#Inquisitor Elrevas

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Okay, so, I Know enough about The Plot to understand how silly this post could be once I finish what ever the Fuck's at the end of Metaphor, but I AM gonna talk abt what I meant on this finally, because it tickles my brain still, and I think maybe writing it down now and then adding Final Thoughts once I'm post-game will be interesting.

But before I get to Metaphor specifically, I need to talk about RPGs in general, and specifically their Protagonists.

In my mind, there's this sort of... three-setting sliding scale I can affix most Standard RPG Protagonists into, depending on the way the game wants you (as a player and audience member) to interact with the game and its story.

On one end there's the Customizables: Dragon Age, Fallout, Baldur's Gate are first to my mind as examples. Where you are given a canvas to paint a character onto, as a direct avatar to interact with the world. The freedom to make someone in the story, with very few caveats on creativity beyond the worldbuilding (and character creator) itself, all the dialogue choices, several endings to try and account for whatever character you've built.

On the other end are the Signature Characters: the ones that are much like protagonists in other genres and mediums where the story is set, the protagonists that without which the game would not be the same, regardless of your personal input. These are the ones who are established as Characters of Consequence to the story before you ever arrive peering over their shoulder, and your view is filtered primarily through their worldview.

My Ideal character examples here are Neku from TWEWY and Cicero from Masquerada: of Songs and Shadows (which god I miss dearly. and wish got a sequel. badly.)

In the middle are, expectedly, the halvsies, where the Protagonist is already designed without your input, maybe has some excuse or prior background to lead to their Protagonist Potential, but otherwise blank enough you're meant to project onto them on some level rather than relate to or build on top of.

While plenty of other games do this, and even I have my own reservations on calling their protagonists specifically "blank", for our purposes I will call out Persona for this category of Protagonist, because consequently Metaphor's Protag Will fell into this category for me to start with.

Because, I mean, where else would I put him with how much Persona DNA is in Metaphor, right? The fact he's voiced is more novelty than anything by comparison. ...Except, well. Will being voiced turned a feature I'd disliked prior into a strange insight I focused in on.

Elaboration: I mentioned Dragon Age very specifically before because its Protags have a... bumpy history with being voiced, for me. The first one, the Warden, was unvoiced and had a lot of character written in those dialogue choices, making them feel like more even without the voice.

The second, Hawke, had their character customization scaled back vastly compared to the Warden, but this scope also narrowed Hawke into their own character of your making, and often with thanks to the voiced dialogue. Hawke had a few discrepancies between what the dialogue tree would tell you you were saying vs. what Hawke themself would say though, in tone and/or meaning.

This is a problem that plagued me the worst in the third game though, the Inquisitor having a broader scope of possibility of character concept that then makes the dialogue choices available to you stiff, or otherwise unlike the character in your head when you picked them.

(for all that I love my Inq Elrevas, a lot of him was reworked or even bent around some of the dialogue not matching anything of him in my mind. It's... an interesting exercise in character building, I think, but certainly not my favorite exercise on my first time through DA:I)

But when that same issue of written-voiced discrepancy crept in as I played Metaphor, in Will, it sparked curiosity in me instead of disappointment. Because instead of having a character of my mind boxed into gameplay limitations, a character not fully mine said something I did not know about him, did not decide about him, even when I was picking his responses.

(it sounds so... basic, when I write it down, but I hope my point of gravitas lands with the topic I've established)

The very first time this occurred to me was when you first talk to Brigitta and she suddenly asks, "do you believe in God?" in relation to a job she wants you to go on.

I picked the latter option of dialogue choice, "everyone's faith is their own." and I had meant it in a, sort of, what's it to you in this transaction? type of way, but then Will answers differently than that, says, "Not the one everyone else does."

Now, it's not like I expected him to believe in Sanctism when it so clearly denounces the Elda tribe even that early in-game, and sure, in hindsight it tracks in a Western Fantasy setting especially that there are multiple gods believed in whether the Fantasy Catholicism Faction™ of them likes it or not. But I was surprised because no one had told me the Elda believed in anything.

Suddenly Will knew something I did not, and this caught me off-guard because the majority of the game is you experiencing Euchronia for the first time as Will does, but that meant I didn't know anything about my protagonist or his past because no one else knew anything about the Elda (both the boy and the tribe) to teach me the audience member. And that's when I started staring closer at my lil guy, trying to figure out what else he knew that I didn't, if I could find it between lines of dialogue that were otherwise just novel not insightful.

