It's the same thing for the better part of a year now - every single thread discussing the expansion's merits will inevitably attract people all too willing to keep crapping all over these boards with the same rhetoric - Amber Scott is the devil, Beamdog has brought this controversy upon themselves, SJW this, liberal that, etc. The people change every now and then, but the stupid remarks are always the same. In the case of this particular thread it's under the guise of civil debate.
Look, guys, you're not fooling anyone. And you should go away. A lot of people here can successfully ignore you, but every now and then someone else is going to get fed up and call you out on your bullshit. And then you play the victim. Well, you're not. The row goes on for so long because you keep coming back. And having to put up with this casual, nonchalant, thinly veiled hate speech eventually gets on people's nerves.
So people who have a different opinion than yours "Should go away?" Wow.
A friendly reminder that everyone here is entitled to a viewpoint, and the Site Rules prohibit disrespectful behavior. Personal attacks are not tolerated.
If you want to continue posting in this thread, I strongly recommend you consider whether you're criticizing an idea or criticizing a person. If it's the latter, you're probably not going to win any hearts or minds.
For what it's worth, Mizhena only tells you her identity if you ask her (it's standard practice for RPGs in general for NPCs to reveal personal details). And ALL of that text is contained in this one single screenshots.
Mizhena says nothing about her gender besides those four sentences.
@Kilivitz Hate Speech? Who is hating who exactly? Who here is faking to be civilized? *confused*
@semiticgod So.. any hints as to how much she will be fleshed out in the up coming patch? - Will we be able to quest for her? - Will romance/flirt options be available? - Will she explain herself better? - Can she join the party? etc I really hope this next patch isn't just "lets just add a few more lines of dialogue". A lazy effort like that after all the fuss over her will just be rubbing salt in the wounds imho
I'm not sure who wrote what parts of the game lines, but the quality of writing did differ throughout the game. But might be that I didn't buy the whole Caelar story line. Also I didn't get any more infos on what Khalid and Dynaheir's death.
After all the controversy about the TG npc, the thing that bugged me most is the dialog transition. I did not wonder about her "strange" name ( hello , its a fantasy world, everyone uses strange names) and then tells her life story. Without the spotlight she would have just been a side note or something fairly forgettable.
The game banshee review was pretty fair and I would agree with most points.
@Yamcha I loved the dialog where Glint tries to explain why he can't technically wield edged-weapons.
Several of the banters were quite good as well. The game is worth playing, plain and simple.
@Teo_live not sure what you are waiting for, you're missing out. $20. It takes more than 20+ hours to beat. Holidays with time off are upon us. Get your Fah la la la la la on!
I'm not sure who wrote what parts of the game lines, but the quality of writing did differ throughout the game. But might be that I didn't buy the whole Caelar story line. Also I didn't get any more infos on what Khalid and Dynaheir's death.
After all the controversy about the TG npc, the thing that bugged me most is the dialog transition. I did not wonder about her "strange" name ( hello , its a fantasy world, everyone uses strange names) and then tells her life story. Without the spotlight she would have just been a side note or something fairly forgettable.
The game banshee review was pretty fair and I would agree with most points.
"Hello, my name is Koveras" "That's a strange name" "When I was born, my parents thought I would be the future "Lord of Murder"@tm so didn't bother educating me in the subtle art of deception" "That's interesting......just let me ignore that completely" (as an aside, "boring conversation anyway")
I agree, I think the quality of the writing was very variable.
@Teo_live: I'm a moderator, not a developer, so I don't know what's in store for Mizhena, but I don't think it will be revolutionary. She is a minor character and will probably stay that way.
The ONLY goal should have been to retain everyone who owned a copy of BG and ensure they bought SoD. I feel so frustrated, not by the controversy, but because this was Beamdog's chance to expand the BG universe.
It was such a big deal to me to get the EE's. Now I feel like anything they do next will be some exercise in Sisypheon futility.
