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Most hated characters in sw games? There may be spoilers


Owenmoz

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Wazzap people! The title is rather straight forward. I wanted to compile the characters you hate here, also please add reasons. Mine are:

 

Redbeard-He's an incompetent coward. *strong words i know*

 

The salassar imitation drakon in g5- One might have written greed here, but Alcander is greedy as i love the dude. Simply it was an unoriginal character with no redeeming points.

 

Dedrik-I thought jennel was shallow. But this... this is all kinds of foolery. Worst of all its that it was pointless and he dares be dandy about it. As well as the whole emotional blackmail and guilt tripping. *omg, this is so wrong, i shouldnt be doing this, im a bad bad boy* and im like *you really dont have to do this*

*Inserts series of slurs aimed at me and some lame ass wannabe jaded-emo anakin skywalker kind of thing* I guess i got carried away with this one.

 

Gladwell-He's meh and a rather pain in the backside in exchange of power and money all dandy and fair until he asks you to get the spider eggs. That is unforgivably evil and nasty. I wont go on but he is evil.

 

Zachary-Lame coward with no redeeming qualities.

Barzhal-Oh, i could like him if he didn't slaughter shanti.

 

Lankan-I admire spirit and ability to stand up for yourself, i admire those more than most qualities. But if you have absolutelly no self control? And with your actions you doom people that look up to you and follow you? I am sure only person i know who would feel more strongly about this is my grand dad.

 

Melanchion or how you write it- I dont hate him but teen agnst is a big turn off.

 

Thats all i can think of folks!

 

 

 

 

 

 

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Alwan. Dedrik. Nathalie -- sorry Triumph. Ghall-Ihrno -- so poorly written and implemented. Starrus -- so pointless. Ghaldring -- not nearly as interesting as the hype and foreshadowing, of which there was too much. Shema -- what an equally anticlimactic high poobah the Shapers ended up with. And I guess Linda -- I always found it annoying that her obviously catastrophic ideas were tolerated by people who otherwise displayed paranoia about magical safety.

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Off the top of my head:

 

Dedrik: I actually made a whole post about how stupid he is (and basically the rest of the Wyldrylm too).

 

Lankan: so much of the trouble on Harmony Isle comes down to Lankan being implausibly stupid.

 

Kyass: he's okay in AEFTP, but his appearance in A2CS was über-lame.

 

 

 

I'm kind of curious what is "pointless" about Starrus. I mean, he's far from a standout awesome character, but somebody had to show up as king, right? Not sure what about him could draw such "hate?"

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I'm kind of curious what is "pointless" about Starrus. I mean, he's far from a standout awesome character, but somebody had to show up as king, right? Not sure what about him could draw such "hate?"

 

i mean, for one thing he's basically a walking retcon to avoid Chevyn inheriting the throne

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He's in a prominent position for several games and he basically never displays any personality, or interesting characteristics, or interesting anything. Big Bob, and he's as vanilla as can be. He actually manages to be more boring than his not-very-interesting predecssor/father, who at least had an interesting backstory. The extent of Starrus' backstory, as Lilith mentions, is that he suddenly replaces a more interesting (if admittedly adolescently-conceived and tasteless) character. That wasn't even a necessary retcon -- I mean, geez, A4 retcons Rone into still being alive; Micah could easily have still been around as an old man, too.

 

Actually, replacing Chevyn with Starrus is a pretty good analogy for the shift in character from the First Trilogy to the Second Trilogy: it offers the motivation behind the change, and then shows how lame and banal the change ended up being.

 

Which reminds me, Manifred "Redmark" deserves to be on the list simply because of how insulting his use of the name is. I know it's supposed to be ironic, but it could have been ironic without creating Redmark Lite.

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I didnt hate starrus; but prazac managed to be more interesting and she isnt even a "character". Well chevyn had no real future, but its really pissing how the second trilogy got rid of all the remarkable characters. And the beat of the stpry changed completelly from wild australia pioneer adventure/survival of the fittest and important quests(a3 being an exception, the main plot was weak imo). They sort of bring it back on 5 but has less detailed writing as well as from an outsiders perspective.

But starrus himself wasnt horrible. As you said he's pretty much the same as micah but with no badass backstory.

