Valerie scar

[Mr.Marmelad]

Valerie say one of the alchemists sold her a potion that heals a scar. This is potion help or alchemist lied to her?

[ŋıɠɧɬɱąཞɛ!]

Or maybe Amiri and Valerie are just unlikable characters. Not everyone's personality appeals to everyone. Overly arrogant, haughty people, with intransigent philosophies towards divergent belief systems aren't sexy.

[𝔗𝔢𝔞 ❀]

Publicado originalmente por ռɨɢɦȶʍǟʀɛ!:

Or maybe Amiri and Valerie are just unlikable characters. Not everyone's personality appeals to everyone. Overly arrogant, haughty people, with intransigent philosophies towards divergent belief systems aren't sexy.

They sound interesting and sexy. Jaethal is haughty and also hot.

[𝔗𝔢𝔞 ❀]

Publicado originalmente por Lord_Matheas:

Publicado originalmente por Jeysie:

To answer your questions:

The only companions that were in the original AP were Amiri and Jubilost. Every other party companion is Owlcat's doing. (Though some of the non-party NPCs are also from the AP.)

Based on a lot of their comments thus far, they kinda come off as one of those "I don't like the companions because SJW pandering" types, and those types who've shown up here in the past tend to hate Valerie and Amiri the most.

i didnt even notice it till you pointed it out, yeah i can certanly understand getting bit annoyed by writting if it was made with the intention to pander, though it seems like a poor reason to straight up hate a character

that reminds me that the order of "rose" palladins were certanly an annoying ass bunch, i feel like they were made to be as annoying as humanly possible, it actually sadened me that slaughtering them all wasnt a valid way to progress the quest line

No, you can kill them. It pushes the quest along, and means you can keep her right to the end. I ran through that trial a few times, and murder is certainly on the cards. Did want a final, "okay, that battle is finished, let's burn this temple down", but we don't always get what we want.

[Jeysie]

Publicado originalmente por ռɨɢɦȶʍǟʀɛ!:

Or maybe Amiri and Valerie are just unlikable characters. Not everyone's personality appeals to everyone. Overly arrogant, haughty people, with intransigent philosophies towards divergent belief systems aren't sexy.

Sure, there are certainly reasons to dislike Valerie and Amiri. I dislike the former for being rigid to the point of near-stupidity and caring more about the letter of the law than anything resembling the spirit of it, and I dislike the latter for being bloodthirsty and dangerously impulsive.

But things like "eff feminism", "pandering to pop culture extremism", "I don't like that they had consensual sex once", are, shall we say, very dubious reasons to dislike a character.

[Orange]

Publicado originalmente por Jeysie:

Sure, there are certainly reasons to dislike Valerie and Amiri. I dislike the former for being rigid to the point of near-stupidity and caring more about the letter of the law than anything resembling the spirit of it, and I dislike the latter for being bloodthirsty and dangerously impulsive.

But things like "eff feminism", "pandering to pop culture extremism", "I don't like that they had consensual sex once", are, shall we say, very dubious reasons to dislike a character.

Those do feel like the sjws and anti-sjws complains... But you do have to admit there is a weird set of coincidences with the characters.

Amiri never seems to learn a lesson from her impulsiveness and its consequences which makes your friendship with her being based on either damage control or on rolling with it.

Valerie's stance on the other hand is a default "I am always right", where you have to agree with her ideology if you want build a relantionship, which lacks nuance as you play the accepting and understanding role.

But all this could just be lazy writting and people are just reading too much into it.

[𝔗𝔢𝔞 ❀]

Definitely wouldn't say it is lazy writing, given how much writing there is and these characters do have depth (but I will agree the responses are not always so deep with plenty of choice). Romancing Valerie I did not always agree, but I did noticed she got quite a verbal thrashing from the other companions, due to the way the first to say something at the camp does not get the last word.

[𝔗𝔢𝔞 ❀]

Publicado originalmente por Jeysie:

Publicado originalmente por ռɨɢɦȶʍǟʀɛ!:

Or maybe Amiri and Valerie are just unlikable characters. Not everyone's personality appeals to everyone. Overly arrogant, haughty people, with intransigent philosophies towards divergent belief systems aren't sexy.

Sure, there are certainly reasons to dislike Valerie and Amiri. I dislike the former for being rigid to the point of near-stupidity and caring more about the letter of the law than anything resembling the spirit of it, and I dislike the latter for being bloodthirsty and dangerously impulsive.

But things like "eff feminism", "pandering to pop culture extremism", "I don't like that they had consensual sex once", are, shall we say, very dubious reasons to dislike a character.

There is nothing "dubious" about disliking something that is an exemplar of beliefs you do not like in your games.

Amiri is the perfect example of an absurdly-masculine rarrr, "woman can be as strong as men, no STRONGER", feminist wish-fulfilment character, and not only is it tiresome and rubs people the wrong way, as people notice this more and get increasingly tired of it, they are going to call it out. The reaction to woke culture is indeed a thing.

