Races and romance poll

Yeah, I can understand why people would be into her with that being the case. Lace is a normal, nice and absolutely agreeable person that does not say or anything that could potentially annoy or anger the player. She would be perfect girlfriend material IRL.

That's exactly why I don't find her interesting, though, funnily enough.

By being utterly inoffensive and having no personal issues of her own there's no real character arc for her, which to be fair isn't surprising given that she's a minor character, but I find that it does make her generic and ultimately not relateble because of it.

I mean, we've had "cute" characters before who were unabashedly good people, but there was always a twist or potential for conflict in how a player interacted with them. Alistair is a genuinely nice, kind of dorky guy that will almost always have your back... BUT he can also be whiny, immature, and will flat out dump you if you don't execute Loghain for him. Merril was kind of the same way too... BUT she was also a blood mage and regularly spoke to a demon and refused to listen to you for most of DA2. I'm sure people are frustrated when their companions refuse to listen or throw out ultimatums but to me that just adds to their realness as characters.

Of course, I think Dragon Age does need at least one safe, unproblematic romance in their games, like Josephine in Inquisition. I don't fault the game for that but to me it usually lends itself to creating somewhat dull characters without much going on internally.

That all said, the Scout Harding that I could find interesting and would like to see in DA4 is the one who shot a confused mage in the face without a word and than smirked proudly about it. That's the woman that Spymaster Leliana thought could be her replacement and that Harding seems interesting.

Not quite how normal, nice, or agreeable people, or girlfriends, work IRL. Just because she doesn't sneer or rant at you to your face at any point in Inquisition doesn't mean she doesn't have buttons, like everyone does, that you just happen not to push in the comparatively short time you spend talking to her, or private reservations about you, or that she doesn't have things in her life she regrets, or opportunities that passed her by, or things in the world that scare or anger or inspire her in insightful ways or things in her past that hurt to think about.

Or, for that matter, that she doesn't fart and steal the blankets in bed, or wouldn't go ballistic at you for leaving the fridge door open while pouring milk after having reminded you not to do so for the fourth time. Things like that are part of being in any relationship, theoretically perfect girlfriend material or not.

And you really are her direct superior by quite a margin, and the entire organization is kind of built up around you. It makes sense for her to watch her behavior around you if you don't have a real personal relationship. Not taking opportunities to mouth off at your employer slash messiah-figure isn't exactly a sign of being "absolutely agreeable", "utterly inoffensive", 'incapable of potentially being annoying' or 'without a character arc'. 

On the contrary, she's just reasonably polite with someone she respects and doesn't have the time or status to get to know very well, and good-humored and able to have a short chat without turning it into a pity party or a demonstration of her resolve to fight the evils of the world as she sees them. In my experience, most real people are able to do those things without being considered uninteresting wusses, and the ones who can't or don't are considered emotionally weak or unstable, and actually quite boring rather than dynamic or interesting people. 

Josephine is a different case. She's a natural and professional diplomat, and absolutely a bit of a wuss. I definitely agree that there's bit too much Disney princess and not quite enough substance to her character once you get to know her for me to be particularly intrigued. 

And obviously a game that features Harding as romancible would have to put her in the spotlight and flesh her out more. I don't think anyone is hoping for another game in which she's your busy little scout who barely has time to say hello, only this time you can bang her.

I agree. It's also just the kind of realistic detail that makes the game feel a bit more grounded and down-to-earth along with her. During the American War of Independence, for example, British officers would use their mainly American recruits as guides and diplomats and occasionally translators when moving through terrain and social landscapes local to them, and even military forces today put a priority on developing well-disposed local contacts and advocates in occupied territory so they aren't completely disoriented when dealing with obscure conflicts and disputes and age-old family feuds they otherwise have no frame of reference for.

*sees people talking smack about Josephine and her romance*

My problem with Harding is that in my playthrough of Inquisition she barely registered as a character. When people say they want her as a romance I can't help but wonder who's next. The requisition officer? The grumpy smith from Haven? The fussy nobleman that wants you out of there? That random Orlesian aristocrat you can bang in Josephine's quest?

They're fictional, so no, they don't have complex inner lives until the author bothers to make them up and put them into a story. Sure, you can take any sketch of a character and develop it into an elaborate painting, but by then you might as well make a new one from scratch. My point is that Harding didn't stand out to me from dozens of other background figures in the game. If I mentioned those that made a bad first impression particularly, it is only because they made an impression at all. Others, I'm sure, I have completely forgotten about.

*throws the detonating Pikachu at you, laughing* 

Your Lavellan? Yeah, it's hard to spin an undersized and adorable-by-default wilder woman as particularly impressive or dynamic in the wide war-torn world. We just don't get a lot of flavorful background to go on.

The advantage to playing a Dalish mage, as most of us do in Inquisition, is that they're raised and trained for leadership if not large-scale administration from childhood in a world that tries to marginalize their people, allowing you to tap into all sorts of cool archetypes. Compromising consummate diplomats conscious of their vulnerability, supremacist visionaries eager to spread their superior cultural wisdom, ruthless-by-necessity and suspicious guerrilla warlords... people "bred" for harsh responsibility tend to be pretty hardcore.

What I take from a Dalish background regardless is just very old-timey values though. They live in tight-knit units that depend heavily on each other, meaning that disloyalty and dishonesty are necessarily looked down on more than incompetence, and incompetence more than interpersonal friction. And while in-game elven history mostly robs them of it, it's still fun to play a bit on the sense of mystery and superstition that surrounds folklore about graceful little people with strange powers living in the woods. There's very little outright faerie-like about the Dalish, but that doesn't mean that they wouldn't try to play up that image to keep shemlen on the back foot.

The other themes to play on are more Roma or "gypsy" -like, with strong respect for dependability and hard work and craftsmanship and individual personal qualities, and very little for or interest in collective groups or organizations or administrations. Then we start moving into city elf territory too though.

Oh my, yes! He's perfect.

I can imagine why you like him.

He looks like Anders