 

I almost forgot to second manifred. Jesus and to think he was ashamed of erika. By far his only quality was being related to her and her only flaw was being related to him. He goes under list of people i hate. Sheesh he's basically the opposite of her in all aspects. Ugh.

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I actually like Rentar in A3. She's not deeply fleshed out, but I appreciate that she doubles down on the worst of her ambiguous traits from A2. The problem with A4 is that it's the same thing again. It would be just as bad if it were just about any character rehashed.

 

The second trilogy wouldn't gained a lot by having Micah instead of Starrus. Have the wizards preserve his life too, as he gets older and frailer and still holds the reigns of power because there's no one else to step in. His death at the end of A6 would be poignant and fitting.

 

Rawal is a character I love to hate. He's odious and infuriating and actually one of the better bad characters in Spiderweb games.

 

—Alorael, who doesn't think Chevyn on the throne would have worked for more than a cheap joke. Sure, he could've been there, but then actual power would have to go to someone else. And his joke was fairly well played out. Replacing king with council could also have worked and provided an interesting slow-motion fragmentation of the kingdom.

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Lankan really pisses me off. He's a moron. The shaper he was pissed at wasn't even being a dick, the shapers were not responsible for the problem in the first place, if it weren't for the bloody rebels running amok sewing chaos there wouldn't be any rogues to begin with. And then siding with the person who actually caused your problems. And do you ask me to take care of the rogues? no, no the imbecile just wants a canister. And when I go and singlehandedly purge the entire island eliminating the problem they rebelled over entirely, does he stop his foolishness and go home? no, he just sulks in his swamp. I loathe the arrogant fool.

 

Rawal. I joined the rebellion out of sheer spite so I could gut the smug rat-bastard like the swine he is. I felt bad for killing astoria and alwan, taygen I didn't feel remorse but took no pleasure in it, but Rawal, him I enjoyed killing. Had I the option, I would have made his death slow and painful indeed. Nobody puts a control tool in my chest and treats me like a pawn and a slave and gets away with it, and he even had the gall to act like I should be grateful for it.

 

 

I gotta say I'm not liking Redbeard much at all so far in Avadon.

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Miranda from Avadon, because she's willing to see the country overrun and its defenders slaughtered just for a personal revenge on Redbeard. If you're playing with forces that large, and you haven't thought past the pleasure of staring at heads on pikes for the rest of your life....retire to private life already.

 

 

Zakary and Barzahl from Geneforge 2.

Hard to say which I hate worse. Barzahl drives himself nuts with canisters, and doesn’t seem to mind that he’s making creatures that will get scarier and scarier ‘til they overwhelm the earth…or Zakary because he’s sane enough to know this is going on, but hides it from the Council to save his own hide for a little while longer. Such contemptible cowardice.

 

 

 

 

Agree with the badvotes on Rawal too...such pettiness in the face of disaster.

The shapers, having elevated themselves to such power, ought to have an ethic of noblesse oblige. Some do, but he’s run to the other extreme.

 

(On the other hand I am a Redbeard lover for reasons I gave here - http://spiderwebforums.ipbhost.com/index.php?/topic/15219-fighting-redbeard-a-poll-spoilers-within/#entry194696 – in the constant crisis he faces, you really do have to be tough and ruthless.)

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Huh, I thought this'd be "hated" as a good villain, not a poor character.

 

There's a number of Exile3 Empire people that mostly fit that, people who aren't going to forget the war and who've decided to keep on hating. Which is neceesayr for the setting, but I hate the characters (as people, not as bad characters).

 

I always imagined the many Merrys in X3 actually being the same person trying to prevent me from returning a faulty set of lockpicks, a la the

.

 

Eh, there's already one of those (Fletcher), and he has a terrible memory so that'd work.

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Ooof, I have to say, it hurts to see so much Lankan hate. I think his move is understandable, and he's full of a lot of remorse for it too. It was a split-second action and he recognizes that. It actually humanized the Rebellion for me a lot, because this was just some frustrated human who didn't necessarily have a lot of ideological opposition to the Shapers, as it seems every other rebel does. And he, too, is corrupted by self-shaping. It's a fitting synedoche for the whole Rebellion.

