Emmrich Volkarin - Official Companion Thread [Spoilers]

So I heard the voice actor talking about Em, and it sounded like the guy was a midwife for the dying. He used the word "kind" quite a bit.
This leaves me confused because Necromancers deal with dead bodies and spirits. As far as we know spirits =/= souls. And I never got the feeling the Necropolis was an hospice.

Solas didn't kill Mythal. He may have killed Flemeth but Mythal is not dead. She never was entirely as he readily admits in Trespasser. He reminds us of our meeting with Flemeth/Mythal, which is interesting if you met her in the Fade as he wasn't even there. So, was it the Inquisitor, Morrigan or Keiran who revealed that encounter? Or did Solas allude to it because it was there in his memory from Mythal and he felt safe in doing so as we wouldn't question how he knew?

I am still at a loss how someone can "hand their power" without some aspect of themselves at the same time, as though Mythal's power was just a computer program that can be downloaded to a different hard-drive. Since Flemeth did die clearly some degree of the life-force keeping her alive must have transferred along with the "power". Flemeth said explicitly to Morrigan that a soul cannot be forced on the unwilling, so Solas accepted the transfer of Mythal to him. Thus, it was not him who killed Flemeth but Mythal leaving her. Mythal killed her original host in order to transfer to a new one. Now it is possible that Flemeth had been warned in advance this was a possibility, which is why she put a piece of herself into the eluvian to ensure her survival, likely to be picked up at some stage by Morrigan, but to all intents and purposes Mythal is now a part of Solas. Further proof of this can be found in Asunder, where the spirit keeping Wynne alive transfers to Evangeline in order to save her from death. In this case Wynne willingly let the spirit go so Evangeline could live. If Flemeth had made a contingency plan, perhaps she let Mythal go willingly too, but it is equally possible that she had no say in the matter and it was Mythal's decision not hers.

I've given renewed consideration recently to what went on between Flemeth and Solas in that final exchange. Was it all about who was going to make the exchange? Was Solas actually admitting that he had messed up and so he was the one who should surrender himself but by using the words "old friend" Mythal signaled to him that she accepted his apology and she would go to him? At which point Solas looked up and allowed her in. Watch it again and think about it. Then think again about his attitude to Mythal if you drank from the Well before this occurred and then afterwards when he met us in Trespasser. Is he now being influenced not only by her presence in him but the fact that she spared him, as he would see it, for the sake of her people. Remember his words to Flemeth: "I should pay the price but the people they need me." By transferring to him, Mythal would seem to have concurred with that statement.

I've also been wondering again about Emmrich's outfit. I thought in the past that the Mortalitasi were said to be "black robed" but I may be remembering that wrong. However, Nevarra does have a strong connection with dragon hunters and looking at Emmrich's outfit again from the back it occurred to me that perhaps it wasn't meant to be mimicking a serpent so much as a dragon.

The nobility of Nevarra are said to be very fond of their ancestral pageants held in the autumn where they hire actors to re-enact events from their illustrious ancestors' lives, so perhaps he was able to pick his costume up second hand cheaply because naturally they would never want the same one used twice in the pageant. It definitely makes me think of something that would be used at these displays. The Mortalitasi are also said to perform special autumn rites in connection with these pageants, so perhaps he acquired the costume to do with that and then liked it so much he continued to wear it.

It does suggest a certain flamboyance to our Necromancer even if his taste leaves something to be desired. I think he may be a tad eccentric, which is all good to me. I like eccentric.

Was it ever explained why they changed the necromancer magic colour from purple in Inquisition to a sickly green in Veilguard when green colour magic is primarily associated with Veil/Fade magic as seen with the Rift Mage in Inquisition. Not complaining just curious.

I think you have your answer there. The Necromancer has a lot of dealings with the spirits of the Fade and perhaps they wanted to emphasise that it was more neutral in its alignment. Spirit magic was already colour coded green in DAI, although it was pale blue in DAO, whilst nature magic was green, then in DA2 the spirit magic was colour coded purple and creation magic was green, so they have kept on changing this from game to game. Storm magic was colour coded light purple in DAI and they probably only opted for dark purple instead of black for Necromancy so it would seem less sinister.

Plus purple is now associated with the game itself and the Veilguard organisation. For whatever reason they preferred to colour code Lucanis as purple out of our companions and Emmrich as green. I can understand the latter because of his specialism but await the explanation for this choice for Lucanis in game.   However, the Shadow rogue specialism was colour coded purple in DA2, so there is a link there and Lucanis very much likes to work in the shadows and it is possible some of his unique abilities include some of those from the Shadow specialism.   (Shadow was my favourite rogue specialism in DAA and DA2, so I was sorry not to see it in DAI although there was some echo of it in the Subterfuge skills, which were also colour coded purple).

This guy better talk like Vincent Price or I will be enraged.

Mortalitasi are mages only, I believe. 

Yes, from the way I understand it, only mages can be Mortalitasi but both Mortalitasi and non-mages can be members of the Mourn Watch.   One of the Warrior specialisms is connected with the Mourn Watch:  Reaper: uses night blades to steal health from foes, risking death to gain supernatural abilities.  Sounds like the night blades have special vampiric abilities.  Whether they are enchanted weapons or magical spirit weapons remains to be seen but there does seem to be a tendency to give hybrid, cross-class abilities both to the companions and as our specialisms.  Reaper may well be some variant on the Spirit Warrior that we haven't seen since DAA.   If it is, I might actually be tempted to play a Warrior first run.  Normally my favourite class is mage, followed by rogue but Spirit Warrior has always interested me.

Possibly but it is strange they didn't just go with Reaver again then. In some ways it would fit with a faction associated with Nevarra because of the idea that you have to drink the blood of dragons to acquire the ability and the country is renowned for its dragon slayers, who no doubt gained their strength because of drinking the blood of the dragons they killed. Cassandra even references this if the Inquisitor takes it as a specialism and says her family members became aggressive and dragon-like as a result.

So either it is pretty much the same class as Reaver but they changed a letter in the name because of the association with death, you know the Grim Reaper, or because it does have abilities that derive from a different source. The Wiki says that originally the Reaver specialism was taught to human fighters by demons, so when dragons started to become rarer, making it more difficult to acquire the necessary blood (although wyvern blood can also be used) perhaps the spirits/demons came up with an alternative source from which to derive their powers. Perhaps there is going to be less emphasis on deriving strength from the pain of your own wounds and blood lust in attacking your enemies, which always put me off the specialism as it sounded a bit sado-masochistic, and more on spiritual attacks like those in the Entropy School in DAO which could drain health and heal you at the same time but would be linked with a faction that specialises in spirit magic associated with the life force and death.