#dragon age: inquisition is bad and you're not going to like this if you liked that game
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AS SAID BY DORIAN PAVUS
* assorted dialogue from dragon age inquisition, updated version
i don't care what they think about me. i care what they think about us.
i like you. more than i should. more than might be wise.
discretion isn't your thing, is it?
all this dancing, politics, and murder makes me a bit homesick.
i suppose it really depends. how bad do you want to be?
living a lie... it festers inside of you, like poison.
i'm a man of many talents. what can i say?
the moment i saw you, i thought "there's a man who knows quality."
if you don't come through this, i swear i'll kill you.
i'm curious where this goes, you and i. we've had fun. perfectly reasonable to leave it here.
here is my proposal: we dispense with the chitchat and move on to something more primal.
i tease you too much, i know.
i'll have to find something we can do that doesn't involve teasing.
time to drink myself into a stupor. it's been that sort of day.
i see you enjoy playing with fire.
i like playing hard to get.
i'm not suggesting we venture into mutual domesticity.
if it's a trap, we escape and kill everyone. you're good at that.
talk to me. let me hear how mystified you are by my anger.
oh, i'm not arguing. just pointing out the ridiculously obvious.
if you choose to leave your door unlocked like a savage, i may or may not come.
now... what was i talking about? ah, yes. me.
i am apparently an incredible ass at accepting gifts.
i prefer the company of men.
would you prefer me bound and leashed?
sometimes the ones you love are also the ones who disappoint you the most.
you are the man i love, [name]. nothing will truly keep us apart.
the things you ask are just... very personal.
sometimes... love isn't enough.
there will always be an "us." we'll just be... farther apart, for a time.
i had no idea something like you was possible.
i'm imagining what you would look like in a dress.
i've never seen you smile so much!
i have no idea what you're talking about.
you stand there, flexing your muscles, huffing like some beast of burden with no thought save conquest.
you're shaping the world for good or ill. how could i aspire to do any less?
my footsies are freezing, thank you.
don't you ever bathe?
you're not suggesting we're similar.
watch where you're pointing that thing!
i'm not wearing a skirt.
it's significantly more impressive than hitting them with a sharp piece of metal.
i only meant to say i'm very sorry for your loss.
we can continue this dance forever, if you wish.
i'm saying we should be careful what we assume when it comes to such matters.
demons don't appreciate a man with good hair.
what i wouldn't give for some proper wine.
your outfit's entertaining. i'll give you that.
he had to leave early on account of assassination.
it's nice to know you have friends.
i'm here to do what is right.
come on, just answer the question.
they were asking me about you. personal things.
you said we'd be ass-deep in trouble. this is more like knee-high.
so what's your estimation? think we can win?
you can't call me pampered. nobody's peeled a grape for me in weeks.
you startled me. you're always so... nondescript.
you're a special and unique snowflake. live the dream.
i wanted to see you make flowers bloom with your song. just once.
you've done a lot less dancing naked in the moonlight than expected.
i've never seen anyone in this part of the world do it.
i realize there's more to you than that.
have i offended you?
for hating the outdoors, you sure seem to like bad weather.
i can't figure you out, [name].
you don't play their stupid game, they send an assassin or three your way.
i can't believe you're scared of magic.
i'm going to take that as a compliment.
still don't like me, [name]? after all this time?
[name], i owe you an apology.
i suspect people will use any excuse to hate us.
why be ashamed? power should be respected, not swept under the carpet.
maybe you're not a complete moron.
i just need to know you're capable of higher thought. for my own comfort.
it would take work. and soap. lots and lots of soap.
#dragon age#dorian pavus#rp prompt#rp meme#rp memes#roleplay memes#roleplay prompt#rp starters#ask memes#ask meme#roleplay meme#roleplay inbox prompts#rp inbox meme#inbox prompt#inbox meme#sentence starter prompt#sentence starter#sentence starters#mcflymemes#annnndddd a revamped dorian#because i love him so much
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You're fueling my dragon age fever and I thank u for that
Alistair, Fenris and Varric with a crush who gives them a smol portrait they did of him during their travels that they insist is just a rough sketch 🥺 Pretty plz, I thank u for ur service 🫡
Receiving a Portrait From Their Crush
Fandom: Dragon Age
Characters: Alistair, Fenris, Varric
Type of Request: Headcanons
Notes: Still upset that you couldn't give companions gifts in DA2 and Inquisition. Well, DA2 it became a quest item but you know what I mean >.<
Alistair
What you drew him? Like took the time and energy to make him your focus? And you didn't give him bushy eyebrows or a bad mustache? He's touched.
Despite his constant jokes, he really is touched by the drawing. Can't help but scoff and roll his eyes when you tell him it's a sketch. Yeah he'll just pin this on a wall in his office.
No! He's going to frame and hang it up! Well maybe not hang it up, that'd look awful conceited of him.
Then again, he probably wouldn't be the only king to hang pictures of himself on the walls. He'll do something with it to let you know how valuable it is to him.
Fenris
Usually when Fenris sees images of himself, he feels angry because he's reminded of all the bullshit he's gone through. His tattoos are so prominent and a reminder of his life before.
But you giving him this sketch, it makes him look softer somehow. Like things are peaceful. He honestly doesn't know how to feel when looking at it. You get a quiet thank you from him.
He'll keep the "sketch" on a desk. Maybe use it as a bookmark in one of his favorite books that he's learned to read.
Tries to keep the portrait out of view when he has guests. He doesn't need Varric or Isabella mentioning how he's not brooding enough.
Varric
Sure and all of his published works are just children's school plays.
He knows artists (and most of them hate themselves), you doing a portrait isn't any kind of sketch. You can say it's a work in progress, but this is not just a sketch.
Is impressed you managed to sketch him while traveling. He saw you writing in your book and just assumed it was to keep busy in between running from almost certain death.
Not one to sit still in pose, but just know that you have permission to make more "sketches" while he's telling his stories. Just make sure to get his good side.
#dragon age x reader#alistair x reader#fenris x reader#varric x reader#varric tethras x reader#da alistair x reader#da fenris x reader
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Is Solas neurodivergent?
Of course, unless Weekes confirms one way or another, we'll never actually know. But I'd like to point out a few things.
Firstly. I'm autistic/ADHD, so are my kids and I've been an advocate for invisible disabilities, especially those two, for almost a decade now.
I offer an option on my Patreon for parents (or even just people) who need or want advice.
I have a little bit of a clue here. (More like a massive clue by nuke, but I digress 🤣.)
Why I code Solas from Dragon Age: Inquisition as neurodivergent.
1. Mentally ill fits under the neurodivergent (ND) umbrella. There's no way on Thedas that Solas isn't mentally ill.
(Yes, it really does fit. I'm not going to entertain arguments on the topic. It originally meant 'autistic' it no longer means that and hasn't for a long while. Neurodivergent brains = brains that work in any way other than 'the average'.) The antonym is Neurotypical. I tend to abbreviate them. Neurodivergent = ND, Neurotypical = NT.
At the very least, he likely has survivor syndrome. I'd wager on Depression and CPTSD too. (I have these conditions and am comfortable with saying he has a lot of the traits.) The guy was the leader of an enslaved elves rebellion and a war against the Evanuris. In his own words, he got his hands bloody.
No matter who you are, violence, whether you're the perpetrator or the victim, causes trauma to the psyche. And it went on for actual ages. An Age, in The Dragon Age franchise, is considered to be 100 years, so for hundreds of years, if not thousands, this dude has been fighting. Humans can get CPTSD just from a bad childhood. There's no way he hasn't developed it too.
Survivor syndrome is the response of a person when they believe they have done something wrong by surviving a traumatic event when others did not, often feeling self-guilt. (Can we classify Solas clearly with this? Yes, yes we can.)
He wakes up in a world so horrific to him that he can't even conceive of the people as people.
That's a type of disassociation, which is a symptom of many mental illnesses. Depression is the most obvious. He fucked up, he knows it, he's now trapped in a hellscape. (Heeee, we're all trapped in a dystopian hellscape right now and Depression is on the rise, the correlation is there.)
Disassociation is feeling disconnected from yourself and/or the world around you. For example, you may feel detached from your body or feel as though the world around you is unreal.
There could be a few other things there. He'd be a classic case for Disassociative Identity Disorder, for instance, but given the shit rep on the topic, I'm not going there.
2. ADHD
ADHD is still not very well understood by the average person. Sometimes people think it means we can't hold still. But a lot of the time, the H-Hyperactivity portion is only evident in our brains. For me, for instance, I have to constantly be feeding my brain written stuff or I get very antsy and uncomfortable. (ADD no longer exists, we're all ADHD now.) It's why i developed the habit of reading encyclopedias for fun. (Yes, I really do this.)
Solas is constantly reading, or studying, or thinking.
He shows a pretty typical type of temper for an ADHDer several times. Our tempers can be hot, flaring up suddenly for seemingly unexpected reasons. He absolutely does that. Now, there's always a reason for it, but few people on the outside of us will be aware of whatever the issue is.
ADHDers can also experience incredibly fast (compared to neurotypicals) shifts in emotion. Solas does this. Especially in the after the well of sorrows/pre-breakup scene and the break up scene itself. He see-saws emotionally a lot.
He's incredibly creative. He paints (and probably draws at least a little to paint the way he does). So many neurodivergent people are incredibly creative.
Snark. Many ADHDers tend to be snarky or sarcastic because of, well, everything that usually happens to us in life. The snark and salt simply spill out of Solas. Especially on the 'make him hate you' route through the game. Or any time he's around Vivienne.
Finally, ADHDers very frequently have a deep seated drive to change the world and make it better. Stares at Solas. Yup!
3. Autistic
So, firstly, let me say that most people don't understand what autism is or what autistics look and act like.
As an autistic/ADHD person, my experience of life is completely different from a neurotypicals simply because my brain is wired differently.
Reminder that you can't see autism or ADHD. You can sometimes see common comorbids, but without a brain scan, you cannot see autism or ADHD.
I connected and empathize so heavily with Solas because he's a well written, complex character, and because I love anti-heros.
But also because he's exhibits the exact same type of autistic/ADHD traits that I have. (Both autism and ADHD come in different flavours.) Seeing that rep in a triple AAA game was an incredibly powerful experience.
Even though, given Bioware's absolutely shit rep re: disability, it had to be accidental. I credit Weekes with that rep. I read on Twitter they were recently dxd with one or the other (ADHD or Autism, I honestly can't remember which. And up to 80% of ADHDers are also autistic.)
Solas practices esoteric arts. It's a common thing for many autists & ADHDers to learn and practice arts that just aren't as common anymore. Mine? I spin with a spinning wheel, drop spindle, or Andean hand spinner. I make maps. There's several other strange hobbies and skills I've picked up along the way too.
He shows hyperfocus several times in the game. (Hyperfocus is a trait of both ADHD and Autism.)
He stims with his hands a lot. Especially in the kiss scene. I don't recall seeing any of the other characters do this. I'm not talking about the 'dry hand wash' movements most of the characters do. Solas does a thing I do, taps the tips of his fingers against each other. Whoever did his modelling (is that the right term for making a game character?) understood neurodivergency or are ND themselves. Whether they know it or not.
You could even call his painting a type of stimming.
Stimming is where someone will use repetitive motions or sounds to self-soothe. It's really bad to prevent an autistic/ADHDer from using their stims.
I used to have to have a book on my person at all times. I'm late diagnosed, so I didn't know I was using the books as both a stim and a comfort item.
