Board 8 > So I'm going to start Dragon Age: Origins on the PC for the first time.

(+) Yeah! (+)

azuarc posted...

I was looking at DA:I during the Steam sales and someone in the comments was mumbling otherwise, complaining about the integration of Steam into EAplay or some shit, so I dunno. I'm not trusting that comment 100% since I'm not sure I understood it correctly in the first place, but I wouldn't assume. I know that my ancient saves from when DA:O came out were still around when I installed the game via Steam in 2019. (Or at the very least, I had all the subclasses unlocked already.)

As for length, I think it's generally billed as like 40 hours? Honestly, I spent enough time in menus and stuff, and carefully managing the battles, that it was probably slower than that for me.

Inquisition uses the Keep anyway, so saves don't really matter.

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TheRock1525 posted...

Fucking Christ, I forgot about the Broodmother.

One of the creepiest experiences I've had in a game.

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This my Grey Warden, btw.

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So this playthrough, I think I'm going to force Alistair to impregnate Morrigan so my Warden can survive and I can play as her in Awakening.

I've actually never played Awakening before, is it worth a damn? I heard it's about 20 hours or so.

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I played it shortly after Origins and liked it a good deal.

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The only thing I remember about it was Anders was in it and then he was in DA2 with a completely different VA and personality. And people were super pissed about that.

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I thought Awakening was pretty great.

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Checking off the DLC stuff, so now I think the last main quest is helping out the Dalish, who I recall correctly are having problems with werewolves or something?

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Ha I don't remember Anders in awakening, which sounds like a good thing

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He was sooo much better in Awakening.

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I like the Awakening cast much better than the Origins cast and it's got some neat decisions and writing.

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I might make a new topic for Awakening so I can put a spoiler tag in the topic title.

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So, when I upgraded my OneDrive due to lack of space, apparently that fucked up everything. There's two separate folders for this, one under Documents/BioWare and then one under a steam folder on my C-drive.

So when I loaded it, it didn't load any mods, but all none of the DLC, and all my characters are naked.

Any ideas?

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lol my stupid cheap laptop can only play DA:I on medium settings. Anything higher and the framerate is like 15-20.

So basically I have to make DA:I look like DA:O to play it.

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It literally took 5 hours but I got everything restored. Mostly.

My character was literally a floating head at one point with no hair.

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My dad and brother just got in from Florida so no update for tonight.

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I only played on Xbox! No mods for me

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TheRock1525 posted...

My character was literally a floating head at one point with no hair.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VDanX-beShQ

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So I'm trying to figure out if I want to run mage for DA2 or DA:I.

On one hand, DA2 might be worth it because my first playthrough I had Bethany as the surviving sibling, and if I went with a mage I'd get Carver this time.

On the other hand, I played DA:I for like 20 minutes to test it out on my laptop and I made a qunari mage, and that could be kinda fun, too.

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So, uh, I didn't remember a damn thing about Nature of the Beast other than there were werewolves involved.

But I've finished off the last main quest, so I'm trying to decide what side quests to bother with or not. I didn't harden Alistair last time, maybe this time I do?

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Also I've spent like no time in Denerim this playthrough.

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Screw Denerim and its back alley ambushes that are harder than anywhere else in the game.

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I was ambushed by dwarf rebels leaving the forest.

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I found pretty much all the Origins "random" encounters to be way harder than anything the story throws at you, it was kinda silly.

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It's weird how huge this game felt when I played it 10+ years ago and now it feels... quaint? Like going through the Deep Roads or the Brecilian Forest felt like massive undertakings back in the day, and now they feel so small and constricting. It's weird because shortly after this I remember playing Assassin's Creed 2 and never feeling overwhelmed by the more open world stuff.

I know DA2 is even more restrictive for (poor) reasons, and on the flip side DA:I goes way in the fucking opposite direction. And it's even weirder to think, IIRC, that Mass Effect 2 came out less than a year later, where they dumped all the overworld stuff in favor of hubs and missions.

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The Dragon Age series has really struggled to find an identity. EA buying Bioware sucked for multiple reasons, but their direct hand in meddling with DA2/DA:I and forcing those games into weird directions is probably the worst thing they did.

