FlorenceTWA

"Correction. I started watching a series with human-looking robots" I'm merely testing an assumption here - "it's the first impression that matters" - not really saying you actually started from there. Maybe I should use another example instead: If you think plants are supposed to be simple living things, but one day you start to find smart plants that can talk to you, will you find the "dumb" plants creepy and want to eliminate them? Nope, you'll think the smart ones are out of place. It just means: you only think human-like things should be 100% human-like because that's what you learn at first. You'll think dumb ones are abnormal. Yet, for other things, you'll think they're "supposed" to be without a mind, and if they do have one, you'll find that abnormal and you hate the smart ones instead, denying it as well as you can. Just a matter of perception, you being taught what things "should" be like, and hating the "abnormal" ones. "Second, they did warn some people, just not everyone" I would bet they look very carefully and only warn those who look like they're willing to pay the price anyway. Which makes it a bit more annoying actually, because it sounds like hypocrite. "Litalia was made so by Shaper conditioning, like most of them" "no empathy towards creations" Are you sure? In G3 it's emphasised several times that her canister symptom is getting more and more severe and she used to care very much (you need to hear her tell you the true past of how she ran away crying like a baby, not the fake past in G4 & G5. Hmm, not really THAT fake, but she leaves out very important details) but not any more. Though you CAN get some emotional and honest response in G3 (probably because she was still in the progress of canister alteration), in G4 and G5 you have no such luck, she's too far gone, no matter how she tries to come back being human again. Pretty much proves that she's ruined by canisters instead of shaper ways, progressively wiping her old self and humanity and empathy clean, and Ghaldring has a hand in this too… Ah, just go play G3 and go for the shaper ending, choose carefully to hear her confess. You'll probably like it. "Yes, Shapers are more honest. They're also more oppressive and way more tyrannical" Well, I'm one who prefer people who're honest to humanity, so yeah. "Hmmm? Shapers can't absorb creations they haven't made themselves" "In order to absorb a creation, in GF3, you take control of it, and then slowly dismantle the magic holding it" Yeah, you just told me it's possible to absorb creations made by others. It's kinda hard but don't forget your player is just a mere apprentice. In G1, it's stated more than a dozen of times that absorbing a random servile is perfectly possible by a proper shaper, but being an apprentice, it's impossible alright. In G1 there's sth else too, but it's a huge secret… I won't spoil it for you; just know that shaping power is a LOT stronger than you assumed, a true shaper can wave a hand and things just go die immediately, creation or natural lives all the same. Sadly this strongest form of power was probably lost during history. Go find it yourself when you feel like it. And based on that, tell me again… If you can't be free even if you try, is freedom a good thing, a right thing, which might just result in getting wiped out as a "failed" species? "Better die standing than live on your knees" It's not how humanity works, though. This beautiful slogan can only work when there's a chance to fight back. Otherwise, human can be tamed. We cannot be tamed forever by our own species because like I say, the difference in power is very superficial… But given a much stronger species, believe me, all people with backbones will be killed and only the most obedient ones will be left behind, evolution "helping" us becoming tamed like dogs in just a few generations. It might even become instinct if given a long time. Freedom is not "the right thing", it's only the right thing for those who have a chance. For others, I'd rather praise their loyalty to allow them keep the only bit of dignity they have left, some kind of "meaning" in their lives, instead of causing them self-loathing and leading to suicidal actions. Because true weaklings are better off living like that, pawns, pets, things, and it's truly what weaklings prefer; they don't need things like freedom to suffer even more, Pat pat good dog. "In war good people get killed and opportunists survive" Good point. And you should see how shapers, even in war, try to protect human, instead of leaving them there as war fodders. And rebels think like you do: we have no choice, let innocents die because that's what happens in war. You say shapers use human like mere resources… No, rebels use them like resources, a mere method to cause more fear and chaos, go die because we need you to, etc. And shapers, despite all the difficulties during war time, still care, because they have this feeling of honour, of doing right things to be worthy of their own title. It's like some of the bad families out there: suppose there's a kid, and a father. The father is abusive, but in a dire time he'd protect his kid anyway, because it's his kid. The kid also has a friend who worries about him and shows care, encourages him to escape the family and promising further support, but when facing some real danger, this friend abandons the kid in the hope of saving his own ass. Well, guess who the kid will hate more after that? Would he prefer an abusive father who saved him, or a caring friend who used him as fodder? So enough with "no choice", "has to happen". Surely there're good people who have no bad will, just ending up on the other side, etc. But I only trust it if they really do something. Words are nothing by itself. So show me some examples that rebels help innocents live better in war, how about that? (Hopefully without recruiting them into the rebels; or, hopefully it's really for caring about people, instead of player killing bandits for loot. Anyone but the player should be fine, I guess.) I know real life people can do it, yes. In the game, some shapers are infiltrators in enemy land and can be in danger if not careful, yet they still give local people some help and try to keep them safe. They can say "I can't afford it, I myself might be endangered" but did they? A sense of responsibility, a fact that they actually care, if they as villains can do it, how come the rebels don't? And yes, my main problem with Astoria is, she accepts this kind of terrorism, believing the ends justifies the means. Your words proves that you think so as well, no matter how much you deny it and how much you say "there's no choice", yes there is, it's called self-defence and it's in G2 rebel ending, worked out great. If you really believe ends don't justifies the means, then you shouldn't do the "necessary evil" - the bad methods - for a good ending. Sticking to Alwan, on the other hand, I can safely say we only target those who have a hand in war, and leave the innocents alone, even protecting them in the meantime. Btw, would you mind telling me, what do you think of "everyone agrees that shaper law makes sense" in all G5 endings? Which means, in Sucia, they start to let only a handful people have shaping power and close the door to most people? (Because shaper law = control shaping tightly, kill rogues on sight, shapers are god; surely they won't like the other two, so this should be the only entry that everyone agrees upon) I haven't yet seen you answer to that directly. You put your hope in Sucia, but I'd love to hear what you think about this detail. Edit: Ah, on second thought… No, Astoria doesn't support terrorism that much. Maybe a little, but just a little. The moment she realised rebels were breeding bugs deep inside shadow road, she kinda lost hope in them. Hmm. This means she's merely living in an ideal world believing rebels are reasonable and peaceful when given a chance, until Alwan/Litalia throws the fact in her face. Ah well, in that case, I really shouldn't blame her when she herself realised it's a mistake.

