bpd-anders

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be the change u wish to see & etc. so dragon age fandom please reblog/reply with your transfem headcanons for canonically male nonmage characters in the franchise. i’ll start: alistair “it has to be a pretty dress” theirin & sten (i will not elaborate)

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Cursed to draw this wicked being 100 times

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i think about that "they hated that blond freak so much they nuked his entire profession" post constantly because just double checking. we all agree thats why they changed mythal's virtue from justice/vengeance to benevolence/retribution right

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yeag

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i'm sorry but the "da fandom is a little racist BUT veilguard holds most of the blame for making davrin so irrelevent in the game" excuse is the weakest shit i've ever heard. no actually i genuinely think this is almost exclusively a fandom issue. like i won't argue that the "davrin vs harding choice is reliant on assan" shit john epler pushed was unbelievably racist and i won't argue that there's merit to the fact that it was tone deaf at Best to have the black man's character arc so reliant on his animal companion but i'm sorry you cannot fucking convince me that the "knight in shining armor with a gentle heart and a cute animal companion that takes you out on picnic dates and carves you little wooden trinkets" character is not almost Perfectly Engineered to be the most popular romance option in any game ever and yes i fully believe the only reason he isn't is entirely hinged on the fact that he's black and no amount of whataboutism towards the devs can convince me otherwise

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what if the left and right hand of the divine uhhhh clasped dude

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They’re gonna be weird about it.

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varric tethras woke up and put on his cock ring necklace and red tunic. he threw his hair up into a messy bun and came downstairs.

"pack your things bitch! i sold you for red lyrium money" said hawke from the kitchen table, cigarette in hand.

"what? you're a horrible person!"

"well i love red lyrium and i hate you!" said hawke. varric felt something hard hit the back of his head. hawke had thrown a copy of hard in hightown at him. varric ran for the door.

"hawke, he's trying to run away!" screamed anders as he grabbed varric. he was also smoking a red lyrium cigarette. when varric opened the door there was a beautiful butch lesbian standing there with a bald guy and a person with a glowing hand.

"ello, love! we're your new owners! i'm cassandra" said the beautiful butch.

"aren't you those losers from that stupid inquisition? there's no way i'm going with you!" varric turned to run away. the green hand one gestured to the bald guy, who started telling stories about the fade in extreme detail. it was so boring it started putting varric to sleep.

"thanks for taking him off my hands, inquisitor! goodbye, slut!" hawke laughed. it was the last thing varric heard before the bald guy's iambic pentameter made him pass out.

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no other game in the world is laced with anything nearly as addictive as whatever the fuck dragon age 2 is laced with. kirkwall is a shitty evil flop city and i will never ever leave it

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"Why are you complaining about not having evil options? I know that none of you play evil/the majority of people play good characters anyway."

Most good RPGs won't just give you an evil choice and a good choice. Usually it'll be a sliding scale of assholery, and usually there will be a decent enough in-universe reason to do something "evil".

A good enough writing/dev team will make it very tempting to pick a shitty option, be it through gameplay advantages or character motivation. Some games get away with just making it fun/unhinged to be a dickhead (Mass Effect Renegade Shep comes to mind, as they objectively get a "worse" mechanical outcome at the end of the trilogy, but plenty of people still maintain it's the best way to play). WotR gives you enough wacky chaotic options that playing a goody two-shoes makes me feel like I'm missing out.

I actually think that having bad options presented to the player makes the choice to be good all the more rewarding? Like when I see just how much of a shithead I could make my character, what truly cruel and unhinged things they could say, that makes it more meaningful when they don't? Ya know? I could be evil but I choose not to? In games where I'm placed in a position of power? Imagine that. Not picking those options is just as much of a power fantasy as anything else, to me.

You can be good without being nice. Games aren't great at this distinction yet, but being able to be sassy or stoic or rude while still making "good" choices is very much a part of roleplaying. I don't have many "evil" OCs (aside from my original work), but all my OCs are good in different ways. Some of them are just barely good enough to not be evil.

Sometimes one "evil" choice presented can fit an OC that is otherwise a disinclined to do bad shit, just because it better aligns with their personal morality. So even if I don't play a wholly "evil" OC who picks every "evil" choice, I can still play somebody who's unique and complex. Or at the very least somebody who makes mistakes? Like people do?

Replayability? In an RPG?? Might be important? Yes most people don't play evil ... for their first run. But people who replay games, and particularly RPG players, will make multiple characters/runs, and the existence of different options makes the prospect much more rewarding.

Idk man. There's like a bajillion reasons that players who only play good guys should still want the options to be shitty in their games. And a bajillion more for why they should exist in roleplaying games in particular.

Just my onion though.

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(absolute destiny apocalypse bass boosted)

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I can see people think I’m being too harsh but as a writer with a degree in this shit they did not have to write that game the way they did. They did not have to do any of that. They could have written differently within the constraints they’ve laid out and made a much better and more cohesive story. They made their bed and now they have to lie in it and put up with the valid critique people have of the writing decisions they made. Taking critique is a major part of writing. They are all adults who have worked in this industry before. They should be able to look at criticism and understand where it’s coming from and take it as not a personal attack bc not all of it is.

I’m also a professional in an adjacent industry. They’re big boys and girls and people. If they can’t handle the criticism they should find somewhere else to work.

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they had no business making him this cute in awakening