Sometimes, some of the choices catch me off guard, giving me Dark Side points where I had expected Light Side points and vice versa. Most glaring example of this is the early Nal Hutta side-quest: Man with the Steel Voice.

 

 

An impoverished, crippled invalid who has suffered Nal Hutta's pollution alongside the rest of the enviroment, has sunk all his life's savings into one goal: Purifying the nearby river.

A noble idea that has not only cost him a lot, but is sure to improve life locally.

So I march out and find squatters near that river who keep me from it. It will drive the local mutants crazy they say and frankly, the squatters are obstinant enough not to want to move because they have jobs there.

 

 

For me personally, the choice is easy. A clean river is the first step into restoring the enviroment, improving the conditions of life for everyone surrounding it for generations to come (once the mutants leave) and finish an old man's life work.

 

But no, I get dark Side points for that. Its like fining the chairman of British Pretroleum for causing an oil spill and getting Dark Side points because that makes him fire employees.

 

 

 

I think back and I can recall a game like KOTOR having a far more elegant system: Intentions matter, not results when they're ambiguous. Choosing wether or not to cleanse the river should not net you Dark/Light side points when you do it. No, getting back and explaining yourself will.

 

If you cleanse the river, you have two options near the Steel Voice:

Not care for the lives that it took: DS

Regret the loss of life but take heart in cleansing the world: LS

If you wreck the valves and cause even more pollution, then return to the squatters.

Not care for the pollution: DS

Be happy that the squatters will never be in danger again from the Steel Voice: LS

 