Solas has something autists call 'flat face effect'. Basically, his face is a bit masklike. He doesn't show emotions strongly on his face or in his body language (unless you make him angry 😅 which is also pretty typical for many of us). I've seen rather a lot of discourse about how emotionless Solas appears. I can read him easily, the emotive cues are there, just subtle, like they would be in an autistic & or ADHD person.
He's a decent actor. Now, most autists will agree that we're not innately good at lying or acting. But we're also really good at acting, at least, many of us are by the time we're adults. It comes from having to mask (autistic masking) almost every second of every day just to survive. Masking kills us. So it's not good that we are forced to do it. But it does make many of us incredible actors.
Anthony Hopkins is argueably one of the best actors of the past several decades. He's openly autistic. And he's spoken of how he got to be a good actor. Dan Ackroyd and Darryl Hannah are a couple of others who are out about it. I code a lot of other creatives as being one or the other, but it’s considered rude to assign a diagnosis like that to a living person. That's for them to do.
Solas managed to stay hidden as a 'unwashed apostate hobo' for however long the Inquisition took to fix things. I've seen estimates of 18 months to 2 years. That's a looooong time to be acting like something you're definitely not.
We see in Trespasser that he's not like that at all. But he still sold it so well his reveal at the end of the game shocked many people.
He's a nerd. An absolute nerd about the fade. Nerdery isn't solely the domain of autistics and ADHDers, but it’s a really common trait.
He's stand-offish.
Many autists and ADHDers are rather stand-offish with people for a variety of reasons.
1) We've been hurt so many times because of people refusing to do half the work of communicating with us. (Trust me, autistics and ADHDers are trying ALL THE TIME to communicate with neurotypicals. Y'all could pick up your part of things, y'know?)
2) We've been rejected so often for a genetic condition(s) we can't change. But accommodations for us, which are usually pretty simple and often help neurotypical people too, are considered 'too much'. There's something called RSD that most, if not all, autistic and ADHD folks experience. Rejection Sensitivity Disorder is a bitch kitty and there's no dealing with it well. It hurts.
3) We're often stand-offish while we try to figure out whatever social rules exist in that space/time. We often warm up when we know (or think we know) the rules. Or once we get to know people.
4) Solas is often alone, he's rarely pictured as being with anyone else other than Cole and the Inquisitor. NDs often end up either pushed to the edge of the crowd, or we choose to stay distant as a preventative measure so we aren't rejected.
Food sensitivities: Solas utterly loathes tea. There's a whole cutscene about it. (Fun fact, Solas doesn't like tea because Weekes doesn't.) But that extreme reaction to a relatively innocuous drink is a classic example of a food sensitivity. Most autistics and ADHDers have food or texture sensitivities or both. I can't abide raw tomatoes, and I'll get the urge to cry if I touch corduroy fabric.
Sensitivities can really be anything, but if you know someone who has them, please understand we're not trying to be difficult or to ask for extra attention or to make trouble. The modern world is frankly hell for most autistics and many ADHDers. Brain scans of us when we’re exposed to our sensitivities show that they actually are causing us physical pain. Pain centres in the brain light up like a Yule tree.
Solas is quiet, until he's not. Then he'll talk your ear off. This is pretty common for many of us too.
Solas and the fade. Special interest, anyone?
Special interests: Most autistics and ADHDers have Special interests. It's something that can utterly enthrall us. We tend to want to learn everything we possibly can about the subject we're fascinated with. And we love to share that information. In something called 'infodumping' we're trying to connect with other people. It's one of the ways many of us say we care about someone. By sharing our favourite things. We're also deeply penalized for something we can't change, there, too.
We deeply enjoy the thing and want to share our enjoyment with people we like/love. This can utterly backfire on us, but it doesn't change the urge to share. Often until our audience is giving us the 'dead fish face'. It's where the person's eyes are a little glazed over and they look a bit concussed. Anyone who has ever taught a class of students or is a parent or child caretaker, or is autistic/ADHD knows the look I'm talking about.
I'll stop blabbing for now, but those are most of the reasons I heavily code Solas as autistic/ADHD/mentally ill. Or, in another word. Neurodivergent.
Thanks for reading! If you have the wherewithal I'm a disabled mom of two disabled kids and a tip would help more than you can probably understand. Another way to help is to become a patron. My work of words is my only income and we live well under the poverty line. Like a lot of other neurodivergent people do.
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#solas#dragon age series#solavellan#dragon age inquisition#dragon age#inquisitor lavellan#solavellan hell#solas dai#dragon age confessions#neurodivergent#actually adhd#actually autistic#actually neurodiverse#neurodiversity#autistic adult#autistic problems#autism#adult adhd#ADHD
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What do you think of the people you can romance in DAI? Who is the best in your opinion?
I honestly don't have a good answer. For all my time playing Dragon Age Inquisition, for good or bad, it's romances are something I've mostly left untouched simply because unlike Origins, and even DA2, Inquisition doesn't lend itself all that well to replaying the game with a different origins.
A Kossith Mage Herald is unfortunately not nearly as different compared to playing as anything else as it should be. The only exception is playing as an elf, and unlike Origins, that only opens up all the cracks and flaws to the Inquisitor as a character.
The end result is that i effectively only have two Inquisitors I use, and as a result, i have only two romances i've gone through.
With that in mind, i can only comment on those, and what i've seen in other's playthroughs.
Josephine
Josephine is a good character, and if you go her romance, it does feel like you forge a connection... But the game unfortunately does not let you delve into her deepest secrets on such a route the way it should.
One common thing I've seen is a big problem with all the romances is that because Bioware didn't want to touch any of the inquisitors pasts in any meaningful way, it's impossible to open up to anyone about one's past, and get their take on it all.
Josephine tells you of her past, her family, siblings, etc. But you cannot really do the same.
Do the inquisitor have siblings? How do they feel about their parents? Have you had previous relationships? I have no idea.
If the Inquisitor was written as an actual in game person, defined by their background like hawke and the Warden, then the game's way of handling romance would have hit way harder and better. Because there is good stuff here, as I know just going through two romances.
The best highlight of Josephine's romance of course is her personal romance quest where you decide to engage in a duel for her hand, a very, very antivan thing to do, and a display that goes more to flesh out the actual Antivan culture than almost anything else in the games.
This kind of open, grand, romantic displays is what actual antivan society is all about, far, far more than it ever is about the tiny minority of assassins that are their most famous part to the world ever was...
And subsequently, it's excellent to showcase how Josephine differs greatly from other Antivan noblewomen. Rather than be taken in by it all, or swept of the feet, she is angry, and terrified, a results of her own history as a failed bard in the monstrosity that is the great game.
But if the Inquisitor choses to just anounce their love then and there for all to hear(also a very antivan thing to do), she is ultimately swept off her feet, and the lord you're fighting also choses to back down as he realises it's an actual duel for love, while he merely wanted a challnge and the honor of having dueled the inquisitor.
Again, this is a very great way of showcasing actual Antivan culture.
Overall i would say that though there is nothing wrong with Josephine's romance, and i do like the way it's a departure from previous ones by being all about courtly love, it didn't exactly wow me by being outstanding the way Morrigan's and Alistair's did in Origins.
Cassandra
Cassandra's romance meanwhile is both better, and worse than Josephine's.
Better in that you have a much, much more defined and in many ways more nuanced relationship with her, which can actually have some real weight depending on your choices. Like if you decide to actually make her divine... And she no longer feels she can have a relationship with you, despite how much she wants to, because she feels it would not be proper.
I would also say i greatly do like how the game handles the fact that Cassandra's an older woman, who is also a romantic at heart, but not very experienced in such matters... Which leads to an intentionally corny, but very enjoyable wooing scene after setting up a romantic date.
Subsequently, if you are a woman, i do like how she actually does go through a moment where she intentionally turns you down due to incompatible orientations. It's a small moment that shows her awkwardly fumbling as she usually does, but showcases that she is a good girl at heart, as she tries to let you down gently.
Now to the bad stuff.
Namely if you woo her off her feet as an elf... Like I did.
Now there is the core of something good here... But it's not fleshed out at all.
As i've said before, cassandra's biggest issue as a character is that like most of the companions, there are aspects of her personality you are not even allowed to change, and in this case, it's her less than flattering opinions on Elven religion(which even if completely true in the end, it doesn't exactly paint her in the best light).
There is a moment where she questions a dalish inquistor about possible Synchronization between creator worship and Andrastian, but you are not allowed to go any deeper on the subject, either positively, or negatively.
Which sucks, because if it had been, this could have added some much needed peraonal growth for her on the subject, either if you affirm the idea that there is room for such(as we know from lore, you would not be the first dalish to think so) and through that maybe Cassandra might actually learn that Creator worship isn't quite as scary as she has been led to believe, or reject it, and she eventually grows to love you anyway.
Because that is one of the strengths of this romance playing as a dalish. For all the way she talks shit about the creator religion, she comes to both love the inquisitor, and respect them like absolutely no other, felling that they are force of nature, that can do anything. And she does that regardless of whether you convert, is an atheist, or remain steadfast creators worshipper, all the way to tresspasser.
Now, we could debate whether he actually does, but the important thing here is that she believes it.
There was room here to really make something really special by delving into this, as cassandra has a moment where she notes that in the future, she will either be recognized as the lover of a saint, or an elven madman.
It's a poignant moment, which is echoed by what happened with other historical elven related figures in the game, but unfortunately you aren't allowed to ask her the simple, yet extremely important question "Do you care what they think?", instead the closest being "I don't care what they think, what do you believe?" Which ultimately is there to affirm Cassandra's belief in the maker, and that she does fully believe you were chosen by god, rather than allow her to express that regardless of what other people might think, she does love you, and will stick by you to the very end.
That kind of thinking is obviously still there... But it's subtext, when it should have been the main thesis around which her character arc was built.
All in all, Cassandra's romance arc is good... But if you're playing as Dalish, there is a lot of jank that mirrors the way the game handles so much about a dalish inquisitor.
Sera
From here on I haven't actually played any of these, so this is more observation more than anything else.
Sera seems to be okay enough, if you like her brand of humor, and personality, but i've seen a lot of people who greatly dislike the fact that if youre dalish and you refuse to abandon the elvhen gods, she breaks up with you, and is another reason Sera is a terrible character.
I disagree heavily on that front. The fact that Sera refuses to compromise on her beliefs and accept a "pagan" partner is a character flaw... But it's a very human one, and unlike so much else, I would say it's a character aspect you should not be able to change.
Its something that makes her a fundamentally different person than Cassandra, and that is good... But if you hate her as a character already, this really doesn't help much with that.
Blackwall
From what I can tell, this romance doesn't really add much to his character... Though it does add much to the Inquisitor, by showing how badly she wants it, and is willing to play the part of the sub for some love.
Solas
Ah, the Solavellan Hell.
Cullen
I don't really have any bigger thoughts on this one, other than to note it seems to be a better told version of the blackwall romance. Also it tells us that Cullen is not into women who are either taller than him, or way shorter.
Dorian
The most interesting thing about this romance from a character perspective is how the romance quest brings out Dorian's Tsundere side, something not seen much elsewhere in the game.
You only briefly see it in his personal quest depending on your choice of words, and far more in his banter and relationship with The Iron Bull.
Other than that it seems a perfectly decent romance quest.
The Iron Bull
Now this one is interesting for a number of reasons... But by far the most facinating thing about it, is that while Bull is not being disgenious, tresspasser shows us two things.
1. That regardless of how he feels about you, you ARE second to the Qun in his eyes, and 2. The thing he truly, truly cares about more than both the Qun and You if you romance him, is his mercenary crew.
They are his true family, his home, his soul.
That adds a lot of interesting hidden subtext for his romance as far as I'm concerned.
