He was really scared of his mortality after he became a Warden and found out about his shortened lifespan and felt somewhat betrayed by Duncan, event hough Duncan saved him from jail after killing Vaughn. Although he supported the mission of the Grey Wardens he was always conflicted by their necessary utilitarianism. Although he left Jowan to the mercy of Arl Eamon, he spared Avernus for somewhat selfish reasons because he wanted to see if Avernus could extend his life despite the taint. Thus, he felt guilty and tried to apepal for Jowan's life once Eamon was revived but Arl Earmon insisted on sending him back to the Circle.
He killed Flemeth at Morrigan's behest. At first he had a lot of respect for Morrigan on an intellectual level and although he was a Circle supporter with views similar to Wynne, he did not think Andrastian law should extend to those of other cultures with their own values and practices, like Morrigan and the Dalish. However, due to Morrigan's selfish and somewhat untrustworthy nature, he grew colder and colder towards her.
He forced Zathrian to undue the curse and while he didn't approve of Witherfang's attack on the innocent elves from his tribe, he understood why she did it to free the werewolves from the curse, most of whom weren't involved in the attack on Zathrian's family. He also transferred the knowledge of the Arcane Warrior to Morrigan in order to preserve lost Elven knowledge. He wasn't fond of her at that point but still slightly trusted her and didn't want to give it to Wynne because he was concerend about her health due to her age and issues with the spirit and didn't want to over-exert her.
He slowly struck up a relationship with Leliana although he thought she was a lesbian at first because she was hitting on Morrigan and revealed her history with Majorline. He also found himself strangely attracted to Zevran (whom he spared hoping he could use him to kill Loghain in Denerim) and projected this in Denerim's Pearl where he lost his virginity to another male elf but this solidified his heterosexuality.
In Orzammar he really saw no difference between Bhelen and Harrowmont, especially after the noble in Tapsters, whom he was fond of, said neither of them has probably ever left the Diamond Quarter (he didn't get enough intel about Bhelen's desired reforms for the Casteless) so he tried to play both sides in the hopes of not alienating the loser and trying to remain uninvolved in politics. But when he had to go to the Deep roads, he was so disgusted by Bhelen's thinly veiled directions to kill Branka that he resolved to tell her about it if she was found, putting him in Harrowmont's camp.
In the Deep Roads he got protective and pissed that Oghren, whom he already had contempt for as a drunk (he's wary of alcohol because it's his cousin Shiani's greatest vice and down fall and a destructive escape mechanism for his fellow alienage elfs), was hitting on Leliana, which cemented his low opinion of the dwarf. After the Deep Roads when Oghren tagged along, he was going to kick him out of the party but was too disgusted by how pathetic he was and felt too bad doing it since he could never go back to Orzammar.
In the Deep Roads he sided with Caridain because golem making seemed way too much like blood magic and clearly disadvantaged the lower classes. From what he saw of the Dwarven nobles, he saw no reason why it would be any different in modern times. Shale was also with him so that cemented (har har, get it?) the decision. Back in Orzammar, he gave the crown to Harrowmont on account of Bhelen being a murderous scumbag in his view.
He was very curt and abrasive with the dragon cultist from Haven so he never got the offer to taint the ashes (and likely wouldn't have taken it) and decided to kill the dragon after retrieving the ashes to protect the holy site. However, he had earlier sent Genitivi out of the temple for his safety due to the fighting so the ashes disappeared. He always suspected a chantry cover up after that given his distrust of both the Chantry and other high ranking institutions like the Grey Wardens.
After rescuing Anora he surrendered to Ser Cautherin to divert attention away from Anora, recognizing her as the best change to thrawt Loghain's power over several nobles and prayed that things would be resolved before Loghain's soldiers could torture or kill him. Fortunately, Wynne and Leliana rescued him first.
Because Alistair, his good friend, clearly didn't want to be king and he figured that Anora against Loghain could unite the two factions in the civil war, he agreed to support her at the Landsmeet. However, he also made it clear that he could not spare Loghain for his crimes, leading Anora to betray him at the Landsmeet and stand with her father after he had persuaded Ser Cautherin to stand aside outside the throne room.