 

~~~~~

 

 

Some rebuttals:

 

I think the OP missed the finer points of this story. The chemicals the old man created to clean the water CREATE the mutant wildlife.

 

Actually, after passing the quest by again, the situation is following:

 

The Chemicals WILL purify the river.

However, they will drive the MUTANT beasts wild.

 

The chemicals won't mutate the wildlife boneflower. Its clear that the chemicals will get rid of all mutagens, including the mutated wildlife. To me, the mutated wildlife is a symptom of the pollution. If I can get rid of both, than all the better. I'm not going to put up with a handful of squatters who think its fine.

 

In this particular case, the choice simply isn't black and white, that's all. There's nothing wrong with it. At first, it appears simple enough; clean up the environment. But when you get to your objective, you find that cleaning up the environment will have a negative effect on all the life in the area, from the sentient beings down to the wildlife, which runs the risk of being mutated by the chemicals you have brought.

 

It will have a negative effect on all surrounding life, because all surrounding life is horribly mutated. And an enviroment mutated through industrial pollution, can't possibly be a healthy, nor stable enviroment. It wrecks bio-diversity with constant mutations.

 

 

 

To go back to the BP analogy: The Oil Spil created a rare, three eyed, carnivorous dolphin that threatens to whipe out the normal dolphins. BP hires a few biologists and proclaims the three-eyed dolphin to be a rare species natural to the enviroment and makes sure that the species is allowed to live, no matter how dangerous it is. Other ecologists protest, but by then its too late and the three-eyed dolphins wipes out all other life in the gulf.

 

They then get a group of lawyers to argue against cleaning the mess up, since this would endanger the three-eyed dolphin. In fact, they excuse all further oil-spills as a natural, biological occurence that stabilizes the ecology in favour of the three-eyed dolphin.

 

Scientists come up with a solution to revert back the gulf to its normal state, but by then the three-eyed dolphin has evolved legs and BP warns that fixing the enviroment might cause dolphin attacks on major coastal cities. Instead, PB emancipates the three-eyed dolphin, gives it human rights and causes several more oil spills in other territories. A decade later and we all suffer under an opressive PB-Dolphin Empire that rules the world.

 

 

Can you see a pattern emerge? If you don't fix it and only make apologies for the current state, it will only get worse.

 

Its like the steel voice says: "If only I had acted sooner, when I new what the Hutts were doing and I was still young."

 

The light side option just makes things worse down the line.

Edited December 25, 2011 by Skirlasvoud

I completely agree, but ultimately you can look at some of these choices as grey areas.

Coming from the Dark Side of things I can agree, as there have been a couple of times where the really evil thing gives you Light Side points, so trying to maximize my Dark Side, I take the other choice.

In this particular case, the choice simply isn't black and white, that's all. There's nothing wrong with it. At first, it appears simple enough; clean up the environment. But when you get to your objective, you find that cleaning up the environment will have a negative effect on all the life in the area, from the sentient beings down to the wildlife, which runs the risk of being mutated by the chemicals you have brought.

 

This is not "there's an oil spill, let's go clean it up." You find out that the chemicals you are using to "clean up" are also harmful to the environment in their own way. Your goal is good, but your method dark, if you choose to endanger the lives of the people living in the area, not to mention harming the local beasts (turning them into aggressive mutants) in order to clean up the pollution.

 

This would be like BP "cleaning up the oil spill" by carpet bombing the beaches. All the oil is burned up, and therefore no longer a problem. Unfortunately, you also burn alive all those animals soaked in oil, on said beaches. Morally light goal, morally dark execution.

 

-Macheath.

Actually, with the exception of the aggressive mutants, this is exactly the story with BP and their use of Corexit in the Gulf.

I think the OP missed the finer points of this story. The chemicals the old man created to clean the water CREATE the mutant wildlife.

 

Basically, you are given a choice of leaving the water (which is already poisoned via industrial pollution) dirty until a better solution can be found, or using hazardous chemicals to "clean" the water of the industrial waste, and instead poison the wildlife, and people.

 

What is the point of clean water just for the sake of clean water if the animals and people who need and deserve that clean water will be mutated and poisoned by it on a genetic level?

 

It's a subtle storyline that requires people to really think deeply about what is being asked and done and what the consequences are of that. On the surface it seems odd to get dark side points for cleaning up pollution, but in truth you are getting darkside points for genetically poisoning all the wildlife and endangering the locals in the process.

 

Personally, I like these sort of delicate, lesser of two evils type of stories. Grey is the new Light and Dark.

I think the OP missed the finer points of this story. The chemicals the old man created to clean the water CREATE the mutant wildlife.

 

Actually, after passing the quest by again, the situation is following:

 

The Chemicals WILL purify the river.

However, they will drive the MUTANT beasts wild.

 

