#Harding

[nadas-dirthalen]

Dragon Age: the Veilguard Was Packed with Lore — But Many of Us Overlooked It

— PART ONE —

Welcome back, friends and travellers. If you've been here a while, you'll know that I wrote 30,000 words of predictions in the week and a half before DA:tV released. But here's the most surprising thing—I was right, for the most part.

I spent my first Veilguard playthrough grinning (and then sobbing) at all the lore reveals. And here's the thing: I think most of us missed a lot of them, including even me.

So let's begin with...

Titans: Dark and Light, Compassion and Rage, the Eternal Hymn and its Endless Listeners (1/2)

This is your warning: This post will contain spoilers for the entirety of Dragon Age: the Veilguard, and all Dragon Age content made before Veilguard.

Alright, pals. If you've been here a while, you know how this goes. I always start by listing what we're going to cover, like anyone who's never fully recovered from academia.

Today's Discussion:

What Veilguard (Re)Taught Us about the Titans

The Titans the first Shapers of the known world.

The Titans are beings of the Abyss.

The Titans are sleeping, dormant—but alive.

Dwarves are the Titans' children, created to tend them.

The Evanuris mined the Titans' bodies to create people.

The Titans—the Earth—fought back.

What Veilguard (Re)Taught Us about the Titans

The best thing about Dragon Age, as someone who loves the series to death, is that its worldbuilding is consistent, but also bears the unique quality that we, as players, are not aware of it all. Our protagonists in each game don't know everything; the people they learn from also don't know everything. We learn what we can through codices that are all biased and need an extra layer of decoding. This is a feature, not a bug.

It also means that we did not know how to understand the Titans before. Even my 30,000 words of theorycrafting, especially my piece all about the Titans, had elements of speculation. I had to check that speculation against other sources like the Chant of Light, which is a source that we REALLY did not know how to decode when it was revealed piece by piece in DAO, DA2, World of Thedas, and Inquisition.

Here, I'm going to break it all down, piece by piece.

The Titans were the first Shapers of the (known) world.

It is said in the Descent DLC that Titans are enormous beings whose singing shapes the world. Their existence predates much of Thedas, if not all of it. The Titans are called the first Shapers for this reason, and in Veilguard it is restated several times over that they did, indeed, shape the world—for instance, by Cole in Inquisition.

"Their ancient shapers were mountains drawn of all their wills, walking their memories into valleys of the world." —Cole dialogue.

Inquisition told us so much more about the Titans than just that, though. The Titans have a realm all their own, a counterpart to the Fade, mentioned over and again in the Chant of Light and referenced as a quest name in Inquisition.

Here lies the abyss: the well of all souls.

The Titans are beings of the Abyss.

Now, it's important that I mention right here that the Chant of Light has existed long before Inquisition. In fact, its tale is what opens DA:O as the game begins. Recently Eurogamer stated that BioWare has had a massive lore document for the 20+ years of its existence, and I believe that there is no truer example of this than in the Chant of Light itself.

The Abyss, for a long time, was a mystery to us. Inquisition cleared it up a lot—not only with its game content, but with World of Thedas' publication shortly thereafter.

Not only is the Abyss referred to in many elven codices, but we go there. The key locations of the Descent DLC—the Forgotten Caverns, Bastion of the Pure, and the Wellspring—are in a region called the Uncharted Abyss.

Now, with Harding, we go deeper into the Deep Roads than the average dweller. The same is true in that instance: venture down far enough, and we reach a Titan's heart.

We find a Titan's heart there. But the Titan does not wake—none have before DA:tV, and even then, they have not fully woken. Because, for as long as we have known...

The Titans are sleeping, dormant—but alive.

"It's singing. A they that's an it that's asleep, but still making music." — Cole dialogue.

There is so much Cole dialogue in Inquisition that speaks on the sleeping Titans, on their old songs that once sang the same, on how they will never wake up, that it would be folly to try and post every codex here. Suffice it to say: Cole knows of the Titans, knows of their songs, and knows they are asleep. He is one of the pathways to our knowledge of the Titans in Inquisition, and his words are peppered throughout the game.