This lead to open conflict in the throne room even though Loghain won the Landsmeet, leading to the duel. Although he saw merit in the Revered Mother's duel proposal to save lives, he was uneasy at victory or defeat coming down to a duel and favored the more utilitarian means of taking control of the Landsmeet by force with his entire party. Nonetheless, this prompted Alistair to step up and agree to the duel, leading to the automatic execution of Loghain with his approval. Afterwards, he was bemused when Alistair started ****ing at him for becoming king, even though it had only happened because Anora betrayed them to avoid her father's execution and making Anora queen after her betrayal would have likely meant their deaths. They got over it though.
On the night before they left Redcliffe he told Leliana to leave out of concern for her safety, recognizing that the odds were against them in the battle and that they'd likely lose. She asked if she'd see him again and he replied "I don't know," unable to promise that he would survive. She disappeared after that (working for the Divine evidently) and evidently never sought him again, which broke his heart (hopefully they'll meet up in DA 3, pretty pretty please devs
). Although he was expecting to lose the battle on some level, Riordian's news gave him an almost certain death sentence that was hard to deal with. So Morrigan's offer seemed particularly tempting even though it went against his religion and deeply-rooted piety. But he just couldn't bring himself to do something that he considered so evil (he also really distrusted Morrigan's motives at this point, believing she had come at Flemeth's behest just for this purpose). However, he agreed to talk to Alistair to get him to do the ritual as the coward's way out. Seeing Alistair's disgust at the prospect, however, he realized he was becoming what he hated and he couldn't manipulate Alistair into doing it, even if it meant death. So Morrigan got pissed off and left.
He took Alistair, Wynne and Shale to help him slay the archdemon (where a contingent of Dalish archers aided him on top of Fort Drakon). Alistair was the last one standing against the archdemon but when it was on its last breath, laying on the ground, gasping for life, he got up to make the killing blow. Alistair, who was closer, stopped him when he saw him getting up and offered to kill him. The warden, who had almost died himself, wasn't so sure but then he thought about his family and friends in the Alienage and his plans to improve their lives with his newly acquired wealth from travelling, in addition to Leliana, whom he wanted to see again and make sure he was safe. He also knew that Alistair really didn't want to be king and was moved by Alistair's argument that sacrificing himself was the best king he could be. But there was also a desire to live and not accept his taint as the inevitable death sentence it is. He was unwilling to sacrifice himself so Alistair was the true hero, not the warden. As such, he always felt guilty about letting Alistair making the ultimate sacrifice after that and it always weighed on him.
At Anora's coronation he was upset by the lack of acknowledgement or fanfare for the recently deceased King Alistair's heroic sacrifice. As his boon he asked that his people be treated fairly for once so Anora made him Bann of the Alienage. He intended to use his status and victory to leave the wardens and use his position as Bann to improve his people's lives and push for a Bann of the Highever Alienage (Anora was never receptive to this, of course, due to the high anti-elf sentiment among the nobles).
After a few months, however, the wardens demanded that he become Commander of Amaranthine and presented their demand as a "compromise," saying he could split his time between governing the alienage and Amarnthine. Anora also encouraged his because, while she couldn't outright deny the hero of Fereldan his low cost requests, she also had to solidify support among the nobles and giving elves more rights would clearly alienate them.
Since Amarnthine was obviously the priority given the high concentration of retreating Darkspawn, he made his way there with Mhari, a recruit from Anora's royal regiment.
He was never sure that Anders hadn't killed his two templar jailers and, as a proponent of the Circle (granted, an ideal Circle with less discrimination against mages) and Anders' propensity to flee, he was always skeptical about Anders' motives and commitment to the Wardens but allowed him to undergo the joining due to lack of numbers and figured it'd be a fitting form of justice if he had killed the templars.
When he saw Oghren at Vigil's Keep with the intention to be a warden he was disgusted and wouldn't permit him to undergo the joining. Anora offered the dwarf a position in her court, which I imagine was because she wanted the Hero of Fereldan's former companions hanging around to boost her status, but I'm sure she quickly dismissed Ogrhen from her service due to his drunken, lecherous, debacherous ways.
