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[caradoc2000]

Blackmarsh is my personal favorite of the DAA locations, the spooky feel of the place is great, and it has a fun bonus boss.

[Jaison1986]

I just looked in the wiki, and here is how the peasant quest goes:

They will accuse you either of:

Lack of safety; It happens if you choose to use soldier to protect the city or trade routs.

Lack of food; It happens if you choose to protect the farms or spread soldier evenly.

You are an tyrant; If you choose to protect Amaranthine, execute people for lesser crimes, steal the land from those two nobles.

You can persuade them to walk away if they complain about the lack of safety.

If they complain about lack of food or that you are an jerk, your only options to end it peacefully is either giving them the food they want or intimidating them to walk away.

[JeffZero]

Yeah, I figure the bonus boss is likely tied into the dragon bones I was bumping into all over the place. I think there are one or two of those things left out there. Maybe I'll go poking around for them tonight. I don't want to get too bogged down with such stuff, so hopefully the wiki can help make heads or tails of what I've missed.

Oh, shucks. The villagers were complaining about the lack of food. Well there you go. Sadface. Thanks for the detective work, Jaison.

[caradoc2000]

JeffZero wrote...

Yeah, I figure the bonus boss is likely tied into the dragon bones I was bumping into all over the place. I think there are one or two of those things left out there.

Yes. You need five bone fragments.

[JeffZero]

By the way, are Golems of Amgarrak and Witch Hunt as short as Leliana's Song? It'd be good to know what kind of time investment I'm looking at with those two so I can estimate how much longer I'll be in Ferelden before I fire up Dragon Age II.

Speaking of DA2, I guess I'll have a couple of questions on it too before I begin my journey as Hawke, but I'll save those at least until I've completed Awakening.

[caradoc2000]

JeffZero wrote...

By the way, are Golems of Amgarrak and Witch Hunt as short as Leliana's Song?

About the same length, yes.

[JeffZero]

Thanks.

Felled that dragon. I always feel like such a hero when that happened. Ha, King Alistair's probably seething that Aedan gets to be the only one off doing this these days.

Vigilance is great. And now it's +30 against darkspawn so it's more than great. It's legendary.

[caradoc2000]

JeffZero wrote...

Vigilance is great. And now it's +30 against darkspawn so it's more than great. It's legendary.

It even gets its own epilogue slide.

[JeffZero]

I uh. I know. Because. Well. Y'see. I sort of got carried away with all my Dragon Aging today. In fact I hereby dub this day... Dragon Age... Day.

I concluded Awakening, took care of Amgarrak, and now I'm off on a little Witch Hunt. I'm two hours shy at most from wrapping things up (for now, anyway) with Aedan Cousland. It's been a wild ride and my last big update is going to have a lot of ground to cover but I'm looking forward to the challenge.

I took the opportunity to snap a shot of Aedan just now by the way. Used my phone so it's not the greatest quality but I figured I would shine a little light on him before the credits roll one last time. I usually roll default but the default Human Noble was just a bit too ugly for my tastes.

http://instagram.com/p/ktEMJYvzSF/

[Jaison1986]

Oh, Amgarrak? tell me, how many times you got close from tearing your hair? It's a bit annoying, but you can't import an save post Harvester boss battle. Hopefully, the Keep will fix that.

You romanced Leliana right? Witch hunt is an DLC that feels more meanful if you romanced Morrigan. It even allows for an unique ending that might have implications for Inquisition. I personally have my Cousland warden romancing Morrigan.

Oh, nice screenshot. I might show you mine once my computer gets fixed. I bled my hands to make my Cousland look good.

[JeffZero]

I will answer those DLC questions in a bit, gonna do this in order to avoid tearing out my hair trying to remember everything. But yeah, definitely show me your Cousland when you can!

OK, once more unto the breach. The shear volume of stuff that has transpired is going to make this kind of lethargic in certain areas relative to my usual rants, so hopefully you're all cool with that. Heck, I wouldn't blame ya for being thankful.

Took care of some companion quests before speaking with Varel. Everyone was feeling dandier than before, save Velanna whose quest I just couldn't seem to trigger (someone did warn me of that) and Oghren who was still unwilling to speak more about Felsi. Ah well, maybe there'd be more opportunities down the remaining road.

