I agree, in the sense that Radovid or Nilfgaard winning can both be role played legitimately from Geralt's perspective.
It is the Djisktra ending that is woefully OOC.
It is the Djisktra ending that is woefully OOC.
Yeah, and I remain unconvinced by your logic.
Of course, I also think its influenced by the fact Geralt's decision to support one side or another in the war may have personal motivations either. An Imperial-leaning Geralt would want Radovid dead for Ciri to be able to ascend to the Imperial throne with less enemies as well as protecting Triss as well as Yennefer. An Anti-Emhyr one would want to support Dijkstra's plan to fight on as it means that Emhyr will be weakened (and eventually killed) as well as depriving Ciri, Triss, and Yennefer of a dangerous enemy.
That may well be too devious for Geralt, though.
There are weaknesses in the game's politics, personally, as well as depiction but I have a significantly softer view of them than you. It also helps that I view the situation in much more morally ambiguous terms than you.
I also see a difference between killing Roche and Thaler versus abandoning them.
The end result is the same but the actions are different, certainly from a moral perspective.
BTW, I confess my ignorance but where does it say Emhyr provides mages more rights?
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And I understand that you will remain unconvinced, as will I and your additional reasons don't help at all. But it is a topic that has exhausted itself and its marginal utility has dropped to 0.
Moving on then...
Which was VERY different from the North's prior experiences.
The devastation is much-much greater due to the much-much greater ability by the Nilfgaard to project force on a larger scale. Previous border wars are replaced by the conquest and subjugation of the entirety of the North in what, by all accounts, is going to be a massive set of deaths. Disturbingly, the game also hints at religious persecution as the Temerian drunk mentions the mass murder and rape of a Temple of Melitele due to "Northern superstitions" no longer being tolerated.
Is this a formalized practice of Nilfgaard or a one-time war crime? If it's a formalized practice, Nilfgaard's advantage over Radovid may well evaporate as there are just as many religious people as nonhumans.
What's your opinion, my fellow posters?
You're incorrect about the Temerian partistans as one of the earliest missions with Roche is the "Ves" mission where you, Roche, and Ves partake in an attack on Nilfgaardian forces and kill them in order to prevent the massacre of a Northern village. Military operations against the Black Ones are on-going and of reasonable effectiveness as we see with events in Velen and destroyed groups of fighters.
Natalis' fate is also mentioned by Roche in his description of how he's gone from being a Temerian soldier to being a guerilla. Contrary to the way you're depicting it, Temeria actually was able to muster its full military forces against Nilfgaard and engage them despite the death of King Foltest with Natalis being mentioned as the leader of these forces. The Temerian military fought and successfully held off the armies of Nilfgaard for three days.
Which, depending on the casualties, may be a massively effective resistance which was overwhelmed by sheer numbers or a pathetic defeat or both. Roche and company were defeated after three days and broken by the battle into scattered bands with only his group remaining a coherent partisan resistance versus the others degenerating into bandits or surrendering.
Natalis' fate I can't recall thereafter but the implications were he'd gone underground to organize the resistance further while Roche continues to harry Nilfgaard's forces.
The large scale war of Nilfgaard is a relatively new phenomenon in the North, though, which should be highlighted. The large scale nation-wide conflicts which Nilfgaard has brought to the North and their resulting atrocities are a difference between the kind of feudal warfare the North is used to and the total war which Nilfgaard practices. In short, this is the difference between raiding and the Thirty Years War.
Which was VERY different from the North's prior experiences.
The devastation is much-much greater due to the much-much greater ability by the Nilfgaard to project force on a larger scale. Previous border wars are replaced by the conquest and subjugation of the entirety of the North in what, by all accounts, is going to be a massive set of deaths. Disturbingly, the game also hints at religious persecution as the Temerian drunk mentions the mass murder and rape of a Temple of Melitele due to "Northern superstitions" no longer being tolerated.
Is this a formalized practice of Nilfgaard or a one-time war crime? If it's a formalized practice, Nilfgaard's advantage over Radovid may well evaporate as there are just as many religious people as nonhumans.