Bull is facinating, because as Cole reveals if he betrays you, there is no malice, no hatred, nothing. This really was not anything personal. He really did like you... But you were essentially just a bond girl of the week to him, and him the great spy, the glamorous Bond, moving on from yet another conquest.
Of course bond doesn't tend to get brutually murdered by said Bond girl(or guy, Bull ain't picky) after the fling, so there is that.
That is a fascinating dynamic, and great and interesting way to handle a romance with a spy.
#dragon age#dragon age inquisition#josephine#cassandra pentaghast#solas#sera#blackwall#cullen#dorian#the iron bull#romance#meta#shipping#the inquisitor#the herald of andraste
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First off I was literally obsessed with your demo. It was actually the very first thing I ever read on dashington and I was basically inlove with all of the ROs.
That being said. As for the changes I've read through all the comments, asks and replies. And it's... different. Not necessarily bad just new I guess? Because it changes alot of the wonder I had experienced playing the demo. So it just feels weird I suppose?
No saying I won't read it, come on I love your writing. I practically word vomited my praises on tumblr as soon as I finished reading it the first time. And I get you said the old demo would still stay on but there's like.. no point if it's not gonna continue..? If that makes sense it's just then kind of incomplete?
I also for the most illogical reasons feel the same way as others when it comes to ROs being in relationships outside of MC. Like if they were already in a pre-existing relationship sure I get it! There are many stories like that if you don't choose to romance a character in the beginning they get back with an ex they broke up with or they are with someone else where you choose a route in like the very beginning. But again hear me out I'm completely stupid for this!!! But whenever I play a game where an RO then gets like with one of MCs friends on a different route it just fucks with my head for that LI. Like I then just see them with that other person. And have a fuck you attitude to that character aswell EVEN on a different route lmao it makes no sense! It's not logical! And it's dumb! But that's why I play fictional stories okay! So I don't hve to deal with shit like that. Don't judge me 😅🤣
Kay long tangent aside.. I guess what I'm saying is the new changes kinda scare me. But I'm keeping an open mind. I'd honestly read whatever you post because of how talented you are and yeah.. some of the ROs are probably gonna get a fuck you out of me for being in a different relationship and I'll probably not do that route because of how stupid my head is. So jesus I hope it isn't my fav LI 😭 but I'll still support you and I do wish you the best in the writing. I do love the story and I do like the addition of I guess more characters. Just the RO thing fucks with my head alil. I'm sorry if that's weird to some people.
I'm not making any sense just gonna go now... 🙈
Dear heck, I think this is the longest ask I've ever received. I didn't even know asks could be this long...
The changes will take a while for everyone to get used to, I think. But at least we'll all be in the same boat?
I do get the unsettling nature of seeing LIs romancing other characters while you're on alternate routes. The first one that springs to mind for me is Josephine in Dragon Age Inquisition. Seeing her fawn over Blackwall was weird. But, it made me realise how attached I was to her romance and hers alone, so it worked out in the long run.
Myrk Mire still isn't back on my working schedule yet, I'll let you all know when it is, and I'll try to keep you updated with WIP screenshots or planning doodles. Perhaps then I'll also give a bit more information on the dynamics of the LIs and the variables driving who makes eyes and who.
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Too Many Thoughts About Sera: A Love Letter
This post was originally part of a big long write-up I did after my first complete playthrough of Inquisition a few years ago and posted on dreamwidth and later here. It has been slightly edited to stand on its own here, but it's mostly the same. I thought it might be worth it post it as a standalone, so here is a slightly less analytical and more feelingsy post about Why I Love Sera So Much.
I understand not everyone likes Sera and that's completely okay but I am going to request that you refrain from outright dumping on her or making personal attacks on her writer on this post.
If you're interested in my more recent efforts at an in-depth analysis of Sera's character and background, you can check out my Sera Series.
Knowing my affinity for difficult, complicated, "unlikable" female characters, I was probably doomed from the start. But the truth is I did not go into this knowing I would love Sera. I just wanted to get to know her, regardless of how I ended up feeling about her. So I romanced her with my mage Trevelyan, the first Inquisitor I actually finished.
And at the end of that journey... yeah, I love Sera. I love her a lot.
So let's talk about Sera. As a character, as a companion, and as a love interest, because in this playthrough I got to experience her as all three.
And disclaimer up front that I know Sera is a controversial character in the fandom and there are a variety of reasons for that, so if you don't like Sera, that's fine. Some of this may read as an impassioned defense of her, and it kind of is, but it's not a manifesto; it's mostly that I have a lot of thoughts and feelings I'm excited to share.
Sera is a city elf orphaned young and raised as the ward of a human noblewoman, Lady Emmald, an upbringing which has left her with both a troubled relationship to elven identity, and a deep hatred of the nobility. We get only a brief glimpse into Sera's childhood with Lady Emmald, as she does not like to talk about it, but we can gather that the memories that have stuck with her are not good ones, most notably the "pride cookies" story that Sera will share with the Inquisitor at a high enough level of friendship. Lady Emmald would buy cookies from a local baker and pass them off as homemade, unwilling to admit she wasn't good at baking. To keep Sera from finding out, Emmald told her the baker hated elves so that she would never go there. She led Sera to believe she was hated and to hate in return, all to protect her own pride. To this day, cookies bring up bad memories for Sera.
World of Thedas Volume 2 suggests that Sera may have inherited Lady Emmald's estate when her guardian died of illness sometime before the Blight, but rejected her inheritance, wanting nothing more to do with that life. I don't believe this ever comes up in the game, however.
As an adult, Sera is a member of the Friends of Red Jenny, a loose network of common people who collaborate across Thedas to benefit one another's interests and offer some degree of protection from or revenge for the abuses of nobles where they can. Sera's Red Jenny affiliation is a nice bit of continuity from previous games which I like a lot. The Friends of Red Jenny are first mentioned in a cryptic little side quest in Origins wherein the Warden delivers a small painted box to a location in Denerim on the instructions of a note looted from a body after an ambush, for the reward of a few gold coins. In Dragon Age II, Hawke can clear the streets of bandits and undesirables at night and return to "A Friend" in the Hanged Man for rewards; at the end of that quest line, "A Friend" is revealed to be a Friend of Red Jenny. And now in Inquisition, we have a Red Jenny companion, who brings her network of Friends and unorthodox methods to the Inquisition. (It's also suggested in the war table operation "Red Jenny and the Tantervale Charade" that Hawke's cousin Charade Amell is a Jenny operating out of Tantervale in the Free Marches, which would explain a lot about Charade's roundabout ploys to get Gamlen's attention!)
I think it's safe to say that Sera's personal identity is most strongly rooted in a kind of class consciousness; she identifies first as what she would call a "little person," a commoner.
And it's worth noting that Sera doesn't respect social climbers any more than she respects the existing nobility, which comes out a lot in her banter and in her responses to various quests. She disapproves, for example, if in "Noble Deeds, Noble Hearts" the Inquisitor gives proof of Fairbanks' noble heritage to Clara; she approves if you respect Fairbanks' wishes to keep his parentage a secret and live as a commoner. In "Wicked Eyes and Wicked Hearts," she disapproves of reconciling Celene and Briala, but approves of any outcome that involves blackmail (either against Gaspard or against all three parties).
I think there's an interesting contrast to be had, too, between Sera and Vivienne, both of whom are characters I like and find quite interesting. And despite what you might think if you take their conversations at face value, I think their relationship is quite a bit more complicated than Vivienne being more privileged than Sera and looking down on her. Vivienne dresses, talks, and behaves like a noble, yes—but she's not a noble. Vivienne was born to Rivaini merchants and raised in the Circle of Magi, where she rose to First Enchanter of Montsimmard and then Enchanter to the Imperial Court of Orlais—a position that according to Leliana was once "little more than Court Jester" until Vivienne herself worked to make the appointment a position of respect. Sera is elven and common-born yet inherited a noble fortune; while she probably would never have held a title in Ferelden, she could have had greater financial resources at her disposal, had she not rejected them. It's easy to forget, but both Sera and Vivienne have come from fairly humble origins, and both of them have been presented with some unique opportunities given those origins.
Vivienne holds considerable influence in Orlais for a mage, but we should not forget that she has had to work for every scrap of it. Vivienne's manner, the way she approaches every situation with confidence and poise and her head held high, is just how one survives in Orlais. If you're not looking down at someone, you're looking up at them, and if you're looking up you're under someone's boot. On the one hand I don't love the way Vivienne treats Sera, especially a romanced Sera; on the other hand I must admit that "It's nothing personal, darling. I am demonstrably better than most" is an absolutely sick burn and I did laugh. (These days, I am frequently more amused by companion acrimony than I probably should be; I think somewhere around DA2 I just gave up on being bothered when companions don't like each other and instead embraced the comedy gold that often comes with it.)
There's a delightful little bit of party banter where Blackwall (who shares much of Sera's distaste for the nobility) needles Vivienne a bit about how she must miss being away from the luxuries of Val Royeaux. To this, Vivienne breezily responds, "I miss them. I do not require them. But please, continue to imagine me a pampered lady, if it makes you feel superior."
I am reminded here of the ongoing tension between Solas and Sera that comes out frequently in their party banter. At one point Solas will remark that it is a shame she was "denied an elven life," and Sera fires back, "Ooh! You think the only reason I'm not elfy is because I had no choice? Poor me, right?" At multiple points Solas will offer opinions on Red Jenny. When he asks Sera, "Do you wish to disrupt the nobility, secure a title? Or change the political structure entirely?" Sera responds with dismay, "None of it! I don't want any of that!"
Set these next to each other and they show us how Sera and Vivienne are alike and how they are different. Vivienne has worked hard to achieve upward mobility, and the reward for her success is that everyone assumes she is too privileged to know anything else. Sera has deliberately rejected upward mobility (as well as "elfiness") in favor of class solidarity, and is rewarded by people assuming that she is too stupid and ignorant to have chosen anything else.
Sera and Vivienne do not like one another, and probably never would, and Vivienne especially doesn't approve of the Inquisitor romancing Sera and makes that known (I'm sure the reverse would also be true if Vivienne were romanceable, which she isn't, because the world isn't fair). Both of their identities and worldviews are rooted in a certain understanding of power and power structures, but they approach those structures completely differently. Vivienne is a climber, believing it worthwhile to try and reach the top. Sera despises climbers, preferring to stay on the ground and fire arrows upward. And yet as different as they are, they have both made very deliberate choices with regard to their social status, and both will in their own way call out the assumptions other people make about them.
I think the biggest question that arises with Sera is, if she thinks the nobility is so terrible, then why isn't she trying to actively change the existing power structure? This is certainly Solas's confusion, as expressed in this conversation:
Solas: I do not understand you, Sera. You have no end goal for your organization.
Sera: Nobles get rattled, and people get payback. I play in the middle.
Solas: Why not go all the way? You see injustice, and you have organized a group to fight it. Don’t you want to replace it with something better?
Sera: What, just lop off the top? What’s that do, except make a new top to frig it all up?
Solas: I…forgive me. You are right. You are fine as you are.
This, I think, gets at some of Sera's core beliefs about power and why she prefers to act from below rather than trying to get to the top. Sera views structural power as inherently corrupting. Anyone who makes it to the top is going to frig it up.
That's what being at the top means.
We might call it a failure of imagination on Sera's part that she doesn't seem to be able to consider the possibility of creating a different kind of power structure, only replacing who's at the top. And, well, fair enough. But consider even in our own world, with a variety of governing structures on display for us, the challenge of imagining something completely new and then envisioning a realistic path to it. (And if you've got that all figured out, let me know!)
