The Hero, Anti Hero, and Deconstructed Hero: Oh yes, I fully see where you are going with DA:O and what you mean by DA:O's warden sitting somewhere slide scale of the hero to anti hero depending on how you choose to role play the character. Given my love for deconstructed heroes, I'm now itching to start DA2 although not until I finish awakenings first. Second and third full play-throughs of DA:O are just going to have to wait. ;)
Can person truly stop being a Grey Warden?
I think I rambled too much above without getting directly to my point. First, I really like how Eamon was written as a character--very believable, especially since I did the Return to Ostagar mission before Redcliffe, which gave me (and my warden) additional political perspective.
The problem I had was this-- during my play through both me and my Warden became Very Annoyed with Alistair (or the way Alistair was written) from Redcliffe until the end of Landsmeet because much larger issues that were not options for discussion. Namely: should a person with the taint be put on the throne at all. Add in the backstory of how political tensions regarding the wardens and governance and ... I was grumpy that my play though never gave me options to ask the questions of Alistair I really needed to ask. To me, it is more than can he have an heir that continues the Theirin succession but what are the larger political consequences of a warden on the throne. Despite being in a romance with him, the issue of an heir either never came up in dialogue or was a passing minor bit. Nothing about his early death came up and the political issues of putting a warden on the throne all came from other characters.
Thus, I came away feeling like the game wanted me to push me into tossing Alistair on the throne without considering the large political implications beyond how to make sure Alistair might spawn a little Theirin asap. Thankfully, my warden was grilled Anora (alone) and Alistair (alone, multiple times) to get their general feelings about being married off to each other as a political arrangement and, finally, my Landsmeet turned into a wonderful disaster after I though it a good idea to let Alistiar duel Loghain and, after winning fairly, he just suddenly beheaded the man (my one big holy shit moment) which tossed the game into me making Anora versus Alistair defend their individual cases for the throne. Alistair ended up looking like a sputtering fool after running through the many dialogue options so the decision was easy: Anora wants to be Queen, Alistair want to be be a Warden who fights Darkspawn (confirmed privately and publicly), and my warden knows that putting a warden on the throne is a potentially bad idea so, done deal. You each get what you want and we'll let Anora worry on her own how succession will be handled (or not, as it turned out).
All of that said, I really like how the game was written. I just feel that a few places in the game had romantic (or arranged) relationships seriously trump big picture politics. Perhaps it is a personal taste issue.
Edited to say: once I got a feel for the political situation and personal feelings, I never finalized brokering a marriage between Alistair and Anora because neither seemed to want it and Alistair appeared (rightfully) hurt by the idea. The only reason my Warden explored that route was to elicit a wealth of information from either of them that, apparently, couldn't be gotten otherwise. :)
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Can person truly stop being a Grey Warden?
I think I rambled too much above without getting directly to my point. First, I really like how Eamon was written as a character--very believable, especially since I did the Return to Ostagar mission before Redcliffe, which gave me (and my warden) additional political perspective.
The problem I had was this-- during my play through both me and my Warden became Very Annoyed with Alistair (or the way Alistair was written) from Redcliffe until the end of Landsmeet because much larger issues that were not options for discussion. Namely: should a person with the taint be put on the throne at all. Add in the backstory of how political tensions regarding the wardens and governance and ... I was grumpy that my play though never gave me options to ask the questions of Alistair I really needed to ask. To me, it is more than can he have an heir that continues the Theirin succession but what are the larger political consequences of a warden on the throne. Despite being in a romance with him, the issue of an heir either never came up in dialogue or was a passing minor bit. Nothing about his early death came up and the political issues of putting a warden on the throne all came from other characters.
Thus, I came away feeling like the game wanted me to push me into tossing Alistair on the throne without considering the large political implications beyond how to make sure Alistair might spawn a little Theirin asap. Thankfully, my warden was grilled Anora (alone) and Alistair (alone, multiple times) to get their general feelings about being married off to each other as a political arrangement and, finally, my Landsmeet turned into a wonderful disaster after I though it a good idea to let Alistiar duel Loghain and, after winning fairly, he just suddenly beheaded the man (my one big holy shit moment) which tossed the game into me making Anora versus Alistair defend their individual cases for the throne. Alistair ended up looking like a sputtering fool after running through the many dialogue options so the decision was easy: Anora wants to be Queen, Alistair want to be be a Warden who fights Darkspawn (confirmed privately and publicly), and my warden knows that putting a warden on the throne is a potentially bad idea so, done deal. You each get what you want and we'll let Anora worry on her own how succession will be handled (or not, as it turned out).
All of that said, I really like how the game was written. I just feel that a few places in the game had romantic (or arranged) relationships seriously trump big picture politics. Perhaps it is a personal taste issue.
Edited to say: once I got a feel for the political situation and personal feelings, I never finalized brokering a marriage between Alistair and Anora because neither seemed to want it and Alistair appeared (rightfully) hurt by the idea. The only reason my Warden explored that route was to elicit a wealth of information from either of them that, apparently, couldn't be gotten otherwise. :)