Necros wrote:
really? hmm, I always thought the consoles would never allow nekkedness. Or is it just for the PC version?

I'm on the PS4.

 Lynata wrote:

Psienesis wrote:Was not expecting the sudden shut-down from Cassandra. Kinda caught me off-guard.

Sounds like you had some awkward moments?

I finally decided to go for Josephine (I blame the accent). Hilarious how Leliana immediately goes into overprotective mother hen mode.



At first I was afraid these supporting characters would offer only marginal interaction and dialogue, given how they're not actually potential party members. Maker, was I wrong.
Lulz were had. The humour in the writing is great. The game really does feel like a rollercoaster between epic heroism, grimdark drama, and lighthearted comedy.

Compel wrote:"They're too Joss Whedon."

How could anyone not like Firefly?

thedarkavenger wrote:Spent the time gathering everything and have gained control of Orlais. Tedious as hell though.

The Exalted Plains? Sheesh, I do like large environments with lots of stuff to do, but this region was really pushing it. The others feel more "balanced", though. Not too small, not too big.
It wouldn't be so bad if it wasn't for that compulsion to actually "finish" an area, which happens to include dozens of those damn shards, astrolabes, mosaics, etc. One could, in theory, just ignore it, which would probably lead to greater enjoyment of the game ... but there's that nagging feeling ...

Nah, it really wasn't awkward, it was kind of sweet, actually, it was basically:

Cass: "You've been flirting with me... haven't you?"
Me: "Yep, sure have."
C: "Um... that's sweet but, you're... the Herald of Andraste, my leader... and a woman."

... and right then I knew where the conversation was going, because I've watched pretty much the same conversation happen IRL. It ended pretty much as well as one could expect. Cass is (apparently) not an option for lesbian romance (which is... surprising), though the game will string you along in that pursuit for quite some time.

Sera an FemInq with Iron Bull also show. On console, too. The Witcher 2 did it, too

ESRB rules are universal across platforms. What gets an M rating in a PC game gets an M rating on a console.

thedarkavenger wrote:I meant that my inquisitor is using Gaspard, Celene and Briala as puppets.

Ohh, I see.

Yeah, I didn't realise this would be possible. Oh well, my solution works as well, and may even be more internally stable in the long term.

Psienesis wrote:... and right then I knew where the conversation was going, because I've watched pretty much the same conversation happen IRL. It ended pretty much as well as one could expect. Cass is (apparently) not an option for lesbian romance (which is... surprising), though the game will string you along in that pursuit for quite some time.

Heh - I think it's good that the game deals with it this way, though, rather than being all in-your-face about it. Makes the relationship(s) and thus the characters and their interaction seem more real/solid/meaningful.

So far, I'm quite content with how things have turned out on my end. The drama and laughter I got out of that really complemented the martial part of the game nicely.
Though I also think the party banter between the various companions alone should qualify for an award.

I didn't like Cassandra stringing me along so I was just like, "Hey Josephine, you're the easy one right?" And I sent cass off to the chantry to be a nun... after taking her dragon armor and weapon away so she didn't pull a Solas on me.

I'm still early on in the game, but I'm finding it pretty funny that Sera (who my female character has mentioned she's interested in and is currently in the 'wait-and-see' stage of the relationship with her), is approving of my character flirting with Scout Harding.

 Compel wrote:
I'm still early on in the game, but I'm finding it pretty funny that Sera (who my female character has mentioned she's interested in and is currently in the 'wait-and-see' stage of the relationship with her), is approving of my character flirting with Scout Harding.

This happens to my male Inquisitior too.

Well, minus the romancing stuff with Sera

 Compel wrote:
I'm still early on in the game, but I'm finding it pretty funny that Sera (who my female character has mentioned she's interested in and is currently in the 'wait-and-see' stage of the relationship with her), is approving of my character flirting with Scout Harding.

You know what they say about the cray cray

Sera approves of lots of things. So glad I brought her along to the Masquerade.

Hey guys, my da3 is jittery as hell and I can't seem to stop it, even on lowest settings, my puter is brand new and I've updated all the drivers etc but nothing seems to work?

Specs is always a good place to start.

Yeah tried all that :/ , it's annoying as I designed my pc to be able to play it at full spec.

We mean, tell us what your specs are. Simply claiming that it's "brand new" doesn't mean anything, as something off the shelf might be running on-board video (which will not run this game at all well), or it might come off-the-shelf with 2GB of installed RAM... which is likewise insufficient.

Ah I'm a tard, sorry will upload specs tomorrow, but the 2 gig ram sounds about right, I was assured that would be enough, I'll head down to pc world and talk to them


Automatically Appended Next Post:
Ah I'm a tard, sorry will upload specs tomorrow, but the 2 gig ram sounds about right, I was assured that would be enough, I'll head down to pc world and talk to them

the game requires 4 or more iirc

So, I began my Sera romance. One of the interesting little touches, is that her character selection card has now been updated.

To something slightly battier...

That happens in a couple different instances during the game, depending either on story events or your relationship status with the character. I noticed a bunch of my Companions got new cards after the Masquerade.

I also seem to have really pissed Blackwall off somehow, but I have no idea how I did it. I was even rescuing his Grey Warden relics, tried to convince the Wardens to stand down in the fight with them... basically taking his side throughout that whole storyline... but he up and left.

Blackwall doesn't seem to have much dialogue I've been finding.

I've been bringing him, Sera and Cassandra through much of my travelling through the various environments and I barely hear a peep out of him.

I swapped him out for Iron Bull and within a few seconds, he's chatting with everyone.

Blackwall doesn't talk much, but I'd say it fits to his background. The game lets you find out why.

The Iron Bull on the other hand is pretty much a partygoer. Even tried hitting on Cassandra, with ... poor results.

In case anyone missed it, there's a new free multiplayer DLC.

"Destruction Multiplayer Expansion"

I really do hope that EA realised that the Mass Effect 3 multiplayer free DLC worked great as a concept and they continue it for DA:I.

On the other hand, I've yet to properly PLAY the multiplayer yet. I'm mostly just wandering round the various open realm areas trying to avoid doing anything of any real consequence because, well... I'm weird like that.