Sera is class-conscious, Sera identifies and organizes around class-consciousness, but she is not a revolutionary. We might criticize that about her, but why lay that burden on her, specifically, when the Inquisition is packed to the gills with people who have far more structural power than Sera? This setting is full of injustices, but it is worth questioning why the burden of righting them should be laid on this character, specifically, when she is already dedicated to helping other "little people" in smaller and less risky ways.
Once the Inquisitor gets friendly with Sera, they can ask her more about herself, about where she's from. In this conversation she'll talk about the Red Jennies in Denerim where she grew up, and she'll mention that some other Jennies were "a lot more serious about being serious" and that it got some of them killed—a reminder that Sera's "little people" have plenty to lose. And Sera really hates anyone who gets less powerful people hurt and killed for their own ends. I think this is really at the heart of both her visceral hatred for nobles and her passion for Red Jenny, and this becomes really clear during the "The Verchiel March," when Sera will get more and more upset if the Inquisitor keeps talking to Lord Harmond and appears amenable to working with him. She never set out intending to kill the Verchiel nobles, only rattle them a little, but after Harmond murders an unwitting informant in front of her? She's furious. She wants him dead. And if the Inquisitor is willing to work with him, that makes the Inquisitor someone who can't be trusted.
So let's talk about Sera's relationship to elven identity. There's no question that it's a complicated one; one of the first things she says to an elf Inquisitor (which at the time of writing I'm currently playing) is an offhanded "Hope you're not too elfy." You don't get an approval hit for saying she's "different for an elf," but she will respond to the effect that she doesn't appreciate assumptions being made about her based on her being an elf, which doesn't seem unreasonable, honestly. I've seen Sera's attitude framed as self-hatred but I do feel like it's a bit more complicated than that; has she struggled with self-hatred in her life, yes, absolutely--the cookie story makes that very clear. But I think that to simply say Sera hates herself for being an elf is an oversimplification in the same way as saying Vivienne hates herself for being a mage. Sera definitely has some insecurities, and I think Vivienne needles her accurately when she remarks that Sera actually cares a great deal what people think of her. At this point in her life, however, I don't feel like she hates being an elf so much as she hates when all people (elves and otherwise) see in her is their own presumptions about what elves are or should be, and not who she is.
Elven identity is a complicated thing in this universe, and tensions between city elves and Dalish elves is certainly nothing new. Dalish elves largely view themselves as the sole keepers of elven culture, calling city elves "flat ears" and in some cases barely regarding them as elves, and yet I would argue that alienage culture is also elven culture. Though they are not referenced as a group in-game, we also see plenty of examples of what we might call "country elves"—elves who live on farms and in villages in more rural areas, some of whom still maintain a bit of the ancient language and a belief in the ancient gods. (The elf family you meet in Lothering comes to mind, as well as various NPCs around the Hinterlands.) Even among elven servants, which could be regarded as a sort of sub-class in itself, there seems to be a kind of subtle understanding and solidarity, based on Briala's point of view in The Masked Empire. All of these are elven culture.
Sera is on the extreme end of not identifying with elven culture generally, but I want to draw a distinction between Dalish culture (which might be called a kind of Elvhen reconstructionism) and elven culture generally. Sera is not fond of the Dalish, but I'm also not sure how much contact with Dalish elves she's actually had, considering that she's lived most of her life in major cities. So I have to wonder if her particular irritation with the Dalish comes from interactions with actual Dalish elves, or from their general reputation. I'm not saying the Dalish wouldn't be rude to Sera; many of them definitely would. I'm just not sure if her feelings about them come from direct experience with the Dalish or from other elves generally.
Because Sera does feel alienated by elven culture generally, and if you listen to to her ambient dialogue and banter throughout the game, if you take her on quests and listen to the things she says, it becomes really obvious that being told she's the wrong kind of elf is a particularly sharp pain point for Sera and has left her with a lot of anger and resentment. I don't know from whom exactly this has come, because she never goes into details, but it's obviously something she's heard a lot.
I had Sera with me for most of Jaws of Hakkon on this playthrough, and she has some really interesting dialogue for Finn, a young Avvar man who is in danger of being disowned because due to a disabling injury, he is unable to complete the ritual hunt for his late father's funeral rites. "Wait, so he does this or he's the wrong kind of elf?" Sera snaps, like that's something she's been told repeatedly. She clearly feels a powerful compassion and solidarity for Finn, insisting the Inquisitor give the gifts of the hunt to Finn himself so that he can keep his father's name: "We help him. Not asking. Do it." Upon doing so, Sera remarks to Finn, "Say what they want, and you can belong. But maybe when you figure that threatening you was shit, come look for a Jenny." She wants him to have the option to stay with his community, but also for him to know he has somewhere to go should he choose to leave. I really love that. To me, this is Sera at her best, reaching out in solidarity and compassion to help someone outcast, offering them a place to belong.
Sera certainly has her less-sympathetic moments too. Her absolute glee over the revelations from the Temple of Mythal is honestly not cute. I have sympathy for where Sera's coming from on elfy things, but she's really spiteful about it in this case: "The Dalish. Are going. To shit themselves!" She'll get angry at a human Inquisitor (as she did at mine, who was in a romance with her) just for trying to be respectful of what they saw in the temple and not outright denouncing all of elven tradition as rubbish. "You're not even an elf! Why are you being so damned elfy?" There are several ways to resolve this fight, and it certainly wasn't a relationship ender with a human Inquisitor. (I can't speak to elf Inquisitors since I haven't romanced her with one yet.) I certainly don't think it's out of character for Sera, but it definitely exposes some of her pettiness and insecurity. If she were fully secure in who she is, elfy or not, she wouldn't need "elfy elves" discredited to validate her.
But Sera's a flawed character, and that's not a bad thing. I think she does show some growth in subtle ways, too—if an elf Inquisitor befriends her, her journal will include the line: "Book. Read elfy stuff for her (scratched out)." She's trying! In Trespasser her journal entries express concern about whether the Inquisitor is "all right with the elfy stuff" and wanting to be there for them and help if they aren't. A big step forward from the Temple of Mythal!
I also enjoy the way Sera actually comes around to certain people you wouldn't expect her to like, or at least respects them. Of Josephine, Sera remarks that "She's as good at humbling her kind as I am, just with less mess. Knows her business, if you have to have it." And there's this beautiful banter with Dorian:
Sera: So you’re fat with it, right?
Dorian: Me? Are you referring to…?
Sera: Do you sleep on silk while gold shits down all over you? Are you rich?
Dorian: I left all that behind. Although I do miss the gold-shitting from time to time.
Sera: You really left it, huh? Knew you weren’t all bad.
I talked quite a bit about Vivienne above, so let's talk about how other characters interact with Sera.
After a successful march through Verchiel, Cullen notes at the war table, "Potential future gains may be impressive. Do not tell Sera I said so."
Why not?
This quest is Sera's first chance to prove her value and the value of her organization to the Inquisition—and she's proven it. (Yes, things go a bit sideways later, but that hasn't actually happened yet, and she continues to bring information and quests to the Inquisition after that setback if allowed to stay.) So, that Cullen doesn't want to acknowledge her value after she's demonstrated it? Well, that sucks a little! We sure wouldn't want to let one of our allies know she's valuable to us. All because he doesn't like her personally—and because she's not important enough to be worth showing respect. It leaves a bad taste in my mouth, honestly, and illuminates a certain feeling I have about the Inquisition generally.
Let's review the backgrounds of the rest of the Inquisition's inner circle, shall we?
Cullen Rutherford, Knight-Captain turned Commander, respected enough to gain the trust of Leliana and Cassandra which is not nothing. Leliana, experienced bard, used to mingling with nobles, friend of the Hero of Ferelden, Left Hand of the Divine. Josephine Montilyet, noble-born, Ambassador. Cassandra Pentaghast, Nevarran royalty, Seeker of Truth promoted to Right Hand of the Divine at a remarkably young age. Dorian Pavus, Tevinter nobility, albeit estranged from his family, still influential enough to be apprenticed to a magister. Varric Tethras, born to a powerful dwarven Merchant Guild family, popular author, friend of the Champion of Kirkwall. Vivienne, Enchanter to the Imperial Court, mistress to the Duke of Ghislain (which in the Orlesian court is considered a respectable enough position to be declared openly). The Iron Bull, Qunari Ben-Hassrath, commander of the Bull's Chargers. Solas, the Dread Wolf of elven legend and though currently known only as an elven apostate, quite vocal about his authority on elven history and his dismay over Sera's everything.
Compare all of those Very Important People to: Blackwall, (not) Grey Warden, traitor, murderer, and liar. Cole, spirit, lost soul. Sera, commoner, elf, Red Jenny.
At the end of the day, you can spin it any number of ways and it's generally in-character for most of them so this isn't a writing complaint, but people look down on Sera. Most of your advisors and companions are either noble-born, used to mingling with nobility, or otherwise Someone Important. Even Blackwall, the closest to Sera in terms of class (and you can tell by how well they get along in party banter), spends most of the game pretending to be Somebody that he isn't. Cole's whole personal conflict is a crisis of identity and fear of his own nature. Sera is low class, crass, broad, common—and an elf to boot. And she doesn't try to hide any of that. She is who she is.
And her commonness is her value. She sees things in a way that people like Cullen and Josephine and Cassandra cannot. She has a perspective most of the Inner Circle doesn't. She is valuable because she is nobody. The founders of the Inquisition make plenty of noise about "restoring order" and you get a lot of dialogue about how the Inquisitor gives hope to "the people" and how important they are to "the people." Well, Sera is the goddamn people. Not to say that she represents all commoners, but if the Inquisition has contempt for the manner and perspective of someone like Sera, they are going to have that same kind of contempt for many of the very people they claim to be protecting, when they actually meet them face to face.
Sera's crassness and prankster tendencies come across as disrespectful, but it's worth asking why exactly everyone else is deserving of her unconditional, unearned respect when they show none to her. Just because they're Very Important People of higher social standing? Is that not an assumption worth interrogating? I think it is, and I think Sera's very presence in the Inquisition invites us to examine assumptions about class and status and respect that might otherwise go unexamined in a story like this. And if you've read my Masked Empire essay, you know that I am 100% here for storytelling in this universe that dismantles the fantasy trope of the benevolent nobility.
It's no mystery why the companion Sera gets along with best is Blackwall, and they have some great friendly banter. I think she might even get along fine with Cole if she didn't know he was a spirit, and if he didn't constantly say out loud really on-the-nose things about people's hidden pain, because that's the stuff about him that freaks her out. If he was just a weird dude who wanted to help people and went about it in some strange ways, I think she'd be cool with him.
I gained a lot of sympathy for Sera over the course of the game and romancing her, but frankly nothing gained me more sympathy for her than seeing how shitty other characters are to her. Sera's used to being treated like dirt, but she's also not going to curtsy and thank you for the pleasure. Fart noises, indeed.
But that's not actually a complaint about the game. Like I said, I think the unexamined disdain for someone like Sera is pretty in-character for most of our Very Important Companions. And I like all of those characters a whole lot, so I'm definitely not trying to slam any characters to uplift Sera. It's good for characters to have flaws. Sera has them. Every companion has them. That's good writing.
Where I do have some complaints is in the ways in which the Inquisitor is able to talk to Sera—or rather, the ways they're not.
