39 réponses à ce sujet

[MinotaurWarrior]

Teleportation would take a whole lot more energy than sinking a city that had extensive trade relations with the dwarves. Y'know, the people who like to build giant, engineering / physics defying tunnels and open spaces underground.

And by all accounts the Tevinter's problem with the darkspawn wasn't that they were having a hard time killing them, it was that with pre-existing unrest in the territories, their gods literally rising from the earth to attack them, and no way to kill the archdemon for good, they suffered a devastating morale failure.

[Elessara]

How do you know it would take more power to teleport something than to sink it under the earth? Teleportation doesn't exist in game (or not that we know of) so we really don't know how much power it would take.

My problem with the "Arlathan disappears through the eluvian" theory is .... how does an entire city fit through the mirror? Was it a really big mirror?

Anyway someone pointed out earlier a list of things Merrill did to provide examples of her skill ... except that in many of those instances Anders does the same things ... and even a mage Hawke can do some of them.

I don't take Merrill into the Fade because I don't trust her around demons. Yeah ok everyone has the possibility of betraying you at one point or another but if you're not metagaming then Merrill is the only companion you have that you *know* has made deals with demons before. So I was unaware that she had no dialogue or anything with Marethari and you know ... that would bug me. Not even some acknowledgement? Hi? How are you? Nothing?

[Chiramu]

Arlathan might be referencing the Lost City of Atlantis. I don't think Arlathan is that important to anything in the main plot.Unless you are a treasure hunter.

[LobselVith8]

Elessara wrote...

How do you know it would take more power to teleport something than to sink it under the earth? Teleportation doesn't exist in game (or not that we know of) so we really don't know how much power it would take.

My problem with the "Arlathan disappears through the eluvian" theory is .... how does an entire city fit through the mirror? Was it a really big mirror?

Anyway someone pointed out earlier a list of things Merrill did to provide examples of her skill ... except that in many of those instances Anders does the same things ... and even a mage Hawke can do some of them.

I don't take Merrill into the Fade because I don't trust her around demons. Yeah ok everyone has the possibility of betraying you at one point or another but if you're not metagaming then Merrill is the only companion you have that you *know* has made deals with demons before. So I was unaware that she had no dialogue or anything with Marethari and you know ... that would bug me. Not even some acknowledgement? Hi? How are you? Nothing?

It addressed that Merrill was proficient with magic, not that she was the greatest mage that had ever taken a step onto the grounds of Kirkwall. Although I respect that she's proactive and trying to help the People while Hawke is terribly reactive to the point of absurdity.

[TEWR]

Rifneno wrote...

LobselVith8 wrote...

The ancient Tevinter mages destroyed Arlathan with blood magic and sank the entire kingdom.

Yeah, I've heard that in-game. I completely disregard it. I'm rarely one to say "never," and even the darkspawn origin story the Chantry preaches I only take with a grain of salt. Blood mages sinking a kingdom? That's just plain asinine. Nothing we've seen shows mages having a fraction of that power. To destroy a landmass? That's just... okay, for example, Krakatoa. You're familiar with the disaster I presume? That eruption was the equivalent of 200,000,000 tons of TNT. 14,285 times as powerful as the Hiroshima nuke. And some of the island survived even that. There have been a few noted cases of sizable cities sinking (Helike, Ubar, Port Royal) but in every case they were built on unstable land, i.e. sand, and a massive natural disaster reminded them that sand moves. Arlathan was forested. Solid ground. The amount of power it would take to sink it is mindblowing even by modern standards with nuclear weapons and asteroids in our mental database. If Tevinter possessed that kind of magical arsenal, the First Blight would be no big deal because obliterating a darkspawn horde would be a cakewalk. Lastly it just doesn't make any sense to sink it. It would take a small fraction of that power to simply lay waste to it and leave it in ruins. But if it were teleported somewhere... that'd make a lot more sense. And the only teleportation known is the eluvian, an elven artifact rather than Tevinter.

Actually.... some dwarves seem to believe Arlathan may have been sunken into the earth.




Commander Regnar of House Cadash,

You were wise to send the relic you uncovered. The Shaperate has compared the carvings on it to various records, and believe them to be of elven origin, possibly thousands of years old. I would advise that you cease repair work on the warrior training grounds immediately and continue investigation. A team will be dispatched from Kal-Sharok as soon as possible.

--Shaper Warrek

The excavations are going well. I think Shaper Warrek secretly hopes that the artifacts will lead him to the lost city of Arlathan, despite Tevinter records that insist on its complete obliteration. Even if he found the site of the city, there would be little remaining of any worth. As for the artifacts, they must have come to this area by trade. Cadash Thaig is old, built upon an ancient settlement called Cad'halash. Lots of junk can accumulate over that much time, even elven junk.

