Government district needs improvement

srvk

To begin with, it is easy to kill everyone inside the government house. Considering how the cowled wizards will chase you if you cast a single magic missile in the open, I've always found taking out the government representatives extremely easy. In retrospect, destroying everything in the Seven Suns HQ is more difficult.

Moreover the district seems somewhat empty after you do the Viconia and Jan Jansen quests. There are hardly any characters strolling the streets and the npcs inside the houses will only interact if you're on a specific quest. The city prison has only one prisoner and one guard, a disappointment considering that the Baldurs Gate and even the Cloadwood mines prison have more prisoners

sarevok57

maybe the government officials don't like having a bunch of randoms wondering around all over the place, plus there are 2 npc quests there ( keldorn's and anomen's) also jan's quest comes back there, and after you finish the cult of the unseeing eye quest, there is another quest that is required for you to go back, plus nalia's quest after the keep has you go there to find evidence, so quite a bit does happen there if you have the right team mates and what not, but as you said mainly if you are on the right quest the npcs will talk to you, but aren't pretty much all the districts like that though?

ZanathKariashi

Because you're not taking out the government representatives. The people in the main hall are just the base level management mooks that no one cares about. The actual Council of Six meets elsewhere, as do the Cowled Wizards. (them using the government room for the sentencing cutscene was just laziness on the part of the developers not wanting to design an area JUST for that one scene)

And killing them all does drop your rep down low enough for you to be attacked by random guard spawns and the like.

elminster

ZanathKariashi said:

Because you're not taking out the government representatives. The people in the main hall are just the base level management mooks that no one cares about. The actual Council of Six meets elsewhere, as do the Cowled Wizards. (them using the government room for the sentencing cutscene was just laziness on the part of the developers not wanting to design an area JUST for that one scene)

And killing them all does drop your rep down low enough for you to be attacked by random guard spawns and the like.

This. I mean its not as if you see the whole city in the game. Just pockets.

sarevok57

@srvk I think you are missing some vowels in your name

srvk

Well, your reputation drops if you kill random commoners in the slum district. Killing government officials should get the whole Amnish guard chasing you, as the Flaming Fist did when they suspected you of killing the leaders of Iron Throne. And the fact that you cannot meet the Council of Six members is another weakness of the city design. In Baldurs Gate you had the option of killing Dukes Eltan, Belt and Liia

ZanathKariashi

Actually you can, sort of. Aran Linveil is one of the council of six under his noble alias, when he isn't busy being the shadowmaster of amn. And technically the two nobles in trademeet (which shouldn't exist) are as well (or at least their families are, it's probably not them specifically, they just each have a representative on the Council).


And do keep in mind...the Shadow Thieves pretty much run Amn. Everything that passes is by their consent, and inexchange they keep their activities on the down low, and ensure the council stays in power. The church of Waukeen knows about it (considering Athkatla is an entire city dedicated to the glory of Waukeen), but as long as they're making money and fostering trade (it's legality is irrelevant), the church doesn't care, but they do want them to at least be discreet.


And you do get to meet several high ranking members of the cowled wizards (though to be fair, Zallanora should've easily rolfstomped the party as considering "she" is a max level Lich who is powerful enough to make cutscene Irenicus seem positively unimpressive). On the other hand, it's more likely you were just fighting a Simulacrum of him instead so he didn't risk blowing his cover. (2/3 of 30 would be lvl 20, after all)