Valmy's ADHD Dragon Age playthrough

[Valmy]

The DLC was spoiled to me (ok, I read Bioware's friggin' forum, my own damn fault ), but I feel that, story-wise, it was really interesting.
Combat wise, it's closer to Descent.  Some fights are a tad insane.  Fucking ... ah, well, you'll discover it for yourself

I would have had it finished but i got this massive cold last weekend. Give me a day or two and I will have it posted.

[viper37]

Cool, I'm curious about your final choices.
Then I'll have some more comments on the game

[Valmy]

TRESSPASSING PART ONE

So all is quiet in Skyhold these days. Most of Lothar's inner circle is getting ready to head out on their own business while he and his councelors continue the drudgery of mending Thedas together.

Everybody is mostly chattering on about the new Lyrium-less Templar order and the new Mage divine. Crazy times...yet somehow still too conservative for some.

Leliana and Lothar though, who have been cool to each other for awhile now, bury their differences.



'Ok Leliana I guess we can 40% trust one another from here on out.'

So Lothar and his united and victorious Inquisition get to work finishing their mission. Which I have to admit is rather vague considering Lothar was clear the goal was defeating Corypheus. But the rest of the rifts need to be closed and political stability must be re-established I guess.

Ok so years pass and stuff happens.

Lots of stuff.

Oh so much stuff I cannot even tell you.

But then this stuff happened:



Long story short: Orlais has curried lots of favor with the Inquisition, but the Inquisition sits in Ferelden territory with a massive army. Ferelden is pissed and wants the Inquisition disbanded. Orlais hopes to use Ferelden displeasure to gain power over the Inquisition. Divine Victoria has called the Exalted Council to settle things. Will endless cloak and dagger and diplomatic intrigue break out? Well they are going back to the Winter Palace...but even though Lothar will be there in person the monarchs or Ferelden and Orlais stay away. That has to be a slight



'The Inquisition finally finds a use for its mounts.'

Yeah so everybody has come together again for this big council! First Mother Giselle meets Lothar and reminds him of their discussion back in Haven way back in the day.



Lothar wants to step down so bad and just marry Cassandra and...try to live happily ever after while she rebuilds a militant order of religious fanatics...like you do.

But spoiler alert: his burdens are not likely to lessen anytime soon.

Varric has been made Viscount of KIrkwall! It seems the nobles decided the position was cursed so when Varric complained there was no Viscount they took it as him volunteering for the job. He has a present for Lothar!



'Yeah! A place to retire to!'

I mean he never will be able to retire but hey the dream is real! Varric also gave him the title of 'Compte' which is weird because I thought Compte was higher than Viscompte. Oh well. Oh and he gives Lothar the key to the city...which also controls Kirkwall's
harbor defenses. Sweet. Not bad for the younger son of the Bann of Oswick

Oh and that guy with him is supposed to be the Seneschal...huh...



Huh...maybe he died his hair.

Cole has been out and about doing good deeds and...a few other things as well.



So despite writing a creepy fawning song about Sera, the bard ends up with Cole. But bisexuality is the norm around here. I wonder if spirits can make babies. Huh.

Well isn't that sweet?

Thom Rainier has been out trying to right all his previous wrongs...let's just say it got awkward.



'So...sorry about the fucking up your life thing...'

But despite that he has become a symbol of forgiveness and redemption. The prodigal son of Orlais...with a strange Ferelden accent.

And check this out:



So kick ass. Thank you Bioware for that touch. Every bit that makes you feel like you impacted the world is really nice to see.

Sera's flow of conciousness journal reveals she is getting fat...and wants to blow Dagna up with bees...weird.



'Rainier keeps his beard trimmed to the exact same length at all times.'

And she suggests Lothar and she celebrate their reunion by throwing pies in everybody's face because...well why not?



'I hope this conference to decide if the Inquisition lacks respect for the established powers isn't lessened by the Inquisitor throwing pastries in everybody's face.'

Then Sera gives Lothar a second retirement plan:



'Um...how do I put this delicately?'

So he says he will be Sera's friend but not her um...'friend'. The other Jennies are bummed but hey what did they really expect?

Sera suggests Lothar will still help them out, and yeah he probably will.

And then The Iron Bull. Oh let me tell you about all the things The Iron Bull has to say: nothing at all. Huh.



So...we are still good...right?

Very unnerving. What are the Qunari up to?

Meanwhile, because this is Dragon Age Inquisition, there are tons of tiresome side quests to arrange paintings and find dog treats and whatever it was I accomplished by finding this after a difficult jump puzzle:



'Totally worth it!'

And these all give ability score boosts for some stupid reason. It does not even make sense, this is not the fade.

Lothar is eager to see his true love but it seems Cassandra heard Varric talking about a proposal (presumably Varric's proposal to make Lothar a noble?) and thought Lothar was going to propose marriage to her. After a bit of awkwardness Lothar suggests that that might be a great idea.



'Well of course. I will get a choir on loan from the Chantry at once.'

Cullen is getting a bit homesick as evidenced by his adoption of a stray Mabari Warhound he found in the Winter Palace. It is that dog you are supposed to give all the dog treats you find...which of course I do because um it is there to do.



'Thanks pal we will get through all this.'

Leliana suggests that we do go ahead and 'disband' the Inquisition and work from behind the shadows while she settles into comfortable 'old rich lady' retirement.



'I like the way your twisted little mind works Leliana.'

This is an excellent idea that would help defuse the situation and allow Lothar to fulfill his promise.

The monarchs of Ferelden sent instructions to Arl Teagan:



Stupid King Alistair and Queen Anora. If Lothar can come in person so can you. Grrrr.

Speaking of Arl Teagan, Lothar soon finds him talking to Divine Victoria. Divine Vivie...er...Victoria lets Lothar know she fully intends to keep the Inquisition around...yeah I bet she does.



'Yeah we'll see about that.'

They seem to have at least a few entire nations on their side. You might be on your own soon your Divinity.

Lothar then has a talk with Arl Teagan. He is playing the part of Ambassador Udina from Mass Effect and is constantly OUTRAGED about EVERYTHING.



'THIS IS AN OUTRAGE!'

So his tone is not going to change the whole time. Diplomacy through grumpiness.



So what do you think, does this look like the same guy only 14 years older?

Speaking of guys we know before who are now elder statesmen, Lothar meets the ambassador Orlais sent to its own palace. Yes even Celene blew Lothar off.



Hey look it is guy Urien had to seduce and drug to get the key to Chateau Haine back in DA2. The son of Duke Prosper de Montfort. Remember?



So hey the gang is all here for Tresspasser! Anyway since Orlais is trying to use the Inquisition as a tool, he is very friendly...not as friendly as he was to Urien but quite friendly indeed.

Oh and when Lothar first met Duke Cyril de Montfort, he was talking to Dorian. Dorian is here as Tevinter Ambassador which does not even have a position for fear everybody will oppose it simply because Tevinter has an opinion. So pretty easy job for Dorian. Unfortunately his father is dead so Dorian will soon be moving on up:



'Oh got to love Tevinter.'

Dorian is going to be returning and leading the new reforming faction in the Magisterium and he gives Lothar a crystal so they
can talk and work together even though they will be very far away.



Well it is just a love fest whenever Lothar and Dorian get together.

Josephine wants to enjoy a little Orlesian culture before they get bogged down at the council.



'Well let's just say they like some weird shit.'

Man I wish there was more of this in the game proper...more on that later.

The last quick thing is that Divine Victoria treats Lothar to a spa day. I wonder if Pope Francis does this for his friends.



'Yeah it seems like that would make my eyes puffy.'

While this is going on the Friends of Red Jenny are running around knocking shit over...it was weird.

