What did you do today in DA? [Spoilers]

Curious Crow That's a much better description. It's a nice summary of that whole mess.

I'm going to put my gear stats into spoiler tags. The weapon bits aren't the final ones. I'll need more dragon stuff for that.

Axe of the Wylde King


Trevelyan's Legacy (Armor)


Pride of the Chargers (Bull's 2H axe)


Hawke's Gift (Varric's armor)

colfoley
In my current game, I've triggered the book scene (but haven't given it to her yet) and already done the seeker quest, but have yet to get her "find these 5 bad guys" quest. It's really weird how you can get them in any order. It seems like the book scene shouldn't even trigger until the other two quests are done. I figure next convo will be the other quest but who knows?

For Blackwall, his quest won't trigger until both WEWH and HLTA are done, and you have the required approval. If it's just an approval thing, take him with you to kill darkspawn or find another artifact or two.

So, I got my reward for exam passing in the mail today. Mage killer comic.

And it immediately goes into this serious mage killer mercenary monologue for like ten pages. Battle and blood and a bit of shady spy feeling. very serious. Then it becomes "in the now" and Tessa is like, "I got something for you Marius"

And pulls out Swords and Shields.

I bust out laughing. Varric, you popular rascal.

--I was going to buy the nug mount, but decided the Belt of Elements was far more worth my time.  +15% resist to all three elements.  That thing is over 15k.  I still have the Hissing Wastes, the rest of the Emerald Graves, the DLC zones and Arbor Wilds to do before the end of the game.  Plenty of time to get the cash back.

--I knocked out all of the dragons in Emprise du Lion and the one on the Storm Coast. I also saved Sutherland and CO while I was out there. I forgot I have two WT missions left before the quest chain is completely done.

--Got Leliana's quest done ("Niceness before knives, Leliana,") the Sulevin Blade equipped on Cass and I got the Temple of Dirthamen knocked out. Such a creepy place, but much easier now that torches don't dissipate when you drop them. At launch, if you dropped a veilfire torch due to combat, you'd have to trek your butt back to the nearest brazier.

--Started the Emerald Graves and completed the quest for the Ardent Crown. It's an easter egg quest. You can tell the devs had fun sneaking this into game. Short video explaining it here:


Yes, you heard that right.  Jump on that little cave 50 times in a row.  Don't stop even when you hear someone talking.  Stop only when you get the fetch quest for the 10 Crystal Graces.  You drop them off at the same cave.  The gear reward is in Emprise du Lion but there will be no quest text telling you this.


After all that jumping and running around, the reward is a flower helm. With 41 armor and +24% Sunder on hit. My warrior is now running around with that on. I turned on helmets long enough to take a look. Then I saw the rest of my party's ugly hats and shut it back off. Here's an example of what it looks like on Cass:

I'm working my way up through Denerim, or rather my cute, mute Irene Brosca is! She denied Morrigan her demonspawn and since Riordan fell rather horribly she's knows the score. Alistair has to take care of Ferelden. A light that burns twice as bright burns for half as long and Irene has burnt very, very brightly.  

We went to the Vimmark Wastelands

While we're here, we may as well see what these Dwarves are on about.

Wow, I just got a warm shot of nostalgia straight to the heart here.

When I first got into Dragon Age, I was still on an elf kick.  I'd played mostly elves or half-elves until D&D 3.0.  Then I couldn't stop playing tielfings.  

Anyway, both of the elf origins didn't click with me at first.  They were very well written but it just didn't draw me in.  Then I played my Brosca.  It was love as soon as I did the Proving as a dual wield rogue.  That's what drew me into the game.  Friends of mine in the ToR forums recommended the series to me.  I went in completely blind.  I had no spoilers.  All I knew was that there was LGB romances in the game and that I was playing a western RPG.  My character didn't trust Morrigan as far she could throw her.  So no DR for Terra Brosca.  She did the US.  Imagine my shock when I found my character had died.

I adore the way the DA team wrote the dwarves.  They took some of the standard tropes and turned it on its head.  I enjoy the hell out of that.  I will always love the dwarves of Thedas because of that.  I'd better.  I've played hundreds of hours and I've spent some decent amount of money on the series.

In tribute, here's my favorite picture of Garnet Cadash.  She was the first DA:I character I played.  This was 8 days after the game first came out.  This was her rallying the Wardens while wearing Warden-style armor.



Never forget.  <salute>

Quite good magical replica of a real fire.

Since I probably will want to take her through Awakening I may have to go back a bit, harden Alistair and try a softer ending . Or a new character...  but it feels a bit rough to not do DAA with her. It will suit her.

The Highlight of that whole thing, for me, is unveiling Florian's duplicity in front of the entire court. It makes me smile every time.

Edit add: meant to say "redeeming." Mostly I feel me about the whole place.