Mystery and Night - The last two Old Gods, the last remaining sealed Evanuris.

I do think this has more to do with Taint and the Void as the Corypheus refers to the former as Darkness and the Dalish believe it comes from Banal'han, the Place of Nothing, in other words the Void. This would also tie in with the legend of Andruil where she went hunting in the Void and brought back plague. This is why I tend to associate Lusacan with Falon'Din, the god of death (rather than simply the Dead), who was able to "walk where the People could not", which would make sense if referring to the Void. I also believe that one or both of them were associated with the original Mortalitasi and their rituals.

We know that spirits/demons can mimic beings they have encountered through the Fade. So it is entirely possible that the Old Gods are spirits that took on the attributes of the Evanuris once they were safely shut away and this accounts for their similarity to them. Or as you say, they could be human heroes.   The Neromenians certainly believed that their heroes were reborn as dragons (as did the Cult of Andraste in the Frostbacks).   Human history is still shrouded in mystery. The Dalish legends say that humans first arrived from over the sea and landed in Par Vollen. That would be the Neromenians that later split into 4 distinct kingdoms, Neromenian, Qarinus, Tevinter and Barindur, the latter allegedly being destroyed by Dumat after they refused to honour him, although Solas seemed to suggest it was really a volcanic eruption. Then the kingdoms later reunited to create the Tevinter Imperium. However, it is not clear where the southern barbarians fit into all of this. Were they another offshoot of the Neromenians that relocated further south in the face of Neromenian aggression? Or did they originate somewhere completely different? They are certainly in no doubt that their gods are spirits of the Fade that they interact with through the medium of the tribal Augur, or shaman. This sounds very similar to the Wise Women up in Rivain, who presumably were also an offshoot of the Neromenians, so it is entirely possible they all have the same origin and likely a similarity in belief as well. So, it is entirely possible the Old Gods started off as spirits of the Fade communing with tribal shaman, which would also fit with what Andraste says on the matter, that were latter called into dragon vessels, as per Hakkon. The only problem with this theory is when did they become imprisoned underground? Although, there is a codex where it is speculated that the dragons just went into hibernation for a while to recover their strength, which according to Felassan in Masked Empire is also what the elven gods did, using Uthenera presumably to continue to communicate with their priesthood. So, the Old Gods could have been doing something similar.

If they are connected to the Evanuris in some way, then my theory up to now is that each of them split their soul with a dragon (like Corypheus did) as an insurance against dying. The reason Mythal was consigned to the Fade on death is that they simultaneously killed her dragon. Meanwhile, with the others, when the dragon half is killed, the piece of the soul goes to wherever they are imprisoned and reunites with them, perhaps making them stronger, which is why Solas wanted to prevent the remaining two Old Gods from being killed.

Otherwise, the reason there are two is simple; they are not related to the "First of my People", so the previous risings as Arch-demons did result in their death. Thus, there are now only two left, or three technically if the Warden did the Dark Ritual, although that depends on what happened to the OG soul when Solas "killed" Flemeth (although technically that may have been Mythal if she voluntarily left her host to join with him).

The latest cinematic did seem to point towards a definite connection between the Old Gods and the Evanuris if there was a significance between the number of blacked out discs versus golden ones in the earlier trailer. It also seemed to hint that the Golden City became Black on the creation of the Veil, at the least on the inside, even if outwardly it still appeared golden until the invasion by the Magisters. Was the Veil necessary to contain the Taint away from both the Fade and the Waking World, so the breach back in ancient times was what allowed it to escape?

Perhaps because blights end only when the darkspawn go underground to find a new archdemon, so if you kill the remaining archdemons then the darkspawn will just stay on the surface corrupting the land forever until everything else dies out? An eternal blight. A bad idea if you do not also have some means of curing/eradicating the taint. Solas is perhaps frustrated that they would have taken away precious time needed to find/develop one?

Pretty much this. I think there was a codex in one of the earlier games that showed Solas wasn't the first to question the idea that killing all the Arch-demons would end the Blights.

The other possibility is connected to the idea that the Old God dragons are in some way connected to the creation of the Veil, so they were his allies in creating the prison for the Evanuris and trapping the Taint within the Black City. So, killing the last of the Old Gods would release the Evanuris, who would likely use the darkspawn as their army to conquer the world. The problem with this one is that the Old Gods allegedly encouraged the assault on the Black City, which resulted in the release of the Taint on the world and ultimately their own corruption. Thus, I think this theory is only viable if being trapped underground wasn't part of the original plan. In other words, the Old Gods are the Forgotten Ones that the Dalish claim were his allies but he also betrayed. They just wanted to get rid of the Evanuris but he wanted them all gone, so the magic Solas employed sealed them in their prisons as well. The only way for them to be freed would be to break into the Black City, starting the chain of events that led to the creation of the darkspawn.   Something like that anyway.

