The Blanketfort (crying and throwing up) - The Official Solas Thread [Spoilers]

I know....

But one can hope!  

Wait, Solas was mentioned somewhere?  Cause all I see are dark chocolate peanut butter cups ... mmmm.  You're right, that was cruel.  Now I want dark chocolate covered peanut butter cups.

The "Dread Cock" tag just got a whole lot more interesting.

Well, it certainly makes "you play as egg?" more interesting

Would anyone else want to see a comic series about what Solas did in the year before DAI?

Wouldn't have even give us any earth-shattering revelations about Solas' plans, intentions or the Ancient Elves either, I'd be satisfied with seeing how they fill in the blanks between his waking up, giving his orb to Corypheus and when we meet him at the Conclave.

When did he reconnect with his spy network and Felassan? How did he learn about Corypheus and decide he could unlock his Orb? When did he run into the Dalish, as he alludes to Lavellan that he's had some bad experience interacting with them?

And seeing his perspective would be fascinating, since from he's basically in the same situation as the Sole Survivor in Fallout 4. He's woken up to find he's slept through the end of the world (that he caused), his entire civilisation has collapsed into ruin and have been replaced by societies that are constantly infighting or at war with each other. Thedas really is a post-apocalyptic setting, when you think about it.

Someone needs to petition Weekes or Bioware to write this.

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Was replaying the Dalish origin again and it got me thinking about the Eluvian.

Could it have connected to another located in the Deep Roads, which might explain the city that Tamlen saw through it? If the Eluvian was one of those that's connection was kept "ajar", that might have explained how the Blight spread through it and corrupted the Bereskarn. Perhaps when Tamlen touched the mirror, he unwittingly unlocked it. That might have allowed the Genlocks to come through and that's why there so so many of them present when we return to the scene later?

Might also mean that Marethari's fears about the Eluvian were totally justified and what the writers meant by Merrill completing it being a "bad idea". If it connects to the Deep Roads, unlocking it might have allowed Darkspawn to swarm right into the heart of Kirkwall... oops.

(Also if we take that LOTR easter-egg statue at face-value, the Dwarves who "dug up" to find Elves actually ran across an Eluvian. As we saw in Trespasser, the network does seem to extend into the Deep Roads, so it really could have been a dwarven thaig that Tamlen saw?)

I think a comic book pre-Inquisition would be cool, because I'd love to know more about how Solas thinks/his motivations, but I think that's probably exactly the reason why there isn't one - his perspective needs to be kept mysterious, to keep player agency in the game. Imagine all the people who hate him finding out that he's actually a really good guy with solid motivations for what he plans to do? Or imagine all the people who love him finding out that he really is an evil SOB who isn't worthy of the air he breathes? It would take the heart out of the whole "Redeem or Kill" choice at the end of Trespasser, and make a DA4 in which we're hunting him down for redemption or assassination really kind of pointless.

Better to keep Solas' perspective out of the players' conciousness until we've tried to redeem him or kill him - our decisions will feel much more impactful once that has happened, I think.

Hmmmm.... how much do you think the Qunari will be involved with Solas plot?

Would they be an 'external' threat that is mostly there to move the Tevinter plot (invasion, potential politicking in preparation for war, perhaps attempted sacking of Minrathous) - or would they be more substantially involved?

I mean, Trespasser has already proven that the Qunari may not know all, but yet still know a lot more about ancient Elvenhan than people on the South, and will use the ancient knowledge and magic if it helps them realize their goals. We also have hints that suggest that they're researching ways to strengthen the Veil. IMO, as much as Inquisition may have thwarted their plans, which led to significant losses in their special division, we know from Bull that ain't a problem, as nobody under the Qun is irreplaceable - new heads and people are assigned and things continue. They may have lost access to perhaps most eluvians, but they likely retained most of their stockpiled knowledge, as much as Inquisition has recovered some.

Of course this also raises a question of involvement of Sten. Would the Arishok lead more than just a military invasion on Tevinter? Or would that invasion be as sneaky as invasion on South? IMO, he'd be a fairly easy companion/character to bring back, considering that he goes back on Par Vollen without being significantly changed as a character, regardless of whether we befriend him or not.

With their plan to invade South in tatters I wonder if it means that the main invasion would get modified, perhaps.

Oh, I don't mean it in a sense that they could potentially bring Sten back as a companion - only as a character who'd be otherwise difficult to write if he had too many permutations after time spend with HoF. But as it stands, he either respects some Southerners... or he doesn't (or respects less of them). That means that he wouldn't be that hard to bring back, even if he'd actually act as an antagonist, for example.

Right!  Yes, likely the people who would be in Tevinter wouldn't be people he's met before.  Giving his sword back is in the Keep and those Alistair/Varric/Isabella comics are apparently cannon so he could always have vague references to "some" southerners being worthy of respect.  So no tailored/complicated dialogue for players/companions he's met before or their actions.

I read it as a slightly subtler version of that. I’m guessing they give people like her a lot of autonomy in how they run their teams. They’d have to, otherwise they’re not really gaining the benefits of delegation. It would be exceedingly difficult to run an organization as large as the Qunari empire if everything required explicit approval.

One side benefit of this is that it gives them very genuine plausible deniability when something goes sideways. They can send out a diplomatic message saying “sorry, we didn’t know”, and really mean it. It might benefit them from time to time, but honestly I don’t think the triumvirate really wanted the hassle of dealing with the fallout of Dragon’s Breath. Even if it were successful, it would still have been a mess. So I don’t think they’re intentionally creating that kind of environment, it’s more of a natural consequence of managing large groups of people (especially when keeping power requires paying lip service to some of the more fringe ideas... and hoping no one actually acts on them).

I mean, the Inquisition is much smaller than the Qunari machine, and even they run into this problem. With hindsight, someone can say “hey, you guys should have been more wary of those Kirkwall elves who joined on” or “hey, maybe follow through with checking this guy’s obviously ancient hometown”, but there are so many plates spinning that it’s impossible to follow every suspicious lead. The best they’re able to do is shrug their shoulders at the Exalted Council and say “whoops, sorry about that”, then change their procedures so that specific problem doesn’t happen again.

I don’t think I understand this bit. You saying you think the Qunari leadership would consider Viddassala to be fringe? And they would try to placate those fringe beliefs and tolerate them, rather than just brainwash her into compliance?