Your Canon Character Alignments.

[idbeholdME 394]

Here is a list of characters/alignments that I have played for longer periods of time for context:

Seraphim - Light

Inquisitor - Shadow

Shadow Warrior - Shadow

Temple Guardian - Light/Shadow

High Elf - Light/Shadow

Dryad - Light (shorty, did not finish campaign)

Dragon Mage - Shadow (shortly, did not finish campaign

 

 

As for the canon alignments, here are mine:

Light - Seraphim, Dryad, Temple Guardian

Shadow - Inquisitor, Shadow Warrior, High Elf

Either - Dragon Mage

 

Seraphim and Inquisitor are set so no argument there.

 

Shadow characters:

Shadow Warrior. It really feels like he has a reason to seek revenge. Sent on a suicide mission, resurrected for nefarious purposes, denied his final rest... Nobody can blame him for having had enough of it all and deciding to give the world a piece of his mind... and much more.

High Elf, I just love how arrogantly toxic she is to everyone and everything with the Shadow alignment. Even with the Light alignment, the snark and arrogance seeps through with some voice lines. She absolutely feels like the type that would desire the ultimate power over everything else.

 

Light characters:

It just fits for the Temple Guardian. Being the last "sane" one among his kind, being accidently unearthed after having been buried for Testa knows how long. Having a fresh perspective of the world after such a long time, he realizes the true severity of the situation with T-Energy and the Great Machine having an adverse effect on the world and sets out on one final task to finally lay the Great Machine to rest.

And as for the Dryad, I simply can't find a reason for her to be evil. The only thing she could really desire is to save the world and especially the nature, which the T-Energy destroys, mutates and corrupts.

 

With the Dragon Mage, I don't really feel one way or the other with him. But if I had to choose, it'd probably be Shadow. But again, the Dragon Mage is as close to a 50/50 as it can get for me.

So how about you? Do you have your own canonic alignments for the classes? Kind of interested in what the general consensus is.

[Flix 5,116]

There are really only two places where the alignment comes through: the voiced comments and (IMO where it really shines) the character class quests.

As far as the Seraphim and Inquisitor go, I think they have weaker class quests, and the main Light/Shadow quests are actually their "real" character quests. They, more than anyone, have reason to be involved in their respective main quests.

The Dragon Mage sadly is identical in all respects, he has all the same voice lines (except for maybe character creation) and his class quest is the same either way. I do tend to think of him as more Shadow-oriented. The existing Dragon Cultists in Sacred 2 are not pleasant or caring people, and the DM's comments are mostly arrogant and callous. He is concerned with personal power - that's a good fit for Shadow.

That leaves 4 characters that are ambiguous and have distinct alignment personas. The way they are written, they really could believably swing either way. But here's how I lean:

Dryad - Light path. Her class quest is a jumbled mess either way, really more a collection of vaguely nature-related quests just kind of strung together. The only real difference is how she treats people who go "against" nature. The Light version has some tolerance, understanding, and a willingness to teach, while the Shadow version has a more zero-tolerance, survival-of-the-fittest mentality. But her demeanor either way is of a noble keeper of nature, staunchly against T-Energy, and I think that makes her better suited to the Light path.

High Elf - By far my favorite Shadow class quest. A lot of the character quests are neutral for big chunks and only have key phases as light or shadow. Not the High Elf. Her entire trajectory is different on the Shadow Path. The Light path Elf naively falls into traps, limping along while trying to fend off repeated ambushes and assassination attempts by a vile aristocratic family. The guileful Shadow Elf is always one step ahead, pitting the family against foes (and playing them off one another) and constantly leading them into traps that ultimately lead to their own destruction. It's especially satisfying to play the Shadow quest after the Light version. It's like the Shadow Elf is the smarter twin sister, and that cunning makes her feel like the "real" High Elf..  Plus all her voiced lines just ooze condescension.

Temple Guardian - 60/40 in favor of Shadow. Either path is believable for me, but there's something sort of Terminator-like about the Shadow TG that really clicks for me.  A lot of his Shadow decisions are motivated by simple efficiency, almost as if he's beyond basic morality. There's not much malice, scheming, or overtly "evil" traits, so much as a sort of amoral unconcern with anything outside of his mission. Obstacles are simply eliminated in the simplest way.  His class quest isn't the easiest to follow, with a ton of forgettable fetch quests and meandering lore about the Demiurge and "Mother" and his hologram that represents his lost memories trying to re-assimilate with him. But since on either path he decides the current management of the Great Machine has gone haywire and needs to change, there's a sort of sense in him repurposing the power for himself. He's a creature of T-Energy.

