Tuchanka Love
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Games: Mass Effect Trilogy, Dragon Age: Origins, Dragon Age 2, Dragon Age Inquisition, KOTOR, Baldur's Gate, Jade Empire, SWTOR
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Post by Tuchanka Love on Sept 14, 2016 8:28:13 GMT
Don't rage quit over a lost hand when it'll probably get replaced with a bad ass prosthetic anyway. It'll just add character. Mate, this is medieval stuff, the Inquisitor is a cripple for life. About this Quest: In a playthrough I actually let Gaspard live, Celene continued as an empress, Briala ended up ok. It was the best outcome. And it was even awesome because they all responded to the Inquisition now *evil laugh*. I basically played everyone perfectly.
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Tuchanka Love
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Post by Tuchanka Love on Sept 14, 2016 8:33:30 GMT
Nevermind
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Post by phoray on Sept 14, 2016 13:41:23 GMT
Mate, this is medieval stuff, the Inquisitor is a cripple for life. About this Quest: In a playthrough I actually let Gaspard live, Celene continued as an empress, Briala ended up ok. It was the best outcome. And it was even awesome because they all responded to the Inquisition now *evil laugh*. I basically played everyone perfectly. If you are a mage, you can still cast with one hand. And if you join the Red JEnny's with Sera at the end of the game, then there is a slide, about you, the Quiz, with a crossbow replacement.
Then there is the fact that it is a world of magic. Mechanical stuff may not be up to snuff, but Bianca the genius Dwarf is totally in your pocket and you are rich, so you probably used that combo to get the prostethetic crossbow arm.
So, the only people that really lose is the two handed weapon people. If you can slap on a crossbow, you can slap on a shield and stay Surf and Board. If you were an archer, you're just a new kind of archer. Double daggers and giant two handed weapons may be the only true losers.
But then you remember it's a video game with magic and they could probably make a totally functional prosthetic.
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Post by Elfen Lied on Sept 14, 2016 14:20:02 GMT
I'm not a fan of the quest either, but more because I think that it's just poorly written and presented. Orlesian politics, the civil war, and ~The Game~ are all not well explained, not well shown, and we're given a debilitatingly small amount information to work with about any of them. That's because you are supposed to have read the novels, which is wrong Reading a book or any other piece of fiction shouldn't be mandatory in order to understand a game. Ever.
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Post by lordofwar on Sept 14, 2016 14:37:58 GMT
I'm not a fan of the quest either, but more because I think that it's just poorly written and presented. Orlesian politics, the civil war, and ~The Game~ are all not well explained, not well shown, and we're given a debilitatingly small amount information to work with about any of them. That's because you are supposed to have read the novels, which is wrong Reading a book or any other piece of fiction shouldn't be mandatory in order to understand a game. Ever. Definitely agreed, and that has been a worrying trend in BioWare games lately. But even looking a summaries of the novels, it seems like a lot of the plot points and even characterization don't even transfer over very well to this quest.
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Post by Crim on Sept 14, 2016 14:42:04 GMT
I'm one of those weirdos who actually really enjoys this quest. *edit: having read The Masked Empire before DAI came out helped me understand the politics of Orlais better too.
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Post by Deleted on Sept 14, 2016 14:42:27 GMT
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Post by Duke Cameron on Sept 14, 2016 15:48:59 GMT
After any mission involving Hawke, this is my favorite mission. I love Orlesian culture and i like Celene and Florianne as characters. I always make Florianne my jester just so i can have her around.
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Post by Catilina on Sept 14, 2016 15:55:08 GMT
At first glance, I liked that there is a weird quest. Then I realized that boring...
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roselavellan
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Post by roselavellan on Sept 14, 2016 18:20:41 GMT
I'm one of those weirdos who actually really enjoys this quest. *edit: having read The Masked Empire before DAI came out helped me understand the politics of Orlais better too. I loved WEWH. It provided a welcome change from the terrain-navigating and constant combat in the other quests. I would think that people who like dialogue would probably enjoy this as well. Also I didn't find the quest that hard. I did refer to the wiki regularly and decided not to bother with the last halla statue, and I still managed to get all the important doors (including Briala's locket).
