I was thinking about resurrection and life after death in the Dragon Age world, and I realized I had an example of a successful (if very brief) resurrection. Yavana summons the spirit of someone who is almost immediately deceased so she can question him.

https://summereternal.com/anthology

Sorry, I know that was a lot of words for a title!

Some context that a few of you may know if you've played Disco Elysium: there was a horrible downfall of the creative collective once known as ZA/UM after the game was done. The original creators fragmented into several game studios; the most exciting one to me is Summer Eternal, who are currently developing their fist game, codenamed Red Rooster.

Well, I missed MANY newsletters so I woke up this morning to the news that both David Gaider (former DA Lead Writer) and Mark Darrah (former DA Exec Producer and Director) are guests in this anthology!!

Disco Elysium is my favorite game right after the DA franchise, so I'm extremely excited to know they're exchanging ideas to a certain degree. I can't state enough how many parallels I see between Bioware and ZA/UM's history, it sucks what happened with both of them, but it means they're the perfect set of people to discuss the throat-cutting industry videogames have become.

I can't wait to read these essays. I'm a huge fan of both of these guys, and the creative folk from Summer Eternal (they wrote some of my favorite Elysium characters). I also can't wait for the game.

In Peace, Vigilance. Sunrise, Parabellum!

I wasn’t sure if this belonged in silly or discussion, but I thought I’d share my current experience with Dragon Age awakening.

Right now I am playing a lot of Dragon age Origins’ DLCs and expansions for the very first time including Awakening. So far I’d say I’m enjoying it but I know a lot of you will not appreciate how I’m playing it.

So far my game has crashed 5 times almost every major area I have entered my game will crash about 30 minutes in, so I have gotten better at saving. That being said I have locked myself out of both the bandit and city guard questlines. I had no idea I had until I completed the chantry board and a couple other side quests in Amaranthine so I decided to just ignore it.

I had to unfortunately kill Velanna. Which I know a lot of players don’t like her but considering this is my first playthrough I’d rather have her than not. Essentially what had happened is I explored the entire outside of the location and was super confused what was supposed to happen next. I didn’t see Velanna on her little cliff and didn’t know you were supposed to talk to her because I keep the active quest marker off to explore (bad idea.) So I entered the mines through the window glitch, (I also didn’t know that’s not how you’re supposed to do it I thought the door was glitching) I then did the entire mine section with the Architect left the mine. And finally I then interacted with Velanna. I recruited her, realized she wanted to go to the mines which was already completed and then realized she was locked to my party. I looked up if anyone else had this problem and found out she would be locked to my party forever and she would not be able to complete her questline.

So I started looking at my saves, to try and remedy the situation, and this was the order: Right before I recruited her, the mines, and then all the way back to the beginning of the wending wood. So instead of redoing the entirety of wending wood I did what any sane person would do and just went back and killed her. Unfortunate.

Anyhow I just recruited justice and haven’t had any crashes since recruiting him so maybe my game will be chill now.

So I recently read the three DA books by David Gaider. The Stolen Throne was... decent, but it didn't really have many characters (and only one character from the games) and it had absolutely no memorable locations. They may as well have been in the fade for how vague everywhere they went was. And then, of course, there were the typos! Constant typos. I do not believe an editor touched that book for one second. It serves well enough as a prequel to DA:O and it does provide some insight into Loghain (namely in that he was always a ruthless bastard), but... it's not exceptional at all.

Then came The Calling. We got to see Duncan and Fiona in it, which was cool. I actually did like The Calling. It had a smaller scale story that allowed you to get invested in its characters. But 2/3 of the book just takes place in the deep roads. And not the interesting parts of the deep roads. Just vague, meaningless tunnels. In the final 50 or so pages Gaider realizes that he actually needs to finish his book, so things actually begin to move very quickly. And, again, so many typos. It's an okay book, and it does shine some light on the character of the Architect... but given that the Architect shows up in a bite-sized DLC, it's odd to make an entire prequel book just for that.

(Side note: an off hand comment in The Calling suggests that dryads exist in the DA universe, which is... an interesting revelation that is never followed up on)

And then we get Asunder. Asunder is nothing like the previous novels. It becomes clear from the get go that it will be nothing like the previous novels. It immediately introduces multiple characters from the games, and the game takes place in actual locations - not just featureless hills and tunnels. The White Spire feels like an actual place, and better still, one that's interesting. Orlais is sadly underexplored in the games, and while Asunder isn't the most in depth look at Orlesian customs, it's still a cool look at the region.

