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A Theirin Heir


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#1
WardenElissa

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Hello everyone! This is my first post so please forgive me for any mistakes or misspellings.

 

I have played through all three games now (with all of the DLC, including items) and I have been very careful about my choices, and so I had a question about one thing in particular.

 

In my game, Alistair became the king of Ferelden, not married to Anora or Elissa, and I had a very particular reason for this.

 

In the Return to Ostagar DLC, there's a codex entry entitled "Cailan's Documents - Page 2 of 3". This particular codex entry is a letter from Arl Eamon Guerrin to his nephew, King Cailan Theirin. In this letter, the Arl points out that Queen Anora is reaching her thirtieth year and has not yet produced an heir, suggesting that she may be infertile, and so Cailan ought to consider setting her aside in favor of another woman (from the other documents found in the king's tent, it appears that the woman Cailan intended to marry instead was Empress Celene).

 

After Cailan's death, it appeared to all parties that the Theirin line was completely eradicated, with the sole exception of Alistair. King Maric was the last of his line during the rebellion against Orlais, and he fathered only one two sons. The other Theirins, those who lived during the reign of King Vanedrin and King Brandel, were slaughtered by the Orlesians and King Meghren, leaving only Moira to continue the line of King Calenhad, and she had only the one son, Maric, who had two sons, Cailan and Alistair. Cailan died childless at Ostagar, so now Alistair is the last of his line.

 

Now, in deciding who would take the throne of Ferelden, I was determined not only to make a Theirin the ruler, but also to make sure that the Theirin line endured into the future. I chose to have Alistair rule alone, unmarried, and I list my responses for each possible outcome here:

 

-Male Cousland x Anora:

In this ending, Alistair is either dead, an exile, or a Grey Warden, and the throne is completely outside of Theirin control.

 

-Female Cousland x Alistair

In this ending, the Alistair is married to the Warden, and both of them have tainted blood as a side effect of the Joining. As a result, according to Alistair's dialogue if you romance him and do NOT marry him, it is impossible for two grey wardens to produce children together. So in this ending the Theirin line is still permanently ended, at least legitimately.

 

-Alistair x Anora

In this ending, Alistair is wed to Anora, who according to Arl Eamon's letter is quite possibly barren. It is also possible that Anora was not barren, and that either Cailan himself was infertile or the couple was simply unlucky. But I decided that it was too risky to have Alistair marry a potentially barren women, especially since he is the last of Ferelden's royal line. I also didn't particularly like or trust Anora after she betrayed the Warden and Alistair in the Arl of Denerim's estate.

 

-Anora rules alone

In this ending the throne is completely outside of Theirin hands and Alistair is either dead, exiled, or a Grey Warden.

 

-Alistair rules alone

Now at least we come to the ending I chose, despite the fact that I romanced Alistair as a human noble. In this ending, after Alistair is chosen at the Landsmeet, he speaks with the Warden afterwards. Since my Warden was romanced, he has some very interesting dialogue regarding his duty to marry and produce an heir in the future.

 

"I will need to find a wife, one who can bear a child. Who will live to raise it. I don't relish it, but... I will have a duty as the king"

 

So, from this we can conclude that, if Alistair is made the sole king of Ferelden, he intends to find a wife and produce an heir. Since Anora is imprisoned and disgraced, it can be safely assumed that he won't be marrying her, and he won't be marrying the Warden either. According to Morrigan's dialogue when she proposes the Dark Ritual, she required a Grey Warden who had not been tainted for very long in order to produce a child bearing the taint. This why she must sleep with either the Warden, Alistair, or Loghain, and not Riordan. So Alistair has a time limit on producing this child, or else the taint will eventually render him infertile.

 

So, now we know that Alistair is fertile, and, if he is made sole king, that he intends to marry a woman of childbearing age and attempt to produce an heir. My question to Bioware is this: Does he?

