The Witcher 1 Thread

He just has a different reasoning for what he does.

 

It was never stated outright, but it has been heavily implied by the in-game events.

Still, he pretty neatly mirrors what Geralt tried to teach Alvin in Murky Waters.

 

There is also precedent in the novels.

And GM does reference things you said to Alvin and wears identical but worn amulet.
The conclusion simply isn't handed to you on a silver platter.

 

I didn't want to dismiss it as dev laziness or something. I actually find this amusing from a determinist point of view. It means that stronger factors were at play and him acknowledging Geralt's "teachings" was just a ex post facto rationalization.

 

IIRC it's executed fairly well.
It's the kind of thing where execution matters a lot.

 

Actually, i would probably need to play the game again someday (order/neutral path, as i sided with elves/dwarves), but in my opinion, there are too many schemes in the whole game in which salamandra/flaming rose seems to be involved. Some plots seems obvious, others are explained by the GM, but i am not sure you get the reasons for each and all of these plots, and some plots are introduced in the epilogue.

The Alvin stuff (won't elaborate as i prefer to remain spoiler free) is not outright confirmed, but implied enough for you to get it, but i feel there are some many schemes that some of them may have been forgotten in the end, or not enough explained.

 

Ok, I guess I worded it wrong again. I liked that part

 

Yes.

 

Since you find an old amulet on his body, of the same style as the one Alvin had...

Anyway, I followed Order.I always had a knack for following the order and lawful parts in games. Guess this is why I liked Miranda the authoritive bitch in ME2 aswell. The elves just came of as a terrororganisation who did not much good to really stop people from seeing them as troublemakers and a shit race.

 

I'm pretty sure the game doesn't represent Scoia'tael properly. There's a disconnect between them and non-humans from city ghettos, you have no idea about pogroms etc. If you haven't played W2 or read the saga, it can be hard to have at least a bit of empathy for them.

 

I think they got their share of abuse in TW1, with the ghetto, the Vivaldi's bank, the expelled armorer, the assault on Voltan etc...
Their darker side is shown too, but on the other hand, i don't see much the order bright side beside Siegfried honor. (if the order path is not chosen, i guess)

 

I know but the Squirrels resembled talibans/Red Khmers or any other brutal group to me, their people might bed "ploughed" as they would say in the Witcher, by humans. But they are not better than Salamandra and even supported a fascist Empire who hold slaves.

 

They are not saint at all, but they indeed shown being wronged, while there isn't enough elements provided to justify the order position. They should have balanced better the two group, especially BEFORE you pick a side.
Not only, you don't feel much the order being wronged, or having justification, but they aren't much guys to be sided with in the first chapters, unless you count the outskirt priest. They might be more layered if you pick their side, but there should be more reasons to pick their side first.

Anyway, the "good" side is supposed to be the neutral path.

 

Well I pretty much picked Order on Siegfried alone that I found much more sympathetic and caring than that black haired hagman of an elf. Also, Im not sure the squirrels been showed wrong. They pretty much do not give a fuck that their actions put the random mr elf and dwarf in more shit than they can ever imagine in the towns when they try to live a normal life while they blow up bridges and villages. Murky Waters is a typical example. A village who thanks to Geralt and historically had a good relationship to a even more odd and distant race of amphibious creatures where both been bound to the Lady of the Lake Godess. Then comes the elves who if I am not wrong, even was not in any trouble of pogrom on the small island. Yet the Order and the Squirrel Elves had to take the conflict to the village and the Vodyanoi. Lady of the Lake seems to be a neutral point they could have used. Hell, that place is super neutral in the way of things in Witcher 1.

I presume the good side for a Witcher is the neutral side but hard to keep hard lined in the middle. I really liked the king as a character. Almost all characters have flaws or really bad sides to them but can still be appealing or have some reason to their actions. I kinda find this been lacking in other bigger RPGS, cough, cough cough cough! Biowareugh! cough. At times.

 

Because it was like that. Whole point of it was that his teaching were skewed via subjective thoughts. Jasques found its goal and Geralt words from Murky Waters gave him a push he needed.
What is more interesting is that Jasques wasn't evil nor his goals or his actions in context of what will come in future.

Big part of TW books is lesser and greater evil.
What is worse commit greater evil but to save city or do lesser evil and save few ?

Jasques choose greater evil to save as many as possible because he knew that non unified nations will fall to the winter and only united they would be able to oppose changes in climate.

Geralt knew that but couldn't deal with greater evil so he choose lesser evil.

Point is both Geralt and Jasques were not wrong as they simply had different perspectives and values. Geralt putting life of people he know first where Jasques put life of most of people before people he knew.



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Now Wild Hunt part in this as why Alvin/Jasques had power to move between planes is different matter and CDPR probably didn't have in plan to do TW trilogy. Only known living person with such power was Ciri via Elder Blood gene which came from elves and even among them it was very rare thing as this is reason why Wild Hunt projects their image on that world instead moving physically.

 

Humans are fine though, because they bleed non-humans slowly and refrain from dramatic acts of violence. Well... except pogroms, lynching and everyday shenanigans - but it's all good with the law and not in the game

 

My point is that you know the bad sides AND the good sides of the squirrel, while you only know the bad sides of the order. It is imbalanced IMO. They should have shown more good sides on the order side to allow to make a proper decision.

 

Was Jasques evil? I see him more as some kind of man who pragmatic maybe? He did what had to be done, in his vision to save the world. He was no shitty villian I say. He just had a vision of a superhunman, Maybe his alchemist would have mastered it in the end and made people not looking much weirder than Witchers.

Well, Im not saying its a good time for elves and dwarves. They are always so superior to humans in like 99% av all fantasy settings, yet they are losing hard on knock out.

The Order had Siegfried, I think he proved a good point to show the good side of the order. Also the Order established....order in Vizima as Foltest was of to god knows what, Im not sure about that point but they kept the city in control and protected it. The problem is, the Order is darkened cause of modern, Western secularism who view religion is a bad thing. Especially Crusades and such which they more or less symbolised. Also, the main villian was part of the Order so this overshadows the "good" things the order did. We would off need an Squirrel side kick to him to show they had wicked dicks too!

 

Pls define "evil".

 

Just recently completed it. I liked the story, especially the confrontation with the main villain in epilogue. I think it could be possible for Triss to confirm the identity of GM if she was given the amulet, but the developers didn't want it to be completely and clearly answered.

Will I miss much if I skip the additional adventures present in the EE and jump straight to TW2? Is it a fan made content? The first one has no voice acting.

 

Two of them are made by the develloppers and add some bits of backstory for the game world and some of the characters.

I don't think it is needed, but quite welcome. And the sum of those two is still shorter than a chapter of the main game, so you wouldn't lose too much time.

 

You mean Alvin.

 

Yes, I wanted my post to be spoiler free.

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Taking into account the evidence, it seems to be almost certain that GM is Alvin.

 

Oh I misread, I thought you originally inferred Triss is the GM.

 

Finished TW1 siding with the Scoia'tel. Really liked the ending and the ultimate absence of "you picked the right choice, here's a +5 sword" for most of your choices. There are some rewards better than others, but once you get used to there not being a "right" answer in every situation, it gets easier to get into the game. You make your choices, you deal with the consequences, but maybe not until much later.

Didn't really like

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killing Siegfried, as he really wasn't that bad a guy, but at the same time he was just as ambitious as countless others in the game and would have had no problem killing every dwarf in town, including my good friend Zoltan. Felt really bad for Alvin, though. Also felt bad for that Witch I boned then turned over to the townspeople early in the game. She deserved better, but there really wasn't any other option. That mob was right.