43 réponses à ce sujet

[KnightofPhoenix]

Now I really thought the game was epic. Some of you thought that the ending act was not so much, but I thought it was epic. Granted, perhaps it wasn't as epic as Mass Effect's ending, because Mass had better villains. But I stil thought it was epic nonetheless.

But then I read about the blights in the codexes and I felt meeehh. This is the first blight that ended so quickly, it didn't even last a year. All the previous blights last for years if not decades. The first one lasted for nearly a century. All of the blights were spread across Thedas, bringing untold devastation and massacre to almost all nations. All the blights were ended with epicily huge battles and with pyrrhic victories.

All blights except this one. Not only does it last a year only. It attacked Ferelden only, the weakest nation of all Thedas. And it was defeated by Ferelden alone. And that's despite the fact that Ferelden had an idiotic king, then lost that king, was at civil war, had political unrest everywhere, and had only 2-3 Grey Wardens, 2 of which are only novices. Epic fail much?
How come the previous blights were so devastating and so powerful, and this blight was an epic fail?

I mean, a legitimate criticism of the game is that the antagonists were not done so well for the story. We don't get that threatening feeling. Most of the game focuses on getting allies and not really fighting the blight. Don't get me wrong, I loved the story. But it didn't feel like it had real antagonists. Not knowin anything about the darkspawn is a part of it, but more importantly the fact that they are not as powerful as they should be.

However, I understand that Dragon Age is supposed to be an introduction to this universe. If there is a sequel, I think it's imperative that if there is a blight, it should last for at least 5 years. Preferably 10-15 years. Yes I am aware that blights usually don't come in the same age. But seeing how this one was a failure and it was destroyed before it began, then I see no reason why the 6th blight shouldn't start almost immediately after the first game. Especially since several groups of darkspawn are moving across Thedas.
 
If the second game spans a few years or a decade, then we can really see the consequences of our actions better, across time. Makes choices much more important and enjoyable. And it also gives the feeling of an epic war going on, like the previous blights.
The game could be divided into 3 acts.
Act I : we become a Grey Warden, investigate, discover there is a new blight, ally factions in the land we are in. Year 1-2.
Act II : make it international. We head off to unite Thedas, or a number of factions in Thedas. Year 2-3
Act III : several battles between a united Thedas and the blight. Final battle and death of the archdemon. Year 3-5. 
 
It would make it much more epic in my opinion. I personally would prefer if it's the same PC as DA:O. In which case, Act I could be different, depending on what your PC is.

Thoughts?

Modifié par KnightofPhoenix, 05 janvier 2010 - 12:18 .

[Suron]

guess you missed the part where the darkspawn dig for ages to find a new tainted god..just because this last one fell within a relatively short time you think it'd be acceptable for them to turn around and make a bee-line to the next Old God w/o much time inbetween.



yah ok..glad you're not designing it. Guess you missed the part where Darkspawn are disorganized and dig for long periods of times searching out the Old Gods..etc...yah let's start a new blight RIGHT AFTER one just ended...yah that's a great plan....



the Blight lasted about a year perhaps over...we're never really given a DEFINATE summary of the time passed...except I believe in the mages origin wynne mentions you being gone from the tower for about a year (Blight started BEFORE you left) and you still have more to do before the end at this point..so COMMON SENSE says it was a year to maybe a few months over a year.



And how do you plan to explain the time-lapse in game with your character not changing at all? 5 years? 10-15 "preferably"??? So our characters will have to hold tea-parties for months on end I guess inbetween things goin on? how exactly do you think that filler can be put in to pass that kind of time?? Stupid. Sure the Blight can last that long but we shouldn't become active in it till near it's end..so perhaps roughly the same time passes as passed in DA:O 1...or by your "preferance" how, pray-tell, do you plan on filling the time gap with things to do in the game for 10-15 years?? (even 5 years is a stretch)...and your Act I-III does not a full game make...so you want 2 years where all we do is fight a horde of darkspawn...YAH that sounds fun.



try thinking

[svenus97]

But it takes a minimum of two weeks and four days to make the journey to the Circle Tower and back!



You missed the point where Duncan said in the epilogue that this Blight ended before it even started.

Thats the point of it.

It never actually said that the Archdemon is all mighty can kill you by just looking at you, and if you remember he got badly-badly-badly injured by Riordan when he scared his wings which also made him crash into a tower.



And why do you think your army would be so much smaller then the darkspawn one... sure it was at Ostagar and also at Denerim but your army had you! aka your PC which completely changes things, your PC will allways be a good leader, no matter if you do "evil" or "good" choices Arl Eamon and others will still listen to you.