Word came that Amaranthine needed aid, so after hearing out my friends and allies, I chose Nathanial ("redeem your name!"), Sigrun (how could I say no to that plea?) and Oghren (who I was selfishly hoping I could raise in approval just a few more points before the ending). Two human men and a fine pair of dwarves began the march... only to fell one wave of darkspawn before receiving the news that Vigil's Keep was under threat of an attack most dire.

This kind of felt like the Ashley/Kaidan choice in ME1 somehow. Which man-made constructs do you suppose would emblemize those two? My money's on Ash as Vigil's Keep and Kaidan as Amaranthine. He may be a touch less "cultured" with regards to Tennyson, but you know, Ash is all soldier, all the time. Kaidan likes a good steak sandwich every now and then.

Uhh, where was I? Oh right, the big decision.

It pained me dearly, but I chose to heed Aidan's insistence that the city was all but lost. Yikes. That cutscene with the fire spreading didn't leave much to the imagination. Well that's gonna leave a mark on the Grey Warden reconstruction effort's long-term reputation... more importantly, however, at least a few dozen people who could have been saved were thrown to the wolves of war. Let's make it count, team.

Well you're damn right I came back for you, buddies. There's simply too much at stake in this conflict at Vigl's Keep, though. If it were a choice between slaughtering innocents and letting Aedan's dream of a more organized Fereldan chapter of Grey Wardens go by the wayside, it'd the latter, even if it meant Anders, Justice, Velanna, Varel, Woolsey, Wade, et al perishing as an end result. I just can't imagine Vigil's Keep has as many people as there were remaining uninfected innocents in Amaranthine. Or maybe I'm wrong there, but I feel like I'm not.

It's not that simple though. The Mother made her move and the Keep was integral in defense against it for the good of the entire arling and perhaps beyond. So we retreated.

Defending the Keep got kind of touch-and-go at a certain point. Surprisingly enough it wasn't the onslaught of armored ogres (RIP you studly seneschal ;_ but the swarm of childers that followed. Lost a couple of companions there for a while. Those buggers just kept coming. But eventually the battle was ended and the decision to press the advantage was made. It was time to send this "Mother" to hell. Anders, Oghren and Nathanial would be my men-at-arms. It isn't often I stick to the beginning of a game's party selection somewhat regularly like this, and I certainly like to shake things up during endgame more too, but these guys are just really cool. Justice and Sigrun are cool too but I only have so many slots and I still wanted that Oghren conversation, dammit. Anders is vitally useful and funny to boot and Nathanial's "restore Howe honor" thing is so nifty (with regards to the fact that the main character of my file is Aedan freakin' Cousland) that I didn't want it to end.

The Dragonbone Wastes are a cool level. Guess I should have seen that high dragon coming. Wonder if she was there to die? Well, she got her wish. Sorry again Alistair, this one's for m... hey, damn you Howe! I take back everything nice I ever said about you! Stop kill-stealing all the high dragons, people!

And then we were in.

At some point in this early stage of the final area I got ol' Oghren to butter up to me at last. I think it was around here anyway. It might have been in the Keep. Strange that I can't remember. But it happened. And I felt more accomplished for it than anything else in the game. So weird he's the hardest to get higher up on the approval scale.

Descending the towers and along came a spider...

[JeffZero]

I haven't made much progress with The Calling, so a lot of The Architect's potential characterization there is still as dark to me as any of the many thousands of Awakening players who never touched the book. It's a good book so far but I have very specific environments in which I read for pleasure and I was in them far more often last week with The Stolen Throne so yeah. I'll finish when I finish, got plenty of time to read all the books and comics prior to Inquisition.

Obviously I mentioned that to point out that I was really uncertain how to proceed here. Big picture? The idea of a sentient darkspawn allying with the Hero of Ferelden who slew the archdemon and seeks to usher in a new era of Grey Warden devotion tickles my fancy. But how did Aedan feel? Well, as hesitant as anyone in such a situation. I listened to the Architect's explanations -- aha, so that's why the Mother is bonkers! -- and... what the hey, I went for it. This is a nifty twist in the overall lore, by the way. I imagine some didn't like it, but I do. I'm especially fond of his answer if you ask why he was born this way. "Why are mages born in your world? I do not know." Thedas works in mysterious ways.

