322 réponses à ce sujet

[Addictress]

Although I like DA2, I really dislike the Lothering section. One, because it looks like a desert, not a blighted farmland, and there is no hint of the actual village of Lothering or any civilization within view.

Two, the impact of losing a sibling so abruptly only is effective if the player actually knows anything about the sibling. Yes, on replays it's sad because we've had a chance to get to know Bethany or Carver for more than two minutes, but not on the first two playthroughs before I've had a chance to form an attachment to them.

Three, it just feels so rushed. I would have liked to have the origin be in Lothering prior to the Blight, maybe see the entire family living together, we see Leandra interacting with the twins at the same time, we can gang up with one sibling against the other. See the family as a unit, making the cracks in the unit more salient when the sibling dies, when Leandra dies, when the surviving sibling leaves.

For me, sibling or immediate parent status overrides need for character introduction, because an immediate family member is such a universal association we all have. Although I usually hate Hollywood movies that go on and on about family, and the protagonist's ONLY character development is their protecting their children. I haaaate that. But in this case, it wasn't everything. The main family angles were in the mentions of Gamlen, then we meet Gamlen, and the mother was pretty well-written, because of her interactions with Gamlen, getting the estate, etc. The dead sibling wasn't rly much.

Also, I thought the blackened desert was just a stark, perhaps exaggerated picture of the blight. It DOES raze villages, and any forms of civilization. Or perhaps it just plays in line with the fact it's a medievalesque time where the majority of land is not affected by man-made things. In between towns, are wide swaths of open nature, which is flammable and easily razed by the blight.

[Hanako Ikezawa]

 

That would be terrible, if i have to be honest 

But i'm not adverse to your idea in general 

For me it would have bumped Origins from my least favorite Dragon Age game to the middle one. 

But I'm glad you aren't opposed to the idea in general. 

 

In DA4 it could be the same. The Origins could be about a slave who sees all magisters as evil bastards, then there could be a mage origin where you see that maybe not all magisters are monsters, the warrior/rogue origin about a guy who is just living his/her life ecc ecc

 

Each Origins, in my opinion, gives a different perspective, and would be really great to experience that in Tevinter since we know nothing about how the place actually works from a day to day life perspective

Again, different origins are not needed for that. To use my previous example, being at a meeting with the different factions of Magisters would do that as well. 

 

Yes we do. With various interactions between people from Tevinter as well as the expanded lore we know exactly how Tevinter actually works. 

[Lezio]

Again, different origins are not needed for that. To use my previous example, being at a meeting with the different factions of Magisters would do that as well. 

 

Yes we do. With various interactions between people from Tevinter as well as the expanded lore we know exactly how Tevinter actually works. 

 

We know how Tevinter works in general. There are good magisters, as mentioned by Fenris and Dorian, and there are bad, evil magisters. We know they have a vlack divine. We learned about slaves and such. Problem is, it's all talk and quite generalized too

For me, it would feel more powerful starting out as a slave/magister/soldier and actually living how Tevinter works for the "small" people, especially since Tevinter is so very different from both Ferelden and Orlais and some time will be needed to establish everything about the setting and how it reacts to the character being a elf/human/mage/vashot/dwarf

 

Your idea is basically what i think they should have done in Inquisition, some time to build everything up and then the big BOOM. It's better than nothing, but it would be a shame, in my opinion, to not expand it further

[Hanako Ikezawa]

We know how Tevinter works in general. There are good magisters, as mentioned by Fenris and Dorian, and there are bad, evil magisters. We know they have a vlack divine. We learned about slaves and such. Problem is, it's all talk and quite generalized too

For me, it would feel more powerful starting out as a slave/magister/soldier and actually living how Tevinter works for the "small" people, especially since Tevinter is so very different from both Ferelden and Orlais and some time will be needed to establish everything about the setting and how it reacts to the character being a elf/human/mage/vashot/dwarf

We do know how it is for the small people. There are multiple codex entries about it, there is Krem who answers from that perspective, and then there is the expanded lore like the comics, World of Thedas, etc. 

All of what you say needs to be established already has. 

 

Your idea is basically what i think they should have done in Inquisition, some time to build everything up and then the big BOOM. It's better than nothing, but it would be a shame, in my opinion, to not expand it further

If they weren't going to go with the amnesia route, I agree that we should have been able to interact with the Conclave. However, since they went the amnesia route I am glad they didn't because the two wouldn't work together. 

[AppealToReason]

We were originally supposed to have character specific missions that popped up throughout the story to serve as like... an active/ongoing prologue.

