Character fans you don't "get"

Hoo boy




I think the choice could have been more interesting if we knew Gaspard would commit troops to the Inquisition (since he did invite us to Halamshiral after all and needs an ally to gain the throne) and Celene was wishy washy about committing any troops. Siding with Celene is easier in WEWH but then she doesn't actually appear during the Arbor Wilds and so we have to fight 2x as many enemies. She instead gives us some additional crafting materials or trade routes or something but reserves her troops to regain order in Orlais.

I would have liked more variety in outcomes to major quests other than war table scenarios. I think the game would have had to have a more logistical component to the gameplay and actually count troops and resources when attacking Adamant or the Arbor Wilds and I get this isn't the type of game for that. But then...we shouldn't have been the leader of a growing power if they weren't actually going to involve the Inquisition as a resource.


You leave my Carver out of this! 




I wasn't a huge fan of Oghren, either, and then he got worse in Awakening. I headcanon that he actually contracted the Blight at some point in DAO and so he knew he didn't have much of a choice and joined the Wardens. But wanted to look like a hero rather than just trying to survive, so he didn't tell Felsi or anyone else.

I liked Varric in DA2 but he felt superfluous in DAI and could have been a temporary NPC who arrives at Skyhold like Hawke was.

I think Divine!Leliana, hardened or softened, would prefer to keep Alistair on the throne and control him like a puppet. Just as she suggests doing when Sebastian invades Kirkwall in the war table, she wants to have agents whisper in his ear so that she can control his actions rather than oppose him outright. And Alistair would be fairly easy to manipulate; if she got rid of him, his successor might not be as easy to control, and she certainly wouldn't know them as well as she knows Alistair.

TBF I think DA2 Anders was kind of this. He was an apostate mage who had escaped the Circle a lot (9 times?), then become a Grey Warden to go on and face off against two of the original ancient magisters (Architect and Cory), then become an abomination with a spirit and then become an amazing healer for the Ferelden refugees. I think at least Grey Warden abomination makes him a bit special.

I just find Sebastian so...boring. He doesn't seem like a friend Hawke would actually hang out with unless it's a female Hawke romancing him. His story really feels so separate from what's going on in Kirkwall, it's all about his family and Starkhaven and his role in the Chantry, which is well and good but doesn't IMO serve as a good reflection of Hawke's journey that much. Maybe it's because he was DLC and they had to remove a lot of linking parts of his story before they added him back in as Day One DLC, but he feels a bit disconnected from everything else.

I was all on board with this until you got to Carver! My bby!

But yeah, Shale is overrated, kind of a one note character who serves as the personification of Gaider's sarcasm. She's funny at first but then there's not much more to her character and it becomes old.

Barris is hot but he was also cool because he was one of the few templars who actively wanted to protect mages and joined the templars to help, not oppress. And he questions authority which is rare for a templar.

But yes, also hot.

I usually have Alistair and Anora marry. It feels to me like the most stable option as it feels like how historical political marriages would have occurred in order to join opposing sides together.








Now for me actually thinking of something instead of replying...

I don't get the people who wanted Leliana as a LI in DAI. Their arguments are usually "she's the hottest woman! So unfair I can't bang her!" I will assume that most of those people romanced Morrigan in DAO or haven't played it, otherwise they would get butthurt at themselves for stealing their DAO waifu away from them in DAI. 

Realistically, no NPC who has already been romanceable in a previous game is also going to be romanceable for a new PC! It's not worth the hassle and is definitely going to piss off people who romanced that character before. Plus, Bioware romances usually have one major story line and then things are resolved, so if that character has another romance, it's going to be light in content or else have to be completely different so it doesn't feel like repeating what we've already done. I actually really liked Leliana's DAI story which was about her personal faith and her relationship with Justinia, and that would have been ruined if she had also had a romance. [/spoiler]
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Since some of you mentioned her...Calpernia. I don't get why so many are eager to see her again. Did I miss something somewhere that makes her interesting, like one of the books?

Since you mention him twice in this response post, what is it about him that you like?


This is one of the best descriptions of him I've ever seen. I think his presence might have been justified if the Exalted March expansion were allowed to be made. As it is, his only purpose seems to be the existence of his Act 3 quest, which isn't really about him at all, but rather allows us to meet Leliana and get her (and the Divine's) take on the goings on in Kirkwall, which seems to set things up for the Expansion That Never Was.



You don't say whether you've done the full templar path in DAI, so that undoubtedly helps. I have never done it; I just like the mage path better for various reasons, even though I know the templar path has its merits.

Calpernia is similar to Dorian in that they both want to change Tevinter. However, their views and methods are drastically different. Dorian wants to work within the system to affect change, while Calpernia just wants to blow it up and start from scratch. It would be interesting to see them butt heads on these issues. I think true, lasting change needs a bit of both. But as I said, I haven't done the templar path (I'll get around to it eventually...), so I don't have a personal investment in the character.

As for the romance aspect of it: she is unique looking, which adds to her appeal; she is a mature, competent, strong woman who knows what she wants, which is also appealing to many.

I also don't get the Cullen love. Well, no, I do get it, he's an attractive blond warrior with a sad backstory, but he's never done it for me. I don't think his "redemption" arc, what existed of it, in DAI was sufficient enough to make up for his role in Kirkwall, and it's irritating that you can't seriously call him out for his shady employment history even as a mage. It's all this vague generic Templar angst, instead of addressing the fact that he specifically helped preside over a prison where we, the players, saw actual evidence of innocent people being terribly abused for years. So either he was a shitty Knight Commander who couldn't keep his ducks in a row and see the obvious problems in front of him or he was actively complicit. Neither of those options leads me to believe he should be leading anything for quite a while, let alone the army of the Inquisition.

...lol, I actually don't hate him, but yeah, the way he's written in DAI bothers me.

I'm also not the biggest fan of Dorian but in fairness to him I think it's partly because I've known guys like him in real life and that sort of self-conscious never-ending sarcasm and preening gets very tiring, very fast for me. He also kind of felt like every Gaider writing quirk on steroids at times. I appreciate his story and in small doses he's fine, but overall he left me neutral at best. (That said for the sake of the Dorian fans and since he's the one gay dude we've got I do hope he's in DA4.)

eta I also want to romance the heck out of Calpernia and I'm still salty you only meet her when doing the Templar path since most of my playthroughs are stuck with boring old Samson  

Well, as a Cullen fan (pre-DAI) I can say that we (Cullen fans) got this a lot ("You just like him because he's hot and a knight in shining armor; sort of like assuming all Cullen fans were swooning housewives). DA2 Cullen was a fascinating character. I was in love with the complexities of this character, with the shades of gray morality. 

DAI Cullen basically spit in my face; all the things I loved about the character were brushed under the rug and he genuinely was rewritten into that cliche white knight that makes all the ladies swoon.

Oh, sorry, I was being facetious there, I know there's other reasons to like him, lol. Although I wouldn't blame anyone for liking him for being a bit of a beefcake, either, nothing wrong with appreciating a little eye candy.

I thought he was an interesting mess in DA2, especially considering what had happened to him in DAO, but then DAI seemed so bent on smoothing that all over to make him more palatable. I'd have liked him a lot more as a character if the game had allowed him to be a natural, if remorseful, progression of his DA2 self instead of new and improved right down to his suddenly flat-ironed hair. 

This short story is pretty cool...

Yes.
Plus:

Oh wow that reminds me of that Cullen x Anders dream I once had. It was very sad, as you might imagine