Throughout the series, what have you found to be the biggest, lingering gameplay issue?

Counterpoint -

Lots of replayability, if you replay for gameplay and not story, is lost when you alter the class distinctions significantly. This isn't necessarily a bad thing, but when your bread and butter is branching dialog choices that can't all be seen in one playthrough...

This would be shooting themselves in the foot. They've done it before, but hopefully not now. Class systems, when well implemented, add lots to the replayability of a game and the interest in what your squad's individual capabilities are.

Yup, I remember reading a chart that said that a little over 50 percent of PS gamers finished The Last of Us.

we aren't representative of the gaming public as a whole and its silly to equate us to it. We play games over and over again and finish them then find days on our lives to post about it on a forum...two very niche mind sets.

I mean hell take the estimated copies of Inquisition, Andromeda, and probably Anthem and then compare it to the number of forum ites who are here. And then compare it to anyone who is an active and we will come to an understanding of just how unicorn we are.

Difficulty balance. I find the game too easy and snowbally on Normal but Nightmare is just stat bloat.

DAI got it right with the challenges like no potion restocking etc so I'd like them to continue that and add more interesting mechanics on tougher difficulties (another challenge I liked but was bundled with other stuff)

That question cannot be condensed into a universal constant that encompasses all three games, as each game is a radically different experience. I'd need to break it down into each separate game.

DA:O
For me Origins was the most near-as-dammit-perfect videogame I have ever played. I'd still maintain it's a strong contender for the best videogame ever made.
There are very few things wrong with it, and of those things most have been fixed by the modding community.
I'd say that the only lingering issues are a couple of bugs that were never properly patched and a rather clunky and unwieldy crafting system, which is particularly bad in Awakening's efforts to create runes. There are also a handful of largely superfluous or plain useless spells within the Mage tree.
That's really all there is, though others may disagree. Other issues such as over-the-top, overly-visible aura and status effects, lack of character/party respec, and dated graphics are all comprehensively fixed by mods.

DA:2
Removal of skills negatively impacts the game, as does limited specialisations.
Lack of character customisation in terms of gear, companion armor etc.
Lack of variety in enemies.
Lack of options for tactical gameplay due to game's habit of having enemies literally parachute in from the sky, which makes party positioning problematic.
Main story loses it's way in the third act.

DA:1
Boring, repetitive combat mechanics, made worse by overly-streamlined selection of rather dull spells and skills.

Removal of all but the most basic crowd control and utility spells/abilities, which further adds to the boredom factor of combat.

Ridiculous limitation of eight spells in the action bar, which mostly takes away any of the fun from levelling up, as by mid-game you're already going to have your optimal eight spells/abilities.

No ability to assign character stat points, which further limits customisation and choice.

Removal of customisable tactics.

Clunky, unwieldy user interface.

Game suffers from significant bloat. Far too much busywork, fetch quests, collectibles etc.

Poor pathfinding and navigation. Verticality sounds cool, but endlessly scrabbling up impassable cliffs, jumping puzzles, endless running around trying to work out how to get to the top of a hill to grab a geegaw was not particularly fun for me, in fact it was frustrating.

God-awful Wicked Eyes and Wicked Minds quest, which could have been so much more.

Removal of spirit healing, and removal of out of combat health regen - which limits the ability to explore, and turns the game into a dated Diablo II-style potion spam fest. I didn't find this fun at all.

Respawning enemies made exploration a chore.

Requirement to farm enemies for crafting materials should really only belong in MMOs.



So you can see that none of these issues really tie together between all three games, save perhaps in a general sense of increased 'streamlining' of game mechanics during each iteration.

If you're an absolutely incredible player with God-like skills and knowledge of the game, then sure I guess you can play the entire game without using a potion, and likely feel that barriers and guard make the game far too easy.

But for players of average skill potions are necessary, especially in the early stages of the game before I have decent gear and mitigation.

I find that there are situations when I am required to spam potions, these are usually the early dragon fights and some of the tough DLC bosses, in particular The Librarian and The Guardian in Descent.

I don't have god-like skills (I do use pause once in a while) and my knowledge of the game isn't god tier either, I learn new things every time I check stuff online...and then forget about it.    These days when I replay, I usually don't bother controlling the party members either (I was doing that a lot in my first PT). I do set up some preferred skills and modify the % to use mana/stamina/potions thought, sometimes change the "follow" as well. The only exception is boss fights, because the AI is too stupid to avoid AOEs. There I use pause to tell them where to go. Also, I only play on normal, because I hate HP sponges. Oh and I can be lazy optimizing my characters too, sometimes I just wear/use something because I like the look of it too.

But yes, the Hinterland dragon is always a PITA and my companions usually end up drinking near all the potions. I've gotten better at making them avoid the fireballs thought. Stupid AI.

But with your "barrier and guard make the game far too easy", I take you aren't bothering using 2/3 of the game damage mitigation features that much which make your complains about guzzling potions makes more sense. Saying that, changing barrier/guard for healing spells wouldn't be any less "make the game far too easy" or less spammy as you'll just be spamming healing spells instead of barrier spells/guard skills. But somehow people are conditioned to find spamming healing spells acceptable...I never understood it.

The actual problem is that DAI combat is designed as a damage/mitigation spamming game. It's all about stacking damage and mitigation for both player and enemies. That is what happens when you remove almost all crowd-control/utilities abilities and their counter-abilities...and I don't see this changing. Modern action combat designer do not understand the awesomeness of a Darkness spell...

I actually do the opposite (excluding bosses encounters), I tend to split the party among the enemies. That mostly result into a beautiful chaotic mess.  

And now I want to go try my Necromancer tank build idea to see how messy it can get (it's not just this discussion that made me do that).

I also liked the bit in dragon age origins during the battle of denerim where you played the party members you didn't take with you for the final fight defending the city. And when the party comes to rescue you at fort drakon. I think bits like that are great. And I like that in swtor the companions you don't take into the field don't just sit around on the ship. You can send them on their own little missions (from which they return with crafting or gift/reputation rewards). And I liked the detail of Mass effect Andromeda that you could send groups on missions or do then as MP yourself.

I think it would be lovely if they built on all these things in DAD. Splitting your companions for a big final Mission and getting to play the other group doing their part as well. Sending not an entire organisation of agents on missions like the war table but instead just sending other companions out on missions while you continue to quest with the pc and their active group. Maybe even having the option to choose to play those other missions with those companions sometimes.

I think the combat blows. Which given how much combat is in the game makes it a bit of a slog.

Dragon Age has never been turn based in the first place.  Origins was kind of a quasi have your cake and eat it to certain way of doing things but it wasn't actually turned based.  

As to the disagreement at hand though it will work pretty much like how Mass Effect or Ghost Recon works or the Witcher or any other game.  Yes I know there really isn't a good counter example out there but I have definitley seen AI handle action combat on their own doing their own thing.  Hell, actually now that I am thinking about it Inquisition was really most of the way there in the first place.  I remember seeing Cassandra dodge and roll with the best of them.  The only difference between that and what I am proposing is that those arent abilities.