Ok that sure was an emotional series of re-unions just for a little diplomatic conference. Probably something else is going down...



'And then they saved your ass? I don't think you are making a good case here.'

Everything outrages Arl Teagan. And that is basically the conference:

'Teagan: Rumble rumble OUTRAGE.'

'de Montfort: Ze Inquisition, c'est pas mal.'

'Teagan: I find your lack of OUTRAGE despicable.'

Anyway Leliana sends a message to Lothat that something needs his immediate attention so he walks out which, shockingly,
OUTRAGES Teagan. OH THE OUTRAGE Ferelden has had to endure.

Anyway Leliana is waiting for him in one of the houses down in the side courtyard. A dead Qunari warrior is there in full weird wicker armor. Lothar suggests they go to The Iron Bull at once...



'HE'S A LIAR! IT IS HIM! HE IS THE MOLE! KILL HIM!'

Ok maybe I am over-reacting. Maybe...I don't even know what this could mean yet.

[Valmy]

TRESPASSING PART TWO

Ok so the dead Qunari left a trail of blood. A very obvious one. Like the Qunari stumbled across the palace fatally bleeding and nobody noticed. Great security here.

Lothar follows the trail and it leads to:



Wait so Eluvians in the Winter Palace is a thing? Why didn't Morrigan just use these instead of having us walk down to the Arbor Wilds? Did somebody smuggle this thing in here? WHAT IN ANDRASTE'S SHAPELY THIGHS IS GOING ON AROUND HERE?!

So Lothar goes and gets Cassandra, Varric, and Dorian to help him. Yep the adventuring team is a major world leader, the new Lady Seeker, the Viscount of Kirkwall, and a member of the Tevinter Magisterium.

So they burst into the crossroads...or supposedly anyway it does not really look like the Crossroads did before. The blood keeps going and leads to an inactive Eluvian. Probably get to go through there at the end. There is also the beginning of an annoying sidequest nearby, yahoo!

Meanwhile they see the Qunari running off to another Eluvian. But nearby is an Eluvian that leads to an Orlesian looking library where they fight some demons and get a nice ring that is part of an item set called "The Taken Shape" and had some nice stats on it:

http://dragonage.wikia.com/wiki/The_Hand_That_Cuts

That got me kind of pumped up. What kind of shape are they talking about?

Anyway they go through the other Eluvian after the Qunari and find themselves:



'Varric, I've a feeling we're not in Kansas anymore.'

This is one ancient looking ruin. And there are dead Qunari everywhere...so at least it has that going for it. There are signs of shanigans though. For one there are weird insta-kill blue flames:



'Oh sure put a treasure chest on the other side...YOU SADISTIC MONSTERS.'

What weird Qunari trickeration is this? Ok probably not the Qunari as they do not tend to blow themselves up and turn themselves to stone:



'That Lothar is one world class gumshoe.'

Ok so as you can tell there are alot of towers around here with Eluvians teleporting you between the towers. Remember when Eluvians were this super rare fancy thing? Dorian tells Lothar and company that the green fields between the towers are actually incredibly dangerous.

So eventually they get to some ghostly minions of Fen'Harel. Aha! So Solas is mixed up in this! Lothar can get past them because Mythal's well knew the password.



See? Mythal and Fen'Harel were always in league. Probably why she got killed.

So around there are mosaics with Fen'Harel propagandapreaching of truth.



'Yes...big brother Solas is watching you.'

I wonder if Lothar can only understand them because of the Well.



'Aha! The lies of the Evanuris! They are not gods like you believe but ageless beings of immense power!'

Whew glad we got that cleared up. Oh and the anchor opens these mosaics which is what you are seeing...not sure what that means. After opening that second one there Lothar is wracked by tremendous pain in the anchor and then:



'So...this might help me...get past the flames and get the treasure! WAHOO!'

Oh and it might mean the anchor is killing Lothar but whatever. Loots!

Oh and they also find a statue thing that will repair the bridge to the tower they cannot get to yet. But first they go and get all the loot. Then the bridge repairs itself and they cross over to find...the Qunari!



'Why hello there friendly allies of the Inqui...aaaaaaaah'

So we are enemies now. They fight across the bridge to the big island and explore and find a few clues before entering the central tower.



Yes...friends in being enemies of the Qunari. Oh joy.

So Lothar fights through the Qunari...so many Qunari...and God I hate those stupid spear chucking Qunari. But eventually they reach a big statue of Fen'Harel and a pretty easy puzzle that opened a secret door and got Lothar an item nobody needed...think it was a bow.

Oh and...



LOL the Vallaslin were symbols of slavery. Oh the irony Dalish. Oh the irony.

Anyway behind that was an armory where Solas' people were storing weapons to launch their attack on the Evanuris, which is what we are going to call the Elven Gods from now on I guess. Or not gods. Just guys who live forever and have immense power. But not gods...whatever those are.

At the bottom of the armory is a Qunari host led by an Elite Qunair Shock Trooper. They beat them down and recover the secret Qunari plans:



It seems the Qunari were going to use the Eluvians to infiltrate the Winter Palace and murder us all and convert the world to the Qun I presume. Single minded fucks. But it appears a mysterious intruder fucked everything up by showing up and re-activating all the ancient defenses. Spoiler: It's Solas.

Well this is bizarre. Ok back to the Winter Palace to tell Leliana and company what Lothar found.



'BECAUSE THEY ARE FUCKING QUNARI!!'

I mean might as well ask why fish fuck in water. Anyway nobody has anything useful to say so back to the crossroads with Lothar.

Oh first...



'LIES!!!'

The Qunari just do not operate like that. Anyway The Iron Bull wants Lothar to bring him along to find out but even if Lothar was that stupid he doesn't need a squishy warrior around.

Lothar finished what is hopefully the last side quest thing that led him to a very nice top hat, which he then placed on a skeleton in the Crossroads which gave him +6 to cunning. For reasons. Very good ones I am sure.

The Qunari are seen running along a new staircase and Lothar finds a weird egg looking device...weird. A new Eluvian takes them to an ancient elven shrine of Ghilan'nain. There there are lots more demons.



'Yes I know there have been literally thousands of demon enemies in this game but it is a nice break from the Qunari.'

There is a pattern here. You follow the Qunari and then jump into the Eluvian they do not go inside and kill demons and take a nice treasure, then you go back into the crossroads and follow the Qunari into the other Eluvian.

This time Lothar got:

http://dragonage.wikia.com/wiki/The_Eye_That_Weeps

Pretty awesome rogue stuff.

Anyway on after the Qunari!

Into...



THE DEEP ROADS!

Oh but not the Deep Roads. These are pre-dwarf Deep Roads. Deep Roads built by Elves so they can harvest Lyrium. What kind of sick disgusting stuff is this? First the Elder Scrolls has dwarves be kinds of elves and now we have elves acting like dwarves? DWARVES AND ELVES MUST BE MORTAL ENEMIES. Though, come to think of it, the elves and dwarves are annoyingly indifferent to each other in this world.

There is an elf working for the Qunari who they put to work trying to figure out what the hell this place was:



Elves working for Mythal and Fen'Harel eh? Not surprising they are in league at this point but why did they need the Lyrium? For the plan to seal away the Evanuris? Or did that Dalish legend even happen?

Eventually they find a human member of the Qun...well a deserter from the Qun. Who was a Kirkwall Templar. LOL does this guy make bad career choices.



'My clever disguise failed!'

The Qunari are being led by the Viddasala, who I understand is the leader of the Ben'Hassrath who specialize in magic. So no wonder they put the Templar there. But it seems the Viddasala is harvesting magical stuff and loads of Lyrium for an insane plan.



'If it were anybody besides the Qunari I would doubt that is possible.'

