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[Jedi Master of Orion]

I really don't think there was much of a point in reading too much into Michel's defeat of the Dalish Warleader. There are many chevaliers in the book, most of them are nowhere near as skilled as him. The only one that doesn't die like a nameless nobody is Gaspard.

 

And we know from playing three games that Dalish Elves, City Elves, Humans, Dwarves and Tal'Vashoth can potentially have the training that makes them powerful enough to be protagonists. Pretty sure any one of the Inquisitors or Warden-Commanders could have defeated Michel in a fight, for example.

[Qun00]

I find it a little hypocritical that Felassan criticises the Dalish for caring only about the past.

Totally unlike himself, right.

[AlleluiaElizabeth]

I find it a little hypocritical that Felassan criticises the Dalish for caring only about the past.

Totally unlike himself, right.

Have you finished the novel, yet?

[Qun00]

The fact that he acknowledges the value of modern people doesn't equal wanting to be part of society.

[Jedi Master of Orion]

He's a monster anyway. Moral judgments from Fel'essan should be of little value.

[Gervaise]

Felassan is only demonstrating the same attitude towards the Dalish that Solas does.   Felassan is happy enough to encourage them when he wants something from them.   I mean just who gave them the idea of activating the eluvians in the first place?    It seems a bit convenient that Felassan just happens to know the one Dalish clan whose Keeper is trying to get them working when Felassan himself is on a mission to obtain the eluvians for his boss and is on first name terms with the demon who they have summoned who has the means to do so.

 

It seems rather ironic that Solas should be so critical of the Dalish trying to preserve the past when he actually wants to destroy the current world in order to restore it.    The Dalish method of recovering their culture seems far less destructive.   Still at least you are allowed to call him out on that one, pointing out that they are at least trying to restore something of the world he admires so much and he actually apologises, not that it costs him much to do so.

[Mistic]

It seems rather ironic that Solas should be so critical of the Dalish trying to preserve the past when he actually wants to destroy the current world in order to restore it.    The Dalish method of recovering their culture seems far less destructive.   Still at least you are allowed to call him out on that one, pointing out that they are at least trying to restore something of the world he admires so much and he actually apologises, not that it costs him much to do so.

 

I think his main problem with the Dalish is that for all their obsession about ancient elven lore, they got it completely wrong. They don't know what ancient Elvhenan was really like, what their "gods" were really like, what their tattoos really mean or how the elves lost immortality.

 

Imagine being Solas, going to the Dalish and discovering that far from considering him a dashing rebel hero who fought slavery, he's the evilest evil in their tales, that they revere what he knows to be false gods, that they blame the wrong people for their mortality and that they don't realize that the most positive aspects of their culture are not really ancient elven practices and it's better that way.

 

From our perspective, it would be like waking up 2,000 years from now and discovering that humans worship Hitler and Stalin as gods, believing everything good and pure in this world came from them, proudly displaying fashion based on the looks of concentration camp prisoners and thinking that the neighbouring country invented infectious diseases. Then, when you try to approach them and tell them that they got it wrong, they look down on you and tell you you are not a "true" human and that they know more because thay are the "keepers of the lost lore". I can understand why he's bitter about it.

[In Exile]

Felassan is only demonstrating the same attitude towards the Dalish that Solas does. Felassan is happy enough to encourage them when he wants something from them. I mean just who gave them the idea of activating the eluvians in the first place? It seems a bit convenient that Felassan just happens to know the one Dalish clan whose Keeper is trying to get them working when Felassan himself is on a mission to obtain the eluvians for his boss and is on first name terms with the demon who they have summoned who has the means to do so.

It seems rather ironic that Solas should be so critical of the Dalish trying to preserve the past when he actually wants to destroy the current world in order to restore it. The Dalish method of recovering their culture seems far less destructive. Still at least you are allowed to call him out on that one, pointing out that they are at least trying to restore something of the world he admires so much and he actually apologises, not that it costs him much to do so.

Solas doesn't want to restore the past. He wants to return the world to the state that it was in the past. He laments the loss of elvhen culture, in part, but all of it is always coloured by the fact that he changed the nature of the world. He does not want to see a return to the era of the Evanuris - he rebelled against everything they represented.

From his POV, the Dalish are obsessed with an absurd fantasy of a past and culture that never existed and venerate an insane group of False god kings/queens.

Also, remember, to Solas it isn't the past. To him, he woke up from that world just a little while ago. It's as much the past as the 2000s are the past for us.

[Jedi Master of Orion]

Solas can't possibly believe he deserves to be thought of as a dashing hero, he destroyed his entire civilization. (And in fact he says the stories of him in Trespasser romanticize him too much)

[Qun00]

Solas can't possibly believe he deserves to be thought of as a dashing hero, he destroyed his entire civilization. (And in fact he says the stories of him in Trespasser romanticize him too much)

True. For all his flaws, Solas doesn't lack humility.

