Leaks about game direction and pre-alpha (combat and design spoilers)

This idea of portals taking us everywhere sounds really videogamey and awful. I can't wait to have no sense of distance or location.

Isn't that just Bioware games though? Portals taking you everywhere to me just means the world will be split up into a series of maps instead of being true open world, but that's something they've done going all the way back to Baldur's Gate. Just instead of hitting the edge of a map and going to a new area some distance away you're going through a portal. Oh, Mass Effect as well yeah with the planets?

I mean, I guess we'll have to see how it's done. It could be done really badly or it could be done quite well. This doesn't worry me too much though, Bioware doesn't do the true open world thing.

Grey Warden (Warrior) Guardian, all races.
Lords of Fortune (Warrior) Berserker, all races.
Mourn Watcher (Warrior) Reaver, human and dwarf?

Grey Warden (Rogue) Tempest all races.
Lords of Fortune (Rogue) Artifcer, all races.
Crow (Rogue) Assassin, human and elf.

Grey Warden (Mage) Spirit Healer? all races.
Lords of Fortune (Mage) Force Mage? all races.
Veil Jumper (Mage) Knight Enchanter, elf.

Like they didn't already have this problem before we discovered we could use eluvians. Opening up a map and just clicking on the location you wish to travel to is really no different. We were bouncing around from the Hinterlands to Skyhold to Val Royeaux to the Emerald Graves to Halamshiral to the Hissing Wastes, which should have taken days or even weeks but no sense of that being the case.

Exactly, although are going to need to explain how we can still use them when Solas claimed he now had control of them. At the moment I'm going with Dorian having discovered how to do this, as he was going to do research when he returned to Tevinter and we know they had previously tried using them in the past but they only functioned as visual communication devices. Now he knows they are capable of more, he could get his best Lucerni working on the problem.

I don't think Grey Warden is going to apply to all classes. Those are the factions of the companions, not our own, but we may be offered the same specialism as them. It said the Grey Warden was a Guardian, which was a specialism in DAA. That being the case, I think the Mourn Watch Reaper is likely a Spirit Warrior, which also featured in DAA (both will be upgraded to fit the new engine). The Spirit Warrior spec could apply to all races as it did with DAA because whilst Justice was a spirit, it is the relationship with spirits that is important to the specialism, not actually being a spirit.
If the Crow is the lady we've seen in concept art, then I think she will be a duelist, with an actual rapier in her main hand rather than simply daggers.
The dwarf rogue mentioned will either be Harding, with Marksman or Scout (a variant of Legionnaire Scout that is not connected with the Legion of the Dead) as her specialism, or a dwarf from Kal-Sharok, ditto. The final rogue will be the qunari lady we have seen in much concept art and she may well be the assassin.
Sadly, I doubt they will revive Spirit Healer, particularly if we can't control companions. More likely the Veil Jumper will have the specialism Arcane Archer with the magic bow instead of the spirit blade of Knight Enchanter/Arcane Warrior (DAIMP) that we can also learn. That will leave the other mages' faction/specialism yet to be revealed. If they are reviving classes featured in DAA, then Battle Mage is a possibility (it has a heavy emphasis on elemental magic). They could bring back Force Mage, although several of its abilities featured in Rift Mage. However, considering we are going to Tevinter, surely Blood Mage is going to return, with it perhaps being our companion's dirty little secret.

I can suspend disbelief for fast travel as I can imagine the character just walking off screen.

Portals sound like something from Kingdom Hearts