What's your opinion, my fellow posters?
Emhyr's assistance in the final battle is with Skellige (Northerners) so the final battle with the Wild Hunt is one of both Northerners who are anti-Nilfgaard and Nilfgaardians. It's also the case where neither side is really intending to help but the Wild Hunt gets called into a quagmire.
Conquered Kaedwen is mentioned by General Voorhis as having been conquered by Radovid and the reason that Nilfgaard's initially default victory is now no longer certain as the two largest remaining nations of the North have merged into a single unified military body.
You're incorrect about the Temerian partistans as one of the earliest missions with Roche is the "Ves" mission where you, Roche, and Ves partake in an attack on Nilfgaardian forces and kill them in order to prevent the massacre of a Northern village. Military operations against the Black Ones are on-going and of reasonable effectiveness as we see with events in Velen and destroyed groups of fighters.
Natalis' fate is also mentioned by Roche in his description of how he's gone from being a Temerian soldier to being a guerilla. Contrary to the way you're depicting it, Temeria actually was able to muster its full military forces against Nilfgaard and engage them despite the death of King Foltest with Natalis being mentioned as the leader of these forces. The Temerian military fought and successfully held off the armies of Nilfgaard for three days.
Which, depending on the casualties, may be a massively effective resistance which was overwhelmed by sheer numbers or a pathetic defeat or both. Roche and company were defeated after three days and broken by the battle into scattered bands with only his group remaining a coherent partisan resistance versus the others degenerating into bandits or surrendering.
Natalis' fate I can't recall thereafter but the implications were he'd gone underground to organize the resistance further while Roche continues to harry Nilfgaard's forces.
Well, our answer depends on perspective we take. If we judge from a perspective of an ordinary Northerner, I doubt we'll find any fault with Radovid. Persecutions on a large scale are simply impossible without public support, and it is obvious that Northerners are quite on board with the genocide of the mages and non-humans. At the same time any crime committed by the Nilfgaardians, be that a private affair, or a matter of policy, will be a matter of outrage.
From modern perspective, and it is the one CDPR are aiming at, Radovid's persecutions are always anathema for modern sensibilities, and an indicator of his insanity. So, from this perspective, in TW3 Nilfgaard is virtually unquestionably better. Which I personally find rather puzzling. Radovid is not doing anything more extreme comparative to Ferdinand and Isabella of Spain, for example, who unleashed Spanish inquisition, but no one considers them insane, or lunatics, or inherently evil.
For me neither side can claim a higher moral ground, and everything pretty much comes down to purely pragmatic matters. If I were neutral, I would go with Radovid winning the war and establishing the Northern Empire. Then we'll have centuries of fan with two empires fighting frontier wars at random intervals.
But being pro-Nilfgaardian, I go with both Radovid and Dijkstra dead.
But problem with Emhyr and Wild Hunt is that he help fight Wild hunt because he must, not because he want to do so, he come there to conquer Skellige not to help us and when we open portal and Wild Hunt show up it`s happened that he is on wrong place in wrong time just like Geralt was when Letho killed Foltest, so he don`t have much of choice just fight them, he can`t actually negotiate with Eredin.
No, as the North experienced that in 2 wars with Nilfgaard. It is not entirely new to them, and similar atrocities were committed.
Secondly, it is still a farcry from systematic oppression and genocide.
As for religious persecution, again nothing is said about it. It's mentioned once and then left to that. We don't know, and the game certainty doesn't consider it important enough to mention, hence the entire problem. You are taking bits and pieces that the game itself clearly doesn't care enough about to explore, and you are over-blowing them in importance and adding a lot of conjecture and speculation as an indicator of depth, while it is merely an indicator of laziness.
You seem to think that I am saying that Nilfgaard is a moral paragon, whereas what I am saying is that the game itself tells you, and shows you, that the Nilfgaard ending is better. Watch the ending slides again, if you need to.