The Chant of Light also makes reference to a mountainous Maker, who oft speaks about a forgotten mountain. When Andraste meets the Maker "in darkness unbroken," specifically, these words are used:

The Maker Appears to Andraste (7) Eyes sorrow-blinded, in darkness unbroken There 'pon the mountain, a voice answered my call. "Heart that is broken, beats still unceasing, An ocean of sorrow does nobody drown. — Andraste 1:7

Heart that is broken, beats still unceasing — a being who has been broken, but whose heart still beats. We can hear that, in the Descent DLC.

Veilguard confirms that both sources are true through Harding, her personal quest, and the codices for the Dwarven people.

Records that exist outside of Orzammar mention "great sleeping Titans" and "the First Ancestors." — Codex Entry: Harding's Notes: Orzammar and Titans

Harding's experiences in Veilguard, in this way, serve to prove Cole right. That is a deliberate narrative choice: BioWare's way of saying, Yes, this is true. Yes, you should take Cole's take on Titans as correct.

We also know, from Cole, that this state of being is permanent. Not only are the Titans asleep, but they don't know how to wake.

Songs screaming far away. It wants to wake up but can't remember how. No one should be here. — Cole dialogue.

This becomes crucial information in Veilguard, and central to the main plot. It serves as the backdrop for what actually matters most to the characters living in Thedas right now, which is...

Dwarves are the Titans' children, created to tend them.

By now, a lot of people have seen this reveal in the art book: the dwarves were created to tend to their Titan hosts/makers. But we knew this before—we just didn't know it in context, and therefore we did not believe it to be objectively true of Thedas.

In truth, we've known about the elves and the dwarves' origin since the Chant of Light came out in full with World of Thedas volume 2.

At last did the Maker From the living world Make men. Immutable, as the substance of the earth, With souls made of dream and idea, hope and fear, Endless possibilities. — Threnodies 5:5

I talk about it in more depth in my Chant of Light dissection, but what this verse says in context is that the dwarves (the Maker's second children) are beings crafted by the maker: bodies made of lyrium, souls made of the same "dream and idea, hope and fear" as the original spirits.

This concept has already been massively hinted toward with both Valta (who has become The Oracle in DA:tV) and Dagna, who both connect to isatunoll during Descent and Inquisition's base game, respectively.

We've known about the Evanuris' horrible crimes since before Inquisition, as well, for the same reason and from the same verses in the Chant of Light.

Until, at last, some of the firstborn said: "Our Father has abandoned us for these lesser things. We have power over heaven. Let us rule over earth as well And become greater gods than our Father." (8) The demons appeared to the children of earth in dreams And named themselves gods, demanding fealty. — Threnodies 5

With the context given to us by Trespasser and Veilguard, we know without a doubt that the Evanuris are those "jealous spirits" that comprise the Maker's first children.

And just like the Chant describes, they sought to conquer the earth: the realm of the Titans.

The Evanuris mined the Titans' bodies to create people.

Trespasser taught us so much of what we needed to know about the Evanuris' and Titans' conflicts. Its codices in the Deep Roads outline how it was Mythal, specifically, creating some of the first elves in the coffins found in that zone. The Temple of Solasan features coffins of the exact same kind.

Ir sa tel'nal Mythal las ma theneras Ir san'a emma Him solas evanuris Da'durgen'lin Banal malas elgara Bellanaris, bellanaris. — Codex: Torn Notebook in the Deep Roads, Section 3

My (updated) translation: Isatunoll Mythal gives you dreams Lyrium within Becomes Solas evanuris Little stone boy You give nothing to the Titan (anymore) Forever, forever.

Trespasser reveals that Mythal mined the bodies of slain titans and rendered their demesne unto the People: she conquered Titans and used their bodies for her own ends. The hints about these actions, however, are not exclusive to Trespasser, nor to Solasan. These seeds were planted all the way back at the Temple of Mythal.