The absolute mind numbing experience for me was that they had broken all mods upon releasing EEs. And broken them AGAIN with SoD. I really can't fathom what's going inside these people's minds. I'm pretty sure their next project would be PST:EE, since any original project would take more time than they announce.
The risk Beamdog took was inserting ANY agenda into a well loved established IP (and not their own IP). This risk was exacerbated by the assumption that gamers would have gotten over Gamergate. Honest, I had to look it up to see what the big deal was. It turns out people don't like being stereotyped...there's some level of irony there you've just got to love!
You're correct. However, what lead to the outrage isn't the risk. Risk is a natural component of creative process. You never know how the audience will react. And in order to keep them interested, you have to offer something new all the time. What did trigger it (it's not my own observation, but after I read it elsewhere, I realized it's pretty much nailed it) is the attitude. Everyone f***s up every once in a while. What do you after that is what matters. Beamdog not only f**ed up, but had the gall the challenge the fans, and show them the middle finger. To alienate their core audience: "These are not real BG fans". I'm speechless. What is this even supposed to mean? Does this person deny my existence? "I am the writer, I get to decide". ***k you. You get to ***k my ***k.
Look, guys, you're not fooling anyone. And you should go away. A lot of people here can successfully ignore you, but every now and then someone else is going to get fed up and call you out on your bullshit. And then you play the victim. Well, you're not. The row goes on for so long because you keep coming back. And having to put up with this casual, nonchalant, thinly veiled hate speech eventually gets on people's nerves.
I thought you said you wouldn't participate in this discussion anymore? Looks like you lied. Or telled the truth and changed your mind afterwards? Which is the same thing, really.
[To all my BG brothers and sisters around the world, Merry Christmas]
@Enilwyn Your like Darth Vader tempting me to make my gaming backlog even larger lol. Looks like Santa is giving away massive steam discounts too, so I have officially run out of excuses
@qwerty123456 I hear you regarding the risk they took. In my mind I envisioned them digging through YouTube vids on what made BG2 the best RPG ever and give us more of that.
As someone that doesn't have the technical acumen to manage mods I would LOVE some kind of easy plug and play way to try fan created content (I would pay realistic sums).
The reaction to the controversy was what confused me the most and why Gamergate still confuses me. It started out with gamers questioning journos, right? But now it has morphed into dev vs gamer and gamer vs gamer?
My simple answer is love (heart and minds folks). Life will go on. Beamdog deserves another chance to impress. We have more fun together than fighting one another. Let's be awesome.
@Teo_live: I'm a moderator, not a developer, so I don't know what's in store for Mizhena, but I don't think it will be revolutionary. She is a minor character and will probably stay that way.
Skie and the soultaker dagger and some continuity references in bg2 would have been better imo.
Edit..By that I mean that I do certainly hope they will get around to doing some small edits to Bg2/ToB, concerning SoD..That is a really big nuisance for me at the moment^^
Hopefully they're done with their current projects at some point in the future.
@Enilwyn : Check BWS in the General Modding forum. It is a platform to help you with easily installing mods @qwerty123456 every patch whatsover would break any mod (also with non-EE versions if i'm not mistaken) so there's no way anyone could update something without breaking stuff. More important, the updates from EE and especially SoD unlocked a vast potential for modders and they are quite content with their new possibilities.
Why is it always, always the ones who make ignorant comments that then get mortally offended when they're called ignorant?
If after all this time you're still singling out Amber Scott as the source of your alleged woes, guess what? You are ignorant - of how video games are made. Adding single lines of dialogue, let alone an entire character, is a process. It starts with a writer (and let's not forget that no one's ever officially confirmed that Mizhena was Amber's creation and not Andrew's, so those of you acting self-righteous should maybe take a moment to reflect on how they reached that conclusion). It ends with the corporate overlords at Wizards of the Coast.
I'll reiterate: The people who make D&D looked at Mizhena and said "Yeah, okay." At that point, anyone who's "uncomfortable" or "not transphobic but" or who wants games to be apolitical and "pure escapism" have already lost. Wizards of the Coast don't give a damn about your discomfort, and they're certainly not losing any sleep over the prospect of losing your business, since they've gone ahead and authorized another Beamdog project.