Oh and his name is/was Ser Jerran. He didn't show up in Dragon Age II that I can tell though. LAME. Anyway the Viddasala either thinks the Inquisition is a tool of Fen'Harel or wants her followers to believe it. The only reason she would think that is because they worked intimately with him for months. Way to jump to conclusions Qunari.



'And what exactly is that?'

Well it involves collecting lots of Lyrium and feeding it Saarebas to make them super powerful because that is what the anti-magic part of the Qunari secret police do? I guess? He suggests they get the primers from the supply area and then blow the mine. Sounds like a plan.

Anyway Lothar and company beat the crap out of the Qunari and reach the supply area. There they find...one giant Saarebas ready to rock.



'Yeah there is a giant Qunari in there someplace.'

After defeating the Saarebas they find...well...



An Andraste's ass load of Lyrium. And the primers for the Gaatlock charges which Lothar uses to blow up the mine. It takes longer than it sounds, as they have to blow each installation individually.

After that the whole pace starts flooding so they have to race out.



'Pfft they are both softies.'

On the way out they find the Qunari grabbed that ex-Templar and executed him for treason. Tough break ex-Ser Jerran.

Back the Winter Palace Lothar and company have no idea that Solas is Fen'Harel, of course, so are just puzzled why the Qunari have decided they are working for him.



'Oh Lothar...if only you knew...'

But then Duke Cyril and Arl Teagan burst in personally and inform Lothar that an Inquisition soldier has attacked an Orlesian servant. Lothar informs them he will see to it personally. Cyril is eager to sort this out but of course Teagan finds it an OUTRAGE.



'Well this problem does involve us directly and does not involve Ferelden so...'

Man you cannot even hurt Orlesians without outraging Ferelden these days. Back when Loghain was in charge Ferelden would have thrown a parade.

The plot thickens!

[viper37]

TRESSPASSING PART ONE

but even though Lothar will be there in person the monarchs or Ferelden and Orlais stay away. That has to be a slight

That's why I don't like royalty.  Always so snob.   

'The Inquisition finally finds a use for its mounts.'

'bout time!
Actually, I used them once, in that desert map where you need to find dwarven artifacts leading to a tomb.  I scoured the f****** map a dozen times to find everything dammit!

Lothar wants to step down so bad and just marry Cassandra and...try to live happily ever after while she rebuilds a militant order of religious fanatics...like you do.

Just when I thought I was out... they pull me back in!

I mean he never will be able to retire but hey the dream is real! Varric also gave him the title of 'Compte' which is weird because I thought Compte was higher than Viscompte. Oh well.

Well, that looks weird, doesn't it, a viscomte handling nobility titles far above his station?  On the other hand, you also have dukes in Kirkwall, I think, yet, the Viscomte rule over them.  So what I think is happening here, is the nobles decide who will rule over the city and give him the title Viscomte so that, ultimately, if things turn
bad, they still have the power to remove him.  Sort of like a Magna Carta++

But despite that he has become a symbol of forgiveness and redemption. The prodigal son of Orlais...with a strange Ferelden accent.

Thom Rainier is from the Free Marches.  They have closer ties to Ferelden than Orlais, which explains the Ferelden accent instead of the Orlesian one. 

'I like the way your twisted little mind works Leliana.'

That's my girl   In my "canon" playthrough of DA:O, she was my love
I like how she became sister Nightingale, how quick she stepped back into the spy game.  Wish I could find a girl like that

Hey look it is guy Urien had to seduce and drug to get the key to Chateau Haine back in DA2. The son of Duke Prosper de Montfort. Remember?

I never realized this!  Thanks

[viper37]

TRESPASSING PART TWO

Ok so the dead Qunari left a trail of blood. A very obvious one. Like the Qunari stumbled across the palace fatally bleeding and nobody noticed. Great security here.

Bah.  You're out enjoying spa with cheese on your eyes, so don't blame these poor souls taking double shifts!

Wait so Eluvians in the Winter Palace is a thing? Why didn't Morrigan just use these instead of having us walk down to the Arbor Wilds? Did somebody smuggle this thing in here? WHAT IN ANDRASTE'S SHAPELY THIGHS IS GOING ON AROUND HERE?!

Maybe she did not know about it, it might have been in storage somewhere and smuggled out of there to another room by servants.

So they burst into the crossroads...or supposedly anyway it does not really look like the Crossroads did before. The blood keeps going and leads to an inactive Eluvian. Probably get to go through there at the end.
[...]
Remember when Eluvians were this super rare fancy thing? Dorian tells Lothar and company that the green fields between the towers are actually incredibly dangerous.

The crossroads always look different, because they can be in this world as well as in the fade.  And one of their canon book as established that non elves have lots of difficulties crossing there, something that was left out of the game.  I'm so OUTRAGED! 

And they are not "rare".  They are everywhere, but if you don't have a key, it looks like any mirror.  And you have no idea where it leads to, because you have no map.  So you would need to take time to explore them and be sure to have the required key for each one.

See? Mythal and Fen'Harel were always in league. Probably why she got killed.

I did not drink the well, so I never experience this, so yeah, you're right

'So...this might help me...get past the flames and get the treasure! WAHOO!'

Sod it!  I never thought of using the ability for that!

So Lothar fights through the Qunari...so many Qunari...and God I hate those stupid spear chucking Qunari.

Told you they were annoying

[Valmy]

TRESPASSING PART THREE

Well it looks like the Orlesian servant was trying to stop a member of the Inquisition dragging Gaatlock barrels (fortunately nobody else knew what it was) into the Winter Palace. Well that is embarrasing. Lothar locks up the offender and apologizes to the Orlesians.



'Our people at that.'

Leliana admires the Qunari plan, noting that if Corypheus had just blown everybody up instead of revealing himself he would have won. Which is true but really all he needed to blow up is Lothar. But glad Leliana is around to admire the murderous guile of the Qunari. Though note that Solas is fucking their plans up just like he did Corypheus'.

What does The Iron Bull say?



'For a spy you are a horrible liar. The Qunari do shit like this all the time. The Iron Bull himself talked about all their atrocities on Seheron.'

Sera has some surprising insight: the elves are being very quiet all the sudden.



Well obviously some of the elves are working for the Qunari but what else is going on? Are the elves secretly all joining up with the Dread Wolf? The Dalish would not trust Solas, of course, but the City Elves might not have such scruples if Solas is promising them...um...whatever he and Mythal are doing.

Varric discusses what is going on with Urien in Weisshaupt:



'OMG Bioware make this adventure!'

I know all this build up to 'Urien in Weisshaupt' is going to disappoint me because, after all Hawke could be in the Fade right now, but damn it sounds so cool.



'To be fair Thom, this is pretty much every week for us.'

And BACK to the Crossroads. The Qunari charge off in another direction...huh it is like they want us to find their secret bases. This time we find their secret to controlling the paths in the Crossroads!



'This magic egg thing. The ancient elves were faberge fans.'

Just as before they go into the Eluvian the Qunari do NOT go into. This time into an ancient Alamarri throne room complete with olde tyme wrytings.  More demons...



And oh wow was this a long fight. Super Revenants with super Despair Demons two horrible tastes that taste...really hard to kill.

But...look at the loot!

http://dragonage.wikia.com/wiki/The_Eye_That_Weeps

One more piece and I get to see the entire Taken Shape. Does it grant shape shifting powers?

But this time there is a second Eluvian the Qunari did not go into. It is an ancient elf jail complete with shattered Eluvians. After a much easier demon fight they find the last piece of the Taken Shape...

http://dragonage.wikia.com/wiki/The_Skin_That_Stalks

So that completes the set. It is pretty good stats wise but this seems to be a really important set of items. Why is it called 'The Taken Shape'? What shape? Who took it? No idea. I do not even particularly like the look of it but Lothar will be wearing it anyway. He was still wearing the stuff I crafted way back before the Arbor Wilds.