Shadow Warrior - This one I really feel is a true 50/50 split between both alignments.  Back when Sacred 2 was first announced I remember his character profile on Ascaron's website as the example of the alignment system and how the same character could follow two different paths. You can tell they poured a ton of time into his class quest. The writing is more detailed and I'm pretty sure it has more phases than the main quest itself.  I can believe him as a rampaging vengeful revenant and I can also believe him as someone trying to reclaim his lost memories and humanity while trying to ensure that resurrections like his never happen again. Yes Shadow is a good fit, it's right there in his name, but the redemption arc aspect of the Light path is just as appealing.

[idbeholdME 394]

16 hours ago, Flix said:

There are really only two places where the alignment comes through: the voiced comments and (IMO where it really shines) the character class quests.

As far as the Seraphim and Inquisitor go, I think they have weaker class quests, and the main Light/Shadow quests are actually their "real" character quests. They, more than anyone, have reason to be involved in their respective main quests.

Interesting. I looked at it more from the perspective of the main quest and why the characters would either want to turn off the Great Machine or take its power, but it is true that the class quests also tell a lot  about them.

I guess that why I was leaning very slightly towards Shadow with the Dragon Mage. Seeing as he is basically a member of the cult we get to fight in act 5, I don't really see him as a guy who would have the well-being of others high on his priority list. Although it could be a different cult, seeing his starting area being very, very far from most of the world. But the Light character selection blurb for him doesn't really help either  

I definitely wouldn't budge with the High Elf. Having seen and heard her in the Light version many years after the Shadow one, it just felt... off. The sheer arrogance, condescension and outright toxicity towards others is a perfect fit for her. Shadow all the way 

Dryad I have played the least of, but from what I could tell from the few of her class quests that I completed, it was indeed just that. Mostly stumbling upon nature related situations and resolving them. Haven't played her in Shadow. But for the sake of balance and the general theme, I put her in Light.

The Shadow Temple Guardian definitely is just a merciless machine going for the objective with no remorse. Even his intro text states so. I can see the appeal and if it was just a regular Temple Guardian we got to play as, I would probably have picked Shadow as my canon for him. But I really like the aspect of him having been unearthed after a very long period of inactivity and seeing the state of the world after probably couple thousand years, something inside him flips and he decides to go against his overriding directive (protecting the Machine at all costs). Kind of like breaking his own programming. Yes, he was supposed to guard the Great Machine at any cost, but seeing the jump from when he was buried and reawakened made him realize that status quo is no longer an option. The world is basically dying due to the rampant T-Energy from the Machine. Guess I find the aspect of him coming to this realization with the help of several millenia of "sleep" compared to just brutally following the original mission statement, appealing. Same with realizing the atrocities committed during the Dragon Wars with the dragon poison. And ultimately "killing" both the Demiurge (The Great Machine) and the Mother (The Guardians) so that the Temple Guardians can truly become independent seems like the perfect ending for him. Definitely the most relevant character to the main quest out of the 5 besides the Seraphim/Inquisitor.

And with the Shadow Warrior, I guess I mostly found the redemption arc of the Light version a bit too cliché  Apparently, the Shadow Warrior did some pretty heinous things in life (even the Light path mentions him being a war criminal), I feel like he would be overjoyed to continue that path with new powers, especially after being ironically given a 2nd chance by the people who de facto executed him, the Elves. But Shadow Shadow Warrior was also the first ever character I played in Sacred 2, so I might be biased 

Edited July 5, 2023 by idbeholdME

[Flix 5,116]

7 hours ago, idbeholdME said:

I guess I mostly found the redemption arc of the Light version a bit too cliché

Funny, our views on the Shadow Warrior and TG are sort of flipped.  They both "come back to life" after a time and have to decide whether to reinvent themselves. I guess I just imagined the human as being more likely to do so than the machine.

The Shadow Warrior reminds me of The Nameless One from Planescape Torment in a way. Wakes up in a morgue, can't remember much about himself, finds out later that he did all kinds of awful things in his past life, but is he still that same person? Maybe it is kind of cliche now.  Maybe the relentless cyborg that can't be turned from his original purpose is too.

6 hours ago, idbeholdME said:

Definitely the most relevant character to the main quest out of the 5 besides the Seraphim/Inquisitor.

Now that I think about it, a Light Path TG might make a better foil to the Inquisitor than the Seraphim does, honestly.  The TG at least is embroiled with the ancient history of the Machine and has a personal reason to care about its disposition. The Seraphim just wants to shut if off because... bland goodness.

7 hours ago, idbeholdME said:

Dryad I have played the least of  ...  Haven't played her in Shadow.

It gets weird. There are these recurring "romance" story beats, in Thylysium and Nor Plat, and then with her old flame.  For the first, the Shadow Dryad hatches this convoluted conspiracy to pit two families against each other that results in everyone dying. Why? Cause someone cut down a tree at some point, or something.  It feels like a scheme the Shadow Elf might do, but way out of character for the Dryad.  Then in Nor Plat a similar "Romeo and Juliet" situation arises and the Dryad just goes psycho and kills everyone.

