Dragon Age™: The Veilguard is a Return To Form

[rusty_shackleford]

After all, Éowyn was created in 1950. Sure, she was an absolute exception

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flanderization



It's not just one "absolute exception", it's now well over half of all melee combatants you see in fantasy.

[rusty_shackleford]

Feminists using Eowyn is no different from ****** pointing to Zevran in DAO: all it makes me think is that you can't have any "minority" representation if it ends up leading to this.

[gerey]

After all, Éowyn was created in 1950. Sure, she was an absolute exception but she was a woman wielding a sword, wasn't she? And Tolkien is the last man who can be accused of feminism.

The Witch King scene was a clever bit of subversion. It was not Éowyn that slew him, even though she delivered the last blow, but Merry stabbing him from behind with a barrow blade, negating his enchantments and making him "mortal".

[rusty_shackleford]

The Witch King scene was a clever bit of subversion. It was not Éowyn that slew him, even though she delivered the last blow, but Merry stabbing him from behind with a barrow blade, negating his enchantments and making him "mortal".

This is what Tolkien himself implied in letter 210

The riders draw slowly in on foot in darkness, and do not 'spur'. There is no fight. Sam does not 'sink his blade into the Ringwraith's thigh', nor does his thrust save Frodo's life. (If he had, the result would have been much the same as in III 117-20:4 the Wraith would have fallen down and the sword would have been destroyed.)

Book itself:

So passed the sword of the Barrow-downs, work of Westernesse. But glad would he have been to know its fate who wrought it slowly long ago in the North-kingdom when the Dúnedain were young, and chief among their foes was the dread realm of Angmar and its sorcerer king. No other blade, not though mightier hands had wielded it, would have dealt that foe a wound so bitter, cleaving the undead flesh, breaking the spell that knit his unseen sinews to his will.

Note that he didn't have magical armor against anyone who wasn't a man(this is misinterpreting it): it was a prophecy of how he would fall, not an enchantment against men or somesuch. Eowyn could not have been the one who slew him, because she did not have the Barrow-Blade.

[Finarfin]

Feminists using Eowyn is no different from ****** pointing to Zevran in DAO: all it makes me think is that you can't have any "minority" representation if it ends up leading to this.

I know this is Off-topic but I just came across his ambush and I interrogated him and then slit his throat. I also killed Jowan because he poisoned Arl Eamon.

[rusty_shackleford]

Note that he didn't have magical armor against anyone who wasn't a man(this is misinterpreting it): it was a prophecy of how he would fall, not an enchantment against men or somesuch. Eowyn could not have been the one who slew him, because she did not have the Barrow-Blade.

I wonder how much the movie skipping over the barrows/Bombadil has to do with this misunderstanding

[rusty_shackleford]

Have them be mages.

I am not immune to female clerics

[Yankee Zulu]

About removing negative reviews on metacritic

https://www.eurogamer.net/metacritic-re ... ew-bombing

Review aggregation site Metacritic has spoken out in response to the ongoing review bombing of Dragon Age: The Veilguard by online commenters upset at the game's inclusive characters and themes.

[fkirenicus]

Note that he didn't have magical armor against anyone who wasn't a man(this is misinterpreting it): it was a prophecy of how he would fall, not an enchantment against men or somesuch. Eowyn could not have been the one who slew him, because she did not have the Barrow-Blade.