This might be related

 Compel wrote:
In case anyone missed it, there's a new free multiplayer DLC.

"Destruction Multiplayer Expansion"

I really do hope that EA realised that the Mass Effect 3 multiplayer free DLC worked great as a concept and they continue it for DA:I.

On the other hand, I've yet to properly PLAY the multiplayer yet. I'm mostly just wandering round the various open realm areas trying to avoid doing anything of any real consequence because, well... I'm weird like that.

So far, the MP is...well, not great.

The Destruction expansion added a few extraneous pathways and the like to the existing 3 MP maps and added the "Beasts of the Wild"(read: wild animal attacks ) to the MP experience.

 CthuluIsSpy wrote:
This might be related

Spoiler:

... if shooting goats would one-shot dragons, I'd hire *ten* of these guys.

As it is, I shipped them to Tevinter, with swords, to do their thing. Gets them out of my hair, causes problems in Cory's backyard.

Also, the box? It's... not the box that's on trial. It's the contents of the box.

 Psienesis wrote:
... if shooting goats would one-shot dragons, I'd hire *ten* of these guys.

As it is, I shipped them to Tevinter, with swords, to do their thing. Gets them out of my hair, causes problems in Cory's backyard.

Also, the box? It's... not the box that's on trial. It's the contents of the box.

Straight to community service

Desubot wrote:Straight to community service

Thank the Maker there is youtube. I couldn't bring myself to do it, but needless to say, I was curious!

I told the box it was guilty as hell and gave its lands and holdings to the crown.

So, I'm a Knight Enchanter now at Level 16. I've just got myself the 'Spirit Blade' ability and I've got to say... Wow.

It's going literally 3 times more damage per hit as my staff. - Twice as much, on average, as Blackwall and his 2 handed weapon.

Just finished my first playthrough. I'm left wondering...

 thenoobbomb wrote:
Just finished my first playthrough. I'm left wondering...

Spoiler:

Was Corypheus right? Does the Maker not exist? And does Thedas need a god?

A seat needs done on to sit in it...

Exactly.

 thenoobbomb wrote:
Exactly.

I assume the Maker is off smoking some form of god drugs. Or creating another Golden City away from those Tevinter.

My insanely completionist first playthrough is at like 70 hours with me about halfway done with the Exalted Plains. Level 17.5, haven't touched the Emerald Graves, Hissing Wastes or Emprise du Lion. In mostly full tier 3 crafted gear and making a mockery of most enemies I encounter.

What Pride has Wrought is up next, but I will probably wait until I at least kill all the available dragons.

Man I hate the tactical view and the lack of tactics, but I do love building a terrifyingly powerful Inquisition.

I decided I didn't want to play 70 hours worth of this game. It's
pretty, sure. Not sure what I wanted. Maybe something more
tactical, less real time. I did enjoy the Inquisition part of the
game. I thought that alone might have carried me through the
story, but it didn't.

Maybe the next one will hook me?

 malfred wrote:
I decided I didn't want to play 70 hours worth of this game. It's
pretty, sure. Not sure what I wanted. Maybe something more
tactical, less real time. I did enjoy the Inquisition part of the
game. I thought that alone might have carried me through the
story, but it didn't.

Maybe the next one will hook me?

The Inquisition aspect and overall feel of the world is enough for me, which is great - because the gameplay f'ing blows. Five years or so on from Origins and things are worse all across the board. The gameplay is terrible in comparison; probably why I like outlevelling everything - I like challenging interesting fights and stuff; but when my mage defaults to charging into melee range unless I switch to her every couple of seconds and order her not to - or everyone in my party will stand around staring off into space while my tank is being attacked, until she starts swinging - bad. Bad console port.

Still though, gameplay, world, story - it's got two out of three.

The gameplay is more interesting when you play it on hard mode at least.

While some of the tactics are annoyingly lacking, I find it possible to rig things up a bit to suit.

Firstly, set the stamina/mana bars on everyone to either a 0% or 10% minimum.

I'm playing a magey/spirithealer/lightning/knightenchanter type. So my tactics setup usually works like:

Tank (Cassandra, sword/shield), Defend the PC. Have Bodyguard / Challenge / war cry be preferred abilities.

Range DPS (Sera, normally), follow the PC's target.

Melee DPS (Iron Bull or Blackwall, normally), follow the PC's target.

Then, making use of the 'Y' and 'L' buttons, plus the occasional use of tactical view (double clicking right mouse button means 'got to this point and hold position there'), seems to make the tactics doable. But yeah, it's not as in depth as I'd like, compared to DA1.


As far as the difficulty goes, I basically just rushed a Level 13 crestwood dragon with no preparation, with my squad being level 18 now. However, the level 15 dragon in the Exalted Plains required more planning.

I have to say that some fights are a pain in the ass only because of the bad AI.
Many times my rogue PC got killed by dragon's breath cause he thought that standing close to Blackwall while he was provoking the beast was a brilliant idea.

I'm running the stealth shenanigan build for my rogue right now. Enjoying it a lot.

It's not that I necessarily want fights to be hard, but I want them to be
fun, and ramping up the difficulty doesn't make them so.

 thenoobbomb wrote:
Just finished my first playthrough. I'm left wondering...

Spoiler:

Was Corypheus right? Does the Maker not exist? And does Thedas need a god?

Ok, the card game that Varric invites you to, with the whole party present? Worth all 100+ hours of game play.

 Psienesis wrote:
Ok, the card game that Varric invites you to, with the whole party present? Worth all 100+ hours of game play.

Yeah, I had that. It really humanizes the whole party. 10/10.

Also...

Check your quarters in Skyhold frequently. You do *not* want to go there for sexy-times and have the Quizquisition lurking in your closet.

Just sayin'.

I was wondering where he ran off to.

I found him in the stables when I first arrived at Skyhold, not seem him since.


Although... I do have this recurring bug where NPC's randomly don't decide to spawn in (Iron Bull is a common one for this).

Then they randomly appear as if they've just Warped in, star trek style from across the map.

Yeah, I had that problem with Cole. Even though the radar-map showed me that he should be right in front of me... he wasn't.