[chattius 2,527]

13 hours ago, Flix said:

Funny, our views on the Shadow Warrior and TG are sort of flipped.  They both "come back to life" after a time and have to decide whether to reinvent themselves. I guess I just imagined the human as being more likely to do so than the machine.

The Shadow Warrior reminds me of The Nameless One from Planescape Torment in a way. Wakes up in a morgue, can't remember much about himself, finds out later that he did all kinds of awful things in his past life, but is he still that same person? Maybe it is kind of cliche now.  Maybe the relentless cyborg that can't be turned from his original purpose is too.

Now that I think about it, a Light Path TG might make a better foil to the Inquisitor than the Seraphim does, honestly.  The TG at least is embroiled with the ancient history of the Machine and has a personal reason to care about its disposition. The Seraphim just wants to shut if off because... bland goodness.

It gets weird. There are these recurring "romance" story beats, in Thylysium and Nor Plat, and then with her old flame.  For the first, the Shadow Dryad hatches this convoluted conspiracy to pit two families against each other that results in everyone dying. Why? Cause someone cut down a tree at some point, or something.  It feels like a scheme the Shadow Elf might do, but way out of character for the Dryad.  Then in Nor Plat a similar "Romeo and Juliet" situation arises and the Dryad just goes psycho and kills everyone.

I think there was more 'love' in the shadow warrior (Schattenkrieger). He had 5 (in words five) audiobooks to boost his story.

[Timotheus 416]

Those weren't available in any language other than German right @chattius?

 

At any rate, I have never completely the story with more than one character, but I did play most of them and therefore you get the gist of their personality in their voices and remarks. I would not put down the Shadow Warrior for Shadow either. As for the Temple Guardian, that would be a complete 50/50 for me having only played the character for 20-30 levels or so...

[Flix 5,116]

7 hours ago, chattius said:

I think there was more 'love' in the shadow warrior (Schattenkrieger).

Too bad I never heard those before.  I preserved as much as I could find in English and put it on his WIki page.

https://www.sacredwiki.org/index.php/Sacred_2:Shadow_Warrior

Reading through that actually reminds me, even his backstory is different in Light vs Shadow. Shadow version was a bloodthirsty marauder, while the Light version was a respected hero who got sent on a suicide mission because he was helping investigate the resurrection conspiracy in Thylysium, ironically becoming a victim of it himself.

Too bad there's not more in-game text about him being linked to T-Energy and therefore denied the afterlife even if he died again. It gives him more reason to care about the main questline.

[Dax 481]

13 hours ago, chattius said:

I think there was more 'love' in the shadow warrior (Schattenkrieger). He had 5 (in words five) audiobooks to boost his story.

It was quite common back then to boost your product with some goodies. In the early days, some game studios added real neat stuff to the game box. :Kas:Ultima:Kas:

Btw. If I understand things correctly, the user @Kashenkon is not only removing typos from the global.res, but is also rewriting some things for Sacred 2. Like thestoryline for example.
It might be a nice opportunity to support him a bit and to add some of your own ideas to his to do list. But it means as well, that users here have to raise their voice, since Kashenkon is neither a fortune-teller, nor can he read your thoughts.

[idbeholdME 394]

Seeing those audio book covers made me realize one thing. Has the High Elf ever appeared in any promo material? Barring the Dragon Mage who was an expansion character, the High Elf never appeared in any cutscenes like the others. Dryad, Temple Guardian, Shadow Warrior and Seraphim appear in the intro cinematic, Inquisitor gets his spotlight in the Sacred 2 Gold Edition trailer, which leaves the High Elf.

Does she appear anywhere besides the 2 loading screens?

[Flix 5,116]

On 7/7/2023 at 10:28 AM, idbeholdME said:

Does she appear anywhere besides the 2 loading screens?

Not much, especially compared to the other characters.  You can find some concept art in the Art & Vision Book

A couple promotional videos showing some of her combat arts.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YRD3EUlu-Js

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=g3GWk-r7h0o

And you can see her briefly in one of the 2007 trailers, though Shadow Warrior and Seraphim got center stage.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m6ecR--pU_Q

And of course as with the other characters, there was a profile page for the High Elf on Ascaron's site with the Light/Shadow paths described, that I copied onto the Wiki:

https://www.sacredwiki.org/index.php/Sacred_2:High_Elf#The_Paths

[idbeholdME 394]

10 minutes ago, Flix said:

And you can see her briefly in one of the 2007 trailers, though Shadow Warrior and Seraphim got center stage.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m6ecR--pU_Q

Oh, it has the mount/dismount animations that a thread recently showed up about on the forum. Have they been cut before release or broken by some patch? Can't really remember if they were there from when I played Fallen Angel.