After this they follow the Qunari through the other Eluvian and into an ancient library. Books about ancient forgotten knowlege are everywhere:



'So the Evanuris defeated Gaxkang, Xebenkeck, Imshael, and pals...wait do I know about this?'

Wait...no the evil Gods were called the 'The Forgotten Ones' not the 'The Forbidden Ones' so that is a totally different sort of Ones. Oh I am so confused. Anyway so Gaxkang and pals have been tormenting mortals for millenia...BUT NO LONGER. Or at least the three we have met so far.

Next they find the mind blowing secret of this place:



'Oh my! IT IS ALL SO CLEAR NOW'

Honestly I freaked out a bit when I found this. I thought all the secrets of Sandal were in my hands! But no...he remains as mysterious as ever. But we do know he spent considerable time in this secret library...and butchered a Qunari apparently. Enchantment!

Lothar then meets the secret spirit of learning that tells him that this was an ancient library that contained all the Elves'
knowlege. It was magically connected to every part of their empire and...well...when the world and the fade were sundered it fell apart. Oh well that makes sense. Wait. What the fuck do you mean when world and the fade were sundered? Hilariously this bizarre statement does not seem to ruffle Lothar much. Did I already know this? Because that seems pretty weird. The fade and the world were once the same place but were divided somehow?

He also knows the Viddasala is there looking for something. Oh and some mysterious stranger has arrived and is awakening all
the Librarians who are going crazy and attacking the Qunari. Or at least I think they are.



'Spoiler: it's Solas.'

I was so stoked that this spirit was possessing that cool statue but it seems it was just a weird camera angle:



'Meh not as cool,'

Bummer.

Then they find the Viddasala...she is on the ceiling.



'Keep in mind this is NOT the Fade. Elves are fucked up man.'

On that theme: when the world and the fade got sundered the elves all died horribly in this library and their final thoughts stayed here as echoes.



So Solas did it? The guy who loves the Fade so much sundered it off from the world thus destroying the elven empire? But how and why? I am just wracking my brains here. I do not recall anybody saying Fen'Harel did this before only that he locked away the Elven Go...er...the Evanuris. Was this before or after Mythal was killed? Again I find it rather surreal how unfazed Lothar and company seem to be to these mind blowing revelations.



'Well...that certainly fits Solas.'

Though I don't know if his advice turned to poison...even though he is the one who almost destroyed the world by giving the orb to Corypheus.

Granted Lothar knows none of this, I do not really like knowing more than my character does, but surely even he is starting to figure it out. The evidence is starting to pile up.

As they go about clearing a path to the ceiling Lothar is wracked by more pain in his hand. He gets more super powers.



So now he blows shit up constantly. Note that this also seems to herald his inevitable demise. Will Bioware have the guts to kill the Inquisitor?



'Well I am glad Dorian seems to grasp the enormity of what we are discovering'

There are lots of puzzles and cool stuff here. Including another puzzle with a statue of the Dread Wolf (an actual wolf not Solas) where you get a magical item, this one was a sword of pure coldness which was cool but nobody really needed it.

In another section you run up to a chest and you get a message...



And you get jumped by a bunch of freaking fear demons. Very cool. Kind of freaked me out a bit.

Speaking of freaky stuff in another section of the library they found a weird section of Hard in Hightown where 'Donnen' (Varric's fictionalized version fo Donnic, Aveline's husband from DA2) chats with an old warrior who has a pet Mabari and they are sitting there talking about home. And...I get the feeling this is Loghain who once had a Mabari Warhound and who has not been home in years.



And Varric never wrote it. Woah. What could it mean? Dorian suggests they are not physical books but ideas (which is weird since this library is NOT in the fade) so is this something Varric has thought about writing? Is Loghain speaking to us from the fade? I don't know. But that was cool.

Finally they find the last glowy magic egg. Oh I forgot to mention this: they needed to find red magical eggs to create a path to the Qunari on the ceiling. So they found them and then the librarians, who are fear demons, decided they made too much noise or maybe had an overdue book or something.



'Yes I was looking for 'Annals of the Trevelyan family'?'

I found that part a bit weird since Solas clearly awoke those dudes to fight the Qunari yet they seem to be showing up to protect them. However Lothar found lots of Qunari all over the library who had been frightened to death. It was probably these fear demon librarians that took them out.

Lothar and company then cross over the bridge and confront the Viddasala. She is confused why everybody did not murder Lothar after his victory since, I guess that is standard procedure for the Qunari.



Frankly I am more confused why they let Lothar walk free when he was literally the only hope for the world. More on that later.



'I will just walk away and assume it all went according to plan...what?'

Ok so they need to get to this Darvaarad. Oh and they have to defeat a small army of Qunari.



'You know there is a Saarebas involved since everything is a seizure inducing light fest.'

They get the key to the Eluvian to the 'Darvaarad' but need the password. Fortunately one of the spirits of the library overheard the Qunari.



Ok now this should allow them to go through the Eluvian that the blood trail led to way back at the beginning. Back to the Winter Palace.

[viper37]

Re: the world that wakes and the world that dreams, all we be made clear by the end.  Well, clearer, I mean.  Nothing is ever totally clear

[viper37]

Finished grinding through hordes of Qunari spearmen yet?

[Valmy]

Finished grinding through hordes of Qunari spearmen yet?

Yes! And boy is my click finger tired.

[Valmy]

TRESPASSING PART THE LAST

Ok back in the Winter Palace the Inquisition are looking like real morons. Not this great organization's finest hour.

The Qunari have managed to smugle Gaatlock barrels into Denerim, Val Royeaux, Nevarra, and the Free Marches. Basically they plan to blow every ruling dynasty in the South at once. And nearly got away with it to if it were not for that meddling ancient elf.

Their tool? Why the Inquisition of course.



'Leliana you must reprimand our spy master for this incompetence....oh wait.'

Oh but it gets better.



'Of course they were.'

Kirkwall! Your fuckup'dness echoes through the ages! I mean how many Kirkwall people have made appearances in Inquisition who have been total screw ups? Double digits I swear.

Lothar laments how the Inquisition is becoming corrupt. Then his advisors do what they do best: fight amongst themselves. The anchor then dramatically sends Lothar into agony. He tells them he will probably die soon but first he is going to the Darvaarad to confront the Qunari. Josephine asks if they should inform Ferelden and Orlais of the Qunari threat.



Leliana says she will take care of it since it is ultimately her fault.

Lothar gathers his group and they head for what might be the final battle of his life. Cassandra and Lothar recognize Lothar will probably soon be dead and get all lovey lovey. Varric announces that Bianca will shock them all with her prowess one last time, his crossbow not his rather less impressive love of his life. Dorian laments that soon everybody will have to suffer not having him around anymore. The final battle, the final countdown has begun! GET PUMPED!

...but first something else. Now I did not mention it in the earlier section but I have had an obsession for the last bit in Trespasser. And that obession is with a blocked door near the Eluvian into the Deep Roads section. You can just barely see an active Eluvian behind it. Now that Lothar can blow shit up with the Anchor they go there first to see if he can blow the door. And he can!



'Oh man...this makes me so happy'

Through the Eluvian is a huge mural and another puzzle with a Dread Wolf statue. It is the same kind of ancient elf Mural that Solas painted at Skyhold.



But actually it depicts something fascinating. You see those blue lines? Those are Lyrium veins. The mural is depicting Mythal slaying a Titan and the Evanuris mining all the Lyrium for themselves. I presume they needed it for their plan to dominate the world? But it also hints that the Evanuris have unleashed dangerous forces by doing so. Did Solas have to banish them to save the world from whatever the Evanuris were unleashing?