Then I went and talked with Sera, and came back, and there he was. Then again, it's Cole, so maybe that is how it's supposed to be.

 Bromsy wrote:

 malfred wrote:
I decided I didn't want to play 70 hours worth of this game. It's
pretty, sure. Not sure what I wanted. Maybe something more
tactical, less real time. I did enjoy the Inquisition part of the
game. I thought that alone might have carried me through the
story, but it didn't.

Maybe the next one will hook me?

The Inquisition aspect and overall feel of the world is enough for me, which is great - because the gameplay f'ing blows. Five years or so on from Origins and things are worse all across the board. The gameplay is terrible in comparison; probably why I like outlevelling everything - I like challenging interesting fights and stuff; but when my mage defaults to charging into melee range unless I switch to her every couple of seconds and order her not to - or everyone in my party will stand around staring off into space while my tank is being attacked, until she starts swinging - bad. Bad console port.

Still though, gameplay, world, story - it's got two out of three.

If your Mage is charging in then that is your misunderstanding of the tactical menu to be fair. You can set all of these preferences in each character's tactical options just like in Origins. I have not once had my ranged fighters do anything but stand back at range and fire at the first thing that moves, like they are meant to.

Its not 'just like origins' it is in far broader strokes. I used to do some fairly clever things with the origins tactic menu.

In saying that, I've yet to really have trouble with DAI tactics although there are some abilities I know just don't work sensibly when the ai use them. Most notably, charging bull and Line In The Sand are particularly badly used.

Oh, on that subject, is there a way to add more than 8 abilities to your ability bar?

 thedarkavenger wrote:

 thenoobbomb wrote:
Exactly.

I assume the Maker is off smoking some form of god drugs. Or creating another Golden City away from those Tevinter.

Games of Divinity, man. Games of Divinity.

 AnomanderRake wrote:

 thedarkavenger wrote:

 thenoobbomb wrote:
Exactly.

I assume the Maker is off smoking some form of god drugs. Or creating another Golden City away from those Tevinter.

Games of Divinity, man. Games of Divinity.

The Tevinter are like his petulant children. "If you can't accept my rules, I'm leaving."

So yeah, just did the part where you make a choice in the Fade.



That choice is probably one of the better pieces of game immersion I've ever seen. It's been years since I last wanted to yell at the story of a game to stop doing something.

Did they ever fix the "Hold position" bug? A few weeks ago, the AI just decided to ignore any "HOLD" command and just rushed into each and every enemy in sight.

I find the hold command is a bit pants, as telling them to do anything else except hold, such as open a gate, overwrites it.

However, I've found the tactical camera, then Double click on a spot for 'hold' combined with the hold command does help.

Yeah, I'll admit that's one of the less awesome things.

Just got to Skyhold after doing everything I could in the Mire, Oasis, and Hinterlands (barring the shards in Oasis, that place fething sucks and the dragon in the Hinterlands) and that put me just a little under level 12.

Gotta say, I'm impressed at the size of the game so far, Hinterlands feels as massive as it should, the Mire was suitably creepy although I would've liked more to do there, and the Oasis was actually a nice change for a bit before I got frustrated with the stupid maze of bs you have to run through to get everything. All in all, I'm having a blast.

One question though, I'm running a 2-handed warrior with Cassandra, Cole/Sera and Solas/Vivienne; I murder most, if not all of the enemies encountered. My only problem with that setup is my Warrior feels very squishy at times, I went down the WW side of the 2h tree and used the...whatever tree has the chain-pull skill. I've considered respeccing and going down the route of the tree that has Bull Rush and it's support skill that builds up guard to offset the apparent low defense and health I currently have.

Anyone else run a 2-hander and having any issues? I suppose if anyone runs Blackwall or Iron Bull that way there might be issues, but either way, some insight would be helpful.

I did notice my 2 hander Blackwall and Ironbull can feel slightly squishy at times. However, there are things that you can do to mitigate it.

I've often found that tanky-Cassandra (on hard) only dies when a full party wipe is pretty much imminent, so I don't give her many health improving upgrades, - Her belt is usally a 'Guard belt' though.

So most of my health ones go onto Blackwall/Ironbull. I usually take a 'superb belt of healing' (+20% healing) combined with a ring of life steal (+2% heal on kill) and that seems to keep Blackwall in the fight.

Also I started both characters down the Guard path, but didn't put more than 2 or 3 points into it. - Just enough to unlock the Guard ability. Even a few segments of guard helps, as it can regenerate during the battle.

Now that Iron Bull has unlocked his 'Reaver' specialisation, he works well with a belt of health (+100 health) and I believe one of the reaver abilities can let him self heal from nearby corpses, or something.

My PC is a mage though, so I tend to look at things from the magey point of view, so my main strategy in the game for keeping people alive effectively comes down to this.

Barrier. Barrier. Barrier. BARRIER.

Knight Enchanter is stupidly broken and/or stupidly fun. I'm only playing on hard, but I just took down the level 19 dragon in the Storm Coast at level 16, with 2 health potions and everyone except my (Knight Enchanter) Inquisitor going into the fight at 30% HP. Cassandra managed to keep herself floating until about the 50% mark, after that it was a solo effort.

Spirit damage really does seem to be really freaking awesome against most enemies. I do like going Gandalf with the spirit blade

I've been playing a girl qunari 2-hander for my 2nd playthrough and I'm about half way through and I kinda feel like I'm done with her. Seems like I made all the right decisions first time, and the wrong ones this time. Everyone but sera seems to hate me. I was thinking about starting over as a dwarf stabby rogue.. are they any good?

I was also gonna try it on the hardest setting... do you always have to use the tactical view for the hard fights? I kind of like to just do my thing while the other 3 companions do their own thing too, and just throw out the occasional "attack my target" order

I've not played it on Insanity (it's a bit insane for me ), but in hard mode, I tend to be fine in most non boss/dragon fights by just having the 'automatically pause the game when doing an AOE ability' option on.

It can also help doing a tactical view in the opening moments of a fight to make sure that my barrier (Barrier, Barrier, BARRIER), covers the whole squad and that Sera manages to get her 1800pt damage shot on unwounded targets off before the stabbifying happens.

