Chloe is so far and away the worst. She's annoying, she's a spotlight hog, she's overpowered, she has an annoying voice, she has a portrait that doesn't even resemble the style of the rest of the BG characters. There's not a single positive thing that can be said about the mod.
At least with Saerileth I find myself appreciating what seems to be a large amount of work that went into the mod, even if the end result isn't very good - in fact, I actually liked the mod at first since it was my first NPC mod and I found it VERY impressive that somebody was able to add a character AND quests into an already existing game. The character also seems about the same power level as other good NPCs, and I liked that her proficiencies seemed chosen around eventually using Purifier instead of the predictable Carsomyr. The worst thing about the mod was a quest that is forced on you rather early which ended in an area where you could not use magic against a powerful boss.
So while both are bad, I can't imagine not picking Chloe and I'm kinda shocked to see that Saerileth is beating her by so much.
Just one thing. Seriously most people whine and bitch because she is "15" - in a medieval fantasy setting - while being OK with killing, delivering justice with their own hands, stealing, breaking and entering, intimidating by force, lying? By the way, that just to mention those playing with GOOD characters. Dont get me started with those who play evil parties.
Holy Thread Necromancy Batman! From what I understand most of the issue with Saerileth is that she's a needy, attention-seeking Mary-Sue with hilariously terrible dialogue who can literally die of a broken heart on a number of occasions. And also forces you into do-it-right-now-or-else quests. She's also fifteen, which is a bit dodgy.
Yeah, the rest I can understand. But the ammount of BS I read "just" for her being 15. Not that I am saying it is RIGHT, but, compared to murder, vigilante-like behavior, stealing, etc etc AND considering the setting, it is ridiculous to bitch about it. Many of your grandmothers either married or know someone who was married at 15, and it was normal. How many of your grandmothers butchered a human being with a sword, delivering a blow so hard it exploded in pieces, and found it normal?
Now that I have tried it, I can confirm that's not just the age thing. The Saerileth mod is bad in all aspects. Even the code is creepy:
IF Global("SaerilethMatch","GLOBAL",0) Global("CheckSaerilethMatch","GLOBAL",0) Gender(Player1,MALE) !Global("AerieRomanceActive","GLOBAL",2) !Global("JaheiraRomanceActive","GLOBAL",2) !Global("TashiaRomanceActive","GLOBAL",2) !Global("imoenromanceactive","GLOBAL",2) !Global("E3FadeRomanceActive","GLOBAL",2) !Global("SaerilethRomanceActive","GLOBAL",3) !Global("ViconiaRomanceActive","GLOBAL",2) Alignment(Player1,MASK_GOOD) CheckStatGT(Player1,15,CHR) OR(3) Race(Player1,HUMAN) Race(Player1,HALF_ELF) Race(Player1,ELF) THEN RESPONSE #100 SetGlobal("CheckSaerilethMatch","GLOBAL",1) SetGlobal("SaerilethMatch","GLOBAL",1) SetGlobal("SaerilethRomanceActive","GLOBAL",1) SetGlobal("SaerilethLoveTalk","LOCALS",1) RealSetGlobalTimer("SaerilethLoveTalkTime","GLOBAL",1000) END
The code above is missing the check to see if she is in the party, so, if you are eligible, the romance with her starts by just visiting the Temple District, even if you don't talk with her or if you leave right away without going anywhere near her. She is literally scripted to be a creepy stalker
Lol, true, she is WAY too sweet and have some creepy stalker touches. I am in the beginning, with her, jaehira and aerie in the party (and plan to get nelia-with her romancepack) so it is a free-for-all. lets see if there is jealousy scripted for them. Catfight! Bu then again, There is no problem with her being 15, of you think there is, I will get my CLUB abd hit you so hard with it you´ll EXPLODE in the middle of the streets, in the front of a law enforcement agents, children and general people and NO ONE will even look twice, cringe or scream.
but I can say that, even if she is sugar coated to the point of diabetis, it is refreshing not to have to romance someone just to fill an emotional hole.
@Erg: Thats the spirit. lets see how this develops, I will keep posting my impressions.
@Radaga you can try, if you want, but unfortunately the authors of Saerileth don't seem to share my views on this (i.e. in the past they haven't usually reacted well to criticism).