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Post by Crim on Sept 14, 2016 18:28:42 GMT
I'm one of those weirdos who actually really enjoys this quest. *edit: having read The Masked Empire before DAI came out helped me understand the politics of Orlais better too. I loved WEWH. It provided a welcome change from the terrain-navigating and constant combat in the other quests. I would think that people who like dialogue would probably enjoy this as well. Also I didn't find the quest that hard. I did refer to the wiki regularly and decided not to bother with the last halla statue, and I still managed to get all the important doors (including Briala's locket). Yup, I also loved the different reactions you got for the race you are/if you're a mage. And of course bringing along different companions each time to see what they say/how they react at the ball. Fun times.
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Post by Deleted on Sept 14, 2016 18:53:20 GMT
I hated the quest too, I have to admit, it seemed kind of lame. After playing it many times I have it down to collecting enough halla to gain entery into Celene's room and releasing the soldier and rescuing the Ferelden assasin and one other thing can't remember...but I confront Florienne, and bring Celene, Briala and Gaspard under Inquisition control...which is one of the reasons why Trespasser didn't set well with me.
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Post by BansheeOwnage on Sept 14, 2016 18:54:45 GMT
If you are a mage, you can still cast with one hand. And if you join the Red JEnny's with Sera at the end of the game, then there is a slide, about you, the Quiz, with a crossbow replacement.
Then there is the fact that it is a world of magic. Mechanical stuff may not be up to snuff, but Bianca the genius Dwarf is totally in your pocket and you are rich, so you probably used that combo to get the prostethetic crossbow arm.
So, the only people that really lose is the two handed weapon people. If you can slap on a crossbow, you can slap on a shield and stay Surf and Board. If you were an archer, you're just a new kind of archer. Double daggers and giant two handed weapons may be the only true losers.
But then you remember it's a video game with magic and they could probably make a totally functional prosthetic. It's even easier, actually. An archer could just keep using a bow, not a crossbow. Just attach it to your arm. (I've posted pictures of this in the past). This works quite well since Quizzy is a righty, and the bow would go on the left arm like it used to anyway. Daggers are likewise easy. Remember the Red Templar Shadows? They have blade-arms. You can do the same for Quizzy's left blade. Two-handers are the hardest hit, but still workable. Nefla drew a picture of a prosthetic with a swivel that a two-hander could use. And all that is ignoring that people in real life, hundreds of years ago, went into battle and wrote with prosthetics. And all of that is ignoring runes and golem-like technology that Thedas has (and we don't, obviously). Physically, it really isn't much of an obstacle, and would be a terrible excuse not to have the Inquisitor return. But it provides a fantastic opportunity for a unique experience, and to be able to RP the emotional impact of the limb loss. I'm one of those weirdos who actually really enjoys this quest. *edit: having read The Masked Empire before DAI came out helped me understand the politics of Orlais better too. It's not so much that I dislike the quest, I just really dislike the mechanics of it. It might look good on paper, but if I need to use a guide, something's wrong. Quests should be intuitive, if difficult. I don't mind it being hard to get good endings, I just don't want them locked behind completely arbitrary things. For instance, the Halla statues There is no way a player on their first playthrough can know how many there are and which doors to open with them. You can't know what's in the rooms that you might need without opening them. I hate that kind of thing. The timer's are kind of annoying too, but at least you can get approval easily enough. So, I like that quest in theory. It's a primarily non-combat quest, which is a nice relief (I wish we had more of them), and I like sneaking around. In practice though, there are the reasons above, and I also don't like that all party members aren't present even though they act like they were after, the characterization of the options wasn't quite fleshed-out enough, Florianne was meh and you didn't actually have to discover her, some advisors were out of character, and The Game is lame™. And like most people, I'd have liked a choice of attire (for myself and the others). That said, I don't hate the quest, it's still okay. And Cullen dance helps Right, thanks! I thought of that just after posting. Already saved to favourites for the next time I play
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Dabrikishaw
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Games: Mass Effect Trilogy, Dragon Age: Origins, Dragon Age 2, Dragon Age Inquistion, Jade Empire
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Post by Dabrikishaw on Sept 14, 2016 18:56:27 GMT
"WICKED EYES AND WICKED HEARTS" is not that bad, even for a timed mission. Getting court approval is easy because you have several methods to accumulate it, and it becomes easier on subsequent runs.
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Post by xerrai on Sept 15, 2016 1:35:27 GMT
It's tedious but not boring. I heard from no less than 3 POV on politics, social issues and how they should be handled. Not to mention that I was actually able to see Orlesian culture in action, which is a rare occurrence in a videogame where fighting is the main objective.