Whilst I agree that I think Solas wants the war to continue, it should be remembered that Tevinter and the Qun have never not been at war. The Llomerryn Accord only applied to the southern nations as Tevinter refused to sign it. Seheron has been pretty much an ongoing battleground for them but the last major conflict between the two groups on the mainland was back in 9:12, when the Qun launched a major assault on Qarinus which was ultimately rebuffed by the superior magical power of the Tevinter army. This is why I questioned the ease with which the Antaam seem to have conquered eastern Tevinter this time round. Sten, who was a junior officer then, suggested they should concentrate on intelligence gathering about their enemies before attempting another major campaign and, of course, he is now the Arishok, so presumably his spies told him that the time was right and that may account for their success.

I think the city in his afresco has been confirmed as being the Golden/Black City in the December trailer, so whatever else may be depicted, the central panel relates to his intention to tear open the Veil. The other figures may explain why he feels he has no choice in the matter.

It is certainly true that many Tevinter cities were built over elven ruins, as PW has confirmed before now. They also plundered them of many useful magical relics of the elven empire, including foci/orbs like Fen'Harel's, as Dorian recalls seeing pictures in the archives in Minrathous of Dreamer mages holding them. However, the major connection, assuming one of the figures is Razikale, is that she was the patron goddess of the ancient kingdom of Tevinter, before the founding of the Imperium, and the Circle of Magi in Minrathous was originally the temple dedicated to her. That has to be significant in some way. The city is allegedly protected by some ancient magic which means it has never fallen to invaders.

According to a story in Tevinter Nights there is an ancient demon chained somewhere beneath the city and in Calpernia's short story she could also sense something in the depths, so it is possible that either Razikale or some other powerful being from ancient times is down there. There was a tower in Emprise du Leon that was said to have been created by using blood magic, either by Tevinter or the ancient elves, and it might be worth recalling the codex on this:
Local tales of the tower and its grisly contents abound. Some believe Tevinters built the structure, reinforcing its foundations with blood magic. In other tales, elves built the tower. My favorite is particularly imaginative. In this story, a blood mage summoned a greater pride demon, who then possessed the entire tower. When the mage died, his sons were unable to control the demon, so they commissioned eight monstrous iron chains intended to hold it. The touch of the cold iron chain is the only thing holding the stone abomination in place. Should they break, the tower will pull itself off its foundations and walk, destroying everything in its path.

Perhaps something similar created the foundations of Minrathous. In Tevinter Nights it was certainly intimated that should the demon be released it would destroy the city.   It is possible that the destruction of the Veil would automatically release it.    It is also possible that the ancient being beneath Minrathous is actually a dormant Titan, in which case we know that any sort of major breach in the Veil would awaken it.

Correct and it takes some time to cleanse them again. In fact I wonder just how great the numbers were running around in previous Blights because, whilst the Anderfels became a barren wasteland because of them, the Freemarches, which are known as the bread basket of Thedas, have repeatedly been attacked and yet apparently quickly returned to normal farming. Perhaps it does depend on how long the darkspawn remain in one area. Lothering was also said to still be corrupted many years after the 5th Blight ended but it would seem the greatest concentration of darkspawn did settle for several months in that location.

The Old Gods give off a definite "song" which all tainted creatures can hear, unless the connection has been broken by the Architect's ritual. The Grey Wardens can hear it too, gradually becoming so pervasive over time that they are compelled to respond. I've often wondered if this is an indication the Old Gods are already corrupted before the darkspawn reach them because I find it hard to understand why they only attract tainted creatures if that is not the case. Likewise, Corypheus was able to mimic the Calling and this both attracted darkspawn to his prison and affected the Grey Wardens near by negatively, suggesting it has a definite connection with the taint.

This was in the Descent and presumably related to Urthemiel before the 5th Blight. It was implied that the corruption came from the Arch-demon and even affected the rock around its prison. So, it may be that instead of the darkspawn breaking through causing the corruption, they simply awake and free the creature. That would make more sense considering that dragons are known to be resistant to the taint and it normally takes a while from coming into contact with the infection before the creature succumbs to it, yet it was implied this was almost instantaneous upon breaking through with the Old Gods.

Anyway, this is why not everyone in Thedas, including Solas, thinks killing the last two Old Gods will end the Blights but more likely will mean there will no longer be anything anchoring the darkspawn to the Deep Roads. In fact, as suggest by the dwarf Renn in the Descent, it would make more sense to try and locate all the various broodmothers and kill them as they are the chief reason the darkspawn keep returning.