Well, there are a lot of trolls and a lot of lack of perspective (i e I am okay with murder and dealing with demons, but I will freak out if you hint at a romance with a 17yr364days-old girl). Those guys would have killed shakespeare, chaplin, jerry lee lewis, Lewis Carol, ghandi, woody allen, polansky, most of the greek philosophers, a pope or two, and the list goes on and on. They would, if they were not too busy trolling, that is.
Hey guys, I decided try this mod again and see, how she will go well with my PC Inqusitor. I was quite angry, when she took an Eye of Tyr for upgrading my Carsomyr in ToB. The romance was really terrible, but some dialogues and the new path to spellhold were fine. Here are some screenshots, which I have made, when she spoke with my paladin about my deity and meaning to be a chosen of Tyr.
Saerileth I found rather nauseating. I was reminded of the Blackadder line where the prime ministers like;
There is just one thing before I go. I've got this sort of downy hair developing on my chest -- is that normal? Also, I get so lonely and confused. I've written a poem about it; maybe you'll under- stand. "Why do nice girls hate me? Why--
Blackadder: Get out, you nausating adolescent! (shoos him out the door) Piss off!
Saerileth I found rather nauseating. I was reminded of the Blackadder line where the prime ministers like;
There is just one thing before I go. I've got this sort of downy hair developing on my chest -- is that normal? Also, I get so lonely and confused. I've written a poem about it; maybe you'll under- stand. "Why do nice girls hate me? Why--
Blackadder: Get out, you nausating adolescent! (shoos him out the door) Piss off!
I wish I could like this more than once. Blackadder is the antidote to all bad dialogue.
Just one thing. Seriously most people whine and bitch because she is "15" - in a medieval fantasy setting - while being OK with killing, delivering justice with their own hands, stealing, breaking and entering, intimidating by force, lying? By the way, that just to mention those playing with GOOD characters. Dont get me started with those who play evil parties.
Most people, can, in fact, distinguish that killing, stealing and intimidating is a part of the game's premise and therefore unavoidable. Having sex with children is a choice.
I don't mind the "shes only 15" thing really, or at least I wouldn't if she didn't have the creepiest, most obsessive, weirdest romance of any romance ever attached to her. I suppose it makes sense considering shes only 15 and thus isn't emotionally matured yet but it's still awful.
I mean, it's rather arrogant of us to assume than because in our modern world with our modern society and culture that says "16/18" is the acceptable sexytimes age that there would automatically be an anachronistic age of consent of 16 imposed into this medieval inspired fantasy culture/society and universe. Historically speaking the age of consent was much lower in most societies around the world, it was usually around the time of "first blush" or puberty which would have been around 12/13 for most kids. It was only later we began to discover the negative psychological and physical affects that being sexually active too early can have on a person.
The 15 thing could be overlooked if the rest of the mod wasn't so god awful.
There are people out there who actually like the Saerileth mod, as mind boggling as it sounds, people such as CoM_Solaufein. And I have repeatedly asked these people what it is about this mod that is good exactly... and never received any answer. Actually I have gotten answers but neither are really acceptable responses to the question. I have had some people tell me they like the mod precisely because of how awful it is - a "so bad its good" thing - which doesn't really answer "whats good about saerileth?" The other response I get is "oh you have already made up your mind so I won't bother telling you" - which is lame cop out of a response.
I should say that I didn't go into playing the mod expecting to hate it. When I first got BG2 I mostly just wanted a companion mod that had a Gay NPC in it lol. Nathaniel of course. And my googlefu turned up Saerileth (yeah yeah I know gay mod jokes har har) and the website made it seem really interesting, so I downloaded and played it. And I just couldn't believe what I was reading from almost the very start. I accidentally killed her with her broken heart twice. I eventually gave up before finishing the mod because it was hurting my brain.
Given that Tsujatha and Saerileth are made by the same two people, and Tsujatha has "sue" (aka Mary Sue/Marty Stu) in his name I strongly suspect that both mods are really bad attempts at trolling in the same vein as the Harry Potter fanfic "My Immortal" but failing at it.
Given that Tsujatha and Saerileth are made by the same two people, and Tsujatha has "sue" (aka Mary Sue/Marty Stu) in his name I strongly suspect that both mods are really bad attempts at trolling in the same vein as the Harry Potter fanfic "My Immortal" but failing at it.
I don't know. If that were the case, then I think they'd be pretty huge successes.
