I already have a Templar playthrough so my Dalish Elf Mage is going to side with the Mages, but she identifies as being a Dalish Elf before she sees herself as a Mage. As such she feels little particular kinship to the Circle Mages.
This is shown in DA2 as well with Feynriel. Merrill outright tells him if we send him to the Dalish that it will be his humanity, not his magic, that will define him and how he is treated there.
Each Dalish clan is so different from each other, it would not surprise me if there's a clan out there that despises mages outside the Keeper, assuming the keeper is mage.
I suppose a Dalish can hate the Temlpars due to their role in the escalation into the Dalish-Orleisian war. Then there's also the fact that templars are sent to capture/ kill Keepers; effectively erasing ages worth of knowledge.
Didn't the Emerald Knights of the Dalish Kingdom function similarly to templars?
I don't remember that being stated anywhere. I thought they were just more traditional elite fighting forces like Chevaliers and such.
I don't remember that being stated anywhere. I thought they were just more traditional elite fighting forces like Chevaliers and such.
I seem to remember being mentioned somewhere, probably the Tomb bit
I seem to remember being mentioned somewhere, probably the Tomb bit
Maybe you are talking about the description of Dhal Vallasan. Indeed, there was a division of the Emerald Knights, the Fade Hunters, who were tasked with protecting the Dalish from maleficarum and demons.
Didn't the Emerald Knights of the Dalish Kingdom function similarly to templars?
Maybe you are talking about the description of Dhal Vallasan. Indeed, there was a division of the Emerald Knights, the Fade Hunters, who were tasked with protecting the Dalish from maleficarum and demons.
It looks like a subsect of the Emerald Knights did function in ways similar to templars.
I doubt they had Circle's so the Dales must have had another way to handle training mages.
Pretty civil in here. This is good.
I did the Dalish/Alliance with mages.
Siding with the templars isn't much of a stretch if you consider all that's happening around you as the game's events unfold. And just because the Keepers guide the clan, doesn't mean that you have to like it. Though he's not Dalish, there can be Fenris angle in there somewhere. It's very interesting; do it.
Maybe you are talking about the description of Dhal Vallasan. Indeed, there was a division of the Emerald Knights, the Fade Hunters, who were tasked with protecting the Dalish from maleficarum and demons.
Oh yeah I remember that. That is only half of the templars' job though.
Oh yeah I remember that. That is only half of the templars' job though.
The other half is limited to the Circle's, which is strictly a Chantry organization, so the Dalish wouldn't have that.
In the end, I think it boils down to what Solas warned us about: Dalish clans are different and are becoming even more different the more time passes. A lot of discussions tend to consider them as homogeneous as Ferelden, but I think the Free Marches are a far better comparison.
Occam's razor suggests that everyone is telling the truth about their own clans. Generalization is the mistake. But it goes both ways; it would be a mistake to think every Dalish clan is like the Lavellans (who so far hold the prize of 'nicest Dalish ever').
I believe Felassan in The Masked Empire says something similar. The Dalish are becoming more and more fragmented. The clans are becoming "clannish" and are adopting different practices. In magic, in the treatment of outsiders, even in the lore they preserve.
I believe Felassan in The Masked Empire says something similar. The Dalish are becoming more and more fragmented. The clans are becoming "clannish" and are adopting different practices. In magic, in the treatment of outsiders, even in the lore they preserve.
You are right. I found it in chapter 9:
“We’ll have to gain their loyalty clan by clan. They don’t have much contact with each other. Don’t want to risk an attack from the shemlen compromising the safety of more than one clan. Of course, staying deliberately separated has led to clans growing more and more different, losing their commonalities. I imagine that’s a metaphor for … something.”
Too many times the 'No True Scotsman' fallacy is used when talking about the Dalish, as if being Dalish was more than just being part of one of their tribes. We forget that not even the Dales were as homogeneous as a simple narrative would want to admit. Imagine, going back to DA2 and telling everyone that the last leader of the Inquisition before they joined the Chantry, the root of Templars and Seekers, was a Dalish mage who believed in both Andraste and the Elven Gods and was pals with Drakon. Absurd!
You are right. I found it in chapter 9:
“We’ll have to gain their loyalty clan by clan. They don’t have much contact with each other. Don’t want to risk an attack from the shemlen compromising the safety of more than one clan. Of course, staying deliberately separated has led to clans growing more and more different, losing their commonalities. I imagine that’s a metaphor for … something.”
Too many times the 'No True Scotsman' fallacy is used when talking about the Dalish, as if being Dalish was more than just being part of one of their tribes. We forget that not even the Dales were as homogeneous as a simple narrative would want to admit. Imagine, going back to DA2 and telling everyone that the last leader of the Inquisition before they joined the Chantry, the root of Templars and Seekers, was a Dalish mage who believed in both Andraste and the Elven Gods and was pals with Drakon. Absurd!