Were Kaedweni nobles mentioned and more importantly shown? Was the internal cohesion of the "alliance" mentioned and more importantly shown? Need I specify that by "mentioned", I actually mean something a bit more substantial than one sentence in passing? Perhaps I should have, I apologize that I didn't. I definitely meant something more substantial than one or two sentences, with a bit more detail that explains to me how this forced unification happened in the matter of 6 months and how it works.
If that's enough for you, good for you. I can look at Skyrim with the same outlook and tell you it has fantastic politics.
Again, Roche and Ves. The Temerian partisans are not shown as an independent faction that you can interact with at length outside of Roche and Ves, who are pro-Nilfgaard.
If you are satisfied with having everything reduced to hearsay, again good for you. I am not. Natalis is not in the game, and his role is reduced to one or two sentences.
Compare that to TW2 and even TW1, and the idea that TW3 had comparable politics, let alone better, becomes quite untenable.
In short, your entire position is based on one or two sentences scattered across the main narrative as an indication that the game broached key subject that should have been there. As far as I am concerned however, Kaedwen was not broached or represented at all. Temerian resistance was not in the game outside of Roche and Ves. And quite revealingly, your position has consistently ignored what the game ending itself tells you.
You can at least admit that the ending epilogue were written idiotically I presume? You can at least see that the game ending is pretty much telling you outright that the Radovid ending is irredeemable whereas the Nilfgaard ending is a much better one? Because I'd much rather discuss the game as it is, as opposed to how you wish it was.
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You are puzzled because you assume that persecution are an indicator of insanity, in our eyes. That is not the case. Rather, Radovid is a lunatic because he behaves, talks, and is presented as a raving lunatic, with no personality whatsoever other than being a lunatic, so much so that Loredo is a much better written character who is actually believably a lunatic.
Secondly, the game itself presents Radovid as completely irredeemable, and practically says so explicitly in the ending that even commoners are doing shit under him. Compare that to how Nilfgaard winning is described.
Thirdly, even by European standards at the time Ferdinand and Isabella were very extreme and many historians describe them, especially Isabella, as having religious obsessions bordering on being maniacal, but that is a different story. The important point is that the persecution of religious groups in the Iberian peninsula is based on a multitude of factors, that the game does not even bother to come close to replicating. Rather, the main reason presented is Radovid being a lunatic. In addition, we all of course know that Ferdinand and Isabela's policies were, as most are, with mixed results and that Spain underwent an era of prosperity, discovery, and strength. Radovid winning is not described with such nuance, nor is it shown to be anything other than a virtual dystopia.
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@KnightofPhoenix
I don't mean to frustrate you, KoP. I think the visual storytelling and politics of the Witcher 3 are far more complex than you with a good deal of attention to detail. The ambiguous nature of the war being fought, the brutal inhuman nature of the conflict, the arbitrary nature of authority, and more are all brought up well to me. I also think there's a good deal of interesting and valid points spread out through the game.
They are, however, insufficiently developed. I don't attempt to argue that we could have, perhaps should have, had far more attention to detail as to what's actually happening in the war as opposed to just having the general beats dealt with. If I might draw a comparison, most of the information about the war is available but you have to sift through hours and hours of game content to get at it.
There are also political elements I feel as a book fan which needed to be developed that weren't like the efforts of other monarchs, Empress Ciri the First of Nilfgaard (the Fake One), and a great deal more about the Nilfgaard's situation. If we can do over a hundred side-quests then the least we could do is maybe devote more to them about the actual war? Including more from Nilfgaard's perspective?
Not to mention the war virtually ceases to be a factor when you reach Novigrad. Being a believer the politics of the Witcher 3 are neither shallow nor superficial doesn't mean that think they're CLEARLY PRESENTED. Quite the opposite, it's an artistic choice of the game that much is ambiguous, murky, and opaque with no clear answers. That only goes so far as an excuse, though, and for such a huge game they could have done more to develop the plots and world-building or at least made it easier to develop. I guess what I'm saying is it's not you giving the Witcher 3 a failing grade of 50/100 and me a 100 out of a 100 but me giving it a 75/100.
It's why I'm hoping our visit to Toussaint will give us expansive insights into the geo-political situation from Nilfgaard's perspective.