Elgar'nan, Wrath and Thunder, Give us glory. Give us victory, over the Earth that shakes our cities. Strike the usurpers with your lightning. Burn the ground under your gaze. Bring Winged Death against those who throw down our work. Elgar'nan, help us tame the land.

This codex to Elgar'nan makes reference to Elgar'nan giving victory over the Earth (capital-E, the Titans). Trespasser would follow this up with much context—that it was Mythal who was first known to have slain Titans, "rendering their demesne unto the People."

I theorized that Mythal's mining of Titans for lyrium to make elvhen bodies was what angered the Titans, based on codices in Trespasser and the Temple of Solasan. (I go into much more depth there!) Veilguard confirms this theory in Solas' Memory #4: A Memory of Manifestation.

Solas: I have the Fade. Besides, this talk of taking on a solid form. When you took the glowing stone to build your body, did the earth not shake? Mythal: The lyrium gives us the strength we had when we were of the Fade. We are the best of physical and spirit.

Mythal's crime was what took the war with the Titans in a new, darker direction. It was what would set off the chain of events that would change the very nature of the world—and it was foreshadowed, back in Inquisition, by Cole.

The Titans—the Earth—fought back.

"They made bodies from the earth, and the earth was afraid. It fought back, but they made it forget." — Cole dialogue.

In this post, I theorized that it was Solas' creation itself that caused the first Titan to "go red." That is to say, to change its nature and fight back. I used codices from Trespasser and Solasan to get there, as well as one paragraph from World of Thedas and this codex on Fen'Harel that describe the Forgotten Ones as "beings of terror, malice, spite, and pestilence."

Thinking about those words, and specifically terror, I read the codex in the secret Deep Roads room in Trespasser with fresh perspective.

For a moment, the scent of blood fills the air, and there is a vivid image of green vines growing and enveloping a sphere of fire. The vision grows dark. An aeon seems to pass. Then the runes crackle, as if filled with an angry energy. A new vision appears: elves collapsing caverns, sealing the Deep Roads with stone and magic. Terror, heart-pounding, ice-cold, as the last of the spells is cast.

Terror. The first of the turned Titans. The fire/plant/ice imagery also caught my eye, and when I went back to Solasan to check, there were many hints that this was, indeed, where Terror came into being. (For more, go look at the most recently linked post in this section!)

Huge implications for Solas aside, what this codex taught me is that Titans' natures could change. This was confirmed in Veilguard many times over, yes—but my point here is that Inquisition taught this to me, just a few days before I gained the context of Veilguard. This was never a retcon! However, this lore plays exactly to BioWare's rules: we did not have the full context, and so almost no one read that Deep Roads codex as it was meant to be interpreted—including me, the first few times I read it!

It was only when I'd seen the achievement icons before Veilguard's release that it all clicked for me. All of the lore of Inquisition and everything before it made sense. That was never a bug, never a retcon, but a genius twist on BioWare's behalf: one that almost no one guessed at for an entire decade.

One that changes everything.

Titans, we know for certain now, behave as spirits. Obscure hints in World of Thedas, Inquisition, and the previous games have been confirmed in Veilguard. This new understanding changes not just the Titans, not just the dwarves, but reframes everything we know about the entire history of Thedas and how its magic system works.

______

Thank you for reading! It means a lot when people engage with these. And don't worry: I'm not nearly through with them. It's taken me a while to compile everything, but with more of Veilguard added to the wiki every day, it's a lot easier to compile things for these posts!

(Immense thanks to the wiki staff, of course. <3)

Up Next: Titans and Spirits are far more similar than we think, and it means everything.

[aves-rook-laidir]

I can feel myself becoming more and more familiar with DaTV now, like, the characters are becoming more familiar. I find myself thinking about them when I’m going about my day, filling in the gaps of who they are with my own headcanons. Like, did you know Emmrich is deaf in his left ear? He got slammed in his first week of combat training as an Apprentice. He was so annoyed about this that from that point on he worked really hard to practice combat, and to his, and everyone else surprise, was brilliant at it. It’s funny really, that this calm, gentle professor known for floating around picking flowers can knock you off your feet if you test him. Taash was the first to pick up on it, they didn’t bring it up just started fighting on his left.