[AlleluiaElizabeth]

The fact that he acknowledges the value of modern people doesn't equal wanting to be part of society.

It shows he's not only caring about the past though. Briala doesn't want to bring back past Elvhenan. She wants to uplift her people in the here and now. Also, Felassan is the one who wards her off romanticizing about the past, reminding her that someone "had to polish the doorknobs" or whatever it was. He's the reason she even knows there was slavery and the trappings of empire in Arlathan. I think he stopped being for bringing back that past around the beginning of the book, if not before the book's timeline even started. He just didn't have an alternative to actually be for instead till Briala got the eluvians and her intentions solidified.

[rolson00]

Solas can't possibly believe he deserves to be thought of as a dashing hero, he destroyed his entire civilization. (And in fact he says the stories of him in Trespasser romanticize him too much)

One thing i noticed was in elven time he didn't like the world so he changed it and now thousands of years later he hates the world he himself is responsible for creating and so wants to destroy it Solas pretty much sh*t the bed and doesn't want to lay in it.  

[In Exile]

Solas can't possibly believe he deserves to be thought of as a dashing hero, he destroyed his entire civilization. (And in fact he says the stories of him in Trespasser romanticize him too much)

 

He doesn't. He doesn't even see himself as heroic figure for what he did - see his conversation with Cole, who tries to tell him that he saved the elves, no matter what the result. It's not about the Dread Wolf being a devil-like figure, as it is about the Evanuris being worshipped again. 

 

One thing i noticed was in elven time he didn't like the world so he changed it and now thousands of years later he hates the world he himself is responsible for creating and so wants to destroy it Solas pretty much sh*t the bed and doesn't want to lay in it.  

 

Well, yeah. And he knows it. The point of his endgame is that he wants to fix it. It's just that, from his POV, fixing his mistake is not a pleasant outcome for the people now alive.

[Vit246]

I think his main problem with the Dalish is that for all their obsession about ancient elven lore, they got it completely wrong. They don't know what ancient Elvhenan was really like, what their "gods" were really like, what their tattoos really mean or how the elves lost immortality.

 

Imagine being Solas, going to the Dalish and discovering that far from considering him a dashing rebel hero who fought slavery, he's the evilest evil in their tales, that they revere what he knows to be false gods, that they blame the wrong people for their mortality and that they don't realize that the most positive aspects of their culture are not really ancient elven practices and it's better that way.

 

They did not get it completely wrong. 

I think my problem with Solas is he implies its their fault for not knowing better and they somehow should have, or that they shouldn't have transformed or slightly romanticized some ancient elven lore with more positive aspects, like their Vallaslin being a rite of passage and a source of pride and happiness.

[Wulfram]

True. For all his flaws, Solas doesn't lack humility.

Maybe I'm being pedantic, but I'd say he does. He still decides to take upon himself the decision to destroy the world.

He doesn't lack for self-recrimination, but that I think is a different thing.

He also I think still wants to see himself as basically a good, compassionate person who made a big mistake - which may well fit with his actions in the distant past but sits poorly with his current activities.

[In Exile]

They did not get it completely wrong. 

I think my problem with Solas is he implies its their fault for not knowing better and they somehow should have, or that they shouldn't have transformed or slightly romanticized some ancient elven lore with more positive aspects, like their Vallaslin being a rite of passage and a source of pride and happiness.

 

His problem isn't that they have a culture - is that they think their culture is his culture, and that he is wrong for suggesting otherwise. 

[Mistic]

They did not get it completely wrong. 

I think my problem with Solas is he implies its their fault for not knowing better and they somehow should have, or that they shouldn't have transformed or slightly romanticized some ancient elven lore with more positive aspects, like their Vallaslin being a rite of passage and a source of pride and happiness.

 

He doesn't blame them for getting it wrong, given the many horrible things that happened to the elves in the past. In fact, his dialogue provides several occassions in which he commends them for trying ("The Dalish remember fragments of fragments, but that is more than most"). A Dalish Inquisitor romancing Solas can argue that Vallaslin now mean something different for them, and Solas concedes the point. That's not his issue.

 

Problems start when Dalish believe themselves to know more than anyone else, hold their view is the right one and use it to decide what is really Elvhen and what not ("Never mistake them for arbiters of "true" Elvhen culture").

[Vit246]

Problems start when Dalish believe themselves to know more than anyone else, hold their view is the right one and use it to decide what is really Elvhen and what not ("Never mistake them for arbiters of "true" Elvhen culture").

 

Is it hard to understand why the dalish might think that way? 

