I'm really curious how armors would work with Mae though. She doesn't have anything done on her, and the human male body is usually very muscular and the female has boobs and waist. Would she use an elven male body like with Sera and female human? What about her armor options? I like her and wouldn't mind using her but I wonder how they're gonna handle her if she's a companion though.

 

A gay templar from Tevinter is a double whammy. I hope they don't pull another gay woe is me again but then it's Tevinter and they're against gay. Seriously, is it necessary to even put it in? To make an afterschool special to show how terrible it is to be gay? I want the gay templar to not be ashamed of his identity, in fact, I hope it never brought as if it's an issue. Like with Iron Bull except with just the guys.

I kinda hope they just give her her own body model like the Iron Bulls' unique model. Or they could just disguise the model's true shape in her armour. Though, to be fair, they could handwaive things and be like 'magiiiiiiiiic', and I do headcanon that she can use magic to make herself slightly more feminised features.

I don't theme my world states that much. There is my canon world state, of course, with my two elven heroes being more or less self-inserts with minor to moderate changes to make things more interesting, (DAO and DAI had such a long time between them and I changed a lot between playing the two games so the two characters are still pretty different), with my canon Hawke being very different to me. I don't have a 'all the 'bad' choices' world state, nor do I have a perfect world state. The closest thing I have to that is my canon, but then it's still pretty much based on what I think is the most interestng set and combination of choices.

tell me about it The ammo buying struggle is real at the beginning of the game.

I had a lot of trouble with ammo in my first playthrough well into my level 20s. Then a friend suggested I give myself higher luck in my second playthrough and it really worked. You find more ammo even without the perk for it, and the other perks mean you can kill enemies much more efficiently. Now I have over 1000 bullets for every gun I regularly use. And MacCready's broken perk helps too.

 

Title(s): Vivienne, The Ambition, Madame de Fer, Grand Enchanter, Lady Opulent, The Mistress of the Grand Game

Sacred Animal: Cats

 

 

Potato Cat Greatly Approves

He actually has already gotten over his wife, and his story is more about his son rather than his wife. He swears not to cuss because he promised his son. He does mercenary works because he wants to get enough money to help his son, he moves around so much because he wants to find a cure for his son. It's basically about a dad looking to help his son. His story is not about shooting people and taking their caps but more about a single dad doing everything for his son. Seeing as I like to side with the institute, I also look out for my son, it just seems like a perfect fit. He only mentioned his spouse once, and it was a preclude to talking about his son. I'm not a fan of his look, per se, but he has a very adorable personality toward his loved one and a very warm voice.

That's kinda cute that they referenced that considering how much he swore in Fallout 3.

 

(Still think Piper's the best though)

Vivienne doesn't like Blackwall because in their first conversation, he assumes she is some helpless woman who needs protecting, when that's the exact opposite image she works so hard to present. She then completely dismisses him and she then mocks his inept attempts of mocking her.

Just wear Charisma boosting clothing. The other stats seem more valuable to me, and historically I'm a massive speech and science kind of person in FO.

Surely making our families recently raised Laetans could solve a lot of problems? Our PCs don't even need to be the mage that raised the family, it could be a sibling. I think the Laetan class really allows for a lot of different viewpoints on Tevinter.

Well, discussion from the FO4 players has raised an interesting question for me. Apologies if this has already been discussed in the thread, but I ain't reading through all 199 pages to check.

 

KISA has both positive and negative associations to it, depending on whom you ask. While they can be the righteous, chivalric champions of a cause, they can also be narrow-minded in their views, classist (I think most KISA's come from a background of privilege of some type, as it requires resources to have access to the standard "knight" lifestyle, even if the character isn't technically a knight), and have other less than desirable attributes. It's especially an issue for gay/bi KISA's, as we are applying modern societal values on a potential romance partner but the culture and values in DA are not going to line up exactly with ours.

 

Take Dorian, who is an all around good guy, especially for a Tevinter (soon to be) Magister. But his family owns slaves and he doesn't seem to have any great interest in freeing them or reforming the system of slavery in Tevinter. He is realistic for his society, but for the players, it's distasteful for a romance partner to own slaves. Most people seem to downplay or ignore this, that I've seen on the boards, but it is a less than desireable quality in a partner.

 

So with FO4 (which I have not played) I've read that some of the KISA types are a bit inflexible in their views and can be prejudiced. Correct me if I'm wrong. So what are people wanting/expecting if we do get a KISA in DA4? Someone with realistic contemporary views of their society, or a proxy for modern Western ideals who wants to bring Thedas into the twenty first century?

