You thought Mage vs. Templar was complicated? JUST YOU WAIT FOR...

Or turn them to your own puppets.

thank you for my beautiful new wallpaper 😂

There’s a fair-to-moderate chance that it’s a Qunari version of the Tranquility ritual, which would make it reversible. We’ll have to see if qamek ultimately turns out to be lyrium/mostly lyrium.

As for the frequency of qamek application, I don’t think it’s quite as simple as “more conquest = more viddath-bas”. I suspect what’s actually happening is this: there’s a - hopefully shrinking - demand for laborers that don’t fall neatly into one of the categories. If we assume about a third (and no more than half, due to gender constraints) of Qunari are farmers/factory workers/everyone else under the arigena... that’s actually not possible at their current level of technology. Like, there are countries today with a higher percentage of their population in agriculture. Never mind countries at the dawn of the industrial revolution.

So, yes, on paper, the Ben-Hassrath apply qamek for religious reasons. But I’d be willing to bet they draw the line for disobedience at different places depending on how many people they “need” to arrest. As a real world example, California spent a long time resisting sentencing reform, even if it would lower recidivism, because prisoners are crucial to fighting fires in the state. And tons of other states in the US have a similar problem. Their economy has come to rely on having a certain supply of people who will work for pennies, so there’s extreme pressure to keep the crime rate high, whether by putting no effort into crime reduction, or by criminalizing increasingly petty things.

If this theory is true, it could explain why the Qunari seem to have mellowed out over time. As their technology advanced, it reduced their need for viddath-bas, so perhaps they could fill their needs with arrests rather than trying to conquer a bunch of other people. Under this lens, Viddasala could actually be reacting to internal dissatisfaction/calls for reform. Increased mechanization is gradually bringing high arrest quotas down (don’t need as many laborers if a machine does it), but conquest is a shortcut. More conquered people means less pressure to arrest domestically to fill the labor gap.

In other words, “more conquest = same total amount of viddath-bas, but a higher percentage of them come from conquest rather than arrests”.

I'm gonna be 100% honest- a society that is deeply flawed, but still allows for the growth and development of diverse beliefs and thoughts (even if you might get killed for them) is better than a stifling, repressive, society that allows for no different opinions at the risk of being brainwashed or being made into a brain dead slave.

My baseline thoughts on Tevinter is- Yes, it's certainly a society that freely allows for the growth of evil, such as slavery, blood magic where the blood is taken from others against their will, open assassination, and highly unsafe and questionable magical practices. HOWEVER, this is STILL the nation that produced Dorian, Maevaris, Cremesius, and dozens of schools of philosophy, education, miracles of magic and science, and is the birthplace of modern culture in Thedas. For all its terrible practices and horrible people, it allows for diversity of thought, and people have opportunity to change their position in society, and even change society itself. Yes, it's incredibly difficult, but clearly with both Maevaris and Dorian and a growing number of people who are discontented in Tevinter, things could actually change there.

Meanwhile, we have the Qun. Let's put aside the various different branches of the Qun, and look at it as a singular entity. Firstly- if you convert to the Qun, great. However, the goal of the Qun is to invade all of Thedas, take over it completely, kill anyone who doesn't convert, and basically brainwash everyone who they can. They don't have family in the Qun. You can't have a 'lover' in the Qun- that is, you can't have someone who you actually love in a romantic sense. Not only is that a foreign concept, you can get reeducated for it. You can get reeducated for a lot of things, it feels like. And reeducation is basically where you're brainwashed through either chemical or psychological means (or both) into following the Qun again. Still can't get those dissenting thoughts out of your mind? Don't worry! They have a potion that will kill your mind altogether! And I'm not going to even touch on the horrible things they do to mages. Does their society work? On the surface it seems to- because they kill dissenters who are on the inside, and if they escape, they will hunt them down and kill them on the outside. 

So to my mind, it's a choice between a society that allows for evil to exist, and a society that will exterminate evil by exterminating choice and individuality, which is in of itself evil. So if I have to choose between the possibility of evil, or something that actually is evil, I'll choose the possibly. Tevinter can be changed- with difficulty, yes, but it can be changed. The Qun is completely evil in of itself and should be destroyed.

Ah, "screw you all, burn in hell and someone get me a beer" ending. I've just recalled why TW1 and VTM: Bloodlines are my favourite games - I was actually satisfied with my choices by killing the bad guys and flipping a bird to survivors!
I doubt Bioware will go that way, though. Protagonists in their games (speaking about latest - DA and ME; I can't speak about those I didn't play) needs back-up of some major organization to advance their goals, so going on your own probably won't be option (although it might make some sense - you would be someone "Solas doesn't and just can't know").

Much as I hate the idea of slavery in any form, I could never support an ideology that believes sewing people's mouths shut is a good idea. Ever since Ketojan I have hated the Qun. If I had to choose between siding with the magisters of Tevinter or supporting the Qunari I would have to go with the lesser of two evils, which is pretty freaking sad considering how evil most of the Tevene ruling class are portrayed as being in lore.

I would hate to have DA4 focus on such a choice, however. It would be a good background thing for a small group, like Bull's quest, but I don't see how our nobody PC could be in a position to affect this decades-long war one way or another. Besides, we've got a world to save! Who cares if Tevinter or the Qunari end up on top if Solas just wipes the slate clean by doing something well-intentioned but stupid.

Exactly my thoughts.

I'll have to add that I actually like Tevinter culture, apart from the slavery and the human sacrifice. Calpernia's story makes me shiver. I want to see her succeed in transforming the empire. 

to many black and white views here, oh my, no wonder why new characters get they alingments gated to lawful good to neutral good at most.

I don't care about what Calpernia did, I killed her because she was getting in my way, simple.

She either leaves fine and dandy or escapes over a waterfall. Writers very careful to keep her death from being certain.

Just irritated why they wouldn't let me kill Samson. Ugh

The war with the Qunari have been brewing in the past 3 games and I would be disappointed if it's placed to the back-burner due to an incident (Solas or something worse) that forces them to settle their differences ala Mage-Templar war.

I guess it will all end -after a few more games- in a war between the Archdemons and remaining Elven deities. Then the Age of Dragons will end.
Maybe a new IP will be born, or they invent some new epoch, like Games Workshop did with Age of Sigmar. :facepalm:

Or maybe-- they put some work into it and create a coherent narrative for this great world of Thedas. I am okay with redcons, as long as it fixes the whole: The world is in peril theme.

Oh god, pls no. That would be a huge letdown.