Well, the seer (don't remember who it was; an elf or an Arnorian dunadan?) was right no matter how one interprets the prophecy: no man could/would kill the witchking of Angmar.
But neither the halfling nor the woman are men in the gender-based interpretation of the word (which after all is quite common, except in Bioware's offices and far too many other places nowadays), so both are right - whether one considers it to have been Merry or Eowyn who killed him. I agree with you insofar as it took 2 - Merry to end the enchantment that made the nazgul immortal, but his arm was made useless in the process, so he couldn't kill the nazgul. Eowyn was the one who actually slew the monster, and her arm was also made uselsess in the process.
But without Merry's attack first, she wouldn't have succeeded.
They basically needed each other, no one of the two could do it alone.
And the same hand (Aragorn) healed them.
And it would not have been possible had not the hobbits been caught by the barrow wights. Which is why I detest most dramatization of LotR (though the radio version is OK otherwise) - that moment is of crucial importance to what is to happen later in the book/s. It is clearly stated that the daggers the hobbits find there are far beyond the ordinary, and hinted that they will prove of vital importance also, if memory serves.

[rusty_shackleford]

And it would not have been possible had not the hobbits been caught by the barrow wights. Which is why I detest most dramatization of LotR - that moment is of crucial importance to what is to happen later in the book/s.

Circles back to:

I wonder how much the movie skipping over the barrows/Bombadil has to do with this misunderstanding

The role Merry plays in it is almost always overlooked and I assume this has to do with most people not actually reading the books but just watching the movie adaptation.

[Dragoon]

Women in armour waving swords is said feminist ideology.

Woman in armor is not always feminism. Many medieval epics feature princess knights, such as Britomart in Faerie Queene (published in 1590) or Bradamante in Orlando Furioso (which was a continuation of Boiardo's unfinished poem published in 1495).

Granted, those princess knights are virginal, and their story involves protecting their own or another hapless maiden's virginity from ill wooers. And they return to traditional hierarchy at the end by getting married.

I won't delve too deep into the pre-Christian mythology since Amazons and Valkyries are already mentioned, but there is also Penthesilea from Trojan War epics, a "bad-***" Amazon queen who felled many warriors until Achilles defeated her. Woman warrior is a time-old male fantasy.

But feminism poisoned the entire concept and now it gives nothing but fatigue to most men (myself included). This trope needs to stop being portrayed in media for some time if it wants to regain its appeal.

[Reichspepe]

Feminists using Eowyn is no different from ****** pointing to Zevran in DAO: all it makes me think is that you can't have any "minority" representation if it ends up leading to this.

Eowyn and her story as well as the point of her story are also massively misunderstood.
To put it short she wasn't wanting to fight because she wasn't allowed to by and "do her part" as well just like them. She wanted to fight because she had no hope and wanted to die in battle which seemed more glorious to her then just getting captured and/or enslaved.
When she meets Faramir she regains that hope and it is presented as her having finally found her place and true meaning and belonging.

It annoys me to no end how people use her as an example of a well done "strong female character" when that was never the point of her and not what she's about at all.

[Reichspepe]

Note that he didn't have magical armor against anyone who wasn't a man(this is misinterpreting it): it was a prophecy of how he would fall, not an enchantment against men or somesuch. Eowyn could not have been the one who slew him, because she did not have the Barrow-Blade.

I wonder how much the movie skipping over the barrows/Bombadil has to do with this misunderstanding

In the movies, there is also the "feminist" angle of her, you don't have to interpret it that way, but the undertones are definetely there.

[rusty_shackleford]

But feminism poisoned the entire concept and now it gives nothing but fatigue to most men (myself included).

I do feel for people like(presumably) @PixiGreen who enjoy representation such as Eowyn when they now have to choose between Veilguard(ugly gender hybrids only!) on one side and us(no womyns!) on the other.
It has become so ridiculous that I'm just tired of seeing women in combat altogether, because it's propaganda — you can decide which is the egg and which is the chicken yourself, but it's obviously meant to be propaganda to make women think they're capable of fighting in war(they aren't), and meant to be "I am womyn hear me roar!!" feminist propaganda. I don't see either as healthy or good for society.


Reminds me of all the pre-invasion Ukraine feminist propaganda of how women would be the first line to defend Ukraine then all the women immediately fled.

[UltraFan123]

There's ways to incorporate female party members into your story without taking away from the fact they are women - making them magic users, empowered with divine might, or rogues that avoid fighting are always good picks. Making them archers is dumb because bows require a lot of upper body strength to operate.

