What did you do today in DA? [Spoilers]

Winter Palace isn't that good, I hate the game.

Worst place is the Fallow Mire. Usually one of the last places I go to. Haven't gone there in this game yet. The captured soldiers will be fine, give them time to think about next time they should fall on their swords instead of being captured by savages.

To use an Iron Bull quote when he is in the Fallow Mire. Which I heard him say once and never again. This place smells of ass. And what my Inky's think about the Winter Palace, this place smells of perfumed ass.

Finished Awakening.
-Had all become wardens.
-Everybody survived and was maxed out on loyalty.
-Defended the city and the keep also survived.
-Architect did not survive. Was tempted to Ally with but darkspawn will always spread the blight so they must die.

Right, I am curious if that was just a skill Cory picked up or if all of the magisters accuired it.

I wonder... why there are no mementos of the Fifth Blight in Inquisition? I mean, there is no sword made with the blade that felled Urthemiel, or legendary armor King Alistair used while in the Battle of Denerim, or the (piece of armor/weapon) of the Hero of Ferelden... there isn't a mention of Vigilance, either. that makes me think that its epilogue slides (that the Crows stole it) are just rumors like Anders' ones...

Seems like if the devs really wanted to forget DA:O was a thing...

Oh, yes, to topic. Played Awakening. Wade forged a two-handed version of Vigilance. Such a beast of a sword...

Hi folks. It’s been a few weeks since I played DA, ‘cause Andromeda, but I finally felt it was time to get back to Hawke’s run. My forum handle used to be domi, in case my characters look vaguely familiar.

Before I went to have a passionate affair with Ryders, my second run of DA2 with Blaze Hawke stalled because I am not a fan of the voice and appearances for the females, and I just was not seeing much of a difference between the red Hawke and purple Hawke (my beloved rogue Revel) & quest resolutions.

This weekend, the IRL weather interrupted all the happy frolicking in the garden and the mountains, and since there is no better way to console yourself when a cold spell hits in May, than a good game, I started another male run of Hawke, with Ebon Hawke (and I still regret not going for Ebone Hawke). I was going for what I would guess a common set up with green responses when he likes someone and red ones when he does not. He is a S&S Warrior, so buy-buy Aveline (trying for Rivalry, but I am not investing much into it). I find Warrior really boring to play atm, at low level.

Figure 1. Dragon Armor, Anders, be still my heart!


I have recruited all of his companions, and settled into a party of Ebon as a Tank, Isabela, Merrill and Anders.

Figure 2. Recruit #1: Merrill


Figure 3. Ebon is Checking Out Merrill



Initially, I was going to be more melee based and have Merrill, Isabela and Fenris, but on level 6, I cannot tank well enough to keep my melee DPS from dying, and Merrill is no healer.

Figure 4. Yep. Ebon gets the dubious pleasure of getting on Isabela’s good side. Eww.



And then, when I recruited the whole party, I realized that I still wanted to see full Fenris romance, so I reloaded Blaze’s save, re-edited her face (again) * sigh* and tried a couple of quests.

I sent Blaze with her companions, including Anders, to search for Fenryel in the Fade. That’s when I felt the difference for the first time. Giving Fenryel to the demon, set Anders on edge, and advanced his rivalry nicely. Moreover, his follow-up dialogue was nice as he told Blaze to direct her advances elsewhere. He suggested Merrill since we both love demons so much, and since I planned the PT as a BFF with Merrill it was nice. But, yeah, I plan to direct the “advances” Fenris’ way. Whom we also killed in the Fade, but he seemed more apologetic than angry (well as much as Fenris can be not angry).

So, now I don’t know what Hawke to play on. Blaze has the romance I am more interested in, but Ebon has more pleasing appearance and voice, plus he is friends with Anders. On the other hand, Blaze class is more fun, she has Carver, and she is in Act 2. She is a rival with Anders, and, if I can manage it, with Isabela too (bloody pirate likes a lot of responses for an evil Hawke). I guess, it makes sense to (try to) finish Blaze’s run, and just cringe through the voicing and keep re-editing her face a lot.

Is it me, or is flirting with the two ladies comes later in the game than with the two gentlemen? It feels to me that I was flirting with Anders and Fenris copiously from the get go, but only once saw a flirt with Merrill, and then nothing, and Isabela just sends Ebon on errands despite her "everything that moves" reputation?

Lyana managed to close the rift at the lake in Crestwood and found out some not so nice things about the mayor. Her boyfriend Solas was happy, because she helped a spirit go back into the fade by obeying a command (she would have slayed that stupid rage demon anyway - he stood between her and the rift) and now she will be off to find warden Loghain.

Yeah, it's fun, it will never beat DA for me, but the universe is certainly interesting. So far, I'm developing a big paranoia in ME2, because I trust no one besides Joker. Cerberus sounds creepy, Miranda is creepy, the Illusive Man is creepy. My little Shep just feels like she has fallen into a piranha pit. Jacob seems nice though. And just now, we recruited some guy, who was beating up his prisoner for no obvious reason. I'm on Omega, I read somewhere that Garrus is there, so hopefully I find my old ally soon.
I just hope, that they will make a ME game one day, where you can play an alien - I would like to play a Salarian, they are just so cute.

You must tell how you do like Sebastian - make sure to take him with Merrill in the group once in a while. They have the most hillarious banter.
I normally use Isabella and Varric, but I remember, you weren't that fond of either, so perhaps, you might like Sebastian (he is too religious for me and there are some elements, I didn't like about him - but that, we can discuss, when you finish the playthrough, I don't want to spoil)

Have fun with baby Seb

*cough, cough* Well, enjoy his character. But please don't romance him, saying this in good faith.

On a serious note, ME2 has some of the best squaddies, though they overdid it with number

My favourite is when he's paired with Aveline or Isabela

SInce Garrus is romanceable, I never even looked at the other options.  Yeah, it seems, there are lot of companions to recruit, judging by the slots.

Seconded. A factor contributing to this IMO was the wide variety of companions you got, not to mention their equally varied loyalty missions. I didn't have a problem with the numbers, because it added to the variety rather than take away from it. I was rarely bored with the conversations because it felt like I was exploring a new fabric of the Mass Effect lore each time I talked to one of them (except *cough*Jacob*cough*). It speaks to great length of Bioware's effort in ME2's character design when even the DLC characters were interesting enough that left me yearning for a Kasumi romance option. And golly, how could anyone forget that really fun James Bond-ish Kasumi loyalty mission? The second-half of it got a little dull, I'll admit, but the spying and espionage first-half was so appropriate for a Spectre like Shepard.

Unfortunately, ME3 took a step back with James Vega. To be fair, to be completely fair, James is the Jacob of ME3, so ME2 was hardly perfect either. But the thing is, I felt like James only stood out because of a lack of numbers. In ME2, we had so many cool companions to roleplay around with, so Jacob was blurred out amidst the excitement. With ME3, while the returning characters were cool, it merely made James stand out even more like a sore thumb. At least Jacob was blended in with a whole cast of new characters, so you can perfectly ignore him without much consequence.