Explain this? Grieving mother comments on meeting Maerwald in the keep...

[WiseCog]

BUT you cant recruit her before meeting and killing him. No way to cross bridge unless killing him. So why is this present in the game? I mean I cant cross bridge and recruit her before killing him anyway... This leads me to believe she might have been an early companion in another version of the game.

PS: I console-traveled and recruited her earlier than you usually can.

[WiseCog]

Or can you actually travel over the bridge without restoring the keep?

[Armanz]

Originally posted by Greenpakto:

Or can you actually travel over the bridge without restoring the keep?

No, you can't.

[D'amarr from Darshiva]

It is not specific to Grieving Mother. Some other companions too, who are not within the party when encountering Maerwald, later comment on what has happened to him. It is a bit similar to Neverwinter Nights 2, where spare companions in the stronghold learn about story/quest related news. Just imagine that companions in PoE implicitly talk about some things.

Originally posted by Greenpakto:

PS: I console-traveled and recruited her earlier than you usually can.

Why? It is an odd choice, considering that new companions will join with the same XP as the watcher. And you can reach Dyrford at start of Act 2 anyway.

[WiseCog]

Originally posted by D'amarr from Darshiva:

It is not specific to Grieving Mother. Some other companions too, who are not within the party when encountering Maerwald, later comment on what has happened to him. It is a bit similar to Neverwinter Nights 2, where spare companions in the stronghold learn about story/quest related news. Just imagine that companions in PoE implicitly talk about some things.

Originally posted by Greenpakto:

PS: I console-traveled and recruited her earlier than you usually can.

Why? It is an odd choice, considering that new companions will join with the same XP as the watcher. And you can reach Dyrford at start of Act 2 anyway.

I consoled because I wanted to find out what dialogue I could miss if I didn't have companions with me from the start.

But I think you are misunderstanding me. This conversation I have with Maerwald, Grieving mother jumps in and says things about Maerwald in response to what he is saying and how he has multiple souls and so on. It's a one time deal but doesn't make sense because we cant recruit her this early.
She also has unique conversations when Aufra asks for help with her child. But this makes some sense because we can actually avoid talking with aufra til we pick Grieving Mother up (but unlikely).

[D'amarr from Darshiva]

Originally posted by Greenpakto:

But I think you are misunderstanding me.

Rather you have not been detailed enough until now.

Originally posted by Greenpakto:

This conversation I have with Maerwald, Grieving mother jumps in and says things about Maerwald in response to what he is saying and how he has multiple souls and so on. It's a one time deal but doesn't make sense because we cant recruit her this early.

It could be related to the development process of the game and how the individual authors of the NPCs have created the written content for the story companions, covering also Act 1. That would have given the developers more freedom to decide on where the watcher will be able to meet a companion like Grieving Mother. Afterall, one can only meet four companions in Act 1, but will be able to meet several more immediately afterwards at beginning of Act 2. Perhaps GM has been moved to Dyrford prior to release of the game.

Originally posted by Greenpakto:

She also has unique conversations when Aufra asks for help with her child. But this makes some sense because we can actually avoid talking with aufra til we pick Grieving Mother up (but unlikely).

Yep, this indicates that GM's author may have created content covering Act 1 onwards.

Might have been an idea to post about it in Obsidian's PoE forum, where various devs hang out and can be pointed to.

[Du-Vu]

I got what you meant from your first post, OP. *shrugs*

But yeah, I can imagine the original vision for the game included a lot of free-roaming from early in the game, because that's how BG was with all its various wilderness areas. Mass Effect 2 has something similar where there are only four recruitable squadmates you can get before Horizon, but you can find videos showing the responses they recorded for every single character. Probably has something to do with them needing to fit the game on two disks in that case, but still. Development is funny like that.

[WiseCog]

Originally posted by Du-Vu:

I got what you meant from your first post, OP. *shrugs*

But yeah, I can imagine the original vision for the game included a lot of free-roaming from early in the game, because that's how BG was with all its various wilderness areas. Mass Effect 2 has something similar where there are only four recruitable squadmates you can get before Horizon, but you can find videos showing the responses they recorded for every single character. Probably has something to do with them needing to fit the game on two disks in that case, but still. Development is funny like that.

Thank you man! I added your post as the answer.

[D'amarr from Darshiva]

Originally posted by Du-Vu:

I got what you meant from your first post, OP. *shrugs*

Maybe, but removed spare companions also comment on the meeting with Maerwald. They don't need to be within the party when meeting Maerwald, but they talk about the meeting later.

[ajohnemus]

We all understood what you meant. Damarr just likes being a douche sometimes(most of the time)