What the Heck are Dorn and Viconia Talking About?
09jambi90
Member Posts: 8
There is a dialogue between Dorn and Viconia that I have never been able to figure out. It goes like this:
Viconia: So here we are again. The distrusted, much-loathed outsiders.
Dorn: Say what you will about (PC name), she's no fool.
Viconia: You say only fools would trust us?
Dorn: Only fools would trust us to go against our best interests.
Viconia: Then we're in the company of fools, I fear.
Dorn: They're fortunate that we're here to guide them.
Viconia: But what will we guide them to?
Dorn: Victory and power. What else is there?
Viconia: There's love.
Dorn: Love? Have you lost your mind, you-
Dorn: Ah, I get it now.
Viconia: I had you going, though.
Dorn: You did, I admit it.
Viconia: I can't believe you fell for that.
Dorn: I guess I'm just a fool for love.
Viconia: A fool, at any rate.
Dorn: Have mercy, drow! I admitted you got me.
Viconia: I'll show you as much mercy as you show your enemies.
Dorn: Gods help me, I'm doomed.
So, is Dorn admitting that he's going against his natural self (best interests) by being in love with the player character? Or, what? I feel like an idiot, but I'm just not sure what this conversation is saying?
Viconia: So here we are again. The distrusted, much-loathed outsiders.
Dorn: Say what you will about (PC name), she's no fool.
Viconia: You say only fools would trust us?
Dorn: Only fools would trust us to go against our best interests.
Viconia: Then we're in the company of fools, I fear.
Dorn: They're fortunate that we're here to guide them.
Viconia: But what will we guide them to?
Dorn: Victory and power. What else is there?
Viconia: There's love.
Dorn: Love? Have you lost your mind, you-
Dorn: Ah, I get it now.
Viconia: I had you going, though.
Dorn: You did, I admit it.
Viconia: I can't believe you fell for that.
Dorn: I guess I'm just a fool for love.
Viconia: A fool, at any rate.
Dorn: Have mercy, drow! I admitted you got me.
Viconia: I'll show you as much mercy as you show your enemies.
Dorn: Gods help me, I'm doomed.
So, is Dorn admitting that he's going against his natural self (best interests) by being in love with the player character? Or, what? I feel like an idiot, but I'm just not sure what this conversation is saying?
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Comments
"I had you going, though" does not sound like something Viconia would say.
It's mildly out of character. That's all.
The character mods I like best are the ones which attempt the same writing style as the original BG2. The mods which are usually less well thought of are the ones which are obviously extra content that doesn't quite mesh with the game, or have canon character speak or act out of character.
And we all know Anomen would only ever remove that stick to brag about how he totally killed three ogres with it that one time and saved his whole company and was given three medals for his valor and so on.
Viconia and Dorn's conversation strikes me as sounding like the two of them are in a good mood and probably a fair bit into their cups. So Viconia lets the mask slip a little bit, in a way she doesn't with others.
It's a plausible extension to how she acts elsewhere to me. Or it could be that the editor was sloppy and let an inappropriate bit of colloquialism through - but I prefer to look and go "So why is this character saying/doing this" rather than point and go "There was not something like this in their previous dialogue/actions so this is clearly wrong".
In real life, I doubt there's anybody who ever lived, no matter how pompous or reserved, who didn't ease up and talk casually and easily with certain people. If Viconia never had that somebody in the original series, then it's just a pity they didn't make more of a point out of Dorn possibly being it.
(And while nobody's really complained about him, I liked Dorn clearly liking and respecting Viconia in this conversation. It makes sense that he might, given his motivations and backstory.)
The only time she lets her guard down is when she's being arrogant or when she thinks she's in no immediate danger, like with Jan and the spider joke (she seems to see Jan as crass, eccentric and foolish). Most of her attempts at dialogue with other NPCs are attempts to assert her superiority/undermine theirs or gather information about them (like using insults to test their temperament). Her approach is similar to Hexxat's, except Viconia goes for intrigue and the shock factor. She's acting pretty much like she's still playing the Drow political game.
Finally, Viconia has a flair for drama and prefers formal language.
If this conversation were to occur much more in character, it would go something along the lines of:
Viconia: So... Dorn (or some flowery Drow language equivalent for a hulking barbarian). It seems we've been left to our own devices yet again - the distrusted, the loathed.
Dorn: Say what you will about (PC name), but she's no fool.
Viconia: Are you sure? Leaving us here with all this idle time - are we being given free reign to dally with our own twisted machinations?
Dorn: Only fools would trust us to go against our best interests.
Viconia: Then we are in the company of fools, I fear.
Dorn: They're fortunate that we're here to guide them.
Viconia: Indeed, jaluk? And to what end are we guiding them to?
Dorn: Victory and power. What else is there?
Viconia: Ah.
(everything below is still pretty out of character)
Viconia: But then, there's also love.
Dorn: L-? Have you lost your mind, drow-
Dorn: Ah, I get it now.
Viconia: I... I did not...
Dorn: You had me for a moment, I admit.
Viconia: Really, jaluk? And why would-
Dorn: I guess I'm just a fool for love.
Viconia: ...
Viconia: A fool, at any rate.
Dorn: ...
Dorn: Spare me, drow. We do not speak of this again.