For many of the dialogue options with Sera, even the most positive response kind of implies that you're just tolerating her or humoring her. Even when you're trying to role-play as aggressively positive toward Sera as possible, the Inquisitor as written and voiced comes off as confused by her and by Red Jenny. Of course that will make sense for some characters, but the total dearth of a "Sounds rad, count me in" option when Sera tells you about her organization is a source of continual frustration to me. Why, exactly, don't I have the option to say I think Red Jenny is awesome? Why is that not a thing my character can think? Of course I should have the option to say otherwise, but why I assume I won't get it and will need it explained to me over and over?
The concept of the Friends of Red Jenny is not that hard to understand. People with little power banding together to exercise a bit more collectively should not be stupid or baffling. It especially should not be baffling to a mage or a surface dwarf or a Vashoth qunari. It also shouldn't be that confusing that they're working together to achieve small goals and desires without looking to start a large-scale revolution that would likely just get a lot of them killed. It's not complicated, but the game seems to expect you to view it with, at best, confusion, and at worst, contempt. It starts to feel like you're expected to either dislike her or at the very least not "get" her, and that rubs me the wrong way not just because I do like her, but because it feels railroady. I should have the option to vibe with Sera right from the start if I want to.
(For the record, I'm pretty sure the reason this happened is because the Inquisitor was originally conceived and written as a human from a noble family. Basically everything that's annoying about the Inquisitor's dialogue with Sera makes so much more sense if you look at it from that perspective, and it's also not the fault of her writer. Mark Darrah has talked about this more recently, and the Bioware team never actually wanted to have a human-only Inquisitor but had to start out that way because EA wanted the game to ship in 2013; it was a whole thing.)
Where you do get the option, it's fun to vibe with Sera. It's real fun. She has some excellent friendship content that is not unique to the romance. There's the pranks sequence, wherein Sera wants to play a few tricks on the Inquisition's advisors. I can see how this could be off-putting to some people (I don't like practical jokes in real life) but I can appreciate Sera's stated reasons for doing it: to humanize these Very Important People to their underlings and as such, to improve morale. In that way, it reminds me of the Iron Bull taking the Inquisitor to mingle with the rank and file disguised as one of them, to hear their perspectives and give names and faces to the people depending on their leader. It's also really nice for breaking up the Everything Is Super Serious tone of the Inquisition as an organization and injecting some fun into it. Again, Sera just brings an energy and perspective to the Inquisition that no one else does. Then there's the roof talk about the cookies, after which you have the option to go spend some "friendly roof time" with Sera whenever you like. For a reluctant Inquisitor, I think Sera can offer a much-needed escape from the gravity of their work, and I certainly found her becoming that for my Inquisitor Eleanor.
I find Sera's little window alcove in the tavern so charming. I also love the idea that she just claimed this space and told everyone to piss off. Maryden might have had a thing for Sera, if the song is any indication, so maybe she went to bat for her. Either way, Sera has her own little space and collection of curiosities.
The codex entry you can read nearby features a note from Quartermaster Morris questioning whether it's a good use of Inquisition resources to give her a cabinet. A cabinet. She doesn't even have a private room with a bed, but how dare she ask for one wooden bookcase for her stuff. Again, it's everyone treating Sera like a waste of space, like she doesn't deserve even one nice thing, while Skyhold's "visiting dignitaries" have their every whim catered to.
And let's talk about stuff. Let's talk about Sera's collection of things, a collection for a girl who's been reminded her whole life of all the things she doesn't deserve. A collection of the few things a girl considers important or interesting after she rejected the inheritance left her by her abusive foster mother. Parts of Sera's catalog are very funny! I will always laugh at "Goblet. Fancy cup. Cup. Shit goblet." But I also find something very touching about Sera's little collection of things, and what she writes about them, especially with a romance active, as she gradually adds things that remind her of the Inquisitor she loves. I could write pages just talking about how much I love Sera's journaling but some bits I especially love:
Silk. Bolts, not arrow-bolts. Soft! Make something!
Use silk for her! Underpants (scratched out). Tit thing (scratched out). Scarf (scratched out).
Silk is stupid. Get book to sew better. (scratched out).
Silk comes out of a worm's arse! Yuck!
That book she reads. Why's it good? Soooo long (scratched out).
Stupid book. Didn't cry.
Book. Learn Human stuff for her (scratched out). Every book is human stuff.
Sera's gift quest, "A Woman Who Wants for Nothing," is delightful and made me so glad I chose this romance. In it, Sera mentions that she got the Inquisitor a hat. Well, actually, what she says is, "Listen! I got you a hat, but it's ugly, so I drew Coryhe-whatzit's face on it, and stuffed it with apples. Everyone's hitting it with sticks! I really hope you like it!" and then runs away giggling. The Inquisitor, charmingly, takes this SUPER SERIOUSLY and decides she needs to get Sera a gift in return. She then asks everyone in the Inner Circle for gift ideas, with the responses ranging from supportive befuddlement to outright annoyance, with Solas and Vivienne both giving approval drops and Vivienne sarcastically replying, "Just shave something rude into your privates, dear. She won't get the redundancy." (If you entertain this suggestion, you get a hilarious bonus cutscene later.)
But when the Inquisitor returns to Sera to confess that she asked everyone for advice but couldn't figure out a proper gift, Sera replies, "Wait wait wait. You went to everyone and said I was your lover? Right to their faces?" She doubles over laughing before adding, "Best gift ever."
It's a funny scene, and a funny quest, but at the core of it is the fact that the best gift Sera could receive is someone who accepts her, who isn't ashamed of her—someone who's proud to claim her and love her for who she is.
Usually, the expression that a person "wants for nothing" means that they already have everything they could possibly want, but for Sera it takes on a different meaning. Sera, probably the least wealthy member of the Inner Circle, with her rejected inheritance and her little collection of things—Sera for whom the greatest gift is not another thing for her shelf, but simply acceptance.
In Trespasser, Sera has a new journal codex, "Sera's Past and Now Things" and it's even more of a delight, with such notes as "Back to the Winter Palace? Never good. Pack bees." It also features Sera's worries about the Inquisitor's mark, which is slowly killing them, with increasing distress for a romanced Sera and such heartrending bits as:
It isn't... (scratched out).
I will... (scratched out).
We have to... (scratched out).
(The book is scuffed, as though thrown against a wall. This page also has what look to be tear stains.)
I have arrows. They leave and things die.
I get to keep something.
Why don't I get to... (scratched out).
Make her happy. I will keep that she was happy.
I also found it really touching that her love being there makes the Fade okay for Sera, and helps her face something she's afraid of.
If you can look beneath the surface with Sera, I think her friendship and especially her romance is really moving, and taking the time in-game to get to know her is extremely rewarding in the end.
The Inquisitor and Sera can get married at the Winter Palace during Trespasser. Inky can wear her terrible dress uniform and Sera wears an ugly dress and shouts "That's our bells, nobbers! We frigging win!" from the balcony. It's perfect.
I love Sera, I'm so glad I really got to know her, I'm so glad I decided to play her romance. This one's a keeper.
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I have a ... complicated relationship with character creators in video games. I do like being able to make a character my own, so I'm ultimately for them, but I'm also very, very bad at using them.
There are degrees, of course. The Baldur's Gate 3 one is basically just a collection of presets and colour options, so I have no real reason to complain. I can pretty much handle the preset features and sliders that are used in the last several Bethesda games. The monstrosity they gave me in Dragon Age: Inquisition was my worst nightmare. It was clearly built for people who are good at character creation, and I am not good at character creation. I almost gave up playing before I'd started.
However. The thing with the Guardian character. I get that you're supposed to be making a character you would find attractive, because it is in some sense a projection of your desires - a being that looks the way you want it to in order to communicate. But my brain ... does not quite work that way, I guess. I can't produce a "sexy" character, and since I hadn't met this character and would not be playing as this character, I had no clear idea how they should look. It was just a lot of hitting the randomise button until I got tired of it, and calling it a day with whatever I had.
The upshot of this is - whenever the Guardian appears to try to persuade me of something, my reaction isn't "hot". It's "You. You bastard! I had to go back into the character creator for you when I'd already finished creating my character! What the hell do you want?"
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ROUND 2, MATCH 32
Propaganda under the cut!
The Red Prince
Propaganda
When you first meet him he sizes you up as a potential slave by checking your teeth and asking after your culinary skills. If you recruit him, his storyline is about hooking up with another lady of his race so that she can birth true dragons again. You can still romance him in spite of his prophesied babymaking. No matter what choices you make though, at the end of the game he point blank tells you that his divinely chosen baby mama is still the One For Him, but you're welcome to return with him to his home country as his sex slave. He's terrible.
Cullen Rutherford
Propaganda
stupid racist cop creep whose fans cry about how hes "changed" and "you can't judge him he was addicted to magic drugs" nah he still chose to be a racist cop and abuse his power over innocent people and i hate him. the writers making him romanceable in da:i after how blatantly horrible he was in da:o and da:2 is baffling but i guess they had to appeal to the part of their audience who watch those "mafia boyfriend" videos on tiktok or whatever
He's creepy in origins, though still 100% willing to kill the female mage pc he's crushing on, as well as all the other mages trapped in the circle with him. He's the second-in-command in an even worse circle in 2, listening to and defending the increasingly obviously insane meredith until literally the end. He's one of the people still pushing for the circle system by inquisition, and yes he's going through withdrawals and working through the traumas of previous games. And to be brutally honest his was the first romance i took and while i don't remember much from it, its not worth all the girls going absolutely nuts over knockoff terrible alistair.
He's basically a cop who thinks being born a certain way can revoke personhood and by Inquisition still thinks mages are monsters to be controlled, not people. He gets a fairy tale cutesy romance that focuses on his personal struggles with addiction while showing absolutely no regard to the atrocities he committed and still thinks were justified. He can be romanced BY A MAGE and his actions and beliefs are just glossed over. He believes mages are 'not people like you (Hawke) and me', but if the Warden was a female mage he canonically had a crush on her and would deliberately hang around her despite the fact that he was her *jailer*. If that Warden romanced Leliana, there is war table dialogue in which he pesters Leliana for news of his 'former' crush despite her repeated statement that she doesn't want to talk to him about her. All this shitty behavior and lack of introspection gets swept under the rug by the game, not even giving the PC the chance to really challenge his beliefs. Like damn even Fenris could apologize when he lashed out due to past trauma with mages, and if anyone has a reason to hate mages it's Fenris. If you want an ex Templar hottie Alistair is RIGHT THERE. Tbh I know Cullen is a popular romance and I'm not here to tell anyone what they can or can't do or like in a video game, I'm just saying I think he is deeply undateable
Spends the first two games as an antagonist, fervently devoted to the cause of subjugating mages, then a bunch of "character development" happens off screen and the games treat him like he's completely reformed. However he's actions make it clear he still sees mages as dangerous and lesser. Not to mention if you romance him with an elf he doesn't pay your culture more than lip service respect like most of the devout characters
He was a total villain in the first two games who was violently prejudiced against mages and uses one single bad experience as an excuse for it (a bad experience that is pretty much exactly what he in his job subjected graduating apprentices to, mind you, but this is never brought up). Now he says he's changed, but his words and actions say otherwise. He still distrusts mages, sympathises with the rebel Templars trying to kill them, and he never owns up to the terrible stuff he did and helped others do in the past two games. He totally knew what Meredith was doing and says he doesn't, and he still tries to defend her intentions. And you have no option to call him out on it. If you romance him as a mage, he angsts about how he might have seen you as subhuman in the past but NOW you're one of the good ones, and when you ask him if he'll kill you if you get possessed, he dodges the question. And the PC is written as being almost sad that she's a mage? Like 'can you love me despite what I am??' Also if Leliana romanced a female mage PC in the first game who is still alive, he asks her creepy questions about their relationship. Fitting considering his original purpose was to be creepy to the female mage Warden.