--From Shaper Assistant Shalla's journal

Dyer,

Got the carvings. These two depict elves forming an alliance with the Cad'halash dwarves, after the destruction of Arlathan. Scholars say it's proof that they took refuge here to escape the Imperium. Should get a great price for this from collectors and historians.

And I almost got caught running these things to your man. They'll hang me if they find out. I want a bigger cut.. fifty or we're done.

--A letter from an excavation worker

We thought the Imperium found the elves hidden in Cad'halash, and destroyed them, but it doesn't add up. The thaig was destroyed with conventional dwarven weaponry, not magical forces. No supernatural means melted the stone and no immense forces pulverized the pillars.

We uncovered shields (among other things) bearing the heraldy of old Kal Sharok houses. We[/b] destroyed Cad'halash--our own people. The only remaining conclusion is that Kal Sharok learned that they were sheltering elves and, knowing it would jeopardize their alliance with the Tevinter Imperium, took stepts to cover it up.

Thus far, there has been no evindence to contradict this theory, but it has split the Shaperate. Some wish to enter it into the Memories, while others demand that it lies forgotten in the dark halls of the Roads.

--From the notes of Shaper Warrek



Hey, anything's possible. The Imperium was a lot stronger back in those days then it is currently.

Modifié par The Ethereal Writer Redux, 02 juillet 2011 - 03:15 .

[dragonflight288]

All I do know is that the Dwarves covered up the fact that they committed genocide against the elves and the dwarves of Cadash Thaig, likely because it would be dishonorable to be in the memories. Like the Dwarven Noble Origin. He/She is removed entirely from the memories so they never existed, yet they obviously do. Surface dwarves are not dwarves, those who go to the surface are no longer dwarves and lose their stone sense. Pretty much a huge cover up.

But if their memories support Elves fleeing Arlathan, chances are that there are ruins somewhere. I mean, the Dalish Origin discovered the caves and ruins built by humans with elven artifacts, when minutes before Tamlen was saying such a place didn't exist or they would have known about it.

Arlathan may simply be hidden elsewhere and its location is lost in the sands of time.

[Foolsfolly]

All I do know is that the Dwarves covered up the fact that they committed genocide against the elves and the dwarves of Cadash Thaig, likely because it would be dishonorable to be in the memories.

With out limited experience with the Dwarves of Orzammar how many things have we rediscovered that were not recorded in the Memories?

The Memories are a very incomplete thing. And as Origins shows us people even steal things from the Shaperate.

Cadash Thaig's history with the slaughtering of the Arlathan elves may have been lost to the Shaperate, censored from the Memories, or part of something lost by thieves or some petty argument between Houses.

Dwarves and their politics, right?

We don't know if it was covered up or not. We just don't know because the Memories aren't nearly as complete as the Shaperate seems to want people to believe. They've lost much of their past to the darkspawn.

[FieryDove]

sphinxess wrote...

Since the entire point of the quest was under the power of a dreamer mage there will be betrayals - Carter and Bethany would have gone the same way

That's why its fun to cheat. I go in with Anders only. Since I dislike demons everything is peachy and its not like they can tempt/possess him. I would have paid to see one try tho...hehe

[Lilunebrium]

Pretty much my strongest issue with Night Terrors, is the whole "Don't you worry, ma'am! I've been to the Fade before!"-comment Hawke makes (I'm uncertain at this point whether it's just a MageHawke that can make this comment, or if a Rogue/WarriorHawke can make it too).

I mean, really? When? How? Why? And most importantly, why wasn't this experience implemented into the game, while the comment was?

If it's mainly meant to be a simple reference to something that happened to the Hawkes before the Blight began, then here's me hoping it'll be turned into some sort of downloadable prequel content. Knowing me, I'm probably overvalueing the importance of the whole thing, but I consider Fade experiences and others of the sort to be possible character shapers, and I'd very much like to shape my own character.

Not to mention I suspect it's merely implemented as an excuse for the whole 'everyone gets influenced by a demon, except Hawke'-thing (Justice/Vengeance hardly counts, in my opinion).

Well. In short, I wish there had been a proper explanation or experience showing why the demons didn't tempt Hawke, while hoping the "I've been there before!" comment wasn't meant as an excuse for it.

[Patchwork]

What bugged me was the quest taking place in the templars' keep. I hope the Fade goes back to how it looked in DAO/A because it was just lame in DA2.

[DPSSOC]

Lilunebrium wrote...

