Gray Ghost, you have an interesting point of view, and in many ways it does correspond to what we see in the game. If you think about it, in a good RPG, Tav is also an empty dummy and puppet. Initially. But we, the players, fill them up, through our choice of lines and actions. When the world reacts to this - the dummy comes to life. If the game doesn't give players the opportunity to roleplay, then it would be much better to create a character with his own character in advance (like Geralt in The Witcher), give the player the opportunity to play only for him and make some choices in the story - where to go, whose side to take, etc., but all within the framework of the already defined character. Then the story would make sense. Otherwise, it's nonsense. Tavs without complex motivation, who just "poke" at everything in the "sandbox", just to see what happens... I associate it with a goat game ("Goat Simulator"), when you run around as a goat, interact "for fun" with the environment, and see what happens (sorry if this comparison is too crude). Sometimes you get absurd interactions, like you think a crane is going to lift the goat, but instead it tosses it up and the goat flies far away. So the goat-Tav helps Astarion, thinks there will be love, but Astarion instead... And Tav flies far away too. Or rather, not Tav, but the players themselves are flying far away from this game. The difference is that it's funny with the goat, but not so much with the "game of the year" in the RPG genre.
I don't see any contradiction in my point of view (imposing "morality" and some ideology in the game) and yours, they can perfectly combine with each other, and, in general, perfectly combine. A dummy without free will pokes the wrong place where a "good dummy" should poke and gets a "moral lesson" about where a dummy should not go. Poke somewhere else, dummy, see if there is a cookie there.