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Ooof, I have to say, it hurts to see so much Lankan hate. I think his move is understandable, and he's full of a lot of remorse for it too. It was a split-second action and he recognizes that. It actually humanized the Rebellion for me a lot, because this was just some frustrated human who didn't necessarily have a lot of ideological opposition to the Shapers, as it seems every other rebel does. And he, too, is corrupted by self-shaping. It's a fitting synedoche for the whole Rebellion.

Worth noting that when offered a deal for light punishment for him and reintegration in society for the rest, he refused. Further dooming his followers and all to satisfy his ego. Some say its for what he stands for. But sometimes you gotta surrender even if it labels you as a coward, you will still save lives. Now if your self image is more important that the lives of those who follow you then indeed, you let people die for your ego.

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I don't think you can assume that was the reason there. People make poor-game-theory decisions like that all the time and it isn't always because of ego -- I think it's usually just because they don't understand all the factors involved in the situation.

You would think so before interacting with him. But he keeps on refusing to see reason. Even knowing full well litalia made the rogues. When offered a chance to turn back after that he still refuses. So... Idk. Game characters even in the best rpgs still sometimes dont capture real human beings

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You would think so before interacting with him. But he keeps on refusing to see reason. Even knowing full well litalia made the rogues. When offered a chance to turn back after that he still refuses. So... Idk. Game characters even in the best rpgs still sometimes dont capture real human beings

 

I've never been captured by a video game character, although depending on who she is I might not mind...

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A funny thing about Rawal, is that in the Astoria ending of G5 *spoilers incoming* when he ends up becoming the head of the Shaper council, he seems to be a decently competent and sane leader. As much as I despise his arrogance and the way he treats me as the PC, his valuing of pragmatism over ideology and not being so tightly and inflexibly bound to the Shaper's traditional philosophy and practices is a kind of virtue in practice, despite the fact that it stems from personal avarice and a touch of cowardice even. He is a shrewd fellow, Rawal. But no one puts a control tool in my chest and treats me like a slave and gets any kind of positive regard from me. Even if I refrain from killing him for the sake of the greater good, I still despise him.

 

 

Yeah, the worst part about Lankan is that he seemingly has no anger at all towards Litalia and the Rebellion (the main rebellion, not his pitiful little insurrection) for causing all his problems in the first place. I can understand his frustration with the Shapers, I can even stomach his pride and unwillingness to craw back to the governor and throw himself on the shaper's mercy, I get that. He's proud, he's stubborn, he's foolish but that part is at least foolish in a way that real human beings often are, it's plausible and relatable even if you think he's an idiot for it. It's that he's a bloody hypocrite who sides with the people who ACTUALLY filled his home with ravening monsters without even the slightest hesitation or thought, that you point out that Litalia put the monsters there and he barely even reacts, doesn't seem to care, that you (the PC) can go and do all the dirty work and purge the island of rogues so he doesn't even have anything left to be pissed about and he's still all just "hur durr, me angry, shapers mean, give canister" that makes him despicable, utterly, utterly despicable. Loathe him, he's scum. At least after taking the canister you can blame his behavior on stars-issue canister madness, but all the worst stuff he says and does is pure, un-shaped human Lankan with no excuse at all. Yeah, I can see him being temporarily taken in by Litalia's glamour/domination while she's there talking to him, cuz that's how shaper magic works, but for him to be totally cool with her even after she's sailed off and he's no longer spellbound, for him to not care when you point out it to him, that's just absurd. If I were in Lankan's position, and I had just been informed that I was duped, I would be enraged about it, I would be beyond wrathful towards the person who had deceived me so, I'd ask the PC to go hack off her head and bring it back on a pike for unleashing a tide of monsters on my home and the bamboozling me. Fool me once, shame on you, fool me twice, shame on me, but either way the shame needs avenging.

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I have this recollection that after G5 came out, people ascertained that whether you killed Greta determined whether Rawal took over the Shaper Council, at least in Astoria's ending? It was a point of annoyance for people because it seemed like a really random factor to have affect the ending in that way. Now, this is my memory of what other people argued about years ago, not something I ever did myself. Can Rawal take over the SC in the other non-Ghaldring endings, too?