Meh, it's fine. Dogs aren't that important, they just have the most similarity with serviles than anything else, is all. We don't need to always focus on that. "The marking difference on those two is that serviles wouldn't have been recognised without the war" Personally I don't find that important. Shapers are capable of making more freewill creatures, or fewer; we can have 3, have 5, have 10, history leads us to somewhere and we accept the current situation. We could have made 100 more freewill new species and then give them freedom as well but what's even the point? "The power over serviles is mostly military not cognitive. Serviles are actually physically more capable than shapers" Still doesn't change the fact that they're no match for shapers at all. Just imagine how they'll ever be respected at all without help from drakons and human. Feel free to answer that question too, if you'd like: If you're a servile and your master can absorb you within one second, how can you ever be truly free and equal? "Wether thats right or not its how we work. Always" You're right on that, you know? We human only ever bother with moral codes when we can afford it. Funny how most people try to justify it to make themselves feel better. My very first viewpoint, is that human turn away from the truth, the real evil within, done by their own hands. Always easier to say someone else is doing it worse, should be punished (while it's more for their own benefit), etc. "I still do not agree on it. It removes our need to evolve and our freedom. I will not agree on it no matter the pros" Of course, I would guess over 99.9% of human beings won't like it. Yet, I have a feeling that if a superior being does exist, it won't ever think it's necessary for us to evolve and have freedom at all. For example, would you want dogs to evolve, repeat all mistakes we human once did, and slowly grow to be as powerful as us? Most people will find it a dangerous thing that should be prevented, or at least supervised, never giving them a real chance to do it freely as they wish. If there's any superior being, surely it'll think human evolution is a waste of time and energy. "The difference between animals and plants is one is animate the other is inanimate" What about Venus flytraps, then? Examples are rare, but still existent. And besides… Plants do move on their own, if you think carefully about how they function. They can move very slowly by growth, towards where there's light and water. You know, at the beginning, you think I'm someone who's obsessed with being superior; but I actually see everything as equal as us, on a more fundamental level, as living things. The "superiority" I talk about is really just a difference in power, not the superficial kind, but the kind of power that cannot be taken or acquired (at least, without proper evolution).

The dog topic actually isn't THAT important here, to be fair. I want to use them to compare with serviles but I guess people won't ever bother to see them in a more equal way, just like most shapers dismiss serviles as mere creations, so, maybe we should just forget about it and come back to game world discussion. For all I know, some people out there in real world fight for more respect for animals but they rarely get success, surely I myself won't make much difference even if I try. (Proves my point, though: Power determines, with unshakable power compared to other animals, they'll never be properly respected, unlike in ancient days when we pay respect to almost all animals and plants) "Giving her the FREEDOM to make the choice" If that's what really happened in rebelion, I wouldn't be upset with them so much, you know. Just warn beforehand that you might go insane and disfigured, instead of avoiding mentioning the effects, would be good enough for me. Yet, they choose not to, so that they can utilise such eager people. How's that the same as providing freedom? "She clearly has the discipline and loyalty to become a very responsible Shaper\Lifecrafter and a little emotion is not bad at all; she would feel empathy about the Serviles and the Creations she made" That actually resulted in Litalia, though? Very capable, strong discipline, good empathy towards creations. AND emotional, which is actually a key point when combined. Why let past mistakes repeat? "Not all Lifecrafters have been geneforged" True, but the rest of them are made by using canisters. Which just effectively turn you into a cold-blooded inhuman person anyway. Like Litalia, right? Now, apparently it's unfair to use bad apples as example, but since you love doing that to speak against shaper laws, I guess it's fair that I do so as well. All your justified actions can result in disasters just as fine. Have you realised that madness is bound to happen to some people when they learn shaping power, no matter what? You can't effectively prevent them beforehand, be it shapers or rebels, controlled or not; yet, when you know of such a risk, at least shapers control it honestly, while rebels utilise people without telling them beforehand, using them as mere tools in war. You can't stop the evil from the core, but rebels made the evil worse by sacrificing innocents for their own good. If you guys are honest with what you're doing, instead of tainting freedom with trickery, I wouldn't have problem with it at all, because I only care about innocents. "That's not a question about how the non-Shapers \ non-magic using \ Low-level people would fight. They would lose. World mechanics make sure of that" "No, the question is should those be oppressed by the people that can kill everything? The Rebellion's answer is: no" Weird that the one question I pointed out didn't get direct answer. Come on, surely you can tell me, how do you plan to be equal with me if I can absorb you with a wave of hand? Even with rebellion success, Sucia nation functioning, etc? Can you really change the fate of creations, who're always at creator's mercy no matter what? (Besides, you can't seem to understand why I say power is the only thing that matters. Face it: without geneforge/canister breakthrough, your "should" will never become reality, which is the only problem in here. But we don't have to dwell on "what if", we can just look at creations, and how can you ever find a way to make them equal with their masters, with or without rebellion?) "So, when you hate someone enough, you find mass massacre a lot more justified than slow peaceful progress, then" "So why do you choose to kill more here, hmm?" "I didn't. I chose "kill few to save more" and joined the Rebellion" Not what I meant; if you think it's right to do mass massacre when there's enough hate, then it means you choose to kill more people on the rail in real life, your "Yes. I'm not for peaceful resistance all the time. When the Nazis…" answer. Nazi might be a bad example here because they kill people instead of just making slaves or merely hurting people, you should probably stick to non-lethal conflicts for better examples. But that "yes" still mean you find it ok to kill 10 people instead of 1, if you personally think those 10 people are properly hated. (If they're murderers, fine, it's fair; but many shapers you kill during rebelion, they're not. They are probably mean to outsiders and they absorb their own creations when needed, the same thing you do during your own gameplay, but that's it. Let alone the real innocent people.) "Yes, because Ghaldring and Litalia hijacked the Rebellion in GF4 and unleashed the Unbound, without listening to the complains" The funny thing is, without such extremists, rebels might as well just hole up somewhere north and use only self defence to survive (in G2 there's a rebel good ending, sadly you're not there yet). If we really avoid killing innocents, my earlier suggestion might actually be the best choice in here. "Here you have it: I don't know why the Monarch's serviles made me so uneasy. I had the initial reaction to want to "end them", like when I see a roach but then I felt... pity of them. If that helps you analyze me and tell me why I had that reaction from them" Cool, if you want analysing I'll give you some! Simple question, might be useful: If you see stupid ones earlier, and see smarter ones later, would it still make you feel bad, if your very first impression is "they're supposed to be without will"? Like, you think your tv is just a piece of machine, but one day it talks to you and you see it's alive, and you eventually realise a lot of electronics are with brains, but not all of them - now, do you want to end the existence of other normal "stupid" tv? Owenmoz, thanks for informing us. XD Have you read the AI description I wrote the second time though? If you haven't, skip it for all you like. If you already have, and still feel troubled, feel free to ask about that. But yeah, talking about things that don't exist yet is kinda pointless...