And we got them.

 

But they were forgettable war table missions that did nothing at all to help differentiate your character. 

 

The game could have used a little bit of extra set up. Even if its a cut scene where some Qunari/Carta/whatever general says "Go to Orlais and figure out whats going down yo" instead of such a cold hard open where you're like "What the ****". 

[vbibbi]

For me, sibling or immediate parent status overrides need for character introduction, because an immediate family member is such a universal association we all have. Although I usually hate Hollywood movies that go on and on about family, and the protagonist's ONLY character development is their protecting their children. I haaaate that. But in this case, it wasn't everything. The main family angles were in the mentions of Gamlen, then we meet Gamlen, and the mother was pretty well-written, because of her interactions with Gamlen, getting the estate, etc. The dead sibling wasn't rly much.

Also, I thought the blackened desert was just a stark, perhaps exaggerated picture of the blight. It DOES raze villages, and any forms of civilization. Or perhaps it just plays in line with the fact it's a medievalesque time where the majority of land is not affected by man-made things. In between towns, are wide swaths of open nature, which is flammable and easily razed by the blight.

 

Eh, when one of the PC's siblings died in the first two minutes of the game, I felt that I was supposed to feel bad about it, but was like...okay did my PC even have a good relationship with that sibling? What was the family dynamic? It's not a happy occasion, but it could very well be that the deceased sibling did not get on well with Hawke and Hawke was planning on leaving Lothering before the Blight hit, or that sibling was Leandra's favorite and Hawke has some mixed survivor's guilt and shame for being happy to now be the favorite, etc. Just having a character introduced as a sibling does not mean I as the player mourn their death so quickly.

 

While Leandra's death was moving, because even though she wasn't even that major of a character, we had enough moments with her to develop an attachment. IMO of course.

 

 

If that's how you interpreted the Lothering landscape, that works for you. But for me, it felt like a very rushed level from a game that had a severely restricted development schedule. Like I said, I liked the game a lot, but I recognize its flaws and don't headcanon that an empty desert level was an accurate depiction of Lothering with all of the buildings razed. Just like I don't imagine that some strange geological phenomenon caused all caves within 50 miles of Kirkwall to have the same structure. It's just rushed game design.

[Hanako Ikezawa]

While Leandra's death was moving, because even though she wasn't even that major of a character, we had enough moments with her to develop an attachment. IMO of course.

I didn't really find hers moving because of how forced it felt. Like how Hawke is handed the Idiot Ball when it starts. "Wait, my mother is missing after getting the same kind of flowers that other victims of an uncaught serial killer get. Well, better wait several hours until late at night before even starting the search."

[Addictress]

Eh, when one of the PC's siblings died in the first two minutes of the game, I felt that I was supposed to feel bad about it, but was like...okay did my PC even have a good relationship with that sibling? What was the family dynamic? It's not a happy occasion, but it could very well be that the deceased sibling did not get on well with Hawke and Hawke was planning on leaving Lothering before the Blight hit, or that sibling was Leandra's favorite and Hawke has some mixed survivor's guilt and shame for being happy to now be the favorite, etc. Just having a character introduced as a sibling does not mean I as the player mourn their death so quickly.

 

While Leandra's death was moving, because even though she wasn't even that major of a character, we had enough moments with her to develop an attachment. IMO of course.

 

 

If that's how you interpreted the Lothering landscape, that works for you. But for me, it felt like a very rushed level from a game that had a severely restricted development schedule. Like I said, I liked the game a lot, but I recognize its flaws and don't headcanon that an empty desert level was an accurate depiction of Lothering with all of the buildings razed. Just like I don't imagine that some strange geological phenomenon caused all caves within 50 miles of Kirkwall to have the same structure. It's just rushed game design.

Yeah I see where you're coming from. The whole sappy 'should-feel-bad-about-sibling-death' thing was overpowered by the 'cool-templar-husband-invoking-the-MAKER-eulogy' bit though. I mean, it was different from Justinia where... we focused on the mourning by itself so much. It seemed to be a more removed death which reflected more on the mother's reaction, the templar husband, the novelty of having these two strangers - Aveline and her templar husband - witnessing a personal family tragedy. So it was more something interesting as pertaining to Aveline and her husband. Like, "o, hello two strangers...watching my sibling die." So I didn't really care about the sibling, but I was fascinated because from a third-party view, which I am, I observe a stranger observing a personal loss of Hawke's and somehow I now anticipate that stranger will be amicable toward Hawke in the future. Establishing a 'positive' link between Aveline and Hawke.