Women should indeed remain at the back and only do support and/or long-range combat either with spells or crossbows, and if she is a rogue she can be part of the melee by using sneak-and-flee tactics with her daggers while the muscular dudes hack with their large swords and tank with their shields.

Funnily enough, modern feminism has pretty much pigeon-holed fantasy women into the warrior role, the ones we tend to see these days who aren't just muscle bros with tits are the rare ones. lol

[rusty_shackleford]

Non-human females of appropriate races are fine for frontline warriors in fantasy settings. Nothing says non-humans need to have sexual dimorphism like humans.

[Envuen]

I know you guys are busy discussing everything else but take a look at Veilguard's numbers. Only 65k peak playing yesterday and possibly even lower peak today, this seems like a quick drop!

https://steamdb.info/app/1845910/charts/

[UltraFan123]

Reminds me of all the pre-invasion Ukraine feminist propaganda of how women would be the first line to defend Ukraine then all the women immediately fled.

I know this shouldn't surprise me in the least but holy **** if it didn't made me lmfao.

Non-human females of appropriate races are fine for frontline warriors in fantasy settings. Nothing says non-humans need to have sexual dimorphism like humans.

Yeah I have seen some settings where the likes of trolls, dragons, spiderkins, and other types of insectoids as well as aquatic creatures have notable dimorphism were the female is physically larger than the male.

I am genuinely curious why these ideas aren't seen so commonly in the mainstream today since libtards enjoy seeing themselves and sympathizing with non-human monsters.

[cleansingcarnage]

I think there's a really important layer of nuance to characters like Eowyn that gets lost as soon as any kind of feminist critique enters the picture, and it's about motivations. Eowyn doesn't want to fight because she thinks she's just as good as a man in battle or because she exists to prove that the protection of men is unnecessary. She wants to fight because she cares deeply about the men around her and her people in general and would rather go into battle with them to face terrible odds than sit idly in the rear without anything constructive to offer.

What's important about her as a character and other warrior maiden type characters is the purity of intention involved; in spite of the fact that she faces more danger on the battlefield because of who she is, she is still so devoted to the cause of her people that she's compelled to forfeit her life for it no matter the odds.

And then, of course, there's important context in the fact that once the danger has passed, she doesn't try to take up a career as a soldier; she falls in love, gets married and has a family.

That type of character is a symbol in the same way Joan d'Arc became a symbol. No one thought Joan d'Arc had remarkable martial prowess or professionalism as an individual warrior, but she was fanatically devoted in a way that inspired hope and faith.

Of course, once you end up with battle lines in which half the soldiers are essentially sacrificial mascots, you start to look kind of misguided and sick as a culture.

[Oyster Sauce]

Orcs in LotR are basically level 1 lesser goblins. The 3' Hobbits regularly take out a bunch of them no sweat. For sure would be drafting women and male toddlers to battle them.

[cleansingcarnage]

There's ways to incorporate female party members into your story without taking away from the fact they are women - making them magic users, empowered with divine might, or rogues that avoid fighting are always good picks. Making them archers is dumb because bows require a lot of upper body strength to operate.

Women should indeed remain at the back and only do support and/or long-range combat either with spells or crossbows, and if she is a rogue she can be part of the melee by using sneak-and-flee tactics with her daggers while the muscular dudes hack with their large swords and tank with their shields.

Funnily enough, modern feminism has pretty much pigeon-holed fantasy women into the warrior role, the ones we tend to see these days who aren't just muscle bros with tits are the rare ones. lol

And this is something that has been said before, but the implication behind that is that women only have value in as much as they can be more like men.

[Roguey]

I do feel for people like(presumably) @PixiGreen who enjoy representation such as Eowyn when they now have to choose between Veilguard(ugly gender hybrids only!) on one side and us(no womyns!) on the other.