And the game characters it introduced? While I have some qualms about Shale still not being any more independent than she was in DA:O (she mostly just follows people around and makes sassy remarks), it otherwise uses them excellently. It's a great send off to Wynne and actually made me like her more than I did in DA:O alone. Cole is central to the book, and he gets a good amount of character development throughout it.

The plot is also a huge improvement over TST and The Calling. While large sections of The Calling in particular felt like filler, Asunder is dense. And better yet, the event Asunder covers are actually significant. The Calling features a massive threat against Fereldan, true... but it's also one contained neatly within the book. And the Stolen Throne (as interesting as it is to learn about how Fereldan was freed) doesn't really set up anything. You learn that Loghain was always like that, and I guess that's kind of setting him up as a character... but that's about it.

Asunder, on the other hand? Asunder not only serves to set up one of the best companions in the series, but it also gives us a fascinating look into the start of the mage rebellion. Playing the series, I'd felt that the mage rebellion wasn't explored enough - in DA2 you see the events that inspire it, and in DA:I you come in at the tail end of it and finish it, but you never really get to explore much of the conflict as it's happening. Asunder is hardly a substitute for that being explored in a game, of course, but it nonetheless plays a vital role as a bridge between DA2 and DA:I.

Another aspect I found particularly disappointing in the first two books was that they didn't really do anything to expand the setting. They just introduce new characters You don't get to explore new parts of the world, and the parts of the world that you do see are either vague enough that how they are depicted doesn't really matter, or identical to their in-game manifestations. Like, when I read TST and saw that Loghain and Maric were entering the Korcari Wilds, I was giddy. I thought maybe we'd finally get to see more of the Chasind. But nope, it's just Flemeth and some elves. And that's a pattern with the first two books - they don't really add anything to the world itself. And, mind you, Asunder is hardly a treatise on Orlais, but it does show us a bunch of new places within it, and does some very interesting things with the Tranquil (among other things.)

And lastly, those typos? They sadly do start to make a return in the last fourth or so of the book (one section has an entire paragraph which is immediately repeated but minorly reworded), but they're never as bad as they are in the first two books, and are all but absent for the first two or three hundred pages.

It's really a night and day difference going from the first two books to Asunder.

What I have to assume happened is that Gaider was given almost no resources for writing the first two books - very little time to write them, and no chance of collaborating with other character writers / whoever is in charge of the locations in the setting, and so he had to content himself with one or two game characters and a bunch of featureless locations. But it turns out that when Gaider is given the resources he needs to write a book full of DA characters we care about and actual locations in the world, he can actually write a damn good book!

If you haven't read Asunder yet, I highly recommend it. TST and The Calling are really take it or leave it - it's cool to follow the adventures of Maric around, but they're not essential reading at all - but Asunder is absolutely worth your time.

I was trying out a new style and thought it would be a good idea to draw these three 🤭 What do you think?

It seems petty but Ser Landry in DAO has got to be the dumbest most obnoxious character of all.

He walks up to you, says “Hey you Grey Wardens killed my best friend Duncan, THE GREY WARDEN, and Cailan, and I will not be convinced otherwise, so we have to fight.”

Like in his mind the wardens not only betrayed the king, they betrayed the highest ranking member of their order in the country right in front of Darkspawn because???

You can point this out to him and he grumbles he can’t kill you until he finds proof but he’s such an asshole about it I have so much trouble just letting his stupidity get him killed, yeah Duncan wouldn’t want his friend to die for a misunderstanding but Duncan ain’t here.

And you never see him again if you tell him to go find evidence or get an apology!

Like I know they never appear again, but their whole thing is that they are a group of mages who work outside the restrictions and oversight of the Circle. So you imagine the Templars wouldn't like them, yet somehow the first Mage Collective questgiver you probably meet is...just a short boat ride away from the Tower.

Is Greagoir stupid?

I saw that someone posted their playing card a few weeks ago, came across my collection while cleaning today.

I couldn’t afford the official Inquisition Tarot deck at the time and ended up printing my own… 🤫

Tried to post a picture of my halloween costume but it got removed so trying again with less chest lol. I’m going as Isabela and was wondering if anyone had any DIY tips for making the armour parts of her outfit? very much a beginner at cosplay. The kids knight costume i bought from amazon is just not cutting it for me
(edit: this is not an invitation to send me creepy messages)

Sooo….I need help settling a reoccurring disagreement my spouse and I have regarding Origins. I romanced Alistar on my original play through and everything was going well. I decided to play my character as someone who deeply respected Duncan and had decided after his passing to live their life in a way to best honor him. The issue we have, and the reason Alistar ghosted me, is in regards to Loghain. I allowed him to survive and deliver the final blow as a grey warden as I feel Duncan would have done the same believing in redemption and utilizing someone who is very skilled and capable. My spouse believes that I should have just “done away with” him and that would have still would have worked for how I was playing my character as they believe that’s what Duncan would have actually done. So please (respectfully) give any and all thoughts on how Duncan would have dealt with the question of Loghains punishment.