So they go back through the main Eluvian and reach the Darvaarad...which is covered with Eluvians the Qunari have been gathering. Time to put an end to the Qunari conspiracy.



Note that I made new gear for everybody before going and they found a certain item in the Library:

http://dragonage.wikia.com/wiki/Fade-Touched_Honeycomb

So I made a new sword for Cassandra and put that on it. So now every fight is covered in bees. Good times.

They push across the bridge and then up into the tower. In the tower they find the ket to the Gatehouse and...a thing about somebody whose avatar I would like to date:



So it is a letter offering advice to Tallis in her struggles with the Qun. It is written a Qunari Ashkaari, which is a philosopher of
the Qun, who discovers he has magic. And as he talks about the magic overcoming him his letter becomes increasingly unhinged. His name, or title I guess, is Saarath and Lothar will be meeting him soon.

Nearby the Qunari have excavated and hauled an ancient Elf mural up to the top of the tower for study...



'Yep that's Solas alright.'

Granted I guess that is abstract a mural enough to be any number of elves.

There are tons of elven and other magical artifacts Saarath was studying. Including red lyrium which probably was making Saarath lose his shit.

They go back and open the front gate and fight through more Qunari into their headquarters.



'Never trust the Qunari. They sure had the Inquisition going.'

There is a ton of incriminating evidence showing how the Qunari are using elves who have converted to the Qun to smuggle their Gaatlock and how they are studying magic to use the Eluvians. Still not sure what they needed the Lyrium for, but I guess they did not get it anyway.

Finally Lothar finds 'Dragon's Breath' and well it was a strangely literal code word:



'Operation Land in Normandy on June 6th will surprise them all!'

The Qunari quickly turn to face Lothar and the Viddesala comes out and sends out her best agent to stop them...and yes it is who you think it is.



'See before The Iron Bull called Lothar 'Boss' but here he echoes it with 'Bas' which is a Qunari slur for foreigners. See that is what we call an ironic echo, something that at first was positive is turned around and given a dark and cynical edge.'

So the betrayal is now official and the battle is on!



'Oh sure he fights for the other side and suddenly he is not squishy at all.'

Lothar is filled with rage and goes after The Iron Bull leaving Varric and Dorian to handle the other Qunari.



'Thus always to traitors! Ok Varric and Dorian you got the other Qunari? Guys? Oh...sorry.'

Fortunately the battle turns. The party stops for a second to digest the revelation that The Iron Bull was one of the key actors in the conspiracy to overthrow the entire south of Thedas and convert it to the Qun. If it were not for Solas he would have almost certainly succeeded.



'Not all Qunari! Well...ok pretty much all Qunari.'

Now Dragon number...um...13? Fortuantely there is a way to not kill the dragon. The Qunari are milking its venom to make Gaatlock so it is pretty pissed off. All Lothar had to do was break it loose and it munched the Qunari good. The remaining Qunari were gathered around the Viddesala. Oh and a GIANT Saarebas. Well that is Saarath. I wonder what made him so huge? His research? The Red Lyrium? He does mention breaking through the walls to true magic or whatever in his letter to Tallis.
Lothar and company rushed to them before he screams out in agony as the Anchor continues to slowly kill him...or not so slowly.

The Viddesala turns to him and notes he will die soon so might as well know the truth. The elves are going to destroy the world...and somehow the mass conquest of the South will stop it. And she believes Lothar is an agent of this destruction planned by the Elves, because Solas saved Lothar from being killed by the Anchor before way back when he was still unconcious...



Oh so close but yet so far Viddesala. Though Lothar has to digest the revelation that Solas gave the orb to Corypheus in the first place.



Though give the fact that Solas now has the souls of three Godlike beings he can probably take care of himself. None-the-less Lothar begins his final battle, to reach Solas and stop the Qunari from killing him.

Lothar always respected Solas so will give him a chance to explain himself.

When they follow the Qunari through the Eluvian we have the choice to make our party one last time:



'The inner circle is now down two traitors.'

What follows is just great. I love these dramatic chase scenes where we are rushing against time towards the final battle. Both Dragon Age Origins, in the Battle of Denerim, and Dragon Age II in both Mark of the Assassin and the Battle at the Gallows had this element. But this time it is through multiple Eluvians against the Qunari rear guard.

As they run through the first area the Anchor starts to really become uncontrollable and blows up. Now it is a very lethal weapon.



Basically now Lothar has to use it as often as he can so it does not fully charge and blow everybody to shit. And his focus charges up really fast now. Well forget about sleeping or anything from now on. Now Lothar must either find Solas and hope he can save him again or he will surely die...and soon.

As they advance through the Qunari they see that giant Saarebas observing their advance. Finally they reach a gate ruin of some sort and Saarath, yes it is Saarath, comes out to play. And DAMN he is a monster.



'SEIZURE INDUCING EXPLOSIONS!!!11'

But beating him down just made him stronger. It shattered the chains and bonds that the Saarebas typically wear and he flies off into the sky...something else they like to do in Inquisition.



'By striking me down you have made me more powerful than you can possibly imagine!'

They set off to the final Eluvian where Saarath awaits for His Worship Lord Inquisitor Lothar Bernard Anthony Ferdinand Aurelian Tythas Trevelyan, Compte of Kirkwall and Protector of the Order of Templars. This shall be the final battle.

And boy what a long battle this was. Saarath the Saarebas has 200K Hps which is not huge by DAI standards but he is so resistant to damage that he usually only took about 1/6th of normal damage Lothar and company inflicted on him so functionally it was more like he had 1.2 million Hps. So yeah this one will wear out your clicking finger. Oh and he summons demons which each have shitloads of hit points as well. Fortunately Lothar now has a tactical nuclear weapon on his hand which goes off periodically.



'To the last hit point, to the last demon, WE FIGHT! WE FIGHT!'

When it was over Saarath was still so powerful that Lothar has to blast him with his tactical nuke to finally finish him off.

So...nice fight Bioware but...COME ON. This needed to be against the Viddesala or the Iron Bull or something. In every other end game boss fight in this series it was so built up that you were just desperate to get at that Archdemon, or Duke Prosper, or hell I was ready to strike Meredith down halfway through Act 1 in DA2. But this is like The Descent where you get a super boss but it is just a really tough thing not a real antagonist.

Anyway now Lothar is dropped from the party and goes after the Viddesala alone. Which makes no sense but whatever. Maybe they figure he can just nuke anybody who gets in his path.

Solas turned her Qunari army to stone.



'Damn. We got a badass over here.'



But of course the Qunari are stubborn bastards so she suicidally still tries to kill him. But I guess when you believe somebody is going to destroy the world that is motivating. Anyway he quickly turns her to stone as you would expect.

Lothar rushes up to confront Solas and pitches over in agony as the Anchor prepares to blow him away. Solas quickly calms the
Anchor and says Lothar has some time if he has questions.

Hey look! Lothar figured it out.



'Lothar, you genius you!'

Even Solas is impressed, just smiling and saying 'well done'. The clipping of Lothar's hair through his collar is not so impressive though Bioware...just saying.

Solas reveals that 'Solas' is actually not an alias but his original name.



The conversation is very friendly and convivial despite the seriousness of the subject matter, like they are just talking back in the library tower in Skyhold.

Lothar suggests that Solas was a hero for trying to free the elves people from slavery. Solas says that story gives him more credit than he deserves.



When Lothar asks him what the Evanuris did to lead him to such desperate measures Solas only says that they killed Mythal and that she was then only one of them who actually cared about the elven people. Oh and he says if he had not created the veil and imprisoned the elves the Evanuris would have destroyed the world.

