Post by Fredward on Jul 1, 2018 11:16:22 GMT
Using nought but this vein of reasoning:
The way this plays out in my head is that some dev or someone they're in contact with on the reg kept mixing up qunari and Quranis and the writers, in their infinite precious innocence said, "Well, we could just change it. I'm sure no one will notice and if you're having trouble with it the fans probably will too." [queue wild conjecture on the connection between Quranis/Ventus and qunari in DA4]. Cuz frankly fans, especially new fans, have had no exposure to qunari/Quranis juxtaposing to any meaningful degree. Which is also why I dislike the implication that this change is somehow as a result of/the fault of "new fans" (the ungood fans) when, at the most, it can be a change in anticipation of confusion for new fans which can't be laid at their feet.
DA withdrawal and too much caffeine I've figured out DA4 overt plot definitely maybe. These are all very good, logical premises and entirely unassailable.
I made this:
From the qunari perspective: your fancy schmancy Dragon's Breath plot failed, you no longer have access to the Eluvian network so your grand invasion will have to be done the old fashioned way. The northern countries in your way are: Rivain, Antiva, Anderfels and the Imperium. Rivain isn't a military powerhouse I don't think, I could be wrong though. You've had a long standing foothold in Kont-arr and, since you're qunari, have probably considered a thousand and one ways to take the country down quickly just for funsies. Recent developments also mean Rivain doesn't have a circle to counter qunari gunpowder.
Next up is Antiva which also isn't a military power. Antiva keeps the peace with trade, the Crows and that one queen of theirs that married her kids into most of the ruling houses of Thedas. If Rivain HAS already fallen I imagine the qunari will turn some of their attention to Antiva next, I also imagine that the Crows will play a big role in slowing them down.
When it comes to the Anderfels they're cushioned by the more immediate threat of Tevinter. I'm not sure what the Anders' military situation is like. We know the Grey Wardens are the real power in the place, does that imply military strength too? The Grey Wardens can't be THAT big of an organization given their high turnover rate and the finiteness of Archdemon blood to induct people. Anyway, thanks to the setup we had in Inquisition we know the Wardens are undergoing their own shit in Weisshaupt so they might be distracted.
That leaves Tevinter as the primary target of Qunari aggression, with legendarily impregnable Minrathous as the big fat dot in the middle of the bullseye. With Tevinter and the qunari being in a slap fight over Seheron for so long they'll be the most primed for a surge of aggression and Tevinter is still consistently described as a major power. So if you're gonna invade you'll go for Qarinus, it's the easternmost holding of the empire and most likely to fall with a surprise attack. With both sides of the Ventosus strait under control you'll be able to set up a barricade barring reinforcements via the ocean. I don't know how viable swinging around, going via the Boeric ocean and dropping in through the Colean Sea is though.
I circled Alam before I brushed up on the situation in Seheron, the wiki mentions that it is 'firmly' under qunari control already. There's some meh about this, for example we know that Tevinter does their utmost to keep the island unmanageable and the Fog Warriors are hostile to both occupiers. We also know that the qunari haven't grasped the island so firmly that places like Ath Velanis (Titus controlled it for a bit) and Akhaaz (described as 'recently reoccupied') are 100% under their control all the time. Lore buffs feel free to enlighten me on the exact situation in Seheron. Anyway, my thinking was hard push from the Qunanri to establish total control over the island and use Alam and use it as a staging area to make ready for a fleetvasion of Minrathous. That doesn't really make sense though, if the Qunari have control over Qarinus it isn't geographical distance keeping them from Minrathous its Tevinter's fleets.
So having cut off the Imperium from reinforcements from the ocean and Antiva/Rivain (I'm assuming there's at least a semi-feasible way to move troops/facilitate large scale trade between Arlathan Forest and the Hundred Pillars that's now blocked with the taking of Qarinus) you're probably moving the troops you've landed towards Minrathous, conquering the settlements along the way. Minrathous has a bridge connecting it to the mainland that they can blow up when they're invaded but that's not a dead stop, you can cross with skiffs or have it rebuilt and defend the engineers from magefire with Saarebas or something. Minrathous can also store very large amounts of food so a siege isn't a great idea and even one functioning Eluvian would could extend that indefinitely at least for the most important people. So an assault is required, splitting the defenders attention between the ocean and the land is vastly preferable to having all the Tevene mages massed on just one side.
Taking all this into consideration reinforcements from the south would be a huge ass pain. Luckily for you, the preferred method of mass troop movement (I'm assuming but it makes sense no?) is the Imperial Highway and they all funnel through Nevarra. What do we know about Nevarra? First, it has an old king, second through events in Inquisition we know there's tension with the Imperium, third it's one of the major military powers in Thedas. Subterfuge will serve the qunari better here than military might, if the Neverrans are already predisposed to watch their enemy get slapped around a bit you don't want to hurry them along in realizing the exact scale of the threat. So imagine Ben-Hassrath agents pouring poison into the kings ear, assassinating him and making it look like old age to get a more amenable heir or even sparking a succession war. Whatever it takes to slow down troop movement through the Imperial Highway.