But there were several things that could have been better, and several things that should have been expanded upon. Like, the intricacies of Celene/Briala/Gaspard I can understand not being available info to the player (most of it was mostly between them after all), but I do expect to be informed about Celene's purge of an alienage (which should have been well known public information). It doesn't even have to be explained from Gaspard, Celene or Briala either, but from gossip in the Court.
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Post by Deleted on Sept 15, 2016 1:41:04 GMT
I didn't hate it or really like it, but it was tedious, and the only thing that saved it was the dance with the LI though . I hated Adamant though - shitty quest it was. My Hawke wasn't full of his usual hope and optimism (which I found my Humorous Hawke was missing, as well as not really being humorous per say - he should've joked around a bit more with Stroud... like the humor worthy person my canon was). I wish my Hawke acted more like himself, not a depressed hybrid of himself... Yeah, and the whole thing about Blood mage, was funny - he himself was a blood mage afterall , and I hated the fact that my Rivalmance was almost deposed of (I HATED that comment about Isabela 'hopefully not having too much without him). That's my basic complaint about Adamant, and do keep in mind, I actually do like my Canon Hawke a great deal (to the point where I killed Stroud to save him from that fate). And plus, I kind of imaged my Quiz was really quite shocked to be trapped in the fade - I don't think there was much of a reaction off of him though - he should've at least freaked out at being trapped in the bloody fade, lol.
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lewie
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Games: Mass Effect Trilogy, Dragon Age: Origins, Dragon Age 2, Dragon Age Inquistion, Neverwinter Nights
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Post by lewie on Sept 15, 2016 2:27:51 GMT
So...why did you come here to announce that you are quitting? Is it all the attention you... ...nevermind. Yeah, it's all the attention you're getting. It's what all the cool kids do. B-) Okay, to actually contribute to the topic at hand: I felt WEWH was poorly written. I like the idea behind it, but thought it was poorly executed. It was also way to easy to figure out who the assassin was. Don't get me started on the required reading to understand what was going on between Celene, Briala, and Gaspard. I didn't think they did well transferring info from the book to the game. It was a jumbled mess. Once I figured out how to get them to co-operate (2nd time), I have done it that way since. I get the story premise but my god. When stuff becomes painful to figure out, you stop caring, it becomes a slog through mud, because you have to repeat all these things. It hurts the re-play value. Next time, they should make the first map a lot smaller, and no more frigging shards. A family member is playing it at the minute and they have already stopped, still in the hinterlands. They have just lost interest already. That place is too big, I don't mind it but it does take a while, to be fair. WEWH was like bring in the fade in Origins too maybe, 'Oh great, search and click and get me outta here'.
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cardbutton
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The end of the end of the end, is the end.
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Post by cardbutton on Sept 15, 2016 2:56:29 GMT
I'm one of those weirdos who actually really enjoys this quest. *edit: having read The Masked Empire before DAI came out helped me understand the politics of Orlais better too. Naw I mean don't get me wrong I absolutely adored that quest. Its just since I did like it as much as I do I do have to be fair with its rather massive flaws. Though its not the quests fault, just as the Inquisitor's weakness as a character isn't their fault. It's all the fault of plunging a poor hapless new PC into a story that was clearly made to at bare minimum clean up an enormous amount of content from previous stories expecting it to feel natural (and I suspect a story originally designed in its infancy of development for Hawke).
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Post by lordofwar on Sept 15, 2016 3:16:30 GMT
I guess my biggest problem with this quest is that it all just boils down to another collect-athon in a game that already has too many. How do you succeed? You don't get to know the court, you don't manipulate it or make backroom deals, you just look for shinies. In a game that talks up Orlesian politics as much as Inquisition, making that the way actually get to participate in them is not a good thing.