Pretty much my strongest issue with Night Terrors, is the whole "Don't you worry, ma'am! I've been to the Fade before!"-comment Hawke makes (I'm uncertain at this point whether it's just a MageHawke that can make this comment, or if a Rogue/WarriorHawke can make it too).

I mean, really? When? How? Why? And most importantly, why wasn't this experience implemented into the game, while the comment was?

I'd assume this would have been something Hawke's father covered.  Since he didn't have a Harrowing Ritual (I hope) he needed his children to be prepared to face the dangers of the Fade.  As for how, maybe lucid dreaming?  Since you always go to the Fade when you dream, and mages retain their abilities in the Fade, a mage who masters lucid dreaming could, in theory, travel the Fade and find others.  So Hawke and Bethany are put to bed and daddy comes and finds them in the Fade and teaches them while they sleep.

[dgcatanisiri]

Foolsfolly wrote...

Merrill never properly explains the Eluvian to Hawke for the same reason Morrigan's explanation about the Eluvian was similarly vague - to keep viewers in suspense about what it truly is, and what's on the other side.

Then how are we the players supposed to make decisions on these items.

"What is it? A mirror?"

"No. It's...powerful ancient relics. The Tevinter thought they were just used for communication but that's not even a portion of their true power" -This information is entirely gleamed from Witch Hunt and not DA2.

"So what will it do?"

"Hopefully not fall on someone, aren't I cute?"

"No, seriously. What will this do?"

"It won't hurt anyone."

"....that's a possibility? What the crap does this thing do?"

"It's saving my people. You don't trust me!"

"WHAT DOES IT DO!"

How can we make any kind of informed decision without information? We really only going on trust of Merrill's judgment and skill?" She's skilled enough, I guess, but her judgment is in extreme doubt.

Funny you put it that way - in my mind, that's sort of how I see Merrill bring the mirror up to Marethari in the first place. The fact of the matter is that Merrill doesn't know what the mirror does. Instead, she knows that it's a piece of elven history, a lost artifact of the elven people. Merrill is a Keeper in training, and is supposed to be finding these things and preserving the knowledge. Marethari simply tells Merrill that its secrets should stay lost. She doesn't explain why, never says that, say, the Eluvian unleashed the demons that sank Arlathan into the Earth and doomed us to wander aimlessly for eternity (for example), and frankly, I agree with Merrill about how even the bad things should be remembered, if only to serve as a lesson of what not to do. If we in the real world followed the basic belief that Marethari seems to be preaching, we'd all be Holocaust deniers and the like.

[Foolsfolly]

If we in the real world followed the basic belief that Marethari seems to be preaching, we'd all be Holocaust deniers and the like.

Erm...not sure that's completely analogous.

[dgcatanisiri]

Foolsfolly wrote...

If we in the real world followed the basic belief that Marethari seems to be preaching, we'd all be Holocaust deniers and the like.

Erm...not sure that's completely analogous.

Maybe. But it's a situation where people refuse to acknowledge a past event and, were they able to be in charge of molding of the minds of later generations, would result in the actual knowledge being lost and the reasons that event happened in the first place would be allowed to happen again because no one remembers the atrocity. As the saying goes, those who do not learn from their history are doomed to repeat it.

And, yes, I can see how that applies to Merrill as well, but Marethari wouldn't give her the lesson, just expected her to listen and follow. Merrill learns from Marethari's death. Marethari didn't learn and it killed her.

[Torax]

dgcatanisiri wrote...

Foolsfolly wrote...

If we in the real world followed the basic belief that Marethari seems to be preaching, we'd all be Holocaust deniers and the like.

Erm...not sure that's completely analogous.

Maybe. But it's a situation where people refuse to acknowledge a past event and, were they able to be in charge of molding of the minds of later generations, would result in the actual knowledge being lost and the reasons that event happened in the first place would be allowed to happen again because no one remembers the atrocity. As the saying goes, those who do not learn from their history are doomed to repeat it.

And, yes, I can see how that applies to Merrill as well, but Marethari wouldn't give her the lesson, just expected her to listen and follow. Merrill learns from Marethari's death. Marethari didn't learn and it killed her.

The better example is that Maratheri didn't learn the lesson that Wynne did at a younger age with her pupil. Maratheri was too close minded to truly communicate with first on this key issue. Could argue that Merrill is wrong to not have listened to her Keeper but it's both sides at fault. In the end the Keeper led to her own destruction. Yet another quest where bad stuff happens that you can never change in the game. Kind of like Night Terrors just it actually ends in a death that doesn't end with a everyone is happy cause they're all awake at the end shrugging.

Modifié par Torax, 03 juillet 2011 - 12:40 .