You can also build weapons, for anyone of any non-mage class, that adds points of Guard per hit. This works out well for a two-hander, as you still get the damage mitigation and such, on top of any Barriers your mage is casting, and the AOE damage that two-handers offer.

 Psienesis wrote:
You can also build weapons, for anyone of any non-mage class, that adds points of Guard per hit. This works out well for a two-hander, as you still get the damage mitigation and such, on top of any Barriers your mage is casting, and the AOE damage that two-handers offer.

Y'know I was wondering about that, I haven't seen any +to guard per hit weapons or anything, but how I have my skills set up I tend to spam Whirlwind (the skill is so damn cool too) so if I had something that added guard per kill or hit that would be INSANE.

I'm tempted to start a second playthrough already as a mage or a rogue, given the videos I've seen online of both classes basically kicking wholesale ass with minimal effort, but I'm determined to finish this one first, despite 2h being a rather difficult path.

Also, BARRIER. BARRIER. BARRIER. The demons that have that fething frost beam? Yeah, feth those guys. Chain pull+stun+mighty blow. 2k damage, suck it you little bastards.

My Inq is a Rogue, so I built a pair of daggers that adds 2 points of Guard per hit, and heals me for 16% of my total HP per kill. I'm nigh-immortal.

Did anyone else have corypheus bug out so that he just stands there while your fully ranged party just nukes him?

I did. Then ruined his dragon.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Frankenberry wrote:

 Psienesis wrote:
You can also build weapons, for anyone of any non-mage class, that adds points of Guard per hit. This works out well for a two-hander, as you still get the damage mitigation and such, on top of any Barriers your mage is casting, and the AOE damage that two-handers offer.

Y'know I was wondering about that, I haven't seen any +to guard per hit weapons or anything, but how I have my skills set up I tend to spam Whirlwind (the skill is so damn cool too) so if I had something that added guard per kill or hit that would be INSANE.

I'm tempted to start a second playthrough already as a mage or a rogue, given the videos I've seen online of both classes basically kicking wholesale ass with minimal effort, but I'm determined to finish this one first, despite 2h being a rather difficult path.

Also, BARRIER. BARRIER. BARRIER. The demons that have that fething frost beam? Yeah, feth those guys. Chain pull+stun+mighty blow. 2k damage, suck it you little bastards.

Mage sucks in the early game. Most staffs have a low dos and you have no cool spells. I'm currently debating going fire/ice KE for maximum obnoxiousness.

 thedarkavenger wrote:
Did anyone else have corypheus bug out so that he just stands there while your fully ranged party just nukes him?

I did. Then ruined his dragon.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Frankenberry wrote:

 Psienesis wrote:
You can also build weapons, for anyone of any non-mage class, that adds points of Guard per hit. This works out well for a two-hander, as you still get the damage mitigation and such, on top of any Barriers your mage is casting, and the AOE damage that two-handers offer.

Y'know I was wondering about that, I haven't seen any +to guard per hit weapons or anything, but how I have my skills set up I tend to spam Whirlwind (the skill is so damn cool too) so if I had something that added guard per kill or hit that would be INSANE.

I'm tempted to start a second playthrough already as a mage or a rogue, given the videos I've seen online of both classes basically kicking wholesale ass with minimal effort, but I'm determined to finish this one first, despite 2h being a rather difficult path.

Also, BARRIER. BARRIER. BARRIER. The demons that have that fething frost beam? Yeah, feth those guys. Chain pull+stun+mighty blow. 2k damage, suck it you little bastards.

Mage sucks in the early game. Most staffs have a low dos and you have no cool spells. I'm currently debating going fire/ice KE for maximum obnoxiousness.

Good, I prefer playing a mage from rags to riches in the way that old school RPGs did it; basically an apprentice with NO idea of what's going on that eventually solo's dragons and demon lords.

Anyhow, I was wondering if it's possible to go as far as you can into the AOE skills the mage has and supplement it with JoB's that are upgraded, basically guaranteed panic and mass element damage over time to a pretty decent radius.

On crafting, I'm aiming to make a masterwork item and I'm seeing the x% to turn into masterwork and then there's things that don't have a percentage, just an inherent bonus. The ones without a percentage didn't craft into masterwork weapons...so I'm guess there's still a % I'm not seeing. My question is, if there a point where you can reliably make masterwork gear? Or is it going to be a 'get massive stockpiles of mats and then just spam until profit'?

so whats the best masterwork armour and ... where it be please

I just got some Masterwork Battlemaster Armour for Cassandra. Item level 19, 264 armour value.

I also just got some Masterwork Prowler Armour for Sera, Item level 19, 238 armour.

All it took was killing a level 19 and then a level 21 dragon!

Best MW armor is stuff you build with Dagna's assistance. I go dragon-hunting specifically for the ultra-rare components to make MW items.

I went to the end-game (level 25ish or so) with my entire party kitted in MW stuff I had built myself, at level 19 or so, save a bow that I found for Sera that fired 3 shots with every pull, simply because I couldn't duplicate that effect (though I could build items that, situationally, provided superior DPS, but that bow was simply too good in most situations to bother swapping out).

Also, there's "Masterwork" and then there's "Masterwork". Some recipes will automatically create an MW item, regardless of what you put into it, and then there's things like dragon fangs which offer a percentage chance to create a MW item (which features a +10% bonus to all the stats on the item). I found that recipes that make MW items, adding in components that added whatever proc or effect I wanted, worked best. When I built sets of dragon-killing items (all the resists I could stack, +Guard and Supremed Dragon-slayer Runes), I found myself able to take on High Dragons 3-5 levels higher than my party without losing everyone (often losing no one during the fight, using Healing Mist bombs and the AOE effects of well-researched healing tonics).

Well, I've found the level 23 dragon. I'm currently level 22, with the rest of my party being level 21.

As I'm playing the game on hard mode... I might let that one sleep a while then come back to it. So, I'm off to the Hissing Wastes now, to find the last remaining normal dragon I have to kill.

I'm trying to avoid visiting the Arbor Wilds, just in case it locks me in for a while.

I still have about half of Emprise Du lyons and the entirety of the Hissing Wastes to do.