And this is where this ramble changed tone and opinion from its first thought, because I've held onto this idea so long that with where I'm at in the game now, any insights into Will mean... not nothing, but are shifted entirely, due to his very nature in this story. I'd still count him as a halvsies-type protagonist, maybe, but... It was never fully me, or the audience in general, projecting onto Will, is how I'd say it now? and leave it at. I don't wanna write out The Big Spoilers abt him, not here.

...but consequently as mentioned, that means the "Will+autonomy" part of my thoughts are so different and bigger from what I'd first intended that it's disconnected from this ramble and will maybe be touched on in a separate post-game ramble I can already feel brewing because it's a huge character thing I LOVE. okay anyways I gotta Life before bed bye

I think I have s/t to say about Metaphor's Protag and autonomy and the way his being voiced subverts some RPG Protag things and not just in the way he's voiced and his Persona predecessors aren't.

...but I've sped past enough spoilery posts to make me think I shouldn't write about Will+autonomy until I. Finish the game. Alas.

[krshush]

Woooo, after being busy today, I finally did get around to writing down info on my DA Kids for @becausedragonage‘s OC Day :’D It’s been awhile since I’ve put a spotlight on them, but I do still love them so much

I have two main timelines, so I’ll sort them as such--

Timeline #1 

(As of 9:40 Dragon (right) she actually usually ties her hair back in a ponytail)

Name: Elias Sibral Aeducan Age: 25 (9:30 Dragon) / 35 (9:40 Dragon)  Gender: Cis female Romantic+Sexual orientation: Biromantic and bisexual Bio: Champion Warrior / Romanced Alistair / Steadfast, compassionate, prideful --A noble warrior armed with a bright smile, Elias was a loved princess of Orzammar... Although she felt the weight of the people’s gaze and the responsibility quite heavily, for she never had another choice but this life. She was often enamored by stories of exploration and the Surface, places she could never go as Dwarven royalty. To put off this wanderlust, Elias took her diplomatic and warrior training wholeheartedly, to take the position of Commander she was expected to as the King’s second daughter. Her exile was a mixed blessing as she joined the Wardens. A Quote: "You're right, brother. You did send your sister to die to the darkspawn, it will be my end. It just happens that now I'm doing so with the formalities of a Grey Warden." Applicable tropes: The Pollyanna, Good is Not Soft, BFS

(Her appearance between 9:31 and 9:40 doesn’t change much, but she does feel much more tired after 9 years)

Name: Marcella Hawke Age: 27 (9:31 Dragon) / 36 (9:40 Dragon) Gender: Female (? may change to NB?) Romantic+Sexual orientation: Grey-romantic and pansexual  Bio: Force Mage / Romanced ??? / Discerning, quick-witted, flippant  --As the eldest child of a mage and a mage herself, Marcella quickly got used to running and secrets. She would however have fun using her powers: catching some selfish bastard on fire, healing a bruise easily, and more... at the expense of her parents’ exasperation. There were few things she couldn’t resolve herself with a quick lie though, something she became very good at as the years ticked by. Losing Lothering did not hurt so much, but it was little compared to the life she build and destroy later in Kirkwall. (Marcella is perhaps my least developed of all these characters, if only because I had messed up some things in the game’s timeline-- I need to remake her and play her fully later) A Quote: "The number of people willing to pay me to solve their problems is amazing. Now if only their problems were actually so simple." Applicable tropes: Bunny-Ears Lawyer, Knight in Sour Armor, Shock and Awe

(Disclaimer: his hair is meant to be so much more curly than any vanilla hair options had)

Name: Elrevas Vi’arlan Lavellan  Age: 26 Gender: Cis male Sexual orientation: Biromantic and bisexual Bio: Artificer Rogue / romanced Dorian / Analytical, soft-spoken, idealistic --Elrevas is the third child born to a Dalish hunter and a runaway Starkhaven city elf. While he showed a knack for crafting and building, he wanted to take up hunting much like his father, and trained in the way of knives and stealth. His crafting was not put aside however--he oft built hunter’s traps and other clever things to aid his work. While not the most talkative, Elrevas also had penchants for diplomacy and understanding, traits the Keeper put to use by making Elrevas a scout and spy into the affairs of other clans and human settlements. That is what got him sent to the Conclave that one, fateful day. A Quote: "I'm not doing this for some higher being or for the power. I just want to protect people from this... unnatural disaster." Applicable tropes: Humble Hero, Reluctant Warrior, Gadgeteer Genius