When he found Nathaniel in the dungeons he put him through the joining, rather than executing him, as a form of justice, figuring Nathaniel would hate it more than death and could be used to gather support among the suspicious Howe loyalists. He started to respect Nathaniel when he saw how he treated the elf servant and became friends with him after Nathaniel learned the truth of his father's ways and understood that his father was trading slaves from the warden's alienage.
In Amaranthine he sided with the city guard to restore order in his city. His experience in Amarnthine with the cheating wife of the dead warden he found in the Architect's chambers made him realize that it wasn't fair to expect Leliana to come back to a warden, since he could never fully commit, especially with his double status as Bann of the Alienage, This helped him start to get over Leliana whom he has not seen again until now (maybe in DA 3, again, pretty pretty please devs???).
He disapproved of Velanna's actions and thus didn't mind putting her through the joining but overlooked her bitter, unrepentant flaws due to his elven bias and fascination with the Dalish. He began to regard her as a sister (which probably wasn't reciprocated) and thus passed the secrets of the Arcane Warrior onto her, thinking she'd appreciate the preservation of Elven lore.
He had paid the Black Wolf to dig out information on the conspiracy but didn't return to him on time so when he got back to Vigil's Keep, he was best with a Peasant revolt that he calmed the populace out of, only to face an assassination attempt by Howe loyalists, in which Varel took an arrow for him. He also pardoned the man who stole for his family by making him become a soldier.
When he recruited Sigrun, he started to develop a slight crush on her but couldn't make her a warden due to lack of time to preform the joining with the imminent assault on Amarnthine (read: stupid, abhorrent bug).
Fearing it might be a trap, he left Nathaniel (who he viewed as his second in command) with Velanna as the wardens at the Keep in case something happened. He took Anders with him to divide the wardens evenly and because he feared Anders would desert without his constant supervision. He also took Sigrun and Justice to help fight the invasion of Amarnthine. He told his Captain to dispose of the Messenger how he saw fit, which probably meant the Darkspawn was executed.
At Amarnthine he saw the damage at the city and assumed it was a lost cause, figuring it would be more practical to try to save the Vigil but Anders' compassionate speech made him realize what he was turning into and he decided to save the city. Fortunately Nathaniel survived the attack on the fully upgraded keep and probably became the Warden Commander after the Hero of Fereldan governed Amaranthine for a while and then used his goodwill with the wardens and Anora to force his way into retirement in order to focus solely on the alienage, which he was concerned about after the human revolt due to the fact that the elves were bettering their lives under his rule.
He couldn't spare the Architect due to his mistrust of the darkspawn's motives. He also remembered his leitenunt, who coordinated the attack on the Vigil, saying "it has ended, just as he foretold, making him suspect that the Architect had prepared for, and perhaps even pushed for, an armed assault rather than a simple negotiation. He was also disgusted by the leniency the Architect gave to his more evil darkspawn leitenunts, like the one who orchestrated the conflict between the humans and Velanna's tribe.
When his guards stationed at Felemth's old hunt gave him word of Morrigan he went to track her down to stop her, figuring she was up to another evil ritual that could threaten people. But he wanted to deal with her personally rather than alerting the Templars since she was a former comrade and felt guilty for making her an Arcane Warrior. Plus he didn't think the Templars could handle her. He found Arianne attractive and would have pursued was but was too focused on finding Morrigan for answers. He didn't trust Morrigan's cryptic answers and suspected she might be lying that Flemeth was still alive to obfuscate her true motives. Remembering her Dark Ritual offer, he stabbed her to ensure she didn't try something like that again but when she looked at him in shock he felt really bad, making him pause for a moment as she fell through the mirror.