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Post by Element Zero on Sept 15, 2016 5:12:24 GMT
I guess my biggest problem with this quest is that it all just boils down to another collect-athon in a game that already has too many. How do you succeed? You don't get to know the court, you don't manipulate it or make backroom deals, you just look for shinies. In a game that talks up Orlesian politics as much as Inquisition, making that the way actually get to participate in them is not a good thing. This is a good point. It did boil down to collecting halla statues and/or blackmail material, in the end. Sigh. I don't dislike this quest. I think many allow themselves to get too stressed by the timer and approval rating. I've found it's incredibly easy to both explore a bit and get 100 approval, regardless of race and class. You get so many opportunities to build approval; and if you've been listening to the constant cues as to how "the Game" is played, you'll ace the dance with Florianne. Knowing that 100 approval is not hard, the pressure is off, and I can just go about the quest. It's not my favorite, but it's not horrible. I did read the novel in advance, or I believe I'd have been completely lost as to who is doing what, the first time through this quest. They did a terrible job setting up this quest. At the very least, there should've been a briefing session with your advisors (at minimum with Josie and Leliana). The Inquisitor could've asked some questions about who, what, when, where, why and how. Had I not read the novel, I'd have felt like I was going in nearly completely blind. Major fail. I imagine many players had no idea who the hell Briala was, and had very scant info regarding Gaspard. There's no way the Inquisitor (or player) should've been sent into that situation.
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Everyone seem normal till you get to know them
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Post by Blaze on Sept 15, 2016 5:32:29 GMT
this was my favorite quest in the game, the thrill the need to say the right thing, playing the grand game. and then i got to confront the assassin with no blood shed? that was awesome! not to mention i got all 3 of the leadersby the balls (so to speaks since briala and celene don' really possess those ) and force them into truce. this quest was awesome and i hope we get something similar in the future and for those who didn't like it, you don't have to play the game you know, as long as you do leliana's side quest and maybe the caprice one you should be fine enough not to fail the quest and you know, just kill stuff
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Post by phoray on Sept 15, 2016 6:27:08 GMT
I wonder. What is the default if you do absolutely nothing? Does Celene get assassinated if you don't bother to gather the blackmail? What if you skip all the halla except to get you to the Florianna fight?
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lynroy
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Thief
Current location: Tuchanka
Games: Mass Effect Trilogy, Dragon Age: Origins, Dragon Age 2, Dragon Age Inquisition, Jade Empire, Mass Effect Andromeda, Mass Effect Legendary Edition
Origin: The3tWits
PSN: The3tWits
Prime Posts: 24,721
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Post by lynroy on Sept 15, 2016 11:35:13 GMT
this was my favorite quest in the game, the thrill the need to say the right thing, playing the grand game. and then i got to confront the assassin with no blood shed? that was awesome! not to mention i got all 3 of the leadersby the balls (so to speaks since briala and celene don' really possess those ) and force them into truce. this quest was awesome and i hope we get something similar in the future and for those who didn't like it, you don't have to play the game you know, as long as you do leliana's side quest and maybe the caprice one you should be fine enough not to fail the quest and you know, just kill stuff That's not why a lot of us don't like it.
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Everyone seem normal till you get to know them
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Post by Blaze on Sept 15, 2016 12:25:14 GMT
this was my favorite quest in the game, the thrill the need to say the right thing, playing the grand game. and then i got to confront the assassin with no blood shed? that was awesome! not to mention i got all 3 of the leadersby the balls (so to speaks since briala and celene don' really possess those ) and force them into truce. this quest was awesome and i hope we get something similar in the future and for those who didn't like it, you don't have to play the game you know, as long as you do leliana's side quest and maybe the caprice one you should be fine enough not to fail the quest and you know, just kill stuff That's not why a lot of us don't like it. to be clear when i said "the game" i meant the grand game not inquisition and from the posts i'v read the issue seem to be the effort of gaining court approval, so if it's not the reason i'm not sure what is *shrugs*
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Thief
Current location: Tuchanka
Games: Mass Effect Trilogy, Dragon Age: Origins, Dragon Age 2, Dragon Age Inquisition, Jade Empire, Mass Effect Andromeda, Mass Effect Legendary Edition
Origin: The3tWits
PSN: The3tWits
Prime Posts: 24,721
Prime Likes: 34,638
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Post by lynroy on Sept 15, 2016 13:24:21 GMT
