Do you think Roland deserve that bullet?

[HUNK]

My answer, yes. He did. While Lilith and Moxxi are characters I will never trust in the future and am irritated that Lilith instigated Jack on absorbing too much information in the Presequel.

For what the story beats that occurred in the PreSequel. I would be pissed as well. Roland had that bullet coming.

So Lilith and Moxxi can be killed off for all I care. Lilith's reckless nature annoys me.

[trukr]

I disagree.
Rolland was an honest sort, even the Pre-Sequel he saw Jack for what he was and was playing along to stay close to try to take him down.

Moxxi did her best to kill Jack, ehhh, along with the Vault Hunters, a price she was willing to pay.

Lilith prevented Jack getting even more knowledge by what she did, not give him more. Se did not show up in the Vault as a friend you know. My problem with her is her trying to kill Athena, that was just wrong. Nisha and Wilhelm are the ones she should have been after, but they got their's.

[Nakos]

No, Roland didn't deserve that.

In a lawless frontier world full of murderers, theives, ruthless treasure hunters and all sorts of other scum, Roland is the man who stood up and said "no, this isn't right, there are ordinary civilians here, they don't deserve to be exploited, murdered, or enslaved and we have to do something about it, because we're the ones who can". Roland is pretty much the single most moral upstanding person in the franchise. Now ... I'm not saying he doesn't have flaws, and doesn't make some compromises that made me a bit uncomfortable, but he's still THE hero. He's the good guy. He's still the avatar of "Lawful Good" on Pandora.

Lilith is ... sorta-kinda good. But a lot of that has to do with being Roland's partner. For Lilith, "good" is more abstract. In the moment, Lilith is much more selfish and hedonistic. And she has a darker streak, which we see when she blames Athena. And also when she refuses to aknowledge the fact that Athena, Wilhelm, Nisha, Claptrap and the others were basically the same as the Vault Hunters, and refuses to even let Athena even say it out loud. You can certainly debate the morals of the others, but Athena really WAS the same as the other Vault Hunters from BL1 and BL2. Athena doesn't deserve being blamed by Lilith. However, at that point Lilith has a lot of anger, and no one left to take it out on..

It's unclear what happens during the end of BL:TPS.

Regardless, it's clear that Lilith's intent was to prevent Jack from gaining too much knowledge from the vault. She may have stopped him from learning as much as he could, she make have inadvertently made it worse by dumping MORE knowledge into his head.

But which ever it was, she really was trying to hinder Jack. And ... Jack was already a mass-murdering "jackhole" by that point.

[Sirius]

Well... can we at least agree that Roland went out like a chump?

Premature celebration leading to the death of a hero somehow makes the hero look a bit silly in my book.

Yes, no one could have known Jack would appear like that (then again, this is basically one of the only times we get "raw" Jack - he is so emotional that you kind of should have seen it coming that he WON'T just accept what happened in that chamber).

My point is, a hero he may have been, he was also taken out like a little ♥♥♥♥♥.

While this deepens the impact of his death (somewhat) or at least shows how dark Jack can be first hand, it also shows that Roland is basically an idiot.

A real hero shouldn't let his guard down after a mere milestone in their quest and going "Well, glad that's over with. We won!".

No. No, you didn't.

[Mister Torgue Flexington]

just putting in my own two cents, if anyone who deserved that bullet, should've been Lilith.

yeah I know, killing Roland was the important part of the story, but Angel did warn him to not let her (Lilith) into the Central Core Chamber. And correct me if i'm wrong, but didn't she tell him that was coming to Angel's chamber regardless if it was a trap or not?

so depending on how you look at it, Lilith inadvertently got Roland killed by showing up, which also got her kidnapped in the process.

[sleepyhead]

OP, might want to edit title to include spoilers as some people haven't gotten this far yet somehow.

[Sirius]

Originally posted by Mister Torgue Flexington:

so depending on how you look at it, Lilith inadvertently got Roland killed by showing up, which also got her kidnapped in the process.

That, too.

[Nakos]

Sure, I don't disagree that Roland had a lot of flaws. Letting his guard down after a big fight like that was certainly one of them, no argument there.

What I'm saying is that in the context of Pandora, it's Roland who's the good guy. That's a subjective measurement, because Pandora isn't a very nice place.

In fiction, it's meant to be what's called a "Pinch Point", where the antagonist reminds us he's powerful and dangerous. So ... someone we (at least nominally) care about has to die to amp up the emotional energy. I'm not saying that Burch was (or was not) successful at this, I'm just saying that's the writing mechanic he's employing.

It wouldn't have worked as well if Lilith had died and Roland had lived, Roland is too stoic. And Lilith isn't really a very nice person, so we'd care less. Also, Lilith was necessary to charge the key.