Dragon Age The Veilguard Criticism Thread (formerly Skepticism Thread) [Spoilers]

So this thread is meant for us to expose or criticism of Veilguard?

I'm so glad this thread exists because I got tired of forced positivity echo chambers of twitter with no room for discussion

Wait, no Blood Mage in this one as well? This is a major letdown.

I suspect it’s more if blood magic plays a major role in the story, it could be very weird if you spec as a blood mage.

A bit like having mindflayer as a playable race in BG3, which would be incredibly challenging to write around at the very least.

This is a trend I see developing from games that have come out recently. Like Diablo 4. Red menu, red UI, red statues effects, red damage cones, red aoe bubbles , just red red red fucking everywhere. It's so absolutely lazy. Devs think of a color they find appropriate for the game then just plaster it all over the game. 

That or people saying “you’re being negative just for the sake of it!” Like bish no, if I’m complaining about it then it’s a pretty big deal for my own enjoyment actually.

Skeptic threads are nice though cause it gives them people a place for it and then people who hate “negativity” can just stay away as well. It’s a win-win.

Idk how you can talk to people on twitter though, them character limits would irk me and I don’t feel the need to pay money where I can have everything in one tweet. If I can’t fit what I want into one tweet I just don’t even respond at all. It seems discord is what a lot of dev companies use these days as well. I don’t see forums much anymore since most of them are closed.

Something I am dubious about.

The gameplay trailer revealed Neve as an "Ice Mage". She used ice magic exclusively. In every DA game so far, you could have fire, ice and lightning (and more, but that isn't my point), and you could pick and choose from any or all of them. Will each mage - Rook included if that class is picked - be limited to one elemental 'school'? (Plus the shared mage talents, of course) I hope not. I get wanting players to experiment with different builds etc, but I think the number of people who will do entire new runs to experience the Fire Mage versus the Lightning Mage is a vanishingly small one. If we are hard limited, hopefully there are readily available respecs.

OK it's time for me to vent after my short meltdown in the other thread about Morrigan probably not returning and getting zero reaction like this isn't a big deal...

What the actual fuck, BioWare?!

Disclaimer: I don't know how old that tweet by Claudia Black is but if it's true that she's not involved, then what sliver of hope I had for the writing to be at least decent is GONE.

Because to me this is a strong indicator that BioWare doesn't care about what happened in DAI with Morrigan and the well and the whole absorbing parts of Mythal drama. And the whole huge deal with Solas and Mythal in general. What kind of shit storytelling would that be?!
Like, seriously, how do you continue that thread in DAV without Morrigan/Mythal?!?
Nevermind my bias because Morrigan is my favorite character and I want her to be the hero of the story. How do you continue with Solas without these two characters having any input and not completing disregard everything that happens before??

I don't understand. I'm so confused right now. I really hope they're keeping her involvement under wraps for some stupid "surprise!" reason.

Jesus... I guess best case scenario for DAV at this point is that this is indeed the DA version of ME2, a game that barely pushed the reaper plot along and just made it about the characters. That sort of worked for Mass Effect. But imo we're not at the same place in the DA story to be mucking around like that. Shit should be getting real. There is no excuse for Mythal and by extension now Morrigan not to get involved like always. Mythal is THE central character of the whole series! The one moving the chess pieces around in every game. Sure, Solas is the one who put up the veil, so he is the big bad in the entire story. But Mythal is equally important as the one whose murder kick-started all this.

So what kind of dumb plot are we getting then that doesn't involve her?? Will this end in just another cliffhanger where everything is yet again postponed until next time? Will Solas just get killed by the two escaped evanuris or die killing them at the end of the game and we're back to square one with the veil about what to do about it? Or will it come down at the end and somehow Mythal didn't bother to show up because it's what she wanted too?
Or is Morrigan sidelined because Solas absorbing most of Mythal means he's two people in one now and her spirit is driving his decisions now? The way I understood that scene at the end of DAI was that Solas "killed" Mythal by absorbing her power. But her spirit was preserved by going into Morrigan. So Mythal only lives on in Morrigan, not Solas. Correct? So then there is no Mythal involvement without Morrigan.
DAI made a really BIG deal out of the whole thing and having Solas and Morrigan at odds like bickering children of Mythal was so delightful. So forgive me for expecting to see this all picked up again!

I hope I'm just overreacting and what the writers are doing with the plot will turn out to be brilliant and it will all make sense, but my expectations crashed down to rock bottom again with this info.
I want this story to get wrapped up sooner than later. I don't want this to be a filler plot to the dating sim. Argh, this is upsetting me more than it should. I lay in bed last night unable to sleep because I kept yelling at BioWare in my head. Ugh.

If somebody has a good explanation for Morrigan not being in the game, let's hear it.
I guess it's a good thing I expect a trainwreck of a story again. Better than getting my hopes up and getting them crushed. Expecting DAV to be forgettable at best is the sensible approach after MEA and Anthem. And I should stick to it.

I'm not expecting much from the writing. I mean, Hawke went to Weisshaupt how many years ago now? What came out of it? Any plot thread can be ignored at any time.

It's the combat that really gets to me. I felt something was weird the first time I watched the gameplay video, now I checked a few moments in it again and now I know what bothers me.

1. The silly ass animations like the DA2 rogue throws-a-bottle-with-a-roundhouse-kick are back. Varric sometimes shoots Bianca while hovering in the air for a moment after a jump, bracing the crossbow under his feet. What a way to treat fine dwarven engineering.

2. Do your companions ever get attacked? Do they even have a hitpoint bar somewhere? They seem little more than providers of piddly extra damage and combo abilities. What an elegant way to solve the "companions too dumb to not constantly walk into the green shit on the floor" problem. Are we wearing a "I'm the protagonist KICK ME" sign?

Would have been interesting to know what difficulty that was at.

Omg, enough with those toxic Tumblr idiots yapping about cultural appropriation and whatnot. Good grief, we're so fucked.

Looked for the tweet. Claudia Black said "Spoiler - I'm not in this one" on Nov 4, 2022. So recent enough to be believable. Yeah, I think Veilguard is a deep sale game for me again. I'll probably be disgusted how they butchered the lore and characters to appeal to toxic women on the internet. I can totally see why Morrigan is not liked by "modern audiences". RIP, Dragon Age.

Morrigan getting a different a voice or maybe even Mythal's voice would be the only explanation I could accept. Would still hate it but at least she'd be in the game...

The combat changes are the least of my concerns. If the writing is bad then the asshole in me hopes BioWare gets shut down asap. I am still baffled how they survived Anthem. I would have bet money on EA closing them down after that disaster. But nope, lucky for all DA fans they let them live to ruin this franchise too. Ugh. Sorry for my mood. I'm angry at myself for letting myself hope we might get something not entire shit after they said they ditched open world, something I never believed EA would allow.