Don't wanna kill Firkraag

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I had mixed feelings toward Gorion in the game (he killed Charname's mother, he kept Charname imprisoned in Candlekeep for years, he never told Charname of his/her true heritage), so, my character could understand Mr Red Dragon.

If I had Keldorn or another paladin in the party, I killed him, because of the sword. *apologetic shrug*

If I did not need a sword, I did nothing - the Dragon sits in his dungeon, does nothing - why kill him? Why risk my beloved NPCs?

 

I don't understand, does anybody can tell me more?(I know bhaal stuff, but I don't know that is Firkragg have to do with Gorion)

 

It was a little vague, about what Gorion did to Firkragg, but I didn't care, I just wanted the sword and scales

 

@Kulyok

Actually, he wrote you a letter in candlekeep saying that your mother was his lover and died giving birth. Elmonster from the journal of Elmonster chose not be belive the Solar...
And he didn't keep you "imprisoned" in candlekeep... he never said "don't go out", you just didn't want to go

 

Elmonster? Hehe!

Seriously though, I don't see any really fundamental objection to killing Firky if you're good. He may be polite with you, but he's still essentially a bastard at heart.

 

Not wanting to kill Firkraag doesnt seem so strange to me. In fact I hate killing dragons per se. I resent it. :/ No matter whether they are evil or silver or...

The fight with them is great fun, yeah, but I feel somewhat bad and unsatisfied with my PC when they eventually fall. Seeing these splendid creatures lie dead - bah. What a waste. What a crime.

Wish they would just drop their treasures and teleport out of there when they are close to dying.

 

Bah, the way I reason it is this: if I kill a few of the really bad ones, the others will get the message and start being decent.

 

Spooky, I sometimes think about that too. I love dragons too - my high school ring has a dragon on it. When I play Magic, I always use dragon cards if I can.

 

If i Have understood correctly, what Gorion did is that he and his Harper friends met Firkaag (possible committing an act of evil) and fight ensued.Firkaag Slayed most of them, but sustained great wounds, and wanted revenge.
Hmm...To think of it, maybe Firkaag realised during his little "game" with CHARNAME, that he had bitten more than he can chew, and let him go quietly?
I almost always kill him, since he is creature of great evil, and i play almost always good.

 

Yes, it's not only that Firkraag may have excuses, it's that dragons are superb and old creatures. And you would kill them for trinkets, some weapons, gold? A shame... No wonder they all disappeared.
They are an endangered specie, if you are good, you'll keep that in mind when you meet one. If you are evil, you don't care.

I'm pretty sure Firkraag refers to Bhaal, not only Gorion. The way I got it, Gorion was annoying to Firkraag but Bhaal was worse.

 

Save the dragons!!! Yay! Next thing will be Firkraag summoning endless waves of heavily armoured PETA activists against your unsuspecting character

The problem with killing/not killing dragons IMO comes from the fact that the whole idea about dragins in Forgotten realms is a bit mixed up. It combines in a strange, sometimes (like the Firkraag example) quite contradictive way two totaly different mythological ideas about these creatures. On first place - here you have the ancient eastern concept about the omniscient and omnipotent dragon, as old as the world itself. From this point of view the very thought of killing a dragon in the game would be ridiculous.On second place here is the medieval western idea of the dragon as an evil to the core firebreathing menace, which plagues the lands with its strenght or with its ensnaring magic(Tolkien?). This one eventually ends up on the sword of a valiant christian knight in shining armour, as another symbol of Christianity's victory over paganity or whatever.

So there you have it, Firkraag - an ancient all-wise, yet evil power... what to do with it? I think the creator's decision here is more than suitable - decide whatever you want or like and feel free to find yourself arguments for your decision, after all there are infinite aguments for both killing him and letting him live. You can both finish SoA by killing each and every dragon in it and finish it without touching any, slay them or respect them - this is roleplaying.