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I think most hate towards rawal goes for psrsonal reasons due to the pc. But come on folk. The pc is g5 is giganticly lame. I cant feel for him at all. Like... dude's lame. And i actually like rawal because he is the only "faction" not self absorbed by his own ideology on what is right and martyrdom. Literally everyone else seems in love with the idea of being a martyr. He is very pragmatic and i guess the only person who will make a choice based wit rather than feelings, that being said he doesnt have much wit, how did he figure the drakons would skip him i dont know. But i prefer him better than Shema( rly dood you should be high councilor of the most powerfull prosperous etc... magocracy in history and in the world, not some old stale fart lacking skill and power enough to zap a mosquito and lets not go to the lack of influence. In g5 only Ghaldrin and Taygen have bigger places in my hate organ. As opposed to heart.

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Shema to me was so unremarkable that I don't care enough to hate him.

 

It's an interesting point Owenrus brings up about Rawal's lack of an ideology. I touched on something similar, but while I agree that the other factions are too single-mindedly bent on their own ideology for their own (or the world's, rather) good, Rawals seeming total lack of any kind of ideology rubs me the wrong way too. I tend to favor pragmatism, but here the world is in the midst of this massive upheaval with the fate of their whole civilization in the balance and Rawal seems totally unconcerned. He's just self absorbed, holed up in his mountains trying to wait out the storm, not giving a damn about the country whose government he's a part of. You're right that my hatred of the man stems largely from how he treats my character. But he really doesn't have any kind of humanizing element to him at all, he's just a greedy old man, shrewd perhaps but also the very embodiment of haughty shaper arrogance and condescension. He's not at all unrealistic, he's a very human character in the sense that a real human being could totally behave the way he does without needing any suspension of disbelief, but he doesn't have any qualities that make me sympathize with him at all. When I look at the net effect of his actions in the ending cutscenes, I can be objective and say "oh, well I guess he's not too bad, that turned out well" but while I'm in the game, he's just really, really irritating and unlikeable. idk if he's supposed to be likable, not every character needs to be, but I'm at a loss as to why anyone would stick with the old rat through the whole game. He's not a badly written character, but he is one I love to hate.

 

Ghaldring, he's not really supposed to be likable, I never got that impression. But neither did he ever so affront me in a personal manner that it evoked the kind of deep abiding loathing I feel for Rawal. Ghaldring is almost, well he's kind of bland really. I could see being frustrated in a larger sense, feeling like the way he was written didn't live up to his importance in the story, but from the perspective of my character playing through the games, he doesn't inspire much feeling one way or the other, hardly more than shema. I do have a little admiration for the way Ghaldring gives his political enemies just enough rope and lets them hang themselves (or more accurately, lets me hang them, hang them with extreme prejudice. I was quite pleased to dispose of the upstart lizards for him). I always got the sense that there was a lot going on inside his head even if he didn't really get enough screen time to project anything other than being sort of brooding and aloof. From what I recall of my interactions with Ghaldring, he actually seemed less arrogant than other Drakons or even the shapers. I don't think this was because he was actually any less arrogant, but rather I got the impression he was so full of himself and so secure in his confidence and power that he didn't feel the need to posture so much, he didn't have to be actively condescending because he knew if someone displeased him he could dispatch them with ease and there was no point in brandishing his stick around. Of course, he wasn't so powerful as he wanted us to think, I did manage to slay him, after all.

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Yah, what i wrote was mostly agreeing with you. And i dont think rawal was to be likable but honestly cant dislike him. I am not imune to the mob effect against him but on my own i dont like or dislike him. But you are right when you say he is the incarnation of traditional shaper arrogance. Honestly more fitting to shema, Strongly reminds me of Perdon Nial from wheel of time. In any case i believe rawal is one of the least hateable characters in geneforge series.

 

About Ghaldrin, on geneforge 4 he was alright albeit having had low air time and his personality comming across as a bit bland but with potential. But on g5 he ends up mirroring rentar inhro in a4. And less original, he faded into the same place as most drakons with being arrogant and greedy and with disregard for other life forms as well as being openly rude and testing about you they set a nice potential for him on 4 as someone i can respect and then ruin him on 5. Ruin the whole rebelion on 5. One of the reasons i strongly disliked g5 was him.

Also no, he was one of the drakons that realised the need of a unified rebelion. He was confident but not necessarilly full of himself at least on 4. Even with Salassar he was quite clear that the player was a tool but he didnt diminish the fact that he needed you and you needed him.

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