I would love to know what precisely the Old Gods were/are since we now know what the Evanuris are, the Stone has been heavily equated to the Titans, the Qun is anathema to the rest of Thedas, the 'Gods' of the Avvar/Alamarri are explained in the Jaws of Hakkon, that just leaves the Old Gods as the only really religious beings that we can explore. Of course there is the Maker, but anything related to him is deliberately and precisely vague to emphasis on the nature and ambiguity of faith. Hopefully since we will be in Tevinter and Northern Thedas we might get more understanding of who/what the Old Gods are.

"Then again, perhaps that 8th "Old God" was really the Maker."


Maybe the real 8th Old God was the friends we made along the way?  

But now to be serious....far as Snake's go, Flemeth back in the day did take on the form of a giant snake to lure out that crazy elf god, a giant snake got in a fight with a titan and created a lake according to one of the myths.  As for coming from crystals, don't the dragon's hibernate in giant lyrium eggs of crystal in the comic with Yavanna? Definitely reminds me of that.

I almost think the earth shifting because of something moving underground has something to do with the elven city that sunk into the earth, if they can move it once maybe they can do so again without coming to the surface and causing sink holes and the like.

If I'm remembering correctly both the elven gods and the dwarves first popped up from out of the earth right?  Perhaps the initial form the elven gods took before they came to the surface was to mimic or possess giant serpents?  

The first non-titan pantheon was presumably Dwarven, if I'm remembering correctly about the elves, makes the ideas of Sandal being an old god perhaps more right than initially thought.

Of course there will also be a bit of sea action going on in the next game, so it being a sea entity not out of hand......though it's not like Sea Serpents don't exist.  But it feels like it would be more fitting to have some kind of leviathan, giant eel or something.

If the idea of giant snakes as some kind of underground "proto-dragon" is right, than the snake men may very well be proto-Qunari.  Or perhaps Proto-Kossith is more appropriate.

Another random thing for the giant snakes, when the Ghasts in DA2 summon their corpse totem, the tentacles that pop it out of the ground and are wrapped around it look scaled.  Tentacles aren't really snake like.....but something to think about.  Though tentacles work as a "sea creature" type and it is under ground, whatever it is.

Though I have to wonder who the "Moon Men" are......actual people in the moon?  Individuals connected to the star child?  A large, more organized split-off of the Ghasts?

While we're at it, I'd like to pose a different question. Is it truly wrong to consider the Evanuris as gods? Their power was peerless in a civilisation where magic that would leave modern mages speechless was simply average. And in a civilisation where immortality was the norm, they were harder to kill than most.

I think that calling one of them an "elven mage" is like calling a dragon a lizard. Not quite wrong, but a great understatement.

I suppose it depends on what the standard is, i.e. when is it right or wrong to consider someone as a god? What is a god? I'd submit that a reasonable standard for when its OK to worship someone as a god is whether they are in fact a god or not- and the Evanuris aren't gods in really any of the traditional senses of the word, they did not create the world, they do not have pre-ordained spheres of influence (i.e. water for Poseidon, war for Ares, air/the sky for Manwe, etc etc), etc.

Is it understandable that some people worshipped them as gods? Sure, they were very powerful and probably appeared quite god-like, so those people could be excused for the mistake. But was it right to worship them as gods? Well no, probably not, because they weren't actually gods.

Or, as Arishok Sten tells them in Those Who Speak, "The Old Gods were like unto dragons, as the first human kings were like unto ordinary men." Since the first human kings were Dreamer mages and that is how they assumed power over lesser mortals, there is a clear analogy there with the Evanuris and the regular elves, even if the latter did have magic of sorts. After all, we know from Tevinter that magical ability can vary enormously between mages, even those from old Altus families. So, in a way it is hardly surprising that the Evanuris started out as just leaders in a war (which is what their name means: leader) and then gradually over time, as they acquired new knowledge and developed their abilities, they were able to consolidate their rule and maintain their power over others, who held them in awe as a result.

Another interesting fact to consider, apparently those in Uthenera could view the world and send aid to their allies wherever they might be. So, for example, the followers of Andruil would be encouraged to pray to her for assistance and, even if she didn't respond to them personally, she no doubt had a priesthood in Uthenera who could on her behalf. This would reinforce belief in her as a god. Also, we know there was an invocation that could summon Mythal personally to the altar at which you prayed. Perhaps all the Evanuris could do this. Having the "god" appear out of the air would also reinforce the idea that they were superior to the supplicants, being able to come and go as they pleased.

Yeah that cult seems alot less crazy now that we've seen Hakkon. Not that I think it was inhabited by Andraste the human woman, but it's much more understandable why they would believe it was her. And concievably allows for the possiblility that there was a spirit in the dragon behaving the way the Haven cult believed it should.