The one making the claim would probably have to fear for their lives. Not even the scholar, once he learned the truth, was so willing to share it because he knew almost everyone would reject it out of hand and an entire human noble family claim to be descended from him would essentially remove all legitimacy to the power they have.
Huh, I wonder what was more scandelous to people. Ameridan being an elf or a mage?
The thing is people keep having this idea that the Dalish would oppose the Templars because of the Dales and the Exalted March, when of course the Templars have actually broken away from the Chantry, yet they seem to forget that the mages have joined up with a Tevinter Magister and have indentured themselves to him as a foreign power. If Orlais and the Chantry are bad, Tevinter is literally the big evil. They didn't just take away the Dales, they destroyed Arlathan by sinking it into the ground and condemned the elves to thousands of years of slavery (at least that is what their legends say). They are the measure for evil against which every other human organisation is measured. When Ameridan tells us how many of his countrymen view Drakon and his new empire, it is that they are no better than Tevinter. So while the Dalish might sympathise with the mages predicament in being pushed around by the Chantry all these years, they have done what a Dalish would never do and have submitted to Tevinter as an alternative.
This is why I feel there is no clear cut way of viewing the matter as a Dalish but at least with the Templars, it is "the devil you know" and "the enemy of my enemy is my friend", whereas the mages as a group have been infiltrated by the Venatori, who are an ultra Tevinter extremist organisation. I certainly found it very hard as a Dalish to justifying an alliance with the mages, so prefer to conscript them even when I do take the mage path.
As for Ameridan, well he was airbrushed out of history the same way Shartan was after the Exalted March on the Dales. It was easier to do so because that human family were claiming a relationship to him. The fact that he was an elf would have been far more as reason to suppress the truth about him than the fact he was a mage, since Drakon was known to approve of mages serving the ruling classes, provided they did not rule themselves. Still essentially he was an embarrassment on both counts to later Chantry propaganda and to the Seeker/Templar order so he was conveniently lost to history.
My female elf Inquisitor sided with the templars as a Dalish Rogue, and choose to ally with them. My previous Qunari mage choose to side with them, and ally with them.
When you think about the skill sets of each, Templars would always realistically be the way to go. You have a choice between a group of volatile persons who are losing a war they started, succeptable to possession, and are actively fighting a group that can nullify their abilites through lyrium consumption, or the group that had church backing and money flowing into it before the split, access to all the drugs needed to fuel their powers and habits, rank-file-and order, and combat experience to a degree (more so than mages).
Headcannon is nice, but reality is nicer. That, and the mages ****** me off to a extreme degree in their logic, per Fiona at least. While you don't ever see Rhys or Evaline in game, you do meet the Ex-Warden Elf-Punk that is Fiona the Enchantress. Because after all logically, after declaring independence just to stick it to the man let's indenture ourselves to a magic empire. It's not even close to as bad as it was under the chantry! Now we're actually slaves!
My headcannon works in that the tower is restored. If I save the mages, it's making them allies for time being, then restore the tower. If you're Dalish, at least for me, the headcannon is: God damn it Anders, god damn it Lambert, let's just reset and talk with the new, reasonable divine while the lead Seeker isn't a sick S.O.B.
Although, with that headcannon, I would like to mention that Viviennes viewpoints on this, while being extremely pragmatic are as much insufferable.
Huh, I wonder what was more scandelous to people. Ameridan being an elf or a mage?
Probably the elf part, or better said, the Dalish elf part. It's actually a dialogue option with Josephine for a Dalish mage Inquisitor.
In race-specific dialogue in Haven when the PC is an elf and Josephine informs them of some rumours , a Dalish mage Inquisitor can be surprised that people are more worried about them being an elf than about them being a mage. Josephine thinks it's because the Chantry teaches that "magic must serve man", so if the Inquisitor closes the Breach thanks to their magic, it won't be hard to justify. But the Heral of Andraste, a "wild Dalish elf"? Not so much. The same could be applied to the last Inquisitor.
The thing is people keep having this idea that the Dalish would oppose the Templars because of the Dales and the Exalted March, when of course the Templars have actually broken away from the Chantry, yet they seem to forget that the mages have joined up with a Tevinter Magister and have indentured themselves to him as a foreign power. If Orlais and the Chantry are bad, Tevinter is literally the big evil. They didn't just take away the Dales, they destroyed Arlathan by sinking it into the ground and condemned the elves to thousands of years of slavery (at least that is what their legends say). They are the measure for evil against which every other human organisation is measured. When Ameridan tells us how many of his countrymen view Drakon and his new empire, it is that they are no better than Tevinter. So while the Dalish might sympathise with the mages predicament in being pushed around by the Chantry all these years, they have done what a Dalish would never do and have submitted to Tevinter as an alternative.