Solas they became to be considered as Gods in the first place as a result of a terrible war. Against the Forgotten Ones? The Forbidden Ones? I don't know. Some sort of Ones. This explains alot of the advice Solas has given Lothar during the course of the game about not becoming a power hungry institutionalized tyrant once Corypheus is defeated.

But his creating the veil destroyed Elven civilization and ended their immortality. Also doing so put Solas to sleep to wander the fade.

Hey I wonder if that is what the other members of the Evanuris are doing right now? Anyway.



'Ah I see you are bringing hope for your people and...wait what was that part about my world dying?'

And a year prior to the start of DAI is the end of DA2 so what did Urien do to wake him up? Corypheus becoming free? Did Mythal do it after being resurrected on the Sundermount? Obviously this was Mythal/Flemeth's plan all along. Wake Solas and then present him with the power of her soul as well as the soul of the Old God. Then he can break the veil and restore the world that was betrayed.

Lothar asks him more about why the world must end. Solas just smiles and says he likes and respects Lothar a bit too much and it is too easy to reveal too much to him but will say no more on that.

Then Solas tells him the Inquisition is filled with his spies as well as Qunari spies and others. That the Inquisition has become corrupt. And he explains he had his people drag the Qunari corpse to the Winter Palace to reveal the Qunari plot. Lothar asks why he did it and he says he values his friends in the Inquisition enough not to have them be reduced to slaves under the Qun during their last years.

Solas says he was too weak when he woke to use his orb to restore the elfy world. So he tricked Corypheus into doing it, knowing that opening it would kill him. But hey Solas chose the only guy in the world who cannot die so that went sour. But it all worked out in the end. But Solas now needs a new plan. And he insists he has a plan on how to deal with Evanuris when they are freed from their prison.

The Anchor then flares up again and Solas comes over and removes it. As he leaves Lothar has a promise for him.



Lothar has a deep and troubling messiah complex. Solas admits it would be nice if Lothar was correct but he doesn't think so and bids Lothar have a good life until Solas ends it.

With that Lothar returns to the Exalted Council ready to do what must be done. As he walks in Arl Teagan is OUTRAGED.



'Ok everybody shut up, I have something to say.'

Oh and removing the Anchor meant removing his arm. That really has to hurt his career as a duel wielding rogue.

There he gives a speech, reminding the council of the Inquisition's mandate and its achievements.



'Cassandra is all: yep that was me.'



'There now solve your own petty problems Ferelden and Orlais.'

So that is that. The Inquisition has come to a close and as far as everybody knows Lothar has retired.

The inner circle gathers one last time and Varric presents Cassandra with his most recent book:



and everybody leaves, leaving just Cassandra and Lothar alone looking at the now healed sky. Damn I sure hope they closed all the rifts now that the Anchor is gone.



'Wait didn't we end the main game this way?'

Cassandra and Lothar just like standing together looking at the sky.

So now we get another epilogue which may or may not be true...mostly not true if we go by Dragon Age: Origins.



'Oh and sorry guys. No pension. No GI Bill. No nother. Demobilization old school.'



'Ok this is the second time the Qunari have done this. Try to take over and slaughter a country and then when they fail pretend it was all a joke. Hey its all good we still like you Bas bastards. Just a little goof there. Hehe. Hey will you help us crush Tevinter?'

I know VIvienne would probably love to unite the schism in the Chantry...but come on Viv there has to be a better way.



'True believer Cassandra does not approve of Vivienne's political worldly ways.'

That's alright. Sometimes you need more wordly Popes.



The Hunterhorn Mountains are where Adamant Fortress is located. Also directly above Kal-Sharok. That may or may not be signficant. The new seekers are doing some kind of vision quest, or perhaps their activites are related to what happened at Adamant.



I am not sure how a one-armed non-Inquisitor Lothar and a reclusive religious order leader can do much to restore order. But Cassandra stays married to her job and they never really end up together. Ah well. No mighty dynasty of Trevelyan-Pentaghasts looks to be starting.



Ok so this image is a clue. Vivienne is not in her regalia so this tells me that even if you are a great liberator like Viper and free the mages Vivienne will form her new circle anyway. Likewise if you are a wise and farseeing leader like me and recreate Circle with some reforms a group of free mages forms anyway. So either way both will exist. So see Viper? It didn't really matter.

Though in my game virtually every single circle mage that took part in the rebellion is dead. So there cannot be just a huge amount of mages around to fill both these factions.

Leliana learned to delegate.



Wait? Final months? What happened to that 'effective immediately' stuff?

But yeah Leliana is not retiring they still have to stop the end of the world again. Damn this is her third time to be in on the saving the world action



Sera is off proving that sticking by your friends in corrupt favoritism relationships is far better than hierarchy and crap. But she and her group also are available to help out Lothar. Huh I wonder what this says if she really hates the Inquisitor.



Ok WTF is this shit? Ok I had to go back and look through my stuff and there was a reference to Dagna as 'widdle' in her journal but of course I cannot understand what Sera is saying half the time. But I guess they are together? Um random? Especially saying 'oh of course she is with her cute little dwarf lover hehe' when this was never mentioned in dialogue and Dagna was always just a cute side character. You were never thinking 'oh yeah this girl is going to hook up with somebody'. While that is not necessary you cannot have a whole screen of the epilogue devoted to a relationship mentioned once in a text box. Especially since that dwarf does not look a lot like Dagna. Oh and finally FUCK DWARF/ELF romances. FUCK THEM. Dwarves and elves should not be getting together. Just a travesty. First Peter Jackson, now Dragon Age. Meh.

So I don't get this screen. My heart is hardly going to be warmed by a relationship I was not set up to root for.



Ok glad to see Aveline there, though I have never seen Aveline have an expression like that before. Glad to see Varric is doing well as Viscount. I thought Sebastian was kind of interesting as a character in DA2, not my favorite or anything but interesting, but I guess I was in the minority on that since the writers tend to crap on him in DAI. Or maybe just Varric doesn't like him and to be fair they didn't get along in DA2. But yet I do feel like the game is expecting me to be all like 'yeah! Fuck Sebastian! Woooo!'. I mean geez he never triggered a massive Qunari war or committed terrorism so as a DA2 companion he scored marks.

But BOOOOO on the spoiler of Hawke surviving. I mean they set up this amazing thing in Weisshaupt and just casually mention Urien is back in Kirkwall? WTF is that shit?



Damn the Inquisition really put a lot of weapons into the Iron Bull. Maybe they took a field trip later and let everybody take a whack at him.

I have a hard time seeing how Tal-Vashoth could possibly be suspected that much more or how their lives could be that much harder. But tough break for having a Ben-Hassrath impersonate you and sully your good name? Not that you name was very good to begin with?

Anyway The Iron Bull was following the Qun. A good soldier to the end. Obviously if you save the Chargers this story ends up better for him.



Cullen goes off with his dog back to his home for the first time in 14 years and runs a twelve step program for recovering Lyrium addicts. Good for you Cullen.



I guess that lady is Maevaris Tilani.



Sweet! Dorian is fighting the good fight.





Thom Rainier basically becomes a wandering angel of compassion. Standing up for the redemption of the wicked.



Josephine returns to Antiva and resumes her duties as head of the Montilyet family.



You broke my heart Yvette. Never take sides against the family again. Now let's go for a boat ride.



Cole and Martyden are off righting wrongs and bringing joy to the world. Still no word on spirit babies.



And just as was hinted at in that conversation with Sera, the City Elves are joining Solas in mass numbers ready for their return to glory. Ominous.

After this we get a post epilogue scene where Harding, Lothar, Cassandra, and Leliana are deep in their secret underground lair (under Haven I think? I think this is where Lothar was being held prisoner way back at the beginning). They note that they lack the resources of the Inquisition and that Solas knows all their secrets. Lothar notes they should go someplace he does not know...