Timeline #2

(Goes from a braid in back to messily tied hair bun in the years between the Blight and the start of the Inquisition. I also sadly could not find his tattoos as a mod for DA:I)

Name: Zarrin Surana Age: 22 (9:30 Dragon) / 32 (9:40) Gender: Nonbinary (uses he/his pronouns most of the time, they/them post-Awakening mb?) Sexual orientation: Panromantic grey-asexual (?) Bio: Shapeshifter/Arcane Warrior Mage / romanced Zevran / Shrewd, sardonic, prickly --Zarrin grew up as a vagrant and thief alongside his mother, both traveling Ferelden’s roads and cities to survive. Living this life, young Zarrin picked up deceitful words and sly hands rather quickly, and had few memories beyond walking and traveling with caravans. When he was 9-10 his magic came in however, at the precise wrong time. They had briefly finally stopped traveling and settled in the Denerim alienage-- not necessarily welcome, but they did have family there to take them in... And then Zarrin had a bad dream, and caught the house aflame. His mother had seen this, and, still rather devout and scared of magic, sent him to the Circle Tower. There, Zarrin settled as a studious, if very snippy and bitter, savant of Primal magic. It’s this skill that caught the attention of the Grey Wardens. A Quote: "It's fortunate that more heroes have come out of the woodwork, because fuck if I'm saving the world again." Applicable tropes: Stepford Snarker, Hidden Heart of Gold, Playing with Fire

(Heterochromia is cool right)

Name: Leonard Iain Hawke Age: 25 (9:31 Dragon) / 34 (9:40 Dragon) Gender: Cis male Sexual orientation: Homoromantic homosexual (gay as FUCK) Bio: Assassin rogue / romanced Fenris / Lively, forthright, mischievous --A goof and prankster, Leonard grew up bringing smiles or scowls to everyone around him, an attempt at bringing joy to his family as they lived in quiet to hide Malcolm and Bethany’s magic. On a first meeting, you wouldn’t expect him to be subtle enough to steal your purse nor deadly enough to be an assassin, but between sneaking around to cause trouble, learning weaponry to protect his family if needed and later being drafted into the Fereldan army, Leonard picked up rogue talents, and put them to even greater use when his family went to Kirkwall. A Quote: "Don't worry. Helping people and killing people are what I'm best at. Er, helping and killing don't often happen to the same person though, don't worry." Applicable tropes: Manic Pixie Dream Guy, Beware the Silly Ones, Lightning Bruiser 

Name: Hissera Theia Adaar Age: 23 Gender: Cis female Sexual orientation: Panromantic pansexual (leans towards ladies though) Bio: Rift Mage / Romanced Sera / Ambitious, prudent, temperamental  --Theia was raised mostly normally in a small farming community, her mother, the bee farmer, as much Theia’s caretaker as the farmhands or the baker or even the nobles they all worked for-- they all had a bit of a soft spot for the young qunari. When Theia’s magical skill began appearing, her mother had managed to find a Circle escapee willing to train Theia in exchange for a place to hide and stay among the village. Though raised simply, Theia always looked for bigger opportunities than being a bee-keeper’s daughter, and so when she met Shokrakar and the Valo-Kas mercenaries while selling goods in Markham, she jumped at the chance to explore and fight and gain fame and gold. Imagine her thrill at being named Inquisitor four years later. A Quote: "Vashoth, not Qunari. I would be better off dead if I were a Qunari, what with all the chains and mouth-sewing they do to their mages. Imagine the shame it would be if I couldn't talk!" Applicable tropes: Determinator, Tomboy with a Girly Streak, An Ice Person

[krshush]

hi. I spent three hours in the Character Creator alone.

and it Will happen again. In the meantime! I made Elrevas!! and only cried a little!! And made (one of) the Rook(s) I couldn't get outta my head! introducing Kallias Mercar, elven ex-slave turned adoptee-spy-apprentice of the Mercar family and Shadow Dragons! They used to disguise themself in all kinds of ways, including hairstyle and color, now settling on dark purple hair while working this job w/Varric that will go Totally Fine With No Hiccups at All.