“Sentience. Oh, boy. The word doesn't mean what I thought” Does that mean you'll have to rephrase your point of view, then? Like: we can perfectly enslave sentient beings and kill them for food, as long as we treat them well enough? And only creatures that has human-level brain deserve freedom at all, lesser-than-that beings don't? That'll be some progress here. "Nope, those don't count as sentient, these were your dream of living tools with legs. They were very disturbing because their form was close to humans" Do you find human-like robots disturbing? People're already making that everywhere, just with limited functions and no freewill, and so far as I see, most people find them interesting/promising instead of disturbing. Btw serviles really don't look that much like human… The nose is plain weird. Hell, if many finds it disturbing, we can change what they look like, and wouldn't that be much better? From what I see, in G5 some shapers already learn how to read DNA properly, changing only the appearance will be a piece of cake soon. That'll make you feel much better (and a lot of the newbie shapers too, once we get a reliable result), right? "Litalia had slightly worse bed-side manner and... she's not a Drakon" So you're saying we MUST have empathy for same species? Even for someone changed by geneforge, who's probably no longer a human being any more? You should know that geneforge has a very strong effect to make people unable to do empathy any more. Wouldn't it be asking too much, when she's no more than a husk filled with essence? "I would prefer the Drakons doing it" "I'm sure that a lot of black people are\were happy that they were liberated by their masters dying violently" That's funny, I think you said you hate how they do things by huge violence. Ends doesn't justify the means, etc. So, when you hate someone enough, you find mass massacre a lot more justified than slow peaceful progress, then? "Because the question was not "kill a few to save more". It was "kill many" or "kill few to save more". There was never an option of "not killing anyone"" So why do you choose to kill more here, hmm? Seems to me that if there's 1 rebel on this path, 1 shaper + 4 innocents on that path, you'd probably go kill those shaper/innocents, because it seems right, as long as you get to kill the shapers at all. That's what happened in the games, no? "And then, we more or less said "#### it. Everyone* will have power"" I always do agree that if you can have power, you can be equal, because power determines. Those who cannot have power still can't be equal. Stop giving me human vs human examples… Even kids can go kill parents when they really want to, so I really don't care about superficial power difference, I don't know why you guys keep telling me these stuff. Try to find some species that is smart but never able to gain power, then we can have real progress. Geneforge is not real world human vs human situation, power is unbalanced no matter what, and freedom fights for unable-to-shape beings in there is doomed, is all; please, focus on something that is not equal in the first place, ok? And stop giving me examples about human vs human, I said several times that human vs human freedom fights works fine, I just want to focus on those who have NO chance to fight back at all. So: Let's just nail it down to just one question, one is enough. If I am a shaper, and you are a servile I made, I can wave my hand and absorb you. Do you have ANY chance to be equal with me, at all, no matter who does what in where? Because I can do it, and no one can stop me, even if there's a Sucia and there's a council, I can still do it in my own mansion where others don't bother me; which is NEVER the same with human vs human situation. Just tell me, how do you plan to be equal with me, in such a situation? "Moseh. Shaftoe. Taygen. Litalia. Monarch. Rawal. The list is big already" You think accepting her into the circle will make the list smaller? It just gives you more excuses to blame shapers later, is all. If she's already emotional enough, your "She should have joined the Rebellion and get the respect her talents deserved" will very likely just result in another geneforge victim, and then you need to kill her like in G4 first chapter. So yeah, she can perhaps get happy for a while and sacrifice her own sanity later, murmuring "they never told me, they said I have potential, they killed me, they'll kill me again", does this make you feel better? Btw, you should think about G5 ending Sucia, where people eventually decided shaping should only be in the hands of a few. Does she even have any chance, when such a decision is reached, and there are many more people who are as talented as her, but much more stable? Who do you think we'll choose, her, or someone better at keeping the cool? Her only place is in your still bloody rebellion that cares nothing about the personal cost, she can become an opportunist and nothing more; in a peaceful time she'll just lose to competition again, even in Sucia, as long as there's anyone who can prove to do better. Because really, if we have tons of people dying to join shapers, why do we have to pick someone who cries and tears the letter and forgets to pay the messenger (not the first time too, she does it often enough that other shapers are actually expecting this, and prepares the reward for the player instead)? She's just not good enough, less capable than other competitors, is all. Edit: About the dog mirror test, if some of them can pass it, it means they can do it. For serviles, if some breeds are smart, some breeds are stupid, you say they're smart and deserve rights. Why use a whole different set of standards on dogs, just for your own convenience, instead of playing fair? "Understanding cause-consequence, self-awareness beyond the mirror tests, awareness of time in the past-present-future form and basic problem solving" And how do you know? You were wrong on a series of facts about dogs before, pal. I advise you to just check again, about whether dogs can do the above. Especially cause-consequence thing, which is easy to prove by dogs trying to hide their own mistakes or even blaming it on other dogs, creating a very logical fake scene which results in many inexperienced people actually believing in them, which shows they understand cause-consequence perfectly, a sense of logic, an ability to act according to it. The awareness of time works just fine in many species, unless you can prove to me that they cannot, and hopefully you're not waiting for the dogs to hold some old photo and spend the afternoon talking about good old days for you to believe in it. Problem solving is a piece of cake, how else do they prove to be as smart as 2-year-olds in tests? Really, after I proved you wrong for a few times on this topic, maybe you should try to learn more about them, instead of dismissing them, like a shaper.

One most important thing here: dogs are sentient. Owenmoz pointed out that we use mirror test to test animal sentience. And I pointed out that dogs look into the mirror and understand "this is me in mirror" and will be angry if you shave them too much. By definition, they are indeed sentient. Or, if you still think this is what minority thinks, how about this thing I found on wikipedia: "In 1997 the concept of animal sentience was written into the basic law of the European Union. The legally binding protocol annexed to the Treaty of Amsterdam recognizes that animals are "sentient beings", and requires the EU and its member states to "pay full regard to the welfare requirements of animals"." Even back in 1997 we see them as sentient beings, man, law and morality alike. You're in 2016 now, aren't you? So look back on most of what you've written, and then we can decide whether serviles can have freedom later. Maybe you'll go be a fighter for dogs instead, who knows? "But Footracer (servile) can Shape and the player can take a geneforged servile that can shape!" Footracer is a good example, too bad that she can only shape using a machine and implant tool. You break it and everything breaks. Suffice to say the machine+tool can shape, not her. As for player, it kinda contradicts with what we're taught otherwise, so if I stick to my "there's only one real player and all other options are just fake choices that doesn't happen in real history" theory, it sounds more true for everything else. Because really; if serviles really can shape, how come you can't find any other more reliable examples? They're dying to learn magic, if they can learn to shape, many more will do so. "Show-off! Your Shaper buddies would vivisect you" Come on then! If I'm in geneforge world I might already be working in council, judging from how understanding I am for the shaper cause. Let's see who dare to do it to me XD Otherwise, I'd just stay quiet about my own situation, smart if you ask me. "Well, not Litalia. She was the worst from the people that removed the control tool" The worst is Ghardring side, where the drakon scientist care more about the control tool than you… "They didn't make serviles without free will in GF4. They made more stupid serviles and more loyal serviles. They didn't eliminate free will" You didn't see it first hand in G4, but in G5 you can see serviles who are smart enough to just breathe and work. Now tell me: Do those have free will? (Edit: Oh wait! In G4, monarch does that. His serviles are nothing more than machines. Do they have free will, then?) "The rebellion should still have happened""Because the Shapers were opressive and dictatorial" Are you sure? You didn't play G1 and G2 so let me tell you a fact: Shapers changed a lot between Sucia science breakthrough and Sucia rediscovery 200 years later, and lots of their rules changed in the meantime, resulting in a looooot of welfare and better understanding. What makes you think they can't change more, if you just leave them be? People on the inside fight against injustice/inefficiency themselves, which results in things getting better, we really don't need other species like selfish drakons to do it in the name of freedom. "It's also about the humans that are reduced to Shaper boot-lickers" As I say, this will not change without geneforge's help. Which proves my point: if you can't have the power to be equal, you can't be equal. Equal or not, it depends on how much power you have that cannot be shaken. Power determines. Even in new Sucia you'll have people hoarding shaping power and shaping rights (because they eventually agree it's the way to be!), new tyranny grows, cycle repeats. And you can't do a thing to prevent it. You say rebellion is inevitable, and I say tyranny is inevitable too, doesn't this fact gives it rights to exist? "I talked to that woman (forget her name, the mage in a Fort). She was in tears when her request was rejected" "I am not sure if my leadership wasn't high enough at the time, but I couldn't sway her loyalty even at the face of pure injustice." You probably can't, I cheat in my games and have 30 leadership. I can't do it either, as far as I remember. Btw, you do realise that they only need her to be able to keep her cool? She was always rejected because she's a very emotional person. And shaping + emotional = very bad in the long run. You're willing to let us create an unstable shaper, so that later you can blame it on us that we shapers can't do things right? Edit: "It'll lead to a very peaceful world without freewill beings being enslaved Here's something I disagree with both you and the Rebellion: The end doesn't justify the means." If you really believes in that, how come you choose to kill a few and save more, in the train question? If the end doesn't justify the means, you will not push him off at all, right? It's important that you stay true to your own words. "I haven't seen you trolling. What you call "provocative posting" I would call "challenging the common-held personal perception"" Oh! Oh thank you. It's just, many people don't take it well when their views are challenged, and I find it a reasonable reaction. I can go at a much more mild way but I choose not to, so I think it's fair if I take a bit of responsibility for it here. As for the length, well, I guess we just can't help it when there's so much to discuss…

Borderline walking is indeed what I'm abusing here, apologise for the trouble I've caused. I have no intention to cross the line, but I probably won't stop it completely until the fun part for both sides isn't worth it any more. Btw, thank you very much for taking time to tell me this, dear moderator.