 

The Fifth Blight happened in 9:30 Dragon, and after the events of Trespasser it is, by my count, 9:43 Dragon. 13 years have passed since Origins, meaning that Alistair only has approximately 17 years left until his Calling, and making him around 31-38 years old, assuming he was around 18-25 in Origins. He must have married during that time; does he have an heir yet?

 

In future Dragon Age games, I would like to have the matter settled, for both Anora and Alistair if either one of them was left to rule alone. Who knows, perhaps Anora wasn't infertile after all, and she could also have married, or perhaps even produced an heir with Alistair and founded a new line of kings of Theirin and Mac Tir blood after all. I think myself and other fans of the franchise would be interested to hear the end results of the choices we made regarding Ferelden's royalty.

 

Thank you for reading my long and poorly written wall of text. Hopefully my first post on here was satisfactory.  :D


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#2
MrMrPendragon

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It is kind of a given that he will get someone pregnant before the taint destroys his body.

 

It would be too much of a slap to the face if the writers just let the bloodline die out even after making the decision of preserving it by picking Alistair as king.


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#3
Andraste_Reborn

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There's no reference in Inquisition to Alistair having a wife or an heir, no matter what you did during Origins. Solo King Alistair has apparently stayed single for ten years because of ... um .... no, I got nothing.

 

I'm pretty sure Ferelden is going to be left without an heir again, regardless of who the ruler or rulers were as the end of DAO. Neither Alistair and Anora together or Alistair alone have produced any offspring in all that time, and solo Anora never marries either. (Obviously Alistair and a Cousland Warden don't have any kids, but that one was expected.)


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#4
Andromelek

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You can convince him to do the Dark Ritual, on that way he has a child, though, he heavily disapproves such ritual unless a romanced Warden asks him, alas if he remains as King he doesn't met Kieran, and he won't find out he is not the monster he thought, so, if you want to preserve his bloodline you can do it, but there is no chance to keep such bloodline in power.
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#5
Sifr

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There's no reference in Inquisition to Alistair having a wife or an heir, no matter what you did during Origins. Solo King Alistair has apparently stayed single for ten years because of ... um .... no, I got nothing.

 

I'm pretty sure Ferelden is going to be left without an heir again, regardless of who the ruler or rulers were as the end of DAO. Neither Alistair and Anora together or Alistair alone have produced any offspring in all that time, and solo Anora never marries either. (Obviously Alistair and a Cousland Warden don't have any kids, but that one was expected.)

 

If you had Alistair and Anora marry, both show up in Inquisition (at the end of "In Hushed Whispers"), but we have no indication that they've had any children during the ten years that have elapsed since Origins.

 

Assuming that Anora is able to have children (since it could easily have been Cailan who was infertile), the lack of children could be due to Alistair having trouble fathering children due to the presence of the Darkspawn taint in his blood. The same would be true of a King Cousland who married Anora, as it seems the longer one is Joined, the more difficult fathering a child becomes.

 

For Alistair and Anora if they ruled alone, that would leave Alistair with the fertility issue, while Anora has the issue of finding a husband to actually father a child first before she can attempt to have a child. One of the epilogue slides (assuming it's semi-canon) states that Anora has somewhat impossible standards and is unwed because no-one matches up to her father in her mind.

 

I'd say that the only solution that would work going into the future is for us to discover that Cailan himself had an illegitimate child, since according to Anora in Origins, he apparently wasn't entirely faithful to her during their marriage. That Alistair himself was illegitimate before becoming King would set enough precedent for the Bannorn to accept it, especially since one could make the argument that Cailan's child would technically have just as much (or more) right to the throne than Alistair does.

 

(And WardenElissa, welcome to the forums!) :D


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#6
theskymoves

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The Fifth Blight happened in 9:30 Dragon, and after the events of Trespasser it is, by my count, 9:43 Dragon. 13 years have passed since Origins, meaning that Alistair only has approximately 17 years left until his Calling, and making him around 31-38 years old, assuming he was around 18-25 in Origins. He must have married during that time; does he have an heir yet?