So off to Tevinter to try to save Solas from himself. Oh great Lothar goes to Tevinter AFTER I stop playing him?! Thanks Bioware


During the credits Cassandra is reading Varric's new book and it is basically the story of DAI, and Varric did end up naming it
'This Shit is Weird'. She hilariously imitates each of the companion's voices. So it is a voice actress doing a character doing another character. Mind blown.

Then at the end she gets to her part and Varric writes Cassandra as a simpering fool but Cassandra is so delighted to be in the book she fangirls out.

The end.

Stuff Lothar did in Trespasser:



The Iron Bull is no more.

The Inquisition is no more.

Lothar will try to redeem Solas at some point. Hopefully before the world is destroyed.

Next will be the DAI wrap up and thoughts on the story at this point.

[Jaron]

This has been a wonderful story, Valmy! I'm sad to see it coming to an end...I hope you'll consider doing another.

[Valmy]

This has been a wonderful story, Valmy! I'm sad to see it coming to an end...I hope you'll consider doing another.

Oh I will I really like these but DAI took me forever so it will be awhile.

I totally forgot this part of the epilogue when I posted it. I had the screenshot saved and had the caption written out and everything. I posted it above but here it is:



My post DAI posts are going to split in two. I really enjoyed the game but I have alot to bitch and moan about so that will be the first post.

Then I will say what I did like about it and show Lothar's final stats and talk about my thoughts on DA4.

[Valmy]

Ok I enjoyed DAI but I have beefs. I have complaints. I have bitching to do. And if that is what you want you came to the right post. This might take awhile

BITCHING SESSION ONE

This is one thing I just have to get off my chest about Dragon Age Inquisition. I mentioned it many times during my AAR but I just have to come out and say it: the entire premise is stupid. I just cannot get past the fact that once they discovered the mark on Lothar's hand was the only way to close the rifts he was not placed under guard and hauled out only to close rifts.

I mean it would be ridiculous to send Eisenhower and Patton with a few rifles to clear that bridge so the 3rd Army can cross over. And the Inquisitor is much more vital to the success of the war against Corypheus than those guys were. I guess you might think they just figure the Maker is with this person and they cannot die but that kind of blind religious faith is not really part of their thing anywhere else.

And it doesn't stop with just the Inquisitor either as in Trespasser you can send out the freaking Divine of the Chantry. Remember what a disaster it was when the last Divine got blown up? And heck the game makes a point of telling you how disastrous it was when the previous Inquisitor got locked in suspended animation in the Frostback Basin.

I mean a pretty important quality an adventurer has is that he or she is a totally expendable person who achieves amazing things against impossible odds. It seems like they just forgot that rather important quality. Now they COULD have made it work. Like if Corypheus' army had destroyed the Inquisition at Haven and the Inquisitor just barely escaped with the agents of the Venatori in hot pursuit. Alone with the whole world falling to Corypheus he or she must finish the Inquisition's work basically alone with just a few scrappy companions along. Or something like that. Man that would have been cool...hey wait that was basically DAO.

It just seemed silly and I hope they never do that again.

BITCHING SESSION TWO

Now here is the next issue and that is with the pacing of the action. I think I mentioned this a bit shortly after the transition to Skyhold. This game builds nicely until the assault on the breach after you recruit the Templar/Mages and then even upsets your expectations by having your plan succeed...only for Corypheus and his Red Templar/Rebel Mage army descend on you and nearly wipe you out. That whole section was so much fun and so very dramatic. Contrived a bit but very fun. It is after this point that the game runs into problems. Once you get to Skyhold there is a certain inevitability of your victory. Everything your advisors suggests works and quickly you unravel Corypheus' designs. Instead of the tension building towards a climax the tension eases. Your companions are saying things like 'oh yeah we got this asshole! He is totally on the run!'. And you feal inviolable in your mountain fortress.

The three main missions (The Adamant Fortress campaign, the masked ball at the Winter Palace, and the Arbor Wilds) are all great in pacing inside themselves but each one is such a severe blow to the bad guy. And you are taking his plans apart constantly in all the war table and side content. By the end the bad guy is alone against the world. He has no chance. And it should be the other way around. Things should seem darkest before the dawn. In DAO, despite all your efforts, it was a 1 in a thousand type shot. The Darkspawn Horde was far larger and more powerful than the army you had gathered and almost all of Ferelden had been overrun. It was a heroic and desperate last stand. In DA2 everything went to shit no matter what you did...hell usually because of what you did. DA2 had its own pacing problems because you always felt like the victim of the story instead of the hero but DAI goes too far in the other direction.

I think I have made my point. But damn that sapped my desire to play when it just felt like the opposition was constantly being beaten down.

BITCHING SESSION THREE

Ok next thing: the combat. This was definitely the least fun of the three Dragon Age games as far as combat was concerned. It was not as tactical as DAO was, but was also not as crazy and fast paced as DA2. It was in a squishy middle that was not as good as either. Also I was not a huge fan of having to click on the bad guy to do my auto attack, let me worry about the special moves computer you handle the auto attack. It was still pretty good, I enjoyed running around finding who I needed to backstab.

But I want to talk about two really big related problems. The first is the bosses. The DLC and expansion in DAO had some amazing boss fights. DA2 just busted your balls with them. There were some duds but for the most part such great boss fights. In DAI only one of them really got me going in the main game and that was the Fear Demon at the end of the Fade during the Adamant Fortress part of the game. That fight was hard and fun as hell. In the side content it was the first Dragon Fight where the Dragon is flying all over the place. Besides that it was mostly just 'this monster has shitloads of hit points and does lots of damage'. And oh wow the fights would be so long and so so very long. And kind of boring and same-y. The DLC bosses were a bit more interesting but still had this problem. The fact that the end bosses in the main game were all badly scaled and really easy was a real bummer as well.

But far worse than this was how the regular monsters scaled. By the end everything had a zillion hit points and hit like American Legend John Henry after several hits of steroids. I really liked being a stealth rogue and setting up big blows but by the end game it was less devastating back stabs and more like 'finally something that decreases their hit points a bit faster.' It made everything so damn tedious. There were so many times when there would be some fight with a bunch of those monsters, like the Qunari or the Sha-Brytol, and I would just be like 'I cannot even...' and just stop playing for a few days. Not because it was hard or anything, just fatigue with it all. Fortunately this only started to become a problem in the late game.

But before the late game the game does this tiresome thing of throwing really low level monsters at you for no discernible reason. Level 7 quest mobs in high level zones? And oh yeah the freaking Lord Seeker Lucius, that has to be a low point in the series.

BITCHING SESSION FOUR

Ok bear with me. Two more to go.

Ok next the side content. First I really dislike crafting in RPGs. It was bearable in the other two Dragon Age games, especially in DA2. But man it hit most of my pet peeves here. First the crafted gear is usually better than the dropped gear, which is lame since RPGs are all about killing people and getting better trousers. Second a major part of the game is collecting crafting materials. This is so not my bag baby. Stopping to pick flowers and mine crap is not what I play these games for, I mean it is ok in limited amounts but they totally go crazy in DAI. I mean I was farming stuff. I AM AN ADVENTURER NOT A FARMER. Also they had these limited edition special fade touched things which had the perverse effect of encouraging you to stockpile stuff and be hesitant to craft anything.

Anyway the crafting encouraged you to spend lots of time doing boring things at a rate not seen since the rune-crafting in Awakenings. Was anybody clamoring for that again?