[Gervaise]

The Dalish are trying to do their best from half remembered folk tales and things they are able to dig up in ruins.   Felassan mocks them for the fact they aren't interested in the present but in some ways they are only being realists.   They don't have the numbers to do anything significant.   Unlike the clan in the book, most other clans are willing to take in city elves trying to escape the drudgery and mistreatment of the human world.    It is not the fault of the Dalish that they have idealised their gods and to be honest have they done any different than the human Chantry?   At least the Dalish have a reason why their gods won't answer them, and that memory is entirely correct; it is all down to Fen'Harel.   Perhaps if he had taken the trouble to ensure his side of the story was passed on then they might have remembered the gods differently.  

 

However, we do only have his side of the story from his viewpoint.   Of course he is going to criticise the Evanuris.    I just think back to the Temple of Mythal.  Abelas says that Mythal was murdered but not by whom.    All the other Creators are found within her Temple, which would seem odd if they were responsible for her death.   If someone had said to the Dalish that Mythal was murdered, would their reaction not be to think the Forgotten Ones were responsible?    In fact, Solas admits they didn't get it wrong about Mythal; she did care for her people and administered justice, protecting them, as they remember.   So wouldn't they feel if they got it right about her, then why not the others.    The Evanuris left a warning about Fen'Harel; the memories of the People in the Library seem pretty angry against him or simply bewildered at the disappearance of their gods.   Clearly they didn't appreciate that it was done in the name of freedom or the Veil was the reason they lost their magic (and later their immortality).   They were witnesses to events as they happened and were the ones who transmitted the story to future generations.   They blamed Fen'Harel and that is what was passed down through history.   How can he blame the people thousands of years later if they were passed the wrong version of the story?   Nor did they have any reason to believe him in the present because he didn't announce himself as an ancient elvhen but simply an apostate elf who claimed to know stuff because of lying around in ruins.    Of course the Dalish were likely to react badly; they probably thought he was a bit crazy.  You don't just throw over years of tradition because some stranger claims to know different without any concrete evidence to endorse this.

 

Even Briala had a romantic view of what Arlathan must have been like, until Felassan questions this.   She was more receptive to his opinion because she had received a bad experience with the Dalish clan.    Yet if he had allowed her to join the Dalish all those years ago, it might well have been a different clan and she would have had a different way of looking at things.   This is presumably why he stopped her, though I do wonder if it was because he wanted an agent in the court of the Empress more than he didn't want her joining the Dalish.   However, he was probably right that she could do more for the elves with the ear of the Empress than she could achieve out with the clans.   It is not that the majority of Dalish don't care; they just don't have the power to do anything other than ride around in aravels, collecting what they can of the past and dreaming of a better future.   It is a matter of pure survival.   Briala's expectations of them was being unreasonable as Felassan could have told her if he cared to.   Instead he let her continue in her self deception whilst sending her back to the empress.   At any point he could have enlightened her as to the true situation with the Dalish but he didn't.   Nor did he apparently tell that clan where he was getting his information from until it suited him to do so.  Had he done so earlier, then may be their reaction might have been different or at least they might have understood what was being expected of them before Felassan, Briala and others turned up in their camp.

[In Exile]

Is it hard to understand why the dalish might think that way? 

 

Yes, absolutely. Venerating some past society they don't know anything about has absolutely no logical connection to their plight. Their racism sort of does, but that doesn't mean they need to incorporate it as part of their theology.

[Ghost Gal]

His problem isn't that they have a culture - is that they think their culture is his culture, and that he is wrong for suggesting otherwise. 

 

Problems start when Dalish believe themselves to know more than anyone else, hold their view is the right one and use it to decide what is really Elvhen and what not ("Never mistake them for arbiters of "true" Elvhen culture").

 

 

I'm sorry guys, but I've never seen a Dalish character claim that their culture is a pure, perfect, complete representation of "true Elvhen culture," nor that they think they've already got all the answers to the past and don't need to learn more. If you have seen a Dalish character or two who thinks that (maybe from a novel or comic), then I'm sorry, but they're the exception.

 

Everything I've ever seen and heard about the Dalish, from codex's to character testimony, is that they know they don't have most of the answers to the past. They know their culture is an incomplete reconstruction of ancient elven culture. They want to learn and discover more about their past (and are constantly digging and searching) because they consider their culture a Work In Progress in reconstructing the Dales and Arlathan--yet everyone accuses them of claiming they already have all the answers and they're a complete reconstruction of Elvhenan?

 

At worst, they're condescending because they believe their culture knows more about ancient elven culture compared to others. And, yeah. Before ancient elves made themselves known, they had every reason to think so. Most dwarves and humans and Qunari don't care about anything "elfy," so of course they don't know as much about ancient elven stuff. Most city elves want to retain their heritage too, but it's established in-universe that most city elves have forgotten most of their history and lore.

