42 réponses à ce sujet

[bootyislovebootyislife]

I love the Dalish and i am so so so so glad that the Elven Inquisitor is Dalish. However, I don't understand why they gave us to companions who seem to dislike the Dalish?

 

Solas thinks they're hostile and Sera dislikes them saying they shouldn't cling to the past, even ''hoping you're not too elfy'' when you meet her.

 

I don't mind, since i wanted to play Dalish anyway, but doesn't this suck for players who might've wanted to play a city elf for example, that Sera would have most likely loved?

 

I dunno i guess i'm kinds bothered too since we don't have a strong defender of Dalish customs in the party like we did in DA2 xd

[Br3admax]

We all have our trials. 

[Xilizhra]

Sera dislikes them saying they shouldn't cling to the past, even ''hoping you're not too elfy'' when you meet her.

****.

 

Well, here's hoping for character development, I guess.

[Xilizhra]

Dalish wouldn't be outcasts if everyone treated them nicely.

 

It's part of the charm of playing one. To be the oddball or misfit.

True. I guess my prime worry is that the companions will prejudice players against the Dalish.

[LOLandStuff]

You don't need companions for that. Just take a good look at the Dalish, they're doing it themselves.

[Xilizhra]

I think it'll ultimately be OK, depending on choices.. I mean, we could even win Fenris over as mages. Or Sten as female. I doubt they'd be too harsh here.

 

edit: Err.. or do you mean it'll have a negative effect on players themselves?

The players themselves. I'm unconcerned with the companions; if they don't want to accept me, that's their problem.

[Sylentmana]

I see this as an opportunity. This time, I get to be the Merrill of the party: quirky and adorable.

[Mistic]

I love the Dalish and i am so so so so glad that the Elven Inquisitor is Dalish. However, I don't understand why they gave us to companions who seem to dislike the Dalish?

 

That has an easy answer: because it provides conflict, which is necessary for any interesting story. By breaking pan-elven fantasies and making PCs face characters with preconceived ideas, we have a richer understanding of what being an elf in the DA setting is. It also allows players to challenge their own preconceived ideas.

 

As Sylentmana said, it's an opportunity.

 

I dunno i guess i'm kinds bothered too since we don't have a strong defender of Dalish customs in the party like we did in DA2 xd

 

That's the role of the player, if they wish so. There was a Dalish PC in DA:O, a Dalish companion in DAII and now again a Dalish PC in DA:I. No one can say that the Dalish are underrepresented in the games. They played an important role in The Masked Empire too.

[Medhia_Nox]

Two progressive elves who aren't mired in bitter resentment or antiquated traditionalism you say? 

I'll give them high ranking positions because their people need them if they're ever going to become relevant on Thedas again.

[BloodKaiden]

Well screw them, if I wanna embrace full on Dalishness I will. I just don't believe my pc will be an asshat about it. What's wrong with a Dalish embracing his/her lost history?

[Medhia_Nox]

@StreetMagic:  You change other people through forward thinking.

 

Claiming you want equality - but you also want to be separate and have your own thing others aren't welcome to be part of - is hypocrisy.  

 

The problem with the Dalish - is that the elves of Arlathan didn't roll around in wagons with albino deer and live hunter gatherer lifestyles.  So they're not at all embracing something ancient - they've made something new and call it something ancient.

 

In D&D terms... the elves of Thedas were once High Elves... the Dalish are wood elves who think the ancient elves were always wood elves.  

 

And if a minority such as that truly wanted a land of their own again - you don't achieve that with your own bigotry, traditionalism and isolationism.  Nobody builds a nation that way...ever.  For them to achieve anything - they need to meet the powers of "now" on common ground. 

 

What's worse - is that the player base seems to want an elven nation when the Dalish clearly don't.  It has been VERY clear that the Dalish hardly communicate and that because of this - the various groups have become SO different that one of them is supposedly radically different in this story. You won't build anything that way.

 

It's as if the Native Americans could just appeal to the United States about how earth loving and harmonious a people they were... and the US would just part like the Red Sea and make room for a new nation of indigenous people. It's not going to happen... ever (that the world is a worse place for losing our tribal peoples is not actually part of the equation).

[Xilizhra]

@StreetMagic:  You change other people through forward thinking.

 

Claiming you want equality - but you also want to be separate and have your own thing others aren't welcome to be part of - is hypocrisy.  

 

The problem with the Dalish - is that the elves of Arlathan didn't roll around in wagons with albino deer and live hunter gatherer lifestyles.  So they're not at all embracing something ancient - they've made something new and call it something ancient.