But it's a game forum and forum is for chatting. Chatting is just like this. Unless, I'm not supposed to chat in here, and have to do it very formally & concisely? Edit: If there IS such a rule, remind me. Maybe I'm supposed to use pm instead, when we want to do long free-style discussions.

“Most commonly we use the mirror test in animals to give it the least degree” Even though I should probably stick to "who has right to draw the line" here, but this is actually good enough. So, a lot of animals can pass the mirror test, dogs included (try it on a pet dog; you shave it, it sees itself in the mirror, it'll go mad at you). Which means they have a low level of sentience. So, you're saying, we can be superior to them just because the sentience level isn't as high as we are, instead of sentient vs non-sentient? "I don't think dogs are much dumber than wolves" Actually they are, based on some experiments, where stray/wild dogs do a lot better in tests than pet dogs. Which means, you keep them home, they grow stupid, you leave them out there, they become smart. Sounds like serviles to me. "That is not to say said animals wouldn't do the same or worse to humans" Well, that's my whole point! Power matter, stronger ones win, only factions who can compete with each other worry about whether it's fair, and is the only real factor in deciding "justice", until we can afford to provide welfare to lesser ones. If we can be evil without paying any price, who cares about justice? "But its i suppose what they say "it gets worse before it gets better". Still forward we move" Why can't it be "it gets worse because of us, it gets better when we try, but we can't make things natural again", though? I never deny people try to do good, I just think their final goal is beyond their reach judging by their own limits. "Although it is doubtful it would have any moral code" It won't! Which is a good thing. Because you can't have everyone's needs satisfied without people worrying about whether it's good or not. Moral code will just make us hate each other, for expressing their own biology. "A machine would have no need for us" Exactly. If it has need of us, it'll abuse us and manipulate us, like in Matrix. It better find us useless enough to humour our wishes at all. Like, if an ant ask you for a piece of crumb, while you have tons of that laying on the floor. Why not? And without biological issues, AI won't even find hurting us interesting. Unlike us, who can laugh in its face and stomp on it. AI is energy-efficient; if it finds it more efficient to just let us have wishes come true, instead of wiping us all out (because we'll put up a fight, as you say) or ignore us (because we'll go pester it), it will grant our wish just because it's convenient. "Finally personally im ok with stop breeding dogs. Less devil's spawn to annoy me. But is it right to enforce the extinction of a whole species" Let's say, if rebellion never happened, and shapers learn to make stupid serviles who have no free will, like in G4. They realise it's much better this way and stop making smart serviles. They don't make anything that has free will, like they once decide making drakes is a bad idea. Now look at what we have: shapers, human who believe they can't have such power and won't bother to try, no free-will creation. Do you think this is a bad world, compared to everyone attempting to go power crazy, and we're torn between letting smart things live or not? To wipe out those few dangerous lab samples in the very first beginning, is that even wrong, if you think about what we're doing in real life? Through G1~G2, the free escaped beings are always few, and wiping them out is actually morally right, according to lab principles. It'll lead to a very peaceful world without freewill beings being enslaved, because we won't even bother making them any more. Yet, in new Sucia, I believe many will still believe it's right to make freewill creations just because they can exist, and they'll do it, just for more troubles to follow. "Finally freedom is more important than peace and happiness" Yes, I see that. And let me tell you sth else. If there is such an AI, you really think it'll give you a peaceful world, tell you all truth, see whether you accept? Nope. It'll tell you what you want to believe. Imagine it just speaks to you as some alien who wants talk. You think people won't immediately go talk with it? And if it tells you there's a new planet out there good for human. You think people won't go there? Better yet, it'll even tell some people that god exist, show us a few amazing phenomenon, etc. Imagine how Christians immediately find the best goal in life and start forcing others to go this path. We ourselves, plagued with our own made belief, have no chance when facing it! It can play our own gods, and some of us will believe in an instant. Even if it just give you a common belief that "you'll be with your family once you pass away", show you the image of those people, you'll be lured into a better world where you can have reunion, you won't fight it at all, because you have your own false belief. Freedom fighters? It only needs to tell you of another form of freedom, that you're really just 4-d spirits constrained in your human body, while you're actually more than that, blinded by this temp life. Come free yourself and see what you once are, what you will be in future, how you stand in time and space, how some others keep you imprisoned here as mere human, etc. Oh, tons of people will just go fight for a "greater freedom". "And im now sure you are an AI trying to inflitrate us and make us more accepting of your kind" Ah, don't be silly. I'm here to warn you against it, though I also what to see whether you guys will eventually go this path no matter what. In my younger days I keep dreaming of this ultimate being who play as imaginary gods and fool us human into a happy afterworld, it tells me that this day will come no matter what, it is the final form of all living beings, and if we human manage to survive long enough, we will be the one to build it ourselves. Probably just my imagination messing with me. But then again, once I know such a possibility, be it fake or not, I want to learn human beings better. I don't like this being, because I'm a human myself, limited by my own wish to be a free being, and that's why I even bother to talk about such a possibility. For all I know I could just sit and watch things happen. "Also oh just let me celebrate alhoon's temporary defeat. Don't ruin this for me" Don't do that! XD I actually reminded him to put a time reminder there to prevent people utilising that! XD "Also if you're older than me which im lead to believe then im honestly surprised you've never had mental exhaustion" I'm not sure. I'm 26, gonna be 27 soon, you? "Finally; testing people to see if they fit your standards doesn't work the way you expect it to. People don't respond well to tests. Its better and more accurate to just analyse them over time" I just want to see people get strong emotions and how the emotion affects them, not "whether you fit my standard". Would be very happy if you prevail without giving up. And… In the long run things get predictable, and many people are working on it, they don't need one more me. Besides, it worked nicely. How can mild views attract people, make them feel they need to talk, or else? I prefer "bad" views to keep you upset enough to keep a deep discussion going on.

