What did you do today in DA? [Spoilers]

My current projected Inquisition PC - a Trevelyan Templar Warrior - is probably going to be two-handed, but he'll be the very first I even attempt in any of the DA games, even though I love playing sword-and-board and dual-wield Warriors. But I also tend to end up spending more time in combat as one of the mages or archers, keeping a bird's eye view of the fight and affecting it strategically while the front-liners duke it out.

Skyrim's two-handed weapons are saved by the fact that you can move around and backwards very nimbly between attacks in that game so you can actually take some advantage of the increased reach of the weapons, but they're still a mite too slow for me to enjoy them compared to the excellent sword and shield and archery gameplay. But yeah, that game was pretty close to getting it right, especially with the Shout that increases attack speed.

Kicked Howe's ass - Oghren landed the killing blow, which will lend certain conversations in Awakening some extra flavor - and finagled a marriage between Anora and Alistair because Eamon really really wants his puppet on the throne and Anora isn't going to get her arse in gear finding a new husband unless we make her, and I really hate where that leaves Ferelden by the time of Inquisition and Trespasser. So for once Alistair's sniveling backside was allowed to stay sober and on Ferelden soil.

It honestly wasn't until Loghain had my character flat on his back getting hacked to pieces that I realized just how much I've been relying on Morrigan's crowd control spells this playthrough, because that fight is usually a breeze with a rogue or mage or tank PC, even on Nightmare. I did manage to win in the end, after swallowing an embarrassing amount of Health Poultices and reloading and activating all my buffs before heading into the Landsmeet.

Then I recruited him because Riordan thought it was a good idea, and let Alistair throw his hissy fit, and took him back to camp. And then, in honor of the late Arsinoe De Blassenville, and as has always been my way when recruiting Loghain, I gave him The Keening Blade as his weapon and threw a winged Grey Warden silverite helmet on his head first thing so he'd know which team he belongs to now. And jammed every map I'd found throughout Ferelden down his throat so he would talk to me on the trip to Redcliffe.

This time I'd already gone through Return to Ostagar and Soldier's Peak with Alistair to remind myself of his and Wynne's vacuous comments about Cailan when Loghain isn't there to set the record straight. It's so hilarious how different those two reactions are.

Alistair and Wynne: Omg! He was actually about to formalize an alliance with Orlais and put a century of war and strife and suspicion behind us all! 

Loghain: That fucking traitor! He was going behind my back to sell Ferelden out from under us, betraying his wife and all but surrendering his own country just to call himself Emperor!

Heading into the finale next. 

Aurora?

Must admi tshe's kind of cute. Don't know who you'er planning on romancing but I think she'd make a grea tpartner fo rAlistai rif you choose to keep him in the wardens rathe rthan make him King

In that particular moment Alistair really makes being a Warden as something only for the best. I remember my Brosca staring at him and questioning his sanity

Had a lovely moment atop Fort Drakon between my Hareas and Loghain. One a great patriotic hero, one a humble vagrant turned reluctant leader of people he's almost forgotten to despise, with neither of them having much to live for after the events of the game. Both knew that it would be one's duty to die, and one's to carry on fighting a bitter and losing battle to protect a stupid and ungrateful world, and die ignominiously and forgotten surrounded by monsters and fallen friends...

After a brief exchange I allowed Loghain to take the final blow and regain his honor, and it was a really beautiful moment considering his views on the Grey Wardens and the darkspawn at the beginning of the story. Swallowing his words and taking responsibility for ending the threat himself, like a man. And finally saving the country he always loved.

I've kept his personal item, the belt Borders Yet To Be, just to have around in the future. I really like the way the map reflects his "optimistic-some might say fanciful" dream for a secure and prosperous Ferelden with strong and rounded borders, as if anyone had a right to begrudge him of all people that thought. I think some part of Hareas will always wish that he had died on Fort Drakon instead, and wonder if Loghain wouldn't have been the better man to continue the fight in spite of all his flaws and missteps.

But life must go on.

Hareas also knows he should have asked Anora to make sure the Wardens were never forgotten again. He knows that that was the right thing to do, that it was his duty and that not doing so after such a short and - from an outside perspective - harmless Blight might be the difference between the world remaining wary and the next one getting through and swallowing up all life. But even though he knows those things, he just couldn't stomach dedicating the rest of his miserable life to the Grey Wardens without doing something, anything to help his people first.

So he asked for some shitty and inhospitable land for the Dalish, for all the good it's going to do before some Ferelden noble or other decides to take it back again. And then he said thank you and goodbye to the friends who were leaving, received a grudging acknowledgement from Alistair, their friendship over, and then that was that. Onwards to Awakening!


Bah. Do it enough times, and all you'll hear will be a big manbaby going 'Waaaah! Waaaah!', and then you can send him to the Free Marches until he grows up. Or rather, until Teagan shows up and drags him home again to undermine Anora or whatever. And you'll have a nice, shiny Loghain to take with you into Inquisition.  And then you can have this glorious exchange:



But yeah, it's hard to justify the decision to spare him as a City Elf. If it wasn't for city elves having murdered his father, Hareas would have had a much harder time with the idea as well.

By the by, am I the only one who feels like the story about the Dalish Origins' parents is a little harsh? "Your dad was killed by poachers, and your mother abandoned you as a babe because she couldn't deal with it, and left us to disappear and die alone." Like, wow. Thank you, Bioware?

Don't feel bad. I don't usually either, but warriors aren't very talent-intensive compared to other classes, even hybrid warriors like my Hareas, and if you can make them effective quickly enough then the talent tomes are better used to amend the deficiencies in Leliana's and/or Zevran's default builds so you can get them viable as fast as possible. So you can start actually using them for more than lockpicking. 

Magical tomes went to Morrigan, obviously, and the skill and sundry ones can only be used by the Warden.

Has anyone... ever.... been able to create brown eyes in DAI's vanilla CC? Every time I try, they end up yellow/orange/red. Try to mute the color and it just makes it grey-yellow or grey-red. Hell, maybe that's why so many companions have grey or grey-tinged eyes.

I just want brown, not amber 😭

AUGH, that's so irritating. How can you not include.... literally the most common eye color in the entire world. Wat.

Guess I'll be going for dark orange too, lol.

Oooh, that's pretty good, and probably as close as you can get without mods. Thank you for sharing. Your Inquisitor looks lovely!

Still, they do strike me as more hazel-y. It just baffles me that literally the most common eye color (just brown!!) is so hard to recreate in the CC. It's like if they took away black/brown hair lol.