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Inspired by that clip I posted, GW2 ruined me in many ways not the least of which being that it borked my sense of Out of Bounds and Jumping in video games. Between that, using a Rogue's Evade to hop on shit and regeneration potions which I used to negate fall damage, I am Insufferable and Unstoppable in DA:I's maps.

like I cannot describe to you all the amount of times Elrevas has just. Slid down mountainsides. Jumped up and then back down from ledges he Should Not have been upon.

There was also at least one time in one of the like elven ruin side quest dungeons, where there was a hole in the floor while combat was happening, and I had Elrevas use his chain hook to fly across the room and attack someone... except he like hit some piece of geometry, and fell down two floors to the lowest part of the dungeon.

Now, Elrevas in my mind's canon is not completely accident-prone and as clumsy as I play... but I do 100% accept that he Did that, with a surprised and undignified squawk into the dark, before announcing to the worried party, "I'M FINE I'M GOOD it's just d-THERE'S SPIDERS. of COURSE THERE IS, FUCK, FUCK!"

Iron Bull, Dorian and Sera were all in that party, 100% they do not let him live that down pghdhf

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I know I already posted Elrevas, but... Listen... I needed to draw him w/the leading ladies before him. 

Consequently, pale asshole Marcella is sandwiched between two freckled, red-headed optimists and it cracks me up.

WARDEN ELIAS AEDUCAN / MAGE-CHAMPION MARCELLA HAWKE / INQUISITOR ELREVAS LAVELLAN

Or rather, I decided to draw my Worldstate #1 in Dragon Age (because I have two, and I’m likely gonna? draw the Heroes of that second worldstate too)

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Gotta give credit to The Descent for giving me a lotta good inq shots <3

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Oh, I hadn't mentioned but I finally started The Descent and immediately remembered Elrevas is claustrophobic. He hates not being able to see/leave/etc in any direction and see the sky. So you can imagine how experiencing earthquakes miles underground is going for him.

Additionally, he knows abt darkspawn blood being poison, but then Renn has a fucking. In-game dialogue where he talks abt a Legionnaire who used daggers, accidentally swallowed blood on a messy kill and took three days to die. Elrevas, who uses daggers, is feeling normal abt this and is also pulling up his little roguish face mask, which is also not helping the claustrophobia, now that I think abt it

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HI. FINISHED JAWS OF HAKKON.

Elrevas is feeling SO NORMAL.

the sheer... grief upon seeing the old Inquisitor had been fighting all this time, forgotten to it all as he was saving the world. The righteous rage as the Chantry again ignored the truth in favor of sweeping the elves all away from history.

"But Drakon told me I was needed... As I suspect you were needed."

"I wasn't Inquisitor by choice. Whatever my life was before..." Elrevas thinks about his family, his clan, all the time he'd spent separate from them for, what, his own selfishness? A looming fear he wasn't enough? And sometimes he wasn't, but other times, they were all each other had. The certainty he'll never go home again hangs in his trailing-off sentence.

"Take moments of happiness where you find them. The world will take the rest." How horrible, to have the suspicion of this truth be confirmed by a man 800 years gone, but never given a burial or honor or even accurate recorded memory. That Elrevas has been taking those moments, because what else is left as everything else is taken from him?

But then, what is the point of accurate memory when the world could end if either Dalish man had failed, or does fail? If Ameridan had not held Hakkon back this whole time, Thedas likely would've fallen. And if Elrevas does not defeat Corypheus, Thedas will fall. Everything in-between these truths pales in comparison, can be argued later. Harding asks, after Hakkon is slain, if Elrevas ever feels the weight of it, worry that who he is might be forgotten like Ameridan.

"It's not about what we feel. It's about doing what needs to be done." is what Elrevas tells her, and himself, hiding the clawing in his chest, the righteous need to set Ameridan's legacy straight. It's this moment that solidifies Elrevas's disconnect of himself, Elrevas the man, and the Inquisitor Lavellan.

There were other moments too, similar disconnects: letting the Advisors continue using the Herald title when he himself doesn't believe it, his hesitance towards murder falling to the wayside as Inquisitor in a War, knowing how "politically unwise" his relationship with Dorian is and continuing it regardless because the Inquisition cannot and will not hold his heart.

