What did you do today in DA? [Spoilers]

Dragon Age: Origins

Went to Redcliffe with Alistair, Morrigan, Leliana, and Sten. Found out that Arl Eamon was poisoned by an elven assassin working for Loghain. Also found out that every night the undead emerge from the castle. Had decided to stay and defend the city. When night approached the undead came. We fought them off successfully but not without any casualties. Inside the castle we found an apostate mage named Jowan who said he was hired by the Arl's wife to tutor her son Connor. During the process Conor was possessed and that's what led to the undead emerging from the castle. Found out in order to save Connor his mother Isolde had to be drained of her blood. My Warden said no to that and found out about the Circle of Magi. They know a ritual where they can safely exorcise the demon within Connor without killing both he and his mother. So to the Circle's tower we go.

This will be the all white playthrough. You'll know what I mean when I get further into the game. The purpose of this playthrough is to be as nice as possible, marry Alistair, recruit all companions, complete their related side quests and to see if Sten, Shale and Zevran appear in the marriage mod. 

Let's introduce the main character. This is SnowMe Cousland, a warrior who has mastered the use of a sword and shield. She was given the name when she started growing hair because the color was a bright white. Her name before that was Eleanor. When she became a teenager, she was able to bribe one of the soldiers to take her to a tattoo artist leading to the tattoo she has on her face. Her mother nearly had a heart attack while her father secretly liked it. Her brother liked it but called her glowy because there was a bit of white glowing from the tattoo.

rush through of Origins, done xD

On to Awakening and the other two dlc's ^^

I had no Connor in my current game. I believe it was this world state where my Warden left Redcliffe to its own devices. Payback in advance for Teagan being such an ass in Trespasser.

I always let Connor live in DAO.
It's only the second time I set up my world state with him in it...

The all white playthrough. 

You are right I forgot about Jowan's part.

So I think I have been taking a little bit of a greater effort to read the codex and what not but also to save time I am not reading stuff I already have done or know about just anything new. In this spirit I started to read up on the Maliphant's journal in the Emerald Graves. And this highlights something that is really great about this franchise. One of my favorite things about it, lots of nuance and this series does not play many favorites. The Freemen certainly have plenty of reasons to be bitter. Them being tired at the Civil War and being emotionally broken by what the nobility has done is something that is deeply sympathetic. But that is not itself a justification for terrorism, banditry, and joining with Corypheus, and thus becoming monsters themselves. This is the pattern here. Be it the mages. Be it the Templars. Be it the Dalish. Be it Solas himself. All of these have their reasons to do the things they do, it can make them sympathetic, but its not full justification for evil action and DA is quite an expression on the negatives of extremism. Though there is an ironic note here is I did trip the quest where Clara asks us to look into Fairbanks's past, her logic? Well he is a noble who has lived like a commoner so automatically that means he will represent us well. I mean she is right and to be fair there is more context here, but it does not always work like that.

Went to the Emerald Graves to of course work towards getting to the Dragon and that is still the objective but still wasn't sure how far I would get. Also cleared out the above quest, a lot of Fade rifts, and ended up going Bear hunting. I think I did make a lot more progress here then I thought because the idea was I would get to the next level and then relocate to the Exalted Plains. I got to the giants and the great bears and still don't have a level but I am close. Really close so I don't think I will make the Dragon. But Great Bears are really hard and time consuming to kill. So worth it though. Just got 2 of them and already have 28 pelts. Then though I got into a massive fight before giving up for the night. Two giants and mannnnyyy Brontos. Yikes.

Some crafting notes Great Bear Hide gives one Critical chance when slotted into an offensive slot. Now I typically, I think, usually heavily emphasise Crit damage primarily and crit chance secondarily when building Kara's skillset and her gear because there is a lot of stuff in the rogue trees that give you automatic crit chance or crit chance bonus so I figure just maxing it out and I have really maxed it out before. However it is worth noting I do wonder if it would be better to get some balance here and if I can get a little more bang for my buck. Food for thought. Other food for thought seems my companions have been pretty relevant despite not always getting the best gear. So I thought. I mean I have been having a pretty easy time of it. But during the Giant fight Kara got knocked out so I hopped on Varric and put some arrows on the Giants...and it was like only doing 20 damage per shot. So I think an upgrade of Bianca is going to be done in the near future. Probably after the Exalted Plains though.

Yeah I'm no tfond o fViv her powers a eruseful and sh eh ssex yarmou rbu that's it. I'v ebeen using he rthis playthrough but that's mainl ybecause I' mnot a mage in this run myself as I'm playing as a rogue. 

Yeah Samson jus tfels like he's a drug addic twi thLyrium as his drug. Its why I always rt yto keep Cullen off it generall yin m yplaythroughs because he at least is better than that and deserves better. I ploa yboth ways as bo thmak eintrestin gvillains but it is co0ol tha ta tleast in Calpernia's case yo ucan convince her t ostan ddown. Calpernia's my enem yin this playthrough as I recruited th etemplars on this run. But for me it largel ydepends on th eInquisitor I'm playing as to which wa yI go.

Inqy Zara decided to go check what's what at Redcliffe Castle. She brought Varric and Vivienne and Dorian threw himself at the party too. And then things went wilds.

And back ok. The Inquisition is now allied with the Mage. Bringing Vivienne was worth it, I might keep her in my party all PT long. Probably with Dorian.   I wish I didn't have to carry a rogue around.

So let me get this straight, this templar was a huge fan of Hawke and also a Tevinter dude and he took too much red lyrium. Did I got that right?


Zara made a friend while exploring the castle


Cass is that best!

More comments on In Hushed Whispers. I actually still very much hate the quest, too much ludonarrative dissonance with it.


The only thing that annoys me just as much in-game is Cassandra having the templar spec and her banter with Solas that dump her into having the same abilities as the Templars when she can tell you what the Seekers powers are and immunity to possession and mind control have nothing to do with Templars powers. Even her gift is unrelated to cancelling magic.

But any, back to IHW:

How Fiona sell the mages to Alexius makes zero sense. Not only she doesn't own the rebel mages so each one should have decided for themselves, she's a former child sex slave and hates slavery.

I'm to believe the exact same people that came with me to the castle were the only people made prisoners over the year (and they were not prisoner all that year because they know what happened. Vivienne was quite the gossip in fact). 

I'm to believe that Cassandra is effected differently by red lyrium then Daniel was (he has no glowy red eye) and going against the info discovered in Champion of the Just.  There is even difference in how red lyrium grows in IHW compared to the rest of the game (like in Emprise du Lion).

I'm to believe that the Elder One waited a year to come to Redcliffe to kill everyone for failure.

I'm to believe the Qunari do not exist in that future...

Anyway, it's done now and will be promptly forgotten in-game. Een the mages just hangs out at the base and don't actually go out fighting (I don't think they even have interesting war table mission and nobody gets promoted like Ser Barris). What a bunch of lazy asses.

And now, lets go to Skyhold.