You get nothing. You lose. So if you want to squat in this forum and recycle the same old talking points ad infinitum, go right ahead. Nobody's listening, nobody's going to change their plans on your behalf, and nobody's going to give you what you want.
I've said it elsewhere and I'll say it here: personal attacks are not acceptable on this forum. Criticize ideas, criticize trends, criticize individual things--but leave your fellow forumites alone. No matter how much you disagree with them, it is not okay to denigrate somebody because of their opinion.
I'm fine with Mizhena, and frankly, I think others should be fine with her, too. But I do not think less of people who are not fine with her--much less do I insult them in a public forum.
Personal attacks do not win hearts and minds. They just make people angry and encourage people to not listen to each other.
I think you are saying wizards of the coast gave the game a thumbs up therefore beam dog is fine for a new game. That souds likely. However, just because wizards of the coast allows tge team to isr thier license does nit meam they or their parent company are going to throw money at them.
I have no idea of the net profit Siege made after theu paid the game designers, genator gnome, and pizza boy. It could be that they made a huge profit. If this is the case thier accountant can make a file for the Beam Dog top dogs to show to a big money corporate game sponsor and say... "Hey dont believe those negative Nancy anti social justice Marxist decenters we made 1500 grand with our 800 grand investment in Siege. You need to spot us some deveopment money for our Baldurs Gate 3 online Game."
if that is the case and that is what it takes for me to get more creepy wretched monster filled caves and filthy stinking hidden cellars with foul dwimmer deads then I am fine if they put in thier anti-capitalists plebian maxist propaganda. But like I wrote... big ammoral corporate sponsors will Not fund a project when they see paltry profits from previous enterprises snd see the team and thier philosophy is the same cash loozer 1....
I seriously hope they do get the funds though cause like I said I had the option of leaving the disagreeable player characters behind and even though Edwin seemed more irritated Biconna was so much more sweet saying she cated mothing for any of us.
If after all this time you're still singling out Amber Scott as the source of your alleged woes, guess what? You are ignorant - of how video games are made. Adding single lines of dialogue, let alone an entire character, is a process. It starts with a writer (and let's not forget that no one's ever officially confirmed that Mizhena was Amber's creation and not Andrew's, so those of you acting self-righteous should maybe take a moment to reflect on how they reached that conclusion). It ends with the corporate overlords at Wizards of the Coast.
So in other words we should be blaming Andrew or WotC and not Amber? Though realistically do you really expect critics to play detective and try figure out who the boogeyman that created Mizhena was (Especially considering how vocal Amber Scott was regarding her agenda pushing)?
I'll reiterate: The people who make D&D looked at Mizhena and said "Yeah, okay." At that point, anyone who's "uncomfortable" or "not transphobic but" or who wants games to be apolitical and "pure escapism" have already lost. Wizards of the Coast don't give a damn about your discomfort,
They also seem to not give a damn about trans people imho.
They seem more than happy writing multiple good LGB characters, but they give the T's one poor lazy minor token NPC? Imo this makes the designers whoever they are the true "transphobics" in all this. The thing that pissed me off the most personally was how much potential Mizhena had to be awesome, she had a sweet voice, has interesting virtues and an unusual backstory. A great "wiafu crush" alternative to air-head Neera.
Glad you understood what he was saying, cause it went completely over my head. I don't see any so called hate speech in this thread. Maybe "discontent speech" would be more accurate.
What @Kilivitz meant (maybe he used not the most polite words) is that almost any SoD-related topic sooner or later focuses on the same thing - Mizhena and writers' (or even writer's) woes. These topics have been discussed to death on many forums, including these boards.
In the OP I've quoted the review by GameBanshee, which had, among others, these words: "The good news is that while I was working my way towards Siege of Dragonspear, a lot of its problems got fixed, and all of the dialogue that offended everybody got removed". Even though in reality the update on Mizhena has not been released yet, the message still stays - that the game should be discussed fully.