I know what you meant in your post. I suggest you read all of the posts in the thread because a lot of them didn't mention trouble with court approval. I'm not a fan of the quest either, but more because I think that it's just poorly written and presented. Orlesian politics, the civil war, and ~The Game~ are all not well explained, not well shown, and we're given a debilitatingly small amount information to work with about any of them.That quest was a mess. Especially with various fetch\collecting quests added to it. I am sure on paper it looked like a very good quest, and most likely it was. But the execution was rather lacking. Okay, to actually contribute to the topic at hand: I felt WEWH was poorly written. I like the idea behind it, but thought it was poorly executed. It was also way to easy to figure out who the assassin was. Don't get me started on the required reading to understand what was going on between Celene, Briala, and Gaspard. I didn't think they did well transferring info from the book to the game. It was a jumbled mess. I do agree that I find the Wicked Hearts quest a bit too convoluted to be fun, and I find some of the comments from Advisors to be out of character (specifically Cullen. He may like Gaspard, but he would never condone standing still while an assassination went on-bah). Dragon Age, the whole series, is pretty much the only video game world I've ever loved. Don't rage quit over a lost hand when it'll probably get replaced with a bad ass prosthetic anyway. It'll just add character. You're totally right about Cullen, and it's not just that, it's supporting Gaspard in the first place. You know, the warmongering Gaspard who wants to return Orlais into the expansionist empire it was in its "glory" days? And where does it want to expand into? Ferelden. You know, where Cullen's from and where his family is Bioware, I know you wanted each advisor to advise something different, but consistency of character is more important than a contrivance like that That's because you are supposed to have read the novels, which is wrong Reading a book or any other piece of fiction shouldn't be mandatory in order to understand a game. Ever. Definitely agreed, and that has been a worrying trend in BioWare games lately. But even looking a summaries of the novels, it seems like a lot of the plot points and even characterization don't even transfer over very well to this quest.It's not so much that I dislike the quest,[I just really dislike the mechanics of it. It might look good on paper, but if I need to use a guide, something's wrong. Quests should be intuitive, if difficult. I don't mind it being hard to get good endings, I just don't want them locked behind completely arbitrary things. For instance, the Halla statues There is no way a player on their first playthrough can know how many there are and which doors to open with them. You can't know what's in the rooms that you might need without opening them. I hate that kind of thing. The timer's are kind of annoying too, but at least you can get approval easily enough. So, I like that quest in theory. It's a primarily non-combat quest, which is a nice relief (I wish we had more of them), and I like sneaking around. In practice though, there are the reasons above, and I also don't like that all party members aren't present even though they act like they were after, the characterization of the options wasn't quite fleshed-out enough, Florianne was meh and you didn't actually have to discover her, some advisors were out of character, and The Game is lame™. And like most people, I'd have liked a choice of attire (for myself and the others). That said, I don't hate the quest, it's still okay. And Cullen dance helps I'm one of those weirdos who actually really enjoys this quest. *edit: having read The Masked Empire before DAI came out helped me understand the politics of Orlais better too. Naw I mean don't get me wrong I absolutely adored that quest. Its just since I did like it as much as I do I do have to be fair with its rather massive flaws. Though its not the quests fault, just as the Inquisitor's weakness as a character isn't their fault. It's all the fault of plunging a poor hapless new PC into a story that was clearly made to at bare minimum clean up an enormous amount of content from previous stories expecting it to feel natural (and I suspect a story originally designed in its infancy of development for Hawke). I guess my biggest problem with this quest is that it all just boils down to another collect-athon in a game that already has too many. How do you succeed? You don't get to know the court, you don't manipulate it or make backroom deals, you just look for shinies. In a game that talks up Orlesian politics as much as Inquisition, making that the way actually get to participate in them is not a good thing. This is a good point. It did boil down to collecting halla statues and/or blackmail material, in the end. Sigh. I don't dislike this quest. I think many allow themselves to get too stressed by the timer and approval rating. I've found it's incredibly easy to both explore a bit and get 100 approval, regardless of race and class. You get so many opportunities to build approval; and if you've been listening to the constant cues as to how "the Game" is played, you'll ace the dance with Florianne. Knowing that 100 approval is not hard, the pressure is off, and I can just go about the quest. It's not my favorite, but it's not horrible. I did read the novel in advance, or I believe I'd have been completely lost as to who is doing what, the first time through this quest. They did a terrible job setting up this quest. At the very least, there should've been a briefing session with your advisors (at minimum with Josie and Leliana). The Inquisitor could've asked some questions about who, what, when, where, why and how. Had I not read the novel, I'd have felt like I was going in nearly completely blind. Major fail. I imagine many players had no idea who the hell Briala was, and had very scant info regarding Gaspard. There's no way the Inquisitor (or player) should've been sent into that situation.This kicker about this last one is there is a very brief briefing after you select the mission on the war table. You're told, "Okay this is Celene, this is Gaspard, this is Briala, and they are all fighting each other. Go play!" ....what?
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