Too early to say whether every dev is going to follow Veilguard's lead. Avowed is certainly not looking as pozzed. KCD 2 also has the crossbow woman but probably isn't going much further than that.

Orcs in LotR are basically level 1 lesser goblins. The 3' Hobbits regularly take out a bunch of them no sweat. For sure would be drafting women and male toddlers to battle them.

otoh it's part of the lore that Elrond's wife was captured and raped by orcs and this traumatized her so significantly that she took the ship out of Middle-Earth.

[Unhelpful Contrarian]

Too early to say whether every dev is going to follow Veilguard's lead. Avowed is certainly not looking as pozzed. KCD 2 also has the crossbow woman but probably isn't going much further than that.

You have far more optimism then I will ever have. I expect it to get even worse in the coming years and I seen nothing to suggest otherwise.

[Roguey]

You have far more optimism then I will ever have. I expect it to get even worse in the coming years and I seen nothing to suggest otherwise.

Wokeness is here to stay, but they can definitely be more palatable about it. The Larian third act trick where it's all shoved into the parts that only 5-10% of players see, and so on.

[UltraFan123]

The more you look at this game, the better a gaming crash looks like lol

[Cipher]

Nowadays I kill Karlach everytime : the simps will say I lose a ton of content... which is like 3 cutscenes about a metal from Hell and 1 about Gortash.

I say I gain a peace of mind without an unimmersive Mary-Sue, a beautiful head to play ball with Scratch, a nice robe for my Shart monk and Wyll won't look like a horny mana-addict ****.

But to the point : I think it's ok to save scum, not just because you want to experience the most on a first playthrough (who knows if you'll do a second), but because you never know when a bug might hit you. I'd rather save time than waste time.

Also, I saw thr game peaked at 80-89k, hopefully it stays there. **** this game and devs (the one who held hostage the non-mentally ill devs at least).

I did this but with Astarion. As soon as he tried to suck my character's blood in the middle of the night. Everyone told me I missed out on the best companion character, the best written character in the entire game and the most emotional and best written questline. I don't care. My character is a Paladin and Astarion outed himself as an undead monstrosity and filthy bloodsuckers get the stake, as Lathander intended.

What you did is respect your roleplay. Many players (especially the female crowd, no offense intended to them) will prefer to forget roleplay when it suits them. Still, I don't know about you, but a guy that hold you hostage with a knife, then next night tries to drink your blood... nobody would even invite the ******* in the party on the first encounter. Especially if you fail the perception check.

Exactly. I passed the first perception check so I wasn't held with a knife but it already showed me as a Player that this Astarion character is shifty and not to be trusted. Then I see on his sheet that he is a rogue so I let it slide but I made a mental note that he is on notice for any underhanded fuckery. First time we rest and now he tries to sneak up on my character while sleeping and it also turns out he is a filthy bloodsucker? Hell no. Not on my watch.

[Xenich]

The more you look at this game, the better a gaming crash looks like lol

I would use the analogy of a forest fire, but when it burns everything down it enriches the soil for things to grow.

This industry has to be burned to the ground and all the toxic waste hauled out, new soil brought in and slowly cultivated back to a healthy growth, and that isn't just because of the faggotry/DEI, the industry is a cancer on all sides and needs to be completely removed.

[KOS-MOS]

Have them be mages.

I am not immune to female clerics

why is she brown ?

[Xenich]

OMG it looks like Planet Coaster 2 is the next smash hit in the industry! It is gaining on the Top 3 and may pass even the enormously successful Veilguard!!!!

Who knew that a Coaster game could be ground breaking GOTY material!!!!

Capture.PNG

[rusty_shackleford]

Have them be mages.

I am not immune to female clerics

why is she brown ?

You, too, can become 'brown' by going outside.
https://www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news/wo ... ed-n794006

(I can't because I burn. The curse of being the last true white man.)