Saddened that I had to kill Dettlaff to save the others
None of them deserved to die. Even though Dettlaff's siege on the city was extreme, put yourself in his wings. It feels horrible enough to have your beloved kidnapped and having to kill to get her back. The fact the victims were violating chivalty rules is little consolation. And then it was all deception. You got tricked into serial murder for nothing. And his 'darling' didn't even have the decency to communicate properly to him what she could communicate to Geralt. Even if she thought he'd not understand, he deserved her best try. And him besieging the city, well, that was Ana choosing love-based nepotism. But overall there was way too little communicating for the sake of drama. Makes for good storytelling of course, but for me as a communicator it's bothersome.
The whole chain of pain could have been stopped in its tracks if Ana had put her foot down. She's the ruler, damnit! She wants to be strong and merciful but maybe a lot of that was wishful pretending after what she had done. She could have predicted what pains her sister would have to endure as an exiled demonized figure. How could she give in like that? (Reminds me a bit of the writing of Celestia and Luna in MLP though. Beloved sister threw a demonic hissy fit and got banished to the moon for 1000 years. Hmmmm. Bit excessive maybe?)
Interesting musing if all had been saved: Would Dettlaff get inofficial, implied amnesty? He definitely should, according to Ana's stance on her sister's actions. My bad feelings about having to kill Dettlaff as if he was the villain in the end almost tempts me to consider an alternate ending more satisfying where the sisters both die and Dettlaff lives. Because the supposedly best ending has a rotten aftertaste of human exceptionalism and glorification, like humans' weakness and mistakes deserve forgiveness where vampires' doesn't. It is vexing how 'Deadlaff' becomes a mere afterthought and a contract monster you get paid for. Either mercy for everybody or for nobody. But I guess this is the typical writing of the Witcher games that it's hard to achieve an altogether good outcome. Well, at least if you want to see it in a cynical way like that. Every now and then I found myself wanting to speak my own dialogue in scenes, more based on Dandelion's expertise. (I would actually like to see a spinoff game where you play Dandelion, more focused on in detail skillful human interaction and music and such.)
R.I.P. Dettlaff
P.S.: Also pains me to see Regis having yet another saddening burden on his soul. He'll have to carry that around for a very long time.
None of them deserved to die. Even though Dettlaff's siege on the city was extreme, put yourself in his wings. It feels horrible enough to have your beloved kidnapped and having to kill to get her back. The fact the victims were violating chivalty rules is little consolation. And then it was all deception. You got tricked into serial murder for nothing. And his 'darling' didn't even have the decency to communicate properly to him what she could communicate to Geralt. Even if she thought he'd not understand, he deserved her best try. And him besieging the city, well, that was Ana choosing love-based nepotism. But overall there was way too little communicating for the sake of drama. Makes for good storytelling of course, but for me as a communicator it's bothersome.
The whole chain of pain could have been stopped in its tracks if Ana had put her foot down. She's the ruler, damnit! She wants to be strong and merciful but maybe a lot of that was wishful pretending after what she had done. She could have predicted what pains her sister would have to endure as an exiled demonized figure. How could she give in like that? (Reminds me a bit of the writing of Celestia and Luna in MLP though. Beloved sister threw a demonic hissy fit and got banished to the moon for 1000 years. Hmmmm. Bit excessive maybe?)
Interesting musing if all had been saved: Would Dettlaff get inofficial, implied amnesty? He definitely should, according to Ana's stance on her sister's actions. My bad feelings about having to kill Dettlaff as if he was the villain in the end almost tempts me to consider an alternate ending more satisfying where the sisters both die and Dettlaff lives. Because the supposedly best ending has a rotten aftertaste of human exceptionalism and glorification, like humans' weakness and mistakes deserve forgiveness where vampires' doesn't. It is vexing how 'Deadlaff' becomes a mere afterthought and a contract monster you get paid for. Either mercy for everybody or for nobody. But I guess this is the typical writing of the Witcher games that it's hard to achieve an altogether good outcome. Well, at least if you want to see it in a cynical way like that. Every now and then I found myself wanting to speak my own dialogue in scenes, more based on Dandelion's expertise. (I would actually like to see a spinoff game where you play Dandelion, more focused on in detail skillful human interaction and music and such.)
R.I.P. Dettlaff
P.S.: Also pains me to see Regis having yet another saddening burden on his soul. He'll have to carry that around for a very long time.