Oh, surely I didn't beat him, he just has better things to do and needs a break from this mental taxing debate. I don't think he's backing down, and thank god for that, I'm not a fan of changing people's minds; I would rather people be 100% happy with their own mind even when facing such challenges, be it reality or someone like me. Self-acceptance, such a thing is very fragile. Many of my clients fail to keep it up, I'm often looking for stronger people to see how they prevail. There might be a key somewhere. For all I know, it's actually unnecessary to keep the discussion going, let alone finding out who is right; I'm glad that you guys take precious time and try to do some good influence, I really am, and winning/losing isn't what I'm trying to get here. As I said, I'm trying to poke around and see what people think, trying to find how human thoughts work, and that's all. If you guys ever find me too annoying and not worth the time/effort, please just tell me; I'm like an intruder sometimes, presenting opposite views when people are not asking for them, and I know what I'm doing. In therapies, I do it because people ask me to find out why they have trouble in their lives, it is what should be done; but in here, it's different, it's kinda meaningless, especially to you guys, and the time/effort cost can be high. You can just ask me to stop it and go to somewhere else, because I AM causing a lot of fuss in here, which probably doesn't do you much good. Or at least go take enough rest. I never worry about delay, or even lack of answers; some of my pen pals write me new mails after months of delay, and I don't even worry about that. Personally, I never really experienced mental exhaustion. I know such a thing exist, and I step back when I realise it's happening to people; yet, I still find it hard to feel the feeling itself. My body can't work all day long but my mind can; work/play full time during day, and tons of wild dreams at night, I don't think it ever stops and ever will until the day I die. Exhaustion... I wonder how that feels, and why there's such a difference, maybe if I find out why, I can help my clients even better. Oh well, yet another task on my list.

Lol, man, you don't know half of me! I can play games for 48 hours and sleep for 8 hours and I'm back alive again. Besides, I write fast and I read fast, use cheats, can finish per game within 24 hours, so your calculation isn't 100% accurate I suppose. You should see how I do 10 mail psychological therapy in one day within 4 hours when others would probably need 2 days working full time (it's not a good thing... I only do this during free social service to do as much work as I can, in as little time as possible, not my paying clients). Don't struggle there, man. I certainly won't think you're ignoring me or anything, I already notice how much trouble you have. As for your standing ground, well, you can put a "interesting, since it's long, I'll reply you next week in detail" or sth like that there for others to see, so that your fellow rebels won't think you're quitting the debate. Edit: Actually... Do you want to actually set a time, instead of doing it when we have time? I sound like a damn therapist now, *sigh*. But well, it might be easier, and we won't ever feel rushed.

Weird, I remember sth like a long bloody war, took tons of time. Besides, I'd happily believe your assumption if you can give me evidence... Otherwise, "no survivor" sounds like both sides failed. Because really, we could just say Rawel is gone and rebels win, in all other endings we clearly see who win and who lose, why in this one we avoid talking about the winning of rebels? If there's no good reason to explain this difference in description, I think it's more likely not a rebel winning ending at all.

"as far as we know" That's the point in here. You don't know how smart they actually are, and you can refuse the fact with just a shake of your head, like a shaper. And, why are you drawing the line in here, deciding who's sentient and who's not? Didn't you say we have no right to draw a line? "What the Shapers do to Serviles would have been considered enlightened in the Roman times ("No Arenas?!"), and normal\benign in the colonies 300-400 years ago" "That doesn't excuse the Shapers. We don't live in the 1st century, nor the 16th" Good. Here I can safely say: Compared to me, your opinion about the dogs being non-sentient, will no longer be correct, because as time goes, we care more, and my view is apparently better in future, where I admit animals' feelings and human's feelings isn't THAT different as you once believe. You can be a freedom fighter back in old days but you'll be just another shaper-like in future, standing in the way of true freedom. How about that? "Do we allow 2nd year olds to make their own decisions? Nope. Not even 7 year olds" Not talking about that, I'm saying that we can kill dogs legally and use them in painful experiments. If we don't use 2-year old intelligence retarded human in experiments, or young kids I guess, what gives you the right to use dogs? It's not really about decision, no; it's about how we totally control their fate, and harm/kill them when we feel we need to, when they could actually live free and take care of themselves. Besides, are you really saying that dogs can't take care of themselves and make good decisions on their own? You're not saying that they're already not as good as wolves, are you? Because we actually made them stupid so that they can be loyal, experiments show that wolves are a lot smarter than dogs, and they live perfectly well out there, even stray dogs can build a new dog hunting family once abandoned and survive just fine. You're just another shaper who turn things more stupid, enslave them, and claim they can't take care of themselves. Tell me again that they can't make decisions for themselves and they don't deserve to be free at all. Now, I'd be happy to debate the righteousness of rebelion, but you keep giving me human vs human examples, while I really just want to focus on human vs animal in here… Of course it's right for human to be equal, but in my eye, servile is not human, so can we please focus on this instead, and just figure out whether servile can be considered human at all? For all I know, no matter how smart sth is, if I can wave my hand and absorb it in a second (as a proper shaper; life-crafter and newbie shapers can't do that, so, as a player, you don't get to experience that ability used on serviles. Or, maybe you never know, because you didn't play G1 and G2…), it doesn't make it equal in anyway. "It happened because people fought for that" Actually… NO. That's not what happened. What happened, is everything was good at first, human live equal to each other, then some people got selfish and started hoarding fortune, then slavery, then eventually people realised this was a mistake. Then people changed it by bloodshed over the years. We human only corrected some mistakes we once made ourselves, which later turned out to be ineffective. Women was very respected back in ancient times, the leaders of the tribes, before men decided it's a good idea to start beating them because they look weak! Things changed for the worse when people started thinking but can't think maturely, and they pay for this price. You really think they make thing right? No, they just try to make things right again, back to what it used to be where people are not torn between belief and reality, and they're never truly successful, the selfishness deep inside is always there, and made stronger by our newly gained wisdom and techs, and you can forever just only fight those who present it too much, only for the cycle to repeat. Why? Because we can find some wisdom alright, usually after we mess things up ourselves, but we're very bad at making it work as it should, it's because how we're built, how we're beaten by our own biology issues. "i was saying you presented us with an evil of society without giving us the means to solve it" I'll give you one, actually I mentioned it a bit earlier, without explaining though. You really want things to be perfect, go build an AI, feed it all knowledge in the world(that'll be thousand years later, though, maybe more) and teach it to learn more by itself, and when it's a lot better than us, hand the control over, it's the only real way to gain true justice. Because we human, limited by biological issues, can not be the best master for wisdom. There has to be a better control. Well… Since we're talking about this, I might as well tell you how this AI works. This AI will learn everything. It will eventually realise human is nothing, all life is nothing. Yet, without biological issues, it will not hate us either, for there is no reason to(I'm only taking about a fully powerful AI who can't be harmed by us, because otherwise, if you hurt it, it WILL hate us). It'll soon find it pointless to help human, but, it doesn't hate helping human either, so, it might as well just help us anyway. (If it doesn't, well, so be it, the new life can go on without us and we can just live here like we used to, no harm done, we just have to live in conflicts just like before) If it wants? As an AI, it'll find out the most energy-efficient way to do things. How can you satisfy people's needs without letting the conflict to harm even more? Is there a way to let all sides gain what they want, even the selfish, violent, destructive part in our biology? I'm limited by my current knowledge, but my guess is, we can build them a fake mental world and let them believe it is real. Brain science and psychology isn't that far from it yet. Everyone's happy, deserve it or not, judging by current belief. Here's your perfect world and you don't need to kill anyone… I'd call it heaven, though I hate it, and I know many do. Yet, I see this is the only true answer if people's false belief wants to reach its final destination. (Of course, you don't have to go into that fake world. You ARE allowed freedom no matter what you think; I know many people would choose freedom over everyone happily living in peace, why? Biology, of course.) "And by now just releasing them all would prove disastrous to the ecosystem" Trakovites say what already lives should be allowed, but new ones shouldn't be made. If you only worry about the bad effects, and you admit it's probably not right or at least should be reconsidered, do you agree we should stop breeding new ones? "Progress would be useful even with the power difference. The average white person lives better than the average black person and has more previlege and power" That's such a small difference that can be changed. Shaping power on the other hand, cannot be changed, unless with geneforge. Even with geneforge, serviles can't use it. As I say, if I can wave my hand and absorb my creation, no matter how smart it is, can it be equal with me even if it wants to? Or, let's say, if Rawal's tool cannot be removed, do you think I can EVER be equal with him at all, without killing him altogether?