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TheRock1525 posted...

So I'm trying to figure out if I want to run mage for DA2 or DA:I.

On Nightmare, the strongest party in DA2 I know of is Rogue using a bow (preferably assassin for Hawke), Bethany, Verric, and Merril. You can basically auto attack things once your party is a few levels in. You have access to strong single and multi-target damage without the need to really worry about the friendly fire mechanic. But I'd actually consider the game relatively easy with that set up for Nightmare mode. It's about as OP as abusing spell combos in the original dragon age.

If you are playing on a difficulty below nightmare it doesn't really matter.

DA2 is a brilliant concept with mediocre/rush execution. It's honestly the one I'm most looking forward to playing, although Awakening will be interesting since I've played nothing of it.

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I forgot, is the Elven Alienage mission something I unlock before or after calling the Landsmeet?

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From the wiki: "Unrest in the Alienage is the final required quest before calling The Landsmeet."

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Oh God what is this song Leliana is singing?

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It's literally called Leliana's Song.

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Yeah, I'm not talking about the name.

I'm talking the complete and utter weirdness of the whole thing.

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So am I mistaken, or isn't Wynne possessed by a spirit? I could have sworn there was a scene triggering that revelation but I haven't gotten it yet and I'm finishing up the last few sidequests.

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TheRock1525 posted...

So am I mistaken, or isn't Wynne possessed by a spirit? I could have sworn there was a scene triggering that revelation but I haven't gotten it yet and I'm finishing up the last few sidequests.

I think that quest only unlocks in a random encounter, so you need to travel with her.

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Haven't played much recently, still just cleaning up sidequests.

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Btw I've traveled with Wynne a lot during this game and still never got that scene to pop. Is it too late or something? Yesterday I just kept traveling between major hubs hoping something would show up but all I got was the occasional random encounter.

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It based on loyalty level and what talks you have had with her.

Would definitely have expected you to get there by now if you are using her. I got it shortly after the circle tower I think.

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Okay looked it up.

Just need her to be warm with the hero and talk about her past. She should then have something happen after a traveling encounter.

So yeah you should probably have gotten her quest going by now. Weird.

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I really enjoyed DA2's story aside from the dumb stuff with Anders. Basing the entire story out of one big city and seeing how it develops is a really cool idea I wish another game would explore more. The gameplay was overall kind of eh and very repetitive. I don't know that I could play it again because its just not fun.

Inquisition I never finished because while the gameplay was okay (still not as good as Origins, though) and the story was interesting, the amount of menial content it bombards you with that you basically HAVE to do is just absurd and sucks all of the enjoyment out of the game.

I don't have much hope for DA4 honestly because I frankly don't think anyone at current Bioware knows how to make a good game anymore and even if they do they'll be hamstrung by EA anyway. Same for the next Mass Effect.

So in order to get the Wynne scene, I had to give her a bunch of gag gifts to lower her approval, then use "Thoughtful Gift" to get it back to 100.

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This happened with Leliana too, apparently. I had to drop her affection level to get her companion quest.

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Quick ranking of companions:

1. Dog aka Barkspawn
2. Sten
3. Leliana
4. Morrigan
5. Alistair
6. Shale
7. Wynne
8. Ohgren
9. Zevran

I remember liking Ohgren before but now he annoys the shit out of me.

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Companion Quests done.

There's a couple of sidequests left that don't seem very plot related so I think I'm gonna bail on them and finally start the Landsmeet.

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TheRock1525 posted...

1. Dog aka Barkspawn

Good choice of name.

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Yeah I believe my first playthrough I named him after an all Zero Punctuation joke about Yahtzee liking to give Link vulgar names. It's definitely a name I can't put here without violating the ToS.

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My friend straight up murdered the dog when he first met him in his playthrough. He's a psychopath.

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Too many mods has led to Riordan not having any hair.

Whoops.

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Is there any point to the Allied Supply Crates? I keep donating but nothing changes.

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In the final battle, you can "summon" elves/werewolves, mages, dwarves, and human soldiers. Allied Supply Crates boost their numbers and/or strength iirc.

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