*Is a bit of a completionist*

thanks guys, im aboot 20 hours in now and not sure what to do next, im now hunting the grey wardens, any sugestions on where to go after?

What level are you?

16 at the mo

 Formosa wrote:
16 at the mo

Go Emprise de Lion, had a lot of fun there myself.

I would have thought Emprise De Lion would be a bit too tough for level 16. Incidentally, I just killed my last dragon. I probably would have been stuffed though, if I wasn't playing a knight enchanter, she was a difficult one to beat. Surprisingly... Noone in Skyhold seemed to give a monkeys about me killing my 10th dragon. There wasn't even any comments after the fight either. I'm a little disappointed.

I've just got the Hissing Wastes to do of the wilderness areas (Assuming the Arbor Wilds isn't a wilderness area). The Hissing Wastes seem incredibly boring :(

The best armor schematics in the game (IMO) are the rare ones sold by the dog vendor in the Hissing Wastes if you've got the Short List perk (it adds rare stuff to all merchants). It's a pain in the arse to farm for though, as you have to exit and enter your save every time the wrong item spawns for sale.

For a Knight Enchanter, Fade-Touched Silverite (5 guard on hit) seems rather broken, with my already significant barrier generation normally preventing me from even taking damage, having guard on top of that is beyond stupid and firmly in the realm of "It does WHAT? COOL!".

Yeah, I think it's been agreed pretty much unanimously that Knight Enchanter is a fair bit broken in general.

Even if I wasn't nigh immortal already, I'm doing pretty silly damage going invisible, then reappearing inside someone and spirit blading. - I think it's 2000+. And I can do it pretty much constantly too. I gave some fade touched obsidian/silverite to Sera, who has Flask of Lightning as a preferred ability. Now THAT's pretty damn scary. Her bow becomes a machine gun quite regularly, giving her full guard. - She's not squishy anymore!

And that's the Hissing Wastes done - Except for 2 flipping notes pages. - I'll probably google to find them later on. Seriously though, what a massive waste of a tame that was. No real storyline for the quests, no named badguys that I saw, ages and ages riding to get now-where (It could have been done with being shrunk by 15%). And all of it for a rune schematic that I'm not going to use. In all that free space as well, there wasn't even a keep.

- If you're looking for areas to skip out. Pick that one, it's literally the worst one of the lot.

I'm lvl 18, Sword and Board Dwarf.

I've been trying to go slowly on the story, since I don't want to get to the end before i've explored everything else. I've completed the Ball/Assassination Plot thingy, killed a couple dragons, captured a couple keeps.

Biggest thing I'm focussing on right now is gathering shards up, so I can clear the temple in the Oasis. I think I'm down to the last door of the three elements.

Ran through a playthrough in Nightmare with a Qunari mage and now back to my human rogue to catch all the quests and side stuff (normal difficulty).

While cool, the 2-handed warrior route is not as fun as I though it would be. While it's definitely a mixture of DA:O and DA2 (squishiness and absurd violence) I'm not sure I'm playing him right. I went Reaver when I could and did most of the right side of the 2-handed tree with a few Battlemaster bits.

He still dies like a bitch though. Perhaps I need to find better gear, but I figured at 19 he'd be the powerhouse everyone else in my party is, but he's not. /shrug

Started a Qunari bow rogue and I'm having a stupid amount of fun. The amount of damage I can do before the enemy even knows a fight has started is just silly. I can't wait to get a specialization and see what happens.

Yeah bow rogues are awesomely fun. Assassin is supposed to make it wrong.

 Frankenberry wrote:
While cool, the 2-handed warrior route is not as fun as I though it would be. While it's definitely a mixture of DA:O and DA2 (squishiness and absurd violence) I'm not sure I'm playing him right. I went Reaver when I could and did most of the right side of the 2-handed tree with a few Battlemaster bits.

He still dies like a bitch though. Perhaps I need to find better gear, but I figured at 19 he'd be the powerhouse everyone else in my party is, but he's not. /shrug

Started a Qunari bow rogue and I'm having a stupid amount of fun. The amount of damage I can do before the enemy even knows a fight has started is just silly. I can't wait to get a specialization and see what happens.

You need to get some gear with the +guard masterworks and/or a specialist barrier mage or some +guard abilities for two hand to be viable. They can do ridiculous damage if they stay up. Adding in some gear with Berserk is awesome once you have some +guard gear.

Blackwall's now doing something in the region of 2000 to 3600 odd damage with each hit now at level 23 with the Sulevin blade. It's rather impressive. He seems to be staying alive ok too, I've equipped him with the Superb belt of healing and the Superb Ring of Life Steal (I'm not even sure if they work together to be honest). However, by spending 1 point in 'challenge' it seems to do well enough by building up guard to keep him alive.

 pretre wrote:
Yeah bow rogues are awesomely fun. Assassin is supposed to make it wrong.

I'm running the assassination/stealth abuse rogue.

Good fun.

I lunge, set stealth, do twin fangs for obscene damage.

Trigger stealth again, use the assassin thrown dagger ability for obscene damage. (Killing the enemy, which resets stealth.)

Lunge, trigger stealth again, twin fangs for more damage.

Trigger stealth, and backstab.

My first Rogue went Assassin and, yes, they are stupidly deadly. My 2nd character is a 2-hander fighter, but since I know how to build +Guard items, plus I know there will be rings that grant a +10% (or higher) bonus to War Cry (which grants Guard)... well, we'll see how that goes.

The sword-and-board build for fighters, though, is the true tank class. I've watched Cassandra and Blackwall stand through just stupid amounts of combat, against stupid-nasty foes, without even needing a heal tonic, let alone a potion.

 Psienesis wrote:
My first Rogue went Assassin and, yes, they are stupidly deadly. My 2nd character is a 2-hander fighter, but since I know how to build +Guard items, plus I know there will be rings that grant a +10% (or higher) bonus to War Cry (which grants Guard)... well, we'll see how that goes.

The sword-and-board build for fighters, though, is the true tank class. I've watched Cassandra and Blackwall stand through just stupid amounts of combat, against stupid-nasty foes, without even needing a heal tonic, let alone a potion.

I've found that after getting to 24 and completing the game with a 2-hander Reaver, +guard items are a MUST if you want to survive. I'm not sure War Cry will help, but I did Charging Bull with the +25% total guard passive coupled with some fade-touched silverite and my character wouldn't die. The speed in which I built guard, was able to spam Dragon's Rage and subsequently Devour made most fights a joke.

Same here with Cassandra, before I'd even gotten her specialization she would simply ignore most damage. Hell, I was 3 levels below the Storm Coast dragon and she soloed it after my party died, it was nuts. I'd like to make a s/s toon, but after having run a warrior already, I want something different - hence my rogue.

Speaking of rogues, as a bow-user should I stack armor pen or stagger? I figure I'll add +guard to an armor at some point but I figure in the mean time I should be doing more damage.

I can't say I've ever really felt the need to go into the mega detail of 'should I have +% bleed, +stagger, +% armour penetration, or +% Critical chance/damage.'

Generally speaking, I just go for the same things other things have.

Question to mages: How can you bear to play the opening? I'm trying to run a mage and it's just so boring pre-spec.

 pretre wrote:
Ran through a playthrough in Nightmare with a Qunari mage and now back to my human rogue to catch all the quests and side stuff (normal difficulty).

Strangely enough my normal was Human Rogue and my Nightmare was Qunari Mage. Don't suppose you have a hard run with Dwarf Warrior by chance?

lol nope. Not yet at least. I think, if I play a third time, it'll be a Warrior though. Was Dwarf interesting?

 thedarkavenger wrote:
Question to mages: How can you bear to play the opening? I'm trying to run a mage and it's just so boring pre-spec.

Mostly by giggling like a schoolboy whenever I use chain lightning. Zappity, zappp zapppp zappity zap. I was a combined Spirit / Lightning mage, so early on a lot of the things I was doing was based around positioning myself to be in the right spot to put barriers on for most of my team.

Gaspard's the man.

 Compel wrote:

 thedarkavenger wrote:
Question to mages: How can you bear to play the opening? I'm trying to run a mage and it's just so boring pre-spec.

Mostly by giggling like a schoolboy whenever I use chain lightning. Zappity, zappp zapppp zappity zap. I was a combined Spirit / Lightning mage, so early on a lot of the things I was doing was based around positioning myself to be in the right spot to put barriers on for most of my team.

Yeah, spec'ing is cheap enough that you can jump around a bit to find a spec you like as mage. A lot of variety.

I've finally finished the game. - That certainly took me a while, but I did basically everything in the game barring a handful of mosaics I couldn't be bothered hunting down (and a missing region in the Exalted Plains).

Now the wait for the DLC, especially after that doozy of a post credits scene.

Hehe. That's why I kind of raced my nightmare game. Get the whole 'finishing it' out of the way so I could sit back, relax and collect tiles and gak.

 pretre wrote:

 Compel wrote:

 thedarkavenger wrote:
Question to mages: How can you bear to play the opening? I'm trying to run a mage and it's just so boring pre-spec.

Mostly by giggling like a schoolboy whenever I use chain lightning. Zappity, zappp zapppp zappity zap. I was a combined Spirit / Lightning mage, so early on a lot of the things I was doing was based around positioning myself to be in the right spot to put barriers on for most of my team.

Yeah, spec'ing is cheap enough that you can jump around a bit to find a spec you like as mage. A lot of variety.

I meant like Knight-Enchanter as spec. I just find the mage to be extremely dull. I can't play one for more than ten minutes at a time. And I've only just unlocked the Hinterlands!

Oddly enough, the short times I've jumped into a warrior, I find myself sitting thinking, "how can anyone play that. Always having to chase after random opponents who are running after things."

I'm plotting my second character now, probably an Elven archer. Though, I'm actually thinking an Elven mage now - even female for a second time.

So, my Rogue now gets +3 guard every time she's hit.

What's the average game length for finishing? I've put 72 hours in, and I'm still 2 missions from finishing it.

Keeping in mind I'm a bit of a multitasker when it comes to computer games, so I leave them on and paused a fair bit.

I was about, roughly, 200 hours for doing effectively everything in the game. - Although the game was jerky and didn't give me the '10 killed dragons' achievement.

Play the game again and there are so many times when you go 'oh yeah' in reference to what would happen post credits. Same with Blackwall's story. It's nice second time around to see the effort put into the story that you couldn't really notice the first time around.

Also, on Facebook Bioware strongly hinted that the post credits scene is laying the foundation for the next game, not just a DLC.

 thenoobbomb wrote:
So, my Rogue now gets +3 guard every time she's hit.

Wait until you get the mineral that allows for +5 guard on hitting a target, it's comically overpowered.

As for my second character I think I've started someone new like five times and I still can't find the 'groove'. My 2-handed warrior felt right from the beginning; grotesque amounts of violence and squishiness rolled into one for most of the game. Now, I've tried archer, dual-blade rogue, and mage and I can't seem to get something that makes me want to play again. Then again it could be I'm still hung up on my warrior and need to wait a bit before starting a new toon /shrug.

Oh, yeah, and I concur: DAT LAST SCENE THO.

So yeah, the part in the Temple of Mythal apparently made me miss out on an achievement, and my closest save is 3 hours away .

 AlmightyWalrus wrote:
So yeah, the part in the Temple of Mythal

Spoiler:

the Well, and who drinks from it

apparently made me miss out on an achievement, and my closest save is 3 hours away .

Yup. I guessed this on a whim and made my decision based on that. Luckily I was right. You can always play again though (and you know you will )

Played multi-player today for the first time, and while I like it, I don't like the pairing system. I get matched with Level 12-20 characters who are going for perfect runs for loot, and when they die they disconnect so the whole party gets booted and you lose your experience. Makes it very harder for a Level 1 character to progress.

 AlmightyWalrus wrote:
So yeah, the part in the Temple of Mythal

Spoiler:

the Well, and who drinks from it

apparently made me miss out on an achievement, and my closest save is 3 hours away .

What achievement?

Why would a two handed axe have a slot for cloth? All I can put in there is stat increases to magic and cunning. What is Iron Bull going to do with that?

Cunning affects Crits, doesn't it?

Seems a good thing for Iron Bull.

I think my crit record now is a double handed weapon (the Sulivan sword), critting for 5000 damage

 thenoobbomb wrote:

 AlmightyWalrus wrote:
So yeah, the part in the Temple of Mythal

Spoiler:

the Well, and who drinks from it

apparently made me miss out on an achievement, and my closest save is 3 hours away .

What achievement?

Spoiler:

I drank from it myself, anything I miss?

Can't remember what it's called ATM, the one with the "Recruit a powerful ally" bit.

 AlmightyWalrus wrote:

 thenoobbomb wrote:

 AlmightyWalrus wrote:
So yeah, the part in the Temple of Mythal

Spoiler:

the Well, and who drinks from it

apparently made me miss out on an achievement, and my closest save is 3 hours away .

What achievement?

Spoiler:

I drank from it myself, anything I miss?

Can't remember what it's called ATM, the one with the "Recruit a powerful ally" bit.

Well, I got that one.

I did some reading about that. Basically, spoilers for end game:

Omg, re: assassin archer rogue... Got a bow that detonates your opponent when they die. Find a pack of bad guys. Stealth. Full draw. No more pack of bad guys.

(First guy gets full draw crit and explodes killing th rest. Hilarious.)

So DA:I isn't using the world state from the Keep that I put together. Well, it's using some of it, but not all. Last night I had my character ask Varric about Hawke and I got information about Merrill being alive, which is in direct contradiction to what I put in the keep. Has anyone else had issues like this?

squidhills wrote:
So DA:I isn't using the world state from the Keep that I put together. Well, it's using some of it, but not all. Last night I had my character ask Varric about Hawke and I got information about Merrill being alive, which is in direct contradiction to what I put in the keep. Has anyone else had issues like this?

I thought you could change it post game, but you have to do it pregame. The best suggestion I saw was to create a world state, start a new game. Save. Then go check to make sure the world state is correct on DAK.

 pretre wrote:

squidhills wrote:
So DA:I isn't using the world state from the Keep that I put together. Well, it's using some of it, but not all. Last night I had my character ask Varric about Hawke and I got information about Merrill being alive, which is in direct contradiction to what I put in the keep. Has anyone else had issues like this?

I thought you could change it post game, but you have to do it pregame. The best suggestion I saw was to create a world state, start a new game. Save. Then go check to make sure the world state is correct on DAK.

Thanks. I'll try this out. I hope it works, because I need Merrill to be dead. I murdered her with ALL of the murder for a reason.

Most importantly, don't forget the click the very concealed 'upload to DA: I' button.

So I re-worked my Tapestry in the Keep, and re-uploaded it to the DA:I servers. Started a new game, downloaded the new world state, and started playing. Got to the point where you control Haven and talked to Varric about Hawke (the only way you can check to see if your world state has actually imported correctly) and everything seemed to sync up fine.

Played thirteen more hours and got to Skyhold, and met a Hawke who was both the wrong class and the wrong gender.

Uninstalled DA:I from my hard drive immediately. Will not re-install until Bioware learns how to make a game read an existing save file from a previous game, something the guys who made Suikoden figured out twenty years ago.

squidhills wrote:
So I re-worked my Tapestry in the Keep, and re-uploaded it to the DA:I servers. Started a new game, downloaded the new world state, and started playing. Got to the point where you control Haven and talked to Varric about Hawke (the only way you can check to see if your world state has actually imported correctly) and everything seemed to sync up fine.

Played thirteen more hours and got to Skyhold, and met a Hawke who was both the wrong class and the wrong gender.

I had this, too.

Uninstalled DA:I from my hard drive immediately. Will not re-install until Bioware learns how to make a game read an existing save file from a previous game, something the guys who made Suikoden figured out twenty years ago.

kek

What does uploading a world state at the beginning of the game actually do?

 Tagony wrote:
What does uploading a world state at the beginning of the game actually do?

It is supposed to allow you to import the story choices & outcomes from the previous two DA games into your DA:I game, thus making Hawke a mage or rogue, or a woman. Or having Loghain alive and running around. Or having Alastair as a homeless bum instead of as king. So on and so forth. This matters because DA:I is set up to have different scenes play out in different ways, depending on the choices you made in the previous two games. To have no way to accurately check that your world state imported correctly until you reach Skyhold (a third?) of the way into the game is absurd, and one of the reasons I'm done with this game.

Ah thanks for reply. I hear you on the buggyness of the game. First first guy was bugged, then couldn't level up his skills. So now I am on my third toon. My wife can almost say verbatim what the characters responses are because she sat there during all of the restarts lol.

I, personally, don't care about the DA Keep stuff. I installed the game "cold", as I don't have any DAO or DA2 saves on this PC and just played it straight through. Never encountered any game-breaking bugs, so I'm not sure what to tell you might be the cause to that.

 Psienesis wrote:
I, personally, don't care about the DA Keep stuff. I installed the game "cold", as I don't have any DAO or DA2 saves on this PC and just played it straight through. Never encountered any game-breaking bugs, so I'm not sure what to tell you might be the cause to that.

The game doesn't interact with saves.

You set up the world state on Dragon Age Keep, and it downloads it onto your account.

So far, all I've done is set up a DA:O world, and that worked just fine.

squidhills wrote:
So I re-worked my Tapestry in the Keep, and re-uploaded it to the DA:I servers. Started a new game, downloaded the new world state, and started playing. Got to the point where you control Haven and talked to Varric about Hawke (the only way you can check to see if your world state has actually imported correctly) and everything seemed to sync up fine.

Played thirteen more hours and got to Skyhold, and met a Hawke who was both the wrong class and the wrong gender.

Uninstalled DA:I from my hard drive immediately. Will not re-install until Bioware learns how to make a game read an existing save file from a previous game, something the guys who made Suikoden figured out twenty years ago.

Right so first up; chances are you probably just overlooked the class when you redid the Keep the second time around while focusing on the upload. There is a default.

As for reading a save file, the game is made to be partly compatible on consoles that don't have the old game. Everyone also makes claims like yours above without genuinely realizing it's not that simple, nor is it the same thing as things were 20 years ago; a vintage car is easier to fix than a newer one in the same way. The more advanced you make something that harder it is to fix or change.

 Godless-Mimicry wrote:


As for reading a save file, the game is made to be partly compatible on consoles that don't have the old game. Everyone also makes claims like yours above without genuinely realizing it's not that simple, nor is it the same thing as things were 20 years ago; a vintage car is easier to fix than a newer one in the same way. The more advanced you make something that harder it is to fix or change.

Then I'll re-install DA:I when Bioware figures out how to make a game read a save file from a game from a different console, something the guys who made Suikoden 3 figured out ten years ago.

Also, I didn't miss anything in the Keep. I constantly went back to it every time I re-made my character (3 times in total) to make sure everything was the way I wanted it. The Keep data was always the way I had wanted it, the game just didn't want to recognize it.

squidhills wrote:

 Godless-Mimicry wrote:


As for reading a save file, the game is made to be partly compatible on consoles that don't have the old game. Everyone also makes claims like yours above without genuinely realizing it's not that simple, nor is it the same thing as things were 20 years ago; a vintage car is easier to fix than a newer one in the same way. The more advanced you make something that harder it is to fix or change.

Then I'll re-install DA:I when Bioware figures out how to make a game read a save file from a game from a different console, something the guys who made Suikoden 3 figured out ten years ago.

Your loss.

Well, finally finished the game.

Yeah, some people have also pointed something else out...

 Compel wrote:
Yeah, some people have also pointed something else out...

Spoiler:

You know the big choice, leaving either Hawke or a Warden in the Fade and most people choosing to leave whoever the Warden was?

Well, even if Corypheus would normally be killed by whatever the Inquisitor did to him... If a Warden happens to be in the fade at the time and still fighting away?

Well, feck...

 Compel wrote:
Yeah, some people have also pointed something else out...

Spoiler:

You know the big choice, leaving either Hawke or a Warden in the Fade and most people choosing to leave whoever the Warden was?

Well, even if Corypheus would normally be killed by whatever the Inquisitor did to him... If a Warden happens to be in the fade at the time and still fighting away?

Well, feck...

I thought

It would be...

But he isn't in Kansas anymore, we don't know if the same rules would apply....

Two handed Reavers.
Soloing high dragons 2 levels higher than us on normal since the the Third Age.

 ThePrimordial wrote:
Two handed Reavers.
Soloing high dragons 2 levels higher than us on normal since the the Third Age.

Or an assassin dual dagger rogue. Soloing Corypheus since release date.

In normal difficulty, isn't any class pretty much solo capable?

I get the sense of that, yeah.

Although, a Sword / shield dude that isn't a templar might have a few infinity battles against a badguy that uses barriers a lot.

To sum it up, anyone with a 'gain guard on hit' weapon is probably near enough unkillable.

 ThePrimordial wrote:
Two handed Reavers.
Soloing high dragons 2 levels higher than us on normal since the the Third Age.

Knight Enchanter (AKA Arcane Warrior 2.0) doing that on Nightmare since forever.

 AlmightyWalrus wrote:

 ThePrimordial wrote:
Two handed Reavers.
Soloing high dragons 2 levels higher than us on normal since the the Third Age.

Knight Enchanter (AKA Arcane Warrior 2.0) doing that on Nightmare since forever.

KE is basically god moding your way through, right?

 thedarkavenger wrote:

 AlmightyWalrus wrote:

 ThePrimordial wrote:
Two handed Reavers.
Soloing high dragons 2 levels higher than us on normal since the the Third Age.

Knight Enchanter (AKA Arcane Warrior 2.0) doing that on Nightmare since forever.

KE is basically god moding your way through, right?

More or less, it's hilariously broken.

I think because I wanted to beat it before I went back to school, I missed most of the game...

 hotsauceman1 wrote:
I think because I wanted to beat it before I went back to school, I missed most of the game...

So play it again...

......I cant at school.......

 hotsauceman1 wrote:
......I cant at school.......

Okay. Cool story.

Pretty late throwing my two cents into this one, but I will say this is my favourite game of 2014 (and 2015, so far). Have had a playthrough going pretty much constantly, and I probably will for a while yet. They certainly deserved all of those GOTY awards.

 AlmightyWalrus wrote:
Well, finally finished the game.

Spoiler:

Of all the ways to finish Corypheus, throwing him into the Fade might have been the least rational. It's almost as if that's what he wanted to achieve all along. Nice job breaking it, "hero".

 pretre wrote:
In normal difficulty, isn't any class pretty much solo capable?

I dread to see what casual difficulty is like, given I find hard difficulty mostly unchallenging.

But then, I suppose it's meant for people who are mostly interested in the story. And it's an achievement of sorts for BioWare if they have such people playing their games.

 Troike wrote:
Pretty late throwing my two cents into this one, but I will say this is my favourite game of 2014 (and 2015, so far). Have had a playthrough going pretty much constantly, and I probably will for a while yet. They certainly deserved all of those GOTY awards.

 AlmightyWalrus wrote:
Well, finally finished the game.

Spoiler:

Of all the ways to finish Corypheus, throwing him into the Fade might have been the least rational. It's almost as if that's what he wanted to achieve all along. Nice job breaking it, "hero".

Spoiler:

I thought this too, at first, but watch it again. Note how the Inquisitor opens a fade rift inside of him, and he disintegrates whilst screaming as he is sucked in. His second trip must have been fatal. Because, obviously, they're not going to have an ending where you help the villain achieve his goal.

Granted, they could have made it clearer, so as to avoid confusion.

 pretre wrote:
In normal difficulty, isn't any class pretty much solo capable?

I dread to see what casual difficulty is like, given I find hard difficulty mostly unchallenging.

But then, I suppose it's meant for people who are mostly interested in the story. And it's an achievement of sorts for BioWare if they have such people playing their games.

At the end, you send corypheus through to the fade without a physical body. So he's just another spirit in the fade.

Was this stated by a developer?

EDIT: Nevermind

The wife surprised me with an Xbone and DA:I for my birthday. Go team go

She got you a console? Damn that's generous. Did she buy it with your money?

Yup, I'm the only income in the house, but it was still a nice thought.