[Amagoi]

With a character that appeared in The Calling and soon will be in the Awakening, it's certainly possible. He's a darkspawn, and he knows where the Old Gods are. Anyway I'm still surprised how fast this Blight ended.



I suppose the Ferelden GW just did a speed run of it. I feel sorry for the next guy. You think you can stop the Blight? Last guy did it in like, 4 months, if that. Good luck topping that pal.

[Layn]

the blight hasn't ended completely. the new expansion apparently continues it a bit longer

[KnightofPhoenix]

Suron wrote...

guess you missed the part where the darkspawn dig for ages to find a new tainted god..just because this last one fell within a relatively short time you think it'd be acceptable for them to turn around and make a bee-line to the next Old God w/o much time inbetween.

yah ok..glad you're not designing it. Guess you missed the part where Darkspawn are disorganized and dig for long periods of times searching out the Old Gods..etc...yah let's start a new blight RIGHT AFTER one just ended...yah that's a great plan....

Just because it took them centuries to find an old god before does not necessarily mean it is impossible to find one in a few years. So your point is moot really.

Suron wrote...
And how do you plan to explain the time-lapse in game with your character not changing at all? 5 years? 10-15 "preferably"??? So our characters will have to hold tea-parties for months on end I guess inbetween things goin on? how exactly do you think that filler can be put in to pass that kind of time?? Stupid. Sure the Blight can last that long but we shouldn't become active in it till near it's end..so perhaps roughly the same time passes as passed in DA:O 1...or by your "preferance" how, pray-tell, do you plan on filling the time gap with things to do in the game for 10-15 years?? (even 5 years is a stretch)...and your Act I-III does not a full game make...so you want 2 years where all we do is fight a horde of darkspawn...YAH that sounds fun.

try thinking

Simple, travel takes time. That's first. Travelling to different nations in Thedas would take a long time.
Second, many games have this system where times passes. War preparations take time. Perhaps be in a city under siege for months. Lots of different ways to pass time, while still being immersed in the context of a war raging across Thedas.

Try to be more polite in your criticism.

Modifié par KnightofPhoenix, 05 janvier 2010 - 12:59 .

[KnightofPhoenix]

Crrash wrote...

the blight hasn't ended completely. the new expansion apparently continues it a bit longer

The blighrt ends when there is no Archdemon.
What we have are darkspawn stragglers for the expansion, not a blight.

[KnightofPhoenix]

svenus97 wrote...

But it takes a minimum of two weeks and four days to make the journey to the Circle Tower and back!

You missed the point where Duncan said in the epilogue that this Blight ended before it even started.
Thats the point of it.
It never actually said that the Archdemon is all mighty can kill you by just looking at you, and if you remember he got badly-badly-badly injured by Riordan when he scared his wings which also made him crash into a tower.

And why do you think your army would be so much smaller then the darkspawn one... sure it was at Ostagar and also at Denerim but your army had you! aka your PC which completely changes things, your PC will allways be a good leader, no matter if you do "evil" or "good" choices Arl Eamon and others will still listen to you.

I didn't "miss" any of those points. Doesn't change the fact that the 5th blight is a failure compared to the others and thus much less epic.

[svenus97]

blight: Darkspawn taint which kills men or turns them into ghouls, or kills the women or turns them into Broodmothers.

Blight: Large gathering of darkspawn led by an Archdemon.

Modifié par svenus97, 05 janvier 2010 - 01:01 .

[Layn]

KnightofPhoenix wrote...

Crrash wrote...

the blight hasn't ended completely. the new expansion apparently continues it a bit longer

The blighrt ends when there is no Archdemon.
What we have are darkspawn stragglers for the expansion, not a blight.

an Archdemon isn't a requirement for a Blight. As long as the Darkspawn have some kind of leadership, leading them onto the surface to taint as much as possible, it's a Blight.
But yeah, this is probably the aftermath and on a smaller scale.

Modifié par Crrash, 05 janvier 2010 - 01:17 .

[Lord Phoebus]

I agree that we should have seen more of the Blight. It would have been nice to have missions between gathering allies. E.g. after you get your first allies, you have to go to Lothering and help the templars hold the line until the refugees get far enough away. Then after you get your second allies you have to help your 1st allies prevent an incursion, etc. As it is after Ostagar, you hardly see the Darkspawn except for Orzammar, where you're really invading their territory, and at the end. Well, what's done is done.

[ash the rpgamer]

i thought the story was great, however do you honestly believe that that was it for DA?



its been an incredible success and must have made them a fortune, not just the game, soundtrack,DLC,novels and more.

i think this is the beginning to this game, whether it be in more expansions or DA2 either way i expect we'll see the other nations like Orlais,tevinter imperium,antiva etc if its still fighting darkspawn i don't know but its almost a dead cert that we'll see the rest of thedas.



also they mentioned that the darkspawn is never truly eradicated, perhaps that could be DA2 attempting to finally completely destroy the darkspawn so they can't come back.

