What does everyone have against Duncan?

[King Aragorn]

I'm in a Dragon Age phase at the moment reading through the novels and playing the games, yes including DAII that I actually found very enjoyable and might make a topic about it if it won't get me shanked, and speaking of shanking why does everyone hate Duncan from Dragon Age Origins? under what pretense is he a bad guy?

He's not exactly a knight in shining armor, but he's a Grey Warden and what Grey Wardens do is stop The Blight, no matter what it takes. Alistair even talks about this, when you pick ''so they're heroes? knights?'' it could mean pretty extreme things really, and with so little to work with Duncan tries his best. Ultimately most people are split on the Ser Jory dilemma, was it justified?
Well, the bearded bloke beats you over the head with the fact that once you commit yourself to being a Warden, there is no turning back and it was Jory who pulled the sword first, not Duncan. Killing him was something that unfortunately, had to be done.

I know this is a dumb little topic but i'm so tired of seeing ''screw that guy!'' within the fanbase.

 

[OpticalJunction]

Everyone hates Duncan? News to me. I thought he was a great character. The way he died was pretty crappy, but it fit in with the rest of the story. I kind of think Duncan was written the way he was to define Alistair's role, Alistair was a better character because of his relationship with Duncan. He needed someone to be a noble father figure to him, to justify his own commitment to the Grey Wardens. Otherwise it wouldn't make much sense.

 

[Sniper Team 4]

Everyone hates Duncan? News to me.

You and me both. The only thing I didn't like about Duncan was that he went down so quickly. Yeah, he took out that Orge by himself, but I wasn't expecting him to leave the game so earlier. I liked him and I haven't come across anyone before who hated him. Where is this coming from?

 

[Soviet Heavy]

Because the whole "sworn to secrecy" angle was bullshit. Why would you not tell your potential recruits that there is no going back? If they back out then, you won't have to kill them later. And Jory wasn't a bad guy, he just got scared and tried to leave. And Duncan killed him for it.

Just tell them straight up: "If you want to become a Grey Warden, know that there is no way out, and you'll either die fighting or become a broodmother."

 

[Gergar12_v1legacy]

Because the whole "sworn to secrecy" angle was bullshit. Why would you not tell your potential recruits that there is no going back? If they back out then, you won't have to kill them later. And Jory wasn't a bad guy, he just got scared and tried to leave. And Duncan killed him for it.

Just tell them straight up: "If you want to become a Grey Warden, know that there is no way out, and you'll either die fighting or become a broodmother."

If your female that is, I think you become something else if your male. Duncan needed men, and women to fight. Desperate shit calls for more desperate shit.

I think this could have all been solved with a posion.

 

[goldenblack]

Never seen much hate for him either. He's not a knight in shining armor, and he's not meant to be. He, and the Grey Wardens as an entity, have only one concern: the darkspawn. Sure, he'll do what good he can along the way, but he's not going to let ideology get in the way of his mission. As the story goes on to show, he's pretty well justified in this mindset; the darkspawn threat is real and capable of killing whole nations or even potentially humanity itself, yet largely disregarded by the world at large until it's right on their doorstep.

As far as Jory goes, he knew what he was getting into when he willingly signed up (Duncan didn't even have to invoke the rite as I recall); Grey Wardens give their lives over to the goal of ending the darkspawn threat. He just didn't know at what point he would first have to risk his life, but it's the same principle and not unreasonable given what we learn about the darkspawn blood. Given the nature of the Joining and the crapsack world that DA takes place in, Duncan's response to Jory trying to back out is plenty defensible. The Grey Wardens have a hard enough time as is getting people to listen to them, but if it became public knowledge that they themselves were tainted? They'd become pariahs. Based on what we know, the world is kinda screwed if there are no Grey Wardens around for a Blight, so they can't take chances with their existence. This goes doubly so when, if Duncan doesn't act quickly and decisively, he risks the panicking Jory alerting the massive army whose camp they're in the middle of on the eve of battle. Harsh, but that's world of DA.

 

[Elfgore]

I too have never heard of the Duncan hate. Maybe it's worse on the Bioware forums, but no one here has ever complained that much.

I personally have nothing against Duncan. He is a man with a goal and he will do some questionable things, but it is all for the greater good. Yes, he did kill a man. But what's more important, one man's life, or the entire world's? Jory was kinda an asshole anyway, way to sure of himself. He just thought as joining the Grey Wardens as another title to add, not as a life choice.

 

[Mikeybb]

When he killed Jory, then told me the drink or die part I thought to myself "if I get through this, I'm gonna find a way to kill that asshole".
I know.
There was no chance the player wasn't going to get through it, but I was caught up in the moment.

Now, when I play a game like that, I do get wrapped up in it.
I was playing a dwarf casteless.
I won't spoil anything from that storyline for those who haven't played it.
Suffice to say I was reacting based on what had happened so far, as well as what appeared at first like a betrayal.

