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[BioWareM0d13]

One thing I've wondered about with the DA lore, is when the characters believe souls first inhabit the bodies of mortals. Does it occur at the moment of conception, at the moment of birth, or at some point in between? 

 

It is one of the things I wish the Warden could have questioned Morrigan about, as it has implications for the Dark Ritual. Did the soul of the Old God leap into an empty vessel that did not yet have a soul? Or was there already a soul there that was either destroyed, or perhaps merged with the Old God to form an abomination?

 

I had my canon Warden choose to do the DR but hesitated at first, because I wasn't entirely sure whether it was in character or not for him to do it. He'd have no problem carrying out the DR if the Old God's soul was inhabiting an empty vessel. The other two possibilities come packaged with either the murder of an innocent or denial of free will however, both of which would probably be out of character for him to go along with.

 

What are your thoughts? What exactly went on with the DR?

[AlanC9]

I'm guessing that Bio really didn't want to get into a subject that's a live issue ITRW. But yeah, it would be nice to know what the Chantry teaches.

[Shadow of Light Dragon]

According to Morrigan's dialogue, the child (such as it is right after conception) will not be harmed, only changed. We can possibly infer that applies to its soul as well, but eh. Morrigan's not above twisting the truth.

[Blazomancer]

Probably the ritual makes it possible for the soul of the child to somehow merge with the soul of the Old God. If the child were soulless during the slaying, then the case might be same as a non-grey warden slaying the Archdemon. Disturbing as it is, imagine Morrigan giving birth to a dragon. So, FWIW my guess would be that the soul is born/inhabits the child just after conception, unless the ritual somehow manages to turn the babe into a resilient soulless vessel unlike the empty soulless vessel that a darkspawn is.

[Jeffonl1]

and is Morrigan part of the Dragon Cult?

She certainly knew everything that was required

[Tommy6860]

Whatever the speculation and I find most of it fascinating, the theory behind all of this and it's underlying premise is almost Arthurian in lore. Perhaps Morrigan (another iteration of Morgana) bears a Mordred like child as depicted in the more modern renditions.

[Jeffonl1]

Whatever the speculation and I find most of it fascinating, the theory behind all of this and it's underlying premise is almost Arthurian in lore. Perhaps Morrigan (another iteration of Morgana) bears a Mordred like child as depicted in the more modern renditions.

Let's hope then that the ogb's purpose is less destructive than Mordred's...

[Corker]

Based on what Riodan says happens to a host-soul when the Archdemon comes knocking, and what Morrigan says about the child ("if it can be called such") not being harmed, I always assumed ensoulment did not occur upon conception in Thedas.  Certainly in our world, different milestones have been suggested for when that happens.  Conception is a popular one, but not the only one.

[Abelas Forever!]

One thing I've wondered about with the DA lore, is when the characters believe souls first inhabit the bodies of mortals. Does it occur at the moment of conception, at the moment of birth, or at some point in between? 

 

It is one of the things I wish the Warden could have questioned Morrigan about, as it has implications for the Dark Ritual. Did the soul of the Old God leap into an empty vessel that did not yet have a soul? Or was there already a soul there that was either destroyed, or perhaps merged with the Old God to form an abomination?

 

I had my canon Warden choose to do the DR but hesitated at first, because I wasn't entirely sure whether it was in character or not for him to do it. He'd have no problem carrying out the DR if the Old God's soul was inhabiting an empty vessel. The other two possibilities come packaged with either the murder of an innocent or denial of free will however, both of which would probably be out of character for him to go along with.

 

What are your thoughts? What exactly went on with the DR?

 

Morrigan says that the child doesn't have a soul so the soul of the old god doesn't destroy or merge with the soul of the child. I'm not sure however is the soul of the old god similar than the normal souls of the children because you can learn from it and I think that is not possible with the normal souls. So if you can learn from the old god then does the child get the personality of the old god? I think that might be possible. So the child is very special and it's not corrupted by the darkspawn. But we don't know what kind of person that old god is. Is that god good or evil and how did the corruption affect the soul of the old god. What I'm trying to say that even if the soul is pure then does it remember the times when it was corrupted and was involved in killing a lot of people. Does that make the old god crazy or was the old god crazy in the beginning? What does the old god want? Maybe it has desires the conquer the whole world or maybe it only wants save the world.