Or Davrin, he keeps pushing off Bellaras attempts to talk to him about the gods, because he just can’t think about it. If he did it would be like a waterfall. He spent the most formative years of his life caring for Halla in the forest, Ghilan’nain is the Mother of Halla! His clan lived and breathed her worship, whether or not he keeps religion now, her presence is interweaved throughout his childhood, and it was all crap, she was nothing more than a psychopath mage, he can’t think about it.

Hallas make Bellara sneeze, but she denies it.

Lucanis was so overwhelmed that he missed his shot at Weisshaupt it took him nearly a day to utter a word to any of them, he left to be on his own as soon as possible and the moment he was alone he had a panic attack.

Harding often thinks back to Haven, and when the inquisition was just stating out. How she had thought back then that Varric and Solas were old friends, they way they walked together in the hinterlands, chatting about nothing in particular, felt so…comfortable. She misses those days terribly.

Neve didn’t lose her leg in some fantastic battle against the Venatori or a Dragon fight, she was just born without it. Sometimes people are just born different.

When Rook awoke from Solas telling her the truth about the Archdemons, she was so stunned and in shock that when she walked down the stairs to discuss with the others, she fell down them much to everyone’s alarm.

Having to fight a dragon in Treviso almost immediately after meeting cemented a close connection between Rook and Davrin, literally thrown into hell together.

Dorian was the only one able to get anywhere close to that dragon in Minrathos, managed to get a hit square in its eye, but it wasn’t enough. The Iron Bull was in the city the week before, but by the time the dragon attacked he was halfway to the Free Marches.

They all regularly play cards and games around the dining room table.

Taash keeps a small sketchbook on them where they likes to draw all the dragons they meets, they also pets every dog and cat they come across. They sneak hugs from Assan when they think no one is looking.

Emmrich gets Bellara to talk academic theory with him a lot as a form of distraction because he knows she lies awake at night having a never ending crisis of faith.

Bellara often worries and frets that Lucanis isn’t eating enough even though he’s feeding everyone. Lucanis worries the same thing about her.

Lucanis is dyslexic as fuck got really self conscious about how long it was taking him to read one of Neves novels, well, until he realised he literally wasn’t being judge at all actually.

Harding grows elf root to smoke it. Dream blunt rotation to be honest.

Communicating with the dead the way Emmrich does is harder than it looks, it takes a lot of stamina and if the connection is held for too long he’s prone to nosebleeds.

They spar and practice combat in the courtyard in front of the dining hall, usually one v one with the others sitting on the steps watching. Neve keeps encouraging them to take bets.

When Aves sleeps on the green couch, she often wakes up to find Assan curled up nearby. Either that or Emmrich hovering over her because she was screaming in her sleep again and he could hear her in the next room.

Taash and Bellara I’m still working on.

[thedissonantverses]

Davrin or Harding: Is it Arbitrary?

No, of course it isn’t. This whole blog got started because I want to bring recognition to how the gameplay decisions work with the narrative. Also, I don’t feel comfortable as a white-passing Hispanic to get into if it’s racist or not. I think we’re probably all the on the same page about is Davrin’s VA as well. I’m not here to talk over anyone, I just want to share why I love this as a story moment. If you’d like to correct me please do! As with everything I write here it’s meant to be a conversation starter.

Anyways, I am still not over it. Not only because this game gave me, a certified dirtbag and queer woman not one but two outdoorsy romantic interests which is incredibly unfair.

All joking aside, let’s talk about what these two characters represent. Learning from the mistakes of the path to build a better future is one of the central themes of Veilguard.