I hate him and want to cause chaos. Plus his VA is an asshole.
Cop
I think you covered almost everything but don't forget that beautiful moment in DA2 - Act 2 where you find out some templars had a petition to lobotomize all mages and Meredith, THE HARDCORE TEMPLAR LEADER, rejects it, but Cullen says they got a point. Despite the fact that we just found out that those templars were using lobotomy (or the threat of) to rape people and get away with it. And then Cullen in DA:I is whining that anything that happened it's not his fault because Meredith kept the worse away form him so he didn't know, but also that anyway Meredith had a point and did what she had to do. Meredith does not go mad until Act 3, before she was of sound mind and Culllen was her second in command BECAUSE he hated mages as much as (or even more) than her. What the FUCK did she even hide from you, Cullen. Oh, but he changed! Because the writers make A VICTIM OF THE TEMPLARS say so. And anyway he only says so BECAUSE HE READS MINDS not because Cullen did anything to show it. Also the narrative wants to sympathise with Cullen for his drug problems while Cullen is openly attacking the only other character with the same problem for...having the same problem. And he's the antagonist, so there were OTHER things Cullen could be mad about. But he is mad about the drug problem. Also I'm not an expert on writing characters with addictions but he is an addict only when it's time to have a cut scene where you pity him. Otherwise it has zero impacts on everything else.
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I binged through all of Dragon Age: Absolution today and honestly I really really liked it! I was allowing myself only some very cautious optimism after watching the twitch premiere of the first episode, but freed from the need for infodumps and setting up the characters the rest of the show actually rapidly gets better from there (some pacing issues here and there excepted but hey they were given 6 episodes, I think they did pretty well considering those constraints)! If like me you HUNGER for, you YEARN for, you CRAVE more Dragon Age right the fuck now, this is not at all a bad thing to help keep some of that hunger down while we wait for the next game, and has a few loveable new characters to get into and some great action animation to boot.
More idle thoughts/reactions under the cut!
first and foremost I love Roland and Lacklon so much haha, a surprisingly well paced romance considering it mainly happens in quick background-ish moments! I'm especially interested in Roland's backstory, since he's very chill and openminded for what seems to be a decently well-trained/educated Orlesian? Lacklon being like 'I want to hold his hand and suck his dick 😔 fml' every time Roland did something cool in battle was just *chef's kiss* too, it was kind of smart to have their fight scenes double as foreplay as well on a writing level since they're arguably the least plot-important characters overall (though they and Qwydion are definitely the heart of the story as far as I'm concerned)
I understand why Miriam clung to Hira so much since she just lost literally everything in her life, good or bad, moments before and that relationship was the only time she had tasted anything like real love since her brother died, but girl... girl when people show you who they are, believe them. marry Qwydion instead you deserve so much better (Hira gave me the Bad Vibes right away from how she didn't respect anything Miriam said or expressed and kept pushing in ways that made me really uncomfortable, so I won't say I was shocked or anything lol.) There is the (??deliberate??) mirror of Hira hugging Miriam from behind in the blood magic dream and Qwydion coming up behind her in very much the same way to rest her hand on her shoulder in the real world afterwards, so I have hope maybe?
can you imagine Dorian watching shitshows like this go down every other week all around Tevinter and tearing at his perfectly sculpted hair because Andraste's tits if you motherfuckers would stop acting stereotypically for FIVE MINUTES! could any of you go take a PISS without resorting to blood magic! Dorian's job is a shit job and he's probably been doing it for a while by the time of Dreadwolf so y'know. get my son a drink
speaking of Qwydion, I am so glad for further support for my theory that vashoth born away from the Qun are actually some of the most well-adjusted people in all of Thedas. they've dodged the Qun from birth by definition, they don't seem terribly interested in the Chantry or grand politics of any kind, they don't have a caste system hanging over them, they can step on anyone who tries to mess with them even if they don't have magic... truly the only sane people running around out here
so you're telling me the Inquisition screws Fairbanks over no matter what you do, b/c either he dies or he's forced into Orlesian politics. Oh buddy I'm sorry we should've just let you frolic around in the Emerald Graves on your own you didn't deserve this
Poor Tessa. she is probably better off without him in the long run but that's a rough week
I was so excited to see Kirkwall again, I saw the horrific chain statues and went 'OH HELLHOLE MORE LIKE HELLHOME'. it's so grim and awful I miss it so much lol
meredith, huh. so uh. hawke really has failed at everything, pretty much, then. even the few people they did manage to kill to protect everyone didn't stay dead. I'm just waiting for the dragon they killed in the Bone Pit to come back and ravage the city as well now, just to top it off. celestial punching bag of thedas hawke. babyyyyyyyyy if it helps I still love you the most and so does your collection of bi weirdos found family
rezaren wasn't even that good a mage, as far as we can tell, so you have to wonder what the FUCK dorian's ancestor was pulling to have created this thing that he could barely control with half a dragon's worth of blood (and what someone like Dorian, who helped crack time like an egg in his student days sort of just to see if he could, it seems, could do with it if they didn't have like scruples or other pesky things like that. everything we see about tevinter magisters makes me more impressed with how comparatively not fundamentally shitty Dorian has managed to turn out (no wonder Bull is kind of impressed with him for having actual integrity, if this is the competition he's up against). can you tell I miss him lol)
I found it genuniely interesting how much rezaren and hira are thematic mirrors to each other and mutually cannot see it, right down to treating miriam ultimately as an object. same self-centered idiot, different hairstyles. what a scathing indictment of Tevinter high society that even Hira, who's family was notoriously progressive and trying to enact change, still treats people exactly the same way as the other magisters when push comes to shove.
thank u to Lacklon for pessimistic cynical bastard representation, he is right that that dragon is going to ravage the countryside and someone on the crew has to keep clear eyes for that sort of thing even when it's a downer
#dragon age#dragon age absolution#dragon age absolution spoilers#dragon age: absolution spoilers#dragon age: absolution
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Dragon Age Inquisition; Finding out a Scout has a crush on Varric
DORIAN
If he heard about it he takes this information to you to check it's authenticity and once he sees it's true he makes it his business.
It is now the most interesting thing he gets to do instead of looking at Skyhold's lack luster library and drinking.
He assures you he will not tell another soul, to which he keeps his word, but he also brings to your attention he heard it elsewhere so it is a rumor.
If he heard it from you he gets excited. You're asking him for help, how precious.
Drops everything to learn about what the situation is. Hell, he'll take you out to Val Royeaux to indulge in food and wine while making sure no one is listening.
He assures you he will not tell another soul, and he keeps his word. He won't even tell Bull/the Inquisitor. Your secret will be safe with him.
Him helping you relates to self-esteem for both you and Varric.
For you he helps you find a sense of style while you're off duty and overall become more confident. Learning to stick up for yourself and be who you are unapologetically. If you're a mage he studies with you.
For Varric he just boosts him by separating him from his mistakes and complimenting the best of him. Overall showing him he has something to offer other people.
Sounds really simple because it is. He wants you to go for it not for him to set you up and he can't outright give Varric hints because; One, he'll immediately see what's going on and Two, Varric wasn't looking for love so that would be a swift rejection.
CULLEN
If he heard about it, it was because his recruits we're talking about it and he only finds out it was you when you bring a report and he complains about the recruits being distracted with the rumor.
He feels bad about complaining about your crush. To make up for it he helps quiet the rumor amongst his soldiers.
If you ask he'll even assign you to places the inquisitor will head next. He finds your crush endearing and quite adorable, though he'll never admit it.
If you told him, it was likely because you asked him for a reassignment to follow the Herald and in that conversation confess the reason.
You expect to be turned down flat but to your surprise he agrees. He finds your crush endearing and quite adorable, though he'll never admit it.
From then on he assigns you to the inquisitor's side as a personal scout. Which not only gets you close the inner circle, it also helps their efforts and makes everything more convenient for everyone.
Him helping you relates to his knowledge of gossiping.
He himself doesn't really gossip, however the people around him do it nonstop, especially when he lived in the barracks. He knows how fast rumors work and to be careful with them.
The rumors themselves are generally harmless. "This scout gets to travel with the Herald because they spotted an ambush and saved a battalion." The story is true but ultimately not the real reason.
He'll even go so far as to brag about this scout to the inquisitor or Varric himself. If you're a range fighter, mage or rouge, he'll suggest you both get to know one another on the battlefield, that you can teach one another and join forces in the back ranks. Kind of forward but it still just a commander bragging about his officers.
CASSANDRA
If she heard about it, she thinks it so romantic. But she didn't know which scout it was until she saw you around him.
She bumps into you and sees how you look at him, without thinking she blurts out, "You're the scout in love with Varric." Luckily no one was around to hear it.
Apologizes but wants details. Why do you like him? When did this start? How well do you know him? Do you talk to him? Do you flirt!? DOES HE FLIRT!?
If you tell her, it's most likely because she keeps an eye on him and she caught you watching him.
In this case she thinks your suspicious and trying to get to him in some way and you think she likes him. Misunderstandings all around. Once that's out of the way she thinks it's so romantic.
Will invite you to drink with her and talk. It doesn't have to be about him but she does want the tea. Also takes this opportunity to get to morale around the scouts and training.
Her helping you relates to her hyping you up and keeping you alive.
She can't really give you fashion advice but she can give you armor advice and training to keep you alive. If you do need fashion and social advice she talks to Leliana and Josephine to help you.
Training with her is awesome no matter what class you are, even if you're a mage. If you are a mage she'll still spar with you to keep up your strength. Some of the recruits are jealous though, personal sparing with her is something people would kill for.
Is the only one who doesn't tell Varric anything. Not because she can't but she doesn't want to intervene with this love story. Very content on the sidelines.
#dragon age inquisition#dragon age imagine#varric tethras#dorian pavus#cullen rutherford#cassandra pentaghast
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Some more snippets of insight on Dragon Age: Dreadwolf, and some thoughts on future BioWare games in general from Mark Darrah, from his recent Dragon Age: Inquisition - Memories and Lessons video:
"[...] presenting vision and 'X' statements, all of the things you do to start to align a team around a direction. This was pretty rocky on Dragon Age: Inquisition for basically three reasons I would say. First of all, we were presenting a top-level vision, things like 'Dragon Age with a Skyrim vibe' or 'the exploration of Dragon Age: Origins in Frostbite' or things like that, things that sort've were very surface level. And those kind of statements can be incredibly useful, it is incredibly valuable to be willing to have vision statements or or 'X' statements that are somewhat derivative, where you say, 'it's like X with Y, because people can grab onto those things really effectively. But when you're presenting a surface-level vision, ideally what you would want to then do is have your sub-disciplines and sub-teams present more detailed visions within their own respective areas, that feed back and build upon that over-arching vision statement. This is what we were doing on Joplin, this is what we were doing on Morrison as well, because by doing that, people are able to find something that they understand a little bit better, grab onto that and then build up towards the over-arching vision."
"So one last thing on vision. I actually don't remember the specific language we were using in the early days of Dragon Age: Inquisition for its vision, which isn't a great sign. I can remember the vision statement for Mass Effect 2, which was 'the Dirty Dozen in space'. I can remember the vision statement for Joplin, which it was 'we would be heroes but the records are sealed'."