 

I wouldn't mind someone with significant flaws who tries to do the right thing but still comes into conflict with the player's opinions. Maybe someone like Anomen, except dial down the annoying whining and immaturity by 100. Someone who battles internally with what they believe is right and what society wants them to do.

I like flaws in my characters. It's characters that openly wear their flaws on the sleeve and are written fully embracing this that I love, (whether or not I also like these characters as people). I like that Dorian owned slaves and was relatively alright with it. Before the game came out, I openly stated I would be disappointed if he didn't. Where I was disappointed was that there wasn't an option make as big a deal of it as I wanted. I do kind of feel people brush his slavery apologist BS aside, but to be fair, the game is just as guilty of this. At least, in my opinion.

 

We also saw Maevaris (semi)defending slavery in the comics. That was something I appreciated about her as a character and not her as a person. I hope this continues, and that come DA4, the Lucerni are not suddenly anti-slavery and it's also something that can be brought up properly.

 

And it's something I want to see in the hypothetical KISA. I want the flaws. And I also want to properly address them.

Ugh. Depends if I had to be hospitalised from the massive eye roll I just did.

I do really love Piper though. She's lovely. I just love complaining about her more. You know, especially how she disapproves every time I try and charisma my way out of a situation even though that's her perk.

I banged Piper before I met Danse. Now I kind of regret it. But he's kinda buggy. He gets aggro'd by mole rats that are like five streets away interrupting conversations. Piper just refuses to wear different armour and use other weapons other than molotovs which she likes to aim at me.

Fell in love with TME Celene, and though DAI Celene wasn't nearly as involved as I wanted, she still totally counts. And I really like Lysette too.

LOL So, for those keeping score at home . . .

From the Solas thread... 7 pages ago...
 

Meh, it'll impress me when they beat the total of all our threads.   

Okay, yeah I didn't respond to the original questioning of the line because I didn't want it to quickly descend into a big discussion about it. I think, for us in the real world, it's totally a racist thing to say, but it's probably more accurate for the setting to say it's xenophobic. Her dark skin is proof of her Rivaini heritage, which would just further isolate Vivienne from the rest of the court. She's a mage, she's certainly not nobility, she's a Marcher and she's not even a Marcher of Orlesian heritage.

Here's the thing though. I'm bisexual. My sexuality is part of me, and if I was a character, my writer, at some point, would have to realise that and write that. And while that doesn't stop me from having any personality in particular, the writer could still use that piece of information when writing me to inform them about how I would react in certain situations. Would Dorian find the idea of marrying a woman so objectionable if he wasn't gay? Hell, even we use that information when discussing our KISA and their story. So my question is when you write a character, when is it okay for them to have a sexuality?

Personally, I don't think you should just set out to write a character of a certain sexuality, unless that character's sexuality is going to be a massive part of their story. I mean, when Patrick Weekes first set out to write Traynor, he started by writing a lesbian and ended up with 'an after-school special', so went back and wrote her as a character first and foremost.

But yes, they've given some totally BS excuses in the past. *coughAshleycough*

Regarding how romances are chosen, I recall David Gaider wrote about this on his blog. You know, when it was still there. I can't remember exactly, but I think what he said about the way characters and LI are written is basically:
1) Writers start off with very general concept. E.g. Josephine started off as simply as 'diplomat' or something
2) Writers who think they would have a good idea for that particular concept will claim that character at some point
3) They begin outlining and writing the character and their regular content, quests, etc
4) MUCH later, they decide the romances. By this point, writers may have a better idea of the character's sexuality and how the romance might work, and whether or not the character would WANT a romance
5) Rewrites and tweaks

LOL welcome to most of our train of thought when we played it!

 

To clarify about the arm. It faded away/dissolved. Solas removed the anchor to stop the spreading, but your arm was already almost destroyed from the meltdown. He managed to stop it from continuing while you chatted, but he could not prevent the inevitable. You had no arm left. There was no chopping off, no severing anything. It just disintegrated.

Shame. If he went all yandere at the end of his romance and decided to keep your arm with him forever, I'd be significantly more interested in a Solavellan playthrough.

#bestromance

 

Xil will never recgonize anything good in Vivienne, there is nothing to discuss with her.

It's usually my policy regarding everything Xil. Particularly after she called me a Nazi once.

 

I don't know why I even bothered.