Nobody says you shouldn't mention Mizhena in your reviews. But what would be much better is to mention many things, and not the only one thing, while you post your thoughts about the game.
What @Kilivitz meant is that we already heard everything there ever can be said about Mizhena and writers.
SoD has a lot to offer, it brings 4 new NPCs, new dialogues for old NPCs, it brings quests, difficult encounters, new items, new romances. Why not discuss it all in the complex?
So in other words we should be blaming Andrew or WotC and not Amber? Though realistically do you really expect critics to play detective and try figure out who the boogeyman that created Mizhena was (Especially considering how vocal Amber Scott was regarding her agenda pushing)?
You're right, fact-checking is too much work. Better to dogpile on the only woman involved without knowing what part she actually played. After all, she's the only person at Beamdog who ever had an agenda, right? She must've snuck Mizhena into the game without anyone noticing. Typical woman.
They seem more than happy writing multiple good LGB characters, but they give the T's one poor lazy minor token NPC? Imo this makes the designers whoever they are the true "transphobics" in all this.
Riiiiiight. The designers are the transphobes, not the people who upload videos on YouTube on how to kill Mizhena, or open dozens of threads asking to delete her, or constantly complain about a character with four lines of dialogue. Makes perfect sense.
The thing that pissed me off the most personally was how much potential Mizhena had to be awesome, she had a sweet voice, has interesting virtues and an unusual backstory. A great "wiafu crush" alternative to air-head Neera.
She's a merchant NPC. Unless you spend your days fantasizing about Gellana Mirrorshade or Kelddath Ormlyr, you had no reason to expect anything out of Mizhena beyond that.
Because for some reason it's perfectly fine to have some random inconsequential NPC - as long as they are cisgender and preferably straight. A trans character must be developed past a certain point to be acceptable, almost like they need a reason to exist...
@Kurona you're spot on in exposing the silly she's trans so she has to be fleshed out argument for what it is: nonsense. Players could require dozens of minor NPCs to "explain themselves" but for some reason Mizhena gets singled out. Personally I love the nonchalance with which Mizhena explains herself. If only trans people could enjoy their identity in such a care-free manner in the real world. Wouldn't it be a nicer place?
I wish Beamdog made a statement and simply kept Mizhena the way she is, but alas, money rules the world.
If after all this time you're still singling out Amber Scott as the source of your alleged woes, guess what? You are ignorant - of how video games are made. Adding single lines of dialogue, let alone an entire character, is a process. It starts with a writer (and let's not forget that no one's ever officially confirmed that Mizhena was Amber's creation and not Andrew's, so those of you acting self-righteous should maybe take a moment to reflect on how they reached that conclusion). It ends with the corporate overlords at Wizards of the Coast.
So in other words we should be blaming Andrew or WotC and not Amber? Though realistically do you really expect critics to play detective and try figure out who the boogeyman that created Mizhena was (Especially considering how vocal Amber Scott was regarding her agenda pushing)?
I'll reiterate: The people who make D&D looked at Mizhena and said "Yeah, okay." At that point, anyone who's "uncomfortable" or "not transphobic but" or who wants games to be apolitical and "pure escapism" have already lost. Wizards of the Coast don't give a damn about your discomfort,
They also seem to not give a damn about trans people imho.
They seem more than happy writing multiple good LGB characters, but they give the T's one poor lazy minor token NPC? Imo this makes the designers whoever they are the true "transphobics" in all this. The thing that pissed me off the most personally was how much potential Mizhena had to be awesome, she had a sweet voice, has interesting virtues and an unusual backstory. A great "wiafu crush" alternative to air-head Neera.
Glad you understood what he was saying, cause it went completely over my head. I don't see any so called hate speech in this thread. Maybe "discontent speech" would be more accurate.
How did she have potential to be awesome? She's a minor NPC whose background can be found in a single screen shot. What about her, and no other minor NPC, makes her deserving of this "potential" in your eyes?