"The telemetry on the tactical camera for Dragon Age: Inquisition basically shows that very few people used it and those people who did use it used it largely to pause, look around at the battlefield, decide what they're going to do and then return to the over the shoulder camera and play the game in real-time for the most part. [...] The fact that it's very expensive plus the fact that it wasn't wildly used, though you could argue that part of the reason why it's not wildly used is because it's not the best possible implementation of it, those two things together to my mind mean probably we aren't going to see tac cam going forward from the Dragon Age franchise. I mean, they could surprise me. My bet is that Dragon Age will continue cementing itself as an action RPG franchise and continue to move away from the old-school cRPG things that mark its origin, so to speak, haha, and that we probably won't see tac cam in Dragon Age 4. But, I guess we'll see."
"You defeat Corypheus, you save the world, the credits roll and then there's a post-credits sequence where something is revealed about Solas. And for some people this undermines the entire game. They feel like the game as a result of the post-credit sequence is incomplete and that we then tricked you into buying Trespasser in order to get the ending of the game. [...] There was a negative enough reaction from enough people within the community for Dragon Age to the post-credits sequence that my guess is that BioWare will never do a post-credits sequence ever again because they are going to be very gun-shy based upon that reaction. And that's kinda too bad from my perspective."
"For Dragon Age: Inquisition, Early Access did not help, it hurts, because what it essentially means is that your launch day is seven days early but for a much smaller group of people, and you are having to deal with a launch and then deal with another launch seven days later. It allows the sentiment on your title to begin to solidify while you're not even really selling that many copies of the game. You saw this dramatically with Mass Effect: Andromeda, where a version of the game came out with some fidelity bugs and it was out in the world for a week without a lot of control over the narrative. Sentiment on the game solidified very quickly and very negatively. I believe that EA is backing away from this for story-driven titles. I do not like Early Access in general, and certainly, Inquisition solidified my opinion on that topic."
"In some ways the box for Dragon Age: Inquisition is very like the box for Dragon Age: Origins and Dragon Age II. It has strong use of negative space, it has a fairly strong graphical look, but in some other more obvious ways it is a big departure. It moves from the red and white aesthetic of the first two games and goes to green and darker blacks and grays. And there's some good reasons and some bad reasons for this. The good reason is to make the box look more like the game. And I think there's something to be said for that. I think there's something to be said for having your color palette of your marketing campaign be consistent with the game itself. You can see this with Dreadwolf. They are trying to do the same thing again, is bring some consistency to the game and the UI and the marketing assets. I think there's something to be said for that, a consistency of look."
"Dragon Age: Inquisition is probably one of the last Collector's Editions that BioWare's ever going to do"
He also mentions the project codenamed Hendrix:
"We decided that we were going to try to make a standalone free-to-play version of Dragon Age multiplayer. This had the codename of Hendrix, following the naming convention that we were using for codenames at the time, and it was basically trying to be something that would introduce you to Dragon Age as a property and be an on-ramp for the game. EA wasn't very supportive of this product at all, because they just saw it as a potential cost center, and so it was only available for download for a very short period of time, it got no marketing and it essentially kind've faded into the ether. But briefly, in 2015 there was a free-to-play version of Dragon Age: Inquisition available for download."
and his plans for [a] future video[s] containing reflections on Joplin and Morrison:
"Okay, I did this for Dragon Age II and I will do it again for Anthem. [...] With that, we are done with Dragon Age: Inquisition. We probably have two more of these left. We will probably do Anthem, Mass Effect: Andromeda and Joplin together as a single video, and then we will finish this series up with a video about Morrison."
[source]
#dragon age: dreadwolf#dragon age 4#the dread wolf rises#da4#dragon age#bioware#video games#long post#longpost#mass effect#solas#mass effect: andromeda#anthem
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I read your notes about DAQ on that wyll vs dorian post and i just could not agree more. Specifically the thing about krem you said, i absolutely hate how the game while trying to introduce trans friendly concepts just. Forcibly makes your character cis in association. Like no my inquisitioner would not say any of that shit!!! He is trans!!!! And you could tell that shit was not written by a trans person. I think they were trying to avoid using many trans specific words to fit in with the setting but like? "Why do you pass?" Is not a question that makes sense for someone to ask and i hate that theyre taking an existing trans term and trying to make it mean like....the entire concept of transitioning?? Idk i feel like i would be more ok if they could have you be like "oh dw i am also trans" but nah we as the player are just assumed to be cis. Also yeah as you said, inventing transphobia in a series where that wasnt present before, its annoying.
Oh dont get me started I could talk about my gripes with the handling of transness in dragon age (and particularly inquisition) forever. Actually do get me started this has been a long time coming.
i absolutely hate how the game while trying to introduce trans friendly concepts just. Forcibly makes your character cis in association
YEP. Yep yes exactly. your options are 'three flavors of being transphobic' or 'when did you know' . which is what i picked, because you can stretch your imagination a little at least.
But there's also this other tiny elephant in the room issue with Krem that i didnt mention in those tags. Or should i say. Bull in the room ?
Because holy shit, way to take away the trans character's speaking voice and characterization so we get to know how much of an ✨Ally ✨the cis man bestie is! Like okay if you're being a transphobic shithead it makes a bit More sense that he'd get defensive and speak up for Krem, but when your question was 'when did you know', Krem answers 'when i was young. not a great thing to know about yourself' and then Bull immediately cuts in to cisplain transness is like? What was the Idea there.
Which then makes the dialogue choices being 90% straight up transphobia MORE suspicious, because the game is letting you, almost pushing you to verbally harass Krem.. almost like he doesn't REALLY matter, he's just a vessel to see how Progressive And Trans Friendly And A Good Friend Bull is.
Thanks, i hate it.
Even in terms of backstory Bull being Krems savior when he was trying to escape his life etc never really sat right with me. Like there's an underlying demsel vibe i feel the devs stuck in there that really irks me.
Not helped by the fact that we dont have a trans voice actor.
Also not helped by the fact that this is a fantasy setting with magic but some form of magic hrt? Nah too impossible.
Like sure there's some implication that it MIGHT exist somewhere but because magic Bad in the dragon age setting and tevinter magic Even Worse he wouldn't go for it-
Like ok. some people might prefer their trans realism in faux medieval media. even fantasy.
Im not one of those people. And all those justifications read more like excuses to me. Like you're telling me the circles wouldn't be making BANK out of selling trans-your-gender potions and abusing the shit out of it?
And just. Again this makes the setting retroactively much Worse because where before i could point to my warden or Hawke and go 'yeah that's a trans man via magic hrt' and someone who prefers trans realism could ALSO do the same when making theirs how they like. Vagueness in such matters allows for imagination!
But now dai is saying noo they had to be cis. And your inquisitor also.
Fuck that.
Also yeah as you said, inventing transphobia in a series where that wasnt present before, its annoying.
one tiny correction here. there were hints of transphobia in the first two games, but it was mostly contained in like. Oghren style aged like milk type humor. more meta than text i guess. like in the Pearl in game one if you ask to be surprised there's a chance you get the ever hilarious 'haha you got man in a dress'
*crickets*
And then Serendipity in mark of the assassin.. well the wiki says she's meant to be a drag queen. So not 100% related to this discussion. But the execution of her character just felt SO mean spirited to me when i was playing that i felt it needed to be mentioned as well. (So i just love her out of spite now. )
But anyway yeah. Out of all the lgbtq things dragon age touches on i feel like gender is one that they. dont really even try to tackle in good faith. And it just got worse as the games went on.
I can handle easily skippable side gags that are shitty and unfunny. Inquisition tries to actually bring ATTENTION to the topic, and proceeds to fall flat on its face. Not to mention Sera. Them having one of the main companions being transphobic in banter.
Bioware when I catch you Bioware. Bioware when i catch you.
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i am sick as fucking hell today so here's my ranking of S-Links so far
caveats: Aigis STILL hasn't fucking unlocked, i'm only halfway thru mitsuru's, and one-third thru yukari's.
Best to Worst:
The Magician, Junpei: I am still flabbergasted at how fucking good his arc is. The fact that in the penultimate slink scene he recognizes the specific way he's been disrespectful to you and meaningfully apologizes for it is not remotely what I expected out of him. Also I somehow got spoiled very early that he wasn't a romance option, and (I can't believe I'm making this comparison) just like Dorian in Dragon Age: Inquisition, it made it feel fun and safe to play-flirt and joke with him, safe in the knowledge it wouldn't go awry. Junpei is my fucking bro, my ride or die.
The Star, Akihiko: Predictable since I am currently evaluating his entire romance against my other favorite romances in video games (I don't think he beats Garrus and The Transistor, but he's top five). Slowly unraveling this boy is delightful, and honestly the way he turns as you get to know him better is very marked and obvious. He goes from relying on his one hyperfixation to communicate, to opening up and sometimes being genuinely so fucking smooth and romantic, it threw me for a loop. Least neurotypical person in the cast.
The Hermit, Saori: From the moment she said a Bad Word I was in love. I like how... careful you have to be with her, how she is very aware of her faults, of the fact she's a doormat, and the reasons she has become that way. Saying goodbye to her was genuinely very fucking sad and I miss her. Would dump Akihiko for her if I could. (Tho even more I want them to meet, could you IMAGINE.)
The Priestess, Fuuka: I love this girl so fucking much. The steel core of her underneath of the self-doubt is wonderful to see. Also the specific way she sucks at cooking and almost locks up from the failure tracks as very real. It does suck to rope someone else into helping you with something and then seeing how good that person is at the thing. Also her slink is so close to a romance, I'm mad about it. LEMME DATE HER.
The Moon, Shinjiro: Ah, the urge to help people vs the urge to be a bitch. Who can't relate to that. Especially given the inevitable end of his arc, the specific way Shinjiro is trying to keep people from relying on him or expecting anything from him... hitting facefirst into the wall of how goddamn fucking reliable he is, it's great. Glad I maxed this one out.
The Tower, Mutatsu: I really like that you're basically therapizing this old monk just by.... being a mirror to reflect his questions back at him. You do very little to help him honestly, you just exist nearby and thus inspire him to challenge himself and better himself. He just needed someone to talk to! Also its funny to imagine FemPC just hanging out in his booth for a few weeks. What a duo.
The Sun, Akinari: Did NOT like this one at first, but wow the actual final thought of it, the idea that.... death is inevitable, and you will never know your purpose, and you will never see your purpose, but you do have purpose. That was surprisingly affecting. Also WAS HE A GHOST THE WHOLE TIME? WHAT WAS WITH THAT? Wacky.
The Chariot, Rio: Oh Rio, I wish I could rank you higher, girl. I really like Rio and think she's actually an incredible example of the Chariot, but in the way I enjoyed being careful with Saori, there were times I wanted to smack Rio upside the head. Because she's making progress, she's getting there, but it's almost entirely without you. You're there to support her and that's great but you cannot fucking challenge her at all ever or she'll get upset. Just frustrating.
The Devil, Tanaka: This one was so fucking weird but enjoyable? But there's no depth here. It's just weird and fun!
Strength, Koromaru: I'm not a dog person but this is a good dog. Also while I didn't vibe with the plot around Koromaru, the way he incited conversation with other characters was great.
Justice, Ken: I'm about... 4 or 5 into this one? And the point seems to be "ah, the trauma of growing up too fast." Which yep. That's a thing. Wish this slink wasn't like pulling teeth.
The Emperor, Hidetoshi: I'm bored to tears and I'm never gonna finish this one. Hidetoshi is a tool, I'm not interested.
The Hierophant, the Old Couple: this one is straight up poorly written. It's just so fucking poorly written I don't know if something went seriously awry in localization or if it was just that bad. I maxed it out and I regret it.
The Hanged Man, Maiko: HEY YO WHAT WAS UP WITH HER DAD HITTING HER AND THE "BEST" OPTION BEING "That's mean!" OH BITCH IS IT MEAN TO HIT A CHILD? OH DANG I HAD NO IDEA.