It wasn't long until I reached the dreaded nest. Chatting with the Mother was appropriately useless. Cool to see the Architect show up for the conversation. You know, until she blew his image away and OH MY GOD PUT THAT SKIN FLAP BACK ON YOUR MANDIBLE DEAR GOD HAVE MERCY THE BROODMOTHERS ARE NOTHING NEXT TO THIS ARCANE HORROR OF A THOUSAND HELLS WHAT THE ACTUAL F

Kill it kill it kill it kill it kill it with fire kill it with affliction hex kill it with sword and bow and no let go of Oghren you jerk stop it leave Oghren alone Anders resurrect Oghren kill it kill it kill kill kill kill

PHEW.

I'm all for equal rights but that face had to go.

And then the squad was a bunch of badasses and Aedan finished her off and then they walked away slowly and then uhh... I got hit by a hilarious glitch because the final sequence looped four times and the last two times the characters stood rigidly in place and just kind of wiggled back and forth a bit the entire time. So Aedan wiggled a stilted frame left and right maybe six inches to the sound of the Mother being torn to ribbons and then he and Anders wiggled their hips a bit and then finally the epilogue triggered. BioWare, yours are some of the most interesting glitches in Western gaming, I'll give you that much applause.

All in all the epilogue was kind of disappointing next to Origins, but I wasn't expecting anything of that magnitude, so I'm satisfied. I wish there was even 30 seconds of in-engine dialogue and such before the credit roll. Would have been nice to *hear* the Architect say he was going to keep his word, but at least the Dragon Age epilogues are nice and detailed so I got to read about it. Some light stuff here, some bleak stuff here. Very fitting overall.

Only thing that sort of niggled my nug leathers was Aedan deciding to depart from Vigil's Keep, "his mission done, the darkspawn gone." That's not what Aedan would have done, no, not my Aedan. In my mind he'd travel with Leliana a few months out of the year but always return to the Keep, to his duty as a Warden, but hey, player agency has to stop somewhere, I get it. Like I said during the Origins epilogue, I imagine some movements leading into Awakening would upset certain fans because they chose starkly separate paths than I, so now I get my just dues, I suppose.

Anders is a companion in DA2, right? I wonder if the slide I got for him will hold true then. It claims he leaves temporarily but then returns and holds true to his vows for the rest of his days, or something along those lines. Something tells me, from what little I've heard about his arc, that that isn't necessarily canon...

Then it was off to Amgarrak. Several months later... or something.

[caradoc2000]

I thought you said to play a slow playthrough

Nevertheless, you can get a new legend with DA2.

[JeffZero]

Dace has a summon bronto spell. Dace is good people.

Kind of cool how the wording of his letter reflects Aedan's accomplishments. Those sorts of permutations do impress me, even if I don't think a single DLC in Origins is on the level of most ME2 and ME3 stuff. It's still worth it as far as "I bought Ultimate Edition for $30" is concerned, especially because I hear-tell Awakening was $40 on its own at launch. Well, Awakening is a separate issue: I think it's definitely worth as much as good ME2 and ME3 DLCs, but those are all $10-15, so at launch I might have had an issue. I could see myself thinking it's worth as much as $20-25, but $40 seems rather steep. Mind you, this is all coming from someone who isn't really into the battle mechanics of Origins all that much. The fights can be fun and speccing characters has been more enjoyable than I figured, but I'm not much for WRPG stuff in general. Anything that feels vaguely MMO-ish is often a turn-off for me but I've done far worse for far less. (The payoff in this case is that it's a BioWare game and its story and characters are excellent.)

Sorry for going off on a tangent about these things in what should be a post about Amgarrak and Witch Hunt, but I guess it's the most fitting place for it. After all, I definitely got the impression Amgarrak is best savored by Origins combat enthusiasts by the end... and the warning before beginning a campaign about it being challenging was well deserved.

There isn't terribly much story to Golems of Amgarrak, but what exists is welcome. As I've said, I like the dwarven lore in Dragon Age a great deal. Someone trying to expand on Caridin's research is bad news. I told Dace as such, to which he replied "spare me your moral grounds", and I immediately looked at the menu to confirm my sudden suspicion that approval doesn't exist in this DLC. Haha. And they brought someone from Tevinter with them? Yeah, this is going to end well.