[vbibbi]

I didn't really find hers moving because of how forced it felt. Like how Hawke is handed the Idiot Ball when it starts. "Wait, my mother is missing after getting the same kind of flowers that other victims of an uncaught serial killer get. Well, better wait several hours until late at night before even starting the search."

 

Her death suffered the same problem as a lot of the game, that it was railroaded and there weren't variations of arriving at the same conclusion. Plus it highlights the discrepancy between being told Aveline is a good guard captain and a lot of bad stuff happening under her watch. But overall I excuse it because it was still emotionally affecting for me.

 

Yeah I see where you're coming from. The whole sappy 'should-feel-bad-about-sibling-death' thing was overpowered by the 'cool-templar-husband-invoking-the-MAKER-eulogy' bit though. I mean, it was different from Justinia where... we focused on the mourning by itself so much. It seemed to be a more removed death which reflected more on the mother's reaction, the templar husband, the novelty of having these two strangers - Aveline and her templar husband - witnessing a personal family tragedy. So it was more something interesting as pertaining to Aveline and her husband. Like, "o, hello two strangers...watching my sibling die." So I didn't really care about the sibling, but I was fascinated because from a third-party view, which I am, I observe a stranger observing a personal loss of Hawke's and somehow I now anticipate that stranger will be amicable toward Hawke in the future. Establishing a 'positive' link between Aveline and Hawke.

 

Good point, I hadn't even considered that Wesley's death actually kind of overshadows the sibling's death. And the death makes sense in context, it's more realistic that not everyone escapes the Blight. I just wanted more time prior to the escape to Kirkwall to build up the relationships before one is cut short.

 

But yeah, it's a good correlation between Aveline and Hawke, and their friendship is one of my favorite relationships in DA.

[In Exile]

Her death suffered the same problem as a lot of the game, that it was railroaded and there weren't variations of arriving at the same conclusion. Plus it highlights the discrepancy between being told Aveline is a good guard captain and a lot of bad stuff happening under her watch. But overall I excuse it because it was still emotionally affecting for me.

 

I think there's a lot of evidence Aveline is a bad guard captain, and it's intentional. Remember, her "coddling" her guards is an actual accusation. I think we're meant to take away that maybe she isn't as capable as she's portrayed - she just is driven to guard and care for the people closer to her, regardless of how it affects others. So bad at stopping crime, good at keeping guards safe. 

[GoldenGail3]

I didn't really find hers moving because of how forced it felt. Like how Hawke is handed the Idiot Ball when it starts. "Wait, my mother is missing after getting the same kind of flowers that other victims of an uncaught serial killer get. Well, better wait several hours until late at night before even starting the search."

And then there's the "YOUR TOO LATE, SHES DEAD, THERES NOTHING YOU CAN DO!!! MWHAHAHAAH!" Thing about it...

[nightscrawl]

Fear in a character, as you said, is a touchy subject, and if they really wanted to implent it in the game they could/should have sneaked here and there some questions about the character's fears and motivations (Leliana/Varric asking if there is a creature the character considers fearful, a discussion about regrets with Solas, Vivienne/Dorian/Solas talking to a mage about Tranquility and if they fear it, fear of losing the LI ecc ecc). As it is, the demon of envy taunts my character about what The Inquisition would become if he got possessed, which just feels impersonal, and the demon of fear completely overlooks him.

On that I completely agree. There are several times in the game where the Inquisitor has a chance to express fear, doubt, and so on, but those are only role play opportunities for the player; nothing is ever done with that and it's never referenced by any NPCs after the fact. After Cullen's lyrium episode, he pointedly asks you, "How are you holding up?" and you can express any number of things. I would really have liked some of those choices to be called on later in the game for something like the Fade sequence.

 

In fact, the only thing of that sort that does seem to be tracked and referenced is whether your PC believes in the Maker and accepts the role as Herald of Andraste. The precedent, and ability, is there for using such RP choices, they just chose not to beyond those two things, which is a shame.

[vbibbi]

I think there's a lot of evidence Aveline is a bad guard captain, and it's intentional. Remember, her "coddling" her guards is an actual accusation. I think we're meant to take away that maybe she isn't as capable as she's portrayed - she just is driven to guard and care for the people closer to her, regardless of how it affects others. So bad at stopping crime, good at keeping guards safe. 