Next was the bizarre additions of horses and jump puzzles. The lack of horses was just weird in the first two DA games. So adding them was pretty cool at first. But they never did anything with them. There were no big cavalry battles or even scenes where the Inquisition was using horses despite the fact there was a whole quest devoted to securing horses for the Inquisition. The times you see the Inquisition moving along, like after the Battle of Haven, they are using Brontos for some reason. So basically mounts were a gimmick designed just to have a feature but there was no point to it. Especially as you can port around the zones using the map and riding is a bad method to explore since there is no mounted combat and you have to keep jumping off your horse to get crafting stuff. The jump puzzles were not particularly hard but, you know, why? Why have jump puzzles in DA? Was this something people really wanted?

Then all the side zones. This is one of the reasons this game gets compared to MMORPGs and the Elder Scrolls series. Having played a lot of both I can say that DAI is nothing like Skyrim and company. In those games you are traveling from point A to point B. In DAI you are clearing a zone, you are not headed to that big city in the distance. It is more like Bioware's first big RPG: Baldur's Gate, where you just clear zone after zone looking for stuff. I kind of liked it in the context of a low level adventure but it was generally not popular and Bioware did not use this style again until Dragon Age Inquisition. I tried man, I really tried to get into exploring these big wilderness zones but I am just not a big fan of the stomping around the wilderness style of RPG with the exception of if I am going someplace. Trying to map the wilderness is something else. Now granted a lot of the problem is me. I want to explore and experience all the content in a game. So perhaps for somebody who didn't care about seeing all the content it worked just fine. Also I don't remember just being blown away by how cool 80% of the side quest zones were. I mean there was some cool stuff but the vast majority of the time you are just walking around killing minor monsters and picking elf root. So much elf root.

Next is the other reason this game gets compared to MMORPGs and the Elder Scrolls series. The collection quests. Now they did a little bit of this in DAO and DA2 but it was just a little side thing you did while you were playing the main quests. Heck in DA2 I was never even clear what was a main quest or a side quest. In DAI these require some real time commitment and effort on your part for pretty weak rewards and there are lots of them. Heck I think you can just ignore the side content and get all the power you need to beat the game just by doing those requisitions. Nobody in the history of RPGs has ever said how much they love the "collecting 10 bear asses" thing. So why did Bioware introduce all this for DAI? The fact they know it was boring and unpopular is pretty obvious when they put those golden nugs in Trespasser which made your side quests transfer between playthroughs. A great sign when the benefit of New Game+ is that you get to skip lots of content.

Basically there was a lot of great content in this game but man you had to (or rather were encouraged to) slog through lots of boring filler content along the way.

BITCHING SESSION THE LAST

Ok this is going to be two related things. First is all the cool stuff that happens during the wartable missions you don't get to do. Second is how they use, or rather do not use, the setting very well.

First so many returning characters and exciting events happen in the freaking war table missions. Expose a traitor in the court of Nevarra? Save King Alistair and Queen Anora in Castle Denerim? Track down a Venatori agent in the Free Marches with Zevran? Oh hell yeah I want to do those things! Instead it is like you have this really annoying rail roading DM in a dungeons and dragons game going 'Oh but...you really don't want to do those things. You think Leliana could do that better. You really want to go wander around the Exalted Plains and fight endless waves of stuff 10 levels lower than you are.' Is the voice actress for Charade Amell really going to break the bank?

But the worst offender here is Kal-Sharok, the ancient capitol of the Dwarf Empire. In Dragon Age: Origins you hear that it was recently discovered and somehow survived after centuries of Darkspawn attack. Word on the street is they are very strange after centuries of cultural and economic isolation and did some fucked up shit to survive. Now that sounds badass and I suspect a lot of Dragon Age fans were looking forward to visiting in Dragon Age 2. But the obviously did not happen. But hey Kal-Sharok is under Orlais and DAI takes place in Orlais so surely this is the game right? Well...no. But you did get to interact with Kal-Sharok via a freaking war table mission. What the Fuck Bioware? And the worst part is we are unlikely to have DA4 take place in Orlais so we are unlikely to visit Kal-Sharok anytime soon, if ever. Which just boggles my mind. Why? Why introduce this amazing location and never let us visit it? But really I could say the same about the dwarf content in general. They made it so awesome, so cool in DAO and in DA2 and DAI we just get very little of it. Even when you can be a dwarf you have to be a casteless surfacer who has never been in the Deep Roads. Meh.

But the Kal-Sharok thing is part of a problem with the setting. Here we have Orlais: big cities, a rich culture, a crazy eccentric people, complete with cutthroat politics. Wow lots of fodder for adventure right? Hell look how great 'Mark of the Assassin' was in DA2! And we get some of that. Some. We get the market place in Val Royeaux and the Winter Palace adventure. And don't me wrong, those are great. But wow we have this big cool empire to explore and what do we get? Three zones in the desert and three zones in the dales. Not even in Orlais at all really. We get one tiny village outside of Val Royeaux and it is really just a ruin. I mean I am not sure there is much more to be said. Stomping around deserts was not really what I had in mind when I heard this game took place in Orlais.

And then there was Ferelden. If you were all excited to see Denerim and returning characters and maybe get to see new and interesting parts of Ferelden well I think you were going to be disappointed. Sure we got to see "Redcliffe" again but come on. That was not Redcliffe. It looked nothing like Redcliffe. The geography was totally different. The places that were supposed to be old locals looked totally different and had no familiar characters in them. For a series notorious for re-using maps they couldn't rebuild Redcliffe? I just do not understand why it happened the way it did. Why not introduce a new part of Ferelden if they did not want to rebuild an old one? There are other Arldoms out there. You do not get to see Denerim again or anything that really ties you close to the last game. We get Crestwood, which was pretty cool and tied into the impact the Blight had on a region. So that was something. But this is likely to be the last time we see Ferelden in a very long time and it did not really feel like visiting our old friend from DAO. Hell they even brought back Haven and the Temple of Sacred Ashes and they looked nothing at all like their previous incarnations. So why not introduce a new place in Ferelden?

And of course there is the absurdity of having a campaign take place in such an impossibly vast place with this level of technology. The most hilarious was Loghain and Urien telling Lothar to meet them in the Western Approach which must be hundreds of miles away from Crestwood. 'Yes you have found my secret base in the Ural Mountains, let us meet in Paris in a weeks time!' But while that was silly that is a nitpick as it does not impact the game at all.

CONCLUSION

So there we go. The premise for adventuring for the game was stupid. The pacing of the plot was poorly done. The combat was mediocre and got really boring and tedious in the late game. The side content was mostly boring filler. The setting material was poorly used.

So sounds like a great game right? I liked a lot of it though and I will talk about that in my next post.

[viper37]

I agree with most of what you said.  The premise, I can get over with, for a lot of reasons.  The rest is absolutely true.

Also, no matter what you do, it has zero impact on the world.  In the Witcher, there is a small encouter with thugs at an inn.  You can chose to walk away or slaughter them.  If you slaughter them, the next time you are in a big inn, someone will scream "murderer!" and tell the tales of your dead.  When you next encouter the co-workers of these guys, they ain't so friendly, forcing you to find an alternative way to enter the castle courtyard you need to be.

In DAI, there is nothing of the sort.  I played both Templars and Mage, and while there is a section of Skyhold that changes, everything else is the same.  Little tiny bits of dialogue will change, of course, but nothing consequential.  If you play Templar, one of the Mothers will tell you the people are reassured by you siding with them, if you play with the Mages, she tell you the people are still worried at first.  How does that translate into the game?  Nothing.  The table missions are almost the same, one or two will change according to your choice of allies.  The people you meet react the same to you, wether you are allied with mages or templars, wether they are conscripted or not.

The table war missions.  'twas great at first. But it becomes tedious.  And there's nothing to do but cast the die.  They could have tied it with multiplayer, somehow.  You either play the mission yourself with a party of adventurers or you chose auto-play (as it is now).  That would have been something.

I'm never buying a Bioware game at full price again.