Temperance, Bebe: The degree to which I failed out of this slink cannot be overstated. When Bebe calls me, I turn him down every time even if I have NOTHING else to do that day. This slink feels offensive to like five different groups of people. Nope. Not doing it. Bye.
I thiiiiiiink that's all the ones I have an opinion on. /jazzhands
Say What About:
Yukari: I bounced off her early because she gave me huge Best Friend Who Quietly Hates You vibes. She gets great development in the main story tho so I'm working on hers.
Aigis: Hasn't unlocked.
Mitsuru: IT TOOK ME UNTIL FUCKING, WHAT, NOVEMBER TO GRIND ACADEMICS? OH MY GODDDDD the stat threshold for her is literally just to fucking high.
Ryoji: Gave me the creeps so I fully skipped everything after the mandatory unlock!!!! Don't like him!
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Hearing you talk about ME3 really solidifies to me that Bioware really just tends to drop the ball when it comes to their 3rd games in terms of writing. It's not like the 3rd games are bad, persay, but they fall flat compared to their predecessors.
For the dragon age games, I've chalked it up to EA meddling and certain writers leaving the games at the time; I wonder if it's the same for ME3? Maybe the crunch time? Bioware really released some games back to back.
The evaporating of morally grey areas really sucks too, I always felt Bioware removed their teeth from their writing in order to appeal to the mass market in later years.
EX: Dragon Age got a whole lot less darker with Inquisition
Damn, now I'm worried about liking Dragon Age too much and getting my heart broken by the sequel games.
The problem is that they take steps back a lot, never commit to something and end up ereasing what they've built. It's like removing the things that made them unique just to follow the current trends of that time, which by now have aged like milk and It just makes me confused on why they flipped a switch so suddenly.
In ME1, it's a military game so you assume they'll portray the military and police as the heros saving the galaxy with no corporation right? Especially with how old the game is.
But they don't, they make you think that they do at the start but then flip a switch and show you the bad things too. How a lot of time the military does more harm than good.
In the ending of the game, they especially resonate that point to you with a big reveal. It builds up perfectly to the second game where you go rogue and help an organisation called cerberus that is independently funded and looks out for the well being for all humans.
They achieve progess because they are devoid of politics, it's mission and straight to action and making the best choice you can for the future of humans. In the first game you've only heard of them and stopped some unethical operations they had around.
They're not like the maifa, they're not in it for the money. But they stay in the grey zone a lot. They kill, they fund unethical experiments and only pull the plug if it becomes too unethical and croses the line into evil.
They saved you and gave you everything in the second game and asked for nothing in return but for you to do your damn job and stop the threat on humanity. Afterwards each of you go your seperate ways when the mission ends.
In the third game, you go back to the alliance and you're framed as a traitor for joining cerberus even tho it was the alliance who refused to take you seriously before.
Even when the threat turned out to be real. And you did publicly save everyone's ass, they're still like "bu buhh but you did it with the baddies!"
The alliance is again framed as the hero, Cerberus gets reduced to evil goons who torture for fun and are all power-hungry and the alliance can do no wrong how dare you question the heros of the army.
It's just.....disappointing. they've taken ten steps back and invalidated both the second and first games.
Also it's glitchy and buggy, it's unfinished. The first two games let you explore new spaces and ships on your own pace, in the third game you're dragged from tutorial to tutorial with a barrage of information.
Progress is less organic, combat is more clunky because they added RE and AC movesets with the rolling, stealth kills and survival priority over combat.
The characters look so ugly- the facial expressions are so weird and your face clips a lot. It's like a rough first animation that needs to be toned down because why am I glaring with spock like eyebrows and why did eyelids clip into my eyes.
There is an annoying vintage filter on the screen, colour is scarce and everything is grey, blue, black and medical white.
The ship is where you spend most of your time when not in missions, it used to be so beautiful and sleek smooth. Stars and futuristic technology. Now it's all gross military base with cables on the ground, dim lighting and empty spaces where decoration used to be. It's greasy at best, who the fuck stole the ceiling boblights I just wanna talk.
This is just sad, I talked so passionately about the first game because I genuinely was impressed. The second game had its flaws, mostly with the story and pacing, but everything else was good! They were turning things around and getting innovative, if you ignore the RE virus slowly spreading.
Now it's like, rather than design a new ship they pissed on the second game's ship and handed it back to you, yellow lights and everything. After robbing it and trashing the place.
I have a theory bc I'm at the start of the game but I might be just coping- what if they ship gets cleaner the more I progress? The construction parts will be gone right? They'll pick up their trash and dirty dishes right? RIGHT? I'M NOT COPING RIGHT?
.
They made companions after mission talks happen without cutscenes and now they're like npcs. Imagine if Lae'zel spoke to you each time you talked to her like the party banter instead of an actual face to face conversation.
Which is so weird because they had the face to face conversation since the first game so why did they remove it???
Resident FUCKING evil does not have it.
It explains the annoyiny cutscenes after cutscene that I can't skip, the bloated dialogue.
They took my eyelashes :(
They took away my ability to speak to people in conversations :(
They took away my clean pristine ship :(
They took away my hero statues and now people in the news hate me :(
They took away my ability to explore freely because the reapers are on my tail 24/7 :(
They took away Ashley :(
But hey. My sniper can shoot three times before reloading now so. There is. That.
Yay.
YET A SINGLE CLIP ONLY HAS 2 BULLETS WHAT WERE YOU THINKING PEOPLE.
Thanks for listening I actually feel better telling someone, I can't wait to play dragonage. Modern game standards I miss you please come back.
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18 22 27 for asks
I hope you're having a good day 😊
oh gosh thank you so much. I hope you are too!!
18. What's one of your favorite lines you've written in a fic?
Oh wow. This is a cool question. But now I have to think back quite a ways hahaha. There are some lines I'm proud of in more recent fics but one of the first lines I felt pretty good about was back in my Dragon Age days. Well, okay, it's several lines; I have a bad habit of interlocking the point through a lot of different phrases. But anyway, this was for a minibang fic I wrote for Inquisition, Dorian/Bull, set during Trespasser: To Have and to Hold. It's a lot of Dorian reflecting on his idea of love, and marriage, and where that fits in his future. The lines are:
Tevinter is not a land that gives hope to men who cannot--will not--pretend. Men who are, for better or worse, quite immutably themselves. And love is, in the end, as illicit as it is elusive. As perilous as it is pointless. Love is not for legacies.
22. Do you know how your fic will end before you start writing?
Oooh. Often yes, but just as often, no. Maybe more accurate to say a lot of the time I'll have an idea of an end, but it rarely ends exactly as I plan, even oneshots. I write like I'm telling myself the story so I like just getting swept up in it and letting it surprise me. But if I really have no idea, it can be frustrating. My current WIP, The Eye of the Storm, for example: I knew ultimately I wanted to end it with Fallout 4's in-game main quest end, but I had no idea how I wanted to get there. And that's contributed a lot to the much slower writing process than with its predecessor. A Line in the Sand just came bursting out. It also did not end the way I planned. It has some of the bones of the original idea, but it was a very different evolution. And I'm glad!
27. Is there a fic you were nervous to post/share? Why?
All of them make me nervous to share. It's hard putting yourself out there creatively and never really being sure what's going to draw people in and what isn't. I guess the one that made me the most nervous was Chapter 13 (fittingly) of A Line in the Sand. There's kind of a big setback to the romance at the midway point that I was very afraid would make people stop reading.
[Send me a number and I'll answer questions about writing! 💜]
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Writer's Game
Writer's Game: First Sentences
Rules: post the first sentence of your last ten fics. If you haven't written ten fics, share as many first-sentences as you have.
Tagged by @theepicreboot
I don't have many people, but I'll tag the ones I do that haven't done this! Tagging @hawksongwrites, @dragons-bones, @punchelf, @wickedwildsurge, @gunbun, and anyone who stumbles upon this in the wild.
From top to bottom of my posting order on AO3, the last 10 fics I've got. Behold the sheer diversity of what comes out of my noggin. My it's a lot of isekai. Please mind the tags, as they may not be for everybody and I am very much a DD:DNE writer.
La Lapine et le Dragon - FFXIV. Rated E, WoL/Estinien. An AU erotic retelling of Beaumont's La Belle et la Bête with inspiration from the Epic of Gilgamesh. Featuring a Nidhogg-possessed Estinien as the Beast and the Warrior of Light as Belle. Multi-chapter, WiP.
The Dragonsong War began by man’s greed and ended by man’s ultimate sacrifice.
2. everything he can lay his hands on - FFXIV. Rated E, Erenville/Estinien. The saga of an irritated gleaner who just wants to go home and have a cup of coffee and the brat of a dragoon who decided ‘yes, this one seems good’ and just keeps on testing his limits. One shot, complete.
To be a gleaner was to be perpetually tired.
3. on a grave of yellow flowers - S and D Tier. Rated E, S Tier/D Tier, by nature of the fandom can be read entirely fandom blind. AU Hanahaki wherein D Tier has Hanahaki Disease because of S Tier. One shot, complete.
The masses dubbed him Nyarlathotep, the Crawling Chaos, God of a Thousand Forms, Stalker Among the Stars, the super villain that made other super villains look like jokes, mass murderer, a blight upon humanity.
4. let me treasure you - FFXIV. Rated E, Estinien/Tataru. One shot, complete.
He doesn’t understand how they can’t see it.
5. PF [Duty Completion] That One Meme - FFXIV. Rated M, eventual G'raha Tia/OC or Thancred/OC. The bulk of my life, the isekai fic featuring one FF14 player stuck in the body of her WoL, doing the most to try to change what she thinks are the bad parts of the plot and save the day. Results may vary. Multi-chapter, WiP.
“Left, left, go left motherfucker,” she hissed, knees crossed on her chair as her fingers all but flew across the keyboard, one hand still on her mouse to click and scroll as necessary.
6. Made of Star Stuff - League of Legends. Rated E, Viego/Reader Insert. Featuring a defined reader character who dies and is stuck with her soul in a pond made of stars and souls. Multi-chapter, complete.
It's cold.
7. Grading and You - My Hero Academia/Boku no Hero Academia. Rated T, Reader Insert & Toshinori Yagi/All Might. Gift fic. One shot, complete.
You're pretty sure this isn't how your day was supposed to go.
8. Oops, Wrong Genre - League of Legends. Rated E, Sett/Reader Insert. Genre-savvy modern-day woman isekai'd into Runeterra, thinks she's got it but hasn't got a clue. Accidentally a fight club membership. Multi-chapter, complete.
This is, irrefutably, a spectacularly awful dream ripped straight out of an anime.
9. The Paperwork Has Paperwork - My Hero Academia/Boku no Hero Academia. Rated T, Aizawa/OC. Featuring a police secretary who is underpaid and overworked, hates the hero population for giving her more work, and idolizes Eraserhead as the pinnacle of heroic perfection for his swift and perfect paperwork skills. Doesn't hurt that it turns out he's attractive in person. Multi-chapter, WiP.
Heroes, as a whole, were the most irresponsible wastes of oxygen to walk the face of the planet.
10. I Want To Be Your Canary - Dragon Age: Inquisition. Rated E, eventual Cullen/OC. Modern Character in Thedas, where the main protagonist is a mage stuck in her own botched spellwork and turned into a bird-woman because of it. Multi-chapter, eternal hiatus.
They say that being a hero in your own story meant being the villain in someone else’s.
#writer games#ffxiv#s and d tier#league of legends#my hero academia#ffxiv fanfiction#fanfic#thanks for tagging me!
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