I liked the puzzles in Amgarrak and I liked the bronto, the Runic Golem and the crazy dwarf brother Brogan. Whose name is like a krogan who's a bro. Take a drink for that if you *must*, but I mean come on, it's asking for it. And the varying levels of Fade and whatnot lend surprisingly poignant atmosphere to what is at its heart a reskin of somewhere I've already been, sorta.

But Andraste's holy hairpiece, the battles.

It had been some time since I'd gotten a true blue game over in Dragon Age. I took that as a sign of pride that someone of my relative disinterest in the finer mechanics (don't expect me to ever play on Nightmare, I'll say that now!) had gotten good enough at Normal to avoid such dread. But uh, yeah. That happened thrice here.

Mind, two of those times were against the same encounter. I found the room with the Reaper's Cudgel. The sentinels were... ahem. Enraged. I was blown out of the water here. Finally I realized I needed to stop worrying about my companions because with my current setup they were doomed to quick departures. Aedan was Level 31 or so at this point and I'd groomed his Constitution significantly, plus his Dexterity was pretty great too. Nothing that'd win any awards among even the most entry-level combat devotee, no doubt, but it was enough. So I did what damage I could with the rest of the group (remember I play on console so the overhead strategy stuff doesn't apply to me) and then kited the ever-loving hell out of the remaining pack of stone *jackals* in that limited space, quick-healing as necessary and taking surprisingly little damage. The only tough part was all the animation-forced "stuns" which occurred despite my best efforts, but eventually they went down, one after the other.

Look on my works, ye mighty, and despair.

And then there was the harvester. The first stage involved a lot of me almost kicking the bucket, but it was the second stage that caused more frustration, I think. He just kept jumping around like some kind of possessed Saren (drink) and keeping on his disgusting head (but nothing is as terrifying as the Mother, sorry buddy) was slow going. But we prevailed, and we stepped away from that terrifying place, and in true horror movie format at least twenty of the bastards were freed. ...way to go, Hero of Ferelden.


A few years later, and... oh, you lucky Dog.

Witch Hunt was the last pillar. With it Aedan Cousland would depart at least from the annals of the playable character, as I understand it. I have heard it's fairly underwhelming so I was going in expecting something truly mediocre. Instead I was treated to something more up my alley than I'd expected, namely thanks to two words: Ariane and Finn.

I can see why people wanting more from the Morrigan thing -- no doubt the defining marketing aspect of the DLC -- would be left cold. And yeah, Jaison, I romanced Leliana, so I missed out on some stuff here. But I went through with the dark ritual, so I still got all that follow-up. And yeah, it was a lot of non-answering and hinting and placement for... Dragon Age II, I presume? But then, the cold reception to that game coupled with Morrigan's apparent "return to the focal point" in the Inquisition announcement trailer has me thinking maybe not even that, heh.

In any case, I was satisfied with what I got. Because, again, the companions. Quality folks, these two. I never would have imagined two of the characters I'd consider placing at the uppermost echelon of the DA1 totem pole would come from Witch Hunt. They're just funny, well-realized. Surprisingly well-developed. Finn is a hoot. Ariane is just darling. Why couldn't they be in the main game? I spent under two hours with them but it was a good two hours indeed.

I also really liked getting back to that Ferelden map briefly, even if it was barebones. The listings available referenced past events, including Amaranthine's destruction by darkspawn (although the wording here could have been better; it was a few sentences about its conditions at the start of Awakening followed by an incorrectly-formatted little blurb, "Destroyed by darkspawn.") But hey.

So is Witch Hunt like... three years or so after Origins? 9:33 or so? It's been a few years, apparently. Oh, and there was real-deal ambient dialogue among some of the mages in the Tower! DA1 has relatively little of that, mostly gossips in Origins and a few tavern-folk in Awakening and whatnot. Not counting the companions, of course, who make up for it. But yeah, one of the pairs of mages was talking about Kirkwall. Hint, hint. I know whose story is gonna take place there!

The maps were retreads, no getting around that, but I didn't care. The Lights of Arlathan were shiny and I know I'm a broken record here but the companions! Finn's adamant fascination with the past reminded me a little of myself. But Ariane's more down-to-earth, live-in-the-present, which I also appreciate. Cultural anthropology, ahoy.