 

However, they're still open to admitting they were mistaken about the past, like bringing the letter from the Knight's Tomb to the Dalish, who immediately accept it as a relic of their lost past and send an apology gift to Red Crossing (after centuries of claiming that the Chantry's claim of an elven attack on Red Crossing being propoganda). The Trespasser end slides also show that that both city elves and Dalish elves flock to Fen'Harel's side, rather than all Dalish rejecting him because "we've already recreated the past / we don't need you / Fen'Harel is the villain of our lore, so we're not trusting you."

 

I also don't really find Solas to be a reliable narrator for his "I tried to share knowledge and they cruelly spurned me" tale of woe. Much as I love him, he conceals the fact that he's an ancient elf, which doesn't really establish good ethos with people you're trying to win over. Also, from what we've seen in the game, he can come across as a pretty arrogant and condescending know-it-all himself.

 

He doesn't blame them for getting it wrong, given the many horrible things that happened to the elves in the past. In fact, his dialogue provides several occassions in which he commends them for trying ("The Dalish remember fragments of fragments, but that is more than most"). A Dalish Inquisitor romancing Solas can argue that Vallaslin now mean something different for them, and Solas concedes the point. That's not his issue.

 

Yes he does. When you first talk to him about elven culture, he'll express disdain for the Dalish, saying things like, "while they're busy picking through ruins, I've gone into the Fade and experienced the past firsthand," and called them "children acting out traditions they don't understand." I was surprised that there was no option in-game to point out it's ridiculous to hold it against the Dalish as a culture for not Fade-walking the way he does since it's common knowledge

 

He does concede later that they're trying, but that's further along in the game, usually after a Dalish Inquisitor befriends/romances him.

[Wulfram]

Solas seems to consider Sera less elfy - "furthest from what you were meant to be" - than the Dalish.

[Mistic]

I'm sorry guys, but I've never seen a Dalish character claim that their culture is a pure, perfect, complete representation of "true Elvhen culture," nor that they think they've already got all the answers to the past and don't need to learn more. If you have seen a Dalish character or two who thinks that (maybe from a novel or comic), then I'm sorry, but they're the exception.

 

And where do we suggest that they claim that their culture is "a pure, perfect, complete representation of true Elvhen culture" or that they think they have all the answers? Not even Solas claims that. The problem, again, isn't that, but what you point out later: they're condescending because they believe their culture knows more about ancient elven culture compared to others.

 

Not only shouldn't that be a good enough reason to be condescending, given that even they have to admit their knowledge is limited, but now we know a lot of that knowledge is wrong, starting from their gods. In an ironic twist, they were right about immortality but wrong about their loss of it. That last mistake is actually used to support a racist view of history and human-elven relations.

 

However, that hasn't stopped the Dalish from considering themselves "the last of the Elvhenan" (from DA:O's Dalish origin onwards), despite not being that at all. They are not the last, and their culture doesn't have much to do with actual Elvhenan. For someone like Solas, it must be as mortifying as it was for the Byzantines to see the Holy Roman Empire usurping their title of "Empire of the Romans".

 

Yes he does. When you first talk to him about elven culture, he'll express disdain for the Dalish, saying things like, "while they're busy picking through ruins, I've gone into the Fade and experienced the past firsthand," and called them "children acting out traditions they don't understand." I was surprised that there was no option in-game to point out it's ridiculous to hold it against the Dalish as a culture for not Fade-walking the way he does since it's common knowledge

 

He does concede later that they're trying, but that's further along in the game, usually after a Dalish Inquisitor befriends/romances him.

 

Actually, if you are polite with him, he apologizes to the Dalish Inquisitor in the very first conversation regarding that issue ("You are right, of course. The fault is mine for expecting what the Dalish could never truly accomplish").

 

Also, that conversation and the one in the first mission with a Dalish Inquisitor mention that his contacts with the Dalish haven't been very good, to say the least. From Dalish "feeling differently" on the subject of all elves being the same people to mocking his stories and him as a "flat-ear", it's pretty evident that if knowledge-sharing was lacking, it wasn't precisely because Solas wasn't willing ("At least you are asking. That is something. I will answer as I can").

[Patchwork]

Solas seems to consider Sera less elfy - "furthest from what you were meant to be" - than the Dalish.

 

 

Maybe because she's so fearful of spirits, demons and the Fade in general? It seems to be a fundamental part of being elven and Solas in particular would find her terrified rejection of it baffling.   

[In Exile]

Solas seems to consider Sera less elfy - "furthest from what you were meant to be" - than the Dalish.

 

I don't think that's what he means, because he doesn't compare her to the Dalish. It's pretty clear he's comparing here to what elves were as beings. Given that, quite apart from her abject fear of all things that are effectively the birthright of elves (like magic and the Fade), she's also pretty much tone-deaf to things like magic, and generally very much against him in values and personality.