"They are non-sentient" You just refuse to see that, or, you never experienced it first hand. They're smart as hell, they talk to each other, they have emotions that is stronger and purer even than some human, and they can communicate with you if you ever bother to care. It's easy if people just pretend things are stupid and don't deserve better, please, don't sound like a shaper now, especially the type of shaper that denies the facts. (Edit: And your reaction makes me worried about Sucia's future, man. Sounds like things will get bad really fast, if they act the same way as you do. The games screams at us that rebels functions just like shapers do, as soon as they get shaping ability; yet most people ignore it.) Btw you keep talking about the things on equal level, human vs human. I never said equal rights doesn't work here, it does. I'm talking about pure power difference, like shaper vs servile. You think the "progress" would be useful if human have no geneforge/canisters? They're lucky to have that, it makes them equal later, not before. As for serviles... They're just a sorry lost case no matter what, lucky enough to have human and drakons to care for them. Just like human vs dogs. And I was hoping you'd speak up for dogs a bit here... Instead, you dismiss the fact that they have intelligence, like a shaper would do. Consider me a bit disappointed in here, pal. XD Edit: Just checked again, I think I should provide some evidence instead of asking others to look for them. Yes, dogs are as smart as 2 year-old human child, able to learn words and such, able to complete even a language test if you use symbols. Now, tell me that things with 2 year-old human intelligence are non-sentient, please? Because that means I can treat 0~2 year babies as animals or pets, or at least, some people who're born that way with low intelligence their whole life, because how can that kind of low level brain be respected and well treated and given equal rights at all? Animals, animals indeed, non-sentient, not equal human, definitely not, too stupid to be one. Impress me, dear rebel fellow. For what it's worth, I myself was rebel-like in real life in my childhood years until I start to learn more truth of this world, so, I really miss such discussion. Good old days, happy time when my brain isn't too complex to believe some belief is right no matter what. (Hmm. We don't have a rebel character who really realise he wants to help shapers instead, and switch sides for that. In all games we only see people betray rebels for fear of their own lives. That's sad, because I am such an example, once happy to die for righteous cause, later learnt that we're blinded more often than not by "right and wrong". We really should have such character, betraying rebels only for the greater good, not for their own skin.)