From Tevinter's perspective: first off, your fleets are your greatest asset. You're not gonna risk them attempting to break the barricade unless you were sure a) you could win and
help was waiting on the other side, cuz if you lose your fleets Minrathous and every coastal city is vulnerable. Cuz you've been a haughty, imperialistic lil' shit for your whole life your neighbors aren't exactly flying to your rescue. Maybe they think it's not that serious, maybe they think they can have the qunari chew you up and then clean up the mess once they're wearily digesting your remains. Point is, once the scale of the threat becomes apparent, you need help. For cities you can't afford to lose it'd be Minrathous for obvious reasons and Vyrantium cuz you don't want to lose access to the Imperial Highway if/when help arrives.
In steps the player as a diplomatic agent of the Imperium. An assumption I've been making through this whole thing is that travel along the eluvians will be a thing. Not enough to mobilize troops cuz the vast bulk of the system is in Solas' pocket but enough edge cases that you can slip a through agents through. It's a DAOish setup where you do stuff like:
1) help the Divine with whatever she needs to declare an Exalted March
2) help the Wardens figure their shit out in Weisshaupt so they can help Tevinter since it's just over there
3) unravel the Ben-Hassrath plot in Nevarra
4) get the Crows' help in retaking Qarinus
5) get the dwarves and their weird cousins' help
Culminating in the defense of Minrathous which's outcome depends on how well you've done your job. All throughout doing this you'd need to stumble upon Solas and his plots somehow, either because he's encouraging the conflict to distract from whatever he's up to or because he's also busy with something in the general area.
Here's some concept art from about a year ago (@_@):
Obviously no way to know where does falls on the developmental process or whether it's even still vaguely relevant but definitely sometime after the devs decided ancient elves would need to be plot relevant. Notice the triangly Tevinter aesthetic, the mage wearing the deathshead helmet (Mortalitasi? Nevarra?), the Grey Wardens, the people whose outfits are screaming CAW CAW, the people who look like they're ready for a dusty/deserty environment (Anderfels?), the variety of elves who may or may not work for Solas, the two flavors of dorf and ofc the qunari.
Thoughts? Wild conjecture? I do loves me some wild conjecture.
The way this plays out in my head is that some dev or someone they're in contact with on the reg kept mixing up qunari and Quranis and the writers, in their infinite precious innocence said, "Well, we could just change it. I'm sure no one will notice and if you're having trouble with it the fans probably will too." [queue wild conjecture on the connection between Quranis/Ventus and qunari in DA4]. Cuz frankly fans, especially new fans, have had no exposure to qunari/Quranis juxtaposing to any meaningful degree. Which is also why I dislike the implication that this change is somehow as a result of/the fault of "new fans" (the ungood fans) when, at the most, it can be a change in anticipation of confusion for new fans which can't be laid at their feet.
DA withdrawal and too much caffeine I've figured out DA4 overt plot definitely maybe. These are all very good, logical premises and entirely unassailable.
I made this:
From the qunari perspective: your fancy schmancy Dragon's Breath plot failed, you no longer have access to the Eluvian network so your grand invasion will have to be done the old fashioned way. The northern countries in your way are: Rivain, Antiva, Anderfels and the Imperium. Rivain isn't a military powerhouse I don't think, I could be wrong though. You've had a long standing foothold in Kont-arr and, since you're qunari, have probably considered a thousand and one ways to take the country down quickly just for funsies. Recent developments also mean Rivain doesn't have a circle to counter qunari gunpowder.
Next up is Antiva which also isn't a military power. Antiva keeps the peace with trade, the Crows and that one queen of theirs that married her kids into most of the ruling houses of Thedas. If Rivain HAS already fallen I imagine the qunari will turn some of their attention to Antiva next, I also imagine that the Crows will play a big role in slowing them down.
When it comes to the Anderfels they're cushioned by the more immediate threat of Tevinter. I'm not sure what the Anders' military situation is like. We know the Grey Wardens are the real power in the place, does that imply military strength too? The Grey Wardens can't be THAT big of an organization given their high turnover rate and the finiteness of Archdemon blood to induct people. Anyway, thanks to the setup we had in Inquisition we know the Wardens are undergoing their own shit in Weisshaupt so they might be distracted.
