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

Considering this is the internet not sure if this sarcasm or not.

Ugh I should stop coming in here my morbid curiosity gets the better of me though and this place seems to be better then the last Skepticism thread...there does seem to be legitimate conversation going on in here that is engaging.

I can't speak for everyone obviously but at least for me the 'reader/player' this has been great to me.  Dragon Age is my favorite fictional franchise atm and Thedas is my favorite fictional world...and this is despite having huge gaping issues with all three of their games believe it or not!  But a large part of the reason I do love the series so much is these revelations and how they treat history and phiosophy...both in the ways that individual characters have differing perspectives when it comes to things...and in terms of the revelations of history.  Because, this is so true to life.  How much does our ideas of history or historical truth change because of new revelations in our world?  The Dead Sea Scrolls leap perhaps most dramatically to mind but there are others (in fact this is kind of the whole point of archeology).  

I do have...issues...with your logic when it comes to IB.  Mainly though I find the idea that the Iron Bull is lying to the player as...problematic...because we as the player know he is lying.  Our previous experiences with the Qun, the nature of the Qunari, the fact that he is called Liar as his Qun assigned role all point to us having good reason of being suspicious of his claims of the veracity of his claims.  Hell much a similar situation exists right now for Solas because we know (unless they decide to clarify the timeline more) that his claims at the end of Tresspasser are similarily false.  

But then, as you put it, who is he lying to?   Well I see a couple of different options.  

-The Inquisitor.  Now this is obvious because most of his qun centric lines are told to her and also we know that his mission is essentially to lie to her and worm his way into her inner circle...and eventually betray the Inquisition.  
-Southern Thedas.  Since he is Hisrad one of his objectives could not have been just to gather intel about the happenings in the South but to recruit more agents/ converts into the Qun.  And to do that you want to show your organization in the best light possible.  
-Himself.  Easy to see since he was clearly going through a crisis of consiounce throughout the game.  

Though it is also worth pointing out that I do have some questions on exactly where he was lying though.  Sure some of these things are probably gussied up but given the nature of the Qun...well his lying is more like lies of omission.  "Yes I am a member of the Ben Hassrath you can trust me...while I secretly await orders that could lead to me turning against you at the drop of a hat."  "Why yes the Qun is just fiiiinnnneee with LGBT issues...that is if the Tamassarans agree to it."  

I mean, it doesn't take too much of a leap to follow the threads in any of this stuff and put together information for ourselves about what is true and what is not.  Even Origins had mystery and historical revelation as a part of its plot (See the Urn of Sacred Ashes and the quests with the Werewolves)

Most of your issues seem to boil down to not liking her personality. Which is not the same thing as poorly written. I don't like her either. But I consider her well written because she makes sense to me. There are plenty of irritating people with black and white thinking out there in real life. And yes, lots of people resent the people who help them because they didn't feel welcome regardless. Some people will find the fault in everything and feel like they are always mistreated and have it so bad.
I find Sera well written exactly because she's like a real person who has deep emotional issues on top of being uneducated. She reminded me a bit of a borderline personality friend I had in school. Wild punk girl from a troubled family life who was very difficult to be around because of her black and white thinking.
And as I said, Sera has a lot of insightful things to say about society underneath her abrasive exterior. She's quite observant.

As for the Temple Of Mythal, I thought it was HILARIOUS how Morrigan is all high and mighty and then gets her ass handed to her. Clearly she is NOT as much an expert as she likes to think. That's what's so funny. Mommy had her fooled the whole time. I love Morrigan, but she got what she deserved in that scene.
And come on, the lecture on elven lore even if your PC is Dalish was clearly an implementation issue. Bioware just couldn't be bothered to adjust the dialogue. Has nothing to do with bad writing. I think they even apologized for the oversight.

In D&D, I'd be tempted to model her as low INT, high WIS.

For clarity sake I didn't mean it in terms of descrepencies just in terms that they will change their minds in the future in order to drive a different point home.

I hope that number is 'zero'

PC1 - learns that an apple is something that can be bought from a vendor in the market. It's juicy and tasty, but must be eaten within some period of time lest it spoils.

PC2 - learns that apples can be cooked or dried and preserved for lengthy periods of time. They're available in different forms from different shops.

PC3 - Comes across an orchard while out adventuring. Learns that apples grow on trees and their seeds can be planted to grow more apple trees.

Same apples, different perspectives.

DAO - The warden was told that only a mage could enter the fade to rescue Connor, and it would require either a blood mage consuming the life of another person or a team of mages with a large supply of lyrium to power the spell. The warden made a decision based on the information and capabilities at hand.

DA2 - Hawke meets a blood mage who is able to make muggles subject to possession. Also, Keeper Marethari pieces together some ancient rite that can send Hawke and companions to the fade. Torpor says he hasn't seen that kind of magic for a very long time... but Hawke made decisions based on the information and capabilities at hand.

Different people are able to do different things with magic. Also, Kirkwall is built on some underlying symbols and has seen a lot of suffering and death, thus the veil is compromised there.

Then there's red lyrium. Introduced in DA2, expanded in DAI; unknown prior to that.

Wynne seemed to like the Fereldan Circle - from her background, it was a relief to be taken in, trained, and housed. Anders not so much, ditto Hawkes. Same Circle. Different perspectives.

Apologies, I didn't see the sarcasm in your statement when I made my response. Still, my point is still valid that if they do change their minds in the future to suit the story they want to tell, it will be a case of unreliable narrator because you can't trust the Dread Wolf.

Was Iron Bull lying or was he giving his biased interpretation?

Who has claimed the former?

Don't take the "character death" literally. It means that a lot of changes to the lore have dire ramifications to the setting, especially to things as established and unfolded in the past. Which, while could be explained away, through a very specific context, require a lot of concessions being made, that are usually bigger than the payoff. This damages the brand. In small ways, sure, but when these pile up, you end up alienating a lot of people from the customer base, to suit a writer's ephemeral vision of what something should or shouldn't do. Which will be undone in the next installment. So why bother? It makes the "fiction" part of the narrative way too obvious and when you're playing make-believe, it is important to keep up the pretenses. Otherwise the illusion is broken and the audience is gone along with it.

Can you be a bit more specific? As you often do, you've posted a bunch of vague blather which just sort of assumes that we're bothered by the stuff which bothers you. Exactly what bothers you, and why?