Valerie, there are plenty of threads on her, but her background situation, and how it has warped her worldview, makes her fit less well into dull feminist characters. On the one hand she is rebelling against beauty and being treated as an object (muh male gaze), but it has made her very cold and evil (her LN is more LE), and thus she is for tyranny even worse than what she tried to escape. Now there is a missed opportunity for an in-game critique of feminism. ; )

[Jeysie]

Publicado originalmente por Tea ❀:

Amiri is the perfect example of an absurdly-masculine rarrr, "woman can be as strong as men, no STRONGER", feminist wish-fulfilment character

That's not really accurate, tbh. She's actually more just an example of what happens when somebody is abused and treated badly merely for not fitting into societal roles and how people realistically react to that.

Since you have related things like how Nilak is a more classically-feminine character who also doesn't fit into her societal role for different reasons, and the game explores the differing ways the two handled the matter.

Then on top of it you get the other barbarian tribes in the game who treat women warriors as no big deal in either direction and think both that Amiri's tribe is nuts but that Amiri herself still doth protest too much as the saying goes.

So even with Amiri's discomfort being justified, she still doesn't actually get a free pass on her behavior and her reactions that are over the top are actually examined by the game.

So I feel like that the only thought process that could take issue with that is one that feels "everybody should always adhere to rigid societal roles imposed on them regardless of their actual aptitudes and never complain", so that even an even-handed exploration of the topic still bothers them.

Publicado originalmente por Tea ❀:

On the one hand she is rebelling against beauty and being treated as an object (muh male gaze), but it has made her very cold and evil (her LN is more LE), and thus she is for tyranny even worse than what she tried to escape. Now there is a missed opportunity for an in-game critique of feminism. ; )

Again, I don't really feel this is accurate, tbh.

Valerie wasn't merely rebelling against being complimented on her beauty. She was rebelling against people focusing on her beauty to the point of ignoring and excluding literally everything else she might be good at or want to pursue, or what's actually best for her as a person. To the point of having creepy old men writing her love poems when she was nine years old and everyone cheering this on as normal.

Plus on top of that the people in question were a religious order, also bringing the question of freedom of belief into the matter. Should you be forced to stick with a belief system you don't actually believe in just because your parents and social cohort don't want to let you leave?

Since Sinnet even chases her down long after she's left the order and made her own life elsewhere, during which time she's done basically nothing to take action against the order versus merely grumbling about her life when asked. It's only after the duel with Sinnet happens and she realizes they're actually never going to leave her alone no matter where she runs to, that she starts tipping over into the deep end behavior-wise.

(Since before that, her personality is just that of someone who believes law above all else, and judging from the personalities of the Shelyn order is likely to be something she absorbed from her paladin training without realizing it, since they too are pretty unquestioning about following their "rules" regardless how nonsensical.)

But much like the Amiri example above, even then her excesses of behavior aren't actually excused. The entire point of her personal quest is to teach her to strike the balance between, yes she has a right to feel aggrieved and to tell Shelyn and her followers to leave her alone, but she also needs to learn to not persecute people just for having beliefs she doesn't agree with even if they actually are otherwise leaving her alone.

So again there doesn't seem to be a whole lot to complain about unless you're dead set on feeling everyone should always accept the roles society forces on them, no questions asked.

Since I would think that the idea of "you should be free to pursue your own path to life, liberty, and happiness without undue abuse and harassment by others for it" would be a sentiment even most anti-woke-culture people could get behind.

So yeah, while there's still reasons to dislike Valerie and Amiri, them having realistic reactions to the way their peers treated them during their childhoods isn't one of them.

P.S. And quite frankly the less said about the people who think "OMG Valerie had a boyfriend once how could she" is an actual valid thing to be upset about, the better, IMHO.

[MΛƬΉΣΛƧ]

Yeah valerie and amiri both have that unpleasant touch of the sjw vibe to them, but when you do their story arks i feel like they are nuanced and decently written enough to give em a pass

Though its certanly understandable that characters like em dont apeal to everyone

After all debating taste is rearely a fruitfull effort

[⚛Doomsday🐲⚛]

I just had a fun conversation between Octavia and Amiri:

Amiri: Do they also treat women like garbage in you contry?
Octavia: In Numeria they treat everyone like garbage

Me: well thats one kind of equality :)

[CircleC]

The scar and the removal of the scar, in addition to being a good exercise in developing self-respect as well as blazing your own trail is also reflected in many mythologies...take Jacob wrestling with God's messenger. It dislocated his hip but he held on and forced a concession. Similar to Valerie, scarred but unbending until Shelyn gives up. Her feminism is not a fight against male entitlement, it's a fight against the fate pressed on her by her god...and she wins.