The Gaming Den

Posted: **Fri Nov 28, 2014 6:17 pm**

I really like most companions in the Inquisition so far. They seem one dimensional at first, but skits you get practically every time you come to the keep flesh them out. It's heartwarming to see Blackwall carving toy griffons in his spare time.

My least favorite companions are Sera and Vivienne. Sera is singlemindedly raging against the nobles, and that's all there is to her. Maybe she'll show something else later, but I see nothing yet.
Vivienne is cold and political, and bitches at Cole and Dorian all the time, whom I actually like.

Posted: **Fri Nov 28, 2014 6:30 pm**

Sera made it pretty clear that she plays a lot. She's all "YOLO!" On the plus side, she apparently lives without a drop of angst, and that's pretty refreshing to me. I'm going to have her as Party Rogue on my playthrough, to see how she plays off everyone else.

Posted: **Fri Nov 28, 2014 7:15 pm**

Sera and Blackwall have the greatest conversation ever.

Sera: Do all Grey Wardens have beards?
Blackwall: No, just me. I stole all the beards, (dramatic voice) and all the power within! There can be only one.
Sera: What.

Posted: **Fri Nov 28, 2014 7:49 pm**

After entirely too much fucking around with drivers, I have finally gotten it to launch.

Posted: **Sat Nov 29, 2014 8:15 am**

Blackwall should have been a dwarf. He's steadfast and honorable, is as tough as old balls, and has an epic beard.

Also, I should have the option to nail Scout Harding... <3

Sera is actually alright once you get past her speech patterns. I like how you find a note where she mentions it's creepy as hell that the bard wrote a song about her...

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=x7Zkun0tJc4

Also, it would be refreshing as hell to NOT have a good aligned user of dark magic join you. I like Dorian, and I agree with his opinions abut blood magic, but do we NEED another likable necromancer in a fantasy game? When does doing the opposite of the cliche become cliche?

Also, I question whether one of his personal quests is topical or pandering:

You find out that Dorian has been estranged from his family. Not because of being a necromancer, his father is a Tevinter Magister. No, it's because his father doesn't approve of dudefucking and used blood magic to force him to be straight and it didn't work...

Posted: **Sat Nov 29, 2014 8:29 am**

Blackwall is more than you think.

Technically, all necromancers (mortalitasi) are good aligned. It's a nevarran tradition of spirit summoners, who watch over graveyards and summon willing spirits into the deceased bodies to have ritual meetings with the family. DA doesn't have traditional necromancy, because ghosts don't exist, and raising dead bodies is done via blood magic shoving a demon inside it.

Also, I question whether one of his personal quests is topical or pandering:

There's also transgender Krem.

Posted: **Sat Nov 29, 2014 8:36 am**

Does Dorian even use blood magic? I know he's pretty against the corrupt system of Tevinter.

Posted: **Sat Nov 29, 2014 9:02 am**

It's unclear. He's okay with using personal, or willingly donated blood, but I assume that he doesn't use blood magic while in service of the Inquisition. That would be crazy.

Posted: **Sat Nov 29, 2014 9:50 am**

Yes, it's definitely not like (in my worldstate anyway) that the Warden and the Champion of Kirkwall were both accomplished blood mages... (angry moth noises)

Edit: Krem is transgendered? I honestly didn't realize that. I didn't talk to him very often though.

Posted: **Sat Nov 29, 2014 10:54 am**

Krem is a woman.

Warden is a special case due to him being a Grey Warden. While Hawke can have a Blood Mage specialization, dialogues with him in Inquisition imply that he hates blood magic and blood mages due to all the crap that happened in Kirkwall. He's also an apostate. Inquisition on the other hand is technically working with the Chantry, and blood magic is a big no-no there.

Posted: **Sat Nov 29, 2014 6:18 pm**

I'm starting to get annoyed by all the conversations speculating about who might have caused the breach, because you never seem to get the option to say, "Almost certainly a Pride Abomination, because duh" Other contenders, in decreasing order of likelyhood: Tevinter Imperium, Flemeth, Darkspawn, Qunari.

It's like the characters have forgotten that opening a giant hole into the Fade is really fucking hard. The most hilarious accusation was directed at the Templars, which is reasonable on all grounds except that it's impossible.

