I certainly don't rank myself in the top 1% of the population.

Think about it - 10 is average in your ability scores, so most of us aren't going to be above average in many things. I went to an encumberance table to try and calculate my strength and I had to guess at a few of the other statistics, so here's a guess at what I believe my stats would look like:

Str: 14
Int: 15
Wis: 6
Dex: 8
Con: 10
Cha: 10

Explanations:

Stength - OK, I work out. I bench press well over 200 pounds - if you want to be exact around 225 pounds - and that's a strength of about 14. So people who have characters with 18 strength, these guys are really, really strong.

Intelliegence - I stand by this even though many people would think that's really high - I'll document it for anyone who wishes me to.

Wisdom - I have absolutely no common sense. I can't see how things work mechanically, so I'm definitely not mechanically inclined, and I'm not handy with any types of tools.

Dexterity - I'm a little clutsy, so I'd guess I'm a little below average

Constitution - I have no idea how I'd measure this on myself - I put in 10 because it's the average. I don't know how to judge this other than by how often you get sick. Since for me that's no more or less than anyone else, I'll go with average.

Charisma - If anything, I'm guessing a little high here. I really don't have much in the way of personal magnetism. I've never been elected for anything, and I tend not to go out of way to be overly sociable.

So, if you take the average, it's 10.5 - and since I'm a typical person, it should be right around 10. If I lived in Faerun, what would I be? Maybe a fighter, maybe a mage (although I don't think I have the stats to be a specialist), but either way, I'd make for a pretty lousy mage and a pretty lousy fighter. If I were playing the game, and I found me there as an NPC, I'd leave me behind. So maybe that's another reason I can't see the character as being me - because it's simply not me.