Maybe it was someone she liked for personal reasons? It's hard to say, given her total disregard of virtually everyone else. Maybe it's just a writing inconsistency. She's scum either way, but it's odd.

 

Oh grow up.

So was it grief for the mage, or for a victory by her enemies? No indication of that. And I'm sure she's canny enough to let a bit of alleged weakness slip through to make herself seem more human to her allies.

 

 

Her approval was neutral and she was in my party when I played it last. She does not approve.

Cole's also canny enough to come to pick up on people's true feelings towards things. The emphasis was on the victim, not the aggressors. 

 

And all I can say is I've had Vivienne in the party every time at Haven. She's always approved. Either your game's bugged, you missed it, or her approval is higher than 35 so says the wiki, which also backs me up.

http://dragonage.wik...eart_Shall_Burn

Vivienne Approves

Tell me why I should believe either alleged expression of grief from this master of the Game who never stops playing it.

 

Also, she doesn't approve if you save everyone at Haven, at least not when I played it on the latest patch.

Well for one, Cole is the one who brought up the death of the mage, and he rarely brings up memories with little emotional weight. She also dislikes displaying emotions that make her appear, (or at least feel), weak and you can tell through Indira Varma's acting that the anger is masking a lot of pain and sadness.

 

And she definitely does approve. She doesn't approve if her approval is already very high though, or if she isn't in the party. Varric needs to be in the party in order to approve as well.

And the view she only cares about herself is just plain wrong. Yes she's selfish, but she's also one of the only two companions who approves if you save everyone at Haven. Not only that her hatred of the rebellion is not only fueled by her loss of power, but by the endless casualties and cruelties the rebellion brought. From the Tranquil at Redcliffe, to a fellow mage who was murdered for not wanting to take part in the rebellion, though she tries to hide it, the fact that she cares for others very strongly is clear to see.

Oh cool beans, keep me posted! Can you think of any titles off the top of your head? I hardly ever open Steam nowadays since I haven't been playing Skyrim (but I will return to it eventually). DmmD is very very popular amongst the BL community, yeah; I tried the anime but if I'm not hooked after the first episode I tend to pass, and that's what happened with this one. It was very hard to follow, and the main character, like so many BL game or otome game main characters, was such a blank slate.

Oh really? I heard he was one of those rare exceptions. Unless I was thinking about another one.

 

Off the top of my head...I'm not sure? I keep seeing new Kickstarters and things on Greenlight, so I'd suggest lurking around there or looking for places that might post links to these things because my memory sucks. I know Magical Diary might have a guy protagonist version coming out at some point with at least two s/s romances, (maybe three if the developer repeats a romance from the last one?). That was definitely one where you start off thinking this is just bad Harry Potter fanfiction or something and then you randomly realise you really love the characters. 

Yanderes can be cute in a creepy sort of way. 

 

I've never actually played a dating sim... back in the day you had to download the Japanese version and then either guess at which button to push or have an English guide handy, and it all seemed way too complicated to me. Plus the only ones I'd be interested in are probably BL ones, and let's be honest, it's basically just pressing buttons to get to the SUPER X-RATED scene at the end which is totally not my cup of tea

 

Like I remember Gakuen Heaven as one of the first anime I ever watched, and I heard it was based on a game, so I looked it up (of course this was before Google) and wow, it was so shocking... the poor main boy was basically a bicycle for different sex positions with the other boys    I noped outta there real quick haha

Yeah, I mean there's some that I really want to try, but the effort to actually buy the game, (which for the really good ones can be super expensive), and then find the English translation patch is really...just ugh. Dramatical Murder, (I think it's called), is the one I'm most interested in at the moment, (and I am not usually a fan of BL at all). The story just seems so interesting and apparently it has a lot of the tropes that I love, (like the insane bad endings). But a lot more visual novels and dating sims are coming to Steam, which is great and I am buying more or less all of them . A lot of them, even when they're bad, they're just so bizarrely, enjoyably bad, like watching the Room and I LOVE it. And if I were you, I'd keep my eyes on Steam, because I know there's a lot of upcoming stuff which will be relevant to your interests. (And usually the Steam version edits out the sex scenes)

 

So in Trespasser

Spoiler

do imagine Cullen taking the Inquisitor's last name or vice-versa, or both keeping their respective last names, when they get married?

I don't think my Quizzy would, but mainly cos she's an elf and Lavellan, (at least according my interpretation), refers more to her clan name than her actual surname. And I don't think a Trevelyan would either considering she's noble and Cullen isn't. Not that I think they would change anyway.