Posted: **Sat Nov 29, 2014 7:28 pm**

Holy shit. Cole is making a Jade Empire reference:

He teaches them to fight with a secret flaw. Part of the glorious strategy.

Posted: **Sat Nov 29, 2014 8:14 pm**

Playing as a Tal'Vashoth mage, it's bugging me that my character keeps getting called a Qunari. Now, most people don't register the distinction, but my character and especially Iron Bull should know better.

Posted: **Sat Nov 29, 2014 8:35 pm**

Qunary is the name of the race, as well as the country. And Iron Bull is close enough to being Tal'Vashoth himself to not care about the caste names.

Posted: **Sat Nov 29, 2014 9:51 pm**

The Dragon Age Nerds wrote:The term kossith is an antiquated technical name and it is not known anywhere around Thedas or even amongst the Qunari. It is only known within scholarly circles, and a few members of the tamassrans, however they do not teach it to other Qunari.[1] The leadership of the Qunari does not recognize even the concept of kossith and few if any rank and file Qunari are aware of the word.[6] To almost everyone in Thedas, the horned race is just "Qunari" or "Tal-Vashoth", respectively.[3][7]

Posted: **Sat Nov 29, 2014 11:48 pm**

name_here wrote:Playing as a Tal'Vashoth mage, it's bugging me that my character keeps getting called a Qunari. Now, most people don't register the distinction, but my character and especially Iron Bull should know better.

Really? In my playthrough Iron Bull is very quick to call me out for not being Qunari, he even emphasizes "Tal Vashoth" in kind of a derogatory fashion at several points.

He also brings up the term "Kossith", but also mentions that word isn't used anymore and the Kossith probably were nothing like either the Qunari or the Tal Vashoth.

Posted: **Sat Nov 29, 2014 11:51 pm**

Count Arioch the 28th wrote:
name_here wrote:Playing as a Tal'Vashoth mage, it's bugging me that my character keeps getting called a Qunari. Now, most people don't register the distinction, but my character and especially Iron Bull should know better.
Really? In my playthrough Iron Bull is very quick to call me out for not being Qunari, he even emphasizes "Tal Vashoth" in kind of a derogatory fashion at several points.

Admittedly he hasn't talked to me much yet, but he called me Qunari during the first meeting. Note that he could clearly tell I had magical powers and a tongue.

Posted: **Sun Nov 30, 2014 12:11 pm**

Longes wrote:So, about Knight-Enchnaters.
Your power comes from the these three abilities:
-Spirit Blade. The first ability in the tree. It costs 10 mana and has no recharge time. It makes a melee attack with a magical sword for 300% of your staff damage, plus 200% against barriers and 400% against guard. Remember, that the sword's damage type is Spirit, which means that armor doesn't apply.
This your main attack now. Using staff is worse than using Spirit Blade in pretty much every situation.
-Combat Clarity. You get 50% faster mana regeneration when within 5 meters of the enemy.
This means you'll never run out of mana for your Spirit Blade.
-Fade Shield. You get 30% of damage you deal back as your barrier.
Congratulations. With a good staff you'll never run out of Barrier as long as you keep fighting. And if you did run out of barrier, you can just recast it, thanks to your great mana regeneration speed.

Now, the synergies. You obviously want the whole right branch of the Spirit tree, because it makes your shield stronger. You want Clear Burn from the Fire tree. It reduces spell cooldown time each time you cast a spell. Spirit Blade is a spell. You cast it all the time. You also want Fade Step from the Frost tree. Together with Fade Cloak from the Knight Enchanter it gives you 4 seconds of invulnerability whenver you want.

About Viviene. Don't put any points into the Knight Enchanter specialty for her. AI doesn't know how to use Knight Enchanter properly, so all those points are wasted.

I am trying that out now, and so far it seems to be working well. I've decided it works well if you take Cole, Iron Bull, and one of the two tanks along as everyone is up in the monster's grill, and I can keep barriers up most of the time on the entire party.