 

In D&D terms... the elves of Thedas were once High Elves... the Dalish are wood elves who think the ancient elves were always wood elves.  

 

And if a minority such as that truly wanted a land of their own again - you don't achieve that with your own bigotry, traditionalism and isolationism.  Nobody builds a nation that way...ever.  For them to achieve anything - they need to meet the powers of "now" on common ground. 

 

What's worse - is that the player base seems to want an elven nation when the Dalish clearly don't.  It has been VERY clear that the Dalish hardly communicate and that because of this - the various groups have become SO different that one of them is supposedly radically different in this story. You won't build anything that way.

 

It's as if the Native Americans could just appeal to the United States about how earth loving and harmonious a people they were... and the US would just part like the Red Sea and make room for a new nation of indigenous people. It's not going to happen... ever (that the world is a worse place for losing our tribal peoples is not actually part of the equation).

Well, Bioware knows of our desires. We'll see what's done with them in DAI.

[waitwhat]

They don't just "roll around". They can fly those things. Pretty advanced magic going on there.. something humans shouldn't dismiss from the so called "backward elves". There's much to be learned both ways.

 

And yet the Dalish has absolutely no interest in learning or teaching anything with anyone not already in their clan. They won't even communicate properly with other Dalish tribes, let alone city elves or other species. The Masked Empire kind of said it best, they'd rather ignore what's happening around them and think only of the past.

[Medhia_Nox]

@Xilizhra:  Oh, I think Bioware has been very clear on their opinion of the Dalish.

 

I think the city elves will achieve change regardless of the Dalish - and I don't believe Briala has ANY allegiance to the Dalish at all.  

 

@StreetMagic:  I'm not impatient - the Dalish don't need to change.  

 

But the player base shouldn't expect the Dalish to get a "nation" until they do.  

[Xilizhra]

@Xilizhra:  Oh, I think Bioware has been very clear on their opinion of the Dalish.

Brave, honorable communitarians who've avoided being eaten by the Andrastian leviathan and have a better answer to the mage question than anything the rest of Thedas has devised?

 

Bioware gave us a Dalish protagonist instead of a city elf for a reason. Don't count us out.

[Tevinter Rose]

I'm looking forward to talking with the other elven companions and hearing Sera's opinion on my clan if she's ever heard of them. 

[Medhia_Nox]

@Xilizhra: Which ones are you thinking of exactly? 

Merrill - the communitarian who abandons her clan?

 

Or... Zathrian, the communitarian that endangers his clain for a vandetta?

 

Or how about the clan in Asunder?  Bioware actually codifies Dalish self-destruction in their novels.

 

I believe there's a chance Bioware gave elf players a Dalish - because they weren't going to write an entire game about the elven rebellion and it would have been natural for city elf players to expect a great huge portion of the game to be about that.

 

I have absolutely no vested interested in seeing the Dalish go anywhere - when I encounter a clan in game I mostly do my best to ignore them.  I just don't find all the noble savage idealism realistic at all for where Bioware will take elves in Dragon Age.  I do not believe the Dalish are the future of elves at all.

[Xilizhra]

@Xilizhra: Which ones are you thinking of exactly? 

Merrill - the communitarian who abandons her clan?

Gets kicked out.

 

 

Or... Zathrian, the communitarian that endangers his clain for a vandetta?

The clan wasn't endangered for centuries.

 

 

Or how about the clan in Asunder?  Bioware actually codifies Dalish self-destruction in their novels.

Keeping in mind that most of the anti-Dalish stuff is stated by one of the villains.

 

 

I believe there's a chance Bioware gave elf players a Dalish - because they weren't going to write an entire game about the elven rebellion and it would have been natural for city elf players to expect a great huge portion of the game to be about that.

Strictly speaking, it's not a rebellion, more a series of covert actions to prolong a civil war... assuming that the game follows on from the novel perfectly.

 

 

I have absolutely no vested interested in seeing the Dalish go anywhere - when I encounter a clan in game I mostly do my best to ignore them.  I just don't find all the noble savage idealism realistic at all for where Bioware will take elves in Dragon Age.  I do not believe the Dalish are the future of elves at all.

The Dalish are those parts of the elven population that are actually uniquely elven, as opposed to a culturally human racial minority. So unless the city elves launch some kind of major archaeological expedition into Arlathan and begin rebuilding the original civilization there, the Dalish will be what we get and where we'll start.