Lace Harding. Her name represents something soft and delicate in combination with strength which is representative of her whole personality. She’s a bad ass already. She was with the Inquisition for ten years. She’s helping Varric track down the elven god of lies, trickery, and rebellion, depending on the story. Everything she goes through from the Inquisition’s formation to the time of the final battle can be linked back to Evanuris meddling. She is the dwarves, they’re kindness and strength and anger even when she didn’t know it. An avatar. A paragon. She respresents a future where the Titans, and the dwarves, have their dreams returned.

Davrin(I don’t think he has a last name??) is a Grey Warden who is also a bad ass. He’s worked his whole life towards the goal of being a weapon, joining the Wardens voluntarily so that he’s a killer with a purpose by his own admission. He’s a hard man, forged so by necessity. But, he’s the inverse of Harding, who presents a soft interior but with a steel spine. Davrin’s heart is softened by his partnership and love of Assan. He’s a Dalish man and a Warden, both of which are groups that developed in response to what the Evanuris did to break the world. He represents the future of the Wardens and Thedas by being the father of the griffons. A future where the Blight won’t shape the people of Thedas, but one where the people of Thedas will carve out their own, better, future.

When it comes to the decision to kill either character, it is not supposed to be easy. It is supposed to feel like a hard choice, and the reason it is so difficult to decide is because you know, either way, you’re sacrificing someone who has already given up everything to put an end to the Evanuris. Someone who has been shaped by the centuries of torment Solas and Mythal unleashed. Someone who represents what the future might look like. It’s an impossible, terrible call, and someone has to make it to ensure that better future for the world.

Davrin and Lace are presented because once more the past requires another sacrifice to put it to rest. While that’s cold comfort to the survivors, they don’t die in vain. There are times you have to give up everything to make the world a better place.

I know they’re both my heroes. I know I will always cry choosing between them, because they’re my friends and sometimes my lover. I hope the choice never becomes easy.

I also know that like Davrin and Lace, I would give up anything and everything to ensure the future is a better place.

[lostiel]

dragon age the veilguard | progression deep dive

[gabrielcrossleyart]

Here's a Harding portrait! Figured it was about time I drew her!

[drathe]

Dragon Age: The Veilguard DA Keep tiles <3

[maia-beans]

Veiltober - day 9, Harding

HARDING!! Our fav flirt. Fav rogue. Fav everything!! I can't freaking wait to see where her ark goes with all the dwarf stuff.... I'm foaming at the mouth to find out vuzrehbohbortbhtpuyfuduhkjhfj

Enjoy her looking fierce!

Prompts come from sweet sweet @lynnerdo

Bye!

[maythedreadwolftakeyou]

Ranking the Veilguard companions Hookup Potential based on the kind of bed situation they have going on in the Lighthouse

(im in early act 2 so have no idea what further romance scenes are actually like, this is just jokin time without any romance spoilers. just pics of how their respective rooms in the lighthouse look and some basic characterization we know about them)

Taash: 8/10

In another game or the real world I would only rate this a 5 because they have no pillows or addition blankets. however they do have a real bedframe AND it's big enough for 2 which means the they are doing better than 90% of the rest of the Veilguard so this score gets boosted. And while there's not many blankets, there are plenty of braziers around the room to keep you warm, and Taash is probably their own miniature furnace to cuddle up to. Crucially, they also have a whole wheel of cheese next to the bed, which means you don't even have to leave the covers to get a snack after.

Lucanis: 1/10

Oh no. I'm not even going to comment on the pantry angle because everyone else asks him about that to begin with, so this is just about the bed. Unfortunately the bed is a cot made of uneven wooden planks with some blankets on top of it, and is only wide enough for 1. This is because Lucanis hates sleeping and doesn't want to do it, so the less tempting his bed is, the better for him. Unfortunately this means sleepover potential is dreadful and you will have to find alternate solutions. He does at least have another blanket to go over him and one that's presumably being used as a pillow, so, he gets a 1 instead of a 0, but I am still planning on gifting him coupons for a back massage for Satinalia.