That leaves Tevinter as the primary target of Qunari aggression, with legendarily impregnable Minrathous as the big fat dot in the middle of the bullseye. With Tevinter and the qunari being in a slap fight over Seheron for so long they'll be the most primed for a surge of aggression and Tevinter is still consistently described as a major power. So if you're gonna invade you'll go for Qarinus, it's the easternmost holding of the empire and most likely to fall with a surprise attack. With both sides of the Ventosus strait under control you'll be able to set up a barricade barring reinforcements via the ocean. I don't know how viable swinging around, going via the Boeric ocean and dropping in through the Colean Sea is though.
I circled Alam before I brushed up on the situation in Seheron, the wiki mentions that it is 'firmly' under qunari control already. There's some meh about this, for example we know that Tevinter does their utmost to keep the island unmanageable and the Fog Warriors are hostile to both occupiers. We also know that the qunari haven't grasped the island so firmly that places like Ath Velanis (Titus controlled it for a bit) and Akhaaz (described as 'recently reoccupied') are 100% under their control all the time. Lore buffs feel free to enlighten me on the exact situation in Seheron. Anyway, my thinking was hard push from the Qunanri to establish total control over the island and use Alam and use it as a staging area to make ready for a fleetvasion of Minrathous. That doesn't really make sense though, if the Qunari have control over Qarinus it isn't geographical distance keeping them from Minrathous its Tevinter's fleets.
So having cut off the Imperium from reinforcements from the ocean and Antiva/Rivain (I'm assuming there's at least a semi-feasible way to move troops/facilitate large scale trade between Arlathan Forest and the Hundred Pillars that's now blocked with the taking of Qarinus) you're probably moving the troops you've landed towards Minrathous, conquering the settlements along the way. Minrathous has a bridge connecting it to the mainland that they can blow up when they're invaded but that's not a dead stop, you can cross with skiffs or have it rebuilt and defend the engineers from magefire with Saarebas or something. Minrathous can also store very large amounts of food so a siege isn't a great idea and even one functioning Eluvian would could extend that indefinitely at least for the most important people. So an assault is required, splitting the defenders attention between the ocean and the land is vastly preferable to having all the Tevene mages massed on just one side.
Taking all this into consideration reinforcements from the south would be a huge ass pain. Luckily for you, the preferred method of mass troop movement (I'm assuming but it makes sense no?) is the Imperial Highway and they all funnel through Nevarra. What do we know about Nevarra? First, it has an old king, second through events in Inquisition we know there's tension with the Imperium, third it's one of the major military powers in Thedas. Subterfuge will serve the qunari better here than military might, if the Neverrans are already predisposed to watch their enemy get slapped around a bit you don't want to hurry them along in realizing the exact scale of the threat. So imagine Ben-Hassrath agents pouring poison into the kings ear, assassinating him and making it look like old age to get a more amenable heir or even sparking a succession war. Whatever it takes to slow down troop movement through the Imperial Highway.
From Tevinter's perspective: first off, your fleets are your greatest asset. You're not gonna risk them attempting to break the barricade unless you were sure a) you could win and
help was waiting on the other side, cuz if you lose your fleets Minrathous and every coastal city is vulnerable. Cuz you've been a haughty, imperialistic lil' shit for your whole life your neighbors aren't exactly flying to your rescue. Maybe they think it's not that serious, maybe they think they can have the qunari chew you up and then clean up the mess once they're wearily digesting your remains. Point is, once the scale of the threat becomes apparent, you need help. For cities you can't afford to lose it'd be Minrathous for obvious reasons and Vyrantium cuz you don't want to lose access to the Imperial Highway if/when help arrives. In steps the player as a diplomatic agent of the Imperium. An assumption I've been making through this whole thing is that travel along the eluvians will be a thing. Not enough to mobilize troops cuz the vast bulk of the system is in Solas' pocket but enough edge cases that you can slip a through agents through. It's a DAOish setup where you do stuff like:
1) help the Divine with whatever she needs to declare an Exalted March
2) help the Wardens figure their shit out in Weisshaupt so they can help Tevinter since it's just over there
3) unravel the Ben-Hassrath plot in Nevarra
4) get the Crows' help in retaking Qarinus
5) get the dwarves and their weird cousins' help
Culminating in the defense of Minrathous which's outcome depends on how well you've done your job. All throughout doing this you'd need to stumble upon Solas and his plots somehow, either because he's encouraging the conflict to distract from whatever he's up to or because he's also busy with something in the general area.
Here's some concept art from about a year ago (@_@):
Obviously no way to know where does falls on the developmental process or whether it's even still vaguely relevant but definitely sometime after the devs decided ancient elves would need to be plot relevant. Notice the triangly Tevinter aesthetic, the mage wearing the deathshead helmet (Mortalitasi? Nevarra?), the Grey Wardens, the people whose outfits are screaming CAW CAW, the people who look like they're ready for a dusty/deserty environment (Anderfels?), the variety of elves who may or may not work for Solas, the two flavors of dorf and ofc the qunari.
Thoughts? Wild conjecture? I do loves me some wild conjecture.
