For some reason I find Durance really hard to understand. (No Spoilers please)

[Desolate Eden]

Not sure why, maybe the way his character is written makes him feel complex personality wise or I'm just finding it hard to understand him, but I don't understand what he wants from me by traveling with me, I dont understand his motives, his world view, things he approves and disaproves of. It's like people like Eder I can understand fine, but with him. it's like in one ear out the other lol. I just unlocked my keep, but yeah, it seems even after talking to durance for 30+ minutes I still don't feel any more attached or closer to him than since I met him. Does he believe in eothas or does he hate the religion?

[D'amarr from Darshiva]

You can skim over the following in parts:
--> https://pillarsofeternity.gamepedia.com/Durance

[Desolate Eden]

thanks i will take a look

[ColorsFade]

He's one of the better voice-acted characters who is, IMO, horribly written. I'm sure Avelone fans will disagree.

But I felt much the same as you when I played the game the first time. Subsequent plays did not improve my feeling about Durance's writing, despite understanding his story arc better.

Part of the problem, I believe, is that the world of Pillars of Eternity, and especially its pantheon of Gods, is completely new and foreign to players. So we have no frame of reference, and no experience, with these gods, or what they really represent (and in fact, their existence at all is a primary question in the game). As such, we don't really understand the people who worship them much either, or why they worship them, or what they hope to get out of such worship (maybe the best question - why does Durance even worship a god?)

Magrin is a foreign entity when the player starts the game, so it's difficult to understand Durance in the context of his relationship with her. Who is Magrin? What does she stand for? Why does Durance even care about worshiping her? Those are questions that need answering before one can start to understand Durance.

Of course, the game reveals some of this information as we play; we learn about the Godhammer and Durance's role in it, but his motivations don't crystallize very well in the wake of these revelations.

The other part of the problem, IMO, is that Durance just isn't a sympathetic character. He's angry and ornery, two attributes that, personally, I just don't care for.

On top of all of that - his stats are garbage.

There were opportunities to make him an interesting character. There were opportunities to make him sympathetic, at least at the end. There were opportunities to, at the very least, make his character useful in a party. The devs failed at each of these points, again, IMO.

Bottom line: I don't think your feeling is wrong. It's shared by me, and by others.

One suggestion: do what I do, and get rid of him, and then replace him with a hired adventurer priest of your own design (from an inn). I feel more of a connection to a blank adventurer with no dialog than I do Durance. And my priest at least isn't ornery.

[Du-Vu]

It doesn't seem like that was the OP's feeling so much as they were just having trouble parsing Durance's huge wall of text. Which is understandable in its own way. He hates Eothas; he has a love-hate relationship with Magran; he refuses to really explain why at first. And you're not supposed to like him or get attached, other than maybe out of morbid curiosity.

Durance is an antagonist who joins your party, basically a puzzle to be solved. He's there to make you question Magran, who's otherwise portrayed positively after having filled the power vacuum in the Dyrwood left by Eothas's death. The problem isn't so much that he's unsympathetic, since he's not supposed to be (he's a lot like Ignus from Torment), it's that his quest is only advanced by keeping him around. Which is a bit counterproductive in that he actually doesn't have much in the way of banter with the other characters.

All the companions in POE have suboptimal stats and loadouts, to encourage unorthodox builds. Durance's stupid-high Resolve actually makes him bizarrely durable for a priest, and that's before you swap out his robes for a suit of plate, or his staff for an arquebus.

[THE_RaBiD_CanuK]

lol. That's fine. He's a bit confusing, but his character will start to make more sense over the course of the game if you pay attention to him.

[Desolate Eden]

thanks for all the answers, especially ColorsFade, that's the answer I was looking for now I feel a bit less guilty about being lost when talking to him lol

[ColorsFade]

Originally posted by Du-Vu:

Durance's stupid-high Resolve actually makes him bizarrely durable for a priest, and that's before you swap out his robes for a suit of plate

Definitely... sub-optimal.

[Dixon Sider]

He is just a miserable old man. I imagine him as someone who got their nuts chopped off as a kid so now he just ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ about others being happy

[dwarfpcfan]

I didn't have any problems with him, he's a bitter dirty old man pissed off at his deity for doing what deities always do. He provides some insight into the world and early game he helps with healing and such. Didn't really need anything else from him.

[lehipi]

He personifies the "Cruel" personality trait.
Hiravias is "Clever", Pallegina is "Passionate" and so on.

So Durance is "an archetype" before "a character", and the writing suffers for it.

Also, I second Du-Vu: the presence-advanced personal quest is annoying and bad design in a game where most companion quests are fowarded by discovery and location - Grieving Mother being the only other exception. Unsurprisingly, the two characters are penned by the same writer.

In the end, I managed to pity him for his role in the events preceding the game (The Saint's War), but "like" the man? Nope...

[smilehigh]

Originally posted by lehipi:

He personifies the "Cruel" personality trait.

In the end, I managed to pity him for his role in the events preceding the game (The Saint's War), but "like" the man? Nope...

Yeah, many players seem to miss or disregard the part of his personal history where he took a very active part in the "Purges" - basically mob justice/lynching of arguably innocent people and never felt even a tiny bit of remorse. Was actually quite proud of it.

[Nevict]

From what I pierced toghether, Durance is trying to understand why her goddes does not speak to him anymore and found new strength in the process. That will prove helpful when you drop a truth bomb on his charred ass.

[NightfallRob]

Originally posted by smilehigh:

Originally posted by lehipi:

He personifies the "Cruel" personality trait.

In the end, I managed to pity him for his role in the events preceding the game (The Saint's War), but "like" the man? Nope...

Yeah, many players seem to miss or disregard the part of his personal history where he took a very active part in the "Purges" - basically mob justice/lynching of arguably innocent people and never felt even a tiny bit of remorse. Was actually quite proud of it.

I don't know that he was proud about it. He said he did it, it didn't help, and he moved on. He definitely didn't evidence any remorse about it, but it seemed more like "I did this" than "I'm proud of this."

OP, Durance is a fanatic. This means his belief in his goddess is nearly delusional in its intensity. His initial premise, that he was used and cast aside, is the correct one. Durance just isn't stable enough to be able to cope with that. He thinks he's putting the Watcher to the test, but really he's just clinging to a reason to live in the hopes that Magran's actions will make more sense to him later on and renew his sense of purpose.

[Nevict]

When the watcher tells him what Eothas tried to achieve, all his world collapses.