The chemicals won't mutate the wildlife boneflower. Its clear that the chemicals will get rid of all mutagens, including the mutated wildlife. To me, the mutated wildlife is a symptom of the pollution. If I can get rid of both, than all the better. I'm not going to put up with a handful of squatters who think its fine.

 

In this particular case, the choice simply isn't black and white, that's all. There's nothing wrong with it. At first, it appears simple enough; clean up the environment. But when you get to your objective, you find that cleaning up the environment will have a negative effect on all the life in the area, from the sentient beings down to the wildlife, which runs the risk of being mutated by the chemicals you have brought.

 

It will have a negative effect on all surrounding life, because all surrounding life is horribly mutated. And an enviroment mutated through industrial pollution, can't possibly be a healthy enviroment.

 

 

 

 

To go back to the BP analogy: The Oil Spil created a rare, three eyed, carnivorous dolphin that threatens to whipe out the normal dolphins. BP hires a few biologists and proclaims the three-eyed dolphin to be a rare species natural to the enviroment and makes sure that the species is allowed to live, no matter how dangerous it is. Other ecologists protest, but by then its too late and the three-eyed dolphins wipes out all other life in the gulf.

 

They then get a group of lawyers to argue against cleaning the mess up, since this would endanger the three-eyed dolphin. In fact, they excuse all further oil-spills as a natural, biological occurence that stabilizes the ecology in favour of the three-eyed dolphin.

 

Scientists come up with a solution to revert back the gulf to its normal state, but by then the three-eyed dolphin has evolved legs and BP warns that fixing the enviroment might cause dolphin attacks on major coastal cities. Instead, PB emancipates the three-eyed dolphin, gives it human rights and causes several more oil spills in other territories. A decade later and we all suffer under an opressive PB-Dolphin Empire that rules the world.

 

 

Can you see a pattern emerge? If you don't fix it and only make apologies for the current state, it will only get worse.

Edited December 25, 2011 by Skirlasvoud

Delete Edited December 25, 2011 by Skirlasvoud

I believe the twi'lek you talk to tells you the chemicals will make the creatures get bigger and meaner so the chemicals will further mutate the creatures. I can't remember if it's implied that the old man knows that or not though. Edited December 25, 2011 by Korlis

I completely agree with the OP on this. The quest even tells you the Hutts are paying the villagers to live by the river so they can convince people its safe, when its not. Plus those villagers are going to end up like the old man. Cleaning the river should be a light side choice, or at least there should be an option for it. By not cleaning the river, you're just extending the cycle. There are a lot more moral choices in this game that don't make sense; I think they should be addressed and improved in future patches. A game that places such a big emphasis on story and moral choices cannot have nonsensical quests like this. This quest made me so mad on my BH I actually went back 10 lvls later to do it again and clean the river.

Ungh. Would be really nice if we had someone who was an actual scientist in this quest. Is the cleaning solution actually causing further mutation, or just driving the existing mutants mad (and perhaps driving some of the bigger and more reclusive ones out into the open). If it's the former, we're dealing with the aforementioned carpet bombing solution. With the latter, we have something of a dilemna. The best solution is to try to relocate the settlers while cleaning the river and containing and treating the mutated beasts... But then, that's a job for an actual hazmat team. Something a single Imperial Agent or hired gun is not up for the task.

 

 

Ultimately, I'd have to say make the choice you feel your character would make, and stop caring about a measly 50-100 alignment points.

To go back to the BP analogy: The Oil Spil created a rare, three eyed, carnivorous dolphin that threatens to whipe out the normal dolphins. BP hires a few biologists and proclaims the three-eyed dolphin to be a rare species natural to the enviroment and makes sure that the species is allowed to live, no matter how dangerous it is. Other ecologists protest, but by then its too late and the three-eyed dolphins wipes out all other life in the gulf.

 

They then get a group of lawyers to argue against cleaning the mess up, since this would endanger the three-eyed dolphin. In fact, they excuse all further oil-spills as a natural, biological occurence that stabilizes the ecology in favour of the three-eyed dolphin.

 

Scientists come up with a solution to revert back the gulf to its normal state, but by then the three-eyed dolphin has evolved legs and BP warns that fixing the enviroment might cause dolphin attacks on major coastal cities. Instead, PB emancipates the three-eyed dolphin, gives it human rights and causes several more oil spills in other territories. A decade later and we all suffer under an opressive PB-Dolphin Empire that rules the world.

 

 

Can you see a pattern emerge? If you don't fix it and only make apologies for the current state, it will only get worse.

 

Its like the steel voice says: "If only I had acted sooner, when I new what the Hutts were doing and I was still young."

 

The light side option just makes things worse down the line.

 

In the realm of logical arguments, this is what is known as a slippery slope. I think that term applies in this case in more ways than one.

 