Posted: **Sun Nov 30, 2014 12:19 pm**

I usually run with Cole, Dorian and Blackwall or Cassandra. A second mage provides helpful status effects, which you don't have time to cast yourself as a Knight-Enchanter

Posted: **Sun Nov 30, 2014 3:16 pm**

Hero of Ferelden is a douche. At a certain point you can do a wartable mission to contact him, which lasts 17 hours. The result is a letter from him that says he is busy, and a +100HP belt. Greedy level 20 bastard.

Posted: **Sun Nov 30, 2014 7:32 pm**

I've just gotten through the mage/templar decision siding with the mages, and have started up the next major portion.

The Templar Order is so fired

In case you miss learning about the important points if you side with the Templars, what happens is that after you and the mages seal the breach, you get attacked by an army of Red Lyrium-infused Templars, with crystals growing out of their bodies, some of them mutated into giant monsters, and with various deadly supernatural abilities and physical enhancements. Apparently because their leadership heard about how it transformed Meredith into a supervillain and decided they wanted some of that.

The hilariously ironic thing about this is that the Templars have demonstrated that they're exactly the same kind of problem as the mages. They wanted more power and control, so they decided to draw on sources they knew were dangerous, and it's been turning them into monsters and destroying their minds. It's granted them power beyond the capacity of ordinary men and has allowed them to slaughter indiscriminately. Hell, the Horrors are more distorted than most Abominations, and they've got a goddamn Red Lyrium Dragon as a pet.

Of course, that's only the Templars who have gone rogue, but they justify locking up mages because of what rogue mages have done. If the circles are reestablished, by all rights the Templars should be imprisoned with them as well. Somehow, though, I get the sense that Cullen and Cassandra won't see things that way.

Posted: **Sun Nov 30, 2014 8:24 pm**

Apparently because their leadership heard about how it transformed Meredith into a supervillain and decided they wanted some of that.

What's even worse, their current leader is Samson. Samson is the templar who got kicked out of the order by Meredith in DA2 for using rite of Tranquility to build himself a sex slave harem. He's been out of the order for five years now. And they've made him their new leader.

Not sure about Cullen, but Cassandra definitely feels that mages were oppressed, and that in the future circles should govern themself, while Templars should be doing demon hunting in the field.

EDIT:

Apparently because their leadership heard about how it transformed Meredith into a supervillain and decided they wanted some of that.

There's more to it. Templars are addicted to lirium. Since they went rogue on the Chantry, they were cut off from their normal suppliers, so a lot of templars decided that red lirium is better than no lirium.

Posted: **Sun Nov 30, 2014 8:47 pm**

Re: Templars

The Templars aren't completely guilty here. The villain is pretty good at this sort of mindscrewing. Essentially, he was playing both sides--Templars and Mages. If you save one, he'll establish his dominion over the other.

I still think they're a bunch of self-righteous assholes who have gone crazy with their own power and are more at fault than the mages, but I gotta give 'em some credit that going nuts on red lyrium wasn't entirely their own idea.

Posted: **Sun Nov 30, 2014 9:36 pm**

Yeah, I did gather that in Redcliff. Though I should point out that if the guy in Val Reyoux was really the Lord Seeker, he's immune to mind control and led them into becoming an insane cult on his own initiative.

However, the point isn't why they went for Red Lyrium, the point is that they could. Just like how mages can use demons or blood magic. So if the threat of what mages can do justifies confining them, the same logic justifies confining the Templars.

At the moment, there seem to be four internally consistent courses of action:
1. Templars and Mages both get confined. The Seekers, who get their powers through meditation and crap and presumably cannot parlay that into becoming some sort of giant monster, expand their ranks and guard both groups.
2. Templars and Mages both get to walk free and get tasked with beating up rogue members of either group.
3. Templars receive Damnation of Memory. All of them die and they're expunged from all records, erasing all knowledge of how to use Lyrium to power their abilities. Mages can't be removed on a permanent basis because new ones keep getting born, so something else gets done about them.
4. Qunari victory, both get used as living weapons kept under constant supervision.

Personally, I favor option 2. I suspect, however, that a lot of other characters are going to want the status quo back.

Posted: **Sun Nov 30, 2014 9:55 pm**

You'll learn about Lord-Seeker and the Seeker "meditation crap" more in one of Cassandra's personal quests.