Finding that sweet spot of "so bad its good" or bad for laughs its a lot more difficult that people suppose. It's a possibility that, thats what the authors were going for and just failed by coming off a little too "straight up" about it (Saerileth more than Tsujatha I admit). But I conceed after all these years, and the many many criticisms levelled at the mods that if that were the case why wouldn't have at least one of the authors have actually said "hey guys! this isn't mean to be taken seriously!" at some point.
I don't know. I'm just tryin to figure out why these mods are popular with a certain subset of modders/bg gamers.
Regarding the notion that Saerileth's age is totally normal given the time period: Although the game's setting has a lot in common with our own middle ages, as far as morality and social norms go, it seems like it might be closer to our present day. E.g. slavery is illegal and bad, women are considered equals to men, etc. So I don't think it makes sense to look at historical views on the age of consent/maturity in the middle ages and then assume that they'd be the same in BG just because they're both at a similar level of technological development.
There are two schools of "so bad it's good" though @ScotGaymer. The first is definitely as you say, deliberate. The Evil Dead films, Braindead/Dead Alive, just about anything by Paul Verhoeven and others all have tongue firmly in cheek. They're bad, they're great, and they're pretty much guaranteed a cult following.
The second type is very different, and there are far fewer of them. It's bizarre accidents like "The Room" that are somehow funny despite trying to be serious. MST3K got a lot of mileage out of these turkeys.
I mean, it's rather arrogant of us to assume than because in our modern world with our modern society and culture that says "16/18" is the acceptable sexytimes age that there would automatically be an anachronistic age of consent of 16 imposed into this medieval inspired fantasy culture/society and universe.
It's not an assumption, though. There's a conversation where Saerileth's like "Why does everyone think you're a creep?" and you say "Because you're 15." They can't use the excuse that it's normal for the time when they themselves wrote that it isn't.
I don't know. I'm just tryin to figure out why these mods are popular with a certain subset of modders/bg gamers.
Bad taste?
I for one have never seen anyone praise Tsujatha for being "so bad it's good." His fans legitimately think he's romantic and well-written. Sometimes people just like trash, dude.
Well, you could try and troll as much as you want, but someone out there will still like it legitimately. Just because these mods have their genuine fans doesn't necessarily mean the author was serious about it.
Saerileth, whatever else you have to say about it, is a big mod. They added a new path to Spellhold. They converted maps from Planescape: Torment. They wrote two separate paths for her romance with the player character and her romance with creepy stalker dude. More effort went into it than most NPC mods. Also, prior to the Tsujatha mod, the author wrote a series of fantasy novels set in "Gilalion", which is where he originates from.
Both mods have had over ten updated releases and been translated into multiple languages.
Point is, I doubt anyone would go to that much trouble just to troll a relatively small number of people and never once let it slip.
Here's a spoiler about Gilalion, which I've gleamed from its preview: it sucks! It is poorly written.
Suffice to say, Saerileth's makers have disallowed talk of Saerileth's age on their forum and they have a thread called reviews but they never include any bad reviews.
They want to be praised, but they mostly want people to tell them what they did right!
So no, this isn't bad it's good stuff, it's bad because if it had a chance to breathe I could enjoy its badness, but I can't.
The 15 thing could be overlooked if the rest of the mod wasn't so god awful.
There are people out there who actually like the Saerileth mod, as mind boggling as it sounds, people such as CoM_Solaufein. And I have repeatedly asked these people what it is about this mod that is good exactly... and never received any answer. Actually I have gotten answers but neither are really acceptable responses to the question. I have had some people tell me they like the mod precisely because of how awful it is - a "so bad its good" thing - which doesn't really answer "whats good about saerileth?" The other response I get is "oh you have already made up your mind so I won't bother telling you" - which is lame cop out of a response.
I should say that I didn't go into playing the mod expecting to hate it.
In the background, you can hear it. Nails, hit on the head. Every nail, forever hit! They will not stop. Though this is less than 400 words, you have said so much in this short paragraph and no nail will ever be hit so cleanly.
Comments
At least with Saerileth I find myself appreciating what seems to be a large amount of work that went into the mod, even if the end result isn't very good - in fact, I actually liked the mod at first since it was my first NPC mod and I found it VERY impressive that somebody was able to add a character AND quests into an already existing game. The character also seems about the same power level as other good NPCs, and I liked that her proficiencies seemed chosen around eventually using Purifier instead of the predictable Carsomyr. The worst thing about the mod was a quest that is forced on you rather early which ended in an area where you could not use magic against a powerful boss.