You can make all kinds of justifications about what will be good later on, but in matters of ethics and morality it's what you do NOW that is the determining factor. You can say ends justify the means, etc. etc. but inherent in this argument is the idea that you're risking doing a little evil now for something you're hoping will turn out better in the long run. But you actually don't have any guarantee it will turn out better for either the wildlife or the civilians, and if it doesn't you'd only have done evil. Even if it turns out good, you still would potentially have done evil to start with, and you were willing to make that choice. So there's your darkside points right there, even before you start to get into what the actual motivations of the old man might be. Road paved with good intentions and whatnot.

 

What you have is two possibly conflicting stories. You have a story from an old man who says he can purify the water. His previous treatments haven't done the job, but he has this new final formula that he believes will neutralize the pollution. You talk to the settlers, and they say his previous treatments purified the water, but mutated the animals even more (these are CHEMICALS, you know, not just a magical fluid that will disappear when you put it in the water after it neutralizes the existing pollution), and that the more mutated animals have or have nearly killed other settlers.

 

One or both could be lying, but one of those scenarios potentially results in deaths and further ecological destruction via replacing one source of river pollution for another. When you confront the old man about this, he says he knew all along that the chemicals would negatively effect the animals, and he says that he thinks that the settlers deserve to die. His motivations when he admits to them starts to edge into the territory of the disgruntled worker and revenge.

 

If you're willing to risk the lives of civilians and wildlife for environmental justice, well, there's a reason that environmentalist groups like ELF who go around blowing up radio towers are considered eco-terrorists.

 

However, to be fair, it does kind of stick in the craw that Bioware is trying to suggest that the status quo is the best possible option. I don't disagree on that count. Hutta seems like a pretty terrible place, and even as a hero character the best you can do is keep it from getting worse. That's pretty sad. Maybe in the future there will be a quest you can discover in the Muckworks that cleanses the river without the horrible mutation and death.

Edited April 29, 2012 by Bytemite

these are CHEMICALS, you know, not just a magical fluid that will disappear when you put it in the water after it neutralizes the existing pollution)

 

I don't see how putting purifying CHEMICALS in a river where factories are already dumping CHEMICALS all day long has to be bad. Chemicals differ in their effects (they use CHEMICALS for drinking water and sewage treatment too you know...). Anyway, by choosing the light side option you are helping the Hutts and indirectly sentencing the villagers (who, let's not forget, are being paid to live there so they can pretend the river is clean and no safety hazard) to death by pollution.

 

And the problem with this quest is not that it's a measly 100 evil/good points, it's that many quests in this game are like this. In quest Black Science for example, you have to steal bioregenerative plans from Lord Grathan's Estate. Then this dude pops up and says he's going to use it for good so don't steal it (stealing it being the dark side option)! But guess what, he works for Lord Grathan who is obviously psychotic and evil and is going to use that technology to do more evil. So how is stealing it evil?? It makes no sense! There should at least be dark and light options for the same choice (depending on your REASON for doing it).

Edited April 29, 2012 by Blackholeskipper

Toxicologists say that ANYTHING is toxic at a specific dose.

 

But more simply, pollution is pollution. You're putting something in there that wasn't there in the first place and it has a negative affect on the wildlife. I got to call it like I see it.

 

There are so many case studies where something that was introduced into the water to cleanse it ended up making the resulting solution even MORE toxic. The surfactants used in the BP oil spill made the oil more mobile and the surfactant used has some toxic elements of its own.

 

You know some surfactants are food grade? Doesn't mean they aren't toxic. You can make the water more potable, but that doesn't mean you solved the problem or that you've headed off long term side effects.

 

The chemical used in water treatment is chlorine, by the way. I wouldn't recommend drinking it straight.

 

This really is a case of choosing whether to make it worse or not. But, I WOULD like an option to eventually try to make it better, as you're right, the pollution levels as they stand are likely going to have bad long term effects as well.

 

Doesn't mean that it's light side points to drive that car off a cliff.

Edited April 29, 2012 by Bytemite

You realize we're talking about Hutta here? A planet covered in Hutt factories that dump their toxic waste directly into the environment? I imagine pretty much anything can improve the environment at this point. Simply put, villagers shouldn't be living by a river that's so polluted (again, they are being PAID to live by an UNSAFE river so they can PRETEND that it's SAFE).

I think back and I can recall a game like KOTOR having a far more elegant system: Intentions matter, not results when they're ambiguous.

Not realy.