@Grum Well first the fact that she was the only official trans by choice in the entire series? Also she just seemed so much more interesting than the boring options available for men romancing women. That is my honest opinion. So yeah it was a personal let down for me at least @Kurona@Blackraven Seems Beamdog disagrees with you both at least according to treant's post as he admitted Mizhena needed more work. Though tbh I would agree with you both if Mizhena wasn't the first of her kind in the entire series.
Name one person in this entire thread that disagrees with ANYONE HERE for simply being a woman?
I rarely get offended, but since people here are being civil (or at least fake civil according to Kilivitz) I must say that post of yours using sarcasm to paint an entire group of potential customers as woman hating... that's quite rude and ignorant (and very hypocritical since you were the one demanding all critics get their facts right). Please respect opposing peoples views here, or at the very least do not strawman us as collective woman-antagonizing sexists it is completely unnecessary.
Name one person in this entire thread that disagrees with ANYONE HERE for simply being a woman?
I rarely get offended, but since people here are being civil (or at least fake civil according to Kilivitz) I must say that post of yours using sarcasm to paint an entire group of potential customers as woman hating... that's quite rude and ignorant (and very hypocritical since you were the one demanding all critics get their facts right). Please respect opposing peoples views here, or at the very least do not strawman us as collective woman-antagonizing sexists it is completely unnecessary.
It's only a strawman if it's not true.
You say expecting critics of Amber Scott to fact-check whether she's actually the legitimate source of their problems is too much to ask; you single her out as pushing an agenda when every other person at Beamdog does the same (was Andrew Foley not pushing an agenda when he created Glint and M'Khiin? Are the gay gnome and the goblin victim of racism somehow exempt from "political opinions"?); you ignore the fact that all SoD content was approved by WotC, meaning "the Mizhena agenda" is authorized by the people who actually own D&D.
The only reason - the only reason - that anyone would still be pushing the BS "cherchez la femme" narrative and dropping on the blame on Amber Scott after all this time is because she was the only visible woman on the team. She wasn't the creative director, she wasn't even the lead writer on the project. That's all this is. Not one of these so-called "opposing people" have the guts to actually take their grievances to WotC, because they know how little they matter to an actual corporation. They'll treat you like the white noise you are, and still get your money in the end because you'll fall right in line when the next D&D game comes out.
But sure, let's focus on how offended you are. Because you deserve consideration and thoughtfulness where Amber apparently doesn't.
Comments
If you want to continue posting in this thread, I strongly recommend you consider whether you're criticizing an idea or criticizing a person. If it's the latter, you're probably not going to win any hearts or minds.
For what it's worth, Mizhena only tells you her identity if you ask her (it's standard practice for RPGs in general for NPCs to reveal personal details). And ALL of that text is contained in this one single screenshots.
Mizhena says nothing about her gender besides those four sentences.
@semiticgod So.. any hints as to how much she will be fleshed out in the up coming patch?
- Will we be able to quest for her?
- Will romance/flirt options be available?
- Will she explain herself better?
- Can she join the party? etc
I really hope this next patch isn't just "lets just add a few more lines of dialogue". A lazy effort like that after all the fuss over her will just be rubbing salt in the wounds imho
My favorite dialogue in SoD
I'm not sure who wrote what parts of the game lines, but the quality of writing did differ throughout the game.
But might be that I didn't buy the whole Caelar story line. Also I didn't get any more infos on what Khalid and Dynaheir's death.
After all the controversy about the TG npc, the thing that bugged me most is the dialog transition. I did not wonder about her "strange" name ( hello , its a fantasy world, everyone uses strange names) and then tells her life story. Without the spotlight she would have just been a side note or something fairly forgettable.
The game banshee review was pretty fair and I would agree with most points.
Several of the banters were quite good as well. The game is worth playing, plain and simple.
@Teo_live not sure what you are waiting for, you're missing out. $20. It takes more than 20+ hours to beat. Holidays with time off are upon us. Get your Fah la la la la la on!