Hawke wasn't nearly as intelligent as the warden and was a somewhat gregarious warrior, who was never as intelligent as his father or sister. He was also gay and pretty promiscuous, taking on several lovers, particularly at Ostagar, which he used to distract himself from reality. He always had a propensity towards sarcasm but Loghain's betrayal at Ostagar, the death of his brother and life at rock bottom living with in his irritating uncle's hovel, after a comfortable life in Lothering, made him develop humor and sarcasam as a defense mechanism. Although he was indifferent to others, and sometimes callous, he cared deeply for his sister and his mother.
Bethany was his best friend and he saw her as a formidable equal but was still very protective of her. He didn't continue his association with Fenris after the job was completed because he was irritated by Fenris' dangerous manipulation and because he didn't want to be associated with someone who was being hunted by Tevinter mages since he was worried about Bethany. But the experience did make him very anti-slavery.
Although he was a bit of an elfist at first, in that he thought they were racially useless and ridiculous, particularly the Dalish, he thought Merill's naievity. and kindness was adorable and she gradually brought him around, instilling a basic respect for her people.
He didn't let Bethany go on the Deep Roads expedition after Leandra intervened, recognizing that it would be too much for his mom to lose both children after Carver. In the meantime, Cullen found her and brought her to the Circle.
He had been indifferent to philosophical and political issues like the circle, simply focusing on how to get by and protect his family. As part of this, he shared Merill's views on blood magice, believing that any means was acceptable to achieve your results and protect your interests, provided you were powerful enough to control it. That's why he became a Reaver after acidently swallowing the dragon blood in the Deep Roads, which augmented his beserker abilities.
In Corypheus' prison, he initially sided with Larius, believing that Jenka was at best foolishly going to release a large threat and at worst under his influence. But when he learned that Larius had threatened Leandra's wife when she was pregnant with him to force Malcom to reseal the prison with blood magic Hawke switched to Janka's side to kill Larius and agreed to release Corypheus and control him out of spite, which was obviously a mistake as he clearly possessed her afterwards.
Bethany's notes and her experience in the Circle, even Kirkwall's Circle, convinced him that his father was wrong and that the Circle was fundamentally a sound system, just in dire need of reform for the mages.
Nonetheless, he didn't explicitly share his views with Anders, instead playing "yes man" with him and agreeing that mages faced grave injustices. He agreed that the Circle operate injustly but was never interested in having intellectual philosophical discussions with Anders about a hypothetical world order, which would probably just make Anders/Justice pissy at him when he found out the extent of his Circle support. Hawke also had a crush on Anders because of his compassion and mission to help other Fereldan refugees in addition to his humor (I had to head canon this from Awakening since the transition from humorous Anders to angry Justice/Vengeance Anders wasn't very well done in DA 2). Hawke kept flirting with Anders but Anders never acted on Hawke's obviously feelings for a while since he had correctly pegged Hawke as a one night stand type of guy.
In the mean time, Hawke had always been attracted to Isabella who had grabbed his crotch after he had helped with her "duel" at the Chantry in order to get him to break into the Hawke Estate cellars with Bethany to find their grandparents' will. When Isabella broke into his manor one evening they started having an affair which lasted until Anders came and confess his feelings for him. Hawke gave him the key to his manor soon after.
Hawke agreed to help Isabella find the relic before resolving Aveline's fugitive-murderer elf crisis because he trusted her and took her on her word that finding the relic would both save her life and help resolve matters with the Arishok. Naturally, Hawke felt betrayed when she fled with the relic for her own profit/to save her own skin and he learned the truth. After Aveline's insistence that the elven converts return to the City Guard from the Qunari provoked the Arishok into attacking the city, Isabella returned with the Relic and, although Hawke was still pissed at her, he couldn't betray someone who had become such a close friend after she had eventually chosen to do the right thing so he agreed to the duel with the arishok for her life (the fact that they had briefly had an affair also helped).
His experiences with the Qunari consisted of him trying to keep the peace up until that point, fearing that a war in Kirkwall could displace his mother and get his sister killed. And when Tallis came along, he agreed to go with her but was disgusted and felt manipulated when he found at that she was a Qunari and actually wanted Duke Prosper's plan to work. After the battle with Prosper though, he let her walk with the list since he just wanted to be done with the whole situation and didn't want to fight a temporary ally (I have a big problem with the lack of significant decisions like this in DA 2 from an RP perspective).
