How *unappealing* do you predict straight male romance options will be in DA4?

Fair enough. I guess I feel like Blackwall, Sera, Bull, Josie, etc. are linked to the previous games and the world of Thedas going forward. Sera's a Jenny, and the Jennies appeared in the first game. She's from Ferelden, where the first game took place. Josephine is an old friend of Leliana's and she's from Antiva, which we heard Zevran wax poetically about all during Origins. Rainier was conscripted by Warden Blackwall and idolizes the Wardens like many Origins players do, and Bull is another thread in the Qunari plot we've been anticipating since DAO.

They all feel relevant to me. Certainly as relevant as the Seekers or the Magisterium.

I really hope this doesn't come off as snarky or dismissive. Such is SURELY not my intent.

Having a romance arc extend into some future installment or having some major relevance to the main story arc of the game itself is, in my opinion, a fairly limiting set of parameters for a writer. I'll cite the example of Sera, just because I mentioned her in an earlier post, and because she's my favorite DA:I romance, although I DID make a female Inquisitor to romance Cullen, and I started a Dorian romance playthrough (which sadly was lost in the restart roulette I'm in a committed love/hate relationship with).

Sera isn't tied to the main plot in any huge way. She's got no real clear cut avenue into any future installments, either. However, to me, that gave her writer the freedom to portray her in a very independent light. The writer had very few holes to try and shoe-horn Sera into. What emerged, to me, was the most natural character Bioware has ever written. There wasn't any "oh she's here because of this plot point" or any other nonsense like that. Sera is Sera, not some preconceived notion of the "Seeker who was the Right Hand of the Divine, and reinstated the Inquisition because Divine Justinia wanted her to, to stop the mage/templar war and blah blah blah" or the former Knight Commander of the Kirkwall Circle, who just happened to be the "Ex-Templar who's going cold turkey to get over his drug addiction, and Leliana just happened to ask him of all the military leaders in Thedas to command the Inquisition's forces and blah blah blah."

Please note, I'm not dissing Cassandra OR Cullen here. Both have pretty danged good romance arcs, in my opinion. And I can certainly understand why people would enjoy those romances.

Dismissing Sera's romance arc, and indeed her whole character, because "she isn't tied to a previous game, or has importance enough to easily slip into a sequel, or has some other conjured up reason to be tied to the plot" is just a bit limited in vision, again in my opinion. Your opinion will disagree, because you obviously think being tied in a major way to the plot, or previous/future installments, is a large criteria to your judgement of a character, but I wouldn't dismiss Sera's romance (or Blackwall's, for that matter, although it's not to my tastes) for not meeting that criteria.

I do not dismiss Sera’s romance. I simply think it is incorrect that female characters do not have access to plot important romances, and therefore male characters are better off in DAI in regards to romantic options available to them. I do not want the same situation repeat in DA4 and would prefer major plot important romances to be available to all players. I do not see how opening at least ONE of those FOUR romances to all females would have destroyed BioWare’s integrity. With a female Qunari, I have to use mods to play with a romance....

It is hard for me to describe how much I outright hate everything about Iron Bull, I don’t like Sera and BW, and Josephine is nice but just not enough for me to do f/f that is a hard sell for my preferences, as I am strongly attracted to men.

But you still get four romances options as a female Qunari. It's fine if you don't care for them, but... yeah. Four.

Sorry you're disappointed. Better luck next game. I'm still holding out for a dwarf LI, personally.

I get that it's frustrating. My canon Warden is single because none of the options suited him. Zevran is my personal favorite, but he's not right for that character. I kind of had to choose between playing the character I wanted versus the romance I wanted. Not quite the same because the option was there, it just didn't work, but I get it. And I'd be bummed if Sera was only romanceable by humans and elves.

Sincerely hope you get to enjoy your favorite romance as your favorite PC in the next game.

So to avoid this, you would want to deprive other players of what they want from romances to fit your strict criteria?

I want options opened up to more PCs, not less.

Having everyone be available to both male and female will result in there being less options, not more. Bioware stated that if they kept the all bi system from DA2 and put it into DAI, there would only be 4 romances. 

Also, if they did this in DAI it would still result in most of the options you wanted not being available. Realistically, if they did do that route the four would be: Cassandra, Rainier, The Iron Bull, and Sera. Cullen and Solas were only added due to the time extension so wouldn't be options, and Dorian wouldn't be an option since his being gay was central to his story as well as a character David Gaider always wanted to write for personal reasons. So of the four you wanted, only Cassandra would have been available to you. 

Maybe, maybe not. Also, if they did those four, then they might have been different in their story involvement, with way more expanded parts. They could have transferred the leading man to Cullen and cut out BW and his story completely, and they could have made Josephine an elf or a dwarf and replaced Sera & Leliana with her, for example. And Bull could have been more like Sten... (Sigh dreamily) yep, i’d Love that.

And Dorian could have been a romance in the next game on his home turf, and bi. Perfect.

Well, the way it is, I am screwed. I can’t see many people being upset with Cullen romancing Qunari and Dwarves or bi Cassandra. Yes, I know, it gets people upset deeply if Dorian story was amended a little to be open to both genders, and I understand why. But I also do not want to play male, and a bi character is a fair and convenient compromise. I also think if Solas was released romancing all races and genders, everyone would have been okay with that.

Blackwall I can see. On paper he looks fine. I'm not really sure why he didn't work all that well in the end. (That's sort of how I feel about NWN/HotU's Nathyrra.)


I think TIB works fine, but he's awfully specialized; that's just not going to be to everyone's taste

First you want to remove the only gay man from the game, then you want to remove the best boy Blackwall? You are a monster!  :srs: