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mrs-gauche · 3 months
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You know, if all the teasers/comics/books/short stories are any indication for the plot of DA4, I'm just thinking about the absolute chaos that's gonna ensue when this game will feature SO many different/opposing factions and all I hope is for the overall vibe to be this one scene from Pirates of the Caribbean where they all start pointing guns at each other
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Like, the Blight and common enemies might bring people together, but the distrust is off the charts. 😂 You have the remaining Inquisition, Solas and his agents everywhere, the Evanuris, Tevinter/Venatori, the Qunari/Antaam, the Crows, the Executors, Veil Jumpers, Shadow Dragons, Lords of Fortune, Grey Wardens and whoever else I'm forgetting.
On the surface we might work together, but the second someone does anything remotely suspicious
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mrs-gauche · 3 months
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𝓋𝒾𝒷𝓇𝒶𝓉𝒾𝓃𝑔 𝒾𝓉 𝒾𝓃𝓉𝑜 𝒷𝑒𝒾𝓃𝑔
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mrs-gauche · 3 months
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Thanks Jon. Ok guys, you know what to do. (☞゚ヮ゚)☞
(Jon Renish is the Technical Director on DA4 btw.)
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mrs-gauche · 3 months
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#if the orb was a key#if you lose or lack the key to a door and you really need to get in#short of waiting for a locksmith to arrive#if its urgent#plan b is sometimes to break it down
I hope it's okay to add your tags here, because I'm so glad you pointed this out. 😂 Because yeah, I feel like we should remember that whatever he's going to do now is all part of an alternative plan, seeing as his initial plan was to open his orb and use the anchor to enter the Fade. So it seems like Plan B involves using the idol now. And maybe this wasn't his first choice, because he knows of the dangers and risks that come with using it?
So as you said, could the idol be a more "violent" alternative to the anchor then, where it can literally be used as a ritual blade to "split" the Veil or reality, like the anchor was able to open and close rifts?
In both the comics and Tevinter Nights, the idol/the weapon produced from the idol seemed to draw power from the blood of its wielder. It makes me wonder if it was intended to be used this way, since we have to remember that it still presumably belongs to Solas, who claims to not practice blood magic (though he's not opposed to it), because it seems to make it more difficult to enter the Fade.
Which is ironic, given what the mage in Tevinter Nights did to disrupt the Fade, but also how the Magisters Sidereal used a massive blood ritual to enter the Fade physically.
And oddly enough, in your first conversation with Solas about blood magic, he makes this curious analogy with daggers as an example...
Inquisitor: Every time I've seen blood magic used, it has been for some evil purpose. Solas: I once saw a woman being stabbed in the stomach with a dagger. She died slowly, in agony. It was repulsive. If the Chantry outlawed daggers, would that stop people from using it? Of course not. [...] Inquisitor: You don't need to sacrifice a slave's life to make a dagger. Solas: I suppose it depends upon the dagger.
(I mean, he wouldn't talk this nonchalantly about Mythal's death, would he?? 😂) But it still makes me wonder, since the idol could after all depict Mythal's death with the crowned figure's agonized expression and I also can't stop thinking about the level design in the Fade when you get the reveal about Mythal and Flemeth, with this massive bloody scenery and the blade stabbing the back of this statue... Like HELLO, that's got to be more than just symbolic! 😂
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Sorry, I didn't mean to ramble, but I could literally talk about this damn thing for hours. 😂 (And btw, since we're comparing it to real weapons, I always thought the object looks a lot like a Kunai? Solas becomes a ninja in DA4 confirmed. lol)
Folks on Dragon Age discord server made a discovery. First, peachypowder found this little asset
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Then, ttdub7254 noticed a simililar thing in Solas' hand in here
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🤔🤔🤔
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mrs-gauche · 3 months
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Commission for @lusilly!
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mrs-gauche · 3 months
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Fenharel
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mrs-gauche · 3 months
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The Temple of Mythal and Greek Sculpture
Or: How Bioware takes from history without any nuance.
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Picture this. You're me, playing Inquisition for the first time. You get to the Temple of Mythal, the doors shut behind you and you finally get to look around. It's a typical elven ruin for the game, nothing much seems different...
Hold on.
Hold the fuck on.
You know what that is.
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You know what that's based on, and for a long time after it tickles you. Oh, maybe that meant something in the grander scheme of things! We've never seen such a blatant reference to a real-life sculpture anywhere else in game (to my knowledge at the time)! Maybe it'll come up later and it'll all make sense!
Here's the deal. I've been bothered by this for years. The more I think about it, the more angry I become. Anger over a single fucking type of statue, you say? There's a lot of other shit to be angry over in this game, and you choose this?
YES! I CHOOSE THIS! AND THIS IS WHY.
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Picture this. You're me again, aged 14 this time. You're in the Louvre, the first museum of Western classical art you've ever been to. You've grown up in a place where this interest could only be cultivated from extra-curricular reading, and for a kid that age from my country to be ass deep in Greek and Egyptian myth is frankly lmao. Neurodivergent. Anyway.
So we're wandering around the Louvre, I've just taken my parents through the Egyptian section and given them a thorough infodump on everything I know about burial rites.
And then we enter this room. And I very nearly fall to my knees when I catch sight of her.
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This is the sculpture the statues at the Temple of Mythal are based on - one Winged Victory of Samothrace.
She is a sculpture from the Hellenestic era, depicting the goddess Nike stood at the prow of a ship. Her head and both arms are missing, save one hand with two fingers (also in the Louvre but displayed separately). She was found on the Greek island of Samothrace, among the ruins of what was known as the Sanctuary of the Great Gods. It seemed like she was displayed at the top of a hill, looming down at all that regarded her.
I’ve had the absolute privilege of seeing her in person twice in my life, both before and after the 2013 restoration. And let me tell you, regardless of which staircase that leads you there, the sight of her will stop you in your tracks.
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[Now with people, for scale.]
She is massive. Larger than life, and immediately is the centre of your attention. It's not the fact that she has no head, no arms. No, you will realise the closer you get to her, the more you're able to appreciate the details of this absolutely astounding piece of history.
No. It's because she feels so alive.
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The way her robes drape against flesh, wet from sea-spray or rain, yet flowing with the motion of an invisible wind. The wings cast behind her dramatically as her right foot steps forward. Standing tall and proud, unflinching, unbowed against the elements. Even without her arms, you can feel how dynamic the torso and legs are.
You don't need to be an art historian, or even have any knowledge of Greek myth or art history to stand in front of her, as I once did as a young teen, and nearly be brought to tears.
So.
This brings me to the first of the two main gripes I have with the way this sculpture is used in Inquisition.
Compared to the way she's displayed in the Louvre, and also presumably how she was presented to her original audience - larger than life, looming, powerful, beautiful - she is relegated instead to smaller, repeating statues of the same nature throughout the temple.
This diminishes the purpose of the original sculpture, which was to instill a sense of awe and wonder. The singularity that forces you to focus and appreciate the scale and intricacy. The aura, the gravitas of having a single, massive sculpture of such a dynamic figure is completely gone.
And to make things worse, they Mythal-ify her. Adding a helmed head and changing her beautiful feathered wings to leathery dragon wings. They don't even add arms, which is odd because the original sculpture very clearly is missing its arms.
And, may I ask, Why?
It feels cheap, like they saw the Winged Victory and were like 'oh shit this is a cool sculpture, we should add it in game' without giving any fucking thought to what the sculpture means.
Which brings me to the second gripe. The complete disregard for the symbolism of the Winged Victory.
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Detail from the Athena fountain, Parliament Building of Vienna, showing Nike the Winged Victory in the palm of Athena's hand [source]
Nike is a minor Greek deity, said to be the daughter of Pallas (a Titan) and the river Styx. Her other siblings by the same parents include Zelus (Zeal),  Bia (Might) and Kratos (Strength).
Yes. That Kratos.
She was one of the earliest gods to pledge her allegiance to Zeus in the Titonomachy, and after the victory of the Olympians, Nike and the other gods that allied with them were allowed to live on Olympus. In her aspect as Victory, she is closely associated with several of the major Greek gods, and in particular, Athena.
There's also her Roman counterpart, Victoria. This version doesn't come with the backstory Nike has, but is more of a general concept of victory. This is the aspect that is present in a lot of the modern sculptures and interpretations of Nike/Victoria:
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Left: Detail from the Berlin Victory Column. Right: Detail from the Victoria Memorial, London. Note the similar iconography, of a woman seemingly standing against a strong wind, fabric and cloth adhering and yet flowing against the breeze, wings outstretched.
From this, we can probably extrapolate what our beloved Winged Victory might've looked like. Here's an artist's render of one possibility:
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There's some iconography we need to go through before moving on - symbols that are commonly associated with Nike/Victoria.
One is the trumpet as see in the reconstruction above, the sound and symbol of the end of war, of impending peace. Another is the laurel wreath, another Greek symbol of victory and achievement. Famously, laurel wreaths were used to crown victors of the original Olympic games.
This is another conversation entirely, but there’s a discussion to be had about the duality of Elgar’nan and Mythal, in term of vengeance and justice, and how an emotional rage versus a calculated wisdom can be compared to the difference between the two Greek gods of war – Ares and Athena.
If we can compare Mythal to Athena, in the sense of her wisdom in making difficult decisions, then it’s not a stretch to associate Mythal with the symbolism of Nike, and therefore explain the presence of statues similar to the Winged Victory in her temple.
But since Bioware absolutely did not put this in the game for anything other than the Aesthetic, there’s some problems that need to be addressed.
Mainly in the way in which these statues are scattered throughout the temple. If you wanted static, ominous statues to line the walls as your player characters explore, perhaps have like, I dunno. Less dynamic statues that you reference?
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Left: Nike of Paionos, Right: Stele 1 of Las Incantadas
Or maybe instead of statues, have friezes lining the walls. Like this one from the equally iconic Pergamon altar, depicting the Giganomanchy.
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It’s the same symbolism, the wings, the smiting of foes and victory of good over evil.
And then perhaps, at the heart of the temple... where, y'know Bioware, lay a body of water sacred to Mythal herself, you could've perhaps done something remarkable. You could then have had the most dramatic and beautiful entrance you’d ever seen.
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[Nike, at the iconic Daru Staircase, the Louvre]
It was at this moment that Mythal walked out of the sea of the earth's tears and onto the land. She placed her hand on Elgar'nan's brow, and at her touch he grew calm and knew that his anger had led him astray. - Codex entry: Mythal: The Great Protector
Mythal herself strides out of the Well Of Sorrows, the metaphorical tears of her followers that died and kept their knowledge alive in her name. Her (draconic) wings spread out, (restored) hands outstretched to touch her husband, to calm the rage that nearly destroyed this world.
A symbol of victory against the blind rage of a god against His father, the Sun. A symbol of wisdom and grace, against the violence of hatred. A divine sense of something bigger than anything we could imagine.
There's also the lack of iconography regarding victory, instead piling on some cheap representations of what we think of as Mythal. That's another post entirely on the symbolism of the Elven gods, but if Bioware really wanted to hone in on the Athena/Athena Nike parallels, they might have thrown in the trumpet/laurel/palm leaf symbolism with the statues, alongside the dragon wings.
If this were the case, then maybe, just maybe, Inquisition would’ve then earned the use of this sculpture in the game.
Sources not listed above/Further reading if you're interested
https://www.louvre.fr/en/explore/the-palace/a-stairway-to-victory
https://www.worldhistory.org/article/1412/winged-victory-the-nike-of-samothrace/https://smarthistory.org/nike-winged-victory-of-samothrace/
https://smarthistory.org/nike-winged-victory-of-samothrace/
https://www.khanacademy.org/humanities/ancient-art-civilizations/greek-art/hellenistic/a/nike-winged-victory-of-samothrace
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mrs-gauche · 3 months
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I can FINALLY publish my art for "Прийдешній шторм" artzine! (Dragon Age theme)
Abyssal High Dragon and Gamordan Stormrider 🫰
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mrs-gauche · 3 months
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im so sorry
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mrs-gauche · 3 months
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a merry band of misfits 🦅
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mrs-gauche · 3 months
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I mean, it's technically true.
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mrs-gauche · 3 months
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Yes, my thoughts exactly! And all this coupled with the lady in the concept art carrying a weapon that looks suspiciously similar to Bianca (which was also, even more suspiciously, completely edited out in the 2020 BTS video 😂👀).... I think Harding is a safe bet. 😁
But if she really is a companion, it is kinda funny to think that she was also present in that final cutscene in Trespasser, when the Inquisitor specifically points out to get people Solas *doesn't* know, only to then immediately take it back, like
Inquisitor: "We need to find people Solas doesn't know!"
*stabs knife into map*
"...........and you Harding. You're crucial to the plan somehow." 😂
You probably answered this question at some point before but
Who do you think will be the one companion to carry over to da:d from the da:i roster? (like Oghren, Anders and Varric)
Perhaps Solas becomes the ~secret companion~ à la Loghain🤭🤨
hello! no complaints here, I love any excuse to dragon some ages ◕‿◕ for this, my speculation is that (a possible Loghain-style scenario for Solas notwithstanding) despite the tradition, there won't be a strictly-carryover companion. not in the companion-to-companion way anyways. and that instead, we'll have someone like Harding as a companion (metaphorically carrying the torch from DA:I and acting as the 'Inquisition perspective' in the party, ascending a fan and dev fav from extra to main, including a lady dwarf, including a familiar and friendly face, including someone who was in the Trespasser final table 'we gotta do something' scene and who was in the recent The Missing comic but who hasn't had lots of screentime yet unlike Varric. also she can't die or leave in DA:I etc) and meet a few other DA:I companions in the game as NPCs of note (faction leaders? advisors? quest givers?), like Varric and Dorian. not sure what the basis for that speculation is though beyond the 'We need to find people he doesn't know' thing, especially since as with Charter, Solas does know who she is. but she isn't from DA:I's Inner Circle at least.
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mrs-gauche · 3 months
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Briala! Illustration I did for Ukrainian Dragon Age zine :)
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mrs-gauche · 3 months
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my work for ukrainian dragon age artzine (@/lunavisua on twitter)
i love merrill character very much and was very glad to draw her!
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mrs-gauche · 3 months
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Another year, another Christmas I need to reblog this again to reinforce my wish. lol
However, this year I'd like to add a few random things to my personal Christmas wish list that I've always hoped would make a comeback in DA4 (listed in no particular order):
Griffons (!!)
bard songs, Lost Elf Theme and/or the Grey Warden Song
Felassan (whatever it takes to bring you back, I'll do it)
Children (and no, I don't mean those horrifying creatures from Awakening, I mean like, actual children that were notably absent from Thedas in DAI? 😂 Am I weird for listing that? lol)
CLOAKS and CAPES (for those who don't know me, I'm kind of obsessed and most of the concept art looks SO promising w(゚Д゚)w)
lots of weird magical stuff again like the rhyming Grand Oak in DAO <3
improved. camerawork. *sob*
Guess we have to wait until next summer for this Santa to arrive, but for now, merry christmas to those who celebrate and happy holidays everyone! 😁❤️
Ok but am I the only one who read the Mortalitasi’s tale in the last chapter of Tevinter Nights and now needs at least one scene in DA4 where Solas just summons his entire friggin spirit army and charges into battle like Aragorn in The Return of the King??
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mrs-gauche · 3 months
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Image description/alt text reads "Solas, standing tranquil in the snow." [source]
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mrs-gauche · 3 months
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❄️ Happy Holidays ✨ and Merry Wintersend everyone! 🐲  
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