"Hello, my name is Koveras"
"That's a strange name"
"When I was born, my parents thought I would be the future "Lord of Murder"@tm so didn't bother educating me in the subtle art of deception"
"That's interesting......just let me ignore that completely" (as an aside, "boring conversation anyway")
I agree, I think the quality of the writing was very variable.
I'm pretty sure their next project would be PST:EE, since any original project would take more time than they announce. You're correct. However, what lead to the outrage isn't the risk. Risk is a natural component of creative process. You never know how the audience will react. And in order to keep them interested, you have to offer something new all the time.
What did trigger it (it's not my own observation, but after I read it elsewhere, I realized it's pretty much nailed it) is the attitude. Everyone f***s up every once in a while. What do you after that is what matters. Beamdog not only f**ed up, but had the gall the challenge the fans, and show them the middle finger. To alienate their core audience:
"These are not real BG fans".
I'm speechless. What is this even supposed to mean? Does this person deny my existence?
"I am the writer, I get to decide".
***k you. You get to ***k my ***k. I thought you said you wouldn't participate in this discussion anymore? Looks like you lied. Or telled the truth and changed your mind afterwards? Which is the same thing, really.
@Enilwyn Your like Darth Vader tempting me to make my gaming backlog even larger lol. Looks like Santa is giving away massive steam discounts too, so I have officially run out of excuses
@qwerty123456 I hear you regarding the risk they took. In my mind I envisioned them digging through YouTube vids on what made BG2 the best RPG ever and give us more of that.
As someone that doesn't have the technical acumen to manage mods I would LOVE some kind of easy plug and play way to try fan created content (I would pay realistic sums).
The reaction to the controversy was what confused me the most and why Gamergate still confuses me. It started out with gamers questioning journos, right? But now it has morphed into dev vs gamer and gamer vs gamer?
My simple answer is love (heart and minds folks). Life will go on. Beamdog deserves another chance to impress. We have more fun together than fighting one another. Let's be awesome.
~E
Edit: spelling
Edit..By that I mean that I do certainly hope they will get around to doing some small edits to Bg2/ToB, concerning SoD..That is a really big nuisance for me at the moment^^
Hopefully they're done with their current projects at some point in the future.
@qwerty123456 every patch whatsover would break any mod (also with non-EE versions if i'm not mistaken) so there's no way anyone could update something without breaking stuff. More important, the updates from EE and especially SoD unlocked a vast potential for modders and they are quite content with their new possibilities.
If after all this time you're still singling out Amber Scott as the source of your alleged woes, guess what? You are ignorant - of how video games are made. Adding single lines of dialogue, let alone an entire character, is a process. It starts with a writer (and let's not forget that no one's ever officially confirmed that Mizhena was Amber's creation and not Andrew's, so those of you acting self-righteous should maybe take a moment to reflect on how they reached that conclusion). It ends with the corporate overlords at Wizards of the Coast.
I'll reiterate: The people who make D&D looked at Mizhena and said "Yeah, okay." At that point, anyone who's "uncomfortable" or "not transphobic but" or who wants games to be apolitical and "pure escapism" have already lost. Wizards of the Coast don't give a damn about your discomfort, and they're certainly not losing any sleep over the prospect of losing your business, since they've gone ahead and authorized another Beamdog project.
You get nothing. You lose. So if you want to squat in this forum and recycle the same old talking points ad infinitum, go right ahead. Nobody's listening, nobody's going to change their plans on your behalf, and nobody's going to give you what you want.
Shout-out to @Kilivitz for calling it like it is.
I'm fine with Mizhena, and frankly, I think others should be fine with her, too. But I do not think less of people who are not fine with her--much less do I insult them in a public forum.
Personal attacks do not win hearts and minds. They just make people angry and encourage people to not listen to each other.
I have no idea of the net profit Siege made after theu paid the game designers, genator gnome, and pizza boy. It could be that they made a huge profit. If this is the case thier accountant can make a file for the Beam Dog top dogs to show to a big money corporate game sponsor and say...