 

 

Alistair is 20-21 during the 5th Blight. He was born in 9:10 Dragon. (Per The World of Thedas, Vol. 1, page 140.)


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#7
SentinelMacDeath

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My headcanon is that my Queen warden became pregnant and that's why she's now off to find a cure for the Calling. Alistair doesn't know that tho 


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#8
BansheeOwnage

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There's no reference in Inquisition to Alistair having a wife or an heir, no matter what you did during Origins. Solo King Alistair has apparently stayed single for ten years because of ... um .... no, I got nothing.

Because he didn't find someone he loved, obviously. He's a romantic. Also, he probably didn't have time.



#9
NRO TYN

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I would really like to see this resolve by the time were in tieventer, but sadly we must wait 2-3 years for DA4

 

My warden married Anora for power



#10
Darkly Tranquil

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I honestly don't know if they will address it. I think it will depend of whether it ends up being in some way relevant to upcoming events. If it doesn't have any particular plot significance I think they will just leave it open and let people headcanon what they want to.

#11
myahele

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Well there's a theory that Morrigan might be Marics daughter with Flemeth ... Morrigan always lives   :ph34r:


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#12
SentinelMacDeath

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half-sibling baby... great....

#13
BansheeOwnage

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half-sibling baby... great....

"Is Kieran... special?"


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#14
TobiTobsen

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Because he didn't find someone he loved, obviously. He's a romantic. Also, he probably didn't have time.

 

Pretty sure that Eamon died of a very severe case of facepalm in that timeline.


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#15
coldsteelblue

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My thinking was this: The Ferelden Wardens are off searching for a cure for the taint during Inquisition* & if you have a surviving Warden who Romanced Leliana, she mentions that she & The Warden are pretty much back together, also a final slide makes mention of them spending time together a Leliana's childhood home. This says to me that a cure has been found, as HoF has finished their quest (how long it took we have no idea). I think that the taint cure will become canon & a King Alistair will take it.

 

Just my thoughts

 

*No idea about having a deceased HoF.



#16
Hydwn

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You can convince him to do the Dark Ritual, on that way he has a child, though, he heavily disapproves such ritual unless a romanced Warden asks him, alas if he remains as King he doesn't met Kieran, and he won't find out he is not the monster he thought, so, if you want to preserve his bloodline you can do it, but there is no chance to keep such bloodline in power.

 

This is interesting, because among the endings you can have is Leliana freeing the mages, and free mages as a part of society.

 

It never once mentions noble lines, but since that's based on a Chantry prohibition against "Magic is meant to serve man and never to rule over him," it is entirely possible that Leliana removes those restrictions.  And since Kieran has his old-god-ness removed, he is likely a perfectly normal mage child now.  

 

That means there is one very specific path could theoretically get you a Theirin on the throne, assuming Alistair doesn't find a wife and reproduce before he's infertile (assuming that hasn't happened already):  Alistair produces Keirin, Alistair assumes throne, Liliana frees mages.

 

Of course, all this assumes that we would have heard of a kid.  DAI is from the Inquisitor's point of view, not the Warden's, and it might just be considered irrelevant from their perspective.  

 

Also, does anyone consider how odd it is that pretty much no nation in the south has a clear heir?  Celene has none, has named none, and I don't think Gaspard has children either.  The elderly Pentagast brothers have no children, and a large family ready to war for Nevarra.  Kirkwall throws its crown at a dwarf who doesn't want the job because no one else wants it - and he has no children either.  

 

Also, Kieran Theirin is a hard name to spell without looking it up!


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#17
Darkly Tranquil

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And since Kieran has his old-god-ness removed, he is likely a perfectly normal mage child now.


Is it even confirmed that Kieran is mage? If he was, is he still one without the OG soul?