Despite Hawke's affection for Merill, she had become incredibly angry with him for refusing to give her the item from Marathaeri she wanted to fix the Eluvian and really resented him for it. Hawke normally would have obliged but when he brought Merill into the fade to save Feynriel, he saw what the Pride Demon did to her and he didn't think she was in control of her blood magic abilities as she thought (he was also pissed at Aveline for falling prey to the Desire Demon and took it very personally although deep down he understood that she wanted to exchange her current like with Hawke in Kirkwall to one with Wesley since he would do the same for his previous life in Lothering with his full family).
He agreed to go with Merill to the Pride Demon for her own good, knowing there was no way to talk her out of it and realized that the demon was trying to trick her when Maratheri claimed she was ok. This led to a confrontation where they exterminated Merill's entire clan.
As he did with the Qunari, Hawke tried to keep the peace with Orsino and Meredith, even though he resented Meredith's control of the city, both because of her totalitarian control of the circle and because her tyranny hurt his business endeavors and income. Nonetheless, he didn't want to put Bethany's life at risk after losing Leandra.
When Hawke and Varric found the remains of the Lyrium Idol in Bertrand's old mansion (Hawke had urged Varric to kill Bertrand when he returned to Kirkwall for revenge, security and on account of Bertrand's hopeless insanity), Varric used Hawke's friendship and trust to convince him to give him the idol shards, despite Hawke's hesitation, which he used to modify Bianca.
Hawke felt very betrayed when Anders used him to gather ingredients on the pretext that he wanted to seperate himself from Justice (which Hawke fully supported for Anders' own good) and their relationship became very frosty after that, especially because Hawke refused to talk to Elthina to "give her one last chance." They still lived together but Hawke tried to convince him to tell him what he was doing and stop it and Anders spent less and less time at the Hawke estate and more time in his clinic.
When Nathaniel Howe's sister appealed to Hawke to find him in the Deep Roads Hawke saw no good reason why he should but Anders insisted and appealed to Hawke due to their past companionship in the Grey Wardens. Hawke used it as an opportunity to force an ultimatum from Anders: he made Anders vow not to go through with whatever plans he had if they went to rescue Nathaniel.
However, when Anders blew up the Chantry and Elithina, the peace maker (he had thought she was worthless with her inaction but grudgingly came to respect her when she decided to stay in Kirkwall at a risk to her safety despite a potential Exalted March and Sebastian's pleas otherwise), Meredith threatened to anul the circle and he had to side with Orsino to defend his sister (plus he knew indiscriminately killing all the mages for no reason other than the actions of one mage was absurd and illogical).
Although he hated to do it, he finally realized that Anders was an abomination because of the way he and Justice had mutually warped each other into a hell bent creature of hate. He also couldn't forgive Anders for his multiple lies and betrayals and, most of all, for putting Bethany's life in danger knowing Meredith would act exactly how she did. Hesitating he asked his companions and Sebastian pointing out that he could have been in the Chantry sealed the deal and Hawke killed him despite their relationship.
Hawke and his remaining companions ensured Bethany's safety and did their best to help what few mages they could escape. While the trauma of the anullment made both Bethany and Hawke firmly anti-Circle from that point on, Orsino's confession that he had contact with Quentin before using his research to transform himself into a Harvester, coupled with Merill's experience, turned Hawke against blood magic (but he still maintained his friendship with Merill despite their disagreement and justified his own use of reaver tactics by virtue of the fact that he wasn't a mage and therefore not in danger of possession).
After Meredith went insane he and his companions fled. Although his companions eventually parted way, I imagine he was still working with Bethany to help the escaped mages via gurellia tactics against the templars in the Kirkwall area. Since he's disappeared since then, I'd imagine that Bethany either disappeared with him or is actively trying to find him as the two siblings would never part since they lost the rest of their immediate family.
So that's the state of things for my play through at the start of DA 3. Yeah I'm bored and I can' tsleep. That's the warden's and Hawke's life story. Sue me.
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