Edit: It would have been nice, however, if your character did benefit from the non-violence decision as well because now it feels like you are being punished for not killing them, since the game presumes that you do this because you are a coward. The non-violent option should be encouraged and rewarded as well.

[ June 13, 2005, 00:33: Message edited by: Myth ]

 

That's an interesting point, Myth. As I understand it, they sometimes try to explain the dichotomy with the dragon's color or element (I haven't read the Faiths and Pantheons manual recently, but isn't Bahamut a neutral good or chaotic good deity?), but not often. I guess part of the problem is that they don't have a lot of ways to express complicated concepts in this kind of computer game.

I would tend to agree.

 

but there are almost no Eastern stuff in BG......(except Yoshi and Katanas, which is Japanese)

 

@Western Paladin

Yes it is true, but it depends on the game really. It is a great problem for more adventuring-oriented games like BG to express those concepts, but it is not even the slightest problem for a game with a deeper and much stronger concept and storyline such as Planescape: Torment. After all Ps:T is all about different concepts and points of view and your choice between them, which eventually causes the character to bear your own personality. I doubt that there is somebody who plays Ps:T like he would play ToEE - just for the quests and the killings, what is more, I think this is impossible.

@Chickavalier

On the very contrary - eastern elements in the game are as many as the western ones. They do not begin and end with particular weapons and particular personalities, just as christian elements do not begin or end with the Radiant Heart for example. The whole game is a mixture of elements from different cultures, which is not always successful (read Firkraag). Different people, however, tend to see above all else the elements of their own cultures in it and this is more than natural.

 

The first few times I didn't kill Firkaag because his behaviour confused the heck out of me. I figured he must be some sort of chaotic neutral variant (rust dragon, orange dragon, or whatever). After I found out that he really was a red dragon, I had no compunction about killing him. No matter what he says, Firkaag is evil .

Did it occur to you that he's probably still lying, and is just waiting for you to kill Irenicus? And after you've exhausted yourselves with the battle with Irenicus, he'll be able to wipe out your entire weakened party without any effort at all!

The real shame is that there aren't any neutral dragons in the game that you can converse with! You might even be able to impress one enough for them to share a nugget of their infinite wisdom with you. Or, if all else fails, you could simply stand and admire the splendor of such a magnificent creature.

 

he is easy to beat once you know how to. and you have INFINITE time chasing Irenicus. so what's the point of exhausted? single rest would take care of that.

 

@Chickavalier:

I was talking about the inevitable injuries, spells and items expended during the fight, etc. Firkaag could follow you, and ambush your party the moment Irenicus falls!

 

It is rewarded: you get to LIVE.

And I think that's the point. The reason that most characters should not kill Firky is because they "should" be scared of him; he is, after all, an ancient red dragon.

The trouble is the implementation makes it realtively easy for a party that knows what it's doing to kill him. This is a game difficulty issue, not a role-playing issue. If dragons had been implemented to anywhere near their true power, and they had a script that matched their genius-intelligence, most parties would not stand a chance.

Even so, there is a reward of carrying on the adventure. What I would say is this: imagine there were no "reload" option; imagine that the fight against Firkraag truly was "do or die", and if anything went wrong or your protagonist got killed, that was it, game over. I suspect that not so many characters would then be queing up to fight him "because he is evil".

As a comparatory example, I'm sure a few people here have read the first Dragonlance novel. There, the party face a dilemma about recovering the disks of Mishakal from Onyx, the black dragon. The party is full of good characters and the dragon is undoubtedly evil, but their plan is merely to steal the disks and escape...it doesn;t turn out that way, but I think that is a good example of where "realism" would lie as opposed to the metagaming that would argue otherwise.

 

Good points, JWN. That was a primary reason why I have never killed Firkraag - namely that my characters were not foolhardy enough to try unless forced into a situation where they had to.

 

@Felinoid
but how? you beat him in hell, and he can't chase you there