[Warden24]

Mmm, this sounds good and all, but the whole point of the game was to stop the Blight before it actually began to ravage the land. You were able to stop it in its infancy, despite civil war and political turmoil.



It would have been nice to see some more cities be annihilated by the Blight, besides Lothering. Perhaps even have your character have to defend against the Darkspawn, or sacrifice one village to save another, that sort of thing.



Anyways, great points, I am however happy with the way the game turned out, well, a majority of it.

[Boeresmurf]

just see it like this:

world war 1. 4 years (big war though)

vs vs terrorism 9 years and counting.

holland vs Spain 80 years (officially was longer)

Russia vs Georgi 4 days. (ownd)



somethimes u get lucky.....

and world just got lucy with a archdemon who thought to march in a weak country with himself exposed at frontlines.

if archdemon just send hordes and hordes into denerim and all major city and stayed in the back himself.. we would have been crushed

i

[Suron]

KnightofPhoenix wrote...

Suron wrote...

guess you missed the part where the darkspawn dig for ages to find a new tainted god..just because this last one fell within a relatively short time you think it'd be acceptable for them to turn around and make a bee-line to the next Old God w/o much time inbetween.

yah ok..glad you're not designing it. Guess you missed the part where Darkspawn are disorganized and dig for long periods of times searching out the Old Gods..etc...yah let's start a new blight RIGHT AFTER one just ended...yah that's a great plan....

Just because it took them centuries to find an old god before does not necessarily mean it is impossible to find one in a few years. So your point is moot really.

Suron wrote...
And how do you plan to explain the time-lapse in game with your character not changing at all? 5 years? 10-15 "preferably"??? So our characters will have to hold tea-parties for months on end I guess inbetween things goin on? how exactly do you think that filler can be put in to pass that kind of time?? Stupid. Sure the Blight can last that long but we shouldn't become active in it till near it's end..so perhaps roughly the same time passes as passed in DA:O 1...or by your "preferance" how, pray-tell, do you plan on filling the time gap with things to do in the game for 10-15 years?? (even 5 years is a stretch)...and your Act I-III does not a full game make...so you want 2 years where all we do is fight a horde of darkspawn...YAH that sounds fun.

try thinking

Simple, travel takes time. That's first. Travelling to different nations in Thedas would take a long time.
Second, many games have this system where times passes. War preparations take time. Perhaps be in a city under siege for months. Lots of different ways to pass time, while still being immersed in the context of a war raging across Thedas.

Try to be more polite in your criticism.

yah my point is moot because I go by the ESTABLISHED LORE and you IGNORE IT.  Whatever you want to tell yourself buddy.  You do know what lore is right?

and your "travel time" solution still fails.  So basically you just want a pretty little text bar to say (on day 1,453 we engaged DS Horde 321)  Again your suggestions fail.  That would make for an idiotic and terrible game.  Fluffed time passing..yah greeeeat suggestion.

again..think.  And my politeness is directly proportional to the intelligence I'm responding too

[KnightofPhoenix]

Established lore says nothing about how much time the darkspawn need to find an archdemon. Show me the scientific fact that the darkspawn necessarily need centuries to find an archdemon. It varies. It can take 4 centuries, or less. It is not impossible for the darkspawn to find one in a matter of years or decades. It simply did not happen as of yet.
So once again, show me in the lore how it is a necessity for the darkspawn to need centurie to find an archdemon. In other words, show me in the lore how it is 100% impossible to find one in years or decades.

The rest of your "criticism" is too childish for me to even consider. You don't like it? That's your right. I am simply suggesting an idea that I think would be good. If you have nothing more to add, then you don't have to be here.

@ Crrash
A Blight only happens with an Archdemon in command, as only it is the only being powerful enough to command a horde. To date, there has not been a single Blight without an Archdemon. Hence why killing the Archdemon is the number 1 priority for the Grey Wardens. Without it, the darkspawn are virtually no threat, at least to the surface world. http://dragonage.wik...wiki/The_Blight
I am obviously not talking about the diseas in this thread.

@ the rest. Yes I understand that the PC was supposed to end the blight before it started. But it really could have been much more epic. Why does the PC have to be God like? The prievous blights saw their fair share of great heroes and leaders and it lasted for decades.

@ Boeresmurf. But a Blight is supposed to be a large scale conflict that threatens all life in Thedas, not a minor one like Russia and Georgia.
I mean really. This Archdemon was an epic fail. He couldn't even last for one year against Ferleden, despite it beign divided and weak.
Now I am not complaining about DA:O, as some might think. What's done is done and I love the game. However, in future installements, should there be another blight, it should be more epic and on a larger scale.