[Aren]

The point that makes this discussion as inconsistent are the Disciples  of the darkspawn,  they were empty  vessel , but then the architect gives them a soul in some way, if an archdemon tried to posses a disciple he will die, (so I think that not only the wardens can kill the old gods, because the disciple are 100%  like the grey wardens), however, the disciples of the darkspawn make the discussion inconsistent and full of contradictions unresolved by the writers.

OGB according to David Gaider  have more than a passing reference, so  i'm curious on how he will try to fix  this contradiction  about souls and if he will  attempt to describe the details of the dark promise,  however because of awakening i see no solution.

[X Equestris]

The point that makes this discussion as inconsistent are the Disciples  of the darkspawn,  they were empty  vessel , but then the architect gives them a soul in some way, if an archdemon tried to posses a disciple he will die, (so I think that not only the wardens can kill the old gods, because the disciple are 100%  like the grey wardens), however, the disciples of the darkspawn make the discussion inconsistent and full of contradictions unresolved by the writers.
OGB according to David Gaider  have more than a passing reference, so  i'm curious on how he will try to fix  this contradiction  about souls and if he will  attempt to describe the details of the dark promise,  however because of awakening i see no solution.

The Disciples may not truly have a soul, only a facsimile of one. All we ever really see them do that differs from normal darkspawn is speak.

[Icy Magebane]

I always assumed that the Archdemon's soul destroyed that of the host... just one more reason for me to avoid the Dark Ritual.

[Riverdaleswhiteflash]

I always assumed that the Archdemon's soul destroyed that of the host... just one more reason for me to avoid the Dark Ritual.

I always thought that the idea was that the Archdemon cannot possess something with a soul, and that the OGB is only able to survive having the soul of the Archdemon inside of it because it was so young as to not have developed even a fetal heartbeat, much less a functioning brain or anything that can really be described as a soul. The whole "Archdemon's soul destroys that of the host" thing, as I understand it, is supposed to only be relevant when an Archdemon is killed the traditionally prescribed way, and that only because the traditionally prescribed way means that the souls each destroy the other.

[Icy Magebane]

I always thought that the idea was that the Archdemon cannot possess something with a soul, and that the OGB is only able to survive having the soul of the Archdemon inside of it because it was so young as to not have developed even a fetal heartbeat, much less a functioning brain or anything that can really be described as a soul. The whole "Archdemon's soul destroys that of the host" thing, as I understand it, is supposed to only be relevant when an Archdemon is killed the traditionally prescribed way, and that only because the traditionally prescribed way means that the souls each destroy the other.

Nah, I like the story better when Morrigan is intentionally destroying the soul of her unborn child.  It fits with her character, so I'll wait until Gaider says something to disprove that before I change my mind...

[Arisugawa]

The Disciples may not truly have a soul, only a facsimile of one. All we ever really see them do that differs from normal darkspawn is speak.

 

I would say that showing deliberate attempts at diplomacy, patience, coercion, compromise, and strategy are indications of a much higher evolved being than the brutal, mindless flood that was the darkspawn of the Blight.

 

I actually with Aren on this. Without further in-world elaboration, what we know of the darkspawn doesn't seem to allow the existence of something like the Architect or the Disciplines to ever come into being. There's always the possibility that Riordan and others are simply wrong and they don't realize how wrong they are, but it seems relatively unlikely.

 

I've never bought the Architect's explanation that he was merely a mutation or anomaly - it always felt like handwaving on the part of the narrative to try and force the player into a moral conundrum on how to handle the Awakening storyline. It's one of the reasons that I despise Awakening to this day, and why it almost killed my interest in the franchise.

[X Equestris]

I would say that showing deliberate attempts at diplomacy, patience, coercion, compromise, and strategy are indications of a much higher evolved being than the brutal, mindless flood that was the darkspawn of the Blight.
 
I actually with Aren on this. Without further in-world elaboration, what we know of the darkspawn doesn't seem to allow the existence of something like the Architect or the Disciplines to ever come into being. There's always the possibility that Riordan and others are simply wrong and they don't realize how wrong they are, but it seems relatively unlikely.
 
I've never bought the Architect's explanation that he was merely a mutation or anomaly - it always felt like handwaving on the part of the narrative to try and force the player into a moral conundrum on how to handle the Awakening storyline. It's one of the reasons that I despise Awakening to this day, and why it almost killed my interest in the franchise.