I don't mean to frustrate you, KoP. I think the visual storytelling and politics of the Witcher 3 are far more complex than you with a good deal of attention to detail. The ambiguous nature of the war being fought, the brutal inhuman nature of the conflict, the arbitrary nature of authority, and more are all brought up well to me. I also think there's a good deal of interesting and valid points spread out through the game.
They are, however, insufficiently developed. I don't attempt to argue that we could have, perhaps should have, had far more attention to detail as to what's actually happening in the war as opposed to just having the general beats dealt with. If I might draw a comparison, most of the information about the war is available but you have to sift through hours and hours of game content to get at it.
There are also political elements I feel as a book fan which needed to be developed that weren't like the efforts of other monarchs, Empress Ciri the First of Nilfgaard (the Fake One), and a great deal more about the Nilfgaard's situation. If we can do over a hundred side-quests then the least we could do is maybe devote more to them about the actual war? Including more from Nilfgaard's perspective?
Not to mention the war virtually ceases to be a factor when you reach Novigrad. Being a believer the politics of the Witcher 3 are neither shallow nor superficial doesn't mean that think they're CLEARLY PRESENTED. Quite the opposite, it's an artistic choice of the game that much is ambiguous, murky, and opaque with no clear answers. That only goes so far as an excuse, though, and for such a huge game they could have done more to develop the plots and world-building or at least made it easier to develop. I guess what I'm saying is it's not you giving the Witcher 3 a failing grade of 50/100 and me a 100 out of a 100 but me giving it a 75/100.
It's why I'm hoping our visit to Toussaint will give us expansive insights into the geo-political situation from Nilfgaard's perspective.
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That's fair. Though where I disagree is with it being due to artistic choice. In my opinion, it was not an artistic choice but rather a resource management one. I think it was decided that resources should be focused on Geralt, the key characters in his personal life, and making the open world sandbox look alive and be populated with side quests and monster hunting. The political aspect of the game was relegated to being a sideshow, which would have been fine except even as a sideshow it is imo inadequately portrayed. Of course, I don't know the internal workings of the company, so it is only speculation.
I openly admit that the fact that I love TW2 so much makes me very harsh with TW3, which I otherwise might have seen as decent in terms of its political portrayal (though I'd probably still give it less than 75). The sting of it feeling like a slap to the face is not something I am completely over yet, which I hope you understand if I ever came across as aggressive.
Ironically, for someone arguing a more Medievalist take on the subject I'm not sure that crimes would require public support to be done. Throughout history, large-scale massacres in feudal or aristocratic societies can and have been done without any support whatsoever from the masses. You are, however, correct that we have no less than three pogroms referenced in the books alone without any required exceptional measures on the governments need.vivaxardas2015 said:
Mages as a persecuted minority, however, is an entirely new thing and interesting to see develop given they've never been treated so in the canon before. They have been dismissed as charlatans or beggers but a direct assault on them is an entirely new thing--much akin to anti-intellectualism's upsurges at various points in Europe's history.
While it's not dealt with much I think it's telling that Pellars (who play a religious role in society) and the falsey accused draw more outrage than persecution of elves and dwarves.
Radovid's depiction is troubling for me not because he chooses to persecute nonhumans and mages but the fact that he's depicted as rambling, incoherent, and prone to making nonsensical speeches in our first meeting with him. In a bizarre way, I don't call him insane for his murderous evil and racism but because he's treated as a gibbering fool despite the fact he's running a military able to stand against the most powerful military on Earth.vivaxardas2015 said:
I draw a comparison with King Henselt who is ALSO incredibly racist (possibly to the point of genocide) and anti-mage (albeit, he was specifically hateful to Sorceresses versus magic in general).
I, too, favor the two Empires ending but I think the irony is that the biggest problem between the two nations is the seeming lack of trade between them. To paraphrase Discworld, "The North has nothing Nilfgaard wants and the North can't afford anything Nilfgaard has." Perhaps the Imperial North will change that.vivaxardas2015 said:
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Also, Jarl Craite shows that the Skelliges are fighting the Wild Hunt as well given he dies fighting Eredin.