 

Yeah that's true. Because I like Aveline I try to instead interpret it as she's doing the best she can, but it still takes a while for her to clean up the corruption from Jevan and the weak Viscount. She's one of the only sane people in a position of power in Kirkwall, so even with her failures she's still doing a lot better than most. If she were truly a bad guard captain, there would be even more shenanigans going on.

 

Of course, I really didn't like how she was aware of the rumors that some of her guards had raped the viddithari elves' sister and was "looking into it" which sounds like it was buried under stacks of paperwork. But the political landscape of Kirkwall was never well depicted so it's hard to tell what the truth was in the situation. I would really really like to think that she had relieved the guards of duty and hopefully had them under house arrest while she investigated, and the elves decided not to wait for her investigation to yield results.

 

But yeah, I don't think she was the bestest guard captain ever, but competent enough given the environment she was in.

[vbibbi]

On that I completely agree. There are several times in the game where the Inquisitor has a chance to express fear, doubt, and so on, but those are only role play opportunities for the player; nothing is ever done with that and it's never referenced by any NPCs after the fact. After Cullen's lyrium episode, he pointedly asks you, "How are you holding up?" and you can express any number of things. I would really have liked some of those choices to be called on later in the game for something like the Fade sequence.

 

In fact, the only thing of that sort that does seem to be tracked and referenced is whether your PC believes in the Maker and accepts the role as Herald of Andraste. The precedent, and ability, is there for using such RP choices, they just chose not to beyond those two things, which is a shame.

 

I really liked the special dialogue options for a faithful Inquisitor and wish other types of Inquisitors had been tracked in the same way. My canon Inquisitor is faithful partially because there were more RP options available to her than the other types of Inquisitors.

[Lezio]

Personally i like Leandra's death for simple 3 simple reasons: it has some actual build up to it(could have done better but DA2), it makes sense with the kind of person (my) Hawke is (cynical, sarcastic, doesn't look into the murderers because she doesn't much care) and, mostly, because it's a great stage for character development.

For example, my Hawke (rogue) went from not really caring about Kirkwall to actually trying to fix things and actually started supporting the Circle, while also trying to make it a better place for mages (she basically went from heavy sarcastic to diplomatic/sarcastic and from "Bethany is a mage so i must support mages" to "mages are dangerous but they are also people too and deserve to be treated as such")

 

I love moments like this in RPGs, where characters' beliefs are shaken because of some kind of personal loss or failure, they allow for some great RP.

 

I feel like Inquisition is kind of lacking on this aspect, too. I never felt like The Inquisitor, apart from the whole believer/non-believer thing, was ever challenged to change his perspective on things or that he could actually fail.

 

Technically, metagaming and without Roleplaying, The Warden can be also be a mary sue too, but to me he never felt like one because in Origins taking into account the character's beliefs and motivations meant, sometimes, failure or hardships 

Hawke's failures are forced upon us but, as i said, i'm ok with them (not with those in Act 3, Orsino's stupididty is just stupid) because they actually provide something in terms of character development

 

The Inquisitor is just..... go be awesome IMHO. Shame That trespasser ends right when i felt like he was becoming interesting

[myahele]

It depends on how Bioware chooses to start the game. In DA2 and Inquisition they both start off with combat fairly quickly; more so DA2. Actually, now that I think of it, it's similar with how Mass Effect starts the game. 

[BansheeOwnage]

We do know how it is for the small people. There are multiple codex entries about it, there is Krem who answers from that perspective, and then there is the expanded lore like the comics, World of Thedas, etc. 

All of what you say needs to be established already has. 

 

If they weren't going to go with the amnesia route, I agree that we should have been able to interact with the Conclave. However, since they went the amnesia route I am glad they didn't because the two wouldn't work together. 

You lost me at "There are codex entries about it". Just kidding, but still

 

Really though, you shouldn't need supplementary material to understand the game (WoT, comics, novels), and exposition through the codex is basically the bottom-tier of exposition quality. That is: One step better than nothing. It's true that Krem gives us some insight into it, and that's good, but it wouldn't be nearly as impactful or encompassing as experiencing it ourselves, I don't think.

 

Well, you could play the Conclave and still have amnesia. Just have the screen cut and show the explosion once you open the door to Corypheus. Then you have the escape from the fade (the CC would be before everything in this case, which I wish it was anyway, for a number of reasons), then you wake up in Haven like normal.

 

I really liked the special dialogue options for a faithful Inquisitor and wish other types of Inquisitors had been tracked in the same way. My canon Inquisitor is faithful partially because there were more RP options available to her than the other types of Inquisitors.