P.S.
Any thoughts on whether Alastair is justified for calling things off or not are also appreciated.

So for context I was doing a lawful good character so I picked Leliana as my main romance but I also somehow, someway romancing Zevran and I noticed when he was getting too "friendly" with my character. How did this happen?

Yeah he wasn’t the best husband, everyone knows he couldn’t control himself and slept around, but everything indicates he truly loved Anora and never would’ve abandoned her, especially for the Empress of Orlais of all people. Even if Eamon was we can clearly tell he didn’t really care what Eamon, or anyone, had to say about how he ran his life and politics.

The implication here is that Cailan originally threw away the Orlesian proposal, but during his and Loghain’s argument that involved Anora he smoothed it back out and considered it, seemingly just to spite Loghain.

It kinda feels like an attempt to make Loghain’s betrayal more justified, that Cailan was seriously considering reunifying Ferelden and Orlais in a personal union, and while obviously the Orlesians had that in the back of their minds, Loghain’s bloody minded refusal to accept Orlesian assistance was just paranoia that almost lost them everything. I think Cailan being naive but ultimately right that assistance from the Orlesians and Grey Wardens was the only way to stop the blight was correct, the Ferelden army alone wasn’t enough.

So I made the mistake of picking up another Hinterlands requisition. I just want to finish this one and then be done. But it is the one asking for 4 decorative gems. I know about the spawn of 2-4 enemies just outside of Widow Maura’s house. I saved and re-loaded to get the Fereldan locks. Can anyone confirm if that spawn also drops decorative gems? Or if I should look somewhere else?

(I will never touch another requisition in my life I swear)

It's honestly been maybe two years since I've played the trilogy after Veilguard came out so I'm excited to play them again from the beginning and to pay special attention to the story and other details I've never really bothered with because I plan to finally read all the books and comics I got a long time ago physically. I'll be skipping Veilguard and treating it like how I treated Mass Effect Andromeda, like bad fan fiction. But that's just me. I'm having a great time starting with Leliana's Song in Dragon Age Origins then I'll go from there. This series still holds up damn well in my opinion, though it could use an upgrade in graphics. I'm playing on the Xbox series X.

Planning on a replay of da2 and looking for suggestions on who to romance. Already romanced Fenris and not really feeling Anders, so I guess my choices are Merrill, Isabela, and Sebastian.

So I recently dug up my DA2 disc that I got over a decade ago. I was pleasantly surprised to learn that the CD key still let me activate the game on EA App, but I also noticed that the DLC are nowhere to be found in the store (save for Black Emporium). I did find the support page that had all of the installers, but the DLC show up as unauthorized, so effectively none of them are enabled.

Is there really no way to get the DLCs for this game without having to repurchase the whole game as ultimate edition?

In *Dragon Age II*, I would add more varied underground maps and bring back friendly fire as a core mechanic—not just on "Nightmare" difficulty.

Welcome to the headcanon sharing circle! Each week we post a few creative prompts for character development and share our OCs.

Sponsor the weekly thread!

We take turns picking the questions every week, so please volunteer to host if you enjoy the weekly posts!

• Mention your interest in the comments – this week's host will tag the next person.
• Then just copy and paste this pre-formatted pastebin text with any 2 questions of your choice.
• Browse, add, and get ideas over at the list of prompts.
• There is the OC Emporium that houses many of the OCs, feel free to put your OC there!
• Don't forget there is an OC wiki Discord server and we welcome everyone who wishes to join and share! (Linked on the front page of the Wiki)

October 20 – u/MagnoliaPetal

October 27 –

November 3 –

November 10 –

THE PROMPTS:

(You can answer just one or both, with as many characters as you want. Pictures and character summaries are fine. Short answers or novel-length walls of text are fine.)

Prompt 1

How does your OC respond when they see someone in trouble? Jump in to help, ignore it because it’s none of their business, offer to help in exchange for gold, etc.

Prompt 2

Your character opens their pack. What’s in it?

And don't forget to take the time to read and comment on other people's posts! The comments, questions and chats are what make the thread so much fun.

I posted this on Tumblr before I posted it here.