"Hey dont believe those negative Nancy anti social justice Marxist decenters we made 1500 grand with our 800 grand investment in Siege. You need to spot us some deveopment money for our Baldurs Gate 3 online Game."
if that is the case and that is what it takes for me to get more creepy wretched monster filled caves and filthy stinking hidden cellars with foul dwimmer deads then I am fine if they put in thier anti-capitalists plebian maxist propaganda. But like I wrote... big ammoral corporate sponsors will Not fund a project when they see paltry profits from previous enterprises snd see the team and thier philosophy is the same cash loozer 1....
I seriously hope they do get the funds though cause like I said I had the option of leaving the disagreeable player characters behind and even though Edwin seemed more irritated Biconna was so much more sweet saying she cated mothing for any of us.
They seem more than happy writing multiple good LGB characters, but they give the T's one poor lazy minor token NPC? Imo this makes the designers whoever they are the true "transphobics" in all this. The thing that pissed me off the most personally was how much potential Mizhena had to be awesome, she had a sweet voice, has interesting virtues and an unusual backstory. A great "wiafu crush" alternative to air-head Neera. Glad you understood what he was saying, cause it went completely over my head. I don't see any so called hate speech in this thread. Maybe "discontent speech" would be more accurate.
In the OP I've quoted the review by GameBanshee, which had, among others, these words: "The good news is that while I was working my way towards Siege of Dragonspear, a lot of its problems got fixed, and all of the dialogue that offended everybody got removed". Even though in reality the update on Mizhena has not been released yet, the message still stays - that the game should be discussed fully.
Nobody says you shouldn't mention Mizhena in your reviews. But what would be much better is to mention many things, and not the only one thing, while you post your thoughts about the game.
What @Kilivitz meant is that we already heard everything there ever can be said about Mizhena and writers.
SoD has a lot to offer, it brings 4 new NPCs, new dialogues for old NPCs, it brings quests, difficult encounters, new items, new romances. Why not discuss it all in the complex?
Makes one wonder, don'tcha think?
I wish Beamdog made a statement and simply kept Mizhena the way she is, but alas, money rules the world.
@Kurona @Blackraven Seems Beamdog disagrees with you both at least according to treant's post as he admitted Mizhena needed more work. Though tbh I would agree with you both if Mizhena wasn't the first of her kind in the entire series. This is a relief, the (majority) of customers vote with their wallets What the f###!? I had to stop reading here.
Name one person in this entire thread that disagrees with ANYONE HERE for simply being a woman?
I rarely get offended, but since people here are being civil (or at least fake civil according to Kilivitz) I must say that post of yours using sarcasm to paint an entire group of potential customers as woman hating... that's quite rude and ignorant (and very hypocritical since you were the one demanding all critics get their facts right). Please respect opposing peoples views here, or at the very least do not strawman us as collective woman-antagonizing sexists it is completely unnecessary.
You say expecting critics of Amber Scott to fact-check whether she's actually the legitimate source of their problems is too much to ask; you single her out as pushing an agenda when every other person at Beamdog does the same (was Andrew Foley not pushing an agenda when he created Glint and M'Khiin? Are the gay gnome and the goblin victim of racism somehow exempt from "political opinions"?); you ignore the fact that all SoD content was approved by WotC, meaning "the Mizhena agenda" is authorized by the people who actually own D&D.
The only reason - the only reason - that anyone would still be pushing the BS "cherchez la femme" narrative and dropping on the blame on Amber Scott after all this time is because she was the only visible woman on the team. She wasn't the creative director, she wasn't even the lead writer on the project. That's all this is. Not one of these so-called "opposing people" have the guts to actually take their grievances to WotC, because they know how little they matter to an actual corporation. They'll treat you like the white noise you are, and still get your money in the end because you'll fall right in line when the next D&D game comes out.
But sure, let's focus on how offended you are. Because you deserve consideration and thoughtfulness where Amber apparently doesn't.