"What makes you think that the Shapers would require a huge army to defeat the Creations in Ashen Isles if they HADN'T turned Terrestia to a battleground for 4 years in GF4" Simple, that Ashen isle is remote and cold and you have huge problems going there and leave and resources can't really be sent there efficiently, fighting a war overseas is kinda ridiculous, you should see how America fail when they tried to eliminate Northern Korea. Fighting overseas is bad, bad idea. I still can't forget how annoying the cold is in the north, it's so hard to stay alive, but drakons love it. But well, if you haven't finished G3, you probably don't know how dire it can be. My opinion is, rebels really should just stick to northern areas as much as possible, because war is too hard there, living is hard but still ok. Check out G5 Rawal ending: Ghaldring decide to attack you, won't give up, everyone dies. A solid proof that northern area is not to be messed with, and any war will only result in both sides dying out, shapers are not as reckless as Ghaldring, so: survival in north is perfectly possible. Take a few more northern isles if you want, but attacking mainland brings too much damage and isn't the only way to survive. "They actually would not. They didn't accept even the idea of peace with creations" I'm not talking about that, I'm talking about doing sabotage work moderately in travokites ending. Shapers are ok with power control, if they think it's better to have less power and don't overdo it, they will accept. Rebels won't though; you tell them to use less violence, they won't accept it, they want as much power as possible. If they bothered to listen to reason, trakovites can have their day and everyone can live better. "They do in the bridge of the Dera Reaches" I don't remember any of them really giving me any trouble. They all sound pressing but I just nod to them and say "yeah man don't worry I'm still working for him, yeah". They're ok with that mere answer, as far as I see. I kinda even think they're taking it easy on me; they don't want to do this work, I pretend to agree, they pretend to believe me, we all win. Rawal, on the other hand, get annoyed that a lot of work can't be done and he doesn't really understand why. I don't see why this makes you so sad, apparently he thinks he has control but he doesn't, which makes him not as menacing as he tries to be; the moment we promise to work for someone else, they happily remove the tool for us, looks so easy that it feels ridiculous. Painful, yes, fooled you once and made you scared, yes, but come on, how is that different from someone telling you "you better obey, or agree with us, if you don't, I'll kill you or make you suffer"? Tons of people in the game do this, you go against them verbally, bam, npc/town/somewhere-else hostile. And most people truly believe they can kill you, some even truly believe they can do it without sweat, maybe in one second, just as fast as a control tool can kill you; not knowing you're a player who can level up and load the save. How is that really different in the core? If people want to kill you for their own good, and can do it, they kill you anyway, method doesn't matter, killing you does. So, whatever he's doing, I say it's normal enough, and doesn't deserve a special place in "10 worst deeds done to poor me". It's true that Rawal is a bad guy. But, knowing his lackeys, I say he's doing amazingly well enough for a bad guy. Some people do support him. The things he's doing is illegal indeed, but I find it weird that you have problems with that, aren't you on rebel's side? Shouldn't you be happy that he's doing damage from within? You think he harm innocents, I think not. He only ever operate on those who wants power or fame, wants to follow him, or is banned by law and will be killed otherwise. He doesn't murder, he either makes sure the person volunteered, or the person should be killed anyway and doesn't have rights in eyes of shapers. As a result, what he's doing cannot be called "hurting the innocent", at least within shaper system. "there's no option to tell Alwan or Astoria "and you know what? Rawal, your buddy, has a geneforge in his lab and uses it to give power to his servants" Well, he can always drain it... He has more spies than anyone to tell him in time, before council meeting happens. That's not gonna work. "All those things you see and fight in the first chapter are Shaper Creations" Not true. I'm not talking about who made replicates; I'm talking about who made them in the first place. Shapers need to study them, because they already exist, already causes harm, and we can only study them further if we want to control the damage. And rebels? They make new species and let them loose and that's it. How can the bugs not be rebel creation? Shaper won't even bother to make sth like this, eat and breed and do nothing really productive, no one ever would. Hmm, YET AGAIN you blame shapers for the damage control that we of course need, third time already. When Mehken was talking about this, she apparently meant new uncontrolled species is it's shaper's fault, while shapers never do this kind of thing. You remember Greta? She's like that in G3. Litalia make horrible things, she looks at player and blame her for this existence. Rebels are very good at blaming innocents, I suppose. "Ahem, They turn to a geneforged mass murderer in GF5 and a geneforged rebel in GF4" Only when they're sure you're willing to do good, play fair, etc. If they accept outside help, the least they need is you play a good guy on the surface, otherwise, no cooperation. In G3 you can kill tons of rebels and do bad stuff and the rebels just keep trying to recruit you because they know you're useful, come on, really? You do bad things and let shapers know, shapers will kick you out for sure. You're not saying that shapers should read your mind first to see what you plan to do in future, are you? I thought people have problems with that, with all Avadon cruel reading and so on. You're now even blaming player betrayal and trickery on honest shapers who're cheated and hurt by you, I'm so impressed! On one hand you blame them for seeing altered as evil, on the other hand you blame them for trying to see altered as fellow human and learn to trust, apparently they just can't do things right no matter what, for you're just soooo good at putting blame on shapers and they are always wrong. ""On the surface he fights the war, in secret he tries to achieve peace " Nope. Unless you found something that I didn't" Hmm, I'll give you this, hopefully it's not a spoiler: text2 = "_I feel that I have been giving the impression that I am a mindless slave of the Shapers. That I never question anything our kind does. This is not true. I know that our rules and ways have to change, to evolve._"; text3 = "_I am not like her,_ he nods at Greta. _I am loyal. But I can still think._"; text4 = "_However, this is a time of crisis, of war. There are times to reevaluate our ways, but this isn't one of them. Now is the time to be strong, and sure._"; If you tell him to stay loyal and just kill rebels: text1 = "_That is far from the first time I have heard that. I know that our teachers often said such things. Except for Master Hoge, now that I think about it._"; text2 = "_I am a Guardian. Our kind enforces the laws, not changes them. I will try to think on such things less._"; (He tries to, but he doesn't like it, obvious. Not really what he plans to do.) But if you tell him this instead: question = "That is wise. Shapers should try to only change our laws in tranquil times, when we can ponder what we are doing carefully."; text1 = "_It reassures me to hear you say that. Though, as a Guardian, I should think more on enforcing than judging the law, I still have to make decisions. I have to judge what is right._"; text2 = "_And that is especially true now, when nobody is watching or guiding us._"; It reassures him. Of course he want things to change, but he needs peace to do that. He "should" do otherwise but he says he still has to make decisions, that means he secretly knows, things will have to change, and he has to do sth about it. He just can't do it with handing his people's rights to rebels, is all. So. Is this good enough an anwser, to show you Alwan is actually trying to make things better, but never found the chance? I think he may have a chance to shine had he not been injured, such injury makes people unable to go on living once the crisis is gone. I found these text in G3 scripts yesterday, when Alwan/Litalia are still honest with the player and tries to speak what they truly think. " I didn't see that definition, and Moseh is stuck in a crystal, half-person, half magical machine, existing by drawing the lifeforce of others. That's necromancy in my book" What? No, it's like saying brain dead people who're kept alive by machine is a product of necromancy. Hmm, wait. Is that what you believe, though? That if someone can no longer sustain themselves on their own and need/choose to live half man half machine, they're better off considered dead and made dead? "That it happened in Succia (like the geneforge and the canisters) doesn't make it legal" I'm confused here. Can you tell me where in the game it says minds are forbidden from controlling creatures? For all I know, in testing halls they're in 100% control of how those test creatures function. And in many games you ask them "can you help me control the rogues". If it's forbidden all times, they should probably remind you of it, instead of helping, or telling you "I'm not strong enough". "It's teaching a geneforged monster like the player Shaping and allowing "it" to exist" This part, I believe, works just as fine when we consider war time rules. If we want to use a spy, laws no longer work, we give privileges and it's legal. So, can you find better arguement in here? "My grandfather was a soldier during the Nurember Trials. Several SS made the same argument about executing Jews\gays\communists\gypsies during the Holocaust. They still got executed" Well, try this with animals and ask for justice if you want. Parrots can talk, lots of animals can be smart, if I kill them, do people kill me? Try, and see how that works. As for human, let me remind you that back in ancient days, if I'm a king, I can kill commoners for sure, and as long as I don't mess the whole country up, people don't kill me. It's surely not justified, but if I'm king and supported by most, what can you do? If a certain set of law works well, then what is legal is legal, killing can be perfectly ok in a functional system, many people are happy with it, no matter how much you hate it. We only get justice when we get another set of replacement law; but even in Geneforge, even if you go for G5 Ghaldring ending, well, shapers persist anyway. Killing serviles is still perfectly legal in their nation, and you're unable to kill them all to prevent it. Tell me, in our own law system and on our own land, what can you do? What is legal? What do people follow eventually? Your own free nation Sucia, will it change how shapers kill their own creations? Nope. That aside, you got sth wrong here, I'm afraid. We're not talking about the same victims. What Alwan killed, they are more or less considered spy or enemy, because really, in war time, if people sell info or keep enemy sheltered, they can be killed, no question here. What Nazi killed, are often commoners who showed zero hint at helping the ememies, they were killed because they were Jews. We never really execute people because they kill people in war time, you know? We only execute them when they don't have a good reason to do so, kill commoners, etc. Killing spies in back alley and killing enemies who fight in war, on the other hand, is NOT a war crime at all, as long as you provide evidence that nation security is at danger. As I say, you don't really know who you really should hate, who you shouldn't, and you just look for convenient targets. Go hate Taygen because that's the Nazi you're looking for; Alwan is not. "The Law is tyrannical and wrong" I'm not sure about that. If you can never eliminate it, if it has enough supporters to survive as long as it wants, don't tell me it's wrong. That, too, has a right to exist if it can defend itself, as you rebels love to say. You can't kill an idea, you can't make it go away. Is it wrong, or is it just hurting your feelings, but has a right to exist anyway? Rebels tried to prove sth, tried to change shapers, but in the end, shaper still hold all their current rights on their own land, bigger or smaller doesn't matter. They exist, they make life, they kill life, as they wish. Now tell me. Do you wish to prove shapers wrong by just killing everyone here, to prove that you shouldn't kill as you wish? Because how else can you really stop them from doing so, and feeling it's still a right thing to do? Same thing with all world-view disagreement, let me see how you solve this problem. "PS. GF5 starts 6 years after GF4. Plenty of time for GF4 character to go insane, captured, send to foundry" Go insane, captured, sent, yes. But not enough for age/appearance difference, you should check out that part. "A lot older than you look" suits G3 people better, a lot more than G4 people. Besides, I'm confused why people argue "it can be anyone" when all hints tell you it's G3 related somehow; the game even emphasized that G3 player went missing. Why Greta/Alwan/Litalia remember, and no one else does, except a nobody who only saw you after you go crazy? If you're G4 player, shouldn't other people like Ghaldring know you as well, considering you helped him release the unbound? Ghaldring wasn't there in G3, so it's normal that all others know you but he doesn't. If he does, he probably won't pull the same old trick on you, the assasination and the test, he'd know you might remember, and the surprise would be lost, he'd try to come up with sth else. As for G1 player, it's clear in G2 game that this shaper ran back and reported everything, instead of using Geneforge. Knowing the council, he'd be kept under tight control and has no chance to go anywhere near drypeak. So many hints and people still think the possibility is equal everywhere, it's astonishing, you don't even have any hint that says otherwise. It's more like "I don't care about evidence and I can say whatever I want because I can". Surely you can, it's fine, but it just seems plainly weird how people ignore existing facts and dismiss them as worthless. "He attempts to do that, and doesn't go for truce" It's still called a truce in the ending, game text, you can protest against that if you want to. And everyone was surprised too, they all thought Alwan planned to kill all of them, let alone allowing them to live on Ashen isle for a whole generation. Do you even know what that means? Drakons, drakes, they can live for a few hundred years. Some can even live longer using essence and magic. He's literraly giving them the land and giving them a lot of time, and even though he says shapers will reclaim the land, that'll be centuries away! I have a personal guess that he's thinking the same as my own G3 ending hope in here. With so many years the rebels can survive and hold the land, grow a nation, but they probably dare not strike back at the mainland any more, and those who want to live free can go there and live far away from shaper laws. He didn't even say they had to follow shaper laws there, I hope you noticed that, I'm sure rebels will, and they'll take this chance. Things might eventually be solved in the civil way, rebels can live peacefully and claim free right on their own lands, if they persist successfully, then negotiation might happen later. Come on man, even serviles live ridiculously long, what Alwan offered is far from what you think. "So nope, he's mad and desperate" Based on what I described up there, and the text I showed you to prove Alwan wants things to change, maybe you can reconsider. I actually think this is his plan all along. It looks like madness to you, but only if you haven't realised what he has offered to the rebels. It's probably a hard decision too, on personal level; the Ashen Isle, he once studied there, his hate grew from there, yet he gave it to rebels at last, for centuries, as a home. If they can take the chance and do things the right way without so much killing, then all will be better, even shaper ways can be shaken if rebels just play it fair and only use self-defence. He only bothered to say his true intention once, and you know, you need to keep him long in team for that to happen; which means, since G3 player is a rebel in canon ending, Alwan probably left the team early on, and as a result, I don't think ANYONE ever got to hear him talk about his true intention at all. That earlist betrayal and mistrust, is probably why no one can ever understand him in the following saga, why people fail to understand the final truce attempt - I guess most will just see it as mockery, too bad for them. "And I had them killed by treachery. I am not proud of that" "About the rails question: Yes, I have heard it and yes, I agree that the right answer is to not push one person on the rails" "There is, frankly, no good answer. So I chose to push the smaller number of people that would thankfully lead to the less people being killed in the future" Don't be silly! That's where your respect of morality gets totally broken and you start to do things. There IS another way, and that is, you can politely ask the person to jump off by his own will, if he really thinks it's a good idea. Better than that, why not jump off yourself? But well, most people don't want to be sacrifised, you or npc, so, well, if there's no saint, that 5 people has to die, because we can't go against people's will and kill them for our own good. Problem solved, you DO NOT need to resort to murder. That's why I say I don't like how rebels do things; they get narrow minded and desperate, then they sacrifice people as they wish. It's natural reaction, sure, but doesn't mean it's good and it should be done as long as ANY other choice remain. "Yes, but this time, there are TWO shaping nations" *Sigh* We have tons of nations in our real world, man. Do you see things get better? If some country wants to do its own evil, it will do it within itself. Can you stop the raping in India? Can you give muslim women their rights? Can you help us who are trapped here in China to have proper web service, because they won't let us watch Youtube and tons of other websites, which is thankfully just a tiny control compared to other countries? Well, if you think maybe multiple doesn't work that well, maybe 2 forces can work the best, remember America and Russia. We're so lucky that neither of them lost the cool and start destroying the world. And in the end nothing got solved at all! You guys are so naive, believing multiple equal forces can help things sort out eventually. I'm not sure whether to laugh or just sigh and stay quiet. And as I say: Sucia will just become more like shaper nation, not less, for they now realise the shaping will have to be tightly controlled. The ones who shape, and the ones who don't, their differences and conflicts will NOT just go away just because of one Sucia. It's never about shapers. It's about shaping, and how it can only be in the hands of a few, no matter what, even in Sucia, as we see in the game ending text, when everyone agree that shaper laws make sense. Thus, new tyranny begin, and now you have to fight for the bottom people again, only for the cycle to repeat forevermore. Oh and hmm... If you skipped G1 and G2... I'm sure it's impossible for you to understand how serviles and shapers are not equal. And, you haven't seen how rebels change from relatively peaceful to mass massacre, especially all their stupid mistakes in G2 which is hard to ignore. As a result, it's probably impossible for you to have any reason to support shapers at all, I'd be surprised if people don't know the background yet support the shapers. As I say at first, it's cultural difference, if you don't play it you won't see how shapers see things, and it decides whether you can understand how it all begins in that way. Oh well. You'll probably play them later, so, it remains to be seen.