That i consider real friend and he always offer his help, and if Emhyr really wanted to help he could give us Fringilla before for battle of Kaer Morhen and not now when Wild Hunt show up when he has no choice, that is why i don`t trust him to even consider option to make Ciri empress i don`t think he has good intentions with her.
@KnightofPhoenix
Well, good for Texas but what about everyone else conquered by force.
That's unambiguous FOR TEMERIA but ominous for everyone else.
If you do want to argue that it's bad storytelling designed to make us "feel good" about choosing Nilfgaard then you have evidence to back you up. Temeria is depicted as prospering and becoming a much happier and pleasant place whereas Dijkstra's victory is depicted as somewhat ambiguous.
Which is confusing because I'm not sure why the developers think I care about Temeria in a particularly notable way. I'm no stranger to in-game fantasy nationalism.
But Temeria isn't a nation I feel anything particularly fuzzy for, especially if I just survived a pogrom in Flotsam. Whereas, say what you will about Dijkstra's ending, but all of the North will prosper under his rule. So if their intent was to make me feel good about Nilfgaard's victory and unambiguous, it was a complete failure.
This is getting into some rather murky waters but, boiled down to it, the real-issue is what sort of treatment the Northerners are going to receive under Nilfgaard rule. Empires are not exactly strangers to systematic oppression. So yes, I'll agree with you, Knight of Phoenix that the politics of Wild Hunt is decidedly absent of detail regarding after-effects for a Nilfgaard victory. I don't need the effects to be even BAD as I could believe, however unlikely, they make similar deals for the rest of the Northern nations and everything is candy canes. The information is ABSENT, though.
Temeria is depicted as getting off surprisingly well, becoming, essentially Toussaint 2.0. However, the ending slides are grossly one-sided as it acts as if Temeria is the only point of concern in a Nilfgaard victory versus one of a dozen places. In real-terms, it's, "Texas prospers under the alien invasion, no mention of the other 49 states."
Well, good for Texas but what about everyone else conquered by force.
This may seem like splitting hairs but Roche and Ves aren't pro-Nilfgaard, Roche is pro-negotiated surrender while Ves is anti-Nilfgaard but supports Roche given her presence there (and her opinion is absent so we can only infer what she thinks). The inability to ask Ves her opinion on the treaty is irritating.
The ending game slide is one we should, in fact, discuss you're right. "In this case, it depicts that Temeria prospers under Nilfgaardian rule before the Nilfgaardian troops are withdrawn to fight in other fronts."
That's unambiguous FOR TEMERIA but ominous for everyone else.
The Radovid ending is depicted as decidedly slanted to making us feel bad about leaving him in power, yes, though that's meta-gaming and not necessarily something I think we can bring to the discussion given Geralt can only act on the information he's provided. I find the ending, also, frustrating because of its incomplete nature.
If you do want to argue that it's bad storytelling designed to make us "feel good" about choosing Nilfgaard then you have evidence to back you up. Temeria is depicted as prospering and becoming a much happier and pleasant place whereas Dijkstra's victory is depicted as somewhat ambiguous.
Which is confusing because I'm not sure why the developers think I care about Temeria in a particularly notable way. I'm no stranger to in-game fantasy nationalism.
But Temeria isn't a nation I feel anything particularly fuzzy for, especially if I just survived a pogrom in Flotsam. Whereas, say what you will about Dijkstra's ending, but all of the North will prosper under his rule. So if their intent was to make me feel good about Nilfgaard's victory and unambiguous, it was a complete failure.
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It's not even presented ominously, at least not nearly as much as it is made explicitly clear with Radovid.
The point I am making, and I think you will agree, is that the game is severely lacking in information as to how Nilfgaardian rule would actually look like, and it's a lot more positively portrayed than Radovid winning which is presented as being irrevocably irredeemable.