Confronting Morrigan left me with a wide array of reactions, but I played it off that we were the friends Aedan once believed unequivocally we were. In Aedan's journey, I could see Morrigan's feelings develop for him, but he was always all about Leliana. Which led to some interesting drama culminating with the dark ritual. (That smirk on Aedan's face was really out-of-character for it, but uh... whatevs, ha.) And now it came to a head again, years down the road, and he wanted to know how she was doing, how the child -- his son -- was doing. And she would only say that Flemeth was more of a threat than she had previously realized, that her plans were more nefarious than she could have known, that the child was safe. And she was going into the eluvian now.

I get the impression I could have maybe joined her. But Aedan couldn't do that. And that was a final bittersweet note on their relationship, at least for the time being. Because Morrigan had loved him, but his heart was taken. And he could have gone with her to the ends of the earth now, and maybe he could have seen his son eventually if he did, and it was damned tempting to throw caution to the wind, whittle her down, discover these plots... but he had Wardens to train and Leliana ever around the bend. He had Alistair to report to and Ferelden to defend.

Morrigan departed, perhaps for good this time from Aedan Cousland's perspective. And she left him a gift... and the credits rolled.

Wait, what? What's the gift? :\\

[JeffZero]

caradoc2000 wrote...

I thought you said to play a slow playthrough

Nevertheless, you can get a new legend with DA2.

I thought so too! 


And... whew. Dragon Age: Origins Ultimate Edition is essentially complete. What a ride. Time to bask, time to reflect. Time to wait a few hours, do some homework, go for a jog and inevitably ask a few questions about DA2.

Modifié par JeffZero, 22 février 2014 - 08:15 .

[caradoc2000]

JeffZero wrote...

And... whew. Dragon Age: Origins Ultimate Edition is essentially complete. What a ride. Time to bask, time to reflect. Time to wait a few hours, do some homework, go for a jog and inevitably ask a few questions about DA2.

Pick your New Legend™,  and get your questions at DA2 forums.

Edit: Maker, my Dalish playthrough is Circle tower...

Modifié par caradoc2000, 22 février 2014 - 08:54 .

[JeffZero]

Hehe. I'm gonna rock an elf next time I play Origins. I'm really surprised how tempting it is to play another race next time. They really did well by them.

Yeah, I'll make the new topic soon. This one can keep going for as long as anyone has further commentary and then disappear into the annals of BSN history.

[DarthGizka]

It is really worth it to switch gender as well. I was quite surprised when I rolled my first dwarven princess, since my very first playthrough was as a male Aeducan.

And switch between the titanium speartip and eminence grise modes of leadership (i.e. leading from the front or from the back). Even if your party has the exact same makeup - like tank, nuker, healer, rogue - things change dramatically depending on who of them is the Prima Donna (or Prim'Uomo, as the case may be). It's a question of where the focus of the battle is.

Modifié par DarthGizka, 22 février 2014 - 11:43 .

[mousestalker]

I highly recommend playing all of the origin stories. What sex you play changes things a lot or not hardly at all depending upon origin. For the human noble origin, your sex really does not change much in game until the very end, and even then it depends upon the choices you made. The city elf origin has a different feel depending upon sex. For the dwarf noble origin, if you play a man and make a certain choice in the encounter, you may have a surprise waiting for you when you return to Orzammar. The dwarf commoner, not so much.

[DarthGizka]

And the female dwarf noble has a surprise waiting in her chamber, right at the start.

[JeffZero]

This all sounds quite exciting. I'm not one to replay games terribly often but I'm contemplating rolling female city elf next time around. It could be a year until such time, but I'll not forget these posts and I'm far less likely to do another male Cousland run because of them.

[caradoc2000]

JeffZero wrote...

This all sounds quite exciting. I'm not one to replay games terribly often but I'm contemplating rolling female city elf next time around. It could be a year until such time, but I'll not forget these posts and I'm far less likely to do another male Cousland run because of them.

If you choose to do one replay, I'd suggest female city elf (as I did earlier).

[DarthGizka]

A magic tour would make more of a change, I think... City elf is still melee. Ranged would be possible but the Dalish would object to such blasphemy, and a nice knife would go to waste.

[JeffZero]

I do hate wasting knives.

[caradoc2000]

Play through all the origins. They are fairly short 1-2 hours apiece.