Allthough i tend to agree with your acertion of swtor, i think its a nice touch to have shades of grey and not black and white decisions. Yes you might helping Hutta enviroment to fit humans , however you will be dooming the alien Mutated species that live there. so yeah you get dark side points naturaly, since Those aliens dont have a place to go, while that old man could "easly" find another place to live. Just my opinion.

Besides You cant say that the KOTORs had elegant decisions, , they were the most basic, there is, act like a jerk and in selfish ways you get dark side, act like a hero and helping others you get light side, couldnt be more basic. The kotors had great stories, but the dark and light side system, allthough interesting, the decisions werent that original that i remember.

You realize we're talking about Hutta here? A planet covered in Hutt factories that dump their toxic waste directly into the environment? I imagine pretty much anything can improve the environment at this point. Simply put, villagers shouldn't be living by a river that's so polluted (again, they are being PAID to live by an UNSAFE river so they can PRETEND that it's SAFE).

 

They shouldn't? Then who are we doing this "purification" for? The wildlife? Do we know if the wildlife isn't mutating further?

 

Maybe that Twilek settlement on Tython should pack up. It's dangerous after all.

 

People are going to make their choices. Some people smoke you know. 60% greater chance of getting lung cancer. It's not up to anyone to tell people where they can and can't live. Especially when indications are that without that money from the Hutts to live there, judging by the rest of that world, they'd be living in pollution anyway AND starving. No call to kill them via an outbreak of unusually aggressive beasts.

Edited April 29, 2012 by Bytemite

There is a way to make things better on Hutta, but it's beyond the scope of the game (and didn't happen in Canon, so it can't happen, sadly. Plus, the Hutt's like Hutta being a big cesspool of toxic waste; They're not going to let anyone fix it); It's not some handfisted solution like the Old Man's, it would be a long, grueling process involving billions if not trillions of credits, and years if not decades of dedicated work by a veritable army of ecologists. Imagine an Oil spill. Picture now much work goes in to cleaning it up. Now dump oil not on a small part of the ocean, but the entire. booping. planet. Then continue dumping oil on it for a couple hundred years, just because what you've already done doesn't make it seem enough like home. That's what the Hutts have done. The Old Man's solution may purify the water in that one river... But without the aforementioned army of ecologists to continue the work, it will just eventually get polluted again and meanwhile there are a bunch of colonists who got displaced and/or killed by rampaging beasts.

 

 

There is no good answer here, unfortunately.

Simply put, villagers shouldn't be living by a river that's so polluted (again, they are being PAID to live by an UNSAFE river so they can PRETEND that it's SAFE).

 

And that makes it right to kill them with radioactive fish monsters?

Hmm when you put it like that... Still, if it's so morally ambiguous to start with, then there should be a light side option for using the chemicals (trying to clean the river) and a dark side option for helping the villagers (to spite the old man). Right now it feels like the quest punishes you for trying to do some good instead of maintaining the status quo.

 

EDIT: I was replying to KorinHyvek btw. Radioactive fish monsters? Who said the chemicals you put in are radioactive? The monsters are mutated to begin with. Besides, the place was unsafe to begin with, they could easily move away.

Edited April 29, 2012 by Blackholeskipper

That's fair about having more choices. And absolutely agree about punishing you for trying to do something good. The whole of Hutta almost feels like that actually.

 

I'm not sure that the settlers have the money to move off Hutta though or even away from the river. So I think we kinda have to work with the situation we're given.

Edited April 29, 2012 by Bytemite

EDIT: I was replying to KorinHyvek btw. Radioactive fish monsters? Who said the chemicals you put in are radioactive? The monsters are mutated to begin with. Besides, the place was unsafe to begin with, they could easily move away.

 

The radioactive bit was slightly tongue in cheek.

 

The point was you are causing them to be attacked by your actions. Does recieving money from a Hutt to live in a specific spot really make it okay to kill them? And in case you didn't notice, all of Hutta is a chemical waste dump. The entire planet likely suffers from the exact same problems.

Besides, the place was unsafe to begin with, they could easily move away.

 

Not really. People are not hermit crabs; Shelters like houses cannot simply be lifted up and moved to another area without a lot of work, and constructing them is similarly time consuming, especially considering leaving probably would not make the hutt's happy.

I believe the twi'lek you talk to tells you the chemicals will make the creatures get bigger and meaner so the chemicals will further mutate the creatures. I can't remember if it's implied that the old man knows that or not though.

 

He does know. He says the people living by the river "get what they deserve" by being killed by the mutant mutant monsters.

I wish there WERE some "grey" choices. Unfortunately, it's much more simple: direct killing means Dark, no blood right this second - light. Even when spearing someones life means endless torturing and suffering of everyone else. Like on BT when you take the general prisoner.

 

Simplification for time saving is understandable, but sometimes it's over simplified.