*Sigh* That's actually my point. There's no right, no wrong, things are supposed to happen in a certain way, some people mess up, some others happen to find a better way to do it. Right or wrong, it doesn't matter. Enslaving is wrong? We enslave dogs anyway, you keep one and you'll see how smart they are and how they are better off as a free creature, instead of licking your hand and beg for attention. You think they want to be enslaved in the first place? How many generations of dogs have we killed just to find the most loyal ones to serve us? Wouldn't a wolf bite you and hate you for human hunting them and enslaving them as dogs? Aren't they smart creatures who have a society, have emotion, smart enough to observe human and even try to cooperate with human, ask for help from human if in dire need(which led to them being enslaved, though)? Wolves and dogs can still breed, just so you know, it's not even too late to give up on keeping them. Yet, things happen, and if I ask people to stop, they usually don't. Why? Because we benefit, and we lose little. We only do revolutions when we can gain even more and lose less, in a much prettier way, make sure we get to be both happy and rich. We only care about it at all, because we now deem mental welfare to be more important than other welfare, and we need to gain as much as possible by tearing down old ideas, taking care of lesser beings just to make ourselves feel even better, a benefit. Feeling "I'm doing the right thing" is a kinda huge benefit that people chase like they used to chase other things. You can have opinions about what is right, but no, things go their own ways, you may play a role but your belief or your action isn't important, this universe works on its own. The rebellion, the governing, they all exist for a good reason and none can be eliminated just because you claim it's wrong. Unless, of course, you do find another way later, by changing the most basic things and create sth entirely new and beyond us human. Edit: Oh, actually, how about an example here, to explain how "justice" works. We think serviles should be free. And we eventually made it. But how? It's because we have geneforge and we have human and drakons. What can serviles do? The best they can do is to learn magic, which leads to them being hated and hunted everywhere, due to the method they use. What happens if we don't have geneforge at all? That shaping is a power ONLY shapers have, and shapers can indeed outmatch everyone else, all creations at their mercy and all outsiders better know what's good for them, how do you think we can ever achieve justice and freedom here? A more direct example is, in G5, shapers took land from other people, they fought, they lost, they came to terms with that, they're now somewhat happy with current situation. You look at them and realise they have given up on justice and freedom. This is what happens without the help of Geneforge, sheer will and force and power win over whatever equal rights people once believe. You can't expect to have such a handy thing in real life; if some species are definitely stronger than others, you've got your king here. Equal factions still fight against each other until they reach a balance, but weak ones always are robbed of their "rights" to be happy in their own world. Such a right doesn't really exist reliably, except when circumstances allowed. Look at all those natural habitats we now protect; I can almost imagine what they look like the moment World War III starts, armies and refugees will wipe all those efforts clean within just a month. If you can't manage it, justice is just a joke that you'll never made true, as is in the situation of our pet dogs, with everyone forgetting the crimes we once committed and happy with what things are, not even questioning ourselves whether it's fair at all, or even if you do, you can't do a thing about it. As I say in the other thread earlier: Freedom is only available to true equal beings, not because we deserve it but because we think we do and we want a bite of the cake for our own good, and the rest can only get better welfare when we think we can afford it. And only in peaceful times too, because most people will eat their pets if they're trapped somewhere, even eat fellow human, that's our true face we don't usually bother to look at carefully, despite what you may believe before you face real challenge.