So while both are bad, I can't imagine not picking Chloe and I'm kinda shocked to see that Saerileth is beating her by so much.
There is just one thing before I go. I've got this
sort of downy hair developing on my chest -- is that normal? Also, I get
so lonely and confused. I've written a poem about it; maybe you'll under-
stand. "Why do nice girls hate me? Why--
Blackadder: Get out, you nausating adolescent! (shoos him out the door) Piss off!
I mean, it's rather arrogant of us to assume than because in our modern world with our modern society and culture that says "16/18" is the acceptable sexytimes age that there would automatically be an anachronistic age of consent of 16 imposed into this medieval inspired fantasy culture/society and universe.
Historically speaking the age of consent was much lower in most societies around the world, it was usually around the time of "first blush" or puberty which would have been around 12/13 for most kids. It was only later we began to discover the negative psychological and physical affects that being sexually active too early can have on a person.
The 15 thing could be overlooked if the rest of the mod wasn't so god awful.
There are people out there who actually like the Saerileth mod, as mind boggling as it sounds, people such as CoM_Solaufein. And I have repeatedly asked these people what it is about this mod that is good exactly... and never received any answer.
Actually I have gotten answers but neither are really acceptable responses to the question. I have had some people tell me they like the mod precisely because of how awful it is - a "so bad its good" thing - which doesn't really answer "whats good about saerileth?"
The other response I get is "oh you have already made up your mind so I won't bother telling you" - which is lame cop out of a response.
I should say that I didn't go into playing the mod expecting to hate it. When I first got BG2 I mostly just wanted a companion mod that had a Gay NPC in it lol. Nathaniel of course. And my googlefu turned up Saerileth (yeah yeah I know gay mod jokes har har) and the website made it seem really interesting, so I downloaded and played it.
And I just couldn't believe what I was reading from almost the very start. I accidentally killed her with her broken heart twice. I eventually gave up before finishing the mod because it was hurting my brain.
Given that Tsujatha and Saerileth are made by the same two people, and Tsujatha has "sue" (aka Mary Sue/Marty Stu) in his name I strongly suspect that both mods are really bad attempts at trolling in the same vein as the Harry Potter fanfic "My Immortal" but failing at it.
Finding that sweet spot of "so bad its good" or bad for laughs its a lot more difficult that people suppose. It's a possibility that, thats what the authors were going for and just failed by coming off a little too "straight up" about it (Saerileth more than Tsujatha I admit).
But I conceed after all these years, and the many many criticisms levelled at the mods that if that were the case why wouldn't have at least one of the authors have actually said "hey guys! this isn't mean to be taken seriously!" at some point.
I don't know. I'm just tryin to figure out why these mods are popular with a certain subset of modders/bg gamers.
Although the game's setting has a lot in common with our own middle ages, as far as morality and social norms go, it seems like it might be closer to our present day. E.g. slavery is illegal and bad, women are considered equals to men, etc. So I don't think it makes sense to look at historical views on the age of consent/maturity in the middle ages and then assume that they'd be the same in BG just because they're both at a similar level of technological development.
The second type is very different, and there are far fewer of them. It's bizarre accidents like "The Room" that are somehow funny despite trying to be serious. MST3K got a lot of mileage out of these turkeys.
I for one have never seen anyone praise Tsujatha for being "so bad it's good." His fans legitimately think he's romantic and well-written. Sometimes people just like trash, dude.
Both mods have had over ten updated releases and been translated into multiple languages.
Point is, I doubt anyone would go to that much trouble just to troll a relatively small number of people and never once let it slip.
Here's a spoiler about Gilalion, which I've gleamed from its preview: it sucks! It is poorly written.
Suffice to say, Saerileth's makers have disallowed talk of Saerileth's age on their forum and they have a thread called reviews but they never include any bad reviews.
They want to be praised, but they mostly want people to tell them what they did right!
So no, this isn't bad it's good stuff, it's bad because if it had a chance to breathe I could enjoy its badness, but I can't.
In the background, you can hear it. Nails, hit on the head. Every nail, forever hit! They will not stop. Though this is less than 400 words, you have said so much in this short paragraph and no nail will ever be hit so cleanly.