It is evident that the game is going to focus on Temeria, because the rest of the North is effectively rendered nonexistent, and the player is forced to remember them when the game clearly doesn't really care short of maybe one or two sentences here and there. And that is also my point. That the war is simplistic because it reduces the entirety of it to the Temerian front, with Emhyr vs Radovid, with Roche and Ves being pro-Emhyr. Saskia's glaring ommission pretty much shows you that the game doesn't give a damn about Aedirn or the entirety of the Eastern Front. That much, I think, you can agree on even if you are more lenient with it than I am.
I just can't wrap my head around just how Ciri becoming empress is actually going to solve any of Nilfgaard's internal and external conflicts. She will always be either seen as an unknown quantity, her father's/husband's puppet or a Northern outsider that does not put Nilfgaard before everybody else.
There is no way anyone would in their right mind pick Radovid soberly as being a good option even if we ignore the epilogue. He is presented, behaves, and is consistently referred to as a lunatic. He is irredeemable even in the game.
The only way a Geralt would have Radovid winning would be from a position of not wanting to interfere and not a genuine position that he thinks Radovid winning is a good idea. Which would have been more acceptable if Nilfgaardian atrocities are made more explicit, and post-war situation hinted at with more detail and clarity, as it would make it more ambiguous. As it stands however, even in the game Nilfgaard winning is a much better alternative than Radovid. The only ambiguity is with Dijkstra, but we've already discussed why I think it's a choice that is presented extremely poorly.
What is difference for Roche and company between being annexed by Redania and be vassal state to Nilfgard it`s not free country anyway i mean is it worth dying for it cuz by definition vassal state is: A vassal state is any state that is subordinate to another. The vassal in these cases is the ruler, rather than the state itself. Being a vassal most commonly implies providing military assistance to the dominant state when requested to do so; it sometimes implies paying tribute, but a state which does so is better described as a tributary state. In simpler terms the vassal state would have to provide military power to the dominant state. Today, more common terms are puppet state, protectorate or associated state.
This is where I'm in an unfortunate position of not being able to add much to the discussion because my position on the Radovid assassination is that the game's overarching themes of moral ambiguity, murky politics, and unforeseen consequences go out the window. Radovid is bad, insane, and a degenerate. The game repeatedly hammers home this particular factor and it reminds me in no small way of the first game's depiction of Salamandra.
In a game which is filled to the rim with how completely CRAP the world is, the game has numerous repeated mentions of how Salamandra and the Fisstech trade are EVIL. Which is...silly. Geralt is after Salamandra because they came after his friends, not because they are objectively worse than anyone else in the setting (at least before their ties to a larger "take over Temeria w/ mutants" conspiracy are exposed).
The execution of King Henselt in the Roche path was probably taken by 90% of all gamers but at least the moral dilemma was presented that regicide is, perhaps, not the best thing to do due to the massive amount of fallout from such an event up to and including civil war. Not ONCE during the conversation with Dijkstra or Roche is the issue of how the war effort of Nilfgaard vs. Redania and her allies will be affected by the assassination of its leader. You can't even bring it up in conversation and you'd think that would be one of the FIRST things Geralt would ask. It's as if the War ceased to exist halfway through the Novigrad questline.
Given the number of callbacks, I'm not sure we're meant to assume that Saskia and Iorveth are forgotten (and I hope to see them in the Oxenfurt expansion) given the selling of Aedirn down the river by Roche--but, as we've butted heads on this subject before--I will acknowledge I may be giving them too much credit. This, to me, at least was an acknowledgement of why Geralt might side against Roche.
We don't know anything about Ves' opinions as she's a silent participant in the backdeal revelation and everything goes to pot within minutes, starting with a nonsensical MacBeth quote. I won't deny it's quite possible that the storytelling framing of Dijkstra's "betrayal" is meant to be framed in the context of a naked grab for power as opposed to a heroic stand for Northern independence. In which case, honestly, it's just bad writing.
In short:
I want to know what the rest of the North is going to have happen to it under Nilfgaard rule.
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As presented by the game? Temeria is much-much better off under Nilfgaard as it becomes Toussaint 2.0 or an autonomous principality of Nilfgaard akin to Highever in Fereldan or Italy in the Hapsburg Empire (or, if you want to be a complete jerk to Nilfgaard, Vichy France).