Most of the Disciples we see do not display attributes like diplomacy, patience, or compromise. Even regular Alphas and Emissaries strategize.

There is also the theory that the Architect is actually a Magister of Tevinter, like Corypheus, who has forgotten what he once was.

[Riverdaleswhiteflash]

Nah, I like the story better when Morrigan is intentionally destroying the soul of her unborn child.  It fits with her character, so I'll wait until Gaider says something to disprove that before I change my mind...

I'll grant that it wouldn't necessarily be OOC for her, but I'd always thought that Archdemons couldn't destroy their host's souls without dying in the process. (Though maybe the Ritual works by the soul not being strong enough to kill the Archdemon's rather than being nonexistent.)

[Icy Magebane]

I'll grant that it wouldn't necessarily be OOC for her, but I'd always thought that Archdemons couldn't destroy their hosts souls without dying in the process. (Though maybe the Ritual works by the soul not being strong enough to kill the Archdemon's rather than being nonexistent.)

Well, there has to be something to the child for the Taint to even take effect, so I won't rule out the possibility that it's merely an extremely weak, underdeveloped soul that is easily destroyed.  But it's only a theory.  I don't have any evidence to prove it and I'm not even saying that I'm right.  It's mainly based on my personal opinion of "when life begins."  Unless Gaider (or somebody else) tells us how it works on Thedas, all we can really do is speculate...

[MouseHopper]

Thank you so much for this fascinating topic; one which I'm sure we among us can never resolve.  However, it is more than worthy of a healthy discussion.  For me it seemed that the DR was intended as a means to keep the Morrigan story alive.  I think she was a popular character, and it was an interesting way to bring her character forward into future editions of the game and yet keep the mystery going.  As far as how the child was impacted by the soul, I expect that the developers deliberately left that up to our individual imaginations.  This is clearly illustrated here in this thread.  So many of us have differing ideas of how and when life begins, and more specifically how this particular soul was impacted in this particular game that I think it was left to us to decide what took place.  Since it is a role-playing game it would seem that we should not be beholden to someone else's imagination in this respect.

[DinkyD]

Logically, what we do know is that in spite of its "early stage", the "child" is at least capable of association with a particular soul or essence, otherwise Morrigan's proposal makes no sense.

 

<Shrugs> Like Morrigan says in a different context "make of that what you will"

[Riverdaleswhiteflash]

Since this is back, my understanding is that Inquisition answers this question.

 

Spoiler

The game represents Kieran and Urthemiel as sharing one body, but still being mentally and spiritually two beings: the OG and the B. In fact I'm given to understand that Flemeth is able to take Urthemiel from Kieran's body without killing him or removing his soul. Which doesn't really support my previous understanding of the Ritual (namely, that it worked because Kieran doesn't have a soul yet and the Archdemon is suckered into becoming his soul, sort of like an involuntary version of that thing Kurama did in the backstory of Yu Yu Hakusho in order to not die) but answers the question of "did Morrigan kill her child's soul?"

[procutemeister]

I think that the Dark Ritual worked because the child in Morrigan's womb would have been only a few days or so old. At that age I would say that a person's soul isn't really formed yet, and when the soul of Urthemiel entered the baby the two souls would not "cancel each other out", but Urthemiel would have to inhabit fetus!Kieran while Kieran's actual soul formed and grew as his body did. So the two souls within the body are separate--hence Flemeth supposedly being able to remove Urthemiel's soul from Kieran's body without harming him.

[Warden Majere]

There is another interesting point that Inquisition brings up. 

Spoiler

A soul cannot enter an unwilling host. Morrigan was never in any danger from Flemeth. While we could say that Flemeth might be lying, I disagree. Do you recall when the Warden first encounters Uldred in the Circle Tower? He looks to the mage and asks, "Do you accept the gift I offer?" This shows that the demons could not simply jump into the mages' bodies. So, isn't it safe to say that one of three things happened during the Dark Ritual? 

1. The child's body contained no soul at the moment of Urthemiuel's death.

2. Kieran's soul allowed Urthemiel to take up residency.

3. While Urthemiel technically took possession of Kieran, Morrigan was the current host. This is why she was so certain of the Ritual's success, because she was the willing host.

[Aren]

It doesn't make any sense the lore is full of contradictions

 

Spoiler

 look at Corypheus he can possess even by forcing the will of the host.