(uncomfortable silence at each's failed attempt at levity)
I do think that two lines are especially cringeworthy. "I had you going though." "I can't believe you fell for that." These are phrases to by used only by obnoxious 12yo boys. Only them. Its hard for me to read it any other way.
If anything, my main complaint about this banter is that it's so skeletal. It suits Dorn fine because he's a man of few words and speaks rather direct, but Victonia's definitely supposed to be more formal and dramatic. She needed better word choices to match her voice.
An extra word or two acknowledging the joke might have helped clarify the teasing nature of the conversation too. The fact that they used such few, simple words and sentences makes me suspect they were under a pretty strict word-count restriction when they wrote this.
"Take heart fellow adventurers, for you have curried the favor of Boo, the only miniature giant space hamster in the Realm!"
"Ah, yes. Stoke that infernal wrath of yours. I can feel the anger within you, boiling like a pit of sulphur in the crevices of your heart. You feel it, do you not? The taint that surrounds your soul like a serpent, squeezing it, spreading its venom... that taint, that wrath exists in all of the children of Bhaal, but few know how to use it."
"Eh... it would appear that... the great and... mighty Tiax... has shrunk his undergarments... three sizes this day."
"The sun shines, and I'm amazed we live to see another day!"
"It seems our resident suicide monger, Ajantis, lives in a black and white world."
"WHAT?! You were going to ask about my name, weren't you? Everyone wants to know about it, and you're probably no different! Well fine! Maple Willow Aspen IS my name and YES my parents were VERY fond of TREES! I am VERY aware of it, and NO don't want to hear ANY jokes about family trees and me being the SAP! Are you HAPPY NOW?!"
"I shall avenge each flower you might have trod on, and every leaf you might have shaken loose in your passing!"
"Why have you come? Is it to steal my riches? - or perhaps you seek to righteously punish me for my affront to your morality. It matters little, for you will do neither. Before I dispose of you in some horribly gruesome manner perhaps I should introduce myself. I am known as Davaeorn; I would ask you for your names but I care little to become acquainted with the dead."
"Hi, I'm Well-Adjusted Al, and my prices are sensible. I used to be called Crazy Al, but therapy has convinced me that selling plate armour for 3 gold pieces and a small duck was no way to get ahead in business."
Yes, there was absolutely nothing other than smooth dialogue that fits so well that you never think about it in the perfect edifice of the original games. None of that ever pops up as a piece of writing, since it is all such naturalistic dialogue that is totally naturally what natural people would say. "Before I dispose of you in some horribly gruesome manner", haw haw! Practically Shakespeare, except without all that tiresome iambic pentameter nonsense.
And if you wanted Viccy specifically, here you go:
"Then you are of no further interest to me, rivel... though I suspect your dreams will be filled with dark imaginings of the hedonistic pleasures you have denied yourself. But even your dreams will be but a pale shadow of my true decadence."
Most of her prose is pretty purple, but her hitting on Sarevok is almost physically painful to read. (Also I'd judge her saying "(sigh) So what else is new?" to be pretty colloquial.)
More importantly, most of those quotes were from BG1. BG2 is much better known for its quality writing and characters, especially for the NPC banters. I think the BG1NPC project is one of the most popular mods for BG1 because it brings some of the best parts of BG2 to the game.
So we could even say that this banter feels more like BG1 writing level, which is why it stands out so much in BG2.
And the Viccy quote I agree is a bit silly. But it's silly in her style by still being overly dramatic and formal. If it had been more in this banter's style, it would go:
"But even your dreams won't match my true sensuality."
It's much more overt and simplified.
forever bitterViccy's quote wasn't (neither was Maple, unless my memory fails me). I can find more shlocky writing from BG2 if you like, it's just easier to find BG1 quotes online and I didn't feel like poking around in the dialogue files.I'd argue the writing in BG2 isn't so much better as it is doing something different than BG1 was doing. It was more writing-focused, and especially NPC interaction-focused. Well, to be honest, that's a much better version of the line, because while still stilted and unnatural, at least it is not laughably so, and "sensuality" is a much better term for what she's getting at than "decadence". However, I wasn't specifically directly comparing the crappiness of Viconia dialogue.
In this case, the examples are more a counter to: "...where in comparison the writing in the original game just fits so well you never think about it. This pops right out at you as a piece of writing. it's so artificial."
The dialogue I quoted from Viccy is garbage. It's purple and awful and unnatural-sounding (and plays into tiresome drow dominatrix wankfodder cliches, but that's another matter). The sainted original games - even the thrice-sainted BG2! - have bad, schlocky dialogue. Not all of it, but not a miniscule percentage either. There is lots of stuff in the original games that "pops right out at you as a piece of writing" and is "so artificial". They are not perfect, and they should be looked at honestly if you're judging their writing, not through rose-tinted nostalgic goggles. That's the primary point here - nothing I quoted fits the description of the original games' writing as put by @DregothofTyr.
If you feel that parts of the writing weren't great, at least they were consistently not great (lol) and matched each other. Adding in colloquial terms to a character's dialogue who only speaks melodramatically and formally, and sometimes stilted, yes, is jarring for me.
isthe other person hasn't yet fully said. In any case, it confused me.Also, FWIW, I am being critical with love. The added content makes a deeper experience on the whole.