Temeria will fight in Nilfgaard's wars and pay taxes to the Emperor but, essentially, will be the exact same as it was prior to the war. It will also have Nilfgaard backing it up in wars against its enemies plus will no doubt benefit economically from being allied to Nilfgaard. As an independent vassal state, it will also avoid being pillaged horribly by Nilfgaard.
Though we've seen that isn't always the case as with the British Empire. The depiction implies this isn't the case.
Redania, from the depiction under Dijkstra and Radovid, implies a full-scale attempt at assimilating the nation into becoming a full one. The use of resettlement by Dijkstra also implies that he's actively attempting to break down national identity.
Either immigrating Redanians to Temeria or Temerians to Redania or both.
In other words, to make a secession in the future impossible.
@Willowhugger
And that is why I think moral ambiguity was never the theme of the game, and that rather it was a very poor attempt at making people like Nilfgaard, because much like bioware before them with regards to Templars, they thought that people would be automatically inclined to hate the empire so a counter-balancing was needed. Except it went way way overboard and, much like bioware with mages, they only succeeded in making the North an irredeemable cluster fuck. And no one can really consciously like Nilfgaard, as we have no idea what it would actually be like short of relying on the books. It is my interpretation of what happened.
Whereas you think moral ambiguity is an intrinsic part of the game, but flies out of the window when it comes to a rather big part of the war. Which is fair.
In conclusion, I think we can both agree that there is a lot of bad writing, I'd just be harsher and more general in that statement.
And that is why I think moral ambiguity was never the theme of the game, and that rather it was a very poor attempt at making people like Nilfgaard, because much like bioware before them with regards to Templars, they thought that people would be automatically inclined to hate the empire so a counter-balancing was needed. Except it went way way overboard and, much like bioware with mages, they only succeeded in making the North an irredeemable cluster fuck. And no one can really consciously like Nilfgaard, as we have no idea what it would actually be like short of relying on the books. It is my interpretation of what happened.
Whereas you think moral ambiguity is an intrinsic part of the game, but flies out of the window when it comes to a rather big part of the war. Which is fair.
In conclusion, I think we can both agree that there is a lot of bad writing, I'd just be harsher and more general in that statement.
Point taken.
Honestly, I'm a student of film from my college days and there's a lot of co-opted storytelling tropes from Spaghetti Westerns and Chambara films. Themes of both those genres are strongly emphasizing the pointlessness of war and its fundamental dehumanizing qualities. I was intrigued by the Bloody Baron, a character who is a minor participant in the war, for example because he's one of the few Les Collaborateurs in the history of modern media to be depicted with sympathy. I also did appreciate the dualistic depiction of Nilfgaard in White Orchard as the Commander of the Garrison is depicted as a "Good Man" but then we're forced to hear the screams of a man as he's scourged.
I stayed for every scream.
For me, the ambiguity and humanity of both sides are strongly emphasized. We're inclined to hate the Nilfgaard but then it becomes MUCH HARDER to do so not only after you meet the commander but also after meeting the Van Attre's hot daughters.There's still enough in the way of atrocities and horror both in Velen and White Orchard, though, that you don't want them to win.
The business with Radovid, however, is dissonant because there's no equivalent with Emhyr. I find the latter a terrifying figure personally threatening my family but the game made it very clear I was meant to treat his desire to take Ciri as his heir seriously.
Even, indeed, that being the ideal goal.
Which makes me think multiple writers had very different ideas about the game's politics. To which I say I like the ones who did White Orchard and Velen as well as their depiction of the 3rd Nilfgaard War. I also like the ones who did the Witch plot of Novigrad and Skellige but that has NUTS ALL to do with the War.
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I can understand that but still it`s not free i mean when Nilfgard needs money or army it will be Temeria`s still outcome of Reasons of State quest is strange, you can`t reason with either side just walk away or kill Djikstra, that i meant is it worth dying for either side because by dying they achieve nothing, and btw Toussaint don`t have army just couple of guards so they can offer only money to Nilfgard