What I did love though was as the story progressed and the extent of the threat became more apparrent, with only the few wardens remaining trying to hold back that danger, my reaction changed.
I came to understand more fully the level of desperation and responsibility he had.

 

[votemarvel]

There might be some 'hate' due to the novel Dragon Age: The Calling, where it is revealed that he encountered the main antagonist from the Awakening expansion before the events of the first game.

 

[Malpraxis]

I don't hate him. But if he pulled that kind of stunt on me I definitely would.

 

[Zhukov]

He shanked a guy to death because the guy didn't want to drink a big steaming mug of hot poison that he had just seen kill another dude.

There's no point to it. If Jory had backed out, they would miss out on a recruit, sure. But if you kill him, you still miss out on a recruit.

So yeah, screw Duncan.

 

[StoleitfromKilgore]

I don't have anything against Duncan. The Grey Wardens on the other hand...they didn't exactly have a lot of depth to them. They could've basically replaced "Grey Wardens" with "Heroes" and it would have been the same thing.

 

[jklinders]

It's been a while, but I was pretty sure that it was VERY explicitly said, "this ceremony is secret and this is your last time to try to back out."

Killing Jory was a bit of a prick move. But when you are part of an organization that is built on sacrifice that has a horrifying way of bringing people in, the less people know about what it entails the better. If everyone knew that being a Gray Warden involved drinking a hot steaming cup of poison, I think there would be a lot fewer volunteers.

They are the only bastion and defense against an otherworldy threat that can only be defeated by sacrificing one of themselves to kill the spirit of the archdemon. If Jory couldn't drink from that cup, he was not going to have the balls to put his life up to kill the archdemon either, plus he was just stupid enough to blab that the Grey Wardens make people drink poison to become one of them. No volunteers after that, no one to kill the archdemons so no one to stop the blights.

Maybe a bit of an asshole, but his line of work does not give him the luxury of being as goody goody through and through. Maybe a better way can be found to combat the blights, but no one had yet found it so the Grey Wardens are it and they are few enough in number as it is without having a dry up in volunteers because they got soft that one time.

 

[Random Argument Man]

Well, there's Jory to begin with. Then, there's the human noble origin. If you decide to stick with your parents and save them, Duncan yells "Right of conscription" and you're magically willing to go to the Grey Warden with no objection. He's a prick with a purpose.

 

[LaughingAtlas]

I'm guessing that if Jory had been allowed to live,

Spoiler: Spoilers for pretty much the main plot of the game, revealed an hour or two in

he'd have been one of the few survivors of Ostagar, and one that went around shouting "Grey Warden Joining fucking kills you!!" in addition to Logain's propaganda. Things would have been marginally worse than Duncan might have first thought, moreso with this being the kind of 'dark fantasy' world in which liars, thieves, and rapists are all over the place. Would you really want to risk not being able to stop a world-ending threat because people were willing to risk themselves even less?

If I had known what Duncan knew at that point,

Spoiler: much later spoilers

that is, that you need a Grey Warden, barring Morrigan's completely unknown-to-everyone-but-her-and-Flemeth ritual, to stop an Archdemon, or it just picks a new darkspawn and keeps fighting,

I would have killed Jory myself.

 

[King Aragorn]

Because backing out = exposed secret. Exposed secret means the Grey Wardens would probably be seen as abominations by everyone, no one would be willing to join their recruits and lest we forget how the religious reaction would be since ultimately, it is a form of blood magic and the Chantry wouldn't be able to feign ignorance like they do now. As a Grey Warden he's bound by responsibility to do whatever it takes to stop The Blight, it doesn't help that the right hand of the king sees them as untrustworthy and it doesn't help that they were exiled before, too. All his questionable actions, including the Human Noble Origin *you were going to die if he didn't do that, by the way. Howe's entire force stormed the castle*, its all done with purpose ultimately, it's what he has to do and he did ultimately save you.

And he did warn you, actually. After you come back from the Wilds, even when you select ''So it could kill us?'' and Duncan elaborates on that, Ser Jory says let's get on with it.

 

[Rabbitboy]

I didn't know people hated him. What he did to Jory can be justified. If word got out there would be a lot less recrutes and the world would be fucked. And telling new recruits is of course not an option.

Personaly I think he seems like a sensible fellow but I didn't like or hate him.

 

[King Aragorn]

Its bit of a shame how early he got killed off, lots of potential to explore his character and the darker aspect of being a Warden, and it annoys the hell out of me how they kept releasing those $5 a pop DLC like Warden's Keep *some of them clearly cut content from the actual game* when a prequel dealing with the chap would have been pretty awesome, I know he got a novelization but playing it would have been even better.

 

[M0tty]

I never really hated him, just wasn't super keen on him after the joining. Not because he killed Jory, but because he didn't even seem to try to calm him down, or warn him that he'd have to kill him. It was just "Don't wanna" "Oke doke" *stab*