True. A Dalish mage Inquisitor can actually point out to Fiona that the mages' cause is not their cause. Bear in mind, however, that Templars are the boogeyman for current Dalish too. A Dalish mage Inquisitor can outright tell Cullen that before going to the conclave the Keeper told them to avoid Templars and wondered if they did anything else beside hunting mages.
My Dalish mage went to the Templars in an attempt to bestow more legitimacy on the fledgling Inquisition. You're already seen as an upstart -- Templars at least have a tradition of being respected, and they're still probably looked upon more favorably than rebel mages.
^That was my reasoning. I can't remember if I conscripted on that playthrough or not. If Barris dies I think I conscripted, if not, I let 'em join under their own banner.
I'm not sure if anyone has brought this up, but when you pick one of the missions, are you really picking one of the groups to side with, or simply picking one to investigate? You might pick one with the intention of following up with the other as well, and get roped into an alliance because of circumstance.
I'm not sure if anyone has brought this up, but when you pick one of the missions, are you really picking one of the groups to side with, or simply picking one to investigate? You might pick one with the intention of following up with the other as well, and get roped into an alliance because of circumstance.
The implication is that you are going to side with whoever is going to help you out. However, if you go to the mages first and then suggest getting the templars to help them out, your advisors straight up say that won't work since the Venatori are already mobilizing for war and that by the time you are done with the templars, the mages will be long gone. There is nothing indicating you'll lose the templars if you side with the mages.
Thus, you'll know you lose mages if you go templars but not the other way around.
She is a ****** liar. She has vallaslin. She was exiled after she became an adult, and unless she came into magic at an incredibly late age, she was exiled for some other reason.
Vivienne is also a ****** liar, in addition to the fact that the Dalish PC can flat-out deny her statement.
No. Lanaya mentioned competing with others, plural, to become First. And saying that Aneirin isn't part of the clan is based on, well, nothing at all.
And competing with others suddenly means a hundred mages? Could be just another two.
The candidates that failed most likely were relocated to other clans that had room for one more.
There's, I think, four others not including Zathrian or Lanaya fighting you if you side with the werewolves.
A Dalish Inquisitor could decide to take Fiona up on her invitation (Val Royeaux making Fiona decidedly less antagonistic than anything to do with the Templars), and investigate Redcliffe in good faith.
Then in Redcliffe you find Tevinter.
I can see Lavellan reframing the sides according to that. In Tevinter, Lavellan would be a slave. So would their clan. So would every other elf. Tevinter is the place where history goes to die. Tevinter is a denial of the elves fighting for their freedom, it’s denial of the Dales existing – it’s thousands of years of elven slavery with no end in sight. When the Inquisitor gets to Redcliffe, the mages haves become “the side with Tevinter in it.” The Templars are no friends of the Dalish, but they’re not actual Tevinter.
(I can even see Lavellan picking the Templars while staying more sympathetic to the mages’ plight: “the side that got eaten by Tevinter” vs “the side with the people who are used to fighting against mages”, and go after the Templars in an attempt to free the mages from their new Tevinter overlords.)
For Lavellan, discovering Tevinter in Redcliffe could change everything.
It's not about siding with the templars; it's about striking against Tevinter.
A Dalish Inquisitor could decide to take Fiona up on her invitation (Val Royeaux making Fiona decidedly less antagonistic than anything to do with the Templars), and investigate Redcliffe in good faith.
Then in Redcliffe you find Tevinter.
I can see Lavellan reframing the sides according to that. In Tevinter, Lavellan would be a slave. So would their clan. So would every other elf. Tevinter is the place where history goes to die. Tevinter is a denial of the elves fighting for their freedom, it’s denial of the Dales existing – it’s thousands of years of elven slavery with no end in sight. When the Inquisitor gets to Redcliffe, the mages haves become “the side with Tevinter in it.” The Templars are no friends of the Dalish, but they’re not actual Tevinter.
(I can even see Lavellan picking the Templars while staying more sympathetic to the mages’ plight: “the side that got eaten by Tevinter” vs “the side with the people who are used to fighting against mages”, and go after the Templars in an attempt to free the mages from their new Tevinter overlords.)
For Lavellan, discovering Tevinter in Redcliffe could change everything.
It's not about siding with the templars; it's about striking against Tevinter.
Except your advisors straight up tell you that the mages will be long gone with the Venatori by the time you get there.
Also, the alliance was wildly unpopular with practically every mage there and its made clear only Fiona made the decision for everyone. Would any elf be totally ok condemning an entire group of people who had no say in their decision including CHILDREN to slavery and potential blood sacrifice?
I always pick the mages and ally with them every single time. My feelings on things pretty much match Leliana's word for word.
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