#18
vbibbi

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There's no reference in Inquisition to Alistair having a wife or an heir, no matter what you did during Origins. Solo King Alistair has apparently stayed single for ten years because of ... um .... no, I got nothing.

 

I'm pretty sure Ferelden is going to be left without an heir again, regardless of who the ruler or rulers were as the end of DAO. Neither Alistair and Anora together or Alistair alone have produced any offspring in all that time, and solo Anora never marries either. (Obviously Alistair and a Cousland Warden don't have any kids, but that one was expected.)

Yes, this is what I think. If the heir of Fereldan is involved in further games (debatable since we're presumably heading north), the heir will have to be easy to import into the worldstate. So it would be easiest if Bioware limits the options of children to...zero. They can then have the same person designated as heir regardless of if the Warden marries Alistair, he marries Anora, Anora rules alone, or Warden marries Anora. The trouble is, I have no idea who would be this heir, as it seems the Theirin bloodline would be over.



#19
Darkly Tranquil

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Yes, this is what I think. If the heir of Fereldan is involved in further games (debatable since we're presumably heading north), the heir will have to be easy to import into the worldstate. So it would be easiest if Bioware limits the options of children to...zero. They can then have the same person designated as heir regardless of if the Warden marries Alistair, he marries Anora, Anora rules alone, or Warden marries Anora. The trouble is, I have no idea who would be this heir, as it seems the Theirin bloodline would be over.


And given how they have built up all the lore surrounding the whole Theirin dragon's blood thing, that would be kind of odd. Surely they've set this up for some purpose.

Game mechanics don't really seem like they would be much of a hindrance here. I see no reason why they couldn't just create a world state condition for a future DA that Alistair and Warden/Anora/placeholder-Queen have a son/daughter if they so desire. Its just a question of whether it ends up being plot relevant and consequently whether they bother.

#20
berelinde

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It would be nice to think that they would throw a bone to the players of female Wardens who put their own romantic happiness aside in order to ensure that the Theirin bloodline continues... but it might be too optimistic. The writers have an imperative even more compelling than the desire to please a portion of their fanbase: they have to keep the game universe viable, and that means limiting the number of variables in the canon worldstate. I use the word "canon" deliberately. They need to build a world that works with everyone's game, regardless of their decisions in previous games. So, as satisfying as it would be to allow players who loved and lost Alistair the consolation that they helped create a Theirin prince or princess, it might be better for them to let both Alistair and Anora remain childless. That will force the Landsmeet to elect a new king. It will tie up a lot of loose ends.

 

As the player of a mage Warden who romanced a hardened Alistair only to be relegated to the title of mistress for the sake of a legitimate prince or princess who will probably never be born, I don't like this situation at all, but I recognize the necessity of it.


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#21
Hydwn

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Is it even confirmed that Kieran is mage? If he was, is he still one without the OG soul?

 

I'd assumed, but I just checked.

 

If an old god, he will sometimes say that being born without magic is like being born blind.

 

If a human, he will sometimes say that magic isn't scary and his mother wouldn't want him to be a Templar.

 

I would assume based on that - and it's not confirmation I know - that OGB Kieran is a mage, and human Kieran is not.  The only thing we hear from if the old god soul is removed from him is "No more dreams?"  I don't know if that means the old god soul speaking to him, or if he's lost magic, or if he's a tranquil now.  We never get a followup.

 

EDIT: To bring this back to the OP, a non-mage child of Alistair has no block against the throne at all except Morrigan's wishes.  We don't know how she'd feel about that, and it would become irrelevant once Kieran has grown up.



#22
Andraste_Reborn

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It would be nice to think that they would throw a bone to the players of female Wardens who put their own romantic happiness aside in order to ensure that the Theirin bloodline continues... but it might be too optimistic.

