General Gameplay Discussion

I found a controller re-bind swap of [LB] and [RB] invaluable. To me, having dodge and parry on the same side made it so much easier.
I'm finding that once the indicator goes white, I'm looking for the enemy swing rather than the indicator.

I really need to put weapon swap on a key that I will never, ever push by accident. There is never a situation where my Evoker wants to be holding a dagger, and especially not when I was frantically trying to switch runes in the middle of combat.

To me, the magenta gear provides interesting, but flawed options. 'Kitty's Collar' in Inquisition was similar.

I still keep forgetting to do this. 

DragonKingReborn

Only the Mage's barrier and Warrior's shield block can be held. Everything else is timed block.

Depends on the item and your build. Some of these are clearly designed to fit very specific builds. I'm using 3, but one only against Darkspawns.

Andraste's Will is useful for a build like mine that focus on necrotic damage when fighting darkspawns who are weak to fire.

I got an helmet that spawn a "specter" on kill that deals respetable damage. I'm going to be able to do that myself after I hit level 40 since I got the same passive in the Reaper skill tree. Not sure if I'll change the helmet then or not. It's great for trash clearing with Shield Toss.

I have a greataxe that deals x2 damage because light attacks are always heavy attacks and count as heavy attacks for all mechanics (any passives/trait related to heavy attacks will trigger). My build has been insane since I've been using it.

Yes, I also only use staff for my mage and never daggers.

Oh I've enchanted EVERYTHING. I feel like a dirty cheater

How do I parry again? XD (I'm playing a Spellblade mage.)

I found swapping bumpers a huge boon. [LB] [RB] making all by combat dodging and parrying with thumb and finger of the same hand.

(I also swapped [LT] [RT] because bow draw is so much more common on the left.)

I found the gameplay for staff mage until around level 20 to be a boring slog because lack of mana/high mana cost of abilities meant I wasn’t able to use many abilities (sometimes only one ability per an encounter at early levels). After around level 20, I had enough mana to cast abilities regularly in combat, and combat was much more fun. Having boring combat for 20 levels is way too long, though, and doesn’t leave a good impression of the start of the game. It is like being stuck in the combat Hinterlands.

One advantage the two ice spells have is they can use cooldowns instead of mana (one by default and one you can pick). This means they can be used when you are out of mana for your other abilities.