Weak Point in the Storyline

[fireblade80]

Spoilers ahead:

Spoiler

After you return from Grout's Mansion (where you "see" Nines exiting the building), your only option when talking to LaCroix is to incriminate Nines, although he saved your life 2 times. Shouldn't there be an option not to tell LaCroix about him, especially since Bach was at the scene and torched the house, so the blame on Grout's death could easily be placed upon the witchhunter?

[jklinders]

Spoilers below








LaCroix is a Ventrue, he used dominate on your character, you had no choice but to tell all, that may not always be the case though.....

[Brother None]

Just consider this a spoiler-filled thread, so don't worry about the spoilers (if a mod can put a spoiler warning in the thread topic?)

LaCroix is a Ventrue, he used dominate on your character, you had no choice but to tell all, that may not always be the case though.....

'fraid that doesn't explain all of it.

Fireblade, but this is not so much a plot weakness as it is railroading. It's not the plot that's bothering you, it's the fact that you're not given any options (which, indeed, might not make sense). This isn't the only time that happens, it also happens when later talking to Nines about the proposition LaCroix made (you can't start by telling him it's a bad idea), when talking to LaCroix about where the key is, when Jack takes you with him in the car, and in the very ending dialogue with LaCroix (and he certainly isn't dominating you then).

So yeah, this is simply Troika telling you where the story should go. It sucks, but it's not uncommon in RPGs.

[jklinders]

Your right of course Brother None, but if I can't rationalize these things out then I can't be a gamer. I do have to admit that there was a bit of a peek at "the man behind the curtain here" I just choose to ignore him. It should be noted that after considerable time Lacroix tries it again on a certain story branch. Dominate was clearly the outcome here, just terribly presented.

[Wesp5]

Dominate was clearly the outcome here, just terribly presented.

No, LaCroix uses Dominate on you several times throughout the game and this isn't one of them.

[jklinders]

Been a couple of years, once again though I have to pretend that I can't see that guy behind the curtain or else the illusion of freedom goes byebye. Then again the entire idea of the game is that everyone Nines included sees you as an expendible pawn. My one full playthrough I blew everyone off as no one in that city actually cared if my char lived or died. If Nines saw what I had to do in the end game as the initiation fee, well the price is not worth the reward thank you very much.

[Celacena]

every game where there is not completely free dialogue imposes limitations on the outcome - some games are more thorough than others at the options, but here, the core plot is so linear in the missions that are given that the game cannot have the degrees of freedom to allow a true RPG experience. it is like with Heather - I am tooled up to the eyebrows, I have celerity 5 and ranged 10, yet I can't save my ghoul Heather? it is an unnecessary plot restriction, but one just has to accept that in a game that was rushed out rather than tweaked to perfection, decisions had to be made.

we ended up with a pretty fascinating game that may never have hit the shops if all the 'tweaking' had been done, so I just accept it.

[The Tremere]

No, LaCroix uses Dominate on you several times throughout the game and this isn't one of them.

Yeah he mostly uses his descipline when you disagree with him you can unterstand it by the blue light abone his face.Am i right?

[Jhereg]

we ended up with a pretty fascinating game that may never have hit the shops if all the 'tweaking' had been done, so I just accept it.

True. If there is one lesson that the

Spoiler

company name withheld to thwart the litigious

server farm parable teaches, it is this: "Perfectionitis is a lethal illness."

To paraphrase the parable, a company developed a computer that was better, faster, more reliable, and 100% software compatible with one of the top computers of its day, and the company folded with only a handful of prototypes completed because they were always sure their computer would be perfect is they just tweaked that one circuit just a little bit more. So it vanished in a cosmically insignificant puff of vapourware. And no, it wasn't - this pre-dates the PC (and seriously dates me, apparrently).

Give me a game I can play and love, quirks, bugs, and all, before you give me a shadow of a hope of a dream that never *quite* makes it into reality. If the game is worth saving, inevitably there will be a Wesp or two around to take up the mantle and sally forth into the fray, so long as there is a mantle to be taken up.

Oh, BTW, did I ever say, "Thanks!", Wesp?

If we only knew how many truly phenomenal games have died horribly, unremembered and unloved, simply because of an overly anal project manager who never figured out how to say, "Close enough."

VTMB was saved. Close enough.

[Wesp5]

Oh, BTW, did I ever say, "Thanks!", Wesp?

You're welcome !