Elrevas, the man, refuses to let go of his hope, ideals and loves, it's what guides his hand as Inquisitor and he would not settle as anything less. But that is not who the world will remember. They won't remember every moment he spared in the Hinterlands and beyond, they won't remember his affinity for niche machinery designs, or the way he'd light up and laugh at near every joke between his companions, that he valued every moment of joy in-between fighting and politicking. They won't remember the rage that churned his stomach to save Orlais, or the sorrow for Red Crossing, or that he loved a nobleman mage who was just out of place in the Inquisition as he was.

If the world did remember, that would be nice. If the world could learn, that would be nice. Elrevas wants so badly for the world to be better than it is, and this is what keeps him affixed as Inquisitor even after Corypheus's defeat, but so as long as they all survive, the rest can be debated later, learned and forgotten later. They don't need to thank him, or remember him, just so as long as the world can see another day. That is what is needed. If he's lucky enough, even if he's forgotten, maybe someone else will learn of him and set his legacy straight. It's the least he could do for Ameridan after all.

[krshush]

Hi I've eaten dinner and got a shower and I'm still thinking abt Elrevas learning abt Red Crossing. I'm thinking abt when he gets back to Skyhold, he asks Maryden (always asks politely when he requests, only during the slow hours, if you can, please, thank you, as if the whole tavern isn't named for him) if she can play the song abt Red Crossing, that he'd seen lyrics written, but has never heard it and would like to.

He does not supply why, and she does not ask, just acquiesces happily to the rare request from the oft-absent Inquisitor. He finds a corner few can see him to sit and listen, and just aches from the history he now knows.

[krshush]

Love thinking abt Elrevas just having insane luck for surviving, even before Inquisition. Like that boy scouted alone, he went into cities alone. He noted down slaver symbols he recognized on woods and walls in places for his clan to avoid, and somehow did Not get Got. He got into some bad scuffles, but still made it to be sent to the Conclave. He's got scars from those fights, and some even healed rough bc he patched them himself in the middle of nowhere sometimes. This is to say nothing of the tussles had IN cities just from humans that thought he looked at them funny. And also nothing of when Elrevas would actually hunt and potentially run into animals that would bite.

Elrevas may not have been chosen by Andraste, but certainly he's got the luck of someone blessed/cursed by a god or two.

[krshush]

I was gonna edit it into my last post but actually it's going out on its own all fleshed out: Elrevas also generally keeps a sketchbook with him and pre-Inquisition days, it was a lot of landscapes and trap designs, sometimes both mixed by geometric style. During Inquisition, it's some more of that ft. Studies of architecture that's strange/fun to him, studies of some of the Inner Circle and their faces, shapes, etc. Many of Dorian that makes Elrevas embarrassed to show his sketches off. And when Sera draws dicks in there, because you know she does, he does his best to incorporate or blend it in somehow. He does show Sera those, and sometimes she's even impressed and they make a game of it.

[krshush]

Elrevas is just. He is filled with a gentle kindness the likes of which stun many first meeting him. He's also filled with a rage that's generations old and that he can not let loose. He's also filled with fear of failure, of being seen as he sees himself, of the fickle belief of the masses watching. Each of these temper each other in turn. Too angry to be afraid, too compassionate to be angry. And smart enough to be humbled and then humble in turn, to ask questions and then understand how to Use.

But also he's j. he is just some dude. Just a lanky willow tree of an elf standin there. He frequently climbs up things he shouldn't and then tumbles off them, including down several mountainsides and holes with a squawk. He has the rogue-signature "I'm raffling through things, I'm looking at your stuff" syndrome. He's a Grade A Nerd, and has nearly singed his eyebrows off because of it, and will tell you ad nauseam about what led to such. He was stunned to realize Dorian, the guy he was pining for, wanted a relationship in part because Elrevas himself hadn't realized the possibility of having a relationship was tangibly there, and this was after they had sex. He tries to be dry-witted and clever, but his face gives him away too often. He was such a stupid teenager and sometimes that foolhardiness shows back up and then sometimes, makes a fool of him again.

My son. My boy.

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Inquisitor Elrevas Lavellan, my boyyyyy

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The way this one unnamed NPC with this ONE dialogue got me to laugh so hard I almost choked because she said this to my boy when the ONLY reason he was in Val Royeux is because of a gay little quest for his gay boyfriend like,

SHE REALLY TRULY SAID

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boye boye boye b--

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Doodle in honor of Elrevas's curls, under the weight of constant rain as I just got him to the Storm Coast