Modifié par KnightofPhoenix, 05 janvier 2010 - 04:24 .

[Sandiz83]

I agree with Knightofphenix.



And i have alson nothis that this conflict was a small one and the tales of the other Blight was sooo mutch bigger. I have more hoppes on the expations and their storys.

[robertthebard]

Crrash wrote...

KnightofPhoenix wrote...

Crrash wrote...

the blight hasn't ended completely. the new expansion apparently continues it a bit longer

The blighrt ends when there is no Archdemon.
What we have are darkspawn stragglers for the expansion, not a blight.

an Archdemon isn't a requirement for a Blight. As long as the Darkspawn have some kind of leadership, leading them onto the surface to taint as much as possible, it's a Blight.
But yeah, this is probably the aftermath and on a smaller scale.

Actually, in order for there to be a Blight, there must be an Archdemon.  This point is drilled home at Ostagar, where the only ones that think it's truly a Blight are the GW's due to dreams.  Cailin and Loghain both suggest that it's not truly a Blight.  When the Archdemon dies, the surviving darkspawn are scattered.  There are bands of darkspawn mentioned, but if the Archdemon isn't required, then the Blight shouldn't have ended.

[ChaoticBroth]

Well, the only real reason the Blight ended so early is because you brought a fairly huge army to Denerim, where the Archdemon was personally leading the horde. If the Archdemon was still in let's say, the Dead Trenches during the siege of Denerim, then it would be a whole different story, right?



So yeah, this Archdemon was made of some pretty epic fail.

[Cryo84]

That's what you get when you make an archdemon out of a beauty god.

[Callie K]

I wanted to chime in and say I this is an excellent critical article.

[KnightofPhoenix]

ChaoticBroth wrote...

Well, the only real reason the Blight ended so early is because you brought a fairly huge army to Denerim, where the Archdemon was personally leading the horde. If the Archdemon was still in let's say, the Dead Trenches during the siege of Denerim, then it would be a whole different story, right?

So yeah, this Archdemon was made of some pretty epic fail.

The army we have at Denerim was pretty hastly assembled and still outnumbered 3 to 1 according to Oghren. Plus the darkspawn had the advantage of actually conquering the city before the army arrived, except if we pulled a Stalingrad on them, which seems to be the case.

But even still. The prievous Blights were ended by an effort of most of the nations in Thedas. It took huge armies to defeat prievous Blights, in huge battles. And that's not even mentioning the armies of Grey Wardens. We don't get that feeling during the Fifth Blight.
It can basically be sumarised as:
-  3  minor battles (which we don't participate in).
- The battle of Ostagar
- Rallying allies and stoppping the civil war, which is not fighting the Blight.
- The rather very poorly written feign attack against Redcliff, with your entire army hiding behind castle walls, despite the fact that there were very few darkspawns.
- The battle of Denerim, which was epic don't get me wrong.

And that's basically it.
It took many battles to defeat the privous Blights. That's how epic wars are supposed to be.

Perhaps the game would have been better if the battle of Denerim was not the final battle. The Archdemon would have retreated to the deep roads and we can take our army and conquer his stronghold in the dead trenches. Maybe killing broodmothers in the process.
That would have made the final act longer and feel like we are in a real war.

Modifié par KnightofPhoenix, 05 janvier 2010 - 06:26 .

[KnightofPhoenix]

Cryo84 wrote...

That's what you get when you make an archdemon out of a beauty god.

Tell me about it.

[Callie K]

I think a few more boss sized enemies would've helped me feel more like Fereldan was really under threat. The only traditional "boss" enemies in the game are the boss at the end of Broken Circle and the demon at the end of the Fade sequence in Broken Circle, the Broodmother, the High Dragon and the Archdemon. Also, randomly, there's that Fade boss in the Deep Roads that you only really benefit from if you /don't/ fight him...



The first ogre boss seemed pretty cool but by the end of the game they're a dime a dozen. From beginning to end the hurlocks/genlocks are pretty much shock troops and you fight too many other humanoids for any of the tough humanoid fights to really stand out. I'd love to see some expansions add some proper bosses that require specific strategies. There are slavering demons that cause flesh stuff to bulge all over places they conquer, etc, and darkspawn can obviously also cause horrific mutation, after all.



However, the battle of Denerim was, in fact, awesome.

[Vicious]

It definetly was anti climactic. If they wanted it to be climactic they could have continued it for another 2 games, like Mass Effect and Shepard's battle against the Reapers, it'd be Dragon Age and Charname's battle against the Blight.



But it is what it is. A really quick blight conquered by a rookie Grey Warden who, surprise surprise, ultimately saves the day.