I wasn't aware of that, as I haven't played a faithful Inquisitor. It kind of sucks that the only RP option I can remember for a non-faithful one was the "I don't believe in gods" volleyed at Corypheus in the endgame

[vbibbi]

I wasn't aware of that, as I haven't played a faithful Inquisitor. It kind of sucks that the only RP option I can remember for a non-faithful one was the "I don't believe in gods" volleyed at Corypheus in the endgame

 

There's a special judgement option for Florianne only available to faithful Inquisitors. There are a few other dialogue options only for a faithful Inquisitor but I don't remember them off the top of my head. Maybe another option for judging Ser Ruth.

 

But yeah, I liked customizing dialogue based on our in-game choices, kind of like the Hawke overriding personality, and would have enjoyed specific dialogue options for non-believing Inquisitors and some other "flavors." (I would have loved some "heretical" dialogue options, but that's just a pipe dream)

[Shechinah]

There's a special judgement option for Florianne only available to faithful Inquisitors. There are a few other dialogue options only for a faithful Inquisitor but I don't remember them off the top of my head. Maybe another option for judging Ser Ruth.

 

But yeah, I liked customizing dialogue based on our in-game choices, kind of like the Hawke overriding personality, and would have enjoyed specific dialogue options for non-believing Inquisitors and some other "flavors." (I would have loved some "heretical" dialogue options, but that's just a pipe dream)

 

Personally, I wasn't all too happy with the Hawke overriding personality but that aside, I tend to always like more options like the one you mentioned barring the Hawke one.  
 

[BansheeOwnage]

There's a special judgement option for Florianne only available to faithful Inquisitors. There are a few other dialogue options only for a faithful Inquisitor but I don't remember them off the top of my head. Maybe another option for judging Ser Ruth.

 

But yeah, I liked customizing dialogue based on our in-game choices, kind of like the Hawke overriding personality, and would have enjoyed specific dialogue options for non-believing Inquisitors and some other "flavors." (I would have loved some "heretical" dialogue options, but that's just a pipe dream)

Yep, I can confirm that that's one of them, unfortunately for me since it's the only way to unlock one of the new Grey Warden armours Trespasser added... I hate that they'd lock a schematic behind such a specific option, only available to specific Inquisitors in the first place

 

Extra options are always good though, and I'd certainly like your dialogue to reflect later events/conversations as was discussed previously. I think the suggestion to use already-made dialogue as Nightmare taunts was a great one.

[Lezio]

Now that i think about it, another way for making the demon of fear work could have been to make The Inquisitor allucinate. Basically have him see and hear the companions he brought to Adamant belitting him/her, maybe even full dialogues with "dark" versions of those companions and not just one liners like in the Fade sequence of the demon of envy.

Possibly something like Planescape:Torment for the tombstone. Make a situation wehre the character has to express his greatest fear and then have it there in the tombstone

[JadeDragon]

Now that i think about it, another way for making the demon of fear work could have been to make The Inquisitor allucinate. Basically have him see and hear the companions he brought to Adamant belitting him/her, maybe even full dialogues with "dark" versions of those companions and not just one liners like in the Fade sequence of the demon of envy.

Possibly something like Planescape:Torment for the tombstone. Make a situation wehre the character has to express his greatest fear and then have it there in the tombstone

Or whoever we romanced or companion with the highest approval. If not scary it would be just plain cruel to have to kill a bunch of Josie Fearlings.

 

But the best option to me would have still been to use racial wartable missions. Another point to how getting personal with our racial option is using the material we had in our codex. Once again I will use the Human Noble as a example, there family is devote to the Chantry no if ands or buts we have family in the chantry and most importantly Templars. Not once in the game did we show concern that our cousin or any relative that is already established as a Templar possibly becoming a Red Templar. Could that alone have not been used as a fear for the Human or at least used as dialogue for Nightmare. Taunting us how we couldnt even save our family memeber from joining the Red Templars and watching them turn into a Behemoth or even if they died in the Temple. That is just a example how a quest that explores our backstory make races feel connected to the world. It doesnt hinder any RP because it would be one random cousin not even a brother or sister which we canonly have, that is apart of the Templar order which we were told during race selection. Elves could have seen the Keeper or clan member, Dwarves the a carta member and Qunari another member of the company.

[vbibbi]

Or whoever we romanced or companion with the highest approval. If not scary it would be just plain cruel to have to kill a bunch of Josie Fearlings.

 

 

That would have been hilarious. Josephine attacking us with a quill as we cleave her in two with a great axe.