 

I'd also love some consequences for my Warden who did marry Alistair, knowing that they'd probably be infertile and the Thierin bloodline would end. It's hard to feel like that was a meaningful decision knowing that Ferelden will seemingly end up with no heir regardless of what anyone does. (I mean, in my headcanon my Warden has misgivings, but that's only because she can't look into the universes next door.)



#23
Andromelek

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EDIT: To bring this back to the OP, a non-mage child of Alistair has no block against the throne at all except Morrigan's wishes.  We don't know how she'd feel about that, and it would become irrelevant once Kieran has grown up.


Except that he really, really hates Witches of the Wilds and anything/anyone related with them, he would never let Kieran take the throne if he knows he is Morrigan's son.

#24
vbibbi

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And given how they have built up all the lore surrounding the whole Theirin dragon's blood thing, that would be kind of odd. Surely they've set this up for some purpose.

Game mechanics don't really seem like they would be much of a hindrance here. I see no reason why they couldn't just create a world state condition for a future DA that Alistair and Warden/Anora/placeholder-Queen have a son/daughter if they so desire. Its just a question of whether it ends up being plot relevant and consequently whether they bother.

True, if they do continue that dragon blood Theirin bloodline subplot, it gets tricky. But there is also the issue that if Alistair was killed in DAO or is a Warden or wandering drunk, he's not going to issue any heirs anyway. So for the blood plot to work, I think it has to be an Option 3 deal, where it doesn't rely on Alistair or Anora or the Warden to advance it.

 

I'd assumed, but I just checked.

 

If an old god, he will sometimes say that being born without magic is like being born blind.

 

If a human, he will sometimes say that magic isn't scary and his mother wouldn't want him to be a Templar.

 

I would assume based on that - and it's not confirmation I know - that OGB Kieran is a mage, and human Kieran is not.  The only thing we hear from if the old god soul is removed from him is "No more dreams?"  I don't know if that means the old god soul speaking to him, or if he's lost magic, or if he's a tranquil now.  We never get a followup.

 

EDIT: To bring this back to the OP, a non-mage child of Alistair has no block against the throne at all except Morrigan's wishes.  We don't know how she'd feel about that, and it would become irrelevant once Kieran has grown up.

 

I don't think he becomes tranquil, he just becomes a "normal" child. Flemeth took something which was in addition to himself, not what was originally part of him.

 

Except that he really, really hates Witches of the Wilds and anything/anyone related with them, he would never let Kieran take the throne if he knows he is Morrigan's son.

And I doubt the bannorn would simply accept some random child showing up and claiming to be Alistair's son. Alistair was recognized as an illegitimate son because Maric had entrusted his identity to Eamon. We only have the word of Alistair that Kieran is his son (even though we as players know the truth)



#25
berelinde

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I'd also love some consequences for my Warden who did marry Alistair, knowing that they'd probably be infertile and the Thierin bloodline would end. It's hard to feel like that was a meaningful decision knowing that Ferelden will seemingly end up with no heir regardless of what anyone does. (I mean, in my headcanon my Warden has misgivings, but that's only because she can't look into the universes next door.)

What kind of consequences would you like to see? What would make it seem more meaningful?

 

I'm conflicted over it myself. On the one hand, I understand the need to consolidate the rulership of Ferelden into one world state for the sake of writer sanity going forward. On the other, my mage Warden had to endure the disgrace of becoming someone's mistress for the sake of the Theirin bloodline. If that bloodline is going to die out either way, it's really hard to feel that choice was meaningful. All that heartache and he didn't even have a child? But the alternative was to lose him altogether, because Amell can't be queen. She gave him some painful advice over Goldana, and in consequence, he was going to become king one way or another. Maybe she would have been happier if she'd been less pragmatic in Denerim, but she doesn't know that. Or maybe she wouldn't, as that would have led to even more painful choices in DAI.)

 

But there is the whole thing about the writers going crazy if they have to maintain too many world states. It would probably be good to avoid that.


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