Bellara: 4/10

This setup is perfectly fine for sleeping. It's the lighthouse standard little bed couch thing, has a mattress/cushion, is elevated off the floor, has a pillow, and she's got her blankets folded below. Perfectly serviceable for getting a good night's rest which we know Bellara is not because she forgot to sleep again. However, it's very much a one person sized setup. You might be able to cuddle for a while but if one of you unconsciously tries to roll over you are going right to the floor. Ouch.

Lace Harding: 5/10

You might be wondring "why is sleeping on the floor rated higher than bellara's" and the answer is because this means you are not rolling off the bed onto the floor. it's not going to be comfy but we are not ranking comfort here we're ranking sleepover potential. Harding has managed to make this space look homey and the canopy gives the illusion of being in a tent or canopy bed to help with that illusion. There are rugs down on the floor plus the blankets and pillows--we know Harding is used to sleeping on the ground due to her career as a scout, and I'm sure she can scrounge up more blankets to make the cushioning big enough for the both of you. Your back WILL hurt in the morning but you'll get to have a fun night first.

Neve: 3/10

Girl I know you can do better than this. Which means you're not trying to on purpose, so, live your life I guess. I will say this cot IS bounds nicer than Lucanis's--you can see its a stretched canvas or hide on a frame rather than wooden planks, so it will have a little more give. However they are not THAT much comfier which I know having slept on this modern equivalent many times. Neve also apparently has 0 pillows or blankets so you're out of luck there, as well as the problem of it only being wide enough for 1 again. This woman has too many other things going on to think about romance so your Rook is going to be the one improvising on that matter I think.

Davrin: 10/10

Now here is a man who has his life together. Double or queen size mattress, rustic bed frame he probably lovingly carved and assembled himself by hand, and not only are there sheets AND blankets AND pillows, they are are full on matching set and this knight in shining armor dutifully makes the bed every morning. There's also enough pillows for two! While the remains of a giant corpse is hanging above you all night, the spacing of the ribs still gives you lots of room above to manouver, so just don't worry about that. As a bonus you'll probably even have a baby griffon come to cuddle in the night which is such a cute thought we're going to ignore how much worse getting stepped on by a griffon foot would be than even the biggest fattest housecat trying to stand on your stomach at 4:30am. My one criticism of the setup here is that due to the bed's positioning if the person on the inside needs to get up in the night they'll have to awkwardly crawl over the person on the outside, however everyone else's bed situation is so dismal I'm not even going to subtract a point for that. Great work Davrin.

Emmrich: ???/10

Where... does this man sleep. Peepaw I KNOW you can't be sitting in that armchair all night you need your beauty rest!!! There are 0 beds or cots or floor blankets in this man's room. HOW am I supposed to break his pelvis if he has nowhere for us to lie down??? We can't risk that old man's spine on the cobblestone.

Wait... unless. No, surly not. I mean--jk. Unless...? 😳😳😳

is daddy necromancer gonna fuck me on the sacrifice slab... 😳😳😳🥵🥵🥵

Bonus:

Solas 11/10

does not matter where he actually slept bc once my inquisitor Gets Him again they WILL be fucking on top of the piano in front of the mural in his Yearning Room

[trueteashoe]

Day 9 of #Veiltober - Harding! Looks like Harding might have something for you... 👀

[ymbrynae]

I love new Harding design 🥰

Keep posting Dragon Age Veilguard meme

[bemp0]

After work hours

[beaulesbian]

harding & lucanis finding a common topic to talk about their weird dreams is so funny

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[aves-rook-laidir]

The way I CRIED when Hardings hero armour was revealed to be a simple Inquisition Scout armour?? No no, you see, I LOVE that armour and would craft it as soon as I could in new playthroughs, my Lavellans old official portrait that I painted in like 2018 was her in that armour. I was always so disappointed that there was no Transmog system for armour for DAI so I could continue wearing the pretty low level looks throughout the game.

[point-maitimo]

Scout Lace Harding! I was surprised to see her among the new companions, but I like her, so it's cool that we'll be able to get to know her better. And those freckles… what a beauty!

[lostiel]

Harding: This is where people come when they dream. But dwarves don't dream…